Political Hebraism: Judaic Sources in Early Modern
Political Thought

Gordon Schochet, Fania Oz-Salzberger and Meirav Jones (eds.)

Between the 16th and 18th centuries, European political philosophy felt intimately at home with the Hebrew Bible, enjoyed some familiarity with later Jewish texts and exegeses, and accommodated a small number of Jews within its political discourse. The period was characterized by a search for Hebraica Veritas, a view of De Republica Hebraeorum as the idealized polity, and biblical and Jewish ideas permeating the political imagination through art, literature, and legal codes.

The conference that produced this volume was the first international scholarly effort to explore the scope and significance of early modern political Hebraism: the use of Hebrew and Jewish sources for politics and political thought at the founding moment of the modern West. Aptly set in Jerusalem, the conference gathered sixty scholars and advanced students from around the world who had been independently exploring aspects of the topic at hand and who were for the most part unaware of one another’s work. Contributions came from a variety of fields, ranging from political science, theology, literature, history, Jewish thought, and law. Following the conference, a peer-reviewed quarterly was launched, Hebraic Political Studies, that would explore Jewish political thought and the impact of Hebraic sources in the political thought of the West. Hebraic Political Studies was mid-way through of its third year of publication at the launch of this book, and the field it recovers seems more vast in 2008 than any of the participants in the 2004 conference dared imagine.  

 “The essays in this volume explain why Jerusalem, no less than Athens and Rome, is crucial to understanding Western political thought. Political Hebraism explores the ways profoundly formative early modern political thought looked to the Old Testament and Hebraic sources for paradigms, rationales, and guidance. This volume points in fertile new directions for scholarship and debate concerning modern conceptions of nationhood, law, and political legitimacy.”

Jonathan Jacobs, Richard J. and Jean Head Professor of Philosophy, Colgate University