The Shaolin Monastery charts, for the first time in any language, the history of the Shaolin Temple and the evolution of its world-renowned martial arts. In this meticulously researched and eminently readable study, Meir Shahar considers the economic, political, and religious factors that led Shaolin monks to disregard the Buddhist prohibition against violence and instead create fighting techniques that by the twenty-first century have spread throughout the world. He examines the monks’ relations with successive Chinese regimes, beginning with the assistance they lent to the seventh-century Emperor Li Shimin and culminating more than a millennium later with their complex relations with Qing rulers, who suspected them of rebellion. He reveals the intimate connection between monastic violence and the veneration of the violent divinities of Buddhism and analyzes the Shaolin association of martial discipline and the search for spiritual enlightenment.

This book collects rewritten articles and essays by the author related first and foremost, but not exclusively, to the catastrophe of the Holocaust as an epistemic crisis – qualified as a “rupture in civilization”, i.e. the destruction of concepts deeply rooted in a common anthropology of humankind, while focusing on methodological as well as conceptual questions. The composition of the volume runs roughly chronologically along several layers of interpretation – embracing questions of German constitutional law, the formation of Continental expansionist geopolitical thinking, the epistemology of the Holocaust, the assertion and transformation of paradigms of historical interpretation in the second half of the 20th century, especially the turn from social history to memory studies, as well as the turn from a Western- and Eurocentric approaches into the direction of colonial and global history.

This collection of articles deals with the connection between the concept of death and the philosophy of the Halakha. Many would argue that recoil from death and flight from it underlie in every culture, including the Halakha. To understand a culture one must examine its attitude toward death. The articles in this volume and its special symposium on the denial of death follow this assumption by studying what the Halakha has to say on this subject. Three themes that link death and Halakha lie at the heart of the book: the issue of fear of death and the tools for coping with it; the connection between human experience and Halakhic conceptualizations and tools pertaining to the issue of death; and the influence of meta-Halakhic views on Halakhic rulings and thought on the issue of death. This diverse collection presents the voices of the leading scholars and intellectuals in the field; it touches on existential issues whose sources lie in deep Halakhic and philosophic study, from the Sages and Maimonides to the Holocaust and the technological age. The book, whose foundation is the philosophical discourse of the Halakha, constitutes a cornerstone for broad study that encourages additional scholarship. It presents the Halakhic world’s deep insights on the end of life, coping with these moments, and the Halakhic implications of the concept of death, including all its derivatives in the Halakha and the Aggada.

The book examines the ideological motivations behind the selection of representations for Israeli banknotes and coins. The research is based on the proceedings and correspondence of the Bank of Israel Banknotes and Coinage Planning Committee from its inception in 1955 to 2012. The study reveals the mechanisms in which the legal tender is exploited as an expression of banal nationalism, implementing national emblems in an unnoticed manner. Banal nationalism is one of three theoretical frameworks we adopted. The other two are the long history of the Jewish people in the territory which today is the State of Israel; and selective tradition as a means for designing a nation. The book comprises eight chapters: theoretical overview; analytical portrayal of the working methods of the Bank of Israel Banknotes and Coinage Planning Committee; a study of the first designed “Allegoric Figures Series” (1959); analysis of the selection of human figures; the construction of the state borders through an array of landscape images; the reflection of the shifting boundaries in the changing representations in Jerusalem; the selection of archaeological emblems as a proof for national continuity; and the symbolic role of flora as identification with the land.

Karaite Judaism emerged in the ninth century in the Islamic Middle East as an alternative to the rabbinic Judaism of the Jewish majority. Karaites reject the underlying assumption of rabbinic Judaism, namely, that Jewish practice is to be based on two divinely revealed Torahs, a written one, embodied in the Five Books of Moses, and an oral one, eventually written down in rabbinic literature. Karaites accept as authoritative only the Written Torah, as they understand it, and their form of Judaism therefore differs greatly from that of most Jews. Despite its permanent minority status, Karaism has been an integral part of the Jewish people continuously for twelve centuries. It has contributed greatly to Jewish cultural achievements, while providing a powerful intellectual challenge to the majority form of Judaism. This book is the first to present a comprehensive overview of the entire story of Karaite Judaism: its unclear origins; a Golden Age of Karaism in the Land of Israel; migrations through the centuries; Karaites in the Holocaust; unique Jewish religious practices, beliefs, and philosophy; biblical exegesis and literary accomplishments; polemics and historiography; and the present-day revival of the Karaite community in the State of Israel.

Among the articles in this issue: Yair Lorberbau | On Rules and Reason on Law and Halakhah - A Fresh Conceptual Framework for the Study of the Rationale of the Commandments Shalom Zadik | The Status of the Tormented Heretic according to Rabbi Hsdai Crescas and his Relation to Abner of Burgos Hillel Ben-Sasson | The concept of Repentance in the Zohar Itzhak Brand | Commandments between Man and God and between Man and his Fellow: A Study in the Dualistic Thought of R. Isaac Abarbanel Eliezer Baumgarten and Uri Sfrai | Kabbalah and Marriage Customs in Early Modern Italy Dvir Warshavski | Zot Torat Ha-'Ola : The Belief in the Creation of the World in Rema's Thought

Bilha Shilo unfolds the complex plot of the extraordinary success of the restitution of the collections of YIVO (Yidisher Visnshaftlekher Institut) – the prestigious research institution of the Yiddish language and culture. A Drama in Acts traces the fragments of post-Second World War YIVO, which meanwhile moved from Vilna to New York - in restituting its cultural property in the West, in the American occupied zone, and documents its bitter failure in the Soviet occupied territory in the East. The book explores, through the question of cultural property ownership, a range of historical issues: the development of modern Jewish culture in Eastern Europe, the advance of Yiddish as a modern literary language, the history of Jewish culture under communist regime, and its extermination under Nazi rule. Other issues addressed are the demise of Jewish culture in Eastern Europe following the division of Europe and the Cold War, and lastly - the conflict between Israel and the Diaspora over the inheritance of Jewish European culture. The book is published in the series "Hefez", which presents the latest research on Jewish cultural property and its demise, in German by the Dubnow Institute, Leipzig, and in Hebrew by Magnes Press.

Nietzsche is not ordinarily considered a philosopher of law, and despite the voluminous literature on almost every other aspect of his thought, little has been written about his reflections on the role of law in the social, intellectual, and personal spheres. Yet careful reading of his works reveals a significant body of critical reflection on socio-jurisprudential questions regarding the nature of law, obedience to the law, the criminal mindset, punishment, and more. The book presents for the first time, a comprehensive collection of aphorisms gathered from the entire Nietzschean corpus that explicitly or implicitly addresses the subject of law, arranged thematically, along with contextualization, annotation, and commentary. The book contains six chapters - The Self in the Presence of Law, The Criminal: A Profile, Causation, Action, Free Will, Punishment, Rights and Obligations, Religion and State. It thus provides a panoramic view of Nietzsche’s critical discourse on law and legal culture.

The World of Machiavelli explores his teaching by placing it squarely in its political and intellectual context. Based on a wide range of personal letters, diplomatic dispatches and administrative memoranda as well as on his treatises, plays and poems, it traces the development of his skills, mental habits and unique views from his youth, through his turbulent public career, to his last days. Alongside the formative historical and personal circumstances, the book explores the universal dimensions of Machiavelli’s thought, which forms an integral part of an ongoing conversation about our ability to organize our shared lives and shape our destiny. Thus, The World of Machiavelli differs from most biographies and studies of his thought: focusing on a cluster of themes that are central both in his works and in our modern public life, the book invites the readers to reflect on major issues of our time by engaging with Machiavelli.

Articles in this issue: Menahem Kahana| 'וכולה מתניתין': Who were the Abbreviators of Mishnayot in the Tannaitic Midrashim? Robert Brody | How many editions of his book Oaths (Kitab al-Ayman) did R. Hayya Publish? Warren Zev Harvey | Did Ibn Gabirol Write Adon 'Olam? Adiel Breuer | Hidushim on Tractate 'Eruvin Attributed to Hame'iri Moshe Yagur | Shaving Hair and Pairing Nails: The Origins and Transmutations of a Unique Rite of Passage in Medieval Judaism

The Intention of the Torah and the Intention of Its Readers surveys how traditional Jewish exegesis throughout the ages has coped with the literary and topical difficulties found in the Torah, in the context of the belief in the Torah’s divine source and sanctity. “All problems stem from expectations.” Readers and exegetes of the Torah throughout the ages supposed, and many continue to suppose, that the Torah is perfect and flawless. They expect the Torah to reflect superior and timeless standards of morality, as well as precise and eternal theological principles. They believe that everything written in the Torah is true, essential, and well thought out. The history of Torah scholarship from the end of the Second Temple period until our day can be conceived of as an uninterrupted continuum of challenges which this unique and, frankly, impossible level of expectations has imposed upon its readers and exegetes. These are glorious attempts to bring the Torah nearer to the time and place of its devotees and to adapt its meaning to theirs. This book is the first attempt of its kind to examine the history of the enterprise of Torah exegesis from a distance. It contains an examination of dozens of key texts from the end of the Second Temple period, from Talmudic and Midrashic sources, dicta of medieval Sages, and the reflections and research penned by scholars of the Enlightenment (Haskalah) and the modern era. A bird’s eye view blurs the details which differentiate between these texts, enabling us to more easily focus upon the similarities; this point of view also allows us to note the central crossroads of change and development which characterize each period. This is an indispensable book for anyone interested in the changing nature of biblical exegesis over the generations.

Philo was the first Jewish philosopher who left behind one of the richest bodies of work from antiquity, yet his personality and intellectual development have remained a riddle. Maren Niehoff presents the first biography of Philo, arguing that his trip to Rome in 38 CE was a turning point in his life. He was exposed then not only to new political circumstances but also to a new cultural and philosophical environment. The Intellectual Biography traces Philo's trajectory from his early days as a Bible interpreter in the Jewish community of Alexandria to his diplomatic and intellectual activity in Rome, when he engaged Roman philosophy. Anticipating Sa'ada Gaon and Maimonides by almost a thousand years, Philo creatively presents Jewish philosophy in the context of contemporary culture and thought.