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The Southern Israelite
3lanker£
Aeu> iVor/r^floc/t &ccAanpe
^jJociale^6em6e/tJ Aeu VcrA (Ytir6Jxc/ianye
Government, Municipal and
Corporation Bonds
Listed and Local Stocks
Underwriters of Southern Securities
Private Wires to
Otis ft Co., N. Y.—Post & Flagg, N. Y.
HURT BUILDING, ATLANTA TEL. WAlnut 9110
LEE, HIGGINSON & CO.
Established 1848
Investment Securities
BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO
EDWIN F. McCARTY, Representative
ATLANTA
814 First National Bank Building Walnut 9232
SOUTHERN DEPARTMENT
o
Insurance Company of North America.
Philadelphia Fire and Marine Insurance Co.
The Alliance Insurance Company.
The National Security Fire Insurance Co.
The Central Fire Insurance Co.
BEN. I. SIMPSON, Manager
Eighth Floor Hurt Building
ATLANTA, GEORGIA
May We Make You A Present
of the equity in one of the several nice homes which we
have recently acquired by foreclosure? Attractive frames
and bricks, five to ten rooms, best sections of Atlanta,
offered at less than we actually loaned on them, as low
as $2,000 with first payment as little as $100 and
monthly payments less than rent. Let us prove it to you.
MORTGAGE GUARANTEE CO. of AMERICA
MORTGAGE GUARANTEE BUILDING
Carnegie Way and Ellis Street Walnut 2226
M. CL Kiser Company
“Shield Brand Shoes”
Extends Compliments of the Season
If I IVere a Jew
(Continued from page 8)
Ship Via
SOUTHEASTERN EXPRESS
“The South’s Own Express Company”
AND RECEIVE SUPERIOR EXPRESS SERVICE
mean much in this age, when hunmanity
seems to be so definitely in revolt against
all things ethical and spiritual. But it is
my conviction that it is righteousness that
holds the world together. And it is my
memory that it was the Jews who first
proclaimed that “justice shall dwell in
the wilderness, and righteousness shall
abide in the fruitful field. And the work
of righteousness shall be peace; and the
effect of righteousness, quietness and con
fidence forever.”
The second thing that is distinctive of
the Jew is his survival. At bottom, of
course, there is nothing wonderful about
survival. The giant tortoise in the zoo
manages to survive one knows not exactly
how many centuries. But the Jew has
survived under conditions which mark his
achievement as in many ways the supreme
miracle of history. Where is there any
thing to compare with the story of the
Jew during the last two thousand years?
His pitiful subjection to the brutal
tyranny of Rome, the destruction of his
country and of his holy city, Jerusalem,
amid conditions of horror unparalleled in
ancient times—his scattering through the
western world like seeds flung before the
wind. Why did he not disappear, as the
ten tribes of Israel had disappeared be
fore him? There are various answers.
His fidelity to the law of his people is
one; his dream of the Messiah and of the
return to Zion is another. But in essence
the explanation is a sheer triumph of the
spirit over all that the ingenious cruelty
and armed violence of the world could
bring against it. The Jew is the most
tragic of men, since he has always been
defeated. But the Jew is also the most
triumphant of men, since he has never
been defeated. Despised, spat upon, mal
treated, persecuted, outlawed, tortured,
murdered, he lias still somehow managed
to live on. The yoke of incredible op
pression has never bent him to the ground.
The darkness of indescribable woe has
failed to quench the flame of his inner
life. His body—bruised, maimed, broken
—has still served as the impregnable fort
ress of his spirit. What can compare
with this achievement? Where elsewhere
can he found such evidence of that pro-
foundest of all truths—that “the things
which arc seen are temporal, but the
things which are not seen are eternal” ?
When I see the Jew two thousand years
ago driven like a hunted animal from
the hearthfires of his home and the altars
of his temple—when I see him, centuries
ago, plunged into the ghetto as into a
dark, impenetrable sea in which he must
be lost forever—and then when I see
him, in my own time, emerging from this
ghetto and taking his place among the
greatest of mankind—I say again that
here is the supreme miracle of that inner
soul of man which is the reflection of
that spirit of reality which is God. Who
would not be proud to be born of such
a race, and carry in one’s blood the living
tradition of such a people!
So I say that, if I were a Jew, I would
be proud of it. But not too proud!
Pride is a good thing in its place as the
basis of dignity and self-respect, but it is
"tisni.
>e Jew
iy be
wails
The
nferi-
:cnces
ution.
' how,
’ nRcn-
’■ mis-
> com-
>rn the
• is an
sc two
n peo-
within
easily corrupted by excess ii
selfishness and arrogance. H
is under a sore temptation, n
cause of the greatness, hut m
of the nature of his achievem
psychologist has told us how
ority complex develops out of ,
of prejudice, disability and •
This psychologist has also told
out of this inferiority compU
dered by unusual circumstano
fortune, there develops a superi
plex as a compensation to hob!
balances of self-esteem. The I ; ■
impressive example of both m
extremes. The idea of “the cl
pie” was an inevitable reacti
the soul of a race who were
such disasters and injustices as have never
been visited so uninterruptedly, tl
sd long a period of time, upon any other
nation. It was this psychologi
spiritual compensation for their woes
which helped to keep them alive i
the darkest periods of their distress. It
remains a comfort today amid the dis
abilities that still are forced up»m the
tribe of Israel. But to the enlightened
and emancipated Jew this idea of “the
chosen people” is, of course, a supersti
tion which can have no part in the pride
which he justly feels in the tradition oi
his fathers. There are no superior nor
inferior peoples. None of us can fall
so low that we are unworthy—none of us
can climb so high that we are “chosen."
“Children of destiny” do not exist. We
are all simply humans, members together
of the one universal family of earth
For what we are, we may be proud;
for what we are not, we should be
humble. So, if I were a Jew I would be
proud—but not too proud! Always
would I remember the proverb, of whicl
the history of my race has been one long,
agonizing, yet glorious parable—
“Better is it to be humble with the poor
than to divide the spoil with the proud.
II
If I were a Jew, I would let people
know that I was a Jew. I would not
deny my racial identity and character
I realize that this is easily said b> on
who has never known what it is to
member of an outlawed class of the com
munity. I feel this so intensely that 1
would not pass judgment upon am man
who seeks to escape disabilities which
have never been called upon to
But I must in honesty confess to you
fact that when I sec a Jew, favored b.
some accident of personal appearance,
running away from association with the
blood members of his tribe I feed the
same sense of shame that sweeps over m>
heart when I discover a light-complex-
ioned Negro living apart from his fUDw#
as a member of the Caucasian raci.
How many Jews there are who diu#
deny their lineage I doubt if aI1 >
knows. It is estimated that there
between two and three millions oi
groes in this country who have
white,” and thus have deserted
brethren. There cannot be, either
lutely or relatively, any such nun
suiter.
the
Jews who have changed their nam
- and