Holy Dirt

Title: Holy Dirt

Location: Jerusalem

Document: Brooklyn Times Union

Time: 1904

This is the first rule. Make it well known among them that no one has any permission to export dirt of Eretz Yisrael under any circumstances, on behalf of any community or individual, in any country under our jurisdiction, unless they obtain express permission from us to do so. Anyone who fails to comply with this measure and is caught exporting dirt of Eretz Yisrael without our permission will be sanctioned by us and not receive a single prutah of chalukah funds from us.

It is your responsibility to adhere strictly to this regulation, as well as to enforce it by ensuring that no member of your community violates this measure. You must warn everyone of the consequences that will be sustained for engaging in this practice. And you must duly inform us of the names of anyone who henceforth engages in this activity in order for us to implement the punitive measures against that individual as enumerated above.

—The Organization of Pekidim and Amarkalim on behalf of Eretz Hakodesh in Amsterdam, in a letter dated 6 Iyar 1852 to the administrators of Kollel Hod (Holland and Deutschland) in Jerusalem.

Fundraising to support Torah scholars in the Old Yishuv differed both from the time-honored ideal of that cause and from ordinary philanthropic support for the poor. Because the recipients were both talmidei chachamim and poor, financial assistance to the Old Yishuv wasn’t understood by the providers as being limited to the realm of philanthropy. It was rather understood as an act of reciprocity. Members of the Old Yishuv were provided with material needs by the Jewish communities of the Diaspora, while the holy scholars provided spiritual goods in return.

The members of Old Yishuv society saw themselves, and were in turn viewed by others, as an avant-garde representing the Jewish People in the Holy Land. By not engaging in material pursuits and instead focusing exclusively on Torah and avodah in Eretz Yisrael; praying on behalf of the klal at holy sites and graves of tzaddikim; performing the mitzvos exclusive to Eretz Yisrael; being sheltered from the social changes sweeping through 19th-century Diaspora Jewish life, and thus serving as a last enclave of holiness unaffected by modernity and its challenges, these beneficiaries facilitated a relationship between giver and receiver that constituted a functional transaction of goods, rather than purely an act of tzedakah for the needy.

The problem with this economic model was that while the giver provided material goods that were quantifiable and tangible, the spiritual goods they received in return were more abstract. As a result, the shadarim (Old Yishuv fundraisers) ran the risk of appearing as generic schnorrers, rather than representing a spiritual elite and partaking in a two-way transaction.

To overcome this challenge, the Old Yishuv developed a souvenir industry in the 19th century that supplemented the spiritual goods with symbolic relics that expressed the transaction in a more tangible fashion. Certificates of recognition for donors, all sorts of Judaica artifacts, artwork from Eretz Yisrael, and a host of other souvenirs were given to donors around the world. Obtaining relics from the Holy Land was a common practice among Christian pilgrims and communities for centuries, and it likely influenced the Jewish community in the 19th century. An entire industry developed around these items, and aside from presenting gifts to donors, entrepreneurs initiated a growing trade in the export and sale of Holy Land souvenirs across the Diaspora.