Magnus Weinberg

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Magnus Weinberg (born May 13, 1867 in Schenklengsfeld ; died February 12, 1943 in the Theresienstadt ghetto ) was an Orthodox rabbi and author of several books on the history of the Jews in the Upper Palatinate .

Childhood and youth

Magnus Weinberg was born as the eighth child of the Hirsch and Rosalie Weinberg family. His father was a businessman. His mother died giving birth to their tenth child when Magnus was less than three years old. Of these ten children, six died before they were three years old. A year after the death of his first wife, Magnus' father married his late wife's sister, who had five more children.

Magnus Weinberg attended the Schenklengsfeld Jewish elementary school until he was ten. From 1877 to 1887 he studied at the humanistic Royal High School in Fulda , which he graduated from high school in 1887. During these years he received religious training from the Fulda Rabbi Michael Cahn. Even as a child, Magnus Weinberg wanted to become a rabbi, as an entry in the student directory shows.

Studies and PhD

From March 1887 Weinberg was preparing in Halberstadt to study at the orthodox rabbinical seminary in Berlin, which at that time was headed by Esriel Hildesheimer . Magnus Weinberg studied there from October 1887 to 1892. His teachers included Adolph Barth, Abraham Berliner , Meir Hildesheimer and David Hoffmann . At the same time, he studied philosophy, psychology, education and ethics as well as Chaldean and Syrian language and literature at the Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin . He completed this course in 1890.

In 1893 Weinberg received his doctorate from the Friedrichs-Universität Halle-Wittenberg with a thesis on the subject of the story of Joseph. Allegedly written by Basil the Great from Casarea , based on a Syrian manuscript from the Berlin Royal Library .

Employment

Magnus Weinberg had acquired a strictly orthodox attitude through his studies at the orthodox Berlin rabbinical seminary and probably also from personal inclination, which was not prepared to compromise. This attitude was to cause him many difficulties throughout his rabbinical activity.

Sulzbuerg

In 1895 Magnus Weinberg succeeded Mayer Löwenmayer, who had died in February 1895, as district rabbi of Sulzbürg. He held this office until 1935. In 1896 he fundamentally revised the synagogue regulations from 1868. As a rabbi, he also looked after the Jewish community in Neumarkt . He took up residence in Sulzbuerg.

The rafter Rabbi Israel Wittelshöfer died in 1896. In 1896, Weinberg applied for a job as Rabbi von Sulzbach and Floß. However, a job did not come about because Weinberg insisted on removing the harmonium in the Sulzbach synagogue, which the Sulzbach Jews refused to accept. Thereupon the Bayreuth Rabbi Salomon Kusznitzky took over the care of the Sulzbach Jews and the Jewish communities of Floß und Weiden.

Rabbi Weinberg did not appear for the inauguration of the Amberg synagogue in 1896 because a harmonium was installed in this newly built synagogue. Nonetheless, Amberg and Cham employed Magnus Weinberg as rabbis. The government of the Upper Palatinate protested because they wanted to keep the Floßer rabbinate and relocate it to Amberg. In the end, Weinberg took care of Amberg.

Neumarkt

In 1910, Weinberg and his family moved from Sulzbürg to Neumarkt. The seat of the Sulzbürg district rabbinate was moved to Neumarkt in 1911. It was now called the District Rabbinate Sulzbürg-Neumarkt.

After the outbreak of the First World War , Magnus Weinberg turned in September 1914 to the deputy general command of the III. Bavarian Army Corps . He asked to be allowed to give pastoral care to the French prisoners of war of the Jewish faith and to hold services in the prison camp. This request was granted to him. From 1914 to March 1918, Weinberg acted as rabbi for the Jewish prisoners of war. From 1915 these came mostly from Russia. He not only held services for the prisoners of war, but also arranged for them tefillin , tallit , siddurim as well as matzo and haggadot for Passover .

From 1920 Magnus Weinberg headed the archive of the historical association for Neumarkt and the surrounding area. He completed the finding aid that had already been started. Since the association's archive with many valuable historical documents burned in the Neumarkt town hall in April 1945, its records bear witness to what was lost. He resigned from his post in 1926 because he was supposed to record the estate of Dietrich Eckart , who died in 1923, when recording current new additions . He was still organizing the handwritten poems, but the pronounced anti-Semitic letters were no longer acceptable to him.

regensburg

In 1931 the Sulzbürg-Neumarkt rabbinate was merged with the Regensburg district rabbinate . The Regensburg Rabbi Harry Levi resigned from office. His successor was Magnus Weinberg. The Weinberg family moved to Regensburg in 1931. At that time, Regensburg was the largest Jewish community in the Upper Palatinate with 450 members.

In Regensburg the difficulties for Magnus Weinberg increased from all sides. On the one hand, the Regensburg Jewish community was split into an orthodox and a liberal camp, and in 1932 the liberal camp took over the presidency of the community. On the other hand, the persecution of the Jews by the National Socialists began in 1933 .

Magnus Weinberg, his son Joseph, and 100 other members of his ward were imprisoned for one day on March 30, 1933. This was followed by a boycott of Jewish businesses and the dismissal of Jews from public institutions. Rabbi Weinberg had to take care of imprisoned members of his community. He tried to help Jews in need. 108 parishioners left the city of Regensburg by the end of 1933.

There were also serious disputes between Weinberg and the liberal community leadership. In April 1934, Weinberg refused to host a concert of secular music in the synagogue. In 1935 he could no longer prevent the synagogue's prayer room from being converted into a gymnasium for the Israelite Gymnastics and Sports Association. From the mikveh showers were made for the members of the association. The prayer room was moved to a narrow, dark room under the roof.

Wurzburg

At the age of 68, Magnus Weinberg retired on December 31, 1935. He moved with his wife to their hometown Würzburg, where there were still 2,200 Jews at that time .

During the November pogroms on the night of November 9th to 10th, 1938, the synagogue and the teachers' college in Würzburg were devastated and the incumbent rabbi Siegmund Hannover was deported to the Dachau and Buchenwald concentration camps together with many other Jews . Magnus Weinberg, who lived very secluded with his wife and sister, remained unmolested. After his release from the concentration camp, Rabbi Siegmund Hannover was forced to leave Germany.

So now Magnus Weinberg had to take over the rabbi post in Würzburg. He held out at this post until September 22, 1942. On that day the Jewish community of Würzburg officially ceased to exist.

family

Magnus Weinberg married Judith Bamberger in April 1898. Judith Bamberger was the daughter of the Würzburg rabbi Nathan Bamberger . The couple had five children.

The Gestapo personnel files show that Weinberg's post and telephone calls have been monitored since 1937. At that time, the Weinbergs' five children were already living abroad. Three children had fled to England. Weinberg's son Joseph lived in Brussels and his daughter Rosalie with her family in Rotterdam. In 1940 Magnus Weinberg tried in vain to emigrate to Palestine . At the beginning of 1942, the 74-year-old Weinberg with his wife and sister and all Jews who remained in Würzburg were relocated to so-called Jewish houses .

On September 23, 1942, the Weinbergs and 562 Würzburg Jews were deported to the Theresienstadt ghetto. Weinberg's wife Judith died on December 28, 1942 in Theresienstadt. Magnus Weinberg died on February 12, 1943 in Theresienstadt. Weinberg's son Joseph was shot by the Nazis in Belgium in April 1943 while he was being transported to Auschwitz . Weinberg's daughter Rosalie had emigrated with her family to the Netherlands and became a victim of the Holocaust after the German occupation of the country : she, her husband and two of her children died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp . Weinberg's sister Zerline Eppstein and his half-brother Hermann Weinberg also died in Theresienstadt.

Works

Magnus Weinberg's work on the history of the Jews in the Upper Palatinate is still of fundamental importance today.

On the history of the Jews in the Upper Palatinate

Memory books

Various notes

  • Jewish prisoner pastoral care in the Grafenwoehr camp in Deutsche Israelitische Zeitung of July 29, 1915, pp. 17-19, of December 30, 1915, pp. 10f
  • The Sulzbach wall calendar for the year of creation 5483 (1722/23) , 1926, self-published
  • War devotion for Jewish women and girls. A supplement to all women's devotional books (Techinot books) , Neumarkt, 1914
  • The convert Friedrich Christian Christhold / Magnus Weinberg , In: Monthly for the history and science of Judaism (1.1851 / 52 - 17.1868; NF 1 = 18.1869 - 14 = 31.1882; 32.1883 - 36.1887; NF = [3.F.] 1 = 37.1893 - 47 = 83.1939; published with it.) Issue 1 (1906), pp. 94-99, Berlin: Jüd. Kulturbund in Dtschl., Abt. Verl., 1.1851 / 52 - 17.1868; NF 1 = 18.1869-14 = 31.1882; 32.1883-36.1887; NF = [3rd F.] 1 = 37.1893-47 = 83.1939; so that adjusted, online: http://sammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/cm/periodical/titleinfo/2846114
  • A newspaper duck from 1790 and its consequences / Magnus Weinberg , In: Monthly magazine for the history and science of Judaism (1.1851 / 52 - 17.1868; NF 1 = 18.1869 - 14 = 31.1882; 32.1883 - 36.1887; NF = [3.F.] 1 = 37.1893 - 47 = 83.1939; thus published.) 11-12 (1904-11), pp. 731-750, Berlin: Jüd. Kulturbund in Dtschl., Abt. Verl., 1.1851 / 52 - 17.1868; NF 1 = 18.1869-14 = 31.1882; 32.1883-36.1887; NF = [3rd F.] 1 = 37.1893-47 = 83.1939; so that adjusted, online: http://sammlungen.ub.uni-frankfurt.de/cm/periodical/titleinfo/2885799

Religious studies discussions

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r Aubrey Pomerance: Rabbi Magnus Weinberg, chronicler of Jewish life in the Upper Palatinate in Michael Brenner (ed.), Renate Höpfinger (ed.): Die Juden in der Oberpfalz , Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag (December 1, 2008), ISBN 978-3-486-58678-7 , pp. 139–157
  2. ↑ http://www.stolpersteine-wuerzburg.de/wer_opfer_lang.php?quelle=wer_opfer.php&opferid=104
  3. ↑ http://www.alemannia-judaica.de/schenklengsfeld_synagoge.htm
  4. ↑ http://www.xn--jdische-gemeinden-22b.de/index.php/gemeinden/st/1736-schenklengsfeld-hessen
  5. ↑ http://www.stolpersteine-wuerzburg.de/wer_opfer_lang.php?quelle=wer_opfer.php&opferid=104
  6. ^ Karl Ried: Neumarkt in the Upper Palatinate. A source-like history of the city of Neumarkt . Neumarkt 1960, p. 478 .
  7. ^ Walter Steiner: Hundred Years of Historical Association for Neumarkt and the surrounding area. A review, in: 100 Years of the Historical Association for Neumarkt OPf. and surroundings 1904-2004. A balance sheet . Ed .: Historical Association for Neumarkt and the surrounding area. Neumarkt idOPf. 2004, p. 19 .
  8. ↑ Hans Meier: Neumarkt city stories. Collected essays . Ed .: Historical Association for Neumarkt and the Surrounding Area (=  Neumarkter Historical Contributions . Volume 3 ). Berching / Pollanten 2000, p. 24 f .
  9. ↑ http://www.alemannia-judaica.de/schenklengsfeld_synagoge.htm
  10. ↑ http://www.stolpersteine-wuerzburg.de/wer_opfer_lang.php?quelle=wer_opfer.php&opferid=104
personal data
SURNAME Weinberg, Magnus
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Vineyard, Magnus Menachem
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German rabbi and local researcher
DATE OF BIRTH May 13, 1867
PLACE OF BIRTH Schenklengsfeld
DATE OF DEATH February 12, 1943
Place of death Theresienstadt concentration camp