Yiddishism (
Yiddish
Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...
: ײִדישיזם) is a cultural and linguistic movement which began among
Jew
Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...
s in
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is a subregion of the European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russia, whic ...
during the latter part of the 19th century. Some of the leading founders of this movement were
Mendele Moykher-Sforim (1836–1917),
I. L. Peretz (1852–1915), and
Sholem Aleichem
)
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Pereiaslav, Russian Empire
, death_date =
, death_place = New York City, U.S.
, occupation = Writer
, nationality =
, period =
, genre = Novels, sh ...
(1859–1916).
Origins
In 1861,
Yehoshua Mordechai Lifshitz (1828–1878), who is considered the father of Yiddishism and Yiddish lexicography, circulated an essay entitled “The Four Classes” (Yiddish: די פיר קלאסן) in which he referred to Yiddish as a completely separate language from both
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
** Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
and
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
and, in the European context of his audience, the "mother tongue" of the Jewish people.
In this essay, which was eventually published in 1863 in an early issue of the influential Yiddish periodical ''
Kol Mevasser'', he contended that the refinement and development of Yiddish were indispensable for the humanization and education of Jews.
In a subsequent essay published in the same periodical, he also proposed Yiddish as a bridge linking Jewish and European cultures.
Scholar
Mordkhe Schaechter
Itsye Mordkhe Schaechter ( yi, איציע מרדכי שעכטער; December 1, 1927 – February 15, 2007) was a leading Yiddish language, Yiddish linguist, writer, and educator who spent a lifetime studying, standardizing and teaching the langua ...
characterizes Lifshitz as "
e first conscious, goal-oriented language reformer" in the field of Yiddish, and highlights his pivotal role in countering the negative attitudes toward the language propagated within the
Haskalah
The ''Haskalah'', often termed Jewish Enlightenment ( he, השכלה; literally, "wisdom", "erudition" or "education"), was an intellectual movement among the Jews of Central and Eastern Europe, with a certain influence on those in Western Euro ...
, or Jewish Enlightenment movement:
Although an adherent of the Enlightenment, ifshitzbroke with its sterile anti-Yiddish philosophy, to become an early ideologue of Yiddishism and of Yiddish-language planning. He courageously stood up for the denigrated folk tongue, calling for its elevation and cultivation. He did this in the form of articles in the weekly ''Kol-mevaser'' (in the 1860s) and in his excellent Russian-Yiddish and Yiddish-Russian dictionaries ..
The Czernowitz Conference
![Czern-conf leaders](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fd/Czern-conf_leaders.jpg)
From 30 August to 3 September 1908, "The Conference for the Yiddish Language" ( yi, text=קאָנפֿערענץ פֿאָר דער ייִדישער שפּראַך, translit=Konferents for der Yidisher Shprakh, label=none) also known as "The Czernowitz Conference" ( yi, text=טשערנאָוויצער קאָנפֿערענץ, translit=Tshernovitser Konferents, label=none) took place in the Austro-Hungarian city of
Czernowitz
Chernivtsi ( uk, Чернівці́}, ; ro, Cernăuți, ; see also other names) is a city in the historical region of Bukovina, which is now divided along the borders of Romania and Ukraine, including this city, which is situated on the up ...
,
Bukovina (today in southwestern
Ukraine
Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...
). The conference proclaimed Yiddish a modern language with a developing high culture. The organizers of this gathering (
Benno Straucher,
Nathan Birnbaum,
Chaim Zhitlowsky
Chaim Zhitlowsky (Yiddish: חײם זשיטלאָװסקי; russian: Хаим Осипович Житловский) (April 19, 1865 – May 6, 1943) was a Jewish socialist, philosopher, social and political thinker, writer and literary critic born i ...
,
David Pinski
David Pinski (Yiddish: דוד פּינסקי; April 5, 1872 – August 11, 1959) was a Yiddish language writer, probably best known as a playwright. At a time when Eastern Europe was only beginning to experience the industrial revolution, Pinsk ...
, and
Jacob Gordin
Jacob Michailovitch Gordin (Yiddish: יעקב מיכאַילאָװיטש גאָרדין; May 1, 1853 – June 11, 1909) was a Russian-born American playwright active in the early years of Yiddish theater. He is known for introducing realism an ...
) expressed a sense of urgency to the delegates that Yiddish as a language and as the binding glue of Jews throughout Eastern Europe needed help. They proclaimed that the status of Yiddish reflected the status of the Jewish people. Thus only by saving the language could the Jews as a people be saved from the onslaught of assimilation. The conference for the first time in history declared Yiddish to be "a national language of the Jewish people."
Further developments
''
The Bund
The Bund or Waitan (, Shanghainese romanization: ''Nga3thae1'', , ) is a waterfront area and a protected historical district in central Shanghai. The area centers on a section of Zhongshan Road (East Zhongshan Road No.1) within the former Shan ...
'' (''The General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia''; yi, אַלגעמײנער ייִדישער אַרבעטער בונד אין ליטע פּוילין און רוסלאַנד, ''Algemeyner Yidisher Arbeter Bund in Lite, Poyln un Rusland''), a secular Jewish socialist party in the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
, founded in
Vilnius
Vilnius ( , ; see also other names) is the capital and largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the municipality of Vilnius). The population of Vilnius's functional urb ...
, Poland in 1897 and active through 1920, promoted the use of Yiddish as a Jewish national language, and to some extent opposed the Zionist project of reviving Hebrew.
In 1925
YIVO
YIVO (Yiddish: , ) is an organization that preserves, studies, and teaches the cultural history of Jewish life throughout Eastern Europe, Germany, and Russia as well as orthography, lexicography, and other studies related to Yiddish. (The word '' ...
(''Yiddish Scientific Institute''; : ''Yidisher Visnshaftlekher Institut'') was established in
Wilno
Vilnius ( , ; see also #Etymology and other names, other names) is the capital and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the munic ...
, Poland (Vilnius, now part of
Lithuania). YIVO was initially proposed by Yiddish linguist and writer
Nochum Shtif
Nohum Shtif ( yi, נחום שטיף; 1879, Rovno – 1933, Kiev), was a Jewish linguist, literary historian, publisher, translator, and philologist of the Yiddish languageEstraikh, Gennady (2010, October 18).Shtif, Nokhem" ''YIVO Encycloped ...
(1879–1933). He characterized his advocacy of Yiddish as "realistic" Jewish nationalism, contrasted to the "visionary"
Hebraists
A Hebraist is a specialist in Jewish, Hebrew and Hebraic studies. Specifically, British and German scholars of the 18th and 19th centuries who were involved in the study of Hebrew language and literature were commonly known by this designation, a ...
and the "self-hating"
assimilationists
Cultural assimilation is the process in which a minority group or culture comes to resemble a society's majority group or assume the values, behaviors, and beliefs of another group whether fully or partially.
The different types of cultural assi ...
who adopted Russian or Polish.
In the Soviet Union during the 1920s, Yiddish was promoted as the language of the Jewish proletariat. It became one of the official languages in the
Ukrainian People's Republic
The Ukrainian People's Republic (UPR), or Ukrainian National Republic (UNR), was a country in Eastern Europe that existed between 1917 and 1920. It was declared following the February Revolution in Russia by the First Universal. In March 1 ...
and in some of the
Soviet republics
The Republics of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics or the Union Republics ( rus, Сою́зные Респу́блики, r=Soyúznye Respúbliki) were national-based administrative units of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics ( ...
, such as the
Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic and the
Galician Soviet Socialist Republic
The Galician Soviet Socialist Republic was a short-lived, self-declared Bolshevik political entity that existed from 15 July to formally 21 September 1920 with the capital in the city of Tarnopol. The communist state was established during a suc ...
. A public educational system entirely based on the Yiddish language was established and comprised kindergartens, schools, and higher educational institutions. At the same time, Hebrew was considered a bourgeois language and its use was generally discouraged.
In 1928, the Soviet Union created the ''
Jewish Autonomous Oblast
The Jewish Autonomous Oblast (JAO; russian: Евре́йская автоно́мная о́бласть, (ЕАО); yi, ייִדישע אװטאָנאָמע געגנט, ; )In standard Yiddish: , ''Yidishe Oytonome Gegnt'' is a federal subject ...
'' ( yi, ייִדישע אווטאָנאָמע געגנט, ). Located in the
Russian Far East
The Russian Far East (russian: Дальний Восток России, r=Dal'niy Vostok Rossii, p=ˈdalʲnʲɪj vɐˈstok rɐˈsʲiɪ) is a region in Northeast Asia. It is the easternmost part of Russia and the Asian continent; and is admin ...
and bordering on China, its
administrative center
An administrative center is a seat of regional administration or local government, or a county town, or the place where the central administration of a commune is located.
In countries with French as administrative language (such as Belgium, Lu ...
was the town of
Birobidzhan
Birobidzhan ( rus, Биробиджа́н, p=bʲɪrəbʲɪˈdʐan; yi, ביראָבידזשאַן, ''Birobidzhan'') is a types of inhabited localities in Russia, town and the administrative center of the Jewish Autonomous Oblast, Russia, locat ...
. There, the Soviets envisaged setting up a new "Soviet Zion", where a proletarian
Jewish culture could be developed. Yiddish, rather than
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
, would be the national language. Although the vast majority of the Yiddish-language cultural institutions in the Soviet Union were closed in the late 1930s, Yiddish continued to maintain a strong presence in some areas.
![Karol Marx](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b9/Karol_Marx.B005.jpg)
As many Eastern European Jews began to emigrate to the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
, the movement became very active there, especially in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
. One aspect of this became known as
Yiddish Theatre
Yiddish theatre consists of plays written and performed primarily by Jews in Yiddish, the language of the Central European Ashkenazi Jewish community. The range of Yiddish theatre is broad: operetta, musical comedy, and satiric or nostalgic revu ...
, and involved authors such as
Ben Hecht and
Clifford Odets
Clifford Odets (July 18, 1906 – August 14, 1963) was an American playwright, screenwriter, and actor. In the mid-1930s, he was widely seen as the potential successor to Nobel Prize-winning playwright Eugene O'Neill, as O'Neill began to withdra ...
. Another aspect was the huge Yiddish press, exemplified in the United States by Yiddish publications such as the Yiddish newspaper ''
Forverts
''The Forward'' ( yi, פֿאָרווערטס, Forverts), formerly known as ''The Jewish Daily Forward'', is an American news media organization for a American Jews, Jewish American audience. Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily socialis ...
''.
Owing in a large part to the efforts of the Yiddishist movement,
Yiddish
Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...
, before
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
, was becoming a major language, spoken by over 11,000,000 people.
The Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, however, led to a dramatic, sudden decline in the use of Yiddish, as the extensive European Jewish communities, both secular and religious, that used Yiddish in their day-to-day life were largely destroyed. Around 5 million, or 85%, of the Jewish victims of the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; ...
, were speakers of Yiddish.
[ Solomo Birnbaum, ''Grammatik der jiddischen Sprache'' (4., erg. Aufl., Hamburg: Buske, 1984), p. 3.] This, coupled with the
revival of the Hebrew language
The revival of the Hebrew language took place in Europe and Palestine toward the end of the 19th century and into the 20th century, through which the language's usage changed from the sacred language of Judaism to a spoken and written language ...
as the national language of
Israel
Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
, essentially extinguished the dynamic momentum Yiddish had been gaining in the early decades of the 20th century.
See also
*
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all those belles-lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Euro ...
*
Yiddish symbols
*
War of the Languages
The war of the languages ( he, מלחמת השפות; ) was a heated debate in Ottoman Palestine over the language of instruction in the country's new Jewish schools. This "language war" was a cornerstone event in the history of the revival of the ...
*
Jewish political movements
Jewish political movements refer to the organized efforts of Jews to build their own political parties or otherwise represent their interest in politics outside the Jewish community. From the time of the siege of Jerusalem by the Romans to the f ...
*
California Institute for Yiddish Culture and Language
* — the first Yiddish grammar, published only partially. It proposed a romanized version based on the
Białystok (Northeastern) dialect, as a unifying language for the Jews of the
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
.
References
Sources
*Joshua A. Fishman: ''Attracting a Following to High-Culture Functions for a Language of Everyday Life: The Role of the Tshernovits Language Conference in the ‘Rise of Yiddish,’'' International Journal of the Sociology of Language 24, 1980, S. 43–73.
* Joshua A. Fishman: ''Ideology, Society and Language. The Odyssey of Nathan Birnbaum''; Karoma Publ., Ann Arbor 1987, .
*Joshua A. Fishman: ''The Tshernovits Conference Revisited: The ‘First World Conference for Yiddish’ 85 Years Later,'' in: ''The Earliest Stage of Language Planning'', Berlin, 1993 S. 321–331.
* Emanuel S. Goldsmith: ''Modern Yiddish culture. The story of the Yiddish language movement''. Fordham Univ Press, New York 1976, reprint 2000 .
* Herbert J. Lerner: ''The Tshernovits Language Conference. A Milestone in Jewish Nationalist Thought.'' New York NY 1957 (Masters Essay. Columbia University).
External links
{{Commons category, Czernowitz Conference
First Yiddish Language Conference Czernowitz, August 30-September 3, 1908.
Yiddish
Yiddish culture
Literary movements
19th century in Europe
Jewish movements
19th-century Judaism
20th-century Judaism