The Experience of a Difficult Neighborhood: Episodes from the History of Social Interaction Between Ukrainians and Jews of Volyn in the First Half of the 17th Century

Abstract

The article deals with the problem of relations and social interaction of Ukrainian communities (primarily burghers and peasants) with the Jewish population of the Volyn Voivodeship in the 1st half of the 17th cent. The author pays attention to the relevance of an objective analysis of this problem in view of false stereotypes about the deep traditions of Ukrainian anti-Semitism and insufficient attention of domestic scientists to the study of the experience of social interaction of Jews and Christians in Volyn during the Lithuanian-Polish era. The most important studies and publications, in which the solution of the problem was initiated, were analysed, the priority directions of further studies related to this topic were emphasized. The article raises the issue of the specifics of conflicts between Christians and Jews in Volyn. At the same time, it was emphasized that relatively few conflict situations related to national-religious misunderstandings were found. At the same time, in a number of cases, their analysis makes it possible to obtain (as background information) information about the cooperation of representatives of the Christian and Jewish communities. When presenting the main material, four episodes from the history of Ukrainian-Jewish relations were analysed, which testified to the cooperation of representatives of these communities in the realities of everyday life in Volyn in the 1st half of the 17th cent. In particular, the practice of inviting Ukrainian burghers and peasant women to Jewish families as babysitters was noted; at the same time, it was emphasized that the mentioned cooperation had a long history and was practiced in Volyn despite an explicit prohibition in the II Lithuanian Statute. Cases of reactions of Ukrainian peasants and townspeople in crisis situations were also analysed, when Jews were saved from robbers and a mob that intended to commit lynching by their efforts. As a result it is possible to confirm the fact that the national-religious boundaries between Jews and Ukrainians were blurred in the everyday conditions of the first half of the 17th cent., already stated in the works of domestic researchers. This was confirmed not only by the example of the communication of Jews with the nobility, but also at the level of other classes, namely burghers and peasants. It was emphasized that the myth of the systemic anti-Semitism of Ukrainians is not confirmed in the sources, so the study of real conflicts between Ukrainians and Jews requires new approaches.