Table Of ContentTHE JEWISH WRITINGS
JEWISH WRITINGS
Hannah Arendt
Editedby
JeromeKahnandRonH.Feldman
SCHOCKEN BOOKS, NEW YORK
Copyright©2007byTheLiteraryTrust
ofHannahArendtandJeromeKohn
Introductioncopyright©2007byRonH.Feldman
Translationof"TheProfessionalReclassificationofYouth,""AGuidefor
Youth:MartinBuber,"and"SomeYoungPeopleAreGoingHome"
copyright©2007byCatherineTemerson.Translationof"AgainstPrivate
Circles,""OriginalAssimilation,"andafterwordbyEdnaBrocke,
'''BigHannah'-MyAunt,"copyright©2007byJamesMcFarland
Allrightsreserved.PublishedintheUnitedStatesbySchockenBooks,adivi
sionofRandomHouse,Inc.,NewYork,andinCanadabyRandomHouse
ofCanadaLimited,Toronto.
SchockenBooksandcolophonareregisteredtrademarksof
RandomHouse,Inc.
Theafterwordinthisedition,"'BigHannah'-MyAunt,"istranslatedfrom
anunpublished GermanessaybyEdnaBrocke,copyright©2007byEdna
Brocke.Translationof"TheEnlightenmentandtheJewishQuestion,""The
JewishQuestion," "Antisemitism," "TheMinorityQuestion," "TheJewish
War ThatIsn't Happening," "Between Silenceand Speechlessness," "The
Political Organization of the Jewish People," "Jewish Politics," "A Way
toward the Reconciliation of Peoples," "A Crisis of Zionism," and "The
Eichmann Trial and the Germans: A Conversation with Thilo Koch" by
JohnE.Woods,copyright©2007bySchockenBooks,adivisionofRandom
House, Inc. The essay "Stefan Zweig: Jews in the World of Yesterday,"
translated by Susannah Young-ah Gottlieb, is taken from Hannah Arendt:
Reflections on Art and Literature, edited by Susannah Young-ah Gottlieb,
copyright© 2007bytheBoardofTrusteesoftheLelandStanfordJr. Uni
versity,publishedbyStanfordUniversityPress.Allrightsreserved.Grateful
acknowledgment is made to Peters Fraser & Dunlop Group Ltd. for per
mission to reprint an excerpt from "Where Are the War Poets?" from
The CompletePoemsbyC.Day-Lewis. Copyright© 1992byTheEstateof
C.Day-Lewis. ReprintedbypermissionofPetersFraser& Dunlop Group
Ltd.(www.pfd.co.uk)onbehalfoftheEstateofC.Day-Lewis.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Arendt,Hannah,19°6-197;.
TheJewishwritings/ HannahArendt;prefacebyJeromeKohn;
introductionbyRonH.Feldman
p. cm.
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN:978-0-8°;2-4238-6
I.Jews-HistorY-I789-194;. 2.Jews-HistorY-194;
3·Antisemitism. 4·Zionism. ;.Holocaust,Jewish(1939-194;)
I.Kohn,Jerome. II.Feldman,RonH. III.Title.
DSI2;.A662007
30;.892'4-dC22 2006044380
www.schocken.com
BookdesignbyPeterA.Andersen
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
FirstEdition
24 6 897 ; 3 I
CONTENTS
Preface:AJewishLife: 1906-1975byJeromeKohn ix
ANoteontheText xxxiii
PublicationHistory xxxvii
Introduction:TheJewasPariah:TheCase
ofHannahArendt(1906-1975)byRonH.Feldman xli
I
THE 1930s
TheEnlightenmentandtheJewishQuestion 3
AgainstPrivateCircles 19
OriginalAssimilation:AnEpiloguetotheOneHundredth
AnniversaryofRahelVarnhagen'sDeath 22
TheProfessionalReclassificationofYouth 29
AGuideforYouth:MartinBuber 31
SomeYoungPeopleAreGoingHome 34
TheGustloffTrial 38
TheJewishQuestion 42
Antisemitism 46
II
THE 1940s
TheMinorityQuestion 125
TheJewishWarThatIsn'tHappening:ArticlesfromAuftau,
October1941-November1942 134
BetweenSilenceandSpeechlessness:ArticlesfromAuftau,
February1943-March1944 186
ThePoliticalOrganizationoftheJewishPeople:ArticlesfromAuftau,
April 1944-April1945 199
Contents
JewishPolitics 241
WhytheCremieuxDecreeWasAbrogated 244
NewLeadersAriseinEurope 254
AWaytowardtheReconciliationofPeoples 258
WeRefugees 264
TheJewasPariah:AHiddenTradition 275
CreatingaCulturalAtmosphere 298
JewishHistory,Revised 303
TheMoralofHistory 312
StefanZweig:JewsintheWorldofYesterday 317
TheCrisisofZionism 329
HerzlandLazare 338
ZionismReconsidered 343
TheJewishState:FiftyYearsAfter,WhereHave
Herzl'sPoliticsLed? 375
ToSavetheJewishHomeland 388
TheAssetsofPersonality:AReviewof Chaim Wei{mann:
Statesman, Scientist, BuilderoftheJewish Commonwealth 402
SingleTrackto Zion:AReviewof TrialandError:
TheAutobiographyofChaim Wei{mann 405
TheFailureofReason:TheMissionofBernadotte 408
About"Collaboration" 414
NewPalestineParty:VisitofMenachemBegin
andAimsofPoliticalMovementDiscussed 417
III
THE 1950s
PeaceorArmisticeintheNearEast? 423
Magnes,theConscienceoftheJewishPeople 451
TheHistoryoftheGreatCrime:AReviewof
Breyiairedelahaine:LeIIrReichetlesjuifi[BreyiaryofHate:
The ThirdReichandtheJews] byLeonPoliakov 453
Contents
IV
THE 1960s
TheEichmannControversy:
ALettertoGershomScholem 465
AnswerstoQuestionsSubmittedbySamuelGrafton 472
TheEichmannCaseandtheGermans:
AConversationwithThiloKoch 485
TheDestructionofSixMillion:AJewish WOrldSymposium 490
"TheFormidableDr.Robinson":
AReplybyHannahArendt 496
Afterword: "BigHannah"-MyAuntbyEdnaBrocke )12
Acknowledgments 523
Index )27
PREFACE
AJewish Life: l906-l975
Jerome Kohn
"The human sense of reality demands that men actualize the sheer passive
givennessoftheirbeing, notinordertochangeitbutinordertomakeartic
ulate and call into full existence what otherwise they would have to suffer
passivelyanyhow."
I
I deliberatelybegin with aquotation from The Human Condition (1958),
unquestionablyoneofHannahArendt'smostread, studied,andscrutinized
works,andoneinwhichthereishardlyanymentionofJews,Jewishaffairs,
orJewishhistory. Indeed, theonlydiscussion thatmightbe called "Jewish"
takes place in the book's last chapter, "The Vita Actiya and the Modern
Age," in the penultimate section on "Life as the Highest Good." There
Arendt shows anegative interest in the Decalogue: the way it "enumerates
theoffenseofmurder," shewrites, "withoutanyspecialemphasis, amonga
number of other transgressions," does not make "preservation of life the
cornerstoneofthelegalsystemoftheJewishpeople."Shegoesontodistin
guish "the Hebrewlegal code" as occupyingan "intermediaryposition ...
betweenpaganantiquityandallChristianorpost-Christianlegalsystems,"a
position that "may be explicable by the Hebrew creed," she says, "which
stresses the potential immortality of the people, as distinguished from the
paganimmortalityoftheworldononesideandtheChristianimmortalityof
individuallifeontheother."2
Althoughthatimportantdistinctionismadeintheonlyovertly "Jewish"
passagein The Human Condition, Iwanttosuggestthatthesenseofthefirst
sentenceIquotedfrom thesamework-whichmakesthegeneralclaimthat
"the human sense of reality demands" all human beings to "actualize" the
LX
Description:Although Hannah Arendt is not primarily known as a Jewish thinker, she probably wrote more about Jewish issues than any other topic. When she was in her mid-twenties and still living in Germany, Arendt wrote about the history of German Jews as a people living in a land that was not their own. In 193
