100 Toras Distributed in Israel

Brandeis Camp Program Buenos Aires Jews Unveil
BUENOS AIRES (JTA) — A
Cements Jewish Ties
NEW YORK (JTA) — The camp monument to Israel's fallen sol-
program at the Brandeis Institute diers was unveiled at the Tablada
demonstrates that young Jews cemetery by representatives of the
whose ties to Judaism are "non- Buenos Aires Jewish community.
existent or greatly attenuated" can The monument consists of a tent-
within a brief period be brought to like structure superimposed by a

Monument to Israel Hero
Star of David and a book in metal
and marble. Hirsz Triwaks, secre-
tary of the community organiza-
tion, stressed the solidarity of Ar-
gentine Jews with Israel. The
monument is the work of sculptor
Simcha Schwartz.

view Judaism "as an approach
Friday, April 25, 1969 15
to life, rather than a collection of THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
anachronistic and dysfunctional
beliefs and practices," according
for the finest personalized service and
to a report by 13 New York Jewish
satisfaction in automobile purchasing . . .
camp directors and educators.
a new Buick ... Opel ... a good used car ..
The Jewish officials reported
SEE
that finding on the basis of a four-
day visit last summer to Brandeis
Institute, now in its 28th year as a
"laboratory for learning to live
at
Judaism," near Santa Susanna.
Graenum Berger, education consul-
TAMAROFF BUICK-OPEL AGENCY, Inc.
tant for camps and centers of the
353-1300
28585 TELEGRAPH
Federation of Jewish Philanthro-
Across From Tel-Twelve Mall
pies, headed the group.

-

SAUL BERCH

Dr. Moses Rosen (right) chief rabbi of Romania, presents a Tora
scroll to Louis D. Horwitz, director-general of the Joint Distribution
Committee, in recognition of the role played by JDC in transferring
some 3,000 Tora scrolls from Romania to Israel. Horwitz in turn,
presented the scroll to the rabbi of one of the Tel Aviv synagogues.
In this latest distribution some 100 Mira Tora were presented to 25
synagogues located in the greater Tel Aviv area.

Prof. Urzidil's 'There Goes Kafka'
Is Published by Wayne State Press

By JACK SIEGEL

(A Seven Arts Feature)

Every so often, but not often
enough, a book will come across
my desk, unheralded, unpromoted,
like this one: "There Goes Kafka"
by Johannes Urzidil issued by
Wayne State University Press.
Prof. Urzidil is a Czech non-Jew
who had to leave his country be-
cause of Hitler. Also, probably, be-
cause he was married to a Jewish
woman. Urzidil's brother-in-law,
Friedrich Thieberger, was Kafka's
Hebrew teacher.
But as Prof. Urzidil, now in the
United States, unfolds his leisure-
ly tale of that time, it slowly
catches you and you become in-
volved in the life of Prague, par-
ticularly the German-Jewish elem-
ent. Prof. Urzidil writes: "The in-
tellectual Prague of that Czech-
Austrian-Jewish synthesis which
had sustained the metropolitan
aspect of the city and inspired it
throughout centuries, came to an
end with Kafka."
People like Franz Werfel, Max
Brod, Egon Erwin Kisch and
many others not generally known
to the world at large, many who,
having had to escape, saw their

Syrian, Iraqi Jews
Beg BBC-TV Crew:
'Please Save Us'

LONDON — "We are living in
hell" were the opening words on
a scrap of paper slipped to a
British television crew in Dam-
asCus' Jewish quarter. Extracts
from the message and others from
Iraqi Jews were shown last week
On "24 hours," a British Broad-
casting Corp. news program.
The letter from the Iraqi Jew
was dated Feb. 15, 1969, two weeks
after the public hanging of nine
Jews and five others in Baghdad
On charges of spying for Israel.
It said: "About 50 (Jews) are
still detained, including four wom-
en. Most of them are not allowed

to contact their parents or anyone
else, even a lawyer. Nobody knows
where they are." Another note
ended: "Please, we need so much
to leave Iraq. Save us."

talent die with
language-..,and

distance from their
home. Writers, ' it
not
bloom in foreign
seems, do

lands.
Prof. Urzidil gives us further
revelations about Kafka, the sen-
sitive, semi-withdrawn a r t i s t,
somewhat introverted. who died of
TB. Among other facts, there was
a 100-page letter Kafka wrote to
his father which emphasized the
(generation) gap between them. It
is conceivable that this existed in
strong, if not in exact, contempor-
ary terms.
Kafka's famous story - Meta-
morphosis," about the son of a
family who turns into an enormous
bug in his bedroom, locking his
family out, is probably a parable
of rejection of a bureaucratic so-
ciety, the theme which takes up
much of his talent. Evidence of his
religiousity does not exist, but
Kafka is quoted as saying: "Writ-
ing is a form of prayer," and ac-
cording to Urzidil. Kafka's faith
was expressed in his "even if sal-
vation fails to come, I want to be
worthy of it every minute." Isn't
this akin to the tale of the old
rabbi who warned his sexton to
respect his sleep but if the Mes-
siah were to come, he wanted to
be awakened immediately? And-
Kafka did study Bible and Talmud
with George Mordecai Langer, a
scholar of Cabala.
The leisurely coffee house and
intellectual life of these days is
gone, not only in Czechoslovakia
but in all Europe. That kind of
one - to - one communication has
been submerged in the mass of
modern society, the kind against
which Kafka rebelled. Certainly,
with the destruction, flight and
ultimate death of Jewish artists,
the countries themselves have suf-
fered. The Jews were the grain of
sand in the oyster which produced
the pearl of literature and the arts.
It was there that the famous
story of the Golem of the Prague
Rabbi Loew took place. And in the
Old Synagogue of Prague, his

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bench is still there, unused, as a
reminder of how far back the
genius, talent and religiosity of

LINCOLN CENTER

the Jews went in that country.
"There Goes Kafka" will not be

a best seller. But for students, or
There seems to be an excess of people generally interested, it is
everything except parking space essence of a past we ought to
and religion. —Kin Hubbard. know.

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