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East European Jewish Affairs, Vol. 36, No. 1, June 2006

‘MAKING’ JEWS AT HOMEZionism and the Construction of Jewish Nationality in Inter-war Czechoslovakia

Tatjana LichtensteinTaylor and Francis LtdFEEJ_A_171442.sgm10.1080/13501670600714742East European Jewish Affairs1350-1674 (print)/1743-971X (online)Original Article2006Taylor & Francis361000000June 2006TatjanaLichtensteintatjana.lichtenstein@utoronto.ca

Honouring the work of Ludvík Singer, a deceased Zionist activist, the prominentJewish leader Norbert Adler evaluated the role of youth and sports for the Zionist project ininter-war Czechoslovakia:

In our country, the Jewish national awakening was a youth movement from the outset.

Youth gave the endeavour, elation and style. Herzl and the movement’s leaders understood

that. Accordingly young people’s longing for physical vigour acted as an incentive to our

national aspirations much in the same way that our national ideals had encouraged the

efforts to achieve physical strength. Thus, from the beginning, the Jewish sports organiza-

tions played an important part in the movement for national awakening. While this was not

unusual among awakening nations, for us, whose spine was bent and arm weakened by

two thousand years of subjugation, it was particularly significant.1

Adler’s eulogy captured several central tropes of Zionist discourse in the BohemianLands. Images of the nation’s glorious past, distorted by exile and assimilation, and projectionsof the Jewish people’s bright future, positioned the present as a decisive existential moment.This moment offered an opportunity for restoration, ‘returning’ the nation to its true self, re-discovering its ancestry, re-erecting its boundaries and thereby healing its relations with otherpeoples. At its core, the Zionist project in Czechoslovakia strove to ‘recreate’ a harmoniousand authentic social order; an order eroded by the centrifugal forces of modern society.

This article examines a Jewish national sports club, the Prague-based Hagibor, as a casestudy of Zionist nation building in inter-war Czechoslovakia. It argues that Prague Zionistsimagined Zionism as a vehicle for ‘making’ Jews at home in Czechoslovakia, both in the senseof creating new Jewish identities and in the sense of making Jews comfortable in the new state.

While this study does not suggest that the beliefs of Zionists elsewhere in the Bohe-mian Lands or in the Eastern provinces were the same, Prague Zionism’s ideological positionwas, nevertheless, one embraced by some of the central figures of the Zionist movement inCzechoslovakia such as Ludvík Singer and Angelo Goldstein. Both were Prague-based Zionistleaders and among the country’s most prominent inter-war Jewish politicians. Theideological line explored here was not marginal. Having said that, however, it is important toremember that inter-war Zionism in Czechoslovakia, as in the rest of Central Europe, was nota homogenous movement. Not only were there various ideological factions dividing theleaderships of the Zionist movement, but lower level activists also interpreted Zionist

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ideology and practice in different ways. One of the chief differences dividing CentralEuropean Zionists was the rejection or acceptance of continued life in the Diaspora.2 Somesaw the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine as a goal that would give direction andenergy to the national regeneration of Jewish life in the Diaspora. The Diaspora, thusimagined, functioned as a legitimate and prosperous space for Jews if they were rooted in anational Jewish culture. In this view, Zionists would act as policy makers and overseers ofJews’ transformation into a national minority.3 Others, however, rejected the Diasporaexperience and argued that the only viable solution to the ‘Jewish Question’ was an end tothe Jews’ minority position. They believed that all the efforts of Zionists should be directedtowards creating a Jewish homeland, not engaging in minority politics.4

The strand of Zionism advocated by Ludvík Singer and Angelo Goldstein focused itsefforts on transforming Jewish life and ensuring Jews’ rights in the new Czechoslovak state.Since the end of the war, Zionists had been instrumental in securing Jews’ rights both as indi-viduals and as a people. The question of Jews’ collective rights, and in this particular contextthe recognition of a Jewish nationality in Czechoslovakia, had been central to Zionist politicalactivity. In the weeks following the war, the self-appointed Jewish leaders, organized in aJewish National Council ([Zcaron] idovská národní rada) and conducting negotiations on behalf ofthe new country’s Jews, convinced the Czech leaders of the utility of strengthening the Zion-ist movement. Supporting their program, these Jewish activists insisted, would allow Jews toadopt a position of ‘neutral loyalty’ vis-à-vis the new state. The Jewish national movementwould, so the argument went, ‘withdraw’ Jews from the Czech and German national camps.Playing on the negative perception of assimilation in Czech nationalist discourse, Zionistsproposed that placing Jews firmly into a Jewish camp would put an end to decades of ‘oppor-tunist’ assimilation. This ‘withdrawal’ would simultaneously, Zionists maintained, neutralizeJews’ role in the national struggle and assert their loyalty to the new state. In addition, Czechsupport for the Zionist program, they argued, would assist the process of moral regenerationof the country’s Jews. The Jewish National Council envisioned this Jewish national renais-sance as a two-fold process.5 On the one hand, Zionism would improve Jews’ self-esteem andmake them into more moral beings through a process of physical and cultural regeneration.On the other, as these ‘new’ Jews shed their formerly corrupt and inferior character, a degen-eracy created by previous generations’ assimilationist attitudes, they would earn the respectof non-Jews, freshly awakened themselves to the significance of nationalism. Furthermore,to the Prague Zionists, adoption of the Czech language and loyalty to the Czechoslovak statewere central components of this process.6 Thus, the national ‘rebirth’ had the potential toensure harmonious co-existence between Jews and non-Jews.7 By transforming the formerspiritually and physically, Zionism would change the self-perception of Jews and the percep-tions of them by non-Jews. To these Zionists, the effort to create a Jewish homeland in Pales-tine was a force that united the dispersed Jewish nation, strengthened their argument fornational rights in the Diaspora, and lent prestige to the movement in the wake of World WarI. For them, however, the central focus of national regeneration—both geographically andemotionally—was to transform Jews’ continued existence in the Diaspora. To them, Zionismwas a strategy to improve Jews’ lives and make them at home in Czechoslovakia.

Setting the Stage: Zionism and Sport in the Aftermath of World War I

In the Bohemian Lands, Zionism only became a serious political force in the wake ofWorld War I. While this was in part a response to the triumphant ethos of democracy and

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national self-determination, the new focus on creating a Jewish national life, which wouldchange the lives of the Jewish masses, was also a reaction against the perceived one-sidedintellectualism of the pre-war Zionist groups in Prague. The war-time experiences ofimportant Prague Zionists, the historian Hillel J. Kieval argues, changed the ideological focusof the movement from individual self-discovery and theoretical discussion to one of Zionisteducation and political action.8 If pre-war Zionism had been characterized by intellectualism,the post-war goal of Prague’s Jewish nationalists was to make Jewish national life a reality.9

They agreed, according to Kieval, that the focal point for efforts to create a mass movementwas education, the education of children and young people in particular.10 Even though pre-war Prague Zionism was seen by prominent activists like Max Brod and Hugo Bergman assalon intellectualism, there were signs of change in the years before the war.

In the two decades before the war, Jewish national gymnastics clubs sprung up insmall towns and cities throughout the Bohemian Lands. This was a Zionist forum accessibleto a wider range of individuals, if not to the masses, then to the coffeehouses and tastefullydecorated parlours frequented by Zionist thinkers.11 At the same time, however, these intel-lectuals were instrumental in the foundation of the Prague Zionist paper Selbstwehr, aninitiative intended to engage a broader Jewish audience in questions of national belonging.One preceded a couple of years earlier by the Brno-based weekly, Jüdische Volksstimme.12

Indeed, in the decade before the war, Zionists established local branches and regional officesof the Zionist movement signalling their desire to participate in mass politics.13 Thus, by the20th century’s first decade, the focus among Zionist activists more broadly had alreadybegun its expansion toward inclusivity and grass-roots tactics in the Bohemian Lands. TheGreat War accelerated rather than started this reorientation. The combined integrativeforces of widespread Jewish solidarity brought on by Jews’ suffering on the Eastern Front,increasing anti-Semitism, and the apparent political triumph of ‘subordinate’ nationalisms,energized the Zionist movement in the Bohemian Lands.

After the establishment of Czechoslovakia, the Czech leadership’s cooperative attitudetowards the Jewish nationalists, embodied by their recognition of Jews as one of thecountry’s nationalities, extended legitimacy and prestige to the Zionist movement. Zionistsenvisioned themselves as the political force that would unite the state’s multivalent Jewishsocieties and simultaneously ensure Jews’ rights. Given the widely held belief in Jews’allegiance to old elites as well as the anti-Jewish riots that followed the establishment of thenew state, a priority for the Zionists was to assure the state’s leadership of Jews’ loyalty toCzechoslovakia. They hoped, thereby, to ensure the authorities’ protection of their Jewishsubjects and convince them of the utility of a Zionist partner.

The Zionists, however, were not the only contenders for the leadership of the state’sJews. The Czech-Jewish integrationists movement saw itself as the ‘natural’ representative ofthe country’s Jews. Considering its longstanding support for Czech nationalism and promo-tion of Czech culture among Jews in the Bohemian Lands, the Czech-Jewish integrationistswere dismayed by the initial success of the Zionists.14

In the post-war years, the democratization of political life on both the local and nationallevels provided new opportunities for political influence and motivated Zionists to increasetheir efforts to create a Jewish national mass movement. These efforts took the form ofamong other things the organization of the Jewish Party in 1919 and the expansion of theJewish press, especially the launching of the Czech-language weekly, [Zcaron] idovské zprávy (JewishNews). Zionist also intensified the efforts to establish forums for disseminating Zionismparticularly to the ‘nation’s’ youth in the form of schools, scouting groups, and sport clubs.

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While Jewish sports and gymnastic organizations existed in Bohemia and Moraviabefore the war, it was only in the 1920s that these institutions became important vehiclesboth ideologically and tactically for the Jewish national revival. Ideologically, the ‘improve-ment’ of Jews’ physical culture was integral to the creation of a ‘new’ strong, healthy, andproud Jew; a counter image to the weak, sickly and downtrodden Diaspora Jew.15 It waswithin these groups that the spiritual and physical regeneration of Jews was to take placeafter centuries of neglect.16 As one commentator put it: “Jews have had a strange relation tosport and to physical culture in general … [they] maintained the freshness of mental concen-tration, not their physical or racial vigour.”17 The image of Jews as culturally non-athleticpersisted in the inter-war years. Jews and non-Jews alike believed that Jews’ historicalghetto-existence and preoccupation with intellectual rather than physical gymnastics hadcreated weak, unhealthy and nervous traits in Jews.18 To Zionists, the degeneration of Jewishphysical culture was closely linked to the loss of political self-determination. The emergenceof the Zionist movement was to ‘return’ Jews to their previous healthy shape. According toone observer, Zionist work “was to revive the Jewish nation … which in all its deeds carriesthe mark of degeneration and inferiority. The [national] revival aims at the spiritual andphysical recovery of the Jewish nation’s sick body.”19 Once the patient had recovered, itsvigour would quell the voices denying Jews equality and respect. Jewish sports and gymnas-tics organizations were, Zionists imagined, to play the same regenerative role that Sokol hadplayed for the formerly stateless Czech nation.20

It was only after World War I, however, that these clubs became part of a concertedeffort to transform Jews into a national entity with clear boundaries and legitimate loyalties.These Zionists’ tactics are just one example of a larger process in the Bohemian Lands wherenationalists struggled to ascribe people to one ‘nation’ or the other.21 Like their German andCzech equivalents, Jewish nationalists were striving to submit the multivalent categories ofidentification such as locality, religion, languages and class to one overarching and clearlydefined ethnicity. But, as Jeremy King has shown, ‘ethnic’ groups and identities in the Bohe-mian Lands were categories produced by nationalists and historians rather than ethno-graphic realities.22 In their quest for legitimizing the ‘nation,’ King contends, Czech andGerman nationalists imagined all other categories of identification as subordinate histori-cally to ethnic identities. Similarly, Jewish nationalists justified their claims to ‘nationhood’ byprojecting ‘ethnic’ boundaries and loyalties backward in time, presenting their current stateas a ‘loss’ of nationhood. In other words, Jewish nationalists built anachronistically uniformnotions of Jewishness, casting them on to diverse Jewish societies and cultures. Doing soallowed them to imagine a narrative of the nation’s historical continuity.

In the inter-war years, Zionist writers authored historical and statistical studies aboutJews and Jewish communities in Czechoslovakia that were instrumental both in the produc-tion of images of nationhood and in diagnosing the ‘Jewish condition.’ In his examination ofthe history of Prague Jewry, the prolific writer and Zionist politician, Franti[scaron] ek Friedmann,constructed an image of a Jewry that “since the earliest times was equally as conscious of itsbelonging to the Jewish nation as was the [city’s] non-Jewish population.”23 Thus, Jewsperceived themselves as a nation and were identified as such by the peoples among whomthey lived. Drawing on contemporary notions of the relationship between language andnationhood, Friedmann made the use of Hebrew as “a cultural and national language” thecentral marker of Jews’ nationhood. Only with the introduction of the Austrian state’sGermanization policies in the 1780s, he claimed, were Jews forced to adopt the Germanlanguage collectively. However, because Jews continued to live socially and culturally

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separate from non-Jews, Friedmann argued, their “Germaness” was only a “veneer.”24

Indeed, contrary to popular belief, he insisted, Prague’s ‘German’ schools were not vehiclesfor assimilation. Rather, because Jews were concentrated in a few areas of the city, theschools in these neighbourhoods had an overwhelmingly Jewish student body. In such anenvironment, Friedmann maintained, “they could not lose their national consciousness,because in the schools, where they could have been re-nationalized, they found themselvesamong their own kind.”25 Indeed, according to Friedmann, these ‘German’ schools strength-ened social ties between Jews and nurtured rather than destroyed Jewish nationalconsciousness.26 Friedmann’s narrative painted an image of unbroken historical continuity;a pointed challenge to the Czech social scientists questioning Jews’ right to claim Jewishnationality in the country’s second census, which was to take place the following year.27

Friedmann’s teleological notion about the transmission of nationhood through earlysocialization and language privileged the primacy of national identities over other collectivecategories of identification. Friedmann invented Prague’s Jewish nation. Unable to locatethe accepted “objective” marker of nationality, namely a Jewish national mother tongue, incontemporary Prague Jewry, Friedmann employed historical evidence and statistical mate-rial to paint an image of an organic Hebrew national culture.28 While the objective nationalcharacter of Prague Jewry in Friedmann’s opinion escaped some non-Jewish social scientists,this Jewish expert’s distinct knowledge provided the ‘evidence’ correcting misconceptionsabout Jews’ character and behaviour. Works like Friedmann’s served a variety of functionsbeyond legitimizing Jews’ claim to nationality status. They also created images of ‘Jews’ thatdefined the Jewish character, its deficiencies, and prescribed the appropriate remedies.29

The knowledge produced about Jews in these studies was utilized by educators and politi-cians in their efforts to devise a new and better path for the country’s Jewry. The socialsciences provided these activists with powerful tools with which to design legitimate andconvincing policies when approaching state agencies for legal and financial support.

In the post-war period, the nationalists’ claims ensured not only political legitimacy,but also promised particular rights such as state support for cultural institutions.30 Zionistinstitutions such as the sports club Hagibor Praha became important instruments forproducing Jewish ‘nationhood.’ The competitions between its teams and those of othernationalities symbolically represented the struggle of equal nations. The socialization youngJewish women and men went through in the clubs were envisioned as fundamental to theshaping of their Jewish national consciousness.

This emphasis on youth was shaped by nationalist and pedagogical discourses onearly education and the formation of national consciousness. Zionists shared with theirnationalist peers the belief that while nationality was determined by ancestry, children’snational consciousness had to be awakened and strengthened through nationalist educa-tion and socialization.31 Parents, nationalists believed, were more often than not eithernationally indifferent or misguided. Hence, as Tara Zahra has shown, it fell to nationalistactivists to ensure that misconceptions were not passed on to children.32 This perception ofparental fallibility was formalized in the census legislation which allowed children from theage of 14 to claim a nationality different from their parents.33 Not surprisingly, Zioniststargeted education and socialization as the most significant tactics in producing Jewishnational consciousness among the Jewish masses, a process which would cement Zionistleadership of Czechoslovak Jewry.

In the 1920s, Prague Zionists saw the sports movement as pivotal in mobilizing Jewishyouth. In the absence of an adequate network of Jewish national schools, the Zionist

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movement was missing what they thought was the most important institution for educatingchildren nationally, an education that their home environment was often deemed unwillingor incapable of providing.34 Hence, as substitutes for schools, Jewish sports clubs and scout-ing groups became the most important venues for nation building in the eyes of Zionistactivists. Indeed, Zionist leaders believed that considering the “indifference” of Jewishyouths and their parents to national questions, sport rather than ideology would attractyoung men and women to Zionism.35 In making the argument for strengthening the Jewishsport movement, Ev[zcaron] en Justic, a long time advocate of Jewish sports, claimed that sport wasboth attractive and accessible to young people. Once “inside” the Jewish clubs “individualswill then befriend their club colleagues. They will become acquainted with their thoughts,interested in the problems preoccupying their friends, they will think about them, and soonthey will share these thoughts with other Jews outside the club. In the Jewish sports club aboy becomes a Jew.”36

Making ‘New’ Jews

[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sportovní Klub Hagibor ([Zcaron] .S.K Hagibor) was established in 1914.37 During thewar the club was scrutinized by local police suspicious of a group of young men “gettingtogether to play soccer.”38 By 1925, however, Hagibor had emerged from its humble begin-nings with enough resources and optimism to begin the construction of its own stadium ona lot rented from the Jewish Community across from the New Jewish Cemetery in Ol[scaron] anylocated in the Stra nice district of Prague.39 Even though the early 1920s were tumultuousfor Hagibor, marked as they were by significant leadership and financial crises, the numberof members increased steadily. In 1923, the club had about 400 members. This numbergrew to 600 in 1927 and more than 900 in 1929.40

[Zcaron] .S.K. Hagibor was a Jewish national club whose members were widely understood tobe Jewish.41 Seeking to reach a large number of members, according to the club’s statutes,the founders only specified that a member had to be a Jew ([Zcaron] id), the capitalization empha-sizing the ethnic character of this definition. Considering that the club was meant to producenationally conscious Jews, the club’s leaders could hardly demand much national awarenessupon entry. Rather, the ethnic definition was meant to include individuals who were Jews bydescent, possibly including non-halakhic Jews (for example children with Jewish fathers andnon-Jewish mothers who are not Jewish according to Jewish religious law, Halakah) andcertainly Jews who were not so by religion.42

The Jewish National Council itself had to broach this issue soon after the war. In themonths before the country’s first census, Zionist leaders proposed that Jewish nationalitywas to be defined both “objectively” through descent (kmenová p[rcaron] íslu[scaron] nost) and “subjec-tively” by national consciousness (uv[ecaron] deom[ecaron] ní národní).43 In the census regulations issued inOctober 1920, the law makers specified that “Jews could choose Jewish nationality” regard-less of mother tongue, the “objective” ethnic evidence otherwise determining an individual’snationality.44 For the purposes of the census, the main “objective” marker defining Jews wasreligion.45 The Zionist leadership did not consider adherence to Judaism a marker of nation-ality, asking specifically for individuals with another faith or with no faith at all to be able toclaim Jewish nationality.46 In practice, however, this seems to be the only way in whichJewish descent could be determined aside from an individual’s own statement or the censuscommissioners’ observation of other ethnic markers.47 Indeed, Zionists themselves did notapply their own criteria, descent and consciousness, when defining who belonged to the

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country’s Jewish nationality. In a lecture presented to the Society for the Study of the Minor-ities Question in Prague, Emil Margulies, an important Zionist representative, discussed theissues facing “the 365,000 Jews that live here, the fellow citizens of Jewish nationality in thisstate,” referring to the approximate number of Jews as defined by religion in Czechoslovakiaaccording to the country’s censuses.48 While Zionists were not in favour of making Jewishnationality mandatory for Jews for political reasons, in the minds of Jewish nationalists,ethnic origin determined national belonging. Jews otherwise convinced simply sufferedfrom a sort of “false consciousness.”49

The ethnification of national belonging was of course a trademark of minority nation-alisms in the Habsburg monarchy.50 Since 1880, when the Austrian censuses began register-ing language, the imperial authorities inadvertently encouraged nationalists to equatelanguage and nationality.51 Minority nationalists claimed that the census’ registration ofeveryday language as opposed to mother tongue served to ‘erase’ the empire’s non-domi-nant nationalities and fuelled these nationalists’ efforts to ensure the use of non-Germanlanguages in public institutions.52 In order to differentiate between ‘Czechs’ and ‘Germans’in the Bohemian Lands, historians like Jeremy King argue, Czech nationalists declaredmother tongue the ‘true’ marker of an individual’s nationality, a process that involved cate-gorizing a whole range of local dialects as either German or Czech.53

After the establishment of Czechoslovakia, this claim was supported by those statisti-cians charged with designing the country’s first census. Social scientists like Cyril Hora[ccaron] ekand Antonín Bohá[ccaron] claimed that mother tongue constituted the most significant and “objec-tive” ethnic marker.54 So fixed was this indicator that they insisted that the “fact” of a person’smother tongue could not be altered by acquired languages. While a person might in rarecases adopt another language to such an extent that he or she changes nationality, mothertongue, they asserted, is the most stable and the easiest observable marker of nationality.55

While this measure for nationality remained in place in the country’s 1930 census, the socialscientists entrusted with its design were less certain about the scientific validity of theirresults recognizing the difficulty of capturing an individual’s national belonging usingobjective markers.56

The situation was complicated by the observation that Jews did not conform to thisrule. While statisticians observed that Jews constituted a separate ethnic group, they weredivided as to whether or not Jews should be allowed to claim Jewish nationality if they couldnot provide the corresponding ethnic evidence, namely Hebrew or Yiddish. Despite thedisagreements among the social scientists, in the end, Jews could choose “between theJewish nationality, a nationality which has lost its language, and the nationality determinedby their original or adopted mother tongue.”57

The peculiar permissibility surrounding the inclusivity of Jewish nationality revealsthat the degree of choice allowed Jews in the census was a politically motivated move. TheCzech political elite sought not only to keep its promise to allow Jews the choice of Jewishnationality embedded in the constitutional articles, but also to diminish the number of Jewsclaiming German or Hungarian nationality in accordance with their mother tongues.58 Zion-ists actively promoted to Czech leaders the notion that large numbers of Jews would chooseJewish nationality over German and Hungarian if given the choice. However, this image ofJews as casually committed Germans and Magyars and the related notion that Jews’ ‘true’national belonging was Jewish also resonated with Czech and Slovak politicians, socialscientists, and probably the non-Jewish public at large, making the ‘desirable’ scenariodepicted by the Zionists appear plausible.

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Prominent Zionists like Norbert Adler, Franti[scaron] ek Friedmann, and Angelo Goldsteinwere closely involved with the Jewish sports movement. Adler chaired the swimming clubHagibor, Friedmann was the head of the sports club Hagibor, while Goldstein was an earlyboard member.59 Considering these close ties between Hagibor and the Zionist leadership,it is likely that Hagibor adopted similar criteria for membership in the club, i.e. ancestry andnational consciousness. However, keeping in mind that Hagibor’s goal was to create Jews byfostering Jewish national consciousness through socialization and education it would seemcounterproductive to demand evidence of an already existing sense of Jewish nationalbelonging. While Hagibor’s leadership encouraged their members to declare Jewishnationality on the census, they really had no way of knowing.60

Hagibor’s club colours (blue and white) and insignia (a Star of David) aligned it with thevarious other types of Jewish national clubs in Bohemia and Moravia such as Bar Kochba andMakabi. Its goal, as formulated in its statutes, was to heighten Jewish self-esteem and Jewishpride through sports activities.61 In 1924, after several years of preparation, Hagibor, alongwith other clubs in the western part of the country, formally established Makabi [Ccaron] SR ([Ccaron] esko-slovenská Republika), whose goal was to promote the Zionist sports and gymnastics move-ment among Jews in all parts of Czechoslovakia. This development reflected thecentralization and proliferation of Jewish national sports taking place in Central Europe inthe early 1920s.62 The Maccabi World Union was established in 1921, creating a centralforum which articulated the movement’s goals and strategies, and encouraged the estab-lishment of national bodies to promote and supervise Jewish sports and gymnastic clubs.63

While the international and national leadership strove to create a politically uniform move-ment, there was tension between their expectations and the actual investment in ideologicaland cultural education by the local clubs and their members. Among Hagibor’s leadership,there were certainly voices lamenting the lack of commitment to Zionism in both theexecutive and the membership.64

These critical voices, however, betray the level of division within the Zionist movementas to what the focus of Jewish nationalism should be. If, according to critics, the club’s leaderswere neglecting formal education about the Zionist project in Palestine, they did pay partic-ular attention to other parts of the ideological platform of Prague Zionism, namely that ofmaking Jews at home in Czechoslovakia. Harmonious coexistence could only be achieved,they believed, when Jewish men and women return to their ‘true’ national community,thereby ending decades of corrupting national side switching. The adherence to the Czechlanguage as a sign of both loyalty to the new order and distance to the attitudes of previousgenerations of ‘German’ Prague Jewry was a central part of this process. Indeed, in the inter-war years, Hagibor’s Jewish nationalism was dogmatically Staatstreu and committed to theCzech language.

Since the end of World War I, these Prague Zionists had been instrumental in definingZionism as a state-supporting political movement. In the immediate post-war years, theJewish National Council, and its Zionist members in particular, attempted to create analliance with Czech leaders by emphasizing both the importance of a ‘satisfactory’ Czechresponse to Jews’ demands for rights and protection and the similarities between Czech andJewish nationalism.

As anti-Jewish violence erupted in the wake of the war, Jewish activists negotiatedwith Czech leaders in Prague and Paris about both the authorities’ immediate protection ofJews as well as the future of the Jewish minority in Czechoslovakia. Zionist leaders ‘clarified’to Czech powerbrokers the damaging effect of news stories about attacks on Jewish

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businesses and homes had on the Czech leadership’s image in the West.65 Pointing to theoutrage among western audiences created by reports of atrocities against Jews in Poland,the Jewish activists warned the Czechs that western public opinion might very well turnagainst the Czech nation if the situation for the Jewish minority in the newly establishedCzechoslovakia began to resemble that of Poland. Playing on inflated notions of Jewishpower held by non-Jewish and Jewish leaders alike, particularly the belief in western Jews’ability to influence public opinion, the Jewish National Council succeeded in enlisting acommitment from the Czech leadership for the protection of Jewish lives and property.66

At the same time, these Jewish activists joined in the international Jewish effort toensure national minority recognition for Jews in the new and enlarged states of East CentralEurope promoted by the Comité des délégations juives aupr s de la Conference de la Paix.67

The Jewish National Council presented the Czech leaders with a platform that demanded therecognition of Jews as a nationality, state support for Jewish national cultural institutions aswell as increased cultural autonomy. In exchange, the Zionists promised to unify thecountry’s diverse Jewish populations into one loyal and useful citizenry. Playing up percep-tions of either Jews’ chauvinist loyalty to German and Magyar culture or the paradoxicalbelief in their indifference to questions of national belonging, the Jewish National Councilpresented itself as the only Jewish leadership that could redirect Jews’ allegiance towardsCzechoslovakia.

While Jewish activists employed discourses of Jewish power, particularly the impres-sions of American Zionists’ influence to catch the attention and ensure the cooperation ofthe Czech leaders, they also stressed the affinity between Jewish and Czech nationalism.Doing so, allowed the Zionists movement to cast themselves as the obvious and naturalpartners of the Czech leadership. In memoranda, newspaper articles, and addresses, theseJewish activists emphasized the shared fate of Jews and Czechs as victims of Austrianoppression.68 Like the Czechs, they claimed, Jews had been de-nationalized throughgovernment policies. These not only encouraged assimilation by favouring individuals whoadopted German culture, but also denied individuals their nationality by privileging every-day language over mother tongue in censuses, thereby, allegedly, inflating the numbers ofso-called Germans. In addition, Austrian authorities had ensured that Jews were added to theGerman pool by defining Yiddish not as a separate language but a German dialect.69 Thus,Jews and Czechs alike, Zionists argued, were denied the right to express their nationalbelonging and subjected to overt policies of de-nationalization.

The Jewish national movement, Zionists claimed, emerged in response to thisexperience of de-nationalization at the hands of imperial authorities. Zionism, in their view,rejected cultural assimilation, the adoption of a national identity different than one’s ‘real’nation, as an act of opportunism and a reflection of lack of moral character. Aligning them-selves with the influential icon of the Czech national movement, Thomas G. Masaryk, Zionistsemphasized the similarities between the two national movements.70 Like Jewish national-ists, Masaryk envisioned the Czech national awakening as a process of moral regeneration.Rather than denying the accusations of Czech nationalists that Jews were bastions ofGerman culture or merely opportunistic ‘Czechs,’ Zionists countered that Jewish nationalismwould remedy their misguided behaviour.

Fuelled by both strategic and cultural forces, the emphasis on Jews’ and Jewishinstitutions’ adoption of the Czech language was critical to post-war Prague Zionism.71 TheJewish National Council had cast itself as the promoter of Czech amongst Jews as part of itsbid to create an alliance with Czech authorities suspicious of the alleged anti-Czech

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sentiments of Jews. When addressing Jewish audiences, Zionists preached that sheddingGerman would communicate respect for the newly victorious Czech nation, distance Jewsfrom the symbol of the old social and cultural power of Austria, and enhance the ability ofJews to enter the public sphere without accusations of Germanizing and disloyalty.72 AsHillel Kieval argues, this ‘Czech’ Zionism, which captured a significant part of the Jewish votein Prague in the local elections in June 1919, owed its success to its rivals, the Czech-Jewishintegrationist movement.73 It was thanks to their efforts promoting Czech language andculture among Jews, Kieval suggests, that a Jewish national identification that incorporatedCzech resonated with Jews in the Bohemian Lands. Indeed, Ludvík Singer himself, the mainpolitical symbol of ‘Czech Zionism,’ had begun his Jewish political career as a member of theCzech-Jewish movement.74

As a member of Prague’s city council from 1919 to his death in 1931, Singer did muchto convince other council members and the city’s public of the temporary character of Jews’alleged “Germanness.” At a meeting on 20 December 1920, someone had raised the‘problem’ of Jews’ persistence in sending their children to German schools, thereby demon-strating their continued loyalty to German power. In his response, Singer contended that“the idea of the Czechoslovak state has had its effects on their [Jews’] Germanness, whichwas never strong, it was only a cultural veneer not the core. Therefore, it won’t be hard forthem to send their children to Czech schools, although without merging with the Czechnation, the same way they did not merge with the German, they will adopt Czech languageand culture, whereby there will be friendlier relations between Jews and the Czech nation.”75

To the Zionists, there was nothing inherently problematic about the ability to switch linguis-tic coats, so to speak. As mentioned, Jews were believed to have “lost” their nationallanguage and while the revival of Hebrew was welcomed, the fact was that Jews spoke thelanguage of the people among whom they lived. It was by knowing Czech that Jews couldsignal their commitment to the new political and cultural order.76

The widespread stereotype of the Jew as a Germanizing element among Czechs was aconcern to both Czech Zionists and their opponents, the Czech-Jewish integrationists. Whilethe stereotype undercut attempts by both groups to present themselves as representativesof the state’s Jews, it also enhanced their case for official support for their activities promot-ing Czech language. Indeed, concerns about Germanizing Jews were not restricted merelyto the border areas. Throughout the 1920s, the continued use of German as an officiallanguage in the Jewish Community in Prague, alongside Czech, was a contentious issue.Jewish and non-Jewish observers alike noted the damaging effects of protracted adherenceto German, which made Jewish society appear as a Germanizing element in the nation’s capi-tal.77

Perceptions of continued Jewish loyalty to German culture, however, were also usedstrategically by Czech-oriented Zionist organizations like Hagibor in their efforts to gainfinancial support from the state. Indeed, Hagibor’s request for funding of their new sportingground from the Ministry of Health and Physical Education is a case in point. In an applica-tion sent to the Ministry in November 1923, Hagibor’s leadership invoked stereotypes ofJews as bastions of German culture, and as potentially disloyal citizens of the state, whendescribing the importance of the club’s activities. Besides the publicity value of Hagibor’sparticipation as a Czechoslovak Jewish club in various Jewish sporting events abroad, theauthors argued, the club’s contribution to the “Czechification (po[ccaron] e[scaron] t[ecaron] ní) of Prague Jews”should not be overlooked. Emphasizing the importance of this endeavour, and of Hagiboras a model for other Jewish clubs, they insisted that thanks to their influence, “Jews in the

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Czechoslovak Republic increasingly constitute a positive element contributing to thebuilding of the state.”78 Furthermore, the authors contended, Hagibor had managed to“take hold of hundreds of Jewish students from Slovakia, who study at Czech universities,and in this manner prevent them from being lured into German clubs cultivating anti-statetendencies.”79 This latter argument, stressing Hagibor’s role in fostering ‘legitimate’ loyal-ties, was not only used by the club’s leadership when dealing with state authorities, but alsofor negotiating internal questions within the community. In [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Kalendá[rcaron] , a Zionistannual, Egon [Scaron] tern reported on the Czech government’s support of Jewish sports because itacknowledged, in his words, “the importance of separating Jewish youth from German andMagyar orientations.”80

The discourse on the fluidity of Jewish loyalties persisted throughout the inter-waryears. By manipulating the image of Jewish physical degeneration, depicting Jewish menas physically and morally weak, deformed and feminine, the authors emphasized theimprovement Jews experienced in Hagibor. The quality of the training these young Jewsreceived in the club transformed them into men ready to serve their country (a claim veri-fied, they suggested, by the high percentage of former members serving in the country’sarmed forces). Creating Jews fit to protect their country was yet another way in whichJewish nationalism was to make Jews at home in Czechoslovakia. Militaristic elementswere part and parcel of nationalist sport and gymnastic movements in Europe, and Czech-oslovakia was no exception.81 The memory of World War I, cultural anxieties about degen-eration, and the unrelenting political tension in Central Europe served to make physicaleducation into a much more serious endeavour.82 An adequate amount of able bodied,loyal and disciplined men depended on the work of the country’s sport and gymnasticmovements. For Hagibor’s leadership, the production of ‘new’ Jews strengthened not onlytheir own nation but contributed to making Jews into model citizens.83 This was also agoal shared by other clubs and the leadership of the Czechoslovak Makabi movement. In1937, at the Czechoslovak Makabi’s Congress in [Zcaron] ilina, Angelo Goldstein noted that Zion-ists were aware of both their rights and their duties to the republic. An awareness, heargued, that was embodied in “the work that Makabi does for the physical vigour of Jewishyouth in Czechoslovakia which is simultaneously an endeavour for the improvement of thedefence of the republic.”84 This congress, he continued, was not only an opportunity forJews to display this vigour, but also “evidence of our conscious love for the democraticstate in which we live.”85

While the need to display Jews’ loyalty and commitment to the state was particularlyurgent in the late 1930s, statements like the one just quoted were the continuation of adiscourse about Jewish national clubs’ ability to act as a mobilizing and integrative force.Zionist clubs brought together Jews from all parts of Czechoslovakia and directed theseyouths towards legitimate identities.86 In the 1920s, Hagibor’s leadership underscored the‘problematic’ allegiances of the Jews, their physical ineptitude and hence inability toparticipate fully in the defence of the country. By emphasizing the unfitness of Jews tofulfil a central task of the country’s citizenry, the leadership presented themselves as theones able to rectify this situation. Hagibor’s leadership thus skilfully manipulated well-known stereotypes, intended to incriminate and denigrate Jews, in a way that representedHagibor and the Zionist movement as necessary and valuable allies of the state. The effortsby Jewish nationalists to bring about the physical and moral regeneration of Jews weredepicted as designed to produce new generations of Jews both faithful and valuable tothe state.87

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Equality through Distinction

While one aspect of the national rebirth was to transform Jewish identities, anotherwas to make Jews comfortable in the new political and cultural context. For Hagibor’sleadership, the club’s emphasis on sports was more than simply an interest in trophies anddonations. The competitive element was integral to their goal of improving Jews’ self-esteem and changing perceptions of Jews held by both Jews and non-Jews alike. Competingas one of the country’s nationalities and as athletes on par with non-Jews, sport was a strat-egy that was to ensure equality through distinction. Here I mean distinction both in the senseof athletic achievement and in the sense of making Jews visible as a national entity equal tobut also separate from the country’s other nationalities. The achievements of Hagibor’sathletes were followed closely in the club’s magazine, [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport (Jewish Sport). Reportsfrom competitions reveal, among other things, the emphasis placed on the wider signifi-cance of Jews’ accomplishments. Hagibor’s sportsmen (the ones reported on were almostexclusively male) were celebrated for their commitment, discipline and endurance as indi-vidual competitors. Their success, stressed the reports, also embodied the ideal ‘new’ Jewand his role as counter image to prevailing prejudices about Jews’ physical abilities. Writersnoted the so-called publicity value of Jewish sport by which they meant the ability of Jewishteams to change ideas of and about Jews more broadly. For example, when evaluatingHagibor’s achievements in the first half of the 1920s, Karel Knöpfelmacher argued thatHagibor’s participation in competitions proved that Jews were as able as other nationalities.Furthermore, he contended, the club and its members proved to both the Jewish and non-Jewish public that among Jews the guiding principle was indeed one of a healthy mind in ahealthy body.88 Similarly, Ota Margolius noted that Hagibor’s skiers had successfully“promoted our fine Jewish name and proved to the public that it can count on us the sameway it counts on the athletes of other nationalities.”89

The need to convince the public of the merits and legitimate place of Jewish sport wasviewed by Hagibor’s leadership as an ongoing struggle. In the fall of 1927, Hagibor eagerlyjoined other clubs in a rally to encourage the government to provide more funding for sport.In its call to arms, the author stressed the opportunity to demonstrate the strength and unityof Jewish athletes and their rightful place among the other Czechoslovak organizations andclubs.90 Following the event, an article in [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] sport noted the spectators’ reactions tothe Jewish team. While some ridiculed the Jews, most, the reporter stressed, expressedacknowledgement and admiration.91

In the late 1920s and early 1930s, Hagibor’s divers, swimmers and runners were partic-ularly successful in national as well as international competitions. These achievementslanded some of the athletes on national teams or as individual representatives of theCzechoslovak state in international competitions. Athletes such as the swimmer Franti[scaron] ekGetreuer and the diver Julius Balasz, were hailed as model Jewish sportsmen. Both were topathletes and ideologically committed to Jewish sport as trainers and managers in Hagibor’sswimming section.92 [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport reprinted excerpts from articles in the general presspraising the Jewish teams’ achievements noting how these commentators embraced theHagiborians as “our” (i.e. Czechoslovak) athletes.93 The Jewish athletes’ ability to live up totheir country’s expectations was, of course, noted with considerable pride—and perhapsrelief.94 When the Hagibor runner Oskar Hek[scaron] came in eighth in the 1932 Olympic Marathonin Los Angeles, Milo[scaron] Ginz reminded the readers that “[o]f course, here as in all other Olympiccompetitions, only the very best were selected to represent the national colours …”. After

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commenting on the extensive attention given to the “Czechoslovak” Hek[scaron] in the nationaland international press, Ginz beamed: “For us it is particularly important that it was a Jew,who was granted the honour of defending the colours of our state in the world’s largestinternational competition and that this athlete did not in any way disappoint the hopesinvested in him.”95

While Hagibor celebrated the triumphs of its “Czechoslovak” athletes, creating adistinct space for Jewish sport among the country’s other nationalities was a priority. Asmentioned earlier, Zionist activists from Hagibor were instrumental in establishing theCzechoslovak section of the Maccabi World Union. Furthermore, as sports in Czechoslovakiawere being organized along national lines, Hagiborians helped establish a Jewish soccerleague alongside its German and Czech counterparts.96 In the mid 1920s, however, thelegitimacy of Jews as an equal nationality was frequently questioned. When the Czechoslo-vak All-Sports Organization held a large meeting on 21 November 1926, [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sportlamented the fact that representatives of Makabi [Ccaron] SR were not invited. While some Makabimembers did attend as representatives of, for example, the amateur track and field union, itwas a slight that the organization representing all Jewish sports clubs in the republic was notincluded among the participants.97 The fight for recognition as one among equals was anongoing struggle.

From the mid 1920s onwards, Hagibor’s stadium in Stra[scaron] nice was the centre ofgatherings of Jewish athletes from the Prague area and other parts of the country. TheCzechoslovak Makabi held annual conventions, and hosted meetings of the Maccabi WorldUnion in places like Brno, Prague, Moravská Ostrava, Banská Bystrica and [Zcaron] ilina. While Jewishactivists noted the support from both local and state authorities for these gatherings, and forJewish sport in general, they lamented the broader Jewish public’s indifference.98 Through-out the late 1920s and early 1930s, Jewish sport activists perceived themselves as the frontline in a battle to ensure the national Jewish rebirth. Despite the grand displays of the newJewish nation and the achievements of Jewish athletes, the perceived overall apathy of theJewish masses meant that the concern to create a new image of Jews persisted amongHagibor’s leadership.99 Other voices were more optimistic. As the club celebrated its swim-mers’ victory in the national Czechoslovak championship in the summer of 1931, [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute]

Sport reminded its readers that the first place meant more to Jews than just beating the rivalteams: “it is another proof that the national renaissance of Jews’ physical culture has reachedthe level of other cultured nationalities, it is proof that the legend about Jews inferiority insports is today exactly that—a legend …”.100

Czech-Jews and Zionists

The Prague Zionist position discussed here was perceived at the time as in oppositionto the Czech-Jewish integrationist position. A fundamental difference was that Jewishnationalists imagined Jews as a nation. Jews had, they believed, “lost” their nationallanguage as a result of the historical dispersion and the ensuing need to adopt the languagesof the peoples in whose midst they lived. With the emergence of the Zionist movement,however, Jews had embarked on a process of national rebirth. To these Zionists, the adop-tion of the Czech language was a strategy of co-existence and a sign of distance from the“assimilationst” German or Magyar past. Czech was the language of the ‘new,’ nationallyconscious Jew in the Bohemian Lands. In contrast, the Czech-Jewish integrationists believedthat Bohemian and Moravian Jews belonged within the Czech nation despite their distinct

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cultural and historical heritage.101 This belonging, the integrationists believed, was rooted inthe ‘fact’ that Jewish families had lived in the historic lands for centuries, adopted Czechlanguage and culture, and had supported the Czech national struggle from the 19th centuryonwards.102 As opposed to the Zionists, the Czech-Jews envisioned that Jews adoption ofCzech language and culture represented the fact that now only religion separated Jews fromnon-Jewish Czechs.

These were significant differences, but there were also important similarities betweenthe two positions. Czech-Jews and Zionists alike agreed that Jews had to be transformed inorder to be useful and loyal citizens. Both groups agreed that Jews needed to divest them-selves of their relation with old power and adopt Czech as a sign of their loyalty and identifi-cation with the progressive forces embodied in the new sovereign state. Furthermore, theyshared the perception, as did many ‘outside’ observers, that Jews were spiritually and phys-ically degenerate, a condition that fostered a corrupt and immoral culture. Whether oneperceived this corruption as the stubborn loyalty to the oppressive German and Magyarrulers or the transgression of racial and national boundaries, to these Jewish activists, the factwas that Jews were in need of urgent transformation. While Czech-Jews envisioned a formof acculturation as the means towards making Jews into Czechs, Zionists promoted Jewishnational regeneration and the adoption of Czech language as a sign of Jews’ loyalty to thestate. As Ludvík Singer allegedly put it on the occasion of Makabi Praha’s 25th anniversary inMay, 1931: “Your flag [Singer was ceremoniously handing over a flag to the Makabim] reflectsa synthesis. On one side, it has an inscription in Hebrew, on the other, one in Czech. We arebringing about this synthesis as good citizens of our republic and as members of the Jewishnation …”.103

Both Zionists and Czech-Jews made loyalty to the state one of the pillars of theirrespective nationalist projects. While this might have seemed particularly urgent during thepost-war outbreak of anti-Jewish violence, conscious and repeated expressions of Jews’loyalty to the state took on a dogmatic character through the 1920s and 30s. This was areflection that uncertainty about Jews’ allegiances, character and sincerity persisted.Ironically, the constant reiteration of this message using images of Jews’ opportunism mighthave nurtured the damaging uncertainty it was meant to counter.104

Zionists and integrationists alike were no strangers to the strategic use of anti-Semiticstereotypes. While Czech-Jews publicly and repeatedly accused Zionists of being veiledGermanizers, Zionists also deployed images of Jews as chauvinistic ‘Germans’ or insincere‘Czechs’ to position themselves in the minds of the Czech political elite and the public atlarge as the most legitimate Jewish leadership. This practice continued through the interwarperiod at both the upper and the lower levels of the Zionist movement. Thus, when Hagibor’sleadership made use of anti-Jewish stereotypes to catch the attention of public fundingagencies by positioning themselves as curative, they were tapping in to a well-establishedtradition.

This use of anti-Semitic tropes attests not only to Zionism’s ‘healing’ character, but alsoto the persistence of these discourses in inter-war Czechoslovakia. Zionists envisioned theirnationalist project as one curing a distorted, unhealthy patient. Their continuous strategicemployment of these anti-Jewish discourses demonstrates that the images of degenerate,disloyal Jews continued to resonate with the authorities. The negative images of Jews wereto some degree nurtured by Zionists and other Jewish political activists. The resilience ofnotions of Jewish vacillation, however, also betray that Jews resisted Zionist attempts to fixthe meaning of Jewish identity.

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Conclusion

In the summer of 1927, Julius Balasz, Hagibor’s top diver and state champion, repre-sented Czechoslovakia at the Slavic Nations’ Games in Belgrade. His performance as a repre-sentative of Slavic masculinity and athleticism is perhaps testimony to the challenges thatefforts to maintain rigid national boundaries continuously faced in the inter-war period. Insome ways, the Hagiborian competing as Czechoslovak and posing as the ideal of Slavicmanhood embodied the goals of Prague Zionism. By creating a distinct Jewish nationalculture and transforming Jews’ identities, Jews would be made at home in Czechoslovakia.

Zionist activists believed, however, that their hard work improved the conditions notonly for Jews, but also for Czechoslovakia’s other minority nationalities. In 1930, [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute]

Sport published an article by Josef Fikl, a Czech member of the Czechoslovak OlympicCommittee, praising the achievements of Jewish national athletes and noting the broadersignificance of the Jewish national sports movement:

In 1919, when we were choosing our representatives to participate in the Olympic Games

in Antwerp, I defended the position that only athletes of Czechoslovak nationality could

represent our country. I was firmly against the participation of Germans, Hungarians, and

even Jews, as I worried that the participation of athletes of other nationalities might be

used for unwelcome purposes … . Today I openly admit that I did not know the character

of the athletes of our country’s nationalities, in particular, I was not familiar with the excep-

tionally loyal attitude of Czechoslovak Jewry. This, however, soon became clear to me and

thus, without hesitation and aware of the responsibility, I welcomed the decision to allow

athletes belonging to other nationalities, including members of Jewish nationality, to

participate in sports events abroad as representatives of Czechoslovakia.105

Thus, Czech observers were picking up on Zionism’s message. By cultivating a healthy,strong, and disciplined Jewish national body along with a commitment to the Czechlanguage, Jews would become an ideal nationality. Indeed, the Jewish nation, in the mindsof Prague Zionists, was a model that tested not only Czechoslovakia’s commitment to itsminority nationalities, but also the willingness of nationalities to transform themselves intouseful and loyal citizens: making themselves at home.

NOTES1. Adler, “O JUDru Ludvíku Singerovi,” in Hamajim. Hamajim was the monthly newsletter of

the swimming branch of Hagibor Praha. It was published from 1933 to 1937.

2. See the discussion of this process within the German Zionist movement in Lavsky, Before

Catastrophe, 66–73; see also Reinharz, Fatherland or Promised Land.

3. For an early example of Jewish nationalism as a Diaspora-oriented movement, see Shanes,

“Neither Germans nor Poles.”

4. For discussion of some prominent Zionists from the Bohemian Lands and their post-war

careers, see Kieval, The Making of Czech Jewry, 163–82.

5. See for example, “An die jüdische Öffentlichkeit im tschechoslowakischen Staat,”

Selbstwehr, 1 November 1918, 1; “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] m voli[ccaron] [uring ] m a voli[ccaron] kám!” (To Jewish voters!),

[Zcaron] idovské zprávy (Jewish News), 9 May 1919, 1.

6. Goldstein, “Asimilace jazyková.”

7. “Memorandum from the Jewish National Council in Prague to the Government of

the Czechoslovak State, October 28, 1918,” quoted in Rabinowicz, “The Jewish Minority,”

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218–21. Appeared in a German translation from the original Czech as “Memorandum des

Jüdischen Nationalrats and den Národní v[yacute] bor,” Selbstwehr, 8 November 1918, 2.

8. Kieval, The Making of Czech Jewry, 167–8, 175–8.

9. Ibid., 167–8.

10. Ibid., 173.

11. See discussion of this environment and the founding of Selbstwehr in Kieval, The Making of

Czech Jewry, 119–23; see also Spector, Prague Territories, 160–5.

12. Kieval, The Making of Czech Jewry, 121; Selbstwehr was first published in 1907, Jüdische

Volksstimme in 1900.

13. Rabinowicz, “Czechoslovak Zionism,” 19.

14. Kieval, The Making of Czech Jewry, 185–6.

15. Gilman, The Jew’s Body, 53; for German Zionist and assimilationist perceptions of physical

degeneration, see Efron, Defenders of the Race, 150.

16. Freund, “Sport a mláde[zcaron] .”

17. Ibid.

18. Schneider, “Sport ve slu[zcaron] b[ecaron] národa.”

19. [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, February 1926, 1.

20. Fuchs, “Die Sokolbewegung;” Trnka, “Sokol-Makabi.”

21. Recent studies on this process are King, Budweisers into Czechs and Germans; Zahra,

“Reclaiming Children for the Nation.”

22. King. “The Nationalization of East Central Europe,” 126–7.

23. Friedmann, “Pra[zcaron] [scaron] tí [Zcaron] idé,” 192.

24. Ibid., 193–4.

25. Ibid., 195.

26. Ibid., 200–2.

27. For discussion of aspects of this debate, see Bubeník and K[rcaron] est‘an, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a

[zcaron] idovská otázka,” 11–39; [Ccaron] apková, “Uznání [zcaron] idovské národnosti.”

28. There was not a consensus among social scientists as to what exactly constituted “mother

tongue.” Some defined it as the language a person learned first, linking the person to his or

her ancestral community, others as the language that a person was most familiar with and

in which he or she thought or spoke. For a discussion of the term and critique of mother

tongue’s status as an objective marker, see Krej[ccaron] i, “Má se p[rcaron] i na[scaron] em p[rcaron] í[scaron] tím s[ccaron] ítaní.”

29. On Jewish social sciences and Zionism, see Hart, Social Science and the Politics.

30. For a discussion of nationhood and the state in interwar East Central Europe, see Brubaker,

Nationalism Reframed.

31. On denationalization of Jewish children in Czech public schools in Subcarpathian Ruthenia,

a case used to demonstrate the urgency of state funding for a Jewish national school

system, Friedmann, “[Zcaron] idovská národní men[scaron] ina na Podkarpatské Rusi (Dokon[ccaron] ení),” 272–3.

32. Zahra, “Reclaiming Children for the Nation,” 503–11.

33. Kollar, “S[ccaron] ítání lidu,” 186.

34. In the face of alleged widespread parental indifference to or misunderstanding of the

importance of monolingual and monolithic national identification, nationalists looked to

the school as the only institution that could ensure that children became nationally

conscious. Further on this issue, see Zahra, “Reclaiming Children for the Nation.”

35. On indifference, see also, “A po válce …” (After the war …), [Zcaron] idovsk [yacute] Sport, April 1931, 7;

Josef Freund, “Sport a mláde [zcaron].”

36. Justic, “Evrop[scaron] tí [Zcaron] idé ve sportu,” 81.

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37. Knöpfelmacher, “D[ecaron] jiny [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagiboru.”

38. For police report of 9.7.1917 doc. 4615 S.II in Archív hlavného m[ecaron] sta Prahy (AHP) (Archive

of the City of Prague) file XIV 0367 “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] sportovní klub Hagibor Praha.” For the club’s

character in its early years, see also Mc.Loy, “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] sportovní klub Hagibor Praha.”

39. For more on Hagibor and Prague’s Jewish Community, see Lichtenstein, “Heja, Heja

Hagibor!”

40. Reports in Ministerstvo ve[rcaron] ejného zdravotnictví a t[ecaron] lesné v[yacute] chovy, Statní úst[rcaron] ední archív

(MZd, SUA) (Ministry of Public Health and Physical Education, State Central Archives), inv.[ccaron] .

3424 8/5/P karton 911, documents d. January 1, 1924, October 17, 1927, June 27, 1930.

41. As reflected in references to the anti-Semitism among judges and audiences, see for exam-

ple, “Hagibor odstupuje z Pipalová memoriálu” (Hagibor withdraws from Pipal’s memorial),

[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, October 1926, 1; “Polov[yacute] turnaj v Hradci Králové” (A water polo tournament

in Hradec Králové), Hamajim, December 1933, 5; on the importance of Jewish national

sports in the eyes of Czech activists, see Fikl, “Pom[ecaron] r [Zcaron] id[uring ] k celostátnímu sportu.”

42. Contemporary social scientists estimated that in Prague about a third of Jewish men and

women who married chose non-Jewish partners, an intermarriage rate comparable, they

noted, to that of Berlin, see Friedmann, “Pra[zcaron] [scaron] tí [Zcaron] idé,” 169.

43. “Memorandum Národní rady [zcaron] idovské Prezidiu ministerské rady [Ccaron] SR o zji[scaron] tování národnosti

p[rcaron] i prvním s[ccaron] ítání lidu v [Ccaron] eskoslovensku 24. [rcaron] ijna 1920” (Memorandum from the Jewish

National Council to the Ministerial Council of the Czechoslovak Republic regarding the iden-

tification of nationality in the first Czechoslovak census, 24 October 1920), reprinted in

Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’an, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a [zcaron] idovská otázka,” 29–31, here 30.

44. Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’an, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a [zcaron] idovská otázka,” 20.

45. Bohá[ccaron] , “P[rcaron] í tí s[ccaron] ítání lidu,” 274.

46. “Memorandum 24 October 1920.”

47. For the Jewish National Council arguing that Jewish nationality could be determined objec-

tively, namely by descent, see “Memorandum 24 October 1920,” Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’an,

“Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a [zcaron] idovská otázka,” 30.

48. “Stenografisches Protokoll des Vortrages Dr Emil Margulies, Leitmeritz, Vorsitzenden

der Jüdischen Partei in der tschechosl. Republik ‘Über die gegenwärtigen politischen

Strömungen und Programme unserer Mitbürger jüdischer Nationalität,’ gehalten in der

Gesellschaft zum Studium der Minderheitenfragen unter Vorsitz des Ministers Dr Krofta, am

21. März 1933 in Prag,” Central Zionist Archives (CZA) file no. A299/9, 4. For census results

(religion) 1921 and 1930, see [Ccaron] eskoslovenská statistika (Czechoslovak Statistics), svazek 98,

[rcaron] ada VI (s[ccaron] ítání lidu, se[scaron] it 7) vol. 1 (Praha 1934), 51 (table 47).

49. For this use of the term, see Zahra, “Reclaiming Children for the Nation,” 521.

50. See Stourzh, “Ethnic Attribution in Late Imperial Austria,” 67–83.

51. Ibid., 67; Kertzer and Arel, Census and Identity, 26.

52. Stourzh, “Ethnic Attribution in Late Imperial Austria,” 67–8; Arel, “Language Categories in

Censuses,” 92–120, here 100–2; Mills Kelly, “Last Chance or Last Gasp?,” 283.

53. King, “The Nationalization of East Central Europe,” 126.

54. Horá[ccaron] ek, “Národnostní statistika,” 192; Bohá[ccaron] , “P[rcaron] í tí s[ccaron] ítání lidu,” for Bohá[ccaron] , see also

Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’án, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a [zcaron] idovská otázka,” 15–23.

55. Horá[ccaron] ek, “Národnostní statistika,” 192–3.

56. Kollar, “S[ccaron] ítání lidu,” 186; Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’án, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti a [zcaron] idovská otázka,”

15–23.

57. Kollar, “S[ccaron] ítání lidu,” 186.

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58. Ku[ccaron] era, “Politick[yacute] [ccaron] i p[rcaron] irozen[yacute] národ?,” 562.

59. “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] plaveck[yacute] klub Hagibor,” AHP file XIV 1153 “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] sportovní klub Hagibor,”

AHP file XIV 0367.

60. The membership forms for the Jewish Swimming Club Hagibor did not contain categories

such as nationality, religion, or language. The aspiring members were asked to state their

names, addresses, date and place of birth. “P[rcaron] ihlá ka” (membership form), Hamajim,

December 1935, 49. Commissioner’s were authorized to make their own decisions about an

individual’s nationality if they believed it was stated incorrectly, “Na ízení vlády [Ccaron] eskoslov-

enské ze dne 30. [rcaron] íjna 1920, [ccaron] . 592 Sb. Z. a na[rcaron] ., jím[zcaron] se provádí zákon o s[ccaron] ítání lidu ze dne 8.

dubna 1920, [ccaron] . 256 Sb. Z. a. n.” (Czechoslovak government decree of 30 October 1920

regarding the census law of 8 April 1920), [Ccaron] eskoslovensk[yacute] statistick[yacute] v[ecaron] stník, 2 (1921): 59–82,

§20; for examples of decisions made or influenced by census commissioners quoted in a

work by the prominent scholar Emanuel Rádl who opposed ethnic ascription and favoured

individuals’ subjective choice of nationality, see Rádl, Národnost jako v[ecaron] deck[yacute] problem, 48,

52–3; see also case quoted in Bubeník and K[rcaron] est’an, “Zji[scaron] tování národnosti jako problem

statistick[yacute] a politick[yacute] ,” 119.

61. “[P][ecaron] stování sportu ku povzne[scaron] ení [zcaron] idovského sebev[ecaron] domí” (“engage in sport in order to

improve Jewish self-esteem”), AHP, [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagibor, Stanovy (statutes) 1915; MZd, inv.[ccaron] . 3424

8/5/P karton 911, Stanovy 1922.

62. On Jewish sport in Europe, see, for example, the articles in: Journal of Sport History, 26, no. 2

(1999); König, “Herr Jud” sollen Sie Sagen!; Friedler, Makkabi Chai, Makkabi lebt!; Schulze-

Marmeling, Davidstern und Lederball.

63. Makabi attempted to devise a unified ideological front and formulated guidelines on

matters such as the degree of emphasis on Palestine and aliyah, the use of Hebrew

commands, and requirements for the Zionist and Jewish knowledge of members. Pick,

“Sports,” 191f.

64. For Hagibor, see Landes, “K poslání [zcaron] idovského sportu”; a similar critique of the conditions

within other groups in Makabi [Ccaron] SR is quoted in [Ccaron] apková, [Ccaron] e[scaron] i, N[ecaron] mci, [Zcaron] idé?, 124. For similar

cases in a different context, see Borut, “‘Verjudung des Judentums’,” 92–114.

65. “Denskschrift des Jüdischen Nationalrats wegen des Holleschauer Pogroms,” Selbstwehr,

13 December 1918, 1; “Communique des Jüdischen Nationalrats über die Ausschreitungen

in Prag,” Selbstwehr, 6 December 1918. This communiqué was said to have been sent to

Jewish national councils and Zionist organizations abroad; “Extract from the report of activ-

ities of the Jewish National Council in Prague, January 1919,” Rabinowicz, “The Jewish

Minority,” 222.

66. For the comparison with Poland, see “Plünderungen,” Selbstwehr, 17 January 1919, 1 and

“Ein tschechischer Eideshelfer der Polenlügen,” Selbstwehr, 21 February 1919, 3; for Czech

politicians on the damaging effect of anti-Semitism, see exchanges recorded in the minutes

from the meetings of the provisional national assembly (Národní Shromá[zcaron] d[ecaron] ní), Josef Stivín,

20 December 1918; Karel Krama[rcaron] , 20 December 1918 (http://www.psp.cz).

67. See Carole Fink for a detailed discussion of this committee’s work at the Paris Peace

Conference (Fink, Defending the Rights of Others).

68. “Memorandum 28 October 1918;” “Eine jüdische Massenversammlung in Prag,” Selbstwehr,

15 November 1918.

69. In October 1920, the Jewish National Council objected to a proposal to register “language”

and not “nationality” in the upcoming census ‘warning’ that Jews, particularly in Slovakia

and Subcarphatian Ruthenia, would end up adding to the numbers of Germans and

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Hungarians because they would, as they had in the past, state German, accustomed as they

were to Yiddish being defined as German, “Memorandum 24 October 1920”; for Austrian

policies, Friedmann, “[Zcaron] idovská národní men[scaron] ina,” 190.

70. For Masaryk’s view of Jewish moral regeneration and prewar contacts with Zionists, see

Kieval, Languages of Community, 208–10.

71. [Ccaron] apková, [Ccaron] e[scaron] i, N[ecaron] mci, [Zcaron] idé?, 100–3; Crhová. “Jewish Politics in Central Europe,” 280.

72. “Asimilace jazyková – asimilace národní,” [Zcaron] idovskééé zprávy, 18 April 1919, 4; [Ccaron] apková, [Ccaron] e[scaron] i,

N[ecaron] mci, [Zcaron] idé?, 127. It is not clear how central the Hebrew language was to the Zionists in

Bohemia and Moravia, but individual cases suggest that lack of Hebrew language skills was

not an impediment to prominence in the Zionist movement in Czechoslovakia, as some

leading activists had little or no knowledge of Hebrew by the time they immigrated to

Palestine/Israel. For example, according to [Ccaron] apková, Emil Margulies, a prominent Zionist

leader, did not know Hebrew when he moved to Palestine in 1939, see [Ccaron] apková, [Ccaron] e[scaron] i,

N[ecaron] mci, [Zcaron] idé?, 122. Another example is Viktor Fischl, the editor of [Zcaron] idovské zprávy, who also

claims that he did not know Hebrew when he left Czechoslovakia for Israel in 1948, see

Emingerová, Dva [zcaron] ivoty, 75.

73. Kieval, Languages of Community, 158.

74. Kieval, Making of Czech Jewry, 98.

75. V[ecaron] stník obecní hlavního m[ecaron] sta Prahy [Municipal newsletter of the City of Prague] 1921, XVI

sch[uring ] ze (meeting), 21 December 1920, 8.

76. Parliamentary speech by Angelo Goldstein, 27 April 1933, available at http://www.psp.cz.

77. Some of the responses of the Czech-Jewish movement and non-Jewish critics are assem-

bled in the newspaper clippings collection in the Ministerstvo zahrani[ccaron] ních v[ecaron] cí—

V[yacute] st[rcaron] i[zcaron] kov[yacute] archív (Archives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs—Clippings Collection), SUA,

MZV-VA 1921–1930.

78. MZd, inv.[ccaron] . 3424 8/5/P karton 911, document d. 16 November 1923.

79. Ibid.

80. [Scaron] tern, “[Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] sport v [Ccaron] eskoslovensku,” 109–13.

81. Brücke/Most-Stiftung, Kde domov m[uring ] j; Waic, “[Ccaron] eskoslovenská obec sokolská.”

82. Mazover, Dark Continent, 91f.

83. Newsletter and magazines noted when members left for military service, see Hamajim,

June–September 1935, 36.

84. Svaz [ccaron] sl. Makabi v Praze, Slavnostn[yacute]í Spis, 21.

85. Ibid.

86. While invoking images of ‘German’ and ‘Magyar’ Jews was perceived as more effective by

Hagibor’s leadership, their ‘disciplining’ of Jews’ political behaviour could also be address-

ing suspicions of Jews’ alleged radicalism.

87. This discourse on the need to improve the situation of the Jews in order to make them more

useful and loyal subjects was integral to the debate on Jewish emancipation and integration

in West and Central Europe since the late 1700s. In the context of 1920s in Czechoslovakia,

the specifics had changed, but the basic notion of the need for Jews to change so as to be

useful to the state persisted. In this particular case, Hagibor’s claim was also intertwined

with Zionism’s vision of the New Jew. For a discussion of the concept of the ‘new’ Jew, see

Stanislawski, Zionism and the Fin de Siècle, 94–97; Zerubavel, Recovered Roots, 25–27;

Mendelsohn, “Zionist Success and Zionist Failure,” 175f.

88. Knöpfelmacher, “D[ecaron] jiny [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagiboru,” 7.

89. [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, January 1927, 6.

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90. “[Zcaron] idovstí sportovci zú astní se manifesta[ccaron] ního pr[uring ] vodu Prahou 18. za[rcaron] í” (Jewish athletes

join the demonstration in Prague 18 September), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, September 1927, 4.

91. “Athleti Hagiboru na sportovní manifestaci 18. zá[rcaron] í t.r.” (Hagibor’s athletes at the sport

demonstration on 18 September 18 this year), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, October 1927, 2.

92. “Skv[ecaron] lé v[yacute] sledky plavc[uring ] Hagiboru” (Hagibor’s swimmers achieve great results), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute]

Sport, September 1927, 1; “Bilance plavecké sekce [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagiboru za rok 1931” (Taking

stock of Hagibor’s swimming section), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, January 1932, 6–7.

93. As quoted in [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, May 1931, 8.

94. Ibid.

95. Ginz, “Hek[scaron] osm[yacute] m,” 1.

96. Pick, “Sports,” 198–9.

97. “Manifesta[ccaron] ní sportovní sch[uring ] ze” (A sports gathering), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, December 1926, 2.

98. “Valná hromada [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagibor Praha” (Plenary session of [Zcaron] .S.K. Hagibor Praha), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute]

Sport, March 1932, 9.

99. “Hagibor vyhrál po prvé Zadák[uring ] v pohár a vít[ecaron] zí v [zcaron] upním mistrovství!” (Hagibor wins

Zadak’s Cup for the first time and triumphs in the league championship), Hamajim, April–

May 1935, 23.

100. “Na vrcholku hory” (At the pinnacle), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, August 1931, 9.

101. During the interwar years, the Czech-Jewish movement consisted of a number of different

groups divided on issues like assimilation vs. acculturation, attitude towards Zionism, and

Jewish cultural renewal, see Kate[rcaron] ina [Ccaron] apková’s discussion of the Czech-Jewish “assimila-

tionists” ([Ccaron] apková, “[Ccaron] e[scaron] i, N[ecaron] mci, [Zcaron] idé?” 50–85).

102. Kieval, Making of Czech Jewry, 154–7.

103. “Záv[ecaron] t dra Ludvíka Singra” (Ludvík Singer’s will), [Zcaron] idovsk[yacute] Sport, August 1931, 1.

104. For an example of Czech-Jews perpetuating the image of ‘German’ Jews, see Fuchs, “[Zcaron] idé a

ochrana men[scaron] in,” 133.

105. Josef Fikl, “Pom[ecaron] r [Zcaron] id[uring ] k celostátnímu sportu,” 7.

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Tatjana Lichtenstein is a PhD candidate in the Department of History at the University of Toronto. She is completing a dissertation on the Zionist movement in the Bohemian Lands between the two world wars.

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