German Jews, Orientalism, and Islam

Starting in the 1830s, German Jews began flocking to the study of Arabic and Islam, launching a century of Jewish identification with Islam as a religion of monotheism, rationalism, and ethical law, which they contrasted with Christianity. Jewish scholarship abounded on the Qur’an and Hadith, and the Jewish fascination with Islam was also represented in translations of the Qur’an into Hebrew, German, and French and the use of Moorish architecture for synagogues. Islam became a template to present Judaism to Europe. How did the rise of German colonialism at the end of the nineteenth century affect the topics and methods of the Wissenschaft des Judentums (study of Judaism) and its exploration of Judaism’s influence on Islam as well as Christianity? How does the Jewish fascination with Islam alter our understanding of European orientalism, and can we identify a distinctive German-Jewish orientalism? This paper will give particular attention to the German-Jewish orientalists Gottlieb Leitner, Ignaz Goldziher, and Josef Horovitz.