The Allied Countries and the Jews

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Enelow Hyman Gerson. The Allied Countries and the Jews

PREFACE

I. FRANCE AND THE JEWS

II. ENGLAND AND THE JEWS

III. RUSSIA AND THE JEWS

IV. ITALY AND THE JEWS

V. PALESTINE AND THE JEWS

VI. AMERICA AND THE JEWS

VII. THE WAR, THE JEW, AND THE FUTURE

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The addresses collected in this little book were delivered at the Sabbath morning Services of Temple Emanu-El during the autumn and early winter of 1917-18. I tried to give a bird's eye view of the relation of the Jews to the several countries with which America is now associated in the War for the defense of democracy. Also, I tried to point out how intimately the advance of democracy has been connected with the improvement of the lot of the Jew. Forming part of Divine Services, the addresses had to be short, but I hope they contained enough to illumine the subject and to stimulate thought, if not further study, as well as patriotic action.

In the present form, the substance is offered of the spoken addresses. The address on Russia may seem more hopeful than the situation today would warrant. Right now, unfortunately, chaos reigns in Russia, and the Jews are said to suffer terribly. Though Trotzky is reported to have renounced all affiliation with the Jews, or any particular interest in them, his changes of fortune are likely to react upon the people from which he sprang. None the less, we must not despair. In the end, Democracy must win in Russia, and find a way of living together and working together for the numerous racial and religious groups which form her vast population.

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The liberal spirit of Montesquieu and Basnage found new expression, and, we may say its culmination, in the men of the Revolution. Mirabeau, who in Berlin came in contact with Mendelssohn and got to know Dohm's famous work on the Civil Improvement of the Jews, issued in 1781, wrote a warm plea for the emancipation of the Jews, under the title of Mendelssohn and the Political Improvement of the Jews. His plea was supported by Gregoire, a priest, and Duport, a Jacobin member of the National Assembly, and it finally resulted in the Assembly's abrogation of Jewish disabilities, and the invitation to the Jews to take the oath of citizenship.

Thus, on September 28th, 1791, the Jews of France were liberated, and the Jews of the world celebrated the beginning of a new era of freedom and of the opportunities that are bound up with freedom.

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