THE JEWISH NEWS
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Incorporating The Detroit Jewish Chronicle commencing with the issue of July 20, 1951
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PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
Editor and Publisher
ALAN HITSKY
News Editor
CARMI M. SLOMOVITZ
Business Manager
HEIDI PRESS
Associate News Editor
WIShl. 1100111
DREW LIEBERWITZ
Advertising Manager
1..;
Sabbath Scriptural Selections
.c.
This Sabbath, the second day of Sivan, 5740, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues;
Pentateuchal portion, Numbers 1:1-4:20. Prophetical portion, Hosea 2:1-22.
DI5TRICT OF COLUMBIA
Shavuot Scriptural Selections
- Wednesday: Pentateuchal portion, Exodus 19:1-20:23, Numbers 28:26-31. Prophetical portion, Ezekiel 1:1-28, 3:12.
Thursday: Pentateuchal portion, Deuteronomy 15:19-16:17, Numbers 28:26-31. Prophetical portion, Habbakuk 3:1-19.
Candle lighting, Friday, May 16, 8:28 p.m.
VOL. LXXVII, No. 11
Page Four
Friday, May 16, 1980
SHAVITOT 9 S SPIRITUAL LEGACY
On Tuesday evening, Jewry will usher in one
of its most important festivals. Shavuot, to be
observed on Wednesday and Thursday, marks
the anniversary of the Giving of the Law to
Israel on Mount Sinai. It is also our Spring Fes-
tival which has agricultural importance in our
history as the Hag Habikkurim, the season of
the ripening of the first fruit.
While the agricultural aspect is strictly re-
lated to the Land of Israel, it has significance for
all of us in its emphasis on our links with our
past and with our kinsmen wherever they may
reside — and there is the particular linkage
with our biblical past.
On this score there certainly exist differences
of opinion, relating to the nationhood of Israel.
Nearly a century ago, the father of Benjamin
Disraeli, Isaac D'Israeli, who took his son to the
baptismal font, argued that Jews were not a
nation. He had written, in the years when he
devoted himself to Jewish scholarship:
The Jewish people are not a nation, for they
consist of many nations. They reflect the colors
of the spot they rest on. The people of Israel are
like water running through vast countries,
tinged in their course with all the varieties of
the soil in which they deposit themselves. Every
native 'Jew, as a political being, becomes dis-
tinct from other Jews. The Hebrew adopts the
hostilities and alliances of the land where he
was born. He calls himself by the name of his
country."
There is much truth in the assertion that
Jews absorb the cultures of the lands of which
they become citizens — and they do it with devo-
tion and with loyalty. But that has not required
abandonment of a parental loyalty, of a heritage
that binds them to an historic past, of an in-
separable kinship with their ancestors and
their brethren wherever they may be.
Isaac D'Israeli's son, Benjamin, who became
famous as the prime minister of his country and
later as Lord Beaconsfield, may have under-
stood the glory of Israel better than the father
who had converted him and his entire family to
the faith that is dominant in England. Benja-
min Disraeli thus described the status of the
people from whom he had sprung:
The vineyards of Israel have ceased to exist,
but the eternal law enjoins the children of Israel
still to celebrate the vintage. A race that per-
sists in celebrating their vintage, although
they have no fruits to gather, will regain their
vineyards. What sublime inexorability in the
law! But what indomitable spirit in the people!"
How prophetic these lines are, having been
written more than seven decades before Israel
regained the vineyards! And how much more
powerful than his father's argument that the
sponge-element in Jewry which absorbs the cul-
tures of the peoples among whom we live means
an abandonment of kinships with the creators of
our great spiritual values!
Shavuot does, indeed, recreate our interest in
our past. It revives ancient glories, even if they
are today, more so even than in the days of Isaac
D'Israeli because Israel as a state is a reality,
the customs of a sovereign nation with which we
are linked merely as kinsmen and not as fellow
citizens. But the traditions as they have come
down to us through the ages, the biblical lore as
we have inherited it and as it is being shared
with us by all faiths, remain sacred. There is a
sanctity about history that can not be de-.
molished by political duties. Spiritual truths
must prevail if political ideals are to be based on
the highest ethical teachings of our sages.
While Shavuot retains this agricultural as-
pect that is now emphasized and observed only
in Israel, with the sanctified memories alone
assigned to us, it is a festival that is distinct in
that it marks the birth of the Torah, as the
Zman Mattan Torahtenu; in the symbolism
represented in the Book of Ruth read during
Shavuot services; in the reaffirmation of faith
by Israel.
It is because of these special links with our
traditions that Shavuot has become the occa-
sion for consecrations and confirmations, for
graduations from Jewish schools and the com-
mencements of new periods of study.
As a festival for the elders who can thereby
derive joy from their faith, and as the notewor-
thy occasion for the children's consecrations,
Shavuot is one of the great holidays on our
calendar. It is as such that we are about to
commence its observance • with a renewal of
faith and a rededication to the highest ideals in
our historic heritage.
THE HEBRON TRAGEDY
Hebron was the capital of the ancient Jewish
state before King David moved it into,
Jerusalem. A tradition of holiness always ho-
vered over that city. Therefore, it had yeshivot,
houses of study for Jews who viewed that area
with reverence.
When some 60 Torah and Talmud students
were massacred there in 1929, Hebron seemed
to have ceased to be a center of holiness for
Torah-inspired students. As part of the new
trends of establishing settlements in Judea and
Samaria, Hebron again became an object for
resettlement by Jews. Controversies developed,
and another massacre occurred there on May 2.
It was a continuity of tragedy and Hebron has
become a symbol of dispute.
The horror evidenced in these processes is
that extremists have resorted to violence, and
this has outraged many., in the media, and in
Israel's population.
Perhaps it becomes an inevitability for ex-
tremism to cause the damage that may hope-
fully lead to proper solutions of difficult prob-
lems. That which is labeled "settlements" as a
major issue could affect the peace negotiations.
May 26 is no longer a target date for Egyptian-
Israeli agreements. Therefore, the effort to be
anticipated will no doubt be for concessions, for
bringing the issue to a head, of establishing
with certainty whether settlements in their
entirety really represent the security of Israel.
Jerusalem
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Holy Land's Explorations
Related in WSU Volume
Wayne State University Press enriches its shelves containing
books of Jewish interest with a highly scholarly study of the geog-
raphy of the Holy Land,
"Rediscovery of the Holy Land in the Nineteenth Century" by
Hebrew University Prof. Yehoshua Ben-Arieh is an historical geog-
raphy and is a thorough review of the discoveries by famous travelers
of all faiths and the explorations relating to subjects that are now
made available for general knowledge.
Commencing with Napolesn's invasion of Egypt, the eminent
author, whose work first was published in Hebrew by the Israel
Exploration Society and Carta Jerusalem, the author proceeds to give
accounts which led to the discovery of Holy Land geographical aspects
in a continuing historical experience.
Dr. Ben-Arieh points out that changes had taken place at the
beginning of the 19th Century. "Palestine was a derelict province of
the decaying Ottoman Empire." The only interest that was shown by
the Turkish rulers was in the holy places. There was neglect, and the
land was "a sad backwater of the crumbling empire — a far cry from
the fertile, thriving land it had been in ancient times."
With the interest in the land that developed in European coun-
tries, consulates were established by Western governments and there
was contesting for control of the holy places.
In his thorough review of the various developments, leading up to
the beginnings of modernization in the years 1865 to 1877, scientific
teams played their roles in what may well be judged as moderniza-
tion.
Travel having become fashionable, travelers revealed the state of
affairs during decadence and the subsequent modernization. This is
especially made evident in the scores of historic photographs, draw-
ings and etchings included in the book, all of which preserve the spirit
of the theme reconstructed by Prof. Ben-Arieh.
Emphasizing the extent of explorations, the effectiveness of mod-
ern influences, the Western penetration into what had been a des-
erted desert is given special consideration in the scholarly researched
volume. In an important historical note relating to the Jewish tasks
in reconstruction, the author states:
"After the Crimean War there was a considerable increase in the
number of Jews who came to the Land of Israel, many of then- ti-
vated by their faith to spend their last years in the Holy Land. L.–Lice
they were largely supported by charitable donations from pious Jews
abroad, they could somehow subsist under the difficult conditions of
the country, while those who had greater initiative used some ' he
incoming funds for attempts at urban and rural settlement.
"New suburbs rose outside the walls of Old Jerusalem, while in
the vicinity of Jaffa, the Miqve Yisra'el agricultural school was set up
in 1870 under the able direction of Karl Netter by Alliance Israelite
Association. Although attempts to establish agricultural settlements
at Motza, near Jerusalem, and elsewhere were unsuccessful, the idea
persisted and others were initiated.
"In keeping with its growing numbers, the influence of the
Jewish community increased. The Jews now became a majority in
Jerusalem, and have remained so ever since. Apart from the old
religious schools and academies, new general educational institu-
tions were set up with funds from abroad. The first Hebrew weekly
journals were founded."
Geography in its historical aspects, the progress in explorations,
the beginnings of Jewish influences in the modern aspects, as well as
the role of Christians in progressive steps eliminating the backward-
ness of the Ottoman rule, all merge into a significantly revealing
document in Dr. Ben-Arieh's valuable studies.