New Edition of Classic Encyclopaedia Debuts

by Holly Lebowitz Rossi, Religion BookLine -- Publishers Weekly, 12/20/2006

In an age where Wikipedia and Google have made fact-finding quick and almost universally available, some might think the future of traditional scholarly encyclopedias is in question. But more than thirty years after the publication of its first edition, a second, completely revised edition of the classic humanities work Encyclopaedia Judaica shipped on December 14.

With an initial print run of 5,000 copies, the encyclopedia is published by Thomson Gale and the Israel-based Keter Publishing House, the same partnership that released the original edition in 1972, though that edition was published under the name Macmillan Reference, now an imprint of Thomson Gale.

The project is edited by Michael Berenbaum, an adjunct professor of theology at the University of Judaism and noted Holocaust scholar and developer of museums and historical films.

Composed of 22,000 signed entries, the new edition features 2,200 entirely new articles, 50 of which cover new scholarship on Holocaust-related topics. Twelve thousand entries in Holocaust studies, Bible, women's studies, Jewish mysticism, and social history were substantially re-worked for the new edition by Israeli, European and American scholars who are experts in their respective fields.

Berenbaum said that the way the encyclopedia, which was begun in Germany in 1928, has grown and built upon itself offers a window into how Jews have understood their own religion, history and culture.

"We expect that people who read this a generation or two from now are going to be able to see the pattern of self-understanding through multiple generations," he said.

Other new developments distinguish the new edition. Each of the 22 volumes contains an eight-page, full-color insert chronicling the physical development of the State of Israel, as well as illustrating the major themes in Jewish life and culture covered in that volume.

Entries that chronicle Jewish history, archaeology, literature, culture, theology, and practice from the Second Temple period to the contemporary State of Israel also now have their own bibliographies, allowing researchers to deepen their work without having to refer to a separate bibliography. There are more than 600 maps, charts, and tables.

Jay Flynn, Thomson Gale's publisher for history, religion, social science and biography, said that in addition to being sold to academic libraries, the encyclopedia will "be in the company of major foundational reference works" as an e-book in the Gale Virtual Reference Library.