From the Zionist idea back to the roots: the story of the Jewish people, Sepharad and Ashkenaz together.
Reading now
The classic anthology (1959) of the thinkers who shaped Zionism, from the rabbis who called for the return to Zion to Herzl, Ahad Ha'am, Rav Kook and Berl Katznelson. Hertzberg gives each thinker a short introduction, and opens with a long essay on what was new in Zionism and what continued the old.
Current chapter: Chapter 3 · Moses Hess (1812–1875)
Coming up
A broad survey (2017) of the Jewish religion from the Second Temple to today, by a leading Oxford scholar: how its streams formed and what they argued about across the generations.
Coming up
The comprehensive work of Hebrew University historians (1969), from ancient times to the founding of the State. A foundational book, dense and precise.
Coming up
Four thousand years of Jewish history (1987) by a British historian, not Jewish, who admires what the Jews gave the world. Fast-paced and easy to read.
Coming up
The history of Spanish Jewry (1992): the golden age, the expulsion, and the communities that rose after it in the Ottoman Empire, North Africa and the Land of Israel. Our pick, to give the Sephardic heritage its place.
Coming up
A short, deep book (1982) on the difference between memory and history: how the Jewish people remembered its past through Torah, festivals and prayer. Our pick, a good way to end the track.
We start with the Zionist idea: how Jews, rabbis and thinkers saw the return to the Land of Israel. From there we step back to the larger picture: the history of the people and of its Torah, from biblical times to the State of Israel.
This track gives real weight to the heritage of Sepharad and the Jews of the Middle East and North Africa, which history books often leave at the margins. One of the fathers of the Zionist idea, Rabbi Yehuda Alkalai, was a Sephardic rabbi from Sarajevo.
Chapter summaries are written as we read. The chapter we are reading now is marked.
We read one book together and meet to talk about it. No background needed, only curiosity.
What we are reading now
The classic anthology (1959) of the thinkers who shaped Zionism, from the rabbis who called for the return to Zion to Herzl, Ahad Ha'am, Rav Kook and Berl Katznelson. Hertzberg gives each thinker a short introduction, and opens with a long essay on what was new in Zionism and what continued the old.