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 Associ-
ation Second-Class
Published every
Friday
by The Jewish News Publishing Co.. 17515 W. Nine Mile. Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075.
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Paid
at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices.
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PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor. and Publisher
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
CHARLOTTE DUBIN
'Business Manager
City Editor
_ DREW LIEBERWITZ
Advertising Manager
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the 27th day of Shevat, 5732, the following scriptural selections
v . ,11 be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portions, Krod. 21:1 - 24:18. 30:11 - 16. Prophetical portion,
11 Kings
Torah readings for Rosh Hodesh Adar, Tuesday and Wednesday,
Num. 28:1 - 15.
Candle lighting, Friday, Feb. 11, 1:42 p.m.
VOL. LX. No. 22
Page Four
February 11, 1972
Unity in Tackling USSR Jewry's Needs
Responsible leadership in American Jew-
r■ must take into account a reverberated sit-
uation that reminds us of the period during
and for a time after World War II when
there was an immense overlapping of activ-
ities in the American Jewish community.
While shunning conformity, in a time of
crisis it is imperative that we have a meas-
ure of unity. We are now experiencing an
unusual miracle. The large number of emi-
grants from Russia to Israel represents a sit-
uation -that was unexpected and unbelievable
as few as five years ago. In the 1960s there
still was the dreaded fear of reprisals in Rus-
sia against those who spoke of Israel or Zion-
ism or Hebrew.
effort which is under way is so huge that only
an organization like the United Jewish Appeal
could reasonably be expected to undertake the
extraordinary efforts to meet the financial needs
of the Soviet Jewish migration. The UJA instru-
ments are the same ones which have performed
the modern-day miracles of relief and rehabili-
tation of oppressed Jews around the world
whose numbers are counted in the millions.
"An official statement which was issued
advisedly last December by the World Zionist
Organization includes the following clear infor-
mation: It should be noted that the needs of
Soviet Jewry in their efforts to leave Russia
and in transit to Israel and other countries, are
being provided for by the agencies supported
by the Jewish Welfare etmds—United Jewish
Appeal campaigns. Their needs on arrival in
Israel and elsewhere likewise are provided for
by the same campaigns. The considerable sums
which are required can be mobilized only by
the United Jewish Appeal as the central, hu-
manitarian agency of American Jewry for over-
seas needs. UJA agencies spare no effort in
bringing relief and facilities for rescue of Soviet
Jews who are able to leave the Soviet Union,
and for their absorption in Israel and else-
where. In order to assist Soviet Jewry, all Jews
should channel their aid through the _UJA."
"The proper instrument through --which re-
sponsible citizens of Detroit's Jewish conununi-
ty can do their utmost financially in meeting
the over-all problem will be by generous contri-
butions to em Allied Jewish Campaign-Israel
Icmergency Fend which of coarse, is the main-
stay of the United Jewish Appeal
Volume by Howe, Greenberg
Helps Perpetuate Great Yiddish
Writings in Notable Collection
Suddenly, there emerged a courageous
spirit that defies suppression, that chal-
lenges those who would oppress Jews
who express loyalty to their historic her-
itage. Entirely unexpectedly, Jews in -
Two scholars, Prof. Irving Howe and Eliezer Greenberg, who have
previously collaborated in editing anthologies of Yiddish stories and
Russia are affirming kinship with other
poetry,
have jointly produced another important work, "Voices From
Jews, . dedication to the Zionist goals, a
the Yiddish," published by the University of Michigan Press.
determination to study Hebrew. Some
even express religious sentiments.
Sharing "a common historical matrix," the essays, memoirs and
This is viewed as one of the miracles of
diaries in this volume add immeasurably towards perpetuating
the
our time, and the tens of thousands who are
availability of Yiddish writings in English translations.
expected to find haven in their ancient home-
In many respects, the works collected here provide, valuable
land this year represent a revolutionary force
addenda to the history of Yiddish literature, and they serve at the
in an atmosphere of counter-revolution to
same. time the purpose of presenting anew, biographically and
their ideals.
ideologically, many of the great names hi the Yiddish literature.
These hordes of emigrants must be pro-
Lovers of Yiddish, those who are acquainted with the names of
vided for. They need actsistance. And they
are getting it. But they need more help than
This is self-explanatory in relation to the eminent writers in the American Jewish press will be especially
delighted to read their essays in English translations. It is not often
could possibly have been planned for in ad- fund raising. But it is not fund raising alone that the names of Abraham Koralnik, Hayim Thillowsky, Joseph Opa_
vance, and the activities of the Joint Distri- that matters in a situation as pressing as that toshrt and many others are brought to light again and their views
re-
bution Committee, the Jewish Agency and involved in the Russian Jewish situation. affirmed in their own articles.
their allied forces in many communities There is also the overlapping in organiza-
In view of what has just happened to a large Yiddish daily in
emerge as vital in the new rehabilitation and tional efforts that should be watched as pos-
New York, these writings assume special significance. When we read,
rescue task that has become world Jewry's sibly endangering unity.
therefore,
the creative works of Shmuel Niger, Hayim Greenberg
We don't know how many dozens of Jacob Glatstein
major responsibility.
and others in a volume of splendid translations, well
In Detroit it is the Allied , Jewish Cam- groups are functioning with the aim of as- edited, the nostalgia for Yiddish returns.
paign that supplies the means of- assisting sisting Russian Jewry, of protesting against
Prof. Solomon Liptzhi of the American College in Jerusalem
discrimination and demanding justice - for
the thousands of migrants from Russia to
was the translator of the first essay in this volume, "Advice to
our kinsmen in the USSR. Butit is clear that
Israel, and the additional numbers who may
the Estranged" by I. L. Pereti. It Iippears in the section "The
find refuge in the United States will get their
most of them are laboring for the same aim,
Founding Fathers," It is followed by other essays by Peretz trans-
that they plead for the same men and women
assistance from the United Jewish Appeal,
lated by Nathan Helper. The eminence of the translators points
the major beneficiary of the Detroit drive. who are jailed or who have been denied
to the seriousness of the effort exerted in the editing of these
means of earning a livelihood -after they had
selected essays.
This has to be understood in order that
an be in dto e n res
e, tsp in eedil
Zioy nis an m d an
there should not be the overlapping and the
undhesi
Isra
tael
t:
Yiddish readers will recall another important name in that litera-
confusion that might erupt from insignifi- and in their Jewish heritage.
t
This is the type of overlapping that ure of Ba'al Makhshoves. His essay on "Mendele, Grandfather
cant individualistic efforts claimed to be in
of
Yiddish
is an appropriate part of a work of the nature
should be avoided, the sort of confusion that of "Voices Literature,"
support of Russian Jewry.
From the Yiddish."
It is impossible to conceive of a com- should have no place in Jewish life. There
indt
is
much
meath
ed to
Niger's "The Humor of Sholom Aleichem" is another of the im-
petitive movement that might even supple-
ment the labors of the major existing ingly, and vast sums of money will be needed portant articles that raise this volume to a high level.
philanthropic causes, primarily, the UJA for the rescue efforts. If there will be compe-
Then there are the essays in the section "Eastern European
and the JDC, when it is taken into account tition, overlapping and confusion, our aims S cene"
in which the shtetl and its components are revived. Essays
that our- chief agencies that function in will be thwarted. Let us avoid such affronts by Dr. Abraham Joshua Heschel, translated by himself, are noteworthy
h ere.
the settlement of newcomers to Israel to Jewish dignity.
must plan to spend some ;35,000 to in-
tegrate it single Russian family into Is-
rael's economy. This requires such great
dedication that any effort to supplement
it could well turn into a regrettable fiasco.
It is regrettable, therefore that in this
critical period of mass migration of Russian
Jews it should have been necessary for Mil-
ton J. Miller as chairman of the Jewish Wel-
fare Federation's committee on independent
appeals, to warn of "the danger of splinter-
ing and fragmentation which could only con-
fuse those of us who desire to be helpful."
The statement on behalf of the Federation
went on to state:
"There is no longer any question about the
plight of Soviet Jews and fortunately there seems
to have been a reversal in their government's
policy so that thousands of Jews have recently
been allowed to emigrate. The symapthy of
Jews the world over for their brethren is also
an established fact.
"The dimensions and the scope of the relief
UN Monkey Wrench
A special section of the book devoted to "The Holocaust" is
noteworthy. It contains the memoirs of Emmanuel Itingelhanin
("In the Warsaw Ghetto") and Michael zylberbers
("A Warsaw
Diary") and a splendid commentary, "Goias-Jew," by Hayim
Greenberg.
Not unlike the peace talks between Israel
and her Arab neighbors in 1918, on the island
of Rhodes, the proposed "proximity" ap-
Because they deal so extensively with language and literature,
proach might well lead to agreements in the
and renew acquaintanceship with the great personalities who predomi-
Middle East .
ated in the Yiddish literary field, this work is important
In the
But United Nations Secretary General
effort to retain all the great contributions that have been made in a
Kurt Waldheim seems to have put a monkey language
that served rtilllions of Jews.
wrench into the machinery with his apparent
-
disapproval of the plan.
Evidently, Waldheim, by his insistence on
In their scholarly introduction, the editors of this volume describe
the Yiddish writers' straggles to confront an unfriendly world, the
d
d ifficulties they had among Jews as well as in facing the
giving priority to a role for the Gunnar Jar- 0
non-Jewish
They point out how they became major factors in "putting
ring mission, and by an implied opposition to to bstacles.
gether the very terms of yiddishkayt." But also
they
point to the
an American role, is, consciously or subcon- Y
writers' "enormous advantages of a spiritual and ethical
sciously, playing an anti-U.S. game in this na iddish
hue which other writers might well ,envy."
matter. With the situation developing as it
•
has, it is doubtful whether even the Soviet t h It is this total picture of a great era of an enormous literary output
Union antagonism matches such a position. of at makes this anthology of such great worth in an era when lovers
What it does, clearly, is that it reduces con- w ho Yiddish justifiably weep over the decline of, the language,*and those
fully appreciate the literature should strive to keep the great
fidence in the importance of the UN under p roducts
alive, even in translations, as
Waldheim's direction.
the Howe-Greenberg volume
oes.