Defenders of the Faith; Inside Ultra-Orthodox Jewry
New York: Schocken Books, 1992. First Edition [stated], presumed first printing. Hardcover. xxi, [1], 394 pages. Illustrations. Notes. Index. DJ has some wear, soiling and wrinkling. DJ is price-clipped. Slightly cocked. Samuel C. Heilman is a professor of Sociology at Queens College of the City University of New York who focuses on social ethnography of contemporary Jewish Orthodox movements. Heilman holds the Harold Proshansky Chair in Jewish Studies at the CUNY Graduate Center of Queens College of the City University of New York, where he also serves as a Distinguished Professor of Sociology. In 2003, Heilman won the Marshall Sklare Memorial Award for his lifetime of scholarship from the Association for the Social Scientific Study of Jewry. He also was awarded the highest university rank of Distinguished Professor of Sociology by the City University of New York. His books have received various awards. Defenders of the Faith was a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award for 1992. Heilman is also the recipient of fellowships from the National Science Foundation, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Council of Learned Societies, the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture, and the Mellon Foundation. He received a Distinguished Faculty Award from the City University of New York in 1985 and 1987. He has been a member of the board of the Association for Jewish Studies, the YIVO Annual and the Max Weinreich Center. In this first in-depth portrait of ultra-Orthodox Jews in Israel today, Samuel Heilman introduces a community that to many may seem to be the very embodiment of the Jewish past. To outsiders who stumble upon these neighborhoods and find bearded men in caftans, children with earlocks, and women in long dresses, black kerchiefs and stockings, it may appear that these people still hold fast to every tradition while turning their backs to the contemporary world. But rather than being a relic from the past, ultra-Orthodox Jews, or haredim, are very much part of the contemporary landscape and are playing an increasingly prominent role in the Jewish world and in Israeli politics. Defenders of the Faith takes us inside the world of this contemporary fundamentalist community, its lifestyle and mores, including education, religious practices and beliefs, sexual ethics, and marriage. Heilman explores the reasons why this group is more militant and extreme than its pre-Holocaust brethren, and provides insight into the worldview of this small but influential sector of modern Jewry. Condition: Good / good.
Keywords: Orthodox Jews, Bar Nutzvah, Belz Hasidim, Chanukah, Haredi, Haredim, Holocaust, Claude Levi-Strauss, Matchmaking, Mikveh, Ritual Bath, Mussar Shmuen, Reb Arelach, Rebbe, Roshei Yeshiva, Shalosh Seudos, Weddings, Zionism
ISBN: 0805240950
[Book #72964]
Price: $45.00