German-Israelite Community Association

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The German-Federation of Jewish Communities (DIGB) ( 1869 - 1933 ) was the first national umbrella organization of Jewish communities in Germany and one of the predecessor organizations of today's Central Council of Jews in Germany .

History and environment

An important prerequisite for the creation of an overall Jewish organization in Prussia , the largest of the later federal states of Germany, was the Prussian law on the conditions of the Jews , enacted on July 23, 1847 , which in its paragraph 37 gave the individual synagogue communities the rights of a legal person as a corporation of public law and which were followed in the course of time by similar laws in other German states. This enabled the municipalities to join together to form larger associations that could themselves be recognized as public legal entities.

During the period of the German Empire , many such Jewish organizations emerged for political, social and community tasks that could not be managed at the level of the local religious community. Religious issues played less of a role in the associations than political issues, especially the challenge of anti-Semitism . Although all attempts before 1933 to create a uniform Jewish organization to represent all German Jews were unsuccessful, there were a number of partly cooperating and partly competing Germany-wide organizations that coordinated Jewish activities to a previously unattained extent.

founding

In the run-up to German unification and after the founding of the North German Confederation in 1867, the need for a Germany-wide Jewish union that was supposed to facilitate communication and coordination among the communities grew, especially among liberal Jews who supported and welcomed the national unification efforts in many ways.

The German-Israelite Community Association was the first large Jewish umbrella organization whose sphere of activity covered all of Germany. It was constituted as a secular Jewish community organization on the occasion of the first Israelite Synod in Leipzig (June 29 to July 4, 1869), to which rabbis , scholars and leading laypeople from sixty congregations in Germany, Austria and other countries in Europe and America mainly belonging to Reform Judaism had gathered. The founding assembly named the fight for the legal equality of the Jews as the main task of the association.

In addition to Moritz Lazarus , the chairman of the synod, the city ​​councilor and chairman of the Jewish community of Dresden , Emil Lehmann , and the syndic of the Breslau Jewish community, David Honigmann (1821-1885), who was the first Prussian in the 1840s , were involved in the foundation Jew ever in Berlin a study of jurisprudence had been completed.

The Israelite Community Association only effectively started its association activities after the establishment of the German Empire in 1871 in the Franco-German War and initially grew very slowly. It was not until 1872 that the statutory minimum number of 100 parishes was reached. Austrian communities were also included until 1875, after which the association was limited to the territory of the German Empire . In order to meet the reservations of stricter Jewish faiths and to enable the broadest possible cooperation, the discussion of religious issues should not fall within his competence.

Goals, structure and tasks

The foundation aimed to unite all Jewish communities in Germany. With this in mind, the general assembly of the federal government decided in 1872 to commission a committee to “influence the legislative factors to establish a unified legal association of the municipalities.” However, the DIGB did not succeed in creating one during its existence To create an overall organization or to establish oneself as such; it always remained a loosely voluntary association, which many congregations did not join either, for example because they rejected the reform Jewish orientation or because they disliked the undemocratic governance structures prevailing in the communal federation. Most of the representatives sent to the governing bodies of the federal government were appointed.

In contrast to most of the national federations and associations established later, including the Central Association of German Citizens of the Jewish Faith (CV), which was founded in 1893 in part with the participation of the same people , the DIGB was in principle always a federation of local communities that got together around financially assist small communities that Wanderbettelei to fight with the states in matters of welfare of the Jewish community life and school system to negotiate and administration. In later times the DIGB also financed pension payments for Jewish teachers.

Anti-Semitism, which grew rapidly in popularity in Germany from 1879 to the beginning of the 1890s, confronted the Jewish communities with the challenge of an increasingly anti-Semitic environment, which was not yet expected in the founding phase of the community federation. The question of how the Jewish side should react to this was answered differently and also led to tensile tests within the DIGB.

Development until 1914

The DIGB was initially based in Leipzig. Already at the beginning of the 1880s and despite its small size at the time, it was one of the better-known Jewish community and cultural organizations in Europe, alongside the Alliance Israélite Universelle in Paris , the Anglo-Jewish Association in London and the Israelite Alliance in Vienna founded in 1872 . When the community federation was expelled from Leipzig due to the Saxon Association Act in 1882, it moved its headquarters to Berlin . The Berlin physician Samuel Kristeller (1882-1896) became the third president and first head of the association after the move ; Deputy President was Moritz Lazarus (1882-1894). Only after the relocation of the headquarters did the association of municipalities begin to grow faster: The 183 municipalities of 1882 had almost doubled to 350 in 1888 and, with 652 member municipalities, more than tripled in 1898.

In the 1890s, the historian Martin Philippson took over the management of the association (1896-1904) and achieved that the DIGB was granted corporate rights and thus the legal capacity as a legal person in Prussia by royal decree of February 13, 1899 , which is enormous for the practical association work was important. However, this required an amendment to the statutes, according to which "the discussion of political matters" in the association was excluded in future . The political education and persuasion work to defend against anti-Semitism had meanwhile largely taken over by the Central-Verein (CV), founded in 1893. However, it did not seem conceivable to the members that a politically incapable community association could represent the interests of Jews in Germany. According to its long-time Secretary General Wilhelm Neumann (who exercised this function for 36 years from 1893 to April 1, 1929 under four presidents), the DIGB has therefore waived its full representation claim since then. Instead, in September 1900, Philippson appealed to the German Jews and called for the establishment of a “General German Jewish Day” representing all Jews in Germany. Although his idea could not be realized, eventful negotiations finally led to the creation of another organization, the Association of German Jews (VdJ), whose board was Philippson when it was founded in April 1904. In the period that followed, the VdJ, which remained closely linked to the DIGB and the CV and existed until the early days of the Weimar Republic , was increasingly perceived by government agencies and non-Jewish institutions as the actual political representation of German Jews, while the community federation itself developed further in the direction of a social and welfare association and coordinated internal relations between the Jewish communities.

At that time, the DIGB had around 800 parishes as members. In 1911 there were 1,012 congregations in the Bund, which was more than a third of all Jewish congregations in Germany.

In the first 40 years of its existence, the DIGB created or initiated important Jewish welfare, educational and educational institutions, the existence of which was secured by substantial foundations and legacies. Many later independent Jewish institutions owe their establishment to the initiative of the community federation , such as the General Archives of Jews in Germany , the Jewish Central Welfare Office (ZWSt) , the Central Office for Jewish Migrant Poor Welfare , the Associations for Jewish History and Literature and the Association of Jewish Teachers' Associations.

Scientific projects and publications

In 1885 a "Historical Commission for the History of the Jews in Germany" was set up at the German-Israelitischer Gemeindebund under the direction of the historian and diplomat Harry Bresslau , whose task it was to model the Monumenta Germaniae Historica and the Historical Commission of the Bavarian Academy of the Studies to collect important Urkunden- and source material of Jewish history and editions to make it usable for research. The Historical Commission, which in addition to Bresslau also included Hermann Bärwald , Ernst Dümmler , Ludwig Geiger , Otto von Gierke , Wilhelm Wattenbach , Julius Weizsäcker and Otto Stobbe , published several volumes of Latin and important Hebrew sources with German translations over the course of about a decade by 1892 published the magazine for the history of the Jews in Germany . When Bresslau withdrew from the association of municipalities in 1902, the work of the commission had come to a standstill for some time for unknown reasons.

There were also non-Jews among the members of the Historical Commission. This and the fundamental scientific controversy about the importance of the Hebrew sources and the orientation of German-Jewish historical research, the main opponents of which were Harry Bresslau and Heinrich Graetz (the latter being excluded from the work of the commission), led to critical evaluations from the communities, which also affected the financial resources of the Commission and thus ultimately led to its decline. In order to continue the historical source work, in 1905 B'nai B'rith and the DIGB founded the General Archives of German Jews , whose board of trustees now consisted only of Jewish members, some of whom had already participated in the historical commission.

Development until 1933

When the Weimar Constitution made it possible to form legally recognized religious societies in 1919 , new attempts were made to achieve joint overall representation for all communities, which in practice were unsuccessful. Instead, separate community associations were established in the individual countries, the largest of which was the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (PLV). Alongside the ZWSt and other institutions, the DIGB was one of the central organizations of Jewish welfare and continued to appear as a social association, funding agency and sponsor of Jewish cultural and welfare institutions, in particular as a sponsor of various home institutions . Negotiations between the regional associations, the DIGB and other representations about the formation of a Jewish Reich Association failed several times. As the differences about the self-image of German Jews between assimilated , Zionists and religious people increasingly came to the fore in the second half of the 1920s, the fragmentation increased and the initiative for action in all essential matters lay with the PLV, the climate for representatives of the DIGB became organized liberals more difficult. The German-Israelitische Gemeindebund played only a subordinate role in the further efforts to form a unified umbrella organization, which only after the Nazis came to power under the pressure of events to form a “Central Committee for Aid and Development” on April 13, 1933 and finally led to the establishment of the Reich Representation of Jews in Germany in Berlin on September 17, 1933, which resulted in the demise of the DIGB.

rating

The undemocratic management structure of the association of municipalities is often cited as critical. In addition, the strong preponderance of liberal Jews in all leadership positions is emphasized, while conservative or Zionist Jews saw themselves neglected and the few Orthodox communities hardly took part in the organization. Most observers emphasize that, contrary to the association's goals, representation of the entire German Jewry could never be achieved and was only inevitable during the time of National Socialism . In contrast, Max Birnbaum describes the situation before the First World War , when there was an informal division of tasks between three closely interwoven all-German associations and the numerically insignificant Orthodox Judaism with the Free Association for the Interests of Orthodox Judaism in Frankfurt / M. since 1907 had its own representation, which was also accepted by the state, as "organized in a satisfactory manner for the needs and requirements of the time." In view of the overwhelming preponderance of liberals in the communities, it is understandable that they almost automatically assumed the leadership role; and principles of democratic representation would not have gained greater importance in the general consciousness until after 1918.

The conceptually and personally outdated model of the traditional association work was no longer able to cope with the dramatically changed social, religious and political conditions in the Weimar period, which may have influenced the overall rather negative contemporary assessment of the community federation at this time and in retrospect, in addition to the ideological differences that burdened the climate between the minority of Jews who sympathized with Zionism, which had been growing steadily since the turn of the century, but especially during the First World War, and the majority of Jews close to the CV.

A study by Claudia Prestel on Jewish welfare education institutions using the example of the failure of the DIGB federal management as the responsible body in view of serious grievances in the Repzin welfare institution , which was closed in 1927 and which ended during the general crisis of the German welfare education , also shows deficits due to outdated structures in association work 1920s came into disrepute not only among Zionist-minded parishioners as a “blot on German Jewry”.

literature

  • Max P. Birnbaum: State and Synagogue, 1918–1938: a history of the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (1918–1938). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1981, ISBN 978-3167437728 .
  • Otto Dov Kulka : Historical introduction. In: also with Anne Birkenhauer and Esriel Hildesheimer (eds.): German Judaism under National Socialism, Volume 1: Documents on the history of the Reich representation of German Jews, 1933-1938. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1997, ISBN 978-3161472671 ; P. 2–9 (“On the history of the supra-community organizations of Jews in the Diaspora”, limited preview in the Google book search).
  • Steven M. Lowenstein: chap. V. The community. In: also with Paul Mendes-Flohr, Peter Pulzer, Monika Richarz (eds.): German-Jewish history in modern times. Third volume: Controversial Integration 1871–1918. Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 978-3406397042 ; Pp. 136–143 (“5. The Rise of Germany-Wide Jewish Organizations”, limited preview in Google book search).
  • Michael Reuven: Art. German-Israelitischer Gemeindebund. In: Michael Berenbaum and Fred Skolnik (eds.): Encyclopaedia Judaica 2nd ed., Vol. 5., Detroit 2007, p. 626 (English, online ).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Central Council of Jews in Germany : Prehistory: From the Beginning to 1945 ( Memento from April 17, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) (self-portrayal on the Internet).
  2. ↑ a b Esriel Hildesheimer: Jewish self-administration under the Nazi regime: the struggle for existence of the Reich Representation and Reich Association of Jews in Germany. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1994, ISBN 978-3161461798 ; P. 2 in the Google book search.
  3. ↑ a b c d e Steven M. Lowenstein: German-Jewish history in modern times. Volume 3, Munich 1997; P. 136 f.
  4. ^ A b c d Max P. Birnbaum: State and Synagogue, 1918–1938: a history of the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (1918–1938). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1981; P. 5–7 in Google Book Search.
  5. ↑ Kerstin von der Krone: Science in public: the science of Judaism and its magazines (Studia Judaica 65). De Gruyter, Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3110266139 ; P. 186.
  6. ^ Negotiations of the first Israelite synod in Leipzig from June 29 to July 4, 1869. Gerschel's Verlagbuchhandlung, Berlin 1869 ( online edition of the University Library Frankfurt am Main, 2013).
  7. ↑ Barbara Strenge: Jews in the Prussian Justice Service 1812-1918: Access to the legal professions as an indicator of social emancipation (individual publications by the Historical Commission in Berlin). KG Saur, Munich a. a. 1996, ISBN 978-3598232251 (De Gruyter Reprint); Pp. 48–50 in Google Book Search.
  8. ↑ a b c d e Michael Reuven: Art. German-Israelitischer Gemeindebund. In: Encyclopaedia Judaica , Vol. 5, Detroit 2007, p. 626.
  9. ↑ a b Otto Dov Kulka: Historical introduction. In: ders. U. a. (Ed.): German Judaism under National Socialism, Volume 1: Documents on the History of the Reich Representation of German Jews, 1933-1938. Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1997; P. 6 in the Google Book search.
  10. ^ Gerhard Köbler: Jewish German lawyers. See point D) Short biographies ( prosopographical overview) (online publication, 2012, accessed on February 1, 2016).
  11. ↑ Peter Pulzer : chap. VII. The return of the old hatred , and VIII. The reaction to anti-Semitism. In: also with Paul Mendes-Flohr , Steven M. Lowenstein, Monika Richarz (eds.): German-Jewish history in modern times. Third volume: Controversial Integration 1871–1918. Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 978-3406397042 ; Pp. 193-277; here: pp. 212–216 (“The first reactions”).
  12. ^ Alliance Israélite universelle . In: Meyers Konversations-Lexikon . 4th edition. Volume 1, Verlag des Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig / Vienna 1885–1892, p. 379.
  13. ↑ Ingrid Belke (eds.): Moritz Lazarus and Heymann Steinthal. The founders of national psychology in their letters. Volume II / 2, Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1986, p. 530, note 1 (editor's note).
  14. ^ Max P. Birnbaum: State and Synagogue, 1918-1938: a history of the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (1918-1938). Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen 1981, p. 177 u. Note 128; Like. Claudia Prestel: Youth in Need: Welfare Education in German-Jewish Society (1901-1933). Böhlau, Cologne and Vienna 2003; P. 258 and Note 249.
  15. ^ Meyers Großes Konversations-Lexikon , Vol. 7. Leipzig 1907, p. 529 f.
  16. ^ Bettina Rabe: Harry Bresslau (1848–1926). Pioneer of historical auxiliary sciences in Berlin and Strasbourg. In: Peter Bahl, Eckart Henning (eds.): Herold-Jahrbuch NF, Vol. 1 (1996), Berlin 1996, p. 59.
  17. ↑ Peter Honigmann : The files of the Galut. Reflections on more than a hundred years of efforts to take inventory of sources on the history of Jews in Germany. ( Memento of March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Online publication by the Central Archive for research into the history of Jews in Germany at Heidelberg University ; also published under the title: The Files of Exile. Reflections on more than a hundred years of efforts to take inventory of sources on the history of Jews in Germany. In: Der Archivar Vol. 54 (2001), Issue 1, pp. 23–31.
  18. ^ Max P. Birnbaum: State and Synagogue, 1918-1938: a history of the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (1918-1938). Tübingen 1981, pp. 177-188.
  19. ↑ Axel Meier: The Reich Representation of the Jews in Germany. Historical contribution from October 26, 2004 on the website of the Foundation Future Needs Remembrance (accessed on February 2, 2016).
  20. ^ Max P. Birnbaum: State and Synagogue, 1918-1938: a history of the Prussian State Association of Jewish Communities (1918-1938). Tübingen 1981, p. 6f.
  21. ^ Claudia Prestel: Youth in Need: Welfare Education in German-Jewish Society (1901-1933). Böhlau, Cologne and Vienna 2003, ISBN 978-3205770503 ; Pp. 276-287.