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Contribution Jews at Civilization Flipbook PDF
Contribution Jews at Civilization
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Rudolf Vorobyov CONTRIBUTION JEWS AT WORLDWIDE CIVILIZATION "... love our people and appreciate the treasures of his spirit which scattered all deaf back streets of the immense world. " Sholem Aleichem
"The traction of knowledge for the sake of knowledge, almost not a fanatical love of justice desire for personal independence, -here are the features of the Jewish tradition " A.Einstein I will emphasize right away: the author of the proposed notes is not a Jewish nationalist, much less a chauvinist. Noting the contribution of the Jewish people to world civilization, the author does not detract from the contribution of other nations and in no way humiliates them. Mankind has a common origin and 97-98 percent of common genes (the remaining 2-3 percent determine the individual characteristics of people), therefore, we are all biologically equivalent. But historically, peoples for various reasons have developed unevenly, and therefore their role in progress is different. Judge intellectual potential and moral level one or another people should be guided by its prominent representatives who have contributed to the treasury of world culture. In a similar aspect, the role of the Jewish people in the development of world civilization is considered. The history of the Jewish people is unusual - it is one of the few that has survived from antiquity, despite the loss of its own territory and statehood, persecution, pogroms, forced assimilation. Jews scattered all over the world are united mainly by common origin, religion (“Jews carried the Bible through the centuries as a portable homeland” by G. Heine) and anti-Semitism. ______ The Jew is the one who has both or one of the parents - Jews.
For centuries living among other nations, Jews were not passive contemplators of events, they were distinguished by activity and, if allowed conditions, worked in various areas of culture, contributing to the progress not only of the cultures of the countries where they lived, but also of world culture. Therefore, to a certain extent, to study the history of the Jewish people is to study the general history and the history of civilization. * * *
Jews marked the beginning of the written history (set out in the Bible) before the ancient Greeks - Herodotus and Thucydides. Jewish writing, invented by Moses, formed the basis of the Phrygian, Greek, Latin, Slavic, and then Russian letters. Moses is one of the prominent personalities in Jewish and world history. It was he who rallied the Jews into one people, reformed their religion. One of the first in the history of legislators who created a code of laws. Establishing monotheism, replacing polytheism, Moses made a revolution in the religious views of the people. Being a wise man, Moses, in order to turn the crowd into a people obliged to abide by the laws, proclaimed them in the name of God. Violation of the law offended the Supreme Being, to which not everyone could decide. “If a man sins against a man, they will pray to God for him; if a man sins against the Lord, who will intercede for him? ” Old Testament. German orientalist J. Velhausen attempted to deprive the Jewish people of Moses, expressing an unfounded opinion that Moses was an Egyptian and brought out of Egypt not only Jews, but everyone who wants to leave the country.Welhausen had followers, among them K. Marx and Z. Freud, an anti-Semite of Jewish origin, who did not conceal his Jewishness, which was why he was in trouble. For the first time in history, Jews proclaimed humanism as a doctrine. “Stop doing evil,” Yahweh calls, “learn to do good, seek justice, help the oppressed.” The laws proclaimed by Moses on behalf of God completely correspond to the humane aspirations of people, which gradually, throughout the centuries, was realized by the Europeans and was reflected and developed in the works of the humanists of the Renaissance. One of the ancient literary monuments is the Bible. For the first time in the world literature, realistic portraits of people are given with amazing skill and historical events are depicted with tremendous emotional power. Psalms are widely popular, the authors of which are Moses, kings David and Solomon, and others. Psalms belong to the works of religious lyricism, performed in the temple with musical accompaniment. Their subject matter is different. In some, evil is revealed and justice is praised. How long will you judge unfairly and to face the villains? ... save the poor and the wretched pull out of the hands of villains! Another psalm also condemns the injustice and lies used by the villains. The villain - as bullied his nose! ... curses his mouth is filled, and fraud and strife; under his tongue is vanity and lies. The Old Testament includes Ecclesiastes, one of the most famous philosophical essays.
The sayings filled with deep wisdom became winged: All term and the time of all things ... time to give birth and time to die ... time to destroy and time to build, time to cry and time to have fun ... time to throw stones and time to collect stones ... time to be silent and time to talk ... Briefly and amazingly capaciously, the actions of people whose lives consist of insignificant actions are characterized: Vanity of vanities, everything is vanity! ... all the fuss and the wind chase. Wonderfully glorifies "Ecclesiastes" wisdom: And I saw what is the advantage of wisdom over stupidity, as the advantage of light over darkness. His wise eye is in his head, but a fool walks in darkness. The statement: “Everything goes to one place: everything came from the dust and everything will return to dust” testifies to the truly materialistic understanding of the author of “Ecclesiastes” of one of the laws of nature - the circulation of substances. And in conclusion about “Ecclesiastes” is the true everyday observation of all times: “... I saw under the sun that not agile one gets a successful run, not a brave one - a victory, not a wise one - bread, and not a reasonable one wealth ... time and chance all of them. "Indeed, you also need luck in life. Luck. About one of the amazing works in the composition of the Old Testament, the historian of religion P. Johnson writes that no one in ancient times "could not create a document mysterious and heartbreaking," like the book of Job. “This book,” says Johnson, “is about the Holocaust, because it contains a fundamental question that has worried humanity for thousands of years: why the almighty God permits (or does himself) such terrible things”, The largest historian and writer of antiquity was Josephus, who wrote valuable works, including on the history of the Jewish people. Josephus - a man of difficult fate, was one of the leaders of the uprising of Judea in I century. Being captured by the Romans, thanks to his talent and resilience, he achieved a high enough position in Rome.
In accordance with the worldview of the Jewish people, man is created in the image of God, it is not by chance that the code of Moses provides for the equality of all people before God, that is, the Law. That is why human life is the highest value on Earth. The Bible warns: "Whoever sheds the blood of man, that the blood will spill." Not only life, but also human property is protected by God (in a democratic society, protected by law). From the standpoint of humanism, the Old Testament prophets condemned "criminal laws and ... unjust decisions, in order ... to appropriate the rights of beggars." Thus, the Jews for the first time in jurisprudence put forward the most important principle of democracy - the equality of all before the law. Any member of society is treated as a person who has both rights and obligations to society, regulated by law. The Jews were the first, in antiquity, to reject slavery. Each person, in fact - a symbol, a representative of all mankind. Not a man but God can control the life of mortals. Jews spoke out against collective responsibility: everyone who commits a crime must answer for himself. Ironically, more precisely - the grimace of history, Christians considered the entire Jewish people guilty of the execution of Jesus by the Romans forever and ever, which became one of the sources of anti-Semitism. The principle of collective responsibility, which was not only confessed, but also implemented by the Bolsheviks and the Nazis, was first put forward by the enemy of the Jewish people, the evangelist Matthew, supported by the apostle Peter. The Jewish people were the first in the history to speak out against wars and preach peace. Since ancient times, Jews, the nation has been literate (not only the citizens were able to read, but also the peasants) and, possessing high self-awareness (unfortunately, as a result of centuries of oppression, this quality disappears from Jews), they do not convert anyone into their faith. The Jewish people have always sought to live in peace with other nations. One of the authors of the Old Testament - the prophet Isaiah - belongs to the surviving words of the millennia: "Cut the swords into plowshares and spear ours - into sickles" and "Let no people lift the people with the sword." Judaism, in principle, rejects violence, therefore, according to the worldview of the Jewish people, the normal state of society is peace. This position was developed by Maimonides and perfectly reflected Sholem Aleichem in the story "Be I the Rothschild." It took thousands of years for humanity for the idea of peaceful coexistence proclaimed by the Jews to seize the minds of people (to my deep regret, not all). Jews gave Mankind the idea of a day off, which was an important contribution to the rest and entertainment system. Jews in antiquity albeit unconsciously, they understood the need for an organism of periodic rest, hence the obligatory observance of the Sabbath, however, in religious packaging. * * *
The development of European and, accordingly, world civilization was decisively influenced by ancient Greek culture and Judaism, the latter through Christianity, which arose in the bosom of Judaism, based on its ideas and postulates. As P.Johnson remarked, Christianity embraced "a lot of morality, dogma, liturgy, the establishment and fundamental concepts of the Jews." This is confirmed by a comparative analysis of the Old (Jewish) and New (Christian) Testaments, which testifies to their deep identity and direct borrowing. Comparing, for example, the commandments of Moses and Christ, it is easy to notice their striking similarity, not only in spirit, but also in formulations. Moses: “Honor your father and your mother. Do not kill, do not commit adultery. Do not desire your neighbor's house. He who strikes a man so that he dies will be put to death. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, a hand for a hand. ”The legal meaning of the latter is the adequacy of the punishment of the crime, it should not be taken literally. Jesus: “Do not kill, but who will kill belongs to the court. Do not commit adultery. An eye for an eye a tooth for a tooth. Love your neighbor. " And the miracles attributed to Christ coincided (which was also a “miracle”) with the acts of the Jewish prophet Elijah. For example, Elijah resurrects the dead, with a blow of his cloak causes the Jordan River to part. Christianity borrowed not only the morality and ethics of Judaism, but also the books of the Jewish sages and prophets, the institute of the synagogue as a prototype of the churches. Christians appropriated psalms and chorals, hymns and burning lamps, candles and incense. And the idea of repentance and redemption in order to purify the conscience took Christianity from Judaism, the apostle Paul introduced the position borrowed from Judaism in Christianity, according to which a person is free only when his conscience is clear. At the same time, the creators of Christianity sought to dissociate themselves from Judaism in every way, many generations of Christians considered Jews to be enemies of Christ (Jews did not recognize Christ as God, for "a Jew believes in the religion of Jesus; a Jew cannot bring himself to believe in a religion about Jesus" - C. Fanyani ), having falsely attributed to them the guilt of his murder, which is why Jews not only became Christians persecuted and despised, but hated the Jews. Even the humanist Leo Tolstoy somehow dropped that Jews should be loved. It sounds ambiguous: why need to ? From humane considerations, are Jews also people? ... Jews do not ask for love, it is enough for them not to be humiliated. That they did not deserve. * * * Throughout its entire ancient history, the Jewish people were conquered and expelled from their land. The Jews finally lost the state after the brutal suppression by Rome of the repeated revolts of Judea against Roman rule in the I - IIcenturies, and the Jewish people were once again settled, in this case through the vast Roman Empire. The most tragic (not counting the Holocaust) almost two thousand year period of Jewish history began, when Jews were forced to live among usually hostile nations, be they Christians or Muslims.
Many Jews found themselves on the Iberian Peninsula, conquered by Arab Muslims in the 7th century, in comparison with Christians they were tolerant of Jews. But still the Jews were not full citizens - they paid special taxes, they were forbidden to build new synagogues, to hold public office. True, these laws were not always strictly enforced. At times, Jewish pogroms broke out, organized by Muslim fanatics. Engaged in the Jewish population of crafts and trade. But not only. Among the Jews were doctors, writers, poets, even statesmen who held a high position in the courts of Arab and Spanish monarchs (Christians gradually conquered the Iberian Peninsula). A major representative of the intellectual elite of the Middle Ages was the Spanish Jew (Sephard) Moses Maimonides, who lived in the XI century, - a rabbi, an expert on Hebrew and Ancient Greek philosophy, a skilled doctor and philosopher who influenced medicine and philosophy. Maimonides served as a leb-medic of the Egyptian Sultan Salah-id-Din, but he refused a career as a court physician to the English king Richard the Lion-Heart. Being a very gifted person himself, Maimonides highly appreciated the intellect. "It is better to like a reasonable person, - he thought - than ten thousand fools." Maimonides considered Moses, the leading biblical character, to be one of the smartest people in history, and “The Bible,” Maimonides argued, “is our patent for greatness.” An optimal society for life, according to Maimonid, should be reasonable, which, in turn, will contribute to the development of citizens' mind. In the Guide for the Difficult, Maimonides writes that “the more stable and peaceful we make our society, the more time and energy a person can devote to improving his mind,” thereby increasing the intellectual potential of society. Maimonides attached great importance to literature, because reading develops abilities. Jewish dictum says: "Sell everything you possess and buy books, because, as the sages say, acquiring books acquires wisdom." Maimonides, advocating for the freedom of the spirit of the Jews, called for combining the study of Torah and the pursuit of secular science. One of the followers of Maimonides, the famous philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, who lived in Germany in the 18th century, argued that religion governs the life of the Jews, but does not control their thoughts. Similar views of Maimonides, Mendelssohn and their supporters allowed Jews, while remaining committed to Judaism, not to lock themselves within the limited confines of the Torah, to enter the world around them, to acquire various professions.
M.Maymonid was famous as one of the best doctors of his time. In his literary heritage - books on dietary and medicinal treatment of various diseases. He was well aware of the theoretical and practical sections of medicine of his time, knew how to heal well. “I gained a high reputation among the greats of this world,” Maimonides writes in one of his letters. - For ordinary people, it is too difficult to get to Fustat (a city near Cairo, where Maimonides lived. - RV) to appear to me, and I spend whole days visiting the sick in Cairo, so that when I return home, I feel myself ... tired ... I discover that my court is full of people of high and low origin, non-Jews, theologians and judges
waiting for me. I dismount, go to my patients. Their turn does not dry out until dark, sometimes until two in the morning. By nightfall, I am so tired that I cannot speak. ” Maimonides, reflecting on human nature, came to the conclusion about the continuity of his physical and spiritual essence (as opposed to Plato, who considered the soul immortal, inhabiting another body). It is not by chance that Maimonides treated both physical (somatic) and mental (mental) diseases. In modern medicine, the psychosomatic direction (for many years not recognized by Soviet medicine) has been widely developed, which studies the role of the psyche in the occurrence of psychosomatic diseases and develops methods for their treatment. Maimonides in another field of medicine ahead of time. He warned doctors against the mindless fascination with drugs and did not recommend prescribing them in cases where the patient's body is able to overcome the disease without medication. “You shouldn't grab the drugs,” warned Maimonides, “... for the innate power (of the organism) will cope on its own.” In this regard, Maimonides was a Hippocratic follower. But only a knowledgeable physician, Maimonides believed, can determine when a patient will recover without medication and will be able to support and even increase the resistance of the patient; “An experienced doctor knows,” Maimonides writes, “how to conserve innate strength and direct it.” A bad doctor prescribes medication when it is not even required, and this causes, sometimes irreparable, harm to the patient. “A stupid healer does not stop treating with medicine,” Maimonides notes with regret. - Therefore, lazy doctors bring their death to their medicines, as they do not pay attention to the innate strength; whereas these forces dominate the body and help in illness. ” Only in the 20th century, the Russian Jew E.Arkin, a physician, psychologist, and teacher, laid the foundations of drug pathology — the science that studies drug complications, that is, drug disease. A prominent representative of this science was the Russian Jew A. Zalmanov - a personality, I must say, remarkable. After studying for three years at the medical faculty of Moscow University, due to dissatisfaction with the teaching of medicine, he moved to Germany, to the University of Heidelberg, which he graduated from. In 1914 he returned to Russia. After the Bolshevik October Revolution, he headed the resort management and was the physician in the family of V. Lenin, after whose death he left Russia. He worked in Germany and other European countries. His name in Russia was not known until 1966, when his famous monograph The Secret Wisdom of the Human Body was published. Zalmanov called on doctors to significantly limit the prescription of drugs, to widely apply methods that increase the body's resistance, to stimulate blood circulation in the affected organs and tissues, in particular, using water procedures (hydrotherapy), which Zalmanov attached great importance. “Therapy without hydrotherapy,” he argued, “is a withered therapy that hides its powerlessness under ... a mountain of poisonous and sterile drugs.” The ideas of M.Maymonida, E.Arkina and A.Zalmanov widely penetrated into modern medicine, this was greatly facilitated by the Russian Jew I.Kassirsky, who stimulated further study of drug pathology.
But let us return to the Iberian Peninsula, where Jews who lived in the Middle Ages were distinguished by their education (“If you drop gold and a book, pick up the book first” is a Jewish proverb), which played a significant role in the creation of the Renaissance in Italy, which flourished in the XV - XVII centuries. The Renaissance began in the XIII - XIV centuries from the acquaintance of Europeans with ancient culture, which became possible thanks to the translation of ancient Greek and Roman authors into Hebrew and Arabic, then into Latin. Consequently, the origins of the Renaissance should be sought in the depths of the Arab-Jewish civilization, which spread from the Iberian Peninsula through southern France to Italy, where Jews from the time of Rome lived in the cities of Genoa, Florence and others. During the Renaissance (Renaissance), the Old Testament ideas of humanism were further developed, prompting a revolution in the worldview of Europeans and changing their views on man. Thus, a powerful impetus was given to a new stage in the development of civilization, including democracy, in the center of which is man, his rights and property. Thus, the continuity can be traced: a god-like man of the Jews and the ancient Greeks - the elect of God in Christianity - an equal to God individual of the Renaissance - a free person in a modern democratic society. In the XV century, the Iberian Peninsula finally conquered Christians as a result of the Reconquista. For Arabs and Jews (except for those who were baptized, and there was no trust in them), difficult times came - they were expelled from the peninsula. The Jewish population was forced to seek refuge in other Arab countries, as well as in Christian countries. Spain has turned into a third-rate country, although before these events it was one of the most powerful states in Europe. Many Jews emigrated to the Netherlands, where tolerance was observed, as well as to German lands and Italian cities. * * * At the end of the 15th century, the largest event occurred that had a tremendous impact on the subsequent history of the mankind, including the strengthening of democracy and its spread in the world. We are talking about the discovery of the New World - the American continent, which was made by a Jew who lived in Genoa and bore the Jewish name Colon, not infrequent in Italy (Colombo in Italian, Columbus in Latin). Columbus (as his name sounds in Russian) came from a family of Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula. Columbus said that he was a descendant of King David. Like it or not, it is not known, but it indicates that he did not doubt his Jewishness. Sometimes they say that Columbus did nothing special, he did not make any geographical discovery. After all, people settled America since the days of the Ice Age, and the Europeans (Normans) visited these lands even before Columbus. However, for science and the subsequent settlement of America by Europeans, it was precisely the discovery of Columbus, which greatly expanded the boundaries of the then known world, stimulated international relations and trade.
Thanks to the discovery of Columbus, writes Stefan Zweig, “such a fever of discoveries and adventures begins, which our old world has not yet seen. After all, the success of one brave person always motivates an entire generation to zeal and courage .... Never, neither before nor after, did geography, cosmography, cartography of such mad, intoxicating, victorious rates of development, know, "continues Zweig, ... Since the time when people live, breathe and think, the shape and volume of the Earth were finally determined when mankind first became aware of a round planet on which it has been rotating in the Universe for so many millennia. ” It is widely believed that Columbus stumbled upon a new (for modern science) continent in search of a sea route from Europe to India. But for this you need to go to the east, and not to the west, which was known at that time, but for some reason Columbus headed west. This is explained by the fact that the navigator sought to get to Asia in search of Jews living on the islands to the west of Europe. Columbus was guided by the statements of the biblical prophet Isaiah: "The Lord ... will stretch out His hand to return to himself the remnants of His people, which remains on the islands of the sea" (meaning Japan) Columbus was inspired by the call of Ezra: “The Lord God of heaven ordered ... to build a house for him in Jerusalem ... which is in Judea. Who among you, of all His people ... let him go to Jerusalem ... and build the house of the Lord God of Israel. And all those who remained in all the places where he lived, let them help. ” And Columbus went, we repeat, to the west, bearing in mind this goal ... Of interest are the reflections of the German physicist and philosopher V. Geisenberg, “what, in fact, was the great achievement of Christopher Columbus, who discovered America. If we explain, based not only on the organizational skills of the great navigator, but also taking into account his psychological characteristics, then, according to Heisenberg, so that returning back from existing reserves was no longer possible. ” Columbus, of course, not knowing it, rendered an invaluable service to the Jewish people. After all, thousands of Jews from the Russian Empire rushed to the democratic USA in the late XIX and early XX centuries , fleeing national oppression and pogroms, and in the 1930s German Jews fled from Nazi Germany fleeing from total physical extermination. Jews in the United States - full citizens, fully fit into American society. Although there were manifestations of anti-Semitism. * * * In the 16th century, the original philosopher and humanist M. Montaigne, whose work contributed to the development of the materialist worldview and pedagogy, as well as experimental methods for the study of nature, gained European fame. M. Montaigne is a native of the French city of Bordeaux, a grandson of the mother of a Jewish broker who fled from Spain, of his grandfather, a Gascon merchant of fish.
Man Montaigne was somewhat peculiar: devoid of the economic vein, did not deal with the affairs of the estate inherited from him and, not being vain, he was in charge of his administrative duties when he was mayor in his hometown for several years. He considered the time spent on domestic and public affairs wasted. The main content of his life was reflections and reading (which was not uncommon among Jews), and he only read books that intellectually enrich and excite thought. Montaigne was thinking about life in the widest and deepest sense and fixed his thoughts. Collected together, they compiled three books "Experiments", repeatedly published in France and in other countries, including Russia, where they are still published. The “experiences” brought Montaigne fame even during his lifetime, which is not surprising, since they are an inexhaustible storehouse of wise thoughts on a variety of issues - philosophy, history, education, religion, superstition, freedom of conscience and many others. Montaigne's creed is that a person should not exist, but live a full life, not giving up pleasures, since there is no other life than earth. “We admit sincerely,” writes Montaigne, “that only God and religion promise immortality; neither nature nor our minds tell us about it. ” M. Montaigne is a staunch supporter of freedom of conscience, but living in an era of bloody religious wars in France and in other countries, he believed that in order to avoid huge sacrifices, the population was obliged to confess the official religion of their country. These arguments of Montaigne characterize him not only as a humanist, but also as a pragmatic person. In principle, he was against unrest and, all the more, revolutions bringing suffering to the majority of the population. With political insight, Montaigne foresightedly predicted that the victims of the revolutions are “those who are shaking the state system,” and the fish are caught not by those who muddied the water, but by others. The history of revolutions both in his homeland and in other countries, including Russia, confirms the correctness of the philosopher. Montaigne had a scientific mentality, it is no accident that he was very negative about superstitions and various miracles. "During my life, I have repeatedly seen," Montaigne shares his observations, "how miracles are born ... Those who were the first to hear about some amazing phenomenon and begin to ring it everywhere, feel great ... distrust ... therefore they give false testimonies." This especially bugs Montaigne - a man of honest and conscientious. Thinking about the origin of superstition, Montaigne came to the conclusion that many people, especially in difficult circumstances, “give themselves up to superstition and try to find the cause and foreboding of misfortunes upon celestial signs ...” I came to conviction, ”Montaigne notes, Belief in miracles, visions, witchcraft ... has its source mainly in the imagination of ... people ... ignorant ... Of them, the ability to judge soberly has been knocked out ... that it seems to them that they see what they really do not see. ” That is why Montaigne strongly recommended, before judging anything, to first understand the problem under discussion, and not to refer to the opinions of incompetent people.
Remarkable reasoning Montaigne on education and training. He is a staunch opponent of mindless mechanical learning, cramming. And therefore he rightly advises: "Let the teacher ask not only the confirmed lesson from the student, but the meaning and the very essence of it." All the efforts of the teacher, according to Montaigne, should pursue the main goal - the education of the individual. Of course, a necessary condition for learning is the assimilation of specific material, facts, but the student must not only know - he must be able to analyze. The humanist Montaigne is the unconditional opponent of violence in any form. "Give up violence," he urged, "there is nothing, in my opinion, that it would have disfigured and perverted nature." M. Montaigne advanced the idea of educating a free harmonic personality, developing abilities inherent in a student, opposed blind obedience, which Leo Tolstoy noticed when he wrote in his diary: “Montaigne was the first to express the idea of freedom of upbringing”. The idea of free education was developed in the XX century by an American doctor B. Spock. It is noteworthy: a number of important thoughts, consonant with the ideas of Montaigne, were expressed recently (in May 2001) by the Rector of Moscow Humanitarian University, Y. Afanasyev, who said: “We must teach a person independent thinking ... A. Herzen is absolutely right, noting that thanks to Montaigne “much earlier Descartes formed ... a practical and philosophical view, free, based on life, on self-thinking ... Montaigne's view ... had a great influence; subsequently it developed into Voltaire and encyclopedists; Montaigne was in some respects the predecessor of Bacon, and Bacon was the genius of this view. ” B. Spinoza, a descendant of Spanish Jews who settled in the Netherlands, was a major thinker of the 17th century who went down in history of the development of philosophical thought. His life was tragic, he was driven out of the Jewish community in disgrace, which was tantamount to exclusion from the CPSU in the USSR. The decision of the Amsterdam synagogue says: "We betray anathema, curse and excommunicate Baruch Spinoza ... Let him be cursed." Why did the philosopher, the national pride of the Jewish people, fall upon such a terrible punishment of that time ? B. Spinoza argued that the Bible should not be viewed as a revelation of the Supreme Being, but as a historical work created by a team of authors. Therefore, he considered it important to find out "how all these books ... universally revered as sacred were combined." But the philosopher went further: he put an equal sign between God and Nature. “God does not exist in the sense that we have always understood this word,” Spinoza concluded, “God does not need to attribute such categories as“ intellect ”and“ will, ”God does not reward and punish, for God is not a being , and all things. " As for nature, it "is the cause of itself." It follows that each phenomenon has its own — a natural cause, and by no means a divine one. Thus, Spinoza initiated a critical study of the Bible. Twenty years after the death of Spinoza (1677), the London rabbi D.Nieto, following Spinoza, also identified God and Nature, and the Amsterdam theologian Z. Ashkenazi called these thoughts trivial in general.
Was Spinoza an atheist? The philosopher himself did not give a direct answer to this question. The German mathematician and philosopher G. Leibnitz, who knew Spinoza, wrote that "Spinoza was indeed an atheist in that respect that he did not recognize Providence that would reward or punish in accordance with the concept of justice." The point, after all, is not whether Spinoza was an atheist or did not consider himself as such, the matter is different. The One God, the forefather of the Jews of Abraham, and the reformer of their religion, Moses, the founders of monotheism, who replaced numerous idols, Spinoza dissolved in Nature. This was the prerequisite for the development of atheism. By nature B. Spinoza was an educator, defended not only freedom of knowledge, but also political freedom. His work philosopher had a direct impact on the French materialists, the leaders of the German Enlightenment and supporters of religious freethinking. One of the founders of German classical literature G.Lessing believed that there was no other philosophy than Spinoza’s philosophy, Voltaire admired his philosophy. The unity of views with Spinoza was deeply felt by A. Einstein, who knew the works of the philosopher well. Einstein emphasized that an important aspect of Spinoza’s teaching was the conviction “of the causation of all phenomena” in nature. * * * The fate of the Jewish people settled in Europe after the suppression of the uprisings in Judea. The Jews, once again emphasize, were forced to live among the hostile Christian population. One of the peculiarities of the Jewish national character is that, having lost their native land and being in a long-term diaspora, the Jews consider the country where they were born and grew up to be their patriots. However, in the eyes of the so-called indigenous nation, Jews are always alien, “not ours,” which deeply traumatizes the Jews. Such an attitude towards Jews, in particular, in Germany, is not only not humane, but also unfair. Indeed, in the territory of the future Germany, Jews live from the time of Ancient Rome. The first Jewish community in Cologne (founded in the first century) has been known since IV century. Assimilated Jews participated in the formation of the German ethnos, which was formed in the 9th and 11th centuries, mainly from ancient Germans, mixed with Prussians, Slavs and other peoples. It is no accident that Yiddish - the language of Eastern European Jews (Ashkenazi) belongs to the Germanic group of languages and is one of the dialects of the German language. By the way, Jewish émigrés who migrated to Germany from the former USSR were descendants of Germanic Jews, who for centuries oppressed German lands and didn’t live from the good life of those who settled in the XIV century in Poland (when massacres of Jews in Germany intensified the invitation of King Sigismund III . He was worried about the increase in the German population in Poland, which is why the Holy Roman Empire (as Germany was then called) could claim Polish territory with the German population. Therefore, the king offered the Jews to move from Germany to Poland - he was not afraid of the Jews. At the end of the XVIII century, a million Polish Jews were suddenly in the Russian Empire
as a result of the dismemberment of Poland under Catherine II . She reacted to the Jewish population, which she inherited as an annex to the new territories, as was customary in her homeland - in Germany: she immediately drove the Jews out of the Pale of Settlement and turned them into a people without rights. In this state, the Jews remained until March 1917, and only after the overthrow of the monarchy, the Provisional Government abolished the Pale of Settlement. The Jewish people were not only deprived of civil rights in most Christian countries, including the right of residence, but were physically destroyed by Jews during the crusades for their commitment to Judaism during epidemics of plague, smallpox, typhus, other epidemic diseases, since the Jews were considered to be the culprits of these diseases; Jews were burned alive at the stake as sorcerers; Jews were maimed and killed during pogroms, accusing the use of the blood of Christian children for ritual purposes, and simply because they were Jews ... Jews were imprisoned in the ghetto, obliged to wear a special identification mark on their clothes. (This medieval custom was revived in fascist Germany and in the countries occupied by it). The Jews who converted to Christianity could break out of the ghetto, which many did, as a rule, for purely practical reasons. Among the Christians there were notorious anti-Semites, for example, Karl Marx; I was very worried that there was an admixture of Jewish blood in him, R. Wagner. For Jews, there was a ban on almost all activities, they were allowed to be loaders, traders and financiers. A natural question arises: why were Jews allowed to trade and make financial transactions? (There are no questions regarding movers). The fact is that the founders of Christianity were very disapproving of trade, money, and wealth in general. The apostle Paul, for example, argued that money is the root of all evil, and therefore it is a crime to love them, much less to earn money, let the Jews do this dirty work. Since Judaism does not oppose material well-being and piety, and the Jewish occupation was sharply limited, it is not surprising that trade and finance in medieval Europe were in their hands. Another important circumstance. Jews were concentrated in cities, as they were forbidden to engage in agriculture. In European cities with the participation of Jews working in the field of trade and finance, urban culture was created. In this regard, P. Johnson notes: “Perhaps the greatest contribution of the Jews in the progress of humanity was that they forced European culture to come to terms with money and their power. "One of the consequences of this was the emergence of self-government in cities, because trade, in general, commodity-money relations can develop if they are not constrained by the rigid framework of feudal laws. And although Christians, especially Protestants, were gradually drawn into the trade, still the anti-Semites still contemptuously call the Jews "traffickers." “What is the cult of the Jews? - asks mentioned Marx. - In the flush. What is their worldly god? In money ... Money is the jealous god of Israel ... For all the goods ... looming ... circumcised Jews "(which he himself was the grandson of rabbis of the mother and father, by the way).
If you look at the problem of developing economic relations without bias, it becomes clear that it was the Jews who largely laid the foundations of the modern market economy, which was crucial for the establishment of democracy in Europe and the United States of America. In the 17th century, mainly Jews created the largest financial market in Europe in the City of London, developed a mechanism for cashless transfer of money - letters of credit and checks to bearer, which facilitated and accelerated financial transactions; formulated one of the most important principles of trade (and service) - the buyer (client) is always right. Jews played a leading role in organizing stock exchanges in London, Amsterdam, and New York and became one of the first brokers. At the same time (in the X VII - XVIII centuries) the science was born, studying economic laws, as objective as the laws of nature. One of the founders of economics, along with the French F., Kene and A. Turgot, the English W. Petty and A. Smith, the American B. Franklin, was an English Jew, D. Ricardo, the son of the Sephardic people, who first moved to the Netherlands, then to England. D. Ricardo contributed to the development of the theory of monetary circulation, put forward the idea of a gold standard, implemented in countries with market economies; studied (and implemented) the mechanisms of international trade relations, pricing and other problems of political economy. They, in particular, solved the convoluted question of cost. “Nothing gave rise to so many mistakes and disagreements,” writes Ricardo, “like ... uncertainty of the concepts that are associated with the word“ value ”.” Indeed, A. Smith was wrong in solving this problem and followed by K. Marx. They believed that the market value of a commodity depends mainly on the amount of labor invested in its production. And Ricardo gives priority to price formation to market self-regulating processes, rightly stating: “If an item is worthless, in other words, if it does not serve our needs,he will be deprived of exchange (market) value, whatever the amount of labor necessary to obtain it. ” At the same time, there are goods, for example, works of art, “the value of which is determined solely by their rarity,” writes Ricardo. “Their value does not depend at all on the amount of labor ... necessary for production, and varies depending on ... the wealth and inclinations of the persons who wish to acquire them.” And in this case, the price of goods is regulated by the market - by supply and demand, but not established by the state, as supporters of socialism erroneously assert. Therefore, A.Smith and K.Marx are not right to postulate that mainly labor lies at the heart of pricing. From which Marx made a far-reaching conclusion that the owner does not pay the worker extra for his work, as a result, surplus value is created, which is appropriated by the ownerexploiter. In order to eliminate exploitation, a revolution is necessary in order to conquer the workers (exploited) power. The viciousness of such views, if one delves into them, is obvious, but they were implemented in Russia and some other countries, unfortunately for millions of people. Marx’s merciless criticism
of private property and a market economy with its free competition, calls to create a centralized economy went against another important idea of Ricardo that “wages must be granted to private and free market competition and must never be controlled by the intervention of legislation”. Well, D. Ricardo was lucky that he did not live under socialism ... * * * In the XIX - XX centuries, there was a leap unprecedented in the history of mankind in the development of civilization. Fundamental laws of animate and inanimate nature were discovered, which led to the industrial revolution, as a result, increased production of food, products of the light and food industries, created fundamentally new means of communication and communication, entertainment and recreation, studied the causes and mechanisms of many diseases and their treatment and prevention, etc. Mankind, in principle, realized the need for peaceful coexistence of states, protection of universal moral values (namely, "the Jews gave the world ... the highest conception of morality" - L. Brunush), nature and the expansion of democratic freedoms of citizens on a global scale. These successes have been achieved through the efforts of many scientists, philosophers, engineers and technicians, politicians from different countries and nations, and not least the Jews. After all, all these achievements miraculously coincided with the destruction of the “Berlin Wall”.Before the release of the Jews, the Jews were mainly engaged in the spiritual and humanitarian spheres - they worked out the problems of ethics, morality, humanism, law, and economics, as far as obtaining civil rights in Western Europe and then in Russia (although, unfortunately, anti-Semitism is nowhere did not go away, forming an indispensable background of the life of the Jews), the Jews actively, one might say, excitedly, joined the development of all areas of culture, science, art, technology, etc. In the XX century there was a breakthrough in the knowledge of the fundamental principles of matter and the laws of the universe, a significant role in this belongs to quantum physics. Its creators are, along with the Germans M. Planck, V. Geisenberg, M. Laue, the Austrian E. Schrödinger, the Englishman P. Dirac, the Frenchman L. Broeille, the Germanic Jews A. Einstein, M. Born, H. Bethe, the Danish Jew N. Bor, Italian Jew E. Fermi, Russian Jew L. Landau, for which they were awarded the Nobel Prize, and other scientists. The dawn of quantum physics emerged in the XIX century due to the deep theoretical work of the English physicist J. Maxwell and the brilliant works of the German Jew G. Hertz (the unit of alternating current frequency was named after him), who discovered the electromagnetic waves (fields) and the photo effect in the experiment. Hertz first in the world created a generator and receiver of radio waves, that is, radio. Hertz was a student of the German physicist G. Helmholtz, who offered him a topic, the work on which led to epochal discoveries. Helmholtz after the death of Hertz, who lived only 37 years, wrote with deep bitterness: “Heinrich Hertz was ... designed to uncover before humanity many ... still hidden secrets of nature, but all hopes were wrecked because of a cunning disease (tuberculosis. - RV), which destroyed this life
so precious for humanity ... My pain ... is especially strong, because among all my students I have always viewed Hertz as the one to whom the circle of my scientific ideas was closest. " The phenomenon of the photoelectric effect continued to study A. Einstein, as a result he discovered a photon - quantum of the electromagnetic field (light). Einstein - the author of the theory of relativity, which changed our views on the universe; it turned out that it is governed by the laws of space-time. In developing the theory of relativity, Einstein relied, in particular, on the discovery of the American Jew, Nobel Prize winner A. Michelson, who proved that the speed of light is marginal and independent of the speed of the light source. This and other paradoxes were explained by Einstein, who possessed not only ingenious and sophisticated intellect, but also a peculiar psychological warehouse, which V. Geisenberg compared with the style of thinking of Columbus. A. Einstein, who discovered science, made it because Heisenberg believes that at the decisive moment he managed to “leave the soil on which the previous science rested,and in a certain sense, make a leap into the void ... managed ... to change the very structure of thinking ". No one in our time needs to prove the value of cybernetics for the progress of civilization. The creator of cybernetics is the American Jew N. Wiener, whose parents fled from the Russian Empire, writes about his father, a philologist scholar, that he "absorbed ... the best traditions of German scientific thought, Jewish intellectual culture and what is commonly called the American spirit"; N. Wiener himself was saturated with all this. He was a mathematician, but not limited to the scope of this science, he always sought to understand the physical meaning of mathematical formulas. He was also interested in physiology, it was not by chance that he collaborated with the Mexican Jew, the physiologist A. Rosenbluth. The breadth of thinking, knowledge of the laws of the functioning of a living organism as a selfregulating system allowed the mathematician Wiener to create a science about the general laws of control in living and inanimate nature. The self-regulating system functions if feedback (information) is carried out. In totalitarian systems, N.Winer notes, there is no feedback: the system eliminates the signaling. Consequently, socialism as a totalitarian system is doomed from the standpoint of cybernetics. For thousands of years of Mankind, suffering severely from infectious diseases, including infectious diseases, had no idea why they arise, did not know their etiology (cause). Recall that in medieval Europe it was precisely in Jews that they saw one of the causes of the emergence of epidemics, for which innocent Jews suffered severely from embittered people ... In the 17th century, an event occurred that played an important role in studying the etiology of infectious diseases. Dutch merchant A.Lёvenguk opened the world of microorganisms. But he was not the founder of microbe science. The honor of its creation belongs to the Frenchman L. Pasteur, the German, Nobel Prize Laureate R. Koch and the Russian Jew (who emigrated to France) I. Mechnikov, who developed the philosophy and methodology of microbiology in the XIX century. Thanks to their work, their students and followers in different countries, pathogens of many diseases were discovered.
Even in ancient times, people noticed that not even the most dangerous infectious diseases, including infectious ones, always lead to a tragic outcome, and not everyone around the patient is infected. Hence, there are some unknown forces in the body (which Hippocrates and Maimonides guessed), providing recovery and immunity to infectious diseases. Solved one of the most mysterious mysteries of nature I. Mechnikov and the German Jew P. Erlich - the founders, along with L. Pasteur, of immunology. Mechnikov discovered the cellular (phagocytic) mechanism of immunity, Ehrlich explained the cell-free mechanism of protecting the body against pathogens, for which both were awarded the Nobel Prize. The cellular theory of immunity is based on the ability of white blood cells (phagocytes) to respond to foreign bodies that have entered the body, including pathogens, to absorb and digest them. Ehrlich found out how microorganisms are neutralized in the liquid part of the blood (serum). In the 20th century, medicine acquired highly effective antimicrobials that have chemical affinity for microbes. Because these drugs are called chemotherapeutic. The founder of the chemotherapeutic method of treatment of infectious diseases is P.Eerlich. He, together with the German R. Virkhov, laid the foundation for hematology, which studies the mechanisms of blood formation, blood disease and develops methods for their treatment. A significant contribution to hematology was made by I. Kassirsky, who contributed to the formation of this branch of medicine in the USSR. The further development of immunology is associated with the name of the Russian Jewish student A. Mezhnikov Mezhnikov, who emigrated to France. Frequently he was the author of the concept of local immunity (by the way, he did not admit to the USSR for more than half a century). According to Berezka, local immunity, being autonomous, but part of general immunity, provides immunity to infection of regions of the body (skin, eyes, oral cavity, etc.) that are directly in contact with the external environment containing pathogens of various diseases. Theory A. Bessredki has enriched medicine with a deeper understanding of the mechanisms responsible for the body’s resistance to microorganisms causing diseases. In the 20th century, vaccination of the population played an invaluable role in the fight against infectious diseases, thanks to which immunity to various diseases is created. A vaccine is a culture of weakened pathogens of a particular disease, the introduction of which into the body makes it resistant to the disease. A similar effect is achieved not at the cost of a serious and dangerous disease, which can result in a tragic outcome due to the penetration into the body of “full-fledged” (virulent) pathogens, but imperceptibly (sometimes with only minor painful events). The first vaccine against smallpox was created in the 18th century by the English doctor E. Jenner. He created his vaccine, guided by experience and intuition, without knowing either the origin of the disease or the mechanisms of immunity. The theoretical basis for targeted vaccine production was laid by L. Pasteur. The first, scientifically based vaccines were received by Pasteur himself - against anthrax and chicken cholera and a
Russian Jew student of Mechnikov (who emigrated to France) V. Khavkin - against plague and cholera. Indeed, the founders of microbiology, immunology and vaccine makers are benefactors of humanity who saved millions of human lives. In medicine, at the turn of the 1940s and 1940s, the era of antibiotics began, at the origins of which the Nobel Prize winners were the British A. Fleming and H. Flory, the English Jew B. Chein (whose parents emigrated from Russia) and the Russian Jew who emigrated to the USA Z. Vaksman, who introduced the term "antibiotics" into science. Important provisions of chemotherapy (including antibiotic therapy) were formulated by I. Kassirsky - one of the founders of this area of medicine in the USSR. The study of physiology, in particular, the functions of the nervous system, allowed G. Helmholtz and his collaborator Russian Jew N. Bakst to make a major discovery - measure the speed of impulse propagation along motor nerves, including in humans. But the mysterious mechanism of transmission of nerve impulses from one nerve to another and to the executive organ remained. The German Jew O. Levi, the Englishman G. Dale, the English Jew B. Katz, the Swede W. Euler, the American Jew A. Axelrod, awarded the Nobel Prize, and the Russian Jews A. Samoilov and A. Ginetsinsky together with the Russian Armenian L. solved the mystery Orbeli. One of the central problems of metabolism - the mechanism of oxidation of organic compounds in the body was found out by the German Jew A. Krebs who emigrated to England (the term "Krebs cycle" entered science) and the German Jew F. Lipman who emigrated to the USA, received the Nobel Prize for these studies. The epochal discovery in genetics was made by the English Jew F. Crick and the American J. Watson, who deciphered the structure of the gene, for which they were awarded the Nobel Prize. The structure of the gene is quite strong, which ensures the sustainability of the transmission of progeny signs of ancestors. However, certain factors (mutagens) cause changes in genes (mutations) and, accordingly, heredity, which underlies the variability of organisms that supply material for evolution and natural selection. Mutagens have a different nature, the first to be discovered is a mutagen of physical nature, it turned out that these are x-rays. The author of the discovery is the American Jew G. Moller, who was awarded the Nobel Prize. Chemicals can also be mutagens, as demonstrated by the Russian Jew I. Rapoport. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences intended to award him the Nobel Prize, but after the scandal with the B. Pasternak Prize, the Academy requested the consent of the CPSU Central Committee, but did not receive it. Во все времена человечеству угрожал голод. Одна из причин заключалась в низких урожаях из-за дефицита в почве азота – составной части белка. А ведь земная атмосфера на ¾ состоит из азота, но растения (кроме бобовых), как, впрочем, и человек, усваивать этот элемент из воздуха не могут. Задача заключалась в обогащении почвы азотом в доступной для растений химической форме. Для этого подходил аммиак – соединение азота с водородом. Но
получать его в требуемых количествах в промышленных условиях не умели. Эту непростую проблему решили германский еврей Ф.Габер, изгнанный из Германии после прихода к власти Гитлера, и немец К.Бош, удостоенные Нобелевской премии. В определённой мере можно считать, что благодаря Габеру и Бошу человечеству голод не грозит, если, разумеется, исключить различные катаклизмы – войны, социализм и др. Since ancient times, physicians have tried to transfuse blood for the treatment of diseases, but this procedure often inexplicably ended tragically for the recipient (to whom the blood was transfused). The cause of fatal complications was established by an Austrian Jew K. Landsteiner, who discovered blood groups, which was the largest achievement in hematology. He also revealed in the blood the Rh factor. Landsteiner's remarkable studies help to prevent not only unsuccessful transfusions, but also some complications in the newborn caused by the Rh factor, as well as widely introduce blood transfusion and its preparations into medicine. Not surprisingly, K. Landsteiner was awarded the Nobel Prize. And another major discovery of K.Landsteiner - he proved that a dangerous disease - poliomyelitis - is caused by a live pathogen, that is, it is infectious. The study of the properties of the virus that causes poliomyelitis made it possible to obtain a vaccine against this disease. Traditionally, Jews continued to participate in the spiritual sphere, in particular, played a significant role in the development of musical culture. “The Jewish musical tradition,” P. Johnson notes, “is much older than any other in Europe,” because music is an element of Jewish worship, and the cantor is no less respected than a rabbi. A German Jew, J. Offenbach, who lived in France, was one of the founders of the most democratic genre of musical and theatrical art, the operetta. Austrian Jew I.Shtraus (junior), Hungarian Jew who emigrated to the USA, I. Kalman, Russian Jew I. Dunaevsky were brilliant representatives of this art form. Classical symphonic and instrumental music and opera genre are Germanic Jews J. MendelssohnBartholdi - composer, conductor, pianist, organist, founder of the first German Leipzig Conservatory; G. Mahler - composer, conductor, headed the Viennese court opera; J. Meyerber composer; American Jew J. Gershwin - composer; Russian Jews A.Rubinshteyn - composer, conductor, pianist, founded and headed the first Petersburg conservatory in Russia; his brother N.Rubinshtein - pianist and conductor, founder of the Moscow Conservatory and its director. The largest representative of German and world poetry was the German Jew Heinrich (Haim) Heine. It was difficult for him to live in his native country. “Right, my nerves are too weak to stay in Germany,” he complained in one of the letters, explaining why he emigrated to France. Despite legal education and a doctorate, for Heine, the paths to an academic career were closed in accordance with one of the anti-Jewish laws adopted in Germany in 1822. Heine had to be baptized “for health reasons,” as he later regretted. In general, Heine was indifferent to religion, as he demonstrated, for example, in “Dispute”, in which an uncompromising dispute, whose religion is true, is described in a sharp satirical form, between a
Catholic monk and a rabbi. The price of defeat in a dispute is the transition to the faith of the winner. The arbitrators are the royal couple. The question is tough: ... who is truly the Lord? G-d is that the Jews is old And one ... Or is it a triune G-d by faith is Christian ... What is the outcome of the dispute? To the king's question to his wife, who won - Christian or Jew, she answered ... in the style of Heine himself: "Understood nothing I am neither in this nor in this faith But it seems to me that both They spoil the air equally. ”
G. Heine was an opponent of divine predestination (teleology). In the brilliantly written travel notes "Journey to the Harz," he ridiculed supporters of such views. During his wanderings, the poet met “an average man with a foolishly intelligent face ... He ... paid my attention,” Heine writes, “to the expediency and usefulness of everything in nature. Trees are green because green is good for the eyes. I agreed with him and added that God created the cattle because beef broth supports the person; that he made donkeys so that they would serve people for comparison, and he made the man himself, so that he would eat beef broth and not be a donkey. ” Heine developed this topic with considerable sarcasm in his work “Towards Teleology”. In what way it is written, we can judge by its beginning. For movement - work superfluous! Two legs gave us the Almighty, So that we are not all together Like mushrooms hanging around. To live in stagnation is the human race You could have one foot.
G. Heine was an opponent of tyranny, opposed the ideas of Marx (they were personally acquainted) about the dictatorship of the proletariat and socialism. In one of his letters, he writes about socialism with such precision as if he lived in the USSR or in the GDR:
“The socialist future smells of whip, blood, godlessness (G. Heine is an advocate of freedom of conscience. - R.V.) and abundant beatings.” On the dictatorship of the proletariat, he, too, accurately said: “I am very afraid of the cruel proletarian power”. G. Heine, like his distant ancestors - the authors of the Old Testament, was concerned with the question: why is there so much unjust in the world? Why under the burden of the cross, All in blood, drains right? Why everywhere is dishonest Met with honor and glory? Who is to blame? Ile the will of God Is not everything available on earth? Or does he play us? It is mean and criminal!
Such is G. Heine - a poet, a thinker, a humanist, a typical representative of the Jewish people, and it was not by chance that in fascist Germany they tried to erase his name from the memory of the people. A major historian was Marc Bloch, a French Jew, a member of the French Resistance, who died in the Gestapo dungeons. His studies of the Middle Ages gained international fame. He worked a lot on the problem of identifying material historical monuments, developed a number of new approaches to the study of history, improved the conceptual apparatus, proposed original methods for studying the spiritual, material, economic and social life of people from different eras. Thanks to M. Blok and his like-minded French historian L.Fevr (by the way, the concept of “mentality” introduced into science), historians began to pay attention to the study of sociopsychological processes in human society, starting from the time of its formation, which allows us to more deeply understand the driving forces of world history . The works of German Jews L. Feuchtwanger, Nobel Prize Winner N. Zaks (who emigrated to Sweden), French Jews M. Proust, A. Morois and Nobel Prize Winner A. Bergson (not only a writer, but also a philosopher) are world famous. Nobel Prize laureate Sh. Agnon from Israel, Austrian Jews Nobel Prize laureate E. Kanetti and S. Zweig, Russian Jews Sholom Aleikhem (who emigrated to the United States), A. Rybakov, D. Samoilov, N. Korzhavin (who emigrated) V.Aksenova (emigrated to IIIA), Nobel Prize laureates A.Zingera (Bashevis living in the USA), Boris Pasternak and Brodsky (who emigrated to the United States) and Grossman. Vasily (Iosif Solomonovich) Grossman is the author of the best in Soviet literature epic about the war "Life and Fate." The critic L.Annensky is absolutely right that this work is in the first row of the XX century Russian prose . Such a book could be written not only by a talented humanist and internationalist writer, but also by a highly educated, well versed in psychology, politics, history, military affairs and philosophically minded, knowing the life of Soviet people in every detail - from ordinary to commanding.
V.Grossman convincingly showed the fundamental identity of the political and ideological regimes of fascist Germany and the USSR; mercilessly exposed terry anti-Semitism flourishing in the USSR, which hit all segments of the population, formulated the main features of this disgraceful phenomenon. If we follow Napoleon’s correct judgment: “The treatment of Jews in each country is the thermometer of its civilization,” then both fascist Germany and socialist Russia were not civilized countries by this criterion; anti-Semitism in both states is not accidental; it corresponds to A. Einstein's formula: “He who now stands against reason and freedom, who implants an insensible world of servility, cannot but see in the Jew an irreconcilable enemy.” Although in Hitler’s Germany and in the Soviet Union there were plenty of other signs of uncivilization. In “Life and Fate” terrible scenes of extermination of the Jews are described, which are impossible to read without shudder. V. Grossman painfully survived the Holocaust: his mother became one of six million Jews - victims of the Holocaust ... V. Grossman was one of the first in the world to publish in 1944 materials about the Treblinka death camp, which appeared at the International Military Tribunal in Nuremberg as the most important documents on the accusation of fascism and its leaders who rejected Germany in the Middle Ages. The Jews had a significant influence on cinema. As P. Johnson writes, in the USA “at the end of the 1890s, poor immigrant Jews connected the cinema with another institution created for themselves - an entertainment passage about socialism”. American Jews created the world famous film company " XX Century Fox", "Metropol-GoldwynMeier" and others. It should be noted that the Jews created not only commercial enterprises, but, according to Goldwyn, their goal was to create a "picture on a solid foundation of art." And they achieved this goal. Outstanding actors and film directors came forward from among the Jews, it is enough to name an English Jew who lived in the USA, Ch.Chaplin, Russian Jews S. Eisenstein, Dziga Vertov, E. Ryazanov, M. Romm. M. Romm was one of the leading cinematographers in the USSR, director and teacher, author of the popular films “Pyshka”, “Nine Days of One Year”, etc. He is probably the best documentary film in the world cinema “Ordinary Fascism”, which played a significant role in exposing fascism. In the film there are many tragic (despite the general optimistic sound) - Jewish ghettos, death factories, destroyed cities, corpses ... A lot of cadres, accompanied by very witty and sarcastic commentary of Romm, making fun of Hitler and his entourage, the most Nazi idea, embodied in the inhuman Third Reich mode . The frames showing the mass psychosis of the population at the sight of their idol - a miserable political figure, but, despite all their insignificance, guilty of the greatest crimes against humanity, are impressive.In Soviet spectators, these scenes evoked by association the visions of such behavior of people during demonstrations on Red Square during the sight of Stalin.
It has been argued that Romm biasedly selected material. But only chroniclers are impartial - what they see is what they write about. And artists cannot be impartial (as well as historians), however, they must be objective, which does not contradict one another. Could Romm objectively show the racism of the Nazis, without selecting the appropriate newsreels and photographs, without showing the terrible scenes in the Jewish ghettos, death camps? To prove the policy of the country's leadership that was disastrous for the German people, Rommus needed visual material, testifying to the military and political collapse of Germany. The film “Ordinary Fascism” (which should be shown constantly, especially in Germany and Russia) thanks to the thematically precisely selected material and high skill of M. Romm clearly shows the real threat that Fascism posed to world civilization. In many ways, thanks to the Jews, cinema has become the most accessible form of cultural entertainment and mass art for the population. Among the major theatrical figures in the USSR, the head of the State Jewish Theater, the great actor, a wonderful director and theorist of the theater S.Mikhoels (Vovsi), who influenced the world theatrical art, stood out. The game Mikhoels combined wisdom, great acting technique, deep insight into the psychology of the character. Representing, for example, the protagonist of Sholom Aleichem's play “Big Win” by a poor tailor who unexpectedly won fabulous money and then again fell into poverty, Mikhoels answered the eternal question: what is happiness. Happiness, in the interpretation of Sholom-Aleichem and Mikhoels, is a favorite work that a person does with pleasure, and therefore she succeeds. The same thought is about the joy of work, regardless of the profession, the main thing is that the work was useful to people, A. Rybakov emphasized in the novel “Hard Sand”. S.Mikhoels made an indelible impression on his contemporaries by the unmatched performance of Shakespeare's King Lear - one of the most difficult roles in the world drama. The actor is so psychologically merged with his hero that they seemed indistinguishable. The fulfillment of this role is the highest achievement of Mikhoels actor. “It was a terrific Lear,” literary critic and writer I. Andronikov admired Mikhoels’s play. “... He created an image of a despot who is leaving power because only she lost all value for him ... Everything is insignificant in his eyes, except for his own personality.” The famous English director G. Craig writes: “... A real surprise, without any exaggeration - a shock, turned out to be“ King Lear ”! ... Now it is clear to me why there is no real Shakespeare in England at the theater. Because there is no such actor as Mikhoels ”. Soul and body belonging to the Jewish people, S.Mikhoels was a true internationalist and humanist, these features are quite widespread among the Jewish people. He was well aware of the terrible danger of fascism for world culture. Having led the Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee (JAC), Mikhoels directed all his energy to building ties with the American public, which played a significant role in providing material assistance and moral support from the United States from the US during the Soviet-German war .
S.Mikhoels fell victim to state anti-Semitism, unleashed by Stalin; on his personal instructions, Mikhoels was brutally murdered, having simulated a car accident. The Jewish theater was closed, the EAC was dispersed, its members, except L. Stern, were shot. L. Stern was a professor at the University of Geneva (which she graduated from where she defended her doctoral thesis and headed the Department of Physiological Chemistry), the author of the concept of the hemato-encephalic barrier - the physiological mechanism of metabolic regulation in the central nervous system, ensuring consistency of the internal environment of the spinal cord and brain. Investigated the chemical basis of physiological processes, established the role of a number of enzymes in metabolic reactions, developed an effective method of restoring the heart (defibrillation) when it stopped, suggested original ways to treat shock and tuberculous meningitis. She also dealt with the problems of studying and preventing old age (which saved her life). L. Stern belonged to the category of Jews who cared about the happiness of all mankind, which is possible, according to their conviction, only under socialism. She left a prosperous life in blessed Switzerland and, being a world-famous scientist, moved to the USSR in 1925 to actively participate in building socialism in her homeland (S. Stern was born and graduated from high school in Russia). She joined, of course, the Communist Party. In the USSR, Stern made a good career: she headed two Physiological Institutes organized by her, the Department of Normal Physiology at the 2nd Moscow Medical Institute, she was elected to the USSR Academy of Sciences (was the first woman academic in the country), the Academy of Medical Sciences. Received the Stalin Prize. Created a scientific physiological school. We add that Stern was a member of the Leopoldino-Karolinska Academy of Naturalists in Halle (Germany) and an honorary doctor of the University of Geneva. However, life made her cruelly disappointed in the "charms" of socialism. In 1949, L. Stern was arrested (for 71 years of age) as a member of the EAC and was held in solitary confinement at Lubyanka for 3 years and 8 months. At the first interrogation, she was taken to the office of the Minister of Internal Affairs, Abakumov, who met her with an insulting curse: "Oh, you old bitch!" “This is how the minister talks with an academician,” Lina Solomonovna said with deep bitterness. In a similar boorish-hooligan style her torturers (officially, investigators) also treated her. L. Stern was tried and sent to Kazakhstan. After Stalin's death, she was soon rehabilitated. Why Stern was not shot? The fact is that the aging leader and best friend of scientists, especially Jews, counted on Stern in the sense of prolonging his youth, and therefore ordered to keep her alive. Jews played an important role in the development of computer science, without which the modern stage of civilization’s development is unthinkable. The German Jew Paul Reuter (Israel Josaphat) who emigrated to England in the middle of the 19th century was founded by the world's largest news agency, which is now widely known.
Technical informatics tools — computers, televisions, mobile phones, and others — were created on semiconductors, the theoretical foundations of which were laid by the Russian Jew A. Ioffe. The Russian Jew, J. Alferov, continued and deepened his research, for which he received the Nobel Prize. The economic sciences, whose successful development in the 20th century is associated with the names of the Nobel laureates of Russian Jews L. Kantorovich, who developed mathematical methods in economics, contribute to the production of material goods ; V. Leontyev (who emigrated to the USA), who improved the methods of economic and mathematical analysis; American Jew S. Kuznets (a descendant of Russian Jews), who made a significant contribution to the method of economic and statistical research; R. Frish is a Norwegian Jew who mathematically developed problems of economic growth and modeling a market economy. * * * One of the recognized objective criteria for the contribution of a scientist and a writer to world culture is the Nobel Prize, established in 1901. For one hundred years of the existence of the Nobel Prize Institute, 25 percent of laureates are Jews from different countries. Award-winning residents of Germany before 1933 (the Nobel Prize was not recognized in Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s USSR) about 30 percent, a third of them are Jews. Let us think: what state would civilization be if the mentioned (and unmentioned) Jews were deprived of the right to study and work, or were killed during the Jewish pogroms in Russia, Germany and other countries ... .