Jewish Emancipation as a Compromise. In The Creation of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy: A Hungarian Perspective, edited by Gábor Gyáni. New York – London: Routledge, 2022, 229–256. (original) (raw)

The Compromise had, among other consequences, the passage of the law granting Jews equal rights with the Hungary’s Christian habitants. Miklós Konrád’s article endeavors to answer the question whether by this time Hungarian political and cultural elites and Jewish intellectuals had reached some kind of agreement regarding the expectations Jews should meet before – or after – being granted equal rights. Konrád tracks the dynamics of Hungarian expectations and Jewish reactions from the early 1840s to 1867. He demonstrates that from the beginning of the emancipation debates, the fundamental expectation set for Jews was that they adopt Hungarian language and declare themselves “Magyars” to strengthen the Hungarian element at the expense of the nationalities. Integrationist Jews fully accepted this condition. However, as far as the most debated issue was concerned, that is the radical reform of Jewish religion, the two sides never reached an agreement. By 1867, Hungarian liberal elite had resigned itself to the fact that with the exception of a tiny minority, Jews would not bargain their religion. Yet in this way an essential disagreement lingered on concerning the degree of the Jews’ acceptable otherness – since this was precisely what the issue of religious reform was about.