Jewish community Hamburg

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The Bornplatz Synagogue in Hamburg, taken from Beneckestrasse

The Hamburg Jewish Community is one of the largest Jewish communities in Germany with around 3500 members. It forms within the nationwide Central Council of Jews in Germany an independent national association. There are also other Jewish communities from other currents that have organized themselves here.

History of the Jewish community (s)

Sephardim from 1590 to 1939 in Hamburg and Altona

The Neweh Schalom synagogue in Altona

From Portugal originating Sephardim settled from 1590 in Hamburg down to set up first without a church. In the beginning, many Sephardim whose families had converted to Catholicism under threat of death did not practice their Judaism publicly. In 1612, the Hamburg Council put Sephardic Jews on an equal footing in commercial matters with the other Hamburg citizens by means of “merchants' handling”. Sephardim founded three synagogue congregations named Kether Thorah (כתר תורה), Neweh Schalom (נוה שלום) and Thalmud Thorah (תלמוד תורה), which they united in 1652 to form the holy congregation of the Sephardim Beith Israel (בית ישראל). Her member Herbert Pardo , who was also her chairman several times until 1933, became known. The Sephardic community existed independently until its forced integration into the Jewish religious association in Hamburg in July 1939.

In Altona , which has belonged to Hamburg since 1937 , Sephardim lived since the time before 1647. They only founded the Holy Congregation Neweh Shalom (נוה שלום) in 1770, which dissolved the few remaining members in 1887 due to insufficient membership.

Ashkenazim from 1610 to 1945

C Hamburg until 1812

Ashkenazim were able to stay in Hamburg for the first time around 1610, provided they were employed as staff in Sephardic households or companies. The Sephardim called the Ashkenazi Jews Tudescos (Portuguese for 'Germans'). Around 1661/1662 they founded the German-Israelite Congregation in Hamburg (DIG). The city of Hamburg granted residence permits very restrictively, so the DIG in Hamburg was smaller than its branch communities in Altona and Wandsbek (since 1937 in Hamburg). Ashkenazim without a residence permit had to i. d. They usually stayed overnight outside of Hamburg and therefore officially chose their place of residence in the aforementioned Danish-Holstein cities. But since they mostly earned their living in Hamburg, they mostly spent the days in Hamburg. The DIG formed from 1671 to 1812 part of the so-called triple congregation AHU (אההו) (Altona, Hamburg, Wandsbek). The DIG existed independently from 1812 to 1938 and then merged into the Jewish religious association in Hamburg .

In 1710 the city of Hamburg issued the regulation of Jews in Hamburg, both Portuguese and High German . This came about through the mediation of Emperor Joseph I , who thus did not want to give up the old imperial Jewish shelf.

In Altona until 1938

Four Ashkenazim have been recorded in Altona as early as 1611. One congregation, the High German Israelite Congregation in Altona (HIG), was founded after 1611. In the years 1621 to 1812 the HIG operated a branch in Hamburg for Ashkenazi, who could not obtain a residence permit in Hamburg and therefore formally had their residence in the liberal Holstein-Pinnebergischen Altona (from 1640 to the Danish ruled Holstein-Rendsburg ). From 1671 to 1812, the HIG was the leading member of the three congregations AHU (Altona, Hamburg, Wandsbek). It existed independently from 1812 to 1938 and then became part of the Jewish religious association in Hamburg .

In Wandsbek until 1938

The Wandsbek Israelite Community (IGW) was founded in Wandsbek in the period after 1621 and before 1650. From 1688 to 1812 the IGW had a branch in Hamburg for Ashkenazi who were not given a residence permit in Hamburg and therefore had formally taken up residence in the liberal Danish-Holstein Wandsbek. The IGW was also a member of the three congregations AHU (Altona, Hamburg, Wandsbek) from 1671 to 1812 . It existed independently from 1812 to 1938 and then became part of the Jewish religious association in Hamburg .

The "Dreigemeinde Altona-Hamburg-Wandsbek" from 1671 to 1812

The DIG, the HIG and the IGW founded a municipal alliance by contract in 1671, the so-called Dreigemeinde Altona-Hamburg-Wandsbek (AHU אההו). The umbrella organization provided services for all three municipalities and their respective subsidiary municipalities. So there was a common religious court ( Beth Din בית דין), common cemeteries, hospitals and other facilities. As a result of the Napoleonic conquest in 1806 and the annexation of Hamburg as part of the first French Empire in the years 1811 to 1814, all Hamburgers, including Jews, obtained French citizenship and thus equal civil rights. In the empire all Jewish communities were subordinate to the central Jewish consistory of France. Therefore, the DIG had to give up the community alliance with the non-French communities HIG and IGW, which is why the three communities dissolved the triple community in 1812 by contract.

From 1812, the residence restrictions that forced the Ashkenazim working in Hamburg to formally reside in Altona or Wandsbek were lifted. The branch communities of the HIG and IGW in Hamburg took over the now independent DIG.

In Harburg until 1938

Ashkenazim lived in Harburg an der Elbe (since 1937 in Hamburg) from 1610 onwards. Before 1718 they founded a community. In contrast to the three cities of Altona, Hamburg and Wandsbek, which were easily accessible to each other on foot or at least by cart, one could only get to Harburg from the three by ship. Accordingly, the Harburg community was not involved in the common institutions of the triune community. Through the Napoleonic conquest in 1803 and the annexation of the Electorate of Hanover (1807), to which Harburg belonged, first through Jérôme Bonaparte's Kingdom of Westphalia and then as part of Napoléon Bonaparte 's first French Empire in the years 1810 to 1814, all Harburgers, including the Jewish, equal citizenship. With the defeat of the Bonapartes, the previous situation was restored. New laws in 1842 put Jews in the Kingdom of Hanover (as it was called since 1814) on an equal footing with other citizens and at the same time obliged Jews to form Jewish communities where this had not already happened. These communities then had to fulfill the state requirements for Jewish religious education in private or public schools and to guarantee all other religious tasks (maintenance of cemeteries and synagogues, holding church services, holding weddings and bar mitzvahs ). Four land rabbis were appointed for the whole kingdom, each of which had to take care of its own district. Harburg belonged to the Land Rabbinate of Hanover .

The land rabbis fulfilled both religious and state tasks. Hanover was one of the few states in the German Confederation where Judaism, like the Christian denominations, had a state-recognized and monitored organization. The land rabbis had a similar semi-state authoritarian relationship to the Jewish communities and their members and employees as Lutheran pastors did to their communities in Hanover at that time. The organization of the land rabbinates remained intact even after the Prussian annexation in 1866, although the Prussian authorities in the old Prussian areas did everything they could to prevent central Jewish associations and denied them any state recognition. With the separation of state and religion according to the imperial constitution of 1919, the semi-state tasks of the land rabbis (school supervision) were abolished and their function was limited to purely religious matters. Since the unification of the cities of Harburg and Wilhelmsburg in 1927, the Jewish community has been known as the Jüdische Synagogengemeinde Harburg-Wilhelmsburg (JSHW). In 1938 it became part of the Jewish religious association in Hamburg .

In Hamburg from 1815 to 1938

After the end of the First French Empire, the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg was restituted as a state and the Jewish Regulations of 1710 were reintroduced. This became possible because Johann Smidt - unauthorized and without a vote - in the final editing of the resolutions of the Congress of Vienna on the rights of the Jews, the text Confessors of the Jewish faith will receive the same rights already granted in the individual federal states , minor, but Changed with serious consequences in: The confessors of the Jewish faith will receive the same rights already granted by the individual states . Since the French and not the Hamburg state had emancipated the Jews of Hamburg, Hamburg revoked the emancipation in 1815 and declared the Jewish regulations to continue to apply. The emancipation in Hamburg then took place on February 21, 1849 in execution of a resolution of the Frankfurt National Assembly . In the cities of Altona and Wandsbek, as in all of Holstein, the emancipation of the Jews took place by law on July 14, 1863.

In 1860, freedom of belief was entered into the Hamburg constitution. From 1865 there was no longer any compulsory membership in the Jewish community. In 1867 the new German-Israelite Congregation was founded as a religious community with voluntary membership. The DIG was now an umbrella organization for two independent cultural associations, the third New Dammtor Synagogue , founded in 1894, was also recognized in the statutes as having equal status after the First World War. In matters of culture, the DIG was not tied to one tradition, but offered all Ashkenazim the opportunity to become a member of the one congregation that maintained various cultural traditions through internally autonomous religious associations (so-called Hamburg system ). Other German Jewish communities were often organized separately according to cultural traditions, so that several Jewish communities of different orientations coexisted in one place.

The DIG financed services such as tuition, health care, poor relief and cemeteries, which all community members could use if necessary, from the taxes of the community members. In addition, the religious associations existed under the umbrella of the DIG, to which the male community members could also join as paying members, but did not have to. These religious associations maintained synagogues, religious celebrations and instruction and employed trained rabbis and teachers for this purpose in the style of the three great cultural traditions, namely Orthodoxy , Reform Judaism (founded in Hamburg) and the mainstream, which was formed in the 19th century and was a middle position between the two, which was partly renewed (today referred to as the conservative current ).

One religious association was the Orthodox German-Israelite Synagogue Association , which had 1,200 paying members nationwide, the other was the liberal Israelite Temple Association (founded December 11, 1817), which was close to Reform Judaism and had 700 paying members nationwide. The third association maintained the tradition of the mainstream and was called the New Dammtor Synagogue and had the largest number of members. The figures do not include the non-paying users, such as family members and the poor.

In Greater Hamburg from 1938 to 1945

After the incorporation under the Greater Hamburg Act on April 1, 1937, the Jewish Ashkenazi communities (DIG, HIG, IGW and JSHW) signed a contract to unify them on January 1, 1938. The chosen name German-Israelitic Community Greater Hamburg , however, was not approved by the NS Ministry of Culture, because 'German' is forbidden for Jewish organizations, 'Israelite' is misleading, since 'Jewish' is the clear term in the NS racial ideology, and 'community' - so the flimsy argument - reserved for political communities. The community then chose the name of the Jewish Religious Association in Hamburg .

In March 1938, the Jewish Religious Association in Hamburg - like all Jewish communities in Germany - was revoked its status as a public corporation with state-organized community tax collection . From December 1938, the Jewish religious association in Hamburg was bound by instructions vis-à-vis the Hamburg state police headquarters. Claus Göttsche from the Gestapo's Jewish Department appointed a new chairman, Max Plaut , on behalf of his department . From then on, in the event of vacancies (e.g. through resignation, emigration or later deportation), the community representatives were no longer to be determined by election, but by self-supplementation through opting - subject to the approval of the Gestapo.

From July 1939, the Jewish communities were no longer purely religious associations, as all persons were now compulsorily registered as members who were considered Jews under the Nuremberg Laws (all persons with three or four grandparents of Jewish religious affiliation), regardless of whether they were halachically considered Jews (Membership through the birth of a Jewish woman or through conversion), whether they were non-denominational or members of other religions (e.g. so-called non-Aryan Protestants and Catholics). At the same time, the very small (1935: 150 members) Sephardic Holy Congregation of the Sephardi in Beith Israel (under this name since 1652) was forcibly incorporated into the Jewish Religious Association in Hamburg , as only one 'Jewish community' was left at each location to simplify anti-Semitic discrimination. was allowed to exist.

At the end of 1942, the Jewish Religious Association in Hamburg was dissolved as an independent legal entity and transferred to the Reichsvereinigung , District Office Northwest Germany of the Reich Association of Jews in Germany . On June 10, 1943 sparked Reichssicherheitshauptamt the by decree Reichsvereinigung on. The remaining employees of the district office were deported to Theresienstadt on June 23, 1943 . Leo Lippmann , the chairman of the religious association and former state councilor of the tax authorities , refused the opportunity to emigrate . When, on June 10, 1943, the Gestapo occupied the offices in which the Jewish religious association was active and informed him of his planned deportation to Theresienstadt, he and his wife Anna Josephine, prepared by him, committed suicide.

Place of the Jewish deportees: memorial and plaque

The Israelitisches Krankenhaus Hamburg continued to function as the only Jewish facility , in which predominantly people living in privileged mixed marriages worked and cared for the few remaining persecuted Jews and non-Jews discriminated against as Jews in the event of illness.

10,000 Jewish Hamburgers perished in the Shoah. On October 25, 1941, 1,034 Jews were deported to Lodz, where they all perished. On November 8 and 18, 1941, 968 and 407 Jews were deported to Minsk, where only 20 survived. On December 6, 1941, 753 Jews were deported to Riga. In July 1942 Jews from Hamburg were deported again. Between October 1941 and February 1945 5,848 Hamburg Jews were deported in 17 transports, 5,296 of which were murdered. 319 committed suicide. 140 were murdered in the course of euthanasia. 50 to 80 Hamburg Jews hid in Hamburg and survived.

Development of membership numbers from 1811 to 1942

These numbers refer to the members of the Jewish community in Hamburg in its respective national borders. The Jews in Altona, Harburg and Wandsbek are therefore not included up to and including 1938.

  • In 1811 there were 6,429 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 4.87% of the 132,007 residents of Hamburg. With Altona and Wandsbek, the Jewish community in the Hamburg area was by far the largest in the German Confederation with around 9,000 people.
  • In 1871 there were 13,796 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 4% of the 338,974 residents of Hamburg. A third religious association was founded in 1894, the "Neue Dammtor Synagoge".
  • In 1910 there were 18,932 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 1.87% of Hamburg's residents.
  • In 1919 there were around 18,500 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 1.76% of Hamburg's residents.
  • In 1925 there were 19,904 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 1.73% of Hamburg's residents.
  • In 1933 there were 16,855 Jewish residents in Hamburg. They made up a percentage of 1.41% of Hamburg's residents.
  • In 1938 there were 7,547 Jewish residents in Hamburg.
  • In 1942 the Jewish Religious Association in Hamburg had 1,852 members, 1,022 of whom were in so-called privileged mixed marriages . How many of them, by their own admission, were Jews is unknown. Many of these marriages were not mixed marriages from a religious standpoint, as one partner converted to the other's religion at the time of marriage. In the context of the Nazi racial ideology, however, in 1942 a Jew was to be counted who (e.g. according to the so-called Aryan certificate ) had three or four grandparents of Jewish religious affiliation.

1945 to 2008

On July 8, 1945, twelve survivors of the old Jewish community in Hamburg gathered to set up a working committee and a culture committee. A total of 80 Jews wanted to re-establish the community. The American Jewish Distribution Committee and the English Jewish Committee for Relief Abroad organized and financially supported the new congregation, which was re-established on September 18, 1945 with a gathering of 72 people. In the same year, the Jewish community applied to the Hamburg Senate for recognition as a public corporation , which it was granted in October 1948. The Hamburg Jewish community had the same legal form until 1938. In 1947 the Jewish community in Hamburg had 1,268 members.

In 1952 there were 1,044 parishioners, in 1960 there were again 1,369 members. In the following 30 years the number of parishioners fluctuated between 1,350 and 1,400.

Today the center of Jewish life in the city is once again around the Talmud Torah School on the Grindel.

The 1911 Talmud Torah School

On November 22, 1993, the City of Hamburg and the Hamburg Jewish Community signed a "five-year contract" for the first time. As a result, from 1994 onwards, the community received a grant of 500,000 marks per year "for the fulfillment of its cultural and social tasks". Mayor Henning Voscherau said at the time that the contract was "an expression of the special responsibility for Jewish life in Hamburg" .

The relationship between the state of Hamburg and the Jewish communities was regulated in a state church contract in the form of a church contract, the contract between the state of Hamburg and the Jewish community in Hamburg of June 29, 2007. The contract of June 29, 2007 includes, among other things. a. a fixed benefit amount of € 850,000 to the Jewish community. Before the State Treaty was signed, there was only one grant agreement between Hamburg and its Jewish community. The grant contract only included payments of 350,000 euros per year, and it had expired in the meantime. For this reason, the municipality only made payments in the form of payments on account. The Central Council said: " The financial basis of the state treaty ensures the community an expansion of the urgently needed infrastructure. At the same time, the contract regulates the partnership between the community and the Hanseatic City of Hamburg and is an expression of the trusting cooperation and recognition between both partners [. .]. "

On September 5, 2008, the state rabbi Dov-Levy Barsilay was released without notice after 15 years of service.

Present - Jewish Infrastructure in Hamburg

Hamburg is experiencing a renaissance of Jewish life, which is also reflected in the necessary supply and expansion of cultural facilities. The sacred buildings such as the synagogues in the districts of Eimsbüttel and St. Pauli , educational institutions such as the Jewish Education Center Hamburg in Rotherbaum and the Jewish Culture House in St. Pauli are the focus of urban life in the multi-ethnic Elbe metropolis.

The Jewish communities in Hamburg - whether Orthodox , Liberal or Reformed - are seeing a four-digit increase in the number of community members due to immigration from Eastern Europe and Israel . Altogether more than 5000 Jews are said to live in Hamburg again, which the city metropolis u. a. with an interesting range of services, art and gastronomy.

In Schleswig-Holstein

1968 to 2002

Since 1968, the Hamburg Jewish Community also looked after Jews in Schleswig-Holstein . In the 1990s, the Hamburg Jewish Community also looked after 1,200 immigrants from the GuS (Community of Independent States) who had settled in the neighboring state of Schleswig-Holstein.

To this end, on January 29, 1998, the Hamburg Jewish Community and the state government of Schleswig-Holstein signed a state church treaty with a term of five years to promote Jewish life in Schleswig-Holstein. At the beginning 400,000 DM were paid and towards the end of the contract 700,000 DM were paid. This contract was extended for three years. In January 2005, the Jewish communities in Schleswig-Holstein broke away from the Hamburg Jewish Community, because in the meantime two new associations had formed in Schleswig-Holstein. The state association of the Jewish communities of Schleswig-Holstein with its seat in Bad Segeberg was founded (2002), which received 88,000 DM after its membership, and the Jewish Community Schleswig-Holstein with its seat in Lübeck, which received 270,000 DM after its membership.

literature

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Arno Herzig: Early modern times. In: The Jewish Hamburg. (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 82.
  2. ↑ The Hebrew letter Waw (ו), which is at the beginning of the Hebrew spelling of the name Wandsbek, is a half-vowel and can therefore be pronounced and transliterated as 'w' (or 'v') or 'u' depending on its position in the word .
  3. ↑ Arno Herzig: "Early Modern Times". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, pp. 81f
  4. ↑ Arno Herzig: "Early Modern Times". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 83
  5. ^ Heinrich Graetz, History of the Jews from the oldest times to the present : 11 vols., Leipzig: Leiner, 1900, vol. 11: 'History of the Jews from the beginning of the Mendelssohn period (1750) to the most recent period (1848) ', p. 317. Bold sentence not in the original. Reprint of the last edition: Berlin: arani, 1998, ISBN 3-7605-8673-2 .
  6. ↑ Ortwin Pelc: "Empire and Weimar Republic (1871-1933)". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 153
  7. ↑ Ina Lorenz, "The Hamburg Jews in the German Empire", in: Four hundred years of Jews in Hamburg: an exhibition of the Museum of Hamburg History from November 8, 1991 to March 29, 1992 , Ulrich Bauche (ed.), Dölling and Galitz, Hamburg 1991, (The History of the Jews in Hamburg; Vol. 1), p. 318seq., ISBN 3-926174-31-5
  8. ↑ Cf. 'Letter from the Reich and Prussian Minister for Church Affairs to the Hamburg State Office from January 15, 1937' Berlin, Hamburg State Archives, inventory 113-5, EIV B1 file, reproduced from: Four hundred years of Jews in Hamburg: an exhibition of the Museum of Hamburg History from November 8, 1991 to March 29, 1992 , Ulrich Bauche (Ed.), Dölling and Galitz, Hamburg 1991, (The History of the Jews in Hamburg; Vol. 1), p. 444, ISBN 3- 926174-31-5
  9. ↑ a b Cf. 'Letter from the Secret State Police - Hamburg State Police Headquarters - to the Chief Finance President, Asset Management Office from June 1, 1943', Hamburg State Archives, holdings Oberfinanzpräsident, Arb. Sign. 31/1 A, reproduced from: Four hundred years of Jews in Hamburg: an exhibition of the Museum of Hamburg History from November 8, 1991 to March 29, 1992 , Ulrich Bauche (Ed.), Dölling and Galitz, Hamburg 1991, (The History of the Jews in Hamburg; Vol. 1), p. 492, ISBN 3-926174-31-5
  10. ↑ Beate Meyer: "Deportations". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 55
  11. ↑ All figures 1811–1933 cf. Ina Lorenz, "The Jewish Community Hamburg 1860-1943: Empire - Weimar Republic - Nazi State", in: The history of the Jews in Hamburg: scientific contributions from the University of Hamburg to the exhibition "Four hundred years of Jews in Hamburg « , Arno Herzig with Saskia Rohde (ed.), Hamburg: Dölling and Galitz, 1991, (The History of the Jews in Hamburg 1590–1990; Vol. 2), pp. 77-100, here p. 80. ISBN 3-926174-25-0 .
  12. ↑ a b Gabriela Fenyes: "Jewish community after 1989". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 135
  13. ↑ a b Gabriela Fenyes: "Jewish community after 1989". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, pp. 136, 137 and 138
  14. ↑ a b Gabriela Fenyes: "Jewish community after 1989". In: Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 142
  15. ↑ Archive link ( Memento from December 19, 2008 in the Internet Archive )
  16. ↑ Archive link ( Memento from September 12, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  17. ↑ [1]
  18. ↑ http://www.jghh.org/cms/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=155&Itemid=15@1@2  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.jghh.org
  19. ↑ State rabbis without training? - Orthodox Judaism knows individual educational paths ( Memento from January 21, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) Jewish newspaper October 2008
  20. ↑ Das Jüdische Hamburg (Ed. Institute for the History of German Jews), Göttingen 2006, p. 138