Jewish Life Winter 1980-81 by Jewish Action

I $2.50

Shevat 5741/Winter 1980/1981 ■

Comments: The Rosh Yeshiva and the Balebos: Rav Yitzchak Hutner; Reb Yitzchak Meir Bunim / Dialogue: The Stifling of Dissent / "Where There Ain't No Ten Commandments" / A Proposed Addition to the Shulchan Aruch / "Who Decides What's News?"

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"The Teshuva Phenomenon: The Other Side of the C oin " /Some sharp dissenting

opinions. Hebrew in the Soviet Union /A Russian

Jewish Dissenter describes his personal struggle to have Hebrew recognized by Soviet authorities as his "official language," and for the right to teach it to others. What Did They Know? The American Jewish Press and the Holocaust, September 1939-December 1942 /a revealing examination of the pages of the Jewish press during the dark years. Bircas Hachamah / Blessing of the Sun / A

new book which describes an unusual mitzva which can only be observed on a Wednesday morning—once in twenty-eight years! A publication of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America./Orthodox Union

Volume IV, Number 4

Shevat 5741/Winter 1980-81

Mrs. Linore Ward and Family have established the Jess Ward Memorial Jewish Life Fund

Editor Yaakov Jacobs Managing Editor David Merzel Editor Emeritus Saul Bernstein Editorial Board Julius Berman J. David Bleich Judith Bleich David Cohen SamueKCohen Lawrence A. Kobrin David Kraftzler George Rohr Sheldon RudoFf Pinchas Stolper . Simon Wincelberg Production Assistant I Fayge Silverman

to help assure the continued publication of Jewish Life and to continue the dissemination of Torah ideology to English-speaking Jewry A tribute to the sacred memory of Jess Ward who in his lifetime gave of his talents and his means to his fellow Jews. We pray that these pages shall be a worthy memorial to his committed life.

A publication p i the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America Sheldon Rudoff/ Ctwirmih PublicMunit -Gj»tmisstin

Contents 2

Comments: The Rosh Yeshiva and the Balebos: HaGaon Rav Yitzchok Hutner; Reb Yitzchak Meir Bunim/ ''Dialogue" and Dissent/"...Where There Ain't No Ten Commandments"/Abscam and Torah/An Addition to the Shulchan Aruch/Personal Comment: Who Decides What's "News?"

Basic Law Jerusalem /A Policy Background

The Teshuva Phenomenon: Responses From Our Readers

Hebrew in the Soviet Union /Lev Ulanovsky

What Did They Know: The American Jewish Press and the Holocaust, September 1939-December 1942 /Alex Grobman

Our Landsmannschaften: Links With the Old Country/Janet Harnik

Books in Review Bircas Hachmah

Letters to the Editor

Because of the small staff producing Jewish Life, contributors are asked to send ah inquiry before submitting manuscripts, and to be patient in waiting for a response. We regret any inconvenience we may have caused in this regard, and we trust we will be able to increase our efficiency in the future. ©Copyright 1981 by the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America. Material from JEWISH LIFE, including illustrations, may not be reproduced except by written permission from this magazine following written request. JEWISH LIFE (ISSN #00-2165-77) is published quarterly. Subscription: 1 year— $10.00, 2 years—$18.00, 3 years—$25.00. Foreign: Add $.50 per year. Single copy $2.50, Editorial and Publication Office: 116 East 27th Street, New York, N.Y. 10016. Second Class Postage Paid New York, N.Y.

The Rosh Yeshiva and the Balebos In the early stages of the rebirth of Orthodoxy in America, it was the Orthodox rabbinate which first raised the colors of Torah and proclaimed that an American O rthodoxy was possible on these shores. In the second phase it was the Rosh Yeshiva, the Torah scholar bent on building Torah institutions who had the strongest impact on the arid countryside of our continent. Concom itant with these two m ajor efforts, was the development of the balebos, the person who accepted the visions presented by charism atic leaders, and helped to bring the dreams into reality through their administrative and financial resources. During the final stages of preparation of this issue of Jewish Life, Klal Yisrael suffered the loss of Rav Yitzchok H utner, the Rosh Yeshiva par excellence; and Reb Yitzchak M eir Bunim, the balebos par excellence. Much will be w ritten about these two men in the m onths and years ahead; but we asked Rabbi Pinchas Stolper to give us a brief appreciation of his Rebbe, who was the Rebbe of us all. And we asked Dr. Marvin Schick to write a brief appreciation of the much-loved Irving Bunim. Their words follow.

HaGaon Rav Yitzchok Hutner nsnaV ¡?hx nat

My Rebbe, the gaonand Yeshiva of the Mesivta Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin and Kollel G ur Yeshiva shelMa'aloh, th Aryeh, was called to the H igh," on the nineteenth day of Kislev, 5741. T he press had little to say about Rav H utner; they had no files to go to since he would never allow his name to appear in any public notice. He had contem pt for publicity and he had instructed that there were to be no eulogies, no obituaries on his passing. He avoided the press which he felt under the best circum stances smacked of shekr,of falsehood, and h his talmidim to know that ernes had found its last refuge in the Bais Medrash. Even in writing these words I may be violating his principles, but his life is now Torah and we must begin to study it. Rav H utner was a private person. His name did not appear on letterheads; his own correspondence was w ritten on a plain sheet of paper imprinted simply: Yitzchok Hutner/Brooklyn, New York. He shied away from conventions; he delivered no public addresses; w rote no articles. In his early years he was known only to a small circle of talmidimand disciples. He reser his energies and talents for them alone, out of conviction that 2

only in this way could he begin to nurture the wasteland of American Jewry. He was one of the first to believe that America could produce a native talmidchochom who was the equal of his European antecedents. In this respect Rav H utner can properly be called America's first Rosh Yeshiva. Even the M esivta, which he built to new proportions, took second place to each of his talmidim. There was always a line of talmidim waiting outside his room, each one waiting to speak to the Rosh Yeshiva about his Gemora shiur, or about one of his ma'amorim, the discourses on Jewish thought of which he was the world's recognized m aster. His interest in each id'sel arning and well-being as a person was talm unceasing. If one did not come to see him, a message would be sent: "T h e Rosh Yeshiva would like to see you." Rav H utner was a supreme student of the mind: He understood each talmid and his own special needs, and established w ith each of us a bond that made it possible for him to m otivate us to develop our own potential to the fullest. His public forum was his Bais Medrash—or the wedding of a talmid. Here he was m ajestic, imposing and regal. W hen he entered a room everyone rose. If the room was crowded, a wide path opened the m oment he entered. Yet he neither desired nor needed respect for himself. This regal, charism atic man was a warm father and a dear friend. Sitting alone with him, one was humbled to think that this great man would devote his personal time to a student's problems. Yet that was his strength: Sitting before Rav H utner, his students felt both love and awe; that he knew all there was to know; that he could, by just looking at your face, read the deepest thoughts in your soul. It was here that one heard his "speeches." He was effervescent, overflowing, generous, and witty; but he could also be critical and insistent. Apart from his stature as a Godol B’Torah, statesm an, and astute observer of world and Jewish affairs, he was primarily a builder and molder of m en—in his own idiom, a "planter." "A builder," he used to say, "assembles his materials and constucts a building following a design. He may, if he wishes, rush his workers. Not so the planter. He m ust plant each seedling; nurture the growing tree, and wait patiently until it bears fruit. A man in a hurry can be a successful builder. A man in a hurry can not be a successful planter." O n the other hand, Rav H utner believed that American Jew ry could not survive the slow and normal process of communal development. It has been said that new ly-settled diaspora communities require a period of three hundred years before they are capable of producing native Torah giants. Rav H utner was driven by a determ ination to speed the process so that the accomplisment of this goal might be achieved within

one generation. As Torah institutions and communities in Europe w ent up in flames he realized that Jewish survival was dependent upon the creation of an American born Torah. To accomplish this required a force that could m otivate young students to make a qualitative jump in their com m itm ent and lifestyle in a relatively short period of time. With this conclusion in mind, Rav H utner decided to concentrate his influence on his students as one would concentrate the rays of the sun through a focused magnifying glass— so as to create the intensity, commitment and idealism that was required. Examined in historical term s, his accomplishment was nothing short of miraculous. The key to this success was the intensive relationships he developed with individuals and his "cam paign" to convince as many students as possible that they could indeed become Gedolei Yisrael. The number of individuals with whom he developed and retained a close and intim ate relationship is astounding. Each of these diverse individuals felt that he was a ben yochid,the only son of the Rosh Yeshiva. While Rav H utner was uncompromising in form ulating Torah positions, he had the capacity to attract to his Bais M edrash a spectrum of students from diverse backgrounds. The Chaim Berlin Bais hdedrash was anything but monolithic? there were members of B'nai Akiva; sons of Chassidic rebbes,' students who had come from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America—and even some with Neturei Karta leanings. Each of these talmidim had one thing in common: Rav H utner was "my R ebbe." Because of his life's work, the Jewish world has been enriched with hundreds of rabbonim, roshei yeshivos and yeshiva educators. The versatility and uniqueness of Rav H utner is not easily explained, but his family and educational background surely played a part. His father was from a prominent family from the Latvian city of D'vinsk. Among the members of his family were the Gaon Reb Yoseph Zundel H utner from Aishushuk, author of distinguished com mentaries on the Shulchan Aruch, and the Gaon Reb Yehuda Siegel, rav and posek in Warsaw. His m other s family, the Wiedenfelds, were chassidim with close ties to the Kotzker Rebbe, one of the most original and daring of the chassidic m asters. As a young man, Rav H utner was influenced by the G errer Rebbe, Reb Avrahom Mordechai, author of the Imrai Ernes. He would visit the Rebbe with his uncle Reb Ben Zion O strover, an intim ate of the Kotzker, a talmid of the ChidusheiHa'Rim, and of the SJas Ernes of Gur. At the age of fourteen, Rav H utner was sent to the Yeshiva of Lumz in Poland. When his genius was recognized, he was snatched away from Poland to Lithuania to study in the worldfamed Slobodka Yeshiva. He soon became known, in spite of

his youth, as the Varshover lluy. He became the protege of the m aster ba'al mussar,"D er A lter fun Slobodka," and the Rosh Yeshiva, Reb M oshe Mordechai Epstein. In 1926, when a branch of the Slabodka Yeshiva was established in Chevron, he w ent to Eretz Yisrael to study at w hat came to be known as the C hevroner Yeshiva, w here he remained until 1929, when Arab riots forced the closing of the Yeshiva. It was during this period that he became a confidante of Rav Avraham Yitzchok Kook, first C hief Rabbi of the Holy Land, and of Rav Yoseph Chaim Sonnenfeld, leader of the old Yishuvin Eretz Yisrael. Rav H utner moved to America in 1935 where he became a Rosh Yeshiva at Yeshivas Reb Yaakov Yoseph, known as "th e m other of American yeshivos." In 1939 he became Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivas Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin. In a brief journalistic response to the death of my rebbe, there is no time to even begin to describe his unique Torah philosophy: an amalgam of such seemingly disparate elements as the A lter of Slobodka, the K otzker Rebbe, the late Rav Kook, and above all, the shining light of M aharal Mi'Prague. Rav H utner's philosophic w ritings—eight volumes of Pachad Yitzchak have already appeared, and about ten more are in m anuscript—reflect all of these great minds, creating a synthesis of Talmudic incisiveness, kabbala, chassidus, and mussar. In a structured, poetic style, Rav H utner imparts new insights to be discovered by even the most learned scholar, repaid by disseminating his teachings, and by becoming "planters" in our lifetim es as he was in his lifetime. The passing of Rav H utner leaves a deep wound, a great void: W ithout him the world seems suddenly em pty—and silent. He was w ithout doubt the most sublime, compelling and aw e-inspriring person I have known. To have been able to call him "R ebbe" was one of life's greatest gifts. To live in his shadow as if he were still with us; to temper our lam entations— as was his wish—and to rejoice in the knowledge that he walked this earth, is his last challenge to us Rabbi Stolper is Executive Vice President of the Union of all. Orthodox Jewish Congregations of Pinchas Stolper America.

Reb Yitzchak Meir Bunim naiaV ¡?’*rs *iat It seemed almost that Irving Bunim —he preferred being called Yitzchak M eir—would always be with us. A fter all: For sixty years he was part of every m ovement (movement in both senses) for the advancement of Torah and Yiddishkeit; and to him that, by definition, included Eretz Yisrael. When some of 5

Dr. Schick is an outstanding halebos of the new generation and now serves as president of the Rabbi Jacob Joseph School.

us were youngsters, he was already an elder statesm an; and our children thought of him in the same manner. Would that one more generation had benefitted from his presence and wise counsel. He was the outstanding layman in American O rthodox Jewish life, and what was most remarkable about him was the broad range of his work. He taught us more about Orthodox unity simply by his being, than scores of resolutions and other attem pts to bring about unity. His skills as a popular lecturer, fund raiser for Torah causes, and prodder of the conscience of Jewish leadership, seemed to come naturally to him, almost by instinct. Yet he was a deep thinker, and his insights—clothed at times in parable, at other times in folk language—w ent to the heart of w hat ailed the Jewish soul over the last sixty years. His love of Avos, which he taught for so many decades, was embodied in his two volumes of Ethics From Sinai, the title itself illuminating the significance of what is more loosely called "Ethics of the Fath ers." Yitzchak M eir Bunim was a man of impressive parts, but he was greater than the sum of his parts. He was of the communityU-almost co-extensive with the community. People at times disagreed with him, but no one ever doubted— no! not his sincerity, he made that over-worked word even paler—no one ever doubted his dedication to Torah and and his loyalty to Torah leadership. In his early teens he joined the Young Israel m ovement. He quickly advanced to leadership which he maintained until his passing. For more than half a century he stood at the helm of the Rabbi Jacob Joseph school. During World War II, sensitive to w hat was happening to our brothers on the European continent, he worked untiringly for Vaad Hatzalah. He so loved Eretz Yisrael that he became a partner to everyone and every movement that shared his love. In the course of his intim ate association with the late Reb Aharon Kotler he became a tireless associate and devoted talmid of the great m aster. When Reb Aharon traveled to W ashington to intercede on behalf of Jews under the black cloud of Nazism, Irving Bunim w ent with him. And when Reb Aharon announced his plans to build Bais M edrash Gevoah in Lakewood, Bunim was at the side o f his rebbe. His work for Torah Umesorah and Chinuch Atzmai never slackened: He was not one to tire of one cause and abandon it for another. As an intim ate of roshei yeshivos and lay leaders, he was more than a bridge between two communities; he was of both communities, breathing his life's breath into both. As we now mourn his passing, we celebrate his life's achievement. He left a legacy of confidence in Torah and Torah values which he helped create. We have reaped the benefits of his achievem ents, and we now carry the obligation to build on w hat his lifetim e brought to pass. M arvin Schick

Editors Post Script: Having known Mr. Bunim for several decades—it took me almost all that time before I could address him as Reb Yitzchak M e ir^ I feel compelled to record the debt of my generation to him. My wife and I had the zchus of spending last Shavuos with him. The loss of his dear wife Blanche had taken its toll, together with several illnesses. He was tired, but not too tired to smile. There was ahavas Yisrael in that smile, and as I come to grips with his passing, it is that m agnificent Smile that comes constantly to mind. We loved you, Reb Yitzchak Meir, and we will never forget you.

"Dialogue" and Dissent Dor Hemshech is an organization sponsored by the World Zionist Organization. Its purpose is to help revitalize the Zionist momement. Let the editor of their new sletter, Dialogue, tell about it in her own words. With both America and Israel torn by political strife, and the world rent by chaotic events, young American Jews who came of age after World War II are witnessing a sweeping unrest that has not been seen on so large a scale for a long time. On a smaller scale, we observe the petty partisanship which too often plagues the Jewish political structure, draining energy which should be directed to vital activities. Younger members of the Israeli political parties, realizing the urgent need for cooperation and interchange, formed Dor Hemshech in 1973, as an attempt to transcend party allegiances and philosophical differences and focus instead on areas of common concern. Today Dor Hemshech, with branches througout Western Europe, South America and the United States, sponsors a variety of activities to train a new generation of Jewish and Zionist leadership. It is against this backdrop that Dialogue comes to you. Our purpose is to explore ideas and exchange opinions. While the pages of Dialogue are open to the widest range of thinking, we emphasize that we stand united behind the Government of Israel as the legitimate, chosen voice of the Israeli people. We are striving to bring together viewpoints not ordinarily presented on the pages of one publication in the hope that open channels of communication among those who share concern for the State of Israel—albeit in different forms—will foster honest debate. We hope that as the magazine grows and develops, we will truly serve as an arena for discussion among young leadership. Any Jew with Eretz Yisrael at heart can only welcome these objectives. The bringing together of "viewpoints not ordinarily presented on the pages of one publication" is a heartening prospect, even though we may ourselves be among those, by implication, criticized for being parochial. Alas: This was not to be. The Summ er 1980 issue of Dialogue, from which the above words are quoted, contained an article entitled "T h e UJA and 7

the State of Israel." T hat is, it did—and it didn't. Let's explain. The article said things about UJA and Israel that are indeed not often said. Among other points made in the article, the author—"an Israeli who spent several years in the United S tate s"—charged that UJA, by its emphasis on M ON EY, has distorted Jewish values. It was furth er suggested that the UJA portrayal of Israelis living in dire poverty flew in the face of efforts to have American Jews settle in Israel. A copy of this issue was "leaked", to Jewish Life. But the bulk of Dialogue readers never saw it. It w ent from the printing press to the shredder, and a revised edition (with the UJA article replaced by another article) hurriedly printed on cheap newsprint, was rushed to the mailing list. We find this appalling. We find this deceitful. How can the World Zionist Organization and Dor Hemshech hope to "refresh the languishing Zionist m ovem ent" by an action which borders on book-burning? Had such an episode unfolded in any other area of journalistic endeavor it would have itself become a cause celebre in the pages of other publications. Yet we have seen no m ention of the episode in print anywhere. (We would be pleased to learn of an exception.) The Jewish People deserve an explanation of this sordid event; our pages are open to such an explanation. We suspect it will not be forthcom ing.

"...Where There Ain't No Ten Commandments" Law is a serious m atter; and Supreme CouTt decisions are surely serious. Someone once said that "th ere are certain things we must take very, very, very seriously—but not too seriously." These thoughts come to mind in contemplating a recent United States Supreme C ou rt decision. The State of Kentucky passed a law mandating that there be posted in every public school classroom a copy of the "T en Com m andm ents." Realizing that the law would surely be tested before the Supreme C ourt against the C onstitution's "Establishm ent C lause," the Kentucky legislators further required that each copy of the Commandments posted include a note in small print stating that the Commandments serve as "th e fundamental legal code of W estern civilization and thè common law of the United States"— a sort of "Surgeon G eneral's w arning." Nevertheless, five of the nine justices ruled that "such an avowed secular purpose is not sufficient to avoid conflict with the First A m endm ent" injunction against the establishm ent of religion. So be it: T he Supreme C ourt has declared the "T en Com m andm ents" to be indeed a religious document; and American schools are now like "T h e Road to

Mandalay/7 where, in the words of the poet Rudyard Kipling: "...th ere ain't no Ten Com m andm ents.77 At first blush, it would appear that the action brought by a Quaker, a Jew and an atheist, and the court's upholding of their argum ent, would present a dilemma to the traditional Jew. One wants to see the Establishm ent Clause maintained and upheld, yet one hardly likes to oppose the "T e n Com m andm ents." But upon reflection, there are two factors we must consider. *Nowhere in the Torah does there appear an expression that can correctly be translated as "T h e Ten Com m andm ents." The Torah does speak of Aseres Ha'Dibros, The Ten Words, which has properly been captured in the Greek coinage used in English—the Decalogue: from deca meaning ten, and logos meaning words. *T h e re is a seem ing paradox in the traditional understanding of the Decalogue. O n the one hand, classical Torah com m entators maintain, in varying ways, that each of the six hundred and thirteen mitzvos are, in effect, derivatives of the Aseres Ha'Dibros, Yet, the practice of reciting the Decalogue in the Bais Ha'Mikdosh, in the Holy Temple, each day was discontinued because it gave rise to the erroneous notion that the "T en Com m andm ents" are the heart of the Divine Imperative, and that all other commandments are of a much lesser m agnitude. T h e use of the exp ression "T e n Com m andm ents" by the Christian world, by non-O rthodox Jews and by O rthodox Jews who should know better, has enforced in the modern mind the notion that the Decalogue is truly a statem ent of basic law which diminishes other Torah laws not listed among the ten. W hatever the State of Kentucky and the Supreme C ourt understand the "T en Com m andm ents" to be can have no bearing on our understanding of the Aseres Ha'Dibros. Y et our society and our times force us into difficult positions: We cannot accept the commonly-held meaning of the "T en Com m andm ents"; yet can we oppose a "docum ent" so firmly implanted in the American mind as the essence of religion? Perhaps the question answers itself.

Abscam and Torah Arab-Am ericans took offense at the use by the FBI of the stereotype of the Arab as a petro-dollar rich sheik. Apparently no group can escape the wounds of the stereotyper and the cliche-m aster. Perhaps it is really impossible to do away with stereotyping because people just aren't so sm art, and it is easier to make group judgements about people than to evaluate each

member of the group as a single human being. O r maybe it's a m atter of laziness. Yet Abseam does have something to teach the believing jew . Th e sainted Chofetz Chaim whose almost hundred years extended into the early tw entieth century, used to say that the invention of the radio helps us to better understand that which we have always believed on faith: that "w hat is said here, can be heard th ere." It has been said as an extension of that concept, that the invention of recording devices helps us to better understand the allusion to "th e books of life" that are examined when a person is brought to final judgement. The use of hidden TV cameras by FBI agents should teach us to behave always as if som eone m ight be w atch in g — because...som eone is always watching.

An "Addition" to the Shulchan Aruch A reader who asked that his name be withheld sent us the following draft proposal for inclusion in future editions of popular codes on Jewish Law.

"On the Use of the Telephone" "1. One should not call someone at such an hour of the morning when a person might still be asleep; or at such an hour of the evening when a person may already have retired. "2. One should not prolong a telephone conversation when it prevents other callers from getting through. "3. If the person one has called appears to be fatigued, the conversation should be curtailed. "4. If one has a secretary who answers one's telephone, that person may not be instructed to say, 'I'm sorry, he/she is in conference," or 'I'm sorry he/she is not in,' if that is not really the case. This is not different from other forms of lying which the Torah forbids. "5. If a person has called one or more times, and the person ca lied is unable to return the call, he should delegate someone to call that person to explain or apologize "6. If one dials a number incorrectly, and becomes aware of the error as soon as the phone is answered, one should not hang the phone up, but one should rather say, to the effect,'I'm sorry to have troubled you; I dialed incorrectly.' "7. When one calls someone, one should state his identity in order to save time, and to spare the answ erer from possible em barrassm ent."

Since Jewish Life is not a halachic authority, the above should only be understood as an advisory until such time as it receives com petent endorsem ent.

Who Decides What's "News?" Newly-published books rarely make the front pages of newspapers. Book reviews and even news stories about books are usually confined to what journalists call "th e back of the book," placed there on the assumption that people who care about b o o k s ta n d current thought—w on't mind searching beyond the front page and the fron t pages. Who decides when a book is news? Who decides what is "n ew s" to begin with?-p|jj Therein lies our little tale. Take the book TheBrethren, an inside look at the United States Supreme C ourt. Even before it was published it was making news all over the country. For the first time ever, so w ent the "h y p e," you can know what goes onbehind the scenes august and distinguished branch of government; what the justices say when they're not intheir robes; the names they call each other; the salty words they sometimes use; and how they reach their decisions. T h e book remained before the public's eye for weeks on end. But it soon sank into oblivion when people began to realize that all the book really told the American public was that Supreme C ourt justices are little different from less-august people; that they are little different from other groups of people throw n together with some collective responsibility; that they jockey for position; that they rub against each other; that they talk behind each other's backs; and that at tim es— not unlike some presidents— they talk like truck drivers. O ne critic, R obert H. Bork, in his review of the book (The Public Interest, Spring, 1980) put it this way: ...the authors trudge from case to ease, narrating the conferences and maneuverings for votes, relating vanities and insecurities, relating anecdotes and unkind assessments. But unless the reader is the sort who thinks Rona Barrett's "news" is important, these stretches of the book are boring...Generally we get the sort of gossip that is out of date in a week. But really im portant books are rarely as lucky as The Brethren. (As the Talmud puts it, in an uncharacteristic tone: "Everything needs mazal, even the Torah scroll in its ark.") If the subject of a new book is the press itself, and if its judgment of the press is harsh, it is more than likely that the American public for the most part will never hear of it. Such a book is Deciding What's News (Pantheon, New York, 1979) by the highly-respected sociologist H erbert J. Gans,

most

subtitled A. Study ofCBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News, N & Time. W ere we writing, for example, for the Columbia Journalism Review, this book would m erit—and undoubtedly has already had—a full-blown review. But writing as we are for a somewhat parochial and obscure Orthodox Jewish journal, we can only use the book as a handle for an is-it-good-for-theJew s aside. But before we get to that, the book deserves, even in these pages, at least a capsule review. Gans spent ten years studying his subjects, actually sitting in on the daily operations of newsrooms and T V studios. He was permitted to observe meetings at which the vast amount of stories th at com e into new sroom s are studied and determ inations made as to what Americans would read and what they would not read in their morning newspapers and news magazines—and what radio and T V listeners would be told on the evening news which must be cut severely because the electronic media can offer only a small percentage of what the print media can. (One New York City "all new s" radio station boasts, "give us 22 m inutes, and w erll give you the world!") Gans concludes that there are clearly identifiable patterns in what actually emerges into the public consciousness, and that the news media pay most attention to and uphold the actions of elite individuals and elite institutions, in support of a certain social order. Briefly: T he news people are far from being the objective journalists they claim to be and cater to special interest groups, especially as they impinge on the operation of their own companies as profit-m aking businesses. W ere such charges to be made against some other area of American social, economic, or political life, it would be blown up by the press in bigger-than-W atergate dimensions. But-"the fourth branch of governm ent," which portrays itself as the watchdog of the public, ever-ready to invoke its constitutional prerogatives from attack, watches over everyone— itself. (When I recently lectured on this subject before a group in New York City only one member of the audience indicated he had heard of the book—and he was in an allied profession.) In the light of growing hostility to the State of Israel, and the campaign to make the PLO respectable, the lesson should not be lost on American Jewry.

The Issue: Dissent It sometimes happens that in the final prepartion of an issue of Jewish Life, a single theme peers through w hat started out as unrelated articles and com ments. In this slightlydelayed issue—we're sorry—"dissent" seems to be the controlling word. The sad episode concerning Dialogue is recorded in our Com m ents. (It isn't often that a quarterly journal gets an "exclusive.") The growing hostility against Israel in the United Nations is now focusing on Yerushalayim —a city occupied by many powers through the ages but which only the Jewish People ever chose to be its capitol. While we have over the years had reason to criticize the weaknesses of Israel's public responses to diplomatic and propagandistic onslaughts, Basic Law: Jerusalem is in our opinion a most effective rebuttal of the attacks on Israel's sovereignty over the Holy City, prepared by Israel's M inistry of Foreign Affairs. The Teshuva Phenomenon: The Other Side of the Coin, which appeared in our last issue (Fall 1980) stimulated a good deal of dissent. We invited several rabbis and lay leaders to com m ent; only two, much to our disappointment, were willing to com ment for the record and their letters appear in this issue. The article resulted in heated debate at the recent convention of the Union of O rthodox Jewish Congregations of America; and the m atter of "chizulc k e 'r o v im reaching out to young people from our own ranks who have defected from Yiddishkeit, was discussed at the convention of Agudath Israel of America. In this context it is instructive to recall that efforts by the late Rav Avraham Yitzchak Kook to reach out to the secular Zionist population in Eretz Yisrael were greeted with nasty attacks. It is a tribute to the entire Torah community that with few exceptions we are all now reaching out. The discussion on methods and priority for these efforts can only advance the cause of Torah, and we welcome more letters on the subject. We are pleased to publish in this issue some sharp dissents from positions stated in our last issue, and we hope that our readers will continue to share with us their dissenting opinions. D issent by Jews in the Soviet Union requires the courage of mesiras nefesh, the kind of self-sacrifice that means a willingness to literally give up one's life. A new breed of Jewish dissenters in Russia has centered on Loshon HaKodesh, the Holy Tongue. In this issue Lev Ulanovsky, in Hebrew in the Soviet Union, tells of his experiences and those of other Jews in asserting their right to teach the language. It is a kind of "dem onstration" which 13

expresses dissent while at the same time strengthening the Yiddishkeit of the dem onstrators. To a growing number of Jews alive today the Holocaust years are recalled from historical accounts. But even for those who were old enough to recall those dark days, there is a fuzziness about them. It is difficult to answ er such questions as "Did we know what was going on in Europe," and "When did we know ?" Alex Grobm an went to the files of newspapers being published at the time, and in What Did They Know? The American Jewish Press and the Holocaust, September 1939-December 1942 shares with us the results of his research. An old piece of Yiddish folklore has it that a Yidgit'zich an aitza. W hat do you do when you come to a foreign land and the only people you know are other immigrants from your own home tow n?—you create a new institution: the Lahdsmannschaft. Janet H arnik gives us an introduction to this fading institution in Our Lansmannschaften: Links With the Old Country.

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The famous Churva Synagogue in Yerushalayim, before and after Jordanian occupation in 1948.

A Poliey Background Paper

Basic Law: Jerusalem It is considered a violation of the canons of journalism to publish what is called in the trade a "canned editorial''M-that is, a statement prepared by a special-interest body presented as the editorial position of an independent publication. The following statement was distributed by the Israel Ministry of Foriegn Affairs/1nformation Division to the American press. To our knowledge it has not appeared in print anywhere, We have no journalistic qualms about printing it verbatim. We too are a "special interest" group. Our position on-^nay, our love for—Eretz Yisrael is well-known. As the world greets almost every independent action by the State of Israel with a kind of hysteria reserved only for Jews and things Jewish, we hail Basic Law: Jerusalem as a courageous act, and as a statement of an ancient truth which no show of hands can reject.—editor. 1.

Jewish political possession of From time to time, forces hostile to Israel bring up the

"Jerusalem question" in4qternational forum s, in an attem pt to undermine the city's status as the Capital of Israel and as the living heart of the Jewish people as a whole. The latest furor over Jerusalem was raised, at the UN and elsew here, on the initiative of the Arab states, aided by some of the countries of Europe and the "Third W orld;" it was not Israel that initiated this move. It is those countries, and not Israel, that are reponsible both for the timing and for the strident tone of this most recent assault on the integrity of Jerusalem.

Jerusalem and absolute freedom of access to it by Christians and Moslems—these have always been twin declared principles of the State of Israel.

2. The Arab and Islamic campaign against Israel on the subject of Jerusalem began back in 1974, at the C onference of Islamic States, and was given renewed impetus, on the initiative of the Arab R ejectionist States, afte r the signing of the Camp David Agreem ents in Septem ber 1978. 3. The subject of Jerusalem came up for discussion at Camp David. When it transpired that agreem ent could not be reached between the parties, each side presented its position on the subject in a separate letter appended to the Agreem ents. It was understood by both sides, together with the United States, that priority be given, in the peace negotiations, to the subject of autonomy for the inhabitants of Judea-Samaria and the Gaza district. 4. It was Egypt that first deviated from this understanding. As far back as 21 March 1980, in an interview with N BC, President Sadat minimized the sanctity of Jerusalem for the Jews, in comparison with its sanctity for the M oslems, citing the fact that there are 900 million Moslems but only 13 million Jews. (In Moslem religious law and tradition, Jerusalem actually ranks third in holiness after Mecca and Medina— a fact dramatized by President Sadat himself when, on his visit to 17

Jerusalem in November 1977, he attended prayer services at the El-Aqsa Mosque, and, of course, together with the other Moslem worshippers in the mosque, turned his face southw ard— towards Mecca, which is center of Islam!)

From time to time, forces hostile to Israel bring up the "Jerusalem Question" in international forums, in an attempt to undermine the city's status as the Capital of Israel....

5. A move of particular gravity was made by Egypt on 1 April 1980, when Egypt's People's Assembly (parliament) issued a statem ent determining that East Jerusalem was sovereign Arab territory, that it was "an integral part of the W est Bank, which had been occupied by armed force." All the steps that had been taken in the city by Israel since the Six-D ay War were proclaimed "illegal, null and void and non-binding." The Egyptian parliament called for the establishm ent of Jerusalem as the seat of the Palestinian autonomous authority. 6. No one outside of Israel raised any objections to this flagrant, unprovoked interference in Israel's internal affairs. Those who stood by in silence when the Egyptian parliament declared Jerusalem to be Arab have forfeited the right to express consternation, now, over the declaration by Israel's Knesset that Jerusalem is Jewish and Israeli.

7. M oreover, the so-called "A rab" sector of Jerusalem has always included a Jewish Q uarter which was razed to the ground during the 19 years of Jordanian occupation, and all its many synagogues, cem etaries, and other religious institutions desecrated, with tom bstones being used, inter alia, to build latrines. 8. The fact is that no country in the world could fail to react in the strongest term s to so prolonged and persistent a series o f provocative interventions in its affairs as has taken place in this instance. Israel was finally compelled to rise to the 18

challenge and to act to protect and clarify its rights. This it did in the form of the Knesset's "Basic Law: Jerusalem/' which originated as a Private M em ber's Bill submitted to the House for the first time on 14 May 1980—in the wake of, and as a reaction to, the anti-Jerusalem campaign that had been mounted in the preceding m onths and some of whose elements have here been detailed. 9. The wide support given this law by the representatives of the various parties in Israel, in the Coalition as well as the Opposition, underlines the unity of view and of purpose prevailing in this country and, in the wider sense, of the entire Jewish people. This fact is deeply rooted in the Jewish consciousness and in the history, culture and religion of the people of Israel. 10. The people and the G overnm ent of Israel are keenly aware of the religious meaning of Jerusalem to the followers of C hristianity and Islam, whose rights, interests and free access will continue to be meticulously guarded by the G overnm ent of Israel, in the future as in the past. But the nature of their attachm ent to the city is different from that of the Jews. This difference was defined with admirable clarity and precision in a leading article in the London Daily Telegraph on 25 June 1967, shortly after the Six-D ay War: To Christians and Moslems, Jerusalem is a place where supremely important things happened long ago. To them, therefore, it is an object of pilgrimage. To Jews, on the other hand, it is the living centre of their faith, or, if they have no faith, of their identity as a people. To them, it is a place to be possessed, today and forever. There is no essential incompatibility between these differing needs. Jewish political possession of Jerusalem and absolute freedom of access to it by Christians and Moslems—these have always been twin declared principles of the State of Israel. 11. Jerusalem 's international standing as a holy city derives essentially from its history and character, as a Jewish city— the city in which Judaism, as a religion and a civilization, and the Jewish people as a nation, came into their own; the city, m oreover, in which, for the last 100 years and more, the Jews have constituted a clear m ajority of the population. It is indeed u nfortunate that so many governm ents still fail to recognize this reality . But that does not make it any less a reality, molded as it has been by thousands of years of history. Certainly, any attem pt to strike at this unalterable reality is to deal a blow to the peace process and to Israel itself. Jerusalem is the very symbol of the sovereignty of Israel, and a central element in the self-determ ination of the Jewish people as a nation.

Jerusalem is the very symbol of the sovereignty of Israel, and central element in the selfdetermination of the Jewish people as a nation.

12. From the juridicial point of view, there is virtually nothing new in this law. It simply reaffirm s the existing situation as established either by previous laws or by accepted norms: (a) The first paragraph of the law reaffirms the long established fact that Jerusalem, complete and united, is the capital of Israel; (b) The second paragraph states that Jerusalem is the seat of the President of the State, of the Knesset, of the Government and of the Supreme Court—as already laid down in the specific laws relating to these official bodies. (c) The third paragraph, dealing with the inviolability of the holy places of all religions and free access to them, repeats what is stated in the Protection of the Holy Places Law, 1967, which, as is universally known, has been fully and meticulously observed. (d) The fourth paragraph deals with the development of the city and the resources to be allocated for this purpose. 13. The real significance of this law lies in the politicaldeclarative realm —in other words, in its serving as a reply to those who would question or undermine Israel's sovereignty over its capital city. It should be understood as a restatem ent of basic facts concerning Jeru salem and as an official reaffirm ation of Israel's rights, in the wake of the ArabMoslem campaign to negate those facts— and those rights. In the light of the fact that Jerusalem is and has been Israel's capital, one must understand that the recent legislation merely serves to confirm the prevailing situation. For those who question Israel's rights in this regard, the law will serve to clarify Israel's position.

JEWISH LIFE A Statement of Purposes ...In the pages of Jewish Life we will share with you insights into the Jewish past as they clarify the Jewish present, and as they help us to see into the future. We will examine the Jewish present in the light of the past, and in the light of what must be our future aspirations. We will look into the future, not with any mystical powers—there are few Jews today who lay claim to such powersjlrbut with the techniques made available to us by the Jewish mind and the Jewish heart refined by Torah learning and historical Jewish experience ... ... Jewish Life will continue to be a platform for the expression of diverse points of view in the American Torah commun ity. Here these criteria alone will gain admittance to the minds of our readers: a commitment to Jewish values, and an articulate expression of a point of view on matters of interest and deep concern to other committed Jews. Surely not all readers will agree with our application of these criteria—and we earnestly look forward to hearing from them. Writing is a mystique I hope to explore in these pages, particularly as it relates to the articulation and in terpretation of Torah values and concepts. And reading too is a mystique: but the two can function only in unison... ... Most people who read are aware of the difficulties of trans lating from one language into another. When a judge an grily said to a Yiddish interpreter that there must be an English word that means "shofar," the reply was "it's a horn." When asked why he didn't say so to begin with, the interpreter shrugged his shoulders and said, "Because it's not a horn!" But few readers realize that all writing is in a sense " t r a n s la t io n particularly when we try to express Torah concepts in any language other than Hebrew. All such attempts must, therefore, by definition, fall short of their mark. It shall here be our objective to come as close to the mark as we can in stretching the English language to accommodate Torah categories and Torah concepts as Jews have in the past used other foreign tongues. In these difficult tasks we solicit your help, your under standing, your patience—and your prayers. Yaakov Jacobs

The Teshuva Phenomenon: Responses From Our Readers To The Editor: I would like to make a few comments on the excellent and perceptive article on the "Teshuva Movement" authored by Rabbi Ralph Pelcovitz, which appeared in your last issue. Basically I agree with his concern lest mekarev work become another fad of the Jewish community, a glamour activity which brings with it glory and fund-raising opportunities. Rabbi Pelcovitz is also correct in warning against neglecting our own communities and ignoring the attrition within our own ranks, within a youth that supposedly "had every opportunity." While the "bird in hand" theory may not apply in the saving of souls, our Sages have said " Ein dochim nefesh mipnei nefesh/' we do not discard one soul for another. That principle works both ways: The obligation to "save" a youngster who attended yeshiva and is being lured away from Yiddishkeit is at least as important as saving a child already devoured by assimilation. I would like to react to some of the annoyances that form the launching pad of the article. It must be reiterated at the onset that ba'alei teshuva are not a homogenous group and the teshuva "movement" is not of a monolithic nature. Reference is made to a significant segment which happens to be the more conspicuous and identifiable. The author raises several issues: 1. How deep, or even, how authentic is the teshuva , considering that in many cases ba'alei teshuva come to us from various trips into

degenerate sex, drugs, cults; even after coming into "our" camp they seem to prefer to cling to charismatic leaders and disciplined groups (a la cults?). 2. Their adherence to Y ahadu s manifests itself in "doing" without sufficient support in learning and knowledge. It makes them appear, at times, like caricatures posturing in the outer trappings of piety without really

knowing what they are doing or the religious meaning and relative significance of their actions. Sometimes their behavior and attitudes appear almost absurdly arrogant and self-righteous. 3. There is evident a complaint regarding the segment of Orthodoxy to which these ba'alei teshuva "return" and which life style within Orthodoxy they opt for. Would it not make more sense for the ba'al teshuva to identify with the so-called modern Orthodox Jew who is much closer to the secular world from whence the ba'al teshuva comes? Instead there is the frequent attempt to emulate, often most awkwardly, a lifestyle that is associated with isolation from the world and a withdrawal from modern life. At the outset we must be careful not to confuse ignorance with inauthenticity or even superficial religiosity. The Ffum e A m Ha'aretz, the pious ignoramus, is not a new phenomenon in Jewish life. Jewish folkore, of Eastern Europe in particular, is replete with stories ranging from the sublime to the ridiculous (yet mostly sympathetic) about the ignorant and awkward " Y i s h u v n i c k s While the Talmud is quite harsh with the A m H a'aretz , it appears that the Talmud was dealing with an A m Ha'aretz of a different ilk, one who refuses to submit, at times, to the discipline of h a la c h a . Certainly chassidu s generated a new sympathy for simple piety. In general from what I have seen, heard and read it seems that teshuva has, in the main, always been experiential rather than intellectual. There are very few Yisroes, or even Carmels in this world; college courses in comparative religion have produced very few converts or ba'alei teshuva —and teshuva is a form 23

of conversion (compare the Talmudic principle that a convert is like a newborn person with Maimonides' description of the ba'al teshuva who considers himself a new person!). Conversions are usually the result of life experiences that trigger the quest for an alternate life style; it could be a bereavement or some other form of personal tragedy, or an encounter with a charismatic personality or a reaching out as a resu lt of deep disappointment in and disgust with current values and practices, or a reaction to experiments in the experiential. It is quite understandable that the ba'al teshuva, particularly the contemporary ba'al teshuva, should seek out Williamsburg and Crown Heights over Forest Hills or Far Rockaway. After all, he wants to get away as far as possible from the Western world that betrayed him; why should he feel comfortable with an Orthodox Jew who flirts with it? I share Rabbi Pelcovitz's regret. Certainly ba'alei teshuva could become a great resource for modern Orthodoxy by bringing to it their skills and worldly knowledge transposed into a religious context. In a sense they are throwing out "the baby with the bath water." In their eyes, the decadence of Western man utterly condemns Western civilization as a whole. But is that not precisely the attitude of the overwhelming majority of the chassidic and "Torah" world? While many Jews by dint of circumstances are Torah lm Derech Eretz or Torah U'Mada Jews in practice, intellectually these positions are still minority opinions in the ranks of Orthodox Jewish scholarship and recognized halachic leadership. And that brings us right back to the basic concern expressed by Rabbi Pelcovitz: the greater preoccupation with ba'alei teshuva than with the floundering products of our yeshivos. The yeshiva world feels more comfortable, more competent and more likely to succeed with a young man or woman who cries out, "rescue me from the Western world/' than with a youngster who cries out, "reconcile me with the Western world"—the basic problem of our defectors. The young men and women in whom "we have invested years of education" and who leave us are precisely those who are inadequately prepared to cope with the modern world

which the yeshiva has cavalierly rejected but which some students cannot ignore, intellectually and emotionally. After all is said and done we are grateful for the teshuva movement and we must be ready to strengthen the hands of all who are engaged in mekarev work. Even superficial and inept chassidim are a greater asset to the Jewish people than successfully assimilated and intermarried Jews. Ultimately what could make the teshuva movement more meaningful, more viable and more constructive in building contemporary Jewish life, and at the same time help overcome the defections amongst our own youth is a stronger, more courageous, more consisten t; more scholarly and more articulate "modern" Orthodoxy. Rabbi Joseph Grunblatt Forest Hills, N. Y.

To The Editor: I wish to disassociate myself from Rabbi Pelcovitz's article, "Teshuva: The Other Side of the Coin,"(Jewish Life, Tishrei 5741/ Fall '80). Jewish Life should not have published this article. The fact that Jewish Life is sponsored by the Orthodox Union, yet not an organ of the Union does not provide license to publish an attack on a great and noble community and movement. Rabbi Pelcovitz, one of A m erica's fin e st and m ost accomplished Orthodox rabbis, has the right to a few prejudices—we however had the responsibility not to allow ourselves to become their sponsor. I will leave it to others to respond to the specific points raised in Rabbi Pelcovitz's article and will address myself to what I feel is his mis-reading of the significance and import of the ba'al teshuva movement itself. The relatively weak response of the overall Orthodox community to the teshuva phenomenon is to a large extent the result of an inability to deal with this phenomenon in its historic perspective and to appreciate the radical and revolutionary nature of the transformation of Orthodoxy's fortunes in its wake. The teshuva phenomenon, which is still in its earliest stages of development demonstrates that this generation has been entrusted with a

unique opportunity which the generations proceeding ours did not enjoy. If our community is unable to adequately respond to the potential of this phenomenon, we are in danger of squandering a moment in history which offers Orthodoxy the opportunity to regain its dominant and pre-eminent position within the Jewish People for the first time in over two hundred years. This historic moment may not repeat itself ^-unless our community grasps the opportunity with which it has been presented. Revolutions almost without any exception exact a price, because they upset the status quo and inject new and upsetting elements into a community. The backlash to the teshuva phenomenon, reflected in Rabbi Pelcovitz's article is to be expected. As the movement gains force, and as the numbers of ba'alei teshuvaincrease, they will inevitably cause communal discomfort and dislocation. Many establisbrnent-minded individuals will find the ba'al tehsuva difficult to absorb, accept and appreciate. And the attention which will inevitably be given to the ba'al teshuva and the teshuva phenomenon is bound to raise questions and objections such as those contained in Rabbi Pelcovitz's article. My most serious objection to Rabbi Pelcovitz's arguments is not his disconcerting remarks about certain elements within the teshuva phenom enon, or his alm ost unforgivable slur on the motivations of those who support this movement, but his failure to appreciate the momentous significance of the teshuva phenomenon which he seems to regard as peripheral, incidental to the main business of the Orthodox community. The teshuva phenomenon is an event which represents a reversal of the trend of disaffection and abandonment of tradition, observance and Orthodoxy which has characterized the past many generations, replaced by a new trend which has turned the Orthodox community into a magnet which now attracts rather than repels the disaffected and searching elements within the Jewish People to the exclusion of all other ideologies, philosophies and trends. In the early years of the State of Israel, when Prime Minister Ben Gurion agreed to maintain the religious status quo which, for example, enforced kashrus in the army and forbade public transportation on Shabbos, he was challenged by many of his colleagues for

giving in too easily to the Orthodox and avoiding a kulturkampf which they felt they could win. Ben Gurion replied that there was no point in fighting the Orthodox since time is on their side and before long the small percentage of youth which still clung to Orthodoxy would abandon it in any case. After all, had he not witnessed this phenomenon throughout his life in Europe where he saw entire communities abandon the Shabbos, and the demands of tradition? Ben Gurion could not then anticipate that in the 60's there would ensue a weakening of the structure of secular Jewishness and the reawakening and resurgence of the religious community in Eretz Yisrael. Nor could he anticipate that thousands of formerly secular Israelis—among them his own children— would seek their roots within the Orthodox community. A similar development took place in America where many traditional-minded Jews submitted to the emasculation of halachic practice by the Conservative movement, in the mistaken belief that an Americanized, "de-Europeanized," Judaism which would make fewer demands, and go easy on religious practice, which would adopt the formal theater-like atmosphere of the American Protestant Church in the synagogue, would be a factor in retaining the loyalties of Jewish youth. They would discover, to their dismay, that the next generation of American Jewish youth would have little appreciation for a watered-down, compromised religion which lacks passion and authenticity and is soft on commitment and consistency. In less than one generation the Conservative synagogue was transformed from a synagogue brimming with youth to a gathering place for the elderly, while Orthodox synagogues are filled with committed and observant youth, products of the yeshiva and ba'al teshuva movements. The teshuva phenomenon is still too recent to have permitted the development of scientific studies and statistical evaluations. This explains why the only individuals who are in a position to evaluate and understand it are still too busy "making it happen" and are not yet prepared to allow themselves the luxury of historical reflection. On the other hand, the Orthodox community dare not allow the teshuva phenomenon to remain the 25

exclusive domain of its few activists, because by now it is clear that the destiny of Orthodoxy is dependent upon its proper evaluation and development. If the teshuva phenomenon is one of the major keys to our survival and renaissance, it must be evaluated from the vantage point of our priorities in the allocation of personnel and finances, not to speak of the way we relate to the ba'al teshuva as an individual. Before proceeding to examine the historical significance of the teshuva phenomenon, a few sentences are in place concerning its ideological import to Judaism. From an ideological vantage point, Judaism and teshuva are inseparable; they are one and the same. The Jewish world-view recognizes that in a world enveloped in darkness and engulfed by sin, one ba'al teshuva, one righteous individual who is at one with G-d guarantees the existence of the world. The scriptural evaluation of the world in the era of No'ach, Avraham and Moshe adequately bears out this evaluation without the need for additional detail. From the cosmic point of view, Judaism is never satisfied to remain one religion among many. Its raison d'etre is to bring about the Messianic day when all men will become ba'alei teshuva and the sovereignty of G-d will be established. Here, the forceful influence of the one Avraham becomes as powerful and pervasive as to create a dynamic, revolutionary force which will transform the entire world into the Kingdom of G-d. This is the conviction that the one who is totally and single-mindedly devoted to G-d can through the force of his charisma bring about the unification of mankind under the rule of G-d. The Torah begins with the sin of the first man and his subsequent teshuva. It goes on to describe the sin of his son, and his teshuva, following which it describes the sin of the generation of No'ach and the sin which resulted from the construction of the tower of Babel. The dominant theme of the Chumash is the struggle against sin and the striving for teshuva. The subject which preoccupies the prophets of Israel, to the exclusion of all others, is Israel's sin and hoped-for teshuva. Teshuva is the ability of a human being to reverse his backsliding and rebellion against the authority of G-d and accept upon himself

the binding authority of the Torah and its commandments. This is the theme of our history and our holidays, and is the struggle which describes the life of a Jew. All the above notwithstanding, during the past two hundred years Orthodoxy lost its ability to transform the the lives of Jews. The impulse to teshuva was replaced by rebellion and backsliding. Jewish life was dominated by movements and currents, each of which represented to a varying degree the rejection of R. Sa'adya Gaon's terse definition of Jewishness: "Our nation is a nation only by virtue of its Torah." Seen in this light, the teshuva phenomenon is much more than an isolated phenomenon which has affected the Orthodox community during the past twenty years and has brought into its midst new adherents, new enthusiasm, new vigor and new strength. It represents an historic, fundamental and longrange reversal of the fortunes of Orthodoxy within the Jewish People and the direction of Jewish life in the years to come. It is a new, unanticipated major force which has the potential to transform not only the direction and fortunes of Orthodoxy but of the entire Jewish People for decades to come. From the time of the Emancipation Orthodoxy began losing ground. Prior to the Emancipation all Jews were shomer mitzvos and accepted the discipline of Torah. This was an era when there were almost no exceptions to the rule; from that time until our day it has all been downhill. From being the totality of the Jewish People, Orthodoxy became a minority. Orthodoxy lost Western Europe, France and England to Reform; Eastern Europe to Yiddishism, the Bund and Communism; Poland to poverty and persecution; America to modernism and the Depression. Between the two World Wars the decline of Orthodoxy was dramatic and traumatic. The hearts and souls of Jewish youth were captured by a half dozen dynamic youth movements which today have for all practical purposes disappeared from the stage of Jewish life. Hashomer Hatsair, Habonim, Betar, the Bund, Yiddishism, and Jewish Socialism captured and ruled the Jewish street. They even invaded the doors of the great European yeshivos and inflicted significant damage. Orthodoxy was left wounded and bleeding. The final blow to Orthodoxy came with

Germany's campaign to annihilate European Jewry. Not only was a third of the Jewish people obliterated, but ninety percent of our talmidei chachomim, our chassxdim, our yeshivos, our shtiblach and our Orthodox baalei batim were extinguished. European scholarship, learning and piety, a communal structure which took two thousand years to develop, all but vanished. The lowest point followed World War II, when a person who kept Shabbos was often asked, "Are you still Orthodox?" The movements which dominated Jewish life between the two wars and subsequent to the rise of Israel's statehood continued to dominate Jewish life. But our detractors committed a stunning miscalculation. Orthodoxy had reached its lowest ebb, and there were those who believed that its fate was finally sealed. While Orthodoxy was the hardest hit by the Holocaust and all but destoyed by the historic factors enumerated above, it suddenly emerged from the ashes as the most creative and dynamic, the most regenerative and prolific movement within the Jewish People. From the pit of decay, destruction and desperation, there literally arose dynamic chassidic com m unities and a new lytransplanted yeshiva movement to the point where there are more students in Israeli yeshivos today than in Israeli universities; to the point where in the United States the senior yeshiva movement—beyond the high school level—has created close to one hundred institutions with some nine thousand students in communities where no one believed an Orthodox yeshiva or kollel coud ever take root. There are many fascinating facets to this re-emergence of Torah scholarship. Not only are there more students studying in American yeshivos than studied in European yeshivos during the two World Wars, what is more significant is that to any student of a people its major strength lies in the commitment of its youth to the study of its literature, its classics, its philosophy. In the Jewish world of today well beyond ninety-five percent of the students committed to the study of any aspect of Judaism in Jewishlysponsored schools on the university level belong to the Orthodox community. Undoubtedly the yeshivos are the source of

the regeneration of Orthodoxy in our day and their continued dynamic growth is a measure of the direction the Jewish community will take in the next generations. The close association of the teshuva phenomenon with the yeshivos indicates firstly that the movement is a serious one, and secondly that it is creating its own leadership through individuals who possess the unique language required to reach out to the non-committed. The proliferation of Torah study in the yeshivos as well as in tens of thousands of homes where daily sessions of Talmud study take place, often by young men whose fathers never knew the fascination of Torah learning, is breathing new life into countless communities. In addition, Orthodoxy enjoys a significantly higher birth rate than the nonOrthodox movements whose numbers, by virtue of their low birth rate alone, are sharply declining. In one or two generations the stark disproportions represented by both the educational and demographic changes in Orthodoxy as compared with all other segments of our people will lead to dramatic changes in the composition of our people.

I will not here attempt to analyze the reasons for the dramatic reversal in the configuration of forces, and the emergence of a new, reborn Orthodoxy during the past thirty-five years. But the facts—as they unfold—demonstrate that Orthodoxy isundergoing a dramatic, effective and significant revival, while all other segments of the Jewish community, with all their complex ideological, social, political and religious colorations, are experiencing an inexorable, irreversible, tragic decline and disintegration. By now the teshuva phenomenon has become the property of all of Klal Yisrael, with many groups joining the bandwagon. Twenty years ago what is now a river was barely a trickle. I remember returning from NCSY events where I told stories of young people from Upstate New York, Virginia, Texas, Chicago, the South, Peoria and Kansas City who had begun to observe Shabbos, to keep kosher, who were forming local Torah study groups and who wished to study in yeshivos—but no one believed me. For years afterwards, despite the fact that the ten events of 1959 had become sixty events in 27

1962, and eighty in 1964, touching the lives of thousands of young people, there were still many who did not believe the stories, and to this day do not believe them. In time there emerged entire communities of ba'alei teshuv(»\ike Atlanta, Riverdale and Venice, California. Suddenly yeshivos began filling with ba'alei teshuva and new yeshivos were created for them: in the United States, Yeshiva University's James Striar School and Yeshiva She'or Yoshuv; and in Israel, Ohr Sam ayach, Aish H atorah and N'vei Yerushalayim. Entire communities began to feel the impact of the enthusiasm and devotion of the ba'al teshuva to learning and mitzvos. Two years ago the late Gaon Rav Yitzchok Hutner told me that the teshuva phenomenon "represents an opportunity which arrives only once in many generations, offering the privilege to accomplish so unusual and mighty a task." Suddenly we were confronted by an historic opportunity to create an undreamed of revival. Twenty years ago, in the midst of the resurgence and rebirth of Orthodoxy, there slowly began budding this new facet of renewal and return. For over two hundred years the Torah community had withdrawn behind high barricades and thick defenses. The reflexes of letting down these defenses and barricades were and are very slow to emerge. This new feeling that we could successfully reach out, that young people and even older people would respond positively, that we could begin to recoup our losses was very new and very strange. In the past we would hear of a Nathan Birnbaum or a Franz Rosenzweig, who had become ba'alei teshuva, and the entire world stood in awe and talked about this unusual phenomenon. The masses were rejecting Yiddishkeit, while here and there was an individual who found his way back. Today we witness the phenomenon of thousands of young Jews, intelligent, worldly, accomp lished, searching and yearning for spirituality, for Torah and for roots, returning to our midst. There are by now thousands of stories of those who have returned—each reads like a novel. Last year I attended the wedding of a young man who has been a student in the Mir Yeshiva of Brooklyn for the past six years, a product of NCSY. I overheard him greeting 28

an old friend who had been a fellow chapter officer of NCSY, also a ba'ai teshuva, who was then a student in the Kollel of the Ner Israel Yeshiva in Baltimore. Turning to his friend, he said "Would you have believed twenty years ago that this would be me, and that would be you?" His friend said "No, I wouldn't, but isn't it wonderful?" Today the weddings of NCSY graduates, which are no different from the weddings of other yeshiva students, have become commonplace. Today forty percent of the students at Yeshiva University and sixty percent at TouroCollege are ba'alei teshuva. Today at Einstein Medical College there is a Talmud shiur attended mostly by ba'alei teshuva. Today we have in our midst new sources of strength and enthusiasm. Educators who work with ba'alei teshuva often say "I wish I could work'exclusively with ba'alei teshuva—they are so responsive, so quick, so receptive and so eager." We witness today an answer to two thousand years of p ersecu tio n , forced assim ilation and seduction. We are witnessing before our eyes the actualization of a statement of our Sages that the souls of all Jews—those then torn and those not yet born—were present at Sinai. <^> |flj| Our Sages teach us that in the time prior to the coming of Moshiach, "light and darkness will rule in confusion." Is this not an era in which both light and darkness are struggling for dominance? Our Sages teach Moshiach will come to a generation which is "fully righteous, or fully guilty." It is hardly possible th at they m eant an era in which righteousness fully disappears from the earth—because we have the Torah's promise that it will never depart from the mouths of our children; nor could they have meant an era of total righteousness. The only possible explanation is that the generation prior to the coming of Moshiach will be one in which each individual would be compelled to choose between righteousness or the opposite. The American Jewish community has been compared to two trains running on parallel tracks, but in opposite directions. One train depicts the core of the Jewish community which is involved in a greater intensification of observance, commitment and Torah study; the second, the masses of American Jewry on

the periphery racing inexorably toward intermarriage/ assimilation and disintegra tion. In this final struggle of forces, theteshuva phenomenon represents the only bridge from one side to the other. It is the channel for the expression of our responsibility to our fellow Jew. It offers the responsibility of recruiting our very best youth before the opportunity vanishes. Our era is characterized by thousands of Jews eager to return to Judaism. While non-Orthodox movements, institu tions and organizations have failed the individual Jew, the thirst to return to Jewish sources is characteristic of ever-increasing numbers of Jews around the country. The rate of our success is amazing. Wherever we employ the tested formulas we discover an eager consumer, and a marketplace in which there is no competition. Special emphasis must be placed on this radical distinguishing feature of this generation. Other than various movements within Orthodoxy, there are for all practical purposes, no competing movements in Jewish life. The movements we have described above have all but ceased to exist. Some have been institutionalized in the form of Israeli political parties, but these have ceased to enjoy the ideological loyalty of the second generation. For the first time in over two hundred years Orthodoxy enjoys a virtual monopoly in Israel and the United States. It is the only ideological current which has any attraction to Jewish youth. The greatest impact of the above development is on Jewish youth and is even more shocking as it relates to Israel. We anticipated that in Israel even the nonreligious would retain basic Jewish loyalties and commitments. We were taken in by the image of the pioneer, the soldier and the idealistic nationalist. But even this is an illusion. Professor Simon Herman of the Hebrew University's Institute of Contemporary Jewry recently described two studies of "The Jewish Character of Israel's Society." The studies— one conducted in 1965, and a follow-up in 1974—sought to determine the level of Jewish identity among sixteen- and seventeen-year-old Israelis all born in Israel after the establishment of the State. What startled the investigators were indications that Israel's young people are turning away

from their Jewish roots. The youngsters were asked to respond to a pair of questions: "If you were born again would you choose to be born a Jew; and if you could be born again outside of Israel would you choose to be born a Jew?" To both questions, one hundred percent of the Orthodox or so-called "traditional" youth chose Judaism. But among the others, only sixty-two percent preferred to be born as Jews in Israel; if they were to be born abroad, even fewer, only thirty-five percent, would choose Judaism. "We tried again with the same questions in 1974/' Herman reports. "We sought to learn if the Six Day War and the Yom Kippur War had affected the Israelis' thinking along religious lines. We discovered that not only had their Jewish identity failed to deepen, but it had actually weakened. More of the secular Israeli boys and girls wished they had been born as non-Jews." It would come as a great surprise if studies of American Jewish youth—who have not been exposed to the intensive "Jewish" éducation every Israeli receives, and who do not live in a country surrounded by enemies, and are not motivated by intense national feelings—would be any better. Herman cites a statistical survey in the United States covering the years 1966 to 1972 which put the intermarriage rate at 31.7 percent and rising. According to many experts the present rate exceeds fifty percent. He said that "one estimate claims that by the year 2076 there will be fewer than a million Jews in the United States/ perhaps only nine hundred and sixty thousand." The picture I have painted is clear: A people is disintegrating, and a current has emerged which has the capacity to resurrect the latent feelings and yearnings of many for spirituality and authentic Judaism. The sterility of this generation on the one hand, and its soul-searching on the other, have opened a new channel for the re-creation of the People of the Torah along the lines intended by the Creator. Hashem has promised us "If you open up to me the width of a head of a needle, I will open up to you the width of a banquet hall." Rabbi Pinchas Stolper Executive Vice President, Orthodox Union 29

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Hebrew in the Soviet Union In July, 1977, five months after Anatoly Shcharansky was arrested, the K G B stepped up interrogations of his friends. O ne morning a black KG B Volga stopped outside my house. A KG B official rang the doorbell and handed me a w ritten w arrant summoning me immediately for interrogation on the Shcharansky case. T he official escorted me into the black car, and delivered me to the K G B Interrogation D epartm ent in Lefortovo containing the KG B Investigation Prison where Anatoly was being held. T he initial interrogation lasted eight hours. The senior investigator of the K G B, M r. Sherudillo, wanted me to testify against Anatoly and I used every possible means to avoid giving any answers at all. It was suggested that I at least testify in an indirect way: my friend Tolya was involved in smuggling out of Russia inform ation about Soviet space m issions-^which was obviously absurd. A fter a day which yielded no results for the K G B, I was given a second w arrant, requesting that I come for a second interrogation in three days' time. At the second interrogation, the pressure was increased. T hey used all possible means, including threats to put me on trial, to get the required testim ony. T he formal part of the interrogations is a protocol which contains w ritten questions by the interrogator and answers by the interrogatee. In my case, I demanded that I be given permission to record my answers myself. In this way I hoped to avoid deliberate distortions by the K G B of my answ ers.. W hen the pressure reached its peak, I w rote in the protocol, "I do not fully understand your question and, therefore, I insist on my legal right to use an interpreter from Russian into my native H ebrew ." Sherudillo's face grew dark. T he interrogator knew very well that my first language was Russian. He also knew that I learned Hebrew and had begun to teach it only a few years previously. There was a moment of silence in the room. T hen he w rote, "T h e interrogation is over," and said to me: "Y ou may go." There are three symptomatic elements in the story about my fortunate escape from the interrogation. O ne is that the interrogator did not reject outright my request for an interpreter, as would definitely have happened in the old days. It reflects the fact that the status of the Hebrew language in the Soviet Union has undergone considerable change. During Stalin's time, Hebrew was considered an instrum ent of counter-revolutionary subversive activities by Jewish religious clericals and Zionists. Anyone associated with Hebrew was automatically considered an enemy of Socialism 31

During Stalin's time, Hebrew was considered an instrument of counter-revolutionary subversive activities by Jewish religious clericals and Zionists. Anyone connected with Hebrew was automatically considered an enemy of Socialism and was severely punished.

Lev Ulanovsky was a Hebrew Teacher in the Soviet Union before emigrating to Eretz Yisrael. This article was made available to us by the Commission on Soviet Jewish Life, an affiliate of the Greater New York Conference on Soviet Jewry.

and was severely punished. However,-during the '50's, Hebrew acquired a completely new status— that of a "foreign language"—which theoretically put it on a par with English French or any other foreign language. T he change resulted not as much from the death of Stalin as probably from the establishm ent of the State of Israel. Although the Hebrew language began to be taught in the universities, admission to the lectures was severely restricted. The students for these classes were carefully selected by the authorities. O f course, Jewish students were not allowed to study Hebrew. T h e Hebrew specialists were trained mainly for KCj J3 and military purposes. The publication in Moscow in 1963 of the famous H ebrewRussian dictionary by Felix Shapiro marked a highlight of the new situation. This book not only helped to educate a new generation of private Hebrew teachers after three generations o f suppression of Hebrew culture in the U SSR, but it also gave a kind of legality to unofficial Hebrew teaching in Russia. A fter the dictionary was published, dealing with the Hebrew language was no longer considered formally a criminal offense. T he second symptomatic element was that the interrogator ...the right to use the Hebrew did not actually supply the interpreter as I had requested This language outside the synagogue reflects the fact that at present in the U SSR the right to use the and the right to teach it privately are not officially Hebrew language outside the synagogue and the right to teach recognized. it privately are not officially recognized. Had the interrogator brought in a Hebrew interpreter it would have been a de facto recognition of the right to use this language. It should be pointed out that a teacher of English, French or any other foreign language can apply and be registered as private teacher of a foreign language. He is then required to pay taxes and be registered in a D istrict Financial D epartm ent which, in turn, registers and gives him a legal status as a private teacher of a foreign language. How many private te a ch e rs— including m yself— have tried to apply fo r registration as private teachers of a foreign language and have all been refused by the D istrict Financial D epartm ent' It was later learned that these offices had been given secret instructions forbidding them to register teachers of Hebrew This makes private Hebrew teaching an illegal activity. In 1 9 7 6 , Iosif Begun was sentenced to three years' exile in Siberia on charges of parasitism because he was refused official registration as a private Hebrew teacher. Since then, the possibility of prosecution for parasitism has become a nightm are for Hebrew teachers. Refusing to register Hebrew teachers is in open contradiction to the recognition of the Hebrew language as a legitimate foreign language. The third symptomatic element was the fact that the interrogation was stopped. It shows th at the authorities are 32

aware of the contradiction between the first two facts. M oreover, they are embarrassed when they are reminded of it. This weak element of the situation may offer a good opp ortu nity for pressing Soviet au th o rities th rough international cultural and trade union organizations for the legalization of private Hebrew teaching in the Soviet Union. Such pressure would be tremendously helpful to thousands of private students and teachers of Hebrew in the Soviet Union and/even more, would provide invaluable encouragem ent to thousands of Jews who lack the courage to join existing classes. At present, in Moscow alone, there are about 40 active Hebrew teachers and about 500 adult students. The efficiency of these courses is fantastic due to the high motivation of both students and teachers. There are also numerous classes in Judaism, Jewish culture and Jewish History, both in Hebrew and in Russian. T he Jewish Cultural M ovem ent in Russia is developing rapidly. However, there are two problems which are yet to be overcome. The major stumbling block is the great shortage of dictionaries and basic Hebrew textbooks. At the moment, the Jewish Cultural M ovem ent is based mainly upon learning the Hebrew language first before proceeding to learning Torah and other elements of Jewish Culture. The second problem is the need for the legalization of private Hebrew lessons. These two problems are inter-connected, because the legalization of Hebrew would make it much easier to supply Hebrew books to the Soviet Union which, in turn, would be of great help to the teachers. Here, I must dwell in greater detail on the fundamental differences of status between the Hebrew and Yiddish languages in the U SSR. From the very beginning of the Soviet State, the language of Soviet Jews was officially considered to be Yiddish. T here were numerous attem pts on the part of the authorities to create a Soviet Jewish culture based on the Yiddish language which would be Com munistic in its contents. Lenin and other Com munist w riters were extensively published in Yiddish. All these attem pts failed because the Russian Jews were not enthusiastic about this absurd combination of the Yiddish language and Com m unist culture. T he Moscow published Sovietishe Heimland, a Yiddish magazine, is not widely read in Russia because it is basically a reprint of articles from Pravda in Yiddish. When the Soviet authorities claim from time to time that Jewish culture is flourishing in the U SSR , they mean exactly this sort of culture. Actually they cannot mean anything else because the national cultures of other minorities are more or less the same, perhaps on a larger scale, with schools and radio programs. O n the other hand, the number of people who can

At present, in Moscow alone, there are about 40 active Hebrew teachers and about 500 adult students....There are also numerous classes in Judasim, Jewish culture and Jewish History both in Hebrew and in Russian.

Although books, magazines and newspapers are still published in Yiddish in the USSR, very soon only very old people will be able to read them.

The best way to pressure the Soviets about the true Jewish culture in the USSR is to begin with the legalization of private Hebrew language classes which are already functioning so effectively in the large cities.

speak and understand Yiddish is diminishing rapidly because the last two generations of Jews have had no opportunity to study it. T here are no Jewish schools or even courses in Yiddish in the whole of the Soviet Union. Recently the Soviets, trying to show the outside world a heightening of Jewish culture in the U SSR , organized two Yiddish theatres. However, they could not find enough Yiddish-speaking actors and had to teach those who agreed to appear (some of them non-Jewish) the language from the very beginning. A spectator can see that a considerable part of the audience does not understand the language. T hey come to the performance as a social event and out of Jewish solidarity and curiosity. In May, 1979, Riva Feldman, in M oscow, started to teach privately two Yiddish classes,, something unheard of heretofore. At the same time, she applied to the taxation authorities for registration as a private Yiddish teacher, mentioning that her profession was a language teacher. A fter some time, she received a w ritten reply saying that she cannot be registered as a Yiddish teacher because her diploma states she is a teacher of Germ an, not of Yiddish. Since no one in Russia, can receive a diploma as a Yiddish teacher, it follows that the teaching of Yiddish is not legal in the U SSR. The Soviet Union is a m ulti-national state, and the Jews comprise one of the largest m inorities in the country. Yiddish is considered to be one of many official languages. Although books, magazines and newspapers are still published in Yiddish in the U SSR , very soon only very old people will be able to read them. W hen talking about Jewish Culture in the U SSR , it is im portant to bear in mind that the Soviet authorities understand it to be Soviet Yiddish Culture. T hat is why all efforts to extract from them concessions on Jewish Culture in general will lead, at best, to an increased publication of Yiddish books, magazines, newspapers, more theatres and, maybe, even Yiddish schools— all with Com m unist contents which will be a total failure. The best way to pressure the Soviets about the true Jewish Culture in the U SSR is to begin with the legalization of private Hebrew language classes which are already functioning so effectively in the large cities. Foreign language status for the Hebrew language in the U SSR provides a good basis for fresh pressure and the success of such a campaign would give a tremendous boost to a true Jewish education in Russia, which is so urgently needed at present.

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Alex Grobman

What Did They Know? The American Jewish Press and The Holocaust, September 1939—December 1942 Although much has been w ritten about the responses of the American Jewish community to the destruction of European Jew ry, there has been no system atic effort to determ ine what inform ation was available in the American, Yiddish, and Anglo-Jewish press about tips catastrophe. Important A m erican Jew ish leaders w ere privy to confidential organizational reports and sometimes to classified State D epartm ent documents, but for the average American Jew the main source of news was the press. M any contem porary Jews maintain that they knew little or nothing about what was transpiring in Europe during the Holocaust because the press in the United States did not or could not provide reports of these events. T he purpose of this paper is to ascertain exactly w hat was known from Septem ber 1, 1939, when the war in Europe began until Decem ber 17, 1942, the day the Allies condemned the Nazis for exterm inating the Jews. A fter determining w hat inform ation was available, we will examine how it was perceived by American Jew ry as reflected in the press. T hese were crucial years during which Jews were herded into ghettos, forced into the Lublin Reservation, systematically gunned down by the Einsatzgruppen, and sent to concentration camps to die of starvation, hard labor, disease, or ultimately in the gas chambers. In order to assess the type of data that existed and the extent to which it was integrated into the consciousness of the press, it will be im portant to review a wide range of papers and periodicals. Special attention will be focused on the press of the most influential Jewish organizations: T h e N ation al Jew ish Monthly of B'nai B'rith; the C ontem porary Jew ish R ecord and the A m erican Jew ish Y e a r Booh of the American Jewish Com m ittee; and the Congress Bulletin (later Congress Weekly) of the American Jewish Congress. Although the Jewish Labor Com m ittee did not have an official paper, the Yiddish daily F orw ard very often espoused its views. O th er national, regional and organizational papers carefully surveyed were D er T og, C hicago Jew ish C hronicle, Jew ish Frontier, N ew Palestine, O pin ion , T h e A m erican H ebrew , T h e C all, T h e G hetto Speaks, the Jew ish A dvocate, T h e Jew ish Exponent, T h e Jew ish O utlook, T h e Jew ish Spectator, and T h e Jew ish T elegraph ic A gen cy D a ily N ew s

A t times, it was difficult to determine exactly what was happening because of fragmentary reports and exaggerated dispatches. A general idea of what was transpiring, however, was available for those who were interested.

Alex Grobman was recently appointed director of the Simon Wiesenthal Center of Yeshiva University at Los Angeles. This article, the second half of which will appear in the next issue of Jewish Life, originally appeared in the American Jewish Historical Society Quarterly, with whose permission it is reprinted.

B ulletin ( J .T .A .) . In addition, the following Jewish periodicals were used on a selective basis: Interm ountain Jew ish N ew s, T h e Jew ish C riterion, T h e Jew ish T ranscript, T h e Jew ish V eteran, T h e Reconstructionist, T h e Jew ish M orn in g Jou rn al and T h e Scribe.

The Conquest Of Poland

Daily reports in the Jewish press told of the wholesale executions, the complete obliteration of hundreds of Polish towns, and the confiscation of all property of Jews who had fled.

Inform ation about the plight of Polish Jewry received sporadic attention in the American press during the first several months of the war. T h e Jew ish T eleg rap h ic A gen cy D aily N ew s B ulletin and the Yiddish press were among the only sources that provided daily accounts of Jewish suffering. Unfortunately, however, not all of this news from Poland was accurate or complete. At tiipes, it was difficult to determine exactly what was happening because of fragm entary reports and exaggerated dispatches. A general idea of w hat was transpiring, however, was available for those ,who were interested.1 First reports from Poland told of Nazi air raids on Polish cities where the Jewish sections were intentionally among the hardest hit. Mendel Mozes, C hief of the Warsaw Bureau of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, visited a number of these battered areas and reported that many Jews had been killed or wounded. Damage to Jewish institutions had been extensive as well.2 His eyewitness description of these events was broadcast th ro u g h o u t A m erica.3 Such bom bings precipitated the flight of thousands of Jews from W arsaw and other cities. The Jewish community of Vilna, like so many others, soon became overwhelmed by the tremendous influx of Jewish refugees and appealed to Jews abroad for food, money and clothing.4 Polish Jews also sought refuge in Latvia and Lithuania but to no avail. Strict security measures had been taken by the Latvian authorities to prevent these Jews from entering. While many Jews succeeded in gaining admittance to Roumania, they were not permitted to stay more than several m onths.5 Tw o of the most distressing reports from Poland during these early days appeared in T h e N ew Y o rk T im es on Septem ber 1 3 ,1 9 3 9 . O tto D. Tolischus, a member of the Berlin staff of the T im es, had been permitted to visit the Germ an armies fighting in Poland. He reported that in the Polish border town of Wieruszow, 50 Jews had been shot for alleged sniping and resistance. T he same situation existed in many other towns in w estern Poland to the point where it appeared that Jews were the leaders in the guerilla war instead of the Poles. Jews suffered so much because they formed the m ajority of the urban population in the embattled towns, and they owned the major business establishm ents in these areas.6 The second dispatch from Berlin discussed the "first

intimations that 'a solution of the Jewish problem' in Poland was on the Germ an-Polish agenda." This was revealed in a "special report" from the Germ an News Bureau dispatched from the occupied areas of Poland. The report indicated that: "Removal of the Polish Jewish population from the European domain would..., in the long view, definitely bring a solution of the Jewish question in Europe nearer. For this is Just the Jewry which, through its high birth rate and in spite of all existing differences between the two groups, has continually established the large numbers of W estern Jew ry, whose birth rate is small." What was not explained, as the Times said, was "how ...the removal of Jews from Poland w ithout their exterm ination can halt the alleged 'strengthening' of W estern Jew ry ..."7 When Warsaw finally surrendered on Septem ber 27, 1939, the American Hebrew observed that the Nazis had succeeded "in what centuries of persecution did not accomplish— the destruction of the heart of world Jew ry."8 Daily reports in the Jewish press told of the wholesale executions, the complete obliteration of hundreds of Polish tow ns,9 and the confiscation of all property of Jews who had fled.10 It also noted the"savage butchery" of Jews by Ukrainian terrorists,11 the condemning to death of tw enty-tw o Jewish nurses serving with the Polish Red Cross by the Nazi military authorities after the fall of the fortress of M odlin,12 the tens of thousands of homeless and starving refugees seeking refu ge,13 and the large number of Jewish suicides in W arsaw ,14 as well as the imposition of forced labor.15

The previously inadequate reporting by the American press of the plight of European Jewry improved somewhat in early 1940.

Eastern Europe Under Nazi Rule As the Nazi war machine extended its domination over the Jews in Eastern Europe, the tales of widespread massacres and executions,16 mass arrests and forced labor,17 expulsions,18 and depredations19 continued to appear in the Jewish press. Dr. Henryk Szoszkes, form er Vice-President of the Warsaw Jewish Com munity Council, escaped from Poland in November and duly reported that "th e Nazis' aim was physical destruction in the shortest possible time of as many Jews as possible."20 The exact number of Jews who had already been killed was very difficult to ascertain. O n Decem ber 18, 1939, the J.T.A . reported on the authority of the World Jewish Congress that in Nazi occupied Poland "about a quarter of a million Jews have been wiped out by military operations, executions, disease and starvation and that at least 80% of the remaining Jews had been reduced to complete beggary."21 However, on January 3, 1940, the J.T.A . reported that the Germ ans had executed "an

Some Jews doubted the authenticity of such horror tales because they believed that American newspapers rarely suppressed news-.-.Therefore, some Jews held that if these events actually happened, they would be reported in the American press.

In an interview with The New York Times published on January 30, 1940, Cardinal Hlond of Poland declared that since the end of December... conditions in Poland had become worse. The Cardinal believed that Hitler was literally carrying out what he had written in Mein Kampf.

average of 200 Jews every day since the war began/7'T h is/ ' the J.T.A . concluded, "would bring the total executions in the four months of the war to approximately 2 4 ,0 0 0 ."22 Initially, some segments of the American Jew ish press reacted to the reports of Hitler's proposed "Jewish State" in Poland with considerable skepticism,23 However, on O ctober 6, 1939, the rumors were given greater credence when Hitler hinted at a plan for the solution of the Jewish problem in his speech to the Reichstag. Furtherm ore, the Associated Press reported from Berlin on the same day that an authorized source had asserted that Hitler was thinking "about a Jewish reservation within the Polish State w here not only Polish and Germ an Jews could live, but Jews from other lands." This reservation was to be modelled after an American Indian reservation, but would be larger than Palestine and would have at least 3,000,000 inhabitants at the ou tset,24 The Forward charged that the Nazis were not interested in founding a Jewish State, but rather a Jewish concentration camp. There Jews from Germ any, Poland, and elsewhere would be held under the poorest of conditions and would suffer great deprivation.25 "If this fantastic plan is carried out/' declared the American Jewish Com m ittee, "it would mean that the 2,000,000 Jews now in Germ any or in territories under Germ an domination, would be confined in w hat would be a large concentration camp, where they would be doomed to degradation, misery, and death."26 B'nai B'rith authorities claimed that "if the plan is carried through, there is little doubt that hundreds of thousands— even millions—will simply die of starvation, disease, and suicide/' According to the Jewish Morning Journal, the proposed reservation was only a* new form of robbery. It was designed as a means to confiscate Jewish property and to "squeeze ransom money out of their relatives abroad."27. In an editorial entitled "T h e New G hetto," Der Tog declared that there "was no limit to the insanity of Hitler and to his abnormal animosity and hatred for the Jew s." Furtherm ore, it pointed out that unlike past persecutions, Jews were now in a "perm anent ceaseless pogrom. They were unable to catch their breath between one pogrom and the other." Der Tog concluded by asking "w hat can Jews expect from a state, such as proposed by H itler?"28 T he answer to this question was to be found in the London Times when it asserted that: "T o thrust 3,000,000 Jews, relatively few of whom are agriculturists,* into the Lublin region and to force them to settle there would doom them to fam ine." "T h at, perhaps is the intention," the editorial concluded.29 During the final m onths of 1939, the Jewish press continued its extensive coverage of the events surrounding the proposed

40 ■

I Lublin Reservation. Reports told of the mass deportations of Jew s from all parts of the Reich to the Lublin region;30 of the frightful sanitary and housing conditions th ere;31 of the appalling shortage of food; of pneumonia, typhoid, and dysentery which had reached epidemic proportions;32 of Jevvish girls taken from their homes and into the barracks to satisfy the lusts of the Nazi soldiers; and of the many suicides committed by those who had been driven to this act by desperation.33 T he tremendous fear of being sent to the Lublin protectorate prompted many Jews to seek asylum in other countries and to request help from the Jews abroad. T he J.T.A . reported on November 5 ,1 9 3 9 , that the Jewish residents of La Paz, Bolivia had received over 300 cables from their relatives in Germ any with appeals to save them from the threat of being sent to the Lublin Reservation.34

Atrocities Revealed In The American Press The previously inadequate reporting by the American press In attempt to gwhitewash" the Polish regime and stop the of ih e plight of European Jew ry improved somewhat in early adverse publicity from the 1940. O n January 23, TheNew York Times reported that Vatican foreign press, Dr. Hans Frank, radio had denounced the atrocities committed by the Nazis ruler of Germany's Polish against the Polish people. The papal radio station broadcast Government General, held a news conference for foreign that it was receiving almost daily reports from Warsaw, jouralists on February 9, 1940. Cracow , Pomerania, Poznan, and Silesia, and told of ...He...denied the existence of "a "destitution/fdestruction and infamy of every description." single concentration camp in thé T here could be no doubt that these accounts were correct. It whole of Poland. " was pointed out that the Nazis had begun to move Jews and Poles into separate hermetically sealed ghettos which were highly inadequate to sustain the several millions destined to live th ere.35 In an editorial on the following day, New York Times explained its previous reluctance in reporting atrocity stories. "All we have heard until now," the Tdeclared, "have been unofficial reports of such horrors that we chose to disbelieve them as exaggerated." However, "now the Vatican has spoken with authority that cannot be questioned; and has confirmed the worse intimations of terror which come out of the Polish darkness."36 W hat The New York Times did not explain, however, was why these unofficial reports and those supplied by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency could not have been investigated. Some Jew s doubted the authenticity of such horror tales because they believed that American newspapers rarely suppressed news. If anything, the press was considered to be "oversensational." Therefore, some Jews held that if these events actually happened, they would be reported in the American press.37 41

While news of the establishment of ghettos in Poland had appeared in the American press in early 1940, it was not until the beginning of October of that year that an American correspondent was able to inspect one firsthand.

A further breach in the walls of silence erected by the American press was made by Congressm an Samuel Dickstein (D., N.Y.), chairman of the House Com m ittee on Im m igration and Naturalization. O n January 24, 1940, Dickstein read eleven dispatches of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency which described "the horrors of the Nazi occupation of Poland" to the House of Representatives. A fter reading these reports, Representative Dickstein reminded his colleagues that the United States held a certain responsibility for Poland since America had been instrum ental in its creation at the end of World War I. O n January 27, Howard Daniel, writing in N ation (a liberal American weekly magazine) observed that if there were still those who were inclined to regard Jewish reports as exaggerated, an account in the Breslau would dispel it. T he account was based on Germ an police records in the province of Lodz and first appeared in the Jew ish T elegraphic A gency D aily N ew s Bulletin on January 3, 1940. It read:

A hundred Jews were executed because during the house-tohouse search for arms many Jews offered resistance. Acting on a report which came to the police that Jews surrounded a synagogue in Lonz in order to prevent Germans entering, fire was opened on the Jews and hundreds of them shot...Jewish streets were blocked hermetically. Jews were strictly forbidden to approach the local peasants because it was alleged that they were obtaining milk, potatoes, and vegetables for hoarding. As there was a typhoid epidemic, Jews were permitted to consult Jewish doctors on condition that these doctors prepared their own medicines. In the town of Sieradz thirty-six Jews were shot because they had fired on German soldiers;...In the town of Kolo 217 Jews were publicly flogged because of a theft of provisions. Among the thieves were the town rabbi and thirteen of his scholars...The work of the authorities was simplified because in some houses many Jews committed suicide before they could be arrested. In many houses the Jews resisted with iron rods and hatchets. More than 100 of these criminals were executed on the spot.38 In an interview with T h e N ew Y published on January 3 0 ,1 9 4 0 , Cardinal Hlond of Poland declared that since the end of Decem ber, when the report had been drawn up, conditions in Poland had become even worse. The Cardinal believed that Hitler was literally carrying out what he had w ritten in M ein K a m p f A9Although Cardinal Hlond's report did not m ention the persecution of Jews, both the American Jewish Congress and D er T og hoped that public opinion in America would be more receptive to the horrible conditions of the Jews in the ghettos in Lodz, Warsaw, Lublin and other Polish cities.4«3 In an attem pt to "w hitew ash" the Polish regime and stop the adverse publicity from the foreign press, Dr. Hans Frank, ruler of Germ any's Polish G overnm ent General, held a news 42

if.

conference for foreign journalists on February 9 ,1 9 4 0 , during the course of which he asserted that he had not "in any way restricted the trade of the jews or in any way limited their other activities." He insisted that "now as before Poles and Jews may intermarry and may join in any business enterprise." He also denied the existence of "a single concentration camp in the whole of Poland."41 | On July 1, D.N.B. (Deutsches Nachrichtenbüro), the official German news agency, reported that several hundred Jews had been killed in Galati, Roumania, when the Roumanian Army suppressed an armed Jewish rebellion. According to the German radio, 600 were listed as dead and many were wounded.42 The American43 and Jewish44 press reported this and other alleged incidents and also on the restrictive measures taken against Roumanian Jewry, but rejected the charge that Jews had been involved in the uprising. In a statement issued on July 8, B'nai B'rith, the American Jewish Committee, the Jewish Labor Committee, and the American Jewish Congress accused "dominant elements in Bucharest" of deliberately "whipping up a spurious alibi" for pogroms, "in order to divert attention of the Roumanian people from the loss of territory (Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina) to the Soviet Government." Of particular concern was the possibility that "the reported massacre of 600 Jews in Galati may be followed by even more awful slaughter..." Three days later, the United Roumanian Jews of America also condemned these actions.45 On August 8th, T h e N ew Y o r k T im es published a statement on "a peace without Jews," that appeared in the S ch w a rz e K o rp s, the official organ of the S.S. The paper attacked the Jews for cooperating with Britain in an effort to "convert all Europe into a chaotic, blood-soaked battlefield" and declared that the Jews would pay the price for this. Once a German victory was secured, some remote area far from Europe would be set aside for Jewish colonization. According to the T im e s , the article implied that anti-Semitic measures already in effect were too weak and a solution on "a continental scale was necessary " 46 While news of the establishment of ghettos in Poland had appeared in the American press in early 1 9 4 0 , 47 it was not until the beginning of October of that year that an American correspondent was able to inspect one firsthand. Alvin I. Steinkopf, who was a member of the Associated Press staff in Berlin, spent a week touring the Government General area (Warsaw, Lublin, Cracow, and Radom) with Dr. Jost Wallbaum, director of Health in the Government General, and Dr. Hans Klaevcks of the German Medical Chamber. Steinkopf reported from Warsaw on October 12 that an eight foot high concrete wall surrounded one hundred or more city

WOHNGEBIET DER

JUDEN BETRETEN

VERBOTEN

The American Jewish Committee concluded that "there is little'doubt that the ultimate aim of the Nazi government is to eliminate the Jews as quickly as possible in any way short of direct mass execution."

Goldmann advocated the use of political pressure as a repsonse to the problems confronting world Jewry. He warned that unless immediate political intervention was attempted to save European Jewry, "then our generation will be burdened with the terrible responsibility before Jewish history."

blocks of the central ghetto district in Warsaw and that it was "so tight, a cat couldn't get through it."48 The American Jewish Congress took issue with the official Nazi rationale that the wall was a health measure, and declared that the German intention was to transform the area into "a sewer of pestilence to consume those who refuse to commit suicide."49 The American Jewish Committee asserted that the completion of the ghetto wall enclosing an area in which Jews "must live under indescribably wretched conditions, and the establishment of virtual ghettos in other large cities in Poland" are an indication "of Nazi plans for all Jews who come within their reach."50 On November 1 6 ,1 9 4 0 the day following the official closing of the ghetto gates of Warsaw, the American press made public an appeal by the women of Poland. It stated: Our husbands, our brothers and fathers perished in mass, murders which wiped out tens of thousands. They die slowly in dungeons or perish from starvation and cold in war prisoner's camps,..We are living in hell...This hell is all around us-^it is smothering us and we are its helpless victims.51

Atrocities Revealed in the Jewish Press

On January 15, 1940, the J . T . A . reported that it had just received "authenticated" accounts of the raping of Jewish girls by German soldiers and officers in Nazi-occupied Poland. Unfortunately, this was one of many such incidents that occurred daily in Warsaw. Similar accounts had also been received from several Polish provinces.5* Another report about Nazi barbarity was brought to Geneva by Dr. Moshe Kleinbaum (Sneh), former president of the Polish Zionist Organization. According to Kleinbaum, Jews who sought to escape from Nazi Poland to Soviet territory often had to submit to "such mutilation as removal of an eye." This would prevent emigrating Jews from joining military forces fighting against Germany.53 The Jewish Advocate of Boston noted that as country after country came under Hitler's domination, American Jewry became incapable of further expression of pain.

The confiscation of Warsaw's only Jewish hospital and the expulsion of all its Jew ish patients, including 1,400 typhus cases, was reported on January 17th. O f trem endous concern was the rapid spread of the disease, which had jumped in two weeks from 250 cases to 1,000.84 Also of great concern was the tragic plight of the 3,000 Jew s marooned on barges and small boats on the ice-locked Danube in Roum anian and Yugoslavian harbors.55 O th er accounts described mass arrests and forced labor;56 massacres and executions; expulsions;5* depredations and fam ine;58 and appeals for help.59 T he American Jewish Com m ittee concluded th at "th ere is little doubt that the ultim ate aim of the Nazi governm ent is to eliminate the Jew s as

quickly as possible in any way short of direct mass execution/'00 Upon returning from a long trip to Europe in early 1940, M orris C. Troper, European director of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Com m ittee (JDC), declared that "the European continent is fast moving toward becoming one of the greatest famine areas in modern history... Large masses of the population in the occupied areas," he continued "are threatened with extinction on a scale heretofore unheard of...Lack of food, clothing, shelter, and medical supplies is daily creating unparalleled misery/' beggaring description." He described the attem pt of the remainder of G erm an Jewry to escape to other nations as "a race with death."01 Nahum Goldmann, Chairman of the Administrative Com m ittee of the World Jewish Congress, predicted that if the war in Europe continued for another year, "1,000,000 of the 2,000,000 Jews in Poland will be dead of starvation or be killed by Nazi persecutors." Goldmann advocated the use of political pressure as a response to the problems confronting world Jewry. He warned that unless immediate political intervention was attempted to save European Jew ry, "then our generation will be burdened with the terrible responsibility before Jewish h istory."02 Samuel M argoshes, editor of D er T o g , concurred with this view and noted that a great deal of political pressure would have to be applied before the Nazis would cease to exterm inate the Jewish population of their conquered areas. Such pressure had to tòm e from the United States and other neutral countries.03 Oswald Garrison Villard, form er editor of the N a tio n , agreed that political pressure was essential.04 For the first time, in May, 1940 after the Nazi offensive in the W est, there were also discussions about the possibility of a Germ an victory and what this would mean for European Jewry. O n May 29, Jacob Fishman, who had served as the editor of the Jew ish M o r n in g jo u r n a l, suggested that American Jewry should develop a broader conception of time and space. Events should no longer be viewed within the context of an individual's brief life span. In this way, even if Hitler should win a momentary victory, it would mean very little in the course of history.05 Salo Baron, professor of Jewish history at Columbia University, accepted the possibility of a Germ an victory, but vainly tried to assure American Jewry that such a triumph did not necessarily mean that Germ any would permanently dominate Europe.00 While many other editorials reflected an optimistic belief in an Allied victory and repeatedly warned against a defeatist attitude, there was considerable discussion about American Jewry's response to these events.07 The Jew ish A d v o ca te of

Boston noted that as country after country came under Hitler's domination, American Jewry became incapable of further expression of paints Shlomo Katz, managing editor of the Je w is h F ro n tier spoke for many Labor Zionists when he attacked the "anemic Jewish reaction" and questioned the efficacy of their methods.09 Life Under Nazi Rule: January-June 1941 In 1941, the condition of European Jew ry continued to deteriorate. It should be reemphasized that throughout the period under review, the Yiddish press provided almost daily accounts of the exorbitant taxation and confiscation of Jewish property;70 of the proliferation of many new anti-Jewish measures designed to eliminate Jews from European economic life;71 of the dreaded mass expulsions and deportations which uprooted hundreds of thousands of lew s;72 of the mass arrests, forced labor and w anton execution;73 and of the brutal conditions in the Jewish gh ettos.74

American Jewry was outraged at this latest outburst and the American Jewish Congress and the World Jewish Congress submitted a protest to the Roumanian Minister in Washington ....

The most important aspects of this information, which were supplied by the J . T . A . and the special correspondents of the Yiddish press, were also published in the Anglo-Jewish press. They were generally given prominent coverage. Although the American press printed reports of Jewish suffering, it was generally not given more than superficial treatment. To appreciate the impact of what was available, it is important to examine some of the major stories and revelations of this period. In late January, 1941, the Jewish press published the "first" eyewitness account of the Iron Guard attempt to overthrow General Ian Antonescu in Roumania. This revolution, which was crushed within three days, took the lives of at least 1,000 Jews in Bucharest alone; and Jewish leaders in Roumania believed that over 2,000 Jews were killed throughout the country. Correspondent Leigh White of the Overseas News Agency left Bucharest for Sofia, Bulgaria, in order to transmit his uncensored report. White observed that like most newspapermen, he had initially been reluctant to accept the atrocity stories as being true. During World War I the press had reported many horror tales only to find out afterwards that they had been duped into reporting propoganda. After his experiences in Bucharest, however, White was forced to admit that atrocities did occur and that those which took place in Roumania far exceeded anything that he could ever have im agined. To illustrate his point, he told of how Jews were picked up in the streets of the Jewish quarter and beaten up. Then they were robbed, doused with gasoline and set afire. Other Jews were burned in their homes, shops and synagogues.

White also reported that reliable informants told him that there were many cases of Jewish women who had had their breasts cut off. In addition, there were incidents of women who had their eyes gouged out, were branded, or had their bones broken. Perhaps the most horrifying account was the story of the "kosher butchering" massacre. Over two hundred Jewish men were taken to the municipal slaughtering house where they were forced to undress. A few score were led to the chopping blocks and the Greenshirts cut their throats. The rest were beheaded with axes and knives, A mass execution was also held for one hundred and sixty Roumanian Jewish leaders.75 American Jewry was outraged at this latest outburst and the American Jewish Congress and the World Jewish Congress submitted a protest to the Roumanian M inister in W ashington on February 4. Dr. Stephen S. Wise, the President of the American Jewish Congress, termed the riots disastrous to Roumanian Jewry. The Labor Zionists and the F o rw a r d also expressed their indignation.76

Perhaps one of the most important revelations during this period appeared in The New Republic of M ay 5, l94l. According to an unnamed dignitary of the Catholic Church, " 85,000 blind, incurably ill or aged Germans were put to death by the Gestapo in September, October and November of 1940.”

The r horror and suffering of Jews interned in French concentration camps also received attention in the American and Jewish press. On January 26/ 1941, T h e N ew Y o r k T im es published reports received by the American Friends Service Committee. According to these accounts the former Jewish population of the German province of Baden, about 7,500, were among the 14,000 in the Gurs concentration camp. A graphic picture of the situation there was described.77 Efforts by the puppet Vichy Government of France to ease the plight of those interned were reported on February 16 and on March 24, and the first accounts from American correspondents permitted to inspect the French "shelter and internment camps" were published.78 In May, 1941, the Jewish press announced that the United States State Department had approved a collective visa for a group of 100 refugee children. The selection was made by representatives of the American Friends Service Committee and of the Oeuvre de Secours aux Enfants (OSE), a French Jewish health and child care society.79 On January 8, 1941, it was reported that the State Department had rejected a Vichy Government request for wholesale migration to the United States of thousands of refugees.80 It was also reported in May that the OSE sought to obtain permission to transfer 3,000 children, 1,000 of whom were Jewish, from a childrens concentration camp.81 On June 8, 1941, the J . T . A . announced that the Nazi Commissar for Warsaw had predicted that all Jews in Nazioccupied Poland would "be annihilated through starvation and disease." He said that the introduction of ghettos in Poland had 47

broken the Jews morally, physically, and "economically. Furthermore, he predicted that as soon as the Jews stopped receiving charity, they would "die of hunger and disease."82 Perhaps one of the most important revelations during this period appeared in T h e N ew R e p u b l i c of May 5 ,1 9 4 1 . According to an unnamed dignitary of the Catholic Church, "85,000 blind, incurably ill or aged Germans were put to death by the Gestapo in September, October, and November of 1940." These non-Jews were killed because they "could no longer manufacture guns in returp for the food which they consumed; because the. German hospitals were needed for wounded soldiers; and because their death was the ultimate logic of the National Socialist doctrine of racial superiority and the survival of the physically fit."83 William Shirer, the prominent American CBS radio correspondent, later described these killings in his book B erlin D ia r y . He believed that the massacre was probably a result of extreme Nazi "eugenic and sociological ideas."84 O n July 18, T h e A m e r ic a n H e b r e w p ro v id ed more details on who were killed and when. O ne fully substantiated eye w itness account described how 400 orphan children were put to death because they were considered a "burden upon the State." T he report concluded by stating that "these reports about the Nazi method of elimination bear further proof as to the menace Nazism constitutes to the entire world, including the followers of N azism ."85 The ,author acknowledges the assistance of the Lionel Bauman Foundation in the preparation of this article. Sources for the material in the footnotes have been abbreviated as follows: AH The American Hebrew AJY American Jewish YearBook CB Congress Bulletin CJC Chicago Jewish Chronicle Contemporary Jewish Record JR $ CW Congress Weekly DT Der Tog F Forward JA Jewish Advocate(Boston) JG Jewish Criterion JE Jewish Exponent(Philadelphia) JF Jewish Frontier JMJ Jewish Morning Journal JS Jewish Spectator JSS Jewish Social Studies J.T.A Jewish Telegraphic Agency Daily News Bulletin N The Nation NJM The National Jewish Monthly NP New Palestine NR New Republic NYT The New York Times O Opinion TC The Call 1.

Complaints to this effect were made by Jonah J. December, 1939), p. 5; F, (10.7.39), p. 1. For typical examples of such exaggerations see NYT (10.13.39), p. 8; J.T.A. (9.6.39), p. 1, (9.16.39), p. 3.

2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

J.T.A. (9.4,39), p. 2. J.T.A. (9.18.39), p. 2. J.T.A. (9.12.39), p. 1. J.T.A. (9.13.39), p. 1; NYT (9.13.39), p.5. NYT (9.13.39), p. 11.

NYT (9.13.39), p. 6; F (9.16.39), p. 3. ' 52. J.T.A. (1.15.40), p. 4; (1.11.40), p. 1. AH (9.29.39), p. 6. 53. DT (3.21.40), p. 1. J.T.A. (9.27.39), p. 1; NYT (9.21.39), p. 13. 54. J.T.A. (1.17.40), pp. 1-2; (1.14.40), P- 1; DT(1.18.40),p. 1. J.T.A. (9.29.39), p. ¡g NYT (9.22.39), p. 7; F (9.25.39), p. 1. 55. J.T.A. (1.16.40), p. 4; NYT (1.16.40), p. 7. JMJ (9.25.39), p. 1. 56. F (11.20.40), p. 4; (12.15.40), Sec. 2, p. 3; DT(4.9.40),p. 1; CB (5.31.40), p. 1; JE (3.29.40), p. 4; NYT (9.20.39), p. 1; J.T.A. (9.21.39), p. 3. NYT(4.21.40), p. 27; and J.T.A. throughout the F (10.2.39), p. 1. period. F (10.3.39), p. 1; (10.27.39), p. 1. J.T.A. (10.20.39), p. 1; (10.23.39), p. 2;(10.31.39), 57. F (1.6.40), p. 1; (1.7.40), p. 8; O (September, 1940), p.19; JF (November, 1940), pp. 10-12; AH (5.3.40), p.l; (11.4.39), p. 2; DT (11.17.39), p. 1. p. 6; in all CJR of the period; DT (4.9.40), p. 1; NYT 17. J.T.A. (11.3.39), p. 1; (11.6.39), p. 6; (11.15.39), p. 2. (1.14.40) , p. 34; (1.19.40), p. 9; CJC (2.16.40), p. 8; 18. J.T.A. (11.11.39), p. 5; (11.14.39), p. 11; CJR(MarchNR (1.22.40), p. 100. April, 1940), pp. 119-133. 19. CB (11.10.39), p. 1; J.T.A. (11.11.39), p. 2; 58. CB (3.22.40), p. 1; (11.22.40), p. 11; AH (4.12.40), p. 16; JE (3.15.40), p. 4; N (1.20.40), pp. 61-62; (11.18.39),p. 1. NYT(1.21.40),p. 24; (2.14.40), p. 10; DT (1.30.40), 20. DT (12.8.39), p. 1; NYT (12.10.39), p. 56. p. 1. 21. DT (12.19.39), p. 1; CB (12.22.39), p. 2; J.T.A.(12.18.39), p. 1. 59. F (10.15.40), p. 1; NP (11.8.40), p. 14; JE (4.12.40), p.4. 22. J.T.A. (1.3.40), p. 1; (12.18.39), p. 1; CB (12.22.39), p.2; DT (12.19.39), p. 1. 60. CJR (January-February, 1940), p. 3. 23. DT (10.5.39), p .l; CB (10.4.39), p.2; JF (November, 61. NYT (3.15.40), p. 10; (4.5.40), p. 4; (7.11.40), p. 13. 1939), p. 5. 62. CB (2.16.40), p. 7; (4.2.40), p. 3. 24. NYT (10.7.39), p. 5. 63. DT (2.10.40), p. 1. 25. F (10.22.39), p. 1. 64. NYT (1.6.40), p. 12. 26. AJY, Volume 42, p. 645. 65. CB (5.31.40), p. 4. 27. NJM (December, 1939), p. 99. 66. CJR (July-August, 1940), pp. 355-356; See also: NYT(6.23.40), p. 13; (6.26.40), p. 19; JE (10.4.40), p. 28. CjRr (November-December, 1939), pp. 36-37; 15. DT(10.14.39),p. 6. 29. J.T.A. (10.25.39), p. 4. 67. JS (March, 1940), p. 6; NYT (3.25.40), p. 13; (5.26.40) , p. 8; (5.3.40), p. 13; (6.16.40), p. 18; 30. NYT (10.31.39), p. 3; N (12.30.39), p. 735; (7.7.40) , p. 26; DT(8.4.40), p. 1; CB (8.31.40), p. 1; JE D T(11.21.39),p. 2; CB (11.20.39), pp. 4-5; (9.27.40) , p. 4; JA(10.4.40), p. 1,4; NJM (December, (11.25.39), p. 5. 1940) , p. 120; O (April, 1940), p. 78. 31. DT (11.28.39), p. 1; NR (12.26.39), p. 180. 32. ! J.T.A. (11.29.39), p. 2; DB(11.17.39), p. 3. 68. JA (8.2.40), p. 4. 33. DT (11.29.39), p. 1. 69. JF (September, 1940), p. 16. 34. J.T.A. (11.6.39), p. 3. 70. JSS (January, 1941), pp. 57-80; F (1.16.41), p. 4; (2.21.41) , p. 4; J.T.A. (2.18.41), p. 1. 35. NYT (1.23.40), pp. 1,5. 36. NYT (1.24.40), p. 2; (1.30.40), p. 18. 71. F (1.4.41), p. 4; NYT (1.12.41), p. 28; J.T.A. (1.2.41), p. 1; CW (4.25.41), pp. 12-13. 37. DT (1.28.40), p. 1; (1.25.40), b- 1; see also JA(2.2.40),p. 1. ?2. F (2.18.41), p. 1; J.T.A. (2.18.41), p. 1; NYT (9.9.41), p. 4. 38. N (1.27.40); J.T.A. (1.3.40), p. 1; (1.22.40), pp. 3-4; CB(1.5.40), p. 3; F (1.11.40), p. 4; NYT (3.8.40), p. 6; 73. F (1.23.41), p. 4; NR (3.31.41), p. 427; NYT (4.3.41), p.4; J.T.A. (5.13.41), p. 4. JS(February, 1940), pp. 36-37; CJR (March-April, 1940), p. 183. 74- F (1.3.41), p. 4; (2.8.41), p. 10; JE (5.2.41), p. 4; CJR(August, 1941), pp. 357-366; NYT (9.16.41), p. 39. NYT (1.30.40), pp. 1,10; (2.4.40), Sec. 4, p. 4e; 9; CW(5.23.41), pp. 5,8; J.T.A. (4.3.41), p. 3. (2.16.40), p. 10. J.T.A. (1.30.41), p. 1; (1.31.41), pp. 1-3; (2.2.41), 40. CB (2.2.40), p. 2; DT (1.31.40), pp. 1,4. ■:':;# 7 5 . pp.1-3; (3.3.41), pp. 1-3; CW (1.31.41), p. 16; 41. NYT (2.10.40), p. 4; CB (5.31.40), p. 6; "Facts in NJM(February,194l), pp. 181-183; JA (2.7.41), p. 4; Review," issued by the German Library of F (l.24.41), p. 1; (1.25.41), p. 1; (2.24.41),.p. 3; AJY, Information (New York City: 4.22.40), p. 158. Vol.43. pp. 268-270; CJR (April, 1941), p. 193; NYT 42. NYT (7.1.40), p. 4. '(1.24.41), p.3. 43. NR (7.8.40), p. 45; (12.9.40), p. 772; NYT (7.3.40), p.l;(7.4.40), p. 5; (7.6.40), p. 4; (7.7.40), p. 1; 76. J.T.A. (2,5.41), p. 4; NYT (2.6.41), p. 6; CJR (April, 1941) , p. 179; J.T.A. (217.41), p. 4; CW (2.21.41), p. (7.10.40), p. 6. 2; F(1.31.4l), p. 4; (1.28.41), p. 4; NP (2.14.41), p. 5; 44. DT (11.29.40), p. 1; (12.26.40), p. 1; O (August, CW(6.3.41), p. 4. 1940), p. 4,18; (September, 1940), p. 18; F (6.29.40), p. 8; (7.8.40), p. 8; (8.8.40), p. 8, (11.11.40), p. 3. 77. NYT (1.26.41), p. 24; F (1.20.41), p. 4. 45. CJR (July-August, 1940), p. 429; (September78. NYT (2.16.41), p. 13; (2.21.41), p. 4; (2.24.41), p. 6. J.T.A. (5.18.41), p. 2. October, 1940), p. 532. 46. NYT (8.8.40), p. 11. 80 • NYT (1.9.41), p. 1. 47. NYT (1.6.40), p.2; (3.16.40), p. 3; CB (1.12.40), p .l; 81 • J.T.A'; (5.18.41), p. 1. J.T.A. (1.15.40), p. 4; (3.15.40), p. 1. 82- J.T.A. (6.8.41), p. 1. 48. NYT (10.13.40), p. 33; J.T.A. (10.14.40), pp. 2-3; 83- NR (5.5.41), p. 627. 0(November, 1940), p. 20; AH (4.26.40), p. 4. 84• William Shirer, Berlin Diary (New York: 1941), p. 458. 49. CB (12.6.40), p. 4. 50. AJY, Volume 43, pp. 233-235,718. 88, AH (7.18.41), p. 5.> 51. DT (11.28.40), p. m CB (12.6.40), p. 5.

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Talmud Torah in Makoio, Poland, supported by landsleit in America.

Photographs from the archives of the YIVO Institute for Jewish Research.

Janet Harnik

Our Landsmannschaften: Links With the Old Country For many of us, children or grandchildren of Eastern European immigrants, memories of the Landsmannschaften— organizations of Jews from one town in the Old Country—are sketchy, growing dimmer and more remote with the passing years. Following a hundred-year history in America during which the Landsmannschaft network stretched across the country, touching every gateway city, these organizations are now in a slow and certain state of demise, all their good works destined to perish in fading memories. Five thousand organizations existed in the United States in 1938. But as membership dwindles each year with the aging and death of old country brethren, only a handful still survive. For reasons ranging from nostalgia to an earnest belief in the importance o f these organizations, there are those who hold onto the threads of communities that were more vibrant in the days of their parents, hoping the atm osphere on the Lower East Side of New York during their childhoods would not be lost.

Transplanted from farm areas throughout Eastern Europe to a second-story loft, a store front, or even a wine cellar, the Landsmannschaft was the sh tetel reborn in America. By incorporating the social and traditional fabric of the sh tetel in their newly formed by-laws and practices, the Landsmannschaften sustained the new immigrant while indirectly transporting a rich cultural heritage to America. In distinct and personal ways, the Landsmannschaft helped its members adapt to new circumstances in America. America was the land of opportunity and peace—without the safeguards of the sh tetel. Many new immigrants, fresh off the boat, were unprepared to meet the challenge of fending for themselves. Searching for freedom—from conscription, persecution, the repressive constraints of the sh tetel —or a more affluent existence, new immigrants often found themselves abandoned on street corners of the Lower East Side. Many an immigrant Jew found D e G o ld en eh M e d in a to bean alien and intimidating place where hopes were dashed—a land where Jews became g o y im and forgot their religious and social roots. Reacting to a world without the safeguards of the s h t e t e l, many boarded ships to return to their homes in Eastern Europe. Other immigrants, who were either more hopeful or unable to return to their homeland, lived from day to day, sleeping in alleys or on doorsteps. They always feared death in a strange land where they had no friends, no congregation, not

Transplanted from farm areas throughout Eastern Europe...the Landsmannschaft was the shtetel reborn in America.

Janet Harnik is a free-lance writer. This is her first appearance in Jewish Life.

Most important of all the Landsmannschaft's services was its continuation of the shtetels charitable tradition.

...a core of Landsmannschaft affiliates attempt to preserve the spirit and the work of their organizations.

even a place to be buried, and the constant fear that they would "end up in Potter's field." In this atmosphere of deprivation and loneliness the Landsmannschaft was born. One person from the old country would tell a friend about an existing organization, or together they would form one, drawing newly-arrived friends and family into membership as they arrived in America. Signs were hung on lamposts, notices were posted in any of the many daily Yiddish newspapers in circulation at that time, announcing upcoming meetings where one might find his own particular dialect of Yiddish spoken. In their capacity as fraternal organizations, newlyformed Landsmannschaften helped maintain a sense of continuity for their members, from the old world to the new, while also holding together Jewish life in a world that seduced the new immigrant to assimilation. Most important of all the Landsmannschaft's services was its continuation of the s h t e t e ls charitable tradition,, Many incoming immigrants were painfully needy, and many more in the old country were in freed of passage to America. Providing financial assistance to the needy among them and to their brothers in Eastern Europe was a major priority. They set up funds to lend money to members, medical plans were devised to provide reasonably priced medical care to those who were sick. Throughout a long history in America, Landsmannschaft activities were often directed by the hand of historical with the pull of old traditions frequently giving way to the desire to become "American." The time was one of hopes, fears, aspirations and the discomfort one invevitably experiences when new ways rub against the grain of traditional values. Throughout a long history in America, Landsmannschaftactivites were often directed by the hand of historical circumstance. After World War I, representatives from individual organizations were sent to the old country bringing money and relief for war victims. During the Depression, the Landsmannschaften concentrated their financial resources on conditions in America, making loans to needy members. After World War II, Europe again became the major focus of Landsmannschaft efforts. Special relief committees were formed to help survivors. Landsmannschaften became centers of contact for survivors wanting information on missing family members. On sadder missions, Landsmannschaften created committees to prepare y iz k o r books, memorials to alleviate some of the awesome anonymity surrounding the mass murder of so many Jews, and to provide an element of dignity to the passing of so many sh tetlech . Many of the memorials standing on the sites of Jewish

54 fl

villages in Eastern Europe were built with Landsmannschaft money. As traces of Jewish life in Eastern Europe gradually diminished with each wave of Nazi occupation, it was the Landsmannschaft which carried the threads to America. But today the Landsmannschaft is no longer what it once was. What it is now for surviving members has been greatly altered by the simple fact that essential services once provided by the Landsmannschaften are no longer needed. Still, a core of Landsmannschaft affiliates attempt to preserve the spirit and the work of their organizations. There is sadness and pain in the faces of these people as they recall a time which moves further into the past, but there is also a joy which transcends the limitations of time and place in re-telling stories and anecdotes fu n d er h eim . "Our society is considered a large one," says a member of a surviving Landsmannschaft. fWe have eighty members, we maintain two cemeteries and we provide many benefits to our membership. Why do we belong? Our lives are richer because we do. It is our way of maintaining our Jewish identity and cultural heritage. We are children of la n d sleit, of parents who went through hell to be Jews. The society helps us remember." "In the old days," he said, talking about his childhood, "Jewish life was perpetuated through the Landsmannschaft. Holidays, weddings, birthdays, or anything which touched the coummunity was felt by the community at large, and was shared in the Landsmannschaft* We were all very attached to one another. Celebrations of this kind rarely exist anymore. But the memories do and they are important to me." A ttachm ent and the shared concerns of the Landsmannschaften, like intimate friendships in any community, were grounded in contingency, in circumstance, in the comfort of familiarity. This element was both the beauty of these communties and the beginning of their demise. * "Families and children have moved away now," says one member sadly. "Our economics have changed. It is hard to find a charity we can all agree on. There are other ways to create a Jewish identity for the young. Today, what we work for is finding a cause to keep the organization going, something we can channel our energies into." The most vibrant of the remaining Landsmannschaften are those whose members are World War II refugees. What keeps these organizations alive is a vitality rooted in present circumstances, a need shared by their membership to band together in friendship. "Our organization is still a good one," says the president of a society composed mostly of World War II refugees. "Every time we meet it is a happy reunion which helps us live beyond sadder times."

“Why do we belong? Our lives are richer because we do.... We are children of landsleit, of parents who went through hell to be Jews. The society helps us remember."

Twenty years from now all that will remain of the Landsmannschaft Era...will be the relics now being collected by Y1VO, the Institute for Jewish Research.

Twenty years from now all that will remain of the Landsmannschaft Era, a rich hundred year history which encapsulized the Eastern European heritage, will be the relics now being collected by YIVO, the Institute for Jewish Research, whose goal has always been to preserve the remaining threads of East European Jewish communities. Under a grant from the National Archives, the Landsmannschaft project has already contacted more than one hundred individuals and organizations in an attempt to locate pertinent records and materials. "If we don't c^tch the essence of the movement now," says its director, " it will be lost: an integral part of Jewish history will vanish without a trace." At YIVO's offices, housed in a former mansion on Fifth Avenue in New York City, there are rows and rows of cardboard files, containing photographs, diaries, documents, letter, all rich sources of information about the Landsmannschaften and life in Eastern Europe. YIVO has established a permanent Landsmannschaft collection representing every aspect of the multi-faceted organizations, a rich source of information about immigrant life in America, and life in the East European sh tetel. What might have been a history with gaps and unanswered questions, is now being assembled for posterity in an archive on East 86th Street. Regal Landsmannschaft memorabilia, y iz k o r books, banners, and minute books which detail the activities of each meeting have been rescued from the basements-*—or the trash cans—of people who kept them until they no longer felt they had need for them. Now they have a home, and this perhaps small piece of Jewish history will be preserved. And who is to say how important or unimportant any piece of Jewish history really is?

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SEA SO N S O F TH E SO U L Religious, historical, and philosophical perspectives on the Jewish year and its milestones

Bircas Hachamah/Blessing of the Sun, a Halachic Analysis and Anthology, with a New Translation and Commentary by Rabbi J. David Bleich, with Overviews by Rabbi Nosson Scherman, Artscroll/Mesorah, New York, 1980. In the year 1925, w hen the next to the last observance of B ircas H a ch a m a h took place, few would have thought that by the

year 1981 there would be any Jews in America interested in this rare m itzva. By 1953, the last occurence of B ircas H ach am ah , things looked brighter, but who would have thought that there would be in 1981 a mass market for a work on the subject. B ircas H ach am ah , the blessing recited for the sun, derives from a passage in the G em ora B rachos, which Dr. Bleich cites as follows: Our Rabbis taught: He who sees the sun at its turning point...should say: Blessed are You who makes the world of creation. And when [does this happen]? Abaye said:Tvery twentyeight years when the cycle begins again and the NisanJSpring] equinox falls in Saturn on the evening of Tuesday, going into Wednesday. The bracha, "W ho makes the world of creation" (oseh m a a s e B 'raishis), is recited on other, more frequent occasions, but its application to the sun is reserved for the sun's "tu rning" to the position it occupied on the day of creation. This phenomenon occurs once in tw enty-eight years, and always takes place on the same day of the week (Wednesday)4-unlike most other observances in the Jewish calendar—because it is measured by the solar calendar, and not the lunar calendar which is normally operative. Rabbi Bleich describes the brach a as an "evocative blessing," since its purpose is to mark a natural phenomenon which evokes a dramatic new awareness of the Almighty's creation. Bircas Hachamah offers more than its long title indicates. The chapter on the calendar is of value to the reader who wants to better understand the basis of the Jewish calendar, and how it differs from the civil calendar used in most of the w estern world. N evertheless, we are especially indebted to Rabbi Bleich for focusing on the mitzva of B ircas H a ch a m a h in time for us to increase our understanding of this rare m itzva prior to its next occurence on Wednesday, April 8, 1981. An extensive portion of the volume deals with the time-problems and other halachic m atters involved in observing the m itzva, with tim etables covering m ajor American communities from Atlanta through M onsey to Silver Spring, as well as overseas cities from Amsterdam to Zurich. The final section of Bircas Hachamah is, in effect, the seder h a te filo s , the order of the various prescribed prayers, with variants practiced in non-Ashkenazik communities; a new

commentary on each of the tefilos; and explanations o f their relationship to this unusual mitzva. In an interesting and fruitful diversion, Rabbi Bleich deals with the recitation of the L'shem Yichud, the kabbalistic invocation which some are zealous to recite before almost every mitzva preceded by a bracha, and others as zealously reject. For those with a kabbalistic bent, the excursion can be intellectually satisfying and edifying, though the conclusion takes us back to the simple: Chassidim do, the rest of us don't. Bircas Hachamah operates on two levels: It is a highly valuable technical exposition of a simple mitzva, and a valuable handbook for every Jew who anxiously looks forward to observing it.

ISRAEL NEEDS PEOPLE THE MITZVAH OF ALIYAH IS ACH IEVED BY PERSO N AL ALIYAH FINANCIAL A S S IS T A N C E TO THE STATE IS SE C O N D A R Y The Aliyah Department of the Orthodox Union is available to help all of those who are thinking of making their final household in Israel. Contact Aliyah Sheliach, Rabbi Michael Starr, Director of Israel and Aliyah activities.

Orthodox Union 116 E. 27th St., New York, N Y 10016 212-725-3400

This Pulriication is Available in M

To The Editor: I have been living in Israel for almost four years and have always looked forward to receiving copies of Jewish Life forwarded to me by my parents. I find your approach to religious issues and trends in America enlightening and th ought-provoking. However, I found the sentiments expressed in the Comment "Torah, Jewish History and the Boston Fifty-Six" [Jewish Life, Tishrei 5741/Fall 1980] not only out of place, but out of touch with the reality of Israeli life. Apparently the Likud propoganda machine is more effective than the Israeli government's official public relations department. Anyone who believes that the Begin government stands for "a return to Jewish tradition and Jewish values" has not lived in Israel recently. The gap between secular and religious elements has widened considerably. The attitude of secular Israelis and immigrants, including American immigrants, has deteriorated from disdain to hostility. Begin's open display of his Jewishness consists mainly of acts performed for the benefit of the gentiles abroad, i.e. insisting on eating kosher food and putting a yarmulke on his head at official functions. While these acts are positive and worthy of a representative of Israel, they are aimed to please you, American Jewry. How does a secular Israeli perceive Jewish values when the Minister of Religion is accused of bribery and, instead of openly inviting investigation as an honest man should, persuades the Chief Rabbi to declare that he is privileged and protected from police investigation? Our young people view observant Jews as fanatics who throw rocks at

cars on Shabbat. No one in the Begin government has arisen to portray a deeper, more meaningful picture of an observant Jew. It is a Jewish tradition to care for the elderly and provide for the poor. Yet after the Begin government put an already sick economy into the grave, they immediately cut social services, removed subsidies on basic foodstuffs such as milk and eggs (usually this was done a few days before a major holiday) and eliminated subsidized school lunches. I invite you who applaud the Begin government to come and try living under their administration. It is very easy for you to sit in your comfortable homes and denounce Peace Now and demand that Israel cling to the West Bank and not negotiate. It will be my children who will die for those sentiments, not yours. It is my family who must pay the price. I watch my friends leave Israel one by one because they cannot find jobs or affordable housing or feed their families because the Begin government is pouring out money, money which this bankrupt country cannot afford, into new West Bank settlements—settlements surrounded by Arab villages, filled with people you know as the enemy. Our Torah tells us "And a stranger thou shall not wrong, neither shall thou oppress him: for you were strangers in the land of Egypt." Y et under Likud, military harassment of Arab civilians in the territories has alienated moderate Arab leaders. And until Likud, there were moderate leaders. .Now these people must either support the PLO or be branded as traitors to their own people. What would you do in their place? Love the Zionists? Leave your home? Even the British had the sense to prefer dealing with the more moderate Haganah over Begin's band of terrorists. In fact, Begin's tactics against the Arabs are the very same that the British used to suppress the Jews. You remember how successful the British were in 1948. We have an Arab problem. We have a group of people who live here, work here and give birth in numbers that far surpass our own. What are we going to do with these people? Ship them to Jordan before they outnumber us? (Hussein doesn't want them either.) Establish an Apartheid system like South Africa's, making them second-class citizens? They are willing to live here despite the 61

economy, prejudice and constant oppression. Are you? Even if all the Arabs left tomorrow, who would replace them? Are American Jews willing to give up their split-level homes, two cars and well-paying jobs to live in threeroom apartments in Kiryat Arba? For thirty years while you were not happy with this secular Jewish State, you were content to vent your displeasure from the safety of your living rooms rather than give up your material pleasures to deal with the complex problems we face every day. We could use your innovative religious thinking and dynamic leaders to combat the stagnation and politics that plague our religious establishment. Isn't anyone concerned that our youth value color televisions and video tape-players above Torah and mitzvot? Nowhere in your comment do you encourage your readers to participate in the rebirth of Jewishness in Israel by making their homes here, You may reject Leonard Fein and the 56'ers, but your position is as invalid as theirs. Ydu barter our future as easily as you accuse them of doing. At least the Peace Now people are here. Maybe they don't have a solution to our problems any more than Labor did or Likud does now. New political leadership would truly be a blessing. Menachem Begin may present a fine figure in Washington and New York. But to us he has shown a stubborn blindness to the social and economic problems that face us today and a willingness to sacrafice the good of the country to keep his shaky government together. You have shown you are not willing to risk the dangers of living here. You have no right to worship at the feet of a man who only makes our burden heavier. Nadine Bonner Yerushalayim To The Editor: I am writing in response to two articles which appeared in the Fall 1980 issue of Jewish Life. In "Torah, Jewish History, and the Boston Fifty-six," a violent attack is presented against critics of the Begin Government. This editorial is highly biased. Your editorialist writes, "Menachem

Begin's attacks on the British and their military installations were no more acts of terrorism than those of George Washing ton..." Yet what of the bombing of the King David Hotel in Yerushalayim? What of the massacre of the Arab village of Deir Yasin? Begin was of course under tremendous pressure during the time of the British mandate. He was a marked man; a price hung on his head. Yet others who were also under duress did not resort to such acts which can only be labelled as terrorism. The article further states, "Menachem Begin and his Likud Party...stand for a return to Jewish belief, Jewish tradition, and Jewish values...", while those who challenge these political positions "...have been embarrassed by Israel's emerging Jewishness." I must take exception to your notions of "Jewishness." It is not "Jewishness," nor does it foster Jewish belief, tradition, or values to expropriate Arab land for the sake of Jewish settlers who weaken, rather than enhance Israel's security. Nor does it foster "Jewishness" to flout the negotiation process by continuing to establish these unnecessary settlements, to pass resolutions annexing East Jerusalem (which, regardless of what we may say in our hearts and to each other, is still theoretically subject to negotiation according to the Camp David agreements), or to hold hundreds of thousands of Arabs without political rights. These are difficult times, requiring difficult decisions. But they also demand a reasonable attempt to find an equitable settlement, reconciling divergent viewpoints and conflicting claims. This editorial concludes by suggesting that what the other nations of the world think about Israel is of no consequence. This attitude is naive, especially when efforts are being made to formulate treaties and establish good will. However, the attitudes of others are not nearly as important as our own self-image. When large segments of the Jewish community consider the policies of the Israeli government to be grossly improper, when Israel holds a foreign people without basic political rights, then new ideas are needed. There must be better ways to promote peace while still guaranteeing Israeli security. On a less political issue, the open letter by Rabbi Bleich regarding a married woman's use of her maiden name cannot pass without

comment. His own admission that " there is nothing at all intrinsically Jewish about family names," concedes the entire issue. It is of no consequence to any synagogue how members choose to be addressed. His contention that different last names for husband and wife implies to society that there is no marriage is simply no longer correct. Two-name families are nowadays so common that only a hermit would be unaware of this usage. Even were this not the case, there is no reason for anyone to examine a synagogue list searching for anomalies in last names. Finally, I would point out that should two people share a domicile but not a ketuba, a synagogue would have no more cause to exclude them from membership than it would to exclude someone who drives on Shabbos or eats nonkosher meat. The synagogue belongs to all Jews, not just to Jews who observe a predetermined number of mitzvos or who use certain names. Rabbi Bleich's implication that the use of separate family names could somehow lead to societal moral decay is without any basis whatsoever. Are two-name families in synagogues responsible for the immoral conduct which Rabbi Bleich sees running rampant in the country today? Does he honestly believe that banning two-name listings would reverse this moral decay? Rabbi Bleich proposes what he considers to be a solution to a problem by suggesting hyphenated double names. This suggestion, while admittedly appealirfg to some, strikes me as totally unnecessary. No solution is needed because there is no problem. This is not a community issue. It is a personal issue. Any attempt to dictate to anyone how he or she should be known is a callous disregard of that individual's rights and feelings. Barry Pinsky St. Louis, Missouri

Rabbi Bleich Replies: Es is shver zu seina Yid—it is hard to be a Jew, but it is even harder to be a rabbi. How often I have heard that rabbis (and, by implication, Judaism itself) are concerned with minutiae of halacha but insensitive to broader ethical issues. And yet when confronted with an

ethical malaise which prompts a focus upon what was candidly recognized as an extrahalachic manifestation and a possible palliative, I am told in effect, "Rabbi, stick to halacha and don't worry about morality." Moreover, it is difficult to explain an unpopular view without being forced to defend ideas not expressed or policies not advocated. Even a superficial reading of my comments will show I did not advocate denyi ng s ynagogue member s hi p to unmarried persons sharing an apartment. It is an old debaters' ploy to misrepresent an opponent's position and to argue against the misrepresented position which no one espouses. It evokes approval, but certainly doesn't contribute to intelligent discourse. Let me clarify the issues: The letter (which actually was not sent to any congregant) was intended as a literary device to focus attention upon a serious problem confronting our community. The general permissiveness of the dominant culture has, baavonosenu harabim, had a corrosive effect upon Jews as well. Only a "hermit" or a tzaddik not of this world would be unaware of what is transpiring in certain sectors of our society. Part, and only part, of the problem is that such conduct is tacitly accepted. The absence of social censure necessarily results in a higher incidence of misconduct. In discouraging use of separate surnames we have found a panacea. It is simply one obvious and readily available means of withholding approval of a lifestyle which Judaism objures. There is only one question with regard to this issue over which committed Jews can disagree: Does rejection of a common family name by a married couple (socially, as distinct from professionally) contribute to an aura of sexual permissiveness? Mr. Pinsky maintains: a) it does not; b) it's too late: everyone is doing it; the damage is done. With regard to a) I submit that it does. My answer to b) is: I don't know about St. Louis, but where I live it is not yet at all common for married people to use separate surnames. Finally, Judaism teaches that when public acts may adversely affect the community at large an individual does not enjoy the luxury of being guided by private "rights * and feelings." For Judaism there are very few matters which are purely personal. Yes, es is shver zu sein a Yid because kol Yisrael areivim zeh lazeh. 63

UNION O F ORTHODOX JEWISH CONGREGATIONS OF AMERICA

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NEW YEAR'S DAY 1981 TH UR SD AY, 25 TEVES/JAN . 1

mtngb n uv W

Mishna Text and Translation

m roj?

.rtjlw in ny’ana — nmt«?

n m yn T ip [k ]

.t»» ornbypymnn ,uyip [1] The order of the fasts mentioned above [applies on ly) if the first rain [was withheld!. However, if plants changed [abnormally], we sound the shofar at once because of them; Mishna Commentary - -nn$n i S k n fiy n -n o _ The order of the fasts mentioned above... The mishnah refers to 1 :5 -7 , which gives the order and the severity of the fasts and other restrictions that are imposed in response to a lack of ra i n (T if. Yis.). According to Kehati, the order mentioned in our mishnah includes the voluntary fasts and self-imposed restrictions of the D’T fv . distinguished individuals, as delineated in 1:4. •njutftn rtyan a — [applies onlyJ i f the first rain [was withheld]. The first rain usually falls on the third, seventh, and seventeenth of MarCheshvan [see above 1:3,4]. Only when rain has not come by then are the fasts and restrictions imposed in gradual order as outlined in 1:47. However, if other calamities, such as those outlined below, are the cause of the public fasting, the initial

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