![Three works on the rights of Jews in Germany, bound together:
• Rettung der Juden [Salvation of the Jews], by Menass](https://files.kedem-auctions.com/files/Sale109/296_1.jpg "Three Works in One Volume – Jewish Emancipation Controversy in Germany")
![Three works on the rights of Jews in Germany, bound together:
• Rettung der Juden [Salvation of the Jews], by Menass](https://files.kedem-auctions.com/files/Sale109/296_2.jpg "Three Works in One Volume – Jewish Emancipation Controversy in Germany")
![Three works on the rights of Jews in Germany, bound together:
• Rettung der Juden [Salvation of the Jews], by Menass](https://files.kedem-auctions.com/files/Sale109/296_3.jpg "Three Works in One Volume – Jewish Emancipation Controversy in Germany")
![Three works on the rights of Jews in Germany, bound together:
• Rettung der Juden [Salvation of the Jews], by Menass](https://files.kedem-auctions.com/files/Sale109/296_4.jpg "Three Works in One Volume – Jewish Emancipation Controversy in Germany")
Auction 109 Books | Letters and Manuscripts | Megillot and Jewish Ceremonial Art
Three Works in One Volume – Jewish Emancipation Controversy in Germany, by Moses Mendelssohn and August Cranz – Berlin and Stettin, 1782-1783
Opening: $500
Sold for: $750
Including buyer's premium
Three works on the rights of Jews in Germany, bound together:
• Rettung der Juden [Salvation of the Jews], by Menasseh Ben Israel, with introduction by Moses Mendelssohn. Berlin and Stettin (Szczecin), 1782.
• Das Forschen nach Licht und Recht in einem Schreiben an Herrn Moses Mendelssohn auf Veranlassung seiner merkwürdigen Vorrede zu Manasseh Ben Israel [In search of light and justice, letter to Mr. Moses Mendelssohn in response to his strange foreword to Menasseh Ben Israel], by August Cranz. Berlin: Friedrich Maurer, 1782.
• Jerusalem, oder über religiöse Macht und Jude [Jerusalem, or: On religious power and Judaism], by Moses Mendelssohn. Berlin: Friedrich Maurer, 1783.
Three works in one volume. Rettung der Juden: LII, 64 pages; Das Forschen nach Licht und Recht: 47, [7] pages; Jerusalem: 96, 141 pages. Overall good condition. Wear, defects and some staining. Wear and defects to binding. Tears to spine.
At the request of Moses Mendelssohn, Prussian diplomat and publicist Christian Wilhelm von Dohm (1751-1820) published his famous work On the Civil Improvement of the Jews (Über die bürgerliche Verbesserung der Juden). Dohm argued that after Jews are granted equality of civil rights, rabbis should be left with the authority to ban and ostracize members of their own community at their discretion.
Moses Mendelssohn, who supported the idea of separation of religion and state, publicly argued against this position in the introduction to the German translation of Menasseh Ben Israel's Salvation of the Jews, published in 1782, which begins the present volume. In this introduction, Mendelssohn called for rabbis to voluntarily give up their right to enforce religious rules on their community.
In response, August Friedrich Cranz (1737-1801) anonymously published a polemical tract, In Search of Light and Justice, attacking Mendelssohn's position, bound next.
Mendelssohn mistakenly believed that the tract had been written by his friend Joseph Freiherr von Sonnenfels (1732-1817). In response, he wrote his Jerusalem, which closes off the present volume.
For further reading, see: Christoph Schulte, "Diese unglückliche Nation" – Jüdische Reaktionen auf Dohms Über die bürgerliche Verbesserung der Juden. Zeitschrift für Religions- und Geistesgeschichte, Vol. 54, No. 4 (2002), pp. 352-365.
Bookplate of Mozes Heiman Gans.
Regulations, Historical Decrees and Antisemitic Works
Regulations, Historical Decrees and Antisemitic Works