Aesthetics and Bible Exegesis - the Case of David Friedlaender

Starting with a brief introduction of the bible translations of the Berlin Haskalah that followed Moses Mendelssohn’s initial translation of the Torah and the Psalms (1783), the lecture will focus on the great importance that some Berlin maskilim attached to aesthetics for exegetical and pedagogical concerns. With the description of the Oriental Printing Press (Orientalische Buchdruckerei) and the Society for the Promotion of the Good and the Beneficent (Gesellschaft zur Beförderung des Edlen und Guten והתושיה הטוב שוחרי חברת) there will be thrown light on the institutional context of the biblical translations. Thereby a special emphasis will be placed on the statements of the Berlin maskil David Friedlaender (1750-1834). Friedlaender regarded Jewish tradition as opposed and alien to aesthetics and the arts because of their power to move the emotions. In contrast he considered “the science of aesthetics” to be the most important improvement of the Enlightenment. Against the background of Friedlaender’s maskilic activities there will be shown, how the arts and aesthetic perceptions became instrumental in revealing the “truth” for the exegetical hermeneutics on the one hand and in stimulating the emotional feelings for educational instructions of the Haskalah on the other hand. Both, the training of the intellect and the senses became a fundamental target in the curriculum of the Jewish Free School (Jüdische Freischule נערים חנוך חברת) that was co-founded by Friedlaender in 1778. In this first modern Jewish school in Germany (or even Europe) the maskilic bible translations were used as textbooks.