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 Associa-
tion. Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co., 17515 W. Nine Mlle, Suite 855, Southfield, Mich. 48075.
Second-Class Postage Paid at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices. Subscription $10 a year. Foreign $10.
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
CHARLOTTE DUBIN
City Editor
Business Manager
DREW LIEBERWITZ
Advertising Manager
Sabbath Hol Hamoed Sukkot Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the 17th day of Tishre, 5734, the following scriptural selections
will be read in our synagogues: .
Pentateuchal portions, Exod. 23:12-34:26, Num. 29:17-22. Prophetical portion,
Ezekiel 38:18-39:16.
Hol Hamoed Sukkot Torah Readings: Sunday, Num.. 29:20.28; Monday, Num.
29:23-31; Tuesday, 'Num. 29:26-34; Wednesday, Hoshana Rabbah, Num. 29:26-34.
Scriptural Selections for Concluding Days of Sukkot, Oct. 18 and 19:
Pentateuchal portions: Thursday, Shemini Atzeret, Deut. 14:22-16:17, Num. 29:35-
30:1; Friday, Simhat Torah, Deut. 33:1-34:12, Gen. 1:1-2-3, Num. 29:35-30:1.
Candle lighting, Friday, October 12, 6:38 p.m.
VOL. LXIV. No. 5
Page Four
October 12, 1973
Sukka as Shelter, Faith as Redeemer
Sukkot has a special meaning this year.
Our people observe the festival by building
traditional booths, eating their holiday meals
in them, some sleeping there. Through the
centuries Jews have literally lived in sukkot.
As wanderers in eras marked by oppressions,
as exiles from many lands, they expressed
faith in eventual redemption while making
the tent their sheltering abode.
For the past three years, on the outskirts
of the Austrian capital of Vienna, Russian
Jews were sheltered in the ancient Habsburg
castle of Schoenau. It became a symbol of
an endless Sukkot, of a constant movement
of our kinsmen who won a struggle with the
powerful Russian government to attain exit
visas to go to Israel.
An attempt was made two weeks ago, by
the stupidly insane members of a movement
aimed at destroying Israel, to demolish that
sukka called Schoenau. But, the searchers
for freedom from Russian oppressions have
not ended the trek toward freedom. The
sukka is a temporary shelter, the faith is a
permanent redeemer.
On the eve of Rosh Hashaha, only two
days before the gangsters had detained three
of the Jewish emigres from Russia in an
attempt at blackmail, a Georgian Jew, on
his arrival in Schoenau, told a New York
Times correspondent: "From today I stand
up like a man! Never on my knees again!
Never!"
It was with a greeting of "Shalom" that
he was welcomed to the transit station, and
within a matter of days—in some instances
only hours separated the travelers from their
homeland of freedom — the welcome, for
peace, was to be in the ancient Eretz Israel.
Faith has triumphed and continues to tri-
umph. The escapees from persecutions keep
finding havens in Israel. Some divert their
roads to the United States: a handful used
Israel as an excuse and instead decided to
demand visas to this country. Hias came to
their rescue. They wished to leave Russia
and succeeded. Even for such a handful from
the tens of thousands who are making Israel
their goal for freedom American Jewry has
provided the sukka as a temporary shelter,
assuring them the freedom that is so vital to
people with courage to break lifetime ties
with tyranny.
The sukka is the great symbol of the day.
Once again, it emphasizes the faith of the
homeless in eventual redemption. The cour-
ageous attain it. They keep retaining the
historic meaning of Sukkot. It is more evident
today than ever. Therefore, the blessings of
the festival become the heritage of Jews
everywhere.
Slumbering During Quota Enforcement
A reversion to the numerus clausus that
created difficulties for Jews seeking admis-
sion to universities in European countries,
also practiced as a quota system in American
universities for many years, is no longer in
the speculative stage. It is a fact. As in years
of the early part of this century, and espe-
cially in the 1920s, some American young
Jews who wish to study medicine already are
applying to European schools. On the home
front, there is a battle for recognition of merit
that may even lead to law suits against uni-
versities' officials on the ground of being
p e rs e c u t e d and of qualifications being
ignored.
A statement supplementing earlier com-
plaints that have been sounded by the Bnai
Brith Anti-Defamation Le ague on this
question declares:
At a congressional hearing in Washington,
D.C., Caspar W. Weinberger, Secretary of Health,
Education and Welfare, said he did not believe
in "any kind of mechanistic, statistical approach
to ending discrimination in employment," that he
was against this "numerical approach" because
it meant that once a "magic number" was
reached further efforts to end discrimination
'topped. He went cn to say that the use of a
Iumerieal goal for hiring and upgrading minor-
ities and women could also mean that employers
who have done a good job but just missed the
numerical goal are unfairly penalized.
The new HEW secretary's public comments
came 12 days after an ADL-compiled list of 36
new examples cf distortion and misapplication
of HEW's Higher Education Guidelines was pre-
sented to him by the League end a group of
other national Jewish organizations. As spokes.
man for the organizations — which included
Agudath Israel of America, American Jewish
Committee, American Jewish Congress and Jew-
ish War Veterans of the. U.S.A.—Arnold Forster,
ADL's associate director and general counsel,
said "the situation is worse today that it was a
year ago" when the organizations first began to
give examples to HEW.
The meeting with Secretary Weinberger was
described as a frank and constructive exchange of
views on a very difficult subject. ADL will sub-
mit standards for HEW's field staff to follow
in making sure that the difference between af-
firmative action and reverse discrimination and
quotas is understood. HEW is also planning con-
ferences with universities to rectify improper
procedures.
An era of liberalism and non-discrimina-
tion seems to have ended, and there is prej-
udice in the reverse, from which Jews will be
the. major sufferers, from the special priv-
ileges that are being granted to women and to
Blacks.
The prejudice is not limited to the appli-
cants for college admissions. They continue to
exist in the large corporations. There is a
token grant of privilege to a limited group,
and some of our able young people are suf-
fering from the revival of a prejudice that
was part of the perpetuated medieval system
in East European countries under the rule of
kings, kaisers and czars.
This problem is again a challenge to the
American Jewish community. It adds to the
burdens imposed upon those seeking unre-
strained justice on all fronts, for all elements
in this country's population.
Unless the spokesmen for our commu-
nities choose to slumber, we are due for an-
other period of despair in the ranks of youth.
In European countries, there was an era
of conversions for those seeking academic
posts as well as the applicants for admissions
to universities. It is doubtful whether this is
still a religious question. It is a matter that
calls for another warning of "Beware" to the
defenders of just rights both in industry and
in commerce as well as in education.
a...7rAr
Katz's 'One Who Came Back'
Adds Indictment of Nazism
It is remarkable how a survivor could have retained the memory
of names, places, even dates, of the years of terror under Nazism.
Josef Katz, who now lives in Los Angeles with his wife—whom he
met in the concentration camp—and his daughter, provides a deeply
moving account of his sufferings, the trials and tribulations in the
camps, in "One Who Came Back." Co-published by Herzl Press and
Bergen-Belsen Memorial Press, this diary of a survivor gives an ac-
count of his commitment as a youth in a Nazi camp, his mother's
death, his various movements from camp to camp, ghetto to ghetto.
That he should have survived is, of course, one of the miracles
of the war and of the Nazi terror. The experiences under the various
camp commandants, the attitudes of the Nazi beasts, the exceptions
tie notes among them—these add up to a story so filled with agony
that it results in a major narrative of experiences by the victims of
the Hitler era.
Katz's is a simply-told story—it was translated from the German
by Hilda Reach. But its very simplicity gives it grandeur. In all its
details, the diary records the day-to-day experiences, the humiliations
and hunger suffered under the brutal knots, the constant search for
means for survival.
Especially significant in this diary is the description of life in the
Riga Ghetto. There are evidences of cooperation and also of search
for survival that often led into utter selfishness in the desire to at-
tain escape from death by starvation or execution. There were also
many instances of heroism.
The risk of death if caught did not deter camp inmates from steal-
ing food supplies whenever it was possible. It was another means of
surviving. The final hours before liberation by the Russians are de-
scribed again in their brutal reality—of camp inmates grabbing at
whatever food items they could find—coffee, sugar, bread. The terror
often made beasts of humans reduced to degradation by hunger.
The liberation, Katz's return to his native German city of Luebeck
in 1972 to find it desolate, the Jewish community destroyed—add up
to growing miseries stemming from a survivor's sufferings. Josef Katz
as "One Who Came Back" related a very tragic story—an addendum
to the indictment of Nazism.
Essays by Noted Scholars
in understanding Theology'
Jewry's most distinguished scholars are represented in the collec-
tion of essays included in "Understanding Jewish Theology: Classical
Issues and Modern Perspectives," published by Ktay.
Four of the articles are by the late Abraham Joshua Heschel. They
are on the subjects of "Monotheism," "The Study of Torah" and "The
Meaning of Observance."
Prof. Emil Fackenheim, on "An Outline of Modern Jewish The-
ology" and "The Human Condition After Auschwitz."
Also represented by two essays is the editor of this volume, Rabbi
Jacob Neusner.
An essay by the late Prof. Solomon Schechter, "God, Israel and
Election," is among the especially noteworthy elaborations on "Israel
agbthe Chosen People."
Other distinguished scholars whose works have been selectee'
.-
this volume include Dr. Mordecai M. Kaplan, Prof. Jakob J.
chowski, Prof. Gershom G. Scholem, Ben Halpern, Dr. Gerson D.
Cohen, Dr. Moshe Davis, Rabbi Arthur Hertzberg, Max Wiener,
Joseph C. Landis, David S. Shapiro, Moses Hayyim Luzzatto and Isa-
dore Twersky.
'
Synagogue in Jewish Life '
In "The Synagogue in Jewish Life," a paperback published by
Ktav, Rabbi Joshua Kohn deals with all aspects of Jewish religious
experiences.
He defines religion, traces the origin of synagogue worship and de-
scribes the synagogue's role in modern times.
He does more than that: he explains the daily services, the Sidur,
the Mahzor, the Torah readings.
Proper attention also is given by the author to synagogue music,
the architecture of the house of worship, the synagoguge's art and sym-
bols. Interesting synagogues are listed and the illustrations and repro-
ductions of documentary records add to the book's value.