Jewish Philosophical Politics in Germany, 1789-1848

36 } Jewish Philosophical Politics in Germany

reform from without. Bendavid’s problem, clearly, is how to mediate between

these two spheres, how to bring the moral Other into the absolute interiority

of Kantian moral subjectivity.^63 The absolute interiority or self-referentiality of

Kantian morality, however, is predicated on the impossibility of such a problem

arising in the first place. The universal Kantian moral logic with which Benda-

vid would appeal to the Jew as moral Other is only binding, paradoxically, to

the extent that there can exist no moral Other to address. In this light it is inter-

esting to note one of Bendavid’s rhetorical strategies for infiltrating the moral

essence of the “good-hearted” Jews he is addressing, and thus undermining

any claim they might have to moral autonomy. “You already feel like Menschen,”

Bendavid writes, sounding like a moral hypnotist, entering into and giving voice

to the silent recesses of the Jews’ moral will: “You already wish, secretly, to be

Menschen.” Adopting the tone of the prophet of Enlightenment, he continues:

“You lack only strength. Come listen! I want to inspire you with strength. Hear

the consequences of your cowardice and shudder!”^64 Bendavid attempts liter-

ally to speak the essence of a universal moral will (Mut, Kraft, Wille) into (ein-

sprechen) the secret and silent (im Stillen) void of Jewish ethical Otherness, the

only form—a void, nothing—that ethical alterity can take from the point of view

of Kantian ethical universalism. How to address, even if only to interpolate, the

moral Other when alterity is inimical to the universal morality into which the

Other is to be interpolated?

It is in order to overcome this impasse that Bendavid appeals to the state.

Since Jews remain beyond moral autonomy’s reach, the task of accomplishing

the impossible mediation between the morally Other and the morally autono-

mous devolves on the external power of the state. Even as it is called on to rem-

edy the essential inability on the part of universal moral subjectivity to engage

an Other, however, the state must be seen as contiguous with—not external to—

the moral sphere, lest the state appear inimical to the very moral subjectivity

it wishes to instill in the Jew. Thus Bendavid assumes, at least rhetorically, the

political good will of Friedrich Wilhelm as he had done with Joseph II when

discussing Joseph’s projects for reforming the Jews in his lands. The political

intentions of these heads of state accord with—are the political analogues of—

the good will of Kantian ethics. There can be no fundamental discord between

the moral and the political spheres because politics is predicated on, derives its

legitimacy from, and should merely extend ethics. Far from overstepping its le-

gitimate moral authority, then, the state, in a presumed preestablished harmony

with the moral law, effectively becomes the agent of moral Nötigung. The state

does not coerce Jews but rather gives them the gift of moral autonomy; it coerces

them to obey only the dictates of their own moral freedom.^65