Old and new covenants: Historical and theological contexts in Scribe's and Halévy's La Juive

Abstract

Fromental Halévy was thirty-six when his masterpiece, La Juive, a grand opera in five acts, was triumphantly produced at the Opéra (February 23, 1835), and at once secured for its author a European reputation. The opera was presented with unprecedented scenic splendor, the stage-setting alone having cost, it was said, 150,000 francs. La Juive (1835), with Meyerbeer's Les Huguenots (1836), marked the defining expression of French Grand Opera. Both operas used highly controversial and sensitive historical material as the very fabric of their artistic medium. The explosive themes of religious and racial bigotry, leading to execution and massacre, were devised and sustained impressively by the playwright and librettist Eugène Scribe (1791–1861), whose fables of intolerance and death seized the public imagination. They presented parables for reflection on contemporary times and the dangers posed to humanity by politics and religion, woven into themes such as Orthodoxy and Purity, Justice and Mercy, the Fire of Truth. In terms of historical background, theological implication, and purely human tragedy, the scenario of La Juive provides a depth and richness of semiotic discourse, a sustained exploration of a complex and many-faceted subject, whose caveats on social intolerance become only ever more topical and pertinent.