The Political Geography of Judaism in Late Imperial Kiev

Abstract

This article explores the institutional religious life of the Jews of late imperial Kiev. Jewish residence in Kiev was restricted by the state, and Jewish life was governed by a complex web of government regulations. Drawing on archival documents such as petitions submitted to the government by groups of working-class Kiev Jews, the author’s research investigates the strategies that Jews employed to establish synagogues and other religious institutions and the various challenges that they faced in doing so. It also places this history within the larger context of organized religion in the Russian Empire by drawing comparisons to parallel phenomena among various Christian denominations in the empire.