obese aA | acer LIBRARY OF THE THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY PRINCETON, N. J. PURCHASED BY THE MRS. ROBERT LENOX KENNEDY CHURCH HISTORY FUND. Division... cdvous.4 SCCttON...C. cadeaad-- a. mS wis ‘ : AN OUTLINE JEWISH HIST ORY ee M. DOUBNOW “IN THREE VOLUMES Authorized Translation from the Russian VOL. If. THE MIDDLE AGES AND MODERN TIMES MAX N. MAISEL PUBLISHER 424 Grand Street, New York, N. Y. 1925 Copyright, 1925, by Max N. Maisel <> RAD SSI) alee CHAPTER TABLE OF CONTENTS VoLuME III PART I—THE MIDDLE AGES I. II. ITI. IV. INTRODUCTION Meo rate ie rer tbne tig JEWISH SETTLEMENTS IN EUROPE BEFORE THE CRUSADES. .. . Italy and Byzantium—Spain Under the Visi- goths— France and Germany— Russia and Poland. Tue REGENERATION OF JUDAISM IN MoorisH SPAIN—950 - 1215 7 NANG BD Pearippoaranny ey 5) NR The Caliphate of Cordova—Solomon Gabirol —The Progress of Jewish Literature—Jehuda Halevi—Abraham-ibn-Ezra—The Almohades— Spain and the East—The Life of Maimonides— Maimonides’ Writings. Tue JEWS IN CHRISTIAN E\UROPE DvuRING THE CRUSADES—1096- 1 DPA SSN VEN BB UN Pa ARR ACU The First Crusade—The Second Crusade— The Third Crusade—The Condition of the Jews in France and Germany—Rashi and the Tossa- fists. CenTURIES OF MAartTyRDOM AND HarpsHie PRECEDING THE Ex- PULSION OF THE JEWS FROM FRANCE—1215-1894 A. D. . . Pope Innocent IlI—Persecution of the Tal- mud and Religious Disputes—Spain and France PAGE 10 34 73 98 CHAPTER iia VII. VIII. —The Struggle Between Religion and Science— The Cabal and the Zohar—The Expulsion of the Jews from England—The Expulsion of the Jews from France—Germany—The Ghetto and False Accusations Against the Jews—The Black Death —lItaly. Tur Jews’ Last Century IN SpAIn—-1391-1492 A. Di... Jewish Courtiers and the Massacre in Se- ville—The Marranos—The Inquisition—Torque- mada—The Expulsion of the Jews from Spain and Portugal. THE JEWS IN PoLAND AND RuSSIA —XJItrH-XVrH CENTURIES . The Influx of Jews Into Poland—Casimir the Great, 1333-1370—The Jews Under the Yaghellons—The Jews in Muscovite Russia, PART II—MODERN TIMES INTRODUCTION | (4ueaten clea lice es Tue JEws IN TURKEY AND PALES- TINE Ur To THE DECLINE OF S ABBATHISM—1492-1750 A. D. Civil Life—Joseph Nassi—Palestine—The Shulhan Aruch—The Cabala—Ari—Sabbatai Zevi—The Messianic Movement and Its Fall. Tue Jews In WESTERN EUROPE From THE XVITH TO THE A Vilvs CENTURY) xoue eo oe Italy—Science and Letters in Italy—The Netherlands—Acosta and Spinoza—Manasseh- ben-Israel and the Return of the Jews to Eng- land—Germany—The Reformation and the Jews —The Condition of the Jews in Germany and Austria—The Intellectual Life of the German Jews. PAGE 140 163 176 178 199 OHAPTER IX. XI. Tur JEws In Russia AND POLAND XVItuH tro X VIItH CenTURY . The Golden Age—The Kahals and the Waads —The Growth of Rabbinism—Khmelnitzki and the Cossack Massacres—The Jews During the Musecovite-Swedish Invasion—Poland’s Decline— Sabbathians and Frankists. THe TRANSITION PrERI0D—1750- D7 OB ATR i ede Ca Ue Moses Mendelsohn—The School of Mendel- sohn—The Struggle for Education—The Haida- maks and the Partition of Poland—The Jews in Russia Under Peter I—lIsrael Besht and Hassid- ism—The Struggle Between the Rabbis and the Hassidim. A SurRvEY oF Principat Events DuRING THE NINETEENTH CEN- UE Widhie ica cad eam naman po eh halt Cel At @ The French Revolution—The Progress of En- lightenment in Western Europe—The Russian Jews under Alexander I and Nichols I—The Jews of Western Europe during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century—The Jews in Russia during the Second Half of the Nine- teenth Century, PAGE 234 268 298 Vi) Wind V/MAne Wik Ny AN ah uy a fh; Vee ee ney Wie Ol MY THE MIDDLE AGES e4 Introduction. HE thousand years which elapsed be- tween the downfall of the Roman EKm- ail pire in 476 and the discovery of Jap America in 1492, is called by historians Br") The Middle Ages. This period falls into two parts, during the first of which (the Vith to the [Xth century) the great mass of the Jewish people lived in the Orient, in Baby- lonia, Persia, Arabia, Syria, Egypt and Pales- tine, only small and isolated Hebrew commu- nities inhabiting such Western countries as Italy, Byzantium, Spain, France, Germany and Russia. From the XIth to the X Vth century, however, (the second part of the Middle Ages), the situation was reversed, only a few Hebrews remaining in the Kast while all the rest moved westward. Instead of Palestine and Babylonia, Germany and other European countries be- came centres of Jewry. A considerable portion of the world’s inter- national commerce was in the hands of the Jews, 7 8 Tur Mippitre AGEs who, ever since olden times, had been the mid- dlemen between Asiatic and European mer- chants; thus it was comparatively easy for them to leave the Orient for more westerly homes. Their migrations increased as their chief centers of culture fell into a more and more hopeless state of decay with the settling of Asia into its age-long sleep after being mundated by Mongolian tribes. In Europe the immigrants found Jewish set- tlements which had been founded in the days of the Roman Empire. Passing from Asia and Africa into Europe, Spain was the first bridge they had to cross. When that country fell into the hands of the Arabs in the VIIIth century, Eastern Jews penetrated with the conquerors into their new possession which became for sev- eral centuries one of the most enlightened coun- tries of Kurope under their transforming hands. The European Jews lived very differently in the first period than in the second. During the former, when their numbers were small upon the western continent, they enjoyed comparative peace, and were very seldom molested by the surrounding nations which were at that time passing through the transition stages from pa- — ganism to Christianity. But in the second pe- riod, they were persecuted and oppressed by the Christians in proportion as they increased in numbers, and the upshot of all their sufferings OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 9 was that they were finally expelled altogether from many Christian countries. The dividing line between the two parts of the Middle Ages was the period of the Cru- sades, which began in France and Germany in the year 1096 A. D. CHAPTER I JEWISH SETTLEMENTS IN E.uROPE BEFORE THE CrusaDEsS—500-1096 A. D. § 2. Italy and Byzantium. HE Roman emperors whose conquests deprived the Jews of their homeland, fn\| Judea, had nevertheless protected them Uig| always so long as they remained on Ro- ZisS| man soil. The division of the Empire into its Western (or Roman) and Eastern (or Byzantine) parts, did not affect the Jews who continued to live as before among Italians in the one part and Greeks in the other. Four hundred years after the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, the Jews witnessed the sack of Rome by the Barbarians, tribes of Goths and Teutons whose invasions brought about the complete downfall of this once invin- cible power (476). They witnessed also the gradual changes by which imperial Rome be- came Papal Rome, observing the circumstances that produced the transformation of a military 10 OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 11 into an ecclesiastical capital, the seat of the Catholic Popes who were the High Priests of the Christian church in Europe. The first Roman Popes did not oppress the Jews, though they tried very hard to convert them to Christianity. Gregory the Great (590) granted the Jewish communities the right to govern themselves according to their own laws and customs, but he offered them all kinds of rewards and privileges to embrace his religion. Whenever friends assured him that men who would be willing to abandon their own faith for the sake of personal gain could never be sin- cere in another, the Pope would answer: “But the children and the grandchildren of such con- verts will be sincere Christians.” When Italy became part of the Western Em- pire ruled by Charlemagne, the prosperity of the Jews increased greatly, for the Emperor had the wisdom to value the activities of the Jews in the field of international commerce at their true worth, and he gave them his special protection. Under Charlemagne’s successors, however, the empire disintegrated and Western Europe came under the new system of feudal- ism whereby the great landowners or feudal bar- ons ruled as despots over their tenants, acquit- ting their whole responsibility towards the crown by the payment of tributes and furnishing of troops in time of war. ‘The situation of the 12 Jewish SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE Jews now depended no longer upon one, but upon many rulers, so that in one place they would enjoy almost complete freedom, sharing in all but a few civil rights, while in another they would suffer cruel oppression. At that time Rome, Venice, Naples and the island of Sicily were the homes of large Jewish communities. The Popes treated the Roman Jews with tolerance, some even taking them un- der their own protection and preventing any restriction of their rights on the part of the church councils. The only prohibition laid upon the Jews within the Papal dominions referred to the employment of Christian servants in their homes, for fear that they might be converted to Judaism. ‘The conversion of Jews to Chris- tianity, on the other hand, was encouraged in many ways, and eventually a descendant of one such converted family even became Pope under the name of Anacletus II (1130-38). Popular legend has accounted in various ways for this event which is a proven historical fact. A learned Rabbi, Simon of Mayence, says the legend, had a little son named Elchanan, who was kidnapped. The boy was baptized and brought up in a Catholic monastery. When he grew to be a young man, he was taken to Rome and it was not long before his extraordinary tal- ents brought him to the rank of cardinal, and the Pope dying soon afterwards, he was elected to OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsTorY 18 the papacy. But Elchanan longed for his own family and for the religion of his own people. So ardent was his desire to see his father once again that he resorted to the following ruse to achieve a meeting with him: He ordered the Bishop of Mayence to impose such hardships upon the Jews in his diocese that they would send delegates to Rome to complain before the Pope, and he had every hope that the vene- rable Rabbi Simon would be one of the en- voys. It fell out as Elchanan had planned; Simon came with others to lay before the Pope the protests of the Jews of Mayence against the Bishop’s edicts. At first Elchanan engaged the Rabbi in a religious dispute in which he dis- played a knowledge of Judaism that amazed the Jewish scholar, and afterwards, being a great lover of chess, the Pope challenged his father to a game. As they sat alone together over the board, Elchanan revealed his secret. When Rabbi Simon recovered from his first shock of surprise, he recognized his lost son in the Roman Pope who soon convinced him of his desire to return to the fold of Israel. Rabbi Simon hast- ened back to Mayence, taking with him the Pope’s order that the Bishop’s persecutions cease at once, and full of joyful news for his wife about the finding of their long-lost child. Shortly afterwards, the Pope disappeared sud- denly from Rome. He made his way secretly 14 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE to Mayence, where he lived in the home of his parents professing the Jewish religion. Another version of the legend brings his his- tory to no such happy conclusion, but tells how the Pope, overcome with remorse at his life-long apostasy, atoned for it with his death as he leaped from the topmost spire of St. Peter’s and was dashed to pieces on the street below. In the Byzantine empire on the Balkan peninsula, the Jews were far worse off than in Italy, for the emperors had treated them with deep enmity ever since the days of Justinian (VIth century). ‘They had few civil rights, and were sometimes even converted to Christianity by force. The emperor Leo the Isaurian pub- lished an edict commanding all the Jews of Byzantium to embrace Christianity according to the rites of the Greek Orthodox church on pain of terrible punishment (723). Many made a pretense of accepting this ultimatum in the hope that the persecutions would cease after a while and leave them free to go back to their own faith, but many others preferred to go away from Byzantium. They went north to the coast of the Black Sea, to Taurida and the Crimea. It has also been said of the emperor Basil the Macedonian that he used every means in his power to compel the Jews to renounce their religion for Christianity, and when he realized that all his efforts were in vain he destroyed OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 15 about one thousand Jewish communities in his empire. Only five were left standing, and these owed their escape to the intercession of the He- brew poet Shepahtiah, who had happened to cure the emperor’s daughter of insanity. Legend at- tributes to this poet a prayer of repentance written in verse, beginning with the words “Israel Nashah.” It is to be found in the Selichot and the Machzor. The following ex- tract depicts the mood of the persecuted people: “Lord, we knock at Thy door like beggars. Hear our prayers, Thou who dwellest on high! We are beset with oppression and insult on every side. Forsake us not, O God of our fathers! Send us salvation that the eyes of all may see. Let the evildoer cease to hold us in his power, and let our great sorrows have an end—let saviors come to Zion!” Persecutions as terrible as those instigated by Basil were, however, comparatively rare. In ordinary times, the Byzantine Jews, in spite of their disabilities, played a very important part in the economic life of the country. They lived in many Grecian cities, notably in Thrace, Macedonia, Thessaly and on the islands of the Archipelago. Communities of considerable ex- tent were to be found in Constantinople, the eapital, and in Salonika, the commercial city on the seacoast. The Jews engaged in a great variety of trades, especially in the production 16 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN E\UROPE and manufacture of silk. Most popular of all was the dying industry and “Jewish dye” was famous throughout the world of commerce. In the large cities, Karaite and Talmudic or “Rab- binite” Jews established their communities side by side. The Jews of Constantinople lived in Pera, the business quarter on the sea-board. Their civil rights, in conformity with the old church laws, were greatly curtailed, but they enjoyed considerable freedom in all matters per- taining to the affairs of their commnuities which were ruled over by elected elders or “ephors.” § 3. Spain Under the Visigoths. Jews had lived in Spain on the Pyrenean peninsula since time immemorial, even before the people of that country had been converted to Christianity, having settled there as subjects of the Roman empire when Spain became part of those far-flung dominions. In the Vth century when the Empire was nearing its fall a Teutonic tribe called Visigoths conquered Spain and established their kingdom in place of the Romans’ which they destroyed. The Visigothic kings, having adopted Christian- ity, granted vast power to the clergy who at once engaged in vigorous persecution of the Hebrews. King Recaredo I (589), enacted ex- ceedingly harsh laws against them, the aim of OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY Vi which was to sever the amicable relations that had hitherto existed between the Jews and their Christian neighbors, for the Catholic clergy feared that the Jews might lure Christians away from the church. The Visgoth King Sisebuto gave all his Hebrew subjects the alternative of becom- ing Christians or leaving his dominions (612). A great number chose to leave, but many others submitted to the compulsion of outwardly adopt- ing the alien faith, though at heart they re- mained loyal to Israel. A few subsequent rulers either modified the cruel anti-Jewish laws or abolished them altogether, but such tolerance was rare. Most of the Visigoths, being crude and savage, were predisposed to resort to meth- ods of unbridled fanaticism in their struggle to reduce the Jews to submission. Goaded on by their clergy they determined to annihilate the Hebrew communities in their kingdom since there was no converting them. None of these kings surpassed Receswind (652), Erwig (680) and Egica (687) in cru- elty. These barbarians reserved their utmost brutality for those Jews who, after having been forcibly converted, returned to their own reli- gion later on. During Egica’s reign these con- verted Jews became so desperate that they con- spired to overthrow the Visigothic dynasty. They entered into an alliance with their fellow- Hebrews in Northern Africa who were living 18 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE very happily under their Arab rulers, and planned, with their assistance, to destroy the intolerable regime in Spain. ‘The plot was dis- covered and all the Spanish Jews suffered cruel punishment. The enraged king convened a special meeting of the church council and with the sanction of the assembled clergy, published the following edict (694) : | “In view of the fact that the Jews not only profaned the religion into whose fold the Church had admitted them after baptism, by continuing to observe the laws of their former faith, but further dared to conspire to seize the supreme power in our kingdom, henceforth they shall all be regarded as slaves and given into serfdom to various Christian masters who are deprived of the right to set them free. Children above the age of seven years shall be taken from their parents and given to Christians to be brought up by them.” It is impossible to predict what the conse- quences of such persecution as this might have been had the Visigoth domination of Spain sur- vived this edict long. But warlike Arab tribes, the Moors and Berbers, living in northern Africa which only the straits of Gibraltar di- vide from Spain, overran the country and soon conquered the greater part of it (711). The — Jews welcomed the Arabs as their saviors and helped them everywhere against the Visigoths. oe, OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 19 The Arab chieftains, after capturing a city, would then leave it in the charge of their faith- ful allies while they pushed on farther. ‘Toledo, the Spanish capital, was surrendered by Jews | to the Arab leader Tarik; it was they who opened the city gates to the conquerors while the Catholic population sought refuge in their churches. And Tarik appointed Jews to main- tain order in the fallen city. Thus they became the masters of the very places from which they had once been so heartlessly expelled. Their rule once established in Spain, the Arab caliphs granted completed religious freedom and com- munal self-government to the Jews. In Granada, Cordova, Toledo and many other cities, numerous Jewish communities again sprang into being, and everywhere the Hebrews enjoyed the same independence as their brethren in Arab Babylonia. The Arab army that conquered Spain be- longed to the Eastern Caliphate which belonged at that time to the Damascus dynasty of Omay- yards, so that Spain was in the beginning a province of the Caliphate of Damascus. When the Omayyads were superseded by the Abbasid dynasty of the Baghdad caliphate, Abdurrach- man, the last of the Omayyads, fled to Spain and declared himself an independent ruler (755). He chose the city of Cordova for his capital and the Arab kingdom in Spain thus 20 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE came to be known as the Caliphate of Cordova. With the reign of Abdurrachman an era of peaceful development opened for the Jews. Strictly loyal to their religion and national tra- © ditions, they nevertheless mingled freely with the enlightened Arabs in political as well as in intellectual activities. Working together, these two Semitic races brought Spain to such a high degree of culture that it long remained the brightest spot in the darkness of mediaeval Eu- rope. ah France and Germany. Jewish settlements in Gaul (France), came into existence at the time when that country was still a province of the ancient Roman empire. In the [Vth and Vth centuries of the Christian era, such communities were founded in Mar- seilles, Orleans, Clermont, Paris, Cologne and other cities. The Jews enjoyed the rights of Roman citizens everywhere, and lived peaceably side by side with the native heathens. The in- fluence of Christianity which began to gain an ever-increasing hold upon the warlike and bar- > barian Gauls, ought to have had a civilizing effect upon their crude and primitive minds; springing from the parent Hebrew faith it ought to have made a point of contact between the Franks and Teutons and the Jews who lived in OUTLINE OF JEWISH History oT their midst. And at first the newly converted tribes, seeing very little different between the two religions, actually did mingle with the Jews and even intermarry with them. But this did not please the high Christian clergy who feared the Jewish influence upon the “sons of the Church” and at once set about destroying their friendship. ‘They began to show their congre- gations how sinful it was to continue on terms of amity with a people whose ancestors had killed Christ, and many Catholic bishops used all their power to make the kings either convert the Jews by force or expel them from their kingdoms. Their efforts were very successful in the new Frankish kingdom under Christian rulers of the Merovingian dynasty. (VIth to VIIth centu- ries). ‘These kings left the Jews completely to the mercy of the clergy and delivered them up to the laws of the church. ‘The ecclesiastical councils of Orleans (533-541) strictly forbade intermarriage; the Jews were not allowed to ap- pear on the streets during Passion Week and Easter Week; the severest punishment fol- lowed conversion of Christians to Judaism; a slave owned by a Jew might buy his freedom by becoming a Christian. The clergy were tire- less in their efforts to break off all possible con- tact between the Jews and the other inhabitants of the country, so as to set them apart as an in- ferior caste, not entitled to even the simplest 22 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE rights that belong to the least of human beings. Not content with this, some of the Frankish kings and bishops tried to convert the Hebrews to Catholicism by violence. Bishop Avitus of Clermont spent much time and energy to persuading the Jews in his dio- cese to renounce the religion of their fathers, but his sermons bore no fruit. Only one Jew was baptized during Easter Week, and his apostasy enraged the others. One day, as he was walk- ing on the street, another Jew poured some evil- smelling oil on his head. ‘This was on Ascension Day, and an angry crowd of Christians destroyed the synagogue to its very foundations by way of reprisal, while the Bishop looked on, and threatened all the Jews with death. The next day the bishop summoned an assembly of the Jews of Clermont and offered them the choice of embracing Christianity or leaving the city. One of the poets of that time, who was also a monk, transcribed the Bishop’s brief speech into Latin verse, as follows: “Look what thou dost, thou old and foolish Hebrew people. Begin thy life anew and learn true faith, even in thine old age. But time is. too short for long discourses. Hear thou then: accept our religion or go hence. ‘Thou has thy free choice; be advised by me and remain with us; let the obstinate ones go.” After three days of painful deliberation about OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIstTorRY 23 five hundred Jews consented to be baptized and the rest fled to Marseilles (576). The Frankish king, Hilperic, and his asso- ciate, the learned bishop Gregory of Tours, dis- played extraordinary zeal in converting Jews to Christianity. Hilperic had a financial agent in Paris, a Jew named Prisk, whose shrewdness and honesty the king appreciated to the full, but he could not reconcile himself to the fact that Prisk insisted upon remaining a Jew. Together with the Bishop of Tours he tried to convert Prisk, but the financier stubbornly refused. One day the king jestingly took hold of Prisk’s head and bending it low, said to the Bishop, “Come, servant of the Lord, lay your hands upon him.” Prisk recoiled in horror from the sign of the Cross, whereupon the king flew into a great rage. The Bishop entered into heated argument with the Jew as to which of their religions was the true one and the latter tried to prove by rea- soning and quotations from the Bible that Christ was not the Son of God. King Hilperic then sent Prisk away to revise his beliefs, but find- ing that he was absolutely immovable, he lost patience and cried: “If the Jew will not believe of his own free will then he shall be made to do so.” Fearing the threats of both the secular and the ecclesiastical authorities, many Paris Jews were consenting to be baptized, but under one pretext or another Prisk postponed his sur- 24 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE render, for he would not even pretend to re- nounce the faith of his fathers for any other. One Saturday as he was going to the synagogue which was on a by-street, he was attacked by a Jewish convert and killed (582). Dagobert, one of the last of the Merovingian kings, treated the Jews with the same cruelty as his contemporaries, the Visigoths of Spain were doing, and mercilessly expelled all the Jewish immigrants who had sought refuge from Spain in his kingdom. In 629 he published an edict, approved by the bishops, by which all Jews who would not consent to be baptized were to leave the Frankish dominions immediately. The chroniclers say that Dagobert took this step as a result of a letter from Heraclius, the Byzantine emperor who had also begun to per- secute the Jews in his empire. MHeraclius, it seemed, had learned from the predictions of as- trologers, that Byzantium would be devastated by a “circumcized people,” and thinking that this must refer to the Jews, the emperor advised the Frankish king to have all his Jewish sub- jects baptized, for otherwise they were a menace to every Christian kingdom. Shortly afterwards | a “circumcized people” did actually invade By- zantium; they were not Jews, however, but Arab Moslems. The fall of the Merovingian kingdom and the founding of the empire of Charlemagne OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 25 brought freedom from persecution to the Jews of France and Germany for many years (768- 814). This great king did not allow the clergy to overrule him as his predecessors had done and always protected the Jews who had by that time become the chief motive power in the industrial and commercial life of Europe. Charlemagne helped and protected their commercial enter- prises in France, allowing them to acquire landed estates and to engage in all kinds of trades and other activities, of which navigation was among the most popular. Some educated Jews were the emperor’s intimate friends, and one of these, a man of great learning named Isaac, was a member of the delegation sent by Charlemagne to the Caliph of Baghdad, Haroun-al-Raschid. Charlemagne’s son, Louis the Pious (810-840) also protected the Jews from the hostility of the Catholic clergy. When Agobard, the fanatical bishop of Lyons, began to incite the Christian congregations to attack the Jews, Louis ordered him to desist and prom- ised to take the persecuted people under his special protection. He appointed an official with the title of “Jewish Elder” (Magister judae- orum) to guard their civil and commercial rights. The empire of Charlemagne fell to pieces once more after the death of his son, and Italy, France and Germany became separate kingdoms 26 JewisH SETTLEMENT IN EvuRopPE ruled over by the emperor’s descendants, whose power was very limited however. Under the feudal system, certain counts and barons enjoyed unlimited and all but kingly powers within their own domains, and the status of the Jews varied consequently according to the fancy of these various feudal lords. In one province they were treated with tolerance, in another perse- cuted. Wherever the clergy’s influence was powerful they were cruelly used, as in the city of Toulouse, where the following “ecclesiastical” custom was established: Once a year, before the Easter holidays, the elder of the local Jewish community had to appear before the count in his castle and submit to having his face smartly slapped, as a reminder of the sufferings of the crucified Christ. Later on the Jews paid a spe- cial tax to avoid this annual indignity. In Béziers, the Catholic clergy preached ser- mons during the Passion Week, calling upon the Christians to avenge themselves upon the Jews for crucifying Christ, and the mobs, obey- ing their spiritual shepherds, attacked and beat the unfortunate Hebrews and _ stoned their homes. ‘There were cases of armed resistance which led to bloody though futile encounters with the fanatical crowds. When the dynasty of Charlemagne died out in Germany, the Saxon dynasty was inaugu- rated with Otto the Great (Xth century), who OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 27 annexed Italy to his possessions and received the title of Emperor. The German rulers re- garded themselves as the successors of the Ro- man emperors and the Jews as crown property, which they had inherited from ancient Rome. The emperors often ceded whole districts to their vassals, counts, barons or bishops, together with the Jews who lived there. In every dis- trict the Jews had to pay very heavy taxes for permission to carry on trade or commerce of whatever description. In many German cities the Jews lived in sep- arate communities whose chiefs were learned rabbis or elders. ‘The most prosperous of these were in Alsace-Lorraine and in the Rhine coun- try, Mayence, Worms, Cologne and Speyer, in all of which towns Talmudic schools were estab- lished and religious teachers once more, as in the past, became the people’s leaders. At the begin- ning of the XIth century, Rabbi Gershom, a certain scholar of Mayence, rose to great fame. He was surnamed Meyer Hahola (The light of the dispersed people), and was head of the highest Talmudic school where rabbis were trained for service in the communities of France and Germany. Like the gaons of olden times, Rabbi Gershom decided moot questions of law and made new laws when necessary. It was he who prohibited polygamy which still persisted here and there amongst the Jews of the East, 28 JEwiIsH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE and he also ruled that no husband might divorce his wife without her consent. These laws were approved by the rabbis’ convention at Worms. The scholars who were graduated from Ger- shoms’s school were known as “the w-se men of Lorraine.” § 5. Russia and Poland. The Khazar Kingdom. _ The first settlements of Jews in the countries which later on became part of Southern Russia were of very ancient date. In the opening cen- turies of the Christian era they already existed in the Greek dominions north of the Black Sea and in the Crimean peninsula, having been founded by emigrants out of the neighboring empire of Byzantium, which had colonies in all those countries. Two Greek inscriptions on old monuments found near Kerch and dated 80-81 A. D., prove that there was in this province a “synagogue of the Jews,” that is, a Jewish com- munity and house of worship. In the VIIth century a powerful kingdom arose on the shores of the Caspian Sea. This was the Kingdom of the Khazars, a race of Tartar origin. At first they were heathens, but later on became acquainted with the reli- gions of Jews, Greeks and Arabs. The idea of monotheism attracted them greatly and the chronicles tell how Bulan, their king, expressed OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 29 a desire to become a convert to one of these faiths (about 730 A. D.). The Byzantine Em- peror sent envoys with gifts, trying to induce him to embrace Christianity; the Arab caliph, through his ambassadors, tried to persuade him of the superiority of Islam. Jewish sages also were summoned to appear. Finding the repre- sentatives of each religion praised only his own, King Bulan decided on the Jewish as the most ancient, and following their king’s example, many Khazars embraced Judaism. The Khazar kings were called Khagan (cohan, or priest). Their capital was Ityl, near the mouth of the Volga at the Caspian Sea, almost where the city of Astrakhan now stands. Khagan Obadiah, one of Bulan’s descendants, was a particularly zealous Jew. He invited Jewish scholars from abroad to settle in his kingdom and had his subjects taught the Bible. He founded synagogues and regulated the order of divine services. The Jewish population had a highly civilizing influence upon the manners and customs of the half-savage Khazars. For a very long time the Jews of other countries remained in ignorance of this kingdom; the Spanish Jews heard of it for the first time in the Xth century when about the year 950, the Khazar King Joseph, a descendant of Obadiah’s, sent a let- ter to Spain describing the adoption of Judaism by his ancestors. Not long after this, however, 380 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EK UROPE the Khazar kingdom was destroyed. In former centuries the Khazars had often invaded the Slavs living along the Volga and the Dnieper, and re- ceived tribute from them; but as the Russian kingdom gained power under the Kieff Grand Dukes, the prestige of the Khazars weakened. One of these Russians, Sviatoslav, seized many of the Khazar fortresses along the Volga and crowded the Khazars out of the Caspian coun- try (969). Some of them migrated into the Crimea and some were dispersed over various Russian territories. About that time Jews appeared in the Rus- sian city of Kieff. The Russian chronicler Nes- tor says that in 986 “Khazar Jews’ came to Kieff where the Grand Duke, St. Vladimir, was preparing to abandon his heathen state and become a Christian according to the rites of the Greek church. The Khazar Jews, so say the legends, tried to persuade him to become a Jew instead, and Vladimir asked them “Where is your country?” “In Jerusalem,” the Jews re- plied. “Do you live there?” persisted the Duke. “No,” they answered, “for God, to punish our ancestors, scattered them over many countries all over the world.” ‘Then Vladimir said: “How then can you teach others if God turned against you and dispersed your people?” So the Grand Duke was baptized and his subjects also. Later on Russian monks, educated by the Greeks, OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 31 came to Kieff and often engaged the Jews in theological discussion. One of them, Theodosius of Pechersk, often visited the Kieff Jews and held long disputes with them, calling them in- fidels and apostates (1070). Russia was begin- ning to assume the same attitude towards the Jews as Byzantium before her. One hundred years after the reign of St. Vla- dimir, Jews still lived and carried on commerce in the duchy of Kieff. The Grand Duke Svia- topolk IL protected Jewish merchants and even entrusted some of them with the duty of collect- ing taxes and other ducal revenues. The com- munity was a very large one, but a great calam- ity befell it during the interregnum following the death of Sviatopolk (1118). Vladimir Monomachus was invited by pop- ular consent to occupy the throne of Kieff, but the new ruler kept delaying his departure for the duchy, and meanwhile riots broke out in the city. Mobs sacked the house of Putiata, one of the officials, and then attacked the Jews and plundered their homes. The inhabitants of Kieff again sent envoys to Monomachus, with instruc- tions to warn him that if he hesitated much longer, the riots would soon be uncontrollable. At that, he left immediately and as soon as he arrived in Kieff order was restored. The Jews lived on in Kieff. In the year 1124 they suffered great loss of life and property in 82 JEWISH SETTLEMENT IN EUROPE a conflagration that swept over a large portion of the city. A great many Jewish merchants were attracted to Kieff as one of the principal centers of exchange for European and Asiatic merchandise. Jewish emigrants from Byzantium and neigh- boring countries of Asia usually settled in Rus- sia in this duchy while those from Western Eu- rope chose the nearer country of Poland for their refuge. It is believed that Jewish mer- chants from Germany had had business con- nections with Poland since the time of Charle- magne and that this was the deciding factor in their settling there rather than in Russia. There is an old Polish legend concerning the Jews, which runs as follows: After the death of their duke Poppel, the Poles came to the assembly in Krushewitz to elect a successor (about 842). There was a long argument as to who should be elected and it was finally decided that the first man to enter the city on the following morning should be their duke. It happened that this was a Jew named Abraham Porchovnik; he was declared duke, but declined the honor and advised the people — to elect Piast instead, who was a Pole and a man of great wisdom. ‘They did so and Piast became the progenitor of the dynasty to which he gave his name. Another legend tells that towards the end of OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIstTorRY 33 the IXth century Jewish delegates from Ger- many came to the Polish duke Leshek with a petition to admit Jews to Poland, and that Leshek, after questioning them as to the nature of their religion, gave his consent, whereupon there was a great migration from Germany into his domains (894). The influx of Jews into Poland vastly de- creased towards the end of the Xth century when the Poles, by embracing Christianity, es- tablished connections with the Western or Cath- olic church and with the European countries where large communities of Jews were estab- lished. CHAPTER 11 Tue REGENERATION OF JUDAISM IN MoorisH SPAIN—950-1215 A. D. § 6. The Caliphate of Cordova. Y the tenth century the kingdom founded in Spain by the Moors in 711 \ A had reached a high degree of prosper- pve) ity. It had spread over the whole BS) center and south of the Pyrenean Peninsula where vhe great cities of Cordova, Seville, Toledo and Granada bespoke its power. In the north only, small Christian kingdoms still lingered in Aragon and Castille. The Jews lived among the friendly Arabs, enjoying the protection of their rulers, called Caliphs, whose capital was Cordova. The Caliphate of Cor- dova reached the zenith of its glory during the reign of Abdurrachman IIT and Alakem II (912-976 A. D.), of whom the former was one of the most illustrious rulers of his age, whether Christian or Mahometan. He was famous as a patron of science, poetry and the arts. Commerce and industry flourished in the 34 OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 85 Spain of the Arabs. .Of the country’s many rich and populous cities, Cordova had about half a million inhabitants, Mahomet- ans, Jews and Christians, more than a hundred thousand houses and many mosques and _ pal- aces. ‘lo the peace-loving and enlightened Cor- dovans, intellectual prowess was more honor- able than military, and in the highest circles the poet and the man of science commanded more respect than even the most famous warrior. The Caliph Alakem was himself a poet and lover of science; he spent vast sums on rare and valuable books and his library contained a collection of over four hundred thousand manu- scripts. The University of Cordova was the most famous in Europe. Scientists and writ- ers, both Jewish and Moor, were very often appointed to the highest offices in the kingdom. One of the most influential statesmen of that time was a Jew named Hasdai-ibn-Shaprut (915-970 A. D.) The son of a well-known citi- zen of Cordova, Hasdai received a good educa- tion; he studied philology and medicine and was equally at home in the Hebrew, Arabic and Latin languages. He possessed, besides, a very practical mind and exceptional adminis- trative ability. The attention of Abdurrachman having been drawn to Hasdai’s rare talents, the Caliph made him his councillor or minister of foreign affairs, 36 Tuer REGENERATION OF JUDAISM in which capacity all negotiations between the Caliph of Cordova and foreign rulers or envoys were conducted by him. Occupying a position thus eminent at court, Hasdai was tireless in helping his fellow-Jews. He became the chief of the Hebrew communities in Spain, an office which corresponded somewhat to that of the exilarchs in ancient Babylon. Under his pro- tection the Spanish Jews lived peacefully and grew rich, and whenever envoys from Byzan- tium or other countries of Europe or Asia came to Cordova, Hasdai would question them closely as to the condition of the Jews where they came from. One day the Persian ambassador told him that in a remote land there existed an independent Jewish kingdom called Khazaria, whose king was named Joseph. Hasdai at first refused to believe this joyous news. He deter- mined to convince himself of the truth of the story and ascertain whether there was indeed a place on the earth’s surface where some of the dispersed and homeless nation had actually founded a kingdom of their own. After a long search, Hasdai’s scouts discovered the route to the unknown Khazaria, and he then sent, by way of Byzantium and Russia, an envoy bear- ing a letter to King Joseph, begging him to write him the whole truth concerning his mys- terious kingdom. “For if I knew,” wrote Has- dai, “that our people do really possess a king- OUTLINE oF JEWISH HISTORY 87 dom in this world which is wholly theirs, I would abandon my high position here, forsake my fam- ily, and cross mountains and valleys, sea and land, until I came to the place where my mas- ter, the Jewish king, lives. I would behold the peace in which this remnant of Israel dwells; then would I pour out my soul in praise to God, who has not denied His mercy to all of His unhappy people who have sought deliverance so ardently and so long in their wanderings from country to country. With our honor gone, shorn of our pride, and exiled, we have no an- swer to give to those who say to us: “Every nation has a kingdom, but you have not even a trace of one on all the earth.’ ” Some time later, Hasdai received an answer from the Khazar , king, or Khagan, Joseph. (About 960.) From this missive he learnt that the Khazar kingdom was not of Jewish origin and that only the kings and a certain section of the population professed Judaism. At the end of his letter, King Joseph said: “Our eyes are turned to- wards the wise men of Israel in the academies of Jerusalem and Babylonia. May the Lord hasten the promised deliverance of Israel, may He bring His dispersed people together while we yet live!” Ten years after the date of King Joseph’s letter, Spain received the sad news of the fall of the Khazar kingdom. It was not Hasdai’s destiny to settle in the Jewish king- 88 THE REGENERATION OF JUDAISM dom; on the contrary, it was to Spain that the descendants of the Khagans were forced to flee for refuge against their conquerors. Hasdai, himself a scholar, was a patron and protector of the representatives of Jewish learn- ing. A Talmudic school for advanced scholars was founded in Cordova during his lifetime, of which the chroniclers give the following account: One of the four Talmudic scholars sent from Babylonia to collect money for the academy in Sura, who were taken prisoners by Arab sail- ors (see Part II, §72), was set free by Cor- dovan Jews paying a ransom for him. (925 A.D.) The name of this Babylonian Talmudist was Moses-ben-Knoch, and he settled in Cor- dova without letting anybody know him for the great scholar he was. An accident brought the truth to light, however. One day he came to the synagogue of Cordova wearing the dress of a poor wanderer. The local rabbi and judge, Rabbi Nathan, was lecturing on the Talmud and trying to explain to his students some very intricate pomt of the law. Moses, sitting hum- bly near the door, saw that the rabbi’s exposi- tion was not very clear, but he contained his impatience as well as he could. After a while he found it impossible to remain silent any longer, and interpolated his own opinion upon the question at issue. ‘The audience listened in great astonishment to the profound learning of OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIstrory 89 this poor wanderer, and a number of other diffi- cult questions were to put him then, all of which he answered with a readiness that showed the vast extent of his knowledge. At length Rabbi Nathan, as he prepared to leave the synagogue for the day, said to his hearers: “It is not for me to be your rabbi; that title belongs to this stranger who comes here thus poorly attired. He is my master and hereby I declare myself — his pupil. Let him be elected in my place, as rabbi and judge of the Jews of Cordova.” When this was done, Moses set himself the task | of spreading the knowledge of the Talmud among the Jews all over Spain. He founded a school of higher learning in Cordova and had precious manuscripts sent there froin Baby- lonia. This school soon became so faraous that a great many eager young students ‘locked to. it from all parts of Spain and from the neigh- boring countries in the north of Africa. The spiritual rule of Rabbi Moses was universally recognized; everybody submitted without ques- tion to his rulings, just as in olden times the people accepted those of the Babylonian gaons. Moses did not bear the tile of gaon, but of rabbi (teacher), which came into general use thereafter among the Jews of Europe. The Jewish philologists and grammarians also enjoyed the special protection of Hasdai. Mena- chem and Dunash, the celebrated grammarians, AO Tuer REGENERATION OF JUDAISM were living in Cordova at that time, both en- grossed in the study of the Hebrew language, but holding divergent opinions upon its gram- matical rules. Menachem wrote the “Machber- eth,” the first dictionary of the ancient Hebrew tongue, and Dunash reviewed it, not without much sharp criticism of his rival’s findings. This led to a heated controversy between the follow- ers of the two scholars; Hasdai joined the ranks of Dunash’s supporters and withdrew his pro- tection from poor Menachem. A pupil of the latter master was Jehuda-ibn-Hayyuz, another famous grammarian who was the first to estab- lish the rule that the stem of all Biblical words consisted ordinarily of three letters. § 7. After the reigns of the Caliphs Abdurrachman and Alakem, the glory of Cordova began to decline. The Christians on the one side and the African Moors on the other, often raided the territories of the Caliphate, leaving ruin and havoc behind them. In 1013 Cordova itself was _ devastated by hordes of Arabs and shortly af- terwards the Caliphate fell. Arab Spain then split up into several petty kingdoms named after their capitals, Granada, Seville, Saragossa. Many Jews fleeing from the chaos in Cordova . settled in Granada, and soon after the arrival of these refugees, a remarkable man appeared OUTLINE OF JEWISH History Al in their midst who did the same for his fellow- Jews in Granada as Hasdai had done in Cor- dova. This was Samuel Halevi, who later on teceived the title of Nagid (chief, elder). A. native of Cordova, Samuel received in his youth a liberal education, both religious and secular. He was equally familiar with Hebrew and Arabic, wrote with great literary distinc- tion and was an admirable caligrapher, a talent very highly esteemed in those days. After the fall of Cordova, Samuel settled in the city of Malaga, which belonged to the king- dom of Granada. There the proceeds of a small spice-shop afforded him a very meagre liveli- hood. His shop stood next door to the residence of Alarif, the vizier of Granada, and Samuel used to write letters for one of the maid- servants to her master in Granada. Alarif be- came interested in those letters written in so beautiful a hand and so elegantly expressed. Coming one day to Malaga, the vizier made a point of meeting Samuel and was greatly as- tonished to find the modest shopkeeper a man of wide learning and distinguished intellect. “Your place is not here,” he said to Samuel, /. \“but at my side; henceforth you shall be my adviser.” ‘The vizier took Samuel back to Gra- nada, and made him his secretary. Several years later Alarif was taken ill and on his death-bed he indicated Samuel to Gabus, king 4.2 THE REGENERATION OF JUDAISM of Granada, as a man likely to be very useful in an administrative capacity. King Gabus, who set scholarship at the highest value, made Sam- uel his intimate and entrusted him with the supervision of important matters of state. (1027 A. D.) Samuel occupied the exalted office of vizier of Granada for twenty-eight years. His wise rule helped to increase the country’s pros- perity; he set the kingdom completely in order and was very often successful in keeping it out of military encounters which would have been risky and dangerous. This Jewish official had many enemies among the prominent Arabs who were angered that a Jew should occupy a posi- tion of such eminence at court. But Samuel disarmed even his bitterest foes by his good na- ture and gentleness. Conscientious in his duty as a statesman, he was also diligent in further- ing the interests of his own people. King Gabus appointed him “nagid,” that is, chief over all the Jews in his kingdom, and while he held this office, Samuel did much to raise their civil status. His protection was extended not only to the Jews in Spain, but also to the communities in North Africa, Babylonia and the Holy Land. And in the midst of all the arduous work which his high position entailed he still found time to hold Talmudic lectures for the exposition of the law to those who sought and loved learning. He supported poor scholars and employed scribes OvuTLINE oF JEw1sH History 43 to copy the Talmud in manuscripts which he then gave to indigent students free of charge. Samuel wrote a book entitled “An Introduc- tion to the Talmud” (Mebo-ha-Talmud) wherein he tries to explain the origin of the “verbal teachings” and to describe the methods by which the Talmudists interpreted the Bible. This “Introduction” is to be found in all the editions of the Babylonian Talmud. Besides this work Samuel wrote a book of religious songs in verse, in imitation of the Psalms (Ben- Tehilim), a book of Parables (Ben-Mishleh) after the Parables of Solomon, and a collection of philosophical meditations (Ben-Koheleth) like of the Book of Ecclesiastes. He died in 1055 and was succeeded by his son Joseph as vizier of Granada and Jewish nagid. Joseph held these offices during the reign of King Badis, the son of Gabus, render- ing great services to the kingdom. But influ- ential Moors, envious of the great Jew, con- spired to bring about his downfall. During a war in which Granada was engaged, his enemies circulated false rumors to the effect that it was he who had invited the enemy into the country with the object of setting another king upon the throne of Granada. The Arab populace credited these rumors and one day a frenzied mob rushed the vizier’s palace. Joseph black- ened his face with charcoal in an attempt to 4A Tur REGENERATION OF JUDAISM save himself from recognition by the crowd and hid in one of the farthest chambers of the pal- ace. But they found and killed him there, and his body was hanged near the gate of Granada (1066 A. D.). Then the mob attacked the other Hebrews, killing and robbing several hun- dred families. ‘The rest saved themselves by flight and amongst the fugitives were the wife and son of the murdered vizier. This fearful outbreak had a powerful and far-reaching effect upon the fate of the Jews throughout Granada; after fifty years of peace and prosperity they had to leave the country and migrate to other Moorish possessions in Spain. Wars between the Arabs of southern Spain and the Christians of the north, were becoming more and more frequent. At last Christian Castile and Arab Seville met in open warfare, the Sevilians summoning to their aid the war- like tribe of the Almoravides from Africa. A bloody battle took place near Solac in which the Moors were victorious (1086 A. D.). Jews fought bravely in the ranks of Mahometans and Christians alike, for there were at that time many Jews in Castile. Because of the religious requirements of the combatants, the day of battle had to be arranged so as not to fall on Friday, for that was the Sabbath of the Mos- lems, nor on Saturday, the Sabbath of the Jews, nor on Sunday, the Sabbath of the Christians. OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 45 The Almoravid conquerors established their do- minion in southern Spain and retained supre- macy there for the following half-century. § 8. Solomon Gabirol. The Progress of Jewish Iuterature. There were so many Jewish scholars and poets in Spain during the XIth and XIIth cen- turies that this period has justly received the title of the “Golden Age of Hebrew Litera- ture.” One of these who lived at the time of Samuel Nagid (1020-1058 A.D.) was the famous poet Solomon-ibn-Gabirol. Born in Malaga he lost both his parents when very young and in this forsaken state he was doomed to a life of wandering and poverty. Drifting from one city to another, he finally settled in Granada where Samuel took him under his protection. Gabirol’s verse, as distinguished for its profound emotional quality as for the sonor- ous melody of its cadences, delighted his con- temporaries no less than later generations. It is in his sacred poems which are read in syna- gogues to this day, that the inspired character of his genius is perhaps most striking. ‘These poems voice the sorrows of the scattered nation and the longing of the faithful soul that seeks God with unremitting devotion. The following is a typical example of his popular hymns: 46 Tut REGENERATION OF JUDAISM “In a foreign land the hapless captive is be- come a slave, a slave of Egypt (1. e., the alien). Since the day, O Lord, when Thou didst first forsake her, she has awaited Thy return. All things have an ending but to my troubles there is no end. Year follows year and my wounds heal not. ‘Tortured and trodden underfoot, bent under a heavy yoke, robbed and stripped, how long, O God, shall we bewail our insults, our age-long bondage? Ishmael (Islam) is like the lion and Esau (Christianity) like the vulture; when the one is done with us the other comes to torture us yet more.” Gabirol’s religion found its loftiest and most powerful expression in a long hymn called the “The King’s Crown” (Kether-Malchus). ‘This noble composition, which has been incorporated into the service on Yom-Kippur, contains a great deal of philosophy concerning the main dogmas of creed, the attributes of the Deity and the marvels of the created world, the wisdom of God’s ways and the mysterious forces of the human soul. : Another of Gabirol’s works dealing with these religious and philosophical subjects is “The Source of Life.” He was a follower of the Greek Plato and of the Hebrew Philo of Alex- andria.. “The Source of Life,” translated from Arabic into Latin, was widely used by the Christian theologians of the Middle Ages who OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 47 knew the author under the name of Avicebron. Gabirol died at the age of 38 years and the fol- lowing popular legend arose about his death. An Arab who envied him his greatness as a thinker and a poet, secretly killed him and buried the body under a fig-tree in his garden. Immediately the tree began to bear fruit of such wonderful flavor and size that tales about it reached the ears of the king himself who sum- moned the Arab to appear before him and explain how he managed to grow such magnificent fruit. When Gabirol’s mur- derer, taken unawares, began to grow confused in his explanation, the king gave orders to get the truth from him by means of torture. The Arab confessed his crime and the king had him hanged on the fig-tree that had betrayed him. The succeeding generations of poets were all imitators of Gabirol and of these Moses-ibn- Ezra (1070-1138 A. D.) was one of the most gifted. He belonged to a family of Granada, and while still a youth fell in love with a daughter of his brother’s and asked her hand in marriage. But the brother refused and in his grief Moses left his native city and went to . Castile. Having renounced happiness, he sought forgetfulness in poetry and philosophy. He sang of the sorrows and disillusionments of life, of the treachery of friends, of the malice and falseness of all men. Now and then, however, 48 Tur REGENERATION OF JUDAISM the poet seemed to take heart again and dream of a quiet life of peace in the bosom of nature, _ and then his verse would be in praise of beauty, and of the ecstasy of youth. The secular poems “make up a volume of lyrics under the title of “Tarshish.” Later on, Ibn-Ezra devoted him- self almost entirely to religious themes as Gabi- rol had done before him. He wrote some two hundred “prayers of repentance” (selichoth), many of which are read in synagogues still. Besides his poems, which were all written in Hebrew, Ibn-Ezra wrote many books on rhe- toric, philosophy and ethics, but these were only an imitation of Arab works of the same kind. Among the thinkers of that time, one, Bahya- ibn-Pakuda, a rabbi of Saragossa, was especially well known. He wrote an excellent book on moral duties called “Duties of the Heart’ (Hovoth-ha-Levavoth). He divides the entire law into two parts: “rites,” or duties of the body, and moral precepts, or duties of the heart, and gives to the latter a far higher place than to the former. The object of this work was to awaken and develop in every Jew a deep moral consciousness. Translated from Arabic into He- | brew it became the favorite reading of all think- ing people, and centuries later, translated into the Jewish vernacular, it was eagerly read at the common people. Among the Talmudists of the golden age, OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 49 Isaac Alfasi was admitted the greatest master. (1103 A. D.) He was a native of Fez (which is called Fas in Arabic, whence Isaac’s name), and settled in Spain at the time of the Almo- ravid conquests. He was a celebrated Talmud- ist even in his native city and his fame pro- ceded him to Spain where students, wishing to improve their knowledge of the law, flocked to him from all over the country. The city of Lacena, where Alfasi occupied the position of rabbi, became the center of rabbinical learning, as Cordova had been before it. To facilitate the study of the Talmud, Alfasi wrote his famous work, “‘Galachoth,” the Rudiments of the Juaw. In the Baylonian Talmud, which consists of many books, tne portion dealing with matters of the law (Galacha) is not separated from that dealing with matters of ethics (Hagada). Aj- fasi extracted the ethical data scattered all over this immense collection, shearing them of all su- perfluous commentary, and collected them into a “Little Talmud.” This work made the study of the Talmud considerably easier and was the first step towards a systematic classification ot the Hebrew law. § 9. Jehuda Halevi. Hebrew poetry in Spain found its highest ex- pression in the work of Jehuda-Halevi (1086- 50 THE REGENERATION OF JUDAISM 1142 A. D.) A native of Christian Castile, ' Jehuda left his home to live in Moorish Spain, » and was educated there in the schools of the most eminent ‘T'almudists and philosophers. He also studied medicine and returning in after years to Castile he made his living by the prac- tice of medicine. But most of his time was de- voted to poetry, philosophy and theology. As a poet, Jehuda Halevi greatly surpassed his predecessors, even the illustrious Gabirol. In the suave, melodious verse of his young days, he sang of nature, of love and of the charms of living. He very often turned his poetic gift to such everyday themes as laudatory odes to his friends and patrons, riddles, humorous bal- lads, etc. With increasing years, however, Halevi’s muse grew graver and more sad. The poet found the inspiration of his middle age in the tragic fate of the Hebrew nation; its for- mer greatness and its decline, its hopes and disappointments, its endless sorrow and _ long- ing. All the grievous history of his race found > reflection in Jehudah Halevi’s work. The la-> mentations of the long-suffering people resound in poems where the singer implores God to set a term to their exile in many lands. “On the wings of an eagle didst Thou bear the dove (the Hebrew nation); Thou gavest her shelter upon Thy bosom, Thou hast hidden her in quiet places. Why then hast Thou for- OUTLINE oF JEWISH History 51 saken her now, so that, not knowing whither, she must wander through forests forever where snares are laid to entrap her every step. The stranger tempts her with alien gods, but she weeps in secret for the One, the chosen of her youth. ... Why then, doth her heavenly Friend stay so far from her? Why do her enemies so oppress her?” The most powerful of all Halevi’s patriotic poems are those wherein he reveals his passion- ate yearning for the ancient homeland of Israel, for the Holy Land and Zion, the demolished: “O beauteous land, joy of the world, abode of a great King! From the distant West my soul yearns towards thee! I burn with pity when I recall thine ancient greatness which is no more, thy temple that lies in ruins. O, that the wings of the dove might carry me thither! I would drench thy dust with my tears! I would kiss and embrace thy stones, yea the taste of thy stones would be sweeter than honey in my mouth! My heart is in the East, yet I am in the farthest West; how then should I find savour in my food? How should I keep my vows while Zion is fast in the chains of Edom (Crusaders), and I languish under the Moorish yoke? All the treasures of Spain could not lure me back were I but once to behold with mine own eyes the ruins of thy fallen temple.” 52 THe REGENERATION OF JUDAISM _ This longing for Zion was no mere poet’s frenzy soon to pass: it filled Jehudah Halevi’s whole soul, and to see the land of his fore- fathers became the dearest wish of his heart. _ 'Fowards the end of his. life, he realized his dreams... When his wife died, he left his seques- tered home in Spain, his relatives, pupils and friends, and set out on his pilgrimage to the distant Holy Land. After a long voyage across the Mediterranean, he reached Egypt and there met many prominent and learned Jews. From - there he went to Palestite where the Crusaders, having recently taken the country from the Mo- hametans (1140) were beginning to make their presence felt. What befell the poet in the ~ Holy Land history does not say; it is not known ' whether or not he ever reached Jerusalem, his \ ultimate destination. All we know is that he | died in Palestine, probably not long after he arrived. A popular legend tells that, coming to the gates of the Holy City, he fell weeping to the ground and in that moment began his famous elegy, “Zion, thou wilt ask of the fate of thine exiles.” While the poet lay there, an Arab horseman passed by, so the story goes, — and rode his horse over the Jew’s prostrate form, trampling him to death. The elegy referred to in this legend is one of the noblest of his “Songs of Zion.” To this | day it is read in the synagogues on the ninth \ OUTLINE or JEwisu History 53 day of Ab. The following are some extracts from it. “Zion, thou wilt ask of the fate of thine exiles who send thee greeting, the remnants of thy scattered flock. From west and east, from north and south, they greet thee, from far and near. The prisoner in lifelong bondage to his love for thee gives thee greeting also. He — sheds his tears like dew on Hermon and yearns to shed them on thy mountain-sides. Ah, could IT but ease my soul of its burden there, where — the spirit of the Lord descended upon thy chosen ones! Thou, the abode of Kings, the glorious throne of God! Why do slaves now sit upon the thrones of thy lords? How should IT eat or drink when I see dogs tearing at the bodies of thy lions and how rejoice in the light of the sun when I behold the vultures devour- ing thine eagles? Hearest thou not the moan- ing of the prisoners striving towards thee in. their prison cells? Can Shinear and Patras (Babylon and Egypt) think to rival thy splen- dor, or is their superstition comparable to the wisdom that is thme? Who is like unto thine anointed, to thy prophets, thy Levites and thy singers?” | Halevi was not only a great poet but a deep thinker too, as he proves in the “Khazari,” his philosophical work written in Arabic and later translated into Hebrew. The foundations of 54 Tur REGENERATION OF JUDAISM the Jewish religion are therein expounded in the form of a discourse between a Khazar king, a would-be convert to Judaism, and a He- brew scholar. In the opinion of Jehudah Halevi, revelations are of greater importance than rea- son, since they come direct from God and human reasoning is liable to err. The revela- tions of Sinai, upon which the religion of Israel was based, are an indisputable fact, he declares, witnessed by tens of thousands of Israelites. God revealed Himself first to them, because they, before any other, showed themselves capa- ble of knowing Him. It became their mission, therefore, to carry the truth to all the rest of mankind, just as the heart sends the blood all over the body, giving it life. ‘The obligations imposed upon the Jew by his religion are multi- plied in order that he might find direction in his every step towards spiritual perfection, and that his every action might be performed in the name of the divine law. Judaism strives to- wards the development of the spiritual forces Jatent within man. It differs from Hellenism in that it places truth and goodness above | beauty. “Do not be carried away by Greek wisdom,” Halevi used to say, “for it has only blossoms, but no fruit.” OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 55 § 10. A braham-ibn-Ezra. Abraham-ibn-Ezra, friend and contemporary of Halevi, was born in Toledo in 1089. A man of outstanding intellect, he soon mastered the arts and sciences of his time. One art, how- ever, he never learnt, that of living and work- ing quietly. Throughout his life he was a stranger to success; everything he understood was foredoomed to failure. “If I had dealt in shrouds for the dead,” he complains, “I be- lieve not one man would have died so long as I lived. If I had been a candle-merchant, the sun would never have set until my dying-day.” ) Abraham-ibn-Ezra travelled extensively in Eu- ‘rope, Asia and Africa, and wherever he stopped, he enjoyed the protection of wealthy Jewish patrons. While in Rome he began to write his famous “Commentary upon the Bible.” This was the first commentary in which the Scriptures had been interpreted according to history and grammar without any arbitrary explanations. Up to that time, the Biblical writings had been expounded by law-makers, philosophers and moralists, each of whom ex- erted much ingenuity to make his reading fit his own ideas and serve his particular purpose. Ibn-Ezra, however, desired to arrive once again at the true meaning of the Bible of old and 56 Tre REGENERATION OF JUDAISM ‘clear its interpretations from the former com- mentators’ mistakes. He succeeded to a con- siderable degree, but very often found himself unable to publish his opinions openly for fear of being accused of heresy. Wherever he met this obstacle he deliberately clothed his thought in very vague expressions from which so much was omitted and so much merely hinted at that only the highly-discerning could get at his mean- ing at all. In spite of these precautions, he was regarded in later years as a heretical writer, and his commentary was used only by free- thinkers. Besides the commentary, his most important work, Ibn-Ezra wrote many books on gram- mar, astronomy, mathematics and philosophy, as well as religious and secular poems. He was a past master of poetic form, but for depth and sincerity of feeling, his verse is far inferior to that of Halevi. There is a legend that tells how the two poets became acquainted. Jehu- dah Halevi was familiar with the poems of Ibn- Ezra, but had never met their author. One day a poor wanderer stopped at Halevi’s home, without telling the poet who he was. Halevi was working on a long poem in the form of an acrostic. When he came to the letter R, the poet came to a halt, either because his invention had failed him or because he found himself at a momentary loss for a word or line. Greatly OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 57 annoyed, he left the unfinished manuscript on the table and went to bed. ‘The next morning he rose and to his amazement found a beautiful line written on the page where he had left off. “Only an angel or Abraham-ibn-Ezra could have done this,” cried the astonished author, whereupon the poor wanderer revealed his name; it was Ibn-Ezra. After a long and roving life, he at last turned his steps towards home, but on the very border of Spain he died (1167). The last poet of the Golden Age was Jehu- dah Alcharisi (about 1165-1225). OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 181 ruined city of Tiberias in Palestine, to rebuild it and use as a settlement for Jews. Selim II conferred upon him the title of Duke of Naxos, Naxos being one of the Cyclade islands in the Archipelago. The Jews called their powerful co-religionist “Nassi,’” which means “a man of eminence, a great lord.” Joseph Nassi was a munificent patron of He- brew scholars and writers, of whom a great many had made Constantinople their home. He also supported rabbinical schools. After the death of Selim II, Joseph retired from office and devoted the remaining years of his life to intellectual pursuits, surrounded by the scholars to whom he had thrown open his vast library and collection of manuscripts. He died in 1579. Reina, his widow, founded a printing-house in Constantinople for the printing of books in He- brew. § 37. Palestine. The Shulhan-Aruch. Many of the Jewish immigrants to Turkey made their home in Palestine where, ever since the time of the Crusades, Christians and Mo- hametans had continued to dispute possession of certain districts sacred to the members of both religions. Finally the territory passed into the hands of the Turks, devastated and ruined, yet it was to that very desolation, the precious rem- 182 JErws IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE nant of their ancient fatherland, that the des- cendants of the exiled nation of Israel, weary of the persecutions they had suffered in Europe, returned in their thousands at last. The homeless newcomers could not revive the political conditions their ancestors had enjoyed, but they did succeed in founding a good many communities in the Holy Land to which the Turkish authorities granted certain privileges of self-government and the right to establish reli- gious institutions. In the XVIth century Jew- ish communities of considerable extent were to be found in Jerusalem, Saphed and Tiberias. Saphed became famous for the Talmudic schol- ars who lived there. \Jacob Berab, the Rabbi (1540), even conceived the plan of establishing in Palestine a high council of rabbis, somewhat after the system of the old Sanhedrin, to decide questions of religion, pass laws and appoint the spiritual leaders of the Jews in all countries. This ambitious project could not, however, be put into effect because the Palestinian commu- nities were too few and too poor. Then there appeared in Palestine a man who by his single effort, accomplished a task of such difficulty that a whole Sanhedrin would not have been too much to undertake it. This was - Joseph Karo (1488-1575), the author of the “Shulhan-Aruch,” the famous rabbinical code. A native of Spain, Karo was a young child OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 183 when the edict of expulsion sent all the Jews out of the Catholic kingdom. His youth was spent in Turkey in Europe where he lived in Adrianople and other cities. He threw himself ardently into the study of rabbinical literature and displayed extraordinary talent. He devoted twenty years to revising the Jewish laws with supplements and explanations, which great work he completed only after his arrival in Safed where he occupied a position of eminence among the Talmudists of Palestine. Jacob Berab, eld- est of the rabbis there, solemnly bestowed upon him the title of “teacher of the law.” While in Safed Karo compiled a new code containing all the Jewish laws for popular use. He called it “Shulhan-Aruch” (The Covered Table) and it was printed in Venice in 1565. The work con- sists of four parts: “Ora-Chaim,” laws concern- ing religious ceremonies for the Sabbath and holidays; “Joredea,” laws concerning dietary ob- servances, the slaughter of animals, domestic du- ties, etc., ““Eben-ha-eser,” laws concerning fam- ily relations, divorce, etc., and “Hoshen-mish- path,” the civil and criminal code with the laws of legal procedure. New laws and regulations supplemented every article of the old codes, based on rabbinical commentaries or on popular custom. The “Shulhan-Aruch” stands as the most exhaustive code of Hebrew law, containing as it does many minor laws set down by certain 184 JEws In TURKEY AND PALESTINE zealots of more than ordinary austerity and strictness. Karo’s contemporaries received this work with amazement at the power of intellect and range of erudition which had created it. By some he was regarded as divinely inspired; rumors were circulated to the effect that an invisible messenger from above (magid) had visited the scholar and revealed to him the mighty truths of the law. The author of the “Shulhan-Aruch” shared the belief of his fel- lows that he was a being of a superior order. He delved into the mysteries of the Cabala which had just begun to agitate the minds of the Palestinian Jews. § 38. The Cabala. Ari. In the X VIth century, the Cabala had made perceptible headway among the Jews. The cal- amities through which they had passed pre- disposed their minds to a belief in mysteries, and fostered ideas of a hereafter and of the future kingdom ruled over by the Messiah who . would come to liberate the Jewish people and be their Savior. ‘The appearance in print of a new and sacred book called the “Zohar,” where hitherto it had only been obtainable in manuscript, did much to spread the influence of these mystic doctrines. Sects of hermits arose, preaching repentance and telling of the OUTLINE OF JEWISH ElistoRY 185 kingdom of heaven. They believed that through’ the Cabala they could learn to become saints and communicate with the realm of celestial spirits. Safed had two famous Cabalists, Moses Cordovero and Elias Vidas. Cordovero pro- claimed his doctrine of three degrees of knowl- edge, the Bible, the Talmud and the Cabala, of | which the last was the highest because it re- vealed to the student the mysteries of God. Vidas’ book, “Reshith Hachna” (The Begin- ning of Wisdom) is filled with stern moral teachings and the portrayal of hell’s torments. A group of Cabalists calling themselves “the God-fearing men” met on Fridays in the syna- gogue at Safed and confessed to one another the sins they had committed during the week. Their leader was an ardent student of the mys- tic cult namd Isaac Luria Ashkenazi, or Ari, an abbreviation of the words “Ashkenazi Rabbi Isaac.” Ari was born at Jerusalem in 1534 into a family belonging to the Ashkenazi. He had grown up in Egypt where he received his Tal- ‘“mudic training under the Rabbi of Cairo. But Talmudic law did not satisfy this youth’s search- ing mind; the study of the Zohar was more to his liking and to that he devoted all his time, seeking in its teachings the solution of the profoundest problems of religion. He lived the life of a hermit, spending his days in fast- 186 Jews IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE ing and prayer, and from time to time he would pass into a state of ecstasy in which voices would come to him from heaven and beautiful visions appear. In 1570 Ari arrived in Safed \ and joined the group of Cabalists there, whose | leading spirit he soon became. Surrounded by the other members, he would wander over de- serted fields and cemeteries and discuss with them the mysteries of religion. On certain days it was their custom to visit the outskirts of Safed, where, according to the legends, Simon- ben-Jokai, the supposed author of the Zohar, - lay buried. On the site of his grave they per- formed mysterious rites, sang hymns of exalta- tion, and spoke of the imminence of the “time of miracles,’ telling how best to prepare to meet the approaching Messiah. Suddenly Ari disappeared, and it was discovered that he had died of a plague at the early age of 38 years (1572). His sudden death came to his follow- ers as a terrible blow; they began to speak of him as a saint. Some even carried their admira- tion so far as to declare that in his person the - “Messiah of the House of Joseph” had ap- peared, being the forerunner of the great “Mes- siah of the House of David.” Haim Vital,one V of Ari’s most intimate friends and disciples and the son of a copyist of holy books, became the chief exponent of the leader’s mystic doctrines. He wrote down the teachings Ari had preached OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 187 and attributed to him many of his own ideas. The following is a resumé of their combined doctrine, collected under the title of the “Prac- tical Cabala”’: Man, as a consequence of his original sin, strayed from his divine source, from the world of pure spirits, and sank into an abyss filled with forces of evil. It is then the task of every true believer to free his own soul from the dominion of those forces and bind it once more to its lost divinity by means of fasting and prayer. The purification of the soul after death is accomplished through “wanderings” or reincar- nations (gilgul), by which the soul of a sinner enters another man’s body in which it has op- portunity to reform, but if it fails to do so it must again pass after death into yet another man’s body, and so on until it is completely. purged of evil. Instances are cited of human souls entering the bodies of animals and suffer- ing unspeakable torment. An intimate tie binds man close to the higher spirits; every acticn, every work he utters, has its repercussion in the world beyond. Great disturbances occur in heaven according to how some man prays or performs certain religious rites. It is even pos- sible to “summon” the Messiah, that is, to hasten his coming by means of fasting, repentance and atonement for sin. At all costs it is important 188 Jews in TuRKEY AND PALESTINE never to cease to mourn the destruction of the Jewish kingdom, of Jerusalem and of the tem- ple. The advent of the Savior must be passion- ately desired at all times and expected from day to day. | All these commandments and beliefs con- tained in the “Practical Cabala” found a ready response in the hearts and minds of the people, and ultimately created the Messianic movement which in the seventeenth century overspread the entire Jewish world. § 39. Sabbatai Zevt. All the Jews in Turkey, and those of Pales- tine in particular, fell ever more completely under the influence of the Cabalists with their ceaseless assurance of the imminent coming of the Messiah. Rumors of the early restoration of the Jewish kingdom in the Holy Land trav-— elled to the communities abroad, and filled the thoughts of Jews in Asia and Western Europe with speculations as to the date of the advent. Some vague hint in the “Zohar” was construed to set the date for 1648 and in that year a man actually did appear in Turkey, calling him- self the liberator of the Jewish people. His name was Sabbatai Zevi. OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 189 Sabbatai-Zevi (Shabsi-Zvi) was born in the Turkish city of Smyrna on the fast-day of the ninth Ab, 1626.. His father was a merchant ” of Sephardic descent. Sabbatai was very hand- some and possessed besides a beautiful and mel- odious voice. His extraordinary talents enabled him to master the whole of the Talmud and the Cabala at a very early age, thereby attaining the educational equipment considered necessary for every Jew at that time. His Talmudic men- tor was the celebrated rabbi of Smyrna, Joseph Yskafa, and on the side of the Cabala he was a follower of the ascetic Ari. A born dreamer, Sabbatai shunned the society of friends and fel- low-students and lived in almost complete soli- tude. In conformity with the Eastern custom, | he married very young, but married life did not please him, so that he soon divorced his wife. The farther he pursued the mysteries of the “Zohar” and the Arianic Cabala, the more pow- erfully he was impelled to assume the burden of redeeming the sins of all his people and thereby hasten the Messiah’s advent, as the Cabalist doctrine promised. Sabbatai spent his days in prayer and fasting which resulted in his becom- ing subject to fits of religious delirium, and while in these trances, when the dividing line between the real and the fancied disappears, it was easy to persuade himself that he was the man destined to be the very Messiah for whom 190 JEWws IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE the world was waiting. This belief in his high destiny was apparent in his attitude towards his fellow-students who fell willingly under the in- fluence of the young hermit’s enthusiasm as he initiated them into the secrets of the Cabala. He was but twenty years old when a group of young visionaries and mystics accepted him as their leader. With the dawn of the year 1648 | indicated in the Zohar as the date of the Mes- siah’s advent, Sabbatai decided to reveal him- self to the people of Smyrna. ‘The day came when he uttered in the synagogue before the assembled congregation, the full name of God, Jehovah, instead of the customary “Adonai.” This word, according to tradition, might be spoken by none but the High Priest of the an- cient temple of Jerusalem himself. Sabbatai’s action was intended to convey that the restora- tion of the temple was at hand. As soon as the rabbis of Smyrna heard of the claims Sabbatai was putting forward, they ex- communicated the self-styled Messiah together with his followers. Even his old teacher, Joseph Yskafa, joined in the condemnation. Sabbatai was forced to leave his city but this only in- creased his renown (1651). His followers talked of him as the “suffering Messiah” while he went from one city to another throughout Turkey preaching his doctrines. He gathered many new adherents in Constantinople, Jerusalem, OUTLINE OF JEWISH Hustrory 191 Cairo and Salonika. In the Egyptian capital the attention of the populace was drawn to him by the following incident: A tale was abroad concerning a young Polish woman named Sarah who had been kidnapped as a child and placed in a Christian monastery. From there she had succeeded in escaping to _ Holland where she had returned to her original faith. She was often heard to declare that she was destined to become the wife of the Jewish Messiah, and when her story reached the ears of Sabbatai he too said that the marriage had been decreed on high. His messengers were despatched to Europe and the beautiful Sarah returned with them to Cairo, where her union with Sabbatai was consummated with solemn ceremonies. Those wonderful adventures filled the hearts of the Jews with amazement and hope. The curse of the “herem” laid upon Sabbatai was forgotten and when, after long wanderings, he returned to Smyrna whence in his youth he had been expelled, he was met with acclamation and rejoicing, the people shouting “Long Live our king, our Messiah!” (1656). He gained new followers every day; self-styled prophets ap- peared who spread tales of the “holy mission” of the Redeemer from Smyrna, and of the ap- proaching “time of miracles.” One of the most zealous of these prophets was Nathan of Gaza, 192 Jrws In TURKEY AND PALESTINE a native of Palestine. He sent out his “pro- phetic revelations” to all the Jewish communi- ties, declaring that the Messiah from Smyrna was soon to tear the crown from the Sultan’s head, after which, by means of miracles and marvellous exploits, he would lead all the Jews back to Jerusalem. Sabbatai’s name was soon famous throughout Europe, especially in Italy, \ Germany and Holland. It was commonly be- lieved that Jewry stood at the threshold of great events. A sort of spiritual abandon pos- sessed the people; some, when they met, would sing and dance together, others made long fasts and prayed continually, making public confes- sion of their sins. All, according to their fash- ion, were actively preparing to meet their Sa- vior. Special prayers for Sabbatai Zevi were offered up in the synagogues. Even the Chris- tians spoke and wrote a great deal about the new Jewish Messiah, connecting his advent with certain ancient theological discourses predicting a world-upheaval in the year 1666, according to calculations based on the Apocalypse. In vain the most honored of the rabbis inveighed against the people’s credulity, warning them not to be deceived; no one paid any heed to them. — All eyes were turned towards the East where great events, miracles and omens were hourly expected to occur. OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 193 § 40. The Messianic Movement and Its Fall. The year 1666 when, according to the pre- dictions of Sabbatai and his prophets, the final change was to be made manifest, dawned at last. In this year it was expected that the new Mes- | siah would enter the Turkish capital and ac- quaint the sultan with his power. Sabbatai Zevi did in fact set out for Stamboul, escorted by a guard of honor, but the Turkish govern- ment had heard of the unrest his “mission” had been causing amongst the Jews and had taken due precautions for his reception. The moment he arrived with his body-guard in the capital, Sabbatai was arrested by order of the authori- ties and imprisoned (February, 1666). Two months later the prisoner and his disciples were sent by the Grand Vizier’s command to the cas- tle of Abydos, near Stamboul, where they re- mained. The imprisonment of the Messiah, so far from undermining the people’s faith in him, strength- ened it greatly. They gave full credence to the idea that the redeemer of Israel was passing through the period of supreme suffering which, according to the ancient legend, must precede the sublime act of liberation. Enthusiastic ad- herents flocked to Stamboul from every land in the hope of seeing the new Messiah and hearing from his own lips the glad tidings of deliver- 194 JEws IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE ance. Many brought with them rich gifts, and gold and jewels wherewith to mitigate the Mes- siah’s sufferings by satisfying his creature needs. Sabbatai lived at Abydos like a prince in his castle; by bribing the Turkish guards, all visit- ors and messengers could gain admittance to his presecence. His prison became known to his followers as the “Migdal-oz,” the Castle of Power. From there he sent his decrees abroad to all Jewry the world over. He ordered that the fast on the ninth day of Ab, which had been established in commemoration of the de- struction of Jerusalem, be changed to a festival of rejoicing in honor of its coming restoration and of the birthday of the new Messiah, who was to rebuild it. Among the delegations that came to Sabbatai from Europe was one from Poland. Nehemiah Cohen, a member of this party, mistrusted Sab- — batai and desired to put his honesty to the test. Several personal conversations with the Messiah led this doubting Polish Jew to the conviction that Sabbatai was only trying to deceive the people. Firm in this belief, Nehemiah left Aby- dos and reported to the Turkish authorities everything that was taking place at the castle. The matter was referred to the sultan, Mahomet IV, who was so incensed at Sabbatai’s con- duct that he was ready to have the Messiah exe- cuted as a rebel on the spot. Upon his arrival OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 195 at the Turkish court, a friendly courtier advised him to go over to Islam if he would save his life and appease the sultan’s fury. The pseudo- Messiah decided to take the fatal step; he en- tered the presence of Mahomet IV with a tur- ban on his head in token of his conversion. His wife and a few of his disciples followed his ex- ample. Then the “Messiah” who had renounced his faith was made a doorkeeper of the royal palace in Adrianople and given the name of Mahomet-Effendi (August, 1666). Notwithstanding his act of apostasy, Sabbatai continued to mislead his followers. To the Turks he said that he was using all his influ- ence to convert the Jews to Islam, and to the Jews he declared that his adoption of the alien religion was a mere pretence, a means of at- tracting the Turks to Judaism and accomplish- ing the glorious feat of redeeming the people of another creed. ‘The simple enthusiasts who were his followers accepted all the ridiculous tales that were circulated in Sabbatai’s name. Some voluntarily went over to Mohametanism in or- der to join the Master in his great task of re- demption. Others believed that it was not Sabbatai himself but his ghost who became con- verted to Islam, remaining in the world in the person of Mahomet-Effendi; as for the Messiah, he had ascended to Heaven and would again ap- pear when the hour of freedom would strike. 196 JEws IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE Tales of this kind were spread all over the Jewish world by Nathan of Gaza and other prophets, and for many years the mass of Jews continued to believe in the divine mission of Sabbatai, the Messiah. | The hero of the movement, himself, was be- having very strangely in Adrianople. Now he would pretend to be a very devout Moslem, now he would conduct the services of Israel with song and dancing. The suspicion of the Turk- > ish government were once more aroused. At last they banished him to Dulcigno, an obscure little town in Albania where none of his fol- lowers were allowed to see him. There the false Messiah died in 1676, forsaken and alone. | The death of Sabbatai Zevi had a sobering effect on most of his followers, both in Asia and Europe. Many recanted and did penance for their ill-considered change of faith. The rabbis redoubled their efforts to keep the re- turned heretics within the fold and exercised the utmost vigilance in routing out all the followers | of the false Messiah from the midst of the community. Some nevertheless remained faithful to Sab- batai, clinging in their credulity to their belief in his divine mission. ‘They were convinced that the Messiah who had ascended to heaven would soon return to earth again and accomplish the deliverance of the Jewish nation. Later on a OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 197 sect of “Sabbatians” was founded in Turkey, under the leadership of Jacob Zevi, the “Mes- siah’s” brother-in-law. Salonika, the home of Sabbatai’s kinsfolk, was their headquarters. The members of this sect evolved the strangest ideas of faith and morality. According to the lead- ers, there were two Gods, one the Creator of the world, and the other the God of Israel. It was the latter who had descended to earth in the person of Sabbatai Zevi. Further, they taught that no moral laws were binding upon men and that “at the end of time” everybody might sin as much as he pleased. All kinds of depravity was therefore indulged in freely by the Sabbatians; indeed their behavior became so notorious that the attention of the Turkish au- thorities was finally attracted to them and they found hemselves faced with persecution by the state officials. The late Messiah, having shown them the way out of difficulties such as this, they followed his example and adopted the religion of Mahomet. Islam received them, four hun- dred strong (1687). Jacob Zevi and the other leaders covered the sect’s apostasy with assur- ances of its occult significance. After Jacob’s death his son Berachiah_ became head of the Sabbatians of Salonika (1695-1740) and un- der him the sect degenerated steadily. While observing all the Mohametan ceremonies in public, they persisted in their Sabbatian faith 198 JEws IN TURKEY AND PALESTINE and still believed their founder to have been the incarnation of God. ‘This sect existed in Salonika for a great many years, and a rem- nant of it is still to be found under the Turkish name of “donme,” the apostates. CHAPTER VIII THe JEws IN WESTERN EUROPE FROM THE XViItH To THE XVIITrH CENTURY. § 41. Italy. LARGE proportion of the Jewish ex- iles from Spain made their way to Italy where they felt assured of being } a &| able to live in comparative peace. The @5| leader of this migration was Isaac Abarbarnel, the last of the great leaders of the Spanish Jews. Abarbanel first settled in Naples, but after- wards went to Venice. In Naples he held for some time an administrative post at the royal court, which, however, he resigned in order to devote himself wholly to study. He had written an exhaustive commentary on the Bible, and a number of other works on the fundamental prin- ciples of Judaism. ‘The profound grief with which he considered the disastrous career of his people, led him to consecrate his most ardent efforts to the fathoming of the Messianic dogma. By reference to ancient legends and the pro- 199 200 Tuer JEws IN WESTERN EUROPE phets’ predictions he tried to calculate the time of the Messiah’s due advent, which he believed to have become imminent. The aged and illus- trious sage, as he felt his life moving towards its term, rejoiced in the conviction that the hour of deliverance was at hand for all his race. Abarbanel died in Venice in the year 1509. He had not been long dead when his calcula- tion seemed to have justified itself, for in 1524 a mysterious stranger appeared in Venice, hav- ing come from the Kast, no one knew whither. It was impossible to tell whether he was a real visionary or merely an impostor; at any rate, he said his name was David, and claimed to be of the tribe of Reuben (Reubeni). According to his story, he was from the distant land of Arabia where a Jewish kingdom existed, populated by desecendants of the ancient shepherd tribes of Israel, the Reubenites and Gadites. The king of that far country was his own brother, and he, David, had been sent into Europe as the bearer of messages of great moment to the monarchs | of Christendom. He entered Rome riding on a white horse, and went straight to the palace of Pope Clement VII, who received him in audi- ence for a considerable time. From Italy, Da- vid Reubeni proceeded to Portugal where, as in Rome, he was welcomed by King John III with the honors due to the representative of a fellow-ruler. This mysterious embassy created OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 201 a conviction amongst the Jews that great events were afoot. It was rumored that David had come to Europe on behalf of the Arabian Is- raelites to arrange for the supply of firearms for their projected war against Turkey, the object of which was to regain possession of the Holy Land. The utmost excitement reigned in the clan- destine Jewry of Spain and Portugal, that is, among the Marranos upon whom the Inquisition had inflicted such intolerable suffermg. Solo- mon Molcho, one of the Marranos of Lisbon, followed the self-styled Jewish Envoy in his vis- its from place to place. This Molcho was a pas- sionate Cabalist and like many of his contem- poraries, indulged dreams of the imminent com- ing of the Messiah. Carried away visions of the Jews’ early deliverance, he left Portugal and went to Turkey and Palestine where he joined the Cabalists of those parts and spoke every- where he went of the approaching advent. On his return to Europe, he began secret negotia- tions with the Pope, and shortly afterwards achieved a bold exploit that astounded Europe. With David Reubeni he gained an audience of the German emperor Charles V at Regens- burg, and laid before him a plan to mobilize the European Jews for the Turkish war. This en- terprise, however, ended badly when the Em- peror had both of them arrested and taken to 202 THe JEwSs IN WESTERN EUROPE Italy in his train. Molcho, as an apostate from Christianity, was condemned to death by the Inquisition and burned at the stake in Mantua (1532). As for Reubeni, he was imprisoned in Spain and remained there until his death several | years later. Thus the hopes of the Jews suffered cruel dis- appointment. ‘Their condition in Italy was changing for the worse. The Popes had begun to oppress them in the Papal States, and all Innocent III’s humiliating laws against them were restored and enforced. City Jews were segregated in ghettos and made to wear the dis- tinguishing badge whenever they appeared on . the streets. They were allowed to have no more than one synagogue in each town, and Tal- mudic study was again banned. ‘The invention of printing had brought about a vast increase in this branch of learning. The first complete edition of the Talmud was printed in Venice about 1520. ‘The enemies of the Jews revived © the old charge of insults to Christianity con- tained in various passages of the work, and the Inquisition ordered all copies of it to be burnt. The houses of the Roman Jews were searched and all the volumes confiscated on the day of Rosh-Hashona, 1553. In other Italian cities the same thing was happening. After this out- break of anti-Talmudic enthusiasm, however, the Catholic clergy revoked their ban and al- OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 203 lowed the Talmud to be reprinted on condition that all derogatory allusions to Christianity be omitted. Most of the censors appointed were converted Jews, who exercised great diligence in cutting out the objectionable passages. Few of the Popes equalled the fanatical Paul IV in hostility towards the Jews. He pub- lished two bulls enacting a whole system of anti- Hebrew laws applicable to the Jews in Rome and throughout the Papal dominions. In their cruel and humiliating character they were very much like the laws that had been in vogue dur- ing the Middle Ages. ‘They provided for the isolation of the Jewish residents in all cities and for the wearing of the distinguishing badge. No Christian might take employment in Jewish homes as servants or nurses to children; they were forbidden to be present at any Jewish feast or to allow themselves to be treated by Jewish physicians, or even to address a Jew as “mas- ter,’ whoever he might be. The ghetto-dwellers were allowed to engaged in petty trade only, and this usually took the form of dealing in old clothes; the lending of money at low rates of interest was also not denied them. They might acquire no real estate of any kind. The ruth- less and insulting laws contained in these bulls of 1555 drove the Jews to the brink of humilia- tion and financial ruin. The second half of the XVIth century saw 204 Tuer Jews 1In WESTERN Europe the Jews of Rome and other Italian cities in the same state of defencelessness as that in which the German Jews had been sunk before them. The Roman ghetto was on one bank of the Ti- ber, so low-lying that when the river rose, the ground was completely under water. A wall with many gates cut off the ghetto from the rest of the city; special guards were set to watch the gates at night, so that none of the Jews might leave once they had been locked in at the ap- pointed hour. According to one visitor to Rome in 1724, the Jewish quarter consisted of only two long and six short streets, and there some three thousand families, or twenty thousand per- sons lived in terrible congestion. Most of the Jews were occupied in some form of small trade or handicrafts. 'The ghetto streets were lined with shops, large and small, where all manner of merchandise, from foodstuffs to old clothes were sold. The trade in old clothes was raised by the Roman authorities to the status of a “privileged” occupation for this ancient race, and the promotion carried with it the right to penetrate into the Christian city for the pur- chase of cast-off garments, as also have store- houses outside the ghetto. Of the handicrafts, tailoring was most generally followed. “AI through the summer,” says a chronicler of that time, “hundreds of tailors are to be seen at work on the streets, near the doorsteps of their homes. OUTLINE oF JEw1sH History 205 The women are beside them, making button- holes and buttons; so skilful are they that they are employed in this work by tailors of other nationalities from every part of the city. Roughly speaking, three-fourths of the Jewish craftsmen are tailors, and the rest work at vari- ous other skilled trades.” The special garb was compulsory for all Jews, irrespective of sex, age or class. The men wore yellow caps and the women, a yellow scarf, cut to a certain width, over their heads. In course of time, the yellow headgear was changed to orange, and then to red, so that fi- nally the “barretts,’ as these caps were called, looked almost like the red hats worn by the cardinals. This modification resulted in another order which enforced the use of yellow only, so as to preevnt trouble on this score. These indignities were put upon the Jews with the single object of making them renounce their religion for Christianity. The so-called “compulsory” sermons were arranged for the same purpose, the Jews being forced to sit in churches and listen to the sermons of the priests. This they had to do every Saturday afternoon, when police guards came to the ghetto and drove them in crowds, men, women and children over twelve years of age, into the churches. “At two o’clock precisely,” relates an eyewitness (1724), “they were made to appear in church. 206 THE JEWS IN WESTERN EUROPE The large wooden crucifix hung on the wall was covered with a sack in order that they might not jeer at it. The men and women sat on sepa- rate benches, separated from each other by a curtain as in their synagogues. A priest occu- pied the pulpit which was raised well above the ground. In a loud voice he would begin his ser- mon, using so many Hebrew words that he could easily be mistaken for a Jew himself, and the discourse followed this method: first he praised the Jews as God’s chosen people; then change completely, reviling them for their stub- bornness, and heaping scorn upon them, for re- fusing to heed his teaching. The sermon usually lasted two hours, during which time nobody might move, nor say a word nor fall asleep. Supervisors watched the listeners all the time, and severely punished any failure to obey.” From time to time the agents of the Papal police took some Jew by force to the “house of new converts” in order to prepare him for bap- tism. ‘These prisoners were ordinarily detained for forty days spent by their captors in per- suading them to change their religion. Some would submit, but those who persisted in re- maining adamant were driven back to their ghetto. OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 207 § 42. Science and Letters in Lialy. In spite of their deplorable civil condition, the Italian Jews reached a high plane of intellectual development during the XVIth and XVIIth centuries. It seemed as though they had fallen temporary heirs to the culture of the Spanish exiles. The lists of their distinguished men included famous Talmudists, preachers, Cabal- ists, philologists, historians and philosophers. In » the XVIIth century Italian Jewry gave two creative thinkers to the world, Jehuda-de-Mo- dena and Joseph Delmedigo. Jehuda-De-Mondena (1571-1648) occupied the position of Chief Rabbi of Venice, but in his heart he entertained grave doubts as to the truth of both rabbinical and cabalistic doctrines. Of his many books, two stand out as more re- markable than the rest; one, a refutation of the: rabbinical laws (Shaagath Ari), and the other (Ari Nohem) a protest against the Cabala, whose sacred books the author declares to be spurious. Being afraid to publish these works during his lifetime, De Modena left them in manuscript form, and it was not until much later that they were brought to light. Joseph Delmedigo (died in 1655), a native of the island of Crete, was a writer of another kind. Few men of his time had received a wider 208 Tue Jews In WESTERN EUROPE or a more exhaustive education; he was familiar with most ancient and modern languages, and at the University of Padua, where he was a student, he learnt mathematics and astronomy at the feet of the immortal Galileo. His studies in physical and medical science did not, how- ever, prevent his being attracted to the Cabal- istic school of thought. His passion for knowledge went hand in hand with a passion equally great for travel. He visited many parts of Europe and Asia, and made his home alternately in Poland and Lithu- ania until his middle age, when he went from Amsterdam, Hamburg and _ Frankfurt to Prague where he engaged in the practice of medicine. In a large volume called “Elim,” Delmedigo expounded the knowledge he had ac- quired in all branches of secular learning. His lesser works are devoted to the “secret learning” or the Cabala. (Matzref-Le Hoch, etc.) — Even the women were active in literature dur- ing this productive period of the Italian Jews. The two poetesses, Debora Ascarelli and Sara Sullam, wrote in Italian. The former, wife of | a highly-respected Roman Jew, translated some of the Hebrew hymns into lovely Italian verse, and Sara Sullam, daughter of a Venetian mer- chant, was one of the most cultured women of her day. A Genoese priest tried for a long time to convert this gifted poetess to his own OUTLINE oF JEwisH History 209 faith, but in vain. He then asked her permis- sion at least to pray for her conversion, and this she granted on condition that he, in his turn, allow her to pray that he might be con- verted to Judaism. Sara Sullam died in 1641. Of all her works none are known but a few sonnets and a book on the immortality of the soul. At the beginning of the XVIIIth century a gifted young writer became known in Italy. The name of this forerunner of the renaissance of Jewish poetry was Moses-Haim Luzzato of Padua (1707-47). From his early youth Luz- zato had shown extraordinary talent as poet and stylist. At the age of twenty, he had already written “Migdal Oz” (A Strong Tow- er), an idyll in pure Biblical Hebrew verse, setting forth the triumph of sacred over pro- fane love. This work was rare in contemporary Hebrew literature where hitherto the poets had found their inspiration only within the walls of the synagogue, and had expressed that inspira- tion only in psalms of sorrow or in hymns. Had Luzzato continued along the path he first pur- sued, he would most likely have achieved the reform of Hebrew poetry; as it was, he allowed himself to be swept away by his enthusiasm for the Cabala, and the mystical philosophy of the Cabalists, and the course of his life was diverted from its original channels. He studied the 210 THE JEWS IN WESTERN EUROPE “Zohar” and Ari’s commentary thereon, and then began to write in that same bizarre and cryptic manner, though so skilfully, it must be said, that he was even moved to call his Cabal- istic works the “second Zohar.” In his passion for the “secret wisdom,” Luzzato went out of his depth. He came to believe that he wrote at divine dictation, received through an intangible messenger in the form of an angel or “magid.” In 1729, Luzzato confided to a few fellow- students of the Cabala, these ideas which so profoundly affected him, and they conceived an ordinate admiration for him accordingly. In letters to their friends they hinted that a young Cabalist in Padua was about to reveal new truths to the world, and that very soon. This took place at a time when the rabbis were every- where conducting a desperate campaign against the secret Sabbathian sects, and publicly curs- ing them in the synagogues. ‘Their attention being now drawn to Luzzato’s activities, they proceeded to persecute him with the other Sab- batian heretics of whom they believed him to be one. Their first action was to extract a promise from him under oath to cease writing on the Cabala, but he broke his word. Thereupon the Venetian rabbis invoked the “Herem” against him and his books, that is, excommunicated him from the synagogue and forbade the reading of his works. As an excommunicate, Luzzato could OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 211 not remain in Italy, and for a long while he drifted from place to place throughout Ger- many and Holland. It was in Amsterdam that he produced his masterpiece, a philosophical drama called “The Glory of the Righteous” (La-iesharim-Tehila), and a series of works on the Cabala and ethical subjects. Luzzato’s pow- erful impulse towards mysticism and Messian- ism, filled him with longing to see the Holy Land. He therefore journeyed to Palestine, but died there of a plague at the early age of forty years. He was buried in Tiberias. Luzzato’s place in Hebrew literature was at | a cross-roads; as Cabalist he belonged to the past, as poet to the future, for his verse anti- cipated the tendencies which came to their full development during the XI Xth century. § 43. The Netherlands.—Acosta and Spinoza. The scope of international commerce in- creased immensely with the discovery of Amer- ica, and the main current of trade between the Old World and the New flowed through the two greatest maritime countries of Europe, England and the Netherlands. The free-spirited and energetic peoples of both these countries had rid themselves of the Catholic yoke in the XVIth century, and adopted the creed of Pro- testants. 212 Tur Jews In WeEsTERN EvROPE In Holland religious emancipation but shortly preceded political, and a heroic, long- drawn struggle against Spain ended with the defeat of the cruel king Philip II, crowned inquisitor and grandson of Ferdinand the Cath- olic. The Netherlands became a free republic in 1579, and immediately all the persecuted came flocking to its shores from Spain and Por- tugal. Many descendants of the Marranos were among the immigrants, fleeing from the dangers and hardships that attended their secret observ- ance of Judaism. They surged into Holland by the thousand, able for the first time, to be Jews outwardly as well as in their hearts. Most of them were merchants of wealth, physicians, ex- officials and military officers. A large commu- nity soon gathered in Amsterdam, and smaller groups in other cities of the Netherlands fol- lowed their lead. .The founder of the Jewish community in Amsterdam was a Portuguese Marrano, Jacob Tirado. In 1593 Tirado, ac- | companied by a few Marrano families, arrived in the town, and professed their religion in public. They chose a rabbi and soon had built a synagogue which they called Beth-Jacob (Jacob’s House). Twenty years later the Jew- ish population of Amsterdam had grown to several thousands, and was rapidly increasing. The immigrants were granted communal self- government, and a council of elders (maamad) OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 213 consisting of both secular and ecclesiastical mem- bers were in charge of their lay affairs; religious “questions were decided by rabbis or ‘“‘chachams” alone. ‘The council of elders shared with the rabbis the right to penalize free-thinkers or re- fractory members of the communities as they saw fit. | In the Netherlands, as in every other coun- try where the Jews were allowed to live in peace and liberty, a number of gifted men rose to eminence in various branches of literature and science. ‘There were poets and _ prose-writers who used the Hebrew, Latin, Spanish or Portu- guese languages, and poetry and the Cabala, owing to their emotional and imaginative ap- peal, find a high place in Dutch-Jewish litera- ture. Nor did they lack philosophers whose - chief concern it was to inject the principles of free thought into their theology. So far in- deed did some of these thinkers go in their in- dependence, that they incurred the displeasure of the orthodox rabbis who began to persecute them. ; One of these free-thinkers was Uriel Acosta, an erstwhile Marrano, born in Portugal in 1590. He had been brought up a Catholic from child- hood, and studied law in his youth at the age of twenty-five he was treasurer of a church. But his searching intellect found no satisfaction in the dogmas of Catholicism, so he took up the 214 Tuer Jews In WeEsTERN EvuROPE study of Biblical literature. Immediately he was seized with an ardent desire to return to the faith of his forefathers. He left Portugal secretly, and went to Amsterdam where he set- tled with his mother and brothers, living openly as a Jew. But even Judaism failed to satisfy him, so opposed was his freedom-loving mind to the multitude of external ceremonies and rites established by the Talmudists and ob- served with the greatest fidelity by the Jews. He was unwilling to submit to these irksome regulations, and publicly criticized the doctrines of the “Pharisees,” as he called the rabbis. This brought its natural result; the heretic was ex- communicated from the synagogue until he should reform. Uriel did not reform; on the con- trary, he went deeper into his evil courses. He wrote a book in Portuguese called “A Survey of the Legends of the Pharisees,” in which he ex- posed the falsehood not only of the Talmudic legends, but of the Bible as well. (1624.) This exploit caused all the Jews to shun Acosta as a dangerous heretic, and for several years he lived in isolation and disgrace. He could not, however, endure this state of ostracism forever, so at last he decided to recant in public, and in the presence of the rabbis. Great solemnity dignified the event. Acosta entered the synagogue where the rabbis and a large congregation were already assembled, and in a loud voice read the formula OUTLINE oF JEWIsH History 215 of repentance, renouncing his views which he declared contrary to the creed of Israel. Then, following the order of the rites of recantation, he received thirty-nine lashes of a whip upon his back, and finally prostrated himself on the threshold of the synagogue, and all the congrega- tion stepped out over his body. These humilia- tions completely unhinged the mind of the un- happy heretic; shortly afterwards, in a fit of despairing anger, he committed suicide by blow- ing out his brains. (1640.) He left his autobiog- raphy, written in Latin, entitled “Exemplar Humane Vite,” (An Example of a Human Life). Another free-thinker, Baruch, or Benedict, Spinoza, stood his ground with far greater firm- ness than Acosta. The greatest philosopher Jew- ry ever produced, Spinoza was born in Amster- dam in 1632. His earliest education he received under the rabbis and scholars of Amsterdam, in @ Talmud-Torah where the studies were divided over seven grades. The gifted youth followed the rabbinical teaching first with the study of medieval Hebraic philosophy in the works of Ibn-Ezra, Maimonides and Krescas, and after- wards with general secular branches of learning. Descartes’ system of philosophy was just then attracting a great deal of notice, and Spinoza was profoundly impressed with the idea of the elevation of free human reason above the blind 216 Tue JEws IN WESTERN EUROPE belief in religious dogma and legend. From the reason, he held, all knowledge sprang, and in accordance with this principle, his mode of living underwent a complete change, passing out of the range of rabbinical direction. Having decided to live as his reason alone dictated, he went no more to the synagogue and ceased to observe any of the rites of his religion, considermg them un- necessary. ‘The rabbis did all they could to bring him back to the path of right-thinking, but when they had proven their efforts fruitless, they ex- communicated him. (1656.) Thereupon Spinoza left Amsterdam, whither he returned only on rare occasions. He spent the rest of his life at the Hague, where he lived the life of a recluse, emerging from his philosophical studies only for a few hours each day, during which he plied the trade that provided him with his frugal livelihood. He was a grinder of lenses. In 1670 he published a_politico-theological — treatise in Latin, the “Tractatus theologico- politicus,” which filled the clergy of all creeds with the greatest alarm. It was the first un- biased examination of the Biblical dogmas as the foundation of theologies. The “Ethics” and other works contain the exposition of Spinoza’s doc- trines in general philosophy, whereby he shows the Deity and Universe as one indivisible whole. This philosophy, known as Pantheism, made its author’s name famous throughout the world. OUTLINE oF JEWISH History 217 Amongst Christians and Jews alike, it was ac- claimed and condemned with equal ardor. The Jewish thinkers of that epoch, could not, however, subscribe to the teachings of an ex- communicate. Their religion had cost them too much suffering for them to be ready to change it for any system of mere philosophical reason- ing, however persuasive. Spinoza, so far as these fellow-Jews were concerned, remained an outcast until the day of his death. (1677.) § 44, Manasseh-ben-Israel, and the Return of the Jews to England. The place of highest eminence among the rabbis and writers of the Netherlands Jewry in the XVIIth century, belonged to Manasseh- ben-Israel. He was born into a Marrano family in Lisbon, in 1604. For a long time his father languished in a Portuguese prison, the Inquisi- tion having discovered him observing the rites of Judaism in secret. At last he managed to escape with his family to Amsterdam, where they might live openly as Jews, and there the young Manasseh received a many-sided educa- tion. His profound knowledge of the literature of his own race was equalled by his familiarity with the literatures of Europe which he knew in ten languages. He was the intimate friend of some of the most famous Christian scholars 218 THe Jews In WESTERN EUROPE of his day, and for some time carried on a@ cor- respondence with a royal savante, Christina, princess of Sweden. He owed his reputation to his literary works, some of which were in Latin, some in Spanish and some in Hebrew. The most celebrated of these is his “Breath of Life,” (Nishmath Haim) written in the latter tongue in 1652. It is a medly of philosophy and the Cabala. No such universal attention was drawn to any of his writings as to the treatise in Eng- lish “In Defense of the Jews.” It was an at- tempt to refute the superstitious medieval accu- sations against the Jewish people, and did great service to the Jews who lived in that country from which medieval prejudice had once ex- pelled them. Some three hundred and fifty years had elapsed since the English Jews had been ex- pelled, (1921), during which period the life of the English nation had changed very consider- ably. Most of the population had renounced Catholicism and become Protestants; the sect of “Puritans” had arisen, all of whose members read diligently in the Old Testament which they accepted as the basis of the true religion. This devotion to the Bible formed a bond be- tween the English Protestants and the Jews, and created a feeling that a movement to re- voke the order of expulsion would be an act of justice greatly to be desired. OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 219 Cromwell was at that time head of the state (1649-58), and he was an ardent devotee and student of the Bible. A group of Jewish mer- chants living in Amsterdam thought the auspi- clous moment had arrived when they might peti- tion Cromwell for the rehabilitation of their people in England. Manasseh-ben-Israel was chosen envoy, and they gave him full power to conduct the negotiations. Following an exchange of letters with the Protector, he set out for London in the autumn of 1655. The address he presented on behalf of the “Jewish nation,” begged Cromwell to admit them into the country once more and to grant them freedom of reli- gion, and occupation, and communal self-gov- ernment. A commission consisting of ecclesi- astics and laymen was appointed to consider the petition. This event aroused much excitement in Eng- lish society, and a number of authors published their attempts to revive the anti-Jewish temper of the Middle Ages. Manasseh-ben-Israel’s contribution to the literature of the subject was the above-mentioned work, which made a deep impression upon the people. The government was in no hurry to decide the issue, but refrained from molesting such Jews as had already settled in London. Soon the capital became the seat of a community of considerable size, most of the members being 220 Tue Jews In WESTERN EUROPE Sephardim from Holland. Later on, Jews set- tled, undisturbed, in all the cities of England. Manassah did not live to see his labors bear fruit, for he died on his homeward journey to Holland. (1657.) § 45. Germany. The Reformation and the Jews. The great religious movement known as the Reformation which, as it were, revived the youth of many European nations, had its origin in Germany. ‘There it was that the first voices were raised in protest against the oppression of the Catholic church and the arbitrary power of © the Pope. The leader of these “Protestants” as they were called, was the famous Martin Luther (1517). The prelude to his crusade against the ex- isting ecclesiastical order, was the beginning of conflict between the ignorant Dominican friars and the enlightened members of the “humanist” party, whose chief representative was Johann Reuchlin. This scholar was perfectly famiilar with the Hebrew language which he had learned from Jewish teachers, and his study of the lit- erature of Israel inspired him with a deep sense of friendship towards the Jewish race. He be- came their ardent protector against the cruel persecutions of the Catholic clergy. The latter, seeking to do harm to the cause of both the Jews OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 221 and the Humanist students of Hebrew letters, employed a converted Jew, an ex-butcher named Pfefferkorn, to lend his name to a charge of blasphemy and immorality against the ‘Talmud. The apostate, together with his Dominican mas- ters, succeeded in inducing the Emperor Maxi- milian I to issue an edict ordering the destruc- tion of all Hebrew books. (1509.) All priests were directed to confiscate them wholesale and burn those in which passages were found deroga- tory to the Christian religion. Thereupon the noble-hearted Reuchlin as- sumed the defence of the proscribed works, and in an address which he presented to the highest dignitaries of the church, he demonstrated the falseness of the charges brought against them. The Talmud, he pointed out, was merely a collection of ancient commentaries on the Bib- lical laws, and dealt with Hebrew theology, law and medicine besides; that to burn it served no purpose, since peaceful persuasion only, not brute force had power to alter the minds of men; that, so far from being prevented, the study of the Cabala ought to be encouraged because of the close resemblance some of the ideas therein bore to the Christian dogmas. Reuchlin’s opinions raised a storm amongst the “obscure ones” as the Catholic zealots were called at that period. He was accused of at- tempting to disseminate “Judean heresy,” and 222 ‘Tur Jews In WEsTERN EvurRoPE was summoned to appear before the Inquisition in Cologne. What this war between the human- ists and the “obscure ones” might have resulted in no one can tell, had not Luther just then begun his Protestant campaign which ended in a general denunciation of Catholicism through- out Germany. Luther’s attitude towards the Jews in his capacity of founder of the new Church, was uncertain and vacillating. At first he preached humanity towards them, and in a book he pub- lished in 15238 he bitterly attacked their enemies. “The fools which are our people,” he wrote, “the Papists, the bishops, the monks, have used the Jews in such fashion that every good and true Christian ought forthwith to have turned Jew. Had I been a Jew and seen such ignorant imbeciles the rulers of our church, I had sooner become a hog than a Catholic. For the Catho- lics have borne themselves towards the Jews as though they were curs and not human beings. Yet they are our brethren, and brethren of our Lord. . . . Therefore Christian, not Papal, love should determine our conduct to- wards them; we owe them our friendship and opportunity to labor for their livelihood, as we for ours.” Later on, however, when Luther had risen to the peak of his power and assumed the same infallibility towards his Protestants as the Pope OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 223 had done towards the Catholics, a radical change came over his views concerning the Jews. He preached against them as anti-Christ and or- dered their persecution everywhere; “to the glory of God and Christendom,” he called for the destruction of their synagogues, for the seizure of their Talmud and their prayer-books, for the suppression of religious instruction by rabbis, for the restriction of their choice of occupation and the compulsory employment of able-bodied members of all their communities in public labor. (1543.) Shortly before his death, Luther enjoined his followers either to force baptism upon the Jews or to expel them from the country altogether. Thus the founder of the German Reformation revived many of the crude medieval superstitions it had been his declared purpose to combat. § 46. The Condition of the Jews in Germany and Austria. The Reformation, while it undermined the prestige of ‘the Catholic Church throughout the Protestant countries, did not destroy the uni- versal enmity towards all non-Christians. In only one way did it affect the situation of the Jews—instead of being persecuted by the clergy as formerly, they were now persecuted by the 224 Tue Jews In WESTERN EUROPE kings instead. ‘The German emperors most often abandoned their “crown serfs” as the Jews were rated, to the mercy of the rulers of the various districts and cities in the empire. In the cities, the Jews’ bitterest enemies were the merchants and skilled workers, who refused to tolerate economic competition on the part of “aliens.” The city magistrates, and the trade- corporations of guilds, oppressed and humiliated the defenceless ghetto-dwellers, and now and then riots broke out as a result. One day, the Christian artisans of Frankfort- on-Main, led by a baker named Fettmilch, sur- rounded the Jewish quarter and attacked the inhabitants. The Jews put up a desperate fight under the protecting ghetto walls, and some in the forefront of the attacking mob were killed. It was impossible, however, to withstand the overwhelming numbers of their enemies, and at length the ghetto was taken by storm. Led by Fettmilch, the crowd swarmed in, and sacked, plundered, destroyed and vio- lated their way through, finally driving all the Jews out of the city. (1614.) A similar outbreak occurred in Worms, where another populous Jewish community existed, and after a long struggle, the artisans of that city also forced the aliens to leave. (1615.) This time, the attempt was less successful, for the Emperor Matthias took the part of the OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 225 persecuted people. He ordered the punishment of the ringleaders of both riots; Fettmilch and his followers were beheaded, and imperial troops escorted the dispossessed Jews back to their ghettos in Frankfort and Worms. In Austria, the eastern portion of the German Empire, where Catholicism remained the pre- » vailing faith, the Jews were hardly better off. During the Thirty Years War between the rival Christian factions (1618-1648), they had suf- fered much in the way of depredations and violence at the hands of the foreign armies which overran Austria at that time. The German Emperors, whose residence was in Vienna, the Austrian capital, allowed the Jews to live their in their own quarter. A still more numerous community existed in Prague, the chief city of Bohemia. The ruler of Ger- many during the War, granted the Jews few civil rights, but as a devout Catholic, he was diligent in his efforts to save their souls. In 1630 he issued an order commanding the Jews of Vienna and Prague to attend church every Saturday to hear the priests’ sermons, and the unwilling congregations were strictly watched lest they slept or talked while the sermons were in progress. Forty years later, in the reign of Leopold I, a terrible disaster befell the Jews of Vienna. Margarita, the Emperor’s wife, was a Spaniard 226 Tue Jews IN WESTERN EUROPE and the most pious of Catholics. Her confessors found in her hatred of the Jews a useful tool, and they did all they could to keep this enmity aflame within her. On the birth of a still-born child, the Empress begged her husband to ap- pease the wrath of God by performing a “good deed,” and expel the Jews from Vienna and Lower Austria. Leopold obeyed this entreaty, which emanated as much from the Catholic priests as from Margarita, and issued his edict of expulsion in spite of some protest in the Imperial Council, where certain of the members voiced their disapproval of so inhuman an action. In 1670, accordingly, the Jews were ordered to leave Vienna and the Duchy of Austria with- in a few months. In vain they besought the revocation of the emperor’s decision; in vain they offered huge sums of money to be allowed to remain. Their own influential men and foreign envoys interceded for them alike in vain. Several thousand exiles left Lower Austria and Vienna within the time given them. The gov- ernor of Vienna bought the deserted ghetto from the emperor for the sum of one hundred thousand gulden, and called it Leopoldstadt in the emperor’s honor. The synagogues were transformed into churches. A small group of the Viennese exiles settled in Prussia which had arisen as Austria’s rival OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 227 in the struggle of supremacy within the German Empire. Frederick William, the Grand Elector of Brandenburg and Prussia, willingly admitted the Jews into his territories. They founded a new community in Berlin which in time grew to be the largest in all Germany. His son, Frederick I, King of Prussia, harbored a preju- dice against the Jewish religion, however, and began to restrict the freedom of its adherents. Then one Hisenmenger, a Protestant theo- logian, made a collection from a variety of sources of all the prosperous medieval tales about the ways of the Jews, and published them in a great volume written in German and en- titled “Judaism Exposed” (Entdecktes Juden- thum). Before the book had even left the printers’ presses, rumors of its contents spread alarmingly abroad. ‘The Jews implored the Emperor Leopold to forbid its publication which would certainly rouse the fury of the credulous populace against them. ‘The emperor granted their petition but later on King Fred- erick of Prussia gave permission for the book to be published in his own city of Konigsberg (1711). The “Judaism Exposed” became the inex- haustible source to which all the enemies of Israel ever afterwards repaired for the false accusations and preposterous slanders they dis- 228 Tur JEws IN WESTERN EUROPE seminated to harm the Jews. ‘They found in this work an endless store of distorted Tal- mudic or rabbinical quotations, and countless false reports that exposed the Jews in a repul- sive or ridiculous light. § 47, The Intellectual Life of the German Jews. Segregated in their social life, the Jews held aloof from their German neighbors in their in- tellectual activities as well. In spite of the dawn of the new era, medieval customs still survived unchallenged in the Jewish quarters of the kingdom. Young men were being brought up from childhood with no mental training but that afforded by Talmudic learning, and the men of the middle classes devoted their leisure to the same study. As for the men and women of the lower orders, they gained what food their minds required from the reading of “morality tales” which began at that time to appear in the Jewish-German dialect. In the XIVth century, Prague, the capital of Bohemia, became the intellectual center of Austro-German Jewry. A Jewish printing- press was established there, as also were several schools for advanced Talmudic study, called “veshiboth,”’ which had famous rabbis at their head. OvuTLINE of Jewish History 229. One of these rabbis, Jacob Poliak (died about 1530), acquired a certain renown as the inventor of “pilpul,” a curious system of trick answers to Talmudic questions. By this method, the ques- tion under consideration was made to appear infinitely more complex than it really was. The procedure was as follows: first the student would quote every contradictory opinion he could find throughout the Talmud bearing upon the matter in hand, then one by one he would refute and thus eliminate them. It was a form of mental gymnastics which undoubtedly whetted the edge of the students’ reasoning faculties, but it was death to clear and logical thinking. The “pilpul’” was severely condemned by all the best rabbis. The name of one of the rabbis of Prague, Yomtov-Lipman Heller, is closely associated with the history of the Austrian Jews during the Thirty Years’ War. He was chairman of the commission appointed to take charge of the special tax of 40,000 gulden sent from the Jew- ish communities of Bohemia each year to Vienna towards the expenses of the war. Although the rabbi did his best to organize the payment of this heavy tax equitably amongst the various sections of his community, he could not do so to the satisfaction of all, and his administration was often reproached by those who considered themselves unjustly used. At last the enemies he 230 THE Jews In WESTERN EUROPE thus incurred sent a report to Vienna, complain- ing of irregularities in the administration, and mentioning for good measure, that in one of Heller’s works, expressions were to be found disparaging the Christian religion. The result of the movement’s most furious antagonists was Prague, and his removal to Vienna by order of the emperor. (1529.) There he was flung into prison with common criminals while the authori- ties considered the accusations against him. The crime of showing disrespect to the Church was punishable by death, and this would have been Heller’s fate had not the Jewish community in Vienna interceded successfully in his behalf. The emperor set him free, but deprived him of the further right to occupy the position of rabbi, and fined him 10,000 gulden into the bargain. Thus bereft of his honorable standing and of all his fortune, Lipman Heller left Germany and emigrated to Poland where he became the rabbi of Cracow. His most important works are a commentary on the Mishnah (Tosfoth Yomtov), which was used as a text-book in the Talmudic schools, and a highly interesting autobiography (Megi- lath Ayva), in which all his adventures are set forth. One of the very rare representatives of secular learning in the “realm of rabbinism” which was German Jewry, was David Hans. (Died 1613.) OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 231 Living most of his life in Prague, Hans was an ardent student of mathematics, geography and history. ‘The famous astronomers, Kepler and Tycho Brahe, were his friends. He compiled an historical chronicle in two parts, one devoted to Jewish history, the other general. “Zemach David,” Prague (1592). In the course of this work, the author went to many sources outside Jewish chronicles. He also published two other works, one on astronomy and one on mathe- matical geography. Germany also produced a famous Cabalist, Isaiah Horwitz (1630), the rabbi of Frankfort and Prague. The upheaval caused by the Thirty Years’ War, led him to leave Europe and spend the remaining years of his life in Palestine. Devoted to pious deeds, he lived in Jerusalem and Safed, which latter town was the hotbed of the Cabalist movement whose adher- ents lived there like hermits. In Safed he com- pleted his life-work begun in Europe, the “Shne Lucoth Habrith” (The Two Tables of the Covenant), better known under its abbre- viated title of “Shelo.” It is an enormous volume containing a collection of articles on the Cabala, on law, ethics, penitential rites, and rules of life for hermits according to the doc- trines of Ari and Vital. The Messianic Movement founded by Sab- bathai Zevi, found followers amongst the Ger- 232 Tue Jews In Western Europe man Jews, who, in the midst of their hardships as subjects of oppressors, longed for the advent of the wonderful savior who would deliver them into freedom, but their hopes were doomed to bitter disappointment. Sabbathai’s fraudulent claims were finally exposed, and the rabbis at once began to persecute all who were suspected of being members of any Sabbathian sect. One of the movement’s most furious antagonist was a well-known ‘Talmudist named Jacob Emden, | whose home was in Altona, near Hamburg. — (Died 1776.) He left no stone unturned in searching out the remotest hiding-places of the “Sabbathian heresy” and ruthlessly pursued all suspects, without respect of person, though some were the most esteemed members of the com- munity. His writings heaped censure upon the heads of all heretics, dead or alive. Emden became the center of attention when he entered into a controversy with Jonathan Ejbeschutz, a famous rabbi of Prague. (Died 1764.) Ejbe- schutz was an eloquent preacher and a learned Talmudist, but he had also studied the Cabala, | and was rumored to be carrying on secret negotiations with the Sabbathians. He was in the habit of writing occult Cabalistic formule on pieces of parchment and giving these to the sick as talismans sure to cure them. When he became chief rabbi of Hamburg, he also became a near neighbor of Emden who began to watch OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 233 him closely. He obtained some of the alleged: talismans, and declared that some of them con- tained references to Sabbathai Zevi, whereupon he publicly accused their author of a strong leaning towards, if not actual participation in, the Sabbathian heresy. (1751.) The open accu- sation of Ejibeschutz caused great disturbance amongst the rabbis, who split into two parties, ,one siding with Emden and the other with the ‘chief rabbi. The struggle was upheld by both factions, and the death of Eibeschutz found German Jewry definitely divided into two opposite camps, the Talmudists on the one side and the Cabalists on the other. CHAPTER IX. Tue JEws In RusstA AND POLAND. XVitH-XVIiItrH CENTURY. § 48. The Golden Age. HE XVIth century was the golden age for the Jews in Poland and Lithuania. rage Poland inherited the supremacy in irie| Jewry that Spain had lost, for the hor- ae") rors of medieval Western Europe drove multitudes of Jews into the eastern coun- try where they soon made their presence felt in its economic development. The highest stra- tum of Polish society was the class of land- owning nobles, and the lowest the peasant class. The Jews, who represented the industrial and commercial activities of the kingdom, came be- tween the two. Their only competitors in the cities were the Polish guilds and the German merchants. The Polish kings of the X VIth century were all protectors of the Jews in their dominions. Sigismund I, brother and successor of Alexan- der (see § 34) ratified the rights his predeces- 234 OUTLINE oF JEWIsH History 235 sors had granted them. (1507.) His wealthy Jewish subjects rendered him valuable financial service, supervising the collection of state taxes and customs dues, lending him money for the prosecution of his wars, leasing or managing the royal estates which they developed with great efficiency and consequent profit to the king. In many ways they contrived to enrich the royal treasury. Michael Yosephovitch, chief tax- supervisor and collector of Lithuania, became very influential at court and was appointed elder or chief of all the Lithuanian Jews. This charter, granted by the king, carried with it extensive privileges, amongst others, permission to deal directly with the king on any important issue connected with Jewish affairs, the right to try and to pass sentence on Jews according to the law of Israel and use his own methods of collect- ing all government taxes. A rabbi, learned in the Jewish law, was appointed his assistant. With their racial integrity so securely safeguarded, the prosperity of the Jews grew apace; their communities flourished in Brest, Grodno, Troki, Pinsk and other cities of Lithuania. The excellent circumstances of the Jews often aroused the envy of their enemies, espcially of the Catholic clergy, whose influence had suffered a great diminution with the spread of the reli- gious reform from the West. The Protestant movement which went back to the Bible for its 2386 ‘THe JEws In Russia AND POLAND foundation, inclined many Catholics towards Judaism, and a number of voluntary conver- sions followed. One Polish woman, Catherine Zaleshvska, accused of ‘Jewish tendencies” was burned at the stake by order of the local bishop; the execution taking place in the market-place of Cracow in 1539. The clergy accused the Jews of seeking these conversions, particularly in Lithuania, and discussed repressive measures against them. But the good King Sigismund saw that nothing came of their attempts to in- terfere with the people he had taken under his special protection. His successor, Sigismund II August (1548- 72), made a declaration upon his assuming the crown, to the effect that he would safeguard all the civil rights of his Jewish subjects. He extended the scope of their self-government, granting both rabbis and elders the right to try refractory or criminal members of their communities according to the Mosaic-Talmudic law, and even impose heavy penalties upon them. This was the nucleus of the system of autonomous communal life which, by uniting the members of each community, drew all the communities together with a sense of racial — unity. During Sigismund II’s reign the Catholic clergy again attempted to revive the old perse- cutions of Jews. Rumors were set afloat, accus- OUTLINE oF JEwisH History 237 ing the purchase of holy communion bread from a Christian woman of Sokhachev, which the Jewish buyers stabbed until it flowed with blood. The supposed perpetrators of the crime were burned at the stake, but the king agrily de- nounced this conviction of innocent people on the strength of suspicion that had no foundation except in the superstitious ignorance of their accusers. When the clergy followed their exe- cution of the alleged defilers of the host with reports accusing the Jews of killing Christian children as Passover sacrifices the king issued an edict ordering the instant suppression of all such outrageous statements unless corroborated by four Christian and three Jewish eye-wit- nesses. (1556.) Sigismund’s successor, Stephan Batory, also declared the above attacks upon the Jews to be base and groundless slander, used for the pur- pose of oppressing and robbing the Jews. He zealously protected the civil rights they had held under the former occupants of the throne, and added new privileges to those they already enjoyed. (1580.) About that period the order of Jesuits was rising to immense power throughout Poland. This order of monks fought all non-Catholics with equal frenzy, using every conceivable means, fair or foul, to attain their ends. Their efforts at extermination were directed impar- 238 THE JEWS IN RUSSIA AND POLAND tially against Protestants, Greek Orthodox Catholics and Jews. Soon they had become the most potent educational force in Poland, almost all the tuition of Polish children falling into their hands, and when their pupils left the Jesuit schools, their minds had been filled with the most extraordinary superstitious beliefs and the deepest hatred towards alk non-Roman Catholic mankind. The Jesuit pupils grew up to occupy positions of importance in every walk of life, and their evil influence soon permeated the government. Sigismund III and Vladislav IV, kings of Poland during the first half of the XVIIth cetury, already relaxed their protection of the Jews. ‘The city governors, or magistrates, and the artisan guilds restricted the rights of Jews in the direction of trades and commerce, and the usual ecclesiastical charges against them be- came more and more frequent. But they were still strong enough to fight against their enemies, for they were fortified in the possession of com- munal freedom and in the powerful sense of racial unity that bound them together, as also in the richness of their spiritual life. § 49. The Kahals and the Waads. The Jews of Poland formed a separate ele- ment in the population, governed by their own OUTLINE OF JEwisH History 239 elected representatives, spiritual and temporal. The community affairs were under the direction of the Kahals, or community councils, which existed in all cities where Jews lived, except in the very small towns or villages. In the case of Jewish communities too small to have a Kahal of their own, the one nearest to them directed their affairs. ‘The members of the Kahals were elected once a year during Pass- over week, and were chosen by vote-casting and the drawing of lots. iach Kahal formed spe- cial groups within itself, each group attending to some special branch of administration. Three or four elders (Rosh), were the chiefs of the Kahal, and after them came the “members of eminence” (Tubim), judges (dayans), super- visors, and trustees of various institutions. The scope of the Kahal’s activities was very wide. It included the collection and forwarding of the district tax to the royal exchequer, the appor- tionment of the taxes for the government and for their own communal uses, the supervision of synagogues, cemeteries and charitable institu- tions, the drawing up of deeds for transfer of real estate, supervising the education of the young, the settling of law-suits between mem- bers of the community, with the assistance of the “dayans” and the rabbi. The rabbis ruled and judged the members of their communities according to the laws of 240 THE JEWS IN RUSSIA AND POLAND the Bible and Talmud, so far as those laws were applicable to practical life, but there were occasions when the local rabbinical court was in doubt whether to apply certain laws, or when the litigants, discontented with their decision, appealed to a higher court. It also happened now and then that one Kahal would enter into litigation against another, or some private citi- zen against a Kahal. In these cases rabbinical conventions were held every year to act as the higher tribunal where justice could be dealt out to all who sought it. At first this assembly was convened at the time of the great fairs to which multitudes came from far and wide; of these, the fair at Lubin was the principal. Ever since the time of Sigismund I, the rabbis had been accustomed to meet there for the trial of civil cases “according to their own law.” Later on, these rabbinical and elders’ conventions oc- curred more frequently, and as a result, a permanent institution called the ‘“Waad” or Diet, was established. It was convoked annually and its members represented all the Jewish com- munities of Poland. It was called the “Diet of the Four Countries,” because its members came from the four parts of the kingdom, from Great Poland, whose capital was Posen, from Cracow in Little Poland, from Lwvoff in Podolia and from Ostrog in Volynia. The Waad not only tried appealed cases and established the inter- OvuTLINE oF JeEwisH History 241 pretation of laws, but issued new ordinances pertaining to public and religious affairs. Its activities were of particular importance during the X VIIth century. Lithuania, which did not belong to the Polish crown lands, had its own Waad, consisting of rabbis and secular delegates from the five largest communities in the country, Brest, Grodno, Pinsk, Vilna and Slutzk. The leaders of Jewry were ardent in their efforts to strengthen the nation’s unity and pre- serve its characteristics. ‘The education of chil- dren was the chief preoccupation of the Kahals and the Waads, and in every community the rabbi was regarded as the school-children’s nat- ural guardian. Very often he was at the same time “Rosh-yeshiba,” i.e., head of the highest Talmudic school in his own city, and supervisor of the “Kheder” or elementary schools as well. In the larger communities, however, where the position of rabbi carried with it manifold public and ecclesiastical duties, the post of “Rosh- yeshiba” was filled by someone else, usually some celebrated Talmudist. A contemporary chronicler draws a graphic picture of school-life in the Jewish communities of Poland and Lithuania in the first half of the XVIIth century. “In no other country,” he writes, “ought knowledge of the holy teachings of Judaism to be so widespread as in the Polish 242 Tur JEws In Russia AND POLAND kingdom. For in every community there is a yeshiba whose head receives a liberal salary paid out of the public funds, in order that he might be relieved of material care and pursue his studies unharrassed. Young men studying in the yeshiba are also supported at the charge of the communities. Each student supervises not less than two boys whom he teaches in order that he may become proficient in instruc- tion and in learned debate. Each student with his two pupils boards in the house of some prosperous member of the community, and is considered a member of the family. There is not one Jewish home without a scholar, some- times in the person of the head of the family, or of the son, or son-in-law, or of a boarder- student at the yeshiba; and very often all of these could be found in the same household. “The following curriculum is followed by Pol- ish students: The school-year at the yeshiba is divided into two periods, summer and winter sessions. At the beginning of each, the Gema- rah, or Babylonian Talmud is studied with great diligence, as also are the commentaries of Rashi and the Tossafists. All the scholars in the com- munity, the young men and all others who de- sired to study, assemble daily in the school where the Rosh-yeshiba sits where he may be seen by everyone. The students and men of learning stand round him. He lectures on the Galacha, OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 243 commenting on, and supplementing it as he goes. When the lecture is over, scholastic de- bates are held, various contradictory passages out of the Talmud or its commentaries are com- pared, the contradictions eliminated by other quotations and contradictions in those quota- tions disclosed and eliminated so that the prob- lem at last stands clearly forth, solved. “The head of the yeshiba has a special servant who makes daily rounds of the elementary schools and sees that the children are attentive and diligent. Once a week, on Thursdays, the pupils of these kheders come to the house of the “gabay” or supervisor of their school, who gives them tests in what they have studied dur- ing the week. Wrong answers are punished with a flogging administered by a servant at the supervisor’s order, and a reprimand before the other boys, so that the culprit may remember to do better next week. On Fridays, the boys have to pass examinations given by the Rosh- yeshiba himself, an ordeal which keeps enough fear in the children’s hearts to ensure their studying industriously. . . . Men of learning are held in high esteem and are obeyed by all the people. ‘This proves a powerful stimulus to learning; all who would be influential within their community strive towards scholarship, and thus the land is filled with knowledge.” 244 ‘Tuer JEws In Russia AND POLAND § 50. The Growth of Rabbinism. Thanks to the freedom of government within the Jewish communities and the increase of schools, Talmudic learning in Poland reached a degree of excellence that had never been equalled. By the end of the XVIth century, that country, which had been almost negligible in the spiritual world of Jewry, had become supreme. The first great scholars to arrive in Poland, came from the neighboring land of Bohemia, where the Talmudic “pilpul’”’ invented by Jacob Poliak was much in vogue. (See § 47.) A pupil of Poliak’s, Sholom Shakhna (died 1558), founded a Talmudic School or yeshiba in Lublin, from which most of the most eminent Polish rabbis graduated. One of these, a scholar of Cracow named Moses Isserlis (or Ramo, died 1572), was a contemporary of Joseph Karo, the Palestinian author of the “Schulchan- Aruch,” and Isserlis did much to have this code adopted in Poland. Being a Sephardic Jew, Karo had made no mention in his book of any of the rituals and customs common to the Ashkenasim, or Polish and German Jews, so Isserlis included in his text of the “Schulachan- Auruch” a great many rules derived from popu- Jar customs in those regions, or from the experi- ences of the Ashkenasic rabbis. As Karo had OUTLINE oF JEw1sH History 245 called his book the “Covered Table,” Isserlis called his supplement the ‘“Table-cloth” (Mappa). His edition of the code was adopted by the Polish, Lithuanian and Russian Jews as a text-book on religious law. He was the chief of the community in Cracow, the ancient Polish capital, and there a great number of disciples gathered about him, many of whom became in after years great and famous rabbis. Besides his supplement to the “Shulachan-Auruch” he wrote many other books on rabbinical law and theology. One of Isserlis’ contemporaries and friends was Solomon Luria (or Rashai, died 1573), a remarkable 'Talmudist who occupied the posi- tion of rabbi first in Ostrog and then in Lublin. Unlike his Cracovian friend, Luria attached but small importance to the “Shulchan-Auruch,” regarding it as an elementary, popular work, not worth the attention of a serious scholar, Luria took up the study of the original source of all the law, the Talmud, and wrote profound commentaries on many of the treatises contained in that vast work. These he published under the title of “Solomon’s Sea” (Yam Shel She- lomo). He had many pupils. and disciples and was the founder of a school of rabbinical litera- ture. Both these Jearned men were often called upon to decide questions of rabbinical learning 246 TueJEWwSIN RussiIA AND POLAND _ and law, by correspondents all over Poland, and in Italy, Germany and Turkey as well. A collection of their answers and rulings was pub- lished in a book called “Questions and Answers” (Shaalothu 'Teshuboth). The scholars of the succeeding generation fol- lowed in the footsteps of these two founders of Polish rabbinism. Some wrote commentaries on the Talmud, Rabbi Meir (or Maharam) of Lublin, Rabbi Samuel Edels (or Maharsho) or Ostrog; others wrote supplements and interpre- tations of the old codes of laws, Rabbis Mordecai Joffe of Posen, Joel Sirkis of Cracow, David Halevi of Lvoff, and many others. Jewish learning flourished in Poland in the XVIIth century as it had done in Babylonia during the era of the Amoraim. A great many works of scholarship were printed in the Jewish printing shops of Cracow and Lublin. Tal- mudic and rabbinical studies held undisputed sway throughout the country; secular learning and philosophy were altogether neglected, and lovers of the occult confined their studies to the Cabala alone. The best-known work on the Cabala was written by Nathan Shapiro, 2 prominent Cabalist of Cracow; his book was called “Exposing the Depths“ (Megale Amu- koth) 1678. The religious unrest stirred up by the Re- formation, created within Polish society several OUTLINE oF JewisH History 247 sects whose tendencies were opposed to the established church. Of these the one which most closely resembled Judaism in its dogmas was that of the Unitarians, who denied the Trinity and the divine origin of Christ, but recognized the religious and ethical creed of the Gospel. These heretics were disdainfully called “half- Jews” or “Judaists” by the Catholic clergy. Christian theologians of various denominations frequently engaged the rabbis in controversy, and as a result of this practice, a remarkable book appeared in 1593, written by Isaac of Troki, entitled “The Strengthening of the Faith” (Hizzuk Emuna). In the first part of this book the Jewish scholar defends Judaism against the attacks of Christian theologians, and in the second he assumes an attitude of aggres- sion, criticising the dogmas of the church. He reveals a number of contradictions in the text of the Gospel, points out where the New Testa- ment deviates from the Old, and shows where the church dogmas of later ages departed from the teachings of the New Testament itself. For a long time no one dared publish this work and it did not appear until a hundred years after- wards in a Latin translation made by a Chris- tian writer. Its formidable title was the “Fiery Arrows of Satan,” and the purpose of its publi- cation was the exposition of the “Jewish falla- cies.” In after years, this book was used by 248 ‘THE JEWS IN Russia AND POLAND Voltaire and the French Encyclopedists of the XVIIth century, wherewith to belabor the dogmas of the church. § 51. Khmelnitzki and the Cossack Massacres. In the middle of the XVIIth century the condition of the Polish Jews took a change for the worse, owing to the increasing bitterness of inter-racial, inter-religious and inter-class strug- gles in that kingdom. ‘The Polish and Russian peoples had come into conflict, as also had the Catholic and Greek-Orthodox Churches, and the nobility and the peasants. The Shlakhta, or nobles of Poland, oppressed the Russian peas- ants on their estates, and the Catholics incited the kings against their Greek-Orthodox sub- jects in particular and all non-Catholics in gen- eral. This state of affairs was especially bad in the eastern provinces of Poland, known as the Ukraine or Little Russia. The larger portion of the population was Russian and of the peas- ant class, employed by Polish “pani” or land- owning nobles. A smaller section was the mili- tary group of Cossacks, who in time of war, served the Polish government. Besides the Cossacks in the service of the king, there were others, who lived in freedom on the steppes north of the Snieper Falls. They were called OvTLINE oF JeEwisH History 249 Zaporozhtsi. The Orthodox Cossacks and the peasants hated the Poles, their oppressors; they hated the Jews also for occupying the middle class between the nobles and themselves. As Jews often leased the estates belonging to nobles they acquired the same power over the peasants as the owners possessed, and the Russian peas- ant, whose dealings were more often with the Jewish supervisor than with the Polish prince who actually owned the land, came to look upon the former as the immediate cause of all his hardships and meditated revenge accordingly. The bitterness of the down-trodden was mingled with the hatred of another religion, and the long pent-up feelings of the ignorant Russian popu- lation against the Jews finally broke out in a terrible uprising of the Cossacks and peasantry in the last year of King Vladislav IV’s reign. The leader of the Ukrainian rebels was Bog- dan Khmelnitzki, a Cossack chief from the city of Chigirin. He gathered together an immense horde of Cossacks and peasants of the Ukraine, made an alliance with the Zaporozhtzi and the Tartars of the Crimea, and at the head of that vast army moved towards Poland prepared to invade the kingdom. (1648.) The Polish troops sent out against them were defeated, and King Vladislav dying, the country was plunged into all the disorder consequent upon an interreg- num. The rebellion spread over the whole of 250 THEeJEWSIN RuvssiA AND POLAND the Ukraine and the adjacent provinces. Bands of Cossacks and Russian peasants, led by Khmelnitzki and his confederates, the ruthless Zaporozhtzi, overwhelmed all resistance and de- stroyed Poles and Jews with the utmost sav- agery. “The murders were accompanied by torturing of the most barbarous description,” says a Russian historian. “The victims were skinned alive, sawed in halves, clubbed to death, roasted on live coals or scalded with boiling water. Even infants were not spared. The worst cruelties were reserved for the Jews. Wtter extinction was to be their lot, and every trace of pity shown them was looked upon as de- liberate treason. The scrolls of the Torah were snatched from the synagogues, and danced upon by Cossacks as they caroused with vodka. The Jews were then stood on the sacred manuscripts and prodded mercilessly with knives. 'Thou- sands of Jewish infants were thrown into wells or buried alive.” Particularly tragic was the fate of Jewish refugees who fled out of smaller towns and vil- lages into the fortified cities in the hope of find- ing protection against their enemies. Khmelnitz- ki, learning that several thousand were in hiding within the fortification walls of Nemirov in Podolia, sent a troop of Cossacks to destroy them. Owing to the difficulty of taking the city by storm, the Cossacks resorted to cunning. OUTLINE oF JEw1sH History 251 They approached Nemirov with Polish banners, and asked for the gates to be opened. The Jews, believing they were Polish troops come to rescue them, admitted the enemy and paid dearly for their mistake. (June 1648.) Joined by the Rus- sian population, the invaders killed every Jew in the city. Yehiel-Mikhel, the rabbi and Rosh-yeshiba of Nemirov, hid with his mother in the cemetery, where they were found by one of the rioters, a shoemaker. He began to club the rabbi, whose aged mother implored the murderer to kill her instead of her son. But the inhuman brute slew the rabbi first and her afterwards. Young Jewish women were often spared, to be forcibly baptized and married by the Cos- sacks and peasants. One beautiful girl, carried off by a Cossack for this purpose, told him that she knew how to charm bullets so that they could strike her and rebound without doing her any harm. The ignorant Cossack, challenged to con- vince himself, shot the girl who fell, mortally wounded to the ground. But she died rejoicing at her deliverance from the enemy’s hands. Another woman, as the Cossack intending to marry her was dragging her towards the church, jumped off the bridge over which they were passing into the river beneath. About 6,000 Jews perished in Nemirov, and all those who managed to escape fled to the 252 TueJews in Russia AND PoLAND fortified city of Tulchin. There, however, a second bloody drama was enacted similar to the last. The invaders besieged the fortress where several hundred Poles and some two thousand Jews had taken shelter. The besieged swore not to betray one another, and vowed to defend their stronghold to the last man. The enemy was kept at bay by the bullets of Jews, shooting from the fortification walls; the siege continued without success for the Cossacks who, tiring at last of their wasted efforts, conceived a base and treacherous plan to enter the city. ‘They sent a message to the Poles within the gates, saying: “Surrender the Jews to us; them we will punish, but we will leave you unmolested.” The Polish nobles, forgetful of their oath, decided to sacri- fice the Jews in order to ensure their own safety, and admitted the enemy into Tulchin. The Jews were first disarmed, then robbed of all they possessed, after which they were offered the alternative of conversion or death. Not one of them would betray his religion, so fifteen hundred were put to the cruellest and most inhuman death. The perfidious Poles were ill-repaid for their treachery, for when the Cos- | sacks had finished with the Jews, they proceeded to exterminate all the Roman Catholics among whom were many of the most prominent repre- sentatives of the nobility of Poland. From Podolia the rioters penetrated into OvuTLINE oF JEwisH History 253 Volhynia where the massacres continued through the summer and autumn of 1648. The Polish troops, led by the valiant Jeremiah Vishnevetzki succeeded in defeating them here and there, but were unable to suppress the rebellion. It was not until the accession of Jan-Casimir, brother of Vladislav IV, was elected king at Warsaw, that peace negotiations were definitely opened between the Polish government and the Cos- sacks. In 1649 peace was restored, the Cossacks having acquired certain rights and privileges within the Ukraine, amongst others the right to prohibit Jews from settling m Cossack lands. Jan-Casimir allowed all forcibly baptized Jews to resume the profession of their own religion. The women fled from the Cossacks who had stolen them and returned to their own families. The Waad of the Four Countries assembled in Lublin in the winter of 1650 and passed measures for the restoration of order in the public affairs and in the domestic relations of the Jews. ‘The anniversary of the massacre in Nemirov was proclaimed a day of fasting and prayer, in memory of the martyrs who perished there. 254 Tur JEws 1n Russia AND POLAND § 51. The Jews During the Muscovite-Swedish Invasion. The Poles soon broke their treaty with the Cossacks and attempted to subdue them once more, whereupon the leader or hetman of the Cossacks, Bogdan Khmelnitzki, proposed to the Muscovite Tsar Alexis Mikhailovitch, the an- nexation of Cossack Ukraine to his dominions. In 1654, therefore, the inhabitants of Little Russia, as this territory was called, became the subjects of the Tsar. Immediately, Muscovite troops moved to the adjacent provinces of Lithuania and White Russia with the purpose of making war on Poland. ‘The Jews of both countries suffered terribly during the war which lasted for two years (1654-56), and each sur- render of a Polish city to the allied invaders meant a fresh massacre or wholesale expulsion of the persecuted Hebrews. When the city of Mohilev-on-the-Dnieper surrendered to Alexis, he ordered all the Jews out of the city and turned their homes over to the officials of the city government and the Russian authorities. The Jews, however, ling- ered on in the city, hoping that the Poles might soon win it back again, but their optimism cost them dear. 'Towards the end of the summer OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 255 of 1655 Colonel Poklonski, the commander of the Russian garrison in Mohilev, heard that Polish troops were approaching the city. Fear- ing that the Jews might join the enemy, he made them all leave the city limits, and as they fled away with their wives and children, and whatever property they had been able to carry with them, Russian soldiers fell upon them and put them to death. When Vilna, the Lithuanian capital, was sur- rendered. to the Muscovite troops, the Jews suf- fered as before; most of them, however, man- aged to escape, but those who were left behind were either killed or expelled by order of the Tsar. ! Then came the turn of the crown lands of Poland, when the Swedish invasion brought the country to the very brink of ruin. (1655-58.) The whole territory was transformed into a military camp. ‘The Jewish communities had to stand successive onslaughts by Muscovite soldiers and Cossacks, by Swedes and finally, by the Polish troops, whose brutality knew no bounds. The awful ravages of plague were added to the horrors of war, and enormous num- bers of Jews in Cracow, Posen, Lublin and Kalish perished either by the sword or by dis- ease. By 1658 the country had just begun to re- build order out of the chaos wrought by the war. 256 THe JEwSIN RvuSSIA AND POLAND Polish Jewry, contemplating the losses sus- tained during that terrible decade (1648-58), was appalled at the total which, according to the chroniclers, reached over half a million. About seven hundred communities lay devas- tated, and in Russian Ukraine they had disap- peared altogether. In ‘the Polish Ukraine only a tenth of the former Jewish population sur- vived. The rest either met death at the hands of the Cossacks, or were taken prisoners by Tartars if they had not fled to Turkey or other countries in Western Europe. Jewish refugees were to be met in every part of Europe and Asia at that time, and everywhere they told pitiful tales of the calamities which had befallen their brethren and of the hundreds of martyrs, until their listeners shuddered with horror. The contemporary chronicles and the mourn- ful chants sung in the synagogues at that period, reflected the torture of the Jewish people under the unspeakable disasters through which they were living. Nathan Hanover, an eye-witness of the Ukrainian massacre, describes it in his masterly history, the Yeven Metzula (1658). The rabbis sent new prayers to the synagogues to be read in memory of the new martyrs, and the anguish of the people poured forth in des- perate, heart-rending supplications to Heaven. OUTLINE or JEwisu History 257 § 53. Poland’s Decline. After the Cossack wars, the kingdom of Poland began gradually to decline. Its return to power under the heroic Jan Sobieski (1674- 96), who showed marked favor towards the Jews, was but a dying flash. During the reigns of the Saxon kings, August II and August IIT, the kingdom again lost ground, owing to their misrule and the over-taxing of the country’s resources for the prosecution of their unsuccess- ful wars. The treatment of the Jews went from bad to worse. The government pursued its sole aim of extracting money out of them to their last penny by means of taxation; the municipal governments and artisans’ guilds restricted them in the matter of free choice of trades and com- mercial activity; the nobles, as members of the Diet restricted their civil rights; the Jesuits in the schools filled the hearts of young Polish children with contempt for the alien race and religion in their midst. Mobs of rough Polish school-boys would at- tack and beat defenceless Jews in the streets, and sometimes even force their way into the Jewish quarters where they started riots. This occurred in Posen, Lvoff, Vilna and other cities. In order to protect their members against these 258 Tre JEws in Russia AND POLAND “school-boy raids,” the Jewish communities in the larger cities paid an annual tribute to the heads of the Catholic schools in return for their restraining the excesses of their pupils. Humiliated on every side, the Jew found sanctuary only within his community, within the Kahal. The strength of this council was strengthened by the Polish government which refused to have any dealings with individual Jews but only with the Kahal which collected each man’s taxes and paid the whole sum into the state exchequer. The Kahal stood responsi- ble to the government for every misdeed of which any Jew was guilty, and owing to all these circumstances, the council’s power in the community became almost boundless. It served a very valuable purpose in uniting all the Jews and protecting their interests, but on the other hand many Kahals abused the power vested in them. In certain cases their tax-administration was exceedingly unjust, and sometimes they were known to wrong the poor to please the rich and to interfere with the personal liberty of members of the community. The calamities they endured left an indeli- ble mark on the spiritual life of the Polish Jews. In the Ukraine in Podolia and Volhy- nia, where the Cossack rebellion had taken its cruelest toll, the intellectual level of the people sank lower and lower. Talmudic learning in OUTLINE oF JEwisuH History 259 which hitherto all classes had participated, be- came the occupation of a small group of “book- men,” while ignorance and superstition filled the minds of the poverty-stricken masses. In Lith- uania and the Polish crown-lands, rabbinical science did not lose its hold so soon upon the people at large, though even there a perceptible slackening of intellectual activity immediately set in. The single hopeful exception to this universal decline was the appearance of a book of history written by the rabbi of Minsk, Jehiel Halperin. This work, entitled “The Order of Generations” (Seder Hadoroth, 1700), falls into three parts. Tracing the events of Jew- ish history from Bibilical times to 1696, it opens with an enumeration in alphabetical order of © the names of all the tanaim and amoraim (Part I), together with their sayings or rulings as contained in the Talmud (Part II), and con- cludes with a list of post-Talmudic writers and their works. As interest in rabbinical learning grew weak- er, preoccupation with the “secret learning” or Cabala increased. The teachings of the Pales- tinian Cabalists, Ari and Vital, found many dis- ciples in Polish Jewry, while more and more books were published dealing with life beyond the grave, with angels and demons, heaven and hell. Miuracle-workers followed, claiming the power to cure diseases of mind and body by 260 TuEeJEWSIN RussIA AND POLAND means of mysterious incantations and talismans. A contemporary writer says “In no other land ean the Jews so concern themselves with Cabal- ist nonsense, devils, talismans and _ spirit-invok- ing as in Poland.” § 54, Sabbatians and Frankists. Sabbati Zevi’s Messianic movement followed upon the horrors of the Cossack massacres in Poland. In the midst of thew suffering the Polish Jews heard with fierce hope the rumors from Turkey, telling of the exploits of the pretended Messiah. In many places they even made all their preparations for immediate de- parture to the Promised Land. Nor did the popular enthusiasm for the movement diminish when the false savior renounced his faith, caus- ing all pious men, rabbis and laymen to shrink from him in horror. Groups of “secret Sabbat- jans’ were formed in Podolia and Volhynia; they were called “followers of Shabsi-Zevi” or more shortly, “the Snabses.”” Many of the tra- ditional religious rituals were ignored by them, and they turned the Ninth of Ab from a fast- day into one of feasting in honor of the so-— called Messiah’s birthday. Certain branches of the sect gave up their lives to fasting and do- ing penance, others passed their nights and lays in merrymaking and depraved practises. So OUTLINE OF JEwisH History 261 rapidly did this dangerous heresy threaten to spread, that the frightened rabbis resorted to drastic measures for its suppression. In the summer of 1792, accordingly, the rabbinical synod at Lvov called down the “herem” or “pronouncement of excommunication” upon all secret Sabbatians refusing, after a given time of grace, to recant their false doctrines. This move met with some success; a good many members of the sect made public confession of their sins and performed the necessary deeds of expiation. But the majority clung to their heresy, and in 1725 the rabbis had no choice but to use the “herem” against them. Jacob Frank, the founder of another sect, was born and brought up amidst the secret Sabbati- ans, in Podolia (1726). Leib, his father, had been expelled from the Jewish community on account of his connection with the Shabses, and had gone to live in the neighboring country of Wallachia, then a Turkish province. Jacob’s first occupation was as clerk in a shop, and later on he became an itinerant merchant, go- ing into towns and villages with his wares. His route took him from time to time into the cities of Turkey and he often found himself in Salon- ika, the centre of Sabbatianism. There he came into contact with the leaders of the sect from whom he learnt all that was most desirable in their teachings. At last he conceived the idea 262 TueJEws In RvssiIA AND POLAND that much might be gained by returning to Poland, and appearing before the Sabbatians there as a prophet. In this course, Frank was actuated less by religious zeal than by personal ambition and an adventurous spirit. He made his entry into Podolia in 1755, and joined the leaders of the local Shabses to whom he communicated the revelations which had been vouchsafed to him by the Messiah’s successors in Salonika. Secret meetings were arranged at which strange rites were performed by the members. One day during a fair in the town of Lanzcorona, Frank and a large crowd of his followers gathered at an inn to hold the services of their religion. ‘They sang hymns and stirred their pious enthusiasm up to the highest point by means of revelry and dancing, men and women together. ‘The Sabbatians’ scandalous conduct horrified the orthodox Jews attending the fair, and resulted in a report being car- ried to the local authorities that a Turkish sub- ject was in the town, inflaming the emotions of | the people in order to convert them to a new religion. The gay assembly was put under ar- rest. Erank, as a foreigner, was deported back to where he had come from and the rest were delivered over to the rabbis and officials of the Kahal. The rabbinical synod at Brody pro- claimed a strict “herem” against all Frank’s fol- lowers, ostracizing them from the Jewish com- OUTLINE oF JEwIsH History 263 munity and making it the duty of every true son of Israel to hunt down every member of the dangerous sect until the heresy was stamped out. The persecuted heretics of Podolia resorted to desperate measures against the rabbis. A dele- gation of their members appeared before the Catholic bishop, Dembovski, at Kamenetz-Po- dolsk and declared that their sect repudiated the Talmud and recognized only the Zohar, the holy book of the Cabala. Like the Christians, they believed in One God in three persons, of whom the Redeemer or Messiah was one. This declaration filled the bishop with hopes of con- verting the Sabbatians to Christianity. He took the “anti-Talmudists” (as the Frankists called themselves) under his special protection, and challenged the rabbis of Podolia to meet them in open debate in Kamenetz. This event took place in 1757, in the presence of Dembovski and other Catholic priests. The rabbis’ attempted refutation of their opponents’ arguments and exposure of the falsehoods they disseminated proved unsuccessful; the bishop ruled that the “anti-Talmudists” were right, and ordered the defeated rabbis to pay the Frankists a fine. In addition to this, he caused all copies of the Tal- mud owned by the Jews of Podolia to be seized and destroyed. ‘Thousands of volumes were car- ried away to Kamenetz and burned in the pub- 264 Tur JEws in Russia AND POLAND lic square, amidst the jubilations of the sectari- ans, whose revenge upon their enemies was thereby made complete. It is impossible to say what the upshot of this affair would have been had not Bishop Dembovski died suddenly just then, depriving the Frankists of their only pro- tector and leaving them exposed to the persecu- tions of the Kahal. Matters were at this stage when Jacob Frank returned from Turkey. He soon realized the desperate plight into which his followers had fallen through having renounced their Judaism without becoming proper Christians, and ad- vised them to pretend to be Christians, at least for the time being. “Just as Sabbatai Zevi and his people embraced Islam to mere outward ap- pearance only,” he argued, “so may his Polish followers feign acceptance of Christianity.” In their hearts, however, they were to go on be- heving that Sabbatai Zevi or Jacob Frank, his representative on earth, and not Jesus, was the true Messiah. Thus in 1759 the Frankists made known to the Catholic clergy their intention of joining the church. ‘They were received with open arms. Solemn ceremonies of baptism were held in the churches of Livof, and Polish nobles stood god- fathers to the new converts, bestowing their own names upon them and thereby admitting them into the ranks of the aristocracy of the land. OUTLINE OF JEWISH Histrory 265 Frank himself was baptized at Warsaw, and King August III himself was his godfather. The ceremony was attended by ministers, cour- tiers and members of the most illustrious society of the capital. He was given the baptismal name of Joseph. But the Frankists could not keep up the ap- pearance of conversion for very long. It was noticed by the Polish clergy that the new Cath- olics were secretly practising their old rites, and betrayals from various sources soon brought the whole scheme of deception to light. The Frank- ists were shown to have merely pretended to accept the church in order to save themselves from ruin, whereas they had in reality never ceased to regard Frank as their “Holy Lord” and the successor of Sabbatai Zevi. Frank was thereupon arrested and tried before an ecclesi- astical tribunal, and his judges, the highest au- thorities of the Church, sentenced him to impri- sonment in the fortress of Chenstokhov. This stronghold adjoined the local monastery and was connected with it, and it was thought that this circumstance would ensure his complete dis- appearance so far as his followers were con- cerned. The hopes of Franks’ judges were how- ever not realized, for though he remained in the prison for thirteen years (1760-73), his adher- ents contrived to keep in communication with him all the time. Some settled in Chens- 266 THEJEWSIN RwSSIA AND POLAND tokhov or its suburbs where they formed a close secret sect, and they looked upon their “Holy Lord” as enduring the same fate as had befallen the “suffering Messiah” Sabbatai, who had also been imprisoned in Abydos. Frank did his best to keep up his people’s faith by speeches and messages. He would tell them that only through the “religion of Edom” could salvation be attained, by which religion he meant the extraordinary miscellany of Christian and Sabbatian ideas which formed his peculiar creed. Frank was at last set free when Poland was first divided (1772), Chenstokhov being sur- rendered a little later to the Russian troops. Accompanied by a great number of his faith- ful followers, he left Poland and went into Moravia. There, and later on in Austria, he presented himself amidst the Jews as a Chris- tian missionary, and in that role he even insinu- ated himself into the favor of the Viennese court. His success was shortlived however, for it was not long before someone exposed his past and he was forced to leave Austria immediately. Establishing himself finally in Offenbach, Germany, Frank took the title of “Baron von | Offenbach.” With his daughter Eva, called the “Holy Lady,” he became the leader of a secret group of his sect, and lived in great luxury on the money he received from his Polish and Mo- ravian disciples. After his death in 1791 the OUTLINE oF JEwisH History 267 sect began to break up. Such of the members as remained in Poland gradually mixed with the native Catholics and in time became one with the rest of Polish society, losing their in- tegrity altogether. CHAPTER X Tuer TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. § 55. Moses Mendelsohn. HE second half of the XVIIIth cen- tury was a period of transition for the Jews, during which the old order of their lives gave place to the new. A liberal movement towards the emanci- pation of people’s minds from the bondage of inherited medieval prejudice, was making great headway amongst the educated classes throughout Western Europe. A school of writ- ers sprang up in France who demanded liberty of thought and of conscience for all, however widely the ideas of the individual might diverge from those accepted by the majority. (Vol- taire, Diderot, Rousseau and the Encycloped- ists.) ‘These radical Frenchmen’s views became very popular in Germany, and amongst their admirers was no less a personage than Freder- ick II, King of Prussia, himself, who was fond of declaring how free his subjects were to save their souls according to whatever creed they chose. 268 OUTLINE oF JEwisH History 269 In practice, unfortunately, Frederick made no attempt to alleviate the sorry condition of his many thousand Jewish subjects, but kept them without civil rights and granted the privi- lege of residence in Prussia only to such wealthy merchants as could afford to pay the heavy taxes imposed upon them. A small Jewish community existed in Berlin, the Prussian cap- ital, and a ban was placed upon all would-be immigrants of small means who desired to make their home in the capital. They contrived to make their way there secretly, nevertheless, and one poor youth who got in by stealth lived to become the glory of his own people and of the whole of Germany. This youth was Moses Mendelsohn. He was born in Dessau in 1728, the son of a poor copyist of Biblical scrolls for the syna- gogue, named Mendel. Under his father he studied Hebrew and the Bible, and the local Rabbi, David Frankel was his tutor in the Tal- mud. The boy’s chief delight was in studying, and when his teacher Frankel was invited to become the rabbi in Berlin, young Moses fol- lowed him thither, being then only fourteen years of age. In his Berlin attic, he suffered great privations, but pursued his studies no less diligently for that. The spirit of free thought within him was aroused by his acquaintance with the philosophy of Maimonides. Jack of nour- 270 THE TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. ishment combined with excessive mental activity completely undermined the boy’s constitution, and his wholly sedentary life at last caused curvature of the spine, so that he became a hunchback for life. But he was utterly indif- ferent to physical suffering; he had interest only for the concerns of the mind, and there he was insatiable. He desired to add philosophy and secular sciences to his store of knowledge, al- though these subjects were at that time thought superfluous for a Jewish youth, if not danger- ous. He plunged into the study of mathematics, Latin and modern languages, and soon began to read French and German literature. It was not long before he obtained employment as tutor in the home of a wealthy Jewish manufac- turer, from which position he was later on trans- ferred to that of superintendent of his patron’s office. His material situation thus well estab- lished, he was at leisure to devote all his spare time to the intellectual pursuits he so ardently enjoyed. Mendelsohn’s meeting with the great German poet, Lessing, in 1754, was the turning point in his career. Lessing, who in one of his earli- | est dramas, “The Jews,” had condemned his countrymen’s prejudice against the Hebrew race, encountered in Moses Mendelsohn one of that race’s noblest representatives. The two young men were immediately drawn towards OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 271 each other by the similarity of their ambitions, and under the influence of their intimate friend- ship, both these thinkers found their minds ex- panding. They were kindred spirits. Lessing introduced Mendelsohn into the cultured cir- cle of his Christian friends, thereby laying the foundation of his literary fame. One day Mendelsohn gave Lessing the manu- script of his “Philosophical Discourses’ for crit- icism, and Lessing had it published without the author’s knowledge. ‘The book was a popular success on account of the clarity of its thought and its beautiful style. The young philosopher added to his renown with his next work, “Phae- don,” which was an attempt, in the form of dis- courses between the Greek Sage, Socrates, and Phaedon, his disciple, to prove the immortality of the soul. Men of education read it eagerly, and Mendelsohn found his praises on every tongue. He was acclaimed as one of the great- est writers in Germany. His acquaintance was sought by the most famous authors of the day, and his home became the rendezvous of the in- tellectual élite of the capital. There, all moot problems of philosophy and ethics which so pro- foundly occupied the minds of his generation, were debated with ardor, and Mendelsohn came to be called the Jewish Socrates. From his place of eminence in German soci- ety, he was not unmindful of his own people’s 272 Tuer TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. welfare. If he devoted his earlier years to gen- eral philosophy, all his later life was dedicated to the task of strengthening and rehabilitating Judaism. The following incident led to his tak- ing up thus passionately the fight for his reli- gion: Among Mendelsohn’s friends was Lavater, the famous preacher, who greatly desired to convert the Jewish thinker to Christianity. In dedicating his book “On the Proofs of the Truth of Christianity” to Mendelsohn, he challenged him to refute his contentions, and if he failed, to turn Christian. ‘This defiance aroused Mendel- sohn’s indignation, and in his reply, “The Mes- sage of Lavater,” he probably declared himself a Jew once and for all time, saying that that religion alone he sincerely believed to be ra- tional and divine. At the same time he ex- pressed his contempt for the dishonesty of any man who would betray his religion or induce others to change theirs. But Mendelsohn’s main ambition was not the defence of Jews in the eyes of the outside world, so much as the restoration of their creed from within and he sought for a means whereby it could link up with the course of progress throughout Europe. Like Maimonides, he wanted to widen his people’s intellectual horizon and reconcile the religious doctrines with the truths of secular philosophy. He realized that OUTLINE OF JEwisH History 2738 the Talmudic training led its students astray from the true foundations on which their reli- gion had been built and which were to be found in the Bible alone. ‘The rabbis’ distorted interpretations obscured the sense of the divine book, and therefore, like Luther before him, he began his people’s re-education by translating the Bible for them. He turned the Penta- teuch, or Torah, into German, keeping strictly to the spirit of the original, and later on, in collaboration with other scholars, he wrote the Biur, a model commentary in Hebrew upon the Pentateuch, based on the grammatical and log- ical sense of the Biblical text, unadulterated with any artificial sophistries in the manner of the other commentators. Published in 1783, Mendelsohn’s ‘Torah’ was received with enthusiasm by all the pro- gressive lovers of learning, and with indignation by the reactionary orthodox rabbis who re- garded it as a piece of dangerous heresy. All the rabbis of Germany published heated pro- tests against the “Berliners,” as they called Mendelsohn and his friends, and declared the new edition of the Bible an impious and heretical work, ordering its instant destruction. But their persecution of the book only helped to make it successful, and the Berlin Bible became the fountain of knowledge for many a young Jew- ish seeker after truth. They studied it in secret 274 Tue TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. and found in it a means towards learning the rules of pure Biblical writing, and towards a real knowledge of Biblical poetry and history. Eager searchers after truth learnt the German language through Mendelsohn’s version of the Bible, and procured thereby the key which un- locked for them the treasury of German litera- ture and secular philosophy and science. A new edition of the Psalms and other Biblical books followed the translation of the Pentateuch, and the rest were turned into German later on by Mendelsohn’s disciples. In “Jerusalem,” one of the great sage’s last works, written in German, he tried to show how rational learning combined with the observance of moral and national laws, and not blind faith, was what Judaism really required of its adher- ents. This book was hailed by Kant as the beginning of a general religious reform. Less- ing, in his drama, “Nathan the Wise,” had used his friend Mendelsohn as the prototype of his noble hero. Mendelsohn’s life was short, but crowded with great achievements. He died in 1786, and many | friends and admirers of his genius mourned his untimely end. OUTLINE OF JEWISH HisToRY 275 § 56. The School of Mendelsohn—the Struggle for Education. Mendelsohn was of those writers and think- ers whose influence upon their generation is ex- ercised as much by their charm of personality and greatness of character as by their written works. Mendelsohn, as leader of a group, was far more important than as an author; he had the gift of inspiring his friends and disciples, and of inflaming them with the desire to labor for the common good. The task undertaken by the “Mendelsohn cir- cle” was two-fold, being on the one hand the reform of Jewish school-systems and on the other, the regeneration of Hebrew literature. These aims were well on the way towards ac- complishment before the leader’s death. In 1778 his friend and colleague, David Fried- lander, brought about the foundation of the first “free Jewish school” in Berlin, where gen- eral subjects, Hebrew grammar and the Bible were taught in German. ‘This new school was intended to do away with the evils of the old *““Kheder” system of education which was con- cerned exclusively with the narrow training af- forded by Talmudic study. Hand in hand with the education of the young in the new schools, went the re-educa- 276 THE TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. tion of their elders through the study of litera- ture. The incorrect rabbinical language in which scientific books had been written had to be revised, and the pure language of Biblical Hebrew reéstablished. To this end Mendel- sohn’s disciples founded the “Union of Lovers of Hebrew’ in Berlin (1783), under whose auspices a journal called the “Collector” (Measeph) was published. This magazine con- tained lyrical and didactic poems in Hebrew, scientific articles, articles on Hebrew grammar and the literature of the Bible, and translations of the finest examples of French and German letters. It bore a great resemblance to the young-folks’ magazines of our own day, and it was precisely to this fact that it owed its popular | success. Kichel, Wessely, Friedlander and other — disciples of Mendelsohn were the chief contrib- utors. | One of Mendelsohn’s most famous colleagues was Naphtali-Herz Wessely of Hamburg, a prolific writer who contributed much to Mendel- sohn’s commentary, the “Biur” (1726-1805). Before that, however, he had attracted some attention as the author of a remarkable mono- graph on the philology of the Bible, which work he had followed by others, chiefly articles and poems in “The Collector.” Wessely wrote in the new Hebrew, unlike Mendelsohn who used German almost exclusively. His long poem, the OvuTLINE oF JEwisH History OTG: “Moseiad” (Shire Tiphereth) describes the ca- reer of Moses and the exodus from Egypt in powerful Biblical verse such as had not been seen in Hebrew poetry for many a long year. His greatest renown, however, he earned as the fighter of the reactionary rabbis who hindered by all the means at their disposal the new educa- tion in Austria. The enlightened Joseph II, who reigned at that time over the Austrian Empire, made stren- uous attempts to improve the condition of his Jewish subjects, and issued an edict ordering . the establishment of elementary schools for Jew- ish children where general subjects and the Ger- man language were to be taught. This edict greatly alarmed the Jews of Austria, Bohemia and Polish Galicia, which country had lately been annexed to the Austrian Empire. The pious mass of the Jewish people, encouraged by their spiritual leaders, feared that these sec- ular schools would lure the scholars away from the study of the religious law and the Talmud. The ‘“‘Lovers of Education” on their side, wel- comed the emperor’s edict as the beginning of a brighter era in the life of their people. Wes- sely wrote a panegyric in praise of the “Em- peror and Liberator.” When he learnt of the dissatisfaction of the rabbis over the very re- forms which were filling his party with joy, he sent a message to the Jewish communities in 278 Tue TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. Austria, which he published in Berlin in 1782 under the title of “Words of Peace and Truth” (Dibre sholo mve-emmeth). In this message he implored all his fellow-Jews to accept the beneficent edict of Joseph II with the enthu- siasm it deserved, and tried to make them see that even from the standpoint of religion, every Jew ought to be compelled to know the lan- guage of the empire in which he lived, and to receive a general education, without which it was impossible to understand either the con- tents of the Talmud or the spirit of Judaism in | general, both demanding a certain knowledge of natural science, history and geography. Wessely’s message found no favor except in the community in Trieste where Italian Jews made up most of the members; everywhere else it raised a veritable storm of indignation in the conservative camps. Jezekiel Landau, the chief rabbi of Prague, one of the most ardent defend- ers of the old order, condemned the “heretics” in the synagogue, pouring out upon them the most passionate denunciations. The friends of education found themselves seriously at war} they were excommunicated from Jewry and publicly cursed in the synagogues. In the city of Lissa Wessely’s message was burned in the presence of all the people. Thereupon he wrote a second message in which he defended himself against the charge of heresy, and made another OUTLINE OF JEWISH HISTORY 279 attempt to prove his contention that general education and religion were not incompatible. The effect of this latter message was that at- tacks upon Wessely personally ceased, but the struggle between the friends and foes of the new education was not to end for many years. § 57. The Haidamaks and the Partition of Poland. While Western Europe stood at the threshold of a new life, Poland was in the throes of the long-standing disorder which brought about its final ruin. During the reign of Stanislav Au- gust (1764), the last king, this ancient mon- archy fell into a state of dependency on her powerful neighbors, more especially upon Rus- sia. Chaos increased as the conflicts raged more bitterly between class and class and religion and religion. The rights hitherto enjoyed by the Jews and “dissenters,” which classification included all non-Roman Catholic Christians, | were withdrawn one after the other. Nowhere were the Jews in a more lamentable condition than in Podolia, Volhynia and the districts of the Ukraine which had remained un- der the sway of Poland. As in the past, the unhappy people in those parts, found them- selves once more crushed between the two mill- stones of the harsh and despotic Polish nobles 280 Tue TRANSITION PERION—1750-1795. above and the enslaved Russian peasants be- low them. Once more, as in the days of Khmel- nitzki, unrest was seething amongst the peas- ants, and during the first half of the XVIIIth century run-away serfs were again joining the Cossacks of the Russian Ukraine and the Zapo- rozhtsi (Cossacks from beyond the Dnieper), forming themselves into bands of “Haidamaks,” fearless bandits roving from place to place on their nefarious business. They raided and laid waste the estates of the Polish noblemen as well as small Jewish towns. At first the raids oc- curred but spasmodically and not very often, but as time went on they became more and more frequent and organized, until they assumed the terrible importance of a great popular uprising. The storm broke in 1768. Poland and Russia had come into conflict over the Greek-Catholic population in Poland. Russia demanded that this section of the peo- ple should enjoy equal rights with the Roman Catholics, but the Roman clergy threw all their weight into the balance against this plan of emancipation. On its side, the Greek Church made an attempt to incite a rebellion in the - Russian Ukraine. A forged edict, purporting to have come from the Empress Catherine II of Russia, ordered the annihilation of Poles and Jews throughout that part of the country, whereupon a new Haidamak movement sprang OUTLINE OF JEwisH History 281 into life, led by a Zaporozhian Cossack and Zhelezniak. Bands of the rioters ranged over the province, within the boundaries of what is now the Gov- ernment of Kieff. Jews and Polish nobles per- ished at their hands, as they overran small towns and great estates at will. Often the Haidamaks would hang a Pole, a Jew and a dead dog to the same tree with the inscription “A Lakh (Pole), a Zhyd (Jew) and a dog—they are all of one faith.” After having massacred and robbed the Jews thus in several towns, Zhelez- niak led his bandits upon the city of Uman, whither more than ten thousand Poles and Jews had fled for refuge at the first rumors of the uprising. When the Polish governor of Uman received the news of the Haidamaks’ approach, he sent his Cossack troops to meet them. But the governor’s army was led by Gonta, himself a Greek-Catholic Cossack, and he betrayed the Poles and joined Zhelezniak instead of stopping his progress towards the city. On the 18th of June, 1768, the allies marched on Uman, which at first put up a brave defence. Poles and Jews labored side by side on the city walls, pouring shot from guns and cannon upon the invaders, but they could not save themselves. The Haida- maks forced their way in, and instantly attacked the Jews who fled in panic before them through the streets. They met the most brutal deaths, 282 Tue TRANS/TION PERIOD—1750-1795. They were trampled under the hoofs of horses and thrown from the roofs of tall buildings; children were impaled on the points of bayonets and women were put to ruthless torture. About three thousand Jews had barricaded themselves inside a large synagogue, but the Haidamaks set a cannon against the door and blew it to fragments, after which they rushed inside and turned the sanctuary into a shambles. Having disposed of the Jews, the blood- thirsty horde turned their attention to the Poles. They slew many in the church, and the governor and other dignitaries were not spared. The streets of Uman were strewn with corpses and with maimed men and women left for dead; in all some twenty thousand Poles and Jews together perished in the Uman mas- sacre. Meanwhile, in other districts of Kieff and Podolia, such as F'astov, Tulchin and elsewhere, smaller Haidamak bands, reinforced by the lo- cal peasantry, were exterminating the Polish nobles and the Jews. Once more Jewish blood flowed upon the ground where the hordes of Khmelnitzki had passed in by-gone years, and ~ air resounded with the groans of martyrs. This time, however, the massacres did not last long. The Polish and Russian soldiery lost no time in suppressing the Haidamaks, and soon after the Uman invasion both Gonta and Zhelezniak were OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 283 captured. The former was surrendered with his band to the Polish government, and they all suf- fered hideous retribution for their treachery; the leader was skinned alive and then quartered. Poland disintegrated very quickly and little by little was divided among the countries on its borders. Three times, beginning in 1772, the Polish dominions were redistributed among themselves by Russia, Austria and Prussia in council. The last partition of Poland occurred in 1795 when Russia received White Russia, Lithuania, Volhynia and Podolia; Austria, Ga- licia or Red Russia; and Prussia, Pomerania and the province of Posen. Within two dec- ades, of the vast population of Polish Jews, the majority had become Russian, and the rest Austrian or Prussian subjects. § 58. The Jews in Russia Under Peter I. The Tsars of Old, or Muscovite, Russia, per- sisted in their stubborn refusal to admit Jews into their dominions. ‘The Russians of that period did not like any foreigners at all, least of all the Jews who, as non-Christians, had in- troduced the heresy of the “Judaists’” into their country many years before. Jewish merchants in Russia on business from Poland and Lithu- ania might stay there for a while, but were not allowed to settle permanently. 284 Tuer TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. When Ivan the Terrible captured the city of Polotzk from the Poles, he gave orders to bap- tize all the Jews or drown them in the Dvina (1563). Tsar Alexis Mikailovitch banished them even from the Lithuanian and White-Rus- sian cities which his troops were only tempo- rarily occupying. (See § 52.) Nor were they allowed to settle in the Ukrainian provinces which the Russian kingdom had just annexed. It was not until the reign of Peter the Great and his successors that great masses of Jews began to penetrate into the Russian provinces on the Polish borders, more especially into Lit- tle Russia. Peter would not have them molested, but dur- ing the reign of Catherine I an edict of expui- sion was issued, and all the Jews who had settled in Little Russia were forced over the frontier back into Poland (1727). In spite of the interdictions, Jewish merchants still went into Russia on business, and in 1743 the Senate petitioned the Empress Elizabeth Petrovna to allow them back at least temporarily, on the grounds of their commercial value to the prov- inces in which they pursued their activities. The empress returned the petition with the follow- ing reply written across it: “From the enemies of Christ I desire no. profit.” It so happened, however, that vast numbers of Polish Jews be- came the subjects of Russia notwithstanding, OUTLINE oF JEWISH History 285 for the final partition of Poland brought many Polish provinces under the rule of the Russian empire. The attitude adopted by the Empress Cathe- rine II towards her new Jewish subjects hesi- tated between opposite extremes. On the score of their usefulness in the development of indus- try, she gave them the right to settle in New Russia, the recently annexed provinces, which were as yet very sparsely populated. Russia proper, or Great Russia, was still prohibited ground to them. The government promised them the same rights and privileges they had enjoyed before their provinces were annexed, but as a matter of fact, their situation grew steadily worse. In the cities their commercial rights were circumscribed and their taxes con- tinually increased. In 1794 a new order im- posed a tax upon Jews registered as members of the burgher and merchant class, twice as great as the corresponding tax paid by Chris- tians. Only the Karaite Jews were exempted under a special charter which did not apply to the Rabbinists. For no reason but that they belonged to a particular race and adhered to a particular religion, the Jews found themselves impeded at every turn by the Muscovite gov- ernment’s legislation against them. ‘They were not recognized as real citizens and their civil 286 THE TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. rights were greatly restricted. Much the same state of things exists in Russia to this day.* § 59. Israel Besht and Hassidism. Parallel with the political transition period when the Polish Jews gradually became the sub- jects of Russia, a religious movement of far- reaching importance began to evolve, differing from both the old Rabbinism and the new “Ber- lin” system of education. The masses could no longer accept Rabbinism with its insistence on — Talmudic learning and rigid observance of ex- ternal rituals. Book-learning was not within the reach of the great majority, who exhausted all their energy in the struggle for their daily bread, and those whose piety was more than skin-deep found no satisfaction in the perfunc- tory performance of a multitude of mere cere- monies. Discontent of this nature had formerly gone to swell the ranks of Sabbatians and Frankists, but when these two sects renounced Judaism altogether a new doctrine came into be- ing which touched the trouble nearer its source and was far better adapted to the long-felt reli- gious needs of the period. ‘This was the “doc- trine of piety” or Hassidism, whose founder was a humble Jew of Podolia named Israel Besht. *Up to the Russian Revolution of 1917. (Translator’s Note.) OUTLINE oF JEwisH History 287 Israel Besht was born in Podolia about 1700, ° into a very poor family. He lost his parents at a very early age and was cared for by charitable townsfolk who sent him to the Kheder to study the Talmud. But the monotonous routine of school irked the boy who was by nature a dreamer, and he would often play truant. Many a time he was found straying in the woods all by himself, absorbed in his own thoughts. At thirteen he became an assistant or “behelfer” in the Kheder, and later he was appointed sexton of the synagogue. It was at that period that his behavior took a strange turn; he slept, or pretended to, by day and at night when the synagogue was deserted he would pore over books or pass long hours in fervent prayer. The mysteries of the Cabala took hold of his mind, and he took to studying the “writings of Ari.” He also began to acquire the art of per- forming “miracles” by means of Cabalistic in- cantations. After his marriage, Israel settled in a village in the Carpathian mountains, which he after- wards left to live in the Galician city of Tlusta. It was there, according to the Hessidic legends, that he prepared himself for his future career. When he was thirty-six years of age, he an- nounced himself publicly as a “Baal-shem,” or miracle worker. ‘There were a great many of these Cabalist conjurors at that time, all claim- 988 Tur Transtrion PER1Iop—1750-1795. ing the power of curing diseases by incantations, magic formulas, amulets and medicinal herbs. Israel Baal-Shem employed these agencies like his colleagues, but at the same time, he tried to effect cures through prayer as well, which he offered up with much shouting and strange ges- ture. Whenever he was called upon to foretell the future, he would open the Zohar at random and make his prediction according to its dic- tates. Very soon he became known to all the people as a saint and miracle-worker, and they nicknamed him “the good Baal-Shem” (Baal- Shem Tov) or Besht, for short. His reputation in this capacity thus estab- lished, Besht took up the teaching of religion. He travelled all over Podolia and Volhynia, healing and preaching. He made his home in Medzhibozh, a small Podolian town, and peo- ple came to him there from far and wide, to see him with their own eyes and listen to his sage discourses. Besht preached that true sal-— vation lay in sincere devotion to God, in sim- ple, unquestioning faith and ardent prayer, rather than in Talmudic learning. The essense of | religion was “communion with God,” and prayer | was the means thereto. This, to be efficacious, should express the fervent ecstasy of the soul, di- vested, as it were, of its earthly shell. Artificial means, such as violent gesturing, shouting and swaying back and forth, might be resorted to in OUTLINE OF JEWISH Hisrory 289 order to attain the necessary state of exalta- tion. Besht opposed the chief demand of the Arian Cabalists by declaring that long fasting, mortification of the flesh and other practices of asceticism were both injurious and sinful, for God loved men of cheerful and joyous disposi- tion rather than men made wretched by self- inflicted suffering. The inner feeling was what counted in religion, not the outward ceremonial, and he further condemned as harmful excessive observance of the minute details of ritual. The truly pious man, or Hassid, served his God not merely by conforming to the established rites of his faith, but by remembering Him at every moment of his daily life, in his work and in his thoughts. Constant communion with God through the spirit might bring a man the gifts of clairvoyance, of prophecy and of power to perform miracles. The righteous man, or Tzad- dik, was one who has come, through the piety of his life, into closer touch with God than other men, and therefore his role in life was to act as intermediary between his fellow-men and the Lord. Only with the help of the Tzaddik could perfect purity of soul be attained and with it all earthly and heavenly blessings. The Tzaddik must be held as an object of universal reverence as the messenger and favorite of God. No better doctrine than Hassidism could have been offered to meet the needs of the Jews of 290 THe TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. Podolia, Galicia and Volhynia. On the one hand, it laid stress upon the principle of simple and implicit faith which all could understand, whereas the unattainable learning and scholar- ship of the older theology was beyond the minds of the great majority; and on the other hand it held out the opportunity of salvation through the miracle-working Tzaddik, always a highly attractive figure in the eyes of the average man. Israel Besht as the Supreme Tzaddik became a popular idol, and rumors of the miracles ac- complished and of the eloquent discourses deliv- ered by this teacher of Medzhibozh brought even men of learning, rabbis and preachers, to visit him. He was said to have received divine reve- lations directly from the prophet Elijah. Besht himself had the utmost belief in the high mission to which he had been called. About 1750 he sent to Palestine a message of prophecy wherein he described a marvellous vision that had come to him. His soul, he said, had been transported to heaven where he had beheld the Messiah and many souls of the dead. “Tell me, O Master,” he had said to the Messiah, “when You will appear on earth?” And the Messiah had answered, “This is the token of my com- ing:. when your teachings shall everywhere be known and when all men will have the power to perform those miracles which you now per- OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 291 form, then the time of great joy and salvation will have arrived.” Besht died in 1770 at Medzibozh, surrounded by his devoted disciples. § 60. The Struggle Between the Rabbis and the Hassidim. Besht’s work was carried on by his disciples, chief amongst whom were Behr, a preacher of Mezherich, and Jacob-Joseph Cohen, though the former was held to be the great Tzaddik’s direct successor. While he lived his town of Mezherich in Volhynia became the Mecca of Hassidism as Medzhibozh had been before. From all over Poland and even from Luthuania disciples came to the Master to be prepared for the mission of Tzaddiks. When Behr died, Ja- cob-Joseph Cohen, the preacher and rabbi of the cities of Nemirov and Polonny, rose to first eminence as a Hassidist. In his written works, Toldoth Yakob Yosef, etc., he set down for the first time, sayings of Besht’s which he had direct from the lips of the founder of the move- ment (1780). These books formed the nucleus of an extensive Hassidic literature, to which many prominent Tzaddiks contributed as time went on. By the end of the XVIIIth century Hassid- ism was spreading like wild-fire throughout Poland and Lithuania, In Podolia and Volhy- 292 Tue TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. nia whole communities went over to the new doctrine. The Hassidim had their own syna- gogues, where they conducted the services in their own peculiar manner, with shouts and vio- lent gesticulation; they also slightly altered the order of the services and the contents of the prayers. In Lithuania and White Russia, how- ever, the strongholds of the Talmudists, they met at first in secret, for fear of persecution. The Tzaddiks, most of them disciples of Behr, were the leaders of the Hassidim. ‘The most eminent were Elimelech of Lizno in Gali- cia, Boruch of Tulchyn, a grandson of Besht in Podolia, Levi-Itzhok of Berdichev in Vol- hynia and Zalman Shneersohn in Lithuania and White Russia. The Tzaddiks of Podolia and Galicia were miracle-workers as well as teach- ers of religion, and throngs of believers dogged their footsteps, imploring cures for their dis- eases, blessings, predictions of their future, and so forth. Many of the Tzaddiks profaned Besht’s teachings by abusing the people’s credulity and accepting money in payment for their advice and prophecies. Zalman-Shneersohn was the > only one who refused to stoop to the role of bogus miracle-worker. A native of Liozno, a town in the govern- ment of Mohilev, Zalman received his early edu- cation in the Talmudic schools. At the age of twenty he went to Mezherich and became con- OUTLINE OF JEWISH HISTORY 293 verted to Hassidism under Rabbi Behr, after which he returned home as a preacher of the new doctrine, though in another form, more rational than the one adopted by the Tzaddiks in the South. Zalman’s teachings won him many followers in Lithuania and White Russia (1780- 1800). The rapid spread of MHassidism greatly alarmed the rabbis who still exercised great power in Lithuania. The chief of the Lithua- nian rabbis at that period was Elijah of Vilna, to whom the ancient honorable title of Gaon had been given (1720-1797). He was a man of distinguished mind which a lifetime devoted to unravelling Talmudic intricacies had rendered extraordinarily sharp-witted. From his earliest childhood he had given proof of unusual talent. At the tender age of six he was already a stu- dent of the Talmud, and at eleven he was tak- ing part in Talmudic debates of the most com- plicated kind, astounding the old rabbis by the extent of his knowledge. He quickly became master of every subject he undertook to learn. He was familiar with the Cabala, and incidentally picked up a scattered knowledge of mathematics, astronomy and physics, as much as he needed for the understanding of certain passages in the Talmud. His home was in Vilna where he lived the life of a hermit, ab- sorbed by his books. He ate far too little, slept 294 THe TRANSITION PERIOD—1750-1795. only two hours a day, and very seldom spoke to strangers on ordinary subjects outside the range of his studies. At certain hours, however, he lectured on the Talmud before his pupils. The outstanding features of his life were his strict observance of the minutest details of religious rites and his ascetic mode of existence, in which there was no place except for study and pious practices. It was inevitable that he should be deeply opposed to Hassidism which rejected the rigid observances he believed so essential, as well as his gloomy asceticism, and denied the import- ance of scholarship. Elijah the Gaon assumed the leadership of the rabbis, and declared war in their name upon the doctrine of Besht. In Vilna and other cities all the members of the Hassidic sect were publicly cursed in the synagogues (1772-1781). The Hassid syna- gogues throughout Lithuania were closed and all the books dealing with the new doctrine were burnt. The Hassidim were declared apos- tates and were expelled from many communi- ties. The zealous loyalists to the Rabbinist — theology called themselves “Mithnagdim,” 1. e., opponents of the new teachings. Since most of the Kahal elders in Lithuania and White Rus- sia belonged to the latter party, the Hassidim found themselves faced with persecution in their public, as well as in their religious, life. But OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 295 all efforts were powerless to impede the growth of the new order. In 1796 the Kahals, with Elijah’s permission, set another anti-Hassidist campaign in operation. The death of Elijah the Gaon occurred in 1797, and the persecuted Hassidim made no attempt to conceal their joy at the event, which fanned the fury of the Rabbinists against them into violent flame. Unable to contain their rage and hatred for the apostates any longer, the Mithnagdim resolved to denounce the leaders of the sect before the Russian government, declar- ing them to be preachers of a dangerous heresy. Zalman Shneersohn found himself arrested and taken to St. Petersburg where, after submitting to a cross-examination in the Secret Chancel- lery, he was thrown into prison. The appeals of his fellow-Hassidim, however, soon set him free (1798) though not for long. ‘Two years later he was again arrested as a result of his enemy’s denunciations, and this time he re- mained imprisoned until the accession of Alex- ander I, when he was finally restored to free- dom. He returned to Liozno, his original home, but moved later to Ladi in the Mohilev govern- ment, where he conitnued his activities as leader of his many followers, the Habad Hassidim.* *Zalman’s teachings as set forth in his book “Tania,” were founded upon three principles: wisdom, understanding and knowledge, or in Hebrew, “chochma, cyna, deah,” which three words abbreviated, formed the “Habad.” 296 Tur Transition PERrop—1750-1795. The struggle between the two great parties in Lithuania and White Russia resulted in the founding of separate communities by the Hassi- dim, and for a great many years the members of the rival sects ceased even to intermarry. In Podolia and the Southwest, the Hassidim almost entirely supplanted the Mithnagdim, and the T'zaddiks acquired the same spiritual dom- ination of the people as had once been the prerogative of the rabbis. The one spot of common ground upon which the ideas of the two conflicting sects met was their common hostility towards the new liberal education then coming into vogue in German Jewry. So uncompromising was their attitude in this connection that Polish-Russian Jews, whose inclinations tended towards secular learn- ing usually went abroad to get it, and Germany was the country they most often chose. One of these emigrants was a Lithuanian Jew named Solomon Maimon_ (1753-1800). His father was a country lease-holder near Nezvizh in the government of Minsk, and like all the other children he knew, he was brought up on the Talmud. According to the custom of the time, his parents had him married at twelve, but he did not give up his studies. From the Tal- mud he passed to the Cabala and then to the religious philosophy of Maimonides. ‘The boy’s mind thirsted for new learning which was not OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 297 to be found where he lived, and so in 1777 he left his home and family and went to Germany to get himself educated in science. At first he lived in Ko6nigsberg and later in Berlin, suffer- ing’ great privation and tasting all the bitter- ness of an exile‘s life in a foreign land. In Ber- lin he met Mendelsohn and was introduced into the great man’s circle. He did not take long to become familiar with German literature and science, and he next undertook the study of philosophy, more especially the theories of Emanuel Kant. The radical change from his Lithuanian se- clusion to the life of an educated European, pro- foundly affected Maimon; he was beset by doubt, and his religious belief hung precariously in the balance. His works of scholarship writ- ten in German were confined to the analysis of abstruse philosophical problems, but in 1792 he published his “Autobiography,” wherein he painted a vivid picture of the everyday life and customs of the Polish-Lithuanian Jews and told the sad story of his own career. He died alone in Silesia, in 1800. During the latter years of his life Maimon had become estranged from the Jewish people. His contribution towards their enlightenment was small, consisting of scarcely more than his single published work in Hebrew, an unfinished commentary on Maimonides’ “Guide.” CHAPTER XI A SURVEY OF THE PrincipaAL Events DuriIne THe NINETEENTH CENTURY. § 61. The French Revolution. HE end of the XVIIIth century saw a vast upheaval in Europe which altered a|| the political condition of several na- 4| tions. With the great French Revolu- | tion, the principles of “Liberty, Fra- ternity and Equality’ were enunciated for the first time, and men of all classes and religions were proclaimed equal. No exception was made in the case of the Jews, who, having reappeared in France during that century, found them- selves on the same political footing as the rest of the people.* *Since their expulsion in 1394, the Jews made no attempt to reenter France until almost three hundred years later. Only Marranos, or “secret Jews,’ fugitives from Spain, lived in the French kingdom under the name of “Neo- Christians.” At the end of the XVIIth century, however, a great many Jews from the German provinces of Alsace and Lorraine became the subjects of Louis XIV when he at- tached those territories to his own. More Jews entered France during the XVIIth century, some even living in Paris, but their condition as citizens was no less degrading than it had been in Germany. 298 OUTLINE OF JEWISH HISTORY 299 The most eminent and active sponsors of the revolution, such as Mirabeau and his friends, demanded of the National Assembly that the Jews receive all civil rights enjoyed by Christ- lans (1780), and in this they were enthusiastic- ally supported by the delegates from the Jewish communities of Paris and other cities. Only the Catholic and Alsatian deputies opposed the proposal, but after many sessions spent in violent debate, the pro-Jewish parties won and King Louis X VIth set his seal to the Assembly’s rul- ing (September 28, 1791). This was the first in- stance in European history of a Jewish emanci- pation, that is, of a sucessful movement to free them of their age-long civil and political dis- abilities. | The Christians were not to be easily recon- ciled, however. In Alsace, the home of quite a large Jewish population, hostility towards the enfranchised people showed no signs of abating for a long while. The Emperor Napoleon I, who usurped the political power after the Revolution, could not decide upon a definite attitude to adopt. In 1806 he summoned Jewish delegates from all over France, Italy and Holland to appear be- fore him. Abraham Furtado of Bordeaux, a wealthy Sephardic Jew, presided over the assem- bly. The delegates were called upon to answer twelve questions bearing on the compatibility of 200 Events Durinc XI XtH CENTURY Jewish religious law with French civil law. They replied that the Jews living in France regarded that country as their own, and held its laws equally sacred with the laws of their faith. 'This answer greatly pleased the emperor, who shortly afterwards, established a Sanhedrin in Paris, consisting of seventy-one members with the old- est rabbis in France at their head. The purpose this council was to evolve the best possible sys- tem of governing the French-Jewish communi- ties. The Sanhedrin recommended the establish- ment of a head rabbinical consistory at Paris both necessary and expedient, with secondary consistories in the provinces. It was the function of these bodies to manage the affairs of their communities and see that the civil laws of the country were duly respected. They were ac- cordingly established as the Sanhedrin advised and survive to the present day. Napoleon’s victories cleared the way for Jew- ish emancipation in other European countries. With the French domination of Italy the Jews there found themselves free, and in Holland the last restrictions against them were removed. | § 62 The Progress of Enlightenment in Western Europe. In Germany, the home of the new Jewish education, the improvement in the civil condi- OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 801 tion of the persecuted people did not long con- tinue. In the territories forming the “Union of the Rhine,” created by Napoleon, they had been given equal rights with the other citizens, and Prussia, while under the Emperor’s heel, took similar steps to liberate them. In an edict is- sued in 1812, Frederick-William II, the king, declared the necessity of granting the Prussian Jews full civil rights. No sooner, however, had Germany shaken off Napoleon’s yoke than this privilege, so graciously bestowed, was instantly revoked. In 1815 the European monarchs formed the “Holy Alliance” for the purpose of putting a check on liberal ideas and re-establishing the old political conditions. Germany and Austria were the most ardent advocates of this reaction- ary movement which persisted for more than thirty years. All activities on the Jews’ behalf immediately ceased and the various German governments re- stricted their rights again as before. In several places there was even a recurrence of anti-Semi- tic outbreaks such as were common in the Mid. dle Ages. Wurzburg, Bamberg and a few other cities witnessed anti-Jewish riots in 1819 and 1820. This time the Jews felt their civil and politic- al disabilities more keenly than ever before, for they had had time to grow used to German cul- 802 Events Durinec XI XtTH CENTURY ture, and had but recently taken an active part in the wars to free Germany from the French conqueror. They regarded themselves as guod citizens with all other Germans of the common Fatherland, when suddenly those same Germans turned round and began to treat them as aliens all over again. Not every Jew received the shock of this insult with the same bitterness and dis- may. Many of the educated ones had already mingled with the Germans so completely that they had quite forgotten their own people. In Berlin and elsewhere many families became con- verted to Christianity, amongst them even Dor- othea and Henrietta Mendelsohn, the philos- opher Moses Mendelsohn’s daughters. Men and women of culture, both Christian and Jewish, met in the salons of the capital, and marriages between Christian men and Jewesses were the common result, the wives adopting their hus- bands’ religion. The greatest representatives of German literature of that period, Borne (died 1837) and Heine (died 1856), both renounced Judiasm in their youth, but in their latter years they made atonement for their apostasy by be- coming their people’s ardent champions. Borne, a gifted publicist and apostle of free- dom, held the faults of the German character up to the light, and none more ruthlessly than their barbarian prejudice against the Jews in their midst. Heine, greatest of German poets OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIstToRY 803 after Goethe, expressed in some of his wonder- ful verse the sorrows of his race, and wrote a novel of Jewish life in the Middle Ages, “The Rabbi of Bacharach.” Towards the end of his career he wrote his inspired lines on the Bible. There were other Jews in public life who de- voted all their energies to the service of their people. Gabriel Riesser, the editor of a maga- zine in German called “The Jew” (1830), was a tireless advocate of Jewish emancipation, and labored continuously to arouse his co-religion- ists’ sense of self-respect while heaping censure on the apostates. “The son who is ashamed of his father is without honor,” he would say, “and the generation ashamed of its past likewise.” Other writers produced works on Jewish learn- ing and history. The most prolific of these was Leopold Zunz, called the father of the new Jewish historiography. The period of his great- est activity was from 1825 to 1855. His re- _markable researches in the field of the literature, religious poetry and sacred rites of the Middle Ages, had thrown much light on a particular phase of Jewish spiritual activity which until then had remained in obscurity. M. Yost, a fellow-student of Zunz, wrote the history of the Jewish people from antiquity to his own day, in a series of popular volumes. Both these writ- ers used the German language. In these historical works the educated reader 804 Events Durinc XI XtH CENTURY was able to follow the unfolding picture of the development of Judaism. Free-thinking writ- ers expounded the theory that the innumerable rituals and laws prescribed by the 'Talmudists and rabbis of bygone ages were not applicable to modern Jewish life. ‘They even pointed out that so heavy a burden as their observance en- tailed was a grave source of danger to the reli- gion, for the modern educated Jew, unable to observe them all, tended to reject with the un- important laws of a later date, the basic com- mandments of the Bible as well, until he had renounced his faith altogether. They demanded reforms made in the light of altered conditions. The leader of the reformists of 1840 was Abra- ham Geiger, rabbi of Breslau, a gifted historian of his race. His party, however, lacked unity; some devoted their attention to such external matters as the beautifying of synagogues and embellishing of the services, others began by rejecting the fundamental principles of the re- ligion instead of merely changing rituals of minor importance. A party representing the Orthodox Jews duly appeared in declared oppo- sition to the reformists. Rabbi Samson-Raphael Hirsch, a one-time fellow student of Geiger’s, was at its head. “To adjust life to religion, not | religion to life” was the motto of these “True © Believers” as they called themselves. The two OUTLINE OF JEWISH HISTORY 805 factions met in a desperate struggle for the up- per hand. A notable expansion in the intellectual ac- tivity of the French, Italian and Austrian Jews was meanwhile taking place, though to a lesser degree than in Germany. The most prominent figures in Jewish learning in France during the first half of the XIXth century were Salvador, | the author of important works on the Mosaic law, the history of Roman domination in Judea and the origin of Christianity, and Munck, the famous Orientalist whose books threw consider- tble light upon Hebrew-Arabic thought during the Middle Ages. In Italy a great thinker, Samuel David Luz- zato (1800-65), one of the teachers in the rab- binical seminary in Padua, rose to high emi- nence. The author of many historical and scien- tific works, Luzzato wrote of his conviction that Judaism embodied the most sublime philosoph- ical truths and the most perfect system of mor- ality ever devised. In his latter years he be- came convinced of the essential fallacy that underlay the new European culture, and con- sidered the pure principles of Judaism the one solid bulwark against the encroachments of uni- versal moral decay. The spirit of free criticism and research pene- trated even into the most obscure Austrian provinces which had once been Polish Galicia 806 Events Durtine XIXtH CENTURY and where Hassidism, hostile to every form of European enlightenment, reigned supreme. Yet even there a few men cropped up whom the new intellectual movement from Germany swept along on its tide. Nachman Krochmal of Brody (died 1850), wrote of the history of Judaism throughout the ages in the light of modern thought (“More Nebuche-hazman’’) and his pu- piu, Solomon Jehuda Rappoport of Prague, analyzed, after the manner of Zunz, many im- portant epochs of Hebrew literature. In spite of his piety, Rappoport was persecuted by the Hassidists and rabbis, who considered the appli- cation of scientific method to the study of the ancient writings an act of sacrilege. These ob- scurantists were often made the butt of two Galician satirists’ wit, Joseph Pearl lampooning them in his “Megalle Temirin” and Isaac Erter in his “Hazofe.” § 63. The Russian Jews Under Alexander I and Nicholas I. — he The liberal tendencies rife throughout West- ern Europe at the beginning of the XIXth cen- tury, penetrated for a short time into Russia where the great mass of Jews had made their homes after the annexation of Poland. 'The Emperor Alexander I (1801-25), grandson of Catherine the Great, established a special com- mittee to deal with the improvement of the OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIstToRY 807 Jews’ condition, and in 1804 he ratified the “Statute concerning the organization of the Jews” drafted by that committee. The first provision of the Statute was for educational re- form; Jews were allowed to enroll in Russian schools and steps were taken to enable them all to learn the Russian language. They fell into four economic divisions, agriculturists, man- ufacturers and artisans, merchants, and burgh- ers. Extensive privileges were. granted to the members of the first group, particularly in re- gard to their exemption from certain taxes. Inn- keeping and the sale of intoxicants, and lease- holding of peasants’ lands, were strictly pro- hibited however, and in order that these restric- tions might not be infringed, Jews were de- barred from living in villages. As an induce- ment to them to become farmers, the govern- ment set aside vacant land on the steppes of New Russia for their use and offered special privileges to would-be settlers. Several hundred families from the Northwestern provinces re- sponded to the call, and the first Jewish agricul- tural colonies were founded in Southern Russia in 1808. The experiment was a failure. On the one hand the Jews had never been accus- tomed to life on the land, and on the other, they found themselves faced with insurmountable dif- ficulties in trying to tame the wilderness they had been sent to colonize. The settlements fell 808 Events Durinc XI XtTH CunTURY into decay and were only recently re-organized. The Russian government’s solicitude for the welfare of the Jews did not last very long. The war with Napoleon (1812) and Russia’s en- trance into the “Holy Alliance” (1815), di- verted Alexander’s attention from the Jewish question, so that the second half of his reign saw the early liberal reforms superseded by very different measures. ‘The establishment of the “Society of Israelite Christians” in 1817 was an abortive attempt to spread Christianity amongst them. They were expelled from villages to cities with great harshness, and the reforms pro- vided for in the Statute of 1804 which aimed at their cultural and economic betterment were never carried out. Under Nicholas I (1825-45) their condition grew considerably worse. The medieval belief persisted in all government circles that the Jew- ish question could be solved in one way only, by compelling the Jews to adopt the religion and customs of the Russian people. The brutal legislation of the time was designed with that sole end in view. In 1827 a ukase was issued » making military service compulsory for all Jews, under a conscription system of great se- verity. The protracted service lasting about 25 years in distant outposts of the empire, tore the young Jew away from his family and com- munity, and accustomed him to a mode of life OvuTLINE OF JEWIsH History 809 utterly new and foreign to him. Time after time young Jewish boys, scarcely more than children, were drafted into military service, and usually sent to the far eastern governments where they were put into special battalions of “cantonist” minors. Under pressure from their superior officers, most of these Jewish “can- tonists’” went over to the Greek-Orthodox faith and never returned to their homes again. Other cruel laws restricted the right of Jews to live where they preferred or to choose their trades and occupations. No Jew was allowed to take up permanent residence outside the for- mer Polish provinces which formed the “Jew- ish pale.” It was not until the last ten years of Nich- olas’ reign that the government realized that merely restrictive measures could not meet the Jewish problem, and that it would be necessary to see that their educational status was raised before anything effective could be done. Fol- lowing the advice of Uvarov, the minister of education, elementary schools were founded in 1840 where general subjects formed part of the curriculum, and two rabbinical schools in Vilna and Zhitomir respectively took care of the train- ing of rabbis and teachers. The majority of the Jews, whom the govern- ment’s former cruelty had thoroughly fright- ened, met these new measures with deep distrust 810 Events Durtinc XI XtTH CrEentTURY and saw in the projected “school-conscription” yet another danger come to menace their race and their religion. The peculiar civil situation of the Russian Jews created favorable conditions for their spir- itual isolation from the rest of the population. Rabbinism and Hassidism were at one in pre- venting any new ideas from penetrating into the popular mind; though rival sects in every other respect, they were ever ready to join forces to combat the common foe of liberal education. ‘The intellectual tendencies of the time contrived nevertheless to thrust out roots from Western Kurope even as far as the dis- tant eastern places where the Jews still went in darkness. Isaac-Behr Levinsohn of Krementz (1786- 1860) was amongst the most ardent advocates of liberal education for the Russian. Jew, and in his books which were written in Hebrew, he pointed out that the study of the Bible and of the Hebrew language ought to be given prefer- ence over Talmudic learning. Neither, he said, was there any article of the Jewish religion that » forbade the study of foreign tongues or of sec- ular subjects. (“Theuda-b’Israel,” 1828.) He also wrote scientific articles on the history of Biblical and Talmudic Judaism (“Beth-Je- huda” and “Zerubabel’), as well a work de- voted to a refutation of the outrageous legends OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 811 accusing the Jews of using Christian blood for ritual purposes. With these and other efforts on behalf of his race, Levinsohn worked hard in the hope of bettering the condition of his unhappy fellow-Jews. Few of them appreci- ated his efforts, however; indeed he was com- monly regarded by the Hassidim, who formed the greater part of the Hebrew populace, as an apostate and traitor to his religion. The Rabbinists frowned similarly upon the “circle of the enlightened” (Maskilim), founded at Vilna about that time, with the chief object of restoring the use of pure Biblical Hebrew in literary composition. One of the members, Mor- decai-Aaron Guinzburg (died 1846), labored with much success in the cause of prose style. His own works, consisting of books on travel, stories, historical sketches and an autobiography, marking a considerable advance on the style of his generation. (“Debir,” “Abiezer,” etc.) Abra- ham-Behr Lebenson (“Adam”) of Vilna re- vived the Hebrew verse-forms in his “Songs in the Holy Language” (“Shire Sefat Kodesh,”’ 1842.) For poetic gift and emotional quality, he was surpassed by Mikhel Lebenson, his son, whose death at the age of twenty-four (1852) brought a bright career to an untimely end. His “Songs of Zion” and “The Harp of Zion” (“Shire Beth Zion,” “Kinor beth Zion”) rank with the finest poetry in the Hebrew tongue. 812 Events Durinc XI XtTH CENTURY § 64. The Jews of Western Europe During the Second Half of the XIXth Century. In 1848 the political condition of the coun- tries in Western Europe underwent a radical change. Revolutions in Germany, Austria and Italy resulted in a restriction of monarchical power and a great increase of popular influ- ence in matters of government. ‘The passing from a despotic to a constitutional regime meant a general movement towards political and social emancipation, and the Jews, whose leaders had largely helped to bring about the new order, found themselves once more in possession of rights as citizens. The vice-president of the Constitutional Assembly at Frankfort, where the new German constitution was being drawn up, was Gabriel Riesser, an old champion of Jewish freedom, and the council ruled that Ger- man subjects of whatever denomination were entitled to equal rights under the state. A sim- ilar decision was reached by the Prussian “Na- tional Assembly” then in session in Berlin. All over Germany equal rights for Jews were en- sured by law, and opponents of the new regime who in 1850 were in the majority, found their attempts to restrict those rights sternly resisted by the members of more liberal society in which Jews were already playing an influential part. OUTLINE OF JEWISH HiIsTorY 813 The added strength gained by Prussia after the war with Austria (1866), together with the uni- fication of Germany following the Franco-Prus- sian war of 1870, lent further prestige to the German constitutional regime, and the position of the emancipated Jews, so closely bound up with it, grew accordingly more secure. Jews of talent were outstanding figures in all fields of political, social and literary activity. The emancipation of their Austrian co-reli- gionists proceeded along much the same lines. The consolidation of the Jews’ position in that country was, however, a far more difficult task owing to the continual struggles for supremacy that were carried on within the empire by the various elements of its heterogeneous popula- tion. The liberal constitution granted in 1848 was frequently altered and abridged, but the constitution of 1867 ultimately made definite provision for the Jews’ complete enfranchise- ment in Austria-Hungary. They were still better off in France, after the revolution of February, 1848. In that country, which had been the first in all Kurope to spon- sor a movement to give freedom to the Jews, a Jew, Adolphe Cremieux, was twice Minister of Justice. (In 1848 and in 1870.) Cremieux was an ardent champion of his peo- ple’s cause. In 1860 he founded in Paris a society called the “Universal Jewish Alliance,” 314, Events DuriInc XI XtTH CENTURY with the two-fold object of protecting Jewish interests in all lands and of spreading European _ education in all their communities. It was only in the Mahometan countries of the East, Tur- key, Algeria, Morocco and Tunis, that the Alb- ance was able to fulfill both of these purposes. England granted the Jews equal political rights in the year 1858, adding this franchise to the civil rights that were theirs already. The newly emancipated people soon began to return their own representatives to the Parliament of Great Britain, and the honorary position of Lord Mayor of London was more than once occupied by a Jew. Lord Beaconsfield (Ben- jamin Disraeli), an outstanding figure in the history of that period and for many years Prime Minister of England, was a Jew and re- mained a sympathetic friend of his fellow-Jews all his life. The great Anglo-Jewish philan- thropist, Moses Montefiore, labored indefatiga- bly for the welfare of the Jewish people all the world over, and interested himself especially in’ their communities in Palestine. By the end of the third quarter of the XI-Xth century, Jews had been granted equal rights in every European country under constitutional government. Italy (since 1848), Sweden and Denmark, and later on, Bulgaria (1878), Ser- bia and Roumania, however, stubbornly refuse to emancipate the Jews within their borders and OUTLINE oF JEWISH HIsToRY 815 continue to regard them as aliens to whom un- restricted civil rights cannot be granted. The work of Jewish historical research begun by Zunz and Yost, was carried on by other scholars during the second half of the XIXth century, more especially in Germany. ‘The most eminent of these historians was Graetz, the author of an exhaustive “History of the Jews from Ancient to Modern Times,” in eleven vol- umes (1854-1876). Many other men of learn- ing devoted their talents to the study of the various epochs in the history of their race. The civil emancipation of the Jews of West- ern Kurope, while beneficial in many respects, was not without its less desirable consequences. The inevitable and natural intercourse between Jews and Christians who now had their social and political interests in common, very often resulted in a complete fusion of the two. ‘This “assimilation” tendency made considerable head- way in Germany and France, where certain of the Jews, calling themselves Germans or Frenchmen “of Mosaic faith,’ made a small matter of breaking the religious tie which, they said, inevitably weakened under the influence of new ideas and which alone bound them to their people. The younger generation drifted farther and farther from its Jewish sources and took an ever-declining interest in the concerns of their race, being gradually absorbed by the na- 816 Events Durtinc XI XtH CENTURY tions in whose midst they had been born and raised. This state of estrangement might have assumed an alarming aspect had not the attitude of Christian Europe towards them suddenly changed, bringing them up short in their pro- gress towards assimilation. The last quarter of the XIXth century saw a new anti-Jewish movement in Kurope. It went by the name of “anti-Semitism” and re- solved itself into an attempt to revive the old Jew-baiting practices of the Middle Ages un- der a new disguise. ‘The rapid progress the Jews, once emancipated, had made in all fields of social and industrial activity had aroused the jealous fear of those sections of Christian so- ciety which still clung to the idea of the social inferiority of the Hebrew people. It was de- clared that the Jew, being a Semite on account of his racial characteristics, was not fitted to tempt universal control, which in the domains live side by side with the Aryan Christian. His superior intellectual endowments led him to at- of industry and finance, of politics and juris- prudence, of journalism and science, he was already in a fair way to achieve, and the Chris- tian was being forced out. The anti-Semites demanded the revocation of civil rights for Jews, and some even advocated such restrictions as would spell total ruin for the undesired peo- OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 317 ple and compel them to emigrate to other coun- tries. Anti-Semitism made its first appearance m “ Germany during the reign of William I when the empire was under the administration of the famous chancellor, Bismarck. One of the found- ers of the anti-Semitic party was a clergyman named Stocker, the royal chaplain in Berlin (1880). From 1880 to 1890 the party’s influ- ence increased greatly; its members sat in the Reichstag, it published its own newspapers and sent its agents far and wide to incite popular uprising against the Jews. After 1890 anti- Semitism went no further in Germany, but in Austria it was gathering momentum, as also in France in spite of the fact that that country had been the original home of Jewish freedom in the West of Europe. In Austria, with the various nationalities composing its population continually at odds, the Jews had enemies in the ranks of Germans, Czechs, Poles and others. The French anti-Semites began operations by attacking Jews in the newspapers (Drumont), and continued their campaign in the Chamber of Deputies and in public affairs where Jews were concerned. In 1894 they brought a false charge against Captain Dreyfus, a wealthy Jew employed in the War Office. He was accused of selling military documents of great import- ance, dealing with certain plans of the French 3818 Events Durinc XI XtH CENTURY government, to the representative of an enemy power. The crime was high treason. Though the charge was obviously without foundation, Dreyfus was nevertheless convicted and exiled to Devil’s Island in South America. It was five years before the political parties who en- tered the struggle for and against the convicted officer, succeeded in making public the fatal error that had sent him into disgrace, and in having the unfortunate man brought home again. The best and most representative Christians of all countries condemn the shameful activities of the anti-Semites and fight as best they can against their influence, but they are not able to exterminate this pernicious movement which has its roots in class antagonism and in the preju- dices of the ignorant masses. Anti-Semitism set the Jews of Western Eu- rope thinking hard. The Hebrew populations at large, which once showed a powerful inclina- tion towards fusion, are beginning to realize the necessity of uniting for the defence of their national integrity against the hostile forces lined up to attack them. § 65. The Jews in Russia During the Second Half of the XIX th Century. With the accession of Alexander II to the throne of Russia (1855), a more hopeful era OUTLINE OF JEWISH HIsToRY 819 dawned for the Jews in his empire. This great ruler, called the ‘Liberator’ on account of his putting an end to serfdom and his efforts to improve the state administration in all its branches, did not neglect the Jews in his re- forms. Without making any radical change in their situation, the government saw the neces- sity of abolishing the most burdensome restric- tions under which they had suffered at the hands of Alexander’s predecessors. X The recruiting of Jewish “cantonists’ was dis- continued in 1856. Jewish merchants of the first guild, university graduates and artisans were allowed to settle in whatever part of the country they pleased (1859-65). Secular edu- cation had been somewhat encouraged, but the elementary schooling still remained in a state of almost complete neglect. In 1873 the two rabbinical schools and all the government schools established by Uvarov, were closed, and in their place, Teachers’ Institutes and elementary schools of a new kind were established. Only a few cities of the Jewish Pale were given ele- mentary schools, however, and the old system of education, the “kheder” and “yeshiba” con- tinued predominant, while in all the other classes of Russian society, the young people flocked to the new institutions of learning. ‘The radical change from “kheder” to “gymnasium” and from rabbinical learning to the secular 820 Events Durinc XI X1tH CENTURY study at the universities, came to be quite a matter of course for the younger generation of Jews. Fathers and sons, as representatives of two conflicting generations, struggled together with bitterness for the upper hand, the elders holding the more fiercely aloof from the native Russians, the more strenuous their children’s ef- forts grew to assimilate with them. As in West- ern Europe there were many cases of educated Russian Jews renouncing their allegiance to their own race and becoming one with their Christian compatriots. The truly enlightened Jews who assumed the duty of working for their people’s social and intellectual uplift, stood btween the orthodox majority at the one extreme and the “progres- sive’ minority at the other. These “maskilim,” or enlightened ones, revived literature in the pure Hebrew tongue, as one of the means of achieving their purposes. Abraham Mapu of Kovno (died 1866) delighted all who read his historical novels of Biblical times, ““Ahavath Zion,’ and “Ashmath Shomron,” and his por- traits of contemporary Russian-Jewish life {“Ayit 'Tzabua,”) written in the stately Hebrew of the ancient prophets. Leib Gordon, a gifted poet (died 1893), exploited every re- source of Hebrew verse in his lyrical, satirical and epic poems. Both in his prose and in his poetry, Gordon exposed the intolerance and . OUTLINE OF JEWISH History 821 conservatism of the rabbis and Tzaddiks with- out mercy. Peretz Smolensky (died 1885), who published in Vienna a Hebrew Magazine called “Ha’Shahar” (The Dawn), which was read chiefly by Russian Jews, was a tireless champion of the cause of liberal education for the Jewish people, and his novels and other works all reflected his views on this subject. The weeklies “Ha’Melitz,” “Ha’Magid” and “Ha Karmel,” (The Interpreter, The Herald and Carmel), laid the foundations of Hebrew periodical literature (1855-1860). Jewish literature in the Russian language first began in the sixties with such periodicals as “Zion,” “The Dawn” and “The Day’ pub- lished in Odessa, and “The Sunrise” and “The New Dawn” in St. Petersburg, all of which espoused the cause of civil liberty for the Jews. Joseph Rabinovitch Levanda and Bogrov, writ- ing in Russian, wrote of the bright and dark sides of Russian Jewish life. This same Rabin- ovitch, together with a noted journalist named Orchansky, who died early in life (1875), ar- dently championed the emancipation ideal and never ceased to demonstrate the falsehood of the traditional anti-Jewish charges. Just when it seemed most likely that the bright hopes of all these writers were at the threshold of ful- fillment, the sad events coincident with the out- 322 Events Durinc XI XtrH Century break of anti-Semitimism in the West occurred to prove how ill-founded and premature was their belief in the better time to come. In 1881 and 1882 many cities of Southern Russia became the scene of anti-Jewish attacks. During these “pogroms,” as they were called, Jewish homes were robbed and destroyed, prop- erty confiscated and now and then some of the Jews were killed. The attacks were particularly fierce in the places where the “Haidamaks”’ had raged in the X VIIth century, in Elizabethgrad, Kieff, Balta and other towns of the former Ukraine. Thanks to government intervention, the pogroms ceased in the second half of 1882, or reculled, if at all, only very casually in the districts of the Jewish Pale. The Jews’ civil condition, however, took a decided turn for the worse. During the reign of Alexander II (1881-94), laws were passed forbidding the Jews to live freely in towns or villages (Temporary Legis- | lation of 1882) limiting the number of Jewish children in high schools and universities to a very small percentage (1887), expelling Jew- ish artisans and small merchants from Moscow (1891) and prohibiting Jews from being elected members of city councils, etc. (1892). Their economic situation being disastrously affected by these laws, the Jews began to leave Russia in great numbers. Most of the emigrants went OUTLINE OF JEWISH Hisrory 323 to America, some smaller groups to Palestine. In the last twenty years of the XIXth century nearly one million Russian Jews emigrated to North America and settled in the United States or in Canada. Agricultural colonies were founded by them in South America (Argen- tine) as well, upon the bounty of the famous millionaire-philanthropist Baron de Hirsch. The generosity of Baron Edmond Rothschild of Paris and of the “Palestine Society” of Odessa made similar colonies possible in the Holy Land. In connection with the events of those last decades, the Russian Jews experienced a re- vival of their national spirit. This chiefly mani- fested itself in the rejection of the assimilation idea by a considerable number of the Jewish intellectuals, and their voluntary rapproche- ment with their own people. Many of them be- lieved in the possibility of founding gradually an independent Jewish state in Palestine, and this idea was strongly upheld by the Palestine Society in the “eighties.” It appeared in a new form under the name of Zionism in the “nine- ties” and spread all over Russia and Western Europe wherever Jews were living. Since 1897 the Zionist party which has acquired a vast number of adherents and whose great leader was Dr. Herzl of Vienna, has held periodical con- ventions in Basle and elsewhere. ‘The party 824 Events Durinc XI XtH CENTURY hopes, with the aid of its “Colonial Bank” and its “National Fund,” to develop agriculture and industry in Palestine, to encourage immigration on a large scale, and as a result, to create a great center of Jewry there, based upon the principles of freedom and self-government. THE END Date Due on vee ine of Jewish history, Princeton Theological Seminary—Speer Library DS117 .D8 v.3 An outl 4 8 pastes aR wistioreoran bans lghee evevevevesy ye weer ee rey mf r