Bento, his eyes closed, held both hands to his head and moaned, “The fools, the fools.”
“Wait. The worst is yet to come. About three weeks ago a traveler from the east arrived and reported that the Ottoman sultan was so displeased with the hordes of Jews pouring into the east to join the Messiah that he summoned Sabbatai Zevi to his palace and offered him the choice of martyrdom or conversion to Islam. Sabbatai Zevi’s decision? The Messiah promptly chose to become a Muslim!”
“He converted to Islam! So that’s it?” Bento’s face registered surprise, “Just like that. The Messiah insanity over is over?”
“One would think so! One would think that all the Messiah’s followers would understand they’d been duped. But not in the least—instead, Nathan and others have convinced his followers that his conversion is part of the divine plan, and hundreds, perhaps thousands, of Jews have followed him into conversion to Islam.”
“And what then happened with you and Rabbi Aboab?”
“I could no longer contain myself and publicly urged my congregation to come to their senses, to stop selling their homes and possessions, and to wait, at least wait a year, before emigrating to the Holy Land. Rabbi Aboab was irate and now has suspended me and threatens me with cherem.”
“Cherem? Cherem? Franco, I must make a ‘Franco’ observation—something I learned from you.”
“And that is?” Franco looked at Bento with great interest.
“Your words and your melody do not match.”
“My words and my melody?”
“You describe such portentous events—Rabbi Aboab rebuking you publicly, withdrawing his love, sending observers, restricting your freedom, and now cherem. And yet, even though you were horrified by witnessing my cherem, I see no despair in your face, no fear in your words. In fact you seem—what? Almost buoyant. Whence comes your lightheartedness?”
“You observe accurately, Bento, though, if we had spoken even a month ago, I would not have been so buoyant. But just recently a solution occurred to me. I’ve decided to emigrate! At least twenty-five Jewish families who believe in my way of being a Jew will, in three weeks’ time, set sail with me for the New World, to the Dutch island of Curacao, where we will establish our own synagogue and our own way of religious life. Yesterday I visited two families in The Hague who had left Rabbi Aboab’s congregation two years ago, and they too will most likely join us. This evening I hope to enlist two other families.”
“Curaçao? Half the world away?”
“Believe me, Bento, though I am full of hope about our future in the New World, I am also greatly saddened to think that you and I may never again meet. Yesterday on the trekschuit ride I daydreamed, and not for the first time, that you came to visit us in the New World and then chose to remain with us as our sage and scholar. But I know it is a dream. Your cough and your congestion tell me you cannot make the journey, and your contentment with your life tells me you will not make it.”
Bento stood and paced about the room. “I am too aggrieved even to sit still. Even though our meetings are perforce infrequent, your presence in my life is vital to me. The thought of a permanent farewell is such a shock, such a loss, I can find no words to speak of it. And at the same time my love for you raises other thoughts. The dangers! How will you live? Are there not already Jews and a synagogue in Curacao? How will they accept you?”
“Danger is always present for Jews. We have always been oppressed—if not by Christians or Muslims, then by our own elders. Amsterdam is the one spot in the old world that offers us some degree of freedom, but many foresee the end of that freedom. Multiple enemies gain strength: the war with the English is over but most likely only briefly, Louis the XIV threatens us, and our own liberal government may not long withstand the Dutch Orangists, who want to create a monarchy. Don’t you share these concerns, Bento?”
“Yes! So much so that that I have put aside my work on the Ethics and am now writing a book about my theological and political views. Religious authorities have influence over the governing bodies and are now meddling so much in politics that they must be stopped. We must keep religion and politics separate.”
“Tell me more about your new project, Bento.”
“Much of it is an old project. You remember the biblical critique I offered you and Jacob?”
“Every word.”
“I am putting these on paper and shall include all those arguments and so much more that any reasonable person will come to doubt the divine sources of the scriptures and ultimately come to accept that everything happens according to the universal laws of Nature.”
“So you’re going to publish the very ideas that brought about your cherem?”
“Let’s discuss that later. For now, Franco, let’s return to your plans. There is more urgency there.”
“More and more, our group has come to believe our only hope is in the New World. One of our merchant members has already visited and selected some land that we have purchased from the Dutch West Indies Company. And yes, you’re right: there is already an established Jewish community in Curacao. But we will be on the opposite side of the island on our own land, teach ourselves to farm, and create a different type of Jewish community.”
“And your family? How do they react to this move?”
“My wife, Sarah, agrees to go but only under certain conditions.”
“Certain conditions? Can a Jewish wife set conditions? What conditions?”
“Sarah is strong-willed. She agrees to go only if I agree to take seriously her views about changing the way Judaism regards and treats women.”
“I cannot believe what I hear. How we regard women? I’ve never heard such nonsense.”
“She asked me to discuss this very topic with you.”
“You talked with her about me? I thought you had to keep your contact with me secret even from her.”
“She has changed. We have changed. We have no secrets from one another. May I deliver her words to you?”
Bento nods warily.
Franco cleared his throat and spoke in a higher key. “Mister Spinoza, do you agree it is just for women to be treated as inferior creatures in every manner? In the synagogue we must sit separately from the men and in poorer seating and—”
“Sarah,” Bento interrupted, immediately entering into the role play, “of course you women and your lustful glances are seated separately. Is it right that men be distracted from God?”
“I know her answer exactly,” said Franco and, mimicking her, continued: “You mean that men are like beasts in continual heat and are driven from their rational minds by the mere presence of a woman—the very woman they sleep with side by side each night. And the mere sight of our faces will dispel their love of God. Can you imagine how that feels to us?”
“Oh foolish woman—of course you must be out of our sight! The presence of your tempting eyes and your fluttering fans and shallow comments are inimical to religious contemplation.”
“So because men are weak and cannot stay focused, it is the woman’s fault, not theirs? My husband tells me you have said that nothing is good or bad but it is the mind that makes it so. Not right?”
Bento reluctantly nods.
“So perhaps it is the mind of the man that needs to be edified. Perhaps men should wear mule-blinders instead of demanding that women wear veils! Do I make my point, or shall I continue?”
Bento started to reply in detail but stopped and, shaking his head, said, “Go on.”
“We women are kept prisoners in the house and are never taught Dutch and thus are limited in shopping or conversing with others. We carry the burden of an unequal amount of work in the family, while men sit for much of the day and debate issues in the Talmud. Rabbis openly oppose educating us because they say we are of inferior intelligence and if they were to teach us the Torah, they would be teaching us nonsense because we women could never grasp its complexity.”
“On this one instance I agree with the rabbi. You actually belie
ve that women and men have equal intelligence?”
“Ask my husband. He’s standing right next to you. Ask him if I don’t learn as fast and understand as deeply as he does.”
Bento raised his chin gesturing to Franco, who smiled and said, “She speaks the truth, Bento. She learns and comprehends as quickly, perhaps more quickly, than I. And you knew a woman like her. Remember that young woman who taught you Latin, whom you yourself labeled a prodigy? Sarah even believes women should be counted as one of the minyan and be called upon to read from the bimah and even become rabbis.”
“Read from the bimah? Become a rabbi? This is beyond belief! If women were capable of sharing power, then we could consult history and find many such instances. But there are none to be found, no instances of women ruling equally with men, and no instances of women ruling men. We can only conclude that women have an inherent weakness.”
Franco shook his head. “Sarah would say—and here I would agree with her—that your evidence is no evidence at all. The reason there is no power sharing is—”
A knock on the door interrupted their discussion, and the housekeeper entered, carrying a tray heavy with food. “Mr. Spinoza, may I serve you?’”
Bento nodded, and she began placing dishes steaming with food on Bento’s table. He turned to Franco. “She’s asking if we’re ready for some lunch. We can eat in here.”
Franco, startled, looked at Bento and replied in Portuguese, “Bento, how can you think I could eat this food with you? Have you forgotten? I’m a rabbi!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
BERLIN, THE NETHERLANDS—1939–1945
He is “almost Alfred.” Rosenberg almost managed to become a scholar, a journalist, a politician—but only almost.
—Joseph Goebbels
Why does the world shed crocodile’s tears over the richly merited fate of a small Jewish minority? . . . I ask Roosevelt, I ask the American people: Are you prepared to receive in your midst these well-poisoners of the German people and the universal spirit of Christianity? We would willingly give every one of them a free steamer ticket and a thousand-mark note for traveling expenses, if we could get rid of them.
—Adolf Hitler
Though Alfred did not suffer another debilitating depression, he never grew comfortable in his skin, and for the rest of his life his self-worth gyrated wildly: he was either puffed or deflated, depending on his perceived closeness to Adolf Hitler.
Hitler never loved him; yet, convinced that Alfred’s skills were useful to the party, he continued to heap responsibilities on him. These duties were always in addition to Alfred’s primary task as editor-in-chief of the party newspaper. The Völkischer Beobachter, “the fighting newspaper of the Nazi Party,” flourished under Alfred’s direction: by the 1940s it had a daily circulation of well over a million. Personally, Hitler preferred the vulgar, anti-Semitic caricatures in Streicher’s Der Stürmer, but the Beobachter was the official party newspaper, and Hitler or his deputy, Rudolf Hess, never failed to read it daily.
Alfred had a cordial relationship with Hess and, through him, gained access to Hitler. But that ended precipitously on May 10, 1941, when, after a long leisurely breakfast with Rosenberg, Hess drove to the airport and, for reasons still perplexing historians, flew a Messerschmitt BF110 to Scotland and parachuted out, only to be immediately captured and imprisoned by the British for the rest of his life. Martin Bormann assumed Hess’s deputy post and, as Alfred put it, became “dictator of the antechamber.” Except for rare occasions, Bormann granted access to the Führer only to the inner circle—and that never included Alfred Rosenberg.
Yet no one could deny Alfred the amazing success of his book The Myth of the Twentieth Century. By 1940 it had sold over a million copies and was second in Germany only to Mein Kampf. Other duties abounded: Alfred’s role as director of the ideological education of the entire Nazi Party required frequent meetings and public addresses. His speeches never strayed far from the catechism outlined in his book: Aryan race superiority, the Jewish menace, purity of blood, dangers of impure breeding, necessity for Lebensraum, and the dangers posed by religion. He relentlessly hammered away at the threats posed to the Reich by Jews and never failed to insist that the Jewish question must be solved by the removal of every Jew from Europe. When, by 1939, it became clear that no country would accept the German, Polish, and Czech Jews, he argued for the relocation of the European Jews to a reservation (pointedly not a state) outside of Europe—for example, Madagascar or Guyana. For a time he considered Alaska but then decided that its harsh climate would be too severe for the Jews.
In 1939 Hitler summoned Rosenberg for a meeting.
“Rosenberg, in my hand I have my official announcement of your German National award. I’m certain you remember our conversation about my nominating you—you called it the proudest day of your life. I myself approved these lines. ‘Rosenberg’s indefatigable struggle to keep National Socialist philosophy clean was especially meritorious. Only future times will be able to fully estimate the depth of the influence of this man on the philosophical foundation of the National Socialist Reich.’”
Alfred’s pupils widened: he was stunned by Hitler’s largesse.
“And today I plan to assign you to a position you were meant for. I’ve decided to formally establish the Hohe Schule, the party’s elite university of Nazism. You are to be its leader.”
“I am deeply honored, mein Führer. But I’ve heard nothing of the plans for the Hohe Schule.”
“It shall be an advanced center of ideological and educational research to be located in northern Bavaria. I envision a three-thousand-seat auditorium, a library of five hundred thousand volumes, and different branches in various cities of the Reich.”
Alfred took out his notepad. “Shall I write about this in the Beobachter?” “Yes. My secretary will give you the background material on it. A brief Beobachter announcement of its establishment and your appointment to head it would be timely. Your first task—and this is not for publication”—Hitler lowered his voice—“is to build the university library. And build it quickly. Immediately. The books are available right now. I want you to take the lead in seizing the contents of all Jewish and Freemason libraries in occupied territories.”
Alfred was euphoric: this task was meant for him. He began immediately. Soon Rosenberg’s emissaries were ransacking Jewish libraries throughout Eastern Europe and sending thousands of rare books to Frankfurt, where librarians would select the best books for the Hohe Schule library. Hitler was also planning a museum for extinct peoples, and other valuable books would be selected for ultimate display there. Before long, Alfred’s mandate was broadened to include artwork as well as books. Like an eager puppy craving attention, he wrote Hitler on the Führer’s fiftieth birthday:Heil, mein Führer:
In my desire to give you, my Führer, some joy for your birthday, I take the liberty to present to you photos of some of the most valuable paintings that my special purpose staff, in compliance with your order, secured from ownerless Jewish art collections in the occupied territories. These photos represent an addition to the collection of fifty-three of the most valuable objects of art delivered some time ago to your collection.
I beg of you, my Führer, to give me a chance during my next audience to report to you orally on the whole extent and scope of this art seizure action. I beg you to accept a short written intermediate report of the progress and extent of the art seizure action, which will be used as a basis for this later oral report, and also accept three copies of the temporary picture catalogues, which, too, show only part of the collection you own. I shall take the liberty during the requested audience to give you, my Führer, another twenty folders of pictures, with the hope that this short involvement with the beautiful things of art that are nearest to your heart will send a ray of beauty and joy into your revered life.
In 1940 Hitler formally notified the entire Nazi Party of the formation of the ERR—Einsatzstab (task force) of Reichsleiter Rosenberg—
whose mission was to confiscate all Jewish-owned European art and books for use by the Reich. Rosenberg found himself at the head of an enormous organization that moved together with the military into occupied territory to safeguard and remove “ownerless” Jewish property deemed valuable to Germany.
Alfred was thrilled. This was his most rewarding assignment. As he pranced down the streets of Prague and Warsaw with his ERR team, he mused: Power! Finally, power! To have life-and-death decisions over the Jewish libraries and galleries of Europe. And also to have bargaining chips with Göring, who is suddenly so nice to me. His greedy hands grasp for art plunder everywhere. But now I’m first in line. I get first pick of the art for the Führer before Göring can snatch it away for his own collection. Such greed! Göring should have been eliminated a long time ago. Why does the Führer tolerate such betrayal of Aryan tradition and ideology.