Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

Journey to Poland, by Alfred Doblin, Joachim Neugroschel (Translator). 1991

Visiting German Jew (1920s) Confirms Endeks on the Fact That Poland’s Minorities Generally Cannot Be Assimilated. Poland, Unlike the USA, Lacked the Economic Resources To Encourage Jews to Assimilate

Nowadays, Poles get a lot of flak for once supporting the ethnonationalism that is (falsely) attributed to the Endeks instead of the more inclusive civic nationalism. These critics have no understanding of the situation in interwar Poland. This author did.

Author Alfred Doblin (Doeblin) was a German Jew who had grown up in Stettin. (p. xiv). He travelled across the newly-resurrected Poland in 1924, and spent much time with Poland’s Jews. Doblin’s book, originally published in German in 1925 (p. ix) under the title REISE IN POLEN, is hereby translated into English and published in 1991.

All in all, Doblin shows an astonishingly-good grasp of Polish history. For instance, he writes, (quote) The aphorism of 1861 is magnificent: “Under a mild regime, the Poles rise up because they can; under a strict regime, because they have to.” (unquote). (p. 25).

The author also has sophisticated insights into Polish-Jewish relations. I focus on a few issues of lasting interest:

JEWS AS THE “OTHER”: A NATION-WITHIN-NATION IN SELF-IMPOSED APARTHEID

Alfred Doblin was immediately struck by the essential difference between Poland’s Jews and the Jews of Weimar Germany. He writes, (quote) Three hundred fifty thousand Jews live in Warsaw, half as many as in all Germany. A small number of them are strewn across the city, the bulk reside together in the northwestern sector. They are a nation. People who only know Western Europe fail to realize this. The Jews have their own costumes, their own language, religion, manners and mores, their ancient national feeling and national consciousness. (unquote). (p. 50).

JEWISH DISLOYALTY IN ACTION. IN SOME LOCATIONS, JEWS REFUSE ANY MODUS VIVENDI WITH THE NEW POLISH STATE

While in Lublin, Doeblin concluded that, (quote) During the Russian period, these two nations were on good terms. Then the Russians used the Jews against the Poles; that was the start of Polish anti-Semitism. In this city, social intercourse between the two nations is virtually nonexistent. The Orthodox Jews are powerful. They received the majority vote in the municipal elections. But the town council actually fell apart; it got into a conflict with the government because over half the councilmen spoke only Yiddish. The government demanded that at least the chairman speak Polish. But when he tried, all hell broke loose; and that was the last session. (unquote). (p. 132).

JEWISH AUTHOR DOBLIN CONCURS WITH ENDEKS: POLAND’S MINORITIES ARE MOSTLY INASSIMILABLE

Nowadays, Poles put up with a lot of flak about the pre-WWII “exclusiveness” of Polish nationalism, particularly that of Roman Dmowski and the Endeks. Poles get moralized about the “fact” that the so-called ethnonationalism of the Endeks should have given way to an “enlightened” and “inclusive” so-called civic nationalism. Doblin knew better. He realized that large-scale assimilation of minorities, besides being incompatible with Poland’s Roman Catholic culture, was not practical because of Poland’s low standard of living. Reflecting especially on the situation in Eastern Galicia, Doblin quipped, (quote) Assimilate the Ukrainians, White Russians, Lithuanians, Jews, Germans—Poland can’t do it. It’s bitten off more than it can chew. America manages to assimilate, it’s an open basin. The masses easily pour in, American civilization is large and enviable. Here, the rural population is uneducated to the point of illiteracy; the urban education is narrow with sharp national accents, and a powerful and rigid Catholicism. (unquote). (p. 150).

For other Jewish voices that affirm the fact that Poland’s Jewry cannot be assimilated on a large scale, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/unassimilability-prewwii-jews-endeks-confirmed-lewin/

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/unassimilability-prewwii-jews-endeks-confirmed-scharf/

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/jews-vs-dmowski-sarolea/

There is another side of the coin to Doblin’s comments. Are traditional Jewish ways for sale if the price is right? One that the USA could pay but Poland could not?

Note that Poland’s Muslims and Armenians became integrated into Polishness centuries ago, and that notwithstanding Poland’s “rigid” Catholic culture. See:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2020/05/16/armenians-and-muslims-no-jewish-excuse-for-not-uniting-with-poland-schmitt/

EVEN POLONIZED JEWS CAN RETAIN A HOSTILITY TOWARDS POLISH PATRIOTIC TRADITIONS

Many (if not most) of Poland’s Jews went to special Jewish schools, and this only accentuated their “otherness” relative to Poles and Poland. However, even the acculturated or assimilated Polish Jews, whose children went to public schools and were instructed in Polish alongside ethnic Polish children, commonly remained alien to essential Polish-ness. The following observations by Doblin, in Lodz, are revealing, (quote) The young woman who speaks to me teaches Polish and Jewish children together in a Polish school. “The little Poles are better in writing, in composition and handcrafts; but the little Jews are better in language and comprehension.” However, the questions raised by the little Jews are dreadful; at times you’re absolutely horrified. Recently, they were talking about Jesus, when a Jewish child asked very calmly: “Did he really exist?” And the Polish children gaped and gawked. She once told them about a heroic patriotic Pole who allowed his hand to be burned off in a war with the Turks; she demonstrated that he had shown courage. A Jewish child sat there, reflecting, and then remarked: “Yes. But the Turks also showed courage.” (unquote). (p. 244). [If this boy survived the eventual German-made Holocaust two decades later, would he have made the wisecrack that, not only were the Jewish fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (1943) heroes, but so also were the Nazi SS units that fought them?]

THE SELF-ATHEIZATION OF POLAND’S JEWS. JEWISH COMMUNISTS CANNOT BE PROFILED OR DISMISSED AS JEWISH-MARGINAL

Already by the early 1920’s, Poland’s Jews had taken significant steps towards irreligion and atheism. Doblin writes, (quote) During the war [WWI], the religious and ethical feelings of the Eastern European Jews were weakened, the love of material things gained control. But eventually, Jewish life stabilized. (unquote). (p. 252).

Nowadays, a common apologetic trope, on Jews and Communism (Zydokomuna), is the one about Jewish Communists variously being “not really Jews”, “only of Jewish background”, “Jews by ethnicity”, “non-Jewish Jews”, etc. Once again, Alfred Doblin upends this, (quote) I converse with a Zionist leader, a lively, bearded, thoroughly energetic man. He says: “…Judaism no longer has a living religious and spiritual life, a religious and spiritual movement as in the days when Hasidism was growing. Jews are becoming increasingly secular…The caftan and the capote don’t tell you much. There are Communists who wear caftans.” (unquote). (p. 58).