Jewish Life August 1958

Av 5718 — August 1958

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JEWISH LIFE

A u g u s t 1958

rrn

Av, 5718

Vol. XXV, No. 6

Saul Bernstein , Editor

• EDITORIALS M. Morton Rubenstein Reuben E. Gross Rabbi S. J. Sharfm an Libby Klaperman Editorial Associates

BEN G U RIO N DECLARES

W A R ........

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SABBATH A N D CIVIL RIGHTS IN LO U ISIA N A ............................

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Thea Odem , Editorial Assistant

• ARTICLES JEWISH LIFE is published bi­ monthly. Subscription two years $3.00, three years $ 4.00, four years $5.00, Supporter $10.00, Patron $25.00.

A ll rights reserved

Editorial and Publication Office: 305 Broadway N ew York 7, N . Y. BEekman 3-2220

Published by

Un io n of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America Moses I. Feuerstein President

Benjamin Koenigsberg, Nathan K. Gross, Samuel L. Brennglass, S. David Leibowitt, Vice Presi­ dents: Edward A. Teplow, Treasurer: Reuben E. Gross, Secretary.

Dr. Samson R. Weiss Executive Vice President

KULTURKAMPF CRISIS IN I. Halevy-Levin

ISRAEL

SHALL THE D A Y SC H O O L BE O PEN TO ALL? .......................................

Zalman F. Ury

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THE DEVOUT JEW A N D HIS LITERATURE 22 Aryeh Newman RASHI ..........................................

Meyer Waxman

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THE "L E G A T IO N " .....

B. Menachem with Deborah Offenbacher

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LIFT UP YOUR EYES O N H IG H ............. 41 Menachem Kasher THE JEW ISH SC H O O L IN PERU........... 46 William W. Brickman

® DEPARTMENTS HASHKOFAH: JEW ISH ID EN T IT Y ......... 27 Samson R. Weiss A M O N G OUR CONTRIBUTORS..........

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O N THE JEW ISH RECORD................. 51 Application for second class mail privileges is pending at New York, N . Y.

August, 1958

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.................. 53 EXCERPTS selected and translated by David M. Hausdorff 3

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JEWISH LIFE

RABBI MENACHEM KASHER, world renowned Rabbinic scholar, is the editor of. -'Torah Shelemah” (Hebrew Biblical Encyclopedia) and a distinguished author of notable works.

Rabbi Rasher’s first contribution to J ewish L ife appears in this issue.

HALEVY-LEVIN’S articles continue to provide J ewish L ife readers with discerning insights into basic developments in Israel. He is prominent in Israel religious circles and is the editor of “Modern Israel Library”.

DR. MEYER WAXMAN is the eminent author of “A History of Jewish Literature” and other noted works. He is Professor Emeritus of the Hebrew Theological. College of Chicago.

among our contributors

RABBI ZALMAN F. URY has been actively asociated with the Day School movement for the past ten years. A musmach of Beth Medrash Govoha of Lakewood, N. J., Rabbi Ury is the educational director of the Hillel Hebrew Academy in Beverly Hills, California.

DR. WILLIAM W. BRICKMAN, by now well known to J ewish L ife readers from his descriptions of Jewish community life in

present-day Eastern Europe, records in this issue another vig­ nette gathered during his extensive travels. Dr. Brickman is Professor of Education at New York University.

ARYEH NEWMAN is assistant editor of the Torah Education Department of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem. He is a frequent contributor to J ewish L ife and other periodicals.

Cover: Campers during Torah study hour. (Photo Courtesy Bnei Akiva Camp Moshava.)

August, 1958

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JEWISH LIFE

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Ben Gurion Declares War ROCEEDING from crisis to crisis, Israel’s perennial kulturP kampf has moved to an ominous new phase with the current “identity card” issue. Whereas heretofore identity cards as Jews were granted only to those who could be defined as such by Jew­ ish Torah Law—that is, those born of a Jewish mother not pro­ fessing a religion other than Judaism and those of non-Jewish birth who have become Jews by legitimate conversion— a new edict of the Israeli government would grant such cards, and recognize legally as Jews, anyone who declared himself a Jew, and also children of non-Jewish parents, both of whom declare their children to be Jews. The representatives of the religious parties in the Government coalition have had no recourse but to resign in consequence of this issue, which bears the threat of direst consequences, not only in the State of Israel, but through­ out the Jewish world.

The evils of the Israel Government’s foray into the field of Jewish identity need hardly be spelled out. The arbitrary measure Road constitutes a deliberate nullification, by the Jewish State, of Jew­ ish law; it would violate and undermine the historic character of fo the Jewish people; it would bring chaos into Jewish family life, Chaos would spur mixed marriages among Jews everywhere. This breach with fundamental Jewish principle would split Israeli Jewry in twain, not making gentiles Jews but Jews gentiles, and making Israel not a Jewish State, not even a secular state, but a gentile state with a false Jewish label.

Be it noted that this move by the Ben Gurion government is in flagrant violation of the compact entered into upon the forma­ tion of that government whereby it was solemnly agreed by all parties to the Coalition that the status quo on religious policies shall prevail and the religious authorities shall have sole jurisdic­ tion in matters of personal status. The non-religious parties have honored this compact more in the breach than the observance.

Again and again has the Coalition been endangered by the chip­ ping away of segments of the agreement. This time, the action can be seen only as a deliberate and calculated act of war by the leaders of Mapai, headed by Ben Gurion, against religious Jewry.

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August, 1958

HE immediate motivation of Ben Gurion and his cohorts in the “identification” move are not hard to detect. Although religious Jewry in Israel has repeatedly been put on the defensive and maneuvered into a disadvantageous “public relations” posi­ tion on public religious issues, nonetheless the Israeli populace

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becomes—by a process inherent in a Jewish land—ever more imbued with the realization that Jewish principles must prevail.

This spirit, though as yet incoherent on the part of many, inevit­ ably makes for a Torah-ward trend, and impels the secular—that is the gentilizing—forces to strategem after strategem in the effort to maintain their dominant position. Now, apparently, Ben Gurion has come to the conclusion that the battle must be fought to a conclusion while the forces he leads still command great power.

It is possible that Ben Gurion may realize, before it is alto­ gether too late to retreat, that he has committed an historic World blunder, to the hurt of all Israel without benefit—if such word can be used—to his own party. The reaction to his policy has W ide been sharply adverse everywhere, and is likely to become stronger Struggle rather than weaker. But if he remains determined to brazen the matter out, tragedy will ensue. The battle cannot be confined within the borders of Eretz Yisroel. It will be fought in every Jewish community in the world, and, one might say, within every Jewish heart in the world. Amidst the struggle, established links will be shattered, the campaigns of the United Jewish Appeal, Israel Bonds and many other forms of pro-Israel endeavor crippled, IsraePs world position weakened, its inner solidarity shattered.

It is imperative that responsible Jewish leadership exert every power to check this fearful eventuality. Under no circumstances can Israel’s religious forces yield to the perversion of Jewish life.

Mapai and their leftist allies must be compelled to retract the identity card measure and to desist from their campaign to deJudaize the Jewish State. As for Ben Gurion, it is plain that his disservices to his country and people begin to outweigh the his­ toric services which he had rendered in the past. It would have been better for Ben Gurion to have remained in Sde Boker.

Sabbath and Civil Rights in Louisiana ELATEDLY, Jews of Louisiana have come to realize the implications of a law recently enacted in that state requiring that primary elections to be held, dafka, on Saturdays. Last minute attempts by individual Jewish leaders to prevent passage of the law were unavailing. Now, with the law an established fact, organized efforts, backed by all elements of Louisiana Jewry, are being made to secure its repeal. It is unfortunate that equal community energies were not applied to prevention of pas­ sage of the law. It is still more unfortunate that an important, long-established Jewish community could arrive at a stage which would permit the enactment of such rankly discriminatory legislation.

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JEWISH LIFE

The essence of the situation is to be seen in the position attri­ buted to the Governor of Louisiana, Earl Long. Rebuffing appeals for à veto after the measure had been passed by the state legislature, he is reported to have said that Louisiana Jew have no occasion to protest the law since “they do not observe their Sabbath anyway.” Touché, indeed!

While the view voiced by Governor Long may bear a brutal logic, it is of course morally indefensible nonetheless. Many Jew­ ish Louisianans may be delinquent in the observance of the Sab­ bath, but the transgression, however widespread, is that of indi­ viduals, for which an entire religious community may not be penalized by collective loss of right. Whatever the religious lapses of some, the Sabbath itself remains unchanged and unchangeable, Disen­ the bedrock of the laws and sanctities of the Jewish faith. And franch­ this faith has been an honored part of the Louisiana scene, the isement creed of a significant element of its populace, from the state’s earliest days to the present day. Yet to all intents and purposes, all Louisiana Jews who will not, by voting in Saturday primary elections, publicly disavow the sacred laws of their religion, are now disenfranchised.

HE NEW Louisiana law offers a lesson which Jews throughout the United States will ignore to their peril. Widespread chillul Shabboth is by no means peculiar to Louisiana Jewry—-it is all too familiar a phenomenon in many American Jewish com­ munities. Nor are there lacking in these many other areas, as in Louisiana, heterodox sectaries who not merely condone but formally countenance the desecration of the holy Sabbath. If, then, Jews themselves do not honor this most sacred and most pivotal Jewish institution, can their non-Jewish neighbors be expected to do so? Moreover—and this logical consequence is now brought home in plain terms to Louisiana Jewry—if by such means Jews manifest a lack of essential self-respect, can the nonJew fail to disrespect them? The inevitable sequel to loss of respect is loss of rights and position in civil society.

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The Key Never too often can we gainfully reiterate the apophthegm: To “Far more than Israel has upheld the Sabbath, the Sabbath has Respect upheld Israel.” The Sabbath is the rock upon which Jewish life

rests; departing from it, we abandon ourselves, at one and the same time, to spiritual dissolution and civil disregard. Only in honoring and observing and rejoicing in the Sabbath, can we stand in strength and dignity, commanding the respect of all.

Let all who are concerned with defense of Jewish civil rights be well advised: this cause, no matter how hard-fought, is doomed to defeat if it be addressed only to the external world.

If we Jews are to remain free, we must remain Jewish; and to remain Jewish, we must observe and keep sacred the Sabbath.

August, 1958

9

Kulturkampf Crisis in Israel

By I. HA LEVY-LEVIN

Jerusalem: TOP-RANKING Cabinet Com­ mittee, comprising representa­ tives of all parties (Pinchas Rosen, Progressive; Mordecai Namir, Mapai; Kadish Looz, Mapai; Israel Bar Ye­ huda, Achduth Ha’avodah; and Israel Barzilai, Mapam), is, at the time of this writing, still negotiating with the National Religious Party to achieve a settlement of the Population Regis­ tration crisis. Any prospect of com­ promise, however, is virtually pre­ cluded by the Government’s re­ affirmation of its decision of June 22nd and the manner in which this re-affirmation was made and the res­ ignation of the National Religious Party Ministers was announced in the Knesseth (although Mr. Moshe Shapira was in the Knesseth building he was not informed of the Prime Min­ ister’s decision to announce the resig­ nations and was thereby prevented from making the customary state­ m ent). Finally, the aggressive tone of Mr. Ben Gurion’s letter to Rabbi Judah Maimon seems to seal the is­ sue. Indeed after its latest Cabinet meeting it is difficult to see how the Government can climb down, without a disastrous loss of face, to meet the National Religious Party’s demands.

The official communique issued after the meeting put the Government’s decision on the registration of adults

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and children in Israel in the follow­ ing terms: Any person stating in good faith that he is a Jew and is not a member of any other religion shall be registered as a Jew. In the event of one parent not being Jewish and both parents de­ clare in good faith that their child is a Jew and not a member of any other faith, their child shall be registered as a Jew. The National Religious Party’s pro­ posed formulation of this same in­ struction (for the use of Israel’s Population Registry Offices) is basi­ cally different: Any person declaring in good faith that he was born a Jew, or has been converted, and is a member of the Jewish nation shall be registered as a Jew if he is not a member of any other religion. All minor children of a Jew­ ish mother shall be registered as Jews.

If the mother is not a Jewess and both parents desire the child to be a Jew, the child shall be registered as a Jew only after he is converted according to religious law.

HE present Government crisis hinging upon the crucial defini­ tion, “Who is a Jew?” has been brew­ ing for four months. On March 10th, Israel Bar Yehuda, Minister of In­ terior* issued new instructions to the Population Registry Offices in regard to the registration of the religion of residents. Moshe Shapira and Dr. J. Burg, the National Religious Party’s

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JEWISH LIFE

HE ISSUE is far too grave to be Ministers in the Cabinet, strongly pro­ discussed within the context of tested against Mr. Bar Yehuda’s or­ ders to officials to register as a Jew ordinary political rivalries, for it is any person declaring in good faith the first time that an Israeli law or that he is a Jew—but under pressure administrative ruling expressly flouts agreed, after their amendment “and an Halachic injunction. It is not ir­ is not a member of any other reli­ relevant to mention, however, that the gion” had been accepted. The main current development is also an in­ object of their opposition, however, fringement of the Coalition agreement was the second clause. This, recogniz­ providing for the maintenance of the ing as a Jew any child whose noh- status quo in religion and cognate Jewish mother and Jewish father re­ matters, with the exception of speci­ quested to have him registered as fied questions—such as Sabbath leg­ such, is contrary to the halochah islation and new arrangements for that only the child of a Jewish mother high schools—which are subject to a special agreement between the Na­ is recognized as a Jew. This principle, indeed, had been tional Religious Party and the Prime officially endorsed and a Ministry Minister. It is indicative of the gen­ of Interior since November 1955), eral attitude towards the demands of entitled “Determination of the reli­ the religious parties that these under­ gion and nationality of a child born takings have not been honored to in Israel of mixed marriage (Jew and this day.

As a result of the opposition of non-Jew)”, contained the following ruling: “In determining the religion the National Religious Party a spe­ the rule to be followed is that the cial Cabinet Committee, comprising religion of the child follows the reli­ Moshe Shapira, Israel Bar Yehuda, gion of the mother.” This instruction and Pinchas Rosen (Minister of Jus­ was confirmed a year later in another tice), was appointed to seek an agreed circular issued by the Ministry and solution. The committee was unsuc­ dated May 14, 1957 and bearing the cessful in this task and the matter was title: “Limits of registration of chil­ referred back to the Government. In dren of mixed marriages.” The rele­ view of the far-reaching significance of any decision taken, not only for vant passage reads: Israel but for the entire Jewish peo­ “In order to standardize mixed mar­ ple, Mr, Shapira proposed a national riages, registration must be effected within limits in keeping with the fol­ referendum. The proposal, however, lowing criteria: 1. If both parents are was rejected, and in the course of a Jews the child shall be registered as a brief Cabinet meeting Mr. Bar Ye­ Jew; 2. If only the mother is Jewish huda’s instructions were endorsed with the child shall be registered as a Jew; 3. If the mother is not Jewish the reg­ an amendment suggested by Mr. Sha­ istered religion of the child shall follow pira—the addition of the words “and that of the mother; 4. Should the par­ is not a member of any other reli­ ents make any declaration other than gion”. Members of the Cabinet were the above the matter shall be referred to the competent Population Registry persuaded to agree to this amendment Office or the Central Office in Jeru­ by the insistence of certain apostates, salem. If the parents have in their pos­ including a Haifa monk, that they session a certificate of conversion of continued to be Jews by nationality their child, the child shall be registered though Christians by religion. The as a Jew.” II August, 1958

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decision to endorse the instruction re­ garding the registration of minors, however, struck the National Reli­ gious Party ministers with consterna­ tion and at an angry meeting of the Central Council of the party, called the following day, they were in­ structed to leave the Government. the week that followed there was general opti­ mism that differences would soon be ironed out and there was even talk that the crisis was being artificially prolonged “to teach the Religious Party a lesson”. A Mapai delegation was appointed to deal with the rep­ resentatives of the Religious Party.

There seemed to be an appreciation that not only did the new instruc­ tions issued by Mr. Bar Yehuda con­ travene the Coalition agreement on maintenance of the status quo, but that it touched upon a question of conscience from which no religious Jew could retreat. The prospects of a speedy settlement were heightened by the atmosphere of goodwill in which the Mapai delegation (com­ posed of Mordecai Namir, Kadish Looz, and Akiva Govrin, Chairman of the Government Coalition), and the leaders of the National Religious Party were then conducting their talks.

Mapai Ministers were reported to be impressed by the logic of the Re­ ligious Party’s arguments and by a realization of the unfavorable reac­ tion in the Diaspora to the new in­ structions, where assimilation is rife and inter-marriage threatens the very existence of entire communities. It was at the request of the Mapai ne­ gotiators that the Religious Party con­ tacted the highest religious authorities in the land to obtain their opinion on the validity of the conversion of a minor child of a mixed marriage (in

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hroughout

which the mother is non-Jewish) at the request of both parents. Accord­ ing to authoritative reports the com­ promise envisaged making mandatory the formal conversion of any child of such a marriage whose parents wished to register him as a Jew. The precipitate re-affirmation — while hopeful negotiations were in progress— of the Cabinet’s previous decision which had generated the crisis and the eagerness of the Prime Minister to announce the resignations, are indicative of Mr. Ben Gurion’s fears that a settlement might be reached on the lines indicated, and of a determination to block any agree­ ment by a fait accompli.

Throughout the period which has elapsed since the crisis came to a head a current of opinion among the labor parties has been hardening, taking as its slogan: “The rabbis will not decide who is a Jew!” In view of Mr. Ben Gurion’s known opinions on the place of religion in the St^te re­ iterated in his letter to Rabbi Maimon his statement that “Israel is a state of the law and not a state of the Halochah,” his unfriendly relations with the Rabbinate and his conduct of the Cabinet meetings, there can be little doubt that Ben Gurion relinquished his proclaimed position of neutrality on the issue and threw the entire weight of his influence into the scales to block any settlement. The transfer of the negotiations to a Cabinet Com­ mittee, representing all parties in the Government, though on the face of it eminently reasonable, is no more than a transparent attempt to make the outcome of the talks a foregone conclusion. The Cabinet Committee, it must be recalled contains two in­ transigent opponents on the religious point of view. The Committee was simply a device to throw the responJEWISH LIFE

sibility for the breakup of the Coali­ tion and the ensuing situation on other people’s—not Mapai’s—shoul­ ders.

HE NEW instruction must even­ T tually undermine the only field in which the Rabbinate still exercises a general authority—marriage and di­ vorce. Mr. Bar Yehuda, in the course of a press conference, indicated that he was aware of this possibility and did not regard it as unwelcome. A newspaperman asked the Minister what would happen when these chil­ dren of non-Jewish mothers, now registered as Jews; grew up and in­ sisted upon being married or divorced in keeping with Israeli law. The Rab­ bis, the journalist pointed out, could hardly sanction the marriage or di­ vorce of a person who according to religious law is not a Jew. The citi­ zens affected would have reason to be very resentful of the fact that though recognized as Jews by the civil law they remained non-Jews in the eyes of the Rabbinate. To this the Minis­ ter replied that in such an eventuality some reply would have to be given to these people. If the number of such cases increased, he added, the problem might have to be settled not by administrative action but by Knesseth legislation.

Haaretz, the leading Israeli daily, has also drawn attention to this aspect of the question. (In parenthesis, HaaretZy which is consistently antireligious in outlook, has evinced a surprising understanding of the relig­ ious point of view, urging the Gov­ ernment to recognize that its endorse­ ment of Mr. Bar Yehuda’s instructions was a mistake, and to bring the crisis to an early solution.) “As long as the entire complex of personal status come& under the general authority of August 1958

the Rabbinical Courts,” Haaretz com­ mented in an editorial, “enactments that contradict the laws of these in­ stitutions can scarcely be introduced.

If up to the present the child of a Jewish father and a non-Jewish mother has not been registered as a Jew, this practice may at some date in the future produce an element, composed of Israelis who are neither Jews nor Arabs, burdened by certain problems. But against this problem affecting a comparatively small num­ ber of people there is the problem of all religious Jewry, whose conscience cannot permit recognition as Jews of persons who according to religious tradition are not Jews . . . If no solu­ tion is found to this impasse it is possible that religious Jews—or cer­ tain sections of religious Jewry—will retaliate to the Government’s decision by introducing rigorous injunctions governing marriage between Jews, and there may emerge in this country Jewish elements who insist upon a careful scrutiny of the ancestry of any person desirous of marrying.

They may even refuse to recognize the competent Rabbinical authorities in the State.'W’ In this context the following deci­ sion of the Chief Rabbinate is sig­ nificant: “At its meeting on the 6th of Tammuz the Rabbinate considered the Govern­ ment’s decision to register as a Jew whoever seeks such registration. After discussion of the matter the Rabbinate resolved that this decision will not be binding for Rabbinical institutions and Batei Din, as it is contrary to the in­ junctions of the Torah and jeopardizes the existence of the Jewish people.”

LTHOUGH the National Relig­ ious Party holds only eleven seats in the Knesseth, and its resignation leaves the Government still with a

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clear majority of sixty-nine seats, its part of the normal routine of Govern­ depai jure has upset a precarious equi­ ment in this country, and try to deal librium, which makes the prospects with it in the ordinary political pro­ of the Government concluding its cedures. The statement made by Dr. statutory final year of office very Zorach Warhaftig, former Deputydoubtful. Hitherto the Progressives Minister of Religious Affairs, that the have justified their adhesion to this Government is trying to build up the predominantly Labor Government by State on the ruins of the Jewish peo­ the presence of the National Relig­ ple, is no more than an expression ious Party, which, of course, is more of the shock caused by the deliberate a N party of the Center than of the introduction of a practice directly Left. Under present circumstances its contrary to Halochah, and the con^ continued participation becomes un­ cern felt at the probable outcome. A comfortable. But largely the Govern­ major consideration limiting the in­ ment’s fate will be determined by the cidence of inter-marriage in the Godegree of forbearance shown by Ma- lah has been the ambiguous position of the children. Now the example of pai’s left-wing partners.

Throughout the three years in the State of Israel making the Jewish­ which Achduth Ha’avodah and Ma- ness of the child of such a marriage pam have shared in the Government dependent upon the arbitrary decision they have been out-maneuvered and of the parents throws the door wide out-voted on a series of major ques­ open to the encroachment of assimi­ tions of both internal and external lation and loss of national identity. policy, such as the Sinai campaign, HE CHARGE of racialism has the subsequent withdrawal from the been bandied about carelessly in Gaza Strip, acceptance of the Eisen­ hower Doctrine and the State Labor connection with the present contro­ Exchanges. In this last year before versy. Nothing could be more stupid. the Knesseth elections, they appear A glance at Israel’s heterogenous pop­ before their electors empty-handed, ulation is sufficient to prove that with nothing to show in return for Judaism as a creed and Jewry as a their support of Ben Gurion’s admini­ nationality have always been open to stration, except for some scores of persons of every race and color. political appointments in the Mini­ Furthermore, Judaism does not shut stries they control. Of course they out would-be proselytes; the sole cri­ may decide not to give the Religious terion is that of sincerity. The child Party the satisfaction of having caused of a Jewish mother, let it be repeated, the fall of the Government and stick whatever the color, race or creed of it out to the bitter end. But it is the father, is a Jew. What has been— already certain that the strains and and remains—at issue, from Ezra’s stresses to which all coalition govern­ day to our own, is not the racial ments are subject—and they have not purity of the Jews but their survival been excessive in the course of the as a people.

The perils of a world-wide cam­ present Government’s term of office paign such as the National Religious —will be very much aggravated.

Obviously the National Religious Party is contemplating must not be Party cannot regard the present crisis under-estimated. The National Relig­ as just another of those which are ious Party, up to the present, has oc-

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JEWISH LIFE

cupied an invidious position between the left-wingers in Israel and the orthodox extremists in England and America. Much of what the National Religious Party may say and do in the course of this campaign will provide grist for their mill. If that should prove

the case the position of the National Religious Party in Israel would become unenviable. It is a tragic dilemma but it can scarcely be avoided. The issue, in its wider implications, is no less than the national identity of the Jew­ ish people.

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August, 1958

15

Shall The Day School Be Open To All?

By ZALMAN F. URY An educator explores basic problems of educational objectives brought to the fore by the phenomenal growth of the Yeshivah Day School movement.

HE Yeshivah Day School move­ ment has been gaining momentum ever since it appeared on the national scene scarcely two decades ago. In­ stead of a mere handful of yeshivoth, we now speak in terms of 250 schools with a school population of over 50,000. There are many indications that this curve of growth will con­ tinue to climb higher — despite the negative prognostications of so many supposed experts and statisticians. The very existence of schools which many American Jews have been branding as “parochial” their rapid and dy­ namic development, and above all, the amazing fact that young “native” Americans are clamoring by the thou­ sands for a yeshivah education for their offspring, truly represent one of the major turning points in the annals of the American Jewish community.

All these facts are indeed encourag­ ing and very inspiring to lay and pro­ fessional leaders in the field of ortho­ dox day school education. There are, however, some very evident “growing pains” that are accompanying this fast expansion, which require our vigilant attention.

As additional schools spring up in new regions, and as existing schools enlarge their classes and add on new

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junior and senior high school depart­ ments because of a constantly increas­ ing student body, there appear wide differences in the quality and compo­ sition of this growing school popula­ tion.

When day schools were small and few, they ordinarily served a limited and selected group of students. Today, this is no longer the case. Among the pupils of practically any given day school, you will find a representative cross-section of the general Jewish population. This varied student body, coming as it does from different back­ grounds and outlooks, contains many pupils who do not belong to the cate­ gory of an intellectual elite. Many of these students rate relatively low on I.Q. tests and are considered as slowlearners.

Slow-learners, or average students, pose a problem even to the public school, which has only one language and one culture to cope with. Such pupils present a much more serious challenge to a yeshivah day school with its bi-lingual culture. Moreover, the Yeshivah curriculum does contain some difficult and abstract subjects which may be beyond the mental abil­ ity of slow-learners. The challenge that these students present to the JEWISH LIFE

(Courtesy Nat’l. Council for Torah Education of Mizrachi-Hapoel Hamizrachi)

A you n g pupil, en g ro ssed in the p a g e s of the Talm ud, a t Y eshivath R abbi M oshe Soloveitchik in N ew York City.

Yeshivah is clear. How shall the Ye­ shivah continue with its superior form of education and yet satisfy the needs of pupils who seemingly cannot ab­

sorb such an education? There are several approaches to this problem which we will now discuss rather briefly.

School for the Talented or for All?

fTTHERE are those who claim that JL the Yeshivah has always been the school for the Iluy (extremely bright) and the Gaon (genius). They point out that such students have been the pride of the Yeshivah; they have been coddled and encouraged, whereas the mediocre were left by the wayside.

This idea is supported by the popu­ lar contention that the primary func­ tion of a yeshivah is the production of talmidey chachomim (Torah schol­ ars). Talmud, being a difficult and intricate field of study, proficiency could be achieved — so runs the ar­ August, 1958

gument — only by those who possess superior intellectual ability.

The proponents of this idea would therefore have the Day School con­ centrate on the gifted students who hold the greatest promise for future leadership and scholarship. These edu­ cators would also set up a rigid system of admission-testing which would en­ able them to accept only those who meet certain standards. Thus the chal­ lenge of the slow-learners is disposed 6f by a process of elimination.

There are other educators who could not afford to follow the above 17

{Courtesy Nat’l. Council for Torah Education of Mizrachi-Hapoel Hamizrachi)

At the S eattle, W ashington, H ebrew D ay School, first g ra d e rs h av e a H ebrew re a d in g session.

system, or would not subscribe to it on philosophical grounds. These Day School people think that the role of the Yeshivah today has somehow been modified. While they do not wish to abandon the objective of the produc­ tion of talmidey chachomim, they maintain that today’s Day School has an additional and very important task.

These educators say that wè always had many Jews who were no scholars, but, by virtue of their piety, observ­ ance, and attachment to traditions could be labeled as “good Jews”.

These good-hearted folks — it is ar­ gued — indeed constituted the major­ ity or the backbone of the people even in the glorious days of yesteryear.

Where did these Jews obtain their form of education? Certainly not from 18

the yeshivah. Their environment was so thoroughly Jewish that from child­ hood they became saturated with tra­ ditions and observances in which the cheder, the shtetl, and the home played the major roles. The yeshivah of that era could therefore devote its energies to the selected superior stu­ dents.

ODAY, it is claimed, conditions no longer afford the yeshivah the opportunity of working with the in­ tellectual elite. The Jewish atmosphere of the shtetl is gone. There are no possibilities here for good pious Jews to develop if the yeshivah will not open its doors to all. Scholars are definitely needed, but do not these scholars need a people whom they can

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teach and inspire? The Day School is the only possible agency for produc­ ing the “good Jew”.

As a result, these educators would do away with strict admission regula­ tions. They would swing the doors of the Yeshivah wide open. They would attempt to provide for the special needs of the gifted, but would frankly admit that they must lower their standards for the sake of accommo­ dating the majority.

A third approach is suggested by some in the form of a dual yeshivah curriculum. These educators claim that if we are to do justice to both the gifted and the slow-learners we must offer them separate courses of study.

While this is not a new idea, there is

one unique feature in this approach, which should be properly noted.

These educators do not believe that both groups should learn the same subjects and the difference should be only in the form of more quantity for the gifted and less for the slowlearners. They are convinced that be­ cause such subjects as Talmud are too complicated for the slow group, they should not be required to study it at all. Instead, they should learn other related subjects which will inspire them to remain loyal, good Jews even without becoming scholars. In other words, there are basic qualitative dif­ ferences between the suggested two curricula.

Fallacies of Each Approach

HE ABOVE three approaches specify that we should teach only the have much good to offer and each gifted, or that we teach the bright T one may be better suited to serve the ones the genuine Torah and let the specific needs of particular schools.

However, there are, in my opinion, some basic fallacies in each of them on philosophical as well as practical grounds. Let me raise my objections point by point.

The view that the major aim of the Yeshivah is the production of talmidey chachomim, and that the Yeshivah had always dealt primarily with the geniuses or near-geniuses, cannot, in my opinion, be sustained.

The basic goal of the Yeshivah is surely harbatzath Torah (dissemina­ tion of Torah knowledge). Our job in the Yeshivah is to teach. Whoever among our pupils is talented will rise to a high level. Whoever is not so talented will rise less, but the main point is that he too will rise! We were bidden by G-d, Vshinantom Vvonecha (“thou shalt teach them diligently to thy children”). The Almighty did not August, 1958

duller ones roam the streets and be miseducated by those who water-down Jewish education.

The assumption that the Yeshivah has traditionally concentrated on the extremely bright pupils is invalid. It is common knowledge that geonim were always rare and far between. Even the great yeshivoth of yesteryear had only several near-geniuses each, the rest of the student body having been above average and average. Today, then, as in the past, the yeshivoth cannot exist only for the few; they exist for all.

Then too, the selective approach is not realistic. It may be that large schools in metropolitan areas may allow themselves the luxury of rigid selectivity. But, what will small schools in isolated small communities do? If they follow this pattern, they will have no students or just a few, and will not be able to exist.

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HERE are many more practical professional objections, but I will cite only two: First, these educators are putting too much faith in “his majesty, the I.Q.”. It is true that such a test is indicative of a child’s potential, yet the I.Q. has been found wrong at times.

Second, we are often prone to label children as “poor scholars” (or poor citizens for that matter) when in re­ ality it is the fault of poor teachers who do not fire these children’s imagi­ nation with enthusiasm and devotion.

While it is not easy to offer a defi­ nition of the “good Jew”, it seems that reference is thereby made to an adult who, although not a scholar, is ob­ servant, pious, and respectful of Torah and learning. Such individuals consti­ tute an essential part of the people, and we wish we had more of them.

Schools, however, have been primarily charged with the task of raising the intellectual standards of the people and they have no moral right to satisfy themselves with mediocrity. They must set up high goals and should con­ stantly pursue them. The higher their aspirations, the more substantial will be their accomplishments.

Moreover, Yiddishkeit basically rests on knowledge. Our sages tell us: “Talmud (learning) is great because it leads to action.-’ In other words, there is no other way to proper actions and the “good life” than the road of knowledge. If “a little knowledge is a dangerous thing,” it could not be more dangerous to anyone than to our people. The fatal enemy of Judaism is ignorance, and a resignation to mediocrity is, in my opinion, a form of unconscious ignorance.

Now, the proponents of a watereddown curriculum whip up the dead horse of the abstractness of the He­

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brew curriculum with particular em­ phasis on the Talmud. It is true that the Gemora involves abstract think­ ing, but it also contains much common-sense-ism, logic, and real-life problems. I can testify from experi­ ence that average students, if prop­ erly taught, find the Talmud a most enthralling and compensatory subject.

In fact, they prefer it to most other subjects.

Finally, the overdue emphasis on the average majority creates unhap­ piness and jeopardizes the progress of the gifted who are subjected to a boring and uninspiring school life.

Why should they be sacrificed on the altar of the majority?

N philosophical grounds, dualism in our curriculum must be re­ jected. We are not allowed to deny Torah to a large segment of our school population. That segment may learn less quantitatively but should never be offered a watered-down curriculum.

The Torah in its totality was given to all of us (barring morons) and it is the inalienable right and duty of each and every one of us to study the gen­ uine Torah. Whatever the student com­ prehends or grasps is his personal lot, and no one can tell him to how much learning and knowledge he ought to be exposed.

There are also some practical ob­ jections. First, a small school with a limited enrollment would not be finan­ cially able to administer two different curricula. Second, this separation of the intellect will carry with it a social stigma and will cause much injury to the feelings of children and parents.

Third, many children are slow in the beginning and blossom out later. Clas­ sification as second-rate citizens of the school may stifle their progress forever. Fourth, this idea seems to

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run counter to recent valid thinking in education. Only now has American education suddenly realized that it had underestimated American children by not giving them more mathematics and science—subjects that require ab­

stract thinking. Shall we in the day schools, who always offered a superior education, attempt to lower our stand­ ards when others are rejecting any form of lesser standards?

Is There Another Solution?

NE of the weak points common to ship, and citizenship. We cannot make O the above three approaches is the any compromises there. dependence of each on a single for­ 5. Many of the children who seem mula. Instead of an either-or approach to be dull possess latent talents but, I would rather recommend the follow­ unfortunately, their teachers do not ing synthetic and balanced program: bring out these potential abilities. I, 1. The Yeshivah Day School should for one, would look more for talented have a single curriculum for all its teachers than for talented pupils. Ex­ students because of the belief that perience bears out that a poor teacher knowledge is indispensable to all. Dif­ will turn the best students into miser­ ferences in the rate of learning should able learners, whereas a good teacher exist, but not in the quality of the will forge ahead even with the aver­ curriculum. All students should there­ age student. fore study all subjects.

6. Serious consideration should be 2.

Because we do not depend on given to the fact that public schools, one single approach, we operate with teaching only one language, accept much flexibility and we may employ a first graders at the age of six only, certain system in one situation and a whereas we, teaching two distinct lan­ different one in another. For example, guages and cultures, admit first grad­ large schools with a big enrollment ers at five and a half years of age. In may set up parallel classes, dividing many cases the children are not yet the children by ability. But here, too, mature and therefore score low on all subjects are to be taught to bright tests. and average alike.

7. We ought to relax our admission 3.

Smaller schools should divide regulations. All normal children have their classes in groups according to a right to enter a yeshivah. Only after ability in order that all may progress several years of work attendance can in all subjects at their own speed. we know whether or not any of them Our Hebrew teachers must be trained may continue with us, rather than by to organize group work. Until now any single test. The doors of the we have neglected this vital area of Yeshivah must be open to all, and teacher training. the same Torah must become the 4.

Our aims and objectives must becommon heritage of every Jewish none other than high standards of child. achievement in knowledge, scholar­

August, 1958

21

The Devout Jew and His Literature

By ARYEH NEWMAN I

A challenging view of the role of the Jewish writer.

ELIGIOUS circles in Israel are becoming increasingly preoccu­ pied with the problem of providing appropriate modern literary fare for the faithful in school and home. Chief Rabbi Herzog in his Tenth Anniver­ sary message made a special point of calling for the production of popular literature for the new generation by Torah circles. Besides the daily ortho­ dox newspapers for young and old, an illustrated weekly, “Ayin BeAyin” is trying to hold its own after its prede­ cessor, “Panim El Panim,” gave up the ghost after a year of struggle. In recent years Mosad Harav Kook has added to its erudite rabbinic publica­ tions two anthologies, one of religious poets, the other of religious short story writers. Other foundations are produc­ ing “religious” novels and biographies of Torah worthies. This article surveys the attitude of Judaism towards litera­ ture from early times, in view of these developments. * * * That the creation and enjoyment of literature is a legitimate feature of human activity, even according to the most austere and rigid interpretations of Judaism, cannot be denied. Admit­ tedly, there are gradations of value in human engagement and pursuits— the study of Torah, the sacred word of the Deity rating the highest. But art and science, work and play all have their place in the Jewish scheme of things:

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And even when he sleeps—if he does so with the conscious intention of re­ freshing himself mentally and physic­ ally so that he should not fall sick and be unable to serve the Lord . . . it turns out that his very slumber constitutes a Divine service. The Sages referred to this when they admonished: “And let all thy deeds be done for the sake of Heaven,” (Pirke Avoth 2:17). To this Solomon in his wisdom alluded when he stated: Acknowledge Him in all thy ways, and He shall direct thy paths (Proverbs 3:6).

(Maimonides’ Code, Deyoth 3:3) It is thus the aim and purpose , of human activity that matters. If they in any way lead towards moral perfec­ tion, to making better human beings, promoting good actions and right thinking, they are not only legitimate but to be commended.

MORAL valuation is thus im­ plicit on any Jewish appraisal of literature. In this it stands fairly and squarely in the line of the classical critics from Plato onwards to their medieval and modern followers. It would not harmonize with the dictum that a work of art is justified of itself without any consideration of its moral effect. One might well conclude how­ ever, that a work of art which has a vicious moral effect can hardly be con­ sidered genuine. The pleasure it pro­ duces is of such a primitive and even brutal nature, both anti-social and anti-educational, as to render meaning­ less any artistic qualities. To be more explicit, it does not produce pleasure

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in the accepted sense and consequently does not perform the basic function of art in any theory of literary values.

In actual fact, no artist has ever con­ doned pornography. The area of con­ troversy has rather centered around the definition of pornography and the criteria for detecting it. That our Sages of old were neither prudish nor overpuritanical is amply evident from the frank and uninhibited way in which they discussed sex in all its aspects.

But their discussions were not sala­ cious. They were inspired by practical motives, informative and instructive: they found the very contemplation of human beauty instructive.

It happened to Rabbi Simeon Ben Gamaliel when he was standing on a step on the Temple mount that he be­ held a very beautiful heathen woman.

Whereupon he exclaimed: How mani­ fold are Thy works, O Lord! (Psalms 104:24). Rabbi Akiva too beheld the wife of Turnus Rufus (she was a noted beauty) the wicked. Whereupon he spat, laughed and wept. He spat be­ cause she had come from a fetid drop; laughed that she was destined to be­ come a proselyte and he would marry her, and wept that the dust should de­ stroy such beauty . . . He who beholds goodly favored creatures recites the benediction: “Blessed art Thou Who hath created such in His world.”

(Talmud, Avodah Zorah 20a) But side by side with the above sen­ timents come stringent exhortations not to feast one’s eyes on human beauty and beware of the temptations of lustful thoughts. It is this passion for holiness coupled with the abhor­ rence of idolatry which underlies the denunciations of “theatres and cir­ cuses” in Talmudic literature, espe­ cially in view of the pagan rites and immorality associated therewith. But from a later period too we come across the following ruling in the Shulehon Aruch which has a more direct bearing on our subject.

August, 1958

Profane parables and fables, lascivious literature such as the book of Im­ manuel [medieval Italian Jewish poet] as well as books of wars are forbidden to be read on the Sabbath and are in­ deed anathema on the weekdays too... lascivious literature arouses the evil in­ clination and whoever composes them, transcribes them, and needless to say whoever prints them are perverters of the public.

(Shulehon Aruch Sabbath Laws para. 307) The later glosses, including the standard modern one, Mishna Berurah (by Rabbi Israel Meir Hakohen, known as Chofetz Chayim), add, however, that this prohibition does not apply to Jesephus’ histories, Shevet Yehudah (Virga), and similar works which are “morally instructive and promote fear of G-d.” Rabbi Moses Isserles (RaM a), the 16th century codifier of Ashkenazi custom who re­ garded science and general knowledge as essential assets to a Torah scholar, permitted the reading of “secular ma­ terial and books of wars” on the Sab­ bath, provided they were in Hebrew.

The following sentiments expressed

by Christian opponents of the stage in the 16th and 17th centuries in Eng­ land seem to parallel the view of Joseph Karo, the author of the Shulchon Aruch: Neither in polity nor in religion they [plays] are to be suffered in a Christian commonwealth, specially being of that frame and matter as usually they are, containing nothing but profane fables, lascivious matters, cozening devices, and scurrilous behaviours, which are so set forth as they move wholly to imitation and not to the avoiding of those faults and vices which they represent.

(A letter from the Lord Mayor and Alderman to the Privy Council, 1597) O that men endued with reason, en­ nobled with religious: with immortal souls: fit only for the noblest, heavenliest, sublimest and divinest actions, should ever be so desperately besotted as to waste their precious time upon 23

such vain, such childish, base, ignoble pleasures which can no way profit soul or body, Church or State; nor yet ad­ vance their temporal, much less their spiritual and eternal good which they should ever seek.

(Prynne, Histrionmastrix, 1633)

Rabbinic commentary from the Mid­ roshim onward has devoted much la­ bor to uncovering the consummate literary artifice and technique embed­ ded in the sacred text. The piecemeal documentary theories of the Higher UST as the constant abuse of art Criticism of the Bible received their and decadence of the Theatre in deathblow from the literary approach 17th century England led to its de­of such scholars as the late Professor cline and outright condemnation, so Cassutto who, making extensive use of Rabbinic authorities in all ages tended the findings and comments of the tra­ to lean on the side of strictness for ditional expositors, revealed the de­ fear of the evils that seemed inevitable liberate artifice underlying every word concomitants of artistic creativity. But and phrase in the sacred text. Archae­ they were the last to maintain that the ological discovery too indicated the abuse of artistic media disqualified existence of recognized and highly de­ them per se. How could the Sages veloped literary conventions and tech­ themselves, superb artists as they were, niques which enabled the objective who knew how to play on the chords scholar to appreciate at a glance the of human feeling, condemn the very literary unity of the Pentateuch. means of communication they them­ Anomalies in order and phraseology selves utilized in their popular homi­ are immediately explained on the letic discourses, in their Aggadoth and grounds of literary technique and the Midroshim? How could they take a aims and purpose of the narrative. dim view of the very media which the HROUGHOUT the ages Jewish Almighty Himself, as it were, had employed in revealing His truths to Sages have not scorned to utilize them in the form of an unsurpassed their artistic gifts in producing great literary creation, in the form of a poetry and prose, emulating their in­ Book — the Torah — which, as they spired predecessors, the Prophets and were wont to say “spake in the lan­ Psalmists. The Talmudic Aggadah, guage of men?” The Creator, Who liturgical poetry or piyyut, Chassidic knows the thoughts of man, chose to tales, the parables of the Dubnow communicate the highest truth on Maggid, and even the pilpulistic exer­ which His world was built through cises of the yeshivah genius-—admit­ sublime artistry— omitting all that did tedly designed for a highly select circle not contribute towards His Divine —constitute literature belong to the purpose and investing every word and category of instructive or innocent letter with infinite depths of meaning. entertainment.

The Torah, according to the tradi­ Jewish religious authority in every tional view, is no mere literal record­ epoch has had to formulate its own ing of historical events, a chronicle of attitude towards the innovations of the facts, scientific or otherwise, but a day in every field of human activity, highly selective manual of moral and taking note of the latest examples of religious lessons which are illustrated human ingenuity and passing judg­ in the main developments in the uni­ ment in accordance with its age-old verse since its creation, seen from the criteria. The theatres and circuses of vantage point of its . Divine Author. Greece and Rome were banned for 24 JEWISH LIFE

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their idolatrous associations, the stories of Immanuel for their erotic under­ tones.

The advent of mass printing and publishing, daily papers, the appear­ ance of the ubiquitous Jewish unbe­ liever and even “anti-semite” ridicul­ ing their own faith and the faithful, called for a re-appraisal of the situa­ tion. In the latter context matters have reached such a pitch that nonJewish classics, whether the original or in Hebrew translation, were to be preferred to the modern Hebrew clas­ sics tainted with the real or suspected heresy of their authors. The writer has heard this point of view promulgated in determining the literature syllabus of a religious secondary school in Israel.

Admittedly the literature penned by the enemies of traditional Judaism can hardly be considered appropriate fare by the devout for the Jewish school and home. On the other hand, the devotional literature of a bygone era is scarcely adequate to meet the realities of the contemporary scene, to. enable the modern Jew to develop his artistic taste and judgment and powers of expression, and to convey to him the timeless message of his faith in the everchanging human situ­ ation and in “the language of men”.

That even the most “orthodox” circles in Judaism do not deny this may be seen in the production of daily papers in Israel, for instance, by the most uncompromising wings of religious opinion— witness the Hakol and Hamodia of the Agudath Yisroel which, in common with the Mizrachi daily Hatzofeh, contain book reviews, short stories, poems, essays, and serials de­ signed for the most devout of readers and the ultra-pious yeshivah student.

The instinct of the founders of these journals, such as Rabbi Moshe Blau August, 1958

(Hakol) and Rabbi Meir Bar Ilan (Hatzofeh), was a healthy one in which they followed in the footsteps of the Sages, Rambam, Yehudah Ha­ levi, the Dubnow Maggid, and others in speaking in the language of con­ temporary man. Unfortunately these journals do not always stand on a technical level equal to that of their secular counterparts. Possibly those responsible have forgotten one vital point. Just as the greatest artist stands to ruin his work by stooping to the level of a decadent public, so the most wellintentioned scholarly and pious writer will fail to communicate if he has no literary flair and technique. On the other hand, they may consider that the audience they aim at has no other alternative but to listem to them; has no literary standards to judge by.

Apart from the obvious loss of pres­ tige and influence beyond their circle that is involved they are guilty by their own lights of violating the Rab­ binic dictum that the true Torah “scholar is never responsible for im­ perfect work.” (Talmud Pesachim,9a). there is little doubt that those writers who combine natural IgiftsNDEED, with a profound familiarity with and appreciation of the past traditions of their people are the best equipped to produce a permanent and valuable artistic creation. Much ink has been spilled on the importance of new He­ brew writing, on those pioneering in new paths and getting away from the old. But the position of contemporary Hebrew literature, the failure of the “new writing” and the success of the few traditionalists such as Agnon and Hazaz or the neo-traditionalists like Shamir confirm what has been said.

The same point has been made by the most renowned of modern literary critics, Mr. T. S. Eliot, in his essay on 25

“Tradition and Individual Talent” : We dwell with satisfaction upon the poet’s difference from his predecessors, especially his immediate predecessors: we endeavor to find something that can be isolated in order to be enjoyed.

Whereas if we approach a poet without prejudice we shall often find that not only the best, but the most individual parts of his work may be those in

which the dead poets, his ancestors, as­ sert their immortality most vigorously.

In modern Hebrew literature Agnon* is still the prince of writers and it is the Jewish religious inspiration of even the “deviationists” which has given depth and value to their work. *He was awarded the T enth Anniversary Prize in Hebrew literature by the State o f Israel in April of this year.

THE FEAST OF WOOD-BEARING Josephus the h istorian calls the 15th of Av the “F east of X ylophory" (w o o d -b earin g ), a s it w a s “the cusom for every one to brin g w ood for the a lta r on th at d a y so th at there should n e v er be a lack of fuel for the ete rn a l fire".

In the Talm ud, one of the re a so n s g iven for cele b ra tin g the 15th of Av is th a t both p riests a n d p eo p le b rought kindling-w ood in la rg e q u a n titie s for use in the b u rn in g of sacrifices du rin g the w hole y ea r. D uring the d a y s of the Second Tem ple, this d a y w a s a p o p u la r festival. The m aid en s of Jerusalem , rich a n d poor, all d ressed sim ilarly in borrow ed w hite garm en ts, so th a t n one m ight be a sh am ed if she did not p o ssess an y . They w en t out to d an ce in the v in ey ard s, ask in g the y o u n g m en to m ake their choice of a life's p artn er. The fair ones san g : “Young m en, turn your e y e s to b e a u ty , for w om an sta n d s for b e a u ty ." The p a tric ia n s' d a u g h te rs san g : “Y oung m en, turn your e y e s to n oble p a re n ta g e , for w om an is the p re ­ serv er of fam ily p rid e." Those p o ssessin g n eith er b e a u ty nor nob le birth san g : “G race is b eau tifu l a n d b e a u ty is v ain —bu t a w om an w ho feareth the Lord, sh e sh all be p raised ." In m odern tim es, the 15th of Av is one of the “M inor" or “Half" holidays, b e in g o b serv ed m erely by the om ission of the Propitiatory P ray ers (“T ach an u n ").

The Son of D avid will not come until all of the false ju d g es a n d le a d e rs of Israel will d is a p p e a r . . . a n d until arro g an c e will h a v e v an ish ed from Israel.

S an h ed rin

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JEWISH LIFE

H a s h A ttfti It Jewish Identity

By s a m s o n

r . w e is s

“The adversary has spread his hand upon all her treasures, for she has seen enter her Sanctuary peoples of which Thou didst command that they should not enter Thy congregation ” (Eycha, 1:10) When the enemies entered the Holy Temple, the Ammonites and Moabites entered with them. All ran to loot silver and gold, but the Ammonites and Moabites ran to destroy the Torah to erase its command: “No Ammonite and Moabite shall come into the congregation of the Lord ” (Devorim, 23:4) (Medrash Eycha 1:40) HE ENEMIES of the Jewish peo­ ple, from Bileam on have always consciously or instinctively directed their attacks against the Jewish spirit.

To destroy the Temple was the objec­ tive of Nebuchadnezzar as much as to conquer the land. To plant an idol in the Sanctuary and to flaunt in its sacred confines the abomination of sexual immorality, was the purpose of Titus as much as to strengthen the hold of the Roman Empire on Eretz Yisroel. Short of the literal slaughter of our entire people, which the Al­ mighty has always prevented, there was never a way to conquer the Jew unless by divorcing him from his Torah and his G-d.

We mourn the destruction of the Holy Temple, and will continue to mourn it until it is rebuilt, because freedom and an independent state of our own were never ends in them­ selves for the Jewish people, but rather the perfect vessels in which the pure content of Jewish essence and Jewish identity could be preserved.

The breakage of these vessels has weakened this essence and identity and has caused, throughout the ages of our exile, the loss of all those who sub­

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mitted to the onslaught of outer pres­ sures and saw human dignity only in the terms of equality with the Gentiles.

It takes men and women of truly heroic proportions to maintain in the face of ridicule, misunderstanding and naked hatred, loyalty to a faith and to an idea and pride in an identity. Thus, in every generation many were lost by overt conversion or by the silent sh’mad of toppling over the periphery of Jewish consciousness and belonging.

A component of this exile-psychol­ ogy marking those not possessed of the courage and heroism necessary for Galuth survival, has been the phe­ nomenon of Jewish self-hatred. There stood up in every generation men who pretended to see, or in myopic view mistakenly assumed, a need to trans­ fer the base of Jewish perpetuity and Jewish peoplehood onto platforms di­ vorced from Jewish traditions and sanctities and cut off from the deep wellsprings of Jewish continuity, ex­ changing them for “false cisterns which do not preserve their waters.”

ARADOXICALLY, the Jewish State has now become a vehicle for such Jewish self-hatred. Some of those who fought and bled for the

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state, want it to be a secular mold in which to form a new Israel, a new people like all other peoples, and have fallen prey to this fatal aberration. A nationalism without any metaphysical content and allegiance; a patriotism re­ placing millenia of yearninngs with the accomplishments of parliamentarism and technology; the substitution of time for eternity and of man for G-d —this is the new form of escapism. A graver self-imposed danger to the Jew­ ish nation cannot be found in the an­ nals of our people. It is the destruction of the Temple transposed into a prin­ ciple of Jewish nationhood. It is the willful decision to sever the Jewish present and future from the Jewish past and to substitute the vessel for the content, the “now” for the Messianic hope. It is the arrogance of taking ten years of Jewish history and placing the entire Jewish future on its secular and immature evaluation. ^ Who is a Jew? A taxpayer to the Jewish State? An inhabitant of the territory of Israel? The child of a Gentile woman fathered by a Jewish transgressor of the Divine Law? Can a denier of all Jewish values and sanc­ tities, by the mere act of a declaration, become a Jew? Or is a Jew the one who, either by birth or by adoption of their way of life, calls Abraham his father and Sarah his mother? Is a Jew the one begotten in proper wed­ lock of Jews of, at least, conceived in the womb and born in the labors of a Jewish mother? Hallowed are in the esteem and in the living memory of our people those born as Gentiles, the B’nei Nechor, who joined our people by the acceptance of Torah, signify­ ing this acceptance by M ’eelah and Tevilah, by circumcision and immer­ sion in the ritual pool. While we do not seek them out, we accept them if con­ 28

vinced of their moral and intellectual sincerity. We are commanded by the Almighty to extend to them our love, and this commandment is repeated, as Maimonides points out in his famous response to Rabbenu Ovadiah Ha-Ger (The Proselyte), thirty-six times in our Torah. Thus, a person may de­ clare himself to be a Jew for himself and for all his progeny. There is no other way.

A STATE harboring in its bounx V daries people of divergent creeds, must offer them equal individual and collective protection. A Jewish state must, therefore, protect not only the ephemeral existence of its Jewish in­ habitants but must accept as its prime obligation the protection of the peren­ nial character of the Jewish people dwelling therein. The bastardization of the Jewish people now attempted by declaring a Jew anyone who cares to pronounce himself a Jew regard­ less of descendence, faith and prac­ tice, is genocide perpetrated by legis­ lation.

To declare citizenship in the Jew­ ish State as identical with Jewishness, is the absurd and yet inescapable con­ sequence of the Galuth psychology of self-hatred which has always befallen those oblivious to the higher reality of Jewish existence. This phenomenon is not new in the sad experience of our dispersion. The present tragic differ­ ence lies only in the fact that secular­ ists denuded of the true meaning of Jewish identity are now in power in Israel. Therefore, they are in a posi­ tion to destroy what even Nebuchad­ nezzar and Titus were never able to destroy.

Suddenly, Tisha B’Av has assumed an additional heartrending meaning for all of us.

JEWISH LIFE

Rashi

By MEYER WAXMAN

Another in our series of studies of the lives and work of great figures of the Jewish ages.

ISTORY does not repeat itself, but it can manifest itself, at the same time, in a similar way in dif­ ferent places. The 10th century, which marked the rise of the sun of Jewish learning in Spain, also saw its rise in Jewish centers in France and Germany. But while we can point to several factors which brought about that rise in the former center (see essay on Chasdai Ibn Shaprut, Jewish Life Adar, 5717), it seems that the rise in the latter was a spon­ taneous outburst of the Jewish spirit.

For centuries Jews had dwelt in fair numbers in both France and Ger­ many, but little is known of their inner life and history. The few docu­ ments we possess, which cover a pe­ riod of five hundred years, tell of tribulations, expulsions, and wander­ ings, but do not refer to spiritual and intellectual activity. But suddenly we hear of a great scholar in the 10th century by the name of Rabbi Yehudah ha-Cohen, better known by the name of Leontin (based on the Bibli­ cal statement, “Judah is a lion’s whelp,” Bereshith 69:9). Who he was and what was the nature of the en­ vironment in which he grew up, we know little of. Again, we are told in a legendary manner of the establish-

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ment of earlier centers of study by scholars imported by Charlemagne, in the year 787, from Italy and Baby­ lon, or by Charles the Bald in 876.

One thing is clear, though, that in the middle of the 10th century there appeared the first fruits of spiritual and intellectual activity, and a number of centers of learning had been founded, such as in Narbonne, in several cities of northern France, and the most important of all, in Mayence, Germany, where Rabbi Gershon, “the Light of the Exile”, taught.

HE concept of these early schol­ ars of Torah and the scope of its study was broad. They sounded, with equal intensity, the depths of both the Scriptural and the Oral Torah. However, study and research were not easy in those days. Print­ ing had not yet been born, and there were very few books at the command of both teachers and students; when obtained there was doubt of the cor­ rectness of the available texts of the Bible and the Talmud, as they were not always copied correctly.

Much effort was therefore spent on obtaining correct copies. And beyond the need to establish and make avail­ able correct texts, there was an equal

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need to secure a correct understanding of the texts. As a result there developed early in the 11th century an extensive activity in Biblical exegesis, a number of scholars devoting themselves entirely to this pursuit, On the whole, this current of Biblical exegesis divided itself into two

streams. Some commentators specialized in the Agadic, or homiletic, form of exegesis, while others followed the Peshat form — that is, explanation according to the grammatical construction and the linguistic connotation of words,

Commentation on the Talmud

OWEVER, important as was the activity in the field of Biblical exegesis during this period, of still greater importance and of greater ex­ tent was the activity in the field of commentation of the Talmud which, like the former, received its great im­ petus from Rabbi Gershon. He spent a large part of his life in clarifying and establishing the right readings in the Talmud. He spared no effort in obtaining the most authentic copies in order to produce a correct text of the Talmud, parts of which he copied in his own handwriting.

Of yet greater and more enduring value was Rabbi Gershon’s work in explaining the Talmud to his numer­ ous students in his Academy at Mayence. He laid the foundation for the French method of commentation, intended for students to whom the study of Torah was the path of life.

His work was continued by his stu­ dents. Before long there began to circulate little booklets called Cuntres (plural Cuntresim), a mispronuncia­ tion of the Latin word commentarius, meaning both “note books” and “com­ mentary”. The Cuntresim formed the layers of a commentary printed in today’s editions of the Talmud, on the margin of a large number of tractates, as “Perush Rabbenu Ger­ shon”. It is not, however, an individ­ ual production, but a work of two generations of scholars.

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All this work which was going on in two lands, France and Germany, by two generations of scholars in a number of Academies, as well as by individual scholars in the two great fields of study, the Bible and the Talmud, left much to be desired and completed. The Biblical commen­ taries were either partial or consisted of explanations of certain chapters and difficult passages. The Cuntresim, though of wider extent, were still partial, and besides, they were pri­ marily written by students and for stu­ dents who spent many years in study.

The two great works, the Bible and the Talmud, still remained, to an ex­ tent, closed books for the large masses of Jewry, whose years of study were limited by conditions of life. It is really difficult to imagine what would have happened to Jewish learning and knowledge through the ages had there not arisen in the third generation after the rise of the Franco-German center of learning, a man with a master mind, who absorbed all the knowl­ edge of his predecessors and, pos­ sessing an exceptional ability for systematization, undertook to write complete commentaries to both the Bible and the Talmud, which opened the gates of the two great sets of works for all Jews of all generations.

That man was Rabbi Shelomoh ben Yitzchok, known, from the initials of his name, as Rashi.

JEWISH LIFE

ASHI was born in the city of Troyes, France, in the year 1040.

Numerous legends surround his birth, a fact which testifies to the great ad­ miration the Jewish masses entertained for their teacher. According to one of these legends, Rashi’s father pos­ sessed a diamond of great value which the Christians of the city attempted to force him to sell to them in order to decorate with it the statue of their messiah. To get out of this forced sale, he threw the diamond into the sea. That night he dreamed that a son would be born to him who would be the light of Jewry, a dream which was actually realized.

Rashi received his early education in Troyes. We do not know who were his first teachers, but it is possible that his uncle, Shimon ben Yitzehok, a disciple of Rabbi Gershon, was among them. Later he went, as was customary in those days, to study at the Academy of Worms under Rabbi Yaakov ben Yakar whom he called “my teacher in Gemara and Scrip­ tures”. After the death of Rabbi Yaakov, Rashi continued his study there* under Yitzchak ha-Levi, an­ other disciple of Rabbi Gershon who, as it seems, also taught Torah at the Academy. Thence he proceeded to the Academy at Mayence, presided over by Yitzehok ben Yehudah, also a disciple of Rabbi Gershon, to com­ plete his studies. At the age of twentyfive, now a married man, he returned to Troyes. There he engaged, like most of his countrymen of the pro­ vince of Champagne, in the wine industry.

Rashi’s real occupation, however, was the study of Torah, for though he was not an official rabbi, he was considered one of the leading scholars of the day, and from all sides rabbis turned to him for decisions on all

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questions bearing upon religious mat­ ters. He founded an Academy which, due to his fame, was attended by stu­ dents from all parts of Europe, in­ cluding the Slavonic countries. He had two daughters, Miriam, who was married to Yehudah ben Nathan (abbreviated Ribon), and Yocheved, married to Meir ben Samuel, the father of the two leading Tosafists, Yaakov Tam and Samuel ben Meir.

For forty years Rashi taught Torah to his students, both Bible and Tal­ mud, and as a result, his commen­ taries on the two great collections of Jewish literature were produced. His old age was embittered by the suf­ fering of the Jews during the First Crusade (1096) and also by his own sickness. He died in 1105, at the age of sixty-five, mourned by all Jewry.

ANY were the qualities which fitted Rashi to be the commen­ M tator par excellence, and probably the greatest of them was his character, the outstanding trait of which was the simplicity of soul. He was simple in all ways of life; he lived in his own daily life the Torah which he taught to his students. And with simplicity went modesty; he was never conscious of his greatness and was always will­ ing to receive instruction as well as to impart it. His love for his people was unbounded, and it included every member of the people, even those who had gone astray. Unbounded, too, was his love for Torah. This was the essence of Rashi’s life; hence his profound grasp of it. There was not a branch of Jewish literature which he did not master. He did not draw any lines: every field of learning —law, Agada, history, grammar, and even secular sciences, as much as he could derive from Hebrew books, all 31

were open to him. His all-absorbing mind drank in thirstily any informa­ tion he could possibly lay hold of, yet with all his piety and absorption in learning, Rashi knew life. He in­

formed himself on matters of business, trade, industry, and even on govern­ ment affairs, as is evidenced from his commentaries.

Rashi’s Commentary on the Pentateuch

HE commentator on any work has many difficulties to over­ come, but many times more are the difficulties which lie in the way of one who undertakes to explain the Book of Books, the Bible, and espe­ cially its leading part, the Chumosh.

The Torah was the axis upon which the life of a dispersed people was centered, large portions of whom lived under widely differing sets of cir­ cumstances and spoke differing lan­ guages. Around this axis there re­ volved, through the ages, a vast literature in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, the purpose of which was to explain, analyze, and derive from sec­ tions of the Torah not only thoughts and concepts, but a view of life. The vast body of basic law known as Halochah, the broad stream of in­ spirational lore designated Agada, and the mystical allegoric philosophy developed by Jewish scholars in Egypt, are in reality commentaries on the Torah. And if one should under­ take to penetrate through the compli­ cated and complex works of genera­ tions and bring out their hidden light to serve as a torch to light the way of the learned, and also of the un­ tutored, who can neither immerse themselves in the flowing waters of the Agada, nor in the sea of Halo­ chah, that man must be endowed with the insight of a genius. Such a man was Rashi.

As in the case of every master who creates a great work, either from nothing or from primitive material,

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Rashi’s work was subject to numer­ ous difficulties which could not be removed entirely. If he did not fol­ low the Peshat method completely, it was not because of inability, but because of his folk intuition and his insight into the soul of the people.

On the contrary, this very amalgam of the Agadic and Peshat methods, which represents a union cf the tradi­ tional way of Scriptural interpretation with the plain exegetical meaning, en­ abled him to be the teacher of the people through all generations.

There were several factors which restrained Rashi’s inclination to fol­ low the Peshat method entirely. The most important was the fact that the traditional exposition, whether it dealt with Halochah or Agada, was not mere exegesis. It was amalgamated with the Torah itself, or more cor­ rectly, with the conception of the Torah by the whole people, becoming part and parcel of its soul and spirit.

Thus, searching for an approach which would embrace this precious heritage together with direct textual analysis, Rashi found the above-mem tioned amalgam.

T WAS not very difficult to come to terms with the Halachic inter­ pretation of a large portion of the Pentateuch. The Halochah is precise and is based on the verses of the Chumosh. It was therefore impossible to omit its interpretation even par­ tially. If the foundation of the Halo­ chah in the verses of the Torah could

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not be proved, then the very way of Jewish life would be impaired. We therefore note that Rashi’s commen­ tary on the legal portions of the Ohumosh is primarily based on inter­ pretations found in the Tannaitic Midrashim, or borrowed from the Talmud. He is careful, however, to insert between the lines remarks which elicit the plain meaning of verses or words. This inclusion of the gist of the Halachic interpretation briefly and lucidly, and close to the plain meaning of the verse, forms one of the great contributions of Rashi’s commentary. It opened the gates of the Halochah to all Jews, even to those who never studied, or had for­ gotten what they had studied, and thus pointed out to all the close con­ nection between religion as it was practiced and the written law. He brought it about that Torah in its widest connotation shall not be for­ gotten among all strata of the Jewish people.

A more difficult problem was pre­ sented by the Agada. This exegetic tradition is like a wide river in which currents, different from each other, flow, and verses are frequently inter­ preted in various ways. But it was impossible to omit it, for the Agada had become part and parcel of the essence of the spirit of the people.

Rashi, however, solved his problem in a masterly way. He differentiated between an Agadic interpretation which is far-fetched and one which is close to Peshat, but he included in his commentary primarily the interpreta­ tions of the latter type.

Rashi had also another criterion in his selection of Agadic interpretations.

The main purpose of the Agada is to aid and inspire the people in the struggle for existence. The Agada, therefore emphasises the moral lesson August, 1958

which can be derived from the verses of the Bible, inculcates the love of Israel and the love of Torah, illumines past history, and encourages the peo­ ple to bear the burden by pointing to a glorious destiny. It was such inter­ pretations that Rashi sought to in­ clude in his commentary.

TILL, with all his love for the Agada and its interpretations of verses, Rashi keeps the interpretations separate on the whole. Either he gives the Peshat interpretations first and then says, “And the Rabbis explain in the following way,” or places the Agadic interpretation first, and then adds that “according to the Peshatthe meaning is as follows.” The in­ clusion of the gist of the selected Agada in the commentary on the Torah, and joining it with the Peshat is Rashi’s second contribution to the people of Israel. His commentary formed the gate through which Jew­ ish children entered the garden of the Agada, where moral teaching, poetic charm, and flight of vision are united.

At times, Rashi adds an original remark of his own, and we do not know where the Midrosh ends and where Rashi begins. We will cite one example. When the brothers ask Jo­ seph to forgive their sins against him, they say, “ W e p ra y thee, fo rg ive the

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transgression o f the servan ts o f the G -d o f y o u r fa th ers,” (Bereshith,

50:19). Rashi then adds the follow­ ing note: “If your father is dead, his G-d exists, and thy brothers are His servants”—a remark which means, men may die but their beliefs live; The third contribution of Rashi is the portion where exegesis is entirely according to the Peshat. Taking into consideration the hundreds of com­ ments which are taken from the Mid33

rosh but are close to the Peshat, we can say that the Peshat exegesis of Rashi extends to a little more than half of the commentary.

"HEN undertaking to give a plain exegetical explanation of the Torah, whose every word and even letter are holy and convey an important meaning, the commentator must take into consideration the fol­ lowing: the meaning of the words themselves; the meaning of the verse as a whole as well as the connection between the verses; and the removal of difficulties which stem from vari­ ous sources. Without going into de­ tail because of lack of space, we can assert briefly that Rashi mastered all the three elements in a very high degree.

With reference to the exposition of the plain meaning of words and phrases, we have the testimony of all scholars in this field that Rashi possessed an exceptional sense of lan­ guage which helped him to derive much from the little material at his disposal. He made use of the works of Menachem ben Saruk and Dunash ben Labrath, the Spanish Hebrew grammarians and lexicographers, but added much of his own. There is a large number of grammatical passages in his commentary which, if collected, would make a work of many pages.

In explaining the meaning of words, as well as of verses, Rashi employed varying methods, at times relying upon the studies of others and at times upon his own original research.

In the last case, he used the method of analogy. Being exceptionally ver­ sed in the entire Bible, he always finds one or more places where the same word is used, and on analyzing the general connotation of all the places, he elicits the right meaning

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of the word, and frequently says, “This is the father of all,” signifying that the meaning of a word or an expression determined in one place is the same wherever it is found in the Scriptures.

Of the sources from which he bor­ rowed explanations of words, or even verses, the most important is the Aramaic translation, the Targum Onkelos. He quotes it frequently but does not always follow it; at times he rejects its explanation and offers his own. Among other linguistic sources upon which he drew are Menachem ben Saruk’s dictionary, the Machbereth, which he quotes of­ ten, but whose views he likewise often rejects, and Menachem ben Helbo’s exegetic work, Pitronim.

ASHI spends much effort in en­ deavoring to show the logical connection between the verses. His great ability in Peshat exegesis is es­ pecially revealed in the descriptive passages, such as Shemoth 29:37 which describes the work of the Tab­ ernacle (Mishkon), or Chapter 24 in Bemidbor which delineates the boun­ daries of Eretz Yisroel. In these he reveals his embracive knowledge in all branches of arts and crafts, which he derived from observation. It is to be noted that when Rashi felt that a verbal description is not sufficient for the comprehension of the form of a vessel or any other subject mentioned in the Bible, he illustrated the object by drawings, which unfortunately were omitted by the first printers.

As for the third element, the re­ moval of difficulties, it is to be noted how successful he was at removing a number of them, even some which are usually removed only by applying in­ volved philosophic explanations. We will quote one. The expression betzal-

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menu (“in our image”, Bereshith, 1:26), used in regard to the creation of man, baffled commentators, for how can we speak of an image or like­ ness in regard to G-d? Rashi explains it as follows: Betzdlmenu means “in our mold”; namely, as he explains further, “in the mold which was pre­ pared before creation by G-d for man”. Again, Kidmuthenu (literally “our likeness”) in the same verse means, says Rashi, that just as G-d possesses understanding and reason, so does man possess these qualities. That the same qualities in both bear no comparison is understood. It is inter­ esting to note that Maimonides de­ votes to the discussion of this question the entire first chapter in the “Guide of the Perplexed” and comes to the same conclusion, that man’s likeness to G-d consists in possessing reason like Him, while the same idea is ex­ pressed by Rashi in a few words.

IMITED space does not allow a discussion of Rashi’s commentary on the Books of the Prophets and the Kethuvim. We will only remark that Rashi’s commentary covers the entire Bible except the Book of Chronicles and the last two chapters of the Book of Job. In the printed Bibles, the com­ mentary on the Book of Chronicles goes under his name, but it is not his, as many scholars have proved con­ vincingly. As for the last two chapters in the Book of Job, Abraham Berliner, who spent years in the study of Rashi’s work, found a note in a manuscript on verse 27 in Chapter 40 which says: “Just as the owner of a fig tree knows the time when its fruit is to be gath­ ered, so did G-d know the end of the span of life of Rabbi Shelomoh and He took him from this world in time and brought him to the Academy on High.” From this verse to the end of the book, it was commented by his grandson, Rabbi Shmuel (Rashbam).

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Rashi’s Commentary on the Talmud

OT less supreme an achievement than Rashi’s Bible commentary was his commentary on the Talmud.

Not only is the Talmudic material which had to be explored of large and wide extent, but its nature is excep­ tionally complicated and contains in­ numerable varieties of subjects. Many were the scholars before Rashi who undertook to chart the sea of the Talmud and attempted to guide the learners in its devious paths, but none were as successful as hev True, he was shown the way by his immediate pred­ ecessors, who forged a new way in commenting the Talmud which dif­ fered greatly from that of the Geonic and Spanish commentators. The latter concentrated upon giving the content of the passage, or summarizing it and

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bringing it closer to the reader whom they did not know. The FrancoGerman commentaries grew out of ac­ tual teaching in the Academy where the pupils sat at the feet of the master and listened to the expounding of every part of the passages. This meth­ od in which Rashi was initiated by his teachers was not only perfected by him and carried to the highest degree, but was impressed with his originality.

A great commentator must possess affinity with the subject, exhaustive knowledge, and pedagogic ability.

Rashi possessed all three and in addi­ tion an intuitive sense for divining the true meaning of a passage. He com­ prehended the meaning of a compli­ cated subjept at a glance. His knowl­ edge included the entire Talmudic 35

literature, all that was written in the guides him in the mazes of the laby­ field — the Babylonian and the Jeru­ rinth of the Talmud.

In explaining the meaning of a salemite Talmud, the Tannaitic Mid­ rashim, the Geonic commentaries, and passage, Rashi is very concise and all other books. All this knowledge he limits himself to the subject at hand placed at the service of the students. without encumbering the reader with When a passage in the Talmud deals unnecessary repetition of what has briefly with the subject, relying on the gone before or information on what discussion of the same subject at is to follow. Only when knowledge of length in another place, Rashi in his what follows is required for the under­ commentary supplies the missing data standing of the passage does he give and clarifies the meaning of the pas­ a succinct account of it. Whenever sage. At times, he merely indicates the necessary, Rashi explains the rules of reference and lets the student find out Talmudic hemeneuiics, i.e., the regu­ lations by which laws were deduced for himself.

Outstanding above all was the peda­ from the Biblical verses as well as gogic ability which Rashi displays. In those of the discussion. He supplies his method there is an harmonious historical data in a sufficient measure blending of induction and deduction. necessary for the understanding of the The method, though, varies. At times subjects discussed. He also endeavors he explains every word and expression to describe the customs of the times, slowly by degrees, and busies himself and determines the location of geo­ with the particulars, but at the same graphic places with much accuracy time, he explains also the meaning of as the state of knowledge at the time the entire passage, an explanation could offer. In short, he did not ne­ which is interwoven in the explanation glect any point in the Talmud which of the parts. At other times, he ex­ required explanation. plains first the entire statement and Rashi’s explanations of the Biblical then each word. Rashi utilizes all ped­ verses quoted in the Talmud are es­ agogic means; he employs consider­ pecially valuable in the interpretation ably the method of apperception, ex­ of Agadic passages. In his explanation plaining the unknown by the known, of the Agada, he made great use of very often using similes, comparisons, the Midrashim, and he often explains and other devices. difficult passages in the Talmud by citing parallels in the many collections ASHI is very careful to guide the of the Midrashim. An important dis­ student in his studies. The Tal­ tinction of Rashi’s commentary is its mud, as is known, contains no punc­ wonderful style. It possesses not only tuation system, no question marks, brevity and lucidity, but also the and wherever a doubtful remark oc­ happy quality of proportion. He curs, he points out how it should be always manages to crystallize his read. Whenever the discussion is very thoughts into a few central and im­ complicated and the repartee between portant concepts, which include them scholars confusing, one asking and the all. No wonder that with all these other answering, Rashi informs the qualities which Rashi’s commentary reader who is the inquirer and who possesses, it became the commentary answers. He thus supplies the inex­ on the Talmud. perienced student the thread which

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ASHI wrote his commentary in three drafts, which resulted in three editions. The third edition is naturally the most improved, and is the one appended in the printed Tal­ mud. Rashi’s commentary covers the whole Talmud with the exception of a large part of the tractate Baba Bathra, from Folio 29 on, which was completed by his son-in-law, Yehudah ben Nathan. On most of the tractates we have the third edition of Rashi’s commentary, but in several tractates we have only the first draft. Such are the commentaries on the tractates Taanith, Moed Koton, and the commen­ tary on the tenth chapter of Pesachim, on which chapter his grandson, the Rashbam, wrote a longer commentary.

The tractates Nedorim and Nozir contain Rashi’s commentary in the edition of his disciples and lack the perfection of hand of the master. It is almost certain that the lack of Rashi’s own commentary on these tractates is due to the negligence of the copyists, for quotations in other

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works prove that the third edition in­ clude also these tractates.

In concluding our rather short sur­ vey of Rashi’s great and lasting con­ tributions, we can say that during the 850 years which have passed since his death no other scholar had succeeded in exerting influence upon our nation as a whole in a measure compared to his. During the centuries there was not a Jewish child who did not study the weekly portion of the Torah with Rashi’s commentary. Nor was he for­ saken later. Rashi accompanied the Jewish youths on their way of study for many years from their first at­ tempt to delve into the mysteries of the Talmud to the days when they left the house of study. And even then they turned many an hour for spiritual comfort to their youthful friend, Rashi. In short, his influence extends to all strata of Jews, from the lowest to the highest, including modern prose writers and poets. Verily, Rashi’s merit is so great that he became a corner­ stone in the heritage of Israel.

FROM ALEPH TO TAV The S a g e s com m ented on the a lp h a b e tic a l construction of "E ychah", Scroll bf L am entations. The five c h ap te rs are all com posed a lp h ab e tically : C h ap ter 5 w a s considered in this cate g o ry b e c a u se it consists of tw enty-tw o verses, corresponding to the n u m b er of letters in the alp h a b e t.

They a re sym bolical of the five sins com m itted b y Israel.

They also in d icate th at Israel v iolated the Torah from the b eg in n in g to en d —from "A leph" to 'T a v " . The letter "P eh" w a s p la c e d before "A yin" in the second, third, a n d fourth c h ap te rs to in d icate th at Israel spoke w ith the m outh (peh) w h a t the ey e (ay in ) h a d not seen.

M idrash R ab b a h

August, 1958

37

The “ Legation”

By B. MENACHEM A s told to D E B O R A H O F E E N B A C H E R

HORTLY after my arrival in New York City, I chanced upon an unpretentious brownstone build­ ing on East 66th Street displaying a metal sign with the words: Jewish Agency for Israel. Like a cruel flash of lightning, these four words illu­ minated a ghost-ridden past.

It was in the building of the Jew­ ish Agency in my native Budapest during the Nazi terror of 1944 that I served as “clerk”— one of the odd­ est motley of clerks ever to set stamp to document. In those nightmare days, the building which sheltered us bore the name “Immigration Section —Swiss Legation”; the “nationals” to whom we issued protective passports were devoid of any nationality; and the “clerks” ranged from frail old­ sters to babes-in-arms.

The official story of Hungary’s Jewry under the Nazi occupation when all that stood between thou­ sands of us and the gas chambers were flimsy certificates of protection, is by now well known. Men like Raoul Wallenberg, Israel Kastner and Joel Brandt have passed before the bar of public opinion to receive their share of glory or measure of con­ tempt. Yet, as always in history, there are the forgotten incidents, memories of heroism and infamy rounding out the picture behind the men who hold the limelight.

In October 1944, when German and Hungarian Nazis seized the reins

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of Government in Hungary, the Swiss Consul, Charles Lutz, agreed to take the Budapest office of the Jewish Agency under his protection by turn­ ing its two small buildings into the Immigration Section of the Swiss Le­ gation. Thus was created a tiny island of immunity which originally housed about forty people (the Agency’s staff and their families) but soon sheltered some 3,600 men, women and children.

With storm troopers roaming the streets of the city, it was not easy to convey Jews from their homes to the “Legation”. A handful of young, Aryan-looking chalutzim volunteered to “arrest” Jewish families and to bring them in, a move which in view of the Nazi’s own schutzhaft (protec­ tive custody) orders was not without irony. Equipped with military or police uniforms, swastika armbands and home-made “warrants”, the young men set out to locate Jewish families, pushing through Nazi guards with a flash of laboriously produced “identi­ fication papers” and a flood of Heil Hitlers or Heil Szalasys. In fact, so convincing was their performance, that many of their “victims” could hardly be persuaded to follow them.

T THE “legation”, conditions A staggered the imagination. There was no water, no light, and scarcely any food. Even access to the lava­ tories had to be rationed, with two coupons a day allotted to every perJEWISH LIFE

son. Our “passport service’’—though not exactly open to the public— oper­ ated twenty-four hours a day. There was no clock-watching, because there were no clocks; no lunch breaks, be­ cause there was no lunch. In place of filing our records, we evolved a careful system of “misplacing” lists requested by the Nazi authorities. A small, battery-operated radio was our only frail link with a world beyond the convulsions of the dying Reich.

To make our office complete, we had our regular schedule of visitors.

I recall one troop of sixteen police officers led by a high-ranking Nazi official, who stormed into our build­ ing demanding to know “whether old women and babies were part of the staff”. A sweet old thing obligingly fainted at the official’s feet and a former bank president, asserting his duty “as a member of the medical profession” to extend first aid to this patient, succeeded in diverting the menacingly levelled guns. At other times, a move towards the telephone to “report this breach of consular im­ munity to our authorities in Switzer­ land and to request retaliatory action against the Hungarian Legation there” brought the desired results.

Although the Papal Nunciature had issued letters of protection for some Hungarian Jews (mostly converts), our office could also boast an official visit from a member of the clergy.

One cold December morning, the notorious Father Kun, two guns strapped to his cassock and his swas­ tika armband prominently displayed, appeared in our office in the company of a gang of young hoodlums “to empty this building at the request of Col. Nidossy.” Our resourceful bank­ er, who for once decided to be hard of hearing, greeted the delegation with a meek Laudetur. Father Kun August, 1958

was taken by surprise but as his Christian training was of longer stand­ ing than his Nazi allegiance, he re­ sponded automatically with in sterum amen. However, after a moment’s embarrassed silence he demanded to know how many Jews were in the building. “I could not tell,” our banker replied regretfully. “We are not in the habit of inquiring into the religion of our Legation staff.” After the usual order “to get up a list of these Jews here”, Father Kun departed minus laudetur but in possession of four new leather jackets for his rag­ ged company.

We later learned that this was per­ haps the only occasion on which Father Kun had been shocked into a semblance of mercy. A fairly young man, with a knack of exciting the mob by a well-timed waving of the cross, he tried to hide after the libera­ tion but was tracked down and executed. The same fate befell his boss, Lt. Col. Nidossy, who before being elevated by the Germans had been a podiatrist in a public bath.

HEN necessary, our “legation” reverted to its original char­ acter as headquarters of the Jewish Agency. It was in this capacity that the Ministry of the Interior instructed us to prepare a list of 7,800 Jews, eligible for immediate immigration to Israel (then Palestine). Persons in­ cluded in this list, which was to be submitted with photographs, would be allowed to remain in the various buildings which were under the pro­ tection of a number of neutral lega­ tions. The rest of Budapest’s 100,000 Jews was liable to transfer to the Ghetto. A district comprising some 40 streets in the poorest section of the city, the Ghetto was practically sealed off from the rest of the world and—

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as rumors had it—mined and ready to be blown up in the event of a Ger­ man retreat from Hungary. The list, submitted in response to this request, was an unnumbered, unstapled feat of disorganization, certainly the long­ est list of 7,800 names ever to be compiled. The ghetto, by the way, remained intact. A carefully organ­ ized whispering campaign spread word that officials protecting the in­ tegrity of the ghetto would enjoy the hospitality of our “legation” in the event of an Allied victory.

During the last two to three weeks of German occupation, a number of anti-aircraft guns were located near the Jewish Agency buildings and the officer in charge— a veteran career soldier—agreed to respect the im­ munity of our “legation”. His co­ operation with his “Swiss” neighbors was responsible for saving 250 Jew­ ish lives in the following incident.

N December 31, 1944, a num­ ber of Jews living in one of the buildings under the protection of the Swedish legation were foolish enough to accept a glass of champagne from their Christian neighbors as a New Year’s eve token of good will. Im­ mediately a troop of Nazis who had been informed of the pre-arranged act of brotherly love invaded the build­

O

ing shouting, “The swine drink to the victory of our enemies.” Some 300 Jews were hauled out of their apart­ ments and marched towards the bor­ ders of the Danube for execution.

When word of this incident reached the “legation” an emissary was dis­ patched to the German commander of the anti-aircraft battery, explaining the situation and asking him to save these innocent victims by sounding the air-raid alarm. And indeed, as soon as the sirens began to wail over the city, the self-styled executioners on the banks of the Danube sprinted for shelter, and 250 Jews hurried through the deserted streets to the safety of the “legation”.

The action of the German com­ mander was dictated not only by hu­ manitarian consideration but by the knowledge that the days of German occupation of Hungary were num­ bered. On January 17, 1945, the three-months’ nightmare of Nazi ter­ ror ended and in our “legation” 3,600 men, women and children faced each other in stunned silence, unable to believe that we had indeed survived.

So sustained had been our tension and so intense our immersion into our own web of fabrications that for a moment it seemed as if liberation had left us without identity.

FROM MOURNING TO REJOICING The M essiah m ust a p p e a r on the Ninth of Av, for this w a s ap p o in ted for a tim e of m ourning in our d ay , a n d in the future the A lm ighty will ch a n g e it into a festival, a s it is said: "A nd I sh all transform their m ourning into rejoicing."

P esikta 40

JEWISH LIFE

Lift Up Your Eyes On High

By MENACHEM KASHER

URS is a time of wondrous things. Before our eyes, mighty, O world-shaking events have occurred in the realm of scientific discovery, from the explosion of the first atombomb to the launching of the satel­ lites Sputnik and Explorer, and an entire world has reacted with mixed feelings: on the one hand, a sense of awe, a great amazement at the mar­ vels that science has wrought in our time; and on the other hand, a dread fear that these technological achieve­ ments are evil winds, blowing an un­ settling augury of the world’s de­ struction.

The question arises: What is the view of Torah, Israel’s teaching for eternity, on these events of magnitude?

Whoever has learned the first ele­ ments of our faith knows that the study of nature, the quest for the secrets of creation, evoke and affirm in man a cognition of the Creator.

The Psalmist hymns: The heavens de­ clare the glory of G-d, and the firma­ ment showeth His handiwork (Psalms 19:2). In fact, for Maimonides it is a significant principle of Torah to study the laws of creation. In his major work, Mishneh Torah, Rambarn writes: It is a religious obligation to love and fear this revered and awe-inspiring G-d, for it is stated, Thou shalt love the Lord thy G -d (Devorim, 6:4), and again, The Lord thy G -d shalt thou fear (ibid. 13). And what is the path­ way to a love and fear for Him? When a man will consider His deeds and cre­ ations, how wondrous, how great they are; and he will see through them His wisdom, boundless and immeasurable; August, 1958

at once will that man love, praise and laud the Great Name, and will yearn with a deep longing to know Him: as David said: M y soul hath thirsted for G-d, for the living G-d (Psalms 42:3).

Then, as the individual ponders these very matters, all at once will he recoil aquiver and be afraid, knowing that he is but a little, lowly creature of dark­ ness, standing with small, insignificant knowledge in the presence of the Om­ niscient One. As David said, When I see Thy heavens, the work of Thy fin­ gers . . . what is man that Thou art mindful of him (ibid. 8:4-5)? . . Thus

did our Sages say concerning love of G-d: “Through this means will you know the One who spoke and the world became.” (Mishneh Torah, Hilchoth Yesodey Torah, 11, 1-2.)

Maimonides opens four gates to us that lead to cognition of the Creator, to loving and fearing Him, so that we may obey His will and serve Him wholeheartedly, in happiness. It is well worth delving into his words, in the light of the spectacular events of our time.

The Wonders of Creation

writes, “When a

man will consider His deeds and M creations, how wondrous, how great a im o n id e s

they are . . .” Further on he de­ scribes as marvels of creation the constellations of stars and planets, as they were known to the science of his day. With the passing of the centuries, and especially in our own age, astronomers have discovered many times over the number of heav­ enly bodies that were known in Rambam’s time, and they have determined the stars’ sizes and orbits. With the 41

perfected telescopes of our day (es­ pecially the 200-inch instrument on Mt. Palomar, California—the world’s largest—which was completed 1 in 1940) literally billions of stars can now be discerned, and their distances from earth measured; and all staggers the imagination.

Let us cite for example calculations and comparisons. The earth’s circum­ ference is 40,000 kilometers; its dis­ tance from the moon is 384,000 kilo­ meters; from the sun, about 150 mil­ lion kilometers. When at dawn the sun sends forth a ray of light to earth, it takes that ray eight minutes and twenty seconds to appear on our eastern horizon. For light travels 300,000 kilometers (186,000 miles) in a second. Now Pluto, the last planet to be discovered (in 1930), is six and one-half billion kilometers from earth, and completes its orbit around the sun once in 250 years. On the other hand, of the fixed stars, the two near­ est the earth, Proxima and Alpha Centauri, are 270,000 times as far from us as is the sun; while the “distant” stars and the Milky Way are billions upon billions times as far from the earth as is the sun. The numbers in­ volved in these calculations spring far beyond the ordinary range of our earthly reckoning; it is impossible for the human mind to picture what these numbers mean. They remain mathe­ matical abstractions, literally “as­ tronomical figures”.

stand how truly amazing they are; then he is prepared to grasp an inkling of the realization that there is no end, no bound to the wisdom of the Creator.

Science in our day has made pro­ found discoveries about the structure of the atom and its splitting; it has learned much about the hydrogen atom, before and after fission. And it has probed many of the secrets of the atmosphere and the stratosphere. All its findings and discoveries deepen our realization of how gossamer, how sub­ tle is the Higher Wisdom. For all the elements of creation are interde­ pendent; each complements and com­ pletes the other. And the entire sys­ tem is of the most subtle and delicate balance.

Let us now consider that all the human eye can see is as a drop in the ocean in comparison with what we cannot see. And from the heart’s well-springs we will say, how awesome are Thy works, O Lord; Thy greatfiess is beyond fathom.

In the words of Maimonides: “At once will that man love,, praise and laud the Great Name . . . as David said, ‘My soul hath thirsted for G-d,’ etc.” This indicates that if one con­ templates the wonders of creation and the greatness of the Creator, this has the power to evoke in him a thirsting yearning for Divine illumination. We might well raise our eyes heavenward and see: at this time, when all the world is immersed in the material and mundane, it is quite certainly by To Ponder Higher Wisdom Divine Providence that new stimuli O QUOTE Rambam again: “He have appeared in the guise of scienti­ will see through them [G-d’s won­ fic discoveries to spur people to con­ drous works] His wisdom, boundless sider and ponder higher matters in the and immeasurable.” In other words, spiritual realm. And this inner quest let a man see with his own eyes the must bring a thirst for spirituality, a marvels of nature and creation; let longing to know the Source o f life in him ponder them, and try to under­ all that lives.

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JEWISH LIFE

HE WORDS of Maimonides are apt in their application to main in our time. Modern man has suc­ ceeded measurably in mastering many of nature’s forces. But let man ever remember; though he discover and in­ vent a thousand more scientific mar­ vels, he is “a little, lowly creature of darkness, standing with small, insigni­ ficant knowledge in the presence of the Omniscient One”. Let man under­ stand this thoroughly, writes Rambam, and “he will fear and dread for his lowliness, his poverty, his insigni­ ficance”. (Hilchoth Yesode Torah 11.4).

We might gainfully cite here a passage based on a statement by a leading astronomer: I began by sitting at the giant telescope for several months, night after night, to gaze at the stars strewn across the heavens and record their sizes, orbits, names, and so on. At first I was moved by the beauty and splendor of nature.

In a while I had grown accustomed to this beauty; then I began to be filled with a sense of the wonder and gran­ deur of the heavenly constellations. To this as well I grew accustomed, and concentrated further on my work: I saw millions of stars and recorded their distances, which for the human mind are akin to infinity. And I felt a dread, a terror, confusion, and sorrow—like a man wandering alone in an immense desert. I realized the insignificance of our world in relation to the galaxies in the heavens, in the total impenetrable mystery that envelops all creation.

Whence came all these stars? Who ar­ ranged their order? .. What is their ul­ timate purpose?

To these questions Maimonides in­ dicated the answer, counseling and guiding the bewildered in the proper way to utilize the fear and dread which the spectacle of Creation en­ genders, toward a higher awe and reverence for the Creator of all Worlds, and toward a worship out of love and joy.

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August, 1958

UT our Sages of blessed memory knew that not all who contem­ plate are alike. The ways of the Lord are right, and the just do walk in them; but transgressors do stumble therein (Hosea 14:10). In Ethics of the Fathers (3:1) the Sages teach: “reflect upon three things, and you will not come into the grasp of sin: Know whence you came, and whither you are going, etc.” The thought of one’s ultimate destination, “where one is going to,” has the power to move the decent person to piety and good deeds. But others who remain defiant regard also their inevitable day of death, and their evil grows stronger: “Let us eat and drink, for tomorrow we die,” (Isaiah 22:13). The enslave­ ment to earthly and material things in life with their illusion of pleasure, blind such people to wisdom or righteousness.

Be it a contemplation of “whither you are going” or the wonders of creation, all depends on who is con­ templating.

We read in the Torah: Lest thou lift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the host of heaven, thou be drawn away and wor­ ship them, and serve them, etc. (Devorim 4:19). The Torah thus warns those who regard the “host of heaven” that they might be moved by their deep emotion to deify and reverence the galaxies, and worship them as a separate supernal power; and such worship is idolatry.

Therefore Maimonides indicates how man is to channel the awe which will arise in him as he studies the sky: that it move him to revere and love the Creator of the entire universe, who set the stars in their courses, by His will. The heavenly bodies have no separate power; they exist by His

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Providence: Thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their h o st. . . and Thou givest life to them all (Nehemiah 9:6).

So also does the Midosh explain: “For ever, O Lord, Thy word standeth fast in Heaven (Psalm 1 1 9 :8 9 )...

Said the Holy One: What maintains heaven? The words I said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters . . . and it was so (Bereshith 1:6-7). The words He uttered estab­ lished it; therefore is it stated, He spoke, and it was; He commanded, and it stood (Psalms 33:9); By the word of the Lord were the heavens made (ibid. 6). By the very word with which He created heaven — by that decree is it forever maintained”.

ITHOUT a firm faith in the Creator, the new, world-shaking developments in science are likely to fill man with dread fear, and thus destroy the world. The only way that remains is to cling to this faith and grow strong in it: that at this mo­ ment, when man feels utterly humble <and reduced to nought before the grandeur of the Creator, the gates of knowledge open before him, and the element of the Divine comes alive in him: When 1 behold Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which Thou hast established; what is man, that Thou art mindful of him? A nd the son of man, that Thou thinkest of him? Yet Thou hast made him but little lower than G-d, and hast crowned him with glory and honour (Psalms 8.4-6).

It should be emphasized that the man of faith clearly recognizes (as Rabbi Bahya quotes Rabbi Saadiah Gaon, beginning of Sidrah Va’era) that for the Holy One there is no dif­ ference between creating heaven and creating the tiniest worm; the size

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involved is of no import to Him. In regard to the celestial spheres Scrip­ ture writes, When l see thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers (Psalms 8:4); and about the minute gnats which plagued Egypt, This is the finger of G-d (Exodus 8:15). And it is our faith that all creatures are under His watchful care, whose eyes are open all the ways of the sons of men (Jeremiah 32:19).

The core of man’s worth is that he was formed in the image of G-d; in him was instilled a soul, a higher element of the Divine. But Torah teaches us that with all our knowl­ edge we must realize that a human being cannot know and understand the ways of G-d, or nature, or its ultimate purpose. Faith alone, im­ planted in the believing, can illumine the way of man, so that he be not lost wandering in the dark of the universe, in his brief span of years. Faith alone can give man a foretaste of the spir­ itual joy which ultimately awaits him when he merits to return to the Source of all life.

HE Russian government is utiliz­ ing its achievements with the Sputniks to battle faith and religion, and spread atheism and denial of G-d throughout the world. It is our hope that the very same developments will awaken faith among mankind; that ultimately man will heed Isaiah’s prophetic words: Lift up your eyes on high and see: who created these?

(40:26). Then will people recognize truth, and out of darkness will choose a pathway of light.

Millions are impressed and over­ whelmed, caught up in the wake of the latest sensations of our rocket age; how superficial is their view; how limited their understanding.

Actually, our age of man-made sa-

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JEWISH LIFE

tellites, flying robots, rockets, missiles, and atomic engines, reinforces over and over our awareness of man’s in­ significance and small stature meas­ ured against the forces of nature. If man can now rise higher into the stratosphere with his planes and rockets, then before him open endless expanses which defy description. And should man succeed some day in reaching the moon, what is a flight to the moon compared with the dis­ tances of the stars, innumerable in the heavens and infinitely far from each other? And will man ever fly on from the moon to the sun, to be consumed in its burning gases? Then again, what profit remains for man after all his brilliant calculations and amazing dis­ coveries in mathematics, astronomy and science? Have we discovered after it all, a fragment more of nature’s ultimate mystery and purpose? The very laws of nature which have so awed us thus far, attest and affir that our universe is a “fortress which cannot be ungoverned”.

One must lead to the other: per­ ceiving the greatness of the Creator, a person of understanding must realize how humble his own self is.

Knowing his own insignificance, man rises in knowledge of G-d, in love and fear for Him; such insights are G-d’s most precious and worthy gifts to man.

HAT we are describing here is is a double realization, two facets of the same coin: on the one hand, a full cognition that What is man that Thou art mindful of him?

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August, 1958

(Psalms 8:5); but on the other hand, a concomitant awareness that Thou hast made him but little lower than G-d (ibid. 6).

This double-sided realization was stressed in chassidic thought in its latter generations. There is a wellknown saying by a great Chassidic rebbe: that every Jew should carry two statements about him (so to speak), one in either pocket; in one pocket, “I am but dust and ashes” (Bereshith 18:27); in the other, “For my sake was the world created.”

The Rebbe of Peshischa elaborated on this: One must have a doubleimaged vision, using both eyes; he must see with one eye his own lowli­ ness, and with the other the great majesty of his Creator.

If we will but regard our world with “both our eyes” we will see clearly the light of faith shining forth out of the terrors of our time.

A passage from Tanna d’be Eliyahu (chap. 18) clarifies the core of Maimonides’ thought: “Hear me, my brethren and people, that you come not to be arrogant in spirit. Let a man . . . raise his eyes heavenward and ask, Who created these: sun, moon, stars, galaxies; the four winds of the sky; the whole of creation?

For in His wisdom and understanding, each and every thing is dependent on His word, as it is said, By his word were the heavens made (Psalms 33:6) . . . Therefore I say, a man is obliged to bless, praise, laud, exalt and sanc­ tify the name of Him who spoke and the world became. . . .’’

45

The Jewish School in Peru

By WILLIAM W. BRICKMAN HE SCHOOL was founded in AST year I was privileged to per­ form a variety of educational T 1946 with eighteen pupils. In L missions in Europe, Israel, and South the fall of 1957 it had an enrollment America. This 40,000 mile trip of nearly five months yielded many in­ sights into general and Jewish educa­ tional problems. Few visits to schools were as interesting to me as the one to the Jewish school of Peru, the Cole­ gio Leon Pinelo in Lima.

I visited this school last September, and subsequently delivered an oral re­ port in Yiddish on what I saw to the leaders of the Jewish community. I should like to describe and discuss my observations of this educational insti­ tution.

The great majority of the 5,000 Peruvian Jews live in Lima, th ^ cap­ ital city, and seem to have a com­ fortable economic background. In this community may be found Jews of va­ rious origins, Ashkenazim of East and West European origin as well as Seph­ ardim. The Association de Socie­ dades Israelitas del Peru (Associa­ tion of Jewish Societies of Peru) consists of the Union Israelita, made up of Polish, Russian, and Rumanian Jews, comprising 75% of the com­ munity; the Sociedad Sephardi, Turk­ ish Jews, with about 15%; and the Sociedad de 1870, the original Ger­ man Jewish immigrants who are now only 10% of the Jewish population.

Some 80% of all Jewish children of Lima attend the Colegio Leon Pinelo. There are eight Christian pupils who study the Hebrew lan­ guage together with the Jewish chil­ dren. Sixty of the pupils are of mixed Jewish-Peruvian parentage: the father is usually Jewish.

46

of 604 children, about half of them boys, and a teaching staff of fortyone. Instruction is given on all levels from the kindergarten to university entrance. The school is located in a residential area, Orrantia del Mar, San Isidro, a suburb of Lima. The building was erected in 1954 on beau­ tiful spacious grounds, only a few blocks from the Pacific Ocean. I traveled with one of the five blue-andwhite school buses from my hotel in downtown Lima. En route, the driver picked up youngsters and teachers.

The number of palatial homes from which the children came was quite impressive.

The fees are 130 soles per month (19 soles to one U.S. dollar) for a nine-month year in the primary school. The secondary pupils pay 150 soles a month. A total of 66 pupils get full and partial scholarships.

The headmaster, who came to the school in 1955 from Bolivia, is Dr. Jacques Messenger, a young, enthus­ iastic, cultured, professionally minded educator who was born in Berne, Swit­ zerland, and who received his Jewish and secular education in Switzerland and France. Although his job is by no means an easy one, he appears to be performing his administrative duties efficiently.

The boys and girls in the primary school wear blue-and-white smocks with their names prominently em­ broidered thereon. Very few yarmulkes are in evidence in the open-air JEWISH LIFE

corridors, on the playground, or in most of the classes.

Some of the pupils bring their own lunches and eat in a separate room apart from the rest of the children.

Most boys and girls, however, eat in the main dining room, served by white uniformed waiters. The food is supplied and prepared by caterers.

More yarmulkes can be seen in the dining room.

OLEGIO Leon Pinelo is a private school governed by a Comité Directivo which consists of three members from each of the three con­ stituent groups of the Associacion mentioned in a previous paragraph.

The president of the committee is se­ lected by the Associacion. The pres­ ent incumbent is Dr. Markus Roitman, a heart specialist, and the honor­ ary Israel consul in Lima. It is note­ worthy that each board member is required to have one child attending the school.

The Peruvian Ministry of Educa­ tion fully recognizes the school and values it as one of the better educa­ tional institutions in the country. I found that its reputation was excellent for its educational work, in both Jew­ ish and Christian circles. The fact that the school is recognized means, among other things, that 80% of all teachers must be Peruvian citizens.

Less than one-fourth of the faculty is Jewish: seven teachers of Jewish subjects and two teachers of other subjects. This policy makes it diffi­ cult to get teachers from abroad. I should also point out that many of the non-Jewish teachers are on a part time basis, as is the case in the major­ ity of the secondary schools in Latin America.

The primary school day begins at 8:10 A.M. and ends at 3:00 P.M. Be­

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August, 1958

fore the 50 minute lunch, which comes at 11:45, there are two breaks, one of five and one of ten minutes. Lunch usually lasts about 20 minutes, after which the pupils play for about half an hour before returning to their classes. The high school pupils study from 8:10 A.M. to 3:55 P.M. Their lunch period lasts from 12:35 to 1:25. They have a morning break of five minutes and one of ten.

On Mondays and Fridays, school begins with a five-minute open-air as­ sembly, and the pupils sing the Peru­ vian National Anthem and the Hatikvah. On Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, they sing Hebrew and re­ ligious songs.

The kindergarten enrolls boys and girls from four to six years of age.

Elementary education extends from six to twelve. The first year is called throughout Peru the Transición (tran­ sition) class and at the end of Grade five the pupil completes his primary course. In a Transición group, I saw pupils prepare Hebrew New Year’s cards.

HE OFFICIAL primary schools T in Peru require 25 hours of work each week. At Leon Pinelo, however, the children get 35 hours, which con­ sist of the following: Spanish gram­ mar and spelling, arithmetic, history and geography of Peru, natural sci­ ence (mainly biology), music (songs), arts and crafts, physical education (basketball, soccer, volleyball, and gymnastics), English, and Hebrew.

English is the first foreign language in Peruvian schools, and Pinelo starts the teaching of English—earlier than the other schools in the country—in the first grade. From the language point of view, the aim of the primary department is to teach the pupils to speak Hebrew and English fluently.

47

Incidentally, Hebrew is not an offi­ at Cornell University, the University cially recognized language in Peru. of Oklahoma, and the Massachusetts The children get nine hours a week Institute of Technology. (two periods a day) of Hebrew in­ The high school uniform is blue struction. The Hebrew course in­ trousers and sweaters, a blue blazer, cludes Jewish history (taught in He­ and a dark tie for the boys; and dark brew) religious benedictions, and blue skirts and sweaters, blue blazer, holiday information. light blue and white smocks, and The Peruvian government requires brown shoes and socks for the girls. one hour of religion in all the schools.

The national course of study for At Pinelo, however, there are two Peruvian secondary'schools prescribes hours of religious teaching each week. thirty hours per week; Pinelo pro­ In this course the pupils learn Chu- vides forty hours. The extra time is mosh, Tanach, and Siddur, and re­ used for English, Hebrew, and reli­ ceive instruction on the Yomim gion.

Tovim. At no time are prayers re­ The regular curriculum of the Pinelo cited in the school. includes mathematics (algebra, geom­ I visited a primary Hebrew class, etry, trigonometry), Spanish grammar where I heard the Sephardic pro­ and spelling, the literatures of Peru nunciation employed. The fluency of and Spain, the sciences (botany, the children was quite adequate, al­ zoology, anatomy, chemistry) and though the teacher would resort to Jewish philosophy (logic, ethics, psy­ Spanish from time to time to make chology), art and crafts, history of some point more clear. One of the music, physical education, English pupils, a Christian boy, showed fine (completing the ten-year course) and progress in speaking and writing He­ Hebrew grammar and post-biblical brew. None of the children in this literature. Typing is an elective. Pre­ class had his head covered. military instruction is obligatory by A second-year English class was law. reading one of the volumes in the The day is not divided into Hebrew “Learning to Read” series, edited by and secular sessions. Rather, the sub­ Nila B. Smith and published by Silver jects follow each other in a fashion Burdett Co. The twenty-seven chil­ which has been popularly but incor­ dren, who were 7-8 years old, read rectly described as “integrated” in with ease and discussed the content Jewish day school circles in the United in correct English. The teacher used States.

English throughout the lesson.

S stated before, religion is taught HE high school department offers in the high school. This is usu­ a five-year course leading to the ally a study of Tanach two hours a university. As a rule, Peruvian pupils week. Neither Talmud nor Mishnah complete the secondary school be­ are taught in the high school. There tween the ages of 16 and 17. The are parents who engage private tutors graduating class of Pinelo averages 15 to give their boys a more substantial years and eight months. Graduates Jewish religious education. I know of of the school are doing well in the several graduates of the Pinelo school universities in Peru. I know of three who study Talmud privately, and also who are now studying with distinction attend sessions on Shabboth.

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JEWISH LIFE

At one of the high school classes which I visited, whose subject was third-year Hebrew, there were twentyeight pupils aged 14-15. The lesson was a grammatical one and the teacher made frequent use of Spanish in his explanations. This practice is in keeping with foreign-language teaching methods in other countries.

Another class of interest was fourth-year religion, where Rabbi Shalem, the spiritual leader of the Sephardis, delivered an interesting talk in Spanish on Pirke Avoth. The pupils took notes, as in a college class. Not all of the 15-16 year old boys in this class wore yarmulkes.

In all, there are 191 boys and girls in the high school. Of these, 183 are taking the regular course and eight are pursuing a commercial course. My impression was that they had less dif­ ficulty in following my Spanish than my Hebrew and English.

T N viewing the school as a whole,

JL one can be impressed by its physi­ cal structure, comprehensive curric­ ulum, smooth administration, and the success of its graduates. Also impres­ sive is the fact that it enrolls a very high percentage of Lima’s Jewish children, and the figure seems to be rising and approaching 100%. All this is to the good. But a basic question may arise: is this a Jewish school?

Jewish it is because it is owned and financed by the Jewish community, because the student body is almost exclusively Jewish, because it teaches Hebrew and Judaism, On the other hand, it does not resemble by any means the Jewish school of the Yavneh type in Mexico City, the Yeshivoth of Argentina, or the Jewish day schools in England and the United

August, 1958

States. One is seldom conscious that he is in a Jewish school, unless he visits a class in Hebrew or Bible. The amount of time spent on Jewish reli­ gious subjects appears to be woefully meager.

We must take into consideration that the Colegio Leon Pinelo is the Jewish school of Peru. As the alterna­ tive to a Sunday school or some equally anemic religious teaching pro­ gram, it is undoubtedly an improve­ ment. But when we think of thorough, systematic, dedicated Jewish teaching, however, then we realize that the school can hardly be said to do its fullest to educate the pupils as Jews.

It seems to me that the Jewish community of Peru should consider the rethinking of the school’s aims and of its religious teaching program.

It is obvious to me that greater em­ phasis can be given to religious con­ tent and to Yiddishkeit. Certainly, a country like Peru needs & strong nu­ cleus of learned, Torah-faithful Jews.

Visits by some of the Peruvian Jewish leaders and educators to the Jewish schools of the neighboring countries of Argentine and Brazil and to Mex­ ico will yield ideas on how to make the school more truly Jewish. Taking into consideration the difference in the national educational systems, it is also possible for Peruvian Jews to learn something of the place of Jew­ ish studies in a day school by examin­ ing the North American and the British day schools.

It would be only proper for us in the United States to maintain closer relations with Jews who are engaged in Jewish educational work in other countries. All of us can profit from becoming familiar with each other’s achievements and problems.

49

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JEWISH LIFE

On

TheJewish Record

N ew Music From the Modzitzers

By ERIC OFFENBACHER

WO YEARS ago the Jewish rec­ ord-buying public was enthralled T by the appearance of a unique 10" disk called “Modzitzer Melave Malke Melodies.” These columns extolled the enterprising group of young Modzit­ zer Chassidim who in altruistic fash­ ion and with considerable musical talent had opened an avenue for the documentation and transmission of original nigunim from an important music-loving Chassidic “court”. ( J e w ­ i s h L i f e , Kislev 5717). Three genera­ tions of Modzitzer rabbis were cited whose compositions (many of them lost due to lack of proper notation) are still alive and receive spirited in­ terpretation by their present disciples.

This first issue concerned itself with the more or less established texts of z’miroth for Motzoey Shabboth.

Today this is followed by a larger disk containing a collection of fifteen melodies for Sholosh R ’golim culled for the most part from the synagogue liturgy of the Festivals. Yet, with few exceptions, the melodic pattern of these nigunim does not lend itself readily to recitation in the Beth Haknesseth. They were composed primar­ ily to be *chanted in group singing around a Yomtov table at home gath­ erings. As such they breathe the same DR. ERIC OFFENBACHER, a dentist by profession, has been a devotee of Jewish music., for many years.

August, 1958

SHOLOSH R ’GOLIM, Chassidic Melodies of the Three Festivals by the Rabbis of Modzitz; sung by the Modzitzer Choral Ensemble; Benzion Shenker, Soloist; Elliot Birnbaum, director. Musical ar­ rangements and accompaniment by Herbert Rothgarber; technical direction and program notes by H. Stambler; jacket design by Chenoch Lieberman. One 12" LP Record. NEGINAH RECORDS, NR 1202. List Price $4.98.

atmosphere of freshness and intimacy which characterized the Melaveh Malkah melodies. They differ from similar Chassidic offerings in their avoidance of ecstatic excesses. Theirs is a con­ trolled and very melodious harmony.

The record offers a variety of moods, with joyous motifs gaining the upper hand. Thus about eight or nine numbers present rhythmic dance themes befiitting the command “v’somachtah b’chagechah”. Typical among these is the chassidic “Hodu Lashem” from Hallel with a delightful “bambam-bam” accompaniment. Equally characteristic is the last offering called “Rikud” which is sung without words. Chassidic leaders believe that words often create a barrier to the fervent outpouring of the soul in the Divine presence. Another selection, “Ko Keli”, which, enumerating the various sacrificial offerings, serves as an introduction to the Musaf service, receives (as the jacket notes state) a “brilliant martial interpretation.” Un­ fortunately, its tune reminds one of quite worldly university student songs (especially with so unwitting an allu­ sion to “He’s a jolly good fellow” !).

51

N the other hand there are emo­ tionally sad numbers which for their moving poignancy confront the chorus with a more formidable task of interpretation. The challenge appears to have enhanced their artistry to better advantage than in the strictly lively numbers. Outstanding here are the beautiful “Odcha”, with its meditative theme, the popular “B ’tzeis Yisroel” (both from Hallel), and the tender “Kulom Ahuvim”.

Finally, there are the “chazonishe” numbers featuring the soloist of the ensemble, Benzion Shenker, whose schooled voice shows remarkable im­ provement in its luster. His rendition of T’filas Tal, the major work on this disk, is the highlight of this new col­ lection of Modzitzer Ningunim. Mr. Shenker's cantillations border on the best professional cantors have to offer, and he is well supported by the rest of the chorus. One may only regret that the full texts (Hebrew and Eng­ lish) are not included in the printed annotations. Desirable for all selec­ tions on the record, inclusion of the texts would have served especially here to deepen the understanding of and appreciation for one of the most poetic prayers in the holiday liturgy.

A natural question introduces it­ self. How does this second record of Modzitzer Nigunim compare with the first one? The answer would be “three-dimensional”. Musically, the works on the new disk seem to favor

O

straightforward cheerful selections easily assimilated to the popular ear.

This is helped by the strophic com­ positions whiph frequently repeat the main theme. The former record, oth­ ers may argue, was on a higher plane musically. Sonically, fidelity of sound is about equally fine, but there is an improvement in balance here which places the piano more on a par with the singing than on the previous oc­ casion. Economically, there is dis­ appointment. Enlargement to the 12" size record brings us only eight more minutes of music. A modern longplaying disk of this size may have engraved upon it up to one hour of program. Here we are given thirtyfive minutes (!) to the former twentyseven.

HIS REVIEW would not be com­ plete without noting the untimely death of Elliot Birnbaum, musical di­ rector of the Modzitber Chorus, ac­ companist and commentator. At the age of only twenty-eight he was taken from the midst of his colleagues while preparing this recording of the Sholosh R'golim Melodies. The tragedy gives added emphasis to the laudable endeavor of the Modzitber Chassidim to use all proceeds from the sale of their recordings for the support of their rabbi's Yeshivah in Eretz Yis­ roel. Concomitantly, this charitable intent may serve as an apt memorial to their late devoted leader.

T

THREE PROPHETS Jerem iah w a s a d e sc e n d a n t of Joshua a n d R achab. He w a s a contem porary of Z ëp h an iah the Prophet a n d H ulda the P rophetess (w ho w a s likew ise a d e sc e n d a n t of Joshua an d R achab ). The former p re a c h e d in the S y n ag o g u e, the la tter spoke to the w om en, a n d Jerem iah to the m en in the Sifre N um bers, M egillah, P esik ta R a b b a h 52

JEWISH LIFE

Letters to the Editor OPPOSITION TO HEYCHAL SHLOMO

SERVICEMEN SERVED

Brooklyn, N.Y. Upon reading your editorial of the Sivan 5718 issue on the Supreme Re­ ligious Center, I was surprised that you only mentioned praise for the “Heychal Shlomo”, while not at all mentioning the fact that a number of Gedolim in Israel, headed by the most prominent Brisker Rav—Rabbi Zev Solovetchik, the Mirrer Rosh Yeshiva —Rabbi Finkel, other Roshey Yeshivoth, and the Agudath Israel are all against this project. No doubt Agu­ dath Israel and these Gedolim repre­ sent a substantial portion of Ortho­ doxy, both in Israel and in the United States.

I can’t seem to understand why an impartial magazine as yours, which is not affiliated with any political party should not even mention the fact that beside the non-religious Zionists, a good part of Orthodoxy is also against the Supreme Religious Center.

Rabbi Chaim Kaufman

North Hollywood, Calif.

I read with amusement your June issue in which Mr. A. Rubin Huttler describes “Pesach at Fort Sam Hou­ ston, Texas”. Perhaps you will better understand my feelings when I tell you the following: In 1944, as the Jewish Welfare Board director for Camp Crowder, Missouri, with the aid of one chap­ lain, Rabbi H arry Schectman, one chaplain’s assistant and my wife, we served a strictly orthodox Passover Seder dinner, as defined by the Shulchon Aruch, to more than 2600 serv­ icemen. The records of this feat are one file with the JWB in New York City.

We personally kashered a National Guard Armory kitchen in Neosho, Missouri, and procured all brand new utensils from Camp Crowder, by or­ der of the Post Commander, Colonel Teachout. More than 1200 pounds of turkey was prepared in Kansas City, Missouri, under the supervision of Rabbi Maurice Solomon. All veg­ etables were prepared by my wife and Mrs. Schectman. The American Legion Post of Neosho acted as waiters and pot washers. Our dishes were paper plates. Our wine cups were non^waxed paper cups, specially obtained for the Seder. Every detail of the Seder was observed according to the orthodox ritual. I should also note that the soup for the Seder was also prepared in Kansas City and that as a final note I personally transported the en­ tire load of turkey, vegetables and

WANTS MORE

New Haven, Conn.

Thank you for the enjoyment I re­ ceived in reading the Sivan issue of J ewish Life containing Dr. Weiss’ Hashkofah article, “The Premise of Faith”. I was struck with the beauty of his closing paragraph, “Jewish and world history . . .”. I trust you will continue to give us more articles of this kind . . .

Barney Dubin August, 1958

53

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54

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JEWISH LIFE

soup by truck from Kansas City to Neosho, a distance, if memory serves me, of more than 200 miles.

As a side note, at the conclusion of the Yom Kippur services at Camp Crowder, in 1942, we served bagels, cream cheese, lox, honey cake and coffee to 6000 men. The making of the coffee is one for the book. By arrangement with the Army at Camp Crowder, the boilers in the field house were stoked to high heat before the beginning of Yom Kippur. At the end of the services on the following eve­ ning I prepared hot coffee by using powered coffee and filling 50 gallon containers with the hot water from the field house boilers.

Jess Nathan [Editor’s Comment:

Mr. Nathan is evidently interested to make known the fact that the no­ table undertaking he reports provided a Seder for a fa r larger number of servicemen than attended the Sedorim described in Mr. Huttler’s article.

However, Mr. Huttler undoubtedly had no thought of claiming unique­ ness 6r record attendance for the Fort Sam Houston Sedorim. In all military installations, Sedorim are generally arranged for the Jewish personnel. The aspect with which Mr. Huttler's article was primarily con­ cerned was the setting up of a Kosher Mess Hall which provided the Jewish men at Fort Sam Houston with not just one Seder and one Pesachdige meal, but Kosher-for-Pesach meals thrice daily throughout the eight days of Pesach, besides both Sedorim.

This and a number of similar achievements contribute significantly towards the goal of providing Jewishly-observant servicemen with daily Kosher meals.]

August, 1958

JEWRY IN BOSTON Dorchester, Mass. . . . I must tell you that I feel very proud that Orthodoxy has produced in this country such a magnificent magazine.

I would, however, like to add a few comments to the article on “Orthodox Jewry in Boston1' by Philip K. Isaacs which appeared in your February Adar issue. I have lived in Boston for a long time and am therefore very familiar with Boston Jewry. I was amazed to find the following omis­ sions in a rather thorough survey by Mr. Isaacs.

First, there was little mention of the excellent service that Rabbi Levi I. Horowitz, the Bostoner Rebbi, has given to people who come here for medical help, as well as the very beautiful and modern mikvah for which Rabbi Horowitz was respon­ sible.

Secondly, no mention was made of the largest and most important orth­ odox synagogue in our area, Con­ gregation Agudath Israel, which can compare in its services to many of the leading synagogues in New York.

Congregation Agudath Israel, located in Dorchester, Mass., and better known as the Woodrow Avenue Shul, has three daily services which are well-attended, and on Shabboth has an attendance of 300-400 people.

Thanks to the efforts of its Rabbi— Rabbi Meyer J. Strassfeld—who has been with the synagogue for the past five years, the membership has been increased including many young peo­ ple ; new organizations have been founded; and'a Hebrew School, which the synagogue never had, has been added. . . .

Hyman F. Schaffer 55

ANACHRONISMS

ACCOLADE

Detroit, Mich.

There are a few apparent anachron­ isms in the otherwise good story by Aaron Chait, “The Story of Israel, the Convert,” in the June/Sivan issue of Jewish Life.

Mr. Chait says that Reb Israel Glickman was “born a Russian Cos­ sack of the Volga.” Cossacks were territorial troops settled on land.

Thus, there were Don Cossacks, Ku­ ban Cossacks, Ussuri Cossacks, etc., but no Volga Cossacks.

On the same page Mr. Chait changes Reb Israels original habitat from Volga to the Ukraine. That is quite a distance. The Volga does not flow through the Ukraine . . .

Boris M. Joffe

Brookline, Mass.

To show you the faith that I have in your wonderful magazine, I am enclosing a check to cover a fouryear subscription.

I think you publish a magnificent journal. It brings honor and glory to traditional Judaism. I am delighted to extend an accolade to you, the editor, and to all the rest of the peo­ ple who produce this admirable mag­ azine.

As an old editor, I know the problems and joys of a really fine publication dedicated to the honorable survival and service of Jews and Judaism. More power to you.

Rabbi Joseph S. Shubow

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JEWISH LIFE

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New Temple $150,000 Jewish Community Center Paramus, N. J. Religious Center $200,000 Kehilah Israel Kansas City, Mo. Sanctuary $500,000 Temple Beth Israel Phoenix, Arizona Fourteen additional classrooms $100,000

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Beth Israel Vineland, N. J. Relocation and new plant

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