Judaica Olomucensia

Judaica Olomucensia 2015/1 Special Issue Jewish Printing Culture between Brno, Prague and Vienna in the Era of Modernization, 1750–1850 Editor-in-Chief Louise Hecht Editor Matej Grochal This issue was made possible by a grant from Palacký University, project no. IGA_FF_2014_078 Table of Content 4 Introduction Louise Hecht 11 The Lack of Sabbatian Literature: On the Censorship of Jewish Books and the True Nature of Sabbatianism in Moravia and Bohemia Miroslav Dyrčík 30 Christian Printers as Agents of Jewish Modernization? Hebrew Printing Houses in Prague, Brno and Vienna, 1780–1850 Louise Hecht 62 Eighteenth Century Yiddish Prints from Brünn/Brno as Documents of a Language Shift in Moravia Thomas Soxberger 90 Pressing Matters: Jewish vs. Christian Printing in Eighteenth Century Prague Dagmar Hudečková 110 Wolf Pascheles: The Family Treasure Box of Jewish Knowledge Kerstin Mayerhofer and Magdaléna Farnesi 136 Table of Images 2015/1 – 3 Introduction Louise Hecht Jewish Printing Culture between Brno, Prague and Vienna in the Era of Modernization, 1750–1850 The history of Jewish print and booklore has recently turned into a trendy research topic. Whereas the topic was practically non-existent two decades ago, at the last World Congress of Jewish Studies, the “Olympics” of Jewish scholarship, held in Jerusalem in August 2013, various panels were dedicated to this burgeoning field. Although the Jewish people are usually dubbed “the people of the book,” in traditional Jewish society authority is primarily based on oral transmission in the teacher-student dialog.1 Thus, the innovation and modernization process connected to print and subsequent changes in reading culture had for a long time been underrated.2 Just as in Christian society, the establishment of printing houses and the dissemination of books instigated far-reaching changes in all areas of Jewish intellectual life and finally led to the democratization of Jewish culture.3 In central Europe, the rise of publications in the Jewish vernacular, i.e. Yiddish, that addressed women and lesser edu- cated strata of Jewish society since the late sixteenth century, clearly testifies to this trend.4 The first centers of Hebrew printing5 were located in Italy; after a short intermezzo on the Iberian Peninsula during the fifteenth century, in the sixteenth century Hebrew printing houses spread to the Ottoman Empire in the east and to Prague, Basle, Augsburg and several Polish cities (especially Krakow and Lublin) in the north; during the seventeenth century also liberal 1 Elchanan Reiner, ‘The Ashkenazi Elite at the Beginning of the Modern Era: Manuscript versus Printed Book’, Polin 10 (1997), pp. 85–98 (pp. 88, 91–3). 2 Zeev Gries, The Book in the Jewish World, 1700–1900 (Oxford et al.: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2007), pp. 1–2. 3 Elchanan Reiner, ‘The Ashkenazi Elite’ (s. note 1), pp. 87, 93. 4 Chava Weissler, Voices of the Matriarchs (Boston: Beacon Press, 1998), pp. 3–8. 5 “Hebrew printing” does not refer to prints in Hebrew language alone, but includes the whole output of printing shops in Hebrew letters; i.e. also books in Yiddish, Judeo-Spanish and German in Hebrew letters. 2015/1 – 4 Introduction Louise Hecht cities like Amsterdam became important hubs, while the Polish centers lost some of their power due to turmoil and pogroms.6 Hebrew and Yiddish printing were thus wide-spread and well-established by the eighteenth century. Yet, due to the Enlightenment’s quest for learn- ing and education, communication and information changed in quality and quantity from the second half of the eighteenth century onward. They became essential factors for upward social mobility among central European Jewry. Consequently, book production dramatically increased in Jewish just as in gentile society. Different literary genres emerged, such as textbooks, readers, journals, books for children and novels. New segments of society, especially children and lower social classes, were recruited as reading audiences and new reading habits (extensive rather than intensive reading) finally produced the so-called Lesewut (reading mania) around 1800. Parallel to the process of secularization central European Jewry under- went a language-shift from western Yiddish to high-German, with German printed in Hebrew letters (also called Judendeutsch or Weiberdeutsch7) as an in- termediary stage, from the second half of the eighteenth century onward. Al- though the language-shift was instigated by the aversion of Jewish enlighten- ers against the Jargon – as they called the Yiddish language, Joseph II’s Edicts of Toleration hastened the disappearance of Yiddish by decreeing that Jewish business records and legal documents had to be written in German.8 Yiddish books were thus increasingly replaced by reading material in German. This trend manifested itself even in religious literature: from the 1810s onwards prayer-books for women written in German (first printed in Hebrew letters, but after 1830 almost exclusively in Latin letters) became a new and burgeoning genre that quickly replaced the traditional Yiddish Tkhines in central Eu- rope.9 Although the genre gained momentum in the German lands, the first women’s prayer-book in high-German (printed in Hebrew letters) was composed by the Bohemian Maskil Peter Beer10 and published in Prague by Karl Wilhelm Enders,11 in 1815. 6 Shlomo Berger, ‘The Oppenheim Collection and Early Modern Yiddish Books’, in The Bodleian Library Record 25 (2012), pp. 37–51 (p. 38–9). 7 For different definitions of the terms, cf. the articles by Thomas Soxberger and Kerstin Mayerhofer/Magdaléna Farnesi in this volume. 8 On the Edicts of Toleration and its impact, cf. my article in this volume. 9 On Tkhines cf. Weissler, Voices of the Matriarchs (see note 4), pp. 3–35. 10 Peter Beer, Gebetbuch für gebildete Frauenzimmer mosaischer Religion: Zum Gebrauch bei der öffentlichen als auch häuslichen Gottesverehrung (Prague: K. W. Ender, 1815), cf. image 1; on Beer’s prayer-book, cf. Louise Hecht, Ein jüdischer Aufklärer in Böhmen: Der Pädagoge und Reformer Peter Beer, 1758–1838 (Köln: Böhlau, 2008), pp. 324–337. 11 On Enders‘ publishing house, cf. Alena Köllner, Buchwesen in Prag von Václav Matěj Kramerius bis Jan Otto (Vienna: Edition Praesens, 2000), p. 63. 2015/1 – 5 Introduction Louise Hecht In the introduction to his prayer-book Beer claimed that he had composed the prayers primarily for the benefit of his wife and daughter; only a government degree that preliminarily prohibited Tkhines encouraged him to make his collection public.12 Besides attesting to the language-shift of Bohemian Jewry, Beer’s prayer-book thus neatly exemplifies how government measures and maskilic ideas could coincide in the attempt of modernizing central Eu- ropean Jewry. The concerted efforts between the state and the Maskilim first and foremost entailed the reformation of the Jewish educational system; both parties aimed at the inclusion and even the prevalence of secular subjects in the Jewish curriculum. The laws for compulsory education and the establishment of the German-Jewish school system during the reign of Joseph II enhanced the maskilic project and decisively transformed Jewish society in the Habsburg Monarchy.13 While both, the enlightened absolutist state and the Maskilim aimed at modernizing Habsburg’s Jews, state measures did not always suit maskilic efforts. Joseph II’s relaxed censorship regulations from 1781 encouraged public discussions through a flood of pamphlets and brochures; this contributed to the formation of a vital public discourse and simultaneously to a boom in the printing business. The window of opportunity that opened up for clever Chris- tian printers, was hampered for the Hebrew book market though. Joseph II’s Edicts of Toleration sought the acculturation of Jews by reducing the use of Hebrew and Hebrew letters and, finally, by abolishing them in every sphere but religious practice. Hence, the Emperor opposed the establishment of new Hebrew printing presses. Concurrently – seemingly for purely economic rea- sons – all existing Hebrew printing presses in the Bohemian lands passed into Christian hands during the reign of Joseph II.14 It was not before 1824/6 that Moses Israel Landau, the grandson of Prague’s former chief rabbi Yehezkel Landau, could (re)establish a Jewish printing house in Prague.15 The Maskilim, on the other hand, tried to launch Hebrew as a (secular) learned language16 and were thus interested in expanding the Hebrew book market. Since the Josephinian state did not interfere with Jewish religion, 12 Beer, Gebetbuch (see note 10), introduction, footnote. 13 On the reformation of Jewish education, cf. Hecht, Ein jüdischer Aufklärer in Böhmen (see note 10), chap. 3. 14 Cf. the article by Dagmar Hudečková in this volume. 15 Iveta Cermanová, ‘The Fall and Rise of Hebrew Book Printing in Bohemia’, in Hebrew Printing in Bohemia and Moravia, edited by Olga Sixtová (Prague: Academia, 2012), p. 215–237 (p. 231–7). 16 On the role of Hebrew for the Haskalah movement, cf. Louise Hecht, ‘The Haskalah in Bohemia and Moravia – a gendered perspective’, in The Enlightenment in Bohemia: Religion, morality and multiculturalism, ed. by Ivo Cerman, Rita Krueger, Susan Reynolds (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 2011), p. 253–272 (p. 260–1). 2015/1 – 6 Introduction Louise Hecht enlightened Bible commentaries provided an effective opportunity to reach their goal. Hence, Maskilim in the Habsburg Monarchy not merely promot- ed Moses Mendelssohn’s project of a German Pentateuch

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