In the last two decades of the eighteenth century, when the banner of militant enlightenment was floating over German Jewry, a bitter warfare between the Hasidim and Mithnagdim was raging all along the line in Poland and Lithuania, with the result that the consciousness of the political crisis through which Polish Jewry was then passing was dimmed, and the appeal from the West calling to enlightenment and progress was silenced. The specter of German rationalism, which flitted across the horizon of Polish Jewry, produced horror and consternation in both camps. To be a "Berliner" was synonymous with being an apostate. A Solomon Maimon was forced to flee to Germany in order to gain access to the world of new ideas, which were taboo in Poland.
2. The Period of the Quadrennial Diet (1788-1791)
The first year of the French Revolution coincided with the first year of Polish reform. In Paris the états généraux were transformed, under the pressure of the revolutionary movement, from a parliament of classes into a national assembly representing the nation as a whole. In Warsaw the new reform Diet, styled the Quadrennial, or the Great, though essentially a parliament of the Shlakhta, and remaining strictly within the old frame of class organization, reflected nevertheless the influence of French ideas in their pre-revolutionary aspect. The third estate, that of the burghers, was knocking at the doors of the Polish Chamber, demanding equal rights, and one of the principal parliamentary reforms consisted in equalizing the burghers with the Shlakhta in their civil, though not in their political, prerogatives.
Two other questions affecting the inner life of Poland claimed the attention of the legislators touched by the spirit of reform: the agrarian and the Jewish question. The former was discussed and brought to a solution, which could not be other than favorable to the interests of the slaveholding landowners. As for the Jewish question, it cropped up for a moment at the tumultuous sessions of the Quadrennial Diet, and like an evil spirit was banished into the farthest corner of the Polish Chamber, into a special "deputation," or commission, where it stuck forever, without finding a solution.
It would not be fair to ascribe this failure altogether to the conservative trend of mind of the rejuvenators of Poland. There was an additional factor that stood in the way of radical reforms. Over the head of Poland hung the unsheathed sword of Russia, and Russia was averse to the inner regeneration of the country, which, having undergone one partition, was expected to furnish a second and a third dish for the table of the Great Powers. The Quadrennial Diet was a protest against the oppressive patronage of Russia, which was personified by her Resident in Warsaw, and had for its main purpose the preparation of the country for the inevitable struggle with her powerful neighbor. The "estates in Parliament assembled" had to think of reorganizing the army and filling the war chest rather than of carrying out internal reforms.
But outside the walls of the Chamber the current of public opinion was whirling and foaming. Side by side with the legislative assembly, a literary parliament was holding its deliberations, the famous pamphlet "literature of the Quadrennial Diet," reflecting the liberal currents of the eighteenth century. The "Kollontay smithy"[221] alone, which was, so to speak, the publishing house of the reformers, flooded the country with pamphlets and leaflets touching upon all the questions connected with the social reorganization of the Polish body politic. Scores of pamphlets dealt partly or wholly with the Jewish question. The discussions on the projects of "Jewish reform" were conducted with intense passion, taking the place of parliamentary debates.
The impulse to the literary discussion of the Jewish question came from a pamphlet previously referred to, which had been published by Butrymovich, a representative of the city of Pinsk in the Diet, who stood out as the principal champion of the renaissance of Polish Jewry. The publication consisted of a reprint of the well-known pamphlet of "A Nameless Citizen," which had been circulated in two editions.[222] Butrymovich supplied the pamphlet with a new title ("A Means whereby to Transform the Polish Jews into Useful Citizens of the Country"), and garnished it with comments of his own. In this way the popular member of the Diet put the seal of his approval upon the reform project, which was based on the assumption that the Jews in their present state were detrimental to the country, not because of their intrinsic make-up, but on account of their training and mode of life, and that their political and spiritual regeneration had to precede their association with civil life. The proposed reforms reduced themselves to the following measures: to promote useful pursuits among the Jews, such as agriculture and handicrafts, and to remove them from the obnoxious liquor traffic; to combat their separateness by curtailing their Kahal autonomy; to supersede the Yiddish dialect by the Polish language in school and in business; to prohibit the wearing of a distinctive costume and the importation of Hebrew books from abroad. This reform project was supplemented by Butrymovich in one particular: the Jews were not to be admitted to military service in person, until enlightenment had transformed them into patriots ready to serve their fatherland.
Yet even this project, imbued though it was with the spirit of patronage and compulsory assimilation, was deemed far too liberal by many representatives of advanced Polish society. One of the progressive Polish journals published "Reflections Concerning the Jewish Reform Proposed by Butrymovich" (December, 1798). The writer of the "Reflections" concedes a certain amount of "political common sense" in the project, but criticizes its author, because, "in his great zeal to preserve the rights of man, he shows too much indulgence towards the defects of the Jews." The anonymous journalist in turn demands the complete annihilation of the Kahal and limits the action of the Jewish communities to the exercise of a purely congregational autonomy. He also considers it necessary to restrict retail trade among the Jews in the cities, so that, having been dislodged from commerce, they might be induced to engage in handicrafts and agriculture.
Several magazine writers spoke far more harshly of the Jews, and adopted a tone bordering on anti-Semitism. The famous prelate Stashitz, the author of "A Warning to Poland" (Warsaw, 1790), who enjoyed the reputation of being a democrat, styles the Jews "a summer and winter locust for the country," and voices the conviction that only in an environment in which idleness is fostered could this "host of parasites" find shelter, entirely forgetting that these "parasites" had created the commerce of the country riven between nobles and serfs.