The heart needs something to hope for.A family history of Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Göttingen: Wallstein, 2018

This book deals with European religious history in the kaleidoscope of family memory. Around 1900, many Germans toyed with Eastern philosophies and religions that offered them alternatives to European traditions. Two movements paved their way. German Life Reform adopted Theosophy and esoteric religion as a means to experiment with religious otherness. Simultaneously, missionaries from India founded mission stations in the European capitals. With the help of the private archive of a Jewish-Prussian family - the Oettingers from Marienwerder (Western Prussia) - Gerdien Jonker unfolds the various narrative strands and places them against the horizon of early globalization. Tracing the changing milieus, she lends four Jewish generations her voice: German-Jewish assimilation during the German Empire; experiments with the Life Reform in the Weimar Republic, in which a reformed, cosmopolitan Islam played a pivotal role; survival strategies during National Socialism, finally, a new start in England after the war. Connecting family memories with the history of European religions, the author coins historical research with ethnographical inquiry, capturing stories that were handed down in the Oettinger family and placing them in their historical context. The result is a new chapter of European religious history.
 

---