In both works one may discern, though in vague outlines only, the theory of a “spiritual nation.” [1] However, Smolenskin did not succeed in developing and consolidating his theory.  The pogroms of 1881 and the beginning of the Jewish exodus from Russia upset his equilibrium once more.  He laid aside the question of the national development of Jewry in the Diaspora, and became an enthusiastic preacher of the restoration of the Jewish people in Palestine.  In the midst of this propaganda the life of the talented publicist was cut short by a premature death.

[Footnote 1:  The conception of a “spiritual nation” as applied to Judaism has been formulated and expounded by the author of the present volume in a number of works.  See his “Jewish History” (Jewish Publication Society, 1903) p. 29 et seq., and the translator’s essay “Dubnow’s Theory of Jewish Nationalism” (reprinted from the Maccabaean, 1905).  More about this theory will be found in Vol.  III.]

The same conviction was finally reached, after a prolonged inner struggle, by Moses Leib Lilienblum (1843-1910), who might well be called a “martyr of enlightenment.”  However, during the period under consideration he moved entirely within the boundaries of the Haskalah, of which he was a most radical exponent.  Persecuted for his harmless liberalism by the fanatics of his native town of Vilkomir, [1] Lilienblum began to ponder over the question of Jewish religious reforms.  In advocating the reform of Judaism, he was not actuated, as were so many in Western Europe, by the desire of adapting Judaism to the non-Jewish environment, but rather by the profound and painful conviction that dominant Rabbinism in its medieval phase did not represent the true essence of Judaism.  Reform of Judaism, as interpreted by Lilienblum, does not mean a revolution, but an evolution of Judaism.  Just as the Talmud had once reformed Judaism in accordance with the requirements of its time, so must Judaism be reformed by us in accordance with the demands of our own times.  When the youthful writer embodied these views in a series of articles, published in the ha-Melitz under the title Orhot ha-Talmud ("The Ways of the Talmud,” 1868-1869), his orthodox townsmen were so thoroughly aroused that his further stay in Vilkomir was not free from danger, and he was compelled to remove to Odessa.  Here he published in 1870 his rhymed satire Kehal refa’im, [2] in which the dark shadows of a Jewish town, the Kahal elders, the rabbis, the Tzaddiks, and other worthies, move weirdly about in the gloom of the nether-world.

[Footnote 1:  In the government of Kovno.]

[Footnote 2:  “The Congregation of the Dead,” with allusion to Prov. 21.16.]