Yoram Hazony (born 1964) is an Israeli-American philosopher,

Bible scholar Biblical criticism is the use of critical analysis to understand and explain the Bible. During the eighteenth century, when it began as ''historical-biblical criticism,'' it was based on two distinguishing characteristics: (1) the concern to ...

, and

political theorist A political theorist is someone who engages in constructing or evaluating political theory, including political philosophy. Theorists may be Academia, academics or independent scholars. Here the most notable political theorists are categorized b ...

. He is president of the Herzl Institute in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

and serves as the chairman of the Edmund Burke Foundation.

Biography

Yoram Hazony was born in Rehovot, Israel, and moved with his family to

Princeton, New Jersey Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...

, US. He was raised and educated in the United States and returned to live in Israel after finishing university. Hazony received his BA from

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

in East Asian studies in 1986 and his PhD from

Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's College, and was ...

in political philosophy in 1993. While a junior at Princeton, he founded the '' Princeton Tory'', a magazine for moderate and conservative thought. He is the brother of

David Hazony David Yair Hazony (born 1969) is an American-born Israeli writer, translator, and editor. He was the founding editor of '' The Tower Magazine'' from 2013 to 2017, and from 2017-2020 served as executive director of the Israel Innovation Fund. He ...

and Daniel Hazony. He married Julia Fulton, whom he met at Princeton, and she moved to Israel with him. The couple live in

and have nine children.

Academic and journalism career

Hazony founded the Shalem Center in Jerusalem in 1994 and was president and then provost until 2012. He designed the curriculum for

Shalem College Shalem College ( he, המרכז האקדמי שלם, ''HaMerkaz HaAkademi Shalem'') is a private liberal arts college in Jerusalem, Israel providing undergraduate education and founded with the aim of producing "broadly educated citizens for ...

, Israel's first liberal arts college, established in 2013. Hazony has served as director of the

John Templeton Foundation The John Templeton Foundation (Templeton Foundation) is a philanthropic organization that reflects the ideas of its founder, John Templeton, who became wealthy via a career as a contrarian investor, and wanted to support progress in religious a ...

's project in Jewish Philosophical Theology and as a member of the Israel Council for Higher Education committee examining general studies programs in Israel's universities and colleges. He is author of a regular blog on philosophy, politics, Judaism, Israel, and higher education, called ''Jerusalem Letters''. Hazony has published in outlets including ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'', ''

Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', and '' American Affairs''.

Views and opinions

Hazony is a Modern Orthodox Jew and relates his views on Open Orthodoxy in an article published in 2014. In it, he states that he fears that Open Orthodoxy is acting as an ideological echo chamber in which any unapproved views are ridiculed and quashed without debate. Hazony describes his concern that elements of Open Orthodoxy have seemingly decided to accept all conclusions of academic Bible critics as indisputable fact, without even going through the motions of investigating whether these conclusions are true. Hazony is an outspoken Judeo-

nationalist Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...

and has written that nationalism uniquely provides "the collective right of a free people to rule themselves". However, several critics of Hazony's 2018 book, '' The Virtue of Nationalism'', maintain it is both theoretically inconsistent or incoherent and that it bears little relation to the historical body of nationalist thought. In a review for the ''Tel Aviv Review of Books'', Yair Wallach argues that Hazony's 2020 book, ''A Jewish State: Herzl and the Promise of Nationalism'', is characterised by "intellectual dishonesty", in part for presenting a selective account of

Theodor Herzl Theodor Herzl; hu, Herzl Tivadar; Hebrew name given at his brit milah: Binyamin Ze'ev (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austro-Hungarian Jewish lawyer, journalist, playwright, political activist, and writer who was the father of modern po ...

's understanding of Zionism and nationalism.Yair Wallach
No True Nationalist
''Tel Aviv Review of Books'', Summer 2021

Bibliography

;Books * ''The Political Philosophy of Jeremiah: Theory, Elaboration, and Applications,'' (doctoral dissertation, 1993) * ''The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel's Soul'' (New York: Basic Books and The New Republic, 2000) * ''The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture'' (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012) * ''God and Politics in Esther'' (Cambridge:

Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press in the world. It is also the King's Printer. Cambridge University Pre ...

, 2016) * '' The Virtue of Nationalism'' (New York: Basic Books, 2018) * ''A Jewish State: Herzl and the Promise of Nationalism'' ebrew(Sella Meir and Tikvah Fund, 2020) * '' Conservatism: A Rediscovery'' (Washington: Regnery, 2022) ;Edited books *

, Yoram Hazony, and Michael Oren, eds., ''New Essays on Zionism'' (Jerusalem: Shalem Press, 2006). * Introduction to Aaron Wildavsky, ''Moses as Political Leader'' (Jerusalem: Shalem Press, 2005). * Yoram Hazony and Dru Johnson, eds., ''The Question of God's Perfection'' (Leiden: Brill, 2018). * Yoram Hazony, Gil Student, and Alex Sztuden, eds., ''The Revelation at Sinai: What Does 'Torah from Heaven' Mean?'' (New York: Ktav, 2021). ;Translated books * Iddo Netanyahu, ''Yoni's Last Battle: the Rescue at Entebbe, 1976'' Yoram Hazony, trans. (Jerusalem: Gefen, 2001).

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hazony, Yoram 1964 births Living people Princeton University alumni Rutgers University alumni Israeli Modern Orthodox Jews 21st-century Israeli philosophers Political philosophers People from Rehovot 21st-century Israeli non-fiction writers Israeli political writers