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, 1942 at Post °Mc,. Detroit. Mich. under act of Congress of March
b. 187i
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-first day of Sivan, 5719, the following Scriptural selections will
be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Behaaloteka. Num. 8:1-12:16. Prophetical portion. Zechariah 2:14-4:7.
Licht Ben , hen,
VOL. XXXV. No. 17
Friday, June 26,
Page Four
7:53 p.m
June 26, 1959
Secular Courts in Jewish Tradition
The Jewish Publication Society of
America has rendered another valued
service to our people with the publication
of "Tears and Laughter in an Israel Court-
room" by Israel's Supreme Court Justice
Shneor Z. Cheshin. Not only does this
volume provide entertainment: it also
serves as a textbook on Jewish law.
Justice Cheshin's collection of excel-
lent stories, incorporated in this volume.
now available in an English translation.
is accompanied by explanations of Jewish
traditional laws, of the making of wills
in manifold categories, religious and other
stipulations in final testaments and other
important data.
Thus, "Tears and Laughter in an
Israel Courtroom" not only entertains, it
also instructs.
Justice Cheshin's scholarly work
commences with an introduction in which
he explains that "there was a time—not
so long ago—when the institution of the
secular court was not generally accented
by the Jewish community in the Holy
Land. .Tews on the whole preferring to
bring their differences before the tradi-
tional rabbinical court (Bet Din)." The
tradition of the Bet Din was not limited
to the Holy Land. It was a vital factor in
Jewish community life in many Diaspora
countries.
Three major causes are outlined by
Justice Cheshin for this attitude. One
was "the broad iuridical autonomy
granted to various religious communities"
and the fact that "the rabbinical courts,
like the courts of other religious com-
munities, had jurisdiction over a great
variety of lawsuits involving marriage
and divorce. alimony, wills, inheritances
and legacies, and other matters relating
to the personal or religious status of the
Jewish community."
Another cause given is that "in the
last analysis. the unnonularity of the
judicial institutions of the- government
stemmed not so much from a negative
attitude as from the absence of any atti-
tude whatever. For the Jews. in the sim-
plicity of their daily life, did not need
courts "
We view as being of major import-
ance the first reason given by Justice
Cheshin, since it is applicable to Jewish
communities everywhere in relation to
specific Jewish issues and liticrations in-
volving Jewish traditions and institutions.
Justice Cheshin states:
"First and foremost of these (three
major causes) was the severe nrohibi-
-
Mission to Israel
A group of Detroiters will visit Israel
in September on a special Mission to Is-
rael, nationally under auspices of the
United Jewish Appeal and locally as a
venture of the Allied Jewish Campaign
and the Jewish Welfare Federation.
It is a commendable project that
should lead towards a deeper understand-
ing of overseas needs by those who are
supervising fund-raising campaigns in
our community.
While tours to Israel are now com-
mon occurrences, with increasing num-
bers of our people planning to witness at
first hand the historic developments in
the Jewish State, an organized tour in
behalf of campaign leaders, under the di-
rection of people who are able to guide
them properly, is valuable for our com-
munal planning. Such missions are to be
commended heartily.
tion pronounced by rabbinic law against
resorting to Gentile courts. Motivated,
on the one hand, by the difficult condi-
tions under which our forefathers lived
in the Diaspora and by their lack of
faith in the fairness of governmental
courts, and, on the other hand, by the
desire to strengthen the well-springs of
the Jewish people's own creative pow-
ers, the spiritual guardians of Israel
decreed that no Jew was to summon a
fellow Jew to judgment before a Gen-
tile tribunal. Thus Maimonides, in his
`Code' at the end of the section 'San-
hedrin,' states: 'Whoever submits a
suit for adjudication to heathen judges
in their courts. even if the judgment
rendered by them is in consonance
'Soviet Union and Middle East'
with Jewish law, is a wicked man. It is
as though he reviled. blasphemed, and
rebelled against the Law of Moses, our
teacher. . . "
Conditions have changed in the Holy
Land where the courts of Israel must be
recognized as Jewish courts. and the rea-
sons outlined for shunning secular courts
Walter Z. Laqueur, the distinguished authority on the
are no longer applicable. Also, in a free Middle East. in an impressive new book, "The Soviet Union and
land like ours, such rules are outmoded. the Middle East." published by Frederick A. Praeger (15 W.
Nevertheless, we believe that in mat- 47th, N.Y. 36), minimizes the fear that the Arabs are Com-
munists. lie believes that the trend has been only towards
ters involving strictly Jewish issues. the pro-Soviet
alliances.
Code of Maimonides is as valid today as
Thus. he maintains that—
it was eight centuries and more ago.
"The successes of the Soviet Union in the Middle
When a lawsuit involving Jewish
since 1955 cannot be ascribed to any single cause:
practices is brought before a secular East
they certainly can not be explained by the magic of words,
court for the airing of internal religious such
as 'Algeria,' or 'Israel' or 'Arabian oil.' It is even
differences. it is our contention that there doubtful whether they should, or even could, be interpreted
is a reviling and a blaspheming of Jewish solely in terms of foreign policies."
traditions.
Laqueur has an important approach to the problem. He
The Mt. Clemens case is the issue maintains that—
at hand at present. We reiterate what
"The present leadership of the Arab nationalist move-
we have stated at the outset: that it takes ment will try to carry out its own program of uniting' the
only one person to be right in his interpre- Arab world, of restoring it to its old power and glory. Arab
tation and practice of certain rules of nationalists believe that they are on the threshold of success."
conduct in the synagogue. An entire com-
He admits. however, that the Arabs are not the only
munity can be wrong. But when many contestants in the Middle East struggle and certainly no the
communities overwhelmingly rule to strongest.
make changes in methods of observance.
In the impending struggle, Laqueur does not believe that
the individual who differs with the vast the Arabs will emulate the Chinese, and his view is that Marx-
majority has a perfect right to form a ist appraisals of the Arab nationalism are transient phenomena
mmvan of his own to pursue his preferred fated to be split up eventually into groups competing for politi-
policies. Individual freedom can not and cal power.
A conflict is inevitable, we are told, since the dynamic
must not be tamnered with. and when
Communist movement cannot afford "to stagnate" and since
the tampering with the desires of the "slow
progress" within the national Arab movement will not
great majority tends to undermine a be tolerated.
Laqueur therefore does not even preclude "a
community's status it is equally as wrong possible rift between Moscow and Cairo that is wanted by
to tamper with the wishes of the majority. neither side, but become inevitable as the result of the pre-
One could argue the Point on the mature emergence of a semi-Communist regime in such a
score of democratic rule. That. however, country as Iraq."
Equally interesting is Laqueur's observation that "the
is not in question. What we challenge is
the airing of a strictly internal religious emergence of national Communist regimes in the Middle East
issue in the public courts. It was wrong is admitted as at least conceivable. This Asian or Middle East-
in New Orleans; it was blasphemous in ern form of popular democracy remains highly unorthodox
the classical Communist point of view. Such regimes
Mt. Clemens; it would be equally inexcus- from
would be on an equal footing with Moscow—so long as the
able if it were to happen in our immediate international balance of power did not change."
community.
Laqueur writes that Communism has stagnated in Israel
'I he Bet Din can still serve a valuable since 1955. He refers to the plan to establish the nucleus of
purpose in Jewish life. In this community, an anti-Israeli guerrilla army on Israel soil in 1957-58, an
the Jewish Community Council has a_ idea that had to be dropped for practical reasons, and states
standing arbitration tribunal whose panels that another factor that _limited Communist appeals among
could be composed of impartial men of Jews was the Russian policy on the "Jewish question"
good judgment representing all phases inside the Soviet Union. '
The Russian attitude toward Israel and Zionism is discussed
of Jewish life. A Bet Din can be created at several
points throughout the book. Laqueur describes how
wherever there is a wholesome. well-func- Russia
discouraged . Zionist sympathizers and potential emigrants.
tioning Jewish community, and it is our A- brief chapter is devoted to a review of Soviet-Israel diplo-
conviction that such communities exist matic relations. and there is a description of the attacks on
wherever there are Jews. The refusal to Israel in radio broadcasts.
call such a Jewish religious tribunal into
The Moscow arms deal with Egypt "had nothing to do -
action can only be interpreted as display- with the Arab-Israeli conflict," Laqueur writes. He states
ing a lack of faith in the Jewish com- that "for Moscow, Israel was a minor issue—the main intent
was anti-Western."
munity.
The Soviet attitude toward Israel is further indicated in
Holding fast to faith in our kehillot, an appendix
to the book, "Israel in the Soviet Mirror: 1958," in
we accept as valid the Code of Maimon- which the views
expressed by
Ivanov and Z. Sheinis are
ides, and we reject the antithesis that reviewed. The two Russians had K.
undertaken to dispose "of the
makes a public spectacle of Jewish 'miserable theories of the (Jewish nation's) exclusivity and its
religious differences.
messianic mission.' "
Laqueur Describes Antagonistic
Russian Attitude Toward Israel
,