Moses of Oxford: A Jewish Vision of a University and Its Life (2 Volume Set)

Between the thirteenth-century expulsion of the Jews from England, Oxford was home to a significant Jewish community and a noted Jewish scholar known as Moses of Oxford. Some seven hundred years later, his life and work still serve as an inspiration to the Oxford University L'Chaim Society and its dynamic director, Rabbi Shmuel Boteach.Rabbi Boteach reviews profound scholarship (did the bible ever mean the translated phrase 'an eye for an eye' to be taken seriously? - his summary is that it did not); social and academic values (the pressures of achievement, history and tradition); racism; relationships and retaining passion in monogamous sexuality; what he describes as 'the absolute centrality and equality of women' and much else. His broad interest range from Shylock and Darwin, Freud and Star Trek's Mr. Spock.Already regarded as a leading contemporary Jewish thinker, Rabbi Boteach, in this stimulating and comprehensive work, examines both the lessons of the past and looks to the future, exploring the key issues confronting Judaism as the end of the millennium approaches.