German Jews as Hungarian nationalists and the emergence of Oriental Studies

For German Jewry living beyond the borders of Germany, the problem of identity and nationalism was particularly acute in the secularized societies of late 19th century Central Europe. At the heart of the matter was identity: the German Jewish 'Diaspora' grappled with defining themselves in their own terms whether ethnic or religious and in relation to the new secular nationalist societies of which they were part of One prime example is the paradoxical attempt by the Reform German Jews of Budapest to formulate German Jewish identity in secular terms, in part through the founding of the Budapest Rabbinic Seminary and then pursuing the discipline of Oriental Studies as an expression of their secular ethnic Jewish identity. The German Jewish scholars in Hungary struggled to create in scholarship a secular Jewish identity that was motivated by nationalism and found expression in the study of the Orient. Oriental studies served as the medium to address the issue of secular Jewish identity depicted as related to the Hungarian ethnic majority. The status of Hungarian Jewry was defended in both homiletic and academic works of these scholars. They provided an example of intellectuals who coordinated all aspects of intellectual Jewish life in order to negotiate the ethnic and cultural obstacles of European modernity and used academic demonstration in order to provide a justification for secular ethnic identity for the modern Jew. This dissertation focuses on modern Jewish conceptions of connections between secular identity and nationalism in the modern multi-cultural society, where Reform German Jews of Hungary aspired to define themselves in secular ethnic terms. I assessed their writings in light of the hypothesis that the historical, religious and cultural sphere of Reform German Judaism in Hungary emerges out of the relationship to the cultural and political realities of its time. I provided illustrative examples through a close analysis of the writings of German Reform Jewish scholars. I argued that these writings clearly show that Reform Hungarian Jews thought of themselves as being German and Hungarian simultaneously, and that the tenor of their works reflects an essential place of Hungarian-Oriental consciousness in Reform German Hungarian Judaism.