Judaism and Human Geography

Yossi Katz, winner of the 2016 Israel Prize in Geography, is a professor in the Department of Geography, Bar-Ilan University, Israel. Most of Katz’s research work relates to various issues of settlement, society, state, and community in the contemporary history of the Land of Israel and the State of Israel.

"A thesis of the book is that the diverse ways communities adapted to different geographical areas and adhered to traditions, customs, and habits give the Jewish community landscape unique hermeneutic resonance, and reflects how Judaism shaped it… The book demonstrates that Jewish geography is often shaped by the requirements of Judaism, thus making for a unique Jewish geography reflective of halakhah, customs, and folkways of Jews. The book pioneers the way for further research for geographers of religious landscapes… The [diverse chapters] shed light on better understanding Jewish cultural landscapes, and offer insights into human geography across the globe. Recommended."—David B Levy, Touro College LCW, NYC, AJL Reviews“In this insightful anthology, Yossi Katz… is specifically interested in… dipping into the relationships between particular Jewish communities and their physical surroundings. The author, one of the Jewish state’s leading geographers with respect to the study of how Jewish communities, both in Israel and in the Diaspora, have shaped and been shaped by their surroundings, focusses here on the human–environment relationship as it has played itself out amongst various urban and rural Orthodox Jewish communities in the Jewish state, in the United States and in Canada… [T]he author’s anthology clearly represents a very informative and important introduction to the field of human geography in the Jewish state, as well as in the Diaspora.”—David Rodman, Israel Affairs

• Table of ContentsIntroduction1. The Implementation of Jewish Religious Law in the Building of Neighborhoods and Agricultural Settlements in the Land of Israel2. Environmental Concerns in the Bylaws of Jerusalem’s First Neighborhoods3. The Agricultural Settlement Attempt in Kfar Uriya4. The Religious Kibbutz Movement and Its Credo5. HaPoel HaMizrachi Movement and Urban Religious Settlement in the Land of Israel6. Incorporating Jewish Law in Israel’s Land Law, 19697. The Chabad Movement and Beit Moshiach on 770 Eastern Parkway, New York8. “Jewish Toronto”: Street Names, Signs, and Symbols in the North of Metropolitan Toronto9. The Failure of Jewish Agricultural Settlement in Western CanadaBibliography