Timothy Snyder, The Making of Modern Ukraine, Lecture #8: Early Jews of Modern Ukraine
I’ve just watched the eighth lecture for Timothy Synder’s course, The Making of Modern Ukraine. This lecture, titled “The Early Jews in Ukraine,” was given by Glenn Dynner, a faculty member at Sarah Lawrence College who specializes in religion and history of East European Jewry.
Jews have lived in Europe for more than 2,000 years. There are records of Jews living in Greece dating from the 4th century BC and across the Roman Empire from the 1st century AD. In some cases, Jews were brought to Rome and Greece as slaves from conquered territories. In others, they came as merchants, following the path of imperial armies and settlements. Jews lived peacefully in Europe until the Catholic Church gained prominence, upon which Jews found themselves increasingly persecuted, particularly during the Crusades, forcing them to move ever eastward.
Eventually Jews migrated to Poland, where they were protected by the nobility. Under that protection, a vibrant Jewish culture flourished. But that protection came to an end when the Teutonic Knights invaded, and Jews were expelled from Poland to what is now Ukraine. (Four centuries later, the Ukrainian Jewish population in Ukraine was augmented when the Russian Empire prohibited Jews from living anywhere except the Pale of Settlement, which included Ukraine, Belarus, Lithuania, and Moldova.) In Ukraine, the Jewish community thrived, and the Polish nobility, which owned most of the land in Ukraine, continued to protect them, because the Jewish community provided an important service.
Jews were not allowed to own land in eastern Europe, but they were allowed to lease businesses from the Polish nobility, such as taverns and distilleries. These provided a source of revenue for the Polish nobility in the form of rent and taxes, as well as an easy source of credit. A distinct advantage for the Polish nobility was that the Jewish community could never pose a political threat. Polish nobles could collect their revenues without having to make political accommodations, such as granting rights or allowing political represention.
Over time, the Jewish community grew from 4,000 to 40,000 in Ukraine (Some scholars put the number at more than 100,000.) Talmudic scholarship flourished, and Jewish youth even sought secular instruction in European universities. Jews were able to enjoy complete autonomy in their communities, according to their own laws and traditions. But while the arrangement with Polish nobles had proven beneficial to Jews, peasants had become increasingly impoverished under the rule of the nobility. The peasants blamed the Jews. Things came to a head in the mid-17th century when the Cossacks of Zaporizhia (south central Ukraine) rose up against the Polish overlords. However, not having direct access to the Polish nobility, they massacred the Jews instead.
In 1648, half of the Jewish population was exterminated by Cossacks, who committed unspeakable acts of brutality against Jewish men, women, and children. Roughly 20,000 people were killed. The massacre left permanent scars on the Jewish community, ending its golden age of scholarship, and ushering in an era of mysticism and Hasidism.
Centuries later, the trauma is still felt by Eastern European Jews. (The word “Cossack” can produce a shudder among elderly Jews, even though the atrocities committed by the Cossacks were far eclipsed by the Nazis.) Currently, Ukraine is home to between 360,000 and 400,000 Jews, making it the fifth largest Jewish community in the world. President Zelensky is Jewish.
As an aside, I find it interesting to note that in Ivan Rudnytsky’s essays (required reading for this course), he refers to Jews in Ukraine as a “nation.” Rudnytsky is an impeccable scholar and an outstanding analyst of Ukrainian intellectual history. Yet, I have not found in the historical writings he analyzes any attempt to consider the Jews in Ukraine as anything other than “foreigners.” The refusal to recognize that Jews can be 100% Jewish while simultaneously considering themselves to be 100% citizens of the countries of their birth (i.e. Ukrainian, American, or any other nationality), is one of the wellsprings of anti-semitism. It singles Jews out as “not belonging,” a designation which has led to their repeated decimation. Sadly, eastern Europe, which had been home to a flourishing Jewish culture for centuries, was also the site of their near complete extermination.
You can watch the eighth lecture of The Making of Modern Ukraine here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bp495Uz_Cq4
The syllabus for the course is here: https://snyder.substack.com/p/syllabus-of-my-ukraine-lecture-class
You can watch all of Timothy Snyder’s lectures for The Making of Modern Ukraine here: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLh9mgdi4rNewfxO7LhBoz_1Mx1MaO6sw_
You can read my summaries here: https://ericaverr.medium.com/
Erica Verrillo is the author of the Phoenix Rising Trilogy (Random House). Her short work has appeared in over a dozen publications. She is also the author of the definitive reference guide for treating myalgic encephalomyelitis, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: A Treatment Guide, now in its second edition (first edition, St. Martin’s). She holds degrees from Tufts University (BA — History) and Syracuse University (MA — Linguistics) as well as doctoral work in Linguistics, Anthropology, and Speech Communication. Her professional life includes: Spanish language editor for the journal Mesoamerica, linguistics instructor (Dartmouth), Spanish and ESL instructor (Syracuse University), classical musician (Oxford Symphony Orchestra), Mayan linguist (SUNY Albany), and director of a non-profit NGO for Mayan refugees. She is the president of the American Myalgic Encephalomyelitis and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome Society, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to to serving the needs of patients and caregivers through support, advocacy, and education. Her blog for writers, Publishing … and Other Forms of Insanity, has received nearly 8 million page views. You are welcome to visit.
