Kagal ( Kahal , Hebrew קָהָל - “ meeting of the people, gathering ”) - a body of community self-government, which headed the separate Jewish community in the Diaspora and was an intermediary between it and the state, in the broad sense of the word, the Jewish community, in the narrow the administrative form of self-government by the Jewish community in Poland and other countries of Eastern Europe in the 16th – 18th centuries, in the Russian Empire in the period 1772–1893 .
In a figurative sense - a messy crowd, a noisy bunch.
In the Septuagint, קָהָל was translated by the word ἐκκλησία - in ancient Greece, the highest organ of state power, the people's assembly. In Athens in the 5th century BC e. ecclesia was the supreme organ of the state that exercised legislative, executive and judicial powers. Any Athenian male citizen who reached the age of 20 could take part in the work of ecclesia. Other supreme bodies in democratic policies were also called ecclesia. In oligarchic policies , ecclesiastical rights were restricted by other state bodies such as councils and collegiums. In a number of states, popular assemblies had special names: apella - in Sparta , agora - in Delphi and the cities of Thessaly, aliyah - in Argos, Epidaurus, Gel, Acragant.
Content
History
Under the Polish name “Zybras of the Jews”, this form of Jewish self-government was officially recognized in countries where there were Jewish communities . The letters of Sigismund II to the Jews of Lublin ( 1556 ), Lvov ( 1569 ), Poznan ( 1571 ) are known in the Polish history of Vaad in four countries . Subsequently, the word kagal was assigned to this advice. Already in Polish letters of the 16th century, the kagal was transferred the right of the rabbis to oversee the religious life of Jews, the right to punish violators by excommunication - khem , exile .
In Russia, the kagal was granted, among others, the right to keep metric books for the Jewish community.
Each city or town should have had one Kagal, even if the local Jews were divided into several sects and sects. The number of kagalnyh, elected, with the approval of the provincial government, for 3 years, was not determined. Kagal was forbidden to impose new taxes without the knowledge of his superiors, and in 1818 they were given books from the state chambers, which, among other things, were to report on the receipt and use of the amounts of box duty, which was originally intended to pay off kagal debts. At the same time, Kagal was entrusted with the charity of homeless Jews, assistance to Jewish immigrants, etc. By the regulation of 1835, the Polish kagal organization was completely restored, within the framework of Jewish settlement. By virtue of this provision, every Jew (except Jewish farmers) must have been attributed to the urban Jewish community, even if he lived in a town, village or village. In cities, Jews elected, with the approval of the provincial government, for 3 years from 3 to 5 commissioners, who made up Kagal. The duties of Kagal consisted in monitoring the correct receipt of taxes and fees of both state, city and zemstvo, and especially Jewish (box collection), in storing and spending kagal sums, in the charity of the elderly, maimed and poor Jews, in monitoring the prevention of vagrancy. The recruitment charter of 1827, having established the serving of the recruitment service by Jewish societies separately from the Christian ones, entrusted Jewish societies with the duty of serving this service and armed them with the power “to give all Jews at all times, for malfunctioning taxes, for vagrancy and other riots intolerant in Jewish society. ”
- ESBE
Hasidim opposed the dominance of the kagala in the public life of the Jews.
Catherine the Great, by her personal decree of 1780, the first of the European rulers allowed her subjects of the Jewish profession to be assigned to all classes, including the nobility and the clergy (Jewish), with all the relevant rights. When enforcing this decree, the authorities faced protests of the Christian population, however, these protests were answered in the registered decree of 1785, which said [1] :
“When, according to the decrees of Her Majesty, people entered the state equal to others on the basis of decrees of Her Majesty, then, in any case, it is necessary to abide by the rule, Her Majesty established that everyone in rank and state should use the benefits and rights without distinguishing the law and the people” .
Multiple attempts to destroy the isolationism of the Jewish community in Russia, limiting the power of the kagala, were made by emperors Alexander I and Nicholas I. In 1802 - 1803, as part of the general reform of the Russian state system, the Minister of Justice Derzhavin tried to legislatively limit the powers of the kagals in the western provinces, but did not succeed and was soon forced to resign.
In 1844 , kagaly in Russia were abolished almost everywhere, with the transfer of their affairs to urban public and estate institutions. The exception was Riga and the cities of the Courland province, where the kagaly existed until 1893.
Kagal structure
The kagal administration consisted of a certain number of people, mostly proportional to the size of the community: in Krakow there were 40, in Vilna - 35, in medium-sized communities this number ranged between 35 and 22, in small ones it was not less than 8. Kagal members annually allocated from their On Wednesday, by lot, five "voters" who, by a majority vote or by lot, determined the composition of the new kagal.
Usually these annual elections only shuffled the members of the former kagal who, instead of some functions, received others. Thus, the entire organization had an oligarchic character. Elected were divided into ranks or ranks. At the head of the kagala were four foremen ( Roshis ); “honorable persons” ( Tuva ), numbering from 5 to 3, followed them. They both made up a legal meeting of the kagala and decided all public affairs. The foremen, in turn, were for a month in the post of Parnassus Vaad, that is, the head, treasurer, and the executive body in general.
The third category of kagal ranks consisted of “full members” (ikors) and candidates, who in Belarus bore the common name “community leaders” ( alufs ); their number ranged from 4 to 10. Then followed persons endowed with special functions: supervisors, trustees of schools, etc., and finally, judges ( dayen ). In the Pinkeses (act books of kagals) of the beginning of the 18th century, there is still a category of female guardians. When the kagale were special bailiffs ( shameshi ).
The Krakow Kagal Statute of 1595 distinguishes three groups of kagal judges: lower, middle and highest, 3 people in each group. The former examined all kinds of claims, for an amount not exceeding 10 zlotys, the latter - for an amount of 10 to 100 zlotys, and, like the former, sat daily; the highest group of judges, sitting at least twice a week, parsed claims of more than 100 zlotys.
Kagal Powers
Not limited to collecting taxes and managing all public institutions, the kagal monitored trade, the correct measures and weights, the passing people, the cleanliness of Jewish streets and generally deanery, regulated rental relations, issued decrees on rabbis, children's education, book printing, behavior and rewards for servants and maidservants and so on. In extreme cases, the kagal sought assistance from the administrative authorities.
Under Catherine II, it was decided to include Jews in city books, the decision on the correctness of Jewish debts was provided to ordinary courts, judicial functions were not recognized for the newly established provincial and district kagals, except for cases relating to “ceremonies of the law and worship of Jews.” On the other hand, however, according to the decree of 1776, the total money continued to be paid by the kagal, and Jews were supposed to receive passports from him. This made the district and provincial kagals as a continuation of the former kagal organization. The Statute on Jews of 1804, having separated the spiritual-judicial part from the sphere of activity of the kagal and handed it over to the rabbis, entrusted the kagal with the duty to observe that the state fees were paid regularly and without money, as well as to dispose of the amounts entrusted to them from Jewish society.
Notes
Literature
- Kagal - an article from the Electronic Jewish Encyclopedia
- Kagal // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.