Friday, June 8, 1956—THE DET ROIT JEWISH NEWS-4

.

THE JEWISH NEWS

Does Right Hand Know What Left Hand Does?

Incorporating the Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20, 1951

Member American Association of English-Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association, National Editorial
Association.
Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17100 West Seven Mile Road, Detroit 35. Mich.,
VE. 8-9364. Subscription $5 a year Foreign $6.
Entered as second class matter Aug. 6, 1942, at Post Office, Detroit, Mich., under Act of March 3, 1879

SIDNEY SHMARAK
Advertising Manager

PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher

FRANK SIMONS
City Editor

Sabbath Rosh Hodesh Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the thirtieth day of Sivan, 5716, the following Scriptural selections will be
read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portions, Korah, Num. 16:1-8:32, 28:9-15. Prophetical portion, Is. 66:1-24.
Torah selections for second day of Rosh Hodesh Tammuz, Monday, Num. 28:1-15,

Licht Benshen, Friday, June 8, 7:47 p.m.

Page Four

VOL. XXIX. No. 14

June 8, 1956

Assimilation Mixed Marriage Problem

,

Sydney Nelson, the Joint Distribution
Committee's director for Latin America,
reporting on a 12-month tour of his area
on behalf of the JDC and the Conference
on Jewish Material Claims Against Ger-
many, stated 'that while cultural and spir-
itual activities among Jews in Latin Amer-
ica are declining, there is a rise of assimi-
lation and mixed marriages.
This investigator's studies in Bolivia,
Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, San
Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico, Cuba, Ven-
ezuela, Brazil and Uruguay led him to the
conclusions that there is virtually no Jew-
ish education, and that these communities
suffer from a lack of educators and teach-
ers; that there are few Jewish publications
and libraries; that the Jewries in these
countries do not confer on Jewish themes;
that there is a lack of rabbis and syna-
gogues; that the youth are not provided
with social and athletic centers.
Mr. Nelson maintains that there is no
"Jewish spirit" to counteract the increase
in mixed marriages and assimilation which
is "progressing rapidly." While he pointed
to major exceptions in Uruguay, Brazil
and Mexico, he reported that there are
no coordinated activities in Latin Ameri-
can countries, that the Sephardic and
Ashkenazic communities are in competi-
tion organizationally, that fund - raising
campaigns are successful only erratically
because of a lack of unity, that Jews are
economically successful and take care of
the indigent, that there is a flight of Jews
from smaller to larger countries, that there
is no Zionist youth work and that there is
immigration only into Brazil, Uruguay and
Venezuela.
* *
*
While the JDC director's report sounds
ominous, Latin American Jewish commu-
nities are not an exception to the rule,
but part of a worldwide pattern. Only a
month ago, the Canadian Jewish Congress
reported that the rate of intermarriage
between Jews and non-Jews in all of
Canada has tripled in 30 years. The re-
search bureau of the Canadian Jewish
Congress reported that while inter-
marriages only doubled in the provinces of
Alberta and Quebec and fell off in New
Brunswick, they tripled in the provinces
of Ontario, Saskatchewan and Manitoba
and increased by 50 per cent in Nova
Scotia and British Columbia.
* *
*
This is only part of the story. A short
time ago, two French Jewish leaders who
were visitors in this country — Roland
Nusnik, deputy director of Centre Edu-
catif, central French Jewish educational
agency, and Tito Cohen, executive direc-
tor of Ronds Social Juif Unifie—said that
half of the Jews in France are marrying
non-Jews and are raising their children as
Christians, and that a majority of the
French Jewish- women are ignorant of
Jewish customs and are not observing
them. They reported that of the 250,000
Jews in France, only about 15,000 adults
are affiliated with Jewish community ac-
tivities. This includes about 2,500 syna-
gogue - members, 7,000 contributors to
Jewish philanthropy, and members of
all ideological and other groups. For
French Jewry, the only contact with Jew-
ish life is, at most, synagogue attendance
on Yom Kippur, they said. About 12 per-
cent of young children, however, and five
percent of adolescents have some contact
with Jewish life.
*
* *
There is another area to account for:
England. Writing recently in the Man-
chester Guardian, Dr. I. W. Slotki, an emi-
nent demographer, stated that 10 to 12 1/2
percent of British Jews are marrying non-
Jews. He based his. opinion, that inter-

marriage is on the increase in Great Brit-
ain, on data he gathered from marriage
licenses and discussions with rabbinical
authorities.
Thus, the • trend toward increases in
intermarriage appears to be universal.
The danger of assimilation is great and
Jewish communities everywhere must
study the • problem thoroughly in order to
solve it before the inroads made by mixed
marriages seriously threaten Jewry's
survival.
*
*
*
An encouraging factor in the studies
we have just outlined is the frankness
with which the issue is approached. The
mere fact that the rise in intermarriage is
taken seriously is an indication that it is
a pressing issue. Accompanying each study
is an assertion by community leaders that
they are striving to conduct a systematic
fight against disintegration, that they are
striving to intensify Jewish educational
activities and that there is a serious
movement afoot in Jewish communities
throughout the world to train able teach-
ers - and to increase school facilities.
At the same time, there is an aware-
ness that the problem is not easily soluble,
as long as the youth is not thoroughly
integrated into communal life. Of special
interest is the study that was made by
the Inter-University Jewish Federation of
Great Britain and Ireland.
*
*
*
Such is the danger facing world Jewry
today. It is traceable to a lack of under-
standing of Jewish values among our
youth, and therefore to a lack of desire
to perpetuate our values.
In his annual report to the Bnai Brith
Hillel Foundations, the retiring Hillel di-
rector, Rabbi Arthur J. Lelyveld, declared
that "the average American college stu-
dent comes today to the campus with
scarcely any background for appreciating
a program which stresses religious and
cultural values." He characterized our
contemporary American college youth as
"rich, valuable human material which has
not been awakened, and which cannot be
reached by the mass approach of today's
educational system."
How, then, is the problem to be solved?
How are our young people to be reached
by Jewish appeals? This is the grave re-
sponsibility of our educational agencies,
on the local as well as the national fronts.
Thus far, we are certain of the problem,
but are uncertain of the solution.

Peace...and Deaf Ears

Israel keeps crying for peace, but her
urgent calls for amity fall on deaf ears.
That is why all the discussions at the
United Nations on the Hammarskj old Re-
port and the Middle East situation
turned into ineffective debates.
Israeli spokesmen, and the statesmen
with vision who insist that the UN Secre-
tary General, Dag Hammarskjold, should
pursue his negotiations with the aim in
view of getting Arabs and Israelis together
for peace talks, are rapidly becoming dis-
illusioned. All this because Israel says she
wants peace, and the Arabs answer with
an emphatic NO.
If the UN is not to remain a mere de-
bating society, means will have to be
found to enforce peace. Any other action
will be mere sham. So far, all we have is
words ...Words ...words. There are calls
for peace from Israel, and the Arabs offer
deaf ears. The world powers will have to
prove that they possess strength to lead
the world to peace. At the moment, their
power lies only in forensics. That is why
the latest discussions of the Hammarskjold
Report have proven such a sham.

lieRE ilorMiGyanR,L 4240 SOMERS ar 7 E M10-fir"

`Venture in Utopia'

Social Study of 'Kibbutz'

The subtitle of the book "Kibbutz," by Melford E. Spiro,
published by Harvard University Press, is "Venture in Utopia."
This reveals- at once the author's intention.
What Mr. Spiro, who is associate professor of anthropology
at the University of Connecticut, does in this book is to describe
"an anthropological study of Kiryat Yedidim, the fictitious
name of a collective settlement (kibbutz) in Israel." But the
only fictitious element is the name of the specific kibbutz de-
scribed. In all other details, the author has adhered to facts
and presents what may well be termed the best evaluation
offered thus far of the historic Israeli institution of the kibbutz.
At the outset, Mr. Spiro explains the three types of Israeli
settlements: Moshav Ovdim, representing "segmental coopera-,
tion" in agricultural villages, on land of the Jewish National
Fund, each family doing its own work and retaining its income;
the collective kibbutz and the moshav shittufi, the compromise
between the two, combining collective work and ownership
with the private living of the moshay.
The social nature of the kibbutz is outlined in its minutest
details. While the kibbutz emphasizes the liberties of man, while
"no censorship of any kind exists, we nevertheless learn from
this book:
"A person's vocational preferences are usually considered
in deciding his work assignment, but if the kibbutz requires his
labor or skill in some special branch, he is expected to recognize
the paramount needs of the group. The same logic applies to
ideological matters. An individual is permitted complete freedom
in the process of arriving at political decisions and in attempting
to convince others of his point of view. But once a formal
decision is reached by the kibbutz, he is expected to acquiesce
in its decision and to support it, however much it conflicts with
his personal views."
In a chapter on the social history of the kibbutz under
review, we learn a great deal about the new approaches to the
Zionism of the kibbutz, the manner in which it differs from the
Zionism of their fathers which was primarily a religious Zionism.
But there is emphasis on the point that without Zionism the
kibbutz movement would have been just another episode in
the lives of the kibbutz settlers.
The analysis of the communal society of the kibbutz and
its functions as a political community form the meat of the book
and represent a fine social study of a significant collective effort
at establishing a cooperative way of life.
Mr. Spiro brands as "irrationality" the faith of the settlers
in "the benevolence of the Soviet Union. The struggle between
capitalists and. proletariat is the reason ascribed for the thinking
which not only is tolerable to the Soviets, but suspicious of the
democracies. The author is frankly critical of this unrealistic
approach which is not, however, the policy of the ruling
majority in Israel.
The women, we are told, are primarily responsible for
the crisis now in evidence in the kibbutz: "Almost all resigna-
tions are instigated by the women; the increased demand for
private property and for greater privacy is found most strongly
in the women; most of the tension in the kibbutz is caused by
the women. . . . It is no exaggeration to say that if Kiryat
Yedidim , should ever disintegrate, the 'problem of the women'
will be one of the main contributing factors."
Thus far, "every child of Kiryat Y edidim has chosen to
remain within it upon becoming an adult." But the author is
uncertain of the future. If the children should seek to implement
"values of the 'world' without" it could lead to "discontent with
their village life." The sabras have not remained in the kibbutz
out of ignorance of the outside world. But apparently the test
of ithe kibbutz'. strength is yet to ,come.

.

•

•• •

•

