Review Essay: Orthodox Judaism and Jewish-Christian Dialogue [Review of ‘Jacob’s Younger Brother: Christian-Jewish Relations after Vatican II’, by Karma Ben-Johanan].

Abstract

Jacob’s Younger Brother by Karma Ben-Johanan is a fascinating, impressive, but problematic volume, whose author has recently been appointed to a new chair in Jewish-Christian relations at the Hebrew University. The book, the author’s own translation of an earlier Hebrew work, is divided into two sections. The first begins with the ancient, medieval, and early modern relationship between Judaism and Christianity but quickly moves to the Second Vatican Council in the early 1960s and its aftermath from 1965 to 1985. It then devotes entire chapters to two major post-conciliar Popes: John Paul II (1978–2005) and Benedict XVI (2005–2013). In the latter case, Ben-Johanan properly examines his pre-papal career as well, when he was the highly influential Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger. Ben-Johanan is interested not so much in the course of events at the Council but in the deeper issues that it raised. (from Introduction)