History /
Terrible past for the Jews in Poland? [930]
Those statutes were very enlightened for their times. Just a shame they weren't always enforced.
That would depend how egregiously it was broken.
So, can you enlighten us on this matter, jon357?
Poland was obviously a more desirable location for Jews than some other countries otherwise they wouldn't have migrated there. But for Polish people to take credit for that or be proud of that is mistaken. If Poland was hospitable to Jews in certain periods it was thanks to the kings.
So what? Polish kings were usually to some extent a product of the Polish society and there was a period of Polish history when they were elected by the nobles.You think the British aren't proud of their, for example, Elizabeth I of England? It seems to me they are. It looks like they're even proud of Elizabeth II, although I'm not entirely sure why.
There were kings in Polish history that Poles are proud of and there were kings that Poles are ashamed of.
Are Poles allowed to be ever only ashamed of everything?
It's tiring and depressing, you know?
Every nation has a need to have something positive in their history, some kind of positive heritage, something that a nation could take an example of even. Having something like that is healthy for the collective psyche of any nation.
When I was at school the tolerance of the Polish Crown (shown not only to Jews, but also to others, like, for example, Scots,both Catholics and Protestants) and a kind of multiculturalism of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was being presented as something positive, an example that should be followed and I think it's a good thing.
One more thing - if Poles are giving examples of relative tolerance of Poland in some of its past they're usually not doing that to take some kind of credit for that or whatever, but to show we're not some kind of "genetic anti-Semites" or "genetic intolerant bastards" or "genetic monsters" or "genetic whatever". Because we feel that there's some kind of label put on us and we're tired of this. OK?
townspeople were hostile to Jews as a competing element, local noblemen were usually against the Jews (especially when they owed them money) and the Catholic clergy were openly anti-Jewish.
All of them? Always? How do you even know that?
Once the Polish People had their independence after WWI we see how hospitable they were to Jews.
As opposite to Germans, right? lol I don't think it's a fair statement, yehudi - the Polish society after the partitions wasn't the same as the Polish society before the partitions. So I don't think it's OK for us to say that after Poland regained independence Poles somehow showed their "true colours" (if that's what you mean).
Btw, did you know about the Pale of Settlement ? If you (and others) didn't then I wrote a bit about it here:
https://polishforums.com/history/poland-european-anti-semitism-29186/6/#msg1462696You think such thigs didn't affect Polish society? Of course they did.
Do you remember the town of Chmielnik I wrote about in one of the threads on PF? It's in my region, not that far from Kielce, "the pogrom city". Polonius3 mentioned Arians, the Polish Brethren who were members of the Minor Reformed Church of Poland, a Nontrinitarian Protestant church that existed in Poland from 1565 to 1658. In the 16th and 17th centuries Chmielnik was a major centre of Polish Protestants (Calvinists and the Polish Brethren). On the basis of privilege granted by Krzysztof Gołuchowski in the second part of the 17th century the town was populated by Sephardi Jews expelled from Spain. They built a synagogue in 1638 and took over houses and shops of the Polish Brethren expelled from the town in 1658.
Nowadays they are probably no Jews in Chmielnik and most probably no Protestants either.
Societies change during the course of history for all kinds of reasons. Look at Germans.
Today's Polish society is different than it was centuries ago, it's even different than it was before the war. It's already different than the post-war society even.
Other European societies change too, not necessarily for the better. I've heard the right is on the rise all over, UKIP won the election to the European Parliament in the UK, Le Pen's National Front won in France, there's Orban in Hungary and let's not forget the "lovely" Mr. Putin in Russia...
Things change, people, panta rhei...
And we can turn the table, too, history is a b1tch this way, I guess lol Or maybe it's God giving the humanity a poignant lesson in humility - once the Jews got their own state look at what they're doing to Palestinians... Jews aren't a nation of victims anymore, nowadays they are a nation of perpetrators (and that's nothing new really - victims turning into perpetrators - it's as old as humankind, I guess). I'm writing this with all seriousness and sadness (and disappointment too, to some extent). In 50 years time or more your grandchildren will have to "świecić oczami", as we say in Poland, for what Israel/Israelis did and is/are doing. Of course there are and there will be justifications being given, explanations (they always are), just as I am explaining things to you and as some others are giving justifications. And some will be in total denial. As many in Israel are now, probably.
I don't usually use this argument but sometimes I have an impression that some people need a reality check form time to time.
What I don't understand is why you differentiate between Jews and Poles.
If they are differentiated on other occasions (usually by you, Westerners, and by Jews themselves) than why not in this case too?
They were all Poles - just with a different faith.
What faith? lol They were communists.
he MBP numbers above are to be taken with a grain of salt then.
Why is that? Those numbers are based on ethnicity, not nationality.
Shiites and Sunnis are both Iraqis, but they are still at each other's throat.
Aren't they of the same ethnicity? Jews in Poland weren't just of different faith but also of different ethnicity. And what about Catholic Jews? lol They weren't (and aren't) ethnically Jewish?
Except for the Lutherans who made up the majority of a certain ethnic group, that is ... :)
Were they expelled for being Lutherans? Nope.
but that didn't prevent them from oppressing their own countrymen and women.
Yes and this can be said of members of any ethnicity. Lately I've read about Baruch Steinberg, Chief Rabbi of the Polish Army during German invasion of Poland in 1939 who, like many other Jewish officers, was murdered in the Katyn massacre by the Soviets in April 1940.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Steinberg
I can imagine there were some Jewish members of the NKVD shooting their religious brothers in their heads.
Now, can we move on? I don't think anyone claims in this thread that there were no (ethnic) Poles serving the communist terror apparatus.
As for differentiating between Jews and Poles - it's a complicated matter. There were in the past and are Jews who didn't and don't consider themselves Poles. They consider themselves "Polish Jews" at best. Yesterday I've read an interesting note of Ela Sidi at her blog - she's an author of a book "Izrael oswojony" (I guess it could be translated as "Tamed Israel") - it's about everyday Israel and Israelis seen through the eyes of a Pole living there. She's a gentile who married an Israeli and has been living in Israel since 1991. She asked her fellow "Poles" (Jewish ones) who moved to Israel whether they consider themselves Poles, part of Polonia abroad. To her surprise (and disappointment, I guess) most of them answered "No", despite those people were born and bred in Poland, speaking Polish among themselves in Israel, always interested in Polish culture and even taking part in creating it and popularising it, visiting Poland often, missing the country where they were born. It's an interesting note, maybe I'll translate it one day and post it on PF (but that's a big "maybe", because it's freaking long lol).
