Dr Howard Freeman
This is an evening about 20 years in Victoria, 1919 to 1939.
If one could characterise the Victorian Jewish community in the years after the First World War, you could easily come to the conclusion that in spite of the community's sense of religious identity, there was an overarching sense of being British, and a deep pride in being British. The pride was enhanced by the enormous contribution and achievements made by Jewish ex-servicemen and women during the war.
Jews had enlisted in enormous proportions, far greater than the half percent they occupied in the wider community. Pride was centred on relatives and friends, and of course on the more public heroes - General Monash, Colonel Harold Cohen, Major Isadore Isaacson, Theodore Aarons (the first Jew to enter Duntroon), Corporal Issy Smith VC, and many others.
But the casualties were very heavy, dead and wounded, and many regional Jewish communities suffered deeply. Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo were grief stricken by the war losses among their young people.
But as I said, loyalty to Empire, cultivation of civic virtues, and the idea that 'to be a good Jew really means being a good citizen' - this was the view of the 15 year old Marcus Stone in Ballarat in 1919.
In a religious sense, Jewish identity was fairly homogeneous, probably with one exception, as all the synagogues in the early post-war years were happy to exist under the watchful halachic eye of the Chief Rabbi in London- the exception was EMHC, which did not have that allegiance and was known as the Foreigners Shul because of its largely late 19th century Russian congregation.
In 1917 the Balfour Declaration pledging British support for a Jewish national home in Palestine had a moving, even profound, effect on every Zionist institution, and many (but not all) synagogues around the world.
In Melbourne however there was a deep silence. Certainly no euphoria. A cousin of Monash went to print with his view that Australian born Jews were very comfortable here and supposed that Zionism required one to live in Palestine - besides, he asked, would sacrifices be introduced into the worship, and will there be a King?
By the early 1920's this ignorance was gradually replaced and by the middle '20's Zionism was a feature of Melbourne's Jewish communal life. It was encouraged by the rabbis, including at that time Rabbi Danglow.
Mind you, at that time outward Jewishness was not all that evident in Australia, communal life was static, and leadership was largely uninspiring - the community was largely congregationally based, not communally based. Communal unity was only to be a feature when the Jewish Board of Deputies was created in the mid-20's.
Because the regional centres of Jewish life were in decline, especially as a result of the wartime losses as well as the Depression, Melbourne became the focus of Jewish life in every sense. And then a miracle occurred - Eastern European Jewry discovered Melbourne and another wave of immigration began.
Between 1921 and 1930 over 600 male Jews immigrated to Melbourne. In Carlton, Sam Brilliant created the Victorian Jewish Welcome Society - in 1926 alone his group met 26 ships bearing Jewish passengers to Station Pier.
The established Melbourne Jews south of the Yarra however were often openly contemptuous of the 'Polaks', including some who Rabbi Brodie pointed out were of quite recent Polish origin themselves!
The point was that the Jewish population of Melbourne suddenly increased by about 50%. As a result there were many new clubs and organizations formed, or were reborn to a new existence: UJEB, JYPA, Young Jewish Social Club, Young Judean Zionist Society, Girls Young Judean Club, and Jewish Undergraduates Association. Many of them soon merged to form the Judean League, and bought Monash House in Canning St Carlton in 1926.
But the truth was that for the next 2 decades Melbourne was divided by the Yarra, culturally socially and religiously. It became a society that was chalk and cheese, to quote Rabbi Lubofsky: Rabbi Joseph Lippman Gurewicz in Carlton, the Vilna Gaon of Carlton, and Rabbis Brodie and Danglow south of the Yarra, the Great Divide. There were new synagogues in Carlton and East Brunswick, St Kilda and Toorak.
But below the surface, intermarriage was increasing, and the orthodox were becoming indifferent, no doubt distracted by the Great Depression. And then Reform Judaism established itself, with a slow start, largely as a response to unobservant orthodoxy. It nearly died at birth, but in 1936 the charismatic and young Rabbi Dr Sanger arrived to breathe new life into the Beth Israel community. Large numbers of German and Austrian Jews came to Melbourne following the proclamation of the Nuremberg laws and the gathering darkness over Europe.
So towards the end of our period, 1939, the migrants began to take control, particularly those of Russian and Polish origin - the Kadimah, Yiddish theatre, writing and literature, The Yiddishe Nayes , The Daniel Herman Theatre, Melech Ravitch and Hertz Bergner, Yossl Bergner.
Brilliant, Sher, Rose, Wynn were the shakers. Many were making good - the Smorgons and others were moving south of the Yarra, But the post war years were to see massive immigration, and then later the exodus from north of the Yarra.