Valuable Contribution to Jewish Communal,
Traditional Analyses in New Volume of Bnai
Brith Adult Education, 'Great Jewish Ideas'

A valuable collection of Bnai
Brith Book Series, the first four
volumes of which have delt with
great Jewish personalities and with
contemporary Jewish thought, is
enhanced by a fifth impressive
work, "Great Jewish Ideas."
Edited by Dr. Abraham Ezra Mill-
gram, the new work contains a
series of essay by distinguished
American Jewish scholars, dealing
with a variety of subjects relating
to Israel, the American Jewish com-
munity, Torah, traditions, and nu-
merous related subjects.

Participating in producing this
work, Rabbi Morris Adler of De-
troit, writing on "-T or a h and
Society," shares in examining
Torah and the Jewish Way of
Life.
Commencing with discussions of
Jews in Israel and America, the
first section of the book features
an analysis by Dr. Alfred Jospe,
Bnai Brith Hillel Foundations' na-
tional director of programs, of "The
Jewish Image of the Jew"; Prof.
Abraham S. Halkin's essay, "People
and Land of Israel"; "The Ameri-

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1

Boris Smolar's

'Between You
... and Me'

I

(Copyright, 1964, Jewish
Telegraphic Agency, Inc.)

The Graduation Season
Fifty years ago, there were about. 7,300 Jewish students in American
colleges and universities . . . In 1919, after World War I, their number
doubled to about 15,000 . . . Today, there are about 300,000 Jewish
students in the American schools of higher learning, and it is expected
that their number will reach 400,000 by 1970 . . . During the years
between the two world wars, the Jewish students constituted 10 per
cent of the total number of students, but today they constitute only 6.5
per cent . . . This ratio is expected to decline even further by 1975,
because of the lower birthrate among Jews . . . It must be added that
today, only 26 per cent of the college-age group in the total American
population attend schools of higher learning, while no less than 70 per
cent of Jewish college age boys and girls go on to university study .. .
Within two decades, it is believed, almost all American Jews will have
attended an institution of higher learning . .. But the number of non-
Jewish youths in American colleges and universities is proportionately
growing with every year and is expected to double by 1970 what it is
today, when Jewish percentage on the campus is already very much
on the decline.

*

*

The Jewish Students
In the years between the two world wars—when the number of
Jewish students was small but larger in percentage than it is today—
most of the Jewish students were immigrants . . . Today, the great
majority are American-born, and many of them are children of Ameri-
can-born Jews .. . In the years between the two wars Jewish students
specialized chiefly in medicine, law, dentistry and engineering ... Today
many of them study to become scientists . . . They study nuclear age
engineering . . . A good many study liberal arts to become university
teachers and highly qualified social workers . . . There are many Jewish
students who take up accounting and management with a view to taking
over the businesses of their parents . . . However, there is still a sub-
stantial 'number of Jewish students who study medicine . . . There are
now no more obstructions for Jews to enter medical colleges, many of
which were until recent years more selective in their admission of
applicants .. . A substantial number of Jewish boys are still studying
law, although a Jewish law graduate finds its difficult to join a corpo-
rate law firm, unless the firm is Jewish . . . Opportunities for success
in building up a practice as an independent lawyer have been rapidly
disappearing . . . This explains why so many Jewish law graduates go
into government service or accept other positions which have nothing
to do with the study of law.

Jewishness on Campus
The Jewish student of today takes his Jewishness for granted . . .
Rabbi Benjamin M. Kahn, national director of the Hillel Foundations,
which serve the social and religious interests of Jewish students on the
campuses, asserts that it is rare to find a student who hides the fact
that he is Jewish . . . However, Jewishly, the average Jewish student is
illiterate . . . He knows practically nothing about Jewish history, Jewish
literature, the work of organizations which make up the Jewish com-
munity, does not recognize religion and shows little or no interest in
Israel . . . His reactions to the Eichmann trial reflected a near-complete
lack of knowledge of the Nazi period and its effect upon Jewish lives,
according to Rabbi Kahn . . . This is to a great extent due to the fact
that most Jewish college students were infants at the time of the fall
of the Nazi regime and had no contemporary exposure to the Nazi
terror . . . However, it is also due to the fact that in their Jewish educa-
tion, they learned nothing, literally nothing, about this tragic experi-
ence in the history of the Jewish people . . . The impact of Hitler and
the loss of 6,000,000 Jews is a blank page to them . . . In the absence
of a feeling of involvement in Jewish history, ancient or modern, the
Jewish student seems to lack also relationship to the Jewish people as
an entity . . . All this is due primarily to the fact that the Jewish stu-
dent comes to the college with inadequate notions and knowledge of his
own background as a Jew . . . His minimal Jewish education was ar-
rested at the childhood level . . . Having retired from Jewish education
at the Bar Mitzvah age, his understanding of Jewish history and Jewish
teachings has failed to keep pace with general knowledge . . . Thus,
when he is exposed to the challenge of the physical and the social
sciences, and to intellectual disciplines on an academic level, he con-
cludes that Judaism does not measure up . . . The directors of the Hillel
Foundations feel that the Jewish commounity is to a great extent to be
blamed for this situation, because it neglects to invest funds for Jewish
education of the student on the university campus . . . They argue that
whereas the community spends an annual average of $100 per child
for his Jewish education on the elementary level, less than $10 per per-
son is expended for the Jewish student in the colleges and universities.

40

Friday, June 19, 1964

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

can Jewish Community" by C.
Bezalel Sherman.
The second section, discussing
Torah as God's Revelation to Israel,
relating to the Personal Life, and
to Society, as a Mode of Worship
and Education, features essays, in
addition to Rabbi Adler, by Dr.
Bernard J. Bamberger, Louis Ja-
cobs, Prof. Nathan Isaacs and Dr.
Samuel M. Blumenfeld.
In the third section, in which
relationships of God and Man are
viewed, are essays by Prof. Lou H.
Silberman, Rabbi Levi A. Olan,
Prof. Eliezer Berkovits,. Rabbi
Jacob B. Agus, Rabbi Steven B.
Schwarzschild and Rabbi Harold M.
Schulweis.
Dr. Arthur Hertzberg, Rabbi Ira
Einstein and Prof. Eugene B. Boro-
witz are the authors of the fourth
section dealing with "A Tradition
in Transition."
Each of the sections is pre-
ceded by an introduction evalu-
ating the different groups of
essays by the book's editor, Dr.
Millgram.
Of special value in this work is
the evaluation of American Jews
and their interests.
The differing backgrounds of the
authors point at once to a variety
in emphases, to ideas that are not
based on uniformity but are the
result of basic studies by represeta-
tives of the three religious group-
ings as well as secularists.
Under discussion are the chal-
lenges to Jewry, the status of
our people under freedom. Dr.
Hertzberg, to point to one view-
point, explains that while Jews
continue to live on, "our age was
meant to be an age of waiting ...
perhaps it was intended that we
hang on as best we can, incarnat-
ing in our oft tormented ways
the mystery of Jewish existence."
Dr. Herzberg goes on to say in
relation such survival: "What is to
be done? The Jewish community
has spent the last century or so in
emphasizing its resemblances to all
other groups. It has not really con-
vinced many non-Jews, and it has
been all too successful in convinc-
ing Jews and leading them out of
Jewish life. The strategy of the next
century should be based on the cul-
tivation of that which is sui generis.
That is the necessary precondition
of survival. It is also the index of
the faith of the Jew in the America
which has given him unconditional
freedom. The ultimate test of his
trust is that freedom will be his
willingness to be unique."
In his essay "Torah and Society"
which is fortified with many refer-
ences to traditional Jewish teach-
ings, Rabbi Adler points to the
many trends in Jewish traditions,
to the emphasis on the dignity of
labor, to the social ethics of Juda-
ism, and he asserts:
"It becomes the responsibility
of each alert and high-minded in-
dividual to resist the encroach-
ments upon justice, truth and
peace which constitute the foun-
dations of freedom. No man may
stand aside and remain neutral
in the ongoing struggle to achieve
in human life a fuller approxima-
tion of virtue and righteousness.
To abdicate such an obligation is
to abet the forces of evil and to
become an accomplice in the
perpuation of wrong." According
to Jewish traditional teachings,
he shows, "apathy becomes a sin
of commission, increasing the de-
cadence that prevails."
Dr. Millgram's scholarly editorial
introductions, the discussions relat-
ing to Jewish values, Jewish ethical
teachings, the status of Jewry, ele-
vate this volwue to the top rung of
evaluative works produced by
American Jews. Bnai Brith's De-
partment of Adult Education,
headed by Rabbi Adler, deserves
commendations for having made
this work possible.

Weekly Quiz

BY RABBI SAMUEL J. FOX

(Copyright, 1964, JTA, Inc.)

means of releasing one from his
rights or obligations, or transfer-
ring one's rights. Where the rights
are transferred to another, the
shoe is given to another. Where
the rights or obligations are can-
celed, apparently the shoe was
taken off and discarded. It may
be that the shoe was used be-
cause it is used by humans as a
means of enabling one to stand up-
right, or perhaps it symbolized
human dignity and rights. Some
(like Rabbi Yehiel of Paris) claim-
ed that removing the shoe from
the brother-in-law invoked a state
of mourning since mounrers tradi-
tionally remove their shoes when
in the state of mourning. When he
rejects the privilege of marrying
the widow and establishing an off-
spring to bear the name of his
brother, his brother's soul dies, in
a sense, and he is then again cast
into mourning for the soul of his
brother. Some claim that the ab-
sence of the shoe makes one's
feet very sensitive to the ground
they tread on. It thus perhaps, be-
comes a symbol of the fact that
we should be extremely sensitive
to the feelings and cares of others
as we walk along in life.

What is "Chalitzah?"
"Chalitzah" is the name given
to the ceremony by which a child-
less widow releases her husband's
brother from the obligation of
marrying her and thus gains the
right herself to marry whomever
she pleases. Since the ceremony
involves an act of removing, un-
tying, or taking off the brother-
in-law's shoe, the rite has been
t, given the name of "Chalitzah"
which signifies the act of "taking
off" or "untying."
* * *
What is the reason for this
ceremony?
Basically, the Bible throws the
responsibility of caring for the
childless widow upon the brothers
of the deceased. This is so, espe-
cially since it is the husband's
name and family which the wife
marries into. Also, it demonstrates
a deep sense of family loyalty and
responsibility by which a brother
actually takes over the responsi-
bility of his deceased brother. This
is most important in the case
where the deceased brother left
no offspring and thus left no heir
to carry on his name. Originally,
by the levirate marriage, in times Hebrew Corner
when one could have more than
one wife, the marriage between
Tales
the widow and the brother-in-law
was a means of establishing an off-
For generations the Jews of Europe
told their tales about the righteous,
spring by which the deceased Hassidim
and plain Jews. Many of these
brother's name could be perpetu- tales were not collected and printed to
be
kept
for
future generations.
ated. It later turned out that some
Lately the Devir Publishing House
brother-in-laws were taking unto published
six volumes of "The Books
themselves their brother's wives of Tales." It has a fortune of stories
about Zadikim and Hassidim, written
not so much out of the desire to by
Mordechai ben Yeheskail in the
perpetuate the deceased brother's style accepted for generations for such
stories.
name but out of personal ulterior
the work Mordechai ben Yeheskail
motives such as their personal got For
the Bialik Prize by the Municipality
physical attraction for the widow. of Tel-Aviv. The writer tells us that he
to write the stories under the
At such a time the rabbis forbade began
influence of Bialik, who suggested that
he
gather
the tales.
the practice of the levirate mar-
This was a difficult job for which he
riage and limited the consequences
his lifetime. Every tale has its
to the alternative offered by the devoted
different version. At the end of the Book
Bible to the brother of the de- of Tales is a treatise on all of the tales
in the book, its origin and various
ceased in case he refused to marry versions.
Many of the stories he heard
his brother's widow—the ceremony from elderly Hassidim, while others he
found in books. The writer improved
of "Chalitzah."
the language and edited a story which
* * *
is easily read.
This is the special art of Mordechai
Why is the shoe of the brother- ben
Yehezkail, well versed in all the
in-law taken off during the cere- legends and knowing how to edit them
for the modern reader without losing
mony?
their original taste.
In the Book of Ruth (Ruth 4:7)
Translation of Hebrew column, pub-
it appears that this practice was a lished
by Brit Ivrit Olamit, Jersualem.

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