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Anti-Jewish literature
Anti-Jewish themes appeared in early Polish
literature along with the first more significant waves of
Jewish
settlement. In the writings of the great chroniclers Gall
Anonim and
Wincenty Kadlubek one can find negative comments about Jews,
as well as
in the fifteenth century writings of Stanislaw of
Skalbmierz, Jan
Dlugosz and Maciej of Miechow (Miechowita). Political
writers of the
second half of the fifteenth and the first half of the
sixteenth century
criticized Jews' economic activities, as well as the
freedoms Jews were
had been granted by the privileges. They believed these led
to an
unfair economic advantage for the Jews, posing a threat to
the Christian
burghers. Jan Ostrorog (1460) and Stanislaw Zaborowski
(1500) condemned
Jewish usury. Justus Decjusz (1516), Sigismund the Old's
secretary,
argued that the activities of Jewish customs collectors,
merchants and
bankers had detrimental effects. He also criticized the
wealthy nobles
who had hired Jews on their estates as agents and
lease-holders, since
these positions often gave them power over Christians.
Stanislaw Orzechowski (1543) accused Jews of spying for
Turkey. All
these charges were included in the sections of treatises
that discussed
Polish history or current economic and political affairs.
The sixteenth
century also saw the first works dealing exclusively with
the Jews. Jan
Dantyszek, the bishop of Warmia and a diplomat at the court
of King
Sigismund the Old, was the author of Carmen de Judeis
[Latin, Song of
the Jews, ca. 1540], published one hundred years later under
the title
Bledy talmudowe [Polish, Mistakes of the Talmud]. Dantyszek
attributed
Jews with many negative traits: immorality, dishonesty,
cruelty,
drunkenness and adultery. He condemned their stubbornness in
maintaining
their own religion and for what he believed was their
stupidity in not
recognizing the divine nature of Christ.
Jakub Przyluski's writings (1553) abounded in libellous
comments. In
Postylli (1557), Mikolaj Rej contended that Jews were wrong
to cling to
their faith. In his work Victoria deorum (Latin, Divine
Victory, 1587),
Sebastian Klonowicz, a poet and a Jewish judge in Lublin,
condemned
Jewish usury and warned against the expansion of trade among
Jewish
merchants. Most of the publications of the second half of
the sixteenth
century contained anti-Jewish statements. The early Polish
anti-Jewish
writings can be divided into two main groups: 1) those
written by
fervent Christians who wanted to convert the Jews, such as
the first
brochure devoted completely to Jews, the Epistola or Letter
of Rabbi
Samuel (1538); 2) those that were decidedly anti-Jewish,
seeing Jews as a
threat to religion and the state, such as the publication
"Okazanie
kilku bledow z niezliczonego bluznierstwa, autorstwa
filozofa, teologa i
mowcy" [Polish, Demonstration of Several Errors of
Unprecedented
Blashemy Written by a Philosopher, Theologian and Speaker]
(1569), by
Jan Gorski. Most of the seventeenth and eighteenth century
writings
dealing with Jews fell into that second category at least to
some
extent. The number of these kinds of publications grew
during the
Counterreformation, although no more than thirty were
published in all.
The most truculent of these included works by authors such
as Przeclaw
Mojecki - Zydowskie okrucienstwa, mordy y zabobony [Polish,
Jewish
Cruelties, Killings and Superstitions] (1589 or 1598),
Szymon Hubicki -
Zydowskie Okrucienstwa nad Naswietszym Sakramentem y
Dziatkami
Chrzescianskiemi [Polish, The Jews' Cruel Deeds Towards the
Blessed
Sacrament and Christian Children] (1602), Jan Achacy Kmita -
Ein Send
Brief albo list od Zydow do Messyasza [German and Polish,
Ein Send
Brief, Or A Letter from the Jews to the Messiah](1601), Kruk
w zlotej
klatce [Polish, A Raven in a Golden Cage](1648), Sebastian
Sleszkowski -
De Judeis (Latin, On the Jews, 1611), Dostateczna Genealogia
Zydowska
[Polish, An Adequate Genealogy of the Jews] (1622), Jasne
Dowody O
Doktorach Zydowskich [Clear Evidence about the Jewish
Doctors] (1623),
Sebastian Miczynski - Zwierciadlo Korony Polskiej [Polish,
Mirror of the
Polish Crown] (1618), Bazyli Waglicki - Swawola wyuzdana
zydowska
(Polish, Immoral Jewish Deeds) (1648), Piotr Pruszcz - O
okrutnym
Dziateczek niewinnych morderstwie [Polish, On the Cruel
Murder of
Innocent Little Children] (1662), Sebastian Zuchowski -
Odglos Processow
Kryminalnych na Zydach [Polish, Echo of the Criminal Trials
of Jews]
(1700), Proces Kryminalny o Niewinne Dziecie [Polish,
Criminal Trial
About an Innocent Child] (1713), Gaudenty Pikulski - Zlosc
Zydowska
Przeciw Bogu [Polish, The Jewish Anger Against God] (1758),
and Antoni
Opolski - O zabobonach narodu Zydowskiego [Polish, On the
Superstitions
of the Jews] (1786). Anti-Jewish publications from the
sixteenth to the
eighteenth centuries were used and even reprinted by some
publishing
houses associated with nationalistic and Church circles in
later
centuries. [H.W.]
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The number of anti-Jewish publications grew by
leaps and bounds with the appearance of political
anti-Semitism.
Magazines devoted entirely to attacks on Jews began to be
published, as
well as numerous books. In France, the treatise La France
juive (French,
Jewish France, 1886) became very popular. Its author, E.
Drumont,
accused Jews of wanting to take over France.
A Prussian journalist named W. Marr published a journal
titled
Zwangloser antisemitischer Hefte (German, Independent
Anti-Semitic
Journal, Berlin 1879-80), and in 1873 published a brochure
titled Der
Sieg des Judenthums �ber das Germanenthum [German, The
Victory of Jewry
Over Germandom]. In it, he attacked the entire
Judeo-Christian legacy,
which he claimed was responsible for the fact that the
German nation's
"spirit" was dominated by Jewish tradition. The books of E.
D�hring were
much more widely read in the German lands. It was he who
first used the
word "extermination" with reference to the Jews, by which he
meant Jews
should be excluded from society�not that they should
be killed en
masse. The English philosopher H. S. Chamberlain's arguments
for the
superiority of the "Aryan race" became the foundations of
Adolf Hitler's
ideology, outlined in Mein Kampf (German, My Struggle,
1925-1927).
Anti-Semitism comprised the main subject matter of a leading
Nazi paper
Der St�rmer (1923-45), published by J. Streicher.
In Russia, an author using the pseudonym Osman-Bej (F.
Braffman)
published a brochure in 1869 titled Kniga Kagala (Russian,
Book of the
Kahal; Polish translation, Zydzi i kahaly [Jews and Kahals],
1876),
which in saw over ten editions in Russian, the Kingdom of
Poland and
Galicia over the course of a few years. The author, who
converted from
Judaism to Russian Orthodoxy, developed an entire conspiracy
theory in
his book, arguing that the traditional form of Jewish
self-government is
a network by which the Jews rule the world. The pamphlet
Protocols of
the Elders of Zion contains a similar conspiracy-oriented
vision of
history. In Poland, anti-Semitic writing was modeled on such
precursors,
though there was a local variety that developed as well. In
the Kingdom
of Poland, the publication Rola [The Land] was the first to
promote
anti-Semitism, followed by Glos [Polish, The Voice] in
1886-1900, which
began promoting racism. R. Dmowski included anti-Jewish
texts in
Przeglad Wszechpolski [Polish, Poland-Wide Review]
(1895-1905), and
wrote programmatic brochures (such as Kwestya zydowska
[Polish, The
Jewish Question], 1909) and anti-Semitic novels (such as
Dziedzictwo
[Polish, Heritage], 1931).
The novelist and publicist T. Jeske-Choinski wrote on
similar
topics, arguing that the "Jewish spirit" had wielded a
negative
influence on Polish culture. Anti-Jewish themes can found in
Krakow�s
conservative press as well. During the interwar period, the
number of
anti-Semitic publications grew significantly, and some
publishing houses
began specializing in them. Some of these, such as
Biblioteczka
Zydoznawcza [Polish, Library of Knowledge about Jews]
published by the
"Rozwoj" [Polish, "Development"] Association received
financial support
from the Catholic Church. Some newspapers with large print
runs, such as
Ilustrowany Kurier Codzienny [Polish, Illustrated Daily
Courier] also
had an anti-Semitic orientation, as did most Catholic
publications.
During the years 1934-1939, anti-Semitic publications were
clearly being
published on a large scale by the Franciscans in
Niepokalanow: Maly
dziennik [Polish, Small Daily], published at the initiative
of Cardinal
A. Kakowski and Father Maximilian Kolbe, and Rycerz
Niepokalanej
[Polish, Knight of the Immaculate [Virgin]]. Many priests
were
anti-Semitic publicists, including S. Trzeciak, J.
Kruszynski, M.
Morawski, J. Gnatowski and I. Wladzinski.
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During the German occupation, the Nazis
promoted anti-Semitic publications in the Polish
language. Several small
newspapers published underground by the National Armed
Forces (Narodowe
Sily Zbrojne) remained anti-Semitic, such as Wielka
Polska [Great
Poland], 1941-44; Polska Informacja Prasowa [Polish
Press Information]
1940-44), which persisted in publishing such things even
as the
Holocaust unfolded right before its very eyes.
After the war, in 1944-1947, the anti-communist
underground produced
some anti-Jewish flyers and publications. After
censorship was
introduced, anti-Semitic writings were published only
sporadically. In
1968, the anti-Semitic press campaign contained themes
adopted from
anti-Jewish publications (March 1968). At the initiative
of one of the
departments of the Ministry of Internal Affairs,
excerpts from the
Protocols of the Elders of Zion were reprinted. The
Propaganda
Department of the Municipal Organization of the Polish
United Workers'
party in Lodz went so far as to translate a text from
the Nazi
publication Der St�rmer and publish it as a handbill.
Later, the special
services would sometimes use anti-Semitic materials in
their fight
against the opposition, such as the book Judeopolonia:
Unknown Pages
from the History of the People's Republic of Poland,
published
anonymously in 1981.
Since 1989, there has been a significant rise in the
number of
anti-Semitic publications. Several new editions of the
Protocols of the
Elders of Zion have been published, and the prewar
writings of Fathers
Trzeciak and Kruszynski, as well as works by new authors
associated with
anti-Semitic organizations. These books deal with
questions related to
"Judeo-Communism", and they sometimes attempt to justify
the anti-Jewish
activities of the National Armed Forces (NSZ). As a
whole, anti-Semitic
writings are characterized by their aggressive tone, use
of calumny,
exaggerated simplifications of reality, mutual
borrowings, the
repetition of catch-phrases (such as "stick with your
own kind" (swoj do
swego) and "Poland for the Poles" (Polska dla Polakow).
Anti-Semitic
propaganda created key Jewish traits, such as "Semitic
appearance"
(semicki wyglad), "Jewish nose" (zydowski nos) and
"Jewish trade"
(handel zydowski). The hallmarks of anti-Semitic
propaganda have proved
to be enduring, despite the fact they do not reflect
reality.
(A.C., H.W./CM)
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