April 15, 2022 • 43 mins
In this episode of ReligionWise, the discussion features Jessica Cooperman, Associate Professor and Chair of Religion Studies and Director of Jewish Studies at Muhlenberg College. Our conversation focuses on the materials and methods that a historian uses to paint a picture from the past, including publicly and privately held archives.
Show Notes:
- Making Judaism Safe for America: World War I and the Origins of Religious Pluralism
(https://nyupress.org/9781479885008/making-judaism-safe-for-america/)
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Chip Gruen (00:00):
W elcome to ReligionWise, the podcast that
(00:11):
features educators, researchers,and other professionals
discussing their work and theplace of religion in the public
conversation. I'm your host ChipGruen, Director of the Institute
for Religious and CulturalUnderstanding at Muhlenberg
College. Today's conversationfeatures Dr. Jessica Cooperman,
Associate Professor and Chair ofReligion Studies, as well as the
(00:34):
Director of the Jewish Studiesprogram at Muhlenberg College.
Sometimes people say aboutreligious studies that it is the
Frankenstein's monster ofacademic disciplines. Instead of
being one whole, it is pieces ofother disciplines stitched
together in order to makesomething new. So the
(00:56):
constituent parts includepolitical science, history,
sociology, anthropology,philosophy, and puts them
together for the purposes ofstudying this thing that we call
religion. Dr. Cooperman's workis actually a case in point. She
was not trained as a religiousstudies scholar, but instead was
(01:17):
trained at NYU in history. So asyou'll hear, she's interested in
American Judaism and theconnection between American
ideas about religion, and theinstitutions of the American
state. Her first book isentitled Making Judaism Safe for
America, World War I and TheOrigins of American Religious
Pluralism. I encourage you to gopick up a copy of that and read
(01:41):
it and think about the ways thatJudaism is incorporated into a
larger discussion of religiousdiversity in the United States,
in particular, for the purposesof integrating Jewish soldiers
into the military during WorldWar I. For the purposes of this
conversation, though we willtalk about some of the issues
(02:01):
that are presented in the book,I'm more interested in her
methods that lead to it. So asyou'll hear, she's an archivist.
Someone who goes into thecollections of papers,
documents, letters, materialscollected by organizations, and
explores those for primarysources that might help to paint
(02:23):
a picture of the historicalpast. In this case, that would
be Jewish identity within themilitary. These sources are very
different from what you mightthink of as scholarly work in
religious studies that veryoften is interested in sacred
texts, or writings that areproduced by religious
(02:44):
individuals for theircommunities, or maybe
observation of religiouscommunities, what
anthropologists callethnographic reports. Instead,
this is taking the actualdocuments, the actual
byproducts, of administration ofthese organizations, whether
they be churches and synagogues,or organizations like the
(03:08):
Salvation Army or the USmilitary, and thinking about the
conversations that are leftbehind in those records and
thinking about how piecing thoseconversations together can lead
to a fuller picture of the past.
Welcome, Jessica Cooperman.
Thanks for coming onReligionWise.
Jessica Cooperman (03:29):
Thanks so much for having me.
Chip Gruen (03:31):
So, you are a historian. You teach in a
religion studies department, butare trained as a historian. One
of my favorite comments aboutthe religious studies discipline
is that it is sometimes referredto as a Frankenstein's monster,
because we put different piecestogether, whether it be
(03:53):
sociology, anthropology,philosophy, history, history of
religions, etc. Can you talkjust a little bit about what
it's like moving from a historydepartment into a religion
studies department? How doesyour discipline, you know,
contribute something a littledifferent? And then we'll talk a
little bit more about the thenuts and bolts of that.
Jessica Cooperman (04:13):
It was an interesting transition in a lot
of ways. I think sometimes thequestions that historians ask
and the questions that peopletrained in other fields,
including religious studies, askare going to be slightly
different. Sometimes that'sexciting. I actually found that
to be a really energizing sortof shift. It did lead me though
(04:38):
to ask different questions. Ithink that historians focus on
maybe political and economicissues in different ways. I
think that historians focus ondifferent aspects of daily life.
And for me, as somebody trainedin Jewish history, it actually
(05:01):
was sort of exciting to thinkabout, not just those larger
structural issues, but questionsabout religious life and about
how people experience, define,think about their religious life
and to develop those questionsin conversation with colleagues
who are trained in other fields,actually was an unexpectedly
(05:22):
rewarding transition for me tomake.
Chip Gruen (05:26):
So you talk about different questions, it seems to
me like there are also differenttools, different types of
sources, not to say that peoplein other disciplines don't ever
use those sorts of sources. Butthe types of sources you use, in
particular, archival research,archival resources, are sort of
a different kind of materialthan we might be used to
(05:50):
thinking about when we thinkabout studying religion. Can you
talk a little bit about, one,the content of those kinds of
archival resources, like whatdoes that look like? And two,
what is that process like? Iknow that you are very often
traveling to removed archives indifferent places, some of which
are digitized, some which arenot. What does that process look
(06:13):
like as well?
Jessica Cooperman (06:14):
Sure, I actually think archival research
is incredibly exciting. And Ithink that it's one of the big
misconceptions that most peopleI think have about history and
the writing of history. We're soused to getting history in a
pre-digested form, right? Mostof us go through school, and we
read history textbooks, thatkind of makes it look like these
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are fixed narratives that havejust been sort of canonized
through the creation oftextbooks. And that's fine. It
serves a useful educationalpurpose. But historians don't
start with the textbooks, theygo and they look for primary
materials, they look for stuffthat was written, created,
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produced in the moment of timethat they're studying, that
they're trying to understand.
And so I think when you startthinking about archival
research, and start doingarchival research, you realize
that those historical narrativesare much more changeable than
they look in a textbook. They'reinterpretations of history that
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come to shape the way thoselarger narratives are presented.
And as the questions thathistorians ask shift over time,
the stories they tell about thepast also shift. And so the
writing of history is, I think,much more dynamic than we
generally get to see when we'resitting in a classroom and
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reading a textbook. Going intoarchives, I find to be really
fun. Sometimes they're a littleoverwhelming. I've done some
research in the NationalArchives, for example, which is
a huge collection of stuff onevery aspect of the federal
government. I've done a lot ofwork with their military
(08:12):
archives. It's an enormouscollection, and it is sometimes
just files and files of piecesof paper. And so when people ask
me like, Well, isn't that alldigitized by now? I think, Oh,
my gosh, you can't imagine howmany pieces of paper we're
talking about. There'll bearchival boxes, filled with
(08:32):
folders, and each folder isfilled with pieces of paper and
a collection, may be hundredsand hundreds of boxes, just
filled with pieces of paper andphotographs and memos and
letters and sometimes newspaperarticles that have been
assembled together. And so Ifeel like doing archival
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research is sort of like goingon a treasure hunt. You pick a
topic, you identify like, well,this collection of documents
might tell me something aboutit. You go into the archive, you
work with archivists to findwhich box out of the hundreds
you're interested in you'regoing to start looking at, and
then you just read things. Andfor me, there is something
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really exciting about being ableto pick up a letter that was
written in 1917 and see thesignature of that person at the
bottom of the page and have thatkind of immediate hands on
experience with this historicaldocument. And then the
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opportunity to think about well,what's the context in which this
document was produced? What werethe concerns that that person
who signed the letter wasthinking about? What were what
were the problems they weretrying to solve, and what other
pieces of information to workout that larger puzzle, can I
find in this collection ofdocuments, or maybe in other
(10:05):
collections somewhere else, thathelp me build a bigger picture
of this moment in time, this setof historical questions.
Chip Gruen (10:16):
And you mentioned the National Archives, but I
know that there are alsosmaller, lesser known archives,
that might be the personalpapers of a particular person or
a community organization. Howdoes going to one of the smaller
archives different from going tomaybe a big, publicly serving
institution like the NationalArchives?
Jessica Cooperman (10:37):
Sure. So the National Archives are probably
the biggest collection that I'veworked with. And there is an
enormous collection. But thereare indeed lots of other
archival collections andarchival institutions. I did a
lot of work for my first book atthe American Jewish Historical
Society, which is in New YorkCity, and they are the oldest
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ethnic Historical Society in thecountry and they collect papers
related to American Jewishhistory. So some of those are
going to be institutionalrecords for an organization like
the American Jewish Committee,or the American Jewish Congress.
I worked with a collectiondealing with the Jewish Welfare
Board. And sometimes they'regoing to be very small
(11:21):
collections, personal papersfrom an individual or a family
or a club, a communityorganization, where people have
preserved papers that wereimportant to them, and then as
they looked either to preservethem, or sometimes to get rid of
them, contact these archivalcollections. And we'll talk to
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the archivists there and see ifit's worth preserving those
papers. And those also arereally exciting to get to look
at one family's story or onegroup of people's story, and to
think about the differencesbetween different types of
archival collections. So Imentioned the American Jewish
Historical Society, I've doneresearch at the Presbyterian
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Historical Society inPhiladelphia, and thinking about
the different types ofcollections they have, the
different types of papers thatyou can find, and how you can
use those documents to build asense of, of the past.
Chip Gruen (12:19):
Yeah, so being trained in antiquity and ancient
materials myself, one of thethings that always was a little
frustrating is knowing that 100sor 1000s of scholars have looked
at some of the materials that Iwant to say something about. You
don't have that problem, youknow, it seems to me a lot of
these archival materials, youmight be the first person with
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professional training to lookat.
Jessica Cooperman (12:43):
Yeah, I think that's right. That's how I kind
of got started on my first bookproject. I was looking for a
topic to write about, I wentinto the, I was in graduate
school at NYU, so I was close towhere the archives were housed,
and spoke to an archivist andsaid, Well, I'm kind of
interested in writing somethingabout the chaplaincy and the
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military. And they said, We havea newly catalog collection of
papers that nobody's looked atyet. Do you want to look at it?
And I said, Great, that soundsawesome. And so I'm sure lots of
scholars have looked at it sincethen, it's a wonderful
collection, but it was excitingto think like, wow, I can use
these papers that not manypeople have seen that have been
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only recently organized and putinto these categories that the
archivists there have gonethrough and sort of carefully
thought about. Yeah, it wasexciting. It is, I think, a big
difference between studying theancient world and studying more
recent history.
Chip Gruen (13:43):
So you talk about, you've used this metaphor of
building on several occasions,the idea that you look for these
materials, and then you're ableto build a narrative, or reshape
a narrative that has previouslybeen told. And then you also
mentioned your first bookproject, which was Making
Judaism Safe for America, WorldWar I and the Origins of
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Religious Pluralism. I want totalk a little bit about that
monograph, about how thesedocuments, this archival work
really enabled you to tell thestory of the building of an
American pluralism, a religiouspluralism in a different way. I
(14:25):
was reading some of the reviewsand praise for your book, and so
many reviewers mention how thisreally reframes the advent of
pluralism, this type ofpluralism, from the context of
World War II back to World WarI. So how did the archives help
you see this and how does thatnarrative spin out differently
(14:48):
after your research, after yourwork?
Jessica Cooperman (14:50):
I think one of the ways in which historians
build those structures, thosenarratives is, certainly for me,
I started with a question thatwas pretty open ended. I wanted
to find out about Jewishmilitary chaplains in World War
I. It was the first time therewas an organized Jewish military
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chaplaincy, I thought, cool,I'll go learn something about
those people. But I didn't havean overarching question about, I
didn't know in advance why thatmight be an interesting thing to
study, or what I was going to beable to show by studying that
group of people. I was just sortof fascinated by that group of
people, and this question of,What did it mean to have
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military chaplains at all in acountry that prides itself on
separation between church andstate; who are these people who
are religious functionaries ofan institution of the state?
What was their job? What didthey think about? How did they
do that job? What was thepurview of their work? And then
what in particular did it meanto be representatives of a
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minority religious community, ofAmerican Jews, in the American
military? So I thought thosewere interesting enough
questions to start with. But asI read the archival collections,
as I thought more and more aboutthe sort of set of questions
connected to these groups ofpeople, not just what are their
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individual stories, but how didthey get their commissions? Who
was fighting for them to getcommissions? What challenges did
they face when they got thosejobs? What was the support
network around them? I realizedthat it was a much bigger story
than just the experience ofthese men. And there are about
25 Jewish chaplains in theAmerican military in World War
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I, so a relatively small groupof people, but their experience,
and then the experience of thisnetwork of organizations and
individuals that supported theirwork and advocated for their
ability to get these positionstold a much bigger story about
shifting American ideas aboutwhat is religion, what is
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American religion, and how doesit fit into American society.
And so there was a long standingand, I think, solid historical
narrative about the developmentof what we talk about as
tri-faith religious pluralism,the idea that Protestants,
Catholics, and Jews are allintrinsic members of this
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American religious tradition,what we think of today as a, or
have thought of since the mid20th century, as a
Judeo-Christian tradition in theUnited States, that that emerges
from World War II. And there'slots and lots of excellent
scholarship about that, andexcellent reasons to think about
World War II as a crucialturning point in how Americans
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thought about religion. But as Iwas doing the research for my
work on World War I, it becameapparent that a lot of the
structural changes and a lot ofthe institutional changes and
even ideological changes thatmade it possible in World War II
for us to think of as the UnitedStates having a Judeo-Christian
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heritage, didn't just instantlyappear in World War II, that the
groundwork had been laid inWorld War I. And so what started
as a fairly focused set ofquestions about the experiences
of a relatively small group ofrabbis working for the US
military kind of grew over timeinto a much larger set of
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questions about, well, How didthe military shape American
ideas about religion? And whydid the American government
change its definitions of whoshould serve as a religious
functionary within the military?
And what can that tell us aboutthe structures of government and
of society and of the needs ofthe American population and of
the way Americans thought aboutreligion? And my conclusion was
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that some of those shiftstowards thinking about the
United States as a tri-faithcountry, with all the
limitations of tri-faith, right,that there are plenty of
communities that are notincluded in that definition, and
were not included in thatdefinition in the mid 20th
century, that those shifts hadhappened earlier than people had
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thought, that they didn't justcome about as a result of World
War II, that the structuralchanges have been put in place,
I would argue, through some ofthe changes the military makes
during World War I.
Chip Gruen (19:33):
So one of the things that's been interesting to me as
I think about publicconversations about religion,
and some of those publicconversations happen through
policy and in this case, you'retalking about the military, the
military is nothing, if notpractical. That we think, What
is the goal of the military?
It's to have soldiers that areready to do their jobs. It is
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not the job of the military to,to explore narratives of
religion necessarily, to makedefinitions of religion,
categories of religion,understand the intricacies of
religious belief and practice,yet here they are at the front
of this movement. Does your workshine a light on the thinking
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behind why the United States,States military is interested in
pursuing this project? I mean,how does it fit their goals?
Jessica Cooperman (20:34):
I think that's a great question. And I
think it actually ties back toyour original question about
being a historian now situatedin a department of religion
studies and thinking more andmore about religion studies as a
field, because you're absolutelyright, the US military did not
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enter World War I with theintention of promoting religious
pluralism. Their concern wasabout preparing soldiers for
battle and building aneffective, efficient military
force. And so they end up beingthis site in which American
definitions of religion change Iargue almost by accident, almost
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as a result of their own kind ofblind spots. That there is, the
military chaplaincy is a veryold institution, and so military
leaders felt like almostreflexively, like, of course,
men need chaplains as they'regoing to go off into battle.
It's necessary to maintain themorale of the troops and the
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moral character of these youngmen. And I don't think that they
intended to make any reforms inpolicy as they made those
assumptions as they got ready toenter World War I, however, the
country had become significantlymore diverse in the years
between the Civil War, the lastmajor military draft and
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conflict that the United Stateshad been engaged in- by the time
they enter World War I, millionsof immigrants have entered the
country. It's a more diversereligiously, ethnically,
culturally diverse country thanit had been in previous years,
and suddenly, the military findsitself faced with resistance to
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old ideas about the chaplaincy.
And so in the interest ofmilitary efficiency, they end up
having to make space for Jewsand Catholics, for Judaism and
Catholicism, within thestructures of the military. So I
think it's, it's not with theintention of promoting
pluralism, it is with theintention of promoting military
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efficiency that they end upbecoming this site in which
pluralism is not only toleratedbut encouraged. But thinking
about my position as a historiannow in a department of religion
studies, I think that issomething that historians can
bring to the table in the studyof religion, certainly in the
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study of religion in the UnitedStates, that there's a way in
which, in public discourse aboutreligion- a category like
Judeo-Christian values, right,that seems like something that
we could identify what thatmeans, or that it would have a
fixed category. But it's not.
(23:28):
That by looking back athistorical documents, by
thinking about, when did peoplestart using that term? And why
did they start using that term?
And what did they mean when theystarted thinking about
Protestants, Catholics, and Jewsall being part of an American
religious framework? By thinkingmore about how and why those
ideas came about, I think thatwe can sometimes destabilize
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ideas that seem like they'rereally fixed. We can appreciate
that they themselves are part ofa changing narrative of American
religion. And we can help peoplethink more creatively and sort
of broadly about how it is thatideas about religion have
changed over time, and what thatcan tell us about why they
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change, and who gets to changethem, and for what reasons. And
like you say, sometimes it's forreasons that are not about
theology, ideology, aspirationstowards pluralism, it's for very
practical reasons that will haveunexpected outcomes.
Chip Gruen (24:31):
So I want to follow this thread just a little bit
more, because it's an examplethat I sometimes use when I talk
about contemporary religiouspluralism that I think that you
will appreciate, is that if yougo today to Arlington National
Cemetery, you will of course seecrosses, you will see Stars of
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David, you probably would,people probably would not be
surprised to know that you see acrescent and a star, symbols of
Islam, but then you seepentagrams, for example, or
symbols of religious traditionsthat are even more diverse than
what we've been talking about inthe early to mid part of the
(25:15):
20th century. Your subtitle isOrigins of Religious Pluralism,
how much do you see thoseprocesses that you trace from
the early part of the 20thcentury impacting the way that
the public conversation in thisparticular public organization
are happening? And how much isthat affecting definitions of
(25:36):
religion and inclusion ofvarious religious identities
within the contemporarymilitary?
Jessica Cooperman (25:43):
I think it's tremendously important, right?
And if you think about thesignificance of a place like
Arlington National Cemetery,that people, all kinds of
Americans for all kinds ofreasons, will walk through that
space and encounter, experiencethese symbolic representations
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of different religioustraditions, some that may be
familiar to them, some that maybe unfamiliar to them, but by
virtue of them all beingrepresented in this space of
deep national significance, thecountry itself, the government
is, the military is givingrecognition, is sort of
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officially recognizing those aspieces of the American religious
tradition, as components of theAmerican religious tradition.
And it's not simply a naturalprocess that led to all those
different symbols being there.
For each symbol that isincluded, there is a story of
people serving in the military,and then of advocating for their
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right to representation in themilitary and having civilian
populations at home supportthem, and having sometimes
members of Congress advocate forthem, and having clergy come and
defend the need for thosereligions to be represented
within the military. And so, youknow, each of those symbols
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represents a different history.
And then collectively, I thinkthey change the way Americans
think about religion, becauseeven without knowing those
backstories, you walk throughthis space and your idea about
religion is changed andexpanded. And then that
appreciation that there's anarrative that accompanies each
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of them, I think, is reallyinspiring.
Chip Gruen (27:38):
Yeah, it's interesting, I would think if
you just talk to an educatedperson on the street and they
thought about the way thatreligious identity is
adjudicated, or is understood inthe contemporary world, I think
the first thing that most of uswould think of is Supreme Court
decisions. Something like use ofpeyote or practice of Santaria,
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or, that there have been a listof Supreme Court cases that have
dealt with this. But it'sinteresting to see these other
sort of conversations, theseother discursive spaces, where
that kind of diversity ishappening, maybe alongside
legislative or judicial paths aswell.
Jessica Cooperman (28:19):
I think that's exactly right. Supreme
Court cases are obviouslytremendously important. But they
represent moments of conflictthat the court will adjudicate,
will then resolve for thecountry. But it's interesting to
notice in the example of themilitary, that these are
decisions not necessarily madebecause there's some sort of
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conflict that has to be resolvedthrough legal means, back to
your original question about themilitary, there's a pragmatic
set of concerns about, How do wemove forward in a way that is
productive and efficient, andwhere can we make changes and
where can we include people orserve people's needs that will
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allow them to be bettersoldiers? And so I think that is
an important other story, thatnot every moment of
renegotiation of our categoriesof religion happens through
legal conflict. A lot of themhappen through these much more,
kind of mundane-looking problemsolving moments that happen in
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other kinds of institutions, themilitary, in schools, and even
just among individuals withincommunities. How will they mark
holidays? Who will berepresented? How will they
decide upon thoserepresentations? Who will be
included in those decisionmaking processes? Those also are
important moments for helping usunderstand how religion gets
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defined and experienced in theUnited States. And sometimes
they are moments of conflictthat have to be resolved by the
courts, but sometimes they'remoments of negotiation between
people and within institutions,and I think those are just as
important.
Chip Gruen (30:05):
So this project, I think it's fair to say, got you
interested in these questions ofreligious pluralism, in what are
often described as interfaithinteractions, which leads us to
your next archival project, whatyou're working on now. And you
don't need to provide anyspoilers on what all you found
(30:26):
so far, but you're interestedin, you mentioned holidays, in
Passover Seders. And you don'thave to interrogate too many
Christian communities before yourealize that there's a
longstanding tradition ofChristians either participating
in or hosting their own PassoverSeders as a, as an expression,
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perhaps, of their ownChristianity? And so how did you
get interested in this topic?
How is it related to thatarchival work we talked about
earlier? And how does it relateto this bigger project of
religious pluralism?
Jessica Cooperman (31:03):
So I became interested in this project
really because it was somethingI'd never heard of. And it was
so fascinating to me, assomebody who studies American
Jews and American Judaism. Iended up in a conversation with
(31:26):
a Lutheran pastor who wastelling me about the Passover
Seder he had hosted at hischurch, and how important this
was to his interfaith connectionto his Jewish neighbors, to
Jewish community, and toJudaism. And I thought, wow,
that's strange, I've never heardof that before- I didn't say
(31:48):
that to him. But I was just sofascinated why, about why
something that seemed totallynatural and obvious to him as an
expression of interfaithconnection between Jews and
Christians was something that I,as a scholar of American Jews
and Judaism, had notencountered. And so that just
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kind of was a question thatlingered in the back of my head
for a while until I had time todo what I do, I guess, when I
have questions, is to go backinto archival collections and
see if I could start tracinglike, Okay, well, what's the
story here? Where does this comefrom? Who is doing it? And how
do different people understandwhat it is that they are doing
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when they either decide to hostinterfaith Seders, or when
churches like this pastor'schurch decide that they're going
to host a Seder of their own?
Could I unravel something of thestory behind that? So part of
what makes that interesting tome is that, while you said it
seems like maybe an obvious partof a lot of American Christian's
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tradition today, historically,that was not the case. So
thinking about, When did thisbecome part of Christian
tradition and why was kind of mystarting question. So it seems
to me that part of that story isvery much about post-World War
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II periods and reconfigurations,sort of like new understandings
of the relationship betweenJudaism and Christianity that
emerged in the post-war period,both among academics and among
theologians, and among concernedindividuals. And then another
part of the story that I foundreally interesting was the
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attempts by Jewish organizationsstarting in, certainly by, the
1950s to use Passover Seder asan opportunity to intentionally
reshape relationships betweenJews and Christians, and to
rethink the relationship betweenJudaism and Christianity. And so
thinking about what Jewishorganizations were interested in
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when they embarked in those onthose projects of using this
holidays as a moment ofconversation and
reconfiguration, and then whattheir Christian partners, or
neighbors, or other Christianorganizations were interested in
when they embarked on thatproject of using the holiday as
a moment of discussion andexploration and thinking about
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both their own tradition andtheir relationship to Jewish
neighbors, Jewish organizations,to Judaism. I just found that a
fascinating story that I wantedto learn more about.
Chip Gruen (34:45):
Yeah, that conversation starts, as you get
into it, starts to look likeother conversations we have in
the contemporary world aboutcultural borrowing as well. That
not only is this a question ofinterfaith relations, or
Christians wanting to talk toJews, or Jews wanting to talk to
(35:07):
Christians, because they eachhave their agendas about
diffusing antisemitism, forexample, or other concerns of
Christians wanting to tie moreclosely to their Jewish past as,
I would hazard, a more nuancedview of the historical Jesus
(35:28):
starts to come into view in the20th century as well. But this
also starts to look likeappropriation, and I know that
some of your, some sources startto get a little bit
uncomfortable with Christiansusing Jewish symbols, Jewish
rituals, Jewish ideas, sometimesin concert with Jews and Jewish
(35:53):
communities, but sometimes ontheir own. How does that add
another wrinkle to this story?
Jessica Cooperman (35:57):
So I think that's the part where I find
things really get interesting tome. Thinking about, What are the
intentions that people bring tothese projects? How do they
differ? Where do they overlapand where do they diverge? So
again, thinking about archivalsources, it was incredibly
(36:18):
fascinating to me to look at therecords of different
organizations that are inconversation with each other
about interfaith projects,Jewish-Christian interfaith
projects, some related toPassover, some sort of more
broad about bringing peopletogether for discussion or
(36:38):
educational programs, and thatthey might be able to work
together on building theseexciting conversations,
conferences, educationalprograms, but the intention that
they bring to it is often verydifferent. As you mentioned,
Jewish groups tended to be,particularly in the post-war
(36:59):
period, very, very focused onfighting off antisemitism,
whereas Christian organizationstended to have theologically
motivated intention about,sometimes also about fighting
off antisemitism, certainly, butin thinking about the identity
of Jesus as a Jew, and how theycould better understand that
(37:21):
experience. And so there aremoments where those two
different streams of intentioncan work together and mesh
really productively. And thenthese other moments where you
see them kind of diverge. And Ithink that's where we get into
that sense of discomfort, right?
At the moment in which you havetwo individuals or two
(37:44):
communities of people, they'reworking together, and then
suddenly their interestsdiverge, then I think that sense
of maybe territoriality comesin, right. Who gets to make the
decision? If we don't agree uponeverything, then which one of us
will be right? Which one of ushas the authority to make a
(38:06):
decision about the content of aneducational program, or in the
case of a holiday where I thinkthe stakes are maybe even
emotionally higher, who will getto make a determination about
what is an authentic experienceof a particular holiday? What
are the necessary ingredientsthat make an experience
(38:29):
authentic or not? And who hasthe authority to decide, I
think, becomes certainly, Ithink, painful and contentious
sometimes for the peopleinvolved in making those
decisions, and for me, as ascholar, I think becomes really
fascinating for thinking about,How do we negotiate
(38:49):
relationships, discussions,dialogues between different
communities where there's typesof understanding that are
definitely possible andfruitful, and then there are
these moments of divergence andhow is that negotiated? What can
that tell us about religion inthe United States?
Chip Gruen (39:12):
So I always like to end our conversations with the
"so what" question. I think thatlisteners will agree with me
that all of these topics areintrinsically interesting within
themselves, and seeing thosenegotiations, seeing the
narratives develop over time,seeing these different groups
(39:35):
sort of vying, sometimescooperatively and sometimes not,
to develop over time. But forthe contemporary, interested
individual, for the contemporarylistener, what lessons do you
think your work and yourconclusions and the historical
(39:56):
antecedents to our world thatyou study, what lessons can we
take from all that to be moresophisticated when we're both
thinking about this question ofreligious pluralism or thinking
about various religiouscommunities in general?
Jessica Cooperman (40:13):
I think the first one is one I mentioned
before, that I think thatlooking back historically helps
us appreciate that things thatseem like they've existed for
all time, almost never have.
That ideas that seem the bedrockof our society, almost all of
them have some sort of moment ofprofound, or maybe multiple
(40:36):
moments of profound, historicalchange. And I think that
realizing how much thestructures of our society have
changed in the past is usefulfor thinking about what is
possible in the future. Forhaving a sort of perspective on
the potential for change anddevelopment and a broader sense
(40:58):
of what has been possible, whatpeople have done in the past. I
think to that question about thesort of specific moment we live
in and those questions ofcultural appropriation, I think
those are, those are emotionallycharged questions as people
(41:19):
wrestle with their identities,different individuals, different
communities of people, wrestlewith their identity and their
space in the American publicsphere in the contemporary
moment. And so I think thatbeing able to look backwards and
think about, well, Where have weseen moments of change and why?
(41:40):
And what has been possible andwhy? And then, What can that
help us appreciate, both aboutour contemporary moment and
about the types of change we canmake, the types of interventions
into what seem like fixed ideasabout things have always been
(42:01):
this way? Well, maybe not. And,how can we imagine things being,
creating more space fordifferent voices, different
types of people? I think thathistory doesn't offer a clear
map forward, but it offers us anoverview of what has been
possible that I think maybe canbe inspiration for what is
(42:27):
possible.
Chip Gruen (42:30):
All right. Thank you, Jessica Cooperman. Thanks
for coming on ReligionWise. Thishas been a lot of fun.
Jessica Cooperman (42:35):
Thank you so much.
Chip Gruen (42:39):
This has been ReligionWise, a podcast produced
by the Institute for Religiousand Cultural Understanding of
Muhlenberg College. For moreinformation and additional
programming, please visit ourwebsite at
religionandculture.com There,you'll find our contact
information, links to otherprogramming, and have the
opportunity to support the workof the Institute. ReligionWise
(43:03):
is produced by the staff of theInstitute for Religious and
Cultural Understanding ofMuhlenberg College, including
Christine Flicker, and CarrieDuncan. Please subscribe to
ReligionWise wherever you getyour podcasts. We look forward
to seeing you next time.
W elcome to ReligionWise, the podcast that
(00:11):
features educators, researchers,and other professionals
discussing their work and theplace of religion in the public
conversation. I'm your host ChipGruen, Director of the Institute
for Religious and CulturalUnderstanding at Muhlenberg
College. Today's conversationfeatures Dr. Jessica Cooperman,
Associate Professor and Chair ofReligion Studies, as well as the
(00:34):
Director of the Jewish Studiesprogram at Muhlenberg College.
Sometimes people say aboutreligious studies that it is the
Frankenstein's monster ofacademic disciplines. Instead of
being one whole, it is pieces ofother disciplines stitched
together in order to makesomething new. So the
(00:56):
constituent parts includepolitical science, history,
sociology, anthropology,philosophy, and puts them
together for the purposes ofstudying this thing that we call
religion. Dr. Cooperman's workis actually a case in point. She
was not trained as a religiousstudies scholar, but instead was
(01:17):
trained at NYU in history. So asyou'll hear, she's interested in
American Judaism and theconnection between American
ideas about religion, and theinstitutions of the American
state. Her first book isentitled Making Judaism Safe for
America, World War I and TheOrigins of American Religious
Pluralism. I encourage you to gopick up a copy of that and read
(01:41):
it and think about the ways thatJudaism is incorporated into a
larger discussion of religiousdiversity in the United States,
in particular, for the purposesof integrating Jewish soldiers
into the military during WorldWar I. For the purposes of this
conversation, though we willtalk about some of the issues
(02:01):
that are presented in the book,I'm more interested in her
methods that lead to it. So asyou'll hear, she's an archivist.
Someone who goes into thecollections of papers,
documents, letters, materialscollected by organizations, and
explores those for primarysources that might help to paint
(02:23):
a picture of the historicalpast. In this case, that would
be Jewish identity within themilitary. These sources are very
different from what you mightthink of as scholarly work in
religious studies that veryoften is interested in sacred
texts, or writings that areproduced by religious
(02:44):
individuals for theircommunities, or maybe
observation of religiouscommunities, what
anthropologists callethnographic reports. Instead,
this is taking the actualdocuments, the actual
byproducts, of administration ofthese organizations, whether
they be churches and synagogues,or organizations like the
(03:08):
Salvation Army or the USmilitary, and thinking about the
conversations that are leftbehind in those records and
thinking about how piecing thoseconversations together can lead
to a fuller picture of the past.
Welcome, Jessica Cooperman.
Thanks for coming onReligionWise.
Jessica Cooperman (03:29):
Thanks so much for having me.
Chip Gruen (03:31):
So, you are a historian. You teach in a
religion studies department, butare trained as a historian. One
of my favorite comments aboutthe religious studies discipline
is that it is sometimes referredto as a Frankenstein's monster,
because we put different piecestogether, whether it be
(03:53):
sociology, anthropology,philosophy, history, history of
religions, etc. Can you talkjust a little bit about what
it's like moving from a historydepartment into a religion
studies department? How doesyour discipline, you know,
contribute something a littledifferent? And then we'll talk a
little bit more about the thenuts and bolts of that.
Jessica Cooperman (04:13):
It was an interesting transition in a lot
of ways. I think sometimes thequestions that historians ask
and the questions that peopletrained in other fields,
including religious studies, askare going to be slightly
different. Sometimes that'sexciting. I actually found that
to be a really energizing sortof shift. It did lead me though
(04:38):
to ask different questions. Ithink that historians focus on
maybe political and economicissues in different ways. I
think that historians focus ondifferent aspects of daily life.
And for me, as somebody trainedin Jewish history, it actually
(05:01):
was sort of exciting to thinkabout, not just those larger
structural issues, but questionsabout religious life and about
how people experience, define,think about their religious life
and to develop those questionsin conversation with colleagues
who are trained in other fields,actually was an unexpectedly
(05:22):
rewarding transition for me tomake.
Chip Gruen (05:26):
So you talk about different questions, it seems to
me like there are also differenttools, different types of
sources, not to say that peoplein other disciplines don't ever
use those sorts of sources. Butthe types of sources you use, in
particular, archival research,archival resources, are sort of
a different kind of materialthan we might be used to
(05:50):
thinking about when we thinkabout studying religion. Can you
talk a little bit about, one,the content of those kinds of
archival resources, like whatdoes that look like? And two,
what is that process like? Iknow that you are very often
traveling to removed archives indifferent places, some of which
are digitized, some which arenot. What does that process look
(06:13):
like as well?
Jessica Cooperman (06:14):
Sure, I actually think archival research
is incredibly exciting. And Ithink that it's one of the big
misconceptions that most peopleI think have about history and
the writing of history. We're soused to getting history in a
pre-digested form, right? Mostof us go through school, and we
read history textbooks, thatkind of makes it look like these
(06:38):
are fixed narratives that havejust been sort of canonized
through the creation oftextbooks. And that's fine. It
serves a useful educationalpurpose. But historians don't
start with the textbooks, theygo and they look for primary
materials, they look for stuffthat was written, created,
(07:02):
produced in the moment of timethat they're studying, that
they're trying to understand.
And so I think when you startthinking about archival
research, and start doingarchival research, you realize
that those historical narrativesare much more changeable than
they look in a textbook. They'reinterpretations of history that
(07:25):
come to shape the way thoselarger narratives are presented.
And as the questions thathistorians ask shift over time,
the stories they tell about thepast also shift. And so the
writing of history is, I think,much more dynamic than we
generally get to see when we'resitting in a classroom and
(07:47):
reading a textbook. Going intoarchives, I find to be really
fun. Sometimes they're a littleoverwhelming. I've done some
research in the NationalArchives, for example, which is
a huge collection of stuff onevery aspect of the federal
government. I've done a lot ofwork with their military
(08:12):
archives. It's an enormouscollection, and it is sometimes
just files and files of piecesof paper. And so when people ask
me like, Well, isn't that alldigitized by now? I think, Oh,
my gosh, you can't imagine howmany pieces of paper we're
talking about. There'll bearchival boxes, filled with
(08:32):
folders, and each folder isfilled with pieces of paper and
a collection, may be hundredsand hundreds of boxes, just
filled with pieces of paper andphotographs and memos and
letters and sometimes newspaperarticles that have been
assembled together. And so Ifeel like doing archival
(08:56):
research is sort of like goingon a treasure hunt. You pick a
topic, you identify like, well,this collection of documents
might tell me something aboutit. You go into the archive, you
work with archivists to findwhich box out of the hundreds
you're interested in you'regoing to start looking at, and
then you just read things. Andfor me, there is something
(09:19):
really exciting about being ableto pick up a letter that was
written in 1917 and see thesignature of that person at the
bottom of the page and have thatkind of immediate hands on
experience with this historicaldocument. And then the
(09:40):
opportunity to think about well,what's the context in which this
document was produced? What werethe concerns that that person
who signed the letter wasthinking about? What were what
were the problems they weretrying to solve, and what other
pieces of information to workout that larger puzzle, can I
find in this collection ofdocuments, or maybe in other
(10:05):
collections somewhere else, thathelp me build a bigger picture
of this moment in time, this setof historical questions.
Chip Gruen (10:16):
And you mentioned the National Archives, but I
know that there are alsosmaller, lesser known archives,
that might be the personalpapers of a particular person or
a community organization. Howdoes going to one of the smaller
archives different from going tomaybe a big, publicly serving
institution like the NationalArchives?
Jessica Cooperman (10:37):
Sure. So the National Archives are probably
the biggest collection that I'veworked with. And there is an
enormous collection. But thereare indeed lots of other
archival collections andarchival institutions. I did a
lot of work for my first book atthe American Jewish Historical
Society, which is in New YorkCity, and they are the oldest
(11:00):
ethnic Historical Society in thecountry and they collect papers
related to American Jewishhistory. So some of those are
going to be institutionalrecords for an organization like
the American Jewish Committee,or the American Jewish Congress.
I worked with a collectiondealing with the Jewish Welfare
Board. And sometimes they'regoing to be very small
(11:21):
collections, personal papersfrom an individual or a family
or a club, a communityorganization, where people have
preserved papers that wereimportant to them, and then as
they looked either to preservethem, or sometimes to get rid of
them, contact these archivalcollections. And we'll talk to
(11:42):
the archivists there and see ifit's worth preserving those
papers. And those also arereally exciting to get to look
at one family's story or onegroup of people's story, and to
think about the differencesbetween different types of
archival collections. So Imentioned the American Jewish
Historical Society, I've doneresearch at the Presbyterian
(12:04):
Historical Society inPhiladelphia, and thinking about
the different types ofcollections they have, the
different types of papers thatyou can find, and how you can
use those documents to build asense of, of the past.
Chip Gruen (12:19):
Yeah, so being trained in antiquity and ancient
materials myself, one of thethings that always was a little
frustrating is knowing that 100sor 1000s of scholars have looked
at some of the materials that Iwant to say something about. You
don't have that problem, youknow, it seems to me a lot of
these archival materials, youmight be the first person with
(12:41):
professional training to lookat.
Jessica Cooperman (12:43):
Yeah, I think that's right. That's how I kind
of got started on my first bookproject. I was looking for a
topic to write about, I wentinto the, I was in graduate
school at NYU, so I was close towhere the archives were housed,
and spoke to an archivist andsaid, Well, I'm kind of
interested in writing somethingabout the chaplaincy and the
(13:05):
military. And they said, We havea newly catalog collection of
papers that nobody's looked atyet. Do you want to look at it?
And I said, Great, that soundsawesome. And so I'm sure lots of
scholars have looked at it sincethen, it's a wonderful
collection, but it was excitingto think like, wow, I can use
these papers that not manypeople have seen that have been
(13:26):
only recently organized and putinto these categories that the
archivists there have gonethrough and sort of carefully
thought about. Yeah, it wasexciting. It is, I think, a big
difference between studying theancient world and studying more
recent history.
Chip Gruen (13:43):
So you talk about, you've used this metaphor of
building on several occasions,the idea that you look for these
materials, and then you're ableto build a narrative, or reshape
a narrative that has previouslybeen told. And then you also
mentioned your first bookproject, which was Making
Judaism Safe for America, WorldWar I and the Origins of
(14:03):
Religious Pluralism. I want totalk a little bit about that
monograph, about how thesedocuments, this archival work
really enabled you to tell thestory of the building of an
American pluralism, a religiouspluralism in a different way. I
(14:25):
was reading some of the reviewsand praise for your book, and so
many reviewers mention how thisreally reframes the advent of
pluralism, this type ofpluralism, from the context of
World War II back to World WarI. So how did the archives help
you see this and how does thatnarrative spin out differently
(14:48):
after your research, after yourwork?
Jessica Cooperman (14:50):
I think one of the ways in which historians
build those structures, thosenarratives is, certainly for me,
I started with a question thatwas pretty open ended. I wanted
to find out about Jewishmilitary chaplains in World War
I. It was the first time therewas an organized Jewish military
(15:14):
chaplaincy, I thought, cool,I'll go learn something about
those people. But I didn't havean overarching question about, I
didn't know in advance why thatmight be an interesting thing to
study, or what I was going to beable to show by studying that
group of people. I was just sortof fascinated by that group of
people, and this question of,What did it mean to have
(15:38):
military chaplains at all in acountry that prides itself on
separation between church andstate; who are these people who
are religious functionaries ofan institution of the state?
What was their job? What didthey think about? How did they
do that job? What was thepurview of their work? And then
what in particular did it meanto be representatives of a
(15:59):
minority religious community, ofAmerican Jews, in the American
military? So I thought thosewere interesting enough
questions to start with. But asI read the archival collections,
as I thought more and more aboutthe sort of set of questions
connected to these groups ofpeople, not just what are their
(16:20):
individual stories, but how didthey get their commissions? Who
was fighting for them to getcommissions? What challenges did
they face when they got thosejobs? What was the support
network around them? I realizedthat it was a much bigger story
than just the experience ofthese men. And there are about
25 Jewish chaplains in theAmerican military in World War
(16:41):
I, so a relatively small groupof people, but their experience,
and then the experience of thisnetwork of organizations and
individuals that supported theirwork and advocated for their
ability to get these positionstold a much bigger story about
shifting American ideas aboutwhat is religion, what is
(17:03):
American religion, and how doesit fit into American society.
And so there was a long standingand, I think, solid historical
narrative about the developmentof what we talk about as
tri-faith religious pluralism,the idea that Protestants,
Catholics, and Jews are allintrinsic members of this
(17:24):
American religious tradition,what we think of today as a, or
have thought of since the mid20th century, as a
Judeo-Christian tradition in theUnited States, that that emerges
from World War II. And there'slots and lots of excellent
scholarship about that, andexcellent reasons to think about
World War II as a crucialturning point in how Americans
(17:45):
thought about religion. But as Iwas doing the research for my
work on World War I, it becameapparent that a lot of the
structural changes and a lot ofthe institutional changes and
even ideological changes thatmade it possible in World War II
for us to think of as the UnitedStates having a Judeo-Christian
(18:11):
heritage, didn't just instantlyappear in World War II, that the
groundwork had been laid inWorld War I. And so what started
as a fairly focused set ofquestions about the experiences
of a relatively small group ofrabbis working for the US
military kind of grew over timeinto a much larger set of
(18:34):
questions about, well, How didthe military shape American
ideas about religion? And whydid the American government
change its definitions of whoshould serve as a religious
functionary within the military?
And what can that tell us aboutthe structures of government and
of society and of the needs ofthe American population and of
the way Americans thought aboutreligion? And my conclusion was
(18:58):
that some of those shiftstowards thinking about the
United States as a tri-faithcountry, with all the
limitations of tri-faith, right,that there are plenty of
communities that are notincluded in that definition, and
were not included in thatdefinition in the mid 20th
century, that those shifts hadhappened earlier than people had
(19:20):
thought, that they didn't justcome about as a result of World
War II, that the structuralchanges have been put in place,
I would argue, through some ofthe changes the military makes
during World War I.
Chip Gruen (19:33):
So one of the things that's been interesting to me as
I think about publicconversations about religion,
and some of those publicconversations happen through
policy and in this case, you'retalking about the military, the
military is nothing, if notpractical. That we think, What
is the goal of the military?
It's to have soldiers that areready to do their jobs. It is
(19:55):
not the job of the military to,to explore narratives of
religion necessarily, to makedefinitions of religion,
categories of religion,understand the intricacies of
religious belief and practice,yet here they are at the front
of this movement. Does your workshine a light on the thinking
(20:22):
behind why the United States,States military is interested in
pursuing this project? I mean,how does it fit their goals?
Jessica Cooperman (20:34):
I think that's a great question. And I
think it actually ties back toyour original question about
being a historian now situatedin a department of religion
studies and thinking more andmore about religion studies as a
field, because you're absolutelyright, the US military did not
(20:55):
enter World War I with theintention of promoting religious
pluralism. Their concern wasabout preparing soldiers for
battle and building aneffective, efficient military
force. And so they end up beingthis site in which American
definitions of religion change Iargue almost by accident, almost
(21:20):
as a result of their own kind ofblind spots. That there is, the
military chaplaincy is a veryold institution, and so military
leaders felt like almostreflexively, like, of course,
men need chaplains as they'regoing to go off into battle.
It's necessary to maintain themorale of the troops and the
(21:41):
moral character of these youngmen. And I don't think that they
intended to make any reforms inpolicy as they made those
assumptions as they got ready toenter World War I, however, the
country had become significantlymore diverse in the years
between the Civil War, the lastmajor military draft and
(22:04):
conflict that the United Stateshad been engaged in- by the time
they enter World War I, millionsof immigrants have entered the
country. It's a more diversereligiously, ethnically,
culturally diverse country thanit had been in previous years,
and suddenly, the military findsitself faced with resistance to
(22:25):
old ideas about the chaplaincy.
And so in the interest ofmilitary efficiency, they end up
having to make space for Jewsand Catholics, for Judaism and
Catholicism, within thestructures of the military. So I
think it's, it's not with theintention of promoting
pluralism, it is with theintention of promoting military
(22:46):
efficiency that they end upbecoming this site in which
pluralism is not only toleratedbut encouraged. But thinking
about my position as a historiannow in a department of religion
studies, I think that issomething that historians can
bring to the table in the studyof religion, certainly in the
(23:06):
study of religion in the UnitedStates, that there's a way in
which, in public discourse aboutreligion- a category like
Judeo-Christian values, right,that seems like something that
we could identify what thatmeans, or that it would have a
fixed category. But it's not.
(23:28):
That by looking back athistorical documents, by
thinking about, when did peoplestart using that term? And why
did they start using that term?
And what did they mean when theystarted thinking about
Protestants, Catholics, and Jewsall being part of an American
religious framework? By thinkingmore about how and why those
ideas came about, I think thatwe can sometimes destabilize
(23:51):
ideas that seem like they'rereally fixed. We can appreciate
that they themselves are part ofa changing narrative of American
religion. And we can help peoplethink more creatively and sort
of broadly about how it is thatideas about religion have
changed over time, and what thatcan tell us about why they
(24:15):
change, and who gets to changethem, and for what reasons. And
like you say, sometimes it's forreasons that are not about
theology, ideology, aspirationstowards pluralism, it's for very
practical reasons that will haveunexpected outcomes.
Chip Gruen (24:31):
So I want to follow this thread just a little bit
more, because it's an examplethat I sometimes use when I talk
about contemporary religiouspluralism that I think that you
will appreciate, is that if yougo today to Arlington National
Cemetery, you will of course seecrosses, you will see Stars of
(24:52):
David, you probably would,people probably would not be
surprised to know that you see acrescent and a star, symbols of
Islam, but then you seepentagrams, for example, or
symbols of religious traditionsthat are even more diverse than
what we've been talking about inthe early to mid part of the
(25:15):
20th century. Your subtitle isOrigins of Religious Pluralism,
how much do you see thoseprocesses that you trace from
the early part of the 20thcentury impacting the way that
the public conversation in thisparticular public organization
are happening? And how much isthat affecting definitions of
(25:36):
religion and inclusion ofvarious religious identities
within the contemporarymilitary?
Jessica Cooperman (25:43):
I think it's tremendously important, right?
And if you think about thesignificance of a place like
Arlington National Cemetery,that people, all kinds of
Americans for all kinds ofreasons, will walk through that
space and encounter, experiencethese symbolic representations
(26:03):
of different religioustraditions, some that may be
familiar to them, some that maybe unfamiliar to them, but by
virtue of them all beingrepresented in this space of
deep national significance, thecountry itself, the government
is, the military is givingrecognition, is sort of
(26:25):
officially recognizing those aspieces of the American religious
tradition, as components of theAmerican religious tradition.
And it's not simply a naturalprocess that led to all those
different symbols being there.
For each symbol that isincluded, there is a story of
people serving in the military,and then of advocating for their
(26:49):
right to representation in themilitary and having civilian
populations at home supportthem, and having sometimes
members of Congress advocate forthem, and having clergy come and
defend the need for thosereligions to be represented
within the military. And so, youknow, each of those symbols
(27:12):
represents a different history.
And then collectively, I thinkthey change the way Americans
think about religion, becauseeven without knowing those
backstories, you walk throughthis space and your idea about
religion is changed andexpanded. And then that
appreciation that there's anarrative that accompanies each
(27:35):
of them, I think, is reallyinspiring.
Chip Gruen (27:38):
Yeah, it's interesting, I would think if
you just talk to an educatedperson on the street and they
thought about the way thatreligious identity is
adjudicated, or is understood inthe contemporary world, I think
the first thing that most of uswould think of is Supreme Court
decisions. Something like use ofpeyote or practice of Santaria,
(28:01):
or, that there have been a listof Supreme Court cases that have
dealt with this. But it'sinteresting to see these other
sort of conversations, theseother discursive spaces, where
that kind of diversity ishappening, maybe alongside
legislative or judicial paths aswell.
Jessica Cooperman (28:19):
I think that's exactly right. Supreme
Court cases are obviouslytremendously important. But they
represent moments of conflictthat the court will adjudicate,
will then resolve for thecountry. But it's interesting to
notice in the example of themilitary, that these are
decisions not necessarily madebecause there's some sort of
(28:40):
conflict that has to be resolvedthrough legal means, back to
your original question about themilitary, there's a pragmatic
set of concerns about, How do wemove forward in a way that is
productive and efficient, andwhere can we make changes and
where can we include people orserve people's needs that will
(29:00):
allow them to be bettersoldiers? And so I think that is
an important other story, thatnot every moment of
renegotiation of our categoriesof religion happens through
legal conflict. A lot of themhappen through these much more,
kind of mundane-looking problemsolving moments that happen in
(29:24):
other kinds of institutions, themilitary, in schools, and even
just among individuals withincommunities. How will they mark
holidays? Who will berepresented? How will they
decide upon thoserepresentations? Who will be
included in those decisionmaking processes? Those also are
important moments for helping usunderstand how religion gets
(29:49):
defined and experienced in theUnited States. And sometimes
they are moments of conflictthat have to be resolved by the
courts, but sometimes they'remoments of negotiation between
people and within institutions,and I think those are just as
important.
Chip Gruen (30:05):
So this project, I think it's fair to say, got you
interested in these questions ofreligious pluralism, in what are
often described as interfaithinteractions, which leads us to
your next archival project, whatyou're working on now. And you
don't need to provide anyspoilers on what all you found
(30:26):
so far, but you're interestedin, you mentioned holidays, in
Passover Seders. And you don'thave to interrogate too many
Christian communities before yourealize that there's a
longstanding tradition ofChristians either participating
in or hosting their own PassoverSeders as a, as an expression,
(30:50):
perhaps, of their ownChristianity? And so how did you
get interested in this topic?
How is it related to thatarchival work we talked about
earlier? And how does it relateto this bigger project of
religious pluralism?
Jessica Cooperman (31:03):
So I became interested in this project
really because it was somethingI'd never heard of. And it was
so fascinating to me, assomebody who studies American
Jews and American Judaism. Iended up in a conversation with
(31:26):
a Lutheran pastor who wastelling me about the Passover
Seder he had hosted at hischurch, and how important this
was to his interfaith connectionto his Jewish neighbors, to
Jewish community, and toJudaism. And I thought, wow,
that's strange, I've never heardof that before- I didn't say
(31:48):
that to him. But I was just sofascinated why, about why
something that seemed totallynatural and obvious to him as an
expression of interfaithconnection between Jews and
Christians was something that I,as a scholar of American Jews
and Judaism, had notencountered. And so that just
(32:13):
kind of was a question thatlingered in the back of my head
for a while until I had time todo what I do, I guess, when I
have questions, is to go backinto archival collections and
see if I could start tracinglike, Okay, well, what's the
story here? Where does this comefrom? Who is doing it? And how
do different people understandwhat it is that they are doing
(32:36):
when they either decide to hostinterfaith Seders, or when
churches like this pastor'schurch decide that they're going
to host a Seder of their own?
Could I unravel something of thestory behind that? So part of
what makes that interesting tome is that, while you said it
seems like maybe an obvious partof a lot of American Christian's
(33:01):
tradition today, historically,that was not the case. So
thinking about, When did thisbecome part of Christian
tradition and why was kind of mystarting question. So it seems
to me that part of that story isvery much about post-World War
(33:21):
II periods and reconfigurations,sort of like new understandings
of the relationship betweenJudaism and Christianity that
emerged in the post-war period,both among academics and among
theologians, and among concernedindividuals. And then another
part of the story that I foundreally interesting was the
(33:44):
attempts by Jewish organizationsstarting in, certainly by, the
1950s to use Passover Seder asan opportunity to intentionally
reshape relationships betweenJews and Christians, and to
rethink the relationship betweenJudaism and Christianity. And so
thinking about what Jewishorganizations were interested in
(34:09):
when they embarked in those onthose projects of using this
holidays as a moment ofconversation and
reconfiguration, and then whattheir Christian partners, or
neighbors, or other Christianorganizations were interested in
when they embarked on thatproject of using the holiday as
a moment of discussion andexploration and thinking about
(34:32):
both their own tradition andtheir relationship to Jewish
neighbors, Jewish organizations,to Judaism. I just found that a
fascinating story that I wantedto learn more about.
Chip Gruen (34:45):
Yeah, that conversation starts, as you get
into it, starts to look likeother conversations we have in
the contemporary world aboutcultural borrowing as well. That
not only is this a question ofinterfaith relations, or
Christians wanting to talk toJews, or Jews wanting to talk to
(35:07):
Christians, because they eachhave their agendas about
diffusing antisemitism, forexample, or other concerns of
Christians wanting to tie moreclosely to their Jewish past as,
I would hazard, a more nuancedview of the historical Jesus
(35:28):
starts to come into view in the20th century as well. But this
also starts to look likeappropriation, and I know that
some of your, some sources startto get a little bit
uncomfortable with Christiansusing Jewish symbols, Jewish
rituals, Jewish ideas, sometimesin concert with Jews and Jewish
(35:53):
communities, but sometimes ontheir own. How does that add
another wrinkle to this story?
Jessica Cooperman (35:57):
So I think that's the part where I find
things really get interesting tome. Thinking about, What are the
intentions that people bring tothese projects? How do they
differ? Where do they overlapand where do they diverge? So
again, thinking about archivalsources, it was incredibly
(36:18):
fascinating to me to look at therecords of different
organizations that are inconversation with each other
about interfaith projects,Jewish-Christian interfaith
projects, some related toPassover, some sort of more
broad about bringing peopletogether for discussion or
(36:38):
educational programs, and thatthey might be able to work
together on building theseexciting conversations,
conferences, educationalprograms, but the intention that
they bring to it is often verydifferent. As you mentioned,
Jewish groups tended to be,particularly in the post-war
(36:59):
period, very, very focused onfighting off antisemitism,
whereas Christian organizationstended to have theologically
motivated intention about,sometimes also about fighting
off antisemitism, certainly, butin thinking about the identity
of Jesus as a Jew, and how theycould better understand that
(37:21):
experience. And so there aremoments where those two
different streams of intentioncan work together and mesh
really productively. And thenthese other moments where you
see them kind of diverge. And Ithink that's where we get into
that sense of discomfort, right?
At the moment in which you havetwo individuals or two
(37:44):
communities of people, they'reworking together, and then
suddenly their interestsdiverge, then I think that sense
of maybe territoriality comesin, right. Who gets to make the
decision? If we don't agree uponeverything, then which one of us
will be right? Which one of ushas the authority to make a
(38:06):
decision about the content of aneducational program, or in the
case of a holiday where I thinkthe stakes are maybe even
emotionally higher, who will getto make a determination about
what is an authentic experienceof a particular holiday? What
are the necessary ingredientsthat make an experience
(38:29):
authentic or not? And who hasthe authority to decide, I
think, becomes certainly, Ithink, painful and contentious
sometimes for the peopleinvolved in making those
decisions, and for me, as ascholar, I think becomes really
fascinating for thinking about,How do we negotiate
(38:49):
relationships, discussions,dialogues between different
communities where there's typesof understanding that are
definitely possible andfruitful, and then there are
these moments of divergence andhow is that negotiated? What can
that tell us about religion inthe United States?
Chip Gruen (39:12):
So I always like to end our conversations with the
"so what" question. I think thatlisteners will agree with me
that all of these topics areintrinsically interesting within
themselves, and seeing thosenegotiations, seeing the
narratives develop over time,seeing these different groups
(39:35):
sort of vying, sometimescooperatively and sometimes not,
to develop over time. But forthe contemporary, interested
individual, for the contemporarylistener, what lessons do you
think your work and yourconclusions and the historical
(39:56):
antecedents to our world thatyou study, what lessons can we
take from all that to be moresophisticated when we're both
thinking about this question ofreligious pluralism or thinking
about various religiouscommunities in general?
Jessica Cooperman (40:13):
I think the first one is one I mentioned
before, that I think thatlooking back historically helps
us appreciate that things thatseem like they've existed for
all time, almost never have.
That ideas that seem the bedrockof our society, almost all of
them have some sort of moment ofprofound, or maybe multiple
(40:36):
moments of profound, historicalchange. And I think that
realizing how much thestructures of our society have
changed in the past is usefulfor thinking about what is
possible in the future. Forhaving a sort of perspective on
the potential for change anddevelopment and a broader sense
(40:58):
of what has been possible, whatpeople have done in the past. I
think to that question about thesort of specific moment we live
in and those questions ofcultural appropriation, I think
those are, those are emotionallycharged questions as people
(41:19):
wrestle with their identities,different individuals, different
communities of people, wrestlewith their identity and their
space in the American publicsphere in the contemporary
moment. And so I think thatbeing able to look backwards and
think about, well, Where have weseen moments of change and why?
(41:40):
And what has been possible andwhy? And then, What can that
help us appreciate, both aboutour contemporary moment and
about the types of change we canmake, the types of interventions
into what seem like fixed ideasabout things have always been
(42:01):
this way? Well, maybe not. And,how can we imagine things being,
creating more space fordifferent voices, different
types of people? I think thathistory doesn't offer a clear
map forward, but it offers us anoverview of what has been
possible that I think maybe canbe inspiration for what is
(42:27):
possible.
Chip Gruen (42:30):
All right. Thank you, Jessica Cooperman. Thanks
for coming on ReligionWise. Thishas been a lot of fun.
Jessica Cooperman (42:35):
Thank you so much.
Chip Gruen (42:39):
This has been ReligionWise, a podcast produced
by the Institute for Religiousand Cultural Understanding of
Muhlenberg College. For moreinformation and additional
programming, please visit ourwebsite at
religionandculture.com There,you'll find our contact
information, links to otherprogramming, and have the
opportunity to support the workof the Institute. ReligionWise
(43:03):
is produced by the staff of theInstitute for Religious and
Cultural Understanding ofMuhlenberg College, including
Christine Flicker, and CarrieDuncan. Please subscribe to
ReligionWise wherever you getyour podcasts. We look forward
to seeing you next time.
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