(By Bernhard Pomeranz.)
(Translated for The Hebrew by P.B.)
Who is there that is not familiar with the wonderful story of the wanderings of the Israelites in the desert? The historic narrative describes how the “pillar of fire” lighted their journeyings by night and the “ pillar of cloud ” protected their wanderings by day. This is symbolical of the later history of God’s chosen people.
For nearly two thousand years, the history of our race has been one of perpetual wandering through a wilderness of exile. The “ pillar of fire ” has been the symbol of that ardent enthusiasm for the national or Jewish ideal, which has sustained and guided us through the long nights of oppression and fanatical persecution. But, with the dawn of a brighter day, when the sun of tolerance, liberty and equality rises over us, we observe the “ pillar of cloud,” symbolical of selfishness, materialism, and indifferentism which have cast their shadow over the higher aims and ideals which should animate us.
The anti-Semitic movement which, in recent times, has sprung up in many continental centres, may prove after all a blessing in disguise, and serve to fan into flame the smouldering embers of a holy patriotism and enthusiasm, causing us to rally once more round the standard of Judaism. Then may we cry unto our enemies and detractors, “You have desired our death, but the Lord has made it our blessing.”
The activity of our enemies teaches a useful lesson, teaches us our duty, what we should do and what we should leave undone; the faults we should renounce, the virtues we should cultivate.
The best source whence to gain counsel and advice is the history of our own people, for therein we find the reflection of the spirit, the tendency and the destiny of our race.
Historia Magistra Vitæ said the Romans : That which is experience to the individual is to a nation its history. History lays bare to us the life of a nation and teaches us to adapt to our future conduct the lessons of the past; as was said by Israel’s greatest prophet to the people : “ Remember the days of old, consider the years of many generations.”
The study of our National History is not only useful, but it is also interesting in the highest degree. There are two powerful reasons which make Jewish history particularly attractive, and its study so fascinating. Firstly: The history of nearly every nation other than our own is the history of a single race or nation, of its origin and development, a record of its relations with its neighbours, its successes and its failures; its decay and final extinction or absorption into another race. But the history of our people on the other hand brings us into contact with all the nations of the world, and is therefore universal. We meet with the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians and the Persians; our ancestors lived in the Greek, Macedonian and Roman Empires ; we came into contact with all the national groups formed during the middle ages, and are citizens at this day in every country of the globe. We meet all on our way in the study of the history of our eternal race.
Secondly : Israel was the first nation to lay the foundation of a so-called Philosophy of History. It was the first to perceive, underlying the struggles of rival nationalities and in the complications of national policies, a universal principle; and, recognising in its existence, a distinct purpose, proclaimed its history to be, and to be intended as such, a sure guide for all the world. Again, it was Israel that first formulated the axiom that “nations prosper by virtue and perish by vice.” It is, therefore, the originator of the fundamental principles of the world’s moral code. Neither the ancient mythologies nor heathen histories teach anything like that. Hesiod and Homer are silent about it just as are Herodotus and Tacitus. In the Homeric songs it is written that the gods do interfere with the destinies of nations and direct them according to their fancies and the end of the Trojan war is described as the realisation of the will of Zeus. But all we can learn is that the gods favored some above others from pure fancy, without a moral motive, without any regard to right and justice, and frequently in opposition to justice and morality.
I shall now endeavour to show when and how Judaism has influenced the moral and intellectual development of mankind and impressed it with the stamp of its own spirit, the understanding of which will also be an indication of the proper conception of our duty and a guidance for our conduct in the present and future.
The spirit, the essence of Judaism, can briefly be characterised in the words of the prophet, “ Love truth, love peace !” Judaism appeals to the mind and to the heart of man. Its fundamental doctrine is the unity of God, as the highest principle of the world ; the existence of fixed laws in nature and the unity of all forces and of all spirits. Judaism demands peace, peace of the man within himself, peace with his fellow man, and in its last consequence, the peace of the world. The whole tendency of Judaism is contained in two words : Monotheism and Messianism. To realise and to carry to victory these ideas, is its destiny in accordance with the prophecy: “You will carry the light of civilisation before all mankind.”
Let us now observe by the light of history when and how Israel has borne this spirit into the world. For this purpose we may divide our history into three epochs :
1. The Mosaic era to the return from the Babylonian exile.
2. The Talmudic-Neo-platonic period.
3. The time of our dispersion.
During the first epoch of Jewish national life, the influence of Judaism upon the non-Jewish world was, as a matter of course, limited, During that time our nation was preparing itself for its high mission, its literature was in a state of development. It was during this period that the ideas relating to God and Man underwent a process of fermentation and purification in the mind and heart of our people. But even at that time, this great intellectual movement, initiated chiefly by the prophets, had considerable influence upon other nations living in the neighbourhood of Canaan. This monotheistic doctrine pierced the dense clouds of Asiatic heathenism in every direction, and the God inspired Seers of Israel not only directed their fiery denunciations at their own race, but also at the inhabitants of the surrounding countries.
Through the Babylonian exile, and later under the rule of the Persians, the Jews came into close contact with the Babylonians and the Persians. Conflicting influences now asserted themselves—civilization and enlightenment from Judaism, darkness and corruption from those nations of whom we read in the Talmud: “ The names of the Angels, as they appear in the book of Daniel, they have borrowed from the Babylonian mythology, and thus grafted a foreign branch upon their own tribe.”
Part II.
It was only during the second epoch of Jewish national life that the influence of Jewish ideas made itself felt upon the heathen world. This was effected by the Bible, by means of its Greek translation, the Septuagint.
The Holy Writ, this book of books (of which even Goethe, the “ great heathen,” said that to it he owed in a great measure his education), was to the heathen world, up to the end of the third century, a book sealed with “ seven seals.” It was by its translation into Greek, the language understood and spoken by the civilized peoples of that time, that its contents became accessible to all civilized nations and the common property of mankind. “ The Septuagint,” says a prominent writer, “was the first apostle whom Judaism sent out to convert the world.”
One can imagine the powerful and even startling impression this work must have exercised upon the people of those days. A new field of thought, conception and principle was opened at once to the heathen world. Especially were the philosophical and cultured Greeks and Alexandrians struck by this original work of human intellect, feeling partly attracted yet partly repulsed by it, until the school of the Neo-Platonics, with their great and noble thinker, Philo, as leader, made them acquainted with the spirit of the sacred writings and, by means of an allegorical explanation of its contents, brought into harmony the Jewish with the Greek philosophical conceptions.
Even at that period we find Judaism at work welding the ideas of the Orient with those of the Occident by influencing the Neo-Platonism in Egypt through the Jewish philosophical school at Alexandria, and also by impressing its character upon the “ Gnosis ” through the Essenes, the forerunners of the Kabbala, in Palestine.
In such manner the ground was prepared for the growth of a new doctrine, Christianity. By lifting the Bible out of the prescribed circle of the Hebrew scholars to whom alone its language was intelligible, and by the endeavours of the Jewish savants of Alexandria to accommodate the sacred writings to the philosophical mind of the Greek thinkers, the conviction gradually took hold of the heathen world’s representatives, that they had hitherto lived in utter darkness, and that a better and truer doctrine was now before them. They became conscious of the littleness of their mythology, and the depravity of their morals, but they were deficient in moral strength to elevate themselves to the ideal height of the Jewish doctrine. Then arose men who undertook the work of mediators, who, in order to introduce part of the Jewish doctrine into heathenism, made concessions to the latter, diluting Judaism to make it tasteful to the heathens, and thus originated a religion which, thanks to the duplicity of its character, was able to propagate and make its way in the world, but which, still in consequence of its duplicity, became necessarily the enemy of its parent, Judaism. But not only indirectly by Christianity did Judaism give a great impulse to the intellectual life of mankind, but for a lengthened period it had a direct influence upon the mind and heart of the deeply agitated heathen world.
For it is an erroneous impression, that Judaism intended to remain a national religion only without showing any inclination to proselytism. This opinion is founded upon the fact, that, with the sole exception of the converting of the Idumaces by force, Judaism has never made proselytes by fire or sword. That the aspiration to become a universal religion, as announced by the prophets, did exist and that about two hundred years before and after the Christian era the doors of Judaism were open and thousands of heathens became converts—of this there is no doubt whatever. It is proved by the many stories of conversion, which Talmudic tradition has preserved ; also by the writings of contemporary Greek and roman authorities, who censure the apostasy of their countrymen and appear angry at the influence and adoption by them of Jewish spirit. For many of these proselytes, particularly for the “ metuentes,” who only observed certain Jewish morals and customs, without having accepted the totem of the union, Judaism was in most instances only a state of transition from heathenism to Christianity. Yet many became Jews pure and simple and remained true Jews for ever. It was only in later times, when experience showed the instability of conversion, politically as well as from a religious point of view, that Judaism ceased its efforts at proselytising and expressed just anger at the disappointments experienced, in the words : “Proselytes are the most dangerous disease on the body Judaic.”
This seclusion from the outside world was in reality the result of obedience to the law of self preservation as, after the loss of their political independence the Jews were scattered over countries, where the new creed gradually took firm root, and with increasing strength and power, lessened its tolerance. The new creed did not feel secure in the possession of its inheritance, as long as there existed a people who denied its right of ownership. It was therefore a vital matter either to christianise the Jews or to eradicate them absolutely and entirely. That was the cause of the first missionary mania, of the period of hatred and destruction that evolved canonical laws against the Jews, and the bloody persecutions and fanatical disputations.
But this struggle, which on the part of Judaism was purely defensive and carried on with intellectual weapons only, assisted considerably in the strengthening of the Jewish ideas and their propagation amongst mankind. Already the disputations from which the Church expected great advantages, had an opposite effect and caused doubts in many a Christian’s heart. This gave birth to a new branch of literature, called Apologetics, intended originally only to serve as a means of defence against the attacks of religious opponents. From this branch, even non-Jewish opponents of the Church took their sharpest weapons of attack. From the publication of the contra-gospels, written by Jews in the second century, and causing much trouble to the fathers of the Church, up to the time of Frederic the Great, Voltaire and other freethinkers ; all the opponents of the established Church found material for their effective and disintegrating polemics in the writings of the Jewish philosophers.
This circumstance explains the fury of the Church against Jewish literature and its endeavours to destroy by fire the Talmud and other literary products of Jewish intellect. But these endeavours of the Church missed their aim.
Here again we see Judaism exercising a lasting influence upon the modern world. The strife, provoked by the Church against the value of the writings of the Jews of that period, caused Reuchlin and other men well versed in Hebrew, to defend Jewish literature. A great literary battle was fought for and against it. The most prominent men of that age and the representatives of the universities entered the arena, and the strife ended with an unquestionable victory for Jewish literature and saw the appearance of a man, who was destined, with Bible in hand, to make a breach in the rotten walls of the Church—the appearance of Martin Luther.
Part III.
The Reformation, which founded the Protestant Church, was, as regards Judaism, a great step towards the truth and a return to the ancient faith. The more any sect frees itself from superstition and dogma, the nearer it approaches the original source of religion, the doctrine of Judaism. One of the consequences of the reformation was the deeper study of the Hebrew language by Christian learned men, and a deeper insight into our literature by the help of the works of Jewish linguists and commentators, such as Raschi, Ebsn Esra and Kimchi, who materially assisted in the understanding of our sacred writings and the fructification of contemporary Christian writers with the Jewish spirit.
A revolution, similar to that effected in the Occident by Judaism giving an impulse to Christianity, was accomplished, seven hundred years later, in the Orient by the foundation of the Mahomedan religion.
It is well known that Mahomed communicated to a great extent with Jewish learned men, and was made acquainted by them with the Bible and the hagadic part of the Talmud. It was this acquaintance with the Jewish sacred writings, that induced him to free his fellow natives from heathenism and convert them to Monotheism. Mahomed, says Renan, was at a certain time of his life a Jew, and it can be maintained he remained a Jew all his life long. The Koran is imbued by a Jewish spirit. Mahomed has made the Jewish ideas with all their traditions and rites conform to the intellect and feeling of the Arabs, he “ Arabified " Judaism. In company with these “ Jewdified ” Arabs, with the Moors of the Pyrenaic peninsula, the Jews worked hard during the middle ages to preserve science to the world. This is one of the greatest services Judaism has done to mankind. Whereas over the whole of Europe there was entire darkness ; as with the call: “ God wills it ” crusades were undertaken and tens of thousands of families put to death, while wonders and relics are almost the only theme under discussion over the whole of the Occident; while Christianity was submerged in a bottomless abyss of superstition without the slightest inclination for the investigation of truth and science : during all that time the Jews remained on the path of science and worked to increase human knowledge. There existed during those times a legion of deep Jewish thinkers, prominent physicians, natural philosophers, and last, but by no means least, translators of the Greek and Arabic literature for the benefit of Europeans.
By translating the works of the Greek philosophers and naturalists into Arabic, and the philosophical and medical works of Arabic thinkers and savants into Latin, they provided the Occident with a knowledge of classical antiquity, and by doing so and also by making Europe acquainted with the philosophy and natural science of the Moors, they greatly assisted in the revival of science in Europe and became thus the standard bearers of Humanism in the fifteenth century.
And from another quarter the enlightening influence of the Jewish-Spanish school made itself felt, by giving birth to one of the greatest thinkers Judaism ever has produced, Spinoza. Spinoza, prompted by the writings of Ebn Esra, lays, through his Biblical and political treatises, the foundation of a rational investigation of the Bible and thus becomes the apostle of freedom of conscience. Urged thereto by the works of Maimonides and a study of the Kabala, he introduces with his “ Ethica more geometrico demonstrata” a mathematical method of investigating the science of metaphysics, and becomes the principal founder of modern philosophy.
During the 18th century the tendency of religious thought be came more liberal, more tolerant. This tolerance emanated from puritanical, Bible-loving England. It made itself appreciated throughout France and Germany where Lessing and Herder were the champions of the newly awakened freedom of thought. These liberal ideas were closely allied to the spirit of Judaism and were more in sympathy with the teachings of the Old Testament rather than the New.
Renan, not without reason and justice, calls the prophets the first true socialists. These prophets, who detested injustice, who had fiery words of condemnation for every kind of oppression, exploitation and slavery, who with all the enthusiasm of their great souls preached absolute equality in the eyes of the law and the possible perfect equality of ownership; these prophets who, as a means to counteract undue accumulation of property, had instituted the year of release :—these prophets gave to the world the socialistic idea three thousand years ago. It was the office of their successors, such men as Lassalle and Marx, to make the spark a blazing flame.
Thus we see Judaism during the whole course of its history in the workshop of humanity, industrious, courageous and untiring, working for the realisation of its ideals : truth and peace ; unity as a principle of the world, and unity as a principle for life.
And not without success.
Unity as a principle of the world is accepted to-day and taught by modern science ; in unity as a principle of life in the progress of humanity the better part of mankind already believes.
If these ideals are not yet fully realized it is not the fault of Judaism, but the cause is heathen sensuality, in the chains of which the larger part of mankind is still fastened, for, as the poet says:
Dass in der Wiege
Die Menschheit noch liege
Beweisen zur Genüge :
Mönch, Sclave und Kriege.
Therefore our mission is not yet finished. Therefore it will be our duty to fight with all our power against the spirit of darkness and injustice, against narrowminded dogmatism and bigotry, the greatest enemies of enlightenment, progress and Judaism.
Australasian Hebrew (Sydney, NSW ), November 1896
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