At Home in Exile / Alan Wolfe 272 pp.

Wolfe is an American academic whose book is a call for the Jewish people to embrace their position in the diaspora.  He calls for a return to 'universalism' in Jewish thinking rather than the 'particularism' which has arisen since the Holocaust and the development of the state of Israel.

In vigorous, clear language (one reviewer calls Wolfe's style 'feisty') Wolfe plumbs the issue of diaspora in a way which calls into question the nature of Jewish identity itself: can one be fully a Jew and yet content to make a home outside Israel?  Are those who do so allowed both to love Israel and to be critical of her at the same time?  Who gets to decide these issues?

Wolfe looks at important historic and contemporary Jewish politicians and intellectuals and characterizes their thinking in terms of universalist or particularist features.  Of course this is a dichotomy which works effectively in an argument but which in real life is less tidy.  Still, I found Wolfe highly accessible and even a pleasure to read.  This will certainly be a controversial work, but it may also be a necessary one for anyone who wants to participate in future conversations about the Jewish people.