New-York tribune., 1896-05-30
JEWISH HISTORY.
CHANGES IN THE LAST TWO CENTURIES
AND ITS OUTLOOK.

>.
Vol. V. From the Chmielnick Persecution OF the
Jews in Poland 10 the Present Time; Pp TX;
76s Philadelphia: Jewish publication Society OF
America.
AND CITIZEN: BY Simon. Wolf. -. Edited t,s,i, by
Louis Edward Levy. PIP. kill 576 Philadeiphia'
The Levytype Company
JEWISH IDEALS AND OTHER ESSAYS. BY Jo-
scph Jacobs. PIP. xviii, 2f2.
ISRAEL AMONG THE NATIONS. A study o. the
Jews and Anti-semitsm. BY Ana;ole Ler2y-
Beaulieu Translated by Frances Helman' fp'
xiii. SS5. G. p. Putnam's Sons.
THE SPIRIT OF JUDAISM BY Josephine Lazarus
PIP. POP. Dodd, Mead & Co.
A HISTORY OF THE HEBREW PEOPLE, Ps + FrSm ON
Knedom' Ry Charles Foster Kent Pm. p, As
sociate Professor Of Biblical Literature ard HIS; lis
tory in Brown University. With Maps ana
Plans Pp Xxi 90 Charles Scrbner's Sons.
This group or books is of kind to discourage
two classes Of people. In the first place they
give little consolation to the Jew wbaters for their
whole purport unconscious as well as intentional.
is to show that the Jew is always as much like
his ne.ghbors as circumstances will allow MN
70 be. On the other hand. the Judaic extremist
n such person still exists. Will be horror-strlcKeh
by the decadencn from ancient standards. FRO
fessor Graetz's closing volume whatever his own
doctrnal opinions is one long record OF the fall-
ing away Of Jews in the last two centuries from
the traditional learning. the strict usage and the
ceremonial devotion Of earlier times FROM the
vantage point Of old Jewry even fanatical Mes
sianic crazes had their justification. They were
an erratc display Of the true genius of the race
But TO modern Judaism such outbreaks are I'M
possible not because IT is less capable Of making
a spectacle of itself but because 1t no longer
believes in the possibility Of a Messiah. or be-
cause like some forms of Christianity 1t has
Transmitted the ancient hope into new KIND OF
absurdity-the dreams of socialism.
What makes the closing chapters Of Professor
Craetz's massive work the more melancholy Is
the obvious proof they give that Judaism as 1t
has been owes its destruction to its greatest men,
above all to Its greatest thinkers. Spinoza and
Mendelssohn. Spinoza had a contemporary for
whom the historian has not the words strong
enough to express his contempt This was the
famous. or Infamous Sabbath Zcvi. the syrian
Messiah. For Spinoza Professor Graetz has the
highest admiration. Yet truth compels him to
bracket the philosopher and the mountebarK To-
gether the embodiment of reason with unrcason
incarnate because the two coined hands to treat
Judaism as abolished and dissolved. and. so to
speak to dethrone the God of Israel If any
body not a Jew had said such thing as this. he
would be thought guilty o. extravagant satire at
the expense Of the Jews. For SpinoZa, though
banished man, communicated by his race with
the utmost soemnity. was man Of wonderfully
good life whose system of thought was so alb
stract and difficult that II hardly be said to
have touched the world except through the writ
ings Of others. He was long as obnoxious TO
Christian theologians who pretended to under
stand him as 10 Jews. AS contrasted with him.
sabbataT Zevl was thoroughly vulgar character.
with meagre learning and without any convic-
tions that he could not cast away. Yet this man,
as a pretended Messiah stirred all Asia Minor
and Egypt shook the Grand Turk in his seat
and awakened the curiosity Of all Europe. only to
turn Mahometan at last in fear of death.
The case was still worse with Moses Mendels-
sohn. for he man who was more than
reasonably careful in religious observance. He
brought Jews and Christians together as they
had almost never come together before But
the result was a wave of free thought and
freer conduct in which Mendelssohn's own
daughters the the leaders. With Schlegel
and Schleiermacher to point the way Judaism
in Berlin became byword The picture which
Jewish satirist drew Of plump Jewesses going
into church with gorgeous crosses hung to
massive chains around their necks is likely to
outlive all the works of the Hebrew Plato.
Mendelssohn had opened the way to renewal
of youth in the Jewish race. but neither he nor
any Of his time were quite prepaI ed for the
decomposition Of religious habits amcng Jews
that followed And here again the work Of a
thinker was brought into sharp contrast with
fanatcism While the Berlin Jewesses were
wearing jewelled crosses and opening literary
salons where young Jews discussed French
literature with lettered Teutons Polish Jews
recurred TO the beliefs and customs Of the an
cient Essenes. with ablutions and baths. white
garments miraculous cures. and prophetic vi
eons" This historian himself is startled by
the juxtaposition of reason and superstition
all the more because Merdelssohn detested the
memory OF Spinoza. and the new Essenes of
Poland were far from being followers OF Sab
bataY Mendelssohn declared rational thought
to be the essence of Judaism and here was
this new and spreading sect 20 give him the
lie by turning it all into washings and dreams
Yet both were agreed against tradition. "Rea-
son and unreason seemed to have uttered into
a covenant 10 shatter the gigantic structure 0!
Talmudic Judaism" Now all these things hap
pened In a green tree. when Judaism seemed
to be as exclusive as 1t bad ever been. Wha'
will happen when the tree becomes dry can only
be inferred from a group of essays like those
OF Josephine Lazarus, who chooses her literary
references by preference from the New Testa'
ment or those Of Joseph Jacobs. who. with
the genius Of fokorist treats Judaism. rever
emily enough, solely an object OF anti
Quarian research.
Perhaps. then, when all the world becomes
sceptical and Indifferent the Jew, as type, vii
disappear. NJ. Leroy Beaulieu thinks the latter
will be the case without any contingency 1tistht
races among whom Jews lived who created the
Jewish type in his opinion, and that type, at the
worst is not nearly prevalent as fancy ant
caricature pretend. AS the prejudice OF race dis
appears the type formed amid the horrors of th'
medieval ghettos will also be merged In
larger humanity. AS some Jews have alread,
done, so now NJ. Leroy -Beaulieu more elaboratelJ
argues that the Jews by no means Of un
mixed descent The prosclytes Of old times be
came part Of the nation. a whole kingdom in th'