Economic Origins of Antisemitism: Poland and Its Jews in the Early Modern Period

In this examination of the economic roots of antisemitism, Hillel Levine traces the position of Jews in Poland from the end of the 16th century to the demise of the Polish state in 1795. Levine explains why Poland was not able to modernize its backward social, economic and political system at a time when Western European countries were rapidly evolving, and he shows that Jews were blamed for this failure to modernize, fueling an economic antisemitism that contributed to the Holocaust and is with us still. Levine examines various philosophical and socioeconomic theories that were inspired by Judaism, Christianty, scholasticism, the Reformation, Counter Reformation, and the Enlightenment and that encouraged or discouraged the quest for modernization. He demonstrates how these theories were either adapted or rejected by Poland, by Jews and by the West. He argues that, contrary to popular belief, Polish Jews were innovative and managerial and could have spurred trade and industry. They were instead channeled into equivocal enterprises such as the production and distribution of grain-based intoxicants. Levine explains how the painful awareness of backwardness that developed among Poles provided a new rhetoric for reform and a vocabulary that linked Poland's economic and political decline to the Jews, a convenient scapegoat. He concludes by assessing the dangers faced by ethnic minorities stemming from economic resentment and social change.