Note (return) — Chapter IV

The beautiful city of Odessa, on the Black Sea, at that time just out of its infancy and full of the virility and aspiration of youth, was also in the full glare of the German Haskalah movement. With its wide and straight streets, its public and private parks, and its magnificent structures, it presents even to-day a marked contrast to other Russian cities, and the Russians, not without pride, speak of it as "our little Paris." In the upbuilding of this southern metropolis Jews played an exceedingly important part. For, as regards the promotion of trade and commerce, Russia had outgrown the narrow policy of Elizabeta Petrovna, and did not begrudge her Jews the privilege of taking the lead. The "enemies of Christ" were permitted, even invited, to accomplish their "mission" also in Odessa, and thither they accordingly came, not only from Volhynia, Podolia, and Lithuania, but also from Germany, Austria, and especially Galicia. Erter, Letteris, Krochmal, Perl, Rapoport, Eichenbaum, Pinsker, and Werbel became better known in Russia than in their own land. As the Russo-Polish Jews had carried their Talmudic learning back to the countries whence they originally received it, so the Galician Jews, mostly hailing from the city of Brody, where Israel Zamoscz, Mendel Levin, Joseph Hakohen, and others had implanted the germs of Haskalah, now reimported it into Russia. The Jews of Odessa were, therefore, more cultured than other Russian Jews, not excepting those of Riga. Prosperous in business, they lavished money on their schools, and their educational system surpassed all others in the empire. In 1826 they had the best public school for boys, in 1835 a similar one for girls, and in 1852 there existed fifty-nine public schools, eleven boarding schools, and four day schools. The children attended the Richelieu Lyceum and the "gymnasia" in larger proportion than children of other denominations, and they were among the first, not only in Russia, but in the whole Diaspora, to establish a "choir-synagogue" (1840). "In most of the families," says Lilienthal, "can be found a degree of refinement which may easily bear comparison with the best French salon." Even Nicholas I found words of praise for the Odessa Jews. "Yes," said he, "in Odessa I have also seen Jews, but they were men"; while the zaddik "Rabbi Yisrolze" declared that he saw "the flames of Gehennah round Odessa."28