Religious Law and Secular State

17 October 2019
Ruth Wodak traces how a new “normality to the right” is establishing itself in many European countries.
Video: in German; no subtitles

16 September 2019
Zvi Aviram was born in January 1927 in Berlin as Heinz Abrahamsohn. From age 14, he had to perform forced labor in the arms industry. During the so-called factory operation on 27 February 1943, his parents were arrested and deported and he himself went into illegality.

12 June 2019
Sally Perel was born in Peine in April 1925. After the German invasion of the Soviet Union he pretended to be a Volksdeutscher and called himself Josef Perjell.
In 1990, his memoirs were published and were filmed in the same year under the title Hitlerjunge Salomon.

28 August 2019
W. Michael Blumenthal Fellow Walid Abdelgawad talks about reflections on Islam and Judaism in the writings of German-speaking Jewish orientalists (1833–1955)

13 June 2019
Many people are skeptical of miracle stories found in Jewish and Muslim Scripture, or reject them entirely. For others, as believers, they are objective accounts of the facts and proof of God’s existence. Is it possible to believe in miracles in this day and age? A discussion with James A. Diamond, the expert in Jewish philosophy, and Umeyye Isra Yazicioglu, a scholar of religion.

9 May 2019
Museums are called on to deal critically and transparently with the often invisible colonial history of their collections. The curators Jisgang Nika Collision (Haida Gwaii Museum, Haida Nation & Canada) and Léontine Meijer-van Mensch (Saxonian State Ethnographic Collections) discussed this topic.

30 April 2019
New findings in psychology, neurology, and genetics have been increasingly casting doubt on humans’ capacity to make conscious decisions. This comes down to whether humans are responsible for their own actions. Is our free will really just an illusion? A discussion with Alan Mittleman (Jewish Theological Seminary of America) and Martin Mahmud Kellner (Institute of Islamic Theology, Osnabrück).

20 March 2019
The conference explored discriminatory access barriers in schools and questioned the museum practices of collecting, organizing and exhibiting from critical perspectives on racism. In her keynote, Bonita Bennett (District Six Museum, Cape Town) considered museums as places of social change.

5 March 2019
How can belief in the divine revelation of Scripture be reconciled with historical textual research? A discussion between Benjamin Sommer, an expert in modern Jewish theology, and Ghassan el Masri, researcher on the Koran in the context of the Arabic literature of his time.

31 January 2019
Natan Slifkin ( Biblical Museum of Natural History, Israel) and Fatimah Jackson (Howard University, USA) discuss how Jewish and Islamic theologians treat evolutionary biology.

27 January 2019
Cellist and contemporary witness Anita Lasker Wallfisch shares the stage with three generations of her family for the first time.
Marking the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz concentration camp on 27 January 1945, they read letters from the family written between 1942 and 1952 and play works by Beethoven, Schubert, Bloch, and others.

2 December 2018
Welcoming Remarks and Introducing the Academy Programs | Discussion with Performance: Archive of Life. Memory in a Society Shaped by Migration | Panel Discussion: Jewish Fathers – Jewish Children? | Panel Discussion: A Pre-fascist Era? | Reception: 5 Years – 5 Friends – 5 Gifts

3 December 2018
Peter Neuhof speaks about his memories and experiences in an interview with Aubrey Pomerance, head of the archive. His parents were active members of the German Communist Party (KPD) and were arrested in 1943. Peter was able to remain in the parental home.

22 November 2018
This event for the “'68 Now” series discusses (in German and Polish) the events of 1968 from the Polish perspective. In Poland, the student protests were co-opted by an antisemitic rampage that resulted in 13,000 Jews being forced to leave the country.

20 November 2018
Geoffrey A. Mitelman and Ahmad S. Dallal discuss how Jewish and Islamic theologians have reflected for centuries on the conflicting powers of God and his revelation and human reason.

11 and 12 October 2018
The international conference “Living with Islamophobia” considered how cultural and religious affiliations are constructed and invited experts to enter into discussion.

30 August 2018
Is Antisemitism increasing with the number of refugees from Arab countries? We discuss with political, academic, and practical experts which manifestations of antisemitism among Arab migrants and Muslims in Germany exist (in German).

6 September 2018
Lecture by Michael Sfard, one of Israel’s leading human rights lawyers

26 June 2018
Seyla Benhabib (Yale University) discusses the challenges migration poses to liberal democracies.

25 June 2018
Hanni Levy describes her wartime memories and experiences. Hanni Levy, born in 1924, survived the Nazi era in hiding in Berlin with the help of courageous friends.

18 June 2018
In this symposium, research that explores the origins of Jewish ceremonial objects exclusively in Israel and Germany, took center stage for the first time.

14 June 2018
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

7 June 2018
Opening Session of the academic conference
Including Imani Perry's keynote »What Lies Underneath: Difficult Histories and the Resurgence of The Far Right«

28 May 2018
Born in Breslau in 1925, Anita Lasker Wallfisch studied cello in Berlin from 1938. In 1942, Anita’s parents were deported to Izbica and murdered, and in 1943 Anita and her sister Renate were deported to Ausschwitz.

3 May 2018
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

12 April 2018
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

9 April 2018
Margot Friedländer was born in 1921 in Berlin and has had close ties with the museum for many years. She reads from her memoir, which takes its title from her mother’s last message to her: Try to Make Your Life.

20 March 2018
Lectures by David Feldman and Stefanie Schüler-Springorum

8 March 2018
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

12 February 2018
Reading and Talk with the Author Joshua Cohen and Literary Scholar Jan Wilm

31 January 2018
Born in 1924 in West Prussia, Walter Frankenstein lived in Berlin from 1936. When deportation threatened, he went into hiding with his wife and their five-week-old son. The family managed to survive with the help of friends.

25 January 2018
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

11 January 2018
Eyewitness Horst Selbiger in Conversation with Léontine Meijer-van Mensch

4 December 2017
Born in Celle in 1924, 14-year-old Kurt Roberg fled alone after the 1938 November pogrom to the Netherlands, where he was to finish school. He finally reaches his family in New York via Berlin and Lisbon in 1941.
Language: German

23 November 2017
Part of our lecture series Jewish and Islamic Perspectives on Human Rights

16 November 2017
Discussion on concepts of being Jewish within the third generation of Jews in Germany (in German and English)

24 to 27 October 2017
International conference for scholars from different continents and academic disciplines, who discuss questions of culture, identity and memory of Jewish life in Arab and Muslim majority countries.

23 October 2017
Henry Wuga was born to a Jewish mother and a Catholic father in Nuremberg in 1924. In 1938, his parents were able to send him to Scotland with a children’s transport and later in 1947, he could bring his mother, who had survived in hiding, to his home in Glasgow.
Language: German

26 September 2017
Discussion on the Importance of Minority Perspectives for European Societies’ Commemorative Cultures (in German and English)

18 September 2017
Book Presentation and Discussion (in German)

9 September 2017
An Evening with Israeli and German Poets (in Hebrew and German)

29 June 2017
Discussion with Reina Lewis and Meriem Lebdiri (in German and English)

26 Januar 2017
Theme day with lectures by Michel Abitbol, Eric Salerno, Patrick Bernhard, Haim Saadoun, and panel discussion
Language: German, English, and French

Conference on 16 September 2016
With: Dr. Rosa Fava, Juliane Jurewicz, Prof. Dr. Iman Attia, Olga Gerstenberger, Ozan Keskinkiliç, Anita Awosusi, Ilona Lagrene, Prof. Dr. Michael Rothberg, and Serpil Polat
Language: German and English, no subtitles

Panel discussion on 7 September 2016
With: Dan Diner, Adam Michnik, Dietmar Herz, Étienne François, and Hans Kundnani
Language: German, no subtitles