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TBI SOUTH KEN ISRAELITE
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Friday, la—ary U, IMS
PLAIN TALK — by Alfred Segal
All About a Hanging
Off The Record
By Nathan Ziprin
I go along with wise rabbis
who're against Eichmann being
hanged (Eichmann has been
condemned to hanging by the
judges in Israel for all the mur
ders perpetrated by the Germans
in the Hitler time. Among the
dead were 6,000,000 Jews.)
Two rabbis of our town have
spoken up against this hanging
. Dr Nelson Glueck who’s
president of the Hebrew Union
College and Dr Victor Reichert
of B’nai Israel Temple. They
were quoted in the daily press
and on TV, and some Christians
who are my friends called me up
to protest; they said a murderer
as awful as Eichmann should be
hanged.
Well, I reply to these demands
for Eichmann to die by telling
about my own experience of cap
ital punishment. That is to say,
as daily newspaper reporter I’ve
seen four killers die in the elec
tric chair and one hanged on a
scaffold . . . five such deaths in
all, and I came away from all of
them quite unshocked. Yes, I had
learned it was easy punishment
. . so simple for murderers to
die that way!
There was that first time when
I was assigned to the peniten
tiary to report on a couple of
murderers being put to death in
the electric chair I remember
trembling fearfully as I ap
proached the death chamber. I
came to a determination: As re
porter I would stay in the death
house just long enough to see one
of these two murderers knocked
off; then I would run out of
there in order not to have to
look at the other one perishing
also.
Well, the first of them was
seated in the electric chair; I
turned away my frightened eyes
to the man in the chair; I had
to watch him die. Oh, to have
to look at a guy dying I re
proached myself! Why did I ever
become a reporter. It would have
been easier for me to have be
come a salesman or a lawyer or
a ditchdigger
Then the one in charge of the
official killings that night pulled
an electric switch close by the
chair. In that instant the head
of the man in the chair seemed
to rise up, but in an instant he
was calm; he sat there serenely,
he was dead. Death in the chair
was so easy. The man was lifted
out of the chair and his associate
in crime then was brought in to
take his place there.
But I didn’t walk out of the
place, as I had promised myself
I would do, rather than to wit
ness two executions. Oh, dying
that way was so easy, and I
wasn’t afraid of it any longer. I
kept sitting there and in a few
seconds more the other man was
dead.
I walked away in deep medi
tation: How easy it was to die
that way! Was it really punish
ment? I knew of good people
who had died in deep pain after
months of suffering! Was capital
punishment really the worst?
After that, during my years as
reporter, I witnessed a couple of
other electrocutions, and felt lit
tle or no spiritual pain, because
those murderers didn’t suffer
either. Then, down in Kentucky
I witnessed a hanging on a gal
lows; the victim was a boy of 18
who would now be about 68. On
that occasion 1 felt a bit of pain
. on account of that kid dying
so early.
The reason I've been reporting
all this Is to suggest that, in my
opinion, the hanging of F.icta-
mann may be a bit too easy after
all the killings he has been found
TABLE TALK
by SAMUEL H. ROSENBERG
Executive Director, Atlanta Bureau of Jewish Education
Regardless of how successful
the Jewish schools are numeri
cally, it is imperative that a con
tinuous effort be made to iden
tify and solve those problems
which will make for greater
quality. This is not alone the re
sponsibility of professional staffs
and school committees, it is the
vital concern of all the people
in the Jewish community.
One of the problems that re
quires more study and discussion
is the recognized need for ever
more competent classroom teach
ers. The quality of the classroom
teacher is the most important
single factor in the educative
process. It is the classroom teach
er who works with his group of
children throughout the week; it
is he who is cast in the strategic
role of having the greatest oppor
tunity of influencing the individ
ual child. Any school is primarily
a reflection of the composite
quality of all of its classroom
teachers. The classroom teacher
is a scholar who never ceases to
learn, who always teaches as
well as he knows how, who
makes a real and positive dif
ference in the lives of children,
and who sees, hears and feels for
every child. Every classroom
should be staffed with a quality
person who can be the favorite
teacher years after his pupils
have attended the school.
When teacher compensation,
welfare and security are com
mensurate with professional
training, experience and teacher
growth, there will be greater in
ducement for additional superior
persons to enter the Jewish
teacher profession. When the
schools, the teachers and the
community will give their full
support to the development of a
core of truly competent teachers,
then will the Jewish schools take
the most important step in the
continued growth of school qual
ity.
Alongside of the need for more
competent classroom teachers is
the whole area of what one
teaches in the elementary Jew
ish schools. Three basic concepts
need fuller study and discussion:
One, the nature of the learner.
"Children never come to school
alone. They bring with them
their fathers and mothers, all
their relatives, their home, their
culture, their religious beliefs
and practices, and all the atti
tudes and behavior they have
learned from birth to the pres
ent ” The good classroom teacher
must recognize all of these fac
tors and understand how to teach
and guide the whole child — and
at the same time recognize the
differences between one child
and another.
Two, the most effective ways
that each child learns. The class
room teacher must have an un
derstanding of . how children
grow and develop at different
ages. Mental hygiene, or the
study of how children feel, act
and think, has been making rap
id gains. The good school no
longer limits its program just to
the mechanics of teaching; the
learning by children is stressed
and the teaching process is di
rected toward that go^l
Three, the environmental fac
tors are real life experiences of
children. Children learn more
rapidly from what they actually
live and experience — in the
home, synagogue, community and
school — and they take on a
very important role in the prac
tice of Jewish ideas and ideals.
(The above notes are baaed
upon ADMINISTRATION AND
SUPERVISION IN THE ELE
MENTARY SCHOOL, by E. V.
Kramer and O. E. Domian.)
guilty of. Wouldn’t a lifetime in
jail be much harder for him to
have to take ... to endure years
of regret for his having been
the hired killed for Hitler. Oh.
Ililler himself had a much easier
ending than he would have suf
fered had he been put in a prison
to live out his years.
But, while I’ve been speaking
of the easy way of dying by exe
cution, much easier than being
in prison a life-time . there’s
really more to it all if our ethical
and spiritual idealism has mean
ing to us all who are Jews. As
one who was Jewishly brought
up, I can’t bring myself to join
in killing even a sinner for ven
geance’s sake. I’d rather leave it
all to God as David does in
Psalms: ‘‘O Lord, Thou God to
whom vengeance belongeth
shine forth Lift up Thy self,
Thou Judge of the earth; render
to the proud their recompense".
And the Lord Himself is
quoted as saying, in Deutero
nomy: "Vengeance is mine and
recompense.”
And the prophet Nehemiah
spoke about Babylon: “For it is
the time of the Lord’s vengeance
He will render unto her a
recompense.”
Will let Eichmann keep on
staying in prison as example of
the higher morality of Jews who
abhor killings, even legal ones.
Let him, through the remainder
of his days, meditate upon him
self in a prison cell. As I’ve al
ready suggested to take a life
time in prison hurts a lot more
than the hangman's noose, the
pain of which Ls of no more than
an instant.
I hand all this on to the dedi
cation of our rabbis.
French Diggers Find
2 J00- Y ear-Old
Settlements in Israel
JERUSALEM, (JTA) — Re
mains of a "Beersheba culture"
group of settlements dating back
to the second half of the fourth
century BCE are now being ex
cavated by Jean Perrot, head of
the French archeological mission
in Israel.
The settlements are above
ground and reinforced by stone
walls. They were found in an
area ranging from the Negev
through the coast to Mount Car
mel The excavations were start
ed two weeks ago and will be
continued until mid-January.
Finds include a group of three
skeletons—a woman, child and
dog-flint tools of excellent work
manship and bone implements
Volunteers on the digging include
members of kibbutz Urim, stu
dents of the Hebrew University,
a visitor from Chicago and a girl
from Arlington, Va.
Another Year . . .
Time in our space age moves
rapidly but not mercifully
Year after year in recent
decades the world has been
grappling with crisis after crisis
and still there is no sign of a
receding of the madness.
Each year we hoped the en
suing one would bring the world
back to clarity, to vision for sur
vival, but always the script was
unchanged as if the hand of the
scribe were steeped in doom, de
termined to crush our hopes and
our covenant with ourselves.
The last pa*>e is now closed on
1961, and there is no urge to turn
its pages back, for they were in
variably blurred. There was no
radiance on the horizon last year.
If there was any balm at all it
rested merely in respite from ex
plosion
We like to think of a new year
as the opening key to a new and
better tale. However, as the
world savors of the new year it
is too sick for recounting an ex
hilarating tale within foresee
able time.
Yet there will be new hum-
mings and surfacing of hope and
faith as we tutn the pages of the
new year—unless of course we
are engulfed by the angry wave
that is about us.
The gravity of our crisis is
such that we must choose be
tween survival or the undoing of
creation. Therefore we must
abide by the faith that man will
not undo what God had wrought,
that tranquility will return when
the current madness has passed
its crescendo, that radiance will
come when the flood has abated
Signs of the Times
On December 3, 1928, the
American Jewish Committee
leader Louis Marshall wrote of
Yeshiva College: “I have been
absolutely opposed from the very
beginning to the creation of such
a college. It is destined to failure
and is sure to do much harm to
the best interests of Jews in
America.” On November 21, 1961,
another American Jewish Com
mittee president, Louis Caplan,
wrote: "The work of Yeshiva
University in its 75-year history
has greatly enriched the Ameri
can Jewish religious and cultural
scene. It has played a significant
role in achieving the respect in
which Judaism is held in thfe
United States.”
Mr Caplan's views truly re
flect the rising tide in public ac
ceptance of yeshivot and their re
lated institutions.
The word “yeshiva" over the
centuries held a powerful grip
on the Jewish imagination. In
ancient days it was yavneh and
Pumpedita that dominated Jew
ish thought. Later our people
“Evwr sine* Hm* worn, W* aI Tv* Iwm doing.**
were molded by yeshivot in all
areas of Jewish concentration m
the world.
In my young days it was Mir-
and Volozhin that conjured up
pictures of scholarship and piety
in the Jewish enclaves of Eastern
Europe. Today, the word yeshiva
conjures up America and Its
Jewish community. Yeshiva has
thus become synonymous with
Jewish living, with the Jewish
future in America.
Some weeks ago I was watch
ing a TV program on which Ben-
net Cerf of Random House was
a panelist. He was to guess the
occupation of a man who identi
fied himself as “Y.” Cerf specu
lated the man’s name and then
came up with an interesting asso
ciation—Y, he said, stood for
yeshiva.
As a former student of the
Yeshiva in the pre-Revel days,
I am privileged to have been
witness and occasional chronicler
of its story and impact.
Bar-llan U. Applies
For Charter From
New •¥ork Regents
NEW YORK, (JTA)—Bar-IIan
University in Israel has applied
for a charter from the New York
Board of Regents which would
make the school officially an
American university in Israel, it
was announced here last week.
Rabbi Joseph H. Lookstein,
president of the Board of Gov
ernors of the university, also an
nounced that Moshe Shapiro,
Israel’s Minister of the Interior,
has been selected to serve -as
head' of the executive Board of
Trustees in Israel. Phillip Stoll-
man of Detroit is chairman of
the Board of the Trustees.
Mr Shapiro, now visiting the
United States, said that there will
be 1,000 students in attendance
at Bar-IIan next year. “Bar-IlAn
is getting students fydtn all over
the world,” he reported. “The son
of the Minister of Commerce of
Ethiopia (a Falashin Jew) has
come to study at Bar-IIan be
cause his father wants him to
get a Jewish traditional back
ground as well as a degree.” ••
Zorin - “Takes
Two to Agree”
UNITED NATIONS, (WUP)—
So long as there is no agree
ment on one side—-the Arab—
there can be no negotiations be
tween Israel and the Arab states
on the Palestine question, Val-
erin Zorin of the USSR declared
at his press conference here fal
lowing the adjournment of the
General Assembly.
Asked why the Soviet Union,
which in the past held to the
view that in any solution of the
Middle Eastern conflict both
sides must get together and ne
gotiate—had rejected the 16-
power resolution in the Special
Political Committee urging the
Arabs and the Israelis to nego
tiate their differences, Mr. Zorin
replied that “there must be a
basis for negotiations, and since
the Arab countries see no accept
able basis so long as Israel does
not implement the UN resolution
on the refugees, it is difficult
that such negotiations can start
There must be agreement by
both parties, and there is no
agreement on the Arab side.’’
Estimate 12.3 Million
Jews As of 1959
JERUSALEM, (JTA)—The
Jewish population in the world
totaled 12,300,000 by the end of
1959, according to estimates in
Israel’s officials Statistical Bulle
tin, published recently. Of the
total, 15.3 percent of the world’s
Jews live in Israel, the figures
show.
Israel’s population in ihe
data shows, was 2,1*0,000- The
population density in this coun
try rose from 41.3 per two
square kilometers in 1948 to
106?. in I960