difference between Judaic religion and Jewish ethnicity is whollyrnobscured). Courses on tlie Holocaust attracted manv morernstudents than courses on Judaism. Ethnic history, seen as notrnonly continuous but consequential for personal identificationrnand conviction, enjoyed far more interest than those in the classicalrnwritings of Judaism. For the natural constituency of bothrntypes of courses, Jewish students themselves, brought to therncurriculum these same powerful convictions on the selfevidencernof the ethnic and the dispensability of the religiousrnthat animated the community at large.rnWho paid? Blacks got their slots through threats and intimidation;rnJews, on the other hand, bought their way in. Jewishrnphilanthropists, likewise secular to the core, remaikably indifferentrnto the provisions of chairs in departments of ReligiousrnStudies for the traditional study of Judaism, brought millions ofrndollars in endowments for the study of the Holocaust, Jewishrnhistory leading up to the Holocaust, Israeli literature, I lebrew asrnspoken in the state of Israel (but not as written in the classics),rnand the study of the Jews as an ethnic group here, there, and everywhere.rnNot only could the disciplinary study of Judaism notrncompete, but departments of Religious Studies themselves,rneadier prepared to use precious university-funded positions forrnJudaism, now accommodated the new ethnic definition of JewishrnStudies. The externally funded positions would now sustainrncourses on the Jews that in no way pretended to compare withrncourses on Christianity or Buddhism or Islam in those samerndepartments.rnYale’s Department of Religious Studies, its home for JewishrnStudies, has professorships in every discipline but that of religion:rnin history. Oriental studies, literature, but not religion.rnBrown University’s Department of Religious Studies offers norncourses on Judaism, insisting that the Program in Judaic Studiesrndo the work; but that program has no professor educated inrnthe discipline of religion at all! These cases arc not extreme,rnbut typical. The study of Judaism, in essence, is once again inrnI ghetto, matching th e one m which it thrixed before reachingrnthe academy. When Cerman-Jewish scholars of Judaism in thernbeginning of the 19th century aspired to form a university disciplinernand found themselves excluded, they produced outsidernthe academy scholarship more than matching the profession’srnhighest standards, whether in philosoph-, religion, theology, orrnhistory. American Jewish scholars of Judaism in our own dayrnhave indeed found a warm welcome within the academy, butrntheir enclave is a wasteland.rnIt appears that neither the academy nor the Jews welcomedrnthe opportunity presented by the visionaries of the I950’s. Thernacademy would make its ])eaee with self-segregation, and thernJews would seek their home in an intellectual ghetto. Comprisedrnof gcncralists, rich in opinions on everything but qualifiedrnby specialization m onl a few things, and validated by nornrigorous discipline at all, that self-segregated cell of discreternspecialists found little in common in its own academic base,rnand nothing at all in common with the rest of the university.rnToday, the academic and disciplinary study of Judaism takesrnplace in the academy only with considerable difficulty, becausernthe minority that values the academic calling finds itself scarcelyrnable to compete with the sectarian and nondisciplinary studyrnof the jews. How Judaism will be studied in the future will berndictated by whether the academy reeoxers its own vocation,rnwhich has been, and may once again become, the task ofrnforming a coinmunit}’ of shared argument, about commonrnquestions, investigated through autonomous reason, producingrnresults bearing insight beyond all special pleading and claims ofrna prior consequence. But whether the academy regains whatrnhas made it whole is a question that far transcends the study ofrnJudaism. crn() order by credit card, call: 1-800-397-8160 or send check or money order m the amount ol -1′ i > n 11,,rnChronicles, P.O. Box 800, Mt. Morris, IL 61054rn(Discounts available for bulk orders.)rn’For immediate serviee please list on payment or mention uticn orderiiic; SOURCt’ CODE- ‘M1 KS and II’tM CODt’ MLKBrnmmi’^sm»mmiiMWMmM*ii’^rjMm^^*^mmMU,autM^Mj^£3i»mtii!tmiim«wmrn22/CHRONICLESrnrnrn