Dilemmas in Modern Jewish Thought

"From the scientific revolution and the rise of modern philosophy to the Enlightenment and the Holocaust, modern events have stimulated new ways of understanding the central concepts and principles of Judaism. Is Judaism a timeless, universal set of beliefs or, rather, is it historical and contingent in its relation to different times and places? Do Jewish beliefs derive their meaning from texts and revelation or from rational argument and experience?"--BOOK JACKET. "Michael L. Morgan addresses major Jewish thinkers from the seventeenth century to the present who have wrestled with the moral and theological dilemmas that history poses for Jewish belief and identity. Among figures discussed are Baruch Spinoza, Moses Mendelssohn, Leo Strauss, Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, and Emil Fackenheim. By clarifying the tensions and dilemmas that characterize modern thinking about the nature of Judaism and Jewish experience, Morgan clears the way for Jews to appreciate their historical situation and yet locate enduring values and principles in a post-Holocaust world."--BOOK JACKET.

Beyond its central premise, the book can be read through the connected lenses of Philosophy, Nonfiction. Those themes offer useful points of attention as the characters, ideas, or world develop, especially where the book complicates the expectations of its primary category.