UP FRONT

Scholar Compares Jewish Life
In America, Eastern Europe

ELIZABETH APPLEBAUM

Assistant Editor

T

he first photograph
showed an old man and
woman sitting in front
of a false backdrop of trees.
Taken in 1890 in the
Ukraine, the picture was a
gift from the couple to their
children, who were on their
way to a new life in the
United States.
Subsequent pictures show-
ed women with no teeth who
took in pennies outside
cemeteries; a rabbi who once
declared all the city's mat-
zah treife
because women
and children had been over-
worked producing it, the
matzah had been made with
"blood," he said; leading in-
tellectual and literary fig-
ures and Yiddishists; and
pogrom victims, their arms
and heads bandaged.
These were the Jews of
Eastern Europe in their
glory and their agony, pic-
tured in the slides with
which Dr. Zvi Gitelman
began his talk last week at
Congregation Beth Abra-
ham Hillel Moses. He focus-
ed on the differences and
similarities between the

—

Jews of Eastern Europe and
the American Jewish com-
munity today.
Gitelman, professor of po-
litical science and Judaic
studies at the University of
Michigan, said a number of
myths exist about the East
European Jews: that it was a
static community, that all
men were learned and

"Americans don't
like to be
commanded. If we
do something,
we're doing it out of
the goodness of our
hearts."
Zvi Gitelman

followed the same way of
life, that most Jews lived in
a shtetl.
In fact, Jewish life in
Europe was highly dynamic,
Gitelman said. While, until
the 20th century, most Jews
kept traditional religious
observances, the East Euro-
pean Jewish community also
saw the development of the
Chasidic movement and the

flourishing of such groups as
the Musar movement, re-
ligious Zionists, Bundists,
populists and territorialists.
"We can hardly talk about
a monolithic, unchanging
Jewish community,"
Gitelman said.
East European Jews took
"political, social and econ-
omic ideologies very seri-
ously," he said. Unlike
Americans, who basically
have two major political par-
ties to accommodate all
views, East European Jews
were convinced only their
truths were legitimate,
Gitelman said. He suggested
this was the reason for the
numerous political parties in
Israel today.
Their political and social
views were anything but
homogeneous, but the Jews
of Eastern Europe showed
little diversity in their econ-
omic situations, Gitelman
said. The vast majority were
poor; in 1900, two-thirds of
the Jews of Odessa had to be
buried at communal ex-
pense. And most lived in
cities like Cracow, Minsk
and Vilna where, even amid
constraints — such as being
forbidden to own land —
Jewish life flourished.

Zvi Gitelman: "Many Jews go to shul not to talk to God, but to talk to
each other."

"External oppression and
repression resulted in inter-
nal cohesion and creativity,"
Gitelman said.
By contrast, American
Jewry, facing no outside
repression, is challenged to
keep that internal cohesion
and creativity, he said.
"Freedom in America means
the individual's possibilities
are no longer confined to the
Jewish world."
Gitelman said East Euro-

pean Jewish life was
characterized by a central
communal organization and
highly developed Jewish in-
stitutions such as the
Chevra Kadisha (burial
society), a beit din (Jewish
court) and a hospital. Yet
those heading the organiza-
tions, unlike their modern
counterparts, often were un-
trained in their fields and
had risen to positions of
Continued on Page 12

neighbor city, Niagara Falls,
but this year, it may be offer-
ing the best wedding gala in
New York state.
Providing a young couple
with all the accouterments
of a traditional, halachic
Jewish wedding, the
Rochester Jewish Folk Arts
Festival this month an-
nounced plans for a gigantic,
all-expenses-paid June wed-
ding party to be attended by
what they hope will be 35,000
people.
Replete with klezmer
bands, chuppahs, a rabbi
and cantor, hand-painted
ketubot, flowers, wine, 11
entertainment groups, eight
caterers and a honeymoon
night in Rochester, the fes-
tival committee says it is
offering the opportunity for
"a wedding to end all wed-
dings."

Of Rochester's 24,000
Jews, only 4,100 are af-
filiated with a synagogue,
Morgenstern said.
Those interested in taking
advantage of the biggest and
the cheapest Jewish wed-
ding of the summer may con-
tact Netti Sheinman, Tem-
ple B'rith Kodesh, (716) 224-
7060, or Dan Morgenstern
(716) 244-1484.

ROUND UP

MPs Support
Israel Boycott

London — Seventy-five
members of the British
Parliament are expected to
add their names to an adver-
tising campaign calling for a
boycott of Israeli products
and services, to be launched
in the United Kingdom next
month by the Joint Com-
mittee for Palestine (JCP).
The JCP, which comprises
10 Jewish and non-Jewish
organizations, hopes to use
the boycott to force Israel to
withdraw from territories
won in the 1967 Six-Day
War and increase public
awareness about conflicts in
the Middle East, according
to Britain's The Observer.
"Our opposition to the
Israeli government is not
anti-Jewish," said Dr. Uri
Davis, honorary research
fellow in politics at Exeter
University and a member of
a JCP-affiliated Jewish
group, Return. "The boycott
is an important element in a
complex mosaic which will
lead to peace."

Other leading British Jews
disagree.
"Have they (the JCP)
started to boycott Iraqi
goods?" asked Hayim
Pinner, secretary-general of
the Board of Deputies of
British Jews. "These people
are virulently anti-Israeli
and would try to do anything
to damage it."

Rare Anne Frank
Autograph Found

Rabbi Irvin Ungar of Holy
Land Treasures in Burl-
ingame, Calif., has obtained
a one-of-a-kind autograph
verse inscription signed by
Anne Frank and found in
the friendship album of a
childhood friend, Henny
Scheerder. The autograph is
dated March 4, 1940, one
month before the Nazis in-
vaded Holland.
Frank, the famous diarist
who died in Bergen-Belsen,
composed the verse when
she was 10. Written beside a
picture of a basket with a
dove, her inscription reads,
"It is little worth, what I

Rabbi Ungar with the Frank
autograph.

offer you. Pluck roses on ear-
th and forget me not. By my-
self written, by myself done,
Anne Frank, so is my
name."

What I Did On My
Summer Vacation

New York (JTA) — Ro-
chester may not have the
tumultuous waterfalls, ever-
ready justices of the peace or
tacky hotels like its

Dan Morgenstern, general
chairman of the festival,
said the purposes of the
event are to de-mystify
Judaism for the non-Jewish
Rochester public and to br-
ing Rochester Jews back to
the community.

HUC-JIR Gives
Mandela Award

New York — The Hebrew
Union College-Jewish In-
stitute of Religion plans to
grant an honorary degree to
South Africa's Nelson
Mandela, it was announced
at a meeting this month of
black and Jewish leaders in
New York.
Mandela has received
criticism in the Jewish
community after he embrac-
ed Palestine Liberation
Organization leader Yassir
Arafat.

Compiled by
Elizabeth Applebaum

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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