EDITOR'S NOTEBOOK
LETTERS
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The Circle Of Life
Do not seek greatness for yourself; and do not crave honor; let your performance
exceed your learning.
— Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi, Pirkei Avot/Chapter 6
T
he ideal of tikkun olam — of repairing the world — is pursued daily
in the Detroit Jewish community.
People of all ages get involved in this pursuit through volunteer
support of Jewish communal agencies and synagogue-based social
-44. action projects. These causes draw their vigor from the heartfelt
need to give of oneself to help the less fortunate.
Every once in a while, I hear an especially moving story of an
unpretentious mitzvah that gives texture to the ideal of tikkun
olam. Such was the case when I heard about a group of Congre-
gation Shaarey Zedek teachers who have rallied around one of
their own, West Bloomfield's Denise Goodman, 50, who, in
December, learned she had breast cancer. Her first husband,
ROBERT A. Alan Cohen, died of Hodgkin's lymphoma at age 37 in 1986.
"The kindness of this group shall always become one of my
SKLAR
life lessons to my students," Goodman says.
Editor
In a note to me about her life experiences since being conse-
crated at Adat Shalom Synagogue in Detroit in 1956, Good-
man expressed heartfelt thanks to "the people whom I teach with, and whom I
am friends and colleagues with." They have done "the one mitzvah that has
touched my heart more than anything," she says.
And they have done it selflessly.
Twenty-six teachers at Shaarey Zedek have signed up to bring a weekly
kosher dinner to her home as she receives chemotherapy and radiation following
a double mastectomy on Feb. 17. She returned to teaching three weeks later;
treatment is expected to continue through December.
Without fanfare, these friends and colleagues, led
by fourth-grade teacher Miry Serlin, have come
together to, "most of all, wrap me and my family in
warmth, love and caring," says Goodman, who will
mark 30 years of Jewish teaching in September.
Family Ties
Hers is a story layered with goodness. It's a story
about a granddaughter who has tried to cherish who
and what she is, "part of a greater, larger family, the
Jewish community." That's what her grandmother,
Ethel Fruman, taught her while fastening a gold
Denise Goodman
mezuzah around her neck 45 years ago at her conse-
cration.
Goodman's family continues to be a pillar of support. Her husband, Dennis;
daughter Arianna, 9; in-laws Helen and Ralph Goodman of West Bloomfield;
sister Melissa Rubin of Tucson; aunt and recently deceased uncle Dorothy and
Albert Fruman of Bloomfield Hills; sisters and brothers-in-law Shelly and Allan
Kalmus and Harriet and Wally Goodman of Farmington Hills — all have
inspired her to battle the scourge of cancer.
The former Temple Beth El teacher teaches high school students Monday
nights at Adat Shalom. At Shaarey Zedek, she teaches about the Holocaust to
seventh-graders three days a week.
The outreach to her family shown by her colleagues won't cure her, but it is
elixir for the soul. Symbolic of her attitude, she says: "I'm stronger than any-
thing I need to fight.
"My doctors think I have a 99.8 percent chance of a complete cure since the
cancer hasn't gone into the lymph nodes," she says. "Hopefully, I'll teach the
next 20 years — that's my goal."
Meanwhile, she continues to tap her family tree for spiritual guidance.
"When people care enough to put their personal time aside and help another
teacher," she says, it shows they "are living with their hearts the way my grand-
mother taught me to."
Sustaining such a circle of life — passing Jewish values through the genera-
tions of a family — is the essence of living Jewishly. D
AN AMAZING
EVENT TO HELP
CHILDREN WITH
SPECIAL NEEDS!
To What Length Is
Depth Of Hatred?
The thought that "We Jews should
hate the German, Austrian and Polish
people for their World War II and
past actions for the indeterminate
future," which was expressed in the
letter from Michael Drissman ("We
Must Not Let Memories Fade," April
27, page 5), is a serious cause for con-
cern. The logical extension of that
thought is even more troubling.
If we Jews are to hate the German,
Austrian and Polish people thusly,
should we not also hate the Romanian
people, the Ukrainian people, the Vichy
French, etc., for their indifference to the
plight of the Jews who were purged
from their midst and slaughtered?
Should we Jews also not hate gov-
ernmental authorities throughout the
Western world, including the U.S.
State Department, which callously
impeded the flight of Jews from the
Nazi juggernaut? Should we Jews also
not hate other peoples throughout the
world from whom perpetrators of
other crimes against humanity arose?
Bearing enough hatred to recipro-
cate in kind the enormity of these evil
acts may be beyond the capacity of
the living population of all the Jews in
the world; and, to paraphrase Portia's
speech, the quality of hatred is
strained. It burdens both the character
of the one who bears it and the one to
whom it is directed. Its effects are per-
nicious to both.
The Jewish people must maintain
long memories of the persecutions to
which fellow Jews fell victim. Those
who forget their history may be
damned to repeat it. Nonetheless, an
encompassing hatred of the people of
the nations that caused or counte-
nanced those monstrous persecutions,
would be a sad legacy to leave to our
descendants.
Fred Mann
M1JK and Honey
(Dietary 1.42uis observed)
Huntington Woods
Living In Peace
A Critical Issue
Jonathan Tobin's column ("Biting The
Hand That Feeds Them," March 16,
page 34) includes a number of basic
misperceptions regarding Jewish-Arab
coexistence in Israel.
Our perception is that most of the
money from the American-Jewish
LETTERS on page 6
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