By now the reader knows of my partiality to the cultural authenticity of the “ultra-observant” religious Jews and of my admiration for the uncompromising Talmudic minds of some brilliant Jewish thinkers. So that there is no misunderstanding about it, my sympathies are not limited to dissimilationists and loners. I understand and respect sincere assimilationists, and I have a very positive view of the Haskala, Jewish Enlightenment. I see nothing wrong in that kind of cultural symbiosis, when certain positive elements of the host culture have been accepted without sacrificing the core of one’s native culture. Mind you, both the liberal champions of the Haskala, the Maskilim, and the conservative Haredim, were always reasonable in their respective social demands. Neither of them was a cultural aggressor, a destroyer of other cultures, a proselytizer, a promoter of some pernicious alternative ideology such as the radical “communism” of the nineteenth/twentieth centuries or Globalism and neo-conservatism of the more recent times.
We have already talked at some length about the Haredim. Now it’s the turn of the Maskilim. "Nathan der Weise," aka Moses Mendelssohn, the subject of this entry, was undoubtedly the epitome of this last kind. In fact, he can be called the father and the leading representative of the Haskala in Germany, and in Europe in general.
…Abraham Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, one of the richest bankers in Hamburg, and a Lutheran by creed, had a good sense of humor, which was by no means of the self-deprecating variety, as it was unquestionably true, and even quite flattering to himself, when he was proudly “complaining”: “I used to be the son of my father, and now I am the father of my son.”
The son he was speaking of, was the illustrious composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. The father was none other than Moses Mendelssohn: philosopher, critic, and Biblical translator and interpreter, known to his admiring contemporaries as “the German Socrates” (some say, it was “Jewish Socrates”), or “the Modern Plato” (some say, it was “Berlin Plato”; but, in both these cases, who cares about such little trifles? Perhaps, this discrepancy of the multiple appellations existed in his time already), and, of course, as the prototype of Lessing’s famous novel Nathan Der Weise.
As a literary critic, Mendelssohn received high acclaim for his writings on Homer, Aesop, Pope, Rousseau, and Burke, among others. His Biblical work was of a far more unusual kind. He first translated the Psalms, and then the Pentateuch (in this case, it would probably be a mistake to call it the Torah) into German, but using Hebrew characters (!), this, for the benefit of the Jewish readers who spoke German, but were literate primarily in the Hebrew script, used both in Hebrew and in Yiddish.
Returning to Moses Mendelssohn’s prominence as a philosopher, any of his above-mentioned soubriquets, that is, either as a Socrates or a Plato, had it been a fair estimate of his philosophical potential, would have earned him a place in Britannica’s Macropaedia (after all, all major philosophers are there, as is an entry secured by his friend Lessing, as are also a number of entries on other Jewish philosophers, including even the far less known Franz Rosenzweig, who will be the subject of a later entry in this section). Not only is such an entry for Moses Mendelssohn non-existent there, but he is, likewise, prominently absent from the Time Almanac’s People list (the only Mendelssohn there, is his grandson Felix).
As a philosopher, he was unmistakably derivative, having benefited mostly from Spinoza (recently discovered for the world by Goethe and Lessing) and Leibniz, and, to some extent, from Christian Wolff and Alexander Baumgarten. He also studied the works of John Locke and Plato, and although he is frequently considered a Platonist, this is more on account of form (see my comment on his “Phaedon” below) than of the substance. In his general writings on philosophy, I repeat, he is not original. To me, however, he is original enough, as the trailblazing exponent of the philosophy of the Jewish Haskala.
It is obvious that his great fame among contemporaries rests on his extraordinary Renaissance upbringing, his encyclopedic erudition and literary skill (in 1763 he won the prize of the Prussian Academy of Arts for his essay On Evidence in Metaphysical Sciences, where his argument that metaphysics pursues its subject matter by applying the same method with mathematics, conceptual analysis, is certainly derivative from at least Spinoza’s Ethica. But he puts this quite elegantly: “The analysis of concepts is for the understanding nothing more than what the magnifying glass is for sight”), and perhaps, to a much greater extent, on his far-reaching leading role in the Haskala movement, and on his lasting intellectual legacy in Germany and across Europe. Leading a commendable lifelong effort to elicit an understanding between the Jews and the Christians, he actually succeeded in winning over quite a few Christians to the defense of Judenthum, and, not altogether ironically, may have played some indirect role in his own son Abraham’s conversion to Christianity.
His overall accomplishments are eminently impressive. A prodigy linguist, he learned classical Hebrew as a child, and later taught himself Greek, French, English, Italian, and Latin (these of course in addition to German). The resulting conversational versatility, coupled with a sharp mind, helped to assure the success of his philosophical Morning Lectures given by him for the benefit of his son Joseph in their Berlin home, and in 1785, attended by the celebrated brothers von Humboldt, Wilhelm and Alexander, who were both greatly influenced by Mendelssohn’s personality.
He was a scholar of the Torah, upon which he based his belief in Judaism. As a young boy, he was reading Maimonides’s Guide for the Perplexed, and later Leibniz’s Theodicy. He read Homer and Plato, translated the first three books of Plato’s Politeia into German, and wrote several of his philosophical treatises in the Platonic dialogue form. His famous work, Phaedon, or On the Immortality of the Soul (1767), used Plato’s Phaedon as its base. It brought him particular fame as a philosopher. He studied, and loved to recite, the works of Shakespeare. He was fascinated with the progress of the American Revolution and took a keen interest in the emergence of the United States of America…
Mendelssohn was a passionate lover of music all his life. He studied piano with Johann Philip Kirnberger, one of Johann Sebastian Bach’s disciples. His work on Bach led, in 1761, to his anonymous publication of a treatise on the best method of constructing a well-tempered piano. He included a treatise on the divine art of music in his philosophical essay On the Sentiments.
Mendelssohn's protégé and close collaborator was the silk manufacturer David Friedlander, whose brother-in-law was the rich banker Isaac Daniel Itzig. Itzig, Mendelssohn, and Friedlander founded the Berlin Free School, aimed at educating boys from poor Jewish families who could not afford to hire tutors: the only way to secure a secular education in the Jewish community. (The school developed such a reputation, that even Christian children soon began attending.)
Mendelssohn and Itzig were the direct descendants of the famous scholar, Rabbi Moses Isserles of Krakow (1520-1572), which must undoubtedly have contributed to Mendelssohn’s stature: “good” genealogy never hurts. Incidentally, the two became even closer related via the marriage of their respective progenies, when Lea Itzig Solomon, Isaac’s niece, married Mendelssohn’s son Abraham. Their son was the composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.
(To be continued…)
We have already talked at some length about the Haredim. Now it’s the turn of the Maskilim. "Nathan der Weise," aka Moses Mendelssohn, the subject of this entry, was undoubtedly the epitome of this last kind. In fact, he can be called the father and the leading representative of the Haskala in Germany, and in Europe in general.
…Abraham Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, one of the richest bankers in Hamburg, and a Lutheran by creed, had a good sense of humor, which was by no means of the self-deprecating variety, as it was unquestionably true, and even quite flattering to himself, when he was proudly “complaining”: “I used to be the son of my father, and now I am the father of my son.”
The son he was speaking of, was the illustrious composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy. The father was none other than Moses Mendelssohn: philosopher, critic, and Biblical translator and interpreter, known to his admiring contemporaries as “the German Socrates” (some say, it was “Jewish Socrates”), or “the Modern Plato” (some say, it was “Berlin Plato”; but, in both these cases, who cares about such little trifles? Perhaps, this discrepancy of the multiple appellations existed in his time already), and, of course, as the prototype of Lessing’s famous novel Nathan Der Weise.
As a literary critic, Mendelssohn received high acclaim for his writings on Homer, Aesop, Pope, Rousseau, and Burke, among others. His Biblical work was of a far more unusual kind. He first translated the Psalms, and then the Pentateuch (in this case, it would probably be a mistake to call it the Torah) into German, but using Hebrew characters (!), this, for the benefit of the Jewish readers who spoke German, but were literate primarily in the Hebrew script, used both in Hebrew and in Yiddish.
Returning to Moses Mendelssohn’s prominence as a philosopher, any of his above-mentioned soubriquets, that is, either as a Socrates or a Plato, had it been a fair estimate of his philosophical potential, would have earned him a place in Britannica’s Macropaedia (after all, all major philosophers are there, as is an entry secured by his friend Lessing, as are also a number of entries on other Jewish philosophers, including even the far less known Franz Rosenzweig, who will be the subject of a later entry in this section). Not only is such an entry for Moses Mendelssohn non-existent there, but he is, likewise, prominently absent from the Time Almanac’s People list (the only Mendelssohn there, is his grandson Felix).
As a philosopher, he was unmistakably derivative, having benefited mostly from Spinoza (recently discovered for the world by Goethe and Lessing) and Leibniz, and, to some extent, from Christian Wolff and Alexander Baumgarten. He also studied the works of John Locke and Plato, and although he is frequently considered a Platonist, this is more on account of form (see my comment on his “Phaedon” below) than of the substance. In his general writings on philosophy, I repeat, he is not original. To me, however, he is original enough, as the trailblazing exponent of the philosophy of the Jewish Haskala.
It is obvious that his great fame among contemporaries rests on his extraordinary Renaissance upbringing, his encyclopedic erudition and literary skill (in 1763 he won the prize of the Prussian Academy of Arts for his essay On Evidence in Metaphysical Sciences, where his argument that metaphysics pursues its subject matter by applying the same method with mathematics, conceptual analysis, is certainly derivative from at least Spinoza’s Ethica. But he puts this quite elegantly: “The analysis of concepts is for the understanding nothing more than what the magnifying glass is for sight”), and perhaps, to a much greater extent, on his far-reaching leading role in the Haskala movement, and on his lasting intellectual legacy in Germany and across Europe. Leading a commendable lifelong effort to elicit an understanding between the Jews and the Christians, he actually succeeded in winning over quite a few Christians to the defense of Judenthum, and, not altogether ironically, may have played some indirect role in his own son Abraham’s conversion to Christianity.
His overall accomplishments are eminently impressive. A prodigy linguist, he learned classical Hebrew as a child, and later taught himself Greek, French, English, Italian, and Latin (these of course in addition to German). The resulting conversational versatility, coupled with a sharp mind, helped to assure the success of his philosophical Morning Lectures given by him for the benefit of his son Joseph in their Berlin home, and in 1785, attended by the celebrated brothers von Humboldt, Wilhelm and Alexander, who were both greatly influenced by Mendelssohn’s personality.
He was a scholar of the Torah, upon which he based his belief in Judaism. As a young boy, he was reading Maimonides’s Guide for the Perplexed, and later Leibniz’s Theodicy. He read Homer and Plato, translated the first three books of Plato’s Politeia into German, and wrote several of his philosophical treatises in the Platonic dialogue form. His famous work, Phaedon, or On the Immortality of the Soul (1767), used Plato’s Phaedon as its base. It brought him particular fame as a philosopher. He studied, and loved to recite, the works of Shakespeare. He was fascinated with the progress of the American Revolution and took a keen interest in the emergence of the United States of America…
Mendelssohn was a passionate lover of music all his life. He studied piano with Johann Philip Kirnberger, one of Johann Sebastian Bach’s disciples. His work on Bach led, in 1761, to his anonymous publication of a treatise on the best method of constructing a well-tempered piano. He included a treatise on the divine art of music in his philosophical essay On the Sentiments.
Mendelssohn's protégé and close collaborator was the silk manufacturer David Friedlander, whose brother-in-law was the rich banker Isaac Daniel Itzig. Itzig, Mendelssohn, and Friedlander founded the Berlin Free School, aimed at educating boys from poor Jewish families who could not afford to hire tutors: the only way to secure a secular education in the Jewish community. (The school developed such a reputation, that even Christian children soon began attending.)
Mendelssohn and Itzig were the direct descendants of the famous scholar, Rabbi Moses Isserles of Krakow (1520-1572), which must undoubtedly have contributed to Mendelssohn’s stature: “good” genealogy never hurts. Incidentally, the two became even closer related via the marriage of their respective progenies, when Lea Itzig Solomon, Isaac’s niece, married Mendelssohn’s son Abraham. Their son was the composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy.
(To be continued…)
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