Word: neusner
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...admirer of the Jews, but one whose goodwill toward them may be moderated by his other concerns. Should that matter? "It's hard to imagine, but it's true that the Jews are not at the top of the agenda of everyone else in the world," quips Rabbi Jacob Neusner, a professor of Jewish studies at Bard College with whom the Pope has a fruitful scholarly relationship. One could justifiably wonder why, on an issue like the Latin Mass or SSPX, a busy Pope should constantly have to ask himself whether it's good for the Jews...
...Still, Neusner was "amazed" when he heard that Ratzinger, now Pope, has revisited it in detail--and in print. When a papal confidant told the Catholic News Service that it was "one of the reasons" Benedict had undertaken his entire two-volume Jesus of Nazareth project, the somewhat puzzled but delighted professor called it "an academic love letter...
...preoccupied with what he sees as the Gospel's overriding message of Jesus' divinity, even in passages that liberal Christians read primarily as straightforward injunctions to help the poor and powerless. Having a rabbi help make that case is novel and convenient. Regarding one verse, Benedict writes that "Neusner shows us that we are dealing not with some kind of moralism, but with a highly theological text, or, to put it more precisely, a Christological one." He acknowledges the rabbi's point that Jesus is offering the Jews a transformation rather than a continuation of the Torah but maintains that...
...Neusner, in his Rhinebeck, N.Y., home, is equally unfazed by the Pope's repurposing of his argument. "You can't expect him to get circumcised," he says. "He's still a Christian, and I'm still a practitioner of Judaism. But the two positions can consider the same text and identify where they converge and where they part company. I think it's terrific...
...picked up by anyone who reads their diocesan paper," says Fisher of the Bishops' conference. Amy-Jill Levine, a Jew who teaches New Testament studies at Vanderbilt University Divinity School and has her own Jesus book, The Misunderstood Jew, says both undergrads and interfaith experts can profit from the Neusner-Benedict exchange. Rabbi James Rudin, senior interreligious adviser to the American Jewish Committee, says it is in some ways "the full maturation of the modern Catholic-Jewish encounter." But perhaps it may mature further still. Asked what he would like to write next, Neusner says, "I'd like...