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14. Karl Marx and the Socialist Revolution

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Revolutionary Jews from Spinoza to Marx
This chapter is in the book Revolutionary Jews from Spinoza to Marx
399fouRteenKarl Marx and the Socialist RevolutionBorn at Trier, on the river Moselle, on the extreme western edge of Ger-many, on 5 May  1818, Karl Marx (1818–1883), six years younger than Hess, belonged to a family boasting a long line of rabbis on both sides. Marx’s father, Herschel Mordechai Marx (1777–1838), son and brother of local rab-bis, made his way as a respected lawyer in the Rhineland city of Trier while under French occupation and, later, when the area was temporarily formally annexed, from the mid-1790s until 1814, in Napoleon’s France. Owing his career, broad secular horizons, and success in the world as a Jew, to the Rev-olution, especially its anti-clerical, anti-religious thrust, and hence to the French Enlightenment without which neither the Revolution in the form it took, nor anything he accomplished would have been possi ble, Herschel Mor-dechai venerated the Enlightenment’s achievements and great figures, Vol-taire and Lessing especially.1Napoleon’s defeat and Prussia’s annexation of the Rhineland created pressing problems for Herschel Mordechai and his family, as for Börne, Heine and numerous others. In 1814, Prussia annexed the Rhineland provinces with the blessing of the Vienna Congress and Holy Alliance proclaiming itself a “Christian” state. At once, followed by most smaller German states, and with considerable public support, the Prussian crown began reversing basic changes introduced since the French occupied the Left Bank of the Rhine, in 1794, among others canceling the equal status granted the Jews twenty years before. The new, greatly enlarged post-1814 Prussia also canceled the
© 2021, University of Washington Press

399fouRteenKarl Marx and the Socialist RevolutionBorn at Trier, on the river Moselle, on the extreme western edge of Ger-many, on 5 May  1818, Karl Marx (1818–1883), six years younger than Hess, belonged to a family boasting a long line of rabbis on both sides. Marx’s father, Herschel Mordechai Marx (1777–1838), son and brother of local rab-bis, made his way as a respected lawyer in the Rhineland city of Trier while under French occupation and, later, when the area was temporarily formally annexed, from the mid-1790s until 1814, in Napoleon’s France. Owing his career, broad secular horizons, and success in the world as a Jew, to the Rev-olution, especially its anti-clerical, anti-religious thrust, and hence to the French Enlightenment without which neither the Revolution in the form it took, nor anything he accomplished would have been possi ble, Herschel Mor-dechai venerated the Enlightenment’s achievements and great figures, Vol-taire and Lessing especially.1Napoleon’s defeat and Prussia’s annexation of the Rhineland created pressing problems for Herschel Mordechai and his family, as for Börne, Heine and numerous others. In 1814, Prussia annexed the Rhineland provinces with the blessing of the Vienna Congress and Holy Alliance proclaiming itself a “Christian” state. At once, followed by most smaller German states, and with considerable public support, the Prussian crown began reversing basic changes introduced since the French occupied the Left Bank of the Rhine, in 1794, among others canceling the equal status granted the Jews twenty years before. The new, greatly enlarged post-1814 Prussia also canceled the
© 2021, University of Washington Press

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Contents vii
  4. Acknowledgments ix
  5. Introduction 1
  6. 1. The Subversive Background of a Revolutionary Thinker 30
  7. 2. Spinoza and the Origins of the Modern Revolutionary Consciousness (1650–1677) 61
  8. 3. Orobio de Castro and the Enlightenment Myth of the Sephardic Universal Iconoclast 86
  9. 4. The Destabilizing Reverberations of the Early Haskalah 124
  10. 5. Maimon’s Rebellion and Mendelssohn’s Dilemma (1770–1800) 149
  11. 6. David Nassy’s New World Vistas (1770–1790) 173
  12. 7. Zalkind Hourwitz (1751–1812) and the “Great Revolution” 195
  13. 8. Jewish Revolutionaries and the Terror (1793–1794) 232
  14. 9. Remaking the New World (1790–1820) 263
  15. 10. The Dissident Jews of Felix Libertate (1787–1800) 289
  16. 11. Napoleon and the Jews (1796–1815) 311
  17. 12. Heine, Börne and the Post-Napoleonic Jewish Revolutionary Tradition (1810–1840) 335
  18. 13. Moses Hess (1812–1875) and “The New Jerusalem” 377
  19. 14. Karl Marx and the Socialist Revolution 399
  20. Conclusion: Jewish Revolutionaries, 1650–1850 428
  21. Notes 451
  22. Bibliography 499
  23. Index 533
  24. The Samuel & Althea Stroum Lectures in Jewish Studies 550
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https://doi.org/10.1515/9780295748672-017

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter i
  2. Dedication v
  3. Contents vii
  4. Acknowledgments ix
  5. Introduction 1
  6. 1. The Subversive Background of a Revolutionary Thinker 30
  7. 2. Spinoza and the Origins of the Modern Revolutionary Consciousness (1650–1677) 61
  8. 3. Orobio de Castro and the Enlightenment Myth of the Sephardic Universal Iconoclast 86
  9. 4. The Destabilizing Reverberations of the Early Haskalah 124
  10. 5. Maimon’s Rebellion and Mendelssohn’s Dilemma (1770–1800) 149
  11. 6. David Nassy’s New World Vistas (1770–1790) 173
  12. 7. Zalkind Hourwitz (1751–1812) and the “Great Revolution” 195
  13. 8. Jewish Revolutionaries and the Terror (1793–1794) 232
  14. 9. Remaking the New World (1790–1820) 263
  15. 10. The Dissident Jews of Felix Libertate (1787–1800) 289
  16. 11. Napoleon and the Jews (1796–1815) 311
  17. 12. Heine, Börne and the Post-Napoleonic Jewish Revolutionary Tradition (1810–1840) 335
  18. 13. Moses Hess (1812–1875) and “The New Jerusalem” 377
  19. 14. Karl Marx and the Socialist Revolution 399
  20. Conclusion: Jewish Revolutionaries, 1650–1850 428
  21. Notes 451
  22. Bibliography 499
  23. Index 533
  24. The Samuel & Althea Stroum Lectures in Jewish Studies 550
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