From Publishers Weekly
Many recent studies of Black-Jewish relations assume that the two ethnic categories are mutually exclusive. Not so, according to the two Swarthmore College historians who edited this absorbing volume. A 1990 national survey found that 2.4% of American Jews--about 132,000 people--identify themselves as black and that 239,000 African-Americans claim some personal connection with Judaism. The ten essays that comprise this collection offer "a suggestive sample" of their varied stories. The most interesting chapters examine the terms in which African-American Jews negotiate their compound identities in the context of a wider culture that is generally unsympathetic. Other essays examine such topics as the theological connections between Judaism and African-American varieties of Islam, the appropriation of abandoned synagogues by African-American congregations and the employment of Jewish stereotypes among Haitian practitioners of Vodou. One may quibble with the selection: a celebratory essay on Abraham Joshua Heschel's relationship with Martin Luther King seems decidedly out of place, and there are two chapters on the Hebrew Israelites, a small sect of black Americans who emigrated to Israel in 1969, but none on the Falasha Jews of Ethiopia, whose cause appeals neither to Pan-Africanists nor to Zionists. However, the book's eclectic nature is also one of its strengths, revealing the great diversity and complexity of modern religious responses to the questions of ethnic identity. (Jan.) Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Recent events, e.g., the Million Man March, anti-Semitic statements by the Rev. Louis Farakhan, and African American leaders' sometimes vocal support of Palestinian self-determination, have occasioned a public examination of relations between the African American and Jewish communities, making this outstanding collection timely indeed. Chireau and Deutsch (religion, Swarthmore) have collected well-written essays by qualified scholars and journalists that demonstrate just how nebulous are the boundaries and identities of black, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim communities. Topics include the various groups that identify themselves as black Jews or Hebrews; the Nation of Islam's rhetoric; the influence of Martin Luther King on Abraham Heschel; interest in the builder-prophet Nehemiah among black leaders; and the appropriation of former synagogues as urban churches. In all, the essays make clear the intensely human and complex processes by which people build their religious identities. Highly recommended for all public and academic libraries.-Steve Young, Montclair State Univ., NJ Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From Kirkus Reviews
paper 0-19-511258-X A timely collection of ten essays, all by scholars, that sensitively examine the deep but often fraught religious ties between Jews and African-Americans. As the editors, both professors of religion at Swarthmore, explain in their introduction, these essays do not propose a theory about dialogue or relations between the two groups but rather ``explore the critical role of religion in defining and shaping the relationship between the two peoples.'' It is a role they feel has been neglected in favor of political and social associations that underestimate the potent religious symbols and beliefs that connect them. During the period of slavery, African-Americans were comforted by the example of Moses leading his people from bondage in Egypt to freedom in the Promised Land. Editor Chireau, in Black Culture and Black Zion, describes how analogies in the experiences of blacks and Jews have led to a concentration on the Hebrew Scriptures as well as a growing identification with Judaism itself. Blacks who thought of themselves as Jews established congregations with their own rabbis. African American Jews depicts the often challenging efforts of black Jews or children of interracial marriages to practice their faith, while Another Exodus describes the history and fate of the American- born Black Hebrew Israelites, who have emigrated to Israel in search of deliverance and now live, after an often rocky relationship with the Israeli government, in a Negev Desert settlement. Other essays detail the ways in which readings of Biblical texts have shaped the relationship between the Nation of Islam and Jews; the transformation of inner-city synagogues into black Christian churches; and the close friendship between Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., who both believed in a loving God, rather than the ``unmoved Mover'' of the Aristotelian tradition. An illuminating corrective to conventional wisdom and conventional prejudice. -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.


Book Description
Black Zion explores the myriad ways in which African American religions have encountered Jewish traditions, beliefs, and spaces. The collection's unifying argument is that religion is the missing piece of the cultural jigsaw puzzle, that much of the recent turmoil in black-Jewish relations would be better understood, if not alleviated, if the religious roots of those relations were illuminated. Toward that end, the contributors look a number of provocative topics, including the concept of the Chosen People, the typological identification of blacks with Jews, the actual identification of blacks as Jews, the sacredness of space and symbols, the importance of scriptural interpretation in creating theology and self understanding, the dialectic of exile and redemption in communal history, and the integration of ethnicity and religion in constructing group identity. Ranging from the Nation of Islam to the Hebrew Israelites and from Abraham Joshua Heschel to Martin Luther King, Jr., the book sheds light on a little examined but vitally important dimension of black-Jewish relations in America: religion.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Black Zion explores the myriad ways in which African American religions have encountered Jewish traditions, beliefs, and spaces. The collection's unifying argument is that religion is the missing piece of the cultural jigsaw puzzle, that much of the recent turmoil, in black-Jewish relations would be better understood, if not alleviated, if the religious roots of those relations were illuminated. Toward that end, the contributors look a number of provocative topics. Ranging from the Nation of Islam to the Hebrew Israelites and from Abraham Joshua Heschel to Martin Luther King, Jr., the book sheds tight on a little examined but vitally important dimension of black-Jewish relations in America: religion.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

Many recent studies of Black-Jewish relations assume that the two ethnic categories are mutually exclusive. Not so, according to the two Swarthmore College historians who edited this absorbing volume. A 1990 national survey found that 2.4% of American Jews--about 132,000 people--identify themselves as black and that 239,000 African-Americans claim some personal connection with Judaism. The ten essays that comprise this collection offer "a suggestive sample" of their varied stories. The most interesting chapters examine the terms in which African-American Jews negotiate their compound identities in the context of a wider culture that is generally unsympathetic. Other essays examine such topics as the theological connections between Judaism and African-American varieties of Islam, the appropriation of abandoned synagogues by African-American congregations and the employment of Jewish stereotypes among Haitian practitioners of Vodou. One may quibble with the selection: a celebratory essay on Abraham Joshua Heschel's relationship with Martin Luther King seems decidedly out of place, and there are two chapters on the Hebrew Israelites, a small sect of black Americans who emigrated to Israel in 1969, but none on the Falasha Jews of Ethiopia, whose cause appeals neither to Pan-Africanists nor to Zionists. However, the book's eclectic nature is also one of its strengths, revealing the great diversity and complexity of modern religious responses to the questions of ethnic identity. (Jan.) Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal