120 Friday, September 12, 1980 THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS A Jew in Spirit St. John's Lifetime in Defense of Jewry By GLORIA CHARNES (Copyright 1980, JTA, Inc.) They ask him all the time. How is it that you, a gen- tile, are so absorbed in Jewish causes? And when they find out that his wife Ruth is Jewish, they smile knowingly. "Ah ha, so that's the reason he's interested in us." But they're wrong. Ruth is not a cause; she's an effect. His devotion to Israel pre-dates Ruth by at least a score of years. Why, then, are Israel and the Jewish people his highest priorities? Robert St. John, noted writer and lecturer, ex- plains: In one night of un- precedented carnage, while he was an Associated Press correspondent in Romania early in 1941, the fascist Iron Guard rounded up hundreds of Jews and butchered them in a slaughterhouse at the edge of Bucharest. When St. John learned of this gro- tesque savagery the next morning, he did some criti- cal thinking. "I realized I had been born into a group that had been doing this sort of thing for 2,000 years and, therefore, had to share responsibility. I promised myself that if I lived out the war, I'd spend the rest of my life trying to atone for the sins of my people, for the monstrous atrocities committed in Bucharest by men presumably exposed to Christian precepts they had so barbarically violated." Former newspaper editor and publisher, foreign correspondent, radio and TV commentator, he re- ported the liberation of Paris, and as an NBC broadcaster, St. John was the first to announce to the world the signing of the armistice that ended World War II. He has seen evil, re- corded it, and managed to survive. Arriving in Yugoslavia one step ahead of the Nazis, he was in Belgrade when that city was raided by a surprise attack of the Luftwaffe. Fleeing the country in a 20-foot sardine boat obtained in trade for an automobile, he was machine-gunned by the Nazis. "The bul- RUTH, ROBERT ST. JOHN lets, which I refuse to let any doctor remove, are still in my right leg to re- mind me, when it hits a nerve, of certain events I don't want to forget." St. John pauses. "This all sounds like ancient history. And to the present genera- tion," he reflects sorrow- fully, "perhaps it's not only ancient history, but un- known history." As a journalist in Israel, he covered the fighting in 1948, 1956, 1973, experi- ences which intensified his loyalties and affection for 5740's Ten Best Jewish Books tion for the Israeli Secret Service. The Jewish books of this THE BOOKS OF past year are characterized RACHEL by Joel Gross by their sense of looking (Seaview). The best first backward. Writers are seek- novel by a Jewish writer ing to understand the pre- this year, "The Books of sent by examining the past, Rachel" is an historical to make sense of the present chronicle covering- 500 Jewish situation by deter- years of Jewish history and mining its context. Perhaps is told through the records this is a sign of uncertain of a remarkable Jewish feelings about the future woman. FROM GENERATION and a confusion about the TO GENERATION by Ar- present. Jewish books continue to thur Kurzweil (Morrow). be numerous and of high This valuable book corn- quality, although there is bines a reference guide to not enough material for Jewish genealogy and fam- pre-school Jewish children ily history with a very mov- nor enough adult fiction ing personal account of the with positive Jewish heroes. author's search for his own Here, then, is a list of the Jewish roots. 10 best Jewish books of THE SHTETL trans- 5740:_ lated and edited by Joachim TOWARD THE HORI- Neugroschel (Richard ZON by Charles Angoff Marek). This volume aims (A.S. Barnes). This is the to portray the reality, not late author's-11th novel in the stereotype, of small his Polonsky series. The town and ghetto Jewish life volumes trace the history of through a series of tales Anti-Semitism in America. from the last several cen- This book is particularly in- turies. Much of this excel- teresting because in it the lent material appears for hero confronts the anti- the first time in English. Semitism felt by his family. OF BLOOD AND SHULA: CODE NAME HOPE by Samuel Pisar THE PEARL by Aviezer (Little, Brown). This is an Golan and Danny Pinkas autobiographical account of (Delacorte Press). This is an a Holocaust survivor. His exciting, true-life spy story fascinating tale of the war about the "Mata Hari of the years, the black market and Middle East," Shula Cohen, his eventual triumph as a a young housewife, smuggl- presidential adviser goes ing Jewish refugees into Is- beyond one man's story to rael from Lebanon and ob- explore the lessons the taining valuable informa- Holocaust has for the con- By LAWRENCE EPSTEIN (A Seven Arts Feature) - temporary world. BREAKING RANKS: A POLITICAL MEMOIR by Norman Podhoretz- (Harper & Row). "Commentary's" famous editor traces his political development from liberalism to radicalism to neo-conservatism and in doing so offers valuable in- sights into American Jew- ry's continuing political un- rest. FROM BERLIN TO JERUSALEM: MEMORIES OF MY YOUTH by Gershom Scholem (Schocken Books). One of Israel's foremost scholars — an expert in Jewish mysticism — traces his intellectual develop- ment. His decision to move to the Land of Israel is told with special beauty. NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM by Avital Shcharansky with Ilana Ben-Josef (Morrow). This brief account details vividly the life of Soviet Jews, their passion for Jewish culture and their desire to emigrate to Israel. The book is tinged with sadness as it tells of Anatoly Shcharansky's con- tinuing imprisonment. THE THIRTEEN- PETALLED ROSE by Adin Steinsaltz (Basic BookS). This difficult yet rewarding book attempts to deal comprehensively with all aspects of the Jewish religion, including such di- verse subjects as angels, the soul and Torah. the people and their land. During the Yom Kippur War, a memory, searingly etched: A young cellist, turned soldier, demanded: "Do you understand what we are fighting for? Not only for the survival of Is- rael. Not only for the survi- val of Jews wherever they may live. But also for the survival of certain princi- ples which you Americans, whether or not you are Jewish, at least pretend to believe in." An infinitely compas- sionate man, with vast sensitivity for the perse- cuted and the hunted, he is pained by those who are forced to endure op- pression. Witnessing the flight of refugees from Nazi invaders in Eastern Europe left him a heartfelt sympathizer with victims of tyranny everywhere. As a child growing up in Oak Park, Ill., a suburb di- rectly west of Chicago, he suffered the anguish of not belonging. Oak Park, an ultra-conservative commu- nity, was split by two sets of railroad tracks. "Those who lived south of the second were regarded as undesirable, unworthy of association." He recalls the wounds that never quite healed. "We lived in a small house on an unpaved street on the wrong side of both tracks. Our family physi- cian was Ernest Heming- way's father, but I never played with Ernest. He lived in the north part of the village, two notches socially higher than us." A skilled writer, many of St. John's best-sellers have been translated into a half dozen languages. Of his 20 books, 11 concern Israel, the Middle East or Jewish topics. His highly inform- ative, "Jews, Justice and Judaism," recounts the his- tory of American Jewry and their vital contributions to America. David Ben-Gurion, Abba Eban and Eliezer Ben-Yehuda are the sub- jects of three of his biog- raphies. "In more than 50 years as a reporter," he acknowl- edges, "I've interviewed famous heroes and villains but I've been in the presence of greatness only five times. Ben-Gurion was one of the great ones." The others? "Mohandas Gandhi, Albert Einstein, Helen Keller, Al- bert Schweitzer. You sensed their greatness the moment they entered the room." During his conversations with Abba Eban, St. John observed that the former Foreign Minister and pre- sent Knesset member is "one of the few people keep- ing the English language alive. I am tired of trying to converse with people who have a vocabulary of 600 words. It's tremendously gratifying to be compelled to go to the dictionary and look up a word after talking to Eban." Articulate and un- swerving in his support of Israel, St. John's lec- ture tours have taken him to 49 of the 50 states. 1-7- has appeared beforc,‘ tually every existing Jewish organization. Born a Christian, his up- bringing was strictly de- fined by Episcopalian doc- trine. His mother, ardently religious, came from a Church of England family who followed a revered tra- dition: The eldest son "went into the church." St. John thus had his career planned for him. But there is no way St. John can identify as a Christian. "I am critical of Christianity more now than ever," he asserts, his anger obvious. "What infuriates me is that we are living in the most immoral, mate- rialistic and militaristic age of mankind. All three of these conditions are the an- tithesis of Christianity. I still believe in the precepts of Christianity but I have only contempt for its prac- tices." When he married Ruth 15 years ago, he suggested the ceremony be performed by a rabbi. "But we decided I was a little too old for conver- sion. The rabbi assured me I was already a better Jew than most members of his congregation. And unlike Henry Kissinger, we did not get married on the Sab- bath." Significance of Shofar on Rosh Hashana nant symbol of God's mercy to His people — indeed to all mankind. Hence the sound- In the book of Numbers ing of the ram's horn re- 29:1 the shofar is mentioned minded God that He should in describing the ritual for forgive the Jewish people Rosh Hashana. "You shall their transgressions. The shofar was and still observe it as a day when the is "the ritual horn" of the horn (shofar) is sounded." The horn was commanded Jews. When the Torah to be part of the New Year was given on Mt. Sinai, observance by this prescrip- the shofar was sounded. tion; furthermore, it was When the walls of Jericho specifically defined as a fell, the shofar was ram's horn when the sages utilized. The victory of included in the service for the Judge Ehud over the Rosh Hashana the story of Moabites was marked by Isaac on the altar and his the sound of the shofar. being replaced by the ram At Ein Dor in the dark of caught in the thicket by his night, Gideon and his 100 blew the shofar as an ac- horn. The horn became a poig- companiment to their By RABBI DAVID GEFFEN World Zionist Press Service surprise attack. In our times, when in 1967 the Israeli army cap- tured the Western Wall, then Chief" Chaplain Shlomo Goren sounded the shofar to mark that moment — a joyful sound heard round the world. The shofar, therefore, has been a call to assembly, a call to alarm, a call to battle. After the recitation of the penitential Psalm 27, the "tekia," the long single note, the- "terua," the nine staccato notes and the "shevarim," the three broken notes, are sounded. This is a daily act ex-, cept for the Sabbath an0/ 1 the day before Hashana. In fact the Baal Tokea the shofar blower — must get the ram's horn to emit 100 notes on each day of Rosh Hashana as well as the majestic "tekia gedola" at the end of Yom Kippur. Therefore, whether he uses the small curved shofar or the monumental spiral black or brown shofar, the Baal Tokea must have pre- pared well _enough so thr‘ when called upon during the service he will cajole the right notes out of his unique instrument. , Yona Yaffe of Yeshiva Aish Torah is shown blow- ing the shofar in Jerusalem last year during Rosh Hashana.