I previously wrote about my writing a book detailing the origins of Zionism and the role of Theodor Herzl, the founder of the political movement that eventually led to the birth of Israel. In that earlier article, I explored how Herzl desperately searched for a response to the murderous attacks on Jews especially in Russia and finally concluded only a Jewish nation could protect against ongoing anti-Semitism.
He planned his first action in May 1895. He thought there was a trade to be made. Turkey, the center of the Ottoman Empire, controlled the Land of Israel. But Turkey was deeply in debt. Herzl saw his answer: he would provide debt relief and in return Turkey would allow Jewish sovereignty in part of the Jews’ ancient homeland. Herzl therefore went to wealthy Jews to seek the funds for his vision. Much to his shock, wealthy Jews didn’t think his idea feasible. Maurice de Hirsch had his own alternative: sponsoring the growth of Jewish communities in Argentina.
Anguished, Herzl thought of a way to present his idea to the world. He considered writing a novel but then decided that he had to be more direct. The plan took shape. He would write a brief publication offering the idea that Jews needed their own nation.
Der Judenstaat was published on February 14, 1896. It is the seminal work of political Zionism. The pamphlet is often translated as The Jewish State. This translation carries political implications, as though the state established by Herzl’s ideas was intrinsically Jewish, that its essential character was Jewish. In such a state, the national anthem should reflect Jewish thought. The laws of the state should give provide special privileges for Jews, such as the right of Jews throughout the world to return to their ancestral home as citizens.
It is this interpretation that has caused some later readers of the pamphlet such as the prominent Israeli novelist Amos Oz to use a different translation, to call Herzl’s pamphlet The State of the Jews. This translation is meant to convey the notion that no state can be “Jewish” in its nature. A state of the Jews is a state with a Jewish majority but without special privileges for Jews stemming from the nature of the state.
However, both of these translations are incorrect. The correct translation is The Jews’ State. The word “Juden” was frequently used pejoratively by those who hated Jews. What Herzl had in mind was a bold, defiant, assertive title to say to the haters that even the Jews that were hated, the Juden, could form their own nation. Herzl, however, did not intend a specific political dimension in his title. It might be noted that The Jewish State does not need to be used with political implications but simply as a more polite way to translate the title than The Jews’ State.
The pamphlet’s intentionally stiff, legalistic prose, written in that way to avoid charges of utopianism or romanticism, lays out Herzl’s analysis of why people hate the Jews and what the Jews can do about it, specifically establishing their own nation. Herzl had absorbed a lot of lessons while reporting on French political life. He had learned to think like a politician. For example, at one point in his pamphlet Herzl notes that the exact location of the Jewish nation is not clear. Perhaps, he suggested it would be in Palestine (then a neutral term used to describe a territory of the Ottoman Empire, not a separate nation.). Or, alternately it could be in Argentina. But as he had told a group of Jewish students a few days before Der Judenstaat appeared, Herzl had mentioned Argentina so that the Turks wouldn’t think that Jews would only settle for some Turkish territory and therefore would be subject to whatever price the Turks offered.
Herzl’s pamphlet had the effect of a bombshell. Orthodox Jews were mostly horrified that a journalist would take on the role that was traditionally expected from the Messiah. Reform Jews were mostly adamant in their opposition, saying the Jewish mission required that they live among the nations.
And Herzl wasn’t finished. Having created a stir throughout the Jewish world, he decided that offering the idea wasn’t enough. He had to act on it.
Herzl had a staggering political idea. He would found a movement to turn his idea into reality. That movement would be created at a meeting which has come to be called the First Zionist Congress. Herzl’s aim was nothing less than to create a Jewish parliament, to make the Zionist movement an international one. It was a bold move that reversed history. Usually a state existed and then a parliament was selected. Herzl called for the parliament itself to shape and organize the existence of the state.
The book I am writing tells the story of that First Zionist Congress.
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