A Black Jewish Messiah in an Apocalyptic Age —
On Sept. 25, the Melton Center partnered with the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and the Department of Classics to present a lecture with Alan Verskin, Chair of Jewish History at the University of Toronto. Dr. Verskin told the historical saga of “a Black Jewish Messiah,” David Reubeni. In 1524, David Reubeni appeared in Venice, making the unlikely claim that he was the ambassador of a powerful Jewish kingdom located in the heart of Arabia. He had access to major European rulers of his day, including important Jewish leaders. Amazingly, this story gave him access to all the major European rulers of the time, as well as to some of the most important Jewish leaders. The key to Reubeni’s success was his apocalyptic diplomacy. Reubeni was able to persuasively speak the Mediterranean’s common language of millenarian expectancy that was shared by many Jews, Christians and Muslims. This apocalypticism both fueled and was amplified by the fierce rivalries between the ascendant Ottoman and Christian kingdoms, the expulsions and wars of religion, and the discovery and brutal conquest of distant lands and civilizations. Reubeni arrived in Europe at a time when many Christians and Jews believed that their ultimate salvation would be brought by armies originating in Africa. Dr. Verskin explored that belief and how Reubeni was able to take advantage of it. The next day, Dr. Verskin presented a seminar for graduate students and faculty titled “Writing the History of a Man from Nowhere.” Dr. Verskin discussed how and why he, trained as a historian of the medieval Islamic world, came to study the diary of David Reubeni and the society of 16th-century mediterranean Europe in which he operated. He also discussed the complications of researching and interpreting Reubeni’s own (often unreliable) narrative of his travels that took him from Arabia and Sudan to Portugal and Germany. He introduced some of the sources that he used to corroborate Reubeni’s diary and the challenges that they present. Both events were supported by the Diane Cummins Community Education Fund.
God is enslaved with them: Exile, Diaspora, and the Jews in the Roman and Byzantine Era —
On Nov. 12, the Melton Center hosted Mika Ahuvia, Associate Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Washington, for a public lecture on exile, diaspora and the Jews in the Roman and Byzantine era. In the centuries around the turn of the Common Era, successive empires repeatedly enslaved thousands of Jews and displaced them elsewhere. Displaced Jews joined established Jewish communities dispersed over three continents and lacked uniform, central or stable governance structures for the first one thousand years of the Common Era. Jews who witnessed the expulsions of their co-religionists drew on historical precedents and biblical models to develop new conceptions of God’s ongoing faithfulness to the Jewish people (e.g. the Shekhina). A full account of Jewish experiences of exile and forced migration in the Roman era must acknowledge divergent responses found in a variety of textual sources (e.g. rabbinic literature, piyyut, Targum, Latin and Greek witnesses) as well as archaeological sources (e.g. funerary inscriptions, synagogue art, incantation bowls) from ancient Syro-Palestine and beyond. Later that day, Dr. Ahuvia presented a seminar workshop, “Reimagining the Foundations of Judaism.” Dr. Ahuvia explored the stories told about the foundations of Jewish history, culture, and society. She explained how scholarly paradigms have not kept up with uncovered evidence of enslaved, manumitted and fostered children in antiquity. She argued that it is time for the contributions of non-normative Jews to late antique synagogues, rabbinic learning and Jewish society in Late Antiquity to change our narratives of history. Our imaginings of Jewish society and the Jewish household in pre-modernity must change to accommodate the evidence of these heretofore marginalized Jews. A more inclusive story of the past sets the stage for more inclusive and ethical attitudes in the present. The workshop was co-hosted by the Department of Classics and both events were supported by the Diane Cummins Community Education Fund.
The Thomas and Diann Mann Symposium
The Thomas and Diann Mann Symposium fund was established in 1997 by Mr. and Mrs. Mann to support annual symposia in which eminent scholars, along with The Ohio State University faculty, present lectures on a chosen topic in the area of Jewish studies. The 2024–2025 Mann Symposium on Jewish Migrations and Cultural Production highlighted the ways that Jewish cultural production reflects routes and roots of Jewish migrations. It featured Ari Ariel (University of Iowa) and Renana Gutman (Longy School of Music of Bard College).
Ari Ariel
Jewish Cooking Around the World and Yemeni Jewish Homelands —
On Feb. 3, the Melton Center hosted Ari Ariel, Associate Professor of Instruction in History and International Studies at the University of Iowa, for a cooking demonstration highlighting Jewish foods from around the world. In Ohio State’s instructional kitchen, Dr. Ariel demonstrated how to cook, and told the migration histories of, caponata, shakshuka and cheese latkes. Participants tasted samples of these dishes and considered how food is connected to Jewish history, diaspora and identity. Dr. Ariel’s work focuses on Jewish communities in the Arab world and Mizrahi communities in Israel, and he is particularly interested in the impact of migration on foodways and other cultural practices. The next day, Dr. Ariel presented the lecture “Yemeni Jewish Homelands: Cultural Practice as a Space Between.” Yemeni Jewish migration to Palestine and Israel began as early as the 1880s and continued until recent years. Throughout this period, Yemeni Jews employed strategies to maintain a connection with Yemen, and to resist assimilation, while also working to integrate into Jewish society in Palestine and Israel. Dr. Ariel explored the ways Yemeni Jewish foodways, music and dance reveal the ways that diasporic communities use cultural practices to negotiate the contradictory pressures migration places on identity.
Renana Gutman
“Unheard Melodies” Piano Performance —
On Feb. 17 and 18, the Melton Center partnered with Ohio State's School of Music to present “Unheard Melodies,” a performance by pianist Renana Gutman (Longy School of Music of Bard College). The program presented music by composers whose Jewish identity sealed their fate as musicians and as human beings in the period surrounding the two World Wars. The detailed, imaginative soundscape these composers created was influenced by other composers they were personally associated with, such as Debussy and Berg, by their geographical journeys to Eastern and Western Europe and to Palestine, and ultimately by the turbulent circumstances of their time, a monumental chapter in history. Their compositions bear witness to their rich life experiences, encompassing great stylistic diversity and a vast range of emotions. The performance on Feb. 17 was at the Wexner Heritage Village retirement community on the east side of Columbus, and the performance on Feb. 18 was in the Timashev Recital Hall on Ohio State’s campus. Prior to the performances, Gutman gave a piano master class in the School of Music. She instructed students on the finer points of the qualities of the music, and the physical conversations they had with the music to establish the movement qualities of their hands while playing. She coached students in how to play with an excited feeling and how to remain kinesthetically engaged while performing.
This year also kicked off a two-year 2024–2026 Mann Symposium on Jewish Leadership series, which highlights the diversity of historical and contemporary approaches to Jewish leadership. Our first session featured Sarah Federman (University of San Diego).
Last Train to Auschwitz: The French National Railways and the Journey to Accountability —
The 2024–2026 Thomas and Diann Mann Symposium on Jewish Leadership series kicked off with Dr. Sarah Federman, Associate Professor of Conflict Resolution at the University of San Diego’s Kroc School of Peace Studies and author of Last Train to Auschwitz: The French National Railways and the Journey to Accountability. Her talk on Oct. 29 focused on the interconnected roles of perpetrator, victim and hero that the French National Railways took on during the harrowing years of the Holocaust and its long journey to make amends for its role in the Holocaust. Based on 120 interviews, including 90 with Holocaust survivors, Federman discussed the complex question of what happens when corporations engage in (and avoid) reckoning work.
Mann Israel Lecture Series
Since 2014, the Thomas and Diann Mann Lecture Series on Jews, America, and Israel has explored the special and complex relationship between Israel and America. This year’s series featured Rachel Harris (Florida Atlantic University) and Orit Rozin (Tel Aviv University).
Rachel Harris
How the IDF Founded the Israeli Film Industry —
On Nov. 7, the Melton Center welcomed Rachel Harris, Gimelstob Eminent Scholar Chair for Judaic Studies, Professor of Film and Multimedia Studies, and Director of the Program in Jewish Studies at Florida Atlantic University. Dr. Harris lectured about the contributions the Israel Defense Forces made to the creation of the Israeli film industry during the late 1940s and 1950s. Tracing the history of the IDF Film Unit (1948–1954) through recently declassified military documents and oral testimonies, Dr. Harris explored the ways in which it served as a training facility for a generation of technicians, and as a pipeline to Geva Studios, one of two studios created during the 1950s. The unit, which brought together trained and experienced filmmakers who had studied or worked in Europe, served as a critical apprenticeship for a new generation of native-born youths and immigrants who had arrived in the immediate aftermath of the country’s establishment. Though it was short-lived, many of the soldiers (and civilian staff) who would pass through it would be instrumental in developing the film industry in Israel during the next two decades through both local and international productions. By the 1970s, many pioneers had established their own production companies in Israel and had acclaimed international reputations.
Orit Rozin
“Israel at its finest hour:” Emotional Management on the Eve of the 1967 War —
On Feb. 27, the Melton Center hosted Orit Rozin, Professor of Jewish History at Tel Aviv University, for a talk focused on her recent book Emotions of Conflict, Israel 1949-1967. For her Zoom lecture about the Six Day War of 1967, Dr. Rozin discussed the history of citizens’ emotions through an analysis of the reports about how they felt that comprised the emotional regime. She explained the emotional repertoire designed by political leaders and cultural agents wishing to mold the feelings of Israeli citizens. Israel’s emotional regime was meant to mitigate fear, foster preparedness and instill a shared feeling of purpose, belonging and solidarity; it served as foundation for the political elite’s ideology and nurtured a model of citizenship. This emotional regime imbued Israelis with a sense of moral rectitude and equipped them with tools to manage their fears. Dr. Rozindiscussed the “waiting period,” a three-week period that preceded the outbreak of hostilities in June 1967: the Six Day War. Israel’s citizens have had to cope with the emotional challenges of the threats their country faced during its first two decades.
The 33rd Annual Pearl and Troy Feibel Lecture on Judaism and Law
The Pearl and Troy Feibel Lecture on Judaism and Law was established in 1988 by Pearl Feibel with support from Barbara Feibel Robins, James Feibel (z”l), Donald Feibel (z”l) and Robert Shamansky (z”l).
Stories from Court: Lay People's Power in the Talmud —
On March 23, the Melton Center welcomed Lynn Kaye, Associate Professor of Rabbinic Literature and Thought at Brandeis University, for the annual Feibel lecture. The topic of her talk, “Stories from Court: Lay People's Power in the Talmud,” focused on instances in the Talmud where lay people made their voices heard in court, using a variety of tactics and arguments when they appeared before rabbi-judges. While the Sasanian empire had a legal apparatus, the Jewish population seems to have had self-governing opportunities, with courts of arbitration. Dr. Kaye presented some of these stories, of men and women, some good, some bad, some knowledgeable, some lucky, and explained what purpose these stories serve in an ancient corpus of law. The topics ranged from disputes over claiming abandoned land to arguments over inheritance, and from tricky divorces to compensation for assaults, injury and theft. The stories dramatize how ordinary people navigate the unfamiliar terrain of law courts as they try to find justice. The next day, Dr. Kaye led a workshop on material from her new book in progress, Power and the People: Lay Advocacy and Judicial Formation in Talmudic Narrative.
Ohio Jewish Studies Workshop —
On April 27, the Melton Center partnered with the Department of Near Eastern and South Asian Languages and Cultures to host a workshop for Jewish studies faculty from across the state of Ohio to share research, network and discuss current issues related to Jewish Studies in the state. Events included a Current Research in Jewish Studies panel, field-specific breakout group conversations, and a discussion about Jewish studies in Ohio today.