Nordau developed from this premise a critique of modern art, explained as the work of those so corrupted and enfeebled by modern life that they have lost the self-control needed to produce coherent works.

Max Simon Nordau ( July 29, 1849 – January 23, 1923 ), born Simon Maximilian Südfeld in Pest, Hungary, was a Zionist leader, physician, author, and social critic.

Despite the fact that Nordau was Jewish and a key figure in the Zionist movement ( Lombroso was also Jewish ), his theory of artistic degeneracy would be seized upon by German National Socialists during the Weimar Republic as a rallying point for their anti-Semitic and racist demand for Aryan purity in art.

Nordau also, at the 1898 Zionist Congress, coined the term " muscular Judaism " ( muskel-Judenthum ) as a descriptor of a Jewish culture and religion which directed its adherents to reach for certain moral and corporeal ideals which, through discipline, agility and strength, would result in a stronger, more physically assured Jew who would outshine the long-held stereotype of the weak, intellectually sustained Jew.

It was Nordau, convinced that Zionism had to at least appear democratic, despite the impossibility of representing all Jewish groups, who persuaded Herzl of the need for an assembly.

Indeed the fact that Max Nordau, the trenchant essayist and journalist, was a Jew came as a revelation for many.

Whereas Herzl favoured the idea of an elite forming policy, Nordau insisted the Congress have a democratic nature of some sort, calling for votes on key topics.

Nordau was central to the Zionist Congresses which played such a vital part in shaping what Zionism would become.

" There would be eleven such Congresses in all, the first, which Nordau organised, was in Basle, 29 – 31 August 1897.

James mocks the author on the grounds that he exemplifies the then current school of medical materialism, stating that Nordau " has striven to impugn the value of works of genius in a wholesale way ( such works of contemporary art, namely, as he himself is unable to enjoy, and they are many ) by using medical arguments.

Nordau was born Simon Maximilian, or Simcha Südfeld on 29 July 1849 in Budapest, then part of the Austrian Empire.

Nordau was an example of a fully assimilated and acculturated European Jew.

Nordau was also a staunch eugenicist.

One was the liberal or utilitarian school of Herzl and Nordau.

On May 13, 1946, the ship Max Nordau, carrying 1, 754 immigrants, was captured by the British destroyers HMS Jervis and HMS Chequers.

In Hungary, Hebrew-language authors included Solomon Lewison of Moor ( 1789 – 1822 ), author of " Melitzat Yeshurun "; Gabriel Südfeld, a poet who was the father of Max Nordau ; and the poet Simon Bacher.

* January 23 – Max Nordau, Hungarian author, philosopher, and Zionist leader ( b. 1849 )

* July 29 – Max Nordau, Austrian author, philosopher, and Zionist leader ( d. 1923 )

The term Entartung ( or " degeneracy ") had gained currency in Germany by the late 19th century when the critic and author Max Nordau devised the theory presented in his 1892 book, Entartung.

Nordau drew upon the writings of the criminologist Cesare Lombroso, whose The Criminal Man, published in 1876, attempted to prove that there were " born criminals " whose atavistic personality traits could be detected by scientifically measuring abnormal physical characteristics.

Nordau went on to play a major role in the World Zionist Organisation ; indeed Nordau's relative fame certainly helped bring attention to the Zionist movement.

Nordau saw in Jewish Emancipation the result of ' a regular equation: Every man is born with certain rights ; the Jews are human beings, consequently the Jews are born to own the rights of man.

Nordau cited England as an exception to this continental anti-Semitism that proved the rule.

Herzl obviously took centre stage, making the first speech at the Congress ; Nordau followed him with an assessment of the Jewish condition in Europe.

Nordau used statistics to paint a portrait of the dire straits of Eastern Jewry and also expressed his belief in the destiny of Jewish people as a democratic nation state, free of what he saw as the constraints of Emancipation.

As the 20th century progressed, Nordau seemed increasingly irrelevant as a cultural critic.

Nordau, in comparison, seemed very much a creature of the late 19th century.

Nordau died in Paris, France in 1923.

He blamed Booker's 130 years of sugar production in the Caribbean for the region's modern poverty.

Rousseau's detractors have blamed him for everything they do not like in what they call modern " child-centered " education.

This devastation, for which many modern writers have blamed Turenne, appeared no more harsh a measure than the spirit of the times and the circumstances of the case permitted.

This reduction in anti-wear chemicals in oil has caused premature failures of camshafts and other high pressure bearings in many older automobiles and has been blamed for pre-mature failure of the oil pump drive / cam position sensor gear that is meshed with camshaft gear in some modern engines.

Antonio Baretti commented in 1768 that individuals “ of weight and consideration ” should not be blamed for condemning “ those puny gentlemen ” who, as enthusiasts of Italian opera, were able to “ feel its minuet niceties, and to be of course in rapture with the languishing Cecchina ’ s of Piccini .” This modern music, Baretti decried, “ far from having any power of increasing courage or any manly virtues, has on the contrary a tendency towards effeminacy and cowardliness .”

Outside the Satmar Hasidic community, Teitelbaum is probably best known for his opposition to all forms of modern political Zionism, and for his controversial statements in which he blamed the Zionists for the death of six million Jews during the Holocaust.

The modern society is blamed for blemishing the pure people.

20th century Chinese intellectuals blamed Confucianism for the scientific and political backwardness of China after the disastrous conflicts with Western military technology at the dawn of the modern era.

The OPV AIDS hypothesis relates only to the historical origin of AIDS, and its proponents have accepted the safety of the modern polio vaccines, but rumors based on a misunderstanding of the hypothesis exist, and those rumors are blamed in part for the recent failure to eliminate polio in Nigeria.

Because the men were frequently blamed for petty crime, in modern Spanish the word is associated with references to delinquent, petty thief, or hoodlum.

Soon after this she experienced vocal problems, losing much of her upper range and clarity, which she blamed on singing so much modern music.

), in which he presents the Serbs as a degenerate race, blaming all of Balkan's modern and past problems on the Serbian nation and its aggressive policies, as well as referring to their similarity to the Jews, whom Axis world's ideology blamed for most of world's problems.

He was blamed for the humiliating defeat at Leuctra by his contemporaries for being biased towards the enemy, though some modern historians do not believe that he was actually pro-Theban.

The Chronicle of Alfonso III blames Wamba's successor Erwig for this ; some modern commentators have blamed Julian of Toledo, who was made primate of the Visigothic church by Erwig ( in reward for his services ?).

He remains one of the most important figures in Nepalese history, though modern historians have also blamed Jung Bahadur for setting up the dictatorship that repressed the nation for more than 100 years and left it in a primitive economic condition.