ABSTRACT
During the medieval and early modern periods in what would become Germany, Jews were denied legal membership in the polities they inhabited. The first dimension in Germany can be located in a history of anti-Jewish legal restrictions, including the denial of full citizenship and restrictions on residency and freedom of movement, as well as restrictions on participation in certain economic sectors. The discussion of the second dimension shows many Germans doubted that Jews could or would assimilate fully into a unified Germany by abandoning their separate Jewish identities and practices. In pre-modern times, anti-Jewish beliefs and attitudes were almost exclusively based on religious antagonism, and thus constituted religious Jew-hatred or anti-Judaism. The anti-Jewish attitudes were reinforced by, many of the exclusionary practices. The exclusionary understanding of the German political community survived until the Nazi era. The history of separating Jews and Germans, and the lack of genuine integration between the two groups, left Germany fragmented along German-Jewish lines.
