Letter 16: Emancipation
Integration into non-Jewish society
Following the responses to Benjamin’s questions from Letter 1, Rav Hirsch now turns to more “contemporary” issues. This letter tackles emancipation, or the new opportunity for Jews to integrate into non-Jewish society. Letter 17 discusses the impulse towards “reforming” Judaism. Finally, Letter 18 is essentially Rav Hirsch’s diagnosis of how many of the problems challenging the Jewish community developed over time (an especially important letter). Letter 19 is more of a postscript, explaining Rav Hirsch’s decision to publish the Letters and Horeb.
Summary
Emancipation was a gradual process that began in the late 1700s. Over time, countries either voluntarily or in response to civic pressure granted citizenship rights to minority groups, including Jews.
Should this be seen as something positive for the Jewish People, or was life in the ghetto as an oppressed minority somehow preferable? “Is emancipation in harmony with the spirit of Judaism?” To me, the modern iteration of this question is, “Is engagement with modern society desirable?”
Rav Hirsch answers that emancipation is theoretically positive — as long as it is used in the right way.
He opens by citing the pesukim from Yirmiyahu 29, which we noted in Letter 12 he understands to constitute a full-fledged mitzvah:
Build houses and dwell therein; plant gardens and eat their fruit… And seek the peace of the city whither I have exiled you, and pray for it to the Lod, for in its peace there will be peace unto you.
Rav Hirsch takes this as Divine instruction to “ally ourselves as closely as possible with the state that has accepted us, to further its aims, and not to think of our own welfare as being independent from that of the state.” Based on Rav Hirsch’s take on the role of Jewish statehood from Letters 8 and 9 (that statehood was a means to the end of actualizing the Torah in the broadest possible context, but not an end unto itself), he argues that while in exile, “attaching ourselves to the host state” does not contradict our essential task of learning and keeping the Torah. In fact, such a reality creates opportunities for significant kiddush Hashem and furthering the ultimate goal of bringing all mankind to an awareness of Hashem and His intentions for Creation.
Practically speaking, is the “attainment of civil rights desirable?”
Rav Hirsch says yes:
As a corrective for years of forced isolation and stunted spiritual and character growth
As a step forward for the proper regard for justice, human dignity, and truth (this turned out to be short-lived, especially in Germany; the Nazi Party would rise to power almost exactly one hundred years following the publication of the 19 Letters)
As a step towards recognition of God as the only Lord and Father, and thus all humans as His children and therefore siblings
But, these caveats need to be kept in mind:
Along with emancipation, we must also be inspired to learn about and commit to our unique mission as Jews
Emancipation should never be seen as the goal of Judaism, but as one more detail in achieving the goal set for us by Judaism (and one that is actually more challenging to deal with than oppression)
Seeing emancipation as the end of galus would signal a complete misunderstanding of the Jewish story
If the Torah is sacrificed as the “price” for acceptance into wider society, that would be a tragic mistake
In short, if emancipation is seen as just another means to the end of using galus to strengthen ourselves while bringing God-awareness to the world, wonderful. If, though, it is taken as a redemption unto itself, that would be bad.
We must become Jews, Jews in the true sense of the word, pervaded by the spirit of Torah, accepting Torah as the wellspring of our life. Then Judaism will gladly welcome emancipation as affording greater opportunities for accomplishing our task and realizing our ideal.
Diving Deeper
Impact of the Holocaust on Rav Hirsch’s Thought
While its obviously impossible to know, I’m curious how the Holocaust would have shifted Rav Hirsch’s approach to these issues (and to the related issue of Zionism/returning to Israel). While its true that Jewish history is full of persecution, the sheer scale and nature of the Holocaust as the “Final Solution” seems different than the usually local pogroms and inquisitions that had taken place in the past. (Historians, feel free to correct me). Would he still have advocated for “full ties” to non-Jewish countries after seeing what could happen from the country regarded as the being on the forefront of progressive human values? Would he continue to reject our ability to return to Israel after all other countries refused to save Jews from extermination, citing “immigration quotas”?
Jews and Broader Society
At least to me, this letter serves as a critique of unthinking introduction of modern media into Orthodox society. Rav Hirsch’s vision was for “emancipation” to facilitate our bringing Torah values to the broader society; in practice, what more often seems to have happened is the intrusion of secular (lack of) values into Orthodox society. To hold up Rav Hirsch as the moreh derech who allows for integrating Torah with general culture while ignoring his prescriptions for what that integration is supposed to look like is incorrect and clearly not something he would have accepted.
The Harder Test
While Rav Hirsch acknowledges the pain and difficulty of thousands of years of oppression in exile, he still describes emancipation as posing a more difficult challenge to the Jewish People as a whole. Historically, we have responded with remarkable commitment and sacrifice to threats of forced conversion and confinement to ghettos; we accepted higher taxes and second-class status. But it was already clear that the friendlier overtures of gentile society following the Enlightenment were tempting huge numbers of Jews away from observance. Like Chazal’s comment about the dual threat posed by “my brother, Eisav,” Rav Hirsch warned about the deceptive challenge that acceptance into non-Jewish society could pose to our People. As we’ve cited before from Rav Hirsch’s commentary to Bechukosai (and Toldos, as well, if I recall correctly), this is the second stage of galus, the Yitzchak stage, and only if we can make it through while holding on to Torah and mitzvos can we reach the Avraham stage and eventually merit the return to Israel — v’ha’aretz ezkor.
R SR Hirsch was focused on High Culture, not Popular Culture. I am not sure the Modern Orthodox strategy is a necessary means for obtaining the former. Information access has been democratized to the point that one needn't be all that exposed to or participate in Popular Culture in order to have access to the fine arts, higher academic knowledge, or any other aspect of refined High Culture.
Then there is the problem that the keepers of High Culture are increasingly tainted by values that are rapidly diverging from ours. It is now considered "refined" in those circles to be welcoming of gender confusion, or of patently false, destructive and self-destructive narratives (such as the Palestinians, but also examples that lie further from home) under the rubric that all narratives are allegedly equal. Modern Orthodoxy may simply not fit the Post-Modern West that well.
But then, neither does much of what R Hirsch wrote. Along the same lines as wondering what R SR Hirsch would have said post-Shoah. We don't know.
That said, our contemporary Chareidi strategies do not distinguish between the two and eschew both.
We have to forge new strategies for how we can learn Torah and keep its mitzvos and values in the world Hashem put us in. We may not have a R Hirsch to guide us, but then... Hashem "Thought" it was our souls, not His, that should be here-and-now facing these issues. We are the ones designed to face these issues in as productive a way as possible.