Yiddish, the Language of Love: Isaac Wetzlar's Libes Briv (1748/49) in the Context of Pietism, Enlightenment and Ethical Literature

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In 1748/49, the educated Jewish businessman Isaac Wetzlar (1685/90-1751) of Celle in Lower Saxony, completed a religious-ethical reform treatise in Yiddish, "Libes briv" (Love letter). Shortly before his death, Wetzlar addressed his Central European Jewish brothers and sisters with sharp social criticism, including an urgent call for religious-ethical renewal, and proposals for the reform of Jewish society. Apart from educational reforms, Wetzlar argues for a return to the essential values of Judaism: devoted prayer, penitence, good deeds and brotherly love. Based on the "Libes briv" and other selected 18th-century works, the interdisciplinary project explores the relationship of Central European Judaism with contemporary German Pietism. In both form and content, Wetzlar's "Libes briv" seems indeed to be influenced by the Christian "Love Letter" (often written in Yiddish) that Pietists employed in their quest of missionizing the Jews of Central Europe "with a carrot in lieu of the stick." Wetzlar adopts theological concepts and ideals of Pietist religiosity and lifestyle. The comparative analysis of additional texts of ethical literature (mussar) and the early Haskalah respectively (written in Yiddish, Hebrew, German and Dutch) in the context of Pietism contributes to the better understanding of the Jewish concepts for social reform and religious renewal in general, and an educational reform in particular, which are strikingly similar to Pietist reform programs. Besides a new cultural and literary historical classification of "Libes briv" which, while never printed, has come down to us in a rich manuscript tradition, the project will prepare a critical and annotated edition on the basis of all extant manuscripts, with a German translation.