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More striking is the comparison with Lublin,
which even then was among the most important
Jewish communities: It had about the same number
of Jewish households as Luboml (only three
more).
Indeed, from that point onthat is, from the
1550s-we can determine the beginnings of the
blossoming of Luboml's Jewish community.
However, it is necessary to add the following
comments:
Establishing periods in human history is generally
artificial. Historical processes are so intertwined,
they grow in and out of one another to
such an extent, that it is almost impossible to say
that one period ends and another begins in such
and such a year. If history must be divided into
periods, these are only approximate and designed
to make it easier to understand the complicated
course of world history.
This is as true for local history as it is for
general history on a broader scale. Certainly this
was so for the development and prime of Luboml.
If we want to tie the beginnings of Jewish life
in Luboml to a major event in general history, we
would identify the Lublin Confederation (Union
or Alliance) of 1569, as a turning point in the
history of Poland that could not but have a deep
effect on Volhynia and on its Jewish settlements
in particular. It is true that Luboml 's development
occurred a bit later, but historical processes
cannot be measured exactly.
It is no accident that in the 1560s, the Jews of
Luboml were given permission to appoint a rabbi,
to whom the proclamation gave quite broad religious-administrative
authority. This was probably
their very first rabbi.
And it is no mere coincidence that, starting
after the initiation of the Lublin Confederation,
the office of Luboml's rabbi was filled by a series
of distinguished rabbis who graced the town for
centuries thereafter and about whom much more
will be told.
The first rabbi of Luboml, we believe, arrived
in 1556, and only one year later the Jews of Luboml
obtained the privilege from King Zygmunt
Augustus. That is, the various local magistrates,
apart from district magistrates, no longer had the
power to try Jews, and Jews received the right to
THE EARLY DAYS 5
appeal verdicts of the district court directly to the
king.' This privilege freed Jews from having to
deal with local, lower officials and strengthened
their security and sense of stability.
In that same year, the Luboml kehila [community]
issued a very interesting decree (takhana)
that has been preserved in a Jewish book. It is
interesting first of all because it is the opposite of
other decrees with which we are familiar.
Generally, diaspora Jews lived in more
crowded quarters separated from their Christian
neighbors. This happened not only during the
Middle Ages but also in the modern era, and to a
marked extent Jews maintain that tradition even
up to the present day.
This segregation occurred not only for religious
reasons, though within a community it is
easier to observe Yiddishkeit and keep Christian
influences to a minimum Here, it was no less an
expression of group interest in times of danger,
and since Jews in the extraordinary condition of
diaspora found themselves under siege and subject
to attacks and pogroms, they wanted to be
among Jews in order to better defend themselves
in times of trouble.
But the decree of Luboml's Jewish community
seemed to oppose such segregation. In it, the
community forbade the town's Jews even to dare
buy a house or property from a non-Jew if it was
within the area where Jews lived. And the community
warned that anyone who did not adhere
this decree would be severely punished.
We learn about this interesting and important
decree from Rabbi Yoel Sirkis, himself a
rabbi in Luboml, known as the Bach (named after
his book Bayit Chadash-"The New House").'
In a shortened, nonliteral Yiddish translation,
the decree reads as follows:
In 1558, the Luboml community forbade any
local householder from purchasing a house or land
from a non-Jew in a town or neighborhood where
Jews lived. The Kahal [community] came to the
conclusion that if non-Jews did not want to live
among the Jews, there was a danger that non-Jews
might set fire to Jewish houses or demand that the
Jews be driven out.
Those Jews who did not obey the decree were
forced to return the purchased houses or property
to the Christians. In 1577, this decree was re-