Opera on the Move in the Nordic Countries during the Long 19th ...

Excursus I: Who is Jewish?
Rachel the Jewess in Copenhagen
231
During the nineteenth century many European Jews converted to Christianity.
For some, the conversion could be seen as a logical step in a process
of cultural “modernisation”, while for others, such a process ought not to
involve conversion, but rather a reforming of Jewish religious and cultural
traditions. 15 Conversion was also part of the process of political and cultural
integration into the dominant Christian culture, a move that could make
life much easier with respect to education, work opportunities and marriage
(Schwarz Lausten 2006, 16ff and 202ff). In Denmark Jews in principle
had been “free citizens” since the so-called Frihedsbrev (“Letter of
Freedom”) of 1814, i.e. they were allowed to work in all trades. 16 In reality
this freedom was quite restricted, however, and anti-Semitic sentiments
were widespread. Literary campaigns against Jews in 1813 and 1816 and a
violent pogrom in 1819 marked perhaps the most explicit manifestations of
such sentiments, yet anti-Semitism is detectable throughout and beyond
the period under discussion here (see, again, Schwarz Lausten 2006 and
also Tudvad 2010 and Borchsenius 1968). While this is not the place to
analyse or consider the many complex aspects of this history of cultural
change and discrimination, a few questions do seem to be relevant to the
present discussion. One has to do with the appreciation in Christian society
of conversion, not only as a phenomenon that concerns an individual’s formal
religious identity, but also as concerns that individual’s cultural identity,
15 Cf. (Botstein 1991).
16 This included employment in public institutions, in principle at least, yet it appears
that interpretations of the Frihedsbrev could vary on this point. As far as the Royal
Theatre is concerned, the employment of Jewish singers or actors seems to have been
controversial, and it may have been the general understanding for several decades after
1814 that Jews had no legal access to these jobs. In September 1827 two sisters, Ida
and Emilie d’Fonseca, whose father was Jewish, were employed at the Theatre, and a
third sister, Julie, was employed in 1833. Ida d’Fonseca, an alto with a dark timbre, was
known, nationally and internationally, as one of the foremost singers in Denmark at the
time. Tellingly, when a reviewer in Kjøbenhavnsposten on 15 January 1829 complained
that many Copenhageners were unjustly prejudiced against “Israelites” on the stage
and that the fine talents of the two d’Fonseca sisters ought to persuade them to think
otherwise, the directors of the Royal Theatre felt obliged to issue an official denial that
the d’Fonseca sisters were in fact Jewish: on 19 January a statement was published
in Kjøbenhavnsposten that the sisters were of Christian birth and religious persuasion
(Ahlgren Jensen 2007, 75). Martin Schwarz Lausten quotes the Jewish catechist, A.D.
Cohen who stated in 1837 that no Jewish person had obtained public employment
in a number of central types of jobs so far – in teaching, governmental institutions,
the army, etc. Cohen adds, however, that this was not because the King or the law
prevented such employment from happening, but rather because tradition and habit
worked against it (Schwarz Lausten 2006, 16).