Sharp and sudden was the transition from rabbinic scholasticism and soporific hasidic mysticism to this new world of ideas, flooded with the light of science, to these new revelations announcing the glad tidings of the freedom of thought, of the demolition of all traditional fetters, of the annihilation of all religious and national barriers, of the brotherhood of all mankind.

The Jewish youth began to shatter the old idols, disregarding the outcry of the masses that had bowed down before them.

A tragic war ensued between "fathers and children," [1] a war of annihilation, for the belligerent parties were extreme obscurantism and fanaticism, on the one hand, and the negation of all historic forms of Judaism, both religious and national, on the other.
[Footnote 1: The title of a famous novel by Turgenieff, written in 1862, depicting the break between the old and the new generation.] In the middle between these two extremes stood the men of the transitional period, the adepts of Haskalah, those "lovers of enlightenment" who had in younger years suffered for their convictions at the hands of fanatics and now came forward to make peace between religion and culture.

Encouraged by the success of the new ideas, the Maskilim became more aggressive in their struggle with obscurantism.
They ventured to expose the Tzaddiks who scattered the seeds of superstition, to ridicule the ignorance and credulity of the masses, and occasionally went so far as to complain of the burdensome ceremonial discipline, hinting at the need of moderate religious reforms.

Their principal task, however, was the cultivation of the Neo-Hebraic literary style and the rejuvenation of the content of that literature.