Nadene Goldfoot
Born in Lithuania in 1874, Rabbi Zelig Schachnowitz set his goal in life to use his creative talents to disseminate Torah-true Judaism, for adults as well as children. He served as editor-in-chief of the journal Der Israelit. He is the author of Light from the West and Avraham Ben Avraham. When the Nazis came to power he emigrated to Switzerland where he passed away in 1952. The book he is well known for is "The Jewish Kingdom of Kuzar, The Rise and Falls of the Legendary Country of Converts." It is published by Feldheim of Jerusalem and New York. Zelig is of German origin and means, "The Blessed One."
The book Zelig Shachnowitz wrote that I have is about the Khazars of Khazaria. "Over one thousand years ago, did the population of an entire pagan country, nestled between the shores of the Black and Caspian Seas and secluded in the forests of the Crimea, really convert to Judaism? Or is it just the stuff of legend? This sweeping historical novel tells the story of the Kuzars, with startlingly authentic detail and high quality writing that absorbs the reader completely. The fascinating plot and colorful characters bring enlightenment and inspiration even as they captivate the imagination. This book was originally written in German by Rabbi Zelig Shachnowitz, the famed German-Jewish author and editor who used his pen to fight against the Haskalah movement of his times. A timeless treasure, it has now been translated from the Hebrew translation, making it accessible to all who yearn to plunge into its richness and unique tapestry." I have it in the English translation.
The Haskalah movement, meaning "Enlightenment" was coined in 1832 by Judah Jeiteles that spread over the modern European culture among Jews from about 1750 to 1880. The Haskalah School believed that Jewish Emancipation required intellectual and social conformity with the non-Jewish population and that the latter could be achieved by modernized and westernized Jewish religion and customs including the active literary use of the Hebrew language. It attempted to mediate between unyielding Orthodoxy and radical assimilation.
The Reform movement came out of this. Reform became the first known group in more than 3,100 years of Jewish history to deny the Torah’s divine origin. Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786) started the Reform movement after four out of six of Mendelssohn’s surviving children converted to Christianity. The Reform rejected the Mesorah. (refers either to the transmission of Jewish religious tradition, or to the tradition itself. Its etymology.)
Out of the Reform movement came the Conservative movement, with Solomon Schechter remembered the most. The group leading the movement breaking away from the Reform, JTS (Jewish Theological Seminary), said this:
"An article printed in the new institution’s magazine declared that JTS would steer a course between “stupid Orthodoxy and insane Reform." Solomon Schechter (1849-1915), who took over JTS in 1902, violated the Sabbath publicly, and wrote that “the three r’s” stood for “rotten ranting rabbis.” Conservative historians say that Schechter’s successor, Cyrus Adler (1863-1940) “shared the anticlerical bias.”I find it shocking that the man responsible for our belief system was so anti-religious of his own religion, showing such a lack of understanding and respect. It's a good thing that rabbis following him were less dramatic in their thinking. None of this attitude of Schechter showed up with my Rabbi Kleinman when I attended from age 5 to 16.
Rabbi Solomon Schechter certainly seemed to answer the call of haskalah and was a leader in Conservative Judaism. The synagogue in Portland, Oregon was Neveh Zedek.
Here, opposing Orthodox ways, the men and women sat together. By the 1980s, the group evaluated the role of women and gave them more of the male role in Judaism. From this came women rabbis and cantors. They came to accept "who is a Jew" through the father's line as well as the mother's line, something the Reform Judaism group had already been practicing.
Solomon Schechter was born in 1850 in Romania, but studied in Vienna and Berlin. After living in England for some years, he moved to the USA where his idea gained hold. By 1901 he was appointed president of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America in New York. He developed the Seminary and published in English many papers. He died in 1915 at age 65. Conservative Judaism has been more popular in the USA than Europe.
Remaining Jewish forms of practice are the Orthodox, Conservative and Reform movements. Even Rabbi Shachnowitz couldn't prevent Reform or Conservative's hold on Jews, leading them away from our former practices. By writing his books, he was sharing his knowledge of our Jewish history that kept it alive for him.
Further research came up with : SCHACHNOWITZ, SELIG (1874–1952), Orthodox journalist and writer. Of Lithuanian origin, Schachnowitz served as cantor of the Swiss-Jewish rural community of Endingen between 1901 and 1908. So Zelig became Selig. Our rabbi was surviving as a cantor in Switzerland.
Another find: Schachnowiz, Selig from Encyclopedia.com was that he was born on May 27, 1874 in Jurbarkas (Yarburg) , Lithuania and died January 23, Zürich, Switzerland. Yurburg was famous in Lithuania for its Zionist atmosphere and Hebrew culture that dominated it. it's one of 31 communities in Lithuania that had a noticeable population of Jews.
His town of Jurbarkas used to be about 12 km or 7.5 miles to the east of the Prussian border, surrounded by woods. It began as a stronghold of the Knights Order of the Cross in the 13th century named Jurgenburg, but after the border between Germany and Lithuania was defined in 1422, became a border town and customs point. In 1862 there were 2,550 Jews in Yurburg.
The Haskalah movement flourished in Yurburg there among the Jews more than in other communities in Lithuania. This was demonstrated by the cooperation of the community heads in the establishment of a quite modern Talmud-Torah in 1884 where 100 poor children studied, and in addition to religious subjects, Hebrew and grammar, mathematics and Russian were also taught. One of the teachers was the famous Hebrew writer, Avraham Mapu. The school was under the supervision of the government, but its financial maintenance was mainly the responsibility of the community.
Lithuania became independent from 1918 to 1940. Yurburg was now in the Raseinai district. The 1st census was in 1923.
1714 2,223 Jews
1862: 2,550 Jews Jurbarkas often suffered from floods (notably in 1862).
1897; 7,301 population including 2,350 Jews (32%)
1923: 4,409 population including 1,887 Jews (43%)
In 1843 Emperor Nicholas I ordered that Jews living within 50 km (31 mi) of the Empire's western border should relocate eastward, but Jurbarkas was one of 19 towns which disobeyed the order. The Jewish Enlightenment (Haskalah) prospered in Jurbarkas.
Few of Jurbarkas Jewish citizens survived World War II. Of those that did, some remained in Vilnius or Kaunas after the War, while most emigrated to Palestine, the US, Canada, Mexico, South Africa, Germany, or other nations – in some cases joining family and friends who had left Lithuania before the War.
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