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JEWISH NEWS

bicorporating 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..
.VI. 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

PHILIP SLOMOVITZ

SIDNEY SHMARAK

Editor and Publisher

Advertising Manager

FRANK SIMONS

City Editor

Sabbath Hazon Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the sixth day of Ab, 5716, the following Scriptural selections will be read
in our synagogues:
.
Pentateuchal portion, Devariin, Deut. 1:1,3:22. Prophetical portion, Isaiah 1:1-27.
Pentateuchal portions, morning, Deut. 4:25-40; afternoon, Ex. 32:11-14, 34:1-10. Prophetical
portions; morning, Jer. 8:13-9:23; afternoon, Isaiah 55:6-56:8.

Licht Benshen, Friday, July 13, 7:49 p.m

VOL. XXIX. No. 19

July 13, 1956

Page Four

Intermarriage: Deterrent to Successful Unions

Giving "Eight Reasons Why Marriages
Go Wrong," in an article in the New York
Times Magazine, Prof. James H. S. Bos-
sard, of the University of Pennsylvania,
lists intermarriage as a contributing fac-
tor to the possibility that 40,000 of June's
175,000 marriages are likely to fail.
Prof. Bossard's views on the religious
aspects in successful — or unsuccessful —
marriages are worthy of study. We quote
him:

Intermarriage between cultural groups
can be a strain on both parties. This is the
inevitable price we pay for the heterogeneity
of our population and the diversity of our
cultural strains. Among such marriages, the
most important in their effect are those be-
tween members of different religious groups.
The number of interfaith marriages is
large, and it is _ increasing. Recent studies
show that half of the marriages involving Ro-
man Catholics are mixed marriages, valid or
invalid, and that the percentage has been in-
creasing steadily since 1910. A study made
for the United Lutheran Church shows that
58 per cent of its members marry outside of
their church and that there has been a
marked increase in such marriages since
1936.
Mixed marriages are looked upon with
disfavor by the leaders of all organized
church bodies. The Central Conference of
American Rabbis has declared that mixed
marriages "are contrary to the tradition of
the Jewish religion and should therefore be
discouraged by the American rabbinate." The
attitude of the Roman Catholic Church is
definite and uncompromising; it considers in-
Valid any marriage involving Catholics that
is not solemnized in a religious ceremony
under prescribed conditions. Within the last
two decades, several Protestant denomina-
tions have been taking an increasingly firm
stand on mixed marriages.
It is unfair to argue, as is sometimes
done, that the concern of the church is purely
one of self-interest, growing out of fear of
losing members. It is true that persons con-
tracting mixed marriages tend to drop away
from their respective churches and are some-
what less concerned than usual with the
religious rearing of their children. But there
are other reasons for the' attitude of the vari-
ous churches. Their leaders, for example,
have long known what recent sociological
studies verify.
Three such studies (Landis, Bell and
Weeks), covering a total of 24,184 families,
show that there are approximately three
times as many divorces or separations in
Catholic-Protestant marriages - as there are
when the marital partners are of the same
faith, and about four times as many when a
Catholic father is married to a Protestant

Holy Days Bond Drive

Appeals in synagogues, in support of
the Israel Bond drive, have become an
established tradition during the High Holy
Days.
Detroit's congregational leaders went
on record, during the visit here of the
national Israel Bonds' High Holy Day cam-
paign. chairman, Adolph Hamburger, for
the continuation of this tradition.
A considerable income in Bond sales is
always assured by appeals during the Holy
Days, especially in view of the inevitable
condition that many people can be reached
through the synagogues, only on the Holy
Days.
It is sincerely to be' hoped, therefore,
that there will again be a hearty response
to the Holy Day appeal; that all of our
synagogues will participate in this effort
and that proper advance preparations will
be made to assure large advance sales dur-
ing the High Holy Day period. This is
one of the ways of giving Israel the en-
couragement she needs in industrial devel-
opment.

mother. And here again the story of marital
unhappiness is far larger than divorce and
separation statistics show.
Contemporary youth tends to be im-
patient with the verdict of experience con-
cerning mixed marriages. "We are broad-
minded," they say. "We are quite willing to
respect each other's religious beliefs. Besides,
religion is not as important as it used to be."
What these young people overlook is the
real nature of religion and its role in life.
Religion is not merely a set of beliefs; it is
a way of living and of thinking. Roman
Catholicism is a culture pattern, as we sociol-
ogists put it; so is Judaism, or Methodism, or
being an Episcopalian.
Each religion has its distinctive set of
values, as well as its forms of worship, and
these reach over and express themselves in
a minutiae of the daily lives of their respec-
tive adherents. Eating fish on Friday is not
a mere belief; it is a dietary institution. The
observance of church holidays involves the
organization of a family's leisure time.
Perhaps the real wonder is not that mixed
marriages often fail, but rather that so many
succeed. An old Chinese maxim has it that
every boy should marry the girl who lives
across the street from him. The meaning is
still clear: people of the same background
and circumstances are most likely to find
marital happiness with each other.

The final paragraph is of particular
interest in our discussion. The sharp con-
trasts in beliefs, and the effects they have
on families, are especially influencing fac-
tors in mixed marriages.

*

*

Translation by Ludwig Lewisohn

Jacob Picard's Short Stories

Two distinct elements distinguish the latest product of the
Jewish Publication Society of America, "The Marked One and
Other Stories" by Jacob Picard.
The first, of course, is the fact that this book incorporates
the best short stories by the distinguished writer..
The second is the distinction given the stories in the excel-
lent translation by Ludwig Lewisohn and the illuminating
introduction by the late Dr. Lewisohn. -
Dr. Lewisohn treated this translation as a labor of love.
This is evident in his essay and in the charm he had given the
stories in his good translation.
The reader acquires the respect that is due the narrator
from the tribute accorded him in the Lewisohn introduction.
The masterful German tales are made available, by the trans-
lator who was himself a master of German, in the perfect
English which the translator commanded.
"A legendary air belongs to these stories," Lewisohn wrote.
. . . Nor does this legendary air rob the, characters of either edge
or passion. It is achieved by the employment of historic memory
exercised at a given moment of time."
They are the stories of Jews "exposed at this late age to
the fires of persecution," Jews "who remember what they are
and what their fathers were and how they came through the
centuries to be what they are in this hour of the renewal of a
tragic fate."
First published in Germany in 1936, Picard's stories deal
with the travails of Jews in the 19th and 20th centuries. The
first of his stories, "The Darkest Hour," appears last in the book
because it symbolizes the era of recent Jewish sufferings. "The
Marked One," "The Lottery Ticket," "The Wooer," "The Fish"
and the other stories in this book are tales about simple people,
people of faith and of struggle.
The stories are representative of the simplicity, piety
and depth in the life of the German Jew of the 19th and early.
20th centuries. As Dr. Lewisohn said in his introduction, "Ja-
cob Picard has strongly, tenderly, beautifully rescued from a
probable oblivion an entire world of our people and has added
this community both to the realm of history and of the human
imagination."
The last story in the book deals with the famous Stadlan,
Yossel of Resheim, of the 16th century. It has peculiar and pro-
found relevance to events in Germany in more recent years.
It is a good book, the stories are inspired and inspiring, and
the reader has much to gain from them..

Several weeks ago, we pointed out in
these columns that there is a marked in-
crease in intermarriage between Jews and
Christians throughout the world. The
Jewish Standard of Toronto, quoting the
figures we listed in Our analysis of the
intermarriage problem — indicating the
high rates of mixed marriages in British,
Columbia, Saskatchewan, New Brunswick
—resorts to consolation by stating: "One
compensating factor that can be drawn
from the statistics is that the three prov-
inces which comprise the bulk of Canadian
Jewry — Quebec, Ontario and Manitoba—.
have the smallest rates of intermarriage."
It is as if we were to say that there
are fewer mixed marriages in Detroit thah
in Saginaw; the reason being that there
are more intermarriages in the smaller
communities than in the larger ones where
our young people have better opportuni-
ties to meet co-religionists. In the case of
the Canadian provinces, the more serious Z. H. Chajes' Noteworthy Work
effort that is made against mixed marri-
ages in a strong Catholic area like Que-
bec's — thereby strengthening Catholic re-
sistance to intermarriage — may be ac-
Farrar, Strauss & Co. (101 5th, N.Y. 3), having taken over
countable for the reduction in mixed mar-
the East and West Library Series, has made available another
riages among Jews.

Talmud Guide fOr Students

*

*

Mixed marriages carry with them not
only the dangers to completely successful
unions but also to the amity of the fam-
ilies involved. None of us has the solution
to the problem. Sons or daughters of very
pious Jews have intermarried, and young
Jews who hail from homes with the best
spiritually Jewish backgrounds — includ-
ing those of noted rabbis — are known to
have taken as spouses mates of a different
faith. There were intermarriages in the
Zangwill, Nordau, Daiches and other
equally well known homes.
Therefore, since we do not possess the
perfect solution, we must at least retain
the hope that there will be no further
increases in mixed marriages and that ef-
forts to strengthen our cultural ties will
militate against them. If we cannot ac-
complish the impossible, we must at least
strive for the possible—for the best results
from the most serious efforts to give our
youth the high type of Jewish training
that will retain their Jewish loyalties.

very important work, "The Student's Guide Through . the
Talmud" by the noted scholar fof the last century, Zevi Hirsch
Chajes. It was translated from the Hebrew, edited and critically
annotated by Rabbi Jacob Shachter of Belfast, Ireland.
The original edition, which appeared under the title "Mebo
Ha-Talmud," Was published more than 100 years ago, but the
text, formulating the authority of tradition, remains as valuable
today as in the period of its first printing.
Outlining the categories of Oral Law, which also is
explained in relation to the Written Law, Rabbi Chajes' guide
explains all the aspects of Talmudic scholarship. Scriptural
ordinances are reviewed in detail and there are references
to halachoth (customs) that were adopted by 'the Rabbis without
any record in the Torah.
The student, guided by Rabbi Chajes' work, will acquire
authoritative knowledge about the Takkanoth (enactments),
Aggadoth (narrations) and Gezeroth (decrees), and he will
secure a thorough knowledge about the rabbinic rulings and
ordinances affecting . Jewish traditions.
There is an interesting chapter on Talmudic method of
expounding names of persons. Other chapters deal with Aggadoth
relating to the performances of miracles, parables, employment
of numbers figuratively, etc.
In addition to a biographical sketch of the eminent author,
this volume contains the editor's and translator's valuable essay
on "Talmudic Introductions Down to the Time of Chajes."
This is a highly scholarly book that enriches Talmudie
knowledge.