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Is There a Solution? Jh.e Jewish. Problem Seen Jkrough. Non-Qewish. Cyes Can anti-Semitism be outlawed/ The question is being seriously considered by Jewish and non-Jewish leaders who are con templating the calling of an international con ference to combat anti-Semitism. The author of this article is the secretary of the Interna tional Student Fellowship, which has done much to counteract anti-Jewish prejudice in the F.uro- pean Universities . . . The Editor. “T DON’T like Jews, hut I don’t know why.” I Mention the Jewish problem to most people and that will he their answer. Added to the “instinctive” anti-Semitism which has come down from the mediaeval Church, and is perpetuated by the Sunday School, there is a whole complex of feelings about Jews personally. There is a com plete set of anecdotes about them, some simply humorous and which are told of Scotsmen or of Jews impartially, depending on whether at that particular moment it is Scotsmen or Jews who are being pilloried, hut others which are told ex clusively about the Jews, and which are said to he based upon “specifically Jewish” characteristics. It is this, and the exactness of these stories, which distinguishes anti-Semitism from other racial hatred, such as the hatred of colored races by the whites. There not only are the accusations more vague and general, hut they are mixed up with the general sense of the inferiority of the colored race, which is supposed to exonerate them from excessive blame. These things are “what you ex pect” with a “nigger”—almost it is not his fault. This element of recognition of extenuating cir cumstances is almost completely absent in similar accusations against the Jew. Yet there are more extenuating circumstances in his case than in any other. The memory of man is short; but the mem ory of the subconscious is very, very long. No ordinary man knows much about the his tory of the Jews in Europe, and since they are all about us, mixed in with European so ciety, met with on every step of the social scale, it is the presumption of the ordinary man that the Jew has had approximately the same history as the rest of us since he left Palestine two thousand years ago, and that he is therefore responsible to the same extent as the rest of us, for his attitude to and his place in the society in which we both find our selves. Tin’s is far from true. Jewish tradi tions have been narrowed by being drawn from only a few classes and its characteristics have been formed and deformed by oppres sion and by self-defense. Needless to say, we are not considering the exceptional cases, either good or bad. Every body knows Jew's who are conspicuous for their learning or for their generosity, and Jew's who have made themselves notorious at the other end of the moral scale. But stories about individuals, though useful as illustra tions, cannot take the place of argument, though it is a common human failure to use them as such. General arguments cannot he contradicted by stories about individuals. It is not the man who moulds his own fate, whether good or bad, but the man whose fate is moulded by his setting, that is, the average man, who must be the subject of such a study. The Jewish Law' is largely of the static va riety, but if we ask what arc the factors which have created the European society of today w r e are confronted with a dynamic norm, the force By Dr. James Parkes DR. JAMES PARKES . . . “No ordinary man knows much about the history of Jews." . . . of public responsibility. The greatest humanizing and civilizing agency of modern times has un doubtedly been the evolution of democracy. Hu manity rises from childhood to manhood in its adoption of the ideal of the citizens in place of the subject, whether in State or Church, or so cial relationship. Ideally, democracy is the great est discipline which man has yet invented, and responsibility and tradition are together its strong est supports. There is no community on record possessing a morally healthy life which was de prived of the exercise of that degree of responsi bility of which it was capable. Neither good gov ernment nor prosperity are substitutes. There » an old saying that man does not live by bread alone, and a newer one, equally true, that good government is no substitute for self-government. Tradition and responsibility expressed in discipline of one sort or another. Dictatorships and autot ra cies on the one hand, and colonial exploitation on the other, provide the most glaring examples of the truth of this. For the inner discipline is sub stituted the single law: “'Fhou shalt not be found out.” Autocracy produces moral rottenness in rhe governing class holding their positions by the whins of a ruler or by subservience to a slogan. Around them gather a class of sycophants whose only creed is to obey the behests of their rulers, and the rev of the people are either servile or secretelv rebel lious. In business autocracy there is the same rot tenness, w hether it be “Graft” or the pitiless ex ploitation of the feeble. In either case humanity exercising or submitting to irresponsible control shows its w’orst sides. We know' how Jewish traditions have been nar rowed down both by external causes and by in ternal reactions. Turning from the past to the Present, w'hat does this mean in terms of responsi bilities and opportunities? What has conditioned Jewish development in modern society? In the answer is revealed the tragedy of their situation. Circumstances have been such that the Jew has developed under precisely those condition* which are likely to bring out the worst in human nature. Every government has been for him a dic tatorship, for he has lived under conditions in the making of which he has had no share, politically, socially, or commercially. The mediaeval guilds excluded him from their membership, but at tempted to compel him to observe the rules. So ciety may accept him, but expects him to observe its own code. Countries may give him hospi tality, but on condition of his observing their manners and customs. He must either accept what is offered him without criticism, or hi* opposition must be underground. Law's are made which affect him, but he has no open and straightforward w-ay of opposing, or even influencing them. It is only in quite recent times, and in a restricted way, that there have been openly Jewish political parties. Usually he has had either to accept them, or to u« such secret influences as financial pressure, and the press, to alter them. He has been a subject and not a citizen, and as such he ha* had no ground for that instinctive loyalty to society w-hich is expected from a free and responsible member of it. It is in the light of this that w-e ought to consider the many accusations of disloyalty w'hich are made against him. The individualism of w hich the Jew is often accused is but another form of social disloyalty He is said to be self-centered and to seek only his own advantage and to remain completely indifferent to the public good. Here, also! it is noticeable that when this accusation » made in France or Germany, it is usually! made against the recent emigrants from the 1 east who have made a rapid fortune in the countries of their adoption. Jew'ish w r ar prof iteers, and the Jew's who made fortunes out of speculation in the post-w'ar currencies, and who flaunted their wealth amid the general! distress and poverty, are particularly often quoted. Let it be said at once that such peo-l pie, whether Jew (Please turn to page 12 . . . the late Boris Shaft interprets here a Jerusalem type . . . [6] * THE SOUTHERN ISRAELI!?