ABSTRACT
In traditional Jewish representations, the Diaspora has a double connotation, negative and positive; negative in the sense of exile and God's punishment, and positive in the sense of Israel's mission among the nations. In both cases, the concept of Diaspora is dynamic, heavily charged with Messianism. This chapter shows how Diaspora paradigm remains a useful structuring element for an understanding of the complex identities woven between politics and religion in contemporary Judaism. In spite of the genocide and the persistence of a latent endemic anti-Semitism, Jewish modernity must face the test of a Diaspora paradigm that has been de-dramatized. The Diaspora is integral to the Jewish condition; not only because the period of dispersion is the longest in Jewish history, but mainly because it constitutes the frame within which Judaism, distinct from the original Hebraism, developed through its contact with reality.
