Everything about Heinrich Graetz totally explained
Heinrich Graetz (
October 31,
1817 -
September 7,
1891) was amongst the first historians to write a comprehensive history of the
Jewish people from a Jewish perspective.
Born Tzvi Hirsh Graetz to a butcher family in Książ-Wielkopolski (
Poznań) in
Germany (now in
Poland), he obtained his doctorate from the
University of Jena. After
1845 he was principal of the
Jewish Orthodox school of the
Breslau community, and later taught history at the Jewish Theological Seminary in
Breslau (now
Wrocław, Poland). His
magnum opus History of the Jews was quickly translated into other languages and ignited worldwide interest in Jewish history. In
1869 the
University of Breslau granted him the title of Honorary professor, in 1888 he was appointed an Honorary member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Sciences.
Biography
Graetz received his first instruction at
Zerkov, where his parents had relocated, and in 1831 was sent to Wollstein, where he attended the
yeshivah up to 1836, acquiring
secular knowledge by private study. The "Neunzehn Briefe von Ben Uziel" (see
Samson Raphael Hirsch) made a powerful impression on him; and he resolved to prepare himself for academic studies in order to champion the cause of
Orthodox Judaism. His first intention was to go to
Prague, to which place he was attracted by the fame of its old yeshibah and the facilities afforded by the university. Being rejected by the immigration officers, he returned to Zerkov and wrote to S. R. Hirsch, then rabbi of Oldenburg, intimating his desire. Hirsch offered him a home in his house. Graetz arrived there on May 8, 1837, and spent three years with his patron as a pupil, companion, and amanuensis. In
1840 he accepted a tutorship with a family at
Ostrowo, and in Oct.,
1842, he entered the
University of Breslau.
At that time the controversy between Orthodoxy and
Reform Judaism was at its height, and Graetz, true to the principles which he'd imbibed from Hirsch, began his literary career by writing contributions to the "Orient," edited by
Julius Fürst, in which he severely criticized the Reform party, as well as Geiger's text-book of the
Mishnah ("Orient," 1844). These contributions and his championship of the Conservative cause during the time of the rabbinical conferences made him popular with the Orthodox party. This was especially the case when he agitated for a vote of confidence to be given to
Zacharias Frankel after he'd left the
Frankfurt conference because of the stand which the majority had taken on the question of the
Hebrew language. After Graetz had obtained his degree of Ph.D. from the
University of Jena (his dissertation being "De Auctoritate et Vi Quam Gnosis in Judaismum Habuerit,"
1845; published a year later under the title "
Gnosticismus und Judenthum"), he was made principal of a religious school founded by the Conservatives. In the same year he was invited to preach a trial sermon before the congregation of
Gleiwitz,
Silesia, but failed completely.
He remained in
Breslau until
1848, when, upon the advice of a friend, he went to Vienna, purposing to follow a journalistic career. On the way he stopped at
Nikolsburg, where
Samson Raphael Hirsch was residing as Moravian chief rabbi. Hirsch, who then contemplated the establishment of a rabbinical seminary, employed Graetz temporarily as teacher at
Nikolsburg, and afterward gave him a position as principal of the Jewish school in the neighboring city of Lundenburg (
1850). In Oct., 1850, Graetz married Marie Monasch of Krotoschin. It seems that Hirsch's departure from Nikolsburg had an influence on Graetz's position; for in 1852 the latter left
Lundenburg and went to Berlin, where he delivered a course of lectures on Jewish history before rabbinical students. They don't seem to have been successful. Meantime his advocacy of Frankel's course had brought him into close contact with the latter, for whose magazine he frequently wrote articles; and accordingly in
1854 he was appointed a member of the teaching staff of the seminary at Breslau, over which Frankel presided. In this position he remained up to his death, teaching history and Bible exegesis, with a preparatory course on the
Talmud. In
1869 the government conferred upon him the title of professor, and thenceforward he lectured at
Breslau University.
In
1872 Graetz went to
Palestine in the company of his friend
Gottschalck Levy of
Berlin, for the purpose of studying the scenes of the earliest period of Jewish history, which he treated in volumes one and two of his history, published in
1874-76; these volumes brought that great work to a close. While in Palestine he gave the first impetus to the foundation of an orphan asylum there. He also took a great interest in the progress of the
Alliance Israélite Universelle, and participated as a delegate in the convention assembled at Paris in 1878 in the interest of the
Romanian Jews. Graetz's name was prominently mentioned in the
anti-Semitic controversy, especially after
Treitschke had published his "Ein Wort über Unser Judenthum" (1879-1880), in which the latter, referring to the eleventh volume of the history, accused Graetz of hatred of
Christianity and of bias against the
German people, quoting him as a proof that the Jews could never assimilate themselves to their surroundings.
This arraignment of Graetz had a decided effect upon the public. Even friends of the Jews, like
Mommsen, and advocates of Judaism within the Jewish fold expressed their condemnation of Graetz's passionate language. It was due to this comparative unpopularity that Graetz wasn't invited to join the commission created by the union of German Jewish congregations (
Deutsch-Israelitischer Gemeindebund) for the promotion of the study of the history of the Jews of Germany (
1885). On the other hand, his fame spread to foreign countries; and the promoters of the
Anglo-Jewish Exhibition invited him in 1887 to open the Exhibition with a lecture. The seventieth anniversary of his birthday was the occasion for his friends and disciples to bear testimony to the universal esteem in which he was held among them; and a volume of scientific essays was published in his honor ("Jubelschrift zum 70. Geburtstage des Prof. Dr. H. Graetz," Breslau, 1887). A year later (Oct. 27,
1888) he was appointed an honorary member of the
Spanish Academy, to which, as a token of his gratitude, he dedicated the third edition of the eighth volume of his history.
As usual he spent the summer of
1891 in
Carlsbad; but alarming symptoms of heart disease forced him to discontinue his use of the waters. He went to Munich to visit his son
Leo, a professor at the
university of that city, and died there after a brief illness. He was buried in Breslau. Besides Leo, Graetz left three sons and one daughter.
Works
History of the Jews
To posterity Graetz will be chiefly known as the Jewish historian, although he did considerable work in the field of
exegesis also. His "Geschichte der Juden" superseded all former works of its kind, notably that of
Jost, in its day a very remarkable production; and it has been translated into many languages. The fourth volume, beginning with the period following the destruction of Jerusalem, was published first. It appeared in
1853; but the publication wasn't a financial success, and the publisher refused to continue it. Fortunately the publication society
Institut zur Förderung der Israelitischen Litteratur, founded by
Ludwig Philippson, had just come into existence, and it undertook the publication of the subsequent volumes, beginning with the third, which covered the period from the death of
Judas Maccabeus to the destruction of the
Temple of Jerusalem. This was published in 1856 and was followed by the fifth, after which the volumes appeared in regular succession up to the eleventh, which was published in 1870 and brought the history down to 1848, with which year the author closed, not wishing to include living persons.
In spite of this reserve he gravely offended the Liberal party, which inferred, from articles that Graetz contributed to the "Monatsschrift", that he'd show little sympathy for the Reform element, and therefore refused to publish the volume unless the manuscript was submitted for examination. This Graetz refused to do; and the volume therefore appeared without the support of the publication society. Volumes i. and ii. were published, as stated above, after Graetz had returned from Palestine. These volumes, of which the second practically consisted of two, appeared in 1872-75, and completed the stupendous undertaking. For more popular purposes Graetz published later an abstract of his work under the title "Volksthümliche Geschichte der Juden," in which he brought the history down to his own time.
A translation into English was begun by
S. Tuska, who in 1867 published in
Cincinnati a translation of part of vol. ix. under the title "Influence of Judaism on the
Protestant Reformation". The fourth volume was translated by James K. Gutheim under the auspices of the American Jewish Publication Society, the title being "History of the Jews from the Down-fall of the
Jewish State to the Conclusion of the Talmud" (New York, 1873).
A five-volume English edition was published in London in 1891-92 as
History of the Jews from the Earliest Times to the Present Day, In 5 vols. By Professor H Graetz, Edited and in part translated by Bella Löwy. According to a review in the January-April 1893 edition of
Quarterly Review, it "was passing through the press in its English version, and had received the author's final touches, when Graetz died in September 1891".
Exegesis
Graetz's historical studies, extending back to
Biblical times, naturally led him into the field of exegesis. As early as the fifties he'd written in the "Monatsschrift" essays dealing with exegetical subjects, as "Fälschungen in dem Texte der LXX." (1853) and "Die Grosse Versammlung: Keneset Hagedola " (1857); and with his translation of and commentaries on Ecclesiastes and Canticles (Breslau, 1871) he began the publication of separate exegetical works. A commentary and translation of the Psalms followed (ib. 1882-83). Toward the end of his life he planned an edition of the whole Hebrew Bible with his own textual emendations. A prospectus of this work appeared in 1891. Shortly before the author's death, a part of it,
Isaiah and
Jeremiah, was issued in the form in which the author had intended to publish it; the rest contained only the textual notes, not the text itself. It was edited, under the title "Emendationes in Plerosque Sacræ Scripturæ Veteris Testamenti Libros," by W. Bacher (Breslau, 1892-94).
The most characteristic features of Graetz's exegesis are his bold textual emendations, which often substitute something conjectural for the
Masoretic text, although he always carefully consulted the ancient versions. He also determined with too much certainty the period of a Biblical book or a certain passage, when at best there could only be a probable hypothesis. Thus his hypothesis of the origin of
Ecclesiastes at the time of
Herod the Great, while brilliant in its presentation, is hardly tenable. His textual emendations display fine tact, and of late they've become more and more respected and adopted.
Other literary work
Graetz's activity wasn't limited to his special field. He enriched other branches of Jewish science, and wrote here and there on general literature or on questions of the day. His essay "Die Verjüngung des Jüdischen Stammes," in Wertheimer-Kompert's "Jahrbuch für Israeliten," vol. x., Vienna, 1863 (reprinted with comments by Th. Zlocisti, in "Jud. Volks-Kalender," p. 99, Brünn, 1903), caused a suit to be brought against him by the clerical anti-Semite
Sebastian Brunner for libeling the Jewish religion. As Graetz wasn't an
Austrian subject the suit was nominally brought against
Kompert as editor, and the latter was fined (Dec. 30, 1863). Within the Jewish fold the lawsuit also had its consequences, as the Orthodox raised against Graetz the accusation of heresy because he'd denied the personal character of the prophetic
Messiah. To the field of general literature belongs also his essay on "
Shylock," published in the "Monatsschrift," 1880. In the early years of the anti-Semitic movement he wrote, besides the articles in which he defended himself against the accusations of Treitschke, an anonymous essay entitled "Briefwechsel einer Englischen Dame über Judenthum und Semitismus," Stuttgart, 1883. To supplement his lectures on Jewish literature he published an anthology of Neo-Hebraic poetry under the title "Leḳeṭ Shoshannim" (Breslau, 1862), in which he committed the mistake of reading the verses of a poem horizontally instead of vertically, which mistake Geiger mercilessly criticized ("Jüd. Zeit." i. 68-75). A very meritorious work was his edition of the
Jerusalem Talmud in one volume(Krotoschin, 1866). A bibliography of his works has been given by
Israel Abrahams in "The
Jewish Quarterly Review" (iv. 194-203).
Legacy
Graetz's history became very popular and influential in its time. The material for Jewish history being so varied, the sources so scattered in the literatures of all nations, and the chronological sequence so often interrupted, made the presentation of this history as a whole a very difficult undertaking; and it can not be denied that Graetz performed his task with consummate skill, that he mastered most of the details while not losing sight of the whole. Another reason for the popularity of the work is its sympathetic treatment. This history of the Jews isn't written by a cool observer, but by a warm-hearted Jew. On the other hand, some of these commendable features are at the same time shortcomings. The impossibility of mastering all the details made Graetz inaccurate in many instances. A certain imaginative faculty, which so markedly assisted him in his textual emendations of the Bible, led him to make a great number of purely arbitrary statements. Typical in this respect is the introductory statement in the first volume: "On a bright morning in spring nomadic tribes penetrated into Palestine," while the Bible, which is his only source, states neither that it was in spring nor that it was on a bright morning. His passionate temper often carried him away, and because of this the eleventh volume is certainly marred. Graetz doesn't seem to possess the fairness necessary for a historian, who has to understand every movement as an outgrowth of given conditions, when he calls
David Friedländer a "Flachkopf" (xi. 173) and "
Moses Mendelssohn's ape" (ib. p. 130), or when he says of
Samuel Holdheim that since the days of
Paul of Tarsus Judaism never had such a bitter enemy (ib. p. 565). His preconceived opinions very often led him to conclusions which were not borne out and were even frequently disproved by the sources. His feelings often led him to make unwarranted attacks on Christianity which have given rise to very bitter complaints. All these short-comings, however, are outbalanced by the facts that the work of presenting the whole of Jewish history was undertaken, that it was executed in a readable form, and that the author enriched Jewish history by the discovery of many an important detail.
Bibliography
- Geschichte der Juden (History of the Jews) in 11 vol., 1853–75
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