The European Jews, Patriotism and the Liberal State 1789–1939: A Study of Literature and Social Psychology

383 Pages·2013·2.423 MB·English

by  David Aberbach

The European Jews, Patriotism and the
–
Liberal State 1789 1939
The fragility of the liberal democratic state after 1789 is illustrated in the
history of the European Jews from the French Revolution to the Holocaust.
EmancipationandhopeofemancipationamongtheEuropeanJewishpopulation
created a plethora of Jewish identities and forms of patriotism.
ThisbooktakestheoriginalapproachofstudyingEuropeanJewishpatriotism
as awhole, with particular attention given to creative literature. Despite their
growing awareness of racial, genocidal hatred, most European Jews between
1789and1939tendedtobepatriotic towardthecountries oftheircitizenship,
andstronglyattachedtotheirlanguagesandcultures.Theseattitudesarereflected
intheliteratureofthetime,inallmajorEuropeanlanguages,especiallyGerman.
Yet the common assumption among emancipated Jews that anti-Semitism
wouldfadeinaworldgovernedbyreasonprovedfalse.FormillionsofEuropean
Jews, the infinite possibilities they associated with emancipation came to
nothing. The Jewish experience exposed many of the weaknesses and failings
of the liberal multicultural state, and demonstrated that its survival cannot be
taken for granted but is dependent on vigilance and struggle. By focusing on
Jewishpatriotismfrom1789–1939,thisbookexploresthenatureoftheliberal
state, how it can fail, and the conditions needed for its survival.
Professor DavidAberbachteaches intheJewishStudies departmentatMcGill
University, Montreal, and has held visiting postitions at Oxford University,
Harvard University, University College London and the London School of
Economics. He has published 12 books including Imperialism and Biblical
Prophecy (Routledge, 1993) and Jewish Cultural Nationalism (Routledge,
2010). His research interests focus on the relationship between literature and
the social sciences.
Routledge Jewish Studies Series
Series Editor: Oliver Leaman, University of Kentucky
Studies, which are interpreted to cover the disciplines of history, sociology,
anthropology, culture, politics, philosophy, theology, religion, as they relate to
Jewish affairs. The remit includes texts which have as their primary focus
issues, ideas, personalities and events of relevance to Jews, Jewish life and the
concepts which have characterized Jewish culture both in the past and today.
The series is interested in receiving appropriate scripts or proposals.
MEDIEVAL JEWISH FROM SYNAGOGUE TO
PHILOSOPHY CHURCH: THE TRADITIONAL
An Introduction DESIGN
Dan Cohn-Sherbok Its Beginning, its Definition, its End
John Wilkinson
FACING THE OTHER
The Ethics of Emmanuel Levinas HIDDEN PHILOSOPHY OF
Edited by Seán Hand HANNAH ARENDT
Margaret Betz Hull
MOSES MAIMONIDES
DECONSTRUCTING THE BIBLE
Oliver Leaman
Abraham ibn Ezra’s Introduction to
A USER’S GUIDE TO FRANZ the Torah
ROSENZWEIG’S STAR OF Irene Lancaster
REDEMPTION
IMAGE OF THE BLACK IN
Norbert M. Samuelson
JEWISH CULTURE
A Historyof the Other
ON LIBERTY
Abraham Melamed
Jewish Philosophical Perspectives
Edited by Daniel H. Frank
FROM FALASHAS TO
ETHIOPIAN JEWS
REFERRING TO GOD Daniel Summerfield
Jewish and Christian Philosophical
and Theological Perspectives PHILOSOPHY IN A TIME OF
Edited by Paul Helm CRISIS
Don Isaac Abravanel: Defenderof
JUDAISM, PHILOSOPHY, the Faith
CULTURE Seymour Feldman
Selected Studies by
E. I. J. Rosenthal JEWS, MUSLIMS AND MASS
Erwin Rosenthal MEDIA
Mediating the ‘Other’
PHILOSOPHYOFTHETALMUD Edited by Tudor Parfitt with Yulia
Hyam Maccoby Egorova
JEWS OF ETHIOPIA THE JEWISH-CHINESE NEXUS
The Birth of an Elite A Meeting of Civilizations
Edited by Emanuela Trevisan Semi Edited by M. Avrum Ehrlich
and Tudor Parfitt
GERMAN-JEWISH POPULAR
ART IN ZION CULTURE BEFORE THE
The Genesis of National Art in HOLOCAUST
Jewish Palestine Kafka’s Kitsch
Dalia Manor David Brenner
HEBREW LANGUAGE AND
THE JEWS AS A CHOSEN
JEWISH THOUGHT
PEOPLE
David Patterson
Tradition and Transformation
S. Leyla Gürkan
CONTEMPORARY JEWISH
PHILOSOPHY
PHILOSOPHY AND RABBINIC
An Introduction
CULTURE
Irene Kajon
Jewish Interpretation and
ControversyinMedievalLanguedoc
ANTISEMITISM AND
Gregg Stern
MODERNITY
Innovation and Continuity
JEWISH BLOOD
Hyam Maccoby
Reality and Metaphor in History,
JEWS AND INDIA Religion and Culture
History, Image, Perceptions Edited by Mitchell B. Hart
Yulia Egorova
JEWISH EDUCATION AND
JEWISH MYSTICISM AND HISTORY
MAGIC Continuity, Crisis and Change
An Anthropological Perspective Moshe Aberbach; Edited and
Maureen Bloom translated by David Aberbach
MAIMONIDES’ GUIDE TO THE JEWS AND JUDAISM IN
PERPLEXED: SILENCE AND MODERN CHINA
SALVATION M. Avrum Ehrlich
Donald McCallum
POLITICAL THEOLOGIES IN
MUSCULAR JUDAISM
THE HOLY LAND
The Jewish Body and the Politics of
Israeli Messianism and its Critics
Regeneration
David Ohana
Todd Samuel Presner
COLLABORATION WITH THE
JEWISH CULTURAL
NAZIS
NATIONALISM
The Holocaust and After
David Aberbach
Edited by Roni Stauber
THE GLOBAL IMPACT OF THE RABBINIC THEOLOGY AND
PROTOCOLS OF THE ELDERS JEWISH INTELLECTUAL
OF ZION HISTORY
ACentury-Old Myth The Great Rabbi Loewof Prague
Edited by Esther Webman Meir Seidler
THE HOLOCAUST AND ISRAELI HOLOCAUST
REPRESENTATIONS OF THE RESEARCH
JEWS Birth and Evolution
History and Identity in the Museum Boaz Cohen
K. Hannah Holtschneider
MODERN GNOSIS AND
WAR AND PEACE IN JEWISH ZIONISM
TRADITION The Crisis of Culture, Life
FromtheBiblicalWorldtothePresent Philosophy and Jewish National
Edited by Yigal Levin and Amnon Thought
Shapira Yotam Hotam
JESUS AMONG THE JEWS THE EUROPEAN JEWS,
Representation and Thought PATRIOTISM AND THE
Edited by Neta Stahl LIBERAL STATE 1789–1939
A Study of Literature and Social
GOD, JEWS AND THE MEDIA Psychology
Religion and Israel’s Media David Aberbach
Yoel Cohen
The European Jews, Patriotism
–
and the Liberal State 1789 1939
A Study of Literature and
Social Psychology
David Aberbach
Firstpublished2013
byRoutledge
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SimultaneouslypublishedintheUSAandCanada
byRoutledge
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©2013DavidAberbach
TherightofDavidAberbachtobeidentifiedasauthorofthisworkhas
beenassertedbyhiminaccordancewithsections77and78ofthe
Copyright,DesignsandPatentsAct1988.
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthisbookmaybereprintedorreproducedor
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BritishLibraryCataloguinginPublicationData
AcataloguerecordforthisbookisavailablefromtheBritishLibrary
LibraryofCongressCataloginginPublicationData
Aberbach,David,1953-
TheEuropeanJews,patriotismandtheliberalstate,1789–1939:astudyof
literatureandsocialpsychology/DavidAberbach.
p.cm.–(RoutledgeJewishstudiesseries)
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
1.Jews–Europe–History–18thcentury.2.Jews–Europe–History–
19thcentury.3.Jews–Europe–History–20thcentury.4.Patriotism–
Europe.5.Nationalism–Europe.6.Jewishnationalism.7.Jews–Identity–
History.I.Title.
DS135.E82A242012
305.892’40409034–dc23
2012021676
ISBN:978-0-415-54013-1(hbk)
ISBN:978-0-203-07920-1(ebk)
TypesetinTimes
byTaylor&FrancisBooks
In memory of my parents Moshe and Rose Aberbach
with love to Mimi, Gabriella, Shulamit and Jessica
and thanks to my students and colleagues at McGill University;
The London School of Economics; University College, London;
and Harvard University, where this book was written 2000–2012
Contents
Acknowledgments x
Preface xi
1 Between hope and terror: the European Jews, 1789–1939 1
2 Patriotism and its limits in Germany 38
3 Jewish patriotism in Austria-Hungary 68
4 Patriotism and East European Jews 89
5 Jewish emancipation, patriotism and anti-Semitism 132
6 From patriotism to militant Zionism: European Jewish army
service, 1789–1939 154
7 Zionist patriotism and anti-Semitism, 1897–1942 169
8 Literary warnings of the Holocaust 192
9 Love unrequited: the failure of Jewish emancipation, 1789–1939 208
10 Ancient roots of European anti-Semitism and Jewish patriotism 224
Conclusion 238
In memoriam: Moshe Aberbach (1924–2007) 255
Notes 260
Bibliography 300
Index 331
Acknowledgments
IamgratefultoEdwardIngram,AntonyPolonsky,AnthonyD.Smith,Stanley
Nash and Oliver Leaman, who edited sections of this book, respectively for
International History Review, Polin, Nations and Nationalism, CCAR Journal
and my edition of my father’s writings, Jewish Education and History: Con-
tinuity, Crisis and Change; and to Dara Horn for editing a version of the
chapter on literary foreshadowings of the Holocaust for a Festschrift for my
colleagueatMcGill,RuthWisse.Iamfortunatetohavehadexcellenteditorsat
Routledge, Oliver Leaman, Kathryn Rylance, Joe Whiting and Victoria
Chow, to steer the book through to its final form. I also thank Joyce Seltzer
for her invaluableadviceand mycolleaguesat McGillUniversityforproviding
me with conditions that greatly facilitated the writing of this book; as well as
HarvardUniversity,MahindraHumanitiesCenter;UniversityCollege,London,
English Department; and The London School of Economics, departments of
SociologyandGovernment,wheremuchofthisbookwaswritten,andpartsofit
werepresentedinpubliclectures,duringgenerousperiodsofleavefromMcGill.