The Invention of the Jewish People

Written by Shlomo Sand

Narrated by Barry Abrams

A historical tour de force that demolishes the myths and taboos that have surrounded Jewish and Israeli history, The Invention of the Jewish People offers a new account of both that demands to be reckoned with. Was there really a forced exile in the first century, at the hands of the Romans? Should we regard the Jewish people, throughout two millennia, as both a distinct ethnic group and a putative nation-returned at last to its Biblical homeland?

Shlomo Sand argues that most Jews actually descend from converts, whose native lands were scattered far across the Middle East and Eastern Europe. The formation of a Jewish people and then a Jewish nation out of these disparate groups could only take place under the sway of a new historiography, developing in response to the rise of nationalism throughout Europe.

The central importance of the conflict in the Middle East ensures that Sand's arguments will reverberate well beyond the historians and politicians that he takes to task. Without an adequate understanding of Israel's past, capable of superseding today's opposing views, diplomatic solutions are likely to remain elusive. In this iconoclastic work of history, Shlomo Sand provides the intellectual foundations for a new vision of Israel's future.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Tantor Media, Inc
• Translator: Yael Lotan
• Release date: Apr 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9781666198867

Reviews for The Invention of the Jewish People

[David Schneider · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

A weak thesis that does not hold up to the Prima Facia evidence we have about Judaism and Jews. Revisionism at its core, and a work that is used in bad-faith to polemicize.

[Ben Vix · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Excellent and very well researched book. Sand brings strong arguments and compelling evidence, and alot of its core thesis is well known yet somewhat surpressed or understated (the fact that there was no expulsion in the destruction of the second temple, the fact that judaism was a proselytizing faith, the fact that early zionist historians and archeologists were highly recruited and ideological zionists)and Sand is also being caerful and honest when his thesis and ideas are speculative or ideologically driven. Seminal new historian work.

[Daniel · Rating: 1 out of 5 stars]

A revisionist and antisemitic history book. Keep looking if you want to learn something real