A THOUSAND YEARS OF JEWISH HISTORY IN POLAND

In a nutshell: Jewish settlements in Poland can be traced back more than 1,000 years. Jews from all over Europe sought refuge in Poland, contributing to the variety of religious and cultural groups. By the middle of the 16th century, about 80% of Jews in the world lived on Polish lands. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, Jews enjoyed a unique form of self-government called the Council of Four Lands (Va'ad Arba Aratsot), which functioned as a Jewish parliament. Before the outbreak of World War II, more than 3.3 million Jews called Poland home, but barely 11 percent (369,000) survived the war.

860 - Polish lands first mentioned in Spanish Jews' diaries.
 
10th C - First settlements in Silesia and Wielkopolska (Greater Poland).
 
1096 - First large immigration wave into Poland after pogroms in Western Europe.

13/14th C - Polish rulers encouraged immigration from more highly developed countries in Western Europe.  Many who came were Jews fleeing the persecution and economic hardship (in 1290 approximately 16,000 Jews were expelled from England; in 1306 all Jews were expelled from France, etc.).

1264 - Prince Boleslaw the Pious of Calisia granted the first deed of rights to the Jews of Poland (Calisian Statute). This document served as the basis for the legal status of Polish Jews for the next 500 years.

1334 - King Casimir the Great extends the Calisian Statute to all Jews in Poland (a law guaranteeing certain civil rights and protection against persecution).
 
1338 - Privileges granted to Lithuanian Jews.

15/16th C. - The Jewish community of Poland grew and prospered. A large proportion of the Jews lived in small towns (yiddish - shtetl) where Jews made up the majority of the population. In those towns a distinctive pattern of Jewish life evolved.

1569 - Poland and Lithuania unified and then Poland annexed the Ukraine. Many Jews were sent to colonize these territories. Polish nobility and landowners became partners with Jewish merchants in many business enterprises. Jews became involved in the wheat industry, which was in high demand across Europe. The Jews built and ran mills and distilleries, transported grain to the Baltic ports and shipped it to the West. In return, they received wine, cloth, dyes and luxury goods, which they sold to Polish nobility.

1580 to 1764 - The Council of Four Lands (Va'ad Arba' Aratzot) in Lublin, Poland was the central body of Jewish authority in Poland. Seventy delegates from local kehillot met to discuss taxation and other issues important to the Jewish community. The "four lands" were Greater Poland, Little Poland, Ruthenia and Volhynia. This was unprecedented in Europe at that time.

1648/1649 - Cossack hordes led by Bogdan Chmielnicki massacred the Jews of eastern Poland (now the Ukraine). It is estimated that between 100,000 and 200,000 Jews were brutally slaughtered by the Cossacks in a frenzy of bloodshed, robbery and looting.

1654 - The first Jews arrived in New Amsterdam (later: New York) and established a congregation.

1760 - Death of Izrael ben Eliezer (Baal Shem Tov, born 1700) - the founder of Hasidism. From the beginning of the 18th C. up to 2nd World War, Hasidism was a major force in Poland. Under charismatic leaders, known as rebbes, it gave renewed hope to the Jewish masses. The teachings of Hasidism are founded on two concepts: the omnipresence of God, and the idea of Devekus, communion between God and man. Divine worship among the Hasidism thus came to include singing and dancing.

18th C. – 80% of all Jews lived in contemporary Poland. At that time Poland included the lands now belonging to Lithuania (Vilnius, for many years called "North Jerusalem"), Belorussia (Grodno) and Ukraine (Lvov, Kiev).The Jewish population usually accounted for about a third of the citizenry of larger cities in central Poland. They sometimes made up about 50% and in some cases even 70% of the population of smaller towns (especially out on the eastern frontier).

1795 - Poland was divided among Russia, Prussia and Austria. The majority of Poland's one- million Jews became part of the Russian empire. Since Jews were treated badly by the Russians, many decided to become in involved in the Polish insurrections: the Kosciuszko Insurrection, November Insurrection (1830-1831) and the January Insurrection (1863).

19th C. - In the Jewish community education was in the center of all activities. Hundreds of yeshivot (academies for higher rabbinic studies) flourished, producing thousands of outstanding scholars. A large proportion of the major works currently studied in rabbinic literature were produced in Poland. The language mainly spoken by the Jews in Poland was Yiddish, a language largely based on Middle High German, interlaced with Hebrew and certain Slavic elements. The literature in this language, which grew to major proportions in the 19th and 20th centuries, started with prayers for women and epic sagas based on stories from Bible. In Yiddish the name Polin (Poland) is interpreted as "I shall have a rest here". When much of Poland was a part of anti-Semitic Tsarist Russia, a great wave of emigration began, and Polish Jews went to the United States, Canada, Argentina, Germany, France and the Land of Israel.

1918 - Poland became a sovereign state.

1921 - The March Constitution gives Jews the same legal rights as other citizens and guarantees them religious tolerance.

1930 - The Jews in Poland constituted the second largest minority with 3.5 million people, comprising some 10 per cent of the total population of the country. Germany invaded Poland.

1939 - First ghettos are designated. Altogether, the Germans created more than 400 ghettos in occupied territories. The ghettos in small towns were generally not sealed off, which was often a temporary measure used until the residents could be sent to bigger ghettos. Large cities had closed ghettos, with brick or stone wall, wooden fences, and barbed wire defining the boundaries. Guards were placed strategically at gateways and other boundary openings. Jews were not allowed to leave the so-called "Jewish residential districts", under penalty of death. The largest ghetto was in Warsaw.

1941 - Extermination camp is built in Chelmno by the Nazis on the Ner River.

1942 - Extermination camps appear in Sobibor, Betzec, Treblinka, Auschwitz (Oswiecirn), Birkenau (Brzezinka), Majdanek. By 1942, all Polish Jews were either confined to ghettos or in hiding.

1943 - Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

1945 - The Second World War ended. 85% of Polish Jews perished in the Holocaust.

1946 - The Kielce Pogrom. In July 40 Jews were killed and it was the impetus for mass emigration.

1947 - At the end of this year only 100,000 Jews remained in Poland.

1958/1959 - 50,000 Jews emigrated to Israel, which was the only country Jews were able to immigrate to under Polish law.

1967 - Following the 1967 War, Poland broke off diplomatic relations with Israel.

1990 - A year after Poland ended its communist rule full diplomatic relations were restored with Israel.