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April 8, 2019 - Nisan 3, 5779

newS

A Conference about the Pharisees to Wipe Out Centuries of Misunderstandings
to Be Held in Rome

By Adam Smulevich

The complex relationship between the Catholic Church and the Pharisees has caused more than one obstacle to contemporary Jewish-Christian dialogue.
During his pontificate several times Pope Francis has described the Pharisees as a negative example, as a category to indicate wrongs that must be corrected. His words have been stigmatized by many in the Jewish world since the Pharisees were the most significant religious group at the time that preceded the destruction of the Second Temple of Jerusalem. The rabbinic Judaism practiced today is a direct derivation of them.
However, an opportunity for clarification is on its way: an international conference, entitled "Jesus and the Pharisees: An Interdisciplinary Reappraisal", will take place at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome from May 7 to 9.

newS

The State Archive of Turin Launches Online Section Presenting Its Jewish Collections

By Pagine Ebraiche staff*

The State Archive of Turin has launched a new section on their website devoted to the collection of Jewish books and manuscripts. This will allow researchers to consult its database.
The collection comprises all the materials gathered over centuries by the House of Savoia; the rulers of the Sardinia Kingdom that eventually became the monarchs of Italy. It is one of the richest collections in the field in Italy and the world.
The books are mostly located at the National University Library of Turin. The work to catalogue them has been carried out by Chiara Pilocane, director of the Terracini Jewish Archive, under the scientific supervision of Corrado Martone, professor of Hebrew language and Literature at the University of Turin.

culture

Villa Emma, Remembrance through Art

By Pagine Ebraiche staff

Several dozens of architectural design projects from different Italian, European and non-European cities have been submitted to build a monument in memory of the Jewish boys who were offered protection at Villa Emma, in Nonantola, in the province of Modena, between the summer of 1942 and the spring of 1943. Participants in the competition were very numerous and distinguished themselves for the quality of their works.
The Studio Bianchini e Lusiardi Associati eventually won the competition, coming up with a design that is based on both a physical and symbolic thickening of the paths and the human relationships that involved 73 youths who found shelter in the Emilian municipality and were given help to reach Switzerland after the 8th of September. Their artistic itinerary is marked by little chairs, “the ultimate symbol of welcoming and hospitality, made up of bronze and placed near some of the key places of the story”.

*Translated by Arianna Mercuriali, student at the Advanced School for Interpreters and Translators of Trieste University, intern at the newspaper office of the Union of the Italian Jewish Communities.

bechol lashon - español

Exclusiones del pasado
y del presente

Por Gadi Luzzatto Voghera**

Es admirable la lección de densidad cultural y claridad expositiva que nos ofrece el Prof. Benjamin Ravid en un artículo sobre el gueto de Venecia. Se trata de relacionar la experiencia histórica con cuestiones relativas a la contemporaneidad. ¿Cuáles fueron las dinámicas de exclusión que sufrieron las minorías (y más precisamente los grupos judíos que vivían en Venecia) en el pasado y cómo el estudio de aquellos episodios puede hacernos reflexionar sobre las muchas exclusiones que caracterizan el presente?

*Gadi Luzzatto Voghera, Director Fundación CDEC. Traducido por Arianna Mercuriali, estudiante de la Escuela Superior para Intérpretes y Traductores de la Universidad de Trieste, de prácticas en la oficina del periódico de la Unión de las Comunidades Judías Italianas.

Leia mas

pilpul

21st century

By David Bidussa*

On April 1, 1979, Iran woke up as an “Islamic Republic”. The results of the referendum on the matter doesn’t leave any doubts: 98% of the votes in favor and 2 % opposed. We have not entered the 21st century in “unforgettable 1989” but in “forgotten 1979”.

*David Bidussa is a historian of social ideas.

Read more

ITALICS

The Ghetto

By Benjamin Ravid*

The word “ghetto” initially referred to the copper foundry of the Venetian government, il ghetto (sometimes spelled gheto, getto, or geto) where cannon balls were cast, from the root gettare, to cast or to throw, encountered in English words such as eject, jet, and trajectory. Eventually, an adjacent island was used to dump waste products from the ghetto, and it became known as the Ghetto Nuovo, the new foundry, to distinguish it from the area of the foundry that then became known as the Ghetto Vecchio, the old foundry. However, in the 14th century, when the foundry was no longer able to meet the needs of the Venetian state, the Venetian government sold the area and it became the site of modest houses mainly inhabited by weavers and other petty artisans. Only in 1516 did the ghetto become the compulsory, segregated and enclosed quarter to which all the Jews in Venice were relegated.
The major impulse for segregating the Jews initially came from the Christian Church. Therefore, in order to understand that development, one must briefly consider the special attitude of Christianity toward Judaism. After the original Judeo-Christians broke with Judaism by rejecting Jewish law and accepting pagans directly into their midst without first converting them to Judaism and thereby establishing Christianity as a separate religion, Christianity adopted a hostile “sibling rivalry” toward those who remained Jews. On a theological level, this was not—as so often assumed—simply because the Jews were considered responsible for the death of Jesus. Rather, it was because Christianity based itself and its legitimacy upon the “Old Testament” and claimed to be the true Israel, while condemning the Jews who were perceived as erring by stubbornly following the rabbinic interpretations of the Bible rather than the new true Christian exegesis.

*The article was published in The Tablet on March 26, 2019.

moked è il portale dell'ebraismo italiano

This newsletter is published under difficult conditions. The editors of this newsletter are Italian journalists whose native language is Italian. They are willing to offer their energy and their skills to give international readers the opportunity of learning more about the Italian Jewish world, its values, its culture and its traditions.
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Special thanks to: Francesco Moises Bassano, Susanna Barki, Amanda Benjamin, Monica Bizzio, Angelica Edna Calò Livne, Eliezer Di Martino, Alain Elkann, Dori Fleekop, Daniela Fubini, Benedetta Guetta, Sarah Kaminski, Daniel Leisawitz, Annette Leckart, Gadi Luzzatto Voghera, Yaakov Mascetti, Francesca Matalon, Jonathan Misrachi, Anna Momigliano, Giovanni Montenero, Elèna Mortara, Sabina Muccigrosso, Lisa Palmieri Billig, Jazmine Pignatello, Shirley Piperno, Giandomenico Pozzi, Daniel Reichel, Colby Robbins, Danielle Rockman, Lindsay Shedlin, Michael Sierra, Rachel Silvera, Adam Smulevich, Simone Somekh, Rossella Tercatin, Ada Treves, Lauren Waldman, Sahar Zivan.

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Realizzato con il contributo di: Francesco Moises Bassano, Susanna Barki, Amanda Benjamin, Monica Bizzio, Angelica Edna Calò Livne, Eliezer Di Martino, Alain Elkann, Dori Fleekop, Daniela Fubini, Benedetta Guetta, Sarah Kaminski, Daniel Leisawitz, Annette Leckart, Gadi Luzzatto Voghera, Yaakov Mascetti, Francesca Matalon, Jonathan Misrachi, Anna Momigliano, Giovanni Montenero, Elèna Mortara, Sabina Muccigrosso, Lisa Palmieri Billig, Jazmine Pignatello, Shirley Piperno, Giandomenico Pozzi, Daniel Reichel, Colby Robbins, Danielle Rockman, Lindsay Shedlin, Michael Sierra, Rachel Silvera, Adam Smulevich, Simone Somekh, Rossella Tercatin, Ada Treves, Lauren Waldman, Sahar Zivan.