Soviet Charged at U.N. with Banning Jewish Religious Instruction

A plea for adoption of a principle providing that all governments–including that of the Soviet Union–permit individuals and groups to run private schools for religious instruction was made here this week-end by Dr. Isaac Lewin, representative at the UN of the Agudas Israel World Organization. Dr. Lewin voiced his request at a meeting of the Commission on Human Rights. He tied his plea to the Commissions discussion of a report by its Subcommission on the Prevention of Discrimination and Protection of Minorities.

Pointing out that Judge Philip Halpern, Buffalo Jewish communal leader and the United States expert on the Subcommission, had clashed on that point with Russia’s expert, Dr. Lewin cited Russia’s admitted refusal to permit organized religious instruction for Jewish children in the Soviet Union. Russian Jews said the Agudas Israel representative, are told they may give their children religious instruction themselves or hire tutors. “Obviously,” declared Dr. Lewin, “elimination of all organized efforts to give children religious instruction is discrimination in education.”

He cited official and quasi-official Soviet statements, over a period of a quarter of a century, to show that forbidding religious education to Jewish children is a matter of official Russian government policy. Agudas Israel, he told the Commission, agrees with the U.S. expert, and with the expert from France who had taken a similar stand, that “the right to religious education and to set up private schools for the purpose without government interference are essential human rights; their prohibition constitutes discrimination against the respective individuals or groups.” Such discrimination should consequently be included in the Subcommission’s study on discrimination in education, currently under way, Dr. Lewin urged.