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A Remembrance of His Wonders: Nature and the Supernatural in Medieval Ashkenaz (Jewish Culture and Contexts)
The twelfth and thirteenth centuries witnessed an explosion of Christian interest in the meaning and workings of the natural worlda "discovery of nature" that profoundly reshaped the intellectual currents and spiritual contours of European societyyet to all appearances, the Jews of medieval northern Europe (Ashkenaz) were oblivious to the shifts reshaping their surrounding culture. Scholars have long assumed that rather than exploring or contemplating the natural world, the Jews of medieval Ashkenaz were preoccupied solely with the supernatural and otherworldly: magic and mysticism, demonology and divination, as well as the zombies, werewolves, dragons, flying camels, and other monstrous and wondrous creatures that destabilized any pretense of a consistent and encompassing natural order. In Read more