Obituary: Jacob Neusner, academic who transformed study of American Judaism

Influential academic Jacob Nuesner. Picture: Emily Darrow/Bard College via AP

Jacob Neusner, who transformed the study of American Judaism, becoming one of the most influential 20th-century scholars of the religion, has died at the age of 84. Neusner died at his home in Rhinebeck, New York, according to Bard College, where he had taught since 1994. He had suffered from Parkinson’s disease.

“He pretty much single-handedly created the field of Jewish studies in this country,” said Aaron Hughes, a University of Rochester professor and author of Jacob Neusner, An American Jewish Iconoclast.

Neusner became an academic in the 1960s, at a time when religious studies at universities was largely focused on Christian theology, according to A Legacy of Learning: Essays in Honor of Jacob Neusner.

At the time, Judaism was taught mostly in yeshivas, or Jewish seminaries, or as part of ethnic studies programmes at American colleges. Neusner pushed for a critical examination of Judaism as an important part of studying the humanities, drawing on scholarly techniques from history, anthropology, literary studies and other disciplines. His translations of rabbinic texts made them broadly accessible, and his scholarship paved a path for non-Jews to also study the faith.

“He brought rabbinic Judaism into conversation with other religions and really made Judaism a mainstream subject in the study of religion in the American university,” said William Scott Green, of the University of Miami, who was a student and collaborator of Neusner’s.

Known for his astounding output, Neusner was the author or editor of hundreds of books and articles, including Judaism: The Evidence of the Mishnah, and Stranger At Home, about the Holocaust and American Judaism. He was a pioneer in studying Judaism in relation to Christianity. His work was quoted so extensively by retired Pope Benedict XVI that Time magazine dubbed Neusner, “the Pope’s favorite rabbi”.

Born in West Hartford, Connecticut, Neusner grew up in the liberal Reform Jewish tradition but with little knowledge of Judaism or Hebrew. He began studying Judaism as an undergraduate at Harvard University, and went on to earn degrees from the Jewish Theological Seminary, the flagship school of the Conservative Jewish movement, and from Columbia University.

Unlike many US Jews of his generation, who were more recent immigrants, his family was assimilated into the country and he had no direct connection to Europe, which shaped his worldview and scholarship.

“He felt there needed to be an American Judaism for the freest Jews in history,” Hughes said.

Neusner eventually said he was returning to the liberal Reform movement. Yet, he became a cultural conservative, who was appointed to the National Endowment for the Arts and the National Endowment for the Humanities, around the time of some of the fiercest culture wars over art. He sided with North Carolina Senator Jesse Helms in his opposition to government-funded exhibits of the photographer Robert Mapplethorpe, among other conservative stands on art and morality.

Neusner was also famously cantankerous, often issuing biting public criticism of others’ work, alienating colleagues and dressing down students. Green said Neusner could also be a generous supporter of other scholars’ work. He served as a president of the American Academy of Religion, and received ten honorary degrees, many fellowships and academic prizes, and was a member of the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton University.