The Jews and Modern Capitalism (part II)

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The Jews and Modern Capitalism
Die Juden un das Wirtschaftsleben

by Werner Sombart
translated by M. Epstein

Part II - The Aptitude of the Jews of Modern Capitalism

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Chapter 8
The Problem

Before us lies a great problem. We are to explain why the Jews played just the part they did in the economic life of the last two or three centuries. That this is a problem will be admitted with but few exceptions by all. There are a few faddists who deny that the Jews occupied any special position in modern economic life, asserting as they do that there are no Jews. These will object. Then, too, there is that other small category of people who hold that the Jews were economically of such slight import that they were without any influence whatever on modern economic life. But we shall pay little heed to either class in our considerations, which are for all those who think with me that the Jews had a decisive influence on the structure of modern economic life.

I have spoken of the aptitude of the Jews for modern capitalism. If our researches are to be fruitful of results we shall have to make two things absolutely clear: (1) their aptitude -- for what? and (2) their aptitude -- how developed?

Their aptitude for what? For everything which in the first part of the book we have seen them striving to achieve -- founding and promoting international trade, modern finance, the Stock Exchange and the commercialization generally of all economic activities; supporting unrestricted intercourse and free competition, and infusing the modern spirit into all economic life. Now in my superscription of this part of our subject all these activities are summed up in the word "capitalism." In a special chapter (the ninth) we shall show that all the single facts that have been mentioned hang together, and that they are kept together by means of capitalistic organization. The essentials of the latter, at least in their outline, will therefore also have to be dealt with, in order to demonstrate the special functions of the individual in the capitalistic system. This method will give the death-blow to such vague conceptions, usually met with in connexion with the Jewish problem, as "economic capacity," "aptitude for commerce and haggling" or other equally dilettante phrases, which have already done too much mischief.

As for the second point, how, by what means, is it possible to achieve any result? If any one rescues a drowning man, it may be that it was because he happened to be standing at the water’s edge, just where a boat was tied, or on a bridge, where a life-belt was ready to hand. In a word, his accidental presence in a particular spot made it possible for him to do the deed, by rowing out in the boat to the man in danger, or by throwing the life-belt to him. Or he may have done it because he was the only one among the crowd on the shore who had the courage to jump into the water, swim out to the sinking man and bring him safely to land. In the first case we might term the circumstances "objective," in the second "subjective." The same distinction can be applied to the Jews in considering their aptitude for capitalism: it may be due to objective or to subjective circumstances.

My immediate business will be to deal with the first set of causes, and for many reasons. To begin with, every explanation that is put forward must be closely scrutinized, in order to make sure that no unproved hypothesis is its basis, and that what has to be proved is not a dogma. Dangerous in most cases, it is particularly so in the problem before us, in which racial and religious prejudices may work havoc, as, indeed, they have done in the writings of the great majority of my precursors on this question. I shall do my utmost to avoid their error in this respect, and shall be at great pains to see to it that my considerations are above criticism. My aim is to discover the play of cause and effect as it really was, without any preconceived idea influencing my reasoning, and I shall adduce my proofs in such a way, that they may be easily followed by all -- by the assimilationist Jew no less than by the Nationalist; by him who pins his faith to the influence of race as by the warmest supporter of the doctrine of environment; by the anti-Semite as by his opponent. Hence my starting-point will always have to be from facts admitted on all hands. That will preclude any appeal to "special race characteristics" or arguments of that ilk.

Any one who does not admit that the Jews have special gifts may demand that the part played by this people in modern economic life should be explained without any reference to national peculiarities, but rather from the external circumstances in which Jews were placed by the accident of history. I shall endeavour to satisfy this demand in the tenth chapter.

Finally, if it becomes apparent that the contribution of the Jews to modern economic life cannot be entirely explained by the conditions of their historic situation, then will be the time for looking to subjective causes, and for considering the Jews’ special characteristics. This shall be the purpose of the twelfth chapter.

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Chapter 9
What is a Capitalist Undertaker?

Capitalism¹ is the name given to that economic organization wherein regularly two distinct social groups co-operate -- the owners of the means of production, who at the same time do the work of managing and directing, and the great body of workers who possess nothing but their labour. The co-operation is such, that the representatives of capital are the subjective agents, that is, they decide as to the "how" and the "how much" in the process of production, and they undertake all risks.

Now what are the mainsprings of the whole system? The first, and perhaps the chiefest, is the pursuit of gain or profit. This being the case, there is a tendency for undertakings to grow bigger and bigger. Arising from that, all economic activities are strictly logical. Whereas in the pre-capitalistic period quieta non movere was the watchword and Tradition the guiding star, now it is constant movement. I characterize the whole as "economic rationalism," and this I would term the second mainspring of the capitalistic system.

Economic rationalism expresses itself in three ways. (1) There is a plan, in accordance with which all things are ordered aright. And the plan covers activities in the distant future. (2) Efficiency is the test applied in the choice of all the means of production. (3) Seeing that the "cash nexus" regulates all economic activity, and that everywhere and always a surplus is sought for, exact calculations become necessary in every undertaking.

Everybody knows that a modern business is not merely, say, the production of rails or cotton or electric motors, or the transport of stones or of people. Everybody knows that these are but parts in the organization of the whole. And the characteristics of the undertaker are not that he arranges for the carrying out of the processes named. They are to be found elsewhere, and for the present we may put it roughly that they are a constant buying and selling of the means of production, of labour or of commodities. To vary the phrase somewhat, the undertaker makes contracts concerning exchanges, wherein money is the measure of value.

When do we speak of having accomplished a successful piece of business? Surely when the contract-making has ended well. But what is meant precisely by "well"? It certainly has no reference to the quality or to the quantity of the goods or services given or received; it refers solely and only to the return of the sum of money expended, and to a surplus over and above it (profit). It is the aim of the undertaker so to manipulate the factors over which he has control as to bring about this surplus.

Our next step must be to consider what functions the capitalistic undertaker (the subjective economic factor) has in the sphere of capitalism, seeing that our purpose is to show the capacity of the Jews in this direction. We shall try to discover what special skill is necessary in order to be successful in the competitive struggle. In a word, we shall seek for the type.

To my mind, the best picture of the modern capitalistic undertaker is that which paints him as the combination of two radically different natures in one person. Like Faust, he may say that two souls dwell within his breast; unlike Faust’s, however, the two souls do not wish to be separated, but rather, on the contrary, desire to work harmoniously together. What are these two natures? The one is the undertaker (not in the more limited sense of capitalistic undertaker, but quite generally), and the other is the trader.

By the undertaker I mean a man who has an object in view to which he devotes his life, an object which requires the cooperation of others for its achievement, seeing that its realization is in the world of men. The undertaker must thus be differentiated from the artist or the prophet. Like them he has a mission; unlike them he feels that he must bring it to realization. He is a man, therefore, who peers into the distant future, whose every action is planned and done only in so far as it will help the great whole. As an instance of an undertaker in this (non-capitalistic) sense we may mention an African or a North Pole explorer. The undertaker becomes a capitalistic undertaker when he combines his original activities with those of the trader.

And what is a trader? A man whose whole being is set upon doing profitable business; who appraises all activities and all conditions with a view to their money value, who turns everything into its gold equivalent. The world to such a man is one great market-place, with its supply and demand, its conjunctures -- good and bad -- and its profits and losses. The constant question on his lips is, "What does it cost? What can I make out of it?" His last question would in all probability be, "What is the price of the universe?" The circle of his thoughts is circumscribed by one piece of business, to the successful issue of which he devotes all his energies.

In the combination I have endeavoured to sketch, the undertaker is the constant factor, the trader the variant one. Constant the undertaker must be, for, having set his heart upon some far-distant goal, he is of necessity bound to follow some plan in order to reach it. Change in his policy is contrary to his nature. Constancy is the basis of his character. But the trader is changeable, for his conduct wavers with the conditions of the market. He must be able to vary his policy and his aim from one moment to another if the prevailing conjuncture so demands it. "Busy-ness" marks him out above all else.

This theory of the two souls in one body is intended to clarify our conception of the capitalistic undertaker. But we must analyse the conception still further, this time into its actual component parts.

In the undertaker I perceive the following four types:

(1) The Inventor -- not merely in the technical sense, but in that of the organizer introducing new forms which bring greater economies into production, or transport, or marketing.

(2) The Discoverer -- of new means of selling his commodities, either intensively or extensively. If he finds a new sphere for his activities -- let us say he sells bathing-drawers to Eskimos, or gramophones to Negroes -- we have a case of extensive discovery; if he creates new demands in markets where he already has a footing, we may speak of intensive discovery.

(3) The Conqueror. An undertaker of the right kind is always a conqueror, with the determination and will-power to overcome all the difficulties that beset his path. He must also be able to risk much, to stake his all (that is to say, his fortune, his good name, even his life), if need be, to achieve great results for his undertaking. It may be the adoption of new methods in manufacture, the extension of his business though his credit is unstable, and so on.

(4) The Organizer. Above all else the undertaker must be an organizer; i.e., he must be able so to dispose of large numbers of individuals as to bring about the most successful result; must be able to fit the round man into the round hole and the square man into the square; must be able to give a man just the job for which he is best equipped, so as to obtain the maximum of efficiency. To do this satisfactorily demands many gifts and much skill. For example, the organizer must be able to tell at a glance what a man can do best, and which man among many will best suit his purpose. He must be able to let others do his work -- i.e., to place in positions of trust such persons as will be able to relieve him of responsibility. Finally, he must be able to see to it that the human factors in the work of production are sufficient for the purpose, both quantitatively and qualitatively, and that their relationship to each other is harmonious. In short, the management of his business must be the most efficient possible.

Now business organization means a good deal more than the skilful choice of men and methods; it means taking into consideration also geographical, ethnological and accidentalcircumstances of all sorts. Let me illustrate my point. The Westinghouse Electric Company is one of the best organized concerns in the United States. When the Company decided to capture the English market it set up a branch in this country, the organization of which was modelled exactly on that of the parent concern. After a few years, what was the result? The financial break-up of the English branch, chiefly because sufficient allowance had not been made for the difference in English conditions.

This leads us to the activities of the trader. A trader has no definite calling; he has only certain well-defined functions in the body economic. But they are of a very varied kind. For example: to provision ships and supply them with men and ammunition, to conquer wild lands in distant parts, to drive the natives from hearth and home and seize their goods and chattels, to load the ships with these latter and bring them home in order to sell them at public auctions to the highest bidder -- all this is a form of trading.

Or, it may be a different form -- as when a dealer obtains a pair of old trousers from a needy man of fashion, to whose house he comes in vain five times in succession, and then palms those same trousers off on a stupid yokel.

Or, again, it may take the form of arbitrage dealing on the Stock Exchange.

Clearly there are differences in these instances, as there were beThe tween trading in modern and in mediaeval times. In the pre-capitalistic period, to trade meant to trade on a big scale, as the "royal merchants" did in the Italian and German cities, and the trader had to be an undertaker (in the general, and not merely in the capitalistic sense). "Each (of the citizens of Genoa) has a tower in his house; if civil war breaks out, the battlements of these towers are the scenes of conflict. They are masters of the sea; they build them ships, called galleys, and roam for plunder in the most distant parts, bringing the spoil back to Genoa. With Pisa they live in continual enmity." "Royal merchants" these, if you like; but not traders in my sense.

I regard those as traders who set out with the intention of doing good business; who combine within themselves two activities " calculation and negotiation. In a word, the trader must be (1) a speculating calculator, and (2) a business man, a negotiator.

As a speculating calculator, he must buy in the cheapest market and sell in the dearest. Which means that he must obtain his labour and his raw material at as low a rate as possible, and not waste anything in the process of manufacture. And when the commodity is ready for sale, he must part with it to the man whose credit is sound, and so forth. For all this he must calculate, and he must speculate. By speculation in this sense I mean the drawing of several conclusions from particular instances -- let us call it the power of economic diagnosis, the complete survey of the market, the evaluation of all its symptoms, the recognition of future possibilities and the choice of that course which will have the greatest utility in the long run.

To this end the dealer must have a hundred eyes, a hundred ears and a hundred feelers in all directions. Here he may have to search out a needy nobleman, or a State bent on war, in order to offer them a loan at the psychological moment; there, to put his hand on a labour group that is willing to work a few pence below the prevailing rate of wages; here he may have to form a right estimate of the chances that a new article is likely to have with the public; there, to appraise the true effect of a political crisis on the Stock Exchange. In every case the trader expresses the result in terms of money. That is where the calculation comes in. "A wonderfullyshrewd calculator" is a term common in the United States for an adept in this direction.

But a discerning eye for a profitable piece of business is not sufficient: the trader must also possess the capacity for doing business. In this, his negotiating powers will come into play, and he will be doing something very much more akin to the work of an arbitrator between two litigants. He will talk to his opponent, urge reasons and counterreasons in order to induce him to embark on a certain course. To negotiate is to fence with intellectual weapons.

Trading, then, means to negotiate concerning the buying and selling of some commodity, be it a share, a loan, or a concern. Trading must be the term applied to the activity of the hawker at the back-door, trying to sell the cook a "fur" collar, or to that of the Jewish old do’ man, who talks for an hour to the bucolic driver to persuade him to purchase a pair of trousers. But it must be equally applied to the activities of a Nathan Rothschild, who negotiated with the representative of the Prussian Government for a loan of a million. The difference is not one of kind, but of extent, for the essence of all trading is negotiation, which need not necessarily be by word of mouth. The shopkeeper who recommends his goods to the public, be his method what you will, is in reality negotiating. What is all advertisement but "dumb show" negotiation? The end in view is always the same -- to convince the possible buyer of the superiority of a particular set of goods. The ideal of the seller is realized when everybody purchases the article he has recommended.

To create interest, to win confidence, to stir up a desire to buy -- such is the end and aim of the successful trader. How he achieves it is of little moment. Sufficient that he uses not outward force but inner forces, his customers coming to him of their own free will. He wins by suggestion, and one of the most effective is to arouse in the heart of the buyer the feeling that to buy at once will be most advantageous. "We shall have snow, boys, said the Finns, for they had Aander (a kind of snowshoe) to sell," we read in the Magnus Barford Saga (1006 A.D.). This is the prototype of all traders and the suggestion of the Finns the prototype of all advertising -- the weapon with which the trader fights. No longer does he dwell in fortified towers, as did his precursor in Genoa in the days of Benjamin of Tudela, nor does he wreck the houses of the natives with his guns if they refuse to "trade" with him, as did the early East India settlers in the 17th century.

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Notes to Chapter 9

1. For a fuller account of the subject of this chapter, see an article of mine, "Der Kapitalistische Untemehmer," in Archiv für soziale Wissenschaft und Soziale Politik, vol. 29.

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Chapter 10
The Objective Circumstances in the Jewish Aptitude for Modern Capitalism

Now that we know what a capitalist undertaker is our next question must be. What were the outward circumstances that made it possible for the Jews to do so much in shaping the capitalistic system? To formulate an answer we shall have to review the position of the Jews of Western Europe and America from the end of the 15th century until the present time -- the period, that is, in which capitalism took form.

How can that position be best characterized?

The Governor of Jamaica in a letter he wrote (December 17, 1671) to the Secretary of State was happy in his phraseology.¹ "He was of opinion," he said, "that His Majesty could not have more profitable subjects than the Jews: they had great stocks and correspondence." These two reasons, indeed, will account in large measure for the headway made by Jews. But we must also bear in mind their peculiar status among the peoples with whom they dwelt. They were looked upon as strangers and were treated not as full, but as "semi-citizens."

I would therefore assign four causes for the success of the Jews: (1) their dispersion over a wide area, (2) their treatment as strangers, (3) their semi-citizenship, and (4) theirwealth.

Jewish Dispersion over a Wide Area
The fact of primary significance is that the Jews were scattered all over the world. Scattered they had been from the time of the first Exile; they were scattered anew after their expulsion from Spain and Portugal, and again when great masses of them left Poland. We have already accompanied them on their wanderings during the last two or three centuries, and have noted how they settled in Germany and France, in Italy and in England, in the Near East and in the Far West, in Holland, in Austria, in South Africa and in Eastern Asia.

One result of these wanderings was that off-shoots of one and the same family took root in different centres of economic life and established great world-famed firms with numerous branches in all parts. Let us instance a few cases.²

The Lopez family had its seat in Bordeaux, and branches in Spain, England, Antwerp and Toulouse. The Mendes family, well-known bankers, also hailed from Bordeaux, and were to be found in Portugal, France and Flanders. The Gradis, relatives of the Mendes, were also settled in all directions. So, too, the Carceres in Hamburg, in England, in Austria, in the West Indies, in Barbados and in Surinam. Other famous families with world-wide branches were the Costas (Acostas, D’Acostas), the Coneglianos, the Alhadibs, the Sassoons, the Pereires, the Rothschilds. We might continue the list ad infinitum; suffice it to say that Jewish business concerns that had a footing in at least two places on the face of the globe may be counted in hundreds and in thousands.

What all this means is obvious enough. What Christian business houses obtained only after much effort, and even then only to a much less degree, the Jews had at the very beginning -- scattered centres from which to carry on international commerce and to utilize international credit; "great correspondence" in short, the first necessity for all international organization.

Let us recall what I observed about the participation of the Jews in Spanish and Portuguese trade, in the trade of the Levant, and in the economic growth of America. It was of great consequence that the great majority of Jews settling in different parts hailed from Spain; they were thus agents in directing colonial trade, and to an even greater extent the flow of .silver, into the new channels represented by Holland, England, France and Germany.

Was it not significant that the Jews directed their footsteps just to these countries, all on the eve of a great economic revival, and were thus the means of allowing them to benefit by Jewish international connexions? It is well known that Jews turned away the flow of trade from the lands that expelled them to those that gave them a hospitable reception.

Was it not significant that they were predominant in Leghorn, which in the 18th century was spoken of as "one of the great depots in Europe for the trade of the Mediterranean,"³ significant that they forged a commercial chain binding North and South America together, which assured the North American Colonies of their economic existence, significant above all, that by their control of the Stock Exchanges in the great European centres they were the means of internationalizing public credit? It was their distribution over a wide area which enabled them to do all this.

An admirable picture of the importance of the Jews from this point of view was drawn by a clever observer who made a study of that people two hundred years ago. The picture has lost none of its freshness; it may be found in the Spectator of September 27, 1712:⁴

They are so disseminated through all the trading Parts of the World, that they are become the Instruments by which the most distant Nations converse with one another and by which mankind are knit together in a general correspondence. They are like the pegs and nails in a great building, which though they are but little valued in themselves, are absolutely necessary to keep the whole frame together.

How the Jews utilized for their own advantage the special knowledge that their scattered position gave them, how they regulated their activities on the Stock Exchange, is related in all detail in a Report of the French Ambassador in The Hague, written in the year 1698.⁵ Our informant is of opinion that the dominance of the Jews on the Amsterdam Stock Exchange was due in a large degree to their being so well-informed. This piece of evidence is of such great value that I shall translate the whole of the passage:

They carry on a correspondence on both these subjects (news and commerce) with those they call their brotherhoods (congregues). Of these, Venice is considered to be the most important (although neither the richest nor the most populous) because it is the link, by way of the brotherhood of Salonica, between the East and the West as well as the South. Salonica is the governing centre for their nation in these two parts of the world and is responsible for them to Venice, which together with Amsterdam, rules the northern countries (including the merely tolerated community of London, and the secret brotherhoods of France). The result of this association is that on the two topics of news and commerce they receive, one might almost say, the best information of all that goes on in the world, and on this they build up their system every week in their assemblies, wisely choosing for this purpose the day after Saturday, i.e., the Sunday, when the Christians of all denominations are engaged in their religious exercises. These systems, which contain the minutest details of news received during the week, are, after having been carefully sifted by their rabbis and the heads of their congregations, handed over on the Sunday afternoon to their Jewish stockbrokers and agents. These are men of great cleverness, who after having arranged a preconcerted plan among themselves, go out separately to spread news which should prove the most useful for their own ends; ready to start manipulations on the morrow, the Monday morning, according to each individual’s disposition: either selling, buying, or exchanging shares. As they always hold a large reserve of these commodities, they can always judge of the most propitious moment, taking advantage of the rise or fall of the securities, or even sometimes of both, in order to carry out their plans.

Equally beneficial was their dispersion for winning the confidence of the great. Indeed, the progress of the Jews to la haute finance was almost invariably as follows. In the first instance their linguistic ability enabled them to be of service to crowned heads as interpreters, then they were sent as intermediaries or special negotiators to foreign courts. Soon they were put in charge of their employer’s fortunes, at the same time being honoured through his graciousness in allowing them to become his creditors. From this point it was no long step to the control of the State finances, and in later years of the Stock Exchanges.

It is no far-fetched assumption that already in ancient times their knowledge of languages and their acquaintance with foreign civilizations must have made them welcome visitors at the courts of kings and won for them royal confidence. Think of Joseph in Egypt; of the Alabarch Alexander (of whom Josephus tells), the intimate of King Agrippa and of the mother of the Emperor Claudius; think of the Jewish Treasurer of Queen Candace of Ethiopia, of whom we may read in the Acts of the Apostles (viii. 27).

As for the Court Jews in the Middle Ages, we have definite information that they won their spurs in the capacity of interpreters or negotiators. We know it of the Jew Isaac, whom Charlemagne sent to the court of the Caliph Haroun al Rashid; of Kalonymus, the Jewish friend and favourite of the Emperor Otto II; of the famous Chasdai Ibn Shaprut (915-70), who achieved honour and renown as the diplomatic representative of the Caliph Abdul-Rahman III in his negotiations with the Christian courts of Northern Spain.⁶ Similarly when the Christian princes of the Iberian Peninsula required skilful negotiators they sought out Jews. Alphonso VI is a good example. Intent on playing off the petty Mohammedan rulers against each other, he chose Jewish agents, with their linguistic abilities and their insight into foreign ways, to send to the courts of Toledo, Seville and Granada. In the period which followed, Jewish emissaries are met with at all the Spanish courts, including those Jews, learned in ethnography, whom James II commissioned to travel into Asia in order to supply his spies with information and who tried to discover the mythical country of Prester John;⁷ including also the many interpreters and confidential agents associated with the discovery of the New World.⁸

Considering the importance of the Spanish period in Jewish history not only from the general, but also from the special economic point of view, these cases are worthy of note in that they clearly show the reason for the rise of Jews to influential positions. But they are not limited to the Spanish period; they abound in subsequent epochs also. Thus, Jewish diplomatists were employed by the States-General in their intercourse with the Powers; and names like Delmonte, Mesquita⁹ and others are well-known. Equally famous is the Seigneur Hebraeo, as Richelieu called the wealthy Ildefonso Lopez, whom the French statesman sent on a secret mission to Holland, and on his return bestowed upon him the tide of "Conseiller d’Etat ordinaire."¹⁰

Finally, the dispersion of the Jews is noteworthy in another way. Their dispersion internationally was, as we have seen, fruitful enough of results; but their being scattered in every part of some particular country had consequences no less potent. To take one instance -- the Jews were army-purveyors (and their activities as such date from the days of antiquity, for do we not read that when Belisarius besieged Naples, the Jewish inhabitants offered to supply the town with provisions?).¹¹ One reason was surely that they were able to accumulate large quantities of commodities much more easily than the Christians, thanks to their connexions in the different centres. "The Jewish undertaker," says one 18th-century writer, "is free from these difficulties. All he need do is to stir up his brethren in the right place, and at a moment’s notice he has all the assistance he requires at his disposal."¹² In truth, the Jew at that time never carried on business "as an isolated individual, but always as a member of the most extended trading company in the world."¹³ In the words of a petition of the merchants of Paris in the second half of the 18th century,¹⁴ "they are atoms of molten money which flow and are scattered, but which at the least incline reunite into one principal stream."

The Jews as Aliens
During the last century or two Jews were almost everywhere strangers in the sense of being new-comers. They were never old-established in the places where their most successful activities were manifest; nor did they arrive in such centres from the vicinity, but rather from distant lands, differing in manners and customs, and often in climate too, from the countries of their settlements. To Holland, France and England they came from Spain and Portugal and then from Germany; they journeyed to Hamburg and Frankfort from other German cities; later on they dispersed all over Germany from Russian Poland.

The Jews, then, were everywhere colonists, and as such learned the lesson of speedy adaptation to their new surroundings. In this they were ahead of the European nations, who did not become masters of this art until the settlements in America were founded.

New-comers must have an observant eye in order to find a niche for themselves amid the new conditions; they must be very careful of their behaviour, so that they may earn their livelihood without let or hindrance. While the natives are still in their warm beds the new-comers stand without in the sharp morning air of dawn, and their energy is all the keener in consequence. They must concentrate their thoughts to obtain a foothold, and all their economic activities will be dictated by this desire. They must of necessity determine how best to regulate their undertakings, and what is the shortest cut to their goal -- what branches of manufacture or commerce are likely to prove most profitable, with what persons business connexions should be established, and on what principles business itself should be conducted. What is all this but the substitution of economic rationalism for time-honoured Tradition? That the Jews did this we have already observed; why they were forced to do it becomes apparent when we recall that everywhere they were strangers in the land, new-comers, immigrants.

But the Jews were strangers among the nations throughout many centuries in yet another sense, which might be termed psychological and social. They were strangers because of the inward contrast between them and their hosts, because of their almost caste-like separation from the peoples in whose midst they dwelt. They, the Jews, looked upon themselves as a peculiar people: and as a peculiar people the nations regarded them. Hence, there was developed in the Jews that conduct and that mental attitude which is bound to show itself in dealings with "strangers," especially in an age in which the conception of world-citizenship was as yet nonexistent. For in all periods of history innocent of humanitarian considerations the mere fact that a "stranger" was being dealt with was sufficient to ease the conscience and loosen the bonds of moral duty. In intercourse with strangers people were never quite so particular. Now the Jews were always brought into contact with strangers, with "others," especially in their economic activities, seeing that everywhere they were a small minority. And whereas the "others" dealt with a stranger, say, once in ten times or even in a hundred, it was just the reverse with the Jews, whose intercourse with strangers was nine out of the ten or ninety-nine out of the hundred times. What was the consequence? The Jew had recourse to the "ethics for strangers" (if I may use this term without being misunderstood) far more frequently than the non-Jew; for the one it was the rule, whilst for the other it was only the exception. Jewish business methods thus came to be based on it.

Closely interwoven with their status as strangers was the special legal position which they occupied everywhere. But this has an importance of its own, and we shall therefore assign an independent section to it.

Jews as Semi-Citizens
At first glance the legal position of the Jews would appear to have had an immense influence on their economic activities in that it limited the callings to which they might devote themselves, and generally closed the avenues to a livelihood. But I believe that the effect of these restrictions has been over-estimated. I would even go so far as to say that they were of no moment whatever for the economic growth of Jewry. At least, I am not aware that any of the traces left by Jews on the development of the modern economic system were due to the restraining regulations. That these could not have left a very deep impress is obvious, seeing that during the period which is of most interest to us the laws affecting Jews differed greatly according to locality. For all that we note a remarkable similarity in Jewish influence throughout the whole range of the capitalistic social order.

How varied the laws in restraint of Jews were is not always sufficiently realized. To begin with, there were broad differences between those of one country and of another. Thus, while the Jews in Holland and England were in a position of almost complete equality with their Christian neighbours so far as their economic life was concerned, they laboured under great disabilities in other lands. But even in these last their treatment was not uniform, for in certain towns and districts they enjoyed entire economic freedom, as, for example, in the papal possessions in France.¹⁵ Moreover, even the disabilities varied in number and in kind in each country, and sometimes in different parts of the same country. In most instances they appeared to be quite arbitrary; nowhere was there any underlying principle visible. In one place Jews might not be hawkers, and in another they were not allowed to be shopkeepers. Here they received permission to be craftsmen; there this right was denied them. Here they might deal in wool, there they might not. Here they might sell leather, there it was forbidden them. Here the sale of alcoholic liquors was farmed out to them, there such an idea seemed preposterous. Here they were encouraged to start factories, there they were strictly enjoined to desist from all participation in capitalistic undertakings. Such examples might be continued indefinitely.

Perhaps the best is furnished by Prussia’s treatment of her Jews in the 18th century. Here in one and the same country the restrictive legislation for one locality was totally opposed to that of another. The revised General Privileges of 1750 (Article 2) forbade Jews the exercise of handicrafts in many places; yet a royal order of May 21, 1790, permitted the Jews in Breslau "to exercise all manner of mechanical arts," and went on to say that "it would be a source of much pleasure to Us if Christian craftsmen of their own free will took Jewish boys as apprentices and eventually received them into their gilds." A similar enactment was made in the General Reglement for the Jews of South-East Prussia, dated April 17, 1797 (Article 10).

Again, while the Jews of Berlin were forbidden (by Articles 13 and 15 of the General Privileges of 1750) to sell meat, beer and brandy to non-Jews, all the native-born Jews of Silesia had complete freedom of trade in this respect (in accordance with an Order of February 13, 1769).

The list of commodities in which they were allowed or forbidden to trade seems to have been drawn up with an arbitrariness that passes comprehension. Thus, the General Privileges of 1750 allowed the Jews to deal in foreign or home leather prepared though undyed, but not in raw or dyed leather; in raw calf and sheep skins, but not in raw cow or horse hides; in all manner of manufactured woollen and cotton wares, but not in raw wool or woollen threads.

The picture becomes still more bewildering when we take into consideration the varying legal status of the different classes of Jews. The Jewish community of Breslau, for instance, was (until the Order of May 21, 1790, changed things) composed of four groups: (1) those with "general privileges," (2) those with "privileges," (3) those who were only tolerated, and (4) temporary residents.

The first class included those Jews who were on an equal footing with Christians so far as trade and commerce were concerned, and whose rights in this respect were hereditary. In the second were comprised such Jews as had "special (limited) privileges" given them, wherein they were allowed to trade in certain kinds of goods specifically mentioned. But their rights did not pass to their children, though the children received preference when privileges of this kind were being granted. The third class was composed of Jews who had the right of living in Breslau, but whose economic activities were even more limited than those in the second class. As for the fourth, it contained the Jews who received permission to dwell in the town for a temporary period only.

But even of such rights as they had they were never sure. In 1769, for example, the Silesian Jews who lived in country districts were allowed to receive in farm the sale of beer, brandy and meat; in 1780 the permission was withdrawn; in 1787 it was renewed.

Yet in all this it must not be forgotten that regulations in restraint of industry and commerce during the last two or three centuries were for the most part a dead letter; as a matter of fact, capitalistic interests found ways and means of getting round them. The simplest method was to overstep the law, a course to which as time went on the bureaucratic State shut its eyes. But there were lawful means too of circumventing inconvenient paragraphs: concessions, privileges, patents, and the whole collection of documents granting exceptional treatment which princes were always willing to issue if only an additional source of income accrued therefrom. The Jews were not slow in obtaining such privileges. The proviso mentioned in the Prussian Edicts of 1737 and 1750 -- that all restraints referring to Jews might be removed by a special royal order -- was tacitly held to apply in all cases. Some way out must have been possible, else how could the Jews have engaged in those trades (e.g., leather, tobacco) which the law forbade them?

At one point, however, industrial regulations made themselves felt as very real checks to the progress of the Jew, and that was wherever economic activities were organized on a corporate basis. The gilds were closed to them; they were kept back by the crucifix which hung in each gild-hall, and round which members assembled. Accordingly, if they wished to engage in any industry or trade monopolized by a gild, they were forced to do so as "outsiders," interlopers and free traders.

But a still greater obstacle in their path were the laws regulating their position in public life. In all countries there was a remarkable uniformity in these; everywhere the Jew was shut out from public offices, central or local, from the Bar, from Parliament, from the Army, from the Universities. This applied to the States of Western Europe -- France, Holland, England -- and also to America. But there is no need to consider with any degree of fullness the legal status of the Jews in the preemancipation era, seeing that it is fairly generally known. Only this we would mention here -- that their condition of semi-citizenship continued in most countries right into the 19th century. The United States was the first land in which they obtained civil equality; the principle was there promulgated in 1783. In France the famous Emancipation Law dates from 27th September 1791; in Holland the Batavian National Assembly made the Jews full citizens in 1796. But in England it was not until 1859 that they were granted complete emancipation, while in the German States it took ten years longer. On 3rd July 1869 the North German Confederation finally set the seal on their civil equality; Austria had already done so in 1867, and Italy followed suit in 1870.

Equally well-known is it that in many cases the emancipation laws have become dead letters. Open any Liberal paper in Germany (to take a good instance) and day by day you will find complaints that Jews are never given commissions in the Army, that they are excluded from appointments to the Bench, and so on.

This set-back which the Jews received in public life was of great use to industry and commerce in that the Jew concentrated all his ability and energy on them. The most gifted minds from other social groups devoted themselves to the service of the State; among the Jews, in so far as they did not spend themselves in the Beth Hamidrash [the Communal House of Study], such spirits were forced into business. Now the more economic life aimed at profit-making and the more the moneyed interests acquired influence, the more were the Jews driven to win for themselves by means of commerce and industry what was denied them by the law -- respect and power in the State. It becomes apparent why gold (as we have seen) was appraised so highly among Jews.

But if exclusion from public life was of benefit to the economic position of the Jews in one direction, giving them a pull over their Christian neighbours, it was equally beneficial in another. It freed the Jews from political partisanship. Their attitude towards the State, and the particular Government of the day, was wholly unprejudiced. Thanks to this, their capacity to become the standard-bearers of the international capitalistic system was superior to that of other people. For they supplied the different States with money, and national conflicts were among the chief sources from which Jews derived their profit. Moreover, the political colourlessness of their position made it possible for them to serve successive dynasties or governments in countries which, like France, were subjected to many political changes. The history of the Rothschilds illustrates the point. Thus the Jews, through their inferior civil position, were enabled to facilitate the growth of the indifference of capitalism to all interests but those of gain. Again, therefore, they promoted and strengthened the capitalistic spirit.

The Wealth of the Jews
Among the objective conditions which made possible the economic mission of the Jews during the last three or four centuries must be reckoned that at all times and in all places where their role in economic life was no mean one, they disposed of large sums of money. But this assertion says nothing about the wealth of the whole body of Jews, so that it is idle to urge the objection that at all periods there were poor Jews, and very many of them. Any one who has ever set foot in a Jewish congregation on the Eastern borders of Germany, or is acquainted with the Jewish quarter of New York, knows that well enough. But what I maintain -- a more limited proposition -- is that much wealth and great fortunes were to be found, and still are to be found, among Jews ever since the 17th century. Put in a slightly different way, there were always many wealthy Jews, and certainly the Jews on an average were richer than the Christians round them. It is beside the mark to say that the richest man in Germany or the three richest in America are not Jews.

A good many of the exiles from the Pyrenean Peninsula must have been very wealthy indeed. We are informed that their flight brought with it an "exodo de capitaes," a flow of capital from the country. However, in many instances they sold their property, receiving foreign bills in exchange.¹⁶ The richest among the fugitives probably made for Holland. At any rate it is recorded that the first settlers in that country -- Manuel Lopez Homen, Maria Nunez, Miguel Lopez and others -- had great possessions.¹⁷ Whether other wealthy Spaniards followed in the 17th century, or whether those already resident added to their fortunes, it is not easy to discover. But certain it is that the Jews of Holland in the 17th and 18th centuries were famed for their riches. True, there are no statistics to illustrate this, but an abundance of other weighty evidence exists. Travellers could not sufficiently admire the splendour and the luxury of the houses of these refugees who dwelt in what were really palaces. And if you turn to a collection of engravings of that period, do you not very soon discover that the most magnificent mansions in, say, Amsterdam or The Hague were built by Jews or inhabited by them -- those of Baron Delmonte, of the noble Lord de Pinto, of the Lord d’Acoste and others? (At the close of the 17th century de Pinto’s fortune was estimated at 8,000,000 florins.) Of the princely luxury at a Jewish wedding in Amsterdam, where one of her daughters married, Gliickel von Hamein draws a vivid picture in her Memoirs.¹⁸

It was the same in other lands. For 17th and 18th century France we have the generalization of Savary, who knew most things. "We say," these are his very words, "we say that a tradesman is ‘as rich as a Jew’ when he has the reputation of having amassed a large fortune."¹⁹

As for England, actual figures are extant concerning the wealth of the rich Sephardim soon after their arrival. A crowd of rich Jews followed in the train of Catharine of Braganza, Charles II’s bride, so that while in 1661 there were only 35 Jewish families in London, two years later no less than 57 new-comers were added to the list. In 1663, as appears from the books of Alderman Blackwell, the following was the half-yearly turnover of the wealthy Jewish merchants:²⁰ Jacob Aboab, £13,085; Samuel de Vega, £18,309; Duarte de Sylva, £41,441; Francisco da Sylva, £14,646; Fernando Mendes da Costa, £30,490; Isaac Dazevedo, £13,605; George and Domingo Francia, £35,759; and Gomez Rodrigues, £13,124.

The centres of Jewish life in Germany in the 17th and 18th centuries were, as we have already observed, Hamburg and Frankfort-on-the- Main. For both cities it is possible to compute the wealth of the resident Jews by the aid of figures.

In Hamburg, too, it was Spanish and Portuguese Jews who were the first settlers. In 1649, 40 of their families participated in the foundation of the Hamburg Bank, which shows that they must have been fairly comfortably off. Very soon complaints were made of the increasing wealth and influence of the Jews. In 1649 they were blamed for their ostentatious funerals and for riding in carriages to take the air; in 1650 for building houses like palaces. In the same year sumptuary laws forbade them too great a show of magnificence.²¹ Up to the end of the 17th century the Sephardic Jews appear to have possessed all the wealth; about that time, however, their Ashkenazi brethren also came quickly to the fore. Glückel von Hamein states that many German-Jewish families which in her youth were in comparative poverty later rose to a state of affluence. And Glückel’s observations are borne out by figures dating from the first quarter of the 18th century.²² In 1729 the Jewish community in Altona was composed of 279 subscribing members, of whom 145 were wealthy, possessing between them 5,434,300 mark [£271,715], that is, an average of more than 37,000 mark [£1850] per head. The Hamburg community had 160 subscribing members, 16 of whom together were worth 501,500 mark [£25,075]. These figures appear to be below the actual state of things, if we compare them with the particulars concerning each individual. In 1725 the following wealthy Jews were resident in Hamburg, Altona and Wandsbeck: Joel Solomon, 210,000 mark; his son-in-law, 50,000; Elias Oppenheimer, 300,000; Moses Goldschmidt, 60,000; Alex Papenheim, 60,000; Elias Salomon, 200,000; Philip Elias, 50,000; Samuel Schiesser, 60,000; Berend Heyman, 75,000; Samson Nathan, 100,000; Moses Hamm, 75,000; Sam Abraham’s widow, 60,000; Alexander Isaac, 60,000; Meyer Berend, 400,000; Salomon Berens, 1,600,000; Isaac Hertz, 150,000; Mangelus Heymann, 200,000; Nathan Bendix, 100,000; Philip Mangelus, 100,000; Jacob Philip, 50,000; Abraham Oppenheimer’s widow, 60,000; Zacharias Daniel’s widow and widowed daughter, 150,000; Simon del Banco, 150,000; Marx Casten, 200,000; Abraham Lazarus, 150,000; Carsten Marx, 60,000; Berend Salomon, 600,000 rthlr.; Meyer Berens, 400,000; Abraham von Halle, 150,000; Abraham Nathan, 150,000.

In view of this list it can scarcely be doubted that there were many rich Jews in Hamburg.

Frankfort presents the same picture; if anything the colours are even brighter. The wealth of the Jews begins to accumulate at the end of the 16th century, and from then onwards it increases steadily. In 1593 there were 4 Jews and 54 Christians (making 7.4 per cent.) in Frankfort who paid taxes on a fortune of over 15,000 florins; in 1607 thennumber had reached 16 (compared with 90 Christians, i.e., 17.7 per cent.).²³ In 1618 the poorest Jew paid taxes on 100 florins, the poorest Christian on 50. Again, 300 Jewish families paid as garrison and fortification taxes no less than 100,900 florins in the years 1634 to 1650.²⁴

The number of taxpayers in the Frankfort Jewish community rose to 753 by the end of the 18th century, and together they possessed at least 6,000,000 florins. More than half of this was in the hands of the twelve wealthiest families:²⁵ Speyer, 604,000 florins; Reiss-Ellissen, 299,916; Haas,Kann, Stem, 256,500; Schuster, Getz, Amschel, 253,075; Goldschmidt, 235,000; May, 211,000; Oppenheimer, 171,500; Wertheimer, 138,600; Florsheim, 166,666; Rindskopf, 115,600; Rothschild, 109,375; Sichel, 107,000.

And in Berlin the Jews in the early 18th century were not by any means poor beggars. Of the 120 Jewish families resident in the Prussian capital in 1737 only 10 owned less than 1000 thalers, the rest all had 2000 to 20,000 thaler, and over.²⁶

That the Jews were among the richest people in the land is thus attested, and this state of affairs has continued through the last two or three hundred years right down to our own day, except that to-day it is perhaps more general and more widespread. And its consequence? It can scarcely be overestimated for those countries which offered a refuge to the wanderers. The nations that profited by the Jews’ sojourn with them were well equipped to help forward the development of capitalism. Hence it should be specially noticed that the wanderings of the Jews had the effect of shifting the centre where the precious metals had accumulated. Obviously it could not but influence the trend of economic life that Spain and Portugal were emptied of then: gold and England and Holland enriched.

Nor is it difficult to prove that Jewish money called into existence all the large undertakings of the 17th century and financed them. Just as the expedition of Columbus wouldhave been impossible had the rich Jews left Spain a generation earlier, so the great India Companies might never have been founded and the great banks which were established in the 17th century might not so quickly have attained their stability had it not been that the wealth of the Spanish exiles came to the aid of England, Holland and Hamburg; in other words, had the Jews been expelled from Spain a century later than was actually the case.

This in fact was why Jewish wealth was so influential. It enabled capitalistic undertakings to be started, or at least facilitated the process. To establish banks, warehouses, stock and share-broking -- all this was easier for the Jew than for the others because his pockets were better lined. That, too, was why he became banker to crowned heads. And finally, because he had money he was able to lend it. This activity paved the way for capitalism to a greater degree than anything else did. For modern capitalism is the child of money-lending.

Money-lending contains the root idea of capitalism; from moneylending it received many of its distinguishing features. In money-lending all conception of quality vanishes and only the quantitative aspect matters. In money-lending the contract becomes the principal element of business; the agreement about the quid pro quo, the promise for the future, the notion of delivery are its component parts. In money-lending there is no thought of producing only for one’s needs.In money-lending there is nothing corporeal (i.e., technical), the whole is a purely intellectual act. In money-lending economic activity as such has no meaning; it is no longer a question of exercising body or mind; it is all a question of success. Success, therefore, is the only thing that has a meaning. In money-lending the possibility is for the first time illustrated that you can earn without sweating; that you may get others to work for you without recourse to force.

In fine, the characteristics of money-lending are the characteristics of all modern capitalistic economic organizations.

But historically, too, modern capitalism owes its being to moneylending. This was the case wherever it was necessary to lay out money for initial expenses, or where a business was started as a limited company. For essentially a limited company is in principle nothing but a matter of money-lending with the prospect of immediate profit.

The money-lending activities of the Jews were thus an objective factor in enabling the Jews to create, to expand and to assist the capitalistic spirit. But our last remarks have already touched upon a further problem, going beyond objective considerations. Is there not already a specific psychological element in the work of the money-lender? But more than this. It may be asked, Can the objective circumstances alone entirely explain the economic role of the Jews? Are there not perhaps special Jewish characteristics which must be taken into account in our chain of reasoning? Before proceeding to this chapter, however, we must turn to an influence of extreme importance in this connexion -- to the Jewish religion.

---
Notes to Chapter 10

1. M. Kayserling, op. cit., p. 708.

2. An account of the Jewish world-famed firms of his time is given by Manasseh ben Israel in his Humble Address to Cromwell. The story of the single families may be found in the Jewish Encyclopedia, which is especially good for biographies.

3. "Lettres écrites de la Suisse, d’Italie," etc., in Encycl. mèth. Manuf., vol. 1, p. 407. Cf. the opinion of Jovet, quoted by Schudt, Jüdische Merkwürdigkeiten, vol. 1, p. 228.

4. The Spectator, No. 495.

5. Revue Historique, vol. 44 (1890).

6. Graetz, vol. 5, p. 323.

7. These instances of Jewish diplomatists are generally known. The number could easily be added to. Any one specially interested in this question should refer to Graetz, where abundant material will be found (e.g., vol. 6, pp. 85, 224; vol. 8. ch. 9, etc.).

8. M. Kayserling, Christopher Columbus (1894), p. 106.

9. H. J. Koenen, op. cit; p. 206.

10. Edmund Bonaffé, Dictionnaire des amateurs français cm XVII siècle (1881), p. 191.

11. Friedlander, Sittengeschichte Roms, vol. 3, p. 577.

12. (v. Kortum) Über Judentum und Juden (1795), p. 165.

13. Ibid.. p. 90.

14. R.E.J., vol. 23 (1891), p. 90.

15. M. de Maulde, Les juifs dans les Etats français du Saint-Siège (1886). The legal position of the Jews generally is treated fully in the current Jewish histories, most of which are in reality nothing more than the history of the legal position of the Jews. Indeed, a goodly number of their authors imagine they are writing economic history when all the time it is just legal history they aredealing with. For records, consult the article "Juden" in Krünitz (vol. 31) and Sehudt, Jüdische Merkwurdigkeiten (specially for Frankfort). For France, see Halphen, Recueil des lois, etc., concernant les Israëlites (1851); for Prussia, L. von Rönne and Heinrich Simon, Die früheren und gegenwärtigen Verhaltnisse der Juden in den sämtlichen Landesteilen des preussischen Staates (1843). All the laws quoted in the text I have taken from this collection. A. Michaelis, Die Rechtsverhältnisse der Juden in Preussen seit dem Beginn des 19 Jahrhunderts: Gesetze, Eriasse, Verordnungen, Entscheidungen (1910).

16. Cf. B. Bento Carqueja, op. cit., pp. 73, 82, 91.

17. Wagenaar, Beschrijving van Amsterdam, quoted by Koenen, op. cit., p. 142. Further, for the wealth of the Dutch Jews (greatly exaggerated) see Schudt, vol. 1 (1714), p. 277; vol. 4 (1717), p. 208. Cf. M. Mission, Reise nach Italien (1713), p. 43. Of newer books, M. Henriquez Pimentel, op. cit., op. 34.

18. Memoiren, p. 134.

19. Savary, Dict., vol. 2 (1726), p. 448.

20. Lucien Wolf, The Jewry of the Restoration, 1660-1664, p. 11.

21. See H. Reils, "Beiträge zur ältesten Geschichte der Juden in Hamburg," in Zeitschrift des Vereins für hamburgische Geschichte, vol. 2 (1847), pp. 357, 380, 405; and M. Grunwald, op. cit., pp. 16, 26, 35.

22. In M. Grunwald’s Hamburgs deutsche Juden, pp. 20, 191.

23. F. Bothe, Die Enfwickelung der direkten Besteuerung der Reichsstadt Frankfurt (1906), p. 166, Tables 10 and 15.

24. Kraeauer, op. cit., p. 341.

25. Alexander Dietz, Stammbuch der Frankfurter Juden (1907), p. 408.

26. L. Geiger, Geschichte der Juden in Berlin (1871), vol. 1, p. 43.

***Menydh*** · #5 (**permalink**) Sunday, September 11th, 2005

Chapter 11
The Significance of the Jewish Religion in Economic Life

Introductory Note
Three reasons have actuated me in devoting a special chapter to the consideration of the religion of the Jewish people and the demonstration of its enormous influence on Jewish economic activities. First, the Jewish religion ca be fully appreciated in all its bearings from the economic standpoint only when it is studied in detail and by itself; secondly, it calls for a special method of treatment; and thirdly, it occupies a position midway between the objective and the subjective factors of Jewish development. For, in so far as any religion is the expression of some particular spiritual outlook, it has a "subjective" aspect; in so far as the individual is born into it, it has an objective aspect.

The Importance of Religion for the Jewish People
That the religion of a people, or of a group within a people, can have far-reaching influences on its economic life will not be disputed. Only recently Max Weber demonstrated the connexion between Puritanism and Capitalism. In fact. Max Weber’s researches are responsible for this book. For any one who followed them could not but ask himself whether all that Weber ascribes to Puritanism might not with equal justice be referred to Judaism, and probably in a greater degree; nay, it might well be suggested that that which is called Puritanism is in reality Judaism. This relationship will be discussed in due course.

Now, if Puritanism has had an economic influence, how much more so has Judaism, seeing that among no other civilized people has religion so impregnated all national life. For the Jews religion was not an affair of Sundays and Holy Days; it touched everyday life even in its minutest action, it regulated all human activities. At every step the Jew asked himself. Will this tend to the glory of God or will it profane His name? Jewish law defines not merely the relation between man and God, formulates not merely a metaphysical conception; it lays down rules of conduct for all possible relationships, whether between man and man or between man and nature. Jewish law, in fact, is as much part of the religious system as are Jewish ethics. The Law is from God, and moral law and divine ordinances are inseparable in Judaism.¹ Hence in reality there are no special ethics of Judaism. Jewish ethics are the underlying principles of the Jewish religion.²

No other people has been so careful as the Jews in providing for the teaching of religion to even the humblest. As Josephus so well put it: Ask the first Jew you meet concerning his "laws" and he will be able to tell you them better than his own name. The reason for this may be found in the systematic religious instruction given to every Jewish child, as well as in the fact that divine service partly consists of the reading and explanation of passages from Holy Writ. In the course of the year the Torah is read through from beginning to end. Moreover, it is one of the primary duties of the Jew to study the Torah. "Thou shalt speak of them when thou sittest in thine house and when thou walkest by the way and when thou liest down and when thou risest up" (Deut. vi. 5).³

No other people, too, has walked in God’s ways so conscientiously as the Jews; none has striven to carry out its religious behests so thoroughly. It has indeed been asserted that the Jews are the least religious of peoples. I shall not stay to weigh the justice of this remark. But certain it is that they are the most "God-fearing" people that ever were on the face of the earth. They lived always in trembling awe, in awe of God’s wrath. "My flesh trembleth for fear of Thee, and I am afraid of Thy judgments," said the Psalmist (Ps. cxix. 120), and the words may be taken as applicable to the Jews in every age. "Happy is the man that feareth alway" (Prov. xxviii. 14). "The pious never put away their fear" (Tanchuma Chukkath, 24 ).⁴ One can understand it when one thinks of the Jewish God -- fearful, awful, curse-uttering Jehovah. Never in all the world’s literature, either before or since, has humanity been threatened with so much evil as Jehovah promises (in the famous 28th chapter of Deuteronomy) to those who will not keep His commandments.

But this mighty influence (the fear of God) did not stand alone. Others combined with it, and together they had the tendency of almost forcing the Jews to obey the behests of their religion most scrupulously. The first of these influences was their national fate. When the Jewish State was destroyed the Pharisees and Scribes -- i.e., those who cherished the traditions of Ezra and strove to make obedience to the Law the end and aim of life -- the Pharisees and Scribes came to the head of affairs and naturally directed the course of events into channels which they favoured. Without a State, without their sanctuary, the Jews, under the leadership of the Pharisees, flocked around the Law (that "portable Fatherland," as Heine calls it), and became a religious brotherhood, guided by a band of pious Scribes, pretty much as the disciples of Loyola might gather around them the scattered remnants of a modern State. The Pharisees now led the way. Their most distinguished Rabbis looked upon themselves as the successors of the ancient Synhedrium, and were indeed so regarded, becoming the supreme authority in spiritual and temporal affairs for all the Jews in the world.⁵ The power of the Rabbis originated in this fashion, and the vicissitudes of the Jews in the Middle Ages only helped to strengthen it. So oppressive did it eventually become that the Jews themselves at times complained of the burden. For the more the Jews were shut off, or shut themselves off, from the people among whom they dwelt, the more the authority of the Rabbis increased, and the more easily could the Jews be forced to be faithful to the Law. But the fulfilment of the Law, which was urged upon them by the Rabbis, must have been a necessity for the Jews for inner reasons: it satisfied their heart’s desire, it appeared the most precious gift that life had to offer. And why? Because amid all the persecution and suffering which was meted out to the Jews on all sides, that alone enabled them to retain their dignity, without which life would have been valueless. For a very long period religious teaching was enshrined in the Talmud, and hence Jews through many centuries lived in it, for it and through it. The Talmud was the most precious possession of the Jew; it was the breath of his nostrils, it was his very soul. The Talmud became a family history for generation after generation, with which each was familiar. "The thinker lived in its thought, the poet in its pure idealism. The outer world, the world of nature and of man, the powerful ones of the earth and the events of the times, were for the Jew during a thousand years accidents, phantoms; his only reality was the Talmud."⁶ The Talmud has been well compared (and the comparison to my mind applies equally to all religious literature) to an outer shell with which the Jews of the Diaspora covered themselves; it protected them against all influences from without and kept alive their strength within.⁷

We see, then, what forces were at work to make the Jews right down to modern times a more God-fearing people than any other, to make them religious to their inmost core, or, if the word "religious" be objected to, to keep alive among high and low a general and strict observation of the precepts of their religion. And for our purpose, we must regard this characteristic as applicable to all sorts and conditions of Jews, the Marannos of the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries included. We must look upon these too as orthodox Jews. Says the foremost authority on that period of Jewish history,⁸ "The great majority of the Marannos were Jews to a much larger extent than is commonly supposed. They submitted to force of circumstance and were Christians only outwardly. As a matter of fact they lived the Jewish life and observed the tenets of the Jewish religion. . . . This admirable constancy will be appreciated to the full only when the wealth of material in the Archives of Alcala de Henares, Simancas and other places has been sorted and utilized."

But among professing Jews the wealthiest were often enough excellent Talmudic scholars. Was not a knowledge of the Talmud a highway to honour, riches and favour among Jews? The most learned Talmudists were also the cleverest financiers, medical men, jewellers, merchants. We are told, for example, of some of the Spanish Ministers of Finance, bankers and court physicians that they devoted to the study of the Holy Writ not only the Sabbath day but also two nights of each week. In modern times old Amschel Rothschild, who died in 1855, did the same. He lived strictly according to Jewish law and ate no morsel at a stranger’s table, even though it were the Emperor’s. One who knew the Baron well says of him that "he was looked upon as the most pious Jew in all Frankfort. Never have I seen a man so afflict himself -- beating his breast, and crying to Heaven -- as Baron Rothschild did in the synagogue on the Day of Atonement. The continual praying weakens him so that he falls into a faint. Odorous plants from his garden are held to his nose to revive him."⁹ [Sombart in the German text quotes this as an occurrence on the Sabbath. It is obvious that the description refers to the Day of Atonement. -- Trans.] His nephew William Charles, who died in 1901 and who was the last of the Frankfort Rothschilds, observed all the religious prescriptions in their minutest detail. The pious Jew is forbidden to touch any object which under certain circumstances has become unclean by having been already touched by some one else. And so a servant always walked in front of this Rothschild and wiped the door-handles. Moreover, he never touched paper money that had been in use before; the notes had to be fresh from the press.

If this was how a Rothschild lived, it is not surprising to come across Jewish commercial travellers who do not touch meat six months in the year because they are not absolutely certain that the method of slaughtering has been in accordance with Jewish law.

However, if you want to study orthodox Judaism you must go to Eastern Europe, where it is still without disintegrating elements -- you must go there personally or read the books about it. In Western Europe the orthodox Jews are a small minority. But when we speak of the influence of the Jewish religion it is the religion that held sway until a generation ago that we mean, the religion that led the Jews to so many victories.

The Sources of the Jewish Religion
Mohammed called the Jews "the people of the Book." He was right. There is no other people that lived so thoroughly according to a book. Their religion in all its stages was generally incorporated in a book, and these books may be looked upon as the sources of the Jewish religion. The following is a list of such books, each originating at a particular time and supplementing some other.

The Bible, i.e., the Old Testament, until the destruction of the Second Temple. It was read in Hebrew in Palestine and in Greek (Septuagint) in the Diaspora.
The Talmud (more especially the Babylonian Talmud), from the 2nd to the 6th century of the Common Era, the principal depository of Jewish religious teaching.
The Code of Maimonides, compiled in the 12th century.
The Code (called the Turim) of Jacob ben Asher (1248-1340).
The Code of Joseph Caro -- the Shulchan Aruch (16th century).

These "sources" from which the Jewish religion drew its life appear in a different light according as they are regarded by scientific research or with the eyes of the believing Jew. In the first case they are seen as they really are; in the second, they are idealized.

What are they in reality? The Bible, i.e., the Old Testament, is the foundation upon which the entire structure of Judaism was built up. It was written by many hands at different periods, thus forming, as it were, a piece of literary mosaic.¹⁰ The most important portion of the whole is the Torah, i.e., the Pentateuch. It received its present shape by the commingling of two complete works some time in the period after Ezra. The one was the old and the new (the Deuteronomic) Law Book (650 B.C.) and the other, Ezra’s Law Book (440 B.C.).[I.e. Deut. v. 45-xxvi, 69 (about 650 B.C.) and Exod. xii. 25-31, xxxv to Lev. xv; Numb. i-x; xv-xix; xxvii-xxxvi. (about 445 B.C.).] And its special character the Torah owes to Ezra and Nehemiah, who introduced a strict legal system. With Ezra and the school of Soferim (scribes) that he founded, Judaism in the form which it has to-day originated; from that period to the present it has remained unchanged.

Besides the Torah we must mention the so-called Wisdom Literature -- the Psalms, Job, Ecclesiastes, Ecclesiasticus and the Proverbs. This section of Jewish literature is wholly postexilic; only in that period could it have arisen, assuming as it did the existence of the Law, and the prevailing belief that for obeying the Law God gave Life, for transgressing it Death. The Wisdom Literature, unlike the Prophetic Books, was concerned with practical life. Some of the books contain the crystallized wisdom of many generations and are of a comparatively early date. The Book of Proverbs, for example, the most useful for our purpose, dates from the year 180 B.C.¹¹

Two streams flow from the Bible. The one, chiefly by way of the Septuagint, ran partly into Hellenistic philosophy and partly into Pauline Christianity. That does not concern us further.

The other, chiefly by way of the Hebrew Bible current in Palestine, ran into Jewish "Law," and the course of this we shall have to follow.

The specifically Jewish development of the Holy Writ already began as early as Ezra’s day; it was due to the first schools of Soferim (scribes), and the later schools of Hillel and Shammai only extended and continued the work. The actual "development" consisted of explanations and amplifications of the Holy Writ, arrived at as the result of disputation, the method in vogue in the Hellenistic World. The development was really a tightening of the legal formalism, with the view of protecting Judaism against the inroads of Hellenistic Philosophy. Here, as always, the Jewish religion was the expression of a reaction against disintegrating forces. The Deuteronomic Law was the reaction against Baal worship; the Priestly Code against Babylonian influences; the later Codes of Maimonides and Rabbenu Asher and Caro against Spanish culture; and the teaching of the Tannaim [Tannai -- teacher] in the century preceding and that commencing the Common Era against the enervating doctrines of Hellenism.¹²

The old oral tradition of the "Wise" was codified about the year 200 A.D. by R. Judah Hanassi (the Prince), usually called Rabbi. His work is the Mishna. Following on the Mishna are further explanations and additions which were collected and given a fixed form in the 6th century (500-550 A.D.) by the Sdboraim [Saborai -- those who give opinions]. Those portions which had reference to the Mishna alone were termed the Gemara, the authors of which were the Amoraim [Amorai -- speaker], Mishna and Gemara together form the Talmud, of which there are two versions, the Palestinian and the Babylonian. The latter is the more important.¹³

The Talmud, as edited by the Saboraim, has become the chief depository of Jewish religious teaching, and its universal authority resulted from the Mohammedan conquests. To begin with, it became the legal and constitutional foundation for Jewish communal life in Babylon, at the head of which stood the "Prince of the Captivity" and the Presidents of the two Talmudic colleges, the Gaonim [Gaon -- Excellency]. As Islam spread further and further afield the Jewish communities in the lands that it conquered came into closer relation with the Gaonate in Babylon; they asked advice on religious, ethical and common law questions and loyally accepted the decisions, all of which were based on the Talmud. Indeed, Babylonian Jewry came to be regarded as the new centre of Jewish life.

As soon as the Gemara was written down, and so received perma nent form, the development of Judaism ceased. Nevertheless we must mention the three codes which in the post-Talmudic period embodied all the substance of the religion, first, because they presented it in a somewhat different garb, and secondly, because in their regulation of the religious life they could not but pay some heed to changed conditions. All the three codes are recognized by Jews as authoritative side by side with the Talmud, and the last, the Shulchan Aruch, is looked upon today by the orthodox Jew as containing the official version of religious duties. What is of interest to us in the case of all the codes is that they petrified Jewish religious life still more. Of Maimonides even Graetz asserts as much. "A great deal of what in the Talmud is still mutable, he changed into unmodifiable law. ... By his codification he robbed Judaism of the power of developing. . . . Without considering the age in which the Talmudic regulations arose, he makes them binding for all ages and circumstances." R. Jacob ben Asher went beyond Maimonides, and Joseph Caro beyond Jacob ben Asher, reaching the utmost limit. His work tends to ultra-particularism and is full of hair-splitting casuistry. The religious life of the Jews "was rounded off and unified by the Shulchan Aruch, but at the cost of inwardness and unfettered thought. Caro gave Judaism the fixed form which it has retained down to the present day."¹⁴

This, then, is the main stream of Jewish religious life; these the sources from which Judaism drew its ideas and ideals. There were, of course, tributary streams, as, for instance, that of the Apocalyptic literature of the pre-Christian era, which stood for a heavenly, a universal, an individualistic Judaism;¹⁵ or that of the Kabbala, which busied itself with symbols and arithmetical figures. But these had small share in the general development of Jewish life, and may be neglected so far as their effect on historic Judaism is concerned. Nor were they ever recognized by "official" Judaism as sources of the Jewish religion.

So much for the realistic conception of these sources. But what of that current in orthodox Jewish circles? In many respects the belief of the pious Jew touching the origin of the Jewish system is of much more consequence than its real origin. We must therefore try and acquaint ourselveswith that belief.

The traditional view, which every orthodox Jew still holds, is that the Jewish system has a twofold birth: partly through Revelation and partly in the inspiration of the "Wise." Revelation refers to the written and the oral tradition. The former is contained in the holy books of the Bible -- the Canon as it was fixed by the members of the Great Synagogue. It has three parts¹⁶: the Torah or Pentateuch, the Prophetical Books and the "Writings" (the remaining books). The Torah was given to Moses on Sinai and he "gradually instructed the people in it during their forty years’ wandering in the wilderness. ... It was not until the end of his life that he finished the written Torah, the five books of Moses, and delivered them unto Israel, and we are in duty bound to consider every letter, every word of the written Torah as the Revelation of God."¹⁷ The remaining books were also the outcome of divine revelation, or, at any rate, were inspired by God. The attitude towards the Prophetical literature and the Hagiographa, however, is somewhat freer than that towards the Torah.

The Oral Tradition, or the Oral Torah, is the explanation of the written one. This, too, was revealed to Moses on Sinai, but for urgent reasons was not allowed to be written down at once. That took place at a much later date -- only after the destruction of the second Temple -- and was embodied in Mishna and Gemara, which thus contain the only correct explanation of the Torah, seeing that they were divinely revealed. In the Talmud are included also rabbinic ordinances and the Haggada, i.e., the interpretation of those portions of Holy Writ other than the legal enactments. The interpretation of the latter was called the Halacha, and Halacha and Haggada supplemented each other. Beside these were placed the collection of decisions, i.e., the three codes already referred to.

What was the significance of all this literature for the religious life of the Jews? What was it that the Jew believed, what were the commands he obeyed?

In the first place it must be premised that so far as I am aware there is no system of dogmas in Judaism.¹⁸ Wherever compilation of such a system has been attempted it was invariably the work of non-Jews.¹⁹ The nature of the Jewish religion and more especially the construction of the Talmud, which is characterized by its lack of order, is inconsistent with the formulation of any dogmatic system. Nevertheless certain principles may be discovered in Judaism, and its spirit will be found expressed in Jewish practices. Indeed, it will not be difficult to enumerate these principles, since they have remained the same from the very beginning. What has been termed the "spirit of Ezekiel" has been paramount in Judaism from Ezra’s day to ours. It was only developed more and more, only taken to its logical conclusions. And so to discover what this "spirit" is we need only refer to the sources of the religion -- the Bible, the Talmud and the later Rabbinic literature.

It is a harder task to determine to what extent this or that doctrine still finds acceptance. Does, for example, the Talmudic adage, "Kill even the best of the Gentiles,&qu