Jewish Ideas Weekly www.jewishideasdaily.com January 18-25, 2013

Friday, January 18 recognized as merely provisional, subject to had come to see in the changed political at- correction not only by new evidence, but, titude a sharp break with the past or even to Where Does the Modern Period also, by the lengthened perspective gained perceive the messianic prospect of full Jew- of Jewish History Begin? in the passage of time.1 For Jewish history, ish participation in the political and cultural periodization is fraught with all of the meth- life of Europe. Although by the time when By Michael A. Meyer odological difficulties that attend the divi- Jost began to write his history, the post-Na- sion of world history. Scattered among the poleonic reaction had cast serious doubts on What marks the beginning of modern Jewish nations, the have participated to vary- the realization of that hope, he remained of history? ing degrees in simultaneous and successive the opinion that an unalterable process had The advent of Moses Mendelssohn? The foreign civilizations while at the same time been set in motion, and, as a loyal Prussian, French Revolution? The migration of Judah carrying on their own heritage. The very he chose to see its origins in Prussia. Jost, the Pious to Palestine in 1700? The Sabbatian diversity and uniqueness of therefore, designated 1740 as explosion in the 17th century? These were their experience the beginning of modern Jew- some of the answers offered by the great Jew- have militated against any ish history, since, in that year, ish historians of the 19th and 20th centuries. agreement on its division. Frederick the Great ascended In his classic 1975 article, When Though the major Jewish his- the Prussian throne. He real- Does the Modern Period of Jewish Histo- torians have all had to utilize ized, of course, that Frederick’s ry Begin?, Michael Meyer argued that there is some system of periodization policy had, if anything, been no value in “setting a definite terminus for the to organize their material, more restrictive toward the beginning of modern Jewish history.” This did they have differed vastly in Jews than were the regulations not settle the question, but it made it impos- the schemes which they have of the monarchs who had pre- sible for anyone to address it without taking employed. In part, method- ceded him. But, even as late as Meyer’s views into account. ological considerations have 1846, Jost still claimed that the —The Editors determined this divergence of enlightened despot had awak- systems, but, to no small de- ened a spirit The endeavor to divide history into distinct gree, religious and ideological motivations and meaningful periods has met with so have played a role as well. Nowhere is the which strides over the ghetto walls and little success that contemporary historians operation of both factors more apparent and glances into the dismal apartments of have treated the subject with utmost cau- instructive than with regard to the problem the Jewish streets . . . , it declares liberty tion. Grand theoretical speculations, such of setting the threshold of the modern pe- to the oppressed, and this one word, even as the bold efforts of Hegel to assert clearly riod in Jewish history. In fact, tracing the before its content is grasped and appreci- defined stages in the development of the various theories regarding the onset of Jew- ated, arouses the soul to glad hope and the human spirit, or of Marx to locate similar ish modernity reflects with amazing clarity yearning for a better life.2 stages in the various forms of production, both the course of Jewish historical thinking have all come to grief at the hands of em- and the shifting conceptions of Jewish exis- Since Jost was writing for German gen- pirical inquiry. Few historians today still tence that have characterized the last hun- tiles as well as for Jews, he doubtless wanted believe that world history allows of any dred and fifty years. to link the turning point of the modern age simple, precise division, let alone that any The first Jewish scholar since Josephus to in Jewish history with the monarch who suggested plan is rooted in the very nature undertake a comprehensive history of the had brought Prussia to a position of pow- of reality. All-embracing schemes of peri- Jews was Isaac Marcus Jost, a German Jew er in Europe. At the same time, he tried odization, nearly everyone now acknowl- who wrote a nine-volume History of the Isra- to make his Jewish readers appreciative of edges, rests more on stipulation than on in- elites that was published from 1820 to 1828. what they owed to the Prussian state. It ference. Though a division of some kind is Jost grew up in the period when German was, he thought, in response to this new still considered necessary as an instrument Jewry was given its first measure of civil enlightened spirit emanating from Freder- for understanding turning points and tran- equality. Responding to this new situation, ick that the fundamental transformations sitions in history, each proposal is generally a considerable segment of the community in the Jewish community which generated

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Jewish Ideas Weekly, published by Jewish Ideas Daily, is a project of Bee.Ideas. To contact us, please email [email protected]. modernity came about: the decline of un- velopments in Germany—supposedly set for the future. It represented the beginnings questioned rabbinic authority, the shift from in motion by Mendelssohn—while pay- of a rebellion against the galut and the en- a corporate entity to a religious denomina- ing scant attention to the vastly larger Jew- deavor to seek ’s national salvation in tion, and the increasing participation by ish settlement in Eastern Europe. Second, its own land.7 Jews in German cultural and political life. Graetz’s emphasis on the role of individuals Dinur’s theory effectively eliminates Dias- With the origin of these changes in Prussia, and of intellectual processes in history was pora Jewish modernity from the basic struc- Jost saw the beginning of a new epoch for out of keeping with the positivist approach ture of Jewish history. Its commonly ac- all Jewry, one which he termed “the age of that had meanwhile come to dominate Eu- cepted characteristics are not determinative spiritual liberation.” ropean historiography and had influenced of an age. Although Dinur does recognize Jewish writers contemporary with Jost Dubnow. Finally, Dubnow simply could not the relative significance of Jewish emancipa- shared his sense of living in a new and hope- see in Mendelssohn a model for the modern tion and acculturation, these are essentially ful time both for Europe and for the Jews. period. The Jewish philosopher’s cherished conceived as forces making for Jewish na- That was certainly true of the young Leopold goal of acculturation ran directly counter to tional dissolution and as foils—albeit neces- Zunz and his circle when they laid the foun- Dubnow’s autonomist ideology, which ad- sary—for the primary process, which is the dations of the scientific study of Judaism, vocated separate, highly independent, com- rebuilding of the Jewish nation in Palestine. declaring that the time had come to render munal entities within the frameworks of Unlike Diaspora Jewish historians, Dinur account of a past that was now closed and non-Jewish states. Dubnow favored politi- placed a definite and final terminus on this determining to use their scholarly tools to cal integration within the larger society but, modern period. It concluded in November, further the process of political and cultural at the same time, argued for cultural sepa- 1947 with the resolution to integration. When Nahman Krochmal, the ratism. It is, therefore, not surprising that in establish a Jewish state and with the decla- profound Galician Jewish philosopher and his own writing he should have linked Jew- ration of its coming into existence the fol- historian, divided Jewish history into suc- ish modernity to political, rather than cul- lowing spring. The modern era, thus, lasted cessive cycles of growth, blossoming, and tural, transformation. In his World History almost exactly 250 years, and the birth of decay, he chose to conclude the most recent of the Jewish People, which appeared in the the State of Israel brought it to an end. With period of decline with the Cossack persecu- 1920s, it is the French Revolution, the pe- 1948 this final stage of Diaspora Jewish his- tions of the mid-17th century. His own age, riod when the Jews first gained citizenship, tory has definitely reached its climax. For by implication, represented a new period of and not the beginning of the Haskalah, the the last generation, Jewish history has been germination, the first stage of a fresh cycle.3 Jewish enlightenment, which serves as the essentially post-modern, the history of the The best-known of the 19th-century Jew- watershed.6 people in its land, with that portion which ish historians, Heinrich Graetz, did not, More recently, the majority of Jewish remains on the Diaspora periphery playing, however, fully share the earlier messianic en- historians have preferred to fix the bound- at best, a secondary role. thusiasm. A severe moral critic of modern ary line about a century or more before the Gershom Scholem’s revisionism has been European culture,4 he set the Redemption far French Revolution. They have chosen the much less obviously ideological, but he, into the future. But, like Jost, he, too, thought earlier threshold for a variety of reasons. too, has had a specific purpose in view. He that the most significant break in recent Jew- The most blatantly ideological justification has devoted much of his life to establish- ish history had occurred in the preceding for such an earlier terminus a quo is that ing the central significance of the kabbalah, century. Because of his predilection for the which was given by Ben Zion Dinur, who not merely as a byroad of Jewish history, internal intellectual history of the Jews, and died just recently after a productive and in- as Graetz insisted, but as a main highway. his ascription of the dominant role in histori- fluential career as professor of Jewish history Scholem has shown that the kabbalistically cal change to prominent individuals, Graetz at The Hebrew University in . As influenced, Sabbatian, pseudo-messianic assigned the beginning of the modern period an ardent Zionist, Dinur could not resist se- movement of the 17th century had an enor- of Jewish history to the appearance of Moses lecting the first evidence for a movement of mous influence in its time, and he has tried Mendelssohn. In the biography of this first return to the Land as the beginning of the to raise its significance even further by argu- significant figure to link Judaism with mod- modern period of Jewish history. What ac- ing that it made possible Jewish modernity. ern European culture, Graetz found what he culturation had been for Graetz and eman- The unorthodox theses of the radical Sabba- called “a model for the history of the Jews in cipation for Dubnow, Zionism became tians, their ideological doctrines, as well as modern times, for their upward striving from for Dinur. One might have expected him, their attitude toward practice, Scholem has lowliness and contempt to greatness and self- therefore, to select a very late date, perhaps argued, shattered the world of traditional consciousness.”5 the appearance of the first Zionist classic, Judaism beyond repair. Once these mes- Graetz’s selection of Moses Mendelssohn Moses Hess’s Rome and Jerusalem, in 1862, sianists ceased to be “believers,” they could as the turning point met severe challenge a or the formation of the Hibat Zion move- no longer return to contemporary rabbinic generation later at the hands of Eastern Eu- ment and the agricultural settlement which Judaism. Instead, “when the flame of their rope’s most significant Jewish historian, Si- it fostered in the 1880s, or even the publica- faith finally flickered out, they soon reap- mon Dubnow. For him, Graetz’s selection tion of Herzl’s The Jewish State in 1896. In- peared as leaders of Reform Judaism, secu- was questionable on three grounds. First, stead, however, Dinur chose the year 1700, lar intellectuals, or simply complete and it was—no less than Jost’s view—distinctly for in that year, Judah the Pious led indifferent skeptics.”8 Scholem would thus Germano-centric. Beginning with Men- some one thousand Jews to Palestine. For not only regard the Jewish history of the late delssohn, Graetz had gone on to devote Dinur, this symbolic event (the immigra- 16th and early 17th centuries as dominated two-thirds of his last volume to tracing de- tion was actually a failure) was portentous by kabbalism and pseudo-messianism, but

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 2 would make even the anti-mystical Judaism Baron’s enumeration of such a variety of world of the individual Jew. of 19th-century Western Europe ironically, causes leaves little room for criticizing the But even if there could be agreement on embarrassingly—and unconvincingly—an selection of a particular feature to the exclu- the characteristics determinative of the outgrowth of it. sion or relative diminution of others. But modern period, difference of opinion would Other Jewish historians have shared Scho- his direct linkage of Jewish modernity with remain as to when they emerged. Even if lem’s preference for the 17th century but have phenomena of world history which had only economic, political, and cultural integration argued for the determinative significance of limited, indirect, or delayed effect upon the be taken together as representative of Jew- factors other than mysticism and messianism. Jews raises serious doubts; the general trans- ish modernity, the question as to when they Shmuel Ettinger, currently professor of mod- formations which he lists here—important became constitutive must still be settled. ern Jewish history at The Hebrew University, as they were for general history—had little The proponents of a boundary line in the has developed the theory that the emergence modernizing influence on any consider- 17th or early 18th century have pointed to of the centralized absolutistic state was the able segment of the Jews in Europe in the widespread evidence of the decline of rab- most crucial factor in initiating the changes 17th century. No less subject to dispute is binic authority, the pursuit of secular educa- that differentiated modern Jewish existence his willingness to set a single watershed at tion, and the disregard of traditional Jewish from previous forms. The new state was no a distinct point in time—and even to de- norms in Central Europe decades or more longer willing to tolerate separate corporate clare in the title of the later volumes of his A before the appearance of Moses Mendels- entities with their own structures of law and Social and Religious History of the Jews that sohn.12 Their critics have held that such authority. The resulting deprivation of Jewish the “Late Middle Ages” of the Jews stretches manifestations of dissolution, taken in his- communal autonomy spurred the integration specifically from 1200 to 1650. torical context, really do not indicate a break of the Jews into European society and re- Of course, neither Baron nor any Jewish at all. They are simply aberrant phenomena sulted in the intellectual response of the Has- historian, from Jost down to the present, in a society which is still basically intact. kalah.9 But, for Ettinger, the process of cul- has regarded the exact line of demarcation Even where Jewish laws were violated, the tural and political integration, set in motion which he chose as more than symbolic. All violation was not yet justified by an appeal by the development of the centralized state, were far too aware of the gradual passing of to values drawn from outside the Jewish was characteristic of modern Jewish history one age into another to assume that such community.13 But in admitting a seedtime only during the first of two stages. Beginning precise boundaries could be anything other for Jewish modernity which precedes its ini- with the resurgence of anti-Semitism in the than instrumental or suggestive. Yet, the tial boundary, the critics, in turn, are forced 1880s, a reversal took place which resulted fact that they have selected a particular year to assume the difficult task of determining in the success of Jewish nationalism and the or, at least, a limited period of time during at which point the heretofore exceptional or creation of the Jewish state. For Ettinger, as which, they argue, the chief characteristics deviant instances become normative. for Dinur, the establishment of the state con- of modern Jewish history made their ap- The issue is further complicated by the stitutes the climax of modern Jewish history.10 pearance, itself raises a number of serious differentiation that must be made, even by Finally, we may consider the view of Salo questions which have yet to be resolved. non-Marxists, between the various classes Baron, the dean of Jewish historians in Perhaps the most basic question concerns within the Jewish communities. Jacob America. It, too, focuses on the 17th cen- the principal causes and characteristics of Toury, of University, has argued tury, except that for Baron no single factor is modernity. It seems most unlikely that agree- that the integration of the Jews into Ger- determinative: ment here will be achieved, not only because man society proceeded much more rap- of the continued effect of ideology, but, also, idly among the wealthiest and the poorest The Jewish Emancipation era has often because economic, social and intellectual classes of Jews, while the lower middle class been dated from the formal pronuncia- influences will continue to be weighted as remained impervious to outside influences mentos of Jewish equality of rights by the variously by Jewish historians as they are by for a relatively much longer period.14 While, French Revolution, or somewhat more their colleagues in general history. At pres- increasingly, during the 18th century, both obliquely, by the American Constitution. ent, Jewish scholars span the entire gamut— economically successful Jewish merchants However, departing from this purely le- from Marxist economic determinism to an and destitute Jewish vagrants mingled freely galistic approach, I have long felt that the idealism which largely ignores the relevance with their gentile counterparts and adopted underlying more decisive socioeconomic of societal change. In particular, it is by no some of their values, the bulk of the German and cultural transformations accompa- means resolved whether the Jewish Enlight- Jews still retained their traditional norms. nying the rise of modern capitalism, the enment and Emancipation were primarily Even more significant than the qualifica- rapid growth of Western populations, the a response to the rise of capitalist modes of tion by social class is the one necessitated international migrations, the after-effects production, to the need for more efficient by geographical differentiation. During the of Humanism, the Reformation, and the government, or to a more favorable social 18th century, Eastern and Western (includ- progress of modern science, long antedat- attitude emanating from a growing class of ing Central) European Jewries came to differ ed these formal constitutional fiats. While liberal intellectuals. Nor is there agreement enormously. Although the sociologist and such developments can never be so pre- whether what is basic for Jewish history is historian, Jacob Katz, has attempted to argue cisely dated as legal enactments, treaties, demography (and, hence, the change in the the simultaneous emergence of modernity wars, or biographies of leading person- migration pattern from west-to-east to east- among Ashkenazic Jews through Hasidism alities, the mid-seventeenth century may to-west in the 17th century would loom as a in the East and through Haskalah in the indeed be considered the major turning decisive event), or community structure and West, he was forced to admit that Hasidism point in both world and Jewish history.11 cohesion, or the intellectual and emotional did no more than “distort” the framework of

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 3 the traditional Jewish society while the Has- centuries, just as some scholars have tried sentially living the heritage of the Jewish en- kalah actually shattered it.15 However much to dismantle the Renaissance by carrying its lightenment while Israelis draw sustenance Hasidism challenged some of the norms of various elements back to the Middle Ages.16 from the roots of Zionism, then we have the rabbinic Judaism, it surely did not create the Surely, the Golden Age of Jewish life in Is- anomalous situation where Diaspora Jewry characteristics of Jewish modernity. On the lamic Spain and certain of the communi- today lives in one period of Jewish history contrary, it soon became the most vocifer- ties of 16th-century Italy possess significant while Israeli Jewry lives in another. From ous opponent of Jewish enlightenment. characteristics of modernity when held up the Israeli viewpoint, this suggestion that the If integration, on various levels, into non- against 18th-century Poland. On the other Diaspora remains mired in an earlier period Jewish society be taken as the basic criterion hand, there remains a vast difference be- while Jewish history has marched on to its of the modern period, then the determina- tween the degree of modernity in evidence next stage is strangely reminiscent of Less- tion of a watershed for Eastern Europe in before the mid-18th century and that appar- ing’s, Hegel’s, and, later, Toynbee’s viewpoint either the 17th or 18th century is very hard ent thereafter. One can neither ignore the on the failure of the Jews to advance along to justify. A much better argument could seeds of later development by suggesting with the history of the world. According be made for a turning point in the mid-19th a 17th-century “traditional society” little to its Zionist variation, Diaspora Jews have century during the relatively liberal reign of touched by change until a century later, nor, stubbornly refused to make the called-for Alexander II or even as late as the Bolshevik contrariwise, suggest that modernity has ar- dialectical transition from Haskalah to Jew- Revolution. As for the Jewish communities rived along with its first harbingers. ish nationalism. of the Orient and North Africa, with the ex- What the Jewish historian can legitimate- For the future of Diaspora Jewish exis- ception of a small upper class, there seems to ly do—and must do—is to set the forces of tence, such a conception must be as unac- have been relatively little interruption of their continuity (which are never absent) against ceptable on ideological grounds, as it is for mode of Jewish existence until they were those of change and to analyze their relative historiography on account of its serious dis- exposed to their Ashkenazi brethren in the progress and interaction. For most recent tortion of demographic realities. Yet there State of Israel. These Eastern communities times, this means tracing a transformation is no avoiding the obvious fact that many— have been the stepchildren of Jewish histori- of Jewish life that proceeded gradually, and though by no means all—of the commonly ography, virtually ignored in textbooks and sometimes fitfully, from West to East, from accepted characteristics of Jewish moderni- lecture courses until their aliyah in the 1950s. class to class, and in which various constitu- ty do not apply to the State of Israel. Those As their descendants now gradually make ent elements—economic, social, and intel- which result from minority status are nota- their way into Jewish scholarship, especially lectual—underwent differing degrees of bly absent. Thus, there is a basic bifurcation in Israel, they will doubtless try to diminish change. The scholar may find crucial points that necessarily exists between that portion the weight given to European developments, of development which he can legitimately of the Jewish people which lives exposed just as Dubnow had sought to reduce the ex- regard as watersheds for a particular Jewry, to the complexly interacting forces of as- cessive emphasis which Graetz had given to but their limited importance must always similation and anti-Semitism and the other the Jews of Germany, in favor of Poland and be borne in mind. Rather than being con- portion which enjoys a high degree of po- Russia. Periodizations of the modern age cerned with the impossible task of deter- litical independence and the ability to shape which are exclusively Europe-centered may mining the precise bounds of a single “mod- education and culture. In order to employ a become subject, therefore, to considerable ern period” for all Jewries, it would be best single concept of modernization which will challenge in the next generation. to focus on the process of modernization17 in embrace developments leading simultane- With all of these difficulties, is there any its various aspects, tracing it from one area ously toward today’s Diaspora Jewry and value in setting a definite terminus for the of Jewish settlement to another and trying toward Jewish existence in the State of Israel beginning of modern Jewish history? I to determine its dynamics. (To what extent, it is, therefore, necessary to include within it would argue that there is not, unless stimu- for example, does it operate by diffusion and both the forces that have operated in the di- lating discussion with some new theory be to what extent is it explainable by an internal rection of integration into non-Jewish soci- itself a value. Any endeavor to mark a bor- dialectic within each Jewry?) ety and those equally modernizing influenc- derline which will be meaningful for all Jew- Finally, there remains the question of the es—such as a modern separatist nationalism ries and embrace the origin or rise to nor- differing perspective between Jewish histo- drawn largely from European models—that mative status of all—or even most—of the rians in Israel and in the Diaspora. If the have driven in the direction of disengage- characteristics of Jewish life as it presently modern period, or the process of modern- ment. Jewish nationalism must be seen not exists seems to me bound to fail. Yet, one ization, is defined in whole or in part by Jew- as post-modern, but as part of the modern- must begin somewhere in relating the Jew- ish life led as a minority group participating ization process itself. ish history of most recent times. In practice in a non-Jewish society and subjected to the A single concept is possible, moreover, it is, therefore, probably best to begin with ambiguities and ambivalences of that situa- because the division created by the opposing the 17th century where, according to nearly tion, then the establishment of the State of forces has not become complete. Although all views today, many of the elements that Israel—as Dinur has asserted—has put an the integrative pattern still dominates Di- become constitutive of later Jewish life first end to such Jewish modernity, at least for aspora existence today, elements of Jewish made their appearance to any degree. But the Jews in Israel. In fact, the entire Zion- national identity are noticeably present as the conventionality of so doing must be fully ist movement can then be seen as essen- well. By the same token, Israeli society is so realized. For, looking further backward, it is tially post-modern, a reaction spurred by influenced by the cultural and intellectual possible to attest certain apparently modern anti-Semitism to the integration favored by currents of the West that it hardly makes developments in some form even in earlier the Haskalah. But if Diaspora Jews are es- sense to declare that its center of gravity

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 4 lies within a specifically Jewish sphere like 3. Kitvei Rabbi Nahman Krochmal, ed. Simon Ra- 11. A Social and Religious History of the Jews (New that of pre-modern Jewish communities. widowicz (Berlin, 1924), p. 112. York, 1965), IX, p. v. If, therefore, modernization (which results 4. See his anonymously published Briefwechsel 12. E.g., Azriel Shohet, Im Hilufei Tekufot (Jeru- einer englischen Dame über Judentum und Semi- salem, 1960). in modernity) were conceived in terms of tismus (Stuttgart, 1883). 13. See Baruk hMevorah’s review of Shohet’s novel elements of both integrative and dis- 5. Geschichte der Juden (Leipzig, 1870), XI, p. 3. book in Kiryat Sefer, XXXVII (1961-62) 150-55. junctive character, it could meaningfully be 6. In this view, as he himself acknowledged, Dub- 14. “Neuehebraische Veroffenthchungen zur used to characterize a basic process which now was anticipated by Martin Philippson, Neueste Geshichte der Juden im deutschen Lebenskrei- has led to both of the forms of Jewish ex- Geshichte des judischen Volkes, 3 vols. (Leipzig, s e ,” Bulletin des Leo Baeck Instituts IV (1961) 67-73. 1907-11). From a Marxist perspective it was later 15. Tradition and Crisis (New York, 1961), pp. istence today, that of the Diaspora and that adopted by Raphael Mahler, Divrei Yemei Yisra- 227, 245. See the criticism of Shmuel Ettinger on of the State. The conceptual unity of Jewish el (Merhavia, 1969), p. 22. the original Hebrew edition in Kiryat SeferXXXV history would thus be preserved, even down 7. Israel and the Diaspora (Philadelphia, 1969), (1959-60) 12-18. to the present. pp. 79-161. 16. Wallace K. Ferguson, The Renaissance in His- 8. The Messianic Idea in Judaism (New York, torical Thought (Cambridge, Mass., 1948). 1. See George H. Nadel, “Periodization,” Inter- 1971), pp. 125-26, 140-41. 17. Cf., Richard Bendix, “Tradition and Moder- national Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences (New 9. Toldot Am Yisrael Mi-Yemei Ha-absolutism ad nity Reconsidered,” Comparative Studies in Soci- York, 1968), XI, pp. 581-81. Lehakamat Medinat Yisrael (Jerusalem, 1968), p. 2. ety and History IX (1967) 292-346. 2. Neuere Geshichte der Israeliten (Berlin, 1846), I, 10. Toldot Am Yisrael Ba et Hahadashah (Tel p. 7. Aviv, 1969).

Monday, January 21 found a new voice and a new language: the bition by shaking bread crumbs from a nap- Shabbat Shirah: Song Takes language of poetic imagery. Here we see the kin or tablecloth onto the grass, but I doubt people draw close to the divine through po- this is what the had in mind. How Wing etry, metaphorically experiencing the blast curious that they should have creatively in- of God’s very “human” nostrils. voked the midrash concerning Dathan and By Jerry Friedman To celebrate Shabbat Shirah, the Rabbis Aviram to give legitimacy to a custom that On Shabbat Shirah (the “Sabbath of Song”), suggested, in addition to the customs con- was otherwise halakhically forbidden! we read the Torah account of the crossing of nected with the synagogue Torah reading, I strongly suspect that Israelites were the Red Sea by the Israelites. The climax of a home-based ritual: on Shabbat Shirah we feeding birds at this time of the year long be- the reading is the “song at the sea,” with its feed the birds. Some have suggested that we fore the customs, halakhah, and midrashim lofty, rolling musical melody. The Rabbis -be do so to acknowledge the birds’ singing in of rabbinic Judaism emerged. I believe the lieved that the shirah was sung responsively, praise of God and his great miracle at the practice originated during the Israelites’ first by Moses and the men, then by Miriam sea. Others have linked feeding birds with journey through the desert, where they and the women. Today, in keeping with this their role in the biblical story of the double would have witnessed a striking annual tradition, the congregation sings a number portion of manna that miraculously ap- natural phenomenon. Each spring, 500 mil- of the verses before the Torah reader chants peared on Friday so that the Israelites would lion birds migrate up the rift valley in Af- them, as an expression of the spontaneous not have to gather manna rica, along the Red Sea, across enthusiasm of the people. on Shabbat. A midrash tells the , north Nahum Sarna tells us that the shirah in us that two trouble-makers, through the Arava and Jor- this Torah reading—unlike Greek epic po- Dathan and Aviram, put out dan Valley, dispersing at last etry, which focuses on a historical event—is manna Friday evening so that in the birds’ summer homes a spontaneous lyrical outpouring of emo- the people would discover it throughout Asia Minor and tion in response to a miracle, employing on the morning of Shabbat Europe. The Israelites would poetic imagery rather than heroic narrative. and Moses and God would have witnessed flocks of rap- Thus, the narrative description in Exodus be discredited. But the birds tors seeking the warm morn- recounts, in simple, concrete language, the gobbled up all the manna ing updrafts to traverse the way in which God drives back the sea with before the people awoke, mountains, great flocks of a “strong east wind all that night . . . turn- preserving the miracle of the storks and cranes darken- ing the sea into dry ground.” In the shirah, double portion of manna on ing the sky and creating a by contrast, the same event is described in Friday and its absence on din with their beating wings. striking visual imagery: Shabbat and, thus, confirming the leader- They would have seen the tiny vulnerable ship of Moses. songbirds, the warblers and finches with At the blast of Your nostrils, the waters The teaching that we should feed birds their beautiful colors and melodic songs. piled up, on Shabbat presented a halakhic challenge And of course there were the flocks of quail The floods stood straight like a wall, for the Rabbis. On Shabbat, we are gener- on which they feasted. The depths froze in the heart of the sea. ally permitted to feed only domesticated This annual migration of hundreds of animals, not wild ones. An individual might millions of birds, heading in exactly the In witnessing the miracle at the sea, Israel technically circumvent the halakhic prohi- same direction as the Israelites, must have

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 5 made a tremendous impression on these The Rabbis, writing in the first century, The Rabbis need not have worried. Al- wandering nomads and fostered an intimate were likely dealing with a well established though the people continued to remember connection. Throughout the 40-year jour- popular custom. They seemed to go to the miracle at the sea and their desert rela- ney in the desert, the appearance of these great lengths to put it into a religiously sanc- tionship to the birds, they never worshiped flocks of birds each spring must have cap- tioned framework, using various imagina- them. Our people knew the difference be- tured the imagination and lifted the spirits tive midrashim. Undoubtedly they feared tween poetic imagination and worship, and of their human companions. Many of the an implied worship of birds, such as existed God Himself had no hesitation about using birds would have alighted at the Israelite throughout the ancient world. Contempo- bird imagery to express His relationship to campsites to feed and eventually to be fed. rary Egyptians expressed their death-and- His people. As the Israelites stood at the Once the nation was settled in Eretz Yis- rebirth symbolism through the image of a foot of Mount Sinai before receiving the rael, this annual migration would have godlike phoenix rising from the ashes. In covenant, God responded to their fear and continued to be a powerful reminder to the the Greco-Roman world, bird flight, bird- trembling at the momentous event and their Israelites of their ancestors’ 40-year journey song, and the entrails of sacrificed birds apprehension about their journey into the through the desert. Feeding the birds would were used to augur the future. In later unknown by comforting them with these become a way of celebrating their connec- centuries, birds were to figure prominently tender words: “I will carry you on wings of tion to the great spring migration that was in Christian iconography, as momentous eagles, And bring you near to me.” witnessed during that first spring of libera- events were commonly accompanied by tion at the sea and annually for 40 years. white doves.

Tuesday, January 22 of the messianic era (Isaiah 2:4). The word by traveling merchants for protection, into keshet not only describes the violent arrow a synagogue (Orach Chaim 151:6). In con- Gun Control, Halakhah, and employed by Ishmael and others but repre- temporary Israel, where armed soldiers and History: Further Thoughts sents God’s rainbow, His promise to protect citizens regularly enter synagogues to pray, the world from further destruction (Genesis contemporary decisors contend that one By Shlomo M. Brody 9:13). The imagery strongly suggests a bibli- should, where possible, cover the weapons Jewish Ideas Daily recently published an ar- cal belief that weaponry, like war, is a real- or remove the ammunition (Shu”t Yechave ticle in which I argued that even people who ity of life—but should not be glorified, since Da’at 5:18). share a framework of Jewish values may The same sentiment informs the modern reasonably disagree about how to deal with treatment of handling weapons on Shabbat, America’s gun crisis. This argument has a day when one generally may not move provoked comment from opposing direc- any object regularly used for activities for- tions. One set of critics protests, “How can bidden on Shabbat (muktzeh). One should you overlook Judaism’s absolute abhorrence not handle a hammer, for instance, because of weapons?” Another group says, “After the building is a category of forbidden labor. Holocaust, how can you ignore the moral What about a gun? It produces a flame and imperative for Jews to bear arms?” Neither draws blood, both of which are forbidden of these questions changes the conclusion Shabbat activities; therefore, many rabbis that Judaism’s teachings are ambiguous in believe that handling guns is prohibited on their implications for public policy toward Shabbat (muktzeh) unless for saving lives. gun control. Yet Rabbi , former As with warfare in general, the Bible is of the and the State of ambivalent toward weaponry: weapons are Israel, argued that even on a weekday, a Jew necessary but not idealized. The Torah fre- may use weapons only for morally impera- quently refers to weapons. While some ref- tive purposes—to deter enemies, prevent danger, or save lives. But if the purposes are erences merely describe contemporary in- our greatest hope is for an end to its use. morally imperative, a Jew may handle weap- struments of war, many are symbolic. After This moral sentiment is expressed in law ons even on Shabbat. Adam and Eve’s exile, the Garden of Eden as well. The Bible forbids the use of cer- The same logic makes the notion of us- is protected by revolving swords, signifying tain metal instruments to construct an altar ing guns for recreation, like hunting, totally the beginning of an era in which weapons (Exodus 20:21); the reason, in one interpre- alien to Jewish law. Some scholars say the will be needed to protect our most treasured tation, is that those same instruments may use of a gun to earn a living by hunting—or property (Genesis 3:24). Cain’s descendant be used to shorten life, while worship on the even by operating a recreational hunting fa- Tubal-Cain invents “instruments of copper altar is meant to extend life. Similarly, the cility—may be permitted, especially if other and iron,” understood by the Sages to sym- Sages forbade entering the Sanctuary with jobs are unavailable. But to use weapons to bolize weapons of destruction (4:22). The a sword (Sanhedrin 82a), a restriction later kill animals for fun, as Rabbi Yechezkel Lan- transformation of swords into plowshares interpreted by medieval Jewish law to for- dau declared in a celebrated responsum, is represents the end of war and the beginning bid bringing sharp knives, apparently used to imitate biblical villains like Nimrod and

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 6 Esau, not our forefathers Abraham, Isaac, phasis should be placed on promoting Jew- makes it morally imperative for Jews to own and Jacob. (Since 1955 Israeli law has, un- ish perspectives within the private spheres guns, they are entirely unpersuasive. Yes, fortunately, allowed recreational hunting. A of home, school, and synagogue. fewer Jews might have been killed in the recent rise in illegal poaching has renewed But none of the legal sources contemplates Holocaust if the Nazis had not barred them debate about the practice and may lead to its banning weapons—certainly not weapons from owning guns. But the lesson of that curtailment.) used for self-defense. As Rabbi Isaac of Vi- experience is that when a totalitarian anti- In the same way, while it is understood that enna’s ruling testifies and historians have Semitic government tells Jews to give up the use of weaponry is sometimes morally confirmed, Jews have owned weapons dur- their guns, Jews should keep those weapons necessary, the glorification of weaponry is ing many historical periods, even when dis- or, better yet, flee. How is that relevant to foreign to Jewish thought. In a well-known criminatory laws purported to ban Jewish contemporary America and its police and Mishnah, the Sages, in line with Isaiah’s ownership. Yitzchak Kahane has document- armed forces? Those who actually fear ram- messianic vision, banned bearing weapons ed discussions of Jewish-owned weaponry pant anti-Semitic attacks on a future gen- in public on Shabbat, even as an ornament, in everyday legal texts on topics from prop- eration of unarmed U.S. Jews should move since “they are merely shameful.” Very few erty disputes to broken contracts for weap- to Israel, with its Jewish army and nuclear historical sources refer to Jews wearing arms ons training. More significant, there are bombs. Otherwise, they should just get a as ornaments, except for certain early mod- numerous halakhic discussions of the issues grip. ern court Jews who thereby signified their involved in weapons sales by Jews to their If we accept the fact that 21st-century social rank. One 13th-century scholar, Rabbi gentile neighbors (Avodah Zarah 15b). Me- Washington, D.C. is not Nazi-era Berlin, Isaac of Vienna, criticized Bohemian Jews for dieval Christian texts stress the obligation of here is a better question: Including Repre- wearing armory on the Sabbath eve—but de- Jewish citizens to assume their share of the sentative Gabby Giffords in Arizona, Noah fended the practice if it was intended to deter defense of city walls, and this obligation led Pozner in Newtown, and the Canadian cou- bandits (Or Zarua 2:84). to a rich halakhic discussion of bearing arms ple recently murdered in Florida, how many What do these sentiments imply for pub- on Shabbat. In Spain, one 12th-century Jews have been injured or killed by the lat- lic policy in America? First, society should French scholar noted, “it is still common for est round of U.S. gun violence? In the same abhor and boycott cultural media, like mov- Jews to go to war with the king,” reflecting period, how many were killed by anti-Sem- ies and video games, which glorify guns and the early Hispano-Jewish tradition of war- ites? In all likelihood, more American Jews violence. Social scientists debate the impact rior leaders like Shmuel Ha-Nagid. There is have fallen victim to hunting accidents and of these media on behavior. Irrespective of even documentation of Jews’ occasional use careless gun-handling than to punks with that debate, however, violent imagery with- of weapons to defend against anti-Semitism, swastika tattoos. In America, maximizing out educational purpose violates the values like this passage from the so-called Crusade Jewish welfare means maximizing safety for of a religion that goes so far as to prohibit Chronicles: all citizens. Does this mean encouraging re- even raising one’s hand against someone else sponsible citizens to own handguns, getting without cause, let alone actually striking the When the people of the Holy Covenant . . . weapons off the streets, or any of the other individual. The second necessary implica- saw the great multitude . . . they clung to strategies that have been proposed? That is tion is that guns should be used only for their Creator. They donned their armor the question to ask. protection, not for recreation. and their weapons of war, adults and chil- The legacy of Jewish perspectives on gun Yet in America, both media violence and dren alike, with Rabbi Kalonymos . . . at control—as related in law, theology, and his- recreational use of weapons are difficult to their head . . . and they all advanced to- tory—is that weapons should be regulated regulate. The First Amendment protects the ward the gate to fight against the errant in a manner that deters evildoers and pro- media; the Second Amendment, to some ones and the burghers. tects the innocent. What specific policies extent, protects weapons use. Moreover, will achieve this goal in today’s America? large numbers of Americans view recre- None of this discussion marks Jews as Reasonable people can disagree. But Jews ational hunting as morally acceptable. In warmongers or even habitual hunters, but who take part in this dialogue can draw on these areas, alas, specifically Jewish perspec- it does show that Jews owned weapons and critical Jewish values that should frame the tives are outside the contemporary Ameri- used them to defend themselves. debate, even if these values cannot provide can consensus and very likely to remain so. On the other hand, when some U.S. gun all the solutions. This fact, too, has implications: Greater em- rights advocates claim that Jewish history

Wednesday, January 23 and Israel will install new chief rabbis. Jona- term, to be succeeded by whomever a special than Sacks, the brilliant and widely published 150-member electoral assembly selects—for Why America Has No Chief chief rabbi of the United Kingdom, is retir- the moment, a subject of intense speculation Rabbi ing, to be succeeded by the affable Ephraim and backroom maneuvering. Mirvis, currently rabbi of the Finchley Syna- The position of chief rabbi dates far back By Jonathan D. Sarna gogue in North London. Yona Metzger, the in Jewish history. In the Middle Ages, when The public face of world Jewry will change this Chief Rabbi of the Ashkenazi community Jews were treated as a corporate body, the summer. Come September, both England of Israel, is completing his ten-year fixed chief rabbi served not only as the judge,

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 7 scholar, and supreme religious authority for that had brought Rabbi Joseph to America individual activities and accomplishments, his community, but frequently bore respon- defaulted on its obligations to him and went exemplified by Newsweek’s annual listing of sibility for collecting its taxes as well. Many out business. The unfortunate rabbi spent the 50 most influential rabbis of the year. a chief rabbi, as a result, was appointed or his last years as an impoverished invalid. American Jews have nevertheless been confirmed directly by the king. No successor was ever appointed. reluctant to recommend their free-market Chief rabbis today confine their authority A few Orthodox rabbis in other Ameri- approach to religion to Jewish communities to the religious realm, but their role is never can cities did, for a time, carry the title “chief abroad. A recent conference hosted by the purely ceremonial. Inevitably, they must also rabbi,” based on their learning and status. prestigious American Jewish Committee, devote themselves to promoting their own One or two even pretended to the title “chief for example, heard a litany of complaints brand of Judaism (usually some variety of rabbi of the United States.” But none ever concerning the Israeli chief rabbinate and Orthodoxy) over all the oth- achieved recognition outside its maltreatment of non-Orthodox Jews, ers. Israel’s chief rabbinate, his own Orthodox circle. Russian Jews, women and converts. But in in recent years, has sought to As a matter of law, the First the end, AJC called for “significant modifi- undermine more liberal ap- Amendment precludes the cations” to the chief rabbinate, rather than proaches to conversion and government from recogniz- the embrace of the religious free market. A has taken a hardline stance ing one religious authority paper by former Undersecretary of Defense on women’s issues and on the as “chief” over another. Just Dov Zakheim, delivered at the conference, thorny problem of who is a as America introduced free- argued that “what is needed . . . is not the Jew. Rabbi Sacks alienated lib- market capitalism into the abolition of the Chief Rabbinate, but rather eral Jews early in his tenure and economy, so it created a free its transformation into a much more cir- promoted a centrist form of market in religion. Con- cumscribed, yet relevant and all-inclusive Orthodoxy that those to his re- trary to expectations, this has authority.” ligious right openly disdained. had the paradoxical effect of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik, America’s America is unusual in never strengthening religion in the foremost 20-century Modern Orthodox having had an official chief Chief Rabbi Aaron Hart. United States. As Thomas thinker, who exercised vast influence on rabbi. In 1888, a short-lived Jefferson observed as early as American Jewish life without ever having Association of American Orthodox Hebrew in 1820, religion thrived under the maxim been selected chief rabbi, was wiser. He Congregations imported Rabbi Jacob Jo- “divided we stand, united we fall.” turned down the invitation to serve as Is- seph of Vilna to serve as chief rabbi of New In this environment, the creation in rael’s chief rabbi, because, he explained in York, but that effort ended disastrously. America of a government-protected form of 1964, he “was afraid to be an officer of the Consumers soon balked at the extra charges Judaism under the authority of a chief rabbi State.” imposed in return for the rabbi’s supervision was clearly impossible. Instead, American As England and Israel prepare to install of kosher food. Competing rabbis, some of Jews accommodated themselves to the na- new chief rabbis, Rabbi Soloveitchik’s deci- whom also styled themselves “chief rabbi,” tion’s competitive religious marketplace, sion deserves to be remembered. “A rab- offered their supervisory services at lower which by and large has served them well. binate linked up with the state,” he warned, rates. Without its projected income stream, Rabbis, like their Christian religious coun- “cannot be completely free.” the association of Orthodox congregations terparts, win or lose status through their

Thursday, January 24 Wistrich notes the Left’s “disturbing com- Marx, Engels, and Rosa Luxemburg. placency,” its “crippling paralysis of imagi- Perhaps—but the subsequent 600 pages Antisemitism: Obsession or nation,” and its “consensual point” with do much to demonstrate that anti-Semitism Logic? anti-Semitism. But his tone is rueful, and was and is a fixture of the Left. Wistrich he takes pains to distinguish the disgraceful shows, for example, how young Marx— By Alex Joffe aspects of the Left’s present from its more whose notorious 1843 essay “The Jewish The title of Robert Wistrich’s new book, respectable past. Speaking of the alliance Question” depicted German Jewry as a spir- From Ambivalence to Betrayal: The Left, between the Muslim Brotherhood, per- itless fossil, identified with capitalism, whose the Jews, and Israel (University of Ne- sonified by Sheikh al-Qaradawi, and British own actions generated anti-Semitism— braska Press), may be read as a description leftists like George Galloway and Ken Liv- “supported Jewish emancipation only as a or a conclusion. The book delivers only the ingstone—the “red-green axis,” to which an- tactical political demand consistent with the former. Wistrich, perhaps the world’s fore- ti-Semitism is fundamental—he states that principles of bourgeois society while simul- most expert on anti-Semitism, lays out an “what went wrong” was “already prefigured taneously advocating its liquidation in the erudite and stunning bill of particulars but in the 19th-century seedbed of anti-Semitic name of a higher social order.” But Wistrich never quite states a conclusion about the socialism.” He goes on to claim, though, then wavers, saying only that this “dialecti- route taken by the Left from ambivalence to that such alliances represent a “complete cal paradigm” was “undoubtedly open to betrayal. His diffidence tells us something betrayal of the Enlightenment legacy and anti-Semitic interpretations.” important about Jews and the Left. a caricature of socialist internationalism,” To the contrary, Marx’s stance, unambig- There are clues in the preface. There, which would have been inconceivable to uous and life-long, represents the basic logic

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 8 and ur-text of the Left’s relationship with the of Zion, accused the Talmud of preaching strain of Calvinist predestination in Marx- Jews. Jewish emancipation (including op- racism and violence, and condemned the ist thought, the “clear division of men into position to anti-Semitism) was but a means; “Nazification” of Israel. This, not racism or the children of light and the children of society’s full liberation required liquidation accusations of deicide, is the source of most darkness,” with the latter “a multitude con- of “Jew” as a separate identity and Judaism contemporary anti-Semitism, imported demned by history itself to perish.” as a belief system. The goal was and remains wholesale from the Soviets by the Left and It is this division of humanity into the a utopia where, as Marx said, “the Jews will the Muslim world. saved and the unsaved that helps lead the have become impossible.” Left unasked by Wis- Left, on Wistrich’s own evi- Wistrich discusses in detail well-known trich—and by Colin Shind- dence, to the alliances he figures like Luxemburg and Moses Hess as ler in his recent book Israel abhors. Thus, some Western well as many who are more obscure. Pat- and the European Left: Be- progressives hail terns with contemporary resonance re- tween Solidarity and Delegit- as inherently anti-capitalist, cur. German socialist leader August Bebel imization (Continuum)—is anti-imperialist allies, swal- attributed the growth of anti-Semitism in whether the Left’s anti-Sem- lowing or not even sensing the late 19th century to the lower classes’ itism is inherent or inevi- the cognitive dissonance in “understandable” identification of Jews with table. Anti-Semitism is fun- alliances with patriarchal, capitalist oppression: after all, money was damental to the nationalistic theocratic authoritarians the “secular God of the Jews.” Thus, social and religious right; Jews are who hold progressives in democrats opposed anti-Semitism but “un- necessarily the Other for contempt. In contrast, Jews derstood” anti-Semites. German Commu- fascists like the Hungarian are the ultimate chimera, nist Party founder Franz Mehring not only Jobbik party. But amid the ancient yet modern, at once blamed anti-Semitism on Jews but charged universalistic pretensions of a people, a religion, a nation liberals with attempting to “suppress,” as the Left, its own logic of anti-Semitism—the and a nation-state. They can never be saved. anti-Semitic, speech that said so. Such “un- logic that turns ambivalence to betrayal—is Why does Wistrich come right up to derstanding” and cries of censorship are disguised, overlooked, or forgiven. Even the brink but refrain from these conclu- common today. Wistrich, who lays it all out, refrains from sions? He did the same in his last book, A Russian Communists were more severe, comment except in his regretful preface. Lethal Obsession: Anti-Semitism from and Wistrich’s expositions of Bolshevik and This logic dictates that real or imagined Antiquity to the Global Jihad (Random Soviet denunciations of the very idea of Jew- Jewish claims to “chosenness” will collide House). There, two-thirds of the discussion ish nationality are especially valuable. The with the Left’s demand that identities be deals with anti-Semitism from the Left and exigencies of World War II required tempo- homogenized. When this proves impos- Islam; but their common logic—the need to rary indulgence of worldwide Jewish solidar- sible—when ethnic or national minorities deem Jews the Other—is called merely “ob- ity and even Zionism, and after the war the rebel, when class solidarity fails to material- session,” hateful but irrational, capable per- Soviets supported the creation of Israel as a ize, when proletarians perceive their interests haps of being overcome by reason. wedge issue against the West. But at home, differently from the revolutionary vanguard, Like many disappointed veterans of the anti-Jewish campaigns began swiftly in 1946; when someone wishes to retain an identity Left, Wistrich holds with hope over experi- by 1949, they extended to assimilated Jewish as a thinking individual—someone must be ence. Many have found themselves in this intelligentsia, who were accused of lack of blamed. It is usually the Jews. situation, led to unpalatable conclusions “Soviet patriotism.” The campaigns culmi- Examples, historical and contemporary, that threaten to undermine their worldviews nated in Stalin’s 1952 “Doctors’ Plot,” which, abound. Purges of the Austrian and Pol- and lives. For some, it means abandoning Wistrich puts it, fused accusations of “Jewish ish Communist parties were justified by the hope of assimilation or integration or nationalism” and “cosmopolitanism” in an the need to expunge Jews and Zionists. The admitting the permanence of anti-Semitism explicit Zionist conspiracy theory also linked failures of Arab nationalist movements, or of Jews as outcasts. For others it means to Israel and Western imperialism. the authoritarian or fascist states they pro- finding themselves in agreement with “con- Khrushchev admitted that there was duced, and the Arab Spring rebellions servatives,” something to be avoided at all never really a doctors’ plot, but the political against them were all blamed on machina- costs. Wistrich’s own motives remain as benefits of maintaining and exporting anti- tions by Zionism and Israel—or their very unclear as his prescriptions; but his book is Semitism, especially to Arabs and Muslims, existence. These phenomena represent valuable as a work of massive and learned were too great to forego. Thus, Soviet opera- not simply “scapegoating” but a consistent scholarship and a document of a journey tives and their supporters resurrected classic totalitarian logic that pervades the Left, not yet completed. Tsarist texts like the Protocols of the Elders flowing from what Isaiah Berlin called a

Jewish Ideas Weekly January 18-25, 2013 9