Project Gutenberg's The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915, by Various This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net Title: The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 Author: Various Release Date: August 11, 2007 [EBook #22300] Language: English Character set encoding: UTF-8 *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MENORAH JOURNAL, VOL. 1, 1915 *** Produced by Juliet Sutherland, Emmy and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net THE MENORAH JOURNAL [Illustration] VOLUME I NO. 1 JANUARY 1915 Greetings: From Dr. CYRUS ADLER, LOUIS D. BRANDEIS, Professor RICHARD GOTTHEIL, Dr. JOSEPH JACOBS, Dr. KAUFMAN KOHLER, Justice IRVING LEHMAN, Judge JULIAN W. MACK, Dr. J. L. MAGNES, Dr. MARTIN A. MEYER, Dr. DAVID PHILIPSON, Dr. SOLOMON SCHECHTER, JACOB H. SCHIFF, and Dr. STEPHEN S. WISE A Call to the Educated Jew LOUIS D. BRANDEIS Menorah: A Poem WILLIAM ELLERY LEONARD The Jews in the War JOSEPH JACOBS Jewish Students in European Universities HARRY WOLFSON The Twilight of Hebraic Culture MAX L. MARGOLIS Days of Disillusionment SAMUEL STRAUSS Three University Addresses--President ARTHUR T. HADLEY of Yale University, Chancellor ELMER E. BROWN of New York University, President CHARLES W. DABNEY of the University of Cincinnati The Menorah Movement HENRY HURWITZ From College and University: Reports from Menorah Societies PUBLISHED BY THE INTERCOLLEGIATE MENORAH ASSOCIATION 600 MADISON AVENUE, NEW YORK -:- -:- -:- 25 CTS. A COPY INTERCOLLEGIATE MENORAH ASSOCIATION For the Study and Advancement of Jewish Culture and Ideals OFFICERS Chancellor HENRY HURWITZ 600 Madison Avenue, New York President I. LEO SHARFMAN University of Michigan First Vice-President MOSES BARRON University of Minnesota Second Vice-President LEON J. ROSENTHAL Cornell University Secretary ISADOR BECKER University of Michigan Treasurer J. K. MILLER Penn State College THE ADMINISTRATIVE COUNCIL Composed of Representatives, one each, from every constituent Menorah Society (The Representatives for 1915 will be announced in the next issue of The Menorah Journal) There are Menorah Societies now at the following Colleges and Universities: Boston University Brown University Clark University College of City of New York Columbia University Cornell University Harvard University Hunter College Johns Hopkins University New York University Ohio State University Penn State College Radcliffe College Rutgers College Tufts College University of California University of Chicago University of Cincinnati University of Colorado University of Denver University of Illinois University of Maine University of Michigan University of Minnesota University of Missouri University of North Carolina University of Omaha University of Pennsylvania University of Pittsburgh University of Texas University of Washington University of Wisconsin Valparaiso University Western Reserve University Yale University Office of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association 600 Madison Avenue, New York THE MENORAH JOURNAL VOLUME I JANUARY, 1915 NUMBER 1 An Editorial Statement THE MENORAH JOURNAL, in its efforts to carry forward the aims and aspirations of the Menorah movement, will necessarily be far more than merely an "official organ" for the Menorah Societies. That function, indeed, becomes increasingly important as the Menorah Societies multiply in number and influence throughout the country. In this special appeal to Menorah members, however, the Journal will be more than a news medium; it will supply important material for study and discussion, and stimulate thinking and active effort in behalf of Menorah ideals. And inasmuch as the furtherance of Menorah ideals means the advancement of American Jewry and the spread of Hebraic culture, the Journal should appeal to every one in America who sympathises with these purposes. The Journal will be conducted with this general appeal always in mind--with the desire, indeed, to make it a model publication dealing with Jewish life and thought. To publish a periodical that shall measure up to this high standard, with its accompanying influence and power, is one of the aspirations of the Menorah movement; and the Menorah auspices and conditions are so peculiarly favorable to the achievement of this ambition as to lend every encouragement to the effort that will be put forth to make the Journal a genuinely significant publication for the whole of American Jewry. For conceived as it is and nurtured as it must continue to be in the spirit that gave birth to the Menorah idea, the Menorah Journal is under compulsion to be absolutely non-partisan, an expression of all that is best in Judaism and not merely of some particular sect or school or locality or group of special interests; fearless in telling the truth; promoting constructive thought rather than aimless controversy; animated with the vitality and enthusiasm of youth; harking back to the past that we may deal more wisely with the present and the future; recording and appreciating Jewish achievement, not to brag, but to bestir ourselves to emulation and to deepen the consciousness of _noblesse oblige_; striving always to be sane and level-headed; offering no opinions of its own, but providing an orderly platform for the discussion of mooted questions that really matter; dedicated first and foremost to the fostering of the Jewish "humanities" and the furthering of their influence as a spur to human service. It will undoubtedly prove necessary on more than one occasion in the future to emphasize again the fact that the Journal is an unqualifiedly non-partisan forum for the discussion of Jewish problems; and that accordingly neither the Menorah Journal nor the Menorah Societies are to be regarded as standing sponsor for the views expressed in these columns by contributors. Nor will the Journal have any editorials expressing the views of its editors or of the Menorah organization,--particularly since the Menorah organization takes no official stand on mooted subjects. The editorial policy will be one of fairness in giving equal hospitality to opposing views; and space will gladly be given to reasonable letters or articles that take exception to statements or opinions published in these pages. The Journal is singularly fortunate in having enlisted the co-operation of the distinguished leaders of Jewish life and thought who comprise its Board of Consulting Editors. The assurances already in hand of important articles to come from our Consulting Editors and from other notable men and women, both Jewish and non-Jewish, lend strength to the editorial confidence that succeeding issues will more and more repay the public interest. As an incidental but none the less vital aim, the Journal hopes to be instrumental in encouraging our young men and women, particularly in the Menorah membership, to devote themselves to Jewish subjects as worthy of their best literary effort,--with publication in the Menorah Journal as a prize to be eagerly sought for. The Menorah hopes through the incentive of the Journal to develop a "new school" of writers on Jewish topics that shall be distinguished by the thoroughness and clarity of the university-trained mind and inspired by the youthful, searching, unfearing spirit of the Menorah movement. With these aims and these aspirations, the Menorah Journal bids for the favor of the public. Scholarly when scholarship will be in order, but always endeavoring to be timely, vivacious, readable; keen in the pursuit of truth wherever its source and whatever the consequences; a Jewish forum open to all sides; devoted first and last to bringing out the values of Jewish culture and ideals, of Hebraism and of Judaism, and striving for their advancement--the Menorah Journal hopes not merely to entertain, but to enlighten, in a time when knowledge, thought, and vision are more than ever imperative in Jewish life. Greetings _From Dr. Cyrus Adler_ _President of the Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, Philadelphia_ [Illustration] I AM very glad to be able through this first number of your Journal to send a word of greeting to the Menorah men throughout the United States. An Association which has as its object the promotion in American colleges and universities of the study of Jewish history, culture and problems, and the advancement of Jewish ideals, cannot but fail to command my personal and official interest and support. The Jewish people have a long and honorable record of literary activity. Our Holy Scriptures, our Rabbinical Literature, our contributions to philosophy, to ethics, to law, our poetry, sacred and secular, our share in the world's history, all become part of the program which you have laid out for yourselves as a means of cultivation. In their due proportion they should (although they do not) form a part of the outfit of every educated man. That they should be especially cultivated by Jewish young people is self-evident, and, for several thousand years, they have been. You Menorah men have taken the modern form of association for the purpose of carrying on these studies, of cherishing your Jewish ideals along with your general culture or with your chosen profession, and it was high time that you should do so. You already count thousands of young people, and as time goes on you will gradually increase in number. From among your group will come the future leaders of the Jewish people in America, and your main body will form our intellectual backbone. It is my hope and belief that your movement will gradually tend toward the maintenance and promotion of Judaism in this land. We are now a population of nearly three million souls. That such a vast body should be lost to Judaism or should maintain a Judaism ignorant of its language, its literature or its traditions, is almost unthinkable. Conditions abroad may shift the center of gravity of Judaism and of Jewish learning to the American continent. Your movement is one which will aid in training the group that may be expected to measure up to our new responsibilities. It has been a source of great personal pleasure to me to meet with your Association in your annual convention and to have the privilege of coming in personal contact with some of your Societies,--at Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Pennsylvania, and Boston Universities. I hope to have the pleasure of meeting more of you and to derive more of the stimulus which your enthusiasm gives me in my work. Speaking not only in my own name but in behalf of my colleagues on the Board of Governors and the Faculty of The Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, I wish your Association and your Journal success in all of your endeavors. [Illustration: Signature: Cyrus Adler] _From Louis D. Brandeis_ _Chairman of the Provisional Executive Committee for General Zionist Affairs_ [Illustration] THE formation at Harvard University on October 25, 1906, of the first Menorah Society is a landmark in the Jewish Renaissance. That Renaissance, in which the Society is certain to be a significant factor, is of no less importance to America than to its Jews. America offers to man his greatest opportunity--liberty amidst peace and large natural resources. But the noble purpose to which America is dedicated cannot be attained unless this high opportunity is fully utilized; and to this end each of the many peoples which she has welcomed to her hospitable shores must contribute the best of which it is capable. To America the contribution of the Jews can be peculiarly large. America's fundamental law seeks to make real the brotherhood of man. That brotherhood became the Jews' fundamental law more than twenty-five hundred years ago. America's twentieth century demand is for social justice. That has been the Jews' striving ages-long. Their religion and their afflictions have prepared them for effective democracy. Persecution made the Jews' law of brotherhood self-enforcing. It taught them the seriousness of life; it broadened their sympathies; it deepened the passion for righteousness; it trained them in patient endurance, in persistence, in self-control, and in self-sacrifice. Furthermore, the widespread study of Jewish law developed the intellect, and made them less subject to preconceptions and more open to reason. America requires in her sons and daughters these qualities and attainments, which are our natural heritage. Patriotism to America, as well as loyalty to our past, imposes upon us the obligation of claiming this heritage of the Jewish spirit and of carrying forward noble ideals and traditions through lives and deeds worthy of our ancestors. To this end each new generation should be trained in the knowledge and appreciation of their own great past; and the opportunity should be afforded for the further development of Jewish character and culture. The Menorah Societies and their Journal deserve most generous support in their efforts to perform this noble task. [Illustration: Signature: Louis D. Brandeis] _From Dr. Richard Gottheil_ _Professor of Rabbinical Literature and the Semitic Languages, Columbia University_ [Illustration] I HAVE been asked to say a word of greeting to the readers of the Menorah Journal. I do so with pleasure; indeed with much satisfaction. The Menorah students at our colleges and universities will now be bound together by a new bond, one that will give them a more unified direction and converge their efforts toward the goal which the Menorah has set for itself. I should like to think that it is not entirely fortuitous that this added impulse is given to our work just at this time. We all feel that the present is a moment when the very foundations of our ethical life--both as individuals and as groups--have received a rude shock. At such a time--more than ever--we need to understand and to bear in mind the great teachings which Jewish sages have given to the world, as their and our contribution to the moral foundations of society. Such teachings were, in most cases, not decked out in the tawdry trappings of a recondite and far-fetched philosophy, nor garnished with the decorations of superlogical terminology, nor even put forth with lusty rhetoric. They were simple and to the point, because they were founded upon deep religious convictions. One of these teachings occurs to me as I write these lines: "The moral condition of the world depends upon three things--truth, justice and peace." Have we outgrown such teaching? Have the astounding advances made during the last one hundred years in the science of physical living brought us any nearer to the true inwardness of moral living than the ethical principles put forth by these early teachers? As our hearts are rent by the sufferings of those who are caught in the meshes of the terrible war now raging, and as our intellects are befogged by the various excuses advanced in justification of carnage and wholesale destruction, do not the simple words of the old Hebrew sage appear to us as a beacon-light in the surrounding darkness? "Truth, Justice, Peace!" Many similar lessons are awaiting those who will show some little willingness to learn and to know. They are a part of the patrimony that is ours, and which for the most part we refuse to claim. A voice is crying to us out of our own midst. We do not hear; for our ears are sealed as with wax. The Menorah Societies, which now are to be found in most of our institutions of higher learning, have set themselves the task of bringing our Jewish students to a consciousness of their own past, to a knowledge of their history as members of a great historic people, and to a just appreciation of the teachings of their religion. It is only the knowledge of what we have tried to be that will make us realize fully what we are and will enable us to see what our future may be. The Menorah Journal is intended to bring this knowledge to our young men, to harden their Jewish resolve and to point the way along which lies the consummation of our Jewish hopes. It sends its greeting to every Jewish student, whether or not he be a member of a Menorah Society. We of an older generation look to our university and college men as the Jewish leaders of the future. Let them gather around the Menorah Journal in order to make it a true expression of Jewish ideals, a powerful incentive to join the ranks of those who are active in our cause. The word of the Prophet comes to me again: "Be ye strong, therefore, and let not your hands be weak; for your work shall be rewarded." [Illustration: Signature: Richard Gottheil] _From Joseph Jacobs_ _Editor of The American Hebrew, New York_ [Illustration] I GREET the appearance of the official organ of the Menorah Societies something in the spirit of Ibsen's Master-Builder, who hears the coming generation knocking at the door. I have long been of the opinion that the future of American Israel lies with the academic Jews of the American universities. The organ that represents them should be, from this point of view, the voice of Israel's future in America. If you can live up to that ideal, you have indeed a great future before you. [Illustration: Signature: Joseph Jacobs] _From Dr. Kaufman Kohler_ _President of Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati_ [Illustration] AS you wander through the ruins of the _Forum Romanum_ and are within sight of the _Via Appia_ at the other end, your attention is riveted by an exquisite white marble arch wonderfully preserved. It is the Arch of Titus erected in memory of Rome's triumph over _Judæa Capta_. As you look closer at the trophies chiseled on this famous monument, you find there standing out most conspicuously the seven-armed candlestick carried by the Jewish captives, the _Menorah_, regarded, no doubt, by the proud victor as the most characteristic feature of the destroyed Jewish temple. Yet how strange! It seems to be almost a foreboding of the future dominion of the vanquished over the vanquisher. Israel's state, with its temple, Israel's nationality was trampled under foot by the Roman legions--Israel's religion remained unconquered, the light of its truth remained undimmed; nay, it grew brighter and stronger until the world was filled with its splendor. Little did the Emperor Vespasian dream, when he granted Rabbi Johanan ben Zakkai, the Jewish maker of learning, the privilege of building a schoolhouse at Jamnia as a substitute for the hall of the judiciary in the temple at Jerusalem, that this sanctuary of the Jewish law and what it represents would by far eclipse all the power and greatness of the Roman civilization. Yet this was symbolized by the Menorah. Whether originally intended or not, it was the emblem of Israel's mission of light. It indicated the task of the Jew, when scattered over the wide globe, to be a light to the nations, the religious luminary to the world. And if we be permitted to give a special meaning to the seven arms of light of the Golden Candlestick, we might find therein a suggestion of the lights of truth, justice and purity, or holiness, on the one side, and the lights of law, literature, and art, or wisdom, on the other, while the light in the center stands for religion, from which all the other lights emanated and for which the Jew throughout the centuries lived, suffered, and died, to preserve intact as mankind's highest treasure to the very end of history. These ideas I would offer as greeting to the editors and readers of the Menorah Journal. The name "Menorah" was aptly chosen by the founders of the pioneer Menorah Society with a view to the two-fold task of the light-bearer, to enlighten a surrounding world, and to foster self-respect in the hearts of the Jewish students by spreading the light of Jewish knowledge among them. Now, if I understand correctly the purpose of starting a Journal as the organ of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, it is to give to these endeavors a more permanent and classical literary form, and thus successfully defend the cause of Judaism. Wishing this enterprise all success and Godspeed, I venture to express the hope that true to its name Menorah, the Journal will become a real banner-bearer of light not only dispelling clouds of doubt and of prejudice within and outside of our camp, but also aiming to spread the truth of Judaism in all its spiritual force and grandeur. Not nationalism, which in these days of a cruel world-war with its barbarism puts our much-vaunted modern civilization to everlasting shame and which has split the Jewish people also into warring camps, but Judaism as a religion, which notwithstanding the differences of its various wings as to form is in its essentials and fundamentals one, should be the watchword, for it is the light of the Torah that is both law and learning, religion and culture, which is to unify and consolidate all the forces of American Israel. [Illustration: Signature: Dr. K. Kohler] _From Irving Lehman_ _Justice of the Supreme Court of the State of New York_ [Illustration] I CONGRATULATE the members of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association upon the fact that in their Journal they are obtaining a new instrument to carry forward their work of bringing to the Jewish youth knowledge of the old ideals and lessons of the Jewish past. During these dreadful days, the Jewish students of almost every country except America have been called from study, and preparation for a life of usefulness, into pitiless war and useless destruction. The oppressed in Russia, the student in Germany, and the free Englishman, all have answered the call to arms of the country in which they live, and each is fighting, firm in the belief that he is defending his Fatherland against foreign aggression. The loyalty shown by our brethren even in those countries where their treatment might well have furnished at least an explanation for disloyalty, is a new demonstration of the ancient spirit of devotion to their ideals which, I believe, has always been the true spirit of the Jews. But the ideal of national physical strength is not the ideal which we Jews had when we were a nation and which we must strive to make the ideal of the modern nations in which we live. Dark though these present days are, yet humanity must progress into the light of a permanent peace, and though the Jews are doing their full share of the fighting in this war brought on by their rulers, we must do more than our share in bringing to its fruition the ancient prophecy: "For the law shall go forth from Zion and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. And He shall judge many people and rebuke strong nations, and they shall beat their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more." The voice of this Journal may be only a weak, small voice, but if that voice speaks in the spirit of the prophet and brings home to us the worth of the prophetic ideals, it may well prove an important factor in enabling Israel to fulfill its mission as a messenger of peace to all the nations. [Illustration: Signature: Irving Lehman] _From Julian W. Mack_ _Judge of the United States Circuit Court of Appeals_ [Illustration] MY hopes are high that the Menorah Journal may prove a valuable means not only of linking together the Menorah Societies of the country but also of bringing to the individual members a clearer conception of the culture, ideals and traditions of the Jews, thereby increasing their interest in all things Jewish. This would inevitably tend to strengthen the religious faith of the Jewish members and to awaken in all of the members a keener and a more intelligent appreciation of the contribution which Jews and Judaism have made to human progress. [Illustration: Signature: Julian W. Mack] _From Dr. J. L. Magnes_ _Chairman of Executive Committee, Jewish Community (Kehillah) of New York_ [Illustration] I SEND hearty greetings to the members of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association upon the publication of the Journal. If the Journal can be put upon a sound business basis assuring its permanence, its publication will mark an important event in the development of Judaism in America. What we need above all things is sound thinking on Jewish affairs. I have no doubt that proper action will result from sound thinking. The Menorah Journal ought to become the medium for publishing the best thought modern Jewry is capable of. The present catastrophe overwhelming Europe has conferred upon the Jews in America the leadership of Jewry. We can assume this historic obligation only if our theories be clear cut and well thought out. [Illustration: Signature: J. L. Magnes] _From Dr. Martin A. Meyer_ _Rabbi of Temple Emanu-El, San Francisco_ [Illustration] IT is a pleasure to know that a journal is being launched in America for the benefit of thinking Jews, which will stand between the technical journal of the "Quarterly" type and outside of the purlieus of our numerous "Weekly" gossip sheets. Jewish journalism in America has done little, if anything, to justify the numerous calls which it makes upon the people for support. On the other hand, there is sad need for a journal representative of our best thought, which will be readable and which will represent rather than misrepresent us. The field of Jewish culture and ideals surely has not been exhausted by our European brethren. No matter what they may have contributed to the exploitation of this field there surely remains ample ground for the American Jew to express himself in the light of the old standards of Jewish conduct and belief. It goes without saying that your Journal will make its primary appeal to the college man and woman. If successful, it will have saved for Jewry its most valuable elements and enable us to build in the future on a better and broader basis than the purely financial and commercial leadership of the past. From the far West we join hands with you in the far East and unite in fervent hopes that the new Menorah Journal may grow from strength to strength. [Illustration: Signature: Martin A. Meyer] _From Dr. David Philipson_ _Hebrew Union College, Cincinnati_ [Illustration] SOME seventy years ago the celebrated Jewish scholar, Abraham Geiger, charged the Jewish _intelligenzia_ of his day with indifference towards Judaism and Jewish interests. This accusation of Geiger's has since been repeated frequently. But a rift is appearing in the cloud. To-day as never before our _intelligenzia_ as defined by university training and education is identifying itself more and more with Jewish life and aspiration in our country. And I feel that due credit should be given the Menorah movement in our colleges for this change of attitude of Jewish students and professors. This movement, still young, has accomplished much in bringing together the young men and women who form our intellectual elite into associations for the study of Jewish history and the consideration of Jewish problems. It has awakened an interest in Jewish matters in many who have been lukewarm and indifferent. It has brought as lecturers to our colleges Jewish men of light and leading from many communities, who have voiced their messages and given food for thought to the future leaders now sitting on university benches. The call of the ages sounds to the intellectual nobility of our day and generation. Learning has been extolled among Jews from earliest times, and the wise man has been the accredited leader, so that it was declared that "the wise man is greater than the prophet." I would have the learned classes come again into their own. I would have our university men in coming years the staunchest Jews in the community through their intelligent interest in everything that makes for its highest welfare. To achieve this is the task of our university men. The possibility of this achievement I see in such significant signs as the Menorah movement, the institution of student congregations, and the launching of this magazine by the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. What has been called the "Jewish consciousness," a term which has done yeoman's service during the past decade, is being aroused through these agencies to an even greater degree. This aroused Jewish feeling will, I am sure, be translated into active service more and more as the years pass and the present generation of college men carve out their careers in our communities throughout the country. This is the great Jewish opportunity of the present generation; in this will they reverse, such is my hope and my belief, that condition and that attitude of the Jewish _intelligenzia_ in the past (and still largely in the present) which evoked the statement of Abraham Geiger. May this new undertaking prosper so that the young generation whom this magazine represents may be helped toward a realization of its ideals, and become an inspiration to all Jewry throughout the length and breadth of the land. [Illustration: Signature: David Philipson] _From Dr. Solomon Schechter_ _President of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America_ [Illustration] I WISH to send my hearty congratulations to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association upon their undertaking the publication of the Menorah Journal, which I have no doubt will prove greatly helpful in promoting the knowledge of Judaism among the Jewish college youth. In a liberal country like ours, with the eagerness of our people for acquiring knowledge, there never was a lack of Jews in our Colleges and Universities. But what the Menorah Association will accomplish with the aid of the Journal is, I hope, to have Judaism also represented in our seats of learning. [Illustration: Signature: S. Schechter] _From Jacob H. Schiff_ [Illustration] IT is with much satisfaction that I learn of the launching of the Menorah Journal, to provide an opportunity for a more general spread of the high ideals of the Menorah Societies among our college youth. When I received some time ago a copy of the publication entitled "The Menorah Movement," I noted with particular pleasure the progress the Menorah Societies had already made. After an attentive perusal of the contents of this publication, I felt as if a copy ought to be placed in the hands of every Jewish college and university student, and I myself distributed a number of copies for propaganda purposes. The Menorah Societies are to be congratulated upon their new venture in issuing the Journal, upon which I wish them every success. It is to be hoped that the Menorah Journal will help the Jewish student to understand what Judaism means and what as Jews we should strive for to become useful and worthy citizens of this country. We shall have to face increasing problems because of the deplorable war in Europe, which so tragically affects our co-religionists there, and it will require much devotion and understanding on our part to properly deal with the conditions which will necessarily arise. The Menorah Journal should freely discuss these conditions, so as to inspire its readers with the desire to aid and the courage needed in the situation which is facing us. Thus, by "spreading light," the Journal can greatly assist the Menorah movement, and render efficient service in and outside of the university. Let me wish Godspeed to your new publication and its managers. [Illustration: Signature: Jacob H. Schiff] _From Dr. Stephen S. Wise_ _Rabbi of the Free Synagogue, New York_ [Illustration] I REJOICE to learn of the establishment of an organ by the Menorah Association. The Menorah Journal will, I take it, serve the threefold purpose of keeping the various groups of the Menorah throughout the universities of the land in constant touch with one another, of interpreting the ideals of the Menorah to widening circles of the Jewish youth, and of confirming anew, from time to time, the loyalty of the Menorah men to the Menorah ideal. A truly great Jew said about fifteen years ago that a high self-reverence had transformed _arme Judenjungen_ into _stolze junge Juden_. I believe that the Menorah movement in this land is in part the cause and in other part the token of a transformation among young American Jews to-day parallel to that cited by Theodor Herzl. It marks a sea-change from the self pitying Jewish youth, immeasurably "sorry for himself" because of his exclusion from certain dominantly unfraternal groups, to the Jewish youth self-regarding, in the highest sense of the term, self-knowing, self-revering. That the self-respecting young Jew command the respect of the world without is of minor importance by the side of the outstanding fact that he has ceased to measure himself by the values which he imagined the unfriendly elements of the world without had set upon him. The Menorah movement is welcome as a proof of a new order in the life of the young college Jew. He has come to see at last that it is comic, in large part, to be shut out from the Greek letter fraternities of the Hellenes and the Barbarians, but that it is tragic, in large part, to shut himself out from the life of his own people. For it is from his own people that he must draw his vision and spiritual sustenance if he is to live a life of self-mastery rather than the life of a contemptible parasite rooted nowhere and chameleonizing everywhere. Time was when their fellow-Jews half excused the college men, who drifted away from the life of Israel, as if the burden of the Jewish bond were too much for the untried and unrobust shoulders of our Jewish college men, as if their intellectual and moral squeamishness led to inevitable revolt against association with their much-despised and wholly misunderstood Jewish fellows. Now we see, and our younger brothers of the Menorah fellowship have caught the vision, that no Jew can be truly cultured who Jewishly uproots himself, that the man who rejects the birthright of inheritance of the traditions of the earliest and virilest of the cultured peoples of earth is impoverishing his very being. The Jew who is a "little Jew" is less of a man. The Menorah lights the path for the fellowship of young Israel, finely self-reverencing. Long be that rekindled light undimmed! [Illustration: Signature: Stephen S. Wise] A Call to the Educated Jew BY LOUIS D. BRANDEIS [Illustration: _Louis D. Brandeis (born in Louisville, Ky., in 1856), lawyer and publicist, is a distinguished leader in the voluntary profession of "public servant." His extraordinary record of unselfish, genuine achievement in behalf of the public interest--for shorter hours of labor, savings bank insurance, protection against monopoly, against increase in railroad rates, etc.,--gives peculiar aptness to the appeal for community service made in this article, which Mr. Brandeis has prepared from a recent Menorah address. From the beginning Mr. Brandeis has taken a keen interest in the Menorah movement as a promotive force for the ideals he has at heart._] WHILE I was in Cleveland a few weeks ago, a young man who has won distinction on the bench told me this incident from his early life. He was born in a little village of Western Russia where the opportunities for schooling were meagre. When he was thirteen his parents sent him to the nearest city in search of an education. There--in Bialystok--were good secondary schools and good high schools; but the Russian law, which limits the percentage of Jewish pupils in any school, barred his admission. The boy's parents lacked the means to pay for private tuition. He had neither relative nor friend in the city. But soon three men were found who volunteered to give him instruction. None of them was a teacher by profession. One was a newspaper man; another was a chemist; the third, I believe, was a tradesman; all were educated men. And throughout five long years these three men took from their leisure the time necessary to give a stranger an education. The three men of Bialystok realized that education was not a thing of one's own to do with as one pleases--not a personal privilege to be merely enjoyed by the possessor--but a precious treasure transmitted upon a sacred trust to be held, used and enjoyed, and if possible strengthened--then passed on to others upon the same trust. Yet the treasure which these three men held and the boy received in trust was much more than an education. It included that combination of qualities which enabled and impelled these three men to give and the boy to seek and to acquire an education. These qualities embrace: first, _intellectual capacity_; second, _an appreciation of the value of education_; third, _indomitable will_; fourth, _capacity for hard work_. It was these qualities which enabled the lad not only to acquire but to so utilize an education that, coming to America, ignorant of our language and of our institutions, he attained in comparatively few years the important office he has so honorably filled. Now whence comes this combination of qualities of mind, body and character? These are qualities with which every one is familiar, singly and in combination; which you find in friends and relatives, and which others doubtless discover in you. They are qualities possessed by most Jews who have attained distinction or other success; and in combination they may properly be called Jewish qualities. For they have not come to us by accident; they were developed by three thousand years of civilization, and nearly two thousand years of persecution; developed through our religion and spiritual life; through our traditions; and through the social and political conditions under which our ancestors lived. They are, in short, the product of Jewish life. _The Fruit of Three Thousand Years of Civilization_ OUR intellectual capacity was developed by the almost continuous training of the mind throughout twenty-five centuries. The Torah led the "People of the Book" to intellectual pursuits at times when most of the Aryan peoples were illiterate. And religion imposed the use of the mind upon the Jews, indirectly as well as directly, and demanded of the Jew not merely the love, but the understanding of God. This necessarily involved a study of the Laws. And the conditions under which the Jews were compelled to live during the last two thousand years also promoted study in a people among whom there was already considerable intellectual attainment. Throughout the centuries of persecution practically the only life open to the Jew which could give satisfaction was the intellectual and spiritual life. Other fields of activity and of distinction which divert men from intellectual pursuits were closed to the Jews. Thus they were protected by their privations from the temptations of material things and worldly ambitions. Driven by circumstances to intellectual pursuits, their mental capacity gradually developed. And as men delight in that which they do well, there was an ever widening appreciation of things intellectual. Is not the Jews' indomitable will--the power which enables them to resist temptation and, fully utilizing their mental capacity, to overcome obstacles--is not that quality also the result of the conditions under which they lived so long? To live a Jew during the centuries of persecution was to lead a constant struggle for existence. That struggle was so severe that only the fittest could survive. Survival was not possible except where there was strong will--a will both to live and to live a Jew. The weaker ones passed either out of Judaism or out of existence. And finally, the Jewish capacity for hard work is also the product of Jewish life--a life characterized by temperate, moral living continued throughout the ages, and protected by those marvellous sanitary regulations which were enforced through the religious sanctions. Remember, too, that amidst the hardship to which our ancestors were exposed it was only those with endurance who survived. So let us not imagine that what we call our achievements are wholly or even largely our own. The phrase "self-made man" is most misleading. We have power to mar; but we alone cannot make. The relatively large success achieved by Jews wherever the door of opportunity is opened to them is due, in the main, to this product of Jewish life--to this treasure which we have acquired by inheritance--and which we are in duty bound to transmit unimpaired, if not augmented, to coming generations. But our inheritance comprises far more than this combination of qualities making for effectiveness. These are but means by which man may earn a living or achieve other success. Our Jewish trust comprises also that which makes the living worthy and success of value. It brings us that body of moral and intellectual perceptions, the point of view and the ideals, which are expressed in the term Jewish spirit; and therein lies our richest inheritance. _The Kinship of Jewish and American Ideals_ IS it not a striking fact that a people coming from Russia, the most autocratic of countries, to America, the most democratic of countries, comes here, not as to a strange land, but as to a home? The ability of the Russian Jew to adjust himself to America's essentially democratic conditions is not to be explained by Jewish adaptability. The explanation lies mainly in the fact that the twentieth century ideals of America have been the ideals of the Jew for more than twenty centuries. We have inherited these ideals of democracy and of social justice as we have the qualities of mind, body and character to which I referred. We have inherited also that fundamental longing for truth on which all science--and so largely the civilization of the twentieth century--rests; although the servility incident to persistent oppression has in some countries obscured its manifestation. Among the Jews democracy was not an ideal merely. It was a practice--a practice made possible by the existence among them of certain conditions essential to successful democracy, namely: First: _An all-pervading sense of the duty in the citizen._ Democratic ideals cannot be attained through emphasis merely upon the rights of man. Even a recognition that every right has a correlative duty will not meet the needs of democracy. Duty must be accepted as the dominant conception in life. Such were the conditions in the early days of the colonies and states of New England, when American democracy reached there its fullest expression; for the Puritans were trained in implicit obedience to stern duty by constant study of the Prophets. Second: _Relatively high intellectual attainments._ Democratic ideals cannot be attained by the mentally undeveloped. In a government where everyone is part sovereign, everyone should be competent, if not to govern, at least to understand the problems of government; and to this end education is an essential. The early New Englanders appreciated fully that education is an essential of potential equality. The founding of their common school system was coincident with the founding of the colonies; and even the establishment of institutions for higher education did not lag far behind. Harvard College was founded but six years after the first settlement of Boston. Third: _Submission to leadership as distinguished from authority._ Democratic ideals can be attained only where those who govern exercise their power not by alleged divine right or inheritance, but by force of character and intelligence. Such a condition implies the attainment by citizens generally of relatively high moral and intellectual standards; and such a condition actually existed among the Jews. These men who were habitually denied rights, and whose province it has been for centuries "to suffer and to think," learned not only to sympathize with their fellows (which is the essence of democracy and social justice), but also to accept voluntarily the leadership of those highly endowed morally and intellectually. Fourth: _A developed community sense._ The sense of duty to which I have referred was particularly effective in promoting democratic ideals among the Jews, because of their deep-seated community feeling. To describe the Jew as an individualist is to state a most misleading half-truth. He has to a rare degree merged his individuality and his interests in the community of which he forms a part. This is evidenced among other things by his attitude toward immortality. Nearly every other people has reconciled this world of suffering with the idea of a beneficent providence by conceiving of immortality for the individual. The individual sufferer bore present ills by regarding this world as merely the preparation for another, in which those living righteously here would find individual reward hereafter. Of all the nations, Israel "takes precedence in suffering"; but, despite our national tragedy, the doctrine of individual immortality found relatively slight lodgment among us. As Ahad Ha-'Am so beautifully said: "Judaism did not turn heavenward and create in Heaven an eternal habitation of souls. It found 'eternal life' on earth, by strengthening the social feeling in the individual; by making him regard himself not as an isolated being with an existence bounded by birth and death, but as part of a larger whole, as a limb of the social body. This conception shifts the center of gravity not from the flesh to the spirit, but from the individual to the community; and concurrently with this shifting, the problem of life becomes a problem not of individual, but of social life. I live for the sake of the perpetuation and happiness of the community of which I am a member; I die to make room for new individuals, who will mould the community afresh and not allow it to stagnate and remain forever in one position. When the individual thus values the community as his own life, and strives after its happiness as though it were his individual well-being, he finds satisfaction, and no longer feels so keenly the bitterness of his individual existence, because he sees the end for which he lives and suffers." Is not that the very essence of the truly triumphant twentieth-century democracy? _The Two-fold Command of Noblesse Oblige_ SUCH is our inheritance; such the estate which we hold in trust. And what are the terms of that trust; what the obligations imposed? The short answer is _noblesse oblige_; and its command is two-fold. It imposes duties upon us in respect to our own conduct as individuals; it imposes no less important duties upon us as part of the Jewish community or race. Self-respect demands that each of us lead individually a life worthy of our great inheritance and of the glorious traditions of the race. But this is demanded also by respect for the rights of others. The Jews have not only been ever known as a "peculiar people"; they were and remain a distinctive and minority people. Now it is one of the necessary incidents of a distinctive and minority people that the act of any one is in some degree attributed to the whole group. A single though inconspicuous instance of dishonorable conduct on the part of a Jew in any trade or profession has far-reaching evil effects extending to the many innocent members of the race. Large as this country is, no Jew can behave badly without injuring each of us in the end. Thus the Rosenthal and the white-slave traffic cases, though local to New York, did incalculable harm to the standing of the Jews throughout the country. The prejudice created may be most unjust, but we may not disregard the fact that such is the result. Since the act of each becomes thus the concern of all, we are perforce our brothers' keepers. Each, as co-trustee for all, must exact even from the lowliest the avoidance of things dishonorable; and we may properly brand the guilty as traitor to the race. But from the educated Jew far more should be exacted. In view of our inheritance and our present opportunities, self-respect demands that we live not only honorably but worthily; and worthily implies nobly. The educated descendants of a people which in its infancy cast aside the Golden Calf and put its faith in the invisible God cannot worthily in its maturity worship worldly distinction and things material. "Two men he honors and no third," says Carlyle--"the toil-worn craftsman who conquers the earth and him who is seen toiling for the spiritually indispensable." And yet, though the Jew make his individual life the loftiest, that alone will not fulfill the obligations of his trust. We are bound not only to use worthily our great inheritance, but to preserve and, if possible, augment it; and then transmit it to coming generations. The fruit of three thousand years of civilization and a hundred generations of suffering may not be sacrificed by us. It will be sacrificed if dissipated. Assimilation is national suicide. And assimilation can be prevented only by preserving national characteristics and life as other peoples, large and small, are preserving and developing their national life. Shall we with our inheritance do less than the Irish, the Servians, or the Bulgars? And must we not, like them, have a land where the Jewish life may be naturally led, the Jewish language spoken, and the Jewish spirit prevail? Surely we must, and that land is our fathers' land: it is Palestine. _A Land Where the Jewish Spirit May Prevail_ THE undying longing for Zion is a fact of deepest significance--a manifestation in the struggle for existence. Zionism is, of course, not a movement to remove all the Jews of the world compulsorily to Palestine. In the first place, there are in the world about 14,000,000 Jews, and Palestine would not accommodate more than one-fifth of that number. In the second place, this is not a movement to compel anyone to go to Palestine. It is essentially a movement to give to the Jew more, not less, freedom--a movement to enable the Jews to exercise the same right now exercised by practically every other people in the world--to live at their option either in the land of their fathers or in some other country; a right which members of small nations as well as of large--which Irish, Greek, Bulgarian, Servian or Belgian, as well as German or English--may now exercise. Furthermore, Zionism is not a movement to wrest from the Turk the sovereignty of Palestine. Zionism seeks merely to establish in Palestine for such Jews as choose to go and remain there, and for their descendants, a legally secured home, where they may live together and lead a Jewish life; where they may expect ultimately to constitute a majority of the population, and may look forward to what we should call home rule. The establishment of the legally secured Jewish home is no longer a dream. For more than a generation brave pioneers have been building the foundations of our new old home. It remains for us to build the superstructure. The Ghetto walls are now falling, Jewish life cannot be preserved and developed, assimilation cannot be averted, unless there be reëstablished in the fatherland a center from which the Jewish spirit may radiate and give to the Jews scattered throughout the world that inspiration which springs from the memories of a great past and the hope of a great future. To accomplish this it is not necessary that the Jewish population of Palestine be large as compared with the whole number of Jews in the world. Throughout centuries when the Jewish influence was great, and it was working out its own, and in large part the world's, destiny during the Persian, the Greek, and the Roman Empires, only a relatively small part of the Jews lived in Palestine; and only a small part of the Jews returned from Babylon when the Temple was rebuilt. The glorious past can really live only if it becomes the mirror of a glorious future; and to this end the Jewish home in Palestine is essential. We Jews of prosperous America above all need its inspiration. And the Menorah men should be its builders. [Illustration: Signature: Louis D. Brandeis] _THERE are two things necessary in the Jewish life of this country. The one is an heroic attempt to organize the Jews of the country for Jewish things. That can be done, I believe, primarily through the organization of self-conscious Jewish communities throughout the country. The other thing necessary is, that we have vigorous Jewish thinking. We need a theory, a substantial theory, for our Jewish life, just as much as we need Jewish organization. We need to have our college men think their problems through without fear, courageously, by whatever name their theories may be known, be these theories called Zionism or anti-Zionism, Reform Judaism or Orthodox Judaism. We need some vigorous Jewish thinking._--_From a Menorah Address by Dr. J. L. Magnes._ Menorah By WILLIAM ELLERY LEONARD [Illustration: _WILLIAM ELLERY LEONARD (born in New Jersey in 1876), Assistant Professor of English at the University of Wisconsin, is the author of several volumes of verse and literary criticism which have won high praise,--notably "Sonnets and Poems," "Byron and Byronism in America," and "The Vaunt of Man."_] WE'VE read in legends of the books of old How deft Bezalel, wisest in his trade, At the command of veilèd Moses made The seven-branched candlestick of beaten gold-- The base, the shaft, the cups, the knops, the flowers, Like almond blossoms--and the lamps were seven. We know at least that on the templed rock Of Zion hill, with earth's revolving hours Under the changing centuries of heaven, It stood upon the solemn altar block, By every Gentile who had heard abhorred-- The holy light of Israel of the Lord; Until that Titus and the legions came And battered the walls with catapult and fire, And bore the priests and candlestick away, And, as memorial of fulfilled desire, Bade carve upon the arch that bears his name The stone procession ye may see today Beyond the Forum on the Sacred Way, Lifting the golden candlestick of fame. The city fell, the temple was a heap; And little children, who had else grown strong And in their manhood venged the Roman wrong, Strewed step and chamber, in eternal sleep. But the great vision of the sevenfold flames Outlasted the cups wherein at first it sprung. The Greeks might teach the arts, the Romans law; The heathen hordes might shout for bread and games; Still Israel, exalted in the realms of awe, Guarded the Light in many an alien air, Along the borders of the midland sea In hostile cities, spending praise and prayer And pondering on the larger things to be-- Down through the ages when the Cross uprose Among the northern Gentiles to oppose: Then huddled in the ghettos, barred at night, In lands of unknown trees and fiercer snows, They watched forevermore the Light, the Light. The main seas opened to the west. The Nations Covered new continents with generations That had their work to do, their thought to say; And Israel's hosts from bloody towns afar In the dominions of the ermined Czar, Seared with the iron, scarred with many a stroke, Crowded the hollow ships but yesterday And came to us who are tomorrow's folk. And the pure Light, however some might doubt Who mocked their dirt and rags, had not gone out. The holy Light of Israel hath unfurled Its tongues of mystic flame around the world. Empires and Kings and Parliaments have passed; Rivers and mountain chains from age to age Become new boundaries for man's politics. The navies run new ensigns up the mast, The temples try new creeds, new equipage; The schools new sciences beyond the six. And through the lands where many a song hath rung The people speak no more their fathers' tongue. Yet in the shifting energies of man The Light of Israel remains her Light. And gathered to a splendid caravan From the four corners of the day and night, The chosen people--so the prophets hold-- Shall yet return unto the homes of old Under the hills of Judah. Be it so. Only the stars and moon and sun can show A permanence of light to hers akin. What is that Light? Who is there that shall tell The purport of the tribe of Israel?-- In the wild welter of races on that earth Which spins in space where thousand other spin-- The casual offspring of the Cosmic Mirth Perhaps--what is there any man can win, Or any nation? Ultimates aside, Men have their aims, and Israel her pride. She stands among the rest, austere, aloof, Still the peculiar people, armed in proof Of Selfhood, whilst the others merge or die. She stands among the rest and answers: "I, Above ye all, must ever gauge success By ideal types, and know the more and less Of things as being in the end defined, For this our human life by righteousness. And if I base this in Eternal Mind-- Our fathers' God in victory or distress-- I cannot argue for my hardihood, Save that the thought is in my flesh and blood, And made me what I was in olden time, And keeps me what I am today in every clime." [Illustration: Signature: William Ellery Leonard] The Jews in the War BY JOSEPH JACOBS [Illustration: _JOSEPH JACOBS (born in New South Wales in 1854), noted author and editor, was one of England's well-known scholars and men of letters when he was called to America to become managing editor of the Jewish Encyclopedia. He has held the chair of English literature at the Jewish Theological Seminary, and is now editor of the American Hebrew. He is the author of many authoritative books, including "Jews of Angevin England," "Studies in Jewish Statistics," "Jewish Ideals," and "Literary Studies."_] IT is of course difficult to conjecture what will be the ultimate effect of such a world-cataclysm as the present European war on the fate of the Jews of the world. The chief center of interest naturally lies in the eastern field of the war which happens to rage within the confines of Old Poland. This kingdom, founded by the Jagellons, brought together Roman Catholic Poland and Greek Catholic Lithuania and could not, therefore, apply in full rigor the mediaeval principle that only those could belong to the State who belonged to the State Church. Hence a certain amount of toleration of religious differences, which led to Poland forming the chief asylum of the Jews evicted from Western Europe in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. As a consequence here lies the most crowded seat of Jewish population in the world. From it comes the vast majority of the third of a million Jews in the prime of life who are fighting for their native countries and often against their fellow-Jews. Probably three hundred thousand Jewish soldiers are under arms in this district. Besides the inevitable loss by death of many of these and the distress caused by the removal of so many others for an indefinite period from breadwinning for their families, there must be ineffable woe caused by the fact that this district is the scene of strenuous conflicts, which lead to the wholesale destruction of the Jewish homes in a literal sense. When one reflects that one out of every six of the inhabitants of Russian, Prussian, and Austrian Poland is a Jew, the extent of the misery thus caused may be imagined. One meets friends whose birth-place changes nationality from week to week, according as the different armies take possession. The Jewish inhabitants of Suwalki, for example, must be doubtful whether they are Germans or Russians, according as Uhlan or Cossack holds control of their city. But whichever wins, for the time being, the non-combatants suffer by the demolition of their houses, the requisition of their property, and above all by the dislocation of their trade. The mass of misery caused by the present war in this way to the Jews of Russian, Prussian, and Austrian Poland is incalculable. Nor is this direct loss and misery compensated for by any hope of improved conditions after the war is concluded. One may dismiss at once the rumor that the Czar has promised his Jewish soldiers any alleviation of their lot, on account of their loyalty and bravery. Such rumors are always spread about when the Russian autocracy needs Jewish blood or money. Besides, we all know the value of the plighted word of the crowned head of the Russian Church; the emasculation of the Duma is sufficient evidence of this. And even if the Czar carries out his promise of giving autonomy to Poland, including any sections of Prussian and Austrian territory which he may acquire by the present war, the Jewish lot will not be ameliorated in the slightest. For, unfortunately, Poles have of recent years turned round on their Jewish fellow sufferers from Russian tyranny somewhat on the principle of the boy at school who "passes on" the blow which he has received from a bigger boy to one smaller yet. _The Probable Strengthening of Anti-Semitic Influences_ BUT the chief evil which will result from the present war, whatever its outcome, will be the increased influence of just those circles from whom the anti-Semitic movement has emanated throughout Europe for the past forty years. It is, in my opinion, absurd to think that militarism will be killed or even scotched by the present war; militarism cannot cast out militarism. Even if Germany is defeated, it is impossible to imagine that she will rest content with her defeat, and practically the only change in the situation will be that "La Revanche" will be translated into "Die Rache"; and in Russia, the defeat of Germany will simply increase the prestige and influence of the grand-ducal circles from which the persecution of the Jews has mainly emanated. In the contrary case, if Germany gets the upper hand, the influence of the Junkers in Germany, with their anti-Semitic tendencies, would be raised to intolerable limits, while the Reaction in Russia, even if it loses prestige, will yet be granted more power in order to carry out the projected revenge. _Diminished Chances of Emigration_ ANOTHER unfortunate result for Jews from the present war will be the decreased stream of emigration from Russia and Galicia to this country, so that the escape from the House of Bondage would be still more limited. Many will be so impoverished by the war that they will not be able to afford the minimum sum needed for migration. Death on the battle-field or in the military hospitals will remove many energetic young fellows who would otherwise have come to this country and afterwards have brought their relatives with them. Conditions here too, in the immediate future, are likely to be less attractive for the immigrant from the economic point of view owing to the dislocation of trade caused by the current conflict. Altogether, as will have been seen from the above enumeration, I am strongly of opinion that the Jews will suffer even more than most peoples concerned in the present war. They have nothing to gain by it; they are sure to lose by it. [Illustration: Signature: Joseph Jacobs] _SURELY a law, the essence of which is mercy and justice to one's fellow men, is not a narrow rule of life, to be discarded by us today on any plea that we have outgrown it; surely a history of thousands of years' devotion to spiritual ideals is not a history to be forgotten. America is a land of divers races and divers religions. Each race and each religion owes to it the duty of bringing to its service all its strength; it derives no added strength from a race which has forgotten the lessons it has learnt in the past, a race which deliberately discards the spiritual strength which it has obtained by devotion to its ideals._--_From a Menorah Address by Justice Irving Lehman._ Jewish Students in European Universities BY HARRY WOLFSON [Illustration: _HARRY WOLFSON (Harvard A. B. and A. M. 1912), a member of the Harvard Menorah Society since 1908, was the Hebrew poet at the annual Harvard Menorah dinners for four years, and won the Harvard Menorah prize in 1911 for an essay on "Maimonides and Halevi: A Study in Typical Jewish Attitudes Toward Greek Philosophy in the Middle Ages." On graduating from Harvard he received honors in Semitics and Philosophy, and was appointed to a Sheldon Traveling Fellowship. As Sheldon Fellow he spent two years abroad, studying in the University of Berlin and doing research work in the libraries of Munich, Paris, the Vatican, Parma, the British Museum, Oxford and Cambridge. The present article is based upon the impressions he gathered during this period. He is now pursuing graduate studies in Semitics and Philosophy at Harvard._] THE Jewish student is no longer a _déraciné_. Deeply rooted to the soil of Jewish reality, he is like the best of the academic youth of other nations responsive to the needs of his own people. If in spots he is still groping in the dark, he is no longer a lone, stray wanderer, but is seeking his way out to light in the company of kindred souls. A comprehensive and exhaustive study of native Jewish student bodies in countries like England, Germany, Austria, France and Italy, as well as of the Russian Jewish student colonies strewn all over Western Europe, would bring out, in the most striking manner, contrasting tendencies in modern Jewry. But that is far from the direct purpose of this brief paper. As a student and traveler in various European countries during the years 1912-1914 I had the opportunity of observing Jewish student life and Jewish conditions in general abroad, and it is merely a few random impressions of certain aspects of these European conditions that I have here gathered together for the readers of the Menorah Journal. _In England_ JUDAISM in England, though of recent origin, is completely domesticated. The Jewish gentleman is becoming as standardized as the type of English gentleman. But more insular than the island itself, Anglo-Jewry, as a whole, prefers to remain within its natural boundaries, and is disinclined to become the bearer of the white Jew's burden. Two of her great Jews, indeed, had embarked upon a scheme of Jewish empire building. The attempts of both of them, however, ended in a fizzle, for one was an unimaginative philanthropic squire, and the other is an interpreter of the dreamers, himself too wide-awake to become a master of dreams. Yet within its own narrow limits, Anglo-Jewry is active enough to keep in perfect condition. Over-exertion, however, is avoided. Cricket Judaism is played according to the rules of the game, and the players are quite comfortable in their flannels. The established synagogue of Mulberry Street is as staid and sober as the Church of England, the liberalism preached in Berkeley Street as gentle and unscandalizing as the nonconformity of the City Temple, and the orthodoxy of the United Synagogue as innocuously papish as the last phases of the Oxford movement. In England it is quite fashionable to admit Judaism into the parlor. Parlor Judaism, to be sure, is not more vital a force nor more creative than kitchen Judaism, but it seems to be more vital than the Judaism restricted to the Temple. At least it is voluntary and personal, and, what is more important, it is engaging. So engrossed in the subject of his discussion was once my host at tea, that while administering the sugar he asked me quite absent-mindedly: "Would you have one or two lumps in your Judaism?" "Thank you, none at all," was my reply. "But I am wont to take my Judaism somewhat stronger, if you please." _Jewish Student Groups at Oxford and Cambridge_ AS compared with ourselves, English Jews have a long tradition behind them, in which they glory. That tradition does not at present seem to stand any imminent danger of being interrupted. The younger generation follow in the footprints of the older. Nowhere is there so narrow a rift between Jewish fathers and sons as in England. Hence you do not find there any prominent organization of the young. Last winter an anonymous appeal for the organization of the Jewish students in England ran for several weeks in the _Jewish Chronicle_, but it seems to have resulted in nothing. Independent local organizations of Jewish students, however, are to be found in almost every university in England. In Oxford and Cambridge they are organized in congregations, having Synagogues of their own, in which the students assemble for prayer on every Friday night and Saturday morning. In Cambridge they hold two services, an orthodox and a liberal, both well attended. In Oxford they have recently published a special prayer book of their own, suitable for the needs of all kinds of students, it being a medley of orthodoxy and liberalism, which if rather indiscriminate in its theology is, on the whole, made up with good common sense. English liberal Judaism, it should be observed, is markedly different from its corresponding cults in Germany and in the United States. In Germany, reformed Judaism has its nascence in free thought, and it aims to appeal to the intellectual. With us liberalism is stimulated by our pragmatic evaluation of religion, and is held out as a bait to the indifferent. In England it arises from the growing admiration on the part of a certain class of Jews for what they consider the inwardness and the superior morality of Christianity, and is concocted as a cure to those who are so affected. As a result, English liberal Judaism is more truly religious than the German, and more sincerely pious than the American. In a sermon delivered before the Oxford congregation, a young layman of the Liberal Synagogue of London apostrophized liberal Judaism as the safeguard of the modern Jews from the attractiveness of the superior teachings of Christ. _Social Service Work of Jewish Students_ ENGLAND is the classic home of old-fashioned begging and of old-fashioned giving. You are stopped for a penny everywhere and by everybody, from the tramp who asks you to buy him a cup of tea, to the hospital which solicits a contribution to its maintenance "for one second." Pavement artists abound in Paris as much as in London, but in Paris it is a Bohemian-looking denizen of the "Quartier" posing as a pinched genius forced to sell his crayon masterpieces for a couple of sous, whereas in London it is always a crippled ex-soldier trying to arouse your pity in chalked words for a "poor man's talent." But England is also the classic home of modern social service of every description. The Salvation Army had its origin in London, where also Toynbee Hall, the first University settlement of its kind, came into existence. Likewise among the Jews, there are, on the one hand, the firmly established old-fashioned charitable institutions to help the "alien" brethren of the East End, and on the other hand, there are also the equally well organized boys' clubs for the "uplifting" of the "alien" little brethren of the same East End. The Jewish University men in England take an active interest in both these branches of philanthropy. It was a fortunate coincidence that when I came to Oxford the Jewish students there had among them a social worker of the latter type, who had come to make arrangements for the reception of a squad of Whitechapel boys who were under his tutelage. When I afterwards went to Cambridge I found there a delegate of some charitable board of the London Jewish community, seeking to enlist the aid of the Jewish students in his work. _What the Bulletin Boards Told at Berlin_ AT the University of Berlin I did not have to go far to find traces of the presence of Jewish students. With their far-famed efficiency the Germans have contrived to turn the large university hall into a medium of information more adequate than our University Bulletins and Registers combined. The bulletin boards covering every vacant spot on the walls told me the story of all the phases of Jewish activities in the University, professional, social, vocational and, if you please, also gastronomical, more fully than the frescoed walls of Dido's temple told their story to pious Æneas. In the announcement of courses by the various faculties, well-known Jewish names stand out quite prominently,--none of them above the rank of Honorar-Professor, to be sure, but in popularity and achievement they are among the foremost. Among the long rows of the variegated Wappen of the Korporationen, the Borussias, Teutonias and Germanias, there hang the insignia of the Jewish students' societies, the yellow and white of the Sprevia and the black and gold of the Hasmonea, both announcing the dates of their Kneipe held in their respective places in the students' quarters around Linienstrasse and Charlottenburg. In another nook of the hall, from the midst of a jumble of little slips of paper enumerating in minute detail in microscopic German script what dishes are offered at the paltry sum of so many pfennig in the various "Privat-Mittagtische" and "bürgerliche-Küche" there looms up unblushingly, proud in the clearness of its square characters, the Hebrew word כשר over the notice of a Lebanon restaurant run by a Palestinian Jew. Still further on the wall, students of unmistakably Jewish names offer instruction in almost all the languages spoken, while a German young lady wants to exchange lessons in Russian with an _orthodox Christian_ and one who hails from the mendacious little country, cautiously states, as an inducement to a prospective pupil in the Roumanian tongue, that the would-be instructor is a _true_ Roumanian. Here you have a picture of Jewish life in the Berlin University, in its outer paraphernalia, in its cosmopolitan character, in its relation to the rest of the student body, in its freedom and restriction, as portrayed in the unjaundiced tales of bulletin boards. _The Opposing Views of Student Societies at Berlin_ OF the two Jewish organizations mentioned above, the Hasmonea is a branch of the inter-varsity K. Z. V. (Kartell Zionistischer Verbindungen), whereas the Sprevia belongs to the K.-C. (Kartell-Convent der Tendenzverbindungen deutscher Studenten jüdischen Glaubens). The former, as the name implies, is Zionistic; the latter is opposed to Zionism. Their relation to each other, however, is not like that between the Menorah and the Zionist societies in American colleges. The Hasmonea and the Sprevia are mutually exclusive, rather than complementary to each other. The German Jewish student does not come to the university with a mind open and free as to Judaism. He comes there with definite views on the subject which have already been crystallized under the influence of early training. Judaism, of whatever shade it may happen to be, is more potent a factor in the domestic life of German Jews and in the bringing up of the young than it is with us here. Jewish boys there evince a keener interest in Judaism than do Jewish boys in America. Their intelligent understanding of Judaism is therefore not necessarily preceded by a period of indifference and lack of knowledge. It steadily grows and develops with them from their early youth. And so by the time they enter the university, at an age somewhat older than that of our average freshman, their Jewish consciousness is mature and fixed. They are able to judge whether they can work for or against Zionism, for to them Zionism is the only vital question in present-day Judaism, a question which they are willing to face squarely and once for all determine their position towards it; and it is on this question of Zionism and the future destiny of the Jews as a nation that the two leading student organizations radically differ. There is another quite as notable distinction between our Menorah and the Jewish students' organizations in Germany. With us the Menorah is primarily an undergraduate society. When graduate Menorah Societies arise, they may be confederated with the undergraduate organization, but they will of course retain their separate character. In Germany this distinction between undergraduate and graduate does not exist. Matriculation in the University, not the taking of a degree in it, introduces one into the society of the educated with its appellative "intellectual" corresponding to our "high-brow" rather than to our "college grad." Joining the membership of a student organization marks the entrance into that large class of "intellectuals." And once you join such an organization you are a member ever after. In Germany, in fact, nobody graduates from a university in the same sense that we do. There the taking of a degree is merely an episode. If you take it, you will thenceforth be addressed as "Herr Doktor"; if you do not take it, you will keep on printing on your visiting card "Kandidat Philosophie" all the rest of your lifetime, and be addressed by the uninitiate as "Herr Doktor" just the same. Thus the achievements generally ascribed to Jewish students' organizations in Germany are in reality the collective work of all the Jewish men of academic training, and not necessarily of students actually engaged in university studies. Read over the names of contributors to publications issued by what are known as "student organizations," and you will notice how loosely that term is used. _Intellectual Problems of the German Jewish Youth_ THE Jewish university men in Germany, whom we commonly call Jewish students, take more interest in Jewish life than do our university men in this country. This is chiefly due to the peculiar position of the modern Jews in Germany. German Jewry, by the total disappearance of its laboring class during recent times, has ceased to be a people by itself and has become a part of the middle class of the general German population. Among the native Jews of Germany, if Berlin is to be taken as a typical example of Jewish communities in large cities, there is no organic social body, complete in itself, consisting of various classes, following all imaginable trades, ranging from the chimney-sweep and the cobbler to the merchant prince. Such communities, forming organic wholes in themselves, you may find in Russia, Galicia, Roumania, and in the newer Jewish settlements of England and America. You do not find them in Germany. Higher up in the social scale, Jews are represented everywhere, but lower down you cannot find any native Jew below a shop clerk or master tailor. Being thus interspersed among the middle class of the general population, that part of the population which more than any other sends its children to universities, the number of academically trained men engaged in liberal professions among the German Jews is exceedingly large. These professional Jews encounter greater difficulties in their careers than those engaged in commerce. While the latter are given free range for the development of the native Jewish talents, the former find their road toward recognition blockaded. Consequently they are hurled back upon their Judaism, and their energies not finding vent elsewhere turn into Jewish channels. The activities of Jewish university men in Germany are chiefly literary and intellectual, for the problem with which they are faced is quite different from that of ours. With us the problem of Americanism and Judaism is in its ultimate analysis the possible conflict between two sets of social duties, in themselves not necessarily contradictory, which can be easily reconciled by a working program adjusting the practical demands of both without curtailing the scope and efficiency of either. For Americanism in the abstract has no existence. The American mind is as yet unknown in its essence; it is only manifest by its functions, of which Jewish activities may form a complementary part. In Germany it is quite different. If Germanism stand for Aryanism and Occidentalism, Judaism must inevitably stand for Semitism and Orientalism,--and can the twain ever meet? That the Jew manifests in his works and actions good practical patriotism does not radically solve the problem; that the Jews are capable of being good patriots is no longer questioned, but can they be genuine ones? Will not the Jews always remain the carriers of an alien culture, unabsorbable and unassimilable, despite their conversion and intermarriage? It is this problem that confronts the Jewish intellectuals in Germany, in the over-hanging shadow of which the "Sorrows of the Jewish Werther" was written, and the martyrdom of Otto Weininger, self-inflicted, was made possible. Hence the great introspective literary activity of the German Jewish youth. There is, on the one hand, the great, ever-increasing inrush of the Jews into the inmost sanctum of German cultural life, where their Germanic protestations are more vociferous than those of the native Teuton,--and they sometimes have, too, as must be admitted, a false ring. Ludwig Fulda openly proclaims that as to his relation with Judaism there is none: Goethe is his Moses and the German war of liberation is his Exodus; and Jewish "Gymnasium" seniors inundate the columns of the _Allgemeine Zeitung des Judentums_ with introspective analyses of their Teutonic souls. On the other hand, there are those who, while quite as good Germans as the others, so far as practical patriotism is concerned, do not renounce the intellectual and spiritual heritage which is their own. Their self-imposed task is therefore the cultivation, enrichment, and modernization of Jewish thought and tradition. Hence the great output of highly meritorious literary works on purely Jewish subjects which, if not as scholarly as those of the German Jewish scientists of the past generation, are far more stimulating and of greater educational value. (_To be concluded_) _IT may interest you to know that in this country, during the early years of our leading universities, Hebrew not only formed, a subject of instruction, but also appeared upon the Commencement programs. Upon such grandiloquent occasions you will find that side by side with a poem in Greek there figured a speech in Hebrew. What the Hebrew was like that was poured out there I have difficulty in imagining. But that the instruction was of much use to the student, I have grave reasons to doubt. Will you allow me to read to you a note written in regard to that famous professor of Hebrew at Yale towards the end of the eighteenth century--Ezra Stiles. Stiles was a very learned Christian Hebraist. One of his pupils wrote about him: "For Hebrew he possessed a high veneration. He said one of the Psalms he tried to teach us would be the first we should hear sung in Heaven, and that he should be ashamed that any one of his pupils should be entirely ignorant of that holy language."_--_From a Menorah Address by Professor Richard Gottheil._ The Twilight of Hebraic Culture _The Transition from Hebraism to Judaism_ BY MAX L. MARGOLIS [Illustration: _MAX L. MARGOLIS (born in Merecz, Russia, in 1866), one of the leading Biblical scholars of America, received his education in Russia, Germany, and the United States (Columbia Ph.D. 1891). He has held important professorships of Semitics and Biblical Exegesis at the Hebrew Union College and the University of California,--and since 1909 has filled the chair of Biblical Philology in The Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate learning. He has been engaged also, as Editor-in-Chief, in the monumental task of the new English translation of the Bible by American Jewish scholars. He is the author of numerous learned papers and books on Biblical lore and theology._] SO long as Jewish psalms are sung in the cathedrals of Christendom and Jewish visions are rehearsed by Christian catechumens, the Synagogue will continue to hold in veneration the chest where reposes its chiefest glory. Surely a book which thrills the religious emotions of civilized mankind cannot but be an object of pride to the people that produced it. Stupendous as the literary output of the Jewish people has been in post-biblical times, the Scriptures stand on a footing of their own. Throughout the era of the dispersion they have held their unique position and have exercised a most potent influence on the Jewish soul. And the modern man taught by Lowth and Herder, and the modern Jew under the spell of Mendelssohn and the Haskalah, have their minds open to the æsthetic side of the "Bible as literature." To the Jew, however, the Scriptures are possessed of an interest beyond the religious and literary. They are the record of his achievements in the past when his foot rested firm and steady on native soil, of a long history full of vicissitudes from the time when the invaders battled against the kings of Canaan to the days when the last visionary steeled the nation's endurance in its struggle with the heathen. They are the charter of Jewish nobility, linking those of the present to the wanderer from Ur of the Chaldees. As a finished product the Hebrew Scriptures came after the period of national independence. When canon-making was in its last stage, Jerusalem was a heap of ruins. The canon was the supreme effort of Judæa--throttled by the legions of Rome--withdrawing to its inner defences. The sword was sheathed and deliverance was looked for from the clouds. The Scriptures were to teach the Jew conduct and prayer, and the chidings of the prophets were listened to in a penitential mood, but also joyfully because of the consolations to which they led. The canon-makers had an eye to the steadying of a vanquished people against the enemy without and the foe within. For there arose teachers who proclaimed that the mission of the Jew was fulfilled: free from the fetters of a narrow nationalism, of a religion bound up with the soil, he was now ready to merge his individuality with the large world when once it accepted that measure of his teaching suited to a wider humanity. The temple that was made with hands was destroyed, and another made without hands was building where men might worship in spirit and truth. The dream was fascinating, the danger of absorption was acute, because it was dressed up with the trappings of an ideal to which many believed the Scriptures themselves pointed. There was a much larger range of writings in Palestine and a still larger in Egypt. The list included historical works carrying on the story of the people's fortunes beyond Alexander the Great; novelistic tales like that of the heroic Judith luring the enemy of her people to destruction, or that exquisite tale of Jewish family life as exemplified by the pious Israelite captive Tobit; books like the wise sayings of Jesus, son of Sirach, the Wisdom of Solomon, or the Psalms of Solomon, all modelled after patterns in the canon; midrashic expositions of the law, like the Little Genesis; apocalyptic visions going by the name of Enoch and the Twelve Patriarchs and Moses and Isaiah and Esdras, whose prototype may be sought in the canonical Daniel. Over and above the three parts which the Synagogue accepted there were a fourth and fifth; but by an act of exclusion the canon was concentrated upon the three and the others were cast overboard. The canon was the creation of the Pharisaic doctors, who drew a line at a point of their own choosing, and decreed that writings "from that time onward" did not defile the hands. _The Making of the Canon by the Pharisees_ THE Pharisee held the ground when the nation had politically abdicated. The war with Rome had been brought on by the intransigent hotspurs of Galilee and the commune of Jerusalem. John, son of Zakkai, parleyed with the enemy that Jamnia with its House of Study might go unscathed. There the process began which culminated in the gigantic storehouse of legal lore which was to dominate Jewish life and Jewish literature for centuries, commentary being piled upon commentary and code upon code. For in the sum total of Scriptures the Torah was admittedly to be the chief corner-stone, albeit prophecy and wisdom had not lost their appeal; and in moments of relaxation or when addressing their congregations worn out with the strife of the present, the scholars of the wise brought out of the ancient stock many a legend and quaint saying and even apocalyptic vision, transporting the mourners for Zion into the ecstasies of the future redemption. While official Judaism was committed to the dialectics of the Halakah, in the unofficial Haggadah mysticism exercised a potent influence by underground channels, as it were, issuing in later days in Kabbalah and offsetting the rational philosophies borrowed from Hellas. For the time being, however, the dominant note was legistic, Pharisean. The Pharisees had been lifted by the national catastrophe into the leading position. They had previously been a party among many parties, and their Judaism one of the many varieties. The Sadducees, their chief opponents, had a literature of their own: the day upon which their "Book of Decrees" was consigned to destruction was made a legal holiday upon which fasting was prohibited. But even writings which were lightly touched by the Sadduccee spirit were frowned upon: the Siracide was barely tolerated on the outside because he made light of individual immortality, and believed in the eternity of Israel and the Zadokite priesthood. The Pharisees had been on the opposition during the latter period of the Maccabeans: so with partisan ruthlessness they excluded from the canon the writings commemorative of the valorous deeds of those priest-warriors who freed the people from foreign overlordship and restored the Davidic boundaries of the realm. Because the apocalyptic visions inclined to teachings not acceptable to the dominant opinion, they were declared not only heterodox, heretical, but worthy of destruction. Had the stricter view prevailed, the sceptical Preacher--now, to quote Renan, lost in the canon like a volume of Voltaire among the folios of a theological library--would have shared the fate of Sirach and Wisdom and the other writings which Egypt cherished after Palestine had discarded them. And there were mutterings heard even against the Song, that beautiful remnant of the Anacreontic muse of Judæa. It was then that Akiba stepped into the breach and by bold allegory saved that precious piece of what may be called the secular literature of the ancient Hebrews. The process concluded by the Pharisees had begun long before. The Pharisee consummated what the scribe before him had commenced, and the scribe in turn had carried to fruition the work inaugurated by the prophet. Just as the Pharisee decreed what limits were to be imposed upon the third part of the Scriptures, the scribe in his day gave sanction to the second, and at a still earlier period the prophet to the wide range of literature current in his days. Sobered by national disaster, the scribe addressed himself to the task of safeguarding the remnant of Judæa in the land of the fathers. There were schisms in the ranks, and all kinds of heresies, chief among which stood the Samaritan. The nation's history was recast in a spirit showing how through the entire past faithful adherence to Mosaism brought in its wake national stability, and conversely a swaying from legitimacy and law was responsible for disaster. With the Torah as a guide, prophecy was forced into the channels of orthodoxy. Heterodox prophets, the "false prophets," were consigned to oblivion. Their opponents alone were given a hearing. Secular history there was to be none; there was room only for the sacred. We may take it for granted that the "prophets of Baal," as their adversaries triumphantly nicknamed them, had their disciples who collected their writings and recorded the deeds of _their_ spirit. But they were one and all suppressed. The political achievements of mighty dynasts had been recorded by annalists; the pious narrators in the so-called historical books of the canon brush them aside, gloss over them with a scant hint or reference; what is of absorbing interest to them is the activity of an Elijah or an Elisha, or the particular pattern of the altar in the Jerusalem sanctuary. In their iconoclastic warfare upon the abomination of Samaria, the prophets gave a partisanly distorted view of conditions in the North which for a long time had been the scene of Hebrew tradition and Hebrew life. _The Death-blow to the Old Hebraic Culture_ WHAT these upheavals meant in the history of Hebrew literature and culture can only approximately be gauged. One thing is certain: they all and one dealt the death-blow to the old Hebraic culture. When the excavator sinks his spade beneath the ground of a sleepy Palestinian village, he lays bare to view from under the overlaid strata, Roman and Greek and Jewish and Israelitish, the Canaanite foundation with its mighty walls and marvellous tunnels, its stelæ and statuettes, its entombed infants sacrificed to the abominable Moloch. Similarly if we dig below the surface of the Scriptures, we uncover glimpses of the civilization of the Amorite strong and mighty, which generations of prophets and lawmakers succeeded in destroying root and branch. On the ruins of the Canaanite-Amorite culture rose in the latter days Judaism triumphant; the struggle--prolonged and of varying success--marked the ascendancy of the Hebraic culture which was a midway station between the indigenous Canaanite civilization on the one hand and that mighty spiritual leaven, Mosaism in its beginnings and Judaism in its consummation, on the other. The Hebraic culture was a compromise. It began by absorbing the native civilization. The danger of succumbing to it was there, but it was averted by those whom their adversaries called the disturbers of Israel. And even to the last, when the sway of Judaism was undisputed, the Hebraic culture could not be severed from the soil in which it was rooted. It was part of a world-culture just as it contributed itself thereto. Whether living in amity or in warfare, nations influence each other to a marked degree. They exchange the products of their soils and their industry--they also give and take spiritual possessions. Culture is a compound product. The factors that are contributory to its make-up are the soil and the racial endowment recoiling against the domination from without which, though not wholly overcome, is resisted with might and main. Cultures are national amidst an international culture. They express themselves in a variety of ways, chiefly in language and literature. For while blood is thicker than water, the pen is mightier than the sword. Out of a mass of myth and legend and worldly wisdom the Hebrews constructed, in accordance with their own bent of mind, their cosmogonies and ballads and collections of proverbs. At every shrine the priests narrated to the throngs of worshippers the marvelous stories of local or national interest. _The Difference Between Hebraic Culture and Judaism_ THE chief feature of the Hebraic culture was that it was joyous. The somber seriousness of latter-day Judaism had not yet penetrated it. Israel rejoiced like the nations. The young men and maidens danced and wooed in the precincts of the sanctuaries which dotted the country from Dan to Beersheba. The festivals were seasons of joy, the festivals of the harvest and of the vintage. The prophets called them carousals and dubbed the gentlemen of Samaria drunkards. Probably there were excesses. But life was enjoyed so long as the heavens withdrew not the moisture which the husbandman was in need of. The wars which the Kings waged were the wars of the Lord, and the exploits of the warriors were rehearsed throughout the land--they were spoken of as the Lord's righteous acts. National victories strengthened the national consciousness. Taunt songs were scattered on broadsides. The enemy was lampooned. At the height of national prosperity, when Israel dwelt in safety in a land of corn and wine moistened with the dew of the heavens, the pride of the nation expressed itself in the pæan, "Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, a people victorious through the Lord, the shield of thy help, and that is the Sword of thy excellency!" Excellency then meant national independence and welfare. It was the period of the Omrides whose exploits are merely hinted at in our sources, whose sway marked the nascent struggle between Hebraism and Judaism. For the time being, Hebraic culture was on the ascendant, successor to the indigenous Canaanite civilization which it had absorbed, remodelled, developed. The chief difference between the Hebraic culture and Judaism which supplanted it consists in the fact that, whereas the latter was bookish, transforming its votaries into the "people of the book," the former was the sum total of all that goes to make up the concern of a nation living upon its own soil. Bookishness, literature, has a place in the affairs of a nation, but it contributes only a side in its manifold activities. The spoken word precedes the written. The writer has an eye to aftertimes. He lives in the future. The speaking voice addresses itself to the present and its varied needs. Saints are canonized after death. The act of canonization means the verdict of the survivors who from a distance are able to gauge the merits of past deeds. When a literature is pronounced canonical or classical, it is no more. In its dying moments it is reduced to rule, and its range becomes norm. But normalization is an act of choosing, of accepting and excising. A living literature is far from being normalized. Much that is written serves a temporary purpose, but is none the less effective while it has vogue. However, it is only a part of the national activities, mirroring them and commenting upon them. So is religion another part of the national life. Government policy and legal procedure and the arts and the crafts occupy a nation's living interests. The Hebraic culture meant all that. It is now a thing of the distant past. It speaks to us from beneath the Hebrew Scriptures by which it is overlaid, themselves the remnant of what in times gone by stirred the nation's spirit. A revival of that culture may come, but when it comes it will be tempered by Judaism. And the Hebrew Scriptures which constitute the bridge between them both will act as the peacemaker. [Illustration: Signature: Max L. Margolis] _JEWISH knowledge to me is valuable in the sense in which the word "knowledge" is employed in Hebrew. For "to know" in Hebrew_ (yada) _does not merely mean to conceive intellectually, but expresses at the same time the deepest emotions of the human soul; it also means to care, to cherish, to love. It is remarkable indeed that the only Hebrew expression which in any way approaches what in modern languages we call religion is_ daath elohim, the knowledge of God. _It is no less remarkable that the fundamental concept formulated by one of the greatest thinkers who proceeded from Jewish loins, by Baruch Spinoza, is_ amor Dei intellectualis, _"the intellectual love of God," that is, the mental and yet emotional conception of the Supreme Power that rules the universe. If I were to wish for anything, it would be for an_ amor Judaismus intellectualis, "_an intellectual love of Judaism," not shallow love and hollow self-complacency that cover every sin. We want to be frank about our Judaism, we want to be clear about our faults, we want to remedy our faults whenever we can, but at the same time we want to have the sympathy that goes with knowledge._--_From a Menorah Address by Professor Israel Friedlaender._ Days of Disillusionment BY SAMUEL STRAUSS [Illustration: _SAMUEL STRAUSS (born in Des Moines, Ia., in 1870), was publisher of the Des Moines Leader from 1895 to 1904, and became publisher of the New York Globe in 1904. Since 1912 he has been associated with the management of the New York Times. Mr. Strauss has taken an active and effective interest in many worthy movements for Jewish betterment. He is a member of the Graduate Advisory Menorah Committee and of the Menorah College of Lecturers. His impressive and stimulating talks have given him marked popularity with the Menorah Societies._] WE are at present witnessing an instance of the truth that a great crisis is always a test for genuineness. Since August 1st a number of things seemingly vital have come tumbling to the ground as mere inflated delusions or comparative trifles formerly viewed out of all perspective. Men are beginning to realize that they have been deceiving themselves, and the immediate effect is disappointment. What profit will be derived from it all is as yet merely a matter for speculation. Not yet have men been able to think of the conflict in other than negative terms, to see in it other than despair, crippled industry, a fall from civilization, all that belongs on the debit side of the ledger. But there is also a credit side: and to realize that the effects of war are positive as well as negative is by no means to condone war, but only to accept it as a fact. History teaches us to expect that the positive result of this struggle will be in the nature of a physic--a dissolving away of delusions, and simultaneously a bringing into relief of some essential facts. This clearing of the ground will not wait until the war is over; it has already begun, though men are yet but half-conscious of it, and then only in the guise of profitless disillusionment. This state of mind is understandable enough. The spectacle of thousands going out by trainload to settle differences through slaughter has been a terrible shock. Individuals, having progressed beyond that stage, had assumed that collectively, too, men must share the same aversion to so illogical a method as murder for the solution of differences. This assumption has had root in a justifiable belief in the world's attainment to a higher plane of civilization. The quality of to-day's culture may not be so fine as that of Judæa, of Greece, or Rome, or of the Renaissance, but surely in no period of history has its extent been so great. Never had the entire world been nearer denationalization, never had the economic interdependence of nations been more complete. Jingoism has seemed obsolete, cosmopolitanism had seemed the ideal, as the horizon of an increasing number of individuals broadened out, and prejudice gave way before enlightenment. But now this assumption is suddenly discovered to be mere delusion, and at once much scorn is heaped upon "our alleged civilization." How much justification there is for disappointment over the failure of culture to influence action is difficult to determine. There is much confusion of thought on this point. To conclude that because nations go to war, individuals have therefore made practically no advance from the original state of barbarism is absurd. What should be clear is the danger of generalizations from the individual to groups of the individual--two psychologically different entities. It may be that even as communities we have progressed more than we believe, as some future reaction to this war may indicate, but what is brought to the surface now is the old fact that the progress of groups of men is at snail's pace, however men may forge ahead as individuals. This refreshed realization is by no means of negative value. It is rather a positive benefit, and should be fixed in the minds of all men who are striving collectively for various ends. For political parties, socialists, suffragists, all and sundry reformers, this realization should be the starting point from which to readjust programs when the cataclysm is over. For the Jewish people this realization is peculiarly significant. Though the outlines of the general situation the world over are as yet indistinct, some problems of the Jews have already been brought out into sharp relief. Like the rest of mankind, the Jew has had his eyes cruelly opened, and the clear boundary between truth and delusion which this war has made should be stamped upon his memory, to remain vivid after negative feelings of wrongs and disappointments have been forgotten. _The Delusion of Assimilation_ IN the past hundred years, the Jew has had more reason than at any time since the dispersal to consider himself assimilated in all save the Slav countries. Not that anti-Semitism had disappeared; but it had seemed to be, and indeed is, so much less important when viewed against the background of the Jew's positive advance to light and freedom. Explained more recently as a survival of many prejudices which do not die overnight, including the old religious differences, physical and mental antipathies, economic jealousies--the force of anti-Semitism was not only weakened by the increasing breadth of vision, the cosmopolitanism on which the world has plumed itself, but dwarfed by the achievement of the Jew himself. He has come out of his Ghetto; softened by a more liberal attitude on the part of his individual neighbor, he has largely laid aside his resentment and his hostility. There was a feeling that adaptation and assimilation had advanced so far that the Jew, by his own progress and with the consent of his neighbor, had become a citizen of his community, differentiated from the rest, if at all, only by what he chose to keep of his religious belief. Those who have most zealously argued for assimilation as the sole solution of the Jewish problem have had little need of late to push their gospel further; the process seemed to be taking excellent care of itself. But after all, it was not real. A drastic crisis like the present one was required to brand it as delusion. The attitude of the occasional individual was construed as the attitude of the entire community. This has been a double-edged delusion. The Jew has not judged himself as a community in relation to his neighbor, and he has misjudged his individual neighbor as a community in relation to himself. It takes two sides always to make up the full truth, but from both sides, from the Jew and from his neighbor, there is circumstantial evidence in the events of the past five months that gives abundant support to this conclusion. In this time of crisis the world has thrown aside its pretense, honest and well-intentioned pretense though it may have been, and revealed its underlying feeling toward the Jewish people. Suddenly, without any absolute change in their status, the Jews are singled out and set apart. Special inducements are held out for their support. The Czar, though this was reported upon dubious authority, addresses his "beloved Jews;" a non-commissioned Jewish officer is recommended for the Order of St. George; Dreyfus is decorated in France, his son made Lieutenant; Austria issues a special appeal to the Jews of Poland; an English Jew voices England's hope of their loyalty; in Germany anti-Semitic newspapers suddenly announce their discontinuance. _The Test of Jewish Patriotism_ IT is not a new story. Doubt of the Jew's place in time of war has been continuous. Through the centuries there has been report that he has dodged his war tax wherever he could, that he bought soldiers to fill his place in the ranks, that as financier he offered his gold without scruple to the bitterest foes of his own fatherland. How much of this is based on blind prejudice is beside the point. What is important is the effect that this doubting attitude has had on the Jew's normal impulse to render patriotic service. The Jew to-day who feels most keenly the cause of Germany, or of France, or of England in this war, who most unreservedly throws in his lot with his compatriots, glorying in a privilege long withheld, moved to an intense fervor of patriotism, cannot but be disheartened at the spectacle of his neighbors as in one way or another they give evidence of their lack of faith in him. Why this feeling of distrust? How has it been engendered, what are its roots? Again the answer is to be found both with the Jew himself and with his neighbor. As far as the present situation is concerned, the Gentile world has had lying dormant in its subconscious mind the notion that the Jew was inferior, and by its own action it has kept this subconscious notion alive. For while the world has admitted the Jew to its political life, while it has modified much its religious and its economic prejudices and jealousies, it has not broken down every barrier. Without fully realizing its attitude, it has still held the Jew to be different and of lower quality. The Jew's neighbors have had an honest sort of delusion about their attitude toward the Semite; because they had discovered the individual Jew, and taken him, as it were, into the arms of their community life, they have fancied that all prejudice, even toward the Jew as a class, had become obsolete. Here again there is evidence of the fact that feeling toward Jews as individuals has been mistaken for feeling toward the Jews as a race group. This delusion has its base in something more fundamental, to which may be accredited perhaps the distrust against which the Jews have been battling for centuries. It is not the stranger who inspires continued suspicion, for he soon ceases to be a stranger, but it is the wanderer and the gypsy. There is imbedded in human nature a distrust of shifting things and a respect for what is long established in any one place, and it is in the wandering class that the Jew is placed in spite of all talk of assimilation. He has had no point of departure and hence no place of arrival. The French have crossed over the Channel and become Englishmen; one would hardly know that the Romans still live on in the Tyrol; but the Jew has always remained Jew, for he has no established place from which to come and whither to return. _"A People Without A Home"_ NOT only have the Jews been looked upon by others as a people without a home; subconsciously they have always regarded themselves as such. To-day a gigantic fund is proposed for the relief of the Jews affected by the present war, by the very ones who have argued most persistently for adaptation and assimilation. Yet this is a relief fund not for Belgian Jews, nor French Jews, nor German Jews, but for all Jews irrespective of the side on which they fight. The Jews are not thinking of themselves in terms of citizens or subjects of this or that country, but only as members of the Jewish race, who have no unity save as members of that race. It is the surest indication that beneath all self-delusion the Jews have subconsciously realized themselves as a homeless people, men without a country. Is it strange that the rest of the world should regard the Jew as alien when he cannot but hold himself as such? It would seem that this argument leads along a straight path towards Zionism as its conclusion. But practical Zionism, like all other programs of reconstruction, must await a time which will admit of reconstruction, and that is not the present. It may be that when this war is concluded, world conditions will have so completely changed that Zionism and its geographic program will no longer be the answer to the problem of Jewry. All that is certain of it now is its uncertainty. But the spirit of which Zionism is the expression, and which has made of it more than a mere experiment in colonization, still remains, emphasized by the self-realization to which the Jews have been brought in the present conflict. _The Persistence of the Jewish Faith_ IN every crisis, even in those which have swept whole nations from existence, the Jew has always found himself with one inalienable possession--his faith. There is something mystifying about the persistence through so many vicissitudes of a religion which commands respect from neighbors who see in it a powerful inspiration, while the Jew himself, especially the Jew more fortunately placed in the general community, endeavors so often to cast it off as outworn and impracticable. It is the Jew himself who has misled the rest of the world into a delusion. He has seemed to consider himself, and the faith with which he is bound up, inferior. In his endeavor to take on the color of his environment, he has sought to lay aside all that was old, and of this the religion of his fathers was a part. But a faith as strong and as far-reaching as Judaism cannot be dropped out of the life into which it has been ingrained, and hence the Jew has been hard put to cover it up, to hide it, or to attempt its modification to fit the fashion in religions. The inevitable reaction on the non-Jewish part of the community has been a feeling of mystification, and, following on that, suspicion and distrust. It is this which has undermined confidence in the Jews as a people--their negation of that which is their valuable heritage. For Judaism is not merely tradition, a thing to be reverenced as a relic; it is a thing to be put to everyday use. This practical and vitalized Judaism is the real salvation for which the Jews have been groping, all the while under the delusion that it was anywhere but near at hand. Such a rejuvenated faith would mean an end of that homelessness which is accountable for much of the Jew's displacement in the world's life. And though the remedy has been intimate to him these many years he has failed to make positive use of it. It is true that the Zionists have been striving for a geographical base for Judaism. But a geographical base is never more than an outward expression of a people's unity; it is an excellent starting point, but as an end in itself it is nothing. The Jews had a geographical base for their start; thereby they were enabled to build up a unified result, the Jewish spirit. It is this which, if recognized as a positive fact, will take from the Jew his feeling of homelessness, and from his neighbor the notion that the Jew is a member of a tribe forever unestablished and purposeless. It is around a spiritual core that the Jews as a people must build, around that central force which has thus far held them intact. _The Spiritual Service of the Jew_ AND never has there been a time, it would seem, when not only the Jews themselves but the world at large were so ready for this reconstruction. If in the very near future, as seems probable, the Jews are again to play a prominent rôle in history, it will be more largely through the pressure exerted by the world outside than through their own initiative. Men are coming more and more to need what the Jewish people, under certain conditions, are peculiarly qualified to bestow. The period of materialism now undoubtedly coming to a close has brought with it a heavy burden of discontent, and there has been a turning from tangible comforts, a reaching out for spiritual consolation. Under the rule of enlightenment religion has gone away, and the world begins to feel its lack. One may not prophesy that religion is soon to return, but the suggestion of its coming is in the air. What the Jew will then be able to furnish may now be an open question, but the great fact of his religion is undeniable. It should be remembered that only in things spiritual has the Jew been able to render world service; in material progress he has been able to do little more than march with the rank and file. Should the Jew again lead in the world, it must be in a time when the things of the spirit are paramount in men's desires. With the hope that such a time is near at hand, the Jew should retrim his lamp, in the faith that it may help to illuminate much that had fallen into darkness. [Illustration: Signature: Samuel Strauss] Three University Addresses I PRESIDENT ARTHUR T. HADLEY _of Yale University_ _Before the Yale Menorah Society, October 14, 1914_ [Illustration] IT is a great pleasure for me to speak to the Menorah Society, and a double pleasure when I see beside me the Menorah emblem, the emblem of light, "the outward and visible sign of the inward and spiritual grace." Jewish history is embodied in a great literature, and a literature which is worthy of deep and earnest study. It is the common heritage of all mankind, and should be studied by every man who lays claim to culture and education. By studying the literature of the Jewish race, men at Yale and elsewhere can do a great work for the learning and for the inspiration of our country; especially can this Society do a noble and inspiring work. History is in large measure made by the study of the literatures of ancient races. What was it that waked Europe during the dark ages from her apathy and ignorance but the discovery and the revival of the Greek and Latin classics by enthusiastic scholars? In the various centres of learning at the end of what we call the "dark ages," we find groups of earnest young men devoting themselves to this study, and in these groups we find the influence which roused Europe from her period of intellectual torpor. Classics are the literatures which thus make history; which serve the needs of all peoples, voicing truths of universal application. And though it is to the Greek and Latin that the name classics has been often confined, yet the Hebrew classics are being recognized more and more as worthy of a place beside if not above them. Interest in the Jewish classics never utterly perished. Throughout all ages the theologian kept alive his interest in those writings; but there is something of more than mere professional interest in these studies, something which closely touches every man's development and experience. It is not for me to attempt to say what these writings mean to humanity. Biblical writings are far above any individual praise. But I may with propriety say the reading of the Hebrew writings in English has meant much to me personally. As a boy I read fewer books than do youngsters of the present day, and among them the Bible was one of extraordinary interest. I read the Psalms and Isaiah as wonderful poetry, and turned to the Bible as to a storehouse of historical literature. Hebrew history has been of great importance in the early history of our country. The early settlement in America was due to the same causes as the settlement of Canaan by the Hebrews. To the Pilgrim Fathers the Old Testament was a supporting hand and a guide for them in all matters. They took the Jewish theocracy as their model of government and, in the measure that they patterned after a good model, they achieved good results. So largely are the early history and institutions of the United States a copy of Jewish institutions that the spirit of the American people both before and after the Revolution cannot be fully understood without a knowledge of Hebrew literature. These early settlers were imbued with spirit and desire for the best in life by reading the Bible. It was their one book, and "a man of one book makes a strong man." And perhaps it is the Old Testament rather than the New Testament the knowledge of which is of greater consequence for the best understanding of the peculiar conditions of the early American people. Therefore I welcome your Society first because it represents something which has done much for learning in our great centres of learning, the universities; and second, because as Americans, Jewish history means much to us in understanding the early development of our own country. II CHANCELLOR ELMER E. BROWN _of New York University_ _Before the Menorah Society of New York University, May 12, 1914_ [Illustration] IT seems to me that it is not only of value to the Jewish students, but to the whole university, that there should be a body here devoted to the study of Jewish tradition, Jewish literature and Jewish history. You are emphasizing something that is of permanent value to your associates here in the University who are not of the Jewish race and the Jewish faith. The Christian Church finds in the Jewish Scriptures some of the finest and most precious of the things it cherishes from the religious point of view. Our civilization in these occidental countries is deeply indebted to the history and the literature of the Jewish race. From time to time that indebtedness comes to stronger expression, and we may expect that in the future the sense of that indebtedness of our whole people to that which is the immediate concern of the Menorah Society will be more keenly felt. If you go back in the history of this country you will find a time when our New Englanders were especially indebted to what they as Christians called the Old Testament. There was a time in Colonial days when the earlier portions of this literature exercised a mighty influence over these new commonwealths. As you read the history of New England you cannot help being profoundly impressed by the influence of the Hebrew literature upon the life of the seventeenth century. The names and references to the Jewish people are all interwoven with New England history. I was thinking of a curious illustration of this fact only a short time ago. You know the old poem of "Darius Green and His Flying Machine" that has come into astonishingly new popularity in modern times. It contains, you will recall, an enumeration of the brothers of Darius, and four of the five names are taken from Hebrew history. The appearance of these Jewish names in such large numbers is coincident with a reappearance of Hebrew spirit in our Colonial times, all modified of course by Christian tradition, but presenting a most important and essential ingredient of the time. This apparently trivial illustration simply shows that which is to be found in our whole culture. It is profoundly significant in regard to our American culture. So it seems to me that the Menorah Society has work of two kinds--to bring together our Jewish students on a higher plane of sentiment, and at the same time to put new emphasis, in all parts of the University, on the invaluable things which the Jewish race has contributed to the civilization of the world. So I feel that I may look to you of this organization to bring to New York University a new emphasis upon these great things which are the common heritage of our scholastic society. I trust that you will feel that there is a genuine warmth and a genuine interest in the welcome that I extend to you,--not a welcome to the University alone, but a welcome to this new service in this University, in which every movement such as this has work to do for the good of all. III PRESIDENT CHARLES W. DABNEY _of the University of Cincinnati_ _Before the Cincinnati Menorah Society, November 19, 1914_ STANDING as it does for the study of the history and culture of the Jewish people, and for the advancement of their ideals, the Menorah Society is welcomed to the University of Cincinnati. This University, of all institutions, should welcome every such organization. The University of Cincinnati claims to represent the idea of the democracy of the higher education, the equality of opportunity for the highest culture in its latest form. The American idea is that the university should be as free to all cultures as our country is free to all races. Standing for this idea more distinctly than any other type of institution among us, the American state university has been called the characteristic institution of the republic. But the municipal university is destined to democratize the higher education even more completely than the state university. The state university makes the higher education free to all who can come to it, but the municipal university takes it to the poorest citizen at his home. For these reasons, if for no other, we should welcome the Menorah Society into our midst. As I was just informed that the national convention of the Intercollegiate Association is about to take place, let me, on behalf of this University, say to you, Mr. Chancellor, as the representative of the national organization, that we are glad to extend an invitation to your convention to meet in our halls. There are special reasons, too, why we should welcome the Menorah Association here. We believe that the University and its members need this Society for several reasons. In the first place, a great democratic institution like this can grow only when all the races bring into it their peculiar customs and ideals. I believe the non-Jews need it as well as the Jews. It takes varied elements to make up the democracy, and America, and Cincinnati, and its University all need the spiritual resources of the Jew. I am impressed with the statement of the purposes of the Menorah Society as explained by the Chancellor in the address to which we have just listened. He tells us first of all that its object is to promote the study of the history of the Jewish race. Your ancient books are the sources of all history; in fact, I cannot conceive of the study of history unless it begins with, or takes up very early, these great historic books of the Bible. They furnish the Ariadne's thread for the wanderer through all history; they are the fountain head also of the philosophy of history. The old Jewish historians always took the teleological view of the world and looked from the effect back to the cause, interpreting human events in the terms of God, the designer, the creator, and the governor of the world. In fact, their great contribution to history was this doctrine of God's hand in human events. The Jew had also, it seems to me, throughout his whole history, a special talent for theistic truth, for those verities that are eternal. With an insight and a power almost surpassing all other men, he discovered truths which have ever been, and always will be, essential factors in all religion. The first of these ideas is his conception of Jahveh, not only as a sovereign, powerful, and terrible Being, but as a personal, holy, righteous, and good Father, "who pitieth his children." Your Bible, however, nowhere tries to prove the existence of a God; it everywhere assumes it. "It is the fool who says in his heart there is no God," declares the Psalmist. For the same reason, your great books are the world's text book of comparative religion. I cannot conceive of any one studying religions without going to them, for above all others the Jewish religion is original. For these and many more reasons, we hold that the history, religion and philosophy of the Hebrews is fundamental and indispensable for the student of these subjects--in fact, for all students of the humanities. It was the Jew who discovered conscience, also, and produced in due time an order of men who made themselves the conscience of their nation. Moses first formed a law declaring the word of God and teaching men their relations to God and to each other. Other nations have had priests and augurs who received the oblations of the people and gave them advice about their affairs, but the Jewish nation was the first to produce real prophets who dared to denounce the sins of the people and remind them of their duty as men and nations. What the world needs today is another line of such prophets. To the young men assembled here tonight, I would say, therefore, it is your duty to study the history, philosophy and theology presented in these ancient Scriptures, and thus inform yourselves how to instruct this great democratic people. Be prophets like the prophets of old to guide the people into the truth! The Jews were the first people to uphold the sacred character of patriotism, the patriotism of principle, not of mere power, the patriotism that teaches that it is not might that makes right, but right which makes might. How sadly the European powers need to learn this lesson today! Only "righteousness exalteth the nation" and gives it the power and the right to lead in the world. If nations would seek righteousness as a means of winning leadership, they would never need to go to war, and the exercise of might would never be necessary. Because this Society proposes to study the great history and literature which teaches these things, we give it a welcome tonight, and pray that the light held up by the Menorah may shine not only for the people of Cincinnati, but for the people of America, and the world, that all the nations may be guided into that righteousness which leads to Peace. The Menorah Movement BY HENRY HURWITZ _Chancellor of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association_ I THE MENORAH MOVEMENT is now in its ninth year. Starting at Harvard University, where the first Menorah Society was organized in October, 1906, the idea spread to other colleges and universities in various parts of the country. Societies arose at Columbia, College of the City of New York, Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins, Minnesota, Michigan, Chicago, Illinois, Wisconsin, and Missouri. Before long a common desire was felt for closer relationship and co-operation. This led to the holding of two intercollegiate conferences early in 1912: one, an eastern conference, at Columbia University, in January, with delegates from six Menorah Societies, and another, a western conference, at the University of Chicago, in April, where also six Societies were represented. As a result of these preliminary gatherings, the first national convention of Menorah Societies was called at the University of Chicago, in January, 1913. Delegates of twelve Menorah Societies from universities in both the East and the West came together, and seven other Societies were heard from. At this national convention, the Intercollegiate Menorah Association was formed. In a period of less than two years since this first convention, the number of Societies has grown from nineteen to thirty-five. There are Societies now at the following colleges and universities: Boston University, Brown, California, Chicago, Cincinnati, College of the City of New York, Clark, Colorado, Columbia, Cornell, Denver, Harvard, Hunter, Illinois, Johns Hopkins, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, New York University, North Carolina, Ohio State, Omaha, Pennsylvania, Penn State, Pittsburgh, Radcliffe, Rutgers, Texas, Tufts, Valparaiso, Washington, Western Reserve, Wisconsin, and Yale. New Societies are in the process of formation at several other universities. This development of the Menorah movement has from the very beginning been a natural, unforced growth. The Intercollegiate Menorah Association makes no effort to organize new Menorah Societies; its policy is rather to encourage and assist the efforts of students who, wishing to join in the movement, have undertaken on their own initiative to organize Menorah Societies at their colleges and universities. Hence every Menorah Society is the result of a spontaneous desire among students to organize for Menorah purposes. The first Menorah Society started with sixteen members. Now the total membership of Menorah Societies approximates 3,000. The Menorah idea is firmly implanted in leading colleges and universities throughout the country, from Massachusetts to California. II EVERY Menorah Society is organized to promote at its college or university the study of Jewish history and culture and contemporary Jewish problems. First of all, the Menorah Societies aim to spread a knowledge of the Jewish humanities--Jewish literature, religion, and ideals--and of their influence upon civilization. In other words, the Societies aim to promote a true appreciation of the spirit and achievements of the Jewish people, from ancient to modern times. Particular study is made of contemporary conditions and problems, and of the ways in which Jewish culture may not only be conserved but advanced. To this end, the Menorah Societies strive to inspire the Jewish student with an intelligent and spirited devotion to Jewish ideals, and with the desire to develop and contribute to the community what is best in his Jewish character and endowment. Thus, in endeavoring to promote knowledge, culture, idealism, the Menorah Societies are in keeping with the university spirit which has helped to call them into existence. The Societies are an expression of the liberality and freedom of American universities. Membership is open to all students and instructors. College and university authorities have heartily welcomed the Menorah Societies, have aided them in carrying out their objects, have enhanced their influence among the students at large, and have been most generous in recognizing the definite contribution which the Societies make to the intellectual and idealistic life of their universities. Not only the university authorities, but the graduates, too, and other public-spirited men and women outside of the universities, have warmly welcomed the Menorah Movement. They see in it the expression of a spontaneous and earnest desire on the part of growing numbers of Jewish students for Jewish knowledge and idealism, for a realization of the Jewish _noblesse oblige_; they see, too, that this movement is bound at the same time to help bring about a more just and liberal attitude on the part of university men and women in general toward the character and ideals of their Jewish fellow-citizens. Through the encouragement and generous support provided by a Graduate Advisory Menorah Committee, under the chairmanship of Justice Irving Lehman of New York, the Intercollegiate Menorah Association is being helped materially in carrying out its objects. III WHILE the purposes of all the Menorah Societies are identical, they are free to carry out these purposes in any ways they choose, along lines that best suit their local conditions and are in keeping with the academic and liberal character of the organization. Certain activities, however, are followed in common by most of the Societies. To begin with, it may be stated that all of the Menorah Societies strongly encourage their members to take the regular courses in Jewish history and literature wherever such courses are a part of the curriculum and are devoted not so much to technical learning as to a liberal and humane study of Jewish culture. Where such courses are not offered--and it is unfortunately true that many institutions are deficient in this regard--the Menorah students are creating a demand which, it is hoped, will be met in time by the offer of appropriate courses. It is even hoped that a number of the leading universities will eventually have special Chairs in Jewish history and culture. Meanwhile, however, whether to supplement or to take the place of regular courses, the Menorah Society enables its members--or, rather, all the members of the university who so desire--to pursue their interest in Jewish studies in less formal manner. Thus, the Societies have lectures on Jewish subjects by members of the faculties, or by men from outside their universities. In this connection, the Intercollegiate Menorah Association has been of considerable service to the various Societies. The Association has established the Menorah College of Lecturers, consisting of a number of Jewish scholars, publicists, and religious leaders, who have undertaken to lecture (for love) before the Societies. Their lectures, which are generally followed by informal discussions, are, as a rule, open to the whole university, and are often held not merely under the auspices of the Menorah Society, but also in conjunction with some department of the university, or with some other student organization. At times, the Menorah lecturers are invited by the university authorities to address the whole student body at assemblies and convocations. At other Menorah meetings, the members themselves present papers and carry on discussions upon Jewish topics of historic and literary as well as current interest. Not content, however, with such lectures, papers, and discussions, most of the Societies provide their members with opportunities for intensive and systematic study. Study groups are formed, under the leadership of older students or of competent men from outside the universities, for the purpose of regular study in Jewish history, religion and literature, or contemporary Jewish conditions and problems, or the Hebrew language, or any other special field of interest. The work of these groups is carried on along the lines of a regular class or seminar, though, of course, with less rigor and formality. IV AS an incentive to original investigation on the part of the students, several Menorah Societies have been enabled to offer prizes to their universities for the best essays on Jewish subjects. Thus, at Harvard, since 1907, through the generosity of Mr. Jacob H. Schiff, of New York, the Menorah Society has offered an annual prize of $100 for the best essay written by any undergraduate on some approved Jewish subject; and similarly, at the Universities of Wisconsin and Michigan, through the generosity of Mr. Julius Rosenwald, of Chicago, the Menorah Societies are enabled to offer prizes of $100 each to their Universities upon the same terms. (Menorah Prize Essays will be printed from time to time in this Journal.) One or two other Societies have been enabled to offer smaller prizes. All of the Societies are anxious to be of similar service to their universities, and it is hoped that the Intercollegiate Menorah Association may be enabled next year to offer prizes open to the undergraduates of all American colleges and universities. This should help materially to stimulate Jewish study among students throughout the country. Perhaps the most essential requirement for carrying on Jewish study is an adequate supply of books. Except at the larger institutions, there has been a notable lack of Jewish books at American colleges and universities, mainly, no doubt, because Jewish studies as a whole have been neglected. The Intercollegiate Menorah Association has fortunately been able to remedy these conditions to some extent at the institutions where Menorah Societies exist. With the assistance of the Jewish Publication Society and a number of individuals, the Association has sent Menorah Libraries of Jewish books to the various Menorah Societies. These books are for the use not only of Menorah Societies, but of all the students in their universities. That the Menorah Libraries have helped the work of the Societies, and have added appreciably to the library facilities at the various institutions, is abundantly shown by the gratitude expressed both by students and authorities. Yet the work of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association has only begun. Its field is almost unlimited; and with constantly growing membership, both of undergraduates and of graduates, with the increasing encouragement and support from men and women in all parts of the country, the Association is gathering strength for enterprises that must prove beneficial not to universities alone, but to the community in general. Thus, the Menorah Journal is launched this year in response to a desire not only on the part of the students, but of men and women throughout the country who have been wanting such a Review of Jewish life and literature in America. Other literary enterprises are contemplated for the future. Besides syllabi for the study groups, pamphlet essays, and similar facilities designed especially for students, one large scheme in mind may appropriately be mentioned here as of interest to all the readers of the Journal, namely, the plan for the Menorah Classics. These are to be the selected treasures of the literature of the Jewish people, from the Bible to Bialik, printed in attractively handy form, with translations and notes designed for the general reader as well as for students. In this way, it is hoped to place the gems of the great store of Jewish literature within the reach of all. V THE work of the Menorah Societies is not designed to make Jewish scholars of the members. It is meant to gratify their desire to understand their heritage, to stimulate them still further to study that heritage, to help them realize the honor and the responsibility they share as the heirs and trustees of Jewish tradition. And though the earnest work of Menorah Societies partakes largely of the spirit of the class-room and the lecture-hall, the pursuit of Menorah aims expresses itself incidentally in sociable ways as well. Smokers, dinners, pageants, literary and dramatic evenings, testify to the pleasure which the members find in their association together for Menorah purposes. Menorah Societies, however, do not assume the character of social organizations. Menorah Societies are all-inclusive, not exclusive; they promote democracy, mutual respect, and understanding between different types of Jewish students who have often in the past retained toward one another the prejudices of their elders. The Menorah fellowship expresses and promotes the common sentiment of all students who have come to appreciate Jewish knowledge and ideals, who accept their common Jewish heritage and Jewish hopes. In other words, where in the past snobbery and spinelessness were not lacking among Jewish students at our universities, there has grown up now a spirit of democracy and of manly frankness, which has not escaped the observation of older men, both within and without the universities. But these qualities in the Jewish students of to-day have merely been revealed by the Menorah movement. The movement has definite moral purposes of its own. The Menorah idea embraces not merely the study but the enhancement of the Jewish heritage. And this requires not moral enthusiasm alone, but vision and action. To accomplish their full purposes, the Menorah Societies endeavor to inspire their members with the will to throw themselves into the heart of Jewish life, to join hands with other men in the active effort to advance its interests and solve its problems. While this participation in Jewish life must be the personal outcome of Menorah enthusiasm and activity--as indeed has been proven already among students and graduates--the Menorah organization, as such, maintains its non-partisan character. A Menorah Society is neither orthodox nor reform, neither Zionist nor anti-Zionist, but rather an open forum for presenting and discussing every point of view, a forum hospitable in true academic spirit to the open-minded pursuit of truth. VI IN sum, the Menorah movement represents an organization and an idea. If the organization has grown in extent and importance beyond the fondest expectations, it is because the idea, conceived by students and carried out by them, has found a welcome home in the American university. And one of the reasons why the Menorah idea has seized upon the imagination and caught the heart of the university man is because it appeals both to his independence of mind and his pride. A Menorah Society imposes no dogma, no ceremony; the independence of thought so dear to the bosom of youth is given full scope. A Menorah Society aims, first of all, to satisfy an aroused intellectual curiosity with respect to the past and present and possible future of the Jewish race. But the real source of Menorah strength lies far deeper. Consciously or unconsciously, from the very beginning of his affiliation with a Menorah Society, the Jewish student responds to a call within himself of _noblesse oblige_. It is pride of race--not vanity or brag, but a pride conscious of its human obligation--that animates Menorah men and women throughout the country. Knowledge and service, which may be regarded as the very cornerstones of Jewish idealism, constitute the twin motives of the Menorah movement. The Menorah movement is the answer of the Jewish academic youth to the challenge of American democracy. American institutions give us the opportunity to develop all our capacities in freedom. The endeavor of Menorah men is to preserve and enhance, for America and for mankind, the best in us that may flourish in freedom, our Jewish heritage and endowment. From College and University _Reports from Menorah Societies_ [_It is not planned to have reports from all the Menorah Societies in any single issue of the Journal. A complete list of Menorah Societies may be found on the inside of the front cover._] =University of California= THE California Menorah Society has begun its fourth year under most promising auspices. The first meeting of the year, on Monday evening, August 31, was the finest ever held by the Society. It had been announced before the entire student body at the University meeting in Harmon Gymnasium, and all interested were invited to attend. Eighty men and women of the University were present. The theme of the meeting was the Menorah Idea. Mr. Samuel Spring, Harvard, '09, a former member of the Harvard Menorah Society, spoke on "The Menorah and the Community from a Graduate's Standpoint;" Rabbi Edgar F. Magnin of Stockton, now a graduate student in the University, spoke on "The Menorah and the Rabbinate," and the chief speech of the evening was delivered by Dean D.B. Barrows on "The University and the Menorah." Professor Barrows greatly approved of the organization and characterized the California Menorah Society as the most, useful student organization on the campus. The second general meeting of the Society, held on September 28, was devoted to the topic of Immigration. Professor Ira B. Cross, of the University Economics Department and of the State Industrial Accident Commission, delivered an excellent address on "Streams of Immigration, Past, Present and Future." Mr. R. J. Rosenthal, of the California State Commission on Immigration and Housing, spoke a few words on the Jewish side of the question. A selection from Mary Antin's "The Promised Land" was read. Appropriate literary and musical selections were rendered. About fifty-five members were present. On Monday evening, October 12, a Study Circle meeting was held. Rabbi Edgar F. Magnin conducted a discussion on "Dominant Notes in Jewish Poetry." Among the poems read were the Song of Deborah, the 23d Psalm, the Wine Song of Gabirol, selections from Emma Lazarus, and "The Jewish Soldier" and "The Sweatshop" of Rosenfeld. At the general meeting of the Society on Monday evening, October 26, Rabbi Jacob Nieto of San Francisco spoke on "The Modern Viewpoint of the Bible" to an audience of over sixty, including several non-Jews, who were so favorably impressed with the meeting that they declared their intention to be present at future Menorah meetings. Rabbi Nieto's talk stirred up a great deal of discussion among the members. The first chapter of Isaiah and the Song of Moses were read, and there were musical selections. On Monday evening, November 9, Mr. Harry Hart, Assistant City Attorney, led a discussion in the Study Circle on "Early Jewish Philosophers." The last general meeting was held on Monday evening, November 30. Professor William Popper gave a most interesting talk on "Jewish Education," in which he traced the history and methods of Jewish pedagogy through the Biblical, post-Biblical and Talmudic periods. Musical and literary numbers were rendered, the "Menorah Quartet" making its debut at this meeting. The attendance was about sixty, of whom ten were non-Jews. The constitution of the club has been revised to meet the expanding needs of the Society. Three standing committees now exist. The executive committee, composed of the four elected officers and three other members elected by the general body, will be the administrative arm of the club. The club's policy is largely determined by this committee. They decide what business is to be brought before the club members, and they set in motion all innovations looking to the betterment of the club. The membership committee, composed of a chairman, appointed from the three elected executive committee members by the President, and nine other students, selected from the different colleges of the University, has the duty of increasing the membership roll of the Society. This committee began active operations in the summer. California being a State university, its student body is made up almost entirely of residents of California. Hence through the assistance of Rabbis in different sections of the State, the committee has been enabled to get in touch with many of the newcomers to the University this fall. To them, as well as to the old members of this Society, a circular letter was sent. The aims of the Menorah were briefly outlined, and the dates of monthly meetings stated; the office hours and location of several members of the Society during registration were named, and all freshmen were advised to consult with them for any information or aid desired. In this way the committee has been able to reach newcomers at the University and impress them with the Menorah idea before the entrant's viewpoint has been beclouded by any false attitude toward a Jewish organization on the campus. After the college year has begun, the committee scours the campus for those Jewish students who have not yet been enlightened as to the work of the Menorah. The California Society does not bow down before numbers, but it feels that the benefits of the Menorah should be enjoyed by the largest possible number of Jewish students. Upon the third committee, however, the Social committee, which plans the programs, rests the major responsibility for the Club's success. Taking the Harvard plan as a pattern, the California Menorah has created what is for the present called the Menorah Study Circle. This meets bi-weekly. On the other hand, a general meeting of the Society as a whole is held every month. These general meetings are more popular in nature, for the many elements of the Jewish body must here be conciliated, as well as those of non-Jewish faith who are interested in the purposes of the Menorah. Due to the complex and many-sided character of the Jewish student group, a concession to the various interests must be made in the form of a cultural-social program for the evening. Lecturers are secured; informal discussion is encouraged; musical and literary programs are arranged--all, of course, in the effort to present in attractive form such cultural material as the diverse elements in the body of Jewish students can absorb. The Study Circle meetings have a different viewpoint. They are of a more specialized nature. Through them the serious phases of the club's activity are furthered. The personnel of the Circle is made up of those who are seriously interested in the distinctly intellectual work of the Club. The demand for the Study Circle arose spontaneously from these students. A faculty member, or Rabbi, or outside scholar, is occasionally asked to present an address. Discussion follows. Jewish literary, religious, economic and social problems are thus handled. The recent arrival of the Menorah Library has greatly pleased the members. The books will be a great aid in the work of the Society. The attention of all the students in the University is being called to the Library by a statement in the _Daily Californian_ and by other means. Efforts are now being made to introduce a Menorah prize for the best essay on a Jewish subject. LOUIS I. NEWMAN =University of Cincinnati= THE University of Cincinnati Menorah Society was organized on April 25, 1914. Our first task was to place the Society in the right light on the campus, to emphasize the absolutely unsectarian, academic, cultural nature of a Menorah, and the fact that membership is "invitingly open to all the members of the University," irrespective of creed or sex. We accomplished this by continuous announcements in the _University News_, by the open character of our meetings, and by the actual composition of our membership. Though we organized late in the year, we succeeded in having several large meetings at which addresses were delivered by men who are authorities in their respective subjects. At the initial meeting, preliminary to organization, Dr. David Philipson, '83, spoke, and Dean F. W. Chandler of the College of Liberal Arts cordially welcomed the Society. The first meeting after our organization was addressed by Professor Julian Morgenstern of the Hebrew Union College, who spoke on "The Judaism of the Future." Addresses at subsequent meetings were delivered by Mr. A. J. Kinsella of the Greek Department of the University of Cincinnati on "The Greek and the Semite in the World's Civilization;" by Dr. Edward Mack, Professor of Old Testament at the Lane Theological Seminary, on "The Influence of Hebrew Literature on the World's Thought and Literature"; and by Rabbi Louis L. Mann of New Haven, Conn., on "Christian Science and Judaism." These meetings had an average attendance of seventy. Among the meetings held so far this year the most important was on the evening of November 19th. Chancellor Henry Hurwitz of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association delivered an address on the purposes of the Menorah movement, to which President Charles W. Dabney of the University responded, heartily welcoming the Menorah Society to the University and extending a cordial invitation to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association to hold its next annual Convention at the University. (The address of President Dabney is printed above, page 47). Dr. David Philipson spoke on the significance of the Menorah, and lighted a large Menorah on the platform. Music was rendered by the Girls' Glee Club. Dean F. W. Chandler sent the following greeting: "With the modern drift of attention away from the classics and away from the Bible, it behooves those of us who would count as the friends of culture to welcome every effort to stimulate interest in either. The Menorah Societies which are finding a place in our chief universities have assumed a laudable task. They are striving to hold before the minds of the youth of this land the fine ideals of the ancient Hebrew literature. In such efforts they should be encouraged by Jew and Gentile alike. For we are all heirs of Hebrew tradition; we are all brothers engaged in a common undertaking. We believe it to be our duty to learn from the past whatever is best, to the end that we may enrich with that knowledge the present and the future. We welcome therefore all that the Menorah Society can give us of inspiration toward making the most of our heritage. We rejoice that through this agency we may be kept constantly aware of what a great people has contributed to our civilization." The Cincinnati Menorah Society is delighted that the Association has accepted the invitation of President Dabney to hold the next Convention at this University. Preparations are now being made for the Convention and for the entertainment not only of the delegates but of all Menorah men and women who will come. We ardently hope to welcome a large number of our fellow-Menorah members. It will be of interest to relate that, after reading a copy of "The Menorah Movement," Miss E. McVea, Dean of Women and Assistant Professor of English, suggested the following three subjects for twenty-page essays in one of her English classes: "The Contribution of the Jew to Civilization," "The Integrity of the Jewish Race," and "Zionism." Early in the year Mr. Louis D. Brandeis of Boston spoke under the auspices of the Menorah Society at a meeting open to the whole University upon "The New Science of Efficiency"--the subject being chosen at the request of President Dabney. In introducing the speaker President Dabney expressed the indebtedness of the Faculty to the Menorah for the pleasure of having Mr. Brandeis at the University. ABRAHAM J. FELDMAN =College of the City of New York= DURING the past year the Menorah Society of the College of the City of New York has made very important gains. First, in numbers--from 165, reported at the last Convention, we have increased to 327. There are still about 500 Jewish students who are not yet members, and these we intend to gain over. Second, in prestige--from a position of mere toleration we have gradually risen to the position of the recognized and accepted exponent of Jewish culture in the College, and as such we have set the College its standard of a cultural society. Third, in influence--we have inspired a large number of students, including many who for some reason or other have not yet become members, with a lively interest in things Jewish and a serious desire for collegiate Hebrew instruction. At present the College lacks such instruction; but we hope before long to report progress in remedying this condition. Meanwhile we are attracting the favorable attention of a considerable number of the alumni--men who in their college days would not or could not join the Menorah Society. This is indeed remarkable; that old graduates, who never knew the Menorah, should manifest toward it the highest interest and approbation is a most eloquent sign of the influence of the Menorah idea. Our plan for the organization of the graduates as associate members is the same as Harvard's. But their dues are disposed of in a different way: out of the two dollars one goes to our Library Fund, and the other is sent to the Menorah Journal as the associate's subscription, for we feel that this is the best way to keep him in touch with Menorah activities. This system has a further advantage in that it spreads the Journal everywhere. There were held during the past year thirty regular meetings and lectures--one each week. At the meetings the average attendance was 36, at the lectures 155. The principal lecturers were: Professor M. M. Kaplan, "The Menorah Idea"; Professor Richard Gottheil, "Jews in Various Lands"; Mr. Jacob H. Schiff, "Zionism and Jewish Nationality"; Professor A. Marks, "Persecutions of the Jews in the Middle Ages"; Rev. Dr. David de Sola Pool, "Jewish Education"; Professor Israel Davidson, "Hebrew Literature"; Rev. Dr. M. A. Hyamson, "The Mishnah"; Rev. Dr. Harry S. Lewis of London, "The Jews and Democracy"; Rev. Dr. H. P. Mendes, "Traditional Judaism"; Professor Stephen P. Duggan, "Tradition as a Static and Dynamic Force"; Rev. Dr. Stephen S. Wise, "What's Wrong with the Jew?" There were four courses taught. The average attendance at a course was 16. Rabbi Nathan Blechman led the course in "An Extensive Study of the Bible," Professor M. M. Kaplan taught "Essentials of Judaism," and Rabbi Samuel Margoshes gave the course in "Jewish Philosophy and Literature." At the request of a number of students a course in "Elementary Hebrew" was also given for a time. Two social meetings were held during the year. The first was a reception in the vestry rooms of the Temple Beth-el tendered us by the Menorah Society of Hunter College (formerly Normal), in recognition of our help in the organization of their Society. The second was a "smoker" held at the College in the Faculty lunch-room. The guests of the occasion were Professor Israel Friedlaender of the Jewish Theological Seminary, Professor A. J. Goldfarb of the College, and Rev. Dr. D. de Sola Pool. For the first semester this year, four regular Wednesday evening meetings have been scheduled, four public lectures, six study circles, and four courses. The courses--"Modern Movements in Judaism" (one hour), "Elementary Hebrew" (two hours), "Post-Biblical History" (one hour), and an "Extensive Study of the Bible" (one hour)--will be conducted by Rabbis Stephen S. Wise, J. L. Magnes, Max Reichler, Rudolph Grossman, Maurice Harris, C. H. Levy, H. S. Goldstein, and A. Robinson. The study circles, which will meet once a week, under the leadership of Dr. Joseph I. Gorfinkle and Dr. A. Basel, will read the "Essays of Ahad Ha-'Am," Schechter's "Studies in Judaism," the "Book of Job," the "Book of Jeremiah," "Pirke Aboth," and the "Five Scrolls." With the respect and co-operation of the student body, the faculty, and the alumni, the prestige of our Menorah bids fair to increase until, it is hoped, it will not be exceeded by that of any other City College organization. GEORGE J. HOROWITZ =Cornell University= THE Cornell Menorah Society has this year issued a prospectus which has met with much favor among undergraduates, graduates and faculty, and has been very helpful in our work. It contains an explanation of "The Menorah Idea," accounts of the history and activities of both the Cornell Society and the Intercollegiate Association, and the address of President Schurman of November 24, 1913, by which he welcomed the Menorah Society to the University. There is also included, besides the general program for the year, the announcement of the Cornell Menorah prizes. These are three prizes of $25.00 each, offered by the Cornell Menorah Society to all the undergraduates of the University for (1) the best essay on any subject relating to the status and problems of the Jews in any country; (2) the best essay on any subject relating to Jewish literature in English; and (3) the best essay or poem in Hebrew. The first meeting of the year, on October 7, was very successful. It was attended by more than eighty students and several members of the faculty. The meeting was devoted to an exposition of the purposes and ideals of the Menorah movement. Professor W. A. Hurwitz and Professor Hays spoke very enthusiastically of the accomplishments and the hopes of the Cornell Menorah Society. About thirty new members were enrolled, bringing our membership list up to one hundred. This number includes five members of the faculty and about a score of graduates. Several men who had come to the meeting to scoff stayed to enroll. The subsequent meetings have also been well attended. Our organization is gaining greater and greater prestige on the campus. In the plans for this year, the work of study circles has been particularly emphasized. As compared with two circles last year, meeting more or less irregularly, we have at present six circles meeting very regularly and doing really splendid work. More than half of our members are now enrolled in one or several of these circles. The subjects of study are: (1) Elementary Hebrew, (2) Advanced Hebrew, (3) The Bible, (4) Jewish History, (5) Sociological Problems of the Jews, and (6) Zionism. Though we have been feeling very keenly the need of suitable syllabi and text books, each circle has chosen the texts considered most suitable and available for its purpose. Most of the men have bought their own text books, and have subscribed to various Jewish periodicals. Thus, the beginners in Hebrew are using Manheimer as a text; the members of the advanced Hebrew circle are also using the Bible as a text and have each subscribed to the _Hatoren_ (a Hebrew monthly of New York). The Bible circle is also using the Bible as its text, and the Hebrew and Bible circles contemplate procuring jointly several Jewish Commentaries, like those of Rashi and Kimchi, for general reference in the University Library. The circle in Zionism is using Professor Gottheil's book, and the members have each subscribed to _The Maccabæan_. The history circle has recently decided to use Dubnow's Essay as a text. It may be mentioned here that the books of the Menorah Library are receiving very good circulation and the standard reference works, such as Graetz, Ginsburg, Schechter, and others, have been of great value to the members of the study circles in their work. It is hoped that a number of Jewish periodicals may also be made available in the University Library. It is planned to hold meetings of the Cornell Menorah Society in conjunction with one or two other university organizations for several lecturers whom we expect through the courtesy of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. One meeting in particular that is planned for the future may be noted. Annually, in February, occurs what is known as Farmers' Week in Ithaca. During the week thousands of farmers from all over the country visit the College of Agriculture, where a most elaborate program is arranged for their benefit, consisting of lectures, demonstrations, exhibits, and addresses on the various phases of agriculture and country life. Last year, Mr. Joseph M. Pincus, Editor of _The Jewish Farmer_, addressed a large audience under the joint auspices of the Menorah Society and the College of Agriculture on "The Jew as a Farmer." The lecture was illustrated with a fine selection of lantern slides, and the meeting as a whole was very successful. In planning for the coming year, we have tried to emphasize even more strongly than last year our part in the program for Farmers' Week. Mr. Pincus has kindly consented to come again, and probably we shall also have Mr. Leonard G. Robinson, General Manager of the Jewish Agricultural and Industrial Aid Society, who will speak on "Jewish Agricultural Co-operative Associations." We are now trying to make arrangements for our Society to take care of an exhibit which will show by charts, photographs, and other suitable material, the activities of the various Jewish agricultural organizations and the progress of Jewish farmers in America within recent years. It may be of interest to add that as a direct result of the Menorah meeting last year during Farmers' Week, one of the students was appointed by the Extension Department of the College of Agriculture to go out with an "educational train" during the summer and carry on certain extension work among the Jewish farmers of New York State. LEON J. ROSENTHAL =Harvard University= THE opening meeting of the ninth year of the Harvard Menorah Society was held on October 13, 1914. The meeting was the largest in the history of the Society, over 150 men being present. The purposes of the Society were explained to the new men by the officers, and Le Baron Russell Briggs, Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, extended a welcome in behalf of the University. He said in part: "I was present at the foundation of the Harvard Menorah Society in 1906, and was very much impressed by the fine earnestness of the leaders. If I were a Jew, I would be so proud of the history and traditions of my race that I would welcome the opportunity that this Society offers. For this reason I have always taken a great interest in the Menorah Society." The plans for this year include as usual a series of fortnightly lectures by men of learning and prominence. Among the speakers for the first half year are Dr. Cyrus Adler of Philadelphia, Professor Richard Gottheil of New York, Mr. Samuel Strauss of New York, Dr. A. A. Neuman of Philadelphia, Dr. Martin A. Meyer of San Francisco, Dr. D. de Sola Pool and Dr. S. Benderly of New York. In addition, there are planned three study circles, each of which will meet every alternate week. One of these circles is to be devoted to Jewish history, another to the study of the Hebrew language, and the third to the consideration of modern Jewish problems. The prospects for this year are even brighter than ever before. The enthusiasm is as great as it has ever been, and the membership will undoubtedly exceed all past records. It is of interest to note that more and more members of Menorah Societies at other Universities all over the country continue their Menorah activities in our Society when they come to study in the graduate departments of Harvard University. ISADORE LEVIN =Hunter College= THROUGH the influence of the Menorah Society of the College of the City of New York, a Menorah Society was formed at the Normal College of New York (for women), with the approval of the Dean, in May, 1913. Owing to the change of name of the College, it is now known as the Hunter College Menorah. During the first year of its existence, under the leadership of its first President, Miss Selma Blechman, and the hearty support of its members, the corner-stone for its present greater work was laid. A program of lectures was planned to be held on the third Friday of every month. The lectures were to cover the several periods of Jewish history from ancient to modern times. This was done with great success. This year, in addition to the lectures, the Society is planning to give courses in (1) Hebrew, (2) Jewish History, and (3) the Bible. This project has met with the hearty approval of both the President and the Dean, and the Menorah hopes to enter soon upon active work in these subjects. A word about the membership of the Hunter Menorah must be said. When the Society started it had a membership of one hundred, of whom ninety were active members. It now has about twice that number, with an active membership of one hundred. The Society has acquired such repute that students who are not members attend the lectures and are very enthusiastic about them. Indeed, the Hunter College Menorah sees before it a very rosy future. At the recent Bazaar given by the College Athletic Association for the Red Cross Relief Fund, the Society had a booth and sold appropriate articles, like brass Menorahs, books and small Hebrew scrolls, objects of Jewish art, and candy and almonds from Palestine, thus adding a considerable sum to the Fund. Besides, the members have contributed over $100 for Jewish relief in Palestine. JULIA MITCHELL =University of Michigan= IN 1910 a group of Jewish students at the University of Michigan formed a society and assumed the Menorah name. After a rather checkered course of three years, marked by misunderstood ideals and activities not always well-considered, the organization suddenly became more alive to the consideration of the vital problems which had been the ultimate excuse for its existence. A few men, sacrificing personal ambition for the common welfare, spurred the Society on to more serious and genuine work. The rejuvenated Menorah Society enjoyed this period of prosperity only for a few months when a new organization for Jewish spiritual development at the University was formed. It calls itself the Jewish Student Congregation, and its aim, as distinguished from the Menorah goal of cultural research, is purely religious. The weekly prayer meeting, marked by sermon and ceremony, is now offered to the Jewish students in addition to the weekly study circle of the cultural society. However true or untrue may be the oft-repeated statement that the Menorah has blazed the way for the Congregation, it still remains a fact that the new organization was not confronted with the difficulty of gaining a following, such as the parent Jewish society had experienced. Though the attendance of the Congregation shaded off quite considerably the last few months of its first year, there were always enough to show their appreciation by their presence at the services and to guarantee the continuation of the services in the future. One noteworthy fact calls for special mention here--a certain group of students seemed to be more religious than devoted to cultural interests. Only a few of this class, however, were really inspired by a religious zeal; for there were some who expressed this preference because there still rankled in their thoughts the stigma which a few thoughtless pioneers had allowed to attach itself to the Menorah in the early days of its formation. That the Congregation would appeal to a certain number was evident from the first. The Jewish service was fraught with that sociable spirit which became more lacking in the Menorah the more it devoted itself to its primary motives of research and investigation into Jewish history, culture and ideals. Though there unquestionably exists a strong feeling of fellowship in the Menorah, it cannot compare with the atmosphere of fraternalism in a religious meeting. Moreover, the student can come to the Congregation to relax. He can sit back passively and draw inspiration from the service. But a Menorah meeting is virtually a class-room lacking a few formalities. There the student must actively discuss the problems placed before him; he must earnestly dig for the Pierian waters before he can hope to quench his thirst. The average Jewish student comes to Michigan wofully ignorant of matters pertaining to Judaism. Many of them have been reared in small towns, where the efforts of parents to train their children in Jewish ways, if tried at all, barely passes the first two or three pages of the "Siddur"; while those who have been raised in the city are generally the victims of the lax system of Jewish training prevalent there. At the most they have only a superficial knowledge of Jewish culture, of the great Jewish movements of the past and present. The Synagogue or Temple represents to the mind of the average Jewish student all that there is in Jewry; and so, while he will readily and voluntarily support a movement for the establishment of the Jewish church, he will have to be persuaded to help or join an organization devoted to Jewish culture. For in the latter case he must first be made to understand that there are other vital forces in Israel than the Jewish church as it stands to-day in its conventional form. The Menorah at Michigan faces the problem of attracting that element, forming the big majority of the student body, which, though it proudly upholds the high scholastic standard generally credited to the Jewish student, still has its eyes closed and its brains dulled to many of the vital Jewish problems which press for solution. With the co-operation of the Intercollegiate Menorah office, the Society is gradually molding the sentiment of the individual student toward a more intelligent and favorable attitude. That the Menorah is already a vital force on the campus may be seen from the work being done, the zeal and enthusiasm displayed by the officers and members, many of them among the University leaders. Those who formerly scorned or stood aloof, including some who were in the position to mold student sentiment, have begun to show a sympathetic interest, bordering in many instances on actual participation. The Jewish Student Congregation does not conflict in any way with the Menorah Society. There is room for both on the campus. Each has its own purpose. Menorah members participate in the conduct and the services of the Congregation. JACOB LEVIN =University of Minnesota= JUDGING from the interest and enthusiasm displayed at the opening "get together" meeting, arranged especially for the benefit of new arrivals at the University, the Minnesota Menorah seems certain to make this year the most successful in its history. The meeting, which follows an established custom at Minnesota, was well attended by both students and alumni, and enabled both elements to become better acquainted. The early part of the evening was devoted to a general reception; this was followed by a short entertainment, and then a very interesting discussion of Menorah ideals and duties by various members of the faculty and alumni. The plans of the Society this year look more than ever before to an intensive study of Jewish subjects by the students themselves. Although various outside speakers will be asked to address the Society, the bulk of the work will rest with the student body. DAVID LONDON =New York University= THE New York University Menorah Society is unique in its make-up and in the form of its administration. The Society is really two organizations within the one university. This dual composition is necessitated by the division, geographically, of New York University into colleges in the downtown section of New York City, and into colleges in the far uptown section of the Bronx, the distance between these divisions being some twelve miles. It has therefore been found necessary to organize one Menorah Society at University Heights, the Bronx section, and another at Washington Square, the downtown section. Each of these Societies has its own officers, and each is active in its own section. The Executive Councils of both Societies meet jointly as a Board of Governors at least once in two months. This Board directs Menorah work pertaining to the whole University, at the same time considering the problems arising in the work of each Society. The University Heights chapter is the older, having been organized December 22, 1913. Its membership is about 75 at this time, and an increase to 100 is expected by the end of the present academic year. Formed by the zeal of some twenty-five men, and looked upon at its inception with indifference by the college community, it has made itself respected at University Heights and has become, young as it is, an institution in the college life. Its work during the first half-year was directed chiefly to the internal strengthening of the Society, the increasing of its membership and the institution of smooth working machinery of administration. At the same time, however, the Society offered a number of valuable lectures which attracted wide interest. Among the speakers of that half-year may be mentioned Professor Israel Friedlaender, Dr. Madison C. Peters, and Dr. Theodore F. Jones of the faculty. The activities of the University Heights Menorah Society for this year are extensive. It has arranged a program of lectures, among which may be mentioned the following: "The Talmud," by Dr. Clifton H. Levy; "The Jew in English Literature," by Dean Archibald L. Bouton; "The Jews in Medieval Spain," by Dr. D. de Sola Pool; "Conservative Judaism," by Dr. Jacob Kohn; "Historical Beginnings of Christianity," by Dr. A. H. Limouze; "Reform Judaism," by Dr. Isaac Moses. Besides these lectures, some meetings are devoted to discussions by members of such subjects as Zangwill's "Melting Pot," "Zionism," and others of current interest. The Society does not limit its work to these meetings. It conducts regularly, every Thursday evening, classes in elementary Hebrew and in Post-Biblical History, and on Tuesday afternoons a class in Advanced Hebrew and the reading of Hebrew Literature. The Thursday evening class in Hebrew is under the direction of Dr. Max Reichler. The course in History is divided into several periods, and as the course proceeds to a new period in the history a different instructor takes the class. Among the men giving the course are Dr. M. H. Harris, Dr. Reichler, Dr. Moses Hyamson, and Dr. Joseph Gorfinkle. The class in Advanced Hebrew is conducted by Mr. Max Kadushin of the Jewish Theological Seminary. Through the kindness of the Jewish Publication Society of America and the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, and by its own additions, the Society has placed a collection of books in the University library, which, according to the Librarian's statement, is used more frequently than is any other collection of books placed in the library by a society. All these activities have caused favorable interest on the part of the student body, faculty, and college authorities. Aside from these academic efforts, the Society has made its members feel something of a social friendliness toward each other and has brought together men who might otherwise not have come in contact at all. The Society at Washington Square promises an exceedingly good future. At the present writing it is only several weeks old, but it already has a membership of over one hundred and fifty. Judging from the strong beginning it has made, it is bound to become a factor in its section of the University. CHARLES K. FEINBERG =Ohio State University= THE year 1913-14, the fourth year of the Menorah at Ohio State University, proved to be the most successful in its history. In accord with the nature and purpose of our organization, we strove to be academic, sociable and non-sectarian, and accomplished this end, even beyond the expectations of the more optimistic. During the year the Society carried on a lecture course in Biblical History, by Professor Morgenstern, of the Hebrew Union College, in such a creditable manner as to attract attention even outside the University. The lectures of Dr. Israel Friedlaender and Dr. H. M. Kallen met with similar success, and after their lectures at the University they addressed large audiences at our local Temples. The new University library opened its doors this year, and we are greatly indebted to our beloved friend, Mr. Joseph Schonthal, of Columbus, for placing upon the shelves a set of the Jewish Encyclopedia; and to the University, the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, and the Jewish Publication Society for books and periodicals. The trustees of the University considered our proposition for the establishment of a chair in Jewish History and Culture, but it was agreed that conditions were not yet ripe for this move. These several undertakings, in connection with the entertainments, held the members steadily interested throughout the year. The bi-monthly meetings, the programs of which were made up by the members themselves, were inspiring and beneficial. A successful close was marked by a "Farewell Banquet" to the seniors, among whom were several of our best workers--pioneers of our Society. Of the guests present, only our old friend Dean Orton made an address. He was greatly impressed with the work of our Society, and assured us that the faculty is in full sympathy with our aims. With the passing of a good year we are looking forward to a still better one, and are predicting a big year for Menorah work. Such men as Dr. J. Leonard Levy, Dr. Washington Gladden, Dr. Moses J. Gries, Prof. I. Leo Sharfman, Dr. David Philipson, and Dr. Louis Wolsey are among the speakers this year. Our program committee has been working up attractive plans, and expect to carry out discussions and studies in Jewish history, literature and problems. The social part of our program is taken care of as the year progresses, and forms only so much of our work as is justifiable to keep the members together. The Ohio State Menorah takes this opportunity of extending its best wishes to the other Menorah Societies and of expressing its perfect readiness to co-operate with them. The members will eagerly welcome the first number of the Menorah Journal, both for its own sake and as a means of strengthening the bonds with the other Menorahs. HENRY GREENBERGER =University of Pennsylvania= OUR Menorah at Pennsylvania has passed through a crisis which for a time threatened its welfare, but happily the present internal condition is healthy and assures the new administration the hearty support of the entire membership. Despite difficulties our work has been successful and varied. Last year fourteen regular meetings were held, some devoted to programs by our own members, others to outside speakers. Among those who addressed us last year were Dr. Cyrus Adler, '83, President of the Dropsie College; Rabbi Henry Berkowitz, Chancellor of the Jewish Chautauqua Society, on the "New Teaching of Religion"; Dr. Henry M. Speaker, Principal of Gratz College, on "Jewish Literature"; Rabbi Haas of the Baron de Hirsch School, on "Woodbine, a Jewish Town"; Dr. Isaac Husik of the Semitic Faculty, on "Philosophic Movements of Medieval Jewry"; and Dr. Henry Malter of the Dropsie College, on "The Written and the Oral Law." In addition to the regular meetings we have been for the past three years conducting a Jewish Discussion Group, led by Rabbi Marvin Nathan of this city, which has proved very popular. The group meets at the noon hour and attracts also non-Menorah men, women students, and liberal-minded non-Jews. This year in order to accommodate the students whose schedules prevent their attending this group, we expect to institute another to be conducted either like the present or in such a way as to utilize the services of the Rabbis and other prominent Jews of Philadelphia. Our policy this year concerning new members differs decidedly from that of the past. While we are by no means more restrictive or exclusive than heretofore, we feel that the method of "rushing" men into membership is psychologically wrong. It cheapens the organization in the eyes of non-members and thereby defeats its own end. Instead of attempting to cajole freshmen into joining, we shall endeavor to attract the serious-minded men on the campus by the quality of our programs and the variety of our activities. With the strong men in, the others will follow, and in this way our membership will be one of both quality and quantity. Another innovation this year will be the acceptance of women students as members. The attitude of the University toward mixed membership in organizations that meet on the campus has been unfavorable and as a result women students have been admitted only to the Discussion Group and to public meetings. Their wholesale application for admission into the Society, however, prompted us to intervene in their behalf, and in view of the seriousness of our purpose the authorities consented to make the exception. Hereafter, therefore, we shall be able to offer membership, on an equal footing, to all students. Although our attention this year will be directed mainly to intensive work, the Menorah will continue to act unofficially as the medium between the Jewish students here and local communal activities. In a quiet way, also, we intend to exert our influence upon local Jewish organizations so as to induce them to take a more active interest in Jewish affairs. They will be invited to attend our public meetings and assistance will be offered them in arranging programs along Jewish lines. We shall further offer to furnish them with speakers from among our members. A real need of our Menorah, and probably of other Menorahs, is some extra incentive to induce the writing of Jewish papers. The establishment here of a Menorah Prize would, we feel confident, work wonders in stimulating interest in Jewish problems. We look forward to the early filling of this need. Of our work this year we are very optimistic. Several papers have already been prepared by members and others are promised. A number of notable men, including Provost Edgar F. Smith, of our University, and Professor David W. Amram, '87, of the Law Faculty, will give us addresses. We are in addition organizing a Menorah Orchestra with the idea primarily of presenting to the public the best Jewish music, and we hope in this way to combine business with pleasure. JACOB RUBINOFF =Penn State College= THE Penn State Menorah was organized on April 27, 1913. Our activities from the beginning were characterized by a willingness on the part of the members to devote a great deal of their time to the mapping and carrying out of our weekly program. The significant fact that the Society has held forty talks during the past year, most of which were delivered by its members, is in itself proof of the conscientiousness and devotion that the men of Penn State bring to the Menorah Society. As is quite natural, our organization did not at first strike all the Jewish students as something worth while, but in a comparatively short time we found that ninety per cent. of the Jewish students of the College were members, and that our attendance for the past year averaged thirty-five out of a possible forty. Our meetings are held every Sunday morning from ten to twelve o'clock. Our constitution states that any member who absents himself for three consecutive meetings without a legitimate excuse is automatically expelled. Thus far no man has been expelled. Members of the Menorah Society are excused from the chapel by the Dean, provided they attend all the Menorah meetings. Our Society has also striven to get desirable lecturers. Owing to our limited treasury, we must depend upon the Intercollegiate Association for support, else we can make but very little headway. The Menorah Library has proved a big boon, for practically every man is making use of the books for his own reading and in the preparation of papers for our meetings. We were very fortunate in having been offered the services of Professor O. F. Boucke as a lecturer for the Society and as teacher of a special course of study on the Old Testament. Professor Boucke's assistance is bound to add materially to the prestige of the Menorah on the campus. At an early meeting this year we had a most interesting and inspiring talk by President Sparks, who is taking a deep interest in the Menorah movement. It is our belief that the Menorahs in colleges and universities that are isolated from the large cities (a good example of which is Penn State) are bound to have by far the greater success, because the students enjoy more opportunity of being together and doing more things in common. In our Menorah Society the Jewish students find their chance not only to study things Jewish in common, but to come together and exchange their thoughts on all subjects in which they are interested. M. TRUMPER =University of Texas= THE Menorah Society closed a successful year with a banquet held May 18, 1914, at the Hotel Driskill, Austin. In addition to forty-three students and faculty members, there were present four honored guests: Dean W. J. Battle of the University of Texas, Rabbi Henry Cohen of Galveston, and Messrs. J. Koen and N. Davis of the Austin Jewish community. The opening address was delivered by the President of the Society, Mr. L. W. Moses, who traced the growth of the Menorah Society of Texas from its beginning in 1907 through its affiliation with the Intercollegiate organization and its consequently renewed vigor. Dean Battle, as head of the department of Greek in the University, spoke on "Hellenism and Hebraism," discussing the essential principles of the two cultures and comparing their influence on modern civilization. Mr. H. J. Ettlinger of the University Faculty elected as his subject, "The Menorah in Its Relation to Other Student Activities," and he elaborated on the many reasons why the Jewish student should select the Menorah Society as one of his extra-curricular activities. Rabbi David Rosenbaum of Austin and also of the University faculty, taking excellent advantage of his position as a representative of both the University and the community, gave an instructive talk on "What Judaism Expects of the Student." Rabbi Henry Cohen, speaking eloquently on "Judaism as a Factor in Modern Life," took up each one of the Ten Commandments and summarized their influence on society to-day. A poem written especially for the occasion was read by Mr. Israel Chasmin, and piano selections were rendered by Miss Beatrice Burg and Miss Minna Rypinski. The program closed with the installation of officers for the year 1914-15. We lost ten members by graduation last June, but our membership has none the less increased on account of the greater number of Jewish students at the University this year. The opening meeting of the year was attended by fifty out of the fifty-eight Jewish students. In enthusiasm it resembled a football rally, and the new students caught the spirit of the occasion. Since then a number of other meetings have been held, with an average attendance of forty. At the first meeting, Professor L. M. Keasby of the Department of Institutional History gave an eminently just interpretation of Jewish history from the point of view of the economic development of mankind. At the next meeting, Israel Chasmin reviewed Dubnow's Essay on Jewish History. At the last meeting, Rabbi J. Bornstein of Houston, Texas, spoke on Jewish Music. We are looking forward to an illustrated lecture by Professor Gideon of the Department of Architecture on "The Architecture of the Synagogue, Past and Present." Through the fund for local speakers which we are raising and through the aid of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, we hope to have a speaker at least every month for the rest of the year. The Menorah Library which we have received through the Intercollegiate Menorah Association is greatly appreciated by the University and will be of much help in the work of the Society. H. J. ETTLINGER =University of Washington= IN the summer of 1913 several Jewish students met and discussed the feasibility of organizing a Jewish society on the campus. As a result, a meeting was called at the Y. M. H. A. rooms in the first week of the 1913-14 semester. Cards for the meeting had been sent to all men students known to be Jews. There was an enthusiastic discussion of the purposes of the meeting, and it was decided to effect a permanent organization, which should include the Jewish women students as well, and to begin active work. Our purposes were then somewhat different from what they are at present. We felt that if our union could bring about a better understanding between the various Jewish elements in the city of Seattle and throughout the State of Washington, we should be accomplishing something worth while. The fact that the student body itself was composed of these various elements would aid us, it was believed, to bring that result about speedily and effectively. And so members of the Menorah Society joined the Jewish lodges in Seattle, Jewish synagogues, and the "Modern Hebrew School," so that they might effect their objects both from within as individual members and from without as the Menorah Society. Our members volunteered to teach at the Modern Hebrew School, an orthodox institution, one day in the week. The offer was accepted gladly and greatly appreciated. At the same school, a class was conducted by one of our members for the instruction of Jewish men in the fundamentals of citizenship, and over twelve of this class passed the examinations and secured their citizenship papers. Another member organized an athletic club among Jewish boys, and still another member did much valuable work at the Settlement House. At the meetings of the Society, which were held in the quarters of Jewish organizations downtown and at members' homes, papers bearing on Jewish questions were read. During the past summer it was felt that by affiliating with the Intercollegiate Menorah Association greater impetus would be given to our Society, and steps have already been taken for admittance into that body. President Henry Landes of the University has expressed, I believe, the favorable attitude of the whole University toward the Society, as shown in the letter quoted below. This year we shall devote more time to the study of Jewish culture and ideals. A course of lectures is being arranged which will bring noted Jewish men of the Pacific Coast to our University. It is hoped also that we may have the benefit of speakers from the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. Of course, the work we began last year down town will be kept up, but it will now be done unofficially. EIMON L. WIENIR _From a Letter of Acting President Henry Landes of the University of Washington to the Chancellor of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association:_ "In behalf of the University it gives me great pleasure to endorse this movement and to assure you of the satisfactory university standing of the students who are members of the local society. The scholarship of the students is good, several of the number having obtained highest grades in most of their studies. I feel sure that the organization in every way is worthy of recognition by the Intercollegiate Menorah Association and that such recognition will be of great assistance to these and other students in the formation and conservation of the culture and ideals of the Jewish people. The University recognizes the large debt modern culture owes to these ideals and feels assured that the Menorah organization among us will be of the greatest assistance in keeping alive a keener consciousness of this fundamental part of our civilization. "The University will be glad to assist the Association by permitting it to use University rooms for its meetings, under the usual regulations governing the use of rooms by student associations. "Personally I shall be glad to co-operate in any way I can to make the work of the local Society successful. "HENRY LANDES, "_Acting President_" =University of Wisconsin= TO have the student members of the Society furnish the largest part of the program has been the policy of the Wisconsin Menorah for the past two years. Because of its advantages, the same policy has been adopted for the current year. In the past, the programs have been of a diverse nature, many phases of Hebrew life and letters having been touched upon. The program committee has put forth special efforts to assign to members those subjects in which they have special interest. The work of the past year came to a close with a large banquet, at which Professor I. Leo Sharfman, Judge Max Pam of Chicago, and Professor Joseph Jastrow and Dr. H. M. Kallen of the Faculty of the University of Wisconsin gave short talks. Although the Wisconsin Menorah may be said to be still in its infancy, there is no doubt that, with its membership, which includes both men and women, steadily increasing, it will soon be ranked high among the Menorah Societies of the Middle West. FLORENCE J. ELLMAN =Yale University= AT a meeting held soon after the college opening, the Yale Menorah Society inaugurated what bids fair to be a most successful year. President Arthur T. Hadley addressed the meeting (for the address of President Hadley see above, page 45), as did also Professor Charles F. Kent of the Yale School of Religion. Professor Kent said:--"It is a great pleasure for me to face the work of the new year with you, and it is a source of congratulation that the Menorah is no longer an innovation but an established institution at Yale. It seems a pity that Jews do not inherit Hebrew as a birthright, but fortunately the study of Hebrew history and ideals can proceed without this knowledge. "Men must appropriate old ideas and interpret them into the terms of modern life and thought, for in the old we find the germ of the new. It is in Jewish history that we must look for the first true commonwealth or democracy, where the king was chosen by the people and where his authority was derived solely from and rested in the people. This has no ancient parallel, not even in Greece. International peace was also one of the great fundamental teachings of the prophets of Israel. "Religious education is to be traced directly to the Jews,--and this is one of the great needs of America to-day. Not to the Greeks but to the prophets do we turn for religious education. Hebrew sages were the forerunners of the modern religious education movement, for they devoted their time to developing the moral and spiritual ideals and character of the individual. And then the great teacher of Nazareth was a Rabbi, a Jew. The social motif is exceedingly strong throughout Jewish history and literature. Social justice, social service, and the universal brotherhood of man are the dominant ideas in the Old Testament, and they constitute a heritage of priceless value to the world and to our country to-day. "All success and joy to you in your work, for the Menorah fills a large gap in the life of the University." We hold lecture meetings fortnightly. Among the speakers thus far have been Professor Richard Gottheil of Columbia University and Mr. Samuel Strauss of New York. In addition to these regular meetings study groups have been planned under the direction of Rabbi Louis L. Mann of the Temple Mishkan Israel of New Haven. Mr. Norman Winestine who was last spring elected President for this year has been awarded a fellowship at the Dropsie College of Philadelphia and has therefore left the University. Mr. Charles Cohen has been chosen President to take Mr. Winestine's place. R. HORCHOW Notes Of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association _Third Annual Convention_ The Third Annual Convention of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association took place at the University of Cincinnati on Wednesday and Thursday, December 23 and 24, 1914. A report will be published in the next number of the Journal. _Menorah Prize Awards_ The Harvard Menorah Society Prize of $100, established by Mr. Jacob H. Schiff of New York, was awarded last May to Henry Epstein, '16, for an essay on "The Jews of Russia." The judges were Professor David Gordon Lyon of Harvard, chairman; Professor William R. Arnold of Harvard, and President Solomon Schechter of the Jewish Theological Seminary. This is the seventh award of the Harvard Menorah Society prize since its foundation in 1907-8. (For the list of previous awards, see _The Menorah Movement_, 1914, page 102.) The Wisconsin Menorah Society Prize of $100, established in 1911-12 by Mr. Julius Rosenwald of Chicago, was awarded for the first time, in 1912, to Marvin M. Lowenthal (adult special student in Letters and Science) for an essay on "The Jew in the American Revolution." There was no competition in 1912-13, but last year the prize was divided into two equal parts and awarded to Hemendra Kisor Rakshir (senior in Letters and Science) for an essay on "The Jews and the Interest Rate in Angevin England," and Percy B. Shostac (senior in Letters and Science) for an essay on "A Short Survey of the Modern Yiddish Stage." The prize for 1913-14 was awarded again to Marvin M. Lowenthal for an essay on "Zionism." The Committee of Award consists of Professor R. E. N. Dodge, chairman, Professor E. B. McGilvary, and Professor M. S. Slaughter, of the University of Wisconsin. The chairman has stated that the Menorah prize is the best prize offered by the University of Wisconsin. The Michigan Menorah Society Prize of $100 was established in 1912 by Mr. Julius Rosenwald of Chicago, but was not awarded the first year. Last year three prizes of $50 each were awarded, one to Paul Blanshard, '14, for an essay on "The Approach of Reformed Judaism to the Unitarian Movement in the United States," one to Miss Judith Ginsburg, '15, for an essay on "Disintegrating Forces in Contemporary Jewish Life," and one to Miss Sadie Robinson, '15, for a general discussion of Jewish problems upon the text of Proverbs 30, 13. The judges were Professor Robert E. Wenly, chairman, and Professor I. Leo Sharfman of the University of Michigan, and Rabbi Leo M. Franklin of Detroit, Mich. _Cornell Menorah Prizes_ The Cornell Menorah Society offers this year the following prizes to the undergraduates of the University: a prize of $25 for the best essay on any subject relating to the status and the problems of the Jews in any country; a prize of $25 for the best essay on any subject relating to Jewish literature in English; and a prize of $25 for the best essay or poem in Hebrew. The judges will be Professor Nathaniel Schmidt of Cornell University, chairman; Professor M. M. Kaplan of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and Professor I. Leo Sharfman of the University of Michigan. _Gift from the Harvard Menorah Society_ The Harvard Menorah Society has made a gift of $50 to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. The sum is taken from the Associate Membership Fund of the Society. This Fund consists of the dues of associate members (graduates), "which shall be used exclusively for the substantive work of the Society" (Harvard Menorah Constitution, Article IV, section 4). The control of this Fund is in the hands of an advisory committee, consisting of the President of the Society and two associate members designated by the Executive Council of the Society. * * * * * Transcriber's Notes: Page 14, "Ayran" changed to "Aryan" (of the Aryan peoples) Page 35, "Judea" changed to "Judæa" (muse of Judæa) Page 44, "ony" changed to "only" (Not only have the) This text uses both to-day and today. THE MENORAH JOURNAL VOLUME I APRIL, 1915 NUMBER 2 [Illustration] For Small Mercies BY ISRAEL ZANGWILL Thinking of Poland and her tortured Jews, 'Twixt Goth and Cossack hounded, crucified On either frontier, e'en the Pale denied, Wand'ring with bloodied staff and broken shoes, Scarred like their greatest son with stripe and bruise, Though thrice a hundred thousand fight beside Their Russian brethren and are glorified By death for those who flout them and abuse,-- I suddenly was touched to thankful tears. Not that one wave had ebbed of all this woe, Not that one heart had softened in "the spheres"[A] One touch of bureau-malice to forego, But that amid blind eyes, dumb mouths, deaf ears, One voice in England[B] said these things were so. [Illustration: Signature: Israel Zangwill] FOOTNOTES: [A] Only permissible form of Russian reference to the Tsar and his Counsellors. [B] The London _Nation_. From Across the Seas _From Dr. Max Nordau_ _Madrid, Spain_ [Illustration] I hail most cordially the appearing of THE MENORAH JOURNAL with the noble and impressive program which you develop. It shows your consciousness of the new duties of the rich, free and powerful American Jewry, your readiness to assume fully the moral responsibilities which your privileged position imposes upon you, and your comprehension of the needs of the present hour. Your journal seems the promising beginning of that organization in which we are so sorely wanting and without which we will achieve nothing in the forthcoming deep transformations of the old world. [Illustration: Signature: Dr. M. Nordau] _From Dr. Moses Gaster_ _Chief Rabbi (Haham) Spanish and Portuguese Congregations of the British Empire_ [Illustration] I am glad to see that you have brought out again the Menorah from the corner into which it had been thrust, that you have polished up the old candlestick, nay, even more, that you have trimmed the wick and poured the oil into the cup, that you are kindling a light which is to dissipate the darkness spiritual, more dangerous, more terrible than darkness physical. What our people really want is to be able to see that light of truth, that light of hope, of humanity, of knowledge, of idealism, which has been ours through the ages. We have never allowed our lamp to be extinguished, whether it burned in a remote corner in the ghetto, smoky, ill trimmed, even evil smelling; still there was the light sufficiently strong to illumine the pages of the Torah and the Talmud, even the pages of the writers of philosophy and science. It was quite sufficient if one lamp was kept alight. This is the greatness and the beauty of it,--that from one, one can kindle a thousand. There is no limit to which the light cannot reach and there will be no limit, I hope, to the light which you will now spread. It will reach the remotest corner of the universities and schools of learning, nay, even more, it will bring everywhere a measure of knowledge and of truth, and above all it will illumine and warm. It will reach the eyes of those who have hitherto refused to see the beauty of their own past and the greatness of their own future. They may then learn to live in the present by the teaching of the past and by the hope of the future. Make both known. In conclusion, I can only express the wish that you keep steadily and exclusively to Jewish questions, Jewish problems, Jewish learning. Make your readers know what they can find in Jewish literature and make the students of the various universities realize that in the libraries of Europe and America there are vast treasures accumulated which await the hand and the heart of the Jewish scholars. There are great and grave problems which await solution and the field is unlimited. Let them begin to till the ground of our own field, and turn the furrows and sow the seed, and the golden harvest is sure to repay them for their labor in the service of love and truth, and above all of devotion to Judaism. [Illustration: Signature: M. Gaster] _From Norman Bentwich_ _Professor of International Law, School of Law, Cairo, Egypt_ [Illustration] You are indeed happy in the moment of your appearance. I am not of those who regard this world war as a terrible catastrophe. I can see in it with God's grace the preparation of a great uplift of humanity and especially the coming of redemption for Israel. But the more glorious the vision of the future the greater the need of light, and more light, to illuminate the present and to enable the young generation to advance steadily towards the vision and make it reality. That is what I believe the function of THE MENORAH JOURNAL to be, and your first number is an earnest of the sincerity of your aim and the goodness of your means. The Jewish people stand on the brink of a new era in which they are to resume their true function of the spiritual teacher of mankind. And American Jewry, it is a truism to say, has a vital and a leading part to play in moulding the destiny of the Jewish people. So we may adapt the old Rabbinic saying: "He who saves the soul of a single Jewish student is as though he saved the world." THE MENORAH JOURNAL in holding up the light of the Jewish spirit to the young men and women of America is doing the work of humanity. May I express the hope that the Menorah Societies will direct the gaze of their members to the land of promise and the land of the prophets, where the inspiration of Judaism has always come and whither the hopes of Jewry have always turned. Living as I do, in the reflection of Palestine as well as in the shadow of the Pyramids, I am very conscious of the need for a continued Passover from the ideas of the various Egypts that beset the Jewish people to the message that calls us, in spirit if not in body, to the land of our fathers. To-day in Palestine the light has begun to shine brightly again. Judaism has relit there its prophetic lamp, which in centuries of stress and darkness has never been permitted to fade away altogether. In our own time the Menorah has been re-established in the Temple of the land by a new band of Maccabees. But a single branch, so to say, of the seven branches as yet shows its clear light. But if the Jewish youth wills it, the whole Menorah may be lighted and shine full and clear to the world with fresh lustre. In our day there may be a new Hanukka, a rededication of the Hebraic light--if only we will it. [Illustration: Signature: Norman Bentwich] The Jewish Problem Today BY JACOB H. SCHIFF [Illustration: _JACOB HENRY SCHIFF (born in Frankfort-on-the-Main, Germany, in 1847, came to America in 1865), one of the world's leading bankers (senior member of Kuhn, Loeb & Co., New York), and a prince of philanthropists, noted for his personal devotion and munificent gifts to many causes for human betterment. He was among the first to encourage and befriend the Menorah movement, founding in 1907 the annual Menorah Society Prize at Harvard. The present article forms the approved substance of an interview granted by Mr. Schiff to the Editors of The Menorah Journal on March 4, 1915. Mr. Schiff's statement regarding the need for a separate Jewish Relief Fund is given special significance by the fact that he is Treasurer of the American Red Cross._] It is hardly possible to exaggerate the horrors of the Jewish conditions in the war-stricken countries, especially in the three Polands. According to the reports we get, conditions in Russian Poland are such that Belgium's plight is a mere _bagatelle_ in comparison. The Jewish people there have been outraged in the most terrible manner, both by the Poles who denounced them to the Russians as enemies and spies and then by the Russians themselves, who treated them as such. It is only after the Russian armies are forced to leave that the Jews are given protection by the Germans. In saying this I do not want to be misjudged, for it is well known that I am a German sympathizer. But the fact is that the Russians and the Poles alike have been inhumane to the Jewish population. According to the latest reports, the conditions are not being improved in any way. And the relief so far has been entirely inadequate. It has never been adequate. We need millions for the immediate relief of our brethren, and so far only about half a million has been forthcoming from American Jews. This in spite of the fact that all parties and factions in Jewry are acting together in the work of relief, except only one organization, the B'nai B'rith, and for this there is some reason, because the B'nai B'rith have their own lodges abroad and they want evidently to apply their relief to their own members first. "_We Must Have a Jewish Relief Fund of Our Own_" We must have a Jewish Relief Fund of our own in addition to the Relief Funds for other people in the war-stricken countries, because the Jewish problem forms everywhere a problem of its own. It would be rather hard to say whether, were it not for the specific Jewish Relief Fund, the Jews would get as much relief as the other suffering people, but there is very little doubt that the Jews in the war-stricken districts, especially in Poland, have suffered a great deal more than the rest of the population. The Jews, therefore, need more relief, particularly as the civilian population has been against them. Beyond the immediate measures for relief we can for the present do nothing. We must act from day to day. As the war goes on we must simply keep on trying to relieve the distress. As to what is in store after the war, I am unable to form a picture, at least so far as Russia is concerned. The hope is expressed that when peace is restored Russia will do better than heretofore for her large Jewish population. But we have been disappointed so often by Russia's promises that we should believe this only when actually done and not before. I have little confidence at all in the assertion that Russia will mend her way in the future. "_There Is Only One Way to Solve the Jewish Problem in Russia_" There is only one way to solve the Jewish problem in Russia and that is nothing less than the entire removal of the Pale. We must ever demand this and accept nothing else. When the Jew can go where he pleases, and trade where he pleases, and live where he pleases, the Jewish question in Russia will be solved. It is the government, the governing classes, in Russia that create the enmity towards the Jews. I believe there is no people anywhere who have at present or ever had less anti-Jewish feeling than the mass of Russian people. When once the pressure brought by the bureaucracy is removed and the Jews are permitted to have normal relations with the mass of the Russian population all over the country, the Jewish question will be a thing of the past. The situation is different in Poland and Roumania, where the people themselves are anti-Semitic. It may appear strange at first that there should be such a difference between the Polish people and the Russian people in their attitude towards the Jews in their midst. But it may be easily explained. People who are oppressed generally become narrow by the oppression. The Poles and the Roumanians have had long to suffer from oppression to a great extent, the Poles from Russia and the Roumanians for many years from Turkey, from whose yoke they were freed only a few decades ago. It is generally a fact that when the servant becomes a master he makes the most intolerant master. Even if a Polish autonomous kingdom should be created, it could not be much worse for the Jewish population than it is now. But the Russian people have been happy. They have gotten used to their despotic government and do not feel it in particular, and they have little prejudice against their still greater oppressed Jewish neighbors. The great numbers of Jews who have gone into the war and are fighting heroically will, I have no doubt, make a convincing demonstration of Jewish patriotism in every country, and that should make for an improvement of Jewish conditions all over, except possibly in Russia. "_I Am Afraid England Has Been Contaminated By Her Alliance With Russia_" But I am afraid that England too has been contaminated by her alliance with Russia, because England doesn't want to do anything that is displeasing to her ally, more through fear to offend her than through respect for her. So far, at least, it has not come true, as it was hoped in certain quarters, that England might apply pressure upon Russia to obtain an improvement in the condition of the Jews. And unfortunately the conditions in England itself affecting the Jews are certainly not as good now as they have been formerly. England has always been our great friend. In England there existed no such thing as anti-Semitism. But now there are, I fear, signs of a change. In Germany the Jews do not suffer. They have a high standing and occupy many high positions. There has, it is true, always been a certain anti-Semitic tendency in Germany. But I think this war will crush out most of that, in fact all class differences. I am quite convinced that anti-Semitism in Germany is a thing of the past. "_When Peace Negotiations Begin, We Should Take United Action_" What part America and the American Jews should play in the efforts to bring about a permanent betterment of Jewish conditions elsewhere, it is hard to say. America has already gone pretty far by breaking off commercial treaty relations with Russia. Whether the United States could or should go further is difficult to judge at this time. It is certainly clear that the solution of the Jewish problem in Russia along the lines already suggested would solve the passport problem and would pave the way for the resumption of regular treaty and commercial relations between the two countries. I do not think there is anything to do now for the Jews and for Jewish bodies in America except to work harmoniously together in the raising of relief funds. Of course, we must always be on the alert and ready to take a definite position whenever the proper time arrives. But not now. When peace negotiations begin to be talked about, I think it will be well for such bodies as the American Jewish Committee, possibly the B'nai B'rith and other organizations, to take united action. What action they should take it is hard to say. It is a very difficult question to decide at this moment whether or not it would be advisable to have special Jewish representatives present at the peace negotiations to look after the specific Jewish interests. Whatever influence should be brought to bear at the proper time should originate with the American Jewish Committee, which is the most suitable unifying Jewish agent in America to-day. "_Arouse the Jews of America From Their Apathy_" For the present, however, I repeat, what we need is to raise relief funds to a much larger extent than we have done so far. There has been too much apathy among the American Jews. They have done much less than at the time of the Kishineff massacres, when almost a million and a half was raised. Now, with conditions infinitely worse, we have thus far not been able to raise half as much as was readily given then. Unfortunately we have become used to horrors and they do not touch us any more as deeply as they should. Moreover, we have weighty and costly problems of our own at home. We have to expend such enormous sums for home problems that American Jewry seems unable to bear much more. But notwithstanding this more must be forthcoming. We Jews must give until it hurts, until it really becomes self-sacrifice; we must stir up our people to the terrible condition of our brethren abroad. And the Menorah Societies, which represent the most intelligent and idealistic Jewish youth of the land, should do their share in making known the tragic conditions and in arousing the Jews of America from their apathy. [Illustration: Signature: Jacob H. Schiff] Nationality and the Hyphenated American BY HORACE M. KALLEN [Illustration: _HORACE MEYER KALLEN (born in Silesia, Germany, in 1882, came to America in 1887), studied at Harvard (A. B., Ph.D.), Princeton, Oxford, and Paris. He has been assistant and lecturer in philosophy at Harvard, instructor in logic at Clark University, and since 1911 of the faculty of philosophy at the University of Wisconsin. At the request of the late William James, he edited his unfinished book on "Some Problems of Modern Philosophy." Besides contributing to philosophical and general periodicals, Dr. Kallen is the author of a recently published book on "William James and Henri Bergson." Dr. Kallen was one of the founders of the Harvard Menorah Society, and has rendered signal service, both by tongue and pen, to the Menorah movement._] The United States of America are at peace with all the world. Our government is not taking sides in the great war; officially we are the friends of all the embattled powers. And yet--we have but to take up any newspaper, anywhere in America, to find violent praise of one side, violent blame of the other. The sentiment of our country is divided. On all sides, our diverse populations are emphasizing afresh their European origins and background. The German in German-American, the Slav in Slavic-American, the Briton in British-American, have awakened, have become demonstrative and emphatic. The President, observing this, has declared his official and personal boredom with the "hyphenated American," and the conception expressed in this phrase has become an issue in the written and spoken discourse of our country. Why, in an officially neutral country, has this come to pass? When we look closely to the ground and principle of the division of sentiment in our population, we discover this significant fact: the division is not truly determined by the merits of the European issue; it is determined by the lines of our population's European origin and ancestral allegiance. The Americans of German and Austrian and Magyar ancestry are pro-German; those of French or British or Russian ancestry favor the Allies. Only the Jews seem to be an exception to this rule. Being mainly from Russia, their favor should go to the Russians, but their newspapers, almost without exception, favor the Germans. The case of the Jews, however, is an exception that proves the rule. Although the majority of them came from Russia, they have had no part in the Russian polity; they have been oppressed, persecuted, terrorized, as their brethren still are in Russian territory. As Americans, what portion and what hope have they in Russia that they should desire Russian victory? None. But they are not for this reason in favor of Germany. The headlines of their newspapers do not celebrate German victories, but Russian defeats. The Ghetto's partiality to Germany is a consequence of its loyalty to Jewry. Kinship of blood and race, ancestral allegiance, determine with the Jewish masses in America also, what side they take in this war. Although they have no political background in Europe, and their civil allegiance is absolutely American, they too are hyphenated in sentiment--Jewish-Americans. Such is the fact. Its significance lies in what it reveals, and what it reveals is a force much deeper and more radical, distinctly more primitive and original, than anything else in the structure of society. It hyphenates English and Germans and Austrians and Russians and Turks no less than it hyphenates Americans, and, in the failure of the external socio-political organization of Europe to give it free play, it is the chief, almost the only, cause of the present unendurable European tragedy. Its name is nationality. _Two Mosaics of Nationalities: A Contrast_ Nationality is not nationhood, although it is the most important constituent of nationhood. Many nationalities may compose a nation (such is the case of the British, Russian, Austro-Hungarian and Turkish Empires, of the Swiss Republic, of our own Union), and then the relation between the nationalities will determine the strength or the weakness of the nation. Again, a single nationality may be divided among many nations (such is the case of the Poles, of the Serbs and other Slavs, of the Jews), and then the stability of the nations will be largely determined by their effect on the nationalities divided among them. The Swiss Republic, for example, is a nation composed of three nationalities, two of which belong to powers at war with each other. These are the French and the German; the third is the Italian. Yet the nationhood of Switzerland is the most integral and unified in Europe to-day, because Switzerland is as complete and thorough a democracy as exists in the civilized world, and the efficacious safeguard of nationhood is democracy not only of individuals but of nationalities. The German, French and Italian citizens of the Swiss Republic are to-day under arms to defend the neutrality of their nation from possible violation by German, French or Italian belligerents, and in defending their nation, they are defending also the autonomy of each other's nationality. In Switzerland, nationhood, being democratic, is the safeguard and insurance of nationality. Contrast Swiss nationhood with Austro-Hungarian nationhood. Austria-Hungary is the immediate and direct occasion of the great war by reason of the fact that, although she is a mosaic of nationalities like Switzerland, her government, instead of being a democracy, has in the long run been directed toward the control and exploitation of many nationalities by one or two. Hungary contains a population of seven million Magyars among twelve million Slavs; yet the Hungarians, having the economic and political upper hand, have sought to Magyarize by force and trickery this almost doubly greater and culturally equal population. They have tried to compel Magyar forms and standards in language, in literature, in history, the arts, the sciences, religion, law, in every intimate or remote concern of the daily life and national genius of their Slavic subjects. The result has been the steady disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian mosaic, the increasing use of force to hold it together, the corresponding increase of restlessness among the subject-peoples, plot and counterplot, the assassination of the Archduke, and the attack on Serbia, which precipitated the war. In this war Austria has come off worst of all the combatants, and for the same reason: the attempt to maintain the unity of a nation of nationalities by the force of one of them instead of by the democratic coöperation of all. In Austria-Hungary, nationality, having been exploited and suppressed, has been the enemy and destroyer of nationhood. _America A Commonwealth of Nationalities_ In this country the whole spirit of those institutions which constitute American nationhood makes for the liberation and harmonious coöperation of nationalities. This spirit is also a part of the Hebraic spirit, a part of the explicit program of our prophets, those champions and vindicators of social justice and international righteousness and peace; and this, significantly, is the spirit that literally inspired the democracy of our America. For the democracy of America had its first articulate voicing in the Pilgrim Fathers and the Puritans of New England. These men and women, devoted to the literature of the Old Testament, and upheld by the ancestral memories of the Jews, were moved to undertake their great American adventure by the ideal of nationality. It was not because of an overwhelming oppression of body and soul that the Pilgrims adventured to America. It was not "freedom to worship God" that they sought. They had that in Holland. They sought freedom to be themselves, to realize their national genius in their own individual way. Their English manners, English speech, English history, and English loyalty were, in fact, more important to them than their Hebrew Bible. They used that as the spiritual pabulum which nourished their English corporate life. Their Calvinism was a reinterpretation of its prophetic nationalism expressed in the doctrine of the "chosen people"; their political institutions were a modification of the ideal political order it was supposed to reveal. As Cotton Mather narrates, his grandfather, John Cotton, found, on his arrival in New England, that the population was much exercised over the framing of a "civil constitution." They turned to him for help, begging "that he would, from the laws wherewith God governed his ancient people, form an abstract of such as were of a moral and lasting equity." So "he propounded unto them an endeavor after a theocracy, as near as might be to that which was the glory of Israel." Out of this beginning the democratic mood of America surges; in such conceptions the ideals which express the mood have their origins. These ideals are the conservation of nationality, and the equality of men before the inconceivable supremacy of their God. Hebraism and English nationality--these are the spiritual background of the American commonwealth. Political freedom in America has tended to generate self-expression of each national group, and our country is to-day, broadly speaking, a great coöperative commonwealth of nationalities, British, French, German, Slavic, Jewish, each freely developing, in so far as it is self-conscious, its national genius, its language, literature and art in its own characteristic way as its best contribution to the civilization of America as a whole,[C] realizing in this way the ideal of the democracy of nationalities, of international comity and coöperation which our prophets were the first to formulate. American nationhood, thus, is in the way of becoming what Swiss nationhood fully is, the liberator and protector of nationality; its democracy is its strength, and its democracy is "hyphenation." "Hyphenation" may, it is true, become perverse. As an expression of the coöperation of nationality with nationality in the life of the State, it is inevitable and good; as an attempt to subordinate all nationalities to one, to use all for the advantage of one, it is partial, undemocratic, disloyal. Our nation is a democracy of nationalities having for its aim the equal growth and free development of all. It can take no sides. To require it to take sides, German or Anglo-Saxon, Slavic or Jewish, is to be untrue to its spirit and to pervert its ideal. _The Renaissance of Nationality in the Past Century_ It is the attempt of one nationality to dominate and to impose its character, culture and ideals upon others that has been the basis of all the great wars in Europe, of all international injustice from the beginning of history. The movement in modern history which we call progressive has been a movement toward democracy in both the internal affairs and external relationships of nations. Men did not realize its entire significance until the nineteenth century; only then did it come to full consciousness in fact and idea, urged equally in Greece, in Germany, in Ireland, in Italy. Its great voice is the Italian thinker and patriot, Mazzini. In a marvelous essay entitled "Europe, Its Condition and Its Prospects," he wrote, at a time when the hope of social and international democracy seemed extinguished: "They struggled, they still struggle, for country and liberty; for a word inscribed upon a banner, proclaiming to the world that they also live, think, love and labor for the benefit of all. They speak the same language, they bear about them the impress of consanguinity, they kneel beside the same tombs, they glory in the same tradition; and they demand to associate freely, without obstacles, without foreign domination, in order to elaborate and express their idea, to contribute their stone also to the great pyramid of history. It is something moral which they are seeking; and this moral something is in fact, politically speaking, the most important question in the present state of things. It is the organization of the European task. In principle, nationality ought to be to humanity that which division of labor is in a workshop--the recognized symbol of association; the assertion of the individuality of a human group called by its geographical position, its traditions and its language, to fulfill a special function in the European work of civilization." Modern Europe saw the overthrow of the Holy Roman Empire, of the imperial aspirations of Louis XIV, and of Napoleon before it realized the natural fact and moral principle which underlay these overthrows, and which finally so successfully asserted themselves as to unify Italy and cast off the Austrian dominion, to liberate Greece, Bulgaria, Roumania and the other Balkan States from the Turk, to unify and create contemporary Germany. The last quarter of the nineteenth century saw the renaissance, often in the face of overwhelming suppression, of the language and cultures of Czechs, Bohemians, Poles, Irish and Jews. It saw the rise of nationalism in the Oriental dependencies of Great Britain. It saw the beginning of an acknowledgment of the full rights of nationalities by both Austria and Great Britain, the grant of local autonomy to the various nationalities in the Austrian Empire, of progressive home rule to India and South Africa and Ireland. The twentieth century seemed to be moving peacefully toward the fulness of democracy--when came the war. _The Present War: Nationality vs. Imperialism_ Let no one be deceived into believing that this war is a struggle for the economic domination of the world, springing from commercial rivalry and industrial intrigue. No. Nothing is so international as economic life--we in America know that now to our own cost also--and if commercial interests and capitalistic counsels had had their say, there would have been no war. England was Germany's best customer, France her great creditor, Russia supplied her with unskilled labor. The socialist international was against war, the peace party was against it, the intelligence of the world was against it. When it came, it shattered all these international organizations into national units, it smashed the solidarity of even science and art, which are the most international enterprises in the world. And why? Because its cause was something deeper than economic interest or the other secondary interests. Here is the question that the war is to decide: Is the whole of mankind to be dominated in body and in spirit, without its consent, by a portion of it, and to be compelled "to elaborate and express the idea" of the portion? or is the whole of mankind to be self-governed, in a coöperative commonwealth, each part of which, by elaborating and expressing its own idea, contributes its best to the whole? This is the issue between the warring powers and each claims that it is defending itself against the aggression of its opponents. Each claims to be fighting for democracy. In the face of these claims, history has the deciding voice. Now, historically, England, more than any other power, has stood for the democratic and coöperative idea. Her colonies have autonomy, her more backward dependencies are encouraged toward autonomy. Since the Boer war, when imperialism passed away, she has moved toward the position of Switzerland. Even Ireland has obtained home rule. "We are a great world-wide, peace-loving partnership," said Mr. Asquith,[D] has reiterated again and again the principle for which all the Allies are fighting: believing that "the preservation of local and national ties, of the genius of a people which has a history of its own, is not only not hostile to or inconsistent with, but on the contrary, fosters and strengthens and stimulates the spirit of a common purpose, of a corporate brotherhood," the Allies seek to defend public right, to find and to keep "room for the independent existence and free development of the smaller nationalities, each with a corporate consciousness of its own . . . and, perhaps, by a slow and gradual process, the substitution for force, for the clash of competing ambitions, for groupings and alliances and a precarious equipoise, of a real European partnership, based on equal right and enforced by a common will."[E] It is hard to believe that Russia can be fighting for such an end. Fear of Russian barbarism is what brought Germany into the lists, the Germans declare, to defend western ideals and western democracy. Yet Russian government is Prussian in its organization, and it is on the side of the ideal of western democracy that she is explicitly aligned. The contradiction is striking, and it is still more striking when we recall that in her armies are over a quarter of a million of Jews, and that in the other armies there are half as many more. For the Jews the war is more than civil; it is fratricide. On the face of it they have no inevitable personal or political stake in the war's fortune. England has acknowledged their "corporate consciousness" and given them maximal opportunity for "free self-development"; so has France. Russia has oppressed and horribly exploited them; Germany, though infinitely better than Russia, has set them conditions in which "free development" is synonymous with complete Germanization. Austria and Turkey have dealt with them somewhat after the manner of England and France. The contradiction of the Jewish position outdistances that of the Russian. But both contradictions are resolved in the fact that the ideal in question concerns not Russia alone, nor England alone, nor the Jews alone, but the whole of Europe, the whole world. What is at stake is not something local, personal, political, but a universal principle, the goal toward which mankind has been so slowly and deviously crawling from the beginnings of modern history--the principle of democracy in nationality and nationality in democracy. It is for this that our brethren in the armies are fighting; it is for this that they are undergoing crucifixion in the Pale, for this that our people have suffered and died from the beginnings of our history. Our whole recorded biography is the narrative of a struggle for social justice against the exploitation of class by class within our polity, for nationality against imperialism without. Our statesmen and leaders were the first to formulate the ideal of the coöperative harmony of nationality, and the ideal of international peace.[F] Mr. Asquith is echoing our prophets, and our embattled brethren are engaged in the defence of a principle which is the constituent of the genius of their own nationality. _The Service of Jewish Nationality to Civilization_ The genius of their own nationality! That with all its implications is an issue in the war not only as a principle but as a fact. The Jewish people are the great historic incarnation of the _casus belli_. In fortune and in disaster, through difficult and terrible centuries, they have cherished their language, their history, their culture, have sustained their "corporate consciousness" and in terms of it have served civilization in all the institutions of civilization. Not freely, not by free development; not because of conditions, but in spite of them. The Bible, whose moral vision inspires the world, we gave the world only as we had or yearned for "independent existence" and "free development." Our best, like the best of every people, has been a function of this "independent existence and free development." We also, scattered among the nations, tortured and oppressed by the mighty and the weak among them, are among "the smaller nationalities" for whose sake the war is being fought. With Serbia, with Belgium, with Poland, we claim our public right and our national security, and we claim it not merely for ourselves, but for the service of all mankind. For as we have had a rôle "in the organization of the European task," so we still have a rôle, and in that division of the labor of civilization in terms of nationality we have our task to accomplish, our service to render. This task, this service, is the expression of the Jewish idea, the flowering and fruitage of the Hebraic spirit, which, rooted in our historic past, planted on our national soil, shall realize in modern terms, in social organization, in religion, in the arts and the sciences, a national future that by its inward excellence will truly make Israel "a light unto the nations." The indispensable condition for such a realization is autonomous nationality; not nationhood, necessarily, but autonomy. This, more than civil rights among other nationalities, is our stake in this great war. In the last analysis, the Hebraic culture and ideals which our Menorah Societies study, can be _advanced_, can be a _living_ force in civilization, only as a national force. Our duty to America, inspired by the Hebraic tradition,--our service to the world, in whatever occupation,--both these are conditioned, in so far as we are Jews, upon the conservation of Jewish nationality. That is the potent reality in each of us, our selfhood, and service is the giving of the living self. Let us so serve mankind; as Jews, aware of our great heritage, through it and in it strong to live and labor for mankind's good. [Illustration: Signature: H. M. Kallen] _I think I see in your Society a recognition of the real spirit of our country's motto_, e pluribus unum. _That does not mean a sinking of the differences between us all into absolute uniformity, but rather the harmony that can result from the recognition of these differences and developing our own individualities so that we shall have variety in unity.--From an Address before the Yale Menorah Society by Professor Benjamin W. Bacon of Yale University._ FOOTNOTES: [C] For a fuller treatment of this point compare in the New York _Nation_ for February 18 and 25, 1915, the author's articles on "Democracy Versus the Melting Pot." [D] Cardiff Speech, 2d October, 1914. [E] Dublin Speech, 25th September, 1914. [F] Cf. Isaiah, II, 2-4; XIX, 23-25; XI, 6-9; LXV, 17-25, etc. Yankee and Jew _An After-Dinner Address_ BY G. STANLEY HALL _President of Clark University_ [Illustration: _G. STANLEY HALL (born in Ashfield, Mass., in 1846), President of Clark University, is a leading authority on education and psychology, and author of a number of important books, notably "Adolescence" (2 vols. 1904). The present address, delivered at a recent dinner of the Clark Menorah Society, has been revised by Dr. Hall for publication in The Menorah Journal._] I feel an unwonted embarrassment in speaking to you to-night, first because the light After-Dinner View of Life, which is my theme on your program, is far from being serious enough, and I must totally abandon my plan and speak entirely extemporaneously, although upon a subject in which I have an old and strong interest. Again, I am always embarrassed in talking to members of your race because I feel a little as Napoleon did when he told his soldiers in Egypt that forty generations looked down on them from the top of the Pyramids. You know your ancestry in general back for thousands of years, and I am rarely fortunate in being able to go back as much as nine or ten generations to the Puritans of the "Mayflower," but there I stop and everything before that is a blank. David Starr Jordan tells us in his book that there is perhaps no man alive who has not kings or queens in his ancestry, but adds that we all have had murderers among our predecessors, too. _There Is Much In Common Between Yankee and Jew_ There is much in common between the Yankees, whom I represent, and the Jews, and this alone ought to give us a friendly feeling toward one another. We are both misunderstood and caricatured. The Yankee stands for a peculiar sort of closeness in money matters and a shrewdness which has even given its slang name to a neighboring New England State, the "Nutmeg State." Perhaps we have both done too much in the past to deserve this reputation for super-cleverness. One of you has referred to the fact that there are Jews who do not like to acknowledge their race. In that respect we are alike, for there are many Yankees who are ashamed of being known as such. Long years ago, when I was a student in Germany, I was introduced one evening to a young German countess. She said in her broken English, "I am so glad to meet an American. I have heard you have many funny people there, the Dago, the Paddy, the Nigger, and many more; but I have heard that the lowest people there are what they call the 'damn Yankees.' How I would like to see one of them!" This, bear in mind, was soon after our Civil War, and she received her impression of us doubtless from Confederates. I did not have the courage to acknowledge my nationality to her, but diverted the topic to some of the other people she had mentioned. The old New England Puritan taught sternly. He was a patriarchal head of his family. In my boyhood, Saturday evening or perhaps better Thanksgiving Day, when their descendants all gathered together as long as either of the grandparents lived, we had an illustration of something very like Heine's touching picture of an old Jewish peddler who worked hard through the week, but on Friday night put on his long black coat and his three-cornered hat, lit the seven candles at the table, and told his children and grandchildren how Jehovah had led His people through the wilderness, and how the Egyptians and all the other naughty people who persecuted them were long since dead, while the chosen race survived. And so happy in his race was this poor peddler and so proud of his pedigree that, as Heine says, had the great Rothschild entered at that moment and asked him what favor he could do, he would reply simply: "Stand out of my light, that I may finish telling the law to my children." _The Eugenics of the Jewish Race_ We Puritans were brought up on the Old Testament, the spirit of which, far more than that of the New, pervaded the life of old New England. Every day after breakfast, no matter how busy the season or how late the breakfast, my grandfather read to the assembled family a chapter from the Old Testament, and perhaps remarked upon certain passages. After graduating from college and when I became a tutor in a prominent Hebrew family in New York, and especially when I had to teach the children their Sunday school lessons and freshen up the small knowledge of the Hebrew language that I had, I realized very keenly how closely related were the Jews to the Yankees,--with this tremendous difference, that you are increasing in numbers while we are decreasing. As I read the Old Testament, the substance of the covenant with Abraham was that if he kept Jehovah's law, his seed would be multiplied like the stars of Heaven. This placed society and life in that early day squarely on a eugenic basis, for it makes the number and success of good children the supreme test of every human institution, activity, and every kind of culture. This I take it is one of the chief characteristics of your race, and I hope it may long be so. I am going to avail myself of this opportunity to say a few words about a topic that has for centuries been a point of the very greatest difference and tension between your people and mine, namely, the character and work of Jesus. Please do not be shocked till you hear what I have to say. Such of us psychologists as have recently been interested in the psychological aspect of Jesus' life and work understand, as had never been understood before, how purely Jewish he was. Scholars have lately given to his figure a radically new interpretation. "_An Extremely Representative Man of Your Race_" According to many conceptions the chief trait of Jesus was a strong and deep enthusiasm for the loftiest things of life. He was a little ecstatic all the time, illustrating the higher powers of man. His soul was unconquerable by misfortune and disaster, like that of the Jewish race itself. He was also organizing victory out of defeat, and his greatest triumph was over death itself. Some think that his youthful dreams and ideals were to be an agrarian lord of a manor, or a grand country gentleman of the Jewish order, making contracts with servants, leasing out farms and vineyards, giving feasts, and the like, for more than half the parables pertain directly or indirectly to such a vocation. But this youthful dream he was unable on account of poverty and his station in life to realize; so two very natural changes took place in his soul. He came to hate the rich because they were wasting their opportunities and never doing anything; but far more important, he developed from these juvenile reveries his world-transforming ideas of the kingdom, which created the church, visible and invisible, and re-made society. The Jews are never beaten; if checked in their aspirations they, like the prophets in the days of captivity, strike out in higher and nobler ways. Thus you ought to be proud of Jesus for, as he is now being understood, he was an extremely representative man of your race. The real enemies of the Jews are now claiming that no such man ever lived, which is the view of Drews and his school, some holding that he was a deliberate invention of the early decades of the first century, and others, like Jensen, that he was a revived Babylonian myth. But these new views show that Jesus was not an Aryan, as a few of the pan-Germanists have claimed, but a typical Semite. It does look now, in view of the teachings of such men as Gobineau and various of his successors, that the Aryans are the highest and best people in the world and that the Germans are the very best of all the Aryans, that it is Germany that has come to consider itself the chosen people, the elite, superior race. But certainly Germany is not very Christian. It was only converted in the thirteenth century, and Luther soon threw off the fully developed Christianity of Rome. Since then we have had the Tübingen School, that resolved everything into myth, and the very many other negative points of view expressed in Nietzsche's supremest condemnation of Jesus as a wretched degenerate, while Wagner's deliberate slogan was, "_Das Deutschtum muss das Christentum siegen_." _The Rapprochement of Jew and Gentile in America_ I wonder if the time is not near at hand when your people will reconstruct your conceptions so much as to recognize Jesus as a typical, golden, Jewish youth, worthy of being an ideal for young men. We certainly do have in his life as now interpreted exactly what youth needs above all things,--ambition, enthusiasm, idealism, all of them absorbing, all of them diverting physical and sensuous energy into the very highest culture sphere, sublimating desire, and making us understand that youth is not complete without a great effort at achievement. The very essence of youth is excitement. There must be tension, strain, a tiptoe attitude, a strong "Excelsior"-like ambition to climb, and a corresponding horror of inferiority, _Miderwertigkeit_. Youth is an age of idealism, and the tension decade of adolescence needs a regimen and an idealization all its own, to set back-fires to temptation. Instead of the current altogether too plain talk on sex hygiene and teaching, we must realize that every enthusiasm or real interest, be it in the multiplication table or in literature, debate, athletics, is an alternative. It reduces temptation and stores up energy as the great reservoirs in the middle west store up the floods that come down from the mountains, so that they shall irrigate and not devastate the land. Jesus, in the new interpretation of Holzmann and Baumann, stands for this kind of enthusiasm. I cannot but wonder, therefore, whether, in view of these new conceptions, Jew and Gentile are not going to meet in this country and even agree about Jesus. It is difficult at least to see which of us would change most if there were this _rapprochement_. We must neither of us abandon our birthright. We must be the very best Puritan Anglo-Saxons we possibly can, and you must be the best Jews possible, for out of these component elements American citizenship is made up. This country stands for the dropping of old prejudices, such as those that are inflaming Europe now with war. If we can satisfy each other's ideals and meet half way the thing is done, and the melting pot which America stands for has got in its work. I want the Menorah Society to feel that it is in the van of this movement. [Illustration: Signature: G. Stanley Hall] "Golden Rule" Hillel BY MOSES HYAMSON [Illustration: _MOSES HYAMSON (born in Suwalki, Russia, in 1863, came to England in childhood). Rabbi and jurist; educated at Jews' College and University College of London; for thirteen years Senior Dayan of the London Beth-Din (Jewish Court of Arbitration), in which capacity, because of his erudition in both the Jewish and the common law, he rendered notable service to the British community. In 1913 he accepted a call from the Congregation Orach Chayim of New York. Besides being a contributor to the Jewish Quarterly Review and other learned publications, Dr. Hyamson has published "The Oral Law and Other Sermons" (1901), and an annotated edition of the medieval "Collatio Romanorum et Mosaicarum Legum" (1912)._] As the students and teachers in the famous school of Shemaya and Abtalion assembled for worship one wintry Sabbath morning, they were astonished to find their lecture-hall exceptionally dark. On looking up they descried what seemed to be a human form lying prone across the skylight. Willing feet ascended the roof and willing hands swept away the snow from a young lad's half-frozen form. They brought him down, and although it was the holy Sabbath, kindled a fire to revive the chilled body. "Worthy is Hillel," they exclaimed, "that the Sabbath should be desecrated for his sake!" So runs the Talmudic tale. The incident happened in Palestine in the century before the common era. The boy Hillel had come from his obscure home in Babylon, bent upon study at the most famous school in Palestine, whose teachers, Shemaya and Abtalion, were heads of the Synhedrion, the Supreme Court of Jurisdiction. Poor and proud, Hillel supported himself by manual labor while he was securing his education. Like Abraham Lincoln, he was a woodchopper. One half of the small amount he earned daily served for his meals, and the other half he paid to the porter at the college for his admission in the evening. On this short Friday in mid-winter he had been able to earn nothing, and in his keen anxiety not to miss the lecture and discussion, he clambered to the roof of the college hall, braving snow and cold for the words of the living God as expounded by his teachers. Within a few short years Hillel himself had succeeded his teachers as the head of this famous school, and also as President of the Synhedrion. Hillel's career is a shining example of the democratic principle which has always prevailed in Jewish life, of the opportunity open to all men of talents, however humble their origin, to achieve position in the republic of Jewish learning. And learning combined with noble character, as in the case of the great Hillel, carried authority in Jewish life. It is true that Hillel was not without letters patent of nobility; though he came from poverty and obscurity and from an alien land, he was, according to tradition, of the blood of David. It is not, however, to this accident of birth, known only later, that Hillel owed his quick rise and supreme eminence in Jewish life, but to his distinguished attainments, to his profound learning not only in the Jewish Law but in many secular fields of knowledge, to his bold and original mind combined with a pious devotion to tradition, to his indomitable energy and industry, his nobility of character, his sympathy with the people and his understanding of their needs. "_What To Thee Is Hateful Do Not Unto Another_" It was Hillel who first enunciated the Golden Rule, although in negative form. The story that is told in the Talmud is one of the most familiar; yet no repetition can lessen its point and charm. A heathen, it is related, came to Shammai, the leader of a rival school, requesting to be received into Judaism and instructed in the whole of the religion while he stood upon one leg. Shammai, an architect by profession, threatened the heathen with his builder's measuring rod and drove him out. The man went to Hillel with the same request. Hillel, gentle, patient, democratic, received the man hospitably and answered: "The whole of Judaism can be summarized in one short sentence: 'What to thee is hateful do not unto another.' That is the essence of the whole Torah; the rest is commentary." And in the interpretation of that "commentary" which, together with the Torah itself, enshrined the spirit of Judaism and made it a throbbing reality in the life of the nation, Hillel brought out the humanity of every regulation, the true intent behind it, whenever literal enforcement would have worked hardship or might have defeated its true intent because of the changed circumstances since its enactment. While keeping faithfully within the spirit of Jewish tradition, Hillel struck out into innovations, new precedents and legal institutions, which testified at once to the remarkable insight and boldness of his mind as a jurist and to his tact and sympathy as a leader of the people. Some of his innovations anticipate in a striking way the developments under similar circumstances of the common law of England and the United States many centuries later. _Hillel As A Jurist: His Sense of Social Justice_ For example, it happened that the first year after Herod's accession was a Sabbatical year, which, according to the Deuteronomic provision (Deut. 15, 2), set up a Statute of Limitations and effectively barred the recovery of all debts. The people, impoverished by the exactions of the Government and by the failure of the harvest, were compelled to have recourse to money lenders. But those who were able to accommodate the needy were reluctant to do so on account of the imminence of the Sabbatical year and its legal bar to the recovery of past debts. Hillel's keen mind and sympathetic heart found a way out of this difficulty. He set up the institution of the Prosbul, by which a creditor received the right, when making a loan, to register the debt in court. In this way the great jurist anticipated in a remarkable manner a principle accepted so many centuries later in the common law of England and America, namely, that the Statute of Limitations does not apply to recorded judgments. Such judgments can always be sued on and recovered. And so the new ordinance established by Hillel removed the hardship of the Biblical enactment, the purpose of which was humanitarian. By Hillel's innovation, the true spirit of that law was maintained, and applied in accordance with its real intent in an age when the economic conditions were vastly different from the time when the law itself was established. Our modern lawyers and reformers in this country may well take a leaf out of this progressive conservatism of our great democratic teacher Hillel. Other decisions of Hillel equally significant could be cited. To lawyers especially, the study of them is fascinating; they are full of startling relevancy in the present time of unrest and agitation for legal reform in this country. And not without reason. What we are keen for now is a greater measure of social justice in a democratic community. A study of Hillel's jurisprudence--both the theory and the decisions affecting the workaday life of the people--will give one an appreciation not only of the beautiful spirituality of the master, his erudition and his imagination, but the characteristic coalition of letter and spirit, the emphatic sense of social justice, which has prevailed in the whole system of Jewish law. _Hillel's Public Spirit and Humanity_ Thus Hillel, while head of his famous school of instruction, became the founder of a school in another sense--a school of interpretation of the Torah. This school, as already indicated, was marked by a leniency and elasticity of interpretation of the traditional law quite in contrast to the harshness and rigidity of the contemporary school of Shammai; it is the school of Hillel, leaning to the spiritual and the humane, that has prevailed ever since in Jewish law. Hillel made the people realize the truth of the famous text about the Torah: "It is a tree of life to them that grasp it, and of them that uphold it, everyone is rendered happy. Its paths are paths of pleasantness and all its ways are peace." Those who have mistakenly conceived the Jewish law as something dour and rigid, unlovable, unspiritual, should study the decisions and dicta of this great master. Hillel's character is illustrated by a number of pregnant sayings of his that have been recorded in the Talmud. "Do not separate yourself from the community," was one of his characteristic sayings which genuinely expressed his public spirit. His sense of individual and social responsibility is summed up in his three famous questions: "If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am for myself alone, what am I? And if not now, when?" His peace-loving nature and humanity found voice in his counsel: "Be of the disciples of Aaron, loving peace, pursuing peace, loving God's creatures and bringing them near to the knowledge of the Law." His disinterestedness, his liberal pursuit of the Law, that is, of knowledge, made him confidently say: "He who aggrandizes his name, his name shall perish. He who does not add to his store of learning and good deeds will suffer diminution. He who does not teach deserves death. He who uses the crown of the Law for selfish needs and personal advancement will be destroyed." Who had a better right than Hillel, graduate of poverty, to warn his contemporaries: "Do not say I shall learn when I will have leisure; perhaps you never will have leisure." And in every case, even when the conduct of a man seems most reprehensible, as when one of his colleagues Menahem left the Synhedrion to take service under the tyrant Herod, Hillel holds to this advice: "Judge not thy neighbor until thou art in his place." Many a tale is narrated of Hillel's patience, unfailing courtesy and tact, tolerance and humility, even under the greatest provocation. The man who bet 400 Zuz that he would break Hillel's patience by silly and far-fetched questions lost his own temper at the consideration with which he was treated. And so the proverb became current, "Patience is worth 400 Zuz." And other tales are told of Hillel's considerate dealing with heathens who wished to embrace Judaism, in contrast to the harsh treatment meted out to them by his contemporary Shammai. _Sage and Saint_ His perfect consideration and charity had in it even something of the quixotic. When a man came to him for assistance, he was wont to help him according to his previous position in life. Thus, in one instance where a man had formerly enjoyed great wealth but had suffered reverses, Hillel not only provided for him according to his previous standard of living but, it is related, even hired a horse for the man to ride on and a footman to run before him. It is added that on one occasion, when Hillel could not obtain a runner, he himself served in that capacity. His wife, we learn, was a fit helpmeet to the sage and saint. Their domestic life was a perfect harmony. Once on returning from a journey Hillel heard a sound of quarreling in the neighborhood of his house. "I am certain," said he, "that this noise does not proceed from my home." On another occasion Hillel sent his wife a message to prepare a sumptuous meal for an honored guest. At the appointed hour Hillel and his guest arrived. But the meal was not ready. "Why so late?" asked Hillel. "I prepared a banquet," the wife replied, "according to your desire. But I learned that a couple were to be wedded to-day and they were too poor to provide a marriage feast, so I gave them our meal for their wedding banquet." "Ah, my dear wife, I guessed as much." But the greatest and most constant hospitality was shown by Hillel to a guest who was always with him and uppermost in his thoughts. Every day it was his habit to withdraw for a while for private meditation. "Whither art thou going?" asked his colleagues and disciples. "I have a guest to whom I must show attention." "Who is this guest?" "My soul," was the solemn reply; "to-day it is with me, to-morrow the heavenly visitant may be departed and returned home." Is it any wonder that, after forty years of activity in the Patriarchate, when Hillel died (in the year 10 of the common era), men said of him: "Meek and humble-minded, a saint has departed from among us, a disciple of Ezra the Scribe." The title fitted his career, for he came like Ezra from Babylon to Palestine and like Ezra he restored the Law when it was threatened with destruction. Great as a student, he was great also as an inspirer of other students. He left eighty distinguished disciples, of whom the youngest was that famous Jochanan ben Zakkai who became the savior of Judaism at the destruction of the second Temple. [Illustration: Signature: M. Hyamson] EDITORS' NOTE--Dr. Hyamson's portrait of Hillel is the first in a series of character sketches of Jewish Worthies to appear in THE MENORAH JOURNAL. The second paper will be on Hillel's disciple, Jochanan ben Zakkai. The Quality of Mercy _A Sixth Act to "The Merchant of Venice"_ BY WILLIAM M. BLATT [Illustration: _William M. Blatt (born in Orange, N.J., in 1876) was educated in the public schools of Boston, and received his degree of LL.B. from Boston University Law School in 1897. Besides being engaged with the law in Boston and contributing to a number of legal periodicals, Mr. Blatt is also devoted to letters and has published a number of plays, including "Husbands on Approval," and many one-act playlets, including "The Danger of Ideals," which have been given professional performance._] _Characters_: SHYLOCK, JESSICA, ANTONIO, GRATIANO, PORTIA, ISAAC, _a servant of Shylock_. _Scene_: A street in Venice. _Time_: An afternoon, two years after the last act of "The Merchant of Venice." _As curtain rises, Portia and Gratiano discovered standing and looking down the street, Gratiano pointing._ _Gratiano_ Now Lady Portia look a long way off And see if you can recognize a friend. _Portia_ A friend? One person only do I see-- A man, quite old, who hobbles with a staff. _Gratiano_ He is the one I mean. Now look again And try to recognize his face, his beard. _Portia_ Why, is it not old Shylock? Sure it is. And met most opportunely, on my word. Now, dear Gratiano, with this icy heart We must needs waste a score or two of words. _Gratiano_ To make him help his daughter Jessica? _Portia_ That is the task. _Gratiano_ Too much for Hercules. (_Enter Shylock._) _Portia_ A moment, Shylock, of your precious time. You must remember meeting me before. _Shylock_ Remember, nay then, how could I forget The noble judge who spoke so clean and fair And took away on quibbles all I owned. _Portia_ Not all, good Shylock, half of it remained. _Shylock_ Oh, true, I thank you for the half you left. I thank that kindly merchant, him that begged The Duke to quite remit the City's fine Which never would have done him any good-- I thank him for accepting what was all He could have claimed, the half of my estate. _Portia_ In trust---- _Shylock_ I know. In trust until I die. And trust Antonio to eat it up. Is it not known that when he takes a risk Of more than common danger and doth lose, He makes a record that he did invest A part of my belongings in the venture? Belike by now there's not a ducat left. For that however I have naught but joy Because it means that she who was my daughter And that Lorenzo who's her paramour Will, when I die, inherit penury. _Gratiano_ But if Antonio's trust should disappear They still would come by all you leave yourself; 'Twas thus the Duke decreed. _Shylock_ I know a thing Or two that I could tell and make the face Of son Lorenzo somewhat longer grow. _Gratiano_ Faith, often did Lorenzo say to us "The Jew will find a way to cheat me yet." _Shylock_ To cheat him out of what? The gold he earned By robbing me, debauching my--my child? _Portia_ Nay, let us not be quarreling, old man, I have a message that I want to give. _Shylock_ No message from my daughter--none to me. _Portia_ I meant not message, what I have is news. Poor Jessica has come to sorry straits. Her husband, having heard of what you spoke, The loss of what Antonio received, The tricks you have been playing with your own, Fell out with Jessica; they came to words; From words, they say, to blows. And so it seems He left her in a pitiable state. _Shylock_ (_laughing wildly_) Good, good, good, good. I prithee tell me more. _Gratiano_ The fiends fly off with thee. Hast thou a heart And canst thou hear the sorrows of thy child In laughter and with joy? _Shylock_ She is no child Of mine. She is a wench who lied and stole Repaid my love with treason. Broke my heart And left me weakened for mine enemies To ruin and to taunt. Tell me the rest, Leave not a portion out. Describe her pain, Her hunger, her remorse. I would know all. _Portia_ The font has failed to change thy cruel soul; Thou art a Christian, Shylock, but in name. _Shylock_ Well, blame thy sacred water. Blame not me. _Gratiano_ And so poor Jessica must starve and die? _Shylock_ Why, no. For you and she (_pointing to Portia_) should be her friends. You Christians will not let a Christian fall. _Gratiano_ Now there we cut the venom from thy tongue For Jessica will not accept our aid. _Portia_ Indeed, old man, we know not where she is. We told you, that you might go search for her. Bassanio did offer her employment But she refused, belike because her shame Would not permit that we should see her shame. And so she fled. _Gratiano_ And may not be alive. _Shylock_ These circumstances you should tell unto Lorenzo. 'Twas he took her upon himself For better or for worse. Fare you well. I have affairs that interest me more. _Gratiano_ Come, Lady Portia. 'Tis a waste of time. The Bible says that God did choose the Jews But says not what it was He chose them for. Our ancient friend hath made it clear to me That they were chosen by our gracious Lord To be a kind of warning and example Of what a misbeliever may become. _Portia_ Thou wilt not save thy daughter? _Shylock_ Lady fair, In this peculiar and imperfect world The virtues are divided into parts: For instance, mercy. Some do practice it, And some do merely preach. A third there are Whose only contribution is to be The text from which the second sermons preach; They neither preach nor practice. Such am I. Farewell. _Gratiano_ We but insult ourselves to stay. (_Exit Portia and Gratiano. Shylock looks after them. Enter Antonio, sees Shylock, walks over to him and touches him with his stick. Shylock turns._) _Antonio_ Hebrew, have I found thee out at last? Once more thy promises are broken, eh? _Shylock_ Yes, yes. I pray you---- _Antonio_ Pray me nothing more. _Shylock_ Signor Antonio, wait another day. _Antonio_ Another day. For what? Until you hide A bag of ducats or a jewel case? Your bonds are by a fortnight overdue And day by day your fortune dwindles down. If I should sell the roof above your head And all your land and chattels, they would bring Less than enough to pay me what you owe. _Shylock_ I prithee not so loud. But you alone Are cognizant of my disastrous state. My name is good. Perchance I may obtain A temporary loan to tide me through. But if my losses come to other ears Before my kinsmen and my ship arrive A bankrupt's ending stares me in the face. Wait, wait Antonio, surely he will come, My cousin Issachar who sailed away. _Antonio_ Thy cousin Issachar will come no more. He promised to return three weeks ago. _Shylock_ But think, remember, good Antonio, The vessel could not founder. 'Twas my best, Held in reserve, the last one of my fleet. Issachar swore he knew the very spot Where dusky natives mined the laughing gold And that if I would furnish men and ships The moiety of the cargo would be mine. Perhaps he is a little while delayed. _Antonio_ Perhaps another theory will fit. Perhaps your kinsman filled the ship with gold And then did point his helm another way. Perhaps in England now he lives at ease And deems the whole is better than a half. Consider, sir, your kinsman is a Jew. _Shylock_ He will not fail me, for he is my friend. Patience, good sir, patience a day or two. Deal with me kindly as so oft before You treated many an unfortunate. _Antonio_ Let's have no whining. See you pay my bills No later than to-day. Expect no further time. I have done more than doth in truth become A Christian to oblige a Jew withal. Think not to share the leniency I give To men of Venice of my faith and blood. This case is different. _Shylock_ But did thy Lord Not preach a creed of brotherhood and love And bid thee treat thy neighbor as thyself? _Antonio_ He meant our Christian neighbors who reside By right of law and ancient heritage Within the land, but not the tribe who do Usurp the places of their betters. No! _Shylock_ I am a Christian, made so by your Church. Your own priest said so and it must be true. _Antonio_ 'Twas but a form to bend thy haughty will. In heart and manner thou art still a Jew. They should be glad that they can here remain To practice sacrilege, and cheat, and fawn. I marvel we can be so tolerant. _Shylock_ The God who made this land and you and me Mocks at your selfish, mean, philosophy. When you or yours can build a mountain peak Or add a grain unto the universe Then talk of this fair ground as your domain. The earth is one and rests within His hand; The great and small His erring children are, But we who from Yisrael claim descent Are now the eldest of the family. The God of Justice never slumbereth. Jehovah is His name; His will be done. _Antonio_ Mumble thy prayers if that affords relief, But if by sundown I am not repaid Another Moses must thou be and bring Another set of miracles from heaven Or lose the very coat from off thy back. By sundown--but a few short minutes hence. (_Exit Antonio_) _Shylock_ Finished--almost finished--almost done. I see the wave that soon above my hopes, My fears, my sorrows, and my broken heart, Will roll in cruel triumph. I'm content. A long and troubled record I shall leave Of struggles in the dark 'gainst many foes. I begged for light to see my duty clear To see the purpose of my suffering To see the end that my Creator served In heaping hills of torment on my head. The light has never come. But now ere long I must be called where all shall be made clear. Till then a few weeks more of faith in Him A few weeks more with an unfalt'ring tongue To praise His wisdom though its end be hid. A few weeks more to walk within His law. (_Starts to walk off. Enter Jessica in disordered dress and manner._) _Jessica_ Father! _Shylock_ Back! Away! Dare not to touch me. _Jessica_ A word, a single word and I will go. _Shylock_ (_trying to wrest his arm from her grasp_) Let be I say. _Jessica_ Nay, but I cannot leave. I know not how much time I have to live. I marvel that this body thin and frail Has so long stood th' innumerable shocks Which in my married life it hath endured. Death must be near, it stretcheth out its arms, And I in answer have extended mine. _Shylock_ Come not to me for money. Had I all The wealth of Sheba's mines I would not pay A mite to save thy fallen soul from hell. The potter's field may have thy rotten bones And owls and jackals pray for thy repose. _Jessica_ 'Tis not for gold I beg but for thy love. I threw it from me like an orange sucked And turned to grasp the shining fruit that he, Lorenzo, pictured to mine eyes. Ah me, How bitter, hard and worthless to the taste Hath been that substitute. The marriage moon Had scarce grown full before my body bore The marks of coward blows. _Shylock_ Ha! Ha! That's well. _Jessica_ I have not known a single kindly word, I scarce have heard him call me by my name Since less than four weeks after we were wed. _Shylock_ (_gloatingly rubbing his hands_) Hm! _Jessica_ Oh father, why was I not told before That we and all our people are accurst; That those to whom we give our love and trust Curse us and loathe us with a dreadful hate, A hate that neither reason can assuage Nor conduct make amends for. Awful fate, That makes the very children of the street With circle eyes point at us in contempt, And people who have never heard our names Thirst for our blood and menace us with death! _Shylock_ So thou didst think a priestly comedy Could make Lorenzo love his Jewish wife? _Jessica_ I could have died for him. For him I fled And stole your wealth and helped your enemies. Why could he not have been a little kind? _Shylock_ (_chuckling_) Come tell me how he beat you. Tell me that. _Jessica_ Have pity, father. _Shylock_ Tell me how he swore. _Jessica_ Oh, torture me no further. Take me back. Love me not now, but let me win your love A little at a time. No day shall pass But in it I shall do some tiny act That will in time make up a wealth of deeds, And if we both are living long enough The balance will be as it was before. _Shylock_ Thy pleadings are but wasted, Jessica, Thou canst not gain the end that thou dost seek. For even if I have the foolish will (And I assure thee that I have it not) To bring thee back to all the luxury, The silken clothes, the soft and perfumed beds, The shining jewels of thy girlhood days, I could not. I am almost penniless. _Jessica_ Poor, and alone, and old! Nay, father dear, Thou couldst not drive me from thee after this Hadst thou the strength of ten. Let us go forth And find a little corner of the earth Where I may work and you may live at peace. _Shylock_ I need no aid. I want no help from thee. _Jessica_ Then give me thine. I starve for sympathy. I shall go mad. I saw my baby die And all around me were my husband's friends Who spoke in terms of polished elegance. With formal platitudes and commonplace Regarding me as something curious, A vulgar, noisy creature, lacking taste And proper self-control. While on its bier Lay all the joy that life in promise held. Dead, and my heart within it. (_Weeps_) (_Shylock turns to go, looks back after a step or two, and returns_) _Shylock_ I did not know the little one was dead. Was it a pretty child? _Jessica_ A pretty child! A cherub could not be more beautiful. Blue eyes and golden hair. A tiny mouth A dimple in her chin. (_Shylock puts his arm around Jessica_) _Shylock_ Thy mother's face belike. So did she look. And how old when it--died? _Jessica_ A year, a year. (_Enter Antonio and Gratiano. Antonio touches Shylock on the shoulder_) _Antonio_ Well, let us have an end. The time is up. I now demand the payment of my bonds. _Shylock_ I have not moved since last you spoke to me. _Antonio_ All's one for that. You had no move to make. Your whole estate is in the bailiff's hands And you yourself may come along with me. _Shylock_ Where would you take me? _Antonio_ Why, before the Duke. _Shylock_ What need of trials? Freely I confess The debts I owe you. Take what you can find. Take ev'ry rag and counter. Take them all. Myself and Jessica must go away. _Antonio_ Not quite so fast. The law expressly states That I may put you in the debtor's gaol And so I mean to do. _Shylock_ But good Signor-- _Antonio_ No protest will avail. I know you Jews. You hang together in calamity And help each other while the Christians starve. Let them redeem you and repay my loss. _Shylock_ Good sir, my kin are very far away And poor as I. _Antonio_ 'Twill do no good to lie. Write letters. I will see them promptly sent. _Shylock_ I swear to you Antonio-- _Gratiano_ Wait a while. First tell us if the oath thou art to make Is sworn as Christian or in Hebrew style; Though truly which to give the preference Is matter to discuss. A Jewish oath Thou canst not take for thou hast been baptised, And sooth to say I have a sort of doubt About thy reverence for Christian forms. _Shylock_ By that great Power who can humble both Hebrew and Christian, I do swear to you That not in all this universe's span Have I a claim on friends or relatives As large as this. Much more have I the right To claim assistance from Antonio Who though he found me keen for my revenge And steadfast in assertion of my rights Can bring no accusation on my head Of underhanded trickery or crime. _Gratiano_ Because we watch you pretty carefully. _Shylock_ What say you, sir? You will not keep us here? _Antonio_ I warned thee once cajoling will not serve. Write out the letters. That's the only way. I'll see that while you tarry in the gaol Your comfort shall not be too much disturbed. Your food shall be according to your wish And other things in reason you may have. _Jessica_ Good sir, I think you know me, do you not? _Antonio_ Why, are you not my friend Lorenzo's wife? _Jessica_ I am the Jessica who married him, But not his wife if wifehood is a state That presupposes more than legal rights. I and Lorenzo are as strangers now And less than strangers, less than enemies. _Antonio_ I grieve to hear it. _Jessica_ I would have your grief Not for myself but for my father here. He speaks the truth. He has no more to give. _Antonio_ Then let him call upon his wealthy friends, The other Jews will trust him if he asks. _Jessica_ You heard him say he knows not where to sue. _Antonio_ O, that was but the cunning of his race. _Jessica_ Unfeeling man! If his deserts are dumb What of your obligation due to me? The Court's decree as you no doubt recall Was that the half of his estate should go To you to hold in trust for me and mine. I charge you now upon your Christian faith To give my father all the residue That will be mine when he shall pass away Or take it for yourself and let him go. _Antonio_ Three obstacles prevent your sacrifice. The first is that though my intent was fair By bad investments more than half the fund Has disappeared, and all that doth remain Would not suffice to satisfy the bonds. The second, that the sum is payable Upon your father's death, which is not yet. But third and most of all the money goes To you and to your husband, not to you. The gift is joint and neither can alone Claim all himself or any several part. Indeed, I own it frankly, my desire In asking that the Duke should so decree Was not to benefit Lorenzo's wife, A Jewess, who was never aught to me, But solely to befriend Lorenzo's self My coreligionist and distant kin. To give you anything of Shylock's gold Without Lorenzo's will would be a wrong, A breach of trust, a patent injury. And if your separation from his love, As shrewdly I suspect, be fault of yours And growing from thy Jewish wilfulness, It would be most unfaithful and untrue That I should thus reward inconstancy. You see, in honor and before the law I must refuse to do as you request. _Jessica_ I see that Jesus died in vain for you. His Jewish heart, with pity for the low And meek and humble broke upon the cross And for a time the magic of his words Restrained the beast in Gentile followers, But soon the kindly Stoic lost his sway And cruel bigots in his Jewish name, By his offenceless, mild authority Took fire and sword and hatred for their flag. _Antonio_ My girl, there is a law 'gainst blasphemy. _Gratiano_ Why stand we here and listen to her spleen? Away with Shylock. Take him to the gaol. _Antonio_ Come on. _Jessica_ No! No! _Shylock_ Resist no more, my child. _Jessica_ Oh, father, we may never meet again; Your age and suffering cannot endure The shock of this disgrace. _Shylock_ 'Tis better so. I pray for death. It cannot come too soon. Farewell. _Jessica_ Farewell. (_Throws her arms around him_) Yet not a long farewell, I shall not far survive. It is no sin To end a life of misery and shame. _Isaac_ (_behind scenes_) Where is my master? Where has Shylock gone? (_Enter Isaac._) _Gratiano_ Here fellow, here he is. With Jessica He poses like a model for the arts. _Isaac_ Great news and wonderful. His ship is here And laden full of gold. The mine is found And Issachar and he are princely rich. This cargo is the greatest that has come To Venice since the city first began. _Antonio_ I do rejoice to hear it. Truly Jew I have no wish to do thy body harm But thou and thy relations are well known To be so deep in craft and villainy That to recover what is justly due We Christians must resort to rigid means. Go freely with thy daughter. Later on When ev'rything's in order I'll return And you may pay me what the balance is. (_Exit Antonio and Gratiano, followed by Isaac. Shylock still stands expressionless with Jessica's arms around him._) [Illustration: Signature: Wmln. Blatt] Jewish Students in European Universities BY HARRY WOLFSON (_Concluded_) _Judaism and Jewish Students in France_ The decadence of native Judaism in France has become proverbial. The original French Jews never amounted to much; and the Alsatian immigrants, while still supplying rabbis for the pulpits, have of late begun to disappear from the pews. You may state it is an axiom that the synagogue will have to go a-begging for a quorum wherever church-going is unpopular. But French Judaism has recently been gaining reinforcement by the influx of newcomers from Eastern Europe. Paris might be considered next to London the greatest centre of Jewish immigration in Europe. In fact, Paris as well as some large cities in the Low Countries, and to some extent even London, have since the beginning of the Jewish movement towards the United States, become the refuge of a considerable number who straggled behind the migratory columns and were unable to reach their final destination. Free from any official molestations and rather welcomed by the native Jews, the foreign Jewish community in Paris has flourished in its own way. It numbers by this time about twenty-five thousand souls, a large proportion of whom were born and brought up in the French capital. It is these young French Jews of immigrant parentage, students and professional men, who organized themselves, about two years ago, in an "Association des Jeunes Juifs," known by its initials as A. J. J. The aim of that organization, which is non-partisan in Jewish affairs, is both cultural and practical. It publishes a monthly by the name of "Les Pionniers," and occasionally holds debates and lectures on various Jewish topics. It also carries on a program of social work among the immigrant Jews. I might perhaps give a clearer idea of the object of the A. J. J. by reproducing their following declaration: "Notre But.--Nous voulons nous affirmer 'Juifs' sans forfanterie, mais avec fermeté; cultiver, développer parmis nous, faire connaître au dehors, l'âme juive; nous éduquer mutuellement; demander, par les voies légales, le respect, la justice pour tous,--fussent-ils juifs; aider nos frères émigrés à l'aquérir la qualité de citoyen; inculquer à nos membres les principes de solidarité et de mutualité." In the summer of 1913, Dr. Nahum Slouszch of the Sorbonne submitted to the society a scheme for more extensive activities, both Jewish and patriotic in their scope, namely, the participation in educational and social work among the indigenous Jews of the French possessions in Africa. _The Jew of the Roman Ghetto_ It is a pity that so little is known to us about the life of the Jewish masses in Italy. The fame of the Nathans and Luzzattis has led us to believe that in Italy Jews form the class of society from which mayors and statesmen are recruited. But in Italy the majority of Jews still live in social and economic conditions not far advanced above those of their ancestors in centuries past. Italy is the only country in Europe outside those in the Eastern part where the so-called ghettoes are populated by native Jews. Their political emancipation has not raised them from the bottom of the social structure over the heads of their Gentile neighbors. Nowhere is the average Jew so much like the non-Jew in appearance, language, manners, and vocation than the inhabitant of the Roman Ghetto on the bank of the Tiber. He is engaged there in the petty trades of selling his olives, peaches, and figs, and hires out as a journeyman in and outside his country. He hawks with "cartiloni" and "ricordi di Roma" in front of the café terraces, and his street waifs accost the foreigners for a "soldi." Even at the door of his old-clothes shop you can hardly recognize in him the Jew. It is this, more than the paucity of the number of Jews in Italy, that explains the absence of anti-Jewish feeling there. For the name Sacerdote by which Italian Cohens call themselves does not suggest affluence, and the cognomen Levi does not necessarily designate one's business. In his religious life the Jew of the Roman Ghetto resembles the Lithuanian rather than the Western European. His religious activity, to be sure, is restricted to the prayer services of the Temple, but his Temple is more like a Beth Midrash than a symphony hall and lyceum. Living within a Catholic environment, his religion has been preserved as something positive, tangible, and powerful; and if it is no longer an inspiring influence within him, it exists at least as a reality outside of him. The religious institutions and instrumentalities are looked upon by him as something hallowed and consecrate. The synagogue is spoken of as the "sacro tempio" and the rabbi, referred to by the Hebrew words "Morenu Harav," is looked up to in matters religious as if he were the incumbent of the throne of Moses. The place of worship is opened three times a day for the traditional number of the daily public prayers, and young men as well as old, unwashed and in their working garments, repair there directly from their work to hear the "sacra messa," as the services are sometimes termed by them. Most of the younger Jews are unable to read the Hebrew prayers, some read without understanding them; but they all know a few selected prayers by heart which they recite aloud with many interesting gesticulations and genuflections, while in the pulpit the Chasan reads the services from a prayer-book printed in Livorno, chanting them in a monotonous sing-song not unlike what one often hears in the chapels of St. Peter. _Societies of Jewish Youth in Italy_ Racial consciousness is strong among these Jews of the Roman Ghetto. They are to themselves, in common parlance, "Ibrim" or "Yahudim," which they utter not without pride, and the Gentile is looked down upon as a mere "goi," while the passing priest is pointed out as a "komer." If you ever happen to be in Rome, I should advise you take one afternoon off, and ordering a "cafe noro" at some café house on the Piazza Venezia, sit down quietly at a table on the terrace and try to look Jewish. You will soon be assailed by a number of postal-card venders coming one after another, until one importunate youth, discovering your identity, will of a sudden change his attitude, and, his obsequiousness gone, will enter with you into an intimate conversation. He will tell you his name, his pedigree, and of the "tempio," and of the street where many Jews live. He will no longer entreat you to buy his goods; and if you do so, he will mumble out his "grazie" rather perfunctorily. For are not all Israel of the same descent?--and if they are not all princes, at least none of them is better than a postal-card vender in Rome. It is therefore not surprising that among the native Italian Jews there should arise on the part of the young educated elements a desire to convert that latent Jewish sentiment into some form of practical and useful activity. A society of Jewish youth in Italy has already existed for about three years during which time two conventions were held. A number of commendable resolutions were passed about the improvement of Jewish education among the Italian Jews and especially the advancement of the study of the Hebrew language among them. Zionism was warmly endorsed, though the society as a whole did not commit itself officially to the cause. Like the A. J. J. of Paris, the Italian organization also purports to act as intermediaries between the Italian government and the native Jewish population of Tripoli. In Rome there is a local organization of Jewish students, devoted to the study of Hebrew literature, and is rather of cosmopolitan complexion, being composed of Italian, Greek, German, and Russian Jews. The moving spirit of that circle was a brilliant Russian Jew, who had graduated in law from the University of Rome. _Conclusion: The Growing National Spirit Among Jewish Students_ A close observation of European Jewish students, both as individuals and as groups, leads one to the realization of a growing consciousness among them of national unity, and of an increasing belief on their part of the imperishability of the Jews as a race. That morbid feeling of national decay and the imminent disappearance of the race, which had preyed upon the minds of Jewish men in the past generation, and which is reflected in the literature of that time, has been everywhere displaced by one of confidence and hope. Desertion from Judaism, to be sure, may sporadically make its appearance here and there as a convenient escape from material disadvantages; indifference towards it may likewise in some quarters still survive as a relic of the past,--but these are rather unusual and isolated phenomena, emphasizing all the more the universal fidelity and attachment to all things Jewish. The enthusiasm for Judaism, everywhere in a process of growth, manifests itself in its early stages in study and self-cultivation; it assumes a more concrete form, in its later stages, of some communal or social activity; and if that development keeps on uninterruptedly it finally consummates in Zionism. This development, it must be admitted, is not a spontaneous and self-directive movement. In no small measure, it is everywhere stimulated by the growing tendency on the part of non-Jews in almost every country to appraise the Jew according to his racial origin, an appraisal which results in a feeling not necessarily hostile, but in most cases neutral and sometimes even favoring the racial and cultural peculiarity, indestructible and impermiscible, of the Jewish element. It is this external stimulus, rather than any internal impulse, that is responsible for the unfolding of the national spirit among Jewish students and the assertion of their selfhood. None the less, their self-assertion has nowhere reached the extreme of spiritual alienation from their environment. There is nothing more remarkable in the character of Jewish youth of the present day, even among those who were born and raised in East European ghettos, than the spiritual and intellectual snugness in which they find themselves, in what should have been expected to remain to them a foreign environment. The residual estrangement of the Jewish soul from everything that is non-Jewish, which our forefathers in the past had figuratively designated with what Jewish mysticism called the "Captivity of the Shekinah," has totally disappeared. The individual Jew of to-day, while sharing in the sublimated consciousness of the race as a whole, does not in any conscious or subliminal way feel himself to be personally identified with it; whence the hesitation on the part of the majority of Jewish students to participate actively in Zionism even though they would all admit it to be the logical sequel of Jewish history. For Zionism to them can never become a personal ideal, something requisite for the salvation of their souls. It can at its best appeal to them, in so far as they are consciously Jewish, as the cause of the nation as a whole; and consequently the mere suspicion that their affiliation with the movement might be held up against them as an impugnment of their loyalty to the land of their birth and abode is sufficient to keep them aloof from it. It was very interesting for me to notice how everywhere, after a long manoeuvre of Zionist discussions with good Jewish young men, they would finally halt at their unshakable position that Zionists might arouse the suspicion of their Gentile neighbors as to the loyalty and patriotism of the Jews. Where people are obsessed by the fear of being misunderstood in doing what they otherwise think to be good and impeccable, no arguments, of course, can avail. They are in this respect characteristically Jewish. In their Brand-like racial frame of mind, the Jews could never stop midway between the two antipodes of roving world-citizenry and hidebound mono-patriotism. It is probable that their attitude will change as soon as it is generally realized that personal devotion and loyalty to two causes are not psychologically a self-deception, and that the serving of two masters is not a moral anomaly unless, as in the original adage, one of the masters be Satanic. [Illustration: Signature: Harry Wolfson] Extract from a letter received from William Chadwick, President of the Hebrew Congregation and the Adler Society, Oxford University, England, commenting on the section devoted to England in Mr. Wolfson's article in our January number: "The remarks of Mr. Wolfson, whom we remember very well, concerning Oxford, were very apt for the time; but in Oxford, one particular type of Judaism never remains for long; Judaism here is in a state of perpetual flux, and to seize upon any one moment and represent that view as a type of Oxford's Judaism is very erroneous. I am sure that if Mr. Wolfson were here now, he would not recognize the services or the attitude now prevalent. I doubt if he would now hear Liberal Judaism apostrophised 'as the safeguard of modern Jews from the attractiveness of the superior teachings of Christ.'" Zionism: A Menorah Prize Essay BY MARVIN M. LOWENTHAL [Illustration: _MARVIN M. LOWENTHAL (born in Bradford, Pa., in 1890) is at present a Senior in the University of Wisconsin. He has won the Wisconsin Menorah Society Prize twice--in 1912 for an essay on "The Jew in the American Revolution," and in 1914 for the essay on "Zionism" here published for the first time. Mr. Lowenthal is now the President of the Wisconsin Zionist Society._] At the head of an alley-way hard by the Place of the Temple, the Haram-esh-Sherif, in Jerusalem, a long wall built in rough-hewn courses lifts itself above the squalor of the Moghrebin quarter to an eastern sky from which a sun that seldom sleeps bakes the grey stones, bares every detail of a crumbling ruin, and intensifies the wistful odor of decay. This, the remnant of Solomon's glory, is the Wailing Wall of the Jews. Clad in sackcloth and covered with ashes, patriarchal figures sway to and fro, press their lips to the hot granite, beat now their chests and now the wall, and today, as every day for eighteen hundreds of years, wail in the words of the Psalmist: "Oh God, the heathen are come into Thine inheritance; Thy holy Temple have they defiled; They have laid Jerusalem in heaps."[1] This picture reveals the typical and traditional attitude of the Jew toward the land of his forefathers. Taught as children in the Cheder to turn their thoughts and desires toward Palestine; devoting themselves as men to the study of the Law and the Prophets and to the building upon this study of the vast Talmudic structure, until a spiritual Land of the Book may be said to have been created wherein they continually dwelt; crystallizing and adopting the Restoration as a dogma of the faith; commemorating with solemn fasts the Ninth of Ab as the anniversary of the destruction of the Temple by Titus; and repeating at each Passover with the pitiful hope of a child, "Next year in Jerusalem," the Jews have bound the memory of Palestine as a sign upon their hands and as frontlets between their eyes. They have indeed written it upon the door-posts of their houses and upon their gates, to the end--that they have wept and prayed. The vision of the prophets, which created and sustained this passionate ideal, itself inhibited the realization by emphasizing the redemption as miraculous, as a consummation to come in its own time without man's effort, and indeed in spite of man's will. And so, except for the sporadic and meteoric fiascos of mock-Messiahs, the Jews--this most practical of people--continued in hope and prayer to watch the centuries creep by. Frequently the hope flowered into the songs of a Judah Halevi or Ibn Gabirol, songs as sweet as have blossomed in the medieval garden; and the prayer found expression in a poignancy attributable only to the racial genius which created the Psalms; but until the nineteenth century the dream preserved all the qualities of a dream. _A Crusade for A Birthright_ On August 29, 1897, a congress convened in Basel, Switzerland, comparable in Jewry to the Council of Clermont; for in this congress two hundred and four Jews, acting as delegates of their people from half the countries in the world, assembled at the call of Theodor Herzl to go crusading for the recovery of Palestine. This difference, among others, may be apparent--the Christians sought the recovery of a grave; the Jews, of a cradle. Palestine was to be a cradle in two senses; this Congress, the first body representative of all Jewry to be convened in the Diaspora, claimed the land of Israel not by virtue of a death, but as a birthright, and furthermore hoped to find its recovery the opportunity for the rejuvenation of a people. Quoting from his book, "The Jewish State"[2]--a book journalistic in style, but trumpet-toned in the note it sounded for political Zionism--Theodor Herzl offered the following definition of Zionism after the first Zionist Congress (1897): "Zionism has for its object the creation of a home, secured by public rights, for those Jews who either cannot or will not be assimilated in the country of their adoption."[3] Zionism, in a word, is not the last truism in a weary debate, nor a new verse to an old song; it is, on the contrary, a definite answer to a perplexing and imperative question. What are these Jews who cannot or will not be assimilated, and why cannot or will not they be assimilated? This question constitutes what is known as _the Jewish problem_, or, for those who deny or dislike the term, _the Jewish position_; and this question must first be fully stated before the Zionist or any other answer can be intelligible. _The Isolation of Medieval Jewry_ The Jews in the Middle Ages were considered by themselves, their few friends, and their many enemies, as a twice separated nation--a people separated from those among whom they dwelt and separated from the land in which they originated. They were governed by their own law--the Lex Judæorum--which was recognized by the authorities of the land in which they lived as peculiar and proper to them;[4] they dwelt in communal groups which were bound together by common interests; they observed their own customs and nourished their own culture; they were held to be foreigners, and in a comparison of their own with the Christian civilization, they readily acknowledged this status. The force of persecution without and the religious conviction of superiority, separateness, and nationality within, preserved and constantly increased this solidarity.[5] That the existence of a separate, recalcitrant, and even obnoxious nation within a nation did not constitute a problem for the medievals may be attributable to two reasons: (1) the medieval theory of life accentuated a hierarchical order of existence--a theory that found expression in feudalism, in Church organization, and in guild and craft life; in pursuance of this theory, the Jews were accorded a recognized and distinct status; (2) furthermore, the Jews were an economic necessity in the times when a ban was laid on money-lending, and they constituted an important economic facility at a little later period when capital could indeed be worked but when rivalry and hatreds rendered communication uncertain.[6] To the maintenance of Jewish solidarity and the preservation of things Jewish _qua_ Jewish, sacrifices culminating in the surrender of life bequeathed to the race a comprehensive martyrology.[7] Ernest Renan defines a nation as "a great solidarity constituted by the sentiment of the sacrifices that its citizens have made and those they feel prepared to make once more. It implies a past, but is summed up in the present by a tangible fact--the clearly expressed desire to live a common life." In sum, the Jews throughout the Middle Ages, which was prolonged for them until a little less than two hundred years ago, comprised a nation as virtual in point of their own claim and its recognition by other nations as in the days when they were established in Palestine. Renaissance, Reformation, and the rediscovery of the world by science failed to make an impression on the thick ghetto walls; and Jewish isolation, even as late as the eighteenth century, may be vividly realized by thinking of Rousseau and Voltaire in contrast with the contemporary lights of Jewry--Elijah Gaon and Israel Besht,[8] men as medieval as a gargoyle. The French Revolution with its early philosophy of naturalism and humanism and its later political expression in liberty, equality, and fraternity, razed the physical and spiritual walls of the ghetto and set up the "Jewish problem." Following the Revolution, four currents of thought and action, working both simultaneously and successively, causing, reacting upon, and intermingling with one another, affecting the Jews now favorably and now unfavorably, went into the making of this problem. To deal with Emancipation, Enlightenment, Nationalism, and Anti-Semitism in detail would consume a volume, but an outline of their bearing on the present situation is essential. _Emancipation and Enlightenment_ Emancipation may be defined as the removal of the civil disabilities from the Jews, following the acceptance of liberal principles by the European governments. The process was a gradual one. In 1791 the French Assembly passed the vote for the complete emancipation of the Jews, which procedure was ratified and firmly established by the Napoleonic regime. Belgium (1830), England (1846), Sweden (1848), Denmark and Greece (1849), Prussia (1850), Austria (1867), Spain (1868), Italy (1870), and Switzerland (1874) followed the lead of France. The Balkan States in the treaty of Berlin (1878), upon pressure from Disraeli, agreed to the emancipation of the Jews as one of the conditions for securing their own freedom; Roumania has been notoriously delinquent, however, in adhering to the terms nominated in the bond.[9] The removal of civil disabilities brought the Jew into a wide contact with the Christian. This resulted for the Jews in liberalization of outlook and liberation of capacities and talents, in an abandonment of the "jargon" for the national tongues, in a precipitation into the Haskalah movement (to be described in the next paragraph), and in a restatement of their leading religious doctrines, which amounted to a surrender in theory of their nationality and their destiny as a Chosen People to be restored to Palestine. For the Christians the removal of Jewish disabilities resulted in the necessity of either accepting or rejecting the Jew's claim to be an equal and a fellow-countryman. The Enlightenment, or Haskalah movement, broadly speaking, comprises the Jewish absorption of secular learning, particularly in literature and science, the abandonment of the study of the Talmud for modern subjects, and the adoption of farm and craft life.[10] Moses Mendelssohn in Germany and Lilienthal in Russia were the first great protagonists of these radical departures; and the movement, which in part led to the demand for Emancipation and in part resulted from it, further removed the differences between Jew and non-Jew, at least from the standpoint of the former, and further removed him from his religious and historical past, perceptibly weakening and in many cases practically destroying the medieval sense of solidarity. Each Jew adopted the culture of his native country, and so one Jew became virtually a foreigner to another. Haskalah, in a word, is a looking outward on the part of the Jew; for all its virtues this movement had the consequence of blunting racial consciousness and blurring racial identity. _Nationalism and Anti-Semitism_ All might have been well but for the presence of a third and conflicting element. While the Jew became infected with the universalism of the Revolutionary spirit, the majority of Europeans were absorbing and developing the particularistic implications of '89. Nationalism is the self-consciousness of a people, and it found its European expression in the creation of the modern States of Germany, Italy, Hungary, Greece, and the small Balkans. It is a race's recognition of itself, a looking inward, and it leads to the pursuit of racial ideals and development of racial qualities--an inward expansion which, indifferent to the charge of chauvinism, can only be secured by an outward discrimination. The Jew and the Christian had changed places since medieval times: the Jew now stood for a universal society and a universal church, and the Christian for exclusion and separation upon racial bases. Emancipation thus brought the conflict directly to the attention of the strong majority, namely, the Christians, and anti-Semitism was their answer. In its restricted sense, anti-Semitism is a scientific stick used to beat the Jewish dog with. After impartial, impersonal scientific investigation, French and German scholars[11] demonstrated the racial inferiority of the Semite to the Aryan, enumerated the inherent Semitic qualities as greed, special aptitude for money-making, aversion to hard work, clannishness, obstrusiveness, lack of social tact and of patriotism, the tendency to exploit and not to be overly honest. Ernest Renan adequately sums up the anti-Semite position when he claims for the Aryans all the great military, political, and intellectual movements of history.[12] The Semites never had a comprehension of civilization in the sense in which the Aryan understands the word; they were at no time public-spirited.[13] In fact, intolerance was the natural consequence of Semitic monotheism.[14] In the wider sense,[15] anti-Semitism is the modern word for the old and apparently ineradicable hatred of the Jew, partly dependent, as G. F. Abbott well shows,[16] not only upon Christian faith, but upon the Christian frame of mind and feeling--a hatred to which the Nationalism of the nineteenth century furnished a reasonable fuel, which found a social expression in ostracism and rioting[17] and a political expression in the formation of the Christian Socialist Party in Germany (1878), and similar parties in Austria and Hungary (1882-99), seeking the suppression of equal rights for Jews, the Dreyfus affair in France (1895), and the open, violent persecutions in Roumania--all aimed at annulling the privileges granted by the Emancipation. Clerical, economic, and social opposition to the Jews combined to support the nationalistic contention summed up in the words of Heinrich von Treitschke (Professor of History, University of Berlin): "Die Juden sind unser Unglück."[18] This essay is not concerned with the truth of the contention; suffice that it is advanced, supported, and acted upon. _The Jewish Situation in the Four Zones_ A review of the Jewish situation is now possible. But before presenting this review, a definition of two words which will be frequently used may not be irrelevant. The _Jewish problem_ is taken to mean an immediate concrete maladjustment where life and property are imperiled, much as we speak of the Mexican problem. The _Jewish position_, on the other hand, is taken to mean a social, cultural, or spiritual disharmony or repression, much as we speak of the position of the Poles in Galicia and Russia. The Jewish situation falls naturally into four geographical zones. The first, which contains the _problem_ in its most serious aspect, is Eastern Europe, including Russia, Poland, and Roumania, where are settled six of the twelve million Jews of the world.[19] In this zone, the Jews are for the most part maintaining medieval solidarity and separation, are suffering from medieval repression and persecution; but on the other hand, (and this appears to be the determining factor in the gravity of the _problem_), the Russian Jew is by no means a necessity to the Russian in any way similar to that in which the medieval Jew was a necessity to the medieval Christian. The eastern Jew is beginning to expand with the leaven of the Haskalah, and is simultaneously strangling for lack of the release and exercise of his powers afforded by Emancipation. The Russian and Roumanian, in what they believe to be the preservation of Nationalism, are determined on crippling or destroying the inimical and unassimilative factor in their population; and although the Russian is politically medieval, he is economically modern and considers himself restrained by no need of Jewish money.[20] The outcome for the Jews is economic impoverishment, social persecution, political enslavement, and spiritual degeneration.[21] The second zone includes Austria, Germany, and to a minor degree France, where are settled approximately three millions of Jews. Save in Galicia, where political and racial turmoil is constantly giving the Jewish situation the sombre tinge of a _problem_, the Jews are finding themselves, for the most part, in a precarious _position_. Nationalism demands that they surrender their racial identity and proclivities; anti-Semitism declares upon the verdict of science that such surrender is impossible, and substitutes repression, assimilation, or extinction. The Jews in attempting to satisfy the conditions by entering fully into all the activities of national life arouse through their success only greater hostility; and the situation becomes converted into a vicious circle. France to a large degree and England comprise the third zone, where the Jewish _position_ is identical with that of the fourth zone, the United States, save in one important detail. The Jews in these two zones, numbering only one-and-a-half million, have entered freely into the national life about them, and, except for minor social disabilities which can only make the judicious smile, have been accorded equality, with the result that the Jew _qua_ Jew is exposed to complete assimilation. The distinction between the third and fourth zone is that in England and France, anti-Semitism based on Nationalism is a potentiality (though the recent Aliens Bill and Chesterton trial would suggest that it might be more than this), whereas the open-door theory of settlement which created the United States militates basically against race-discrimination. The Jew of England and America does not face persecution nor repression, but a gradual and apparently pleasant extinction. The medieval Jew found himself a necessary, well-paying, if not honored, guest in the households of Europe; but the day when the Jew resolved on adopting the life and manners of his host, the host resolved on drawing tightly the family lines. The modern Jew has discovered it necessary either to convince the obdurate host, who points to a scientifically certified chart of the family-tree, that he too is of blood germane, or take himself to lodgings in the cellarage. And yet--a third possibility here insinuates itself--why may not the Jew set up housekeeping for himself? _The Vain Effort of Reform Judaism_ The medieval Jew would have accepted without hope the unfortunate predicament; the modern Jew, nerved with a distillation of the Revolutionary "rights of men" and confident that he was not combating the implacability of a religious hatred, adopted expedient and remedial measures, the chief of which, since they form the opposition to Zionism, will be outlined. To justify Emancipation before and after it was secured, assimilative doctrines of a peculiar type, known as Reform Judaism,[22] whereby the essentials of Jewish life were to be separated and saved, constituted the main attempt of the Jew to demonstrate that he was a member of the households of Europe and not an intruder. Reform Judaism began as a result of the Haskalah by simplifying and beautifying, according to European standards, the Orthodox religious service (Germany 1810-20), and ended by abandoning the Messianic Restoration, the doctrine that Israel is in exile and that the prophecies are literally to be fulfilled. The expediency of these measures is apparent. To refute the anti-Semitic charge of racial inferiority, the existence of the race as a separate entity was denied, and the necessary scientific backing has lately been secured.[23] To meet the Nationalists, Israel's national hopes were declared void, and it was strongly urged that the basis of a modern nation is citizenship and not race. The Reformers proceeded further and maintained that the Jewish people were themselves the Messiah, whose mission was "to spread by its fortitude and loyalty the monotheistic truth all over the earth, and to be an example of rectitude to all others,"[24] whose goal was "not a national Messianic State, but the realization in society of the principles of righteousness as enunciated by the prophets;"[25] wherefore, it was not only just that they receive citizenship, but religious duty compelled the Jew to demand it. The Jewish religion was considered the essential possession of the Jewish people--so essential that it was to be maintained at the sacrifice of assimilation; but nowhere is it made apparent how a religion can be maintained without a people, how a people can be maintained without separation, and how separation can be maintained without abandoning the no-race, no-nation propositions. If these are abandoned, the Jews are precisely where they began--another circle whose viciousness is becoming obvious and is resulting in the constant discarding of Jewish rite and form, until the religion which was to be prized and saved is fast becoming a watery Unitarianism, and its adherents are allowing themselves, where permitted, to become completely assimilated. Reform Judaism which began as a compromise is ending as a surrender. The final and unanswerable objection to Reform Judaism as a solution is that the majority of Jews will not even in theory accept it. The devotion to race, religion, and separation is too strong. The Gentile in asking the Jew to assimilate is undoubtedly right; the refusal of the Jew undoubtedly is not wrong; and the ring of true tragedy becomes audible. _The Palliative Measures of Philanthropy_ Contemporary with the unsuccessful attempt at clearing up the Jewish _position_ in western Europe, palliative measures were undertaken to solve the _problem_ in eastern Europe. In 1860 the Alliance Israelite Universelle was founded at Paris with the following purposes in chief:[26] 1. To work everywhere for the emancipation and moral progress of the Jew. 2. To give effectual support to those who are suffering persecution because they are Jews. The Alliance began by distributing pamphlets and calling the attention of western governments to eastern injustice; it gradually, however, undertook practical work. Influenced by Rabbi Kalischer, religious enthusiast, a farm school (Mikveh Israel) was established at Jaffa; and after the Russian persecutions of 1880-82, active colonization for the relief of refugees became the chief work, in which the Alliance received substantial aid from Baron de Rothschild. Meanwhile Baron de Hirsch, another philanthropist of international proportions, dedicated millions to the foundation of colonies in Argentine and Palestine. In the latter place the Hirsch activities were incorporated under the title of the Jewish Colonization Association ("IKA", 1891), working in harmony of aim with the Alliance and with still a third movement--one more of the people--styled Chovevei-Zion (Lovers of Zion). The only activities of the Chovevei-Zion, a general term attached to small and ardent semi-affiliated societies throughout Europe and America, with which we are here concerned are the philanthropic; and their services in this respect were haphazard and negligible.[27] To cast up briefly the sum of practical work accomplished by 1898: 94 schools in Asia and Africa,[28] and 25 colonies in Palestine supporting 5,000 Jews.[29] Such philanthropy is to be considered an attempt, however valiant and noble, to empty the sea with a pail--with a leaking pail. Thus, upon a review of the situation, three alternatives present themselves: (1) Maintenance of the _status quo_ with its dull round of persecution and degradation on one hand, and the soul-destroying life in the Fool's Paradise of Reform Judaism on the other; (2) Amalgamation with the surrounding peoples--a grim race-suicide; (3) Re-establishment of a national center where, perhaps not the entire people, but a remnant can be saved. (_To be concluded_) _As Greece stands for art and Rome stands for law and order, so Judaea stands for morality, and so it occupies an exalted position in history. The Menorah Society comes to the University with a challenge and defies us to ignore at our peril that which Judaism has contributed to civilization and which we have derived from it. We have derived our own religion from it, and that spirit of Puritanism which was so closely connected with the settlement of the new world._--_From an Address before the Cornell Menorah Society by President Jacob Gould Schurman of Cornell University._ FOOTNOTES: [1] _Psalm_ 79. [2] _Der Judenstaat_ (Vienna, 1906); English translation, edited by J. de Haas. [3] Theodor Herzl, "The Zionist Congress," _Contemporary Review_, v. 27, p. 587. [4] I. Abrahams, _Jewish Life in the Middle Ages_ (Philadelphia, 1897), p. 49. [5] Jacob S. Raisin, _The Haskalah Movement_ (Philadelphia, 1913), p. 33. [6] James H. Robinson, _History of Western Europe_ (Boston, 1904, 2 vols.), vol. 1, p. 246. Addison & Steele, _The Spectator_ (London, 1823), No. 495, p. 710. [7] L. Zunz, _The Sufferings of the Jews During the Middle Ages_ (New York, 1907). [8] S. M. Dubnow, _Jewish History_ (Philadelphia, 1903), p. 156. [9] Lady Magnus, _Outlines of Jewish History_ (London, 1888), p. 301 et seq. [10] Raisin, _The Haskalah Movement_, Chap. III. [11] S. Phillippson, _Weltbegerende Fragen_ (Leipsic, 1868) Edouard Drumont, _La France Juive_ (Paris, 1886). [12] Ernest Renan, _Études d'Histoire Religieuse_ (Paris, 1862), p. 85. [13] _Idem_, p. 88. [14] _Idem_, p. 87. [15] H. Graetz, _History of the Jews_ (Philadelphia, 1891), 5 vols., vol. V., p. 318 et seq. [16] G. F. Abbott, "The Jewish Problem," _Fortnightly Review_, vol. 93, p. 742. [17] _The Jewish Encyclopedia_ (New York, 1901, 10 vols.), under "Anti-Semitism." [18] _Idem._ and _ibid._, quoting from Preussiche Jahrbücher, 1879. [19] _American Jewish Year Book_ (Philadelphia, 1913-14), p. 215. [20] Arnold White, "Europe and the Jews," _Contemporary Review_, vol. 72, p. 738. [21] American Jewish Year Book, 1906-07, p. 24-90. Tables showing, for period of 3 years in Russia (1903-06), 254 pogroms, in which 3,973 Jews were killed and 14,034 wounded. C. R. Conder, "Zionists," _Blackwood_, vol. 163, p. 598, states on authority of Dr. Farbstein that 70 per cent. of Galician Jews are beggars and 50 per cent. of Russian Jews are paupers. [22] _Jewish Encyclopedia_ under "Reform Judaism." [23] Maurice Fishberg, "The Jews" (New York, 1911). [24] _Jewish Encyclopedia_ under "Reform Judaism." [25] _Idem._ [26] _Jewish Encyclopedia_ under "Alliance Israelite Universelle." [27] Cohen, _Zionist Work in Palestine_, p. 157. [28] _Idem._ [29] _Idem_, under "Agricultural Colonies in Palestine." The Third Annual Convention of the Menorah Societies I. The Public Meeting _The Third Annual Convention of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association was held at the University of Cincinnati, in the city of Cincinnati, on Wednesday and Thursday, December 23 and 24, 1914. The third session, on Wednesday evening, was a public meeting in the University auditorium. Abraham J. Feldman, President of the University of Cincinnati Menorah Society, formally welcomed the convention, and introduced Chancellor Henry Hurwitz as the Chairman of the evening. Mayor F. S. Spiegel brought the greetings and welcome of the city of Cincinnati. Dean Joseph E. Harry extended a welcome in behalf of the University, and Dr. Kaufman Kohler, President of Hebrew Union College, welcomed the convention in behalf of his institution and of the Jewish community. Professor I. Leo Sharfman of the University of Michigan, President of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, spoke on "The Menorah Movement," and Dr. H. M. Kallen of the University of Wisconsin delivered an address on "The Jews and the War." For the substance of Dr. Kallen's address see his article on page 79. The other speakers spoke in part as follows:_ DEAN J. E. HARRY In behalf of the University of Cincinnati, I bid you welcome. I confess that I can agree with the statement made in your declaration of the nature and purpose of the Menorah Societies, that modern civilization is chiefly a product of three ancient cultures, or to be more exact, I should prefer to say two, since the Roman is but a continuation of the Greek, and we cannot understand ourselves without understanding and having direct reference to the character and work of both the Greek and the Hebrew minds. Two principal elements have entered into the spiritual life of the modern world. The past and the present are one and inseparable, and you cannot destroy the former without doing positive damage to the latter. The roots of our civilization lie in the soil of antiquity, and you cannot destroy and disentangle the fibers of the growing tree of civilization from the far-off centuries that are gone, without injuring the whole organism. "If we were to wipe out all the records of the past, what a series of inexplicable riddles would our own history present, and if we were to blot out entirely every reference to ancient writers, or were to blow away all the perfume that has been shaken down from the vestments of those writers, how blurred and how scentless would the fairest and most fragrant pages of our own great poets and historians appear!" What we need to-day, what our country needs more than anything else, is thorough, really liberally educated men, and not merely men who are supposed by the general public to be educated, simply because they have passed through a college, because in some quarters the business of education has, alas, fallen into the hands of men who are not themselves liberally educated; and so as an ardent advocate of the humanities, with hope that the Intercollegiate Menorah Association will contribute to the laying of greater stress upon the value of the study of the humanities in our college curriculum, I bid you God-speed, and again extend to you the cordial greetings of the University of Cincinnati. DR. KAUFMAN KOHLER I do not know whether you have observed that Cincinnati is somewhat akin to the city of Rome as well as to the holy city of Jerusalem--it is a city with many hills. On this hill here, facing one another for friendly and harmonious coöperation, the two institutions of learning in which we especially, the Jewish community, take particular pride--the University of Cincinnati, which so prominently and in ever expanding proportion stands for the humanities, for classical culture, for the professional and scientific branches of secular knowledge, and on the other hand, the Hebrew Union College, which stands for the mother religion of civilized humanity and for the progressive spirit of Judaism and of Americanism. In this rather insignificant incident the Jewish community may well find a great principle expressed. With his face towards the East from which issues the light of day, where was cradled the faith of Israel, the Jew, ever beholding in classical wisdom and knowledge the sister of his faith, proceeded with the westward march of civilization in order to make religion, by the reason and research of the ages, a great, progressive power, ever regenerating his spiritual heritage and rejuvenating that religion of his own as it goes on through the centuries. This fact, however, of a continual intellectual and spiritual progress of Judaism, is altogether too rarely recognized by the surrounding Christian world, even by its men of light and leading or by its seats of learning, because the New Testament is looked upon by altogether too many as the death warrant of the Old Testament, as if the sun of civilization had stood still over Israel ever since its seers and singers and sages of yore voiced the Divine message. Nor does the Jewish man of culture and college training as a rule appreciate the wondrous achievements of the Jewish genius since the very dawn of history until our day, in the whole domain of learning and science, or of ethical and religious culture. It is therefore a highly laudable endeavor undertaken by the Intercollegiate Menorah Association to arouse the dormant spirit of self-respect in the academic Jewish youth, to stir in him the ambition to study and know this matchless history and literature, and to kindle in his soul anew that idealism which made the Jew throughout all the ages endure and brave the onslaughts of the empires and churches and the persecuting mobs, so that even to-day he is as young and as vigorous as any of the youngest races and nations in the world. _The Importance of Israel's Religion_ This past, I say, cannot but appeal to every high-minded American, whether Christian or Jew, and your study of it will certainly meet with our warmest support and encouragement. Only, in my opinion, one thing you need, young as your association is, young in years and young in experience, and that is, a full comprehension and keen realization of the subject you have in view and a wise and right direction towards it. No one doubts or questions the sincerity of your motives or the praiseworthiness of your aims and purposes when you place on your program the study of Jewish history, culture and problems, and the advancement of Jewish ideals, but you omit that which is most essential, which is the all-encompassing force and factor of Jewish life, the real, peculiar and genuine product of the Jewish genius--religion. We have got a religion which, as has been put by Matthew Arnold, has fashioned four-fifths of the world's civilization. In omitting the idea, as expressed by Matthew Arnold, of the power that maketh for righteousness, in declaring your movement as being altogether non-religious, you run the risk of making of your endeavor an inevitable and certain failure.[G] Let me quote to you from an address delivered recently before a Jewish society in London on "Israel and Medicine" by Professor Osler, sentences that are remarkable and worth repeating. He says: "In estimating the position of Israel in the human values, one must remember that the quest for righteousness is Oriental, the quest for knowledge, Occidental. With the great prophets of the East--Moses, Isaiah, Mahomet [he might have included Jesus of Nazareth], the word was 'Thus saith the Lord.' With the seers of the West, from Aristotle to Darwin, it was 'What says nature?' Modern civilization is the outcome of the two great movements of the mind of man, who is to-day ruled in heart and head by Israel and by Greece. From the one he has learned responsibility to a Supreme Being and love for his neighbor, in which are embraced the law and the prophets. From the other he has gathered the promise of Eden, to have dominion over the earth in which he lives." Now let me add to this that whatever the Jew claims or possesses of culture he has borrowed from the nations and civilizations around him, whether it be architecture, the art or the mode of writing, philosophy and science, the modes of social and industrial life, all of which he has taken and assimilated into his own life. Not so with his religious truth. This is all his own, his peculiar and genuine contribution to humanity. Thereby he has given human life its eternal value, its purpose, its goal and hope for all time. Now it seems to me that you may as well expect of the blind to depict for you his impressions of the prismatic glories of the rainbow, or of the deaf to orate on the beauties of a Beethoven symphony, as to expect of one who lacks the sense of religion, the spirit of faith, to expound, or even to understand, the ideals of the Jew, whose history throughout the past was but one continuous glorification of the only one God, by the master works of its hundreds and thousands of men of learning and the unparalleled martyrdom of the whole people, and whose future is humanity made one by the belief in the only one God and Father. Therefore, let me give you, delegates and members of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, the advice to continue as you started, as an academic, cosmopolitan association, yet at the same time let it be linked to the synagogue of each city as the center of the faith. Let your watch-word be true to the symbol of קומי אורי "arise and shine," and give light to all the nations. Let your inspiration and your power of enlightening the world ever come fresh from the sanctuary of faith, as of yore, and you will not only be all the more honored for this loyalty to the spirit of the past and the spirit of the American people which is religious, but the sweetest delight that comes from the classic world of beauty will reflect only the brighter light of the holiness, the beauty of holiness, that comes from Israel's one God. PROF. I. LEO SHARFMAN We want all that is worthy in the Jewish past to be made a potent force in the American life of the present. You men and women who are students at our universities cannot perform your full duty to your universities unless you add to the richness of the university life, to the variety of its content, to its genuineness and versatility. And in the larger American community we Jews cannot perform our full duty unless we place at the disposal of our country the best fruits of the Jewish spirit. Our Menorah allegiance, then, rests on the foundation of Americanism. And insofar as, through the Menorah movement, we are succeeding in uniting by a common bond men and women who have been brought up under a great variety of circumstances and conditions, we are increasing the democratic spirit of our universities and of the larger life beyond the academic gates. Within the universities, too, the broadening effect of the Menorah idea is not limited to the student body. I can bear witness from personal experience that the university authorities, both faculty members and administrative officers, are not merely tolerating, or even mildly accepting, the work of our Menorah Societies in their midst, but are themselves being led to a better understanding of the place which the Jewish problem occupies in the larger problem of their universities and of the American community for whose service they are training the youth of the land. _Menorah and Religion_ I have said that the aim of the Menorah movement is the study and advancement of Hebraic culture and ideals. The culture of a people is but the permanent expression of its ideals in the various activities of life. Religion constitutes one of the most important of human activities, and we in the Menorah Societies are fully cognizant of its fundamental importance. Indeed, we recognize that the ideals of the Jewish people are perhaps expressed more truly, more profoundly, more eloquently in our religious literature than in any other manifestation of the Jewish genius. We should not be charged with excluding religion, merely because we aim to include more than religion in our purposes and activities. I happen at the present time to be teaching at the University of Michigan, at Ann Arbor. We have there a Menorah Society, devoted to the general object to which all our Menorah Societies are devoted. We listen to speakers and engage in discussions on Jewish history, Jewish literature, Jewish religion, and current Jewish social, economic and political problems. Side by side with the Menorah Society there exists a Jewish Student Congregation, a body of men and women of which I feel it a privilege to have been one of the organizers and to be a member at the present time, which devotes itself entirely to religious activity, to regular weekly worship. The two organizations do not conflict in any way. It is significant that about ninety-five per cent, if not more, of the members of the Michigan Menorah Society attend regularly the services of the Jewish Student Congregation. Unfortunately, not so large a percentage of the members of the congregation attend the meetings or are members of the Michigan Menorah Society. In the course of time, the relationship between the two organizations will doubtless be adjusted more satisfactorily. But in the experience at Michigan we have a concrete illustration of the spur to religion which Menorah men derive from their participation in Menorah work. The ideal of the Menorah Societies is a non-partisan ideal. We do not stand for Zionism or anti-Zionism; we do not urge the acceptance of reform Judaism or conservative Judaism or orthodox Judaism; we do not favor the German Jew as against the Russian Jew, or vice versa, nor do we appeal to one social class as against another. We want the Menorah ideal to be broad enough to include every Jew. We do not exclude religion as such from the scope of our interests; we but exclude any insistence upon a particular sect or branch or kind of Judaism. We avoid all partisan activity which may tend to disorganize our Jewish students, which may tend to divide them. That is all. _A Plea for Tolerance_ I believe that what we need in our universities, what we need in the Jewish community, is more insistence upon Judaism and more light upon the inspiration which Judaism can bring us, and less insistence upon the particular kind of Judaism which you or I or some one else may consider the acme of truth. Indifference to religion and not error in religion is the great danger of these modern times. If we really want religion, if we want to stir again the Jew's traditional passion for religion, if we want to inspire once more the Jew's genius for religion, let us try to understand all aspects and all manifestations of it, let us bend our efforts to a renaissance of religious influence. The future of the Jew in this country will not be determined by the theories or the practices of any one group or sect of Jews. The result will be a composite result, to which the reform Jew and the Zionist, the orthodox Jew and the anti-Zionist, will alike contribute. Let us leave it to the growing generation to determine for itself the content of the theory of life best suited to the future destiny of the Jew. At least, within our university walls let us be tolerant, let us be liberal-minded, let us listen to and understand every man's point of view. MR. HURWITZ In the free and honest expression of adverse views which we have heard to-night, this, indeed, has been a characteristic Menorah meeting. It may fittingly be closed by a word from one of our staunchest friends, one of our staunchest friends because he is an ardent and public-spirited Jew and a patriotic American, Justice Irving Lehman of the Supreme Court of the State of New York, the Chairman of the Graduate Menorah Committee. He addresses this word to the convention: "I am very sorry that I am unable to attend the convention of the Association this year. I feel that during the past year we have made some progress upon which you have reason to congratulate yourselves, but we must remember that our movement is still far from having the force and power which I think it deserves. We have a great and difficult task to perform if we are to succeed in bringing back to the Jewish youth a pride in their Jewish heritage and a knowledge of their Jewish past, and I know that such work is worthy of all effort. I trust that your convention may possess the spirit and the wisdom necessary to further the work, and I wish to renew to you my assurance of willing co-operation." II. The Luncheon _The fifth session of the Convention was a luncheon in the Hotel Gibson, attended by the delegates, university students and graduates in Cincinnati, and members of the Faculties of the University of Cincinnati and the Hebrew Union College. Prof. I. Leo Sharfman, President of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, was the Toastmaster. Chancellor Hurwitz spoke for five minutes upon the purposes and progress of the Menorah movement. President Abraham J. Feldman of the University of Cincinnati Menorah Society expressed gratification at the honor accorded to his Menorah Society by the Convention and appealed to the graduates and prominent members of the community present for support in the work of the Cincinnati Menorah Society. The other speakers were Dean Joseph E. Harry of the University of Cincinnati, Dr. Moses Barron, Representative from the University of Minnesota, Dr. Louis Grossmann of Hebrew Union College, Dr. Samuel Iglauer, graduate of the University of Cincinnati, Walter M. Shohl, graduate of Harvard University, Dr. Kaufman Kohler, President of Hebrew Union College, Prof. Julian Morgenstern of Hebrew Union College, Dr. H. M. Kallen of the University of Wisconsin, and Dr. David Philipson of Hebrew Union College. Following are somewhat abridged reports of the speeches:_ DEAN J. E. HARRY I did not know that I was going to be called upon today, or I should certainly have tried to fortify myself, as the old darky in Virginia said when his master sent him down to another part of the plantation to see if the rebels were fortifying the place: "Massa, they am not only fortyfying it; they am fiftyfying it!" I am glad that our Chancellor here to my right said that the speeches were to be brief. I think that an after-dinner speaker who makes a long speech ought to have about the same punishment that the member of parliament mentioned when he introduced a bill, "The only way to stop suicide is to make it a capital offense, punishable by death." But I have always tried to avoid redundancy of expression. I would never say a "wealthy plumber," nor a "poor poet," nor for that matter a "poor professor." "Vessels of wrath, we pedagogues; Better we were dead, Who, by the wrath of Peleus' son, Must earn our daily bread." Nor would I say an "interesting Menorah Association meeting." That they are interesting goes without saying, if we can judge from the one we had last night. I am exceedingly interested in real culture, and being an American, and knowing, as I do, what the Jews in America can do for the advancement of learning, of knowledge and of the humanities, I am interested in the Menorah movement, which will tend to bring this about; and it is when we reflect upon the war in Europe today, with all its sickening horrors and what that means to culture (we can hardly comprehend it yet), what an obstacle to learning, that we may exclaim with that old bibliophile, Richard de Bury: "O pacis auctor et amator altissime! dissipa gentes bella volentes quæ super omnes pestilentias libris nocent." And by "libris" he meant culture. DR. MOSES BARRON Minnesota brings its greeting to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association as one of the very earliest Menorah Societies. It was really originated in 1903, when a handful of students in the University found it desirable to satisfy certain longings by taking up the study of Jewish history and literature. Some of us had found that it was of little avail to cry over the ashes of the past, and we thought that it would be much more proper to try and study the history, the literature, the ideals of the past for the inspiration to be found there, which might better fit us to cope with the problems of the present and the future. Our Society has grown from a mere handful to an enthusiastic company, so that we have from fifty to seventy-five, and even a hundred, attending our regular meetings. I give this fact simply to show what a profound influence the work of the Menorah has been, what an influence it necessarily must have in the future, in promulgating Jewish culture, Jewish thought and ideals. DR. LOUIS GROSSMANN I am reminded by our Chairman of the time when he was still a student at Harvard, in the earliest days of the Menorah movement, when I addressed the Menorah Society there. It was in the room of the Chancellor, unless I am mistaken, and there were a number of students. They were grouped about, some in chairs, some sitting on the floor, some perched on window sills, while others improvised seats on the furniture. I felt myself patriarchal in the midst of these young men. It was a remarkable scene and it was a remarkably helpful evening, helpful and refreshing to me. The pulses of youth always beat high and I caught the elation of it. Who would not have been touched by it? Some of these young men have since become leaders in thought and action, and I am not surprised. Let me make a confession as to that evening. I not only felt a thrill but made also some observations. These young men had their ideals, but they had also their difficulties. And they spoke of them. We had an exchange of thought and of candor such as comes to a man in the ministry and to a teacher of students but rarely. They told me of their doubts. Young men, serious young minds, always will have their doubts. They want to earn their convictions. I hope the day will never come when young men will not insist on seeing things. These young men were quick-witted and ready with repartee and counter-argument, and I saw in each eye a glint of an ideal. The debate was strong, but the ideals were stronger. _The Power of Ideals_ Ideals are pulses that beat in their own way. An ideal is a fact of the soul; it is more than a definition or an argument. An ideal is always very certain and nobody wants to disprove it, nor can. I notice the Menorah Association has for its aim the cultivation of ideals. It is natural that young men, with red blood in them, should hold dear the precious dreams of what might and should be. As I look upon ideals now, through the perspective of years, I see they have both strength as well as limitations. But I know that, however much life and experience challenges them, they are the best force in us. I respect and value them so much that I deplore the waste of the least of them. An ideal is a moral ambition, a great wish of a true, even if a bit naive, soul. And it should have the right of way. Every work in life implies stern necessity and a fine wish. I am reminded of a bridge in Berlin which the Germans have built with inimitable art and truth. There are four groups, each at a corner. On one an elderly man stands erect and writing. It is History, stern and real. At his side stands a boy, lithe and graceful. There are ideals just as much as Law in the affairs of men. On the other side of the bridge stands another symbol of the two forces in Life: a man carrying a bundle, a bent man, who has borne the brunt of the pioneer days, and next to him also a youth. Commerce, however sordid, still implies morality and the generous side of man. On the third side stands the solemn figure of Religion, sober and haggard, the symbol of Faith and martyrdom. And the young man, next to it, seems sprightly and strong. Why must Religion be interpreted as dispensing comfort alone? Should it not also give strength and joy? In the last corner stands Pestalozzi, the teacher, and a boy looks up into his kind face. We crave for action and capability more than for knowledge and facts. And we crave for love more than for truth, and the real truth brings affections and enthusiasm. In the meetings of your Association you speak often of ideals, you speak of them fervently. But ideals are not merely academic. They are personal. An ideal becomes yourself, if it is yours at all. It is a dynamic force within you. It pervades your whole being. It is an unseen but a very telling strength. It directs you, and it sends you on your errand of life. You cannot rest satisfied merely to know your ideal and to speculate about it. It is the engine of warfare in your career. Study ideals, not to contemplate and analyze, but to emulate them and to fill yourself with them. You have work to do. And work is more insistent than philosophy. You have work to do which no one else can do for you, or may do for you. An ideal is your Self at the highest power. You with fresh energies, you with the clear eye of healthy youth, you with unoppressed hearts, you at the beginning of life, you should go at your work splendidly, directly, forcefully. The real idealist is a man of action, of untiring activity. Do things and you verify what you plan. You have the privilege of youth. Have also the pride of youth. Keep it sweet, but keep it also strong. DR. SAMUEL IGLAUER The Menorah Society appeals to me as a college graduate not only for many of its positive virtues but also for some of its negative merits. It is not in any sense a social organization, and above all it is not a secret society. Now I have my own peculiar views about secret societies in universities, and I do not believe that they tend to promote college spirit and college unity. It has been well said that in these societies those who are in any particular societies are brothers, while every one else who belongs to another society, or to no society whatever, is just a step-brother. To my mind that is not a good spirit in an American institution. It seems to me that, having in this city a Hebrew Union College with a gifted faculty, we should establish at our University a Department of Semitics. Since the University is a public school, an institution supported by public taxation, it certainly could not affiliate directly with a sectarian institution, but I see no reason why the professors in the Hebrew College, if they are not already overworked like the students, should not be able to conduct courses at the University itself, and I believe such courses would promote the Menorah movement more than anything else you could do. I think you would attract students from far and wide to the University of Cincinnati, and you would thereby achieve one of the ends for which you are working. MR. WALTER M. SHOHL It is gratifying to me to attend this meeting of the Menorah, because, as the Chairman has said, I heard the flapping of the wings of the stork at its birth. I recall very well the preliminary meetings that we had when the organization of the Menorah Society at Cambridge was first spoken of. At that time I was one of the doubters; I held back. There were in Cambridge a number of societies, social primarily, that did not desire members of our faith among their number. I felt that a movement which was composed entirely of Jewish men would be mistaken for an effort at a Jewish fraternity that was to take the place of the fraternities in which we were not welcome. The other men, however, felt that we could have a society the purposes of which had nothing to do with social matters, and that we could bring out all that was good in Jewish matters of culture and develop a society to promote those interests. So at first somewhat reluctantly, I joined in with the movement, and the result has justified their farsightedness, and I am sorry now that I was only a "trailer" in the beginning. The position of the Menorah movement and what it stands for calls to mind a story that was told in Montreal a couple of years ago by Lord Haldane, who came to America to attend a meeting of the American Bar Association. A part of the story was recited in verse (which I do not recall exactly) and had to do with an Englishman who was taken prisoner in one of the countries of the Far East, and was offered his choice between conversion to the religion of his captors or death. He was a man who had no particular religious feelings; he was not religious when at home. However, he felt that first and foremost he was an Englishman and that if he were to do anything base it would reflect upon all those ideals which were so dear to him, and therefore he cast in his lot and chose against the change of religion. So, too, with some of us who perhaps are not religious in a formal way; the realization of the great things that have been accomplished in the past by Jews, the Jewish historical background, is in itself a shield to us, and the realization of what Judaism is and stands for must act to prevent us from doing something that would be unworthy of ourselves and of the religion of which we are a part. DR. KAUFMAN KOHLER This comes rather unawares, but I wish to be very brief in stating that, while I listened to the very interesting and suggestive remarks that were made all along this table, and also on recalling what we heard last night, I feel glad, after all, from the point of view of the Hebrew Union College, that the Intercollegiate Menorah Association has come here to make propaganda for its work, at the same time receiving perhaps new direction and new ideas about the work they have so nobly begun. The fact that the work--started, as we heard, at Harvard in 1906--has made such progress shows that at least there was something in the young Jewish student at the colleges that called for the creation of such an association and such kind of work. Perhaps I may say that those who had their misgivings as to the tendencies of the Menorah Association are now at least informed that some of these misgivings or suspicions were not well founded. I personally will say that I had the impression that there was too much of nationalism or Zionism behind the movement, and that the movement was not, from the point of view of the Hebrew Union College or my humble self, one deserving encouragement and support. I have learned to change some of my views and some of my impressions as to the purpose and intention of this movement. There is a well-known quotation, for those who know a little German: "Das sind die Weisen, Die vom Irrtum zur Wahrheit reisen; Das sind die Narren, Die beim Irrtum beharren." I am not one of those who insist on views once maintained though later found faulty. I am rather ready to change my views, especially after what I heard today from my honored neighbor (Prof. I. L. Sharfman) and from what he said last night that the religious idea of Judaism is not ignored but is held in view. All Jews who are Jews must believe that Judaism stands for an uncompromising monotheistic truth, while the world around us has compromised the same. Therefore we, as Jews, must always insist upon the maintenance of the pure monotheistic idea for which we suffered and struggled, and for which our fathers died. We must maintain this as the mainstay and vital principle of Judaism. For this very reason, and for no other, we insist, especially from the point of view of a Jewish theological college, that this idea of a pure Jewish religion, the pure monotheistic idea, must be held unshakenly and without any change or any concession. And for that very reason we could not and will not say that race is everything. We cannot admit that a pure race is the best, and that a pure Jew is he who has maintained solely everything Jewish and not allowed the Greek culture to be assimilated in order to sublimate and spiritualize and idealize the truth inherited. For Ruppin and the Nationalists who follow him, the poor Jews, the ghetto Jews, of Russia who speak Yiddish and live only an exclusive narrow life, are _five-fifths_ Jews, while the Jews in free and civilized lands are only half Jews. Now against this, we of the Hebrew Union College, we who represent progressive or reformed Judaism, must protest. We must insist that the Jewish race, the Jewish people or nation, if you want to call it so, can form only the body; Judaism, the Jewish religion, is the soul. And we will always stand not merely for the body, not merely for the material side, not merely for race, which is the lowest kind of life, but for the spirit, the soul of Judaism, and that is its religious truth. PROF. JULIAN MORGENSTERN I believe that it is one of the positive aims of the Menorah Society to recognize the Jewish side of much that enters, or should enter, into our daily life, to develop our full consciousness of all that is essentially and fundamentally Jewish, and thus enable us to live positive and constructive Jewish lives. It is a noble aim, to which I unrestrictedly subscribe. Whenever I hear public speakers or writers pat Jews and Judaism on the back, and patronizingly tell us, "Oh, you Jews are all right," I am, as no doubt most of us are, deeply chagrined, to use a mild expression. What we want is not that others should appreciate us and tell us that we are all right. What we want, and what we need, is that we should appreciate ourselves and that we should take ourselves seriously and at our full value. Not that we should over-appreciate ourselves and think ourselves alone the salt of the earth. There is such a thing as over-appreciation that must in the end lead to futility and vanity. But equally, there is such a thing as self-depreciation, and to a certain extent I cannot but feel that we Jews have been more or less guilty of that in the past, have more or less, particularly in our college and university life, assumed a deprecating attitude, apologizing as it were for our existence as Jews, and, probably unconsciously, have kept the fact of our Judaism in the background, and suffered our education and our culture to influence almost everything but our Jewish knowledge and our Jewish life. For right appreciation, which shall be neither over-appreciation nor under-appreciation, but true appreciation, based upon a correct estimation of all essentials, the first requisite is knowledge, thorough knowledge of all conditions, forces and influences. And the second requisite is pride, pride in this knowledge and in the object of this knowledge. And this, translated into the Menorah language, means, as I understand it, correct knowledge of Judaism, of our Jewish history, our Jewish past, our Jewish heritage, our Jewish religion, and pride in all this Judaism--a knowledge and pride that alone can enable us to know what Judaism truly is, and what its work and its mission for the present and the future must be, that alone can enable us to live positively and constructively as Jews and perpetuate our Judaism for the blessing of ourselves, our children, and all mankind. So I interpret the Menorah movement. And I heartily welcome such a movement, whose aim is the awakening of our Jewish college young men and women to a wholesome and genuine appreciation of themselves, of the Jewish side of their lives, of their Jewish consciousness and Jewish obligations, of the full meaning and responsibility imposed upon them by their subscribing to the name Jew, and their adherence to the religion of our fathers. We must look to our college-bred Jewish men and women to become the guiding spirits in our Judaism of to-morrow and of all the future. And I say, "Thank God for any movement that must surely lead to this goal." DR. H. M. KALLEN Since this seems to be the occasion for reminiscence, I want to take the liberty of recalling for you an episode of the formation of the Menorah Society at Harvard. It turned on the question of the right form of stating the object of the Society and you will remember perhaps that the object is stated in these terms: "The Harvard Menorah Society for the study and advancement of Hebraic culture and ideals"--not Jewish, not Judaistic, but Hebraic. The persons who agitated the use of the term Hebraic had certain very definite literary and historic and social relationships in mind. To begin with, the word Judaism, in the English language, stands exclusively for a religion. It is co-ordinate with the word Christianity, the word Buddhism, the word Zoroastrianism, with any word that stands exclusively for a religion. Now in the history of the Jewish people, there was a time when Judaism did not exist, and if I understand the gentlemen who represent the Reform sect correctly--I speak under correction--the intention of the Reform movement is a reversion in fact to the religious attitude of the pre-Judaistic period in the history of the religion of the Jewish people. It is "prophetic" or "progressive Judaism" for which they stand, I gather, in contrast with the "Talmudical Judaism," of the larger orthodox sect. But the period of the great prophets is not the period of Judaism, and strictly speaking, the term Judaism excludes the prophetic element as an active force in Jewish life. This is significant, and to me the significance seems tremendous, for so far as my personal sympathies are concerned they go entirely with the prophetic aspects of Judaism, or better, of Hebraism. _Hebraism and Judaism_ Hebraism and Judaism are words now in the English language and their usage is determined for us entirely by the writers who become authoritative either by their style or through the weight of their opinion, and this usage has given the term Hebraism a meaning such that it stands for the entire spirit of the Jew, not only in religion but in all that is Jewish; in English the term Hebraism covers the total biography of the Jewish soul, while the term Judaism stands only for a portion of it. Now the Jewish soul is the important thing, but no one has ever met a soul without a body (at least the people who claim they have met it are still required, for belief, to show evidence more than they have thus far shown); generally speaking, soul and body are co-ordinate and mutually imply each other. You cannot have one without the other. This is even more the case when you are dealing not with an individual but with a people. Hence it is the history of the Jewish body-politic with which Hebraism and its components, including Judaism, co-ordinate. For this reason the gentlemen who stated the object of the Society in the constitution of the Harvard Menorah Society were compelled to take into consideration the following historic fact: There was a time in the history of mankind when religion and life were coincident. You know that the prophets were reformers. The orthodox religion which they fought was the religion of the land. They were progressive religionists, just as the gentlemen who are in the Reform sect to-day claim to be progressive religionists. When they established their religion, _it_ became the religion of the whole nationality, for all ancient religion is national religion. Religion for the Greeks, and religion for the Jews, and religion for the Syrians, and for the Babylonians, and the Romans, was essentially national and political, and the political nationalism of religion in the time of the Roman Empire was the immediate basis for the persecution of the Jews by the Romans. The latter persecuted the Jews not primarily because they disliked the Jews, but because the Jews were a political danger in their refusal to worship the representative of the State in the shape of the Emperor. But in the development of civilization, religion became detached from the totality of civilized living. In the progressive division of labor religion became specialized. The priestly group learned to confine itself more and more to the "things of the spirit"--cult, ritual, dogma, while the other elements in civilization loomed larger and larger. Religion remained social, but society was no longer religious. Life was secularized. I think that the representatives of the Reform sect, in one of their conferences, declared that America is not a Christian country. In so doing they acknowledged this fact. _Continuity of the Jewish Spirit_ Throughout the history of the Jewish people, there is a continuity of spirit which is very different from the continuity of form that attends both the secular and the religious developments of Jewish life. This is the same in both these aspects of Jewish life--in the secular Jewish poetry and thought of the middle ages and up to the present day. Even a Bergson, ostensibly a Frenchman, expresses in his philosophy what is essentially the Hebraic conception of the nature of reality and the destiny of man. From Amos through Job, through the philosophers of the middle ages, to Ahad Ha-'Am there is a clear and accountable continuity. Finally, there is the development of the whole of the secular life of modern Jewry, in Yiddish and in Hebrew. Yiddish may be unpleasant, but Yiddish is no less the speech of the Jews than English, no less the speech of the Jews than Aramaic, and Arabic and Ladino, and all of these have acquired literary and qualitative characteristics which are identical as expressions of the spirit of the Jew, of the Hebraic spirit. This may be seen generally in the case of Yiddish alone. Yiddish, as you know, is a German dialect; it is middle high German in its base, and German is an inflected language; its rhythms are essentially long, periodic, indeterminate, radically different from the rhythms of Hebrew, involving a different kind of co-ordination and mode. But compare Yiddish with German, and you find quite an antagonistic literary quality. Yiddish reads like the Psalms, and the Bible, and the Talmud; it doesn't read like German until it is Germanized. The whole genius of the tongue has been altered by Jewish use so that its spiritual quality has taken on the quality of the race that uses the tongue, and its literary kinship has become Hebraic. Again, there is this whole mass of neo-English, neo-Russian, neo-German literatures which, written by Jews, deal with the life of the Jews, with their interests and character. This is not religious. What is its relation to Jewry? Yet again, there is any number of Jewish individuals, among whom I must count myself, who find it impossible to adjust their consciences with any official type of theological doctrine, who are interested in discovering the truth, and are compelled to acknowledge that no truth has been discovered finally, once and for all; there are hundreds and thousands such. What is to be their relation to their people if Jews are to be considered members merely of Judaistic sects? Yet Jews they are, and if they do not contribute directly to Judaism, they do contribute to Hebraism. Hebraism stands not for that particular expression of the Jewish mind, religion, but for all that has appeared in Jewish history, both religious and secular. The term Judaism stands for that partial expression of the Jewish genius which is religious. _The Ethical Motive of Judaism_ It has been said that the genius of the Jew is entirely religious. I do not think that that is historically a demonstrable proposition. For the dominant motive even in Judaism is not a religious motive. It is an ethical motive. Judaism does not conceive its God as requiring man to be damned for his glory. It conceives its God as an instrument by the worship of whom "thy days may be lengthened in the land." Righteousness and not salvation is the aim even of the Jewish religion. Hebraism is the name for this living spirit which demands righteousness, expressed in all the different interests in which Jews, as Jews, have a share--in art, science, philosophy and social organization and in religion. Hebraism, hence, is a wider term than religion and its continuity embraces, but is not embraced by, the continuity of religion. Now the Harvard Menorah Society, taking this fact into consideration, made use, because of the tradition of English usage, of the term "Hebraic." It recognized that since Hebraism is more comprehensive than Judaism, many people might be Hebraists who are not and need not be Judaists. It refused to exclude them from a share in Jewish life and an opportunity for Jewish service. The organization goes on the principle--both the Intercollegiate and the constituent Societies--that nothing Jewish is alien to it. For this reason the Menorah takes no sides; for this reason it is Hebraic and not Judaistic. For this reason it welcomes everything Jewish without exception--theological and secular, Russian, German, French, English. It requires only that a thing shall be Jewish, that it shall be a possible part of the organic total we call Hebraism. Hebraism is the flower and fruit of the _whole_ of Jewish life. Its root is the ethnic nationality of the Jewish people, and with this also the secularizing reformers agree when they prohibit and discourage the marriage of Jew with Gentile. Many of us, however, are not content with merely the _status quo_. Throughout the nineteenth century it has thrown us into a series of dishonorable compromises. We want a condition--I speak now for myself and not for the Menorah--we want a condition in which the genius of the Jew, the Hebraic spirit, may express itself without any need of compromise. The orthodox Jew, at least, retains his integrity with his darkness. But we are in danger of losing our integrity. We concede to our environment point after point. But we are not liberated in spirit by these concessions; we are merely turned into amateur Gentiles. The orthodox sectary makes no concession to environment, and tends to petrify and die. The reformed sectary makes too many, and tends to dissolve and die. This is the penalty for the _status quo_. Life, to be sure, consists of compromise and concession. But for integral living we must make them as masters, not serfs. There must be one place where the ancestral spirit of the Jew will not need to adapt itself to the world, but will, like the English or French spirit, adapt the world to itself. That place is determined nationally, just as the places of all European culture are determined nationally and racially. _The Aspiration for a Jewish State_ Pride in ancestry is not pride of race, but pride in the spirit of the race, and pride of ancestry is not pride merely of background, but pride in the obligations that ancestry sets. All aristocrats have one motto--it is _noblesse oblige_. This must be the motto of the Jew. We must hence carry our obligation in the spirit of the prophets, which is not primarily a theological spirit, but a purely humane spirit, for which the necessity of man determines the invocation of God; in which the ideal of a free and happy humanity, in a just and democratic society, is the dominating ideal; in which a righteous Jewish state is a persistent aspiration. This is the Hebraism which must underly all the activities of the Menorah Association. This Hebraism, academically realized through study, must be realized in the lives of individuals through work, as Dr. Grossmann has well said, and in the life of the great Jewish mass in a free Jewish state. Every ideal we acquire from the past must be turned into a fact of the present. _Noblesse oblige!_ DR. DAVID PHILIPSON I am reminded that this day marks the one hundredth anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Ghent--one hundred years of peace between English-speaking peoples. I need to be reminded of this after the speech that has just been made, because much that was said has quite fired my fighting spirit--but this is a day of peace and it might not be quite in the spirit of this anniversary day to say all I might otherwise say in answer to the points that have been made and with which I differ radically. There are some things in Dr. Kallen's eloquent address that I do believe, but there are many more things with which I do not agree. But let that be as it may, I was very much interested in his remark, that the "Reform sect," as he is pleased to call us, harks back to the prophets. This has been claimed frequently by the reformers themselves, but he puts a new interpretation upon it; he says the prophets were pre-Judaistic. This is the Christian point of view. They claim that Judaism was the growth of the post-exilic period, but we reformers interpret the term Judaism altogether differently. _The Significance of Reform Judaism_ Judaism means for us the Jewish religion and all that this implies; if the Reform movement in its beginnings went back to prophetism it was simply for this reason--that the pioneers of the Reform movement recognized that the Jews had fallen into the very condition that Dr. Kallen deprecates, namely, they had gotten away from life inasmuch as they had been confined to the ghetto where they had been excluded from the currents of contemporary life. Judaism had become a ghetto religion, and because of this divorce between life and religion the Reform movement arose. The Reform movement is not simply a matter of creed. It affects the whole life of the Jew. One of its basic principles is that the religion of the Jew must square with his life; the needs of the Jew in the modern environment must be taken into consideration by Jewish leaders; Reform Judaism, far from making a separation and raising a barrier between the Jew and life, as those who call us reformed sectarians like to say--quite to the contrary, reconciles the Jew to the civilization in which he is living and wherein his children are growing up. This, to my mind, is the great significance of the Reform movement, and I believe that all those who truly understand it look upon it in that way. The Reform movement, as the movement for religious emancipation, was the accompaniment of similar emancipatory movements affecting the Jews at the close of the eighteenth century. First there was the linguistic emancipation when under the leadership of Moses Mendelssohn the Jews of Germany discarded the use of the German-Jewish jargon or Yiddish, the language of the Jew's degradation, (for there would have been no such thing as Yiddish had the Jew not been degraded and excluded as he was in the countries of Europe) and began the employment of pure German. Secondly, there was the educational emancipation. The Jews had been educated in _chedarim_ where they received instruction only in Hebrew branches and no so-called secular education whatsoever. This separated the Jew from the culture of the world. At the close of the eighteenth century German Jews began to attend schools and universities. Gradually this took place also in other countries. Thirdly, there was the civil or political emancipation, when after the French Revolution the countries of western Europe, one after the other, accorded the Jews the rights of men. The Reform movement or, in other words, the religious emancipation, is simply the result of great world forces, as embodied in these various aspects of emancipation, and for this reason the Reform movement, far from being simply a matter of creed or theological belief, made the Jew a citizen of the world and fitted him for the modern environment. _The "Body and Soul" of Jewry_ Now there is one other point made by the previous speaker to which I feel that I must refer and that is the matter of "body and soul." This is a favorite phrase of Zionist writers and speakers as emphasizing the difference between Zionists and reformers. We reformers also believe that the body Jewish is necessary, but in a sense different from the Zionistic claim that the Jewish nation must be re-established. I as a reformer and a non-Zionist also use the term "the Jewish people," but in the sense of a "religious people," not a "political people." This involves a vital distinction--the distinction between religionism and nationalism. Yes, I also believe that the body, the religious community, is necessary. The reform rabbinical conference declared against intermarriage for the very reason that it is all important that the Jewish people, the _mamleket kohanim_, the _goy kadosh_, be the vessel embodying the religious idea, the spirit. But let it be understood clearly that nationally we are poles apart from the Zionists. Nationally I am an American. I also feel that we ought not to have hyphenated Americans, but Americans pure and simple. In that sense I am nationally an American without a hyphen. Religiously I am a Jew, and religiously I am part and parcel of the Jewish people with whom my religious fortunes are intertwined. Further, I feel very much as Dr. Kallen does in regard to our duty towards the Jews made destitute by the murderous European war. They have none else to look to and we must help them; for whatever may be our differences, we must stand united in this pressing duty of the hour, this work of mercy. But may God speed the day when the Jews in Poland, Russia and Roumania will receive full rights so that nationally they may be considered Poles, Russians or Roumanians as are all others in those lands, as is the case here in free America. To my mind this is the only effective solution to the so-called Jewish problem in those countries. Freedom is the Messiah that is still to come to the Jews in the lands where they are oppressed, so that everywhere they may be at one in the rights of citizenship with their fellow countrymen, differing from them in their religion alone. This is the great distinction I desired to draw between the Jew nationally and the Jew as a member of a religious people; this "religious people" is the body of which Judaism is the soul. PROF. SHARFMAN I am constrained to close this meeting with a statement similar to that made by our Chancellor at the conclusion of the public meeting last evening. This was a typical Menorah discussion. We are an open forum for all points of view. We are glad to hear Dr. Kallen's opinions; we are glad to hear Dr. Philipson's opinions. I am sure that out of this clash of views will come a better understanding of the Menorah idea, a truer and deeper realization of the strivings of our Menorah movement. III. The Business Sessions FIRST SESSION Called to order in the Faculty Room, McMicken Hall, at 11 A.M., by President I. Leo Sharfman. N. M. Lyon, of the University of Cincinnati, was appointed Secretary _pro tem_. Upon the presentation of credentials, the following were seated as the Representatives of their respective Menorah Societies in the Administrative Council: College of the City of New York, George J. Horowitz; Columbia University, M. David Hoffman; University of Illinois, Sidney Casner; University of Michigan, Jacob Levin; University of Minnesota, Dr. Moses Barron; Ohio State University, Herman Lebeson; University of Wisconsin, Dr. Horace M. Kallen. And the following were seated as Deputies: Clark University, Philip Wascerwitz; Harvard University, George A. Dreyfous; Johns Hopkins University, Jerome Mark; New York University, S. Felix Mendelson; University of North Carolina, N. M. Lyon; University of Pennsylvania, Joseph Salesky; Penn State College, H. L. Lavender; University of Texas, Jacob Marcus; Western Reserve University, Sol Landman. The applications for admission into the Association of the Menorah Societies at Brown University, University of Cincinnati, Hunter College, University of Maine, the Universities in the City of Omaha, Radcliffe College, Valparaiso University, and University of Washington were presented. After due consideration of the facts in each case and the statements of the University authorities, all of the applications were accepted and the Menorah Societies named were formally admitted into the Association by the unanimous vote of the Administrative Council. Upon the presentation of their credentials, the following were seated as Representatives: University of Cincinnati, Abraham J. Feldman; the Universities in the City of Omaha, Jacques Rieur; Valparaiso University, Florence Turner. And the following were seated as Deputies: Radcliffe College, S. Marie Pichel; Hunter College, Naomi Rasinsky. The role of Representatives and Deputies was read by the Secretary, and the dues of the several Menorah Societies to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association for 1915 were paid. Chancellor Henry Hurwitz read a letter of greeting to the Convention from Justice Irving Lehman of New York, Chairman of the Graduate Advisory Menorah Committee. (See page 125.) SECOND SESSION Called to order by President Sharfman at 3 P.M. in the Faculty Room, McMicken Hall. Chancellor Hurwitz delivered the report of the Officers for 1914. _Abstract of Officers' Report for 1914_ In his report in behalf of the Officers, the Chancellor referred to the organization in the past year of the eight Menorah Societies which were admitted into the Intercollegiate Menorah Association at the previous session of the Convention, making in all thirty-five constituent Societies, every one having arisen spontaneously at its college or university, with the full approval and encouragement of the authorities. Additional Societies are in the process of formation at several other universities. With reference to the organization of Graduate Menorah Societies, the time was deemed inopportune to proceed definitely in the matter, the war situation absorbing the attention and energies of so many of those who would otherwise be interested in the idea of Graduate Menorah organization, and it was recommended that detailed consideration of the question be laid over another year. But a beginning of Graduate organization has already been made in Scranton, Pa., where a Graduate Menorah Society has been formed. The Intercollegiate Menorah Association has been very cordially invited to join the Corda Fratres International Federation of Students, whose objects are: "To unite student movements and organizations throughout the world, to study student problems of every nature, and to promote among students closer international relations, mutual understandings and friendship; to encourage the study of international relations and problems; to stimulate a sympathetic appreciation of the character, problems and intellectual currents of other nations; to facilitate foreign study, and to increase its value and fruitfulness. The movement is neutral in all special religious, political and economic principles." (From the official declaration of principles.) The Corda Fratres at present comprises the following national organizations as its constituents: Consulates of Corda Fratres in Italy, Holland, Hungary and Greece; the Association Generale des Etudiants de Paris, and the Union Nationale des Associations des Etudiants de France; the Verband der Internationalen Studentenverein in Germany; the Liga de Estudiantes Americanos, including student organizations in the Argentine Republic, Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Peru and other countries in South America; and the Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs in North America. Thus, at present, the sole United States constituent is the Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs. It was recommended that the Intercollegiate Menorah Association accept the invitation to join Corda Fratres as a unit co-ordinate with the Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs, it being understood that the Menorah Association, while thus expressing its approval of the purposes and spirit of Corda Fratres and desiring to aid in its influence and to contribute the element of Jewish culture and ideals to its spiritual constituency, would not be qualified in any way as to its autonomy, purposes, and activities. During the past year the Association continued its lecture system, and genuine thanks are due to all the speakers, members of the Menorah College of Lecturers, who have so generously given of their time and effort to the Menorah Societies. Similarly, the Association has been enabled to continue sending Menorah Libraries to its constituent Societies. In most cases these books have been placed at the disposal of all the members of the university no less than of the members of the Menorah Societies, and the authorities have expressed their warmest gratitude for these contributions to their library facilities, even though the books remained the property of the Jewish Publication Society of America. The presence of the books has done a great deal to stimulate actual reading and study on the part of Menorah members, and the work of the study groups has notably increased during the past year. This is a most gratifying evidence of the seriousness with which the students are taking hold of the Menorah idea. They are still hampered by lack of suitable syllabi, the preparation of which has been unfortunately delayed on account of the impaired health of the scholar who had undertaken to prepare them, but it was hoped that the syllabi would be made available before long. The chief visible product of the administration the past year was the 180-page booklet entitled "The Menorah Movement," which contains a full and official exposition of the nature and purposes of the Menorah movement, a detailed history of the several Societies as well as of the Intercollegiate organization, including reports of the conferences and conventions, besides other material illustrating the attitude of the university authorities and the general community towards the Menorah movement. Its preparation took several months of labor on the part of the Officers of the Association (special credit being due to the Secretary, Mr. Isador Becker), assisted by the various Societies. An edition of five thousand, of which only a comparatively small number of copies remain, was distributed all over the country among the members of the Societies, other students, university authorities, alumni, and the interested public. It served to arouse both the academic and lay interest in the movement and to spread authoritative information about the nature and purposes of the Menorah Societies. This publication also prepared the way for the issue of the permanent and periodical Journal of the Menorah Association, the desirability of which has been felt almost from the beginning of the Intercollegiate organization and reaffirmed at the last Convention. It had been hoped that the first number of THE MENORAH JOURNAL would appear in time for this Convention, but the demands of an initial number that should in every way be worthy of the Menorah ideal of the JOURNAL required a little more time, and the first issue could not appear before January, 1915. THE MENORAH JOURNAL, it was hoped, would not only spread interesting and authoritative information about the activities of the Menorah Societies and stimulate their work further in the future, but would itself be a potent means of promoting Jewish knowledge and literature. The JOURNAL was meant to appeal not to Menorah members alone nor to students only, but to all within and without the universities who were interested in the literary treatment of Jewish life and aspiration. The JOURNAL was extremely fortunate in having the counsel and literary co-operation of many leaders of Jewish thought and action of all parties (for list of Consulting Editors see Contents Page), the JOURNAL itself, like the Menorah Societies, being non-partisan, a forum for the free expression of variant views. Upon the success of the JOURNAL will largely depend the future progress of the Menorah movement and its other literary enterprises contemplated, _e. g._, pamphlet essays and Menorah Classics, which for the present should be postponed, all energies having to be devoted to the JOURNAL. The gratifying encouragement given to the JOURNAL enterprise by many men in the community is but a specific application of the co-operation of the Graduate Menorah Committee, headed by Justice Irving Lehman, which has continued during the past year to assist the Association generously and in the most admirable spirit, the committee reposing absolutely perfect confidence in the officers of the Association. To that co-operation and spirit of confidence the Association owes a great deal which it can repay only by continued effective devotion to the cause which is equally dear to the students and the graduates. It was deemed advisable that for the present the Graduate Menorah Committee should continue as an informal body. A gratifying evidence of the mutual co-operation of the Menorah Societies in a material way during the past year was shown in the appropriation of fifty dollars by the Harvard Menorah Society for the Association. All in all, the Association during the past year may be said to have advanced satisfactorily, though the Officers are conscious of the great opportunities which still remain before the organization. Indeed, the Menorah work is still in its beginnings. With the loyal co-operation of the students and the graduates, the Association looks forward confidently to a bright and big future. _Resolutions_ After due consideration and discussion, the following resolutions were unanimously adopted: RESOLVED, _That the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, organized for the promotion in American Colleges and Universities of the study of Jewish history, culture and problems, and the advancement of Jewish ideals, affiliate with the "Corda Fratres" International Federation of Students._ Note: This resolution was adopted upon the conditions (1) that the Intercollegiate Menorah Association be received into the International Federation of Students as a unit co-ordinate with the Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs, and (2) that the autonomy, purposes and activities of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association shall nowise be qualified by such affiliation.[H] RESOLVED, _That the fifty dollars contributed by the Harvard Menorah Society to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association be devoted to_ THE MENORAH JOURNAL. RESOLVED, _That the Officers be constituted a committee to investigate the nature and work of student organizations analogous to the Menorah in other parts of the world and to submit a report thereon at the next Intercollegiate Menorah Convention._ (Readopted from the last Convention.) RESOLVED, _That the Officers be constituted a committee to consider and draw up definite plans for "Menorah insignia and distinctions._" THIRD SESSION The third session was a public meeting held at 8.15 P.M. in McMicken Auditorium, University of Cincinnati. (For report see page 121.) FOURTH SESSION Called to order on Thursday, December 24th, at 9.15 A.M., in the Faculty Room, McMicken Hall, by President Sharfman. After due consideration and discussion the following resolutions were unanimously adopted: RESOLVED, _That the incoming Officers investigate the problem of the organization of Graduate Menorah Societies and prepare a report with recommendations for submission to the constituent Societies at the beginning of the next academic year(1915-16)._ _The Administrative Council, in session assembled, hereby expresses its hearty approval of the relationship that has arisen and has been maintained between the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, through its Officers, and a body of representative Jewish citizens of public spirit, known as a Graduate Advisory Committee, and gratefully records its deep appreciation of the wise counsel and generous assistance of this Graduate Advisory Committee in the prosecution of the Menorah purposes, and_ RESOLVES, _First, that these informal relations between the Intercollegiate Menorah Association and the Graduate Advisory Committee be permitted to continue as heretofore, and second, that the incoming Officers of the Association present plans looking to the permanent organization of this Graduate Advisory Committee, at the next mid-winter meeting of the Administrative Council._ (Readopted from the last Convention.) _The Intercollegiate Menorah Convention extends its cordial greetings to Justice Irving Lehman and acknowledges with warm appreciation his welcome message and his generous assurance of willing co-operation. The Association is encouraged to carry forward with renewed vigor and inspiration its work of promoting the study of Jewish history and culture at American Colleges and Universities and of advancing Jewish ideals; to merit the confidence and support of the Graduate Advisory Committee._ RESOLVED, _That each constituent Menorah Society should be bound to seek the advice and consent of the Officers of the Association before soliciting assistance from any source._ (Readopted from the last Convention.) RESOLVED, _That the Administrative Council of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, in annual meeting assembled, hereby enthusiastically expresses its entire confidence and trust in the work done by the Officers of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association and its appreciation of the able and efficient manner in which they conducted and supervised the work of the organization during the past year._ The oral reports of the several Menorah Societies, in amplification of their written reports, were presented and discussed. FIFTH SESSION The fifth session was an informal luncheon held in the Banquet Hall of the Hotel Gibson, Cincinnati, at 1 P.M. (For a report of the addresses, see page 125.) SIXTH SESSION Immediately following the luncheon, at 4 P.M., the sixth session was convened in the private auditorium of the Hotel Gibson. The following resolution was unanimously adopted: RESOLVED, _That the Officers of the Association take steps to provide Menorah Societies with syllabi of courses in Jewish history, Jewish literature, and contemporaneous Jewish problems._ (Readopted from the last Convention.) Upon proceeding to the choice of Officers of the Association for 1915, the following were elected: Chancellor, Henry Hurwitz of Boston, Mass. (re-elected by acclamation); President, I. Leo Sharfman of the University of Michigan (re-elected by acclamation); First Vice-President, Isadore Levin, of Harvard University; Second Vice-President, Milton D. Sapiro of the University of California; Third Vice-President, Abraham J. Feldman of the University of Cincinnati; Treasurer, N. Morais Lyon of the University of Cincinnati; and Secretary, Charles K. Feinberg of New York University. After some discussion as to the advisability of deciding immediately upon the place of the next Annual Convention, it was RESOLVED, _That the place of meeting for the next Annual Convention be left to the judgment of the Officers of the Association._ After passing unanimously a Resolution thanking the University of Cincinnati, the Hebrew Union College, the Cincinnati Menorah Society, and the city of Cincinnati for the cordial reception accorded to the Convention, adjournment was had at 5.45 P.M. N. M. LYON, _Secretary pro tem_. NOTE: In the course of the convention, several amendments to the Constitution of the Association were proposed and adopted. The Constitution as amended follows: CONSTITUTION OF THE INTERCOLLEGIATE MENORAH ASSOCIATION ARTICLE I: NAME The name of this organization shall be the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. ARTICLE II: OBJECT The object of this Association shall be the promotion, in American colleges and universities, of the study of Jewish history, culture, and problems, and the advancement of Jewish ideals. ARTICLE III: MEMBERSHIP Sec. 1.--Menorah Societies in American colleges and universities, having the object defined in Article II, shall be eligible for membership in this Association, provided that membership in such Societies is open to all members of their respective colleges or universities so far as the efficient pursuit of the object may permit. Sec. 2.--The Administrative Council (provided for in Article IV) shall have power to elect such honorary members as it may deem fit. Sec. 3.--One constituent Society may be composed of members of two or more neighboring colleges or universities. Sec. 4.--All eligible Societies which adopt this constitution by January 3, 1913, shall constitute the charter members of this Association. Sec. 5.--Other Societies which are formed and eligible, or may be formed and become eligible, for membership in this Association, shall be admitted into this Association by the Administrative Council, and shall become members upon adopting this Constitution. Sec. 6.--By a two-thirds vote of the Administrative Council, that body, in session, shall have power to deprive of membership any Society which may not be carrying out the object of the Association, or may be employing methods prejudicial to its spirit. ARTICLE IV: ADMINISTRATION Sec. 1.--The administration of this Association shall be in the hands of the Administrative Council. Sec. 2.--Every constituent Society shall delegate one member to be its Representative in the Council who shall, at the time of his election, be directly connected with the college or the university as a student or as a member of the Faculty. Sec. 3.--The Administrative Council shall elect annually at its mid-winter meeting the following Officers of the Association: Chancellor, First Vice-President, Second Vice-President, Third Vice-President, Treasurer, and Secretary. (a) Officers who are not Representatives shall ex-officio be members of the Administrative Council. Sec. 4.--The Administrative Council shall hold a meeting during the mid-winter recess, when and where it shall please a majority of the Council. Other meetings of the Council may be called upon the request of a majority of its members, and held when and where it shall please a majority. Notice of every meeting shall be sent to each member at least four weeks beforehand. A copy of the minutes of each meeting shall be duly sent by the Secretary to each constituent Society. Sec. 5.--In case the Representative of a Society is unable to attend a meeting of the Council, his Society may send a duly accredited and instructed Deputy[I] who is not already the Representative or Deputy of another Society. Sec. 6.--A quorum of the Administrative Council shall consist of the Representatives or Deputies from two-thirds of the constituent Societies. (Note:--It is understood that a term of office of a Representative or Officer shall be one year, from one mid-winter meeting to the next). ARTICLE V: DUES Sec. 1.--The annual dues from each constituent Society shall be five dollars, which shall be paid to the Treasurer before the first meeting of the Administrative Council. Sec. 2.--If a Society be admitted into membership after such date, its dues shall be paid upon admission. Sec. 3.--Societies whose dues remain unpaid after the time set shall lose their vote in the Administrative Council until payment is made. Neglect to pay for two years may be a cause for dismissal from the Association by the Administrative Council. ARTICLE VI: DATE OF EFFECT This Constitution shall take effect January 2, 1913. ARTICLE VII: AMENDMENTS An amendment to this Constitution may be adopted by a two-thirds vote of the Administrative Council. FOOTNOTES: [G] See Prof. Sharfman's address, page 124, and Dr. Kohler's remarks at the Convention luncheon, page 128. [H] The Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs, at its Convention at Ohio State University on Dec. 26-30, 1914, passed a resolution of greeting and welcome to the Intercollegiate Menorah Association. [I] _How, and to what extent, a Deputy shall be instructed, depends upon the will of the Society which accredits him. (This was the sense of the Constituent Convention.)_ Notes Of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association _Brown Menorah Dedication Exercises_ The Brown Menorah Society held its dedication exercises in the auditorium of the Brown Union on January 16, 1915. The Chairman was Maurice J. Siff, '15, President of the Society. Morris J. Wessel, '11, spoke of the need of the Menorah from the graduate's point of view. Chancellor Henry Hurwitz brought the greetings of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association and explained the purposes of the Menorah movement. President W. H. P. Faunce of the University, in his response, welcomed the Menorah Society to Brown. Rabbi Nathan Stern, of Providence, spoke upon the significance of the Menorah, and unveiled and lit a brass Menorah which he presented to the Society. Dean Otis E. Randall spoke upon "The Educational Value of College Organizations," and expressed the hope that the new Menorah Society would contribute to the uplift of the student body. President Faunce said, in part: "This Society must justify itself by making better Brown men than ever before. Most especially among its duties it must strive for a type of Brown man that cultivates the best there is in himself, a man who respects himself, soul, body and spirit, the type of man who flings himself gladly into whatever he believes in. And so I hope to-night that every member of this Society will cherish the finest things in the history of his own people if he is a member of the Jewish nation--that he will cultivate everything that is worthy and noble and try to help his brethren throughout the world." _The Thirty-Sixth Menorah Society_ A Menorah Society has recently been organized at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Boston. The meeting preliminary to definite organization was held in the Technology Union on March 9. Isadore Levin of the Harvard Menorah Society, First Vice-President of the Intercollegiate Menorah Association, brought the greetings of the Association and explained the Menorah purposes and procedure. Leo I. Dana, '16, was elected President. In a communication to the Chancellor of the Menorah Association, Dean Alfred E. Burton of the Institute writes: "I take pleasure in stating that we shall be glad to have a branch of the Menorah Society formed among our undergraduates, and I can endorse the names of the officers who have been chosen. They are all earnest students in good standing at the Institute and I am sure they will be able to establish a branch of the Menorah Society that will be a credit to the general intercollegiate organization." The first lecture before the Society was delivered on April 5 by Dr. H. M. Kallen of the University of Wisconsin. The subject was "Hebraism and Nationality." _Menorah Dinners_ The Menorah Society of Clark University held its "First Annual Banquet" on December 17, 1914. President Max Smelensky, '15, introduced the toastmaster, Samuel Resnick, '13. The speakers were President G. Stanley Hall of the University, President Edmund C. Sanford of the College, Dean James P. Porter, Rabbi H. H. Rubenovitz of Boston, A. W. Hillman, '07, Joseph Talamo, '14, and Chancellor Hurwitz. (For the substance of President Hall's address see page 87.) The Ohio State Menorah Society held its Annual Banquet on February 21. The toastmaster was Harry M. Udovitch, '14. (Mr. Udovitch was last year President of the Corda Fratres Association of Cosmopolitan Clubs). The speakers were Professor Joseph A. Leighton, Professor Ludwig Lewisohn, President Henry Greenberger, '15, of the Society, Herman Lebeson, '15, Ohio State Representative to the Intercollegiate Administrative Council, Rabbi Morris N. Taxon of Columbus, Dr. Sylvester Goodman, '06, and Helman Rosenthal, '12. The Harvard Menorah Society will hold its seventh annual dinner on May 3. * * * * * Transcriber's Notes: Page 90, "alterative" changed to "alternative" (is an alternative) Page 106, "qualite" changed to "qualité" (l'aquérir la qualité) This text uses both coöperation and co-operation, as well as today and to-day. THE MENORAH JOURNAL _Published Bi-monthly During the Academic Year By The Intercollegiate Menorah Association "For the Study and Advancement of Jewish Culture and Ideals" 600 Madison Avenue, New York_ _Editor-in-Chief_ HENRY HURWITZ _Associate Editor_ I. LEO SHARFMAN _Managing Editor_ H. ASKOWITH _Business Manager_ B. S. POUZZNER _Board of Consulting Editors_ DR. CYRUS ADLER LOUIS D. BRANDEIS DR. LEE K. FRANKEL PROF. FELIX FRANKFURTER PROF. ISRAEL FRIEDLAENDER PROF. RICHARD GOTTHEIL DR. MAX HELLER DR. JOSEPH JACOBS DR. KAUFMAN KOHLER JUSTICE IRVING LEHMAN JUDGE JULIAN W. MACK DR. J. L. MAGNES PROF. MAX L. MARGOLIS DR. H. PEREIRA MENDES DR. MARTIN A. MEYER DR. DAVID PHILIPSON DR. SOLOMON SCHECHTER HON. OSCAR S. STRAUS SAMUEL STRAUSS JUDGE MAYER SULZBERGER MISS HENRIETTA SZOLD FELIX M. WARBURG DR. STEPHEN S. WISE * * * * * VOLUME I JUNE, 1915 NUMBER 3 CONTENTS THE POTENCY OF THE JEWISH RACE _Charles W. Eliot_ 141 ISRAEL AND MEDICINE _Sir William Osler_ 145 THE WAR FROM A JEWISH STANDPOINT _Richard Gottheil_ 150 O SWEET ANEMONES: _A Song_ _Jessie E. Sampler_ 158 "PATHS OF PLEASANTNESS" _David Werner Amram_ 159 THE JEWISH GENIUS IN LITERATURE _Edward Chauncey Baldwin_ 164 JEWISH WORTHIES: JOCHANAN BEN ZAKKAI _Abraham M. Simon_ 173 ZIONISM: A MENORAH PRIZE ESSAY _Marvin M. Lowenthal_ 179 FROM COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY: _Activities of Menorah Societies_ 194 NOTES _of The Intercollegiate Menorah Association_ 200 * * * * * 25 cents a copy. Subscription, $1.00 a year; in Canada, $1.25; abroad, $1.50 _Copyright, 1915, by The Intercollegiate Menorah Association. All rights reserved Entered as second class matter January 6, 1915, at the New York Post Office, under the Act of March 3, 1879_ Classic Casts of Sculpture [Illustration] FOR HOME, SCHOOL, LIBRARY AND CLUBROOM DECORATION Michelangelo's MOSES, shown herewith, may be obtained in the following sizes: 1279 3 ft. 1 in. $25.00 1279A 2 ft. 12.00 1279B 1 ft. 7 in. 6.00 Special discount from these prices to Menorah Societies and Menorah Members Boston Sculpture Co. 67 Sudbury St. Boston Mass. =KOHUT SCHOOL= FOR BOYS =254th St. & Independence Ave. Phone 367 Kingsbridge= =Riverdale-on-Hudson= =New York City= _An Ideal Boarding and Day School_ ALL DAY IN THE COUNTRY Unexcelled Advantages of Refined home Physical training, and outdoor sports under rigid supervision Resident Masters and House-mother Individualized attention in the class-room Gardening, Manual Training Bible Study and Elementary Hebrew For Booklet, Address at School =HARRY J. KUGEL, Principal= =KAMP KOHUT, A Boys' Summer Camp at Oxford, Maine. Under the personal direction of GEO. A. KOHUT, Ph.D.= =STATEMENT OF THE OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, CIRCULATION, ETC., REQUIRED BY THE ACT OF AUGUST 24, 1912= _of_ THE MENORAH JOURNAL _published_ bi-monthly _at_ New York, N.Y. _for_ April 1, 1915 Editor-in-chief, Henry Hurwitz, 600 Madison Ave., New York City; Associate Editor, I. Leo Sharfman, 1607 S. University Ave., Ann Arbor, Mich.; Managing Editor, Hyman Askowith, North Pelham, N. Y.; Business Manager, Benjamin S. Pouzzner, 52 Vanderbilt Ave., New York City. Publisher, Intercollegiate Menorah Association, 600 Madison Ave., New York City. Owners: (If a corporation, give its name and the names and addresses of stockholders holding 1 per cent or more of total amount of stock. If not a corporation, give names and addresses of individual owners.) Intercollegiate Menorah Association, 600 Madison Ave., New York City. An organization composed of thirty-five societies in as many colleges and universities in the country, having a total membership of about 3000, "For the Study and Advancement of Jewish Culture and Ideals." The officers of the Association are: Chancellor, Henry Hurwitz, 600 Madison Ave., New York City; President, I. Leo Sharfman, Ann Arbor, Mich.; First Vice-President, Isadore Levin, Cambridge, Mass.; Second Vice-President, Milton D. Sapiro, Berkeley, Cal.; Third Vice-President, Abraham J. Feldman, Cincinnati, O.; Treasurer, N. M. Lyon, Cincinnati, O.; Secretary, Chas. K. Feinberg, New York University, University Heights, New York City; Known bondholders, mortgagees, and other security holders, holding one per cent or more of total amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities: (If there are none, so state.) None. Average number of copies of each issue of this publication sold or distributed, through the mails or otherwise, to paid subscribers during the six months preceding the date shown above. (This information is required from daily newspapers only.) (Signed) Benjamin S. Pouzzner. Sworn to and subscribed before me this 21st day of April, 1915. (Signed) Margaret M. Murphy. (My commission expires March 30, 1916.) =Kindly mention The Menorah Journal when writing to advertisers= =Cincinnati 1854= =The Oldest and Largest Jewish Publishing House in America= =New York 1901= =BLOCH PUBLISHING CO.= "_The Jewish Book Concern_" * * * * * =SOME RECENT AND POPULAR PUBLICATIONS= =JEWISH CLASSICS.= Three volumes I. Sufferings of the Jews in the Middle Ages, by L. Zunz; II. Hebrew Tales, by H. Hurwitz; III. Sayings of the Jewish Fathers (Pirke Aboth) by J.I. Gorfinkle. Per volume =.50= =JEWISH QUESTIONS.= By Dr. Ignatz Zollschan =.25= =THE CRUCIFIXION.= From a Jewish standpoint, by Dr. Emil G. 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The frieze may also be obtained in five separate panels in each of the sizes--priced, according to size, $4.50, $2.50, $1.00, and 50 cts.] =The Copley Prints= =For 20 years a Hall-Mark of Good Taste in Pictures--Unsurpassed for Home, School, and Club Decoration= At Art Stores, or sent on approval. $1.00 to $100.00. =Illustrated Catalogue=, practically a Handbook of American Art, =sent on receipt of 25 cents= (stamps accepted) this cost deducted from subsequent purchase of Prints. =Also a distinguished new series= =The Copley Etchings= _Mention The Menorah Journal when you write to us._ =CURTIS & CAMERON= =Boston Salesroom: Pierce Building, opposite Public Library= =77 Harcourt St., BOSTON= =New York Salesroom: Craftsman Building, 6 E. 39th Street= * * * * * Kindly mention The Menorah Journal when writing to advertisers _Forthcoming issues of The Menorah Journal will contain articles by_ _=Lord Bryce=_ _=Dr. Max Nordau=_ _=Hon. Oscar S. Straus=_ _=Judge Mayer Sulzberger, Judge Julian W. Mack, Dr. Solomon Schechter, Prof. Felix Frankfurter, Prof. Israel Friedlaender, Dr. J. L. Magnes, Prof. Norman Bentwich, Rabbi Max Heller, Dr. Martin A. Meyer.=_ _Among other articles to appear in future issues may be named:_ _=Dr. Stephen S. Wise=_--="The College Man and Jewish Life"= _=Dr. George Alexander Kohut=_--="Some Curiosities of Jewish Literature"= _=Dr. Solomon Solis Cohen=_--="The Poetry of Jehudah Ha-Levi"= ="Phases of Jewish Thinking in American Universities"=--A Menorah Prize Essay _=Maurice Wertheim=_--="Americanism and Judaism"= _=Louis Weinberg=_--="The Jew in The Industrial and Fine Arts"= _=Dr. I. L. Kandel=_ of the Carnegie Foundation--="The Development of Jewish Education"= ="Jewish Worthies"=--A series of portrait sketches of the most notable personalities in the history of Jewish life and thought ="Jewish Women of the Eighteenth Century Salons"= ="The Jew in Modern Drama and Acting"= _As The Menorah Journal is published only during the academic year, the next number will appear in October._ ________________________________________________________________________ SUBSCRIPTION BLANK THE MENORAH JOURNAL 600 Madison Avenue, New York I enclose $1.00, for which kindly send me The Menorah Journal for the current year. (Signed)___________________________________________________ Address____________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________ THE MENORAH JOURNAL VOLUME I JUNE, 1915 NUMBER 3 [Illustration] The Potency of the Jewish Race BY CHARLES W. ELIOT [Illustration: _CHARLES WILLIAM ELIOT (born in Boston, 1834), preëminent as educator and publicist; for forty years President of Harvard University; revered not only by Harvard men but by all Americans as a great leader of thought and opinion. Dr. Eliot warmly welcomed the organization of the first Menorah Society at Harvard, in 1906; and to his encouragement is due in large measure the growth of the Menorah movement. At a time when the problems and lessons of the war are absorbing his attention, Dr. Eliot has generously shown his continued sympathy with the Menorah aims and his interest in the Menorah Journal by preparing this article._] For many centuries the Jews have had no country of their own or even national headquarters. They have been scattered among many nations, all more or less unfriendly, and some cruelly oppressive; yet they have retained, under the most adverse circumstances, the capacity to earn their livelihood, to bring up families, and to maintain the great traditions of their race. The main reason for the indestructibility of the Jews is that they early embraced certain invaluable ideals, and have struggled towards them indomitably for thousands of years. _Races and Ideals_ The principal difference between races is difference of ideals. Whenever several distinct races come to live side by side on the same territory in the bonds of a peaceful and coöperative fellowship for all common public purposes, it will be found that they have all reached common political and social ideals, although in regard to many racial attributes and even in regard to religious beliefs they remain distinct. The assimilation of different races can be brought about only by a gradual acceptance of the same ideals and aspirations. For several centuries this process of assimilation has been going on in many parts of the earth, and is now going on at an accelerated pace, resulting in larger conceptions of nationality and larger political or governmental units. _The Influence of Lofty Ideals on the Jewish Race_ The Jewish race affords the strongest instance of the influence on a human stock of lofty ideals, persistently held wherever on the face of the earth a fragment of the race has planted itself. In all generations and in all environments the Jews have succeeded in competition with other races to a remarkable degree. Among a poor population they are less poor than their neighbors; among a free and prosperous population the Jews become richer and more prosperous than the average. Confined in unwholesome Ghettos, they retain to an astonishing degree their health and vitality, helped doubtless by the dietary and sanitary directions given in their ancient Scriptures. Deprived of the right to bear arms in many countries, and, therefore, unable to resist savage attack, they remain inextinguishable. Wherever they become prosperous they develop an extraordinary community feeling, and take care of their own poor or unfortunate. In short, in all generations and in all their various environments they have exhibited, and still exhibit, a remarkable racial tenacity and vigor. It is manifest that this normal success of the race is not due to any especially favorable material conditions, but to the rare strength and significance of its ideals. _"The Noblest of Human Ideals": Jewish Monotheism_ What are these ideals? What have they been for thousands of years? The first of the Jewish ideals has been that of one God--the noblest of all human ideals--early attained, and persistently clung to by the whole race. Mohammedan monotheism is noble, and is the main source of the strength of those races which have embraced the religion of Mahomet; but the Mohammedan doctrine of One God arrived thousands of years after the Jewish, and never was so pure. The most significant sentence in the English speech is the first sentence of the Hebrew Bible--"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." That is the first of the Jewish ideals, to which the race has been true in all environments, in weal and in woe; and that belief has delivered it from many sorts of enfeebling and degrading terrors and superstitions. _The Ideal of the Family_ Another Jewish ideal which has counted for much in the history of the race is the ideal of the family--pure, honorable, and sacred. The veneration of ancestors, which has been an important part of the religion of China and Japan, is only an undue exaggeration of the Hebrew commandment, "Honor thy father and thy mother." The Jewish race has seen fulfilled the promise which is the last phrase of that commandment, "that thy days may be long in the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee," although in many lands and not in any land of their own. The organized human society most likely to prove durable or permanent is that which possesses and maintains in theory and practise a lofty ideal of the family. The reverence shown by children toward their parents and the devotion of parents to their children, which prevail in Jewish families, are both more intense than is usual in Christian families. These sentiments yield infinite good in any human society; they produce, and pass on from generation to generation, purity of life, family honor, and a real consecration of the best human affections. That is the second potent Jewish ideal. _The Ethical Ideal of the Ten Commandments_ The third effective ideal is the ethical teaching contained in the Ten Commandments, the most compact and yet comprehensive code of morals ever written. These ethical principles have been held before the Jewish race for thousands of years wherever it has lived, in good times and bad, an ideal toward which the race has always struggled, though with frequent lapses. This code contains the institution of the Sabbath Day, which by itself accounts for much of the extraordinary endurance of the race. The Jews have always been distinguished for their respect for learning and their zeal for education. In the Ghettos of Europe, under the most discouraging conditions, their Rabbis kept alive the ancient learning, and through many centuries gave the elite of the rising generation some mental training, when no instruction was to be had by the masses of mankind. A persecuted race, provided it retains its vitality and elasticity, receives admirable training in loyalty to its ideals. In the case of the Jews this was a loyalty not only to race, but to religion; and religious loyalty is the finest and most sustaining of all loyalties. The religion of the Jews emphasizes an ideal to which the Jewish mind and heart have responded ardently from the earliest times--the ideal of righteousness. Loyalty to this ideal includes loyalty to race, family, religion, and all righteous persons. The Jews believe that righteousness alone exalteth a nation, a family, or a man. _Will the Jewish Race Meet the Test of Liberty?_ For two thousand years the Jews have led their daily lives under exposure to bodily harm, injustice, and all sorts of disaster, and under such grievous trials have preserved their ideals. The race is now to be put to another and severer test. In the free countries of Europe and America the Jews enjoy complete political and industrial liberty. They were for centuries excluded from most professions, arts, and industries, and were driven into trade and money-lending. Now all callings are open to them. In the Middle Ages there were only a few directions in which a successful Jew could safely spend his money. Now he can spend it in any direction--wisely and beneficently, or foolishly and ostentatiously. Will the race bear liberty as well as it has borne oppression? The liberty, which is the only atmosphere in which the strongest men and women can develop, often causes the downfall of weak-willed human beings. Rich Jews, like other rich people, are in danger of becoming luxurious--the more so because the race has been cut off from military service, and has not been addicted to out-of-door sports. The worst destroyer of sound family and national life is luxury. If the race is to meet successfully the test of liberty, it will get over its apparent tendency of the moment towards materialism and reliance on the power of money, hold fast to its social and artistic idealism, and press steadily towards its intellectual and religious ideals. [Illustration: Signature: Charles W. Eliot] Israel and Medicine BY SIR WILLIAM OSLER [Illustration: _SIR WILLIAM OSLER (born in Ontario, Canada, in 1849) Regius Professor of Medicine at Oxford and one of the world's leading medical authorities; distinguished not merely as investigator, teacher, and practitioner, but also as essayist and ethical teacher of singular grace and humanity, as shown in the volumes entitled "Aequanimitas" and "Counsels and Ideals." The present address, delivered in London at the twenty-fifth anniversary of the Jewish Historical Society of England, is here given its first publication in this country, with Sir William's special authorization._] In estimating the position of Israel in the human values we must remember that the quest for righteousness is Oriental, the quest for knowledge Occidental. With the great prophets of the East--Moses, Isaiah, Mahomet--the word was, "Thus saith the Lord"; with the great seers of the West, from Thales and Aristotle to Archimedes and Lucretius, it was "What says Nature?" They illustrate two opposite views of man and his destiny--in the one he is an "_angelus sepultus_" in a muddy vesture of decay; in the other, he is the "young light-hearted master" of the world, in it to know it, and by knowing to conquer. Modern civilization is the outcome of these two great movements of the mind of man, who to-day is ruled in heart and head by Israel and by Greece. From the one he has learned responsibility to a Supreme Being, and the love of his neighbor, in which are embraced both the Law and the Prophets; from the other he has gathered the promise of Eden to have dominion over the earth on which he lives. Not that Israel is all heart, nor Greece all head, for in estimating the human value of the two races, intellect and science are found in Jerusalem and beauty and truth at Athens, but in different proportions. _Medicine in the Talmud_ It is a striking fact that there is no great Oriental name in science--not one to be put in the same class with Aristotle, with Hippocrates, or with a score of Grecians. We do not go to the Bible for science, though we may go to Moses for instruction in some of the best methods in hygiene. Nor is the Talmud a fountain-head in which men seek inspiration to-day as in the works of Aristotle. I do not forget the saying: "_In uns'rem Talmud kann man Jedes lesen, Und Alles ist schon einmal dagewesen_." With much of intense interest for the physician, and in spite of some brave sayings about the value of science, there is not in it the spirit of Aristotle or of Galen. It is true we find there one of the earliest instances in literature of an accurate diagnosis confirmed _post mortem_. A sheep of the Rabbi Chabiba had paralysis of the hind legs. Rabbi Jemar diagnosed ischias, or arthritis, but Rabbina, who was called in, said that the disease was in the spinal marrow. To settle the dispute the sheep was killed, and Rabbina's diagnosis was confirmed. _The Role of Jewish Physicians in the Middle Ages_ In the early Middle Ages the Jewish physicians played a role of the first importance as preservers and transmitters of ancient knowledge. With the fall of Rome the broad stream of Greek science in western Europe entered the sud of mediævalism. It filtered through in three streams--one in South Italy, the other in Byzantium, and a third through Islam. At the great school of Salernum in the tenth, eleventh and twelfth centuries, we find important Jewish teachers; Copho II wrote the Anatomia Porci, and Rebecca wrote on fevers and the fœtus. Jews were valued councillors at the court of the great Emperor Frederick. With the Byzantine stream the Jews seem to have had little to do, but the broad, clear stream which ran through Islam is dotted thickly with Hebrew names. In the eastern and western Caliphates and in North Africa were men who to-day are the glory of Israel, and bright stars in the medical firmament. Three of these stand out preëminent. The writings of Isaac Judæus, known in the Middle Ages as Monarcha Medicorum, were prized for more than four centuries. He had a Hippocratic belief in the powers of nature and in the superiority of prevention to cure. He was an optimist and held strongly to the Talmudic precept that the physician who takes nothing is worth nothing. Rabbi ben Ezra was a universal genius and wanderer, whose travels brought him as far as England. His philosophy of life Browning has depicted in the well-known poem, whose beauty of diction and clarity of thought atone for countless muddy folios. _Maimonides: Prince Among Physicians_ But the prince among Jewish physicians, whose fame as such has been overshadowed by his reputation as a Talmudist and philosopher, is the Doctor Perplexorum--_dux, director, demonstrator, neutrorum dubitantium et errantium!_--Moses Maimonides. Cordova boasts of three of the greatest names in the history of Arabian medicine: Avenzoar, Albucasis, and Averroes (Avenzoar is indeed claimed to be a Jew). Great as is the fame of Averroes as the commentator and transmitter of Aristotle to scholastic Europe, his fame is enhanced as the teacher and inspirer of Moses ben Maimon. Exiled from Spain, this great teacher became in Egypt the Thomas Aquinas of Jewry, the conciliator of the Bible and the Talmud with the philosophy of Aristotle. He remains one of Israel's great prophets, and while devoted to theology and philosophy, he was a distinguished and successful practitioner of medicine and the author of many works highly prized for nearly five centuries, some of which are still reprinted. He says pathetically, "Although from my youth Torah was betrothed to me and continues to live by me as the wife of my youth, in whose love I find a constant delight, strange women, whom I took at first into my house as her handmaids, have become her rivals and absorbed part of my time." The spirit of the man is manifest in his famous prayer, one of the precious documents of our profession, worthy to be placed beside the Hippocratic oath. It ends with: "In suffering let me always see only my fellow creature."[A] _Jewish Physicians and Medieval Popes_ In the revival of learning in the thirteenth century, which led to the foundation of so many of the universities, Hebrew physicians took a prominent part, particularly in the great schools of Montpelier and of Paris; and for the next two or three centuries in Italy, in France, and in Germany, Hebrew physicians were greatly prized. But too often the tribulations of Israel were their lot. As one reads of the grievous persecutions they suffered, there comes to mind the truth of Zunz' words: "_Wenn es eine Stufenleiter von Leiden giebt, so hat Israel die hochste Staffel erstiegen._" Their checkered career is well illustrated by the relations with the Popes, some of whom uttered official bulls and fulminations against them, others seem to have had a special fondness for them as body physicians. Paul III was for years in charge of Jacob Montino, a distinguished Jewish physician, who translated extensively from the Arabic and Hebrew into Latin, and his edition of Averroes is dedicated to Pope Leo X. In my library there is a copy of the letter of Pope Gregory XIII, dated March 30th, 1581, and printed in 1584, confirming the decrees of Paul IV and Pius V, which he regrets were by no means held in observance, "but that there are still many among Christian persons who desiring the infirmities of their bodies be cured by illicit means, and especially by the service of Jews and other infidels. . . ." It was at Mantua that a Jewish physician, Abraham Conath, established a printing press, from which the first Hebrew works were issued. _Names of Distinction in Later Centuries_ Throughout the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries in France, Germany, and Italy we meet many distinguished names in the profession, and in his _Geschichte der Jüdischen Aertz_ Landau pays a very just tribute to their work. Only a few are met with in England. Isaac Abendana, a Spaniard, practised in Oxford and lectured on Hebrew at Magdalen College. We have at the Bodleian Jewish almanacs which lie issued at the end of the seventeenth century, and a great Latin translation of Mishnah. He afterwards migrated to Cambridge. A more important author was Jacob de Castro Sarmento, a Portuguese Jew, who became licentiate of the Royal College of Physicians in 1725, and Fellow of the Royal Society in 1730. There is in the Bodleian an interesting broadsheet from the Register of the London Synagogues respecting charges made when his name was proposed at the Royal Society. He contributed many papers to the Philosophical Transactions, and was the author of several works. In the eighteenth century Jean Baptiste de Silva, of a Portuguese Jewish family, became one of the leading physicians of Paris, consulting physician to Louis XV, and the friend of Voltaire, who remarks, "_C'était un de ces médecins que Moliere n'eut ni pu ni osé rendre ridicules_." One of the special treasures of my library is a volume of the Henriade superbly bound by Padeloup, and a presentation copy from Voltaire to de Silva, given me when I left Baltimore by my messmates in "The Ship of Fools" (a dining club). Voltaire's inscription reads as follows: "_A Monsieur Silva, Esculape François. Recevez cet hommage de votre frère en Apollon. Ce Dieu vous a laissé son plus bel héritage, tous les Dons de l'esprit, tous ceux de la raison, et je n'eus que des Vers, hélas, pour mon partage._" _The Achievement of Recent Years_ In the nineteenth century, with the removal of the vexatious restrictions, the Jew had a chance of reaching his full development, and he has taken a position in the medical profession comparable to that occupied in the palmy Arabian days of Cordova and Bagdad. In Germany particularly, the last half of the century witnessed a remarkable outburst of scientific activity. Traube, who may well be called the father of experimental pathology; Henle, the distinguished anatomist and pathologist; Valentin, the physiologist; Lebert, Remak, Romberg, Ebstein, Henoch, have been among the clinical physicians of the very first rank. Cohnheim was the most brilliant pathologist of his day; to Weigert pathological histology owes an enormous debt, and, to crown all, the man whose ideas have revolutionized modern pathology, Paul Ehrlich, is a Jew. In America Hebrew members of our profession for many years occupied a very prominent position. The father of the profession to-day, a man universally beloved, is Abraham Jacobi, full of years and honors; and the two most brilliant representatives in physiology and pathology, Simon Flexner and Jacques Loeb, carry out the splendid traditions of Traube and Henle. I have always had a warm affection for my Jewish students, and the friendships I have made with them have been among the special pleasures of my life. Their success has always been a great gratification, as it has been the just reward of earnestness and tenacity of purpose and devotion to high ideals in science; and, I may add, a dedication of themselves as practitioners to everything that could promote the welfare of their patients. In the medical profession the Jews had a long and honorable record, and among no people is all that is best in our science and art more warmly appreciated; none in the community take more to heart the admonition of the son of Sirach, "Give place to the physician, let him not go from thee, for thou hast need of him." [Illustration: Signature: Wm Osler] FOOTNOTE: [Footnote A: I am told by authorities that the attribution of this prayer to Maimonides is doubtful. Where is the original?] The War from a Jewish Standpoint BY RICHARD GOTTHEIL [Illustration: _RICHARD GOTTHEIL (born in Manchester, England, in 1862; came to New York in 1873), educated at Columbia and at German Universities; since 1887 Professor of Semitic Languages and Rabbinical Literature at Columbia. Apart from his scholarly labors, Professor Gottheil has devoted himself body and soul to many Jewish causes, notably Zionism, in which he has been a leader in America from the beginning. He was among the first to extend an encouraging hand to the Menorah movement and has responded generously to repeated calls to lecture before Menorah Societies. The present article is based upon an address recently delivered before the Cornell Menorah Society._] The war in Europe presents problems for the Jews which must be faced no matter what the consequences may be. These problems are of two kinds, due to the fact that we are members of a race that is scattered over the whole earth, and the units of which are to be found in the four corners of the globe. In this way a double set of duties is entailed upon us. On the one hand, we have to take our rightful place as citizens of the different countries in which we live: to accept all the burdens that go with such citizenship, and to partake of the joys and sorrows that are its inevitable accompaniment--in a word, to take the advice of the Rabbis of old and "seek the welfare" of the country in which we live. But this obligation is so self-evident, and the problems raised by it solve themselves so naturally, that they need no further thought. In point of fact, the patriotism of the Jews for the lands in which they live has been demonstrated on so many occasions that only blind ignorance or wilful misrepresentation can call it into question. At the present moment, in all the armies that are at the front, our brethren are doing service even beyond their numerical proportion. _The Toll Paid by the Jew_ It is to the second set of problems that I venture to call attention--those Jewish problems that concern ourselves in particular, that deal with our relations to and with our fellow Jews--problems which I am afraid are not always present in our minds. For one reason or another, they are apt to be forgotten, to slip into the background through sheer negligence. Indeed, in many cases we are fain to put them intentionally into a corner and remove them discreetly from sight. It has needed a great world event at this time, as it has in the past, to bring many of us to reason and to a realization of our duty. The titanic struggle in which so many of the nations of the world are engaged has come to remind us also of our position as Jews and to recall to us our relations with the past, our connections with the present, and our hopes for the future. It is indeed true that none of the great political movements that have affected the world have passed by without in some special manner affecting the Jewish people. As we look back through history and allow our thoughts to run down the highway of the ages, we perceive the effects such struggles have had upon the Jew. We think of the time when ancient Babylonia stretched out its arm from the East to gain a foothold on the Mediterranean and to grasp the power of the world. What was the effect upon the Jews? The Babylonian captivity. Many hundreds of years after, Rome--the Babylonia of the West--lunged out toward the East in the same search for universal dominion; and we still observe the Ninth of Ab in commemoration of the destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem. Again some centuries passed us by, and we come to the inevitable conflict between Christianity and the rising power of Islam. Who was it but our own Jews who suffered most as the crusading hordes moved through Europe--our own Jews who were driven before them from the Rhine into what at a later time became the great national Ghetto in Poland? And now in this twentieth century, as a people, and in proportion to its numbers, which body of men, women and children is paying the most exacting toll to the forces of destiny? Again it is the Jew. _"The Belgians of All History"_ We all have the greatest possible sympathy for the Belgian people and for the Belgian land. Yet how much greater has been the suffering of the Jewish people--the Belgians not of a day but of all history? In Eastern Europe, in Poland, in Galicia and in parts of Russia, at least two or three millions of Jews have suffered from the ravages of a war waged with a bitterness that exceeds all bounds. Invading armies have passed and re-passed over their homes--miserable as they were even in times of peace. False accusations have been launched against them so that they have been regarded as enemies by both sides and treated as such. Thousands have been driven from their homes to congest villages already filled to overflowing or to increase the want and suffering indigenous to towns and cities. An amount of anguish and pain has been caused such as the Jews have never known in all their long tramp through the ages. What have we done, we Jews in America, to assuage even a part of this pain? What measures have we in view, when once the war shall be over, to regain for these people the possibility of living, to bring back for them a little of that which they have lost through no fault of their own and in no cause which is theirs? In most cases the only right permitted to them is the right to suffer, and they must in addition pay the price of that suffering. As we think of all these circumstances, is it not proper and meet that we should ponder the whole situation in which we Jews find ourselves today? I believe that it is eminently the moment to do so. We refuse to believe that the great waste of human life and energy now going on in Europe is a waste pure and simple. We refuse to believe that some purification is not to result from the fire through which mankind is passing, and that some sanity in handling human affairs is not to follow the evident insanity with which we are now confronted. Something a little more stable because a little more reasonable must appear at the end to replace the inconstancy and unrest which have up to now characterized the relations of peoples to each other. And as we hope this for the world at large, we are hopeful too that full attention will be given to those problems which concern the Jews specifically. I wish then to indicate the chief among these problems, in order that we may ourselves see clearly the road that must be taken. _The Prospect in Russia and Poland_ First and foremost, of course, rank the questions that concern the Jews in Russia. Quite apart from any consideration of the general problems affecting that country, the case of the Jews in Russia and Poland demands a settlement that shall make existence bearable for them, and which at the same time shall not run counter to the real and vital interests of the Russian people. Nay more; such existence must not only be bearable. It must be of a kind that will place the Jews upon a level with the other inhabitants of the Empire and will give them the necessary opportunity to develop whatever talents or capabilities they possess. It is not for us to prescribe in what manner and by what means this shall be accomplished; and I use the word "must" not in the sense that any compulsion is to be applied to Russia in this respect, but rather as an expression of the certainty that the trial through which the Czar's land is now passing is of such a kind as to purge her necessarily of all traces of national and religious intolerance. This feeling cannot be expressed in better words than those used by M. Bourtzeff, the well-known reactionary, when he said, "We are convinced that after this war there will no longer be any room for political reaction and Russia will be associated with the existing group of cultured and civilized countries." Proof that such feelings are making their way among the most intelligent portion of the Russian population is shown by the remarkable document put forth some weeks ago over the signatures of noted Christian professors, litterateurs, and members of the Duma, in which the plea is made for the removal of all restrictions that at present shackle the Jews. "Let us understand," they say, "that the welfare and the power of Russia are inseparably bound up with the welfare and liberties of all the nationalities that constitute the whole Empire. Let us then conceive this truth. Let us act in accordance with our intelligence and our conscience, and then we are sure that the disappearance of all kinds of persecution of the Jews and their complete emancipation, so as to be our equals in all rights of citizenship, will form one of the conditions of a real constructive imperial policy." And we are the more persuaded that these views will prevail when we remember that Russia has been brought into closer contact with just those nations of Europe where Jewish emancipation has been most perfect and has brought forth the best fruits. It is unthinkable that these nations should fail to put their influence on the side of Jewish freedom in Russia when European accounts are finally balanced.[B] _The Broken Faith of Roumania_ In the second place, any regulation of the Jewish status in Europe must of necessity include Roumania. The injustice of the Government's attitude in that country is even more pronounced than it is in Russia. For Roumania is bound to a certain course by a "scrap of paper." At the Berlin Congress of 1878, one of the conditions upon which statehood was granted to Roumania was that the rights of free citizenship should be conferred upon the Jewish inhabitants in the principality--who, it may be remarked in passing, were among the oldest residents there. Roumania gave her solemn promise to carry out this condition; but by political subterfuge of the most brazen kind she has circumvented the whole spirit of the demand. The Roumanian Chamber passed a law to the effect that only Jews who had been naturalized by it were entitled to citizenship; and as the Chamber refused to naturalize more than a handful each year, the provisions of the Berlin Treaty have been as good as void. When quite recently--in 1913--during the progress of the last Balkan War and prior to the intervention of Roumania, the Roumanian Jews volunteered to serve in large numbers, the proposal was brought forward to grant the rights of citizenship to all Jews who had entered the army. Yet this proposal was voted down; and the condition of the Jews has remained as it was prior to 1878. They are inhabitants in a country, subject to its laws, liable to all duties placed upon citizens--but they are themselves prohibited from becoming citizens. It is intolerable that such a condition should be allowed to continue; and if right is to take the place of might in the inevitable re-arrangement of the community of European nations, the status of the Roumanian Jews must be one of the Jewish problems to be solved. _The Hope of Regaining Palestine_ There is a third Jewish problem the importance of which perhaps even transcends the two just mentioned; transcends because of the interest that attaches to it and because of its vital import to every Jew the world over. I refer to the problem of Palestine, which is wrapt up with the very existence of the Jews and which symbolizes the hopes that have been nurtured throughout the centuries. We know that the Jew in his inevitable march westward has kept his face turned towards the East; that in prayer and in meditation his gaze has rested upon that country which enshrined at one and the same time his origin and his future aspirations. It is true that up to within some forty years that aspiration remained in large part a pious wish; and that though it was cherished as coming to realization "quickly and in our day," very few attempts were put through to arm the Almighty with human effort. At best, God-fearing and pious Jews removed to Palestine, either to immerse themselves there in study and contemplation, or to end their days in the odor of sanctity. But the last twenty-five years have witnessed a conscious effort to make of Palestine a rallying point for the Jewish people, a place where Jewish life may be lived to its fullest extent and which may serve as a beacon light to all parts of the Diaspora. Many a waste place has been made to blossom again; and much of the culture and learning acquired by the Jews in the long centuries of toil and effort has been made available to revivify the Land of Promise. With infinite pains and untold sacrifices the Jewish pioneers went forward in their peaceful effort to regain the soil of their forefathers. Colonies have been founded there; primary schools, high schools and technical institutions have been established, and many of the forces have been started that make the foundation for a permanent settlement. This conscious effort can not have been put forth in vain. Palestine represents the goal of our endeavor. And any settlement after the war that has in view the general problems involved will be forced to take cognizance of the just hopes that we Jews place in the future of that country and the just rights that the Jewish people believe they possess and have acquired there. The form in which such rights shall be expressed is not a matter for discussion at present. The fact alone is of importance. In the past the world has applauded the fight made by the Poles for their national existence; it has followed with interest the Greek War of Independence, the Italian striving for unity, the Irish endeavors for racial autonomy, and the Alsatian effort after independent expression. It must and will appreciate and esteem the attempt made by the Jews to re-fashion their anomalous status and to re-create the statehood that they lost nearly two thousand years ago. _The Collapse of Principles Held Sacred by the Jews_ Our concern, however, in the present world conflict goes further than our own immediate affairs, and meets those interests which we have in common with the rest of humankind. Much as we deplore the wanton destruction of property, much as we bewail the reckless loss of life, we mourn especially the diminution of ethical standards and the perversion of our whole outlook on life. For this means the lapse of much for which our own teachers have stood, the forfeit of many a principle which has been dear to the Jewish heart. Let me touch lightly upon three points out of the many that come to mind. First of all, what we must deplore most is the defiance to law and to its reign which has become so marked a characteristic during the present war. The agreements arrived at in conventions, the bases of treaties, the binding character of compacts, and the sanctity of engagements--all seem to have been thrown into one melting pot. The mere fact that the expression "a scrap of paper" has become a household word, bandied about by orators and scribblers, shows the distance we have descended into the abyss. The whole structure of our international relations seems to have fallen to the ground and the labored work of centuries to have been undone in a few months. Now, the Jews have been from the earliest times a people that have laid the greatest possible stress upon the rule of law; so much so, that their own laws were supposed to have divine sanction. In olden Jewish times everything was regulated by law--man's relation to his fellow men, to the state, and to God; to such a degree that we have been blamed often for being a law-ridden people. We cannot, therefore, remain oblivious to the fact that the sanctity of law has now been rudely called into question and its authority greatly weakened. As Jews we must be deeply concerned in assisting the European world back to a full consciousness of the majesty and eminence of the rule of law. But more than that, it was part of our earliest teaching that "thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." What clouds of hatred have not been blown from one line of trenches to the other! What volumes of spleen have not been sent from one country to the other! In countless speeches, in newspapers and in books, the doctrines of dislike, of animosity, of deepest malice have been preached. Men have been taught to look upon certain neighbors as born enemies, to see in those who do not speak their own tongue not only a stranger but an enemy. Back of the soldiers under arms, back of the cannons with their deadly missiles, stand millions of loathing men and women shooting darts of odium that reach further than any shell and that are more poisonous than any gas. When shall we be able once again to preach the beautiful teaching of the prophet, "Have we not all one Father; hath not one God created us all?" And lastly, we must bear in mind that the Jews have been opposed from of old to the rule and reign of might as represented by the God of War. In a syllabus on the history of the Peace Movement just published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, it is passing strange to find that the Old Testament is entirely overlooked and that from the first point, "The Cosmopolitan Ideal among the Greek Philosophers," the jump is made at once to the second, "Jesus Christ, the Prince of Peace." And yet we know that in the outlook of our greatest teachers and philosophers the vision of peace loomed large and powerful. "Ye shall not teach war any more," said one of our greatest. And for another the true sign of his prophetic mission is that he preached peace. How sadly these teachings have been belied in the present war we know only too well. _Is War Necessary and Good?_ In many circles it has been held that development is possible for the human race only with the concomitance of war. What wonder--when modern teachers have preached just such a necessity? Even so great a religious leader as Luther said, "War is a business divine in itself, and is as necessary as eating or drinking or any other work." Should we then wonder that a historian such as von Treitschke has added, "War is the last revealer of power. God will see to it that war always recurs as a drastic medicine for the human race,"--or that another historian, Delbrueck, should have said, "What beauty was to the Greek, holiness to the Hebrew, government to the Romans; what liberty is to the Englishman, war is to the Prussian." Nietzsche, one of the greatest of modern apostles, has based many of his theories upon "a violent repudiation of any faith or tradition which recognizes a power of right and justice lying beyond our impulsive nature; an identification of self-restraint with degeneracy and of self-assertion with health; a search for happiness in the conquest of others rather than in self-conquest; a substitution of the Will to Power for the Darwinian Will to Live, with the consequent intensification of the unconscious and instinctive struggle for existence into a battle for conscious mastery; and a sharpening of the competition of life, with its self-observed rules of fair play or its traditionally imposed limitations, into a glorification of war as the supreme test of strength, obtaining its justification in success." In a very remarkable article which appeared in the _Nineteenth Century_ for last September, written by a man evidently most religiously minded, appears the following: "Is the heart of England still strong to bear and to resolve and to endure? How shall we know? By the test? What test? That which God has given for the trial of people--the test of war. The real court, the only court in which this case can and will be tried, is the court of God. This twentieth century will see that trial, and whichever people shall have in it the greater soul of righteousness will be the victor. The discovery that Christianity is incompatible with the military spirit is made only among decaying people. While the nation is still vigorous, while its population is expanding, while the blood in its veins is strong, then on this hope no scruples are felt. But when its energies begin to wither, when self-indulgence takes the place of self-sacrifice, when its sons and daughters become degenerate, then it is that a spurious and bastard humanitarianism masquerading as religion declares war to be an anachronism and a barbaric sin." _The Jewish Answer_ The Jewish attitude in regard to this great problem before the world can be dealt with in a very few words. These words have already been given to us in the twentieth chapter of Exodus: "If thou wilt make an altar, thou shalt not wave thy sword over it; for if thou wavest thy sword over it thou hast polluted it." It has been emphasized by the prophet Jeremiah when he said, "Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mighty man glory in his might. Let not the rich man glory in his riches; but let him that glorieth, glory in this, that he understandeth and knoweth Me, that I am the Lord who exerciseth loving kindness, judgment and righteousness on the earth." To this I will add only one single word of the Rabbis: "The whole Torah exists solely for the sake of the ways of peace." This ideal of peace has been the guiding star of Israel for which the Jew has prayed morning, noon and night, and I trust that the young men of the Menorah will be true to that which the Menorah typifies, and will assist in the spreading of its light by upholding the reign of law, the reign of love, and the reign of peace. [Illustration: Signature: Richard Gottheil] FOOTNOTE: [Footnote B: In the last number of THE MENORAH JOURNAL, Mr. Jacob H. Schiff ventured to suggest the reverse influence, and to intimate that the association of England with Russia was having an adverse effect upon the Jews in England. While Mr. Schiff does not tell us upon what evidence he bases his views, I venture to guess that it consists largely of the mistrust and ill-will caused in England by a small coterie of German-born bankers and their following. But Mr. Schiff must know that this ill-will is in no way connected with the fact that the men referred to are members of the Jewish race. Most of them have never taken the least interest in Jewish affairs, some even have ostentatiously kept themselves quite apart from any connection with them. And what is more, the feeling against them is shared by Jews as well as by non-Jews in England. Perhaps more serious still is Mr. Schiff's presentment concerning German anti-Semitism. To speak simply of "a certain anti-Semitic tendency in Germany" is to coat the truth with so much honey as almost to reverse its meaning. Anti-Semitism in Germany, and especially in Prussia, has kept the Jews far from any positions of importance in university life, on the bench, and in all state and military affairs. And to add that the war "will crush out most of this anti-Semitic tendency" is to fly in the very face of well-ascertained and authenticated facts of very recent occurrence. In _Harper's Weekly_ for February 6th of this year (p. 122), a series of such facts is adduced. Nor can Mr. Schiff forget that forced conversion away from the Jewish faith and communion has nowhere taken on the dangerous proportions it has in the Fatherland. Russia, it is true, has martyred many Jewish bodies; German "Kultur" has quenched too many Jewish souls. History will have to decide which has done the greater hurt to the Jewish cause.] O Sweet Anemones BY JESSIE E. SAMPTER _This Song is one of a series put into the mouth of a nationalist Pharisee of Jerusalem living through the times of the coming of Jesus to Jerusalem and the later development or perversion of Jesus' ideals by Paul._ O sweet anemones on Sharon's plain, Light dancing seraphim of sun and rain, Was he not one of us, was he not ours? And yet he saved not us, O crimson flowers! As stars that bloom in heaven, full-bloom and still, As native stags that leap from hill to hill, As you, dear blossom-stars, on native plains, So planted here, with God, our home remains. I, too, would perish here, where he has died, But felled by horse and spear, not crucified; I, man of peace, would pour, O Rock of God, My freedom or my blood on Zion's sod. When pagans sweep thy fields with withering blast, My heart is sanctified to death at last; Its taste is honey-sweet within my mouth, For we that drink with God can dread no drouth. O sweet anemones on Sharon's plain, A spring shall come for us, to bloom again,-- To God a day, to us a thousand years,-- Who still remembers, lives, refreshed with tears. "Paths of Pleasantness" _The Study of the Jewish Law_ BY DAVID WERNER AMRAM "_Her paths are paths of pleasantness, and all her ways are peace. She is a tree of life to those that lay fast hold on her, and happy is every one that retaineth her."--Prov. 3:17, 18._ [Illustration: _DAVID WERNER AMRAM (born in Philadelphia, 1866), educated at the University of Pennsylvania, has been Lecturer and since 1912 Professor of Law in the University of Pennsylvania Law School. Professor Amram has published books and articles not only on common law topics but on interesting subjects in Jewish legal lore and belles-lettres, among his books being: "The Jewish Law of Divorce," "Leading Cases in the Bible," and "The Makers of Hebrew Books in Italy."_] One of the methods by which the Jewish people managed to survive endless misery and persecution during eighteen centuries of dispersion and protect themselves from the continuous bombardment of their social and moral citadels was by taking refuge in the study of the law. The study and observance of the law, both civil and religious, saved the Jews from degeneration and vulgarization, and preserved for them the humanizing memories of the thoughts and deeds of their forebears. Through their common interest in the law and its study they kept in touch with one another throughout the lands of their dispersion, they kept alive their feeling of brotherhood and the memory of their ancient independence, and translated this memory into a hope for the re-establishment of the State, a hope which has never died. "_The People of the Law_" The term "the people of the law" has often been applied to the Jews in the opprobrious sense that they are a people who deal according to hard and strict rules, untouched by the qualities of love and mercy. Properly understood, however, the term "the people of the law" is a title of honor, one of which we may well be proud. As used in our literature and by our people, "law" signifies something more than civil and criminal jurisprudence. It is our word "Torah," meaning doctrine, teaching, including not only what is generally known as law but also what is known as ethics. The people of the law is the people that studies the great thoughts of its great men of all times, and adopts them as rules of life which it becomes a duty and a pleasure to obey. The people of the law is the people that in the midst of a world of chaos in which nation fought nation with the weapons of death, sat in communion with a past world from which came such messages as this: "Attend to me, O my people: and give ear unto me, O my nation: for a law shall go forth from me, and I will make my judgment to rest for a light to the peoples. . . . Hearken unto me, ye that know righteousness, the people in whose heart is my law; fear ye not the reproach of men, neither be ye dismayed at their revilings. For the moth shall eat them up like a garment, and the worm shall eat them like wool: but my righteousness shall be forever and my salvation unto all generations." Righteousness was the aspect of Deity that appealed to the second Isaiah, and it was he that spoke words of comfort to our people in all the days of their endless tribulations. The certain faith in the ultimate success of right sustained them throughout the centuries and constitutes their strength to-day. This is the law that was handed down to them from of old, the law of right, which though often broken, often forgotten, was always found again and cherished as the one thing worth while in a world torn by the brutal instincts in man--instincts which the law had chained and sought to make harmless. So we may well cling to our title of the people of the law, remembering that it does not mean merely Nomos, as the Hellenized Jews mistranslated Torah, but legal and ethical doctrine and knowledge in its broadest sense, and that it is the people of the law that have always shown their love of knowledge and found it "a tree of life to those that lay fast hold on it." Some ancient Jewish mystic said that the sword and the book came out of heaven together and Israel had to choose. Israel did choose and thereafter dreamed of days when swords would be beaten into ploughshares. _How the Heritage of the Law Was Preserved_ The reading of the law has since time immemorial been an established part of the synagogue service, thus educating the people to know their law, the very phrases of which by constant reference and repetition became part of their daily vocabulary. The origin of this custom of reading the law in the synagogue may probably be found in the Biblical references to the great convocations when King and scribe read the law to the assembled people. The effect of the dispersion of the Jews was to give a peculiar sacredness to the law as the sole heritage of their earlier and happier days. In most of the lands of their dispersion, the Jews dwelt a race apart, separated from the rest of the community by mutual prejudices and antagonisms. The soil on which they dwelt was so far as ultimate overlordship was concerned the land of the stranger, but nevertheless in a very definite and special sense it was the Jews' own land. For it was a land in which the law of the stranger was not the law. The law of the land of their dispersion was not the law of the owner of the soil but the law of the Jews. In this sense the Ghettos of Italy and the Gassen of Germany were not so much Italian and German soil as they were Jewish. As by the modern fiction of extraterritoriality the home of an Ambassador is considered part of his own national territory, so these exclusively Jewish settlements were colonies of Judæa planted on foreign soil. They were separated from the rest of the land by visible or invisible walls, and within these walls, hardly touched by the influences that were at work shaping the life around them, the ancient law of the Jews was preserved and handed down from generation to generation. Hence during the Middle Ages the student of the law became the most important member of the community, and all the energy of the community that was not required to outwit the constant menace of brutal force and religious persecution was devoted to the cultivation of the law and of the literature that it gave rise to. It should be noted, however, that since the beginning of the Talmudic period, the civil law developed in certain directions only, because after all the Jewish people had no land of their own in the usual sense and no central authority and were constantly moving from place to place, always subject to persecution. Some branches of their law were entirely neglected and others abnormally developed. _The Schools of the Law_ In the Talmudic period, the judges, members of the Synhedrion, and professors of the law schools, received a long professional training. The course of study lasted seven years, at the end of which, having passed their examination successfully, the graduates were eligible to assignment as judges in the lower courts, from which they were promoted to act as associate judges in the great Synhedrion and eventually might hope to attain the dignity of full synhedrial membership. These judicial dignitaries were obliged to be well versed in the languages, law and customs of the contemporary peoples, especially in the laws of the Greeks and Romans. Great academies of the law flourished in Palestine and still greater ones in Babylonia, the latter eventually supplanting the former. These academies called for the enthusiastic encomium of one Talmudist who said, "God created these academies in order that the promise might be fulfilled that the word of God should not depart from Israel's mouth." The law students met twice a year in assembly for examination. Their studies were pursued at home, except in the months of Elul and Adar when they went up to the Assembly. Here they were arranged in classes and under the direction of their masters heard lectures and discussed the subject matter presented to them topically. At these Assemblies actual questions of law were submitted from Jewish communities all over the Jewish world, and the solutions to these problems were prepared and forwarded by the great masters. In addition to these professional schools there were everywhere general schools or, as we might say, high schools connected with the synagogues. It is a tribute to the importance that was ascribed to the high schools in later generations that their origin was projected back to the days of the Flood when Shem and Eber established a law school in which subsequently Isaac, Jacob, and Rebecca heard lectures. It will be noted that according to this bit of folklore Rebecca was the first woman law student. The same fancy which invented this most ancient of the schools, also invented the law school which Judah built for Jacob in Egypt, and the school established by Moses in which he and Aaron were the professors and Joshua was the janitor. _The Study of the Law "the Chief End of Man"_ The fancy of the people associated nearly all of its great men with the study of the law. The entire tribe of Issachar was said to have devoted itself to the study of the law, the merchant tribe of Zebulon furnishing the means of support. God himself, according to another mystic, was a professor in the celestial law school in which He taught the law to the souls of all the righteous, in that heaven which they conceived of as a place where the law might be perpetually studied; and even while the Temple was still standing and sacrifices were being offered, the Jewish teachers used to say that God does not require burnt offerings but the study of His law. From all of these traditions it will be seen that to the ancients the study of the law was the chief end of man. The Jew never considered ignorance to be bliss and has little sympathy with the religious ideal of many non-Jewish people that religion is more important than knowledge. One of the great masters even went so far as to say that the ignorant man cannot be pious. It was Simon the Just, one of the survivors of the Men of the Great Synagogue, who said that the world stands upon three things, the law, the service of God, and charity, and he put the law first, for the first duty of a man is to observe the law. He must be just before he can be charitable. At one time it was sought to place some limitations upon the right to become a student of law, and herein the schools of Hillel and Shammai differed. Hillel was the democrat who held that all persons, without exception, should enjoy the privilege of studying law; Shammai was the intellectual aristocrat who sought to limit this privilege to those who were wise, modest, of ample means and of goodly parentage, thereby establishing rules similar to those that obtain in the best modern law schools, which require a collegiate education as a preliminary to admission; but Shammai went further in that he required the students to be wise and modest as well as persons of good breeding and of ample fortune. Just how many of our modern law students could meet these requirements is a question upon which I have no statistics. On this very matter of the proper qualifications for admission to the privilege of studying law, we have heard much in our time. Perhaps a contribution to the subject from the old and somewhat neglected Code of the Mishnah would not be inappropriate. The Mishnah says: _"Eight and Forty Qualifications for the Law"_ "The law is greater than priesthood and royalty, for royalty is acquired by thirty qualifications, priesthood by four and twenty, but the law by eight and forty, and they are as follows: Study, attention, utterance, understanding, reverence, veneration, modesty, cheerfulness and purity, service of the wise, choice of associates, debate with fellow students, deliberation in study of Bible and Mishnah, a minimum of business, a minimum of worldly pursuits, a minimum of pleasure, a minimum of sleep, a minimum of talk, a minimum of jesting, forbearance, kindliness, faith in the wise, resignation in suffering, knowing one's place, satisfaction with one's lot, bridling one's words, refraining from self-complacency, amiability, loving the Creator, loving His creatures, loving righteousness, loving equity, loving reproof, eschewing worldly honor, not being puffed up by learning nor delighting in laying down the law, helping one's neighbor bear the yoke, inclining toward a favorable judgment of others, steadfast in the truth, steadfast for peace, concentration in study, asking, answering, listening, enlarging, learning with a view to teach, learning with a view to act, enabling one's teacher to become wiser, thoroughly understanding what one hears, and repeating every dictum in the name of him who uttered it." I recommend this list of qualifications to the consideration of modern teachers and students as well as to those who are concerned with the preparation of a code of legal ethics for the profession. The Jews loved the law and respected it and they honored its expounders and administrators. They do not believe that the world can be made over or made better by any man or by any preaching. They are by instinct conservative, holding on with tenacity to the ideas and institutions that have grown up in past times and that are expressions of the needs of society and of its adjustment to the forces that play upon it. This is why the law, which is the embodiment of these conservative forces, meets with their respect and allegiance, why its study was cultivated with such zeal in the past, and why in our own day it still finds so large a percentage of votaries among the sons of our people. [Illustration: Signature: D.W. Amram] The Jewish Genius in Literature _A Study of Three Modern Men of Letters_ BY EDWARD CHAUNCEY BALDWIN [Illustration: _EDWARD CHAUNCEY BALDWIN (born in Cornwall, Conn., 1870), Assistant Professor of English in the University of Illinois, has taken a special and scholarly interest in the contributions of the Jews to civilization, on which subject he has written a notable book entitled "Our Modern Debt to Israel," besides articles in various periodicals. He is an honorary member of the Illinois Menorah Society, evincing a warm sympathy with the Menorah aims and actively coöperating in the Menorah work._] A study of great Jewish names in modern literature has impressed me with the fact that every Jewish man of letters has attained his fame by virtue of qualities that are essentially Jewish. In other words, we cannot fully understand the work of even modern Jewish literary men unless we know the fundamental qualities of Jewish genius. To illustrate what is meant by this assertion, we may consider briefly the work of three nineteenth century Jewish authors--Heine, Beaconsfield, and Zangwill. These men are apparently wholly different; and yet they attained literary eminence through qualities or mind and heart which we have learned to associate with the race from which they sprang. _Heinrich Heine: A Jew at Heart_ Heinrich Heine is the one writer of the first rank that Germany can boast between the death of Goethe in 1832 and the advent of the younger generation of dramatists, Sudermann, Hauptmann, and the rest, sixty years later. To free himself from such a limitation as his Jewish birth seemed to him to be, and with the more specific object, it is said, of securing a government position in Prussia, Heine allowed himself to become a convert to Christianity. "Judaism," he said, "is not a religion; it is a misfortune." His conversion, however, failed to profit him. He lost the fellowship of his own people, and was contemptuously called "the Jew" by his enemies. In a sense, the designation was entirely just. A Jew at heart Heine remained to the day of his death. On his death bed, speaking of the Jews he said: "Queer people this! Downtrodden for thousands of years, weeping always, suffering always, abandoned always by its God, yet clinging to him tenaciously, loyally, as no other under the sun. Oh, if martyrdom, patience, and faith in spite of trial can confer a patent of nobility, then this people is noble beyond any other. It would have been absurd and petty if, as people accuse me, I had been ashamed of being a Jew." Not only was Heine a Jew in his instinctive racial sympathies, but his work bears the indelible impress of Judaism. It is a distinctively Jewish product. In it appear the buoyancy of spirit which sustained him under suffering that would have crushed a less resilient temper; the intellectual arrogance; the proneness to censure rather than to commend; and especially the excessive self-consciousness;--all these distinctively Jewish traits were in him exaggerated and helped to make his work what it was. It is his self-consciousness, in particular, that made his _Buch der Lieder_ his best production. In that remarkable collection of lyrics Heine appears at his best, because the ability to compose songs that are the spontaneous utterance of emotion, at one and the same time personal and representative, is a Hebrew heritage. The Hebrew genius was essentially lyric, rather than epic or dramatic; and in consequence, the lyrics of ancient Hebrew literature are its chief glory. In proof of this, we have but to recall the dirges and triumph songs, the reflective lyrics, and the liturgical hymns that compose the collection we know as the Psalms. The excellence of both the old Hebrew lyrics and of Heine's Lieder is to be found in the extraordinary subjectivity of the Hebrew temper--the racial fondness for impassioned, yet artistic, self-expression. Yet Heine's Jewish traits are evident not only in the subjectivity of his lyrics, but in the new and richer character that he gave to the German Lied. This, hitherto vague and dreamy, became in his hands startlingly concrete and definite. And this is true even when he expresses the most subtle feelings. Always the most evanescent _Stimmung_, not less than moods more primitively simple, find expression in metaphors so sensuously material as to recall Solomon's Song. Compare a typical lyric of Heine, such as the following: Die Rose, die Lilie, die Taube, die Sonne Die liebt' ich alle in Liebeswonne, Ich lieb' sie nicht mehr, ich liebe allein Die Kleine, die Feine, die Reine, die Eine; Sie selber, aller Liebe Bronne, Ist Rose und Lilie und Taube und Sonne with the love lyric sung by one of Israel's nameless singers: Behold thou art fair, my love; Behold thou art fair; Thine eyes are as doves. Behold thou art fair, my beloved Yea, thou art pleasant: And our couch is green. The beams of our house are cedars, And our rafters are firs. I am a rose of Sharon, A lily of the valleys. As a lily among thorns, So is my love among the daughters.[C] Even so brief a comparison may illustrate, though it may not prove, that for the ultimate source of Heine's Oriental exuberance and materialization, so new to German literature, we must look in Jewish not in European culture. _The Spiritual Depth of Heine_ Perhaps because Heine was in spirit an Oriental, the Germans never have known exactly what to make of him. Professor Francke says (_History of German Literature_, p. 526) that Heine "produced hardly a single poem which fathoms the depths of life." This assertion seems scarcely defensible in view of such poems as the following: Wo wird einst des Wandermüden Letzte Ruhestatte sein? Unter Palmen in dem Süden? Unter Linden an dem Rhein? Werd' ich wo in einer Wüste Eingescharrt von fremder Hand? Oder ruh' ich an der Küste Eines Meeres in dem Sand? Immerhin! Mich wird umgeben Gotteshimmel, dort wie hier, Und als Todtenlampen schweben Nachts die Sterne über mir. To find an equally beautiful expression of faith in God as a universal spiritual presence that transcends all space relations, we must go back to the anonymous Jewish poet who wrote the psalm in which occur the lines: "Whither shall I go from thy spirit? And whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: If I make my bed in Sheol, behold thou art there. If I take the wings of the morning And dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea; Even there shall thy hand lead me, And thy right hand shall hold me. If I say, Surely the darkness shall cover me, And the light about me shall be night; Even the darkness hideth me not from thee; But the night shineth as the day. For the darkness and the light are both alike to thee." As a matter of fact, both poems are to be accounted for as equally the product of a rarely gifted people--a people with a unique genius for religion.[D] _Disraeli and His Oriental Imagination_ Benjamin Disraeli belonged to a family who left Spain in the fifteenth century to avoid the horrors of the Inquisition. Upon their escape, in gratitude to the God of Jacob who had sustained them through unheard of trials, they adopted the name Disraeli, in order that their race might be forever recognized. Of such a family Benjamin Disraeli was a worthy representative. He never was ashamed of his race. On the contrary, he gloried in it, and lost no opportunity to put forth the claim of his people to be the true aristocracy of the earth. "Has not the Jew the oldest blood and the finest genius of the world?" he asks. And again, in one of his books (_Tancred_, 1847), he says, "The Jews are of the purest race; the chosen people; they are the aristocracy of nature." It is Disraeli's Jewish characteristics that have bewildered and sometimes offended his critics. He has been charged with insincerity because he was so clever, and because he wrote with a kind of Oriental exuberance that was to him entirely natural and a part of his Jewish heritage. Gilfillan is the only critic, so far as I know, who has recognized that Disraeli's excellences, and his defects as well, were racial rather than individual. Speaking of his Oriental fancy and cleverness, Gilfillan says: "Disraeli has a fine fancy, soaring up at intervals into high imagination, and making him a genuine child of that nation from whom came forth the loftiest, richest, and most impassioned songs the earth has ever witnessed--the nation of Isaiah, Ezekiel, Solomon, and Job. He has little humor, but a vast deal of diamond-pointed wit."[E] _Disraeli's Wit: A Purely Jewish Product_ Disraeli's wit, which made him so many enemies, is a purely Jewish product. It is satiric. Now satire was the form taken by Jewish wit in the Middle Ages as a result of the hard conditions under which the Jews lived. As one modern Jew has said, "The Jews seized the weapon of wit, since they were interdicted the use of every other weapon." With every door closed in hostility against them, there was little they could do but laugh with bitter irony at their fate, and with savage satire at their oppressors. With such an ancestry as this behind him, it is not to be wondered at that Disraeli's wit is scornful, and that he excelled in personal satire and invective. It was never, however, unprovoked. Disraeli never indulged in personal satire or invective except in his own defence. For example, his mockingly ironical reply to the attack of a member of the House of Commons named Roebuck, which was one of the most effective rejoinders Disraeli ever made, was in answer to a most virulent arraignment of his political motives. "I have always felt," he said, "that in this world you must bear a great deal, and that even in this indulgent, though dignified, assembly, where we endeavor so far as possible to carry on public affairs without any unnecessary acerbity--still we must occasionally submit to some things which the rules of this house do not permit. I could, no doubt, have vindicated my character; but that would only have made the honorable member from Bath speak once or twice more, and really I have never any wish to hear him. I have had the most corrupt motives imputed to me. But I know how true it is that a tree must produce its fruit--that a crab-tree will bring forth crab apples, and that a man of meagre and acid mind, who writes a pamphlet or makes a speech, must make a meagre and acid pamphlet or a poor and sour speech. Let things, then, take their course." _Disraeli's Fondness for Allegory_ Another striking peculiarity of Disraeli was his fondness for veiled allusion. Nearly all of his most popular novels--and this was _one_ of the main reasons for their phenomenal popularity--were thinly veiled representations of Disraeli's own contemporaries, who were easily recognizable by the reading public. Take, for instance, the admirable burlesque entitled _Ixion in Heaven_, where the author tells how Ixion, king of Thessaly, having fallen into disrepute on earth, was taken up into heaven by Jupiter and feasted by the gods. Here Jupiter is really George the Fourth and Apollo is the poet Byron. The latter's pose of gloomy misanthropy, as well as his habit of fasting to keep from growing fat, are admirably satirized in the following dialogue: "You eat nothing, Apollo," said Ceres. "Nor drink," said Neptune. "To eat, to drink, what is it but to live; and what is life but death. . . . I refresh myself now only with soda-water and biscuits. Ganymede, bring some." Now this fondness for veiled allusion is distinctly a Hebrew characteristic. The Arabs today have a saying, "as fond of a veiled allusion as a Hebrew." This has always been a Hebrew trait. I suppose no literature of any people consists so largely of allegory, in proportion to its bulk, as does the Hebrew. In proof of this assertion, one needs but to allude to the vogue in post-exilic Judaism of the Apocalypse, in which contemporary history was presented in the form of allegory, and to the Rabbinical fondness for the allegorical interpretation of the Scriptures. So it would not be difficult to show that not only these qualities I have mentioned, but all the qualities that made Disraeli admired or feared were his by virtue of his Jewish inheritance. _Zangwill's Prophetic Spirit in "The War God"_ Israel Zangwill knows the Jews, not as George Eliot did, through a process of philosophic induction, but at first hand, because he is a Jew by birth and breeding. He, unlike Heine, has never tried to conceal the fact that he is a Jew. In Israel Zangwill all the tenderness and sympathy, all the tenacity, the suppleness and adaptability, and it may be added, the baffling inconsistencies of his race appear. Inconsistent he certainly is. He has been an ardent Zionist, and in his story "Transitional" (from _They That Walk in Darkness_) he seems to hold that assimilation will never solve the Jewish problem; yet in _The Melting Pot_ he obviously regards assimilation as the inevitable and desirable end of Judaism. In spite of his inconsistencies, Zangwill is one in whom the ancient ideals of Israel live again. It is in the spirit of the prophets that he wrote _The War God_ (1912). This play, with all its faults as an acting drama, is nevertheless a remarkable document, voicing, as it does, on the very eve of the breaking down of European civilization, the old prophetic protest against the brutality and waste of war. This protest dates back to at least the ninth century B.C. It may not be generally known that it was a Hebrew prophet who first advocated the humane treatment of prisoners of war. The story is told in the Second Book of Kings that when a band of marauding Syrians were corralled in Samaria, the "king of Israel said unto Elisha, when he saw them, 'My father, shall I smite them? Shall I smite them?' And he answered, 'Thou shalt not smite them: wouldst thou smite those whom thou has taken captive with thy sword and with thy bow? Set bread and water before them, that they may eat and drink, and go to their master.' And he prepared great provision for them: and when they had eaten and drunk, he sent them away, and they went to their master. So the bands of Syria came no more into the land of Israel" (2 Kings 6:1-23). Again, Amos, in the eighth century, in his arraignment of the sins of the nations, pronounces God's severest judgments upon Damascus, Edom, Ammon, and Moab for their cruelty in war. The charge against Edom, for example, is that "he did pursue his brother with the sword, and did cast off all pity, and his anger did tear perpetually, and he kept his wrath forever." And the later prophets' visions of the Messianic age include as the brightest feature of that wished-for time the prediction that then "the nations shall not learn war any more." Of such a spirit Mr. Zangwill's play _The War God_ is an expression. It is a satire upon militarism, but a satire without exaggeration. The arguments employed to justify the maintenance of a huge army and navy are not a whit more absurd than the fallacies which have been put forth for a generation by those who would justify the maintenance of armaments. These so-called arguments are presented by "the Chancellor" who represents Bismarck, and by the king of Gothia, in whom we may easily recognize the Russian Czar. "Dominance," roars the Chancellor,-- "There rings the password of the universe. Who knows it, he is free of every camp. Equality, your level, endless cornfield, However fat and fair and golden-stalked, Would set us pining for the snow-topped peaks And barren glaciers. Life is fight, thank God! "Take war away and men would sink to molluscs, Limpets that wait the tide to wash them food. The nations would grow foul with lazy feeling. What heaven loves is breeds with life a-tingle, Swift-gliding, flashing, darting death at rivals, Men fearing God and with no other fear. Thus were the Albans, now the turn is ours To be the chosen people of Jehovah." And the King endorses such sentiments with the sage observation, "No doubt we must protect our growing commerce." In opposition to such militarists stands Count Frithiof, in whom we may easily see the lineaments of Tolstoi. His motto is, "Resist not evil, but reform yourself." In answer to the Chancellor's declaration, "To safeguard peace, we must prepare for war," he replies, "I know that maxim; it was forged in hell. This wealth of ships and guns inflames the vulgar And makes the very war it guards against. How often, as the mighty master said, the sight Of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done." _A Voice for Social Justice_ Quite outside the dramatic action of the play stands the Jew, Blum, the Chancellor's secretary. Through his astuteness in managing the Chancellor, he has hitherto moulded public policy according to his own will. Finally, near the end of the play, he denounces Christian civilization in a passage worthy of quotation: "Man wins the realm of air and might have been An eagle with a soul; you make him harpy, More murderous than dragons of the ooze. I tell you, we outsiders see the game, We Jews, who bidden rise beyond the code Of eye for eye, must rub both eyes to see Not e'en eye-justice done in Christendom, Whose cannon thunder 'gainst both God and Christ." So might have spoken one of the ancient prophets of his race. Indeed Amos, amid the orgies of the autumn festival at Bethel, did speak in the same spirit when he denounced the formal service of worshippers who ignored the claims of social justice. "Seek good and not evil," cries Amos, "that ye may live; and so the Lord, the God of hosts, shall be with you, as ye say. Hate the evil, and love the good, and establish judgment (justice) in the gate. It may be that the Lord God of hosts will be gracious unto the remnant of Joseph." So it is evident that even the literary work of modern Jews can be understood and appreciated only as an expression of the characteristics of the Jewish race. In this modern Jewish literature appears the exuberance, the emotional intensity, and the love of social justice that were characteristic also of ancient Hebrew literature as written by prophet, priest, and sage. _The Role of Israel in Human Emancipation_ Far greater, however, than the work of these three authors, far greater, indeed, than Israel's literature as a whole, of which they are a part, is the life of this people, of which their literature is the record. We speak of a nation's literature as great if it possesses three or four tragedies that are classics. _Hamlet_, _Othello_, _Macbeth_ and _King Lear_ would, for example, be sufficient to justify the title "great" as applied to English literature. What shall we say, then, as some one has suggested, of this people who for more than twenty centuries have lived a tragedy more pathetic than any the world's literature can show? Job has always seemed to me a type of the Jewish race. We recall that majestic picture in the thirty-first chapter, where Job stands up on his ash-mound, robbed of his wealth, bereaved of his children, deserted by his wife, suffering the agonies of a loathsome and incurable disease, and cast off, as it seems to him, by the very God in whom he trusted, and yet, in the face of poverty, and bereavement, and mortal pain, and bewildered isolation, asserts his own unchanged and unalterable belief that righteousness is salvation. Similarly Israel, through the long centuries of its tragic history, has stood on the ash-mound of its national humiliation. Plundered, vilified, and persecuted, a nation of sorrows, and acquainted with grief, from whom men have hid their faces in aversion not concealed, Israel has yet clung with a grip that nothing could weaken nor dislodge to the fundamental idea that religion--the right relation of man to God--was not creed nor ritual, but simply doing justly, loving mercy, and walking humbly with God. We have been looking backward at the literary accomplishment of three Jewish men of genius. It is, I believe, a fault of modern Judaism to look backward instead of forward, as if the glory of Israel had indeed departed, and as if nothing were left but to look back with pride and regret upon what has passed like a dream away. But I believe Jews may look forward now with confident hope toward the years that are to be. That Israel has completely played its role--that it has finished its service to the world--cannot for a moment entertain. Surely no one who believes in a philosophy of history, who sees in human history more than a meaningless and unrelated succession of events, can think that Israel has been preserved through centuries of discipline for no end whatever. On the contrary, we must believe that Israel has still a mission. What that mission is to be we cannot now foretell. We of this generation are looking upon the breaking down of European civilization. Some of us hope and expect that when the smoke of battle has cleared away there will gradually be built up a new and better social order. In this constructive work of rebuilding, who is better fitted to take a prominent part than the Jew, with his noble heritage of ideals, his passion for social justice? Jews may well rejoice as they reflect upon what individual members of their race have through literature contributed to the emancipation of the human spirit. And they may rejoice also in the hope of what Israel may yet accomplish in the years that are to be. [Illustration: Signature: Edward Chauncey Baldwin] FOOTNOTES: [Footnote C: _Song of Songs_, 1:15-2:2.] [Footnote D: An adequate and sympathetic treatment of Heine's work as a Jewish poet may be found in _Heinrich Heine als Dichter Judentums_ von Georg J. Plotke (Dresden, 1913).] [Footnote E: George Gilfillan, _Third Gallery of Literary Portraits_, p. 360.] [_The Second in a Series of Sketches of Jewish Worthies_] Jochanan ben Zakkai BY ABRAHAM M. SIMON [Illustration: _ABRAHAM M. SIMON (born in Kalvaria, Russian-Poland, in 1886; came to America in 1904) received his A.B. with honors from Harvard College in 1910, and his M.A. from the University of Pennsylvania in 1911. During 1910-11 he was a Fellow in the Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning of Philadelphia, and he spent the summer of 1911 at the Bodleian Library at Oxford and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris, reading and copying Arabic manuscripts. In 1913 he won his Ph.D. in Semitics at the University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Simon was one of the original members of the Harvard Menorah Society, and read a Hebrew poem_ Ner Yisrael (_"The Light of Israel"_) _at the dedicatory exercises of the Society._] The Jewish commonwealth was dissolved; the Jewish nation disrupted. Jerusalem was taken; the Temple had become a ruin. The last vestige of independence seemed to have been wiped out. All who had taken up arms were either dead, or enslaved, or banished. The infuriated Roman conquerors had spared neither the women nor the children. It seemed as if Judaism had breathed her last in that terrible year 70. Sadduceeism was annihilated; the Zealots were exterminated; the austere sentiment of the Pharisees, continually looking back to ancient customs and institutions, tried to assert itself. It is no longer permitted, they announced, to eat meat or drink wine, now that the Temple has fallen, because animals can no longer be sacrificed on the holy altars, nor wine offered there as a drink-offering. By such asceticism, these Pharisees of the strict school would have caused the destruction of Judaism. But there was a Hillelite still alive--a man who had inherited the spirit of Hillel, who rated conviction higher than ceremony, and consulted the times more than the ancient forms. It was he who kept the remnants together in close union, and did not permit the spirit to vanish, although the material bond was broken. This Hillelite was Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai. _The Disciple and Favorite of Hillel_ Of the eighty disciples moulded by the great Hillel to continue his policy, Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai was especially distinguished. Before his death, Hillel is said to have designated Jochanan as "the father of wisdom," and "the father of the coming generation." Tradition divides Jochanan's life, like Hillel's, into three periods of forty years each. The first forty years were spent in mercantile pursuits; in the second he studied; and in the third he taught and managed the affairs of the Jewish spiritual community. Even before the destruction of Jerusalem, Jochanan's fame had spread far and wide. He was a member of the Synhedrion and taught the holy law within the shadow of the Temple. His school was called the "Great House," and was the scene of many incidents which formed the subjects for anecdote and legend. He was the first man who successfully combatted the Sadducees, and who knew how to refute their arguments, which were partly religious and partly juridical. But Jochanan's great fame was chiefly due to the influence which he afterwards exercised at Jabneh. _Jochanan's Escape from Jerusalem_ Owing to his peaceful character, Rabbi Jochanan had joined the party of peace when the Romans laid siege to Jerusalem, and on several occasions urged the nation, and in particular his nephew, ben Betiach, the leader of the Zealots, to surrender the city. "Why do you desire to destroy the city, and give up the Temple to the flames?" said he to the leaders of the revolution. But his well meant admonitions were disregarded by the "war party." When he saw the end approaching, and recognized that all was lost, he determined to leave the doomed city. He counselled with his foremost disciples, Eliezer ben Hyrkanos, Joshua ben Chananja and others. It was decided that Rabbi Jochanan should leave the city, go to the Roman general, and plead for those people who had no share in the rebellion. But to depart from the city was extremely dangerous, as the Zealots kept up a constant watch and slew all who attempted to leave. Rabbi Jochanan, therefore, caused a rumor to be spread of his sudden sickness and later of his death. Having been placed in a coffin he was carried to the city gates, at the hour of sunset, by his pupils Eliezer and Joshua. When the funeral procession approached, it was stopped at the gate within. "Whose body do you carry here?" asked the Hebrew guard. "We are carrying the crown of Israel, the body of our master, Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai," they answered in tears. The captain of the guards was affected. "Open the gates, men, and let them pass," the captain ordered. "Are you sure, captain, that Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai is dead?" exclaimed one of the soldiers. "Maybe they are taking away a living traitor. I will make sure that he is dead." He raised his dagger to strike at the shrouded form of the Rabbi. "Hold, soldier!" cried the captain; "to dishonor the body of the saint would be a sin for which all Israel would have to atone. Open the gates and let them pass in peace." The fanatic reluctantly desisted; the gate was opened and the procession passed through. Vespasian received the fugitive in a friendly manner, the more since, like Josephus, Jochanan prophesied imperial honors for the general. Asked to name the favor he desired, Rabbi Jochanan, instead of seeking personal gain, requested permission to establish a school at Jabneh (or, as the place is sometimes called, Jamnia), where he could continue to give his lectures to his disciples. The request was granted, and thereupon Jochanan settled with his disciples in Jabneh, there to await the issue of events. What could Vespasian have thought of Rabbi Jochanan when he made his request? Any one else bearing such prophecies might have asked for gold, honor, great political preferments, while this Hebrew sage asked simply for a corner where he could study undisturbed. How could the Hebrew nation exist when the leaders, their great men, lacked ambition? Little did Vespasian dream that his granting of the Rabbi's modest request would undo the whole work of the Roman conquest. _The Fall of the Temple: Jabneh Succeeds Jerusalem_ In Jabneh, surrounded by his disciples, Rabbi Jochanan received the terrible news of the fall of Jerusalem and the burning of the Temple. Although he had foreseen the calamity, yet the news crushed the soul of the great master. He and his disciples tore their garments and for seven days wept and mourned in sackcloth and ashes. Jochanan, however, did not despair, for he recognized the truth that Judaism was not indissolubly bound with its Temple and its altar. He saw a new spiritual Temple emerge from the ruins and smoke of the old one; he beheld Judaism rising to a higher plane, offering faith, love, truth and happiness to all humanity. He comforted his colleagues and disciples by reminding them that Judaism still existed. "My children," he said, "weep not, and dry your tears; the Romans have destroyed the material Temple, but the true altar of God, the true place of forgiveness, they could not destroy, and it is with us yet. Would you know where? Behold, in the homes of the poor, there is the altar; love, charity, mercy, and justice are the offerings, the sweet incense which pleases the Lord more than any sacrifice, as it is written: For I take pleasure in mercy and not in burnt offerings." The next step taken by Rabbi Jochanan and his friends was to convoke a Synhedrion at Jabneh, of which he was at once chosen president. With no opposition, Jabneh took the place of Jerusalem, and became the religious national center for the dispersed community. It enjoyed the same religious privileges as Jerusalem. All the important functions of the Synhedrion, by which it exercised a judicial and uniting power over the distant congregations, proceeded from Jabneh. Rabbi Jochanan's motto was: "If thou hast learnt much Torah, ascribe not any merit to thyself, for thereunto wast thou created." He found his real calling in the study of the Law. His knowledge was spoken of reverently as though it included the whole cycle of Jewish learning. And not only the Law but many languages of the Gentiles occupied the active mind of Rabbi Jochanan. The following description of him is handed down to us by tradition: "He had never been known to engage in any profane conversation. He had always been the first to enter the Academy. He never allowed himself, wittingly or unwittingly, to be overtaken by sleep while in the Academy. He had never gone a distance of four cubits without meditating on the Torah and without phylacteries. No one ever found him engaged in anything but study. He always lectured in person to his pupils. He never taught anything which he did not hear from his masters. He had never been heard to say that it was time to leave the Academy." He advised a certain family in Jerusalem, the members of which died young, to occupy itself with the study of the Torah, so as to mitigate the curse of dying in the prime of life. _Rabbi Jochanan as Teacher and Commentator_ Rabbi Jochanan ben Zakkai may be designated as the representative of Halachic Judaism, founded by the great master Hillel, rather than as an originator or independent thinker. Hillel, the most respected of all the teachers of the Law, had given to Judaism a special garb and form. He had drawn the Law from the midst of contending sects into the quiet precincts of the Beth-Hamidrash, and labored to bring into harmony those precepts which were apparently opposed to one another in the Law. Rabbi Jochanan employed and developed Hillel's method. Like Hillel, he was also liberal in his general views. Thus he