PDF Reformation to Revolution: Politics and Religion in Early Modern England by Margo Todd in History

Description

The dominant theme of post-Holocaust Jewish theology has been that of the temporary hiddenness of God; interpreted either as a divine mystery or; more commonly; as God's deferral to human freedom. But traditional Judaic obligations of female presence; together with the traditional image of the Shekhinah as a figure of God's 'femaleness' accompanying Israel into exile; seem to contradict such theologies of absence. The Female Face of God in Auschwitz; the first full-length feminist theology of the Holocaust; argues that the patriarchal bias of post-Holocaust theology becomes fully apparent only when women's experiences and priorities are brought into historical light. Building upon the published testimonies of four women imprisoned at Auschwitz-Birkenau - Olga Lengyel; Lucie Adelsberger; Bertha Ferderber-Salz and Sara Nomberg-Przytyk - it considers women's distinct experiences of the holy in relation to God's perceived presence and absence in the camps. God's face; says Melissa Raphael; was not hidden in Auschwitz; but intimately revealed in the female face turned towards the other as a refractive image of God; especially in the moral protest made visible through material and spiritual care for the assaulted other.