Jewish Life May-June 1966

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JE W A N D JE W , JE W A ÏÏD N O N -JE W AM O N G J E W S A N D CRY PTO -JEW S IN P O R T U G A L IS TH ERE A D E P A CTO E ST A B L ISH M E N T O F R ELIG IO N IN AM ERICA? D E R H EILIG ER RE B BE ? R E B Z U S H A M ISSIO N O F H U M O R SIVAN-TAMMUZ 5726 MAY-JUNE 1966

68th Anniversary B iennial N ational Convention OF THE

Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America will be held AT THE Shoreham Hotel in WASHINGTON, D.C. on Wednesday, November 23—Sunday, November 27, 1966 Kislev 10 to Kislev 14, 5727 PLEASE RESERVE THESE DATES

Thanksgiving Week . . . in the Nation's Capital.

Pill 1f 1

Vol. XXXIII, No. 5 / May-June 1966 / Sivan-Tammuz 5726

»Y'n T H E EDITOR’S VIEW

THE PERILS OF DAY SCHOOL SUCCESS...............

Saul

B e r n s t e in ,

Editor

S. J. S h a r f m a n

Rabbi

L ib b y

K laperm an

H. B a r i s Editorial Associates P aul

D vora

M in d e r

Editorial Assistant JEWISH LIFE is published bi-monthly. Subscription two years $4.50, three years $6.00, four years $7.50. Foreign: Add 25 cents per year.

Editorial and Publication Office: 84 Fifth Avenue New York 10011, N.Y. ALgonquin 5-4100 Published by U n io n O rthodox C o n g r e g a t io n s

M oses

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AR TIC LES

JEW AND JEW, JEW AND NON-JEW / Aaron Soloveichik............... ..............................

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IS THERE A DE FACTO ESTABLISHMENT OF RELIGION IN AMERICA? / Reuben E. Gross . . . . 23 DER HEILIGER REBBE REB ZUSHA / Zalman Aryeh Hilsenrad.............................—

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AMONG JEWS AND CRYPTO-JEWS IN PORTUGAL / Jacob Beller ...................................................... 31 MISSION OF HUMOR / Abraham Shulman........... 42 BOOK REVIEW S

o f

J e w is h o f

A m e r ic a

I. F e u e r s t e i n President

B e n ja m in K o e n ig s b e r g , Nathan K. Gross, Harold Jacobs,; Joseph Karasick, Harold H. Boxer, Vice Pres­ idents ; J o e l S c h n e ie r s o n , Treasurer; Herzl Rosenson, Secretary ; David Politi, Fi­ nancial Secretary.

M .

Dr. Samson R. Weiss Executive Vice President

A NEW PRESENTATION OF FAMILY PURITY / Slfra Tendier...................................................... 50 YE SHALL BE HOLY / Gerslon Appel..................... 53

D EPA R TM EN TS

AMONG OUR CONTRIBUTORS ...............................

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR...................................... 57

Saul Bernstein, Administrator Cover and inside illustrations by Alan Zwiebel Second Class Postage paid at New York, N. Y.

©Copyright 1966 by UNION OF ORTHODOX JEWISH CONGREGATIONS OF AMERICA

May-June 1966

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among our contributors

RABBI AARON SOLOVEICHIK will shortly assume the post of Rosh Hayeshivah of the Hebrew Theological Col­ lege (Beth Midrash Latorah) in Skokie, 111. Scion of a family famed for its great Torah scholars and sages, he ranks among the outstanding Halachic authorities of to­ day. Arriving in this country from Poland at the age of 13, he studied at Yeshiva University’s Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary and Yeshiva College, receiving Semichah at the former and graduating from the latter in 1940. Through the past several years Rabbi Aaron Soloveichik has served both as a Rosh Yeshivah at “Yitzchak Elchanan” and as the Rav of Congregation Morya in Manhattan.

REUBEN E. GROSS, whose contributions in previous is­ sues of this magazine have ranged over various topics, this time offers typically iconoclastic views on secularism as “established American religion.” An active figure in or­ thodox Jewish affairs, Mr. Gross’s crowded program min­ gles writing with public speaking, his law practice, and a number of etceteras. His Staten Island home is invariably well populated with young people of assorted ages, nine of whom are the offspring of Mr. and Mrs. Gross.

ZALMAN ARYEH HILSENRAD, who now conducts an insurance service, made large contributions to the devel­ opment of American Orthodoxy while serving from 1938 to 1948 as Executive Director of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America. He was a founder, dur­ ing this period, of J e w i s h L i f e and was Managing Edi­ tor of the first issues of the magazine. A resident of Brook­ lyn, Mr. Hilsenrad contributes a regular column to The Jewish Press, a weekly published there.

ABRAHAM SHULMAN is the author of three published books and many articles which have appeared in maga­ zines of various countries. After escaping from his native Poland after the outbreak of World War II, his joumeyings took him through several European countries, North Africa, Eretz Israel, Persia, Japan, and Australia before coming to the United States in 1961. At present, Mr. Shulman is a staff writer for the Jewish Daily Forward as well as a correspondent for several overseas newspapers.

JACOB BELLER’S articles in this magazine have enabled our readers to share his experiences as a skilled journal­ ist in visiting lands distant and not-so-distant, exploring the Jewish life of present-day communities and uncover­ ing buried pages of Jewish history. In this issue, Mr. Beller takes us through the cities and countryside of Portugal.

JEWISH LIFE

THE EDITOR S VIEW The Perils of Day School Success PON the pending close of the present school year, some 4,400 boys and girls will be graduated from this country’s elementary Hebrew Day Schools. This new Yeshivah Ketanah record will be complemented by a new peak in the numbers graduating from high school level day schools—approximately 2,100. These figures offer multiple encouragement. Not only are more and more boys and girls receiving their elementary edu­ cation in Jewish day schools but a steadily mounting propor­ tion of them continue in similar schools of higher level.

Seen in overall statistical context, these figures can be given differing evaluations. The 60,000 pupils of the elementary and higher day schools represent nearly a tenth of all Jewish chil­ dren of elementary school age and perhaps a twentieth of all of high school age. In contrast to the situation of but a few years ago, the growth is enormous, the change phenomenal. The fact remains, however, that the great majority of Jewish children still acquire but a sub-minimum of Jewish education or none at all.

If the objective is confined to the training of a select cadre, a leadership force, the present accomplishment can be seen as Limited basic success, the ongoing task being one of consolidation. If, or Total however, the goal is nothing less than the equipping of the broad Goal? ranks of American Jews for a Jewish life—a total, and totally Jewish, goal—then what has been achieved is but an initial phase of a far vaster task.

It must be clear to all by now that only in-depth schooling in Jewishness can equip the Jewish child and youth to achieve a purposeful Jewish life in the world of today. Few lacking such training can withstand the pressures of the environment.

And it has become just as clear that the day school is not just a “better” method of Jewish schooling but must be recognized as the minimal norm of education for the Jewish young.

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n p H E volition of grass roots growth must in any event propel JL the day school and yeshivah to a wider role. This is be­ coming apparent not only in the main centers of Jewish popu­ lace but in the smaller communities too. A recent example in this regard has been set by the vibrant orthodox community of May-June 1966

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Memphis, Tennessee. There, the new-born Yeshiyah of the South, on high school level, offers exciting new vistas of Torah creativity for small communities scattered so widely over South­ ern and Southwestern states. Without doubt this marks an un­ folding pattern which will become increasingly visible in the coming years.

It is painful irony, in view of the original difficulty of “sell­ ing” the day school idea, that in many communities today the Thousands problem is one of accommodating all the children seeking enTurned rollment. The main check to a much faster pace of growth is Away lack of financial means. Literally tens of thousands for whom enrollment is sought cannot be admitted because the schools, filled to capacity, cannot obtain the funds to build additional facilities and to engage more teachers. In very many cases, par­ ents, especially those with several school-age children, cannot afford the tuition and the deficit-ridden schools have exhausted scholarship resources.

It is evident that the need facing American Jewry cannot be met merely by multiplication of schools within the bounds of individual enterprise. What is necessary is the grasping of a total concept and its translation into total approach. If the de­ velopment is not coordinated within a much broader, much more clearly defined frame of reference, the day schools and yeshivoth will be increasingly exposed to mortal dangers. Visi­ ble enough already, these dangers threaten not only the attain­ ment of the greater goal but also the character of present in­ stitutions.

T N a sense, the threat to the day school movement rises from its very success. Now that the day school, created by orthodox Jewry, has proven itself, non-orthodox elements that once fought it bitterly have adopted the policy of moving in on the day school picture. Increasingly, non-orthodox forces are pressing toward infiltration of the governing boards of day schools, the capture of key positions, and the dictation of ideological and educational policy. In not a few cases, the takeover has been all but complete and an institution built with such mesirath nefesh and agmath nefesh for Torah ends by Torah Jews has been pirated and perverted. In other cases where piratical pur­ pose has been thwarted, non-orthodox groups have instituted competitive schools. It is a certainty that both methods will be pursued with intensified determination in the period ahead.

This technique of infiltration, subversion, and division has 4

JEWISH LIFE

long been familiar on the synagogue scene. In this and other connections, it is most unfortunate that an undue measure of Infiltration separation of effort and interest has been permitted to arise and within the orthodox Jewish community between those who focus Subversion on day school or yeshivah effort and those concerned with syna­ gogue affairs. The result is an altogether unjustifiable divergence of orientations which bears multiple penalty. The failure of the day school movement to share and profit by the hard-earned lessons of the orthodox synagogue on the American scene is but one of the costly results of the situation. Of graver conse­ quence is the weakening of the sense rof common identity and unitary responsibility.

Except for those day schools which are directly synagoguesponsored, congregations as such usually do not view themselves as inherently and immediately responsible for the welfare and maintenance of the day schools in their communities. The local day school is looked upon as complementary to the synagogue but not an integral part of it as is the congregational Talmud Torah. On its part, the day school force likewise often feels no inherent responsibility for the synagogue and has little sense of sharing in its functioning and destiny. Rather, the day school The Price of keysets policy to the participation and support of the “comDependency munity as a whole.” To implement this service-to-the-wholecommunity identification, the day school is apt to play its or­ thodox character in low key and to lean on non-orthodox sup­ port to meet its burdensome financial needs. Under conditions of chronic deficit, habitual dependency on this source exposes the school to forced compromise of religious commitment and educational standards—and to eventual capture.

The problem is bound to grow rather than to diminish as the day school takes on its larger role on the American Jewish scene. Unless orthodox Jewish leadership brings the total ap­ proach to bear on the chinuch purview, the problem may be­ come unmanageable.

T T is imperative that a broadly conceived system of central planning, direction, financing, and control be applied to the day school set-up. It is imperative that the “worlds” of the day school, the yeshivah, and the synagogue be unified. It is im­ perative that the resources and efforts of orthodox Jewry be applied with at least that modicum of seychel which will assure that they nourish the tree of Torah rather than that, chas v’cholilah, they be perverted to opposite e n d s . -------S. B. May-June 1966

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Jew and Jew, Jew and Non-Jew In today’s world of radically changed perspectives, basic questions of hu­ man relationships emerge in a context of shifting values. The Jew, in his dis­ tinctive situation, experiences them with special force. These questions as they apply to the Jew, and the answers to them, are explored here in the eternal terms of the Torah hy an outstanding Torah scholar. The article is based on a paper delivered by the author before a joint leadership conference of the UOJCA National Conference of Synagogue Youth and Mizrachi Hatzair.

By AARON SOLOVEICHIK PROBLEM that increasingly agitates the contemporary Jewish scene is that of the basis and form of associations between different elements of the Jewish community on the one hand and between Jews and non-Jews on the other. The issue has arisen out of the sharp changes in the patterns of per­ sonal and public life caused by the upheavals of modern times. Amidst wide confusion, basic Jewish principles applying to personal and collective relation­ ships are overlooked and the sense of Jewish direction is lost.

Under the pressure of events, there is resort to a variety of hastily impro­ vised definitions of policy in regard to the relationships between the religiously observant elements of Jewry and the non-observant, the heterodox, and the non-believing elements. Similar makeshifts are devised with regard to the question of Jewish-non-Jewish relationships. As particular issues relevant to the problem come to the forefront, these formulations collide with each other and all alike prove painfully defective and inadequate.

It is urgently necessary, therefore, that the basic tenets and teachings of the Torah governing this crucial aspect of life be brought into clear view.

Torah being eternal and eternally relevant, the problem of our own time must be, can only be, resolved in Torah terms. Only with clear perception of the Divine commands, as elucidated by our Sages, pertaining to the obligations of Jew to Jew and Jew to non-Jew can we properly determine the right course and shape effective policy.

It is hoped that the following study will contribute in some measure to the above purpose.

A REVUTH, the concept of kol yisroel arevim zeh lozeh, meaning in effect i x “all Jews are co-responsible for each other,” is a fundamental tenet of Judaism. It is commonly assumed that Arevuth signifies the obligation that is incumbent upon all Jews to maintain humanity, decency, and morality within the Jewish community. It is true that the concept includes this mean6

JEWISH LIFE

ing, but it is not limited to it. The obligation to maintain decency and morality within the community extends to the whole human race. One of the seven Noachide commandments, according to the Rambam, has this application; namely, of maintaining fundamental humanity within society. Obviously, such application is not confined to Jews, but extends to all men. It is incumbent upon the members of any human community to maintain certain standards of morality, to deter the members of the community from crime and sin. Arevuth, however, is something peculiar to Israel— “Kol Yisroel Arevim Zeh Lozeh.”

It does not apply to non-Jews. We thus see that Arevuth implies something more than the obligation to maintain morality within the community.

To understand the real significance of this concept one must take notice of the juxtaposition in the Torah of two commandments, that upon which the concept of Arevuth is founded and the one commanding brotherly love.

In the Sidrah K’doshim the Torah says:* “You shall not dislike your brother in your heart; you shall surely rebuke your neighbor and not bear sin for him.” (Vayikra [Lev.] 19:17). And then, the Torah proceeds, in the next verse, with the prohibition against revenge and bearing a grudge against a brother: “You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord.”

We thus see that there is a very close affinity between the mitzvah of Reproof {tochecha), which derives from the concept of Arevuth, and the mitzvah of Brotherly Love (v’ohavta I’reyachd). Likewise, it is evident that Arevuth and its corollary, the mitzvah of Tochecha, are alike based upon ahavath yisroel, love of Israel.

F WE grasp the real significance of the concept “Ahavath Yisroel“ then we will also be able to understand the significance of Arevuth. Unfortunately, the former, though a basic Torah tenet, is widely misunderstood.

In the Talmud we find the expression ahavath yisroel on the one hand and ahavath hab9rioth, love of mankind, on the other. The expression Ahavath Hab’rioth is more general, more inclusive than the other. It implies that ahavah, brotherly love, is to be applied to everyone, whether Jews or non-Jews.

As Reb Chaim Vitale points out in the Shaar Hak’dushah: “Know that ‘Love of Mankind’ applies even to non-Jews, for it is incumbent upon one to love all of mankind, created in the Image, as it is said: Man is beloved because he was created in the image of G-d.”** So that there is a concept of “Beloved is man for he was created in the image of G-d,” of brotherly love—towards all men. But then there is the concept of Ahavath Yisroel—brotherly love that is peculiar to Israel, that is to be applied in a special way to Jews. This mitzvah of “And you shall love your neighbor, as yourself, I am G-d” obviously is confined to Jews only, for the Torah enjoins us: You shall bear no grudge against members of your people but you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

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* The verses quoted are phrased here in accordance with the usual English translations, but inaccuracies in the customary rendering of some words will be noted in the course of this article. ** And Tosefoth Yom Tov points out that the correct version: choviv ha-odom, not odom, in line with the point mentioned by Rebbeinu Tam, that odom, “man,” has reference only to Jews, whereas ha-odom (lit.: the man, signifying mankind) applies to all men.

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THE TW O KINDS OF "A H A V A H HE QUESTION arises: of what significance is the application of Love of Israel if there is an obligation of Love of Mankind that is applicable to T all men? But it seems that there is a definite distinction between the two.

There are two kinds of ahavah. There is intellectual love—love deriving from logic of the mind, marked by objective view of the person that is loved. And then there is also emotional love, springing from the heart. Emotional love is not based upon any logic of the mind; it is blind. “Ahavath Hab’rioth,” which is coextensive with the whole human race, must be based upon a full cog­ nizance of the good qualities possessed by men as well as the frailties that can be found in each and every person. Love of Mankind, based upon the teaching “Beloved is man for he was created in the image of G-d,” is keyed to the idea of human dignity; it bespeaks the fact that every human being is endowed with kovod, dignity, and hodor, majesty: “crowned with honor and beauty,” as David says in Psalms. But then, in regard to Yisroel there is an obligation of “blind” love—love that springs from the heart rather than the mind. There is a wisdom of the heart just as there is wisdom of the mind.

This is shown in the debate cited in the Midrosh between Rebbi Elazar and Rebbi Y’hoshua on the point: “Where do we find wisdom?” According to Rebbi Elazar, wisdom is to be found in the heart of man, while according to Rebbi Y’hoshua, it is to be found in the mind of man. “These and these both are the words of the living G-d.”

OW THE world, in its entirety, has a mind. There are certain phenomena N in the world that generate logic of the mind. The world in its entirety also has a heart— and there are certain phenomena in the world that animate in the hearts of men. The commandments of the Torah correspond to this division, for there is a close affinity between the pattern of the Torah in its entirety and the pattern of the world in its entirety. Our Sages point out that when Almighty G-d decreed Creation “He gazed into His Torah and created the World”— the world was created in accordance with the pattern of the Torah. Conse­ quently there must be an affinity between the two. Thus the commandments of the Torah are of the two kinds—those based upon logic of the mind and those based upon logic of the heart. As the Rashbam points out in one of his Responsa, the two separate mitzvoth pertaining to the phylacteries placed on the head and those placed on the arm against the heart, T ’filin Shel Rosh and T ’filin Shel Yad, represent these two categories in the Torah. The category comprising the commandments that stem from logic of the mind is that of the T ’filin Shel Rosh, while the category that comprises the commandments that stem from the logic of the heart is that of the T ’filin Shel Yad keneged ha-lev— adjoining the heart.

It is remarkable that while the Jews were still in Egypt before the Exodus took place, the mitzvoth of T’filin, of both T ’filin Shel Rosh and T ’filin Shel Yad, were already revealed by G-d to Mosheh (as were a number of other mitz­ voth) . Now we can very well understand why the mitzvah which regulates the calendar, hachodesh hazeh lochem, was revealed in Egypt, for without that 8

JEWISH LIFE

mitzvah there could not be any compliance with the Korban Peeach, the Passover sacrifice, and there could not be any Festivals. But why were the mitzvoth of T ’filin Shel Rosh and T ’filin Shel Yad revealed before the Israelites were delivered from Egypt?

HE Torah, at the end of the Sidrah Bo, mentions these mitzvoth twice.

First in Sh’moth [Ex.] 13:9 the Torah says: “And it shall be for a sign unto you upon your hand, and for a reminder between your eyes” and then again at the very end of the same Sidrah, Sh’moth 13:16: “And it shall be for a sign upon your hand, and for frontlets between your eyes; for by strength of hand the Lord brought us forth from Egypt.” It seems that the mitzvah of T ’filin Shel Rosh and that of T’filin Shel Yad had a direct connection with Y’tziyath Mitzrayim, more than most other mitzvoth. All the commandments of the Torah have a connection with the Exodus from Egypt but the mitzvah of T ’filin Shel Rosh and T ’filin Shel Yad had a direct connection.

The key to the explanation of this lies in a statement of the Zohar in Parshath Vo-era: “So long as the Israelites were in Egypt, their dibur, their speech, was also in bondage and then when the Israelites were delivered out of Egyptian slavery, nithkan hadibur”—the speech of the Israelites was cor­ rected—that is, regained. This, the Kabalah tells us, is the reason why the festi­ val of Pesach is so designated, because peh-sach “a mouth speaks”—upon deliv­ ery from Egyptian bondage the Israelites regained their self-expression. As long as they were subjected to Egyptian bondage, their self-expression was stifled and suppressed. But at the moment of Exodus, the Israelites regained their speech. Slaves cannot express or assert themselves properly, they cannot realize their potential properly. Only the free man is capable of doing so.

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HERE are two main forms of expression—prose and poetry. Since the cheruth, the freedom, of the Israelites was coupled with liberation of their speech, so also Cheruth of the Israelites manifests itself in the two realms of prose and poetry. The distinguishing feature of human poetry as contrasted With human prose is rhyme and rhythm. But, in regard to Divine poetry, as contrasted with Divine prose, rhyme and rhythm are not important. Rhyme and rhythm are only external manifestations of poetry. Halochah itself marks the distinction between Divine poetry and Divine prose.

In the Torah we have certain passages that represent Divine prose, the non-shirah part of the Torah, and we have others such as Oz Yoshir (Sh’moth 15:1-18) which represent Divine poetry—Shirah. According to the Halochah, when writing a Sefer Torah the Shirah sections must be written in a peculiar way—in the form of half a brick set upon whole brick. As Rashi explains, the half bricks represent the written part of the lines of Shirah and the whole bricks represent the blank part of the lines. That means that the Divine poetry of the Torah must be written and spaced in such a way that the blank parts of the lines are double the written parts. Divine prose, however, must be writ­ ten so that one word follows upon another, with only as much blank space as is necessary to separate one word from another^not more.

This halochah is symbolic and indicative of the logic of the heart from

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which Divine poetry stems. The distinction between Divine prose and Divine poetry consists of the following: Divine prose is perceived, in accordance with wisdom qf the mind, through observation and deductive and inductive reason­ ing. The Divine poetry of the Torah, however, stems from logic of the heart which contains “blank space” that is more than the ‘'written space.” A great deal of the logic-of-the-heart Shirah in the Torah cannot be seen by the human eye. It can only be perceived intuitively by the hearts of those Jews who want to perceive. Those who refuse to see through the vision of the heart will not see anything. Consequently, the Torah says: “And it shall be for a sign (as) unto you on your hand and for frontlets (totafoth) between your eyes.” Totafoth, frontlets, our Sages tell us, signifies the T’filin. As Rashi points out, in the name of Menachem Ibn Saruk, on this verse, totafoth is derived from the term “speak,” so that it has the significance of “speaking” and corresponds to I’zikoron, “for a reminder,” for whoever sees the T ’filin bound between the eyes will remember the miracle and speak about it.

HE T ’filin Shel Rosh thus has the distinguishing feature of speech. It is a totafoth, it is matif, it articulates, it talks. This is the meaning of “for T a reminder between your eyes.” The T’filin Shel Rosh corresponds with all the obligations of the Torah that are based upon the wisdom of the mind.

This wisdom can be perceived through observation, through deductive and inductive reasoning. It expresses ideas in a way that anyone can understand.

It is the power of speech. But the T ’filin Shel Yad represents the command­ ments based upon the logic of the heart. Such logic contains a blank dimen­ sion, that is, double-range dimension, double the written dimension; it cannot be seen so easily. It must be perceived intuitively. It expresses itself only in a poetic, rather than a prosaic, form. Consequently, the Talmud says, in regard to the verse (D’vorim [Deut.] 28:10): “And all the peoples of the earth shall see that the Name of G-d is called upon you, and they shall be afraid of you” —this is the T ’filin Shel Rosh.” Tosafoth, on the Talmudic passage B’rochoth 6, explains that “all the nations of the earth” must have reference to the T’filin Shel Rosh. Why could it not have reference to T’filin Shel Yad? The reason given by Tosafoth is because here it is stated: “And all the peoples” thus implying that it is something that can be seen by everyone, by all the nations.

And T’filin Shel Yad is mechuseh, covered—it cannot be seen; only the T ’filin Shel Rosh is exposed, it can be seen by everyone. You regard the T ’filin Shel Yad, our Sages say, in the sense of: “ ‘And it shall be for you as a sign’— a sign for you, not a sign for others^;* it is mechuseh, it is not exposed. Only the T ’filin Shel Rosh is exposed. Why? Why does the Torah say in regard to T ’filin Shel Yad “a sign for you and not a sign for others” and in regard to Tfilin Shel Rosh: “And all the peoples of the earth shall see the Name of G-d and all the nations shall fear you”?

The answer is clear. The T ’filin placed on the head corresponds to the commandments that are based upon logic of the mind. That is something that can be perceived by everyone, by Jews and non-Jews alike. But the T ’filin placed on the arm adjoining the heart—that is mechuseh, a sign for you, peculiar to Israel. It has no application to non-Jews. The Torah, therefore, 10

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says, “And it shall be for a sign on your hand and a reminder between your eyes, that the Torah of G-d may be in your mouth.” Through the “reminder between your eyes” you articulate the Torah of G-d. You will represent the Torah before all the peoples! of the world. But the T ’filin Shel Yad, the obliga­ tions stemming from logic of the heart, that is “a sign for you, and not a sign for others.” Consequently, brotherly love that stems from the heart, emotional love, has application only to Jews.

Turning now to the prohibition: “You shall not take vengeance, nor bear any grudge against the children of your people, but you shall love your neighbor as yourself: I am the Lord,” we find complementary significance.

BASIC REQUIREMENTS FOR JEW ISH BEHAVIOR UR Sages tell us, in Masechoth Arachin and also in th$ Torath Kohanim on this verse, that if one’s neighbor had been very rude to another, or has always refused to lend any object to another, then the one so abused and so mistreated by the other is not allowed to mete out retribution against the offending and abusing person, or even to entertain any feeling of resentment toward him. Even if he does not do anything, even if he does not recompense the rude person in accordance with his rudeness but simply entertains a feel­ ing of resentment toward him, he violates the prohibition: “You shall not bear a grudge against the children of your people.” Is that in accordance with logic?

Can we explain, on the basis of reason of the mind, this prohibition against bearing a grudge against a person who has abused, mistreated, and humiliated one? From the point of view of logic of the mind, if a person abuses me, if he humiliates me, then I should bear a grudge against him. But the Torah, in molding the pattern of our behavior in relation to our fellow Jews, imposes upon us the obligation of being motivated by logic of the heart; and this logic is so often repugnant to logic of the mind. From the standpoint of logic of the mind, it is perhaps absurd not to bear a grudge against those who humiliate us and who mistreat us and who abuse us, but this is the obligation that is imposed upon us by the Torah with regard to fellow Jews.

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HIS, however, does not apply to one who is not a member of the Jewish people. In respect to our relationship with non-Jews, the pattern is based upon logic of the mind. Consequently, there is no basis here for the com­ mandment of “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” which has reference to emotional love—love that is blind, love that is not conditioned upon the merits of the person loved. Emotional love does not take cognizance of the merits or the failings of the person loved. “All inequities you shall envelope with love.” (High Holy Days Machzor.) This is the concept of Ahavath Yisroel. Love of Israel must be applied towards all Jews indiscriminately—reli­ gious or irreligious, gentle or rude, pleasant or unpleasant, respectful or abu­ sive. But, it is inconsistent with all rules of the logic of the mind to love some-

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one as much as I love myself. Only within the compass of logic of the heart is it possible to realize a love of Vohavta Vrayecha komocha.

Blind love towards non-Jews would be suicidal for the Jews themselves.

That has*always been true and there has never been any exception to: “In every generation they set forth to destroy us but the Holy One, blessed be He, rescued us from their hands.”

UR Sages say, it is Halochah L’Mosheh Mi-Sinai, a decree handed down from Mount Sinai,* that “Esau hates Jacob.” One cannot explain on the O basis of psychological or sociological principles why there is such a deeply rooted, inherent prejudice in the heart and mind of every non-Jew, be it the best of them, against Jews. It cannot be explained. It is a fact. In a book by a certain French journalist, he tells of an interview he once had with Thomas Masaryk, who was known as a great liberal and as an “Ohev Yisroel,” a great friend of the Jewish people, certainly one of the Chasidey Umoth Ho-olom, “the righteous of the peoples of the world.” He was responsible to a certain ex­ tent for the issuance of the Balfour declaration, and ever fought against racial discrimination. Asked by the French correspondent whether in his heart he en­ tertained any prejudice against Jews, Masaryk gave him the very honest answer: “In my mind I do not have any prejudice against the Jews. Whenever I feel that I am under the impact of pure logic, then I realize that the Jew should not be disliked. The Jew is as human as anyone else. But sometimes when the control of the logic of the mind loosens, and I fall piey to my feeling, then I take notice of the fact that deep in my heart there is a prejudice raging against the Jews. Why, I don’t know.” This was the answer that was given

by Thomas Masaryk. And this is the reason why our Sages apply the expression halochah Vmosheh mi-sinai she-esov soneh Vyaakov.

The Midrosh Rabbah does not mean “halochah Vmosheh mi-sinai shehitler, y'mach sh’mo, soneh Vyaakov.” Do we have to resort to this source to find out that Hitler was a Jew-hater, or that Haman was a Jew-hater? The Midrosh points to “Esau” in the generic sense. Whoever is a descendant of Esau, be he the saintliest among the chasidey umoth ho-olom, has an innate prejudice against the Jews. How then could we apply blind, emotional love toward non-Jews, when prejudice against Jews is rooted in the hearts of nonJews? But, the Torah has great consideration for human frailty and conse­ quently, the Mishnah declares: “Beloved is man for he is created in the image of G-d.” Brotherly love is to be applied towards all men, but not from the point of view of logic of the heart, not blind love, but based rather upon logic of the mind. It must be applied with objective analysis of the merits of the * When our Sages use the expression “Halochah L’Mosheh Mi-Sinai,” it has reference to something that cannot be conceived through reasoning, through logic of the mind. As the Rambam pointed out, the fact that we find the expression “Halochah L’Mosheh Mi-Sinai” used by our Sages in the Mishnah and Gemora only in respect to a few halochoth does not mean that all other halochoth in the Oral Torah are not handed down through Moses from Sinai. The whole Torah She-ba’l Peh is handed down through Mosheh from Sinai. But the term “Halochah L’Mosheh MiSinai” is applied only to those laws that are not based upon any logic of the mind and cannot be perceived through deductive and inductive reasoning. It has reference only to those laws that are not and cannot be explained on the basis of midoth shehatorah nidresheth bohem—“the Torah shall be expounded in accordance with its exegetical principles.”

12

JEWISH LIFE

individual. We cannot apply brotherly love towards all non-Jews, including all the antisemites. Consequently, our Sages say, in respect to the blessing which Yitzchok conferred upon Yaakov, “They that curse you shall be cursed, and they that bless you shall be blessed.” “Every non-Jew who blesses Israel shall be blessed, as it is written ‘whom you bless shall be blessed’—and every nonJew who curses Israel shall be accursed.. . . ” Love of non-Jews must be commensurate with their merits. Any non-Jew who looks upon the Jew as a human being, who is mevorech eth Yisroel, he is boruch; intellectual love is to be applied toward him; But orarecha orur; it cannot be applied indiscriminately to all human beings.

OW, as mentioned above, the Torah sets forth the mitzvah of Tochecha, reproof, as a corollary to the Arevuth concept, next to the mitzvah of “Love your neighbor as yourself.” It follows, therefore, that just as the latter is based upon logic of the heart, so also is the former. And this is the distinguish­ ing feature between the mitzvah of Dinim, a Law which is coextensive with the whole human race, and the mitzvah of the Tochecha which is peculiar to Jews. The mitzvah of Dinim is based upon logic of the mind; hence, its appli­ cation to all members of the human race. Rabbenu Bachya in the Sefer Kad HaKemach points out the reason why the Torah repeats the term tzedek* in say­ ing: “tzedek tzedek tirdof.” Why does the Torah repeat it twice—“Righteous­ ness, Righteousness you shall pursue”? Rabbenu Bachya says, because the rule of tzedek must be pursued in our relationship with Jews and also in our rela­ tionship with non-Jews, even with a pagan. (In our relationship with a non­ pagan non-Jew we are to apply not only the norm of Tzedek but also the norms of brotherhood and generosity.) Tzedek is based upon the premise of man as created in the Divine image. Righteousness, based upon logic of the mind, is coextensive with the whole human race. Those obligations that stem from logic of the mind must be applied to all human beings.

“Dinim,” Law, which is one of the Noachide commandments, implies the obligation that is incumbent upon all to deter the members of the com­ munity from crime. That is based upon logic of the mind. But Arevuth is something that cannot even be perceived by human reason.

We find the concept of Arevuth in that area of Jewish civil law designated the Choshen Mishpot. If someone becomes a surety, if someone undertakes to be responsible for the debt of another, then he is held responsible as if he, himself, had borrowed the money. Arevuth means surety-ship. We have the concept of Arevuth, in regard to Jews, on a spiritual level.

N

HALOCHAH in Birchath Hamitzvoth stipulates that if one Jew has already fulfilled a given mitzvah but another Jew has not, the Jew who has already fulfilled the mitzvah can recite the B’rochah, the Kiddush, what­ ever it is, on behalf of a fellow-Jew who has not fulfilled it as yet. This would seem to conflict with the Halochah that only one upon whom a given precept

*

* “tzedek“ meaning righteousness, not justice. Justice is mishpot.

May-June 1966

13

is obligatory can be motzi (act on behalf of another). How then can one who has fulfilled his obligation—being no longer a m ’chuyov b’dovor, subject to obligation—be motzi another? The concept of Arevuth conies in, however, and declares: True, you fulfilled the obligation in respect to yourself, but you have not completely fulfilled your obligation, since your fellow-Jew has not fulfilled his. He has not recited a Kiddush; that means that you have not re­ cited Kiddush.

Arevuth means more than an interested concern for the fellow-Jew. It means that 1 am surety—each and every Jew is a surety for every other Jew. Just as a surety in money is held responsible as if he himself had been the debtor, so also every Jew is a surety for all the spiritual obligations of every other Jew. From the point of view of Dinim, universal law, the obligation is only to deter the members of the community from crime. That is the extent of the mitzvah of Dinim, and that can be explained on the basis of logic of the mind. But from the point of view of Arevuth, of kol yisroel areyvim zch lozeh, it means that if one Jew who is a shomer shabboth, a Sabbath observer, is capable of exercising an influence upon another who is mechallel shabboth, a transgressor of the Sabbath, so as to correct him and to change his conduct, yet fails to exert such influence, then the Jew who has been a Shomer Shab­ both all his life is, himself, because of his default, a Mechallel Shabboth in a certain sense. He is responsible for and shares the default, the failures, of every other Jew whom it was within his power to correct and change.

This cannot be explained from the point of view of logic of the mind.

How can we consider a Jew who is so scrupulous in the observance of a given commandment a violator thereof, just because he failed to exercise the proper hashpoah, the proper influence, upon the fellow Jew who throughout his life has been a violator? It cannot be explained, but this is the concept of suretyship in respect to matters of the spirit. And it is remarkable that the Midrosh Rabbah on Parshath Vayigash, in respect to the verse: “For your servant is surety for the boy” (B’reshith [Gen.] 44:32), points out that it is because of this plea by Judah that every Jew is called after his name. Now the name of Yehudah is a synonym for the Jew. “Yehudi” means “Jew.” Every­ one of the House of Israel is a Yehudi; whether he be a descendant of the tribe of Yehudah or a descendant of the tribe of Levi or Ephraim, or any other of the shivtey Yisroel, he is called Yehudi. Yehudah has become the prototype for the spiritual pattern of Israel. Why, the Midrosh Rabbah asks, was not Israel called “Benjamin” , . . why are the Reuveni, the Shimoni, all Israelites of whatever of the tribes of Israel, called “Yehudi”? And the an­ swer is given: Because he, Yehudah, said, “For your servant is surety for the boy.” It is the principle of surety that constitutes the distinguishing fea­ ture of the Jew. The question was raised by Ben Gurion, mi hu yehudi— Who is a Jew? A Jew is a Jew. But what is the distinguishing feature of the Jew? The princi­ ple of suretyship—Arevuth. And Arevuth does not mean only an interest in and concern for the fellow Jew, it means that every Jew is bound to exercise the 14

JEWISH LIFE

proper influence upon the fellow Jew and if he fails to do so, then the guilt of the fellow Jew is attributed to him.

THE IM PLICATIO NS OF "YEH U D I" OW the question arises, if a Jew is called “Yehudi” because the principle of suretyship so typical of Yehudah is the distinguishing attribute of the N Jew, then how could the term “Yehudi” be applied to Jews who have no con­ cern with their fellow Jews? But that can be explained if we delve into the meaning of the mitzvah of Tochecha: Hockeyach tocheach eth amithecha, usually translated: “You shall surely rebuke your neighbor.”

Let us analyze that expression.

In the Torah we have the term “reyah” and we have the term amithecha, both of which are usually translated as “neighbor.” Onkelos* translates ami­ thecha as chavroch—your chover, your fellow. From this we see the distinc­ tion between the term reyah, which actually signifies “a friend,” and the term amithecha, signifying chover, a fellow. We know that the designation “Chover, “Chaveri,” was the synonym used by our Sages for the Pharisee, the P’rushi.

Now superficially it would appear that the term porush, p’rushi—referring to those Jews who followed the Oral Torah—is inconsistent with the conno­ tation of “Chover,” which likewise refers to those Jews who followed the Torah She-b’al Peh. Porush means one who is isolated—isolated from society, from the community. Chover, on the other hand, means, as noted, a fellow, a member. The two connotations seem to be diametrically opposed to each other. Still we find that a Jew who is determined to comply with the Oral Torah is designated both by the term “Porush” and by the term Chover.

The term “Chover,” furthermore, is mentioned in the Talmud in contrast to the term “Am Ho-oretz.”** In popular usage, the term “Am Ho-oretz” is applied to a Jew who is ignorant of the law, but in the Talmud it is never used in that sense but only in reference to the Jew who is delinquent in his religious duties. And of these there are various kinds. There is the Am Hooretz who does not wear T’filin. There is the one who eats tevel, untithed produce. There is the Am Ho-oretz who is a kopher ho-ikor, a heretic.** * The term “Am Ho-oretz” thus refers to a delinquent Jew. What then should be our attitude towards Ammey Ho-oretz, irreligious Jews? rp H E R E are some among us who say that according to the Torah, accordX ing to the Halochah, one should keep aloof from irreligious Jews. And they might substantiate their views with numerous citations from our Sages, It is true that there are certain citations which, superficially, tend to indicate that according to the Halochah, an observant Jew is to keep aloof from irre* Targum Onkelos, the authoritative Aramaic translation of the Chumosh, conveys the meaning of the Torah text as handed down through the Oral Tradition. ** For example: Bigdey am o-oretz midras Vprushim. (Mishnah, Chagigah 2:7) *** See Tosafoth, Pesochim 49b.

May-June 1966

15

ligious Jews. For example, there is the mishnah in Pirkey Ovoth (1:7): “Do not associate with one who is sinful.” But on the other hand, there are the statements by our Sages which tend to indicate that a Jew should never keep aloof from his fellow Jews—not even from those completely divorced from Jewish observance. Now, it is needless for me to exhaust the list of citations of both kinds. It is more to the purpose to see how can we reconcile these two kinds of statements, which on the surface appear to be diametrically op­ posed to each other.

Let us take just two halochoth, which are typical of the two apparent approaches.

One is the above-cited mishnah: Do not associate yourself with the sin­ ful. The other is the halochah at the end of Bova Metziah (32a) where the Gemora discusses the law pertaining to the mitzvoth of perikah and t’inah.

These are the commandments given in the Torah concerning unloading the burden from an ass staggering under it—-not only a tottering human being, but even a tottering ass—and of reloading a burden upon a fallen ass, or a fallen ox. In Sh’moth [Ex.] 23:5, the Torah enjoins: “If you see the ass of your opponent* staggering under its burden, you shall forbear to pass by him; you shall surely help and release it with him.” Then in D’vorim 22:4 we have the mitzvah of T ’inah: “You shall not see your brother’s ass or his ox fallen down by the way, and hide yourself from them; you shall surely help him to lift them up again.” The mitzvah of P’rikah, of unloading, has precedence over the mitzvah of T ’inah, because the former involves tzaar baal chaim—the relief of pain. So if one finds one human being who requires an unloading, and another human being who requires a loading, we must first attend to the unloading and then attend to the loading. What, however, if someone simultaneously finds an ohev liphrok, a friend of ours, an observant Jew, needing help in unloading a burden, and a soneh Viton or mumar, an opponent of ours, an irreligious Jew, needing help in loading a burden, to which shall precedence be given? The Talmud (Bova Metziah 32b) tells us that in this circumstance he must first attend to the loading of the irreligious Jew and thereafter render the required service for the observant Jew. Why? “In order to subdue the evil inclinations within him.” For if the yisroel mumar would see that the observant Jew first attends to the unloading of the ob­ servant Jew, then he will explain it on the basis of a prejudice he fears in the heart of the pious Jew against irreligious Jews. Pious Jews, he will say, have no compassion, have no consideration for irreligious. Jews. Consequent­ ly, we must give precedence to the need of the irreligious Jew and then attend to that of the observant Jew. This indicates the principle that an observant Jew is obligated to help out an irreligious Jew and furthermore, that an irreligious Jew deserves prior­ ity of attention over the religious Jew. * Sonecha, to be taken in the sense of “opponent” rather than the sense of “enemy.’jC Sonecha in Scripture sometimes means “enemy” and sometimes means “opponent,” for according to the Gemora in Pesochim sonecha has reference to a yisroel mumar—one who is addicted to a certain transgression.

16

JEWISH LIFE

OW can this be reconciled with the concept that is implicit in the Mishnah of al tithchaber Vrosha—do not associate with the sinful, have noth­ ing to do with him? The answer is, that a distinction is to be made between friendship and fellowship.

Many non-Jews and, unfortunately, many Jews have fabricated a notion that the Torah She-ba’l Peh, The Talmud, has no consideration, no compassion, for non-Jews. They seek to substantiate this charge by citing the numerous laws which were enacted by the Sages for the purpose of isolating Jews from non-Jews. And it cannot be denied that our Sages did enact numerous ordi­ nances designed to establish safeguards against comingling with non-Jews. Our Sages, for example, forbade partaking of non-Jewish wine and that applies not only to the wine of the pagan, it applies even to the wine of the Goyim of today who are not pagans, and who do not know of the pagan practices of libation, nisuch.* The reason for this is that the partaking of the wine of a non-Jew makes for associations conducive to intermarriage. And there are numerous other such ordinances**, the purpose of which is to establish safeguards against comingling of Jews with non-Jews. Thus it is useless and stupid to deny the allegation that our Sages endeavored to establish a fence between Jews and non-Jews for it is true that they did so. And if it were not for these safe­ guards by our Sages, the Jewish people would not have survived. But, not only did our Sages provide safeguards against close association with nonJews, they established safeguards against close association with irreligious Jews.*** How can that be reconciled with the concept of “And you shall love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord”?

The Ovoth D’Rabbi Nothan explains that this commandment obliges one to bear love—the blind, emotional love to which we have referred—for all Jews— even the Yisroel Mumar, even the Jew who has become an idolator****; is to be applied indiscriminately. How can the Halochah on one hand declare that blind emotional love is to be entertained towards all Jews indiscriminately, and on the other establish safeguards, the obvious purpose of which is to prevent association with irreligious Jews? The answer lies in the distinction to be drawn between association in friendship and association in fellowship.

H

FRIENDSHIP A N D FELLOW SHIP A SSOCIATION in friendship means living together, helping one another, ■¿m. guiding, comforting, encouraging one another. In contradistinction to * Apart from the Takonah of Yayin Nochri that is based upon nisuch, there is also a Takonah that the wine of non-Jews is osur because of chitum and even the wine of a ger toshov, a nonJew who is not an idolator, is forbidden. **e.g.—the Takonah against bishul nochri, the cooking of a non-Jew, and path nochri, the bread of a non-Jew. Under certain circumstances the latter is permitted, under others it is not. *** Thus Rambam in his Commentary on the Mishnah explains with reference to the previously mentioned halochah of tumath am ho-oretz, this was also enacted not so much because of the laxity that prevailed among the irreligious Jews at the time of the Chazal as regards Taharah and Tumah, but primarily in, order to prevent association of the P’rushi, the Chaverim, with the Ammey Ho-oretz, the irreligious Jews. **** See also Rama on Sanhedrin 52b.

May-June 1966

17

this type of relationship, association in fellowship does not necessarily involve deep concern for the welfare of the person with whom one shares fellowship.

Association in fellowship means joining with each other in intimate facets of life; it means, also, playing together, drinking together, seeking pleasure together. In matters of friendship, the Torah does not want any isolation.

The Torah, the Halochah, indeed, condemns and bans such isolation, and not only with regard to irreligious Jews but in respect to non-Jews also and even in respect to the ahum, the pagan non-Jews.* No discrimination in friendship is to be applied toward the pagan. It is set forth in the Mishnah (Gittin 5:8) as well as the Boraitha (Gittin 61a) that just as we are obligated to support and maintain the poor among the Jews, we are obligated to support and main­ tain the poor among the p^gan. Just as we are required to comfort mourners, those who are overtaken by sorrow, among the Jews, so are we obligated to comfort and to encourage the pagans who are overtaken by grief. We are not allowed, even, to hinder a poor pagan from gathering the gleanings, the for­ gotten sheafs, and the field-corners of the Jews. Any act of discrimination shown toward a pagan constitutes a violation of the principle of darkey sholom, which is a fundamental tenet, of direct Scriptural derivation (mid!oraytha) rather than Rabbinic enactment (mid’rabbonori).

There are no limits uppn friendship. It is scarcely necessary to state that there are no limits upon association in friendship with irreligious Jews. As has previously been noted, the mitzvah “You sh^ll love your neighbor as your­ self” is coextensive with each and every Jew. It is to be applied, without dis­ crimination, to all Jews.

UT, when we consider the association in fellowship, association of play­ B ing together, drinking together, feasting together, then it is another mat­ ter. Then association of any sort in fellowship with non-Jews is condemned.

Any sort of association in fellowship with non-Jews is conducive to inter­ marriage. Do we not see this today on the campuses of the various colleges thoughout the United States?

Why is there so much intermarriage? Because there is association in fel­ lowship with non-Jews; because there is no demarcation between a Jew and a non-Jew. And not only is fellowship association with non-Jews condemned, but so too does the Halochah bar fellowship association with irreligious Jews.

That is the meaning of al tithchaber Vrosha. “Chaver” means a fellow, not a friend. A chaver is one with whom you play together, you share life’s intimate occasions, one to whom you confide all your secrets. And chavruthah, fellow­ ship, is a very important matter. “O chavrutha, O mithutha”—the human be­ ing cannot survive without fellowship. We must have fellowship with certain people. But, we must be very careful in choosing those with whom we asso­ ciate in fellowship. “A l tithchaber Vrosha”—there cannot be any association in fellowship with a sinner. True, it is not entirely his fault. He became a sin­ ner because of the multifarious circumstances that moulded his behavior. But the fact remains that he is a sinner. Association in fellowship with an irreligious Jew is conducive to his further demoralization. * The term akum as used in the Mishnah designates the pagan, not the non-Jew as such.

18

JEWISH LIFE

If you associate in fellowship with a drug addict or a drunkard, and you join with him in Vchayim, then you will not elevate the alcoholic or the drug addict but you yourself will become demoralized. However, association in friendship with anyone tends to elevate the person. If you associate with a drug addict, with an alcoholic, in friendship, then not only are you immune to infection with his sickness but in fact you will be elevated. That was the attitude of our Sages toward association with irreligious Jews. Friendship as­ sociation, yes. Fellowship association, no.

Now, on al tithchaber Vrosha. Fellowship with a sinner—no!; but “ohev lifrok, v’soney lit’on”—if it is a matter of helping someone in distress, then there cannot be any discrimination against an irreligious Jew. On the con­ trary, it is a mitzvah to give him preferential aid, “in order to subdue his inclination.” iv .> „ , HY, and again whyr are many Jews delinquent in their behavior? They are responsible, but their neighbors are also responsible. Had their supposed friends—who actually are only fellows—been real friends, then they would have inspired the so-called irreligious Jews and would have elevated them to a higher realm. The Torah, in the mitzvah of the Tochecha, says: “You shall rebuke your friend, so that lo thisa olov chet—you shall not bear his guilt.” Now what does the mitzvah of lo thisa olov chet imply? The Rambam says* that it indicates the Talmudic prohibition against reproving a sin­ ner in the presence of other people, so that “the color of his face changes.”

Accordingly, if one admonishes another for wrongful conduct, then he is to do it in quiet privacy, not in the presence of others, so that he be not embar­ rassed. However, Rabbi Yonay in Shaarey T ’shuvah, and the Ramban (Nachmonides) have a different explanation of this verse. Both these expositors say that “that you shall not bear his guilt” implies a negative commandment ap­ plying to failure to fulfill the duty of rebuke. In other words, if a person fails to admonish a delinquent Jew, then he violates both a positive command, to give necessary reproof, and a negative command, to not incur the guilt of one’s fellow. This interpretation of the verse is in full conformity with the rendering given in Targum Onkelos, as cited earlier.

The question now arises, how can the interpretation given by the Rambam, based on, Torath Kohanim, be reconciled with the interpretation given by the Rambam which accords with Onkelos? The two interpretations seem to negate each other. In seeking the answer we shall see that both interpre­ tations are based upon the same concept.

W

N every English translation of the Bible, hocheyach fchiach is translated as “rebuke” or “reprimand.” This is not an accurate translation. Hocheyach does not mean rebuke, does not mean reprimand. It really means “a proof,” something that serves as a r’ayah, fpr evidence is called a hochochah—a proof.

Thus the Torah says, in fact: You shall prove to your fellow—to your chaver.

Prove what? What shall you prove? Obviously it means: “You shall prove to

I

* Hilchoth Deoth 6:8; Sefer Hamitzvoth, Mitzvah 203, based on Torath Kohanim on Vayikra 19:17.

May-June 1966

19

your fellow the wrongful path upon which he embarks, the wrongfulness of his conduct.” Although the words are omitted, the meaning is implicit. But the question then arises, why, if that be the case, does not the Torah say “leamithecha,” “unto your fellow.^’ If the Torah meaps, by the commandment,, “you shall convince, you shall prove unto your fellow, the wrongfulness of his course,” then “amithecha,” “your fellow,” is an indirect object. How is it that the Torah employs the direct object—“eth amithecha”—when the in­ direct object should be employed? A very profound concept is contained in this posuk, and the key to it lies in the grammatical formulation of this mitzvah. r ' j -*H We find in the Talmud that whenever someone is quoted as referring to the better side of his character, he speaks of himself in the first person sin­ gular, while if quoted as referring to the evil aspect of his character, then he refers to himself in the third person singular. This is without any excep­ tion true, throughout the Talmud. Thus when the Talmud quotes someone as saying that he fulfilled a certain mitzvah, it puts the word ana, “I,” in the mouth of the person quoted. Should the Talmud quote someone as telling that he was a violator of the Sabbath, or that he was rude, then the term hohu gavra, “that person,” is used by the person quoted. We learn from this that within every person there are two personalities. In every individual there is the ideal personality, aspiring towards that which is sacred, noble, worthy.

And simultaneously, every person is moved by certain animal instincts which lead him to sinful acts. The real personality is the one that is motivated by the lofty inclination. That is the “Ana,” the “I,” the essential inner self of the person; the animal instincts that inapel one towards wrongful ways com­ prise only the “Hohu Gavra,” “That Person,” a stranger, a trespasser that occupies his spirit.

THE REAL PERSON— A N D THE INTRUDING STRANGER A REMARKABLE passage in the Gemora (Sotah 49b) sheds light on this duality of the human personality. Commenting there on the state­ ment in the Mishnah (Sotah 9:15): “With the death of Rabbenu Hakodosh anovah, humility, disappeared from among men,53 Rav Yoseph said: “Do not say humility disappeared—I exist.” Now what does this mean? Does Rav Yoseph mean to say that he is the exemplar of humility? Not at all; what he sought to point out was that one should not think that humility van­ ished with the death of Rabbi Yehudah the Prince, for every man possesses a certain measure of humility. Some people appear rude, mean, or arrogant but in most cases these traits are only a defense mechanism. They do not rep­ resent the inner self of the person. In every person there is the spark of hu­ manity, latent though it often may be. It is only because of certain frustrating experiences that the “Hohu Gavra” is able to penetrate the spirit of the real person. So there is in every individual, the “Ana” who represents the real person, the person as he is able to be and as he would like to be.

Every man has a degree of humility. It is only covered up by subterfuge 20

JEWISH LIFE

of rudeness. If we can but arouse the latent humanity and the latent humil­ ity that inhere in the soul of every man, then this spark of humanity can turn into lahavath kodesh, the sacred flame.

The mitzvah of the Tochecha is based upon the belief that the true self is the “I” of the person, not the “That Person.” The “Hohu Gavra” is only subterfuge that covers up and imprisons the real self. How can one correct his fellow? If you see that a person is addicted to sin, how can you change him? Not by calling names, not by reprimanding him, but by proving him­ self to himself. Our Sages tell us that “Acher,” Elisha ben Avuya, originally a devout and gifted scholar, had fallen away from the believers’ fold, and Rabbi Meir again and again urged him to repent. Acher responded, “I cannot repent, because as I was riding on my horse on Yom Kippur, I heard a Bath Kol, a Heavenly voice, exclaim: 'Shuvah, shuvah, chutz m ’acher,’—Repent, repent, but Acher is lost.” Note that our Sages referred to Elisha ben Avuya, after he had drifted away from the Jewish path, by the appellation “Acher,” “Stranger.” Spiritually, he was no longer Elisha ben Avuya; he did not mani­ fest his real self when he drifted away. It was a “Stranger,” a “Hohu Gavra,” that carried him away into foreign domains where he did not belong. Elisha ben Avuya was the prisoner of Acher. Yet Elisha ben Avuya was noble and lofty and he aspired towards everything that was sacred, noble, and worthy.

Why then did he not repent? Because Elisha-Acher was laboring under the erroneous conviction that he was corrupt, basically evil. But this was not true. Acher had failed to understand, when he heard the Bath Kol, that its message was: Acher cannot repent, cannot do T ’shuvah, but Elisha ben Avuya can do T’shuvah. Had he not mistaken Elisha ben Avuya for Acher, had he realized that he but needed to expel the Stranger from himself, then the real Elisha ben Avuya would have re-emerged in true glory, as a Baal T’shuvah.

The reason so many Jews feel incapable of T ’shuvah is because they are not aware of their own spiritual strength. They think that the acher is the real person, when actually it is only a trespasser. The Torah says if you want to succeed in correcting the Jew who is delinquent in his demeanor, then do not try to reprimand him, do not tell him “you are no good,” “you are impure”; that is not the Tochecha. Rather, the Tochecha requires that you convince the one that is delinquent in his behavior, of his inner self: You shall retrieve your fellow.

E cannot associate in fellowship with the sinner so long as the acher, the “That Person,” is not expelled from the Jew, but the moment we succeed in expelling the intruder from the real Jew, then he becomes a chover.

The purpose of the Tochecha is to retrieve, regain, revive the fellow Jew. Right now he is not a chover, because externally there is a rude shell, a hohu gavra, that imprisons his personality, frustrates him, does not allow him to realize his potential. But with the proper approach and proper guidance you can revive and regain the chover so that he will be chavruthah to you. This is the purpose of the hocheyach tochiach v’lo thisa olov chet—that you shall not incur his guilt.

Shall we then fail to realize why so many Jews are delinquent in their

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May-June 1966

21

religious and moral demeanor? Is it not because we, the so-called observant Jews, fail to inspire them? Had we grasped the proper approach towards these Jews, then they would have been inspired to expel the shell that covers up their real selves. Were we to realize now the proper approach and the proper guidance we would beyond any doubt succeed in retrieving and reviving the chover, the amithecha. If we fail to fulfill the Tochecha, then it is our fault, and we share the guilt. *

*

$

OW, we can understand why we are called “Yehudi.” We have seen that N the Jew, the Yehudi, bears his designation because the principle of surety­ ship is the predominant feature in Jewishness. Should it not then follow that only he who is motivated by the concept of suretyship may be deemed a Yehudi— and one who is not so motivated should not be called Yehudi? The answer is: Potentially, every Jew is capable of being motivated throughout his life by the principle of suretyship. It is only because of the “Hohu Gavra,” of the “Acher,” that encompasses us that we fail to be governed by the con­ cept of Arevuth. But every member of the House of Israel is called “Yehudi” because the predominant feature of Jewishness is the potential which persists in every one of us.

22

JEWISH LIFE

Is There a Pe Facto Establishment of Religion in America?

By REUBEN E. GROSS

EW laws have as ironic a history as the First Amendment to the United States Constitution. Enacted to protect the status quo in regard to re­ ligion, it has been interpreted in a rev­ olutionary manner. By revolutionary, I mean that it has turned a complete cycle, firstly, to a directly opposing phase and then back to the original £tate, but on a different level.

The precise words of this amend­ ment are:

F

Congress shall make no law respect­ ing an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise there­ of; . . .

The manifest intention of this lan­ guage was to preserve the status quo.

Nine of the thirteen states had some form of established church at the time of the adoption of the Constitution.

Fearful of a “national religion” which might be established by Congress and so disestablish the existing state churches, many of the clergy opposed the adoption of the Constitution. To quiet their fears and at the same time to placate the members of dissenting or non-established sects, the above language was framed as a nicely calMay-June 1966

culated balance between these oppos­ ing interests. It is incorrect, therefore, to think of the First Amendment as a stroke against established religion.

The basis for its interpretation as such did not arise until the enactment of the Fourteenth Amendment in the Civil War era. This amendment pro­ hibited the states from abridging the privileges or immunities of the citizens of the United States and from depriv­ ing any person of life, liberty, or prop­ erty without due process of law. By judicial interpretation, this amend­ ment has been read so as to give a citizen almost all of the same immu­ nities against the states that he enjoys vis a vis the Federal government un­ der the Bill of Rights (the first ten Amendments), including freedom from an established church. Thus end­ ed the first half-turn of the cycle in which a law enacted as a shield for established religion was manipulated into a sword against it.

N THE last decade or so, successive decisions have emanated from the Supreme Court which have had the effect of turning the circle another one hundred-eighty degrees to the res-

I

23

toration of an established religion— this time a nationally established reli­ gion— secular humanism.

Many people may be surprised at the characterization of secular hu­ manism as a religion. In a sense it is the very opposite of religion in that it denies the validity of all religion as that word is traditionally understood.

However, it is becoming acknowl­ edged with increasing awareness that it is in fact a form of religion. The Supreme Court itself has referred to humanism as a “non-theistic religion.”

Humanism seeks to answer the same basic problems of human existence as does religion. Its adherents are claim­ ing, with growing success, all the privileges and immunities that have traditionally been accorded to religion.

For example, with respect to exemp­ tion from military service, Congress had limited this exemption to those who are conscientious objectors by reason of “religious training and be­ lief.” It then defined those require­ ments to mean “an individual’s belief in a relation to a Supreme Being in­ volving duties superior to those arising from any human relation, but does not include essentially political, so­ ciological, or philosophical views or merely personal ones.” Nevertheless, a young man claiming a “religious faith in a purely ethical creed” which called for belief in and devotion to goodness and virtue for their own sake, successfully invoked the con­ scientious objector’s exemption before the Supreme Court. In another case, a tax exemption accorded by statute to religious institutions has served as the basis for exempting the meeting hall of a humanist society by a Federal Court of Appeal. During the last year this concept of non-theistic religion has gained wide currency among 24

clergymen and theologians, including at least one Reform Jewish cleric.

Thus secular humanism progresses slowly and surely toward winning all the privileges and immunities of reli­ gion. At the same time it has none of the liabilities of sectarian faiths—thus becoming a de facto established reli­ gion. The adherents of secular human­ ism today are in firm control of the State-supported school system—the key to an established faith’s influence.

Non-sectarian prayers and Bible read­ ings have been outlawed from the public schools because of their prej­ udice to believers in the non-theistic religions. On the other hand, religionoriented schools are permitted only the barest of fringe public benefits with a grudging hand.

URING the nineteenth century the school system in this country D was basically Protestant. Nevertheless, it was not regarded as sectarian be­ cause the mores of the market place were Protestant. Catholics and Jews were tolerated and had paper equality even as the Negro had paper equality by the enactment of the 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments. Today in retro­ spect, the Protestant nature of the 19th century schools stands out. How­ ever, the camouflage and blending with background which enabled those schools to appear neutral then, today, mutatis mutandis, impedes recognition of the true nature of the present pub­ lic school system. A little thought, however, will demonstrate that the vaunted “neutrality” of the public school system is a mirage that dis­ solves upon examination.

An education limited to neutral areas, such as mathematics and phys­ ics, is no education at all. Even so cold a subject as biology cannot be JEWISH LIFE

taught without evincing some convic­ tion one way or another as to the origins of life. Searching for a neutral platform for State-supported institu­ tions is to look for the philosophical­ ly impossible. One may admit or deny the existence of a personal G-d, but no serious endeavor -can be under­ taken without référencé to one of thèse commitments. There is no third alternative. One may not be indiffer­ ent or neutral to a challenge that presses for an answer. Mankind may, like Jonah, seek to escape from His presence, but the widening fields of knowledge which were supposed to liberate Man from his ancient beliefs have served only to point up the im­ possibility of flight. So much so, that theology is now news fit to print, and the solemn deliberations of the most august court of the land on the pro­ priety of permitting little children to thank the Deity for their cookies are followed with deep interest through­ out the country.

Though couched in terms of neutral­ ity, the decisions of the Supreme Court in the prayer- and Bible-reading cases place the stamp of public and legal approval upon the present hu­ manist-secularist character of the pub­ lic school system, thereby elevating that faith to a dominance and control greater than anything enjoyed by the Anglican church in England or Juda­ ism in Israel.

In Israel Mohammedanism and Christianity are substantially subsid­ ized by the State. In England, schools of all sects are supported by the gov­ ernment. In the United States, only the secular-humanist schools have the privilege of being classified as public schools, and therefore worthy of pub­ lic support.

May-June 1966

N A recently published penetrating analysis of the First Amendment, law professor Mark D. Howe of Harvard concluded that “the Court’s insistence that the rule requiring neu­ trality between religion and irreligion is historically traceable either to the First Amendment’s prohibition of laws respecting an establishment of religion or to its assurance of the free exercise of religion” is “misleading and distort­ ing.”

The Supreme Court itself has had some mild stirrings of conscience in regard to its decisions in these mat­ ters. Although Mr. Justice Clark, speaking for the Court in the Schempp and Murray cases (Prayerand Bible-reading cases) ruled that, “In the relationship between man and religion, the State is firmly committed to a position of neutrality,” Mr. Jus­ tice Goldberg pointed out that . . . untutored devotion to the concept of neutrality can lead to invocation or approval of results which partake not simply of the non-interference and non-involvement with the reli­ gious which the Constitution com­ mands, but of a brooding and perva­ sive devotion to the secular and a passive, or even active, hostility to the religious. Such results are not only not compelled by the Constitution, but, it seems to me, are prohibited by it. . . . Government must inevitably take cognizance of the existence of religion and, indeed under certain cir­ cumstances, the First Amendment may require that it do so.

I

These penetrating lines deserve careful analysis and study. Although they were part of a concurring opin­ ion, Justice Goldberg articulated his uneasiness with the facile formula of neutrality. Neutrality is an attractive banner but Justice Goldberg points out that standing under it may place 25

one in the anti-religious camp. His analysis evinces a troubled mind.

In effect, Justice Goldberg was say­ ing that no matter how hard he tries to stand .the coin on its neutral edge, it is bound to fall on either its reli­ gious face or humanist side. The fal­ lacy which leads to this confusion is the assumption that “The Constitution commands . . . non-interference and non-involvement with the religious.”

Governments will be able to follow a policy of non-involvement with reli­ gion only when they can function on a basis of non-involvement with peo­ ple. As long as there are people, there will be religious as well as humanist pressures. Wittingly or unwittingly, every court in the land responds to this issue in almost every significant case before it. Shall the defendant be held answerable criminally or in damages for his conduct or misconduct? Is Man a responsible moral agent or is he simply the victim of his environ­ ment and/or heredity? There is no neutral answer to this question. Yet every time the question is answered,

26

sides are taken in the great debate.

Does Man have a mystic quality en­ dowing him with rights against Men, or must the interests of the group al­ ways prevail over the individual? Can any basic philosophic, social, or po­ litical question be answered without affirming or denying the religious con­ ception of Man? A Talmudic wit reading the first amendment might quip: “ 'Congress shall make no law, etc. . . .’ is written; now does this ex­ clude the Supreme Court?”!

F THE Constitution truly com­ mands “non-involvement with the religious . . .” the Supreme Court should have closed down shop a long time ago. Can there be any greater involvement with religion than in an­ nulling laws that prohibit the free ex­ ercise thereof? Clearly, there is no middle ground. In searching for no­ man’s land, the Court has stumbled into the enemy camp and unwittingly elevated secularism to the status of a de facto establishment.

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JEWISH LIFE

Der Heiliger Rebbe Reb Zusha Four Revelatory Episodes in His Life

By ZALMAN ARYEH HILSENRAD i i A LL of us, the disciples of the ■¿V great Maggid of Mezritch,” once remarked the Baal Hatanya V’Hashulchan Aruch, Rebbe Schneur Zalman of Liady, “concentrated on Yirath HaShem, but only one of us reached the highest level: Reb Zusha of Anapol.”

A brother of Rebbe Elimelech of Lizhensk, Reb Zusha was held in the highest esteem by all. Reverently, the most knowledgeable Chasidim would always use the term “der heiliger” (the holy one) when referring to him.

“The mere mention of his name,” once remarked the Rizhiner Rebbe, “inspires Yirath Shomayim.”

During his sojourn in this existence, he was almost completely divested of

earthly drives and ambitions. He lack­ ed nothing; what he had more than met his simple needs. Other tzadikim also followed this mode of life—but only until they reached the level to­ wards which they strived. Not so Reb Zusha; he never changed . . . never worried about mundane matters. His senses just did not function in this area; they could not—for they were ever engaged in the spiritual realm.

He felt that the person who has to accept tzedokah need not feel crest­ fallen; on the contrary, he should be happy— fof through him a Jew is able to fulfill the mitzvah of Tzedokah.

What sort of man was Reb Zusha?

The following four episodes reveal his character—and should help us in our own groping toward Yirath Ha-Shem.

H P H E wife of Reb Zusha once became quite insistent that he buy her a new dress, as years had passed since she last had purchased one. It took a long time and a great deal of effort, but finally he scraped together

enough and the Rebbetzin bought the cloth and brought it to the local tailor to make the dress.

Erev Shabboth, Reb Zusha noticed that his wife looked very downcast.

“What now?” he asked. “A new

May-June 1966

27

. . . and now I am again without a dress.”

“And did you pay him for his work?” asked Reb Zusha.

“Pay him?” asked the Rebbitzin in wonder. “Why, I gave him the whole dress!”

“That’s no excuse,” said Reb Zusha with impatience. “This poor tailor worked a full week for you, not for his daughter. Eagerly, he waited all week to deliver the dress, to get the few dollars he earned, and with it feed his family. Should he suffer loss of what he had honestly earned because you presented the dress to his daugh­ ter? Run back at once and pay him for his work!”

dress you have, Boruch Ha-Shem; why do you look so sad?*’ The Rebbitzin explained that when the tailor had brought back the fin­ ished garment, he had sighed deeply.

Upon her inquiring why, he told her this bitter tale of woe: he had recently agreed upon a shiduch for his daugh­ ter. When the chothon noticed that he was working on the dress, he had assumed that it was for his bride.

When he learned that it was not, he flew into a rage, and the tailor feared that he might break off the match.

“When I heard this,” concluded the Rebbitzin, “I gave him back the dress as a wedding present for his daughter

II

A MERCANT once came to Reb - t \ . Zusha before he had acquired re­ nown, with a business proposition: since he was driving a wagon-load of merchandise to the Y ’rid (market day, or fair, where buyers and sellers meet), he would pay Reb Zusha for remaining on the wagon as watchman so that he could leave to negotiate his business deals.

Reb Zusha gladly accepted this op­ portunity for honest toil. They started before dawn and when they arrived at their destination at sun-up, the mer­ chant said to Reb Zusha: “As you un­ doubtedly will want to daven Shacharith and I will not be leaving the wagon for a short time, run into shool and daven. But remember to finish and return as soon as possible. I have a number of important people to see some distance from here.”

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Relighted that he could leave the wagon, and not miss davening with a minyon, Reb Zusha ran to shool. But to skim through the prayers? Reb Zusha just did not know how. In shool, he was in a completely different realm. The merchant waited an hour, two and three, but Reb Zusha did not return. It was quite inconvenient, but the merchant managed to sell his merchandise during the course of the day. As the time for Minchah ap­ proached, and still no sign of Reb Zusha, the merchant became quite alarmed and hastened to shool, where he found that he had at that very mo­ ment completed the series of daily Shiurim in which it was his invariable practice to engage after the morning service.

When the merchant asked him why he had not returned as agreed, Reb JEWISH LIFE

Zusha pressed his palm against his forehead, and exclaimed: “Oh! I had completely forgotten the whole mat­ ter.”

The merchant realized that he was dealing with a man who was literally out of this world, so he took him home without another word.

When Reb Zusha came home, he at once proceeded to daven Minchah and Maariv. However, in the midst

of Shemoneh Esrey, his wife noticed that he was crying. Alarmed, she asked him, as soon as he had com­ pleted his prayers, what had happened at the fair to have brought on these tears, Answered Reb Zusha: “Yes, we are all journeying to the fair (this exist­ ence); but what shall we bring back?

And with what will we return home from this big Y’rid?”

Ill URING the time Reb Zusha spent you mean Zusha, the assistant shain Mezritch to be near the great mosh. There he is sweeping the floor.”

D Somewhat reluctantly the Rabbi ap­ Maggid who succeeded the Baal Shem Tov as the acknowledged leader of the Chasidic movement, he was complete­ ly unknown. Once an outstanding rabbi came to the Maggid to seek clarification of some very profound matters which troubled him. Among the questions he put to the Maggid was the following: “The Mishnah tells us in Berachoth (54a) that we are obligated to praise G-d for a misfor­ tune, even as we are obligated to praise Him when He blesses us with good fortune. What I cannot under­ stand is how a mortal man of flesh and blood can reach a spiritual level where he is able to fulfill this Mish­ nah. Did you, Horav Hamaggid, ever meet such a person?”

Answered the Maggid: “In our Beth Hamedrash there is a young man named Zusha who will clarify this question for you.”

The Rabbi went to the Beth Ha­ medrash and asked for Rabbi Zusha, but no one knew of any Rabbi Zusha.

Finally someone ventured: “Perhaps May-June 1966

proached the assistant shamosh, who was busily wielding a broom. Ex­ tremely thin, almost emaciated, his clothes in tatters, Zusha was obviously poverty-stricken.

Said the Rabbi: “Excuse me, young man, but the Maggid suggested that you may be able to explain to me how a bosor v’dom can praise G-d in the same measure for an evil occur­ rence as for a happy event.”

Upon hearing this question, Reb Zusha paused a moment, broom poised mid-air, pondering this ques­ tion, then said earnestly: “I am at a loss to understand why the holy Mag­ gid referred this question to me—a man who has never in his life experi­ enced a bad moment . . . who is the object of G-d’s constant bounties.”

The Rabbi reflected for a few mo­ ments . . . noted the hungry look and ragged clothes . . . considered his con­ tention that he had never known a bad moment . . . and understood why the Maggid had referred him to Reb Zusha.

29

r 1 1HE Rebbe Reb Zusha worked J- miracles—but even these manifest­ ed themselves and were channeled through his extraordinary Yirath HaShem, During his tenure, the city of Anapol belonged to a feudal lord through whom many Jewish families earned a livelihood.

One day, someone stole his entire collection of guns and rare jewelry, priceless as family heirlooms and of great historical significance.

When the police failed to recover the stolen articles; he permitted the town’s priest, a Jew-hater, to persuade him that Jews were responsible for the theft. He therefore issued a decree stipulating that if the treasure would npt turn up in one month, he would expel every Jew from Anapol.

The townspeople congregated at Reb Zusha’s home and tearfully plead­ ed for a yeshuah. Calling one of our people who was esteemed by the feudal ruler, Reb Zusha said: “Go and ask him in my name to postpone the expulsion for three months, during which time perhaps the treasure will be found. If not, I guarantee that on

30

the ninetiethTday he will recover every item.”

To this the lord agreed. But the three months passed and the treasure was not found.

On the ninetieth day, Reb Zusha asked the feudal ruler to assemble in one room everyone who lived on his estate or was employed there, as he was coming to find the treasure. At the appointed time, when all were gathered, Reb Zusha appeared and asked if anyone was missing. A care­ ful check revealed that one of the stable hands was missing. When he was brought in, Reb Zusha faced him, and looking him straight in the eye, recited that well-known Yomim Noraim prayer: “And now Lord our G-d, put Thy awe upon all whom Thou hast made, and Thy dread upon all whom Thou hast created. . . .”

Reb Zusha had hardly finished these words when the suspect started to tremble violently and sobbingly con­ fessed to the theft.

And thus did Der Heiliger Rebbe, Reb Zusha, through the power of Yirath Shomayim evoke awe and trepidation from all creatures.

JEWISH LIFE

Among Jews and Crypto-Jews in Portugal In P o rtug al to d a y , ^Ifws o f both Se p h a rd i and A shkenazi ori­ gin have established com m unities in a land w here su rv iv o rs of the p ro scrib e d Je w ish com m unity of old a re still to be found .

When and w hy did Je w s "re tu rn " to P o rtug al— and w hat hap pened to the rem nants o f the "M arran os" who w ere re sto re d to th e ir a n ce stra l fa ith ?

by JACO B BELLER of the summer—wrap himself for an

HE ocean liner slowly $nd ma­ T jestically slid out of the N$w York entire day in a white sheet bearing harbor on its way to Lisbon. From black stripes, would not touch food afar handkerchiefs waved farewell to us from friends and acquaintances. A cool night wind was blowing, the gleaming myriads of New York’s lights sparkled and I stood in the on­ coming darkness at the prow of the ship which sharply cut its way through the powerful waves. A strange feeling overcame me: this was to be my second trip to that country which had incribed a chapter of blood and fire in the book of my people’s martyrdom.

From the day when, travelling in remote parts of Brazil, I came across half-recognizable Jewish practices among the inhabitants and all the threads of these practices led to Portu­ gal, I had wanted to see the country with my own eyes. An old Brazilian woman in an obscure village in the Rio Grande province told me that her father would once a year—at the end May-June 1966

all day and would read various prayers out of an old book; another family had inherited the tradition of spread­ ing a white tablecloth each Friday night and lighting candles, though they did not know why they did this.

A professor in a town in the province of Parana would often come to Jew­ ish gatherings and talk about Jewish customs and prayer—and once whis­ pered to me secretly that he was of Jewish ancestry.

And now here I stood in the dark of night listening to the rush of the sea waves mingling with the tones of the Ave Maria coming from the steer­ age section where the Portuguese pas­ sengers, en route for a visit to their homeland, accompany the hymn with harmonicas. The sound is reminis­ cent of church bells.

On a sunny morning our vessel ar31

riyed at the port of Lisbon—a city surrounded by a long chain of moun­ tains. In the sunlight could be seen the spires of old monasteries and above them*could be seen Moorishstyle palaces, among these the royal palace, Casa dos Reis, now long empty and without an occupant.

HEN I had paid my first visit to Portugal, in 1927, I found a small community of Jews from eastern Europe and a sizable com­ munity of Sephardic Jews. There was a synagogue which for various reasons did not face the street. The head of the Sephardic community at the time was the late Dr. Adolfo Benarus (He­ brew: Ben Ha-rosh) who struggled to bring more Jewishness into the Lisbon community and who himself administered the Jewish school he founded, until a professional teacher was brought. Within the Ashkenazic group one of the leading spirits was an immigrant from Poland named Chaim Sorin, a jeweller by trade.

He brought me together with the man who discovered the remnants of the crypto-Jews, Samuel Schwartz, an engineer from the Polish town of Zgierz. I thus was able to establish a link with both the Jewish community proper and with that which had sur­ vived the long, bitter era of the In­ quisition, clinging in secret through the centuries to each other and their close-guarded traditions—usually re­ ferred to by the pejorative Spanish term Marranos, more properly by the Hebrew designation Anusim, the coerced.

During this second visit, however, the matter proved to be more diffi­ cult. Samuel Schwartz and Chaim Sorin were both dead; the latter had

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left for New York during World War II and had died there. The Sephardic community had expanded. Changes had also taken place among the colony of eastern European Jews. Some dis­ persed to other countries during World War II when there was a threat of Nazi Germany occupying Spain and Portugal. Many came from other lands to Lisbon which was a transit port for refugees fleeing Hitler, and of these some stayed in Lisbon after Hitler’s defeat.

In the early years the links with the Sephardic Jews were not close; there was little harmony between them and the East Europeans. During the war, however, when Jewish refugees from Hitlerism streamed through Lis­ bon, the Sephardim saw the desperate plight of their brethren and along with international Jewish relief agencies they threw themselves into relief ac­ tivity. This brought both sides together and now intermarriages between the two are common—something quite rare in previous days. One need only glance at the communal marriage register of the last few years and one can see the number of Sephardic grooms with Ashkenazic brides and vice-versa. Two synagogues exist: the old established Sephardic Shaarey Tikvah and the Ashkenazic or “Polish” Synagogue. Both share a common community center.

The handsome Shaarey Tikvah rep­ resents an interesting chapter in the story of the Jewish restoration in Portugal, where the banishment of the Jews was decreed in 1496. Within the following year those who had failed to flee in time, comprising most of the community, were forcibly “con­ verted” to Christianity, amidst scenes of horror; many underwent martyr­ dom rather than succumb. The surJEW ISH LIFE

vivors continued to practice Judaism in secret. Constantly pursued by vthe Inquisition, thousands were burned

alive in the fires of the auto da fe through the succeeding years and generations.

O R IG IN OF PRESENT-DAY C O M M U N IT Y N THE middle of the eighteenth century, when the Inquisition was still in force, Portugal underwent kn economic crisis and was in need éf expanded trade. It was then that a Portuguese admiral invited two Jews from Gibraltar on board his ship to come to Portugal to create some com­ mercial outlet. The two Jews, Isaac Aboab and Moses Levi, both leading merchants, accepted the offer. When they arrived in Lisbon they were in­ formed they would have to J change their names before being permitted to land. They rejected this rttèe and pro­ tested the affront with dignity and self-respect. The Portuguese Regent Don Joaô was compelled to give these two men a special safe conduct which permitted them to land using their own •identity and as Jews. This was the beginning of the return of the Jews to Portugal.

In 1820 the country underwent a revolution and a new constitution was created which- set milder terms for the Jews than existed in the Inquisi­ tion period. Jews began to trickle in from Gibraltar and Morocco and started a synagogue in the Portuguese town of Faro. As early as 1820 there was a Jewish cemetery in this city.

This city was well-known to Jews in pïè-Expulsion Portugal: it possessed the country’s first Hebrew printing press which in the fifteenth century, shortly before the Expulsion, pub­ lished an edition of the Chumosh.

According to Professor Moses Ben-

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May-June 1966

sabat Amzalak, the current head of the Lisbon Jewish community, there were a number of synagogues in Lis­ bon dt the beginning of the nineteenth century—all small establishments lo­ cated in private homes. The first offi­ cial synagogue—named Etz Hayim— was founded by Abraham Bensaude, an important businessman who estab­ lished the Bank of Lisbon and the Azores. This synagogue was main­ tained after his death by his heirs.

Later a second sytiagogue, “Etz Hayim No. 2,” was built, more spacious and more comfortable than the earlier prayer houses.

In June 1859 the Jews of Lisbon assembled for the purpose of uniting their congregations and concentrating their efforts on one synagogue appro­ priate to their size and means. A lot was purchased but it Was not until 1902 that Shaarey Tikvah was built.

In 1948 it was re-built and expanded with the aid of an architect engaged for the purpose. The Torah scrolls and other sacred objects were trans­ ferred to rented quarters. When the new structure was ready the Jews of Lisbon conducted a public dedication to which was invited the Chief Rabbi of France, Rabbi Jacob Kaplan, who officiated along with the community’s two rabbis—Abraham Amar and Menahem Diesendruk (now serving Sao Paulo in Brazil). A procession went through the city streets carrying the sacred scrolls adorned with crowns, breastplates, and bells and 33

wrapped in taleithim. The rabbis walked in front intoning psalms, fol­ lowed by the Kehillah leaders escorted by a special police honor guard. The inhabitants of Lisbon looked on with a mixture of curiosity and admiration at the procession of the sacred Jew­ ish scrolls which their forefathers five centuries before had outlawed, de­ spoiled, and put to the flames. * | THE rebuilt synagogue makes a JL striking impression both from within and without. Its architecture is a blend of various styles: the bimah, well-appointed, stands directly oppo­ site an artistically designed Oron Hakodesh bearing the inscription in He­ brew: “Know before whom thou standest,” a massive candelabra of the type common to Sephardic syna­ gogues, an Eternal Light burning in the memory of the martyred Six Mil­ lion, on the wall a memorial plaque marking the anniversaries of those members who have died. Among the Sephardic names is one of an Ash­ kenazi, Jacob Halpern, who with two Portuguese Jews, Alberto Samuel Tiano and Sara E. Belina Cueron, was trapped in France during the Nazi in­ vasion and deported to the camps whence they never returned.

Just as during my first visit, I noticed that the synagogue is not lo­ cated facing the street. It contains a hospital, a mikveh, a kindergarten, and a Hebrew school. There are two ministers—Abraham Assar and Isaac Toledano. The latter, a graduate of Jews’ College of London* is a mem­ ber of a family long resident in Portu­ gal; his father, Habib Toledano, was shochet and spiritual leader of the community of Faro south of Lisbon.

On the cornerstone in Hebrew is the name Kehillah Kedoshah Shaarey 34

Tijcvfh and in Portuguese Esnoga Pqrtuguesa as Portas da Esperanca (i,p. Gates of Hope). The year |9Q2 if indicated as the date of its establishment and the names of founders and officers are listed. th e Kehillah also has a communal app^rafus comprising a hospital, com­ munity center—a central body in which all the institutions are represented-r-a WIZO chapter, a Zionist organization, a school, and a kosher meat market. The visitor who requires kosher food can have a kosher meal at a private pension. The president of the community is Moses Bensabat Amzalac, professor of economics at Pisbon Univerity and author of several books in his field, a national-minded Religious Jew who stems from an old Portuguese Jewish family. His moth­ er’s family lived in England for gen­ erations and when he was a boy his father brought a teacher for him from pastern Europe named Isaac Wolfen|on. Later this man became the offi­ ciating minister performing all the synagogue functions. In his library of Judaic and Hebrew works can be found sets , of the Mishnah and Talmud.

When did Jews from Eastern Eu­ rope first come to Portugal? The first time was 1910 when there was an economic crisis in Germany and Jews living there who had emigrated from Galicia and Poland learned that the Portuguese Consul in Berlin was giv­ ing visas to his country. Groups of Jewish immigrants came and settled in Portugal. They found on the spot a Polish Jew named Terlo who had come many years before and was called the grandfather of the East European Jews of Lisbon. When the Nazis seized France and the French government moved to Bordeaux the JEWISH LIFE

French-Spanish border became the last rescue point for the thousands of desperate refugees who had been suc­ cessful in escaping from the death­ traps of the occupied countries.

Through Spain to Portugal from there overseas.

Of this flow of thousands of Jew­ ish refugees who were saved via Lis­ bon, only a small number remained.

These joined the earlier East European Jews and formed an environment of their own. But—they complained to me—the settlement is diminishing. De­ spite the fact that financially things are well, they are concerned about the future. There are no young men for their daughters, they have gone away to study—some to Paris, some to London, some to New York. The daughters are sent to Israel to find husbands and once they marry there, they remain. Mixed marriages are in­ creasing and the children of these marriages are always raised as Catho­ lics despite the Jewish parent.

OR the tourist Lisbon is a most attractive place with its pictur­ F esque colors and contrast. It stretches for nine miles around the Tagus, sur­ rounded by seven mountains. Actu­ ally it is two cities: the center around Praza do Comercio and Avenida Liberdade and Rossio is reminiscent of Paris, London, or New York; tourists from the world over can be seen; cafes on the Paris style, de luxe shops where the latest fashions are available from the world metropoles; flower vendors dressed in national costumes smile at you offering their selections of wreaths and bouquets.

A short distance from this area and you are in the Plaza Rossio. On this very square in the center of the city not far from the royal palace, May-June 1966

in the year 1506, there took place a slaughter of Jews which lasted three full days. Two thousand Jews per­ ished at the sword in the presence of many high-born noblemen who wit­ nessed the ghastly spectacle. There is a reminder of the Inquisition tribunal destroyed in the famous earthquake of 1755, replaced by a theater, and now the site of a monument to the Portuguese playwright Vincenty Bill considered the father of Portuguese drama. He was so popular that in the sixteenth century King Joao (John) offered to perform in one of his plays.

A second reminder of Jewry’s tragic past in the center of Lisbon is the monument to the Marquis de Pombal, a descendant of Marranos whose name had been Jose de Carval­ ho y Melo. This figure achieved an in­ fluential role and in the year 1773 succeeded in reducing the powers of the Inquisitors. Despite this measure the Marranos were still distrustful and dispersed to the more isolated parts of the country to avoid the keen eyes of the Inquisition’s agents.

A few blocks from the city center is that section of the town known as Bairro Alto, located on the mountain­ side. You make your way upward, higher and higher along primitive stairways. The area’s appearance be­ gins more: and more to resemble the poorest quarter of Rio de Janeiro . . . the old shabby houses look like the favelas of Rio; from the fondos (tav­ erns) where people sit over a glass of cheap wine and dried fish, the sounds of the famous Portuguese fados can be heard, sung by women wrapped in black shawls. These are sentimental songs expressing longing, unrequited love, and complaints against life in general. Amalia Rodriguez is the queen of the fados and her fame has 35

gone beyond Portugal. The song is often accompanied by a tambourine or harmonica. At night when the lights in the houses of the Bairro Alto give the impression that they are hang­ ing in the air, the plaintive songs of longing of the fadistas are heard again. The Portuguese feel as strongly about these songs as the Spaniards do about bull-fighting.

The uneasy tension of the country cannot be seen in the city center where all is outwardly comfortable and imposing. It is visible, however, in the narrow streets of the Bairro Alto where the poor live. The disquiet centering around the University is also evident. Just as in Latin America,

ithe students are the first to show the symptoms of unrest. They stride about the boulevards in their long togas bearing slits in the sleeve—this, it is explained to you, is how they show their academic credits, each slit repre­ senting a completed year.

The loss of Goa, the constant un­ rest in Angola and especially the op­ position at home which grows apace —all this has its effect on the econ­ omy. Demonstrations and arrests are common. I was told that Premier An­ tonio Salazar at one point forbade the singing of fados at windows as the lovers sometimes had been known to weave revolutionary words into the songs.

RELICS OF A JEW ISH PAST HE earthquake of 1755 destroyed all traces of the Inquisition and nothing remains-^-this is what the cu­ rators of the various museums tell the visitor who inquires. However, if the visitor does not rely on these assur­ ances and goes through Lisbon’s vari­ ous museums, he can find abundant material and documentation on Jewry’s tragic past in Portugal.

Lisbon was an important Jewish community when the Moslems con­ trolled the Iberian peninsula. In 1170, when Portugal’s first Christian king cam e to power, the city possessed numerous synagogues. Under John I the Jews performed an important role in the country’s political and espe­ cially its economic life; among them were statesmen, royal advisors, schol­ ars, and merchants. In the Royal Mu­ seum do Camera, the Ethnological Museum, the National Museum of

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Royal Coaches, especially in the Archiveo Torre do Tombo of the Mu­ seum of Popular Art can be seen frag­ ments of tombstones on which He­ brew words can be pieced together, torn pages of a Torah scroll open at the Sidrah Ha’azinu and minutes of Inquisition proceedings recording the confiscation of the property of the accused persons* When forty-seven Marranos were burned in a public square in Lisbon the English consul wrote to London ¿that their offense was that they were rich. A characteristic documënt is one numbered _4427 about a Jewish girl named Brites Henriques who coura­ geously faced the Inquisitors and re­ cited by heart all the Jewish prayers she knew. All the prayers are in­ scribed verbatim in the proceedings.

The girl, not yet 18, was arrested with her family for secretly observing JEW ISH LIFE

larations have been issued in Portugal for Jews to return. The reasons for this revolve around a number of facts.

Firstly, Portugal has no need to announce that the Jews may come back and receive recognition as Spain does, for its Jewish community has been recognized for years; the Shaarey Tikvah synagogue has existed for more than sixty years. Jews started returning to Portugal from Morocco and Gibraltar in 1850 and, as we have indicated, it is believed were there as early as 1820.

The second point is that Spanish intellectuals had a sentimental lean­ ing for the Sephardim who retained the Spanish language over the cen­ turies in various parts of the world.

In Portugal this did not apply, for the conversos who fled from Portugal to the New World were assimilated to the Castillian-Spanish speech of these countries (except, of course, in Bra­ zil), although they continued to be called “Portuguese” in these lands.

Similarly, the Portuguese Jews who sought refuge in European countries found already established there larger communities of Jews who had pre­ viously fled Spain. Because of the similarity between the two vernaculars and the larger number of Spanish Jews, they replaced their Portuguese with Spanish. Important Spanish his­ torians such as D’Azvedo Lucio and the Spanish chronicler Amador de los Rios, Herculano Alexandre and others are as preoccupied with the Portu­ guese Inquisition as with that of Spain.

All this has therefore remained merely N contrast to Spain where there so much historical data for the Portu­ is a zealous search for evidence guese, among whom no one has taken of the Jewish past and where such the interest to do independent research discoveries are widely publicized, in in this epoch. While in Spain there Portugal almost nothing is heard is a constant stream of books and about such matters. Similarly, no dec- journals about the Inquisition, and

Judaism. Her father and an elder sis­ ter were burned at the stake. An older brother was sentenced to life impris­ onment. The persuasive words of the Inquisitors were to no avail; they tried to convince Brites of the truth of Christianity and assured her that all would be forgiven if she would con­ fess and repent her sin. The girl re­ mained obstinate. Vexed by her de­ termination and obduracy the Inquisi­ tion condemned Brites and a younger brother to a life in a nunnery and monastery, respectively.

Traces of the Jewish past can also be observed on the hilly streets of Lisbon. On the edge of the ruin of an old church can be seen some barely legible Hebrew characters whose message is no longer decipher­ able. There is a street nearby called Rúa da Judiaría, in the poorer section of the city. When I stopped a passer­ by to ask him for the meaning of the street name he looked at me curiously and finally shrugged his shoulders.

One of the most interesting relics of the Jewish past is the synagogue in Tamar, 140 kilometers from Lisbon near Coimbra. On Rua Nova, which was once the Jewish quarter, a syna­ gogue was built in the Gothic style with huge columns. Today it is a na­ tional museum.

Similar traces can be found in other parts of the country: Hebrew manuscripts in the libraries, Hebraic inscriptions on tombstones, in mu­ seums, ornaments belonging to Torah scrolls, and other objects.

I

May-June 1966

37

every nook and corner of Spanish his­ tory is examined and exhibitions of historical documents aïe often ar­ ranged, in Portugal should you men­

tion the word Inquisition in a mu­ seum you get the stock answer that the earthquake of 1755 destroyed all historic traces of it.

W H A T HAPPENED TO THOSE M A R R A N O S W H O RETURNED TO JU D A ISM ?

N 1917, because of a pure co­ incidence, the late Samuel Schwartz unearthed an entire com­ munity of continuing Marranos who practiced Jewish customs, observed Jewish festivals, and recited certain Jewish prayers which had been handed down orally for 300 years (not free, of course, from errors which had crept in in the process). The coinci­ dence was that Schwartz happened to come to the Belmonte district in the course of his professional activity as an engineer. While chatting with a native of the area he was told, with reference to a certain locale, “Don’t go there—they are all Judios (Jews).”

This aroused Schwartz’s intense curi­ osity and impelled him to make the visit, and he discovered entire villages of crypto-Jews who still practised their ancestral faith.

After the Inquisition had imposed baptism on the Jews and after the persecution of those conversos who clung to Judaism privately, many of them fled to the hills to be as far away as possible from the Inquisi­ tion. Even after certain mitigations were made (such as that each ac­ cused must know what he is charged with and who is making the charges, that the accused was given the right to present witnesses and defend him­ self and the government required to confirm the verdict) the conversos

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were still distrustful and remained in the hills. The termination of the In­ quisition tribunal at the time of the great Lisbon earthquake in 1755 did not prevent the condemnation and burning as late as 1818 of a nun ac­ cused of observing Jewish rites. This was the Inquisition’s last victim; in 1821 it was finally abolished.

Even after the 1910 revolution the crypto-Jews still did not dare to come out in public and continued their hidden Jewish life in the hills. As a result of their long isolation their practices and prayers became garbled and attenuated. It was only after Schwartz’s discovery that they re­ sumed communication with the Jews of the outer world. He took a close interest in them, visited the districts they occupied and collected their prayers and rites. They put their con­ fidence in him and he later wrote a book about these people, their religion and their ceremonies.

VW ^HEN I visited Portugal in 1927 ▼▼ and met Samuel Schwartz, he accompanied me on a trip to the areas inhabited by the Anusim. I at­ tended their baking of matzoh in Covilhao. The day before had been market day and we had both attended.

On small tables covered with hand­ decorated linen were various neck­ laces with silver amulets bearing porJEW ISH LIFE

traits of Jesus and a cross. Both ven­ dors and buyers were clad in the characteristic Portuguese peasant cos­ tume called the capechino, some in aprons with broad hats. My escort explained to me that among these were those who observe Jewish rites in garbled form. Because of the iso­ lation of centuries some of these be­ lieve that Moses and Jesus were one and the same. In the time of the In­ quisition the crucifixes lying on their breast were a disguise to protect them from the watchful and keen eyes of the Inquisition to cover up any sus­ picion of Jewishness— and so it stayed from one generation to the next.

The ceremony of baking matzah was carried out in a primitive man­ ner. The dough was cast on a hot brick oven until it burst. All those involved came into the room dressed in white clothing in honor of the pao santo (holy bread). They sang addnd of combined prayer and blessing: Shema tefillah To heaven go To earth return For the stay of sinners The Lord-laden tree Will have good harvest During all the eight days of Pesach they refrain from eating meat and from work. They possess certain prayers for Sabbath and the festivals.

Yom Kippur they call Dia Grande (the Great Day), and they observe it by fasting all day. The prayers are recited in a chant by a type of cantor — either the senior man of the village or an aged woman—and are in Portu­ guese but intermingled with some Hebrew words such as sh’ma or shechinah, or sometimes whole phrases May-June 1966

such as Ado-noy tz'vaoth m’lo kol ho’oretz k’vodo (Lord of Hosts, the world is filled with Thy glory!) which is pronounced, of course, with a strong Portuguese accent.

Engineer Samuel Schwartz lent me his friendly assistance and translated some dozens of prayers for me from the Portuguese original, from the blessing over bread to the blessing for salting meat and the prayer for travellers—even special prayers to be used by women (fchinoth). On the eve of Yom Kippur they light lamps with oil wicks which they call candela do Senhor (the Lord’s candelabrum) ; they pronounce a prayer both before and after the fast which they observe from early in the morning until sunset.

Here are these in English trans­ lation: Prayer before the Fast: Lord I am now preparing myself to fast With the aid thou shalt grant me This day of sacrifice and penitence This blood I drain from my body I offer for my salvation, Amen l Prayer after the Fast: Blessed be the star of Ado-noy All I have asked thee grant me Lord Blessed be the star and blessed the company Blessed be the Lord who guided it The hour has come, more than come Praised be the Lord who plucks evil from my body Praised be the Lord that hath made bread from grass.

39

RESPONSE OF W O RLD JEW RY FTER the first visit I wrote my It had been taken to London by a A impressions which were carried family that-had fled the country and

by JTA in the Yiddish press. A year later, with the help of Samuel Schwartz, the Portuguese crypto-Jews organized themselves and established contact with the outside Jewish world.

The first to publicly return to Juda­ ism was Captain Arthuro Carlos de Barros Bastos. A native of Oporto, he was an officer in the Portuguese Army who had distinguished himself at the Western Front in World War I and was the first to run up the repub­ lican flag in his native city during the Revolution. He travelled to Tangiers where he underwent circumcision and he established a movement to bring the Marranos back to the Jewish fold. He started a periodical entitled Halapid (The Torch). Responses came from Jews of various lands. In London a Committee for the Mar­ ranos was set up headed up by Wil­ fred Samuel and Lucien Wolf. In the U.S.A. rabbinical organizations sent aid, and Dr. David de Sola Pool, rabbi of New York’s Spanish and Portuguese Synagogue, shipped an en­ tire library of books. The philanthro­ pist Elijah Kadoorie built a synagogue in Oporto which to this day bears the name Beth Hak’nesseth M’kor Chayim Kadoorie. A public dedica­ tion ceremony was held when it was opened. Soon afterwards synagogues were built in Braganca, Belmonte, and Beira-Baixa. In Oporto a public dedi­ cation ceremony was carried out by Rabbi Menahem Diesendruck (a neph­ ew of the Hebrew writer Zvi Diesen­ druck) who was then rabbi in Lisbon.

A Torah scroll was brought into the synagogue which had actually been used in Oporto in pre-Expulsion times.

40

kept the Sefer Torah in the family’s possession for generations.

At this dedication a memorial ser­ vice was held for the martyrs who met their death through Kiddush Hashem four hundred years ago. It was an auspicious new beginning: Captain Barros Basto became the de facto spiritual leader of the new community.

In time a rabbi came from Poland to serve them.

The Jewish world joyfully greeted the news of the return to the fold of this severed limb of Jewry and be­ gan to display close interest. But be­ fore very long all grew quiet and nothing more was heard form this quarter. The synagogues in Belmonte, Braganca, and Beira-Baixa were shut down. After he died a daughter of Captain Barros Bastos married a Christian. A disciple of his named Rodriguez who had served as cantor in Oporto reverted to Catholicism and married a Catholic. All that re­ mained was the synagogue in Oporto with its historic Sifrey Torah, its Chumoshim, Siddurim, and its library, which is today a tourist attraction.

The Portuguese guide takes you through the building just like the curator of the museum-synagogue in the Spanish city of Cordova and lets you look at and touch the scrolls and sacred books in the library. *

❖

*

HY did the restoration of the lost remnant fail so badly? The Jews of Lisbon don’t want to talk about the subject. No explanation can

W

JEW ISH LIFE

be drawn from them. I did manage to discuss it with a Portuguese jour­ nalist. He indicated that he was with the Opposition to the present regime.

He knew the entire story and made no secret of the fact that he himself was of Marrano descent. The Catholic Church, he said, was not pleased with the uproar made by Jews abroad about the discovery. True, the Inquisi­ tion no longer exists in Portugal but the Church is vigilant about these

May-June 1966

things; it saw to it that the whole affair was frustrated.

The Anusim, too, were intimidated by the Church. My Portuguese col­ league told me that at official registra­ tion if one of these persons indicated he was a Marrano, the reply would come “There is no such thing in Portugal—you are a Catholic.” He assured me, however, that there were still numbers of them in the remote areas who maintain the tradition and wait for better times.

41

Mission of Humor

By ABRAHAM SHULMAN SMALL Jewish community in in opposition to the accepted theory A New Jersey had invited me some that Jewish laughter is a laughter time ago to lecture on Jewish humor.

Lecturing is not my profession, but in the early years of my residence in America it was a pleasant addition to my inadequate earnings. It was a cold day when I made the trip, not yet the pitiless frost of winter, but the air was chilly, wet, and penetrating.

The streets were covered with the remnants of a damp snow and I could feel how the wheels of the bus, which I boarded in the Port Authority ter­ minal, were squashing the snow into mud. The bus was almost empty, its few passengers wearing a common mantle of depressed silence. The air within was overheated and heavy .

I carried a small briefcase, an old European habit which I gave up only recently and inside I kept the notes of my lecture together with several books and anthologies which I used during the lecture to illustrate some points. My theory at that time was faltering to my listeners. I maintained that not only were the Jewish people the possessors of the sharpest and most refined sense of humor, but that Jewish wit was at the roots of the genealogical tree of the universe. And 42

through tears, I collected enough ma­ terial to prove that the nucleus of Jewish wit is optimism and a hilarious attitude toward life. My lecture was usually a success, my audience liked the idea of being the progenitor of cosmopolitan wit, but apart from the national satisfaction my lecture also contained many Jewish sayings, chochmes, and jokes, which evoked in my audience cascades of laughter. Satis­ faction and laughter—what more could one wish to derive from a lec­ ture? In the list of lecture copies which I had originally submitted to the office of the organization in charge of the “cultural activities” I had also set forth a number of other subjects, mostly about Jewish and European literature or impressions of my numer­ ous travels to the remotest Jewish communities over the world. But lit­ erature had little attraction and as for the travels, I could not compete with another very famous, Jewish traveler who had the talent of adorn­ ing his real adventures with prepos­ terous fiction. So I got stuck with my lecture on humor and did, under the circumstances, relatively well. There JEW ISH LIFE

was hardly a weekend without one or two lecture invitations.

Because of the deep snow, my trip from New York to the little town in New Jersey lasted much longer than scheduled. During the trip I made several inquiries of the driver. He was friendly in the beginning but after eight or ten inquiries he grew impa­ tient. En route to lecture engagements I usually rehearsed the main points of my talk, but now, as time dragged on, I sat in anxiety and looked through the window with no patience for jokes.

E finally arrived at the little township with a delay of only W thirty minutes and I stepped off the bus into a deserted street. The door of the bus slammed and it disappeared at a sharp turning. I was left alone on the sidewalk near a gas station which was closed, this being Sunday.

I walked over to the comer and looked to the right and to the left.

All streets were identical, narrow and empty, there was not a sign of human or any other life. I was never in a situation like that before and this lack of precedence threw me almost in a panic. I was supposed to talk on the subject of the ludicrous, but I myself was now a bundle of despair and wretchedness. I had the address of the organization written down on a scrap of paper but there was nobody to ask. All the stores were shut and the little houses, mostly copies of some colonial architecture, had cur­ tains drawn over the windows and their doors seemed uninvitingly locked.

From the far distance, a man came toward me, a thin, tall fellow dressed in black with a round checkered hat on top of his skull. I waited for him to approach. I stopped him and he smiled. I asked him to direct me to May-June 1966

the address and his smile grew broader, but not friendlier, rather selfcentered and detached. He suddenly began to sing in a whirling Flamenco and tumbling over his long legs, he walked on until he disappeared. The situation looked hopeless.

Finally an idea dawned on me— only now I realize its audacity. I had noticed over the roofs of the clustered cottages, a protruding cross of a church and I began walking toward it. The gate of the church was closed, it was long after the services, but I pressed the button of a bell and after several minutes the door opened and the minister himself appeared and looked at me with undisguised astonishment. I had lived many of my previous years in a Catholic country but I never had the opportunity of conversing with a priest and I simply didn’t know how to address the clergy­ man now: “Mr.,” “Sir,” or “Your Reverence.” My embarassment was obvious and he asked me politely what was my desire. I told him that I was lost and that my desire, Sir, was to find this address; upon which I showed him the printed invitation of the “Culture Center.” He looked at it and said that the place wasn’t very far, but that there was ample chance that I might not find it myself. He added with complaint that some of the streets hadn’t even got a sign to their name. He bade me wait, dis­ appeared in the dark little passage and reappeared a moment later with a black overcoat over his clerical clothes.

OR a spectator the view of a priest in his sombre attire walk­ ing with a Jewish lecturer who was clutching under his arm a black brief­ case, would be most bizarre, but there were no spectators. It took us only

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five minutes to arrive at a tiny wooden people. The pictures were arranged structure, which was more a shack around a portrait of a man with a than a cottage, with a small sign bear­ slim cigar sticking out of his mouth ing the name of the society in Eng­ like a chimney. There were also a lish and in Yiddish. I thanked the few shelves with volumes of the three priest. I added after the polite for­ Jewish classics and text books for mula the title, “Your Reverence,” but school children. The only window in in a voice that made it blurred and the office was covered on both sides— uncertain. I walked up a flight of the inside with dust and the outside wooden stairs and knocked at the with snow. Here again—but this time door. There was no answer. I pressed on a sheet torn out from a notebook a button and waited. Again nothing. and glued to the wall with Scotch I was convinced that the whole gath­ tape—was an announcement of my ering was already in the meeting hall lecture. Here I was no more a poet, and that the president was already only a journalist and there was no apologizing for the speaker who mention of bringing along friends. couldn’t come because of the blizzard. Just “Come and laugh.”

I pushed the door and it opened with a squeak. Behind the door was a SUDDENLY heard voices coming passage. from somewhere and I followed The walls on both sides were cov­ them along the passage and onto a ered with photos, drawings, and no­ door. Without bothering to knock, I tices in the same two languages, Yid­ pushed it open and found myself in dish and English. I found among them a meeting room, of an immense size. a small poster bearing my own name One would have never suspected that with the title of my lecture. The poster a small cottage with a narrow front announced briefly: “Come on Sunday would have at the back a hall of at 4 o’clock and listen to the famous such a magnitude. There were about poet and journalist who will lecture a hundred chairs arranged more or on Jewish humor. Come yourself, less in rows except for a few which bring your friends, and have a hearty had refused to comply and they stood laugh.” The notice was signed by the apart with their backs to the presid­ president and several members of his ium. All the chairs were empty, only committee. one of them, somewhere in the center, The passage was empty. There were was occupied by an elderly man in a few doors leading in three direc­ a grey winter coat and in a heavy tions. I chose the door with the sign, cap made of some fluffy material. He “Office,” and knocked. There was no sat motionless and listened with atten­ reply. This time I pushed it with less tion to what was being said from the hesitation. The door gave in with the rostrum. Facing the door, in the re­ same ease as that of the front. The mote depth of the room, stood a office was empty. The only object on long, green-covered table with seven the black-leathered table was a tele­ elderly gentlemen, evidently the ex­ phone covered with dust and sur­ ecutive of the society, sitting around rounded with a few soiled ash trays. on high chairs. Six of the executives There were several pictures on the had grey but bushy hair, the seventh, walls, all of elderly but ruddy-looking the one in the center, despite his ob44 JEW ISH LIFE

1

viously advanced age was covered with a cluster of dense and fire-reddish locks.

As I opened the door all the gentle­ men of the presidium raised their heads and gave me a curious look.

One of them, who sat at the corner of the table over a big ledger, shouted to me: “What is it?”

The only way to answer was either to walk down to the executives’ table or to shout back from the place where I stood, from the threshold of the door. I decided to shout. “I’m the lecturer from New York.” I shouted loud enough for the whole executive to hear it, but obviously not impressively enough to draw the attention of the only man who con­ stituted the audience. The man with the ledger, no doubt the secretary, turned to the chairman with the

cluster of red hair: “Shall we let him in?”

The chairman looked at me with cold indifference and said not to me, but to his fellow executives, “He can, if he wants, sit down and wait until we’ll finish the general meeting.”

SAT DOWN on the nearest chair.

Now the balance in the room had changed-—there were seven men at the table and two in the audience; the elderly man with the fluffy cap and myself, the lecturer, with the briefcase and the notes about the hilarity of Jewish humor. After a little while, I began to realize that I had arrived in the middle of a heated debate. The subject of the debate was the problem of the cemetery lots which belonged to the organization. The question— this I gathered from the next few speeches—was a crucial one: several

1

members of the community, who were not members of this organization, had applied for the privilege of being buried, after their 120 years, in the lots of the society. But the opinions of the executive were sharply divided.

The president himself was absolutely against it. He spoke sitting down, he was too excited to stand, but he kept pounding with his gavel on the table at every word. His mind was made up, but although he was the president, he obviously did not have the full support of his colleagues, since his voice was trembling with rage.

“Never”—he said— “We shall never allow people who did not belong to us while they were alive to come to us after they die and lie in our graves.

They who have not planted shall not reap. As long as I am the president they will not get from us even half a grave, unless they’ll do it over my dead body.”

There were signs of foam in the corners of his mouth, and his red hair—but at that moment I began to have doubts as to its authenticity— began to shake. But then another man, who sat at his right—the vice presi­ dent—asked for the floor. He sprang to his feet. In contrast to the chair­ man whose face was made up of scraps and pieces and sharp, small­ boned angles, the vice president had under his growth of silvery hair, a round face with soft curves and friendly arches. His voice was mild but firm and profound.

“Gentlemen,” he said, “I can’t see why we should be so harsh and so uncompromising toward our brethren.

All they want is one little thing, that we bury them in our midst. I don’t see why we should refuse it. They want to rest in our plots? Fine. Let them. They are not going to bite us.”

46

The word “bite” was the cue to a new eruption from the chairman. His face became almost green with scorn.

“It’s not”—he said— “a question of biting. Nobody is afraid of their bites.

If they will bite we c&n bite back.

It is a question of justice. If they want to be buried, I have nothing against it. Every Jew has a right to a burial. But why in our graves?

Let/them go somewhere else.”

Two members at the extreme ends of the table stood up at the same moment and began to speak. But the chairman hit the table with his mallet.

“You cannot speak at the same time.

Sit down, both of you.”

They obediently sat down and the president gave the floor to the secre­ tary, of whose support he was ob­ viously more assured. And he was right. The secretary shared completely the president’s point of view.

“I am of the same opinion as the chairman. People who did not think it fit to share our duties during their lives, are not going to enjoy the pri­ vileges of their death.” He finished his verdict with a Yiddish idiom: “Let them take their feet over their shoulders and scram.”

But the scales again weighed iagainst the president when the treasurer, the only man with a mustache, rose to face the audience: “I am of the opinion that we should treat the ap­ plicants with more understanding and friendliness. What is it they want?

To be buried with us? Alright: Let them be! With the greatest of pleasure.”

The president’s face turned from green to blue. The split was too sharp to be solved by the usual method of arguing. What was necessary at this point was a Caeserean cut, and the cut was supplied by the secretary. He JEW ISH LIFE

pulled out a sheet of paper from a drawer and held it over the heads of his polleagues.

“The question”—he said—“is not whether we should or should not.

The question is altogether different: Can we afford it? Can we be so gen­ erous and give away graves to others?

Have we got enough for ourselves?

And the answer to this question— here he pointed his finger to the paper —is ‘no.’ And why no? Because we have hardly enough for ourselves.

It w°uld be a grave injustice if we would have to squeeze ourselves in order to let in outsiders.”

Y this time my attention was so B absorbed by the proceedings of the general meeting that I had for­ gotten the purpose of my presence.

Usually I spent the last few moments before getting up to lecture in making the final arrangements in my mind.

Not by recalling the contents. The final preparation has nothing to do with refreshing the memory. I had given my lecture on Jewish Humor so many times that I had already memorized not only the minutest points in their order of development (because all my lectures were built on the basis of architecture where the form is as important as the contents) I also knew by heart every turn and twist where one argument grew out of the other. But experience taught me that even the most perfect reten­ tion of the text was not sufficient.

The success of a lecture depends totally on the musical key of its de­ liverance. All audiences without ex­ ception are extremely sensitive and are not satisfied simply with a repro­ duction, they are content only when the delivery is an act of creation. The whole secret of success depends on May-June 1966

the lecturer’s mood, on his self-enjoyment, because he cannot be amusing to others if he isn’t amused and even surprised by his own words. The awareness of this always spurred me to arrive at a state of elation before the lecture. This wasn’t easy, it was not always possible to work oneself up to elation, but it was absolutely necessary.

However, at this moment, I was wholly absorbed by the unusual pro­ ceedings I was witnessing. Those last words of the secretary, his Caeserean cut, seemed to be final. Surely if the number of graves was hardly suffi­ cient for the long-standing members, what chance could there be for those who did not even carry the card of membership? But the debate was far from being concluded. The vice presi­ dent rose slowly from his chair and tore the secretary’s words to shreds.

“Gentlemen,” he said with a soft but cool mildness, “the secretary is right and wrong at the same time. I am not going to claim that we have an over-abundance of graves. I know very well that this is not the fact and I agree that we have enough of our own members to fill every grave.

But under what conditions? Under the condition that all those who be­ long to our organization will actually be brought to our plots. But, this is hardly the case. There are many among us, and I can supply a list of people who belong to several other societies at the same time and it is not at all certain that they will be buried in our section. You all know the case of our friend, Benny Wein­ stein, who had all his life assured us that he will rest among us; but what happened? When they opened his will we were shocked to learn that he wanted to be buried with the “Socialist 47

Society.” Gentlemen, Benny Weinstein and I expected another heated dis­ was not the only one. There are many cussion, but the vice-president, who others who have made up similiar was obviously acting as a permanent wills. Unfortunately they keep their mitigator, called for a point of order. plans a secret since they prefer to “I move,” he said, “to postpone this hold on to several graves at the same point till the end of the meeting, since time. But the fact is that their graves we have here our distinguished lec­ in our plots may remain unused and turer from New York who will give empty. I therefore suggest that a spe­ us a talk on Jewish humor. Let’s hear cial subcommittee be appointed to him out and then we shall return to conduct an investigation among the the/question of abandoned graves.” members to demand a clear answer to To my surprise the chairman ex­ the question: do you or don’t you pressed his agreement. want to be buried with us? Then we “The vice-president,” he said, “is shall have a clear picture of the right. Let the speaker come forward situation.” and say what he has to say. After But the president was still reluctant he’ll get it over, we’ll come back to to give in. He decided to take the our agenda.” matter to the general meeting; “Who I stood up and began walking down is in favor that we bury strangers in the floor clutching my briefcase under our midst, let them raise their hands.” an arm. The floor was squeaking and The elderly man in the overcoat I tried, like a ballerina, to walk on and fluffy cap didn’t move. my toes. When I finally arrived at “Who is against it?” the table, the seven executives moved Again the audience remained still. together and made room for me in This caused the secretary to announce the center, next to the chairman. Now that since the general meeting had I had no more doubts as to the not decided one way or another, the authenticity of his cluster of red hair. matter would be submitted to the It was definitely a wig, which sat special cemetery subcommittee. With loosely on the top of his head. I this problem at least temporarily re­ shook hands with everybody around moved from the agenda, the president the table, starting with the chairman, knocked the gavel on the table, and and then clockwise with all the rest. asked the secretary to read the agenda The balance in the room had now point number two. changed; we were eight persons around the table and one man in the ^ 1 3 OINT number two,” said the audience. I bent toward the chairman -T secretary, “is the question of and whispered into his ear: “Wouldn’t some of our members who may dur­ it be more proper for the members ing their lifetime move to other cities. of the executive to sit in the audi­ Are they entitled to a refund for their ence?” But he gave me a sharp look. already paid-up cemetery plots or “This” he said, “is a matter that should our committee, rather than lies entirely within the jurisdiction of pay back their money, find for them our committee. Our executives sit al­ plots of equal standing in our fraternal ways at the presidium and no lec­ societies of the prospective towns?” turer has ever tried to introduce new The subject again was controversial orders.” He banged his gavel: 48

JEW ISH LIFE

“Friends—he said— “we have now come to our next item, to the lecture.

As you know, we cannot think only of ourselves, we have also obligations toward Jewish culture. And so from time to time our New York office sends us a lecturer and all we have to do is sit and to listen. In the past we used to have great lecturers, prom­ inent writers such as Morris Rosenfeld or Dr. Chaim Zhitlowsky, but they are all gone and we have to be content with what we have. This time we tried to get for you the very able orator, Boruch Zalowitch, but he is sick and they took him to the hospital.

I move that we send him at this opportunity our hearties wishes for a refuah shelemah. As for this gentle­ man (he pointed at m e), I don’t know him personally, but he was recom­ mended by the office is New York and it is not our policy to quarrel with their recommendations. I hope that our friend from New York, who has been sitting for the last half hour in the audience, is acquainted with the fact that we have still some other points on the agenda and he will be as brief as is humanly possible. And now I give the floor to our guest from New York.”

NLY the vice-president clapped O three or four times when I rose to speak, but even before I said, “Thank you, Mr. Chairman,” the elderly man in the audience also stood up and began to leave. The president looked at him with scorn: “Mr. Blaustein, where do you think you are going?”

“I’m going home,” said Mr. Blau­

May-June 1966

stein and he put down the flaps of his cap over his ears. “ But the meeting isn’t over”— said the chairman—“we are going to hear a lecture*” “I didn’t come for no lectures”— said Mr. Blaustein—“I came to hear about the cemetery.”

“We all came to hear about the cemetery”— said the chairman—“but we have also obligations toward Jew­ ish culture. The debate on the ceme­ tery isn’t finished and as soon as this man will say briefly what he has to say, he will catch his bus back to New York and we shall have all the time to return to our subject.”

Mr. Blaustein didn’t seem con­ vinced, but he submitted to the disci­ pline of the organization. He sat back in his chair, but he left the flaps of his cap where they were: over his ears.

This was the first time in my ca­ reer of a lecturer that I abandoned the premise of the humor supremacy of the Jewish people. I also aban­ doned, but this under the pressure of the chairman, my customary prac­ tice of illustrating the lecture with examples of Jewish jokes. The chair­ man was holding a hand over my books and whenever I wanted to open one of them and read aloud a joke, he pressed down the palm of his hand and said: “Let’s stick to brass tacks.”

After I finished the lecture, the executive helped me to collect my notes with the books into the brief­ case and we again shook hands. On my way to the door, I saw Mr. Blau­ stein lifting the flaps from his ears and settling down with a renewed attention.

49

B o o k R eview s A N ew Presentation of Family P urity

By SIFRA TENDLER A HEDGE OF ROSES. Jewish Insights into Marriage and Married Life. By Rabbi Norman Lamm. Philipp Feld* heim, Inc., New York, 1966, $1.75, 92 pp.

N the foreword to this work, Rabbi Lamm states that his purpose is “to present, in a manner meaningful to the modern Jew, a Jewish institution that is as sacred as it is ancient, as precious as it is unknown, and as vital as it is misunderstood.” We must certainly agree that Taharath Hamishpochah is certainly the most misunderstood precept of the Torah—the one about which the modern Jew is most ignorant. By means of this little volume, the author achieves his goal in explaining in a lucid and poetic style the sacred nature and vitalizing force of this fundamental law of Jewish family life.

From a brief discussion of the Torah’s attitude toward marital sex, the author leads into a general description of the laws of Niddah, the menstruant. At this point Rabbi Lamm very emphatically dispells some of the misconceptions of Taharath Hamishpochah by pointing out that they arose primarily from semantic

I

MRS. SIFRA TENDLER is the wife of a noted Talmudist-scientist and the daughter of a Torah luminary. She lives in Monsey, N.Y., and is active in educational endeavor there.

50

difficulties in translating taharah as “pure” or “clean” and tumah as “im­ pure” or “unclean.” After stressing that the reader must keep in mind that the Law is G-d-given, whereas the reasons and purposes attributed to it are merely the insights of men, the author goes on to elaborate on the various explana­ tions offered for these mitzvoth.

Pleasingly printed in pocket-size for­ mat, the modest size of Rabbi Lamm’s booklet is certainly not a measure of its importance. There has long been an urgent need for a modern presentation of Taharath Hamishpochah that would effectively convey its values as well as its immediate purposes, that would do so with percipient thought and grace of language and style. We have needed an accessible “introduction” to Jewish Family Purity that would present the concept and application of this mitzvah in terms meaningful and compelling to the Jew of today—and particularly to the one whose outlook is shaped by the ideas and standards of surrounding so­ ciety rather than by Jewish premises.

“A Hedge of Roses” goes far towards meeting this need. One can think of no work on the subject comparable to it.

It will be read with pleasure and ap­ preciation by many for its merits as JEW ISH LIFE

literature and as ideological exposition and will surely become a standard tool for all seeking to enlighten others as to Jewish Family Purity.

Finding the author’s imagery so mean­ ingful and poetic, and his presentation as a whole of such rare value, the in­ clination of the reviewer is to acclaim “A Hedge of Roses’* without reserva­ tion as to the rendering of particular points. However, since American Ortho­ doxy has been uniquely inarticulate, especially in the area of Taharath Hamishpochah, any author who writes in this field carries the burden that his every word will be accepted as author­ itative information on this subject. Even minor errors in fact or interpretation loom disproportionately large. It is therefore regrettable that this beautiful essay is marred by several such errors.* A clear differentiation between the issur of niddah and tumath niddah would have saved the author much effort in overcoming the unpleasant connotation of the word “impurity” applied to the latter. The issur of niddah, which in­ volves only the relationship of husband and wife, is as applicable today, and in exactly the same way, as it was when the law was first given. The laws of tumath niddah, which involved anyone coming into contact with a menstruant, were in effect only at the time of the Beth Hamikdosh. I refer to p. 35, where it is stated: “Most of these forms of im­ purity have fallen into disuse today, sim­ ply because of the historical circumstance of the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. . . . Only the law of the im­ purity of the niddah remains intact. . . .

At this point I should like to suggest that it would have been appropriate, * The reviewer consulted with competent Halachic authority before presuming to offer these criticisms.

May-June 1966

when listing the present-day uses of the Mikveh (p. 36) to have mentioned fvillath kelim, immersion of household vessels before initial use, an application that involves every Jewish home.

It also seems to this reviewer that the author detracts from the effective­ ness of his work by so much as men­ tioning pseudo-scientific “evidence” for the benefits of Taharath Hamishpochah.

I refer to p. 44 regarding medical ben­ efits and p. 85, where Rabbi Lamm states that there is a difference between “nat­ ural” and “artificially accumulated” water. The equating of the “natural” with the healthy and the permissible is, of course, most strange since the author certainly knows that stagnant water is permissible for use as a Mikveh whereas most lakes and streams, although truly natural, are forbidden.

Likewise, on p. 81, he perpetuates the error of the secular translators of our Torah by equating “metzorah” with leprosy, a disease with dermatalogical manifestations that it certainly does not resemble, or “running issue” with gon­ orrhea, which is unrelated to “zov” as detailed in the Talmud.

On p. 24 the author gives the reader room for serious error by defining giluy aroyoth, for which a man must surren­ der his life in order to avoid trans­ gressing, as “unchastity.” The connota­ tion of “unchastity” to the modern mind is not that of Halachic adultery in­ volving a married Jewess, which is the only aspect of giluy aroyoth for avoid­ ance of which life must be surrendered.

HESE minor criticisms are offered in the hope that Rabbi Lamm will consider them in preparing for the sec­ ond edition which I am sure will be called for very soon, since this book undoubtedly deserves to be a runaway

T

51

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52

JEW ISH LIFE

best-seller. It is my sincere conviction that every Jewish wife and wife-to-be would find new inspiration in reading this essay and would have to agree with the author that “so profound and far

reaching is the influence of family pur­ ity over the nature of marriage . . . that if it did not exist already, we should have to invent it for our own protection and welfare.”

Ye Shall Be Holy

By GERSION APPEL

THE CODE OF MAIMONIDES—The Book of Holiness. Translated by Louis I. Rabinowitz and Philip Grossman. Yale University Press, New Haven, 1965, 429 pp., $10.

HE treasures of Torah and Jewish learning are becoming increasingly accessible to the modern Jew whose He­ brew is limited, but who still seeks knowledge and enlightenment regarding his Jewish heritage. A significant contri­ bution in this respect has been made by the Yale Judaica Series which has pub­ lished translations of ancient and medi­ eval Jewish classics from Hebrew, Ara­ maic, Ethiopic, and Arabic. At the fore­ front of this endeavor is its translation of Maimonides’ Code of Jewish Law, the Mishneh Torah.

Rabbi Mosheh ben Maimon (Rambam, Maimonides) is first and foremost the great builder and codifier of Jew-

T

RABBI DR. GERSION APPEL, spiritual leader of the Kew Gardens (N.Y.) Synagogue Adath Yeshurun, is the author of noted scholarly works.

May-June 1966

ish law. His halachic activity centered on three major works. The first was his Perush Ha-Mishnayoth, a commentary on the Mishnah written in Arabic and trans­ lated into Hebrew by Samuel Ibn Tibon. This was followed by the Sefer HaMitzvoth, also written in Arabic, which is an exposition of the Divine command­ ments, and was intended as a preface to his Mishneh Torah. In this latter work, Maimonides set himself the monumen­ tal task of organizing and codifying Jewish law from the vast Rabbinic lit­ erature, the Babylonian and Jerusalem Talmud, the halachic Midrashim and Gaonic responsa before him. Writing in classic Hebrew style and with a genius for systematization, Rambam reveals therein the highest spiritual and ethical ideals of the Torah and Jewish law. He sets forth all of the laws of Judaism, even including such as are deemed to be inapplicable until the advent of the Messiah, a fact which in the view of some scholars reflects Maimonides’ in­ tention to formulate a constitution for the Jewish State to be reestablished by

53

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TORAH AND TRADITION

by WALTER ORENSTEIN and HERTZ FRANKEL This Bible textbook for religious schools of all trends has a new and creative approach to the teaching of CHUMASH by emphasizing the ethical teachings of the text, while laying due stress on the understanding of the Hebrew.

The authors have received much acclaim for their volume TORAH AS OUR GUIDE, which is used in hundreds of schools.

TORAH AND TRADITION is the textbook Jewish teachers have long been hoping for. It is highly recommended by prominent educators who have seen advance copies of this unique tool for the effective and enjoyable teaching of CHUMASH.

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JEW ISH LIFE

the Jews upon their return to the Holy Land of Israel.

The Book of Holiness, Sefer Kedushah, which is the fifth book of Mai­ monides’ great code, has appeared re­ cently in an English translation from the original Hebrew made by Louis I. Rabinowitz and Philip Grossman, and pub­ lished under the general editorship of Leon Nemoy as the sixteenth volume in the Yale Judaica Series. In this book Maimonides propounds the laws pre­ scribed by the Torah for a life of holi­ ness. In Judaism, holiness (kedushah) is equated with separation (perishuth). As clearly enunciated by the Sages in their commentary on the Biblical exhortation, “Ye shall be holy” (Vayikra [Lev.] 19:2; see Torath Kohanim, ibid.), this concept of holiness implies abstinence, self-dis­ cipline, and temperance. As further ex­ pounded by later expositors of the Bible, such as Rashi and Ramban, it is taken to apply to the full range of human ac­ tivities. That Maimonides, likewise, sub­ scribed to this conception of holiness is evident throughout his code as well as his philosophical work, the Guide of the Perplexed. It is given concrete expres­ sion in the title Sefer Kedushah, the Book of Holiness, that he gives to this

book which comprises treatises on illicit relations, forbidden foods, and Shechitah, and contains the laws promulgated to effect self-control and restraint in these areas.

M

AIMONIDES’ style in his Mishneh Torah is precise and lucid through­ out, and the translators have succeeded commendably in incorporating these qualities into their fine translation of the original. Their work is rendered the more useful by an introduction, a table of contents, notes, glossary, Scriptural references, and index. While the notes may, as intended, serve the scholar in tracing the sources and in illuminating the text itself, it is regrettable that these translations of Maimonides’ code gener­ ally do not provide for a more expanded commentary. Such a commentary on the text would help make it more meaning­ ful to the average reader. That this would be in accord with Maimonides’ own objective is to be seen from his Hakdomah to the Mishneh Torah, where he states his purpose to be to render Torah Law accessible “in clear language and in a concise manner . . . so that the specific laws pertaining to every commandment be manifest to all.”

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JEWISH LIFE

L e tte r s to th e E d ito r "Confrontation" New Brunswick, N.J. I read with great interest Dr. Jerry Hochbaum’s lucid analysis of JewishGentile relationships in our society which appeared in his article, “The Jewish-Gentile Confrontation: A Sociological Per­ spective,” in your November/December issue. The position most of us take on this question is determined by our social circumstances. The logic of Dr. Hoch­ baum’s exposition and his masterful sketch of Jewish life in this country has the merit of opening the question for a more careful and deliberate formulation of what the Jewish posture should be.

May I add that as a non-observant Jew I was very impressed that your periodical contained articles of such style and sub­ stance.

D. Rosen

Between Man and Man New York, N.Y. On reading Rabbi Norman Lamm’s article “G-d Is Alive” (March/April issue), his dissection of the Christian theologians who have adopted the “G-d Is Dead” slogan of a German philos­ opher of the last century reminded me of this story: A mother had tucked her little boy in bed for the night and start­ ed to leave the room. The boy, suddenly afraid, cried out “Mammy, Mammy— don’t leave me alone!” The mother re-

May-June 1966

sponded: “But you are not alone, dear— G-d is with you,” and the child then said: “I know, Mama, but I want to see someone with a face!”

Those theologians, and other intellec­ tuals of dulled perception, who cannot see G-d in the phenomena of Nature as did the great minds throughout history, want to see G-d with a face like the little boy in the story, and not seeing a face, proclaim: “G-d is dead!” Someone once said: The wise man studies and investi­ gates things he does not understand, while the fool either believes or denies.

Rabbi Lamm poses the question: How can we bring man back to G-d and to religion? Our Sages tell us that the Torah speaks in the language of man. I there­ fore venture to suggest that rabbis and other religious leaders speak and write in the language of man. By this I mean that they should propagate the mitzvoth beyn odom Vchavero, between man and man, in terms that will reach the hearts and minds of all. In the tractate Kedushin, we find it said: There is a bad Tzadik and a good Tzadik; the one who is good towards G-d but bad towards his fellow man, that is a bad Tzadik; the one who is good towards both G-d and man is a good Tzadik. I believe that if religious forces would emphasize and practice the mitzvoth of beyn odom Vchavero, Jews and non-Jews will see that religion is interested in the daily welfare of humanity and will come nearer to religion.

Dr. Abraham Lebow

57

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MetherS,

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From the spotless kitchens of Mother’s Food Products, Inc., Newark 5, N. J. 58

JEWISH LIFE

"Dialogue": Rebuttal

them? Did the Rebbe blackmail them by threatening to take his patronage away from them? It is quite obvious that these New York, N.Y. “disloyal” shool members were to some Re: My article “A Dialogue on Davextent dissatisfied with things as they ening” (Jan./Feb. ’66) and the pursuant were in the shool, found something more “Rejoinder” (Mar/Apr. ’66). attractive to them in the shtibel, and de­ Since I was not able to give the matan cided to switch! And there is a difference b’seiser (anonymous contributor) matan (in spite of Mr. or Rabbi X’s attempt s'choro b’tzido (his reward on the spot), to minimize it). Are the “switchers” to permit me to quote pertinent passages of be blamed—is the Rebbe to be blamed— the “Rejoinder” as I reply to them. for preferring one over the other?

“The entire article reads like an apol^M “It is presumptuous . . . to question ogia skillfully prepared by a good public the standards of a Vaad Hakashruth . . . relations man . . . creating a favorable organized and administered by rabbonim image for his client and his wares” and laymen who are . . . dedicated to a One of the first things I learned in Torah way of life.” my logic course is that an argumentum A careful re-reading of my article will ad hominem (attacking the proponent show that I did not question the stand­ instead of the issue) is one of the weak­ ards of any Vaad Hakashruth (including est arguments in an intelligent debate. that “of the community in which the au­ “The Rabbi {of the “big” Shool) in­ thor of the article resides”). I merely vests his time and talent . . . in building maintained the right of any Rabbi, Rebbe up his congregation without retaining any or congregation not to be forced—in the equity whatsoever. The Rebbe {of the name of community unity—to accept re­ Shtibel) does likewise— but all that he ligious standards he feels should be more builds . . . is ultimately his. . . . If and stringent. Can the writer of the “Rejoin­ when he chooses to move he will sell der” imagine himself, in some out-ofhis Beth Hamedrosh to the highest bid­ town community, being castigated for not der. . . .” participating in certain projects he would Granted. And so what? Does Mr. X not approve? Are there different yard­ (or is it Rabbi X?) refuse to enjoy a sticks for the “ins” and for the “outs”? product or a service because it is offered “The author . . . (should) have re­ by a profit-making concern? If the Shti­ bel provides the leadership, the atmos­ pealed some of the true motivations of phere, the facilities for that which its shtibel congregants in bypassing the com­ congregants desire, and the “price”—in munity synagogue . . . For the average terms of dues, contributions, etc.—is person it is or initially seems more eco­ right, why should anyone care about its nomical . . . There are greater opportunties for honors— omud and aliyah . . . In financial structure?

“How ethical . . . can an institution be a shtibel one is not in danger of being whose foundation is predicated upon a little fish in a big pond. . . ” Is my critic rendering me “aid and raiding . . . community synagogues for its initial minyon? The Rebbe . . . pirated comfort”? Is he offering arguments for congregants from the synagogue . . . con­ my case? Perhaps the “big shool” is out­ vincing them to come to his shtibel. . . .” growing its usefulness. Why should the How did the Rebbe convince these “average person” not be able to afford wayward congregants? Did he bribe the taxing financial burden of his con-

May-June 1966

59

gregation (and perhaps be looked down places and low. My desire was to de­ upon as a second-class member)? Why fend, not offendr Those individuals who should he not have a reasonable oppor­ took offense at my remarks must have tunity to lead the prayers at the omud felt themselves to be in the line of fire. or get an aliyah from time to time? I did not put them there.

Why should he be made to feel like a Bernard Merling “little fish in a big pond”? Perhaps, in these times of shifting populations and Re: "Rejoinder" to changing neighborhoods, the building of "Dialogue on Davening" million-dollar synagogue complexes— with the concommitant tendency to vast Dow nsvi^, Ont., Canada memberships and burdensome financial We have in our city of about 100,000 needs—is not the wisest investment for Yidden, ken yirbu, four great modern the Jewish community. (But that is a orthodox shools, the ideal of the writer subject for another article.) from Queens. Each has a social hall and “Far from being a dialogue, (the ar­ a kitchen to serve it. Each caters to Barticle) is a monologue . . .” mitzvahs on Shabboth, with all the chiU I plead guilty. My intention was to lul shabboth befarhessia involved. It is present a case for one’s right to estab­ an almost every-Shabboth occurrence to lish or to attend a shtibel. And Heaven see these shools ringed with cars, bring­ only knows that there has been consid­ ing guests to and fro. A special feature erable criticism of shtiblach, in high is added on a Shabboth following two

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JEW ISH LIFE

days of Yomtov, when these guests in­ vade the orthodox shool, freshly shaven and sit amongst the regular mithpalelim with their three-day beards, thus brazenly displaying their disregard for everything that is holy to us not only by driving up to the very doorstep of the synagogue, but to and including the Aron Hakodesh.

The argument that it is still better to have these mechalleley shabboth for the duration of the ceremony in an ortho­ dox shool than elsewhere, is fallacious, because (a) we do not grant that privi­ lege to be in the holy place at our ex­ pense, for Kiddush Hashem—it is their host who pays for it, and (b) I have never experienced a case where an ortho­ dox Rabbi would use the opportunity of so many mechalleley shabboth attending, to explain to them the importance of shemirath shabboth and the severity of the opposite—oh no, they are guests and are not to be embarrassed.

As for the selflessness of the Rabbi who, in the words of the writer from Queens, “invests his time and talent, ef­ forts and energy in building up his con­ gregation without retaining any equity whatsoever,” it is a well-known fact that the salary of a rabbi in a modern shool is far from modest and is indeed one of the reasons behind the above-mentioned business activities of the congregation.

One of the leading Gedolim of Amer­ ica admitted to the undersigned -that he tried to discuss this scandalous Barmitzvah situation with some of his talmidim who are now serving as rabbis; they only laughed at him “deriber tor men nit reiden.”

Isac Wagner

More Proportional Outlook Philadelphia, Pa. May I take this opportunity to thank Bernard Merling for his excellent article, “A Dialogue on Davening,” which ap-

May-June 1966

peared in the January/February issue of Jewish Life .

Mr. Merling’s presentation of the dis­ course between “the Rebbe” and “I” was a rare display of narration. The exchange of divergent opinions was aptly handled and merits much commendation by all interested religious leaders. The author’s analysis of these varied perspectives will help create within us a more proportion­ ed outlook in our conception of religious ideals.

Personally, through means of this arti­ cle, I have become better educated and acquainted with an important phase of comparative religious values. As a means of promoting further discussion, it would be well if a series of articles could be written on other aspects of this impor­ tant topic.

Jewish Life is to be complimented for this interesting summary.

Sidney Phillips

CR ITIC CRITICIZED Brooklyn, N. Y. Ordinarily, I would have been re­ luctant to engage in polemics with your reviewer of my study, “Luzzatto’s Ethico-Psychological Interpretation of Judaism,” which appeared in the MarchApril 1966 issue of your magazine.

This I consider to be his inalienable right and perogative as a critic. Such disagreements have always benefited and enriched scholarship. Kinath sofrim tarbey chochmah. However, the tenor of his criticism, the three-pronged at­ tack on the author, editor, and publisher, makes me suspect that his review was hardly written lishmah, for the sake of pure unadulterated scholarship.

His unacademic, enraged, and horta­ tive tone evokes the question, whether the reviewer wrote his criticism meaha-

61

vath Mordecai, from his * profound knowledge of Luzzatto or misinath Homon, out of antipathy to a trend in Jewish life., Permit me, therefore, to examine cer­ tain points in your reviewer’s critique who as a result of his pashtuth, (a fa­ vorite expression of the reviewer), over­ looked or found difficult to comprehend, due to what he considers, “ponderous, hyphenated terminology.” Samuel David Luzzatto (I have a strong suspicion that the reviewer confuses him with Rabbi Moshe Hayyim Luzzatto) was not a simpleton (pashtan) as the reviewer would like him to be, but one of the leading intellectuals, scholars, and phi­ losophers of the nineteenth century. In my study, I attempted therefore, to present a . systematic exposition of this thought within the intellectual context of the philosophy of his era. (a) My study entitled “Luzzatto’s Ethico-Psychological Interpretation of Judaism” is not a preface to my trans­ lation of the Yesodey Hatorah. The in­ clusion of the latter in the same volume was only incidental.

Consequently, the reviewer’s assump­ tion that my interpretation of Luzzatto’s philosophy is merely based on the latter is erroneous. My study, as I clearly indicated, is founded on Luzzatto’s vo­ luminous works, “hundreds of articles, essays as well as numerous letters in Hebrew, Italian, French, Latin, and German.” (p. 19) (b) Had the reviewer been even par­ tially familiar with Luzzatto’s works, he could not have maintained that my view on Abrahamism and Mosaism is merely built “upon two or three sen­ tences.” This statement merely reveals the reviewer’s erudition of the subject.

Actually, this concept is only alluded to in the Yesodey Hatorah. It was, how­ ever, extensively discussed by Luzzatto

62

in his essay, “Attisicme et Judaisme,” in French, in the Zeitschrift fur die Wissenschaft des Judentums and in numerous letters in his Epistolario, in Italian, languages with which the re­ viewer may not be conversant. (c) Luzzatto’s view on Hebraism and Atticism as two antithetical forces in our culture have been widely discussed by scholars like Klausner, Lachover, Bernfeld, Sha’anan, Heinemann, etc. of whom the reviewer is apparently unaware or for whom he has no respect. (d) The reviewer’s entire knowledge of Luzzatto apparently comes from the Yesodey Hatorah, which he read in my English translation. Had his knowledge extended to any other works of Luzzatto, particularly to his Biblical exegesis, he could not equate him with “Pashtanim” of the caliber of Chofetz Chayim, Rashi, Saadia (Saadia— a pashtanl) and Hillel.

With all my admiration of Luzzatto, I do not believe that they would have accepted some of his critical emenda­ tions of the Prophets nor would they have agreed with some of his views. (e) The fact that the Yesodey Ha­ torah was written in pashtuth does not make it less philosophical. Many great and profound ideas were expounded in a supposedly simple style. In my study I mentioned Luzzatto’s reticence to ex­ press certain opinions in public which might have endangered his position in the conservative Collegio Rabbinico in Padua. As a result, one must probe the depth beneath the deceptive surface of pashtuth. It is only a pashtan who takes such pashtuth for granted. (f) The reviewer maintains that “everything that Luzzatto wrote cries out against philosophy and philoso­ phers.” Had he read at least my study before reviewing it, he would have real­ ized that his “cries” were directed JEW ISH LIFE

against the speculative philosophers like Spinoza but not against such moderate rationalists as Locke, Condillac, etc. with whom he agreed and whose philosophies he extolled.

In conclusion, may I avail myself par* tially of the precedent created by your reviewer asking the editor why a vol­ ume of a philosophic nature should be reviewed by an attorney who, as he candidly admits, has difficulties with the philosophic terminology current in this field. May I also humbly suggest that since he so admirably reviewed a book on philosophy, he should be granted the opportunity to write a pashtuth review on a book dealing with theoretical phys­ ics, cybernetics, or interplanetary timespace relationships. I am certain that such a review would be just as pene­ trating and just as delightful.

N oah H . Rosenbloom

Reply by Reuben E. Gross: Although Dr. Rosenbloom would deny me the privilege of “philosophizing” I must concede that he has mastered one of the first principles of trial practice, that is, with an unmeritorious case damn the opposing lawyer, or as Dr. Rosen­ bloom might put it, when urging a proposition (or lemma) that can be established only by a fallacious syllogism, resort to ad hominem argumentation.

Withal, I cannot accept Dr. Rosen­ bloom’s separation of law and philosophy as distinct disciplines. Philosophers should be lawyers of the Universe.

Lawyers should be philosophers of Man to Fellowman relationships (or juridicolegislative operators in the socio-politicoeconomic domain, to use Rosenoomese).

Dr. Rosenbloom’s letter establishes the validity of my criticism with startling May-June 1966

clarity. He expresses the core of his dif­ ficulty in translating “pashtan” as “sim­ pleton.” Of course Luzzatto was no sim­ pleton: I surely agree that “Many great and profound ideas were expounded in a . . . simple style.” But what I just cannot seem to get through to Dr. Rosenbloom is that “ponderous, hyphenated terminol­ ogy” is not a virtue. The function of writers, teachers, and lawyers alike, is to communicate, to reach minds, and this is best accomplished by simplicity, where possible. Complexity, where required, is a necessary evil.

To take the points raised by Dr. Rosenbloom, seriatim, (a) If the inclu­ sion of the Yesodey Hatorah in the same volume as his monograph was “only in­ cidental,” he misled not only me but his editor, Dr. Stitskin, who said in the pref­ ace that its inclusion is of “special sig­ nificance” and that it is in Yesodey Ha­ torah that Luzzatto “set out to interpret the Mitzvoth ha-Torah in the light of the principle of employing certain human in­ stincts to counterpoise human passions” (b) If there is a broader base for Dr. Rosenbloom’s theory of Abrahamism versus Mosaism than the few sentences in the Yesodey Hatorah, Dr. Rosen­ bloom misled all his readers with his statement quoted in my review that Luz­ zatto left this theory “in its embryonic state” and that “neither he nor his fol­ lowers ever elaborated on it.” (c) Dr. Rosenbloom’s paragraph (c) is a fair example of his compulsive dis­ play of knowledge characterized by the name-dropping philosophers in a totally irrelevant manner. I said nary a word about the whole issue of Hebraism ver­ sus Hellenism, but like a feuding child who boasts, “Yeh! I can say a bigger word than you can,” he rattles off a list of names, mostly of authors of articles of relatively recent vintage in Israeli journals, upon a subject that has drawn 63

the attention of almost every Jewish thinker since the writing of II Maccabees.

What this has to do with my review escapes me. (d) Not only can Dr. Rosenbloom say bigger words than I, he has read more lines of Shadal, and therefore, I must accept, uncritically, all that he has to say. This is his position. However, one notes that aside from “Atticisme et Judaisme,” some letters from the “Epistolario,” some Biblical comments, and the Yesodey Hatorah, Dr. Rosenbloom gives little indication of familiarity with other of Shadal’s prolific writings. In Dr. Rosenbloom’s more than three hundred and thirty footnotes, he cites Yesodey Hatorah more than sixty times, but of all other works of Luzzatto, there are about twenty-five, mostly forced citations, all limited to the above mentioned works.

With most authors such evidence would be inconclusive. With this author, how­ ever, it is very soon apparent that what­ ever Rosenbloom reads Rosenbloom cites, whether applicable or not. I agree that the inclusion of Saadia in my list of pashtanim is dubious (but defensible).

For this, however, the editor, owes me an apology. He was asked, before pub­ lication, to strike out Saadia and substi­ tute Halevi, concerning whom one Neumark of the HUC wrote a similarly silly monograph about fifty years ago, trying to make a “philosophe” of him, too, with considerably more justification. (e) At least Dr. Rosenbloom does concede the fact “that the Yesodey Ha­

64

torah was written in pashtuth,” and I think I can safely rest my entire case on that admission. The proof of his sophistication is upon Dr. Rosenbloom, and I would want more than his own assertion to prove it.

However, since Dr. Rosenbloom has attacked not only my literacy but my motives, permit me a further word in reply. He correctly suspects that I am motivated by an "«‘antipathy to a trend in Jewish life” and not by anything per­ sonal toward him or the sponsoring in­ stitution. That institution is the alma mater of my sons and myself and I hold toward it extraordinary warmth. How­ ever, I am troubled when an “alte mama” rouges herself and gads about trying to make an impression upon those with whom she should have no ties.

When the rouge spills over onto a good Jew like Shadal, it is time to call a halt.

I would like to add that on my part I would gladly pay respectful attention to any review by Dr. Rosenbloom of books on theoretical physics, cybernetics, or interplanetary time-space relationships, even though I might be able to design a flip-flop circuit; with a shorter time cycle than he, or integrate a complex variable more deftly. (I’m sure my solu­ tion would be a more simple statement of the result, although of equivalent value.)

My sincerest regrets for any personal hurt to the feelings of Dr. Rosenbloom.

Reuben E. Gross

JEW ISH LIFE

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