Jews Raising Germans

 What part did 'gender' play in the context of Jewish identity and in the Jewish quest for integration into German society between 1871 and 1918?

 

The Jewish quest for integration into German society between 1871 and 1918 presented the Jewish community with several paradoxes, which they sought to reconcile through a shift in Jewish identities along gender lines. German society – particularly in the middle classes, which most German Jews fit into – revolved around constructed gender-separate spheres, prescribing the public world to men and the private, domestic sphere to women. This bourgeois concept shaped both Jewish and non-Jewish participation in society. Gender shaped changing Jewish identities and thus integration into German society between 1871 and 1918, by dictating the socially correct roles, values, and behaviours of Jewish men and women as prescribed by the bourgeois separate spheres of the non-Jewish world. Jewish women’s identity revolved primarily around their role as mothers, through which they shaped wider Jewish integration. Changing notions of Jewish masculinity in light of antisemitic rhetoric resulted in a restructuring of the male identity, redirecting the emphasis towards physical strength and public leadership to better reflect bourgeois ideas of German masculinity. The changes within Judaism are collectively referred to as Bildungsreligion, meaning simply the modernisation or relinquishing of some religious practices.[1] These two groups are not inclusive of all members of the Jewish communities in Germany during this time, all subsections of which deserve and demand their own specialised discussion of such a broad topic, but have repeatedly been identified by historians as the primary directors of Jewish integration.

Moritz Daniel Oppenheim, 'The Return of the Jewish Volunteer from War' (1833)

Jewish women were expected to adopt the roles of wife and mother, an assumption which consequently played a foundational role in determining the collective identity of Jewish women. As mothers of the future Jewish generation, women thus played a considerable role in shaping Jewish integration for the entire community. The responsibility of safeguarding their religion grew between 1871 and 1914 as Jewish integration into non-Jewish German society increased, coupled with rising fears of religious decline within the community.[2] Women were often side-lined if not entirely excluded from public practice in Judiasm, instead practicing their religion privately in the home. The exclusion of women from public religious practice reinforced the notion of gendered separate spheres. It also meant that the mother was the primary religious figure Jewish children encountered, and so the best placed to act as a religious teacher. One young Jewish man recalls that ‘religious holidays remained mere concepts to me…Yet, every Friday night, I saw my mother praying conscientiously and softly’.[3] Such an account was common amongst German Jews raised during this period, and offers contradictory interpretations. On one hand, it reflects the decline of traditional practices, with religious holidays being little more than ‘mere concepts’ to most. On the other hand however, we can see a strong continuation of some religious activity as well as evidence of the lasting influence of this on younger generations. The memories of several Jewish children of their mothers praying at home fostered an understanding of Judaism as a private religion, largely confined to the home. In this way, Jewish women shaped integration by increasingly drawing religion into the private sphere and out of her children’s public lives and personalities, encouraging these to instead be occupied by their “germanness”.
 

Raising “German” children became a defining role for Jewish women during this period, as Jews believed that this would shape the future German-Jewish [read: integrated] community. Raising “German” Jewish children refers to the idea of raising Jewish children in such a way as to instil the behaviours, attitudes, and values of the bourgeois, non-Jewish German children around them, hopefully enabling them to easily integrate into society with limited experience of the growing anti-Semitism around them.[4]  Bourgeois Jewish families often hired Christian house-staff, through which the children would learn Christian-based stories and prayers – usually religiously ambiguous – and adopt common symbols of the German bourgeoise, like Christmas trees.[5]  Being taught these things by someone from outside the family, like a maid or a teacher, Christianity was experienced by Jewish children as an irreligious part of public society, thus distinguishing it from the private practice of Judaism. This distinction was central to the “German-making” task of Jewish mothers, as it served to achieve their aim of facilitating integration while simultaneously safeguarding their religion. Furthermore, the conscious and intimate inclusion of non-Jewish figures in Jewish households highlights motherly efforts of fostering integration from an early age through exposure and familiarisation, while again reflecting another imitation of German bourgeois culture. The gender-defined role of Jewish women as mothers allowed them to shape integration by raising their children to have both a non-sectarian public identity which imitated those of the non-Jewish Germans around them, and a separate private religious identity – this mirrored wider changes in Judaism during this period.
 
Instances of infant-conversion offers us an insight into the more extreme efforts of Jewish mothers to raise integrated children, symbolising a prioritisation of integration over religious maintenance, which demands an exploration beyond the scope of this analysis. 73% of Jewish converts in Berlin during the 1870s were between the ages of 0 and five, coinciding with new waves of anti-Semitism sparked by European revolutions and the collapse of the Viennese Stock Exchange.[6] No mere coincidence, we can infer that parents hoped that conversion would make their children’s lives easier – acting as a bulwark against antisemitism.[7] The later popularisation of racial antisemitism however greatly undermined these well-intentioned efforts.[8]  Deborah Hertz argues that some Jews converted to ‘feel German on the inside…to feel entitled to their place in the dominant society’, an idea that is convincing from a protective, motherly perspective, concerned with their child facing antisemitism.[9] The concept has an endearing idealistic hue, emphasised by her open personal investment and emotional reactions to her findings, but stands in solid analytical thinking. Hertz’ work touches upon a deeper, and less discussed aspect of Jewish integration – the Jewish quest to feel German. Their efforts to integrate were not just driven by the desire to prove to non-Jewish Germans that they were German, but also to prove so to themselves. After experiencing decades of negative antisemitic rhetoric, these insecurities are hardly surprising.
 
Female Jewish interaction with the non-Jewish world around them played a considerable part in shaping integration, highlighting particularly the influence of class difference on Jewish integration. Urban middle class Jewish women, possessing the leisure time that rural, working-class women lacked, built relationships with many of the non-Jewish women around them, some even inviting each other to family weddings.[10]  Cross-religious celebrations in rural villages and the private mixing of Jews and non-Jews in the homes of urban intellectuals suggests successful cohabitation and a degree of integration across all social classes. Many women created strong friendships with non-Jewish women through their involvement in charitable organisations, as will be discussed shortly, but as Marion Kaplan points out the true test of integration is in the genuineness of these friendships.[11]  Wedding invitations between acquaintances could just have easily been motivated by business ambitions, or social politics. While Kaplan highlights a thought-provoking point, it is also a frustrating one. It is nearly impossible to decipher the genuineness of individual friendships other than through individual case studies, the findings of which can scarcely be presented as archetypal of all Jewish-Non-Jewish friendships. Ultimately, we can only speculate about the private relationships between Jewish and non-Jewish women, and while individual case studies offer an insight into the relations of individual Jewish women, Kaplan offers an analytical point with which historians in this field will continue to struggle. Nevertheless, friendships between Jewish and non-Jewish women demonstrates Jewish women as active agents of integration, in contrast to their passive role as mothers.
 
Many of these friendships were formed through activities dictated by their gender identity, such as the maternal expectation for charity and caring.[12] This manifested between 1871 and 1914 as a variety of Jewish women’s voluntary organisations, most focused on providing elements of social care and support, or campaigning for women’s rights.[13]  Womens organisations facilitated increasing interaction with non-Jewish women, with many Jewish women joining both mixed and exclusively Jewish-focused organisations. For those who participated in Jewish only organisations, integration was more limited than those who played leading roles in mixed organisations, demonstrating the varying extents of integration amongst the female Jewish community.[14]  During WW1, many of these organisations focused on supporting the war effort, bringing Jews and non-Jews together through shared experiences, hopes, and fears.[15]* These mixed organisations did foster several friendships, some going well beyond mere cooperation, thus implying a true, reciprocal friendship.[16]  What is more surprising than this is that there is not more evidence of this happening, highlighting the persistence of social distinctions between Jewish and non-Jewish society, even at the ‘historical highpoint’ of German-Jewish integration.[17]

***

The rise of the bourgeois middle class which occurred at the end of the nineteenth century and it’s defining feature of gendered separate spheres challenged previous notions of masculinity in Jewish culture, radically forcing Jewish men to reassess their identity in their quest for integration between 1871 and 1918.[18]  During the mid-nineteenth century, Samson Raphael Hirsch – the founder of Modern Orthodoxy – had praised femininity as the principal of the Jewish religion, reflecting contemporary ideals of a balanced masculinity, including a tender, caring character.[19]  The very same “soft” qualities which Hirsch had said made Jewish men stand out positively in society were quickly subverted by the rising tides of antisemitism and class definition, and were instead cited as Jewish ‘deficiencies’.[20]  This change in bourgeois mentality and the complex quest for Jewish integration helps explain the growing dissonance within Jewish communities at this time between “modern” and Orthodox Jews. The narrative constructed by Hirsch reflected traditional notions of Jewish male identity, but was now being used against Jewish men as a barrier to their integration. Thus, they were forced to imitate and adopt a new identity with two purposes: the first, being the construction of an identity which disproved antisemitic rhetoric by directly subverting Jewish norms. The second, was constructing an identity which mimicked that of respectable bourgeois German masculinity. Attempts at constructing this new identity shaped physical acts of male integration.
 
Male identity in Germany at this time, whether Jewish or non-Jewish, was largely defined by their physical health and ability to perform military service. A new wave of “scientific” racial antisemitism, popularised by characters like Wilhelm Marr, constructed Jewish men as biologically weak, effeminate, and inferior – physically incapable of being “German”, despite any efforts at emancipation.[21]  This postcard illustrates several pseudo-scientific antisemitic tropes Jewish men faced about their supposed biological inferiority, while simultaneously highlighting the ostracisation Jewish men faced in the German army.[22]  The significance of this divisive imagery can be further realised when viewed in light of the knowledge that until WW1 demanded it, it had been near impossible for Jews to become Prussian military officers.[23]  Significantly shorter than the uniformed soldiers leering at him, the ‘Little Jew’ (‘der kleine Cohn’) stands naked – the presumably German candidates visible through the window being notably fully clothed – his body decrepit and weak, his nose huge, and lacking the facial hair of the Germans around him, symbolic of masculinity. The casual antisemitism of this popular postcard reflects the commonplace acceptability with which the non-Jewish German society perceived antisemitism, while also highlighting a distinct German superiority complex.
 
The outbreak and course of WW1 reignited racial antisemitism, to both of which Jewish men reacted by rushing to join the military, hoping that their patriotic duty would help them bond with the non-Jewish Germans around them, while simultaneously proving their physical prowess.[24] The Jewish affliction of “crooked feet” – meaning flat feet, as can be seen in the postcard – made Jews, in Johann David Michaelis’ eyes, “worthless as soldiers” and thus unworthy of being true citizens, spending “more time in the military hospitals than in military service”.[25]  Such allegations were proven untrue by the results of the Jewish census of the army in 1916, sparked truly by the tides of war turning against Germany, but publicly justified by allegations of disproportionate numbers of Jewish soldiers shirking their duties.  The census in fact found that the ratio of Jews in the military to that of the total Jewish population was higher than that of non-Jews, perhaps explaining why the results were never publicly released.[26]  Rather than the shared experiences of war bringing Jews and non-Jews together, Jewish men found themselves discriminated against and ostracised from their units, suffering both the horrible realities of warfare and the rejection and hostilities of the non-Jewish men around them.[27]  Nevertheless, Jewish men still valued it as an act of integration worth suffering to obtain their ‘Germanness’. Performing military service served two purposes for the Jewish man pursuing integration into non-Jewish German society. The first of these was that they believed it would gain them the respect of the non-Jewish population around them, demonstrating a shared willingness to serve and sacrifice, as well as creating shared experiences. This was because of the socio-political requirement of national service as a term of citizenship, essentially casting anyone who has not performed military service as an outsider. The second purpose it served was in disproving the negative rhetoric’s of racial antisemitism and notions of the effeminate male Jew, by demonstrating their physical abilities as equal to those of the Germans around them.
 
Outside of the military, Jewish men further sought to disprove these negative biological arguments through the establishment of gymnastics leagues, which would compete and perform displays to prove their physical strength and capabilities. Even those who were not especially skilled physically were encouraged to participate, demonstrating the strength of their moral character through their attitude and enthusiasm.[28]  Such encouragement demonstrates a sense of comradery between Jewish men against the frequently solitary nature of integration. The emphasis of Jewish male identity on physical health during this period on was reflective of the bourgeois German constructs of masculinity, highlighting the importance of social class as well as gender in Jewish integration. These gymnastics groups also served a significant cultural purpose, restoring a ‘body lost in the past’.[29]  The political arguments of Jewish gymnasts both responded to and reflected on the antisemitic notion of degeneration, with Max Besser stating that the purpose of gymnastics and physical training is thus to ‘reverse these visible physical alterations’.[30]  Multi-pronged attempts to disprove antisemitic rhetoric suggests a self-consciousness of the Jewish community, similar to that highlighted earlier as one of the driving forces behind conversion.
 
As the primary public figures of the Jewish community, men dominated the discourse reinventing Jewish identity in pursuit of integration. Here we find a well-researched paradox, as Jews attempted to simultaneously become Germans and resist homogenization, their integration prevented by a distinct self-consciousness of their religious identity.[31]  Liberal Judaism grew because of the compromises and flexibility of male Jewish religious leaders, allowing most Jews to retain their faith in an individualistic way. The increasing privatisation of Judaism between 1870 and 1914 mirrored a wider trend of religious privatisation in Germany. With the privatisation of Judaism came a redefinition of Jewish identities through the reallocation of religious responsibility and its consequent marginalisation, as female-directed religious activity lacked the same respect as male.[32]  Jewish male identity underwent significant changes during this period, the construction of which shaped male acts of integration.

***

Gender played a significant role in shaping Jewish identity and the Jewish quest for integration into German society between 1871 and 1918. Both male and female Jewish identities changed to varying degrees during this period to reflect the gender identities of the bourgeois German class, but remained strictly divided by gender nevertheless. Women’s identity as mothers evolved during this time to take on the religious responsibilities dropped by their husbands, acting as a religious safeguard and teacher for their children. Their dual role as the primary “German-makers” of the Jewish community was significant in shaping Jewish integration into German society, as they were the ones responsible for instilling the younger generation with German bourgeois manners, attitudes, and beliefs. Thus, the female quest for integration privatised and maintained Jewish practice, and was enacted primarily as an indirect agent through their children, but directly through their involvement in social welfare. Conversely, male integration resulted in the decline of traditional Jewish practice, and the “re-invention” of modern Jewish identities. The antisemitic construction of biological Jewish inferiorities shaped male identities from both outside and within Jewish communities, as the self-conscious act of joining the military sought to disprove and challenge antisemitic rhetoric. Furthermore, doing so was also an active step towards integration for many men, who considered enlisting as a way to “earn” the right to German-ness. Evident in the Jewish quest for integration is a self-consciousness which fundamentally altered the identities of both Jewish men and women, forever marking the course of German Jewry.

 

 

Appendix 1

Antisemitic Postcard. Circa 1900s

 

Bibliography

Primary

Antisemitic Postcard (circa 1900s)

Judenkartei (Berlin: Evangelisches Zentralarchiv)

from Monika Richarz (ed.), Jüdisches Leben in Deutschland: Selbstzeugnisse zur Sozialgeschichte im Kaiserreich (Stuttgart: 1979)

Rohrer, Joseph, Versuch über die jüdischen Bewohner der oesterreichischen Monarchie (Vienna: 1804)

Schudt, Johann Jakob, Jüdische Merkwürdigkeiten (Frankfurt: S.T. Hocker, 1714-18)

 

 

Secondary

Baader, Benjamin Maria, ‘Jewish Difference and the Feminine Spirit of Judaism in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Germany’, in Baader, Gillerman, Lerner (eds),  Jewish Masculinities: German Jews, Gender, and History (Indiana University Press, 2012)

Baader, Benjamin Maria, Sharon Gillerman, & Paul Lerner, Jewish Masculinities: German Jews, Gender, and History (Indiana University Press, 2012)

Gillerman, Sharon, 'Germany: 1750-1945', Shalvi/Hyman Encyclopedia of Jewish Women (Jewish Women's Archive, December 1999)

Judd, Robin, ‘Moral, Clean Men of the Jewish Faith’, in Baader, Gillerman, Lerner (eds), Jewish Masculinities: German Jews, Gender, and History (Indiana University Press, 2012)

Hertz, Deborah, How Jews Became Germans: The History of Conversion and Assimilation in Berlin (London: Yale University Press, 2007)

Kaplan, Marion, 'Friendship on the Margins: Jewish Social Relations in Imperial Germany', Central European History, 34/1 (Cambridge University Press, 2001)

Kaplan, Marion, 'Redefining Judaism in Imperial Germany: Practices, Mentalities, and Community', Jewish Social Studies, 9/1 (Indiana University Press, Autumn 2002)

Kaplan, Marion, M. Kaplan & D. Moore (eds), Gender and Jewish History (Indiana University Press, 2010)

Lazarus, Moritz, 'Introduction', in Nahid Remy's, Das jüdische Weib (Leipzig: Gustav Fock, 1891)

Pulzer, Peter, 'The Return of Old Hatreds', in M. Meyer (ed.), German-Jewish History in Modern Times: Integration in Dispute 1871-1918 (Columbia University Press, 1997)

Reinharz, Jehuda, 'Jewish Nationalism and Jewish Identity in Central Europe', The Leo Baeck Institute Year Book, 37/1 (January 1992), pp. 147 - 167

Steer, Martina, ‘Nation, Religion, Gender: The Triple Challenge of Middle-Class German-Jewish Women in World War I’, Central European History, 48/2 (2015)

van Rahden, Till,  Juden und andere Breslauer: Die Beziehungen zwischen Juden, Protestanten und Katholiken in einer deutschen Großstadt von 1860 bis 1925 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000)

Wildmann, Daniel, ’Jewish Gymnasts and Their Corporeal Utopias in Imperial Germany’, in M. Brenner and G. Reuveni (eds), Emancipation through Muscles: Jews and Sports in Europe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006)

 

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[1] Marion Kaplan, 'Redefining Judaism in Imperial Germany: Practices, Mentalities, and Community', Jewish Social Studies, 9/1 (Indiana University Press: Autumn, 2002), p. 3.

[2] Kaplan, 'Redefining Judaism’.

[3] From Monika Richarz (ed.), Jüdisches Leben in Deutschland: Selbstzeugnisse zur Sozialgeschichte im Kaiserreich (Stuttgart: 1979), p.362.

[4] Sharon Gillerman, Germans into Jews. Remaking the Jewish Social Body in the Weimar Republic (Stanford: Stanford University Press 2009).

[5] Kaplan, ‘Redefining Judaism’.

[6] Judenkartei (Berlin: Evangelisches Zentralarchiv). ; Peter Pulzer, 'The Return of Old Hatreds', in M. Meyer (ed.), German-Jewish History in Modern Times: Integration in Dispute 1871-1918 (Columbia University Press, 1997), p. 198.

[7] Kaplan, 'Redefining Judaism’.

[8] Jehuda Reinharz, 'Jewish Nationalism and Jewish Identity in Central Europe', The Leo Baeck Institute Year Book, 37/1 (January 1992), p. 147.

[9] Deborah Hertz, How Jews Became Germans: The History of Conversion and Assimilation in Berlin (London: Yale University Press, 2007), p. 218.

[10] Marion Kaplan, 'Friendship on the Margins: Jewish Social Relations in Imperial Germany', Central European History, 34/1 (Cambridge University Press, 2001), p. 481.

[11] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, p. 482.

[12] Martina Steer, ‘Nation, Religion, Gender: The Triple Challenge of Middle-Class German-Jewish Women in World War I’, Central European History, 48/2 (2015), p. 184.

[13] Gillerman.

[14] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, p. 489.

[15] Gillerman. ; * The activities of Jewish women’s organisations during WW1 are deserving of a much greater investigation than the scope of this analysis allows, but is expertly explored in Gillerman’s work in the context of both gender and the quest for integration.

[16] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, p. 490.

[17] Till van Rahden, Juden und andere Breslauer: Die Beziehungen zwischen Juden, Protestanten und Katholiken in einer deutschen Großstadt von 1860 bis 1925 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2000), p. 132. ; Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, p. 500.

[18] Robin Judd, ‘Moral, Clean Men of the Jewish Faith’, in Baader, Gillerman, Lerner (eds), Jewish Masculinities: German Jews, Gender, and History (Indiana University Press, 2012), p. 73.

[19] Benjamin Maria Baader, ‘Jewish Difference and the Feminine Spirit of Judaism in Mid-Nineteenth-Century Germany’, in Baader, Gillerman, Lerner (eds),  Jewish Masculinities: German Jews, Gender, and History (Indiana University Press, 2012), pp. 50-51.

[20] Baader, ‘Jewish Difference’, p. 64.

[21] Baader, et al., Jewish Masculinities, p. 1.

[22] See appendix 1, Antisemitic Postcard, circa 1900s.

[23] Daniel Wildmann, ’Jewish Gymnasts and Their Corporeal Utopias in Imperial Germany’, in M. Brenner and G. Reuveni (eds), Emancipation through Muscles: Jews and Sports in Europe (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2006).

[24] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, pp. 485, 496, 498.

[25] Johann Jakob Schudt, Jüdische Merkwürdigkeiten (Frankfurt: S.T. Hocker, 1714-18). ; Moritz Lazarus, 'Introduction', in Nahid Remy's, Das jüdische Weib (Leipzig: Gustav Fock, 1891), pp. iii-vi. ; Joseph

 Rohrer, Versuch über die jüdischen Bewohner der oesterreichischen Monarchie (Vienna: 1804), pp. 25-26.

[26] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, p. 498.

[27] Martina Steer, ‘Nation, Religion, Gender: The Triple Challenge of Middle-Class German-Jewish Women in World War I’, Central European History, 48/2 (2015), p. 118.

[28] Kaplan, ‘Friendship on the Margins’, pp. 485, 496, 498.

[29] Wildmann

[30] Wildmann

[31] Marion Kaplan, in M. Kaplan & D. Moore (eds), Gender and Jewish History (Indiana University Press, 2010), p. 201.

[32] Kaplan, 'Redefining Judaism’, p. 5.