The Southern Israelite. (Augusta, Ga.) 1925-1986, November 01, 1933, Image 12

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Take advantage today of all comforts available through the use of GAS. DURHAM GAS COMPANY L. T. W. TIMBERLAKE DURHAM, N. C. Quality dairy products made by us in highest degree of sanitation Durham Dairy Products, Inc. Durham, North Carolina J. A. Murdock Company, Inc. Ice, Coal and Fuel Oil Phone J-0341 .Morgan Street DURHAM, N. C. Durham Loan & Trust Co. Capital and Surplus $500,000.00 JOHN BPRUKT III1JL. Chairman of Board GKOHGK WATTH MU.. President W. W. KLK1HJE. Vloa-Proa. and Truat Officer JAM KS B. COLK. A»t. ★ EDWARD Y. ('OX. Asalstant Trust Officer HAL W. BORING, Seoretary and Treasurer BENJAMIN R. ROBERTS. Credit Manager Secretary and Treasurer WHY ARE JEWS PERSE CUTED? (Continued from page H) to the distinctive and emphatic character of the miserable lives which they have been forced to live. If a Jew is dirty it is because he has not yet escaped from the ghetto or the slum in which the world has doomed him to exist. If he is ag gressive it is because he has been forced to develop this quality as a condition of mere survival. If he is financially un scrupulous it is because he is the de scendant of a tribe which for centuries was denied any opportunity to earn an honest living, and was therefore forced to exist by the sheer exercise of its wits. Hut these qualities, and similar quali ties, are not racial in character. They are not characteristic of Jews as such. On the contrary, they are qualities which ap pear in all individuals in all groups which have not yet escaped from the so cial doom of prejudice and outlawry, and especially from the curse of economic servitude. As well point to a man arising from a torture-machine and blame him for his bleeding flesh and broken limbs and shattered nerves, as to point to a Jew and blame him for the attributes of his ghetto existence. If there are Jews to day who are spiritually bruised and battered, demoralized and dehumanized, it is not because they are Jews, but rather because they are men and women who bear the stripes which generations of per secutors have laid upon them. And you and I have the effrontery to condemn them because they carry the scars of wounds we have inflicted! The fact of the matter is that Jews, if given a chance, are quite as other men. The Jews of Germany, for example, who have resided in that country for a thou sand years, represent today the finest blood, ablest brains and noblest culture of the nation. German Jews are the leaders in every walk of German science, art and politics. These German Jews labor today under no more serious dis ability in the Hitler regime than the fact that they are with few exceptions the leaders of German life. I think it pretty late in the day to undertake the defense of our Jewish brethren, but since the question is up, let me say this! There are few Gentiles iri this country, I ven ture to say, who have had a greater op portunity than I have had in recent years to know Jews and to share their life. I have preached in their synagogues, lived in their homes, enjoyed their friendship. I know Jews, cherish them, admire them, love them, and am thus able to testify to their gentleness and refinement, their noble culture and artistic genius, their domestic virtue and business integrity, their utter fidelity to the ethical tradi tions and ideals which are the peculiar heritage of their tribe. The Israelite is a man among men, one of our human family, and if he sometimes shows the worst, he quite as often shows the best that human nature can afford. This is my first answer to this miser able charge, that it is untrue. My second answ’er is that it is beside the point! We canont persecute men because of their moral imperfections. If we started to do so there would be no end of terror, and no group among us all would be safe from outrage. As a matter of fact, we do not persecute men for this alleged reason. The personal qualities of individ uals did not enter into the persecution of the Christian martyrs, nor of the Pro testant heretics, nor of the Armenian vic tims. In the same way they have never really entered into the persecution of the Jews. What has happened is that, as a result of an historical and psychological process which I shall describe in a sub- (Please turn to page 14) DURHAM. NORTH CAROLINA JOHNSON MOTOR CO. Buick and Pontiac Motor Cars DURHAM, N. C. Durham’s Better Realty Values -K Everything in Homes • Homo Locations Apartments • Insurance CALL US FOR INFORMATION Durham Realty & Insurance Co. DURHAM, N. C. Trust Building Phone 115*11 Alexander Motor Co. Cars- Trucks- Tractors^ | 1 l ■ M — 1 1 X" DURHAM, N. C. [12] * THE SOUTHERN ISRAE JT®