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PAGE FIVE

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miliar with Jewish life here knows the
value of the community center and
what it has accomplished by way of
establishing mutuality of interest, of #
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4
creating Jewish solidarity. And if
By RABBI LEON FRAM
here, why not Palestine?
I have not formulated this thought
and enlightenment. The law of blood
Which book of laws is the more ad-
revenge, wherever it is permitted to as a panacea. There are no panaceas
vanced with regard to the humane
continue to operate, keeps human hi. for problems.
treatment of criminals, the laws of
But it would he a starting point. It
ings segregated into small groups and
the Bible or the laws of the State of
makes impossible the co-operation and would he what, if I were a psycho-an- I
Michigan.
alyst,
I should describe as an attempt
friendship which are essential to the
I Such a question I realize must sound forming of nations and to the develop- to penetrate to the subconscious. It
sacriligious to all who believe that ment of international amity. The rab- would, indeed, be the subconscious in-
nothing can possibly be advanced be- bis who followed the Biblical teachers fluence of the community center that
yond the Bible, not even scientific in- later on completed the reformation would accomplish the desired result.
I formation. In the State of Tennessee, which was begun by the institution of Necessarily, it would be a slow protest
: for instance, or in Kentucky, or in the City of Refuge, and, in the spirit but, in the long run, an effective one.
putting of of the prophets, abolished, as far as
North Carolina, the very putting
Others who saw things in Jerusalem
such
a question
be coo=l law d its practice was concerned, the whole as I saw thrill, and most of the Ameri-
an outrage.
Can would
the man-made
cans settled in Palestine, have thought
fC of a modern state be better than the system Of capital punishment.
We began of the problem and its solution along
divine law written by the hand of God The question with which
hews pertain- exactly the sonic lines. Older Pales-
in the Bible? And even more liberal is ing
then
answered.
to the
treatment The
of crime recorded tinians, like David Yellin, my inter-
thinkers, those who are willing to con- in the Book of Deuteronomy, do not view with whom on this subject was
cede that the Bible is no textbook of constitute the most advanced or the published recently, holds to the same
O
science, would probably be equally most humane moral institutions; but view. Rabbi Samuel M. Cohen, execu-
shocked by such a question for their considered in the light of the savage tive director of the United Synagogue
attitude is that while the Bible is not customs which they arose to modify, of America, who was in Palestine at
0
be taken as en
a treatise of science, It they are revealed to us as a vast stride the sonic time as I, brought hack the
same thought, and better. He brought
is the supreme authority on all moral
questions. The treatment of crimi- forward in civilization.
Meantime, I am aw are that, fright- back a concrete suggestion to his or-
nals is a moral question. Consequent-
of crime ganization; namely, that there ought
ly, even the religious modernist who coed by the steady
er are
th increase
ninny peoplee who
Re- to he such a center in Jerusalem, but
sees no contradiction between science in Detroit, there
that it should be a synagogue center.
ill , and the Bible would look askance at the would reconside progressi v
chigan
That would stamp the center with
lion taken by the State of Mi
p •
I proposition that laws mad e
some time ago in abolishing capital an indelible Jewish character. It
mortals could not be conceived of as pnishment. They think that the would not be a social center, merely,
superior to the moral principles laid threat of death might deter potential but a Jewish center and, as David Yel-
down in the text of the Bible. And criminals. Actually, however, the re- lin visualized it for me, a Beth Ann of
there is a certain amount of truth in introduction of capital punishment the finest, highest type.
this attitude. It will stand the test would mean that only each one of us
It is what Dr. Magnes had in mind
of reason provided we look upon the becomes also a killer. It would mean when he wrote Rabbi Cohen on the
Bible itself as the result of an evolu- that the re-introduction of the savage subject about a year ago. I take the
simple,
a
in in
tionary process and
liberty of quoting this one paragraph
IOW conceptions of mor-
primitive
and
ality which
develop gradually into the that one killing demands another. The from his letter:
"There is great need within the city
supreme ethical teaching of the great only proper motive that a truly civil-
ized man may indulge in with regard itself of a Jewish renter of the type
to crime, is the protection of society of the Central Jewish Institute in
prophets.
There has been very little moral ad- and the re-adjustment of the criminal. New York. Such a building would
wince beyond such sublime teachers of Neither of these ends will be attained have provisions for a synagogue and It
righteousness as Isaiah and Jeremiah. by a retrogression to the law of blood would have at the same time the re-
But in reading the laws which are re- revenge. It is not severity of punish- ligious, educational and 060 activi-
corded in the chapters on crime and ment which deters the criminal, but ties that would, I ant convinced, he a
punishment in the book of Deuteron- celerity and certainty of punishment. great boon to the community, particu-
omy, we are face to face with small If we are disturbed by the increase of larly the youth." A boon, too, for the
and faltering efforts at moral growth
h.i crime in our midst, we must think not hundreds, the thousands of visitors
which we, the heirs of the later prop
0f how to make our punishments more who are dismayed and chagrined, even
ets and rabbis, can judge from the I , brutal, but rather of how to make our as I was, not to find a synagogue in
of .1 erusalem,
vantage point of a superior position. punishments surer and swifter. We .1 irusalem worthy
Thus we in the state of Michigan can must not lose control of the savage worthy of Judaism.
Particularly the youth, says Dr.
look at the Biblical law "He that kills impulses which are always lurking
a man shall himself he killed" from within us ready to overwhelm us and Magness For the sake of the Jewish
the vantage point of a society which undo the work of evolution. All the youth of Palestine, for the sake of the
has advanced beyond that crude OM- future of mankind rests upon our in- youth with peyoth and the youth in
ception. sistence that human life shall be re- cap and House, for the sake of adding
ed so sacred as to be inviolable to the reconstructive forces of Erez
By taking this position we do by no sanded
means discredit the Bible. In order either by courts and executioners or Yisroel, of gaining so many wonder-
•
ful assets, for the creating of a uni-
I to appreciate the value of the various by diplomats and armies.
fied Jewish youth, each leavening the
portions of the Bible we must study
other and each raising the other to
in
the
light
of
the
social
condi-
them
greater spiritual heights I rejoice that
ti:;•:s which prevailed when they were
the United Synagogue of America is
written and compare them with the
(Continued from Page 4)
calling to the Jews of this country to
1 51 world of s avagry and barbarism in
, which they appeared. Even the mean- bringing about communication, con- give Jerusalem its much needed Syn-
' est of the Biblical laws appears as a tact, in establishing a mutuality of in- agogue Center.
INSURANCE EXCHANGE BLDG.
tL l
J
All lovers of Israel, all lovers of Pal-
searchlight upon a sea of darkness. terest between Jew and Jew has been
t
And one of the most interesting illus. the community center. I need not di- estine will rejoice to respond to this
Cadillac 7100
dua
1
and
faltering
call.
late upon this. Everyone who is fa-
trations of the gra
' advance which the Mosaic law marks
above the prevailing savagery is to be
found in that strange institution
which is described in the nineteenth
chapter of Deuteronomy, the institu-
tion called "The City of Refuge."
What is this City of Refuge? We read
that when a man kills unintentionally,
he must run as fast as he can to a
, pisomiumminion
,necial city called the City of Refuge.
This City of Refuge is not a court
whose temporary protection the inno-
egslg
e
g
iMa
m u r mos y my isse a isseauraer
cent slayer seeks until his case shall
be tried . It is a city wherein he must
henceforth reside permanently. Why I
this peculiar arrangement? It is only
by a study of primitive peoples that
can learn the meaning of such a
we
device. Now one of the salient reac-
••• ■■ •••••• ■ •
tions of the primitive mind is that it
makes no distinction between inten-
tional and unintentional slaying. It
appears that all crude peoples in all
1(1 are governed by an
mats of the writ:
impulse which hss been designated as
the Law of Blood Revenge. This law
nr custom demands that when blood
shed, other blood must he shed to
is
satisfy the ghost of the victim. The 1
of the dead will not rest until
by the shedding
, it has been satisfied
' of more blood. Yon rememb the
er after
, words which were spoken to Cain
t, had slain his brother Abel. "Hark,
I
the blood of your lirrthen cries out to
I me front the earth!" The ghost of
; Cseser ranges the plains of Philini and
• will not cease until Brutus and Cas-
sius have fallen. And the ghost of the
, king haunts his son Ilamlet and will
E• ■ •• ■ •••••••
I not give the young man any peace tin-
, til he has avenged his father.
In the formin which it prevailed in
the days of the Bible, revenge was not
I executed necessarily upon the individ-
ual who was guilty of the killing but
I upon any member of his family or up-
, on any member of his tribe. or upon
his whole family and his whole tribe.
And it did not matter whether the
slayer had actual intentions to kill or
ed ven-
Was sh,
not.
As long as bloo d
I
blood
I seance must be exacted from the
of kin of the slayer.
This ought not to sound strange or
who use in modern
Established 1896
far off even to us
for this law of blood revenge
America,
in all its blindness operates in our
own country. The Kentucky feud is
ood
from
precisely the savage custom o
now, is
revge
en and the feud, as you of bl
practiced not only in Kentucky hut in
Tennessee, in North Carolina, and in
, many other places. The Italian ven-
detta, which is sometimes carried out
Wholesale and Retail Dealers in
among the Italian settlements in this
, country, is anoter name for the same

Crime and Punishment In the Bible

-5011 "TVITYPIITI ESUMEESSSOMfii+isi

Rosh Hashonah
Greetings

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The Styler Press

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The Youth of Jerusalem

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FORT SHELBY GARAGE BUILDING

Phone Main 5517

... *. www.vmsAws.v.. w www.A w k■ v ‘wiLvem s. ssw o mic y csk

Insurance Advisers, Counsellors
and Safety Engineers.

ilgiggrff r

C. C. BERGHOEFFER, Prop.

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Detroit
Insurance
Agency

714

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1

HAPPY

NEW YEAR

TO

EVERYBODY

/ WM. P. BRADLEY
Councilman
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Goodyear Rain Coat Co.

2025 WOODWARD AVENUE

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We Extend the Season's
Greetings

IF7siiiiilloilimiiimiiiiiii111 1 11111111111111111111111111111 1 11111111111111111111111111111111111111ii i i i i nne 11111111111111 S

A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL

_

J. Lefkofsky & Sons

Hygeia Kosher Beef, Sausages and High
Grade Delicatessen.

BROADWAY MARKET, SHOPS 37 AND 38

Phone Randolph 1664

Arcadia Market

TWELFTH ST., Cor Seward Phone GARFIELD 2942

Highest Grades of

Fresh and Canned Fruits and Vegetables,
Meats, Fish, Poultry, Games in Season
Lobsters and Frog Legs a Specialty

I savage custom.
, The law of the City of Refuge was
perhaps the first protest ever made
against thin universal law of revenge.
The early lawgiver could not hope to
eliminate the revenge institution al-
together. It was too deeply rooted.
As you see, it is not quite abolished
even today. The lawgivers of early
Israel could not hope all of a sudden
to break the habit of giving a slayer
over to the kin of the slain for ven-
of the
geance, but through the device

Refuge city they accomplished two
gradual reformations: first, they abol-
ished the habit of punishing a whole
family or tribe for the guilt of one
person and insisted upon the identifi-
cation of the slayer as alone liable to
be punished; second, they insisted that
only he that kills with deliberate in-
, tent or pre-meditation shall suffer the
penalty. Lest the accidental slayer
his
shall be given over to his kin of
for revenge, they provided for
victim
him these three places of refuge, al-
together convenient to every part of
Palestine to which the unfortunate
man might flee as fast as possible and
where he would be afforded sanctuary
;
I against the blind habitual operation of
the law of blood revenge.
Thus the chapter on the City of
I Refuge marks an important step in
the development of morality and civi-
writ-
lization. When this chapter ma.
ten it gave mankind a new freedom.
It liberated us from a custom deeply
imbedded in primal human passion
which stood in the way of all progress

The years slip by mighty fast! Sixteen years ago—when
this organization first made its appearance among local re-
tail stores, we asked you for your confidence and a share of
your patronage. We received your confidence whole-heart-
edly—and much more of your patronage than we had hoped
for at first.

Then the years sped on. We grew stronger and more
pretentious. We received more and more of the business
and good will of the people of Detroit. And each year this
store has pushed forward—nearer the goal its founders hoped
to have it occupy—a tangible asset to a thriving, growing
community!

YOU have helped us grow ! You are, in part, responsible
for any measure of success! It is our sincere desire to express
our warm appreciation of your part in the building up of this
institution. We extend the season's greetings!

I

In bringing to your neighborhood the best there is to be found in all

things good to eat, 1.• carry out our policy adopted throughout our

busies.. career. Nothing in our line too good to carry—no order

too small to fill in our best manner.

Years at Woodward and Stimson.

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WITH THE UTMOST
CORDIALITY WE EX-
TEND TO ALL MEMBERS
OF THE COMMUNITY
OUR BEST WISHES FOR
THE COMING YEAR.

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GREETINGS OF THE SEASON

5686 - 1925

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We wish to extend to the
Jewish Populace of Detroit
our Heartfelt Wishes for a
Happy and Prosperous New
Year, and express our appre-
ciation of the esteemed pat-
ronage proffered by our
many friends in the Com-
munity.

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