Jewish Respectability Politics Through the Eyes of the Haggadah
Post date: March 14, 2021 10:20:42 PM
“Respectability politics” (coined by historian Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham in her 1993 book Righteous Discontent in reference to strategies within the black community discourse in an attempt to reject White stereotypes) is the self-presentation strategy of promoting morality while de-emphasizing any behavior or event that can be interpreted as stereotypical for the group practicing these respectability politics. Subordinated groups frequently practice respectability politics in an attempt to gain upward mobility by holding each other to even higher behavioral standards than what is expected of them, trying to be holier than the pope. With the rise of Jewish Liberalism (late 19th and early 20th centuries), Jews too, deliberately shied away from any self-representation that would be considered stereotypical of them, e.g. the specter of the money greedy Jew.
Rabbi Aryeh Bernstein[1], brought to light how this is reflected in the English Haggadah translations through a question he asked in the Ask the Beit Midrash Facebook group. He expressed interest in the English translations in American Haggadot of the Dayenu text, especially the phrase that talks about how God punished the Egyptians by giving their wealth to the Jewish People before these left Egypt (נתן לנו את ממונם). In Table 1 we see this phrase (in bold) in context, in the first two English translations of the Haggadah, A. Alexander (1770) and D. Levi (1794).
A. Alexander (1770)
1. If he had taken us out of Egypt and had not executed judgment upon them, it would have been sufficient.
2. If he had executed judgment upon them, and not on their gods, it would have been sufficient.
3. If he had executed judgment on their gods, and not have slain their first-born, it would have been sufficient.
4. If he had slain their first-born, and not have given us their wealth, it would have been sufficient.
5. If he had given us their wealth, and had not cloven the sea for us, it would have been sufficient.
D. Levi (1794)
1. For it He had brought us forth from Egypt, and not inflicted justice upon them, it had been sufficient.
2. And if He had inflicted punishment upon them, and not executed judgement upon their gods, it had been sufficient.
3. And if he had executed judgement upon their gods, and not have slain their first-born, it had been sufficient.
4. And if He had slain their first-born, and not bestowed their wealth on us, it had been sufficient.
5. And if He had bestowed their wealth on us, and not divided the sea for us, it had been sufficient.
Table 1 – Comparison of English translation of the first 5 lines of Dayenu in the first two English translations of the Haggadah.
[1] National Educator of the Avodah Movement, Educational Consultant for the Jewish Council on Urban Affairs, Staff Educator for Farm Forward’s Jewish Initiative for Animals, Coordinator and Teacher for Mishkan Chicago’s Social Justice Beit Midrash and a Senior Editor of Jewschool.com.
Image 2 – Revised Union Haggadah (Reform), 1923 based on respectability politics
The replies to Bernstein’s question and a diachronic analysis of my own corpus showed that whereas most traditional translations have translated these lines scrupulously, the Reform movement in their Haggadot struggled with these lines probably because of respectability politics. The very first Reform Haggadot (Marks (1842) and Jastrow (1891)) did not include the Dayenu text at all but the first official Reform Haggadah, the Revised Union Haggadah of 1923, skillfully skipped over lines 2-4 - which describe punishment for Egyptians, Egyptian deities and monetary gain for Jews - linking the exit from Egypt directly to the splitting of the sea (see Image 2)
The first Reconstructionist Haggadah (New Haggadah by Kaplan (1942)) skips these same lines. The only traditional Haggadah that seems to follow suit is the American Family Haggadah (1958) which contains the full Hebrew text and does talk about “Executing judgment upon our oppressors and the idols they worshipped” but omits in the English translation the reference to Egyptian wealth being transferred to the Jewish People.
Towards the 1970s, possibly under the influence of the horrors of WWII, the establishment of the State of Israel and the boosted self-image of Jews as the result of the overwhelming victory of the 6-Day War of 1967, Reform Haggadot started slowly changing their opinion towards these Dayenu lines. In 1969, the Freedom Haggadah, an American Haggadah inspired by the civil rights movement of the late 1960s and published in the year after the assassination of Martin Luther King, reinserts the phrase but hedges it with a caveat justifying the transfer of wealth (bolded by me A.R.):
"If he had slain their first-born, and had not bestowed on us their wealth which we had created, it would have been sufficient." (A. I Waskow, 1969)
Although Reform Haggadot continued to ignore the four vengeful lines in Dayenu (e.g. CCAR, 1974), Conservative ones started to reinsert punishment to Egyptians although the extraction of possessions was still avoided (e.g. RA, Strassfeld 1979). By the 1980s, punishment not just of Egyptians but also their idols is back into the Dayenu text in Conservative Haggadot (e.g. Feast of Freedom, 1982 and Haggadah by Union of Liberal and Progressive Synagogues, 1996) but still no mention of Jews taking the wealth of the Egyptians nor any mention of the death of the Egyptian firstborns [2] in the Dayenu text (see images 3 and 4). Likewise, in later non-traditional Haggadot, such as the Really Fun Family Haggadah (2000) and the Jubilee Haggadah (2017).
[2] No death of firstborns in Dayenu is strange because on the proceeding page the ten plagues are listed with as the 10th plague “Death of the Firstborn”
Image 3 - Feast of Freedom Haggadah edited by Rachel Anne Rabinowicz, 1982
Image 4, Union of Liberal and Progressive Synagogues translation (in the Illuminated Haggadah, 1998)
In personal correspondence[3], Bernstein speculated that this shows how “20th century liberal respectability politics led Jews to be embarrassed by their Biblical ancestors focusing on money or potentially tricking the Egyptians to give them their property”. He further speculated that today “liberal Jews are much more likely to look at that and say, ‘Damn right they demanded their property! They were owed every cent of that as reparations for slavery’” probably because nowadays civil rights activists and feminists criticize respectability politics as reactionary. This last hypothesis, however, is not evident from liberal non-traditional Haggadot which omit references to reparations until today as shown above. When asked about this he speculated that activist shifts often happen first outside the established denominational frameworks and that possibly even the liberal culture of the Reform rabbinate still leans more towards the bourgeois and generationally older sentiments than what me find in Haggadot published more in the grass roots.
How did traditional Haggadah translations deal with this dilemma? As mentioned above, almost all traditional Haggadah translations keep to the original source text and translate the four Dayenu lines discussed above. However, we do find significant differences between the variant translations. First of all, the verb in the sentence has been translated differently:
1. "Bestowed their wealth on us" (D. Levi, 1794, Maxwell, 1932)
2. "Gave us their wealth" (Let My People Go, 1973)
3. "Handed us their wealth" (E. Wiesel, 1993)
4. "Turned their wealth over to us" (Maxwell, 2013).
The above shows a gradual shift from high register to casual English which is in line with the development of the English language over time. However, these changes also show a shift from a regal redistribution (noblesse oblige) via a neutral transfer eventually reaching a possible sense of coercion, in line with Bernstein’s second hypothesis.
In addition, the question which Egyptian possessions were exactly given to the Jewish People is interpreted differently. “Wealth” (Alexander, 1770), “money” (A. Regelson, 1941), “treasure” (Red/Yellow Haggadah by Gutstein, 1956[4]), “property” (School Haggadah, 1958), “chattels” (Polychrome Historical Haggadah, 1974). It seems that here too we see a shift away from mentioning the monetary value to more removed neutral nouns during the 1960s and 1970s possibly under the influence of respectability politics. We see this kind of hedging even clearer in the following two translations in traditional Haggadot (bolded by me A.R.) where a reason is given although none can be found in the source text. These, too, strengthen the claim that from the 1970s onwards American Jews felt that these moneys could be justified as reparations for damages done, even if they felt the need to justify this in the text:
...gave us their chattels in recompence. (Polychrome Historical Haggadah, 1974)
...gave us some of the Egyptians’ wealth, just compensation for our labor (Different Night, 1997)
...gave us reparations (M. Bercowitz in the Lovell Haggadah, 2008)
What is interesting is that we find quite the opposite attitude of respectability politics in a completely different region in the world. In two Haggadot printed in Jerusalem for the Indian Jewish community in Calcutta, which include besides the Hebrew and English text also texts in Judeo-Arabic (שרח ערבי), there is a textual addition in the middle of the Dayenu text, immediately following line 4 (about the wealth). In it, we find an explanatory amplification of the wealth taken from the Egyptians, not just in Egypt, but also at the sea. Below I present the English translation of this text taken from the Haggadah by David Hai Einy printed in 1905 (Yudlov #2303)[5]:
If he had slain their first-born, and had not bestowed their wealth on us, it would have been sufficient.
And from whence may we say, that he gave us their substance. For it is written: and they spoiled the Egyptians i.e. they made Egypt look like a lake bare of fishes or a net (trap board) without grains. Why values the Scripture the spoil of the sea higher than that of Egypt? The reason for it, is, that in Egypt they took, what there was in the houses, but at the sea all that was in the treasuries. And so it is said: “the wings of the dove covered with silver” means the spoil of Egypt, and “the feathes [sic.] with yellow gold” means the spoil of the sea. The words “thou didst multiply and become great” refer to the spoil of Egypt, “and thou didst attain to ornament” alludes to the spoil of the sea. The words: “We will make thee borders of gold” refer to the spoil of Egypt “with studs of silver” to the spoil of the sea.
If he had given us their wealth and had not divided the sea for us, it would have been sufficient.
Etc.
(pp. 40-41)
It must be noted that this is an integral text of the Haggadah read out in these communities in Judeo-Arabic in the middle of the Dayenu text. This text is far from apologetic, quite the opposite. It does not even suggest that it was God who bestowed these possessions on the Jewish People but explicitly states that it was the Jewish People who made sure to take as much of the spoils as possible. And the Jews in Calcutta were not afraid to say so out loud.
Thus, we see how different cultures influenced the Jews living there and the translators in these places in their translation decisions.
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[3] Quoted here with permission
[4] Goldberg in the Revised Red/Yellow Haggadah changed this to “property”
[5] For an online other version, see HERE pp. 15-16