Hasidism, Haskalah, Zionism

Hasidism, Haskalah, Zionism reveals how political and literary dialogues and conflicts between the Hebrew literature of Hasidism, the Jewish Enlightenment, and Zionism interacted with each other in the nineteenth century. Hever implements postcolonial theories and theories of nationality to analyze how Jews used literature to make sense of hostility directed toward Jews from their European “host” countries and to set forth their own ideas and preferences regarding their status, control, and treatment. In doing so, Hever theorizes the Enlightenment’s intellectual aims and cultural influences, tracking how the models of integration crucial to Haskalah gave way to Jewish nationalism in the twentieth century.