Nathan Birnbaum ( he, נתן בירנבוים; pseudonyms: "Mathias Acher", "Dr. N. Birner", "Mathias Palme", "Anton Skart", "Theodor Schwarz", and "Pantarhei"; 16 May 1864 – 2 April 1937) was an

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n writer and journalist,

Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...

ish thinker and

nationalist Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a group of people), Smith, Anthony. ''Nationalism: Th ...

. His life had three main phases, representing a progression in his thinking: a

Zionist Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after '' Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Je ...

phase (c. 1883 – c. 1900); a Jewish cultural autonomy phase (c. 1900 – c. 1914) which included the promotion of the

Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ve ...

language; and religious phase (c. 1914–1937) when he turned to Orthodox Judaism and became staunchly anti-Zionist. He married Rosa Korngut (1869–1934) and they had three sons: Solomon (Salomo) Birnbaum (1891–1989), Menachem Birnbaum (1893–1944), and Uriel Birnbaum (1894–1956).

Early life

Birnbaum was born in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

into an

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russia, whi ...

an Jewish family with roots in Austrian

Galicia Galicia may refer to: Geographic regions * Galicia (Spain), a region and autonomous community of northwestern Spain ** Gallaecia, a Roman province ** The post-Roman Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Gallaecia ** The medieval King ...

and Hungary. His father, Menachem Mendel Birnbaum, a merchant, hailed from Ropshitz, Galicia, and his mother, Miriam Birnbaum (née Seelenfreund), who was born in northern Hungary (in a region sometimes called the Carpathian Rus), of a family with illustrious rabbinic lineage, had moved as a child to Tarnow, Galicia, where the two met and married. From 1882 to 1886, Birnbaum studied

law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its precise definition a matter of longstanding debate. It has been vario ...

, philosophy and Near Eastern studies at the

University of Vienna The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich hi ...

Zionism

In 1883, at the age of 19, he founded Kadimah, the first Jewish (Zionist)

student association A students' union, also known by many other names, is a student organization present in many colleges, universities, and high schools. In higher education, the students' union is often accorded its own building on the campus, dedicated to social, ...

in Vienna, many years before

Theodor Herzl Theodor Herzl; hu, Herzl Tivadar; Hebrew name given at his brit milah: Binyamin Ze'ev (2 May 1860 – 3 July 1904) was an Austro-Hungarian Jewish lawyer, journalist, playwright, political activist, and writer who was the father of modern po ...

became the leading spokesman of the Zionist movement. While still a student, he founded and published the periodical ''Selbstemanzipation!'', often written in large part by Birnbaum himself. In it he coined the terms "Zionistic", "Zionist", "Zionism" (1890), and "political Zionism" (1892). Birnbaum played a prominent part in the

First Zionist Congress The First Zionist Congress ( he, הקונגרס הציוני הראשון) was the inaugural congress of the Zionist Organization (ZO) held in Basel (Basle), from August 29 to August 31, 1897. 208 delegates and 26 press correspondents attende ...

(1897) where he was elected Secretary-General of the Zionist Organization. He was associated with and was one of the most important representatives of the cultural, rather than political, side of Zionism. However, he left the Zionist Organization not long after the Congress. He was unhappy with its negative view of Diaspora Jewry and the transformation of the Zionist ideals into a party machine. His next phase was to advocate Jewish cultural autonomy, or

Golus nationalism Golus nationalism (Yiddish: גלות נאַציאָנאַליזם ''Golus natsionalizm'' after golus, he, לאומיות גולוס, Gālūṯ leumiyút), or Diaspora Nationalism, is a national movement of the Jewish people that argues for furthe ...

, concentrating in particular on the Jews of eastern Europe. He advocated for the Jews to be recognized as a people among the other peoples of the empire, with

as their official language. He ran (in Buczacz, eastern Galicia) on behalf of the Jews (and with the support of the local Ukrainians) as candidate for the Austrian parliament. Although he had a majority of the votes, his election was thwarted by corruption of the electoral process by the local Polish faction. He was chief convener of the Conference for the Yiddish Language held in

Czernowitz Chernivtsi ( uk, Чернівці́}, ; ro, Cernăuți, ; see also other names) is a city in the historical region of Bukovina, which is now divided along the borders of Romania and Ukraine, including this city, which is situated on the up ...

, August 30 –September 3, 1908. It was the first Yiddish-language conference ever to take place. At the conference, he took the place of his colleague and fellow Yiddish activist

Sholem Aleichem ) , birth_date = , birth_place = Pereiaslav, Russian Empire , death_date = , death_place = New York City, U.S. , occupation = Writer , nationality = , period = , genre = Novels, sh ...

who was critically ill. From about 1912 onwards, Birnbaum became increasingly interested in Orthodox Judaism, and he became a fully observant Orthodox Jew in about 1916. He continued to act particularly as an advocate for the Jews of eastern Europe and the Yiddish language. From 1919 to 1922, he was General Secretary of the

Agudas Yisroel Agudas Israel may refer to: * Agudas Israel (Latvia), a political party in Latvia during the 1920s and 1930s * World Agudath Israel, the political arm of Ashkenazi Haredi Judaism *Agudat Yisrael, a political party representing the ultra-Orthodox pop ...

, a widely-spread and influential Orthodox Jewish organization. He founded the society of the "Olim" (Hebrew for the "Ascenders"), a society with a specific program of action dedicated to the spiritual ascent of the Jewish people.

Later life

Birnbaum, decrying political Zionism, 1919:

And is it at all possible that we, who regard Judaism as our one and only treasure, should ever be able to compete with such expert demagogues and loud self-advertisers as they
he Zionists He or HE may refer to: Language * He (pronoun), an English pronoun * He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ * He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets * He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
It is surely not necessary that we should. We are, after all, still the mountains and they the grain, and all we need to do is to gather all our forces in a world organization of religious Jews, and it will follow of itself, and without the application of any great political cunning on our part, that we shall have it in our power to prevent what must needs be prevented and to carry out what we have to carry out. But there is no need first to create this world organization of religious Jews. It is already in existence. The world knows its name, it is Agudas Yisroel he Union of Israel

He continued to write and lecture. His most well-known publication of this period of his life was "Gottes Volk", 1918 (German), "God's Folk", 1921 (Yiddish), translated into Hebrew as "Am Hashem" (1948), and translated into English under the title "Confession" (1946), slightly abridged. In 1933, at the time of the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

rise to power, Birnbaum and his wife, together with their son Menachem (an artist) and family, who at that time were all living in Berlin, fled to

Scheveningen Scheveningen is one of the eight districts of The Hague, Netherlands, as well as a subdistrict (''wijk'') of that city. Scheveningen is a modern seaside resort with a long, sandy beach, an esplanade, a pier, and a lighthouse. The beach is ...

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

, with the help of businessman and diplomat Henri B. van Leeuwen (1888-1973). There, Birnbaum, van Leeuwen, and banker Daniel Wolfe published the anti-Zionist newspaper ''Der Ruf'' ("The Call"). (Menachem and his family were murdered by the Nazis in 1944.) At the same time, their son Solomon (Professor of Yiddish and Hebrew paleography) and his family fled from Hamburg to England. Their other son, Uriel, an artist and poet, and his family fled from Vienna to the Netherlands in 1939. Van Leeuwen, also an Orthodox Jew, became a Dutch anti-Zionist leader and

Bergen-Belsen Bergen-Belsen , or Belsen, was a Nazi concentration camp in what is today Lower Saxony in northern Germany, southwest of the town of Bergen near Celle. Originally established as a prisoner of war camp, in 1943, parts of it became a concentrati ...

survivor.Jews backing academic boycott against Israel
/ref> Birnbaum died in Scheveningen in 1937 after a period of severe illness.

Published works

* "In bondage to our fellow Jews", 1919, from Nathan Birnbaum, ''Series of Essays on Agudas Yisroel'', London, 1944, reproduced in Michael Selzer, editor, ''Zionism Reconsidered'', Macmillan, London, 1970. * '' Selbstemanzipation!'' Periodical. Vienna, 1885-1894. (ed., numerous articles). See above in text. * ''Die jüdische Moderne''; (

Schulze Schulze is a German surname, from the medieval office of Schulze, or village official. Notable people with the surname include: * Andrew Schulze (1896–1982), clergyman and civil rights activist * William August Schulze, rocket scientist recru ...

) Leipzig, 1896, * ''Ausgewählte Schriften zur jüdischen Frage'', 2 Bände, 1910. * ''Den Ostjuden Ihr Recht!''; ( Löwit) Vienna, 1915, * ''Gottes Volk''; (Löwit) Vienna, 1918, * ''Um die Ewigkeit. Jüdische Essays''; ( Welt) Berlin, 1920, * ''Im Dienste der Verheissung'', Frankfurt 1927. * ''Der Aufstieg'' (periodical); Berlin and Vienna, Jan. 1930 - Dec. 1932. * Solomon A. Birnbaum (ed): ''The Bridge'', London, 1956. * ''Confession'', New York, 1946. Translation (abridged) of ''Gottes Volk''. * ''From Freethinker to Believer'' in: Lucy Dawidowicz: ''The Golden Tradition'', New York, 1967. Translation of ''Vom Freigeist zum Glaubigen'', Zürich, 1919. * Shloimy Birnboim (ed) ''Ais Laasys - Giklibene Ksuvim fun Nusn Birnboim'', Lodz, 1939. (Yiddish). Selected essays. * ''Die Freistatt'' (periodical). Eschweiler, 1913-1914. Numerous articles. * ''An'iberblik iber maan lebn'' in: Orlean, Y.L. and Hasofer, N. (eds):''Yubileyum Bukh zum zektsiktn Giburtstug fun Dr. Nusn Birnboim''. Yeshurun, Warsaw, 1925. Yiddish.

References

External links

* The personal papers of Nathan Birnbaum are kept at the
Central Zionist Archives
in Jerusalem. The notation of the record group is A188.

Tshernovits

By Nathan Birnbaum
''The Call''
a digitized newspaper published by Birnbaum, at the

Leo Baeck Institute, New York The Leo Baeck Institute New York (LBI) is a research institute in New York City dedicated to the study of German-Jewish history and culture, founded in 1955. It is one of three independent research centers founded by a group of German-speaking J ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Birnbaum, Nathan 1864 births 1937 deaths Writers from Vienna Austrian Orthodox Jews 19th-century Austrian people Jewish philosophers Austrian philosophers Austrian Zionists Baalei teshuva Yiddish-speaking people