Dispersal Among the Unlettered
When the Romans destroyed the Temple at Jerusalem in 70 AD and the people were driven out of the country the Jews were a highly cultured, organized, and literate race. They initially took refuge in the cultured Roman and Greek colonies.
But the European peoples among whom the Jews came to live in the pre-medieval times, like the Germanic and Slavic tribes, were relatively less cultured and civilized.
They found the Jews socially and economically beneficial. The Jews were welcome wherever they went, especially as they had no territorial ambitions and hence were not a threat.
Formation of Nation States and Decline of the Status of Jews
The decline in the social status of Jews in European countries beginning from the 13th century was apparently due to the formation of nation states dominated by majority ethnic groups in the respective countries. The well literate Jews who were pioneers in commerce and other such occupations were fast replaced by the locals who were giving up their tribal ways and beginning to be more civilized.
The Renaissance and Industrial Revolution that followed saw the European peoples advance tremendously, while the Jews were sidelined and confined to suburban localities where they had to fight poverty and squalor.
Expulsion by Governments
As the closely-knit Jewish communities that were subjected to social discrimination in their adopted countries lagged behind others, hatred and contempt for them set in. European countries expelled the Jews one after the other: England in 1290 AD, France in 1391 AD, Austria in 1421 AD, and Spain and Portugal in 1492 AD. Life became impossible for the Jews in Europe.
The expulsion of Jews from Spain in 1492 AD was so grave a humanitarian crisis at the time that the Ottoman Emperor Bayezid II came to their rescue and officially invited them to come and settle in the Holy Land, and sent ships to Spain to provide them safe passage.
The situation in Europe provided a powerful stimulus and prompted Jews to migrate towards their ancient homeland in Israel which they had not seen. The immigration continued as a trickle till the 19th century when large-scale persecution of Jews in the Russian Empire sent out masses into other European countries and elsewhere as refugees.
Zionist Movement
The founding of the Zionist Movement at the end of the 19th century had a definitive effect on the Jews worldwide. The movement played a vital role till the middle of the 20th century in facilitating the Jews return to Israel from countries where the people faced social and political discrimination.
Major Spells of Immigration
There were a few major waves of immigration, termed ‘Aliyah’ in Hebrew, meaning ‘ascent’ or ‘going up’. The immediate cause was persecution of Jews by Germans and the Russians. The Arabs were remarkably receptive at the time.
- First Aliyah, 1882-1903; 35,000 immigrants arrived from parts of the Russian Empire and Yemen.
- Second Aliyah, 1904-1914; 40,000 arrived, mostly from Russia and Eastern Europe.
- Third Aliyah, 1919-1923; 40,000 from the Soviet Union.
- Fourth Aliyah, 1924-1929; 82,000 arrived, mainly from Poland and Hungary.
- Fifth Aliyah, 1929-1939; 250,000 arrived, from Germany and other European countries subsequent to Nazi persecution.
- Between 1939 and 1948 the Jewish paramilitary organization Haganah smuggled in over 100,000 Jews from Europe to save them from the Nazis.
- When Israel declared independence from British rule on May 14, 1948 upwards of 500,000 Jews fled to Israel from the surrounding Arab nations where they had no safety.
In effect, the Zionist Movement successfully conducted the largest rehabilitation program ever in human history over a period of about sixty years.
R.Michael Paulraj - R.Michael Paulraj is basically interested in the study of history and ethnology. He has studied medieval history of Europe, ancient ...
