Jewish History Soundbites

The Secularization of the Jewish People in the Modern Era Part I

At the dawn of the 18^th century, the overwhelming majority of the Jewish People were religiously observant in the traditional sense. By mid-20^th century, the overwhelming majority of the Jewish People practiced a decidedly secular lifestyle. How and why did this secularization take place? This new series launched on Jewish History Soundbites will explore this topic in this and upcoming episodes, and provide definitive answers to this important historical question.

            Over the course of the 18^th-19^th centuries there emerged internal Jewish movements in Germany, Galicia & Russia who advocated for changes within the Jewish communal, educational & religious structure. Haskala, Reform and others rose to prominence on the Jewish scene and prompted a long and combative response from the Orthodox establishment. Though it may be enticing to suppose that it was these internal Jewish movements which were the cause of secularization, in reality this was not the case. Secularization was almost exclusively caused by primarily external factors, all of which were distinctive features of the modern era. Political changes, emancipation, legislative changes, economic changes, technological advancements, the industrial revolution, wars, revolutions, urbanization, immigration trends, colonialism & other external factors of modernity, all combined to generate a silent trend towards secularization. This was a movement without ideology, platform or leadership. It was a reality of growing secularization which was a direct result of the modern era and its challenges.

 

Sign up for our upcoming trip of a lifetime – Jewish history Europe trip: https://www.lalechet.com/tour/EuropeHeritage

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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Rav Yomtov Lipmann Heller the Tosafos Yomtov

As someone who experienced the upheavals of both the Thirty Years War, as well as the Khmelnytsky uprisings of 1648-49 (Tach Vitat), Rav Yomtov Lipman Heller (1579-1654) lived and led his people during an auspicious time. Much of his early rabbinical career was spent in Prague. Much of his travails were recorded by him, in a unique and rare rabbinical autobiography entitled Megillas Eivah. As the author of many popular Torah publications, he was accused of blasphemy against the Church in one of his writings and was arrested on trumped up charges. This was due to dissent within his own community regarding a progressive income tax which was imposed by the imperial authorities in order to fund the Thirty Years War. He was arrested and initially sentenced to death, but ultimately his sentence was reduced to a hefty fine, as well as foregoing his rabbinical position in Prague. He was later restored to his glory as rabbi of Krakow, where he spent his last years rehabilitating the community in the wake of the Khmelnytsky massacres. As a protection against future tragedies, he famously composed a special Mi Shebeirach to be recited in honor of those who abstain from talking in shul.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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Between Poland & Yerushalayim: The Lelov Chassidic Dynasty

With its origins in 19^th century Poland, Lelov is unique among Chassidic dynasties due to its migrating to Ottoman Jerusalem in 1851. Rav David Biderman established the dynasty in Lelov, Poland, and his son Rav Moshe, immigrated to the Land of Israel towards the end of his life. The successive generations of Biderman’s had a decisive impact on the development of the Chassidic Old Yishuv of Yerushalayim, but as a formal Chassidic dynasty, it greatly differed from its counterparts in Eastern Europe. Lelov also forged a close connection with the Karlin community and its leadership, and the Lelov rebbes were often viewed as proxies of the Karlin Rebbes. With later generations of Lelov Rebbes often visiting and even residing in Poland, and especially with the move of the Lelov Rebbe Rav Moshe Mordechai Biderman to Tel Aviv and later Bnei Brak, it leads to the conclusion that Lelov is neither Polish nor Yerushalmy, but rather between Poland and Yerushalayim.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com

 

The Tiferes Yisrael [Nisan Bak] Shul

The majestic and beautiful edifice of the Tiferes Yisrael Shul, also known as the Nisan Bak shul after its founder and leader, stood as the central shul of the Chassidic Old Yishuv of Yerushalayim, from its establishment in 1872, until its ultimate destruction by the Jordanians in 1948. The project was initially spearheaded by Rav Yisrael Friedman of Ruzhin, known as the Holy Ruzhiner, who headed the Chassidic Kollel Vohlyn, with the members of the Bak family at its head. Upon completion the shul was named for the Ruzhiner, and it served the needs of the Yerushalayim Chassidic community in the ensuing decades.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com

 

The Maharsha

Someone whose Talmudic commentary has completely dominated Torah study for four centuries, Rav Shmuel Eliezer Aidel’s (circa 1555-1631), better known as the Maharsha, emerged as a leading rabbinical figure and teacher during the golden age of Polish Jewry in the late 16^th & early 17^th centuries. Financially supported by his mother in law Aidel for many years, the Maharsha was able to both teach Torah to his students, as well as author his all-encompassing commentary to both the the Halachic as well as Aggadic passages of the entire Shas. Following his mother in law’s passing, he assumed several successive rabbinical positions, before finally settling in the prominent community of Ostroh, where he remained until his passing. There he opened a yeshiva, and served the needs of the community. He also served in a broader leadership capacity within the autonomous governing council known as the Vaad Ha’arbah Aratzos – the Council of the Four Lands, recognized by the government in the old Polish Kingdom. The Maharsha’s influence on Torah scholarship remains prominent until this very day.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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Naming Catastrophe: Holocaust, Shoah or Churban (Destruction)

The Nazi regime under Adolf Hitler carried out the extermination of nearly six million Jews, primarily between the years 1939-1945. How is the horrible tragedy referred to? Over the years various names and terms have been proposed, promoted, used in historiography and public discourse. By the mid 1950’s The Holocaust came to dominate in the English speaking world, while Shoah or The Shoah was already widespread even earlier in Hebrew. In academic circles the Nazi term Final Solution was often used, or alternatively Genocide, or Judeocide was sometimes used in the early years, before Holocaust or Shoah gained more widespread acceptance. Another term to refer to the Nazi murder of European Jewry was Destruction, or the Hebrew term Churban, sometimes elongated to Churban Europa. This more traditional term – which evoked imagery of the destruction of the Bais Hamikdash – was preferred in many religious circles.

What were the origins of these various term, and how did they develop in the trajectory which they did? Does it matter which term is utilized in describing this tragic chapter in Jewish history? Does the choice of name express an ideology or choose a direction of the narrative?

 

Link for Yehuda Geberer lectures on the Holocaust at Yeshiva Shappell’s Darche Noam:

https://open.spotify.com/show/6PGiaiQFk10ybR9dS5wWTp
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/shapells-virtual-beit-midrash/id1516601751
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLc0NeHrGWsCtlV_uVplhJa9mT2ecM0sLt

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

Subscribe to Jewish History Soundbites Podcast on: PodBean: https://jsoundbites.podbean.com/ or your favorite podcast platform

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com

 

Sephardic Purity

With the expulsion from the Iberian Peninsula in the last decade of the 15^th century, the Spanish Jewish diaspora spread across the world. Jews from Spain were called Sephardim, and many of them settled in preexisting Jewish communities in North Africa and across the Mediterranean basin, the Middle East & the Balkans, primarily within the borders of the expanding Ottoman Empire. The huge influx of Sephardic Jews into these communities, overwhelmed them demographically, and the culture, customs and religious way of life of Sephardic Jewry came to dominate the region. Sephardic Jews and the preexisting local Jews integrated, and often intermarried, but at times they each chose to remain apart.

Many Spanish Jews had chosen to remain in Spain and embrace Christianity, and were referred to as Converso’s. When they or their descendants migrated from Spain to the Ottoman Empire or elsewhere, they often had a challenge reintegrating into Jewish communal life. The established Sephardic communities took pride in their own ancestors not having succumbed to the pressure to apostatize. The confluence of the above two factors led rise to a trend of Sephardic purity pride.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

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Rav Shalom Sharabi & the Beit-El Kabbalist Yeshiva

In the center of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem stands the Beit-El Yeshiva. Established nearly three centuries ago, with the lofty goal of exclusively engaging in the study of Jewish mysticism, the institution was and continues to be largely shaped by the legacy of Rav Shalom Sharabi (c.1720-1777). Known as the Rashash, as a young immigrant from Yemen in the mid-18^th century, he studied in and later led the holy community of Beit-El. An innovator of Kabbalistic concepts, the Rashash not only influenced the entire study of Jewish mysticism for generations to come, he also elevated the institution which he headed to the premier institution dedicated to the study of Kabbalah. In the ensuing centuries, Beit-El would be successively led by personality’s influential in this field of study, and this storied academy would develop as an important component of the history of Yerushalayim.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

Subscribe to Jewish History Soundbites Podcast on: PodBean: https://jsoundbites.podbean.com/ or your favorite podcast platform

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com

 

After the Eichmann Trial

The Jewish People, Israeli society and the world at large confronted the Holocaust in the years following the Eichmann trial. Survivors began submitting testimony and writing their memoirs, historians and scholars embarked on research projects in a more systematic fashion and the Holocaust became a permanent element of the international consciousness. Hannah Arendt’s book, Eichmann in Jerusalem, generated much controversy and response. Her exploration of the ‘banality of evil’, as well as her controversial statements regarding the trial itself and Jewish leadership during the Holocaust, resulted in a slew of books, articles and general polemics to disprove many of her ideas and statements. Eichmann’s defense of ‘just following orders’, generated responses as well. From Stanley Milgram’s famous authority experiments at Yale, to Phillip Zimbardo’s Stanford prison experiment, social psychologists seemed as keen as understanding the Holocaust as much as historians.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

Subscribe to Jewish History Soundbites Podcast on: PodBean: https://jsoundbites.podbean.com/ or your favorite podcast platform

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com

 

Witnesses at the Eichmann Trial

The prosecutor at the Eichmann trial, Gideon Hausner, opened the trial with a speech to history. Evoking the memory of the Holocaust victims, and referring to them as the true accusers of Adolf Eichmann at the trial. With that speech both the dramatic atmosphere as well as the overall theme, were set for the entire ensuing trial. The over 100 witnesses took the stand not only to implicate Eichmann for his role in the Final Solution, but also to tell the world, the Jewish People and Israeli society what the Holocaust was all about. Through the often dramatic moments of witness testimony over the course of the trial, the broad scope of the Holocaust narrative was finally confronted. A clear before and after the trial was delineated in the collective memory of the Jewish People and the world at large regarding the history and memory of the Holocaust.

 

Cross River, a leading financial institution committed to supporting its communities, is proud to sponsor Jewish History Soundbites. As a trusted partner for individuals and businesses, Cross River understands the importance of preserving and celebrating our heritage. By sponsoring this podcast, they demonstrate their unwavering dedication to enriching the lives of the communities in which they serve. Visit Cross River at https://www.crossriver.com/

 

Subscribe to Jewish History Soundbites Podcast on: PodBean: https://jsoundbites.podbean.com/ or your favorite podcast platform

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For sponsorship opportunities about your favorite topics of Jewish history or feedback contact Yehuda at:  yehuda@yehudageberer.com