Haskalah (Jewish Enlightenment)
1770 – 1881
An argument that a Jew could be fully Jewish and fully a citizen, made just as European states began asking the question.
- Active
- 1770 – 1881
- Where
- Berlin, then eastern Europe
- Also
- השכלה Haskala
- Status
- extinct as a movement
- Tradition
- Jewish
The claim
Judaism is revealed legislation rather than revealed doctrine. It commands actions, not beliefs — and since reason establishes the truths that matter, no conflict arises between being a Jew and being a citizen.
What it held
Mendelssohn was a working philosopher of the German Enlightenment, admired by Kant, and also an observant Jew — and Jerusalem is his answer to the demand that he choose.
His argument is precise. Judaism does not require belief in propositions that reason cannot reach; the truths about God and the soul are available to anyone through reason. What Judaism adds is law — commanded practice, binding on Jews. So a Jew can accept everything the Enlightenment establishes and remain fully observant, because the two operate at different levels.
From that he derives an argument for religious liberty: the state may compel actions and cannot compel belief, so no religion should have coercive power, including his own.
The movement that followed pressed for secular education, Hebrew as a literary language, and civic participation. The results were not what Mendelssohn expected. Four of his six children converted, the German branch moved toward Reform and assimilation, and the eastern branch produced modern Hebrew literature and a great deal of anticlerical satire.
The pogroms of 1881 ended it as a programme. Emancipation had been offered and then, visibly, withdrawn.
How it argued
Philosophical argument in German for a general readership, plus translation — Mendelssohn's German Pentateuch in Hebrew characters was designed to teach Jews German.
What it was arguing against
Rabbinic authority over civil matters, the exclusion of Jews from citizenship, and Christian demands for conversion as the price of it.
Where it disagreed with itself
Whether the separation of law from doctrine survives scrutiny. Whether the Haskalah opened the door to assimilation, which its traditionalist opponents predicted and which happened.
Common misconceptions
That it was a secularising movement. Mendelssohn was strictly observant and argued that observance was compatible with Enlightenment, not a stage to be left behind.
How it began
Mendelssohn arrived in Berlin at fourteen through a gate reserved for cattle and Jews, and became one of the most respected philosophers in Germany.
What became of it
Ended by the pogroms of 1881, which discredited the emancipation bargain. Its energies went into Zionism, socialism and Jewish scholarship.
Lasting influence
Reform Judaism, modern Hebrew literature, and the academic study of Judaism. Lessing based Nathan the Wise on Mendelssohn.
Why it still matters
The question of how a minority tradition can participate fully in a society without dissolving is not a settled one anywhere.
Put another way
A door opened partway, and an argument about how much of yourself fits through it.
Where to start
Jerusalem, part two. It is where the philosophy of Judaism is set out.
The surprising bit
Mendelssohn was challenged publicly to explain why he did not convert, given his philosophical views. Jerusalem is the reply, and it argues for religious liberty rather than for Judaism specifically.
In their own words
Judaism knows of no revealed religion in the sense in which Christians understand this term.
The state has physical power and uses it when necessary; the power of religion is love and beneficence.
Connections
- Answers
- Maimonideanism
- Opposed by
- Hasidic Philosophy
The verdict
A carefully argued bargain that the other party did not keep.