dents to patriarchal values in our lawsrnand customs,” she notes. Is that so?rnDoes literature suggest law? What isrnthe evidence for this linkage? Similady,rnshe contends that “exposing the racial attitudesrnimplicit in Western historians’rnaccounts of the world may arouse criticismrnof American foreign policy.” Alas,rnit may, but such criticism could be illadvised.rnWas the American foray intornSomalia an expression of deep-seatedrnracist views? Even to pose the question isrnto expose the absurdity of Craige’s conclusion.rnCuriously, it is not most conservativesrnwho adopt a static conception of society,rnbut rather relativists who oppose objectivitvrn—except the truth that they havernalready uncovered, The pursuit of truthrnis a tortuous road lined entirely withrnevidence that is weighed, sifted, andrnrefined. For self-described “culturalrnholists” (Craige’s unfortunate phrase),rntruth is evolutionary until one confrontsrnthat epiphany, that moment when thernblinding formula of revelation is apparent.rnThere the cultural holists see thern”truth” of race, gender, class, and multiculturalism.rnEvery conception, every idea from Platornto Shakespeare, is put through thisrnformulaic scholarlv net. If one deviatesrnfrom the pattern, he is criticized as arnconservative hopelessly devoted to a staticrnview of society. If one calls for evidencernto justify this conception, he isrndescribed as lacking the requisite imaginationrnto appreciate our stage in evolution.rnIf a conservative contends that thernliterary canon is d’namic, allowing forrnthe addition of books whose universalityrnand human experience touch every reflectivernstudent, cultural holists raise thernbanner of race, class, gender, and multiculturalism.rnYes, the academy must remain a siternfor vociferous quarrels over what is true.rnNo quarter has a monopoly on its pursuitrnor acquisition. But it is not the conser-rnativc who wants to silence his academicrnfoes; it is the cultural holist who, assumingrnshe has found the culturalrnRosetta stone, maintains that all scholarsrnshould embrace it. From the emptinessrnof relativism emerges a peculiar totalitarianismrnthat rejects all views but thosernin the radical canon. This, I shouldrnhastily note, is called “antiauthoritarianism.”rnOf course, it may be called anything,rnbut its fragrance is distinctly OrwcUianrnand, for those who listenrncarefulh, the drumbeat one hears is of arnrigid orthodoxy pounding within ivyrnwalls for recognition.rn—Herbert LondonrnT H E AMERICAN ACADEMY ofrnReligion should change its name to thernAmerican Unacademy of Ethno-Religio-rnSecular Fashions, if its call for papers forrnits annual meeting in Washington thisrnautumn is any indication of trends torncome. None of the classics, at least of Judaism,rnis going to find a place on the program.rnThe section on the study of Judaism,rnwhich I founded when I was AAR vicepresidentrnin 1967 and chaired in the earlyrn1980’s, has surrendered to the chic,rngiving us Judaism a la mode in place ofrnthe solid, nourishing fare of times past.rnThe same section that, when I chaired it,rnyielded ]udaisms and Their Messiahs atrnthe Turn of the Christian Era (CambridgernUniversity Press) and found space for everybody’srninterests has now turned exclusionary.rnNon-feminists, non-postmodernists,rnnon-ethnic-ideologists,rnpeople not “with it” need not apply.rnAnd, it goes without saying, no onernworking on the classic sources of Judaismrnand addressing the perennial problems ofrnJudaic learning has a place on the program.rnThat is not because the committee inrncharge—headed by the obligatory woman,rnan unknown from somewhere downrnhere near Disney World, and an unseededrnmale from New Jersev—hints that itrnwould like something suitable for paddlingrnin the mainstream. It is because, inrnso many words, they say—and the italicsrnare theirs—”Please submit papers onlyrnon one of the following eight topics. Wernwill compose sessions out of the five topicsrnthat have elicited the strongest collectionsrnof papers.” No pretense at inclusionrnhere.rnThe AAR might as well have said,rn”Maimonides need not apply.” I meanrnby this that the AAR’s version of thernstud) of Judaism now simply excludesrnanything that is not absolutely current.rnTrue, what they exclude endures, andrnwhat they include will be obsoletern20 minutes after the Washington meetingrncloses. Those of us who foundedrnthe field remember the circuses ofrnyesteryear—”the death of God,” whichrneveryone had to discuss in 1969, forgottenrnalong with its proponents, is onlyrnone.rnWell, then, what are this year’s acts?rnHere is their language, not my meanspiritedrncaricature: “Language, Being,rnand the Names of God; The Holocaustrnin Historical Context (new historical researchrnin response to issues of uniqueness,rnrevisionism, and language); Issuesrnin Jewish Medical Ethics; HasidicrnHermeneutics (classical Hasidic approachesrnto the interpretation of Scripturernand of other genres of rabbinic literature);rnJudaism and the Senses (touch,rntaste, smell, etc.); Jewish Memory; SociohistoricalrnStudies of Jewish Women; andrnJewish or Christian Approaches to Textuality.rnInterpretation, and Suffering.”rnThe cochairmen have given us at onernand the same moment both utter chaosrnand a perfectly lucid statement of whatrnthey do not want. The chaos comesrnwith the mixture of the ethnic and thernreligious. “Jewish” stands for the Jews asrna collection of ethnic groups; it canrnmean anything. Thus “Jewish MedicalrnEthics” can be how any Jewish doctorrnpractices medicine. “Judaic” stands for arnclearly defined religious tradition, withrnits canon and its authority and its logic.rn”Judaic medical ethics” would thereforerntell us how the corpus of authoritativernwritings addresses ethical problems pertinentrnto medicine, not what Dr. Cohenrnor Dr. Goldberg thinks we should dornwith a dying patient. But that is the sidernshow.rnThe main event is the mixture of thernsecular and the religious, on the one side,rnand the inane and the incomprehensible,rnon the other. “The Holocaust” is anrnevent in history; for some it even bearsrnprofound religious meaning. But phrasedrnin the language before us, we have nothingrnmore than historical events in historicalrncontext. Papers will address the secularrnissue of an anti-Semitism that takesrnthe name “revisionism” and denies thernfacts of what happened. None of thisrnhas anything to do with either the Judaicrnreligion or, on the face of it, any otherrnreligion. Such a topic would fit well in arnprogram at the American I listorical Association,rnbut it has no bearing upon thernstudy of religion; thus the confusion ofrnreligious and secular. That virus of thernnon-field “Jewish studies,” which holdsrnthat everything Jewish is the same as everythingrnelse Jewish and in which no disciplinernor intellectual rigor pertain, nowrninvades the formerly healthy AAR.rnAnd what should we make of “Jewishrnmemory”? One might propose a paperrnon “memory in Judaism,” or explore thernway in which Heilsgeschichte has workedrnto shape the records of the past. ButrnSEPTEMBER 1993/5rnrnrn