Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-rcrh6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T11:29:49.706Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Religiosity, Nationalism, and Anti-Jewish Politics in Palestine and Poland: Islamic and Catholic Pilgrimages during the Interwar Era

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  04 October 2019

Peter Polak-Springer
Peter Polak-Springer*
Affiliation:
Humanities Department, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]; [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This study in comparative global history sheds light on a largely ignored forum for the politics of transition from monarchical empire to nation-state in the Middle East and Central Europe—religious festivals at sacred shrines. It compares the role of key pilgrimage festivals at politically important sacred shrines: (1) the Islamic Nabi Musa (Prophet Moses) pilgrimage to the Haram esh-Sharif and Nabi Musa Tomb near the Dead Sea in Mandatory Palestine and (2) various Catholic pilgrimages to Jasna Góra in Częstochowa in interwar Poland. The author demonstrates how these events served as sacred forums for secular politics, where various political factions contested their partisan ideas of the nation, which included the elite nationalism of Grand Mufti of Jerusalem Hajj Amin al-Husseini and the Catholic-Endecja nationalism of Polish clerical leaders. Moreover, I examine the role of these pilgrimage festivals in some of the major conflicts afflicting their respective areas, such as Arab–Jewish violence and hostility in Palestine and wars for borders as well as anti-minority sentiment, especially anti-Semitism, in Poland.

Keywords

religion and nationalismpilgrimages and politicsnational identitycommunal violenceCentral Europe and the Middle Eastinterwar Poland and Mandatory PalestineNabi Musa riotsJasna Góra at CzęstochowaHaram esh-SharifUpper SilesiaJerusalemBalfour DeclarationSykes-Picot AgreementCivil War in Central Europe
Type
Article
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 48 , Special Issue 3: Special Issue on the Soviet Famines of 1930–1933 , May 2020 , pp. 603 - 619
Copyright
© Association for the Study of Nationalities 2019

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Akademickie Ślubowanie Jasnogórskie [Jasna Góra academic pledge]. 1936. Lwów, Poland.Google Scholar
al-ʿUmar, ʿ Abd al-Karīm. 1999. Mudhakkirāt al-Hājj Muhammad Amīn al-Husaynī [The Memoirs of Hajj Muhammad Amin al-Husayni]. Damascus: al-Ahālī.Google Scholar
Alvis, Robert E. 2017. White Eagle, Black Madonna: One Thousand Years of the Polish Catholic Tradition. New York: Fordham University Press.Google Scholar
Antoniewicz, Marceli, Kołodziejczyk, Ryszard, Kersten, Krystyna, Kiryk, Feliks, Szwed, Ryszard, eds. 2002. Częstochowa. Vol. 3 of Częstochowa: Dzieje Miasta i Klasztoru Jasnogórskiego [History of the City and the Jasna Góra Cloister]. Częstochowa: Urząd Miasta Częstochowy.Google Scholar
Asali, Kamil J. 1990. Māwsim al-nabī mūsā fī Filasṭīn, ta’rīkh al-mawsim wa-al-maqām. [The Nabi Musa Feast in Palestine: A History of the Feast and the Sanctuary]. Amman: al-Tab’a al-Āwala.Google Scholar
Bjork, James. 2009. Neither German nor Pole: Catholicism and National Indifference in a Central European Borderland, 1890–1914. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan.Google Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers. 1996. Nationalism Reframed: Nationhood and the National Question in the New Europe. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers. 2006. Ethnicity Without Groups. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Brubaker, Rogers. 2012. “Religion and Nationalism: Four Approaches.” Nations and Nationalism 18 (1): 2–20.Google Scholar
Budeiri, Musa. 1997. “The Palestinians: Tensions between Nationalist and Religious Identity.” In Rethinking Nationalism in the Arab Middle East, edited by Jankowski, James and Gershoni, Israel, 191–206. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Coleman, Simon, and Eade, John. 2004. Reframing Pilgrimage: Cultures in Motion. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Eade, John, and Katić, Mario. 2016. Pilgrimage, Politics and Place-Making in Eastern Europe: Crossing the Borders. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Eade, John, and Sallnow, Michael J., eds. 2013. Contesting the Sacred: The Anthropology of Pilgrimage. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock Publishers.Google Scholar
Flores, Alexander. 1980. Nationalismus und Sozialismus im arabischen Osten: Die kommunistische Partei und arabische Nationalbewegung in Palästina, 1919–1948 [Nationalism and Socialism in the Arabic East: The Communist Party and the Arab National Movement in Palestine]. Münster: Periferia-Verlag.Google Scholar
Freas, Eric. 2017. Nationalism and the Haram esh-Sharif/Temple Mount: The Exclusivity of Holiness. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Friedland, Roger, and Hecht, Richard D.. 1996. “The Nebi Musa Pilgrimage and the Origins of Palestinian Nationalism.” In Pilgrims and Travelers to the Holy Land, edited by Le Beau, Brian F. and Mor, Menachem, 89–118. Omaha, NE: Creighton University Press.Google Scholar
Gerber, Haim. 2008. Remembering and Imagining Palestine: Identity and Nationalism from the Crusades to the Present. London: Palgrave Macmillan.Google Scholar
Ghosheh, Suhbi. 2010. Al-ḥīāt al-ijtimā‘īa fī al-Quds fī al-Qarn al-‘ashrīn [Social Life in Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century]. Beirut: Mūasasa al-arabīa lil darasat wa al-nashr.Google Scholar
Halabi, Awad. 2007. “The Transformation of the Prophet Moses Festival in Jerusalem, 1917–1937: From Local and Islamic to Modern and Nationalist Celebration.” PhD diss., University of Toronto.Google Scholar
Halabi, Awad. 2009. “Symbols of Hegemony and Resistance: Banners and Flags in British-Ruled Palestine.” Jerusalem Quarterly 36 (Winter): 66–78.Google Scholar
Halabi, Awad. 2013. “Islamic Ritual and Palestinian Nationalism: Al-Hajj Amin and the Prophet Moses Festival in Jerusalem, 1921 to 1936.” In Jerusalem Interrupted: Modernity and Colonial Transformation 1917–Present, edited by Jayyusi, Lena, 139–152. Northampton, MA: Interlink Publishing.Google Scholar
Hanebrink, Paul. 2018. A Specter Haunting Europe: The Myth of Judeo-Bolshevism. Cambridge, MA: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Jabłoński, Szczepan Zachariasz. 1998. “Jasna Góra na drodze ku niepodległości w latach 1795–1989” [“Jasna Góra on the Path to Independence in the Years 1795–1989]. In Częstochowy drogi Ku Niepodległości [Czestochowa’s Paths to Independence], edited by Ryszard Szwed, 79–120. Częstochowa: Wyższa Szkoła Pedagogiczna.Google Scholar
Jabłoński, Szczepan Zachariasz. 1999. Jasna Góra w Początkach II Rzeczypospolitej [Jasna Góra at the Beginnings of the Second Republic]. Częstochowa: Wyższa Szkola Języków Obcych i Ekonomii.Google Scholar
Jabłoński, Szczepan. 2002. “Jasna Góra w II Rzeczypospolitej, 1918–39” [“Jasna Góra in the Second Republic, 1918–39”]. In Częstochowa. Vol. 3 of Częstochowa: Dzieje Miasta i Klasztoru Jasnogórskiego [Częstochowa: The History of the City and the Jasna Gora Cloister], edited by Antoniewicz, Marceli, Kołodziejczyk, Ryszard, Kersten, Krystyna, Kiryk, Feliks, Szwed, Ryszard, 159–210. Częstochowa: Urząd Miasta Częstochowy.Google Scholar
Jansen, Willy, and Notermans, Catrien, eds. 2009. Moved by Mary: The Power of Pilgrimage in the Modern World. Farnham, England: Ashgate.Google Scholar
“Jasna Góra a Górny Śląsk: Materiał do Kazań i Przemówień, Rękopis o. A. Laziński, Archiwóm Paulinów w Krakowie na skałce 307” [“Jasna Gora and Upper Silesia: Material for Homilies and Speeches, Handwriting of Father A. Laziński, the Paulin Archive in Krakow on Plate 307.” N.d. 1999. In Jasna Góra w początkach II Rzeczypospolitej, edited by Jabłoński, Szczepan, 171. Częstochowa: Wyższa Szkoła Języków Obcych i Ekonomi.Google Scholar
Jarrar, Husni Adham. 1987. al-Ḥājj Amīn al-Husaynī: rāʾid jihād wa-batal al-qadīyah [Al-Hajj Amin al-Husayini: Pioneer of Jihad and Hero of the Cause]. Amman: Ḍār al-Ḍiyā.Google Scholar
Jbara, Taysir. 1985. Palestinian Leader Hajj Amin al-Husayni. Princeton, NJ: Kingston Press.Google Scholar
Kabaha, Mustafa. 2007. The Palestinian Press as a Shaper of Public Opinion, 1929–39. London: Valentine Mitchell.Google Scholar
Karch, Brendan. 2018. Nation and Loyalty in a German-Polish Borderland—Upper Silesia, 1848–1960. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Khalidi, Rashid. 1997. “The Formation of Palestinian Identity: The Critical Years, 1917–1923.” In Rethinking Nationalism in the Arab Middle East, edited by Jankowski, James P. and Gershoni, Israel, 171–190. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Mattar, Philip. 1992. The Mufti of Jerusalem: Al-Hajj Amin Al-Husayni and the Palestinian National Movement. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar
Matthews, Weldon C. 2006. Confronting an Empire, Constructing a Nation: Arab Nationalists and Popular Politics in Mandate Palestine. London: I.B. Tauris.Google Scholar
Mazza, Roberto. 2015. “Transforming the Holy City: From Communal Clashes to Urban Violence, the Nebi Musa Riots in 1920.” In Urban Violence in the Middle East: Changing Cityscapes in the Transformation from Empire to Nation State, edited by Freitag, Ulriche, 179–196. New York: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
“Memorandum of the Secretary of State for the Colonies.” (1937) 2001. April 30. Political Diaries. Vol. 3 of Political Diaries of the Arab World, edited by Jarman, Robert L., 4. Slough: Archive Editions.Google Scholar
Morris, Beni. 2001. Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist–Arab Conflict, 1881–2001. New York: Vintage.Google Scholar
“Narodowcy na Jasnej Górze. ‘Polski katolik musi być nacjonalistą.’” 2018. Gazeta Wyborcza, April 14. http://czestochowa.wyborcza.pl/czestochowa/7,48725,23271413,ks-kneblewski-na-jasnej-gorze-polski-katolik-musi-byc-nacjonalista.html?disableRedirects=true.Google Scholar
Niedzwiedz, Anna. 2016. “Competing Sacred Places: Making and Remaking of National Shrines in Contemporary Poland.” In Pilgrimage, Politics, and Place-Making in Eastern Europe: Crossing the Borders, edited by Eade, John and Katić, Mario, 79–102. London: Taylor and Francis.Google Scholar
“Odezwa z Jasnej Góry ‘Do Braci i Sióstr Górnoślązaków.’” (n.d.) 1999. In Jasna Góra w początkach II Rzeczypospolitej, edited by Jabłoński, Szczepan, 164–165. Częstochowa: Wyższa Szkoła Języków Obcych i Ekonomi.Google Scholar
Report, Palin. 1920. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Palin_ReportGoogle Scholar
Pappe, Ilan. 2010. The Rise and Fall of a Palestinian Dynasty: The Husaynis, 1700–1948, translated by Lotan, Yael. London: Saqi Books.Google Scholar
Pease, Neal. 2010. Rome’s Most Faithful Daughter: The Catholic Church and Independent Poland, 1914–1939. Athens: Ohio University Press.Google Scholar
Polak-Springer, Peter. 2015. Recovered Territory: A German-Polish Conflict over Land and Culture, 1919–1989. New York: Berghahn Books.Google Scholar
Porter, Brian. 2011. Faith and Fatherland: Catholicism, Modernity, and Poland. New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
“Report on the Political Situation in Palestine for April 1921.” (1921) 1998. Political Diaries. Vol. 1 of Political Diaries of the Arab World, edited by Jarman, Robert L., 80. Slough: Archive Editions.Google Scholar
Roberts, Nicholas E. 2017. Islam under the Palestine Mandate : Colonialism and the Supreme Muslim Council. London: I.B. Tauris.Google Scholar
Roshwald, Aviel. 2005. Ethnic Nationalism and the Fall of Empires: Central Europe, Russia and the Middle East, 1914–1923. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Segev, Tom. 2010. One Palestine, Complete: Jews and Arabs Under the British Mandate. London: Abacus.Google Scholar
Smith, Anthony. 2010. Chosen Peoples: Sacred Sources of National Identity. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Storrs, Ronald. (1925) 2002. “Political résumé.” Records of Jerusalem. In Vol. 2 of Records of Jerusalem, 1917–1971, 427. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Tibi, Bassam. 1997. Arab Nationalism: Between Islam and the Nation-State. 3rd ed. New York: St. Martin’s Press.Google Scholar
“The Jerusalem Riots.” (1920) 2002. April 26. Records of Jerusalem. In Vol. 1 of Records of Jerusalem, 1917–1971, 601. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Thiriet, Damien. 2002. Marks czy Maryja? Komuniści i Jasna Góra w apogeum stalinizmu (1950–1956) [Marx or Mary? Communists and Jasna Gora during the Apogee of Stalinism], translated by Pysiak, Jerzy. Warszawa: TRIO.Google Scholar
Wilson, T. K. 2010. Frontiers of Violence: Conflict and Identity in Ulster and Upper Silesia, 1918–1922. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Zahra, Tara. 2010. “Imagined Noncommunities: National Indifference as a Category of Analysis.” Slavic Review 69 (1): 93–119.Google Scholar
Zilbarman, Ifrah. 2012. “Renewal of Pilgrimage to Nabi Musa.” In Sacred Space in Israel and Palestine: Religion and Politics, edited by Breger, Marshall J., Reiter, Yitzhak, and Hammer, Leonard, 103–115. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar