The Jewish-Russian bacteriologist and immunologist who developed vaccines for cholera and tuberculosis, led the fight against epidemics in India, and worked to preserve Jewish identity (although he recommended that the yeshivots he donated to teach students practical subjects) alongside extensive philanthropy.
Vladimir Chavkin (Valdemar Chavkin, and in his later years Mordechai-Zeev Chavkin), a prominent Russian-French bacteriologist, immunologist, and epidemiologist, was born on March 15, 1860 in Odessa, to the family of a teacher at a government Jewish school and his wife, the daughter of a Hebrew teacher who worked at the same school. He studied in a classroom, and in 1879 graduated from the gymnasium in Berdyansk (then the Russian Empire). In 1884 he graduated from the Imperial Novorossiysk University in Odessa (Doctor of Sciences), where his teacher was Ilya Menchikov, Nobel Prize laureate in Physiology and Medicine (1908), whose mother was Jewish.
During his student years, Chavkin joined a circle of revolutionary Narodniks (narod is the Russian word for people, nation), for which he was twice expelled from the university and was arrested. However, after the Narodniks turned to terror, he abandoned political activity. In 1881, during the anti-Jewish riots in Odessa, while taking part in Jewish self-defense, Chavkin was wounded.
As a Jew, Chavkin did not have the opportunity to conduct scientific research in Russia. The university administration, striving to pave the way for the talented student to a scientific career, suggested that Chavkin convert to Orthodoxy, but he rejected this offer. Due to the anti-Semitic restriction prohibiting a Jew from becoming a professor in Russia, Chavkin was forced to emigrate to Switzerland in 1888. There he began working at the University of Geneva as an associate professor of physiology. In 1889, he joined his teacher Mechnikov and Louis Pasteur in Paris, at the newly established Pasteur Institute. Chavkin soon received the position of associate professor at the local university in Lausanne. The main focus of his work was protecting the human body from infectious diseases using serums and vaccines. By 1892, Chavkin had created the first effective vaccine against cholera, proving its safety for humans on his own body.
At that time, medicine was powerless against cholera. The British government allowed Hevkin to use the vaccine in India, where a cholera epidemic was spreading, claiming hundreds of thousands of lives. In 1893, Hevkin established the production of cholera vaccine and participated in the vaccination of over 42,000 people. As a result, the mortality rate from cholera decreased tenfold.
In 1896, a plague broke out in Bombay and its environs. Chavkin quickly created the first effective vaccine against the plague, proving its safety first on his own body, and then for several years directly participated in the vaccination of the population. The small anti-plague laboratory that Chavkin established in Bombay later became the largest research center in South and Southeast Asia for bacteriology and epidemiology, and since 1925 it has been called the Chavkin Institute.
In 1897, Queen Victoria awarded Chavkin one of the most prestigious decorations of the British Empire, the Grand Order of the Indian Empire. A reception was held in his honor in London, attended by leading medical professionals from Britain. The famous surgeon Joseph Lister gave a speech in Chavkin's honor. In gratitude to Chavkin for all the good he had done for India and for Great Britain, Lister noted that of all the evils in the world, the most evil was anti-Semitism. In 1904, Chavkin returned to Switzerland.
In 1915, at the English War Office, Chavkin supervised vaccinations for British soldiers sent to the front of World War I. He spent his money, which had become a large fortune thanks to his high salary, on philanthropic causes, anonymously helping charitable societies and people in need. The well-known Jewish physician and Zionist Hillel Yaffe wrote of him: "I do not remember a man with a more humble, refined and developed soul, so faithful to his principles."
In Paris, Chavkin lived for 15 years. During this period, he became a deeply religious man and wrote an article in defense of Orthodox Judaism, in which he argued that the religious way of life was the only way to preserve the Jewish people. In this article, there is the following comment: "Always, in everything I did, I understood that the burden of responsibility that my people carried lay on my shoulders. This thought was my guiding star throughout my life."
In 1917, the Balfour Declaration was announced, establishing a Jewish national home in Israel. Chavkin, who was well acquainted with British colonial policy from his life in India, argued that the Jews were likely to be disappointed by British policy. His pessimistic predictions came true.
In 1920, Chavkin became a member of the Central Committee of the World Alliance of Jews, the first international Jewish organization founded in 1860, which pursued philanthropic and educational goals. In this role, Chavkin fought against the assimilationist tendencies of Jews and defended the civil rights of Jews in Eastern European countries. On behalf of the Alliance and another philanthropic organization – the Jewish Settlement Society – Chavkin traveled to Russia, Poland and Lithuania. There he became close to the Jewish communities in these countries and gained popularity.
Since 1928, Chavkin had lived permanently in Lausanne. In 1929, he visited Berlin. There, he visited the office of the Aid Society, founded by German Jews in 1884 to promote Jewish settlement in Israel, and reported that he had deposited money in a bank in Lausanne, which after his death would become a fund for material assistance to needy yeshivahs in Eastern Europe.
Vladimir Chavkin died in Lausanne on October 28, 1930. After his death, the bank informed the charity that the Yeshiva Support Fund had 1,568,852 Swiss francs in its account. In his will, Chavkin added that he was donating the money "to the Fund for Supporting the Study of Judaism in Yeshivahs and Primary Religious Schools (Talmud-Torah) in Poland, Galicia, Romania, Lithuania and other countries in Eastern Europe." He added: "I consider it necessary to emphasize that this financial assistance […] cannot be used as a means of pressuring yeshivas to change the order or content of their studies in any way. For example, I personally believe that subjects in the field of natural sciences, such as physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and cosmography, are a useful addition to the main curriculum of yeshivas. When they leave the walls of the yeshiva, the students, thanks to their familiarity with these fields, will not be blinded, as sometimes happens, by the achievements of secular science and will not belittle […] the great importance of the knowledge acquired in the yeshiva. […]. It would be good and beneficial if the yeshiva students would learn some profession, such as watch repair or goldsmithing, or some other practical profession, as was customary in the old days with the blessing of the Sages. In the future, this would be a means of earning a living from one's own labor, and of avoiding need and poverty."
Chavkin was not only a brave and effective fighter against the epidemics of terrible diseases and against the assimilation of Jews, but also contributed to the rational development of the Jewish people.
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One response
Definitely a person worthy of imitation, studying Torah is very important for the people of Israel.
"He studied in the room" – "room" is Talmud Torah for young people.
"Which claimed hundreds of thousands of lives." -> "Which claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands."
"Given Havkin *one* of the decorations"