Graduation Time
THE JEWISH NEWS
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, 1952 at Post Office, Detroit, Mich., under Act of March 3, 1879
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
SIDNEY SHMARAK
Advertising Manager
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
Circulation Manager
FRANK SIMONS
City Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath., the twenty-third day of Sivan, 5717, the following Scriptural selections
Will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Korah, Numbers 16:1-18:32. Prophetical portion, I Samuel 11:14-1222.
Licht Benshen, Friday, June 21, 7:52 p.m.
VOL. XXXI. No. 16
June 21, 1957
Page Four
The Curse of Bigness'-- Programming Problem
Perennially, at just about this time of
the year, in anticipation of new program-
ming schedules in our community, about
to be made by the scores of our function-
ing organizations, we review past expe-
riences and address appeals to our respon-
sible leaders not to cheapen our "cultural
efforts" and to be careful lest their
planned programs are dragged into the
gutter by vaudevillian stunts.
Apparently, the appeals have borne
some fruit. We have witnessed improve-
ments. There are more serious efforts to
improve upon past performances and to
strive to elevate the standards of our com-
munity's "entertainments" and "cultural"
endeavors.
But much is yet to be attained. We
therefore are reviving the discussion of
this community problem, and once again
invite the attention and interest of our
organizational • leaders in the matter of
programming.
We wish to share with program plan-
ners the valuable editorial sentiments that
were expressed a while ago in the Cana-
dian Jewish Congress' Bulletin, as follows,
under the title "The Curse of Bigness":
"Benjamin Disraeli counselled one of his
followers who asked if he ought to take part
in a debate in the House of Commons on a
matter in which he had an interest as follows:
`No, you had better not, certainly it will be
preferable for the members of the House to
wonder why you did not speak than to wonder
why you did.' This good advice should be
accepted by the discreet, yet it is too hard to
refrain from commenting on the way in which
campaigns are conducted these days. True, the
pattern is fixed and there is nothing to be done
about it but it may be worth another plaint.
"Too many communities insist on having
the tops in the entertainment world, failing
which they become testy about conducting
campaigns or pessimistic about results. The
first bids—no matter how small the community
—are Eddie Cantor, George Jessel or Jack
Benny. When expense is 'mentioned, the quick
reply is that it is well worth while 'investing"
a few thousand dollars which is sure to be
more than made up as a result of the coup in
producing a star. The more intellectual—let's
call it that for want of a ready adjective—
leadership will settle for one of the Roosevelt
bays or a U.S. Senator who has made front
page copy. Yes, there' were even two small
communities in recent years which insisted on
Mr. Truman.
"Community leadership is awed by the
success in the big towns where important
names highlight Jewish fund-raising events.
Apparently the communities want to be enter-
tained, not lectured or hectored. Unless they
are entertained, the people won't attend, and
unless they attend monies are not raised. And
so this pragmatic sanction has all but ruled
the entire fund-raising efforts on this continent.
"We all have to recognize that though the
debased standards are most glaring in the
context of such an important aspect of com-
munity life as raising funds for Israel, overseas
relief, education, synagogues, centers and many
other purposes, it is something that pervades
our lives generally. The same desires are often
found in bar-mitzvahs, weddings and other
simchas which deserve a better fate. Moreover
it is such a vicious circle. The jokes-inith of
today fetches fivefold the fee next week if
he made a big TV. show in the interim. No
one in particular is to blame but the public
generally is the culprit. What makes it so hard
to take is that the causes for which the `Hebrew . • . Cable With Strong Coils'
beneficiaries stand are so sacred and the
9nethods so profane. In any event the whole
question is as highly academic as is the theory
of gravitation to the man who has the tiger
by the tail and dare not let go. Our hope is
that a little more realism enters so that com-
"A quiver full of steel arrows, a cable with strong
coils, a trumpet of brass crashing through the air with
munity leaders try to remember why they are
conducting fund-raising events instead of con-
two or three sharp notes—such is the Hebrew language
centrating so hard on whom to feature."
. . . The letters of its books are not many, but they are
to be letters of fire. A language of this sort is not
This is an echo of sentiments we have
destined to say much, but what it does say is beaten
expressed on several occasions. But it goes
out upon an anvil. It is employed to pour floods of
several steps further. It mentions names.
anger and cries of rage against the abuses of the world,
It gives more specific instances of blun-
calling the four winds of heaven to the assaults of the
ders in programming.
citadel of evil. Like the jubilee horn of the sanctuary
While our Canadian confrere spoke in
it will be put to no profane use; but it will sound the
notes of the holy war against injustice and the call of
the main of the lack of realism in pro-
great assemblies; it will sound accents of rejoicing, and
grams planned for fund-raising functions,
accents, of terror; it will become the trumpet of judg-
we wish to expand upon his idea to appeal
ment." —ERNEST RANAN
for higher standards at events accompany-
Wm. Chomsky's Powerful Book
ing the gathering of money for charitable
and reconstruction purposes, but also in
arranging our purely cultural functions,
our educational endeavors, our religious
programs. Too often, we are so blinded by
the search for "bigness" in talent we seek
to import into our communities that we
overlook the need to advance scholarship
in our own midst, to recognize ability
within our immediate fold.
Programming will become less diffi-
cult when we make it a practice to adopt
the highest principles in search for infor-
mation, for enlightenment, for guidance
in our communal efforts. If we - concen-
trate on the idea, we shall attain the
ideal; if we emphasize the principle we
shall attain true bigness in cultural aspi-
rations rather than in inflated names
which have so often besmirched the goals
we were reaching for,
Arabs Pontificate, But Spread Anti-Jewish Libels
In his interview with William Attwood, disseminating anti-Jewish propaganda is
published in Look Magazine, Egypt's Presi- provided in a JTA report from Washington
dent Gamal Abdel Nasser was asked:
which reveals that tourists visiting the
"Is it true that Egyptian officers have Syrian Embassy and consulate in our na-
been issued copies of Hitler's Mein Kampf tion's capital are presented with copies of
and that your government hired Dr. Johann the atrocious forgery.
JTA exposes the practice of the Syrian
von Leers, formerly a leading anti-Jewish
propagandist in the Nazi regime, as an Embassy of giving to those asking for trav-
official in the Ministry of National Guid- el literature "Protocols" pamphlets printed
in French from plates which are said to
ance?"
have originated in Nazi Germany. Those
His reply was.:
"This kind of question is the reason asking for maps and the customary travel
why I am fed up with the American Press. folders, when inquiring about visits to
I try to be friendly with Americans, but Syria, are presented with "Protocols."
That is how the Arab potentates oper-
they repeat this propaganda that the Israe-
lis start with the object of splitting the ate, while denying prejudice against their
West away from the Arabs. How can I be Jewish "cousins."
There were many opportunities for
anti - Semitic? Egyptians are a Semitic
people too. I am really getting fed up with peace and amity betwen Jews and Arabs.
King Abdullah of Jordan was assasinated
this sort of thing."
This reply, indicating a bitterness to- because he wanted to make peace with
wards American newspapermen as well as Israel. It is believed that Naguib would
towards Jews, could well serve to mislead have made peace with the Jewish state.
Nasser, who deposed him, admitted to Att-
the American reader.
It has been established that the Arab wood, in the Look interview, that Naguib
potentates, while they reiterate that as Se- "was sentenced to ten years house arrest."
mites they could not be anti-Semitic, have
Yes, that's how the Arab rulers, who
distributed both the "Mein Kampf" of hold their subjects under subjection and
Hitler and the outrageous forgeries "The in ignorance, operate in defiance of inter-
national decency — with Israel always their
Protocols of the Elders of Zion."
,„ AsicUfinial ,,praot that __the. Arabs are chief .scapegoat. _. _
-
William Chornsky, in his splendid volume, "Hebrew: - The
Eternal Language," just published by the Jewish Publication
Society of America, appropriately incorporates this quotation,
from the famous non-Jewish orientalist and historian, of France.
It proves the au'thor's contention that "-the biblical style
was apparently a specialized literary genre . . . The early
prophets and poets of that Golden Era of Hebrew literary
creativity must have founded a classical tradition which served
as a model for subsequent generations of prophets and writers
. . . This may be what Isaiah referred to when he declared 'The
Lord God hath given me the tongue of them that are taught ..
(Isaiah. 50:4)."
Dr. Chomsky's evaluations of Hebrew, as already indicated
in earlier reviews, describe the vitality of the language, its
power of survival, its influence upon Israel and mankind.
It is equally appropriate, therefore, that he should also
have inserted this paean to Hebrew, from the late Dr. Solomon
-
Schechter:
"If history has anything to say in the matter; the lesson
it affords us is that the disappearance of the Hebrew language
was always followed by assimilation with their surroundings,
and the disappearance of Judaism. The Hebrew language is
not a ?mere idiom; it is in itself a religious symbol of history,
a promise and a hope."
Dr. Schechter was referring to some communities that had
disappeared through assimilation. But as Dr. Chomsky proves,
Hebrew always existed, and functioned, because it, like the
Jewish people, had that forceful quality of survival.
* * *
One of the very interesting analyses in Chomsky's book is
of the Sephardic and Ashkenazic pronunciations. He shows how
the Sephardic predominated because the Sephardim were among
the earliest settlers in the new movements for the return to
Zion. He expresses the view that "in all likelihood, the pronun-
ciation of Hebrew in Israel itself is bound to be influenced by
all the significant immigrant groups of which its present popula-
tion is composed."
The influences upon and the contributions to Hebrew of the
Haskalah movement are reviewed by Dr. Chomsky.
the works of noted scholars throughout the ages are recapitulated.
Thus, the scenes of Hebrew developments in Germany, Italy
and Eastern Europe are adequately covered here.
* * *
Eliezer •Ben Yehuclah's stubborn efforts to make Hebrew
the spoken language in Palestine and the results of his campaign,
including the subsequent battle of languages in the Haifa.
Technion, are given special attention.
A significant declaration closes this fine book: "The only
guarantee for the survival of the Jewish community as a
creative force in Jewish life is an effective, functional, Torah-
centered and Hebraic type of education. This, therefore, is the
direction, and this is the challenge to American Jews and to
American educators."
. "Hebrew: The Eternal Language" is one of the very
scholarly works on the Jewish Publication Society's list of new
books. We predict for it one of the most permanent positions
in the JPS catalogues.
•