Purely Commentary

Theological Attitudes of Theodor Herzl, Ben-Gurion,

Kallen . . Contemporary Lutherans Seek to Correct
Founder's Grave Error . . . Enigma of Commitment

God-Idea as Defined by Theodor Herzl, Ben-Gurion, Fallen, Reconstructionist
Analyst • • • A Chapter in History Culled from the Historic Herzl Diaries

Permitting ourselves the luxury of departing
from an established policy of avoiding theological
discussions, let us devote a bit of space to the
God-idea.
We do this because of a book that has just
appeared from Reconstructionist Press.
Reconstructionist spokesmen, like representa-
tives of other Jewish religious factions, are con-
cerned that our young should not be skeptical, that
they should not turn into unbelievers. that when
they speak about God they should have the proper
approach to Divinity and Faith.
It is understandable, therefore, why Recon-
structionist Press should place emphasis on one
of its new books, "When Children Ask About God,"
authored by Rabbi Harold N. Kushner of Natick,
Mass.
Rabbi Kushner takes into account many ques-
tons usually posed by the young and he undertakes
to give the answers. It is interesting to know that
while the text is intended to provide explanations
for youths 4 to 14, the book was written for adults.
So—the rabbis are turning to parents with a text-
book to provide them with an answer to questions
with which their children puzzle them.
The major quality in Rabbi Kushner's book
is that it acknowledges shortcomings in the search
for proper approaches. It rejects emphasis on fear
and guilt, states that ''there is something wrong
with a religion or concept of God which fosters
unrealistic expectations of the world. It asserts
that "if God is not a person or a thing"—a basis
that is emphasized in the author's handling the
problem—then the reader is led to this definition:
"God is something like a Force, a Power, a
Process, a quality of relationship. God is the name
we attach to the fact that we find certain things
possible and meaningful in the world and in our
lives and the fact that we find ourselves stirred
to move in the direction of realizing these possi-
bilities. We call God the force behind our growing
and learning, our curiosity to discover and our
impulse to share and to help."
Rabbi Kushner especially emphasizes the need to
affirm, in answering a child's question. "the exist-
ence of Right and 11'rong . . . without leading the
youngster to believe too literally in a 'Father in
Hectl7eir who advises. supervises, rewards and pun-
ishes. the way earthly parents do. There can be
Right, without an enforcer of Right . . . "
And a chapter Rabbi Kushner calls the most
important in his book is entitled "Don't Blame God
for 'Acts of God: " Here he admonishes against
encouraging belief in a punishing god. God doesn't.
punish. Rabbi Kushner emphasizes: "Some people
suffer as a direct result of their actions. but natural
laws operate without making moral judgments. What
God does is to provide resources of strength and
faith for the victims of misfortune and resources
of cempassion for those around them, so that
together they can go on living and building a life
in spite of what happened."
How effective is this type of book? Is it con-
vincing? Does it attain its purpose?
Einstein,,ii3en-Gurion, many leading Jews ‘vho
have not been synagogue goers or strict observers
have made comment on the God-idea. Our readers
will recall our correspondence with David Ben-
Gurion. We asked him to comment on his having
been quoted by the Israel Hebrew daily Yediot
Ahronot regarding his belief in an existing God.
His letter to us read:
"What the Israel evening paper published at any
84th birthday is true: I have not the slightest shadow
of doubt that God exists. He is not a body and He is
free from all the accidents of matter. We can neither
see Hinz nor hear Him. He has no likeness but He
exists . and without Him nothing can exist in the uni-
verse. This is a profound and correct belief and no
science can speak a greater truth than it.
"This is conviction."
We are especially intrigued by a definition that
appears in the diaries of Theodor Herzl.
Under the date of Aug. 18, 1895, written in
Munich, Herzl referred to his having met, at lunch-
eon, at the Jewish Jochsberger's Restaurant, with
Vienna's Chief Rabbi (Moritz) Guedemann (1835-
1918). Herzl states he felt "very much at home" in
that restaurant. Then he described how the subject
of theology came up and we quote this from Herzl's
diaries:
"The proprietor (of Jochsberger's Restaurant)
knew Guedemann and set us up in a separate room.
Later on he discovered, with Jewish acumen, that
we were conferring about the Jewish cause, and saw
to it that we remained undisturbed. This is the sort
of human material we possess in our people. They
divine what one would have to hammer into other
people's heads. They carry it out with intelligence
and devotion.
"At table the subject came up quite naturally.
Guedemann had already won his way to my heart
during the forenoon. More and more I found in him

2—Friday. August 13, 1971

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

a fine, open-minded• splendid lin Man being. Naturolly,
our conversation hod a theological and philosophical
flavor. I incidentally mentioned my views on the
Deity. I want to bring up my children with a belief
in what might be called the historical God. To 'me,
God is a beautiful, dear old word which I want to
retain. It is a wonderful abbreviation for concep-
tions that might be beyond the grasp of a childlike
or limited intellect. By 'God' I understand the Will
to Good ! The omnipresent, infinite, omnipotent,
eternal Will to Good, which does not immediately
prevail everywhere but is always victorious in the
end. For which Evil, too. is but a means. How and
why, for example. does the Will to Good permit
epidemics to exist? Because epidemics cause musty
old cities to be torn down and new. bright. healthful
cities to come into being. with inhabitants who draw
a freer breath.
"Thus. anti-Semitis»z, too, probably contains the
divine 1Vill to Good, because it forces us to close
ranks, unites us through pressure, and through our
unity will make us free.
"My conception of God, is. after all. Spinozistic
and also resembles the natural philosophy of the
Monists. But I think of Spinoza's 'substance' as
something inert. so to speak, and that incompre-
hensible universal ether of the Monists seems too
intangible and too vague to me. But I cant conceive
of an omnipresent will, for I see it at work in the
physical world. I see it as I can see the functioning
of a muscle. The world is the body and God is the
functioning of it. The ultimate purpose I do not
and need not know: for me it is enough that it is
something higher than our present condition. This
I can again express .with old words, and I gladly do
so. Eritis sicut dei, scientes bonum et - maluin —
(Ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.)"

It is worth appending here an additional note
of historical value in relation to Chief Rabbi
Guedemann, as he is recorded in the Herzl Diaries.
Guedemann was an avowed anti-Zionist, although
Herzl believed that he had won him over to his
cause. Guedemann's view was that Zionism had
not emphasized the religious element in Jewish
national redemption. He was among the Reform
rabbis who did not approve of the elimination of
all references to Zion from Jewish prayers. But
he had not supported Herzl.
But when Herzl met with Guedemann, in
Munich, on the recorded date of Aug. 18, 1895, his
diaries state that "Guedemann, the 'anti-Zionist,'
was already won over." Guedemann had said to
him: "If you are right, all my views up to now
fall to pieces." That night they met again and
Guedemann made a comment Herzl long remem-
bered. He said to the Zionist leader: "You remind
me of Moses."
When they parted Guedemann said to Herzl:
"Remain as you are ! Perhaps you are the one
called of God." It had been said that Herzl acquired
Messianic aspirations. Did Guedemann contribute
to it with this remark?
And so, Herzl believed he had converted
Guedemann. Yet, historically, Guedemann is listed
among the anti-Zionist rabbis.
On that August day in Munich, Herzl had gone
to the synagogue where he was originally to have
met Guedemann. Herzl makes this reference to
the synagogue visit in his diaries:
"The services were over when I arrived
Guedemann showed me the interior of the beau-
tiful synagogue. The shames (beadle) or shabbes
goy, an elderly man in blue military tunic, tall
and of shriveling corpulence, bore a great re-
semblance to Bismarck. It was a curious touch
to have a Bismarck figure walking behind us
with the keys, while the rabbi was showing me
through the temple. The goy (gentile) did not
know that he looked like Bismarck; the rabbi
had no idea that he was doing something sym-
bolic in showing me the beauty of a temple.
I alone was aware of these and other things.
"I said nothing that morning concerning,
the project itself. For the most part I let Gue-
demann do the talking: he did not dream that
he would call me 'Moses' before the day was
over."

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Prof. Horace M. Kaller, the venerable 88-year-
old secularist, has interesting things to say about
beliefs, godliness, sanctity, the religious spirit
among many faiths. In his "Essays for the Modern
World" published by Horizon Press under the title
"What I Believe and Why—Maybe," he has a chap-
ter on "This Is My Faith," and therein he asserts:
"If 'religion' signifies what I perceive it to
signify, then to strip 'the Judaeo-Christian religions'
and structural factors' would be to denature them."
Here we have a view of a man reared in Jewish
Orthodoxy who has turned secularist. Neverthe-
less, there is a faith within him that he expresses
in the assertion:
"Religious pluralism is the sine qua non of inter-

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By Philip

SIOMOVitZ

Atonement for . Luther's s nti.-Semitism

At last, there is atonement for the anti-Semitism of Martin Luther.
If there was a single outstanding contributing factor to the cause
for the emergence of Hitlerism, it was the anti-Semitism of the man
who revolted against Catholicism to create his own creed of worshipers.
The great. Jewish historian, Heinrich Graetz, wrote about Martin
Luther: "He poisoned the Protestant world for a long time to come,
with his Jew-baiting testament. Protestants became even more bitter
against the Jews than Catholics had been. It was reserved to him to
place Jews on a level with gypsies."
Here are samples of the preachments of Martin Luther, quoted
from his two pamphlets "About the Jews and Their Lies" and "Shem-
/
Hamphoras" ( 1542-3), which established a foundation for an increased
German anti-Semitism under Adolf Hitler:
"Burn down their synagogues, take away their books includ-
ing their Bible. They should be condemned to forced labor. Food
and shelter should be denied to them. It would be best to banish
them altogether. If they dare pronounce the name of God, de
nounee them to the authorities or pelt them with sow dung!"—,
"Moses already said, Don't suffer an idolater; were he alive he,
would be the first to burn their temples down. May they follow
him and return to Canaan."—"I would rather be a pig than a
Jewish Messiah, for a pig is not afraid of the evil and his hellfire."
"What shall we Christians do with this depraved infamous
people, the Jews? I offer this for your good counsel:
"1. that their synagogues or schools should be burned by fire;
"2. that their houses and dwelling places, too, be broken up
and destroyed, for the evil they commit in their schools they
perpetrate at their homes also;
"3. that we take away their prayerbooks and their Talmud
which teaches them all their idolatry, their lies, sacrilegious
wickedness and blasphemy;
"4. that their rabbis are forbidden, on pain of death, to teach
forthwith;
"5. that Jews are refused the right of way and the use of
our streets;
"6. that they must not be usurers, and that all their riches
—money, gold, silver or jewelry—be taken from them;
"7. that tools are given to all young and healthy Jews and
Jewesses, such as hatchet, pickaxe, spade, spindle and distaff,
and that they have to earn their living, and in the sweat of their
long noses shall they eat their bread . . .
"If, however, you are afraid lest they could harm us even
when working for, and serving us . . . then let us settle accounts
with them by taking back what they have taken from us through
usury, and have them expelled from the country for good!"
Could Hitler have done better? He could not have even improved
upon it: it served as a platform for hatred and barbarism.
We quote it at length in the interest of an understanding of a
position that developed out of venom that poisons the bigoted mind.
But Luther was not always thus disposed. There was a time, when
he first manipulated his attacks on the Catholic Church, when he
had hoped that Jews would join his movement, that they would "see
the light" and be his followers.
In those early years of rational liberalism he had written:
"The papists have so demeaned themselves that a good Chris-
tian would rather be a Jew than one of them; and a Jew would
rather be a sow than a Christian."—"What good will it do when
we constrain them (the Jews), malign them and hate theth_
dogs? When we deny them work and force them to usury—hOW - ,.
can that help? We ought to use toward them, not the .Pop --4: ,
but Christ's law of love. If some are stiff-necked, -what doesjt '-
matter? Not all of us are good Christians"
Now, after 400 years, we have an atonement. The Lutheran
Forum published in New York even suggests editorially that
payment of reparations would be a sign of our firm intention.J-t'!:r i., ,
repudiate Luther's views as expressed in "About the Jews. and
Lies."
The Lutheran Forum charged that the Luther pamphlet is "170
pages of non-stop anti-Semitism." Its editorial declared:
"If there is not a direct line from Luther to Hitler, there is
at least a parallel line between Christian and secular anti-Semit;
ism, so that one has helped to support the other.
"We can only cry out to the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob
—and to our fellow worshipers of that God, our Jewish brethren
—for forgiveness."
The Lutheran Forum suggested that the publishers of Luther's
works (Fortress Press, Philadelphia, and Concordia Publishing House,
St. Louis) turn over funds realized from the sale of the volumes "to
Jewish organizations as a token of reparation for the harm done 15Y: —
anti-Semitism among Lutherans."
Thus, from time to time, we have a demonstration of justice
which crosses all religious lines. The Lutheran Forum has contributed
immensely toward correcting a great wrong shown our people.

The Over Commitment Myth

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Before .there can be over-commitment there must be commit-
ment. When, therefore, we are confronted by a warning of too much
concern over Israel in American Jewry, we must take into considera-
tion all the valid factors in the role American Jewry plays on the
international scene.
We do play a role politically, and if we did not we would right.
fully be branded as cowards. As a matter of fact, we often think of,
the unconcern of our Christian neighbors as being a betrayal of a
trust to human beings who are in danger in the Middle East where
Arabs ,Continue, to think , in terms of annihilating their neighbor Israel.
On the - -American scene: there is the constant admonishment to
Jews' to be committed, and especially plead with our youth to be in-. _
volved with Jewry • and Israel: Where does the over-commitment fit in?
It is enigmatic., and an exaggeriation.

religious peace, even as cultural
and national pluralism underlies
intercultural a n d international
peace. For peace can be had only
in a union of the different wherein
all covenant equal freedocn and

security to each."
Herzl's definition of God, the
Messianic aspect, the respect of
great men for faith and theological
aspects, are worth taking into con-

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a .4°n.

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