ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THE NOTES
AZJ = Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums, Leipsic, 1837—
FKI = Fünn, Keneset Yisraël, Warsaw, 1860.
FKN = Fünn, Kiryah Ne'emanah, Vilna, 1860.
FSL = Fünn, Safah le-Ne'emanim, Vilna, 1881.
GMC = Ginzberg and Marek, Yevreyskiya Narodniya Pyesni, St. Petersburg, 1901.
HUH = Harkavy, Ha-Yehudim u-Sefat ha-Selavim, Vilna, 1867.
JE = Jewish Encyclopedia, 12 vols., New York, 1901-1906.
LBJ = Levinsohn, Bet Yehudah, Warsaw, 1901.
LTI = Levinsohn, Te'udah be-Yisraël, Warsaw, 1901.
WMG = Wengeroff, Memoiren einer Grossrautter, i., Berlin, 1908.
[CHAPTER I]
THE PRE-HASKALAH PERIOD
?-1648
(pp. 17-52)
Footnote 1:[(return)]
Mention might, indeed, be made of Dr. Zunz's pioneer work in his Aelteste Nachrichten über Juden und jüdische Gelehrte in Polen, Slavonien, Russland (Gesammelte Schriften, Berlin, 1875, iii. 82-87), and Firkovich, who, in his Abne Zikkaron (Vilna, 1872), threw much light on the history of the Crimean Jews. The best contributions to the subject, however, are those of Harkavy, Russ i Russkiye v Sred. Yevr. Lit. (Voskhod, 1881), and Malishevsky, Yevreyi v Yuzhnoy Rossii i Kieve, v. x-xii. Vyekakh, St. Petersburg, 1878.
Footnote 2:[(return)]
LTI, p. 33, n. 2; LBJ, ii. 94, n. 2.
Footnote 3:[(return)]
See JE, s.v. Azov, and Kertch. See also Fishberg, The Jews: A Study of Race and Environment, New York, 1911, pp. 150, 192-194.
Footnote 4:[(return)]
See Judah Halevi's Kuzari, Introduction.
Footnote 5:[(return)]
Minor, Rukovodstvo, Moscow, 1881, iv; Ha-Pardes, St. Petersburg, 1902, p. 155.
Footnote 6:[(return)]
HUH, pp. 31-32, 69-76.
Footnote 7:[(return)]
Yevrey Minister, Voskhod, 1885, v. 105 f.
Footnote 8:[(return)]
JE, i. 112, 119, 223; viii. 652.
Footnote 9:[(return)]
The synagogue in Brest-Litovsk, which Saul Wahl built in memory of his wife Deborah, was demolished in 1836. WMG, p. 84.
Footnote 10:[(return)]
HUH, pp. 77-134.
Footnote 11:[(return)]
JE, x. 569.
Footnote 12:[(return)]
The story of Zacharias de Guizolfi deserves to be given at greater length. He was a prince and ruler of the Taman peninsula near the Black Sea (1419). After he had been unsuccessful in a war against the Turks, Czar Ivan III sent him a message sealed with the gold seal (March 14, 1484) as follows:
"By the grace of God, the great ruler of the Russian land, the Grand Duke Ivan Vassilyevich, czar of all the Russias, to Skariya the Hebrew.
"You have written to us through Gabriel Patrov, our guest, that you desire to come to us. It is our wish that you do so. When you are with us, we shall give you evidence of our favorable disposition toward you. Should you wish to serve us, we will confer honors upon you. But should you not wish to remain with us, and prefer to return to your country, you shall be free to go."
For some reason or other, Zacharias never accomplished his contemplated trip, notwithstanding the many inducements repeatedly offered by the czar during a period of eighteen years. Perhaps it was because of the disturbances which rendered transportation dangerous; possibly because he preferred to serve the khan rather than the czar, for we find him, in 1500, a resident of Circassia. See JE, vi. 107-108; vi. 12.
Footnote 13:[(return)]
E.g. Barakha, the hero (1601), Ilyash Karaimovich, the starosta (1637), and Motve Borokhovich, the colonel (1647). See JE, ii. 128; iv. 283; ix. 40.
Footnote 14:[(return)]
See Czacki, Rosprava o Zhydakh, Vilna, 1807, p. 93; Buchholtz, Geschichte der Juden in Riga, Riga, 1899, p. 3; Mann, Sheerit Yisraël, Vilna, 1818, ch. 30; Virga, Shebet Yehudah, Hanover, 1856, pp. 147 f., and Graetz, Geschichte der Juden, ix. 480.
Footnote 15:[(return)]
The Subbotniki, Dukhobortzi, and the other dissenting, but non-Jewish, sects are not referred to here, though they may have received their inspiration from Jews or through Judaism.
Footnote 16:[(return)]
Voskhod, 1881, i. 73-75; JE, vii. 487-488; ix. 570; Bramson, K Istorii Pervonachalnaho Obrazovaniya Russkikh Yevreyev, St. Petersburg, 1896, pp. 4-6.
Footnote 17:[(return)]
Sternberg, Die Proselyten im xvi. und xvii. Jahrhundert, AZJ, 1863, pp. 67-68 (ibid, in L'univers Israelite, 1863, pp. 272 f.); Mandelkern, Dibre Yeme Russyah, Warsaw, 1875, pp. 231 f.; Yevreyskaya Enziklopedya, s.v. Zhidostvuyushchikh; Bedrzhidsky in Zhurnal Ministerstva Narodnaho Prosvyeshchanya, St. Petersburg, 1912, pp. 106-122; Jewish Ledger, Jan., 1902, p. 3; Emden, Megillat Sefer, ed. Cohan, p. 207, Warsaw, 1896. On Count Pototzki, see Ger Zedek, in Yevreyskaya Biblyotyeka, St. Petersburg, 1892; Gershuni, Sketches of Jewish Life and History, New York, 1873, pp. 158-224 (also Introduction), and S.L. Gordon's ballad in Ha-Shiloah (Ger Zedek), i. 431. On Pototzki and Zaremba, see Gere Zedek (Anon.), Johannisberg, 1862. On modern Russian Gerim, see Die Welt, July 5, 1907, pp. 16-17 (Palestine), B'nai B'rith News, May 13, 1913 (United States), and Leroy-Beaulieu, Israel among the Nations, Engl. transl., New York, 1900, p. 110, n. 1; Yiddishes Tageblatt, July 16 and 23, 1913, Gerim in Russland, and Vieder vegen Gerim; JE, i. 336; vii. 369-370, 489.
Footnote 18:[(return)]
HUH, pp. 3, 21 f.; Minor, op. cit., p. 4; Yevreyskiya Nadpisi, St. Petersburg, 1884, p. 217; Sefer ha-Yashar, no. 522; Eben ha-'Ezer, no. 118. On [Hebrew: Bn'n Hrogi] see Monatsschrift, xxii. 514.
Footnote 19:[(return)]
Catalogue de Rossi, in. 200; Ha-Maggid, 1860, pp. 299-302; HUH, pp. 33, 40.
Footnote 20:[(return)]
Autobiography, p. 39.
Footnote 21:[(return)]
LBJ, ii. 95, n.; Ha-'Ibri, New York, viii., no. 33; Lehem ha-Panim, Hil. Nedarim, no. 228.
Footnote 22:[(return)]
Nishmat Hayyim, Lemberg, 1858, p. 83a; Azulaï, Shem ha-Gedolim, s.v. Horowitz; FKN, p. 74, and Ha-Maggid, in. 159. Cf. Sheerit Yisraël, ch. 32, and Edelman, Gedulat Shaül, London, 1854. Reifman, in Ha-Maggid, claims that to Luria belongs the honor of being the first-known Jewish author.
Footnote 23:[(return)]
See Zikronot, ed. Cohan, pp. 62-66, 90, 313, 336, 380, passim; Schechter, Studies in Judaism, Philadelphia, 1908, ii. 132.
Footnote 24:[(return)]
Margoliuth, Hibbure Likkutim, Venice, 1715, Introduction.
Footnote 25:[(return)]
Horowitz, Frankfurter Rabbinen, Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1883, pp. 30-35; FKN, pp. 73-91; Emden, op. cit, p. 125; and biographies.
Footnote 26:[(return)]
LTI, ii. 81, n.; Hannover, Yeven Mezulah, Warsaw, 1872, p. 7b.
Footnote 27:[(return)]
Zunz, Literaturgeschichte, pp. 433-435, 442; Buber, Anshe Shem, Cracow, 1895, pp. 307-309; Benjacob, Ozar ha-Sefarim, p. 396; JE, xi. 217; Bikkure ha-'Ittim, 1830, p. 43. Jacob of Gnesen, I suspect, must have lived in Russia.
Footnote 28:[(return)]
Steinschneider, Jewish Literature, pp. 235, 240; Benjacob, op. cit, p. 396.
Footnote 29:[(return)]
JE, xii. 265-266: "Enfin les incrédules les plus déterminés n'out presque rien allégué qui ne soit dans le Rampart de la Foi du Rabbin Isaac."
Footnote 30:[(return)]
Nusbaum, Historya Zhidóv, i. p. 180; Edelman, op. cit, attributes the coming of Saul Wahl to this cause.
Footnote 31:[(return)]
The Elim (Amsterdam, 1629), if not, as the Karaites maintain, actually the work of Zerah Troki, was surely the result of the problems submitted by him to Delmedigo.
Footnote 32:[(return)]
JE, iv. 504; vii. 264; xii. 266; Ha-Eshkol, iii. and iv. (R.M. Jarre); LTI, ii. 80; Benjacob, op. cit, no. 1428.
Footnote 33:[(return)]
Zunz, Ritus, Berlin, 1859, p. 73, and Gottesdienstliche Vorträge, Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1892, p. 452, n.a.; Wessely, Dibre Shalom we-Emet, ii. 7; Benjacob, op. cit., no. 1187.
Footnote 34:[(return)]
Voskhod, 1893, i. 79; New Era Illustrated Magazine, v.; FNI, p. 28 f.; JE, i. 113; ii. 22, 622; xii. 265.
Footnote 35:[(return)]
JE, vii. 454.
Footnote 36:[(return)]
JE, i. 372; iv. 140; Ha-Yekeb, 1894, p. 68.
Footnote 37:[(return)]
Bersohn, Tobiasz Cohn, Warsaw, 1872.
Footnote 38:[(return)]
Cf. FKN, pp. 38-42 (Vilna constitution); Hannover, op. cit., p. 23a; Ha-Modia' la-Hadashim, II. i. II, and JE, s.v. Council, Kahal, Lithuania, etc.
Footnote 39:[(return)]
See GMC, pp. 59 f., and compare with this Lermontoff's Cossack Cradle-Song, which may be taken as a type:
Sleep, my child, my little darling, sleep, I sing to thee;
Silently the soft white moonbeams fall on thee and me.
I will tell thee fairy stories in my lullaby;
Sleep, my child, my pretty darling, sleep, I sing to thee.
Lo, I see the day approaching when the warriors meet;
Then wilt thou grasp thy rifle and mount thy charger fleet.
I will broider in thy saddle colors fair to see,
Sleep, my child, my little darling, sleep, I sing to thee.
Then my Cossack boy, my hero brave and proud and gay,
Waves one farewell to his mother and rides far away.
Oh, what sorrow, pain and anguish then my soul shall fill,
As I pray by day and night that God will keep thee still!
Thou shalt take a saint's pure image to the battlefield,
Look upon it when thou prayest, may it be thy shield.
And when battles fierce are raging, give one thought to me;
Sleep, my darling, calmly, sweetly, sleep, I sing to thee.
—Westminster Gazette.
See Güdemann, Quellen zur Geschichte des Unterrichts, Berlin, 1891, pp. 285-286; Ha-Boker Or, i. 315 (on Dubno); Ha-Meliz, 1894, no. 254 (on Mohilev); Zunz, Gottesdienstliche Vorträge, pp. 122g and 470a; cf. Weiss, Zikronotaï, Warsaw, 1895, pp. 53-83.
Footnote 40:[(return)]
Cf. Güdemann, Geschichte des Erziehungswesens, iii. 94, n., and see Dembitzer, Kelilat Yofi, Introduction, and Meassef, St. Petersburg, 1902, p. 205, n.
[CHAPTER II]
DAYS OF TRANSITION
1648-1794
(pp. 53-109)
Footnote 1:[(return)]
JE, s.v. Bratzlav.
Footnote 2:[(return)]
In the diary of a Polish squire we find the following item: "Jan. 5. As the lessee Herszka had not yet paid me the rental of 91 gulden, I went to his house to get my debt. According to the contract, I can arrest him and his wife for as long as I wish, until he settles the bill, and so I ordered him locked up in the pig-sty and left his wife and his sons in the inn. The youngest son, however, I took with me to the palace to be instructed in the rudiments of our religion. The boy is unusually bright and shall be baptized. I already wrote to our priest concerning it, and he promised to come to prepare him. Leisza at first stubbornly refused to make the sign of the cross and repeat our prayers, but Strelicki administered a sound whipping, and to-day he even ate ham. Our venerable priest Bonapari ... is inventing all manner of means to break his stiff-neckedness." Meassef, St. Petersburg, 1902, pp. 192-193.
Footnote 3:[(return)]
See Wolkonsky, Pictures of Russian History and Literature, Boston, 1897, p. 136.
Footnote 4:[(return)]
Orshansky, in Yevreyskaya Biblyotyeka, ii. 207.
Footnote 5:[(return)]
Meassef, St. Petersburg, 1902, p. 195; Beck and Brann, Yevreyskaya Istoriya, p. 326; JE, iv. 155; xi. 113.
Footnote 6:[(return)]
Meassef, p. 200. On Russia at the time of Peter the Great, see Macaulay, History of England, ch. xxiii., where he describes the "savage ignorance and the squalid poverty of the barbarous country." In that country "there was neither literature nor science, neither school nor college. It was not till more than a hundred years after the invention of printing that a single printing-press had been introduced into the Russian empire, and that printing-press speedily perished in a fire, which was supposed to have been kindled by priests." When Pyoter Vyeliki (Peter the Great), while in London, saw the archiepiscopal library, he declared that "he had never imagined that there were so many printed volumes in the world." See also Carlyle, History of Frederick the Great, iv. 7.
Footnote 7:[(return)]
FKN, pp. 126-132; Voskhod, 1893; on the Hasidim and Mitnaggedim see below.
Footnote 8:[(return)]
Ma'aseh Tobiah, p. 18; Meassef, pp. 206-209; Geiger (Melo Hofnayim, Berlin, 1840, pp. 1-29) published Delmedigo's corroboration of this statement.
Footnote 9:[(return)]
Rapoport, Etan ha-'Ezrahi, Ostrog, 1776, Introduction.
Footnote 10:[(return)]
Cf. Zederbaum, Keter Kehunnah, pp. 72-74, 84, 121, etc., and Ha-Shiloah, xxi. 165; Schechter, Studies in Judaism, i., Philadelphia, 1896, i. 17 f., and Greenstone, The Messiah Idea in Jewish History, pp. 237 f. According to some, Judah he-Hasid and his followers went to Palestine in the expectation, not of the Messiah, but of Shabbataï Zebi, who was believed to have been in hiding for forty years, in imitation of the retirement of Moses in Midian for a similar period of years. "The ruins of Rabbi Judah he-Hasid's synagogue" and Yeshibah in Jerusalem still keep the memory of the event fresh in the minds of Palestinian Jews.
Footnote 11:[(return)]
Among the many wonderful episodes in the life of the master, his biographer mentions also that he could swallow down the largest gobletful in a single gulp (Shibhe ha-Besht, Berdichev, 1815, pp. 7-8). The best, though not an impartial work on Hasidism is Zweifel's Shalom 'al Yisraël, 4 vols., Zhitomir, 1868-1872.
Footnote 12:[(return)]
Ha-Boker Or, iv. 103-105: [Hebrew: H'fkormot Mn Nshmot M'lh Hngon.]
Footnote 13:[(return)]
Cf. Emden, op. cit., p. 185, and Shimush, Amsterdam, 1785, pp. 78-80, with Pardes, ii. 204-214.
Footnote 14:[(return)]
See Schechter, op. cit., pp. 73-93; Silber, Elijah Gaon, 1906; Levin, 'Aliyat Eliyahu, Vilna, 1856, and FKN, pp. 133-155.
Footnote 15:[(return)]
Levin, op. cit., pp. 28-30.
Footnote 16:[(return)]
See Ha-Bikkurim, i. 1-26; ii. 1-20; Ha-Zeman (monthly), 1903, ii. 6; Plungian, Ben Porat, Vilna, 1858, p. 33; Keneset Yisraël, iii. 152 seq.
Footnote 17:[(return)]
Sirkes (Bayit Hadash, Cracow, 1631, p. 40) decides that Jews may employ in their synagogue melodies used in the church, since "music is neither Jewish nor Christian, but is governed by universal laws." See also Hayyim ben Bezalel's Wikkuah Mayim Hayyim, Introduction, and passim.
Footnote 18:[(return)]
See J.S. Raisin, Sect, Creed and Custom in Judaism, Philadelphia, 1907, p. 9, and ch. viii.; Ha-Meliz, x. 186, 192-194.
Footnote 19:[(return)]
See Ha-Zeman (monthly), 1903, ii. 7.; Shklov, Euclidus, Introduction; Keneset Yisraël, 1887, and Hagra on Orah Hayyim, Shklov, 1803, Introduction.
Footnote 20:[(return)]
See Graetz, op. cit, xi. 590, 604, 606. The Gaon, who as a rule was very mild, lost patience with the Hasidim and wielded the weapons of the kuni (or stocks and exposures) and excommunication without mercy. The Hasidim were also accused of being not only religious dissenters but revolutionaries. Zeitlin, quoted in Yiddishes Tageblatt, from the Moment, March, 1913.
Footnote 21:[(return)]
See Karpeles, Time of Mendelssohn, p. 297; Kayserling, Mendelssohn, p. 12; Ha-Meliz, 1900, nos. 194-196.
Footnote 22:[(return)]
Epstein, Geburat ha-Ari, Vilna, 1870, p. 29; Rabinovich, Zunz, Warsaw, 1896; Wessely, op. cit., ii.; Linda, Reshit Limmudim, Berlin, 1789, and Ha-Zeman (monthly), ii. 28.
Footnote 23:[(return)]
Delitzsch, Zur Geschichte der jüdischen Poesie, Leipsic, 1836, p. 118; Bernfeld, Dor Tahapukot, Warsaw, 1897, pp. 88 f. Dubno also edited Luzzatto's La-Yesharim Tehillah, which, according to Slouschz, marks the beginning of the renaissance in Hebrew belles-lettres.
Footnote 24:[(return)]
Published in Berlin in 1793. It was translated into English by Murray (Solomon Maimon, Boston, 1888) and into Hebrew by Taviov (Warsaw, 1899).
Footnote 25:[(return)]
Bernfeld, op. cit., ii. 66 f. JE, s.v. Maimon; and Autobiography (Engl. transl.), p. 217. For Maimon's system of philosophy and also for a complete bibliography of his writings, see Kunz, Die Philosophic Salomon Maimons, Heidelberg, 1912, pp. xxv, 531.
Footnote 26:[(return)]
Wolff, Maimoniana, Berlin, 1813, p. 177.
Footnote 27:[(return)]
How touching and suggestive is the word [Hebrew: Shbi] in an acrostic at the end of his Introduction to his Gibe'at ha-Moreh, a commentary on the Moreh Nebukim:
'hobi ykr kor'
'bi vshm shmi hd'
Shbi bmlt bhtboknn
Footnote 28:[(return)]
See Murray's Introduction to the Autobiography; Auerbach, Dichter und Kaufmann; Zangwill, Nathan the Wise and Solomon the Fool.
Footnote 29:[(return)]
FKI, p. 196.
Footnote 30:[(return)]
Maggid, Toledot Mishpehot Ginzberg, pp. 52-53; Emden, Sheëlat Ya'abez, Altona, 1739, p. 65 a.
Footnote 31:[(return)]
FKN, pp. 109-114, 269; FKI, p. 300.
Footnote 32:[(return)]
FKI, p. 394; Delitzsch, op. cit, p. 84.
Footnote 33:[(return)]
L'univers Israélite, liii. 831-841: "C'est, vous le voyez, un juif polonais qui contribua puissamment à l'émancipation des juifs de France. Et je me demande si le Judaisme du monde entier ne doit pas rendre hommage à notre coreligionnaire polonais autant peut-être qu' à Menasse ben Israël." FKI, p. 333; Ha-Meliz, ii. no. 50; Shulammit, iii. 425; Graetz, op. cit. (Engl. transl.), v. 443.
Footnote 34:[(return)]
See Berliner, Festschrift, 1903, pp. 1-4.
Footnote 35:[(return)]
See Ha-Meliz, viii. nos. 11, 22, 23; FSL, p. 139; Monatsschrift, xxiv, 348-357.
Footnote 36:[(return)]
Delitzsch, op. cit., pp. 115-118; Ha-Zeman (monthly), ii. 23 f.
Footnote 37:[(return)]
See Meassef, 1788, p. 32, and Levin's ed. of Moreh Nebukim, Zolkiev, 1829, Introduction.
Footnote 38:[(return)]
Ha-Meassef, 1809, pp. 68-75, 136-171.
Footnote 39:[(return)]
See Sefer ha-Berit, Introduction, and Weissberg, Aufklärungsliteratur, Vienna, 1898, p. 83.
Footnote 40:[(return)]
FKI, p. 428.
Footnote 41:[(return)]
See Emden, Torat ha-Kenaot, pp. 123-127, and Hitabkut (Pinczov's letters); Voskhod, 1882, nos. viii-ix; FSL, pp. 136-137; Friedrichsfeld, Zeker Zaddik, p. 12.
Footnote 42:[(return)]
Maimon, Autobiography, pp. 106-107; FSL, p. 135.
Footnote 43:[(return)]
See LTI, ii. 96, n. 1, and Yellin and Abrahams, Maimonides, p. 160, and reference on p. 330, n. 72; Ha-Zeman (monthly), i. 102-103; Margolioth, Bet Middot, p. 20. Heine's admiration for these idealists or those who succeeded them is well worth quoting. In his essay on Poland, he says: "In spite of the barbaric fur cap which covers his head and the even more barbaric ideas which fill it, I value the Polish Jew much more than many a German Jew with his Bolivar on his head and his Jean Paul inside of it.... The Polish Jew in his unclean furred coat, with his populous beard and his smell of garlic and his Jewish jargon, is nevertheless dearer to me than many a Westerner in all the glory of his stocks and bonds."
Footnote 44:[(return)]
Op. cit. Letter ii.
Footnote 45:[(return)]
Likkute Kadmoniot, Vilna, 1860, Introduction.