The Soul of the Bund
JVL Introduction
Founded in 1897, the Jewish Labour Bund, was the first modern Jewish political party in the Russian Empire, as well as the largest social democratic movement in the entire empire. On the eve of the Second World War, it was also the strongest Jewish party in Poland.
Frank Wolf’s Transnational History of the Jewish Labour Bund, first published in German in 2014, is now available in English from Haymarket Press.
In this review, published in New Politics, Marvin S. Zuckerman describes it as “a masterful, scholarly, and insightful account of a powerful and important movement in modern Jewish history”.
It is a social and cultural history, focusing on the Bund’s membership and what it meant to be a khaver (comrade), part of a mishpokhe (family), wedded to a secular Jewishness embodied in the Yiddish language and culture.
It explains the essence of the Bundist ethos, exploring such questions as: What did the Bund’s activism consist of? What did the Bund mean to its members? How did they identify as Bundists? How did it change their lives? What did they then do about their lives, their livelihoods, their world?
If one wants to understand the spirit, the culture, the soul of the Bund, says Zuckerman, one should read this book.
This article was originally published by New Politics on Sat 5 Mar 2022. Read the original here.
The Soul of the Bund: A Review of Yiddish Revolutionaries in Migration
Yiddish Revolutionaries in Migration: The Transnational History of the Jewish Labour Bund by Frank Wolff, translated by Loren Balhorn and Jan-Peter Herrmann, Haymarket Books, Chicago, 2021, paperback, 532 pp.
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I’ve been searching for a readable book on the Bund and it looks like I’ve found it! Given the dire situation that Jewish socialists are in, attacked on all sides and accused of antisemitism by those who should be on our side, there’s a pressing need to rediscover our history.
Sometimes it seems we can only sit and wait for the next onslaught, but we need to remember that we aren’t starting from scratch and to learn from those who came before us. As they (didn’t) used to say in Roman times: Nil Illigitimi Carborundum!
All my respect to the Bund and one comment on Mike Scott’s comment:
Those who accuse us of antisemitism aren’t, nor would they be on our side. The sooner we understand that the better.
I’m not Jewish so didn’t know about this long and proud history of socialism in Judaism. This book sounds like a much needed history in the current climate.