Todd Endelman, “Leaving the Jewish Fold: Conversion and Radical Assimilation in Modern Jewish History” (Princeton UP, 2015)
May 23, 2016
39:43
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In Leaving the Jewish Fold: Conversion and Radical Assimilation in Modern Jewish History (Princeton University Press, 2015), Todd Endelman looks across three centuries and on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean to examine the history of Jews who decided to leave Judaism, most often in the form of conversion to Christianity. While offering new contexts for studying the minority of those who sincerely embraced their new faith, Endelman’s primary interest lies with the hundreds of thousands of Jews who became Christians in the Modern period for what he describes as primarily “pragmatic” concerns – continued obstacles to full political, social and occupational integration in their nations of origin.