THE JEWISH NEWS
Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with the issue otJuly1 .,?0, 1951
Member American Association of English-Jewish Newspapers, Michigan Press Association, National Editorial .-1ssocittion.
Published every Friday by The Jewish News Publishing Co.. 17515 W. Nine Mile, Suite 865, Southfield, Mich. 48075.
Second-Class Postage Paid at Southfield, Michigan and Additional Mailing Offices. Subscription $10 a year.
PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
DREW LIEBERWITZ
Business Manager
Advertising Manager
Alan Hitsky. News Editor . . : Heidi l'ress. kssistant Nests Editor
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the fourth day of Kislev, 5737, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Genesis 25:19 - 28:9. Prophetical portion, Malachi 1:1-2:7.
Candle lighting, Friday, Nov. 26, 4:46 p.m.
VOL. LXX, No. 12
Page Four
Friday, November 26, 1976
Jewish Center Dedication: Great Role
After a long delay, necessitated by
emendations that needed to be made to as-
sure near-perfections in its construction,
the new Jewish Community Center, in West
Bloomfield, will be formally dedicated on
Sunday, Dec. 5. The day should be marked
as an occasion of significance to this com-
munity and as part of the entire American
Jewish aim for the advancement of the im-
portant needs provided by the Jewish
Center Movement.
Distance will be overcome and the large
audiences at numerous community
functions and especially at the 10-day
annual Book Fair already give assurance
that the new Center will remain, as it al-
ready is, the home for significance in Jewish
cultural attainments as well as the com-
mendable recreational programs.
The Health Club, the athletic facilities
provided for the youth -and their elders, are
all taken for granted. They are well con-
ducted, and that is what matters. More sig-
nificant is the educational aspect which
merits high commendation.
In an earlier era there was in evidence
an assimilationist trend in the Jewish
Center movement in this country and De-
troit was not an exception to the rule. Many
of the American Jewish Centers still suffer
from such an indifference to higher Jewish
goals. Some Centers still are Settlement
Houses for the underprivileged rather than
media for great achievements for all in a
united community of all Jews with ranks of
equality. The Detroit Jewish Community
Center long ago began to set the pace for the
higher attainable goals, for recognition of
the spiritual and cultural values that fortify
a community.
The Detroit Jewish Community Center
pioneered in establishing Hebrew classes. It
became the counterpart of the Israel Ulpan
for the advancement of Hebrew studies. The
Detroit Jewish Center introduced the vast-
ness of a Book Fair that is now pride of
this community. Other matters of value are
to the credit of this community's Center
where the elders are encouraged to have
their programs and the retarded are not
shunned but treated as•human beings.
Irwin Shaw, who is retiring as the
Jewish Community Center's executive di-
rector, engineered these great programs. It
was under his direction that the Hebrew
Ulpan was introduced, that the Book Fairs
received proper sponsorship and the serv-
ices rendered became invaluable for a com-
munity concerned with service as a goal: To
Shaw goes the appreciation due a dedicated
director whose love for his work became the
symbol. of his professionalism. .
These are all matters of major esteem
for the Jewish Community Center as it for-
mally dedicates its great new structure. The
blessings on the occasion of the dedication
are merged with a belief that all elements in
this community will work in harmony for
the elevation of the standards of Jewish
values in services for Jewry in the facilities
made available in the new Center.
Speculations and Fears Galore
Thanks to a resolution agonizing Is-
rael, with the United States concurring in
another rapidly defamatory action by the
United Nations Security Council against
Israel, speculation as to future White House
and State Department actions is assuming
a repetitive aspect of fear, stimulated by
resentment, in Israeli and Jewish ranks.
The claim is that the latest anti-Israel
resolution will only lead to speedier move-
ment in search for peace. That has been a
Kissinger policy for which he has received
severe criticism. What the latest American
diplomatic act does is to stimulate debate
and disputable pandemonium among news-
The. Lame Ducks
President Gerald Ford and Secretary of
State Henry Kissinger are the "lame ducks"
in American policies whose decisions may
'seriously affect foreign policy. Which of the
two ordered American participation in the
UN Security Council assault on Israel? Or
was it a decision by both? Is there justifica-
tion to the Kissinger claim that the U.S. act
was a step in the direction of firmer action to
strengthen peace negotiations?
To these questions must be added the
concern of what will happen after Jan. 20
when the new President will be directing
the Middle East policies. The Middle East
will wait, and Jewish patience will reject
anything that may lead to interference with
Jewish sovereignty in Eretz Israel.
casters and commentators. It also arouses
the protests in Jewish ranks which cause
continuing uncertainty over future activi-
ties in Israel's behalf.
Editorial writers and commentators
have already expressed the view that
friends of Israel have gone overboard in
criticism of the latest American diplomatic
act. The advice is to be patient and to let the
act, which in its performance marked the
assurance of mildness in what could have
been a devastating resolution, might lead to
a measure of amity between Arabs and
Jews. This is difficult to anticipate, since
every Arab mouthing of peace is accom-
panied by demands that Israel shrink into a
ghetto, that Jerusalem be abandoned, that
concessions should be of a nature unaccept-
able to a people battling for very survival in
a confrontation with those seeking the
state's demise.
What the newly distressing evolvement
implies is the unceasing duty on the part of
all who are concerned with Israel's security
to keep being on the alert. The new UN act
proves the point that has been made that
vigilance is necessary regardless of the ad-
ministration dictating policies for the U. S.
representatives at the UN. There is a com-
mon ground whence can come danger to Is-
rael, and there is the opposing common
ground of defense and security which must
be attuned to respond unyieldingly to every
danger that may affect Israel's right to live
in dignity.
4
•".177%
Hebrew Love Songs Compiled
In Gross' Enriching Volume
Hebrew love songs are not novelties. They have enriched
Scriptures, the earliest having been recorded" in "The Song of
Songs," and they are evident in liturgy. •
Love songs are to be found in Psalms and in King David's
Psalms, and in King Solomon's "Song of Songs."
These traditional beginnings have had a continuing expres-
sion of love in many works by Jewish poets through the ages.
A compilation of such poems enriches Jewish literature and
David C. Gross, who has an interesting career as author and
editor, is to be credited with a genuine contribution to the
Jewish book shelves with his "Love Poems From the Hebrew"
(Doubleday).
Implemented with 12 very notable and expressive full-page
illustrations by a noted Israeli artist, Shraga Weil, the 75 poems
by the most noted Hebrew writers will be treasured as a literary
gem.
Understandably, Gross commenced his anthological task
with verses 8:6-7 from "Song of - Songs":
Set me as a seal upon thy heart,
As a seal upon thine arm;
For love is strong as death,
Jealousy is as cruel as the grave;
The flashes thereof are flashes of fire,
A very flame of the Lord.
Many waters cannot quench love,
Neither can the floods drown it;
If a man would give all the substance of his house for love,
He would utterly be condemned.
There is genuine eminence in the authorship of these col-
lected works. Here is the list of authors appended to the Gross
compilation: S. Y. Agnon, Judah Al-Harizi, Natan Alterman,
Yocheved Bat-Miriam, Isaac Benjacob, Avraham Ben-Yitzhak,
Chaim Nachman Bialik, T. Carmi, Yaacov Cohen, Jos -eph Ezobi,
Yaacov Fichman, David Fogel, Leah Goldberg, Uri Zvi Green-
berg, Judah Halevi, Abraham Ibn Chasdai, Abraham Ibn Ezra,
Moses Ibn Ezra, Solomon Mandelkern, Proverbs, Rachel, I. Z.
Rimon, Immanuel di Roma, Samuele Romanelli, Zalman
Schneour, Hannah Senesh, Shin Shalom, "Song of Songs,"
Yaacov Steinberg and Saul Tchernikhovsky.
Gross makes notable comments on his valuable poetic an-
thology in his preface in which he states:
• "The Hebrew language, one of the oldest tongues known to
man, is remarkably well suited to poetic expression: it is pithy
sparing of adjectives and adverbs, dependent primarily of
nouns and verbs.
"In biblical poetry, in particular, the lines are short and
direct, depending on action, imagery, vigorousness, and simplic-
ity to convey a mood.
"Poets have been writing in Hebrew from the days of the
Bible right down to the moderns in Israel today. A substantial
part of the poetry created in Hebrew is religious and philosophi-
cal, reflecting the tribulations of the Jews, especially in the past
2,000 years of exile and wandering.
"But the theme of love remained vivid through the cen-
turies of Jewish life. "Love is as strong as death," the "Song of
Songs" tells us, which has elicited a Yiddish proverb: 'Love
tastes sweet, but only with bread.'
"Although the study of Hebrew has grown substantially in
the United States, notably in the past quArter of a century, the
ancient language of the Bible has never achieved the popularity
of the Romance languages — despite the fact that up until the
late 18th Century, the study of Hebrew was a required course at
Harvard and 'Vale, and was also taught at Princeton,
Dartmouth, Brown and Columbia universities. In early New
England, commencement exercises included addresses deli-
vered in Hebrew."