The American Jewish world. [volume] (Minneapolis ;) 1915-current, 1921-05-20
NAPOLEON and the Jews
ON THE CENTENARY OF HIS DEATH, MAY 5, 1921
BY Gotthard
ON THE CENTENARY OF H
BY Prof. GOtthard Deutsch.


ligious forum which the state might
ignore but over which it could have
no influence. But who would blame
Jews, just emerged from the ghetto,
for fearing to provoke the, indigna-
ton of the man before whom then
princes of blood cowtowed?
The next step was the creation of
Sanhedrin composed of rabbis and
laymen which went through the pre-
scribed ceremony of Politically" en-
dorsing the unofficial" opinion of the
Notables, and thus vesting it with
religious authority" It strikes us as
ludicrous today. Progressive German
Jews like David Friedlaender (1750-
1834) considered the whole procedure
as a "Gaukelspiel," an expression
which Graetz, believer in Synhedrial
authority, resents, although it coin
cided with the opinion of anti-Semites
like Ludelf Helst (1821), upon whom
the melodrama was designed to make
an impression. Orthodox rabbis, like
Moses Sefer in Presburg (1762-1839),
Akiba Eyer in Posen (1761-1830,
Solomon Posner in Warsaw, Abraham
Danziger in Wilma, ignored the whole
performance, and Joseph Hazman Of
Jerusalem, or the Yemenite cabbalist,
Shalom Mizrachi Sharabi, probably to
their dying day never knew that the
Sanhedrin had ever existed.
The whole display Of patriotism On
the part of "the French citizens, pro-
Tossing the religion of Noses" was
wasted. Napoleon, far from being sat-
isfied with the declaration of the San
hedrin that the Jewish religion pro-
hibited usury, issued law which re-
quired that every Jew, doing business
on credit or lending money, had either
to- obtain a special license which
would be granted only to persons Of
noted probity, or would require an
act of a notary public, testifying to
the bona fide nature of each transac-
ton. The law from which the Jews
was to be limited to ten years, after
the lapse of which time it was hoped
that it would no more be necessary.
At the time when the renewal came
up for discussion (1818), Napoleon
was in St. Helena, and the Bourbon
dynasty, in spite of it's reactionary
principles, did not renew it. So, con-
trary to the accepted opinion, it was
not Napoleon but the Bourbons who
gave the Jews of France their email
cipation, and it was again their merit
that Napoleon's reactionary measures
were repealed.
Even the Sanhedrin, which was
transformed into corsistorial adj
ministration which with some changes
lasted until the separation of church
and state in 1905 made an end Of it,
was rather humiliation than a rec
ognition. It's main object was to
watch over the Jews that they should
not dodge military service and to
otherwise improve their morals.
This is the true relation of Napo-
icon to the Jews. All other reports are
either legendary of wilful inventions.
The anti-Semite Drumont, who in his
book, Napoleon Anti-Semite" $4,000,
claims that Napoleon became an anti
Semitic when he saw that the house
of Rothschild supported England and
her allies, is not quite wrong, al
though the reason which he gives is
an invention, as this support began
after 1908.
Another widespread report that Ma
poleon was Zionist who, during his
expedition to Egypt and Palestine