German Jews and the University, 1678-1848

Traces the gradual opening of university education in Germany to Jews, its significance for assimilation to the bourgeoisie, and the legal restrictions that nonetheless barred Jewish graduates from most professional careers.

For centuries Jews in Germany were denied full rights and excluded from gentile society. At the same time, Jewish law restricted scholarship to exegesis of the Talmud. But from the late seventeenth century onward, as German universities progressively opened their doors t...