2018 Fluid Boundaries: Rivers and the Jewish Communities of Early Modern Ashkenaz
This discussion explores the interactions between Jews and the natural world. The session focuses around Jewish engagement with rivers, and how waterways shaped the spatial dimensions of daily life. The discussion revolves around three sources from Central Europe that examine the ways in which thinking with rivers can lead us to explore not only the human-made spaces of a landscape, but also the natural elements at their outer limits. Each source sheds light on an aspect of the experience of environment and the role of space in Jewish life, and together offer a portrait of the place of water as a zone of physical and cultural interaction.