Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Gertrude Himmelfarb (1922-2019): The historian of moral revolution
Gertrude Himmelfarb (1922-2019): The historian of moral revolution
Mar 18, 2025 12:35 PM

I just heard some devastating news. Gertrude Himmelfarb, historian, moralist, wife, and mother, has passed. David Brooks has written a touching obituary detailing the life and legacy of this fascinating woman:

Economists measure economic change and journalists describe political change, but who captures moral change? Who captures the shifts in manners, values, and mores, how each era defines what is admirable and what is disgraceful? Gertrude Himmelfarb, who died at 97 last night, made this her central concern. She was a physician for the national soul.

Himmelfarb was born in 1922 and grew up with her parents and brother in a one-bedroom apartment in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn. Her parents immigrated from Russia and spoke Yiddish at home. Her father cut glass and sold engraved saucers and jars to department stores, going bankrupt a few times during the Depression. She made it into Brooklyn College, where she amassed enough credits to have majored in history, economics, and philosophy, while taking the subway at night up to the Jewish Theological Seminary and earning a simultaneous degree there. At a Trotskyite gathering, she met her husband, Irving Kristol.

She went to the University of Chicago for graduate school and was told that she would never get an academic job. She was a woman, a Jew, and a New Yorker. She didn’t care. World War II was raging; the Holocaust was her daily obsession and horror; the atmosphere was apocalyptic. “The future was not something I worried about, because I wasn’t sure I was going to have a future,” she toldThe University of Chicago Magazinedecades later. Kristol, who’d trailed out to Chicago with her, was drafted into the Army. So she found some roommates, including Saul Bellow.

The entire obituary is well worth reading. Himmelfarb authored many books on great Victorian luminaries from the scientist Charles Darwin to the novelist George Eliot. She was one of those rare thinkers and writers who were the total package: prolific, scholarly, and a virtuoso of the writing craft itself.

Her first book was the masterful, Lord Acton: A Study of Conscience and Politics.It was also the first book of hers I read and is still unmatched as a concise, lively, and insightful account of Lord Acton’s life and thought. When the book went out of print I worked on bringing it back into print in a new typesetting from the Acton Institute. It was my first major book project, my introduction to editing and the intricacies of book publishing, and an honor to work on.

When thinking of potential introducers and endorsers for my first named edited volume, Lord Acton: Historical and Moral Essays,she was the first e to mind. Himmelfarb’s biography had been an inspiration for the project from the beginning. She kindly offered her endorsement:

A new volume of essays by Lord Acton is more e than ever. In the present state of cultural and social disarray, his reflections on history and modernity are as perceptive and prescient today as they were over a century ago.

She also paid me one of the pliments I have ever received when she graciously declined to write the foreword saying:

Thank you for asking me to contribute to it. But your fine introduction would make any foreword by me redundant.

I keep this correspondence by my desk as a daily encouragement. The world has lost an unparalleled scholar, writer, and a generous spirit. Gertrude Himmelfarb, her family, and many friends will be in my prayers.

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
The archbishop of Canterbury eyes a ‘broken’ economy
Defending the free market and advocating for ever-greater access to capital is of paramount importance during uneven economic patches. That is how Christians should ments from Justin Welby, the archbishop of Canterbury, who recently said that the economy is “broken.” The archbishop cited familiar economic data of unequal economic growth, youth hopelessness, and questions about wage stagnation. Many of these are part of a ing report from the IPPR’s Commission on Economic Justice, of which he is a member. But...
7 Figures: Income and poverty in the U.S.
The U.S. Census Bureau released its latest report on e and poverty in the United States today. Here are seven figures from the report you should know about: 1. Real median household e increased 3.2 percent between 2015 and 2016—from $ 57,230 to $59,039. (This figure surpasses the previous high reached in 1999.) 2. Real median es in 2016 for family households ($75,062) and nonfamily households ($35,761) increased 2.7 percent and 4.5 percent, respectively, from their 2015 medians. (This is...
A holistic view of Christian vocation
In a society where personal identity is conveyed by one’s job title, it is of little wonder that the nation’s youth are so anxious about career choice. But what if your identity is found in Christ? What if living vocationally has nothing to do with finding the “perfect” career? ...
Explainer: What you should know about single-payer healthcare
Today, Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is unveiling his legislation for a single-payer healthcare system. Here is what you should know about single-payer systems and Sanders’s proposal: What is single-payer healthcare? In a single-payer healthcare system, the government pays for all medically necessary service for of all citizens, regardless of e or ability to pay. Does the U.S. have a single-payer system? In the U.S. most citizens over the age of 65 and people under 65 who have specific disabilities qualify...
Missiles, threats and sanctions: How should the United States respond to North Korea?
The North Korean people are not the same as the North Korean regime. Photo: “Pyongyang, North Korea” by (stephan) (CC BY-SA 2.0) Today the United Nations Security Council will meet and vote on a resolution to impose new restrictions on North Korea. This resolution is a direct response to recent North Korean missile activity and threats from Kim Jong Un. On July 4, North Korea tested an intercontinental ballistic missile and claimed it could hit any nation on Earth and...
Erasing the cross: Public vs. private sector
The European discount grocery chain Lidl stirred controversy by removing the cross from its products’ labels, so as not to give offense. Eagle-eyed consumers noticed that Eirdanous, its Greek food line, featured a picture of a blue-domed Greek Orthodox Church by the sea – but unlike every other such church, its cupola was not topped by a cross. pany Photoshopped the symbol of Christ’s victory over death and Hell off of the Anastasi(in Greek, literally, “resurrection”) Church inSantorini. Perhaps to...
The consuming self as tyrant
“Consumerism is, quite precisely, the consuming of life by the things consumed. It is living in a manner that is measured by having rather than being.” -Richard John Neuhaus In a free economy, we each serve distinct roles as both producers and consumers. As producers, we create and serve, leveraging the work of our hands to meet the needs of our neighbors. As consumers, however, we look to ourselves and our own needs. Consumption is good and necessary thing, but...
Upstream: A Conversation on Artist Renee Radell
On the Upstream segment of this week’s Radio Free Acton podcast, I discuss the visual art of Renee Radell with Gregory Wolfe. Radell’s work is the subject of Renee Radell: Web of Circumstance (Predmore Press, 2016, 220 pages, $80), a book presenting a career overview of her artistic efforts. In his review of Web of Circumstance for The University Bookman, Wolfe – founder and editor of Image magazine – determines the panying text by Eleanor Heartney superficial in contrast to...
The monopoly markup
Note: This is post #48 in a weekly video series on basic microeconomics. Ever wonder why pharmaceuticals are so expensive? In this video by Marginal Revolution University, Alex Tabarrok shows how low elasticity of demand results in monopoly markups. This is especially the case with goods that involve the “you can’t take it with you” effect (for example, people with serious medical conditions are relatively insensitive to the price of life-saving drugs) and the “other people’s money” effect (if third...
5 Facts about the 9/11 aftermath
Today marks the 16th anniversary of the worst terrorist attack ever on American soil. Here are five facts you should know about what happened in the aftermath of the events on September 11, 2001: 1. It took 99 days—until December 19, 2001—for thefires at Ground Zeroto be extinguished.Cleanup at Ground Zero wasn’t pleted until May 30, 2002. It took 3.1 million hours of labor to clean up 1.8 million tons of debris at a total cost of cleanup of $750...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved