RABBI WILLIAM MARGOLIS, Congregation Chab Zedek, 118 West Ninety-fifth street-“The true mothers of every generation did more than care for their children’s healthy bodies. They helped to develop healthy attitudes! Most mothers of today concentrate on the ‘care and feeding of children.’ Not that this phase of child care should be ignored or neglected. But tomorrow’s men and women must have good vision as well as good sight; good thoughts as well as smart heads; fine spirits as well as fine bodies! Many mothers err in the thought that their duties encompass the physical alone! They shift educational responsibility on the schools, while the souls of their children function fruitlessly in a vacuum!
“In Jewish life, from Biblical times, the Jewish mother was extolled as the influence which reigned over the religious life of the home! Those mothers were considered blessed and glorified, whose children were pious scholars and sages. Too many Jewish mothers, like mothers of other faiths, have been shirking or forgetting the duty-nay, rather the privilege-of caring for the souls, the religious and moral consciousness of their children!
“Thus, children will owe their mothers, not only life, but they will owe ‘motherhood,’ in a far higher degree than they do, that higher life which is the emanation of ideal and spiritual in real womanhood.”
WOMEN DELUDED
RABBI LOUIS I. NEWMAN, Temple Rodeph Sholom, 7 West Eighty-third street-“Women of mid-depression days are finding that the so-called new feminism has oftentimes proved a snare and a delusion. The protection which men have given their womenfolk has proved itself highly desirable in an economic crisis when unemployment has daily increased. To be sure many women have proved superior to the men as bread-winners, but this is largely due to the fact that employers have sought the cheapest labor, and therefore have substituted women for men wherever they could.
“The depression has chastened women of leisure, and made them realize the uncertainly of daily life. The depression, though it has created much social havoc, has also created a greater sense of inter-dependency in families, and women has come into her own as the teacher and mentor of her children. Parenthood is becoming a more serious personal responsibility, which the individual mother must herself shoulder. It is to be hoped that with the lifting of the depression families will not scatter in reckless individualism as they did in days of extravagant prosperity. Women must be willing, to espouse radical causes, rather than to obstruct social progress; they must encourage rather than oppose the idealism of their children with respect to economics, politics, and the war system.”
CHILD FEELS JUDAISM
RABBI ISRAEL GOLDSTEIN, Congregation B’nai Jeshurun, Eighty-eighth street West of Broadway-“The Jewish mother has always been the transmitter of Jewish values from generation to generation. Fathers moulded the educational and ritual content of their children’s lives, but mothers moulded the emotional content. Thus it has been in the generations of the past.
“Today, however, a strange thing is happening. The generation represented by the contemporary Jewish mother in western Europe and in America, is a generation which has been reared in an atmosphere of assimilation. They did not as children imbibe strong Jewish values, for the assimilation movement has captured their homes. Basking in the sun of humanitarian hopes of equality between Jew and non-Jew, the Jewishness of many homes became liquidated.
“Now the children of these mothers are feeling the hurt of the reaction against the ###erstwhile liberalism of the western world. These young men and women are beginning to feel, therefore, a stronger Jewish tie than their parents felt. They are beginning to interest themselves in Jewish literature and in the whole panorama of Jewish life. They are seeking out Jewish values. They feel the need of Jewish knowledge and understanding for the integrity and peace of their souls. Thus in many a home, the child is bringing Judaism to the mother.”
MOTHERS’ FAITH
RABBI JOSEPH ZEITLIN, Temple Ansche Chesed, West End avenue at 100th street-“The American people have instituted a very beautiful custom of dedicating the second Sunday of the month of May as the time at which we may pay tribute and respect to our beloved mothers. If we were to ask why it is that we are imbued with such an unparelleled love for our mothers, I believe that we would find the answer in the thought that no one in the world has so much faith in us as our mothers.
“No son or daughter is evil in the eyes of mother. Her position is glorified and exalted by virtue of her trusting nature.
“In a broader sense, would that we attain that divine gift of faith in our fellow-man which inevitably means the creation of happiness for mankind.”
TEACH THOUGHTFULNESS
RABBI SAMUEL H. GOLDENSON, Temple Emanu-El, Sixtieth street and Fifth avenue-“Let us look at the things that mother has taught us. Of most importance is thoughtfulness. This characteristic exists in those people who are charged with the service, welfare and joy of another.
“Mother has taught us the meaning of religion, too. She has conveyed to us the meaning of sacrifice. And who is the most devoted person in the world? Mother.
“On Mother’s Day we ought to seek the real meaning of motherhood. We should give love and sacrifice to her. We should seek to reflect our mother’s goodness. The good of another person is one’s own good only when we can identify ourselves with the welfare of the other.
“Instead of giving real expression we substitute a cheap outlet for our emotions. We call up the Western Union and mark “X” next to the sentiment we wish conveyed to mother.
“Let us dedicate ourselves a right to her. Let us reflect that same thoughtfulness and sacrifice and love that mother has taught us. Then motherhood in the future will be fraught with less anxiety.”
BELIEF IN FUTURE LIFE
RABBI STEPHEN S. WISE, Free Synagogue-“While there is little scientific foundation for belief in the future life, even science is becoming more tolerant of the belief. If there are processes of evolution, why should these processes suddenly end at death? If there is conservation of energy, why should spiritual energy disappear at death?
“What is the essence of human life? Is it the outward aspects or is it the invisible personality of man?
“If all our life is a physical and spiritual preparation for destiny, how can this destiny be denied to us? The source of the spiritual elements of life must be eternal.
“We mortals give each other a second chance. Can the Infinite be more meager than mere men? Certainly the distance between such men as Spinoza, Einstein, and Gandhi to immortal life is less than the distance of those men to the cavemen.
“I believe that immortal life cannot be denied to us.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
