(Jewish Telegraphic Agency Mail Service)
The Jews of Holland did not participate in the meetings organized to commemorate the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the death of Baruch Spinoza.
The reason for this was given by Mr. Seeligmann, Chairman of the Society for Jewish Knowledge, at a meeting of the Society held here last night. Chief Rabbi Maarson of The Hague presided.
“We did not participate in the commemoration exercises.” Mr. Seeligmann declared. “because Spinoza had cut himself adrift from Judaism. Spinoza was excommunicated because he refused to submit to the discipline of the Sephardic community of those days. We honor Spinoza as a philosopher and as a man and as one of the greatest thinkers of the world, but not as a Jews. Neither the Society for Jewish Knowledge nor the Amsterdam Rabbinical School has therefore participated in the commemoration celebrations.”
As a Zionist, Mr. Seeligmann concluded, he deplores the action of the Duth Zionists in sending a telegram to the commemoration meeting at The Hague.
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.
