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Shlomo Yovel
Translated by Ron Skolnik
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Preface
In the first meetings of the editorial board, it became clear to us that a book on the community which is based only on memories of those being included alone would deliver a very narrow and unbalanced picture of the life of the community because, by their very nature, the memories would be able to cover the timeframe of the '20s – '40s of our era.
However, searching for archival material was from the outset something of a gamble. After all, the Bălţi community was a relatively small one within a remote province in which there was not any pan-Jewish center, such as: A famous yeshiva, a rabbinic courtyard, scholars, or a secular education center, etc., that would justify being related to by leaders, well-known people, writers, or at least reports by the period's Jewish press. On the other hand, precisely the absence of such centers raised the challenge of following the evolution of a small, remote, godforsaken Jewish community, like most of the communities in Bessarabia.
Hence, reference to the Bălţi community in the Jewish press could be only in the event that some reader of this press, or a local person of letters, would gather courage and write to the editorial boards and that those boards would publish what was written.
The question was whether there were such readers or people of letters? Well, there were, and in their memory, I will list their names [Hebrew-]alphabetically:
| Zalman Epshtein | Alter Chaikes | M. Kagan | Shalom Spivak |
| Yitzhak bar Lemberg | Aharon Yavelberg | M. Michaelitsch | Yakov Friedman |
| Zalman Berman | M. Yudkovitz | Yakov Sidikman | M. Kreimer |
A. Demographic Development
The name Bălţi is first mentioned during the rule of Alexandru cel Bun (1400-1432) as an estate belonging to the Countess of Zovetskaya, sister of the Lithuanian prince, Vladislav II.
In the XV century, all of Bessarabia suffers from the raids of the Tatars, and they, under the command of Mengli Giray, burn down the settlement and take its inhabitants prisoner. Over time, the settlement is reestablished.
During the Prut Campaign (1711), Tsar Peter I sets his base in Bălţi, but upon his withdrawal, the Tatars return from Crimea and raid the settlement and burn it down.
Tatarian control continued roughly 50 years.
The foundation for ongoing development until the settlement turned into a city began at the time that the entire Bessarabia region was part
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of the Principality of Moldova, while Moldova itself was subject to the authority of the Ottoman-Turkish Empire, in the period of the Phanariots (1711-1768; 1774-1821).
Subjugation to the Ottoman Empire expressed itself, inter alia, in the appointment by the Sultan's government of the ruler-princes in each of the two principalities after their selection from among wealthy Greek families, who were inhabitants of the Phanar quarter in Kushta [Istanbul].
From the quarter's name, the inhabitants of the principalities derived the appellation “Phanariots” for that line of princes of foreign origin who were imposed upon them by the Turkish conqueror.
In 1766, the ruler, Alexandru Ghica, grants the territories on the bank of the Răut to two merchants, brothers Constantin and Iordache Panaiti, who developed the settlement up to the level of “târgușor”[a].
The estate owner, wishing to turn the town into a city, invited Jews to settle there (1779-1782).
The establishment of a Jewish settlement, in those times, required drawing up a contract between the estate owner, who was agreeing to settlement on his lands, and representatives of the settlers interested in founding the urban settlement. They would convey the agreement for confirmation by the prince, and this confirmation turned the agreement into a letter of privileges for the estate owner.
The confirmations were, apparently, temporary and therefore the letter of privileges was reconfirmed by the princes: Constantin Moruzi (12 January 1782), Alexandru Constantin Mavrocordat (20 December 1782), Alexandru Mavrocordat (1786), and Alexandru Ion Moruzi (24 December 1792).
In the wake of the Agreement of Bucharest (25 May 1812), the territory of Bessarabia was transferred into the hands of Tsarist Russia, but there is no doubt that over 300 years of Moldovan-Ottoman mixed rule (1503-1812) left behind layers of political, social, economic, and demographic influence.
Due to this, one should assume that among the Jews who inhabited the Bessarabia region at the time of the transition under Russian rule were also some who had come to Bessarabia from other areas of the Ottoman Empire from among Jewish communities of Sephardic origin. Likewise, Jews who had come from Moldova to settle in Bessarabia remained in place. In the mid-17th century, during the “Decrees of Tach” – the Khmelnytsky pogroms – Jews came to Bessarabia from Ukraine.
“In the period that Bessarabia was conquered by the Russians (1812-1818), 5,000 Jewish families were located in the Bessarabia region. The majority of them had their origin in Podolia, Poland, and Germany and a small portion of whom – Sephardis who had come here from Moldova, children[b] of the exile from Spain from the days of Ferdinand and Isabella.”
According to Soviet research on the city of Kishinev, there was “from the end of the 18th century a great movement of Jews to the cities of Bessarabia. First from the cities of Austria, apparently Galicia, and subsequently from Ukraine and from Crimea”. Precise data is lacking on the number of Jews in Bessarabia generally, and by locale in particular, in the time of the conquest.
Only after five years of Russian rule, in 1817, a census was conducted, from which we learn that there were at that time in Bălţi 244 Jewish families, estimated together as 1,220 people, who were, certainly, a microcosmic reflection of the Jewish populace, taking in its demographic components, in Bessarabia as a whole. The demographic development of Bessarabian Jewry during Tsarist rule was influenced by:
To understand the impact on the Jews in Bessarabia of that policy of populating the region, one needs to distinguish between two periods:
The 1827 law, under which Jews of Russia had an obligation of military service, was not activated vis-a-vis Jews of Bessarabia, and they were saved the nightmare of the “Cantonists”. The Jews of Russia regarded the situation of those settled in Bessarabia thusly:
“In 1832, a royal decree issued from the deceased Tsar Nikolai, may he rest in peace, that all the people of the Children of Israel who desire to leave the cities of their habitancies to wander on the land of Bessarabia and Kherson, which have ever since been deserted of any dweller, to become people of the field and tillers of the soil there shall be given a concession in exchange for their work in the field and shall not pay tax and their sons shall be exempt from the work of the army.”
Descriptions by local inhabitants reinforced this image and apparently, under the conditions of the time, it was not entirely the phantasm of starving migrants. The writer, Zalman Epshtein, about whom we will elaborate later on, at the time a resident of Bălţi, writes in “Ha-Tsfira”:
“Their material condition, measured by the condition of the rest of the Jews of Russia, is very good. The soil is rich and fertile and will bring out its yield aplenty. Mămăligă and wine they have in abundance and cheap.”[1]
At the same time, pressure by the Austrian government on the Jews within its domain gives rise to migration from Galicia and Bukovina to Bessarabia.[2] Bălţi, as a northern city, took in a considerable portion of these waves of migration.
In the second period, two laws were published whose activation embittered the lives of the Jews and turned them into a wandering people. In 1858, a law was published under which residence by Jews within 50 kilometers from any border was prohibited, except for those Jews who were registered as permanent residents of those places by the day of the law's publication.
In 1882, “the temporary regulations” or “May Laws,” known also by the name “the Ignatyev Laws,” were introduced, under which inhabitancy of the Jews in villages was prohibited and they were forbidden to hold real estate assets there. Until the publication of the “May Laws,” the Jews had taken advantage
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of the lack of clarity regarding the activation of the laws on expulsion from the villages as far as Bessarabia was concerned, but during Ignatyev's time the expulsions were activated with complete cruelty. With the activation of the military service requirement, the expulsions from the villages and from the 50-kilometer strip, the legal status of Bessarabia's Jews was made equal to that of the Jews in other areas. Relative to what it had been previously, their situation was made gravely worse. Particularly cruel were the expulsions from the villages because, as opposed to central Russia, 25% of the Jews of Bessarabia lived in the region's villages.
On the maps that were drafted for the purpose of clarifying the expulsion directives, Bălţi was included in the 50-kilometer strip. Thus, two currents of expulsions combine together. One type of expellees from the village to the city and another type of expellees from the 50-kilometer area toward the more far-off areas. The pressure on the Jews of Bălţi begins ever prior to the temporary laws: “Several days ago, based upon the order of the governor, the commander of the Bessarabia region police notified the ispravnic (police superintendent) of Iași County that in the city of Bălţi and in the district located in the strip 50 kilometers from the border there is no residency right for Jews who are not registered in the community and cannot prove possession of property before 1858.”
Because, factually, a very high number of Jews lacking a residency right lived there, the ispravnic is ordered to check the right of the Jews living in Bălţi and the county; in other words, to advise whether those Jews have passports, whether they own real estate assets and as of when and to report on this. Needless to say, the city's Jews lacking a right to reside in Bălţi make up almost 50% of the population.[3] From that year until after the revolution of 1905, the Jews of the city have no rest from expulsions upon expulsions in practice, reports Z. Epshtein:
“Every day they will bring to us such people to the tens [?] from the cities and from the nearby villages and they will order them to go out of the city and settle in the places that are allowed to be lived in.”
It is a wonder that they will expel the Jews only from the small cities and from the villages, but in Belz [Bălţi], which is also within the fifty verst and the number of Jews from other cities is very great, they will not harm anyone any longer.[4]
In November 1883, the Jews of Rodoya [?] are expelled and put into the jail in Bălţi[5] and in April 1884, the Jews of Sîngerei are expelled to Bălţi.[6] Due to pressure from Jewish elements in the western countries on their governments and pressure by those governments on the Russian authorities, the date determining the right to remain in the 50-kilometer area was changed on occasion.
“We are informed from Bălţi that the district authorities, who some time ago had issued instructions to the police to expel the Jews from the 50-kilometer strip, have issued other instructions according to which any Jew able to prove with documents that he was residing in the strip by 1870 could remain there.”[7]
Changes to the instructions and the dates gave rise each time to new inspections, new regulations, and the need for new activity and interventions. Following the easing of the determining date, to 1870 instead of 1858, came an order for executing an expulsion of those Jews who could not prove residence there by 1870, and the Crown Rabbi, Yo'el Shapira, goes off to Chișinău, heading a delegation of five dignitaries, “to ask for mercy”.[8]
The documents demanded by the police for proving residence in Bălţi before 1870 are not obtainable and therefore another delegation goes off to complain before the governor in Odessa. According to the reportage, the governor received the delegation hospitably and “promised to give appropriate instructions that take the complaints into consideration”. During the year 1887, 5,000 Jews were expelled from the city and county.[9] The expulsions are carried out with great cruelty with no consideration for the conditions.
“The expulsions as a natural disaster. Despite the mighty frost, several families a week are expelled from the people in ‘etaps’[c]. Migration is the single way out.”[10]
In the framework of the harsh decrees, special operations were also carried out, and thus different groups were given demands for inspections of permits.
“On Shabbat, January 30, the police officers, who went through the Batei Knesset [synagogues], ordered the craftsmen to come to city hall for an inspection of documents, both of the city's natives and residents and of natives of other cities. A lot of people will be expelled. A lot of people from our city are migrating to America.”[11]
News items about abuse and expulsions appear all the time because many cannot prove residence in the city before 1870. Jews from Faleshty are expelled via Bălţi.[12] The pressure on the Russian government delivers results and in 1895 the directives were changed,
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such that the danger of expulsion pertains only to Jews who had settled in the 50-kilometer strip contrary to Section 18 of the Passport Regulations, though through the “diligence” of the police commander in Bălţi, an extremely short date was set to obtain the birth certificates as proof.[13]
In the second period, in addition to the political and juridical mistreatments, severe economic crises, stemming from a drop in world grain prices, befall Bessarabia, too. Bessarabia's Jews, a portion of whom live in the countryside and engage in the export of grains, are badly hurt. On top of the crisis in prices came a series of consecutive years of drought, which give rise to mass famine. Bessarabia as a “land flowing with milk and honey” turns into a myth of the past. In a report from Bălţi in “HaMelitz”, it was said, inter alia, “the land of Bessarabia as a Garden of Eden was a long time ago and all those coming there and mass masses of our brethren, the Children of Israel, thronged to it from all directions to make wealth … now it, too, has turned into a desert. The commerce has declined and the ‘May Laws’ are burdensome.”[14] A combination of all the factors turned the lives of the Jews throughout Bessarabia and in Bălţi, too, into hell, and the solution called for – turning to migration. In two of the reports that we quoted above, the phenomenon was noted, but the flow had already commenced at the beginning of the '80s and intensifies toward the end of the century.
“A push for Jews' migration due to the drought and the commerce crisis. They register for migration to North America and to Argentina.”[15] The dimensions of the migration to Argentina and America are not manifested in the press on account of the Jewish press in Hebrew and Russian being possessed of a Zionist orientation and its attitude toward migration across the ocean was negative.
One should recall that, at the end of the century, the Jewish Colonization Association was working to organize migration to Argentina and Baron Hirsch's assistance certainly influenced the decision of the country's Jews to migrate. Feinberg, secretary of the committee for migration to Argentina, set out from Petersburg to organize migration by Jews from Bessarabia and from southern Russia to Argentina, and succeeded in organizing a group like this in Bălţi as well.
“The Bălţian group is made up of petty capitalists. Respected people who were not thinking about migration if Jews had not been expelled from the villages. After expellees arrived and they were conversed with at length, they decided to go.”[16]
Dubious characters who exploited people's disconcertedness and “organized” their own groups also infiltrated among the “emissary” activists of the Argentina settlers who were interested in adding settlers into their ranks, who assisted Feinberg in the efforts to recruit and persuade of the great hardship and press for migration; and on such a character it is written from Bălţi: A “character” named Rosenberg collects money for organizing migration to Argentina.[17] We will devote a special chapter to the topic of aliya[d] as a solution to hardship.
In summary, one can say that the demographic structure of Bălţi's Jews is the outcome of the combination and mutual offsetting among three currents of migration, on one hand, and the rates of natural increase, on the other hand. As stated, there existed a continuous flow of immigrants into the city from the other areas of Russia, from Bukovina and from Galicia and on top of that a stream of immigration from the villages of the surrounding area, whereas the third current was of emigration to other countries, mainly to the United States, Argentina, and the Land of Israel.
Demographically, Bălţi is certainly similar to any other city in Bessarabia – as a provincial city in a remote province. In one feature it is different from other province cities in Bessarabia, and it is the fact of it being a new city without municipal status prior to the rule of the Tsars and without a rich community nucleus. This fact makes the community's development especially impressive.
The community's rapid development is without a doubt tied to the city's general evolution, starting from a small village and afterward a town in the Soroca district and on to the main city in Iași County (only in 1887 was the county's name changed from “Iași” to “Bălţi”). At the same time, it becomes clear from the statistical data to be presented later on that the expansion of the Jewish community in the city was greater than that of the non-Jewish communities.
To put together a table of the development of the Jewish population in Bălţi and of the city's population overall, we integrated data from the censuses carried out in 1817, 1858, and 1897 that are cited by Feldman with data that appeared in other statistical compilations and data that appeared in reports from Bălţi.
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Jews |
Population |
in Population |
||
| 1816/7 | 1,220 | 3,100 | 39.3 | Feldman, ibid, pp. 32, 33, 244 families per 5 persons in a family |
| 1847 | 1,790 | “Belts”, Register of Communities – Romania, Volume B, Yad Vashem Publishing, Jerusalem, 5740, p. 336 | ||
| 1858-64 | 3,124 | 8,077 | 38.7 | Feldman, ibid, Table 7, p. 39; Table 2, p. 30 |
| 1880 | Approximately 5,000 | Report by Kreimer, Rasviet, No. 19, 8.5.80, p. 731 | ||
| 1881 | 4,724 | 8,262 | 57.2 | Statisticheski Vermenyik Rasiskoi Imperiya Seria III Vypusk 2 [?], Peterburg, 1884, p.4 |
| 1887 | 9,000 | Report of Sidikman, N.K.V., No. 49, 6.12.1887, pp. 1228-9 | ||
| 1895 | Approximately 10,000 | N.K.V., No. 9, 26.2.1895, p. 234 | ||
| 1897 | 10,348 | 18,478 | 56 | Feldman, ibid, Table 11, p. 114 and Table 12, p. 115 |
| 1900 | 11,000 | 20,000 | 55 | Dr. P. Lander [?], Voskhod, No. 30, 20.4.1900, p. 6 |
Per the data in the table, between the years 1816 and 1900, the Jewish population grew from 1,220 persons to 11,000, which is an increase of 800% or nine-fold. At the same time, the non-Jewish population grew in that period from 1,880 (3,100-1,220) to 9,000 (20,000-11,000), which is an increase of 431% or 5.31-fold. The greater relative increase of the Jewish community raised its rate in the general population from 39.3% to 55%.
Data on the distribution of the population according to age and sex are lacking, but based on the assumption of five persons on average in a family, it is possible to say that, in the year 1900, adults, being 4,400 persons, made up 2/5 of the Jewish populace, while there were 6,600 children. For the purpose of calculating the distribution by sex, we will accept Zashchuk's determination in his book “Material for the Geography and Statistics of Russia” (Russian)[18], which says that, in the Jewish population in Bessarabia, the men constitute 52.7% and women 47.3%, a composition characteristic of migrant populations, while in normal populations the percentage of men is lower. Per this determination, in 1900 there were 5,797 men and 5,203 women in the Jewish community in Bălţi.
For comparison with other communities in Bessarabia, the most appropriate is a comparison with the development of the community in Orheev, even though it preceded Bălţi – greatly – as an urban settlement. In 1864, the Jewish populations in the two cities are almost equal: 3,102 in Orheev and 3,124 in Bălţi.[19]
In the census of 1897, there are already 10,348 Jews in Bălţi, as opposed to 7,144 in Orheev. While the Jewish population in Bălţi increased 3.3-fold in that period, the community in Orheev grew 2.3-fold. Furthermore, the growth rate of the Jewish population in Bălţi was the highest of all the Jewish communities in Bessarabia, even than the growth rate of the Chișinău community, which grew 2.46-fold in that period.[20]
The population's growth rate is influenced, as aforesaid, by the different currents of migration and the rate of natural increase. We lack data both on the migration flows and on the increase rates, however logic dictates that there was no significant difference between the natural increase rate of Bălţi's Jews and the increase rate in the other communities in the Bessarabia region and hence it is possible
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to determine that Bălţi drew Jews in more than it was left by them. Even in the critical years of the cruel expulsions, the statistical data show growth from 5,000 people to 11,000, that is, a 220% increase.
All the data point to the Bălţi community as continuously being a community of migrants the entire time of Tsarist rule, and like in any population of migrants, the constant movement of the populace will encumber the consolidation of community norms, the establishment of institutions and organizations, and the establishment of an educational network for which a stable population is a necessary condition.
B. The Bălţi Community in the Eyes of Visitors
How did the community appear in the eyes of people from that period? Who found it of interest to write up his impression of the Jewish community in such a far-flung city?
These could be well-educated Jewish traveling-writers who came to the locale particularly for the purpose of writing reportage from and impressions of communities that appeared to them as strange to the point of exotic; or they could have been well-educated Jewish residents of the city or the region who saw fit to write about their city in the Jewish press in Russia or in Europe.
In their reports, traveling-visitors from Jewish communities in Western Europe who visited Bessarabia in that period were not complimentary of the Jews there and nearly all of them stress the ignorance, the excessive eating, the internalization of the customs of the boorish people of the land, Moldovan or Ukrainian:
“Of all our brethren, Children of our Covenant, who live in the nations of Europe, the Jews who reside in the nation of Russia stand on the bottom rung of the rungs going up the ladder of wisdom… But our brethren inhabitants of the Bessarabian district have not yet reached even that rung, ignoramuses and fools lacking resourcefulness. And everything that will be said about it: knowledge, understanding, and insight they will banish from their homes, and is loathsome in their eyes. And whereas they have maintained faith and the Torah (law) of G-d, the law of humanity, even though it always goes hand-clasped with the unblemished perfect Torah, they have cast behind their backs … The interest and occupation of its inhabitants all day long to collect capital and accumulate, to eat at jubilant festivals, and drink at commanded festive meals the wine mostly preserved in their grottos. This is the inclination and purpose of their toil under the sun and this in their eyes is the more affirming success on earth…”[1]
Two Jewish well-educated traveling-guests from Western Europe who visited Bessarabia also visited Bălţi at those same times, and they recorded what they saw, first in newspapers and afterward in books that they published. One was Avraham Dov Ber Gottlober.[2] He traveled over Bessarabia twice: The first time in 1828 and the second time in the year 1864. And the second, Ephraim Deinard[3], visited the area in 1885. Both Gottlober and Deinard gained an impression akin to Tzvi Balaban's. After the first visit, Gottlober writes, inter alia:
“Here during all that time, the cities of Bessarabia may they rest in peace to sleep eternal sleep and their sleep is pleasant to them because there is no disturbance. Most of our brethren are still as in ancient times blinded there and the sun of wisdom has not shone on them.”[4]
Ephraim Deinard's impression was more balanced and we have chosen a section in which he notes the Bessarabian's positive attributes, which are bound to develop with a change for the better of the circumstances. After viewing the Jews of southern Russia as Asians, he writes:
“And only a hidden power buried in his midst that a son of Asia is lacking. This power is that the Bessarabian is a master of action and not a philosophizer, he won't be an idler and won't make do with nonsense stories like him and there is enough potency in this power to educate the person and lead him to knowledge [?] and life because his toil will cause him to forget any foreign imagining and nonsense idea, and if they have not yet become educated, surely there is hope that they will become educated with the passage of time.”[5] As stated, both Gottlober and Deinard visited Bălţi. Gottlober records, from his first visit (1830), an encounter and conversation with a Hasid belonging to the Chabad Hasids:
“That I did not know what wind had carried them from Lithuania to Moldavia and for the most part they will be studying there meditatively.”[6]
The negative attitude toward the Jews of the place appears to prevail over the fact – certainly known to Gottlober, too – of famine and hardship in Lithuania. He records, from his second visit, his positive experiences from the encounters with well-educated local residents:
“And how very great my happiness in the city of Belz (which thereto I had come on the first day on the morrow of the Shabbat – the day of my departure
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from Yedinetz – 13th of Sivan, in the evening-time) when came to visit me the honorable teachers, well-educated adherents of the Haskala, Mr. Shapira (he also being the community's Crown Rabbi) and Mr. Ginstling, both young of days, men of Lithuania, who completed their study at the rabbis' Beit Midrash[e] in Vilna, and the distinguished overseer of the school that is there (first tier), adherent of the Haskala and leading light R' Mandil Grassman, a man young of days, among the wealthy of the people lover of wisdom and respectful of its foundations [?], and with them one more man whose name is Dr. B' Berler, and my friend from long ago whose face I had not seen in more than twenty years now, Dr. Lemul Bertnik, and his son. These are the dear people gathered round me and let their vision of me be as seeing a father or brother and so were they in my eyes. And they would take from me at a price five copies of my book ‘Mi–Miẓrayim’[f] which had recently been printed in Vienna (5622) at full cash price.”[7] We learn from what was written that well-educated people from Lithuania turned to Bessarabia seeking a livelihood, mainly in teaching.
Deinard's impression of Bălţi's Jews (1885) is extremely negative:
“From Telenshti I traveled a distance of 40 vierst to the city of Bielts. The city's size is about the size of the city of Orgiev and a single appearance have they, but its spiritual or moral condition is worse. Located in the city is a school for Hebrews on behalf of the government and two Hebraic teachers for Russian studies.”[8] Further on, as he is leaving the city, he defines it as “this city where I did not have my fill of great pleasure”. Gottlober notes that the number of Jews in Orheev is 3,000 souls and through the comparison it is possible to learn that in Bălţi, too, there was a similar number.[i] As opposed to them, Zalman Epshtein writes about the city's Jews from the perspective of a local resident:
“When we shall compare before our eyes the magnitude of the terrible poverty that is sprouting and issuing with all its bitter consequences in the lives of the Jews of Lithuania, then truly like a Garden of Eden the land in this. The people will not go here hunched over and their head to the ground their faces indeed are scrawny and ill-favored, from between the pupils of their eyes feelings of distress and sorrow were not observed, while we will see all these in Lithuania. Even one of the indigents will each day eat meat and drink wine, and for this their faces will express vitality and feelings of strength.”[9]
Bessarabia's writers, influenced by romanticism, emphasized the simplicity, innocence, rootedness, industriousness, communal solidarity, and the willingness for manual labors in handicrafts and in agriculture of Bessarabia's Jews, who integrate in its unique landscape.
We will quote from the words of Y. Fikhman, a native of Bălţi, who spent his childhood there at the end of the 19th century:
“Cities big and full of delight I have seen, but wherever I have wandered and wherever I have roamed, the grass has still not shone in my eyes just as it shone in the gold-speckled meadows on the bank of the clear-watered Răut.”[10]
The traveling-writers focus their observation on “Maskilut”[g], in other words on the influence of that intellectual current that molded their socio-national outlook, their whole interest being in the number of Maskilim[h] in the city and their impact in the community. The local publicists draw attention to the economic foundation, which favorably impacts the majority of community members, giving rise to positive spirits instead of collective depression.
When the different descriptions are placed in counterpoint to one another, one gets the impression as of a dialogue, as each one of the sides emphasizes a different aspect of the community's life. When we examine, later on, the educational-intellectual aspect of the community's life, it will become clear that Epshtein, the local resident, likewise will take a sharply critical position with regard to his community, similar to that of Gottlober and Deinard.
C. Economic Activity
At the start of the century, the Jews of Bessarabia and, like them apparently, the Jews of Bălţi engaged in petty trade and peddling, the leasing of estates from their owners, and handicrafts. Very few were merchants on a large scale to such an extent that in some of the cities they are indicated in their names.
In the first decade of the 19th century, Bălţi was a center for large cattle fairs, to which great herds of horses and cattle were brought from all ends of Bessarabia in order to sell them to traders who would come there from outside the country.[1]
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A French traveler by the name of Buignon, who visited Bălţi in the 1840s, notes that brisk activity is being conducted in the city and most of the merchants, if not all, are Jews.[2]
Just as data are lacking on the dimensions of engagement in commerce, so too are data lacking on the number of those employed in handicrafts or in “industry”, though there is no doubt that in those years a large portion of the city's Jewish residents was already engaged in the typical handicrafts or “industry”, such as: Tailoring, shoemaking, carpentry, and the like. The concept of a “factory” at that time denoted: Flour mills, soaperies, alcohol breweries, and the like, and all this with extremely primitive methods.
In the statistical entries of the period, the existence of a “factory” of this kind in Bălţi in 1857 is noted.[3]
An attempt at a highly incomplete socio-economic estimate of the community was made within a report by Kreimer in which he claims that there are in the city “60 wealthy and 300 financially secure”.
Even though we are talking about an estimation by a person living inside the community and not a statistical document and even though the numbers were recorded so as to serve as a basis for rebuking those who were wealthy and financially secure about their behavior toward the poor members of their people, one can assume that they reflect some measure of reality.
In accordance with the method of calculation in the previous section on demographic structure, the 360 well-off families comprised 1,810 persons and constituted, therefore, 36% of the community, and hence the remaining 64% were not economically well-off. Regrettably, Kreimer did not use a number for the truly poor families who were in need of communal economic welfare, as opposed to the “not well-off,” who provided for themselves to the best of their ability.[4]
At the end of 1887, the editor of “Nedelnaya Khronika Voskhoda” commissioned a report with data on the occupations of the district's Jews according to economic branches, and the local Maskil, Yakov Sidikman, provided them in December that same year:[5]
| Profession | Master Craftsmen | Assistants | Apprentices | Profession | Master Craftsmen | Assistants | Apprentices |
| Tailors | 126 | 45 | 84 | Blacksmiths | 50 | 35 | 75 |
| Hatters | 28 | 10 | 35 | Tinsmiths | 20 | 17 | 38 |
| Furriers | 8 | 11 | 18 | Bronze casters | 2 | 1 | 4 |
| Seamstresses | 8 | 10 | 21 | Building carpenters | 27 | 50 | 43 |
| Weavers | 4 | 2 | 8 | Oven builders | 22 | 34 | 47 |
| Blanket and pillow makers | 6 | 8 | 10 | Brickmakers | 14 | 9 | 10 |
| Glove makers | 1 | 2 | 4 | Construction workers | 31 | 44 | 51 |
| Shoemakers | 130 | 60 | 120 | Ropemakers | 3 | 7 | 10 |
| Leather workers | 10 | 28 | 30 | Soapers | 6 | 8 | 13 |
| Luggage makers | 4 | 8 | 13 | Flour millers | 3 | 5 | 10 |
| Tanners | 6 | 12 | 13 | Fishermen and butchers | 40 | ||
| Painters | 10 | 20 | 28 | Bakers | 10 | 8 | 9 |
| Bookbinders | 3 | 4 | 8 | Soda water manufacturers | 2 | 4 | 10 |
| Printing workers | 2 | 1 | 3 | Barbers | 5 | 6 | 9 |
| Metal engravers | 8 | 10 | 10 | Coopers | 16 | 30 | |
| Water Carriers | 54 | ||||||
| Total | 723 | 582 | 975 |
In order to isolate the number of craftsmen dwelling in the city itself, we will avail ourselves of other statistical data that pertain to the population of Jews in the district. It becomes clear from these data that 60% of the district's Jews reside in villages whereas 40% of them in the city of Bălţi. With regard to craftsmen, one could say that a higher percentage are urbanites because, at least for some
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of the handicrafts in which they engaged, there was not sufficient demand in the countryside. We will not be exaggerating if we shall assume that 45% of the craftsmen as per Sidikman's report are Bălţi residents and according to this calculation in the city of Bălţi at the end of 1887 there were: 325 master craftsmen, 262 assistants, and 439 apprentices, and in total 1,026 craftsmen.
Out of the craftsmen, there were, therefore, 587 breadwinners (325 master craftsmen + 62 assistants)[i]. To them we will add 28 Jewish laborers in industrial plants and 30 breadwinners who engage in porterage, carters, and other occupations that were not noted in the table, and we get the number of 645 breadwinners and in accordance with five persons in a family we will get a population of 3,225 persons, making up 35.8% of the Jewish population in the city (then 9,000) earning a living from work in handicrafts and industry. This statistic is close to the percentage of those earning a living from handicrafts and industry in the Bessarabia region overall (34.6%).[6]
We get an idea about the incomes of the craftsmen from Z. Epshtein's letter, which was already mentioned above: “The craftsmen likewise will find their livelihood pleasantly and not with sadness and even the worst among them will be able to easily earn 5-6 S”R (silver rubles) per week. The awful competition that will completely destroy in both soul and body all the workers of all sorts in the regions northwest has no place here.”[7]
Noticeable from the report overall is the feeling of economic expansion, manifested in a large market that is sufficient for the handicrafts' output, such that the competition between the master craftsmen does not harm their income level. For the sake of comparison, we have a piece of data on the teachers' pay in that period: The senior teacher at the Talmud Torah receives 260 rubles a year, in other words 5 rubles a week, whereas an ordinary teacher 4 rubles a week.[8]
Apart from the distribution of those engaged in handicrafts and in industry, Sidikman also provides additional data on the economic occupations of the city's Jews. Under the ownership of Jews, he notes:
In a later report, several names of the Jewish estate owners are specified as well: H. Blank, L. Putik, V. Greenberg who in aggregate employ 80 Jewish laborers. At a day's wage of 75 kopeks and cooked food”[j]. Another estate owner, Karpinski (not Jewish) employs 50 Jewish laborers daily.[9]
The percentage of Jews from Bălţi who worked as hired workers in agriculture in the surrounding area's fields is especially large, 3.6%, as opposed to 0.7% in Chișinău, for instance.[10] This phenomenon makes an impression, even at the time, as, in a number of reports in the Jewish press, attention is drawn to it while emphasizing the praises sung by the estate owners employing Jewish laborers, mainly the praises from non-Jewish estate owners.[11]
“HaMelitz” saw fit to copy a news item from a Russian newspaper, too, on the work of hired laborers from Bălţi: “The ‘Nedelya’ newssheet is informed from Bielts (P. Bessarabia) that in the fields of the estates around the city owned by nobles, Jews are working as day laborers for harvesting the grain and threshing it and they elicit goodwill from them and their mouths are full of praises because they are industrious in their work”; and HaMelitz adds for its part, “if only the phenomenon would expand.”[12]
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The low wage in agriculture, which came to ¼ of the pay in handicrafts, proves that those lacking a profession toiled hard to ensure a livelihood for their families. We lack data on the number or percentage of those employed in the branches of commerce, finance, clerical and office work, and free professions.
Since the rate of those employed in the two branches that we calculated above matches the distribution by branch in the Bessarabia region as a whole, one could assume something similar in the rest of the branches as well.
We can summarize in percentages the economic structure of the Jews of the Bălţi community at the end of the 1880s:
In commerce and finance 44.0 In handicrafts and industry 36.0 In agriculture 3.6 Free professions and clerical/office 7.0 Other 9.4 100.0
As is known, Jews were not accepted as clerical office workers in government offices, but they apparently worked for non-Jewish business proprietors and members of the free professions and the proof of this is the directive to dismiss all the Jewish clerical workers working for notaries.[13] In commerce, the first of the great wholesalers engaging in export, too, are already appearing. Thus, the agency of Bernshtein from Bălţi is noted as exporting 500 train cars of fish a month.[14]
The '80s were years of deterioration in the political and juridical status of Bessarabia's Jews, and as opposed to this situation, these years were years of improvement in their economic condition. In a report from Bălţi concerning the risk of closure of the local Talmud Torah, the writer argues that “in Bălţi, with its ten thousand Jewish residents, among whom there are many millionaires (emphasis added), there did not exist even one Talmud Torah.”[15]
One should assume that there was much hyperbole in the report for the purpose of polemics and sermonizing, but it seems that a group of wealthy and well-off individuals had already taken shape.
At the end of the '80s, a deterioration of the economic condition of the entire region's Jews took place due to:
“In Bălţi is a population of 11,000 Jews out of 20,000 inhabitants. The city is a center for wheat and cattle export and large fairs. The golden time has passed. The population increased due to expulsions from the surrounding area. The revenues have declined, and a large portion lives on the brink of starvation. From checks of the situation at the export firms, it became clear to me that Bernshtein's agency, which in the past had exported 500 train cars a month, has ceased its operation – 13 August 1899. Every day, 120 laborers had worked loading the train cars, and currently just 4-6. Three hundred Jewish laborers in the city had worked sorting the grain, evaluating it, filling the sacks, and the like. To them one must add the petty traders in grains and also the middlemen who remained without a livelihood and mainly those who worked directly in the fields. 700 families are suffering hunger.”[16]
The situation worsens a year later:
“From the city of Bieltsy. The Jewish inhabitants continue to be tormented by hunger, and the evil angels that accompany famine scurvy disease (scorbute) have already been observed, too. What will be in the future? The situation is graver than in the year gone by.”[17]
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A situation in which 770 families, constituting 31.8% of the population, are suffering hunger turns the community into one in need of help from the outside, which shall come from the central organization for aiding the casualties of famine in Petersburg and from fundraising appeals and donations by Jews from areas of Russia that were not being negatively impacted at the time. The cooperative idea was taken on board in Bălţi, as in all of Bessarabia, in the wake of the activation in practice of the “May Laws” or “Ignatyev Laws”. Jews who had been expelled from the villages brought about population crowding in the cities and towns, and for lack of assets and economic occupations they were forced to turn to petty trade or handicrafts. To launch a pursuit and to operate it, they were in need of capital, both for purchasing buildings and tools and for working capital.
The existing banks did not hasten to lend to customers of this type, while the interest was sky-high. Philanthropic aid associations played an important role through short-term assistance. Among other ideas, ideas of constructive assistance to the needy also began to penetrate the region – that is, aid for creating an economic foundation and for self-support instead of philanthropy. This entire effort would not have borne fruit without the help of the Jewish Colonization Association (JCA), in both the financial sphere and the legal sphere.
The funds grew out of JCA's support and the articles of association that were prepared by the JCA served as the legal basis for the cooperative's existence. On January 12, 1907, the foundation was laid for a cooperative loan and savings fund, and it was the thirteenth fund established in Bessarabia. For 20 years, the fund was headed by the dynamic and highly-accomplished Jewish askan[k], Dr. Westerman, who, together with Eliezer Hik, chairman of the administrative council, worked a great deal to ease the financial distress of the fund's members.
They were both members on the council of cooperatives for the whole of the Bessarabia region, too.[18]
At the beginning of 1912, Dr. Westerman submitted his resignation from the fund's directorate in protest over the payments, which had been growing each year according to the breakdown in his letter, that members of the fund's board are taking for themselves:
In 1907, they worked without compensation In 1908, they received 500 rubles In 1909, they received 700 rubles In 1910, they received 1,300 rubles In 1911, they received 2,370 rubles In 1912, 3,920 rubles is planned
From the five-year financial report of the fund's operation, we learn:[19]
Revenues from borrowers' interest 48,393.52 rubles Payment of interest to depositors 18,890.98 rubles Revenues (gross) 29,612.54 rubles
Set aside from this:
For special funds 3,143.65 rubles For reducing bad debts 300.00 rubles For maintaining income fees 894.00 rubles For reserve capital 1,280.00 rubles For interest adjustment for next year 1,000.00 rubles Total 6,617.65 rubles
The remainder: 22,994.89 rubles was expended on administration
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Within administrative expenses, staff salaries were:
Bookkeeper 1,800 rubles a year Assistant bookkeeper 800 rubles a year Second assistant 660 rubles a year Ozeret[l] 300 rubles a year Two clerks 400 rubles a year Total 3,160 rubles a year
The expenditures planned for 1912 for management, salaries, maintenance, and administration were 9,117 rubles in total and, in the opinion of Dr. Westerman, would put the fund into deficit, and as a protest over this he resigned, but ultimately retracted and continued to run the fund for another 15 years.
The status that Dr. Westerman acquired for himself within the Jewish public and throughout Bessarabia is attested to by the fact that he was a candidate in the elections for the electors (vyborshchik) for the Duma of 1912, and according to all signs he did not win election. Unfortunately, it was not noted on behalf of which party or entity his candidacy was put forward.[20]
We learn from the report of the provident funds in Bessarabia for the year 1912[21] that there were 909 members[22] in the cooperative loan fund in Bălţi that year, the fund's capital came to 151,000 rubles, the deposits came to 301,000 rubles, and the loans given 142,000.
D. Organized Institutions for Public Financing
The pattern of social organization in Bălţi, as in all of Bessarabia, in those days was to establish associations for attending to a problem that arose, both at a time that an organized community was lacking and at a time that this institution was in existence when budgetary limitations prevented it from addressing the problem. These organizational arrangements were accompanied by bitter personal and “ideological” polemics, both in pinpointing the bothersome problem and with regard to the way to handle it, and also with respect to the personal composition of the organization's representative body. What general problems or, more correctly hardships, scare the public back then?
In the absence of capacity to wield political influence, the public effort and the actions of various persons are centered around social problems, such as poverty, health, religious institutions, education, and, later, aliya to the Land of Israel and migration.
In this section we will focus on the associations that came into being for the purpose of solving social problems, while we will discuss the problems of education and the Zionist operations separately. In 1861, a hospital is already established in Bălţi.[1] In establishing a hospital, it is needless to add, the element of aid to poor patients possesses great weight because at that time it went against the accepted norms of the day for a well-off person to go to the hospital. We find fuller details about the hospital in a later report sent by R' Zalman son of [Bar] Mordechai David Berman, who sees fit to emphasize that he is a “native of Galatz”:
“Belz (Bessarabia) – it is roughly six years now that the Belz community public magnificently built a hospital for balm and medication and sustenance for the sake of the poor. Its arrangements and leadership acted in a very good manner and from the day it was founded, each and every day there the wise tenderhearted Dr. K… his name is will go around and give balm to all the additional patients there, and will not take any payment of remuneration for his trouble, and roughly six years worked by the sweat of his brow for the good of the hospital because the love of his people burns in his heart and the eminent supervisors, the honorable elder R' Lebish Bauermann and the honorable R' Yisrael Garfinkel, stood by him.”[2]
As the report continues, it becomes clear that there existed a harsh rivalry in the community between two groups of public activists. The “oppositional” group wanted to remove Dr. K. from his position of service and hand it over to their candidate, Dr. H. The “oppositionists” turned to the authorities with a letter of complaint, claiming that Dr. K. had struck and ejected from the hospital one of the typhus patients and the ejected man had later died at home due to an absence of care.
The investigation and autopsy refuted the story, and Dr. K. returned to his position. From this little incident, it is possible
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to gather that, already at that time, we are talking about an effervescent Jewish community in which great acts of philanthropy and concern for fellow humans combine together with personal rivalries and acts of snitching before the authorities as a weapon in internal disputes, as has been customary in communities of the Jewish people everywhere and for generations. From the standpoint of public life, one needs to point out three amazing facts:
The first – the very establishment and maintaining of a hospital by a community numbering in total, at the time, a bit more than 3,000 persons.
The second – a hospital's declared purpose being “for balm and medication and sustenance for the sake of the poor”.
The third – the work of Dr. K. voluntarily and the public fight about the position even though it did not involve payment.
We learn from G. Gretzenshtein's article (in Russian), “Statistical Data on Jewish Hospitals in Russia,” that in 1879 there were 15 beds in the hospital.[3]
One can learn about the community's moral norms and social sensitivity from a report by Kreimer in which he recounts at length a tragic case of a poor shoemaker's death due to a “lack of sheltering refuge for poor patients”. The shoemaker left behind three fatherless children and a pregnant widow. The widow, together with her children, began to gain a livelihood from begging, but on account of her physical weakness and the hunger, she, too, became ill and died. After not heeding the parents' condition, the community is occupied by the problem of the orphans. At the story's conclusion, Kreimer condemns the “indifference” and immoral conduct of the city's wealthy and, in the fashion of the Maskilim in the small communities, also moralizes:
“Who has concern if our wealthy, who all the time pursue lucre and do not care for the city's poor, do not?” The uproar that arose in the community brought Mr. Fecht to initiate the establishment of an “Association for Helping the Indigent Sick”.
Any Jewish resident who paid one ruble as an entry fee and committed to a weekly payment of 10 kopeks was accepted as a member of the association. According to the report, 150 members had signed up by that time “and among them such who had donated 10 or 15 rubles upon their entry. Two thousand rubles have already amassed in the fund and they estimate that the income will reach 4,000 rubles. The initiator and members of the management are busy composing the articles of association for the association. The association will pay treatment and subsistence expenses for sick poor people.”[4]
Against the backdrop of the social reality in our time and in these parts, it is hard not to be impressed by a community that is shocked by the death of two indigent parents with three orphans remaining. And, more than that, by the fact that the Russia-wide Jewish press would see fit to publish the story in great detail as a tale that is shameful to the community. The shock, the polemics, and the moralizing do not remain futile; rather, they are translated very quickly into a collective act of practical tending to the problem. The journalistic publication likewise turned into an issue of dispute in the community, and Kreimer apparently was “charged” with publishing while being inaccurate with the details in his claiming a “lack of sheltering refuge for poor patients,” at a time that the community is maintaining a hospital for this purpose. Proof of this is that, in a later report, Kreimer clarifies that, by “lack of sheltering refuge,” he meant an institution that attends to the indigent sick in the sphere of subsistence and livelihood for the members of the patient's family and regarding expenses they have beyond the medical treatment in the hospital. At this opportunity, he adds details about the hospital, in which there are already 21 beds, and about a pharmacy that is being built next to the hospital. For completing the pharmacy building, 300 rubles were contributed by various donors.[5]
We also learn from the report about the intake of progressive ideas with regard to welfare institutions such as, for example, the writing of articles of association for an association in order to set, in writing and formally, its goals and the way it is managed. Nonetheless, they also continued in the traditional ways of donations on the part of groups and individuals. During the visit of Rebbe Yechiel (Hilikil), the Admor[m] of Karlowitz, he was asked by “two ba'alei batim”[n] (apparently from among his Hasidic devotees) to wield his influence for the giving of aid “to the multitude of poor people” in the city.
The Admor's action bore fruit and, within two weeks, 200 rubles were collected. Likewise, the purchase of timber for heating and its sale to the poor without deriving profit was organized by the wealthy merchants.[6] The conscription of Jews into the Russian army stirred up economic problems as well and was a burden on poor families in particular.
The gvir [i.e., magnate], Shmuel Lipson, donates 150 rubles for the good of the families of the army conscriptees.[7] In 1844, with the stated purpose of “bringing the Jews in the cities and districts into the general burden of governance,” the community's authorities were annulled.
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The community's “governmental” roles were transferred to the police and the economic roles were transferred to the municipalities. Nonetheless, the authorities did not waive the special taxes that were then being levied on the Jews alone and therefore left two institutions for that purpose: One was the “supervisors of recruits”, whose duty was to ensure realistic quotas from among the Jews, and the “tax collectors”, who were responsible for collecting the taxes unique to the Jews.
There existed in the community the “meat tax”, which served as a source of income for the public's needs, and the community would decide on the goals for the expenditure.
Under the new regulations, it was possible to consign the “meat tax” for leasing and the lessee was obliged to hand over the sum that was collected to the Russian authorities. The governors would decide on the expenditures for the community's needs after they had collected what the authorities were owed and after the allocation for the Jewish schools on behalf of the government.
The leasing of the “meat taxes”, better known by the name the “Korovka” and in Bessarabia the “Taksa”, poisoned community life. First of all, with respect to the relations between the community and the lessees and their assistants, who made heavy the yoke of the people of the community in their desire to collect the lease amount and beyond that for the sake of profit, and subsequently burdened the relations between the different factions in the community which did not see eye to eye on the spending goals for the funds that had been transferred to the community leaders.
Such an argument erupts in April 1884 when Yaakov Kremer, one of the community's attorneys-in-fact for the distribution of assistance, decided to allocate 200 out of the 600 rubles handed over to him from the “Korovka” to aid for orphaned children studying at the local Talmud Torah. The Orthodox, who preferred the traditional “cheder”[o] and objected to the Talmud Torah overall, regarded the granting of support to these children as a tool of appeal that was going to sway parents to send their children to that institution, and they therefore condemned the decision. Despite the opposition, Kremer carried out his decision and a suit, boots, and hat were given to each one of the 48 orphaned children.[8]
An association by the name of “Parnasat Ani'im” [“Providing for the Poor”], whose purpose was the distribution to the needy of bread, other foodstuffs, and timber for heating, was established in 1887. There were 50 members in the association who each contributed 20 kopeks weekly. The city was divided into zones and, in each zone, there was a volunteer collector who passed the contributions on to the association's treasurer, who dispensed the appropriations monthly.[9] The association's members did not, it seems, keep persistent and maintain continuity in their activity, as is implied by a report that alerts to a worsening of the situation of the poor while appealing for a renewal of the assistance.[10]
A peculiar initiative for providing relief to the poor people of the community was that of district official G. Zikov (Russian), who appealed to the Jewish people of means to give assistance to their poor brethren leading up to the Passover holiday and, according to the report, the donors contributed generously.[11] Meanwhile, the aid for the poor children studying at the Talmud Torah became established, and in a journalistic news item from 1890, a distribution of clothing, shoes, and books to those children, at an expense of 200 rubles, is recounted.[12]
As stated, the wealthy of the community would, from time to time, make personal donations in instances when they saw fit, in addition to their participation in the community's effort and that of the various associations. An example of this is R' Shmuel Lipson personally coming to the aid of families of the army conscriptees, which we mentioned above. In this fashion, the merchants R. and C. initiate a contribution on their part and also collect 130 rubles by others to buy timber for heating for the poor.[13] The volunteerism and the recommendations of people of means for helping the community's weak members were also an act accompanied by honor and esteem, and the willingness of the press to publish these revelations attests to this.
In the economic section, we mentioned the severe drought and economic crisis that befell Bessarabia. The assorted associations and donations of individuals are not sufficient any longer to ease the masses' plight of hunger.
The authorities rendered aid only to the Christian needy. We learn about the dimensions of the hardship from the report submitted by Dr. P. Lander, the emissary on behalf of the “Petersburg Committee for Aiding the Poor”. Prior to Dr. Lander, Dr. Landesman, emissary of the “Odessan Committee for Aiding the Poor” visited the community, and he recorded 450 families as needing urgent relief. The local committee for aiding the poor rendered 422 rubles of aid within a month. Dr. P. Lander, together with the local committee, set the relief quota for a family of six at 3 rubles and 10 kopeks a month. In exchange for the above monetary support, such a family could get 2½ puds of corn flour and 30 kilograms of baking flour.
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One thousand nine hundred rubles a month were required as the assistance minimum. One thousand two hundred rubles were promised by the Petersburg Committee and 10-15 local donors undertook to contribute the remaining 700 rubles a month. For Passover needs, the Petersburg Committee transferred 600 rubles and the local committee undertook to contribute the remainder.[14]
Community solidarity dovetailed here with a Jewish solidarity of the communities in the entire country.
The harsh winter aggravated the hardship of the needy. M. Yurkevich reports on the blockade to which the city is subjected on account of the snow, and on the great suffering of the poor due to the cold and the famine. He, too, like the other leaders of the Maskilim, expresses protest vis-à-vis the well-to-do over the lack of active organizing for assistance.[15]
In 1893, a restaurant for the poor was opened. On the first day, a free meal was given to 200 of the city's indigent. The meal included soup, 200 grams of meat, a side dish of beans, and 400 grams of bread. The rest of the days, the price of the meal was 6 kopeks.[16] Another source of troubles were the mass conflagrations. Three large fires visited on the Jews of Bălţi.
In the first fire, of March 5, 1882, 340 houses burned down, 320 of them owned by Jews, of which only 15 houses were insured. Two thousand five hundred souls, about half the population at the time, were left homeless. A large synagogue, a pharmacy, and shops burnt down, inter alia. The damage was estimated at 985,000 rubles. The authorities refused the request to assist the victims, and proposed that the Jews organize internally.
The committee to aid the victims of the fire was headed by one of the community's activists – Dr. Pinkenson. The disaster had been so weighty that villagers from the nearby areas brought flour as a donation for the victims. One of the Christian estate owners donated 200 rubles to the aid fund.[17] Within one month's time, 700 rubles were collected.[18]
The second large fire, in which 50 houses and 60 shops owned by Jews burned down, broke out on August 5, 1884. Over 80 families were left destitute. The damage was estimated at 100,000 rubles and the problem of rehabilitation for the victims of the previous fire worsened even further.[19] A third fire, in which 40 houses of Jews burned down, broke out on June 24, 1887. In this case, too, there was an appeal to compassionate individuals to contribute toward aiding the victims.[20]
As we have already seen in the hospital controversy, and like in every Jewish community everywhere, different groups quarreled with one another and each accused the other's representatives of corruption and bad intentions. At the end of 1882, following such a dispute, and the besmirching of the integrity of the previous community leaders, a new community committee was elected, composed of: Dr. Pinkenson, Dr. Kenigshatz[iii], Lipson, and D. Rabinovitz.[21] Elections for a public office are a golden opportunity for dispute and argument.
On April 1, 1884, the elections for “Crown Rabbi” (the Kazioni Rabbiner) needed to take place, and two candidates vied for the job: One was Yo'el Shapira (mentioned, we shall recall, by the traveling-writer, Gottlober), who holds the position in practice, while the other was another Maskil by the name of Charach. A festive gathering was held in the synagogue for the purpose of selecting, and the person in charge of the election on behalf of the Russian authorities, the ispravnic [police chief] of Iași County, read out before those assembled the appeal of Bessarabia's governor in which he asked the crowd to maintain order and decorum in the elections, to put on a dignified performance, to refrain from intoxication and to refrain from altercations for the sake of the elections' proper execution.
Following the remarks of the ispravnic, an argument broke out among those assembled. Those who objected to the very holding of the elections argued that it is forbidden to swear the required oath on account of Passover, and those siding with the elections argued that the oath is permitted because it was the time of Chol Hamoed[p]. Despite the ispravnic's warning and the governor's appeal, riots broke out, and the elections were postponed to April 15 of that year.
The negative outcome of the event turned into a matter of interest for the Russian press, too, and it was publicized in the Russian newspaper, “Odesskiy Listok”.[22]
We did not find a record about the proper completion of the elections, but it is clear from later activities that Yo'el Shapira remained in his position, while the opposing candidate was later elected “Crown Rabbi” in the town of Faleshty.
The accusations of corruption sometimes went beyond the community framework and even reached the Russian courts of law. Thus, for example,
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three public activists from the community in Bălţi were brought before the district court in Chișinău on the charge of embezzlement of community funds and were acquitted of guilt.[23] There is room, perhaps, to tie the accusations against these three public activists to the election of the new community committee in July 1882, which we mentioned above. With the Russian bureaucracy and the juridical slowness, it is possible that five years went by until the verdict in the second proceeding.
We have already mentioned the slow penetration of ideas in the welfare sphere and the transition from individual charity, via associations to collective organizing such as financial institutions and funds under its leadership. We learn of the existence of a “Jewish Craftsmen's Fund” from three reports in the press. Within a story on the Christian graf, Katarji, who donated 200 rubles to the rebuilding of the synagogue that had burned down in 1882, an additional donation by the same graf is noted – to the craftsmen's fund as an expression of his being impressed by those who had worked at building the synagogue and were members of that fund.[24]
The idea of “productivization”, too, which is so preoccupying the social and political currents – is given practical translation within the Jewish people in the establishment of: A “Fund for Professional and Agricultural Training”. The purpose of the fund was to finance professional training in the different crafts and training for a transition to agriculture, both to change the community's professional-economic structure and to prepare the people for aliya to the Land of Israel or for migration to the United States or Argentina. The fund's coordinator was S. L. Kleinman. Among the participants were Yisrael Anisfield, S. Bartz, Avraham-Ber Trachentenberg, Shtein the veterinarian, rabbi assistant M. Horoba, S. Dobrish (three rubles each), Kleinman, Zachovski (two rubles each), S. Mozis, M. Shtern, M. Shostakovski, A. Gershenzon, Yidl Idelman (one ruble each).[25]
The erecting of synagogues or other religious public buildings likewise required a public financial effort. In this area, too, the phenomenon of specific organizing by those interested in the matter is noticeable.
In 1857, there was one synagogue in Bălţi and six houses of prayer;[26] whereas in 1861, there was one synagogue and seven houses of prayer.[27] We do not have data about the initiative or about the financing for the building of that synagogue and of the other houses of prayer. An example of collective public organizing for building a synagogue is that of the Sadigura Hasids in the city, who build a “kloize” that bears their name:
…In this, our city, as well, it is several years now that a Beit Midrash called “Sadigurer kloize” was magnificently built. The Sadigura Hasids dwelling here gave all the building necessities; each one according to his ability shall set his place that he acquired and they shall make various beneficial arrangements in the house and shall comport themselves properly there for much time and quality, and nothing is wasted, therefore the dignity of the house will not be desecrated and for nothing will it lack.[28]
The absence of a synagogue is a topic for fundraising in the press so as to spur the community leaders to build. One report alerts about the danger of collapse of the single existing synagogue[29], and described in another report is the bleak situation of the worshippers, who require for this purpose a shed that stands next to the bridge over the Răut at a spot very distant from the community.[30] The problem worsens with the burning down of the synagogue in the great fire of 1882:
“From Belz, Mordechai Mikhailovich shall complain that there is no house of God in the city. The Beit Midrash burned down last year and the old synagogue was closed by the authorities because it is apt to fall and it is outside the city in a place of sludge and mud at a time that 18,000 silver rubles leftover from the Taksa is laying in the district treasury and it would be easy from that to build a house to H'[q] if only they had endeavored.[31]
The public organizing for rebuilding the synagogue is an initiative of the public activists: Shimon Hendler, Rafael and Avraham Gerstenfeld. The donor graf, Katarji, who was mentioned above, was given the honor of laying the cornerstone.[32]
So far, we have seen those sources of financing for public enterprises that came from donations by individuals or groups, from the payment of association member dues, and even attempts to set up funds. But the number of family heads in the community, their unstable economic situation, the constant movement of migration oblige one to assume that all these were not sufficient for the establishment and maintaining of community institutions that are active over time.
The solid foundation for funding the public's needs was grand philanthropy and especially the bequeathing of great assets for the needs of the community. We have evidence of three instances of such grand philanthropy on the part of rich members of the community who passed away. The greatest philanthropist of the community throughout its existence was Mr. Chanina Halperin, who died
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on December 31, 1887. About his contribution we read:
“In Belz (P. Bessarabia), Mr. Aharon Yavelberg announces that on the night of the past 31 December, one of the city's generous people, Mr. Chanina Halperin, died and was gathered to his people. The deceased was a good man and did much to bring benefit and sow righteousness for the poor members of the people. Upon his death, he left behind two hundred thousand rubles to his relatives and his kin (because he did not have sons). To things of charity, he donated: A thousand rubles to the hospital for Hebrews and money to the Christians' hospital; a thousand rubles to fix the cracks of the old Beit Midrash; a thousand rubles for the Talmud Torah house to appoint new well-educated teachers to teach Torah and Dalet Aleph and the country's language to the children visiting the house; five hundred silver rubles for the new bathhouse. Apart from that, he donated revenues of his estate – which shall make toward seven thousand silver rubles a year – to be divided in this manner: 2,333 rubles each year to provide for the hospital for Hebrews and this money to provide for the hospital for Christians and the remaining money would be reserved for when needed to support his inheriting relatives if they were to become impoverished. And the deceased, while alive, delivered his landed estate and his money into the hands of an executor, and he is a Christian man, loyal in spirit, and without a doubt will uphold all the deceased's words as he ordered before his death.”[33]
Just as the bequest itself is impressive, impressive, too, is the testator's thought to ensure the continuity of funding by means of “funds” and an organized executorship, even if the fact that the executor is Christian is surprising. Impressive likewise is the parallel concern for the two hospitals, the Jewish and the non-Jewish. We also find out from here the financial source for building an important community institution like the Jewish bathhouse. R' Chanina purchased the tract for establishing the Jewish cemetery while he was alive; hence the explanation for the Bălţian curse, “Go to Chananya”.
A second instance of philanthropy is that of Zamchovsky, already mentioned among those donating to the “Fund for Professional and Agricultural Training”, who died in January 1889. About his will we read:[34]
“(Faleshty) Last week, in the city of Bieltsy, nearby us, died a rich man, of our brethren, who dwelt in the village Tzifaleshty, Mr. Y. Zamchovsky, and upon his death he left behind a great fortune, approximately 150,000 silver rubles. In his will, which he drew up before his death, it was recorded that his heirs be given fifty thousand silver rubles and the remainder will become a Keren Kayemet[r] and its profits will be for the hospital that is for the Hebrews in the aforementioned city. He left a certain amount to the rest of the city's needs as well.”
Occurrences of this kind, of donations by wealthy Jews and bequests for the public's needs, were “sensational news” in the Jewish press of those times and, in no small measure, rightly so. In this case, the reporter from Faleshty “nabbed” the item. Apparently, the source of the wealth that Zamchovsky had accumulated was the estate over which he held ownership and the leasing in Tzifaleshty, and for that purpose he also dwelt in that village part of his time.
In an item from Odessa, we read about a most peculiar donation for the benefit of the community's hospital. “The physician D.V. Vivodtsev, who died a short time ago and who resided in Bălţi during his childhood, bequeathed to the Jewish community of that city 10,000 rubles for building a new structure for the Jewish hospital.”[35] Who knows what story is hiding behind the so-not-Jewish name: “Vivodtsev”? A Jew, a non-Jew, a convert? What impressed him in his youth that brought him to bequeath such a considerable amount to the hospital? From the short newspaper item, it is not possible to know more.
The transition to cooperative organization was noted in the economic section. The establishment of educational institutions and Zionist activity likewise demanded a collective organizational effort, and we will, as stated, discuss each of the topics separately.
E. Spiritual and Intellectual Currents and Educational Institutions
The dominant spiritual current in the Bălţi community of those days, like in all of Bessarabia, was that of Hasidism in its variety of hues. Hasidism was already putting down roots in Bessarabia at the time of the city's founding.
The only son of the Besht [Baal Shem Tov] visited Bessarabia and served as rabbi in Rashkov in the years 1748-1752.[1] Tzadiks [righteous leaders] and their emissaries would visit the region and more than once the community's rabbis themselves were Hasids [devotees] of one “chatzer” [rabbinic courtyard] or another.
Notwithstanding the strong influence of Hasidism, only two “chatzers” of Hasids were founded in Bessarabia, one in Rashkov, as stated, and the second in Bender. The various tzadiks, the heads of the dynasties would visit the cities and towns or send “emissaries” thereto. The Hasids, for their part, would travel to visit the rebbe's “chatzer” on various occasions or would send
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“kvitelech” [little notes] to them by means of the “SHaDaR”s[s]. We read about the strong influence of Hasidism in Bălţi and the critical tone toward that influence by Gottlober.
“In the meantime, came to visit us a Hasidic man from the city of Belz, which is in Bessarabia, he being of the Hasids of Chabad, whom I did not know what wind had carried from Lithuania to Moldavia and shall place him there generally. And with my being a great expert on the book of Chabad in particular and in general on the books of the Hasids and also on some of the books of the kabbalists, the aforementioned Hasid was friendly with me and I let him know, rebbi, his doctrine, the doctrine of Chabad, that is within my innards, and I was liked by and found favor with him. And I was already mocking within his heart [sic] and all the ways of the Hasids of their various types became nauseating in my nose and even though I praised myself for knowing their ways and their homilies for the sins of the people, here I was despising them in my heart and I knew that nonsense are they, acts of fraud and delusion, which have no benefit to them.”[2] Deinard, too, severely criticizes Hasidism's domination in Bălţi.
“Here, too, Hasidism raises an account and all, young and old alike, are like servants of it. Faithful, while its smart foe shall stand outside here having nary a foothold on this sacred ground property of the European savages.”[3]
Salient in the two passages is the disdain for Hasidim on the part of the two Maskilim with a “Misnagdic”[t] background. The locally resident Maskilim likewise take part in the debate being conducted between Orthodox and Maskilim in all communities of the Jewish people. Responding to an attack on Hasidism by one of the Maskilim (not from Bălţi) in “HaMelitz”[4], R' Yakov Friedman notes that he is “a native of Bălţi”, and we learn from his response about the Hasidic wing:
“And even if they send pidyons[u] to dedicate in Sadigera and even travel themselves to show his face, but they will not be negligent in the world of action, they will do commerce and acquisition of property and will come among men, their ways are straight and no one opens their mouth and shows contempt for them, and donations for the needs of the city to support the hands of paupers and they will not be stingy with tzedakah [righteous charity] for every good thing. They are all young of days and nevertheless shall not meddle in a quarrel with reckless spirit. For this, they will gain respect from all the city's dwellers: Jews and Christians alike – well if only all the rest of the battalions of Hasids did like them in their locales, then they would not be a laughingstock in the eyes of all and on account of them their brethren, Hasids and Misnagdim alike, not been accused.”[5]
The Hasid from Sadigura apparently knew a lesson in the craft of disputation and he argues for a differentiation between the principles of the Hasidism acceptable to him and the everyday conduct in relations among humankind “because it is not the system of Hasidism and the faith of the sages that are guilty of anything, just the customs of those zealously protective of it and of its preachers with empty zealotry.”[6] In other words, what should be condemned is not Hasidism and its ideas, but zealotry from any side. To bolster his remarks, he also tells of the effort of the Sadigura Hasids in Bălţi to build a synagogue bearing the name of their rabbi's courtyard, “the Sadigerer kloize”, about which we have talked above. From the story about the visit of R' Yechielik'l of Karolovitz and his intervention for the benefit of the city's poor, we gather that he, too, had Hasid devotees in the city.
With great ridicule, a different Maskil-Misnaged tells of another visit to the city by R' Yechielik'l:
“The tzadik R' Yechielik'l came to us; he was hosted for eight days, collected, per what they say, a lot of donations, blessed the city and the cowshed of the coachman who had transported him as far as Faleshty for free. Upon his going, they immediately informed the tzadik of Olarontsek by telegraph that the place is unoccupied and come he may come, hence there is hope that the city will soon get another tzadik.”[7]
One tzadik among those emanating from this dynasty set up a chatzer in Bălţi. We do not have data on the date that he settled in the city, but the chatzer was in existence until the outbreak of the Second World War. He was called, as the locals pronounced it, “Alesker Rebbele”. It is not clear whether the diminutive, “Rebbele”, comes to indicate his short stature, the small number of his Hasid devotees, or the low rank among the ranks of the dynasty and their status.
“The Rebbele's” Hasids were of the commonfolk[iv], residents of Bălţi and the surrounding villages. In the same style of ridicule and criticism, a Hasidic visit of another sort is told about:
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“Several days ago, appeared in our city a respectable visitor, he being the meshulach [emissary] Ya-tz to shear the holy flock of sheep of the Rebbe of Kapust, whose orders the Hasids of our city obey. We thought that, because of the difficult situation, he would not manage to obtain donations, but that is not the case because he managed to collect thirty silver rubles without travail or great exertion at a time that our city's poor are truly dying of hunger and no one feels sorry for and has mercy on them.”[8]
The acerbic ridicule in the phrase “to shear the holy flock of sheep” makes clear the disdainful attitude of the Maskilim toward Hasidism, but the making of contributions, despite the poverty, also attests to the deep rootedness and faith of “the sheep”. We learn from the few articles that we found that in the city there were Hasid devotees belonging to the Chabad Hasids, of the Rebbe of Sadigera, of the Rebbe of Krilovitz, of the Rebbe of Kapust, of the Rebbe of Boyan, and even a local “Rebbele”. About the Chabad center in Bălţi up to the First World War, we learn:
“In the city of Belts, there was a center for Chabadic Hasidism, and it was headed by two clear-cut Torah scholars: Rebbe Chaim Bar, and on whose days of release would ‘return’ to Ba'al ‘Tzemach Tzedek’[v], and R' Noah Sofer (who immigrated to the Land of Israel, his resting place of honor there). Their livelihood barely existed for them, but day and night they would sit and delve deep into the Torah and Chabadic Hasidism.
All year round, no grape beverage would come to their mouths, except for Purim, at which time these two would compete at wine drinking with all the Chabad Hasids in the city and would display their strength, too, at quips and witty jokes as the way of ‘the Purim rabbis’ in the yeshivas of Lithuania who twist the Ketuvim[w] and uproot mountains [i.e., show keen intelligence] with Purimish expertise and sharpness.”[9] The annexation to Romania severed Bessarabia from the source of Chabad Hasidism and its influence in the city totally declined.
To our regret, we did not find records about the rabbis who sat on the rabbinical throne in the community during that period. R' Shimon Yakabof, who, as Friedman put it, “like the rest of the rabbis in Bessarabia in that period, was not renowned in the world of Halacha [Jewish law],”[10] served as rabbi in Bălţi in the years 1825-1850. Bălţi did not lag much behind the Haskala's slow inroads into Russia, the causes for this being the geographic proximity to the center of Haskala in Odessa and the migration of Maskilim from Lithuania. We do not have data about the beginning of the city's penetration by the Haskala, but in the passage from Gottlober's book that we quoted, his positive impression of the city's Maskilim who met with him is noticeable, enough so in order to note five of them by their full names and, as he put it, “these are the dear people who gathered round me and let their vision of him be as seeing a father or brother and so were they in my eyes.”
It is possible, from the noting of the fact that two of them came from Lithuania, to deduce that the remainder were natives of the city long since or had come from nearby Russian areas.
We have already quoted the words of disparagement the Maskilim had for the “people of darkness”, and to clarify the background we will avail ourselves of Dubnov's description:
“The war on the people of darkness was often waged with the aid of that external force that sought to reduce the figure of Judaism in the spirit of official assimilation. The new Jewish Maskilim and the government forged an alliance in those days. The official rabbis and the teachers from among the students of the schools for rabbis in Vilna and Zhitomir were in most cases officials of the government and in their war against the pious were aided by the governing authority, and some offended the religious sentiment of the masses by publicly desecrating the customs because they felt that the governing authority supports them.”[11]
The dispute in Bălţi between the Maskilim and the Orthodox was apparently somewhat mild compared to other cities, where there were instances of physical resistance to the arrival of or settlement by “tzadiks”, on the one hand, or disturbances and boycott over the opening of secular schools. Not to mention acts of snitching on the part of one camp or the other. Presumably, if such cases had occurred, they would have been given expression in whatever newspaper reports. A major contribution to the dispute's mildness was made by the Maskilim who rejected assimilation and turned to Zionism, the most prominent among them being Zalman Epshtein, who conducts debates with the Orthodox while at the same time showing respect for the values of the religion and tradition.
In his article, “A Few Words Concerning the Materialist and Spiritual Condition of the Jews of Bessarabia,” he writes:
“In Belts, for instance, one of the hubs of commerce in the entire district, the number of whose Jewish dwellers by approximation is very great, there are only six subscribers altogether to Hebrew gazettes! And with regard to observing the religious statutes, behold many of these, like carrying
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a load on the Shabbat, the laws of muktzeh[x], and the like, have already lost their point here, and most of the people treat them lightly in public and no one opens their mouth and shows contempt.”[12]
Further on, Epshtein reproves the public over the synagogues in the city being empty on weekdays, that they do not pray at all and do not respect the rabbis. At the same time, he condemns behaving according to superstition. One can, from Epshtein's criticism, sketch out the archetype of the Zionist Maskil about which we will elaborate later on. Like in any community, the struggle focuses on the educational content and educational frameworks. The schooling of the children and the imparting of Torah-based and secular education regularly occupied the community and primarily salient is the concern for the schooling and education of the children without means. A multisided debate is conducted within the community over the fundamental essence of the education between the Orthodox, who advocate the traditional “cheder” and the “yeshiva” with their elements of content, and the Maskilim, who advocate secular studies and educational frameworks in the spirit of general education [Haskala] and the new pedagogical approaches in those days. Within the Orthodox camp, the debate narrowed around a certain difference in the type of frameworks, whereas in the camp of the Maskilim, the debate widened, between the advocates of a governmental school for Jews, as opposed to a Jewish school of the community, and, in terms of content, between those advocating an emphasis on Hebrew language studies and those supporting an emphasis on studying the Russian language and an additional foreign language.
On the margins of the camp, advocates of going to the Russian general schools later appeared. In the first half of the nineteenth century, the majority of the public related completely negatively to the governmental attempt to establish governmental schools for Jews and for the Jewish teachers from among the Maskilim in those schools.
From a conversation with two Maskilic teachers of Lithuanian origin, who taught in the governmental school for Jews in Brichany, Gottlober gained the impression that the Jews “looked at the teachers as if they had come by order of the government to proselytize and convert their sons.”[13]
The Jews of Bălţi undoubtedly related in a similar manner to the teachers of Lithuanian origin who taught in the governmental school there. Influenced by ideas that had penetrated from the West, the Russian authorities decided on the establishment of governmental schools for Jewish children for the purpose of “rectifying” their “vices”. By funding the existence of such schools, dictating the curricula, and supervising them, they hoped to speed up the assimilation process. At the same time as the establishment of these schools, the authorities were persecuting the “cheders” and the educators stemming from formal grounds, sanitary and pedagogical. The claim in relation to the cheder buildings was that of a lack of minimal conditions of cleanliness and ventilation, and vis-à-vis the educators, they claimed that they lack pedagogical training, behave not nicely towards the pupils, and do not grant them vacations generally and summer vacation in particular.
The Russians regarded the elimination of the “cheders” and “yeshivas” and the establishment of governmental schools for Jews and the abolishing of the Va'adei HaKehilot [communities' committees] as an integrated policy for “fixing this people with a fundamental correction” via cultural means. On November 13, 1844, an order of the Tsar went out to establish such schools, in every place where there is a Jewish community, ranked in two tiers, and two seminaries for teachers. Under this order, the supervisors must be Russian. At the end of 1844, the existence of Va'adei Kehilot was banned and their powers were distributed between the police and the municipalities.[14]
The Jewish governmental school in Bălţi was established at the end of the 1840s at the initiative of the director of the Odessa district education office.[15] According to the data of the “Novorossiyskiy Calendar” of 1857, there was such a school, first tier, in Bălţi (1855), and the teachers Yehuda Shapira and Hillel Rivosh taught there.[16] Three years later, in 1861, the situation was similar.[17] Gottlober, in his memoirs of his visit to Bălţi in 1864, mentions this school and, in addition to Y. Shapira, notes Ginstling as a second teacher. Both, according to him, are graduates of the Beit Midrash for rabbis in Vilna. The supervisor of the school on behalf of the community was R' Mandil Grossman.
Especially acerbic was the criticism of the local Maskilim about traditional education. With derision and sarcasm, the Maskil, Shlomo Moshe Chazan, describes the state of the “cheder” (in 1867). The educator at the “cheder” had indeed invited him to be convinced of his pupils' knowledge of the week's parashah [Torah passage] (“lech l'cha”), but the pupils, according to Chazan, did not understand what was written, and only
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the smallest among them correctly translated the passage into Yiddish.
After describing the poor sanitary conditions, Chazan relates that, on account of the tremendous racket that the “cheder” pupils made, the educator did not hear the cries of his little daughter, who nearly drowned in a tub of water that stood in the middle of the room.[18]
The same Maskil, Shlomo Moshe Chazan, signs another report from Bălţi and nicknames himself “the Hebrew servant” in order to allude in this manner to his position in the debate over the character of the education.[19]
The negative impression of the governmental supervisor (Yanovski) and his visit to the school, in August 1869, brought about its closure. In the report that he wrote, he notes that he had found at the school only 11 pupils, and of them only one had command of “basic knowledge”, as he put it, while at the Russian elementary governmental school, 5 pupils (!) out of 82 had command of “basic knowledge”.[v]
We learn from the report about that school's budget for that year – 1186 rubles. Following the decision about its closure, the budget was divided up as follows: 500 rubles for building an additional classroom in the Russian state school, 250 rubles to the local rabbi (apparently Y. Shapira) for teaching Jewish religion to Jewish pupils in the Russian state school, 200 rubles for the school for adolescent girls, where Jewish girls attend as well, and 236 rubles for the professional department of the Russian state school.[20]
We do not know how long this school was closed, but in 1873 it is once again operating.[21]
We learn from a list of the recipients of the newspaper, “Russkie Evrei”, that one copy of it was sent per the address of Yehuda Shapira, the Crown Rabbi, for the first-tier governmental school for Jews where he served as a teacher.[22] Implicit in supervisor Yanovski's report, cited above, which brought about the closure of the governmental school for Jewish children is that a number of Jewish children, boys and girls, are already attending Russian schools, and that phenomenon undoubtedly provoked debates in the community, just as it provoked debates in other communities. Ten years later, there is evidence of a debate on this issue within the camp:
G. Kreimer, a Maskil who sides with sending Jewish children to Russian schools, writes:
“Among the Jewish pupils in the local district school of the third tier, one can meet sons of parents who several years ago did not, by any means, agree to their children attending a Russian school. To the regret of us all, the local Jews are not capable of imparting to their children elementary rational learning [Haskala].
The local district school cannot accept more pupils than the set standard, and the Jews do not readily send their children to the first-tier Jewish school, and for justifiable reasons, it appears.
A situation is emerging of a shortage of private Jewish schools for adolescent boys. The fact is that there are many private teachers for the Russian and German language and for mathematics, but few are hired for this.”[23]
He dispatches a similar report to “Russkie Evrei”, and from it we learn that there are two Russian schools in Bălţi: One districtual of the third tier, and the other municipal in which there are two classrooms. The number of parents willing to transfer their children to Russian schools, according to him, is growing. He does not settle for delivering information; rather he takes a clear position in favor of Russian learning as rational learning, as opposed to Jewish traditional learning. Also implied in the report in “Rasviet” is that the governmental school for Jews is at such a poor level that the children's parents are right in their refusal to send their children to that institution.
In the report in “Russkie Evrei”, the private teachers of Russian and mathematics are described as “ignoramuses and uneducated”, and the “cheders” as lacking sanitary conditions. The second period of existence of the governmental school for Jews was brief likewise. We learn from a news item from 1883 that in the city there is neither a Jewish school, nor a “cheder”, nor a Talmud Torah.[24] Integrating into the debate over the types of schools and over the content being learned is also the concern for educating
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children of the poor, and it appears that in this area the advantage was in the hands of those advocating for the existence of a governmental school for Jews or in the hands of those advocating for sending the children to a Russian school, because at these schools governmental funding was assured.
“Since the closing of the Jewish governmental school (first tier), three years have passed during which no school exists for the meager of means. Only 15% of the population are capable of paying private tuition. The askanim [public activists] do not even think to see to the school's reopening.”[25] According to the report for 1884 of the supervisor for the elementary schools, copied from the Russian newspaper “Vestnik Bessarabskovo Zemstvo”, in all of Bessarabia there were only two governmental schools for Jews (in Kishinev and in Soroka) and in Bălţi only a private school of the third tier for boys and girls.[26] The quest for an educational institution at which the curriculum would be based on a synthesis of religious studies and Jewish tradition and also secular learning, and which would be able to take in the children from families lacking in means, gave birth to the “Talmud Torah” idea.
A first mention regarding the existence of such an institution in Bălţi is within a report (whose main subject is the problem of the hospitalization of the poor) in “Rasviet” by Kreimer in which it is related: “The condition of the Talmud Torah, too, is very bad. It is run by an ignorant educator.”[27] It appears that 1880 is also the Talmud Torah's year of opening, and we receive evidence of this from a different, later (from 1895) report whose topic is the financial crisis through which the Talmud Torah is going, to the point of a danger of it closing forever “since the previous promoters had planned for it to exist for 15 years.”[28]
In the section on the problems of relief aid[29], we noted the combination of social assistance for the needy pupils of the Talmud Torah and the concern for their studies at the institution. Like at any other community institution, the Talmud Torah's existence, too, was continuously in crisis, and it was closed down from time to time, which is implied by a report that announces its reopening in April 1889.[30]
The reopening was accompanied by a move into a new building (on Petrogradski Street) with five rooms. The rent, 140 rubles a year in total, was paid by the community. One hundred twenty pupils attended the institution. There are some technical and budgetary details about the Talmud Torah in the report. It is thus noted there that the benches were built according to the state schools' standard. The sources of the institution's budget were 600 rubles for administration from the “Korovka”, 500 rubles from the estate of Chanina Halperin, and various donations. Teacher T…, of Lithuanian origin, who teaches the first grade, of ages 6-7, received 260 rubles a year, and another two teachers received 200 rubles a year each. The Russian language and arithmetic teacher received 8 rubles a month. Crown Rabbi Y. Shapira, Y. Lieberman, and Ch. Eisenfeld took part in the management of the Talmud Torah.[31]
One may deduce from the number of children who attended the Talmud Torah at that time that the needy parents preferred it over the governmental school for Jews. From other reports, it becomes clear that the Talmud Torah issue was one possessed of great importance in the community's activity. In every report, there are details about it with regard to the curriculum, budgets, salaries, sources of funding, and the like.
The main figure attending to the Talmud Torah is Rabbi Y. Lieberman, who is serving at that time as the community's chairman, too, and it is he who initiated the opening of professional classes in the Talmud Torah's framework.[32] The curriculum included: Torah, Russian, reading and writing, and arithmetic. The annual budget in 1890 was 1300 rubles and the sources were: 600 rubles from the Korovka and 700 rubles from the fund left by Chanina Halperin.[33]
The Talmud Torah goes through a difficult crisis in 1895, both on account of the increase in the number of pupils who are in need of this institution, and on account of a lack of funding sources and the indifference of the people of means: “Even though the Jewish population is approaching 10,000 residents, there is not any educational institution at which children of the poor will be able to receive an education worth its salt. True, a Talmud Torah exists, but to our great regret, it cannot take in all those who are thirsty for learning. It receives support of only 500 rubles from the “Korovka” funds, and this is not enough even for rent and less than that for retaining a staff of teachers worth its salt. This is the second year that the school principal is not getting a salary. In light of the critical situation, the school will be closed down – if not immediately – then in the coming days. Why are the Jews not coming to the aid of this institution?”[34]
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The situation deteriorated and the topic did not drop off the public agenda. As we have already noted several times. Publication in the press serves as a means in the hands of the Maskilim to raise the issue before the Jewish public arena in all of Russia, and as a means to morally rebuke those who are well-off and who ignore the plight of their community members lacking in means. “Due to a lack of means and due to the disinterest of the place's wealthy people, the Talmud Torah institution has to close down. They are not paying rent and the teachers are not getting their salary and therefore are hardly coming to work.
The children are coming to learn, but the frost causes these unfortunates to flee home. In Bălţi, with its ten thousand Jewish residents, among whom there are many millionaires (emphasis added – S.Y.), not even one Talmud Torah, at which the children of the poor will be able to get elementary learning, can exist, and this is in contrast to the situation existing in Mogilev, Orheev, and Khotyn, where the populace is poorer.”[35]
In the discussion on the economic situation, we have already pointed out the uncertainty of there being numerous “millionaires”, but the comparison to poorer communities that see to the needy belongs to the methods of disputation and of exploiting the “means of communication” at that time. It seems that the community leaders in the city nonetheless pitched in to ensure the Talmud Torah's continued existence, because a year later it is moving to a building of its own from the estate of Chanina Halperin and, with this, the rental money is freed up for funding ongoing operations.
The Jewish education system expanded and a third-tier private school was established, too, under Feldman's management, in response to the demands of parents with means who did not want to send their children to a Russian school, nor to a Talmud Torah.[36]
The spread of Russian learning was slow. In 1897, only 18.7% of the city's Jews knew how to read Russian, and in the entire Bălţi district, there were only 69 Jews with formal post-primary education, in other words 2.5 Jews per thousand.[37]
As mentioned, the policy of persecuting the “cheders” was being implemented at that time. From the little data that we have on the network for education at the “cheders”, we know that in 1883 there was not one “cheder” in the city, whereas in 1885, there were 5 “cheders” in the whole district. In the absence of detail, we do not know the number of “cheders” in the city itself.[38]
The police, pleading concern for the pupils' conditions, ordered the educators to annually grant the pupils a summer vacation, starting from June 1 until August 1, as customary in all the schools. The police furthermore required them to rent large, spacious rooms and the educators signed a commitment to do so.[39]
A vacation for pupils, as much as one is understandable these days, was a most difficult problem in those times, both from the educators' and from the parents' points of view. The educators ran into difficulties making a living because they did not receive salary during vacation time, not to mention that they could not meet the conditions imposed upon them with regard to the structures and the equipment required under law. The vacation, for the parents' part, was perceived as loafing off from Torah, which went against the accepted norms of studying Torah without letup. Added to this were the nuisance problems that the children on vacation caused the parents, who were immersed in the difficulties making a living and looking after their multiple children.
A year later, the police superintendent in the city warns the educators of measures to be taken against them due to nonfulfillment of their commitment, and the educators dispersed their pupils.[40] The authorities went from warnings to acts of punishment in practice as well.
The district supervisor of the elementary schools and the local supervisors did a reevaluation of all the “cheders” and the educators, and it turned out that they did not have satisfactory certificates for teaching. The educators stopped teaching out of fear of prosecution. Three educators were punished. One was sentenced by the court in Chișinău to a fine of 20 rubles, a fine of 25 rubles was imposed on another educator, and on the third a fine of 50 rubles. Only a small number of educators had a “patent” (teaching license), and thus the majority of the children's population, especially the poor among them, was denied Torah-based education.[41]
The pressure on the educators continued without letup, and in 1890 there were only two (Sadigorsky and Roisner) – out of 25 educators in the city – holding a teaching license as required by law, but they were not permitted to teach, either, due to the fact that one of them is teaching more than ten pupils and their “cheders” are neglected, dirty, and not ventilated. Lawsuits were filed against both.[42] It turned out from inspections that the police conducted a year later that the number of educators had risen to 40, however only three of them had teaching certificates by law.[43]
It becomes clear from the data in our hands that the Haskala penetrated the community slowly, but while continuously expanding.
Noticeable effects
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of the decline of ultra-Orthodoxy's influence and rise of the influence of the Maskilim will appear only at the commencement of the twentieth century. Evident, nonetheless, is the “cheder's” vitality and perseverance and the expansion of its network, despite the activity of the Maskilim and their sharp criticism and despite the authorities' persecutions. Within eight years, starting from 1883 when there was not a single “cheder” in the city, their number reached 40 in 1891. Assuming that each of the educators kept to the provisions of the law, which permitted him to teach only ten pupils in his “cheder”, then 400 children continued to attend the “cheders”, and knowing that observance of the law was incomplete, indeed their number was certainly larger.
By our outlook today, there was great justification for the Maskilim's criticism about the cheder, both pedagogically and educationally as well as in terms of the content; but there is no doubt that their reports in the press and especially in the Russian-language Jewish press about specific cases, like an explicit pointing out of this or that educator as an “ignoramus”, pointing out the sanitary and pedagogical conditions in this or that “cheder”, were used as proof for the police's assertions and justifying its persecutions of the educators. The Orthodox and the educators did not send reports or response letters to the Maskilim's press and therefore we do not have written evidence of their reaction, but one can certainly assume their fury over this. Sincere pedagogical intentions, ideological consistency, and the Maskilim's prerogative to criticize took on, in those circumstances, a form of snitching before the antisemitic authorities.
In 1863, the “Society of Propagators of Education among the Jews”, which set itself a goal of speeding up the acquisition of secular learning and primarily Russian culture by the Jews for the purpose of attaining “equality” with the Russians, was established in Petersburg. Two meshumadim (apostates), who did not shy away from pushing for assimilation, also sat in the Society's leadership in Petersburg, and this in and of itself is explanation enough for the suspicion with which the Society's little activity was accompanied.
The Odessan branch, which was founded in 1867, was joined as well by the editors of the Jewish newspapers “Rasviet” and “Tsiyon” and Dr. L. Pinsker, who all thought there was room to take advantage of the effort out of utilitarian reasons, but the pogrom of 1871 in Odessa made it clear to the activists that “equality” is not attained specifically because of the Jews' lack of Russian learning, but rather because of the Russians' and the Ukrainians' antisemitism. The Society managed very little through its operations and at the Bălţian branch the activity was close to nil.
It is recorded in the semiannual report on the Society's operation (1 January 1880-1 July 1880) that “one textbook was sent to a rabbi”.[44]
We mentioned above the establishment of the private school under Feldman's management, which put the emphasis on Hebrew learning as a response to the desire to acquire education without needing a Russian school, and this idea is what gave birth to the central educational institution that will be in existence until the Second World War – the Hebrew Gymnasium.[vi]
F. Zionist Activity
Zionism's ideological consolidation, the modes of self-organization, and the actualization in the form of aliya and settlement among the Jews of Russia as a whole were influenced, on one hand, by the political, social, and economic reality of that Jewry and, on the other hand, by the objective conditions, political and financial, of realizing aliya to the Land of Israel.
The beginnings of the first moshavot [private agricultural colonies] strengthened the subjective aspect of emotions and enthusiasm and at the same time imparted to the act of aliya a dimension of realism. The big impetus for migration generally and, included in that, for aliya to the Land of Israel started with the pogroms of Russia (“Storms in the South”) in 1881. Bessarabia's Jews were influenced especially by the pogroms in the districts geographically close to them, like Balta, Kherson, Dubossary, which began in the spring of 1882. Persisting factors that embitter the lives of the Jews are Interior Minister Ignatyev's “temporary laws” under which the Jews resident in the villages were expelled from their domicile and the directives for expelling the Jews living in a “strip of 50 kilometers” from the border.
As in all the Jewish communities, the ideological influence of M. L. Lilienblum (MLL), Peretz Smolenskin,
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Y. L. Levanda, and afterward Y. L. Pinsker is felt. The Jewish press of the period: “HaShachar”, “HaMelitz”, “HaMagid” was mostly pro-Zionist and contributed its part to the influence. Organizationally, this is the period of the Zionist “associations” that later merge into the Hovevei Zion [“Lovers of Zion”] movement which argues clearly for aliya to the Land of Israel and against migration to America.
The most prominent among the groups is the Bilu[y] group, which was founded following the pogroms (21 January 1882) by a group of Jewish Maskilim who had become disappointed with the attempts to blend into Russian society. The salient idea among the Bilu group was the duty of “self-realization”.
The Bilu'im [members of the Bilu] worked as hired laborers in Mikveh Yisrael and in Rishon LeZion in 1884, and they establish Gedera. Hovevei Zion in Romania also made an impact with their success as immigrants from Romania founded Zichron Ya'akov (1882). This is also the period in which “plans” of various kinds flowered, rousing the Zionists and serving as a connecting link between the ideological debates and organizing for carrying out the aliya and realization. Such programs were formulated by sympathizers with Zionism not from among the Jews (like, for instance, Sir Laurence Oliphant).
Did the debates, ideas, acts of self-organizing, and the aliya in practice penetrate the remote community whose name is Bălţi? Before attempting to answer the question, it is only right to note the great personal contribution of the Maskil, writer, and public figure, Zalman Epshtein, who moved from Odessa to Bălţi and dwelt there a short time.[1] Interesting is the fact that Epshtein himself did not see fit to document his living and his activity in Bălţi. In the very short autobiography that he wrote in the introduction to his book[2], there is no trace of this period. Yaakov Fichman, likewise, does not mention this fact in the book's foreword [and] inasmuch as the autobiography served as a source for the entry in the Hebrew Encyclopedia, the “Bălţi period” is not noted there either.
Like all the Maskilim in that period, Z. Epshtein, too, was active in many areas of the Jewish public arena, such as the educational sphere, taking part in the Jewish press of the time, and mainly in the sphere of Zionist organizing and opinion journalism.[3] As an opinion journalist, he takes part in the great debates then stirring the Jews of Russia. In a report sent from Bălţi, he touches on the problem of a lack of Zionist leaders and leadership, and, among other things, it is said there:
“This great shortcoming will show its operation among us detrimentally in all the ways of society's life. The nation is no longer stiff-necked as before, the bitter experience has already taught it to recognize what is good and what is bad, its eyes are inclined in front of it the correct path and with all heart and soul, lo it is right to return to face it and with correct steps to walk beside it forward; but lamentably, leaders there are not … people, people, bring us…”[4]
Influenced by the success of Hovevei Zion in Romania, he urges getting organized for aliya.[5] Highly impressive is the call composed by him in the form of a letter “On Behalf of Forty Young People” (KIAH)[z] in Paris in which, among other things, it is said:
“We all, the undersigned here, members of the young generation we be, our strength is new with us and our world is still ahead of us. Hands we have for working and a heart for thinking and feeling, and opposite all of humanity we will be able to say that the great idea of restoring the ruins of the land of our forefathers will fill all the arrangements of our hearts and the larger purpose to which our gazes have been ready, in time its creator to be, that we will be able to devote our corporal and spiritual powers to the good of the land of our forefathers, to restore its ruins and bring it back to its dignity.”[6]
The letter came as a response to a call in “HaMagid” to raise donations for aiding those settling in the first moshavot in the Land of Israel, and therefore a donation of 15.5 rubles was appended to the letter as well. The letter was published only four months after the founding of Bilu and it proves (on top of Epshtein's articles quoted above) the readiness for aliya and realization which had taken shape there much time beforehand. “HaMelitz” did not specify the names of those signed onto the letter with which it might have been possible to sort out who of the local Maskilim was among the signers, but there is no doubt that Epshtein dwelt and was operating in Bălţi in those years.
The first document proving Zionist organization in Bălţi is an open letter of the “Lovers of Settling the Land of Israel” association from the 24th of Iyar 5643, 1883, by way of HaMagid, which was directed to “our distinguished brethren, the tillers of the soil in our holy land” and in which, among other things, it was said:
“You, behold, are the happy ones, pioneers who go ahead of our people to clear the path for us that ascends Zion-ward and your names will be melted
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in letters of gold on the tablets of our chronicles for everlasting remembrance. Do not, therefore, despair and grow weak and, despite all the effort, be triumphant.”[7]
Zalman Epshtein is also the moving spirit in organizing a chapter of Hovevei Zion in Bălţi. The chapter was founded on 1 Sivan 5645 (1885) and had 120 members, among them both Hasidim and Maskilim, even though most religious people, across their organizations, work against it.
The most active by Z. Epshtein were S. Rosenthaler and Eliezer Tsipis.[8] The organization's stated purpose was “giving aid to those wishing la'alot” [to go up to the Land of Israel]. The members paid dues and 200 rubles accumulated in the kitty.[9]
In the Bălţian association, debates were conducted on the issue of organizationally affiliating with the central committee of Hovevei Zion and around Z.K. Wissotzky's plan for developing handicrafts, commerce, and industry in the Land of Israel, and around Menashe Meirowitz's plan on establishing moshavot based on growing vineyards and the wine industry. The Maskilim in the association were inclined toward joining the general organization whereas the people of “the masses” leaned toward independent action so as to ensure that the organization and the donations would be directed to aiding the aliya of Bălţians alone. Nonetheless, the latter, too, were willing to join the countrywide organization provided that they be given a guarantee by the office in Warsaw that Bălţians would be added to any organizational framework for aliya and settlement in the Land of Israel. As per the general assembly's decision of the 8th of Marcheshvan 5646, the Bălţian association joined the “Mazkeret Moshe”[vii] association in Warsaw as a chapter.[10] The association commenced activity in the vicinity, too, like Orheev and Parlitza, and connected them with the center. To understand the debates around Z.K. Wissotzky's and Menashe Meirowitz's plans, we will briefly summarize them.
Ze'ev Kalonymus Wissotzky[11] was the most famous of the participants at Hovevei Zion's founding conference in Kattowitz (1884); he traveled to the Land of Israel in 1885 on a mission for the association to check the situation of the moshavot, submit a report and proposals for the future.[12] Wissotzky apparently was impressed by the German settlers of the time and, in line with their occupations, regarded handicrafts, industry, and commerce as the main branches of the future in the Land of Israel and agriculture as a secondary branch. According to the report, every family of immigrants must raise a minimum total of 3,000 rubles and carry out the immigration process gradually and in stages, such as purchasing land, expert advice, the land's cultivation by the head of the family, who immigrates earlier, with the assistance of hired laborers, building a house, and, only at the end of the process, the family's immigration.
The association in Bălţi does not accept Wissotzky's recommendations and emphasizes that it regards agricultural settlement as a fundamental occupation, while regarding handicrafts and industry as a secondary branch. They also thought that the sum that Wissotzky had used (3000 rubles per family) was excessive and, in their opinion, it was possible to settle several families of townsfolk who had 600-700 rubles at their disposal.[13]
That same year, Menashe Meirowitz, one of the Bilu people, published his plan according to which it was possible to settle middle-class families in moshavot that would be based on vineyards and the wine industry. He published the plan in the pamphlet, “Eitzah v'Tushia” [“Advice and Resourcefulness”], and according to it the first association should number 30-40 families with each family purchasing 40 dunams of land suitable for planting vineyards. Meirowitz, too, supported a controlled aliya, in stages, in accordance with the economy's development. Wissotzky, who at that time was in the Land [of Israel], likewise supported Meirowitz's plan and was already conducting negotiations for purchasing suitable lands.[14]
The association in Bălţi is interested in taking part in the plan and turns to the center to get information[15], and the pressure on the association is also toward aliya. In a different letter to the center, Epshtein stresses that the addition by Hovevei Zion of two families from Bălţi to a group of immigrants would greatly increase donations.[16] All those years, uninterrupted activity is conducted of monetary contributions to the funds.[17]
However, of all the Zionist activity in Bălţi at the end of the 19th century, Hovevei Zion's involvement in the city in the first attempt at settlement in Qastina (today Be'er Tuvia) stands out. The daring attempt and the painful failure of settlement in Qastina is known in settlement history as “the Bessarabians affair” and, at that time, it engaged public activists, journalists, and the Jewish public arena in the Land of Israel of the period, and the Jewry of Russia, and it also served as a topic of study by
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several researchers. It becomes clear from an examination of the attempt's unfolding that Bălţi was the hub of that organizational framework, as is reflected in the press of the period and in the correspondence of the Baron's people with Hovevei Zion in Odessa.
At the beginning of 1887, after several attempts at self-organizing for aliya, a group of 40 families from Bălţi takes shape “for establishing a moshava of their own” or to join an existing moshava in the Land of Israel.
In nearby Faleshty, 15 families organized themselves. The two groups united and they were joined by families from Yedinetz, Dombroveni, Skolin, and ultimately a group of 53 families had taken shape. Due to a lack of means for purchasing the land, they decided to appeal to the Baron Rothschild for help, requesting a loan of 40,000 rubles.[18] The appeal to the Baron was made via Rabbi Lubetsky, who was the rabbi of the Jews of Russian extraction in Paris, but it came at an inopportune time of tension between the Baron and the farmers of the moshavot following the revolt against the Baron's officialdom in Rishon LeZion.[19]
Despite the uncomfortable situation, the group decided to dispatch two emissaries to Paris, and these emissaries managed to win the affection of Tsadok Cohen, then the Chief Rabbi of Paris and later of all of France, who supported settlement in the Land of Israel, and of Michael Erlinger, treasurer of Hovevei Zion in Paris. The two were advisers of the Baron, exerted their influence over him, and persuaded him to support the group's settlement attempt.[20]
We learn from a report sent to “HaMelitz” by Avraham Myler of Soroka that the members of the association about to immigrate to agricultural settlement “are residents of the cities Belz, Filesht, and Yedinetz. Most of them are notables and people of means and among them one man with 20,000 rubles and he is ready to assist the rest”.[21] We learn from the same report the details of the arrangement, as reported by one of the emissaries at the assembly of the association's members.
After waiting two weeks, the emissaries were received hospitably by the Baron and he informed them of his willingness to accept only 25 families under his patronage. This patronage was manifested in a willingness to buy for each family 22½ dessiatin of land at a price of 40 rubles a dessiatin, and for each family he would build a house with four rooms and a stable. Two horses, two donkeys, 20 sheep, a plow and other tools would be bought for each family. Until the first harvest, it would receive 5 francs per person per week for sustenance. As public buildings, a house of worship, hospital, pharmacy, and bathhouse would be constructed.
Each of the settlers would pay 1000 rubles and repay the remainder of the money in installments. The emissaries asked to appoint the clerk, Osavitsky, as supervisor over them on behalf of the Baron. Joyfully and with a toast, the association's members accepted the arrangement, drew lots, and compensation of 50 rubles per family was granted to the families not included among the twenty-five.
Incongruity exists between the enthusiasm of the association's members, as is reflected in the newspaper reports, and the spirit reflected in the words written by those handling the various arrangements on behalf of the Baron.
In a December 22, 1887 letter, which M. Erlinger dispatches from Paris to Y. L. Pinsker in Odessa, it is said: “All that pertaining to the Bălţi affair (emphasis added – S.Y.) is partially correct, at least from a basic standpoint. “Two people from Faleshty in Bessarabia came here and asked us how and when they would be able to reach Palestine because they, like many others, are being expelled from the 50-kilometer strip without knowing where to. We cautioned them about taking an irresponsible step and further actions before the ground for that had been prepared. Since then, the people sent money, which is deposited, to our regret, without benefit. As for special circumstances, there's nothing to be said. Nothing was concluded in the contract. The people will travel to Palestine in accordance with the money they sent or another arrangement for them will be found. At your service, M. Erlinger.”[22]
[There are six lines of text here in the original of Erlinger's letter:
Wass die Belzer Geschichte betrifft so ist solche theilweis, mindestens dem Grunde nach, wahr Es kamen hieher zwei Leute aus Filest in Bessarabien, die uns fragten' wie u. wann nach Palestine zu Kommen, da man sie und viele andere aus den 50 Wests ausweist?) und sie nicht wissen wohin. Wir warnten sie keinen un-vorsichtigen Schritt zu thun und nicht eher zu gehn bis terrain vorhanden ist. Die leute haben seither [Geld] geschickt, das leider fruchtlos da liegt. Von besonderen Condizionen ist keine Rede. Es wurde durchaus nicht
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contractiert, Die Leute werden nach Palestine gehn in Verhältniss des Geldes, das sie geschickt, oder das man sonst für sie finden wird4) Ihr ergebenster
M. Erlanger
Five weeks later, on January 31, 1888, Erlinger writes Pinsker another letter on the topic:
“Concerning the Faleshty-Bălţians, I did not take, nor shall I take, upon myself any commitment. Apart from that, the people are very interesting and certainly will be accepted. They are not overly demanding.”[23]
Three lines of text, apparently in German and French are the original of Erlinger's letter:
Hinsichtlich der Filest-Belzer) habe ich nie in Engagemant genommen u. werde auch keines nehmen. Übrigens sind die Leute sehr interessant und man wird sich Ihrer annehmen. Is ne sont pas tres exigeants.
Conspicuous in the correspondence between Erlinger and Pinsker is the former stressing an avoidance of any commitment while the emissaries were able to detail the smallest particulars of an arrangement, as we elaborated above. It seems that every idea that was raised in front of the emissaries in oral conversations was perceived by them as having been concluded and guaranteed by the Baron himself.
We lack a document from which we would be able to learn about the distribution of the families in the group of twenty-five according to their communities. Likewise, we do not have data on the overall number of people in the group; however, we know that in the lead-up to aliya, every family co-opted its married sons as well and any relative it could, such that each familial unit amounted to about 15 people[24], such that the group being discussed numbered over 300 people.
Hardship, zeal, hopes, and mainly naivete propelled the people to actualize aliya without taking note or even without knowing that there did not exist a formal arrangement for the Baron's commitment. In early January 1888, Sidikman reports from Bălţi:
“25 families from us (emphasis added – S.Y.) and from Faleshty depart for the Land of Israel after selling all their property and await the longed-for day. Several capitalists among the departees, while the poor requested assistance.”[25]
The first ones about to depart were several families from Faleshty. In the group of the 25 families were 15 families from Faleshty, and 11 of them lacked means and therefore their place in line for aliya was brought forward. The families with means lingered to liquidate their property. In addition to all the other delays, a problem of the Turkish transit permits arose, too:
“The departure of the Faleshty group is being delayed due to absence of a transit permit from the Turks. Six weeks ago, they sent an emissary to Paris to the Baron with a request that he take care of the transit permit. On 24 January, the emissary[viii] returned and advised that there is no longer an impediment on the Turks' side. Based on this information, six families departed for Odessa by way of Chișinău.[26] In HaMelitz of 10 March 1888, A. Chaikes, then secretary of Hovevei Zion in Bălţi, describes the affair:
“Belz (Bessarabia) – Back at the end of last summer, five-and-twenty families from twenty-six different locations, from here (Bălţi, my note – S.Y.), from Falesht, from Yedinetz, and from Dombroven, banded together and responded and made up their minds to immigrate to the Holy Land to work the land and they would send two people from among them to the well-known philanthropist in Paris to implore him that he be their sustainer for carrying out their heart's desire. The person in charge received the emissaries hospitably and would speak favorably with them and all that they asked, he gave them. These families took upon themselves to give the philanthropist a sum of five-and-twenty thousand silver rubles, and the philanthropist promised to give them all their needs: To buy land for them, to build them houses, and to fill all their needs and when they would be settled down in the Land and their situation sound, at that time they would return to the philanthropist the money which he had spent on their needs over and above the twenty-five thousand silver rubles that they had given him. Several families have already journeyed to the Holy Land and remaining ones are ready to be on the way after the Feast of Unleavened Bread.”[27]
The settlement attempt at Qastina and the failure of this attempt are respectable topics in settlement history and this is not the place to expand on it.[28] Our concern is to examine the Bălţian component within the group.
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After Passover 1888, all the 25 families were already in Jaffa and they later moved to Rishon LeZion. Because of the delays in purchasing the land, they lived quite some time without sources of income and their money ran out. As a result of the revolts against the officialdom by the farmers in the moshavot[29], and so as to secure themselves against revolt attempts on the part of the Bessarabian settlers, the Baron's officialdom demanded that the candidates for settlement waive in writing their ownership of the lands as a condition for the Baron's support and his undertaking to employ them as hired laborers in the moshava or the return of their money. Twenty families refused the conditions being offered, and only five families consented. The names of the heads of the five families are known from a letter that they wrote from Qastina to Avraham Greenberg, a man of Chișinău, who was then chair of “Hovevei Zion” in Odessa; and they are:
Yisrael Yosef Rabinovitz (from Skolin), Yitzhak Kantor (from Faleshty), his son, Yisrael Kantor (he, too, apparently from Faleshty). For the other two: Antshil Shkolnik and Zusia Schwartz, the city of origin is not noted.[30]
Were these two families from Bălţi? We did not find a reference for this. Furthermore, we do not have data on the number of families from Bălţi that were among the twenty families who refused to move to Qastina.
It is known that some of the families returned to Bessarabia: Three families from Faleshty[31] and five families from Dombroven.[32] Presumably, if families would have returned to Bălţi, it would have been written about in the press. The press in the Land of Israel at the time followed the Qastina affair with open sympathy[33] for the settlers and sharp criticism of the officialdom's actions, their maltreatment, and their misapprehension of the conditions and of the immigrants' desire to be independent farmers.[34]
As opposed to the press, M. L. Lilienblum, while polemicizing with the editor of “Havatzelet”, took a stance that was critical toward the settlers and sympathetic toward the Baron's officialdom. Details about the development of the dispute are revealed through the polemics.[35]
Dr. Dan Giladi, one of the researchers of settlement history, directed my attention to the fact that the Bessarabians' endeavor was among the solitary cases in which the settlers were prepared to finance their settlement by themselves, both by an immediate investment of 1000 rubles per family and by their commitment to repay the Baron's loans.
Despite the failure, the Hovevei Zion association in Bălţi continues its activity and tries to organize families for settlement, such as “Menuha VeNahala” in Warsaw.[ix] The association was then headed by Aharon Kalichman in the position of chairman and Alter Heikes as secretary. In a letter to the center in Warsaw, the two request details about settlement within the association's framework.[36]
The absence of newspapers and archival material from the beginning of the 20th century up to the war prevented us from compiling information on the community activity in that period.
We learn from the circulars of the Zionist Organization in Bessarabia that the Organization in Bălţi was active in all the Zionist enterprises of the period, such as: Keren Kayemet L'Yisrael [Jewish National Fund], disseminating the Shekel, and the like.[37]
We learn from a newspaper item that S. Rabinowitz was chosen as a delegate to the Seventh Zionist Congress (1905) on behalf of the Bălţi and Faleshty communities.
Epilogue
It is possible, from the fragments of information that we managed to gather, to put together a picture of a community fighting for its life while continually striving to improve its condition despite the difficult circumstances to which it was fated.
Amid the political conditions of restrictions and persecutions, the social conditions of antisemitic abasement, and economic fluctuations to the point of actual starvation of a large portion of community members, the efforts to establish educational institutions, charitable institutions, a hospital stand out, and all these while at the same time stressing the public duty of the well-off's responsibility toward the weak.
In today's terms, it could be said that: “Kupat Holim” [Sick Fund] (at least for the poor), “closing gaps”, free education, providing welfare relief were known not only as concepts, but were implemented in practice within the dimensions and possibilities of the time. No less impressive is the volunteering (the doctors' work at the hospital without pay), the philanthropy, and especially the feeling of dedication to the needs
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of the public, the self-organizing and the attempts at aliya and settlement. In addition, the oldest ones among us remember a cohesive community that was preceded by 150 years and more of collective communal effort, and the essay above is an attempt to describe, if only a bit, that initial period.
Notes
A. Demographic Development
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This, my article, is dedicated to the memory of my grandfather and teacher, Yitzchak ben Gedaliah z”l – a Torah scholar (talmid chacham) and upright – to the widespread Tenenboim family, denizens of the city, most of whom were tragically killed in the Holocaust and whose burial site is unknown. |
Translator's footnotes:
Author's notes:
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