“Christians and Jews must join hands” to oppose Hitlerism, declared Rabbi Morris S. Lazaron of Baltimore in a round-table discussion of “What Can We Learn from Germany?” at the first session of the Williamstown Institute of Human Affairs at Williams College here today.
“It is difficult to see how the doctrine of human brotherhood common to Christianity and Judaism can be realized over the corpose of Israel,” he asserted. “Official Christian groups, Protestant as well as Catholic, cannot hope by protesting loyalty to the state to preserve the integrity of their own position, even if the Jew be sacrificed.”
Addressing himself to the Jews, Rabbi Lazaron said, “We must clean our own household. Jews must attempt in every way possible to remove irritating factors in Jewish life. We are, after all, a pitiful minority here in America just as the Jews in Germany are a pitiful minority there. The anti-Semitic propaganda which issues forth from Berlin to all parts of the world is a thing which Jews alone cannot meet. We need the cooperation of our Christian friends.”
He outlined three lessons which should be learned from Hitlerism: (1) No group can ride to power on the back of another group. (2) We must maintain freedom of press and speech and individual liberties. (3) In a crisis like the one Hitlerism presents, Jews and Christians must stand together.
Earlier, George N. Shuster, editor of Commonweal, Catholic weekly, had declared that “a spirit of friendliness and mutual respect now exists among religious groups in Germany.
He blamed the churches partly for the rise of Hitlerism because their lack of unity at the critical time permitted Hitler to rise to power.
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.
