124-847: Bronstein is a Russian-Jewish surname. People include: Lev Davidovich Bronstein, birth name of Leon Trotsky (1879–1940), Russian Marxist revolutionary and politician David Bronstein (1924–2006), Soviet chess Grandmaster Hila Bronstein (born 1983), German singer, known as a member of Bro'Sis Ilya Nikolaevich Bronstein (1903–1976), Russian applied mathematician Martin Bronstein (born 1935), Canadian actor Matvei Bronstein (1906–1938), Soviet theoretical physicist Michael Bronstein (born 1980), Russian-Israeli computer scientist Luis Marcos Bronstein (1946–2014), Argentine chess master Olga Kameneva (née Bronstein) (1881–1941), sister of Leon Trotsky Phil Bronstein (born 1950), editor of
248-404: A Berakah is said also at evil tidings. Hence, although the experience of God is like none other, the occasions for experiencing Him, for having a consciousness of Him, are manifold, even if we consider only those that call for Berakot. Whereas Jewish philosophers often debate whether God is immanent or transcendent , and whether people have free will or their lives are determined, halakha
372-704: A "renaissance" in the Jewish community inside Russia since the beginning of the 21st century; however, the Russian Jewish population has experienced precipitous decline since the dissolution of the USSR which continues to this day, although it is still among the largest in Europe . The presence of Jewish people in the European part of Russia can be traced to the 7th–14th centuries CE. In the 11th and 12th centuries,
496-468: A Russian-speaking member of a Jewish community to be named to act as an intermediary between his community and the Imperial government to perform certain civil duties, such as registering births, marriages, and divorces. This position came to be known as the crown rabbi although they were not always rabbis and often were not respected by members of their own communities because their main job qualification
620-615: A centralized authority that would dictate an exact religious dogma. Because of this, many different variations on the basic beliefs are considered within the scope of Judaism. Even so, all Jewish religious movements are, to a greater or lesser extent, based on the principles of the Hebrew Bible or various commentaries such as the Talmud and Midrash . Judaism also universally recognizes the Biblical Covenant between God and
744-813: A convert to Christianity, the attorney Ossip Pergament ( Odessa ). The two Jewish members of the Third Duma were the Judge Leopold Nikolayevich (or Lazar) Nisselovich ( Courland province, Kadet) and Naftali Markovich Friedman ( Kaunas province, Kadet). Ossip Pergament was reelected and died before the end of his mandate. Friedman was the only one reelected to the Fourth Duma in 1912, joined by two new deputies, Meer Bomash , and Dr. Ezekiel Gurevich . Many Jews were prominent in Russian revolutionary parties. The idea of overthrowing
868-588: A higher rate of immigration to Israel than any other country. Russia's Jewish population is still the third biggest in Europe, after France and United Kingdom. In November 2012, the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center , one of the world's biggest museums of Jewish history, opened in Moscow. Jews have been present in contemporary Armenia and Georgia since the Babylonian captivity . Records exist from
992-718: A large majority emigrated to the United States, some turned to Zionism. In 1882, members of Bilu and Hovevei Zion made what came to be known the First Aliyah to Palestine , then a part of the Ottoman Empire . The Tsarist government sporadically encouraged Jewish emigration. In 1890, it approved the establishment of "The Society for the Support of Jewish Farmers and Artisans in Syria and Palestine " (known as
1116-686: A low Jewish population, countries just to its west had rapidly growing Jewish populations, as waves of anti-Jewish pogroms and expulsions from the countries of Western Europe marked the last centuries of the Middle Ages , a sizable portion of the Jewish populations there moved to the more tolerant countries of Central and Eastern Europe, as well as the Middle East. Expelled en masse from England, France, Spain and most other Western European countries at various times, and persecuted in Germany in
1240-464: A means of experiencing God". Reflecting on the contribution of the Amoraim and Tanaim to contemporary Judaism, Professor Jacob Neusner observed: The rabbi's logical and rational inquiry is not mere logic-chopping. It is a most serious and substantive effort to locate in trivialities the fundamental principles of the revealed will of God to guide and sanctify the most specific and concrete actions in
1364-580: A means to learn the contents of God's revelation, but an end in itself. According to the Talmud: These are the things for which a person enjoys the dividends in this world while the principal remains for the person to enjoy in the world to come; they are: honoring parents, loving deeds of kindness, and making peace between one person and another. But the study of the Torah is equal to them all. (Talmud Shabbat 127a). In Judaism, "the study of Torah can be
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#17327694098131488-523: A parallel oral tradition, illustrating the assumption that the reader is already familiar with the details from other, i.e., oral, sources. Halakha , the rabbinic Jewish way of life, then, is based on a combined reading of the Torah, and the oral tradition—the Mishnah, the halakhic Midrash, the Talmud and its commentaries. The halakha has developed slowly, through a precedent-based system. The literature of questions to rabbis, and their considered answers,
1612-523: A permanent king, and Samuel appointed Saul the king. When the people pressured Saul into going against a command conveyed to him by Samuel, God told Samuel to appoint David in his stead. Rabbinic tradition holds that the details and interpretation of the Law, called the Oral Torah or "Oral Law," were originally unwritten traditions based on the Law given to Moses at Sinai. However, as the persecutions of
1736-555: A positive commandment is to be fulfilled: The ordinary, familiar, everyday things and occurrences we have, constitute occasions for the experience of God. Such things as one's daily sustenance, the very day itself, are felt as manifestations of God's loving-kindness, calling for the Berakhot . Kedushah , holiness, which is nothing else than the imitation of God, is concerned with daily conduct, with being gracious and merciful, with keeping oneself from defilement by idolatry, adultery, and
1860-701: A reward for his act of faith in one God, he was promised that Isaac , his second son, would inherit the Land of Israel (then called Canaan ). Later, the descendants of Isaac's son Jacob were enslaved in Egypt , and God commanded Moses to lead the Exodus from Egypt. The Law was given at Sinai —the Torah , or five books of Moses. These books, together with the Nevi'im and Ketuvim , are known as Torah Shebikhtav , as opposed to
1984-530: A seminal role in the formation of Western civilization through its impact as a core background element of Early Christianity . Within Judaism, there are a variety of religious movements , most of which emerged from Rabbinic Judaism , which holds that God revealed his laws and commandments to Moses on Mount Sinai in the form of both the Written and Oral Torah. Historically, all or part of this assertion
2108-642: A separate quarter in Kiev, known as the Jewish Town (Old East Slav: Жидове, Zhidovye , i.e. "The Jews"), the gates probably leading to which were known as the Jewish Gates (Old East Slavic: Жидовская ворота, Zhidovskaya vorota ). The Kievan community was oriented towards Byzantium (the Romaniotes ), Babylonia and Palestine in the 10th and 11th centuries, but appears to have been increasingly open to
2232-513: A special treatment under the law. The 'decree of August 26, 1827' made Jews liable for military service, and allowed their conscription between the ages of twelve and twenty-five. Each year, the Jewish community had to supply four recruits per thousand of the population. However, in practice, Jewish children were often conscripted as young as eight or nine years old. At the age of twelve, they would be placed for their six-year military education in cantonist schools. They were then required to serve in
2356-526: A speech "On Anti-Jewish Pogroms" on a gramophone disc. Lenin sought to explain the phenomenon of antisemitism in Marxist terms. According to Lenin, antisemitism was an "attempt to divert the hatred of the workers and peasants from the exploiters toward the Jews". Linking antisemitism to class struggle, he argued that it was merely a political technique used by the tsar to exploit religious fanaticism, popularize
2480-639: A wide body of texts, practices, theological positions, and forms of organization. Among Judaism's core texts is the Torah , the first five books of the Hebrew Bible , a collection of ancient Hebrew scriptures. The Tanakh, known in English as the Hebrew Bible, has the same contents as the Old Testament in Christianity . In addition to the original written scripture, the supplemental Oral Torah
2604-483: Is Maimonides ' thirteen principles of faith , developed in the 12th century. According to Maimonides, any Jew who rejects even one of these principles would be considered an apostate and a heretic. Jewish scholars have held points of view diverging in various ways from Maimonides' principles. Thus, within Reform Judaism only the first five principles are endorsed. In Maimonides' time, his list of tenets
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#17327694098132728-487: Is a system through which any Jew acts to bring God into the world. Ethical monotheism is central in all sacred or normative texts of Judaism. However, monotheism has not always been followed in practice. The Hebrew Bible (or Tanakh ) records and repeatedly condemns the widespread worship of other gods in ancient Israel . In the Greco-Roman era, many different interpretations of monotheism existed in Judaism, including
2852-597: Is also the source of the Hebrew term for Judaism, יַהֲדוּת Yahaḏuṯ . The term Ἰουδαϊσμός first appears in the Koine Greek book of 2 Maccabees in the 2nd century BCE (i.e. 2 Maccabees 2:21, 8:1 and 14:38) . In the context of the age and period it meant "seeking or forming part of a cultural entity". It resembled its antonym hellenismos , a word signifying people's submission to Hellenistic cultural norms. The conflict between iudaismos and hellenismos lay behind
2976-592: Is an Abrahamic monotheistic ethnic religion that comprises the collective spiritual, cultural, and legal traditions of the Jewish people . Religious Jews regard Judaism as their means of observing the Mosaic covenant , which was established between God and the Israelites , their ancestors. The religion is considered one of the earliest monotheistic religions in the world. Jewish religious doctrine encompasses
3100-550: Is an esoteric tradition in Judaism in Kabbalah , Rabbinic scholar Max Kadushin has characterized normative Judaism as "normal mysticism", because it involves everyday personal experiences of God through ways or modes that are common to all Jews. This is played out through the observance of the halakha , or Jewish law, and given verbal expression in the Birkat Ha-Mizvot , the short blessings that are spoken every time
3224-684: Is called the Jerusalem Talmud . It was compiled sometime during the 4th century in Palestine. According to critical scholars , the Torah consists of inconsistent texts edited together in a way that calls attention to divergent accounts. Several of these scholars, such as Professor Martin Rose and John Bright , suggest that during the First Temple period the people of Israel believed that each nation had its own god, but that their god
3348-463: Is heavily associated with and most often thought of as Orthodox Judaism . 13 Principles of Faith: — Maimonides In the strict sense, in Judaism, unlike Christianity and Islam, there are no fixed universally binding articles of faith, due to their incorporation into the liturgy. Scholars throughout Jewish history have proposed numerous formulations of Judaism's core tenets, all of which have met with criticism. The most popular formulation
3472-726: Is premundane and has no peer or associate; (3) the whole universe is created; (4) God called Moses and the other Prophets of the Biblical canon; (5) the Law of Moses alone is true; (6) to know the language of the Bible is a religious duty; (7) the Temple at Jerusalem is the palace of the world's Ruler; (8) belief in Resurrection contemporaneous with the advent of the Messiah; (9) final judgment; (10) retribution. In modern times, Judaism lacks
3596-606: Is referred to as responsa (Hebrew Sheelot U-Teshuvot ). Over time, as practices develop, codes of halakha are written that are based on the responsa; the most important code, the Shulchan Aruch , largely determines Orthodox religious practice today. Jewish philosophy refers to the conjunction between serious study of philosophy and Jewish theology. Major Jewish philosophers include Philo of Alexandria , Solomon ibn Gabirol , Saadia Gaon , Judah Halevi , Maimonides , and Gersonides . Major changes occurred in response to
3720-600: Is regarded as the first Jewish diaspora . Later, many of them returned to their homeland after the subsequent conquest of Babylon by the Persian Achaemenid Empire seventy years later, an event known as the Return to Zion . A Second Temple was constructed and old religious practices were resumed. During the early years of the Second Temple, the highest religious authority was a council known as
3844-808: Is represented by later texts, such as the Midrash and the Talmud . The Hebrew-language word torah can mean "teaching", "law", or "instruction", although "Torah" can also be used as a general term that refers to any Jewish text that expands or elaborates on the original Five Books of Moses . Representing the core of the Jewish spiritual and religious tradition, the Torah is a term and a set of teachings that are explicitly self-positioned as encompassing at least seventy, and potentially infinite, facets and interpretations. Judaism's texts, traditions, and values strongly influenced later Abrahamic religions, including Christianity and Islam . Hebraism , like Hellenism , played
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3968-418: Is that halakha should be viewed as a set of general guidelines rather than as a set of restrictions and obligations whose observance is required of all Jews. Historically, special courts enforced halakha ; today, these courts still exist but the practice of Judaism is mostly voluntary. Authority on theological and legal matters is not vested in any one person or organization, but in the sacred texts and
4092-530: The Ashkenazim from the 12th century on. Few products of Kievan Jewish intellectual activity exist, however. Other communities, or groups of individuals, are known from Chernigov and, probably, Volodymyr-Volynskyi . At that time, Jews were probably found also in northeastern Russia, in the domains of Prince Andrei Bogolyubsky (1169–1174), although it is uncertain to which degree they would have been living there permanently. Although northeastern Russia had
4216-544: The Catholic Church and Eastern Orthodoxy ), 2 Macc. ii. 21: "Those that behaved themselves manfully to their honour for Iudaisme." At its core, the Hebrew Bible or Tanakh is an account of the Israelites ' relationship with God from their earliest history until the building of the Second Temple ( c. 535 BCE ). Abraham is hailed as the first Hebrew and the father of the Jewish people. As
4340-716: The Enlightenment (late 18th to early 19th century) leading to the post-Enlightenment Jewish philosophers. Modern Jewish philosophy consists of both Orthodox and non-Orthodox oriented philosophy. Notable among Orthodox Jewish philosophers are Eliyahu Eliezer Dessler , Joseph B. Soloveitchik , and Yitzchok Hutner . Well-known non-Orthodox Jewish philosophers include Martin Buber , Franz Rosenzweig , Mordecai Kaplan , Abraham Joshua Heschel , Will Herberg , and Emmanuel Lévinas . 13 Principles of Hermeneutics: — R. Ishmael Orthodox and many other Jews do not believe that
4464-790: The Great Jewish Revolt (66–73 CE), the Romans sacked Jerusalem and destroyed the Second Temple. Later, Roman emperor Hadrian built a pagan idol on the Temple Mount and prohibited circumcision; these acts of ethnocide provoked the Bar Kokhba Revolt (132–136 CE), after which the Romans banned the study of the Torah and the celebration of Jewish holidays, and forcibly removed virtually all Jews from Judea. In 200 CE, however, Jews were granted Roman citizenship and Judaism
4588-1055: The Kaunas province. Among the other Jewish deputies were Maxim Vinaver , chairman of the League for the Attainment of Equal Rights for the Jewish People in Russia ( Folksgrupe ) and cofounder of the Constitutional Democratic Party ( Kadets ), Dr. Nissan Katzenelson ( Courland province, Zionist, Kadet ), Dr. Moisei Yakovlevich Ostrogorsky ( Grodno province), attorney Simon Yakovlevich Rosenbaum ( Minsk province, Zionist, Kadet ), Mikhail Isaakovich Sheftel ( Ekaterinoslav province, Kadet ), Dr. Grigory Bruk , Dr. Benyamin Yakubson , Zakhar Frenkel , Solomon Frenkel , Meilakh Chervonenkis . There
4712-738: The Kohanim and Leviyim (members of the tribe of Levi ), some only to farmers within the Land of Israel. Many laws were only applicable when the Temple in Jerusalem existed, and only 369 of these commandments are still applicable today. While there have been Jewish groups whose beliefs were based on the written text of the Torah alone (e.g., the Sadducees , and the Karaites ), most Jews believe in
4836-688: The Maccabean Revolt and hence the invention of the term iudaismos . Shaye J. D. Cohen writes in his book The Beginnings of Jewishness : We are tempted, of course, to translate [ Ioudaïsmós ] as "Judaism," but this translation is too narrow, because in this first occurrence of the term, Ioudaïsmós has not yet been reduced to the designation of a religion. It means rather "the aggregate of all those characteristics that makes Judaeans Judaean (or Jews Jewish)." Among these characteristics, to be sure, are practices and beliefs that we would today call "religious," but these practices and beliefs are not
4960-697: The Oxford English Dictionary the earliest citation in English where the term was used to mean "the profession or practice of the Jewish religion; the religious system or polity of the Jews" is Robert Fabyan's The newe cronycles of Englande and of Fraunce (1516). "Judaism" as a direct translation of the Latin Iudaismus first occurred in a 1611 English translation of the Biblical apocrypha (the Deuterocanonical books in
5084-417: The Patriarch Abraham as well as the additional aspects of the Covenant revealed to Moses , who is considered Judaism's greatest prophet . In the Mishnah , a core text of Rabbinic Judaism , acceptance of the Divine origins of this covenant is considered an essential aspect of Judaism and those who reject the Covenant forfeit their share in the World to Come . Establishing the core tenets of Judaism in
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5208-411: The Sabbath was banned in 1929, foreshadowing the dissolution of the Communist Party's Yiddish-language Yevsektsia in 1930 and worse repression to come. Numerous Jews were victimized in Stalin's purges as "counterrevolutionaries" and "reactionary nationalists", although in the 1930s the Jews were underrepresented in the Gulag population. The share of Jews in the Soviet ruling elite declined during
5332-400: The San Francisco Chronicle Raphael Bronstein (1895–1988), violin performer and teacher Raya Bronstein (1929-2023), Israeli sportswoman and sports educator and organizer Srul Bronshtein (1913–1943), Romanian/Soviet Yiddish-language poet Other uses [ edit ] Bronstein and Semendyayev , Handbook of mathematics , a classical book on mathematics originally issued in
5456-410: The Soviet Air Forces ) and Grigori Shtern (Commander-in-Chief in the war against Japan and Commander at the front in the Winter War ). During World War Two, an estimated 500,000 soldiers in the Red Army were Jewish; about 200,000 were killed in battle. About 160,000 were decorated, and more than a hundred achieved the rank of Red Army general. Over 150 were designated Heroes of the Soviet Union ,
5580-426: The halakha whereas its ultimate goal is to bring the holiness down to the world. Mordecai Kaplan , the founder of the Reconstructionist Judaism , abandons the idea of religion for the sake of identifying Judaism with civilization and by means of the latter term and secular translation of the core ideas, he tries to embrace as many Jewish denominations as possible. In turn, Solomon Schechter 's Conservative Judaism
5704-420: The oral law . These oral traditions were transmitted by the Pharisee school of thought of ancient Judaism and were later recorded in written form and expanded upon by the rabbis. According to Rabbinical Jewish tradition, God gave both the Written Law (the Torah ) and the Oral Torah to Moses on Mount Sinai . The Oral law is the oral tradition as relayed by God to Moses and from him, transmitted and taught to
5828-412: The rabbis and scholars who interpret them. Jews are an ethnoreligious group including those born Jewish, in addition to converts to Judaism . In 2021, the world Jewish population was estimated at 15.2 million, or roughly 0.195% of the total world population, although religious observance varies from strict to none. In 2021, about 45.6% of all Jews resided in Israel and another 42.1% resided in
5952-494: The " Odessa Committee " headed by Leon Pinsker) dedicated to practical aspects in establishing agricultural Jewish settlements in Palestine. In total, there were at least twelve Jewish deputies in the First Duma (1906–1907), falling to three or four in the Second Duma (February 1907 to June 1907), two in the Third Duma (1907–1912) and again three in the fourth, elected in 1912. Converts to Christianity like Mikhail Herzenstein and Ossip Pergament were still considered as Jews by
6076-484: The 14th century, many Western European Jews migrated to Poland upon the invitation of Polish ruler Casimir III the Great to settle in Polish-controlled areas of Eastern Europe as a third estate , although restricted to commercial, middleman services in an agricultural society for the Polish king and nobility between 1330 and 1370, during the reign of Casimir the Great. After settling in Poland (later Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth ) and Hungary (later Austria-Hungary ),
6200-437: The 1861 abolition of serfdom in Russia . Under his rule Jewish people could not hire Christian servants, could not own land, and were restricted in travel. Alexander III was a staunch reactionary and an antisemite (influenced by Pobedonostsev ) who strictly adhered to the old doctrine of Orthodoxy, Autocracy, and Nationality . His escalation of anti-Jewish policies sought to ignite "popular antisemitism", which portrayed
6324-420: The 1930s, but was still more than double their proportion in the general Soviet population. According to Israeli historian Benjamin Pinkus, "We can say that the Jews in the Soviet Union took over the privileged position, previously held by the Germans in tsarist Russia ". In the 1930s, many Jews held high rank in the Red Army High Command: Generals Iona Yakir , Yan Gamarnik , Yakov Smushkevich (Commander of
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#17327694098136448-456: The 1940s Bronstein -class frigate , United States Navy warships, originally laid down as ocean escorts, later redesignated as frigates See also [ edit ] Braunstein Brownstein [REDACTED] Surname list This page lists people with the surname Bronstein, Bronshteyn, . If an internal link intending to refer to a specific person led you to this page, you may wish to change that link by adding
6572-433: The 4th century showing that there were Armenian cities possessing Jewish populations ranging from 10,000 to 30,000 along with substantial Jewish settlements in the Crimea . The presence of Jewish people in the territories corresponding to modern Belarus, Ukraine, and the European part of Russia can be traced back to the 7th–14th centuries CE. In the 11th and 12th centuries, the Jewish population may have been restricted to
6696-534: The Bolsheviks ( See proletarian internationalism , bourgeois nationalism ) was incompatible with Jewish traditionalism. Bolsheviks such as Trotsky echoed sentiments dismissing Jewish heritage in place of "internationalism". Soon after seizing power, the Bolsheviks established the Yevsektsiya , the Jewish section of the Communist party in order to destroy the rival Bund and Zionist parties, suppress Judaism and replace traditional Jewish culture with "proletarian culture". In March 1919, Vladimir Lenin delivered
6820-448: The Communist Party labeled the use of the Hebrew language "reactionary" and "elitist" and the teaching of Hebrew was banned. Zionists were persecuted harshly, with Jewish communists leading the attacks. Following the civil war, however, the new Bolshevik government's policies produced a flourishing of secular Jewish culture in Belarus and western Ukraine in the 1920s. The Soviet government outlawed all expressions of antisemitism, with
6944-415: The Conservative movement. The following is a basic, structured list of the central works of Jewish practice and thought: The basis of halakha and tradition is the Torah (also known as the Pentateuch or the Five Books of Moses). According to rabbinic tradition, there are 613 commandments in the Torah. Some of these laws are directed only to men or to women, some only to the ancient priestly groups,
7068-549: The Constitutional Democratic Party, were assassinated by the Black Hundreds antisemite terrorist group. "The Russkoye Znamya declares openly that 'Real Russians' assassinated Herzenstein and Iollos with knowledge of officials, and expresses regret that only two Jews perished in crusade against revolutionaries. The Second Duma included seven Jewish deputies: Shakho Abramson , Iosif Gessen , Vladimir Matveevich Gessen , Lazar Rabinovich , Yakov Shapiro (all of them Kadets) and Avigdor Mandelberg ( Siberia Social Democrat), plus
7192-480: The Councils of Elders ( Qahal , Kehilla ), constituted in every town or hamlet possessing a Jewish population. These councils had jurisdiction over Jews in matters of internal litigation, as well as fiscal transactions relating to the collection and payment of taxes ( poll tax , land tax , etc.). Later, this right of collecting taxes was much abused, and the councils lost civil authority in 1844. Under Alexander I and Nicholas I , decrees were put forth requiring
7316-433: The Great Assembly, led by Ezra the Scribe . Among other accomplishments of the Great Assembly, the last books of the Bible were written at this time and the canon sealed . Hellenistic Judaism spread to Ptolemaic Egypt from the 3rd century BCE, and its creation sparked widespread controversy in Jewish communities, starting "conflicts within Jewish communities about accommodating the cultures of occupying powers." During
7440-414: The Imperial Russian army for 25 years after the completion of their studies, often never seeing their families again. Strict quotas were imposed on all communities and the qahals were given the unpleasant task of implementing conscription within the Jewish communities. Since the merchant- guild members, agricultural colonists, factory mechanics, clergy, and all Jews with secondary education were exempt, and
7564-505: The Jewish population in Kiev , in present-day Ukraine , was restricted to a separate quarter. Evidence of the presence of Jewish people in Muscovite Russia is first documented in the chronicles of 1471. During the reign of Catherine II in the 18th century, Jewish people were restricted to the Pale of Settlement (1791–1917) within Russia, the territory where they could live or to which they could immigrate. The three partitions of Poland brought much additional territory to Russia, along with
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#17327694098137688-416: The Jewish population was a majority or plurality in many communities. It was possible to evade these restrictions upon secondary education by combining private tuition with examination as an "outside student". Accordingly, within the Pale such outside pupils were almost entirely young Jews. The restrictions placed on education, traditionally highly valued in Jewish communities, resulted in ambition to excel over
7812-460: The Jews as " Christ-killers " and the oppressors of the Slavic, Christian victims. A large-scale wave of anti-Jewish pogroms swept Ukraine in 1881, after Jews were scapegoated for the assassination of Alexander II. In the 1881 outbreak, there were pogroms in 166 Ukrainian towns, thousands of Jewish homes were destroyed, many families reduced to extremes of poverty; large numbers of men, women, and children were injured and some killed. Disorders in
7936-413: The Jews have crucified our Master and have shed his precious blood." In 1892, new measures banned Jewish participation in local elections despite their large numbers in many towns of the Pale. The Town Regulations prohibited Jews from the right to elect or be elected to town Dumas . Only a small number of Jews were allowed to be members of a town Duma, through appointment by special committees. During
8060-611: The Jews in Russia and areas historically connected with it goes back at least 1,500 years. Jews in Russia have historically constituted a large religious and ethnic diaspora; the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest population of Jews in the world . Within these territories, the primarily Ashkenazi Jewish communities of many different areas flourished and developed many of modern Judaism 's most distinctive theological and cultural traditions, while also facing periods of antisemitic discriminatory policies and persecution , including violent pogroms . Many analysts have noted
8184-517: The Jews increased and the details were in danger of being forgotten, these oral laws were recorded by Judah ha-Nasi in the Mishnah , redacted c. 200 CE . The Talmud was a compilation of the Mishnah and Gemara , rabbinic commentaries redacted over the next three centuries. The Gemara originated in two major centers of Jewish scholarship, Palestine and Babylonia ( Lower Mesopotamia ). Correspondingly, two bodies of analysis developed, and two works of Talmud were created. The older compilation
8308-452: The Jews regarded the Red Army as the only force which was able and willing to defend them. The Russian Civil War pogroms shocked world Jewry and rallied many Jews to the Red Army and the Soviet regime, strengthening the desire for the creation of a homeland for the Jewish people. In August 1919 the Soviet government arrested many rabbis, seized Jewish properties, including synagogues, and dissolved many Jewish communities. The Jewish section of
8432-400: The Jews were 1.8 percent of the Soviet population but 12–15 percent of all university students. In 1934 the Soviet state established the Jewish Autonomous Oblast in the Russian Far East. This region never came to have a majority Jewish population. The JAO is Russia's only autonomous oblast and, outside of Israel, the world's only Jewish territory with an official status. The observance of
8556-410: The Jews who were long settled in those lands. Alexander III of Russia escalated anti-Jewish policies. Beginning in the 1880s, waves of anti-Jewish pogroms swept across different regions of the empire for several decades. More than two million Jews fled Russia between 1880 and 1920, mostly to the United States and Palestine . The Pale of Settlement took away many of the rights that the Jewish people of
8680-439: The Oral Torah, which refers to the Mishnah and the Talmud . Eventually, God led them to the land of Israel where the tabernacle was planted in the city of Shiloh for over 300 years to rally the nation against attacking enemies. As time passed, the nation's spiritual level declined to the point that God allowed the Philistines to capture the tabernacle. The people of Israel then told Samuel that they needed to be governed by
8804-505: The Pale and could not migrate elsewhere in Russia without special permission. Within the Pale, the Jewish residents were permitted to vote in municipal elections, but their vote was limited to one third of the total number of voters, even though their proportion in many areas was much higher, even a majority. This served to provide an aura of democracy, while institutionalizing local inter-ethnic conflict. Jewish communities in Russia were governed internally by local administrative bodies, called
8928-520: The Pale of Settlement amounted to 42,338,367—of these, 4,805,354 (11.5%) were Jews. About 450,000 Jewish soldiers served in the Russian Army during World War I , and fought side by side with their Slavic fellows. When hundreds of thousands of refugees from Poland and Lithuania, among them innumerable Jews, fled in terror before enemy invasion , the Pale of Settlement de facto ceased to exist. Most of
9052-702: The Russian Constitutional Democrat Party , Russian Social Democratic Party ( Mensheviks ) and Socialist-Revolutionary Party . The Russian Anarchist movement also included many prominent Jewish revolutionaries. In Ukraine, Makhnovist anarchist leaders also included several Jews. In August 1919 Jewish properties, including synagogues, were seized and many Jewish communities were dissolved. New laws against all expressions of religion and religious education were imposed upon Jews and other religious groups. Many Rabbis and other religious officials were forced to resign from their posts under
9176-465: The Russian Empire was hostile to Catholicism and Polish nationalism. The cultural and habitual isolation of the Jews gradually began eroding. An ever-increasing number of Jewish people adopted Russian customs and the Russian language. Russian education was spread among the Jewish population. A number of Jewish-Russian periodicals appeared. Alexander II was known as the "Tsar liberator" for
9300-705: The Russian State, for example Peter Shafirov , vice-chancellor under Peter the Great . Shafirov came, as most Russian Jews after the fall of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1795, from a Jewish family of Polish origin. He had extraordinary knowledge of foreign languages and served as the chief translator in the Russian Foreign Office, subsequently he began to accompany Tsar Peter on his international travels. Following this, he
9424-524: The Tsarist regime was attractive to many members of the Jewish intelligentsia because of the oppression of non-Russian nations and non- Orthodox Christians within the Russian Empire . For much the same reason, many non-Russians, notably Latvians or Poles , were disproportionately represented in the party leaderships. In 1897 General Jewish Labour Bund (The Bund), was formed. Many Jews joined
9548-584: The United States and Canada, with most of the remainder living in Europe, and other groups spread throughout Latin America, Asia, Africa, and Australia. The term Judaism derives from Iudaismus , a Latinized form of the Ancient Greek Ioudaismos ( Koinē Greek : Ἰουδαϊσμός , from the verb ἰουδαΐζειν , "to side with or imitate the [Judeans]"). Its ultimate source was Hebrew : יהודה , romanized : Yehudah Judah ", which
9672-600: The antisemitism that was endemic to tsarist Russia. During the World War, Jews were often accused of sympathizing with Germany and often persecuted. Pogroms were unleashed throughout the Russian Civil War, perpetrated by virtually every competing faction, from Polish and Ukrainian nationalists to the Red and White Armies. 31,071 civilian Jews were killed during documented pogroms throughout the former Russian Empire ;
9796-606: The arbitrariness of the qahal to the Russian government. In some cases, communal elders had the most threatening informers murdered (such as the Ushitsa case , 1836). The zoning rule was suspended during the Crimean War , when conscription became annual. During this period the qahals leaders would employ informers and kidnappers (Russian: " ловчики ", lovchiki , Yiddish : khappers ), as many potential conscripts preferred to run away rather than voluntarily submit. In
9920-504: The authority of the rabbinic tradition , and the significance of the State of Israel . Orthodox Judaism maintains that the Torah and halakha are divine in origin, eternal and unalterable, and that they should be strictly followed. Conservative and Reform Judaism are more liberal, with Conservative Judaism generally promoting a more traditionalist interpretation of Judaism's requirements than Reform Judaism. A typical Reform position
10044-536: The basis of the Talmud. According to Abraham ben David , the Mishnah was compiled by Rabbi Judah haNasi after the destruction of Jerusalem, in anno mundi 3949, which corresponds to 189 CE. Over the next four centuries, the Mishnah underwent discussion and debate in both of the world's major Jewish communities (in Israel and Babylonia ). The commentaries from each of these communities were eventually compiled into
10168-471: The belief that God is one and is concerned with the actions of mankind. According to the Hebrew Bible, God promised Abraham to make of his offspring a great nation. Many generations later, he commanded the nation of Israel to love and worship only one God; that is, the Jewish nation is to reciprocate God's concern for the world. He also commanded the Jewish people to love one another; that is, Jews are to imitate God's love for people. Thus, although there
10292-471: The case of unfulfilled quotas, younger Jewish boys of eight and even younger were frequently taken. The official Russian policy was to encourage the conversion of Jewish cantonists to the state religion of Orthodox Christianity and Jewish boys were coerced to baptism . As kosher food was unavailable, they were faced with the necessity of abandoning of Jewish dietary laws . Polish Catholic boys were subject to similar pressure to convert and assimilate as
10416-445: The despotic, unpopular regime, and divert popular anger toward a scapegoat. The Soviet Union also officially maintained this Marxist-Leninist interpretation under Joseph Stalin , who expounded Lenin's critique of antisemitism. However, this did not prevent the widely publicized repressions of Jewish intellectuals during 1948–1953 when Stalin increasingly associated Jews with "cosmopolitanism" and pro-Americanism . Jews were prominent in
10540-485: The education restrictions on the Jews were removed with the appointment of count Pavel Ignatiev as Minister of Education. Even though the persecutions provided the impetus for mass emigration, there were other relevant factors that can account for the Jews' migration. After the first years of large emigration from Russia, positive feedback from the emigrants in the U.S. encouraged further emigration. Indeed, more than two million Jews fled Russia between 1880 and 1920. While
10664-462: The establishment of the authority of rabbis who acted as teachers and leaders of individual communities. Unlike other ancient Near Eastern gods, the Hebrew God is portrayed as unitary and solitary; consequently, the Hebrew God's principal relationships are not with other gods, but with the world, and more specifically, with the people he created. Judaism thus begins with ethical monotheism :
10788-629: The highest award in the country. More than two million Soviet Jews are believed to have died during the Holocaust in warfare and in Nazi-occupied territories. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, many Soviet Jews took the opportunity of liberalized emigration policies, with more than half of the population leaving, most for Israel and the West: Germany, the United States, Canada and Australia. For many years during this period, Russia had
10912-476: The interpretations that gave rise to Christianity. Moreover, some have argued that Judaism is a non-creedal religion that does not require one to believe in God. For some, observance of halakha is more important than belief in God per se . The debate about whether one can speak of authentic or normative Judaism is not only a debate among religious Jews but also among historians. In continental Europe , Judaism
11036-591: The late 17th century Russia had enjoyed. At this time, the Jewish people were restricted to an area of what is current day Belarus, Lithuania, eastern Poland and Ukraine. Where Western Europe was experiencing emancipation at this time, in Russia the laws for the Jewish people were getting more strict. They were allowed to move further east, towards a less crowded region, though it was only a minority of Jews who took to this migration option. The sporadic and often impoverished communities formed were known as Shtetls . Before 1917 there were 300,000 Zionists in Russia, while
11160-488: The late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Russian Empire had not only the largest Jewish population in the world, but actually a majority of the world's Jews living within its borders. In 1897, according to Russian census of 1897 , the total Jewish population of Russia was 5,189,401 persons of both sexes (4.13% of total population). Of this total, 93.9% lived in the 25 provinces of the Pale of Settlement . The total population of
11284-486: The leading Bolsheviks were Ethnic Jews , and Bolshevism supports a policy of promoting international proletarian revolution—most notably in the case of Leon Trotsky —many enemies of Bolshevism, as well as contemporary antisemites, draw a picture of Communism as a political slur at Jews and accuse Jews of pursuing Bolshevism to benefit Jewish interests, reflected in the terms Jewish Bolshevism or Judeo-Bolshevism . The original atheistic and internationalistic ideology of
11408-995: The main Jewish socialist organization, the Bund , had 33,000 members. Only 958 Jews had joined the Bolshevik Party before 1917; thousands joined after the Revolution. The chaotic years of World War I , the February and October Revolutions , and the Russian Civil War had created social disruption that led to antisemitism. Some 150,000 Jews were killed in the pogroms of 1918–1922, 125,000 of them in Ukraine, 25,000 in Belarus. The pogroms were mostly perpetrated by anti-communist forces; sometimes, Red Army units engaged in pogroms as well. Anton Denikin 's White Army
11532-417: The mob. The systematic policy of discrimination banned Jewish people from rural areas and towns of fewer than ten thousand people, even within the Pale, assuring the slow death of many shtetls . In 1887, the quotas placed on the number of Jews allowed into secondary and higher education were tightened down to 10% within the Pale, 5% outside the Pale, except Moscow and Saint Petersburg, held at 3%, even though
11656-504: The modern era is even more difficult, given the number and diversity of the contemporary Jewish denominations . Even if to restrict the problem to the most influential intellectual trends of the nineteenth and twentieth century, the matter remains complicated. Thus, for instance, Joseph Soloveitchik's (associated with the Modern Orthodox movement ) answer to modernity is constituted upon the identification of Judaism with following
11780-489: The next few centuries. Later, two poetic restatements of these principles (" Ani Ma'amin " and " Yigdal ") became integrated into many Jewish liturgies, leading to their eventual near-universal acceptance. The oldest non-Rabbinic instance of articles of faith were formulated, under Islamic influence, by the 12th century Karaite figure Judah ben Elijah Hadassi : (1) God is the Creator of all created beings; (2) He
11904-584: The number of Jewish orphans exceeded 300,000. A majority of pogroms in Ukraine during 1918–1920 were perpetrated by the Ukrainian nationalists, miscellaneous bands and anti-Communist forces. Continuing the policy of the Bolsheviks before the Revolution, Lenin and the Bolshevik Party strongly condemned the pogroms, including official denunciations in 1918 by the Council of People's Commissars. Opposition to
12028-572: The peers and increased emigration rates. Special quotas restricted Jews from entering profession of law, limiting number of Jews admitted to the bar. In 1886, an Edict of Expulsion was enforced on the historic Jewish population of Kiev . Most Jews were expelled from Moscow in 1891 (except few deemed useful ) and a newly built synagogue was closed by the city's authorities headed by the Tsar's brother. Tsar Alexander III refused to curtail repressive practices and reportedly noted: "But we must never forget that
12152-512: The person's given name (s) to the link. Retrieved from " https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Bronstein&oldid=1254072606 " Categories : Surnames German-language surnames Surnames of Jewish origin Yiddish-language surnames Hidden categories: Articles with short description Short description is different from Wikidata All set index articles Russian-Jewish The history of
12276-574: The pogroms and to manifestations of Russian antisemitism in this era were complicated by both the official Bolshevik policy of assimilationism towards all national and religious minorities, and concerns about overemphasizing Jewish concerns for fear of exacerbating popular antisemitism, as the White forces were openly identifying the Bolshevik regime with Jews. Judaism Judaism ( Hebrew : יַהֲדוּת , romanized : Yahăḏūṯ )
12400-573: The population expanded into the lightly populated areas of Ukraine and Lithuania , which were to become part of the expanding Russian Empire. In 1495, Alexander the Jagiellonian expelled Jewish residents from Grand Duchy of Lithuania , but reversed his decision in 1503. In the shtetls populated almost entirely by Jews, or in the middle-sized town where Jews constituted a significant part of population, Jewish communities traditionally ruled themselves according to halakha , and were limited by
12524-748: The privileges granted them by local rulers. (See also Shtadlan ). These Jews were not assimilated into the larger eastern European societies, and identified as an ethnic group with a unique set of religious beliefs and practices, as well as an ethnically unique economic role. Documentary evidence as to the presence of Jews in Muscovite Russia is first found in the chronicles of 1471. The relatively small population of them were subject to discriminatory laws, but these laws do not appear to have been enforced at all times. Jews residing in Russian and Ukrainian towns suffered numerous religious persecutions. Converted Jews occasionally rose to important positions in
12648-704: The public (and antisemitic) opinion and are most of the time included in these figures. At the 1906 elections, the Jewish Labour Bund had made an electoral agreement with the Lithuanian Labourers' Party ( Trudoviks ), which resulted in the election to the Duma of two (non-Bundist) candidates in the Lithuanian provinces: Dr. Shmaryahu Levin for the Vilnius province and Leon Bramson for
12772-401: The public use of the ethnic slur жид ("Yid") being punished by up to one year of imprisonment, and tried to modernize the Jewish community by establishing 1,100 Yiddish-language schools, 40 Yiddish-language daily newspapers and by settling Jews on farms in Ukraine and Crimea; the number of Jews working in the industry had more than doubled between 1926 and 1931. At the beginning of the 1930s,
12896-487: The ranks of two principal revolutionary parties: Socialist-Revolutionary Party and Russian Social Democratic Labour Party —both Bolshevik and Menshevik factions. A notable number of Bolshevik party members were ethnically Jewish, especially in the leadership of the party, and the percentage of Jewish party members among the rival Mensheviks was even higher. Both the founders and leaders of Menshevik faction, Julius Martov and Pavel Axelrod , were Jewish. Because some of
13020-509: The revealed Torah consists solely of its written contents, but of its interpretations as well. The study of Torah (in its widest sense, to include both poetry, narrative, and law, and both the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud) is in Judaism itself a sacred act of central importance. For the sages of the Mishnah and Talmud, and for their successors today, the study of Torah was therefore not merely
13144-431: The sages ( rabbinic leaders) of each subsequent generation. For centuries, the Torah appeared only as a written text transmitted in parallel with the oral tradition. Fearing that the oral teachings might be forgotten, Rabbi Judah haNasi undertook the mission of consolidating the various opinions into one body of law which became known as the Mishnah . The Mishnah consists of 63 tractates codifying halakha , which are
13268-419: The shedding of blood. The Birkat Ha-Mitzwot evokes the consciousness of holiness at a rabbinic rite, but the objects employed in the majority of these rites are non-holy and of general character, while the several holy objects are non-theurgic. And not only do ordinary things and occurrences bring with them the experience of God. Everything that happens to a man evokes that experience, evil as well as good, for
13392-637: The sole content of the term. Thus Ioudaïsmós should be translated not as "Judaism" but as Judaeanness. Daniel R. Schwartz, however, argues that "Judaism", especially in the context of the Book of Maccabees, refers to the religion, as opposed to the culture and politics of the Judean state. He believes it reflected the ideological divide between the Pharisees and Sadducees and, implicitly, anti-Hasmonean and pro-Hasmonean factions in Judean society. According to
13516-688: The south once again recalled the government attention to the Jewish question. A conference was convened at the Ministry of Interior and on May 15, 1882, so-called Temporary Regulations were introduced that stayed in effect for more than thirty years and came to be known as the May Laws . The repressive legislation was repeatedly revised. Many historians noted the concurrence of these state-enforced antisemitic policies with waves of pogroms that continued until 1884, with at least tacit government knowledge and in some cases policemen were seen inciting or joining
13640-467: The third (1795) Partitions of Poland . Under the Commonwealth's legal system, Jews endured economic restrictions euphemised as " disabilities ", which also continued following the Russian occupation. Catherine established the Pale of Settlement , which included Congress Poland , Lithuania, Ukraine, Belarus, Bessarabia , and Crimea (the latter was later excluded). Jews were required to live within
13764-577: The threat of violent persecution. This type of persecution continued into the 1920s. In 1921, a large number of Jews opted for Poland, as the Peace of Riga entitled them to choose the country they preferred. Several hundred thousand joined the already numerous Jewish population of Poland . The chaotic years of World War I, the February and October Revolutions, and the Civil War were fertile ground for
13888-638: The two Talmuds, the Jerusalem Talmud ( Talmud Yerushalmi ) and the Babylonian Talmud ( Talmud Bavli ). These have been further expounded by commentaries of various Torah scholars during the ages. In the text of the Torah, many words are left undefined, and many procedures are mentioned without explanation or instructions. Such phenomena are sometimes offered to validate the viewpoint that the Written Law has always been transmitted with
14012-674: The wealthy bribed their way out of having their children conscripted, fewer potential conscripts were available; the adopted policy deeply sharpened internal Jewish social tensions. Seeking to protect the socio-economic and religious integrity of Jewish society, the qahals did their best to include “non-useful Jews” in the draft lists so that the heads of tax-paying middle-class families were predominantly exempt from conscription, whereas single Jews, as well as "heretics" ( Haskalah influenced individuals), paupers, outcasts, and orphaned children were drafted. They used their power to suppress protests and intimidate potential informers who sought to expose
14136-551: Was a bastion of antisemitism, using "Strike at the Jews and save Russia!" as its motto. The Bolshevik Red Army , although individual soldiers committed antisemitic abuses, had a policy of opposing antisemitism, and as a result, it won the support of much of the Jewish population. After a short period of confusion, the Soviets started executing guilty individuals and even disbanding the army units whose men had attacked Jews. Although pogroms were still perpetrated after this, in general
14260-625: Was also a Crimean Karaim deputy, Salomon Krym . Three of the Jewish deputies, Bramson, Chervonenkis and Yakubson, joined the Labour faction; nine others joined the Kadet fraction. According to Rufus Learsi, five of them were Zionists, including Dr. Shmaryahu Levin , Dr. Victor Jacobson and Simon Yakovlevich Rosenbaum . Two of them, Grigori Borisovich Iollos ( Poltava province) and Mikhail Herzenstein (b. 1859, d. 1906 in Terijoki ), both from
14384-593: Was centered on a pantheon of gods much like in Greek mythology . According to the Hebrew Bible , a United Monarchy was established under Saul and continued under King David and Solomon with its capital in Jerusalem . After Solomon's reign, the nation split into two kingdoms, the Kingdom of Israel (in the north) and the Kingdom of Judah (in the south). The Kingdom of Israel was destroyed around 720 BCE, when it
14508-602: Was challenged by various groups such as the Sadducees and Hellenistic Judaism during the Second Temple period ; the Karaites during the early and later medieval period; and among segments of the modern non-Orthodox denominations. Some modern branches of Judaism such as Humanistic Judaism may be considered secular or nontheistic . Today, the largest Jewish religious movements are Orthodox Judaism ( Haredi and Modern Orthodox ), Conservative Judaism , and Reform Judaism . Major sources of difference between these groups are their approaches to halakha (Jewish law),
14632-716: Was conquered by the Neo-Assyrian Empire ; many people were taken captive from the capital Samaria to Media and the Khabur River valley. The Kingdom of Judah continued as an independent state until it was conquered by Nebuchadnezzar II of the Neo-Babylonian Empire in 586 BCE. The Babylonians destroyed Jerusalem and the First Temple , which was at the center of ancient Jewish worship. The Judeans were exiled to Babylon , in what
14756-599: Was criticized by Hasdai Crescas and Joseph Albo . Albo and the Raavad argued that Maimonides' principles contained too many items that, while true, were not fundamentals of the faith Along these lines, the ancient historian Josephus emphasized practices and observances rather than religious beliefs, associating apostasy with a failure to observe halakha and maintaining that the requirements for conversion to Judaism included circumcision and adherence to traditional customs. Maimonides' principles were largely ignored over
14880-410: Was fluency in Russian, and they often had no education in, or knowledge of Jewish law. The beginning of the 19th century was marked by intensive movement of Jews to Novorossiya , where towns, villages and agricultural colonies rapidly sprang up. In 19th century, legally the Jews were a subcategory of the inorodtsy category, special ethnicity-based category of non-Slavic population that received
15004-455: Was identical with the tradition understood as the interpretation of Torah, in itself being the history of the constant updates and adjustment of the Law performed by means of the creative interpretation. Finally, David Philipson draws the outlines of the Reform movement in Judaism by opposing it to the strict and traditional rabbinical approach and thus comes to the conclusions similar to that of
15128-417: Was raised to the rank of vice-chancellor because of his many diplomatic talents and skills, but was later imprisoned, sentenced to death, and eventually banished. Their situation changed radically during the reign of Catherine II , when the Russian Empire acquired large Lithuanian and Polish territories which historically included a high proportion of Jewish residents, especially during the second (1793) and
15252-410: Was recognized as a religio licita ("legitimate religion") until the rise of Gnosticism and Early Christianity in the fourth century. Following the destruction of Jerusalem and the expulsion of the Jews, Jewish worship stopped being centrally organized around the Temple, prayer took the place of sacrifice, and worship was rebuilt around the community (represented by a minimum of ten adult men) and
15376-627: Was superior to other gods. Some suggest that strict monotheism developed during the Babylonian Exile, perhaps in reaction to Zoroastrian dualism. In this view, it was only by the Hellenistic period that most Jews came to believe that their god was the only god and that the notion of a bounded Jewish nation identical with the Jewish religion formed. John Day argues that the origins of biblical Yahweh , El , Asherah , and Ba'al , may be rooted in earlier Canaanite religion , which
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