-
Preface and Acknowledgments
- Wayne State University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
vii Preface and Acknowledgments This book began with a basic question: How did French anticlerical legislation affect French Jews during the first half of the Third Republic (roughly 1875–1906)? Searching for the answer led me to focus on education, which was one of the main targets of anticlerical activity. My research into schools took me to France, where I combed the holdings of the Archives Nationales, the Consistoire de Paris, and the Consistoire Central. The sources quickly convinced me that what happened during the Third Republic had roots in the early nineteenth century, and I expanded my study accordingly. I had originally intended to focus on the legislative and intellectual aspects of the question, but early on discovered a new, unexplored thread: the financial relationship between French Judaism and the French state. I followed that thread back to legal thinking, which took me to the Archives du Conseil d’État in Paris. This rich resource provided valuable insight into government views of Judaism in particular, and church-state relations generally. The analytical narrative that follows contains the results of this complex investigation. While I was working on this project, the French government banned from the public schools all religious symbolism and clothing (e.g., headscarves for Muslims, kippot for Jews, and crucifixes for Christians). The socalled “Veil Law” of 2004 generated a good deal of controversy, both in France and internationally.1 I did not set out to write about Jews and French schools as an analogy for Muslims and French schools; nor did I seek to comment on contemporary French attitudes toward religion. Nevertheless, as I tell my students, sometimes we find relevance and sometimes relevance finds us. Such is the case with this book, which explores the intertwining of politics and religion in an age seemingly removed from contemporary identity politics. Upon closer examination, the case of Jews and education in the nineteenth century has much to teach us about the way in which broad viii P R E FAC E A N D AC K N OW L E D G M E N T S conceptions respond to specific realities. Nineteenth-century French Jews had to manage government expectations of them and their religion while forging conceptions of themselves as both Jews and citizens of France. A predisposition toward achieving acceptance necessarily limited the points of view available to acculturating French Jews at that time; simply put, with full cultural separatism off the table, they had to explore other options. The reader, therefore, will not find in this book the intellectual or political militancy that characterizes contemporary debate. Yet this absence should not suggest any lack of commitment or passion on the part of the Jewish leaders discussed in the following pages. Even after going over this material many times, I am still struck by their extraordinary dedication to learning, to their fellow Jews, and to the country they loved. This study would not have appeared without the help of a number of individuals and institutions. I could not have undertaken the initial primary research without the generous support of the Tauber Institute for the Study of European Jewry and the Frances and Jeffrey Sachar Fund at Brandeis University, and the Memorial Foundation for Jewish Culture. I was also privileged to work with the collection of French Judaica at Brandeis University, and to view key holdings at the library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. In France, the benefits of being an exchange fellow at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris—from the use of their extensive library to the hospitality of their dormitory—are too numerous to mention. The access I was afforded to the Archives of the Central Consistory (where I was helped by the wise counsel of the director, M. Philippe Landau), the Archives Nationales, and the Archives of the Conseil d’État were vital to my research. Likewise, the assistance I received from the staff of the Biblioth éque de l’Alliance Israélite Universelle and its director, M. Jean-Claude Kuperminc, proved invaluable. I am indebted to those who served as sounding boards at various stages of the project. I especially appreciate the friendship and support of Richard Latner, Henry Samuel Levinson, Gregory Grieve, Sarah Krive, and Maud Mandel, all of whom read early parts of the manuscript and contributed valuable comments. At Kalamazoo College, I have benefited from the insights of Joseph Bangura and Espelencia Baptiste, both of whom helped me tighten my...