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Two German Authors
Paul Gordan, O.S.B.

The Jew, Luise Rinser and Gertrud von le Port
Jewish writers, from the time of Moses Mendelsohn to the early days of Nazism, play an important part in German literature, but the Jew as a literary figure finds astonishingly little mention. There is, of course, Henri Heine's unfinished story Der Rabbi von Bacharach, and his collection of poems, Prinzessin Sabbath. There arc others, too, for instance Stefano Zweig, Franz Werfel, Else Lasker-Schiller, and, above all, Nelly Sachs. However, it cannot be said that Jewish writers have introduced Jewish figures into German literature. It would even seem that the majority, consciously or unconsciously, have avoided creating Jewish characters or writing about Jewish subjects, through shame perhaps, or maybe to hide their own origin. All the great Germanliterature produced by Jews shows an apparently successful process of assimilation, a too complete symbiosis, because it has come about at the expense of lost identity.
Since Jewish writers have not portrayed the Jew to the average German reader, to whom has this task fallen? Three names can be mentioned and three works of very different value: Shakespeare and his Merchant of Venice, naturalized German by his great translators; Lessing's Nathan der Weise, Gustav Freytag's abject figure of Veitel Itzig in his bourgeois novel Soll and Haber:. (As this article is dealing only with literature, Hitler's Mein Kampf, and writings of other antisemitic pamphleteers of the Nazi period will not be included.)
The shock of the apocalyptic catastrophe of 1945 awakened the sensitivity of some German writers, inciting them to render justice to the Jewish victims of such appalling hatred and persecution. In spite of the famous dictum, "Poetry can no longer be written after Auschwitz", writers were not wanting who took inspiration from the tragedy of which they were the horrified and impotent witnesses. With the protestant minister Albert Goes (Das Brandopkr), two Catholic women writers must be mentioned: Luise Rinser and Gertrud von le Fort. each of whom in her own particular style, has traced Jewish destiny in little chefs d'oeuvre.

The story of Jan Lobel aus Warschau by Luise Rinser (S. Fischer Verlag, Frankfurt-amMain, 80 pages) is tellingly and briefly described by an imaginary woman witness, who, during the last months of the war had to work in a market garden run by two young women, the wife of the absent owner (away at the front) and his daughter by a previous marriage. One day SS troups pass through the village, dragging behind them a miserable group of prisoners from a concentration camp. One of them manages to escape with the help of the young woman. He is Jan Lobel, a Jew from Warsaw, whose entire family, including wife and children, have been exterminated by the Nazi hordes. He is kept in hiding, nursed, cared for in secret, but his presence disturbs those about him (rather like the arrival of the mysterious young man in Pasolini's Th'eoreme), exercizing a different influence on each one: the two women, the odd workman and the strange, wild son of the absent proprietor.
The war over, Jan Lobel stays on. Where could he go? Everyone likes him, having fallen under the charm of this young man living in a house which has been without its man for a long time. The atmosphere becomes heavy, then heated, caused by petty jealousy, and the evil tongues of the village do their work. When the owner returns he sums up the situation at once, is rather dazed by it, but finally accepts it. Jan Lobel, however, leaves quietly, without tny fuss, without any scenes. Later it is learned chat he has been drowned near Trieste while Attempting to embark clandestinely on a boat for Palestine.

Jan Lobel is a Polish Jew; his fate would have been the same had he been just a Polish or French intellectual enemy of the invader. His sadness, his appearance, his few words and gests are characteristically Jewish, and quite obviously the author is as sympathetic towards him as the two women in the story are loving and tender towards him. But, the crux of the story is not the problem or the mystery of the Jew; religion is never mentioned, race plays no part in it, all the interest is centred in psychological facts, the different reactions to a man who awakens a whole gamut of feelings in women: pity, tenderness, generosity, heroism, erotic passion, blind jealousy, painful renunciation. All this is described with perfect art, an extraordinary delicacy of psychological touch, consummate refinement and a very noble and restrained sense of dedication. However, it must be admitted that although Jan Lobel aus Warschau is a literary work of high value and very deep compassion, it is no more than that, though that is already quite something!

Another fifteen years were to pass before another message was to be given — symbolically this time — and in a different way, witness of other dimensions of feeling. Gertrud von le Fort, at the age of 90, gave us the legend of Die Tochter Jephthas (Inself Verlag, Frankfurt-amMain, 34 pages), a theological interpretation of the mystery of Israel, whose poetic charm touches the heart, and whose wonderful imagery illumines reason seeking understanding of faith.
The scene is a small Spanish town at the time of the Catholic kings; the law for the expulsion of the Jews has just been promulgated, but the beginning of their exodus coincides with an outbreak of plague. The frightened citizens want to keep the famous Jewish doctor, Rabbi Charon ben Israel, to fight the illness. This Jew, who is as good a logician as doctor, sees the hour of vengeance approaching. He does not want to care for the enemies of his people, he wants to leave with his own; and in this desire he finds an unexpected ally in the person of the archbishop of the town, a young, impetuous fanatic who will not tolerate any deviation from the general edict. In an argument between them, the Jew wins the day. The archbishop: "Wretched Jew! you rejoice at not having to care for the people of this town, because you and your kind hate Christians. If you were a Christian yourself, you would be distressed at not being able to help chose whom you consider your enemies". The Jew: -Do Christians, then, love those whom they consider their enemies?" Alone in the half destroyed synagogue, he promises the God of his fathers a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. Like the Judge Jephthah, he offers what he holds dearest (Judges 11:30 ff).

Now, Charon ben Israel has a daughter of exquisite beauty, unlimited kindness and untainted purity, but she is blind. A young artist who had been commissioned to sculpture the two statues of the Church and the Synagogue for the porch of the Cathedral saw her one day, kissed her tenderly without making himself known, and chose her as model for the statue of the Synagogue, leaving her unblindfolded contrary to traditional iconography. The daughter, struck down by the plague, dies in the arms of her father who is powerless to save her. Before dying she implores him to cure the young man who had given her the dream-like kiss, and to save the other victims of the plague — his brethren. Left alone in the town, the doctor endures a bitter struggle within himself.
One night, there is a knock at his door; the archbishop has sent for him. Triumph seemsto be complete. By refusing treatment he can kill his enemy. But he is mistaken. The archbishop himself takes him to the young sculptor who is dying, and in his workshop the doctor sees the wonderful statue of the Synagogue, and he feels that he is in the presence of his beloved daughter whose last desire he must fulfil. The archbishop, too, has understood. was looking for a Synagogue and found Mary. At the last judgement, we shall not be judged on whether we have the true faith, but on true love and mercy'.
The symbolism of this story is as simple as its language. The encounter between Charon ben Israel — through love of God and his daughter, not so much a sublimated, sensitivized Shvlock, as another Nathan the Wise — and the archbishop — prototype of deep-seated fanaticism conquered by the grace of deep interior conversion — is the prelude to the great reconciliation between Jews and Christians that the author wants to proclaim. Stirred to the very depths of her being by the horrors of Jewish extermination, Gertrud von le Fort seeks some possible significance, some valid interpretation for this persecution. Under the guise of a parallel event in the past, she recounts an anticipated future; her work goes beyond literature and becomes prophetic theology. She herself seems to be transfigured into a legend: the old poet reminding her people, suffering because sinful, of the merciful plan of God who can change the worst crimes into sources of blessing.