Carl Ballod and Janis Rainis
Let us depart from a strictly chronological sequence to honor two eminent Latvians, each of whom was well-known in his respective field outside the narrow confines of the land of his birth. Professor Carl Ballod (Karlis Balodis, 1864-1931) and Janis Rainis (Janis Plieksans, 1865-1929) were also noted as friends of the Jewish people and supporters of Jewish national strivings. Both repudiated nationalistic narrow-mindedness and provincialism. They were ardent Latvian patriots and at the same time. One might say, "European humanists."
Carl Ballod was born in 1864 in Koknese. He studied theology, geography, and economics at universities in Dorpat (Tartu), Jena, Munich, and Strasbourg. After being a Lutheran minister in Russia, and from 1900 to 1902 a journalist in Latvia, he became widely known as an economist. At the University of Berlin during the First World War, he developed a rationing system that was the first comprehensive structure for equitable food distribution in an emergency. This achievement, primarily, gained him respect and recognition not just in Germany, but also from the Allied powers. In 1919 Ballod became a professor at the newly-founded University of Latvia, and from 1928 to 1931 was a member of the Latvian parliament, Saeima, representing the Democratic Union. A specialist in urbanization and demographic issues, Ballod favored rational planning, while rejecting Marxist Utopias. He published widely in Latvian, German, French, and English. His most influential works are "Der Bankerott der freien Wirtschaft," "Der Zukunftsstaat," "Quel maximum de population notre terre est-elle en etat d'alimenter," and "Garden Cities or Agricultural Cities?" His book La Latvie introduced Latvia to the general public.
As mentioned, Carl Ballod was a Latvian patriot. In the autumn of 1919, the democratic government of the young independent Latvian state had to defend itself not only against the Bolsheviks, but also against the German mercenaries of von der Goltz and the Russian mercenaries of Bermondt-Avaloff. One might have thought Ballod would have German sympathies. Instead, the venerable 55-year-old professor volunteered for the legendary Latvian army unit that saved the center of Riga.
But what is Ballod's contribution to Jewish history? At the beginning of 1918, when Germany's collapse was not predictable, he became the chairman of the German Committee for the Advancement of Jewish Settlement in Palestine, known as the Pro Palastina Committee. He brought into the committee several well-known German politicians and scientists, among them Gustav Noske, Erzberger, Sombart, and Max Weber.
In 1918 Eretz Israel, or Palestine, was apart of the Ottoman Empire, an ally of Germany and Austria-Hungary, who were fighting against England and France. The Bolshevik government concluded a separate peace treaty with Germany at Brest-Litovsk in March 1918. Zionists and religious organizations were active among the millions of Jews, the Ostjuden, that lived in the vast area of Russia occupied by the Germans -- Poland, Lithuania, Byelorussia, the Ukraine. On the other side, Zionists in England pinned their hopes on the Allied powers, the Entente. The head of the Zionists was the respected chemist Chaim Weizmann, who became Israel's first president. On November 2, 1917, the British government with the Balfour Declaration had promised to turn the Zionist dream into a reality. But the executive offices of the World Zionist Organization were still in Berlin, as before the war. Concerned about the effect of the Balfour Declaration on the great number of Eastern European Jews, the German government published its own Lichtheim Declaration, Named for a German Zionist, this declaration promised that, in the event of aGerman and Austro-Hungarian victory, the Jews would get not only a "national home in Palestine," but also an autonomous state under the benevolent aegis of the Ottoman Empire.
This was the situation when Professor Carl Ballod undertook the leadership of the Pro Palastina Committee. In his pamphlet "Palestine as a Territory for Jewish Settlement," he gave a positive answer to two questions: Are the goals of Zionism attainable, practically speaking? Is it physically possible to settle a significant part of the world's Jewry in Palestine? Analyzing in detail data about population density, climate, water resources, and the like, Ballod showed that it would be feasible to settle millions of Jews in Eretz Israel, without infringing on the local Arab population. This could be achieved by maximizing intensive agriculture and irrigation, developing the cooperative approach, and founding "industrial villages" and "garden cities."
Of course, Carl Ballod's analyses were based on the scientific and technical knowledge of his time. He also had to take into account the German government's strategic self-interests. But it is a fact that he was one of the first gentile scientists to document the rationale for the Zionist ideal and to strongly support its goals.
Near the end of his brochure, Professor Ballod stressed that if the new Jewish settlement in Palestine were to be stable and not ephemeral, it would have to be "a society of free comrades, not a society of masters and servants." He ended with a quote from Goethe's Faust:
Though not secure, yet free to active toil;
And such a thing I fain would see --
Stand on free soil among a people free!* * *
Janis Rainis is Latvia's most famous poet. As Rolfs Ekmanis states in the Encyclopedia of World Literature in the 20th Century (New York, Ungar, 1984. v. 3, pp. 140-141), Rainis' "place is unquestionable as the greatest Latvian poet, and perhaps the greatest Latvian writer. He was also the key figure in Latvian literary and intellectual history during the 1900-1930 period." In the 1920s it was proposed to nominate Rainis for the Nobel prize in literature, but this was defeated by the intrigues of his political opponents. In my opinion he richly deserved the Nobel prize.
In the same article Ekmanis continues:
As one of the central figures in the 1905 revolution (which in Latvia developed into a nationalist movement), he [Rainis] had to flee from Latvia. Like many other eastern Europeans of the age, Rainis and his wife Aspazija (pseud. of Elza Rozenberga, 1868-1943), a well-known Latvian poet and a feminist leader, emigrated to Switzerland. During fourteen years of exile, Rainis wrote his major literary works and became the ideologist of an autonomous Latvian state, envisioning it as neither a slave to the East nor a servant to the West. In 1920 Rainis returned to the newly proclaimed independent Republic of Latvia, where he held prominent positions in the government (including that of Minister of Education) and in the Social Democratic party. He was instrumental in founding the Riga Art Theater in 1920, and directed the Latvian National Theater from 1920 to 1925.
Rainis was also a deputy in the Saeima, in his speeches passionately defending the rights of a free press. He repeatedly stressed that free Latvia was an integral pan of a free Europe, and that the example of the ancient Greeks showed that even small nations can make significant contributions to world culture and civilization. As a dedicated democrat and humanist, Rainis in all his public offices championed the rights of ethnic minorities, especially the Byelorussians and Jews. In the 1920s ideologues of the National Club, a group of rightist extremists, disparaged Rainis as a "Jew-lover," ignoring the fact that Rainis was a dedicated Latvian patriot and that his poems and plays, especially Fire and Night (1907) and Daugava (1919), inspired the Latvian people to struggle for their freedom and national independence.
Ekmanis further states that Rainis' play Joseph and His Brothers (1919), in the English translation (1924) called The Sons of Jacob, "is usually considered Rainis' greatest drama because of the handling of the emotions and psychology of its characters. Based on the biblical story of Jacob and his sons, it expresses the irreconcilable conflict between the individual and society, of which Rainis was so aware." It is worth noting that this play about Joseph and His Brothers still has an honored
place in the Latvian theater repertory of Russian-occupied Latvia, and actors consider it a great honor to be entrusted a part in this striking, deeply philosophical play. Regretfully the play has not become part of the repertory of leading theaters in the free world, which is the more surprising since translations exist. An English translation has been available since 1924, and there is an adequate German translation by Rainis' wife Aspazija. There is also an Italian translation, Giuseppe e i suoifratelli (Florence, Sansoni, 1949). In my subjective opinion, Rainis' play Joseph and His Brothers is truly a work of genius, in its spirituality and depth of thought surpassing Thomas Mann's widely known epic novel of the same name.
Early in 1930, Thomas Mann, accompanied by his wife, visited Egypt and Palestine to acquaint himself with the area as background for the novel. Four months before his death in 1929, Rainis visited Palestine. In the words of Bruno Kalnins (Raina un Aspazijas Gadagramata, Stockholm 1972, pp. 36-38):
Rainis' journey to far-off Palestine was motivated by his deep interest in the Jewish people and their achievements in the land of their forefathers.... Rainis arrived in Palestine on April 17, 1929.... He was accompanied by Dr. Lifschitz [his doctor and close friend]. The next day Rainis visited the Histadrut cultural committee, health insurance company, and the cooperative press Hapoel Hatzair. In the afternoon Rainis visited the Histadrut headquarters, where he was greeted by one of the leaders, Kaplansky, who told him about the workers' movement in Palestine.... On April 19 and 20 Rainis traveled around the country, visiting Nes-Ziona, Petach-Tikva, and Rishon-Lezion, where he saw workers' moshavim and kibbutzim. He also visited the agriculture organization Yakhin and the workers' village Shechunat Borochov. In the evening Rainis visited the Jewish workers' youth association and went to a concert. As noted in Rainis' own travel notes, he also saw the ruins of Joseph's tomb and the pit of Dothan, "into which Joseph was thrown by his brothers."
On April 21 Rainis attended the congress of the Jewish socialist party Achdut-Avoda, the predecessor of the present-day Israel Labour Party. At the opening session he was introduced by Ben-Gurion, who emphasized the role played by Rainis in the Latvian socialist movement and his positive attitude toward Jewish inhabitants of Latvia and their cultural interests. In his lengthy speech Rainis expressed great pleasure in having been given the opportunity to participate in the congress and the tenth anniversary celebrations of the Palestine workers' party. He delivered friendly greetings from the Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party and the Latvian people. "Coming here," said Rainis, "I knew something about Palestine, but I realized right away that my knowledge was incorrect in many ways. The Bund, the Jewish workers' party in Latvia, states that there isn't a strong workers' movement in Palestine, that Zionism is a bourgeois movement supported by only some of the workers. Here in Palestine, I have become convinced that this is not so. The workers' movement is the basis of Zionism, and without it the Zionist organization would not be what it is today...."
Rainis ended his speech: "In the few days I have spent here, I have seen how democratic socialism is being built. I would like to specially emphasize the great enthusiasm with which you are turning your ideals into reality. There is no doubt that the Social Democrats of Latvia and all of Europe could learn a great deal from you, especially from your enthusiasm."
... He was now convinced that the Zionists were building a new Jewish state, and that at the forefront of the Zionist movement were the Jewish socialists. Rainis realized that Latvians as a matter of principle should support this effort and also the Latvian Jews who wished to emigrate to Palestine. He understood that Jews had the same right to a state of their own as did the Latvians, Perhaps Rainis' enthusiasm for Palestine went a little too far, for he thought that kibbutzim, democratic agricultural communities, should also be founded in Latvia, which was not a practical possibility. He was not able to carry out his plans on behalf of Palestine, for he died four months after the trip.
According to Aspazija, Rainis shortly before his death told her, "I want to see if, after all, Lifschitz is my only friend, the only true human being?" (cited in the newspaper Socialdemokrats, September 18, 1929). Rainis' last words were, "Lifschitz, dear friend, save me!" (newspaper Pedeja Bridi, September 13, 1929).