emancipation

(ĭ-măn'sə-pā'shən)
n.

1. The act or an instance of emancipating.
2. The condition of being emancipated.

emancipationist e·man'ci·pa'tion·ist n.

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freedom to assume certain legal responsibilities normally associated only with adults, said of a minor who is granted this freedom by a court. If both parents die in an accident, for instance, the 16-year-old eldest son may be emancipated by a judge to act as guardian for his younger brothers and sisters.

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noun

The state of not being in confinement or servitude: freedom, liberation, liberty, manumission. See free/unfree.

n. 1. the action or process of setting free, especially from legal, social, or political restrictions.

2. the action or process of delivering from slavery.

See the Introduction, Abbreviations and Pronunciation for further details.

The granting of civil rights to Jews. For many centuries, the Jews lived as second-class citizens in both the Christian and Muslim worlds. In the Western world, signs of new attitudes began to emerge in the late 17th century and became stronger with the growth of the Enlightenment in the 18th century. New national states in the Protestant world now began to differentiate between Church and State. The Protestant adoption of the "Old Testament" (largely ignored in the Catholic world) also led to a new understanding of Jews and Judaism. Debate raged between those who held that the Jews could not be assimilated and that their faith and practices prevented them from becoming part of the same society as Gentiles and those who felt that given the chance Jews would become useful and productive citizens contributing to the countries where they lived. Among Jews themselves, there were differences of opinion. The outstanding pioneer of Jewish emancipation was Moses Mendelssohn, who, emerging from a ghetto childhood, became one of Prussia's most respected intellectuals while remaining an observant Jew. Others felt that emancipation would lead to ASSIMILATION and that isolation in the ghetto had in fact meant the preservation of Jewish tradition. They pointed to the fate of Mendelssohn's descendants, almost every one of whom converted to Christianity.

The first breakthrough came in the United States with the new state constitution of Virginia in 1776, which stated that "all men are entitled to the free exercise of religion according to the dictates of their conscience." The act establishing religious liberty in 1786 was phrased to include Jews, and the United States Constitution provided for religious freedom through Article VI and the First Amendment (1787).

At the time, however, this affected only a small number of Jews; more significant was the French Revolution and its consequences. Already in 1789 corporate autonomy was abolished for religious and other groups, which meant that the Jews lost powers of self-government. In 1791 they received the full rights of French citizenship. The Jews became loyal French patriots but this did not affect their religious feelings. Napoleon turned his attention to the position of the Jews in light of their new status, and in 1806 summoned an Assembly of Notables whom he confronted with difficult questions regarding possible contradictions between their loyalty to the State and their devotion to Judaism (e.g., Can Jews marry Christians? How does Jewish law regard French Christians?). The Notables found appropriate answers, emphasizing that rabbinical authority was only spiritual. Regarding mixed marriages, they replied that the ban applied to heathens in ancient times but not to France in their day. Napoleon then summoned a "Great Sanhedrin" in 1807, in which a majority of rabbis were included among the delegates, with a request to give official sanction to the decisions of the Notables. The Sanhedrin confirmed almost all the answers of the Notables. Napoleon received assurances on the basic issues---that rabbis no longer had jurisdiction in civil and judicial matters and that Jews no longer regarded themselves as a separate nation or hoped to leave their country of residence and return to Zion. He established a new structure of Jewish life on a purely religious basis (see CONSISTORY). The French Revolutionary and Napoleonic armies spread revolutionary ideals of equality and civil rights for all to other countries throughout Europe. In Italy, for example, the Napoleonic armies, together with the local population and the Jews, enthusiastically tore down the gates of the ghettoes.

The process of Jewish emancipation was temporarily reversed with the defeat of Napoleon, but processes had been set in motion that were irreversible and by the 1870s, emancipation had reached virtually all the Jews of Central and Western Europe. The impact on Jewish life was tremendous. Jews now found themselves faced with new challenges, notably that of living amongst Christians and synthesizing their Jewish culture with that of their surroundings. Inevitably, there was a process of acculturation, which often led to assimilation and estrangement from the Jewish community. Many cases were reported of conversion to CHRISTIANITY, though often---as in the case of the German Jewish poet Heinrich Heine---this was manifestly for social advancement rather than out of religious conviction. Jewish religious life was also affected. REFORM JUDAISM was founded in response to the modernization of Jewish life and to keep within the fold those Jews who regarded traditional Jewish life as anachronistic. Orthodoxy too was affected and certain elements adjusted themselves to the new realities, notably through the development of NEO-ORTHODOXY.Emancipation did not reach the Jews of Eastern Europe until the March 1917 Revolution. Until then, Jews continued to live in their traditional frameworks. After the Bolshevik Revolution, Jewish equality was coupled with a harsh campaign against Judaism (and other religions) and religious education was outlawed. Although traces of Judaism remained (and in the Asiatic parts of the USSR Jewish religion continued to be openly practiced), the surge of Jewish identification after World War II was more nationally than religiously motivated.In Muslim countries, emancipation was delayed. The colonial powers brought it to North Africa and in the wake of the breakup of the Ottoman Empire, Jews in those lands received rights in the first part of the 20th century. In the more distant Muslim lands, such as Yemen, Jews were never emancipated and only knew full civil rights when they left those countries and settled in Israel. Notwithstanding a certain secularization in some of the Muslim lands, the Jewish religious frameworks remained largely unaffected until the Jews left these lands after 1948.

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A term applied specifically to the freeing of slaves from bondage, but which is used more generally in relation to the liberation of any person or group from social or legal restraint.

This entry contains information applicable to United States law only.

The act or process by which a person is liberated from the authority and control of another person.

The term is primarily employed in regard to the release of a minor by his or her parents, which entails a complete relinquishment of the right to the care, custody, and earnings of such child, and a repudiation of parental obligations. The emancipation may be express — pursuant to a voluntary agreement between parent and child — or implied from conduct that denotes consent. It may be absolute or conditional, total or partial. A partial emancipation disengages a child for only a portion of the period of minority, or from only a particular aspect of the parent's rights or duties.

There is no determinate age when a child becomes emancipated; it usually, but not automatically, occurs upon the attainment of the age of majority.

See: parent and child.

A cynical view of the world by Ambrose Bierce

n.

A bondman's change from the tyranny of another to the despotism of himself.

    He was a slave:  at word he went and came;
        His iron collar cut him to the bone.
    Then Liberty erased his owner's name,
        Tightened the rivets and inscribed his own.
                                                                  G.J.

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For a list of words related to emancipation, see:

• Philosophies, Principles, and Parties - emancipation: granting of freedom, esp. from slavery

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