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MENAHEM KAUFMAN
Publications on Contemporary
Jewry
*
A
n
UNPRECEDENTED RATE o f change and a growing in terde
pendence between communities are two trends that have charac
terized the Jewish world since the First World War. The Holo
caust o f European Jewry, the demise o f Jewries founded in antiq
uity in Asia and Africa, and the establishment of the State o f Is
rael have wrought far-reaching changes and left a profound im
print upon the Jewish people’s social structure, its demographic
profile, and its historical and spiritual consciousness. The com
plex reality of Jewish life in the Diaspora, on the one hand, and
the implications o f sovereign statehood, on the other, pose new
challenges to research which can best be met th rough an
interdisciplinary approach . T he Institu te o f Contemporary
Jewry at the Hebrew University has been addressing this chal
lenge now for twenty-five years. The Institute, its faculty and re
search staff, both in Israel and abroad, are at once the products
and the architects o f this approach to contemporary Jewish schol
arship.
Part o f the research sponsored by the Institute has been pub
lished under its own auspices. The rest has been published for
the Institute by a variety of presses at home and abroad, to facili
tate access by a wider international readership. The present re
view brings to the readers’ attention a number o f Institute-
sponsored publications that have appeared since 1980. (Limita
tions o f space rule out a more comprehensive listing.)
The Institute’s newest project has been the publication o f its
own scholarly journals — two separate and distinct annuals, one
in Hebrew and the second, in English. Each has its own content,
* The list o f books cited in this review was prepared at the author’s request by
Dr. Moshe Goodman.
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