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race Twelve
THE SOUTHERN ISRAELITE
Friday, September 23, 1955
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★ |:
Best Wishes
FROM |
| Season’s
Binder
j Greetings 1
Gift & Frame
Shop
★ f
74 Broad St., N. W.
WAInut 1477
i Under Management of J
J. N. ELEY
i JOSEPH and MORRIS '
KRINSKY
PLUMBING
★
Specializing In
Restaurants and Soda Fountains
E. H. HOUSWORTH PLUMBING
& HEATING CO.
342 Ivy Street, N. E. MU. 8-1497
*
*
Holiday Greetings
• *
Biltmore Exterminating Co. f
PEST AND TERMITE CONTROL *
1045 Spring Street, N. W. ELgin 8806
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• GOOD
• SERVICE
• ALWAYS dZ-Zti*
SHEARER MACHINE CO.
219 Whitehall St. S. W. WAInut 6533
. . . Man Can Weep
By HERMAN POTOK
It is rare for a man to weep.
To weep is to lay bare one’s
soul, and there is shame in that
for a man. And when it happens
that a man does weep, it is for
a blinding tragedy that has crush
ed him, a time when shame is
gone and the only sensation is
a numbing ache, and overwhelm
ing emptiness. Rarely does a man
weep over the past.
Yet there is a point in the Yom
Kippur service when the devout
Jew wraps himself in his prayer
shawl and weeps like a child. It
is for the past that he weeps,
for a time two thousand years
old, when the Jew practiced his
faith at the risk of his life, when
to ordain a rabbi meant death
and when ten of our greatest
leaders died horribly at the hands
of the Romans because they would
not abandon the teachings of
their faith. “These things do I
remember,” the devout Jew
chants, feeling his heart constrict
and his eyes fill with tears, “and
my heart is grieved.”
It is only the Jew to whom
the Jewish past is a vivid reality
who can weep on Yom Kippur
for the ten martyrs. He knows
these martyrs, he sees them be
fore him as living beings, and he
knows their anguish, senses deep
ly their indescribable pain, their
profound faith aqd joy at dying
for the people and the God they
love. And knowing this, and
knowing ,too, of the many times
similar acts of martyrdom have
occurred in the history of his
people, the Jew weeps. He weeps
for all the suffering of his people
in an angry world, for babies
unborn and children unwed, for
the bewildered ache that is the
knowledge that his people has
wanted to kill or plunder but
because it wanted only to bring
a little more of God into the
world.
And the devout Jew, who is
aware of his past and knows
what has gone into the making of
his people, weeps not only for
the past but for the present as
w r ell.
He remembers what the Sab
bath meant to the Jew in Europe,
and he weeps over what it means
to the Jew today. He remembers
the sanctity of the family, the
holiness of the festivals, the in
describable beauty of addressing
God in prayer. He remembers the
Jew who had no bread to eat
but loved his life, who had no
land to live in but loved his
world, who had no grandiose
synagogue to pray in but loved
his God. He remembers the de
gree to which the awareness of
God filled a Jew’s life, how the
center and hub of every Jewish
act was motivated by the pro
found desire to do the Will of
God. He remembers these things.
And he weeps.
He weeps for the Jew who is
no longer a Jew and for whom
Judaism is a dying faith. He
weeps for the mother who will
never experience the beauty of
a Jewish home, for the father
who will never know the happi
ness of a Jewish life. He weeps
for the Jewdsh child who will
never truly understand his past
and who will always sense with
in himself a vague unrest, a
vast hunger: perhaps I should
have learned more about my
people. He weeps deeply for the
blameless child, for a life he
will never live, a peace he will
never know, a love he will never
sense. He weeps because he can
not articulate his own profound
love of his faith, because the
things he does are of infinite
beauty and somehow he cannot
explain them to the new gener
ation. And directions for differ
ent goals. And the tears he weeps
are bitter tears, for he knows that
it has never been like this with
his people and that should it con
tinue like this much longer there
will soon be no one left to weep
for the past, no one caring e-
nough to pray for the future (
And the devout Jew, in weep
ing, prays, too. He prays that
the Jew of today will achieve
somehow an appreciation of the
vast reservoirs of beauty inher
ent in Jewish life. He prays that
the Jewish mother will make at
least an attempt at building a
Jewish home, that the Jewish
father will try as best he can
to find for himself some mean
ing in Jewish life. He prays that
the Jewish child will be sent to
a Jewish school where he can
learn to articulate his Jewish
ness, to understand the teachings,
the values and the practices of
his faith. He prays that the next
generation will not repeat the
errors of the past generation,
that out of the dissent that is
Jewish life today, out of the vast
give and take of conflicting ideo—
ogies and divergent observances,
will evolve a faith that will have
as much meaning for the Jew
of todav as the faith of past cen
turies had for the Jew of Europe.
It is for us, each and every
one of us, to determine the degree
to which his prayers will ulti
mately be answered. And it is
the extent to w r hich we involve
ourselves in the creation of a
meaningful faith for the Jew of
today that our own prayers may
very well be answered during
this High Holiday period.
It Is Always a Happy Occasion to Join
in Wishing Our Jewish Friends a
HAPPY HOLIDAY SEASON
Universal Motors
3118 Stewart Ave.
PO. 1-0671 Hapeville, Ga.
AUTHORIZED FORD DEALER
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Holiday Greetings
Newsome’s Shoes
The Rand Shoe For Young Men
117 Clairmont Avenue Decatur, Georgia
EV. 1411
I
< Very Cordial
g Greetings
Planters Edible Oil Co.
PRODUCERS OF HIGHLY REFINED
Kosher Peanut Oil
382 Piedmont Ave., N. E. ATwood 4403
Bus. Phone
AL. 0663
Res. Phone
AT. 2055
Rosh Hashonah Greetings
FROM
MORRIS H. MAN HEIM, JR.
Special Representative
FOR
Roberts Marble Company
477 Marietta SU N. W.
Atlanta, Ga.
Monuments Coping Grave Slabs