Isadore Twersky - Teaching and Research

Teaching and Research

Twersky was a pioneer in the introduction of the methodology of the History of ideas, first developed by Arthur O. Lovejoy, into Jewish Intellectual history. He also devoted special emphasis upon the interaction between law and spirituality in the History of Judaism. He founded the Center for Jewish Studies in 1978 and served as its director until 1993.

His research in some respects resembled that of his contemporary and friend Alexander Altmann (Hacker 2005), and his work on Jewish rationalist philosophy brought him into conflict with scholars such as Gershom Scholem and Shlomo Pines, who viewed the medieval rational philosophy typified by Rambam as an alien parasite grafted onto traditional Judaism (Septimus 2005). There has been noted a certain irony in the affection given to this greatest of Jewish rationalists by the descendant of an illustrious Hasidic dynasty (it being the case by and large that Hasidic doctrine has stronger affinity for the mystical over the rational), but Septimus (2005) sees here a coherent and unified search for the spiritual within the rational.

At Harvard, Twersky taught both undergraduate and graduate students. His popular course, Moderation and Extremism, which compared and contrasted the paths to virtue in the works of Aristotle, Maimonides, and Thomas Aquinas, drew over 200 students in 1995, the final year it was taught. Over the course of his thirty years at Harvard, he taught a large number of graduate students. His exacting standards and expectations were legendary. Nevertheless, over thirty individuals completed their doctorates under his guidance. Many of these play leading roles in Jewish studies, both in North America and in Israel. Among these are Morris (Moshe B.) Berger, Edward Breuer (Hebrew University), Bernard Dov Cooperman (University of Maryland), Joseph M. Davis (Gratz College), Lois Dubin (Smith College), Talya Fishman (University of Pennsylvania), Daniel Frank (Ohio State University), Steven Harvey (Bar Ilan University), Carmi Horowitz (Lander Institute, Jerusalem), Eric Lawee (York University), Diana Lobel (Boston University), David Malkiel (Bar Ilan University), Allan Nadler (Drew University), Ira Robinson (Concordia University), Marc Saperstein (Leo Baeck College, London), Mark Sendor, Bernard Septimus (Harvard University), Marc Shapiro (University of Scranton), Michael Shmidman (Touro College), David Sklare (Machon Ben Zvi), Gregg Stern, Adena Tannenbaum (Ohio State University), Joshua Levisohn, and Jeffrey R. Woolf (Bar Ilan University).