Nathan the Wise Program

DIRECTOR’S NOTES
In 1779 Gotthold Ephraim Lessing wrote his dramatic fable Nathan the Wise as a plea for people of all faiths
to embrace their common humanity. Lessing was motivated in part by the contemporary social problem he observed in the ill-treatment of and lack of basic civil liberties for European
Jews. He found inspiration in his close friendship with the Jewish philosopher Moses Mendelssohn (grandfather of the composer), who provided a model for the character of Nathan.

Lessing was also interested in reconciling the competing demands of faith and reason. In Lessing's view we
should be able to confirm the important principles of any religion through reason, rather than relying entirely on Divine revelation which might limit individual thought. Lessing was concerned that a strict and unreflective adherence to orthodox Christianity (or any other religion) could lead to intolerance. He worried about the harm humans can do to others when they are absolutely certain they are right and others wrong. In Lessing's often quoted words, "If God held all truth in his right hand and in his left everlasting
striving after truth, so that I should always and everlastingly be mistaken, and said to me 'Choose,' with humility I would pick the left hand and say, "Father, grant me that. Absolute
truth is for thee alone.'"

Lessing wrote Nathan the Wise in the wake of a personal tragedy (the death of his wife and new-born son) and a public controversy (his active engagement in a bitter theological debate), yet the work he created was remarkably kind-hearted and optimistic. While we may question the
efficacy of the play's simple moral (that has so far failed to eradicate ethnic and religious intolerance), we might still be interested in the attempt to address the problem and the reminder that the challenges of our time are not entirely new.
I hope that Nathan the Wise will stimulate thought and discussion, especially as we acknowledge the forces working against a happy ending and see the fable not as simply an
easy answer to a complex problem, but instead as a hopeful vision to guide our choices..