Jews in Bamberg 1633–1802/03

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Jews in Bamberg (1633–1802 / 03). The living conditions and scope of action of an urban minority is a monograph by the German historian Michaela Schmölz-Häberlein . The work deals with the living conditions and scope of action of the urban minority of Jews. The interreligious study was published in 2014 in the series Judentum-Christianentum-Islam and in the city ​​archive in Bamberg . The present study on the history of the Jewish minority in the city of Bamberg is the first comprehensive account of Christian-Jewish coexistence from the Thirty Years War to the end of the Old Reich, since Rabbi Adolf Eckstein wrote the work History of the Jews in the former Principality of Bamberg in 1898 .

Cognitive interest

The local historical study is intended to provide a comprehensive representation of Christian-Jewish coexistence in Bamberg during the Thirty Years War up to the end of the Old Reich (p. 11). There has been evidence of a continuous Jewish presence in the community since 1633, which did not end until the National Socialist era . With her work, the author would like to close the gaps about the development of the Jews in Bamberg. In doing so, she worked out the close relationships between Jewish and Christian worlds (p. 16). The work is divided into the subject areas of demographic, economic, social and cultural development. This is intended to provide a differentiated picture of the history of Bamberg's Jews in the 17th and 18th centuries (p. 18).

In the last few decades numerous general accounts and research overviews of the life of Jews in Germany have been created. Little attention was paid to the history of the Franconian Jews, although the largest, economically and culturally most important southern German Jewish communities existed in this region. With her investigation, Schmölz-Häberlein wanted to close the gaps in research. It was important to her not to read Jewish history of the 17th and 18th centuries through the retrospective glasses of the Shoah. Anti-Jewish prejudices and discrimination are not ignored , but urbanity and autonomy of Bamberg's Jewish community are also emphasized.

For her work, Schmölz-Häberlein used the city's series of invoices in the city archive, government files and protocols from the Bamberg Monastery (holdings of the secret chancellery) in the Bamberg State Archives and the collections of the Bamberg Historical Association (p. 17).

content

The work deals with two central topics: with the development of Jewish life in Bamberg since the resettlement around 1633 on the one hand and the resulting conflicts on the other. After 1633, the Bamberg community recorded an increasing number of Jewish households. Associated with this were the emergence of institutions of Jewish self-government, the anchoring of Jews in urban economic life and the growth of a rich scholarly culture. The close coexistence of Christians and Jews in the 17th century was, however, associated with conflicts, which manifested themselves in protests , riots and demands for eviction. The authorities burdened the Jewish population with special taxes, legal disadvantages and social discrimination. During the Thirty Years' War the number of Jews decreased and increased again between 1650 and 1800. Around 1800 there were around 450 Jews living in Bamberg (p. 18). Due to the growing Jewish population, numerous new communities developed, which were equipped with their own synagogues, mikvehs, rabbis and rabbinical courts.

The work is divided into ten chapters and deals with the development of the Jewish community, the legal status of the Bamberg Jews, their self-governing organs, the Jewish court factors, their working life, central religious customs of the family and the life cycle, the coexistence between Jews and Christians in the field of tension of coexistence and conflict and finally the phenomenon of conversion .

Effect and reception

André Griemert praised the work as an extensive contribution to research into Bamberg's local and regional history - and, in connection with it, the local Bamberg identity. He divides his review largely into the phases of Jewish life in Bamberg introduced by Schmölz-Häberlein: After the resettlement (1633-1680) the personnel and organizational foundations were created. The years from 1680 to 1740 are presented as the real heyday of Bamberg's Jews. The third phase (1740-1803) was characterized by stagnation, growing competition with Christian merchants, loss of autonomy and increasing internal conflicts in the course of the Enlightenment. Griemert said that the study offered overall “a very good and at the same time deep insight into the living conditions of the Bamberg Jews. The work of Schmölz-Häberlein will be of central importance as a basis for further studies on this topic, as it offers a broad insight into the local sources. ”At the same time, he complained that the author of her concern to write a Jewish history of Bamberg apart from the history of persecution, on the other hand it was not successful: “The conservative approach to the source material indicated above can at best outline the scope for action by the Bamberg Jews. At this point, it would have been more hermeneutical to sound out the scope for action via the argumentation strategies of the Jews on site, for example in local court proceedings or in official contacts, and to compare this with the reactions of the respective counterpart. Overall, contacts between Jews and Bamberg's citizens emerge at best like a woodcut, which may also be due to the fact that recent central publications on this topic have been ignored. ”As a local study close to the source, the book would and will provide a wealth of interesting observations offer central points of contact for comparative work.

In his review of the book, Friedrich Battenberg emphasized that the author in the study deliberately set herself apart from older research perspectives in which poverty, marginalized group existence, persecution and repression are in the foreground and the individual contribution of the Jewish community with its urban structure is neglected. Schmölz-Häberlein rejects the one-dimensionally constructed story of suffering and would like to work out the relationship between Jewish and Christian worlds in detail. The study is more traditional, with a conservative approach to the source material. Despite the gaps in research, she succeeded in conveying a differentiated picture of the history of the Jews in the city of Bamberg.

output

  • Jews in Bamberg (1633–1802 / 03). Living conditions and scope for action of an urban minority. (= Judaism - Christianity - Islam. Interreligious Studies 11 ; also publications of the Bamberg City Archives, Vol. 18 ), Ergon-Verlag, Würzburg 2014, ISBN 978-3-95650-019-0 .

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c André Griemert: SEHEPUNKTE - Review of: Jews in Bamberg (1633-1802 / 03) - Issue 16 (2016), No. 1. Accessed on July 9, 2019 .
  2. ^ A b Friedrich Battenberg, Review: Jews in Bamberg 1633-1802 / 03 " In: Historische Zeitschrift. 2014.