Introduction

This introduction advances the concept of a ‘domain’ for the depiction of the contemporary global arena. It contends that existing paradigms of geopolitical space, including the dominant example of the nation-state, are conceptually inadequate for a proper representation of the contemporary situation of the Jewish people. The contemporary global epoch, characterised by newly significant forms of global space and context, has rendered existing concepts and nomenclature inadequate, particularly in relation to the Jewish people. In response, the book advances three primary constructs, the national domain, the global domain, and the domain of the land, which characterise and define Jewish existence in the global era. This chapter theorises the concept of domain as a spatial context and elucidates its various meanings hitherto in the social sciences. It seeks to show how primal conceptions of space and time had taken form in Israel’s ancient arenas, which would subsequently shape Jewish identity, memory, and consciousness through Jewish history. It would be in the global epoch that the ancient paradigms would gain new relevance and meaning, being a time of spatial transformation when long-established social and political structures were to become increasingly destabilised and reconfigured.