4 Friday, August 21, 1981
THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
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ALAN HITSKY
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HEIDI PRESS
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Associate News Editor
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Sabbath Scriptural Selections
This Sabbath, the 22nd day of Au, 5741, the following scriptural selections will be read in our synagogues:
Pentateuchal portion, Deuteronomy 7:12-11:25. Prophetical portion, Isaiah 49:14-51:3.
Candle lighting, Friday, August 21, 8:06 p.m.
VOL. LXXIX, No. 25
Page Four
Friday, August 21, 1981
ON THE ROA D. TO PEACE?'
Peace, in all its connotations, whether with
related terms of Shalom and Salaam, suffered a
juggling interpretation. Bitter conflicts defied
positive definition. Hatreds displaced aspira-
tion for the higher values in human existence.
Now there are signs that barriers may be re-
duced, that obstructions could be eliminated,
that people separated by extreme distances
might be brought together for a taste of har-
mony.
Is it possible that Saudi Arabia, yesterday's
pronouncer of a call for a Jihad, a -Holy War,
may tomorrow say Salaam to her neighbor and
accept a stretched-out Israeli hand for a greet-
ing with a smile, denoting neighborliness, flirt-
ing with friendship, reaffirming kinship?
Both Egyptian President Anwar Sadat and
Israel Prime Minister Menahem Begin called
the Saudi -Arabian proposal old copy. Yet, ter-
minology that may be misinterpreted as
"recognition" is flaunted as a departure from
Jihad. Therefore; the prolonged pessimism is
being only minutely reduced by hope.
Understandably, there is caution in ap-
proaching the displayed but-not-as-yet-
completely-outstretched hand of peace. There
are the unacceptable conditions. There is the
terrorist element not yet shaken off by any of
the Arab potentates. There is the matter involv-
ing Jerusalem.
When the Saudis steady themselves to the
realism of the situation, when they admit that
there is 'total religious freedom in Jerusalem
and on that score recognize that the glory of the
Holy City of Peace is assured under just and
democratic Israeli administrative fairness, out-
stretched hands will clasp.
Distance in attaining amity among nations
will be expanded if the hatreds linger and the
misunderstandings predominate. Hopefully
there are rays of light which, like human lasers,
may evaporate bitterness and make possible the
establishment of an accord that could, as it
should, assure security for the Saudis as well as
for Israel. Israel's neighbors are as much in need
of a sense of confidence in their survival against
the destructive elements threatening them,
from enmities internally as well as externally,
as is Israel. Neighborliness can obviate threats
to existence.
This is the juggling of the peace needs. Israel
is surrounded by enemies and must exercise
caution even when neighbors hitherto posing as
enemies threatening Israel's very life begin to
speak of peace. These gestures must be
supplemented by evidence of sincerity. Proving
it, the distances creating hatreds can vanish.
The task is difficult, the protective needs seri-
ous.
That which made possible the Camp David '
Accord between Egypt and Israel may, well
prove the criterion for future results in what is
now a dream but may tomorrow become reality
in .the vacillating term called Peace.'
ROMANIAN 'PAPER BRIDGE'
Romanian Jewry sends an inspirational mes-
sage to American and world Jewish com-
munities. It is occasioned by the 25th anniver-
sary of the publication of the Jewish Journal —
Revista Cultului Mozaic — the observance of
which is now attracting global interest.
There are some 33,000 Jews left in Romania.
In the 33 years of Israel's existence; 350,000
Romanian Jews settled in the Jewish state.
These figures are of significance because the
total Romanian Jewish population prior to the
Holocaust numbered 900,000. Now it is a
'kehilla, an organized community of Jews func-
tioning with a devotion to Zion in the atmos-
phere of Communist government.
The recognition given the Romanian Jewish
Journal by Jewish leaders from all parts of the
globe, including Israel's President Yitzhak Na-
von, Chief Rabbi Immanuel Jakobovitz of Great
Britain and many others, is a tribute to Chief
Rabbi Moses Rosen of Romania who, as editor of
the Jewish Journal, as leader and guide of his
people, has established a notable rapport be-
tween Jewry and Romania.
The appellation given the Romanian Jewish
Journal, that it is the "Paper Bridge" linking
Romanian Jewry with world Jewry, symbolizes
the unity of the People Israel. That there are
10,000 readers of the magazine, which has ap-
peared, trilingually in Romanian, Yiddish and
Hebrew, that it has become a textbook for He-
brew studies for the general Romanian Popula-
tion, induces respect and admiration for Rabbi
Rosen and his associates in the leadership of the
Jews of Romania. That some 800 copies of the
magazine, which now also uses English as a
fourth language, should reach many Jews in the
Soviet Union is also a matter inspiring respect'
for a community with a Jewish identification.
There is another anniversary marked by the
600-year-old Romanian Jewish community —
the 250th anniversary of the Romanian
Sephardic Jews who became a part of the larger
Ashkenic community in the..land.
These achivements have earned the respect
and admiration of Jews everywhere who send
greetings to Romanian Jews on the occasion of
the two anniversaries.
EXPOSING A CANARD
Yitzhaq Ben-Ami's factual statement on the
Deir Yassin tragedy is a timely expose of the
unfortunate resort to the casualties of war as
means of condemning Israel and the Jewish
people.
People die in the tens of thousands as victims
of war conditions. It is when Jews and Israelis
are involved, as in the instance of the July 7
bombing of the Beirut PLO headquarters, that
Jews are accused of abandoning morality.
The fact is, as in the instance both of the
bombing of the King David Hotel and the Deir
Yassin misfortune that the Israeli military
were ordered never to attack civilians. When
civilian deaths resulted, they were beyond such
control.
The Ben-Ami essay in this issue serves im-
portantly in setting the record straight in its
reference to all authorities, Arabs included, for
a vindication of the Jewish forces from the ac-
cusation of deliberate immorality.
Jewish Literature Journal
22 Essays 'Reconsider'
I. B. Singer's Writings
"Studies in American Jewish Literature" makes its appearance
as a journal devoted to the American Jewish writer and the American
Jewish experience. It will appear annually as a product of'the State
University of New York Press, Albany, and the first issue is devoted
to the works of Isaac Bashevis Singer.
The journal is edited by Daniel Walden, of the Pennsylvania
State University editorial board, and members of the editorial board
included noted authors and academics.
With the appearance of the first volume in the series there is the
announcement that the second volume will be entitled "From Margi-
nality to Mainstream: The Mosaic of Jewish Writers."
In the "Reconsideration" of Isaac Bashevis Singer's work, the
American Jewish Literature introductory volume places emphasis on
the successes of the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature despite the
decline in the use of Yiddish as the major Jewish language.
Both the commendations and criticisms of Singer are accounted
for and his tireless labors, his uOiminished creativity as a writer,
"from right to left in Yiddish," as the introduction to this paperback
literary study indicates.
The "greatness" of Singer is thus defined in this new serialization
of literary Jewish works:
"Happily married for many years to his de-
voted Alma, he lives unpretentiously on New
York's upper West Side. 'I don't go to the
theater, or to fancy restaurants, and I don't
dress well,' he told Tony Schwartz. 'This is not
my fashion. I live the same life that I did when I
was a poor man.' The Nobel Prize has not
changed him. 'I'm still one of the millions of
miserable people who eat, think, hope, worry,
sleep, pray and die.'
"Singer is a modest man and he is a humble
man, a man who until recently spoke to
everyone who called him on the phone. Above
SINGER
all, he is a great writer who writes in Yiddish
because it contains treasures that have not been revealed to the
of the world. 'It was the tongue of martyrs and saints, of dreamers'ill"
cabalists — rich in humor and in memories that mankind may never
forget,' he explained in his Nobel speech. 'Yiddish is the wise and
humble language of us all, the idiom of the frightened and hopeful
humanity.' "
The critical analyses of Singer and his works, included in this
volume, are by 22 reviewers who comment on many of Singer's major
works. The fact that these essays are packed into 187 pages is an
indication of the conciseness of the articles. Yet they express the
validity of Singer's' rise to leadership in the literary world.
Among Singer's works reviewed in the 22 essays are "The Fools of
Helm," "The Family Moskat," "Satan in Goray."
This introductory volume of "American Jewish Literature" thus
symbolizes 'authorship, selects the gems from Yiddish appearing in
their English translations, offers an interesting study of the Nobel
Prize winner. The volume is an interesting addition to Jewish literary
studies.