Knowing the Heart of the Stranger
- With its exhortation “You shall also love the stranger (gēr), for you were strangers (gērîm) in the land of Egypt” (Deut 10:19), the book of Deuteronomy helps cultivate a healthy and appreciative sense of past hardship, current prosperity, progress, and relative privilege. In contemporary culture, where the term “privilege” has become an unfortunate source of contention, Deuteronomy might point a way for recognition of one’s relative privilege in regard to an Other as a basis for gratitude and responsibility. This essay argues that we have gained “privilege” after having been immigrants and strangers in a strange land. Privilege could become an empowering and challenging exercise of counting one’s blessings and considering how these could be used for the benefit of others, including strangers in our land.
| Author details: | Shani TzorefORCiDGND |
|---|---|
| DOI: | https://doi.org/10.1177/0020964317749540 |
| ISSN: | 0020-9643 |
| ISSN: | 2159-340X |
| Title of parent work (English): | Interpretation : a journal of Bible and theology |
| Subtitle (English): | Empathy, Remembrance, and Narrative in Jewish Reception of Exodus 22:21, Deuteronomy 10:19, and Parallels |
| Publisher: | Sage Publ. |
| Place of publishing: | Thousand Oaks |
| Publication type: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Date of first publication: | 2018/03/19 |
| Publication year: | 2018 |
| Release date: | 2021/12/16 |
| Tag: | Continuity; Empathy; Hospitality; Identity; Imitatio Dei; Immigrants; Memory; Narrative; Other; Privilege; Rabbinic exegesis; Stranger; Trauma; ger; gerim |
| Volume: | 72 |
| Issue: | 2 |
| Number of pages: | 13 |
| First page: | 119 |
| Last Page: | 131 |
| Organizational units: | Philosophische Fakultät / Institut für Jüdische Studien und Religionswissenschaft |
| An-Institute / Abraham Geiger Kolleg gGmbH | |
| DDC classification: | 2 Religion / 20 Religion / 200 Religion |
| Peer review: | Referiert |
| Publishing method: | Open Access / Green Open-Access |
