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[Pages 10-67]

A. Historical Background

The town of Rohatyn is situated in Galicia on the shores of the Gnila Lipa River. Its recorded history began as early as the 12th century, and the events therein left their stamp for future generations. There are not many documents available from the earliest periods of its history, but from what there are, the following picture appears. Rohatyn first began as a small village that slowly grew, deriving a good amount of its income from marketing fairs. It does not seem to have constituted a special political entity of its own, in the beginning, but was attached to other areas and was politically affected by what happened in the surrounding areas. It began as a village, and it became a town in the 13th century. From one document we learn that in 1375 King Wladyslaw gave the town of Rohatyn to the Cardinal of Wlodislaw.^{[1] [Ed1]}From this period until about the middle of the 15th century, we do not have any information. Around 1444 the starosta (district administrator) of Rohatyn was Wolsko, who was followed by Mikolaj Paraba of Lubin in 1444.^[2] In the year 1460 the town and its surrounding areas were transferred to the ownership of the Parait family from Chodecz as a pledge for a loan made to King Casimir Jagiellonczyk (Kazimierz IV, 1447–92). During this period, as we learn from various documents, Rohatyn was doing business with Zydaczow.^[2a]The yearly town market fairs became so successful that they interfered with the trade of the city of Lwow and caused it a serious loss of income. Whereupon the voivode (provincial administrator), Andrzej Odrowaz, petitioned the king to abolish the yearly trade fairs in Rohatyn, which were so damaging to the city of Lwow. On 23 June 1461, King Casimir Jagiellonczyk responded by abolishing not only the Rohatyn fairs but also those of Tysmienica, Trembowla, Gologory and Jazlowice, which apparently had also contributed to the loss of income to the city of  Lwow.^[3] These restrictions applied only to the regional fairs. The local market days were permitted to continue, and by the 16th century they grew beyond the scope of a local fair.^[4]In the 15th century we learn that Rohatyn received a singular honor when the Halicz district parliament (sejmik halicki) met there.^[Ed2] Until then it had been meeting in Sadowa Wisznia.^[5] Living among the Slavic inhabitants of the town were also people of German descent. Included among them were Johannes, “the famous citizen” of Rohatyn, procreator of Petrusi, Raphal, and Otto, German brothers^[Ed3] who did business with the nobility.^[6]In 1482 a suburb was added on the other side of the entrance to the town near the gate that was termed “Suburbium Rohatinense,”^[7] a place that would be associated with the history of the Jews for hundreds of years thereafter. At that time, legal matters were still carried out for the town in the courts of Halicz.^[8] In 1523 Otto of Chodecz, voivode of the province of Sandomierz and a starosta in Red Ruthenia,^[Ed4] tried to improve the position of the town by granting it a special permit to carry out special fairs known as sochaczki^[9] every Saturday during the period between Wielkanoc (Easter) and John the Baptist Day (June 24). This permit applied only to the butchers of Rohatyn and only during the three months before the Holiday of the Three Kings. However, after the fairs, cattle belonging to the inhabitants of the area could be brought to Rohatyn to be slaughtered and sold upon payment of a fee to the national treasury of a groschen for each ox or cow and six denars for each sheep or goat. During that year, a bridge was erected and paved, the use of which required, by order of the voivode of Red Ruthenia, the payment of a toll of two denars for each wagon and one denar for each horse.^[10] In 1533 the government transferred the proceeds of this fee to the town.^[11] After the death of Otto of Chodecz, the town again became the official property of the king,^[12] and the first starosta was Johann Boratynski.^[13] In the year 1535 King Sigismund I applied the Magdeburg law to Rohatyn and thus exempted the town from the payment of a number of taxes (on such items as eggs, cheese, spayed chickens, and oats) and permitted the hewing of wood in the forests. Because of incursions into the town by surrounding enemies that caused great damage, the king granted Rohatyn a special “privilege” in 1539 that permitted it to erect fortifications and a protective wall, the expenditures of which the king subsidized from taxes on liquor and szos (paved roadways). He wrote in the privilege, “Desiring that the town grow and develop, it shall be surrounded by walls, and we permit the erection of a citadel in the center of town, including a town hall with a tower.” The expenses for the maintenance of this citadel were to be derived from taxes on the sale of textile remnants (postrzygalnia) and liquor. According to a survey in 1572, the town had a population of 115 homeowners, 18 tenants, and 36 citizens who lived on the outskirts, while the new town held 100 homeowners and 11 tenants. In 1578 Rohatyn paid seven hundred gulden in taxes on liquor.^[14] The condition of the inhabitants at this time had deteriorated so much that apparently King Stefan Batory issued an order on 12 December 1576 exempting the town from payment of levies and taxes except for customs at the borders. This directive was sent to all of the customs offices and tax collectors.^[15] In reaction to this directive, a quarrel broke out between the customs inspectors of Red Ruthenia and those of the village of Rohatyn, because the people of Red Ruthenia did not wish to recognize the decree of the king and demanded the payment of duties. The issue came before King Stefan Batory on 4 August 1578 in Lwow, and he confirmed that the inhabitants of Rohatyn were required to pay only customs at the border.^[16] During these years, there existed a variety of guilds. Of note are the goldsmiths who received a special charter from King Stefan Batory on 15 June 1575. Among the best known of their works were those created by Bartolomy.^[17] Another attempt by the king to improve conditions in the town was a call by His Majesty to all merchants and travelers not to encroach on the town of Rohatyn. In the 16th century the town was attacked by the Tatars. In one of their incursions, they kidnapped Anastasia, the daughter of the local Ruthenian priest Lisowski, who was sold into the harem of Suleiman I. She found favor with him to the point where she became his first wife, taking the name of Roxolana. For a time, she even directed the official policies of Turkey.^[18] In the 17th century the Cossack bands began their attacks on Poland. In 1615 an intensive battle was waged against them near Rohatyn, and the Hetman (Commander) Zolokowski succeeded in destroying them as well as capturing their leaders and executing them. In 1616 King Sigismund III permitted the erection of a public bathhouse known as the Babinski Patopek on the Babianka River, and the income from it was transferred to the town for its expenditures.^[19] The Chmielniszczyzna (followers of Chmielnicki), a Ukrainian anti-Polish movement, expanded into the Rohatyn area. Ruthenians from there joined them in their military preparations and maneuvers. Together with other Ruthenians from surrounding towns, they took part in military attacks on the manors of the nearby Polish nobility, threatening not to leave one “Polak” alive. The Ruthenians of Rohatyn were filled with a burning hatred toward the Catholic religion, monasteries, and churches.^[20] According to a survey dated 1663, the town had two hundred houses in the old town and thirty-one in the new suburb. The residents complained that the podwodne ^[20a] they were forced to pay was unfair.Despite its relatively small size, the town had a wide variety of guilds – tailors, weavers, cobblers, butchers, bakers, furriers, belt makers, musicians, blacksmiths, iron mongers, harness makers, and armorers. Tinsmiths, saddle makers, and carriage makers were united into one guild. In the 1670s the starosta was Sigmund Karol Pszaromski, followed by the nobleman Adam Mikolaj Sieniawski, who carried out many important duties in the community. For a number of years he was the president (marszalek) at sessions of the district parliament (sejmik) at Sadowa Wisznia. ^[21] In the 17th and 18th centuries the town became known as a center for the sale of cattle, horses, and agricultural products. To the town were attached the villages of Perenowka, Firlejow, Podgrodzie, Zalipia, and Zawadowka. In the census of the year 1765 the population of the town numbered 539. The starosta was Franciszek Bialinski, and the net income for the district rose to 37,560 gulden per year. At that time, the town belonged to Jozef Bielski.After the conquest of Galicia by Austria, Rohatyn was transferred to the noblewoman Zofia Lubomirska as partial compensation for her Dobromil manor, which was taken by the Austrian government. ^[22]Under the Austrians, the town grew. In 1857 Rohatyn had 5,101 inhabitants. In 1870, 4,510; in 1880, again 5,101; in 1887, 6,548; in 1890, 7,188 and 914 houses; in 1900, 931 houses and 7,201 inhabitants; and in 1910, 7,664 inhabitants. In 1921 the population was reduced to 5,736 because of World War I. In 1885 occupations in the town of Rohatyn included:

Merchants, 51: textiles, 3; shoes, 11; iron, 2; eggs, 1; grain, 13; glass, 1; flour, 12; agricultural products, 4; and wagon grease, 4; Crafts: furriers, 2; tailors, 1; Leaseholders: millers, 1; bartenders, 1.In the general area of Rohatyn, there were 1,290 people in different occupations. They included as follows:

Trades, 393 merchants: wine, 11; textiles, 35; spices, 16; wagon grease, 7; salt, 12; handicrafts, 6; flour and cereals, 14; hides, 19; cattle, 8; horses, 5; petroleum, 5; lumber, 8; whiskey, 4; flooring, 1; eggs, 5; iron, 12; fish, 4; grain, 43; fruit, 5; haberdashery, 53; peddlers, 5; moneychangers, 5; middlemen, 3-4; brokers, 3; retailers, 95. Craftsmen, 520 workers that included: tailors, 55; furriers, 21; hosiers, 4; weavers, 18; cotton wool makers, 2; rope weaver, 1; soap makers, 7; shoemakers, 58; chimney sweeps, 2; comb makers, 3; charcoal makers, 2; metal forger, 1; stonecutters, 2; carpenters, 26; potters, 21; precious metal smiths, 2; watchmakers, 5; glaziers, 7; tanners, 4; bronze coaters, 1; coachmen, 12; belt makers, 4; woodcarvers, 3; bookbinders, 4; butchers, 44; wooden house builders, 25; blacksmiths, 20; ironmongers, 4; insulation, 4; gardeners, 2; millers, 58; mechanics, 2; fence-makers, 19; harness makers, 4; wood cutters, 3; musicians, 4; barber-surgeons, 17; builders, 3; painters, 2; bakers, 16. Leaseholders, Bartenders, Suppliers, Druggists, Factory Owners, 337, including:

Leaseholders of mills, 49; owners of mills, 40; tavern keepers, 96; leaseholders of inns, 7; owners of blacksmith shops, 2; distillery owners, 13; bartenders, 152; distillers, 2; meat suppliers, 2; partition suppliers, 3; fodder suppliers, 4; milkmen, 4; soda water suppliers, 2; druggists, 4. In the year 1889 the town of Rohatyn transferred its records to the state archives in Lwow, among them a large number of documents, such as thirteen permits and charters from the years 1438, 1525, 1535, 1539, 1567, 1581, 1603, 1663, 1669, 1676, 1729, 1738, 1796.^[23] After World War II this important historical treasure remained in the hands of the Soviet Union.

There is no way of knowing when the Jewish community of Rohatyn began, since we do not have any documents attesting to its beginning. We only know that by the end of the 15th century, Jews of Red Ruthenia and other parts of Poland were coming to the market fairs to buy cattle that were, in turn, sold in Silesia and Western Poland. They also bought horses that were brought there from Hungary.^[24] We learn from one document, dated 1463, that one of the cattle wholesalers was a Jew by the name of Shimshon from Zydaczow. He bought cattle, oxen, and horses from the landowners of the areas around Rohatyn. In 1463 an agreement was reached between the Polish nobleman, Johann Skarbok, and the Jewish wholesaler, Shimshon, from Zydaczow. According to this agreement, Skarbok would provide Shimshon with the use of his town, Olchowiec, in the district of Halicz, for the rental fee of forty marks, and Shimshon would agree to accept five hundred head of cattle (peccora quinta) from him to be sold at the next fair in Rohatyn. In the event that the fair did not take place in Rohatyn, Skarbok was to deliver them in Olchowiec.^[25] Shimshon also did business on a large scale with other nobility in the Rohatyn area, where he was the major buyer at the Rohatyn fairs in the years 1447–64. As a result of this, Jews began to settle in Rohatyn. Jews are first mentioned in legal documents of Rohatyn dated in the year
1531.^[25a]During the 15th and 16th centuries their numbers were still quite small, and they did not as yet have an organized community. They were subject to the jurisdiction of the Jewish community of Lwow. The residents of the area were directly tied to the kahal (Jewish community council) of Lwow, or through one of its branches in the district of Halicz. As the town expanded and became a larger marketing center, more Jews were attracted to settle there, since the town needed skilled workers, retailers, and peddlers. In the year 1582 the collection of taxes on liquor in Rohatyn was leased to Mendel Izakowicz for an unknown number of years.^[26]On the other hand, Rohatyn, a crown property, did not grant the right of citizenship to Jews or anyone else who was not a Catholic, in contrast to “free” towns, not officially under royal jurisdiction, whose economic interests led them to grant Jews rights equal to their other inhabitants. They even gave Jews the right to vote for members of the town council, as exemplified by Brody, Dukla, Zmigrod, etc.As a result, Jewish inhabitants in areas like Rohatyn, who were not under the jurisdiction of such towns, did not benefit from the provisions of the Magdeburg law, which provided for the administrative and judicial independence of municipalities. They were deprived of the possibilities of taking part in some of the economic endeavors available, such as the distilling and sale of hard liquor. Since the Jews of Rohatyn lacked a charter, the economic rules that applied to them were different from the rest of the community, with the exception of sales connected with the yearly fairs. Thus, during this period, the number of Jews in the community did not increase in proportion to those living in “free” towns.Changes in the development of the Jewish community of Rohatyn did not really gain momentum until the year 1633 when King Wladyslaw IV granted them a charter that was continued by King John Casimir (Jan Kazimierz) and restated again by King Michael (Michal) in 1669. This charter laid the foundation for the legal establishment and organization of a Jewish community. In it he states that he, King Michael, reaffirms and validates the charters of earlier origin granted to the Jews by his predecessor, Wladyslaw IV, on 27 March 1633, and continued by John Casimir on 21 May 1663, and on this, the day of his coronation, the 22 November 1669, (he reaffirms) the plan and contents of the privileges previously presented in their magnanimity by his predecessors.^[27]

The text states in part, after a prologue written in Latin, that “on the fifth day after the religious holiday Purificationis Beatissimae Virginis Mariae,^[27a] there appeared by himself, in the town of Lwow, the Jewish intermediary (Jacob)
Selig^[28], who presented the signed charter by His Majesty for registration in the archives of Lwow and addressed in His magnanimity the Jews of Rohatyn, the text of which states as follows:

“Polish king Wladyslaw IV (followed by all of his titles) publicly declares that whereas We have accepted in this, the coronation session of the Sejm, all of the laws of our kingdom and of those of the cities, do We, in keeping with the petition of the Jews in Our town of Rohatyn, reinstate and recognize all of the privileges, decrees relating to surveys of the houses and lots where they live, the synagogue, the cemetery, all trades, and businesses without distinction as to buying and selling, and the buying and selling of lead and other goods; they are permitted to keep taverns and the varieties of liquor in them, to brew beer and mead, to distill whiskey; they further have the right to sell and buy cattle, meat, whole or in parts, in the town square (rynek), in keeping with their past marketing customs, being equal with the townspeople according to privileges, and without prejudice, as practiced in the town.

“As to the taxes on the Jews, they are to pay city taxes similar to those paid by the townspeople but are not required to pay 'private taxes.' On the other hand, taxes that they have been paying, according to law and earlier customs, are to be maintained.

“His Majesty authorizes all customs and laws that were enjoyed previously to the extent that they are still in use and do not violate the body of the laws as a whole. In addition to this present authorization, we do give our promise that they will continue to remain in effect.”

It is stressed in the charter that the Jews of Rohatyn had presented a petition in writing asking that the third day of the week, their traditional market day, be continued and recognized as found in previous documents. The king granted their petition, taking into consideration their right to recuperate from the ravages of enemy incursions and to operate their business affairs to their best advantage.

The charter instituted rules for the legal maintenance of the Jewish economy and insured their rights, permitting them to conduct their business legally. The salient passage here is “rowno z mieszczanami tamecznymi wedlug przywileju i starodawnego zwyczaju” (on a par with the local citizens according to the privilege and longstanding customs). We see that equal rights were ensured to all residents of the town. In contrast to Jews in a number of other towns in Red Ruthenia, they were free of various levies such as the supply of tools; participating in the construction and repair of roads, repair of bridges and town walls; tributes to officials, the church, and the priests, etc. These special rights derived from the permission given to the Jews to maintain their stores in the center of town and their freedom of trade. These rulings did not cover the socio-legal organization of the Jewish community, since the community of Rohatyn developed in the same fashion as other Jewish communities in Poland. It is quite possible that by the 17th century, the Jews of Rohatyn had received a charter in this area as well, but there are no definite documents to validate this assumption with certainty.

In practice, the Jewish community of Rohatyn was one of nine communities that were included in the general Jewish community of Lwow prior to the attacks of Chmielnicki. These communities included Bohorodczany, Buczacz, Brody, Zolkiew, Tysmienica, Lesko, Zloczow, and Rohatyn. The officials under the jurisdiction of Lwow included the chief rabbi. As in all other Polish communities there was a Va'ad (governing council) consisting of:

1. 3 – 5 parnassim (leaders) who were responsible to the government and were elected yearly after swearing loyalty to the government of Poland. The election of the parnassim was contingent on their acceptance by the voivode (provincial administrator), because it was a crown town as opposed to a private town, where acceptance of Jewish officials was determined by the owner of the town or his deputy;
2. 3 – 5 tuwim (notables);
3. members of executive committees.

The officials of the community were the rabbi (rav), judges (dayanim), the preacher (darshan), the scribe (sofer), and the beadle (shamas). An intercessor (shtadlan) represented the Jewish community before the government when the need arose. Thus we find Selig, the Lwow shtadlan, presenting the charter granted by the king of Poland for entry into the official books of Lwow. Rohatyn, a small town, was unable to maintain its own shtadlan and thus employed the services of Selig from Lwow. Many heavily populated communities kept a doctor, a druggist, a nurse, a midwife, guards, collectors, and messengers in addition to the above. To what extent this existed in Rohatyn, we do not know. Even in Rohatyn, there existed organizations for burial, etc.

Since Rohatyn in the 17th century had within it a large number of craftsmen in various categories, it also had many trade unions that stood guard to protect their interests within the Christian guilds, the municipality, and within the governing committee of the Jewish community as well.

In 1658 at the request of the Red Ruthenian nobility at the sejmik in Sadowa Wisznia, there were established Va'adei Gelilot (Jewish district councils) which in the end resulted in the creation of a council for towns surrounding Lwow and eight additional Jewish communities.

In practice, it was the kahal (Jewish council) of the city of Lwow alone that directed all the activities of the regional council, to the point where the parnassim of Lwow had concentrated under their control the enactment of all the activities of the kehilah (Jewish community). They stood guard to protect this hegemony from falling out of their hands and thus excluded the kehilot (Jewish communities) within the eight provincial towns. After the wars during the 17th century and the revolt of Chmielnicki, the kehilah of Lwow sharply decreased in size. In its place, politically, there emerged the provincial towns, which effectively took the leadership away from the parnassim of Lwow in the national Jewish council. The kehilah of Zolkiew, which hitherto had been considered a branch (przykahalek) of the Lwow Jewish community, succeeded, with the aid and support of King Jan Sobieski, the owner of this royal town, to free itself completely from the domination of the Lwow kehilah. It also went on to take control of the regional council, together with the kehilot of Brody, Tarnopol, and Buczacz. This enabled the rabbi of Buczacz to be elected chief rabbi of the whole region. Among the other kehilot that joined it were Rohatyn, Lesko, and Zloczow, whose representatives were included among the heads of the new executive council of the area.

The declining economic conditions of Lwow forced many Jews there to leave the city and settle in the eastern towns of Red Ruthenia. To what extent this affected their coming to Rohatyn is hard to tell. One thing is certain, that due to the continued wholesale exodus of the Jews from Lwow eastward, the city was so weakened that they were unable to fulfill payment of their required head tax that was placed on the small number of Jews remaining there. This fact was brought to the attention of the sejmik of Wisznia on 18 April 1701.^[29]

The members of the nobility complained that they were not obtaining their tax money because large numbers of Jews were leaving for Podolia, then under the Turks, where there was no head tax. They therefore asked that the taxes be reapportioned for the existing number of inhabitants. The sejmik approved the request but did not put it into effect until fifteen years later in 1716. Eventually, Red Ruthenia and Podolia were given different tax schedules from then on.

In 1664 the kahal members from the nearby towns of Buczacz, Zolkiew, Jaworow, Kolomyja, and Brody attacked the Lwow contingent at the Va'ad Hagalil (district council) meeting in Âwierz and forced them to revise their monopoly to include the views of their neighbors that had heretofore been ignored. This brought about the addition to the council of seven more members from the nearby towns. The council, which met in Kulikow in 1720, had fourteen members – five members from Zolkiew, three from Brody, one from Bohorodczany, one from Stryj, one from Rohatyn, one from Zloczow, and one from Buczacz.^[30] Among the issues that this session dealt with, on 11 Tamuz 5480 (17 July 1720), was the (previous) unseating of the Gaon Rabbi Yehoshua Falk, author of Pnei Yehoshua, from his office as rabbi in Lwow.^[31] This council, which included Rohatyn, unanimously voted to return the Gaon to his office, which had been taken from him and given to Rabbi Chaim ben Leizerel, Rabbi ben Leizerel having been elected through the intercession of his father-in-law, the purchasing agent for the voivode Jablonowski.^[32] The representative from Rohatyn, Zvi Hirsh, took part in this.

During the 17th century, the area of Halicz and its surrounding towns were prey to violent attacks and invasions by Tatars and Turks. Later, in the time of Chmielnicki, Russians and Cossacks wreaked havoc – destruction, murder, rape and fire – wherever they went, as they did in all of Red Ruthenia. In this Rohatyn was no exception and fared no differently than the other communities in the area. There are no exact recorded figures of the extent of destruction and murder that was committed there, but in general, the effects of the ravages of Tach VeTat (the tragic years 1648–49) continued to be felt until the middle of the 18th century. What is known is that the damage in Rohatyn was no less than those in the other neighboring areas. This resulted in a great deterioration in the economic condition of the Jews of the area, to the point where on 23 December 1675, even the sejmik of Halicz was impressed and brought up the topic for official discussion with regard to the payment of the head tax by the Jews of Red Ruthenia. It was clear, even to them that the Jews would no longer be able to pay it. The Ukrainian rebellion against Polish rule erased whole communities that had once supplied taxes that were now sorely missing. ^[33] This finally resulted in bringing the members of the Halicz parliament (sejmik) to petition the national parliament (Sejm) to absolve the Jews from paying this tax. King Jan Sobieski III took note of this request in his directive of 27 July 1694 when he declared, “The Jews of Red Ruthenia have suffered more than the rest of the Jews from the movement of Polish soldiers through their area plus the incursions of the enemy.”

Nevertheless, the Jews were required to contribute their part in paying for the expenses of the war, as provided by the laws of the sejmik of 3 September 1633. This money was used to pay for the salaries of soldiers. Every person without exception had to pay one zloty. In times of general conscription, a tax on lead and gun powder was levied on tenants and tavern owners of the towns and surrounding villages, while the inhabitants had to appear before the army to be drafted in time of attack. And one may very well imagine that in case of invasion, Jews were not exempt from joining the general community in fighting off the enemy; this would include Rohatyn. The economic situation became so bad that people became wild and did what goyim (gentiles) do to Jews whenever they are under pressure. Jewish debtors found themselves pulled off the streets and tied up by their creditors without recourse to the courts. This was too much even for the sejmik, and on 11 December 1675 the sejmik at Sadowa Wisznia ordered their representatives to the Sejm to complain about this anarchy rampant at that time and to do something to eliminate such behavior.^[34]

There was a similar occurrence of this nature that took place in the 1620s, when a nobleman, a Skopowski from Rohatyn, grabbed one Yaakov and his wife from Rohatyn and threw them into prison. No reason for this was given, and this aroused the ire of the town, which issued an official complaint against this so-called nobleman as part of its role as the defender of its citizens, even if they were Jews.^[34a]

On the other hand, by 1639 the sejmik began to clamp down on Jewish sources of income. It wanted to limit competition with the other inhabitants in business and trade and in public leasing.^[35] The sejmik further requested of the Sejm, on 6 November 1713, that it forbid Jewish communities from levying taxes on Jewish tenants in the villages on their own initiative without the assent of the voivode of the area. The sejmik claimed that these kehilah taxes, which went for Jewish community use, were emptying the pockets of the tenants to the point where they were unable to meet their obligations to the owners of the estates.^[36]

In addition to the rental of properties, the Jews of Rohatyn engaged in brewing liquor, maintaining taverns, selling beer and wine, peddling, and keeping small shops – which brought in the greater part of their income. At the end of the 17th century and the beginning of the 18th century, we find Jews primarily engaged in the production of liquor – the brewing of beer and the sale of whiskey, mead, and wine – areas that were open to them in keeping with the rulings of 1633. Jews leased the brewery in the suburb of Babince.

As wholesalers they engaged, to a large measure, in the sale of agricultural products and cattle. As craftsmen they were engaged in a wide variety of occupations – as bakers, tailors, butchers, brewers, and hatters.^[37]

Relations between Jewish and non-Jewish workers were correct until around 1663, when the shoemakers' guild complained that Jewish shopkeepers were selling shoes of sheepskin and yellow and red boots in their stores and stalls without notifying them. They felt that this was unfair competition, and therefore, Jews who did so should be required to make a payment of a liter of beeswax for each violation, on pain of confiscation of their goods by the shoemakers' guild. Those who continued to sell black boots should be required to pay the guild ten grzywne on pain of confiscation by the guild.^[38]

This was in keeping with the privilege granted to the non-Jewish shoemakers in 1589 and 1633, whereby they could confiscate substandard goods. It also accorded them the right to have first choice in buying leather, effectively enabling them to stifle competition, since the best goods would come from them. However, some Jews continued to ignore these regulations and bought as good a quality of leather as they could obtain as early as they could get it, privilege or no privilege. This aroused the shoemakers' guild to investigate the matter between 1661 and 1664 and resulted in a report that concluded that Jews were indeed buying up first quality leather ahead of the members of the guild, in violation of prescribed privileges. The guild therefore proclaimed that Jews should not be allowed to continue this practice of engaging in the purchase of leather ahead of their non-Jewish competitors. If they were caught in violating this ruling, the shoemakers' guild had every right to confiscate their merchandise, since it was manufactured illegally, and the guilds were to have first choice in purchases of leather.^[38a]

From the instructions of the sejmik of Halicz to its parliamentary delegates in its session of 1712–14, we learn that, based on the list of Jews who paid the chimney tax (podymne), Jews were at that time engaged in the sale of wine, in the brewing and sale of beer, in keeping inns, taverns, stalls and stores, as well as being owners of houses in the town square (domy rynkowe) and of taverns in the surrounding villages.^[38b]

The economic condition of the Jews of Rohatyn, in particular, as part of the total picture of what was going on in Red Ruthenia, in general, continued to degenerate during the 18th century. Their tax load, normally heavy before the invasions, became progressively unmanageable following them. While the sejmik agreed that there was reason for this condition and indeed the Jews were under great strain economically, they nevertheless, on 9 December 1710, demanded a levy from the Jews of Halicz of 30,000 zlotys per year. However, they agreed to release the towns of Rohatyn, Bursztyn, and Tluste from this obligation for “certain reasons.”^[39]

As noted above, the legislators in the district of Halicz – which included Rohatyn – sought especially hard to impose prohibitions and limitations on Jewish commerce, particularly against lessees of government and church-owned real estate. This was backed by the representatives to the sejmik of Halicz, who demanded punishment of those Jews who still held property, on the grounds that they opposed Christianity and therefore had no right to hold Christian property. Those who continued to do so were to be punished.^[40] The result was a demand by the sejmik of Halicz, on 20 July 1696, via their representatives, to pass a law in the Sejm of Warsaw to this effect during the time of the interregnum.

This approach dominated the economic policy of the Halicz nobility and was based on the proposition that Jews were “untrustworthy people” (gens perfida), whose only interest was the filling of their own pockets at the expense of the welfare of the republic. ^[41] In 1718 the nobles of the Halicz sejmik instructed their representatives to the Sejm in Warsaw to demand an end to the collection of taxes by Jews, Armenians, and the like, of customs, national levies, and rental of properties belonging to the nobility. A violation of this should result in the expropriation of the said property. ^[41a]Even worse was the demand to forbid Jews from exporting salt, horses, oxen, and wine – a large source of income for the Jews of Rohatyn and environs. ^[41b] They also forbade Jews, by law, from keeping Christian servants.

In addition to attacking the Jewish economy, the goyim of Halicz directed their hatreds at the personal life of the Jewish people and tried to keep them from growing in number. Toward this purpose, the sejmik at the session of 17 September 1736 instructed their delegate to the national Sejm to ask the Sejm assembly in Warsaw to pass a law that would decrease the number of early marriages among Jews. This was to be done by requiring a payment to the government by anyone marrying at an early age of either a certain portion (sortem certum) of their possessions or of their dowry, on threat of a fine.^[41c] These economic tribulations were encouraged by the Catholic Church through their anti-Semitic exhortations in church, which fired everyone up against the Jews – as if they needed being fired up.

On 14 August 1752 a complaint was lodged by the sejmik of Halicz in the Sejm, that the Jews were greatly upsetting “the Christians and the merchants in their business, thus wrecking our cities and the royal cities. Therefore, they should be prevented from engaging in all forms of trade with the exception of the sale of textiles and liquor (kwaterka – quarter of a liter) and to embody this in law.”^[41d]

In view of this anti-Semitic approach, it is surprising to find the sejmik stressing the need to ease the full brunt of the pressure on the Jews of Rohatyn with regard to the national head tax – from time to time, although not for an extended period.^[42] Similarly, in 1725 the tax on liquor was lowered for Rohatyn because of its poor economic condition, attested to under oath by Jews and other people of the town.^[42a]

With regard to the head tax, the Jews of Rohatyn paid 715 zloty s and 12 groschen of the 33,857 zloty s levied on the total population of Red Ruthenia in 1717.^[43] This caused an uproar by the Jewish taxpayers, who presented a complaint about the criminally unfair division of the head tax on certain communities by some of the people who were in charge of apportioning the head tax. This caused the sejmik at Sadowa Wisznia to decide on 15 March 1717 that the Jews of the towns and villages should gather together in one place and, in keeping with the numbers there, divide the total sum of the tax among those assembled.^[44] Then there would be no discrimination against anyone and no reason to complain.

However, the head tax continued to plague the area, and a complaint was again lodged with the marszalek of the regional sejmik in 1734. It was recorded in the town ledgers to the effect that the tax load was unjust and beyond the ability of the inhabitants to pay, since it did not take into consideration the economic condition of the towns and villages, in general, and that of the individual tax payer, in particular. Taking this complaint into consideration, the sejmik ordered the representatives of the Jews to assemble 28 April 1734 in Tarnopol in the presence of the secretary general of the Va'ad Arba Aratzos (Council of Four Lands) and the trustee of the Jewish community, Mordechai (Marek) Rabinowitz. They were entrusted to apportion the head tax equally among the Jews of the towns and villages, without doing injustice to the communities from the point of view of the number of towns and villages, taking into consideration their economic condition. The resulting figures were to be recorded by the secretary general of the Jews and entered into the Halicz and Trembowla ledgers.^[45] The result was that in 1734 the Jews of Red Ruthenia were required to pay a head tax of 55,590 zlotys.

In 1750 Reb Yitzchak Yissachar Berish Babad of Brody, the son of Reb Moshe Ze'ev, was appointed “Trustee of the House of Israel” for the Council of Four Lands in place of Isser of Zolkiew, as well as acting parnas (leader) for the area kahal. These appointments caused an uproar among the members of the Jewish district council to such an extent that a number of the communities excommunicated him and accused him of misusing public funds for his own purposes. They also complained about the way in which the head tax was apportioned. In 1756 Rohatyn lodged a similar complaint against
him.^[45a]

In the 1760s the relationship of the sejmik of Halicz with the Jews deteriorated even further. In 1764 it instructed its delegates to the national Sejm, during the interregnum and during the session of the coronation, to demand that Jews be forbidden to hold and lease private, national, church, and royal properties; to act as tax collectors, officials, or clerks in tax offices; to sell wine, oxen, and horses; or to sell merchandise from one estate to another; and that the nobility be forbidden to place Jews under their protection.^[46]

The depredations of Chmielnicki and his hordes as well as the others who ravaged Galicia left their mark not only on the Jewish economy but also on its religious views, in two opposing directions. There were those who wanted a Messiah immediately and tried to bring him to redeem them, and those who were willing to play up to the temporal powers that existed at that time in order to improve their lives, even if it meant leaving their religion to accomplish this. The traditional procedures for Jews trying to bring the Messiah has been to pray, study the Torah, and do good deeds. Later, two new elements were added – Cabala mysticism and the Land of Israel, the Holy Land of the Jews. These last two sources were stressed by Rabbi Yehuda Hachasid, an esteemed Cabalist, who succeeded in convincing over 1,000 Jews to try to come to Eretz Yisrael (Land of Israel). Earlier, around the time of Tach VeTat (the terrible years of 1648–49), the opposite also took place. The charlatan Sabbatai Zvi claimed to use Cabala but was unable to and was later succeeded by Jacob Frank, using the relatively same ploys but with even greater ignorance than his predecessor. Both attracted far too many people on false pretenses of messianic promises.

When Rabbi Yehuda Hachasid left, the drive toward mysticism weakened for lack of an outstanding leader. There were some Cabalists here and there in the Carpathian Mountains who attracted followers, but this was sporadic. On the other hand, at this time, there were Jews who approached the Catholic Church to a lesser or a greater extent, some becoming Catholics officially. This could especially be found among lessees of land. The exact number of these apostates is not known. What is known is that King Jan Sobieski, on the recommendation of the nobility, encouraged these practices by granting them properties and even titles of nobility.

This aroused the jealousy of the sejmik of Halicz, and in its session of 27 July 1696 at Sadowa Wisznia, it accused the Jews of deceiving the country and pocketing a good deal of the money that they received, rather than passing it on to the national treasury. Prominent among those accused were the tax collectors Abers and Barnet from the area of Sambor.^[47] These accusations by the sejmik were accepted as valid, and their properties were transferred to Daglan Nowiorski of Czestochowa.

As a result of this decision, the nobility of Red Ruthenia cast doubt on the veracity of the Jewish apostates, while the Jews utilized these events in their war against the Sabbatians and the Frankists.

That brings us to the coming of Jacob Frank to Rohatyn. The movement of Sabbatai Zvi spread in Poland, especially in Podolia, Wolhynia, and the parts of Red Ruthenia that bordered on Podolia. Spearheaded by the missionaries of Sabbatai Zvi, it succeeded in gaining adherents in the towns of Malopolska (southeastern Poland) and Red Ruthenia, including Rohatyn. What they officially presented to their audiences was mysticism perverted to suit their purpose. The same was true in the towns of Zolkiew, Podhajce, Busk, Gliniany, Horodenka, Zbaraz, Zloczow, Tysmienica, and Nadworna.^[Tr1]

Among the first residents in Rohatyn to join the Sabbatian movement was the family of Elisha Schorr, who moved quickly into the foremost ranks of the movement due to his large family and effectiveness. Elisha Schorr and his sons were joined by Yehuda Leib, the son of Nota Krysa. Even after Sabbatai Zvi died, there remained a large residue in Red Ruthenia that still believed in the Sabbatian claims. They tried to continue to absorb new members by preaching quietly to individuals, so that the rabbinate would not officially be aware of it.

But Schorr was not the only one by any means engaged in this belief in Sabbatai Zvi. There were others such as Moshe David in Podhajce,^[48] who claimed to be a Cabalist and miracle worker, and Krysa, whom we have already mentioned, in Nadworna. These three towns in Red Ruthenia, which border with Podolia, were the strongholds of Sabbatianism in Red Ruthenia. Not only did they have the largest number of adherents but also the greatest number of Sabbatian missionaries who spread the beliefs.

In Rohatyn Elisha Schorr and his sons, Shlomo, Natan (Lipman), and Leib were the principal activists. Elisha Schorr was known as a preacher in Rohatyn. He was a descendent of Rabbi Zalman Naftali Schorr,^[49] author of Tevuos Shor, which gave him a facade behind which he could hide, since the family was highly respected. Nobody would dream of what he was up to, and since he was accepted as a religious and learned person, people believed what he said. Those who knew better kept quiet.

Elisha Schorr was also in contact with outlying towns in Podolia through his son-in-law, Hirsch Reb Sabbatai, in Lanckorona, who was married to his daughter, Chaja. Chaja eventually was accepted as a prophetess in the Sabbatian camp and became known officially when the activities of the Sabbatians came to light, during the report given by witnesses to the rabbinate, of her sexual aberrations. These included having sexual relations with her brother-in-law, to whom she even bore children, her brothers, as well as with strangers. In this she did not fall far behind her sister-in-law, the wife of Shlomo, whose own sexual activities became well known in Rohatyn – all in the name of religion, the Sabbatian beliefs.

When Frank appeared on the scene, these Sabbatian centers in Red Ruthenia became Frankist strongholds. The elder Elisha Schorr was among the first to join up with Frank whom he considered to be the heir to Sabbatai Zvi. Frank had reached the Dniester River on 5 December 1755. From there, he crossed over to Moghilev, then to Korolowka, his birthplace, on to Jezierzany–Kopyczynce, and from there to Busk. From Busk, he went to the German settlement of Dawidow near Lwow and from there directly to Lwow. In Lwow he settled outside of the city wall in a Christian suburb, but apparently he did not enjoy his stay there and quickly left the area, returning to Dawidow. From there, he came to Rohatyn together with his entourage, at which point he was joined by the Schorr family.

Frank himself related in the year 1756, “I was already engaged in special activities in Brzezany, Rohatyn, and Dworow to such an extent that I turned all of their heads. Even among the Polish magnates, I succeeded to the point where they were all completely befuddled. So you see how it goes with them.”^[50] This gives us some concept of the kind of egomaniac he must have been.

After arriving in Rohatyn, Frank began his sexual orgies similar to those that he carried out in Lwow. Among the most active in these orgies was the wife of Shlomo Schorr who engaged in these with a will, all with the permission of her husband. She accepted not only the outside believers but also her father-in-law, Elisha Schorr, and her brother-in-law, Lipman Schorr, who up until then had been more circumspect in their behavior. Now they released all inhibitions “under the influence of Sabbatai Zvi, and even the rabbi from Zbish^[Ed5] fell in with them and confessed that he could not forgive himself for his love for the wife of Shlomo.”^[51]

The prayers of the Frankists were carried out according to the tradition of Sabbatai Zvi before Frank arrived and continued after his arrival with the addition of the name Jacob next to Sabbatai Zvi – Jacob Sabbatai – according to a witness presented to the Satanow rabbinical court. Rabbi Yaakov Emden in his work, Sefer Shimush, describes how far these people went in their perversion in which they created a divinity of Sabbatai Zvi. They termed him “the true creator, king of the universe, the true Messiah, after whom there is no other anywhere in the universe,” etc.^[51a] So far did they go in their perversions. It is not surprising therefore that they were capable of anything.

When Frank left Rohatyn with his followers, he went to Podhajce and then Kopyczynce, where they grew substantially in number. In general, he added new followers wherever he went. By the end of January 1756 he reached Lanckorona where he lived at the home of Hirsch (Zvi), the brother of Leib, son of Sabbatai, and his wife Chaja, the daughter of Elisha Schorr, who served as the center of attraction for the orgies.^[Tr2]

The Schorr family was very active in the events in Lanckorona. Once their activities were uncovered, they placed themselves together with Frank under the protection of Bishop Debowski, a rabid anti-Semite, who used them against the Jews. At their instigation, a debate (the first of two) was held between the Frankists and the rabbis in Lanckorona. The protagonists included Elisha Schorr and his son, Shlomo, who together with three more Frankists signed the text of “Accusations and Answers,” around which the debate centered. Elisha, Shlomo, and Krysa probably composed its contents. Frank certainly could not have done it. He was a complete ignoramus who knew how to twist words but used the Schorrs as his “rabbis.”^[52]

In other words, the Frankists completed the full gamut to the other side and dropped their religion. When Dembowski died suddenly in November 1757, the Frankists lost their protector, and they followed their leader, Frank, to Dziurdziow, which was at that time under Turkish rule. Frank had already become a Moslem, emulating his predecessor, which is not strange since he did not believe in any religion. Even in his early stages of activity he proclaimed that, as he put it, “I came to Poland solely to destroy all law and beliefs.”^[53]

The outstanding religious opponent of Frank in Rohatyn was Rabbi David Moshe Abraham, the author of Mirkevet Hamishne. His descendants were very proud of his war against the Sabbatians and the Frankists. How effective he was in this campaign varies with whom you read. According to the tradition in his family, he is described as “a man of the mighty arm who warred against the band of evildoers and raised the sword of G-d and smote them until they were annihilated.” “Were they not the unclean evildoers who adopted the path of that arch evildoer, Sabbatai Zvi, may his name be erased? And the head of this unclean sect was Elisha, may the teeth of the wicked rot, whose nest was in the town of Rohatyn and was known as Elisha of Rohatyn.”^[54]

The descendants of the family further relate that “when this cursed criminal Frank came to our town to lure Jews in the direction of those who had lost their way, the Gaon and author rose up against them, took a spear in his hand and risked his life in order to beat, attack, and annihilate him. This criminal fooled the ruler of the town and inveigled him into chasing the rabbi and the dayan out of town and he, the author of Mirkevet Hamishne, risked his life and did not spare himself from attacking him. And the Al-ty was by his side, and this criminal finally dropped his religion and then all the evil was turned on him, and he could no longer lead any Jew astray.”^[55] The fact is, however, that Rabbi Adam's campaign against Frank did not stop Schorr's family from continuing with the Frankists as part of their upper echelon.

Schorr and his family were the most prominent personalities of the Frankist movement during the debate of Lwow in 1759 and after. Frank himself said that when he lived in Dziurdziow, he was always told to go to Rohatyn, on the border of Poland, and he would immediately go there “in order to fulfill the command of his Lord with love.”^[56]

Shlomo Schorr and Krysa headed the Frankist faction of the debate. They also carried out the arbitration between the priest Pikulski and the Frankists and signed the petition presented to Primate Lubienski on 16 May 1759. This document was also passed on to the Polish king, Augustus III. It included a petition to have their group settled in the towns of Busk and Gliniany. Although the reasons for the debate began with the relationship between the Christians and the Frankists, after the death of Bishop Debowski, the protective umbrella that had been placed over them was removed.

The rabbis had attempted to open the eyes of the authorities to the fact that the Frankists were not really Christians. Therefore, they requested that one side of their face be completely shaven, resulting in their abuse by many people and causing some of them to run away to Turkey. Among those who ran away was the elder Elisha Schorr of Rohatyn. At that point, the decree was passed officially to persecute them and shave off their beards. But here, too, they received no respite, because the Jews informed the Turks of their perverted ways, and then the Turks oppressed them and took everything away from them. Elisha Schorr was mercilessly beaten and died there, ignominiously, at the end of 1757, “bereft of everything.”^[57]

When Frank saw the treatment of his group by the Turks, he decided that they had better leave Turkey. He told his followers to return to Poland, become apostates, and petition Bishop Lubienski of Lwow to accept them into the Catholic religion, because they wanted to “leave the religion of the Talmudists.” This is the background to the infamous debate about the Talmud in Lwow, and that is when Shlomo Schorr and Krysa went to Lwow to quietly arrange the (second) debate there, in retaliation against the Jews for their troubles.^[Tr3]

The debate caused troubles not only for the Jews of Halicz, among themselves because of the anarchy that it had introduced there, but also for Jews all over Poland, because it muddied the relationship of the Polish people with the Jews. This became obvious in the decision of the 16 March 1761 sejmik at Sadowa Wisznia, in which they petitioned the Sejm in Warsaw to take extraordinary measures against the Jews. This was based on the results of the debate of Lwow in 1759 which, they claimed, proved conclusively that the Jews do not follow the Torah of Moses and degrade Catholic religious beliefs; their sole purpose is to “undermine our homeland.”

To prevent this, they asked, via the delegates of the Halicz sejmik to the national Sejm, to pass a law forbidding the Jews of Poland and Lithuania the use of their Hebrew religious books and to command them to hand these said books over to the Polish authorities for destruction. In addition, it shall be forbidden to them the use of the Hebrew language in print, which shall be replaced by the Polish language or Latin. To this purpose, it is necessary to close all Jewish printing presses and schools. Furthermore, their prayers shall only be offered in Polish or in Latin and only in front of two priests, and they that resist these commandments should be severely punished.^[57a] This was the proposal. How much of this was actually officially accepted by the Sejm of Warsaw is not known.

The leading troublemakers who helped to bring about these problems were Frank and his associates, foremost of whom was the Schorr family. Frank knew how to utilize their capabilities for his nefarious purposes and sent them ahead of him as his messengers to spread the Frankist propaganda. However, in the end, Shlomo Schorr, one of Frank's biggest promoters, brought serious trouble upon Frank and his group, including himself, the result of which was that they were hauled up before the ecclesiastical courts of Warsaw to account for their beliefs.

This came about as follows. Schorr and five of the Frankists who had become apostates were staying in Lwow. The priest Gaudenty Pikulski in Lwow, Schorr's teacher of the Christian religion, was treated to wonder stories about Frank. In the process, Schorr told Pikulski that not only was Frank a miracle worker, but he believed him to be the reincarnation of Jesus. As proof of this he pointed to the fact that Frank had marks on his forehead that were related to the tortures of Jesus.

The Church had been suspicious of the Frankists in view of their behavior, and they decided to investigate what lay behind their conversion, in view of the fact that what they claimed officially and what they really believed did not correlate. Pikulski^[Tr4] contacted the Papal Nuncio Serra in Warsaw. Frank was arrested in Warsaw on January 1760. He was interrogated, and then the true beliefs of the Frankists came out in the open. He was therefore tried before an ecclesiastical court that sentenced him and some of his followers to imprisonment in the fortress of Czestochowa. Interestingly, Frank could not talk his way out of this and had to wait until the Russians freed him thirteen years later, perhaps because too many of his followers had made too many incriminating statements during their interrogation. Among those in prison with Frank was Jan Wolowski (Schorr). ^[Ed6] Shlomo Schorr apparently succeeded in being released before Frank.

From 12 September 1759 to 15 November 1760, which was after the debate of Lwow, forty-eight Frankists from Rohatyn apostatized and became Christians, as did forty-seven in Lwow and one in Warsaw. Among the first to convert from Rohatyn was Eliyahu, age seventy-three, the son of Leib and Feige, also Ze'ev Wolf, the son of Shlomo, who took the name of Andrzej. The family of Schorr who became apostates included Shlomo, his wife and children (Joseph, Jan, Feliks, Michal, Ludwik, Henryk, and Tomasz), their wives and children, and also their relative, Jan Kanti Rafal Wolowski of Satanow. Shlomo Schorr, henceforth Franciszek Wolowski, and his brothers, Natan and Michal Nota, became the “apostles” of Frank and traveled to St. Petersburg on his behalf.

In the year 1768 a group of women from Rohatyn joined the group of Franciszek and Pawel Wolowski. In that year, the Wolowskis sent letters to the Jews of Moravia, Bohemia, and Podolia with a call to accept “the religion of Edom, because only that can save the Jews.” We find the Wolowski children as activists and messengers as well as the “sages” among the group. They composed the leaflets and signed the appeals to the Jewish communities. Later, after Frank's release, when he had settled in Brunn (Bruno), we find a deputation that included Shlomo-Franciszek and Jan and Michal Wolowski being sent to Warsaw by Frank. In December Frank sent Jan and Ludwik Wolowski with two others to Constantinople.^[58] Michael Wolowski stayed with Frank in Vienna. In Offenbach, Lukasz Franciszek Wolowski approached Chava, the daughter of Frank, with intentions of matrimony, and she turned him down. Jan, Michal, and Joseph Wolowski raised money in Warsaw and in Turkey on behalf of Frank.

“A letter in red ink written by the sons of Elisha Schorr of Rohatyn, Franciszek Wolowski (Shlomo), Michal Wolowski (Natan Nota), and Jedrzej Debowski (Yeruham, the son of Hanania Litman from Czernikosnice) to Beit Israel (the House of Israel) dispersed among the Saxon states.” The same letter that was sent to the Jews of Tatria was printed in 1914 by Dr. M. Wishnitzer in the publications of the Academy of Scientific Studies under the name, “A Letter from the Frankists, Year 1800.” In 1921 the letter to the Jews of Hungary was published by Dr. A. Brauer, “Hashiloach”, Jerusalem, Volume 22:38, Pamphlet 5-6.

1. Jan Kanti (1803–64)^[59] became a well-known lawyer and later secretary of state of Poland and the author of the civil code of Poland. In 1839 he was made a nobleman and received a medal from Czar Nicholas I. In 1861 he became the head of the Department of Justice and a professor and deacon of the Faculty of Law at Warsaw University. He was the author of professional books on studies in law and founded the scientific quarterly Biblioteka Warszawska.
2. Teodor became an officer in the Polish army and, in 1839, received the same honors as his brother.
3. The same was true of the third brother, Feliks Franciszek.^[60]

Ludwik (1810–76) was a well-known economist. In the Polish-Russian war of 1831 he was an artillery officer and then became secretary of the Polish national delegation in Paris. After the Polish revolt, he remained in Paris. From 1834 on, he published a monthly magazine dealing with issues in law together with his brother-in-law, Leo Faucher (who was also of Jewish descent). From 1839 on, he served as a professor. Between 1848 and 1875 he also played an active part in political life in France. Casimir excelled as an officer in several battles in the War of 1831.

The Wolowski family was one of the most diverse of all of the Frankists, with many branches. In the beginning of the 19th century they included tens of male members who were heads of families. They were also the most able of the members of the cult. Many were outstanding in international relations, economics, and Polish literature.^[62]In the beginning they followed the spirit and teachings of Jacob Frank, but from around 1830 they began to break away and ceased marrying only Frankists of Jewish descent, intermarrying instead with Polish nobility. The Wolowskis were among the first families to make a determined effort to break away from the Frankist tradition and to intermarry with Catholic families, in order to forget that they were descendants of Elisha Schorr of Rohatyn, the “prophet” of Jacob Frank. In Rohatyn itself, once the Frankists converted to Christianity in 1759, the Sabbatians and Frankists dropped out from the Rohatyn scene.

The following were the rabbis of Rohatyn during the period of Polish independence that are known to us:

At the beginning of the 18th century the rabbi in Rohatyn was Rabbi Avraham Leibers, the son of Reb Zalman Leibers, the parnas (leader) of the Lwow Jewish community, a great-grandson of Rabbi Yosef ben Mordechai Ginzburg, rabbi of Ostrog and author of Leket Yosef (Prague, 1789).^[62a] In the middle of the 18th century the rabbi was Rabbi David Moshe Avraham, known by the shortened version of his name, Rabbi Adam.^[63] He is famous not only as a great scholar but also as a brave warrior against the Frankism that had infested Rohatyn, abetted by the Schorr family. Rabbi Adam is described as one who displayed bravery and spiritual drive “and battled with a mighty arm against the band of evil-doers” headed by Elisha Schorr.^[Ed7]

This did not deter the Frankists from presenting false reports about the rabbi to the authorities of the area and demanding his expulsion from the town of Rohatyn. His descendants and the members of the family of the rabbi of Lwow, Rabbi Yosef Nathanson (Shaul), have recorded the difficulties that Rabbi Adam had to overcome in his battle with the Frankist followers.

As a rabbi, Adam excelled as one who possessed a deep knowledge and sense of fairness. In the year 1745 he is recorded as having given his endorsement of Milei D'Avot (Words of the Fathers) printed in Lwow in the year 1746.^[64] He exchanged correspondence with the great rabbis of his day, and his responsa (comments) were printed in their works. He wrote Mirkevet Hamishne,^[65] which received a letter of endorsement by the rabbi of Lwow, Rabbi Chaim HaCohen Rappaport, and by Rabbi Yitzchak Landau, first rabbi of Zolkiew and later rabbi of Cracow.

The manuscript never reached the printing press during his lifetime and lay hidden for one hundred and fifty years with his family. It came to light when his granddaughter, Teme, the wife of Yechezkiel Goldschlag, visited the Belzer Rebbe, who ordered it to be printed when he learned that she was the granddaughter of Rabbi Moshe David Avraham. He told her that she and the other grandchildren had a duty to print their grandfather's work.

Accordingly, headed by Reb Moshe Nagelberg, the grandchildren carried out the directive of the Belzer Rebbe and printed the book. In addition to Reb Moshe Nagelberg, his sons, Yudel and Itche Nagelberg, his son-in-law, Ephraim Struhl, and Yechezkiel Goldschlag and his wife, Teme, took part in this project. The work appeared in print in Lwow in the year 1895, introduced by the letters of endorsement of Rabbi Yosef Shaul Nathanson, author of Shaul Ve'Meshiv, rabbi of Lwow, and Rabbi Ze'ev (Wolf) Salat, who kept the manuscript of Mirkevet Hamishne in his possession.^[66] According to Rabbi Margulies, in his article cited previously, Rabbi Adam also wrote Tiferet Adam and various other religious works that remained in manuscript form. The exact years of his birth and death are not recorded.^[67]

Rabbi Adam passed away in Rohatyn and left an extensive family that lived in Rohatyn as well. He was followed by Rabbi Avraham Shlomo, the uncle of Rabbi Yosef Shaul Nathanson.^[68] We do not know how long he served as rabbi, but we know that he was the rabbi in 1765, because he signed the census document of the Jewish community of Rohatyn in the name of the kehilah at that time.

Rabbi Adam was followed by Rabbi Yitzchak ben Aharon (Icko Aronowicz), who gave his approbation in 1766 to the Ohel Moed – comments on the portion of the Talmud dealing with holidays written by Rabbi Yosef Yaski, the rabbi of Ulanow, and printed in the year 1767 in Frankfurt-an der-Oder.^[68a]

As we know, the Jews of Podkamien and Stratyn were considered as branches of the Jewish community of Rohatyn. Therefore, they were part of the general census of Rohatyn on 14 February 1765 that included the surrounding villages and hamlets.

The national committee enumerated in the town of Rohatyn 742 adults and 55 children under the age of one. In the two towns of Podkamien and Stratyn, there were 200 adults and children and 25 infants under age one. In the forty hamlets attached to the Rohatyn community, there were 295 adults and children and 30 infants under the age of one, making a total of 1,237 adults and children and 110 infants under the age of one.^[69] In total, there were 797 people in Rohatyn together with all the children, and when we add the 550 people in the hamlets attached to Rohatyn, we have a total population of 1,347 people. The following are the villages where Jews lived:

Town	Adults & children	Infants under 1	Town	Adults & children	Infants under 1
Podgrodzie	7	1	Lipica Dolna	5	1
Ruda	5	1	Âwistelniki	10	--
Kleszczowna	8	1	Szumlany	19	1
Firlejow	6	--	Slawentyn	29	3
Korzelica	7	--	Sarnki	7	1
Hulkow	5	--	Zolczow	12	--
Janczyn	8	1	Danilcze	4	1
Potok	5	--	Czesniki	13	2
Czercze	11	1	Lopuszna	5	--
Soloniec	5	1	Dusanow	5	1
Wierzbolowce	3	--	Kutce	4	1
Putiatynce	6	1	Zalipie	2	1
Luczynce	9	2	Psary	2	--
Babuchow	5	--	Doliniany	4	--
Koniuszki	9	--	Dehowa	4	--
Ujazd	2	1	Zalanow	7	--
Obelnica	5	--	Dziczki*	7	1
Kunaszow	4	--	Bienkowce*	11
Zelibory	3	1	Fraga	4	1
Lipica Gorna	3	1	Dubryniow**	22	4

Occupations	Jazlowice Population 968 Employed	Zaleszczyki Population 859 Employed
Silk Merchants	2	1
Storekeepers	10	25
Town Bartenders	27	25
Barber-Surgeon	1	--
Goldsmiths	2	--
Coppersmith	1	--
Tailors	11	17
Bakers	3	3
Butchers	2	6
Tavern Lessees	26	--
Other Lessees	7	7
Middlemen	2	--
Servants	19	25
Bathkeepers	--	2
Aged or Sick on Pension[70]	14	2
Unemployed	46	36

During the last years of Polish independence, starting in 1763, Rohatyn was forced to endure the invasions and passages of foreign soldiers, especially those from Russia and later from the invading troops of the Confederation. This ended only when Poland ceded all of the Halicz district to Austria after the first division of Poland in 1773.

Rohatyn was included in the district of Zloczow, which was headed by Starosta Tannhauser. Zloczow was raised to the rank of district capital; this correlated with the beginning of the development of the district. In contrast to the typical Austrian bureaucrats common in Galicia who stressed pan-Germanism, Tannhauser was a Polish sympathizer and was more interested in stressing the development of a stable economy. He saw to it that taxes were eased and looked for ways to improve the socioeconomic condition of the population. In the first years of the Austrian conquest the conditions of the Jews of Rohatyn were difficult because of the new conditions introduced by the Austrian government that differed from those that had existed under Poland. During the first four years, the organization of the Jewish kehilah remained substantially the same as it had been under Poland. However, after the proclamation of the ordinances concerning Jews (Judenordnung) of the Empress Maria Theresa on 16 July 1776, the ordinances of Joseph II of May 1785, and the tolerance ordinances of 7 May 1789, a new permanent organization of Jewish affairs was established in Galicia that brought about decisive changes in the community life of the Jews.

The Jewish community (kehilah) was organized according to the ordinances mentioned. At the head of the committee in Rohatyn, as in all other medium size and small communities, there was a community council (va'ad kahal), composed of chosen heads with very limited powers, that was required to obey and to submit to all the demands of the district authority (Kreisamt). The kehilah was responsible for collecting all of the taxes that were levied on the Jews, for providing soldiers to the army, etc.

According to the Jewish ordinances of the year 1776, the community council was composed of six members. According to the rulings of Joseph II, the council was reduced from six members to three, except for Lwow and Brody, which had seven members. The right to vote “actively” was given to heads of families who paid a Sabbath candle tax of seven or more candles during a full year before elections, and the right of “passive” voting applied to heads of families who lived in Rohatyn, had a good name, knew how to read and write German, and paid a Sabbath candle tax of ten Sabbath candles during a full year before elections.

In addition to heads of the community, heads of the burial society (chevra kaddisha), beadles, managers of the hospital, and auditors were elected. The officials of the community included a secretary (scribe), a caretaker, cantors, beadles, ritual slaughterers (shochetim), and gravediggers. The direction of religious matters was placed in the hands of a rabbi who was elected for three years by the electors of the community. This state of affairs lasted until the period between 25 August 1783 and 23 May 1784 at which time the central government in Vienna no longer recognized the jurisdiction of the Jewish communities and the rabbinical courts. After the regulations of 1785 the office of community rabbi (Rav Hakahal) was abolished and only the appointment of teachers of religion (Religionsweiser) and cantors was permitted. Every district was given its own district rabbi (Kreisrabbiner), and in Rohatyn, there was officially only a teacher of religion who held all jurisdictional powers.

According to the regulations of 7 May 1789 the leaders of the Jewish communities received their salaries from community funds deducted from taxes. This resulted in a rush for these positions, as they were a sure source of constant income. The desire to receive the honor of being head of a Jewish community (parnas) was understandably strong right from the beginning of the establishment of Jewish autonomy in Poland, as this was the most prestigious office among the Jews there.

Even in Rohatyn a great deal of activity took place during the elections of the Jewish kehilah. These were accompanied by conflict, complaints, and secret accusations against candidates who were accused of levying taxes illegally. It was claimed that they placed the main burden of taxation on the weakest class of the population while sparing themselves and their families.^[70a] This resulted in not a few explosive reactions as well as false accusations to the authorities, based on fictitious concoctions of their imagination. Every Jew required to pay taxes had a tax ledger (Steuerbücher) that served as his passport of membership in the community. If his ledger was taken from him because of any differences with the kahal (council) or any other violation, his name was erased from the official roster of the members of the kehilah. More than once these so called violations were fabricated by the heads of the kehilah in order to ostracize someone whom they did not want or like for any reason.

Such things were recurrent in Rohatyn during the years 1781–94 and during the 1820s,^[71] as we can see from the records in the archives.

The salary paid to the rabbi of Rohatyn was eighty-six florin per year plus the free use of the house in which he lived during his tenure.^[72] Rohatyn under Poland was a possession of the crown, in contrast to the other towns of eastern Red Ruthenia that had established Jewish communities. This facilitated the sale of its property by the Austrian government. Indeed, a short time after the Austrian conquest, it began to sell Polish royal property, which included towns, and by 1783, it had sold 5,000,000 florin worth of property. In this way, the ruling government tried to promote the development of towns. The residents saw this action as a sure means for the removal of Jews, or at least a reduction of their numbers. However, after investigating this project, the Austrian government concluded that such a move would accomplish just the reverse of what it was intended for and wreck the towns, since other than Jews, there was no established sound economic factor that could maintain the economy; Jews were the essential economic pipeline of the towns.

The Austrian government also recognized that there was an element of cruelty in their suggestion and stated, “It would appear that this contains within it an element of cruelty even if the circumstances would seem to make it necessary, unless they are willing to forego the improvement of the towns.”^[73]

At the beginning of the conquest, Rohatyn was included as part of the district of Zloczow and administered by the chief official Tannhauser, a man who was interested in the welfare of the inhabitants. He was an able administrator who put in effort to ensure that all taxes were paid on time, and indeed, in his district, this was the case. He recognized the contributions of the Jews to the economy and opposed their being driven out, either from his district or from the properties that they were renting, because such an act would cause an economic vacuum. Later in the '80s, Rohatyn was transferred to the district of Brzezany.

In 1774 the Austrian government raised the head tax in Poland from thirty kreuzer to one gulden. This tax was made part of the Jewish Ordinances of 1776, under the name of a tolerance tax (Toleranzsteuer), rather than a head tax, in the sum of four gulden per family. In addition to this, it levied an income tax in the sum of four gulden per Jewish family and a marriage fee, levied according to the wealth of the family. Taxes were first apportioned by the Austrians according to communities. This apportionment of taxes was divided among the communities, which in turn divided it among their members. Then, in the year 1784 Joseph II of Austria abolished the income and property taxes and replaced them with the following:

1. A national real estate tax (Landeshaushaltsbeitrag) in the sum of one gulden per family. This tax was strictly enforced by officials especially chosen for this purpose by the government.
2. The existing marriage fee was replaced by a marriage tax that was divided into three categories:
1. Craftsmen and salaried workers, who paid three ducats upon the birth of the first son, six ducats on the birth of a second son and twelve ducats on the birth of a third son if their annual income did not exceed 100 gulden. If their income was estimated at over one hundred gulden per year, they paid twice as much.
2. Public employees, who paid twelve ducats after the birth of the first son and twenty-four ducats after the birth of the second son.
3. Those who engaged in commerce and related occupations and those who earned as much as four hundred gulden paid twenty, forty, and eighty ducats. Jews engaged in agriculture were completely freed from paying this tax.

3. A tax was imposed on kosher meat the amount of which varied with the type of meat being sold.
4. 1789 Jews engaging in agriculture were exempt from paying the tolerance tax. Even before Joseph II's regulations of 1789, the following taxes were to be found on the books:

   Opening a new synagogue required one payment.
   Opening a new Jewish cemetery required a payment of two hundred gulden upon its opening and one hundred gulden every year thereafter.
   A census fee of fifty gulden per year.

In 1797 the real estate tax was abolished and replaced by the Sabbath candle tax and a supplementary tax (Ergänzungssteuer). When not enough taxes were realized from the property tax and kosher meat tax, the difference was covered via a supplementary tax.

A special tax (Extrasteuer) was levied on Jews in place of the income tax that was collected from Christians.

Every Jew and Jewess was required to pay the candle tax with the exception of

1. those whose sole income was derived from agriculture
2. soldiers and their wives
3. widows of soldiers
4. unmarried children living with their parents, guardians, relatives, or friends and
5. helpers in a store or business, apprentices, house cleaners and helpers, bachelors, and widowers.

With the enactment of the kosher meat tax, which was tied up with exorbitant profits, strife broke out in all of the communities. Collection of these taxes was the official monopolistic prerogative of tax collectors who were granted powers to determine the size of the kosher meat tax at their discretion and to limit the right of slaughtering meat to certain butchers, resulting in the raising of the price of kosher meat. Since these butchers worked hand in hand with the tax collectors, the customer had no way of knowing what the price of meat would be at any given time. The butcher could always claim that the rise in price was due to the rise in taxes, which were subject to sudden change. This situation aroused the ire of the Jewish population, especially of the poorer families, who were being incited by the butchers who had been refused the right to sell kosher meat, thus wrecking their livelihood. This problem existed in all communities and engendered hatred and bitterness among the Jews of the community.

In addition to the relatively large amounts of money to be paid in taxes, there were also the methods employed in collecting the taxes that aroused the anger of the people in no small measure. Thus, when people fell behind in their payments, confiscation might be carried out by soldiers on horseback and police who seized private belongings and furniture without pity. Then too, there was the element of graft related to such matters. Most tax collectors were parnassim who received the full ire of the community, thus deflecting it from the government that had levied the exorbitant taxes.

According to figures arrived at by the commissioner of the district of Zloczow in the year 1806, each Jewish family paid the following for basic Jewish taxes alone:

Candle tax - six florin per year
Meat tax - up to fifteen florin per year
Tolerance tax - four florin per year
Special tax - five florin per year.
Adding up to a total of twenty-eight florin per year.^[74]

The town of Rohatyn had the help of a clerk, officially called the Jüdischer Amtsschreiber, a non-Jew working for the Jewish community (Judendirektion). This position was filled between 1 November 1779 and 1 May 1785 by Johann Silva, who received two hundred florin a year. Before this appointment he was a sergeant in the quartermaster corps of the infantry. When Jewish autonomy was eliminated in May 1785, he was retired without pension, because he was appointed investigator for the district of Brzezany. In addition, there was a clerk who worked on a daily basis.^[75]

In addition to the usual load of taxes that Jews of Galicia, including Rohatyn, bore, they were also required to clear up their old debts dating from the time of Jewish autonomy in Poland. These included the debts of the central agencies, such as the Council of Four Lands and the District Council, as well as the different Jewish communities.

This demand for the liquidation of the debts of Jewish organizations dated back to 1764 when they were still under Polish rule, at which time this task of settling the debts of the Jews was assigned to a committee of the treasury. On 22 April 1766, this liquidation committee provided, in a special report, that Jews must pay three gulden per capita in order to liquidate the debts of the Jewish councils. When they received no satisfactory reply to their request, they repeated this demand in an official notice on 21 March 1767. In it they pointed out that with the passage of time, the debt had increased, due to the addition of interest and fines accrued because of delinquency in payments.^[76] Special note was taken of the debts of the communities of Red Ruthenia that had not forwarded their payments. In the meantime, the first partition of Poland took place, and Rohatyn, as part of Red Ruthenia, was ceded to Austria with the debts being left unpaid. These unpaid debts included money owed to churches and monasteries and Jewish institutions, as well as private individuals.

After the partition of Poland, the victorious powers agreed that the outstanding debts of the areas belonging to them would be paid. In Galicia, the Austrian government appointed a special committee for the liquidation of debts (Liquidationskommission), which included the provincial advisor Ernst von Kartum, Joseph Baum von Appelshofen, advisor to the department of accounts, and Joseph Milbauer.

The committee was ordered to decide on the amount owed, by whom and to whom, to organize detailed lists of these names, and suggest procedures of payment by the Jewish organizations. Creditors were required to present detailed lists of the debts incurred prior to 12 June 1772 to the district offices, in four months, if they were in the country, and in six months, if they were out of the country. Creditors were promised that they could expect to receive the full payment of their loans any time after 1 August 1785 plus an additional interest of 5%.^[77]

In their meeting of 26 July 1786, the department of accounts presented the committee for the liquidation of debts with a full list of Jewish debts and debtors, including their relevant documents. These combined debts amounted to 602,285 florin. In order to ease payment, the government decided that the Jewish communities should transfer to the debt fund the korowka, i.e., the levy of one kreuzer that was added to the price of kosher meat.

From these lists, we learn that the Jewish community of Rohatyn owed the local church 125 gulden, the Dominican monastery 1,250 gulden, and Firlejow 300 florin, for a debt that dated back to March 1735, and a second debt of 75 florin to the same Firlejow, also dating from 1735.^[78]

In addition to these sums, Rohatyn had to take part in the payment of 34,654 Polish gulden to pay off the debts of the kehilot of Red Ruthenia to Yaakov Zelikowicz and Tzadok Meirowicz. After a lengthy and continuous arbitration between them and the directorate of the Jewish communities of Galicia (Judendirektion), via the mediation of the government, the two parties came to a compromise on 28 January 1781, whereby the debt would be lowered to 14,500 florin, the payment of which would be apportioned among the different communities.^[79] The portion to be paid by Rohatyn amounted to 63 f lorin and 10 kreuzer^[80] to be paid over a period of five years.^[81] In addition to the taxes and elimination of debt, Jews were required to participate in war loans during the period of 1794-99.

In 1784 conditions became worse when the government issued an edict that anyone derelict in his payments for a period of over three quarters of a year could be officially declared a Jewish pauper (Betteljude) and could be expelled at any time from his town or even Galicia as a whole.

This engendered fears and suspicions among Jews, since there could always be found Jews and non-Jews willing to falsely accuse other Jews of harboring paupers in their homes or of having quiet marriages without paying the marriage tax. To prevent these slanders, Jews had to pay hush money (Denunziationsgelder). In Rohatyn there circulated, as we learn from the pages of the archives, informers and even clerks who were engaged in informing in order to obtain this easy money. People were forced to pay this bribery in order to “keep the dogs from barking and wagging their tongues.”

The Jewish economic situation became so bad that in the year 1789, the office of the district of Brzezany ordered the expulsion of 1,050 families from the district including Rohatyn. The government in Vienna viewed this as overbearing and passed a directive on 9 March 1789 that expulsion for non-payment of taxes should be eliminated from the Jewish statutes, and this was brought up for discussion before the Austrian government.^[82]

In the year 1782 the Department of Occupational Status (Wydzial Stanowy) of Galicia suggested that the Jews be removed from all leasing of property. The central government in Vienna utilized this initiative of the department to order the removal of Jews from leased properties and from engaging in brewing.^[83] Indeed, in the district of Brzezany, many Jews in small villages were in fact removed from their properties. In addition to forbidding Jews from leasing taverns, in 1785, Jews were also forbidden to take part in the leasing and management of estates, fields that were not worked by Jews, mills, and houses in cities that were originally intended for German settlers. They could not collect fees for markets and stalls or district taxes, emblems of estates, money for the clergy, taxes on tobacco, export of salt, leasing of beer breweries, producing lumber for housing, or for surveying, wagons, or tolls. This order strongly affected the Jews of Rohatyn, since no small number of them was engaged directly or indirectly in these areas of the economy. It was emphasized that within three years, by the end of 1787, Jews must relinquish these properties to Christians.^[84]

In reaction, the Jewish community of Lwow joined other communities of Eastern Galicia in a combined attempt to influence the powers of Lwow and even Vienna to rescind these edicts, but to no avail. On their side, the Jewish communities attempted, between 1785 and 1793, to put into effect a joint policy that would protect their economic interests and limit as much as possible the areas of endeavor that were being forbidden or limited to them. These defense measures attracted the attention of the Christians who sought to prevent the Jews from putting them into effect, and to this purpose, employed agencies of the district and national government. The result was that in 1794 a court commission (Hofkommision) in Vienna recommended that an explicit prohibition be made against Jewish communities holding combined assemblies.^[85] There were differences at this time between Rohatyn and its outlying communities regarding the payment of taxes and the like.

The census of 1788 reveals very little about the condition of the Jews in the district of Brzezany, including the town of Rohatyn. We learn that there were in Brzezany at that time ten communities with a total of 2,757 Jewish families. This included 2,700 men, 2,685 women, 1,100 boys and 993 girls above the age of twelve, 2,137 young boys and 2,108 young girls below the age of twelve, 719 servants, 819 maids, 112 poor men, and 245 poor women, making a subtotal of 6,758 men and 6,845 women, in total, 13,603 people. Of the 2,757 families, the taxpayers on Level A numbered 278, Level B, 32, and Level C, 1,568, with 879 paupers.^[86]

In the 1791 census there were 2,514 families, which included 2,801 men, 2,490 women, 878 boys and 737 girls above the age of twelve, 944 boys and 1,905 girls below the age of twelve, 372 servants, 489 maids, 146 poor men, and 304 poor women, making a subtotal of 5,841 males and 5,925 females and a total of 11,766. During this year, of 2,514 tax paying families, there were 1,793 on Level A, 266 on Level B, forty-six on Level C, and 409 paupers.

In the four years following 1788, the number of Jews decreased from 13,603 to 11,766, i. e., a reduction of 1837, and the number of paupers dropped from 889 to 409. As to the economic composition, there is only one list from 1780, which shows that in Rohatyn there were 401 Jews engaged in business (Jüdische Handelsleute).^[87] The business composition did not indicate any change. Most of them were merchants, retailers, traders, and peddlers; a number were engaged in brewing beer and distilling liquor. Still others were craftsmen working as tailors, furriers, hat makers, butchers, and bakers.

Educational institutions, which had hitherto been under Jewish supervision, were, by the ruling of Maria Theresa, transferred completely to the supervision of the government, something that caused opposition and displeasure on the part of the Jews. The government, for its part, was interested in drawing Jewish children into public schools, which were open to them as of 1782. Since Jews did not wish to utilize these “rights,” the Jewish communities were legally required on 27 May 1785 to establish their own general public school system – also to no avail.

The Jews paid no attention to these rulings and angered the authorities, who severely castigated them. Placing upon the Jews the blame for the “backwardness” of their children, they demanded that children up to thirteen be enrolled in a secular school.^[88] Each Jewish community was required to establish a German-style elementary school to correct the “Jewish approach” to learning. In order to achieve these goals, the government stipulated that no Jew would be permitted to get married without written proof that he had learned German at school or at home.

Herz Homburg, (1749–1841), a student of Moses Mendelssohn, was appointed in 1806 as head of this Jewish educational system in Galicia. In 1788 forty-eight Jewish schools were established in Galicia, including one in Rohatyn – a school for youths taught by Shlomo Kornfeld at a yearly salary of two hundred florin.^[89]This school was maintained until the closing of the whole system of Jewish schools in 1806. The system failed because of the negative attitude of the Jews who, despite wheedling, punishments, and fines, refused to send their children to the (state) schools because of their fear that attendance there would lead them to apostasy.

Another goal of Joseph II to improve Jewish life in Galicia was to move Jews into agriculture. By contrast, this did not meet with much opposition, because in 1785 the new laws had caused thousands of Jewish families to lose their source of income. To those willing to enter the field of agriculture, the government promised to lower the tolerance tax by 50%. In 1785 Joseph II ordered the establishment of a Jewish agricultural community in Galicia. In the spring of 1786 the first Jewish colony, called Dabrowka, was founded near Nowy Sacz, and in it there were close to twenty families.^[90]

After that, another colony was founded near Bolechow that was named “Neu Babylon” (Babilon Nowy). In Brzezany this affected 69 families, 12 of whom came from Rohatyn. By 1793 this allotment was completely filled by the communities as follows: Brzezany, 10 families; Kozowa, 5 families; Podhajce, 9 families; Bursztyn, 7 families; Chodorow, 3 families; Rozdol, 5 families; Strzeliska, 4 families; Bobrka, 8 families; Przemyslany, 6 families, and Rohatyn, 12 families. These families, settled by 1803 on 49 parcels of land, were composed of 98 men, 83 women, and, below the age of eighteen, 91 boys and 80 girls. The settlers received 66 houses, 66 barns and silos, 124 horses, 88 oxen, 147 cows, and 66 pieces of agricultural equipment.

The 12 families from Rohatyn were settled on six parcels of land and included 14 men, 16 women, and, below the age of eighteen, 16 boys and 12 girls. They were supplied with 12 houses, 12 pieces of agricultural equipment, 12 barns and silos, 24 horses, 8 oxen, and 22 cows.^[91] In the year 1822 an agricultural census in the district of Brzezany revealed that out of the 69 families that had entered farming, 40 of them had actually become farmers – 24, at the expense of the community and 16, at their own expense.

The heavy tax load upon the Jews of Rohatyn caused them great suffering. Especially oppressive was the candle tax, which afflicted every family. The tax collectors generated ill will, resulting in altercations between themselves and the people. In 1798 Rohatyn, together with other communities in the district of Brzezany, presented complaints about the inhumanity of the candle tax collectors.^[92]The government rejected these complaints and even punished the writer, who happened to be the Christian clerk of the district by the name of Heinrich Hepp. Thus the 18th century ended with the Jews of Rohatyn at an economic low without any prospect for improvement.

In the beginning of the 19th century taxes rose, accompanied by oppression from the collectors. They made unrealistic assessments and applied pressure to pay quickly and remove earlier debts without any consideration of the severe economic condition that the Jews were enduring. Then, too, because of the many wars in the first decade of the 19th century, Jews had to pay heavy war loans. Together with other communities, Rohatyn presented its objections, which reached Kaiser Franz I. These appeals were ignored; they received no answer, and the tax collectors were given a free hand. The important thing was to bring in money, and the government did not care what methods were employed to obtain it. In addition to the war loans, there were other taxes that were paid directly to the government. These included a property tax, a housing tax, a personal tax, income tax,^[93]and a supplementary tax^[94] to make up for what the meat and candle taxes did not provide – in total some fifty-two different types of taxes and payments.

In 1810 a census was taken of the Jews of Galicia. In Brzezany there were at that time 2,457 families with 10,933 people – 5,395 men and 5,538 women. As compared to 1788, this was a decrease of 300 families. The census of 1792 showed 2,514 families, resulting in a decrease of 243 families, and a further loss of 57 families between 1792 and 1810. In Rohatyn itself the census of 1810 showed a population of 282 Jewish families, in which there were 595 men and 621 women – a total of 1,216 people.^[94a] However, by 1819 the downward trend was reversed, and the district of Brzezany had 2,539 families, showing an increase of 82 families as compared with the population of 1810.^[95]

In 1810 when the Jews of Rohatyn were again given permission to lease breweries, the town in turn again complained to the authorities in Lwow in an attempt to prevent this. However, this time the central government sided with the Jews and reprimanded the authorities in Lwow, saying that from now on the Jews in the towns would either have to be accorded equality in leasing breweries or they would all be removed from brewing.^[96]

In the year 1819 conflicts developed between the Jews of Rohatyn and the tax collector, Marcus Kreisler, who collected bridge tolls, legal payment on weights and measures, and rentals for the use of town grazing land. Kreisler was a resident of Rohatyn who made these collections on behalf of Citizen Tomasz Sobienski. With the aid of a soldier on horseback and a policeman on foot, he would receive various pledges from Jews and squeeze money out of them for his own benefit. The Jews presented a complaint to the commissar of the district (Czetsch) during one of his visits. They claimed that not only was Kreisler taking money legally for the government, but he also took money for himself that should have been going to Sobienski. In view of this complaint, the administration of the district of Brzezany sentenced Kreisler to ten lashes. This decision was authorized by the central government of Vienna.^[97]

During this period, a question arose concerning the wearing of traditional Jewish clothing. According to the decrees of King Joseph, Section 47, the Jews of Galicia were required by 1794 to discontinue wearing their traditional garb that separated them from other inhabitants. Only rabbis were permitted to wear traditional Jewish clothing. The Jews did not pay any attention to this, and on 20 May 1790 the government abrogated this decree. Between 1816 and 1821 the central government of Vienna again tried to institute laws forbidding Jews from wearing their traditional dress. These laws applied to all the Jews of Galicia. Baron Hauer suggested that they institute a new ruling that explicitly forbade the wearing of Jewish style clothing since it was not of the accepted conventional mode. Thus, the central government should be required to take steps forcing the Jews of Galicia, with the exception of rabbis and those engaged in religious occupations, to change their mode of dress in keeping with accepted European styles.

On 17 May 1821 the Viennese government notified the authorities in Lwow that this matter was linked with the announcement of Jewish laws that would improve their condition. When the Jews heard of these machinations, groups arose to oppose them. Led by the community of Stryj, they rose to take action in this matter and to appear in person before the government in Vienna to oppose the demands of the district authorities. All the communities of Galicia presented a joint written request that Jews be permitted to retain their traditional form of dress.

Rohatyn was among those joining this appeal and in April 1821 also sent a petition of its own to the district authorities. It requested that this matter be removed from the agenda since the Jewish population was still very poor and lacked the funds to buy the proper cloth needed to produce German-style clothing (Deutsche Kleider). Also, the Jewish stores selling cloth were still filled with their stock of woven goods, intended for Jewish clothing, which would not be sold for quite some time.

The only ones who approved of the governmental demands were members of the Haskalah (Enlightenment) of Brody, Tarnopol, and Lwow. They pushed for the enactment of these demands, since they thought it would hasten the Europeanization of the Jews of Galicia. The merchants, furriers, and cloth manufacturers among the gentiles of Austria followed suit and also presented their own petitions. The government of Vienna sent a reply to each petition of April 1821, stating that the objections to the change in dress were not valid. The proof of this was that taxes from the sale of meat among the Jews of Moravia were not lessened despite the fact that they changed their way of dress. In any case, these recommendations of the district authority of Galicia never took hold. The problem of Jewish dress was removed from the agenda, and things calmed down.^[98]

In 1827 a change took place from an economic point of view. The retail liquor trade, which was forbidden elsewhere to Jews, was permitted in Rohatyn. The official reason was that these rights were controlled by the local authorities and more than once in the past, they had leased this privilege to Jews.

During this time the head of the Jewish community was Benjamin Wunderlich, who was not well accepted by the members of his community. More than one complaint was presented against him, especially in such matters as management of community funds and appointing new parnassim of the kehilah.^[99] The Jews also complained about the collector of the candle tax from Brzezany, Aharon Klar, who mercilessly oppressed the inhabitants of Rohatyn and carried out seizures and attachment of properties at will.^[100]

During the 1830s the Hasidic movement developed in the district of Brzezany. Those who were active in this included the Grand Rabbis (Rebbes) Yitzchak Meir of Przemyslany (known as Meir'l of Przemyslany), Yehuda Hirsch Brandwein of Stratyn (the Stratyner Rebbe), and Yitzchak Yehuda of Baranowka, who gathered many followers in Rohatyn. By contrast, we do not precisely know to what degree the Haskalah movement made inroads into Rohatyn and to what degree its influence was felt. We do know that during the 30s and 40s the maskilim (proponents of Haskalah) were active in politics and worked toward the improvement of the political and economic condition of the Jews of Galicia as well as removing the special Jewish taxes. In the Haskalah circles of Brody, Tarnopol, Stanislawow, Lwow, and Tysmienica, they spoke about the need for establishing schools in the cities and the towns,^[101] but Rohatyn was still far away from this goal. In 1847 there was a gathering in Lwow at the initiative of the Lwow kehilah, headed by members who had already achieved a high level of secular education. They met together with the heads of the Jewish communities to discuss their common problems and decided to forward a petition to the central government in which they described their economic conditions. This petition was sent only by the large communities, and it is not clear whether Rohatyn took part in this meeting.

The Jews of Rohatyn were not as affected by the events of 1848 as were the communities of Lwow, Tarnopol, Brody, Zolkiew, Tysmienica, and Stanislawow. Rohatyn did send an elected representative to the June 1848 parliament in Vienna; his name was Sabrin Smarowski, a prominent landowner. We do not know to what degree the Jews contributed to his election. The constitution of April 1848 did not bring equal rights to the Jews, as they had hoped it might, and did not solve the Jewish problems, as the Jewish intelligentsia thought it would. The Galician Jewish interest was primarily directed towards the elimination of two taxes that were exceedingly oppressive and despised by them – the kosher meat tax and the candle tax – which were collected by the people who paid the highest bid for the job. The constitution of April 1848 did not specifically eliminate these taxes. However, because Section 25 provided equality for all inhabitants with regard to serving in the army and paying taxes, the Jews interpreted this to mean that they, too, could benefit from these laws. The members of the Galician government did not agree, and the district of Brzezany publicly announced that “false rumors are being spread to the effect that the meat and candle taxes have been abrogated. It should therefore be known that this is not the case, and the authorities are still required to collect these taxes.”

The Jews did not heed this warning, however, and were at loggerheads with the tax collectors. In the end, on 5 October 1848 the parliament voted 243 to 207 to abrogate all Jewish taxes, and in this way, the Jews were formally acknowledged by the government as equal citizens with equal rights. This emancipation did not last very long, only until 1851. In 1850 when Jews were permitted to acquire real estate, they presented petitions to the government asking permission to purchase property. This included the Jews of Rohatyn who forwarded a number of petitions requesting permission to purchase real estate. However, it was only in 1866 that two Jews, the merchants Goldschlag and Weidenfeld, were granted this right.^[102]

In contrast to the other areas where we know that a great struggle took place between the pious Hasidim on one side and the intelligentsia on the other, in Rohatyn, either prior to 1848 or after it, this was not the case. The maskilim were unable to make a dent in the way of life of the Jews there; they were completely rejected.

In the first half of the 19th century the Hasidism of Rabbi Yehuda Zvi Hirsch Brandwein of Stratyn took strong root in Rohatyn. Rabbi Yehuda was the disciple of Rabbi Uri of Strzeliska, termed the Saraf (burning angel), who had been a student of Rabbi Shlomo of Karlin. Rabbi Yehuda was one of the famous rebbes (Admorim) in the first half of the 19th century and had a great influence on the masses of Jews in the towns of Eastern Galicia. He was noted for his remedies and cures for diseases and for women with difficulty in bearing children. This was true to such a point that he attracted the attention of the Austrian government, which conducted an investigation of his practices. His opposition stemmed primarily from the maskilim of Tarnopol who went out of their way to complain to the government about his wonder-working remedies and amulets. They claimed that the Hasidim were being duped and extorted.

Rabbi Yehuda was followed by his oldest son, Rabbi Avraham, who inherited his position as rebbe. He in turn was followed by Rabbi Nahum, in 1865, who became the rebbe at the early age of eighteen. Rabbi Nahum moved from Stratyn to Bursztyn where he was the rebbe until 1914. Most of his Hasidim lived either in Bursztyn or Rohatyn or in the surrounding towns. There they established small synagogues (Burstyner kloizen) whose congregants followed the Stratyn customs. In addition to the Stratyn brand of Hasidism, there were also Hasidic groups affiliated with Belz, Czortkow, Bojanow, and Husiatyn.

G. 1848 – 1914

The second half of the 19th century marked the beginning of an increase in the number of Jews. As a result of the spiritual and cultural ferment of the times, which came about as a result of the Revolution of 1848, new slogans appeared in the Jewish towns and villages of Galicia, carried by a relatively small percentage of the intelligentsia of the maskilim. Rohatyn, too, albeit later, experienced this phenomenon. With the passage of time, political conditions developed in which the leadership of the communities passed to power-seeking individuals. These individuals made it their business to serve the interests of the rulers of the area at the expense of the important needs of the Jews. Until 1876 the Jewish Galician leaders were centrist-German in political outlook. Later, however, they turned for many decades to support the Poles during elections and helped to bring in the Jewish vote in national political matters.

At this time, Galicia became one of the main centers of Hasidism, including all its factions. The courts of the rebbes and especially the court of the Belzer rebbe became strong supporters of the Polish faction in the Austrian parliament. His followers were ordered to vote for the Polish nominees. In this way, the common political platform brought about a cooperation between Polish assimilationists and rabbinic Hasidim, both of whom accelerated the political subordination of the Jews to Polish policy.

On the other hand, these phenomena in Galicia awakened Jewish nationalism a number of years before the appearance of the Herzl Zionist movement and opened a new chapter in the political battle of the Jews of Galicia. This process could also be found in the Jewish community of Rohatyn but slightly later than in other towns. At the head of the community stood leaders of the old school. The size of the intelligentsia there was still too small to have any effect in gaining control of the community, and matters continued to run in much the same fashion as they had before, which brought about conflict with the authorities.

In the 1850s the government accused the kehilah of Rohatyn of illegal conduct. This arose as a result of the difficult economic condition and great deficits when the community could not cover its budget via the usual taxes.^[103]

	Remittance/Cheque 10 Franks in Austrian Currency Bukaczowcer Land Leaseholder Paid Against 6 Orders/Demands One Gulden in Banknotes Chaim Grauberg
Money order issued in 1849

After receiving permission in 1859 to reside and purchase land in the small towns, Jews began to settle in the villages surrounding Rohatyn, as brewers, lessees of estates, and farmers. The wealthy invested money in buying estates that were in turn managed by Jewish supervisors.

In the year 1868 Jews were granted equal rights, including the right to participate in town councils. Thus, in keeping with the law of towns, the town council of Rohatyn was composed of thirty members, divided among eighteen Polish Catholics, six Greek Catholic Ruthenians (later called Ukrainians), and six Jews.

Under the influence of the equal rights laws, there arose among the maskilim of Galicia a movement to eliminate the organized communities (kehilot) or at least to limit their powers. They wished to place them under town supervision and to take these powers into their own hands, together with all the funds that were now being held by the communities. This movement was a reaction to the control of many kehilot by the ultra-orthodox. In this they were backed by the Poles who were interested in integrating Jews with Poles, primarily for political reasons. The Poles wanted to strengthen their position against the Ruthenians, especially since the Ruthenians had begun to demand the right to determine policy in Galicia. These demands were also supported by the municipalities in order to weaken the power of self-rule by the Jewish community organizations and place them under their domination.

The movement first arose among groups of maskilim in Cracow who were then joined by similar groups in Tarnow. Together they turned to the central government in Vienna and petitioned it to eliminate the independence of the kehilot. The Viennese government opposed this request to intermingle the Jewish communities with the towns, because it realized that behind it lay the desire to promote the Polonization of the Jews of Galicia. This was contrary to the policy held by the Austrian national government, which was interested in Germanizing the Jews.

In addition to the political aspect, the heads of the government pointed to the legal factor found in Paragraph 15 of the Basic Laws of 21 December 1867. The law stated, “The organization and administration of all internal affairs of churches and religious communities recognized by law shall be carried out by their own community organizations and remain under their control and administration, including their foundations and trusts that are related to religious, educational, and charity needs.”^[105] Therefore, it was very clear from the start that these requests would be met by a strong negative reply.

It is interesting to note that this movement found appeal and backing in Rohatyn where the Jewish representatives – Ostern, Leib Weidman, Shmuel Holder, and Marcus Nagelberg – were seated in the town council. Judging by the wording of the Ostern suggestion that we will cite, we can deduce that it was motivated by a strong antagonistic movement against the leaders of the kehilah. Ostern, the sponsor of the proposal, and the members of the town council were all maskilim who saw that the kehilah lay in the hands of leaders who were irresponsible and careless with the assets of the community. Wishing to remove these community leaders from their position, they therefore requested that the administration of the community be brought under town control.

On 20 February 1868 at the session of the town council, Ostern, the Jewish member, presented the following proposal: “The Rohatyn Jewish community has under its control a large amount of capital derived from a variety of contributions, pledges, and collections that are in the hands of its leaders who do not present managerial reports to the town, and no one knows what they are doing. The synagogue, whose structure was begun years ago, is still waiting to be completed. At this rate, this holy structure will collapse. Despite the fact that large sums are constantly being collected for graves, the cemetery still lacks a fence. The bathhouse, for which three hundred florin are collected annually, is ready to collapse. There is no registry of Torah scrolls and megillot, which are in the hands of the beadle of the synagogue who has no supervision. According to Section 93 of the town ordinance, the town has the right to supervise special matters concerning the Jewish community. Therefore, I suggest that the town council should decide that from now on the administration of affairs, that heretofore have been in the hands of the heads of the Jewish community, be placed under the strict supervision of the town. Towards this purpose, a supervisory committee of three councilmen should be chosen, whose task it would be to supervise the operation of the affairs of the community in all of its aspects. These would include the signing of all documents and legal papers, the receiving of accounts and the registration of property, and, from time to time, presenting a report to the town council on its activities and undesirable impressions.”

The proposal of Ostern was unanimously accepted, and a committee was immediately chosen that included three Jews – Leib Weidmann, Shmuel Holder, and Marcus Nagelberg.^[107]

The mayor of the town, Ambrose Mruczynski, passed the decision of 20 February 1868 on to the hands of the chief official of the district, who declared that this decision stood in contradiction to the existing laws and forbade the town to carry it out. The town council appealed the decision of the district official on 9 September 1868 before the commission on Galicia, which also turned down this proposal. The town then turned to the Ministry of the Interior in Vienna. The Ministry of the Interior viewed this decision as another attempt similar to the decisions of the cities of Cracow and Tarnow “to take out of the hands of the Jewish community the supervision of religious Jewish affairs, which it is legally required to carry out, and pass these powers on to the committee of the town council. This decision, whose purpose is to eliminate an organization recognized by law, directly contradicts Section 15 of the fundamental laws as well as the town ordinances of Galicia.”^[108] On 19 November 1869 the Ministry of the Interior upheld the decision of the commission to reject the proposal of the town council.

Having been turned down by the central government, the town authorities were helpless to make any basic changes, and matters remained as they had been until the 70s when a new administration, composed of younger and educated members capable of initiative, was appointed.

In the years 1866–68 the chief rabbi of Rohatyn was Rabbi Eliezar Horowitz (1820–68), the son of the rabbi of Stanislawow (Rabbi Meshulam Yissachar Horowitz), who was raised in the house of his grandfather, the Gaon, Reb Arye Leibush. Before his appointment, the rabbi of Rohatyn was the rabbi of Maryampol, 1850–56. Contrary to the ways of his father, Rabbi Meshulam Yissachar, who refused to recognize the Admorim (the Rebbe leaders) and did not permit them to exert any influence in community matters in Stanislawow, Rabbi Eliezar became attracted to Hasidism and traveled to the Tsaddik, Rabbi Yehuda Zvi of Rozdol. He copied the works of his grandfather on the Torah and organized them according to the portions of the week under the name of Pnei Aryeh (Face of the Lion) to which he added his own addenda, entitled Ateret Zekenim (Crown of the Elders) (Przemysl, 1874). After that, Rabbi Meir Yehuda Leib, the son of Reb Shmuel Glass, previously rabbi in Pomorzany, was appointed rabbi. He remained rabbi in Rohatyn until he passed away in 1894.

In 1896 Rabbi Natan Lewin was appointed rabbi. He was born in Brody to a family of famous rabbis and was the student and later son-in-law of the rabbi of Lwow, Rabbi Yitzchak Schmelkes. He was learned in both secular and religious subjects and successfully matriculated as an extern at the gymnasium (high school) of Brody. After the passing of Rabbi Meir Kristianfoler, Brody did not hold any further elections of rabbis until after the victory of the Haskalah in the community elections. In the new elections there were five candidates, all natives of Brody – Rabbi Avraham Binyamin Kluger, the son of the preacher, Rabbi Eliezar Landau, Rabbi Moshe Reinhold, Rabbi Yitzchak Chajes, and Rabbi Natan Lewin. They chose Rabbi Yitzchak Chajes, the son of the rabbi of Zolkiew, Rabbi Zvi Hirsh Chajes.

Two years later, in 1896, Rabbi Natan Lewin became the rabbi of Rohatyn. He was, as we have said, a man of wide education and nationalistic views. He did not become involved in the differences between the Hasidim and the Mitnagdim (those who objected to Hasidic views). He urged the establishment of Jewish schools and a Jewish gymnasium, because he viewed a well-rounded education as the solution to and defense against the assimilation of youth. He objected to the desires of the Admorim to separate the communities similar to what was occurring in Hungary and saw a unified kehilah as the only national religious institution that would serve the interest of all Jews.

During his rabbinical term in Rohatyn – until 1905 – he took part in the congress of the Jewish communities of 1 May 1900 and initiated an intensive drive to expand and improve Jewish education in Rohatyn. In 1903 he participated in the first general rabbinic congress, which assembled on August 13 in Cracow. In 1905 Rabbi Lewin was appointed rabbi of Rzeszow.

Pressed by the Zionist movement that was striving to dislodge the administration of Jewish communities from the control of the traditional conservative families, a congress was held on 1 May 1900 in Lwow after a break of twenty-two years. The previous congress of kehilot had last taken place in Lwow in 1878 and was initiated by the organization Shomer Yisrael (Protector of the Jews), which was promoting at that time the rejuvenation of community life. Rohatyn did not take part in the first meeting and contented itself with sending a congratulatory telegram.

As for the second gathering, Rohatyn sent its rabbi, Rabbi Natan Lewin, as a delegate. The meeting was attended by seventy representatives, forty of whom came from the smaller communities; thirty representatives were from Lwow alone. Twenty-nine representatives, including Rabbi Natan Lewin, united to form the Zionist club, which succeeded in obtaining representation in the leadership of the congress. They elected Rabbi Natan Lewin, who had been taking part in the proceedings, as their representative. During the debate, he sharply attacked the corrupt methods of community organization that had become the main obstruction to development of public life in Jewish Galicia. He made a strong impression on the delegates during this address when he presented the need for opening a Hebrew gymnasium.

Lewin stressed that “the necessity for a Hebrew gymnasium is strongly felt by us. If with regard to secular studies there may not be a great difference between one school and another, from the religious point of view, we need to worry about our children becoming assimilated as a result of their contact with the outside world. In any case, we can no longer leave the sad conditions as they are now. Do we want a school in which the study of Hebrew predominates and Jewish studies do not exist, like 'those souls who walk around naked'?^[Tr5] The Jewish student must first and foremost be an exemplary Jew who respects his people, his Torah, and his nationality. How sad is the picture that exists now, in which Jewish students are so poorly educated that they celebrate our holidays while at the same time violating the laws of the Sabbath and the Holy Days. Since, at this point, we have a long way to go before we can erect a special gymnasium, because that would result in too many hardships and be difficult to put into operation, we will therefore have to content ourselves, at this point, with something small and attempt, where it is appropriate, to incorporate a suitable curriculum in every gymnasium that would enable Jewish students to withstand the pressure to violate Shabbat and Yom Tov.”^[109]

When the spokesman for the assimilationists, Dr. Bernhard Goldman, demanded that the official language of the community organization be Polish, and Dr. Gottlieb attacked the Zionists, claiming that rabbis are anti-Zionist, Rabbi Lewin replied, “We Orthodox rabbis are all Zionists even if we do not always take part in Zionist activities. For how is it possible for an Orthodox rabbi who constantly thinks of Zion and constantly pours out his soul in prayers for the return to Zion not to be a Zionist? Not Zionists? We are waiting with baited breath to return to our land. It is our heart's desire to which all of our poets have dedicated their most inspired works in the holy tongue. Here they saw their visions that have maintained us for generations. Every lump of earth in our land is holy to us, and we are all tied to it body and soul – and we are not Zionists?” (During the speech Dr. Caro interrupted with the objection that this address implied that only Orthodox rabbis are ardent Zionists. Progressive rabbis are also very attached to Zion.)

“However,” continued Rabbi Lewin, “;the time has not yet come to put into effect the use of Hebrew in community matters. On the other hand, to use Polish would result in a great disadvantage to the Jewish community, since most of the people, especially the rabbis, who should be in the forefront of community affairs, do not know Polish adequately and would therefore be unable to function properly. They would be regarded as outsiders, sitting with folded hands, because they would be unable to take part in the community assemblies.” Rabbi Lewin therefore requested that matters be left as they were, wherein each group manages its affairs in the language it finds most comfortable.^[110]

Most of the proposals that dealt with the creation of a permanent representation of the communities – ranging from a renewal of the Council of Four Lands to an increase in the productivity of the Jewish masses in order to improve their economic condition – was accepted under the pressure of the Zionists. In the end, a permanent committee for the congress of the communities was established, consisting of sixty members, including four Zionists – Dr. Kornheiser, Adolph Stand, Hillel Badian, and Rabbi Natan Lewin.

Thanks to this plan, it was stressed in the decision, “We now know what we want and what we have to do. You have presented us in a clear and definite fashion with a true, elevated goal, and we must do all that is in our power to realize it.” However, they go on to say that these Zionist hopes are based on the proposition that he, Dr. Herzl, will take upon himself “to be the captain of our ship that is shaking on the waves of dangerous political oceans and will raise the fallen flag of our people that will gather the masses about him with enthusiasm.” The contents of this decision were relayed to Dr. Herzl in a letter dated 22 April 1896, two months after the publication of Der Judenstaat.^[111] In response to their letter, the Zionists of Rohatyn received the following reply, dated 27 May 1896, which stated: “Honorable Sirs, Having only recently returned from my journeys, I was unable to answer your letter of encouragement and acceptance of my views until now. I thank you wholeheartedly for your kind words, and I hope that when the time comes and the proclamation is announced in our ranks, that we will all march together, united and willingly. I am still working and fighting almost entirely alone through my own efforts, and I am planning on promoting matters through a society that I will create in London called the 'Society of Jews.' The efforts of one man alone do not suffice to awaken the stragglers, and the stragglers are mostly those who do not lack for anything. However, we must be strong in spirit and not stray from the great purpose that lies before us. Your devoted, Theodor Herzl.”^[112]

Beginning with the year 1894 Rohatyn was represented at all national gatherings of the Zionist movement of Galicia as well as at the general meeting of the 'Chevrat Yishuv Eretz Yisrael Zion' (Society for the Settlement of Eretz Yisrael and Zion) and 'Ahavat Zion' (Love of Zion) in Tarnow.

Shalom Melzer was the representative of the Zionist association and took part in debates at the assemblies. At the national congress that took place on 26–27 December 1897 in Lwow, he was elected to the national committee and took an active part in its procedures. Ahavat Zion was founded in Rohatyn as a branch of the organization in Tarnow and was headed for several years by Alter Weidmann, with Ephraim Sternhal as his deputy. Other members included the physician Dr. Siegfried Scharf, Manish Schenker, Hirsch Yoseph Haber, Moshe Damm, Naftali Schumer, Eliezer Igra, Avigdor Edelsberg, and Avraham Zlatkis, while Shalom Melzer basically managed the Zionist activity behind the scenes.

In 1896 Ephraim Sternhal, Alter Weidmann, Yitzchak Nagelberg, Dr. S. Scharf, Daniel Damm, and Shalom Melzer were elected to the local committee. In the contest that took place between the leadership of Ahavat Zion in Tarnow, headed by Dr. Avraham Zaltz, and the Action Committee of the World Zionist Organization, Shalom Melzer attempted to mediate and reach a compromise. At the general assembly of 19–20 May 1897 in Tarnow, Melzer and Ephraim Sternhal were elected representatives of Rohatyn to the Tarnow Ahavat Zion convention.

The representatives of Rohatyn – Melzer and Zlatkis – played an important role in the national Zionist convention that took place on 26–27 June 1898 in Stanislawow. This convention dealt with the question of taking a unified stand by the Zionists of Galicia regarding problems that were on the agenda of the Second Zionist Congress. In the convention, Melzer opposed the goals of the group headed by Rosenhock of Kolomyja – to sever their relationship with the national committee of Lwow and form a central organization of their own, because they felt that the Lwow committee opposed political Zionism. The representatives of Rohatyn strongly backed the national organization led by the committee in Lwow, and Melzer was elected to this national committee.

In 1898 the B'nai Zion organization of Rohatyn numbered one hundred members, headed by Alter Weidmann. In the fund raising campaign for the Treasury for Settlement (JCT), which took place between March 1899 and 28 April 1899, 112 shares, at one pound sterling per share, were sold in Rohatyn as compared with 7,210 shares in all of Galicia.

With the selection of Rabbi Natan Lewin as Rabbi of Rohatyn, intensive activity began in the field of education. He represented the community of Rohatyn at the assembly day, which convened on 1 May 1900 in Lwow.

Between the years 1900 and 1905, the B'nai Zion organization was headed by A. Weidmann, and many political and social activities were carried out. Shalom Melzer was among those who laid the foundation for the 'Mizrachi' organization, which came into being at the convention of Pressburg in August 1904. He was elected to the central executive committee as the representative of Galicia, but he refused the mandate and remained with the national Zionist organization. In 1909 the Zionist organization of Rohatyn suffered a great loss with the passing of Shalom Melzer.

Leibel Toives of Rohatyn was among the sixty-three representatives elected in Galicia to the Zionist Congress of Vienna in 1913. In the year 1905 the Zionists became an important active factor in community leadership. Their impressive activities, led by Shalom Melzer, resulted in the establishment of a Hebrew school that year through the community council. This was the first Hebrew school of its kind in Galicia. With the appointment of Rafal Soferman as principal of the school, a noticeable change came about in Hebrew cultural life among the Jews. Teachers included Lichtman, Berkowitz, Zvi Scharfstein, Carmi, and Sobel. The number of students reached 176. Rafal Soferman (1879–1956), an outstanding personality, was one of the first modern Hebrew teachers who instilled new energy into the nationalistic activities and was the driving force of the Hebraic Zionist movement of Galicia. Under his initiative, the Hebrew Teachers Union was founded, and its main headquarters were in Rohatyn. In 1911 Soferman went to Brody, and the new school principal was Jacob Prost. The years 1910–14 were characterized by a high degree of Jewish nationalistic life that left its stamp and color on the entire Jewish population of Rohatyn.

In 1880, in the total district of Rohatyn, including the town of Rohatyn, there were 72,491 non-Jewish residents and 12,569 Jewish residents. Of this number the Christians residing in towns and villages numbered 10,331 (13.6% of their total number), while the number of Jews was 9,561 (76.1% of the total Jewish population in the district). In 1890 there were 81,743 Christian residents, of whom 12,810 lived in towns and villages (15.7%), and 14,149 Jews, of whom 10,609 lived in towns and villages (75% of the total Jewish population in the district). In 1900 there were 94,799 Christian residents, of whom 14,368 lived in towns and villages (15.2%), and 13,472 Jews, of whom 10,305 lived in the towns and villages (76.5% of the total Jewish population).^[117]

At the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th centuries, there were in the town “;learned” families such as the Nagelberg family, the grandchildren of David Moshe Avraham (Rav Adam); Holder, Ostern, Goldschlag, Alter Weidmann, Ephraim Sternhal (one of the wealthy members of the community); and, of course, Shalom Melzer (one of the first Zionists of Galicia). They all held top-level positions in the Jewish community.

For decades, until 1904, Chaim Holder stood at the head of the Jewish community, followed by Alter Weidmann. Weidmann instituted many changes in the community and initiated the building of the large synagogue that was famous for its artistic murals. After that came Dr. Pinchas Scharf, who held the position until the day of his death. Lastly, Shlomo Amarant followed and remained in this position until the Holocaust.

Between the years 1904 and 1910 Alter Weidman was assisted by his deputy, Ephraim Sternhal. The executive department (Kultusvorstand) was staffed by Dr. Siegfried Schaff, Avraham Zlatkis, Motel Kreisler, and Z. Weidmann. In the council (Kultusrat) were Yonah Rappaport, Daniel Damm, Sender Margulies, Shalom Melzer, Yaakov Fisch, and Yaakov Lewenter. The community budget amounted to 14,400 crowns.

The officials who participated in the last community council of the Austrian regime were Alter Weidmann, chairman, and Ephraim Sternhal, vice-chairman. The executive members were Dr. Siegfried Schaff, Avraham Zlatkis, and Motel Kreisler. The members of the board included Yonah Rappaport, Daniel Damm, Sender Margulies, Avraham Koenigsberg, Yaakov Fisch, Zadik Zeidman, and Yaakov Lewenter.

No new rabbi was appointed after Rabbi Natan Lewin left. The rabbinical tasks were performed by the dayanim rabbis, Shmuel Henna and Avraham David Spiegel. In the general schools, religion was taught by Hirsch Schwartz. The community budget rose to 20,000 crowns, which was covered by the community taxes paid by 620 taxpayers. This was in addition to revenues permitted by law, such as the tax on kosher meat, payments for the bathhouse and cemetery, etc. The community recorder of births, weddings, and deaths was at that time Yisrael Ostern.

The Jewish elected representatives to the municipality included Ephraim Sternhal, Alter Weidmann, Shalom Melzer, Yerachmiel Schwartz, the attorney Dr. Goldschlag (who also functioned as deputy mayor), and Rabbi Avraham David Spiegel. In addition to the chevra kaddisha the following committees were active in the town:

1. Association of Merchants, presided over by Fischel Banner. Members of the committee included Yitzchak Doller, Yeshaya Singer, Akiva Wagschal, Yechezkel Weiler, Yoel Granowitter and Aharon Weinstock
2. The Diligent Hands Craftsmen Association, presided over by Chaim Szkolnik
3. Maot Chitin – Money for Passover officially collected by the community
4. Kimcha DePischa – Money for Passover, collected for the poor by individuals
5. Community charity organization, directed by Shimon Teichman
6. Dorshei Tov – Seekers of Goodness
7. Rodfei Zedek – Pursuers of Justice
8. Women's Society (Frauenverein), presided over by Helena Ostern

One of the great accomplishments at this time was the founding of the Hebrew school under the sponsorship of the organization called 'Safa Brura' – clear speech. There was also a small yeshiva run by Reb Avraham Grünberg.

	Election ballot Being entitled to vote for one representative to the state parliament from District 29, I give my vote to: Dr. Wladyslaw Duleba
Election ballot with the printed name of Dr. Duleba

		Protest against the election of Dr. Wladyslaw Dulemba. A picture of the terrorism and crimes committed in favor of Dr. Wladyslaw Dulemba in connection with the elections to the Austrian parliament from the 29th Electoral Circuit in the district towns of Brzezany, Rohatyn, Chodorow, Brzozdowce, etc. At the same time we appeal to civilized Europe Issued by the United Ruthenian (Ukrainian) Social Democrats, Ruthenian (Ukrainian) town – and Jewish-National Election Committees in Brzezany. Publisher – Richard Timm's Family Press, Vienna II, Darwin Street (etc.)		Dr. S. Rappaport

Despite the terror, stealing of ballots, and bribe money, Duleba was unable to obtain a majority in the first round and was forced to run again, against Dr. Rappaport. In the second round, which took place 31 May, the Ruthenians decided to vote for Dr. Rappaport. On Election Day the terror was increased even more. Contrary to election laws, government officials together with the head of the district and the mayor openly carried out acts of bribery and deceit with threats of pogroms against the Jews. Ballots marked Dr. Rappaport were stolen out of the ballot box, and in this way, Dr. Rappaport lost, and Duleba was elected. The election committees of the Zionists and Ruthenians presented an appeal to the parliament contesting the election – however, to no avail.^[119] The Polish club, backers of the members of the national government, saw to it that the election of their candidate, Dr. Duleba, would be accepted. In the elections of 1911 the Jewish nominee for Rohatyn was the lawyer Dr. Horowitz of Stanislawow, and his campaign was waged by the Austrian member of parliament Ernest Breiter, a gentile who was pro-Zionist, and again, the Jews lost.

By the end of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century, Rohatyn possessed a class of intelligentsia with academic training. Among doctors these included Dr. Siegfried Schaff and Dr. Moritz Stein, and among lawyers, there were Dr. Moritz Lipner, Dr. Yosef Weidmann, Dr. Pinchas Scharf, Dr. Herman Zahnhauser, Dr. Ferdinand Katz, Dr. Shmuel Schoder, Dr. Oswald Klugman, and Dr. Moritz Fichmann.

At the end of World War I political changes began to take place. The Ukrainians set up the Western Republic of Ukraine in eastern Galicia. Then a war broke out between Poland and Ukraine in which the Jewish leaders declared their neutrality and refused to take part in the dispute. To protect their interests, all the Jewish parties united to create a national Jewish committee for all the communities. Community councils were eliminated and national committees were elected in which all parties were represented.

The Jewish community of Rohatyn had many problems under the Ukrainian regime. There was a Jewish population of 3,000, of whom 2,000 (66%) were in need of monetary aid as compared to 150 (15%) before World War I. There were 2,100 (70%) without any means of support. Shops and crafts were paralyzed because of the anti-Jewish policies of the Ukrainian regime and their ineptness in government and economics. As a result, Jews were unable to find any source of income. In addition, there were pressing shortages of food and basic necessities. Persecution, attacks by soldiers, robbery, and thievery were the outstanding characteristics of daily life for Jews at that time. The Jewish committee of Stanislawow made every effort to obtain redress from the Ukrainians, but to no avail, because the town authorities paid no attention to the demands of the committee and did exactly as they pleased. Nevertheless, despite all the difficulties, schools and cultural institutions functioned. In June 1919 the Poles broke through the Ukrainian front and conquered all of eastern Galicia, thus beginning a new chapter in the Polish exile.

Bukaczowce: Bukaczowce is first mentioned in documents dating from 1438. In 1489 it received the rank of a town. In 1515 the town paid three and one half grazovna tax on liquor. From 1489 on, the town, together with Chodorow, was owned by the noble family Zarwinski. In the year 1578 the town had six craftsmen and paid a liquor tax of twenty-eight florin. No one knows when Jews first settled there.

In the census of 1765 there were 289 Jews listed in the town and 72 Jews in the surrounding villages, making a total of 361 Jews.

• In the year 1880 the town grew to 2,085 inhabitants, of whom 1,115 were Jews (53.5%).
• In 1890 there were 260 buildings with 2,459 inhabitants, of whom 1,216 were Jews (49.5%). In 1900 there were 288 buildings with exactly the same number of inhabitants and the same number of Jews.
• In 1921 the town had a population of 2,251 inhabitants, of whom 649 were Jews (8.8%).

Stratyn: Until the 17th century Stratyn had the official rank of a village. In 1671 King Michael agreed to the request of the owner of the village, Gabriel Sylinski, to grant Stratyn the status of a town, with the right of holding three yearly market fairs and a market day every first and sixth day of the week. In 1675 the Tatars attacked and were severely defeated by the Polish commander, Ataneus Miaczynski.

• As of the year 1671 there existed Nowy Stratyn, the town, and Stary Stratyn, the village.
• In 1765 the census counted 95 Jews, which included 83 adults and 12 children. The Jewish community increased 50% by the second half of the 19th century.
• By 1880 the town had 143 houses and 840 inhabitants, which included 192 Ruthenians, 19 Poles, and 593 Jews (73.8% of the population).
• In the year 1890 there were 99 houses, 768 inhabitants, of whom 552 were Jewish (71.9%).
• In 1900 there were 97 houses, 694 inhabitants, of whom 413 were Jewish (59.5%).
• In 1921 the population fell to 373 inhabitants, of whom 151 were Jews (41.6%).

His position as Admor was inherited by his eldest son, Rabbi Avraham, whose brother, Rabbi Eliezer (Reb Laiserel), became the Admor in Jezupol. He had two sons – Rabbi Uri, who inherited his father's position in Jezupol, and Rabbi Nachum, who became the rabbi of Stratyn in the year 1865 at the age of eighteen. After a few years he moved to Bursztyn and was the Admor there until 1914. He was a Cabalist and a very erudite man who published four books on Cabala – Imre Tov, Imre Chaim, Imre Brachah, and Imre Ratzon. He established a stately court in Bursztyn where a large number of “residents” lived at his expense. There were many “Stratyner Hasidim” in the surrounding towns of Bursztyn, Rohatyn, Bukaczowce, Bolszowce, and Nadworna. After his passing in 1915 the Stratyn court was divided up into two courts – one headed by his son, Eliezer, and the other, by his son-in-law, Rabbi Isaac of Podhajce. The son of Rabbi Eliezer, Rabbi Moshe, renewed his grandfather's court in Bursztyn in 1935. He was killed together with his wife and children during the Holocaust.

Bolszowce: Bolszowce is first mentioned in documents dating from 1436. In 1578 it became the property of the Szeniewski family who owned it until 1624. In the year 1624 it became a town with the right of holding markets. The marketing fairs for oxen were especially well known. In the 19th century the town was owned by Kornel Kaszczonowicz, a well-known Polish statesman, who was a member of the Sejm of Galicia as well as a member of the Austrian parliament.

• In 1765 there were 178 Jews in Bolszowce, of whom 166 were adults and 12 were children.
• In 1880 it had a total population of 2,932 inhabitants, of whom 1,760 were Jews (58% of the population).
• In 1890 the town contained 364 houses and 3,481 inhabitants, of whom 2,058 were Jews (59.1% of the population).
• In 1900 the town contained 415 houses with 3,938 inhabitants, of whom 2,256 were Jews (57.3% of the population).
• In 1910 the town had grown to 4,029 inhabitants, of whom 2,438 were Jews (52.7% of the population).
• By the year 1921 the population had fallen to 2,186 inhabitants, of whom 825 were Jews (37.7% of the
  population).^[Ed8]

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