The jews of rural franconia in the first half of the 19th century are a kind of their own in the history of the Haskala, the jewish emanciaption movement. Their encounter with modernity challenged them in multiple ways, be it social, political or, maybe most of all, religious. When exploring the diverse and rich world of the franconian jews, one has to admit that the clichée of the antimodern, backwors-minded rural jew is indeeed just a clichée. The rural world was very well aware of the questions modernity posed, but found genuine answers and is thus a world as interesting and vibrant as their cousind in the cities of Germany and the Stetls of eastern europe. |