Judaism and Science: New Directions

Session Submission Type: Roundtable

Abstract

The field of science and religion has been dominated by the study of Euro-American Protestant elites. When Judaism is included in religion and science conversations, it is too often on the terms set by the same normative formations. Drawing on critical insights and tools from science and technology studies (STS), religious studies, sociology, anthropology, and history, our presenters will collectively demonstrate that negotiations of science and religion are shaped by political power, which manifests in different ways in particular nation-state contexts.

The discussion will be rooted in ethnographic research conducted in Israel the US among Orthodox and non-Orthodox communities and will address the following questions: How does a comparative approach contribute to a more nuanced understanding of Jewish negotiations of science and religion? What epistemological and theological discourses influence science and religion as it is lived and studied? How do different social-political settings manifest in Jewish interpretations of science? And, what are the broader ramifications of these divergences?

To begin to address these questions, a pair of researchers will discuss how Haredi medical ASKANIM (self-ascribed communal experts) with very limited formal science education engage in and mediate science and medicine for Haredi publics in Israel.
The next presenter will examine popular and scientific debates over epigenetics and inherited Holocaust trauma in the United States and Israel. It will show how the authoritative language of molecular biology is entangled in re-negotiations of ethnic and religious collective identity.
The third presentation will focus on Jewish engagements with food and agricultural science in the United States. It considers how American Jews involved in community farming and kashrut engage in scientific conversations about what is "fit to eat."

Our final presentation will focus on new modalities of Hasidic healing, including new engagements with alternative medicine and psychotherapy, in the US and Israel. It will explore how Hasidic medical cosmologies interact with contemporary social and political questions in a post-Covid context defined by a rising skepticism towards the medical establishment.
Our moderator will both raise further questions and organize discussion with the goal of creating a lively, open discussion.

Sub Unit

• Interdisciplinary Approaches

Moderator

• Mara Benjamin, Mt. Holyoke College

Discussants

• Lea Taragin-Zeller, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

• Mendi Yaacobovitz, Hebrew University in Jerusalem

• Cara Rock-Singer, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

• Adrienne Krone, Allegheny College

• Rachel Feldman, Dartmouth College

Zoom Host

• Zoom Host 12