Jonathan,
 
If one reads Deuteronomy, say, it is not hard to see why Pound found
abhorrent certain elements of Judaism that he considered to be part of its
essential make-up:
 
"If a man happens to meet in a town a virgin pledged to be married and he
sleeps with her, you shall take both of them to the gate of that town and
stone them to death--the girl because she was in a town and did not scream
for help, and the man because he violated another man's wife. You must purge
the evil from among you."
 
It does not matter really that Judaism is a complex religion with many
facets: I am not looking to Pound to explain Judaism or Christianity to me,
but am seeing to comprehend Pound's understanding of these Western religions
and his great disdain for them. Isn't one of our goals as scholars or
critics (or as scholar-critics) to understand the nature of Pound's ideas,
however distorted they may seem, which form the basis of his attitudes
towards this religion or that? And if we find ourselves judging him morally,
aren't we required to comprehend his motives?
 
"The idea that the love of god for human beings is a Christian invention is
sheer hokum, part and parcel of the vast impertinence of the Christers. The
Greek gods loved, I admit, select individuals, either for reasons of kinship
or because of particular merits of the individual. It was more humanly
comprehensible than the abstract love of mankind at large regardless of his
abstract and collective infamies and imbecilities. The loved were the elect,
or you might say, the hand picked. ...
 
Calvin's god and the god of all writers leading to and descending from
Calvin is a maniac sadist, one wold prefer other qualities in one's
immediate parenthood.....
 
The religious man communes every time his teeth sink into a bread crust.
 
If a race NEGLECTS to create its own gods, it gets the bump.
 
The essence of religion is the <i>present</i> tense."
 
OR
 
"We want an European religion. Christianity is verminous with semitic
infections. What we really believe is the pre-Christian element which
Christianity has not stamped out. The only Christian festivals having any
vitality are welded to sun festivals, the spring solstice, the Corpus and
St. John's eve, registering the turn of the sun, the crying of "Ligo" in
Lithuania, the people rushing down into the sea in Rapallo on Easter
morning, the gardens of Adonis carried to Church on the Thursday...."
 
Tim Romano
 
 
----- Original Message -----
From: Jonathan P. Gill <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Monday, 18 Oct 1999 3:53 PM
Subject: Re: Anti-Semitism: getting started understanding it
 
 
> Re Pound, Jews, and Sexuality:
>
> One of my big points on this list of late has been that Pound spoke plenty
> about the Talmud, of which he really knew next to nothing!  He was, in
> that sense and in most other senses, very poorly prepared to talk about
> Jewish law and ethics.
>
> Abandon and adultery?  Plenty of those in Torah, and no shame, from
> Abraham (although Paul might say where there is no monogamy there is
> no adultery) right on down to David.
>
> As for Pound's association of Judaism with patristic Christianity, why
> would we approve of him damning Abraham and Moses for what was really
> Augustine? It is just so hard to take anything that Pound says about
> Judaism with anything other than bemusement on one hand and offense on the
> other.
>
> Also, I must emphasize that Pound's ideas about any form of sex other than
> heterosexuality probably resemble those of orthodox Jews quite closely!
> It was all about fertility for him, right?  Whereas homosexuality in
> classical Greece, for example, was largely about the beauty and pleasure
> of the sexual body as a form of union with the gods.
>
> Jonathan Gill
> Columbia University
>
>
>
>
> On Mon, 18 Oct 1999, Tim Romano wrote:
>
> > Jonathan,
> >
> > Did Pound ever study of the secondary and tertiary exegetical literature
of
> > Hebrew scripture to get a more complete view of the subtleties of the
Jewish
> > religion(s)? Judging from the way Pound's mind usually works, I think he
> > would have reached his understanding of Jewish monotheism via the "Old
> > Testament."  Or am I wrong about this? The pervasive attitude towards
human
> > sexuality in the Old Testament is quite different from the attitude
towards
> > the same which pervades the literature and art of polytheistic Greece,
and
> > no doubt quite different also from that of most "observant" Jews today.
I am
> > not saying that there is no such thing as good wholesome sex among
> > contemporary observant Jews! What I am saying is that the pervasive
attitude
> > in the Old Testament towards any kind of sexual abandon or sexual
departure
> > (fornication, adultery, onanism, homosexuality, whatever else) is that
it
> > was illicit big time (shameful behavior) and ought to be punished
severely,
> > and Pound did not like that at all. He associated Judaism with the early
> > patristic and then later with the medieval Christian tradition (with the
> > exception of Eriugena, and separated in his mind from Provence) in which
> > human sexuality was linked to shame, generation with corruption.
> >
> > Tim Romano
> >
> > P.S. I'm not sure I know what you meant by "retroactive influence."  Are
you
> > suggesting that one must be careful not to view the Old Testament
through an
> > early patristic Christian filter?
> >
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: Jonathan P. Gill <[log in to unmask]>
> > To: <[log in to unmask]>
> > Sent: Monday, 18 Oct 1999 9:37 AM
> > Subject: Re: Anti-Semitism: getting started understanding it
> >
> >
> > > Fellow Poundians:
> > >
> > > I fear from Tim Romano's letter that some of us may be getting our
> > > knowledge of Judaism from Pound--a very bad idea.
> > >
> > > As regards interest and gentiles, the Hebrew Scriptures have hundreds
of
> > > laws, articulated in a variety of confusing ways (hence the secondary,
> > > tertiary legal literature). For every rule that talks about charging
> > > interest only to gentiles, there's one that says Jews are obligated to
> > > treat gentiles better than fellow Jews.
> > >
> > > As for alleged Jewish shame about coition, this seems to be some sort
of
> > > retroactive Pauline or Augustine influence.  Far from being considered
a
> > > bad thing, sex is part of man's side of the covenant--every observant
Jew
> > > knows that heterosexual intercourse in considered a
mitzvah--especially on
> > > the Sabbath!
> > >
> > > I'm not blind to the restrictions in Jewish law on other kinds of sex
> > > (homosexuality, onanism, etc.)--but I suspect that, as usual, Pound
was
> > > alot closer to the Jews on this issue that he was willing to admit.
> > >
> > > By the way, I'd like to hear from Leon Surette more often on this
list.
> > > For now, I wonder how he compares his own view of Pound's "conversion"
to
> > > anti-semitism (apologies for the paraphrase) to that of Wendy Flory,
who
> > > dates it to 1935 and gives Ethiopia as the reason.
> > >
> > > Jonathan Gill
> > > Columbia University
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > On Mon, 18 Oct 1999, Tim Romano wrote:
> > >
> > > > Tim,
> > > > I won't suggest any literature that addresses your basic
incomprehension
> > of
> > > > the related hatreds. But hatred (racial, tribal, etc) does not seem
> > > > unnatural to me -- it seems more the anthropological rule than the
> > > > exception.  The Jews considered themselves the Chosen Race. African
> > tribes
> > > > massacre each other. Many Koreans despise whites. The Japanese
consider
> > > > themselves superior. Many whites consider blacks to be inferior. The
> > ancient
> > > > Saxons thought the dark-skinned Britons were an inferior race. Not a
> > modern
> > > > phenomenon by any means.  Genocide is nothing new. These feelings
are
> > > > perhaps instinctual.
> > > >
> > > > But I have not encountered anything that I would regard as racial or
> > tribal
> > > > hatred in Pound's writings, though I've yet to read the Agresti
letters
> > and
> > > > am not very far into Pound's wartime radio broadcasts, and maybe
there
> > is
> > > > evidence of this kind of hatred to be found in the things I haven't
read
> > > > yet. In one of his wartime broadcasts, Pound actually speaks out
against
> > the
> > > > physical stereotyping of the Japanese in Zukor's animated cartoons.
> > > >
> > > > In what I have read of his, Pound's "anti-Semiticism" is
> > > > culturally/economically based.  Deuteronomy permits the Jews when
> > > > moneylending to charge interest to Gentiles only. Pound had great
> > antipathy
> > > > for Jewish monotheism and the shame in which it shrouds the human
act of
> > > > coition. There are things one might reasonably hate about Jewish
culture
> > > > which have nothing to do with racial or tribal hatred, or hatred of
any
> > > > individual human being who happens to have been raised as a Jew,
just as
> > one
> > > > might despise the practice of female infanticide or female genital
> > > > mutilation or the chopping off of the hands of petty thieves or the
use
> > of
> > > > the flagellum.  Some cultures are more humane than others, if not
more
> > > > human.
> > > >
> > > > Tim Romano
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > ----- Original Message -----
> > > > From: Tim Bray <[log in to unmask]>
> > > > To: <[log in to unmask]>
> > > > Sent: Monday, 18 Oct 1999 12:27 AM
> > > > Subject: Anti-Semitism: getting started understanding it
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > > As a well-read non-humanist in his 40s who has spent time in the
third
> > > > > world and seen tribal hate at work, the problem I have with all
the
> > > > holocaust
> > > > > literature is that it fails to address my basic incomprehension as
to
> > how
> > > > this
> > > > > could have happened.  I.e. how intelligent well-educated people
(eg
> > EP,
> > > > nuts
> > > > > maybe, smart probably, well-educated definitely) can have thought
such
> > > > > silly things and done such evil things?  The tribal hate I've seen
> > could
> > > > not
> > > > > survive in the absence of real immediate grievance (they killed my
> > > > brother)
> > > > > and the presence of a decent education (history and ethics are
> > > > complicated).
> > > > >
> > > > > So, on the assumption that people who agonize over EP know
something
> > about
> > > > > this subject, what would be a good recommendation for literature
to
> > > > address
> > > > > this basic incomprehension? -T.
> > > > >
> > > > >
> > > >
> > >
> > >
> >
>
>