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 48235 Mich., VE 8-9364. Subscription $6 a year. Foreign $7. Second Class Postage Paid at Detroit, Michigan PHILIP SLOMCWITZ Editor and Publisher SIDNEY SHMARAK CARM1 M. SLOMOVITZ Advertising Manager Business Manager CHARLOTTE HYAMS City Editor Sabbath Scriptural Selections This Sabbath, the twenty-fifth clay of Heshvan, 5725, the following scriptural selec- tions will be read in our synagogues: Pentateuelial portion: Gen. 23:1-25:18; Prophetical portion: I Kings 1:1-31. Licht benshen, Friday, October 30, 5:11 p.m. VOL. XLVI. No. 10 Page 4 October 30, 1964 Approaching the Day of Judgment We are on the eve of the Day of Judgment. Next Tuesday, when all roads will lead to the ballot boxes of the free American electorate, the verdict on our future will be written by ourselves, by the constituents of this land who will decide who is to occupy the most important elected role in the world. We must go to the ballot boxes with the faith that whoever will be elected will follow the dictates of the people and will strive to perpetuate the ideals which have made this the land of the free and the home of the brave. While prophecy is not always treated with the utmost respect and is on occasions subjected to ridicule, we join in the augury that President Lyndon B. Johnson will be retained in offce, that he and his running mate. Senator Hubert H. Humphrey, will - be our chief executives for the coming four years. But we have sufficient faith in our Con- gress, in our high court. in the public opinion of the American people. to believe that if the Goldwater-Miller ticket were to succeed, in spite of all the odds against it, that even the extremists would have to toe the mark; that the bitterness and the name-calling the candidates resorted to in the course of a vile campaign would be amended; that the press- ure groups would. in the course of time, be eliminated from influential positions either in government or among the right-wing prop- agandists who have seen fit to preach hate and to instill shocking negativism in Ameri- can life. * * * When .we go to the polls on Tuesday, let us remember the many obligations that face us. The ablest judges must be chosen, men best suited for posts in our educational insti- tutions and for the Detroit Board of Educa- tion should be given preference, and the legis- lators to be elected should be people of high repute. The able and tried candidates for both houses of Congress have earned suffi- cient confidence to be given the voters' approval, and it is to be hoped that the judiciary has been studied sufficiently so that only the most responsible candidates should head our courts, the old and the new. * * * The presidential election retains priority New Brochure Series of interest in Tuesday's election. As we have advocated throughout the pre-election period, we must hope that the two-party system will be retained. But that can be assured only when political discussions are on the highest levels of decency. when differences are ideological and principled. When, however, hate-motivated right-wing groupseek to divide the people in an effort to rule the country, they should be repudiated, as we believe they will. We approach the national election with great solemnity. We have great confidence in the good sense of the American people and we are certain that at midnight on Tuesday we shall be able to seek our rest with a feel- ing of safety. with an assurance of security for America—the land and the people. Thenceforth we hope that the fears that have hitherto been injected will vanish. that a spirit of faith and fearlessness again will predominate in our midst, and that the land of the free will remain just that: the bastion of freedom for us and for the world. The 50th Anniversary of the JDC A highlight of the forthcoming United Jewish Appeal conference which will launch the 1965 drive, in December, will be the observance of the 50th anniversary of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Commit- tee. It is an anniversary of such historic sig- n i fi c a n c e that it deserves extraordinary attention. When the first call for help came at the outbreak of the First World War, in 1914, in the form of a request for a $50.000 fund to protect the Jews of Palestine who were then living under Turkish rule, the Joint Distribu- tion Committee of American Funds for Jewish War Sufferers was organized under the chair- manship of Felix M. Warburg. The reason for that long name was that the new agency, which was to establish highest standards on record for philanthropy, was composed of two bodies that had merged to form the JDC—the Central Committee for the Relief of Jews and the American Jewish Relief Committee. Soon thereafter the Central Corn- mittee for the Relief of Jews also joined the newly formed body and a single organization emerged to tackle the important job of pro- viding relief for suffering Jews during the first world conflict. But the big job for JDC was yet to arise. It was with the appearance on the world scene of the Hitler scourge that the JDC again was faced with responsibilities that taxed the energies of our people and placed the duty of rescuing hundreds of thousands of our kinsmen from certain death. The JDC had planned to liquidate shortly after the end of World War I. But new emergencies arose. There was famine in Jewish-populated areas in Eastern Europe. There were pogroms in Poland and in Romania, and the humiliated and impoverished Jewries depended upon American aid for their sustenance and for retention of their sense of dignity. Then came the era of Nazi terrorism. and all hopes for the termination of philanthropic activities ended. Hundreds of thousands had to be cared for. provisions had to be made for those who could escape from Germany to be helped with emigration facilities. The immensity of the JDC task is ex- pressed in figures—in the more than 4,000.000 Jews who were helped by this great agency in 76 countries. in the $810,000,000 sum that was spent during the half-century period for relief. Liquidation of the displaced persons camps was made possible by the JDC. Coop- erative efforts with the Zionist movement, with the Jewish Agency, assured mass migra- tion efforts that resulted in the settlement of hundreds of thousands of Jews in Israel after their escape from lands where they had been persecuted, disfranchised, dispossessed of their belongings. * * * JDC had made possible the airlifting of 46,000 Jews who were brought, via Operation Magic Carpet, from Yemen to Israel. Other communities were liquidated and their sur- viving Jews were settled in Israel with JDC's aid which had helped more than 400,000 Jews establish new homes in the new Jewish State. Many prominent leaders contributed to- wards this great effort. The Jewish communi- ties in free countries aided in the great task, and Detroit Jewry played a vital role in the rescue efforts and as supporters of the JDC programs. It is as partners in the great JDC effort that the Jews of this city join in the celebration of the historic event—the 50th anniversary of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee. NMI Shema, Torah, Intermarriage, Prayer, Law Viewed in Tracts By making available a series of brief tracts explaining basic Jew- ish principles. Burning Bush Press (1109 5th, NY28), makes it most difficult for any one who seeks knowledge to lay claim that it was not available. Four Conservative rabbis and one Reconstructionist are the authors of the five brochures in the Jewish Tract Series. "The Shema." the basic declaration of Jewish Faith, is explained by Rabbi Fritz A. Rothschild, faculty member of the Jewish Theological Seminary, who states that "Jewish law and tradition would not have assigned it so central a place in the daily prayer service if it did not contain something essential to a proper understanding of our religion. The Sheina is described as "the first Hebrew sentence which the young child is taught to pronounce by his father, and the final affirmation of faith which the dying Jew utters in his last conscious moments." Rabbi Rothschild refers to these historical experiences in his explanatory essay: "Even during the Hadrianic persecutions (132-135 C.E.) there was one man who defied the orders of the Roman Emperor: Rabbi Akiba, the foremost scholar of his generation. taught the Torah publicly despite the prohibition of the government. He was led to his execution at dawn just as the time for the morning Sherpa had arrived. As he went to his death he recited aloud the Sheina Yisraei, thus fulfilling a mitzvah at its appointed hour and, at the same time, openly defying the claim of all earthly power to absolute loyalty. His executioners tried to stop this declaration of faith by torturing him with iron combs, but Akiba finished the sentence and died with the word ehad—one—on his lips, thereby fulfilling his own interpretation of the commandment to love the Lord with all thy soul (life) which he had understood to mean: 'Love even when He takes your soul (life)!' "The example of Rabbi Akiba was followed by countless martyrs throughout the Middle Ages. During the Crusades. whole congregations died with the words of the Sheina on their lips rather than give up their faith. Every Jew utters the declaration of God's unity when he feels death approaching. thus affirming the sovereignty of God and his love for Him even at the moment He takes the soul." Rabbi David Aronson of Minneapolis, in "Torah—The Life of the Jew," describes Torah, Scripture and the unwritten tradition, as being "the sum total of Israel's culture, spiritual heritage and religious tradition." There is no time for graduation in pursuing Jewish studies, this brochure asserts. and Rabbi Aronson states that "the mastery of Torah is not a matter of mere knowledge," that "it must express itself in the growth of one's character and in the development of one's personality." "Intermarriage" is the subject of the tract written by Reconstre0- tionist Rabbi Ira Eisenstein. He describes the increases in mixed marriages and emphasizes the values that are worth preserving. He urges dispassionate evaluation of the issue in the best interests of the Jewish family and in assuring the happiness of individuals concerned, a well as "the psychic security of children," and he encourages accept- ance into the Jewish fold of non-Jews who show a sincere desire to embrace Judaism and have no ulterior motives. Another tract, "The First Words of Prayer," was written by Rabbi Jack Riemer of Dayton, 0. It is an interesting explanation of the spirit of prayer and an interesting explanation of some of the important selections from the prayer book. "Jewish Law—A Conservative Approach," by Rabbi Ben Zion Bokser of New York, explains some of our laws and the challenge of secularism. He also explains Reform attitudes and shows how the basic Jewish law is reaffirmed by Conservative Judaism. Asserting that Conservative Judaism does not merely modify certain elements in Jewish law but must also be equally emphatic in "affirming the authority of the law which abides unchanged," Dr. Bokser state= "The observance of Kashrut in the home and outside the horne,lhe observance of the Sabbath by cessation from work, the restoration a the festivals to a place of holiness in our lives, the duty of daily prayer, the study of the Torah—these constitute basic elements in the discipline which has made for the distinctiveness of the Jewish group. To these elements we add, it goes without saying, the ethical and moral demands which are likewise part of Jewish law."