Russian Jews :: essays research papers

Russian Jews To Russian Jews, the synagogue was the center of religion and religion was the most important thing in their lives. The rabbi was their leader, they came to him with every problem they had. Jews were poor, but they all gave tzedakah. It was said that even the poorest Jews could find someone poorer to help and give money to. According to the Jewish religion, tzedakah is one of the most important mitzvahs you can do. The same could be said about the Jewish holidays. They were observed very strictly, but Shabbat was the most welcomed. In order to teach the importance of Jewish law, they started their own schools, their own courts of law, and their own burial societies. even though there were pogroms, religious persecution forced the Jews to create stronger communities and made them more united. In the beginning of the 1800s, Alexander I ruled Russia. He promised the Jews that they could become farmers, could live in two districts, and could buy unoccupied land. Although Alexander was kind and helped the Jews, the tax they were forced to pay, stayed. before he died in 1825, the Jewish situation became hard for them to bare. They lived in poverty in small and crowded places and were oppressed. For hundreds of years, Jews lived these ways in two communities - the ghetto and the shtetl. To keep out thieves and rioters from coming in, they built walls around their section of town. When they did this, the government and churches got an idea, they would use the walls that the Jews built, to lock them in. These walls were located near a foundry that made cannons, so they named it â€Å"ghetto† which means "foundry". They would close the gates every night and the Jews would be locked in until daybreak. The word of the ghettos quickly spread, soon there were ghettos all over Europe. The Jews were all treated the same in every ghetto that was in Europe, according the government and churches, the Jews had no rights. They were no allowed to own land, join crafts guilds, or do any kind of work that Christians got to do. In some ghettos, they were even forced to wear badges so anyone who saw them would know they were Jewish. The badge was usually a Star of David. For many years, the government took copies of the Talmud, and burnt them. Also the government forced the Jews to listen to long Christian sermons. Even though all these terrible things took place and the government was not good to the Jews, the ghettos seemed to be a