The Habsburg province of Moravia straddled a complicated
linguistic, cultural, and national space, where German, Slavic, and
Jewish spheres overlapped, intermingled, and sometimes clashed.
Situated in the heart of Central Europe, Moravia was exposed to
major Jewish movements from the East and West, including Haskalah
(Jewish enlightenment), Hasidism, and religious reform. Moravia's
rooted and thriving rabbinic culture helped moderate these
movements, and in the case of Hasidism, keep it at bay.
During the Revolution of 1848, Moravia's Jews took an active part
in the prolonged and ultimately successful struggle for Jewish
emancipation in the Habsburg lands. The revolution ushered in a new
age of freedom, but it also precipitated demographic, financial,
and social transformations, disrupting entrenched patterns that had
characterized Moravian Jewish life since the Middle Ages. These
changes emerged precisely when the Czech-German conflict began to
dominate public life, throwing Moravia's Jews into the middle of
the increasingly virulent nationality conflict. For some, a
cautious embrace of Zionism represented a way out of this conflict,
but it also represented a continuation of Moravian Jewry's
distinctive role as mediator--and often tamer--of the major
ideological movements that pervaded Central Europe in the Age of
Emancipation.
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