Napoleon never delivered the proclamation. He was forced to lift the siege prematurely and withdraw, due in large part to British intervention. His intentions, however, at least at face value, clearly pointed in a positive direction for the Jewish community.
Further yet, Napoleon introduced his Civil Code in 1804, offering the Revolution’s gains to Jews, as well as to Protestants and Free Masons.
My primary desire was to liberate the Jews and make them full citizens. I wanted to confer upon them all the legal rights of equality, liberty and fraternity as was enjoyed by the Catholics and Protestants. It is my wish that the Jews be treated like brothers as if we were all part of Judaism. Jews should participate as equals, like all other religions, as permitted by our laws.
Soon thereafter he abolished special taxes levied against German Jews and gave them, for the first time, civic and political equality. In fact, everywhere the French sword advanced, Jewish freedom and liberty followed, moving progressively throughout Europe over the next century. By 1919, every European country, with the sole exception of Spain, had emancipated its Jews.
To be sure, Napoleon’s liberation of the Jews did not go unopposed by the gentile community, both inside France and without. This may explain his 1806 declaration remitting all debts owed to Jewish creditors of Alsace-Lorraine for one year, a devastating blow to local Jewish creditors.
In truth, Jewish emancipation in France did not emanate from Napoleon’s concern for the much-oppressed Jews, but rather from his desire to assimilate them. His was a benign solution to the Jewish question that so troubled the enlightened French.
[Expulsion] is not the way to solve the Jewish question. I will never accept any proposals that will obligate the Jewish people to leave France, because to me the Jews are the same as any other citizen in our country. It takes weakness to chase them out of the country, but it takes strength to assimilate them.
Certainly, Napoleon was still struggling to define his relationship with this “vexatious, irredeemable” people when he summoned the aforementioned one hundred eleven Jewish notables, representing Jews of all shades and backgrounds, to Paris in May 1806.
They met from July of that year until the following April. Their mandate was to answer twelve questions put to them about Judaism and its relationship with other nations. Once the answers were formulated, the larger Assembly of Notables would require ratification by a “Sanhedrin” of seventy-one consisting of both scholars and laymen.
The questions dealt with such topics as the permissibility of polygamy and divorce, the status of mixed marriages, Jewish attitudes toward France, judiciary power, and usury.
Beyond his exploration into basic differences between Judaism and Christianity, Napoleon was eager to answer this most essential question: Do Jews consider themselves first as Jews or as Frenchmen? The answer would dramatize the complicated and traumatic clash between traditional Judaism and the forces of Enlightenment.
Assimilated Jews welcomed the opportunity to display their true loyalties. Traditional Jews, however, were far less enthusiastic. To them, the notion of an unholy Napoleon renewing the sacred Sanhedrin for personal purposes was sacrilege. In any case, what tangible benefit could such a gathering offer them?
The Jewish delegates responded with wisdom, skill and diplomacy. With the first chief rabbi of France, David Sinzheim at its head, the Assembly/Sanhedrin effectively struck a delicate balance between satisfying Napoleon and adhering to strict halacha.
Framing a “social pact between the people of God and the people of France,” they declared that only France would claim the Jews’ political allegiance. Jewish law, though clearly binding, was defined as exclusively religious, with civil courts taking precedence over sacred tribunals in areas of conflict.
