Austria
“They All Could Have Been Saved”Thursday, May 2, 2013 by Lance J. Sussman | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Gilbert and Eleanor Kraus personally rescued 50 Jewish children from Nazi-era Vienna and brought them home to Philadelphia. A new documentary tells their story—and contrasts it with the apathy shown by their community.
Leaving the GhettoFriday, February 8, 2013 by Jacob Katz | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
"Was there any possibility," asks Jacob Katz in this 1996 Commentary essay, "that the Jews collectively might have been accepted in Europe on their own terms—that is, as a community, with a religion opposed to Christianity?"
Art and Idolatry in AustriaTuesday, October 30, 2012 by Alex Joffe | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features
Art transforms life through beauty but inspires a possessiveness unlike any other. Collectors tend toward obsession, which overwhelms morality; museums, like the medieval church, wash away sin with exhibitions for the public good.
Editors' Picks
Changing the Tune Michael White, Telegraph. Having laid bare its Nazi history, the Vienna Philharmonic has faced calls to disband. But ought we to assume that "all great musicians should be great examples of humanity"?
A Marriage Made in Hell Rafael Medoff, JNS. Seventy-five years ago this week, German troops entered Austria to impose the Anschluss—and found the people, in the words of Sigmund Freud, "entirely at one with their brothers in the Reich."
Vienna's Jewish University Cnaan Lipshiz, JTA. To its founder, the Lauder Business School is a first-rate business university for European Jews. To Austria, it is a chance to "re-establish Vienna as the seat of Jewish intelligentsia."
What Is Hungary Hiding? Bill Gladstone, BillGladstone.ca. An expert at Yad Vashem is convinced that a massive trove of documents on Austro-Hungarian Jews lies hidden in Budapest's state archives—and he’s determined to gain access to it.
Cue the Organ Benjamin Ivry, Forward. Once, churches forbade organs because they recalled Jewish Temple music in Jerusalem. Later, the Haskalah re-introduced the organ to synagogues—partly to drown out the cantor.
A Habsburg Hanukkah Matti Friedman, Times of Israel. How did the ornamental headgear of an Imperial soldier, emblazoned with the double-headed eagle, emblem of the Holy Roman Emperor, come to be a hanukkiah?
Judaism's Golden Plate Lawrence Schiffman, LawrenceSchiffman.com. For a committed Jew to hold this item in his hands concretizes millennia of Jewish faith. But it also raises questions about the history of monotheism and the permeability of culture.