1st Edition
Expressivist Religious Zionism Modernity and the Sacred in a Nationalist Movement
1 Expressivist Religious Zionism: An introduction; 2 The origins of expressivism in the Religious Zionist community: National identity and the Torah Regime; 3 R Kook’s religious philosophy as expressivist thought; 4 The institutionalization of expressivist Religious Zionism; 5 The general will and the divine state; 6 Illegalism and loyalty to the state from Sebastia to the Disengagement; 7 The individualist turn: Personal religion and the religious meaning of literature, art, and sex; 8 Neo-Hasidism, apocalyptic radicalism, and the recognition of the Other; 9 The political sphere: The judicial reform and the Iron Swords War; 10 Concluding reflections
Biography
Shlomo Fischer taught in the School of Education of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem until his retirement. He is now a Senior Fellow, Jewish People Policy Institute (JPPI), Jerusalem and Area Head, Sociology and Jewish Identity. He has published extensively on the intersection of religion, politics, and social class in Israel.
"With the furies of religious nationalism literally and figuratively exploding around the world and more ferociously by the day, Shlomo Fischer's long-awaited, groundbreaking masterwork is the book we need now. It is both a crucial intervention today, and an outstanding historical study, leavened with lifelong reflection on philosophy, theology and social theory, that will be a standard work for years to come. The deep erudition and keen analyses Fischer brings to bear in multiple fields bear out his striking contention that Israel's radical religious Zionists - and by extension their parallels elsewhere - are not, as so often portrayed, Fundamentalist reactionaries, but themselves revolutionary modernists at heart. Failure to recognize this has contributed to decades-long failures at peacemaking. And so this outstanding work should be required reading not only for scholars, but for policymakers, journalists, educators and more."
Professor Yehudah Mirsky, Brandeis University, former US State Dept official, author of Rav Kook: Mystic in a Time of Revolution (Yale University Press, 2014).
"This book is an intellectual tour de force that takes readers into the heart of the Religious Zionist movement. Shlomo Fischer's brilliant account of both the philosophical foundations of the movement and its every-day culture is also strikingly novel. Fischer lays to rest the commonplace understanding of Religious Zionism as yet another fundamentalist movement. He shows, instead, that Religious Zionism is a thoroughly modern phenomenon, akin to other modern revolutionary movements, where ideas such as authenticity, individual self-expression, and the general will take center stage. This breathtaking study should be required reading for students of contemporary nationalism and indeed, for anyone who wishes to understand one of the great antimonies of modernity: the close connection between emancipatory movements and violence."
Professor Suzanne Last Stone, Cardozo Law School
