Talk:Litvaks

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Lithuania is and Belarus and Smolensk, and Briansk and even Pskov
Lithuania had Lithuanians who spoke and polish church and Slavic church language and real Lithuanian language, but the nation was one and the same and this nation lived together with Yiddish speaking Jews, and this nation until occupation in 1773 lived in 700 000 km2 area (some parts were occupied and annexed by russians earlier, some in Kiev Rus times). So when we are talking today about Lithuania's Jews, we must include and annexed territories and a second half of Lithuania's nation today's Belarus people.

Thus, we must include and such people as actors Michael Douglas and Kirk Douglas and Harrison Ford, and Lisa Kudrow90.219.188.76 (talk) 18:23, 16 December 2010 (UTC)

It is my understanding that the Litvak cultural area was considerably larger than the borders of modern Lithuania. Can anyone confirm/explain this in the article?--Pharos 19:12, 4 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Tony Judt (english Author) is said to be a decentant of a lithuanian rabbi. Maybe a famous one.Peppermintschnapps (talk) 19:00, 6 January 2010 (UTC)

My father's family lived in Horodok, Belarus, which I believe changed hands among Russia, Poland and Lithuania. Modern maps -- even those purporting to show previous historical territorial boundaries -- are often much more definitive than documentary history supports. Jules Siegel 10:12, 13 Jan 2006

Map of present-day Lithuania ilustrates a historical article. It should be replaced by a historical one.Xx236 08:44, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Rabbi Krinsky is actually Chabad rabbi, so description about his physical removal by two men hired by him is an oxymoron.

Litvak cultural area basically coincides with Grand Duchy of Lithuania borders ca. 15th century, "from the Baltic to the Black Sea" as Lithuanians are fond of saying. That includes modern Lithuania, Belarus and a large portion of Ukraine. The Volhynian schism or the Chassidim/Orthodox conflict happened later. Other famous Lithuanian Jews include Emma Goldman and Roseanne Arnold-Barr. Monica Lewinsky is also mentioned sometimes, whose mother's maiden name is reportedly Wilenski (Vilna). Trotsky also took his stage-name from a Jewish Lithuanian family he stayed with named Trotsky, which is supposed to derive from the place-name Trakai, the ancient capital of the Lithuanian Grand Duchy. Solly Grinor writers about this in his book "Light One Candle."81.7.91.43 10:44, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

Modern day Haredim
There are indeed many subgroups within Ashkenazi Jewry, including descendants of German, Polish, Polish Hasidim, Lithuanian, Galician, Galician Hasidim, Hungarian, Hungarian Hasidim, Russian, Russian Hasidim, etc. Jewish communities. In the modern day (Israeli) Haredi culture, however, the sole groupings are Lithuanian and Hasidic. Put differently, within the (Israeli) Haredi world, anyone not Hasidic or Sefaradic is Lithuanian, irrespective of ancestors or outlook on life. Although these "Lithuanians" are affiliated with yeshivas, some of which are successors to Lithuanian institutions, they themselves are not in any way Lithuanian. In reality, their approaches to Judaism and to life draw as much on Polish, Hungarian, and general Hasidic ideals as Lithuanian ideals.

Similarly, it is inappropriate to list rosh yeshivas as Lithuanian leaders when they are more accurately described as yeshiva leaders whose Israeli constituents have appropriated the Lithuanian label for themselves. Would you categorize the late Rabbis Moshe Feinstein, Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, or Joseph B. Soloveitchik as Lithuanian? Only one of them was of Lithuanian descent or mentality, and he was the one least associated with the modern "Lithuanian" movement. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.237.215.95 (talk) 01:09, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

Image copyright problem with Image:Vilna Gaon portrait.gif
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Louis Ginzberg?
Hey, wasn't Louis Ginzberg from Lithuania, claiming to be related to the great Vilna Gaon? Okay, while I know I could take a few minutes and figure out how to add the name to the list, I thought I would use this oppurtunity to say how much I liked his book "On Jewish Law and Lore". While I am a non-believer, I thought the book was a real eye-opener (not to say how great the narrative is) about Jewish history and thought. Ginzberg says that "allegorical interpretation" is a thoroughly Jewish dread. (This is the Ginzberg talk page, right?) Teetotaler 5 December, 2009  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.67.81.197 (talk) 06:12, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

Intro
This article begins with the sentence: "Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks are Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews with roots in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania..." Forgive me if this is an ignorant question, but wouldn't Lithuanian Jews, by definition, all be Ashkenazic Jews rather than Sephardic? I didn't change the article because there may be more to the subject than I know, or thought I knew. Neutron (talk) 20:27, 10 November 2010 (UTC)


 * This might be one of those things that is less binary (=more interesting) than one might think. So I'd let that sentence stand. The editor may have been working from sources like this -'...the emergence of a growing cadre of younger scholars who were ethnically Sephardic but culturally converted to the worldview and and religious ideals of the haredi, "Lithuanian,", musar-type yeshivot." More complexities here . Novickas (talk) 16:45, 11 November 2010 (UTC)


 * We still need to distinguish between (1) descendants of actual Lithuanians and (2) the modern Israeli use of "Litvish", i.e. all those Haredim who follow an Ashkenazic non-Hasidic style of life and learning and are associated with certain yeshivot. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 10:10, 12 November 2010 (UTC)


 * Thanks, your edit clarified. Novickas (talk) 18:05, 12 November 2010 (UTC)
 * Agreed, I think Sirmyles(etc)'s edit is a definite improvement and clears up the issue I raised. Neutron (talk) 18:26, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

Copied material
This article contains material copied from the Wikipedia article Lithuanian_people. Novickas (talk) 19:09, 12 November 2010 (UTC)

Famous Jews with Lithuanian origin or parentage
I doubt keeping such lists makes sense. Imagine each ethnicity page starts having lists of people, whose grand-grand-grand-parente were, e.g., Poles or Manchu or from Muscovy. I suggest to delete this section. Lokys dar Vienas (talk) 22:25, 21 January 2011 (UTC)

Emigrations of the 1890's?
Bit of a gap in the history, isn't there? I thought the big emigrations of Lithuanian Jews to New York around 1890 were viewed as most significant, both in Lithuania and America -  and not only for fans of Al Jolson and Eddie Cantor! 86.160.15.49 (talk) 01:29, 1 April 2011 (UTC)

Map incorrect
The map illustrating the article excludes Livonia. Historically there has not been such thing as Latvian Jews. Rothko, born in what is today Latvia, was a Litvak. I suggest updating the map accordingly to reflect the true boundaries of where Lithuanian Jews have lived. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.128.204.90 (talk) 00:09, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

The Litvak-Galitzianer feud
Hi. There's this one thing which I'm trying to figure out and which, while absent from the article, could benefit it. Namely, having noticed that the Litvak-Galitzianer feud was closely tied to the Hasidic-Misnagi dispute, I'm looking to find out whether the former predated the rise of Hasidism. Notice that it's said in the article, “[T]he Galitzianers ... thought of them as cold fish. They, in turn, disdained Galitzianers as irrational and uneducated.” Did that state of affairs come along as a consequence of the Hasidic movement, or does its history go back further than the birth of the Baal Shem Tov? 213.109.230.96 (talk) 00:26, 7 November 2013 (UTC)

Proposed merge with Famous Litvaks of Lithuanian origin
This list looks like a category. It does not have any content, beside listing famous Lithuanian Jews. It's clearly belong to Lithuanian Jews article. Arthistorian1977 (talk) 08:35, 30 May 2015 (UTC)


 * No subject knowledge, but obvious is obvious. Yes it should be merged into Lithuanian Jews. Joseph2302 (talk) 10:51, 30 May 2015 (UTC)

Incorrect use of two meanings of "Lithuania"
Two meanings of "Lithuania" and "Lithuanian" are confusingly merged throughout the article. For instance, in the first paragraph, Litvaks are defined as Jews with roots in Grand Duchy of Lithuania, while the second paragraph deals exclusively with the state of Lithuania, a new, mostly ethnically Lithuanian state comprising a small fraction of "Líte's" territory and in its ideology distancing itself from the Grand Duchy's heritage, with links to Holocaust in modern Lithuania only (omitting most other territories). The same holds for other sections of the article. Proposition: create two articles, one for Litvaks as they are most commonly defined (Jews from Grand Duchy's territories), and the other for Lithuanian Jews from modern Lithuania's territories. Another option: expand current article to include all Litvaks (from modern Belarus, Ukraine, parts of Latvia and Poland).89.10.188.12 (talk) 18:10, 10 September 2016 (UTC)

Pronunciation of the holam
The article states that Lithuanian Jews pronounce the holam as "ej." What is this sound? "oy"? It seems to me that the IPA representation should rather be "ɔɪ". Michael Sandler (talk) 08:58, 22 August 2017 (UTC)


 * No. [ɔɪ] is the Polish pronunciation. The Lithuanian sound is like the "ey" in English "they". (Oddly enough, it is also an "e" sound in some forms of Yemenite Hebrew.) One doesn't hear it a great deal nowadays. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 09:51, 22 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Would "eɪ" be better than "ej" in the article? Michael Sandler (talk) 10:15, 22 August 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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Proposed merge with Litvishe
They are about the same subject. תנא קמא (talk) 10:06, 1 August 2019 (UTC)
 * Speedy agree. The Lithuanian Jews is even a redirect for Litvish, so why would Litvishe be different? Debresser (talk) 14:47, 1 August 2019 (UTC)
 * @PiMaster3, you expressed basically the same idea on Talk:Litvishe. Debresser (talk) 22:20, 1 August 2019 (UTC)
 * , You are honored to close the discussion and do the page merge. Thank you! תנא קמא (talk) 11:57, 9 August 2019 (UTC)
 * I disagree with the proposed merge. The concept of Litvishe Jews is clearly distinct from that of Lithuanian Jews.--Jahaza (talk) 17:43, 23 January 2020 (UTC)
 * I agree with you. What I don't understand is why we shouldn't merge Litvishe into Misnagdim? Debresser (talk) 00:09, 24 January 2020 (UTC)
 * On balance, I support the original proposal, to merge Litvishe into Lithuanian Jews, with the proviso that Litvishe should have its own section (as a subset of the Lithuanian Jews), but the alternative merge target is also fine. The Misnagdim article (and term) describes a population in the 18th and 19th century, who now identify as Litvishe. So, while as a merge from the older term Misnagdim into the modern concept of Litvishe might work, I think that the historical context of the Misnagdim makes that group independently notable. Klbrain (talk) 06:18, 17 August 2020 (UTC)

Agree. Merge and explain the (slight) difference. Zezen (talk) 08:18, 25 August 2020 (UTC)

I agree with that merging Litvishe into Misnagdim makes more sense. The concept and connotation clearly implies an ideological/hashkafic affiliation rather than roots in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which many self-described Litvishe folks do not have. (For the same reason, Litvaks should redirect to Misnagdim rather than Lithuanian Jews imo.) But either way is fine since the Lithuanian Jews page acknowledges the vagueness of the term. Benhisoka (talk) 23:46, 28 August 2020 (UTC)

Language
Could you add a section on language here? How did these people speak at home, how did they write, did they speak Lithuanian, Russian? Antepali (talk) 07:26, 4 May 2020 (UTC)

Dubious Tag on The Jewish Population of Vilnius
There's no reason listed anywhere on the talk page behind this. Jewish Virtual Library seems to be an acceptable source by wiki standards for issues like Jewish historical demographics. I'm deleting the tags; if someone has a better argument for including them than "none," they're welcome to replace it, but for now they're gone. 73.145.230.216 (talk) 14:21, 1 July 2020 (UTC)

Jewish Virtual Library
This is not considered RS, and should not be cited. Also citations should be made in the article, not the edit summary.Pipsally (talk) 15:20, 30 July 2021 (UTC)


 * removing jewish virtual library. It is indeed strongly discouraged; it cites wikipedia, for one thing. There was indeed a very high proportion of Jewish residents and the other roughly half was Polish, so it shouldn't be difficult to source this elsewhere.Wilno, as it was called then, had a Jewish community of nearly 100,000, about 45% of the city's total population. Elinruby (talk) 11:32, 11 January 2024 (UTC)

Check your fins
So I was s in a car and my dad said he forgot something so we have to drive all the way back to my house and it was far far away so next time you go somewhere always remember to check your fins 2A02:C7E:815:A900:A917:C3B6:E475:61D8 (talk) 18:53, 25 April 2022 (UTC)

Regions with significant popluation
Why are only South Africa and Lithuania in this table?? It makes it seem like there are practically no Lithuanian Jews in existence anymore, which of course is completely incorrect... FlyingScotsman72 (talk) 22:38, 23 September 2022 (UTC)

Requested move 30 August 2023

 * The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: moved. (closed by non-admin page mover)  ❯❯❯  Raydann  (Talk)   17:25, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

Lithuanian Jews → Litvaks – Litvaks is the name of a historical, ethno-cultural group of Jews living in the area of the pale of settlement, mainly the territories of present-day Lithuania, Latvia, Belarus, northern Ukraine and north-eastern Poland. It is not the same area as today's Lithuaniaor the historical Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The current name is misleading because it suggests that we are talking about Jews living in Lithuania. Articles devoted to this group on encyclopaedias on Jewish history and culture do not confuse the two terms and are labelled "Litvaks".

YIVO: Litvak Delet: Litwacy Sztetl: Litwacy Visuotinė lietuvių enciklopedija: litvakai Marcelus (talk) 11:53, 30 August 2023 (UTC) — Relisting. – robertsky (talk) 15:34, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Move from Lithuanian Jews to Litvaks. I disagree with Marcelus' statement that the territory inhabited by the Litvaks was not congruous with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and other statements as well. Regardless, my reasoning for supporting such a move is because Litvaks are a clearer subject than whatever the scope of this article is. "Lithuanian Jews" (in the sense of Jews in Lithuania) =/= Litvaks. "Lithuanian Jews" is a vague term that can mean several things and this ambiguity should preferably be avoided. Ideally, the topic of Jews that are now in Lithuania should be treated in an article called Jews in Lithuania. After all, not all Litvaks would fall under the scope of an article about Jews in Lithuania.--Cukrakalnis (talk) 16:09, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * @Marcelus I recommend that you post this in the relevant Wikiprojects so that we get more input from others.--Cukrakalnis (talk) 16:10, 4 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Note: WikiProject Lithuania has been notified of this discussion. – robertsky (talk) 15:34, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Note: WikiProject Judaism has been notified of this discussion. – robertsky (talk) 15:35, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Note: WikiProject Jewish history has been notified of this discussion. – robertsky (talk) 15:35, 7 September 2023 (UTC)
 * Support Move to Litvaks with potentially a rewrite to the intro to make it very clear that this is a primarily cultural designation and not simply a territorial one nor, as you say, one that corresponds to modern-day Lithuanian nationality or residence. Dan Carkner (talk) 20:04, 8 September 2023 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.
 * Weak support. I don't see much difference, but nom's argument is somewhat compelling, and it is also supported by Cukrakalnis, so it seems uncontroversial and supported by editors with good grasp of the topic. I'll note that Polish wiki uses a similar term; Lithuanian uses the "Lithuanian Jews" but in the lead states "Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks", and what I can translate from Hebrew suggests they use a one word similar to Litvaks too. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus&#124; reply here 03:32, 14 September 2023 (UTC)

Litvaks in the Polish army
@Marcelus - Ctrl+F in for "Lithuanian Jews" and you should find the section being referenced. This is what it says:

"When Germany defeated the Polish army it captured altogether 60,000 to 65,000 Jewish soldiers. The Jews were immediately separated from the prisoner-of-war population for harsh treatment and many died, some 25,000, by the spring of 1940.

In late 1939 the Germans began releasing Jewish prisoners. These demobilized prisoners were sent to Polish ghettos and most perished, suffering the fate of the ghetto population.

However, the Lithuanian Jews were treated as ordinary prisoners-of-war and not singled out as Jews for harsh treatment or demobilization. Of the Polish soldiers who were from Lithuania 72 survived to liberation." The further sources given are "Sources: Tec, Defiance; Encyclopedia of the Holocaust; Ran, Jerusalem of Lithuania." Maybe it would be worthwhile to check the original sources for more information? Cukrakalnis (talk) 14:45, 15 September 2023 (UTC)


 * Removed text: Quoting the research done by H. G. Adler into Poland during World War II called Theresienstadt 1941–1945, there were "80,000 Jews conscripted into Poland's independent army prior to the German invasion who identified themselves as Lithuanian Jews". Using different sources Holocaust researchers claim there were between 60,000 and 65,000 Jewish soldiers in Poland's independent army who identified themselves as Lithuanian Jews isn't supported by the source.
 * Source doesn't say anything about Adler's research. Source doesn't say anything about 80k Litvaks in Polish ranks also. Similiary 60-65k number refers to all Jewish POVs not solely Litvaks (that's a clear misinterpretation of the source). Marcelus (talk) 14:52, 15 September 2023 (UTC)