Theodor Herzl: Political Activity and Achievements

Herzl's Political Activity¹

The Ideological Background

It was anti-Semitism that made Herzl and Max Nordau, his close collaborator, conscious Jews.² Both were steeped in European culture, but the resurgence of modern anti-Semitism wounded their dignity. Herzl was particularly stirred by Eugen Dühring's book Die Judenfrage als Frage des Rassencharakters und seiner Schädlichkeit für Existenz und Kultur des Volkes (The Jewish Problem as a Problem of Race and the Harm it is Causing to the Existence and to the Culture of the People). As the years went by, the feeling of disenchantment grew stronger, but it was not until the Dreyfus trial in 1894 that Herzl's hopes of emancipation were irreparably shattered. He realized that the civilized nations could not cope with the "Jewish Question," which was a legacy from the Middle Ages. "They have tried it through emancipation, but it came too late." The belief of the doctrinaire libertarians that "men can be made equal by publishing an edict" was erroneous. The Jews themselves were not yet accustomed to freedom, and the people around them had "neither magnanimity nor patience." In those places where the Jews had been liberated, the nations saw only their bad characteristics. Lacking historical perspective, they failed to realize that some of the anti-social qualities they attributed to Jews were the product of oppression in earlier times.³ In vain did Jews endeavor to show their loyalty, sometimes even exaggerated patriotism, toward their countries of domicile. Their sacrifices, their achievements in science, and their contributions to commerce were in vain. The "fatherlands" in which they had lived for centuries, denounced them as "strangers."⁴

Herzl appreciated that anti-Semitism was a complex phenomenon. In some countries, it did occasionally reveal a religious bias, but its virulent character was primarily a consequence of emancipation. Contrary to the general belief that hostility to the Jews would disappear, Herzl feared that it would worsen. Hence, he believed that it was futile to combat anti-Semitism. Assimilation had failed, since in any genuine sense, it could be effected only by intermarriage, and the nations would not tolerate members of an unassimilable group becoming their leaders, although, he allowed, perhaps they were "fully within their rights." He predicted that in Russia and Romania persecution would be inspired officially; in Germany, discrimination would be legalized; in Austria, people would allow themselves to be intimidated by the mob into initiating a "new St. Bartholomew's Night." Hungary, Herzl's country of birth, would be no exception. The calamity would come in a "most brutal form; the longer it is postponed, the more severe it will be; the more powerful the Jews will become the fiercer the retribution. There is no escape from it."⁵

He hoped that, in the long run, anti-Semitism would not harm the Jews and that educationally it might even prove useful. "It forces us," he concluded, "to close ranks, unites us through pressure, and through our unity will make us free." It was this feeling of freedom that made Herzl declare: "We are a people, one people. We recognize ourselves as a nation by our faith." Henceforth, he no longer regarded the "Jewish Question" as a social or religious problem, but as a national one, which the council of the civilized nations should solve politically. Sovereignty over a portion of land, "large enough to justify the rightful requirements of a nation," to which the Jewish masses would emigrate, would provide the right solution. Pondering the choice between the Argentine and Palestine, the "ever memorable historic home" seemed preferable. Its very name would attract the people "with a force of marvelous potency."⁶

Herzl wanted to give the Jews "a corner . . . where they can live in peace, no longer hounded, outcast, and despised . . . a country that will be their own," to rid them of the faults that centuries of persecution and ostracism had fostered in them and to allow their intellectual and moral gifts free play, so that finally they might no longer be "the dirty Jews, but the people of light." There they would regain...