Читать книгу Prophet in a Time of Priests - Janice Rothschild Blumberg - Страница 10

IV - PRESIDENT GRANT AND THE MAN WHO CHALLENGED INGERSOLL

Browne ignored Wise’s advice and accepted a call to the pulpit of Congregation Anshe Emeth of Peoria, Illinois, the oldest Jewish community in the state other than Chicago. Originally comprised of Western Europeans some of whom had arrived in the 1840s, Peoria Jewry had grown considerably in recent years due to the arrival of immigrants from Eastern Europe. Congregation Anshe Emeth, Peoria’s first synagogue, had established a religious school and a burial association in the1850s, and completed its building by1863. The rabbi who preceded Browne had remained there for ten years, an unusual longevity in those times that spoke well not only for him but—significantly—for the character and stability of the congregation. It was a congenial community, where Jews mingled freely with their non-Jewish neighbors as they did in Evansville and elsewhere.1

The Brownes settled comfortably in lodgings at 406 Jefferson Street and embraced the cultural life of the city. In the “First Grand Entertainment” of the Standard Literary Association, the rabbi recited Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven” and Sophie performed several pieces on the piano. Browne joined the local lodge of B’nai B’rith as he had probably also done in Evansville. Membership in the philanthropic fraternity was considered de rigeur for Jewish men of position. Browne was no stranger to the Peoria lodge, having spoken there while still serving as rabbi in Evansville. At that time he so pleased the local committee that it sent a series of resolutions to the Israelite declaring him “one of the foremost ministers in America,” and “a preceptor under whose guidance we can safely trust our noble cause, and our motto and watchword Progress be actually correct in the effect.” 2

The same emphasis on image is seen in the report of a lecture that Browne gave in Burlington, Iowa. It inspired Jews there to advise the Israelite that it “would be an honor for Judaism if our talented rabbis would occasionally make a tour, especially to places which are not so fortunate.... It creates a good influence....”3

These kudos aptly identify a primary goal of Jews in mid-nineteenth century America: acceptance for themselves and their religion in their Protestant-dominated land. Browne served Peorians well in this role of ambassador to the gentiles. Then a new role for rabbis, it soon became a major requirement for those serving acculturated American Jews. Peorians emphasized this yearning as they expressed to Wise their pride in having “the most able Jewish rabbi in the West,” thus permitting them to “feel with dignity our elevation among an enlightened community” and to declare, “This, Dear Editor, is what Judaism here and elsewhere long has sought—to have the right man to lead us in our synagogues, and represent us among our Christian friends....”4

The same dispatch reported that “the Rev. Doctor has created quite a new life” in the city, that religious services were “splendidly attended,” that a Young Men’s Social Club had recently been established “for literary and dramatic purposes,” and that the B’nai B’rith lodge was “in most excellent condition, numbering now fifty-one members, with a fund of $1200.”5

Peorians especially appreciated Browne’s public lectures outside of the synagogue. The city’s mayor introduced him on one such occasion, a B’nai B’rith sponsored benefit to help yellow fever victims in two southern cities. Thanks to the rabbi’s popularity the lecture raised the substantial amount of $500. Another time, he addressed the Illinois State Senate and was voted “one of the very best, wholly extempore, eloquent and interesting throughout.”6

At the county court house, where he spoke on “The Jewish God” for the Free Thought Association, Browne said that if the Bible were fully understood and read in the light of the times in which it was written, there would be no need for further “infidel meetings.” This inspired Wise to quip that such free thinking probably pleased the speaker’s free-thinking listeners. Despite lingering reservations about biblical criticism, Wise also praised the speech for having “sustained the Bible and its connection with science clearly shown and in perfect accord.”7

The reference to infidel meetings applied to the hugely popular lectures of another Peoria resident, the brilliant lawyer, teacher, preacher and war hero, Colonel Robert G. Ingersoll. Known as the Great Agnostic because of his strong opposition to religion, Ingersoll’s popularity increasingly threatened religious leaders. With Darwinism looming as a thunder cloud over the church, Protestants felt especially vulnerable to agnosticism. Church leaders organized tent revivals in an effort to reinvigorate the faith, but Ingersoll’s rhetoric was highly entertaining and soon exceeded Darwinism as a perceived threat to Christianity. The preacher cleverly manipulated facts to support his case against God, communicating directly and charmingly to his eager listeners. The power of his words and his personality exemplified the religious community’s worst fears.8

In January 1874, the Peoria Democrat announced that “Rev. Dr. Browne, of the Hebrew Church” successfully challenged Ingersoll. When after his oration the Great Agnostic invited comments from the audience, Browne rose to his feet and refuted Ingersoll’s “unjust attacks...upon the Bible and religion.” According to one witness, the young rabbi “handled the theories of the speaker without gloves” for twenty minutes, using “a keen-edged dissecting knife with the skill of an old master.” Thereafter newspapers referred to Browne as “The Man Who Could Challenge Ingersoll.”9

Debates between Ingersoll and such personages as Jeremiah Black, Reverend Henry Field and British Prime Minister William Gladstone made news for over two decades. During these years public controversy grew more heated, and likewise spurred the demand for Browne to refute the agnostic. In 1881, Bishop John P. Newman of New York recommended Browne as “the only man who can answer Ingersoll.” Ten years later, a reporter in Lincoln, Nebraska, wrote, “After hearing Dr. Browne, it could be easily understood why the bold and eloquent Ingersoll is afraid to meet him.... Dr. Browne, like Colonel Ingersoll, has full sway over his audience, but the rabbi holds his people spellbound by the earnestness of his reasoning, addressing himself to the souls of his hearers, and binding them to his own deep religious convictions.”10

Although Browne continued to denounce Ingersoll, it is uncertain if they ever confronted each other in person after their initial encounter in Peoria. Had Browne devoted himself to preaching the compatibility of science and religion with the same intensity as Ingersoll preached against it, he might have hastened the day when the world could accept both. He might even have averted the Scopes “Monkey” Trial or the current twenty-first century brush with Creationism.

Browne had other interests though, and as a congregational rabbi, other responsibilities. In 1873, he represented Peoria at the founding conference of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, Wise’s first landmark achievement in his mammoth effort to organize American Judaism. Besides serving on the committee for permanent organization, Browne proposed reforms that addressed such ongoing issues as the still competing prayer books and problems caused by self-proclaimed rabbis who had neither training for the position nor compensating intellectual achievements. He wanted the UAHC to exercise jurisdiction over its congregations and their rabbis, appoint a council to adjudicate problems arising between them, and form a committee (from which he excluded himself) to examine the credentials of men who claimed to be rabbis, licensing those who were qualified and exposing the fraud of those who were not.11

Both motions were ruled out of order. Lay leaders remained wary of any suggestion that implied imposition of authority, and Wise, having witnessed Isaac Leeser’s failed attempts to form a union, was not disposed to entertain any proposal that threatened divisiveness. He understood the delicate balance needed to keep all parties at the table, and knew that in order to achieve his goal of a rabbinical seminary, he must gather under his banner all of the dissident factions. Eventually— when the timing was right—he embraced Browne’s issues as his own.12

Although social anti-Semitism had not yet highlighted an obvious need for rabbis to be ambassadors to the gentiles, Peoria’s Jews increasingly appreciated their rabbi’s spectacular success in that role. They reelected him unanimously in 1874, and again sent him to the UAHC conference. Whereas business at the first conference had centered on organization, delegates at the second one concentrated on resolutions concerning ecumenism and patriotism, religious education, obtaining English Bibles, circuit preaching (apparently needed due to the scarcity of qualified rabbis fluent in English), the sharing of rabbis for communities too small to support one full time, properly honoring major donors, and organization of the rabbinical seminary. No rabbis were listed as members of reporting committees. Browne again pressed for regulations to improve the treatment of qualified rabbis and weed out the unqualified, still without success.13

Later that year, Browne became inadvertently involved in the personal life of his mentor. The Wise family had not heard from son Leo or known his whereabouts for four years, at which time he had absconded with funds entrusted to his father for the forthcoming Hebrew Union College. Long considered a “wild boy,” Leo had run away from home at least once before, supposedly to join the Mexican army. Browne had been like an older brother to Leo while living in Cincinnati, sometimes interceding for him with his father. Fully realizing that the boy might resent him for doing so, Browne nonetheless occasionally tried to “put him straight” with brotherly counsel.14

On November 5, 1874, Leo sent Browne a note indicating that he was in Peoria and needed to see him. Browne welcomed him and listened to his confession. Leo admitted having spent all of the stolen money, then signing onto an English ship bound for Africa, and frequently landing in the brig. Despairing that his life was hopeless, he told Browne, “If they give me an unkind word at home, I shall leave at once and forever.”15

Browne tried to console Leo, assured him of a home if he ever needed one, and then hurried him off to Cincinnati where his mother lay dying. At her funeral a month later, Leo told Browne that he felt he had killed her.16

Theresa Wise had been like a mother to Browne, and her death was as much a blow to him as to her own children. Wise understood his grief and acknowledged it by including him in the family circle for the mourning rituals. As they observed Theresa’s casket being taken from her home to the hearse and on to Wise’s Temple B’nai Jeshurun for the funeral, it was Browne who read from Psalms and led the recitation of kaddish, the traditional mourner’s prayer. At the service itself Browne co-officiated with Wise’s distinguished Cincinnati colleague and dearest friend, Rabbi Max Lilienthal.17

That sorrowful event marked the end of an era for Browne as well as for the Wises. The patriarch soon remarried, sired more children, and changed forever the ambience at Floral House on College Hill. Its new mistress, Selma Bondi Wise, busy with her own growing family, had neither time nor interest in cultivating her husband’s former student.

Leo vowed to repent and promised Browne to become “a different man”in the future. Within a year he again appealed for help, this time in a frantic plea for medication with which to abort a friend’s pregnancy. Browne balked at that one. Ethics, law and morality overrode his sense of brotherhood. Leo never forgave him for refusing. Soon thereafter Leo became his father’s surrogate as editor of the American Israelite, an ongoing position that enabled him to exact revenge upon those who offended him. Browne was not alone in receiving that revenge as years went by.18

Soon after Theresa Wise’s death, Browne received a terrifying prognosis from Dr. Joseph Aub, the famous Cincinnati ophthalmologist who had been treating him for a serious eye disease. Browne learned that his condition had greatly deteriorated and in Aub’s opinion, he would lose his sight completely unless he left the rabbinate for work in a profession less demanding on his eyes. He had no choice but to resign his position and seek other employment.19

Because he knew his subjects and spoke extemporaneously without further study, lecturing to the public seemed a viable option not likely to worsen his condition. The lecture circuit, however, required him to be away from home for long periods of time touring the country. He was loathe to leave Sophie because they were trying to start a family and she had already suffered several miscarriages. He considered moving to Chicago, headquarters of his journal, the Jewish Independent, as well as that of his lecture bureau. Although he inquired about renting office space there, he ultimately opted to keep his residence in Peoria, intermittently sojourning with Sophie at her parents’ home in Evansville.20

In addition to signing onto the lecture circuit, Browne applied for a position in the diplomatic corps, a move that led to his friendship with President Ulysses S. Grant.

While still in Wisconsin, the summer of 1871, the rabbi had initially written to Grant applying for the chaplaincy at West Point. This seemed odd at the time, for Browne had just received his law degree and had been invited to serve a prestigious congregation. His action becomes somewhat plausible in hindsight, however, as we shall see. Possibly he wanted to make a point rather than obtain a job when he addressed the president:

Your Excellency:

I figure upon the full amount of your charity in allowing myself this importunity, emanating wholly from motives selfish in their nature. Having learnt of the vacancy created in the West Point Academy by the resignation of Prof. French, I ventured my application to the Secretary of War for the position of Chaplain to West Point. The press throughout the land dwells largely on the claims of the Episcopalians and Methodists to that office, so much so that President Grant is at a loss to make a choice between them...

Now I fail to see (I am convinced your Excellency will side with my views) what claims any particular denomination can have upon that office. It appears to me that we, the Jews, have equal rights with them, hence I applied and lay my prayer before your Excellency. In fact it seems to me that the Jews have perhaps more just claims as the Christian clergy, because no Jewish minister has yet been given a single office while the Christian clergy is very well represented in the offices of the U. S. I am the rabbi of Emanuel Temple in this city, duly graduated Rev. A.M., M.D.,LL.B, 26 years of age, and am willing to fill besides the chair of any branch in the academy falling in the line of my professions, ready to undergo the necessary examination. My references are the Revs. Isaac M. Wise and Max Lilienthal of Cincinnati, Ohio, James K. Gutheim of N.Y., Robert Collier of Chicago, J.N. Dudley and D. Graham of Milwaukee. In conclusion I would state that I was Chaplain to our State Senate during the last session.21

This was the first of many attempts that Browne would make to pique the government’s conscience on its promise of equal opportunity for all. As will be discussed in subsequent chapters, throughout his life he advocated for immigrants—especially Jews—to receive justice and recognition in whatever area he perceived their need and his ability to help.

Although Browne did not get the appointment at West Point, his letter may have drawn Grant’s attention and thus caused him to remember Browne’s name. In 1875, the rabbi really did need a job and approached Grant for a diplomatic post, either domestic or foreign. He was endorsed by influential friends such as Illinois Senator Richard J. Oglesby, who wrote to the president that Browne was “a gentleman of high scientific and literary attainments now suffering from a disease of the eyes” which necessitated a change of employment, and that he was highly recommended also by Indiana Senator O. P. Morton as well as by “members of the Jewish church.”22

Wise, having known Grant since before the Civil War, also advised him that Browne’s “prominent talents and learning are appreciated by a large number of our people,” and that the “particular favor... in his time of distressing sickness, if granted, would make a very favorable impression on very many of your zealous friends, and also many of your political opponents.”23

No mean politician himself, Wise, an avowed Democrat who was considered by many to be the voice of American Jewry, diplomatically flattered the Republican President with a personal expression of “utmost respect for your many virtues as the chief magistrate of our blessed country.” He did not mail the letter, but gave it to Browne to deliver personally. The enterprising job-hunter had used his status as a journalist to obtain an interview with Grant and soon made his appearance at the president’s vacation home in Long Branch, New Jersey.24

Although already into his second term, Grant still suffered from the effects of his anti-Semitic General Order No. 11 that temporarily expelled all Jews from the Department of the Tennessee during the Civil War. He claimed to have signed the document under pressure and immediately regretted doing it, but even after becoming the nation’s enormously popular national hero he never overcame his inner need to convince Jews that he was not an anti-Semite.25

Browne, who at the time of the American Civil War was a teenager in faraway Hungary, probably never heard of Order No. 11 until the 1868 presidential campaign when he was living with the Wises in Cincinnati. Wise, although he opposed Grant politically, remained his friend throughout and even refrained from harshly criticizing Grant editorially during the presidential campaigns of 1868 and 1872. As to Order No. 11, Wise declared that he had “long ago forgiven him that blunder.” Wise was convinced that Grant had made sufficient atonement and “had been adequately punished right after having issued it.”26

Experts have long debated the degree to which Grant was personally responsible for the order, arguing the point most heatedly in the years immediately after the war when Republicans looked to the general as a shoo-in for the White House. Grant himself courageously admitted his mistake and asked forgiveness, and recent historians have concluded that he could “in no wise be held responsible, personally and solely, for the anti-Jewish regulations which he dictated and signed.” Historian Jacob Rader Marcus, while not disputing Grant’s own acknowledgment of guilt, asserted that, although he was “an inept administrator and an egregious failure as a President . . .[he].was no Jew baiter.”27

In the White House, Grant tried to dispel that reputation by giving more appointments to Jews than had any of his predecessors. While it seems that as president, with influential Jewish supporters such as Washington lobbyist Simon Wolf and New York’s powerful Seligman banking family whom he had known since he was a junior officer in the army and they were small town storekeepers upstate, Grant would have had little need for the good will of an unemployed young rabbi. Apparently that logical conclusion was offset by the fact that Grant understood the power of the press. Browne applied for the meeting in his capacity as journalist, not rabbi. The president probably welcomed his interview as an opportunity to improve his image with readers of Browne’s Jewish Independent. The journal was based in Chicago, home to America’s largest Jewish population outside of New York.28

The President received Browne cordially. Not surprisingly, he lauded Jews whom he had known, recalling that he had met many in the social settings of Cincinnati and in his father’s home across the river in Covington, Kentucky. The discourse with which he continued was disappointing, but likewise no surprise. It seemed to imply, as philo-Semitic statements often do, deep and frequently unrecognized anti-Semitism. The President told Browne:

I think the Jew lives longer because he loves his life more. It is certain that the Jew takes no risk of life and limb, while even in the many railroad accidents Jews, though much more given to traveling, are rarely injured. And yet I have found Jewish soldiers among the bravest of the brave. The Jew risks his life only to show his patriotism and then he is fearless. The Jewish soldiers, as stated, I have found wonderfully courageous in our Army and in the Rebel lines as well. But there were army followers among us. It happened one day that a number of complaints reached me and in each case it was a Jew and I gave the order excusing the Jewish traders. You know that during war times these nice distinctions were disregarded. We had no time to handle things with kid gloves. But it was no ill-feeling or want of good-feeling towards the Jews. If such complaints would have been lodged against a dozen men each of whom wore a white cravat, a black broadcloth suit, beaver or gold spectacles, I should probably have issued a similar order against men so dressed....”29

However disconcerting those words appear to Jews, Grant undoubtedly meant them to be friendly and conciliatory, affirming his admiration for Jewish people and their values. In closing, he encouraged Browne about the job possibility and advised him to send his application to Secretary of State Hamilton Fish.

Browne wrote to Fish, indicating that the president promised to nominate him for a currently open spot in the diplomatic corps and thoughtfully enclosing an item from the Chicago Times that mentioned his disability. He added that, although he had expressed a preference to be posted in Europe or South America, he now understood that there would be an opening in Turkey and preferred that above all others. Constantinople had been a center of Jewish activity since 1492 when the Ottoman Empire welcomed Jews expelled from Spain. Now the American government treated it as a “Jewish” post.

In stressing his qualifications, Browne modestly informed Fish that he did not “claim the favor as a mere gratuity,” for he was known “in every Jewish family throughout the U.S., am not without some influence abroad and especially in my own state.” He also noted that he was recognized as one of the best lecturers and campaign speakers in the country, that he had lived in the South for three years, was “posted in the history of our politics,” and had promised to return the following year “to stump the United States both in the English and German languages for the Republican party....”30

Grant wrote to Fish, suggesting a South American consulate for Browne if one was available. When Fish informed Browne that at present there were no favorable openings in South America, Browne replied that an unfavorable one would do, since he needed only a “small income” to support his family. This apparently yielded him a choice of posts, either in Argentina or in Mexico. Dr. Aub, his ophthalmologist, vetoed the latter because of its climate. Ultimately Browne rejected both because neither paid enough to support him, even if he left Sophie with her parents in Evansville and went alone.31

So ended Browne’s brush with the diplomatic corps, but it was by no means the end of his relationship with Fish and Grant. These blossomed into friendship years later when all three lived in New York and Browne took a more active interest in politics. For the present, Browne still needed a job. Discouraged about finding one in government, he relied on lecturing.32

As usual, Wise tried to help him. He announced that the young rabbi, being threatened with blindness, proposed to tour the country speaking “upon all popular and Jewish subjects.” In addition to the already acclaimed “Types of Manhood” and “The Talmud, Its Ethics and Literary Beauties,” Browne suggested the following topics: “The Religion of Temperance, or How the Chosen People Keep Sober” a response to the Protestants’ intensifying anti-alcohol campaign which he would soon present successfully in Atlanta; “The Genesis of Christianity;” which he later developed into a popular treatise on the Jewish role in the Crucifixion; “The Talmud on Diseases of the Mind;” “The Devil as Viewed by the Ancient Hebrews;” “The Modern Problem of the Southern People, Social not Political;” “The Young Men of the South and their Present Duties;” “The American Crown;” “Women’s Religious and Social (not political) Emancipation;”“The Education of Mankind;” and “Moses Handling Electricity, or The Science of the Bible and Talmud.”

There is no evidence that he ever spoke on other than the first four of these subjects, and little evidence of contemporary rabbis addressing public audiences on any of them. The one known exception was Wise, who spoke widely on early Christianity as well as on certain aspects of the Talmud. Browne evidently chose to avoid commenting on political issues.33

Lectures became an even more popular form of entertainment with the birth of Chautauqua in 1874. The flourishing institution that began as a summer study course for Christian religious school teachers at a camp site in New York State, quickly burgeoned into a program for cultural improvement emulated in other attractive pastoral settings throughout America. It brought to its stages the greatest speakers, actors, writers and musicians of the day, with the most charismatic orators vigorously promoting their various beliefs.

Chautauqua also added impetus to a mushrooming of evangelical tent assemblies and other religious revival programs among the many Protestant sects competing for predominance.

Because of its emphasis on the Christian religion, this original Chautauqua was not a venue for rabbis, although it is possible that Browne occasionally appeared on its programs because of his lectures geared to Christians. Protestants in America at that time took great interest in learning about Jews and Judaism because the Jewish Bible—the Old Testament for Christians—was at the core of their religious belief. They considered Jews to be current descendants of the classical prophets whom they greatly revered.

In 1893, Rabbi Henry Berkowitz and other Jewish scholars founded a similar organization, the Jewish Chautauqua Society, with the cooperation of the existing Christian institution and along the same lines as the original. In this and other fields of communal service in the nineteenth century, American Jewry developed its outstanding system of social welfare and service institutions from models originally provided by denominations of the Christian Church.

Protestants at that time greatly feared that America would be negatively influenced by the large Catholic immigration from Ireland and Mediterranean countries, working people who were not prohibited as were most Protestants from the use of alcohol. Exploitation of labor was rampant, which led many immigrant workers to dilute their frustrations in saloons and barrooms. This produced still more misery for their families, many of which were abandoned by husbands and fathers unable to cope.34

Church groups responded by organizing a forceful anti-alcohol crusade, establishing mission houses and stepping up efforts to convert those whom the zealous missionaries regarded as non-believers. In such an atmosphere, Browne easily attracted crowds with his most popular subjects, “The Jews and Temperance; or How the Chosen People Keep Sober and Straight,” “The Talmud: Its Ethics and Literary Beauties;” and “The Crucifixion of Christ, or Have the Jews Actually Crucified Jesus of Nazareth?”35

After hearing Browne’s presentation on the Talmud, a reviewer in Chicago noted that it was written for Christians, “and for them the Talmud had an unusual interest.... The Rabbi is a lecturer of no mean attainments, and the subject he has chosen... of unusual interest and beauty... treated with rare judgement and skill, and to this is added a good voice and excellent delivery.” Another Chicago paper reported that Browne’s lecture on the Talmud was considered “one of the finest and more unique ever delivered in this city, the lecturer evincing a knowledge of the ancient literature of the Hebrews possessed by few persons.”36

Later, as a result of similar publicity, Browne was urged to address the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church. In 1885, he delivered the same message at the Methodist Episcopal Conference in New York. Invitations for the Talmud lecture increased, one of them producing a lengthy synopsis that revealed more historic and philosophic perspective than his original version presented in Montgomery eight years earlier. This time he added interesting historic background, noting that the Talmud had been condemned by Christian monarchs until the fifteenth century when the French king ordered that it be taught at the University of Paris; that the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian had protected it because it embodied the records of Jesus’s “closest relatives;” and that Martin Luther refrained from burning it along with Catholic documents at Wittenberg in1520, coincidentally the same year that it was first published by a Jewish press in Venice.37

Browne also added an anecdote about Rabbi Gamaliel that emphasized the Jews’ regard for education. He recalled that when Emperor Vespasian offered to grant the rabbi one wish before destroying Jerusalem, instead of asking him to spare the Temple, Gamaliel asked the emperor to spare the universities and yeshivas. This, said Browne, taught that “religion is useless unless based on knowledge.” The statement bordered on heresy for many religious people of his day who believed that faith—belief in Jesus as the Messiah—was the sole requirement.38

Concluding his address with an example of “what a liberal creed implies,” Browne used the metaphor of a doctor prescribing the same medication in three different forms for three patients with different preferences and needs but suffering from the same disease. When the doctor himself needed the prescription, he eschewed sweeteners and other means of making the medicine more palatable, swallowing the ingredients in their natural form. “So on with all the denominational recipes,” Browne declared. “When we come to the great physicians of the soul, like Christ and the Rabbi Hillel, we find the creed of love taught in its simple purity, without any denominational trimmings....”39

Thus did Browne seek to bring Judaism and Christianity together by stripping both of their diverse marketable embellishments. This tactic apparently resonated more with Christians than with Jews. A reviewer in Indianapolis wrote of Browne, “In point of brilliant scholarship and fine liberal tone, the most remarkable one heard in this city... he has no prejudices and expresses his views with the earnestness of an apostle and the liberality of a large minded scholar.... In manner the Doctor is vivacious, clear and highly entertaining.”40

A Jewish listener questioned the ecumenical aspect of the speech, objecting to Browne’s conclusion that both Jews and Christians would share equally in the hereafter if each lived up to his own religious beliefs. “Judaism and Christianity,” declared the dissenter, “cannot reasonably be accepted as two corresponding pieces of the same excellent article: if one is true, the other is not true.”

Wise identified the critic as one “who appears to have a distrust of all the present approved forms of religion, and who is classed among the very intelligent and shrewd freethinkers of the city.” This highlighted a tension between the Jewish yearning for acceptance via ecumenism and the inability on the part of many Jews to accept the validity of any other faith than their own or to view their own with its embellishments stripped away. Browne had attacked their conventional approach to ecumenism. Then and in the future, as he continued to speak frankly, he gained approval and admiration from Christians while drawing the disapproval of Jews.41

In November, 1876, Wise notified readers that Browne would leave shortly for a tour through the Southwest (then meaning west of Atlanta and east of Houston.) Noting that Browne “has engagements for all the larger cities... but we have no doubt that arrangements for smaller places can be made,” Wise urged people not to miss the opportunity “to procure a Jewish lecturer in places where there is no congregation... especially as the Doctor is able, eloquent and his lecture well worth hearing.” 42

That spring Browne traveled eastward across the Gulf states from Louisiana, where a reporter for the New Orleans Times praised his talk at the Rampart Street Synagogue as “the most entertaining and instructive... the people of New Orleans have ever heard or missed hearing for a long time.” 43

Crossing the Chattahoochee into Columbus, Georgia, Browne spoke on the historic Jewish view of the crucifixion, addressing an enthusiastic crowd of 125 that included “one colored Baptist Minister,” in the city’s historic Springer Opera House. A local reporter described the speaker as “able, systematic and forcible as we have ever had the pleasure of listening to....” He extolled Browne’s “power of illustration by analogizing” and his “vein of almost imperceptible humor, which was as subtle as is possible to conceive [as] fine, rich and highly enjoyable, though accompanied with due reverence.” Then the reporter, apologizing that he could not give the two and a half hour lecture a “thorough synopsis” due to its length, reviewed it at a length proportionate to its delivery.44

In this presentation Browne made some startling assertions about Jesus’s trial and betrayal, indicating that he knew about an obscure source, the Judas Gospel, that was mentioned in some medieval Christian texts, but not discovered in the original until the 1970s and undisclosed to the general public until 2006. Based partially on information contained in that document, Browne maintained that Jews were not responsible for the crucifixion because the timing and mode of Jesus’s trial was contrary to Jewish laws, because it was carried out by “scalawags” and Romans, because the judges and officers were bribed, and because all but two of the judges were illiterate in Hebrew (presumably meaning Hebrew law, because the people spoke Aramaic, not Hebrew, and the rulers spoke Latin.) Browne exonerated Judas on the grounds that the alleged betrayer was really trying to save Jesus, who had asked to be delivered to the priests for protection. Furthermore, since Judas was the disciples’ treasurer, he could have escaped with far more than thirty pieces of silver if profit had been his motive. Browne tagged Peter as the guilty one but did not say why.

Browne began his explanation of the crucifixion to his mostly Christian audience by giving a fictitious legal example set in 19th Century America. He then described a parallel case under Roman rule in Judea, where false messiahs constantly appeared promising to liberate the people. Their messianic claim was a political crime, for which the penalty was crucifixion.

“The captive nation cried in bitterness for the Messiah that would save it,” Browne asserted, for the nation was torn in fragments, many of which Jesus had been able to reconcile. Then, “in an unguarded moment, by Jesus’s dearest friend, he was declared to be the Messiah, the son of David, he who was to rescue the Jews from Roman bondage.” The indiscreet announcement caused the Nazarene to be betrayed and indicted for high treason.

Browne noted that the trial could not have been a Jewish one because 1) it lasted only a few hours, whereas “by Jewish law then prevailing” it would have taken three days; 2) it took place on a Friday, which was also contrary to Jewish law; and 3) it was said to have taken place on the Passover, “again impossible according to Jewish law.”A later reviewer quoted Browne as saying that, “in an unguarded moment” Peter declared Jesus to be the Messiah, come to rescue the Jews from Roman bondage--a crime greatly feared by the Roman authorities, and punishable by death.

By advancing the theory that an inadvertent remark rather than purposeful betrayal had led to Jesus’s death, Browne sought to disabuse Christians of the notion that Jews were responsible for the crucifixion. It is doubtful that he succeeded with many. Imbedded within centuries of indoctrination, the theory prevailed unchallenged by the Church until almost a century later.45

The Columbus reviewer wrote that Browne “attributed to Jesus a much more dignified character than is credited to him by Christians,” saying that he was “truly liberal throughout his discourse,” and possessed noble sentiments “worthy of any man... a gentleman of high culture, of profound thought, backed by extended [sic] reading.... We wish that his entire lecture would be published that the people might read and study.”46

While fate decreed otherwise about its publication, Browne’s lecture that evening did bring him good fortune. In the audience were four leaders of Atlanta’s Hebrew Benevolent Congregation. It is possible that they were there on a mission to choose a rabbi, for Browne had lectured in Atlanta the previous year on “The Talmud, Its Ethics and Literary Beauties” to good reviews. The Atlanta delegation was so impressed that the men returned home offering personally to pay for the completion of their synagogue building, halted due to lack of funds, if the congregation would engage Browne as its rabbi. Fortunately, Browne had just undergone an operation by an eminent eye surgeon in Texas which improved his condition sufficiently for him to accept the offer.47

The timing was fortuitous. On October 8, 1876, after five years of marriage, Sophie had finally borne a healthy child, a daughter whom they named Lylah Leah. Her arrival gave urgency to Browne’s need for a stable position.

Browne was ready. In these years, he became widely familiar with Middle America, intimately so with the communities of Evansville and Peoria where he had lived. He preached and published advanced ideas, often at odds with mainstream Jewry. Fortified by his understanding that science could be compatible with religion, he advocated both Darwinism and biblical criticism which were bitterly opposed by most rabbis as well as by the Christian clergy. His approach to ecumenism included stripping both Judaism and Christianity of their popularizing but extraneous embellishments, and explaining the crucifixion from the standpoint of the Judas gospel.

During his brief but highly successful tenure in Peoria, Browne broadened his reputation as a public orator and “ambassador to the gentiles,” established himself as a fighter for ecumenism and against agnosticism, furthered his activity as a journalist, and gained friends in the highest levels of government including the president himself.

Storm clouds began to rise in the distance, however. While still supported by Wise and embraced as a member of his family, Wise’s widowhood and remarriage, as well as his son Leo’s return, initiated changes in his relationship with Browne. As a delegate to the opening conference of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations in 1873, Browne fostered regulations that, while needed, were unpopular with the lay leaders whose support Wise required in order to reach his goal of establishing a seminary to train rabbis in America. Though unsuccessful, these proposals signaled Browne’s growing divergence from his teacher’s opinion on some issues, seeds of independence that questioned the former acolyte’s future reliability as an automatic supporter of the master’s views. These were dangerous waters for a young rabbi.