Jewish History (2011) 25: 407–408 © Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2011DOI: 10.1007/s10835-011-9144-0B O O K R E V I E W

Michael Brenner. Prophets of the Past: Interpreters of JewishHistory (Trans. Steven Rendall).Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010. 295 pps. + bibliography& index

BRIAN HOROWITZTulane University, New Orleans, USAE-mail: horowitz2@gmail.com

In his new book Michael Brenner makes the claim that historical writingabout Jews has been governed by such circumstances as the historian’s polit-ical goals and ideology, the political milieu in which the historian lives, andhis or her personal proclivities. Brenner writes about Immanuel Wolf, a mem-ber of the Wissenschaft des Judentums who insisted on scholarly objectivitybut also fought for political equality. About these incompatible goals, Bren-ner writes, “This contradiction, between undertaking scholarship for schol-arship’s sake and putting scholarship in the service of a higher ideological orpolitical end, was to characterize studies of the Jewish past in the nineteenthcentury” (p. 30). Indeed, the history of Jewish historiography over the lasttwo centuries has reflected the tension between the use of historiography forpolitical goals and historical study for its own sake.

Brenner follows the historiographic trajectory through tsarist Russia, tothe English-speaking world, Israel, and then chronologically up to recentyears. He shows that the tension of ideology versus pure history continued inlate-tsarist Russia, where Simon Dubnov emerged as the leading light. Dub-nov’s innovation, as Brenner correctly notes, was to depict the social historyof the Jewish community in Eastern Europe, its make-up, political institu-tions, and social and cultural forms in order to legitimize his idea of culturalautonomy that represented a political solution for Jews that emphasized self-determination, including control over local taxation, education, culture, andcivil law. Dubnov’s approach spread to his students, in whose work it be-came conventional to combine historical study and political struggle. Thesame may be said of some historians in Israel, writing, in particular, in thedefense of Zionist principles.

The tension between politics and pure historical study continued in theEnglish-speaking world. Brenner focuses on Cecil Roth and Salo Baron,both of whom attained important university positions in London and NewYork respectively. Baron is one of Brenner’s favorites because he shifted the

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paradigm that greater liberalism and freedom meant a Jewish step forwardby demonstrating that emancipation and integration were accompanied bygreater anti-Semitism and ultimately led to the Holocaust. Baron and Rothalso confronted the tension of Jewish historical writing in a new way. Insteadof treating Jews in repressive societies, they tried to construct a Jewish his-torical narrative in free liberal societies in which Jewish feelings of identitywere gradually weakening.

In the book one gets a sense that the author understands Jewish historio-graphical tension as an affect of minority group struggle. Not even works ofhistory were to be set aside on the road to equal rights and social status. YetBrenner seems to prefer that this tension be overcome and put aside, albeitthis is a goal that remains to be achieved. Attempts to sidestep it have re-sulted in actually emphasizing its hovering presence. For example, Brennerwrites about David Biale’s 2002 compendium of essays by leading scholars,Cultures of the Jews, that while the book tries to turn away from the old de-bates over Israel versus the diaspora, religion versus nation, master narrativesversus local empiricism, it ends by reaffirming them. He writes: “The debateabout Cultures of the Jews shows that at the beginning of the twenty-firstcentury and outside Israel, the old questions about how Jewish history shouldbe presented, how Jews are defined, or how successful or unsuccessful theirintegration into their environments was have lost none of their relevance orexplosiveness. Cultures of the Jews thus stands not at the beginning but ratherat the end of a long-term historiographical development” (p. 208).

The questions Brenner poses will without doubt continue to affect thestudy of Jewish history in the decades to come, making this book a necessaryone for the Jewish historian. At the same time, reflection about the book’sgoal and contrasting it to other similar works that have recently appearedshould lead members of the Jewish historical profession to ask why someof its leading members have now turned to meta-historical debate. ClearlyProphets of the Past will play a central role in the discussion.1

Note

1. See also Moshe Rosman’s How Jewish is Jewish History?, Jeremy Cohen and Moshe Ros-man, eds., Rethinking European Jewish History, Marion Kaplan and Deborah Dash Moore,eds., Gender and Jewish History, and Todd Endelman’s Broadening Jewish History: To-wards a Social History of Ordinary Jews.