J. W. B. Leader Takes Issue with Conservative Rabbis on Jewish Centers

A vigorous reply to Conservative rabbis who recently attacked the Jewish community center movement was issued today by Sanford Solender, executive vice-president of the National Jewish Welfare Board in an address at the National Conference of Jewish Communal Service. Mr. Solender charged that the rabbis were seeking “to turn back progress in understanding and cooperation between community centers and synagogues and to destroy the centers.”

The JWB executive, newly elected president of the National Conference of Social Welfare, addressed the annual meeting of the National Association of Jewish Center Workers held in conjunction with the communal service conference. The meeting had been moved up two days to provide an early opportunity for discussion of the synagogue-center issue by Mr. Solender and Rabbi Isaac Trainin, director of the Commission on Synagogue relations of the Federation of Jewish Philanthropies of Greater New York.

“Both the synagogue and the Jewish community center have vital functions in American Jewish life,” Mr. Solender declared. “We must join efforts to increase the effectiveness of both. But our dedication to the central purpose of enriching American Jewish life is too strong to permit of serious diversion. Our best creativity must be addressed to this primary task of fortifying the richness and quality of our life as American Jews. In partnership with all in Jewish life who share this goal, we shall move forward toward even greater success.”

Mr. Solender said that Jewish centers “share their important tasks with other institutions, chief among them being the synagogue. While the center’s community orientation has always influenced it to be concerned about these relationships, this must be given a place of continuing primacy.” He charged that some of the Conservative rabbis have “chosen to ignore” the great progress made in furthering synagogue-center ties.

Rabbi Trainin charged that the rabbis bad taken a narrow view and that their complaints against Jewish centers were without justification. He countercharged that many synagogues had become materialistic, governed by the philosophy that “God can only be worshiped in multimillion dollar edifices with big annual deficits.”

Attempts by synagogues to establish community center activities, Rabbi Trainin added, often result in “empty gymnasium and skeletal programs” and religious institutions involved in programs they are not equipped to handle. On the other hand, he added, the synagogue sometimes criticizes the community center for conducting Sabbath programs similar to those it carries on itself, “intimating that in the Y, these activities on Sabbath are profane, but in the synagogue they are sacred.”

At the same time, he cautioned Jewish centers not to ignore the rabbinate, urging cooperation on both sides. “Religious leaders and Jewish center workers together must formulate Sabbath programs in consonance with the Sabbath and acceptable to all,” Rabbi Trainin declared.