Text of the introductory lecture for the Amsterdam Summer University, ‘The Body in Judaïsm’ (1996), organised by the Jewish Historical Museum, Amsterdam. In this article I take the reader on an imaginary walk through the city of Amsterdam. It is not a new thought to consider the city and its inhabitants as a kind of body. Therefore, a stroll through the city might teach us something about the subject of the conference: the body in Judaism in particular, and the body in Western culture in general.
