Dear Sasha,
thanks for sharing this video. I support the project and hope you will
raise a lot of awareness for your cause. However, because of my
sympathies I have to stress that the video is quite problematic. Like
other list members I was excited to watch it, but then I was very soon
surprised. The video is certainly well produced, looks amazing, and the
cause is inspring, but unfortunately it is full of historical errors,
incorrect statements and misleading footage, which most viewers are not
aware of.
Right in the first frame we see Toledo in Spain, then we see random
Jewish cemeteries (Sarajevo), synagogues (Bulgaria), objects
(Lithuania), gravestones, buildings, reenactments, interiors, all of
which are not in Czernowitz, although the assumption of the viewer is
that we see Czernowitz. We see a picture of Regensburg in Eastern
Bavaria, when the narrator talks about "Swabia"; we see pictures of
Christian farmers, when the narrator talks about Jews, we see a picture
of the 1781 edict of tolerance for Protestants, when the narrator talks
about the 1782 edict for Jews.
But most important are historical errors: There was never an organized
migration of Jews from Austria or Swabia to Czernowitz, which is
depicted in the video as the starting point of the modern community.
Enzenberg was certainly driven by 18th century anti-Jewish sentiments,
but he was not a "devout antisemite" (which is a concept of the 19th
century). Hasidism did not originate in Yazlovets. The quoted passage of
the edict of 1782 was only valid in Lower Austria and Vienna, and had
nothing to do with Bukovina. The Czernowitz Jewish cemetery is not "the
last remnant of the city’s vibrant Jewish past", there are other
important landmarks in the city, like the former synagogue (now a
cinema) or the former Jewish National House (both of which can be seen
in the video on old pictures).
All of that and much more leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. In
fact, the video seems to be mainly a collage of commercial stock footage
and wikipedia knowledge, augmented with some historical and actual
images from Czernowitz, which makes it impossible to understand which
information and image is accurate and which is the imagination of the
creators. Also the assertion that Panorao is a group of historians is
misleading, since Matthew Lupu is a dentist and (soon-to-be)
archeologist. If it would be just one mistake or two misleading pictures
- fine. This video is not an academic paper, it has another purpose and
it looks inspiring if you are not interested in accurate information.
But there is so much wrong and misleading content, that I was relieved
when the video was over. And that is sad for the good cause it should
serve. Please understand everything I wrote as constructive criticism.
Best regards,
Johannes Czakai
--
Johannes Czakai
Visiting Research Fellow
Franz Rosenzweig Minerva Research Center
Hebrew University Jerusalem
https://rosenzweig.huji.ac.il/people/johannes-czakai
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