3 - The Half-Open Society

Summary

This chapter concentrates on the painful zigzag course of Jewish emancipation during the first half of the nineteenth century. It begins with the Prussian legislation of 1812, with special emphasis on the attitude of the national-liberal movement in the various parts of Germany with regard to emancipation but also to other relevant issues of the time. It then tells of the emerging new kind of antisemitism at the time, beginning with Fichte’s ambivalence, through Wilhelm von Humboldt’s principled stand on equality and the outright antisemites, Fries and Rühs. The upheavals known as the Hep-Hep attacks on the Jews in 1819 are then briefly described, followed by quotes regarding ongoing integration in the following decades. Finally, the ambivalent situation of young Jewish scholars, who could now study at the best institutions, but were refused academic posts, is described through the biography of Eduard Gans and the changing fortunes of the young Heinrich Heine.