Saul Bellow on being a Jew and a writer — Part II
The New York Review of Books published the second of a two-part series that excerpted a lecture given by Saul Bellow in 1988 on being a Jewish writer in America.
As you may expect, there’s a lot to chew on when we read Bellow’s thoughts as he dissects his identity. He wades deep into philosophical discussions, particularly when he examines the connections between nihilism, Heidegger and the self.
Just before this passage, Bellow speaks about the nihilistic motives of the Nazis and other anti-Jewish forces. After this set-up, he goes into how being a Jew and a writer fits into this ongoing history:
Jewish writers, if they wish to exercise their option to reject the nihilistic temper, may do so, but it will be all the better for them—for us all—if they do not get themselves up as spokesmen for conscience or try to give the world the business, as it were, by their moralizing.
I never wished to avoid being recognized as a Jew in order to escape discrimination. I never cared enough, never granted anyone much power to discriminate against me—and now it is too late to bother about such matters. My view, a view widely held, is that there is no solution to the Jewish problem. Viciousness against Jews will never end in any foreseeable future; nor will the consciousness of being a Jew vanish, since the self-respect of Jews demands that they be faithful to their history and their culture, which is not so much a culture in the modern sense as it is a millennial loyalty to revelation and redemption.
A philosopher whose views on the subject of Judaism have influenced me says that those modern Jews for whom the old faith has gone will prize it as a noble delusion. Assimilation is an impossible—a repulsive—alternative. What is left to us is the contemplation of Jewish history. “The Jewish people and their fate are the living witness for the absence of redemption,” this philosopher writes. And he states further that the meaning of the chosen people is to testify to this:
At this point, Bellow quotes the philosopher Leo Strauss:
The Jews are chosen to prove the absence of redemption. It is supposed…that the world is not the creation of the just and living God, the Holy God, and that for the absence of righteousness and charity we sinful creatures are responsible. A delusion? A dream? But no nobler dream was ever dreamt.
In this context, suffering is indeed noble. Especially if it’s part of the master plan of creation. Of course, the question to ask is: what’s the end game? I think we’ll be waiting a long time if it’s up to us humans to realize how much we’re responsible for suffering in the world.
I can still pray for a better future, right?
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