Hungarian Jew or Jewish Hungarian? When electing a Jewish congress in the mid-1800s, Hungary’s Jews couldn’t decide

Though Jews campaigned long and hard for equality in their many countries of dispersion, the privilege proved to be a mixed blessing. In Europe, the price of emancipation was total cultural integration, exchanging Yiddish and other Jewish dialects for the national language, and involving the government in Jewish education and communal matters. The Hirschler Collection, in the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, opens a fascinating window onto how Hungarian Jewry split over integration issues.

The Jewish Emancipation Law was approved in the Hungarian Parliament in 1867. Predictably, it was welcomed by Jews espousing religious reform, while traditionalists were less enthusiastic. Which of these camps prevailed?

 

The Jewish Congress

On February 16, 1868, Hungarian minister of education and religion Baron József Eötvös called for a committee of Jewish leaders to discuss the formation of an autonomous Jewish congress that would regulate the Jewish community and represent it to the Hungarian government. Delegates were to be chosen by the community, not imposed on it from above, as in France and some German states. But since it was mostly members of the Jewish Neolog movement who responded to Eötvös’ call, these progressives dominated the committee, eclipsing the Orthodox.

As the congress wasn’t expected to debate theological questions, rabbis were at first excluded from its ranks. Furthermore, delegates had to be fluent in German or Hungarian, whereas most Orthodox Jews spoke only Yiddish and Hebrew. These measures raised a storm, after which Eötvös allowed rabbis (Neolog as well as Orthodox) to vote and be elected to the congress.

Though the baron’s intentions may have been perfectly innocent, those of his adviser, ophthalmologist Ignác Hirschler, certainly weren’t. President of the Pest (later Budapest) Neolog congregation, Hirschler was a driving force behind Jewish emancipation. He probably chose the initial committee members, seeking to minimize Orthodox influence. Hirschler’s personal archive – consisting mainly of correspondence dating from 1868 and early 1869, in German and Hungarian – contains extensive information regarding the congress and Hungary’s Neolog community. The letters, addressed to Hirschler and his colleagues in Pest, come from Jewish leaders and activists all over historic Hungary and often include copies of his replies.