Regulations on Talit Fringes Linked to Man's Awareness of the Devine

By RABBI SAMUEL J. FOX
People refrain from using a
knife to cut or trim the fringes at
the talit' (WWI), osing their
teeth instead.

This is traced to the statements
I the rabbis in the Mishna
Midoth 3:4) where it is stated that
stone which has been touched by
netal is unfit for the altar. The
-eason given by the rabbis pro-
tibiting the use of metal for the
alas stone is that metal is often

is done so as to make a man es of the tails are representative
feel humble before God (Bet Jo- of the commandments of the Al-
seph 8). Other claim that this is mighty. At every phase of life the
done to fill a person with fear Jew is involved with some of the
and reverence before the Almighty. commandments so that his entire
Still others claim that this is done life is committed to the awareness
to help a person concentrate on his of God, to whom man must relate
prayers without being distracted at all times and under all condi-
from outside influence. Further- tions. It should be borne in mind
Inore, the effect of covering the that originally a Jew wore, a talit
l:10Se.
Pions Jews aver their beads head with the taut means that all through the day and not only
one's entire body is wrapped with
with talit during prayer.
Some commentaries explain that the spirit of his Creator. The fring- at prayer as is our present custom,

life by being ma-
terial for armaments while the al-
tar is used to prolong life. The
tzitzit, likewise, are used as a
means of helping one to remember
the commandments of God in order
to prolong life and thus are not
touched by metal which is some-
times used for the reverse pur-

this

used to shorten

THE RUSSIANS ARE LEARNING . . . HEBREW
the Jews in Russia, that is

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TO YOUR HEALTH!

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Health, Department of health F. ducation

and Information.

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A BLESSED
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Christians as well as Jews had
cause to seek vengeance for Nazi
terrorism. The 20,000,000 victims
of the Nazis included people in
many strata. In a new novel by
Charity Blackstock, "The En-
counter" (Coward-McCann), one
of the chief characters seeks re-
venge for the death of brothers.
Alex Coulsden, the young Eng-
lish heroine of the novel, is a
woman who lives on the periphery
of life. She is in a state of emo-
tional shock. She retreats to a
desolate Czech hotel, supposedly
on holiday, but really to prove her
worth through the symbolic act
of climbing a treacherous moun-
tain.
To the same hotel comes Mirek,
a married Czech schoolteacher in
his 40s — attractive, but also
emotionally scarred by his obsess-
ive drive for revenge against the
German he believes Is responsible
for his brothers' deaths. Instinc-
tively drawn to the lonely Alex,
Mirek is nevertheless determined
to shut out all human emotion,
and to murder the German he
has tracked down to their hotel.
Ironically, the day Mirek has
planned for his murder is the day
of the chance encounter with Alex,
becoming a brief moment of reck-
oning that saves them both from

self-destruction.

BY MILTON STEINBERG
In "The Making of the Modern Jew"

',mums

apartment in Tel-

got to

Dan Greenberg "scored" with
"How to Be a Jewish Mother"
and enjoyed its being a best
seller, in spite of much resent-
ment against his approaches in
Jewish ranks. Now he "scores" in
"Scoring," a novel written in first
person in which he gives an ac-

Study—The Jew's Life

• Four

But—No OTB--You've

Two New Novels

count of many "affairs" with
girls over a 20-year period.
This new novel is exactly what
its definition in the subtitle calls
it, "a sexual memoir." He didn't
struggle to lose his virginity, as
the description of the book states:
he made it an aspiration.
• • •

PORTFOLIO OF THE PRESENT

While Russian Jews are coming to Israel in great numbers, and
are crowding the Ulpanim to learn Hebrew, there are tens of
thousands who have been studying Hebrew in Russia itself—clan-
destinely. One of the most popular textbooks in use is a paperback.
written by Israel's Dr. Shlomo Kodesh• called a "master mentor
of Hebrew" and author of many books to teach Hebrew to immi-
granDr. Kodesh's book for would-be "ohm - from the Soviet

thus, all the hours of the day were
spent being aware of the presence
of the Divine.

■

■

1111

Ipna na.be :01105•

Special Feature Prepared by Tarbuth Foundation for the Advancement of Hebrew Culture

Jews. surveying their ov..n past.
express astonishment at the
breadtn and depth of the civiliza-
tion which they have inherited. It
seems unreasonable that such ex-
quisite and variegated floe ers
should have blossomed on a scenic
soil and in an uncongenial atmos-
pher e. Amazement disappears
when one considers the urgency
which impelled Jewish cultural
life. For, since the Jew would not
die, he had his choice of only
two alternatives. He must either
cultivate a compensating culture
or go stark mad. This accounts
for the passionate devotion of the
Jew to ideas, for his intense ab-
sorption in books, for his rever-
ence for scholarship.

often

With other peoples, culture
was an afterthought, a by-prod-
uct of normal living, an amuse-
ment for leisure hours. With the
Jew it was a condition for san-
ity.
Out of rigid necessity the Jew
concerned himself with study and
instruction. In no other society
was education taken so seriously as
in the ghetto. Mothers in their
lullabies assured their infants that
Torah was the best of all wares.
Jewish parents held always before
themselves the example of the
mother of Rabbi Joshua ben Han-
anya who "used to take her child
to the door of the academy in his
crib so that be might early be-
come accustomed to the sound of
learning."

THE DETROIT JEWISH HEWS
50—Frialay, Sept I, 1972