Digest of Public Opinion on Jewish Matters

[The purpose of the Digest is informative. Preference is given to papers not generally accessible to our readers. Quotation does not indicate approval.–Editor.]

The movement in England for a fund with which to bring back to Judaism the Marranos of Portugal is criticized by the London “Jewish Chronicle”, which regards the effort as unnecessary and unjustified in view of important Jewish work to be done within the Jewish fold. The “Chronicle” says, in its April 15 issue:

“An appeal is launched for £ 10,000, so as to resuscitate, in a small handful of Portuguese, the dying embers of a Judaism which their forbears treated none too faithfully when they observed it as a secret religion to be hidden from the sight of men. Surely there are numberless purposes to which such a sum of money might be well devoted in preference to the proposed provision for these Marrano Jews who, with their forefathers, for centuries have been to all intents and purposes dead to Judaism, and to whom Judaism, except perchance as a legendary memory, has long been dead and buried. Doubtless this appeal has its romantic side and it may prove attractive because of the glamour of history, which sheds its beams upon the objects of the collection. The fact that some of the Marranos may possibly be able to trace a high lineage for themselves will also add to the sympathy with which some minds will view the proposal that is now placed before the community. But that is not so much sentiment as sentimentality, while to others–possessed of more robust spirit–this claim for these Marranos will be repellent; for it is a religious exhumation of those from whom the spirit of Judaism has long since departed. There is living Judaism that requires sheltering and shielding, fostering and maintaining; there are children of faithful Jews by the hundreds of thousands, who need Jewish education and Jewish instruction, and calls of this kind upon us are infinitely greater than that of the moribund Judaism represented by those doubtless estimable but esoteric Portuguese.”

A STEP IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

The recent creation of the Permanent Commission for Better Understanding is praised as a step in the right direction by two Virginia papers, the Granville “Register” and the Richmond “Times-Dispatch.”

The “Register” observes: “Oviously the thing necessary to cast out fear and intolerance in the United States, and the hate that it breeds, is understanding. The appointment then in New York, of a Permanent Commission for Better Understanding, composed of the leading members of the three great faiths of America, Jewish, Protestant and Catholic, is a prodigious stride in the right direction. So representative is the commission of the best thought in America, that its combined opinion may do at least something towards moulding that unshapely thing that is American opinion, into the cast of symmetry and harmony, where American life can begin to seek for the higher objectives.”

In the “Times-Dispatch” we read: “Important actual accomplishment may be looked for from this commission. If, as the American Hebrew suggests, a small body of men including Jews and Protestants in its membership had investigated the alleged oath of the Knights of Columbus and had issued a formal statement on the subject, a vast deal of good would have been accomplished. If, too, the absurd ‘Protocols of the Elders of Zion’ had been exposed in all their absurdity by a body of men including Catholics and Protestants, a vast deal of good would have been accomplished. These two illustrations, without the others, indicate what sort of actual accomplishment may be looked for from this distinguished commission.”