Editing A Study of History (section)

=== Jews and Armenians as a "fossil society" ===

In the introduction of his work Toynbee refers to a number of "fossilized relics" of societies, among others he mentions the [[Armenians]], who according to Toynbee played a similar role to that of the Jews in the world of Islam.

<blockquote>"...and yet another Syriac remnant, the Armenian Gregorian Monophysites, have played much the same part in the World of Islam."<ref>''A Study of History'', Volume 1, Section VII, at 164.</ref> </blockquote>
 
Volume 1 of the book, written in the 1930s, contains a discussion of Jewish culture which begins with the sentence <blockquote>"There remains the case where victims of religious discrimination represent an extinct society which only survives as a fossil. .... by far the most notable is one of the fossil remnants of the Syriac Society, the Jews."<ref>''A Study of History'', Volume 1, Section VII, at 135–139.</ref> </blockquote>That sentence has been the subject of controversy, and some reviewers have interpreted the line as antisemitic (notably after 1945).<ref>Franz Borkenau, "Toynbee's Judgment of the Jews: Where the Historian Misread History", ''Commentary'' (May 1955).</ref><ref>Eliezer Berkovits, ''Judaism: Fossil or Ferment?'' (Philosophical Library, 1956).</ref><ref>Nathan Rotenstreich, "The Revival of the Fossil Remnant: Or Toynbee and Jewish Nationalism", ''Jewish Social Studies'', Vol. 24, No. 3 (July 1962), pp. 131–143.</ref><ref>Abba Solomon Eban, "The Toynbee heresy: address delivered at the Israel", in ''Toynbee and History: Critical Essays and reviews'', ed. by Ashley Montagu (Porter Sargent, 1956).</ref><ref>Oskar K. Rabinowicz, ''Arnold Toynbee on Judaism and Zionism: A Critique'' (W.H. Allen, 1974).</ref> In later printings, a footnote was appended which read <blockquote>"Mr. Toynbee wrote this part of the book before the Nazi persecution of the Jews opened a new and terrible chapter of the story...".{{citation needed|date=July 2015}} </blockquote>The subject is extensively debated with input from critics in Vol XII, ''Reconsiderations'', published in 1961.