The Migration of Things

The history of the Jews of Mattersdorf spans over five centuries. Today, some of their descendants live in Kirjat Mattersdorf, a neighborhood in the north of Jerusalem. Samuel Ehrenfeld, the last rabbi of the Burgenland town of Mattersburg (called Mattersdorf until 1924), survived the Shoah and in the 1950s founded the ultra-Orthodox community of Kirjat Mattersdorf in Jerusalem in memory of his hometown. His grandson Isaac Ehrenfeld currently serves as rabbi there.

A Jewish settlement in Mattersdorf can be documented as early as 1527. However, it was only after the expulsion from Vienna in 1670 that Jewish life also flourished in other villages of Burgenland. The comital, and later princely, Esterházy family took the Jews in and regulated their legal status by issuing letters of protection, which granted them protection and the right to self-administration. In return, the so-called Seven Communities (Sheva Kehillot) paid immense taxes to the powerful noble house.

When Emperor Leopold I expelled the Jews from Vienna and Lower Austria in 1670/71, the ruling noble Paul I Esterházy followed suit. Yet only seven years later, the Seven Communities were re-established in what is now Burgenland, which at the time belonged to Western Hungary.

From that point on, the community in Mattersdorf grew steadily. This was largely due to the renowned yeshiva, which attracted Orthodox students from all over Europe. The famous Rabbi Chatam Sofer— the great-great-grandfather of today’s Mattersdorf rabbi Ehrenfeld in Israel—also taught here.

The Jewish Museum Vienna holds numerous ritual objects that testify to religious life in Mattersdorf, such as these Torah finials (Rimmonim), donated in 1779 for the burial society (Chewra Kadisha), or the Torah crown from 1804, donated by Merl and Elazar Katz. These silver objects bear witness to the community’s piety, not to its wealth: living conditions at the time were extraordinarily cramped. In 1811, an average of 32 people lived in a single house in the ghetto.

Close

Tax certificate for the peddler David Moses of Mattersdorf, 1853, JMW, Inv. Nr. 3988

About half of the Jews of Mattersburg worked in trade, mostly as peddlers who offered their goods on foot between Wiener Neustadt and Ödenburg. Over the course of the 19th century, settlement outside the original ghetto also became possible, yet most remained in the immediate area.

In 1938, Burgenland was the first federal state to call itself “free of Jews.” At the time of Austria’s “Anschluss” to the German Reich, 530 Jews lived in Mattersdorf. More than 100 of them were murdered in the Shoah.

This honorary goblet was presented to Zwi Perez Chajes (1876–1927) by the Corfiot Jewish community of Trieste. It dates back to 1918, when Chajes left Trieste to take up the post of Deputy Chief Rabbi in Vienna.

By that time, Chajes had already had an international career: in his birthplace Brody he had attended his uncle’s yeshiva; in Vienna he studied at the Rabbinical Seminary; and in Florence he held a professorship, which he eventually gave up in order to assume the rabbinical post in Trieste.

At that time, Trieste was home to a considerable number of Jews who had fled from Corfu and they found a strong supporter in Chajes. They expressed their gratitude by presenting him with the goblet.

In 1891, a rumor spread among the Greek Orthodox Christian inhabitants of Corfu that a girl had fallen victim to a “Jewish ritual murder.” Over the course of several weeks, they attacked the island’s Jewish minority in a pogrom that claimed around 20 lives. As a result, many Corfiot Jews fled to Trieste. There they formed their own group within the Jewish community of the Habsburg port city and maintained their own rites and traditions. For this purpose, the Jewish community made the city’s oldest synagogue, located in Via Beccaria, available to them.

Close

Historical photograph of a letter from the Jews of Corfu to the Doge, Vienna, c. 1928, JMW, Inv. Nr. 1165

The Corfiot Jewish population consisted, on the one hand, of so-called Romaniote Jews, who were settled in the Levant and spoke a Hebrew-Greek dialect, and on the other hand of Italian and Sephardic Jews. The latter had been expelled from Spain in 1492 and had come to Corfu via Italy.

From 1387 to 1797, Corfu was under Venetian rule. The legal situation for Jews on the island was considerably more favorable than in Venice itself: they were not required to wear a “yellow badge” on their clothing and were spared the expulsion from Venetian territories in 1572.

However, they did not form a unified community. This photograph from the holdings of the first Jewish Museum Vienna shows a complaint addressed to the Doge by the Romaniote Jews concerning the newly arrived Sephardim.

In Vienna, Zwi Perez Chajes was active not only as a rabbi but also as a scholar. He was a member of the board of trustees of the first Jewish Museum, where in 1923 he delivered the lecture “The Jews of Italy in Past and Present”. It is quite possible that he spoke about the Jewish community of Trieste on that occasion—perhaps mentioning the Corfiot Jews as well.

Born in 1890 in Sighetu Marmației in present-day Romania (then Transylvania), Elza Sternberger studied goldsmithing at the Academy of Arts and Design in Budapest from 1913 to 1915. She was considered one of the best students of her class and produced jewelry and small handcrafted art objects in the Hungarian Art Deco style that was widespread at the time. After completing her studies and moving to Vienna, she increasingly turned her attention to Jewish themes and created Judaica in innovative designs—such as this Hanukkah lamp.

Sternberger engaged deeply with biblical sources and sought to renew Jewish craftsmanship—first in Vienna and later also in Palestine.

In Vienna, her works are said to have sold well. The goldsmith died very young, at the age of 34, in Vienna.

The Hanukkah lamp was taken by her brother Marcel Sternberger when he escaped from the National Socialists to Christiansburg, Virginia, in the United States—as the only object he carried with him. Their parents were murdered in the Holocaust.

Marcel Sternberger later became a highly successful photographer. He died in a traffic accident in 1965. In the 1990s, the Jewish Museum Vienna acquired the lamp from his widow, Ilse.

Isak Noa Mannheimer was born in Copenhagen in 1793, the son of Hungarian parents. In 1814, while he was still a student, Danish Jews were granted full civil rights. Mannheimer’s education was shaped entirely by the Enlightenment ideas of the German philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, which at that time quickly gained acceptance in Denmark. This Shulkhan cover from Vienna’s City Temple was donated by one of Isak Noa Mannheimer’s sons after his death in 1865.

In Vienna, the situation was completely different from that in Denmark: equality was still far off, and Vienna’s Jewish community was divided between supporters of reform—who wanted to implement Enlightenment ideas in the synagogue—and Orthodox Jews, who sought to adhere to traditional practices.

A committed supporter of reform was the imperial and royal court jeweler, wholesaler, and banker Michael Lazar Biedermann. He endeavored to bring Isak Noa Mannheimer to Vienna so that religious services there might also be renewed. In this letter dated April 27, 1822, Biedermann writes to Mannheimer that he is still awaiting the decision of the imperial court regarding Mannheimer’s appointment.

In 1824, Mannheimer was finally called to Vienna, though only as director of the Jewish religious school—since Jews in Vienna were not yet permitted to have a rabbi. With the consecration of the City Temple two years later, Mannheimer effectively became its first rabbi; however, only with the official founding of the congregation in 1852 was he allowed to bear the title formally.

In Vienna, however, Mannheimer did not implement all the reforms he desired. Together with the cantor Salomon Sulzer (1804–1890), he developed the so-called “Wiener Ritus” (“Viennese rite”)—a compromise between Reform and Orthodoxy—and thus prevented a split within Vienna’s Jewish community.

He delivered his sermons in German, while the prayers continued to be recited in Hebrew. Nevertheless, in his study he translated many Hebrew prayers, which were later published, as were his sermons.

One of Mannheimer’s best-known sermons dates back to the civic-democratic March Revolution of 1848, in which some Viennese Jews participated prominently. The brutal suppression by the Austrian imperial authorities claimed 35 victims among the revolutionary men and women, for whom, remarkably, an ecumenical funeral was held. Together with a Protestant minister and a Catholic priest, Isak Noa Mannheimer delivered a speech, concluding with this appeal:

Richly decorated with floral and animal ornaments as well as architectural elements, this Hanukkah lamp is a typical example of Eastern European silversmithing—sometimes also referred to as “Jewish Baroque.” The oil containers bear the Kyiv city hallmark in use between 1828 and 1887 and were therefore most likely produced in a Kyiv workshop. The name of the silversmith cannot be determined.

In the Belarusian city of Mogilev (today Mahiljou / Mogilyov), there once stood a famous wooden synagogue that inspired many artists of the Russian‑Ukrainian‑Jewish avant-garde, including El Lissitzky, Marc Chagall, and Issachar Ber Ryback.

The interior of the Mogilev synagogue was painted in 1740 by the artist Chaim Segal with multicolored folkloristic, biblical, and Talmudic motifs. As with Eastern European Judaica more generally, synagogues often made use of vividly colored animal and plant motifs.

Close

Kiev Hanukkah lamp, photo from: A. Kantsedikas/Y. Volkovinskaya/T. Romanovskaya; Masterpieces of Jewish Art, Silver, 1991

Jewish ritual objects from Kyiv were traded throughout Eastern Europe. An almost identical Hanukkah lamp to the one in the collection of the Jewish Museum Vienna can be seen in a photograph from the 1920s from the synagogue in Mogilev, Belarus (today Mahiljou / Mogilyov).

In Galicia as well—part of the Habsburg Monarchy since the partitions of Poland in 1772—there were numerous folkloristically decorated wooden synagogues.

Most of them were destroyed during the First World War, and at the latest in the Second World War.

The Esther Scroll donated in 1844 by Aharon de Majo and Gabriel ha-Kohen, crafted by a Viennese silversmith in the typical Viennese Biedermeier style, was originally intended for the Sephardic synagogue at Große Hafnergasse 321 (today Große Mohrengasse) in Vienna’s 2nd district.

After this synagogue became too small and the Sephardic community built a new house of worship—the so-called Turkish Temple—in Zirkusgasse in the mid-1880s, the Esther Scroll was transferred there.

At the inauguration of the temple in 1887—built in Moorish style following the model of the Alhambra—the cantor recited, alongside the obligatory prayer for Emperor Franz Joseph I, a prayer for the well-being of Sultan Abdülhamid II. As a sign of allegiance to both rulers, a portrait of the Austrian emperor hung in the anteroom of the temple next to a portrait of the Sultan. It is possible that this cloth bearing the tughra (calligraphic signature) of Sultan Abdülhamid II was also donated on the occasion of the opening of the Turkish Temple.

At the inauguration ceremony in 1887, the choir sang the national anthems of both countries. The choir director was Isidor Löwit, who came from a well-known Viennese family. This audio recording features Isidor Löwit and Heinrich Fischer singing the prayer "Hineni heoni mimaas".

How magnificently the Turkish Temple was furnished is shown in a photograph of the open Torah Ark, taken in 1937 by the photographer Oskar Moser on behalf of the banker David Mordechai Halfon.

In front of the Torah Ark hung a Torah curtain donated by the Russo family, produced in the workshop of Carl Giani after a design by the architect Hugo Ritter von Wiedenfeld.

Preserved to this day in the collections of the Jewish Museum is a Torah mantle from the Turkish Temple, donated by Mordechai (Marco) Adutt.

The Adutt family belonged to the oldest Sephardic Jewish families settled in Vienna. Its first known representative was Leon Adutt, born in Constantinople in 1774, whose name appears for the first time in a business partnership agreement dating from 1818. Economically successful and actively involved in the Turkish-Jewish community, subsequent generations of the Adutt family also played a prominent role in Vienna. Owing to their extensive family network, many family members were no longer living in Vienna by 1938. The donor of this Torah mantle had already established a branch of the family business in London in the mid-19th century, and his descendants were British citizens.

These Torah finials (Rimmonim) made of silver and silver filigree, which adorned Torah scrolls in a Viennese synagogue until 1938 and are now preserved in the Jewish Museum Vienna, were crafted in Jerusalem in the early 20th century.

Close

Torah finials, 1906-1922, JMP inv. no. 012.409, © Jewish Museum in Prague

An almost identical pair of Torah finials from Jerusalem—differing only in the dedicatory inscription—is held in the collections of the Jewish Museum in Prague.

The Bezalel Art School was founded in Jerusalem in 1906 by the sculptor Boris Schatz, with the support, among others, of the graphic artist, painter, and photographer Ephraim Moses Lilien. Bezalel is the name of a gifted craftsman mentioned in the Book of Exodus (Exod. 35:30–35).

The aim of the school was to develop an “authentically Jewish” art, to support the Zionist movement, to stimulate the struggling local economy, and ultimately to establish a Jewish National Museum. Typical works of the Bezalel School combine Orientalist elements with those of Art Nouveau.

Pilgrims from around the world visiting the Holy Land constituted an important market for Bezalel’s handicraft.

From the very beginning, close ties existed between the first Jewish Museum Vienna and Bezalel. The inventory book shows that objects were purchased from Bezalel or acquired in exchange for duplicates from the museum, such as this bas-relief.

The Rimmonim likely reached Vienna through a similar route. Since they do not bear an inventory number from the first Jewish Museum, they were probably in use in a Viennese synagogue.

When Jakob Rosenthal was born in Iași in 1836, the city was still part of the Ottoman Empire; it later became part of the Kingdom of Romania.

It is not known why or when Jakob Rosenthal left Iași. Perhaps it was the frequent pogroms against Jews, or economic reasons, that prompted him to leave his home. He most likely first emigrated to Great Britain, where he acquired British citizenship, and later moved on to British India.

Jakob Rosenthal’s official place of residence was Bombay (today Mumbai) in India, where he presumably traded in Swiss luxury watches manufactured specifically for the Indian market.

Time and again, he traveled to Austria-Hungary for sanatorium stays; his name appears on various guest lists from Baden near Vienna and, in 1901, also from Karlsbad. Most of the time he arrived accompanied by his wife—and occasionally even the maid is mentioned.

On the occasion of Hanukkah in 1904, he and his wife Toiwe donated a pair of typical Viennese Torah finials to a synagogue in Vienna. What special relationship he had with Austria-Hungary, with Vienna, or with this particular synagogue remains unknown. Since the finials are among the objects in the Jewish Museum Vienna that were collected and salvaged from the ruins after the November Pogrom of 1938, it is no longer possible to determine in which synagogue they had been used.

Three years later, he probably donated a Torah curtain (parokhet) to the same house of prayer. As indicated by the dedicatory inscription, his wife was no longer alive at that time. Since she is not buried in Vienna, it is possible that she died in India. The parokhet also mentions Jakob Rosenthal’s original home community of Iași in Moldavia.

According to an entry in the inventory book, this etrog container was donated to the first Jewish Museum on February 11, 1902, by a Mr. S. Manassewitsch from Wiesbaden. The donor’s name is also engraved on the object itself, albeit with the addition “Dresden, Tammuz 5661,” which corresponds to June 1901.

The donor was Samuel Moses Manassewitsch. He was born in Russia in 1826 and worked as a merchant in Moscow. The naturalistically designed silver object served to hold an etrog fruit, which is described in the Talmud as the fruit of Paradise and is required for the prayers of Sukkot, the Feast of Tabernacles.

Housed in the seemingly inconspicuous black metal case marked “U.S.” is, in effect, a complete basic set of synagogal equipment in miniature, assembled by the military rabbi Colonel David Lapp. It includes a miniature Torah ark with a Torah scroll and a Torah pointer, a pair of Sabbath candlesticks, a Hanukkah lamp, kippot in military camouflage colors, and a prayer book in Hebrew and English.

In 2000, during a visit to Vienna, David Lapp donated this box—known in professional parlance as a “field synagogue”—to the Jewish Museum Vienna.

Lapp’s family history connected him to Vienna. His father, originally from Galicia, had served in the Austro-Hungarian Army during the First World War. After the collapse of the monarchy, the family settled in Vienna, where David Lapp was born in 1931.

He attended the Jewish elementary school at Malzgasse 16—the same building that had also housed the first Jewish Museum since 1913. Maybe he visited the museum as a child?

Coming from a devout and musical family, he sang every Friday evening in the boys’ choir of Vienna’s City Temple.

With the National Socialist seizure of power in 1938, David Lapp’s idyllic Viennese childhood ended abruptly. His father was arrested and sent to a labor camp. In 1940—literally at the last minute—the family managed to obtain an American visa and fled to the United States.

There, David Lapp trained as a rabbi and from 1957 onward served as a military rabbi in the U.S. Army. Military chaplains of all denominations were simply referred to as “chaplains.”

One of his most challenging assignments was during the Vietnam War, when he flew by helicopter from one combat zone to another to provide pastoral care to Jewish soldiers. According to Lapp, the soldiers’ traumatic experiences led many of them to engage more intensely with religious questions.