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>> ix Acknowledgments This book could not have been completed without the efforts of a great many people. Since coming to Georgetown University in 2006, I have benefited from the support of many sectors of the university. These include several generous grants from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the vital assistance provided by the staff at Lauinger Library, and the encouragement of my colleagues in the Theology Department, the Program in Medieval Studies, and the Program in Jewish Civilization. I owe a special debt of gratitude to Maud Kozodoy for her careful reading of the manuscript and for her many years of friendship. Sarah McNamer and Emily Francomano also read drafts of several chapters and offered helpful comments and suggestions. I also wish to thank Jennifer Hammer at NYU Press and the anonymous readers for their incisive suggestions, and to my mentor, Benjamin Gampel, who remains an invaluable source of wisdom and guidance. The outlines of this book were shaped by discussions that took place at a number of symposia on Mediterranean, Iberian, and Sephardic studies. The x << Acknowledgments organizers and institutional sponsors of these workshops merit special recognition and include Aron Rodrigue and Stanford University; Jose Casanova and the Berkeley Center at Georgetown University and Gabriel Motzkin and Yochi Fischer of the Van Leer Institute in Jerusalem; and Gen Liang and Andrew Devereux, with the support of Catholic University and Johns Hopkins University. I am grateful to them for their leadership and to my fellow participants for their energy, enthusiasm, and insights. In addition to these conferences, my work was greatly enhanced by a fellowship awarded by the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH). The NEH Summer Institute held in Barcelona in 2008, directed by Brian Catlos and Sharon Kinoshita, provided me with much-needed time and access to resources, as well as the valuable feedback of my colleagues. My thanks go to Brian, Sharon, and the other members of the Mediterranean Seminar for their thoughtful contributions. On that and subsequent trips to Barcelona , I was also fortunate to have a series of discussions with Jaume Riera and Ramon Pujades at the Arxiu de la Corona d’Aragó and Roser Salicrú i Lluch of the Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicos that helped to sharpen my focus for the book. The researching and writing of scholarly works is often a solitary business , and one in which the loss of intellectual perspective remains a constant threat. I am therefore very grateful to a host of colleagues who helped me to maintain a broad view of my subject, and whose general camaraderie served to buoy my spirits throughout the long gestation of this book. My thanks to Jonathan Decter, Edna Friedberg, Hussein Fancy, Karla Mallette, Bernard Cooperman, Gershon Greenberg, Sarah Abrevaya Stein, Matthias Lehman, Miriam Bodian, Teo Ruiz, Paul Freedman, Simon Doubleday, David Wacks, Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin, Yaron Ben Naeh, and Nadia Zeldes. Finally, I wish thank my family and friends for their unflagging love, support , and good humor. To my wife, Michelle, and my daughters, Joanna and Sage, thank you for bringing so much joy into my life. I could not have done this without you. ...

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