Reinventing Religion: Jewish Religion Textbooks in Russian Gymnasia

Abstract

This article examines 10 textbooks used in Jewish religion classes in Russian high schools in the final decades of the 19th century. The textbooks reveal an expectation of a low level of Hebrew background, an interest in promoting the practice of prayer, and two distinct approaches to teaching Judaism. While some of the books introduce students to their religion through Biblical or later Jewish history, others present the religion as a systematic set of beliefs and practices. Although it is difficult to ascertain exactly how the books were utilized in classrooms, they certainly provide a sense of the priorities of a group of educators, as well as of the relative freedom they had in defining Judaism for the next generation.

Acknowledgments

The author would like to thank Jonathan Krasner, Michael Zeldin, and the anonymous reviewers for this journal for helpful comments on various drafts of this article. She is also grateful to the University of Maryland's Jewish Studies Program's Rebecca Meyerhoff Research Award and the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research's Abram and Fannie Gottlieb Immerman and Abraham Nathan and Bertha Daskal Weinstein Memorial Fellowship in Eastern European Jewish Studies for supporting the research.

Notes

¹All translations are my own.

²The one-room elementary school for Jewish boys that was traditional in Europe throughout the pre-modern and modern periods.

³Followers of the Haskalah, or Jewish Enlightenment. The Haskalah arrived in Eastern Europe later than in Central Europe.

⁴For more on the concept and consequences of russification, see Weeks (2004).

⁵Gymnasia were highly exclusive academic institutions where the most qualified secondary students could receive a rigorous classical education. The course of study was typically 7 years. Pro-gymnasia were 4-year institutions roughly equivalent to middle schools. Like the gymnasia, enrollment was by examination and standards were high.

⁶The real-school (real'noe uchilishche) was a more practical alternative to the gymnasium introduced in the mid-19th century. Instead of Greek and Latin, students could devote time to the study of sciences and sometimes even technical skills.

⁷It is interesting to note that although the textbooks surveyed here by S. A. Katsenellenbogen and B. L. Segal' were not included on this list, other books by those same authors were.

⁸ Zakon Bozhii, literally God's Law, is the Russian term for religion. Without a modifier, it refers to the Orthodox faith. With a modifier, it can refer to other Christian denominations as well as to non-Christian faiths. In rendering the textbook titles into English, I have sometimes translated zakon literally as law, and at other times more colloquially as religion, depending on the phrasing and my perception of the usage.

⁹It is also worth noting that these same textbooks were also used in Jewish schools, where schedules at times permitted separate courses in Jewish history and religion. The 1901 Spravochnaia Kniga contains some sample curricula. For our purposes, however, where Jewish students had only one course for all of their Judaic studies, time was limited.