UTOPIAS AND CITIES OF KALMAN ZINGMAN,AN UPROOTED YIDDISHIST DREAMER

The article analyses historical, political and ideological aspects of Sholem Aleichem's collection of political feuilletons, Menachem Mendel. Der tsveiter tom (Menachem Mendel. The second volume). The feuilletons were published in the newspaper Haynt (Today) in Warsaw in 1913. They were written as correspondence between the famous personages of Sholem Aleichem's prose, Menachem Mendel and his wife Sheyne Sheyndl. Menachem Mendel. Der tsveiter tom presents a wide panoramic view of the political and everyday life of Russian Jewry on the eve of the First World War. Sholem Aleichem described many aspects and events of world, and of Russian and Russian-Jewish politics, among them the Balkan Wars, the 11th Zionist Congress in Vienna, Jewish emigration, the Jewish question in the imperial Russian State Duma, expulsion of Jews from villages in the Russian Empire, the territorialist movement and the struggle between Yiddish and Hebrew. In 1913, Russian Jews were, on the one hand, an oppressed minority locked in the Pale of Settlement, but on the other a real subject of Russian and world politics, involved with political parties and civil movements, newspapers, leaders, congresses and the like. Within Sholem Aleichem's final half-fictional half-journalistic work a complicated collective portrait of Russian Jews emerges.     

Anti-Jewish disturbances in the North-Western provinces in the early 1880s

This article is devoted to a single wave of anti-Jewish violence in Lithuania which spread through northern Lithuania during the first half of the summer of 1900. It claims that specific incidents that took place during the first half of 1900 at Konstantinovo (news of an allegedly kidnapped girl, the so-called Jewish “procession” and a domestic dispute between Jews and the priest's workmen) were among the most important reasons for the pogroms. At the same time, it is clear that there were some more general (structural) changes in this society which facilitated the occurrence of violence (changes in the economy, growing Lithuanian nationalism, antisemitic tendencies, and pogroms in the south of the Romanov empire in the early 1880s, because they established the idea that violence against Jews was somehow legitimate). Peasants in the Panev??ys and ?iauliai districts took up violence against Jews because, as they understood it, an offence had been committed which no one else (especially the authorities) would put right and so Jews would go unpunished. Uncontrolled rumours ruled the mobs. Since Catholic peasant religious sentiments had been affected the most, it was common religious identity that drew people into a temporary community of action. When Jews were beaten in public spaces, the doors and windows of their houses smashed, the Jews were not only being punished for their alleged offences, but being shown the clearly delineated boundaries within the local social hierarchy. In public life, Jews were supposed to submit to the monopoly of power enjoyed by the Catholic community. Thus, this wave of anti-Jewish violence essentially differs from the deadly pogroms that took place in the early twentieth century in other gubernias of the Jewish Pale of Settlement.     

麴氏高昌国时期的公主

麴氏高昌王国至唐前期的吐鲁番出土文书中,多次出现了"公主"的记载,包括突厥公主、隋唐的公主,还有高昌王国自己的麴氏公主,她们都对麴氏高昌王国产生过一定的影响.但对于这些公主的身份和主要活动,学界一直存在着诸多争论,本文通过对正史记载的一些讨论,结合吐鲁番出土文书和前贤研究成果,力图能够对这些公主有一个相对清楚的认识.     

阿拉伯帝国为何没能产生重商主义?

从比较经济史的角度看,重商主义的兴起为近代欧洲崛起、资本主义制度的确立奠定了基础;而阿拉伯帝国也曾具有某些发展重商主义的历史条件.社会结构的剧变导致经济模式的改变和重农主义的崛起."哈里发"制度既不能有效动员体制内力量进行国际竞争,又无法与体制外力量建立联盟--像西欧一样发展产业城市、市民阶层.反对重利的伊斯兰经济伦理与由利己主义衍生出的重商主义格格不入.所有这些物质和精神上的动因相互作用,共同决定了阿拉伯帝国难以发展出西方意义上的重商主义.     

作为皇权思想的董仲舒历史哲学

董仲舒的《公羊》学产生了一套思辨历史哲学,本质上是一种皇权思想,与现实政治密不可分。为研究作为皇权思想的董仲舒历史哲学,运用文献分析法,从4个方面分析其历史哲学产生的时代背景。研究认为,董仲舒的《公羊》学具有3个特点:提出天命—神意史观,以天人合一的宇宙论解释历史发展的决定性力量,以君权神授说论证皇权合法性;提出王朝的三统循环的历史规律,将君王上升到历史主体的地位,认为皇权永恒;提出历史变易理论,呼应政治变革。从董仲舒以“三统”说和“大一统”说相配合、相交织的历史哲学是在西汉皇权巩固与扩张的政治背景下形成的,对比同时代罗马帝国未能产生高度系统化历史哲学的情形,这一点更明显。董仲舒历史哲学本质上是一种服务于现实政治的皇权思想,既论证了皇权统治合法性,又为当时皇权政治的发展与政治变革提供了理论依据。     

《百苗图》：近代中国早期民族志

通过对清帝国所绘制的多个版本的<百苗图>的绘制缘由、分类体系、构图方式、人物呈现、风俗描绘、宗教信仰的描述等多方面进行细致的分析解读,说明这一图绘所折射的乃是清帝国关于"他者"的认识与想像.在近代早期进程中,即大约于1500年至1800年之间,不同类型的扩张性国家与帝国,在或经由征讨、或直接殖民、或借助外交而扩张时,收集并记录了即将与之往来互动的人群的信息;并且,对他者的民族志兴趣并非是一个"西方独有的"现象,而是更广泛的近代早期时期的国家建构过程的一部分.     

论高昌地区粟特商业的运营

本文主要是利用吐鲁番出土文书,讨论中古时期该地区粟特商业的运营,特别是分析商队的规模、组成和贸易特点,以及商人在旅途中的衣食住行情况,并由此判断吐鲁番在丝路贸易中地位、粟特人在吐鲁番的势力。     

癌症与重生——罗马帝国、西方文明与基督宗教

造成现代文明的文艺复兴、宗教改革、科学革命和启蒙运动,其根源全都蕴含于中古时代的西方文明之中。然而,西方文明乃"两希文明后代"之说却无法完全说明西方文明的产生。西方文明与希腊罗马古典文明的关系可用"癌症与重生"来比喻。古典文明集大成者罗马帝国的辉煌、病症和腐烂,西方文明的重生及其原因和结果,展现出古典文明与基督宗教在对待人的生命、性和婚姻、社会服务、劳动与财产观念、自由与公正观念等多方面的对立,说明古典文明与西方文明是不同的,导致人类文明空前发达的"西方文明",其重生乃因基督宗教,其灵魂乃在基督宗教。     

中华法系与古代罗马法之“暗合”

中国古代很早就与西方有过密切的法律文化交流。在中国古代的正史文献中,大都记录了古代罗马的风俗习惯和政治法律制度等情况。从两汉至唐宋之际,中华法系和古代罗马法系之间有着很多的交流路径。虽然到目前为止,人们还未找到古代罗马法传入中国的直接证据,也没有发现中国古代的法律典籍传到西方的资料,但从中华法系与古代罗马法诸多的＂暗合＂来看,这些＂暗合＂应该不是偶然的现象,而是彼此双方法律文化交流的结果。     

浅析西部城市在早期罗马帝国发展的原因

在长达二百余年的"罗马和平"时期,罗马帝国西部城市雨后春笋般的涌现,并蓬勃发展。这一成就是多种因素综合作用的结果。概而言之,主要有两方面的原因:第一,帝国经济为城市发展提供了重要物质条件;第二,有效的社会管理为城市发展提供了政治保障。