in the course of the long controversy between jewish nationalists and opponents of jewish nationalism many have come to believe that those who oppose nationalism stand for universal judaism, especially since the anti-nationalists call themselves jewish universalists. after the publication of the declaration of the british government with regard to palestine the main anti-nationalistic spokesman in america, dr. philipson of cincinnati, summed up his negative attitude to zionism with the short sentence, "i stand by my jewish universalism." one even hears people from the radical camp of the left proclaiming their jewish universalism. the impression has thus been created that while the nationalists stand for a petty, provincial conception of judaism, they, the anti-nationalists, advocate a broad-minded universalism.
we deem it opportune to examine this jewish universalism, which is played up today against the nationalistic efforts of our people to re-establish a homeland in palestine and to see how far it is sincere in its motives and compatible with jewish tradition, and how far it is intellectual camouflage. we think it rather curious that those who claim to be jewish universalists—the radical reform rabbis and assimilationists from other camps—always lay stress on american, german, french or english judaism, and often speak of the american jewish church or the english jewish church, and so forth. it is also remarkable that these jewish universalists have always worked for a "readjustment" of judaism to local conditions and have tried to americanize judaism in america, to germanize it in germany, to anglicize it in england, to magyarize it in hungary, and so forth.
on the other hand, those who were considered as standing for a petty, provincial conception of judaism, the nationalists, have not only never tried to do anything of the sort but have always defended the interritoriality and catholicity of judaism. one never hears a jewish nationalist here or abroad speaking of an american jewish church or an english jewish church, and so forth. it seems to us that in view of these facts the sort of universal judaism as proclaimed by the assimilationists is of rather doubtful origin and character and that it is everything but universal, for it is territorial and provincial to the core. as a matter of fact, reform judaism as established by the reform rabbis in the middle of the nineteenth century, and developed by american rabbis at the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth, is the first gigantic attempt to break the catholicism of judaism and to territorialize it, that is to say, to annihilate its organic unity. reform judaism is in fact nothing else but territorialism in religious terms, just as yiddishism is a territorialism in linguistic terms. those who divide judaism geographically and claim that each part has little or nothing to do with the other, and that each part is organically connected only with its surroundings, that there is such a thing as american judaism, english judaism, german judaism, french judaism, and so on, stand for the same policy as do the yiddishists, who divide the jewish people into ten or fifteen separate groups, claiming that every group is a unit by itself and has nothing to do with the others. according to yiddishists the ladino-speaking jew has scarcely anything in common with the judeo-german-speaking jew, just as the arabic or greek-speaking jews have little or nothing in common with the ladino or yiddish-speaking jews. some express their jewish territorialism and provincialism in terms of religion, the others in terms of language. both are opponents of jewish unity and jewish catholicism, both are opposed to traditional judaism, both are opposed to jewish nationalism that is organically connected with hebrew, and both are, of course, opposed to a hebrew palestine.
why these people, who, as we have seen, stand for territorialistic judaism instead of universal, should call themselves jewish universalists, we are at a loss to understand. the fact that their notion of god is as colorless and pale as that of the unitarians, and the fact that their conception of ethics, especially of jewish ethics, is as bloodless and vague as that of the rationalists of the eighteenth century, gives them scarcely any right to call themselves jewish universalists and to assert that they stand for universal judaism. our only consolation is that this sort of territorialistic judaism that goes under the false mark of universal judaism is not the invention of the reform rabbis, nor that of the yiddishists, but is as old as judaism itself. all who have carefully paged the history of our people know that there always was a jewish minority from time immemorial that stood for a territorialistic judaism, and if there is any difference in principle between the judeans and israelites this difference consists in that the judeans always stood for universal judaism, while the israelites stood for a territorialistic judaism. the judeans were what the nationalists are today—traditional, conservative and nationalistic, while the israelites were reformers, assimilationists and territorialists. the judeans advocated a palestinian and hebrew judaism, while the israelites always opposed it and were satisfied even with the temple outside of palestine.
the first radical reformer, assimilationist and territorialist was not abraham geiger, but jeroboam ben nebat. the judeans, advocating a palestinian and hebrew judaism, produced the true, great prophets, the prophets of truth and justice, while the israelites produced the false prophets, who misled the people and displayed religious and moral camouflage. the notion of a universal god, of a universal morality and of the brotherhood of man, the fundamental teachings of jewish universalism, have not been created by the prophets of the israelites, the false universalists, but by the prophets of judea, the nationalistic prophets. these great nationalistic prophets, who alone made judaism that tremendous force in history and who, by their genius, secured immortality for our religion and ethics, must turn in their grave when they hear the false prophets of today claiming them as their witnesses. the teachings of our great prophets have been distorted and falsified by many of our enemies and opponents, but none has falsified and distorted them more than the representatives of the so-called universal judaism of today, because our great prophets, who were at the same time great jewish statesmen, taught the doctrine of the indestructible jewish nation and the immortality of our people as a people, and they were so extreme in their nationalism and nationalistic conception of judaism that they dreamt of the jewish nation to be the glory of all the peoples of the earth and the center of all that is good and great and beautiful in humanity.
we doubt whether there are many jewish nationalists today whose nationalistic feelings run as high as did those of our great prophets whom jewish universalists claim as their chief witnesses for their falsified judaism. it was the great hebrew prophets of old who first fought against territorializing judaism and who fought against the attempt to yiddishize it in one form or another. they all stood for the pure, traditional, palestinian and hebrew judaism. they were bitter against ephraim, because ephraim stood for what the israelites stand for today: "ubi bene, ibi patria"—where i do well there is my fatherland.
that the judeans and not the israelites were right in their conception of judaism can be seen from the fate of both. israel disappeared, swept away by the storm of history, while judea remained. it is only a pity that all of the israelites did not disappear also for, if they did, we would have no israelites today in our midst, and god knows that the israelites of today are unnecessary jews and that those who claim a mission for israel have no mission at all. the jewish universalism advocated today by all those who stand for the disintegration and deterioration of judaism is not universalism, and if its advocates are anything, they are jewish nihilists, because judaism is nihil to them—no people, no race, no nation, no religion, no tradition, but——
