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a c k n o w l e d g m e n t s The University of Pennsylvania has proven a wonderful academic environment in which to complete this work. My thinking has been enriched by conversations with my students at Penn, undergraduates as well as graduates. Colleagues in the Department of Religious Studies and in the Seminar on the History of the Book have contributed to my reading and thinking; they have also enabled me to sustain the belief that the best academic inquiry is neither inaccessible nor divorced from life concerns. My colleagues in the Jewish Studies program share my commitment to integrating Judaica into the humanities, and Professors David Ruderman and David Stern, the two colleagues whose interests most closely overlap with my own, have served as sounding boards, coaches, and friends. I wish to express particular thanks to an anonymous reader of this manuscript who offered astute criticisms and suggestions and to the scholars who generously read and offered feedback on chapters at various stages of their formation. Professor Yisrael Yuval read the entire manuscript. Professor Robert Brody and Dr. David Sklare read versions of Chapter 1, and Professor Yehudah Galinsky and Dr. Rami Reiner read versions of Chapter 4. Each corrected errors, pointed me to additional bibliography, and challenged my thinking in various ways. Professor Haym Soloveitchik was an unusually gracious and helpful reader of Chapter 4; his sharp criticisms led me to rethink (and jettison) earlier claims that I had made—though certain perspectives with which he disagrees remain in this version. The aforementioned scholars have collectively helped to make this a less flawed work, and I am enormously grateful to each for manifesting patience and ungrudging collegiality. I also benefited greatly from the stimulating questions, challenges, and conversations that followed my presentation of work-in-progress in a number of academic venues: the Department of Religious Studies, the Program in Jewish Studies, and the Oriental Club of the University of Pennsylvania; the Jewish Studies Seminar at the University of Toronto; the Seminar für Judais- 412 Acknowledgments tik of the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität, Frankfurt-am-Main; the Jüdische Hochshule of Heidelberg; the Seminar für Judaistik/Jüdische Studien of the Martin-Luther-Universität, Halle-Wittenberg; and the Institut für Judaistik at the Freie Universität, Berlin. Some of the themes in Chapter 6 were the subjects of articles: ‘‘The Penitential System of Hasidei Ashkenaz and the Problem of Cultural Boundaries ,’’ Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 8 (1999): 201–29; ‘‘Rhineland Pietist Approaches to Prayer and the Textualization of Rabbinic Culture in Medieval Northern Europ, Jewish Studies Quarterly 11 (2004): 313–31, and ‘‘The Rhineland Pietists’ Sacralization of Oral Torah, Jewish Quarterly Review 96 (2006): 9–16. While working on this project, I was a recipient of fellowships from the Stanford Humanities Center, the University of Pennsylvania’s Center for Advanced Judaic Studies, the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Guggenheim Foundation. The first two experiences offered the camaraderie of an intellectual community , and each fellowship afforded me research time whose value cannot be overstated and for which I am enormously grateful. Staff members of the Van Pelt Library and the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies Library of the University of Pennsylvania helped me acquire hard-to-find materials. Thanks to Dr. Arthur Kiron, Judith Leifer, and Josef Gulka for their many kindnesses, and to the interlibrary loan staff at the Van Pelt Library. Thanks, too, to Jason Watkins for his graciousness in addressing computer problems. For permission to reproduce images in their holdings, thanks to the Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Darmstadt, the Bibliothe ̀que Municipale de Rouen, and the British Library. I am particularly indebted to Dr. Rina Talgam, Director of the Center for Jewish Art of the Hebrew University, and to Michal Sternthal, Head of the Section of Hebrew Illuminated Manuscripts at that Center, who graciously shared their knowledge of relevant images. At different stages in this work’s evolution, I received valuable assistance from a number of former Penn students: (then) undergraduate students Yael Landman, David Shyovitz, and Jonathan Winer, and (then) graduate student Yaacob Dweck. It was an honor and privilege to work with each of them. Special thanks to Dr. Jerry Singerman of the University of Pennsylvania Press for expressing early enthusiasm about this project and for ongoing forbearance —and to Erica Ginsburg, Caroline Winschel, and Eric Schramm for [3.144.97.189] Project...

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