Reviewed by Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein
This scholarly work offers a
comprehensive study of Rabbi Eliyahu Benamozegh’s vision for modernity. His
platform calls for a Universalist reading of Judaism, but instead of the
rationalist framework upon which other forms of Jewish Universalism are built,
Benamozegh championed a more conservative basis for that view, drawing heavily
on the traditions of Kabbalah to justify his claims. The author of this book explores
what factors influenced Benamozegh’s controversial ideas, and how his thoughts
have, in turn, influenced others.
In 1823, Benamozegh was born to a
Moroccan family in Livorno (Leghorn), Italy. Although he received a traditional
rabbinic training and even studied Kabbalah under his uncle, he was better
known as an auto-didactic who was learned in several disciplines. By
profession, Benamozegh was a publisher, and true to his dedication to the
written word, he wrote prolifically in Hebrew, Italian, and French. With the
backdrop of the Risorgimento movement that sought to unify the various Italian
states as one socio-cultural polity, Benamozegh thought about the big picture
and ambitiously sought to construct a theosophy that would unite all of mankind.
In the spirit of his times, Benamozegh
engaged with “modernity,” which he saw as a continuation of tradition,
not as a total break from tradition. More specifically, Benamozegh saw how
Christianity and Islam broadcasted messages that were not only relevant to
members of those faiths, but to humanity as a whole. Yet, he felt that the
universalist aspects of those religions are actually borrowed from their parent
religion: Judaism. In particular, he viewed Kabbalah (which literally means
“tradition”) as the appropriate vehicle for leading the way to uniting all of
humanity. Thus, Benamozegh dedicated himself to finding those aspects of
Judaism that speak to all of mankind and highlighting their importance.
One core principle of
Benamozegh’s thought is the centrality of the Seven Noahide Laws, which are “a
core set of tenets binding on all of humanity and akin to natural laws.” These
laws would serve as the focal point of Benamozegh’s imagined universal religion
for modernity. To sum up Benamozegh’s philosophy/theosophy, Boulouque writes:
“Israel could provide both old and new foundations for the universalist
religion because it contains its seeds. Judaism, thanks to the Noahide Laws,
had the potential to birth the religion of the future.”
Yet, any discussion of the
Noahide Laws inevitably leads to a discussion of Jewish particularism — the
polar opposite of universalism — that focuses on the Jewish People’s role as
the “chosen nation.” According to Jewish Tradition, while all gentiles are
subject to the Seven Noahide Laws, the Jews are subject to a different set of
laws, namely the 613 commandments of the Torah. This reality complicates any
effort to argue for the universalist relevance of Judaism, as it gives one
nation precedence over all the others. As a result of these ostensibly
contradictory notions, one can detect a sort of tension in many of Benamozegh’s
writings, and Boulouque devotes much space in her book to expanding on
Benamozegh’s ways of alleviating this profound difficulty.
In a nutshell, Benamozegh’s
approach to reconciling Jewish universalism with Jewish particularism
postulates that the world is comprised of a “family of nation,” and just as
each member of a family has different roles and responsibilities, so do the
various nations of the world have different roles and responsibilities within
the global community. However, unlike the other nations of the world, the Jews
in particular were given extra responsibilities by Divine Revelation that
demanded of them to preserve and disseminate the Seven Noahide Laws and the
basics of Universal Monotheism. Boulouque shows how this seemingly modern idea
is reflected in the Biblical promise to make the Jews “a kingdom of priests”
(Ex. 19:6), which Rabbi Ovadia
Sforno (a sixteenth century Italian commentator) explains as referring to the
Jewish role in teaching monotheism to the nations.
Another major element of
Benamozegh’s universalist writings is his focus on Adam, the first man. As the
father of all of mankind, Adam was understood to represent a sort of
genealogical reflection of the shared origins of all peoples. Even though
Benamozegh recognizes that Jewish Tradition viewed Adam as a proto-Jew of sorts,
he more broadly understood Adam as an archetypical follower of a more generic
universal monotheism, of which Judaism is but one legitimate expression.
Indeed, the plurality of
legitimate religious expressions is a mainstay of Benamozegh’s worldview that
viewed the gods of the nations as incomplete parts of a greater truth. Through
his Kabbalistic lens, those various foreign deities reflect perceived varying
aspects of the One God himself, and thus contain parts of the truth, but not
the whole truth. Thus, Benamozegh’s Judaism not only tolerates other
religions, but even confers upon them ontological and meta-physical significance.
Benamozegh’s clearest and most
complete treatment of these issues can be found in his work Israel and
Humanity. Yet, a cloud of uncertainty casts its shadow over the provenance
of that work, because this magnum opus remained a two-thousand page
manuscript at the time of Benamozegh’s death in 1900. It was only edited and
published in French fourteen years later by Benamozegh’s Christian disciple Aimé
Pallèire.
Some have claimed that Benamozegh’s more conciliatory and inclusive comments
are actually subversive interpolations that Pallèire inserted into his mentor’s
work, but that Benamozegh himself never meant to downplay the supremacy of the
Jewish People and brandish a universalist world view. However, Boulouque’s
major contribution to this discussion is a close reading of Benamozegh’s original
manuscript (housed in the archives of the Jewish community in Livorno) that
reveals that indeed the edition published by Pallèire matches Benamozegh’s writings.
This detective work clears Pallèire’s name of any impropriety and
demonstrates that the posthumous Israel and Humanity truly reflects
Benamozegh’s positions and teachings. [That work was also translated into
Hebrew by Dr. Shimon Marcus of Mossad HaRav Kook as Yisrael VeHaEnushot].
As Boulouque adeptly
demonstrates, Benamozegh’s writings were always in conversation with the other
worldviews floating around in his time—whether explicitly or implicitly. These competing
weltanschauung include
Maimonidean-style philosophy (associated with such figures as Moses Mendelssohn
and Baruch Spinoza), Christianity, Reform Judaism, and nationalism. Benamozegh
engaged with the leading figures of those theosophies, sometimes strategically citing
them to bolster his own arguments and sometimes rejecting their ideas when they
clashed with his own. Boulouque further shows how Benamozegh’s own legacy
continued to influence a wide spectrum of Jewish thinkers from the Religious-Zionist
Rabbi Zvi Yehuda Kook on the far right to the Marxist-Kabbalist Rabbi Yehuda
Ashlag on the left, as well as Christian philo-Semites and American
evangelists.
In short, Clémence
Boulouque offers a wide-ranging reflection and analysis of one of the most
important Jewish thinkers of his time. She solidly situates Benamozegh’s ideas
and importance amongst the other thinkers of the last 200 years, all the while
showing how the rabbi’s words themselves can be understood and appreciated in a
plurality of different ways. This scholarly and nuanced investigation into the
meaning of Benamozegh’s Jewish Universalism is truly a worthy contribution
towards our understanding of Rabbi Eliyahu Benamozegh’s multifaceted and
complex thought.
