#114 Jewish History in Six Chapter (5)

David Solomon explores the past 500 years of Jewish History, from approximately 1500 to today.

In this talk, David examines each century in detail, looking at:

Sixteenth Century – 

  • Johannes Reuchlin
  • The printing of the Talmud 
  • Shlomo Molcho and David HaReuveni
  • Yosef Karo
  • Moshe Isserles
  • Azariah de Rossi
  • Donna Gracia 
  • Suleiman the Magnificent and the land of Israel 
  • The persecution of Marranos 
  • The publication of the Zohar 
  • The Ari          
  • The Maharal of Prague. 

Seventeenth Century –

  • The Council of the Four Lands
  • The publication of Emeq Hamelekh
  • The Khmelnytsky massacre
  • Jewish Amsterdam    
  • Jews under Protestantism 
  • Menasseh ben Israel   
  • Spinoza 
  • Shabtai Zvi and Nathan of Gaza
  • The Enlightenment
  • Newton
  • Leibniz.

Eighteenth Century – 

  • The Shtetl, Berlin and Italy
  • The Emden/Eubshytz controversy
  • The Baal Shem Tov                           
  • Jacob Frank
  • The Vilna Gaon         
  • Moses Mendelssohn
  • Solomon Maimon 
  • The Haskalah
  • The Aliyot of 1740
  • The Ramchal, the Or HaChayim, and the RaShaSh
  • The American and French Revolutions.

The Nineteenth Century –

  • Rothschild
  • Napoleon
  • Emancipation 
  • The rise of “Reform” versus “Orthodoxy” 
  • Chatam Sofer
  • Samson Raphael Hirsch
  • Abraham Geiger and Samuel Holdheim
  • Wissenschaft des Judentums 
  • Montefiore
  • Jewish America.

The Twentieth Century – 

  • Herzl to the Balfour Declaration
  • The Aliyot
  • Eliezer ben Yehudah and the revival of Hebrew 
  • Rav Kook
  • The Shoah
  • The establishment State of Israel
  • Vatican 2
  • Six-Day War in 1967 
  • The Seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe
  • Chabad
  • The Golden Age of Jewish Publishing.

As always, David places Jewish History in the context of world history. He ends this lecture with a discussion on predictions for the future of the Jewish people and the world more broadly.

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#41 Communities in Search of Meaning: Jewish History of the 17th Century (part 1)

A Jewish History Podcast

With a background of war, emerging superpowers, and the Enlightenment, Jewish History of the 17th century is largely seen through the prism of communal experience. In this podcast episode, David explores the narratives and circumstances of communities across Europe, tales of emerging Jewish life in the Americas, and accounts of the situation for Jews in the Land of Israel. In examining these fascinating stories, David also weaves in portraits of individuals, showing how their contributions and situations were reflected in the broader picture of shared Jewish experience.

The old synagogue in Josefov, Prague. Public Domain.

Continue reading “#41 Communities in Search of Meaning: Jewish History of the 17th Century (part 1)”