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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
January 30, 1976 37
Israel and Diaspora Concepts Are Re-Examined
By SHALOM BEN CHORIN
JERUSALEM — The cen-
trality of Israel is a Zionist
"dogma." Israel is the center
of the Jewish people while
the Diaspora is its peri-
phery. This Zionist thesis
was officially formulated
and incorporated in the
"Jerusalem Program" which
replaced the Basle Program
after the founding of the
state.
The Zionist classics em-
phasize the centrality of Is-
rael in .both the political and
cultural aspects. For Theo-
dor Herzl the Jewish state
was the solution of the Jew-
ish problem. This state,
which was ultimately real-
ized in the state of Israel, is
therefore the incontestable
center of the Jewish people.
Ahad Ha'am, on the other
hand, strove for a spiritual
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center of the Jews. In the
20's and even in the 30's
these two concepts were re-
garded as mutually exclu-
sive and contradictory and
were the subject of heated
discussion among Zionists.
Today they are comple-
mentary. The state of Is-
rael regards itself as the
center of the Jewish people
— a thesis consistently
and strongly propounded
by David Ben-Gurion —
but the state can vindicate
this claim to centrality for
the whole people only by
becoming the spiritual and
cultural focus of Jewish
life.
More than a quarter of a
century after the establish-
ment of the state the nu-
merical preponderance of
the Diaspora is still over-
whelming.
While the total number of
Jews is estimated at 13,-
000,000, no more than 3,-
000,000 live in Israel. More
than half of Diaspora Jewry
is living in the U.S. so that
the "bi-polarity" means the
juxtaposition of Israel and
the U.S.
It is remarkable that al-
ready several decades ago a
non-Zionist Jewish thinker,
Leo Baeck, compared the re-
lation between Israel and
the Diaspora to an ellipsis
with two foci. This simile
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Heshvan a Bitter Month
BY RABBI SAMUEL J. FOX
(Copyright 1975, JTA, Inc.)
ical Court, which, in turn,
proclaimed it to the people
upon their judgment.
Since we do not have the
Sanhedrin today, the con-
gregation hears the words
proclaimed by the cantor
who acts on behalf of the
community in announcing
the arrival of a new month.
in fact is of very ancient ori-
of the centrality of Israel
gin — that of the two
and wrote — after visiting
camps.
the country — that every-
body should strive for real-
While Israel is engaged in
izing the "Holy Land" every-
a life and death struggle,
where, meaning that any
the Jewish substance will
place — and not only Israel
surviv€ in the Diaspora; it
— could and should be made
riust not be sacrificed to the
holy.
centrality of Israel.
It is certainly remarka-
The question arises if
ble that ideas of this sort the Diaspora without a liv-
which Zionism had en-
and -vital Israel would
countered and combatted ing
have the strength neces-
at its beginning, have sary for survival. The non-
made a comeback in our Jewish world identifies
days. This, of course, is in- Israel with Jewry and Ju-
-dicative of a crisis in Zion- daism. For them the state
ist ideology. Ideology as of Israel, its people and its
such is being questioned.
culture are equivalent to
A great many of our con- and synonymous with ev-
temporaries have replaced erything Jewish.
ideological thinking with a
Non-Jews do not distin-
purely pragmatical ap- guish between Israelis and
proach which accepts reali- Jews. They see in the Israeli
ties without creating a phi- the legitimate and author-
losophy out of them. ized representative of Juda-
Therefore there is often a ism and Jewry. In the eyes
strong emotional and even of the world at least the cen-
existential attachment of trality of Israel is an incon-
Diaspora Jews to Israel,
without any Zionist ideolog- testable fact.
ical foundation.
aunt Callen
Owing to the perilous
position in which the state
pipatograpfm
of Israel finds itself in the
Weddings—Bar Mitzvas
political, military and eco-
nomic respect, a "new" con-
cept has cropped up, which
The month of Heshvan is
referred to with a prefix and
called "Mar-Heshvan."
There are two different
interpretations of this pre-
fix which is attached to the
name of the Hebrew month
which ended Nov. 4. Some
say that the prefix "Mar"
means a drop of water as it Teens Accused
is used in the Book of Isaiah of Stealing Arms
(40:15) in the phrase which
A VISIT TO
is still in popular use as "a
TEL AVIV (JTA) — Pol-
drop in the bucket."
ice are holding four Tel Aviv
If this is the meaning of youths aged 19 and 20 on
the prefix then the month is charges of stealing arms
can erase winter's cruelty to your skin
called Mar-Heshvan because from military camps and
the territory of Israel is dry selling them t,04 Israeli Ar-
I A $ 1 0 ' purcht ase of individually recommended cosmetics i
I entitles you
a Free eau d'Evian Atomizer, a French ;
until this month. This is the abs.
I import that keeps F moisture in
i your skin between visits to
month when the rainy sea-
The youths, whose names
the salon.
son begins, and so the prefix were not disclosed, come
denotes the climate of the from affluent homes in a
Call for an appointment today
Month:
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"bitter." This is because army deserters.
many tragic events happen
this month in Jewish his-
tory. The wicked King
Jereboam angered the Al-
Ruth Seligson of
mighty on this month (1
Kings 12:32).
On the fifth day of this
month the sons of Zedekiah
were killed while he was
blinded and brought to Ba-
bylonia (2 Kings 33:7). It
was on this month that the
flood was brought upon the
inhabitants of the earth in
the days of Noah. It is note-
worthy that this particular
month has no holidays —
somehow being destined to
be a period of "bitter" exper-
iences.
Special prayers are made
on the Sabbath before the
new month arrives.
PRESENTS
The basic purpose for
these prayers is to announce_
THE BEAUTIFUL BRIDES'
to the congregation that the
new moon will arise on such
OF SPRING & SUMMER
a day during the coming
week. This is reminiscent of
AT A SHOWING
the ancient times when wit-
nesses watched for the ar-
SUNDAY, FEB. 1, 1976
rival of the new moon from
the hilltop and reported it
12:30 and 3:00 p.m..
by messenger to the Rabbin-
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Progressive Judaism, have
transferred their head-
quarters to Jerusalem, some
Jewish thinker- have doubts
whether this centrality of
Israel is attainable and a
fact today in the realm of
the spirit.
Thus the American Jew-
ish theologian Richard L.
Rubinstein, author of
"After Auschwitz" wrote in
1971: "Politically I am a
firm adherent of Israel but I
regard it as a place where
Jewish religious utopianism
is bound to turn -to ashes."
A European-Jewish
thinker like Herrmann Lev-
in-Goldschmidt of Zurich
came out against the thesis
-
838-2233
869-0720
was readily taken up in
America.
Dr. Joachim Prinz, who
in the-early 30's, as a lib-
eral rabbi in Berlin, made
a considerable contribu-
tion to the "Zionization"
of German Jewry, is to-
day, as president of the
American Jewish Con-
gress, an outstanding ad-
vocate of this "bi-focal"
theory which, of course, is
not consistent with what
he had preached 40 years
ago.
While Jewish world or-
ganizations, as well as reli-
gious organizations like the
Orthodox Agudat Israel and
the liberal World Union for
NORTH OF 9 MILE RD.
PHONE 545-3242
OPEN THURSDAY
TIL 9 p•m.