Trudy Gold
Napoleon and the Jews, Part 2

Trudy Gold - Napoleon and the Jews, Part 2

- Good evening, everyone. And before I start, I want to mention a correspondence I’ve had with one of our lockdown people, Georgina Hyman. And this is what makes lockdown very, very special. In fact, we had this correspondence a year ago and I didn’t include it in my notes and I want to apologise. And she actually wrote to me about Abraham Furtado, because the received wisdom is that his father died in Lisbon earthquake. Well, Georgina happens to be the descendant of his younger brother Joseph, which proves obviously that he didn’t. And in fact, she’s done a lot of research and this is, as I said, this is what I really love about lockdown university. He and his wife did come to London and they were married in the Jewish faith at Bevis Marks prior to Abraham’s birth. So, his parents came to London. The father did not die. He was not born posthumously. He was born to a mother and father. And then, they went back to Bayonne where Joseph was born. And Abraham only travelled to Bordeaux on his marriage. And what is also fantastic is Georgina sent me a copy of a letter describing the parents. Abraham Furtado describes his parents ordeal in the Lisbon earthquake. So, and in order to further set the record straight, there’s a bit more information I need to give you that Joseph’s son became the mayor of Bayonne. And Cecile Furtado-Heine there’s a bust of her in the Pasture Institute in Paris. And Georgina’s grandmother was a war heroin. A lady called Helena Bear. So, important to remember that. So, this is one of the problems with history books and I apologise that I didn’t include it in my notes.

So, I hope we set the record straight, Georgina, that definitely Abraham Furtado knew both his parents. So, I’m going to actually start with, if you remember in the last session, I was talking about the Assembly of Notables and the questions they answered. Now this is, and they, what is now going to happen is that a Grand Sanhedrin is going to be convened. And before I talk about the Grand Sanhedrin, if you don’t mind if we could keep that on the screen please, Judy. I’m going to read to you from Abraham Furtado His reply to Count mole. Count Mole, remember, convened. He was Napoleon’s expert on Jewish matters and he convened the Assembly of Notables. And this is what Abraham Furtado replied to him, “This is the end of the Assembly of Notables. When his majesty determined to call us together in his capital in order to further the accomplishment of his glorious designs, we saw with inexpressible joy the occasion of doing away with many prejudices and errors. It’s important to understand just how much French Jewry, particularly the Sephardim, took this.” It’s important, this is the emperor of the French, the man, the great saviour of France, and of course the empire he’s created. And he goes on today, “The benevolent intentions of his majesty here offered us an opportunity most fervently desired by all honest and enlightened men of the Jewish persuasion residing in France. We share in common with all Frenchmen the sentiments inspired by that protecting genius, which has saved the empire from the horrors of bloody and anarchy.

The revolution is over, the reign of terror is over. And now, they have the emperor of the French.” And when they left the assembly, the Assembly of Notables, when the Jews left, their cry was, “Long live, the emperor.” Now, this is Count Mole’s reply and how he summons the Grand Sanhedrin ‘cause this is really special. Napoleon has the answers he wants, and I’m going to talk about that in a minute, and now he is convening the Grand Sanhedrin. And what was the original Grand Sanhedrin? It was that meeting of the Jewish elders, 70 Jewish elders that met in Judea. It was only abolished with the destruction of Judea by the Romans. That was the end of the Grand Sanhedrin. But it was the important body within Judaism. And by recreating it and having 70 people, plus the president, so 71 actually, it is Napoleon calling on the Jews. He is giving them great honour and that’s how they see it. Remember, and we discussed this last week, this is the love affair. This is Paris. This is France, great France. And not only representatives from the French, but also from the Italian states he’s conquered and also from parts of the Rhine land. And they’ve come together and he is offering them equality. That’s how they see it. The price we talked about, what is the price of equality? It’s fascinating, isn’t it? To the Jews as individuals, everything. To Israel as a nation, nothing. And I also mentioned to you the Chinese figure for crisis represented by two. One is danger, one is opportunity. What is the opportunity of the modern world? Well, as we’re going to see, as you see in every country in Europe, they explode into modernity. More on that later.

What is the danger? Well, there are many dangers. One of the dangers is that they would lose their cohesive sense of being a people. They would lose Judaism itself. We can also talk about Jew hatred, antisemitism as a modern phenomenon, which I’m talking about next week. The term isn’t coined till 1878, but modern antisemitism is racial. And what they could not have seen is that these Jews who are throwing themselves into France and are going to become so successful. For the glory of France didn’t understand that there were going to be many Frenchmen, and many Italians, and many Germans who did not see them as French, or Italian, or German, but saw them as a separate people. So, there were many dangers. But for the rabbis, not only with the rabbis in danger of losing power, but they’re in danger of losing Judaism itself. So crisis, this is the first time really, and this is why the French Revolution and the Grand Sanhedrin is so important. It is the first time that Jews were really asked to be counted. They really had to make their minds up as to what they were. Anyway, this is Count Mole. And you will remember that he wasn’t himself completely satisfied. But he says, “But this is Napoleon says I am.” And this is what he said, “His majesty is satisfied with your answers. Who could be of hold without astonishment such a society of enlightened men chosen from amongst the descendants of the most ancient peoples of the world?” So, Count Mole is being very flattering. “It was after a revolution which threatened to swallow up up all the nations, a furious multitude attempted to destroy everything. A man appeared and he restored everything. He eyes embraced the whole world.” So, he’s really over egging Napoleon, praising the great Napoleon.

And he goes on to say, “He has the wandering remnant of a nation rendered as famous by its fall, as others are by their greatness.” This is fascinating. And of course, he’s talking about the fall of Jerusalem. He’s talking about the fall of the Jews. Because remember, it’s a Christian country and they have taken on the Hebrew Bible. So, the story of the Jews is central to Christianity. Let me repeat that. “He has the wandering remnant of a nation render it famous by its fall, as others by their greatness. Scattered all over the face of the earth. It was just that he should consider their situation. It was right that these same Jews who had held such a distinct place in the memory of mankind shall fix the attention of a man who is to occupy it eternally.” Let me repeat this again. “It was right that the same Jews who hold such a distinguished place in the memory of mankind.” Later on, a great Zionist leader called Leon Pinsker, was going to say, “The problem with the Jews is we are ghosts on the face of the world.” “Should fix the attention of a man who is to occupy it eternally.” The Jews have never as yet been treated with justice. Their customs and practises kept them afar from society from which they were rejected in their term. However, can we go on please? Can we have the next. There you see a picture. You see it’s going to be very, very important. This is Napoleon. This is a response to the Assembly of Notables, the menorah. This is the emperor of the French finding out justice to the Jews. It’s a very important moment for the Jews. How do they see it? Can we go on, please?

Let’s have a look at the first quotation. Now, Napoleon has now determined the Grand Sanhedrin. Now, this is before it is called. And this is what he has to say, “From the doctrine which will be established that the Jews must consider the Christians as brothers, it follows that marriages between Jews and Christians be recommended because they are vital to the welfare of the nation. The obligation is to authorise only two marriages between Jews and Jewesses out of every three marriages, the third being between Jew and Christian. If this is difficult of execution, it will be necessary to take measures of encouragement and command.” You remember that question? May a Jew marry a Christian? What does Napoleon really want? He wants to control the Jewish community. What he’s going to do is to set up consistories. There’s going to be a main one in Paris made up of rabbinic and lay people. Every Jew must be registered. There are smaller communities and they have to also have a consistory, which is under the grands consistory in Paris. So, he creates a pyramid. He wants to know every Jew in his realm. And also he wants one in three marriages to be into marriages. Can we go on to another one of his? Now, this is important. “The obligation of furnishing a number of conscripts proportionate to the Israeli population without it being possible for an Israelite conscript to provide a replacement, except with other Israelites.” Now you could, if you were wealthy, you could buy your way out of the French army. Not if you were a Jew. If you were a Jew, you could only buy your way out with another Jew. So, already he’s pushing back. Can we see the next thing now?

Now remember, this is before the Grand Sanhedrin. And this is what Napoleon’s ideas really are. “The primary object is to protect the Jewish people and to come to the help of the country districts. The second is to weaken, if not destroy, the tendency of the Jewish people towards a number of practises, which are contrary to the civilization and good order of society. When among every three marriages there will be one between a Jew and a Christian, the blood of the Jew will cease to have any unique character. When a portion of the youth are required to enter the army, they will stop having specific Jewish interests and feelings.” They will assume French interests and feelings. Can we go on again, please, Judy? Another summing up of before the Grand Sanhedrin which of course. “When the Jews are submitted to the authority of civil law, all that remain to them as Jews will be dogma and they will leave their current state of affairs where religion is the only civil law, which has been the situation during the infancy of nations.” So basically from now on, your prime duty is to civil law. Now, what about the next sentence? Good is accomplished slowly and a massive corrupt blood can only be improved by time. The Grand Sanhedrin has the best wishes of all who are enlightened amongst the Jews of Europe. With this support, it has the power to expunge from mosaic legislation or those rules which are atrocious. Can we go back to the picture of the Grand Sanhedrin please, Judy, if you don’t mind? The one before that. Thank you.

So, what does he want to do? He wants to take control of the Jews, and as I said, there’s going to be, the main consistory is to be in Paris with three rabbis and two laymen. And they are actually going to control 13 others, including consistories in the Rhine land and in Italy. And if you wish to remain a member of the mosaic persuasion, there is now a change in definition. You have to register. No new community could be formed without permission of the Paris consistory. Each Jew, it was to be encouraged by the consistories to practise what was called a useful profession. Those who didn’t have an acknowledged livelihood had to be reported. And local rabbis had to encourage young men to go in fort military service and was instructed to give formal exemption from religious observance to any conscript. So if you are conscripted into the army, you don’t have to keep the laws of Shabbat you don’t have to keep the laws of Shabbat or of Kashrut. Also the numbers of men of Jewish army conscripts in each area had to be reported. And this is also important. In matters of education, no rabbi could teach any doctrine, not included in the decision of the Grand Sanhedrin. So, what the Grand Sanhedrin does is to ratify the 12 questions. Now, you know what Napoleon’s thoughts are? On one level, he is the first European leader to actually give the Jews emancipation. But I think you will all agree it is a price. Now in 1808, he issues something known as the infamous decree. There was more anti-Jewish activity in Alsace, in Strasbourg, the capital, mainly from money lending activities. And please don’t forget, at this time, out of a population of about 35 million, there were only 45,000, 40,000 Jews. And by 1880, out of a population of 38 million, there were only a hundred thousand Jews. So, you’re looking at a very small percentage of the population. And he was very angry that there was more trouble in our sass.

So, he said, “Perhaps we should restrict all the rights of Jews.” But then the Portuguese, remember the Portuguese mainly in Bayonne and in Bordeaux, they see themselves as a separate entity. Remember what the Alsatian rabbi said of Furtado. He learnt his Talmud through Voltaire. They said, “We are nothing to do with this. We are loyal Frenchmen.” And so, the edict only applied to the Jews of Alsace-Lorraine. So, a moratorium on all Jewish debts in 1806, remember that’s what caused the Assembly of Notables, was lifted. But any debts which had an interest rate of 10% or more were annulled. And actually, that caused financial ruin to many of these petty money lenders. Any Jew who was in trade or commerce had to obtain annual approval from the local magistrate and the consistory. All contracts awarding Jews or involving Jews had to be approved by the state. Jews from other areas of France were forbidden residents in Alsace-Lorraine and and Alsatian Jews were not allowed to settle elsewhere, unless they were engaged in useful professions. No foreign Jew could settle in France, unless he engaged in agriculture, the same old canal. Now, a further decree was passed a few months later that all Jews who did not have family names adopt and register such names within three months. So, the use of names from the Bible or suggesting French cities were also prohibited. You could no longer be Efron Van Heusen, for example. Now, you have to have a proper surname. Now, this was to be introduced. It was to last for 10 years. And in 1818, by this time Napoleon has fallen.

And in fact, there was a very reactionary Bourbon on the throne, Louis the 18th. The law was not renewed. So, the full emancipation did actually apply to the Jews of France now. But as I said, at a price, and I think for me one of the most interesting aspects of all of this is that it shows you, despite, you know, Napoleon, I think he is an extraordinary figure, he does have much of the prejudice of his time. And yes, the Jews are now emancipated. They are controlled by the state and they’re going to plunge into it. But what I’m interested in now, let’s have one quick look at Zalman of Liadi and then, I want to go on. Remember, this is Shneur Zalman of Liadi the bulk of Eastern European Jewry live now under czar’s rule. Remember, they’d originally gone to the kingdom of Poland, which then combines with the Lithuania, and then annexes the Ukraine. That is the largest area of Jewish settlement. Beginning in 1772, culminating in 1815, Poland is wiped off the map and the bulk of the territory goes to the czars Russia. Galicia, where there’s a large Jewish population, to the Habsburgs. The Austria-Hungarian Empire as it became. And another 75,000 Jews into Prussia. These are the victorious powers at the in Vienna, in the Congress of Vienna of 1815. Now, Shneur Zalman of Liadi, you’ve got to remember the news of the Grand Sanhedrin, Napoleon, the emperor of the French, probably the most famous person in the world doing something for the Jews. American rabbis gave sermons. Reform rabbis are giving sermons.

Well, when I use the word reform, when I’m saying modern rabbis at this stage, they give sermons about it. This is the great deliverer of the French. This is the great deliverer of the Jews. But Shneur Zalman of Liadi, who created , he actually went on march with the czar’s armies, the anti-Semitic czars. And this is what he wrote, “I would rather my people be persecuted under the tsars the live in peace under Napoleon, for he will be the end of the Jewish people.” Now, this legislation is going to have far reaching effects though, because please don’t forget that Napoleon has conquered. So, what about the lands he has conquered and what is going to happen to them? Because please don’t forget also, when Napoleon falls, what will go on. Now, after Napoleon’s Concord Act with the Pope in 1801, he’s consolidated his power in France. So, he continues the huge French expansion of Europe. And the main countries, he’s going to now be part, he’s bringing into the empire, areas with large Jewish centres of population. So what I’m going, this is why Napoleon and the revolution and the ideas of the revolution are so very, very important because it’s going to apply to many, many people. So, let’s talk first about the Netherlands. Because in 1795, the French revolutionary armies occupied the Netherlands and established what was known as the Batavian Republic. And as you all know, conditions for the Jews in the Netherlands were far better than any other countries in Europe, even before the French Revolution.

Those of you who have visited Amsterdam, I’m sure you’ve seen the incredible Sephardic Synagogue. And also many of the Jews of Amsterdam, the earliest settlers in Amsterdam, had come to Calvinist Holland that had broken away from Spain. And they were incredibly useful in the pursuit of trade. Never forget that the Dutch West Indies and the Dutch East India Company became the most, the biggest conglomerates in the world. And pragmatically, the Dutch gave all sorts of rights to Jews in Amsterdam that they hadn’t had before or anywhere else, except maybe in England, but we won’t talk about that. So, they had certain disabilities. Certain towns did still exclude them though. But in the Maine, the Jews were living a reasonable life. If you think for example, of Rembrandt, he lived in the Jewish quarter. I’m sure you’ve all seen paintings of the people he painted. They wore, the Jews he painted, they wore ordinary costumes. They lived a reasonable life. But what was interesting, bearing in mind there was certain towns that didn’t admit Jews, the powerful French ambassador Noel, he actually insisted that the Dutch National Assembly grant complete equality to all citizens, including the Jews. In 1808, the newly created Napoleon’s brother Louis, who becomes the leader of Holland, he actually introduces a French consistory style for the whole of the Jewish population. And so, he brings it in within the framework of Napoleon. Napoleon had this wonderful habit of putting his family, you know, the Corsican venture, many of his family members are going to sit on the thrones of Europe. Now, let’s talk about the German states.

And I’m sure you all know, and we are turning to Germany in some detail in the end of January. The plan for next what we are going to complete France, taking it right up to the modern period. Then, we’re going to have a week on Albania, a couple of weeks on Romania, and then the main focus of the spring term will be on Germany. And I’m sure you all know that Germany at this period is divided up into over 7,370 city states. Each one has its own ruler. Each one has its own customs, its own custom union. And many of the Jews who were even allowed into Germany were in ghettos. So basically now, Germany, some of the German states are attacked by Napoleon. And they are annexed. And of course, the Rhine land, the area rest west of the Rhine is formally annexed by France in 1798. Although they’d conquered it earlier, what that meant 20,000 Jews of the Rhineland are going to be given equal rights. So, And until the fall of Napoleon, it’s going to be an integral part of France and representatives from the Rhineland therefore they came to an Assembly of Notables as full members. So, and of course it’s in the Rhineland that some of the most interesting characters in modern Jewish history emerged, like as I already mentioned to you, the Marx family. It’s also, but then of course, when Napoleon is defeated, there’s going to be a real problem because at the Congress of Vienna that met in 1815 to tie up Europe after the French Revolution, what was the main aim? To stop the ideas of Napoleon, the ideas of the Enlightenment. It’s a very conservative body. It’s composed of the victorious, the Austrians represented by Metternich, the Prussians, the British who weren’t really that concerned with the mainland of Europe. They’re living their own life.

They’ve got their huge empire. And so it’s the Prussians, the Austrian, and the Russians. Now, what is going to happen to the Jews who had been enlightened under Napoleon in the Rhineland, including some incredibly interesting families who have now for the first time been awarded special rights? And that meant… And can we really explain that incredible explosion into the modern world? But the Jews of the Rhineland, they just flooded into the professions. And what I’m looking for at the moment, because it’s flicked over, is an extraordinary letter written by Heinrich Heine. So if you bear with me one minute because it flick over and I think it’s quite important. Yeah. There’s going to be a lot more on him later on because yes, Heinrich Heine, at first, he adored Napoleon and he spent much of his time in France. Heinrich Heine, the doubly alienated German poet. But by when the rights were taken away after the fall of Napoleon, he with a group of others actually created a society for the promotion of culture amongst the Jews because he realised that they were losing their Jewish identity. And Heine in the end though, he was desperate for a chair at Dusseldorf University. Never got it. Because can you imagine, rights are awarded then they’re taken away. And he wrote this extraordinary letter, he converts and he says this from the, because he still he thinks the only way is his passport in. Just as later on the great Moses Mendelssohn, the majority of his children converted, his son, when his son Abraham converted his two children, Felix and Fanny, he said, “We have converted you because Christianity is the religion of the civilised.”

Now, his is what Heinrich Heine had to say, “From the nature of my thinking, you can deduce that baptism is a matter of indifference to me. That I do not regard it as important, even symbolically. We are living in sad times. Scoundrels become our best and the best must turn scoundrel. The baptismal certificate is the certificate of admission to European culture.” Keep that phrase in mind, “The baptismal certificate is the ticket of admission to European culture.” “My becoming a Christian is the fault of those Saxons who suddenly change saddles at Leipzig or of Napoleon who really did not have to go to Russia, or if his teacher of geography, Brienne, who did not tell him that Moscow winters were very cold.” In fact, fascinating after Heine, of course, Heine converted, he doesn’t get the chair. He’s a radical. He goes to live in Paris. And towards the end of his life, somebody asks him about religion. He says, “I’m a Jew.” In the end, I realised that the Jews were always, the Greeks were beautiful, but the Jews were always powerful men. But it gives you a notion of the kind of agony that, for the first time, talented Jews are going to face. Imagine Herschel Marx, Karl Marx’s father, he’d become a lawyer. Once Napoleon falls, he can’t practise law anymore. These are really acute problems. Now, Hamburg and the Hanseatic League, they were annexed to France in 1810. That was to counter the British blockade. So because of that, they granted equal rights to the Jews, but they didn’t want Jewish emancipation. These are merchant cities. They see the Jews as rivals. So, and in fact, Bremen and Lubeck had previously forbidden Jewish residents. Directly Napoleon falls, they’re expelled again. So, that’s what happened in the Hanseatic League.

And it’s not going to be until 1871 under Bismarck that full emancipation is going to be granted to the Jews of Germany. Now, what about other kingdoms? The Kingdom of Westphalia. It’s very important that we go through these because you need to understand, and I’m sure many of you have studied this, but it’s important to reiterate just how powerful the impact of Napoleon was. Napoleon establishes a Kingdom of Westphalia after the defeat of Prussia and he puts his brother Jerome on the throne. And that comprises Hanover and Brunswick, with the western provinces of Prussia. So the west of Prussia now, individual states, it’s now the Kingdom of Westphalia and the capital was in Kassel. So, there were 15,000 Jews. He establishes a foot, many of them have been in ghettos. He now establishes a consistory on the French pattern. So now, these Jews have, they have equality. And the court banker, Israel Jacobson, who was incredibly useful, he was appointed head of the Jewish community and with the king’s support, institutes the first measure of religious reform. Because here, you have Israel Jacobson, he’s a court Jew. We have a long tradition of court Jews. He wants to raise the Jews up and he realises he has to institute reform. And we will be addressing the whole issue of reform Judaism. Let me say, in the beginning, it was never about theology. It’s to make Judaism acceptable to the outside world, which meant decorum, the sermons, and the vernacular and getting rid of those areas, which those who hankered after the Enlightenment, who hankered after being accepted as citizens of Europe believed were a bar.

Now, what about Frankfurt? This is where they had to wait the longest. Ironically, Frankfurt, of course, is the city of the Rothschilds. An interesting Mayer, his wife, Guttle, who lived to be 93, she would never leave the ghetto. So the city council, they refused the French demands to remove Jewish disabilities. And after the second occupation of 1796, the restrictions on the ghetto were lifted mainly because the area had been removed by the fighting. And it remains a semi-independent state. And finally, the Jews of Frankfurt had to buy their equality. 440,000 guilder was the sum annually in order for Jewish equality. And they had to raise the loan. And it’s fascinating because if you think about it, the richest Jewish family in the world came from Frankfurt. And whenever there was a Rothschild marriage, the families would go back to the ghetto for the blessing of Guttle. And in fact, Nathan, who was the British Rothschild, what happened, I’m sure you all know, Mayer Amschel of the ghetto of Frankfurt. He sent four of his sons out, one to London, one to Paris, one to Naples, one to Vienna. And of course, they create and one stays behind. And they create this incredible family and they become really the symbol of wealth in the world. So basically, but for the blessing of the mother, they go back to the ghetto in Frankfurt. And there’s a lovely story about Guttle. Again, there was a fear of a European war. This was after Napoleon’s fall. And the neighbours come to Guttle crying and she says, “Don’t worry, there won’t be a war. My sons won’t let them.”

Now, what about the allies of France? The Grand Duchy of Berg, which had a Jewish population of 12,000. Jews were allowed to attend general schools. So basically, they take over some of the ideas of the revolution. In the Kingdom of Bavaria the Jewish population was 50,000. But only the community in Munich, which made up of 150 Jews, had was allowed right of residents. So basically, even those who are allied to France are with, there’s still a resistance in the German states going on. Prussia. Prussia is defeated by Napoleon in 1806. However, they begin to introduce emancipation and they themselves, the Prussian authorities themselves, decide to issue in 1812 an edict of emancipation, which lifted all the disabilities against the Jews. So, they granted civil rights and the promise of future political political rights. And you’ve got to remember also the loss, they’d lost East Prussia to the new Duchy of Warsaw created by Napoleon. So that they’d lost their 200,000 poor Polish Jews. So basically, Jews had been granted full emancipation. Why? Because there’s a whole card now of rich Prussian Jewish bankers and they want to keep them. Again, it’s the image of the Jew and money. They’re quite prepared to lose the poor Jews. Now, in Denmark in 1814 modelled on the Prussian edict, the Danes issue an edict of emancipation, which gives civil but not political rights to Danish members of the mosaic faith. So, you see what’s happening in Europe.

It’s very much the Napoleonic method. People of the mosaic religion are given a certain amount of rights. Now, Italy. Italy invades and of course the Jews of Italy, as I’ve already mentioned, they are going to undergo huge change because he does break down the ghetto war physically, wherever he conquers. Ironically, much of the population of Italy welcomed the French as heroes. And the withdrawal of the French armies from Italy for Napoleon’s campaign in Egypt temporarily reversed the situation. Counter-revolutionary forces, particularly clerical forces, made things very, very bad for the Jews. So basically, what I’m saying to you is you have this extraordinary response. And don’t forget that when Napoleon conquers Warsaw that he creates the Duchy of Warsaw. He now has all these Jews under his command. So by 1810, there are 310,000 Jews, which represented about 8% of the total population of the Warsaw Duchy. The majority of Jews are in Russia, remember? And the cornerstone of the state is based on the code Napoleon. So of course, after the fall of the Duchy of Warsaw, all these rights are going to be whittled down. So to sum up, Napoleon is supported in the Maine by the Jews of Central and Western Europe, particularly those who are beginning to make a good living. And also, I said this to you last week, never forget the, what it must have been like to come out of the ghetto, to actually go to the capital cities, to see what was happening, and why was it an incredible success story. I mean, next week I’m going to talk about the growth of antisemitism in France, but I’m allying that to the most extraordinary success story.

As I said to you before, by 1880, there were only a hundred thousand Jews in France. A third of the bankers were Jewish. It wasn’t just the French Rothschilds who were incredible philanthropists. It wasn’t just their banking. It was also they created the railway networks, the Pereire brothers who also were involved in the creating of the railway networks. Think of the gallery Lafayette, the great department store of Paris. The son-in-law creates Monoprix. Think about Andre Citroen. Whatever area of industry of business, but think also of the radicals. Karl Marx went to live in Paris. He was there at the time of the rape revolution of 1848, had to come to England. Think about Heine. There’s a whole circle of revolutionaries in Paris. There’s also the beginnings of Jews exploding into the intellectual professions. Sociology as a discipline is created by a Jew, Durkheim. Now, many of these people throw away their Jewishness, not the Rothschilds, but many of particularly those who go into academia. So, what you get is an incredibly high visibility profile and a love affair with modernity. And please don’t forget something else. There are two Francis. Yes, I think from the extracts I’ve given you about Napoleon, you will see that he had many of the issues of his own class and background. Look, there’s a terrible quote. That Jew hatred is to delight dislike Jews more than is necessary. I think I have over the months very carefully explained to you where I believe Jew hatred comes from. And I think tragically, it does come from Christianity.

Now, let’s be careful because Christianity is also a moral religion. But all the blame for the death of Jesus, who remember is God, is not put at the hands of the Romans, is put at the hands of the Jews. Don’t use rationality in this. And also the image of the gentle Jew wound around the great cathedrals, read the sayings of the church fathers, read the gospels themself. This is the negative stereotype that goes on and on and on. And then, you have the European Enlightenment and we’re going to be part of it. And not only that, the great emperor of the French is making us part of it. This is going to be the brave new world. And if they don’t like us, because the majority of French Jews become middle class and bourgeois, don’t let kid ourselves. I’m not talking here about the revolutionist. The same is going to be true in Germany. The same is going to be true in the Habsburg Empire. They just wanted to be accepted and many of them wanted to keep their religion, but then most of them wanted to modernise it. But they wanted to be seen as French, and German, and Italian, and whatever. And the pain, that’s why I think so many baptised. I think many of the baptisms were not religious conversions necessarily at all. It was the final Philip of saying, “Yes, we love your world and we want to be part of it.” So basically, of course, the response in Eastern Europe was completely different, because under the czars in Eastern Europe, that is where you have the bulk of the Jewish community. But Warsaw was the third Jewish by 1900.

You need to take on the intensity of the Jews who lived to the west of the Russian Empire, in what became known as the Pale of Settlement, where I guess an awful lot of the people who are Jewish living on, who are online today, I guess many of your families came from. You would live in a town or a village that was maybe 80% Jewish, because you needed the community. You would’ve lived a Jewish life. And you see the dream of intermarriage, the dream of conversion, the dream of being part of a society. France had a very strong middle class. So did Germany. Think about Russia with its terrible antisemitism, with its aristocracy, Basically at this period, there isn’t really a developmental class to move into. So basically, they would’ve been pretty sure that their society really was the one to live by and they were religious. I’m going to read a little more from Shneur Zalman of Liadi. This is when he writes to one of his followers. And he died, remember, on campaign with the czar. “If Napoleon wins, Jewish wealth and prosperity will rise, but Jewish hearts will be defeated. But if Alexander wins,” the czar, “our poverty and persecution will increase. Jewish dignity reduced, but the hearts of Jews will become close to God. And though I die soon and our Jews will be taken into the Russian army, it is worth it. Please destroy this letter.” So basically, I suppose what I’m saying to you now is the forces unleashed by Napoleon bringing their wake completely contradictory elements. It’s the breakup also of the old feudal patterns of organisation. It opens up a huge range of new opportunities. Imagine you are the bright boy of the yeshiva, and now you can be the bright boy of the savo. They set up whole new fields of study. That’s the point. They are the outsiders, the outsiders to the system.

And I think I don’t find the Jewish success story difficult to evaluate because I do believe that if you push a people into certain trades and professions, and that’s what happened historically through Christianity, we weren’t allowed to be part of most professions because they were Christian guilds. You make a people stay together. And don’t forget the rabbis didn’t enclose the Jews in what they called the wall of law. And you do have a finite kind of study. And even if you don’t study, the greatest thing is, the greatest person in the town or village is the rabbi. Many of the court Jews, remember, were rabbis or had great rabbinic training. And I think we would all agree that Talmudic training is great mind training. Now, what the choice is now and after 1871, it could be Oxford or Cambridge. England is a completely different case as we’ve established. In the past in England, it’s a long slow process of emancipation, a different story. But now, you can be part of it. What is the price you have to pay? And the despair, and I think that the horror story that is later to occur is they didn’t see the rise of racial anti-Semitism, because the collapse of Napoleon, the collapse of the French Revolution, and don’t forget the complete disarray of France in the 19th century. I keep on labouring this and I know that William does as well. You’ve got to see a completely divided society.

You have the French Revolution, the France of secularism, the France of liberalism, the France of tolerance on one side. But what is on the other? The church, conservatism, monarchy. And France undergoes huge changes. Not only because what is going to happen is modernity is going to break into France. Look, I just mentioned that the Rothschilds and the Pereires, they funded the railway network. Do you think the majority of people like railways? What did it mean? It meant ugly cities. It meant industrialization. It means the end of the lovely countryside, the romantic idea. Look, the reality was not that, but it’s about fantasy. It’s the clash between the Enlightenment and romanticism and who is seen as the arbiter of modernity. Be it your doctor who’s going to have strange methods, be it the sociologist, be it those that are even daring to tamper with sexuality. Can you imagine how the church came down on these kind of things? In the Maine, they are people of Jewish birth who want so desperately to be loved and part of it. And some are prepared to take, to go the whole route and to actually convert. So, what I’m saying to you is the French revolution is the watershed in European history. Nobody could have foreseen the rise of racial antisemitism. But except I would say that when society is going through stress, and this is where we have parallels today, when you have economic, social, and political unrest and France was the country part excellence in the 19th century.

You know, the French weren’t even reproducing themselves because there was this kind of, you know, there were harvest failures. Nobody knew what kind of monarchy you were going to have or whether you were going to have a republic. It was such an uncertain, terrible time that people weren’t even having many children. So basically in this kind of malaise, when you also see the growth of a strong French nationalism, what kind of country are we? Romantic nationalism, going back to the past. Now, do the Jews fit into this at all? No, they’re not seen as doing so. You can be as French as you scream yourself to be, but if you are not of our blood, because don’t forget in the 19th century, you begin to see these notions of race and blood. So, France becomes an completely divided society even though the Jews are a tiny percentage of the population and it’s going explode of course into the Dreyfus affair. And I’m contend in a couple of lectures I’ll be giving in a couple of weeks that it goes, that it actually goes from Dreyfuss to Vichy. The French did a wonderful minds trick in the Second World War. The treatment of the Jewish population in France during the war was absolutely appalling, and yet the French have managed. It’s changed now, but for a long time they put themselves out as something incredibly special. But when we analyse it, I’m afraid it’s not so. Having said that, it’s also the land that first gave Europe liberty, equality, and fraternity. And again, the whole situation rests. And one of the presentations I’m going to be giving later on is I’m going to talk about Herzl in Paris. Because when Theodore Herzl arrives in Paris as a correspondent of the Neue Freie Presse, he’s balled over. He says France is the centre of civilization. It will take the rest of the world a hundred years to achieve what the French achieve. And where is he? He’s there for the Dreyfuss affair. So, I will stop now and I hope we’ve got a lot of debate on this.

Q&A and Comments:

Q: David says, “Were the only man, were the Jews the only minority in France at the time of the Grand Sanhedrin?”

A: Other than the Huguenots, yes.

Q: “Is the Grand Sanhedrin still in France?”

A: It doesn’t exist anymore.

Q: “Did Napoleon see himself as Cyrus the Great of the Persian Empire?”

A: Oh, yes.

Q: This is from Peter, “What about acknowledging the influences of the Enlightenment on modern Israel? Ben-Gurion, Mayer, Rabin, and Diane were all atheists and their beliefs were clearly influenced by Enlightenment thinkers. In Tel Aviv, you can see which books Ben-Gurion had in his personal library. It concluded one of the best collections of books by encyclopaedia I’ve seen. The Enlightenment can justly be considered as part of modern Jewish heritage.”

A: Yes, yes, totally agree with you Peter. And in a way, I think it must have been heartbreaking. I may have mentioned this to you before. One of the last conversations I ever had with the late Robert Wistrich who headed up the Centre for the Study of Antisemitism in Jerusalem was an argument we had on the Enlightenment. And he said, 'cause he died in 2014, and he said, “You’ve got to accept I think tragically the Enlightenment was a blip.” Of course, the Enlightenment would think to Jews even would appeal to Jews, Peter, even Jewish atheists. I mean, what are the prophets about? Are not the prophets are about Enlightenment and social justice? The Enlightenment is a wonderful dream. What was it Gandhi said about western civilization? Too soon to tell. Is the Enlightenment over? I hope not. Alan Warman’s telling us his maternal grandmother came from Harlem and her family that lived in the Netherlands far back as she could recall survive the war in hiding. Yes. You see, Jews began to go to Holland after Holland broke away from Spain. Holland becomes Calvinist. They break away from the Spanish Empire and they become this great trading nation. So, converso are welcomed.

Q: “So, were my ancestors now Belarus supporting Napoleon when he invaded Russia?”

A: Robert, I very much doubt it. I doubt it because they’re, I say that’s complicated. The majority of rabbis in Eastern Europe were against it, because they thought it would lead to the disintegration of Judaism. However, I remember the great Jack Kagan mentioning to me, and he came from Novogrodek, in Belarus, he had the Mendelssohn translation of the of the Biur. So in his little shack in Belarus, there was the Mendelssohn translation. That is a complicated question, Robert, You’ll need to do some more research on that In the Maine, I would think they wouldn’t because you know, look, from what I’ve told you about Napoleon, look, it does break down the ghetto war. It just does plunger plunge the Jews into the modern world. But on the other hand, the modern world was worth having, wasn’t it? It didn’t have to go so terribly wrong.

Q: “In what year did Franz Joseph give Jews religious freedom in the Austria Hungarian Empire?”

A: Judith, it was 1866, I think. I’ll check that in the whole of Habsburg Empire. Yes, Nathan first came to Manchester, of course , it was the centre of cotton industry. He came with a fortune of 20,000 pounds. And then, he came to London where he married the daughter of one of the richest Jews in England, Levy Barent Cohen. And her other daughter, Levy Barent Cohen’s other daughter, married Nathan, married Moses Montefiore. And they lived next door to each other in Park Lane and I think Montefiore, they did business together. That must have been quite an interesting circle.

“My Austrian paternal grandfather, Dr. Jacob Braun, did genealogical researchers tracing one line of ancestry in the Schlesinger family as far back as 1540 in . Our family as a brief letter of permission awarded to Moses and Mark Schlesinger from Charles VI, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, presumably for their financial support.” Yes, it’s interesting, a lot of the emperors had they, I think if I remember rightly, Charles VI, I’ll have to check this, he was very supportive of Jews and most of them had a huff feud. One of Schlesinger daughters married a Herman Heine, grandfather of Heinrich Heine, one of whose aphorisms where they burned books. They will, in the end, burned human beings too.

Yes, that is such an important phrase, isn’t it? Because yes, Heinrich Heine’s uncle was a very wealthy banker, and Heine had a very ambiguous relationship with money. So did Karl Marx. Karl Marx, his mother’s brother created the Phillips Empire in Holland. Justin in Constantinople started the ghetto and Jews subject to and only to possess donkeys and not allowed to ride on horse. I’m not sure about that. It wasn’t just under Islam, there were certain rules. I don’t think it was Justinian, but though the Muslims that it’s the Dhimmi status. You could not ride in processions as high as Muslim, but that’s a whole other subject. And in fact, we have lovely Lynn Julius coming in soon to talk about the last Jews of the Arab world. And we have given occasional lectures on this. And of course, there was anti-Jewish feeling in Roman and Greek times. Of course, there was. “Jews were separate. Jews were clannish. Jews were monotheistic,” quote, unquote. But on the other hand, it wasn’t the same level that you found in the Christian world.

Judy, “Just brought light and insight from the past of our licorice all sorts family descended from merchants in Zara and from Prussia.” How interesting.

“I think it was Mao who might have said it was too soon to tell if the French Revolution was successful. Might have been Ho Chi Minh.” Fascinating. “Did Herzl visit U.K.?” Yes, indeed he did. In fact, Herzl came to Kilburn. In 1896, he arrived at the home of a writer called Israel Zangwill, with letters of introduction from Dr. Max Nordal. And of course, you can make the case that political Zionism was born in the living room of 24 Oxford Road, Kilburn.

“Third generation Rothschilds married Art the Arthrusis and now Christian. We’ve lost so many wonderful families.” Yes, yes. That in itself is a story. But if you think about it, we’ve held the core. We always have. It’s a complicated, long, difficult story.

This is from Josie. “Our great-grandmother saved documents from seven generations of our maternal family. They lay in boxes until after my mother died. Their original grants of surnames to our grandfathers, the last handwritten bar mitzvah in one family in 1842, Kiddush cups, baptismal certificates.” What wonderful, wonderful family memories.

You know, that’s as I said, I’ve said it to you many, many times, that’s what I like about lockdown. One of the things I like so much that we share so many things, so much information.

So, may I wish you all good night and I personally will see you back next Tuesday. And keep safe everyone, bye.