>[!quote]- Author's Preface >"The eruption of blazing indignation over the shame to which they were subjected has turned to a rain of ashes, gradually covering the glowing soil. Shut your eyes and hide your head like an ostrich - there is to be no lasting peace unless in the fleeting intervals of relaxation you apply a remedy more thoroughgoing than those palliatives to which our hapless people have been turning for 2000 years." >[!quote]- The Jewish Question >"The Jews comprise a distinctive element among the nations under which they dwell, and as such can neither assimilated nor be readily digested by any nation. >Hence the solution lies in finding a means of so readjusting this exclusive element to the family of nations, that the basis of the Jewish question will be permanently removed. >This does not mean, of course, that we must think of waiting for the age of universal harmony." >"The world has yet long to wait for eternal peace. Meanwhile nations live side by side in a state of relative peace, secured by treaties and international law, but based chiefly on the fundamental equality between them. >But it is different with the people of Israel. There is no such equality in the nations' dealings with the Jews. The basis is absent upon which treaties and international law may be applied: mutual respect. Only when this basis is established, when the equality of Jews with other nations becomes a fact, can the Jewish problem be considered solved." >[!quote]- "The status of nationhood" >"The Jewish people has no fatherland of its own, though many motherlands; no centre of focus or gravity, no government of its own, no official representation. They home everywhere, but are nowhere at home." >[!quote]- "The self respect of Jews" >"... Judaism and Anti-Semitism passed for centuries through history as inseparable companions... No matter how much the nations are at variance in their relations with one another, however diverse their instincts and aims, they join hands in their hatred of the Jews; on this one matter all are agreed... The antipathy as such, however; exists in all places and at all times, whether it appears in the form of deeds of violence, as envious jealousy, or under the guise of tolerance and protection. To be robbed as a Jew or to be protected as a Jew is equally humiliating, equally destructive to the self-respect of Jews." >[!quote]- Emancipation >"The German proud of his Teutonism, the Slav, the Celt, not one of them admits that the Semitic Jew is his equal by birth; and even if he be ready, as a man of culture, to admit him to all civil rights, he will never quite forget that his fellow citizen is a Jew. The legal emancipation of the Jews is the culminating achievement of our century. But legal emancipation is not social emancipation, and with the proclamation of the former the Jews are still far from being emancipated from their exceptional social position." >[!quote]- Not ancient Judea >"If we would have a secure home, give up our endless life of wandering and rise to the dignity of a nation in our own eyes and in the eyes of the world, we must, above all, not dream of restoring ancient Judea. We must not attach our selves to the place where our political life was once violently interrupted and destroyed. The goal of our present endeavours must be not the 'Holy Land,' but a land of our own. We need nothing but a large tract of land for our poor brothers, which shall remain our property and form which no foreign power can expel us..." >"Perhaps the Holy Land will again become ours. If so, all the better, but first of all, we must determine - and this is the crucial point - what country is accessible to us, and at the same time adapted to offer the Jews of all lands who must leave their homes a secure and undisputed refuge, capable of productivisation." >[!quote]- United emigration >"We do not, of course, propose united emigration of the entire people. The comparatively small number of Jews in the West, who constitute a small percentage of the population, and for this reason, perhaps are better situated and even to a certain extent naturalised, may in the future remain where they are. The wealthy may also remain even where the Jews are not willingly tolerated. But, as we have said before, there is a certain point of saturation beyond which their numbers may not increase, if the Jews are not to be exposed to the dangers of persecution as in Russia, Roumania, Morocco and elsewhere. It is this surplus which, a burden to itself and to others, conjures up the evil fate of the entire people. It is now high time to create a refuge for this surplus." >[!quote]- Where? >"The first task of this national institute, which we miss so much and must unconditionally call into existence, would have to find a territory adapted to our purpose, as far as possible continuous in extent and of uniform character. In this respect, two countries, lying at opposite points of the globe, which have lately vied with each other for first place and created two opposite currents of Jewish emigration, present themselves. This division caused the failure of the entire movement." >[!quote]- The territory >"The territory to be acquired must be fertile, well-situated and sufficiently extensive to allow the settlement of several millions. The land, as a national property, must be inalienable. Its selection is, of course, of the first and highest importance, and must not be left to off-hand decision or to certain preconceived sympathies of individuals, as has, alas, happened lately. This land must be uniform and continuous in extent, for it lies in the very nature of our problem that we must possess as a counterpoise to our disposition one single refuge, since a number of refuges would again be equivalent to our old dispersion." >[!quote]- North America or Asiatic Turkey >"This tract might form a small territory in North America, or a sovereign Pashalik in Asiatic Turkey recognised by the Porte and the other Powers as neutral. It would certainly be an important duty of the directorate to secure the assent of the Porte, and probably of the other European cabinets to this plan." >[!quote]- Palestine or Syria >"If the experts find in favour of Palestine or Syria, this decision would not be based on the assumption that the country could be transformed in time by labour and industry into a quite productive one. In this event the price of land would rise in proportion. But should they prefer North America, however, we must hasten. If one considers that in the last thirty-eight years the population of the United States of America has risen from seventeen millions to fifty millions, and that the increase in population for the next forty years will probably continue in the same proportion, it is evident that immediate action is necessary, if we do not desire to eliminate for all time the possibility of establishing in the New World a secure refuge for our unhappy brethren." >[!quote]- Profit >"Whether this act of national self-help on our part might turn out profitably or otherwise, however, is of little consequence as compared with the great significance which such an undertaking would have for the future of our unsettled people; for our future will remain insecure and precarious unless a radical change in our position is made." >[!quote]- Government consent >"Of course, the establishment of a Jewish refuge cannot come about without the support of the governments." >[!quote]- Not a living nation >"The Jews are not a living nation; they are everywhere aliens; therefore they are despised. >The civil and political emancipation of the Jews is not sufficient to raise them in the estimation of the peoples. >The proper, the only solution, is in the creation of a Jewish nationality, of a people living upon its own soil, the auto-emancipation of the Jews; their return to the ranks of the nations by the acquisition of a Jewish homeland. >We must not persuade ourselves that humanity and enlightenment alone can cure the malady of our people." >"That we may not be compelled to wander from one exile to another, we must have an extensive productive land of refuge, a centre which is our own. The present moment is the most favourable for this plan." Translated from German by Dr. D. S. Blondheim, Federation of American Zionists, 1916, Essential Texts of Zionism Full text: https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/quot-auto-emancipation-quot-leon-pinsker