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P*|* Pi
the iodtbikn ISRAELITE
Friday, March 4, 1M6
THL SOUTHERN ISRAELITE
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I PM.. FRIDAY, but material received earlier will have a much better
chance at puhtlratloo.
Adolph Rosenberg, Editor and Publisher
Kathleen Nease, Jeanne Loeb, Joseph Redlich
Vida Goldgar, Harry Rose, Betty Meyer, Kathy Wood
Georgia Prea* Aaaoclatlou
NATIONAL EDITORIAL
7 Aria Featurea
Jew tub
Telegraphic
Agency
World Prea*
OFF the RECORD
bv NATHAN ZTPRIN
THE DETROIT TRAGEDY . . .
I was in fhe midst of reading
“The Beginners,” a new novel by
Dan Jacobson, when the radio
blasted the tragic news that a
berserk twenty-three-year-old
Detroit youth who had seemingly
despaired of the only anchor in
his life, religion, had shot and
critically wounded the rabbi of
a synagogue in protest against the
emptiness he 6aid he found in
the very sanctums he hoped to
find fulfillment.
The boy, said the newspapers
the next day, had been a brilliant
but emotionally disturbed stu
dent who seemed to be troubled
by such problems as the meaning
of life, religion, man’s place in the
universe and his ultimate destiny.
At the apex of his mad moment
in the synagogue, he was report
ed to have proclaimed: ‘This con
gregation is a travesty and an
abomination. It has made a
mockery by phoniness and hypo-
cricy of the duty and spirit of
Judaism and is composed of
people who, on the whole, make
me ashamed that I am a Jew.
With this act, I protest an un
acceptable position."
The tragedy that came upon
the Detroit synagogue and its
saintly spiritual leader, Rabbi
Morris Adler, could not have
been hatched by any but an in
sane mind.
But what of the motivation?
In Jacobson’s novel, released
for publication this week by Mac
millan, a young man in South
Africa has just returned from the
war and is taken to shul by his
parents, not overly religious peo
ple who go to worship more out
of habit and custom than out of
belief. The young man, Joel, had
seemingly hoped to find a new
climate in the synagogue. Instead
he finds that nothing has chang
ed there since he had last seen
the synagogue.
Everything in the synagogue,
the author speaks for Joel, “was
the same, not least the feeling of
boredom and estrangement which
came over Joel immediately the
service began. . . The prayers
were still meaningless. . . Still
the God to whom they raised
their plaintive, discordant voices
and bowed their workaday
bodies—still that God did not
exist. . . Joel believed t'hht he
would have been moved by the
history which was embodied in
the service, by the very supplica
tion to that God in whom he did
not believe.”
Joel did not end up in mad
ness. Instead, he took another
path.
However, both Joel and the
young man who vented his des
pair on the venerable rabbi acted
out of the same motivation. Both
had dreams and saw them melt
into nothingness for them and
they rebelled, each in his own
way. What has added significant
dimension to the Detroit tragedy
lies in the fact that both the
victim and his assailant were in
essence in quest of same pur
pose-finding meaning in life and
in creation.
The rabbi’s assailant apparent
ly had a deep sense of Jewish
values, of Jewish meaning, and
he was fearful that they were
being watered down in the very
precincts he expected them to
preserved. In his demented mind
erzats Judaism was a seared
pasture on which he could not
feed and, rather than perish
slowly, he chose the path of self-
immolation. But he seemingly
would not go down alone, for
then the very evil he complained
of would survive and so he
chose to perish together with the
Philistines of his sick mind.
What happened in Detroit was
a tragedy of Grecian conception,
but only in the sense that it was
a thunderbolt cutting down two
men, their families and the con
gregation. Its significance how
ever is of transcending import
ance, for the event, though doubt
lessly generated by a madman,
has served to focus attention
anew on an American youth
burgeoning with unrest against
its Jewish climate.
The affliction that had come
upon Rabbi Adler will be amelio
rated only if it serves to awaken
our Jewish community to the
need of mending its fences, of
forging value-purposes that will
be palatable to our young in a
changing world.
Open For Business
Announcement is made that our facilities are
open for business after being closed due to the
untimely passing of Mr. Katz. We take this
opportunity to express our deep thanks for the
many kindnesses and expressions of condolence
received during this time of sorrow.
—Mrs. Katz—Owner Manager
I/AT7 Kosher
lift I im Meat & Poultry Market
1048 N. Highland Ave., N. E.
Free delivery Atlanta, Georgia
Out-of-Town Orders Welcomed TR. 2-8887
AS WE WERE SAYING
By Robert E. Segal
(A Seven Arts Feature)
A condensed yet powerful version of Rolf
Hochhuth’s bitterly-discussed play, “The
Deputy,” is now beginning to reach the hinter
land. And as the searing drama, primarily
about two shocking ingredients—murder and
silence—comes to the people living outside the
pulsating New York area, one viewing the
play in 1966 may well be startled to recall
some of the efforts to curb its production in
1963.
Pope Pius XII, who was papal nuncio to
Bavaria when he was still the rising young
churchman, Eugenio Pacelli, near the end of
World War I and in the early 1920s, is critical
ly presented as God’s deputy who did not in
clear terms condemn Hitler’s murder of mil
lions upon millions of Jews.
testant observer at the Vatican Council, in a
memorable article supporting “The Deputy,”
went back to Albert Camus to help get through
to the innocent bystanders and befuddled
people of good will who prefer politeness to
any expression of justified indignation. Dr.
Brown, after experiencing the shock of wit
nessing “The Deputy,” wrote that he had al
ways been haunted by Camus’ statement that
as a member of the French underground, he
had waited in vain for a papal condemnation
of Nazi atrocities. Camus had declared: “What
the world expects of Christians is that Chris
tians should speak out, loud and clear, and
that they should voice their condemnation in
such a way that never a doubt, never the
slightest doubt, could rise in' the heart of the
simplest man.”
But this sorry episode is only a branch of
the tree of a greater indictment- All who do
not protest stand condemned. These are not
only the silent ones in the days of holocaust,
but ourselves in 1966 and our contemporaries.
The vicious Nazi doctor in “The Deputy.”
is certain that God will not help Father
Riccardo Fontana, the valiant priest who is
compelled by his faith and his conscience
to enter the gas chamber with Jews he has
befriended. And bulwarked by that harsh
certainty, the doctor points to the audience
and thunders: “They won’t help either, all
the good people out there. They’re too com
fortable. They don’t want to be embarrassed,
involved. They won’t help either.”
Robert McAfee Brown, an official Pro-
If t ritag? *
Extract* from ‘'The Graphic History
of the Jewish Heritage." Edited by
■P. Wollman-Tsamlr. Published by
Shengold Publishers and Foundation
For A Graphic History of Jewish
Literature.
i A Seven Arts Feature. _____
6. joshua yunrp
Joshua payi homage to
God’s angel who standi
before him with drawn
sword.
"And the captain of the
Lord’s holt said unto
Joshua: 'Put off thy shot
from off thy foot; for tht
place ... is holy’ “ (Josh.
5.15).
1 The son of Nun, Joshua belonged to the tribe
of Ephraim (Numbers 13.8; I Chronicles 7.20-
29) His name was originally Hoshea, but Moses
changed it to Joshua (Numbers 13.16). He was
Moses’ servant who “departed not out of the
Tent,” as well as one of the twelve scouts (Exo
dus 33.11; Numbers 13; 14). He led the Israelites
in battle in the desert and defeated Amalek in
Rephidim Exodus 17.8). During Moses’ life
time he was appointed to lead the people in the
conquest of Canaan (Numbers 27.18). He suc
ceeded in winning the area extending “from Baal-
gad in the valley of Lebanon even unto the bare
mountain, that gocth up to Seir” (Joshua 12.7)
and apportioned the land among the tribes of
Israel by lot, while receiving his own portion from
God (Yalkut Shimoni, Joshua, § 19).
The rabbis noted that Joshua judged the peo
ple for fourteen years (Seder Olam). Ten ordi
nances for civil welfare are attributed to him
(Baba Kamma 80b) as well as the composition
of some of the psalms of the Hallcl (Pesahim
117).
According to the Aggadah, he married Rahab
(Erubin 17.1), and eight prophets and priests
were among their descendants (Megillah 14).
Joshua is considered one of the principal trans
mitters of the Torah: he received the Torah from
Moses and passed it on to the elders (Aboth
1.1).
King Christian X of Denmark, who, like
“The Deputy’s” heroic young Father Fontana,
affixed the Yellow Star to his coat, spoke up
boldly when Hitler sent his rat pack into Den
mark. That valiant little nation still stands.
The Third Reich does not. Is silence then such
a virtue?
But Pope Pius XII did make himself
heard, we are told. Perhaps. Yet even D’arcy
G. Osborne, British Minister to the Holy See
from 1936-1947, a great admirer of Pius, ob
served: “Unfortunately, the language of his
addresses was too often so prolix and obscure
that it was difficult to extract his meaning
from its extraneous verbal envelope.”
There was another Pope who reacted dif
ferently. True, he did not hold the solemn
office and high responsibilities of the papacy
during the Hitler madness- But as titular
Arch-bishop of Mesembria, the man who was
to enter the golden pages of history as Pope
John XXIII wept over and bitterly protested
the Reich’s satanic treatment of Jews. When
Iranz von Papen asked that great churchman
in 1941 whether Hitler’s war against Commun
ism might find favor with the Vatican, the
prelate of the great heart replied: “And what
answer do you give me regarding the two and
a half million Polish Jews you are ex
terminating?”
According to the excellent Catholic
magazine, America,” when Hochhuth’s play
was produced as “Der Stellvertreter” by the
Royal Shakespeare Company, the Lord Cham
berlain asked for an authoritative Catholic
opinion. Subsequently, the theater program
printed the observation that came from Car
dinal Montini shortly before he was named
Pope Paul VI. The Cardinal stoutly defended
Pius, but did more. He suggested that “play
wrights insufficiently endowed with historical
discernment. . .forbear from trifling with sub
jects of this kind.”
Hochhuth, it is true, is not a major play
wright. He shouts when he might more
effectively speak in quiet tones. His original
version seemed never to end. But he has
brought forth a morality play undoubtedly of
an enduring fabric.
Nor has he trifled with “subjects of this
kind.” The subjects, we must repeat are
Silence and Murder. And in this era of the
failure of nerve and dearth of leadership, every
man is entitled to ponder these themes and to
express all that his soul informs his heart and
mind concerning them.
JEWISH
CALENDAR
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and Thursday
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