Review
NATHAN THE WISE
Reviewed by Jeffrey R Smith of the San Francisco Bay Area Theatre Critics Circle
Theatre FIRST of Ninth Street in Oakland is currently presenting Gotthold Ephraim Lessing’s reconciliation piece: NATHAN THE WISE. Set in Jerusalem at the end of the twelfth century, the characters of the play serve as worthy representatives of the three major faiths of that tiny star crossed region.
A brief plot synopsis would run as follows: Saladin: the Moslem Turk, is ensconced in Jerusalem, presiding over the Holy Land and busy repelling Christian crusaders. One day he spares a captured Knight Templar from execution. The Knight reminds Saladin of his own brother whom he has not seen for over twenty years. The pardoned Knight Templar subsequently rescues Rachel: a fair, presumably Jewish, maiden from a fire in the home of her Jewish father: Nathan and her Christian mother: Daya. Nathan and Saladin are friends. In the tradition of MERCHANT OF VENICE, Saladin wants to borrow money from the Jew, in this case Nathan. In the tradition of all love stories, the Templar and Rachel fall in love following the rescue. And in the tradition of OEDIPUS REX and COMEDY OF ERRORS, Saladin, the Templar, Rachel and Nathan discover how invisibly intertwined their lives have been for decades. While the principals of the play discover, explore and enjoy their commonality, Crusaders and Turks, remaining steadfastly and resolutely focused on trivial differences, sustain the religious hecatomb outside the palace of Saladin.
While the play might seem like a modern metaphor for Arabs and Jews, Americans and the Taliban, or Americans and Iraqi Insurgents, or Bloods and Crips, it actually dates back to 1779 when it was first published in German as NATHAN DER WEISE. The hopes for world peace expressed in the play are reminiscent of John Lennon’s lyrics for IMAGINE. The interminable religious and cultural bloodshed however are reminiscent of an Arab expression: “I fight against my brother; my brother and I fight against my cousin; and my brother, my cousin and I fight against the stranger.”
According the Richard Dawkins, author of THE SELFISH GENE, a genetically determined predisposition to bloodletting tribalism has been sewn into our DNA. Evolutionary success and numerical superiority at the tribal level are favored by the adaptive strategies of virulent ethnocentricity and rabid xenophobia: by killing off the strangers, you drive his DNA to extinction while your own DNA flourishes. By contrast, exogamy too is an adaptive strategy: it too is wired into our DNA. Exogamy makes us see the foreign and exotic as erotic. When we kill off the male strangers we are then free to enjoy the spoils of war: to exercise the privileges and perquisites of victory with the exotic women: i.e. duplicate our DNA.
Even if the Crusades are thundering on as the curtain descends on NATHAN THE WISE, the play expresses some hope. Perhaps with the internet, the would be combatants of the world might have the opportunity to get to know each other before decapitating each other with bread knives. The pacifying potency of the internet is obviously recognized by leaders who would like to sustain the murder rate. Given a mix of poverty and censorship, familiarity and friendship with the manufactured enemy is denied. Communication with the enemy is tantamount to treason, spying and religious apostasy. Propagandists manipulate the atavistic tribal instincts that incline a people toward hostility and genocide. In an information age, eventually propaganda may ultimately fail to motive tribal instincts toward religious homicide. NATHAN THE WISE was banned by right-wing Extremists in 1922. Later its was banned by the Nazis. It contains truth. See it while Homeland Security will let you.
For tickets to a thoroughly thought provoking play, call the box office at 510 436-5085 or contact Theatre FIRST via www.theatrefirst.com.
Sidewalk Politician and Arm Chair Liberal