100%

Scanned image of the page. Keyboard directions: use + to zoom in, - to zoom out, arrow keys to pan inside the viewer.

Page Options

Share

Something wrong?

Something wrong with this page? Report problem.

Rights / Permissions

The University of Michigan Library provides access to these materials for educational and research purposes. These materials may be under copyright. If you decide to use any of these materials, you are responsible for making your own legal assessment and securing any necessary permission. If you have questions about the collection, please contact the Bentley Historical Library at bentley.ref@umich.edu

July 30, 1920 - Image 15

Resource type:
Text
Publication:
The Detroit Jewish Chronicle, 1920-07-30

Disclaimer: Computer generated plain text may have errors. Read more about this.

America with Pcrfodical Cotter

CUPTON AVENUE • CINCINNATI 10, OHIO

PAGE FIFTEEN

THE DETROIT JEWISH CHRONICLE

Theodor Herzl and
His Followers

By Dr. Max Nordau.

It is now sixteen years that Theodor ih-SE and Pinsker when he conceived
Herd has shut his dominating black the idea of the "Judenstacet". It w.ts
eyes fur ever. Rut he seems to have only after the complethon and the puto
rive n from the dead. We, his nearest heat Ion of this sensational book that
friends. mourned a long tine' when he a German reader of it draw his atten-
had prematurely gone from us. But tion to - Rome and Jarusalem" of
veil' Boel, we see now that ho Is present 11089, and that Russian University
sitelenta of members of the
among to More than ever.
The Balfour Isoclaration was a first, seeks y "Katilenah" brought Pinker's
Autoemancipation" to his knowledge.
cautioust and timid approach to the
standpoint of Herz'. The decisionn of In this he may be reproached for
San Remo embodied in the Peace lolconalole ignorance. Possible. Ito
Treaty with the ()Unman Empire is had worked in other fields. Ile was a
the definite and indisputable triumph student or law, a writer of fiction, and
it publicist. Ile concentrated his at-
of lierzl's Central idea.
There is an immanent Justice in tention and exerted his exceptional
Ilistory deeply comforting to those gifts in directions fur away from spe-
who would easily give way to a seem- cifically. narrowly Jewish develop
ingly Justifie' pessimism if they limit ments, and particularly from the sit-
their scrutiny to a short succession of uation of East-European Jewry. But
events. Steer some years lierzl's au- all this, which has to bo admitted,
thority suffered something like an only proves that he drove his inspirit
ecliptics True, to the heart of the tom entirely from his inner conscious
Jewish {motile he never •'eased to be bless and that his toothiest Zionism IS
dear: with its sure instinct it always wholly and exclusively his own per
creation.
felt that he was one of those providen-

tial nantures which, from Rine to
time, appear in the midst of a suffer-
ing and despondent people to fill it
with new hope, and strengthen its
Will to persevere and to perdue; in
fact the production of such estop.
Donal personalities is a proof and the
measure of the unweakened vitality
of the people. But, in a certain See-
!ion of t hose who mot ended to lie
Zimdst0 and had boldly taken posses-
sion of the Inheritance of Hersh it
became the fashion to deny him and
to eliminate him tacitly or expressly
from the movement which he created.
he , alone and no one' else.. he, with the
help of a few followers recruited by
himself, he, against an indifferent.
amused or hostile world. fhe atte mpt,
audaciously, systematically, cunningly
undertaken to darken his fame. to
dim his Image ,to falsify his ideas or
to render them Incomprehensible, to
make them appear adventurous and
silly by introducing confusion and
misinterpretations into their admir-
able limpidity and logic, has miser-
ably failed. As a low, creeping mist
which covers the soil and narrows the
view Is dispelled by one vigorous gust
of a breeze from the main. thus these
artificial clouds susellated around the
memory of (tent have been swept
away by the great vInelieation of his
life work througit the sisnatory pow-
ers of the San Remo treaty.

A witty English Conservative has
said: "It's a pity that rho history of
Great Britain has been written by
Whigs only." We might say the game
political Zionism.
of the history
Would-be historians have already
been busily at work arranging facts.
smuggling between then little inven-
tions of their own, mixing cleverly
truth fend fiction. coolly passing oven
Import ant events and t heir authors,
to give a prominent place to puffed-
tip nobodies and to grotesquely es-
agcorated nothingn , sews: and by ilia
means to create it wholly false impres-
sion which, they hope. will become
the established, recognised, unit tradi-
tional reading of the facts and their
enchainment. They trace back the
origin of Zionism some two thousand
years, and affirm unctiously that it Is
nothing else but a somewhat moder-
nised wording. of the prophecies of
Scripture. Very clever, very edifying,
but shockingly untrue.

or

To be sure, the promisee of the
Prophets have ever remained living to
the souls and the hearts of the Jewish
peoples and have maintained unshaken
through all the vicissitudes and tor-
tures of two thousand years of de-
feats, persecutions and martyrdom,
its trust in its ultimate restoration to
a national existence in the land of its
fathers. Hut this mystical hope is
only the remote starting point of
Iferzl's reasonings. It is only the
pre-existing soil wherein to sow his
own Ideas. To be sure he was the
son of the people, of the book. and he
addressed himself to the people of the
hook. But he was a man of the nine-
teenth century, he thought in tunas
of his own time. and his message to
Israel and to the world had nothing
to do with prophecies and their ful-
fillment. nothing with Memel:mine and
its miraculous realisation, nothing
with supernatural interventionsn. It
was a wholly secular. rational struc-
ture, it was the thought of a stales-
man who deals with political and so-
cial problems in accordance with the
realistic methods of state.stnancraft.

I oments, many of them, abandoned
him. spoke. with iniplous irony of his
diplomacy and relapsed into that bar-
ron more (*hover' Zionism from which
they hied tome forth, lead or dragged
by the hand of Herz' into infinitely
Wider fields. They boasted that one
square yard of Palestinian soil bought
by a Jew had more importance than
all the sonorous political talk of Herz'.
And when he died, a grout , of Pigmies
got hold of his inheritance, intruded
and establishes] itself in the organiza-
tion which was his work, displayed all
its cunning and malice to precipitate
him, his name and his merit into the
deepest :thyme. (of oblivion. II was
told by an absolutely reliable witness
that one of those putted up dwarfs
had boasted: "Win have ut last suc-
ceeded in Melding Ilerzl out of Zion-
ism") repudiated the, very name of
pi litical %luutotu, yelepind it "practical
Zionism". because It became in their
hands the most provokingly unpracti-
(al children's play carried on with but
Coon seriousness, and set up a pro-
gram of "Gegenwartz arboit", of
"Work of the Present", rightly called
So because it was as miserly ephe-
meral a sthe evanescent instant be-
tween eternal past and eternal future,
and beeniose it contained not the small-
est germ of this future.

A few- words only as to the relations
of Ilerzl's political Zionism with the
Russian Chosen' Zionism. I shall be
the last to overlook the great and
lasting merits of the, latter. It was
horn of the traditional religious love
fur the ancestral homeland and of the
despair over the furious outbreak of
criminal anti.sionlitism in INSI, as a
sequel of what was then called
Nihilistic agitation, and of the murder
of Alexander II. The heroic young stu-
dents. known as "'Mar, who set out
for JPielestine, unprepared, without
the faintest knowledge of agriculture,
without (edictal protection of any kind.
without money. armed only with their
wonderful idealism, with their inborn
energy, with their Juvenile illusions.
and unhesitatingly took possession of
a few yank of Palestinian soil, there
to become peasants and the nucleus of
a future renewed Jewish nation, these
"Itilur will become legendary figures
In the history of the Jewish renasence,
glorified by Jewish art and poetry and
fiction, praised beyond the Argonauts,
who only went in search of a golden
', Memo, while they steered their
"Argosy" towards the incomparably
nobler aim of national and Individual
redemption, beyond the Pilgrim Fath-
ers, because the task of those was far
less pestles anti difficult than that of
the "Itilar. But their attempt, altho'
In a somewhat later stage backed by
the Russian organization of fervent
lovers of Zion, the "Chovevi Zion",
and powerfully aided ley that unique.
immortal enthusiast, Baron Edmond
tit. Rothschild, was hopelessly (loomed
to failure. It had and could have no
future. A few thousand Jewish tillers
of the soil, settled on an inopereepth
ble part of Palestine, less than the
average property of an East Eiblan
"pinker". contemptuously tolerated by
the still powerful Turkish rulers of the
land, without any right or privilege,
witheout a status in public law, with-
out the contractual protection of a
foreign power, had no more hope to
make Palestine. Jewish than the col-
onlsta of Wilhelma and Senora had to
make it German. even less because
they had not a country like Germany
behind them.

Then appeared 'lent and raised the
romantic undertaking to an Incom-
parably higher level and enlarged lin-
measurably its horizon by Introducing
for the first time a clear political pur-
pose into the dreamily mystical. vague
idollogy underying the foundation of
the first Jewish colonies in Palestine.
He set his face against the sneaking
in, he claimed rights, he opened de-
terminedly negotiations with the sover-
eign power for the obtaining of auto-
(Remy, he presented the case of a Jew-
ish Palestine to the European Govern-
'ents and solicited their support, with
one word he proclaimed the now gos-
pel of political Zionism, he the first,
he alone, and nobody else.

Political Zionism implied Choveni
Zionism. but It was infinitely larger,
Infinitely more pregnant with possi-
bilities and promises. It could use the
humble beginnings of a Jewish Colon.
tzation as a Jumping board. not for a
loan in the dark like that of the
"Minn but for a bold swing which
was to land the athlete on the secure
ground of a froc homeland for the
Jewish nation. Those among the
original Chovesi Zionista who were
apt to grasp a political thought and
The same perfidious hiographera a modern method of reasoning, listen-
and historians who do their best to be- ed surprised, and soon on raptured.
little Herz' and to whittle down to a to Ilerzl's message, hailed it and hast-
negligible. to an almost impereeptiele ened to adhere to It and its author.
Ills lifework, attribute to him
But man yof those followers of the
all sorts of ancestors and endow him great tondos were feeble of faith and
with all kinds of heirlooms, so as to short of sight. As he was a prophet
reduce to little or nothing his per- and not a magician, as he had a con-
sonal' share in the values which he hag viction and a purpose, but not a col--
brought forth and bequeathed to his eeror's wand, a she was equipped with
peoples
an historical right and a powerful
[lent has hail procursors; nobody
moral claim, but not provided with a
will deny that. The sante conditions
mighty army and milliards of money,
of thc Jewish people dispersed among he could not at once realize his lofty
the- nations which sot him meditating
schemes. the created the permanent
over its fate and properly created him
Zionist organization and the periodi
as an historic-el personality, have had
cal Congress which were to become
tho same effect on others before him,
the framework of a Jewish nation.
but he knew nothing of thorn, and he
parliament and Government, but lie
Marled_ his venture utte , rly ignorant
could not present Palestine as a free
of wild they may have dreamt and
gift to the Jews. This is not the place
schemed. In order to . diminish his
merit all manner of claims have heen to tell the martyrology of Herz' and
the drama, almost the tragedy of pre
IniSed on behalf of Moses Hess, of Pr.
el'inslier, of ('honest Zionism of still 'ideal Zionism. When Ilerzl, after
editor pioneers of a kind of ZIoniarn seven years. a moment In the history
I can testify to the fact that Ilerzl of a people, had not yet achieved the
did not even guess the existence of foundation of a Jewish state, his ad-

What a supremo., almost demoniac
rcny of Ilistory that these petty Matto
doci of the gnat leader who even now,
atter San Remo, treniblo be fore the
weed of Jewish State and warn us
with a voice strangled by fear for,
Gtr I'll sake not to use it, that these
(welly dhoti- what were seized by they
Iron hands of the, recent world events,'
and pushed Irresistibly into the tier-j
clod whirl of politics, and forced,
against their Will and without their in-
Million, to play the role of statesmen,

I leave it to the reader to continue
this line of thought and to gaze into
the perspective which I have (opened
before his eyes. The curtain has
dropped over a saddening act In the
Zionlst drama. It is to rise before
a new yet which I 'lope will lead up
to a moving, comforting end at a level
with the magnificent beginning. May
we soon be able to knock at the door
of Ilerzi's Vienna sepulchre and call
down into its echoing vaults: "Theo-
dor Herzl, be ready. we are here to
take thine to thy lasting place of rest
in that Jewish State of which thou
west the prophet and the spirit oat
creator."

The Jew in Science

Following closely upon the startling
announcement that the almost incred-
ible theory of l'rofessor Einstein has
been accepted by the world's scien-
tists comes the gratifying news that
for the ninth time the Noble l'rize
has been awarded to a lees, this time
to the chemist Fritz Ilaber of Stut-
gart.
Tin.se achievements by Jewish sci-
entists are highly gratifying, yet they
are not surprising. The various de-
partments and divisions of science, in
its strict sense, are practically con-
fined within the borders of contem-
porary history. The nineteenth cen-
tury is par excellence the century of
science. Vet science cannot by any
means be called a creation of the
nineteenth century, nor of any one
previous epoch. It represents a growth,
a development which in many re-
spects Inas reached its culmination a
generation or two ago. All preceding
generations had, however, been con-
stantly adding to the growth and de-
veloping and clearing the way for
final achievement. This process has
really been going on since man was
first able to reason about the universe,
sinner he was first able to observe ob-
jects and reach conclusions. The sci-
entific verities of the present are
based upon the partial truth of the
past. 't 'he demonstrable facts of to-
day are intimately bound up with the
distorted phenomena of bygone ages.
Here a little and there a little, every
race, every people, every nation had
been gathering and storing up knowl-
edge for recent science to classify
and to compute into heat,
energy and motion.
From this it can readily be seen
that the Jew who has lived in every
land, ,who has spoken the language
of every nation and read the liter-
ature of every country, must have
been well prepared to march in the
van of modern science. His vista was
ever wide and his scope was never
limited. As a linguist no one ever
approached [inn. Ile not only mas-
tered every existing language, but he
even created new ones IZainenhof's
"esperant 0") and was thereby able to
think with every people and to in-
terpret the thoughts of one people to
another. His services in the construc-
tion of modern science was therefore
of a twofold nature. He supplied the
material and helped in the building.
And as the structure of science con-
tinued to rise, he labored more and
more for its completion, until today
he occupies a place of honor among
the master builders.
If front these general statements we

turn to particular examples. we shall
hod Jew Ish achievement most pleas-
ant and prominent in every field ui
scientific endeavor. In botany there
are few men who have investigated
more thoroughly or experimented and
examined more successfully 0.111 Fer-
dinand Julius Cohn, whose inquires
led his pupil, Robert Koch, to the dis-
covery tit the tubercle bacillus. Asch-
erson, Pringsheim, Sachs, Sorauer,
Strashurger, and Wallich are other
Jewish botanists who have won wide-
spread fame.

thOritltive. So, It careful and consci-
entious labor, en the part int a pioneer
could not of course but inspire other
workers at a time when the scuince
had already aSsuined larger propor-
tions. As a result, scientists, like Ire
noted zoologist Herman LoeW and
Emil Silenka, have made biological
discoveries Who, Tar-reaching ;Ins
portance will be acknowledged and
appreciated be many generations to
curve.—'Ile hittl.h Ledger.

DAILY POGROMS ON
HUNGARIAN JEWS

No less is the achievement of Carl
Lieberman in chemistry, in which
field (neon ge Lunge, Heinrich Gustav
Itlagnus, Victor Meyer and Adolf
111'1I.NPEs'l
1 lode is hardly am
Pinner are also distinguished, while issue of a Ilung.oi.di lie n reap, r which
5lathias Liebreich, the director of the has not it, :la, ■■ 11111. it ■ 11,1t.
Berlin Pharmacological Institute, has k111011 the den, iisi ss le N“ of Hun-
been known the world over for his gary.
many and great discoveries. Note-
In Szegled a number of Jewish
worthy also are the geological works
homes were plundered and the chid
of Jews, as those of Thomas Davidson
surgeon, 1)r. Stephen Itinkor, was nttr-
and Emil Cohen. But of greater im-
dered. lye. Bokor served at the front
portance are the Jewish contribution , throughout the Whole war and
was
to our knowledge of physics. Here awarded time highest distinction for
the name of Heinrich Ilerz, illumined 'bravery.
by the light of his "clectro-magnetic
Dr. Edward Szektilsz, the president
waves," looms large before the stu-
of the Jewish Kehillah of Kecskennet,
dent's eyes. Franz Joseph l'isko, on
was kidnapped by the military. Vara
the other hand, wrote many works,
his friends in the local assembly at-
some of which are still used as text
tempted to learn of his wile ...thou!,
books in physics, and Peter l'heophil
They were thrown out by drunken
Riess, a close friend of Alexander von
army officers.
Humboldt, directed the electric cur-
The Keeskemet soldiery plundered
rent in masterly demonstration of
all the homes of the Jews of Abony
scientific principles. In this connec-
and in a most perverse manner mis-
tion it might also be recorded that
treated men, women and children. In-
the first telephone was constructed by
describable tortures, unknown even
a Jewish physicist, Philipp Reis, to to the demons of the Inquisition were
whose memory a beautiful monument applied to the victims. Many of the
.was erected 35 years ago, in Goln- Jews were crippled for life. .Among
these were the old physician of tine
hausen, the investor's birthplace.
1'ery significant, indeed, have also community. Hr. ttlartin Hien, one of
been Jewish contributions to the sci- the foremost ear specialists of Hun-
ence of political economy, in which gary, who used to serve the poor
David Ricardo occupies an exceed- without charge, and the First Lieuten•
ant Rudolph l'alstay-l'ollizer, who
ingly important position.
during the Communist regime had to
As physiologists, too. Jews have flee Irvin Hungary- and returned
often led, as may be seen from the when the new, "Christian" regime
celebrated works of Gabriel Gustav came into power.
alentire, Isidor Rosenthal, Julius
Bernstein, Ileidenhain, Munk, Her-
mann, and Schiff, besides those who
could be mentioned in connection
with medicine. But the most interest-
WARS.kW — Polish soldiers travel-
ing example of Jewish achievement is
to be found in the latest of the sci- ing through the city of Kinnov made
a
pogrom upon toe Jewish in-
ences—biology. As early as the mid-
dle of the eighteenth. century Markus habitants. As a result of which the
folowing
were victims: Alter Plan-
Eliezer Bloch wrote a work of 12
volumes on "Fish Life," which was tiniza and his two daughters, Hirsh
epoch-making and was at once trans- Anberstein (whose ear was cut off and
lated into other languages. That work a gold watch taken sway from him),
of Bloch's was for almost a hundred Leib Domenovitch, Frankel and
years the chief, if not the only, and Meyer Libert. !II these Jews were
most scientific work on the subject. robbed to a greater or smaller extent
and is even now often quoted as au- and severely beaten.

POGROM IN KUTNOV

REORGANIZATION SALE

4.1 if. oar

mar;

311ir 1'4)

This Sale Marks the Change
of Name and Reorganization
of This Business

This is both the announcement of a change, and the announce-
ment of an opportunity. Mr. Gray, who for so many years has
been associated with this business, has found it expedient to retire
from active participation, and from this time on, the store will
be known as The Hartman Furniture Co.

Na recognize thin( assuming the diree•
Wrath of such a store as The Gray Fur-
niture Co. has been carries with it may
personal obligations to the customers
who have been guests here so long, and
so this sale may be considered as our

Invitation to You, through the medium id
a substantial paving, to acquaint your
with this fact that the same fine
relationships, the same character of store
scoviee that has made the Gray Store
se- well known, will be continued.

Every Piece of Furniture in Our Entire Stock
Has Been Reduced 25% (No Exceptions)

Hand In hand with the announcements of tine change of name and reorganization
conies our n's discount sale which is going to bring a long waited for opportunity
to many Detroit homes. Nothing has been eqicepted in this sale and every piece of
•furniture for every room in the home, from tbe basement to the roof, has been in-
eluded and will be sold at 25'I 'nom the regular selling price. Little need to be said
about the quality of this furniture, . The people of Detroit, long familiar with the
character of furnitme (lisp/eyed at this store, will quick to grasp the significance of
a sale of this kind.

The Hartman Furniture Company Formerly the

Gray Furniture Comp'y

340-432 WOODWARD AVENUE

UPPER Woodward-Lower Prices

Back to Top

© 2025 Regents of the University of Michigan