Benyomen Moss: An Unchosen People

This week on The Yiddish Voice / דאָס ייִדישע קול, we featured an
in-depth conversation with historian Benyomen
Moss (Kenneth B. Moss), the Harriet and Ulrich E. Meyer
Professor of Jewish History at the University of Chicago. He
spoke with Sholem Beinfeld, professor emeritus
at Washington University, St. Louis, about his book An Unchosen
People: Jewish Political Reckoning in Interwar Poland (Harvard
University Press, 2021). We reached Moss in Chicago via Zoom on
Jan. 19, 2025.


What future did Poland's Jews imagine for themselves in the years
between the world wars? As antisemitism intensified and
liberalism faltered, some Polish Jews sought new ways to
understand their community’s place in an increasingly hostile
world. Moss explores how these Jewish thinkers grappled with
diasporic vulnerability, the forces of nationalism, Zionism’s
promises, and the difficult political choices ahead.


Moss, an acclaimed historian of modern Jewish thought, is also
the author of Jewish Renaissance in the Russian Revolution
(Harvard University Press, 2009) and co-editor of From Europe’s
East to the Middle East (2023). His work has been recognized with
prestigious fellowships and awards, including the Sami Rohr Prize
for Jewish Literature.


Related links:




Publisher page for Unchosen People:
https://www.hup.harvard.edu/books/9780674245105




Review of Unchosen People in Forverts (March, 2022), in
Yiddish, by Mikhail Krutikov:
https://forward.com/yiddish/483574/did-prewar-jewish-socialists-believe-that-jews-had-a-future-in-poland/




Kenneth Moss page at U. of Chicago:
https://history.uchicago.edu/directory/Kenneth-Moss




Music for Tu Bishvat


Victor Berezinsky: Tu Bishvat

Henry Carrey: Tu Beshvat (Music and Lyrics by Beyle
Schaechter-Gottesman)





Intro instrumental music: DEM HELFANDS TANTS, an instrumental
track from the CD Jeff Warschauer: The Singing Waltz




Air date: February 12, 2025