Friday, October I, 1943
THE JEWISH- NEWS
Publication Society Views
Growth, Aid to U.S. Jewry
Came Into Being In Order To Meet Problem During
Critical Period in History of the American Jewish
Community; Founded 55 Years Ago
By DR. SOLOMON GRAYZEL
Editor, Jewish Publication Society of America
A consciousness of crisis pre- contrary, a very powerful force
vails in the thoughts and actions for good. In this case it laid the
of the Jews today. We shall not foundations for a cultural revival
stop to consider here how great which helped save the dignity
a world upheaval was needed to and spiritual unity of American
stir so many of our contempor- Israel. This is evident from the
aries out of their lethargy.
earliest publications • of T h e
It is more important to ask Society. Graetz's "History of the
what will result from this in- Jews" in English translation
creassed concern with the Jew- proved to be not merely an in-
ish fate and future. Some Jews teresting work; it was rather a
Will yield to panic and others tool with which . another link
to paralyzing fear.
was forged in the chain of Jewish
The more clearly the implica- history. •
tions of the present state of Jew-
The publication of Israel Zang-
ish life are realized, the greater will's stories was a means of
the recognition which will be bringing to the English-reading
accorded to the usefulness of The public a recognition of the spiri-
Jewish Publication Society of tual values of the new East
America. It came into being in European population and an ap-
order to meet a problem during preciation of the poignant pro-
a critical period in the history cess of their adjustment to the
of the American Jewish commun- Anglo-Sakon environment.
ity.
Borrow From Others
Founded 55 Years Ago •
The time soon came for the
The Jewish Publication Society Jews to reclaim the Bible. Ignor-
was founded 55 years ago. No one ance of this fundamental Jewish
could have foreseen at that time treasure was partly due to ignor-
that the comparatively small ance of the Hebrew language.
American • Jewish population of The Jews, in this respect as well,
seevral hundred thousand would, were living on borrowings from
within less than the . span of a others. The traditional Jewish
single lifetime, become the larg- meaning of the Bible's words and
est aggregation of Jews in the thoughts had been lost because
world.
the translation in general use
The Jewish communities of was of Christian • origin. The
England, France a n d Italy, Jewish Publicatibn Society rose
though numerically smaller than to the occasion. .
the Jewish population of the U.
In co-operation with the Cen-
S., were far ahead of us in Jew- tral Conference of American.
ish cultural productivity. Amer- Rabbis, the society produced an
ica's Jewish population was English translation which retains
scattered over a broad land. It the best elements of the King
lacked organization. It was de- James Version but presents the
veloping serious religious cleav- Jewish attitude and interpreta-
ages. It had few effective plans tion. The publication of The
for Jewish education.
Society's translation of the Bible
Such was the situation when (1917) marks the emergence of
a small group of Jews met to American Israel as a community
organize The Jewish Publication spiritually independent and in-
Society. Among them were tellectually productive.
Judge Mayer Sulzberger, Rabbi
Two new motives had thus en-
Joseph Krauskopf, Dr. Cyrus Ad- teredinto The Society's work or
ler and Dr. Solomon Solis-Cohen. at least attained prominence in
The Third Attempt
it: the aim to unite the commun-
What motivated these men to ity around its spiritual heritage
organize the society? Theirs was and the desire to give the Amer-
actually the third attempt to ican Jew a sense of continuity in
form. an organization for the relation to the great Jewish:com-
publication in the U. S. of Jewish munities of the past. Both mo-
books in the English language. tives were in response to the
The two previous efforts had needs of American Israel during
failed, primarily because the and after the First World War.
American Jew had been content
Still . another series speaks elo-
to live on intellectual food bor- quently of the society's efforts to
rowed from the older communi- foster dignified community con.-
ties across the sea.
sciousness among the Jews of
They were ashamed that a America. 45 years ago, the so: .
large and well situated number ciety began the annual publica 7
of Jews knew so little about their tion of a Year Book. CyrnS,Adler
religion,. their past and their peo- Was its first editor; later the edi-
ple's contribution to civilization. torship was taken over by Harry
There is • nothing petty about . Schneiderman. The annual vol-
a sense of shame. It is, on the : umes are a joint publicaton of
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Fifth of Hungarian Jews
Claim Jewish Nationality
ZURICH, (JTA)—One out of
every five Hungarian Jews de-
clared that they adhered to the
"Jewish nationality" when
queried during the official
census of 1941, according to sta-
tistics made public in Budapest
this week and appearing in
Hungarian newspapers received
here.
While 724,000 persons, or 4.9
per cent of the population, de-
clared that they were of the
"Jewish religion," 150,000 said
that they were of "Jewish na-
tionality."
The Society and the American
Jewish Committee.
This neglect has, unfortunately,
not been limited to the Year
Books. Altogether the American
Jewish public has not shOWn any
marked appreciation of The So-
ciety's work, at least not in fin-
ancial terms. The Jews . of
America, avid readers though
many of them are, have not
as enthusiastically as
they might have -to the oppor-
tunities presented by The So-
ciety's publications which, apart
from those mentioned above, are
numerous and -valuable.. This is
certainly not due to the price of
membership; $5.00 a year is sure-
ly not a large sum for the three
books given in return. One ex-
planation may be that a large
proportion of the books issued
by The Jewish Publcication So-
ciety offer solid (as opposed to
light)., instructive (as opposed to
entertaining) reading.
Page Forty-nine
Thomas Mann
Praises Volume
by Dr. Klatzkin
Noted Philosopher's Book,
'In Praise of Wisdom', Is
Called Colorful
"So colorful and brilliant a
collection of aphorisms has not
been published since Nietzsche.
`In Praise of Wisdom' is the
work of a man with deep knowl-
edge of life and soul whose dic-
tion is lucid and kindly, and who
has counsel, enlightenment and
consolation to offer to many."
These are the words of
Thomas Mann on Dr. Jacob
Klatzkin's newest book, trans-
lated from the Hebrew, publish-
ed Sept. 23 by L. B. Fischer Pub-
lishing Corp., 381 4th Ave., New
York.
Biographer of Spinoza
Jacob Klatzkin, the noted Eu-
ropean Jewish philosopher and
psychologist, the creator of an
original widely acclaimed bi-
ophilosophy, is author of many
books on philosophy and psy-
chology which have been pub-
lished abroad. He is a biogra-
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pher of Spinoza, author of a dic-
tionary of philosophy, editor of
the Encyclopedia Judaica.
His book "In Praise of Wis-
dom" is concerned with the
large and small aspects of every-
day life and the art of living.
Here are mature, sensitive re-
flections on science, art, politics,
philosophy, psychology and re-
ligion, the art of the writer,
manners and morals, saints and
the human spirit. Here are dis-
tilled the essences of rich expe-
rience and observation, and deep
knowledge of many literatures,
professions and civilizations.
Provocative Items
The book is divided into "Life
Microscoped," which includes
such provocative items as "To
each generation its laugh," "Kiss
vs. Bite," "Creeping Thoughts,"
"The Common Origin of Two
Extremes"; "Psychological Es-
says," including such headings
as "Preachers and Speakers,"
"Midwife and Nurse," "Spiritual
Eunuchs as Guardians"; "Aphor-
isms," numerous capsules of wis-
dom and wit.
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