When British General Allenby entered Jerusalem as conqueror in December 1917, he made a point of doing so on foot.
Full original post.
Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Religion. Show all posts
Sunday, April 9, 2017
For Palm Sunday: A Palm Sunday Donkey
From the vaults: One of the most charming pieces of Easter religious sculpture is the depiction of Jesus entering Jerusalem on a donkey.
When British General Allenby entered Jerusalem as conqueror in December 1917, he made a point of doing so on foot.
Full original post.
When British General Allenby entered Jerusalem as conqueror in December 1917, he made a point of doing so on foot.
Full original post.
Tuesday, December 27, 2016
Christmas Decorating With the Nazis: From the War Diary of a German Girl
This is a document that my father acquired during his service with the US Occupation Government in Germany after World War II: confiscated, or just found in his office or quarters—I don’t know. It is described as a “war diary” for a young girl. Normally speaking, a war diary (Kriegstagebuch) is an official German record of a military unit or department, or occasionally, a private record kept by a combatant. The extension of this term—rather than, say, scrapbook—to a gift made for a child is indicative of the culture of militarism and indoctrination under the Third Reich. (more background at the bottom of the page)
The Christmas entries are particularly instructive.
Weihnachten with the Wehrmacht
24 December 1940
In one of the most famous military broadcasts of the War, German radio shared transmissions from the Arctic Circle and Stalingrad to Africa as soldiers sang "Silent Night."
Of course the tendency to seize upon Christmas as a respite from combat was not unique to Germany. 101st Airborne veteran Art Schmitz recalled being surrounded by the Germans at Bastogne in 1944. Hearing "Radio Berlin doing a request broadcast: German civilians asking for Christmas carols to be played for their soldiers serving in Narvik, Norway; Italy; or Novosibirsk, Russia," the Americans decided to sing their own Christmas carols. "There was 'The First Noel,' 'O Little Town of Bethlehem' and others before we began 'Angels We Have Heard on High.' What we heard was the sound of angels of death overhead." A Nazi air raid began and the singing ceased, but the memory remained.
The diary pages for the two days of Christmas (celebrated for two days in Germany) epitomize the blending of the military-propagandistic and bourgeois-sentimental.
The sketch of the evergreen branch with a candle (a tree-decorating tradition maintained up to the present in some circles, though not without risk) is the only original art work in the book.
Compromised Christianity
Nazism was ideologically anti-Christian, but it readily availed itself of Christian imagery and symbols not only because they were familiar, but also because they were particularly well suited to convey the fascist message of "palingenetic" ultranationalism, or the urgent need for national regeneration: the propaganda film "Triumph of the Will" begins, after all, by speaking of Germany's "crucifixion" by the Versailles Treaty and "rebirth" after the advent of Hitler.
Christmas was in many ways the ideal holiday for the Nazis: a convenient means to affirm their connection with mainstream society (for even their most barbarous acts were committed in the name of decency and middle class values) as well as to impart their own inflection to it. Christmas was of course common to both Catholic and Protestant Germans, but the latter connection was most fruitful, for Lutheranism was associated with the national identity and heritage: the revolt against Rome; the translation of the Bible, which laid the foundations for the modern German language; and (at least according to popular tradition) even the introduction of the Christmas tree. Further, the natural-seasonal aspects of the holiday, which coincided with the winter solstice, were multivalent, allowing for easy identification with either a Christian or a Nordic-pagan message (or some combination of both), as the need dictated.
Finally, the holiday, with its themes of both domesticity and light versus darkness, could incorporate varying ideological messages about the relation between battle front and home front, depending on the course of the war: from the early expectations of peace and national renewal, to later, increasingly bitter denunciations of the barbarous enemy--whether the advance of the Red Army or the allied air campaigns against German cities--as a motivation to fight for the preservation of the innocents at home.
Thus, the page facing the photo of the soldier trimming the Christmas tree was devoted to a an address by Hitler.
The Nazis as the Peace Party?
Indeed, as Ian Kershaw so clearly demonstrated in his modern classic, The Hitler Myth, Hitler succeeded for so long precisely because he was credited not only with achieving domestic recovery but also securing--without war--the consensus international goals of the military and geographic revision of the Versailles Treaty. This presumed evidence of his genius as a leader reinforced his standing among the loyal and cut the ground out from under the would-be critics. When war finally broke out in 1939, the German people, fully aware of what had happened in 1914, were more sober and anxious than enthusiastic, but the relatively easy victories in Poland and then in the west following the end of the "Phony War" in 1940 merely reinforced Hitler's reputation for wisdom and infallibility.
What the mother writing this diary--and the rest of the public--did not know was that peace was in fact further away than ever: on 18 December 1940, Hitler had ordered the military to prepare for the invasion of the Soviet Union, even if the war against Britain was not brought to a conclusion.
From Peace Party to Pagan Turn
Thus, when Himmler greeted the SS and their families in the 1943-44 volume of the holiday annual Weihe Nacht (a deliberately archaic spelling of Christmas, connoting pagan origins), it was in a very different tone:
Background
The culture
About a generation ago, there was a rather sterile but revealing debate among scholars of women’s history. One view, which passed for a radical political and feminist stance of a sort, maintained that, because Nazism was a masculinist racial system, women could not have been complicit in the crimes of a regime that also oppressed them. A countervailing and more plausible view called attention to their neglected role as “accomplices,” providing the stable private sphere supportive of the tasks of the politically and militarily active males. As others pointed out, one does not have to choose between victim and accomplice: it was entirely possible for Aryan women, individually and collectively, to be both.
In 1935, Hitler declared, “I would be ashamed to be a German man if only one woman had to go to the front. The woman has her own battlefield. With every child that she brings into the world, she fights her battle for the nation. The man stands up for the Volk, exactly as the woman stands up for the family.” The continuation of that battle meant raising girls to understand the culture and course of warfare.
The bibliographic object
The document takes the form of a notebook of blank pages (c. 16 x 25 cm, with lines ruled in with pencil), bound in faded purplish boards with a black cloth spine. A handwritten label (in an indeterminate hand) on the cover calls it “Kriegstagebuch For [name],” whereas the title page, in the large printing of a child’s hand reads, “Mein Kriegstage Buch [sic].” By contrast, the text entries are all in an immaculate version—thus evidently an adult hand—of the Sütterlin German script taught from 1915 through 1941: under the Nazi regime, the only one from 1935 on. The contents consist of dated entries—generally excerpts from or summaries of press reports, speeches, and the like—accompanied by photographs clipped from newspapers and magazines. Unfortunately, the book covers only the period November 1940 to early February 1941; the reason for that choice is unclear.
* * *
The Christmas entries are particularly instructive.
Weihnachten with the Wehrmacht
24 December 1940
 |
| "Our soldiers, too, decorate the Christmas tree, for it connects them with the homeland and recalls many a pleasant hour." |
Of course the tendency to seize upon Christmas as a respite from combat was not unique to Germany. 101st Airborne veteran Art Schmitz recalled being surrounded by the Germans at Bastogne in 1944. Hearing "Radio Berlin doing a request broadcast: German civilians asking for Christmas carols to be played for their soldiers serving in Narvik, Norway; Italy; or Novosibirsk, Russia," the Americans decided to sing their own Christmas carols. "There was 'The First Noel,' 'O Little Town of Bethlehem' and others before we began 'Angels We Have Heard on High.' What we heard was the sound of angels of death overhead." A Nazi air raid began and the singing ceased, but the memory remained.
The diary pages for the two days of Christmas (celebrated for two days in Germany) epitomize the blending of the military-propagandistic and bourgeois-sentimental.
 |
| 25 December The Führer on Christmas with his personal Guard Regiment The Commander of the Guard Regiment SS Lieutenant General Sepp Dietrich, greets the Führer |
 |
| 26 December Santa Claus with the Führer's escort team |
* * *
Compromised Christianity
Nazism was ideologically anti-Christian, but it readily availed itself of Christian imagery and symbols not only because they were familiar, but also because they were particularly well suited to convey the fascist message of "palingenetic" ultranationalism, or the urgent need for national regeneration: the propaganda film "Triumph of the Will" begins, after all, by speaking of Germany's "crucifixion" by the Versailles Treaty and "rebirth" after the advent of Hitler.
Christmas was in many ways the ideal holiday for the Nazis: a convenient means to affirm their connection with mainstream society (for even their most barbarous acts were committed in the name of decency and middle class values) as well as to impart their own inflection to it. Christmas was of course common to both Catholic and Protestant Germans, but the latter connection was most fruitful, for Lutheranism was associated with the national identity and heritage: the revolt against Rome; the translation of the Bible, which laid the foundations for the modern German language; and (at least according to popular tradition) even the introduction of the Christmas tree. Further, the natural-seasonal aspects of the holiday, which coincided with the winter solstice, were multivalent, allowing for easy identification with either a Christian or a Nordic-pagan message (or some combination of both), as the need dictated.
Finally, the holiday, with its themes of both domesticity and light versus darkness, could incorporate varying ideological messages about the relation between battle front and home front, depending on the course of the war: from the early expectations of peace and national renewal, to later, increasingly bitter denunciations of the barbarous enemy--whether the advance of the Red Army or the allied air campaigns against German cities--as a motivation to fight for the preservation of the innocents at home.
Thus, the page facing the photo of the soldier trimming the Christmas tree was devoted to a an address by Hitler.
The Nazis as the Peace Party?
24 DecemberIf this strikes us as preposterous as well as utopian, it is because we are so detached from the perceived reality in that time and place. Today we associate Hitler and Nazism primarily with war, but we need to recall that this was not always the case, at least domestically. Another book that my father acquired was a propaganda album of cigarette cards issued to commemorate the first year of the new regime (1934), which it praised as "The State of Labor and Peace."
Prepared for the Final Call!
When this war will have ended, then there will begin in Germany a great process of creation, then a great "Awaken!" will resound throughout the land. Then the German people will cease the manufacture of cannons and begin with the work of peace and task of reconstruction for the masses in their millions!
And then from this labor will arise that great German empire of which a great poet once dreamt. It will be a Germany to which every son is attached with fanatical love, because it will be a home even for the poorest.
Adolf Hitler!
Indeed, as Ian Kershaw so clearly demonstrated in his modern classic, The Hitler Myth, Hitler succeeded for so long precisely because he was credited not only with achieving domestic recovery but also securing--without war--the consensus international goals of the military and geographic revision of the Versailles Treaty. This presumed evidence of his genius as a leader reinforced his standing among the loyal and cut the ground out from under the would-be critics. When war finally broke out in 1939, the German people, fully aware of what had happened in 1914, were more sober and anxious than enthusiastic, but the relatively easy victories in Poland and then in the west following the end of the "Phony War" in 1940 merely reinforced Hitler's reputation for wisdom and infallibility.
What the mother writing this diary--and the rest of the public--did not know was that peace was in fact further away than ever: on 18 December 1940, Hitler had ordered the military to prepare for the invasion of the Soviet Union, even if the war against Britain was not brought to a conclusion.
From Peace Party to Pagan Turn
Thus, when Himmler greeted the SS and their families in the 1943-44 volume of the holiday annual Weihe Nacht (a deliberately archaic spelling of Christmas, connoting pagan origins), it was in a very different tone:
Women and mothers! Men of the SS and Police!
Implacably harsh is the enemy power, against which we have to defend and augment the Reich as the legacy of our ancestors and obligation for our children. Once again the season of the solstice and Christmas summons us to the gathering of clans [a term with a pagan-racial tinge] and families. Once again the task in the longest night of the year is to yearn for the victory of the sun with the faithful trust of our ancestors. May this deep faith in the victory of the light characterize us more deeply than ever today, when we in the privacy of the family or comrades kindle our lights. The lights on the green boughs will, spanning the distances that separate comrades in the front lines and the women and children at home, form bridges between hearts.
You mothers and women truly stand, as in all the great hours of destiny of our Teutonic-German past, truly also personally in battle. The enemy's dishonorable conduct of the war has reduced to rubble the homes of many, and yet you have lost neither courage nor faith. The harsher the struggle, the more cordially the clans must close ranks . . . .
* * *
Background
The culture
About a generation ago, there was a rather sterile but revealing debate among scholars of women’s history. One view, which passed for a radical political and feminist stance of a sort, maintained that, because Nazism was a masculinist racial system, women could not have been complicit in the crimes of a regime that also oppressed them. A countervailing and more plausible view called attention to their neglected role as “accomplices,” providing the stable private sphere supportive of the tasks of the politically and militarily active males. As others pointed out, one does not have to choose between victim and accomplice: it was entirely possible for Aryan women, individually and collectively, to be both.
In 1935, Hitler declared, “I would be ashamed to be a German man if only one woman had to go to the front. The woman has her own battlefield. With every child that she brings into the world, she fights her battle for the nation. The man stands up for the Volk, exactly as the woman stands up for the family.” The continuation of that battle meant raising girls to understand the culture and course of warfare.
The bibliographic object
The document takes the form of a notebook of blank pages (c. 16 x 25 cm, with lines ruled in with pencil), bound in faded purplish boards with a black cloth spine. A handwritten label (in an indeterminate hand) on the cover calls it “Kriegstagebuch For [name],” whereas the title page, in the large printing of a child’s hand reads, “Mein Kriegstage Buch [sic].” By contrast, the text entries are all in an immaculate version—thus evidently an adult hand—of the Sütterlin German script taught from 1915 through 1941: under the Nazi regime, the only one from 1935 on. The contents consist of dated entries—generally excerpts from or summaries of press reports, speeches, and the like—accompanied by photographs clipped from newspapers and magazines. Unfortunately, the book covers only the period November 1940 to early February 1941; the reason for that choice is unclear.
An 18th-Century French Nativity
Since we've been on the subject of Baroque Christmas art and depictions of the Nativity, I'll share this little piece from my collection.
It's a French eighteenth-century pencil sketch with sepia wash, on laid paper (c. 40 x 25 cm, with no apparent watermark).
The geometry suggests to me that it was a sketch for a wall painting, but that's just my best guess.
Oddly enough, the depiction of the central figures of the Virgin Mary and Christ child seems somewhat awkward in comparison with that of the flanking shepherds, who observe the miracle in quiet dignity.
In any case, the piece just radiates the spirit of the period.
It's a French eighteenth-century pencil sketch with sepia wash, on laid paper (c. 40 x 25 cm, with no apparent watermark).
The geometry suggests to me that it was a sketch for a wall painting, but that's just my best guess.
Oddly enough, the depiction of the central figures of the Virgin Mary and Christ child seems somewhat awkward in comparison with that of the flanking shepherds, who observe the miracle in quiet dignity.
In any case, the piece just radiates the spirit of the period.
Sunday, December 25, 2016
Merry Christmas, 2016
Wishing a merry Christmas to all my readers who celebrate the holiday!
Here, from a past post, are two images of the Nativity from southwest German eighteenth-century bibles. (Full story.)
Here, from a past post, are two images of the Nativity from southwest German eighteenth-century bibles. (Full story.)
Wednesday, June 8, 2016
8 June 1794: Robespierre Presides Over the Festival of the Supreme Being
On 8 June 1794, Maximilien Robespierre presided over the Festival of the Supreme Being, the inauguration of a new civil religion that was to be a high point of the remaking of France in accordance with the principles of revolutionary reason. Instead, it proved to be a foreshadowing of his downfall.
a belief in some divine presence was essential to the philosophical and social order
Contrary to the popular stereotype, Robespierre was not some bloodthirsty monster: in fact, he tried to rein in the "enragés" and "terrorists" who, oblivious to political reality, insisted on implementing ultra-radical policies and carried out murderous and indiscriminate retribution against any presumed "counterrevolutionary" elements of the population. For Robespierre, the so-called "Terror" was just "prompt, severe, inflexible” justice unique to revolutionary situations.
Part of his opposition to the "enragés" also derived from their radical atheism, which struck out against religion, the religious, and monuments of religious cultural heritage alike and did not scruple at the casual murder of priests and nuns. Although Robespierre had no use for the traditional church, he condemned the radical "de-Christianizers" and upheld freedom of worship. For him, as a disciple of Rousseau, a belief in some divine presence was essential to the philosophical and social order, which, he believed, rested on the moral and spiritual certainty of reward and punishment.
"The day forever fortunate has arrived, which the French people have consecrated to the Supreme Being"
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen appended to the radical French Constitution of April 1793 acknowledged the existence of Supreme Being. Attempting to address the twin crises of the Revolutionary war and the internal divisions of the Revolutionary camp the following spring, Robespierre sought to institutionalize this belief. He delivered a Report to the National Convention on the Connections of Religious and Moral Ideas with Republican Principles, & on National Festivals on 18 Floréal, Year II (7 May 1794).
It concluded with the outline of a Festival of the Supreme Being, proposed by the artist Jacques-Louis David, to be held on 20 Prairial Year II (June 8, 1794)
On 4 June 1794, Robespierre was elected President of the Convention (=legislature), and on 8 June, he presided over the Festival of the Supreme Being, according to the aforementioned mise-en-scène.
Unlike the more shallow, who felt the need to prove their revolutionary bona fides through ostentatiously "populist" dress and demeanor, Robespierre saw no contradiction in combining the most radical principles with traditional sartorial propriety: he was a fastidious dresser who still wore a powdered wig and silk stockings. A contemporary account described him as presiding over the festival "dressed in a sky-blue coat, with exquisite ruffles of lace, and holding a bunch of flowers, fruit, and ripe wheat in his hand."
The hostile image below, from a nineteenth-century history, conveys the stereotypical view of him: murderous monster as fastidious prig.
from the first French edition of Alphonse de Lamartine's Histoire des Girondins (History of the Girondists--the moderate left-center faction in the Revolution). The work ran to 61 "books" divided among 8 volumes, whose publication (Paris: Furne et Cie.,1847-50) coincided with the outbreak of a new revolution, in which the Romantic poet and liberal politician himself briefly played a key part. It was accompanied by 39 steel engravings of Revolutionary figures, along with a portrait of the author. The plates, drawn by Denis August Marie Raffet (1804-60), engraved by various artists, and printed by Plon, were issued separately in 13 installments costing 1 franc each, from 1848 to 1850 (sheet size: c. 19.5 x. 25.7 cm). This engraving is by one Bosselman, active in the first half of the nineteenth century.
All did not go as planned, either. When he symbolically set fire to the statue of Atheism to reveal the statue of Wisdom rising form its ashes, the latter emerged rather scorched. Whereas Robespierre viewed the Festival as a crucial last attempt to reinvigorate the Revolution, both contemporaries and modern scholars have seen it as one of the factors that contributed to his downfall. It alienated both de-Christianizers and more traditional deists; critics accused him of megalomania and seeking to set himself up as a new "pope" or "Mahomet" (Muhammad).
When despite the new military victory of Fleurus (26 June), which seemed to secure the Republic's fate, Robespierre insisted on ratcheting up the Terror against internal enemies, both left and right, he found that he longer had a base of support and fell victim to his foes on both extremes a month later. The radical Revolution died with him.
a belief in some divine presence was essential to the philosophical and social order
Contrary to the popular stereotype, Robespierre was not some bloodthirsty monster: in fact, he tried to rein in the "enragés" and "terrorists" who, oblivious to political reality, insisted on implementing ultra-radical policies and carried out murderous and indiscriminate retribution against any presumed "counterrevolutionary" elements of the population. For Robespierre, the so-called "Terror" was just "prompt, severe, inflexible” justice unique to revolutionary situations.
Part of his opposition to the "enragés" also derived from their radical atheism, which struck out against religion, the religious, and monuments of religious cultural heritage alike and did not scruple at the casual murder of priests and nuns. Although Robespierre had no use for the traditional church, he condemned the radical "de-Christianizers" and upheld freedom of worship. For him, as a disciple of Rousseau, a belief in some divine presence was essential to the philosophical and social order, which, he believed, rested on the moral and spiritual certainty of reward and punishment.
"The day forever fortunate has arrived, which the French people have consecrated to the Supreme Being"
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen appended to the radical French Constitution of April 1793 acknowledged the existence of Supreme Being. Attempting to address the twin crises of the Revolutionary war and the internal divisions of the Revolutionary camp the following spring, Robespierre sought to institutionalize this belief. He delivered a Report to the National Convention on the Connections of Religious and Moral Ideas with Republican Principles, & on National Festivals on 18 Floréal, Year II (7 May 1794).
Following the political and philosophical exposition, the Report set forth a 15-point decree on the cult and its festivals.The day forever fortunate has arrived, which the French people have consecrated to the Supreme Being. Never has the world which He created offered to Him a spectacle so worthy of His notice. He has seen reigning on the earth tyranny, crime, and imposture. He sees at this moment a whole nation, grappling with all the oppressions of the human race, suspend the course of its heroic labors to elevate its thoughts and vows toward the great Being who has given it the mission it has undertaken and the strength to accomplish it.
Is it not He whose immortal hand, engraving on the heart of man the code of justice and equality, has written there the death sentence of tyrants? Is it not He who, from the beginning of time, decreed for all the ages and for all peoples liberty, good faith, and justice?
He did not create kings to devour the human race. He did not create priests to harness us, like vile animals, to the chariots of kings and to give to the world examples of baseness, pride, perfidy, avarice, debauchery, and falsehood. He created the universe to proclaim His power. He created men to help each other, to love each other mutually, and to attain to happiness by the way of virtue.
It is He who implanted in the breast of the triumphant oppressor remorse and terror, and in the heart of the oppressed and innocent calmness and fortitude. It is He who impels the just man to hate the evil one, and the evil man to respect the just one. It is He who adorns with modesty the brow of beauty, to make it yet more beautiful. It is He who makes the mother's heart beat with tenderness and joy. It is He who bathes with delicious tears the eyes of the son pressed to the bosom of his mother. It is He who silences the most imperious and tender passions before the sublime love of the fatherland. It is He who has covered nature with charms, riches, and majesty. All that is good is His work, or is Himself. Evil belongs to the depraved man who oppresses his fellow man or suffers him to be oppressed.
The Author of Nature has bound all mortals by a boundless chain of love and happiness. Perish the tyrants who have dared to break it!
Republican Frenchmen, it is yours to purify the earth which they have soiled, and to recall to it the justice that they have banished! Liberty and virtue together came from the breast of Divinity. Neither can abide with mankind without the other.
O generous People, would you triumph over all your enemies? Practice justice, and render the Divinity the only worship worthy of Him. O People, let us deliver ourselves today, under His auspices, to the just transports of a pure festivity. Tomorrow we shall return to the combat with vice and tyrants. We shall give to the world the example of republican virtues. And that will be to honor Him still.
[source]
First Article.
The French people recognizes the existence of the Supreme Being, and the immortality of the soul.
II.
It recognizes that the manner of worship worthy of the Supreme Being is the practice of the duties of man.
III.
It places chief among these duties: to detest bad faith and tyranny, to punish tyrants and traitors, to assist the unfortunate, to respect the weak, to defend the oppressed, to do all the good that one can to others, and to be unjust toward no one.
IV.
Festivals shall be instituted to remind men of the Deity and of the dignity of their state....
It concluded with the outline of a Festival of the Supreme Being, proposed by the artist Jacques-Louis David, to be held on 20 Prairial Year II (June 8, 1794)
On 4 June 1794, Robespierre was elected President of the Convention (=legislature), and on 8 June, he presided over the Festival of the Supreme Being, according to the aforementioned mise-en-scène.
 |
| Festival of the Supreme Being, from Charles François Gabriel Levachez, and Son, and Jean Duplessi-Bertaux, Tableaux historiques de la Révolution Française, 1798-1804 (folio engraving; image size: c. 190 x 250 mm) |
Unlike the more shallow, who felt the need to prove their revolutionary bona fides through ostentatiously "populist" dress and demeanor, Robespierre saw no contradiction in combining the most radical principles with traditional sartorial propriety: he was a fastidious dresser who still wore a powdered wig and silk stockings. A contemporary account described him as presiding over the festival "dressed in a sky-blue coat, with exquisite ruffles of lace, and holding a bunch of flowers, fruit, and ripe wheat in his hand."
The hostile image below, from a nineteenth-century history, conveys the stereotypical view of him: murderous monster as fastidious prig.
from the first French edition of Alphonse de Lamartine's Histoire des Girondins (History of the Girondists--the moderate left-center faction in the Revolution). The work ran to 61 "books" divided among 8 volumes, whose publication (Paris: Furne et Cie.,1847-50) coincided with the outbreak of a new revolution, in which the Romantic poet and liberal politician himself briefly played a key part. It was accompanied by 39 steel engravings of Revolutionary figures, along with a portrait of the author. The plates, drawn by Denis August Marie Raffet (1804-60), engraved by various artists, and printed by Plon, were issued separately in 13 installments costing 1 franc each, from 1848 to 1850 (sheet size: c. 19.5 x. 25.7 cm). This engraving is by one Bosselman, active in the first half of the nineteenth century.
All did not go as planned, either. When he symbolically set fire to the statue of Atheism to reveal the statue of Wisdom rising form its ashes, the latter emerged rather scorched. Whereas Robespierre viewed the Festival as a crucial last attempt to reinvigorate the Revolution, both contemporaries and modern scholars have seen it as one of the factors that contributed to his downfall. It alienated both de-Christianizers and more traditional deists; critics accused him of megalomania and seeking to set himself up as a new "pope" or "Mahomet" (Muhammad).
When despite the new military victory of Fleurus (26 June), which seemed to secure the Republic's fate, Robespierre insisted on ratcheting up the Terror against internal enemies, both left and right, he found that he longer had a base of support and fell victim to his foes on both extremes a month later. The radical Revolution died with him.
Ramadan Kareem
To my friends and readers:
Ramadan Kareem
 |
Roberts's view of the "Interior of the mosque of the Metwalys" (1846-49)
(New York Public Library Digital Collections)
• Last year's Ramadan post:
A Tale of Interfaith Cooperation and Historic Preservation from Old Jerusalem
• Ramadan posts from all previous years
Sunday, March 27, 2016
Easter Listening
Wishing all my friends who celebrate Easter a joyous holiday and weekend.
When we think of holiday music, most of us probably think first of Christmas rather than Easter, in part because the former was and still is deeply associated with other folk traditions of celebration, for which reason the Puritan settlers of New England--and their descendants for many generations--did not have much use for the holiday.
Still, Easter produced its share of great works, above and beyond Bach's great Passions and Easter Oratorio.
Here, a few selections from what I have been listening to this week.
Lutheran choral music from the transition of the Renaissance to the Baroque can, like even Bach's music, be an acquired taste--to the uninitiated, it may seem too understated and repetitive--but once one comes to understand it, it is a taste well worth acquiring. Heinrich Schütz (1585-1672), the greatest 17th-century German composer, born exactly a century before Bach, composed the Christmas and Easter Historias late (1660) and early (1623) in his career. Together, they constitute a drama in music, a miniature pendant to Händel's "Messiah," which likewise spans both holidays.
The Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross, drawn from the Gospels, were a natural subject of musical composition for Holy Week. Schütz set the German texts to music in 1645. Here, and especially in the other works on this recording, such as the Magnificat, one clearly discerns the influence of his years in Venice.
Franz Josef Haydn's Seven Last Words, by contrast, was originally composed as a purely instrumental piece in 1786, though he later added a choral version, as well as settings for string quartet and piano.
Haydn, who created the work for a church in Cadíz, recounted the story of the commission to his biographer A. C. Dies (1, 2), but also published a brief explanation himself in the preface to a new edition of the work (1801):
Foerster himself recounted the circumstances of its composition in his autobiography:
When we think of holiday music, most of us probably think first of Christmas rather than Easter, in part because the former was and still is deeply associated with other folk traditions of celebration, for which reason the Puritan settlers of New England--and their descendants for many generations--did not have much use for the holiday.
Still, Easter produced its share of great works, above and beyond Bach's great Passions and Easter Oratorio.
Here, a few selections from what I have been listening to this week.
Lutheran choral music from the transition of the Renaissance to the Baroque can, like even Bach's music, be an acquired taste--to the uninitiated, it may seem too understated and repetitive--but once one comes to understand it, it is a taste well worth acquiring. Heinrich Schütz (1585-1672), the greatest 17th-century German composer, born exactly a century before Bach, composed the Christmas and Easter Historias late (1660) and early (1623) in his career. Together, they constitute a drama in music, a miniature pendant to Händel's "Messiah," which likewise spans both holidays.
The Seven Last Words of Christ on the Cross, drawn from the Gospels, were a natural subject of musical composition for Holy Week. Schütz set the German texts to music in 1645. Here, and especially in the other works on this recording, such as the Magnificat, one clearly discerns the influence of his years in Venice.
Franz Josef Haydn's Seven Last Words, by contrast, was originally composed as a purely instrumental piece in 1786, though he later added a choral version, as well as settings for string quartet and piano.
Haydn, who created the work for a church in Cadíz, recounted the story of the commission to his biographer A. C. Dies (1, 2), but also published a brief explanation himself in the preface to a new edition of the work (1801):
Some fifteen years ago I was requested by a canon of Cádiz to compose instrumental music on the seven last words of Our Savior on the Cross. It was customary at the Cathedral of Cádiz to produce an oratorio every year during Lent, the effect of the performance being not a little enhanced by the following circumstances. The walls, windows, and pillars of the church were hung with black cloth, and only one large lamp hanging from the center of the roof broke the solemn darkness. At midday, the doors were closed and the ceremony began. After a short service the bishop ascended the pulpit, pronounced the first of the seven words (or sentences) and delivered a discourse thereon. This ended, he left the pulpit and fell to his knees before the altar. The interval was filled by music. The bishop then in like manner pronounced the second word, then the third, and so on, the orchestra following on the conclusion of each discourse. My composition was subject to these conditions, and it was no easy task to compose seven adagios lasting ten minutes each, and to succeed one another without fatiguing the listeners; indeed, I found it quite impossible to confine myself to the appointed limits.
* * *
Finally, a leap into the modern symphonic literature. (I have my father to thank for introducing me to this one.) Unlike Schütz and Haydn, Josef Bohuslav Foerster (1859-1951) is little known beyond the circles of specialists, but he became a leading figure in the Czech musical generation that followed his mentors Smetana and Dvořák. Unlike their music, his did not make extensive use of Bohemian national idioms and was closer to that of his friend Gustav Mahler. Conductor Lance Friedel calls the Fourth Symphony, entitled, "Easter," Foerster's "masterpiece." |
| disc details |
In Hamburg in the year 1904, seized by the spirit of Holy Week, I began writing my Fourth Symphony on Good Friday. I had no precise concept of the overall plan and was at first undecided whether to carry it through as a meditation on Good Friday.
As the first bars already indicate, I wanted to compose the work in a rich polyphonic vein. The first movement too shape very quickly, and I found that its tragic character and relatively slow tempo urgently demanded a strong contrast. My childhood years then came to my mind, especially my Easter vacations, which I was permitted to spend with my grandfather at Osenice.
The desired mood was thus produced. In the first movement, the Easter season as experienced by an adult; in the second, the same seen through the eyes of a child. There, the grief-laden path of the Saviour bearing his cross; here, the first verdure, the anemones and primroses, the spring breezes and shepherd's song. Then the slow movement, in praise of solitude and its magic; a prayer with two themes which ultimately flow together. The last movement, a fugue with three themes (of which the second is derived from a Gregorian chant), developing into a celebration of the Saviour's resurrection, the movement culminating in an exultant hymn, interrupted three times by our native chorale, On the Third Day was the Lord Arisen.That excerpt comes from the liner notes to an old LP recording by Václav Smetáček with the Prague Symphony Orchestra (Nonesuch Records, 1972), but you can hear it here:
Palm Sunday Donkey again
I suddenly realized that, immersed in work, I had let Palm Sunday pass without again sharing a picture of one of my favorite types of religious folk art: the Palm Sunday donkey.
From the vaults, here's last year's post.
From the vaults, here's last year's post.
Saturday, December 26, 2015
A Merry Christmas from Maximilien Robespierre (with a side-note on that Newton business)
From the vaults via last year's Tumblr post:
Understandably enough, we tend to think of December 25 primarily as Christmas, thereby ignoring or forgetting other events that occurred on that date. Among the latter is the birthday of Isaac Newton (1642).
Neil deGrasse Tyson caused a stink this year when he made what he thought was a witty tweet about this coincidence and aroused the ire of some who thought he was anti-Christian. In fact, he was doing nothing new or particularly clever: advocates of science have for some years promoted celebration of the 25th as Newton’s birthday as a light-hearted way of increasing awareness of scientific knowledge.
I always honor the birthday of the scientific revolutionary Newton, but also the occasion of a major address by the political revolutionary Robespierre.
read the rest
Understandably enough, we tend to think of December 25 primarily as Christmas, thereby ignoring or forgetting other events that occurred on that date. Among the latter is the birthday of Isaac Newton (1642).
Neil deGrasse Tyson caused a stink this year when he made what he thought was a witty tweet about this coincidence and aroused the ire of some who thought he was anti-Christian. In fact, he was doing nothing new or particularly clever: advocates of science have for some years promoted celebration of the 25th as Newton’s birthday as a light-hearted way of increasing awareness of scientific knowledge.
I always honor the birthday of the scientific revolutionary Newton, but also the occasion of a major address by the political revolutionary Robespierre.
read the rest
Friday, December 25, 2015
Traditions of Christmas Past: from boisterous to banned to bourgeois
From the vaults, via last year's Tumblr post:
“‘At Home’ in the Nursery, or The Masters and Misses Twoshoes Christmas Party,” by George Cruikshank (1792-1878)
Image dimensions: c. 214 x 267 mm (approx. 8.4 x 10.5 inches)
Signed in the plate, “G Cruishank fect” (left) and “Pubd. Augt 1st 1835, by Thos McLean, 26, Haymarket.” (right)
This is the second issue. The print first appeared in the 1826 collection, Holiday Scenes, published by Samuel Knight (active 1805-41). Thomas McLean (1788-1875) reissued it 9 years later in Cruikshankiana, an assemblage of the most celebrated works of George Cruikshank. He largely effaced the original Knight signature, but it survives as a ghost imprint above his own, at lower right:
“London Pubd Jany 3d 1826 by S Knight, 3 Sweetings Alley [{Roy[a] X'Change’}]
The fourteen (count 'em!) children–this, at a time when the average British family size peaked at around 6 children (1, 2)–play with a mixture of sedate enjoyment and abandon as a stout serving-woman brings in a tray of treats. The image is rich in period detail, from the toys and the copy of the Eaton [sic] Latin Grammar abandoned on the floor, to the delicate jelly-glasses (whatever possessed the parents of that day to put them in the hands of youngsters?) and the faux-bamboo “fancy chairs” on which the children sit or climb.
The etching also also suggests why the Calvinists and their American descendants held no truck with Christmas. Theologically, it was a problem for them because its celebration was not biblically mandated, and the date of Jesus’ birth was in any case unknown. The holiday was moreover associated with revelry–whether heavy drinking by adults or just boisterous behavior, as shown in our print–that seemed incommensurate with the spirit of a holy festival.
Such was certainly the attitude here in Massachusetts, where Christmas celebrations were banned in 1659, as the legislature put it: “For preventing disorders … by reason of some still observing such ffestivalls as were superstitiously kept in other countrys, to the great dishonnor of God & offence of others.” The state lifted the ban in 1681, but it took more than a century and a half before things really began to change. Under the influence of shifting national tastes, Christmas began to assume its familiar lineaments of wholesome domesticity and consumption. (In Massachusetts, Irish immigration also contributed to the shift.) The 1855 Christmas celebration at the Worcester Free Church under minister and abolitionist Thomas Wentworth Higginson was a symbolic turning point. The following year, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow observed, “We are in a transition state about Christmas here in New England. The old Puritan feeling prevents it from being a cheerful hearty holiday; though every year makes it more so,” and the legislature officially recognized the holiday.
“‘At Home’ in the Nursery, or The Masters and Misses Twoshoes Christmas Party,” by George Cruikshank (1792-1878)
{enlarge}Etching with hand coloring.
Image dimensions: c. 214 x 267 mm (approx. 8.4 x 10.5 inches)
Signed in the plate, “G Cruishank fect” (left) and “Pubd. Augt 1st 1835, by Thos McLean, 26, Haymarket.” (right)
This is the second issue. The print first appeared in the 1826 collection, Holiday Scenes, published by Samuel Knight (active 1805-41). Thomas McLean (1788-1875) reissued it 9 years later in Cruikshankiana, an assemblage of the most celebrated works of George Cruikshank. He largely effaced the original Knight signature, but it survives as a ghost imprint above his own, at lower right:
“London Pubd Jany 3d 1826 by S Knight, 3 Sweetings Alley [{Roy[a] X'Change’}]
{enlarge}Not yet "Victorian” in the strict (or any other) sense, the etching nonetheless lacks the ribaldry or bite of Cruikshank’s other early (especially political) work: it manages to be satirical and sentimental at once. We can already recognize in it our received image of Christmas as domestic idyll, familiar from Dickens to “The Nutcracker” (though the evolution of the latter is a tale in itself).
The fourteen (count 'em!) children–this, at a time when the average British family size peaked at around 6 children (1, 2)–play with a mixture of sedate enjoyment and abandon as a stout serving-woman brings in a tray of treats. The image is rich in period detail, from the toys and the copy of the Eaton [sic] Latin Grammar abandoned on the floor, to the delicate jelly-glasses (whatever possessed the parents of that day to put them in the hands of youngsters?) and the faux-bamboo “fancy chairs” on which the children sit or climb.
The etching also also suggests why the Calvinists and their American descendants held no truck with Christmas. Theologically, it was a problem for them because its celebration was not biblically mandated, and the date of Jesus’ birth was in any case unknown. The holiday was moreover associated with revelry–whether heavy drinking by adults or just boisterous behavior, as shown in our print–that seemed incommensurate with the spirit of a holy festival.
Such was certainly the attitude here in Massachusetts, where Christmas celebrations were banned in 1659, as the legislature put it: “For preventing disorders … by reason of some still observing such ffestivalls as were superstitiously kept in other countrys, to the great dishonnor of God & offence of others.” The state lifted the ban in 1681, but it took more than a century and a half before things really began to change. Under the influence of shifting national tastes, Christmas began to assume its familiar lineaments of wholesome domesticity and consumption. (In Massachusetts, Irish immigration also contributed to the shift.) The 1855 Christmas celebration at the Worcester Free Church under minister and abolitionist Thomas Wentworth Higginson was a symbolic turning point. The following year, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow observed, “We are in a transition state about Christmas here in New England. The old Puritan feeling prevents it from being a cheerful hearty holiday; though every year makes it more so,” and the legislature officially recognized the holiday.
Thursday, December 24, 2015
Christmas greetings! (and two eighteenth-century prints of the nativity)
Wishing a merry Christmas to all my readers who celebrate the holiday.
From the vaults:
Artifact of the Moment: Reflections on Nativity Scenes in Two Eighteenth-Century German Bibles
Saturday, August 8, 2015
Robespierre: It Takes a Tender Man to Lead the Terror (with a nod to Mike Huckabee)
And . . . having noted the murder of Jean-Paul Marat by Charlotte Corday (1, 2), it would not be appropriate to neglect the anniversary of the fall of the Revolutionary leader Maximilien Robespierre--"The Incorruptible."
So, I had planned to write something about this anyway, but I never thought that Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee would provide the added hook.
It's not often one hears the term, "Supreme Being," used in modern political discourse. It was a name for the divine favored by Enlightenment deists who rejected "revealed religion," and is thus not part of the vocabulary of a Christian conservative such as Huckabee. Presumably, he just needed the parallel construction in order to drive home his anti-government message.
And how is all this connected with Robespierre?
He was a far more complex figure than the caricature propagated by his enemies would suggest. For example: although opposed, with the majority of the revolutionaries, to any social or political role for the Church, he considered it tamed by the early reforms, and condemned the extreme "de-Christianizers" who pursued policies ranging from destruction of religious art and architecture to slaughter of priests and nuns. He did not see the individual believer as a threat, and on the contrary, successfully advocated for freedom of worship, arguing that mindless persecution of the religious would only revive the mindless fanaticism that the Revolution had sought to eliminate.
For Robespierre, atheism was an aristocratic affectation, at odds with both democracy and the emotional needs of the populace. Belief in a deistic divine presence ensuring the reward of virtue and punishment of vice was central to his worldview.
Belief in a Supreme Being had been part of the French Constitution since April 1793, but Robespierre sought to restore cultural peace and unity by clarifying and formalizing the consensus belief. He set forth his ideas in the Report to the National Convention on the Connections of Religious and Moral Ideas with Republican Principles, & on National Festivals on 18 Floréal, Year II (May 7, 1794)
Following the political and philosophical exposition, the Report set forth a 15-point decree on the cult and its festivals.
It concluded with the outline of a Festival of the Supreme Being, proposed by the artist Jacques-Louis David, to be held on 20 Prairial Year II (June 8, 1794)
Whereas Robespierre viewed the Festival as a crucial last attempt to reinvigorate the Revolution, both contemporaries and modern scholars have seen it as one of the factors that contributed to his downfall. It alienated both de-Christianizers and more traditional deists; critics accused him of megalomania and seeking to set himself up as a new "pope" or "Mahomet" (Muhammad).
A contemporary account described him as "dressed in a sky-blue coat, with exquisite ruffles of lace, and holding a bunch of flowers, fruit, and ripe wheat in his hand."
This hostile engraving from the mid-nineteenth century is arguably intended to convey that view of the priggish and arrogant Robespierre. At the same time, in retrospect it perhaps inadvertently humanizes him by presenting him in a manner to which we are unaccustomed.
The rather soft-looking Frank Perdue may have laughed all the way to the bank on the slogan, "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken."
Well, the Robespierre corollary is: it took a tender man to lead the Terror.
So, I had planned to write something about this anyway, but I never thought that Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee would provide the added hook.
And how is all this connected with Robespierre?
He was a far more complex figure than the caricature propagated by his enemies would suggest. For example: although opposed, with the majority of the revolutionaries, to any social or political role for the Church, he considered it tamed by the early reforms, and condemned the extreme "de-Christianizers" who pursued policies ranging from destruction of religious art and architecture to slaughter of priests and nuns. He did not see the individual believer as a threat, and on the contrary, successfully advocated for freedom of worship, arguing that mindless persecution of the religious would only revive the mindless fanaticism that the Revolution had sought to eliminate.
For Robespierre, atheism was an aristocratic affectation, at odds with both democracy and the emotional needs of the populace. Belief in a deistic divine presence ensuring the reward of virtue and punishment of vice was central to his worldview.
Belief in a Supreme Being had been part of the French Constitution since April 1793, but Robespierre sought to restore cultural peace and unity by clarifying and formalizing the consensus belief. He set forth his ideas in the Report to the National Convention on the Connections of Religious and Moral Ideas with Republican Principles, & on National Festivals on 18 Floréal, Year II (May 7, 1794)
 |
| Robespierre's Report, published by order of the Convention at the National Printing Works in Paris: in-octavo, 45 pages |
{enlarge}
Following the political and philosophical exposition, the Report set forth a 15-point decree on the cult and its festivals.
{enlarge}
First Article.
The French people recognizes the existence of the Supreme Being, and the immortality of the soul.
II.
It recognizes that the manner of worship worthy of the Supreme Being is the practice of the duties of man.
III.
It places chief among these duties: to detest bad faith and tyranny, to punish tyrants and traitors, to assist the unfortunate, to respect the weak, to defend the oppressed, to do all the good that one can to others, and to be unjust toward no one. . . .
It concluded with the outline of a Festival of the Supreme Being, proposed by the artist Jacques-Louis David, to be held on 20 Prairial Year II (June 8, 1794)
{enlarge}
|
| Festival of the Supreme Being, from Charles François Gabriel Levachez, and Son, and Jean Duplessi-Bertaux, Tableaux historiques de la Révolution Française, 1798-1804 |
{enlarge}
Whereas Robespierre viewed the Festival as a crucial last attempt to reinvigorate the Revolution, both contemporaries and modern scholars have seen it as one of the factors that contributed to his downfall. It alienated both de-Christianizers and more traditional deists; critics accused him of megalomania and seeking to set himself up as a new "pope" or "Mahomet" (Muhammad).
A contemporary account described him as "dressed in a sky-blue coat, with exquisite ruffles of lace, and holding a bunch of flowers, fruit, and ripe wheat in his hand."
from the first edition of Alphonse de Lamartine's History of the Girondists.
The work ran to 61 "books" divided among 8 volumes, whose publication
(Paris: Furne et Cie.,1847-50) coincided with the outbreak of a new
revolution, in which the Romantic poet and liberal politician himself
briefly played a key part. It was accompanied by 39 steel engravings of
Revolutionary figures, along with a portrait of the author. The plates,
drawn by Denis August Marie Raffet (1804-60), engraved by various
artists, and printed by Plon, were issued separately in 13 installments
costing 1 franc each, from 1848 to 1850 (sheet size: c. 19.5 x. 25.7 cm)
{enlarge}
This hostile engraving from the mid-nineteenth century is arguably intended to convey that view of the priggish and arrogant Robespierre. At the same time, in retrospect it perhaps inadvertently humanizes him by presenting him in a manner to which we are unaccustomed.
The rather soft-looking Frank Perdue may have laughed all the way to the bank on the slogan, "It takes a tough man to make a tender chicken."
Well, the Robespierre corollary is: it took a tender man to lead the Terror.
Monday, March 30, 2015
Palm Sunday Donkey
One of my favorite genres of medieval sculpture is the so-called Palm Sunday Donkey (German: Palmesel), a tradition that thrived in particular in Central Europe from the Middle Ages through the eighteenth century, when the rise of the Enlightenment and new ideas of propriety led the Church to suppress the increasingly raucous behavior that accompanied it. Palm Sunday processions commemorating Christ’s entry into Jerusalem are documented beginning in the seventh century. At first, it seems, a priest or villager rode a donkey in these processions, but there were concerns over the vanity of the performer and hubris of imitating Christ. In any case, it eventually proved more practical to substitute a dependable sculpture for a sometimes recalcitrant beast. Both the use of the live donkey and the wooden substitution are documented since the late tenth century. The typical Palm Sunday donkey thus consisted of a figure of Christ seated on a donkey mounted on a wheeled platform. Most such sculptures were large if not life-sized and carved of limewood or oak, decorated with colored paint.
The Cloisters and other sources speak of some 50 surviving examples at the end of the nineteenth century, but modern inventories cite 190 examples in the German-speaking lands alone. The earliest, in Switzerland, dates from circa 1200, and there are a few other examples from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, but most are late-medieval.
I honestly forget where I first encountered this phenomenon: I believe it was in college while spending a summer studying German in the Catholic region around Freiburg, with its great museum of medieval art. It was probably only after my return that I discovered we had one in the University of Wisconsin art museum. (My photos are not accessible to me at the moment, but this one shows it nicely.) At any rate, the genre always appealed to me, for it perfectly embodied both the humanity and the majesty of Christ in church doctrine, and the donkey (much like a nativity scene) had a wonderful way of bringing home the nature and naive charm of popular religion in rural medieval society.
|
| Palmesel (15th-century Germany), The Cloisters |
Read the rest on the Tumblr.
The biblical entry into Jerusalem had its modern historical resonances, as well: When British General Allenby captured the city in December 1917, he made a point of entering on foot: not only out of humility vis-à-vis Christ--but also as a rebuke to the Kaiser, who on his visit had ridden in on a grand horse.
Friday, February 27, 2015
Marking Human Rights Day in Amherst
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,...
As I noted in a recent post, the Massachusetts legislature honored the Amherst Human Rights Commission with a special citation on the occasion of our first official Black History Month ceremony last year.
The charge of the Commission is “to ensure that no power goes unchecked, and that all citizens are afforded equal protection under the law,” specifically: "to insure [sic] that no person, public or private, shall be denied any rights guaranteed pursuant to local, state, and/or federal law on the basis of race or color, gender, physical or mental ability, religion, socio-economic status, ethnic or national origin, affectional or sexual preference, lifestyle, or age."
An earlier version of the statement spoke, rather more ambitiously, of "promot[ing] economic and social justice for all citizens through means of mediation, education, and enforcement of local, state, federal, and international human rights laws”--above all, as embodied in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Although the Declaration finds no formal resonance in the official documents, it nonetheless embodies the spirit that moves the Commission. Accordingly, it has become our custom for the Select Board each December to issue a proclamation for the celebration of International Human Rights Day, on the anniversary of the promulgation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. By tradition, the Human Rights Commission then marks the occasion with a candlelight vigil and reading of the Declaration on the Town Common in the evening (often followed by a thematic presentation on a subsequent day).
***
"Many of the assumptions about who wrote the Universal Declaration of Human Rights are wrong. The less known story of the men and women who wrote this foundational, emancipatory and anti-colonial document must be told in today's world."
Even those familiar with the Declaration probably do not know the story behind it. Some years back, Gita Sahgal, founder of the Centre for Secular Space, and the former Head of the Gender Unit at Amnesty International, took on this educational challenge.
These are challenging times, she observed. On the one hand, modern philosophers reject the whole concept of demonstrable or natural rights as a throwback to an earlier, naïve age (Alasdair MacIntyre: “tantamount to belief in witches and unicorns”), while on the other, some strains of leftism and postmodernism reduce such supposed “rights” to “the political philosophy of cosmopolitanism” that “‘constitutionalise[s]‘ the normative sources of Empire.” (I’m feeling guilty already.) As Sahgal drily observes, those fighting the Bush administration’s practice of torture and the continued existence of the Guantanamo detention facility “would be surprised to see themselves as empire builders,” while the authors of the Declaration, for their part, would have found "absurd" “The idea that different peoples were endowed with separate rights,” as exemplified by the attempt to create a specific Declaration of Human Rights in Islam.
Citing the work of Susan Waltz, she explains that the origins and character of this fundamental document are both more varied and more radical than even its admirers realize. For example, it is commonly attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt because she chaired the drafting committee, yet she contributed little to the concept or the content. (The idea in fact originated with the President of Panama.) The notion that “western” powers were responsible for the sections on civil and political rights, and the Soviet Union, for those on social and economic ones, is also a gross oversimplification. The desire for emancipation of all, emphasizing that rights applied to everyone everywhere, emerged as a major concern. Significant additions were made by newly de-colonized states regarding, slavery, discrimination, the rights of women, and the right to national self determination.
A host of countries, not least the smaller or emerging ones, saw to it that the document addressed social rights as well as the rights of colonized and other non-self-governing territories. An Indian activist fought for language referring to rights of ”human beings” rather than men, lest it be construed as discriminatory against women. Several Muslim delegates supported the clauses on freedom of religious choice. The final product was truly a collective one
Fifty nations voted in favor of the Declaration. None dared oppose it, but (big surprise), Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and the Soviet Union abstained. Still explains a lot (plus ça change).
* * *
The Amherst Human Rights vigil on the occasion of the document's anniversary is at once a sobering (not to say: depressing) and an inspiring occasion: sobering because, in this town of nearly 38,000 residents--and some 27,000 students--where (as the expression goes) "only the 'h' is silent," I don't believe I have ever seen more than a dozen citizens from among our self-proclaimed liberals, progressives, radicals, and revolutionaries ever put on a down coat and show up. To be sure it's cold and dark, and yet . . . it is an important symbolic commitment to a vital cause. Again, it can be a lot to ask for a symbolic 30-minute gesture on a frigid December night. (I freely admit that I myself am at times the laziest person in the world.) Still, . . . . you get the point.I hope that residents, and above all, my fellow members of Town government--employed, elected, and appointed--will in future consider taking part in what for me is one of the most moving political experiences of the year. When we hold the ceremony, we take turns reading from the Declaration, basically one clause/per person at a time. I have to confess that I often have to suppress a shudder when my turn comes, no matter which paragraph is at issue. The preface is a stirring document:
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world,
Whereas disregard and contempt for human rights have resulted in barbarous acts which have outraged the conscience of mankind, and the advent of a world in which human beings shall enjoy freedom of speech and belief and freedom from fear and want has been proclaimed as the highest aspiration of the common people,
Whereas it is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law,
Whereas it is essential to promote the development of friendly relations between nations,
Whereas the peoples of the United Nations have in the Charter reaffirmed their faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person and in the equal rights of men and women and have determined to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,
Whereas Member States have pledged themselves to achieve, in co-operation with the United Nations, the promotion of universal respect for and observance of human rights and fundamental freedoms,
Whereas a common understanding of these rights and freedoms is of the greatest importance for the full realization of this pledge,
Now, Therefore THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY proclaims THIS UNIVERSAL DECLARATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS as a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations, to the end that every individual and every organ of society, keeping this Declaration constantly in mind, shall strive by teaching and education to promote respect for these rights and freedoms and by progressive measures, national and international, to secure their universal and effective recognition and observance, both among the peoples of Member States themselves and among the peoples of territories under their jurisdiction.
How can a chill not run down one's spine when one contrasts the noble goals and innocent hopes of 1948 with--taking all progress into account--the atrocities of the present day?
Scenes from past vigils
2011
On the evening of December 9, one of the first that felt truly cold in what has been a comparatively mild season, a small group gradually assembled under the guidance of tireless Chair Reynolds Winslow.
Everyone received a candle and a copy of the Declaration, in the form of an illustrated “passport,” produced by Amnesty International.
 |
| at right: Bonnie McCracken |
As we stood in the cold, many of us attempting to hold both a candle and text in gloved hands, a car with a couple of blonde college-age women in it drove by, and the driver leaned out the window and helpfully shouted, “Hey, what the fuck are you doing?!”
That could have been a metaphor for the problem: ignorance and scorn. We knew exactly what we were doing, yet they had no clue. In a way, it’s understandable: at the end of the college semester, if students venture out into the Friday night cold, it is for physical rather than moral pleasures. And what of the rest of the town? In a community that prides itself on its “activism” and can readily generate a crowd with signs and candles for any “cause,” whether epochal or trivial, it was disappointing to see that we could with difficulty muster only about a dozen participants.
 |
| the vigil: Amherst Human Rights/Resources Director Eunice Torres, foreground |
As we began to read from the Declaration, the sirens of police and fire vehicles, far more loudly, yet much less offensively, also interrupted the event.
The intense dedication of its participants stood in inverse proportion to the size of the gathering. The nominal membership of the Commission is nine, though at the moment only six seats are filled: three of them, notably, by high school students. Human Rights Director Eunice Torres was there representing Town staff, and I was present on behalf of the Select Board.
A few interested residents rounded out the group. Some were just supportive. Others, including Commission member Mohammed Ibrahim Elgadi, were from our Sudanese community, and brought with them a deep commitment to human rights arising from their own suffering. Mr. Ibrahim, who was tortured for his activism, is the founder and chair of Group Against Torture in Sudan (GATS). Sudan was in fact the focus of last year's program.
An elderly woman from Egypt, wearing a headscarf and speaking in Arabic through a translator, said that she was proud of the changes that her compatriots had accomplished in the past year, and hoped that their example would bring democratic change to the rest of the Africa in the next one. It seemed a fitting way to close.
On Saturday, December 10, the Commission, as is its custom, made a presentation on human rights work to the community, hosted a potluck luncheon, and distributed posters of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
This year the presentation was devoted to human rights and relief work in Haiti.
2012
 | |
| Deborah Radway (Director, Amherst Dept. of Human Resources/Human Rights), Judy Brooks |
Judy Brooks and Human Rights Commission Chair Reynolds Winslow read from the Preface
2013
As the preceding photos show, holding the vigil on the corner of the Common at the four-way intersection of Town Hall had the advantage of visibility but the disadvantage of an unprepossessing setting and traffic noise that interrupted the reading. Beginning in 2013, the Commission moved the ceremony a few yards to the southeast, beneath the "Merry Maple" tree and closer to Town Hall.
2014
 |
| Human Rights Commission Chair Gregory Bascom |
Resources
• The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (from the UN)
• 60th Anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (from the UN)
• Gita Sahgai,”Who wrote the Universal Declaration of Human Rights?” 50.50 Inclusive Democracy, 9 December 2011
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