448
PARTISAN REVIEW
measured and exhausted the sources of spiritual good. But we know
how the poor help the poor."
Her novels depict this constantly concerned and evolving attitude.
Beginning with
Scenes of Clerical Life
(1857)
and culminating in
Daniel
Deronda,
Eliot's representation of religion complexly reflects the
numerous debates of the day. These novels neither reject nor denounce
religion.
Daniel Deronda
creates a space where the atheist, materialist,
and cleric can meet. Paradoxically, the space for a spiritual renewal in
Christian culture is Jewish. While many of her novels depict a mercur–
ial, shifting Christianity-Adam
Bede
and
Middlemarch,
for example–
these works do not adequately resolve their contentious spiritual issues.
Daniel Deronda,
of all her novels, focuses intently on the question of
spiritual practice and how that practice has universal significance.
Judaism becomes a testing ground for questions of spirituality, philoso–
phy, ethics, and politics. For Eliot, pure religious spirituality is not the
novel's main concern. She does not anticipate the Jewish religion enter–
ing into the mainstream. Rather, Eliot understands the need for a mul–
tiplicity of faiths, while using a specifically defined Judaism as a
synecdoche for a spirituality that would accept the significance of the
material world while embracing the notion of a viable political commu–
nity. For this essay, I define spirituality as that state which would have
the individual reach beyond himself for answers and guidance
to
life's
moral and ethical dilemmas. But, and this is crucial for Eliot, the
"beyond" does not exist solely in the supernatural. The "beyond" can
be recognized, utilized, and celebrated in this world. Some ha ve argued
that Eliot looks
to
revitalize her nation's lagging spirituality.
In
part the
novel does this, but its depiction of Daniel Deronda suggests that, as
opposed
to
a nationalist agenda, Eliot advocates a universalist spiritu–
ality. Ultimately, this spirituality can be applied
to
the English national
scene because it has ubiquitous, humanist dimensions.
To succeed, though, Eliot must balance Jewish self-representation
with her own place in a dominant culture hostile to Judaism. How can
a minor culture's basic rituals, beliefs, and social standing, which are
belittled or denied by the majority culture, be embraced by that same
majority culture? While the novel mostly champions Jewish culture, it
questions Judaism'S potential redemptive value in British society
because it focuses so much on the resolution of the Jewish Question of
nationhood. That Daniel travels extensively throughout Europe, and
leaves for Palestine at the novel's end, reflects the narrative's tentative
avowal of Jewish perspectives. Eliot seems to fear the consequences if
Daniel completely renews his Jewish spirituality in England.
