The Jews

A Response to Mr. G

In the supplement of Sürgöny, a certain Mr. Gasparich published an article about the Jews; in it, following numerous impressive sentences, sanctimonious admonitions and heartbreaking sighs over the viciousness of the miserable Jews, and after some fabricated quotations from the Talmud, he concludes that Jews should not, must not, be granted civil rights unless they become completely Christian or abandon the Talmud and its “horrible” principles.

My religion and the Talmud (Pirke avot 1:6) so condemned by Mr. G. oblige me to assume that everyone has favorable intentions; I thus must accept as true Mr. G.’s declaration that he was inspired to write this article not by hatred, hostility, or some other impure motivation but by the pure love of humanity and noble aims for the benefit of our Christian friends. Additionally, Mr. G. states this declaration and others like it so many times and so seriously, and repeats the teachings of his master so often, talking about his love of humanity and all individuals—not excluding Eskimos, Hottentots, and even Jews—with such interest and such deeply moving words that one would have to have an iron heart to cast doubt over his noble, humane intentions, even though every one of his lines present a bitter challenge to our faith.

Thus, no matter how hard it is for us not to be irritated about the kind of dishonorable nonsense that has been presented and refuted a hundred times before this, no matter how superfluous it is to retaliate seriously and powerfully when we have been attacked by such outdated and rusty weapons of long-refuted prejudices, still, exercising great self-restraint, I would like to call Mr. G’s speech a clever argument and subject it to a calm and serious examination. Maybe I will succeed in teaching him something and can correct his views on the “miserable Jewish people” and their religious texts, lessening to some degree the thick darkness of ignorance that surrounds him.

Mr. G. starts off with the observation that according to the will of fate, the Jewish people have been dispersed among the nations of the world in order to be living proof that internal strife leads to the downfall of a country. It is quite a clumsy and hackneyed ethic that fate would want to teach people in this manner. There was no need to go so far and to involve such great preparations. The entire history of the world resounds with this message and imbues every nation with the belief that every country that suffers internal strife will go under. Moreover, fate could not have found anything less suitable to demonstrate this truth with than the example of the dispersion of the Jews. In the days when it happened, it was the most natural consequence of existing circumstances and the nations were not compelled to attribute moral reason to it. Countries far larger and mightier were also forced to bow to the world power of Rome and subjected themselves to slavery. How could tiny Judea—no matter how brave and heroic—have attempted to shake off the yoke of the tyrant without retribution? The fact that this tiny country subsisted for so long while several world monarchies came and went one after the other is more of a miracle than its demise in the end. Wouldn’t the example of Rome, the judge of the world, or artistic and learned Greece, or any other country brought down by internal strife be more suitable for hammering this doctrine into the heads of the nations? But from the point of view of revealed faith, the dispersion of the Jewish people appears in a completely different, much more important light for the objective observer.

The mission of the people of Israel for the nations of the earth relates to its dispersion as well as its chosenness. We can go so far as to say that their dispersion fulfills the mission of chosenness. What we mean is that after the period when Israel was safeguarding the fire of pure knowledge of God that gave light to other nations in its own home, fate ordered them to be dispersed among strangers in order to test their faithfulness to their calling again and again, with the task of serving as a living fountain from which the nations, whose pure knowledge of God had been awakened, could draw good insights in order to strengthen and expand their faith. Israel’s duty was to stand among the nations, holding the teachings, their lives embodying the teachings, with miraculous events, with their sturdy faith that defeats even death and humiliation, serving as living proof of God’s existence and authority, as an eternal reminder of God’s extraordinary acts to provide them with guidance and enlightening, as a living religious certificate that preaches the eternal salvation-truth of God and of fate to every person and every nation in a language intelligible to all. This remains Israel’s mission today.