A Very Jewish Christmas: Jesus in Modern Jewish Literature
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Lecture
In Person:Admission: $15 Zoom Livestream:Admission: Free |
“Other, and indeed banned, and yet one of my brothers” was how the renowned Yiddish and Hebrew modernist, Uri Zvi Greenberg, expressed his ambivalence toward Jesus in one of his many poems about this towering figure. Greenberg’s contemporaries shared this sentiment. For them, Jesus was inextricably bound up with the history of violence towards Jews committed in his name. At the same time, he also embodied an “authentic national Jew,” whose suffering and resistance to the authorities of his time created a powerful image that played a significant role in rethinking Jewish identity.
In this talk, Neta Stahl will examine how Jewish writers portrayed Jesus during periods of significant transformations in Jewish life. She will demonstrate that Jesus serves a range of ideological, theological, aesthetic, political, social, and psychological functions that not only relate to the long history of Jewish-Christian relations in Europe but also reflect attempts to reframe Jewish national lives in the diaspora and Israel.
A kosher Chinese food dinner will follow the presentation.
This program is supported, in part, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council.
About the Speaker
Neta Stahl is Professor of Modern Hebrew Literature and Head of the Hebrew and Yiddish Subdivisionat Johns Hopkins University. She is the author of The Divine in Modern Hebrew Literature (Routledge) and is currently working on a book about the poet Uri Zvi Greenberg.