Centro Primo Levi
PROGRAMS
May 5
Silversmiths and Literati: Modena’s Jewry from the Renaissance to Emancipation
A multimedia presentation in collaboration with the Municipality of Modena.
May 12
Gods and Laws: The Roman Empire and the Rabbis in Pre-Christian Palestine.
Natalie Dohrmann, University of Pennsylvania
May 13
Longing for the Future: Italians in Israel 1920-2008.
Screening of the film “Chalutzim: Pionieri in Eretz Israel” by Marco Cavallarin and Marcvo Mensa.
Talk by Manuela Consonni, Hebrew University of Jerusalem: “Enzo Sereni: A Jewish Hero Between Two Worlds”.
The program will be held at the Consulate General of Italy. Reservations are
strictly required.
May 20
The Tree of Life. A Film by Hava Volterra.
A conversation with the film maker will follow the screening.
The program will be held at New York University Casa Italiana Zerilli Marimò in collaboration with the Italian Cultural Institute and the Consulate General
of Italy.
Lucia Servadio Bedarida,
photo by Renato D’Agostin.
Seal of Lucia Servadio’s medical degree, Italian Channukka lamp, silk tallit from the collection of the
Servadio-Bedarida family.
Menorah on stone from the synagogue of Ostia Antica, Rome.
Courtesy Jewish Museum of Rome
LEARN MORE ABOUT THE CENTER FOR ADVANCERD JUDAIC STUDIES AT www.cjs.upenn.edu
ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
PAULA FREDRIKSEN
Dr. Paula Fredriksen is one of the world’s leading scholars in the field of Jewish-Christian relations in Late Antiquity
and is the Aurelio Professor of Scripture at Boston University.
She is author of three books and over a dozen articles on early Christianity. Among her numerous awards and honors are a National Endowment for the Humanities
grant for University Professors and a Lady Davis Visiting Professorship of
Ancient Christianity at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Her second book,
From Jesus to Christ: The Origins of the New Testament Images of Jesus,
received the Yale Press Governors' Award for Best Book in 1988. More recently,
her book Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews, won the Nation Jewish Book Award
in 1999.
Fredriksen holds a Ph.D. in history of religions, ancient Christianity, and
Greco-Roman religions from Princeton University and a theology diploma from
Oxford University. Dr. Fredriksen has gained wide acclaim on account of her
public lectures on television and radio programs.
She edited and contributed to a collection of essays about Mel Gibson¹s controversial film, On The Passion of the Christ¹ (University of California Press 2005). She also served as historical consultant for the BBC production The Lives of
Jesus and was a featured speaker and historical consultant for U.S. News and
World Report's "The Life and Times of Jesus."
Her most recent study, Augustine and the Jews, is forthcoming from
Doubleday and will no doubt become a major contribution to the field of the
Judaeo-Christian dialogue.
ODED IRSHAI
Dr. Oded Irshai, professor of Jewish history at Hebrew University, is one of the
leading Israeli scholars in patristic and rabbinic history. He is respected for
combining sensitivity to literary texts with insightful historical
reconstructions, and for navigating the complex literary corpora of both the
Church Fathers and rabbinic literature.
His research interests include Palestine in the Second Temple period, Jews and
Judaism in early Christian historiography, and social and cultural dimensions
of Jewish life in Late Antiquity.
Particularly important is his scholarship on the reemergence of the Jewish
priesthood in Late Antiquity as a social force.
Among his many publications in Hebrew and English, he has produced
groundbreaking work on Cyril of Jerusalem, and has written a seminal article
titled
“Constantine and the Jews: the Prohibition Against Entering Jerusalem – History and Hagiography.” Dr. Irsahi is also the editor of “Zion: Journal of the Israel Historical Society.”
He received his Ph.D. in 1993 from Hebrew University. He was awarded a
postdoctoral fellowship from Oxford University and a Starr Fellowship from
Harvard University
’s Center for Jewish Studies. In recent years, his collaborative work with Paula Fredriksen has contributed to
a landmark study of Jewish-Christian relations in Late Antiquity.
NATALIE DOHRMANN
Dr. Natalie Dohrmann is the Adjunct Assistant Professor in
Religious Studies and the Jewish Studies Program at the University of
Pennsylvania.
As the Executive Editor of the Jewish Quarterly Review, and director of
Publications at the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies, she is responsible for
revitalizing the journal and turning it into cutting-edge scholarship with an
ever increasing readership.
Having received her B.A. from Princeton, she then got her doctorate from the
University of Chicago in the History of Judaism under Michael Fishbane.
Before coming to Penn she was Assistant Professor of Early Judaism at North
Carolina State University.
She has published on early rabbinic midrash with an emphasis on its relation to
Roman law.
Her most recent project is a book edited with David Stern called Jewish
Interpretation and Cultural Exchange: Comparative Exegesis in Context,
University of Pennsylvania Press, spring 2008.