Deutsch-jüdische Geschichtsschreibung nach der Shoah : die Gründungs- und Frühgeschichte des Leo Baeck Institute

A study of the prehistory, foundation in Jerusalem in 1955, and first decade of the Leo Baeck Institut, an organization dedicated to the study of German Jewish history. Traces the idea of establishing this kind of research institute in exile, not in Germany, to the years following Hitler's rise to power. Before 1938, when Jewish historical research was banned by the Nazis, Jewish intellectuals still thought it possible to continue work in Germany. In the early 1940s German Jewish plans included the creation of a research intitute in the U.S., in response to Nazi "historiography". After 1945, in the face of the devastation of Jewish life in Germany, return was deemed impossible, and historiography was reoriented to serve as commemoration. Emphasizes the role of historian Eugen Täubler in this new orientation, and in the many projects that paved the way for the LBI. For many years these projects failed due to lacking financial and political resources, but German reparations in 1953 enabled the establisment of the institute. Until 1965, when a new generation took over, the LBI's view of history was colored by its members' personal history of persecution. Historiography's memorial function was in the foreground, German Jewish symbiosis was glorified, and the time after 1933 was ignored. 1. Aufl. 319 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm