Wolfram Kinzig. Harnack, Marcion und das Judentum: Nebst einer kommentierten Edition des Briefwechsels Adolf von Harnacks mit Houston Stewart Chamberlain. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2004. 344 S. EUR 38.00, cloth, ISBN 978-3-374-02181-9.

Reviewed by Roderick Stackelberg

Published on H-German (May, 2007)

In this closely argued book, church historian investigate and critique Harnack's attitudes to‐ Wolfram Kinzig explores the puzzling question wards Judaism as a religion and towards contem‐ how Adolf Harnack (1851-1930), the most famous porary Jewry as a people. academic representative of liberal Protestantism The book consists of three parts. The frst, by (known in as Kulturprotestantismus) at far the longest and theologically most challenging the turn of the century, arrived at his notorious part, "Harnacks Marcion," traces the evolution of proposal to exclude the Old Testament from the Harnack's interpretation of Marcion from his canon of the German Evangelical Church. Elevat‐ prize-winning dissertation as a nineteen-year-old ed to the hereditary nobility by Kaiser Wilhelm II student of theology at the Baltic-German Universi‐ after his appointment as royal librarian in 1906, ty at Dorpat, today Tartu in Estonia, to his 1921 bi‐ Harnack made his startling recommendation in ography.[2] Harnack's 1870 Preisschrift, while his last major work, a biography of the second- sympathetic to Marcion for allegedly anticipating century Greek quasi-Gnostic heretic Marcion, the Protestant doctrines of salvation by faith which he published in 1921 at the age of seventy. alone and the priesthood of believers, was much [1] Völkisch publicists after the First World War, more reserved about Marcion's importance for including members of the Nazi-supported Christian theology than his later biography. The Deutsche Christen, frequently referred to Har‐ young Harnack did not yet embrace Marcion's nack's recommendation to justify their own rejec‐ low opinion of the Old Testament nor his absolute tion of the "Jewish" Old Testament, despite the fact diferentiation between the stern creator God of that Harnack repeatedly disassociated himself the Old Testament and the good, merciful God of from the antisemitic movement and criticized its the New Testament. Kinzig carefully analyzes doctrines of racial supremacy. While the specifc Harnack's growing valorization of Marcion as a focus of Kinzig's study is the genealogy of Har‐ harbinger of the sixteenth-century Reformation in nack's proposal to revoke the canonical status of his major works, the multi-volume History of Dog‐ the Old Testament, his more general purpose is to H-Net Reviews ma (1886-89), his widely circulated Das Wesen des and conventions of the Pharisees, and Hellenistic Christentums (translated as What Is Christianity?, Diaspora Judaism (represented theologically par‐ 1900), and The Mission and Expansion of Chris‐ ticularly by Philo), which reconciled biblical tianity during the First Three Centuries (1902). teachings with Greek and prepared Harnack became increasingly enamored of Mar‐ the ground for the Christianization of the Greeks cion's dualistic doctrines of God versus nature, and the religion's subsequent spread. While Har‐ spirit versus matter, soul versus the fesh, and the nack praised Hellenistic Judaism as a preliminary gospel versus the as pointing the way to the stage to the universalism of Christianity, he fault‐ progressive development of Christian theology. In ed Palestinian Judaism and its followers in the Di‐ Harnack's evolving description Marcion took on aspora for reverting to an exclusive "Volksreli‐ more and more traits of Martin Luther. In his cul‐ gion" (p. 164). Kinzig does not hold back in his minating biography Harnack praised Marcion for criticism of Harnack's interpretation of ancient creating the New Testament canon, making the Judaism as a religion stunted by ritualism, legal‐ doctrine of salvation the center of Christianity ism, and ethnocentrism, while Christianity, im‐ rather than founding Christianity on cosmology, bued by the Greek spirit of freedom, supposedly and going beyond Saint Paul in repudiating Judaic overcame the constraints of Judaism and alleged‐ residues in Christianity, including the Old Testa‐ ly democratized and popularized Judaic ethics. ment. Harnack conceded that the second-century Kinzig illuminates the contradictions in Harnack's Old Catholic Church had been right not to have analysis, which at times portrayed Diaspora Ju‐ discarded the Old Testament, which furnished the daism as a proselytizing movement in competi‐ necessary historical justifcation for Christianity tion with Christianity, while at other times stress‐ in its precarious early years. He also sympathized ing its exclusiveness as the source of Christian an‐ with Luther's judgment that the Protestant Refor‐ tisemitism. Kinzig's most serious charge is that mation could not do without the law as embodied Harnack entirely neglected Jewish sources in his in the Old Testament. But while Harnack insisted histories of the early Church, although he did be‐ that the Old Testament, particularly the prophetic latedly support the introduction of Jewish Studies books and the Psalms, should continue to be read into the theological faculty of the University of as edifying literature today, he declared that one in 1912. He was not familiar with Hebrew cannot learn from it what it means to be Chris‐ and provided no evidence from rabbinic litera‐ tian. Hence he concluded that its retention as a ture for his characterizations of Judaism. By ig‐ Protestant canonical document in the twentieth noring the works of Abraham Geiger (1810-74), century was "the result of a religious and ecclesi‐ the founder of the Hochschule für die Wis‐ astical paralysis" (p. 86). senschaft des Judentums in Berlin in 1872, and The second part of Kinzig's book, headed "Ju‐ other Jewish scholars, Harnack failed to keep den und Judentum bei Harnack," is more accessi‐ abreast of the latest research in his feld.[3] Like ble to non-theologians and will be of greater inter‐ so many other Protestant theologians of his era, est to historians and general readers. Kinzig frst he saw Jesus' teachings not in relation to, but as a examines Harnack's attitude toward ancient Ju‐ contradiction of Judaism. Kinzig chides Harnack daism before addressing his attitude toward con‐ for failing to realize that a deeper knowledge of temporary Jewry. Harnack's assessment of an‐ ancient Judaism might have facilitated a better cient Judaism was based on his distinction be‐ understanding of early Christianity. tween what he called Palestinian Judaism, which The indiference Harnack displayed toward provided the historical setting for Jesus' emer‐ Jewish scholarship also characterized his stance gence as a rebel angrily combating the authority on the "Jewish question," increasingly propelled

2 H-Net Reviews into the political limelight by the growing anti‐ the present age can be healed through parades, semitic movement in Germany in the 1880s and swastikas, and steel helmets" (cited on p. 196).[5] 1890s. While he criticized the antisemitism of Im‐ Harnack's prejudices and ambivalence, and perial Court Chaplain Adolf Stoecker (1835-1909) those of Kulturprotestantismus more generally, as a "sad scandal" and insisted that antisemitism are nowhere more evident than in the third part had no place in the Church or Christian religion, of Kinzig's book, "The Correspondence between he acknowledged that there might be a Jewish Harnack and Houston Stewart Chamberlain question in a "national or economic sense," on (1855-1927)." Their acquaintance was mediated by which, however, he disclaimed any competence to Wilhelm II in 1901, who wanted the distinguished comment (p. 190). Harnack also unequivocally de‐ theologian to meet the newly celebrated author of nied the validity of notions of racial determinism, The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century (1900). writing in the liberal Vienna Neue Freie Presse in Like many other liberal Protestant theologians, 1907 that in social and political afairs "there is Harnack had praised Foundations for its exalta‐ nothing more disgusting and infuriating than the tion of Christianity and the Reformation while ei‐ fanaticism and hypocrisy that seek to conceal ego‐ ther dismissing or ignoring its racist and anti‐ istic claims to power and dominance under the semitic content. The two writers did not exactly cloak of race and religion" (cited on p. 193). Yet in hit it of, each criticizing the other in letters to insisting that unique Jewish traits were not racial‐ third parties. In 1902 Chamberlain wrote to Cosi‐ ly determined but acquired as a result of persecu‐ ma Wagner, "Ich verehre Harnack als Gelehrten.... tion and victimization, he implicitly accepted as‐ doch geistig fühle ich mich durch eine Welt von sumptions about a negative Jewish type. Although ihm getrennt" (cited on p. 215). To Wilhelm II he rejected völkisch antisemitism without reser‐ Chamberlain complained about Harnack's all-too- vation, he was not active in fghting against it, re‐ moderate nationalism in 1903: "Er ist doch ebenso fusing an invitation to join the board of the Verein frei wie ich und hätte eine deutsche, entschiedene zur des Antisemitismus in 1924, in con‐ Sprache reden dürfen und sollen" (cited on p. trast to his son Ernst and nephew Arvid, both of 216). Between 1901 and 1912, the Harnack-Cham‐ whom were executed for their resistance to berlain correspondence was limited to polite but Nazism during the Second World War.[4] Like his fairly perfunctory exchanges. Harnack's longest older friend and mentor, the classical scholar letter in 1902 contained his sometimes quite cen‐ Theodor Mommsen (1817-1903), Harnack advo‐ sorious corrections to Chamberlain's collection of cated full Jewish assimilation, which he seems, sayings by Jesus, Worte Christi (1901), most of however, to have regarded as a function of con‐ which Chamberlain adopted in the second edition version to Christianity. He also shared with of his pamphlet in 1903. The nature of their rela‐ Mommsen a sense of resignation about the possi‐ tionship changed abruptly in 1912 after Chamber‐ bility of countering so populist and hateful an ide‐ lain sent Harnack a copy of his newly published ology as antisemitism with rational argument. biography of Goethe. Harnack responded with Kinzig describes Harnack's attitude toward the fve letters of efusive praise and detailed com‐ Jews as "paternalistic" (p. 200), regarding them as mentary between November 13 and 21, 1912, as disobedient children who have to be treated with he voraciously read the book chapter by chapter. love and discipline. On the other hand, Harnack Again he rejected Chamberlain's antisemitism and resolutely defended the , writing racism (less pronounced in Goethe than in The in the Neue Freie Presse in 1924 that reactionaries Foundations), writing, "You are really possessed were wrong-headed to think that "the defects of by an anti-Jewish demon that clouds your vision and disfgures your wonderful book.... I believe

3 H-Net Reviews that we owe Isaiah, Jeremiah, the Psalms, and planation. From a post-Holocaust perspective his‐ above all Jesus Christ himself to the Jews" (cited torians cannot help but question how Harnack on p. 263). But Harnack made it clear that he could have maintained such friendly relations for would not let the issue of antisemitism get be‐ so long with so notorious an antisemite, and tween them, cutting short his criticism of Cham‐ Chamberlain was not the only one, as Harnack berlain's racism with the words, "But enough; the was also on excellent terms with völkisch theolo‐ Jew is not to have the last word. May he rather gian Johannes Müller (1864-1949), whose evangel‐ now disappear completely [from our correspon‐ ical community at Schloß Elmau he visited for ex‐ dence] and may only the conviction of how much tended periods in the 1920s. Kinzig points out that we have in common remain, as you have so won‐ if Chamberlain wanted to gain the approval of derfully shown in your portrait of Goethe" (cited Germany's Bildungsbürgertum, he could not have on p. 266). Chamberlain agreed to drop the sub‐ chosen a better subject to write about than ject--"Sie werden Ihre Meinung nicht ändern, und Goethe, on whom Harnack's brother Otto, a pro‐ ich die meine ebensowenig"--(cited on p. 271) but fessor of literature, had also written a widely read not until after he tried to rationalize his hatred of scholarly biography. Harnack shared with the aca‐ Jews as a necessary corollary to his love of honor, demic German elites some of their mandarin con‐ nobility, reverence, and morality. "Seien Sie auch servatism, expressed in contempt for the masses, hierin generös," Chamberlain wrote, "und lassen suspicion of elected or unelected majorities, oppo‐ Sie mir meinen Haß, auf das ich nicht meine sition to secularization, and disdain for politics, Liebe verliere" (cited p. 272). They continued on which conservatives invariably associated with good terms. Harnack gratefully acknowledged re‐ the reform eforts of the left. Kinzig might have ceipt of Chamberlain's war pamphlets in 1914 and made more of anti-Catholicism as a bond among 1915, and praised them highly to the Kaiser, and liberal and conservative German Protestants as his Mensch und Gott. Betrachtungen über Religion well. From Harnack's point of view the greatest und Christentum in 1921. Chamberlain reciprocat‐ danger to Protestantism was "the progressive ed by heaping praise on publications sent by Har‐ Catholicizing of the Protestant Churches," by nack, including his Marcion in 1922. Certainly which he meant a "Catholic conception of the they were united in their hopes for a German vic‐ Church, which identifes the Church of the Faith tory in the First World War, in their bitter disap‐ with the Church of History [and] everything that pointment at German defeat, and in their assump‐ naturally goes with it--fanaticism, the despotic tion of the superiority of the German form of tendency, impatience, a mania for persecution, Protestant Christianity. Although he preached tol‐ clerical uniform, and clerical police."[6] True erance, it was Harnack who had written in 1901, Protestantism did not treat the creed dogmatically "Wer diese Religion nicht kennt, kennt keine, und as legal ordinances requiring obedience, as the wer sie samt ihrer Geschichte kennt, kennt alle" Catholic Church supposedly did, but rather as an (cited p. 204). inner faith and feeling that pervaded every aspect Clearly, Kinzig's purpose in including Har‐ of a Protestant's life. Harnack's strained relations nack's correspondence with Chamberlain, some with the evangelical church hierarchy, which had of which has not been published before, is to opposed his original appointment at the Universi‐ show how very diferent Harnack's attitudes to‐ ty of Berlin in 1888 because of his liberal views, ward Jews and racialism were from those of ironically may have made him more receptive to Chamberlain. But he concedes that their corre‐ Chamberlain's antipathy to the organized Catholic spondence "casts a dark shadow on the biography and Protestant churches as well. of the church historian" (p. 231) and requires ex‐

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Kinzig denies that the attitude of Harnack, readers of this excellent scholarly study. His in‐ and of Kulturprotestantismus more generally, to‐ troduction also provides a useful guide through ward Jews can be adequately understood through the recent literature on the attitudes of Harnack such polarizing categories as anti-Judaism or anti‐ and Kulturprotestantismus toward Judaism. A semitism. It would be more accurate to speak of key to Kinzig's own theological perspective may an intermittently in- or decreasing distance to Ju‐ be found in his earlier massive study of the idea daism and Jewry on the part of Protestant theolo‐ of progress in the early Christian Church. For Eng‐ gians. According to Kinzig, Harnack's call to de‐ lish-speaking readers he summarized his fndings canonize the Old Testament was a result of his as follows: "The lesson to be learned from this historical research and his fascination with Mar‐ study is that the idea of progress, useful though it cion, not of contemporary political disputes or is, is highly problematic and should be aban‐ anti-Jewish prejudice. Although Harnack should doned."[9] This idea, as held by the Church Fa‐ have recognized that his attitude toward the Old thers he studied, was not compatible with our Testament and ancient Judaism could be misused, grim historical experience after two world wars he cannot be held responsible for its political in‐ and the Holocaust. "Moreover, it is anti-Jewish, strumentalization against his will. While agreeing because it is based on the idea of a progressive with Harnack's critics, above all the Israeli schol‐ revelation and thus leads to an instrumentalisa‐ ar Uriel Tal and the many scholars of various na‐ tion of the Jewish experience with God which is tionalities who followed his lead, that religious ethically questionable. The question as regards anti-Judaism paved the way for the more lethal the right Christian interpretation of history," he racial antisemitism that followed, Kinzig argues concluded, "is therefore still open."[10] His con‐ that Harnack's disinterest in the Old Testament clusion indirectly underscores the historical irony and ignorance of contemporary Judaism should that the most signifcant Protestant resistance to not be defned as anti-Judaism or as antisemitism Nazism came not from Kulturprotestanten in the insofar as this implies a connection to völkisch an‐ rational tradition of Harnack, who prided them‐ tisemitism or the Holocaust.[7] Kinzig can fnd no selves on their liberal ethics and sense of cultural evidence in Harnack's works for Tal's assertion progress, but from stern advocates of a spiritual that because Harnack and his students under‐ Christianity, such as Karl Barth (1886-1968) or Di‐ stood the purpose of Jewry as providing "witness etrich Bonhoefer (1906-45), who acted directly on for the correctness of the Christian faith" through the teachings of the Jewish, historical Jesus. their sufering, they believed that after emancipa‐ Notes tion and the acquisition of full civil rights Jews [1]. Adolf von Harnack, Marcion: Das Evan‐ had lost their "Existenzberechtigung" (p. 34).[8] gelium vom fremden Gott. Eine Monographie zur Kinzig is critical of teleological theories of anti‐ Geschichte der Grundlegung der katholischen semitism that understand the Holocaust as the Kirche (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1921). Translated by culmination of nineteenth-century antisemitism John E. Steely and Lyle D. Bierma as Marcion: The or of centuries-old Christian antisemitism. "Wir Gospel of the Alien God (Durham: Labyrinth stehen nach Auschwitz in der akuten Gefahr," he Press, 1990). writes, "den deutschen Antisemitismus immer auf die Shoah hin zu lesen und möglicherweise in [2]. Adolf von Harnack, Marcion. Der mod‐ seiner Bedeutung innerhalb seiner eigenen Zeit erne Gläubige des 2. Jahrhunderts, der erste Re‐ überzubewerten" (pp. 204-205). formator (Dorpat: Die Dorpater Preisschrift, 1870). New edition edited by Friedemann Steck Kinzig's mildly "postmodernist" conclusion, (Berlin and New York: Walter de Gruyter, 2003). distrustful of master narratives, should not put

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[3]. See Susannah Heschel, Abraham Geiger bius (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck und Ruprecht, and the Jewish Jesus (Chicago: University of Chica‐ 1994), p. 592. go Press, 1998); and Christian Wiese, Challenging [10]. Ibid. Colonial Discourse: Jewish Studies and Protestant Theology in Wilhelmine Germany, tr. Barbara Harshav and Christian Wiese (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 159-169. Both Heschel and Wiese are even more critical of Harnack than Kinzig. According to Wiese, Harnack "relentlessly made it clear that, as he saw it, the Jewish religion was completely ob‐ solete" (p. 169). [4]. On Ernst von Harnack (1888-1945), see Jahre des Widerstands 1932-1945, ed. Gustav- Adolf von Harnack (Pfullingen: Neske, 1989). On (1901-42), see Shareen Blair Brysac, Resisting Hitler: and the Red Orchestra (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). [5]. See also Christian Nottmeier, Adolf von Harnack und die deutsche Politik 1890-1930. Eine biographische Studie zum Verhältnis von Protes‐ tantismus, Wissenschaft und Politik (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2004), especially chapter 6, "Der konservative Republikaner: Harnack und die er‐ ste deutsche Demokratie," 462-514. [6]. Adolf Harnack, Thoughts on the Present Position of Protestantism, tr. Thomas Bailey Saun‐ ders (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1899), 32, 35. Jews and Judaism are never mentioned in this brief book. [7]. Uriel Tal, Christians and Jews in Ger‐ many: Religion, Politics, and Ideology in the Sec‐ ond Reich, 1870-1914, tr. Noah Jonathan Jacobs (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1975), 191f. [8]. Kinzig cites Tal's essay, "Theologische De‐ batte um das 'Wesen' des Judentums," in Juden im Wilhelminischen Deutschland 1890-1914, ed.Werner E. Mosse and Arnold Paucker (Tübin‐ gen: Mohr, 1976), 599-632. [9]. Wolfram Kinzig, Novitas Christiana. Die Idee des Fortschritts in der Alten Kirche bis Euse‐

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Citation: Roderick Stackelberg. Review of Kinzig, Wolfram. Harnack, Marcion und das Judentum: Nebst einer kommentierten Edition des Briefwechsels Adolf von Harnacks mit Houston Stewart Chamberlain. H-German, H-Net Reviews. May, 2007.

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