Lloyd P. Gartner, History of the Jews in Modern Times (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2001)


Chapter 3: A Rift Opening, 1720-1780

Study questions

1) How does Europe’s population increase from the mid-eighteenth century to the end of the nineteenth century compare to that of the Jews during the same time period?

2) Where was Jewish population increase the greatest? Ottoman Empire? Poland? German-speaking lands?

3) Why was the governing kahal often accused by their communities of abuse of power? Were steps undertaken to end the abuse?

4) What was an arrendator? Who are the “moralists” in Gartner’s history? And what wrongs did the moralists accuse the arrendators of committing?

5) Can you glean from Gartner’s text what exactly “Frankism” consisted of? Gartner states, on the one hand, that Frankism had no “associations outside Judaism” and, on the other, that it “rejected the Talmud and Jewish tradition.” What, therefore, might Frankism have exemplified?

6) Why did Gartner describe Hasidism as a new sect within Judaism which spoke more to the less educated poor than it did to the intellectual elite?

7) Can any of the factors which motivated the rebellion of Hasidism be described as similar to those which had motivated the earlier Protestants?

8) What most characterized the Haskalah, the “Jewish Enlightenment”? Does Gartner offer any clues or speculations as to why Haskalah became most prominent in Berlin rather than, say, London or Cracow?

9) What were the attitudes of the various Enlightenment thinkers Gartner cites towards the Jews? How does Gartner’s opinion of Voltaire differ from that of fellow historian Peter Gay? (The latter question draws your attention to the value of footnotes; see page bottom of page 85!)

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