Hitler and other modern tyrants who undertake the annihilation of the Jewish people could take their cue from the Book of Esther, and see how the Persian Minister failed in his efforts to exterminate the Jews 2,300 years ago.
This was urged yesterday by Dr. Cyrus Adler, president of the American Jewish Committee and of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, in a special Purim address broadcast over the NBC network.
RECALLS GLORY OF PROPHETS
“The history of Israel, like that of most peoples, is a combination of sunshine and shadow,” Dr. Adler said. “It may be that at the present time of darkness we are more inclined to look upon the gloomy side, taking our reflection from the rest of the world, but we have a right to remember the glorious epochs in Palestine when great prophets and poets and wise men and historians have over a long period been producing that matchless and inspired literature which is called the Bible that has been one of the civilizing influences of the world.
“Yesterday a portion of the faithful will have observed the Fast of Esther. Today, a much larger number are observing the Feast of Esther. This festival, although one of the minor festivals and not having the rank of the holy days ordained in the Scriptures, has beside its synagogue observe an element of joyousness, for young and old, in which a sort of carnival spirit was introduced quite different from the regular holy days of the Jewish people.
URGES STUDY OF HISTORY
“People get a perspective position for their future by drawing a line to their past and so today, one dares, without being pedantic, emphasize the need of the study of Jewish history, for Jewish history and all history is a useful discipline. Indeed, I invite all people to study the history of this day. Such a study of the history of an occasion has a value quite beyond the acquiring of knowledge although this acquisition of knowledge is an end in itself which has always been prized by civilized people. History is, as it were, the review of the experience of mankind.
“Few things are happening today that have not happened before and just as in a great profession like that of medicine in which every wise physician keeps a record of a patient and of all his previous patients and how they reacted to certain treatment, so too mankind must study the record of its experiences to profit both by the successes and the failures which attended the remedies that previous ages applied.
THE PLOT THAT FAILED
“Back in the Persian Empire there arose a Prime Minister who for personal reasons of his own wrote an indictment against the Jewish people and persuaded his sovereign to decree their extermination. The plot failed. This plot, it may be noted, was proposed in Persia, a country which has lately decided to change its name to Iran and which with some intermixture, is the only country in the world that has a right, if any country has a right, to call itself ‘Aryan,’ though as all scholars know that word can only be properly applied to a language and not to a people.
“It is the study of an incident like this which happened more than 2,300 years ago that can serve both as an encouragement and as a warning. And so, it is good exercise today to have read the Book of Esther, a book of the Bible which strangely enough has no expressed religious element in it. With the tendency some years back to be skeptical about everything, including many books of the Bible, the Book of Esther was held by some critics to be a pure piece of fiction—a novel. But since then scholars have, both from the historical and archaeological point of view, demonstrated that it is an account of an historical occurrence.
It is worthwhile to reflect that no one who followed in his malevolent footsteps has ever succeeded in such an effort. Modern tyrants who undertake to destroy people because of difference of religion or alleged difference of race should study the Book of Esther, ponder its lessons and remove the unrighteous from their conduct, good not evil, is the handmaiden of statesmanship. If the Book of Esther does not suffice to teach them the lesson they should read another book of the Bible, the Book of Daniel, so they may, before it is too late, learn its lesson of the handwriting on the wall.”
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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.
