THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS — Friday, December 1, 1961
THE JEWISH NEWS
Hanukah 1961
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 Congress of March
8, 1879.
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
SIDNEY SHMARAK CARM1 M. SLOMOVITZ HARVEY ZUCKERBERG
Advertising Manager
Business Manager
City Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
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This Sabbath, the twenty-fourth day of Kislev, 5722, the following Scriptural selections
will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Wa-yeshev, Gen. 37:1-40:23. Prophetical portion_, Amos 2:6-3:8.
Licht Benshen, Friday, Dec. 1, 4:44 p.m.
VOL. XL, •No. 14
Page Four
December 1, 1961
Lessons of Courage-Inspiring Hanukah
Dedication to the Jewish spiritual
values and re-dedication to our heritage
again is the order of the day as we usher
in eight days of candle lighting of joyous
celebration of the Maccabaean Festival,
the Hanukah Festival of Dedication.
A post-Biblical festival which does not
require abandonment of daily labors,
Hanukah nevertheless is one of the great
events on our calendar. It is a festival
that inspires the children with its story
of heroism, with its account of the
spiritual strength of their forefathers,
with the opportunities it provides for
festivities and for the receiving of gifts.
Even the gift-giving is essential in in-
stilling a love for the holiday among
children.
There are competitive elements in the
life of the Jewish child during December.
The Christmas festival, so brilliantly
emphasized for weeks ahead among shop-
pers for gifts—even more so than among
those who prepare for prayers and re-
ligious observances — is evident every-
where, and the Jewish child is aware of
its approach. The child is tested by it -in
our schools, among neighbors, on radio
and television — wherever one turns in
daily life which we share with our Chris-
tian fellow-men. Therefore every move
to overcome the competitive ideas, which
often threaten to be enticing, must be
welcome as valuable aspects of the
Hanukah festival.
What is necessary, of course, is that
we emphasize the lessons of Hanukah—
the fact that the festival represents a
triumph of right over injustice, that in
time of crisis even a handful of people
can succeed in overcoming brutality, that
Hanukah's ideal is rooted in its observers'
right to be different, and this right to
differ has, since the days of the Macca-
bees, become a basic right of all men
among all faiths.
In the days of the Maccabees Jews
were challenged by the competitive spirit
of Hellenism. They even -drew upon some
of its aspects which became incorporated
in Jewish teachings. But they overcame
the overwhelming odds contains in such
a conflict and survived, indeed they con-
quered, Hellenism. Now there are other
factors in a struggle for survival, in
Jewry's efforts to live and to continue to
make its contributions to the world at
large. The Hanukah lesson, with its
emphasis on the right to be different,
with its insistence upon . Israel's right to
live, helps to sustain a people that is in.
the minority everywhere. Inspired by the
existence of a group of kinsmen that is
now a majority in one nation—for the
first time since the end Of Jewish state-
hood 1900 years ago — in Israel, the
Hanukah re-dedication to faith and to
constructive living becomes simpler.
- Hanukah therefore continues to be
one of the very joyous events on our
calendar. It is a great day for the young,
and they help to make it an inspiring
day for their elders. May the joy of
Hanukah remain as a blessing for Jewry
and as a continuing lesson to the coura-
geous and just-minded of all nations.
Arabs Reveal Aim to Destroy Israel
Let it be said to the credit of the
Arabs in the United Nations that they
are not hiding facts, they seek the de-
struction of Israel and say so bluntly.
In one of the anti-Israel addresses
before the General- Assembly of the UN,
Ahmad Shukairy, head of the Saudi
Arabian delegation, demanded that steps
be taken which "will really be the end
of Israel."
In the usual fashion adopted by Arab
spokesmen, who do not hesitate to inject
themselves into internal American af-
fairs, Shukairy had the audacity to ask
the United States "to outlaw Zionism and
to ban its activity."
Israel's UN delegation chairman,
Michael S. Comay, found it necessary to
state in the UN General Assembly:
"I shall not take the time of the
Assembly to reply to every false state-
ment and every fabricated quotation
recited by the delegate fram Saudi Arabia.
I shall say only it is a lot of wild non-
sense. Zionism is the movement of Jewish
national liberation. Whether the Saudi
Arabian delegate likes it or not, Israel
is a permanent feature of the landscape."
Rationally - minded people must, of
course, concur with Comay. In viewing
the Arab position, on the basis of Shu-
kairy's assertions, there is this to be said:
he exposed the Arab position in all its
cruelty. He desires to see the destruction
of a member state of the United Nations.
There is hardly any reason for doubting
that - those who have faith in the United
Nations and wish to see the international
organization survive will refuse to con-
done genocide — the destruction of an
entire nation—which is exactly what the
Arabs are aiming at.
The Eichmann Verdict and Genocide
Within a very few days, a long verdict,
estimated to run into close to 300,000
words, will be read in the Jerusalem
courtroom, pronouncing judgment on the
arch Nazi murderer, Adolf Eichmann.
Many anxious months were devoted to
hearing testimony and to studying the
data related to the Eichmann crimes and
to the guilt of his associates.
In more than one sense, there was
more than one person under accusation
of the worst crimes on the world's rec-
ords. But while Eichmann was being
tried, the nation in whose name he was
performing his cruelties was repudiating
him and his associates and West Germany
aligned itself with civilized world opinion
in repudiating the deeds of the mass
murderers. There were dissenting -opin-
ions in Germany, evidencing an inheri-
tance from Nazism, but it is hoped that
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the negative views represent a. minority.
Much more is needed, however, for
the repudiation of the Nazi crimes. The
Eichmann trial must teach the Germans
that their chief obligation, even before
strengthening their economy, even before
they re-establish their position that has
been made so difficult by the East-West
crisis, is to teach the German youth
never again to condone even the minutest
attempts to revile their fellow men.
It doesn't matter what the verdict will
be. There are many who believe that it
can not be anything else but the death
penalty. We are inclined to doubt that
Israel will resort to capital punishment
even in the instance of the vilest criminal.
What does matter is that the lesson of
the holocaust should not be lost, that the
world at large should feel the shame of
what had happened, and that never again
should genocide be in evidence anywhere.
Goodman's The New Country:'
60 Stories from the Yiddish
Stories from the Yiddish must depict life of a generation
that was prolific in Yiddish. A new generation has arisen that
does not know the language. Too few use it today, and whatever
is related about those for whom it was "the mother tongue"
may sound strange to the offspring. There is need, however, for
an understanding of the former generation—for historical and
social reasons.
That is why the collection of short stories about life in
America, translated into, English from the Yiddish by Henry
Goodman and published under the title "The New Country" by
Yiddisher Kultur Farband, Inc.—YKUF—(189 Second Ave.,
N.Y. 3), is so important.
These stories deal with immigrant
with the people of
the era of the sweatshops and the tenemerits on New York's
East Side, with the Bohemians and the poets, with the Jewish
passion for justice, with a hope for farming and an imbedded
life in mercantilism,
Henry Goodman, who selected and translated the 60 short
stories in this 520-page book, has a background of 35 years
as a teacher of English in New York high schools, and as an
instructor in short story writing in Hunter College's extension
division. He has edited a number of books and has devoted
himself to the translation of works by the leading Yiddish
writers.
Goodman's approach to his selections is indicated in the
titles for the six parts of the book: Getting Settled, Making a
Living, Parents and Children, There's Laughter, The One in
the Many and There Are Others. Thus, there is indication
of his having chosen topics that deal with the immigrants'
plight, family problems, economic struggles, relationships with
non-Jews—and the inevitable humorous elements.
Sholem Aleichem is well represented here, with stories
about striking garment workers, the schooling of immigrants,
youngsters on the streets of New York, a swindler, immigrants
problems.
Noteworthy also among the names of great writers whose
stories appear in "The New. Country" are Sholem Asch, Abraham
Raisin, Peretz Hirschbein and others.
Those who are acquainted with the background of Yiddish
literature will recognize the editor's- understanding of his task,
in making the selections for this 'book, when they read stories
by Joseph Opatoshu, Leon Kobrin, I. J. Singer, Jacob Gordin
and others whose stories delighted the Yiddish readers in the
past half century.
In the section devoted to the lighter side of life, in the
part entitled "There's Laughter, Too," there are delightful
narratives by Opatoshu, Tashrak, Moishe Nadir, M. J. Chaimo-
witz and others.
The religious element also enters in, and there is the in-
evitable subject of the marriage broker and the aspiration by
parents to have their daughters wed to scholars. And there
is the "problem" of parents' dependence on children, the asser-
tion of elders who seek independence from the younger genera-
tion, the mourning of parents for martyred sons and other related
subjects.
There are dramatic elements in the evaluation of the strug-
gle between generations, and the Yiddish masters treated their
subjcts with skill.
Among the story-tellers whose narratives are included in
this book also are: Zalmon Libin, Yona Rosenfeld, Isaac Raboy,
Chaver Paver, Chone Gottesfeld, Aaron Maizel, L. Chanukoff,
David Ignatoff, Sheen Miller, Lamed Shapiro, Borech Glassman,
B. Applebaum, Jacob Gordin, Sheen Daixel.
Goodman's excellent translations and his illuminating intro-
duction are elements attesting to the merit of this book that
should find a welcome in many Jewish homes.
Fiction, Poems, Non-Fiction
in Meridian's 'Noble Savage'
Saul Bellow and Keith Botsford are the editors of No. 4 of
"The Noble Savage," the literary periodical published twice a year
by Meridian Books and World Publishing Co. (119 W. 57th,
N.Y.
19).
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Here we have a variety of features — non-fiction and fiction,
poetry and controversial discussions.
Non-fictional, for example, is Dan Jacobson's "Coming to
London," and Antoni Slonimsky's "Memories of Warsaw." There
are Jewish . references in the latter that provide material relevant
to a study of the current tragic situation of a Poland virtually
without Jews.
B. H. Friedman's "Whisper" is a remarkable delineation of
New York.