8 Friday, January 28, 1983
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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS
Blind Rabbi Credits Jewish Braille Institute
(Continued from Page 1)
In an interview with
the Jewish Week of New
York, Rabbi Levy credited
the Jewish Braille Institute
with providing the tools for
his achievements.
"It's not a question of
my having more courage
than the next person," he
said. "The institute helped
with attitude and then with
the tools. When we came
across the problem of study-
ing Talmud with all kinds of
asterisks and footnotes, we
worked it out on the basis of
alternatives. The institute
told me of transcribers, and
we hammered it out."
The young rabbi also
spoke with respect of the
role of his family in his
life. "I remember my
father sitting down with
me when I was seven or
eight, going over the
prayers to make sure I
was able to keep up. I
didn't really want to do it.
Rosh Hashana or Yom
Kippur was always
around the time of the
World Series. That's a
terrible conflict for a kid.
My father took the posi-
tion that I had to do it just
like any other Jewish
person my age."
The ,Jewish Braille Insti-
tute's executive vice
president, Gerald M. Kass,
point out that about 20,000
American Jews are legally
blind. Another 50,000 are
on the borderline between
legal blindness and extreme
visual impairment. •
"Our feeling is that there
are two basic needs," Kass
said. "The first is to provide _
alternate techniques to ac-
complish certain tasks, to
-
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normalize one's life. The
second is to help blind per-
sons re-evaluate them-
selves and their sense of
self-esteem."
The institute has some
60,000 volumes in Braille
on Jewish topics. In addi-
tion, there are more than
100,000 tapes and cassettes,
and a groWing library of
English and Hebrew books
in large type.
"Our counseling is in-
formational, not
psychological," Kass
said,' seconding -Rabbi
Levy's emphasis on
"tools" for indepen-
dence. "A female college
student will call us, won-
dering whether she can
go to law school. First we
tell her, 'Yes, other blind
students have gone.' We
give her the telephone
numbers of five who have
graduated, who can tell
her about admission pro-
cedures and their experi-
ences.
"We try to reorient blind
people's thinking about
themselves. Society says
blind people have limited
alternatives. We introduce
them to maximum alterna-
tives.
"It really came out of the
need," Kass continued, "for
normalcy in Jewish life —
not segregation, not to be
apart, not to have their own
congregation. Churchill
said: 'Give us the tools and
we'll do the job.' Give me a
Braille prayerbook and I'm
a member of the congrega-
tion."
Kass stressed that the
goal of the institute was to
foster the overall indepen-.
dence and autonomy of the
blind. "An agency, hope-
fully, will not become a W
- ay
of life," he said. "Call us
when you want something,
and we will send it to you.
For the child in religious
school, let us know the
books that are needed, and
we'll send them in Braille. If
the teacher has any ques-
tions, we'll talk with the
teacher.
"But as in the case of
Rabbi Levy's upbringing,
the child's primary reli-
gious affiliation should
be with the synagogue.
We enable that to hap-
pen; that's what we call
'normalization.' We
would defeat our objec-
tives if we became a way
of life. We're a resource.
Come to the well, take the
water, and go."
Rabbi Levy added, "There
is a mental emancipation
that has to take place in all
of us. If you judge a blind
person and a sighted person
only on the basis of visual
acuity, the blind person
seems to come out as less
able. But nobody's that
one-dimensional. It could be
that the blind person is bet-
ter educated, wealthier, in-
volved in better emotional
relationships, and that
when you add up the col-
umns, there's nothing there
that makes for pity."
Summing up the Jewish
An advantage over
kinsmen is the worst kind of
disadvantage.
Braille Institute's philos-
ophy, Kass stated:
"I look upon the institute
as a unique experience in
Jewish history. This is the
only time a position has
been taken in 5,000 to 6,000
years of our history _that
says blind. people shall par-
ticipate. Without us here,
there would be the 11th lost
tribe. It's hot that this is a
special act of charity on our
part. It's just basic fair-
ness."
Caricatures
for your party
By
SAM FIELD
call
399-1320
THE PALESTINIANS
Towards the middle of the last
1
century, the Jewish homeland, then
called Palestine, was a largely uninha-
bited wilderness of swamps and des-
erts. Jerusalem, the largest town —
then nothing more than a community of
miserable hovels — had a population of
Jews that far outnumbered Christians
and Muslims.-,The land had a greatQr
number of Jews as settled and perma-
nent residents than Arabs who were
largely nomadic Bedouins . . .
Most of the Arabs who settled in
2
Palestine were attracted from nearby
countries as the Jewish pioneers re-
claimed their Biblical heritage and made
the land bloom once again with their
loving labor. Before Israel's rebirth, 'for
every three Jews that settled in Pales-
tine, there were two Arabs that came to
benefit from Jewish development —
some to benefit unlawfully. The record
of Arab attacks of Jewish settlements:
the plunger, rape, arson and murder
fills the pages of history . . .
Before Israel's st a tehood, 'those
3
who sang "Palestine, My Palestine"
were Jews. The "Palestinians" who
fought in World War II alongside the
British and Americans were Jews. Be-
fore Israel was reborn in :1948, Jews
were known as the "Palestinians."
Arabs have assumed the "Palestinian"
identity as a subterfuge to justify a war
against the Jewish nation:
THE CLAIM OF A "PALESTINIAN PEOPLE"
— SEPARATE AND DISTINCT FROM AN ARAB
PEOPLE — IS A FRAUD STARTED
SOME 20 YEARS AGO
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