Goethe and the Jews

The following is the third of a series of illuminating articles revealing Goethe’s lively interest in Jewry and things Yiddish, based upon excerpts from “Goethe and the Jews,” (G. P. Putman’s Sons, publishers), by Dr. Mark Waldman of the College of the City of New York. The author, who is a distinguished teacher, scholar and lecturer, has won high praise for his literary contributions and research on Goethe from Professor Carl F. Schreiber, head of the Germanic Department at Yale University and head of the Goethe Symposium, to which Professor Waldman’s contribution was adjudged outstanding.

The Bible largely shaped his life and accompanied him through life wittingly and unwittingly till his very last breath. He never failed to acknowledge the profound debt he owed to the Book. In speaking of the Bible he says that because it is so rich in content it gave occasion more than any other book to reflection over human affairs and could, therefore, be used as a basis for sermons and other religious matters. It was taken on faith that the Book of Books had been written in a single spirit, that it was inspired by the divine spirit and dictated, so to speak.

Nevertheless, the various contradictory parts had been partly criticized, partly defended by both believers and unbelievers long ago. Englishmen, Frenchmen and Germans had attacked the Bible with more or less vehemence, ingenuity, insolence and wantonness. On the other hand, it was defended by serious-minded people of all nations.

“As far as I am concerned,” he continues, “I lived and esteemed it: for almost to it alone I owed my moral education, and the events, the teachings, the symbols, the similes, everything had made on me a profound impression and had become effective in one way or another. I, therefore, disliked the unjust, railing, and distorted attacks; however, a point was reached at that time when as chief defense of many passages of the Bible the argument was advanced that God had adapted Himself to the manner of thinking and comprehension of the human beings, and the inspired men had, hence, been unable to disavow their character, their individuality. Amos as a cowherdsman, of course, does not use the lofty language of an Isaiah, who is supposed to have been a prince.”

It is interesting to note that the ancient Rabbis make a similar observation on Isaiah and Ezekiel. The former, they say, describes his vision of the throne of God and the angels like a city dweller, that is to say, is more refined, whereas the latter, like a villager, is crude and uncouth.

BIBLICAL INFLUENCE ON GOETHE STRONG

As a result of the controversies higher criticism developed, or as he calls it “historical – critical views,” to which the ever-increasing knowledge of languages largely contributed. Especially was it Michaelis who threw the power of his talents and his knowledge on this domain.

In consequence thereof the Bible was made more intelligible and more comprehensible; many objections were removed, many objectionable things eliminated, and every shallow cynicism silenced. Alongside of it there also developed a sort of exegesis. Some made the obscurest, most mysterious writings the object of their reflection and interpretation and though they did not clarify them they did, however, by their explanation affirm them.

Again and again Goethe reverts to the Bible which has exerted an incalculable influence on the world. “That great veneration which many races and peoples have bestowed upon the Bible is due to its inner worth. It is not merely a national book but a book of the nations, because it sets up the destinies of a nation as a symbol for all others, because it connects its history with the origin of the world and leads it through a gamut of terrestrial and spiritual developments, through a scale of indispensable and accidental events into the remotest regions of the uttermost eternities.”

SPINOZA EXERCIZED GOETHE

If Goethe never tired of acknowledging his profound indebtedness to the Book of Books, he never ceased to reiterate till the end of his days his deep gratitude to the “God-intoxicated Jew” Spinoza.

It seems that many human beings are born with a certain Weltanschauung. It ordinarily lies dormant in them till it is awakened by some extraneous cause or causes. If it receives no impetus from without, the man of ordinary intelligence will, on the whole, adopt a Weltanschauung foreign to his nature, merely dictated by environment, association, or both. Not so, however, a person of superior intellect. His Weltanschauung will crop up at all events and under all circumstances.

Before Goethe knew anything of Spinoza’s system of philosophy he was already conscious of a philosophy of life entertained and expressed by the latter. When a mere youth he was already dominated by pantheistic ideas. When only twenty he wrote in his diary—he had already discarded his faith in a personal God—the momentous words, so thoroughly Spinozostic:

“To act separate from God and nature is difficult and dangerous, for we recognize God only through nature. All that exists belongs of necessity to the nature of God, since God is the sole existence.” This idea is expressed in Spinoza’s Ethic I. Prop. 29. “In nature there is nothing contingent, but all things are determined from the necessity of the divine nature to exist and act in a certain manner.”

When Goethe wrote down his credo he had only known of Spinoza from a booklet and Bayle’s encyclopedia, in both of which Spinoza had been caricatured and reviled. In the summer of 1773, however, he tapped the Spinoza fount himself. Thenceforth, he became infected with an unbounded admiration for the man and his teaching. Spinoza became his master, teacher, and inspiration. His Ethic became Goethe’s breviary and companion. In time of travail and despair he took refuge in it from which he drew counsel, solace, and peace of mind.

ADMITS DEBT TO PHILOSOPHER

When Goethe met his friend Jacobi in 1774 they discussed vital matters which touched the innermost recesses of their very souls. Goethe, in speaking of this occasion, says: “Fortunately I had already worked on myself, if not trained myself, from this angle and had absorbed the life and mode of reasoning of an extraordinary man, to be sure, incompletely and almost furtively; but I nevertheless felt some notable effects. The spirit which had such a decisive effect on me and which was to have such a great influence on my entire way of thinking was Spinoza. After I had searched in vain in the whole world for a medium of training of my singular being I finally came upon the Ethic of this man. What I may have read out of this work, what I may have read into it, I could not tell now; enough, I found here tranquillization of my passions; a large and wide vista seemed to open up before me on the sensuous and moral world. What attached me to him especially was his boundless unselfishness which shone forth from every sentence. That singular maxim: ‘Whoever loves God rightly, must not demand that God love him in return,’ with all the premises upon which it is based, with all the corollaries which ensue, filled my entire thought. To be unselfish in everything, to be most unselfish in love and friendship constituted my greatest joy, my principles, my practice, so that that impertinent later axiom ‘If I love thee, what does it concern thee?’ was just spoken out of my heart. Moreover, it should be noted that the closest combinations only result from opposites. The tranquility of Spinoza, balancing everything, contrasted with my aspirations, agitating everything; his mathematical method was the counterpart of my poetic disposition and presentation, and just that regulated mode of treatment which was not considered adaptable to moral matters, made me his passionate disciple, his most decided admirer. Mind and heart, reason and disposition sought one another with inevitable elective affinity, and by it was brought about a union of the diversest beings.”

To Be Continued