Jewish Life October 1958

Tishri 5719 -

lit t hi s i ss ue EDITO RIALS It Can Happen

mm The Jewish W a y

Yom Kipper ip Jerusalem— •' i i i i i i i i i i

The W ay af Tefz

W hat Is a Jew?

Israel arid the Iraqi Coup

Sukkah in Bavaria

O ctob er 1958

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O ctober, 1958

Tishri, 5719

Vol. XXVI, No. 1

Saul Bernstein , Editor

• EDITORIALS THE JEWISH W A Y ........................

M. Morton rubenstein Reuben E. Gross RABBI S. J. SHARFMAN Libby Klaperman Editorial Associates THEA ODEM, Editorial Assistant

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.

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IT CA N HAPPEN HERE.........................

• ARTICLES ISRAEL A N D THE IRAQI COUP I. Halevy-Levin

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SUKKAH IN B A V A R IA ......................... 17 Oscar M. Lifshutz WHAT IS A JEW ?............................ 20 I. Grunfeld

All rights reserved

THE YESHIVAH PROBLEMA NEW APPROACH ...........................28 Morris Brafman

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THE EGGHEADS CAME TO LEARN ....... 37 Abraham N. AvRutick

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Y O M KIPPUR IN JERUSALEM-66 C.E.....45 Cecil Roth THE W A Y OF TELZ ............................ 55 Tovia Lasdun and Leo Davids

Published by U n io n of O rthodox J ewish Congregations of A merica

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

Application for second class mail privileges is pending at New York, N. Y.

October, 1958

• SHORT STORY DEFEATED ........................................50 Moshe Dluznowsky

• BO O K REVIEWS A SOCIOLO GIST VIEW S THE AMERICAN JEW ........................ 61 Henry Siegman TORAH A N D MODERN LIFE IN ISRAEL. 67 Leonard Oschry

• DEPARTMENTS HASHKOFAH:T'shuvah ................... 34 Samson R. Weiss LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 76 A M O N G OUR CO NTRIBU TORS............ 3 EXCERPTS selected and translated by David M. Hausdorff ILLUSTRATIONS by Cyla London

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JEWISH LIFE

DAYAN DR. ISADORE GRUNFELD is a member of the Beth

Din (Ecclesiastical Court) of the Chief Rabbinate of the United Hebrew Congregations of Great Britain. A lawyer as well as as rabbi, his writings cover the spheres of religion, law, and economics.

DR. CECIL ROTH, eminent Anglo-Jewish historian, is the author of such outstanding works as “The Jews of Venice,” “A History of the Marranos,” and “A Short History of the Jewish People”.

RABBI ABRAHAM N. AvRUTICK is Rabbi of Congregation Agudas Achim in Hartford, Connecticut. He is a graduate of Yeshiva University, receiving Semichah from the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, and is vice-president of the Yeshiva of Hartford.

TOVIA LASDUN, Hamburg born, attended the Telz Yeshiva

in Lithuania, later making his way to Shanghai, and finally to the United States. He is associated with a Jewish publishing firm. LEO DAVIDS was bom in Amsterdam, Holland, in 1938.

He is presently studying for the Rabbinate at Yeshiva Chofetz Chaim, and is an honor student at The City College of New York.

MORRIS BRAFMAN heads a manufacturing firm in New York

City. Vitally interested in Yeshivah education, he serves on the Boards of the United Lubavitcher Yeshivoth and the Beth Medrosh Govoha of Lakewood. Mr. Brafman is a graduate of the University of Vienna, and was a regular contributor to the Neue Welt, a distinguished weekly of pre-Hitler Austria.

CHAPLAIN (Major) OSCAR M. LIFSHUTZ is now stationed at Fort Sam Houston, Texas. A graduate of the Hebrew Theological College of Chicago, he has served in Germany and is the recipient of the Bronze Star for service with the Eighth Army in Korea.

MOSHE DLUZNOWSKY has achieved literary note with his short stories on Jewish life in North Africa. He is the author of “The Wheel of Fortune,”; which won the Zvi Kessel Literary Prize.

DR. SAMSON R. WEISS is the executive vice-president of the

Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America. Noted Jewish educator and thinker, his column on Jewish concepts is a regular feature of J ewish L ife .

Cover: “And ye shall take you on the first day the fruit of goodly trees, branches of palm-trees, and boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook, and ye shall rejoice before the Lord your G-d seven days.” (Vayikra 23:40.)

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JEWISH LIFE

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The Jew ish W ay HE SPIRIT of the High Holy Days season, rich with in­ finite meaning and evoking a sense of ultimate reality, yields endless rewards. Not the least of these is deeper insight into the problems which confront us as individuals and as a people. Particularly, the Yomim Noroim oblige us to focus on the problems which lie within ourselves, rather than those rising from external causes. We may hope, therefore, that at this sacred season the ranks of Jewry will be blessed with enlight­ enment as to the path of Jewish life in the world of today.

In view of the constantly mounting concern as to the Jewish future, it is evident that such enlightenment is sorely needed.

Notwithstanding so epochal a development as the re-establish­ ment of the Jewish State, the phenomenal growth of Jewish education, and the strengthening of the agencies of communal endeavor, the question is frequently raised as to the ability of Jewry to withstand the forces making for disintegration. The prevailing vogue is to put the question in the form of concern as to Jewish “survival”. Not. mark you, as to how the Jew shall Jewishly live, but how he shall— survive. Prominent fig­ ures of the Jewish world are apt to dwell on this subject at all occasions.

Prime Minister David Ben Gurion, for example, lets no op­ portunity go by to assert that world Jewry outside Israel, Amer­ ican Jewry included, is doomed to extinction; that religion is no longer the common bond of Jewry, whose only possible link and source of survival is Israel; and that accordingly the sole Programs program 7for survival must be personal and cultural identifica­ for tion with the Jewish state. Dr. Nahum Goldmann, president of “Survival99 the Jewish Agency and the World Jewish Congress, too sees Goluth Jewry disintegrating. His solution, \as qutoed in press reports, is “knowledge of and resulting pride” in Jewish history and “participation in the reality of Israel”. From platforms and pulpits everywhere, like ponderings are uttered and like formu­ lae are handed down.

It is remarkable that these rationalizations of the Jewish situation are invariably drawn from an historical approach to Jewish life— and yet find no ultimate message in Jewish history.

This message is plain enough, to those whose eyes are not blinded by transient vistas and whose ears are not defeaned by the clang of machinery. The Jew has been brought into the world to serve a Divine purpose; so long as he reach to fulfill­ ment of that purpose, so long shall he live—not merely survive,

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October, 1958

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but live, meaningfully, fruitfully, enduring against every ad­ versity and obstacle. No synthetic technique, no contrived strategy, can achieve the continuity of Jewish existence.

ODAY, as in all preceding eras, it is clear that the Jewish will to live can surmount the forces making for assimilation, The Will disintegration, and destruction only if it is inseparable from , the will to be Jewish, in all circumstances and at all costs. And ° be to be Jewish, in this ultimate sense, entails the personal, daily Jewish uving cf Jewishness, a living rising from the well-springs of belief and formed of the application of distinctively Jewish tenets and values, Torah and Mitzvoth, to the total stream of life. This is true no less of the Yishuv than of the Golah.

The creation of a social environment saturated with the Jewish spirit is unquestionably a sine qua non for collective Jewish existence. The Jewish State, of its nature, offers an infinitely better basis than can ever be hoped for, even under the most . favorable conditions, in any non-Jewish land. Yet the ultimate strength of any Jewish community, be it that of Eretz Yisroel, of America, or of the shtetl of yesteryear, must derive from the inward Jewishness of the individuals who compose it.

In facing the situation before us then, in all its reality, we find our true program delineated in the age-old experience of the Jewish people. It is none other than fulfillment of the Divine mandate given through the hand of Mosheh Rabbenu, proclaimed by the Prophets, illuminated by our Sages, transmitted through the Rabbis, the teachers, the leaders of Israel from generation to generation.

Let us build the Jewish future on Jewish foundations. Let us focus our efforts on the making of believing Jews. Let us ground our schools, our institutions, our social pattern, our economic life, our cultural expression—whether in Israel or in the Diaspora —on Torah conviction and Torah purpose.

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IEWING, in this light, the Jewish scene of today, we will not lose courage by the evidences of decline that confront us V Jew ish on many s|des. Rather, we will be strengthened and inspired by Generation the manifestations of Jewish creativity that stand forth in clear light, notably in the Land of Israel, yet visible too in America and elsewhere. We will see rising above a confused scene a new Jewish generation, unafraid of the challenge of the Space Age, a generation that wills to be Jewish and that fashions, out of Jewish conviction, ideal, and purpose, an enduring vessel for Jewish life. Many, many difficulties must be faced and overcome before the vessel is completed and launched, but, with Divine aid and guidance, the work will go steadfastly forward.

“Happy is the people that knoweth the sound of the Shofor; in the light of Thy countenance, O Lord, shall they walk.”

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JEWISH LIFE

It Can H appen H ere O THE profound distress of the major part of the American Jewish community— and particularly the orthodox Jewish community—-President Eisenhower has signed the controversial Humane Slaughtering Act. For the first time in American his­ tory, there has thus been enacted Federal legislation which many believe bears an overt menace to Jewish religious rights.

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Uncompromisingly opposed by American orthodox Jewry, this Bill is viewed as the spearhead of a process aimed against Schechitah, the form of animal slaughter prescribed by the laws of the Jewish religion. These well-founded considerations, to­ gether with the widely prevalent doubts as to the humanitarian bona tides of the Bill, had led to recommendation by the Senate A m en d ed Committee on Agriculture and Forestry, after prolonged investig... p . gation of the matter, that this measure be replaced by a Study 1 a Bill. In Senate debate, the Study Bill was defeated by the nar­ row margin of 43-40, and thereupon the Senate proceeded to pass the Bill in the form which it had previously been passed by the House of Representatives. Attached to the Bill as finally voted by the Senate, however, were two amendments, designed by their Senatorial sponsors to abate the objections voiced by orthodox Jewish spokesmen and to give additional protection to Shechitah. One, submitted by Sen. Javits (Republican, New York) designates the pre-slaughter handling required for Shechitah as “complying with the public policy” prescribed by the Bill; the other, presented by Sen. Case (Republican, New Jersey) provides that “. . . in order to protect freedom of re­ ligion, ritual slaughtering and the handling or other preparation for ritual slaughter are exempted from the terms of this act.”

The House subsequently accepted the Senate version, which has now received the Presidential signature.

The amendments, though mitigating the immediacy of the danger, do not remove the basic apprehensions with which orthodox Jewry regards the Humane Slaughtering Act. It re­ mains the unanimous view of traditional Jewish leadership that this legislation can in no way contribute to the establishment of more humane forms of animal slaughter—an opinion shared by the Department of Agriculture as well as the Senate Agricul­ ture Committee. It is equally the view of orthodox Jewish leaders that the presumptive safeguards for Shechitah and reli­ gious freedom may prove transient and illusory.

ASHLY conceived, ill-written, confused and contradictory in its provisions, opposed by the Department of Defense, the Department of Agriculture, the Senate Agriculture Commit­ tee and many individual Senators and Congressmen, by eminent

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October, 1958

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scientific authorities, by every group that has given prolonged, objective study to the question, voted on by Senate and House under pressure of intensive agitation and with reasoned evidence discarded in favor of impassioned emotionalism, the miscalled Humane Slaughtering Act impinges on religious liberty, yet cannot serve its purported purpose.

With the enactment of this legislation, the American Jewish community must look forward to a taxing defensive struggle.

Under the elation of its passage, backers of the Bill let slip boasts that this measure is but an entering wedge for more drastic legislation to come. This, of course, is what realists have foreseen. With the gates of anti-Shechitah once opened, there will ensue an ongoing campaign to nullify the exemptions, to replace the present legislation with measures aimed openly at their target, to supplement the federal law with restrictive Entering measures in every state— and beyond this . . .?

W edge American Jews will be well advised to take proper stock of this situation, and to reflect upon the strategy which the Hu­ mane Slaughter forces have employed. The proliferating Hu­ mane Societies—who seem notably unconcerned with such prevalent forms of cruelty to animals as hunting, boiling lobsters alive, docking of tails, castrating, branding, etc.—have carefully avoided the imputation of Antisemitism. Amidst their outpour­ ing of propaganda an occasional anti-Jewish diatribe has slipped through, but they have avoided identification with known Jewhaters. To the contrary, they have assiduously cultivated the support of liberal elements.

An important effect of this strategy was the breaching of the unity of the Jewish forces which had been arrayed against the legislation. Up to the end of last year, all major national Jewish organizations, orthodox and non-orthodox alike, stood together in firm opposition to the proposed legislation. At this point, pressure was brought to bear both upon and within Jewish organizational life. Certain non-orthodox organizations were made apprehensive of being charged with hostility to humanitarianism, and of a resultant trend towards Antisemitism among hitherto friendly elements.

All had been made aware, from conclusive evidence pre­ sented at inter-organizational conferences, that the humanitarianism of the proposed bill was spurious, that the agitation in its favor echoed the pattern of a similar movement in Britain and other lands whose anti-Jewish motivation is today no longer dissembled. Ample evidence was brought forward, too, that there was in fact nothing “inevitable” about the passage of the bogus Humane Slaughter legislation, which was widely opposed by informed elements, while the artificially stimulated agitation could be countered by effective action. Nevertheless, three nonJEWISH LIFE

orthodox organizations were moved to retreat from active opUnity position to the Bill. Their move was promptly and adroitly exBrea ched ||B |y by the “Humane Slaughter” proponents, who thereupon raised the claim that one part of the Jewish community, unlike the orthodox forces, was no longer opposed to the bill and in fact favored it.

There can be no doubt that by thus yielding to pressure, the organizations which abandoned the battle facilitated passage of the Humane Slaughter Bill by each house of Congress in turn.

Working alone, the orthodox organizations contributed to a de­ cision against the Bill by the Senate Agriculture Committee and to its near-defeat, lacking only two votes, on the floor of the Senate. Had the defaulting organizations remained steadfast, this Bill profoundly affecting basic Jewish interests would never have been passed in the face of united Jewish opposition.

ITH every appreciation for the high and sincere motives of many, perhaps most, of the Humane Slaughter Bill’s proponents, this legislation presents an ominous vista. It would be naive to take as purely coincidental the similarities between the American “humane slaughter” campaign and the virulent anti-Shechitah movement, likewise operating under the humane In H um ane slaughter banner, in many other Western lands. In Britain and Robes other countries in which the “humane slaughter” movement has arrived at a more advanced stage, it has been exposed as the vehicle through which a new, streamlined form of antiJudaism has sprouted. Clad in the robes of humanitarianism, this insidious movement abroad has recruited many who would ordinarily spurn with indignation any association with recog­ nizable bigotry. Once involved, they become conditioned to a propaganda diet of malevolent distortion and falsification. This is the technique with which a sequence of “humane slaughter” legislation, increasingly restrictive as to Shechitah and backed by mounting waves of anti-Jewish agitation, has been enacted in England and elsewhere. We in America dare not ignore this precedent, nor may we underestimate the menace.

Thanks to the efforts of the orthodox Jewish organizations, non-Jewish as well as Jewish opinion has been alerted to the dangers lurking in the innocent-seeming Humane Slaughter pro­ posals. The testimony which the orthodox Jewish spokesmen so ably presented to the Senate Agriculture Committee, the pre­ sentations made to important public figures, and the mobilization of com munal defense, undoubtedly motivated changes in the final Bill. The danger is checked, but for the moment only.

Henceforth, all must join with full force in repelling a critical menace to Jewish life.

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October, 1958

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Israel and the Iraqi Coup

By I. HALEVY LEVIN

Jerusalem: HE GENERAL recognition ac­ corded the new revolutionary regime in Iraq and the election of General Fuad Chehab as President of Lebanon, in succession to Camille Chamoun, mark the beginning of one of those intervals of comparative tran­ quility which alternate with recurrent spells of turmoil in the Middle East.

The feuding of the rival political barons in the Lebanon, touched off by Chamoun’s rumored ambition to pro­ long his constitutional term of office, never exceeded the dimensions of a minor civil war, despite generous aid to the rebels in men and arms from across the Syrian border. The land­ ing of the United States Marines, os­ tensibly in response to the Lebanese Government’s appeal for aid and to protect American lives, came really as a reaction to the revolution in Iraq, the repercussions of which, it was im­ mediately realized, would be infinitely more serious.

Revolution, of course, is not rare in Iraq. Because of its reactionary political, social, and economic regime.

Iraq has always been the most “revo­ lutionary” country of the Middle East.

Violent attempts to overthrow its gov­ ernment have been a fairly regular feature of Iraqi political life—revolu­ tions, all of them abortive, were staged in 1920, 1936, 1941, 1948, and 1952.

According to General Abdul Karim Kassem, head of the junta which car­

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ried through the recent military coup, it was a careful study of the causes of the failure of the five previous at­ tempts which ensured the success—so far, at least—of the sixth. For Iraq revolutions, though successful, are sometimes short-lived.

ROM the evidence currently avail­ able— and today, weeks after the revolution, there is surprisingly little reliable information about post-revo­ lutionary Iraq—there seems little rea­ son to suspect direct Nasserist inter­ vention, except insofar as Nasser’s success in Egypt whetted the appetite of a parallel, frustrated lower-middle class officer caste, supported by an equally dissatisfied intelligentsia. In­ tervention of another kind there has been all along. Cairo’s unrelenting radio war has had telling effect among the miserable, exploited Iraqis, as Nuri Said’s repeated protests and efforts to reach a radio truce prove. The Iraqi contingent of Nasser’s ramified sub­ versive organization, operating in every Islamic country under the direc­ tion of Aly Sabri, his second-in-com­ mand, also did much to dig the ground from beneath Nuri’s feet, though more recently its influence seems to have been limited after the latter’s resolute counter-measures.

However, there does not seem to have been any direct collusion between Iraq’s new rulers and Abdul Nasser, despite the latter’s attempt to take the credit for up­ setting Faisal’s throne.

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JEWISH LIFE

Indeed, in the weeks that have passed there has been a gradual but definite tendency on the part of the Iraqi Junta to underline their inde­ pendence of Nasser’s regime. Even in the moments of apprehension follow­ ing their initial success, when Western intervention seemed imminent, the Iraqi revolutionaries went no further than a mutual aid pact with the United Arab Republic, stressing at the same time the new regime’s resolution to respect existing oil agreements and international treaties, including the Baghdad Pact. (It is not irrelevant to record that Nasser adopted a similar accommodating attitude in the early period of his rise to power). Revolu­ tionary propaganda centers on the Junta and its chief, and observers have noted with surprise the decrease in the number of Nasser’s photographs in the windows and Nasserist slogans on the walls. So far, the only act on the part of the Iraqi Government that may be regarded in the spirit of the United Arab Republic is its intention to seek Soviet economic aid. Indeed there is no logical reason why oilrich Iraq should saddle itself with the insoluble problems of poverty-stricken Syria and Egypt, except, of course, a genuine desire to sacrifice its wealth and independence, and the power of its new rulers, upon the alter of Nas­ ser’s brand of Pan-Arabism.

For the time being the West can derive— and is deriving— some com­ fort from the reasonableness of the revolutionaries. For Israel, however, it leaves the situation practically un­ changed. Of crucial importance for Israel is the effect of the revolution on her immediate neighbor—Jordan.

There is not the slightest doubt that the days of Hussein’s kingdom are numbered.

October, 1958

HATEVER doubts may have been entertained in Baghdad about the Hashemite Federation, for Jordan it was the ideal solution to an almost insuperable problem. So much indeed was this the case that Hussein accepted a subordinate posi­ tion to Faisal, his ineffectual cousin, whom he is believed to have much disliked. Federation with Iraq gave Hussein the revenue, from an Arab source, which he so desperately needed after the severance of the British con­ nection. At the same time it strength­ ened the forces capable of opposing the powerful Nasserist element threat­ ening the regime, The military coup in Iraq has dashed Hussein’s hopes to the ground.

One of the first acts of the revolu­ tionaries was to denounce the Feder­ ation and to break off all relations with Jordan. For their own protec­ tion the Iraqi revolutionaries must destroy this surviving branch of the Hashemite dynasty in Jordan. (Emir Zaid, King Abdullah’s last surviving brother, Iraqi Ambassador to Great Britain under Nuri Said, appreciates this only too well. He has gone into hiding!) The situation in Jordan is exceptionally favorable for any plans they may have in this direction.

Revolutionary elements, similar to those who have risen to power in neighboring Iraq, have been active in Jordan for years. In Jordan the posi­ tion is complicated by the presence of a large number of pro-Nasser Palestinians — refugees and others.

With the exception of some Bedouin tribes, whose loyalty to the kingdom must be constantly reinforced by gifts of gold, there is no section of his sub­ jects upon whom Hussein can rely.

The Arab Legion is disaffected. It was only the arrest of sixty high-rank­ ing officers last month that saved

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Leni Sonnenfeld

Israeli officer (left) a n d U nited N ations truce observers, rep resen tin g the U nited S tates, S w ed en a n d F inland, stop their patrol a t a point in the G alilee n e a r the S y rian border.

Hussein from Faisal’s fate, while the villagers, who make up the National Guard, are only waiting for a signal to turn their guns on their masters.

There is not a country in the world — not excepting Israel—so completely surrounded by hostile states as is Jor­ dan-—and so incapable of resisting them. Syria is to the north, Iraq to the west, Saudia, which did not even go into official mourning for the House of Hashem, is to the south. Israel, to the west, is the least hostile of them all, and it is one of the ironies of the present situation that it is to the grace of Israel, which permitted British m

paratroopers and American fuel planes to use its air-space, that Hus­ sein owes his throne, and perhaps even his life. The paradox of Hus­ sein’s position is tragic. Only the Bri­ tish troops, whom he has summoned, stand between him and murder, but by summoning them, after having driven them out, Hussein has de­ stroyed the last vestiges of loyalty to his dynasty.

HE revolution in Iraq, though brewing for a long time, took T everyone by surprise. In Jordan revo­ lution can be predicted with certainty.

JEWISH LIFE

And when it comes a pro-Nasser reg­ ime, which will join the United Arab Republic, will emerge. It was to such an eventuality that Mr. Ben Gurion referred when he spoke of the Iraqi revolution as the gravest development in the Middle East since the Second World War. It was the encirclement of Israel by Nasser’s Quadruple Alli­ ance, under which Syria, Jordan, and Saudia placed their armies under Egyptian supreme command, that trig­ gered the Sinai Campaign. During Sinai Egypt’s allies, fearful of Israel’s retribution, betrayed her. The crea­ tion of a unitary Arab state goes far to coordinate combined aggression against Israel. For that reason it is infinitely more serious.

For the time being Israel is inter­ ested in the maintenance of the status quo. It was to ensure that status quo that it facilitated—by granting per­ mission to British planes to fly over Israeli territory—the return of the British to Jordan. But that permis­ sion was granted only on the assump­ tion that the, stationing of British troops in Amman, and of American marines in Beirut, was not only a sedative to meet an emergency, but the initial phase of ?a more radical plan to curb Nasser’s imperialism. In the absence of any such plan Israel regards the presence of British troops as worse than useless. Their inevi­ table withdrawal, probably in the notdistant future, must create an ex­ tremely perilous situation, with which Israel alone will have to cope. This was the immediate reason for the withdrawal of permission to use Israel’s air-space.

London-inspired reports of an Israeli plan to occupy Palestine west of the Jordan, in the event of a British with­ drawal from Jordan, transparently seek to create a more favorable at­ October, 1958

mosphere for the British troops there, who any day, when the signal is given from Cairo, will be subjected to acts of terrorism, such as preceded the transfer of the Canal Zone to the Egyptians.

Obviously the departure of the Bri­ tish troops would place Israel in a very delicate position. Israel can agree neither to an Egyptian nor an Iraqi occupation of Jordan. The alterna­ tive, to occupy at least the western bank of Palestine, might augment this country’s Arab population by close upon one million, bringing the total in Israel not far from numerical par­ ity with the Jews.

SRAELI’S international position, steadily improved since the Sinai Campaign, has been substantially strengthened by the events in Iraq, Jordan, and Lebanon. There is still a strong section of opinion, recently joined by Lord Attlee, holding that the establishment of Israel was a mis­ take and that many of the West’s dif­ ficulties in the Middle East may be traced to its existence. But the more general view, fortunately, is that it is a forward position of the free world, of vital importance so long as the West does not consent to surrender the Middle East to the Russians. Is­ rael’s stability in the surrounding tur­ moil is little short of a miracle, and the small army of international cor­ respondents who settled on Tel Aviv on the day after the Iraqi coup left disappointed a few days later when they saw that there was no total mobil­ ization, no frantic hoarding of food­ stuffs, no run on the banks and no panic on the foreign currency ex­ change.

There is a theory that Russia, too, is interested in this country’s exist­ ence. So, at any rate, the Russian

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Ambassador has assured local party leaders. The fact of Israel does ensure that Nasser will not get out of hand.

And certainly the gloomy predictions that Khruschev would come out in support of Nasser’s demand for a return to Israel’s 1947 borders, after their talks in Moscow, proved un­ founded.

In a statement to the Knesseth Mr. Ben Gurion spoke of the need to strengthen Israel’s security and to win new friends. Golda Meir and Shimon Peres (Director General of the Min­ istry of Defense), have had talks with General de Gaulle and other French statesmen on both of these points.

Peres, in particular, has been making a tour of Paris, London and Washing­ ton, seeking supplies of heavy equip­ ment, although there are as yet only faint signs of a more understanding attitude in the two latter. The atmo­ sphere is also favorable for an im­ provement in relations with Iran and Turkey, whose less-than-cordial atti­ tude towards Israel, in deference to their Iraqi ally, was the subject of much criticism in both countries. efforts to secure arms have been stimulated by a variety IofSRAEL’S proposals for neutralizing the Mid­ dle East, including one envisaging

Leni Sonnenfetd

D uring a m om ent of re lax atio n n e a r the S yrian border, UN truce superv isio n officers co m pare notes. From left to right they re p re se n t S w eden, F inland, Israel a n d C a n a d a .

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JEWISH LIFE

some sort of United Nations super­ vision. An arms embargo, which would be an integral feature of any such scheme, would place Israel at a dis­ advantage, both because of the vast stockpiles of weapons, supplied by Russia and the West, already avail­ able in the Arab ¡countries, and the fact that while Israel’s contingent bor­ ders are already sealed, the frontiers of the Arab countries can scarcely be controlled. The failure of UN observ­ ers to supervise less than one hundred miles of Syro-Lebanese frontier does not augur well for the success of any such plan.

Russia, riding on the crest of the Arab nationalist wave, might regard neutralization favorably, in the knowl­ edge that Nasser is in any case doing her work for her, and in the hope that a non-intervention agreement would prevent the West from repeating the dispatch of troops to Lebanon and Jordan in support of other threatened pro-Western governments. Neutraliza­ tion, of course, would only exclude outside intervention—notably by the Great Powers, It cannot impose any restriction upon subversion inspired and directed from within. Mention has already been made of Nasser’s underground organization, operating in more than a dozen countries, through local legal and illegal parties and poli­ tical groups. Nasser’s immediate am­ bition—the first phase in his wider plans—is the unification and neutrali­ zation of all the Arab countries. Since this definition would involve the liqui­ dation of all Middle Eastern bases, it suits Russia’s book perfectly. Hitherto Russia has shown no interest in ac­ quiring bases of its own in this area, while it has only a negative interest in Middle Eastern oil—to prevent its flow to the West. Nasser, Russia knows, is prisoner of his own aggresOctober, 1958

sive policies. By squandering his coun­ try’s resources, by mortgaging Egypt’s cotton crop for years ahead to buy arms, by alienating Egypt’s best cus­ tomers, by frightening away foreign investors and by completely neglect­ ing his program for economic devel­ opment and social reform, he has cre­ ated a situation forcing him to engage in xenophobia and foreign adventure to silence criticism and resentment at home.

SRAEL is fully aware that the belief that it is possible to come to terms with Nasser’s brand of Arab national­ ism, still current in highly influential circles in Western capitals, is a major threat to herself. Only France, under pressure of Nasser’s trouble-making in North Africa, has finally rid itself of this delusion, which holds that: the creation of Israel was a mistake; she exists and must be accepted, but it is still possible to minimize some of the more harmful consequences. Force Israel back to her 1947 borders, re­ strict immigration, and compel her to receive back the Arab refugees and you have a basis for an understand­ ing with Nasser. Nasser, after all, only wants Arab unity and neutrality, neither of which are objectionable to the West. In regard to oil, Britain and Western Europe are its natural con­ sumers so a commercial agreement can be reached to the satisfaction of all concerned.

There are, of course, none so blind as those who will not see. The men of Munich refused to see. Certainly the British, from their own experience, should know better. After all Britain came to terms with Arab nationalism in 1915 and consistently supported it down to 1948. Throughout this period it successively divested itself of its other international obligations in the

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Middle East, perverted the Balfour Declaration and the Mandate, forced out France, attempted to sabotage the creation of the Jewish State. As head of the nationalist movement, the Bri­ tish chose the most natural candidate, Hussein, Sherif of Mecca and a direct descendent of the Prophet, second in the Islamic hierarchy only to the Caliph himself. In 1945 Anthony Eden renewed Britain’s alliance with Pan-Arabism, when he stood godfather to the Arab League. With what re­ sult? Great Britain today is regarded as Public Enemy Number One of the Arabs!

T IS still not clear whether, when, where, and what sort of a Summit Conference will be held. Israel’s de­ mands, based upon the assumption that it will be more than just another propaganda match and will make a serious attempt to come to grips with some of the problems of the region,

I

have been set forth by David Ben Gurion. A basic premise of Israel’s attitude is that it will not be bound by any decision adopted at such a conference, held without her partici­ pation and consent, in any matter in which a decision is taken directly or indirectly injurious to her interests.

Mr. Ben Gurion has also declared that any attempt against Israel’s territory will meet military force. Finally he has insisted that Israel must meet the Arabs face to face and without media­ tion, to reach a peace settlement in keeping with the terms of the Armis­ tice Agreement and the principles of the United Nations and that the Arabs must abstain from economic warfare, including the boycott, the blocking of the Suez Canal and the Kirkuk-Haifa pipeline.

If the Great Powers can persuade the Arabs to sit down with Israel the Summit Conference has some chance of success.

Re: JEW ISH LIFE We are pleased to call to the attention of our readers the restoration of the original form of our magazine’s title appearing on the outside masthead and inside “logotype”. This is now again as it had been initially, just: J e w is h L i f e .

For a prolonged period, this title had been duplicated by another magazine.

Pending final acceptance of our claim to sole rights to the title, the word “ortho­ dox” was prefixed to our title on the masthead, to preclude confusion. Our patience was rewarded when the other publication agreed to change its name.

Thus the title J e w is h L if e — which in our case surely requires no further quali­ fication — is now again that of our magazine alone.

16

JEWISH LIFE

Sukkah in Bavaria Courtesy U. S. A r m y Engineers

By OSCAR M. ÜFSHUTZ

66 /CHAPLAIN,” the voice on the

telephone asked, “what in the Sam Hill is a Sukkah?” You sure you spelled it right?”

“Certainly,” I answered the Lieu­ tenant from the engineering section.

“It’s spelled right.”

“But it’s not in the book, Chaplain.

How about changing the nomencla­ ture?”

Thus began my friendly encounter with the U. S. Army Engineers to build a Sukkah for the Feast of Tabernacles in Munich, Germany.

Now don’t get me wrong. The Army can build anything, but they have to know what they are building and there are always a few technicalities to be complied with if you want to have it done right or at all. G.I.s call it red-tape. But that’s not true. It’s a matter of getting the right idea to the right place in proper form, and of course,— with proper approval. The Army will build a 500-foot TV tower if you can prove you’re entitled to it, or build a bridge across the deepest gorge if you can assure them that you have to cross it. But when it comes to building a Sukkah—that’s another matter.

FEW weeks before Rosh Hashonah of last year I conferred with Chaplain Terry, my administra­ tive chief, and laid out my plans for the High Holy Days and Sukkoth.

He was enthused with the entire pro­ gram and told me to make sure to

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October, 1958

put my requisitions in on time. Thus I had gotten across the first hurdle when I cleared my program and the other Chaplain concurred. A chapel shared by many faiths requires pro­ gramming and when men of under­ standing get together, even though they represent diverse faiths and opinions, the U. S. Army is where you learn to work together.

Then I called in my assistant, Sam Roth, and told him to type up a 447 which is the Army way of putting in a work-order. We dispatched it im­ mediately to the Engineers for action.

A few days later a German civilian called on the phone and asked for the Chaplain. When I answered the phone he asked,. “Chaplain, was ist das—Sukkah?” I explained to him the nature of the Sukkah and gave him a brief idea as to its construction. “Oh, zie wollen ein chapel annex haben,” he answered. “This is verboten. Keine building. Military economy.”

I again explained to him that this Sukkah didn’t have a roof and was only a temporary structure. He quickly answered that this would make no difference but if I would hang on for a moment he would check it with the boss. After waiting for a while I heard his voice again and he told me that the boss might go along with me but added with a chuckle, “Warum keine roof? For the same money and approval sie kennen ein roof haben.”

“But I don’t want a roof,” I an17

swered heatedly. “I just want a Suk­ kah.”

It was then that the Lieutenant in charge of the Engineering Section got on the phone and asked me what a Sukkah was.

“Long ago when the Children of Israel came out of Egypt and traveled in the desert, they lived in booths,” I started to tell him. And after a few moments of Scriptural history I conveyed to him the significance of the Sukkah.

“We’ll approve it, Chaplain,” he answered, “and I’ll send my represen­ tative out to see you.”

E WERE still far from having a Sukkah but were over the major hump. The next morning a represen­ tative came out to see me and we vis­ ited the chapel grounds. “How large do you want it?” he asked as we sur­ veyed our possible location. I gave him a rough idea as to our needs. “Ah, come on, Chaplain,” he said, “as long as we’re building a Sukkah, let’s build a big one!” I tried to explain to him that I didn’t want to overdo it and every time I measured, he added on a couple of feet for good measure.

“Now Chaplain,” he said, “let’s un­ derstand something. Maybe you were a little modest; let me give you a roof.”

“But we don’t want a roof,” I said.

“It would be contrary to Jewish law and it wouldn’t be a Sukkah if it had one.”

“It rains awful bad here in Bavaria and I for one am well acquainted with the liquid sunshine we have been re­ ceiving.”

“Don’t worry,” I told him, “it never rains on Jewish holidays.”

With a mirthful look he assured me it would be accomplished accord­ ing to our plans and religious direc­

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18

tives. But we still didn’t have a Suk­ kah!

Next I had to get permission from the supervisor of grounds in order to put up the structure. Then we called the fire department to get their con­ currence. They assured us it would be approved if they could come in and fireproof the place before it was used. Then we called the utilities to get permission to put an electric exten­ sion line from the chapel into the Sukkah. Permission was granted.

FEW days later as I left my home across the street from the chapel, I witnessed a beautiful sight.

There by the chapel was a huge Army truck being unloaded by its crew. I went over to see what was going on and found to my extreme satisfaction that the U. S. Army Engineers were ready to tackle the problem— one de­ luxe Sukkah for the Jewish Chaplain.

While the crew began to lay out ma­ terials, one of the German civilians assisting came over to me and whis­ pered quietly, “Ya, I know was ist ein Sukkah. Years ago there was one of your people who used to build a Sukkah behind his house.”

“Years ago?” I asked him.

He answered in a mournful tone, “It was before they took him away.”

By mid-afternoon our Sukkah was completed. It was a delight to behold!

Several of the Jewish GIs came out and gave it their approving nods. We were happy but we still had some problems to overcome. We needed “schach”—the covering for the Suk­ kah. Although we cover the top with foliage, it must allow those inside to peer through and see the stars. My delegation of Jewish boys went to see the Forester of Perlacher Forst, the area in which we reside. When I ex­ plained to him what we needed, he

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JEWISH LIFE

not only gave us his immediate ap­ proval but asked us if we would like to have a few trees planted around it.

I told him that it wasn’t necessary and thanked him profusely.

The Jewish Women’s Club came down and decorated the Sukkah with fruit, candy, tinsel* the bright autumn foliage, and the aromatic pine cones.

Army folding tables and chairs were brought in. Sam Roth stood on a ladder and hung up strings of bright red apples handed to him by my wife, Miriam, Frieda Kolieb, and Mrs. Cill Reitler, who also filled little paper bags with sweets, nuts and surprise gifts for the children.

HEN we ran into a most hilarious situation. The school children on their homeward way stopped to take notice. They asked why couldn’t they have a Sukkah too. The children of our neighbors wanted to know if

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October, 1958

they could have a party in it after the Jewish Children were through. Our neighbors arrived to congratulate us.

I arranged with the Christian chap­ lain to take the Sunday School chil­ dren into the Sukkah. The Sunday sightseers came by in droves. One commented that at last the Army had begun to build a chapel annex.

But little did they know that out here in southern Bavaria, across the street from Stadleheim Prison of Nazi infamy—on the edge of a forest, a Sukkah was filled with joyous sons and daughters of Israel who were com­ memorating the Feast of Tabernacles.

The walls hid from our sight the tyr­ anny and terror that once lived here.

They now encompassed the merry throng and hid from sight the dread reminders of the past—we looked upward in song through the roof and saw the stars.

19

What is a

J

By I. GRUNFELD

HE controversy over “What is a Jew” which is still agitating Jews through­ out the world was caused by the definition of the Government of Israel, fof the purpose of the national identity card, of the term Jew as meaning “any one who chooses in good faith to call himself a Jew and who does not profess any other religion”. Although, following world-wide protests and the with­ drawal of the National Religious Party from Israel’s coalition Government, the Prime Minister of Israel has had to cancel the directives issued by the Israeli Minister of the Interior concerning the registration of children of mixed marriages, the subject of “What is a Jew” is bound to be re-opened again.

This problem goes far beyond the realm of politics, and is not confined to the State of Israel. It touches the very essence of Judaism, the character of Jewish nationhood, the identity, and with it the survival, of the Jewish people.

According to Jewish Law there are two possible ways only of acquiring the status of a Jew. Either to be born of a Jewish mother (Holed Kemothah ) 1 or to be received into Judaism by the proper legal procedure of proselytization (Ger Tzedek ).2 The direction of the Israeli Minister of the Interior, later confirmed by the Government of Israel, according to which children of a mixed marriage where the mother is a non-Jewess can be registered as Jews if both parents agree, is in clear contradiction to the law of the Torah. Apart from this, it is self-contradictory and devoid of any meaning whatever. The State of Israel is entitled to lay down conditions of citizenship of that State, but the secular organs cannot answer the religious question of what is a Jew, unless such a definition satisfies religious law. The direction of the Israeli Minister of the Interior contains neither a definition of Israeli citizenship nor a correct definition of what is a Jew, in accordance with Jewish law. By adding to the direction the proviso that the person calling himself a Jew must not profess any other religion, the Israeli Government brought a religious element into the definition which is illogical and confusing. If the conditions of citizenship are laid down by a modern democratic secular state, the question of religion does not arise. If on the other hand a religious status is defined, it can only be defined according to the tenets of that religion.

The recent statement by the Attorney General of Israel “. . . The fact that according to the Law of Moses and Israel a man is not accepted as a Jew does not prevent that man from being considered as a Jew so far as the laws of the State are concerned . . .” is devoid of meaning. So is the statement attributed to Mr. Moshe Sharett: “A Jew is a person honestly describing him-

T

1 Cf. Devorim VII, 3,4 in conjuhction with b. Talmud Kiddushin 66b. Mishnah and 68b; Maimonides, Issurey Biah Chap. XII; Shulchan Aruch Even Haezer Chap. XVI 2 Cf. b. Talmud Yevamoth 46; Maimonides, Issurey Bia Chap. XIV; Shulchan Aruch Yoreh Deah, Chap. 266.

20

JEWISH LIFE

self as a Jew”. Again one must ask, does the statement refer to citizenship or to religion? If it refers to the former surely nobody would say for instance that a person who honestly considers himself a British citizen, is a British citizen. If it refers to the latter, i.e., to religion, surely the rules of that religion must be consulted as to who can be considered to belong to that religion. As the Jewish scholar and folklorist, L. Olsvanger, has rightly pointed out, the statement of Mr. Sharett amounts to saying that “a circle is a geomet­ rical figure called a circle.” There is much more truth in Olsvanger’s own definition of a Jew which, though meant in a more jocular way, has also a serious side to it by bringing out the predominantly religious element in the definition of a Jew. Olsvanger says “A Jew is a man who puts on Tefilin, or who does not and is blamed by those who do.” m HE QUESTION will be asked, what has brought the Israeli Government to such aT*dangerous muddle, and what necessity was there to get involved in the whole problem, when all that was needed seems to be a definition of Israeli citizenship. The answer to this question is that the Israelis were caught by the illogical and historically untrue conception of a secular Jewish nation­ alism. A Jew is not just simply to be defined like an Englishman, a Frenchman, or a German, by nationality or citizenship. The Jewish nation is unique inasmuch as the national and religious elements are inseparably interwoven.

As we say in our prayers: “Thou are one, and Thy name is one, and who is like Thy people Israel, a unique nation on the earth?” (See also I. Chron. XVII, 2-21). From the point of view of a secular Jewish nationalism, the left-wing parties in Israel are seemingly logical in maintaining that the word “Jewish” may denote nationality only and that a man can call himself Jewish by nationality and Christian or Moslem by religion. But such a conception of secular Jewish nationalism makes nonsense of all Jewish history and con­ tradicts the historical phenomenon of the Jewish people in which nationality and religion are fused in one.

This unity of the national and the religious is not an accident of Jewish history. It flows from the very essence of Judaism and its fundamental belief in the unity of life, which for the Jew is the logical sequence of the Unity of G-d. That is why the Torah knows no division of life into departments of religious and secular, or religious and national. The splitting up of the elements of Judaism or the Jewish people will never succeed, because it is unnatural, and contradicts the tenets of the Torah as well as the innate reli­ gious genius of our people. The latest statement by the Israeli Prime Minister, Mr. Ben-Gurion, that the Government did not take it upon themselves to decide who is a religious Jew, but that the issue before the Government was, who is a national Jew, only begs the question.

T

• '-

HI.

■

T IS highly characteristic that the first abortive attempt in Jewish history at an artificial separation of the religious and national elements in Judaism was due to outside influence, and like the present attempt was, significantly,

I

j&Ctofrgr, 1958

21

associated with the problem of mixed marriage. It arose from one of the questions put in 1806 by Napoleon’s Imperial Commissioners to the Assembly of Jewish Notables in Paris: “May a Jewess marry a Christian or a Christian woman a Jew?” The members of the Assembly realized very well that this question was put by the Imperial Commissioners in order to test the allegation of the opponents of Jewish emancipation that owing to the segregation enforced upon the Jew by his national religion, he could never fully identify himself with the nations among whom he dwells and was therefore not entitled to emancipation and equal citizenship. The Assembly of Notables gave an answer which skillfully evaded the issue. But hedging and side-stepping, useful as they may seem for the moment, are dangerous in the long run as far as religious truth is concerned. Here too, the consequences of this spiritual hedging for the inner life of Jewry proved very dangerous, as we shall see later. In the answer of the commission appointed by the Assembly, it was stated that, according to the view of the Bible, only marriages with Canaanite nations were forbidden. Even according to the Talmud, the Commission pointed out, intermarriages were allowed because the nations of Europe were not considered as idolaters. The Rabbis, however, the Commission continued, were opposed to such unions, seeing that the necessary ceremonies could not be performed in the usual way, just as the Catholic priests refused their assistance on such occasions. This refusal, nevertheless, was of little con­ sequence, because civil marriages were recognized by the State.1 This reply of the Assembly of Notables worked out by a special Commis­ sion, contains a number of half-truths for which reason it was originally opposed by the orthodox members of the Assembly. It is true that the Biblical Text (Devorim VII, 7ff) which prohibits intermarriage, literally refers to the Canaanite nations only. But it has always been the accepted Halachic view that this prohibition includes the marriage with other non-Jews as well;2 the difference being that whilst a marriage with other heretofore non-Jews is permissible after they have become proselytes in a proper manner, marriage with the Canaanite nations remains forbidden even after proselytization .3 Instead of side-stepping the issue, the Commission should have stressed that the segregation of the Jewish people enforced by the Torah, does not imply looking down on other nations or considering them as inferior races. The prohibition is rather a necessary safeguard to preservation of the identity of the Jew and to enable him to carry out his task in the world, to testify to G-d and the spiritual values of life, as G-d’s chosen people. This is evident from the Biblical Text itself, which is the source of both the prohibition of inter­ marriage and the legal dictum that in Jewish Law the personal status of a Jew is derived from that of the mother.1 For thou art a holy people unto the Lord thy G-d; The Lord thy G-d hath chosen thee to be His own treasure, out of all peoples that are upon the face of the earth. (Devorim VII, 6.)

1 Cf. H. Graetz Geschichte der Juden, Leipzig 1870. Vol. XI, ppg. 287, 288; English Edition “History of the Jews”, London (Jewish Chronicle Office) 1901. pp. 522 and 523. * Maimonides, Hilchoth Issure Biah. XII, I.; Shulchan Aruch Even Harzer, XVI. 3 b.. Talmud Kiddushin 68b. Yebamoth 76a. See also Malachi Chap.Tl, Verse 12 and Ezra Chaps.

IX arid X. 1 Devorim Chap. VII, 3-9.

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JEWISH LIFE

IV. HE ANSWER of the Assembly of Notables referred to before, was later ratified by the so-called great Synhedrion convened in Paris by Napoleon, who seemed to be satisfied with the answer. Napoleon was willing to grant emancipation to the Jews as individuals, but not as a nation. He bad accepted the view that Judaism consists of a combination of religious and moral ideas which are of permanent value, and legal, national, and political elements which had lost all significance since the downfall of the Jewish State. Inside Jewry, however, it was clear to any one with an understanding of Judaism that any differentiation between the national, legal, and religious-moral elements of the Torah was an artificial one, until a generation later the German-Jewish Reformer Samuel Holdheim took up this idea again. In his work on the “Autonomy of the Rabbis and the Principle of Jewish Marriage” ,2 Holdheim expounded in all seriousness the theory that in Judaism only the religiousethical ideas were permanently binding, owing to their universal character, whereas the laws of the Torah, which were national and political in character, and those connected in any way with the existence of the Jewish State, had lost their binding character for the Jew, after the disappearance of the Jewish State.3 Thus Holdheim, who was the most radical amongst Jewish Reformers, de­ clared the laws of Sabbath observance, the Jewish laws of marriage and divorce, and many other laws of the Torah, which in his view were connected with the existence of the Jewish State, as no longer binding. Even the initiation into the Covenant of Abraham was no longer held to be essential for the Jew. Holdheim’s abandonment of the National element in Judaism finally led him to encourage intermarriage.1 No wonder that such radical and destructive measures aroused fierce opposition even among rabbis and scholars who did not consider themselves as belonging to Orthodoxy, such as the famous historians Heinrich Graetz and Simon Dubnow. Graetz, for example, was so indignant at Holdheim’s attempt to separate the religious and national elements in Judaism, and to declare our religious-national laws and aspirations as no longer valid, that he wrote of Holdheim: “Since Paul of Tarsus Judaism had never known such an enemy in its midst who shook the whole edifice to its very foundation” .2

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2 “Ueber die Autonomie der Rabbiner und das Prinzip der juedischen Ehe, Schwerin, 1843. See also the same author’s “Vorschlaege zu einer zeitgemaessen Reform der juedischen Ehegesetze (1845); and “Das Religioese und Politische im Judentum (1845), 3 Holdheim’s “Autonomie der Rabbiner, etc.” pp. 14, 15, 21 and 45. i In a wedding address which is printed in the 4th Vol. of Holdheim’s sermons and headed “Address on the Occasion of the Solemnization of a Mixed Marriage,” Holdheim addressed the bride and bride­ groom as follows: “Although you belong to different religions, your happiness will remain unmarred as long as you are united in love. Outside your home you may worship in different churches as long as the cult in your home is the same. Your roads to heaven may differ as long as you walk together the road of virtue on earth—then you will meet again at the goal.” See also Holdheim’s “Gemischte Ehenzwischen Juden und Christen” Berlin 1850, and his “Das Religiose und Politische im Judentum mit besonderer Beziehung auf gemischte Ehen, Schwerin” 1845. In his “Vorschlaege zu einer zeitge­ maessen Reform der juedischen Ehegesetze,’ Schwerin, 1845, para. 29, Holdheim explicitly states that mixed-marriages between Jews and non-Jews are valid also from the Jewish religious point of view and may be solemnized by a rabbi according to the rites of the Jews even in cases when the non-Jew has not been received into Judaism.

2 cf. H. Graetz, Geschichte der Juden, Leipzig 1870, Vol. XI, pp. 565, 566; English edition, “History of the Jews”, by Prof. H. Graetz, London (Jewish Chronicle Office) 1901, pp. 726, and 727.

October, 1958

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This judgment may seem rather harsh; but one must not forget that Graetz’s historical insight told him that any separation of the religious and the national in Jewish life would undermine the very existence of our people. Similarly Dubnow, the protagonist of the conception of Jewish national autonomy, reproaches Holdheim as having turned Jewish history upside down. Of the reform of Holdheim and his disciples, Dubnow says: “It was a complete submission of Judaism to the demands of the moment, a sub­ mission of religion to the aims of Germanisation and civil emancipation. The men who stood between the graves of the fathers and the cradles of the children proved as good gravediggers for the old but as bad promoters of the new. In the national sense they were dedicated to death and the reform carried through by them was bare of historic roots and was therefore stillborn and devoid of all life . . . without any understanding of Jewish history, these men did not realize that by destroying the national element of Jewish culture, they also destroyed the soul of Judaism”3

V. HE PRESENT ruling of the Israeli Government contains in essence the same fatal mistake as the ruling of the Paris Assembly of Notables, and the assimilationist Reform philosophy of Holdheim. The difference is only that the Jewish assimilationists of the Emancipation epoch dropped the national element in the term “Jew” in order to please Napoleon and his advisors, who aimed at undermining ¿he identity of the Jewish people by encouraging mixed marriages, whereas the Jewish-national assimilationists of the present Government of Israel seek to drop the religious element in defining the term “Jew” in order to please those Israeli citizens or immigrants who live in mixed marriages.

According to the statement of the Israel government, the definition for the purposes of the national identity card of the term “Jew” is not supposed to interfere with the right of the Rabbinical Courts to deal with questions of personal status, such as marriage and divorce, in accordance with the definition of the term “Jew” as laid down by the Halochah. This means in practice that two authorities, both empowered by the same Government—the Rabbinate and the Ministry of the Interior—whose conception of what is a Jew are diamet­ rically opposed, are entitled to express their conflicting views in each indi­ vidual case by issuing contradictory documents. This is clearly both a con­ stitutional and a practical impossibility, which would ¡probably lead to the Rabbinical Courts having to give up their prerogative of dealing authorita­ tively with questions of personal status of Israel. The Israeli Rabbinate would then be forced to set up its own genealogical registry. In a comparatively short time, the Israeli population would then be divided into two sections, which would be unable to inter-marry with each other. The section of the population registered with the Rabbinate would continue to be Jews in the traditional sense and be eligible for marriage with any proper Jew throughout the world. The other section would be quasi-Jews and ineligible for marirage with those whose personal status is ruled by the Halochah. Thus the State of

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3 S. M. Dubnow “Die neueste Geschichte des juedischen Volkes, Vol. II. 1920 pp. 86, 87, 95; 24

JEWISH LIFE

Israel would have succeeded in doing something which two thousand years of Diaspora history and persecution have not been able to achieve—the division of the House of Israel. ® T THE beginning of our national History, when Jacob and his sons went to Egypt, the Torah recalls this event with the words: Every man and his household came with Jacob. Says Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch: “This spirit of the family, with which each son builds his home only as a branch of his father’s house which allows every father and grandfather to go on living in children and grandchildren, so that parents with their children, and children with their parents are ever intimately united—this is wherein lies the root of Israel’s eternal blossoming, wherein lies the secret of the everlasting stem of Jewry.”1 The question of the personal status of the Jew touches the very core of Jewish family life and survival. All the other great problems of Jewish religious life like Sabbath Observance, Kashruth, and Education cannot be compared in gravity to this problem. A Jew who does not observe the Sabbath or the Dietary Laws will perhaps find a way to observe them in future; the way back is always open. But in the sphere of personal status there is an awful finality which rends the Jewish people apart and prevents marriages between one Jewish section and the other. Moreover, the ruling of the Israeli Government is bound to encourage mixed marriages throughout Jewry in the Diaspora, whose identity is already threatened by the steadily increas­ ing number of intermarriages. Surely the last thing one had expected of the movement of Jewish national revival, which has led to the creation of the State of Israel, was that the Government of that State would by its actions condone and assist mixed marriages.

Unless the Government of Israel confine themselves to the question of citizenship, and leave the question of what is a Jew to the religious Courts of Israel, they are bound to undermine the identity and existence of the Jewish people, which has been upheld against all odds during the viccissitudes of the last two thousand years of our dispersion among the nations.

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VI. HE splitting up of the conception of the Jewish people as A m Kodosh into religious and national (i.e., i “secular”) elements, also destroys the T very essence of the Jewish philosophy of life. Mr. Ben Gurion is reported to have stated that Israel is a Secular State and not a Theocracy. This utter­ ance too, is the outcome of an assimilationist philosophy, as is Mr. BenGurion’s statement that the Israeli Government only wants to define the term “national Jew”, and not the term “religious Jew”. The conception of our people as Am Kodosh does not know any differentiation between religious and national Jew. And as to the term of “Theocracy”, this too comes from outside Judaism. Josephus, who seems to have been the first within Jewry to use this term, acknowledged that only by “straining the expression” may 1 Commentary on the Pentateuch, *Exod, 1,1, translated by Dr. Isaac Levy, London 1956.

October, 1958

25

the term be applied to the Jewish State.1 The word ‘Theocracy” is usually defined as a State governed by G-d directly or through a sacerdotal class.

The Torah, however, does not speak of a Theocracy, but of a “A Kingdom of Priests and a Holy Nation”. This does not mean a nation which is ruled by a priestly caste but a commonwealth where every home is a temple and every table an altar; where the fields and meadows, the workshops and the market-places are just as much the scenes of Divine service as the house of worship. And that is why the injunctions of the Bible are not limited in their scope to what is usually called the “religious” sphere but are concerned with commercial and public life as with prayer and character training.

In our days, more than ever before, it is necessary to return to the classic conception of religion as co-extensive with the whole of life, a conception which underlies the Torah. Hebrew, the classical language of the Bible, has no word for “religion”. This seemingly strange phenomenon can easily be explained. Religion, in the Biblical conception, must permeate life in all its aspects, individual, economic, social and political. The Bible does not use the word “religion” because to the Bible everything is religious. To set aside a part of life and call it the realm of religion is the negation of the philosophy of the Bible; indeed, it borders on blasphemy because it implies there is a sphere of life from which G-d is excluded. The unity of life is as important an axiom in the religious view of the Bible as the unity of G-d. Life is one and indivisible just as G-d is one and indivisible; and no aspect of life, indi­ vidual or collective, is outside the rule of G-d and His law. This is the meaning of the saying in Proverbs (3:6): In all thy ways acknowledge Him, and He will direct thy paths.

HE OUTLOOK of the Israeli rulers is not even modern. It lags behind the times and is in contradiction to the best thought of our days. The divorce of the sacred and secular has proved to be the curse of European civilization and the root cause of the crisis of our times. The separation of State and Religion is a compromise which was made in order to enable Europe to keep the pagan tradition of Greece and Rome as the standard of our material society. Only after the secularization of political thought had been accomplished, was religion changed from the keystone which holds together the social edifice into a small department within it.

The classical Jewish conception of the unity of the sacred and the secular, of the religious and the national, is gaining ground more and more among leading contemporary thinkers. Religion should embrace the whole of life; whenever there is a vacuum left by religion, paganism in an old or new garb creeps in. It is, indeed, a fundamental religious error to try to “localize”

T

In this context it is of interest to refer to Psalm C whose few verses contain a universal call to all the peoples of the earth to join with Israel in the worship of G-d and to serve Him in gladness. The mird verse reads: Know ye that the Lord He is G-d; it is He that hath made its, and we are His; Irlv u - e flock ° f His pasture. In the Hebrew text the Massorah has preserved a Kere V Kethib which is a striking illustration of the metaphysical character of our nationhood. The Kere (reading of the Hebrew text) is [“It is He that hath made us] and we are His”. But the Kethib (written text) runs [ It is He that hath made us] and not we ourselves)”. Indeed, Israel is either His, G-ds people, or it is non-existent. This conception which underlies the Massoretic text is much more than mere homiletics—it is stark historic reality.

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JEWISH LIFE

G-d in a house of worship. G-d is either everywhere or He is nowhere; and the Law of G-d either rules supreme in all aspects of life or it rules nowhere effectively. If there is any totalitarianism which is justified, it is the totalitarian rule of the moral Law of G-d in the life of the individual no less than in the affairs of society and the relationships between nations. To be religious does not mean primarily to pray, although prayer is an essential part of all personal religion. To be religious means to conceive of all human activities as falling within one scheme whose character is determined by the spiritual destiny of mankind.

This dualism of life, this departmentalizing into religious and secular spheres with its conflicting moral standards, is the scourge of modern civiliza­ tion, the basic cause of its weakness in our day. The extension of the activities of organized religion, the fusion of the religious and the secular instead of their separation, is the paramount task of our time and the only means of healing a sick world.

Instead of helping our sick world to return to the classical conception of the Bible concerning the unity of the religious and the secular, instead of the “Law going out from Zion, and the word of G-d from Jerusalem the Israeli rulers of today introduce into the new Jewish Commonwealth the out-' worn and dangerous slogans of the separation of the religious and the secular, a conception which destroys the unity and spiritual foundation of life and has led to the bankruptcy of European civilization.

OR the present rulers of Israel to continue in this un-Jewish, assimilationist conception of Jewish nationhood, would amount to a betrayal of Israel’s task in the world. Moreover, to empty the term “Jew” of its religious meaning, would reflect upon the status of the Jew in the world, who with all loyalty as a citizen of the country where he lives, yet looks to the State of Israel in the Holy Land with love, affection, and active support. The bogy of dual loyalty is indeed nothing more than a bogy— as long as the Jewish nation is a nation sui generis, the people of G-d, the people of the Bible; a unique nation to which,7 as the older seer Balaam recognized, the usual terminology of ordinary nationhood cannot be applied.

If the Jewish people be secularized and Jewish nationhood be severed from its metaphysical foots, the House of Israel is robbed of its raison d etre; and it becomes impossible to comprehend our people’s extra-ordinary position in the world. The phenomenon of the Jewish people just does not make sense unless one applies to it the ancient term and conception of the people of G-d, “Thou art one, and Thy name is one, and who is like Thy people Israel, a unique nation on the earth?”

This is not the first attempt made in our history to destroy the concep­ tion of the Jewish people as Am Kodosh by splitting it up into so-called national and religious components. Like the previous attempts, the latest one will also fail, if the faithful remnant of Jewry are watchful and remain loyal to their task.

F

E ditor ’s N ote : A summary of Dayan Grunfeld’s views has previously appeared in

The Jewish

Chronicle” of England.

October, 1958

27

The Yeshivah Problem— A New Approach

By M ORRIS BRAFMAN

I

D ia g n o sis of basic financial ailments of the D a y School m ovem ent, an d

a bold prescription

ORTY years ago, the Jewish Com­ munal Register of New York City for 1917-1918 reported: “There are four Jewish Parochial Schools in America, all in New York City, with a total of 985 pupils, all boys. The teaching staff consists of 54 teachers, whose language of instruction is Yid­ dish. The annual cost of instruction is $70 per child, so that Jewish paro­ chial education costs approximately $70,000 annually/’ The four Paro­ chial schools were the Rabbi Jacob Joseph School on Henry Street, with 548 students and a $40,000 budget, the Talmudical Institute of Harlem on 114th St., with 100 students, the Yeshivath Rabbi Chaim Berlin on Prospect Place, Brooklyn, with 200 students, and Yeshivath Etz Chaim on Montgomery Street, with 137 stu­ dents.

In addition to 985 boys receiving their Jewish education in Yeshivoth, 64,000 or about 23.5% of a total of 275,000 Jewish children in the eight grades of the public schools in New York City were then receiving Jewish religipus instruction in the following manner: 31,000 in weekday-afternoon Talmud-Torahs, 8,000 in institutional Sunday Schools, 11,000 received pri­ vate tuition and 14,000 were in Che-

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for their cure.

dorim. Of the last named the Com­ munal Register of 1917-1918 wrote: “Many of the Chedorim are situated in unbelievable places, above stables, in back of stores, in cellars, in gar­ rets, badly ventilated and poorly lighted. The equipment is unsani­ tary and dilapidated, consisting usu­ ally of a rickety table and backless benches upon which the pupils spend their brief but uneasy period of learn­ ing . .

In summary: in 1917, 76.5% of all Jewish school children received no religious instruction at all, 5 % went to Chedorim, 11.6% to afternoon Tal­ mud Torahs, 2.9% to Sunday School, 3.6% received private instruction and 0.4% went to Yeshivoth. The wide Yeshivah Movement consisted of four schools, 985 boys and a yearly budget of $70,000. . . . Let us compare this with the situation in the year 1957.

The recorded Jewish school enroll­ ment in greater New York (according to the American Jewish Year Book for 1958) for the school year of 1955-56 was 133,000. According to a census of the Jewish child population of New York City of elementary and high school ages, the child population was 415,000 for that school year.

The Jewish school enrollment durI JEWISH LIFE

ing these years had grown from 64,000 to 133,000, or 108%. The increase in child population had grown from 275,000 To 415,000, or 51%. The school enrollment had thus grown faster than the increase in the child population. New York in this respect, followed, or set the trend, for the United States as a whole.

O DEVELOPMENT has been as striking or as vital as the growth N of the Hebrew Day School movement during the same period. From four Day Schools in 1917 to 17 in 1935, to 227 in 1958. Of these 109 are located in New York City, and 118 outside of New York City. Hebrew Day Schools are located in 78 com­ munities, in 24 states and the District of Columbia. This figure includes 50 secondary schools (Junior and/or Senior High Schools), 22 of which are located outside of New York City.

The total enrollment in all Hebrew Day Schools today is approximately 43,000. 28,500 children attend Day School in the greater New York area, and 14,500 attend Day School out­ side of the New York area. Over 50% of all Day Schools outside of New York City were founded by Torah Umesorah, while numerous others were founded by the Mizrachi movement’s Vaad Hachinuch Hatorani, and still others by the Lubavitcher Mercaz L’inyonei Chinuch.

1917-‘r-four Day Schools with 985 pupils, 1928— 227 with 43,000 stu­ dents. From 0.4% of the total school enrollment in 1917 to almost 10% of the total school enrollment in 1957 (488,432 according to the American Association for Jewish Education.)

In 1917 the “ideal” of many par­ ents with respect to Jewish education contained but three elements: fluency in the mechanical reading of prayers, October, 1958

knowledge of Kiddush and Kaddish and the ability to read the Haftorah assigned to the Bar Mitzvah boy. To­ day, parents and children demand a full Jewish education. From all indi­ cations the trend developed from parttime instruction, from afternoon and Sunday School to all-day YeshivahChinuch. This is the great challenge to our generation. Never before in the history of the Jews in America have the signs of awakening on the part of Jewish parents been so appar­ ent as today. The great majority of Jewish parents desire to give their chil­ dren a full Jewish education. Are we prepared to meet this challenge?

HE BUDGET of the Day Schools has risen from $70,000 yearly in T 1917/18 to $19,844,070 by 1958, and the cost per pupil from $70 to $461.49 (American Jewish Year Book, 1958, page 135).

The magnitude of the problem of meeting this challenge becomes evi­ dent from a view of its financial as­ pects.

The devotion of teachers and prin­ cipals, the administrative staffs, and practically everybody connected with Yeshivoth goes far beyond the call of duty. The work of all volunteers who for forty years have nurtured the movement from the primitive small beginnings to today’s remarkable posi­ tion in Jewish life is one of the most; noble accomplishments in Jewish his­ tory. The financial problem, however, is gigantic. The average Jewish par­ ent has more than one child of school age, he cannot afford to pay $500 for each child yearly, and thousands are being accepted for only a few dollars per month, because that is all their parents can afford. These are the stark facts. The grave predicament of the Yeshivah Day School Movement 29

is: the methods of financing and fund raising have not improved over these forty years.

HEREIN lies the problem. In many European countries, in for­ T mer days, all Jews belonged to their

tensive operations—streamlined, effi­ cient, modern and systematic, and surely vastly more up to date than their parents’ enterprises of forty years ago.

Why these men and women who are the financial backbone of the Yeshivah Movement (many thousands of them graduates of these institutions) have not introduced into their Yeshivoth the same administrative techniques which are “conditio sine qua non” in their own businesses and professions is one of the incomprehensible phennomena of the American Jewish scene.

Kehillah. The Kehillah took care of all communal needs. Kashruth, Chinuch, Charity, Hospitals, GemilathChesed, Chevra Kaddishah, every­ thing. And the Kehillah was empow­ ered by governmental law to tax every member in accordance with his earn­ ings. Thus the Jewish community functioned in orderly, regulated, legal HE solution? The problem of democratic fashion. Here in our free financing the Yeshivah Movement country, institutions in Jewish life can develop only on a voluntary system must be approached on a national scale: The Yeshivah Movement has based upon inner persuasion.

The Yeshivah Movement has made grown to the scope and status of fill­ tremendous strides—in size, in con­ ing an educational function on a na­ tent, in influence, in altering the whole tional scale. Accordingly, its mainte­ Jewish outlook, in reshaping Jewish nance is a national problem, to be life; yet its method of administration solved only on a nationwide basis. has remained almost as primitive, in­ The amount of money necessary to efficient, and wasteful as forty years cover the difference between the schar ago. Its methods of “doing business” limud which Jewish parents can afford have not basically changed. The same and the actual cost must be looked old Meshulochim roam the country, upon as the proud obligation of Am­ the same Melavah-Malkoth and Din­ erican Jews at large. We can be con­ ners, the same journals and bazaars— fident that the latter have matured primitive, costly, wasteful as forty enough to have understanding of and years ago. The same desperate ap­ respect for the necessity of traditional peals in synagogues and shtibelach for Jewish education for every child unpaid teachers, for the poor and whose parents desire to give it to him.

Parallel to the existing two great hungry students, for the unpaid bills of the butcher and baker, the milkman fund raising agencies, the United Jew­ and the oil company. The same ap­ ish Appeal and the Community Fed­ peals, the same emergencies every erations and Welfare Funds, a third week, the same crude, ineffectual ap­ one, an Independent Appeal for Tra­ proach as forty years ago. And all ditional Jewish Education, must be that in contrast to the fact that today organized on a national basis.

Some of those with whom I have there are perhaps 50,000 or more American orthodox Jewish business discussed this idea object to the crea­ and professional men, men of the tion of a third fund-raising agency. modern era. Each of these conducts They demand, on the contrary, that a business or profession involving ex- the existing ones be approached* to

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JEWISH LIFE

include the Yeshivah Movement in their list of beneficiaries. If organi­ zations such as the American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Con­ gress, the Jewish Welfare Board, Bnai Brith, etc., as well as hospitals and other institutions, are beneficiaries of the major fund campaigns, why not the Education Movement of the Yeshivahs?

Even leaders of the Reform Move­ ment complain bitterly about the lack of understanding on the part of the Federations for the need to support educational institutions. A national leader of the Reform group was quoted in the New York Times of October 13, 1957 as protesting that of the more than $130,000,000 that had been contributed in recent years

by American Jews for Jewish health, welfare, refugee, and overseas pro­ grams, considerably less than $5,000,000 (4% ) has been made available for institutions that have as their goal “the preservation and strengthening of Judaism.”

Those who urge the inclusion of the Yeshivah Movement by the two major fund raising agencies point out that Jewish education is the basis without October, 1958

which fund-raising institutions and charitable agencies cannot long sur­ vive if the new generation is to be imbued with the solemn duty to con­ tinue our heritage, to give Tzedakah.

The U.J.A. and the Federations, these assent,s^are well organized and quite capablelof raising a few additional mil­ lions yearly to take care of the Yeshi­ vah Movement’s deficit. Furthermore, they insist, orthodox Jewry is suffi­ ciently active in U.J.A. and the Fed­ erations, to be in a rightful position to insist that their specific needs for educational institutions be taken care of by these agencies.

No one can refute the logic of this reasoning. To our regret, however, it is the grim reality that the people in control of U.J.A. and the Federations are not ready to comply with our wishes. Not yet. They lack under­ standing even of the educational de­ mands of the non-orthodox move­ ments, which are ideologically so close to the way of thinking of many of them. One can readily imagine, then, how much understanding and appre­ ciation one can find there today for our traditional Chinuch.

FTER long and intensive study of the problem, the writer has sought to formulate a fundamental, compre­ hensive and realistic approach.

Here is my plan:

A

m To find and organize a small group of orthodox Jewish businessmen, preferably in the age group of 3550, energetic, successful men, head­ ing important enterprises, who are active in the Yeshivah Movement and are deeply devoted to the ideal of traditional education for our children. They must possess an un­ common combination of gifts — brains, breadth of mind and far vision. They must be able to see the movement in its entirety, not colored by special feelings for an

31

individual institution. And, last but not least, they must have faith and courage—courage to analyze, to ascertain the elements composing this complex phenomenon, and faith that by steadfast resolution and putting heart in this work, all obstacles will be overcome and success will be achieved in spite of all repulses arid defeats. Are such men around? I believe so.

2. This group, let us tall them “Cham­ pions of Religious Education”, shall constitute itself as the provi. sional Board of Directors of a “Bu­ reau for Religious Education”. Its main function should be to gather all facts and figures on the Yeshivah Movement, from the day it started through its history and de­ velopment until its present status.

Preferably this research job should be done first-hand, by meeting with Deans and Principals, with Execu­ tive Directors, and Teachers, with Presidents, Board Members and P.T.A. representatives. This group should seek knowledge concerning all their problems, listen to their presentation and ask for recom­ mendations. They should engage the services of a first class account­ ing firm to collect in expert fashion all data pertaining to every phase of the Yeshivah Movement in or­ der to give us the facts as they really are. This research job should also explore the future of the Yeshivah Movement, the potential of expan­ sion, the scope, and the cost.

3. In addition to the “Fact Finding Accounting Office”, this group should engage the services of the best qualified expert to become Na­ tional Director of the “Bureau for Religious Education”. His duties, among many, shall be: To gather all available material and literature published in the course of the last thirty years in connection with the problems of the Day Schools and proposals how to solve them. To my mind, such an expert should above all do research in the fol­ lowing fields, namely : who has fi­ nancially supported the Yeshivoth up to now? How large is that segment of the Jewish community?

Have We reached, as far as these 32

men and women are concerned, a saturation point whereby they give the maximum and cannot give more? How large, on the other hand is the portion of the Jewish population whom the Yeshivah Movement did not reach, and why not? Further: Who is interested in religious education—the commun­ ity, the parents, the children them­ selves, the rabbinical organizations, the great national orthodox move­ ments, and the Kosher products industry, which is directly depen­ dent on the Jewish market? What has been the contribution of each of these interested parties? With reference to the last-mentioned it is an undisputed fact that in the field of secular education, colleges and universities can only exist be­ cause of the financial support given to them by industry. How large is that industry engaged exclusively or primarily in the production of Kosher items? How much is their yearly contribution to religious education?

4. After completion of all those tasks, the final job of the Provisional Board would be the organizing of the first “National Conference for Religious Education”. I visualize a Conference of delegates from all over the country, including five of the most capable Baale-battim from each of the Day Schools and major Yeshivoth. I visualize a Confer­ ence lasting several days, of his­ toric character and scope. The Board of Directors and its staff, armed with a world of facts and figures, ideas and concrete pro­ posals, based on proper scientific research, would lay the findings be­ fore the National Conference, rep­ resenting the Yeshivah Movement in its totality. Experts will present plans for examination and discus­ sion by committees and workshops, and then come forward with a “National Plan for Religious Edu­ cation”, comprising the whole scope of the Yeshivah Movement.

A National Conference, well planned and prepared, can create the national climate and leader­ ship necessary for the future suc­ cess of the movement. As the sole JEWISH LIFE

spokesman of the total Yeshivah Movement*, the National Confer­ ence would present its National Plan to the great American Jewish community, to the hundreds of thousands who are deeply sympa­ thetic with our efforts to give to our and the coming generation a genuinely Jewish, Torah-true edu­ cation. Such a Conference would, as part of its plan, create a “United Fund for Yeshivah Education”, and set a campaign goal to raise per­ haps five million dollars in the first year (to cover the deficits of all 200 schools).

Surely an army of volunteers, thousands of men and women of incomparable devotion, will be ready to give their time, energy and enthusiasm in immeasurable quan­ tity to serve as the leaders and key workers all over the United States for so vast, challenging, and inspiring an undertaking.

NATIONAL CONFERENCE speaking in the name of 200 in­ stitutions of a great and inspiring movement will leave its deep impact on the Jewish community. It must gain an effective response from a major industry dependent upon the

A

Jewish community. It will bring to the United Yeshivah Movement tens of thousands of new friends and en­ thusiastic supporters, who will con­ sider it an honor and privilege to do their share year after year in the form of a voluntary tax, for the support of a great and noble cause, the reli­ gious education of our children.

A National Conference as proposed would above all serve to educate the American Jewish community into a realizing sense of the essential impor­ tance of such an education. Such an effort will of itself have a distinct educational value. Most likely it will be a gradual process. For the first few years a United Fund may perhaps raise enough money to arrest the finan­ cial problems, to serve a complimen­ tary role in covering deficits only. Ul­ timately, I feel confident, it will take over the whole financial problem, and in the same fashion all the problems of the Yeshivah Movement.

Can such a plan be put into reality?

I believe it can.

YOM KIPPUR AND SHABBOTH There is a sp e c ia l positive (m an d ato ry ) C om m andm ent differentiating Yom K ippur from S h ab b o th —to rest from e a tin g a n d drinking. For w e le a rn from tradition th at "afflicting our souls" m e a n s "fasting". Thus one w ho fasts o bserv es a positive com m andm ent. W hile one w ho e a ts a n d drinks thereo n vio lates both a positive a n d a n e g a ­ tive (prohibitory) com m andm ent.

R am bam , M ishneh Torah

The Torah perm its u s to enjoy m an y m ore things in life th a n it prohibits.

V ayikra R a b b a h October, 1958

33

M ashk o f a h Tshuvah

By SAMSON R. WEISS

Tshuvah brings near those who were afar. Yesterday, the sinner was rejected before the All Present, was outcast, removed and abomi­ nated; and today he is beloved, chosen, close and befriended before Him. (Rambam, Hilchoth Tshuvah 7:6) HE IDEA of T ’shuvah is one of the central concepts of the Jewish faith. There is no word in the Eng­ lish language or, for that matter, in any other language, which could serve as a proper translation of this term.

In its literal meaning, T’shuvah is Return. Yet, the Hebrew term includes in its periphery also repentance, reso­ lution, change, and atonement. Fur­ thermore, it is not limited to emo­ tional and intellectual components only, but also connotes practical cor­ rective and preventive measures. The Jew “does” T’shuvah. It is a revolu­ tionizing and shattering inner experi­ ence culminating in definite and ex­ pressive action. A limitation of this experience to mere contemplation would manifest its weakness and even insincerity.

What makes man punishable today for sins and transgressions of yester­ day? Is it justice to make him ac­ countable and suffer for something past? The answer lies in the con­ tinuity of existence and in the soul­ shaping power of the human action.

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One who stole yesterday has, by the act of thievery, become a thief and, regardless of the cessation of this ac­ tion, he yet remains a thief even to­ day. By uttering a falsehood a man becomes a liar and remains one, whether or not he continues to lie.

What man does becomes part of his inner structure and character. It carves his spiritual physiognomy. Organi­ cally, he is the cumulative result of his entire past, the sum-total of the thoughts and actions of all his yester­ days. Therefore, the punishment, de­ layed though it may be, remains just and properly addressed.

If this were unchangingly so, man would remain inescapably chained to, and condemned by, his past, forever carrying its burden. The cessation of the evil in itself could neither change nor redeem him and would only pre­ vent further deterioration of his soul.

In effect, the very continuity of his existence would be almost meaning­ less, for the very essence of life is change and flux and growth. To re­ main forever what one was and to repeat but yesterday’s existence, being bereft of these most precious essen­ tials of life, would not deserve to be called life. Man’s freedom would be reduced to a negative status, for he would be free only not to become worse or weaker. The best he could do in such limited freedom would be to remain stationary and suspended on the level of his downfall.

JEWISH LIFE

Were this to be true, punishment and tendency, from lust and deceit, would be barren, for it would not from haughtiness and folly, from cal­ truly atone. Judgment would be futile, lousness and cruelty. Logically, it must for it would produce no betterment. be of an intensity and incisiveness at Possibly, it would benefit society by least equal to that of the previous protecting it from the effects of the abandonment, for otherwise it could repetition of the crime, but never the not evoke the necessary inner change sinner himself. Any failure would be­ and transformation which true T’shu­ come the mark of Cain and the first vah demands. T’shuvah is rebirth, as transgression the tombstone on the our Sages define it, a process leaving grave of hope. Dark indeed and deso­ literally no part of one’s existence late would be all existence before untouched. One either emerges from such finality of human imperfection. T’shuvah completely reborn, k’koton she’nolad, or one has not done T’shu­ UT the sovereignty of life denies vah.

The regret, the cessation, the cor­ such hopelessness. Seven times rection wherever possible of the con­ falls the righteous and yet rises up (Mishley, 24:16). The past does not sequences of the sin, and the accept­ govern and determine the present. The ance by resolution of the proper life yesterday has no dominion over the in the future, they all are compo­ today and the tomorrow. The ability nents of T’shuvah and must be ex­ to choose and to decide in freedom is pressed in the Vidui. This Vidui is the very pulse-beat of human exist­ more than a confession of guilt, more ence and can break all enchainment than an expression of remorse, more of previous aberration. There is in than a prayer for forgiveness. It is a man the power to reaffirm or to deny declaration of inner rebirth by the all he ever did before, the good as power of man’s free decision and of well as the bad, by renouncing it and the enthronement of the good in man over the evil to which he submitted. henceforth acting accordingly.

“Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai said It is the announcement of the decision even if a man is completely righteous not to accept past actions as a com­ all his days and at the end he regrets pelling commitment for one’s future, it, he has destroyed his former good unless they are scrutinized and weighed deeds as it is written: The righteous­ again and found just and noble. It is ness of the righteous will not save him the expressed recognition of man’s on the day of his rebellion (Ezekiel, ability yet to become worthy of G-d’s 33:12); and even if a man is com­ favor, in spite of his having sullied pletely wicked all his days and does himself and his surroundings by the T’shuvah at the end, the Heavenly defacement of his soul. It is the out­ Tribunal will not again mention his cry of man being delivered again on wickedness,, as it is written: and the the birthstool of the Divine Grace wickedness of the wicked will not which in granting life also has granted make him stumble on the day when him the possibility of constant re­ newal. he returneth from his wickedness (Talmud Bavli, Kedushin 40b.) ’SHUVAH is an experience of This nullification of the past is the such supernatural dimensions that core of T ’shuvah. It is the soulwrenching disassociation from habit our Sages declare it to be superior in

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October, 1958

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some aspects to the entire life in the world to come (Pirke Avoth, 4:22).

In the moment of Tshuvah, man’s proximity to his Maker is greater than at any other moment of life. Seek the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near (Isaiah, 55:6)—these days of nearness, so our

Sages say, are the days between Rosh Hashonah and Yom Kippur. Let the wicked forsake his way and the man of sin his thoughts, let him return unto the Lord and He will mercifully accept him—for this is the closest man can come to his G-d.

THE FINAL PLEA The "D ubner M ag g id " w a s once a sk e d w hy ev ery p a rt of the "O vinu M alkeynu" is sa id aloud, w ith the exception of the final p le a , w hich is sa id silently. He re sp o n d ed w ith one of his custom arily brillian t p a ra b le s. "There w a s once a m erchan t," he said , "w ho cam e into a la rg e w h o lesaler's w areh o u se a n d ord ered y a rd s a n d y a rd s of asso rted m aterial a n d gro sses of different kinds of m erch an d ise.

As he called out his n e e d s in a loud voice, clerks scu rried aro u n d to fill them . W hen he h a d com pleted his order, he took the proprietor a sid e a n d w h isp ered th a t he reg re tte d he h a d no cash , a n d th a t credit w ould h a v e to b e ex­ tended. 'A nd so," concluded Jacob of D ubno, "w e come to the A lm ighty on Rosh H ash o n ah a n d Yom Kippur. In loud tones w e p la c e our orders for a life of goodness, a life of redem ption a n d salv atio n , a life of su ste n a n c e a n d liveli­ hood, a n d for m an y kindred 'item s of m erch an d ise'. A nd then w e call the A lm ighty a sid e a n d w h isp er to him: 'Be g racious unto u s a n d an sw e r us, for w e h a v e no good w orks of our ow n—d e a l w ith us in charity a n d k in d n e s s !'"

To be a w a re of w h a t one h a s done am iss a n d to blam e one's self, is the p a rt of a rig h teo u s m an; b u t to b e in se n ­ sible to such things c a u se s still m ore g rievous evils to the soul, an d the conduct of w icked m en.

Philo Ju d aeu s

FROM GOOD DEEDS The garm en ts w orn b y the pious in the W orld-to-Com e a re m ad e of cloth w oven from the good d e e d s perform ed in this w orld w hich h av e b e e n transform ed into th re a d s of light.

Zohar

36

JEWISH LIFE

The Eggheads Came to Learn

By ABRAHAM N. AvRUTICK

One community's experience over a decode of adult

education reveals the desire of the Jewish intellectual for an understanding of his religion.

HE YEAR 5719 marks the tenth anniversary of the founding of the Hartford Institute for Jewish Studies which was organized as a school for adults by the local ortho­ dox rabbis and congregations. It is the tenth consecutive year that ortho­ dox rabbis of Hartford have been lecturing on topics of intellect espe­ cially designed for the Jewish “egg­ head”. Twenty-four such weekly lec­ tures are given between Succoth and Pesach.

Hartford, Connecticut, according to John Gunther’s “Inside U. S. Af” (1947), “has more Jews per capita than any American city except New York.” Whether this fact still holds true today is not known to me, but of Hartford’s 400,000 population some 30,000 souls are Jews. We have nine orthodox synagogues, six Conserva­ tive and two Reform temples. At the time when the adult educational pro­ gram was being organized (in the summer of 1948) there were but three orthodox rabbis in the community: Rabbi William Cohen, Rabbi I. Sol­ omon Rosenberg (who is presently deputy minister for Social Welfare in Israel), and the writer of this article.

Later, when other chaverim received October, 1958

posts in Hartford, they too were co­ opted into the work.

Prior to the year 5709 some of the synagogues in our city did conduct classes for adults, but none could have been considered a success either quantitatively or qualitatively. (The same was true of the Conservative and Reform temples.) Yet when discus­ sions commenced to organize an adult school under a joint orthodox spon­ sorship, in the background of the de­ liberations lurked the fear that per­ haps the synagogue Boards (and the rabbis too) would not be willing to give up a project which they consid­ ered and counted as their own.

The entire summer of 1948 was spent by the rabbis in setting up the school. No detail was left to chance.

We consulted with Dr. Samson R. Weiss, who was then director of the Young Israel Institute for Jewish Studies, and we discussed our plans with Professor Jacob Hartstein, who at that time was head of thé Graduate Department of Yeshiva University.

Both men encouraged us in the project.

T ^E R Y early in the discussions the v rabbis agreed that the adult school was to be the contribution of 37

the orthodox congregations and Rab­ binate to the community. The fol­ lowing points were therefore adopted: 1) the sponsors of the school are to be the orthodox congregations only; 2) courses to be offered are to be on a level which would attract the seri­ ous-minded student who is willing to attend regularly; 3) orthodox rabbis only are to teach in the school; 4) to accept no remuneration for teaching in the adult school.

The first major problem that con­ fronted the organizers of the school was where to conduct it. None of the synagogues had facilities adequate to house the whole school; certainly it was inadvisable to offer different courses on different premises; nor did we wish the school to be identified with any particular congregation. It was therefore decided to rent class­ rooms in a local high school (one of the finest in our city), and conduct the school there. This proved to be a most fortunate choice. Fortunate, too, was the choice of name for The pro­ jected school. We wanted to stay away from the phrase “adult school”— somehow it did not have the proper appeal; and “Institute” was already in use by another congregation. We therefore adopted the name “The Hartford College For Jewish Studies”.

The name college “took”. Everybody was soon talking about the “College”.

AY participation in the College A was brought about through the sponsoring synagogues. Every con­ gregation was to appoint two individ­ uals to serve on the Board of Gov­ ernors of the College. Furthermore, every sponsoring congregation was to contribute one hundred dollars towards the initial expense of the undertaking.

Without any exception the synagogue boards cooperated with enthusiasm.

1

38

The publicity was carefully planned and prepared. It was always news­ worthy and dignified. Every means available was employed—the daily press, the Anglo-Jewish periodicals, the radio, and the synagogue pulpit.

Well prepared and attractive bulle­ tins announcing the courses in detail, names of instructors, purpose of the College, etc., were mailed to practi­ cally every Jewish home in Hartford.

Every student had the opportunity to take two subjects in one evening.

The registration fee was three dollars for one course per semester, and five dollars for two courses per semester.

A three-way registration was an­ nounced: 1) by mail (registration poor); 2) synagogues were designated as registration centers for a period of one week (registration poor); 3) the last opportunity to register was at the high school where the College was to be conducted. Over one hundred men and women registered in one evening.

When the statistics were tabulated we found that 149 adults registered for 225 courses.

HE COLLEGE opened immedi­ ately after the Succoth holidays.

The year was divided into the fall and spring terms of twelve weeks each.

We met once a week, on Thursdays, each course lasting 75 minutes (7:45 p.m. to 9 p.m. and 9:15 p.m. to 10:30 p.m.). Eight courses were offered: Jewish Thinking in the Bible, Element tary and Advanced Hebrew; High­ lights of Jewish History, Jewish Ethics and Philosophy, Political, Economic and Social Ideals of Judaism, Jewish Laws and Customs, Israel—its Back­ ground, Constitution and Future, and Yiddish.

T

The chart below presents an in­ teresting study: JEWISH LIFE

Spring Registration Total Students ...................

Courses Taken ..........................

Students taking exams......... ......

126 205 19

Regis­ tered Men Philosophy 32 13 Israel 30 13 Laws, Customs 27 4 Bible 26 2 History 20 3 Hebrew I 17 4 Hebrew III 17 5 Yiddish 9 3

Wo­ men 19 17 23 24 17 13 12 6

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Analyzing the chart we note: 1) women students predominated in the school in a ratio of two to one: 2) in spite of the high sounding title, “Philosophy” drew a high registration.

People definitely were interested in “thinking topics”; 3) great demand for the study of Hebrew language; 4) Yid­ dish took a severe drop in the spring term, perhaps because of a) lack of a good Yiddish textbook and b) as soon as people learn how to read they are satisfied to be on their own; 5) most people came to learn and not for the sake of a diploma.

To summarize, the success of the Hartford College for Jewish Studies during the first year may be attributed to the following factors: the sincerity and anxiety of a cooperative rabbinate to put the project across; a thorough preparation and organization of the school; excellently planned publicity; choice of place for school; courses made interesting by the instructors, who prepared their lectures carefully and delivered them skillfully.

One other factor must be taken into consideration when speaking of the initial success of the school. On May 14, 1948, the State of Israel was proOctober, 1958

Fall Registration Total Students Courses Taken Students taking exams.....

1

.

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

Regis­ tered Men Laws & Customs 38 5 Israel 36 12 Hebrew 2 34 16 Philosophy 27 15 Yidish 25 11 Bible 23 3 Hebrew 1 23 10 History 19 4

149 225 28 Wo­ men 33 23 18 12 14 20 13 15

claimed. American Jewry suddenly became very proud of itself and its heritage. The ecstasy for the State of Israel overflowed toward the desire for knowledge about Jewish matters. We opened the school in the first year of Israel’s existence, and thus became its beneficiaries.

ITH the increase in years there W came a decrease in enrollment in the school until a certain constant was reached. For the past several years registered students number be­ tween fifty and sixty. We had to re­ name the school because we were informed by the State Board of Edu­ cation that the term “college” was not applicable to our type of a school.

(We now call it the Hartford Institute for Jewish Studies.) We had to de­ crease the number of courses offered because we did not have the neces­ sary qualified personnel to fill the teaching staff. (Rabbi Cohen and I are the only instructors who remained with the school since its inception.) We refused to lower the standards of thè school by inviting non-observant lecturers, and instead lowered the hours of instructions per course.

39

Noted too should be the decreased demand for the study of Hebrew, per­ haps due to the subsidence by our people of the enthusiasm for the lan­ guage that came in the first year of the founding of the State of Israel.

One demand, however, continued.

Courses in Jewish thinking through the study of the Bible and Jewish phil­ osophy never lacked a good registra­ tion. Asking for these lectures were the intelligent core of our student body, who genuinely wanted to learn, to know, and be instructed. Some continued to come regularly and con­ secutively for years, taking every avail­ able course. New students would re­ place old ones, and quite a few would even repeat a course after a year or two of absence.

HROUGH the years the courses that attracted the widest atten­ T tion and interest carried the following information in the syllabi: 1. “Theological Concepts. Concepts in Jewish Theology will be considered and compared with non-Jewish thought and theory. Topics to be discussed: Faith and Reason, Modification and Variations of Monotheistic Theory.

2. “Modern Ideologies in Judaism. This course will analyze and discuss the various modern ideologies and trends in Jewish life. It will discuss the back­ ground, history, philosophy, and pro­ gram of Orthodoxy, Conservatism, Re­ form, and Reconstructionism”.

3. “The Faith of the Jew. This course will seek to explain the basic funda­ mentals of the faith of the Jew. It will treat the principal tenets of Judaism in the light of modern thought and outlook. The philosophy of Judaism as expounded by great Jewish thinkers.

4. “Jewish Thinking in the Bible. The Bible as the basis of Jewish theology and thinking will be discussed. Biblical passages will be read in class and ex­ pounded in accordance with the tradi­ tional commentaries and commenta­ tors. Some of the topics to be dis­ cussed: The Greatness of the Bible.

G-d and Nature—G-d and the Person.

40

Adam and Eve—Do we believe in the Original Sin Garden of Eden?”

The reader will readily recognize how the Biblical stories and the theo­ logical topics have been connected. In every instance the Torah passage was read as recorded, and explained in ac­ cordance with the comments of one or more me for shim. The philosophical and theological lesson implied in the text was based on material found in the seforim available—written by our early teachers or modern scholars.

The general character of the regis­ trants has not changed in the past number of years, though the student body has had its additions and sub­ tractions. We still find that the female registration predominates; that the average age is between twenty and fifty, consisting of professionals, busi­ ness people, housewives, and students; and that the majority are non-obser­ vant.

HE experiences incurred in a dec­ ade of teaching at our Institute have yielded some general observa­ tions relevant to this article. There is a certain rapprochement today, it may particularly be noted, between the intellectual and the Jewish heritage that was lacking in former years. The climate is warmer. When a discussion ensues on a Jewish theological theme, it is no longer shunned. When a com­ mandment or a prohibition is ex­ pounded, at least there is the interest of the listener and not the scorn of the skeptic. This does not mean that this group has become more religi­ ously observant or is willing to become shomre mitzvoth. What it does mean is that we now have an opportunity to explain, expound, and present our point of view to a receptive Jewish audience. I do not wish to enter that famous debate of whether religion to­ day has an “upsweep” or “down

T

JEWISH LIFE

sweep” style. But that the intellec­ tual grandchild seeks to understand the teachings of his “old fashioned” grandfather, of that there is ample evidence.

American Jewry seems now to be in a third stage of evolvement. First there was the immigrant Jew, then the run­ away Jew, and now it is the seeking Jew. It is not important how the cur­ rent development came about — whether because of disappointment in the “isms” of yesteryear, or the fail­ ure to find values in modernity; whether it was the will to identify oneself with a Nazi-persecuted people or the pride in the newly established Jewish state. The facts of the matter are that there are certain opportuni­ ties today that we did not have yester­ day.

N a general way (if we do not stretch the point too far) it may be stated that in the realm of thought our times are not unlike that of the Jews in the 15th century, particularly in Spain. A Rambam in the 12th century, a Levi ben Gerson in the 13th century and even a Chasdai Crescas in the 14th century had before them the propositions: 1st) to defend Jew­ ish religion which was being endan­ gered by opinions of science and phi­ losophy as taught especially by the Aristoteleans; and 2nd) to clarify the meaning of certain words, figures, expressions and terms in the Bible which in their literal sense perplexed many a student.

The central theme, therefore, of the early medieval Jewish philosophers was G-d and his attributes. They es­ tablished proof of the existence of G-d, the theory of creation, noneternity, etc., etc., and found the con­ firmation thereof in the Bible. It was

I

October, 1958

primarily a philosophical defense of Judaism as a religion.

In the 15th century there was a shift in emphasis. Judaism no longer was in need to prove the existence of G-d, incorporeality, etc. These were accepted themes and much has been written about them. The need of the age was a defense of Judaism against other claimants of divine origin, such as Christianity and Islam. The need of the age was a discussion and pre­ sentation of the fundamental beliefs of our faith. What Judaism, qua reli­ gion, means to the Jew? What is Divine Law? What does Judaism have to say about Reward and Punishment, Good and Evil, Immortality, Olam Haba, and similar problems? Hence we find a man like Joseph Albo, who himself took part in the year 1414 in a religious disputation to defend Judaism against Christianity, writing a book called Sefer Ha-Ikkarim where the central theme is the study of the principles of our Divine Torah and Mitzvoth.

Let me not be misunderstood. I do not mean to imply that the pre-Albo teachers had nothing to say about the Ikkarim discussed by Joseph Albo. On the contrary, they wrote a great deal about them. They were the original teachers, and they gave the direction and the content and the lead. All Jew­ ish thinkers,' from Saadia on, had much to say about G-d, Man, the Soul and Divine Law. But in every age the times were different, and therefore, the emphasis was different.

Our task today as teachers of adults is to a great extent not dissimilar to that of Joseph Albo. Our students need no conviction of the existence of G-d, his l Unity, or his incorpo­ reality. They seek not so much an­ swers to the question of religion vs. science and philosophy, but rather to 41

learn the Jewish view of man and his soul.

apply it with greater meaning and understanding in the home.” “. . . in those instances where the lecturer convinced me with his inter­ pretation I gained without measure; and in those instances where I could not honestly accept the lecturer’s view, I gained because he made me more firm in what I believe . . .”

“I have found the courses most in­ formative and necessary for the un­ derstanding of orthodox Judaism.”

“I enjoyed the course very much, the subject matter, and the manner it was presented. It has definitely stimu­ lated my interest in other courses. I have not had any Jewish education since confirmation.”

After living in a college dormitory with 95% Gentiles, and taking Courses m Old Testament, Christian Philoso­ phy, etc., I felt a definite need for some supplementary Jewish knowledge to answer questions raised by these Christian associations. This course has fulfilled my need.”

HE FEW that do come to us for knowledge and guidance and dis­ cussions want to know the Jewish an­ swers and attitudes. We need not be, nor are we expected to be, original in our presentations. As a matter of fact what our students want is not our thinking, but to hear the authorita­ tive sources and thinkings of our an­ cient and modern Torah scholars.

That this is so (at least in Hart­ ford) was corroborated by a ques­ tionnaire we distributed a year ago to the student body of some fifty persons.

Thirteen questions were asked pertain­ ing to data on school organizations, subject matter and evolution. No sig­ nature was required. We received thirty-seven replies. It was interesting A CURSORY study of the above to note that twenty-four students learned about the courses through the -t* . comments (plus others on rec­ school brochure, and twelve through ord) leads one to the conclusion that the recommendations of friends. much can be accomplished through Thirty-five people did not consider a an adult school that is well organized, twelve-week term too long. Thirty- properly staffed, and with a curricu­ two replies indicated that it was the lum geared to the needs of the stu­ subject matter and not the lecturer dents. It gives us a vast opportunity that influenced the choice of courses. to present Torah-true Yiddishkeit to The last question asked for an a group (small though it be) that can­ evaluation of the course “with par­ not otherwise be reached; to expound ticular reference to the interest of the the authority of Halochah; and to lecturer, what you feel you gained urge the necessity of bridging thought from the course, whether you have (machshovah) and deed (ma’aseh) been inspired to take further courses through Mitzvah observance.

It serves no purpose to tell these and any other data that you may feel to be pertinent.” What follows are people “read this book” or “study this excerpts from some of the comments. scholar,” or “here is something for “Instructor excellent. Course in­ you to read; you’ll find many an­ triguing. Would enjoy getting further swers there.” Our audiences are not into Jewish philosophy.” ready for that type of reading nor are “Studying the Bible in the manner we are doing gives me a greater un­ they attuned to the structure and derstanding of our Jewish way of life phraseology of such writings. Most . . . it not only inspired me to seek of our adult students are still in the and know more of our religion, but to “discussion” and “talking” stage.

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42

JEWISH LIFE

W O M E N ’S

BRANCH

of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America

ANNOUNCES IT S 35th ANNIVERSARY

NATIONAL C O N V E N T I O N at the BREAKERS HOTEL Atlantic City, N. J. FROM — NOVEMBER 17 through NOVEMBER 19

SPECIAL ANNIVERSARY FEATURES DRAMATIC PRESENTATION PROMINENT SPEAKERS PROVOCATIVE WORKSHOPS PANEL DISCUSSIONS TRIPLE-TREAT (§) EXHIBIT I. E d l e s National President

M rs. A l le n

M rs. E m a n u el

L azar

Convention Chairman

October. 1958

M rs. N ath an

G reen span

Program Chairman

43

A nnouncing T h e 6 0 t h A n n iv ersa ry N a t i o n a l B i e n n i a l C o n v e n t io n of the

U n io n o f O r t h o d o x J e w is h C o n g r e g a t io n s o f A m e r ic a The weekend of

N o v e m b e r 13-14-15-16 (1-4 Kislev, 5719)

B reak ers H otel (On the Boardwalk)

A t la n t ic C ity, N . J.

SHARE — IN FORWARDING THE SACRED JEWISH HERITAGE — IN SHAPING DEFENSE OF RELIGIOUS RIGHTS — IN BUILDING THE NATIONAL PROGRAM OF ORTHODOXY FOR TODAY AND TOMORROW

Four Unforgettable Days of Thrilling Events and History-Shaping Activities RESERVE THIS DATE! UNION OF ORTHODOX JEWISH CONGREGATIONS OF AMERICA 305 BROADWAY, NEW YORK 7, N. Y.

44

JEWISH LIFE

Yom Kippur in Jerusalem in 66 C.E. INCE the discovery df the cele­ brated Dead Sea Scrolls, exten­ sive exploration of the caves in which the scrolls were discovered, and of sites in the vicinity, has brought to light many documents and other relics revealing the existence through many years of a previously unknown Jewish religious body with its center at Qum­ ran. The character and doctrines of this body, and the dating of the period in which it existed, have been and remain the subject of extensive schol­ arly discussion. Wide differences of opinion obtain on many points. The prevailing view holds that the Qumran sect flourished in the approximate period of the destruction of the Second Temple and the fall of the Jewish State, at the hands of the Romans.

Since the sole surviving source for the history of this period is the works of Josephus— who himself participated in the Jewish struggle against the Rom­ ans and then deserted to the latter— the key to identification of the Qum­ ran community must be sought in his writings.

Although Josephus’ works yield no reference to the Qumran community, in the view of the present writer the identity of this sect with the Zealot faction entrenched at the fortress of Masadah— as recorded by Josephus— has been definitely established. Ma­ sadah too was located in the Dead Sea area, not far from Qumran, and there appear to have been many points of similarity between the outlook and ex­ perience of the Zealots, as can be determined from the works of Jose­ phus, and those of the Qumran sec-

S

October, 1958

By CECIL ROTH

E ditor's N ote : We are pleased to

bring to the attention of our readers this challenging article on an aspect of one of the most widely discussed developments of modern times—-the Dead Sea Scrolls.

With the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls and exploration of the caves in which they were found, widely dif­ fering— and conflicting— theories have been propounded as to the character and significance of the finds, and as to the period of history to which they can be attributed. Whereas some scholars view the discoveries with marked skepticism, and consider the Scrolls to date from the Middle Ages, numerous others hail them as the legacy of an important sect, hereto­ fore unknown, current in the period of the Second Temple. Among these latter scholars, in turn, radically dif­ fering opinions prevail as to the pre­ cise period and duration of the Dead Sea sect, its tenets and character, the meaning of cryptic allusions which abound in the Scrolls, the relationship of the sect to other sects and move­ ment of the time, and numerous other factors.

It should be noted that many of the newly discovered documents have not yet been published. In general, it would appear that much of the ma­ terial written on the subject is pre­ mature and that far more— and prop­ erly objective— study of all available material must be made before really definitive conclusions may be arrived at.

The hypothesis outlined by Dr. Roth in this article, and the conclu­ sions based upon it, must be viewed in the light of the foregoing. Need­ less to say, the position taken by Dr. Roth represents his own distinctive thinking on the subject, but the views of so eminent an authority on Jewish history necessarily bear significant weight.

45

taries as indicated by present research.

If we do not accept this identification, then we will have to postulate that at the period of the fall of the Jewish state, shortly before the year 70 of the Common era, there were at these two places, both on the west shore of the Dead Sea, two different sects, both opposed simultaneously to the Romans and to the central Jewish government in Jerusalem, and both of them ven­ erating the personality of a leader who went through precisely the same ex­ perience at the same season of the year at the hands of a priestly enemy, and both having an outstanding asso­ ciate of the same name.

OR u s Jews, the most important consequence of this identification is that it shows a great part of the literature discovered at Qumran to have been Zealot literature, and the historical allusions comprised in it to refer for the most part (though nof of course wholly— actual names have been identified which relate to a con­ spectus of earlier history) to the period of the great Revolt against the Rom­ ans. In fact, we have in these docu­ ments the most important source of Jewish history in those heroic days af­ ter Josephus; and the only one thus far known to us not written from the point of view of a pro-Roman syco­ phant and quisling. Above all, light is thrown— a completely new light—on the history of the late summer of 66 C.E., when the Romans were ejected from Jerusalem. Dovetailing our new information with the old, it appears that the crucial events were closely associated with Yom Kippur of that year, when a clash between the two elements took place in Jerusalem which completely changed the course of Jewish history. It is impossible to

F

46

be certain about all the details, nor can one here go into all the arguments and demonstrations which will be pub­ lished in due course. All that can be done for the moment is to give a general, tentative outline of the picture that is beginning to emerge.

The Zealot sect had been founded

by Judah the Galilean, who had re­ volted unsuccessfully against the Ro­ mans in Galilee in 5 B.C.E. and then retired with his followers, as it seems, to Damascus. Ten years later, he re­ turned to Judea, occupied the aban­ doned ‘monastery’ at Qumran, and began to spread his revolutionary ideas in Judea. These, it seems, combined a mystical with a political tendency; obviously and naturally, not specified

by Josephus, who knew that his readers in Rome would have been bored by them. It appears, however, that the Zealots had become preoccupied with the obsession that the calendar in Jerusalem was wrong, and that a new one should be introduced, analogous to that of the Book of Jubilees.

This question was inevitably of overwhelming importance in the eyes of the Jewish people, especially as re­ gards the observance of the Day of Atonement. The great problem of the time was, why it was that G-d had handed his people over to the relent­ less rule of their Roman enemies, all revolts having failed. Here, in the view of the Zealots, was the answer.

G-d had promised His people in enact­ ing the regulations of the great Day of Pardon that “on this day” He would forgive their sins (Vayikra 16:30).

Hence if the Temple ceremonial were observed on some other day than the proper one G-d would not forgive their sins, and the people would go on from year to year with an ever-grow­ ing burden of iniquity on their shoul­ ders. In these circumstances, the JEWISH LIFE

Zealots held, the Jews could not ex­ pect victory over their foes and the obvious prerequisite of salvation and political redemption was to observe Yom Kippur in the Temple as G-d has prescribed, on the right day.

HIS WAS among the ideas and conceptions inherited from Judah the Galilean by his youngest son, Menachem, who succeeded to the leadership of the Zealot movement after the death at Roman hands of his two brothers. He had initially better fortune than theirs. As soon as the uprising against the Romans started in 66, Menachem led his followers from Qumran to the Herodian fortress at Masadah and seized it; obviously, this operation could have been carried to a successful conclusion only from a neighboring base. Equipping his forces from the great armory there, Mena­ chem went with them to Jerusalem and there took an outstanding part in the operations against the Roman gar­ rison besieged in the royal palace, whom he compelled to surrender to him. This took place, according to Josephus, on the sixth day of the month Goripaeus, which Professor Solomon Zeitlin calculated many years ago (long before the Dead Sea Scrolls were discovered!) to correspond to the third of Tishri. The exact correspon­ dence, however, is immaterial, for reasons that will appear later. In his criticism of my thesis (in which in­ deed he seems to recognize implicitly the authenticity of the document in question, which hitherto he had stren­ uously denied!) Professor Zeitlin fails to realize this point. But one is glad to see that he is now adopting a more positive attitude towards the entire question, instead of restricting himself as hitherto to incredulous and un­ tenable denial.

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October, 1958

For the next few days Menachem was the outstanding figure in the city, much to the chagrin of the Priestly element, led by Eleazar ben Chananiah, the Segan or Captain of the Temple. This group had initially taken the lead against the Romans and now had expected to revert to their tradi­ tional political hegemony. Josephus— himself a priest—-gives a very bitter and jaundiced view of Menachem’s personality and activity and implies that he was aiming at establishing his personal political supremacy. That may be, but he was wishing to establish a spiritual ascendancy as well. There is some evidence in the Dead Sea Scrolls that Menachem was himself a priest; if this was not the case there were certainly priests among his devoted ad­ herents. Now, therefore, the opportu­ nity had arrived for him to follow up the initial victory by at last ensuring the observance of the Day of Atone­ ment on what he deemed the proper date, securing for the Jewish people atonement for their burden of accu­ mulated sin, and thereby ushering in the Great and Final Deliverance.

Menachem went up, therefore, to the Temple, clad, Josephus tells us, in magnificent robes (could he have been wearing the priestly vestments?), and, we are informed, with the intention of “prostrating himself”—the term so often used in connection with the Day of Atonement ritual. This was, ac­ cording to Josephus, about or shortly after the third of Tishri, and accord­ ing to the Dead Sea Scrolls in the Habbakuk commentary) on the Day of Atonement—not the generally ac­ cepted Day of Atonement, as we have seen, but the Yom Kippur according to the sectarian reckoning, which may have differed from the accepted date by any period between a day and a month.

47

ENACHEM’S action, however, of another Zealot or semi-Zealot fac­ M gave his enemies their oppor­ tion. So we are told by Josephus; the tunity. Josephus gives the improbable Dead Sea literature refers to the picture that the people suddenly turned against their popular hero and sacrileg­ iously assaulted him in the sacred pre­ cincts. On the face of it, this seems unlikely. But on the hypothesis that we have put forward the story be­ comes more dramatic and more plaus­ ible. By his action, Menachem was obviously threatening the entire posi­ tion, spiritual as well as political, of the established priesthood. Moreover, the whole people, Pharisees and Sad-

Teacher’s associate, Absalom, appar­ ently as being dead immediately after the clash, and obviously the same per­ son is in question.

It was even now not impossible for the situation to be retrieved, for Men­ achem was still at the head of a com­ pact body of well-armed followers.

Both sides now prepared themselves for the final clash. Now, it seems that, when the people of Jerusalem had risen against the Romans, the rebel

ducees alike, vehemently objected to what Menachem was attempting—to subvert the established religious cal­ endar, to presume to conduct the greatest solemnity of the Jewish year on some day other than that stipulated by the universal and immemorial Jew­ ish tradition; No wonder that they fell on him, killing some of his fol­ lowers even in the sacred precincts; he himself taking refuge for a while on the Hill of Ophel. Among the casual­ ties was his associate, Absalom, leader

leaders (who, as we know from Jo­ sephus, had of recent years made themselves masters of little pockets of resistance all over the hill-country, like Menachem himself) all swept on Jeru­ salem to join in the operation. Among these was Simon bar Giora, who later was to play so heroic a part in the re­ sistance and in the siege of Jerusalem.

48

T SEEMS that it is Simon bar Giora who is referred to in the Dead Sea literature as the “Man of Lies”; the

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JEWISH LIFE

title perhaps reflecting the disappoint­ ment of the Dead Sea sect in his ac­ tion, perhaps their disapproval of his egalitarian social program. The halt­ ing initial reason for this identification was that the Man of Lies is reported to have “gone away” with his atten­ dant warriors, and the only military leader of this period who is known to have “gone away” ostentatiously from this area with his warriors is Simon bar Giora, when he left Masadah after a prolonged residence there in 68. However it may be, the Man of Lies was in Jerusalem in those fatal days in the late summer of 66. Here, of course, we are on very unsure ground, and what follows is for the moment largely conjectural.

It would appear, however, that the one castigated as the Man of Lies threw in his lot with the Priestly party, disapproving presumably of the Zealot religious program, and led his forces against Menachem and his followers.

Even so, all was not lost. The follow­ ers of the dead partisan chieftain Ab­ salom (“the House of Absalom”) were still maintaining their identity and had they joined Menachem and his Zealots the day might yet have been saved.

But they did not. They “stood aloof”, and did not help the one extolled in the Dead Sea literature as the “Teacher of Righteousness” against the Man of Lies, to quote the Habbakuk com­ mentary.

Now, defeat was inevitable. Mena­ chem was killed; the survivors among his followers withdrew sullenly to Masadah, under the leadership of his nephew, Eleazar ben Yair, Here they retained their identity, a separate sect, bitterly opposed both to the Romans and to the ruling factions in Jerusalem, but still convinced that in the end, when their enemies had been swept away, G-d would Himself redeem them. They jfound support for their views, as it seems, in the Book of Micah, 4:8, which prophesied clearly (or so they thought) that the sequence of events which should redeem the Jewish people was to have its begin­ ning in Ophel. This was probably why they chose this work as subject-matter for one of their remarkable apocalyp­ tic commentaries, telling and describ­ ing what was to happen in the “End of Days”.

HAT DAY in the year 66 which the Zealot sect held to be Yom T Kippur, contrarary to all Jewish tra­ dition, when the “Teacher of Right­ eousness’ (whether he was Menachem himself or his successor Eleazar) was overwhelmed by the “Wicked Priest”, was henceforth to be central in the historic experience of the sect. But for these events, the record of the great struggle against Rome would have been fundamentally different. Perhaps it was one of the decisive days in the history of the Jewish people.

AZAZEL A bctrbanel su g g e sts th a t the "A zazel" g o at in the Yom K ippur ritu al in d ic a te s th at if w e a re "az" (arro g an t, dis­ obedien t, im pudent") like E sau, th en Jacob will b e "a z a l" (com pelled "to d e p a rt" into exile).

October, 1958

49

Defeated

By MOSHE DLUZNOWSKY

EYER MIGDAL paced back and having a party for her friends. They forth—in one room and out the are due to arrive soon. I was waiting M other. He was visibly upset and wor­ ried. His eyes wandered over the massive furniture, the heavily orna­ mented draperies on the windows, the highly polished grand piano, the paint­ ings on the walls—and it seemed to him that he was seeing all these ob­ jects for the first time, and that he was a complete stranger in these sur­ roundings. Thoughts were hammer­ ing away in his mind, in utter con­ fusion, and he could not grasp at a beginning or an end.

Slowly he entered the dining room, walked over to the table upon which there stood a decanter of wine, a Kiddush cup, a Havdolah candle, and a silver spice-box, that spread a pleasant aroma of spices. Meyer Migdal filled the cup with wine, lit the candle, and in a quiet voice said Hav­ dolah, He took a sip of wine, raised his eyes, and saw his wife Bessie, who sat, as if implanted, in a deep chair, fat and fleshy, with a sculptured tower of grey curls on her head, waiting impatiently for her husband to finish Havdolah. Meyer glanced at her, and brusquely uttered from the corner of his mouth: — “Gut voch!”

— “What’s wrong, Meyer,”—Bessie asked— “What makes you so irritable?

Business trouble?”

— “It is nothing”— Meyer answered dryly.

“Let’s clear the table. Evelyn is 50

until you finished making . . .”

“Another party,” Meyer angrily in­ terrupted her talk. “Another nuisance tonight! And why the great hurry to clear the table of the bit of Yiddishkeit? Ashamed of it, are you? Em­ barrassed for your daughter’s friends?

What do they know of Jewish tradi­ tions?”

“You are simply impossible to­ night, out of your mind,” Bessie raised her voice. “What are you shout­ ing about? Who is ashamed of what?

Why have you turned against Evelyn’s friends? And why this sudden pro­ found interest in Yiddishkeit?”

“Oh, how can I speak with you, when all you are interested in is parties and bridge games. That’s all I hear and see in my house. What chord will it strike, what does it matter to you, if I tell you that one Jew from my home town has been rescued. Un­ derstand? One Jew! and . . .”

“You should be pleased that some­ one was finally found. Instead you are shouting and having tantrums.

Who is he? A relative?”

“No! No! No!,” Meyer screamed in fury. “Not a relation. A stranger, a total stranger.”

He strode out of the room, leaving his wife sitting in a pose of complete bewilderment. He moved to a faroff room, took a book in hand, and attempted to read, but the letters seemed to fade, and on the pages of JEWISH LIFE

the book there unfolded days and events, echoes of his youth in the old country and also of his thirty-odd years in America, years of toil, pov­

erty, and the final climb up the lad­ der to wealth, business fame, and success.

All the years that separated him from

N Saturday evenings Meyer Migdal, the jewel merchant, was his village seemed to disappear, and O usually content and good humored. he recollected the scenes as if it were Before he began his business trans­ yesterday.

His village, Lipovitz, his home, actions of the week, he made Havdolah, the Sabbath evening recitation, Chanele, the daughter of Fishel the wished his family a good week, and Melamed, a slender dark beauty of a hummed a Chumosh-melody that had girl, with an oval face, and deep black remained with him from the old coun­ eyes, that would soothe with their try days, and that somehow always es­ goodness. They loved each other caped from him in moments of happi­ dearly, although they seldom had an opportunity to talk together, and ness.

This particular Saturday night Meyer rarely saw each other face to face. could not catch the melody of the old Every day Meyer and his father passed refrain. A sorrow gnawed at his mind her house on their way to their store.

Chanele stood in the window of her and body.

It had come unexpectedly. In the house, and followed him with her synagogue “Anshei Lipovitz”, where fond glances. Meyer eagerly awaited his landsleit showered upon him the day when he would be able to honor and respect, as became their marry Chanele. All in the village most prominent member, Meyer Mig- were certain that they were a pair dal had learned that a short while ago, blessed by G-d.

Then a fire destroyed his father’s Leibel, the son of Chanele and of the lame shoemaker, had arrived in New store and the family was left penni­ York. Memories of the past were re­ less and in dire need. An uncle in awakened. His heart was stirred with America sent for him and employed ache and pain, just as if one had him as a salesman. Meyer was then plucked at the strings of a fiddle and a young man, in his early twenties, it gave forth with sounds and tenors. with boundless energy. He worked The only survivor, the only Jew from hard, saved his pennies. Gradually Lipovitz, who had escaped from the the longing for Chanele began to great disaster, and had somehow diminish, and her personage faded found his way to America—one soli­ and disappeared from his heart and tary Jew, the last remnant of an entire memory. He had forgotten her. The daily toil to make a living—so he community.

It seemed to him a sign of fate. He excused himself—had made him for­ thought of Chanele. It was thirty- get her.

A few years later he married Bessie, odd years ago that they were betrothed to each other. And it was his fault. the daughter of a wealthy New York A guilt that could not be forgiven. business man. His old home had October, 1958

51

ceased to exist for him, except for an occasional pang of longing and the few Jewish customs and practices that he observed.

going from one party to the next, dancing and singing through the night, and then sleeping half the next day.

She always found fault with men and no one suited her. Her father she regarded as a nobody, a peasant who became successful and wealthy merely because of chance and circumstance.

E HAD later learned that Chanele became very ill after his depar­ ture, and after a slow recovery had married Wolf, the lame fellow, a poor shoemaker, who could hardly provide HE NOISE of the river and the a living for his family. These occa­ boats penetrated through the win­ sional bits of news grieved him mo­ dows of the apartment on Riverside mentarily, but the pain quickly sub- Drive, and reached Meyer’s ears. From sidéd in his wild race for business the distance a row of lights glistened success, in the hustle and bustle of like a string of pearls. From the the commercial world. Meyer Migdal other rooms of the house Meyer heard gradually acquired an excellent estab­ shouts and laughter, loud music. Eve­ lishment m New York, became a man lyn’s party was in full swing. He of business repute. In his house Jew­ sighed and lapsed back to his thoughts. ishness was at a meager minimum. His He and his wife were not happy to­ wife Bessie saw to that. He just held gether. They had never really loved on tenaciously to a few observances-— each other—actually, they had grown davenning on Shàbbath in the shool almost to hate each other, but lived of the landsleit, making Havdolah, together under one roof, because that because the words of that recitation is the way it was already, and they gave him such faith and hope. And could not help themselves. He had occasionally, when something inside little joy -from his family. He had gnawed at him, he would pick up a been punished because he had forgot­ “sefer”, become absorbed in the yel­ ten Chanele, because he had broken low pages for an hour or two, and this the bond between them, torn apart would satiate him for a while. that which was meant to be. Now His wife was busy with her contin­ fate ruled that Chanele’s son should uous round of card-parties. Twice survive and come to demand reck­ weekly they assembled in his house oning. ànd played cards until very late at Meyer fell asleep over his book, night. His bookcase of “seforim” was and when he awakened, it was al­ pushed into a corner of the last room, ready dawn. . . . out of view. Bessie usually made a “Why is he so proud and haughty, wry face at the custom of Havdolah your green landsman?” Bessie asked —she reared the children as she angrily,^ as they sat at the breakfast wished, not permitting Meyer a voice table. “He’s been here several times in household affairs, relegating to him already and always acts as if ‘Heaven just the business of making money. knows what’!”

Their daughter, Evelyn, led an “He is not putting on any airs,” empty, frivolous existence. She was Meyer answered. “He’s suffered a the ruler at home. Not pretty, but great deal and . . .” with a superficial attractiveness, she “He doesn’t look as if he’s suffered was the center of her social circle, so much. He looks well. Why the act?

H

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JEWISH LIFE

He has little to say to anyone, he’s Evelyn. Perhaps, with G-d’s help, always day-dreaming. All I get in the two of them will become . . .” return for my interest and my ques­ “What are you so happy about? tions as to how he survived, whether What good fortune is that for Evelyn? he needs money, how he supports What kind of bargain did you find? himself, is a smile, and a few remarks I will never allow that this green­ that there isn’t much to tell and that horn'- . .

4 ..<4* he somehow manages to make a liv­ “Is it beneath you? Not good ing. enough for you? I will do everything “And what does Evelyn say about in my power to bring about an en­ him?” Meyer asked his wife hesitat­ gagement. Do you really think that ingly. “They’ve spent a few evenings money is all that counts. No-^it is together, no?” not everything. And he is a fine “At first she laughed at him. She young man. I knew his mother well. was right.”

Yes, I will do all I can to encourage “Laughed?” Meyer asked angrily. it.”

“She said that all foreigners that Bessie, upset and angry, hurriedly come to America seem to think that left the room. they know everything. He told her Meyer paced back and forth across that he will study to be an engineer. the room in happy expectation.

He said that he’s been accepted in a It was a wonderful idea, he thought. college, and that he can speak several If only his daughter would agree to languages.” accept Leon for her husband. He “And now,” Meyer asked impa­ would give him a partnership in his tiently. “What does she say now?” business, present him with a huge “She’s changed her talk now. Now dowry. Perhaps that would repay for she chatters nonsensically about his the grief and trouble that he had dreamy eyes, how clever and indepen­ caused his mother . . . perhaps . . .? dent he is, that he is a person who He would invite Leon and discuss knows what suffering means. I am it with him, True, he was a difficult her mother, and I tell you, she is person, withdrawn and quiet, but he beginning to fall in love with that would certainly agree to become his man.” son-in-law. He could not dismiss such “That’s fine. I will take him into a piece of luck. It would be a good my business. Perhaps he is meant for thing. . . . .

understand? I knew your

X mother and father—knew them

well. We were neighbors. Your mother was a beautiful woman, and as gentle and quiet as a dove. I am, thank goodness, not exactly a pauper here in America . . . came here with­ out a cent . . . a great country— America. I would like to take you October, 1958

into my business. Would treat you as a son. After all—you are the only one left from the old home . . .”

Leon smiled arid said: “And because I miraculously es­ caped, do I rate a pat on the back for that? Does that that mean that you have to provide for me? As you say,

m

America is a great country. I will davit would open all doors. Just make my way.” that. You do not have to trouble “I meant-—why seek employment yourself, Mr. Migdal. If you Would from strangers, when you can begin telephone your lawyer. It is just a to establish yourself right here and matter of a few days to prepare. I now. I am told that you are quite the would never forget the favor.”

American fellow, have already taken Meyer was silent for a while. He to our American ways, that you speak simply could not utter a word. One the language well and that you are thought was hammering away in his far from helpless. Come around to mind: the office tomorrow and we will make “Not destined. . . . I can not replans.” pay!”

“Thank you very much, Mr. MigThen he answered Leon quickly and dal. Since you are so considerate quietly: may I . . . I mean . . . may I . . .

“Such a simple thing. It is nothing I wanted to ask a favor of you, Mr. at all. I wanted to do more for you, Migdal.” as if you were my own. Tomorrow “Certainly, Leon, anything at all, morning I will see my lawyer and don’t hesitate.” start the wheels rolling. You need not “I want to send for my fiancee . . . be ashamed, perhaps you need money Miriam . . . that is her name”, Leon for expenses, I mean . .

“No. Thank you very much. I am stammered, his face becoming red and flustered. working. I have even saved some “What do you mean?” Meyer asked, money.” becoming pale.

“Come to visit us more often, Leon.

“My fiancee is still in Europe. We You can feel at home with us.” met about two years ago. She is a “Certainly, I will. My mother al­ wonderful girl. From Poland. All ways spoke so well of you. I knew alone in this world. I want to bring that you would not refuse me this her to America and marry her.” favor. I’ll write Miriam this very “So what shall I do?” Meyer’s evening.” voice became hoarse and shaky. “I They sat a while longer and talked. mean—what do you request? Money When Leon departed, Meyer felt a for transportation?” horrible void, a sense of waste, a “No, no. Not money. I only want feeling of apathy toward everything an affidavit for Miriam. Your affi­ and everyone.

DIVINE SOVEREIGNTY W hy, before p a rta k in g of som ething, do w e p ronounce a benedictio n w hich also in clu d es m ention of th e Lord's Sovereignty? P salm s say s, "The e a rth is the Lord's", y et w e also re a d further, "A nd He h a th g iv en the e a rth to the children of m en". In m ak in g a ben ed iction , w e first a c k ­ n ow ledge th a t all th in g s on e a rth b elo n g to the Almighty, a n d then He h a s giv en them to u s to enjoy.

Talm ud, B erachoth

54

JEWISH LIFE

The Way of Telz

By TOVIA LASDUN and LEO DAVIDS

Portrait of a distinctive institution of Torah learning transplanted from Eastern Europe to Midwestern America.

ITHUANIAN Jewry contributed Rabbi Israel, with the support of to the inscription of a greatly cre­ one Reb Hirsch Nevyaser, founded at L ative spiritual chapter in the history Kovno a Talmudic school emphasiz­ of Judaism. The tradition of Lithu­ anian scholarship and piety reaches back to such profoundly intellectual and consummate masters of the art of Avodah (Service of G-d) as Rabbi Eliyahu, the Gaon of Vilna, and Rabbi Chayim of Volozhin, who were inti­ mately involved in the founding of Lithuania’s renowned Yeshivoth.

It is to this background that the elements may be traced which went into the make-up of Telz, the youngest of these Yeshivoth, originally located at the Lithuanian town of that name and now reestablished in a suburb of Cleveland, Ohio. However, the roots of the Telz Yeshiva “system” strike back also to the distinctive period in which it developed.

During the second half of the nine­ teenth century, the Haskalah, or “En­ lightenment”, movement sought to de­ stroy the traditional fundamentals of Judaism, and had indeed made some inroads, creating great dissension among Lithuanian Jews. At this cru­ cial moment the famous sage and saint, Rabbi Israel of Salant, appeared on the scene.

October, 1958

ing the attainment of a thorough knowledge, and objective evaluation, of one’s own psychological forces, and the importance of a greater awareness of social forces and relationships.

When Rabbi Israel left Kovno to devote himself to the dissemination of Torah elsewhere and to starting the Mussar, or “Moralist”, movement, he selected a young scholar of Kovno, Rabbi Eliezer Gordon, to take his place there, and to deliver the lectures to his students.

After several years at Kovno, Rabbi Gordon was elected (in 1882) as Rabbi of Telz; he found a yeshivah there which had been formed by sev­ eral Talmudic scholars in 1875. Its program was based on the then new method of stressing logic and analytic reasoning in the studies, consisting principally of Talmud and religious philosophy. Rabbi Gordon’s own out­ standing capacities strengthened this special atmosphere and transformed it into a veritable catalyst for this type of intellectual development in Jewish learning.

55

The Telz Approach

OGETHER with this general ap­ proach to Talmudic study, there developed a definite methodologicaldialectic tradition, to which some of the other principals and professors, namely Rabbi J. L. Bloch, Rabbi S. Y. Shkop and Rabbi Ch. Rabinowitz, contributed.

Instead of an uncritical manipula­ tion of Halachic concepts in long chains of dialectic reasoning, their method called for a pronounced stress on the application of logical analysis toward an understanding of the nature of these concepts themselves. Often, the best way to a comprehension of the Talmudic texts , andf the classic commentaries was seen as a matter ^ painstaking selection of precisely that interpretation, out of the several rec­ ognized alternatives, which could be most fruitful in the solution of specific Halachic problems.

But while these developments in its approach to Talmudic study have pro­ vided Telz with the credentials for its constituting a, “School” in its own rights they go only a short way toward explaining the significance of Telz as a distinct interpretation of the Torahguided way of life; This significance is bound up with the place of Da’ath (literally: “Knowledge”), or “Wis­ dom”, as introduced by Rabbi J. L. Bloch through his famous lectures, in the Telzer curriculum, and its integra­ tion with the established approach to Halachic studies. These discourses were called Shiurey Da’ath, or “Lec­ tures on Knowledge”, and were basic­ ally analogous to the regular Halachic lecture, which of course has always been considered the core of the Yeshivah curriculum; Besides the moral edification that forms part of the aim of these lee-

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tures, they were intended to aid the development in thè student of a ma­ ture and reasoned appreciation of the world-view implicit in the thoughts and actions of the Torah-guided Jew. For the student to derive maximum bene­ fit from the many days and nights he spent in the study of Halochah, Rabbi Bloch believed, he had to be made conscious and aware of the over-all philosophical framework within which such study assumed paramount signifi­ cance.

This meant also perceiving the unity of all phases or branches of Torah, and contemplating the ethical and moral teachings of the Bible and Rab­ binic literature.

HE approximate counterpart of “Da’ath” in the leading “Mussar T Yeshivoth” is of course Mussar, the introspective study of Jewish ethics.

Telz is considered a non-Mussar Yeshiva. This does not mean, however, that the standard Mussar texts are less studied in Telz than elsewhere. It is rather in its understanding of the con­ cept “Mussar” that Telz differs. The Mussar yeshivoth understood Mussar as a subject apart from, and of a higher spiritual status than, Halochah; it was seen as “lifnim mishurath hadin”, that which goes above and be­ yond the demands of religious law.

The Telzer view is that Mussar must be not only subordinate, but entirely subject, to the discipline of Halochah.

The virtue of ,r“lifnim mishurath hadin” must be an outgrowth from Halochah, and may never contradict it.

This attitude is summed up in a pithy saying ascribed to the old Telzer Rav, Rabbi J. L. Bloch of blessed memory: ^‘People are under the im­ pression that Mussar should be studied with the heart and Gemora’with the head, but I say that Mussar must be JEWISH LIFE

ing a thorough Torah-Jewish as well as a secular education, and two teacher-training institutions. Branch elementary schools of this sort were set up and maintained in scores of communities. The Yeshiva became the central backbone of a system of Torah education conducted in a mod­ ern way, and served as a model for Jewish religious education throughout Lithuania.

In 1821 a post-graduate school was opened at the Telz Yeshiva, in order to offer advanced courses to the in­ creasing number of scholars ready for them. There the learning was espe­ cially devoted to the timeless wisdom of Jewish law so as to study its appli­ cation in the contemporary world. studied with the head, too, Gernora also with the heart”. (Quoted from Rabbi M. M. Poliakof.)

To return to our consideration of Telz’s history, Rabbi Bloch, who suc­ ceeded Rabbi Gordon, was an excel­ lent educator and communal organ­ izer; under his guidance, some of the advanced students devoted their en­ ergy to improving Lithuanian Jewish education. They established a prepar­ atory academy (for the Yeshiva), two elementary schools providing both sec­ ular and religious education, a Girls’ High School and Junior College, offer:0ctober, 1958

M ig ra tio n a n d R e establish m en t

HE SOVIET occupation of Lith­ uania in World War II was of great concern to Jewish leaders throughout the world, as they feared for the future of this historic Jewish center and its great institutions of Torah learning. They therefore per­ suaded Rabbi Elisha Meir Bloch and Rabbi Chaim Mordecai Katz to under­ take the perilous journey through Siberia in 1940, to seek a new home for the Telz Yeshiva in a safer and freer country. After journeying for

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months through the endless expanses of the Soviet domain, enduring epic trials and dangers, the two arrived at Vladivostock and from there suc­ ceeded in getting passage to Japan.

From thence they left for the United States, arriving at Seattle in late 1940.

Immediately following their arrival, committees set to work to seek re­ establishment of the T^elz Yeshiva.

Telz, these devotees felt* had a unique and invaluable contribution to make to Jewish life; its work must go on; the Yeshiva, with these two key figures as its nucleus, and with former talmidim of Telz, now resident in Am­ erica, as instructors, must be replanted on American soil. And it must become part of the American environment. It was decided that a Midwestern loca­ tion be sought, and finally Cleveland was chosen.

On October 28, 1941, the Telz Ye­ shiva was reopened in a private dwell­ ing in Cleveland, Ohio, with a student body of ten. From the very inception its growth was phenomenal, though the choice of the city aroused astonish­ ment in the Jewish world. The Ye­ shiva reached and attracted modernday American-bred youth. Every year hundreds of intelligent college stu­ dents applied for admission. Scores were turned down as its quarters, al­ though steadily enlarged, were always cramped beyond endurance. In 1944 the Yeshiva moved into new buildings with the facilities necessary for hun­ dreds of students. When these quarters in turn became cramped beyond en­ durance, the Yeshiva acquired a 57acre site in one of Cleveland’s most beautiful suburbs, Wickliffe, Ohio.

This revolutionary concept of Torah Study in surroundings of beauty re­ veals to us one of the factors of Telshe’s success.

The universality of Telz appreciates 58

all human achievements and has a special affinity for the aesthetic and beautiful. Uncompromising and strong in its Torah-true Jewishness, yet tem­ pered with pleasantness and emphasiz­ ing the humane ideal, Telz addresses itself in a positive and constructive way to its surroundings and circum­ stances. Telz’s modern system and approach to learning in its broadest traditional ramifications, the method of stressing logic and reason in the philosophy of religion, have brought world-wide prestige to its educational institutions, ranging from all-day ele­ mentary school up to the post-graduate school.

The Telzer Yeshiva Today

T MIGHT appear at first that the predominant aim of the Telz Ye­ shiva must be to produce great Torah scholars; were this so, it would follow that intellectually gifted youths would be preferred by the Yeshiva, while the intellectually mediocre or weaker youth would only be tolerated. How­ ever, by observing the regular activi­ ties of the Yeshiva, one .may discover that such is not the case.

Although indeed we may find some of the students to be geniuses and out­ standing Talmudists, for whom the Yeshiva, as has been mentioned, spon­ sors a post-graduate school, we may also notice that the aim of the Yeshiva is actually to produce mature and pol­ ished Torah scholars out of almost any human “raw material”, who may then enter any walk of life for which they are fit. The curriculum thus satisfies the need of every student, whether he is a candidate for the Rabbinate or not, at any rate offering him the re­ quired recognition of, and desire for, spiritual progress. This, of course, is the all-encompassing aim of dynamic Jewish living. Telz concentrates on

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JEWISH LIFE

bringing to the student body a posi­ tive, open-eyed approach to life and to the ideals of Jewish living in prac­ tice: Jewish living as it relates to the world of business, of education, of family life, to friends and neighbors, the nation, and all mankind.

Knowledge of, and enthusiasm for, these ideals, however, cannot just be taught as can courses that are for “in­ formation only”; nay, they must be absorbed, and can be learned only by direct example in daily life. Herein, therefore, the Yeshiva has tried a new experiment. To assure that spiritually invaluable contact, and meaningful student-teacher relationship, which alone can accomplish this purpose, the administration has given the faculty members land on the new campus on which to build their homes. After all, it is not only the quantity of study that counts, but also the extent to which the student becomes attached to his teach­ ers and worthwhile friends (who are among the most important influences on him). Many great educators have found these relationships crucial to the passing on of “greatness” to the student.

O CONVEY a clear idea of Telz’s regular functioning, let us con­ sider, for instance, a typical Halochah lecture. Everyone present is free to question the “Rosh Hayeshiva” (pro­ fessor) on the consistency and accu­ racy of his dissertation. A sound question may lead to an answer which leads to another question; there is then a call for source material, and refer­ ence books soon pile up on the lectern.

In such discussions one can contradict the lecturer from any pertinent source, and a heated discussion on the super­ iority of one logical assumption, or trend of thought, over another, de­ velops. Voices are raised, and more

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October, 1958

students join in. No scholarly means of argumentative warfare are omitted, within the bounds of propriety, in or­ der to bring truth to the fore. Such free discussions are a boon to intellec­ tual development.

Although it has a highly formalized school structure, Telz does not seem to suffer from any excess of rigidity.

On the contrary, it is devoted to bring­ ing out and developing the individual latent talents of each student, helping him to perfect his own abilities and approach the studies according to his particular aptitudes.

Opportunity to develop an individ­ ual and unique intellectual style is afforded the students through a sys­ tem of research groups. The students in these groups organize for presen­ tation some innovation, perhaps in the way of a new approach, a solution to some known problem, or a novel ar­ rangement of the subject matter. In a walk through the central study-hall any ordinary afternoon, one comes upon such groups, with a small circle of students listening to one of their fellows and—unconsciously perhaps— improving their perception and reason­ ing faculties by looking for a “loop­ hole” in the argument through which to attack his reasoning.

From time to time the students have opportunity to hear a lecture on some topic of general Jewish interest, such as one given recently on “Movements in Contemporary Judaism”, at which the lecturer, a distinguished visitor, ex­ pounded a world-encompassing view of Jewish affairs. Such lectures do much toward enriching and rounding out the curriculum.

HE students’ organization operates a laundry and bookstore on the campus, the profits from these ven­ tures going mainly for the State of

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Israel. When asked for the reason be­ hind this practice, one is given the fol­ lowing answer: Since it is the aim of the Yeshiva to prepare its students to bear the responsibilities of “K’lal Yisroel”, the whole Jewish people, the most good can be accomplished by day-to-day practical application of the theories they learn about here.

For the same reason, incidentally, the student organization formed a “Committee for the Propagation of Jewish Education”. During the past eight years, volunteers trained at the Yeshiva’s Teachers’ Institute have been sent forth into the Jewish educational field as temporary principals or teach­ ers, going wherever assistance of this sort was asked for. Thereby, many a Jewish school even as far away as South Africa has been developed into an independently viable institution of Jewish learning. An important detail of this program is that after this type of work has been engaged in for a period of two semesters, the volunteer rejoins the Yeshiva to continue his studies.

Conclusion

ITH the core of the Yeshiva’s ideological and practical prin­ ciples independent of time and place, the system as a whole has proven itself remarkably flexible in adjusting to ex­ ternal conditions as necessary. This is illustrated by the smoothness with

W

which Telz continues to achieve^ its educational ends despite the com­ pletely altered conditions found in the transition to the American environ­ ment.

Several factors for the Yeshiva’s success and productivity on the Am­ erican scene include its appreciation and use of whatever is best suited to the students’ needs of the many mod­ ern intellectual a n d . technical ad­ vances in any field, as well as the scientific and analytical approach of which we have spoken.

Furthermore, the attraction which Telz in Europe had had for students from Western European countries has proven itself even stronger in its effect on the American student. The essence of this attraction is the chal­ lenge that yeshiva study offers Jewish youth to learn, accept, and carry out in practice the lofty principles of Judaism. This, by the way, is not always easy, but has nevertheless shown itself to be a veritable magnet for young, enthusiastic American stu­ dents.

Under the leadership of Rabbi Chaim Mordecai Katz the new cam­ pus has developed into a living monu­ ment to the great European Jewish center which has been so tragically wiped out. Indeed, it provides the physical and spiritual facilities through which achievements of great conse­ quence for Judaism can be attained.

THE SHOFOR The Shofor is so u n d e d on Rosh H ash o n a h to rem ind u s of Is a a c 's w illin g n ess to b e m arty r a n d to a w a k e n us to our w illin g n ess to do likew ise.

Talm ud, Rosh H a sh o n ah ¡IGB

60

JEWISH; LIFE

B

o

o

k

K

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v

i e

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s

A Sociologist Views the American Jew

By HENRY SI EG MAN

AMERICAN JUDAISM by Nathan Glazer, University of Chicago Press, 1957, 175 pp.

ERE one to take at face value the analysis given in Nathan Glazer’s book, “American Judaism”, one would be apt to feel that in the next decade or so Jewish history will have written its final, sad chapter. To begin with, Glazer places his study within the discouraging context of a modern age whose desiderata and val­ ues have little affinity to the terms by which religion interprets life. More­ over, Judaism has a particular prob­ lem, in addition to the difficulties en­ countered by all religions, in th at it promulgates a unique and all-embrac­ ing pattern of daily living. This pat­ tern, according to Glazer, is all but disappearing.

In developing his thesis, Glazer .de­ scribes in some detail and with much sociological insight the development of Reform in America, the “crucial de­ cades” of 1920 to 1940, during which Judaism made way for “Jewishness”, and the post World War II religious revival, which he interprets primarily in sociological terms.

W

RABBI HENRY SIEGMAN, director of campus activities of the American Zionist Council, is a Musmach of Yeshivah . Torah Vodaath and a graduate of The City College of New York.

October, 1958

It would not have been far-fetched, towards the end of the 19th century, states Glazer, for a historian of ideas to predict a merger between Reform Judaism and liberal Christianity. That this did not happen, Glazer attributes to a subconscious insistence that the Jews be maintained as a people, to a simple and unreflecting attachment to the Jewish people that still remained underneath the rationalist and assimilationist ideologies of the Reform lead­ ers. Nevertheless, Glazer does not fail to perceive the complete break that Reform made with Judaism and with every basis of Jewish unity and Jewish continuity. In the past, doctrines such as those proclaimed by Reform always meant complete and unqualified exclu­ sion from the body of the Jewish people.

OST perceptive is his analysis of M of the “Crucial Decade”—1920 to 1940—when the areas of first settle­ ment, the Lower East Side in New York and similar “ghettos” of the large cities, were deserted for the areas of second settlement, and ultimately for the areas of the third settlement— the suburbs. These changes had seri­ ous consequences for Jewish religious Sukkah. Permission was granted if they could examine the cable to see if it was properly grounded to prevent 61

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JEWISH LIFE

life. During this period a vast variety of Jewish organizational activities bloomed, activities of a philanthropic, defense, and benevolent nature. Yet these activities had little or nothing to do with Judaism. It was during this period that the Jewish Center move­ ment became popular. The “ideology” of this movement proclaimed that Jew­ ish life could be maintained without Judaism. It is, therefore, not surpris­ ing to note th at great impetus was given to this movement by Mordecai Kaplan, who in 1918 formed the New York Jewish Center. Kaplan promul­ gated what Glazer calls a sociological approach to the Jewish religion. His focus was not Judaism, but what he called “Jewishness”, a new term that was to denote the common element m a variety of activities^—political, cul­ tural, intellectual, religious and phil­ anthropic, all of them legitimately and equally “Jewish”. This ideology be­ came the “leitmotif” of the times.

Needless to say, this “Judaization” of the “secular”, rather than being mosif mechol el hakodesh, had the very oppo­ site effect. It “greased” a mass slide away from any expression of authentic Jewishness. Glazer properly points out that though Conservatism rejected Kaplan’s theory, it adopted Kaplan’s practice.

This tendency was arrested after the Second World War, in the ensuing “re­ ligious revival”. There was a notice­ able return to the “right” in both Reform and Conservatism, and, Glazer notes, Orthodoxy began to show amaz­ ing strength and rejuvenation, partic­ ularly in the field of education. Glazer finds it hard to interpret this change in purely Jewish terms. He explains it in sociological terms, which, never­ theless, have religious implications. He sees in this change a return to the con­ cept of Judaism, as distinct from “Jew­ October, 1958

ishness”. One wonders, however, whether the return to the Synagogue in the suburbs is not attributable in some measure to the assumption by the Synagogue of the role of the Center and its manifold social activities. A study of non-orthodox suburban insti­ tutions would undoubtedly reveal that religion there is as compartmentalized as ever. Reform and Conservative ternpies with large memberships draw capacity attendance for fund-raising and social activities, but struggle to scrape together a bare minyon for Shabboth morning services, except when there is a Bar Mitzvah.

LAZER views with extreme grav­ ity the break introduced by Re­ form with its injection of the Law. Jewish history, states Glazer, has not known, nor is it prepared for, the abandonment of the Law. The abando­ nment of the traditional pattern of Jew­ ish religion has not been replaced by Reform with any other form of expres­ sion of religious faith. On the other hand, Glazer insists that Orthodoxy cannot make the traditional pattern of “rituals and observances” viable and meaningful in the modem age. He, therefore, cannot foresee anything but the disintegration of Judaism. He sees light only in the fact that American Jews, for some strange reason, still want to remain Jews. It is because of this that, perhaps, in the near or dis­ tant future, Judaism may come to life again in some unknown and unpre­ dictable form.

A good part of the book is devoted to a brief but incisive analysis of the characteristics of the succesive waves of Jewish immigration to this country —the Spanish, Portuguese and early German groups; later German groups; and still later Eastern European groups. Dr. Glazer analyzes how the

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JEWISH LIFE

intellectual and social strands char­ acteristic of these various migrations were affected by and adapted to the unique problems of the new American environment.

R. GLAZE R has written an im­ D portant work that must be taken seriously-^when he speaks as a so­ ciologist, not as a theologian. In the latter capacity, he tends to do serious violence to his own high standards of scholarship and objectivity. The ca­ valier manner in which he treats and discards Orthodoxy throughout his book is quite revealing. It is true, no doubt, that many Jews who came to this country, because they did not have the benefit of a good Jewish education, but were nevertheless observant, were not able to understand the relevance of Torah to modern society, nor did they feel the need to do so. There is little doubt th at the ignorance and lack of sophistication among this ele­ ment seriously impeded their efforts to implant in their children loyalty to Torah and Mitzvoth. But for Glazer to accept the shortcomings of these people as the shortcomings of Orth­ odoxy cannot be dismissed as mere ignorance or superficiality. It seems to reveal a personal prejudice, which he is unable to suppress on a number of occasions.

Most spurious is the argument that those who observe Torah and Mitzvoth are but a small minority. Jewish his­ tory abounds with examples of such conflicts between the requirements of Jewish Law and the “adjustment” of the masses. Salo Baron, in the intro­ ductory chapter to his “A Social and Religious History of the Jews” writes: “In a sense, Judaism is independent of the number of those who profess it. Theoretically there might remain only a few hundred Jews in the October, 1958

world and Judaism would still be a living religion. Consequently we speak of a prolonged struggle be­ tween Judaism, or the “essential” Mosaic religion, and the so-called “popular religion” of ancient Israel.

Regardless of how few the votaries of the former, how many adherents of the latter, Judaism in its Mosaic formulation remained the main stream in Jewish history. Similarly, in later times the many schismatic movements among Jews usually broke off from the main body of Jewry and, sooner or later, the people and its religion were once again coextensive . . . Since Amos and Isaiah, Judaism has learned more and more to stress quality above quantity. Increasingly realiz­ ing the necessity of a chosen people as an example, and the intricacies of its own non-political power of self-preservation, it placed the true vital inner power of the chosen few above the fictitious and externally glamorous force of the many.”

The superficiality of Glazer’s com­ ments regarding the “dignified” Orth­ odoxy of the Sephardim, which he con­ siders to be an appropriate and viable pattern as compared to the “disor­ derly” Orthodoxy of Eastern European vintage, is typical of his appraisal of orthodox Judaism. This reviewer will be the last to gainsay the importance of decorum and dignity. But surely the spiritual and intellectual vigor and vitality of Eastern European Or­ thodoxy cannot be ignored, as it is in Glazer’s book, because of the “lack of decorum” at religious services. Partic­ ularly revealing is the fact that Glazer sees “little that could be considered morally edifying” in traditional Jewish education, “which constitutes almost solely of the learning of the Bible and the Talmud”.

HESE and other statements about Orthodoxy’s supposed utter in­ capacity to deal with the forces set in motion by the Emancipation reveal

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JEWISH LIFE

that Glazer seems to suffer from a malaise all too common among Jewish intellectuals—an unwillingness to ac­ cord Jewish orthodoxy the intellectual courtesies—objectivity and open-mind­ edness—that are readily extended to their other fields of study. It is as if they are afraid th at a friendly and sympathetic association with this sub­ ject would identify them with the so­ cially and intellectually unprestigeous

Eastern European immigrants, with whom they associate orthodoxy. It is a manifestation not so much of intel­ lectual dishonesty as -of a disturbing lack of inner security.

Be that as it may, these failings, in the opinion of this reviewer, seriously detract from what is otherwise a con­ cise, informative, and continuously in­ teresting survey of an important epoch in the history of the Jewish people.

Torah and Modern Life in Israel

By LEONARD OSCHRY TORAH AND MODERN LIFE IN ISRAEL, W. Turaowsky & Son Ltd., in cooperation with the Committee for Heichal Shlomo, under the auspices of the Ministry for Religious Affairs, Tel Aviv. 125 pp. 13%" x 10".

HE airlines bus travelled at a leisurely speed along the road T from Lod to Tel Aviv in the darkening evening. Across the aisle from me sat a bearded young man talking to his wife. His clipped British pronunciation marked by the guttural influence of Afrikaans was unmistakable. A lands­ man! I struck up a conversation. He was a Capetonian, a journalist, Au­ brey Hodes by name, who had settled in Israel. At present he was associated with Turnowsky, the publisher, and was assisting in the preparation of an album of pictures depicting Torah life RABBI LEONARD OSCHRY, born in South Africa, was graduated from the Hebrew Theo­ logical College of Chicago. He is director of the High School of Jewish Studies of the Associated Talmud Torahs of Chicago.

October, 1958

in Israel. He thought I ought to be interested in such a work.

There immediately came to mind the usual photographs of religious life in the Medinah: old, bearded patriarchs in some secluded corner of Jerusalem who played no part in the life of the State and were the last remnants of a dying age. I ventured the guess that his employer had not deviated from the accepted practice.

Oh, no! he assured me. Mr. Turnow­ sky had undertaken to portray the con­ structive achievements of religious Jewry in Israel, since he believed that Torah was the strongest force binding Jews together all over the world. He (Hodes) would be glad to send me a copy of the album as soon as it would be ready.

The volume has now been released.

Its story is told most impressively; the message abundantly clear, without be­ ing over-emphasized or preached. Here Torah life stretches across all sections of the country and population, and 67

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through all the generations of Jewish history. The tzitzith have' the same meaning whether they dangle from the tallith of a worshipper in Meah Sh’orim, or of a chalutz at his tractor in Tirath Zvi, or of a soldier on the eve of battle, or whether they have crept out beneath the dusty shirt of a workman operating a compressed-air drill, breaking stones in the Negev.

There is a direct line connecting the 1600 year-old ruins of an ancient syna­ gogue in Meron, with the one built on the ruins dating from the third cen­ tury in Pekiin, with the synagogues of the Ari and the medieval Kabbalists, to the modern Beyth Knesseth in a kib­ butz and the army tent of worship somewhere in the desert. The Torah is the -same whether contained in the ornate oriental casings shown in a bril­ liant color plate or in the simple Sefer carried, under a chuppah supported by fixed bayonets, to an artillery regi­ ment.

HE KEDUSHAH of Torah life seems to spread from the pictures and to fill the onlooker. Here is the Sephardi Rav of Ramie meeting a young group travelling by cart to the fields, and he takes the time to bless a little girl who has stepped down and gone to him—there, the Kohanim on Mt. Zion bless children before Yom Kippur. B’ney Torah will surely-treas­ ure the scene of the sainted Reb Isser Zalman Meltzer of blessed memory de­ livering a shiur in the Yeshivah Etz Chaim.

The peace, contentment and serenity of faith find their place here; there are none of the violent antagonisms of demonstrators, nor even the ecstatic abandon of mystic dancing. In fact not a single note mars the calm of the whole work, unless it be the obdurate refusal of the Premier, Ben Gurion, to

T

October, 1958

cover his head as Minister Moshe Sha­ piro lights the Chanukah candles at a meeting of the Cabinet. There are no storms. All the pictures are bright with the light of the warm sunshine of Eretz Israel, softened here and there by the shade of a tree or the shadow in a courtyard.

Nevertheless, there is a wide range of human emotions in the work. One feels the dignity of the Chief Rab­ binate and the Rabbinical courts. One shares the joys of the Chathunah-H whether the couple belongs to “fash­ ionable society” in Jerusalem, or are immigrants from Cochin, or kibbutznikg, or soldiers in the Sinai campaign.

One senses the mixture of anxiety and happiness at a Brith Milah. The goodnatured chuckling of contented Lubavitcher chicken farmers is almost infectuous; and one mourns with the mother crouching over the military grave of her son.

The great variety and color of reli­ gious living is fully revealed. The pho^ tographs are reproduced with pin-point clarity and hold the attention so long that the book seems to be much larger than it really is. And one returns again and again to gaze at the now familiar outlines and to search for de­ tails previously missed.

NUMBER of articles and quota­ tions have been included in the volume. The writing is factual.

No attempt has been made to indulge in rhetoric. Recognized authorities in several fields have contributed short summaries of their respective subjects.

Among them are Cabinet ministers and the directors of the Department of Religious Education, The Bezalel Na­ tional Museum and the Music Teach­ ers* Training College of Tel Aviv.

Laws governing days of rest, personal status, the religious courts and daya-

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70

JEWISH LIFE

nim, are given in their original form without any comment. A few docu­ ments have been reproduced. The ac­ count is all the more effective because of this procedure.

The publishers have lavished the same care on the physical make-up of the album as upon its content. Im­ pressed in the suede front cover is a cellophane-wrapped illustration, the <fSeholar,>, the original of which dates back to the 15th century. Hand-letter­ ing and printing, etc., all combine to

make the work a delight to the eye.

Certainly religious American Jews will want to own this album. It would make an excellent gift—if one already owns his own copy; otherwise he might find difficulty in parting with it.

Messrs. Turnowsky are to be con­ gratulated on the production of a work of such high quality. Its publication is a notable addition to the cultural events of the Tenth Anniversary cele­ brations of Medinath Israel.

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72

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JEWISH LIFE

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73

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and F am ily, Forest H ills, N. Y.

Mr. & Mrs. Clarence H orow itz

Mr. & Mrs. P aul H. Shapiro E lizabeth, N . J.

R abbi & Mrs. Joel Schneierson and Children, Lawrence, N. Y.

Mr.& M rs.B en j.H .K oen igsb erg N ew Y ork, N. Y.

R ubin Morris H anan M ontgom ery, Ala.

Mr. & Mrs. S. D avid L eibow itt N ew York, N. Y.

Mr. & Mrs. E. A. T eplow B rockton, Mass.

D w oretsky Bros. & Co., C.P.A. 300 W ycoff Ave., Bklyn., N. Y.

T he Glazer F am ily P aul J. Haas, P u b lic A ccountant

Dr. & Mrs. M aurice G oodgold Jay and Iris, N ew York, N. Y.

D ayton, O hio Mrs. Joseph G olding N ew York, N. Y.

Mr. M arvin Lieberm an N ew York, N. Y. Mr. & Mrs. H arold H. Boxer Forest H ills, N. Y.

Mr. & Mrs. Max S. R osenfeld Mr. & Mrs. M ilton Braun and Susan, H annah and Judy Prof. & Mrs. Moses Legis Isaacs N ew York, N . Y.

74

Mr. & Mrs. Jacques Habib Long B each, N. Y. Mr. & Mrs. Saul B ernstein K ew Gardens, N. Y.

JEWISH LIFE

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75

Letters to the Editor B. G. AND JEWISH BIRTHRIGHT

Los Angeles, Calif.

The tragic immensity of our Galuth and martyrdom can only now be com­ prehensively summed up, if after so much torture, so much suffering and so much bloodshed, one old man, serv­ ing only a term in a temporal office, can repeal and abrogate the Jewish birthright. (Editorial “Ben-Gurion Declares W ar”, J ewish Life, A v 5718). Is this why a David BenGurion put in so many hard years of labor into the redemption of Israel; so that he should presume to undo Israel, the People.

However much against the grain some of Ben-Gurion’s political doings have rubbed, it was always my con­ tention that Jews outside the State had no right to meddle. This, however, is something altogether different. Had Ben-Gurion decided, however arbitrar­ ily, what constitutes an Israeli citizen, Jewry at large in the world should have nothing to say.

But what he did was to specify di­ rectly that, if a Jew declares he is not a member of any other faith, or if anyone else so declares himself that he is a member of no other religion, then he is a Jew regardless of the Jewish laws governing the traditional meaning thereof. In that case, world Jewry, as a m atter of faith, has a right to challenge his decision. We, too, wherever we may be, are Jews, and in numbers outnumber Ben-Gurion’s constituents six to one. He has ño more right to declare non-Jews 76

Jews in Israel than anyone can as­ sume that right elsewhere.

The heritage and legacy of Judaism was guarded with the lives of too many for too long outside Eretz, and Ben-Gurion has Judaism to play with now only because so many, and per­ haps better Jews than he, were will­ ing to die so that Judaisni may live.

Whether or not he loses face, he must not be allowed to get away with his presumptuousness. Better no Israel for another thousand years, than no Jewry and no Judaism. We are all equal heirs with him in the faith of our fathers, and we outnumber him* Every conscious Jew in the world has a right to protest, and should protest.

Lillian Ott FROM MANE-KATZ

Paris, France I have just received a copy of J ew­ ish Life of June 1958 with the excel­

lent article by Alfred Werner dedi­ cated to me and my work.

I want to thank you and the author warmly for such understanding of my efforts. I have appreciated very much your kindness in publishing this ar­ ticle, which is a great encouragement for me to persevere in my work and try always to renew my means of expression. . . . If you visit Israel, I hope to see you in Haifa, where, as you may know, a Museum of my work is being erected by the Municipality.

Mane-Katz JEWISH LIFE

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PROBLEM OF IMMODEST ATTIRE

New York, N. Y. The criminal wave sweeping this country at present seems to be a mat­ ter of grave concern everywhere. It is generally admitted that the provoca­ tion of sensual desire promoted through all media of mass-communi­ cations incites those desires, resulting in a wave of juvenile crimes. Public measures are being taken to curb cer­ tain types of indecent or obscene pub­ lications, yet only very few dare men­ tion the most common and immediate factor: the way people—particularly women—dress.

Year after year, our streets more and more resemble beaches, to put it mildly.

This is, of course, a m atter for gen­ eral public concern and action, but the problem, like so many others, also has a specifically Jewish aspect. We Jews must be specifically concerned with the situation.

Throughout the generations, Jews have been a symbol of decency and chastity. Throughout the ages Jews have known how to preserve their own high moral standard however low the level of their environment. Why should it be different in our own day?

If mankind at large begins to real­ ize that there is no “abstract moral­ ity” independent of man’s practical conduct; that the provoking of sen­ sual desire does generate crime and immorality under any ethical code, how much more so should we Jews realize this simple truth which is an integral, fundamental part of our faith. It is one of the foremost prin­ ciples of Judaism that, since the Cre­ ator has created us in human, phys­ ical bodies, no intellectual belief, how78

ever profound, no moral or ethical view, however firm, and no religious abstract devotion, however honest, can substitute for, or exempt from, practical and physical performance of, and compliance with, the Divine commandments. The Torah, our Sages teach, has not been given to angels. It is given to humans in this world to be performed in and by their physical beings.

By dressing indecently, the Jewish woman not only associates herself, if only unknowingly, with an evil prac­ tice but she first and foremost trans­ gresses a Divine commandment, the only one to which the Almighty adds the warning, “and He will turn away from thee”.

It is the more deplorable that this evil practice is spreading even among those who otherwise consider them­ selves and truly desire to be orthodox —-let us be frank about it. In some cases people even go as fa r as coming to the house of worship scantily dressed.

What makes people act in such manner? In the vast majority of cases, the true motive is neither perverted exhibitionism nor even the “compul­ sion” of hot weather. The vast major­ ity of women dressing in that manner are certainly not indecent at heart, yet no man in his right senses would sit in his office or business place or attend a social affair or even walk on Main Street in a bathing suit or even in a T-shirt. Moreover, it is not hot­ ter now than it was ten or twenty— or for that purpose a hundred—years ago. Yet, even ten years ago women did not appear in public the way they now do. The true motive—as in so many other cases—is the childish de­ sire to “keep up with the Joneses”.

The same idol of “fashion” that makes JEWISH LIFE

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79

a woman wear a sack or wear the same sort of dress as great-grand­ mother did, not worrying at all about being “old fashioned”, will induce her to vanquish her own inborn feelings of decency and modesty under the pretext of “being modem”—as “mod­ ern” as the primitive aborigines of the jungle.

On the other hand, history has proved that revolutions can be wrought by a handful of resolute young people, unafraid of being called names.

Would it not be a supreme task for Jewish youth to start a revolutionary movement in this direction? “Modern­ ism” in many respects has already be­ come old-fashioned. In many fields, such as education, religion, etc;, the youngest, the most modern, have be­ come the champions of the older prin­ ciples. Why should not Jewish youth start an “On to Torah” movement also in this direction of restoring the old glory of Jewish modesty and de­ cency in dressing?

Let us not regard the task as easy.

It is true that the arguments, if any, in favor of indecent attire are not logically founded, but this very illog­ ical subconscious urge to “keep up with the Joneses” cannot easily be countered by logical arguments. Yet the task is not impossible. By launch­ ing an overall campaign of explana­ tion in favor of decent dressing, with the participation of our ministers, teachers, communal leaders and—first and foremost—by our youth, the idea

80

can be brought home to the Jewish public, and eventually to the general public.

We may be surprised at the bene­ ficial results.

Uriel Zimmer OMMISSION New York, N. Y. I wish to ask you to correct an error which crept into my article on Rashi (J ewish Life, A v 5718). It is stated there that the commentary on Baba Bathra from page 29 on was completely by Kashi's son-in-law, Yehudah ben Nathan, which is grossly erroneous. It was completed by Shmuel ben Meir, known as Rashbam, Rashi’s grandson, as any young student of the tractate knows. It was so in manu­ script and was followed by a state­ ment that Yehudah ben Nathan com­ pleted the commentary on Makkoth. A sentence or so was omitted and hence the error.

Dr. Meyer Waxman [Our apologies for this error, result­ ing from inadvertent omission, in printing, of a line of text. The article should properly have read (p. 37): “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 grandson, Shmuel ben Meir, and a small part of the tractate Makkoth, completed by his son-in-law, Yehudah ben Nathan.”—Editor]

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