This book discusses the decoration types of Sephardic illuminated Bibles in their broader historical, and social context in an era of cultural transition in Iberia and culture struggle within Spanish Jewry.

This book discusses the decoration types of Sephardic illuminated Bibles in their broader historical, and social context in an era of cultural transition in Iberia and culture struggle within Spanish Jewry.

The essays collected in this volume present a multi-faceted range of scholarship from late antique synagogues, Jewish funerary art, early Christian and Byzantine mosaics, to Byzantine and Jewish book art, and the representation of the Old Testament in Western manuscripts.

According to a longstanding interpretation, book religions are agents of textuality and logocentrism. This volume inverts the traditional perspective: its focus is on the strong dependency between scripture and aesthetics, holy books and material artworks, sacred texts and ritual performances. The contributions, written by a group of international specialists in Western, Byzantine, Islamic and Jewish Art, are committed to a comparative and transcultural approach. The authors reflect upon the different strategies of »clothing« sacred texts with precious materials and elaborate forms. They show how the pretypographic cultures of the Middle Ages used book ornaments as media for building a close relation between the divine words and their human audience. By exploring how art shapes the religious practice of books, and how the religious use of books shapes the evolution of artistic practices this book contributes to a new understanding of the deep nexus between sacred scripture and art.

"A major challenge for people of faith is to resist the growing demonization of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism . . . I want to do something to build bridges between the three religions. I feel called to embody in my own life the healing, the reconciliation, the unity I long for between people of different religions." Art Gish became involved in the life and worship of all three religions; he considered himself a Christian, a Muslim, and a Jew, and worked at integrating those three perspectives into his life. Acknowledging that Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are all threatened by narrow-minded, violent extremists who put the particular interests of their own people above our common interests, he tells inspiring stories of open-minded Muslims, Jews, and Christians who struggle together for reconciliation and who confront injustices that spawn hostility. Gish looks not only at the disagreements but also at the unity of the three Abrahamic faiths. He writes, "When people cross boundaries, exciting things happen. Each time in Israel/Palestine that I experience Jews, Muslims, and Christians eating, working, laughing, and crying together, I sense a foretaste of the coming kingdom of God, a demonstration of how things could be, and one day will be."

This book reflects on one of the most pressing challenges of our time: the current and historical relationships that exist between the faith-traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It begins with discussion on the state of Jewish-Christian relations, examining antisemitism and the Holocaust, the impact of Israel and theological controversies such as covenant and mission. Kessler also traces different biblical stories and figures, from the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, demonstrating Jewish-Christian contact and controversy. Jews and Christians share a sacred text, but more surprisingly, a common exegetical tradition.

This volume contains essays dealing with complex relationships between Judaism and Christianity, taking a bold step, assuming that no historical period can be excluded from the interactive process between Judaism and Christianity, conscious or unconscious, as either rejection or appropriation

Ritual Dynamics in Jewish and Christian Contexts investigates questions that arise in modern ritual studies concerning Jewish and Christian religious communities: How did their religious rituals develop? Where did different ritual communities and their ritual texts interact? How did religious communities and their authoritative texts respond to change, and how did change influence religious rituals? The volume is a product of the interdisciplinary and international research efforts taken by the Research Centre “Dynamics of Jewish Ritual Practices in Pluralistic Contexts from Antiquity to the Present” at the Universität Erfurt (Germany) and unites the voices of important senior and emerging scholars in the field. It focuses on antiquity and the medieval period but also considers examples from the early modern and modern period in Europe

Following the tradition and style of the acclaimed Index Islamicus, the editors have created this new Bibliography of Art and Architecture in the Islamic World. The editors have surveyed and annotated a wide range of books and articles from collected volumes and journals published in all European languages (except Turkish) between 1906 and 2011. This comprehensive bibliography is an indispensable tool for everyone involved in the study of material culture in Muslim societies.