Center or Frontier: Hungary and Its Jews, Between East and West", Journal of Levantine Studies, vol. 1, Summer 2011, pp. 67-91 (original) (raw)
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Both Terms " East " and " West " are used very often in the historical research of Jewish communities in Europe. The division between " East " and " West " in Jewish historiography had to do in the past with the identification of each of the two sides with various other terms and concepts. " West " was identified mostly with progress and economic development as well as with deep integration of the Jews in their respective European homelands, their languages, cultures and societies. Western Jews (Westjuden) were presented first and foremost by their own speakers as important contributors to the economy and culture of their various homelands and sometimes even to the whole world – a model of success that the Eastern Jews (Ostjuden) wanted so much to imitate. A more critical profile of the western Jews, as mostly Jewish Orthodox and Zionists speakers presented it, described them as " assimilating " – Jews who gave up on their roots and their intimate Jewish Identity for the sake of the profits of integration. This " deal " was also presented, before but mostly after the Holocaust, as a false bargain. Eastern Europe was identified, on the other hand, with political, economic and social backwardness. Its Jews, it was often said, never really achieved full equality and stayed in the Ghetto. They were not connected to their countries' language and culture and did not really identify with its people. More emphatic historians and thinkers, primarily but not exclusively from eastern European origin, tended to identify the " East " with Jewish authenticity which was not damaged by the process of modernity, as well as with collective loyalty to traditional or national values in contradiction to the western Jews who gave up these values. The Jewish historiography of the last decades, which gradually became free from ideological considerations, dissociated itself from the polarity between East and West for the sake of a much more complicated picture. The tendency for empiric, detailed and impartial historical research, the aspiration to understand each of the historical experiences of the various European Jewish communities with its uniqueness and diversity as well as the closer contacts with the general non-Jewish historiography of these countries and with the social sciences, contributed to the undermining of the " East – West " dichotomy. 1 In this context, the tendency to integrate the research of the Jewish history in the various countries with a comparative perspective emerged, which will contribute to the understanding of the whole picture. Some used the comparisons in order to emphasize the differences and the uniqueness of each process – as did Todd Endelman with the description of English Jewish history as based on circumstances and processes which differed in their essence from those which characterized the German Jewry. 2 David Sorkin, who also avoided the tendency to This article is a slightly updated version of the Hebrew original which appeared in: in: Raya Cohen (ed.), European Jews and Jewish Europeans between the Two World Wars, Tel Aviv, 2004, pp. 69-98
From Yellow Star to Red Star: Anti-Semitism, Anti-Communism, and the Jews of Hungary (PoLAR, 1995)
Popular Hungarian myths of the Jew as "Other" have proved to be both durable and flexible. Hungarians of Jewish background are still culturally constructed as foreigners in Hungary, despite their historical efforts to assimilate—e.g., through compliance with linguistic citizenship requirements in the eighteenth century—and their self-censorship of Jewish identity, whether in religious or ethnic form, in the years since World War II. Pre-war constructions of the Jew as capitalist—which were of diminished utility during the communist era, when Jewishness was linked with communism itself—have resurfaced with the transition to a market economy. The flexibility of these constructions has served to maintain not only anti-Semitism in Hungarian popular discourse, but of Jewishness itself as an element of identity within Hungarian society, an identity that is seen as being mutually exclusive in relation to Hungarian-ness. Contemporary ethnonationalist popular discourse thus publicly legitimizes anti-Semitism. In it, Hungarian-ness is linked to a myth of the rural peasantry which, in the context of the borders drawn after World War II, encompasses ethnic Hungarians beyond the physical borders of the nation. Jewishness, on the other hand, is linked to urbanism, specifically to Budapest, a national space that in the context of Jewishness is nonetheless foreign.
Religion Culture Society 5 , 2018
The study examined the question of veneration of the king, confessionalization and state patriotism in the Jewish denominational press before 1944 through the example of the attitude towards the ruler and the authorities of the Jewish communities interpreting themselves in the historical life-world of the diaspora. The life-worlds of the Monarchy experienced on a denominational basis fundamentally determined the experiences, possibilities for action, interpretations, discourse tradition and perspectives of their members. In the case of the Jews the ways in which denominational discourse traditions were shaped and the ways of relating to the broader social environment were influenced by the traditions of Judaism, the possibilities and limitations of the changing society, and by the appearance of modern ideals of nation.
Antisemitism Contested. The Emergence, Meanings and Uses of a Hungarian Key Concept
Antisemitism has emerged as a key concept of the Hungarian sociopolitical vocabulary during the last decades when it has been chiefly employed by its critics. The paper lists four main reasons that are in turn historical, transnational, intellectual and political behind the much increased importance of this concept. Through the methods of conceptual history, it subsequently aims to show that the meaning of antisemitism has undergone significant changes since the fall of the communist regime. The three most important semantic shifts identified are its moralization, extension and politicization. While moralization is meant to indicate the complete unacceptability of antisemitism, its extended conception tends to depict it as a most complex and dangerous form of prejudice. Both the moralized and extended conception of antisemitism was also politically employed by Hungarian left liberals to contest the legitimacy of the conservative rightist forces. The latter have in turn aimed to redefine antisemitism as a political as much as a social or cultural issue, thereby contributing to its further politicization. More recent years have also brought about the visible revival of antisemitism -in spite of the concept having been recurrently and critically used in public discussions of recent decades.
THE POLITICS OF JEWISH ORTHODOXY: THE CASE OF HUNGARY 1868–1918
Modern Judaism, 2016
In its early days at the turn of the nineteenth century, Jewish Orthodoxy (henceforth: Orthodoxy) was no more than an abstract notion shared by a few European rabbis who dreaded the consequences of modern values, opposed the idea that Jewish children should be taught secular subjects and resisted the introduction of religious reforms. Only a century later, at the beginning of the twentieth century, were two global Orthodox organizations—Ha-Mizrahi and Agudath Israel—established. These were fully-fledged political movements, one of which operated within the frame of the Zionist movement, while the other, although willing to cooperate with the Zionist leadership, never became a part of it. While the link between religion and politics has occupied academia worldwide, the history of the relations between Orthodoxy and politics has gained far less attention. Most available studies address the historical processes and events that occurred after the establishment of the two major Orthodox movements, i.e. during the twentieth and the twenty-first centuries. Only a handful of studies has examined the early stages of the evolution of Orthodoxy’s political forms, and even less attention has been paid to Orthodoxy’s inner politics. Although this article deals with occurrences that took place more than a century ago, many of the political and social issues it discusses are as relevant to Orthodoxy today as they were back then.
Jewish Lives Under Communism. New Perspectives, 2022
, Hungarian historian Miklós Szabó discussed the problem of prejudice and antisemitism in an interview published on the pages of Hírmondó, the Hungarian samizdat-an illegal under ground journal opposed to the socialist regime. He opined that Hungarian society should react to the so-called Jewish issue in two ways: first, it should not discriminate in any way against those who are or want to be assimilated; second, it has to make it pos si ble for Jews to express their Jewish identity if they wish to do so.1 Szabó correctly noticed that there had been significant changes in the self-definition of Hungary's Jews by the late 1960s. But what exactly did these new Jewish identities encompass, and how should Hungarian society put Szabó's ideas into practice? My study maps the discourses surrounding this shift in identity among Hungary's Jews, the largest Jewish community in East Central Eu rope after the Shoah. After two postwar emigration waves-in 1945-1948 and after the failed revolution of 1956-the Hungarian Jewish Community numbered more than 100,000 people,2 even though the majority were highly assimilated. I argue that the dif erent responses to the "Jewish Question" from among this still sizable Jewish population were not only connected to prob lems of minority politics but were also indicative of key questions about the nature of the future Hungarian democracy and the dif er ent groups within the then-forming Hungarian opposition and proto-parties. Thus, the arguments put forward by the under ground Jewish formations discussed in this chapter engaged in debate not only with the socialist regime but also with its opposition. The "Jewish Question" thus became deeply embedded in the broader structural and ideological po liti cal issues of Hungary.