Brafman, Jacob. Kniga Kagala ["The Book of the Kahal": Russian translation of Pinkas of Community of Minsk]

(ANTISEMITICA)

Vilna

1869

FIRST EDITION. Text in Cyrilic. On title, quote from Schiller in German: "Die Juden bilden einen Staat im Staate" ["The Jews Form a State Within a State."]

In his youth, Kahal officials of his native Kletzk forcibly sought to have the Author conscripted into the Tsar's army as a "Cantonist", amounting to 25 years of brutal military service. This insensitivity confirmed Brafman's belief in the evils of Jewish communal life. After his conversion to the Greek Orthodox Church, Brafman served as Censor of Hebrew books in Vilna and St. Petersburg. At government expense, Brafman published in 1869 Kniga Kagala, a fairly accurate translation of the documentary Pinkas of the Kahal of Minsk. Though clearly designed to stir up hatred of Jews, by accusing them of conspiring against Gentiles, the book has nonetheless served several scholars as a valuable historical source of knowledge concerning 19th-century Russian Jewry. See S. Ginsburg, Meshumodim in Tsarishen Rusland (1946), pp. 65-79; and EJ, Vol. IV, col. 1288