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Posted 9-22-99
The College of Arts and Sciences at Case Western Reserve University has formalized an agreement with Hebrew University of Jerusalem to bring Israeli faculty members to campus and provide exchange opportunities for CWRU students.
The agreement evolved after four days of intense meetings last June in Jerusalem between John Bassett, dean of the College of Arts and Science, and Yair Zakovitch, dean of humanities at Hebrew University. CWRU will welcome its first visiting professor in the spring semester.
Accompanying Bassett was Peter Haas, professor of Jewish literature and thought from Vanderbilt University. On September 1, the CWRU Board of Trustees named Haas the Abba Hillel Silver Professor of Jewish Studies (for a 10-year term effective January 1, 2000) and director of CWRU's Samuel Rosenthal Center for Judaic Studies. He succeeds Susannah Heschel.
Susan GriffithYair Zakovitch, dean of humanities at Hebrew University, and John Bassett, dean of CWRU's College of Arts and Sciences, shake hands over a new agreement that will bring Hebrew University faculty members to CWRU as visiting professors and allow CWRU students to study there. |
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Hebrew University, founded in 1924, is the oldest of Israel's five leading research universities. It enrolls more than 22,000 students. This is the first agreement of its type for both the College of Arts and Sciences and Hebrew University's humanities program.
Bassett, with Haas accompanying him for some of the meetings, explored Hebrew University's vast resources and visited with members of its Institute of Jewish Studies, the Jewish Folklore Department, the Mandel Center for Jewish Continuity, the Steven Spielberg Jewish Film Archive, the Harman Institute of Contemporary Jewry, the Rothberg School for Overseas Students, the Vidal Sassoon Center for the Study of Anti-Semitism, the Melton Centre for Jewish Education, the Center for Jewish Art, the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, and the Jewish National and University Library.
They looked at ways to enhance Jewish studies courses and to expand the offerings of CWRU's Samuel Rosenthal Center, which provides programs and lectures for the campus and Greater Cleveland communities.
"Many possibilities exist for the two universities," says Bassett. A committee with representatives from both faculties will look at potential opportunities for distance-learning classes; the use of Hebrew University's vast archival collections by CWRU graduate students; and overseas study opportunities during the summer and academic year for CWRU undergraduate students.
Bassett notes that some CWRU students already opt to spend their junior year abroad in Israel.
Hebrew University is encouraging its faculty members to travel overseas. It will benefit CWRU under this new agreement.
Bassett envisions faculty from many disciplines coming to CWRU. In most years, the College of Arts and Sciences will host two Israeli faculty members, either for an intensive month-long course or for an entire semester on campus.
"It works nicely for us, because it allows us to invite people who have expertise in areas that we normally wouldn't have faculty to teach," says Haas. "We can bolster the program in religion with these visiting faculty members."
Haas points out that Hebrew University has experts in many areas, such as Islam and the Middle East, which are related to topics taught in the religion department. Faculty exchange
Shalom Sabar, director of the Jewish and Comparative Folklore Program at Hebrew University, will be the first visiting faculty member. Sabar, an historian of Jewish art, will visit CWRU in February. Students will finish the semester in independent research projects that they will send to Sabar at Hebrew University electronically or by mail.
Sabar has taught more than 30 different courses at Hebrew University. Topics have included "The Life Cycle in the Art of Jewish Communities"; "The Holy Sites in Folk Art"; "Rembrandt, the Jews, and the Bible"; "Jewish Art in Italy from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance"; "The Synagogue Throughout the Ages: Art and Architecture"; and "Visions of Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Art."
He also has lectured and taught throughout the United States, Europe, and Israel at college campuses, museums, and synagogues. He has been a major organizer behind annual conferences for the Society of Jewish Art.
Sabar received his undergraduate degree from Hebrew University and earned his M.A. and Ph.D. in art history from the University of California at Los Angeles. New religion faculty
CWRU's religion department is one of the smallest in the College. Four faculty members will teach religion in the 2000-01 academic year. Although Haas will begin teaching in the spring semester, he has traveled to Cleveland for meetings and joined new department members Alice Bach and Timothy Beal in discussions on restructuring the department's curriculum.
Haas joined Vanderbilt's faculty in 1980 after receiving his Ph.D. from Brown University in religious studies and the history of Judaism. Prior to his doctoral work, Haas served as chaplain in the U.S. Army at Fort Knox, Kentucky, for two years and for one year in Seoul, Korea. His military experience shaped his future scholarly work in the ethics of religion and science as he counseled soldiers dealing with combat situations.
"These situations raised a lot of murky moral issues which got me interested in how, as a chaplain, I related to the soldiers," he explains.
Haas, who received his rabbinic ordination from Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati in 1974, has written Responsa: Literary History of a Rabbinic Genre (1996), which explores Jewish law and the ethics of the interface of science and religion. His other books are A History of the Mishnaic Law of Agriculture: Maaser Sheni Translation and Exegesis, The Talmud of Babylonia: An American Translation XXXV, and Morality after Auschwitz: The Radical Challenge of the Nazi Ethic.
The Abba Hillel Silver Chair of Jewish Studies was established in 1964 with gifts from the Edith Anisfield Wolf Fund, the Louis D. Beaumont Foundation, and the Jewish Community Federation. The chair honors Rabbi Silver, a friend of the University and a holder of an honorary degree from Western Reserve University.
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