Three Forces that Shaped Early Modern German Rabbinic Culture

Abstract Three forces influenced the identity of early modern German rabbinic culture: emigration, print, and immigration. Roughly speaking, these factors made their marks consecutively and cumulatively rather than simultaneously. Each affected other early modern Jewish communities, but the focus here is their progressive effect on German rabbinic culture. This article argues that emigration drained much of the human and cultural capital from the German-speaking lands, leaving German Jewry without strong local rabbinic leadership. In the sixteenth century, print exposed German Jews to different ideas about rabbinic culture and challenged local ways. While some sixteenth-century German rabbis responded, they failed to print their ideas, which limited their distribution and influence. Instead, the printed works of Polish rabbinic scholars became reference works for German Jews. Finally, the immigration of Jews from eastern Europe in the seventeenth century brought people who did things differently into German communities and altered some distinctive German-Jewish ritual practices.