Sacred trash : the lost and found world of the Cairo Geniza PDF
Preview Sacred trash : the lost and found world of the Cairo Geniza
$26.95 U.S.A, $31.00 Can, ne May day in 1896, at a dining-room table in Cambridge, England, a meet- — ing took place between a Romanian- born maverick Jewish intellectual and twin | learned Presbyterian Scotswomen, who had assembled to inspect several pieces of rag paper and parchment. It was the unlikely start to what would prove a remarkable, continent- hopping, century-crossing saga, and one that in many ways has revolutionized our sense of what it means to lead a Jewish life. In Sacred Trash, MacArthur-winning poet and translator Peter Cole and acclaimed essay- ist Adina Hoffman tell the story of the retrieval from an Egyptian geniza, or repository for worn-out texts, of the most vital cache of Jewish manuscripts ever discovered. This tale of buried scholarly treasure weaves together unforgettable portraits of Solomon Schechter and the other heroes of this drama with explo- rations of the medieval documents themselves— letters and poems, wills and marriage contracts, Bibles, money orders, fiery dissenting tracts, fashion-conscious trousseaux lists, prescrip- tions, petitions, and mysterious magical charms. Presenting a panoramic view of nine hundred years of vibrant Mediterranean Judaism, Hoff- man and Cole bring modern readers into the heart of this little-known trove, whose contents have rightly been dubbed “the Living Sea Scrolls.” Part biography and part meditation on the supreme value the Jewish people has lori placed on the written word, Sacred Trash is above all a gripping tale of adventure and redemption. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2021 with funding from Kahle/Austin Foundation https://archive.org/details/sacredtrashlostfO00Ohoff JEWISH ENCOUNTERS Jonathan Rosen, General Editor Jewish Encounters is a collaboration between Schocken and Nextbook, a project devoted to the promotion of Jewish litera- ture, culture, and ideas. >nextbook POTMLS Sae ID) THE LIFE OF DAVID - Robert Pinsky MAIMONIDES : Sherwin B. Nuland BARNEY ROSS - Douglas Century BETRAYING SPINOZA ~- Rebecca Goldstein EMMA LAZARUS - Esther Schor THE WICKED SON - David Mamet MARC CHAGALL -: Jonathan Wilson JEWS AND POWER -: RuthR. Wisse BENJAMIN DISRAELI - Adam Kirsch RESURRECTING HEBREW «:: Ilan Stavans THE JEWISH BODY - Melvin Konner RASHI - Elie Wiesel A FINE ROMANCE - David Lehman YEHUDA HALEVI - Hillel Halkin HILLEL - Joseph Telushkin BURNT BOOKS - Rodger Kamenetz THE EICHMANN TRIAL - Deborah E. Lipstadt SACRED TRASH - Adina Hoffman and Peter Cole FORTHCOMING THE WORLDS OF SHOLOM ALEICHEM -: Jeremy Dauber ABRAHAM -: Alan M. Dershowitz MOSES - StephenJ .D ubner BIROBIJAN - Masha Gessen JUDAH MACCABEE -: Jeffrey Goldberg THE DAIRY RESTAURANT -: Ben Katchor JOB - Rabbi Harold S. Kushner ABRAHAM CAHAN ‘:: Seth Lipsky SHOW OF SHOWS .- David Margolick MRS. FREUD - Daphne Merkin DAVID BEN-GURION -: Shimon Peres and David Landau WHEN GRANT EXPELLED THE JEWS -: Jonathan Sarna MESSIANISM -: Leon Wieseltier Sacred Trash
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