Solomon ibn Verga was one of the victims of the decrees expelling the Jews from Spain and Portugal in the 1490s; and his Shevet Yehudah (The Scepter of Judah; ca. 1520) numbered among the most popular Hebrew books of the sixteenth century. Its title page lured readers and buyers with a promise to relate "the terrible events and calamities that afflicted the Jews while in the lands of non-Jewish peoples": blood libels; disputations; conspiracies; evil decrees; expulsions; and more.The book itself preserves collective memories; illuminates a critical and transitional phase in Jewish history; and advances a new vision of European society and government. It reflects a world of renaissance; reformation; and global exploration but also one fraught with crisis for Christian majority and Jewish minority alike. Among the multitudes of Iberian Jewish conversos who had received Christian baptism by the end of the fifteenth century; ibn Verga experienced the destruction of Spanish-Portuguese Jewry just as the Catholic Church began to lose exclusive control over the structures of Western religious life; and he joined other Europeans in reevaluating boundaries and affiliations that shaped their identities.In A Historian in Exile; Jeremy Cohen shows how Shevet Yehudah bridges the divide between the medieval and early modern periods; reflecting a contemporary consciousness that a new order had begun to replace the old. Ibn Verga's text engages this receding past in conversation; Cohen contends; it uses historical narrative to challenge regnant assumptions; to offer new solutions to age-old problems; to call Jews to task for bringing much of the hostility toward them upon themselves; and to chart a viable direction for a people seeking a place to call home in a radically transformed world.
#412579 in Books 2009-05-14Original language:EnglishPDF # 1 9.25 x 6.25 x 1.00l; 1.21 #File Name: 0812241800248 pages
Review
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful. How They Lived In And Ultimately Left ConcordBy Michael CarbonneauI have always admired Thoreau's "Walden"; and so I have consequently been extremely interested in the history of Concord; MA. Thoreau's rural home town played a major role in the founding of our country and the birth of the American abolitionist movement. It is often held up as the quintessential example of an enlightened New England township. In this book; Lemire reminds us of the initial presence and later exodus of a small but highly significant enslaved black population; one whose unpaid labor ironically made the intellectual fermentation of liberty and rebellion possible. She speculates about factors which contributed to their immediate post Revolutionary War unofficial emancipation; bringing up the high probability that whites needed to be individually coerced into these actions by the blacks themselves. Through amazingly thorough research into town records and resident's memoirs; she paints a picture of Concord life; for both the "haves" and the "have nots". We discover that formerly enslaved families were immediately marginalized and ultimately nudged out of town by their wealthy neighbors; leaving us with a lily white rural enclave where the concept of slavery could be condemned as a faraway evil.By it's very nature; a book like this is more speculative than the typical historical project. It deals with the history of a community that left very few personal records of their thoughts and actions. Lemire is forced to piece together and defend a narrative gleaned from secondary sources. Consequently; there is always the danger that her evidence is insufficient to support her conclusions. At times; I found myself thinking that she was a little too quick to moralize and judge. Then again; her most prominent points seem to be based on indisputable; common sense reasoning of how normal people with and without power would behave in a small; rural town. Still; there was unquestionably something different going on in this place! I wish that she had followed her well researched reasoning even further; delving into the question which always comes into my head when I think about Concord. How did this typical small New England town end up having such an indisputable positive influence on the world? That's a ridiculously big question; and it makes me think that I should just be extremely thankful that Elise Lemire took the time to give us more extremely valuable insight and background while we all attempt to find our own answers.3 of 7 people found the following review helpful. Two StarsBy Katharine Estykind of disorganized and biased14 of 14 people found the following review helpful. An enlightening; disturbing; necessary readBy Corinne H. SmithBy now students of American history should be able to accept the fact that a fair number of our "founding fathers" were slaveholders who had a chance but chose not to eradicate the business of slavery with their Declaration. The relationship that existed between Thomas Jefferson and Sally Hemings continues to make news and to raise eyebrows and further debate. But who would have thought that slavery was prevalent in the town we most consider the birthplace of American freedom? And who would have thought that Henry David Thoreau might be the person to provide posthumous direction for this discovery?Elise Lemire begins her research with descriptions found in one chapter of Thoreau's WALDEN. In "Former Inhabitants; and Winter Visitors;" the naturalist and Transcendentalist outlined the kinds of people who once lived in and around Walden Woods. They were folks who were considered to be on the fringe of society: individuals that the townsmen of Concord wanted to keep at a distance. The enclave included a number of former slaves who forged their own kind of independence as best as they could; on tiny parcels of land that others discounted as useless. No doubt Thoreau felt a certain kinship with them in that regard. Fortunately he named names and repeated the local myths and word-of-mouth histories surrounding those residents. That's all the prompting Lemire needed to do the research and to learn more about those people and where they had come from. Here then is "the rest of the story."The narrative is chockfull of names and dates and life stories; of both white colonials and black slaves who lived in the Boston-Concord area in the 18th century. (The author thankfully provides a "Dramatis Personae" list as an appendix; otherwise; it's easy to get lost in the sea of similar names used among both races.) Lemire's recurring focus is on two specific men: John Cuming (1728-1788); a first-generation American of Scottish descent who had aspirations of making his mark in Concord as a squire and a gentleman; and Brister (1744-1822); the slave who was given to John as a wedding present from his father-in-law in 1753. In following their paths together and alone; the author reveals a colonial culture of castes in which ownership of land and slaves -- and the more of each; the better -- earned one the honor of sitting in the best pew in church on Sunday morning. It also provided optimum circumstances for the colonials to go off on other missions as needed; since they had workers to keep their farms going without their direct involvement. Thus does this book paint an altered picture of Concord's esteemed agricultural heritage and its ability to raise a colonial militia. Paradigms shift as each page turns.Readers should be disgusted by the incidents that illustrate man's inhumanity to man. Simultaneously; they should also see the multiple ironies in these revelations. That the "shot heard 'round the world" probably couldn't have happened without slaves back home taking care of the properties and families. That a place known for its passion and involvement in the abolitionist movement in the mid-1800s; had itself been populated by slaves and slave owners just two or three generations back; when it looked very much like the plantation system that its residents later railed against. That the end of slavery in New England came about not by official proclamation or deliberate freedom-granting by masters; but by their general abandonment of the institution during the uncertain and busy times of the Revolutionary War and its aftermath. The latter is an eerie premonition of events that would take place south of the Mason-Dixon line ninety years later; when another war would supposedly and finally correct the founding fathers' original omission.BLACK WALDEN deserves wide readership by *anyone* interested in American history. It's not just for New Englanders or for people fascinated by the Concord story. Nor is it a mere study of race relations. For surely what happened in the town of Concord was a pattern of behavior repeated elsewhere in those days; beyond the confluence of the Sudbury and Assabet Rivers; beyond the Bay State's borders. That the truths uncovered here were brought to light by a native of nearby Lincoln; Mass.; gives them even more credence. Lemire is a local who is not afraid to be graphic and to point an accusing finger. If the town's tour guides and historical site personnel are conscientious; they will read this book and make corresponding changes in the way they present their information. Those rear stairways weren't just used by servants; in colonial days; they were used by slaves.
