Sejarah Zionisme, 1600-1918/Volume 1/Bab 53
CHAPTER LIII.
THE PRINCIPLES OF ZIONISM
Palestine as the Homeland—The rebirth of Jewish civilization—The security of public law—The aims of Political Zionism—A modern Commonwealth for the Jewish people.
We are afraid that some readers may feel a certain disappointment at the absence in this book of any formulation of what they would call “definite demands” in respect to Palestine. They may have expected a detailed scheme, showing what political conditions are proposed, whether “autonomy” is demanded or certain “privileges,” and so forth.
These details are of course very important, and will have to be considered in the near future. But we do not enter into them here for several reasons. In the first place, our aim has been mainly historical. We have been concerned with the past, and to some extent with the present, and any predictions with regard to the future would be out of place. Secondly, the precise nature of the measures that will be taken to realize Zionist aims must necessarily depend upon the future political position of Palestine. An arrangement that would suit one set of circumstances would be quite impossible in another. It is, therefore, useless to conjecture anything in advance. And, thirdly—and this is the most important consideration—the form of the scheme is, to our mind, a secondary matter. When once the principle of Zionism is ♦accepted—the principle of a Homeland for the Jewish people—the adoption of the best means for carrying out its object will follow.
We do, however, derive from history and experience certain conclusions as to the way in which the aim of Zionism can be achieved. These conclusions may be summarized as follows:—
I. The Homeland of the Jewish people must be in Palestine.
II. Palestine can and must be made capable of fulfilling its function by the method of patient colonization.
III. The security of public law—that is, of the recognition of the rightful claim of the Jewish people to regenerate Palestine and itself through Palestine—is a necessary condition of success.
As to the first point, experience has sufficiently shown that the Jew as colonist and as pioneer is at home only in Palestine. More or less successful attempts at settling Jews on the land have been made in the Argentine and elsewhere; but none of these settlements has any vital significance for Jewry at large. Their value begins and ends with the individuals who take part in them. With the Palestinian settlement it is quite otherwise. The heart of the Jewish people responds to the efforts of the Palestinian settlers: it recognizes in them not merely a number of individuals, but its own representatives, the vanguard of its struggle towards a new life. That is a natural consequence of the place which Palestine has held for centuries in the Jewish scheme of things. Opponents of Zionism have sometimes tried to reconcile conflicting points of view by admitting that “Palestine is not worse than any other country,” and that, therefore, “Jews should not be oppressed there,” and that “if there is a chance for colonization it should be taken.” But this is like telling a man that his mother is no worse than any other woman, or that his language is no worse than any other language. Such compromises cannot be seriously discussed. If Palestine is anything to Jews, it is the Land of Israel. But is Palestine capable of being the Land of Israel in anything but an ideal sense? and if so, how is this to be brought about?
We have come to think of Palestine as a barren land; but its apparent barrenness is not to be attributed to defects of soil or climate, as its productivity is in no degree impaired. The causes are the scantiness of population, lack of industry, skill, initiative and intelligence, and the want of a local administrative system to encourage the labour of husbandmen to productive activity. If these obstacles were removed and a little exertion bestowed upon it the soil would soon yield abundant crops of the richest grain, and plantations of all kinds would flourish; the country still answers the description given of it in days of old. A stronger proof of its fertility cannot be adduced than the fact that the territory of Judæa alone, at one period, brought into the field more than three hundred thousand, and at another two hundred and four score thousand “mighty men of valour” (2 Chron. xiv. 7). According to Flavius Josephus (37‒95 ?), Galilee alone had hundreds of towns and millions of inhabitants. Even if we do not accept these as exact figures, there is undoubtedly room for several millions of people in Palestine, particularly if the Trans-Jordanic regions are irrigated, the old roads repaired and the projected railway lines constructed. There may be room in the future even for several millions. The country only awaits repopulation and reconstruction.
This work of repopulation and reconstruction has already been begun by Jews, who have created the nucleus of a flourishing settlement in Palestine during the last thirty years. All this has to be expanded, increased, developed and protected; but the basis is there, and the lines of progress are sufficiently marked out. This is the way, and there is no other. The Zionist Organization, the Baron Edmond de Rothschild administration and the Chovevé Zion are competent, by virtue of their knowledge and their devotion to the work, to suggest the necessary improvements. They alone know how much they have had to suffer through all kinds of obstacles which impeded and delayed development, through the absence of security in consequence of disputed title deeds and inability to acquire landed property, through exorbitant taxes and many other hindrances. Whatever has been done, in spite of these hindrances, is nothing short of a miracle; and a hundred times more could be done, and certainly would have been done, had there been freedom and security. Given those necessary conditions, the Jewish people could find in Palestine a real Homeland, where it could live according to its own spirit and work out its own civilization.
Now, the fundamental notion of civilization is that of a progressive movement, of a gradual development from the less to the more perfect. It suggests to us immediately the greatest activity and the best possible organization of society, an organization calculated to produce a continual increase of wealth and power and their proper distribution among its members, so that their condition is kept in a state of constant improvement. But great as is the influence which a well-organized civil society must have upon the condition of its members, the term civilization conveys something still more comprehensive and more lofty than the mere perfection of social relations in the economic sphere. In this other aspect the word embraces the development of the intellectual and moral faculties of man, of his feelings, his propensities, his natural capacities and tastes. Civilization in both aspects has to be worked out by the Jews in their own way. The rebuilding of a Home in the economic sense is not the sole aim of Zionism. Living, national Judaism on historic lines, expressing and asserting itself throughout the whole range of human life, is the principal object of Zionist effort: to procure for Jewish individuality the possibility of regaining harmony with itself, and of reaching its highest possible perfection, like any other national individuality, is an essential part of the Zionist programme. In this sense Zionism means the rebirth of Jewish civilization (or, as it is frequently termed, “culture”—“Jewish culture”).
Jews are not anxious to acquire military power; they reject and condemn the idea of subjugating any other people. On the other hand, they have grown tired of their rôle of a homeless Chosen People, and would prefer to be a self-supporting “small nation,” with a quiet spot of earth for themselves. They want to be united in an organic community, to feel entirely at home, with their institutions, congregations, societies, settlements, schools and with their national language, literature and Press. That, neither more nor less, is what Zionists look to as the goal of their efforts.
The only serious opposition to a return of the Jews to the Holy Land—and here we come to our third point—is that which is based upon the insecurity of political and economic conditions in Palestine. Zionism, therefore, demands improvement in these respects.
But how is that improvement to be brought about? The answer is supplied by Political Zionism, with its insistence on the security of public law.
“Political” Zionism does not mean politics for politics’ sake, nor does it mean state building as an end in itself. “Political” Zionists know perfectly well that political recognition by itself is nothing; one has to be on the spot to toil and to labour, to work out one’s destiny, and without this systematic work all rights are futile, all political combinations useless. The Jewish agriculturists, working-men, artisans, teachers and artists who have gone to Palestine to settle there, and those who are still to go, know better than all the preachers of Jewish spirituality what the essence of the Jewish character and aspirations should be and is: they not only know it, they help to make it, in the highest sense of the word. They are Jews, idealists, the People of the Book; all they seek for is life in peace. Without practical work in Palestine Zionism would have been one of a thousand futile political schemes, whereas now it is a solid national movement, the colonies being its most powerful argument, even from the strictly political point of view. But none the less some guarantee of security is indispensable. It makes no difference whether we lay more stress on culture or agriculture (the various activities have to be judiciously combined and balanced); in practice the importance of political and legal securities is too obvious to need particular emphasis. The reader of this book will have realized that this idea is no new-fangled invention of Zionism: it has been at the root of the attitude of various Governments which for generations have been occupied with the Near Eastern question. The innumerable schemes of reform suggested by England, France and other Powers during last century; the English projects of 1840; Great Britain’s protection of the Jews in the East; Lord Shaftesbury’s proposals; Sir Moses Montefiore’s negotiations with Mehemet Ali; the “Memorandum of the European Monarchs” of 1840; the suggestions for reform after the Crimean War—all these schemes and efforts, suggestions and demands presupposed the point of view which is expressed in “political” Zionism. The autonomy granted in 1860 to the Christians of the Lebanon, owing to the efforts of England and France, was a scheme very similar to that which Zionism contemplates for the Jews in Palestine. The idea was much the same as that in the Basle Programme: security, guaranteed by the Government of the country and other powers, for a successful settlement and the free development of a particular section of the population.
The Jewish settlers in Palestine will have to attach themselves to the soil, and to build up the superstructure of a complete settlement upon the model of their own ideas and spirit. In place of the existing forty to fifty Jewish colonies, Zionism wants four hundred to five hundred colonies. In place of the model town Tel-Aviv Zionists want a hundred Tel-Avivs. They want as many schools and libraries, a University and factories and workshops. There is a clever saying:—
“Narrative is linear, action is cubic.”
Happily, the stage of action has been entered in Palestine; we need only action on a larger scale. And for this enlargement and extension of its activities, for this colonization work which means the reopening and regeneration of a neglected country, Zionism needs such special facilities and protective measures as the Basle Programme contemplates when it speaks of a home for the Jewish people secured by public law. The formula may be varied, but the sense is abundantly clear: it means such rights and assurances as will, in existing conditions, help to lay the foundations of a modern Commonwealth for the Jewish people.
It has been thought by many that a Chartered Company would be the appropriate instrument for achieving this object; others have thought of concessions to the Zionist Organization and its financial institutions. But these questions of detail matter little at present. The form will be decided by general conditions; the principle is a Home secured as far as possible, and behind this again there is the great and profound idea of the reunion of the Jewish Nation with its nobler self. This idea has obtained currency and spread continually: it has progressed outwardly and inwardly taken shape, and has done more than any other idea to awaken and rekindle the powers of the Jewish race. It is an impulse of the national soul towards self-discovery and self-expression, and history testifies to the fact that all genuine impulses of this kind have attained their object.
The quotations which we have brought together in this book show us an unbroken chain of opinion that extends over several generations in England and in France. Throughout we observe the same convergence of ideal, practical and political reasons in support of the Zionist idea. Zionism is, indeed, not less practical for being based on sentiment. Englishmen have always been practical enough to be idealists, and it is not surprising that Zionism has always met with the greatest sympathy in England. This was the case even in the earlier stages of the Zionist idea, when there was no clear programme and no real activity. Now, when Zionism has a clear programme and has years of activity behind it, English interest in Zionism naturally grows stronger and deeper.
Zionism has, then, every reason to hope for the sympathy and support of the most enlightened Powers in its effort to secure the conditions necessary for the prosecution of its work in Palestine. But the achievement of a political success with this or that Power must never be mistaken for the real aim of Zionism. Its real aim is the regeneration—physical, economic, moral—of the Jewish people. That is a constructive task of the highest value from the point of view of humanity, and those who set their hands to such a task need many high qualities—patience and tenacity of purpose, experience and foresight. Above all, they need the gifts of imagination and optimism, without which no great object has ever been achieved. So at last the great day will dawn, and the task of Zionism will be accomplished.