Door to Aid Open at: Last

THE JEWISH NEWS

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

Membei 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 SC.
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 eighth day of Heshvan ,5718, the following Scriptural selections
will be read in our synagogues:
40:27 41:16.
Pentateuchal portibn, Lech Lecha, Gen. 12:1-17:27. Prophetical portion, Isaiah

-

Licht Benshen, Friday, Nov. 1, 4:35 p.m.

Vol. XXXII. No. 9

Page Four

November 1, 1957

The Balfour Event: ATriple Anniversary

The 25th anniversary of the events
sponsored in Detroit by the Zionist Or-
ganization coincides with two other im-
portant occasions—the 60th anniversary
of the First World Zionist Congress and
the 40th anniversary of the issuance, of
the Balfour Declaration.
Therefore, the current event in De-
troit assumes more than ordinary im-
portance.
Actually, the present observance
honors an entire generation's devoted
efforts in behalf of the cause of Jewish
national rebirth.
Detroit Jewry has always been in
the forefront of Zionist activities. Our
people have recognized and honored an
obligation to their fellow-men who were
less fortunate, who were downtrodden,
who were discriminated against, and
joined wholeheartedly in the task of
re-creating statehood for the stateless.
Our people joined in the cultural re-
naissance movement of all Jewry and
participated in the revival of Hebrew,
in the sponsorship of educational proj-
ects aimed at the elevation of the stan-
dards of our people, in the advancement
of the basic ideals that are the People
Israel's.
This has been the task of the Zion-
ist Organization of Detroit in \ which
thousands were enrolled.
The Balfour events, marking the an-
niversary of the issuance of the Balfour
Declaration, were part of this extensive
program.
*
*
*
Celebrating as we now do the im-
portant Zionist anniversaries and the
silver anniversary of the Balfour events
of the local Zionist organization, we
must reaffirm basic facts: that the Zion-
ist movement arose out of the despair
of the Jewish masses who were con-
stantly faced by pogroms, whose lives
were endangered, who had no other
hope than to find a permanent haven
in a land where they could feel free to
create, to study, to strengthen their tra-
ditions.
History taught us, and Prophecy
constantly reassured us, that the Land
of Israel—Eretz Ysrael—Palestine—is
that haven. American Jews, knowing
the plight of their kinsmen, supported

Zionism. The movement finally suc-
ceded, and Israel now is an established
fact.
This is the result of the efforts of
the Zionist movement. This is what is
also being observed now, on the anni-
versary of the Balfour Declaration.
*
*
*
One of our people's great scholars,
Rabbi Jacob Emden (1697-1776) wrote
this historic declaration Eretz Yisrael:

"Every Jew should steadfastly re-
solve to Eretz Yisrael and remain
there. If he cannot go himself, he
should support some person in that
country.
"The mistake our forefathers
made was that of ignoring this
precious lhnd, and thereby causing
much suffering in the generations
that succeeded them. The thought of
this land has ever been our solace
in our bitter exile, where we can
find neither peace nor rest. When
we forgot our land, we ourselves
were forgotten.
"Misfortune befell us when Israel
enjoyed honors in countries like Spain
and assimilated with the people among
whom they lived. No one at all
yearned for Zion; it was abandoned
and forgotten.
"Israel and the land of Israel are
called God's heritage, and the Torah
is connected with both, with the
people of God and the heritage of God;
whoever abandons the one abandons
the other."

This was written several generations
ago. • Yet, it is applicable in our time.
Those who can not be in Israel to build
it and to be rebuilt by it, can assist in
the redemption by assisting others to be
the builders.
That is what the Zionist movement
is doing, and that is what we honor in
the Zionist movement on the historic
anniversaries we celebrate today.
To the Zionist Organization of De-
troit, on the occasion of its annual con-
cert-anniversary celebration, we pay
honor, as we join in paying tribute to
the pioneers who made possible the rise
of modern Israel. May the hands of the
builders of Zion-be strengthened.

N. R. Epstein and the City of Hope

It was back in 1927 that Nathan R.
Epstein helped to organize the Detroit
Auxiliary of the City of Hope, then
a 14-year-old tuberculosis sanitorium
struggling to exist in order to aid needy
.people who could not afford treatment.
Through the years, Mr. Epstein has
watched the Duarte, Calif. institution
grow in size and scope so that today
it successfully copes not alone with
tuberculosis, but cancer, leukemia and
heart disease and conducts a research
program that has uncovered many clues
to the causes of illness.
In 1942, joined by a number of
prominent citizens here, Mr. Epstein
helped to organize a second group—the
Detroit Business Men's Group of the
City of Hope, an organization which
started modestly to raise funds, but to-
day sets for itself a goal of $100,000.
The main source of fund-raising is
the annual dinner-dance, to be held this
year on Nov. 10, at the Sheraton-Cadil-
lac Hotel. Nathan R. Epstein has been

singled out for special honors this year,
not only as the founder of the Business
Men's Group but as the man who served
as president from its formation until
1955, when he was succeeded by his son,
Eugene Epstein.
The beauty of the idea behind the
City of Hope is that the institution is
more than a hospital, more than a
charitable organization, for the very
word "charity" is frowned on by its
supporters. The underlying principal of
the City of Hope is that "man is his
brother's keeper," that "none enters
who can pay and none that enters pays."
Nathan R. Epstein and his co-
workers in the City of Hope — business
and professional men — devote much
of their time, effort and money in sup-
porting the humanitarian principles
adopted by this non-profit organization.
Their work makes possible further
study in wiping out disease — some of
which are today considered incurable,
but one day will be obliterated.

Dr. Salo Baron's 'Social and
Religious History of the Jews'

The Jewish Publication Society of America has earned the
gratitude of English-reading communities for many valuable
literary products. The publication of the English translation of
the Bible, of Heinrich Graetz's "History of the Jews" in English,
and the introduction of Israel Zangwill to America are among
the great accomplishments of the Society. Added to it, now, is
the very scholarly work, "A Social and Religious History of the
Jews," by Prof. Salo Wittmayer Baron of Columbia University.
The first two volumes, which were issued in 1952, dealt with
the beginning of the Christian era and the first five centuries
of the Christian era.
This week, the Society issued three snore volumes in the
Baron studies. They deal with "Heirs of Rome and Persia,"
"Meeting of East and West" and "Religious Controls and Dissen-
sions," covering the years 500-1200.

Simultaneous with the publication of these volumes by the
Jewish Publication Society, they also were issued by Columbia
University Press (2960 Broadway, N.Y. 27).

Three more volumes are yet to be published, on the topics
"Laws, Homilies, and the Bible," "Hebrew Language and Let-
ters" and "Philosophy and Science."

.
In the present turbulent times of Arab-Israeli conflicts,
the third volume has particular value. Prof. Baron describes
in it the Jewish position in the pre-Islamic world, the ancient
• Arab-Jewish relations and the rennaissance of Islam and Juda-
ism in the period of the rise of Mohammed and the Caliphate.

There were periods of genuine friendship between Jews and
Moslems, but there also were alternating times of persecution
and hatred. But it was a time that also was marked by cultural
attainments.
The yellow badge for Jews was introduced in the 11th cen- .
tury. "The Almohade Al-Mansur made the Jews wear 'dark blue
garments with sleeves reaching down to their feet, and vile skull-
caps covering their ears'."
But there were also eras of good relations and a happy inter-
change of fellowship.
Then, as now, there were such problems as intermarriage, as
well as conversion, which created a host of problems in civil law,
especially in the realm Of inheritance."

Prof. Baron points out that "insecure as life generally was
in the troubled periods of Islam's decline, there was none of
that feeling of personal insecurity which dominated the me-
dieval Jewish psyche in the West."
The era of the Crusades is under review in Volume IV. Dr.
Baron outlines the expansion of Christianity, the ascendancy of

the Catholic Church and the effects of these developments upon
Jewish life. Jewish "tenacity in the face of adversity and grow-
ing animosities" accounted for progressive Jewish activities. Dr.
Baron informs his readers that "there was a tremendous expan-
sion of the Jewish population in Christian Spain and in the newer
sections of Central and Eastern Europe. Certainly, by 1200 many
more Jews lived under Christendom tha4 had in 1095." The
distinguished author emphasizes:

"The 'multifaceted' 12th century was anything but a period
of unmitigated gloom even in Jewish history. While whipping
up much religious fanaticism, the Crusades nevertheless
bridged the gap between the divided worlds of Islam and
Christendom. Jews, who bad long served as mediators between
East and West in both international trade and cultural ex-
changes, now found themselves confronted by many new com-
petitors in the former, but also by numerous collaborators in
the latter spheres. Even north of the Alps and Pyrenees many
Jews maintained personal contacts with Christian scholars,
merchants, and customers, and thus learned, as well as, im-
parted the knowledge of, each other's human qualities . . . "
The maintenance of communal unity and cohesiveness in

spite of weakened authority and decentralization of communities
in Jewry is described in Volume V, in which Dr. Baron deals
with the schism between the Karaites and the Rabbanites.
There is a thorough study of the socior-religious controversies, of
Jewish communal controls, of the effects of sectarian trends
among Jews in medieval times.
The Karaites are viewed as "but islands within the sea of
European Judaism." They "gradually sank to a position of minor
significance in the history of their people."
Richly annotated, these volumes lend themselves to pro-
longed study. They will be valued as textbooks in advanced

classes of Jewish studies, and will prove invaluable to Christian
and Moslem students as well.

