Zionism and National Humanism: George L. Mosse and His Political-Intellectual Interpretation of a Failed Hope

This article will focus on George L. Mosse and his fascination with the ethical and political ideal of national humanism. This idea belongs to the little-known history of Zionism, as it was elaborated by some German-speaking Zionist intellectuals, including Hans Kohn, Hugo Bergmann, Max Brod, Felix and Robert Weltsch, who promoted it in their writings in order to give a new, different meaning to nationalism after the First World War. This article will offer a brief introduction to this ideal and its origins within Zionism. It will then reconstruct the intellectual work that led Mosse to rediscover this Zionist idea in the mid-1970s and early 1980s by examining published and archival documents. Finally, it will suggest that Robert Weltsch may have played a key role both in preserving the memory of this ideal and in influencing Mosse through his close relationship with him. The analysis will thus allow us to reconsider Mosse's political-intellectual interpretation of this failed Zionist hope.