Responsa as a Source of Modern Jewish History

Catalog description

Few historians have begun to explore the rich and diverse ways with which traditionalist Jews and their rabbinic leaders responded to modernity. In this course, students will explore how leading Central and East European rabbinic authorities applied halakha to novel historical circumstances and social conditions. Students will focus on responsa that deal with issues of marital life and personal status: the plight of agunot, especially those whose husbands disappeared at war and those who needed ḥalitsah from a recalcitrant brother-in-law to remarry; the halakhic status of civil marriage; and conversion for the sake of marriage. Students will demonstrate the extent to which poskim proved willing to take changing historical circumstances into their halakhic decision making.