A Short History of the Jews »

Michael Brenner is professor of Jewish history and culture at the University of Munich. His books include "Zionism: A Brief History" and "After the Holocaust: Rebuilding Jewish Lives in Postwar Germany "(Princeton).

"Drawing on the best recent scholarship and wearing his formidable learning lightly, Michael Brenner has produced a remarkable synoptic survey of Jewish history. His book must be considered a standard against which all such efforts to master and make sense of the Jewish past should be measured."--Stephen J. Whitfield, Brandeis University

"With his characteristically deft touch, Michael Brenner has produced a sweeping and riveting account of Jewish history from Biblical times until the present day. This slender volume is lively, engaging, and a pleasure to read."--John M. Efron, University of California, Berkeley

"Brenner is a proven author with a broad competence in Jewish history, which makes him one of the few Jewish historians able to handle a volume of such large scope. His book has a novel approach that sets it apart from other one-volume histories. It is intended as a first book in Jewish history for readers with little knowledge of the subject. The style is extraordinarily readable."--Michael A. Meyer, author of Judaism within Modernity

Publishers Weekly

In this concise but all-encompassing account of the Jews, Brenner (After the Holocaust) does a remarkable job of escorting readers from the biblical narrative of Abraham's journey from Ur and idolatry through the treacherous, monotheistic course of Jewish history, concluding with modern-day Israeli society. A professor of Jewish history at the University of Munich, Brenner treats much of the biblical narrative as lore, accepting as fact only those stories and time lines corroborated by extra-biblical evidence. Wandering, tradition, and tragedy emerge as themes as the Jews, once exiled from their biblical homeland of Israel, spend much of history defending their religion, being coerced to forsake it, and yearning for the re-establishment of the Temple. Tragedies have followed the Jews: Crusades, expulsions, book burnings, the Holocaust; yet there have also been periods of efflorescence and development during which the Jews have thrived and produced works of great scholarship and innovation. Brenner's work successfully conveys, in a comprehensive and comprehensible fashion, the enduring history of the Jewish people.
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Chapter 1: From Ur to Canaan A Wandering People 1
Chapter 2: From Exile Back Home Priests and Prophets 19
Chapter 3: From Hebrew into Greek Disdain and Admiration 31
Chapter 4: From Modiin to Jerusalem A Jewish State Stands and Falls 39
Chapter 5: From Jerusalem to Yavneh The Diaspora Legitimates Itself 55

Chapter 6: From Medina to Baghdad Under Islamic Rule 69
Chapter 7: From Sura to Cordoba Sepharad--Jewish Culture on the Iberian Peninsula 83
Chapter 8: From Lucca to Mainz Ashkenaz--The Roots of Central European Jewry 95
Chapter 9: From Lisbon to Venice Expulsions and Their Aftermath 117
Chapter 10: From Khaybar to Rome Messianic and Mystical Movements 137

Chapter 11: From West to East A New Center in Poland 151
Chapter 12: From Dessau to Berlin Rural Jews, Court Jews, and Enlightenment Philosophers 167
Chapter 13: From the Ghetto to Civil Society Political Emancipation and Religious Reform 189
Chapter 14: From Posen to New Orleans Starting Over in America 209
Chapter 15: From the Shtetl to the Lower East Side East European Jewish Dreams and American Realities 223

Chapter 16: From Budapest to Tel Aviv An "Old New Land" in Zion 255
Chapter 17: From Tétouan to Teheran The Europeanization of Jews in the Islamic World 273
Chapter 18: From Czernowitz to Cerna?ut,i Political Crisis and Cultural Florescence between the Wars 287
Chapter 19: From Everywhere to Auschwitz Annihilation 319
Chapter 20: From Julius Streicher's Farm to the Kibbutz The Jewish World after the Holocaust 349

Appendix: Jewish History in Numbers 389
Further Reading 393
Picture Credits 401
Index of Names 405
Index of Place Names 415