56 Friday, January 5, 1919

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

Jerusalem's Islamic Museum A Focal Point Of Israeli Culture

By DVORA WAYSMAN

World Zionist Press Service

It is a beautiful building -
five stories of mellow
Jerusalem stone. Sur-
rounded by gardens, it is
situated not far from the
President's residence, and a
plaque proclaims in He-
brew, Arabic and English,
that it is the L.A. Mayer
Memorial Institute for Is-
lamic Art.
There are some unusual
features. One is that the in-
stitute was envisaged and
endowed by a Jewish
woman, the late Mrs. Vera
Bryce Salomons, in memory
of another Jew, her friend
and teacher, Prof. Leo Arie
Mayer (1895-1959). He was
the author of many books on
Islamic art, as well as pro-
fessor of Nea-r. Eastern art
and archeology at
Jerusalem's Hebrew Uni-
versity. In 1949, he was

awarded the Israel Prize for
his work.
The aim of the institute is
to stimulate in the Israeli
public the perception,
appreciation and under-
standing of the cultural
heritage and artistic
achievements of the peoples
among whom Israel's cul-
ture is emerging. In this
way, Mrs. Bryce Salomons
hoped to build a bridge be-
tween Arab and Jew.
Daughter of Sir David
Salomons, who was the
first Jewish Lord Mayor
of London, Mrs. Salo-
mons chose the Islamic
Museum as just one of her
ventures to fulfill this
vision, which also in-
cluded endowing homes
in Israel for blind Arab
children.

The museum was opened
by past President Ephraim
Katzir in October 1974. The

director of the museum is
Dr. Gabriel Moriah, and the
curator is Mrs. Rachel Has-
son.
Associated with the
Mayer Memorial is one of
the greatest scholars and
outstanding authorities in
the world of Islamic art,
Prof. Richard Ettin-
ghausen, head of the Is-
lamic department of the
Metropolitan Museum in
New York.

Islamic art, in broad
terms, refers to the cultural
context, rather than to a
religious context. It per-
tains to ethnic, cultural,
temporal and geographic
categories.

The exhibition halls are
.arranged according to
period and provenance, and
display an assortment of
ceramics — vessels,
figurines and tiles; a collec-
tion of calligraphy and

vessels of precious metal
and jewelry, much of which
was made in Fatimid Egypt
(969-1161 CE).
One special exhibit com-
prises elements from a gold
belt crafted- for Sultan Abu
al-Fida Isma'il (born in
Damascus in 1273). Most of
the glass exhibits are Early
Islamic and were probably
made in Iran between the
Eighth and 10th Centuries.
The East-West Room
represents cultural con-
tacts between Europe
and the Islamic world
from the late Renais-
sance onwards. It con-
tains a "damascened"
sword blade, a Venetian
chest decorated with
ivory inlay, and Spanish
---
tiles from the 16th and 17
-
This 18th Century Centuries with arabes-
clock of inlaid wood and que ornamentations.
A highlight of the collec-
lacquer is one of the items
on display at Israel's Is- tions, which acts as a mag-
net to all visitors, is the
lamic Museum.

miniatures; and a group of
Iranian glass vessels. There
also is an extensive collec-
tion of the now extinct art of
Turkish shadow figures.
The Treasury Room houses

watch and clock collection of
the late Sir David Salo-
mons. The timepieces are
highly developed, utilizing
sophisticated, mechanical
principles (most of which
were manufactured by Bre-
guet, the famous Swiss-born
Paris watchmaker) and
there are also richly deco-
rated automata — musical
boxes, snuff boxes etc. The .
collection includes a jewel-
led watch which belongedi„.
Queen Marie Antoinette.

The museum houses
three separate collec-
tions, comprised of more
than 4,000 priceless ob-
jects dating from 700 CE
and includes exhibits
from Iran, Turkey, India,
Egypt, Syria and Iraq.
There is also a library
and archives of 16,000
slides and photographs
available to local and
foreign scholars.

Israel's Few Religious Kibutzim Retain Tradition Amid Technology

By MARTIN HOFFMAN

World Zionist
Press Service

To an ordinary tourist,
coming to Kibutz Be'erot
Yitzhak for the first time, it
seems no different from any
of the hundreds of kibutzim
that punctuate the Israeli
landscape: Yet the tightly
enclosed community, with
its huge dining hall, turkey
houses, dairy herd and or-
chards, is a unique phenom-
enon in contemporary
Jewish life. Here it is reli-
g4 on which weaves together
the land, the people and the
Book.
In structure and function,
the religious kibutz accepts
all the principles of other Is-
raeli kibutzim. Yet within
the socialistic framework
there are elements that
have lain dormant since the
days of the Temple.
The Jewish communities
of Eastern Europe and the
Pale, under optimum condi-
tions of cohesiveness and
self-sufficiency, depended
on the non-Jewish world for
various goods and services.

The "Shabbos Goy" is the
classic example in which a
gentile does those labors
that are prohibited to a Jew
on the Sabbath.
For centuries, the
Eastern European Jews
not only had the Shabbos
goyim lighting their
stoves and milking their
cows, but they them-
selves refused to join any
profession that might in-
volve desecrating the
Sabbath. Thus there
were Jewish lawyers and
doctors, but few sailors,
and very few policemen
or farmers. Many of the
biblical injunctions are
specifically agricultural
and impose rigorous
conditions on Torah ob-
servant Jews.
The problems facing the
founders of religious kibut-
zim demanded revolution-
ary solutions, for there had
been no Jewish equivalent
in Eastern Europe for the
services the gentiles had
provided. Nor would the
founders accept the status
quo; they wanted a total

Cheerful banter marks lunchtime in a children's
house in the religious kibutz of Shaalbaim, north of
Latrun.

environment with Jewish
cops and farmers whose ac-
tivities would not damage
their religiosity.
One of the most difficult
injunctions to follow is the
Shmitta Year, for the Torah
states that ploughing and
sowing the land is prohib-
ited every seventh year and
all crops that appear afthat
time are ownerless. The
concept is not conservation,
but ethics, teaching the
farmer that his Creator
owns the land, and he
merely holds it in trust. The
rabbis have stated that the
Jewish people lost the land
of Israel because they neg-
lected this commandment.
On one kibutz, hyd-
roponic farming is practiced
in that year, with chemicals
and water replacing the
soil. On another, an entire
field is left fallow and the
beautiful flower gardens
which surround the kibut-
nik's houses go to seed. Yet
realistically, it's not possi-

ble for an entire country to involve gravting to related
stop the growing process for stocks, but no complete an-
a whole year. "We sold the swer.
Within the Torah, there
land to the Arabs in the
Shmitta Year," said Phil is the concept of uncircum-
Lerman, a member of the cised fruit, called "orla."
kibutz. Admittedly, it's not This means that after plant-
satisfactory, but we're ing a tree, one is prohibited
working toward a solution." from eating the fruit for
There is another Torah three years. To the
injunction that prohibits kibutzniks, this poses no
sowing diverse seeds problem since it takes at
such as cereal and least that long for the fruit
legumes in one field. The tree to reach maturity. But
problem arises with cat- grape vines begin bearing
tle feed which often re- from the second year.
Although it was permis-
quires a mixed seed; yet
after various experi- sible to sell the trees to
ments, the kibutzniks non-Jews, many of the
discovered that cloves kibutzim declined and ac-
and beans, both legumes, cepted the economic loss.
Before the days of the
would provide exactly
power stations, many Sab-
what they needed.
The same law applies to bath commandments were
tree grafting, prohibiting extremely difficult to fulfill.
the joining of two different "At the tarn of the century,"
species. Yet for proper said Phil Lerman, "you
growth, many species of could fill a library with all
fruit must be grafted onto the literature on how to
diverse stocks. Partial solu- milk a cow on the Sabbath.
tions have been found which Every rabbi in Israel has a

response." Yet now, with
the "Shabbos Clock," an
electric timing device that's
pre-set before the Sabbath,
the animals' needs are ful-
filled automatically. In
addition, the Shabbos clocks
regulate lights, heaters,
and all other operations
which previously involved a
Shabbos goy.
The cycle of Jewish
fesitvals demands an-
other kind of response
from the Torah obser-
vant_ community.
Passover, with its re-
quirement of leaven-free
surroundings, means a
complete overhaul of all
buildings. Not only are
walls and floors scrub-
bed, but the animal diet is
changed from leavened
fodder to durra and
maize.
On Sukkot, the religious
kibutzim replace their din-
ing halls with the largest
sukkot in the world, seating
400-500 people at a time.

You Don't Have to Be Yiddish to Be Jewish

By RABBI
MARC ANGEL
NEW YORK — The word
"Yiddish" is a confusing one
for people of non-Yiddish
speaking background. Be-
cause the word Yiddish also
means Jewish, the implica-
tion is that one who does not
speak Yiddish is somehow
not authentically Jewish.
When, for example, Isaac
Bashevis Singer suggested
that Yiddish be designated
the second language of the
state of Israel, he
exemplifies a general atti-
tude among Yiddish speak-
ing Jews. It is incredibly in-
nocent and naive, in that it

Interestingly, the decora-
discounts the actual fact
that the majority of Jews in tive label on the candles
Israel are not of Yiddish- contains a phrase in He-
speaking background. It brew as well as one in Yid-
would be more plausible to dish. When I objected to in-
make Judeo-Arabic or cluding the Yiddish phrase,
Judeo-Spanish a second a number of my colleagues
language, if people don't were surprised. My argu-
think Hebrew is good ment simply is this: al-
though most of the Jews
enough by itself.
It must be remembered by who were destroyed by the
all Jews that Yiddish is a Nazis did speak Yiddish,
language of an important many thousands perished
segment of Jewry, but by no who did not know the lan-
means is it the language of guage at all.
the Jewish people. It is one - Whole communities of
of many different lan- Greek-speaking and Judeo
Spanish-speaking Jews
guages.
The confusion carries were decimated. French and
itself into other areas. Italian Jews, many of whom
For example, an attempt were not of Yiddish speak-
is being made at estab- ing origin, also suffered
lishing a home commem- dramatically in the
oration of the Holocaust. Holocaust. Therefore, if we
Memorial candles have intend to make a commem-
been designed which oration, it ought to include
children would bring all six million Jews and not
home from their religious merely five and a half mil-
schools and which would lion of them. The language
be lit at home in memory of our people is Hebrew.
All Jews have reason to
of the Six Million mar-
be proud of the accom-
tyrs.

plishments of the Yiddish
speaking writers and
orators. There is no doubt
that the Yiddish language
is a wonderful expression of
Ashkenazic Jewry and that
it is a colorful and express-
ive language. Certainly, we
all have reason to be prof
of the fact that a Yiddist,
writer won the Nobel prize.
Yet, all this being said, we
must not lose sight of the
fact that it is quite possible
to be Jewish without being
"Yiddish."

RABBI MARC ANGEL