Jewish Society In The Time Of Mendelssohn

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Title:     Jewish Society In The Time Of Mendelssohn
Author: Gustav Karpeles [More Titles by Karpeles]

On an October day in 1743, in the third year of the reign of Frederick the Great, a delicate lad of about fourteen begged admittance at the Rosenthal gate of Berlin, the only gate by which non-resident Jews were allowed to enter the capital. To the clerk's question about his business in the city, he briefly replied: "Study" (Lernen). The boy was Moses Mendelssohn, and he entered the city poor and friendless, knowing in all Berlin but one person, his former teacher Rabbi David Fränkel. About twenty years later, the Royal Academy of Sciences awarded him the first prize for his essay on the question: "Are metaphysical truths susceptible of mathematical demonstration?" After another period of twenty years, Mendelssohn was dead, and his memory was celebrated as that of a "sage like Socrates, the greatest philosophers of the day exclaiming, 'There is but one Mendelssohn!'"--

The Jewish Renaissance of a little more than a century ago presents the whole historic course of Judaism. Never had the condition of the Jews been more abject than at the time of Mendelssohn's appearance on the scene. It must be remembered that for Jews the middle ages lasted three hundred years after all other nations had begun to enjoy the blessings of the modern era. Veritable slaves, degenerate in language and habits, purchasing the right to live by a tax (Leibzoll), in many cities still wearing a yellow badge, timid, embittered, pale, eloquently silent, the Jews herded in their Ghetto with its single Jew-gate--they, the descendants of the Maccabees, the brethren in faith of proud Spanish grandees, of Andalusian poets and philosophers. The congregations were poor; immigrant Poles filled the offices of rabbis and teachers, and occupied themselves solely with the discussion of recondite problems. The evil nonsense of the Kabbalists was actively propagated by the Sabbatians, and on the other hand the mystical Chassidim were beginning to perform their witches' dance. The language commonly used was the Judendeutsch (the Jewish German jargon) which, stripped of its former literary dignity, was not much better than thieves' slang. Of such pitiful elements the life of the Jews was made up during the first half of the eighteenth century.

Suddenly there burst upon them the great, overwhelming Renaissance! It seemed as though Ezekiel's vision were about to be fulfilled:[76] "The hand of the Lord was upon me, and carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and set me down in the midst of the valley which was full of bones... there were very many in the open valley; and, lo, they were very dry. And he said unto me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, thou knowest. Again he said unto me, Prophesy upon these bones, and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones; Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and ye shall live ... and ye shall know that I am the Lord. So I prophesied as I was commanded: and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold a shaking, and the bones came together, bone to his bone ... the sinews and the flesh came up upon them, and the skin covered them above: but there was no breath in them. Then said he unto me, Prophesy unto the wind, prophesy, son of man, and say to the wind, Thus saith the Lord God; Come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and stood up upon their feet, an exceeding great army. Then he said unto me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel."

Is this not a description of Israel's history in modern days? Old Judaism, seeing the marvels of the Renaissance, might well exclaim: "Who hath begotten me these?" and many a pious mind must have reverted to the ancient words of consolation: "I remember unto thee the kindness of thy youth, the love of thy espousals, thy going after me in the wilderness, through a land that is not sown."

In the face of so radical a transformation, Herder, poet and thinker, reached the natural conclusion that "such occurrences, such a history with all its concomitant and dependent circumstances, in brief, such a nation cannot be a lying invention. Its development is the greatest poem of all times, and still unfinished, will probably continue until every possibility hidden in the soul life of humanity shall have obtained expression."[77]

An unparalleled revival had begun; and in Germany, in which it made itself felt as an effect of the French Revolution, it is coupled first and foremost with the name of Moses Mendelssohn.

Society as conceived in these modern days is based upon men's relations to their families, their disciples, and their friends. They are the three elements that determine a man's usefulness as a social factor. Our first interest, then, is to know Mendelssohn in his family.[78] Many years were destined to elapse, after his coming to Berlin, before he was to win a position of dignity. When, a single ducat in his pocket, he first reached Berlin, the reader remembers, he was a pale-faced, fragile boy. A contemporary of his relates: "In 1746 I came to Berlin, a penniless little chap of fourteen, and in the Jewish school I met Moses Mendelssohn. He grew fond of me, taught me reading and writing, and often shared his scanty meals with me. I tried to show my gratitude by doing him any small service in my power. Once he told me to fetch him a German book from some place or other. Returning with the book in hand, I was met by one of the trustees of the Jewish poor fund. He accosted me, not very gently, with, 'What have you there? I venture to say a German book!' Snatching it from me, and dragging me to the magistrate's, he gave orders to expel me from the city. Mendelssohn, learning my fate, did everything possible to bring about my return; but his efforts were of no avail." It is interesting to know that it was the grandfather of Herr von Bleichröder who had to submit to so relentless a fate.

German language and German writing Mendelssohn acquired by his unaided efforts. With the desultory assistance of a Dr. Kisch, a Jewish physician, he learnt Latin from a book picked up at a second-hand book stall. General culture was at that time an unknown quantity in the possibilities of Berlin Jewish life. The schoolmasters, who were not permitted to stay in the city more than three years, were for the most part Poles. One Pole, Israel Moses, a fine thinker and mathematician, banished from his native town, Samosz, on account of his devotion to secular studies, lived with Aaron Gumpertz, the only one of the famous family of court-Jews who had elected a better lot. From the latter, Mendelssohn imbibed a taste for the sciences, and to him he owed some direction in his studies; while in mathematics he was instructed by Israel Samosz, at the time when the latter, busily engaged with his great commentary on Yehuda Halevi's Al-Chazari, was living at the house of the Itzig family, on the Burgstrasse, on the very spot where the talented architect Hitzig, the grandson of Mendelssohn's contemporary, built the magnificent Exchange. To enable himself to buy books, Mendelssohn had to deny himself food. As soon as he had hoarded a few groschen, he stealthily slunk to a dealer in second-hand books. In this way he managed to possess himself of a Latin grammar and a wretched lexicon. Difficulties did not exist for him; they vanished before his industry and perseverance. In a short time he knew far more than Gumpertz himself, who has become famous through his entreaty to Magister Gottsched at Leipsic, whilom absolute monarch in German literature: "I would most respectfully supplicate that it may please your worshipful Highness to permit me to repair to Leipsic to pasture on the meadows of learning under your Excellency's protecting wing."

After seven years of struggle and privation, Moses Mendelssohn became tutor at the house of Isaac Bernhard, a silk manufacturer, and now began better times. In spite of faithful performance of duties, he found leisure to acquire a considerable stock of learning. He began to frequent social gatherings, his friend Dr. Gumpertz introducing him to people of culture, among others to some philosophers, members of the Berlin Academy. What smoothed the way for him more than his sterling character and his fine intellect was his good chess-playing. The Jews have always been celebrated as chess-players, and since the twelfth century a literature in Hebrew prose and verse has grown up about the game. Mendelssohn in this respect, too, was the heir of the peculiar gifts of his race.

In a little room two flights up in a house next to the Nicolai churchyard lived one of the acquaintances made by Mendelssohn through Dr. Gumpertz, a young newspaper writer--Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. Lessing was at once strongly attracted by the young man's keen, untrammelled mind. He foresaw that Mendelssohn would "become an honor to his nation, provided his fellow-believers permit him to reach his intellectual maturity. His honesty and his philosophic bent make me see in him a second Spinoza, equal to the first in all but his errors."[79] Through Lessing, Mendelssohn formed the acquaintance of Nicolai, and as they were close neighbors, their friendship developed into intimacy. Nicolai induced him to take up the study of Greek, and old Rector Damm taught him.

At this time (1755), the first coffee-house for the use of an association of about one hundred members, chiefly philosophers, mathematicians, physicians, and booksellers, was opened in Berlin. Mendelssohn, too, was admitted, making his true entrance into society, and forming many attachments. One evening it was proposed at the club that each of the members describe his own defects in verse; whereupon Mendelssohn, who stuttered and was slightly hunchbacked, wrote:

"Great you call Demosthenes,
Stutt'ring orator of Greece;
Hunchbacked Æsop you deem wise;--
In your circle, I surmise,
I am doubly wise and great.
What in each was separate
You in me united find,--
Hump and heavy tongue combined."

Meanwhile his worldly affairs prospered; he had become bookkeeper in Bernhard's business. His biographer Kayserling tells us that at this period he was in a fair way to develop into "a true bel esprit"; he took lessons on the piano, went to the theatre and to concerts, and wrote poems. During the winter he was at his desk at the office from eight in the morning until nine in the evening. In the summer of 1756, his work was lightened; after two in the afternoon he was his own master. The following year finds him comfortably established in a house of his own with a garden, in which he could be found every evening at six o'clock, Lessing and Nicolai often joining him. Besides, he had laid by a little sum, which enabled him to help his friends, especially Lessing, out of financial embarrassments. Business cares did, indeed, bear heavily upon him, and his complaints are truly touching: "Like a beast of burden laden down, I crawl through life, self-love unfortunately whispering into my ear that nature had perhaps mapped out a poet's career for me. But what can we do, my friends? Let us pity one another, and be content. So long as love for science is not stifled within us, we may hope on." Surely, his love for learning never diminished. On the contrary, his zeal for philosophic studies grew, and with it his reputation in the learned world of Berlin. The Jewish thinker finally attracted the notice of Frederick the Great, whose poems he had had the temerity to criticise adversely in the "Letters on Literature" (Litteraturbriefe). He says in that famous criticism:[80] "What a loss it has been for our mother-tongue that this prince has given more time and effort to the French language. We should otherwise possess a treasure which would arouse the envy of our neighbors." A certain Herr von Justi, who had also incurred the unfavorable notice of the Litteraturbriefe, used this review to revenge himself on Mendelssohn. He wrote to the Prussian state-councillor: "A miserable publication appears in Berlin, letters on recent literature, in which a Jew, criticising court-preacher Cramer, uses irreverent language in reference to Christianity, and in a bold review of Poésies diverses, fails to pay the proper respect to his Majesty's sacred person." Soon an interdict was issued against the Litteraturbriefe, and Mendelssohn was summoned to appear before the attorney general Von Uhden. Nicolai has given us an account of the interview between the high and mighty officer of the state and the poor Jewish philosopher:

Attorney General: "Look here! How can you venture to write against Christians?"

Mendelssohn: "When I bowl with Christians, I throw down all the pins whenever I can."

Attorney General: "Do you dare mock at me? Do you know to whom you are speaking?"

Mendelssohn: "Oh yes. I am in the presence of privy councillor and attorney general Von Uhden, a just man."

Attorney General: "I ask again: What right have you to write against a Christian, a court-preacher at that?"

Mendelssohn: "And I must repeat, truly without mockery, that when I play at nine-pins with a Christian, even though he be a court-preacher, I throw down all the pins, if I can. Bowling is a recreation for my body, writing for my mind. Writers do as well as they can."

In this strain the conversation continued for some time. Another version of the affair is that Mendelssohn was ordered to appear before the king at Sanssouci on a certain Saturday. When he presented himself at the gate of the palace, the officer in charge asked him how he happened to have been honored with an invitation to come to court. Mendelssohn said: "Oh, I am a juggler!" In point of fact, Frederick read the objectionable review some time later, Venino translating it into French for him. It was probably in consequence of this vexatious occurrence that Mendelssohn made application for the privilege to be considered a Schutzjude, that is, a Jew with rights of residence. The Marquis d'Argens who lived with the king at Potsdam in the capacity of his Majesty's philosopher-companion, earnestly supported his petition: "Un philosophe mauvais catholique supplie un philosophe mauvais protestant de donner le privilège à un philosophe mauvais juif. Il y a trop de philosophie dans tout ceci que la raison ne soit pas du côté de la demande." The privilege was accorded to Mendelssohn on November 26, 1763.

Being a Schutzjude, he could entertain the idea of marriage. Everybody is familiar with the pretty anecdote charmingly told by Berthold Auerbach. Mendelssohn's was a love-match. In April 1760, he undertook a trip to Hamburg, and there became affianced to a "blue-eyed maiden," Fromet Gugenheim. The story goes that the girl shrank back startled at Mendelssohn's proposal of marriage. She asked him: "Do you believe that matches are made in heaven?" "Most assuredly," answered Mendelssohn; "indeed, a singular thing happened in my own case. You know that, according to a Talmud legend, at the birth of a child, the announcement is made in heaven: So and so shall marry so and so. When I was born, my future wife's name was called out, and I was told that she would unfortunately be terribly humpbacked. 'Dear Lord,' said I, 'a deformed girl easily gets embittered and hardened. A girl ought to be beautiful. Dear Lord! Give me the hump, and let the girl be pretty, graceful, pleasing to the eye.'"

His engagement lasted a whole year. He was naturally desirous to improve his worldly position; but never did it occur to him to do so at the expense of his immaculate character. Veitel Ephraim and his associates, employed by Frederick the Great to debase the coin of Prussia, made him brilliant offers in the hope of gaining him as their partner. He could not be tempted, and entered into a binding engagement with Bernhard. His married life was happy, he was sincerely in love with his wife, and she became his faithful, devoted companion.

Six children were the offspring of their union: Abraham, Joseph, Nathan, Dorothea, Henriette, and Recha. In Moses Mendelssohn's house, the one in which these children grew up, the barriers between the learned world and Berlin general society first fell. It was the rallying place of all seeking enlightenment, of all doing battle in the cause of enlightenment. The rearing of his children was a source of great anxiety to Mendelssohn, whose means were limited. One day, shortly before his death, Mendelssohn, walking up and down before his house in Spandauer street, absorbed in meditation, was met by an acquaintance, who asked him: "My dear Mr. Mendelssohn, what is the matter with you? You look so troubled." "And so I am," he replied; "I am thinking what my children's fate will be, when I am gone."

Moses Mendelssohn was wholly a son of his age, which perhaps explains the charm of his personality. His faults as well as his fine traits must be accounted for by the peculiarities of his generation. From this point of view, we can understand his desire to have his daughters make a wealthy match. On the other hand, he could not have known, and if he had known, he could not have understood, that his daughters, touched by the breath of a later time, had advanced far beyond his position. The Jews of that day, particularly Jewish women, were seized by a mighty longing for knowledge and culture. They studied French, read Voltaire, and drew inspiration from the works of the English freethinkers. One of those women says: "We all would have been pleased to be heroines of romance; there was not one of us who did not rave over some hero or heroine of fiction." At the head of this band of enthusiasts stood Dorothea Mendelssohn, brilliant, captivating, and gifted with a vivid imagination. She was the leader, the animating spirit of her companions. To the reading-club organized by her efforts all the restless minds belonged. In the private theatricals at the houses of rich Jews, she filled the principal rôles; and the mornings after her social triumphs found her a most attentive listener to her father, who was in the habit of holding lectures for her and her brother Joseph, afterward published under the name Morgenstunden. And this was the girl whom her father wished to see married at sixteen. When a rich Vienna banker was proposed as a suitable match, he said, "Ah! a man like Eskeles would greatly please my pride!" Dorothea did marry Simon Veit, a banker, a worthy man, who in no way could satisfy the demands of her impetuous nature. Yet her father believed her to be a happy wife. In her thirtieth year she made the acquaintance, at the house of her friend Henriette Herz, of a young man, five years her junior, who was destined to change the course of her whole life. This was Friedrich von Schlegel, the chief of the romantic movement. Dorothea Veit, not beautiful, fascinated him by her brilliant wit. Under Schleiermacher's encouragement, the relation between the two quickly assumed a serious aspect. But it was not until long after her father's death that Dorothea abandoned her husband and children, and became Schlegel's life-companion, first his mistress, later his wife. As Gutzkow justly says, his novel "Lucinde" describes the relation in which Schlegel "permitted himself to be discovered. Love for Schlegel it was that consumed her, and led her to share with him a thousand follies--Catholicism, Brahmin theosophy, absolutism, and the Christian asceticism of which she was a devotee at the time of her death." Neither distress, nor misery, nor care, nor sorrow could alienate her affections. Finally, she became a bigoted Catholic, and in Vienna, their last residence, the daughter of Moses Mendelssohn was seen, a lighted taper in her hand, one of a Catholic procession wending its way to St. Stephen's Cathedral.

The other daughter had a similar career. Henriette Mendelssohn filled a position as governess first in Vienna, then in Paris. In the latter city, her home was the meeting-place of the most brilliant men and women. She, too, denied her father and her faith. Recha, the youngest daughter, was the unhappy wife of a merchant of Strelitz. Later on she supported herself by keeping a boarding-school at Altona. Nathan, the youngest son, was a mechanician; Abraham, the second, the father of the famous composer, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, established with the oldest, Joseph, a still flourishing banking-business. Abraham's children and grandchildren all became converts to Christianity, but Moses and Fromet died before their defection from the old faith. Fromet lived to see the development of the passion for music which became hereditary in the family. It is said that when, at the time of the popularity of Schulz's "Athalia," one of the choruses, with the refrain tout l'univers, was much sung by her children, the old lady cried out irritably, "Wie mies ist mir vor tout l'univers" ("How sick I am of 'all the world!'").[81]

To say apologetically that the circumstances of the times produced such feeling and action may be a partial defense of these women, but it is not the truth. Henriette Mendelssohn's will is a characteristic document. The introduction runs thus: "In these the last words I address to my dear relatives, I express my gratitude for all their help and affection, and also that they in no wise hindered me in the practice of my religion. I have only myself to blame if the Lord God did not deem me worthy to be the instrument for the conversion of all my brothers and sisters to the Catholic Church, the only one endowed with saving grace. May the Lord Jesus Christ grant my prayer, and bless them all with the light of His countenance. Amen!" Such were the sentiments of Moses Mendelssohn's daughters!

The sons inclined towards Protestantism. Abraham is reported to have said that at first he was known as the son of his father, and later as the father of his son. His wife was Leah Salomon, the sister of Salomon Bartholdy, afterwards councillor of legation. His surname was really only Salomon; Bartholdy he had assumed from the former owner of a garden in Köpenikerstrasse on the Spree which he had bought. To him chiefly the formal acceptance of Christianity by Abraham's family was due. When Abraham hesitated about having his children baptized, Bartholdy wrote: "You say that you owe it to your father's memory (not to abandon Judaism). Do you think that you are committing a wrong in giving your children a religion which you and they consider the better? In fact, you would be paying a tribute to your father's efforts in behalf of true enlightenment, and he would have acted for your children as you have acted for them, perhaps for himself as I am acting for myself." This certainly is the climax of frivolity! So it happened that one of Mendelssohn's grandsons, Philip Veit, became a renowned Catholic church painter, and another, Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, one of the most celebrated of Protestant composers.

After his family, we are interested in the philosopher's disciples. They are men of a type not better, but different. What in his children sprang from impulsiveness and conviction, was due to levity and imitativeness in his followers. Mendelssohn's co-workers and successors formed the school of Biurists, that is, expounders. In his commentary on the Pentateuch he was helped by Solomon Dubno, Herz Homberg, and Hartwig Wessely. Solomon Dubno, the tutor of Mendelssohn's children, was a learned Pole, devoted heart and soul to the work on the Pentateuch. His literary vanity having been wounded, he secretly left Mendelssohn's house, and could not be induced to renew his interest in the undertaking. Herz Homberg, an Austrian, took his place as tutor. When the children were grown, he went to Vienna, and there was made imperial councillor, charged with the superintendence of the Jewish schools of Galicia. It is a mistake to suppose that he used efforts to further the study of the Talmud among Jews. From letters recently published, written by and about him, it becomes evident that he was a common informer. Mendelssohn, of course, was not aware of his true character. The noblest of all was Naphtali Hartwig Wessely, a poet, a pure man, a sincere lover of mankind.

The other prominent members of Mendelssohn's circle were: Isaac Euchel, the "restorer of Hebrew prose," as he has been called, whose chief purpose was the reform of the Jewish order of service and Jewish pedagogic methods; Solomon Maimon, a wild fellow, who in his autobiography tells his own misdeeds, by many of which Mendelssohn was caused annoyance; Lazarus ben David, a modern Diogenes, the apostle of Kantism; and, above all, David Friedländer, an enthusiastic herald of the new era, a zealous champion of modern culture, a pure, serious character with high ethical ideals, whose aims, inspired though they were by most exalted intentions, far overstepped the bounds set to him as a Jew and the disciple of Mendelssohn. Kant's philosophy found many ardent adherents among the Jews at that time. Beside the old there was growing up a new generation which, having no obstructions placed in its path after Mendelssohn's death, aggressively asserted its principles.

The first Jew after Mendelssohn to occupy a position of prominence in the social world of Berlin was his pupil Marcus Herz, with the title professor and aulic councillor, "praised as a physician, esteemed as a philosopher, and extolled as a prodigy in the natural sciences. His lectures on physics, delivered in his own house, were attended by members of the highest aristocracy, even by royal personages."

In circles like his, the equalization of the Jews with the other citizens was animatedly discussed, by partisans and opponents. In the theatre-going public, a respectable minority, having once seen "Nathan the Wise" enacted, protested against the appearance upon the stage of the trade-Jew, speaking the sing-song, drawling German vulgarly supposed to be peculiar to all Jews (Mauscheln). As early as 1771, Marcus Herz had entered a vigorous protest against mauscheln, and at the first performance of "The Merchant of Venice" on August 16, 1788, the famous actor Fleck declaimed a prologue, composed by Ramler, in which he disavowed any intention to "sow hatred against the Jews, the brethren in faith of wise Mendelssohn," and asserted the sole purpose of the drama to be the combating of folly and vice wherever they appear.

Marcus Herz's wife was Henriette Herz, and in 1790, when Alexander and Wilhelm Humboldt first came to her house, the real history of the Berlin salon begins. The Humboldts' acquaintance with the Herz family dates from the visit of state councillor Kunth, the tutor of the Humboldt brothers, to Marcus Herz to advise with him about setting up a lightning-rod, an extraordinary novelty at the time, on the castle at Tegel. Shortly afterward, Kunth introduced his two pupils to Herz and his wife. So the Berlin salon owed its origin to a lightning-rod; indeed, it may itself be called an electrical conductor for all the spiritual forces, recently brought into play, and still struggling to manifest their undeveloped strength. Up to that time there had been nothing like society in the city of intelligence. Of course there was no dearth of scholars and clever, brilliant people, but insuperable obstacles seemed to prevent their social contact with one another. Outside of Moses Mendelssohn's house, until the end of the eighties the only rendezvous of wits, scholars, and literary men, the preference was for magnificent banquets and noisy carousals, each rank entertaining its own members. In the middle class, the burghers, the social instinct had not awakened at all. Alexander Humboldt significantly dated his first letter to Henriette Herz from Schloss Langeweile. In the course of time the desire for spiritual sympathy led to the formation of reading clubs and conversazioni. These were the elements that finally produced Berlin society.

The prototype of the German salon naturally was the salon of the rococo period. Strangely enough, Berlin Jews, disciples, friends, and descendants of Moses Mendelssohn, were the transplanters of the foreign product to German soil. Untrammelled as they were in this respect by traditions, they hearkened eagerly to the new dispensation issuing from Weimar, and they were in no way hampered in the choice of their hero-guides to Olympus. Berlin irony, French sparkle, and Jewish wit moulded the social forms which thereafter were to be characteristic of society at the capital, and called forth pretty much all that was charming in the society and pleasing in the light literature of the Berlin of the day.

To judge Henriette Herz justly we must beware alike of the extravagance of her biographer and the malice of her friend Varnhagen von Ense; the former extols her cleverness to the skies, the other degrades her to the level of the commonplace. The two seem equally unreliable. She was neither extremely witty nor extremely cultured. She had a singularly clear mind, and possessed the rare faculty of spreading about her an atmosphere of ease and cheer--good substitutes for wit and intellectuality. Upon her beauty and amiability rested the popularity of her salon, which succeeded in uniting all the social factors of that period.

The nucleus of her social gatherings consisted of the representatives of the old literary traditions, Nicolai, Ramler, Engel, and Moritz, and they curiously enough attracted the theologians Spalding, Teller, Zöllner, and later Schleiermacher, whose intimacy with his hostess is a matter of history. Music was represented by Reichardt and Wesseli; art, by Schadow; and the nobility by Bernstorff, Dotina, Brinkmann, Friedrich von Gentz, and the Humboldts. Her drawing-room was the hearth of the romantic movement, and as may be imagined, her example was followed for better and for worse by her friends and sisters in faith, so that by the end of the century, Berlin could boast a number of salons, meeting-places of the nobility, literary men, and cultured Jews, for the friendly exchange of spiritual and intellectual experiences. Henriette Herz's salon became important not only for society in Berlin, but also for German literature, three great literary movements being sheltered in it: the classical, the romantic, and, through Ludwig Börne, that of "Young Germany." Judaism alone was left unrepresented. In fact, she and all her cultured Jewish friends hastened to free themselves of their troublesome Jewish affiliations, or, at least, concealed them as best they could. Years afterwards, Börne spent his ridicule upon the Jewesses of the Berlin salons, with their enormous racial noses and their great gold crosses at their throats, pressing into Trinity church to hear Schleiermacher preach. But justice compels us to say that these women did not know Judaism, or knew it only in its slave's garb. Had they had a conception of its high ethical standard, of the wealth of its poetic and philosophic thoughts, being women of rare mental gifts and broad liberality, they certainly would not have abandoned Judaism. But the Judaism of their Berlin, as represented by its religious teachers and the leaders of the Jewish community, most of them, according to Mendelssohn's own account, immigrant Poles, could not appeal to women of keen, intellectual sympathies, and tastes conforming to the ideals of the new era.

As for Mendelssohn's friends who flocked to his hospitable home--their names are household words in the history of German literature. Nicolai and Lessing must be mentioned before all others, but no one came to Berlin without seeking Moses Mendelssohn--Goethe, Herder, Wieland, Hennings, Abt, Campe, Moritz, Jerusalem. Joachim Campe has left an account of his visit at Mendelssohn's house, which is probably a just picture of its attractions.[82] He says: "On a Friday afternoon, my wife and myself, together with some of the distinguished representatives of Berlin scholarship, visited Mendelssohn. We were chatting over our coffee, when Mendelssohn, about an hour before sundown, rose from his seat with the words: 'Ladies and gentlemen, I must leave you to receive the Sabbath. I shall be with you again presently; meantime my wife will enjoy your company doubly.' All eyes followed our amiable philosopher-host with reverent admiration as he withdrew to an adjoining room to recite the customary prayers. At the end of half an hour he returned, his face radiant, and seating himself, he said to his wife: 'Now I am again at my post, and shall try for once to do the honors in your place. Our friends will certainly excuse you, while you fulfil your religious duties.' Mendelssohn's wife excused herself, joined her family, consecrated the Sabbath by lighting the Sabbath lamp, and returned to us. We stayed on for some hours." Is it possible to conceive of a more touching picture?

When Duchess Dorothea of Kurland, and her sister Elise von der Recke were living at Friedrichsfelde near Berlin in 1785, they invited Mendelssohn, whom they were eager to know, to visit them. When dinner was announced, Mendelssohn was not to be found. The companion of the two ladies writes in her journal:[83] "He had quietly slipped away to the inn at which he had ordered a frugal meal. From a motive entirely worthy I am sure, this philosopher never permits himself to be invited to a meal at a Christian's house. Not to be deprived of Mendelssohn's society too long, the duchess rose from the table as soon as possible." Mendelssohn returned, stayed a long time, and, on bidding adieu to the duchess, he said: "To-day, I have had a chat with mind."

This was Berlin society at Mendelssohn's time, and its toleration and humanity are the more to be valued as the majority of Jews by no means emulated Mendelssohn's enlightened example. All their energies were absorbed in the effort of compliance with the charter of Frederick the Great, which imposed many vexatious restrictions. On marrying, they were still compelled to buy the inferior porcelain made by the royal manufactory. The whole of the Jewish community continued to be held responsible for a theft committed by one of its members. Jews were not yet permitted to become manufacturers. Bankrupt Jews, without investigation of each case, were considered cheats. Their use of land and waterways was hampered by many petty obstructions. In every field an insurmountable barrier rose between them and their Christian fellow-citizens. Mendelssohn's great task was the moral and spiritual regeneration of his brethren in faith. In all disputes his word was final. He hoped to bring about reforms by influencing his people's inner life. Schools were founded, and every means used to further culture and education, but he met with much determined opposition among his fellow-believers. Of Ephraim, the debaser of the coin, we have spoken; also of the king's manner towards Jews. Here is another instance of his brusqueness: Abraham Posner begged for permission to shave his beard. Frederick wrote on the margin of his petition: "Der Jude Posner soll mich und seinen Bart ungeschoren lassen."

Lawsuits of Jews against French and German traders made a great stir in those days. It was only after much annoyance that a naturalization patent was obtained by the family of Daniel Itzig, the father-in-law of David Friedländer, founder of the Jews' Free School in Berlin. In other cases, no amount of effort could secure the patent, the king saying: "Whatever concerns your trade is well and good. But I cannot permit you to settle tribes of Jews in Berlin, and turn it into a young Jerusalem."--

This is a picture of Jewish society in Berlin one hundred years ago. It united the most diverse currents and tendencies, emanating from romanticism, classicism, reform, orthodoxy, love of trade, and efforts for spiritual regeneration. In all this queer tangle, Moses Mendelssohn alone stands untainted, his form enveloped in pure, white light.

 

FOOTNOTES:

[76] Ezekiel xxxvii. 1-11.

[77] J. G. Herder.

[78] M. Kayserling: Moses Mendelssohn, and L. Geiger, Geschichte der
Juden in Berlin, II.

[79] Lessing, Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. XII., p. 247.

[80] Mendelssohn, Gesammelte Schriften, Vol. IV^2, 68 ff.

[81] Hensel, Die Familie Mendelssohn, Vol. I., p. 86.

[82] Cmp. I. Heinemann, Moses Mendelssohn, p. 21.

[83] Cmp. Buker and Caro, Vor hundert Jahren, p. 123.

[The end]
Gustav Karpeles's essay: Jewish Society In The Time Of Mendelssohn

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