Spokesman of his People

The role that Mendelssohn played in promoting the civil rights of Jews was wholly unpremeditated. The initiative he took in activating Dohm on behalf of the cause and his own literary efforts in this field were inspired by the flow of events. Unlike his Bible project, they were not the results of long-term planning. Even so, they did grow out of deep-seated, life-long concerns, and they by no means reflected a newly awakened interest or a shift in his attitude. On the contrary, on many previous occasions Mendelssohn had acted as intercessor when Jewish communities were threatened with special measures of a cruel kind.

Most such appeals had been addressed to him in his unofficial capacity as the most widely respected and influential Jew of the time. On him had fallen the mantle of the shetadlan (“intercessor”), the one who from the sixteenth to the middle of the eighteenth century stood up before kings and princes in defense of Jewish life and limb in Germany and Poland. This function had been exercised, in the majority of cases, in an honorary capacity by Jews outstanding in wealth, command of language, and personal dignity. Famous representatives of this type were men such asJoselman of Rosheim, Samuel Oppenheimer, Samson Wertheimer, Leffmann Behrend Cohen, and some members of the Geldern and Gomperz families. Mendelssohn was a modern version of those shetadlanim. The influence he wielded was based on the admiration he commanded as a writer and on the affection he inspired as a human being. In certain instances his fame was sufficient to induce sympathetic action. In contrast to the old-time defenders of Jewish interests, who were powerful court-Jews of high financial standing, he was a man of rather moderate means, yet he was greatly respected even on account of his commercial talents.

As has been mentioned previously, when after his employer's death in 1768 he took charge of the business jointly with the widow of the deceased, Mendelssohn raised the number of looms in his silk factory from sixty to one hundred two. Reference has also been made to the fact that the Prussian government adopted his proposals for a complete overhaul of the rules governing the importation of raw materials and the credit system.