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The Racial Philosophy of Jehuda Halevi Author(s): Cedric Dover Reviewed work(s): Source: Phylon (1940-1956), Vol. 13, No. 4 (4th Qtr., 1952), pp. 312-322 Published by: Clark Atlanta University Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/272567 . Accessed: 03/01/2013 07:22

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This content downloaded on Thu, 3 Jan 2013 07:22:04 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions By CEDRIC DOVER

The Racial Philosophy of Jehuda Halevi

TUDAHBEN SAMUEL, hal-levi, (ca. 1080-1141), more commonly known as JJehuda Halevi, was born in Toledo, where he passed his early life in comfortable circumstances and under a fairly benign dispensation, both Moslem and Catholic. But he had watched from afar the brutal progress of the First Crusade; and later, as an honoured physician in Cordova, learned something of antisemitic persecution at first hand. He responded with the passion of a "God-intoxicated" poet and the logic of his Rabbin- ical discipline. In verse and prose, he challenged Islam and Christianity, rejected Aristotle and the sensuality of Hellenism, extolled the supremacy of Judaism, and so became the first mystic philosopher of the Jews. In the process, he also did for Zionism what Herder,' more than six centuries later, was to do for German nationalism. It can be claimed for him, too, that he is the first racial philosopher of the Middle Ages, though his teaching lacks the elaborate system of Ibn Khaldun;2 but this point has never been raised before. Philosophers have been content to surround him with the foliage of praise and philoso- phising; students of racialism, busy with customary patterns, have over- looked the significance of a mystic not already "in the literature"; and some Jewish scholars, intimately aware of the Jewish struggle for equal rights, have obviously not thought it politic to emphasise the association of a great Jew with early notions of innate human inequalities. Their diplo- macy seems at first sight justifiable, for the Jews have suffered much through the lesser, and purely doctrinal, concept of the Chosen People; yet the larger truth is that through Halevi it can be clearly demonstrated that Jewish racialism arises from minority status. It is negative and defensive, not positive and aggressive; and its exclusiveness does not deny the command to regard the stranger: "Love ye the stranger: for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt." (Deut. 10:19) The compelling forces of Halevi's thought3 are easily traced in his poetry.4 It is highly symbolical, heavily ornamented, and often choked by Biblical paraphrases; but it is minority poetry at its early best. And,

1 C. Dover, "The Racial Philosophy of Johann Herder," Brit. Journ. Sociology, 3:124-33. 2 C. Dover, "The Racial Philosophy of Ibn Khaldun," Phylon, 13:107-19. 3 I am grateful to a learned Hebrew scholar, Mr. C. Abramsky, for suggesting this enquiry, for productive criticism, and for guiding my struggles with the Halevian literature. It is mostly a devotional Corpus with no relevance here; but I found Isaac Husik's History of Medieval Jewish Philosophy (Philadelphia, 1946) distinctly useful for background. 4 N. Salaman, ed., Selected Poems of Jehudah Halevi (Philadelphia, 1928).

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This content downloaded on Thu, 3 Jan 2013 07:22:04 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE RACIAL PHILOSOPHY . . . 313 like other minority poetry, both ancient and modern, it is most effective when it expresses protest and national feelings. These are so dominant that they exclude another characteristic of minority literature - the theme of universality, coupled with an unusual capacity for assimilation, which is a feature, for example, of the writing of Halevi's predecessor, Solomon Ibn Gabirol (ca. 1021-1058). Halevi's heart lives, uncompro- misingly, in the East: My heart is in the east, and I in the uttermost west. How can I find savour in food? How shall it be sweet to me? How shall I render my vows and my bonds, while yet Zion lies beneath the fetters of Edom, and I in Arab chains? A light thing would it seem to me to leave all the good things of Spain, Seeing how precious it is in my eyes to behold the dust of the deso- late sanctuary. The same theme is recurrent. It occurs, for example, in the famous "Ode to Zion" chanted in the synagogues on the ninth of Ab, the day when Jerusalem was laid waste by the Babylonians and, seven centuries later, by the Romans: I will cut off and cast away the splendour of my crown of locks, and curse the fate That desecrated in an unclean land the heads that bore thy crown. How shall it be sweet to me to eat and drink, while I behold Dogs tearing at thy lions' whelps? Or how can the light of day be joyous to mine eyes, while yet I see in ravens' beaks torn bodies of thine eagles? In these six lines there are three borrowings from the Bible, but their interest lies in the addition of double entendre to nationalistic symbolism. For, in Hebrew, the words "Arab" (Areb) and "raven" (Oreb) are barely distinguishable in sound and appearance, and Halevi knows his audience will not miss the implication. He repeats it in another poem: Turn aside with me to Zoan, to the Red Sea, to Mount Horeb. I will go 'round unto Shiloh to the heap of the ruined shrine, And will get me along in the paths of the Ark of the Covenant, Until I taste the dust of its hiding place that is more sweet than honey, And I see the habitation of that beauteous one who hath forgotten her nest, Since the doves (Jews) be driven away, and ravens abide there. These expressions of longing and fortitude amongst oppressive foreigners often show the Judaeo-Christian characteristic of combining resignation with complaint: The faithful recall today the wonders of olden time; The children groan, for other lords beside Thee are their masters. Where is God's covenant to the fathers, where his former mercies ... And where are all His marvels which our fathers have told us? How long have we drunk our fill of bitterness, and hoped for Thy salvation? . ..

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And watched for the light of morning, but were covered with thick darkness? As though we had not been a People, nay, had not been more won- derful than any People.... He asks again and again, in so many words and in different ways, "Will the Lord reject for ever?" For to be conscious of innate superiority, while living in an underprivileged state, is particularly galling. It sometimes drives him, usually so gentle, to angry contempt for the "fools" around him: Time, the deceiver of all men, hath given me, in exchange for thee, Those that have war in their hearts and peace on their lips. I speak with them, even though I find within their mouths, Instead of thy manna, leeks and garlic. My rage and my wrath is upon those foolish ones Who are wise in their own eyes, Who call their falseness faiths, And call my faith superstition; Who sow and reap their ears of corn, And rejoice in them even though they be blasted ... And when a fool seeketh the secret, I answer him: What hath a ring of gold to do upon a pig's snout? And how, upon a sterile place, should I seek For my clouds to drop their rains? The same attitude is sharply expressed in a poem concerning the Sab- bath,5 the distinguishing day: Thou hast bestowed great splendour on the Sabbath Through the bond of peace and life. And thou hast sanctified it, that it may distinguish Between Israel and the other nations, Who merely utter empty words When they compare their days with my holy day ... Can the deceit of Ishmael and Edom mislead the men of truth? They compare dross with jewels, The dead with the living... Stretch forth Thy hand a second time To renew Thine erstwhile Kingdom, To lead Thy people wandering in the dark, Dispersed to left and right- Then shame will befall Arabia and the Greeks. The Greeks, no less than the Arabs, form a thorn in his side, though the Moslem danger is an immediate reality, while the Greeks trouble him only as the creators of a sensual wisdom he fears. Therefore, in a stern rejoinder to a friend who has criticised his longing to settle in Israel, Halevi warns him against Hellenisation and ridicules the Aristotelian doctrine of the eternity of matter: See now, my friend, yea see and understand, And turn aside from the lure of thorns and snares. Let not the wisdom of the Greeks beguile thee, For it hath no fruit, but only flowers- 5 Heinemann, vide infra.

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Unless the fruit be that the earth was never outstretched, Nor the tents of the sky spread out; Nor was any beginning to all the work of creation, Nor will any end be to the renewal of the months. Hark how the words of their wise are confused, Built and plastered up on a vain, unstable base; Hark - and come back with an empty heart, And a mouth full of dross and weeds. Why, then, should I seek out crooked ways, And forsake the mother of paths? The sentiments expressed in Halevi's poems can be matched again and again in other minority poems; for there are stages in the histories of minority peoples when reliance on the "glory time" to come is inevitable, when survival depends upon techniques for fortifying the spirit. But, useful and understandable though they are, they are poor preparation for philosophy; and Halevi's only critical work accordingly lacks the logic of the Greeks and Arabs he despised. He is often naive and sometimes bemused by class-consciousness, as when he excuses the participation of privileged Jews in the making of the Golden Calf by attributing a greater wickedness to them: "For those of higher station who assisted in making it, an excuse might be found in the fact that they wished to separate clearly the disobedient from the pious, in order to slay those who would worship the calf." Such statements do not encourage confidence in an author's clarity, but it is only fair to recall that Halevi's Kitab al-Khazari,6 or "Book of the Khazars," does not pretend to be much more than a popular justifica- tion of community consciousness in times of stress. It is written, as was the custom, in Arabic in the Hebrew script, the form being an imitation of the Platonic dialogue. Herder acknowledged his indebtedness to it, rather than to Plato, in composing the "great (lengthy) passages" of dialogue in his Spirit of Hebrew Poetry; but there seems to be no valid reasons for the tribute other than psychological ones. The defensiveness of the work begins with its subtitle: "The Book of Proof and Argument in Defense of a Despised Religion"; and its nationalism is implicit in its "plot." For the kings of the Tartar Khazars, amongst whom many Jews had settled, had embraced the Jewish faith some four hundred years or so before Halevi, in mythical circumstances that were a common legend in his time. Bul&n, king of the Khazars in the middle of the eighth century, accepted the one God after many intimate conver- sations with an angel. Thereafter, the Byzantine and Arab rulers invited him to join their religions, but the king insisted on discussion with a rabbi, as well as the priest and the ulama who had been sent to him. He asked the envoys which of the two monotheistic faiths other than their own was the better, and in each case the Jewish religion was favoured. The

6 H. Hirschfeld, Judah Halevi's Kitab al-Khazari (London, 1931; 2nd ed.). Extracts from this work are distinguished by the letters Hd.

This content downloaded on Thu, 3 Jan 2013 07:22:04 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions 316 PHYLON king replied that they had chosen "the best and truest" religion, in which the rabbi subsequently instructed him closely. This story was repeated by a later king of the Khazars in a letter (said to be historically acceptable) to Hisdai ben Shafrut, the learned Jewish minister at Cordova of the Caliph Abd al-Rahman; but the many medieval historians and geographers7 who wrote about the Khazar kingdom have not confirmed it, nor the conversion of the majority of the Khazars. The Jews remained the smallest minority, though the kings were Jewish; and it may well be that the custom of limiting the monarchy through regicide 8 influenced the first royal conversion more than the visions. Abulfeda records, however, that the people remained addicted to their pagan ways. Therefore, Hirschfeld's assertion that the conversion of the Khazar people is an "historical fact", authentically conveyed only to the Spanish Jews, must be ascribed to "in-group"pride. The Arabs and Persians knew a great deal about the Khazars from the eighth century onwards; and it is unlikely that Halevi, learned in Arabic in the centre of Arabic learning, was as ignorant as Hirschfeld of their knowledge. But legend suited his purpose better than history. He saw in the myth of the conversion an impressively ethnocentric medium for presenting serious but popularised arguments against Moslems, Christians, materialists, and the dissenting Karaites. The arguments were derived from Rabbinical teaching; close familiarity with Arab culture; the inspiration of the Moslem mystic al-Ghazali, who rejected philosophy and became a Sufi; and his own emotional responses to oppression, as well as the attacks on orthodox Judaism from within and without. It was a book, in fact, that the conventional Jews needed, and they showed their immediate appreciation by making it a medieval "best- seller." Before the end of the century it was rendered into Hebrew by the great translator Jehuda ben Tabbon, who gave it the name Kusari, which still clings to it. Other translations and commentaries also appeared, but Halevi's reputation was soon obscured by Abraham ibn Daud, Maimonides (whose Guide of the Perplexed appeared in 1190), and other leaders of the rationalist school of Jewish philosophy. Rationalism has always been a feature of Jewish thought in times of relative stability, mysticism in the days of distress; and, in accordance with these natural responses, the persecutions of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries brought a revival of Jewish mysticism, and with it a renewed interest in Halevi. But he was overshadowed, even in mysticism, by Hisdai Crescas (1340-1410), and afterwards by the fifteenth century mystics led by Shemtob ben Joseph ibn Shemtob. Today, on the surface, the Kitab al-Khazari is little more than a literary curiosity, which the emergence of Israel has only been able

7 V. Minorsky, Hudud al- 'Alam- 'The Regions of the World.' A Persian Geography, 982 A.D. (London, 1937). 8 J. G. Frazer, "The Killing of the Khazar Kings," Folklore, 28:382-407.

This content downloaded on Thu, 3 Jan 2013 07:22:04 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions THE RACIAL PHILOSOPHY . . . 317 to propitiate with an excellent abridgment edited and annotated by Isaak Heinemann.9 The minor racialisms of the book are numerous and in conformity with similar thinking in other groups. Converts are inferior to the genuine articles; but the Khazar king, being a king, belongs to a special category of convert distinguished by Providential favour, though deprived of the supreme advantage of seeing God: the only circumstance which makes a convert absolutely equal to a born Jew. Such an attitude invariably coin- cides with denigration of other nations - and Halevi is no exception to the rule. Thus, the Indians have neither "a fixed form of religion," nor a commonly shared book free from historical discrepancies: Such a book does not exist. Apart from this, they are a dissolute, unreliable people, who arouse the indignation of the followers of religions through their talk, and anger them with their idols, talismans and witchcraft. To such things they pin their faith, and deride those who claim the possession of a divine book. Yet they possess only a few books, written to mislead the weak-minded. (Hd. 46.) This statement is not, of course, peculiar to Halevi. He took his analysis from the Arabic view of India, which was definitely coloured by the opinions of the traveller-historian al-Biruni, whose book on India 10 appeared some fifty years before the birth of Halevi. The Hindus were fanatics to al-Biruni, as they still are to wistful imperialists, their fanati- cism being concentrated "against those who do not belong to them- against all foreigners. They call them Mlechla, i.e., impure." He did not like the caste-system either: it was based on colour or descent; and, unlike Halevi, he followed the Islamic doctrine that "all men are equal, except in piety." The Persians also responded in racial terms to the racialism of the Hindus, while accepting the Koran's exhortations against prejudice. Thus, the princely author of the Qabus Nama,/ which was written in the decade of Halevi's birth, liked them even less than al-Biruni. He complained, with a nice disregard for his own habits, that "no slave-girl is safe" from a Hindu master, who was usually an "evil-tongued" fellow as well. Indeed, he found them almost as unpleasant as Juvenal found the Greeks, for intergroup abuse varies little from one age to another. Halevi's attitude towards Negroes is that they are definitely inferior beings, "a people not united upon a common law." It would be difficult in this connexion to accuse him of colour prejudice; for the early Jews seem to have had none, in spite of apparent indications to the contrary. The most easily recalled is the verse beginning "I am black, but comely" in The Song of Solomon (1:5), but the suggestion of prejudice belongs to the

9 I. Heinemann, Jehuda Halevi('s) Kuzari: The Book of Proof and Argument (Oxford, 1947). Extracts are distinguished by the letters Hn. 10 A. Yusuf Ali, "Al-Biruni's India," Islamic Culture, 1:31-35. 1 R. Levy: A Mirror for Princes. The Qabus Nama (A.D. 1082) by Kai Ka'us Ibn Iskandar, Prince of Gurgan (London, 1951).

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King James Version and not the Hebrew: in a literal translation, the conjunction is "and". Nevertheless, it is significant that Halevi dismisses the black peoples as inferior to whites in general rather than to the Jews alone: Any Gentile who joins us sincerely shares our good fortune, but he is not equal to us. If the Torah were binding on us only because God created us, the white and the black man would be equal since He created them all. But the Torah is binding because He led us out of Egypt and remained attached to us. For we are the pick of mankind. (Hn. 35.) There is, too, the customary nationalistic insistence on linguistic superiority. The Hebrew language has beauty and flexibility, but it is a relatively recent growth fostered in the Nile valley by nourishing the changing structure of Canaanite with Egyptian words. It is true that Halevi could not know what we now do about the evolution of languages, but it is equally true that orthodox Jews and Christians refused to know what their own knowledge of history made obvious: that Egyptian was older than Hebrew. Consequently, Halevi, who was a master of Arabic literary conventions, was able to write: Considered historically and logically, its original form is the noblest. According to tradition, it is language in which God spoke to Adam and Eve. ... It is the language of Eber, after whom it was called Hebrew, because after the confusion of tongues it was he who retained it.... The superiority of Hebrew is manifest from the logical point of view if we consider the people who employed it for dis- courses, particularly at the time when prophecy was rife among them, also for preaching, songs and psalmody. ... In the remnant of our language, which was created and instituted by God, are implanted subtle elements calculated to promote understanding .... (Hd. 109- 11.) The language created by God, which He taught Adam and placed on his tongue and in his heart, is without doubt the most perfect, and the most fitted to express the things specified, for it is written: 'And whatsoever Adam called every living creature, that was the name thereof.' It follows that it deserved the name which fitted and characterised it. And this shows the excellence of the Holy Tongue, as well as the reason why the angels employed it in preference to any other. Writing is judged from a similar point of view. ... The giver of forms, designs and order has placed in them all a unique wisdom, and a providence which is in complete harmony with this uniform order, and is visible in the macrocosm, in man, and in the arrange- ment of the spheres. (Hd. 202-04.) In these quotations, as in the others, we see definite signs of the aggravated nationalism which is now called "racialism." This develop- ment of tribal thinking was not new even in Halevi's day, but he raised the existing ethnic mystiques to the level of carefully constructed appeals to reason, though the basic postulates remained those of faith:

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According to the Torah, it was God who created the world, to- gether with animals and plants. There is no need to presuppose inter- mediaries or combinations of elements. If we make creation a postulate, all that is difficult becomes easy to grasp, and all that is crooked becomes straight.... (Hd. 238.) Therefore, the differences between all things are divinely created. The classical theory of progressively finer combinations of elements, controlled by a supreme force, offers much the same emphasis on inequalities, and it is deeply embedded in Halevi's thinking; but he presents it only as an opportunity to rebuke "the Khazari" for admiring a pretentious show of learning. The orthodox postulate of creation has the particular merit, as he says, of being easily grasped, besides permitting "the pick of mankind" to be described as "His people." They are given the additional advantage of belonging to "His country" - a concept obviously indebted to Hippoc- rates, and intriguingly similar to Herder's "centre of beautiful forms". The relevant argument is as follows: The Khazari: What thou meanest by 'His people' is now intelligible to me, but thy words 'His country' are difficult for me to appreciate. The Rabbi: But no difficulty is attached to the assumption that one country may have higher qualities than others. Obviously there are places in which particular plants, metals, or animals thrive well, or where the inhabitants are distinguished by their form and character -through the mingling of humours resulting in the perfection or imperfection of the soul. The Khazari: Yet I have not heard that the inhabitants of Palestine are better than other people. The Rabbi: It is the same case as with your hill on which you say the vines thrive so well. If vine branches had not been planted on it and carefully cultivated, it would never have produced grapes. So prece- dence belongs to those particular people who, as stated before, repre- sent the 'pick' and the 'heart' of mankind. The land has also its part in this and so have the religious acts connected with it, which I would compare to the cultivation of the vineyard. But no other place could share with this pre-eminent people the influence of the Divine power, whereas other hills are also able to produce good wine. (Hn. 64-65.) He adds that Eretz Israel "was appointed for the instruction of mankind and apportioned to the tribes of Israel from the time of the confusion of tongues," from which it follows that "the pick of mankind" are also the custodians of the cream of knowledge: The Rabbi: We cannot reproach the philosophers (who believe that the world had no beginning), because they inherited neither science nor religion. Being Grecians, they belong to the descendants of Ja- phet, who inhabited the north; whereas the knowledge coming from Adam, and sustained by Divine power, is only to be found among the progeny of Shem, who were the pick of Noah's descendants; this knowledge has always been connected with the pick of mankind and will always remain so. The Greeks only received it, when they became powerful, from the Persians, who had it from the Chaldeans. It was only then that famous philosophers arose in their midst; but

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from the moment that Rome assumed political leadership, the Greeks produced no famous philosopher. The Khazari: Does this mean that Aristotle's investigations are not deserving of credence? The Rabbi: Yes. He exerted his mind, because he had no reliable tradition at his disposal. . . . Had he lived among a people with well- authenticated and generally acknowledged traditions, he would have applied his deductions and arguments to the establishment of a theory of creation.... (Hn. 37-38.) How did the superiorities of the Israelites originate? Halevi, aware of the basic importance of the question, answers it by stressing their origin from Adam, whom he regards, in opposition to Christian doctrine, as the perfect man: The Rabbi: Bear with me a little and I will prove the pre-eminence of my people. For me it is sufficient that God chose them as His community and people from all the nations of the world; that the Divine power descended on the whole people, so that all became worthy to be addressed by Him. The power even swayed their women, among whom were prophetesses. Up to that time the power had descended from Adam on isolated individuals only. For Adam was perfection itself, because no flaw could be found in the work of a wise and almighty Creator, wrought from a substance chosen by Him, and fashioned according to His own design. Besides, there were no contaminating influences from the sperm of the father and the blood of the mother, from nursing and nourishment in the years of childhood and growth, from air, soil and water. For He created him in the form of an adolescent, perfect in body and mind. (Hn. 45.) Their origin in perfection accordingly gives the Jews a distinct advantage; but how are they maintained, in view of the many "contaminating influences" over the centuries, as "the pick of mankind"? The answer is again found in Greek biology, which Ibn Sina (Avicenna) had recently revived, with all the weight of his great authority, in the Arab world. Halevi had already employed earlier notions of environmental determin- ism, and it was only a further step to apply ancient observations on recessive phenomena to his own purposes. He founded on them the racial doctrine of a genetic elite, thus making the pick of the pick of mankind responsible for the favoured status of the people as a whole. So "The Rabbi" continues: We call him (Adam) God's son, and we call those of his descendants who are like him, sons of God. He begot many children; but the only one capable of taking his place was Abel, because he alone was like him. After he had been slain by Cain through jealousy of this particular eminence, he was replaced by Seth, who was also like Adam: he was the pick of Adam's progeny and his 'heart,' while the others were husks and rotten fruit. The pick of Seth's progeny was Enoch, and in this way was the Divine power connected with isolated individuals down to Noah: they were the 'hearts,' they resembled Adam, and were styled sons of God. They were perfect outwardly and inwardly, as regards length of life, knowledge and power; their lives

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fix the chronology from Adam to Noah, as well as from Noah to Abra- ham. ... The pick of Shem's progeny was Eber, and Shem the pick of Noah's. Therefore, Shem inherited the temperate zone, the centre and jewel of which is Palestine, while Japhet turned towards the north, and Ham towards the south. The pick of Abraham's sons was Isaac.... The pick of Isaac's sons was Jacob, his brother Esau being removed because the land belonged to Jacob. The sons of Jacob were all picked and worthy of the influence of the Divine power, as well as the country favoured by it. This is the first instance of the Divine power descending on a number of people.... Then God tended them in Egypt, multiplied and fostered them.... And the fruit ripened in Moses, Aaron and Miriam, Bezaleel, Oholiab and the chiefs of the tribes, the seventy Elders . . . then Joshua, Kaleb, Hur and many others. (Hn. 46-47.) He emphasises that this privilege of being picked extends even to the unworthy "by reason of the admixture of picked blood", an advantage denied to "all the posterity of Ham and Japhet." The phenomenon, he observes, is common in nature: Many people do not resemble their father at all, but resemble their grandfathers. There cannot, consequently, be any doubt that this nature and resemblance was latent in the father, although it did not become visible outwardly, like the nature of Eber in his children, until it reappeared in Abraham. (Hn. 47.) The simple Khazar king, moved to admiration by the clever casuistry of the argument, exclaims that "This is the true nobility . . . yours by right . . . among all the inhabitants of the earth." Certainly, it is a doctrine of God-centered nobility, a "distinctly racial" one, as Heinemann notes in a sentence embedded in his commentary; and it is in such doc- trines of innateness, with their attendant justifications of slavery and the oppression of the otherwise underprivileged, that many of "the roots of prejudice" must be found. Finally, the divine ordination of human inequalities is summarised in two of the concluding Principles of the book, curiously omitted by Heinemann. According to the Third Principle: God gives every substance the best and most appropriate form.... The difference of things is the outcome of their substances. Therefore, one cannot ask: 'Why did He not create me an angel?' Just as the worm cannot ask: 'Why did Thou not create me a human being?' (Hd. 253-54.) The obvious conclusion is the subject of the Fourth Principle, which expresses, as follows, "the conviction that existing beings are of higher or lower degree": Everything that is possessed of feeling and perception is higher than those creatures which lack them, since the former are nearer the degree of the Prime Cause, which is Reason itself. The lowest occupies a higher rank than the noblest mineral; the lowest animal is higher than the noblest plant; and the lowest human being is higher than the noblest animal. Thus, the lowest follower of the Divine law occupies a higher place than the noblest heathen. For the Divine law

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confers something of the nature of angels on the human mind, a thing which cannot be acquired otherwise. The proof is that pro- longed practice of this law leads up to the degree of prophetic inspiration, than which there is no nearer degree to God for man. A refrac- tory monotheist is accordingly preferable to the pagan, because the Divine law empowers him to lead an angelic life and to reach the degree of angels, though it has become sullied and defaced by his per- versity. Some traces will always remain .... (Hd. 254.) The arguments quoted from the dialogues are variously repeated, the whole effect being that of a closely rationalised racial philosophy - the peak, in fact, of Jewish racial thinking for more than two thousand years. But it is a special kind of racialism; for it is a reaction, largely devoid of exploiting motive, to the most murderous type of racialism known in Halevi's day and ours. It is difficult, as Spinoza knew, to oppose anything to "animositas and generositas except animositas and generositas." This unintended communication gives the slender Kitab al-Khazari, and the best of its author's poems, their contemporary importance. Indeed, it is only necessary to study them, with a modest sense of history, to realise that neither Halevi nor the Jews "invented" racialism; and it is equally easy to appreciate the materials they provide for a comparative, developmental knowledge of the operative factors in racialism. Essen- tially, Halevi's philosophy, with its suggestive blend of mysticism, nationalism and racialism, is thereby revealed as a direct response to minority status and conflicting monotheistic interests. The romantic view, associated with its claims to priority amongst the ethnocentric mystiques of the Middle Ages, gives it colour but no added significance.

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