ALBRECHT RITSCHL: KULTURPROTESTANTISMUS AND THE JEWS

An apostate of the Tübingen school, Albrecht Ritschl would become a predominant ideologist of Kulturprotestantismus (cultural Protestantism),1 which grew to be a leading cultural and religious force in the Kaiser- reich. Theology was adapted to this project, among other things, and the Jews, even at the beginning of the empire a group of second-class citizens, would by the end of the 1870s become the target of fi erce and programmatic anti-Semitism. The eagerly awaited nation-state was established in 1870/71, Kaiser Wilhelm I being its monarch and the founder of the empire, and Otto von Bismarck being the national hero of a ‘political Protestantism’.2 The empire’s foundation was interpreted as a completion of the Reformation and an achievement by Protestant Prussia.3 Because this religion was the main ‘interpretive culture’ of the empire, and Protestantism was regarded as the cement that could keep the various classes and groups of the newborn nation-state together, leading Protestants had a unique role, and none more so than Albrecht Ritschl.4 Ritschl’s programme was opportune enough to bring about a con- ciliation of (liberal) Protestant tradition and the ideals of the cultural bourgeoisie.5 The main achievement of the liberal theology that thrived at the end of the nineteenth century was the successful synthesis between rationalism, religion and renewed nationalism, which served the national project of the Kaiserreich well.6 Although the liberals opposed the idea of a Christian state in the sense of conservative confessional circles or the ultramontane Catholics, their dream was a Kaiserreich that was

1 The term was coined by its opponents, Manuel Zelger, “Modernisierte Gemeinde- theologie. Albrecht Ritschl 1822–1889”, in Profi le des neuzeitlichen Protestantismus, ed. Fried- rich Wilhelm Graf (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn, 1992), 183. 2 Friedrich Wilhelm Graf, “Protestantische Theologie in der Gesellschaft des Kaiser- reichs”, in Profi le des neuzeitlichen Protestantismus, ed. Friedrich Wilhelm Graf (Gütersloh: Gütersloher Verlagshaus Gerd Mohn, 1992), 12. 3 Ibid., 20–21. 4 Ibid., 14–15. 5 Ibid., 84. 6 Tal, Christians and Jews in Germany, 161. 134 part i. enlightenment exegesis and the jews dominated by Christian ethics, without being ruled by an organisa- tional church.7 In Richard Rothe’s words, “The ecclesiastical stage in the historical development of Christianity has passed and gone, and the Christian spirit has entered its ethical, that is, its political stage.”8 Christianity was to rule as a spiritual power in the state. The place of the Jews, however, was basically the same in the liberal as in the confessional or Catholic vision. For Jews, a Christian state meant relinquishing their religion if they wanted to be assimilated,9 or living as second-class citizens, for example, not being admitted to public posts, army training or the fi eld of education.10 This was the policy supported by Bismarck himself, as well as by liberal Protestants.11 This group had as little understanding for Jewish particularity as anyone else. Their fl agship journal, the Christliche Welt, demanded that Jews—not orthodox or Zionist, but liberal Jews—give up their singularity and become fully part of Christian society. Their failure to do so was met with a complete lack of understanding on the part of Christian liber- als.12 The reason was that national liberalism required assimilation. From early on, liberal Christianity had been a twin to this national liberal project, dreaming of a united Germany, where particularistic groups had been assimilated into the body of the people. The refusal of even liberal Jewish groups to assimilate was a thorn in the fl esh to liberal Christianity. Such particularistic behaviour was in direct opposition to theologians like Ritschl, who argued that Christianity was called to spiritual domin- ion in the world, for instance ruling over “Judaism with its national segregation and confi ning ceremonialism dating from the Pharisees at the time of Jesus”.13 This Christian rule in all areas of life meant that Jews were marginalised, even if the rule was not through any outward power but through indirect Christian infl uence.14 Protestant liberals, for instance, hindered ‘particularist’ schools such as the Jewish ones.15 In

7 Ibid., 167. 8 Ibid., 167. 9 Ibid., 156. 10 Ibid., 135. 11 Ibid., 141, 221. 12 Ibid., 163. 13 Ibid., 169. 14 Ibid., 170–172. 15 Ibid., 176.