Thursday, September 22, 1949 Jewish Life Needs Vigor (Continued from Page 24) the first question in the affirma- ' five. These private conversations at Jewish gatherings, this refusal to pay respectful attention to the thinge that people still claim to respect is a symptom of the de- cline of the Jewish spirit here in the United States which, if some- thing isn't done to halt it, will eventually so atrophy Jewisl , life here that only a skeleton will remain of what was formerly a living body with flesh and blood and soul. But it is only one symptom. Another is a thing like the ad- vertisement of a reform con- gregation in a small city in Michigan for an "aggressive" Rabbi—as if it were desirable that a Rabbi in America should have the same qualities as cos- metics salesman. Another is the complaint of a Rabbi in Texas that at marriage and funeral services—the most t serious, the most solemn, mo- ments in life—people are al- , ways telling him to "make the service short," if not "snappy." I Those are attitudes which are •, just not taken by American Christian congregations who, no matter how hypocritical many of their members may be about their faith, have not surrendered entirely the principles and ideals of the Christian religion to the "principles" and "ideals" of the religion of private profit. • • • . STAGE OF DECLINE HYPOCRISY, ONCE SAID the wise Frenchman Le Rouchefou- cauld, is the homage that vice pays to virtue. The honest cyni- ism that one hears all too often nowadays from the lips of many American Jews about religion and culture—as if the only things worth striving for were money and material pleasures—are a worse stage in the degeneration of the human spirit than is hypocrisy, since the hypocrite at least knows that he is doing wrong while the honest cynic is unaware of it. There is such a thing as being too clever and it doesn't make friends for us Jews among really sincere Christians who would like to be our friends. What can be done to halt this shriveling up of Jewish spiritual values in American Jewry, to ! reverse the process, to reanimate 1 American Jewry with a new soul, with the feeling that there . is more to human life than eco- nomic well-being, material plea- . sures—and even contributing money to charitable institutions? Merely asking people to behave themselves, to sit quietly through Jewish gatherings and give re- spectful attention to what is being said from the platform, DETROIT JEWISH CHRONICLE Herzog in Warsaw Page 33 honest discussion and searching TOM KIPPUR DATES of one's heart. We shall learn Yom Kippur never falls ow much from one another, even if Sunday, Tuesday or Friday. we remain in disagreement. We shall thus clarify our own thoughts, unravel the complexity of our own feelings, learn de- finitely where we stand and learn Rosh Ilashonn ► to respect those spiritual values, • of whose the truth and impor- tance we are now fully convinced. Greetings Is there enough spiritual stamina left In American Jewry for such gatherings of our in- , tellectual and spiritual cream, • as I suggest here? Only time will tell. But if there is, the matter is too urgent to be delayed much longer. Take it from one who has observed and studied American Jewry from coast to cosat, Falls Spring Rabbi David Kahane, Chief Rabbi of Poland, has denied reports of alleged "pogroms" on Jews in Poland. Official anti-Semitism is gone, he said, and such tendencies are being strongly com- batted. Even the army is devoid of bigotry, he added. Above is Chief Rabbi Herzog of Israel who was the guest of the army while on a visit to Warsaw earlier in the year. even if people will pledge them- selves to do it, will obviously not remedy the situation if people haven't their hearts and souls in Judaism and Jewish culture. By applying superficial plas- ters to a disease that goes deep we shall only be fooling our- selves, we shall not attack the disease itself. • • • SUGGESTED REMEDY I HAVE FOR A long time been maintaining that the first thing that must be done in this truly dangerous situation which has arisen in American Jewry, drunk with material prosperity which threatens to leave it spiritually destitute. is to get together our American Jewish intelligentsia all over the country to discust over many months the two vitally important problem s: What do we believe, as of the moment, and what can we be- lieve as a result of an exchange among ourselves of facts, opi- nions, and, not least, feelings? Let us meet, as many of our - - — .1■■■••■■••■■•■■•■••■••■■•■•■•••■ more intelligent Jews and Jew- esses as possible, our doctors, lawyers, teachers, writers and businessmen, too, who are in- telligent enough to realize that there are some precious values in life that money cannot buy. 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