LETTERS

Change Formula
Or Use Reserves

At a time of economic reces-
sion, it would seem that the
Jewish Federation should
give its highest priority to the
needs of members of the local
Jewish community who are in
financial need. Yet The
Jewish News, in its edition of
Jan. 17, quotes Robert Aron-
son, executive vice president
of the Federation, as suppor-
ting a formula that sends 60
percent of Campaign funds to
Israel and allocates 40 per-
cent for domestic use.
Mr. Aronson defends this
view by stating that the for-
mula is "a matter of historic
precedence in this communi-
ty." If this becomes the policy
of the Federation, it is unlike-
ly that the local agencies can
be truly responsive to the in-
creasing demand for their ser-
vices caused by the current
recession, unless _there is an
outstanding Campaign
result.
The current formula was
developed many years ago at
a time when Israel was a
fledgling country with few
resources and the Detroit
Jewish community thought
that it was affluent with few
local Jews in need. These
assumptions are no longer
true.
It is not unreasonable to ex-
pect a country nearing the
half-century mark, with ex-
cellent resources, to manage
its affairs in a way that
makes it more independent of
outside aid. Tbday, anyone
who has read The Jewish
News during the past several
months must be aware that
there are large numbers of
Jewish people in Detroit who
need the services of the
Hebrew Free Loan, the
Jewish Family Service and
the Jewish Vocational Ser-
vice, if they are to survive the
current recession with digni-
ty. Yet the leadership of these
agencies have been reported
to fear that they may not have
the resources to adequately
meet this demand.
A relatively small increase
in the allocation of funds for
domestic use would
strengthen the ability of the
community to meet the
human service needs of the
local Jewish community
without sacrificing, for the se-
cond year in a row, the needs
of Jewish organizations serv-
ing our educational and
cultural needs.
However, if it is still felt
that the formula can not be
changed, another alternative
exists. We are fortunate that
past leadership had the
wisdom to accumulate
substantial reserves in the

United Jewish Charities.
These leaders knew that the
prosperity that our communi-
ty was then enjoying could be
interrupted at times. That
prosperity has been destroyed
for many. Therefore, it would
not be unreasonable to use a
small portion of these
reserves, this year, to meet
the needs of those who are
facing adversity because of an
extended period of economic
cutbacks.
Either solution that I have
proposed would enable our
community to act in its
highest tradition. However I
fear that the status quo may
cause us to fail to serve many
of the truly needy.

Albert I. Ascher
Lathrup Village

Editor's note: Mr. Ascher
retired last month after 20
years as executive director of
Jewish Vocational Service.

Hillel Cutbacks
Will Be Devastating

While I was pleased to see
your (Dec. 20) coverage of the
recent funding cuts to Hillel,
I fear that some might mis-
understand my comments.
I have the greatest ap-
preciation and admiration for
my colleagues who are work-
ing in Hillel. They are truly
a committed group of profes-
sionals, doing the best they
can, and, on the whole, work-
ing much too hard.
But as long as we think
along the lines of one profes-
sional staff person for each
1,000 Jewish students, we
will get only what we pay for.
One staff person cannot be ex-
pected to reach out to 1,000
students or even 500,
especially considering the
level of most of those
students' Jewish knowledge
and commitment, and their
sense of alienation from the
organized Jewish community.
With the most recent
budget cuts, even that ratio of
1:1,000 is endangered.

Rabbi Alan B. Lettofsky
Executive Director,
Hillel of Northeastern Ohio,
Cleveland

Should We Ban
Beethoven, Too?

I have always agreed with
the remark attributed to
Mark Twain that Richard
Wagner's music "isn't as bad
as it sounds." Not the least of
my objections to Alan Hit-
sky's column (Jan. 17) suppor-
ting an Israel Philharmonic
ban on Wagner is that I must
defend Wagner, however
reluctantly, and with great
unwillingness and ill-humor.
While Wagner easily

qualified as an anti-Semite,
there is no particular reason
to believe that his paganism
would have led him to favor
concentration camps and the
other trappings of Nazism. In-
deed, toward the end of his
life his viewpoint on Jews
mellowed slightly, although
he remained rather nasty on
this topic. His distressing
anti-Semitism was sparked as
much by his virulently anti-
Christian attitude as his
dislike for Jews.
Nor is Wagner, alas, alone
among major cultural figures
in exhibiting an unfriendly
attitude to Jews. Mr. Hitsky
candidly bases his objection to
Wagner less on Wagner him-
self and more on posthumous
uses of his work.
But this is quite inconsis-
tent. I lived in Israel for a cou-
ple of years in the mid-1970s
and although I have no direct
recollection of hearing
Richard Strauss or Carl Orff
in concert, I distinctly, even
painfully, remember that
"Reshet Aleph," a television
program, frequently (it only
seemed constantly) played
their works. Both Strauss and
Orff happily accepted corn-
missions from the Nazis; Orff,
for example, composed in-
cidental music to A Midsum-
mer Night's Dream to replace
that by Mendelssohn, who
was proscribed by his Jewish
background.
Hit is "intellectually abhor-
rent" to play the music of a
composer who died a half-
century before Hitler ascend-
ed to power, why is it not so
with respect to composers
who actively cooperated with
the Nazis?
Second only to Wagner
among composers whom the
Nazis embraced was Beetho-
ven. We can easily imagine
Beethoven's thunderous dis-
dain for the Nazis; never-
theless they promoted him
and his music as an emblem
of the Third Reich. Since the
Nazis made a symbol of
Beethoven, should we decline
to play his music, too? As
Noam Neusner suggests,
there is very little intellectual
distance between embracing
or rejecting Wagner's music
because of his politics.
The cultural objections to
Mr. Hitsky's position are
many; the political objections
strike me as not only equally
forceful but also much more
serious.
Remember that the propos-
ed concerts including Wagner
are not on the subscription.
Anyone who wishes to refrain
from hearing the music loses
nothing material, not even
the price of a forgone ticket.
Philharmonic members who
wish are excused from par-

ticipation. No one is compell-
ed to hear or play it.
Mr. Hitsky remarks that
there are hundreds of other
German composers. This is
true as far as it goes, but it
does not go very far, since we
surely agree that in its impor-
tance for Western musical
history, Richard Wagner's
music is more important than
that of, say, Max Reger.
The essence of Mr. Hitsky's
argument is that some people
detest Richard Wagner as a
human being (a sentiment in
which I join) and are offend-
ed by a public performance of
his music. Therefore it is pro-
per to ban his music.
The consequences of such a
position — that offensiveness
to some people means that
something should not be done
— exist around us, most
notably on university cam-
puses, with evident and dis-
quieting results. What's next
— banning the works of
Johann Sebastian Bach
because his personal life of-
fends Planned Parenthood?
In an open society we
should regard such an at-

subject, but I have yet to see
any such things promulgated
to the general public but
especially our Israeli co-
religionists, who ignorantly
condemn German composer-
dramatist Richard Wagner for
his publically professed anti-
Semitic mouthings, while
failing to answer truthful
questions:

1. If Wagner was anti-
Semitic, why did he fawn over
Giacomo Meyerbeer (Jacob
Lieberman Beer)?
2. How come Wagner is
listed as an anti-Semite
despite the fact that he knew
that his amour, Cosima Liszt,
was the granddaughter of
Johann Philip Bethmann, a
Frankfurt banking associate
of Mayer Amschel Roths-
child?
3. If Wagner was so rabidly
anti-Semitic per truth-
ignorant Jewish sources, why
did he permit the first perfor-
mance of his last work "Par-
sifal" to be conducted by Her-
mann Levi, the son of a Ger-
man rabbi?
Among the conveniently ig-
nored, simple answers by

C. 11%

titude with suspicion and
dismay. Israel should struggle
to maintain its open and
democratic culture — not all
Israelis, or Zionists here,
necessarily agree with that
idea, and among its other ill
effects, the ban on Wagner
renders it more difficult to
respond to these absolutists.
If we chiefly seek in music
not its pleasure, its intricacy,
its challenge, and its occa-
sional transcendence, but
rather inoffensiveness, what
is left? Perhaps we should
limit our concert programs to
the likes of Varese and Cage.
I assume these composers are
inoffensive, because they are
certainly incomprehensible.
Almost everyone else would
be found wanting.

Alexander R. Bensky
Detroit

Anti-Wagnerians
Ignore History

The Jan. 17 articles on
Richard Wagner should most
correctly be titled "How to
Continue Beating A Dead
Horse" or "The Most Suc-
cessful Example of Goebbel's
Nazi Propaganda."
I have spent 51/2 decades
studying the truths of the

Israelis seeking a scapegoat
for the Holocaust vendetta,
and by ignorant Jews are:
Wagner was for Jew and
non-Jew alike only as long as
they were unabashedly for
him. He turned against
Meyerbeer, who had sup-
ported him economically and
artistically, when Wagner
was a struggling indigent,
but later constructively
criticized the German's work.
Since Cosima and Her-
mann Levi were totally en-
thusaistic followers, the com-
poser was totally for them,
only against Mendelssohn, as
well as Meyerbeer, who failed
to embrace "Wagnerism"
wholeheartedly!

The Israeli antipathy is bas-
ed on the greatest success
that the Nazis had in pro-
moting that Hitler adored
Wagner's music, when in fact,
he disliked it, using it for
politics only, much preferring
Johann Strauss, Von Suppe,
Millocker, etc.
There were many others of
fame who espoused the
political benefits of
hypocritical anti-Semitism
publicly, but whose private
behavior was opposite. The

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THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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