INTRODUCTION ; CONCLUSION ; APPENDIX A - YIHUS AND MARRIAGE STRATEGIES OF EARLY ZADDIKIM OUTSIDE CENTRAL POLAND: EXAMPLES THROUGH 1815 ; APPENDIX B - AN EXORCISM IN WARSAW, 1818 ; APPENDIX C - WORKS BY HASIDIC AUTHORS, THROUGH 1815 ; BIBLIOGRAPHY ; NOTES ; INDEX
Glenn Dynner is a Professor of Religion at Sarah Lawrence College
"A ground-breaking study of Jewish-run taverns in Poland...Although
scholarly, Yankel's Tavern: Jews, Liquor, & Life in the Kingdom of
Poland makes for fascinating reading, particularly if you are among
the many modern Jews whose ancestors were tavern-keepers."--The
Canadian Jewish News
"Dynner's book represents an important contribution to the
previously understudied historiography of nineteenth-century
Hasidism. His thorough and careful archival research, combined with
his nuanced analysis of important zadikim, their ideology, and
their social power, sets a new standard for the study of Hasidism.
This is an indispensable volume for scholars and enthusiastic
students of nineteenth-century East European Jewish culture and
society."--American Historical Review
"Men of Silk is an original research study which contextualizes the
emergence of Hasidism as a wide ranging popular movement taking
place throughout central Poland between the years 1754 and 1830.
The book presents recently discovered archival material from Poland
pertaining to the social and cultural aspects of the Hasidic
movement and introduces new questions concerning the internal and
external dimensions of the development of Hasidism. The author
contributes to a better understanding of the challenge offered to
the social historian in the presentation of Hasidic Jewry in its
social and political context, while not losing insight into inner
Jewish life."
--Rachel Elior, author of The Mystical Origins of Hasidism
"With precision and learning, Glenn Dynner manages to cut through
so much of the multi-layered mythology surrounding the etiology,
the organization, and the spread of hasidism in Poland. He provides
a new, lucid account of its leaders, the lives of its devotees, and
its relationship with government and Jewish society. He extracts
much historical insight from seemingly recalcitrant hasidic
hagiography, and draws on the widest range of sources --
hasidic,
anti-hasidic, travelers' accounts, official, and more -- in what is
a fascinating, fresh account of one of the most resonant Jewish
religious ideologies in modern times."--Steven J. Zipperstein,
author of
Imagining Russian Jewry: Memory, History, Identity
"The story of Hasidism has been told by both fervent believers and
sworn secularists. This great east-European religious movement
stood for several generations in the center of modern Jewish
Historiography, and yet its diverse nature has been reduced to fit
changing cultural modes, as well as long-forgotten political
agendas. Men of Silk revises the story of Polish Hasidism. It
offers a critical reading of inside and outside contemporaneous
sources.
Dynner's careful reading of the texts reveals Hasidism as a complex
historical phenomenon, quite different from the simplistic portrait
drawn by earlier schools of Jewish historians." --Israel Bartal,
author of
The Jews of Eastern Europe, 1772-1881
"Dynner's book addresses the heretofore neglected but crucially
important subject of 19th-century Hasidism, shedding much light on
this vital chapter of Jewish (and Polish) history."--Gershon David
Hundert, author of Jews in Poland-Lithuania in the Eighteenth
Century: A Genealogy of Modernity
"Dynner's work is a significant contribution to the historical
literature on Polish Jewish society on the cusp of
modernity."--Slavic Review
"Dynner's book is innovative in the wide variety of its sources,
ranging from Hasidic tales to British missionary journals and
Warsaw police reports, but no less in the treatment of those
sources. ...[A] major achievement. Glenn Dynner has taken an
important step towards writing the 'missing chapters' in the
history of the Hasidic movement." --Shofar
"Dynner's prose is easily accessible and the work is impressive in
its erudition. This study will be indispensable for teaching about
Hasidism, providing a pilot for future investigation of similar and
related themes in other geographical centres and periods of the
movement." --Religion
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