Terrible past for the Jews in Poland?

Feh. Bransk was given city rights under Magdeburg Law, a law which was almost entirely ceremonial for Jews at the time. Two Jews were allowed to live there. Jews weren't just given restrictions on where to live, and where to be buried; they were told what line of work they could participate in, as the major guilds were all verboten to them. Bransk was a thrown bone, because in order to keep peace between guilds, the ONE thing the Jews were allowed to do was money-lending. Whenever a loan of a certain necessity was required at a certain rate, suddenly the restrictions on one Jewish group or another was loosened. If you wanted to visit family in Krakow, you might be given a 3-day pass instead of for 1. If you were caught overstaying your furlough, you might only be given a fine, and not imprisoned. Now, centuries later, Jews are still being stereotyped as "craven, and money-hungry" for making a living in the one way they were allowed.

The excerpts may or may not be tainted (it is often easy to selectively quote and to quote out of context in order to make a text say the exact opposite of what the author wrote). What is telling is that you appear to have been reading texts on such sites. Or is there another reason that you decided to not link to the places where we could read the texts you quoted?


Really? 'Stetl' [sic] revealed that? Are you sure you are being completely truthful there?


aapjstudies.org/index.php?id=103


sztetl.org.pl/en/city/bransk/


yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Bransk

Can the reader can be forgiven for thinking that you are not being completely truthful about what the film said?

I have read the quotes on various sites, and at my library, including Google Books (which is where the book by Weinryb is.) I have listed the publisher and date, so you can see that the books do indeed exist and that the excerpts were extracted from the black and white pages in which they were contained. There is no real reason to be suspicious of the literature itself. I am sure they are available at your local library or you could find the excerpts/ snippets on Google books.

The victim narrative (pre-WWII) by members of a certain religion-tribe has employed is mostly false. They were in privileged positions that they had chosen, one of which Catholics would not do because the Church forbade them (ie usury).

I think many (not all) members/affiliates of the Jewish religion-tribe need to analyze themselves as a group, and face their martyr complex and collective narcissism. Defaming countries such as Poland is not a way to invite rational discourse. And stating that they were "forced" into privileged positions (poor them!) is simply a deflection of their own accountability.

How interesting that you should speak of a nation which has a martyr complex and see themselves as victims who are always good, you remind me of a wise man who said this;

[quote] We have a mythology of ourselves as martyr nation. We are always good. The others are bad. With this national image, it was absolutely impossible that [ ] people could do bad things to others."

Care to fill in the blank and guess the source of the quote?


Yes, race hate sites. I wonder what you were doing there, and why you share with us the edited versions of texts as found there rather than the original texts.

That should read:

Cite them, please.

I've already given above two places where his quotes can be found: holywar.org/jewishtr/07poland.htm and radioislam.org/thetruth/07poland.htm

I can't wait to read Dessie's explanation as to why he claims Stetl [sic] tried to present a picture which was the exact opposite of the reality.

Harry, I saw the film about the history of Bransk and it said that Gentiles were required to obtain permission from the Jewish town fathers before being allowed to reside in the town's center. If you don't believe me then so be it, but you need only watch the film to be disabused of your ignorance.

Harry, in the future I would also like you to address me by my full screen name. The use of a diminutive of my screen name sounds very creepy coming from someone like you.

As I had stated in my previous post, just because other sites promoting other agendas use the same excerpts doesn't mean that the excerpts are written by the owners of those sites. The books are on Amazon, Ebay, your local library, Google Books, you could probably even download full pdfs of them if you look hard enough. But you simply prefer to imply that I'm a neo-nazi, how convenient of you.

Rev. Stanislaw Musial said that. I'm not Catholic, I am not fond of the Catholic authorities for my own reasons, and I do know that Polish Catholics, as a group, were not saints (towards neighboring nations.) Or towards their own people (serfdom).

But what Stanislaw Musial said is absolutely true of the Jewish group (not every Jewish individual on the planet.) But it goes further than what he said.

thoughtclusters.com/2007/06/the-martyr-complex

"Wikipedia explains, a "person who has a 'martyr complex' desires the feeling of being a martyr for its own sake, seeking out suffering or persecution because it feeds a psychological need."

Granted, I am not a fan of Wikipedia. But for a simple diagnosis this really does apply to the Jews (as a group, not each individual Jewish person).

So we are left with four possibilities:
a) The film makers somehow erroneously stated that the situation was the reverse of the reality.
b) A person in the film claimed that the situation was the reverse of the reality.
c) You somehow 'mixed up' what was said.
d) You are flat out lying.

Despite the fact that I personally would have a very heavy bet on the answer being one of two of the possibilities outlined above, the very simple fact remains that in Bransk there was non tolerandis Judaeis and not non tolerandis christianis. Please do feel very free to argue with historical fact

According to the documentary I saw the center of the town of Bransk was uniformly Jewish and the Polish authorities granted the leaders of the Jewish community the right to refuse residency to Polish Gentiles attempting to move into that part of the town. This doesn't mean that the Polish authorities didn't also place restriction on Jewish residency in Bransk as well. You seem to be ignorantly believing that these residency regulations are somehow mutually exclusive. They are not.

Nope. When I want to see your rants I have to look further in the past than this thread. But that's a bit off-topic and we'd best not go off-topic.


Am I? Where? Perhaps you could point out such a claim? Surely you would not be making a false claim in order to distract attention from the fact that historical fact is quite the reverse of what you claim it to be, now would you?


You keep claiming the documentary says that that but for some reason you won't support that claim. I do wonder why: which of the four possible explanations might apply here?


Interesting. So you wish us to believe that in a town where non tolerandis Judaeis applied, the centre of town was an area where no Catholics could live, because only Jews could live there. I very much fear that you don't quite see the point of non tolerandis Judaeis. But then hatred does tend to affect people's vision.

Hahahaha! I have given my word upon the forum that I saw it. Anyone can aquire the documentary and see for themselves if I am mistaken. If it matters that much to you, and, given your obsessive performance upon this forum regarding the subject of Polish Jewry, one may assume that it does, then see the documentary for yourself. But, be forewarned: The documentary is several hours long.


Are claiming that Jews were not allowed to live in Bransk? The documentary was produced by a Jew whose Jewish ancestors were from Bransk.


Wrong, Catholics could live in the center of the town if the Jewish town elders approved. That is what the documentary stated and I found it surprising, but there are a lot of things revealed in that documentary that were surprising.

Yes, we have established that; however there are four theoretically possible explanations for that statement (as outlined above). By the way, the "Hahahaha!" adds nothing to this discussion and suggests a very disrespectful attitude. Perhaps the thread would be better without such elements?


Let's get this straight (just so we know where we are): you are saying that the film-maker (a Jew whose Jewish ancestors were from Bransk) stated that Catholics needed to get permission from Jews before they could live in the Jewish part of town, yes?

Mods: given that we are discussing the past of Jews and Catholics in Poland in this thread, are we sticking to topic closely enough?

Harry,I see that the discussion is about the past and as far as I'm concerned the past has shaped what ever perceptions people have on either side of this issue,therefore it is relevant imo,as long as it is Polish History,then it is on topic.However if it leads to any discussions about the state of Israel and her affairs outside of Poland then it is off topic.

Very much agreed. And thanks for replying to the question.

Your welcome Harry.

Regarding the dispute about Bransk, I have no dog in this fight, but was just curious how such a dispute over what should be easily verifiable fact comes up. In doing some quick searches it looks like Harry is right about the non tolerandis Judaeis and such, at least until after the partitions. It also seems that later the town had a larger and larger Jewish population. Could it be from later on that the documentary is referencing? Could you both be right, but not talking about the same time periods?

now this is how you post in a thread like this;and it stays open.well done to each of you.

Well said. A lot of people have great difficulty understanding the world as it used to be and the grinding poverty that went with it. The world today is another planet.


The Russians did, hence the revolution. Then there is the French.

I'm well aware of such events, however what I mean is that the reasons behind them often do not seem to be like those commonly provided in Jewish sources ("stupid peasants talked into by the Catholic clergy" etc.) for instance 1790 "pogrom" was carried out by small business owners, who were threatened by the competition coming from a large influx of Jews into the city.

Hmm, interesting point. Wouldn't you say that the explanation you state is commonly provided by Jewish sources (i.e. 'the Poles who murdered Jews didn't really know any better because they were too stupid and manipulated') is in many ways more charitable that what you state is the real reason (i.e. 'the Poles knew exactly what they were doing and did it for the money')?

You say as if there was need for excuses Harry. If somebody would cut your means of making a living (especially in 18th century) it would be practically the same as if he cut your throat.

Most the issues in Poland with Jews came from the fact they were blocking means of advance for rising merchant class in Poland.


To put it succinctly, during the medieval times in Poland Jews were yet anther class/segment of society. Wheres in other countries of Europe at the time they were underclass.


All three? Really? Cause the rest have no much to do with Poland.

"...kings and noblemen, popes and bishops often employed Jewish
physicians. But not only physicians. Jewish tax and customs
collectors, or (in eastern Europe) bailiffs of manors could be
depended upon to do their utmost for the king or baron, in a way
that a Christian could not always be."

People who have more desirable skills earn more money than people who do not; is that really supposed to be news to us?

However, what might be news is that googling the phrase "Jewish craftsman, peddler, land-lord's steward or petty cleric was immeasurably" produces nine results. First is biblebelievers.org.au,

an noted holocaust denial site. Third is stormfront.com a site which needs no introduction. I wonder where you found the text that you quote from.

And now let's have a look at the author that you quote from, Israel Shahak.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Shahak

Is this really what we want PF to be, a place where people cross-post things from Stormfront? Seriously? That's the image of Poland you want to be projected across the world?

My previous post, on your approach to history, was on topic really.

1. The role of history should not be interpretation of facts the way to be charitable or not for one group or another.

2. I don't think it really is so charitable to present Poles as brainless beasts, who could be easily manipulated to kill Jews, neither It is true as then Jews would have not survived here even a single generation, let alone centuries and their population would have not been growing rapidly. Poles are not the group for whom it is convenient to pretend that there was some totally irrational hate of Jews anywhere they showed up and to build Jewish martyrology and national identity on that foundation.

It would be much more beneficial to everyone to have an unbiased approach to these issues and show their true nature and complexity. Let's be honest, 150 years ago "Poles are stealing our jobs" crowd would have quickly turned into looting their property, putting them by force on the ships sailing off to continental Europe and killing If they resisted. So much for "unique nature of anti-semitism", "traditional Polish anti-semitism", "Polish peasants manipulated by the clergy" and so on.

This is horrible, and undoubtedly will anger some people here, but this is the truth. This morning I asked my mother about Polish people hiding Jews during the occupation.

This is what my mother, pragmatic extreme, said: "Yes, many Poles hid the Jews, some in underground bunkers I knew of. But once the gold that Jews had run out, they would be mysteriously found out."

How old is your mother?

Who's your mom ? God allmighty, who's providing ultimate truth ?


Fascinating. Your story has a quite serious hole thought. Jews back then had no rights whatsoever, they could just take away their "gold" and kill them or call the Gerries to do that. No need to play any tricks with them for months or years risking their own life in that process.

Anyway, say her mother is seventy, so what she knows about WWII? big fat nothing!

Edited by a mod

Listen to the stories of old people that lived through the occupation. After they're gone, all you're going to have left are the spins, second hand stories with an agenda.

My father remembers his family hiding a prominent Jewish family during the war. He even wrote a glorious story about it, through the eyes of a young boy. He didn't include a post script though. After the war over, when his mother contacted the Jewish family, now returned to prominence, the Jewish family was so angry, they would not even open their door, or have anything to do with them.