Source 1 Translation
Regulations of the Jewish Council in Jaroslaw
1739
Regulations of the Council of Four Lands, Jarosław, July 8, 1739
The Congress of Crown Jewry took place in Jarosław, while His Honor Jan Czapski was
Chief Treasurer to the Crown, beginning on March 15 and ending on July 8th, 1739.
The instructions of the Jewish Congress were made in 1739, while His Honor Jan Czapski was Chief Treasurer to the Crown, by His Honor Działyński1, Podkomorzy of Poznań, who was appointed Commissar to the Congress by the Crown Treasury.
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Since disagreement often breaks out among the rabbis who come to our congresses to sit in judgment and deal with other matters over who should take the first seat [at the congress] and chair the session, a great deal of time is wasted before they come to agreement. The delegates, tax administrators, and other elders of the Council also actively promote their own interests in these arguments, which is sometimes not helpful and even detrimental to the Council. So, in order to avoid such disputes and pointless arguments, we have made the following rule to be observed in all future [meetings]: the rabbi, in whose region the General Congress is held will take the chair; no dissent will be allowed. This refers only to the regions of Kraków, Poznań, Lublin, and [Red] Ruthenia. So, when the Congress is held in the Kraków-Sandomierz region, the rabbi of Kraków should take the chair, though he has to be rabbi of the both the Kraków community and the Kraków-Sandomierz region. When [the Congress meets] in the Poznań region, it is the rabbi of the Poznań community [who should take the chair], provided that he is also rabbi of the Poznań region. The same is understood for the rabbis of Ruthenia and Lublin.
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However, should it turn out that the Congress is being held in a region where the [senior] rabbi has jurisdiction only over the community – in one of the four principal towns, Kraków, Poznań, Lwow, and Lublin - and not over the region; or conversely, where he has jurisdiction over the region and not the community or town, then the rabbi of Kraków, who has jurisdiction over both the community and the region - and, if not of Kraków, then of [another of] the principal towns - will take the chair. The rabbi of the region where the Congress is being held will [act as] his deputy.
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Great harm befalls the Council, because the less senior rabbis – the communal ones - interfere in economic matters, [as well as in] the deliberations and regulations of the Lands. Though they are chosen to be the watchmen of our religion and pay no taxes – quite the reverse, those who live beside the synagogue are paid a salary [by our communities] and live from that - yet they take what is not due to them and use various means to receive honors, such as the posts of delegate, assessor, trustee and scribe, which are due to us as the lay leadership who bear all the burdens. So, in order to prevent this competition and greed for those posts and honors, which is unbecoming for rabbis, we have decided and decreed that no rabbi now, or in the future, should dare to stand as delegate, assessor, or trustee, upon penalty of losing rabbinic office and being banned from the [Council] table. Should any region or community put such a one up for a post or elect him, then it will not only lose its representation among the Council leaders but will have to pay a fine of 500 red zloties, half to the Treasury and half to the Council. We exempt from this ruling and this penalty only those same [rabbis] who have accepted these honors for the present Congress before the ruling was made. In the future they will be forbidden to them. The same thing goes for the leadership of the regional councils, to which rabbis have had to be elected [in the past].
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No little damage is done to the Council when two opposing functions, like trustee and Council leader, are held by one man – no-one can be both master and slave! We therefore lay down and make an irreversible ruling that from now on, no trustee, while still holding the post, shall take up the post of Council leader. The penalty [for so doing is to be] the loss of both posts and a fine of 200 red zloties.
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We decree that the trustees must fulfill the regulations of this Congress and keep them in every respect; our Council leader must take great care and ensure that after each division [of the poll-tax burden among the communities], the accounts with the reductions [given to various communities] are handed over to the treasury every year.
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Since the aforementioned regulations only record the salaries of these trustees, and say nothing about travel expenses, we have determined that for this our present Congress, the travel expenses for each trustee and for the Chief Syndyk [Shtadlan] of the Crown Jews, covering both food and travel, when they travel to Warsaw, Grodno, or Radom for the division [of the poll-tax burden] is to be 50 zl. a week. From this food and travel is to be paid. An extra payment [“kontentacja”] for those at the divisions, the commissions, and the sejms is set at 200 zl. for each trustee and 100 zl. for the syndyk; this is in addition to their salary. He [i.e. the syndyk] will also receive 36 zl. a week for travel and food. They may not take any more than this on any pretext whatever. In addition, neither the trustees nor the syndyk may make private journeys at the Council’s expense by pretending to serve Crown Jewry. They must draw up [expense] accounts each year and submit them to the Council Head and to the leaders of the four principal regions.
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We resolve and strongly decree that that the trustees who meet each year on the division [of the poll-tax burden between the communities] will stay at the place [where they make the] division for only three, or at most four days. After this, the divisions must be sent to the regions and districts; the heads of the regional councils must have them sent and handed over to the treasury in accordance with the proclamation of His Honor the Chief Treasurer to the Crown issued on September 15th of last year, under threat of a fine and the rejection of later divisions, which the Treasury will decide upon [alone].
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Since the trustees have been accustomed, to the detriment of the Council, to hand out compromises, reductions, and alternations [in their tax assessments] to Jews in different localities, we have therefore decided and decreed that the trustees, together or individually, are not in any way empowered to give [such] alternations or reductions to Jews anywhere and to add their signatures to them. These [signed documents] will be worthless; the amount of the reduction is to be restored with the signed agreement of the Council; and each [of the trustees who granted the reduction] is to be fined 100 red zloties for the Treasury and the Council of Crown Jews and removed from his post.
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Disasters, such as fires, often cause the Jews significant damage. In such cases, the community, town, or locality may not look for salvation from the trustees, who have no authority to grant reductions. Instead, it must first turn to the heads of the regional council to which it belongs and then to the regional council itself at its annual meeting for the division of taxes, and there look for a reduction or alternation [agreement]. These should be granted in proportion to the destruction and decline [suffered by the community] by the council heads at the meeting; they must themselves sign a document to that effect.
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The sum allotted by the Council for indigent beggars – i.e. 1,500 zl. annually – may not be used by the trustees for any other [purpose] but charity for those poor people, each according to his need. The aforementioned trustees must draw up an account each year and submit it for signature to the Head of the Council and the leaders of the four principal lands, otherwise the amount will not be accepted.
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Previous accounts show that the trustees, at their own discretion and as they thought best, spent large sums for the Sejms and the Radom [Treasury] Commissions, and even though it is impossible to be at those places without such [expenses], the payments they made were sometimes neither necessary nor helpful. We therefore reduce those expenses and decree that the trustees not spend for the purposes of protection at the Sejm and [Treasury] Commission more than 334 red zloties, i.e. 6,000 zl. But if, God Forbid, there should again be similar or worse attempts on the Council than were heard at last year’s uncompleted Sejm, our trustees are empowered to incur greater expenses in order to prevent the destruction of the Council in timely fashion. They should first, however, turn to the all-powerful protection of His Honor the Chief Treasurer of the Crown, which we request from this our present Congress; with his noble wisdom and foresight, he will assess if [such expenditure] is necessary and whom to pay first; then he will give the trustees instruction on how to deal with the issue and whom to approach. With the foresight and protection of this lord the poor community of Crown Jews can avoid [unnecessary] expense. However, should he consider [such expenditure] unavoidable, and the trustees do not have enough money, then we empower them to borrow the sum from the Treasury of His Honor the Chief Treasurer to the Crown or elsewhere. It must be repaid the very next year with noble interest. We beseech his grace [in this matter] from this our present Congress in Jarosław and make our petition through this decision.
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The trustees, of whom we have five, must all come to the Council meeting [dealing with tax] division. In order to reduce travel expenses, two will be enough when it comes to protecting [Jewish] interests at the sejms and commissions. They will be joined by the Chief Syndyk, who understands the politics very well, is known to the nobles involved and has access to them. They should remain half or a quarter of a mile from the place where the sejm or commission is being held and only the Syndyk must be there with some quick-witted attendant he has with him in order to bring [messages] and inform the trustees which proposals will concern the community of Crown Jews.
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Reckoning up the debt remaining from 1739, the expenses of the Warsaw Sejm and our present Jarosław Congress, we see clearly that we will not be able to manage at all without a tax assessment reaching 323,600 zl. So we do not only permit [the assessment] but draw it up and spread it over the years at our disposal and in the form of accounting we are permitted (which we accept and view as positive), with the precondition that in 1743, when, God Willing, we have paid off the debt properly in the way laid down in the aforementioned arrangement, we will not set the tax at more than 270,000 (i.e. two hundred and seventy thousand) zl. [That is] provided that … [no further] debts and extraordinary expenses … [are incurred] under the protection of His Honor the Chief Treasurer of the Crown. This will bring general relief for all [the Jews] and ease the burden of paying the poll-tax.
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We know from experience that in certain circumstances the trustees stubbornly refuse to listen to one another and [each one] does just what he wants. This harms the Council and so in order to avoid this, we decree that in the more difficult matters which concern the Council, they must wisely and with foresight agree among themselves. Should three agree among themselves with good reason, two – and all the more so one - may not oppose four without sound basis, under [threat] of losing his post and repaying the Council [all] losses which his stubbornness has caused it.
15. We decree that all dispositions made by the Council of Crown Jews, whether as part of the tax assessment and allocation or in the form of expenses at the Sejms or the Radom \[Treasury\] Commissions may not be made and accepted without the knowledge and signature of the Council Leader. Those \[dispositions\] about which the Council Leader and the leaders of the principal regions did not know we declare null and void.
Finally, we strongly recommend that the delegates to the present Congress in Jarosław write down and inform everyone what they view and think would be good for the Council.
In order to give these rulings and rites the fullest possible validity, we here sign in our own hands.
In Jarosław at the closing of the General Congress, July 8, 1739
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This translation has made been from the transcription of the Polish text which appears on this website. It was provided by kind permission of Prof. Jacob Goldberg and Prof. Adam Kazmierczyk, who are preparing for publication a volume of Polish language sources dealing with the Council. It is slated to be published in 2011 by Wydawnictwo Sejmowe in Warsaw.
Source:
Ms. Krasinski 5334
Bibliography:
נ”מ גלבר, י’ היילפרין, “ועד ארבע ארצות בשנים 1739 ו-1753”, ציון ב’ (1936/7), עמ’ 184-153, 346-333.
י’ היילפרין, פנקס ועד ארבע הארצות, ירושלים 1945 , עמ’ 328-324
Shmuel Ettinger, “The Council of the Four Lands”, in: A. Polonsky et al. (eds.), The Jews in Old Poland, 1000-1795, London and New York 1993_._, pp. 93-109
Jacob Goldberg, “The Jewish Sejm: Its Origins and Functions”, in: A. Polonsky et al. (eds.), The Jews in Old Poland, 1000-1795, London and New York 1993, pp. 147-165
Gershon Hundert, Jews in Poland-Lithuania in the Eighteenth Century: A Genealogy of Modernity, Berkeley-Los Angeles 2004, pp. 79-98
Judith Kalik, Scepter of Judah: The Jewish Autonomy in Eighteenth-Century Crown Poland, Leiden 2009
Anatol Leszczynski, Sejm Żydów Korony, 1623-1764, Warszawa 1994
Moshe Rosman, “The Authority of the Council of Four Lands Outside Poland- Lithuania”, Polin 22 (2010): 83-108
Adam Teller, “Rabbis Without a Function? The Polish Rabbinate and the Council of Four Lands in the 16th-18th Centuries” in: J. Wertheimer (ed.), Jewish Religious Leadership: Image and Reality, Jewish Theological Seminary 2004, I, pp. 371-400
Endnotes
1 This is a copy of the original text, made in 1739 when Działyński was _Chorąży_of Wschowa. It was made between 1750-55, when Działyński was Podkomorzy of Poznań – most probably in 1753.