American Jewish Soldiers & the Liberation of the Concentration Camps
Jewish American Soldiers played an important role in liberating Nazi concentration camps during World War II. Beginning in the spring of 1945, the U.S. Army began uncovering these camps, revealing the horrific realities of the Holocaust. Jewish soldiers, many of whom were fluent in Yiddish, were not only witnesses to the atrocities but also the first to offer solace and a sense of community to the survivors. The presentation will highlight their unique position as liberators that were simultaneously U.S. Army soldiers and members of the Jewish community, emphasizing their ability to communicate with survivors and provide immediate support and understanding amidst the chaos and devastation.
Michael Rugel is the Director of Programs and Content at the National Museum of American Jewish Military History. Prior to that he served on the museum’s collections management staff.
Rugel has frequently written about Jews in the American military. He regularly speaks about the history of Jews in the American Military at museum programs as well as to local schools, synagogues, community centers and veterans groups. He has given Jews in the military and Holocaust Remembrance talks to groups and organizations including at the Pentagon, Walter Reed Army Medical Research Center and Naval Medical Research Center. Rugel has produced a series of videos featuring American Jewish liberators of concentration camps describing their World War II experiences.
Upcoming publications include “The American Serviceman Finding and (Re)creating Jewish Community during World War II” in Michael: On the History of the Jews in the Diaspora published by The Goldstein-Goren Diaspora Research Center at Tel Aviv University. His writing regularly appears in the Jewish Veteran magazine, Jews in Green website, and National Museum of American Jewish Military History website.
Rugel has appeared in multiple documentary films including GI Jews: Jewish Americans in World War II on PBS and Stabbed in the Back: the story of the 500,000 Jewish soldiers who served in the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary) armies during The Great War.
He was raised in Reston, Virginia. He received a Bachelor’s degree in history from the College of William and Mary and a Master’s Degree in Museum Studies from George Washington University. He lives in Dunn Loring, Virginia with his wife Judy and daughter Hadley.
Talmudic Stories: From History to Literature, Jeffrey Rubenstein, (NYU)
How should Talmudic stories about the sages be studied? From the middle ages until recent times, interpreters adopted an historical approach that understood “sage-stories” as relating “what actually happened,” namely the lives and deeds of the sages. Much of the histories of the rabbis and of the Jewish people in the periods of the Mishnah and Talmud were written on the basis of these stories. More recently scholars have shifted to a literary approach that rejects the historicity of the stories and understands them as didactic literature, teaching morals and lessons to the audience. This talk will explore why scholars abandoned the biographical-historical approach and shifted to an understanding of rabbinic stories as didactic fictions. It will also delineate the revolutionary impact of this “paradigm shift” in our knowledge of the history of the Talmudic period.
Dr. Jeffrey L. Rubenstein is the Skirball Professor of Talmud and Rabbinic Literature at New York University. He was born in Johannesburg, South Africa and grew up in Chicago, Illinois. He received his B.A. in Religion from Oberlin College, his M.A. in Talmud from the Jewish Theological Seminary, where he also received rabbinic ordination, and his Ph.D. from the Department of Religion of Columbia University. He has taught at Columbia University, the University of Pennsylvania and the Jewish Theological Seminary in addition to New York University. His books include, The History of Sukkot in the Second Temple and Rabbinic Periods (1995); Talmudic Stories: Narrative Art, Composition and Culture (1999), Rabbinic Stories (Classics of Western Spirituality Series, 2002), The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud (2003), Stories of the Babylonian Talmud (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), and The Land of Truth: Talmud Tales, Timeless Teachings (Jewish Publication Society, 2018). Dr. Rubenstein has written numerous articles on the festival of Sukkot, Talmudic stories, the development of Jewish law, and topics in Jewish liturgy and ethics.