Reading Science in Early Writings of Leopold Zunz and Rifāʿa Rāfiʿ al-Ṭahṭāwī

The dissertation is divided into two parts, each containing two chapters. Part I describes two nineteenth century movements and fields--the German Wissenschaft des Judentums (Science of Judaism) and the Arab nahda (Renaissance)--moving between what these developments are at their beginnings and what they have come to be through later developments and representations. I argue that both German Jews and Arabs were made to deal with Orientalism and colonialism in the nineteenth century, and that the different forms they encountered shaped how the Wissenschaft des Judentums and the nahda formulated their proposals for reform and their understandings of Europe and of Christianity. Part II turns to examine in greater depth two foundational literary and programmatic texts which initiate discourse of both movements: Leopold Zunz's Etwas ueber die rabbinische Litteratur (1818), which lays out the foundation for the field; and Rifa'a Rafi' al-Tahtawi's travel writing Takhlis al-ibriz ila talkhis bariz (1834). I take science as a departure point for reading these texts, because of the central role sciences play in each. This is not surprising given the post-Enlightenment milieu of which they a