Synagoge
History of the Viennese Jewish community
Between the 12th and the 19th centuries, Jews were allowed to settle in Vienna only with the permission of the local ruler. During these years they were tolerated at times, persecuted and murdered at others.
The Jews began to settle in Vienna at the end of the 12th century. The first recorded personage is a man called Shlom, whom Duke Leopold V appointed mint master in 1194. In 1238 Emperor Frederick II issued a privilege for the Jews and put them under his personal protection. This privilege was renewed in 1244 by Frederick the Warlike. With the establishment of the Habsburg dynasty in 1282, the Jewish community grew steadily until the fateful year 1406, when a fire destroyed the Jewish quarter. In 1421 the Jews were expelled from Vienna and Lower Austria. Better-off memebers of the community are arrested for the purpose of extortion and later burnt alive (Vienna Geserah)
In the following centuries only isolated Jews were allowed to reside temporarily in Vienna. In 1670 under Leopold I the Jews were again banished, ostensibly for theological reasons and accusations of spying for the Turks.
As the Turkish wars needed to be financed, the Emperor permitted individual wealthy Jews to live in Vienna. The first of these was Samuel Oppenheimer. This marked the start of the era of the Viennese Court or Tolerated Jews. In 1782 Emperor Joseph II issued the Tolerance Patent permitting the Jews to practise their religion, although the decree made no other significant differences to Jewish life in Vienna. In 1823 they were given permission to build a synagogue, which was dedicated in 1826 and survives today as the City Temple.
During the 1848 revolution, Jews, Christians, workers, students and bourgeois citizens fought together for the freedom and equality of all Austrians. The revolution was put down and the Jews found themselves suffering some of the same restrictions as they had a century earlier.
The Jewish community was finally officially recognised in 1852 and the Leopoldstadt Temple completed in 1858.
From the mid-19th century a huge influx of immigrants arrived in Vienna from the eastern parts of the monarchy. At the same time anti-Semitism and racial prejudice increased.
The annexation of Austria by the Nazis in 1938 had disastrous consequences for the Jews and they were increasingly persecuted. Of the 180,000 Jews living in Vienna before the war, 120,000 managed to escape and 65,000 were murdered. A very small number survived underground in Vienna, and many of those who emigrated committed suicide or died of desperation.
After 1945 no one expected that there would ever be a flourishing Jewish community in Vienna again, as few of the former inhabitants returned. Nor did the Republic of Austria issue an official invitation for the Jews to return to their country. But things changed through a new immigration from Eastern Europe. A new community life develloped, schools and other important religios and social institutions were built.
In the 1980s a new generation had grown up and community life began to evolve with the emergence of new schools and religious facilities that continue to exist today.
Sabine Frank
