Held at the Centrum Judaicum in Berlin on November 29–30 2022, this international conference by the Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem and Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow marks the 150th anniversary of the »Hochschule für die Wissenschaft des Judentums,« as well as 80 years since its closure by the Nazi regime.
Established in 1872 against the background of the permanent exclusion of Jewish Studies and rabbinical training from German universities, the »Hochschule« became one of the leading Jewish academic institutions in Germany – a spiritual home for prominent Jewish scholars such as Leo Baeck, Hermann Cohen, Ismar Elbogen, Max Wiener, Emil Fackenheim, Abraham Geiger, Julius Guttmann, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Solomon Schechter, and Eugen Täubler. Over its seven-decade lifetime, the »Hochschule« developed a unique tradition of learning that promoted a broad and liberal understanding of Jewish culture and thought. Although it managed
to carry on its work even after November 1938, when most German-Jewish institutions had been dissolved, the »Hochschule« closed for good in 1942, and the majority of its scholars and students perished in the Holocaust. However, the »Hochschule’s« legacy was kept alive against all odds: Some of its members managed to flee Germany and continued their intellectual work in new homelands. This legacy is also preserved in the »Hochschule’s« library, whose remnants survived the war and were disseminated across numerous countries.
This conference brings together scholars dealing with the intellectual legacy of the »Hochschule« as well as with the material aspects of the institution’s historical development. To add a fresh perspective to the question of German-Jewish cultural heritage and its development in the 20th century, we want to focus especially on the post-Holocaust »Hochschule« to understand what its remains may teach us about the »Wissenschaft des Judentums,« Jewish scholarship and culture more broadly.
Program
Day 1 Tuesday, November 29, 2022
12.30 p.m. Yfaat Weiss/Anja Siegemund
Opening
12.45 p.m.
(Material) History and Afterlife of the Hochschule
Chair: TBA
Daniel Schwartz
Hochschule-Style Wissenschaft des Judentums
in the Post-Holocaust World
Kerstin von der Krone
Berlin in Breslau: Tracing the Legacy of the
Hochschule through the Monatsschrift für
Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judentums
2.15 p.m
Coffee Break
2.45 p.m.
Translocation, Exile and New Contexts of Jewish Collections – A Conceptual Framework
Chair: TBA
Caroline Jessen
Reconstructing Contexts. Books and Their Usage
Zsuzsanna Toronyi
Material Evidences of German Jewish Scholarship in Budapest
Rachel Heuberger
The Significance of a Library Catalogue for Jewish Studies:
The Digital Reconstruction of the Freimann Collection in Frankfurt am Main
4.45 p.m.
Coffee Break
5.15 p.m.
Keynote Lecture
Chair: Irene Aue-Ben-David
Nils Roemer
Historicities and Legacies of Wissenschaft des Judentums, Then and Now
Day 2 Wednesday, November 30, 2022
1 p.m.
The Library and Librarians of the Hochschule
Chair: Miriam Rürup
Avriel Bar-Levav
The Ecology of Jewish Seminary Libraries in the 19th and early 20 Century
Bettina Farack
The Last Years of the Library of the Hochschule
Irene Munster
Berlin Legacy: Suse Hallenstein
3 p.m.
Coffee Break
3.30 p.m.
Transfer of Knowledge and Objects of the Hochschule
Chair: Alina Gromova
Anna Holzer-Kawalko
Forgotten Heritage: The Fate of the Hochschule Library in Israel
Noah S. Gerber
From Barbaric to Promised Land:
Refugee Scholars and Hebrew Books in the Wake of the Catastrophe
Irene Aue-Ben-David
Selma Stern‘s Research on German-Jewish
History in Exile – a Material Perspective
5.30 p.m.
Coffee Break
5.45 p.m.
Concluding Remarks – Future Perspectives:
German Jewish Cultural Heritage outside Germany
Chair: Felix Steilen
with Emily Bilski, Joachim Schlör, Christian Wiese
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Speakers
Dr. Irene Aue-Ben-David, Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem |
Prof. Dr. Avriel Bar-Levav, The Open University of Israel, Ra‘anana |
Emily Bilski, Independent Curator, Jerusalem |
Bettina Farack, Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem |
Dr. Noah S. Gerber, Tel-Aviv University |
Dr. Alina Gromova, Stiftung Neue Synagoge Berlin – Centrum Judaicum |
Dr. Rachel Heuberger, Goethe University Frankfurt |
Dr. Anna Holzer-Kawalko, Leo Baeck Institute Jerusalem |
Dr. Caroline Jessen, Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow, Leipzig |
Irene Munster, Priddy Library, Rockville, MD |
Prof. Dr. Nils Roemer, The University of Texas at Dallas, TX |
Prof. Dr. Miriam Rürup, Moses Mendelssohn Zentrum für Europäisch-Jüdische Studien |
Prof. Dr. Joachim Schlör, University of Southampton |
Prof. Dr. Daniel Schwartz, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem |
Dr. Anja Siegemund, Stiftung Neue Synagoge Berlin – Centrum Judaicum |
Dr. Felix Steilen, Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow, Leipzig |
Dr. Zsuzsanna Toronyi, Hungarian Jewish Museum and Archives, Budapest |
Dr. Kerstin von der Krone, Goethe University Frankfurt |
Prof. Dr. Yfaat Weiss, Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow,
Leipzig/The Hebrew University of Jerusalem |
Prof. Dr. Christian Wiese, Goethe University Frankfurt Organization
Leibniz Institute for Jewish History and Culture – Simon Dubnow in cooperation with the Leo Baeck Institute
Jerusalem Conference within the framework of the focal project
»The Material and Intellectual Legacy of the Higher Institute for Jewish Studies in Berlin« – Part of the DFG
Priority Program: Jewish Cultural Heritage (SPP 2357)
www.dubnow.de
www.leobaeck.org
www.spp-juedisches-kulturerbe.de
Registration: https://leobaeck.org/conferences/conference-on-the-hochschule-material-history-and-intellectual-legacy/?lang=en
