The Vienna Haggadah, 1751

The Haggadah of which a reproduction is presented here was written and illustrated in Vienna in the year 1751 by Aaron Schreiber Herlingen, a well-known artist-scribe.

Schreiber, who hailed from Gewitsch in Moravia, was active in his profession for a long period. Some of his works have survived, including quite a number of Haggadoth, the earliest of which was executed in the year 1727.

Schreiber worked not only for private clients, but served also as a scribe for the Royal Library of Vienna and he is described as such on the title page of our Haggadah.

The text of the Haggadah is written in fine, large square letters. Several initial words are in gold and decorated in color.

The Haggadah contains instructions in Judeo-German for the observance of the Seder, as well as the Judeo-German versions of the hymns Adir Hu, Ehad Mi Yode’a and Had Gadya, as they appear in old Ashkenazi Haggadoth.

It is richly illustrated. The large illustrations, with the exception of the first, are all modeled on pictures in the famous Amsterdam Haggadah printed in 1695, which were widely copied by printers and manuscript artists. In the order of their appearance in the Haggadah the pictures represent the following: The Seder of the Sages at Bnei Brak, the Four sons, the three Angels visiting Abraham, Pharaoh’s daughter finding Moses in the Nile, the Egyptians drowning in the sea, and, finally the Temple in Jerusalem. Series of miniatures show the Ten Plagues and illustrate the songs Ehad Mi Yode’a and Had Gadya. The title page is adorned with the figures of Moses and Aaron, which one finds also on the title pages of the Amsterdam Haggadah and other Haggadoth and Hebrew books.

The original size of the Haggadah, with is preserved in the Rosenthaliana Library in Amsterdam is 23.1 x 15.2 cm.

In 1751, when this Haggadah was written in Vienna, there were not very many Jews in the city. About eighty years earlier, in 1669-1670, all Jews then in the city, some 2,000 souls, had been expelled.

Before long the absence of the Jews, who had paid high taxes, was felt by the authorities and negotiations were begun for their return. Individual Jews who it was thought could be of service to the royal court or the city were permitted to settle in Vienna, but they were subject to many restrictions. In 1753 there were only 452 Jews in Vienna in a total population of more than 175,000. Though in following decades the Jews contributed greatly to making the city into a commercial center by establishing a variety of business and industrial enterprises, the general prohibition against their settlement remained in force and those who had the right of residence continued to suffer from various inequalities. As late as 1846 the official Jewish population was only about 4,000. There were also a large number of illegal Jewish residents as well as foreign Jews, mostly Sefardim holding Turkish citizenship, who were exempt from the restrictions in force against Austrian Jews.

The situation changed after the revolution of 1848, in which Jews participated, and particularly with the granting of the constitution in 1867, which gave Jews equal rights. Jews could now freely settle in Vienna and many came there from various parts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, especially from Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia and Galicia.

In 1856 there were 15,600 Jews in the city. By 1880 their number had increased to almost 73,000 and by 1910 to more than 175,000.

World War I saw the influx into Vienna of about 80,000 Jews from Galicia and Bukovina which had been invaded by the Russians. The great majority of these later left the city, but large numbers remained.

In 1934 there were nearly 180,000 Jews in Vienna, constituting about ten percent of the entire population. Vienna was one of the largest Jewish communities in Europe. Jews were very prominent in the economic and cultural life of the city. Vienna was the home of well-known rabbis and men of Jewish scholarship and of Jewish personalities who had attained world renown because of their achievements in various fields of human endeavor, especially in literature and medicine.

After the ״Anschluss״ of 1938 the persecution of the Jews in Austria, whose population was largely anti-Semitic, was much fiercer than in other parts of Germany. Emigration was possible until 1941 and 136,000 Jews left Vienna. However many of these emigrants were subsequently overtaken by the German armies in their countries of refuge. The Jews who remained in Vienna were deported. After World War II a new Jewish community was formed in Vienna.

The destruction of Vienna’s Jewish community during the Nazi period was the third in the long history of the Jews of the city. Jews are believed to have settled in Vienna in the tenth century. In the middle of the 14th century the community was the largest in Germany. It was destroyed in 1420-1421 when part of the 1500 Jews who then lived in the city were expelled, others were burned at the stake, and still others committed suicide to evade forced conversion. A Jewish community was again established in Vienna towards the end of the sixteenth century. This community was in existence for less than one hundred years, coming to an end with the expulsion of 1669-1670.

Prominent rabbis who served the community at various periods included R. Isaac ben Moses (13th century), R. Yom Tov Lipmann Heller, Shabbetai Sheftel Horowitz and Gershon Ashkenazi (17th century). Samson Wertheimer (1658-1724), court banker, statesman, rabbi, communal leader and philanthropist was active in Vienna. He was the most influential Jewish personality of his time, came to the aid of many Jewish communities, and himself an erudite scholar, was a great patron of Jewish learning.

The Vienna Haggadah, 1751, is the sixteenth Haggadah published by the Orphan Hospital Ward of Israel as a token of gratitude to its supporters. Special thanks are due to the director Rabbi Munish I. Weintraub for his efforts to reproduce this beautiful manuscript Haggadah.