The activities of Joseph Perl (1773–1839), one of the central figures of the Galician Haskalah, have been the subject of scholarly interest for over one hundred and fifty years. Born in Tarnopol in eastern Galicia (now Ternopil, Ukraine) to a rich merchant father, Perl was exposed to a broad range of ideas and texts, traditional as well as modern, a background that prepared him for a productive life.Footnote 1 Perl was involved in almost every area of public Jewish life in Galicia in general and in Tarnopol in particular. This included education, economics, religion, politics, and culture. In their research on Perl, scholars have focused mostly on his struggle against Hasidism in the political sphere, his literary works, and the school he established in Tarnopol.Footnote 2 However, Perl's fourth undertaking, namely the synagogue he founded as part of his school project, has never been researched, receiving only scant references here and there, a result of the lack of relevant primary sources.Footnote 3 This left vast room for speculation, with some scholars describing the synagogue as a “temple” with a choir and even an organ,Footnote 4 and with others asserting that the synagogue did not abide any religious innovation.Footnote 5
The recent discovery of the handwritten regulations that Perl formulated for his synagogue in 1815 allow us for the first time to investigate Perl's synagogue vision and thus gain a better understanding of his religious world view.Footnote 6 As a first step in such an investigation, this article will provide the historical background of the establishment of the synagogue, and then analyze four of the areas discussed in Perl's synagogue regulations: decorum, liturgy, sermons, and clergy. Since Perl's synagogue regulations were not the first of this genre, they will be analyzed within the broader context of the synagogue regulations published in the early nineteenth century. Based on my analysis, I will argue that Joseph Perl created the first “modern traditional” synagogue, a model that later characterized (with some modifications) the new synagogues in the great cities of the Habsburg monarchy: Vienna, Prague, Pest, Lemberg, and Kraków.
A School with a Synagogue: A Short History
While Joseph Perl's synagogue was a regular synagogue for all intents and purposes, he decided at the outset to make it an essential part of his school. Thus, the history of the establishment of the synagogue is intertwined with the history of the school. A special appeal that Perl delivered in 1812 to Jews in Tarnopol reveals the source of inspiration behind this project: after lamenting the grave state of Jewish education and its damaging effect on body and soul, Perl told his audience that even in the past, wise men “of our nation” criticized the mode of teaching of Jewish youth in Poland.Footnote 7 He then singled out Isaiah Horowitz (ca. 1555–1630), the author of Shene luḥot ha-berit (Two tablets of the covenant), and his reaction after visiting Amsterdam and seeing the way the youth of its Sephardic community were taught.Footnote 8 Horowitz wished to see youth in Poland enjoy the same type of education, and according to Perl, the pious rabbi demanded that Polish rabbis introduce similar learning methods. His call, as well as calls of others, such as “Rabbi Shabetai Sofer and Rabbi Hirẓ Veizel [Naphtali Herz Wessely],” had no impact.
Perl chose to cite three individuals who were critical of traditional Ashkenazic education. The Amsterdam example praised by Horowitz was a six-room school adjacent to a magnificent synagogue, where children were taught according to their age and level of understanding.Footnote 9 Rabbi Shabetai Sofer, a Polish Jewish grammarian and author of an annotated prayer book (16th–early 17th century), criticized the ḥeder teachers (melamdim), claiming that a majority of them did not understand the meaning of the words in the prayer book and were unable to even read them correctly.Footnote 10 Like Perl, Naphtali Herz Wessely (1725–1805) mentioned R. Isaiah Horowitz as a great authority in his work Divre shalom ve-ʾemet (Words of peace and truth), and copied from Shabetai Sheftel Horowitz everything he retold about his father's visit to the Amsterdam school, praising the customs of the Sephardic community as rational and just.Footnote 11 Moreover, Wessely criticized the lack of knowledge of languages among the Jews in Ashkenaz and Poland, and in general their confused speech, while, in contrast, expressed admiration for the Sephardic tradition.Footnote 12 Joseph Perl aligned his perspective with that of these individuals, thus ensuring that his project would not be viewed as emerging from a modern sensibility. He didn't mention the most recent example of Israel Jacobson and his school in Seesen (to be discussed below) as a model for his project. He concluded his appeal by requesting that those present select a few people who would take it upon themselves to help carry out his project and lay down the cornerstone for the “house of God and study” (גאט- און לערן-הויז).Footnote 13 Clearly, from its inception, Perl's vision included a combination of a school and synagogue. Nathan Horowitz, Perl's first biographer and son-in-law of the Galician maskil Nachman Krochmal (a descendant of R. Isaiah Horowitz), related that Perl told him that his inspiration came from the “kabbalist and Orthodox,” Isaiah Horowitz, specifically what he said about the school in Amsterdam.Footnote 14
In 1812 Perl purchased a suitable lot and started building the school and synagogue. In the meantime, he temporarily vacated six rooms in his house, hired the required teaching staff, and opened a school in his house in the winter semester of 1813 with sixteen students. The new building was completed in 1815.Footnote 15
Perl's school was planned while Tarnopol was still a Habsburg territory, so its curriculum was based on Austrian models.Footnote 16 Perl's project may have been inspired by the extensive plan (about three hundred and fifty pages long) designed to improve education in Austria, which was approved by Emperor Francis I and published in 1806. It discussed in detail school curricula and teachers’ duties.Footnote 17 Instruction in religion and ethics was of central importance in this plan, especially in primary schools in general and the Hauptschule (a city school composed of three or four grades) in particular.Footnote 18 Perl's school was modelled after this type of school.
In 1809 Perl even asked a dignitary in Vienna for permission to open an educational institution in Tarnopol.Footnote 19 But his plan started materializing only after Tarnopol was no longer under Habsburg rule. According to the agreements of the Treaty of Schönbrunn, signed in late 1809 (during the Napoleonic Wars), the district of Tarnopol passed to Russian hands.Footnote 20 In 1815, though, at the end of the Napoleonic Wars and following the agreements of the Congress of Vienna, Tarnopol was returned to Austria.Footnote 21 The brief rule of the Russian Empire over Tarnopol proved rather beneficial for Perl, since establishing a private school was much more complicated under the Habsburg monarchy, expecting the fulfillment of many requirements and appropriate permits. School teachers had to prove that they had a formal and pedagogic education, something Perl or his teachers did not possess.Footnote 22 As for synagogues, after the promulgation of Joseph's II Edict of Toleration for Galicia (1789), establishing a new synagogue was the exclusive prerogative of community councils. It required approval of the district authorities, which was granted only after proof was presented of possession of the necessary funds, which included 2,000 gulden for the approval and an annual tax of 100 gulden (old synagogues were exempt from those taxes).Footnote 23 Under such conditions Perl would not have been able to carry out his plans.
Imperial Russia did not impose such strict regulations. Once Perl secured the personal approval of Ignacy von Theyls, the district administrator of the newly annexed Tarnopol district, he was free to go ahead with his school and synagogue project.Footnote 24 Indeed, von Theyls was later praised by Hirsch Reitmann, who became the director of the school in Brody and was a former student in Perl's school, as a friend and protector of the Tarnopol school.Footnote 25
While Perl's school started operating in his home, the synagogue project had to wait until the new building was ready. In the meantime, in order to raise more money for the building, Perl started selling seats for his synagogue. Sales were carried out in special auctions conducted according to a sixteen-clause document that Perl composed for that purpose on September 6, 1814 (approved by von Theyls the next day).Footnote 26 In addition to the money paid for purchasing the seats, male and female seat owners were expected to pay an annual fee (45 silver kopeks) for lighting the prayer hall,Footnote 27 and fees for necessary purchases for the synagogue, such as chairs, prayer stands (Ständer), lamps, etc. Seat owners were prohibited from making any changes to their seats, such as placing their own lamps on the wall, because in doing so “the inner appearance of the house of prayer could be ruined.”Footnote 28 Seat owners were allowed to sell their seats, provided that the contract ensure that the buyer will continue to pay the annual lighting fee.Footnote 29 According to Philip Friedman, the synagogue had 113 seats for men and 63 seats for women, and when it opened in 1815, 55 men and 41 women had already purchased seats.Footnote 30
A number of synagogue seats were not sold, but rather reserved for school teachers and their wives. Teachers did not own the seats but could use them without payment as long as they were employed by the school.Footnote 31 Seat number 10 in the men's section was sold on the condition that for two Sabbaths during the year, namely after the examinations at the end of each semester, it would be used during the morning prayers by the town rabbi. If the institute decided to hire a rabbi, the synagogue would purchase that seat for him.Footnote 32 Row 17 was reserved for guests,Footnote 33 and row 15, which was close to the entrance and had only six seats, was reserved for mourners.Footnote 34 One may speculate that this arrangement was aimed at ensuring that the Mourners’ Kaddish be recited in unison, a topic not discussed in Perl's synagogue regulations. Reciting Kaddish in unison was originally a Sephardic custom, but was adopted by some Ashkenazic rabbis starting in the eighteenth century, such as R. Jacob Emden and the councilor of the Westphalian consistory, R. Mendel Steinhardt.Footnote 35 Both saw in this Sephardic custom a solution to disputes surrounding the question of which mourner should recite the Kaddish.
According to a memorandum written by Jacob Neuman (the head of the school for the first two years),Footnote 36 selling seats for the new synagogue provided much-needed financial support for the school, especially in its first few years. Moreover, as it turned out, parents and students treated the school with reverence because of the synagogue. Having a synagogue attached to the school also provided teachers with an opportunity to teach the students to pray quietly and without shouting, as was the “custom in the country.”Footnote 37 Interestingly, the published daily school schedule did not include set times for the regular morning prayers.Footnote 38 It seems that it was the responsibility of the parents to ensure students attend synagogue for morning prayers during the week. According to Philip Friedman, students attended the synagogue with their teachers on Sabbath morning,Footnote 39 and indeed the school's printed weekly schedule has Betstunden (prayer meeting) written across the morning hours of the Sabbath.Footnote 40
Like students in all Habsburg schools,Footnote 41 students in Perl's school started the day with a short daily prayer; in Perl's school they recited from Shevaʿ tefillot, a special book composed by Perl with short prayers for each day of the week.Footnote 42 This was not part of a maskilic or Enlightenment project, but rather an adoption of contemporary school norms influenced by German Pietistic pedagogic ideas that were imported into the Habsburg monarchy by the German pedagogue Johann Ignaz von Felbiger (1724–1788) in the second half of the eighteenth century.Footnote 43 Since the traditional prayers were recited in the synagogue, the short daily prayers helped create a religious atmosphere in the classroom, as was expected of all Austrian schools.
On August 6, 1815, about two months after the dedication of the new building, the Tarnopol district was formally returned to Austrian rule. Von Theyls left the city on August 22.Footnote 44 As a result of those political changes, Perl's school and synagogue remained without protection and government recognition. Indeed, less than a year after losing its status, the school encountered the first opposition from within the Jewish community. An unsigned poster distributed in May 1816 in several cities in the area declared a ban of excommunication against any householder who marries his children to Jews from Tarnopol because of its school (or Brody, where a plan to open a similar school was on its way).Footnote 45 The ban did not mention Perl's synagogue, only his Freyschule, where Jewish youth studied languages and secular subjects. Suspicion fell on Hasidim and a directive issued in Vienna called for an investigation, since pronouncing such bans was prohibited by Austrian civil law. In addition, the Viennese Court Chancellery asked the Galician Gubernium (central Austrian administration in Galicia) on August 23, 1816, for information on the Tarnopol Jewish Normalschule, specifically details on when it was established, since all German Jewish schools there had been closed in 1806. It also asked the Gubernium to find out what kind of endowment and charter the school has, and its religious orientation.Footnote 46 Clearly, these developments could not have been welcome news for Perl.
I was unable to find the response of the Gubernium, but according to archival documents examined by Nathan Michael Gelber, the Gubernium suggested maintaining Perl's school as a private institution provided that it employ only trained teachers, conduct itself according to the appropriate school regulations, and be subject to the general school supervisory body. Impressed by the educational level of the school after visiting it during semester exams, the governor of Galicia, Franz von Hauer, gave his support to this suggestion.Footnote 47 Since Perl had to spend money on building renovations and purchase the required equipment in order to comply with Austrian school standards, the financial situation of the school kept deteriorating. This is when Perl came up with the idea of transferring his school and synagogue to the ownership of the community council and turning it into a Jewish public school supported by public funds.Footnote 48
In 1817 Perl approached the Viennese education commission (Studienhofkommision) with this idea, and upon request, submitted an elaborate plan for securing funding for the school, as well as a list of its personnel and their salaries. Essentially, Perl suggested raising the meat tax in Tarnopol and in several Jewish communities in the district, a plan that required the approval of the state authorities. The education commission informed Perl that the emperor would agree to turn his school into a public Jewish Hauptschule only under the conditions that raising the meat tax would be agreed upon by the relevant Jewish community councils without any coercion, and that the school would be subject to the supervisory directives that applied to Christian schools, except in the study of the Jewish religion.Footnote 49 Public schools at that time were under the supervision of the district authorities and the Catholic consistories. Needless to say, the transfer of the school and synagogue to the ownership of the Tarnopol Jewish community had to be carried out through a formal contract of sale.
Almost a year and a half later, on May 1818, the Gubernium approved the complicated steps required to change the status of the school.Footnote 50 The official, detailed endowment charter of the school and synagogue was signed by the Gubernium secretary, Franz Kratter, on September 12, 1818.Footnote 51 It included not only a list of teaching positions and the salaries allocated to them, but also a section requiring maintenance of the synagogue and its personnel, namely, a prayer leader, a Torah reader, beadles, and janitors.Footnote 52 Perl was appointed director for life, or until he was ready to give up his position, and was allowed to live for free in the school building.Footnote 53 Christian children were barred from attending the school.Footnote 54 The school's name was changed from Israelitische Freyschule to Israelitische Hauptschule, and students who were not considered poor had to pay tuition.Footnote 55
According to the endowment charter, the community councils of the Jewish communities in Tarnopol, Skałat, Mikulince, and Trembowla committed to contribute annual funding for the school from a special increase in the meat tax, and the community of Grzymałów agreed to pay an annual sum of 250 gulden. Members of the Jewish community in Zbaraż protested their participation in the project and thus were not included in the 1818 endowment charter. A petition addressed to the emperor, signed by many Zbaraż community members on June 9, 1819, claimed that the required annual contribution of 450 gulden was agreed on by several members of the community council against the will of the local Jews. It explained that most of the Jews in the community are poor, and if the authorities are interested in raising the education level of Jews they can do that for less money by appointing a local teacher. As for teaching Hebrew and Talmud, there are enough learned local Jews who would be able do that. The purpose of the contribution, according to the petition, is to benefit Joseph Perl.Footnote 56 The petition did not mention Perl's synagogue.
In response to the petition the Gubernium requested that the Tarnopol district authorities investigate the matter. In a letter dated September 29, 1819, the local authorities claimed that the opposition was voiced only by the “fanatic sect of Hasidim” and not by the community members at large. In any event, according to the 1789 Galician Edict of Toleration, only community councils were considered representatives of communities and not individual members, so the petition signatories had no right to speak in the name of the community.Footnote 57 About a month later the Gubernium informed Vienna that following the investigation it decided to reject the Zbaraż petition.Footnote 58 On December 22, 1819, Vienna approved the original commitment of the Zbaraż community council to participate in the funding of the school.Footnote 59 On November 16, 1820, the emperor approved the status of the school as a Hauptschule, whose graduates would be able to continue their studies at the gymnasia, and the Galician Gubernium published this as an edict on January 9, 1821.Footnote 60
The formal steps taken to establish the new status of the school did not prevent local Jews from opposing it. In 1819 several of them approached the rabbi of Tarnopol, R. Osias Babad, asking him whether sending children to Perl's school is considered a sin according to Jewish law. The rabbi supported their opposition and was even ready to defend their position to the authorities.Footnote 61 But after the school received imperial approval, internal opposition could not affect its secured existence.
Synagogue Regulations and Their Historical Context
Perl's synagogue regulations were transferred to the Gubernium with other documents pertaining to the school during the negotiations with the authorities about changing the school's status. Their storage in the Gubernium's archive saved them from destruction. The regulations’ nine chapters cover every aspect of synagogue life, including conduct and order in the synagogue during prayers, honors bestowed on participants during the reading of the Torah, fees and payments, wardens and their duties, rabbis and preachers, liturgy, prayer leaders, and Torah readers. The regulations are significant not only because of their careful attention to every detail of synagogue routine, but also because Perl makes clear which innovations are allowed and which are forbidden. Apparently, there was a Hebrew version of the regulations designed for internal use, but such a document has not yet been discovered.Footnote 62
Should Perl's synagogue regulations be analyzed within the continuum of synagogue regulations or as a unique phenomenon situated within its own geographical and social context? This question gets more complicated if we consider Steven Lowenstein's observation that “the earliest wave of Reform was heavily concerned with improving the aesthetics and decorum of Jewish worship.… Changes in decorum and aesthetics were incorporated into regulations (Synagogenordnungen) which were backed by communal authority and, in many cases (especially in the smaller states), by government power as well. The tradition of reforming Synagogenordnungen began in the Kingdom of Westphalia in 1810 where it was enforced by the State.”Footnote 63 Should Perl's synagogue regulations be considered as part of this “earliest wave of Reform”?
Preceding Perl's regulations, the first two publications of synagogue regulations appeared at the end of the first decade of the nineteenth century, and were both a result of French conquest and the application of French law that granted equality before the law to all inhabitants: Meliẓ yosher (Intercessor of uprightness), and Bekanntmachung wegen besserer Einrichtung des Gottesdienstes in den Synagogen des Königreichs Westphalen (Proclamation concerning better organization of worship in the synagogues of the Kingdom of Westphalia). Published in Amsterdam in 1809, Meliẓ yosher (which was written in prose rather than in a numbered sequence) discussed the innovations adopted in Amsterdam's Adat Jesurun synagogue, providing halakhic justifications for each of them. The synagogue was established in 1797 by a group of Ashkenazic Jews, after the French conquered Holland (1795) and granted emancipation to all Dutch Jews (1796). Failing to introduce social and political changes within the old Jewish community, this group established a new community, Adat Jesurun, which offered its members all the religious services, including a rabbi and a synagogue.Footnote 64 The new community ceased its independent existence in 1808 after the French ruler established a Jewish consistory demanding uniformity in all religious and liturgical matters. Meliẓ yosher was published a year later by Israel Graanboom, the son of Aaron Moses Isaak Graanboom, the religious leader (moreh ẓedek) of the new community.Footnote 65
Bekanntmachung wegen besserer Einrichtung des Gottesdienstes in den Synagogen des Königreichs Westphalen was published in Kassel in 1810, and it lists the synagogue regulations formulated by the Jewish consistory established in Westphalia under the leadership of Israel Jacobson (1768–1828) when it fell under French rule (1807).Footnote 66 The French authorities granted all subjects in the Kingdom of Westphalia equality before the law, thus making Westphalia the first German state where Jews enjoyed equal rights (limited for the period under French rule). Unlike in Amsterdam, the Westphalian synagogue regulations were sanctioned by the authorities from the start. Two years after the publication of the Westphalian regulations, Rabbi Mendel Steinhardt, a member of the Westphalian consistory, published his Divre ʾiggeret (1812), which defended the consistory's recent innovations, particularly the decision to permit the consumption of legumes on Passover. Employing halakhic justifications, the work also defended several of the synagogue innovations.Footnote 67 Both published regulations were the first works designated for practical use in specific synagogues.
Scholars have emphasized the differences between the Amsterdam and Westphalian regulations, and generally viewed only the latter in the context of the development of the Reform movement. The Westphalian regulations were backed by a new religious ideology, much of it articulated in the journal Sulamith and in Israel Jacobson's sermons and writings.Footnote 68 Meliẓ yosher did not promote any new religious ideology. Some scholars have suggested that the motive behind Adat Jesurun's synagogue innovations was its members’ wish to adopt the customs and mores of Amsterdam's Sephardic community, which they perceived as superior.Footnote 69
David Ellenson has argued that both in the Westphalian and the Amsterdam cases, the synagogue innovations were a response to Emancipation and the newly available opportunities for social and cultural integration.Footnote 70 Ellenson emphasizes that even in the case of Amsterdam, “an analysis of this work [Meliẓ yosher] shows that changes in practice and behaviour often antedated and took precedence over matters of faith and ideology in determining the various courses which Judaism was to follow in the modern world.”Footnote 71 Recognizing that Meliẓ yosher defended its innovations based on Jewish law, Ellenson argues that the members of Adat Jesurun “may also be viewed in another way—as part of a larger trend towards modernization that was beginning to take place in the Jewish world of Western and Central Europe as a result of Emancipation.”Footnote 72
Contrary to those two precedents, Tarnopol fell under Russian rule instead of French rule, and Emancipation was not on the horizon when Perl drafted his synagogue regulations. Indeed, no scholarly studies have connected Perl's synagogue project with the Adat Jesurun precedent. However, some recent works describe Perl's school and synagogue project within a continuum that starts with the Westphalian example, especially because the head of its Jewish consistory, Israel Jacobson, established a school with a synagogue attached to it in Seesen:
Perl was also a devoted pedagogue who in 1813 established in Tarnopol the first modern Jewish school in Galicia, one in which traditional Jewish subjects were integrated with secular ones. Like Israel Jacobson in Seesen, Perl decided to provide a religious service for his students and their families which would be in harmony with the atmosphere of the school. Thus at his own expense he established a “Temple for Regulated Worship,”Footnote 73 connected with the school, in which the service was more decorous, a boys’ choir sang,Footnote 74 and Perl himself in later years gave occasional edifying sermons. Though school and temple bothFootnote 75 met opposition, they were able to persist, serving as examples of educational and religious reform for other Galician towns.Footnote 76
Other scholars adopt a similar approach, writing that in Perl's synagogue “services were to be marked by the decorousness characteristic of the earliest ‘reform’ synagogue in Seesen,”Footnote 77 and that “Perl introduced some aesthetic reforms into his school and synagogue, such as a German sermon, a boys’ choir, and an organ.”Footnote 78
Interestingly, pointing to Jacobson as a predecessor and even model for Perl was common in the first few decades after Perl died, but only in articles or books written for the German reading public. It seems that Marcus Jost was the first to connect the two, albeit in a very general manner. Writing about Perl in his multivolume Jewish history, Jost describes Perl at the outset as a man of action, even more so than Israel Jacobson, whose vaster means and a more receptive public made it easier for him to be effective.Footnote 79 His reference to Perl's synagogue is short, and he remarks that it was beautiful,Footnote 80 and that Perl knew to establish in his synagogue an appealing prayer service and sermon.Footnote 81
Similarly, Julius Heinrich Dessauer writes that Joseph Perl was a “fearless fighter for light and truth,”Footnote 82 who, despite many obstacles that fanatic Hasidim placed on his path, established a school for boys and girls, whereby he was for Jews there “a second Jacobson.”Footnote 83 The mere mention of Jacobson resonated well with German Jewish readers, who associated this name not only with a school but with some very significant religious innovations in the prayer service.Footnote 84 It also made Germany a point of reference.
S. [Zeev] Demant (1830–1897), a member of the third generation of the Galician Haskalah,Footnote 85 was a child when Perl died, and his references to Perl, which appeared in the Hungarian Jewish periodical Ben Chananja, were not based on personal connections or memories.Footnote 86 Demant contends that “Perl was for Galicia what Mendelssohn and Friedländer through their writings, and Jacobson through his actions, were for Germany.”Footnote 87 Demant expresses a similar view in an article he wrote for the Viennese weekly Die Neuzeit, assigning Perl's “reform efforts” to the influence of the “waves from Berlin” that crossed over to Galicia, especially Mendelssohn's ideas and Jacobson's actions.Footnote 88
Unlike the accounts on Perl written for a German reading public, the Hebrew accounts published after Perl's death never mentioned Israel Jacobson in connection with Perl's project. Instead, they made Perl's personal religiosity their focal point. The tone was set by Solomon Judah Rapoport in his eulogy for Perl, published in 1841. After describing the vast library Perl left for the school, Rapoport writes, “[A]nd above all he was known for his fear of God, since throughout his life he didn't transgress even the smallest ruling of the sages.”Footnote 89 As for the school and synagogue, Rapoport writes, “The walls of the synagogue with the praiseworthy school testify to his precious deeds. Torah is there; prayer is there.”Footnote 90
The most extensive Hebrew account on Perl was published in an 1866 work written by the maskil Berish Goldenberg (1815–1898), a Hebrew teacher in Perl's school. Goldenberg explains that because of the spread of Hasidism, and especially because of the conduct of Hasidim in synagogues, which included smoking, drinking, and merrymaking, Joseph Perl sought to establish a prayer house characterized by solemnity and fear of God. Goldenberg mentioned the regulations that Perl wrote for his synagogue and emphasized that Perl did not tolerate any deviation from them.Footnote 91
Like Rapoport before him, Goldenberg writes that Perl was strict in his religious observance, following even the most minor of the Shulḥan ʿarukh’s rulings, with no questions and no second thoughts.Footnote 92 He expected his teachers to behave the same way and did not hesitate to expel those suspected of the slightest divergence from religious laws. To prove Perl's strict observance, Goldenberg relates a story about the maskil Eliakim ben Judah Ha-Milzahgi Mehlsack. Out of a sense of charity for the impoverished Mehlsack, Perl employed him in his synagogue. On the eve of Yom Kippur, Mehlsack did not spread straw on the synagogue's floor as was the local custom. Upon discovering this, Perl immediately removed Mehlsack from his position, claiming that this innovation would besmirch the place in the eyes of the Jewish public.Footnote 93 While presenting this act as motivated by the wish to preserve the religious reputation of the synagogue in the eyes of the public, Goldenberg first emphasizes the strict personal religious observance of Perl, a factor completely missing in the German-language accounts.
In light of such opposing narratives, analyzing Perl's synagogue regulations within the context of the synagogue regulations published a few years earlier in Amsterdam and Westphalia will provide us with a more accurate perspective for determining Perl's place within the new trend of synagogue regulations in the early nineteenth century.
Joseph Perl's Synagogue Regulations
As mentioned above, Joseph Perl planned the synagogue as an essential part of his school, as the regulations make clear: “The institute, which in all its parts must always add up to a whole and must never be separated, has only one main director for the whole institute.”Footnote 94 This declaration is repeated a few chapters later:
As, in accordance with § 1 Chap. III, the prayer house in no case and consideration is to be separated from the institute, and so fees and gifts of all kinds are at first handed to the acting warden [schulvater, i.e., gabbai], who has, to be sure, to deliver them to the general administration of the institute and get a receipt. The money flows into the general cash box of the institute, and through this all needs of the prayer house are immediately taken care of; the gifts however, such as candles, holy garments, etc., will be handed to the person who is responsible for their keep.Footnote 95
Organizationally, the school and the synagogue were two parts of the same entity, sharing a single administration and a single cash fund.
While Perl's regulations touch on many issues, those most informative for our purposes are decorum, liturgy, sermons, and clergy.
Decorum
Perl's concern with synagogue decorum emerges in various clauses, for example:
The veneration for the Highest Being who is worshiped in the holy house, in and of itself, makes it the duty of everyone to behave there quietly, calmly, and with the highest deference. Thus everyone must take care not to bring mud or dirt on his feet or clothing into the house of prayer; nobody is allowed to be louder than the prayer leader or disturb the congregation in its prayers through excessive shouting; likewise, no one is allowed to bring into the house of prayer children who are too young and who cause disturbance, just as all this is prescribed in the Shulḥan ʿarukh, hilkhot tefillah [laws concerning prayer].Footnote 96
This clause looks like a combination of three clauses from the Westphalian regulations prescribing similar behavior.Footnote 97 Such directives reflect an effort to combat the widespread view of synagogues as particularly noisy places.Footnote 98 As mentioned above, Jacob Neuman, the director of Perl's school in its first year, charged teachers to instruct their students to pray quietly and without shouting.Footnote 99
Another issue associated with decorum was singing during prayers. Meliẓ yosher emphasizes that the congregation should sing responses, as in Hallel, in unison, and not sing along with the cantor.Footnote 100 Perl's regulations are silent on the issue of congregational singing, but he has strong words to say against employing a cantor with assistants: “Never shall a singer [Sänger, Chasan] with assistants be employed in the prayer house of the institute.”Footnote 101 This absolute prohibition is repeated a few clauses later: “He may perform the prayer of the Sabbath and festivals according to his abilities, and with the usual melodies, but never with assistants or additional singers [Gehilfen, Nebensängern] (§ 1, Chap. V).”Footnote 102
Interestingly, when referring to the prayer leader throughout his regulations, Perl uses the term Vorbeter. The term Chasan is used only in connection with this prohibition. At the first glance, this double prohibition using the word “never” (nie) looks like a warning against the introduction of a synagogue choir, a sort of reaction to a recent trend. But choirs were not yet introduced anywhere during prayers, not even in Westphalia. Israel Jacobson introduced male choir singing at the dedication ceremony of the Seesen school synagogue,Footnote 103 but not as part of the prayer service in regular synagogues. It should be emphasized that prayers in the two school synagogues in Westphalia (Seesen and Kassel) were not conducted as regular services. Prayers were abbreviated and recited in German and Hebrew, the Bible portions were simply read, and a children's choir sang hymns in Hebrew and German.Footnote 104 The Westphalian school synagogues were designed as learning platforms for children. Only after he moved to Berlin and established a private prayer service at his home (June 1815) did Jacobson introduce a children's choir during prayers,Footnote 105 which was two months after Perl formulated his regulations. The Westphalian regulations do not mention a synagogue choir, on the contrary, they stipulate that “every cantor shall endeavor to enunciate every word of the prayers clearly. The unsuitable traditional singing that interrupts the prayer is to be avoided. Every accompaniment by singers and bass-singers, employed by some congregations for that purpose, is to cease altogether.”Footnote 106 The Westphalian regulations add that in the case that such singers are already employed by the synagogue under a contract, they should continue to receive their salary until they find a different occupation.Footnote 107
It seems that Perl's and the Westphalian regulations refer to a specific traditional practice, which according to Ismar Elbogen was adopted in Poland, and “still exists” there (that is, at the time of Elbogen's writing in the early twentieth century), where two young choir men (meshorerim) stood on both sides of the prayer leader, and accompanied him with their singing.Footnote 108 Elbogen adds that this was also common in Germany, where for many centuries it had a detrimental influence on synagogue melodies, since those singers borrowed melodies from many sources, including church and countryside songs.Footnote 109 Apparently, the prohibition on employing assistant singers aimed to ensure the use of respectable customary synagogue melodies, as well as to avoid cacophonous singing. This explains Perl's wording, quoted above: “He [the prayer leader] may perform the prayer of the Sabbath and festivals according to his abilities, and with the usual melodies …” (emphasis added). Perl uses the term Vorbeter as opposed to Kantor, which was used in the Westphalian regulations. Since Perl wrote his regulations several years after the Westphalian regulations were published, this could well be a deliberate change.
Perl's reaction to the 1829 Viennese synagogue regulations, specifically the introduction of a choir in the prayer service, is not known.Footnote 110 However, according to Berish Goldenberg, the first thing that Perl's son, Michael, did when he became the head of the school after his father's death was organize a choir and incorporate the Viennese cantor Solomon Sulzer's Shir Ẓion as part of the service.Footnote 111 One can infer that throughout his lifetime Perl continued the ban on additional singers as stipulated in his synagogue regulations. However, by 1840 choirs were already common not only in Vienna, but also in Prague, where Solomon Judah Rapoport served as rabbi.Footnote 112 In October 1843 Samuel Goldenberg urged Moritz Steinschneider to accept the position of the Tarnopol school director, which included preaching “in the modern synagogue founded by Perl in which there are fine decorum and a beautiful service with a choir of fourteen singers.”Footnote 113
The norms for decorum in Tarnopol were different from those adopted in Amsterdam or in the Westphalian Kingdom. Unlike in Amsterdam, Perl did not view the custom of auctioning off synagogue ʿaliyot (honors of being called up to the Torah reading) to be a breach of decorum. Since the income from the synagogue also provided the school treasury with much-needed funds, Perl may have kept this practice for practical reasons. In order to make auctions more respectable, the sums quoted were indicated in hundreds: “The customary honors, such as the calling up for the Torah, the opening of the ark, etc., are sold through calling out to the highest bidder, and in such a way, that the offered 100, costs 10 kopek.”Footnote 114 Auctioning off ʿaliyot was abolished in Amsterdam's Adat Jesurun, and the number of individuals called up to the Torah was limited to seven.Footnote 115 In addition, while an individual in Amsterdam had no right to decide who should be called up to the Torah,Footnote 116 Perl's synagogue regulations granted such a privilege to seat owners who donated the “ten silver rubles for miẓvot” (that is the right to let others be called up to the Torah reading) and for other charities.Footnote 117 Interestingly, the Westphalian synagogue regulations are silent on the issue of how individuals should be called up to the Torah. They did require that people who are given ʿaliyot be called up by their name and family name. Those who did not have family names were barred from that honor.Footnote 118
Another issue associated with ʿaliyot had to do with calling people up to the Torah reading during the Torah portion of Ki tavo (Deuteronomy 26:1–29:8), specifically the section listing rebukes and curses (tokheḥah). Various customs had arisen with respect to this section, since people were reluctant to be honored with a section cursing Israel. The Westphalian regulations stipulate that this section should be read out loud the same as any other Torah portion, and that the rabbi or his assistant should be called up to the Torah for this part. If they are not present, the cantor should be called up.Footnote 119 Perl's regulations stipulate that “this second beadle shall also always be called to the Torah in the section of the curses, should no one from the congregation be found willing to be called up, who is not taking fright from the old prejudices.”Footnote 120 This is the only place in the regulations where Perl uses the phrase “old prejudices.” While this may sound as if it stems from a world view associated with the Enlightenment, the issue was a familiar one in rabbinic literature, and Perl relied on established customs to support his position.Footnote 121
Finally, in the Westphalian case decorum innovations included the abolishment of the custom of knocking on doors in order to call people to morning prayers in the synagogue.Footnote 122 Perl saw nothing wrong with this custom: “The assembly occurs after the customary announcement on all doors. The prayer will begin as soon as the proper number of people are present and the warden has given his permission. In the absence of the warden, the prayer leader may decide this on his own.”Footnote 123
Liturgy
Liturgical innovations in Westphalia and Amsterdam were limited to ceasing to recite piyyutim (medieval hymns). In Amsterdam this practice was justified by citing the prohibition against interrupting the main prayers, as well as an explanation that the piyyutim were added for the generation for which they were written and not for future generations. Moreover, reciting these hymns lengthened the service, which placed a burden on the public (tirḥat ha-ẓibur).Footnote 124 Not every custom should be considered sacred, according to Meliẓ yosher, only those that have a basis in the Torah.Footnote 125 The Westphalian regulations prohibited the recitation of piyyutim, except those said on Rosh Ha-shanah and Yom Kippur.Footnote 126 Contrary to these two precedents, Perl's regulations are unequivocal on this issue: “The prayer shall always, without exception, be performed according to the prevailing prayer formulas and without the slightest alteration or insertion.”Footnote 127 This prohibition on introducing any changes in the prayer formulas appears again in a later chapter, where it is formulated with even stronger language: “Never is the prayer leader of this synagogue allowed to change the form or order of the prayers, or insert other prayer forms, but he must in this, as well as generally in his entire office performance, comply unalterably with the universal dominant customs and formalities of the synagogues of our nation and the way these are presently kept in the local old synagogue (§ 4, Chap. I).”Footnote 128 It is unlikely that these two paragraphs refer to hasidic prayer innovations and additions. Hasidim would not set foot in the synagogue that was attached to Perl's school, an institution they viewed as heretical.Footnote 129 Perl may have been referring to the changes and additions introduced in Amsterdam and Westphalia, like the change in the language of the prayer for the ruler of the country (“ha-noten teshuʿah la-melakhim”),Footnote 130 the shortening of the Seliḥot,Footnote 131 the removal of the ʾAkdamut hymn from the Shavuot service,Footnote 132 and various changes in synagogue customs.Footnote 133
Perl deals with Hasidism in another part of his regulations, albeit without naming the movement: “If he [the prayer leader] declares that he belongs to a specific sect, then he cannot remain in this prayer house as prayer leader, as the institute has no other purpose than to spread unity and peace among all human beings and not to foster sects in its midst.”Footnote 134 This paragraph refers to a hypothetical prayer leader who becomes attracted to Hasidism at some point during his tenure, not to one who introduces actual innovations in the service. Such a prayer leader cannot remain in his position. This is the only specific reference to a “sect” in Perl's regulations.
The regulations even add a special paragraph regarding the piyyutim: “The additional prayers [Pait (sic)] for Saturdays and festivals shall likewise be conducted according to the customary prevailing formulas, namely before and after the Eighteen Benedictions, and entirely as in the old synagogue, and without alteration.”Footnote 135 The prohibition against altering the practice of reciting piyyutim is apparently a direct response to the Amsterdam and Westphalian regulations on this issue, since the question of removing the piyyutim was not debated in Galicia at the time. Perl here constitutes a Galician traditionalist model that upholds the local liturgical formulas and customs in their strictest manifestation.
Sermons
Traditionally, sermons were delivered by community rabbis twice a year, and most were devoted to talmudic explications.Footnote 136 Before the Polish partitions, itinerant preachers (maggidim), and sometimes also local ones, would deliver sermons focusing on ethical issues. This practice became increasingly difficult because of the Austrian government's prohibition of itinerancy without appropriate permits.Footnote 137 The Galician Edict of Toleration did not recognize the position of a paid community preacher, and so preachers slowly disappeared from the Galician scene.Footnote 138 As a result, ethical sermons became a rarity, except in hasidic circles where such sermons relied to a large extent on kabbalistic sources and themes.
The Amsterdam regulations stipulated that a sermon should be delivered on every Sabbath and should promote moral virtues. They even went further, forbidding congregants from disputing the rabbi by means of casuistry (pilpul), since this placed a burden on the public. The rationale was that the practice of delivering a moral sermon was an old custom, as shown in numerous examples.Footnote 139 The Westphalian regulations stipulated that “[s]ince rabbinical discussions do not belong in the synagogue, no rabbi is to deliver talmudic or kabbalistic and mystical disquisitions. He should speak about teachings of religion and ethics only.”Footnote 140 It added, “Just as it is not permitted in the case of a resident, so it is not allowed for an itinerant to give public sermons or addresses without the special permission of the consistory.”Footnote 141 The Westphalian consistory repeated this regulation in the special directives it published for rabbis, which included a list of the rabbi's obligations.Footnote 142 Those stipulated that the rabbi should deliver, where possible, and when there is an opportunity, a sermon aimed at edifying (erbauen) the public, preferably in the German language.Footnote 143
Perl discusses sermons very briefly after stipulating that the town rabbi be the rabbi of the synagogue's seat owners: “The rabbi [of the town] is not compelled to preach in this synagogue; he can do so at will on Saturdays and festivals for the edification [Erbauung] of the congregation, but he must beforehand give notice of the content of his sermon to the institute director, and in case it is granted, the wardens are notified so they can announce it.”Footnote 144 In a similar vein to what was stipulated in the Westphalian regulations, Perl adds, “Beside this, however, no preacher, either local or foreign, shall be allowed to preach in the institute without explicit written permission of the director of the institute or his substitute.”Footnote 145 While he did not introduce regular Sabbath sermons, Perl provided for the possibility, in case the town rabbi wishes to deliver one. What is striking is Perl's expectation, at this early stage and in this place, that the sermon aim to edify the congregation.Footnote 146 As Haim Gertner had shown, Perl had no sympathy for talmudic casuistic sermons, explicitly criticizing them in his later work Boḥen ẓadik (1838).Footnote 147
There is no conclusive evidence that Perl was familiar with the Amsterdam regulations, but he was quite certainly aware of what was going on in Westphalia. Sulamith, which published all the Westphalian regulations, also published a series of articles about Perl's school, including curricula. The first article in that series was written by Markus Ehrenreich, who was involved with the school in Brody.Footnote 148 Such a detailed and informed series could not have been published without Perl's cooperation. The first published educational sermons were written by Joseph Wolf, one of the editors of Sulamith.Footnote 149 In the list of subscribers to the print edition, which was published in German with a Hebrew translation, we find several individuals from Brody, including “Ehrenreich.” Perl's name is not on the list, perhaps because Tarnopol was then under Russian rule, but he could have learned about the book from Ehrenreich.Footnote 150
Perl started delivering occasional German sermons in his synagogue in 1836, stopping in early 1838, when Solomon Judah Rapoport took the position of rabbi in Tarnopol.Footnote 151 While some scholars interpreted his sermonizing in the larger context of synagogue reforms first introduced by Israel Jacobson, their interpretation ignores the local context, especially Perl's attitude to sermons as expressed in his Boḥen ẓadik.Footnote 152 After all, in his view, sermons were not a part of the liturgy. While the new style of edifying sermons originated in Germany and was influenced by Protestant preaching style, Jewish preachers there did not see the practice as Christian in essence, as Alexander Altmann wrote, “In the case of the moralizing Jewish preachers there was little to distinguish them from their Christian models, except the absence of references to the New Testament. Whether their essential ethos was Christian or merely ‘enlightened’ in the sense of Aufklärung theology is a moot point. The Jews certainly felt that the tenets of Aufklärung represented a common, neutral ground between the faiths rather than a sublimation of Christianity.”Footnote 153
Perl did not live in a Protestant environment. He was surely familiar with the new type of German Jewish sermon that was still in its infancy, and he liked its educational elements. Altmann allows for an additional type of sermon that he calls a “modernized form of Derashah,” which is more appropriate for our case: “It had not completely ousted the traditional Derashah, particularly in the eastern parts of Germany, but was generally held to be incomparably superior to it. A modernized form of Derashah was cultivated by men like Hakam Isaac Bernays in Hamburg and Rabbi Solomon Judah Rapoport in Prague.”Footnote 154 It seems that Joseph Perl was the pioneer of the moralizing derashah, preceding both Bernays and Rapoport.Footnote 155
Clergy
References to rabbis in the Westphalian regulations are brief: “Neither at the outset of the prayers, nor [at the conclusion of] the reading of the Shema, nor [at the conclusion of] the Eighteen Benedictions, should there be any waiting either for the rabbi or for anybody else.”Footnote 156 While in this paragraph the honor of the rabbi is sacrificed for the sake of order and decorum, in another provision concerning the Hoshaʿanaʾ prayer during Sukkot, only the rabbi, his assistant, and the cantor are allowed to carry around the palm branches.Footnote 157 The special Westphalian regulations for rabbis stipulated that the rabbi should support his community members with their religious needs, comfort the sick and the suffering, promote obedience to the law and defense of the fatherland, and supervise educational and charity institutions.Footnote 158 While those obligations deviated from traditional rabbinic duties, they were written in rather general terms, avoiding any details of how they should be practiced on a daily basis.
Perl's regulations devote a whole chapter to the rabbi and the preacher, explaining in detail the rabbi's obligations within his institution. The regulations first clarify their perspective on the question of whether the synagogue needs a rabbi:
`As this institute has no other purpose but to guide the youth of our nation toward piety, virtue, and science [Wissenschaft], as well as to spread unity and human kindness, it would be entirely against the aim of this institute to take on a special rabbi or a teacher of religion [Religionsweiser]Footnote 159 in this house of prayer, which could lead to divisiveness or at least to disputes in the congregation. Therefore, except in the (§ 6, Chap. IV) case, a rabbi or preacher [Prediger], no matter by which name, shall never be employed in the prayer house of the institute.Footnote 160
The regulations then add that the town rabbi is the rabbi of the seat owners and the authority they should approach with halakhic questions: “The general town rabbi is also the rabbi of the seat owners in this prayer house, this means that they have to turn to the town rabbi in questions of religion if they cannot or do not want to solve them themselves, and the rabbi has to give them his answer about these.”Footnote 161
When Perl formulated his regulations, Tarnopol was under Russian rule and thus subject to local laws. As mentioned above, according to the 1804 statute of Alexander I, if there is a division between “sects” in the community then one of them can “build its own synagogue and elect its own rabbi.”Footnote 162 It seems that this is why Perl emphasized that his synagogue does not represent such a case; on the contrary, his congregation accepts the authority of the town rabbi.
As for the rabbi's obligations toward the school, listed in the following paragraph, perhaps the approval of the regulations by Ignacy von Thyles, the Russian administrator of Tarnopol, meant that the instructions concerning the town rabbi now had binding authority. This may explain why Rabbi Babad was initially involved in school examinations, as the synagogue regulations stipulated. Babad's involvement stopped when Tarnopol returned to Austrian rule.Footnote 163 Under Austrian rule Perl was in no official position to formulate instructions that would obligate the community rabbi. Such obligations were listed in the Galician Edict of Toleration.Footnote 164 The rabbi was elected by the Jewish community and approved by the local authorities, and his communal duties were agreed upon in his contract.
The regulations then explain in detail the rabbi's obligations towards the school:
The special duties of the town rabbi to the institute are the following:
(a) Upon invitation to the biannual public examination in the Hebraic subjects he must appear in the examination room of the institute in order to conduct the examination there himself or have it conducted under his chairmanship. Absence thereof can be excused only due to illness or otherwise an extraordinary accident.
(b) After this public examination the rabbi issues a certificate signed by him about the progress of the students in Talmud and other Hebrew subjects and hands it to the director of the institute or his substitute; for this the rabbi will be awarded two krone as remuneration from the institute's cash box.
(c) The Saturday after the celebrated examination the rabbi must be present for prayer in the prayer house of the institute, where the abovementioned (§ 1, Lit. a, Chap. II) honor at the Torah [reading] shall be accorded to him.Footnote 165
Since such obligations were not anchored in Russian law (local or imperial), Perl could not assume that such demands of the town rabbi would be respected in the future.Footnote 166 He thus added a clause that deviated from the formal language of the regulations:
(d) One can reasonably hope that a sensible teacher of religion [Religionsweiser] will do his best and contribute all his energy for the support and expansion of such a beneficial institute as ours is for our nation, and it is not to be envisaged that such [a rabbi] would one day refuse to conduct the public examinations at the institute.Footnote 167
The patronizing, almost cynical, tone adopted here by Perl continues in the next clause, where Perl deals with a possible future situation in which the rabbi refuses to follow the regulations: “Should however in the future, against all expectations, a rabbi refuse to be present at three examinations upon written invitation, and thereby also signify that he does not want to promote the good of the Israelite nation, thereupon the congregation of the institute's prayer house is free to elect a special religion teacher [Religionsweiser] for themselves.”Footnote 168 The subsequent clauses discuss the way such a religion teacher would be elected and the payments he should get for his different functions. Interestingly, Perl raises the possibility that a graduate of his school would serve in that position: “Should at such an occasion a pupil of the institute be available who has capability and inclination toward the office of a rabbi, he shall be given preference in the election over all others.”Footnote 169 Perl entertained the idea of establishing a rabbinical seminary, a plan that was never realized.Footnote 170 Clearly, he thought that the education provided in his school would make such a rabbinical candidate the best qualified.
Toward a Galician Model of Synagogue Innovations
Perl's synagogue innovations as formulated in his regulations were limited to three areas: decorum, sermons, and the place of clergy. In matters of liturgy, Perl insisted that the customs and formalities of the “synagogues of our nation” and especially of the old synagogue in Tarnopol should determine the content and form of liturgy in his synagogue. Perl even maintained that the prayer leader should use the “usual melodies.” While Meliẓ yosher defended some changes by arguing that not every custom should be considered sacred, only those that have a basis in the Torah,Footnote 171 Perl insisted that local customs should determine his synagogue routine, whether they looked significant (piyyutim) or not (knocking on doors before the morning prayers or auctions during the Torah reading). Perl opposed new customs introduced by Hasidim, or folk customs that had no roots in tradition, but he did not oppose Polish Askenazic customs in general,Footnote 172 in complete contrast to the Reformers. In charting this path, Perl may be credited as one of the first to suggest a religious option that was both traditionalist and modern, an option that later characterized (with some modifications) synagogue innovations in Vienna, Prague, Lemberg, Kraków, and other Habsburg cities.Footnote 173
While taking upon himself leadership roles in public education and prayer, Perl did not wish to separate his congregation from the community by employing a separate rabbi for the school and synagogue, an act that could lead to divisiveness or disputes. He insisted that the rabbi of the town should be the rabbi of the synagogue seat owners and called on the congregation to turn to the town rabbi in questions of religion “if they cannot or do not want to solve them themselves.” Although Perl would no doubt have preferred that the town rabbi be someone like Solomon Judah Rapoport, he did not require his synagogue's rabbi to have an enlightened outlook. He did insist that the rabbi be present at school examinations, and that if he refused to do so, the congregation was free to elect its own moreh ẓedek. But this was an option that Perl never carried out.
Perl's synagogue regulations, together with the Amsterdam and the Westphalian regulations, present us with three distinct models of synagogue innovations, each emerging from its own particular context. While Perl may have been aware of earlier models, and perhaps even adopted some elements from them, his synagogue regulations were closely tied to his religious world view and scrupulous observance of religious laws. These models should not be viewed as stages in some sort of a linear development of modernization leading to Reform; on the contrary, they were specific responses arising from local conditions and specific personalities. To borrow from Alexander Altmann, Perl certainly felt that the tenets of Aufklärung, such as decorum, character training, and education, represented a common neutral ground rather than a sublimation of the German Jewish reforms. On this common ground he built his unique Galician modern traditional synagogue project.
Appendix
General Regulations and Precepts for the House of PrayerFootnote 174 Incorporated with the Tarnopol Israelite School with an Appendix of the Instructions and Directives for All Persons Serving at This House of Prayer, Which Must Always Remain the Guiding Principles of Their Conduct
Chapter I: On the Conduct and Order to Be Observed in the House of Prayer and during Prayer
1. The house of prayer shall be opened one hour before the prayer and closed one hour afterwards.
2. The assembly occurs after the customary announcement on all doors. The prayer will begin as soon as the proper number of people are present and the warden [Schulvater] has given his permission. In the absence of the warden, the prayer leader may decide this on his own.
3. On those days when religion or customs prescribe the prayer leader to be someone from the congregation, then he, if he is capable of it, may conduct such prayer services, but otherwise, it always remains the charge of the designated prayer leader.
4. The prayer shall always, without exception, be performed according to the prevailing prayer formulas and without the slightest alteration or insertion.
5. The veneration for the Highest Being who is worshiped in the holy house, in and of itself, makes it the duty of everyone to behave there quietly, calmly, and with the highest deference. Thus everyone must take care not to bring mud or dirt on his feet or clothing into the house of prayer; nobody is allowed to be louder than the prayer leader or disturb the congregation in its prayers through excessive shouting; likewise, no one is allowed to bring into the house of prayer children who are too young and who cause disturbance, just as all this is prescribed in the Shulḥan ʿarukh, hilkhot tefillah [laws concerning prayer].
6. Just as there is no waiting for anyone before the prayer, so in the middle of it. Rather, the prayer leader always continues with the recited prayer out loud, as soon as it has become quiet in the usual, known parts, for example, in the Shema and the Eighteen Benedictions, etc. The exception is on the two Sabbath days when the town rabbi has to be present in the house of prayer during the prayers (§ 6, Lit. c, Chap. IV); then one must wait for him.
7. The additional prayers [Pait (sic)] for Saturdays and festivals shall likewise be conducted according to the customary prevailing formulas, namely before and after the Eighteen Benedictions, and entirely as in the old synagogue, and without alteration.
8. The prayer books, designated for the prayer leader, just as generally all books, equipment, etc., designated for the prayer house, must definitely not be utilized by anyone for his personal use, and if someone damages such an object he is responsible for replacing it with a completely new one and may have to, depending on the circumstances, pay a monetary fee.
9. If a doubt arises about prayers or synagogue customs, then it is up to the prayer leader to consult the ceremonial regulations [minhagim] in his possession, and if these say nothing about it, then the most learned person in the congregation shall be asked; but everyone else is to remain quiet and not interrupt the appropriate reverential silence.
Chapter II: About the Honors Bestowed on Various Individuals in the House of Prayer of the Institute
1. In the institute's house of prayer no other honors are given out, except for the calling [up to the dais] when the Torah is read, and this in the following order:
(a) On the Sabbath days on which the rabbi must be in the house of prayer (§ 5, Chap. IV), he is due an ʿaliyah [Aufruf], as is customary in the old synagogue.
(b) Should a rabbi be accepted for this house of prayer, then he is due the third ʿaliyah on all Sabbath days and the first of the festivals.Footnote 175
(c) On each Sabbath day after the public examination held in the Hebrew subjects, the entire teaching staff shall be called to the Torah. The maftir ʿaliyah is to be granted to the most worthy student of the institute; the other customary honors shall be granted to those students who will distinguish themselves in the examination.
(d) When a student of this institute becomes engaged or married, even though he might have left the school long ago, he is due gratis an ʿaliyah on the first Sabbath after the engagement as well as on the Sabbath before and after the wedding.
2. Besides that, each seat owner in the prayer house on certain occasions, such as the circumcision day of his son, etc., is to be granted an ʿaliyah for which he has to contribute to the institute's cash box, via the warden, only one Polish gulden.
3. Besides these cases, the right of ʿaliyah is due to someone who gains it through purchase (§ 2, Chap. VII), in which case he is then free to have any of his friends or acquaintances be called upon for an ʿaliyah as he wishes.
Chapter III: Officers in the Prayer House
1. The institute, which in all its parts must always add up to a whole and must never be separated, has only one main director for the whole institute.
2. But in order to provide the institute's director with administrative assistants, as well as to enable the administration itself to be conducted in the best possible manner, the prayer house will also have two wardens [Schulväter] and one substitute.
3. The election of these wardens takes place annually at the Feast of Tabernacles in the following manner: the director of the institute invites into the prayer house all those men among the seat owners who a year beforehand paid ten silver rubles for miẓvot (that is the right to let others be called up to the Torah) and other ceremonies and charities, and he selects, according to majority of votes, the two wardens and the substitute.
4. The chores and duties of the wardens are the following:
(a) Each of these wardens supervises the prayer house every other month.
(b) This supervision extends over the entire order that is to be observed in the prayer house as described above (Chap. I), over the management of resources of the prayer house, in short, over everything that a pious and honest man can do for the best of such a holy house.
(c) It also falls to the wardens, each one in his month, to collect the synagogue levies (as such are prescribed in Chap. VII) and the voluntary donations, which they have to deliver monthly, for a receipt, to the institute cashier, and in the absence of such, to the director of the institute himself.
(d) Under the immediate guidance of the acting synagogue board are: the prayer leaders, the Torah reader, the school servant, the school subordinate, as well as both wardens who are also responsible for the admission of such persons with the exception of the prayer leader (who is to be admitted by all seat owners) (§ 3, Chap. V). However, all these admissions have to be approved by the institute's director. The acting warden also has to see to any necessary acquisitions or repairs of essential equipment and requirements for the prayer house.
(e) If the warden notices abuses, or if he comes up with ideas for improving the prayer house, then it is his duty to notify the director of the institute of these, orally or in writing.
(f) On solemn occasions, however, upon request by the director of the institute, both wardens must perform their office.
(g) At the quarterly, as well as at the main examinations of the pupils, both wardens must be present.
(h) In case of illness or necessary absence of one of the wardens, the other one must take his place, and when both are absent then the substitute has to take the place.
(i) The monthly warden also has to keep watch over honors (Chap. II) bestowed on various individuals in the house of prayer.
Chapter IV: Rabbis and Preachers
1. As this institute has no other purpose but to guide the youth of our nation toward piety, virtue, and science [Wissenschaft], as well as to spread unity and human kindness, it would be entirely against the aim of this institute to take on a special rabbi or a teacher of religion [Religionsweiser] in this house of prayer, which could lead to divisiveness or at least to disputes in the congregation. Therefore, except in the (§ 6, Chap. IV) case, a rabbi or preacher [Prediger], no matter by which name, shall never be employed in the prayer house of the institute.
2. The general town rabbi is also the rabbi of the seat owners in this prayer house, this means that they have to turn to the town rabbi in questions of religion if they cannot or do not want to solve them themselves, and the rabbi has to give them his answer about these.
3. The rabbi [of the town] is not compelled to preach in this synagogue; he can do so at will on Saturdays and festivals for the edification [Erbauung] of the congregation, but he must beforehand give notice of the contents of his sermon to the institute director, and in case it is granted, the wardens are notified so they can announce it.
4. Beside this, however, no preacher, either local or foreign, shall be allowed to preach in the institute without explicit written permission of the director of the institute or his substitute.
5. The special duties of the town rabbi toward the institute are the following:
(a) Upon invitation to the biannual public examination in the Hebraic subjects he must appear in the examination room of the institute in order to conduct the examination there himself or have it conducted under his chairmanship. Absence thereof can be excused only due to illness or otherwise an extraordinary accident.
(b) After this public examination the rabbi issues a certificate signed by him about the progress of the students in Talmud and other Hebrew subjects and hands it to the director of the institute or his substitute; for this the rabbi will be awarded two krone as remuneration from the institute's cash box.
(c) The Saturday after the celebrated examination the rabbi must be present for prayer in the prayer house of the institute, where the abovementioned (§ 1, Lit. a, Chap. II) honor at the Torah [reading] shall be accorded to him.
(d) One can reasonably hope that a sensible teacher of religion [Religionsweiser] will do his best and contribute all his energy for the support and expansion of such a beneficial institute as ours is for our nation, and it is not to be envisaged that such [a rabbi] would one day refuse to conduct the public examinations at the institute.
6. Should, however, in the future, against all expectations, a rabbi refuse to be present at three examinations upon written invitation, and thereby also signify that he does not want to promote the good of the Israelite nation, thereupon the congregation of the institute's prayer house is free to elect a special religion teacher [Religionsweiser] for themselves.
7. For the election of such a special rabbi not only is the agreement of the director of the institute necessary, but also that of 5/6 of the congregation in the institute's prayer house.
8. Elected in this way, this rabbi takes on immediately the position in the institute instead of the town rabbi with all obligations and benefits, namely:
(a) After each public examination held in Talmud he will receive the two krone from the cash box of the institute as remuneration which had been promised to the town rabbi.
(b) Also, he is to be paid for honors as is due to the town rabbi in the old synagogue.
(c) Besides that, a certain salary will be set for him (which will be determined between him and the seat owners), which he will receive from the cash box of the institute quarterly.
(d) Also, in accordance with the auction document [Lizitazionspunkt] point 12, seat no. 10 in the second bench shall be purchased from the seat owner, for the amount of schillings it had cost him, for the newly elected rabbi with funds from the cash box of the institute.
9. Should at such an occasion a pupil of the institute be available who has capability and inclination toward the office of a rabbi, he shall be given preference in the election over all others.
Chapter V: The Congregation Prayer Leader
1. Never shall a singer [Sänger, Chasan] with assistants be employed in the prayer house of the institute.
2. Since the congregation must have a designated prayer leader, the individual elected for this office will be one who has the competence for it, and is of decent and spotless character.
3. The prayer leader shall be elected by the entire congregation; the president of the institute shall have all those called together, who a year before this election paid more than 10 rubles in silver for miẓvot, other ceremonies, and charities. The prayer leader elected in this way will receive an appointment decree, signed by the director of the institute, in which the annual salary of the prayer leader as well as his obligations will be determined.
4. This employed prayer leader remains in this office as long as he has capability and inclination for it, and cannot be removed from it except in one of the following cases:
(a) If he declares that he belongs to a specific sect, then he cannot remain in this prayer house as prayer leader, as the institute has no other purpose than to spread unity and peace among all people and not to foster sects in its midst.
(b) If he succumbs to an immorality, drink, gambling, and such annoyances.
(c) However, for the dismissal of such a prayer leader, the approval of the director of the institute, both of the wardens, and 2/3 of the seat owners shall be required.
5. If a prayer leader can no longer preside over his office on account of age or illness, then he is allowed the privilege to suggest to the warden his son, relative, or friend.
6. The specific obligations of the congregation prayer leader are:
(a) Punctual obedience toward the management of the prayer house. He stands under the direct control of both wardens, but in difficult cases he can turn to the director of the institute himself.
(b) As prayer leading occurs constantly morning and evening, he has to always be in the prayer house in a timely manner before the prayer and must not leave until after the prayer has ended. Only on Rosh Ha-shanah and on Yom Kippur, upon the request of the prayer leader, the wardens shall see to bringing in a second prayer leader for Musaf or additional prayers.
(c) The employed prayer leader thus has to notify the wardens of this a few days ahead.
(d) He may perform the prayer of the Sabbath and festivals according to his abilities, and with the usual melodies, but never with assistants or additional singers [Gehilfen, Nebensängern] (§ 1, Chap. V).
(e) Never is the prayer leader of this synagogue allowed to change the form or order of the prayers, or insert other prayer forms, but he must in this, as well as generally in his entire office performance, comply unalterably with the universal dominant customs and formalities of the synagogues of our nation and the way these are presently kept in the local old synagogue (§ 4, Chap. I).
(f) In order not to fail in any of these points, the prayer leader is obliged to always prepare himself, especially on Sabbath and festivals, in order to perform the prayer without stumbling and in the aforementioned (e) way, which he owes to the dignity of the prayer house and the congregation.
(g) Nothing can excuse the absence of the prayer leader from the prayer house other than illness or extraordinary cases such as: marriage of a child and the like. In the first case the prayer leader has to notify the acting warden of his illness; in the second case he is allowed to be absent only after obtaining permission from the director of the institute or his substitute.
(h) The prayer leader is required to have a copy of these official duties that he agreed to, and closely familiarize himself with them through frequent reading. This copy will be delivered to the prayer leader in the Hebrew language, and, if needed, will also be explained.
Chapter VI: About the Torah Reader
1. He likewise will be elected by the wardens with the approval of the director of the institute, and in this election attention should be paid to the integrity of his character and his competency for good loud reading.
2. This competency requires a good knowledge of accentuation of the Hebrew language, a clear audible voice and enunciation, etc.
3. For this office, it is always preferable to first consider congregation prayer leaders, then the Talmud teachers of the institute, if they possess the abovementioned competencies.
4. The duties of the Torah reader are the following:
(a) He must assuredly be a member of the congregation, and be a constant participant in the public prayers there.
(b) In conducting his official duties he must be very meticulous; namely, he must always be thoroughly prepared, so that the reading can take place properly and without stumbling.
(c) On the eve before each festival he must go to the synagogue, take out the Torah that will be read the next day from the ark and carefully read through the appropriate portion, so as not to stumble when publicly reading out loud, which would cause delay.
(d) Likewise, he has to see to it that the Torah is properly kept in the ark, secured against harm, dampness, etc., and immediately repaired in case of any damage.
(e) He can never be absent without the permission of the wardens; and if illness or extraordinary circumstances hinder him from coming to the prayer house, he can obtain a substitute for himself after notification to the wardens, or if he has none, make his absence and the reason for it known in a timely manner, so that another temporary reader can be found.
Chapter VII: Fees and Revenues of the Prayer House
The following fees and revenues are designated for the upkeep of the prayer house and for the care of its needs:
1. Every seat owner in the men's or women's section, without distinction of the seats, pays forty-five kopeks in silver annually.
2. The customary honors, such as the calling up for the Torah, the opening of the ark, etc., are sold by calling out to the highest bidder, and in such a way that offering 100 costs 10 kopeks.
3. When a seat owner celebrates the circumcision of his son, or when he has a name given to a newborn girl, he pays fifteen silver kopeks into the cash box of the institute. Against this, he is called up to the Torah gratis.
4. On days when Va-yevarekh David is recited, and on those weekdays when the Torah is read, and also during the prayer ʾAshre U-va Le-Ẓiyon the acting warden goes around with a collection box into which everyone throws a coin as he wishes. Nobody is obligated to this.
5. Two sealed boxes are positioned at the entrance of the prayer house, into which everyone through the kindness of his heart can put a contribution.
6. In addition to these voluntarily given donations, there are gifts and offers that anyone presents for the support and the beautification of the House of God, a laudable custom that is so common in the Jewish nation.
7. As, in accordance with § 1, Chap. III, the prayer house in no case and consideration is to be separated from the institute, and so fees and gifts of all kinds are at first handed to the acting warden, who has, to be sure, to deliver them to the general administration of the institute and get a receipt. The money flows into the general cash box of the institute, and through this all needs of the prayer house are immediately taken care of; the gifts, however, such as candles, holy garments, etc., will be handed to the person who is responsible for their keep.
8. All charitable gifts that someone places into the anonymous charity box [geheime Büchse] and through a note or otherwise designates to which end he would like his donation be used, shall be used according to the wish of the pious giver; however, in such cases notification must be given before the opening of the box, but as soon as it is opened and the gift in it is found without notification, it cannot be designated, but will be disposed generally.
9. As many a donor gives a Torah, sacred garment, dishes, or other objects to a prayer house or synagogue for its use, but regards it as his own property which he can take back any time and do with it as he likes, it is hereby stipulated that nothing shall be accepted until the pious donor declares that the given object shall remain the property of the prayer house to which he will no longer have a right.
10. As it is customary to contribute to the fund of the prayer house or synagogue for the wine for the service, the lighting of the candles, and the shire miẓvot, so pious acts of the donor who made the highest offer shall be acknowledged on the Simḥat Torah celebration of the following year.
Chapter VIII: About the Synagogue Beadles
The synagogue beadle, who will also be accepted by the wardens, is responsible, under the guidance of the wardens, for the entire service pertaining to the public prayer. This service comprises primarily the following points:
1. The synagogue requisites, which are locked up in the prayer house itself, are under his responsibility, and he must see to it that no object is lost or destroyed. These include: the prayer books for use in the prayer house, the candles, in short, everything which is needed for the public prayer. If something becomes damaged or unusable, he must report this to the wardens for repair or acquisition of a new piece.
2. Objects of higher value, such as the curtains of the ark, silver objects, and such, must be handed to the acting warden for safekeeping.
3. He has to see to it that on each Saturday and festival the Torah and its cover and ornamentation, and the ark, get the appropriate cover and decoration.
4. He must light the necessary candles before the prayer and extinguish these after the prayer; on Saturdays and festivals he should place and light the necessary candles, and see to it that they will be extinguished.
5. His services before, during, and after the reading of the Torah are the following:
Before the reading: When on Saturdays and festivals the prayer has ended, he calls out the sales of the rights to call persons for reading and similar honors to the highest bidder (§ 2, Chap. VII); informs the wardens the names of those who have bought the right to these honors; calls these persons to whom an honor has been bestowed, etc.
During the reading: He asks the purchasers whom they want to call up for the Torah. Also, when a stranger shall be called up, he must ask for his name.
After the reading: He has to see to it that the Torah is properly put back and that the ark is locked.
Generally, during the entire act the beadle has to be helpful and at hand everywhere, so that no delay or hindrance occurs.
6. When the office or the administration of the institute wants to make a public announcement, then the beadle has to announce it loudly at the time indicated to him by the warden; however, for this the attendant of the synagogue has first to obtain the permission of the synagogue director.
7. In addition, the attendant of the synagogue, as the constant assistant of the wardens, prayer leaders, and Torah readers, has to be attentive at all ceremonies to various small services, which cannot all be described, and he will also be given an assistant at his side to help him in his duties.
8. This second beadle shall also always be called to the Torah in the section of the curses, should no one from the congregation be found willing to be called up, who is not taking fright from the old prejudices.
[Chapter IX]: Instruction for the Housekeeper
The general business and the duty of the housekeeper, who is hired by the director of the institute, is the upkeep of order in the entire synagogue building. But to give him a more accurate knowledge of his responsibilities the present instructions have been written specifically for him:
1. He opens daily the classroom as well as the prayer house at the hours dictated to him by the director and warden. Also, after the prayer service is completed, as well as after classes have ended, he must lock up everywhere.
2. All smaller requisites of the school buildings, tables, benches, blackboards, rulers, and such, are under his supervision, and he has to see to their upkeep. All this will be handed over to him with a directory.
3. He has to see to the cleanliness of the entire house, and therefore he has to have the subordinate assigned to him sweep all rooms diligently, clean from dust, wash the windows, polish the lamps. He also has to see to it that at least every three months, the floors everywhere are washed, the hearth swept often, etc.
4. He shall buy at the appropriate time all synagogue supplies, such as wood, candles, etc., and see to it that these are not used up in an unnecessary way.
5. He has to take care of all small repairs, of synagogue requisites, as well as of the building itself. Therefore he has to check often that nothing is missing, or has become damaged, and immediately obtain a new item if it is of little value or have it repaired. Objects of greater cost, however, must be reported to the administration of the institute.
6. Finally, he must always see to it that he has a good house subordinate at his side who will help him in his duties.
