At the beginning of the war there were many who ascribed the world
conflagration to a conflict of races. At present there are many who
would either belittle the rôle of race as a factor in history or
eliminate it altogether. These people describe the theories of race as
"race mythology" and consider them the invention of scholars rather
than facts of objective reality.
Among a certain section of the Jewish people this negation of race
theories is very popular. If there are not races in this world, then
assimilation is the easiest and best way to solve the Jewish question.
It may or may not be true that race is a biological category, but
it is true beyond a doubt that the consciousness of race among all
peoples always was and will be an historic factor of prime importance.
Therefore, it matters little whether or not race is a biological fact.
History and its interpretation are concerned only with consciousness of
race.
If consciousness of race were to be recognized only because it exists
and has always existed, people might say: "So other superstitions have
likewise existed." The fact, however, is that the consciousness of race
has a definite psychological basis, although we know next to nothing
about its biological foundation. We see that the co-existence of like
individuals in a definite place and during a long period of time,
who are held together by a common ancestry, by a common destiny and
interest, and the interaction resulting from such co-existence produces
new phenomena and radiates creative energies which cannot be simply
reduced to the qualities and forces of the individual minds. These
energies radiating from the co-existence of a group of individuals
are new, original and creative. They are more than actualized
potentialities, and are to the individuals sharing in the co-existence
as are sounds which the great artist draws from the violin to the
violin itself. The energies emanating from this co-existence often
assume shape and form which differ from the energies of the separate
individuals. They appear rather one-sided and unbalanced. For instance,
the separate individuals have about an equally large or small amount
of religious or æsthetic desire, an equally large or small sense of
justice or morality.
If the energies radiating from the co-existence would comprise and
express the will of the individuals only, the culture of the ethnic
group would necessarily consist of equal portions and exhibit a
proportionate amount of logic, aesthetics and ethics. But we see that
every great culture gravitates in a certain direction. Hellenism
tends towards the artistic-philosophical, Judaism towards the
religious-ethical, and Romanism towards the political-legal. We thus
see that the manifestation of the mind of the race being one-sided is
more than the sum total of the expression of all the individual members
of the race, and as soon as we recognize a certain psychological or
psychical unity, of a certain group of people, we must also recognize
that this unity is modeled and shaped by time. In course of time this
psychological or psychical unit becomes enveloped in traditions and
experiences which make it stronger from day to day. As in biology many
think that the function in time creates an organ, so the new energies
radiating from the co-existence of a group of people become in course
of time something organic in the mind of those people. This is the
psychological basis of race consciousness and since earliest time the
various peoples, all of whom had an outspoken race consciousness except
those savages who cannot count, have recognized or felt that their
consciousness of race was more than belief--that it was a psychological
reality.
Of all the ancient peoples none had more marked race consciousness and
racial feeling than the Jews and Greeks. It is very characteristic
of Greek race consciousness that Greek philosophers, when discussing
ethical or political subjects, have only the Hellenic people in mind.
Their notions of justice and peace were applied only to the Hellenic
people. The ancient Jews were not so one-sided. Yet they, too, had
a well developed race consciousness which showed not merely in the
religious idea that they were the chosen people, but in a very general
acceptance of the belief that they were a distinct unit. Even the
call to righteousness uttered by the prophet is colored by racial
motives: "Hearken to me, ye that follow after righteousness; ye that
seek the Lord. Look unto the rock whence ye are hewn and to the hole
of the pit whence ye are digged." Another of the prophets, Ezekiel,
even speculated as to the origin of the Jewish race. All the terms,
_ger_, _nakhri_, _akum_ and others used by ancient Jews to describe
non-believers characterized non-Jews with reference to race also. The
feeling of racial consciousness among Jews to the present day and the
consciousness of the isolation of that race are best expressed in
the popular Hebrew term, "Umoth ha-Olam," the people of the world.
The "Umoth ha-Olam" are the non-Jews, as the "barbaroi" were the
non-Greeks. This throws light on the mental disposition of the Jews.
While, in the eyes of the Greek, the non-Greek is an inferior, being a
"barbaros," in the eyes of the Jews the non-Jew is simply different and
not necessarily inferior. Even the term _goy_, which is so much abused
by anti-Semites, means only non-Jew. But while the Jew never held the
non-Jew in contempt merely for differences of race, he had always and
still has intense feeling for his own race.
In theological periods of history the fight against Judaism was perhaps
a conflict of theologies only. Today, however, a fight against Judaism
is inevitably a fight against the Jewish race. In times of old the
religious motives of Judaism seem to have been the prime factors in
Jewish life. Today the driving powers in Jewish history are not so
much religious as race and national consciousness. It is, therefore,
characteristic of those Jews whose Jewish backbone is broken to deny
the existence of the race and to scoff at race consciousness in general.
Race consciousness is not a myth invented by the professors, but a fact
of life.