Arthur Hertzberg

variegated group of individuals, ancient Near East, Italian Jewish through the American Academy for many of whom were captivated by history, medieval historiography and Jewish Research were extensive, and his personality and brilliance. history of science, comparative a representative number of articles Barzilay cultivated more than a few literature, Jewish philosophy, and by these colleagues and students doctoral students, who wrote on American Jewish history, to name appear in the Barzilay Jubilee topics ranging from medieval poetry just the sample I encountered Volume, Bein Historiyyah le-Sifrut to the work of the early critical during my years of residency at (Israel: Hakibbutz Hame’uchad, Talmud scholar, Tzvi Hirsch Columbia. For some years Barzilay 1997). This volume contains a Hayyut, the generation of Ahad taught history at the Jewish bibliography of Professor Barzilay’s Haam, the works of the American Theological Seminary, which writings as well. Yiddish and Hebrew poet Gabriel granted him an honorary doctorate, Preil, and of course, modern Israeli and his students there spoke of him Stanley Nash is Professor of Hebrew literature. But he also had a with much enthusiasm. Literature at Hebrew Union profound influence on students who College–Jewish Institute of Religion received doctorates in other areas Barzilay’s associations with scholars in New York. such as Arabic law, Bible and the in Israel and the United States ARTHUR HERTZBERG (1921–2006) David Starr any of the obituaries of preparation for this trip, I have Arthur Hertzberg that asked the participants to read, or Mappeared in The New re-read, Hertzberg’s introduction York Times, Ha’aretz, and a host of to The Zionist Idea (1959). I have other publications in the aftermath also asked them to bring this book of his death on April 17 charted in with them. It will be our constant considerable detail the path that he companion as we explore the land traveled from his Orthodox home of Israel. That we have found to the Conservative rabbinate, Hertzberg’s anthology himself, typically from Hebrew or moral and communal leadership, indispensable will surprise no one. German. Like Nahum Glatzer’s and great scholarly achievement. But few people remember today roughly simultaneous pioneering Rather than survey once again all that he put it together in the first editorial efforts to bring the work of Hertzberg’s multifarious place, in the 1950s, at the behest of Franz Rosenzweig to the activities, I would like to focus on of Hadassah, as part of that attention of the English-speaking one of the less commonly organization’s commitment to public, Hertzberg’s The Zionist emphasized dimensions of his adult Jewish education. Idea reminds us how few of these career, his accomplishments as an A great anthology, like a great precious primary sources were adult educator, the kind of adult performer, makes the difficult look available fifty years ago to those educator the likes of which we easy. To assemble the material that who could not read them in the rarely see. And I would like to made up The Zionist Idea languages in which they were reflect a little on the way in which Hertzberg had to search through originally written. Hertzberg melded in his life and the collected works of the key career ideals that are now all too figures in the Zionist movement as As with any anthology, one may rarely bound together in the same well as the ideological writings of take issue with the finished product person. innumerable other thinkers and political activists. He had to select and the assumptions that drove it. Hertzberg violated the historian’s I write these words in June as I from their respective works the commandment of avoiding prepare to embark on a Me’ah essays he judged to be both central anachronism. His very designation study tour in Israel, leading fifteen to each author’s message and of certain early thinkers as adults on a two-week exploration accessible to the general reading “precursors” itself suggests some of the history of the Zionism and public. And in many if not most degree of anachronistic thinking in contemporary Israel. In cases he had to translate the essays 43 his approach to them. A self- in America (1989), also flirted the Jew. Hertzberg’s life confessed “cultural Zionist,” with normative questions as it represented such a synthesis— Hertzberg prominently features wrestled with the question of who however much he himself may have Ahad Ha’am as a man who came to America, what they built lamented that he failed to live up represents love of tradition, a here, and what became of Jewish either to his rabbinic ideals like his modern openness to rebellion culture in the realm of father or his scholarly ideals like against it, the need to make Jewish acculturation and assimilation. This Levi Ginsberg or Salo Baron. His nationalism as much about Jewish cut against the grain of scholarship rabbinate informed and elevated identity and culture as about that insisted on the creativity and the scholarly choices he made politics, and at the same time a transformative character of Judaism about what to write and what to resolute avoidance of anything that in America, even as it skirted argue; his scholarship affected his smacked of messianism. He paid questions of decline in the level of vision for Jewish public affairs, as is relatively little attention to Jewish culture. evidenced by his famous jeremiad religious Zionism, and barely any insisting that communal leaders to Jabotinsky or Revisionism, Hertzberg was both a scholar and a should actually know something which he reviled. But his short rabbi. Though traditionally these about the Jewish culture and shrifting of these two trends roles were often combined in one civilization they professed to want reminds us of how relatively person, they have become largely to preserve for the next generation. unimportant they were in Jewish separate and distinct professions. life, certainly prior to the Six Day Nowadays scholars and rabbis My own personal experience with War or Begin’s election in 1977. stand for educational visions and the Me’ah adult education program methods that are often far apart, and with my colleagues from All of Hertzberg’s books on and they play different roles in academia who teach in it points to European Jewish history, American public life. the truth of Hertzberg’s synthesis Jewry, and Zionism and Israel of learning and leadership. covered big topics and themes, This separation has come upon us Nothing other than education will drawing a wide and diverse rather abruptly. One has only to save serious Jewishness. Most of readership into a conversation look at back volumes of HUCA or my colleagues grasp this simple about the intersection of the CCAR Journal or the truth. Indeed, I think that many modernity and Jewish existence, Proceedings of the Rabbinical would acknowledge that inside challenging assumptions and theses Assembly or Conservative Judaism every devoted scholar there lurks as he went. The Zionist Idea or especially Judaism to see how “a pintele rav.” Such a person cares situated Zionist thinkers within the recently they boasted of the passionately for Jews and Judaism context of European social contributions of rabbis who were and sees his or her knowledge as a thought, insisting that Zionism scholars, scholars who were rabbis. tool for serving others and making represented a profound break with A half-century ago such rabbi- the world a bit more civilized. Jewish history and thought even as scholars were prominent if not Such a person could set himself or it sought to renew Jewish life predominant in the rabbinate. Such herself no higher goal than to live politically and culturally. men chose the rabbinate partly up to the standards set by Arthur Hertzberg’s first scholarly because Jewish studies had not yet Hertzberg. monograph, The French found a place in the American Enlightenment and the Jews (1968), academy, partly because the pulpit David Starr is the Dean of Me’ah at took on what was for most modern still seemed a place hospitable to Hebrew College, where he is also the Jews the sacred cow of the scholarship, a place requiring Assistant Professor of Jewish History. Enlightenment, arguing that its learning as well as pastoral care. seamy side—anti-Semitism—cast doubt on secularism as the solution In this sense, Arthur Hertzberg’s to the Jewish problem. Scholars passing reminds us of that now continue to debate this point, with largely bygone era, when scholars many suggesting that Hertzberg’s and rabbis were often one and instincts were right in questioning same. Y. L. Gordon’s dictum, “Be the benevolence of the a man on the street and a Jew in Enlightenment from a your tent” called upon the Jew to philosophical and historical be a humanist and the humanist to perspective. His most heavily be a Jew, creating a new sort of criticized scholarly effort, The Jews synthesis between the world and 44.

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