scholarly journals Central European Jewish Émigrés and the Shaping of Postwar Culture: Studies in Memory of Lilian Furst (1931–2009)

Religions ◽  
2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (8) ◽  
pp. 139
Author(s):  
Malachi Hacohen
Keyword(s):  
Culture Studies ◽  
Central European ◽  
European Jewish ◽  
Postwar Culture

German Jews in Paris: Traversing Modernity

2015 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 79-95
Author(s):  
Nils Roemer
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Weimar Republic ◽  
World War ◽  
German Jews ◽  
Central European ◽  
Treaty Of Versailles ◽  
Border Crossers ◽  
European Jewish

The article traces Central European Jewish visitors of Paris during the Weimar Republic and the 1930s and analyzes the shifting meaning of travel, exile, and the figure of the flaneur. Their travelogues articulated their affection for Paris in the aftermath of World War I and the Treaty of Versailles, marking them as border crossers in multiple ways. Writing about modern capitals such as Paris became a way to temporarily belong to them, to reimagine modernity.

Central European Jewry during the Thirty Years' War

1983 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-30 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan I. Israel
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
German Society ◽  
Holy Roman Empire ◽  
Central European ◽  
European Jewish ◽  
Early Modern Era ◽  
German Jewry ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Modern Era ◽  
Systematic Explanation

Despite the wealth of published studies on individual German, Austrian, and Czech Jewish communities of the early modern era, it is remarkable how rare have been the attempts to synthesize the material and reach an overall assessment of the impact of the Thirty Years' War on Central European Jewish life. This gaping lacuna was noted some years ago by S. W. Baron, whose own general discussion of this subject is virtually unique. Immensely erudite, Baron's piece not only reveals the vast scope of the relevant material but tentatively suggests that the great European conflict was a key formative episode in the development of German Jewry, reversing earlier trends and preparing the way for the “Court Jews” of the later seventeenth century. This it undoubtedly was. Even so, Baron's evaluation is open to criticism on several counts. In particular, he fails to bring out, or make clear, just how crucial and how favorable a phase the Thirty Years' War was for the Jews of the Holy Roman Empire. Furthermore, while some effort is made in his essay to identify the key shifts of the period, such as an alleged drift of Jews from the countryside to the towns, it is arguable that this is not handled very convincingly or with sufficient precision. In any case, it is evident that a fuller, more systematic explanation is needed if we are to account for the singular fact that during this period of almost unparalleled disruption, turmoil, and suffering Christendom's perennial scapegoat fared considerably better than most of the rest of German society.

Nathan Birnbaum

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jess J. Olson
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Identity ◽  
Religious Identity ◽  
Political Organization ◽  
Young Generation ◽  
Eastern European ◽  
Central European ◽  
Anti Semitism ◽  
Theodor Herzl ◽  
European Jewish ◽  
Anti Jewish

Nathan Birnbaum (b. 1864–d. 1937), also known by the pseudonym Mathias Acher (“another Mathias”), was a journalist, theorist of Jewish nationalism, and political activist. Birnbaum was a pioneer in the emergence of both secular Jewish nationalism and Orthodox political organization. Deeply affected by his exposure to rising anti-Semitism in fin-de-siècle Vienna and alienated by what he would term “assimilation mania” (Assimilationssucht), Birnbaum’s ideology was shaped early by two themes that developed throughout his career: belief that there was an intrinsic, unique Jewish identity, and that this identity could be activated as a solution to the oppression afflicting European Jews. Birnbaum’s early work integrated models of central European nationalism filtered through the writings of Moses Hess, Peretz Smolenskin, and Leon Pinsker. In the wake of anti-Jewish violence in Russia in 1882, Birnbaum and other Jewish students at Vienna University founded Kadimah, the earliest Jewish nationalist organization in central Europe. He cultivated an important presence among central European Jewish nationalists, and he was a significant influence on a young generation of “cultural” Zionists. In the early 1890s, he coined the term “Zionism” (Zionismus) to describe Palestine-oriented Jewish nationalism. When Theodor Herzl arrived in Zionist circles in 1896, he sidelined Birnbaum along with nearly everyone else who had preceded him in the movement, but Birnbaum’s opinion on the nature of authentic Jewish identity was already evolving. He eventually became an internal, and ultimately outside, critic of Zionism, concluding that an organic Jewish identity already existed in the folkways, Yiddish language, and communities of eastern European Jews. As an extension of this, he led in organizing the first conference of the Yiddish language in 1908. In the aftermath of the conference, Birnbaum deepened his engagement with the Yiddish language and eastern European Jewish culture and increasingly turned his thoughts to issues of spirituality and religion. After the outbreak of the First World War, Birnbaum announced himself a “ba’al teshuva,” a penitent returnee to Torah-observant Judaism. He was embraced by the Agudah, and his skills as a journalist and activist were put to use in Agudah organizing. Now Birnbaum revolutionized his understanding of the foundation of Jewish identity. Maintaining the ideal of Jewish authenticity as the only route to Jewish cohesion, Birnbaum rejected his earlier ethno-nationalist understanding of Jewish identity, replacing it with Orthodox religious observance and belief in the Torah. He aligned himself with a Hasidic religiosity that was an organic extension of his admiration for eastern European Jewry. A transformation that earned him respect in the Orthodox world and derision among the secular nationalists he had left behind, Birnbaum considered his change consistent with his views on Jewish authenticity. As the situation of European Jewry declined in the late 1920s and 1930s, Birnbaum felt vindicated in his dim view of the possibility of Jewish life outside of a religious identity, and wrote in this vein for the rest of his life. He died in Scheveningen, The Netherlands, in 1937.

Medicine and Illness

2020 ◽  
pp. 132-167
Author(s):  
Anna Hájková
Keyword(s):  
Elderly Patients ◽  
Medical Care ◽  
Medical History ◽  
Medical Staff ◽  
Central European ◽  
Medical Careers ◽  
Gendered Power ◽  
European Jewish

Illness was a defining experience for Holocaust victims, yet their medical history is missing. This chapter studies the medical staff, patients, and diseases in the Theresienstadt ghetto. In examining medical care in extremis, it studies how the Central European Jewish doctors succeeded in providing comparably excellent healthcare and good medications for the inmates. However, the medical staff applied triage, separating “important” from “irrelevant,” that is elderly, patients. The chapter examines the mentality, experience, and gendered power mechanisms that characterized the medical staff; the agency of the doctors; and the hierarchies they assigned to patients. Finally, in exploring how the prisoner physicians made sense of Theresienstadt as a part of their medical careers, the chapter shows what kind of historical protagonists doctors are.

Rethinking Jewishness in Networked Publics: The Case of Post-Communist Hungary

2019 ◽  
pp. 261-278
Author(s):  
Anna Manchin
Keyword(s):  
Jewish Population ◽  
Political Change ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Political Freedom ◽  
European City ◽  
Jewish Communities ◽  
Central European ◽  
East European ◽  
European Jewish ◽  
Networked Publics

This chapter cites scholars that viewed the fall of communism in 1989 as a potential turning point for east European Jewish communities. It explains how political freedom promised new possibilities for organizing religious and secular Jewish life and for representing individual Jewish identities and communities. It also describes what form political change could take that will lead to a new flourishing of Jewish religion and culture. The chapter talks about Hungary's Hungarian-born Jewish population in Budapest that represents the largest community in any central European city and was thought to hold great potential for community building. It discusses how Jews were partaking in new manifestations of cultural ethnicity, such as an interest in Jewish history.

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