Who Sank the °Strumit' and the llifeihnre'.?
Shocking revelations made
in Germany . . For details
read Commentary, Page 2
Brith. Ivrith Olamit Story of the 'Struma'—in Hebrew and in English . . • Page 2
HE JEWISH NEWS
Menacing
John Birch
Movement
Changing
Neighborhoods:
Equality Basis
Editorials
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A Weekly Review
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Community
Faces
Crisis
in Hebrew
Education
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Story on
Page 40
Michigan's Only English-Jewish Newspaper —Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle
VOLUME XLVII— No. 14
Printed in a
100% Union Shop
17100 W. 7 Mile Rd., Detroit 35 — VE 8-9364 — May 28, 1965
$6.00 Per Year; This Issue 20c
Joint Israeli, Western Jewish
Tasks Proposed at Bnai Brith
Parley to Meet Jewry's Issues
Conservative • Rabbi Criticizes
Zionist Organization, Proposes
World Assembly as Substitute
KIAMESHA LAKE, N.Y. (JTA) — The Rabbinical Assembly, the
organization of the American Conservative rabbinate, was urged to
summon a World Jewish Assembly for the purpose of forming a new,
worldwide, Jewish organization based on the proposition that the World
Zionist Organization "is no longer adequate. -
The proposal was made at the Rabbinical Assembly's annual con-
vention which is taking place here, with 500 rabbis in attendance. It
was contained in a report entitled "Israel, Judaism, the Jewish people
and Zionism," which stated that the purpose of the World Jewish
Assembly would be:
"To provide a structure which the majority of Jews would recog-
nize as their spokesman in international. bodies such as the United
Nations; to mobilize world opinion to protect the physical and economic
security of Jewish communities whose rights are threatened; to foster
those institutions which teach and preserve Jewish values, while
recognizing that diversity precludes coercion on behalf of or exclusion
of any legitimate Jewish group; and to inculcate a sense of ahavat
Israel (love for Israel) in all who recognized the authority of the
Assembly."
Rabbi Joseph P. Sternstein, of New York, who presented the report,
made clear to the convention the Conservative rabbinate's "unfaltering
support, politically and economically," for the State of Israel, and said
that it is only the World Zionist Organization "that is found wanting!'
The proposed World Jewish Assembly, as envisaged in the report,
would be composed of:
"1. Representatives of all national rabbinic and synagogal groups
accepting the legitimacy of Jewish religious groups which differ from
them in ideology and practice but have reverence for the integrity and
sanctity of each other's religious leadership and institutions.
"2. Representatives of other national and international Jewish
organizations with substantial constituencies which accept the first
principle and recognize the worldwide fellowship of the Jewish people,
our responsibility for the physical security, political freedom and spiri-
tual survival of the Jewish tradition and people wherever they dwell."
There is a new era in the relationships with the Christian world
and the Jews must be prepared for it, Rabbi Max J. Routtenberg,
president of the Rabbinical Assembly told the convention of Conserva-
tive rabbis. He criticized denigrators of inter-religious dialogue.
(Continued on Page 5)
Direct JTA Teletype Wire to The Jewish News
JERUSALEM — Rabbi Morris Adler of Detroit, chairman of the Bnai Brith
adult education commission, told the Bnai Brith convention meeting here that several
problems shared jointly by Israeli and Western Jews deserved a joint effort in solv-
ing them. He said one was the retention of the ethnical sensivity of the oppressed Jew,
historically a dissenter, now that Jews live in freedom and equality. Others, he said,
were how to preserve a sense of personal commitment in an age of impersonal cor-
porateness and how to maintain Jewish continuity in an age which isolates the mod-
ern Jew from his antecedents.
A call for continued, organized protests against the fate of the Jewish minority
in the Soviet Union was issued by Label A. Katz, national president of Bnai Brith,
as the fraternal organization opened its triennial convention in Jerusalem's Convention
Hall.
Two thousand persons attended the opening session, which was greeted by
Israel's two chief rabbis, Sephardic Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Nissim and Ashkenazi Chief
Rabbi Isser Yehudah Untermann. Deploring sharply "the cruel impeachment of
Jewish life in the Soviet Union," Katz told the convention: "The status and future of
Soviet Jewry has become the crucial test, not only of Soviet Jewry but of the Jew-
ish communities."
Prior to the convention opening, delegates and officers of Bnai Brith participat-
ed in ceremonies at the dedication of an addition to the Bnai Brith Martyrs Forest,
near this city. Katz announced that Bnai Brith has pledged an additional $1,000,000 to
the project, bringing the organization's total for that purpose to $2,000,000.
Over the weekend, the Bnai Brith leaders and delegates participated in two
other ceremonies. Near Kibbutz Sde Boker, home of former Premier David Ben-
Gurion, they dedicated a $250,000 Library of Midrasha College. Ben-Gurion was one of
the participants in that ceremony. At Tel Aviv, the Bnai Brith officials dedicated the
Eddie Jacobson Auditorium of the Bnai Brith Building. The auditorium is named after
the late, former business partner of President Harry S. Truman. A letter was read
from Truman, revealing that the late Mr. Jacobson played an important role in gain-
ing Truman's support of Israel's statehood in 1948.
Rabbi Jay Kaufman, the Bnai Brith executive vice president, envisaged a budget
increase of about 50 per cent for the expanded programs of Bnai Brith.
The recent proposals voiced by Tunisian President Habib Bourguiba for Arab-
Israel peace talks indicate an emerging realism in the Arab world toward recognition of
Israel, Deputy Premier Abba Eban told the convention Monday night.
He said that the doctrine of President Nasser of Egypt that Israel would dis-
appear under unrelenting Arab pressures was being questioned by "new voices" in the
Arab wold—voices which were likely to grow.
Linking the survival of Jews outside of Israel with Israeli Jewry, he said that the
(Continued on Page 6)
Biblical Authenticity Affirmed in Research by Dr. Ginsberg;
-Isaiah Passages Used to Confirm 'Prophecies for Our Age'
Current biblical criticism, while adding
immeasurably to our understanding of the
Bible and its period, can really be charac-
terized as "increasingly conservative," ac-
cording to Dr. H. L. Ginsberg, Sabato
Morais Professor of Biblical History and
Literature at the Jewish Theological Semi-
nary of America, New York, in results of
his biblical research made known this week.
Dr. Ginsberg explained, "Frequently the
application of the best tools of modern re-
search. results in heightened respect for
the accuracy of the biblical picture of a
particular age, and for the validity of a
particular biblical lesson."
"Modern scholarship, while aware that
the Bible employs legendary as well as his-
torical materials to bring home its lessons,
is constantly surprising itself by discover-
ing fresh evidence of the historical re-
liability of the Bible, and of an authenticity
which adds depth and luster to its spiritual
teachings," Dr. .Ginsberg continued.
"Fifty years ago," he said, "scholars
tended to assume that any passage which
seemed too 'modern' for its ostensible era,
was a later addition to the biblical text.
They considered this approach 'enlighten-
ed' and 'modern'. Today, as new archaeolo-
gical discoveries help us to date passages
formerly in question as definitely contem-
porary, there is marked hesitancy to make
such attributions. Thus we have gradually
become convinced that, apart from a few
brief, legend-tinged narratives which do
not purport to be by Isaiah himself (since
they speak of him in the third person),
nearly every word in 'First Isaiah' actually
stems from the famous seer of the 8th
Century. Again we can now follow and ap-
preciate as never before the argument of
the Book of Job, thanks to careful exegesis
and philosophical research."
Prof. Ginsberg drew examples to sup-
port his thesis of biblical authenticity from
his own current research, on the Books of
Job and Isaiah, which he is presently pre-
paring for publication. The Book of Job,
he explained, is part of the wisdom litera•
tore of the Bible, as opposed to the coven-
ant literature, of which Isaiah is perhaps
the finest example. The classification of
biblical texts into these two categories, is
very helpful in gaining a better under-
standing of the hooks. The covenant litera-
ture, which deals with the agreement es-
tablished between the Lord and the people
of Israel through the mediation of Moses,
is likely to be susceptible to external veri-
fication, since it deals with the materials
of history. The wisdom literature, on the
other hand, relates to the universal ethical
principles which were assumed to be bind-
ing on all individuals.
. Antedating by many generations the
covenant literature, for which it is a pre-
condition, it lends itself to internal analy-
sis to determine its consistency, its signi-
ficance to us, and its meaning in the period
in which it was recorded. Wisdom litera-
ture is addressed mainly to the individual
reader, and its precepts are considered
valid for people in general, without re-
gard to religious or national loyalty. It is
addressed to the people of Israel, and
therefore shows a disproportionately small
concern both for the individual, and for
the salvation and welfare of other indivi-
duals.
The Book of Job is the most complete,
and the longest study of the problem of
retribution to be found in the Bible. Its
apparent contradictions disappear, accord-
ing to Prof. Ginsberg, if we apply to it
modern philology, technique of exegesis,
and those other tools of modern scholar-
ship which are applicable to a work of
wisdom literature. Here, the test of validity
must be internal consistency rather than
external verification.
First, Dr. Ginsberg divides the story
of Job into two parts — the legend of the
patient Job, and, superimposed upon it,
the story of Job the impatient. Thus chap-
ters 1 and 2, part of 27 and 28, and the
final verses of chapter 42 deal with the
patient Job, but, in the remainder of the
book, the roles are reversed. This section
begins at the point where Job's fortunes
have reached their lowest ebb. Job is now
the protestant, and his friends the chain-
pions of orthodoxy. This much is widely
(Continued on Page 40)