麻豆影院

麻豆影院 Prof. Sacks:

Elias Sacks joined the 麻豆影院 faculty in 2012, and works on the Jewish tradition, religious thought, and theories and methods in the study of religion. After receiving his A.B. from Harvard University and studying at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, he earned an M.A. in Religion from Columbia University (2007) and a Ph.D. in Religion from Princeton University (2012). His research focuses on the modern period, with particular areas of interest including Jewish thought, Jewish-Christian relations, philosophy of religion, religion and politics, hermeneutics, and religious ethics. His first book,听听(Indiana University Press, 2017), offers a far-reaching reassessment of the account of Jewish practice developed by Moses Mendelssohn, the eighteenth-century philosopher generally seen as the founder of modern Jewish thought. Sacks is currently working on a second book听on the nineteenth-century thinker Nachman Krochmal, one of modernity鈥檚 first Eastern European Jewish philosophers.听He has also written on medieval and modern figures such as Moses Maimonides, Baruch Spinoza, Hermann Cohen, Franz Rosenzweig, and Jacob Taubes, and published some of the first English translations of Mendelssohn鈥檚 Hebrew works in听a听听(Brandeis University Press, 2011, finalist for the National Jewish Book Award).听

Sacks is the Modern Judaism editor for the听听(De Gruyter), and is involved in grant-funded projects on听Jews of color in the United States听and听. He holds leadership positions in the Association for Jewish Studies and Society of Jewish Ethics, and previously served as Director of The Jewish Publication Society.

Areas of Research Related to Jewish Studies:

Jewish thought, Moses Mendelssohn, Nachman Krochmal, Jewish-Christian relations, philosophy of religion, religion and politics, hermeneutics, and religious ethics

Courses:听

• God (FYSM 1000)
• Religion, Ethics, and Politics (RLST 2400)
• Judaism (RLST/JWST 3100)
• God and Politics (RLST/JWST 4170-5170)
• Is God Dead? (RLST/JWST 4180-5180)
• Love & Desire (RLST/JWST 4190-5190)
• Topics in Judaism: Bible in Judaism and Christianity (RLST/JWST 4260-5260)
• Introduction to the Academic Study of Religion (RLST 6830)
• Capstone in Jewish Studies (JWST 4000)
• Undergraduate Independent Study (RLST 4840/JWST 4900)
• Graduate Independent Study (RLST 5840/RLST 6840/JWST 5900)

Recent and Forthcoming Publications (Selected):

鈥淐an God Reject the Jewish People? Elijah Zvi Soloveitchik, Supersessionism, and Modern Jewish Thought,鈥澨�Journal of Textual Reasoning听(forthcoming)

鈥淢oses Mendelssohn,鈥澨齣n听Jewish Virtue Ethics, eds. Geoffrey Claussen, Alex Green, and Alan Mittleman (SUNY Press, 2023), 241-254

鈥淢odes of Interpretation in Jewish Ethics,鈥澨齣n听Encyclopedia of Religious Ethics, 3 vols., eds. William听Schweiker, Maria Antonaccio, Elizabeth Bucar, and David Clairmont (Wiley-Blackwell, 2022), 2:831-840

鈥淟iturgical Counter-Symbols: Jacob Taubes, Franz Rosenzweig, and the Politics of Redemption,鈥澨�Rosenzweig Jahrbuch听12 (2021): 127-141

鈥淓xegesis and Politics Between East and West: Nachman Krochmal, Moses Mendelssohn, and Modern Jewish Thought,鈥澨�Harvard Theological Review听114.4 (2021): 508-535

鈥淭he Promise and Perils of Perplexity: Jewish Philosophy and Public Culture, Yesterday and Today,鈥� in听The Future of Jewish Philosophy, volume 21 of听The Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers, eds. Hava Tirosh-Samuelson and Aaron Hughes (Brill, 2018), 79-97

鈥淧oetry, Music, and the Limits of Harmony: Mendelssohn鈥檚 Aesthetic Critique of Christianity,鈥� in听Sara Levy鈥檚 World: Bach, Gender,听and Judaism in Enlightenment Berlin, eds. Nancy Sinkoff and Rebecca Cypess, Eastman Studies in Music (University of Rochester听Press, 2018), 122-146

鈥淲orlds to Come Between East and West: Immortality and the Rise of Modern Jewish Thought,鈥� in听Olam Ha-zeh v鈥橭lam Ha-ba:听This World and the World to Come in Jewish Belief and Practice, ed. Leonard Greenspoon, Studies in Jewish Civilization (Purdue University Press, 2017), 171-195

Moses Mendelssohn鈥檚 Living Script: Philosophy, Practice, History, Judaism听(Indiana University Press, 2017)

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