Shtetl
Encyclopedia
A shtetl was typically a small town with a large Jewish
population in Central
and Eastern Europe
until The Holocaust
. Shtetls (Yiddish plural
: שטעטלעך, shtetlekh) were mainly found in the areas which constituted the 19th century Pale of Settlement
in the Russian Empire
, the Congress Kingdom of Poland
, Galicia and Romania
. A larger city, like Lemberg (Lviv)
or Czernowitz, was called a shtot ; a smaller village was called a dorf .
The concept of shtetl culture is used as a metaphor for the traditional way of life of 19th-century Eastern European Jews. Shtetls are portrayed as pious communities following Orthodox Judaism
, socially stable and unchanging despite outside influence or attacks. The Holocaust
resulted in the disappearance of the vast majority of shtetls, through both extermination under Nazi occupation and exodus to the United States and Palestine
- as well as to the main cities of Russia, opened to Jewish habitation with the fall of the Czarist regime.
ago and saw long periods of relative tolerance and prosperity as well as times of extreme poverty, hardships until pogrom
in XIX century, inspired by Russian Tsars.
Not only did the Jews of the shtetl speak a unique language (Yiddish), but they also had a unique rhetorical style, rooted in traditions of Talmudic learning:
The shtetl operates on a communal spirit where giving to the needy is not only admired, but expected and essential:
This approach to good deeds finds its roots in Jewish religious views, summarized in Pirkei Avot by Shimon Hatzaddik
's "three pillars":
Tzedaka (charity) is a key element of Jewish culture, both secular and religious, to this day. It exists not only as a material tradition (e.g. tzedaka boxes), but also immaterially, as an ethos of compassion and activism for those in need.
Material things were neither disdained nor extremely praised in the shtetl. Learning and education were the ultimate measures of worth in the eyes of the community, while money was secondary to status.
Menial labor was generally looked down upon as prost, or prole
. Even the poorer classes in the shtetl tended to work in jobs that required the use of skills, such as shoe-making or tailoring of clothes.
The shtetl had a consistent work ethic which valued hard work and frowned upon laziness. Studying, of course, was considered the most valuable and hardest work of all. Learned yeshiva
men who did not provide bread and relied on their wives for money were not frowned upon but praised as ideal Jews.
The May Laws
introduced by Tsar Alexander III of Russia
in 1882 banned Jews from rural areas and towns of fewer than ten thousand people. In the 20th century revolutions, civil wars, industrialization and the Holocaust destroyed traditional shtetl existence. However, Hasidic Jews have founded new communities in the United States, such as Kiryas Joel
and New Square
.
There is a belief found in historical and literary writings that the shtetl disintegrated before it was destroyed during World War II; however, this alleged cultural break-up is never clearly defined.
's stories, and Anatevka, the setting of the musical
Fiddler on the Roof
(based on other stories of Sholom Aleichem) are other notable fictional shtetls.
The 2002 novel Everything Is Illuminated
, by Jonathan Safran Foer
, tells a fictional story set in the Ukrainian shtetl Trachimbrod. (Trochenbrod
)
The 1992 children's book Something from Nothing, written and illustrated by Phoebe Gilman
, is an adaptation of a traditional Jewish folktale set in a fictional shtetl.
In 1996 the Frontline programme Shtetl broadcast; it was about Polish Christian and Jewish relations.
Ashkenazi Jews
Ashkenazi Jews, also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim , are the Jews descended from the medieval Jewish communities along the Rhine in Germany from Alsace in the south to the Rhineland in the north. Ashkenaz is the medieval Hebrew name for this region and thus for Germany...
population in Central
Central Europe
Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...
and Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe is the eastern part of Europe. The term has widely disparate geopolitical, geographical, cultural and socioeconomic readings, which makes it highly context-dependent and even volatile, and there are "almost as many definitions of Eastern Europe as there are scholars of the region"...
until The Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
. Shtetls (Yiddish plural
Plural
In linguistics, plurality or [a] plural is a concept of quantity representing a value of more-than-one. Typically applied to nouns, a plural word or marker is used to distinguish a value other than the default quantity of a noun, which is typically one...
: שטעטלעך, shtetlekh) were mainly found in the areas which constituted the 19th century Pale of Settlement
Pale of Settlement
The Pale of Settlement was the term given to a region of Imperial Russia, in which permanent residency by Jews was allowed, and beyond which Jewish permanent residency was generally prohibited...
in the Russian Empire
Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was a state that existed from 1721 until the Russian Revolution of 1917. It was the successor to the Tsardom of Russia and the predecessor of the Soviet Union...
, the Congress Kingdom of Poland
Congress Poland
The Kingdom of Poland , informally known as Congress Poland , created in 1815 by the Congress of Vienna, was a personal union of the Russian parcel of Poland with the Russian Empire...
, Galicia and Romania
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
. A larger city, like Lemberg (Lviv)
Lviv
Lviv is a city in western Ukraine. The city is regarded as one of the main cultural centres of today's Ukraine and historically has also been a major Polish and Jewish cultural center, as Poles and Jews were the two main ethnicities of the city until the outbreak of World War II and the following...
or Czernowitz, was called a shtot ; a smaller village was called a dorf .
The concept of shtetl culture is used as a metaphor for the traditional way of life of 19th-century Eastern European Jews. Shtetls are portrayed as pious communities following Orthodox Judaism
Orthodox Judaism
Orthodox Judaism , is the approach to Judaism which adheres to the traditional interpretation and application of the laws and ethics of the Torah as legislated in the Talmudic texts by the Sanhedrin and subsequently developed and applied by the later authorities known as the Gaonim, Rishonim, and...
, socially stable and unchanging despite outside influence or attacks. The Holocaust
The Holocaust
The Holocaust , also known as the Shoah , was the genocide of approximately six million European Jews and millions of others during World War II, a programme of systematic state-sponsored murder by Nazi...
resulted in the disappearance of the vast majority of shtetls, through both extermination under Nazi occupation and exodus to the United States and Palestine
Palestine
Palestine is a conventional name, among others, used to describe the geographic region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, and various adjoining lands....
- as well as to the main cities of Russia, opened to Jewish habitation with the fall of the Czarist regime.
Origins
The history of the oldest Eastern European shtetls began about a millenniumMillennium
A millennium is a period of time equal to one thousand years —from the Latin phrase , thousand, and , year—often but not necessarily related numerically to a particular dating system....
ago and saw long periods of relative tolerance and prosperity as well as times of extreme poverty, hardships until pogrom
Pogrom
A pogrom is a form of violent riot, a mob attack directed against a minority group, and characterized by killings and destruction of their homes and properties, businesses, and religious centres...
in XIX century, inspired by Russian Tsars.
The attitudes and thought habits characteristic of the learning tradition are as evident in the street and market place as the yeshivaYeshivaYeshiva is a Jewish educational institution that focuses on the study of traditional religious texts, primarily the Talmud and Torah study. Study is usually done through daily shiurim and in study pairs called chavrutas...
. The popular picture of the Jew in Eastern Europe, held by Jew and Gentile alike, is true to the TalmudTalmudThe Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
ic tradition. The picture includes the tendency to examine, analyze and re-analyze, to seek meanings behind meanings and for implications and secondary consequences. It includes also a dependence on deductive logic as a basis for practical conclusions and actions.
In life, as in the TorahTorahTorah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
, it is assumed that everything has deeper and secondary meanings, which must be probed. All subjects have implications and ramifications. Moreover, the person who makes a statement must have a reason, and this too must be probed. Often a comment will evoke an answer to the assumed reason behind it or to the meaning believed to lie beneath it, or to the remote consequences to which it leads. The process that produces such a response—often with lightning speed—is a modest reproduction of the pilpulPilpulPilpul refers to a method of studying the Talmud through intense textual analysis in attempts to either explain conceptual differences between various halakhic rulings or to reconcile any apparent contradictions presented from various readings of different texts.Pilpul has entered English as a...
process.
Not only did the Jews of the shtetl speak a unique language (Yiddish), but they also had a unique rhetorical style, rooted in traditions of Talmudic learning:
In keeping with his own conception of contradictory reality, the man of the shtetl is noted both for volubility and for laconic, allusive speech. Both pictures are true, and both are characteristic of the yeshiva as well as the market places. When the scholar converses with his intellectual peers, incomplete sentences, a hint, a gesture, may replace a whole paragraph. The listener is expected to understand the full meaning on the basis of a word or even a sound... Such a conversation, prolonged and animated, may be as incomprehensible to the uninitiated as if the excited discussants were talking in tongues. The same verbal economy may be found in domestic or business circles.
The shtetl operates on a communal spirit where giving to the needy is not only admired, but expected and essential:
The problems of those who need help are accepted as a responsibility both of the community and of the individual. They will be met either by the community acting as a group, or by the community acting through an individual who identifies the collective responsibility as his own...
The rewards for benefaction are manifold and are to be reaped both in this life and in the life to come. On earth, the prestige value of good deeds is second only to that of learning. It is chiefly through the benefactions it makes possible that money can "buy" status and esteem.
This approach to good deeds finds its roots in Jewish religious views, summarized in Pirkei Avot by Shimon Hatzaddik
Simeon the Just
Simeon the Just was a Jewish High Priest during the time of the Second Temple...
's "three pillars":
On three things the world stands. On Torah, On service [of God], And on acts of human kindness.
Tzedaka (charity) is a key element of Jewish culture, both secular and religious, to this day. It exists not only as a material tradition (e.g. tzedaka boxes), but also immaterially, as an ethos of compassion and activism for those in need.
Material things were neither disdained nor extremely praised in the shtetl. Learning and education were the ultimate measures of worth in the eyes of the community, while money was secondary to status.
Menial labor was generally looked down upon as prost, or prole
Proletariat
The proletariat is a term used to identify a lower social class, usually the working class; a member of such a class is proletarian...
. Even the poorer classes in the shtetl tended to work in jobs that required the use of skills, such as shoe-making or tailoring of clothes.
The shtetl had a consistent work ethic which valued hard work and frowned upon laziness. Studying, of course, was considered the most valuable and hardest work of all. Learned yeshiva
Yeshiva
Yeshiva is a Jewish educational institution that focuses on the study of traditional religious texts, primarily the Talmud and Torah study. Study is usually done through daily shiurim and in study pairs called chavrutas...
men who did not provide bread and relied on their wives for money were not frowned upon but praised as ideal Jews.
Collapse
The May Laws
May Laws
Temporary regulations regarding the Jews were proposed by minister of internal affairs Nikolai Ignatyev and enacted on May 15 , 1882, by Tsar Alexander III of Russia...
introduced by Tsar Alexander III of Russia
Alexander III of Russia
Alexander Alexandrovich Romanov , historically remembered as Alexander III or Alexander the Peacemaker reigned as Emperor of Russia from until his death on .-Disposition:...
in 1882 banned Jews from rural areas and towns of fewer than ten thousand people. In the 20th century revolutions, civil wars, industrialization and the Holocaust destroyed traditional shtetl existence. However, Hasidic Jews have founded new communities in the United States, such as Kiryas Joel
Kiryas Joel, New York
Kiryas Joel is a village within the town of Monroe in Orange County, New York, United States...
and New Square
New Square, New York
New Square is an all-Hasidic village in the Town of Ramapo, Rockland County, New York, United States located north of Hillcrest; east of Viola; south of New Hempstead and west of New City...
.
There is a belief found in historical and literary writings that the shtetl disintegrated before it was destroyed during World War II; however, this alleged cultural break-up is never clearly defined.
The shtetl in fiction and folklore
Chełm figures prominently in the Jewish humor as the legendary town of fools. Kasrilevke, the setting of many of Sholom AleichemSholom Aleichem
Sholem Aleichem was the pen name of Solomon Naumovich Rabinovich, a leading Yiddish author and playwright...
's stories, and Anatevka, the setting of the musical
Musical theatre
Musical theatre is a form of theatre combining songs, spoken dialogue, acting, and dance. The emotional content of the piece – humor, pathos, love, anger – as well as the story itself, is communicated through the words, music, movement and technical aspects of the entertainment as an...
Fiddler on the Roof
Fiddler on the Roof
Fiddler on the Roof is a musical with music by Jerry Bock, lyrics by Sheldon Harnick, and book by Joseph Stein, set in Tsarist Russia in 1905. It is based on Tevye and his Daughters by Sholem Aleichem...
(based on other stories of Sholom Aleichem) are other notable fictional shtetls.
The 2002 novel Everything Is Illuminated
Everything Is Illuminated
Everything Is Illuminated is the first novel by the American writer Jonathan Safran Foer, published in 2002. It was adapted into a film by the same name starring Elijah Wood and Eugene Hütz in 2005.-Plot summary:...
, by Jonathan Safran Foer
Jonathan Safran Foer
Jonathan Safran Foer is an American author best known for his novels Everything Is Illuminated and Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close...
, tells a fictional story set in the Ukrainian shtetl Trachimbrod. (Trochenbrod
Trochenbrod
Trochenbrod or Trohinbrod in Russian was a Jewish shtetl with an area once located in western Ukraine, about 30 kilometers northeast of Lutsk, the nearest now existing villages are Яромель and Клубочин ....
)
The 1992 children's book Something from Nothing, written and illustrated by Phoebe Gilman
Phoebe Gilman
Phoebe Gilman was an American children's book author and illustrator. Her books were notable for their strong lead female characters...
, is an adaptation of a traditional Jewish folktale set in a fictional shtetl.
In 1996 the Frontline programme Shtetl broadcast; it was about Polish Christian and Jewish relations.
List of shtetls
See also
- Crown Heights, BrooklynCrown Heights, BrooklynCrown Heights is a neighborhood in the central portion of the New York City borough of Brooklyn. The main thoroughfare through this neighborhood is Eastern Parkway, a tree-lined boulevard designed by Frederick Law Olmsted extending two miles east-west.Originally, the area was known as Crow Hill....
- History of the Jews in Bessarabia
- History of the Jews in Carpathian RutheniaHistory of the Jews in Carpathian Ruthenia- 20th century census data:The last antebellum census in Hungary, 1910. The four counties of Hungary that coveredthe territory what we now call Carpathian Ruthenia were Ung, Bereg, Ugocsa and Máramaros....
- History of the Jews in PolandHistory of the Jews in PolandThe history of the Jews in Poland dates back over a millennium. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Jewish community in the world. Poland was the centre of Jewish culture thanks to a long period of statutory religious tolerance and social autonomy. This ended with the...
- History of the Jews in Russia and the Soviet UnionHistory of the Jews in Russia and the Soviet UnionThe vast territories of the Russian Empire at one time hosted the largest populations of Jews in the diaspora. Within these territories the Jewish community flourished and developed many of modern Judaism's most distinctive theological and cultural traditions, while also facing periods of...
- Jewish diasporaJewish diasporaThe Jewish diaspora is the English term used to describe the Galut גלות , or 'exile', of the Jews from the region of the Kingdom of Judah and Roman Iudaea and later emigration from wider Eretz Israel....
- Kiryas Joel, New YorkKiryas Joel, New YorkKiryas Joel is a village within the town of Monroe in Orange County, New York, United States...
- Kiryas Tosh, Quebec
- List of Hasidic dynasties
- List of shtetls and shtots
- Moisés Ville (Argentina)Moisés VilleMoisés Ville is a small town in the province of Santa Fe, Argentina founded in 23 October 1889 by Eastern European and Russian Jews escaping pogroms and persecution...
- New Square, New YorkNew Square, New YorkNew Square is an all-Hasidic village in the Town of Ramapo, Rockland County, New York, United States located north of Hillcrest; east of Viola; south of New Hempstead and west of New City...
- Sharon, MA
External links
- Boris Feldblyum Collection
- JewishGen
- Galicia, Diaspora - Jewish EncyclopediaJewish EncyclopediaThe Jewish Encyclopedia is an encyclopedia originally published in New York between 1901 and 1906 by Funk and Wagnalls. It contained over 15,000 articles in 12 volumes on the history and then-current state of Judaism and the Jews as of 1901...
- Cities of Poland - Simon Wiesenthal CenterSimon Wiesenthal CenterThe Simon Wiesenthal Center , with headquarters in Los Angeles, California, was established in 1977 and named for Simon Wiesenthal, the Nazi hunter. According to its mission statement, it is "an international Jewish human rights organization dedicated to repairing the world one step at a time...
Multimedia Learning Center Online - Virtual Shtetl
- Jewish history of Radziłów
- Remembering Luboml: images of a Jewish Community
- The Art of Dora Shampanier
- Towns in the Encyclopedia of Jewish Life
- Pre-1939 Kresy (now Ukraine) photo album --- Broken Link
- Jewish Web Index - Polish Shtetls
- The Lost Jewish Communities of Poland
- History of the Jews in Poland
- History of Berdychiv
- Antopol Yizkor Book
- The Journey to Trochenbrod and Lozisht aug 2006
- Shtetl gallery. 80 paintings by :fr:Ilex Beller. In German and Russian languages
- Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Virtual Shtetl