This is the way he put the case, speaking to his world-wide audience.
“We have honestly tried, everywhere, to lose ourselves in the people among whom we lived, and have asked only that we might retain the faith of our Fathers. That, however, is not permitted.
“In vain are we loyal, and in many cases, overenthusiastic patriots; in vain do we bring the same sacrifices which our fellow citizens offer; in vain do we endeavour to increase the fame of our Fatherland in art, science, trade and commerce. In every country where we have lived through many centuries, we are regarded as strangers, often even by those whose forefathers were not yet in the land when ours had long agonized and toiled for it. “Only the majority can decide who in a country are the strangers, and it is a question decided by force. I yield none of our rights when I say that in the present condition of this world, might goes before right. In vain, therefore, are we brave patriots, even like the Huguenots who were forced to emigrate. If our enemies would only leave us alone; but they will not.
“We have proved that we cannot be annihilated by oppression and persecution. Those means have won only our weaker brethren—the strong returned bravely to their people.”
This last phrase left its barb in my conscience and I struggle with it still. Is there a way which leads from the large human consciousness back to the narrow confines of race or tribe? Can I wipe out of my experience changes which seem to have affected the very cells and nerves out of which my body is fashioned?
In a new way I have asked the Nicodemus question—“Can a man enter the second time into his mother’s womb and be born?”
“The strong returned bravely to their people.” Yes, I am one with the Jew. My heart leaps to him when he is down—hated, ridiculed, or forced to begin again the age-long march which has no ending—but it shrinks from him when he is up, and the other man, whoever he be, is held down by cunning, strength, or whatever the weapon may be.
I am not afraid to share his ignominy. I am not running away from all those subtle cruelties practiced by society against him—for where the Jew is not welcome I do not care to go. And yet I cannot give up this liberating sense of kinship with all the human—not only with the ruling race or type but with all humanity.
Those who know anything about me know that I have not only preached this doctrine of the brotherhood of man dogmatically but that I have practiced it, and have suffered the consequences.
I cannot give up the name “Christian,” I cannot return to Judaism, although it betray weakness or even cowardice.