THE NATIONAL PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT
PEREZ SMOLENSKIN
Perez Smolenskin was born, in 1842, at Monastryshchina, a little market
town near Mohilew. His father, a poor and an unfortunate man, who was
not able to support his wife and six children successfully, was forced
to leave his family on account of a slanderous accusation brought
against him by a Polish priest. The mother, a plucky woman of the
people, supported herself by hard work, in spite of which it was her
ambition to make Rabbis of her boys. At length the father joined his
family again, and a period of comparative prosperity set in.
The first care of the returned father was to look to the education of
his two sons, Leon and Perez. The latter showed unusual ability. At the
age of four he began the study of the Pentateuch, at five he had been
introduced to the Talmud. These studies absorbed him until his eleventh
year. Then, like all the sons of the ghetto desirous of an education, he
left his father and mother, and betook himself to the _Yeshibah_ at
Shklow. The journey was made on foot, and his only escort was the
blessing of his mother. The lad's youth proved no obstacle to his
entering the Talmud academy, nor to his acquiring celebrity for industry
and attainments. His brother Leon, who had preceded him to Shklow,
initiated him in the Russian language, and supplied him with modern
Hebrew writings. Openhearted and lively, he set prejudice at defiance,
and maintained friendly relations with a certain intellectual who was
reputed a heretic, an acquaintanceship that contributed greatly to the
mental development of young Perez. The dignified burghers who were
taking turns in supplying him with his meals, alarmed at his aberration
from the straight path, one after another withdrew their protection from
him. Black misery clutched him. He was but fourteen years old, and
already he had entered upon a life of disquiet and adventure. His story
is the Odyssey of an erring son of the ghetto. Repulsed by the
_Mitnaggedim_, he sought help with the Hasidim. He was equally ill-
fitted for their life. Their uncouth mystical exaltation, the absurdity
of their superstitions, and their hypocrisy drove him to exasperation.
He cast himself into the whirl of life, became assistant to a cantor at
a synagogue, and then teacher of Hebrew and Talmud. The whole gamut of
precarious employments open to a scholar of the ghetto he ran up and
down again. His restless spirit and the desire to complete his education
carried him to Odessa. There he established himself, and there years of
work and endeavor were passed. He acquired the modern languages, his
mind grew broader, and he gave up religious practices once for all,
always remaining attached to Judaism, however.
In 1867 appeared his first literary production, the article against
Letteris, who at that time occupied the position of an incontestable
authority, in which Smolenskin permits himself to pass severe and
independent criticism upon his Hebrew adaptation of Goethe's
_Faust_. In the Odessa period falls also the writing of the first
few chapters of his great novel, _Ha-To'eh be-Darke ha-Hayyim_ ("A
Wanderer Astray on the Path of Life"). [Footnote: A complete edition of
the novels and articles by Smolenskin appeared recently at St.
Petersburg and Wilna, published by Katzenelenbogen.] But his free spirit
could not adapt itself to the narrowness and meanness of the literary
folk and the editors of periodicals. He determined to leave Russia for
the civilized Occident, the promised land in the dreams of the Russian
Maskilim, beautified by the presence of Rapoport and Luzzatto. His first
destination was Prague, the residence of Rapoport, then Vienna, and
later he pushed his way to Paris and London. Everywhere he studied and
made notes. A sharp-eyed observer, he sought to probe European affairs
as well as Occidental Judaism to their depths. He established relations
with Rabbis, scholars, and Jewish notables, and finally he was in a
position to appraise at close range the liberty he had heard vaunted so
loudly, and the religious reforms wished for so eagerly by the
intelligent of his own country. He soon had occasion to see the reverse
of the medal, and his disenchantment was complete. Regretfully he came
to the conclusion that the modern emancipation movement had brought the
Jewish spirit in the Occident to the point at which the Western Jew was
turned away from the essence of Judaism. Form had taken the place of
substance, ceremonial the place of religious and national sentiment.
Heartsick over such disregard of the past, indignant at the indifference
displayed by modern Jews toward all he held dear, young Smolenskin
resolved to break the silence that was observed in the great capitals of
Europe respecting all things Jewish and carry the gospel of the ghetto
to the "neo-Gentiles".
The first shaft was delivered in Vienna, where he began the publication
of his review _Ha-Shahar_ ("Daybreak"). Almost without means, but
fired by the wish to work for the national and moral elevation of his
people, the young writer laid down the articles of his faith:
"The purpose of _Ha-Shahar_ is to shed the light of
knowledge upon the paths of the sons of Jacob, to open the eyes
of those who either have not beheld knowledge, or, beholding,
have not understood in value, to regenerate the beauty of the
Hebrew language, and increase the number of its devotees.
"... But when the eyes of the blind begin to open slowly, and
they shake off the sluggish slumber in which they have been sunk
since many years, then there is still another class to be dealt
with--those who, having tasted of the fruit of the tree of
knowledge, intentionally close their eyes to our language, the
only possession left to us that can bring together the hearts of
Israel and make one nation of it all over the earth.... Let them
take warning! If my hand is against the bigots and the hypocrites
who hide themselves under the mantle of the truth, ... it will be
equally unsparing of the enlightened hypocrites who seek with
honeyed words to alienate the sons of Israel from their ancestral
knowledge...."
War to mediaeval obscurantism, war to modern indifference, was the plan
of his campaign. _Ha-Shahar_ soon became the organ of all in the
ghetto who thought, felt, and fought,--the spokesman of the nationalist
Maskilim, setting forth their demands as culture bearers and patriots.
At a time when Hebrew literature consisted mainly of translations or
works of minor significance, Smolenskin had the boldness to announce
that the columns of his periodical would be open to writers of original
articles only. The era of the translator and the vapid imitator had come
to a close. A new school of original writers stepped upon the boards,
and little by little the reading public accustomed itself to give
preference to them.
And at a time when disparagement of the national element in Judaism had
been carried to the furthest excess, Smolenskin asserted Judaism's right
to exist, in such words as these:
[The wilfully blind] "bid us to be like all the other nations,
and I repeat after them: Let us be like all the other nations,
pursuing and attaining knowledge, leaving off from wickedness and
folly, and dwelling as loyal citizens in the lands whither we
have been scattered. Yes, let us be like all the other nations,
unashamed of the rock whence we have been hewn, like the rest in
holding dear our language and the glory of our people. It is not
a disgrace for us to believe that our exile will once come to an
end, ... and we need not blush for clinging to the ancient
language with which we wandered from people to people, in which
our poets sang and our seers prophesied when we lived at ease in
our own land, and in which our fathers poured out their hearts
when their blood flowed like water in the sight of all.... They
who thrust us away from the Hebrew language meditate evil against
our people and against its glory!"
The reputation of _Ha-Shahar_ was firmly established by the
publication of Smolenskin's great novel _Ha-To'eh be-Darke ha-
Hayyim_ in its columns. In this as in the rest of his works, he is
the prophet denouncing the crimes and the depravity of the ghetto, and
proclaiming the revival of national dignity.
Smolenskin permitted himself to be thwarted by nothing in the execution
of his bold designs, neither by the meagreness of his material resources
nor by the animosities which his fearless course did not fail to arouse
among literary men.
In 1872, Smolenskin published, at Vienna, his masterpiece _'Am
'Olam_ ("The Eternal People"), which became the platform of the
movement for national emancipation. Noteworthy from every point of view,
this work shows him to have been an original thinker and an inspired
poet, a humanist and at the same time a patriot. He is full of love for
his people, and his faith in its future knows no limits. He demonstrates
convincingly that true nationalism is not incompatible with the final
realization of the ideal of the universal brotherhood of men. National
devotion is but a higher aspect of devotion to family. In nature we see
that, in the measure in which the individuality of a being is distinct,
its superiority and its independence are increased. Differentiation is
the law of progress. Why not apply the law to human groups, or nations?
The sum total of the qualities peculiar to the various nations, and the
various ways in which they respond to concepts presented to them from
without, these constitute the life and the culture of mankind as a
whole. While admitting that the historical past of a people is an
essential part of its existence, he believes it to be a still more
urgent necessity for every people to possess a present ideal, and
entertain national hopes for a better future. Judaism cherishes the
Messianic ideal, which at bottom is nothing but the hope of its national
rebirth. Unfortunately, the modern, unreligious Jew denies the ideal,
and the orthodox Jew envelops it in the obscurity of mysticism.
The last chapter of "The Eternal People", called "The Hope of Israel",
is pervaded by magnificent enthusiasm. For the first time in Hebrew,
Messianism is detached from its religious element. For the first time, a
Hebrew writer asserts that Messianism is the political and moral
resurrection of Israel, _the return to the prophetic tradition_.
Why should the Greeks, the Roumanians, desire a national emancipation,
and Israel, the people of the Bible, not?... The only obstacle is the
fact that the Jews have lost the notion of their national unity and the
feeling of their solidarity.
This conviction as to the existence of a Jewish nationality, the
national emancipation dreamed by Salvador, Hess, and Luzzatto,
considered a heresy by the orthodox and a dangerous theory by the
liberals, had at last found its prophet. In Smolenskin's enthusiastic
formulation of it, the ideal was carried to the masses in Russia and
Galicia, superseding the mystical Messianism they had cherished before.
Smolenskin's combative spirit did not allow him to rest at that. The
idea of national regeneration was in collision with the theory, raised
to a commanding position by Mendelssohn and his school, that Judaism
constitutes a religious confession. In a series of articles ("A Time to
Plant, and a Time to Pluck up that which is Planted"), [Footnote: _Ha-
Shahar_, 1875-6.] he deals with the Mendelssohnian theory.
Proceeding from history and his knowledge of Judaism, he proves that the
Jewish religion is not a rigid block of unalterable notions, but rather
a body of ethical and philosophical teachings constantly undergoing a
process of evolution, and changing its aspect according to the times and
the environment. If this doctrine is the quintessence of the national
genius of the Jew, it is nevertheless accessible, in theory and in
practice, to whosoever desires access. It is not the dogmatic and
exclusive privilege of a sacerdotal caste.
This is the rationale of Smolenskin's opposition to the religious
dogmatism of Mendelssohn, who had wished to confine Judaism inside of
the circle of Rabbinic law without recognizing its essentially
evolutionary character. Maimonides himself is not spared by Smolenskin,
for it was Maimonides who had set the seal of consecration upon logical
dogmatism. The less does he spare the modern school of reformers.
Religious reforms, he freely admits, are necessary, but they ought to be
spontaneous developments, emanations from the heart of the believers
themselves, in response to changes in the times and social relations.
They ought not to be the artificial product of a few intellectuals who
have long broken away from the masses of the people, sharing neither
their suffering nor their hopes. If Luther succeeded, it was because he
had faith himself. But the modern Jewish reformers are not believers,
therefore their work does not abide. It is only the study of the Hebrew
language, of the religion of the Jew, his culture, and his spirit that
is capable of replacing the dead letter and soulless regulations by a
keen national and religious sentiment in harmony with the exigencies of
life. The next century, he predicted, would see a renewed, unified
Judaism.
This is a summing up of the ideas which brought him approval and
endorsement from all sides, but also, and to a greater degree,
opposition and animosity, the latter from the old followers of the
German humanist movement. One of them, the poet Gottlober, founded, in
1876, a rival review, _Ha-Boker Or_, in which he pleaded the cause
of the school of Mendelssohn. But the new periodical, which continued to
appear until 1881, could neither supplant _Ha-Shahar_, nor diminish
Smolenskin's ardor. Other obstacles of all sorts, and the difficulties
raised by the Russian censor, were equally ineffectual in halting the
efforts of the valiant apostle of Jewish nationalism. He was assured the
cooperation of all independent literary men, for Smolenskin had never
posed as a believer in dogmatic religion or as its defender. On the
contrary, he waged constant war with Rabbinism. He was persuaded that an
untrammelled propaganda, bold speech issuing from a knowledge of the
heart of the masses and their urgent needs, would bring about a natural
and peaceable revolution, restoring to the Jewish people its free
spirit, its creative genius, and its lofty morality. It mattered little
to him that the young had ceased to be orthodox: in case of need,
national feeling would suffice to maintain Israel. At this point, it
appears, Smolenskin excelled Samuel David Luzzatto and his school as a
free-thinker. The Jewish people is to him the eternal people
personifying the prophetic idea, realizable in the Jewish land and not
in exile. The liberalism displayed by Europe toward the Jews during a
part of the nineteenth century is in his opinion but a transient
phenomenon, and as early as 1872 he foresaw the recrudescence of anti-
Semitism.
This conception of Jewish life was welcomed by the educated as a
revelation. The distinction of the editor of _Ha-Shahar_ is that he
knew how to develop the ideas enunciated by the masters preceding him,
how to carry them to completion, and render them accessible to the
people at large. He revealed a new formula to them, thanks to which
their claims as Jews were no longer in contradiction with the demands of
modern times. It was the revenge taken by the people speaking through
the mouth of the writer. It was the echo of the cry of the throbbing
soul of the ghetto.
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