Jewish Histories in Europe

Term ASHKENAZ:

Germany: name applied generally in medieval rabbinical literature to that country.

The term Ashkenaz is mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in Genesis 10:3 and 1 Chronicles 1:6 as the dwelling place of a descendant of Noah’s son Japhet, ancestor of later Europeans. In Jeremiah 51:27 it seems to be part of Asia, perhaps Asia Minor, and is located northwest of Palestine. How the place name eventually supplanted earlier descriptive names for German-Jewish lands, such as the Rhineland (Rinus) or the lands of King Lothar (Lotir) is not clear.

Localism was close to the heart of northern European Jews who thought of themselves as belonging to a town more than to a region. Among the earliest Jewish residents along the Rhine River were the Jews of Mainz, Worms, and Speyer. They migrated there from northern France or from Italy, where they had lived for centuries, in some cases as the descendants of slaves the Roman conquerors of Jerusalem brought to Italy in 70 CE.

Although Ashkenaz referred in the Middle Ages only to German lands, the term eventually included northern France and England as well as northern Italy and parts of Central Europe like Bohemia. As Jews migrated into the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, the term broadened to include East European Jews as well. Jews of early Ashkenaz brought their spoken German dialect of Yiddish as well as local customs and practices of Jewish living into Slavic territories.

Term SEPHARDIM (called also Spagnioli, Spaniols, or, more rarely, Franconians):

Descendants of the Jews who were expelled from Spain and Portugal and who settled in southern France, Italy, North Africa, Turkey, Asia Minor, Holland, England, North and South America, Germany, Denmark, Austria, and Hungary. Among these settlers were many who were the descendants, or heads, of wealthy families and who, as Maranos, had occupied prominent positions in the countries they had left. Some had been state officials, others had held positions of dignity within the Church; many had been the heads of large banking-houses and mercantile establishments, and some were physicians or scholars who had officiated as teachers in high schools. The many sufferings which they had endured for the sake of their faith had made them more than usually self-conscious; they considered themselves a superior class, the nobility of Jewry, and for a long time their coreligionists, on whom they looked down, regarded them as such.

Sephardic Jews were a marginal element in Eastern Europe with the exception of Romanian lands, where because of their relatively larger numbers, they played a somewhat more significant role. Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula at the end of the fifteenth century, and conversos leaving those lands in later periods, did not settle in Eastern Europe. Those who did move to the region did so after settling first in Ottoman or, much less often, Italian territories. Nevertheless, some Sephardim are established as having resided in various areas of Eastern Europe, arriving from the Balkans and other regions of the Ottoman Empire in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Along with Iberian Jews, there were Italian, Greek or Romaniot, and Arabic- and Persian-speaking Jews who were often identified as Sephardim in Eastern Europe. In addition, Ashkenazic Jews sometimes married and assimilated into the group. (“Ashkenazi” became a common Sephardic surname.)

Term MARANO (plural, Maranos, generally written Marranos):

Crypto-Jews of the Iberian Peninsula. The term, which is frequently derived from the New Testament phrase "maran atha" ("our Lord hath come"), denotes in Spanish "damned," "accursed," "banned"; also "hog," and in Portuguese it is used as an opprobrious epithet of the Jews because they do not eat pork. The name was applied to the Spanish Jews who, through compulsion or for form's sake, became converted to Christianity in consequence of the cruel persecutions of 1391 and of Vicente Ferrer's missionary sermons. These "conversos" (converts), as they were called in Spain, or "Christãos Novos" (Neo-Christians) in Portugal, or "Chuetas" in the Balearic Isles, or "Anusim" (constrained) in Hebrew, numbered more than 100,000.

With them the history of the Pyrenean Peninsula, and indirectly that of the Jews also, enters upon a new phase; for they were the immediate cause both of the introduction of the Inquisition into Spain and of the expulsion of the Jews from that country. The wealthy Maranos, who engaged extensively in commerce, industries, and agriculture, intermarried with families of the old nobility; impoverished counts and marquises unhesitatingly wedded wealthy Jewesses; and it also happened that counts or nobles of the blood royal became infatuated with handsome Jewish girls. Beginning with the second generation, the Neo-Christians usually intermarried with women of their own sect. They became very influential through their wealth and intelligence, and were called to important positions at the palace, in government circles, and in the Cortes; they practised medicine and law and taught at the universities; while their children frequently achieved high ecclesiastical honors.

Classes of Maranos:

The Maranos and their descendants may be divided into three categories.

The first of these is composed of those who, devoid of any real affection for Judaism, and indifferent to every form of religion, gladly embraced the opportunity of exchanging their oppressed condition as Jews for the brilliant careers opened to them by the acceptance of Christianity. They simulated the Christian faith when it was to their advantage, and mocked at Jews and Judaism.

The second category consists of those who cherished their love for the Jewish faith in which they had been reared. They preserved the traditions of their fathers; and, in spite of the high positions which they held, they secretly attended synagogue, and fought and suffered for their paternal religion. Many of the wealthiest Maranos of Aragon belonged to this category.

The third category, Temporary Maranos, which includes by far the largest number of Maranos, comprises those who yielded through stress of circumstances, but in theirhome life remained Jews and seized the first opportunity of openly avowing their faith. They did not voluntarily take their children to the baptismal font; and if obliged to do so, they on reaching home washed the place which had been sprinkled. They ate no pork, celebrated the Passover, and gave oil to the synagogue.

Crakow – term discussion Galut/Diaspora/Exile

Galut:

The Hebrew term galut expresses the Jewish conception of the condition and feelings of a nation uprooted from its homeland and subject to alien rule. The term is essentially applied to the history and the historical consciousness of the Jewish people from the destruction of the Second Temple to the creation of the State of Israel. The residence of a great number of members of a nation, even the majority, outside their homeland is not definable as galut so long as the homeland remains in that nation’s possession.

Only the loss of a political-ethic center and the feeling of uprootedness turns Diaspora (Dispersion) into galut (Exile). The feeling of exile does not always necessarily accompany the condition of exile. It is unique to the history of the Jewish people that this feeling has powerfully colored the emotions of the individual as well as the national consciousness. The sense of exile was expressed by the feeling of alienation in the countries of Diaspora, the yearning for the national and political past, and persistent questioning of the causes, meaning, and purpose of the exile.

Diaspora:

The word diaspora, from the Greek διασπορά (“dispersion”), is used in the present context for the voluntary dispersion of the Jewish people. As such it confines itself to Jewish settlement outside Erez Israel during the periods of Jewish independence or compact settlement in their land. It therefore applies to the period of the First Temple, the Second Temple, and that subsequent to the establishment of the State of Israel. The only dispersion during the period of the First Temple of which there is definite knowledge is the Jewish settlement in Egypt referred to in Jeremiah 44. By the same definition, the Jewish communities in the world at present, after the establishment of the State of Israel, constitute a Diaspora, and since that event the custom has developed of referring to them in Hebrew as the tefuẓot, the Hebrew equivalent of Diaspora, in preference to the word previously used, golah, or galut. By far the most important Diaspora during the period of the Second Temple was that of the Greco-Roman world.

Exile:

Assyrian:

The mass deportation of population groups from conquered nations, as a measure to prevent these nations from rebelling, was introduced as a general policy by Tiglath-Pileser III in the second half of the eighth century B.C.E. Although deportation by Assyrian kings is well attested in the ninth century, it was Tiglath-Pileser’s innovation to practice deportation on a vast scale and to accompany it with population exchange; a practice continued by his successors in Assyria. (The Babylonians did not accompany deportation with population exchange.) The first deportation of peoples from the northern Israelite kingdom took place when Tiglath-Pileser III campaigned against Syria and Palestine (734–732 B.C.E.), at which time *Pekah son of Remaliah joined the rebellion led by the king of *Aram-Damascus against Assyria. In the course of this campaign the Assyrians conquered Gilead and deported the heads of the Israelite clans that inhabited Transjordan (I Chron. 5:6, 26). One of Tiglath-Pileser III’s fragmentary inscriptions lists several thousand captives, apparently only males, whom he exiled from eight cities in Galilee (among which were biblical Hannathon, Jotbah, Rumah, and Merom).

Babylonian:

Exiles of Judah to Babylonia, sixth–fifth centuries B.C.E. Although Babylonia was not the only destination of former Judahites, it was the Babylonian deportees and their descendants whose perspectives inform the Hebrew Bible. As punishment for the rebellion, Nebuchadnezzar sent into exile the young king and his family, royal officials, warriors, artisans, and other distinguished people from Jerusalem and Judah, and took much spoil from the Temple and palace. The number of exiles is reported in round numbers once as 10,000 exclusive of artisans (II Kings 24:14) and once as 7,000 “mighty men” and 1,000 artisans (II Kings 24:16). The destruction of the state and the Temple and the exile to Babylonia were traumatic experiences that concomitantly brought forth desires for revenge and stirrings of repentance. Feelings ran strong not only against Babylon (Isa. 47; Jer. 51; Ps. 137) but also against neighboring Edom, which rejoiced at, and benefited from, the destruction (Ezek. 25:12–14; 35:1ff; Obad.; Mal. 1:3–5; Ps. 137:7; Lam. 4:21–22).

Jewish Histories in Europe

18th - 23th February 2012