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Twice in the Hebrew Bible—Exodus 17:14–16 and Deuteronomy 25: 17–19—the ancient Israelites were commanded to “blot out” the memory of Amalek, their enemy for all time (as God intended to do as well). Yet, because these texts are a part of Jewish (and Christian) religious traditions, annually these passages are read in the synagogue on the appropriate Sabbath occasions in the annual reading cycle, and linked to the Festival of Purim that is based on the Book of Esther. Over the course of Jewish history, Amalek has served as the symbolic enemy of the Jewish people (e.g., Armenians, Nazis, Palestinians); indeed, all of the enemies of the Jews were and are understood to be descendants of the original Amalekites, and thus worthy not only of enmity but of destruction as well (e.g., Haman, Antiochus, Titus, Hadrian, Torquemada, Khmelnitsky, Hitler). Today, many of those in Israel allied with the so-called “settler movement” associated with right-of-center Orthodox Judaism and located among populations primarily of Palestinian Muslims, and Arabs view them as the descendants of Amalek as well, and thus sanction and legitimate their own at times violent actions and behaviors. At its most transparent level, responding to Amalek is a response to antisemitism, both historical and contemporary. This paper examines the history of Amalekut (“Amalek-ness”) within the Jewish (and Christian) religious tradition, the role of memory and forgetting of those survivors and their descendants traumatized by their enemies, the current manner of branding one’s enemies as descendants of Amalek, and whether, in truth, reconciliation is even possible among enemies of long standing. The implications and consequences for all of the divided groups thus becomes an enormous challenge. Practical suggestions are offered at the end as potential models for both present and future work as well.

This unique volume critically discusses the works of fifty of the most influential scholars involved in the study of the Holocaust and genocide. Studying each scholar's background and influences, the authors examine the ways in which their major works have been received by critics and supporters, and analyse each thinker's contributions to the field. Key figures discussed range from historians and philosophers, to theologians, anthropologists, art historians and sociologists, including: Hannah Arendt Christopher Browning Primo Levi Raphael Lemkin Jacques Sémelin Saul Friedlānder Samantha Power Hans Mommsen Emil Fackenheim Helen Fein Adam Jones Ben Kiernan. A thoughtful collection of groundbreaking thinkers, this book is an ideal resource for academics, students, and all those interested in both the emerging and rapidly evolving field of Genocide Studies and the established field of Holocaust Studies.

Confronting Genocide: Judaism, Christianity, Islam is the first collection of essays by recognized scholars primarily in the field of religious studies to address this timely topic. In addition to theoretical thinking about both religion and genocide and the relationship between the two, these authors look at the tragedies of the Holocaust, the Armenian Genocide, Rwanda, Bosnia, and the Sudan from their own unique vantage point. In so doing, they supply a much needed additional contribution to the ongoing conversations proffered by historians, political scientists, sociologists, psychologists, and legal scholars regarding prevention, intervention, and punishment.

The final years of the Ottoman Empire were catastrophic ones for its non-Turkish, non-Muslim minorities. From 1913 to 1923, its rulers deported, killed, or otherwise persecuted staggering numbers of citizens in an attempt to preserve \"Turkey for the Turks,\" setting a modern precedent for how a regime can commit genocide in pursuit of political ends while largely escaping accountability. While this brutal history is most widely known in the case of the Armenian genocide, few appreciate the extent to which the Empire's Assyrian and Greek subjects suffered and died under similar policies. This comprehensive volume is the first to broadly examine the genocides of the Armenians, Assyrians, and Greeks in comparative fashion, analyzing the similarities and differences among them and giving crucial context to present-day calls for recognition.

In 1951, three years after the United Nations ratified its Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide (December 1948), but almost four decadesbeforethe United States affirmed its own participation in 1988, the (American) Civil Rights Congress (CRC), under the direction of its founder William L. Patterson, presented and later published a petition to the UN under the titleWe Charge Genocide: The Crime of the Government Against the Negro People.² Patterson would later publish his autobiography detailing the events leading up to this all but forgotten moment in history under the titleThe Man

There is no question that, in addition to his critically important volume published towards the end of World War II—Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation, Analysis of Government, Proposals for Redress²—Jewish and Polish-born, naturalized American citizen Raphael Lemkin (1900–1959), “father” of the 1948 United Nations Convention on the Punishment and Prevention of the Crime of Genocide and author of our word “genocide,”³ would have made his scholarly and, perhaps, popular mark with the (eventual) publication of what was to have been his magnum opus: his three-volume History of Genocide (I. Antiquity; II. Middle Ages; III.

The essay is an attempt to construct a new interfaith dialogical universal ethic after the Holocaust/Shoah, after first examining several biblical passages of both the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, namely Leviticus 19:13–18; Matthew 22:34–40; Matthew 5:43–48; and Luke 10:25–37. The author contends that the foundational Jewish and Christian scriptural texts can no longer be read, understood, and either interpreted or reinterpreted the way they were prior to the events of 1933–1945. Thus, following an examination of the scriptural passages in question, a new direction in the construction of such an ethic is suggested: that the only kind of holiness that merits our support is one grounded in ethical relations between all human beings, regardless of particularistic identities, and scriptural support for positions that exclude and distance rather than include and embrace must, ultimately, be rejected.

This contribution is an examination of so-called “religious antisemitism” vis-à-vis the various Christian religious communities and/or denominations at the present time, framed by the recognition that, over the last several years, an increase in antisemitism in the United States has been shown by figures compiled by both the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL). It is further framed by examining the 2015 Pew Research Center Report “America’s Changing Religious Landscape,” and its 2016 “If the U.S. had 100 people: Charting America’s Religious Affiliations.”

As Editor of this Festschrift, after initially discussing this overall project in the context of \"Festschriften\" as a contribution to the academic project, this contribution examines and comments on Part 2 of \"Maven in Blue Jeans\", \"Jewish-Christian-Muslim and Other Dialogues,\" by looking at my own essay as well as those of Eugene Fisher, Daniel Morris, and John T. Pawlikowski (pp. 105–144). Since September 11, 2001, the world of the dialogical enterprise has changed, not only the academy but in the world outside the academy as well. What do these four essays tell us about the current and future states of dialogical and trialogical relations? Can they contribute to furthering this newer agenda? Where do we go from here?