Nationalism and Culture (73 page)

Therefore, national-political unity, which always means technique at the expense of culture, is no nutrient medium for the creative formative force of a people. It is rather the greatest hindrance to any higher intellectual culture, because it pushes all important social undertakings into the political field and subjects every social enterprise to the oversight of the national machine, which stifles in men any urge toward higher ends and forces all the impulses of social life into definite forms adapted to the purposes of the national state. The "art of ruling men" has never been the art of educating men, since it has at its disposal nothing but that type of intellectual drill which is set upon bringing all life in the state under a single specific norm. Education means the release of the natural dispositions and capacities in men for independent development. The educational drill of the national state strangles this natural expansion of the inner man by forcing upon him from without matters which, though originally alien to him, still must be made the leitmotif of his life. The "national will," which is only a cautious paraphrase of the will to power, operates always as a crippling force upon every cultural process j where it overbalances, culture suffers, the sources of creative urge are quenched, because nourishment has been withdrawn from them to feed the all-devouring machine of the national state.

Greece brought forth a great culture and enriched mankind for thousands of years, not in spite of, but because of its political and national disunion. Because it never knew political unity each separate member could develop in freedom and could give expression to its own peculiar character. Greek culture grew great upon the minute division and complete separation of the efforts at political power. Because the cultural creative urge which throve so mightily in the Hellenic community, for a long time greatly outweighted the power-urge of small minorities and so afforded a much wider scope for personal freedom and independent thought—

^ Nationalism, p. 17.

because of this, and only because of this, the rich diversity of the cultural impulses found an unlimited field of activity and were not crippled against the rigid bars of a unified national state.

Rome knew nothing of this inner cleavage j the notion of political autonomy was entirely foreign to her leading men, and the idea of political unity runs through all the epochs of her long history. In the field of political centralization Rome achieved the highest that a state can achieve} but for just this reason the Romans produced nothing that was culturally important and remained a highly uncreative people to whom it was denied even to penetrate deeply into the meaning of foreign cultural creations. They completely exhausted all the social forces at their disposal in struggles for political power, which became more violent with each success and at last loosed a genuine power-madness j they had respect for no humanity and could find neither time nor understanding for any other endeavors. The natural cultural endowments of the Romans were shipwrecked on the Roman state and its struggle to obtain and hold world dominion. Political technique swallowed all original cultural enterprise and sacrificed all social forces to a ravenous machine, until at last there was nothing left to sacrifice and the soulless mechanism could but collapse of its own weight. This is the inevitable end of every policy of conquest, which Jean Paul so strikingly pictured: "The conqueror: O, how often art thou like thy Rome! Filled with the conquered treasures of the world, filled with statues of the gods and the great, thou art surrounded by deserts and death. About Rome there is nought green but poisonous swamps, everything lies empty and waste and no hamlet looks toward Saint Peter's. Thou alone swellest up with thy sins mid the tumult, as corpses swell up in a storm."

But these phenomena are not confined to Greece and Rome; they recur in every epoch of human history and thus far have led everywhere to the same results. This is a sign that we contemplate here a certain necessity in the course of events which arises of itself from the valuation that a people sets on cultural activity or the pursuit of political enterprises.

Let us cast a glance at the history of Spain. When the Arabs invaded the Iberian peninsula from Africa the kingdom of the Visigoths was already in a condition of internal decay. After their subjugation of the country the Goths had taken away from the conquered inhabitants three-fourths of the land and converted it into endowments for the dead hands of the church and the nobility. From this there developed, especially in the southern part of the country, an overlordship of the great landowners, and with it a crude feudal system under which the productivity of the soil constantly diminished. The country which had once been the granary of Rome became less and less fertile and in a few centuries was transformed into a desert. By the cruel persecutions of the Jews, especially under

Sisebut, who was completely under the influence of the church, economic life was dealt a severe blow, for business and industry lay in great part in the hands of Jewish groups. After Sisebut had caused a law to be proclaimed under which the Jews had only the choice of turning Christian or of being scalped and sold as slaves, one hundred thousand Jews migrated into Gaul and another hundred thousand into Africa, while ninety thousand were baptized. Besides this, there were the endless struggles for the throne in which poison and the dagger, treachery and assassination played no small part. Only so can we explain how the Arabs were able to conquer the country in so short a time and with no resistance worth mentioning.

After the last Gothic king had been decisively defeated by the Arabian general, Tarik, the Arabs and their allies streamed into the country in great hordes, and there developed the first beginnings of that glorious culture-epoch, which made Spain for centuries culturally the foremost land in Europe. This is usually called the period of Arabic culture in Spain, but the designation is perhaps not quite correct, for the Arabs proper constituted only a tiny fraction of the invading Moslems. The Berbers and Syrians were much more numerous, and besides these there came also great numbers of Jews, who took a prominent part in the upbuilding of that great culture. It was chiefly the Arabic language which united these different race and folk elements.

The country which under the Gothic feudalism had been laid completely waste was in a short time transformed into a flourishing garden. By the construction of numerous canals and a system of artificial irrigation the cultivation of the soil was developed to a degree never before seen in Spain and never since reached. In the fruitful fields flourished date-palms, sugarcane, indigo, rice and many other useful plants which the Arabs had introduced. Countless cities and villages covered the glorious country. According to the descriptions of the Arabian chroniclers Spain was in cities the richest country in Europe, the only one in which the traveler, besides numerous villages, could find two or three cities in a single day's journey. On the banks of the Guadalquivir there were in the period of bloom of Moorish culture six great cities, three hundred towns and twelve hundred villages.

In the ore-filled mountain ranges mining reached a pitch which even today it has not regained. In the numerous cities, moreover, handicrafts and industry flourished luxuriantly and spread welfare and the necessities of a higher culture over the whole country. Weaving and spinning alone employed more than two million people. In Cordova alone a hundred and thirty thousand people were supported by the silk industry j the same was true in Seville. The finest fabrics—arras, damask and costly carpets— were produced in countless workshops and, especially in foreign lands,

were highly prized. Arabic filigree and inlaid work were world-famous. Spain at that time -produced the most precious steel weapons, the most gorgeous leatherware, the most beautiful pottery, with a golden glaze which cannot be produced today. Paper was introduced into Europe by the Arabs, by whom it was manufactured in Spain, replacing the very expensive parchment. In short, there was hardly any branch of industry which was not developed to the most perfect state of craftsmanship.

Hand in hand with this splendid development of handicrafts and industry, art and science developed to a degree which still calls out our unqualified admiration. While in the tenth and eleventh centuries all Europe could show scarcely a single public library and could boast of only two universities that were worthy of the name, there were in Spain at that same time more than seventy public libraries of which the one in Cordova alone contained six hundred thousand manuscripts. In addition, the country possessed seventeen famous universities, among which those at Cordova, Seville, Granada, Malaga, Jaen, Valencia, Almeria and Toledo were especially outstanding. Many students came from distant countries to study in the Arabian high schools, and carried back to their homelands the knowledge they had acquired there—which contributed not a little to the later growth of science in Europe. Astronomy, physics, chemistry, mathematics, geometry, philology, geography, reached in Spain the highest stage at that time known anywhere. Medicine in particular made an advance which had not been possible for it in Christian countries because the church threatened with death the dissectors of cadavers. Artists and scholars united in special associations for the pursuit of their studies. There were regular congresses of all branches of science where the latest achievements of research were announced and discussed, which naturally contributed greatly to the spread of scientific thought.

The Arabs made great contributions in the fields of music and poetry, and their graceful forms had a strong influence on the poesy of Christian Spain. What the Arabs accomplished in architecture borders often on the miraculous. Unfortunately, most of their best works fell as sacrifices to the barbarity of the Christians. Even where the savage fanaticism of the bearers of the cross did not level everything to the earth, they did sufficient damage to splendid works of art by crude mutilation. Nevertheless, structures like the Alcazar of Seville, the great Mosque of Cordova, and above all the Alhambra, in which the Moorish style attained its highest perfection, give us, even today, an idea of that wonderful period. In the Mosque at Cordova, which after the expulsion of the Moors was converted into a Christian church, the powerful impression of the interior with its nineteen bronze portals and forty-seven hundred lamps was in great part destroyed by a barbaric reconstruction, so that Charles V could with justice hurl at the church administration of the time the accusation: "You have

built here what could just as well have been built elsewhere j and have destroyed that which existed nowhere else in the world."

What gave the Moorish style its distinctive character was the abundance of that unusual ornamentation of the walls and interiors known as arabesque. Since the Koran forbids to the followers of Islam the representation of m^n and animals in picture or image, the fancy of the Moors hit upon that mysterious play with lines which in its delicate and inexhaustible richness of forms so deeply stirs the spirit—so that one may with justice speak of a "fairy tale in lines." Wide scope was afforded to the art of the architect because the cities at that time were very populous and extended in area. Thus at the height of Moorish culture Toledo counted two hundred thousand inhabitants, Seville and Granada four hundred thousand each. Of Cordova the Arabian chroniclers tell us that it embraced more than two hundred thousand houses, among them six hundred mosques, nine hundred public baths, a university and numerous public libraries.

Moreover, this highly developed culture unfolded in a time of political decentralization which was uninfluenced by the monarchic form of the state. Even when Abder Rachman III raised himself to the Caliphate he was compelled to make the most far-reaching concessions to the feeling for personality and the sense of independence of the population; he knew only too well that a sharp centralization of the powers of the state would immediately stir up a conflict with the ancient tribal notions of the Arabs and the Berbers which might shake his entire realm. The country was divided into six provinces, which were administered by viceroys. The great cities had their city governors, the smaller towns their cadis, the villages their directors or hakims.

These officials were, however, in a measure only intermediaries between the government of the realm and the municipalities. The administration of the latter was entirely independent; especially where whole tribes of family-groups dwelt together unlimited autonomy prevailed. Arabs, like Berbers, lived according to their ancient laws and constitutions and permitted no interference by the authorities in their community affairs. The Christians enjoyed equal freedom and chose their chiefs from among themselves. These latter, with the bishops, directed the administration of the congregations and were responsible to the government for the fulfillment by their fellows in the faith of their obligations as citizens and for the just collection of the taxes. The bishops were selected freely by the congregations, but had to be confirmed by the caliphs, who had succeeded to the customary rights of sovereignty of the Gothic kings. The civil affairs of the Jews as citizens were ordered in a similar fashion, their head rabbi functioning chiefly as head of the congregation.^

^ Gustav Diercks, Geschichte Spaniens von den fruhsten Zeiten bis auf die Gegenwart. Berlin, 1895. Band II, S. 128.

In fact the rulers of the Ommayad dynasty never succeeded during the three hundred years of their dominion in drawing the reins tighter and instituting a more unified government in the country. Every attempt in this direction led to endless uprisings, refusals to pay taxes, occasional secessions of single provinces, and even to forcible deposition of the caliph. Thus the realm was a rather loose structure, which immediately dissolved into its separate constituents when, in 1031, Hischam III abdicated as caliph and abandoned his former activity with the resigned words: "This race was made neither to rule nor to obey." Cordova then became a republic, and the former kingdom split into a few dozen taifas, tiny states, which no longer obeyed a central governing power. At just that time Moorish culture attained its highest bloom. The little communities strove to excel one another in the development of the intellectual life and the arts and sciences, and the collapse of state authority did not the slightest harm to this cultural development. On the contrary, it rather furthered it by guaranteeing to it freedom from injurious political restrictions.