THEIR DUTY
Where positive causes have been found for an evil it is obvious that the
cure of that evil consists in the removal of the causes, in so far as
they can be removed.
In the particular case of the friction between the Jewish community and
their hosts the causes of that friction are the foolish and dangerous
habit of secrecy and the irritating expression of superiority. The
causes the Jew can remove if he will. The matter is in his own hands: we
can do nothing: he can do everything.
But beyond this negative duty which is incumbent upon the Jews if they
would achieve a peaceful issue of the perils which menace their future,
there is a positive action also incumbent upon them. They must foster,
they must even propose, institutions which will the better mark them off
from a society not their own and restore to them the dignity of a
nation. I shall in the last chapter of this book contend that the policy
leading to a solution must repose not upon direct laws of our own
imagining, not upon reactions which will almost certainly prove
oppressive, and almost certainly be evaded, but upon a general spirit
recognizing the separate nationality of the Jews. But though this is
true of every Christian Western State in which they find themselves, it
is not true of their own nation. They on their side may well come
forward with propositions which they have the capacity for making,
because they will know how to frame them (as we cannot) after a fashion
consistent with their own dignity and their own tradition. There is a
beginning of such things already present in the Jewish schools, the
Jewish guardians and the considerable separate organization which the
Jews have openly set up for their community in this country. These
beginnings have but to be extended.
Those who are openly hostile to Jews will say that any proposals coming
from their side will conceal a trap. "This people" (they say) "will
always suggest things which will seem innocent enough and apparently do
no more than define their position plainly for the future; but we shall
find ourselves caught in an obligation and the Jews more our masters
than ever. They will," say these objectors, "remain as they are to-day,
and while they claim every privilege as a separate community, they will
also insist upon the full citizenship which is incompatible with this
attitude. We shall find that, whatever institutions we ask them to
frame, those institutions will work not only in their favour but also
heavily against us."
I doubt it. The special Jewish institutions already at work have no such
effect. On the contrary, they already relieve the strain. One of those
institutions, for instance, is the Jewish press: the newspapers
specially devoted to Jewish interests and acting as spokesmen for Jewish
ideas. They are not always as polite as they might be. I have had myself
at times to lodge a complaint against the way in which they have
treated sincere efforts for the settlement of our difficulties and an
honest attempt at finding a way out. They have left a handle to their
enemies sometimes by too insistent or, as those enemies would call it,
too arrogant a claim, and they do write now and then as though we, the
vast majority, had no rights and the only thing worth considering was
the advancement of their own people.
But, after all, it would be absurd to expect anything else. A small
minority vigorously fighting its own hand must exaggerate its claim; an
organism defending itself against very heavy pressure from without
cannot but appear aggressive, and I shall always maintain that the
presence of an openly Jewish institution speaking for Jewish interests,
no matter how insistently, is an excellent thing. It presents a healthy
contrast with the converse attempt to present Jewish arguments under the
cover of neutrality, and to spread Jewish ideas anonymously through what
are very far from being neutral agents.
If I be asked what institutions I have in mind I can only repeat that it
is for the Jews themselves to make the first proposal, but I suggest an
extension of the system, which is already present in embryo, whereby
disputes between Jews shall be arbitrated before a Jewish tribunal. Not
only its extension but its confirmation at the request of the Jews
themselves, might be a good thing. It would also not be a bad thing
if--some time hence when things were ripe for the change--disputes
between Jews and non-Jews could be tried in Courts where the special
character of such disputes, the distinctive difference between them and
disputes between the fellow-citizens of the country in which they live,
should come before tribunals of a mixed character. To attempt this
to-day would, of course, be a very new departure in procedure, indeed a
revolutionary one; and there is no prospect of it for a long while; but
with the growing number among us, and the growing influence, of Jews it
will, I think, when it does come at last, be of advantage to both
parties. It would be fatal if it were imposed upon them. It would not be
accepted. It would not work. But if it were suggested by the Jewish
community spontaneously, and started and developed by them, it would
succeed. And it would add a great deal to the relief already experienced
for the functioning of the other institutions I have mentioned.
There is little more to be said under this head. Apart from the duty of
open dealing and this specific policy of fostering separate institutions
we have no claim to press.
All the main part of the mutual Duty is on _our_ side. Therefore have I
given it the space it seems to deserve and confined to no more than
these few lines correlative suggestions for those who, after all, are
not responsible to us for their actions and may properly resent the
airing of _our_ views on the domestic details of their alien
organization.
VARIOUS THEORIES