The Non-Assimilation of Israel By William Yale
From The Atlantic August 1922
AN article entitled ‘The Assimilation of Israel,’ by Mr. Paul Scott Mowrer, published in the Atlantic Monthly for July, 1921, is of particular interest at this time of blinding nationalistic and racial passion.
The exposition of Mr. Mowrer is both just and fair-minded as regards Jew and Gentile; but a careful reading of his thesis leaves one with the impression that he has not got at the root of the matter. There are certainly several factors in the equation of which he has entirely failed to make mention. Mr. Mowrer has apparently convinced himself that the Jewish Problem is distinctly a political one, complicated by religious and social features. With this deduction many cannot agree. It does not satisfy either the Jew or the Gentile.
At the present time of nationalist madness, it is almost heresy to assert that, instead of its being nationalism which underlies world-antipathies, both in the past and in the present, it is the antagonism of diverse cultures. Before applying this theory to the Jewish Question, it is advisable to amplify it in order that it may be quite clear.
The sociologists and anthropologists will probably not quarrel with the general thesis that, underlying the mistrust and fear of one primitive tribe for another, was the difference of habits, customs, taboos, and totems, of which primitive culture consisted. Nor will the historians question the statement that the hatred and fear of the ancient Greeks and Persians were in a large measure due to differences in religion, government, and social customs — in fact, to differences of culture.
The present offers so many examples of this phenomenon that there is an embarrassment of choice. When these problems are not complicated by the political and commercial rivalries of governments, the underlying cultural struggle is more clearly in evidence. The growing hostility and intensity of feeling as between the East and the West are almost purely cultural. The antagonism and hatred between Christians and Moslems in the Near East are essentially cultural — differences of customs, habits, and dress; difference in fundamental moral and social conceptions; a different mode of thought; a different philosophy.
Central Europe to-day presents perhaps the most exceptional picture of the hatreds bred by differences of culture. The much-discussed Irish Question is far more cultural than religious and social.
Similarity of race has, in the past, usually implied similar customs, habits, modes of thought, moral outlook and philosophy — in fact, a similar culture. Religion, with all of its intense hatreds and aversions, is essentially only a distinctive and powerful factor in determining the culture of a race, nation, or other unit of mankind.
Americans and Englishmen have probably more in common than any other great groups into which human society is at present divided. But what many of those on both sides of the Atlantic, who have most at heart a closer association of England and America, fail to understand is that one of the strongest determining factors of the culture of a people — the social organization — is radically different in the two countries. England’s social organism is based in theory and in practice on the caste system; while in theory, and to a great extent in practice, the American social order is based on worth and achievement. Such antagonism as exists between these two countries is due fundamentally to both a conscious and an unconscious conflict of this strong cultural difference.
The foregoing appears a long way removed from the Jewish Problem; but if the reader has had the patience to follow this sketchy definition of the word culture, he will perhaps follow the application of this theory of conflicting cultures to the question why the People of Israel have not been assimilated during the long centuries; and he will be better able to draw his own conclusions as to whether the Jews will ever be assimilated by the people among whom they live.
The Jewish people have a distinct culture of their own — a culture which is more thoroughly inculcated in the individual Jew than is the Gentile culture in the individual Gentile. The Jews have a literature which is distinct from all other literatures; they have customs and habits which set them apart from any other human group; they have a mode of thought peculiarly characteristic of the Jew; their moral conceptions are different from those of the Gentiles; their philosophy is distinctly their own. At a very early age, these differences are drilled into the mind not only of the upper classes, but also, and even more intensely, of the masses. There are so many determining factors in the culture of the Jews which are different from those of all other groups, that the Jews are verily a race set apart — a race or group whose culture is antagonistic, on many counts, to the culture of all other peoples.
There are many causes which have tended to increase and to intensify these cultural differences. But two factors, which have had considerable influence on the question of assimilation have not, it is believed, previously been discussed.
Among Christian peoples women have come to be considered from a different point of view than among other peoples. The attitude toward women among the Christians has consistently through the ages been idealistic. This Christian conception of womanhood is probably due to the fact that early Christianity was based on the worship of a Virgin Mother. The conception was intensified and augmented by the advent of chivalry. Christian culture created a refinement of thought, a delicacy of feeling, and a sense of the sanctity of womanhood, which are apparently lacking in Jewish culture, as witnessed both in their literature and in the daily life of the Jewish people.
This difference between the culture of the Christian and that of the Jew has undoubtedly militated against assimilation, as it has restrained Christian men and women from intermarriage with Jews. With all of her charm, the appeal of her emotional nature, and the attractiveness of her many talents, to the Christian man the Jewish woman has lacked a nicety of thought and feeling. To the Christian woman the Jew, with his extraordinary sensitiveness of feeling, his appreciation of the beautiful in life, in art, and in literature, with the charm of his intellectual brilliance and versatility, has failed to show that delicacy of thought and refinement of manner to which she is accustomed.
On the other hand, handicapped by the lack of this factor in their culture, which to a great extent isolated them and prevented close association with their intellectual equals in the Christian groups, the Jews found themselves thrown among classes of Christians whose intellectual training and equipment were far inferior to that of the average Jew.
For it must be realized that the masses among the Jews receive a far greater intellectual training than the masses among the Christians. As a race or group, the Jews are more intelligent and better trained mentally than any other group. Denied association and intimacy with Gentiles of equal or superior intelligence, the Jews have refused assimilation, both intellectual and physical.
The Jewish Problem is, at bottom, a cultural problem. The antagonistic factors in Jewish culture have made any large assimilation impossible in the past. Jewish culture has much to offer the world, and the question of the future is, whether Jewish thinkers and leaders will endeavor to suppress such factors in the culture of their people as render assignation difficult if not impossible, or whether Jewish leaders will attempt to intensify these differences, in order to prevent assimilation and preserve Israel as the Chosen People.