THE JEWISH NEWS
Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with issue of July 20. 1951
American Association of English Jessish Nesssipapers. Michigan Press Association. National Editorial ASSOC
Published every Friday tts The Jewish News Publishing ('o. 1751S W
Nine Mile. Suite 865. Southfield. Mich 48075
Serondarlass Postage Paid at Southfield. Michigan anti Additional soiling offices. Subscription $8 a year. Foreign 39
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Stub',she.
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
CHARLOTTE DUBIN
DREW LIEBERWITZ
City Editor
Advertising Manager
aysiness Manager
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the 29th day of fyor. 5732, the following scriptural selections
u ill he read in our synagogues
Pentateuch& portfoe. .Nina 1 1 4 20. Prophetical portion, I Samuel 20. I4 42.
Rosh liodesh Swan Torah reading. Sunday. Num. 25 1 15.
(andle lighting.
VOL. LXI. No. 9
Friday. Mar
Page Four
7 . !4
p.m.
May 12. 1972
Happier Tidings for the Aged
Dedication of the Federation Apartments
on Sunday marks another step in serious ef-
forts to assist the aged and to provide hous-
ing for elderly who are not affluent and who
must have community cooperation in assur-
ing a better life after retirement.
Thanks to the provisions for assistance to
the aged in governmental programs, com-
munity agencies like the Jewish Welfare
Federation are in a position to build struc-
tures of the kind that will be dedicated on
Sunday. The combined efforts of social wel-
fare movements like Federation and the fed-
eral agencies give assurance that there will
be an end to neglect and that a happier fu-
ture is in sore for the thousands who need
our empathy.
Interesting chapters in strides toward im-
proving the needs of the aged have been
written in our community. There was a period
of stress in the Home for the Aged. It was
mainly the outcome of neighborhood changes
which threw the institution into near chaos
because of the difficulties that emerge from
sudden crises. The issue was resolved, there
are greater hopes that more of our aged will
be provided with permanent homes, and what
had occurred was a lesson in patience when
there is cause for distress.
There are those who wish to live inde-
pendently, not in an organized home for the
less healthy and those who need constant
care.
There are also those who wish to retain
a large measure of independence by living in
their own homes, under their own manage-
ment, but they must have low-rental housing.
This is where Federation Apartments step in
to fill a great need. As Joseph Jackier, pres-
ident of Federation Apartments, has indi-
cated on the eve of the dedication on Sunday,
there are prospects for additional such facil-
ities. There is cause for great appreciation
for such efforts not only on the part of the
aged who will benefit from such projects. but
from the entire community that should feel
elated that major needs are not ignored.
Wholesome Unity on Foreign Issues
Inevitably. the status of Russian Jewry
and the Middle East conflict will be on the
agenda when President Nixon meets with
Soviet leaders in a matter of days.
While there were urgent pleas addressed
to the President urging that he include the
Soviet Jewish issue in his discussions, it is
inconceivable, in view of the attitude of mil-
lions of Americans—non-Jews as well as Jews
—that the interest expressed in the right of
Soviet Jew s to emigrate. if they so desire it,
could possibly be ignored.
It is taken for granted that the Middle
East will be discussed. After all, discussions
on the Arab-Israel issues have been conduct-
ed by the State Department with the Soviet
Embassy officials for many years. How could
such a vital issue be ignored?
Both issues will be viewed in the context
of American concerns. The friendship of
our government for Israel and the assistance
that is being given on a large scale to Arab
governments who keep receiving American
economic as well as military aid make the
United States a significant factor in the de-
velopments in the Middle East.
Politicians often utilize the two issues
as means of gaining friends. Perhaps that
too, is to be welcomed because the effect
of such quests for votes is to perpetuate
a wholesome condition in our political life:
an assurance that every approach to proper
handling of our foreign affairs will be on
a nonpartisan basis.
That's how it has functioned in this coun-
try. The friendship for Israel embraces the
leaderships of both political parties. Only a
handful of legislators have been uncompro-
misingly an,tagonistic, and even in their ranks
it has been a difference of opinion over pro-
cedures rather than basic principles.
In the matter involving the Russian-Jew-
ish situation, the recent vote in the U. S.
House of Representatives on a measure aimed
as an appeal to the Soviet Union for an end
to restrictions on Jewish rights was 360 to 2.
How could anyone except better proof of
nonpartisanship.
In the months to come—in Michigan dur-
ing the coming week, just prior to the Pres-
idential Primary — the Jewish communities
will be told of the interest candidates have
in Israel's security, in the right of Russian
Jews to emigrate if they so wish, in the op-
portunities to be granted those of the USSR
Jews who wish to come to this country to
find our doors open to them. There will be
bigots who will demonstrate against such
social idealism and humanitarianism. Bigots
have been and will remain a minority.
It is with such principles in view that we
can await the political interpretations in the
approaching primaries and elections. There
are many issues on which Americans will
continue to differ. There are social and ec-
onomic, educational and welfare, war and
peace problems which will inspire divisions
and which will stimulate voting contrasts.
Fortunately, in all other foreign relations
needs, there is a measure of deep-rooted
unity. It is such concurrence of views - Chat
puts an end to claims of ethnic voting.
Good Senatorial Sense Backs USIA
Is it because President Nixon supported
continuation of the Voice of America United
State, Information Agency program that a
group of senators, some of whom had been
acclaimed as "liberals," voted against its
total budgeting to the tune of $194,000,000?
Senator J. William Fulbright failed, be-
cause of the 57-15 vote in favor of the pro-
posed budget, in his effort to reduce support
of the agency that serves the vital need to
break through the Iron Curtain and to keep
the isolated peoples under communism in-
formed about what is happening in this coun-
try and in the free world.
This program may be especially vital to
the Jews of Russia who are in dire need of
information about the free world and about
the areas in which their Jewish kinsmen live
in large numbers. Suppression of the USIA
Voice of America broadcasts would have in-
terfered with such important communicative
means of keeping alive every effort to en-
courage freedom of information.
In the debates in the Senate, it was point-
ed out that Russia broadcasts more programs
in 84 languages than the USIA's Voice. To
have yie;ded to the Fulbright plan. as some
liberals did. would have meant a marked
diminution in the interpretation of the Amer-
ican position. Fortunately, a large majority -
of senators knew better than to be influenced
by a prejudice and by false economy claims.
Sulamith Ish-Kishor's Golem
Story, Bible Tales for Children
There is a continuin4 need for children's books, and the addition
of new books of interest to Jewish youth deserves special attention
and a measure of commendation to authors and publishers.
Sulatnith Ish•Kishor has for many years retained the title of one
of the best story-tellers. Her newest work, published by Harper, is a
story of the Golem. tinder the title "The Master of Miracle," Miss Ish-
Kishor deals with the 16th Century Prague story, with the superstitions
of that era, with the Golem of the legend about the Master of the
Miracle, Rabbi Judah Loewe ben Bezalel.
An orphan boy. Gideon ben Israyel, is presented as the hero of
this narrative, a lad who witnessed the making of the Goletn, having
been entrusted by the high rabbi with this task:
"At midnight go down into the deepest chamber of my house.
where the creature stands. When you go in, give it these instructions.
It is to follow you—it will be invisible to everyone except you. Go
with it through every street, every house. If Maria-Agnes is here,
it will find her, even if she is:dead!"
The search was for the vanished daughter of Count Batislav and
there had been a warning:
"Unless my Maria - Agnes is returned to me alive and unharmed.
before the Passover begins, I swear that not one stone of this ghetto
shall remain, not one Jew . .
This is where the role of Gideon and the Golem functioned—to
locate the missing girl, to avert ;tragedy that was about to he imposed
upon the Jews.
Gideon had experienced thel abuse from Christian antagonists, he
was called "Christ-Killer" and he asked his mother for an explanation.
A record of Jewish sufferings in !the ghetto is depicted, and the Middle
Ages and their anti-Semitic yen* are part of an historic tale so well
told by Miss Ish-Kishor.
The missing girl is found. The high rabbi, as he is described in
this narrative, addresses the "People of Prague," shows them the
girl who asserts: "I am Maria-Agnes. Maria-Agnes von Lehn von
Batislay." There is a roar of jay.
It all ended with a command to end the Golem's existence when
the giant created by the miracle. rabbi became a menace to the Jews
themselves. And the charred heap of clay out of which the Golem was
created lies in the Pincus Synagogue of this 16th Century tale. It lies,
as the noted author states, "coVered up with the remains of many
ancient Hebrew' manuscripts and:books. For it is a custom of the Jews
never to destroy anything that Might have the name of God written
upon it." And with the Hebrew:"Barukh Dayan ha-Emet" this story
concludes, relating a fascinating; old legend.
"The Master of the Miracle.''' so well told, has the added merit of
having been illustrated by a noted artist, Arnold Lobel.
In Miss Ish-Kishoes story. d recluse in the 19th Century Pincus
Synagogue of Prague claims to h5ve been the boy Gideon who received
orders to lead the Golem from Rabbi Loewe. It is an old story brought
up-to-date for a revival of a legend.
•
•
•
Menahem Stern's 'The Sun and the Clouds'
Another splendid volume of stories for the young is "The Sun and
the Clouds" by Menahem Stern, published by Ktay.
This series of Bible tales and legends, impressively illustrated
by Ezekiel Schloss, contains stories commencing with Adam and Eve
through the age of Nebuhadnezzar and Ahasuerus, Mordecai, Haman
and Esther.
There are 32 stories in this volume and they are about the
Patriarchs, the Egyptian bondage, Deborah, Moses, Joshua, Samson,
King Solomon, the Prophet Elija 't.
The brevity of these stories dives them special importance because
they can be read by the young and some can be read in a short span
of time to the young.
The two volumes referred te here fill a great need in providing
narratives for our young readeas—legendary, historical. all with an
appeal to which the youn are e rtain to respond with interest.