# Wissenschaft des Judentums

Part of a series on :
Jews and Judaism :
Etymology
Who is a Jew? :
Religion
God in Judaism (names)
Principles of faith
Mitzvot (613)
Halakha
Shabbat
Holidays
Prayer
Tzedakah
Land of Israel
Brit
Bar and bat mitzvah
Marriage
Bereavement
Baal teshuva
Philosophy
Ethics
Kabbalah
Customs
Rites
Synagogue
Rabbi :
Texts
Tanakh
Torah
Nevi'im
Ketuvim
Talmud
Mishnah
Gemara
Rabbinic
Midrash
Tosefta
Targum
Beit Yosef
Mishneh Torah
Tur
Shulchan Aruch
Zohar :
History
General
Timeline
Land of Israel
Name "Judea"
Antisemitism
Anti-Judaism
Persecution
Leaders
Modern historiography
Historical population comparisons
Ancient Israel
Twelve Tribes of Israel
Kingdom of Judah
Kingdom of Israel
Jerusalem (in Judaism
timeline)
Temple in Jerusalem (First
Second)
Assyrian captivity
Babylonian captivity
Second Temple period
Yehud Medinata
Maccabean Revolt
Hasmonean dynasty
Sanhedrin
Schisms (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Zealots, Sicarii)
Second Temple Judaism (Hellenistic Judaism)
Jewish–Roman wars (Great Revolt, Diaspora, Bar Kokhba)
Rabbinic period and Middle Ages
Rabbinic Judaism
History of the Jews in the Byzantine Empire
Christianity and Judaism (Jews and Christmas)
Hinduism and Judaism
Islamic–Jewish relations
Middle Ages
Golden Age
Modern era
Haskalah
Sabbateans
Hasidism
Jewish atheism
Emancipation
Old Yishuv
Zionism
Soviet Union
The Holocaust
Israel
Arab–Israeli conflict :
Communities
Ashkenazim
Galician
Litvak
Mizrahim
Sephardim
Teimanim
Beta Israel
Gruzinim
Juhurim
Bukharim
Italkim
Romanyotim
Cochinim
Bene Israel
Berber
Related groups
Bnei Anusim
Lemba
Crimean Karaites
Krymchaks
Kaifeng Jews
Igbo Jews
Samaritans
Crypto-Jews
Anusim
Dönmeh
Marranos
Neofiti
Xueta
Mosaic Arabs
Subbotniks
Noahides :
Population
Judaism by country
Lists of Jews
Diaspora
Historical population by country
Genetic studies
Land of Israel
Old Yishuv
New Yishuv
Israeli Jews
Africa
Algeria
Angola
Bilad-el-Sudan
Botswana
Cameroon
Cape Verde
Benin
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Djibouti
Egypt
Ethiopia
Eritrea
Eswatini
Gabon
Gambia
Ghana
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Ivory Coast
Kenya
Libya
Madagascar
Malawi
Mali
Mauritius
Morocco
Mozambique
Namibia
Nigeria (Igbo)
Republic of the Congo
São Tomé and Príncipe
Sierra Leone
Somalia
South Africa
Sudan
Tanzania
Tunisia
Uganda (Abayudaya)
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Asia
Afghanistan
Bahrain
Cambodia
China
Hong Kong
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Israel
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kurdistan
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Laos
Lebanon
Malaysia
Mongolia
Myanmar
Nepal
Oman
Pakistan
Philippines
Qatar
Saudi Arabia
South Korea
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Syria
Tajikistan
Taiwan
Thailand
Turkey
United Arab Emirates
Uzbekistan
Vietnam
Yemen
Europe
Armenia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Belarus
Bulgaria
Cyprus
Czechia
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Moldova
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Serbia
Spain
Sweden
Ukraine
United Kingdom
Northern America
Canada
United States
Greenland
Latin America and Caribbean
Argentina
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile
Colombia
Cuba
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
El Salvador
Guyana
Haiti
Jamaica
Mexico
Paraguay
Peru
Puerto Rico
Suriname
Uruguay
Venezuela
Oceania
Australia
Fiji
Guam
New Zealand
Palau :
Denominations
Orthodox
Modern
Haredi
Hasidic
Reform
Conservative
Karaite
Reconstructionist
Renewal
Science
Haymanot
Humanistic :
Culture
Customs
Minyan
Wedding
Clothing
Niddah
Pidyon haben
Kashrut
Shidduch
Zeved habat
Conversion to Judaism
Aliyah
Hiloni
Music
Religious
Secular
Art
Ancient
Yiddish theatre
Dance
Humour
Cuisine
American
Ashkenazi
Bukharan
Ethiopian
Israeli
Israelite
Mizrahi
Sephardic
Literature
Israeli
Yiddish
American :
Languages
Hebrew
Biblical
Yiddish
Yeshivish
Jewish Koine Greek
Yevanic
Judeo-Tat
Shassi
Judaeo-Iranian
Judaeo-Spanish
Judeo-Gascon
Ghardaïa Sign
Bukharian
Knaanic
Zarphatic
Judeo-Italian
Judaeo-Georgian
Judeo-Aramaic
Judeo-Arabic
Judeo-Berber
Judeo-Malayalam
Domari :
Politics
Jewish political movements
Autonomism
Bundism
Feminism
Leftism
Secularism
Territorialism
World Agudath Israel
Zionism
General
Green
Labor
Kahanism
Maximalism
Neo-Zionism
Religious
Revisionist
Post-Zionism :
Category
Portal :
vte :
"Wissenschaft des Judentums" (literally in German the expression means "Science of Judaism"; more recently in the United States it started to be rendered as "Jewish Studies" or "Judaic Studies," a wide academic field of inquiry in American universities) refers to a nineteenth-century movement premised on the critical investigation of Jewish literature and culture, including rabbinic literature, to analyze the origins of Jewish traditions.

## The Verein für Kultur und Wissenschaft der Juden

The first organized attempt at developing and disseminating Wissenschaft des Judentums was the Verein für Kultur und Wissenschaft der Juden (Society for Jewish Culture and Jewish Studies), founded around 1819 by Eduard Gans, (a pupil of Hegel), and his associates. Other members included Heinrich Heine, Leopold Zunz, Moses Moser, and Michael Beer, (youngest brother of Meyerbeer). It was an attempt to provide a construct for the Jews as a Volk or people in their own right, independent of their religious traditions. As such it sought to validate their secular cultural traditions as being on an equal footing with those adduced by Johann Gottfried Herder and his followers for the German people. Immanuel Wolf’s influential essay Über den Begriff einer Wissenschaft des Judentums (On the Concept of Jewish Studies) of 1822, has such ideas in mind. Its principal objective, as it was then defined in the Zeitschrift für die Wissenschaft des Judentums (1822), was the study of Judaism by subjecting it to criticism and modern methods of research.
The failure of the Verein, attributable largely to the far greater attraction, amongst German Jews, of identification with German culture, was followed, significantly, by the conversion to Christianity of many of its leading figures, including Gans and Heine.

## The Wissenschaft des Judentums movement

Despite the lack of success of the Verein für Kultur und Wissenschaft der Juden, its principles inspired many Jewish thinkers to invest their efforts in a wider Wissenschaft des Judentums movement, and also provoked a conservative reaction (see Opposition). The historian Amos Elon, in his book The Pity of It All, places the movement in the context of anti-Semitic riots in Germany in 1819. The purpose, Elon writes, "was to bring ordinary Jews into the orbit of German Kultur and at the same time reinforce their Jewish identity by bridging the gulf between secular and religious education"; the movement sought to explore Judaism as "both secular civilization and religion", and thereby "help young Jews to remain Jews", even as they moved to a more secular view. According to Dr. Henry Abramson, the primary aim of the proponents of the movement was to articulate a modality of Jewish identity that was consonant with nineteenth century values, and where Jews had to demonstrate that they were patriotic members of their own societies, and at the same time express their Judaism proudly. The movement took on slightly differing characteristics in different national contexts so that, for example, the nature of the Anglo-Jewish movement was affected by the more ambivalent, less overtly hostile, state of Jewish-Christian relations in England; historical critical approaches to Bible were unpopular; a strong interest in rabbinic theology, liturgy, and prayer; an emphasis upon eccentricity, marginality, and challenges to normative rabbinic Judaism; and a widening of the scholarly franchise in England to women and non-established scholars.

### Goals

Proponents of Wissenschaft des Judentums attempted to place Jewish culture on par with Western European culture, as evinced in Goethe's ideas of Bildung, and endeavored to have "Jewish Studies" introduced into the university curriculum as a respectable area of study, freeing the field from the prevailing bias that regarded Judaism as an inferior precursor to Christianity and studied it as such. They also developed and advocated a style of scholarship which allowed complete freedom in the interpretation of traditional texts, and which might be pursued without concerns about the practical ramifications such interpretations might have for religious observance and religious life (Glatzer 1964).
Leopold Zunz (1794–1886), one of the movement's leading figures, devoted much of his work to rabbinic literature. At the time, Christian thinkers maintained that the Jews' contribution ended with the Bible, and Zunz began to publish in the area of post-biblical rabbinic literature. His essays "Etwas über die rabbinische Literatur" and "Zur Geschichte und Literatur" addressed this issue. His biography of Rashi of Troyes was pivotal. When the Prussian government forbade preaching sermons in German synagogues, on the grounds that the sermon was an exclusively Christian institution, Zunz wrote History of the Jewish Sermon in 1832. This work has been described as "the most important Jewish book published in the 19th century." It lays down principles for the investigation of the Rabbinic exegesis (Midrash) and of the siddur (prayer-book of the synagogue).

### Attitude toward religion

Despite the outstanding scholarship of Wissenschaft personalities such as Zunz and Heinrich Graetz (most of whom pursued their scholarly labors on their own time as Privatgelehrte), the Wissenschaft movement as a whole had a tendency to present Judaism as an historical relic with frequently apologetic overtones, and often ignored matters of contemporary relevance:
   Zunz felt obliged to assume that Judaism had come to an end, and that it was the task of Wissenschaft des Judentums to provide a judicious accounting of the varied and rich contributions which Judaism had made to civilization. In a similar spirit, Steinschneider is said to have once quipped that Wissenschaft des Judentums seeks to ensure that Judaism will receive a proper burial, in which scholarship amounts to an extended obituary properly eulogizing the deceased.
Nevertheless, throughout most of its existence and despite certain of its most prominent practitioners, such as Moritz Steinschneider, being vocal opponents of religion, Wissenschaft des Judentums was very much a religious movement—pursued largely by rabbis at Jewish seminaries who were engaged in preparing their students for rabbinical careers. In a foreshadowing of the reform movement, Zunz often led services, which were accompanied by an organ, in the vernacular German, rather than Hebrew. Wissenschaft scholars such as Rabbi Zacharias Frankel, the first head of the Jewish Theological Seminary of Breslau, and his colleague at the seminary, historian Heinrich Graetz, considered Jewish history to be reflective of a divine revelation and guidance. Wissenschaft des Judentums was not restricted to progressive Judaism. In 1873, Israel Hildesheimer founded the neo-orthodox modern Rabbinerseminar in Berlin. One of its most prominent scholars, David Hoffmann, defended a literal reading of the Biblical word which he understood to be the exact product of divine revelation. It was this essentially religious nature of Wissenschaft des Judentums that made it even more dangerous in the eyes of its opponents. Christians even thought that a more liberal form of Judaism would attract converts, or would keep Jews from converting to Christianity, and so the government forced Zunz's synagogue to close.

### Attitude toward earlier scholarship

Indeed, one detects in the writings of many Wissenschaft scholars not only an intense love of scholarship "for its own sake", but also a genuine affinity for the rabbis and scholars of old, whose works they find themselves documenting, editing, publishing, analyzing, and critiquing. Indeed, far from disparaging or despising the Jewish religion and its many generations of rabbinical scholars, the majority of Wissenschaft practitioners are very keen to take ownership of the Jewish scholarly tradition. They see themselves as the rightful heirs and successors to Saadia Gaon and Rashi and Hillel the Elder and Abraham ibn Ezra, and in those prior generations of scholars they see their own Wissenschaft spirit and likeness.
In the Wissenschaft approach to scholarship, then, the earlier generations of scholars become "de-sanctified" and "re-humanized". Wissenschaft scholars feel completely free to pass judgment on the intellectual and scholarly capacities of earlier scholars, evaluating their originality, competence, and credibility, and pointing out their failures and limitations. The Wissenschaft scholars, while respectful of their predecessors, have no patience for a concept such as yeridat ha-dorot. For them, the classical authorities are no more beyond dispute and critique than are contemporary scholars; the opinions of ibn Ezra and Steinschneider may be presented in the same sentence without any sense of impropriety, and either one may then be debunked with the same forwardness. No doubt this de-sanctification of the Jewish luminaries provided further grist for the opponents of the movement.

## Legacy

Although the Wissenschaft movement produced a vast number of scholarly publications of lasting value, and its influence still reverberates through Jewish Studies departments (and, indeed, some yeshivas) around the world, it is possible to regard the publication of the Jewish Encyclopedia in 1901–1906 as the culmination and final flowering of this era in Jewish studies (Levy 2002). The choice of English over German as the language for this epochal work is a further sign that an era of German scholarship was drawing to a close. In the early years of the new century the Wissenschaft culture and style of scholarship was transplanted to a certain extent to bodies such as the Institute for Jewish Studies at Hebrew University (e.g., Gershom Scholem) and Jewish Studies departments at American universities such as Brandeis and Harvard (e.g., Harry Austryn Wolfson).

## Opposition

The Wissenschaft movement drew criticism from traditional elements in the Jewish community, who regarded it as sterile at best, and at worst damaging to the religious community. A key opposition leader was Samson Raphael Hirsch. He and other traditional religious scholars representing urban and sophisticated Orthodox constituencies regarded the Wissenschaft movement as failing to meet the needs of the living Jewish community; Mendes-Flohr observes in this context that historians, by virtue of their craft, necessarily "transform traditional knowledge, draining it of its sacral power." The Orthodox orientation of Wissenschaft figures such as David Zvi Hoffmann did not spare them from Hirsch's condemnation.

## Guttmann and his Philosophie des Judentums

Julius Guttmann is best known for Die Philosophie des Judentums (Reinhardt, 1933), translations of which are available in Hebrew, Spanish, English, Japanese, etc. The English title is The Philosophy of Judaism: The History of Jewish Philosophy from Biblical Times to Franz Rosenzweig (New York, 1964).
Roth sees in this publication "the last product in the direct line of the authentic Judaeo-German 'Science of Judaism'" (more commonly known as Wissenschaft des Judentums). While the movement did not utterly expire with the publication Guttman's work—its spirit living on in the work of G. Scholem and H.A. Wolfson among many others—it is certainly the case that the Wissenschaft movement in Germany had by the 1930s already ceased to thrive.
The original German edition of Philosophie des Judentums ends with Hermann Cohen, the primary influence on Guttman's own philosophy, while the later Hebrew edition includes Franz Rosenzweig. It is also notable that Guttman's work excludes major thinkers of the Kabbalistic school, which reflects his own attitude toward Jewish philosophy.

## List of Wissenschaft des Judentums personalities

* Hermann Cohen
* Wilhelm Bacher
* Eduard Gans
* Heinrich Graetz
* Julius Guttmann
* Heinrich Heine
* David Zvi Hoffmann
* Moses Moser
* Solomon Judah Loeb Rapoport
* Solomon Schechter
* Moritz Steinschneider
* Leopold Zunz
* Samuel David Luzzatto
* Ismar Elbogen
* Isaiah Sonne