Am Kolel Jewish Renewal Center presents

Transcription

1 Am Kolel Jewish Renewal Center presents The Martin Buber Symposium Sunday, May 31, 2015 Commemorating his 50th Yahrzeit Temple Emanuel, Kensington, Maryland 1:30 PM 5:30 PM

2 About Martin Buber Born in Austria 1878 and raised by his grandparents, Martin Buber was one of the most inspiring Jewish philosophers of the twentieth century. An existential religious thinker, political activist and educator he studied philosophy and art at the Universities of Vienna, Zurich and Berlin. He broke with the early political Zionists, spent several years immersed in Hassidim and emerged as Biblical Humanist and spiritual Zionist dedicated to a life of dialogue, deep ecumenism and Jewish renewal. He recorded and translated Hasidic legends and sayings and, also, translated the Bible from Hebrew into German in collaboration with Franz Rosenzweig. He was best known for his 1923 book, Ich und Du (I and Thou), which distinguished between I-Thou and I-It modes of existence relating. His writings challenged many prominent philosophers such as Kant, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche and Heidegger. He advocated a bi-national Arab-Palestinian state and supported the renewal of society through decentralized, communitarian-kibbutz socialism. The leader of Jewish adult education in Germany in the 1930s, he developed a philosophy of education based on addressing the whole person through education of character. In the late 30 s, with the invitation and encouragement of the Hebrew University, he left Germany for Palestine. He died June 13, The Hebrew date, a Sunday, the 13 th of Sivan. Today is the 13 th of Sivan. Symposium Presenters Paul R. Mendes-Flohr, Professor Paul Mendes-Flohr is one of the leading scholars of Modern Jewish Thought. He is the former Director of the Franz Rosenzweig Minerva Research Center for German-Jewish Literature and Cultural History at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, where he is Professor emeritus, and still active as Professor of Jewish Studies at the University of Chicago and a member of Advisory Board Member of the Center of Judaism and Modern Culture at the University of Copenhagen, Denmark, the Simon Dubnow Institute for Jewish History and Culture at the Leipzig University, Germany, and the Leo Baeck Institute, Jerusalem, Israel. His major research interests include modern Jewish intellectual history and philosophy, religious thought and philosophy of religion, German intellectual history, and the history and sociology of intellectuals.among his publications are A Land of Two Peoples: Martin Buber and the Arabs (Oxford University Press 1983); The Jew in the Modern World: A Documentary History (with Jehuda Reinharz, Oxford University Press, 3rs edition 2008); German Jews: A Dual Identity (Yale University Press 1999); Progress and its Discontents: Jewish Intellectuals and their Struggle with Modernity (in Hebrew, 2010). He is the editor of a series on German-Jewish literature and Cultural History for the University of Chicago Press, as well as the collected works of Martin Buber in German, which has published two volumes in the past year. He is currently completing a biography of Martin Buber to be published by Yale University Press. He is the editor of Gustav Landauer: Anarchist and Jew (de Gruyter 2014) and Dialogue as a Trans-Disciplinary Concept (de Gruyter 2014).

3 Rabbi Arthur Waskow Rabbi Waskow was born in Baltimore in l933. He earned a bachelor's degree from the Johns Hopkins University (1954) and a doctorate in United States history from the University of Wisconsin (1963). From 1959 to 1961 he was a legislative assistant in the House of Representatives, and from 1961 to 1963 was a Senior Fellow of the Peace Research Institute. Since 1969, Rabbi Waskow has taken a leadership role in the Jewish Renewal movement beginning with the Fabrangen Community in Buber s tenth yahrzeit. In 1975, as a member of the Fabrangen Havurah and a Resident Fellow of the Institue for Policy Studies, he organized an observance of He founded The Shalom Center in 1983 and serves as its director. From 2002 to 2008, it pursued shared action among Jews, Christians, and Muslims. From 2005 on, it has especially focused on the climate crisis. From 1982 to 1989, Rabbi Waskow was a member of the faculty of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, In 1993, he co-founded ALEPH: Alliance for Jewish Renewal. Rabbi Waskow was ordained a Renewal rabbi in In 2014, he was presented with the first Lifetime Achievement Award by T ruah: the Rabbinic Call for Human Rights. Rabbi Waskow's best-known books include Godwrestling (1978), Seasons of Our Joy (1982), Down-to-Earth Judaism: Food, Money, Sex, and the Rest of Life (1995), Down-to-Earth Judaism, and Godwrestling Round 2: Ancient Wisdom, Future Paths (1996). Sara Scott, Professor Professor Sarah Scott is Co-Director of the Center for Ethics and Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Manhattan College in New York City. She was raised in San Francisco and earned her B.A. in Art History and Modern Culture and Media from Brown University and her Ph.D. in Philosophy from the New School for Social Research. She teaches and conducts research in ethics, 19 th and 20 th century continental philosophy, and the history of philosophy. Forthcoming publications include An Unending Sphere of Relation: Martin Buber s Conception of Personhood, Knowing Otherness: Martin Buber s Appropriation of Nicholas of Cusa, and Martin Buber s Notion of Grace as a Defense of Religious Anarchism. She is currently working on papers on the role of imagination in dialogic ethics and on the recent affirmation in the EU of a right to be forgotten. Additional activities include leading faculty

4 seminars on the Lasallian Catholic mission of Manhattan College and serving as a faculty advisor for the Manhattan College Film Society. Rabbi Max Ticktin, Professor Rabbi Ticktin was ordained by the Jewish Theological Seminary in 1947 and also holds a Masters in Hebrew literature. For nearly 30 years, he shaped the Hillel movement on college campuses focusing particularly on social justice causes and served as National Hillel Director several years. He is also a pioneer in the Havurah and Jewish Renewal movement, creating the "Upstairs Minyan" at the University of Chicago. For more than 30 years he has served on the faculty of the George Washington University's Program of Judaic Studies. A member of the Fabrangen Havurah in Washington, D.C., Max's teachings are built on a lifetime of scholarship, activism, innovation and reflection influence deeply by Abraham Joshua Heschel and Martin Buber. Rabbi Harold White Rabbi White is a native of Hartford, CT. He completed his undergraduate degree at Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT, and received Rabbinical Ordination at the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York City. He served as a U.S. Navy Chaplain and as a congregational rabbi at the Dublin Jewish Progressive Congregation in Dublin, Ireland, and at Beth Israel Congregation in Ann Arbor, MI. He was the B nai B rith Hillel Foundation Director at the American University in Washington, DC, for nine years prior to his being appointed Jewish Chaplain of Georgetown University. Rabbi White is the first rabbi to be appointed to a full-time Campus Ministry position at a Catholic university. He teaches in the Theology Department of Georgetown and has been very active in creating a milieu for Jewish-Christian theological dialogue in the greater Washington, DC area. Rabbi White s current academic interests center on Kabbalistic Studies and the Judaic Roots of Christian scripture. He has been deeply involved in ecological issues and the protection of animal rights.

5 The Schedule 1:00 PM Registration 1:30 Symposium: Martin Buber and the Philosophy of Dialogue Professor Paul Mendes-Flohr, Professor Sarah Scott, Rabbi Max Ticktin 2:30 3:30 Dialogue II Kvutzah Aleph Readings from I and Thou Harold White Kvutzah Bet Why Hassidism? David Shneyer Kvutzah Gimmel Paths in Utopia - From Ancient Decentralized Prophetic Israel to Modern Decentralized Socialism Arthur Waskow Kvutzah Daled Kvutzah Hey Kvutzah Vav The Faith of the Bible: Divine Dialogue and Interpretation Max Ticktin Religious Dialogue: Between God and Man: Buber s Contribution to Interfaith Dialogue Sarah Scott Dialogic Principles Paul Mendes-Flohr 3:45 4:45 Dialogue II Kvutzah Aleph Kvutzah Gimmel Kvutzah Daled Kvutzah Hey Kvutzah Vav Readings in I and Thou Harold White Paths in Utopia - From Ancient Decentralized Prophetic Israel to Modern Decentralized Socialism Arthur Waskow Palestinians and Jews on the Land A Shared Future Aaron Shneyer Religious Dialogue: Between God and Man: Buber s Contribution to Interfaith Dialogue Sarah Scott Dialogic Principles Paul Mendes-Flohr 5:00 PM Symposium Applied Buber for the 21 st Century 5:45 Siyum

6 About Am Kolel Am Kolel is an independent Jewish community dedicated to Jewish renewal by addressing spiritual needs in a welcoming, inclusive manner and responding to issues facing society with a progressive Jewish presence. Am Kolel means "an inclusive people." We celebrate the spiritual warmth of Judaism in a form that is joyful and personal. We reflect the ideals and principles of the Jewish Renewal Movement. Sponsored by Am Kolel Jewish Renewal Community In partnership with the Jewish Study Center Foundation for Jewish Studies, Kehila Chadasha, Congregation Beth El of Montgomery County and Fabrangen Havurah