As to Graetz, in the context of the 1860′s, he could not have been considered observant. Too bad he didn’t live a century later!

Given that the Greeks viewed history as cyclical, whereas Jews viewed history as having a beginning and an end, it is understandable why it was the Jews who produced the Tanakh, which is essentially a history book (and an antisemitic one at that!).

But why did the Jews stop producing history? Between the time of Josephus and the Spanish Expulsion, we find almost no history books. Why do you think this is? This is something I’ve been trying to figure out, and I haven’t arrived at a satisfactory answer. Thank you.

Now, then, two criticisms of your post:

(1) You speak derisively of “modern liberal democratic values”. I might respectfully request that you please rescind the inclusion of “democratic” in that litany. If you read the history of democracy, you’ll find that democracy as we know it has little to do with either Greece (where majoritarian tyranny devoid of civil rights was the norm) or with Enlightenment France (where a decidedly negative view of religion and the Bible was found, and a equalitarian, nearly socialistic philosophy was popular). Rather, democracy as we know it comes from Britain and Holland, especially due to the Calvinists. It all began with Huldrych Zwingli and and Heinrich Bullinger telling John Knox that a good G-d-believing Torah-observant Protestant would of course disobey a G-dless idolatrous Torah-hating Catholic. The idea was that the rule-of-law and morality and the constitution ( = the Torah) comes before whatever any mere mortal might say. Authority was transferred from humans (whether the pope or the king) to G-d (and the constitution He wrote). John Locke complicated things when he added religious tolerance to the mix, whereas previous Calvinists like Samuel Rutherford had little use for such ideas. But even Locke was quite religious by our standards, as were the American revolutionaries; the king of England referred to the American Revolution as the “Presbyterian Rebellion”. What we see is that democracy was created by the Calvinists as a theocratic alternative to secular absolutist monarchy. Whatever the leftists today like to rewrite history to say, the fact is that the original liberals (or libertarians) were also theocrats. Democracy was always G-d-centered; just read the Declaration of Independence, with its references to “nature’s G-d and the G-d of nature”, “endowed by their Creator”, and Divine Providence (in the last paragraph). In fact, it was John Wycliffe, the 14th-century proto-Protestant translator of the Bible, who wrote that “The Bible is for the government of the people, by the people, and for the people.” (By the way: Israeli leftists who criticize IDF insubordinate soldiers as being un-democratic, these leftists haven’t the faintest clue what they’re talking about. IDF soldiers who refuse to expel settlers are the most democratic people in Israel.)

(2) You refer to Graetz as leaving observance. Now, Graetz might have adopted some questionable beliefs, and perhaps he even became lax in certain practices (I don’t know), but I think it’s saying too much to say that he dropped observance. He was closer to early Conservative Judaism, or perhaps Conservadox Judaism, than he was to Reform. I don’t know if he kept bishul aqum or not, for example, but I’m sure he ate only shekhted meat, etc.

But other than that, nice post. Thank you!

If you reply to any of what I’ve written, could you please alert me at mikewinddale@gmail.com? Thanks!

Sincerely,
Michael Makovi