4 Conservative Synagogues
Agree on Four-Year Minimum
Bar Mitzvah School Program
Concern by Conservative syna-
gogues that "in too many in-
stances the Bar Mitzvah rite, as
practiced today, is rapidly be-
coming a meaningless celebra-
tion devoid of serious signifi-
cance," prompted a radical step
last week by the rabbis of the
four Detroit Conservative syna-
gogues, who together with lay
leaders met to remedy the situa-
tion by establishing the follow-
ing new regulations:
Beginning Sept. 1, 1952, the
four congregations — Adas
Shalom, Beth Aaron, Bnai
Moshe and Shaarey Zedek-
will require a minimum at-
tendance of four years at an
accredited Hebrew School be-
fore a boy can qualify to cele-
brate his Bar Mitzvah in any
of these synagogues on Sab-
baths or Festivals. Such boys
who do not meet these re-
quirements may ce 1 e brate
their Bar Mitzvah on week-
days or Sabbath afternoons.
In exceptional hardship cases
where, due to illness or great
distance from a school, a boy
cannot possibly attend regular
classes, private instruction will
be permitted. Such boys will
be expected to pursue a course
of studies equivalent to four
years of study in the recog-
nized Hebrew Schools of our
City.
The full minimum require-
ments will become effective in
September, 1956, exce p t i n g
Congregation . Shaarey Zedek
where these requirements al-
ready have been in force for a
year. By September, 1953, one
year attendance at a recog-
nized sch.00l will be required;
September 1954, two years,
and September 1955, three
years, until the full four-year
requirement becomes effective
in September, 1956. This
means that any Jewish boy
who is approaching the age
of nine must be registered in
a Hebrew School with the
opening of next year's Hebrew
School sessions in September,
1952. It has been the unani-
mous feeling of all Conserva-
tive Congregations that four
years study in a Hebrew School
is the minimum necessary to
make the Bar Mitzvah a
meaningful occasion in the
life of the young Jew signify-
ing adequate preparation for
Jewish responsibility and in-
telligence.
In their announcement, the
spokesmen for Conservative
Judaism in Detroit stated that
it is not their intention to limit
elementary Jewish education to
four years. They pointed out
that the United Hebrew Schools
offer a six-year course leading
to graduation and that there are
opportunities for Jewish studies
on a high school and college
level. The new standards, they
state, are merely the minimum
requirements considered abso-
lutely necessary to make the Bar
Mitzvah Jewishly meaningful.
Similar - regulations already
are in. force in nearly 30 cities
throughout the country. "It is
hoped," the Conservative rabbis'
statement declares, "that these
standards will intensify Jewish
education in our community and
will assure Detroit a more
learned and more alert laity.
The United Hebrew Schools,
which maintain six branches,
along with the Shaarey Zedek
week-day school, have pledged
their cooperation to popularize
and help enforce these stan-
dards. It is urged that other
synagogues adopt these mini-
mum requirements for Bar Mitz-
vah.
A curriculum to help meet
these standards is now being
worked out by a committee con-
sisting of i the following rabbis,
educational directors and school
board chairmen of the four
synagogues and the local
schools: Rabbi Jacob E. Segal,
Dr. .S. G. Epstein and Louis Wes-
ton, Ada8 Shalom; Rabbi Benja-
min H. Gorrelick, Dr. Marvin A.
Last and Bernard Panush, Beth
Aaron; Rabbi Moses Lehrman,
Mitchell Feldman and Walter
Far-ber, Bnai Moshe; Rabbi Mor-
ris Adler, Dr. Leonard Sidlow
and Elliott Schwartz, Shaarey
Zedek; Bernard Isaacs a n d
Albert Elazv, United Hebrew
Schools.
Paraplegic Doctor
Finds New Treatment
NEW YORK, (JTA) —Dr. Ar-
thur S. Abramson, who recently
was honored by AMVETS for his
work in rehabilitation of para-
plegic veterans, was revealed as
the author of v. program of exer-
cise for child? en .suffering from
muscular distrophy that has
slowed down the course of the
disease.
Dr. Abrahamson, chief of the
department of physical medicine
at the Bronx Veterans Hospital,
is himself a paraplegic and is
paralyzed fiom the waist down
as a result of war wounds. The
report on his work was released
by the Muscular Distrophy As-
sociation of America which
described seven months of study
by Dr. Abramson using 27 pa-
tients. The report warned that
the exercises are not a cure for
the ailment. If preliminary re-
sults of Dr Abramson's methods
are borne out by further trial,
this will represent the first prog-
ress made in treatment of the
disease in 100 years and will
benefit 100,000 victims.
24
—
THE JEWISH NEWS
Friday, May 30, 1952
Youni Pianist Ruth Heckler Triumphs
In Luloff Scholarship Auditions
Cross-Section, U.S.A.
Detroiter Visits
Oslo Memorial
Domestic, Worldwide Sensations
By ALLEN LESSER
pies. For instance, if you wan
To Norway's Jews BY-PASSING
MacIVER: The your Tel Aviv secretary to stop,
MAX WENDER stands before
the central pillar of the monu-
ment erected in Oslo, Norway,
to memorialize the 640 Norwe-
gian Jews who were killed by
the Nazis during World War IL
* * *
A Detroit businessman cur-
rently in Europe on a specially
arranged tour of the Detroit
Board of Commerce writes back
glowingly of a beautiful monu-
ment that has been erected in
Oslo, Norway. as a tribute to the
Jewish martyrs who were killed
during the last war by the Nazis.
Max Wender, president of the
Montgomery Engineering Co.,
here, writes that the most inter-
esting part of the story is that
he was guided to the memorial
by a non - Jewish Norwegian
writer, Ragnar Kvam, who has
written in his native tongue an
historical _novel which tells of
the horrors undergone by Jews
in the German concentration
camps throughout Europe.
Kvam became intezested in
anti-Semitism while he, himself,
was a concentration camp pris-
oner. Since those dreary days,
says Wender, t h e Norwegian
has worked actively with the
Jewish community.
Wender describes the me-
morial as consisting of a brok-
en off stone shaft 20 feet high,
with a traditional candelabra
on each face. Underneath is a
bronze commemorative plaque
written in Norwegian and He-
brew. A high stone wall in the
shape of a Star of David appears
on the shaft, a n d contains
the name of every Jew murdered
by the Nazis.
At a reception given by the
mayor of Oslo and city officials
at the city hall, Wender de-
scribes a beautiful mural he was
shown. It depicts the youths
fleeing to the mountain prior
to the Nazi invasion; the on-
slaught by the Germans: the
underground struggle ; and
finally liberation. He is nego-
tiating for a reproduction of the
mural to be presented to the
Oslo Jewish Community Center.
Clarence Enggass of the Eng-
gass Jewelry Co., was another
of the 40 Detroiters making the
trip.
UN Commission Hears of
Welfare Work in Israel
•
American Jewish Committee and
the Anti-Defamation League are
negotiating with the Synagogue
Council of America over an
agreement which would make
the latter the spokesman for
joint interfaith and interreligi-
ous activities. The agreement
when reached will provide for
the establishment of a joint
commission on inter "religious co-
operation with the Synagogue
Council having six representa-
tives and the AJC and ADL
three each.
Talks leading to similar agree-
ments for joint cooperation are
also going on currently with the
Jewish Labor Committtee and
with the Jewish War Veterans.
Informed circles point out
that these agreements in effect
will by-pass any attempt by
NCRAC to implement the rec-
ommendations of the Maclver
Report in these areas. They add
that there talks mean that while
ADL and AJC still retain formal
ties with NCRAC, for all prac-
tical purposes they have begun
to put teeth into their threat to
walk out if NCRAC persists in
2 ttempting to steamroller
through the Maclver pioposals.
In the interfaith area the
Maclver Report assigned the
leading role to the Union of
American Hebrew Congregations
which is a member of NCRAC.
The Synagogue Council, not a
member of NCRAC, is on record
as opposed to this Maclver pro-
posal.
JEWS IN RUSSIA: British ed-
itor Harold Soref charges that
left-wing M.P. Sydney Silver-
man's recent report on Jews in
Soviet Russia is -less enlighten-
ing in positive information than
effective in concealing the grim
plight of Russian Jewry."
In a letter to the London Jew-
ish Chronicle, Mr. Soref cites an
interview given by the rabbi of
the Moscow synagogue last year
which revealed that "in Russia
there is no Jewish religious ed-
ucation, kosher food is not nor-
mally available, and there are no
publications of any kind in ei-
ther Hebrew or Yiddish."
Noting that among the nine
religions officially recognized by
the Soviet government, as listed
in the current edition of the
Russian Encyclopedia, Judaism
not included, Soref warns that
East European Jewry stands in
as much terror today as the Jews
in Germany under Hitler.
At the same time, press dis-
patch"s from Romania describe
May Day parades in which Yev-
sektzias marched with banners
bearing pictures of Israel's Pre-
mier David Ben-Gurion, with the
face almost blotted out by swas-
tikas:
HEBRAIZED ENGLISH: When
our Israeli friend arrived in Ne w
York for a visit recently, the
first thing his 9-year-old daugh-
ter asked him in her best Hebrew
was: "How does one say 'bobble-
gom" in English?"
The current tendency among
Hebrew-speaking Israelis to ab-
sorb English words into their
language has resulted in a num-
ber of similarly amusing exam-
what she is doing, you will say:
"Stoppi." This, you understand,
is the feminine Hebrew ending
for the -word "stop."
Another English-into-Hebrew
oddity is the Tel Aviv version o
the word "puncture." Every fla
tire, of course, is a "punsher,'
but the same word is also used
for such minor misfortunes
a misplaced key, a burned sup-
per, or a misaddressed letter.
Among other words absorb - • ,
by Hebrew and popularly used in:
place of indigenous Hebrew ex-
pressions are- such words a*
"texi" (which refers to almos
any passenger car), "sendvich,n'
"sveder", (s weate r), "keint0
(camp), "koorse" (course), an
"skaytin" (to skate.) One of th..
most commonly used expressiot
is "temble," which means dinni
or stupid. In case you haven's
already guessed it, the word isr
simply the Hebrew version of ou:
own "dumbbell."
DENIAL: Dr. Sidney Marks
executive director of the ZOA
informs us that "there is xi,
foundation in fact" to the repot'
that he would leave unless Rabb
Irving Miller were elected ZO..
president.
SHORT SHORTS: Attentiodl;
AJ Congress: Mri. Franklin 1:),;*
Roosevelt, speaking on housing
and legal efforts to end discrim-
ination this week said: "Withouti
a change in the hearts of meni-
all the laws in the world aren't
going to do what we want t$.',
have done." . . . The AJ Con“
mittee. which last year consider4
ed the arrest of Philip Auer-.
bach, Bavarian Restitution di4
rector, as of no special Jewish
concern, has now sent an ob-i
server to attend the trial . . t
Moscow radio in recent week4.,
has frequently mentioned th!t
name Jack Gaster, of London
for his allegations that the U
is carrying on germ warfare in .
Korea. Gaster, member of ark
English Communist group tha
went to Korea under Soviet aus
pices, is the son of the late Chic
Rabbi Moses Gaster . . By
irony of history, the lifting
the Suez blockade and probable
peace between Egypt and Israe
are being held up by the unwill
ingness of the Sudanese—wh
are friends of Israel—to accept?
Egypt's King Farouk as theie
ruler. Britain and the United
States are working -overtime t. ,)
get the Sudanese to agree . . .
The new Israeli nationality law
was attacked last week by Leo .
Cherne, head of the Researc la,_
Institute of America, who spoket
at the annual meeting of they
New York Council of the Counl'
cil for Judaism . . London'
refusal to grant Israel a loan;;
will soon leave the Haifa 0'
Refineries high and dry. In des
peration Israel has approache
Soviet Russia for a deal to bu
unrefined oil through a barte
arrangement . .. Histadrut wi
soon issue a film based on th
life of the only boy who sur
vived the crash of a JDC-char
tered plane bound for Norwa
two years ago; 28 North Afric
Jewish children perished in th
crash.
`Cash Week' Workers Collect on Bond
UNITED NATIONS, N. Y.,
(JTA) —Trachoma had been
wiped out in Israel but had re-
cirrred following mass immigra-
tion of Jews from Arab coun-
tries, it was reported at the UN
Social Commission by Dr. G. G.
Lotan, Israel delegate. He said
that special measures had been
taken to help blind immigrants
in Israel, including their em-
ployment in some workshops.
Mrs. Ena Harman of Israel
told the Social Commission of
new methods found successful in
caring for children deprived of
normal family life in the Jewish
state.
Miss MARGARET MANNEBACH proudly .stands behind her
pupil, RUTH MECKLER (seated at the piano) who was awarded
the annual Gwladys LulOff Scholarship, at the auditions sponsored
by the Music Study Club last Saturday. Others shown here are
Mrs. IRA G. KAUFMAN, chairman, • and Mrs. JEROME BLUM;
president of the Music Study Club; Mrs. FRANK LULOFF, mother
of the scholarship contributor, and judges, Prof. JOSEPH BRINK-
MAN, VALTER POOLE and JULIUS CHAJES.
Increase in Dairy Products
TEL AVIV, (JTA)—Israel in-
creased its agricultural products
by 90 percent since 1948, it was
estimated at the national con-
ference of Tnuva, an agricul-
Here are some of the workers who gathered Sunday at the
tural an d dairy marketing co-
operative. z-The conference was Young Israel Center to mobilize for collection of. commitments
attended by 700 representatives Israel bonds during "Cash Week" which was conducted under the
chairmanship of Samuel Feldstein.
of 360 settlements.
•
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