“No Heart for Faith”: Depicting Freethinkers and Debating Freethought in the American Yiddish Press (1880s-1920s) Restricted; Files Only

Abstract

Between the 1880s and 1920s, nearly two and a half million Jews emigrated from Eastern Europe to the United States, where they developed a robust Yiddish print culture in cities like New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia. Among these immigrants was a broad range of Jews who considered themselves freethinkers. Bound up with the wider history of freethought in the modern period, Jewish freethinkers emerged with the gradual decline of religion as the principal framework shaping notions of truth and authority and the concomitant rise of science and rationalism as competing systems. In America’s Jewish immigrant communities, the most vocal freethinkers tended to embrace radical political ideologies, namely socialism or anarchism—ideologies originally considered at odds with expressions of Jewish particularity. Should freethinking radicals ignore religion or actively fight against it? How should they relate to religious family, friends, and coworkers? Could freethinking Jews maintain some sense of Jewishness? If so, could historically religious rituals play a role in their secular lives? Freethinking Jewish immigrants took to the American Yiddish press to debate the answers to these questions while being shaped by dramatic events on both sides of the Atlantic. Yiddish writers—radical, conservative, or anywhere in-between—also used fictional Jewish freethinkers to pose questions about religion’s past, present, and future meaning. Focusing on the late 1880s to the early 1920s, this study considers how Yiddish journalists in America discussed freethought and depicted freethinkers, how these discussions and depictions changed over time, and the role they played in navigating America’s religious context. It draws primarily, though not exclusively, on editorials, short stories, and advice columns appearing in the popular Yiddish press. And, since debates about freethought and depictions of freethinkers were particularly meaningful to Jewish radicals, this study pays considerable attention to the radical Yiddish press, especially the popular socialist Yiddish press.

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT

 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

 

INTRODUCTION: Frum Freethinkers and the American Yiddish Press ………………… 1

Freethought and Jewish Religion in Modern Times ………………….…………………...... 8

Freethinkers or Apikorsim? Notes on Terminology ………………………………………... 17

Religion and Irreligion in the Study of American Jewish History: Approach and Methodology ……………………………………………………………………………….. 22

Chapters ……………………………………………………………………………………. 27       

 

PART ONE: 1880s-1904 ……………………………………………………………………... 32

                             

CHAPTER ONE: “A Mockery of the Jewish Faith”: Jewish Radical Politics and Antireligious Agitation (1886-1897) …………………………………………………………. 33

Introduction ………………………………………………………………………………... 33

Jewish Immigrant Radicals and Antireligious Propaganda in the 1880s  ………………….. 35

How Should a Freethinker Behave? Toward an Antireligious Middle Path ………………. 52        

Is a Middle Path Possible?: Tensions in Antireligious Tendencies ………………………... 68   

Embracing Piety’s Power: Radical Politics as Religion …………………………………… 77          

Conclusion …………………………………………………………………………………. 85                                                       

CHAPTER TWO: “What Are We Then?”: Freethought, Religion, and Jewishness in the Socialist Yiddish Press (1897-1904) …………………………………………………………. 87

Introduction ………………………………………………………………………………... 87

Division and Discord in Socialist Politics (1897-1899) …………………………………… 90          

Leon Kobrin and Fraygezonenheyt in “Anna’s Ma Nishtana” (1899) …………………….. 95

Leon Kobrin, Ibergangs-Menshen, and the Controversy Surrounding “What is He?” (1899) ……………………………………………………………………………………………... 109

Acculturation, Tolerance, and the American Yiddish Press (1900-1902) ………………... 119

Antisemitism, Jewishness, and Religion after Kishinev (1903) ………………………….. 132

Debating Tolerance and Freethought in the Radical Yiddish Press (1904) ………………. 141

Conclusion ………………………………………………………………………………... 154

 

PART TWO: 1905-1914 …………………………………………………………………….. 156

 

CHAPTER THREE: Freethought, Religion, and Jewishness in American Yiddish Literature (1905-1914) ……………………………………………………………………… 157

Introduction ………………………………………………………………………………. 157     

New Arrivals, Nationalism, and the Poetry of the Past …………………………………... 161

Fictional Freethinkers at the Intersection of Nation and Religion ………………………. 173

The Conservative Yiddish Press and Jewish Freethinkers After 1905 ………………...... 190

Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………...... 205                                         

CHAPTER FOUR: Debating Freethought and Religion in the American Yiddish Press (1905-1914) ………………………………………………………………………………….. 207

Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 207

Tensions and Tolerance: D.M. Hermalin and the Varhayt ................................................. 211

Yankev Pfeffer: Apikorses as Religion and Socialism as Religion .................................... 223

Rethinking Antireligious Propaganda: Reviewing Benyomen Faygenboym’s Kosher and treyf (1909) ......................................................................................................................... 231           

Debating Religion, Freethought, and Jewishness in the Forverts ...................................... 243

Conclusion ……………………………………………………………………………….. 258

 

PART THREE: 1914 and Beyond …………………………………………………………. 259

 

CHAPTER FIVE: Depicting Freethinkers during the Great War and in the Early Interwar Period ………………………………………………………………………………………... 260

Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 260

War and Peace on the Jewish Street .................................................................................... 262

Debating the War’s Impact on Religion .............................................................................. 274

Freethought and Religion Moving into the Interwar Period ................................................ 282

Conclusion ........................................................................................................................... 294

 

EPILOGUE: An After(Free)thought? American Jews and the Religious-Secular Mélange...................................................................................................................................... 302

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY .................................................................................................................... 314                                                                 

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School	Laney Graduate School
Department	Religion
Subfield / Discipline	Jewish Religious Cultures
Degree	Ph.D.
Submission	Dissertation
Language	English
Research Field	Jewish Studies Religion, History of American Studies
Keyword	freethought print culture Jews freethinker religious studies Judaism Yiddish American religion Jewish studies
Committee Chair / Thesis Advisor	Eric L. Goldstein, Emory University
Committee Members	Gary Laderman, Emory University Miriam Udel, Emory University Allen Tullos, Emory University

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