More Unfinished Business [1 ed.] 9781442683846, 9780802008886

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More Unfinished Business

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More Unfinished Business

W. GUNTHER PLAUT

UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO PRESS Toronto Buffalo London

www.utppublishing.com © University of Toronto Press Incorporated 1997 Toronto Buffalo London Printed in Canada ISBN 0-8020-0888-7

Printed on acid-free paper

Canadian Cataloguing in Publication Data Plaut, W. Gunther, 1912More unfinished business Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8020-0888-7 1. Plaut, W. Gunther, 1912- . 2. Rabbis - Canada Biography. S.Judaism. I. Title. BM755.P62A381997

296'.092

C97-931093-8

University of Toronto Press acknowledges the financial assistance to its publishing program of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.

Contents

Preface vii Part One: The Common Weal Chapter One: On Ageing and Obsolescence 3 Chapter Two: The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate 17 Chapter Three: Canadian Mosaic 35 Chapter Four: Human Rights: Sitting in Judgment 48 Part Two: Living as a Jew Chapter Five: Israel: Love's Ambiguities 63 Chapter Six: Israel: Rabin and After 79

vi

Contents

Chapter Seven: Communal Concerns 96 Chapter Eight: Reform Judaism: A Personal Journey 108

Chapter Nine: Reform Judaism in Search of Self 126 Part Three: At Home and Abroad

Chapter Ten: Magnum Opus 149 Chapter Eleven: Books, et cetera 162 Chapter Twelve: Travels in Space and Time 176 Part Four: Personal Perspectives Chapter Thirteen: The Mutti Phenomenon 197 Chapter Fourteen: Letting Go 210 Chapter Fifteen: Faith, Family, and Future 219 Appendix A: Two Letters That Saved My Life 231 Appendix B: A Missed Opportunity 233 Notes 235 Bibliography, 1982-1996 253 Photo Credits 290 Index 291

Preface

Successful film makers will often plagiarize their own ideas and give us second and third editions of their heroes. But people who feel inclined to tell others of their own lives will rarely, if ever, follow suit. Once is enough. Why then be different and try again? Naturally, I asked myself that question before I started to write this volume as a follow-up to Unfinished Business: An Autobiography (Toronto: Lester 8c Orpen Dennys, 1981). I am not sure that I came up with a good answer, yet I proceeded to write a second volume. Every autobiography is part of one's ongoing attempt to come to terms with life, its joys and disappointments, especially so when, as in my case, one's eighty-fifth birthday starts to beckon. Maybe this book is in no small part a kind of defiant assertion that, while time is unravelling with inexorable constancy, it still has something left for me. Indeed, the last years have seen no 'building down'; on the contrary, they have brought me a succession of new experiences and opportunities. This book differs in two respects from its predecessor. First, while Unfinished Business unfolded a tale of nearly seventy years, with its often-turbulent experiences and changes, this book focuses on critique and analysis more than on chronicling my most recent fifteen years of living. For that reason I have organized the book according to the varying spheres of my activities, and move from larger areas of concern (The Common Weal') to Jewish issues; thence to writing, travelling, and special memories; and finally to 'Personal Perspectives.'

viii

Preface

Second, a book that is observation as much as chronicle brings with it a shift of tone and tends to be both more contemplative and more critical. When writing my first memoir I was still interacting with many people on a daily basis and was usually inclined to withhold negative judgments, which also suited my natural penchant for conciliation and moderation. To be sure, judgments are part of the historian's metier (and writing an autobiography is writing history, however modest), so that their absence constitutes a lacuna and even a skewing of reportage - something I have tried to rectify to some degree in this volume. Age, I tell myself, does have its privileges, and so I try in these pages to overcome a life-long tendency to internalize my feelings (and prejudices) and to be more frank than in the past. Still, I have remained within certain self-imposed limits and hope that I have not overstated my assessment of events and personalities and thereby strained the limits of credibility. With these cautionary and - let me admit it from the start slightly anxious remarks, I send this book on its way. My children and my colleague John Moscowitz urged me to undertake this project, and so did my publisher. Their combined encouragement helped to transpose my latest memories into print. Special thanks are owed to Bill Harnum, senior vice-president, and Robert Ferguson, associate editor, of the University of Toronto Press; to two (anonymous) readers of my draft and the Manuscript Review Committee of the Press; to copy editors John Parry and Darlene Zeleney, who made valuable suggestions; and to Olivia D'Souza, my secretary at Holy Blossom Temple, who created the bibliography. Last but not least, I owe appreciation to my readers, who take this book to hand and thereby share a segment of my life's journey. There is a blessing that Jews recite on festive occasions, both calendric and personal. The publication of this volume demands this additional acknowledgment, which praises the One who has bestowed life on me and permitted me to see this day. Spring 1997 / 5757

With President Yitzhak Navon of Israel, June 1981.

With Henry Kissinger in 1982. The former U.S. secretary of state was delighted to find someone who could reminisce with him about German professional soccer teams.

With Rene Levesque, Quebec City, June 1982, celebrating the 150th anniversary of Jewish rights in Canada. Seated is Ena Robinson.

After the bomb attack, Johannesburg, South Africa, August 1983. Left to right: W.G. Plaut, State President Marais Viljoen, Mayor Alan Gadd, Congregational President Leslie Bergman, Founding Rabbi Moses C. Weiler.

With Dow Marmur and Emmett Cardinal Carter at the installation of Dow Marmur as senior rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple, November 1983.

The Plaut family in 1988 at our fiftieth wedding anniversary. Front row, right to left: my brother Walter's three sons, (Rabbi) Joshua, Carmi, and Yehuda, and Yehuda's wife, Aviva; second row (right to left): Judith, Mutti, daughterin-law Carol, granddaughter Deborah; back row (right to left): (Rabbi) Jonathan, Elizabeth, Gunther. Unfortunately our grandson, Daniel, was unable to attend.

Mutti shaking hands with Chancellor John Aird after receiving an honorary BA at the University of Toronto Convocation, June 1990. A proud son leads the cheers.

Mutti greeting a fellow graduate. (The Toronto Star/M. Slaughter)

A special tennis day at York Racquets Club, Toronto, November 1992. Left to right: Steven Zerker, Alex Fisher, Harold Green, W.G. Plaut, Edgar Brodey, Milton Shier, Fred Metrick, and Max Goldhar.

With Elizabeth and Ontario premier Bob Rae at the dedication of Plant Manor, September 1993.

Plaut Manor, Keele Street, Toronto. The dedication plaque reads: ’Their years of caring provided the vision.’

With Yitzhak Rabin, shortly after he became Israel's prime minister for the first time, in 1974. In the background is Simcha Dinitz, Israel's ambassador to Washington.

Yitzhak Rabin. This 1993 portrait commemorates the signing of the peace accord. (Photo by Al Gilbert, C.M.)

The Plauts at the award ceremony of the Order of Ontario, 1994.

With Marlis Diirkop, president of Humboldt University, Berlin, October 1994.

With daughter Judith at launching of Asylum, York University, Toronto, spring 1995.

On the occasion of the granting of an honorary degree by the University of Toronto to Teddy Kollek, former mayor of Jerusalem, December 1996. Left to right: Joseph Rotman, Charles Bronfman, Chancellor Rose Wolfe, Teddy Kollek, and W.G. Plaut.

With Natan Sharansky, former Prisoner of Zion, now Israel's minister of industry and trade, on the signing of a free trade agreement with Canada, 1996.

Our Detroit family: Jonathan, Carol, Deborah, and Daniel.

The Plaut book-plate.

Part One: The Common Weal

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CHAPTER ONE

On Ageing and Obsolescence

Personal Prolegomenon

Unfinished Business was written in contemplation of becoming three score and ten years old. Its concluding page reminds me how at that time I looked at reaching that milestone: 'Getting older means, alas, that the circle of one's family and friends becomes diminished by death. We suffered our share during these last years. Fortunately there is still my mother.1 And I? At the present time, thank God, I function as I have always done even though my golf score is much poorer than it used to be. My mind is clear, my pen ready ... I don't particularly like to look in the mirror because what I see is an aging man, too aged for my taste. The fact that others also seem to get visibly older is not all that comforting.' More than fifteen years have passed since I wrote those lines. I find myself at a juncture in life where things fall more neatly into place. In my case, each of the three discrete segments of my life has been spent in different countries and different environments. The first I lived in Germany; the second in the United States, and the third in Canada. In the United States I occupied two pulpits - in Chicago and in St Paul, Minnesota - and served for three years in the army. Each move was exciting but also difficult, and that excitement and difficulty were present as well when I changed from pulpit rabbi to a new independent career as writer, lecturer, and public servant.

4 The Common Weal

The last was a transformation in its own way. I was responsible no longer to others, only to myself. My hours were set by me, not by a predetermined schedule, though my routine of rising early to do my writing did not change. There is another important change. Going to shulewas something I had had to do - at least in part - because I was rabbi and was employed to do it. Being no longer paid for it puts the synagogue experience into a different perspective. Now I go because it is a mitzvah to go and because it is Shabbat or holy day. Shule is once again the way it was in my youth: the place where I as a Jew must go to reinforce my sense of God and find the presence of my people. (For more on the state of my faith, see the last chapter of this book.) Getting Older

It is silly to pretend that getting older means getting better. My rising handicap in golf is a constant reminder of the relentless march of time, and my tennis is slipping in lockstep. I get tired more quickly and take an afternoon nap when I can. But in some respects older is better. I think more clearly than I did before, and am more willing to review some of my longheld opinions. I write more easily, especially with the help of my word processor. (The other day, during a long meeting, I took extensive notes by hand, and I was struck with a painful attack of writer's cramp, reminding me how things used to be.) Writing this book on my Macintosh PowerBook has spoiled me thoroughly, though I hope that I will live long enough to write on a laptop that responds perfectly to verbal commands.2 I think that my judgment is more balanced, and, much to my surprise, I find that I have more patience. I used to be impatient in traffic; every second seemed to count. I was impatient with people when they wasted my precious time unnecessarily. And I thought that as one gets older and one's days on earth are more and more limited, each second would become that much more precious. Not so, at least not for me. Maybe I just pretend that I have lots of time left and can afford to be patient. I don't know.

On Ageing and Obsolescence

5

Meanwhile, the mirror on the wall becomes more unflattering all the time. A lot has happened to me since I finished my earlier memoir, and some of it will be recounted in the pages that follow. In many ways the fact that really shapes me more than anything else is the awareness of getting older. Fortunately it is not ever-present, but it is there, hovering in the background of my life. I suppose that this is the price of ageing. So I might as well confront it and start this book with some ruminations on the subject. When I was still a boy my father - may his memory be for blessing - used to pose a puzzle: What is it that everyone wants to become but nobody wants to be"? Answer: Old. That is as true today as it was then, and it applies to individuals as well as to society. We want everyone to live longer and we harness medicine and social services to this end, but when people by the hundreds of thousands reach higher and higher ages we don't know what to do with them. And all too often the 'them' is 'us.' It starts with the way people say, 'Hello.' Formerly, they used the ordinary 'How are you?' greeting, which one is not supposed to answer seriously, for it isn't really a question. So one acknowledges it in like manner by saying 'OK, and how are you?' (In fact, you can leave out the 'OK' and proceed immediately to the mirror response.) But lately, people no longer say this to me. They greet me with 'Hi! You look wonderful!' Of course, they would hardly use this phrase if I looked like death warmed over, but the very fact that they do say something to this effect is a courteous and well-meaning way of expressing their subconscious: 'I haven't seen you for some time. Glad you're still around, and pretty chipper at that!' Is that an unkind interpretation? Would they greet a younger person like that? Hardly, or rarely. Of course, they want to say something flattering, and I appreciate that; but the very phrasing, repeated more often than I can count, has led me to recognize the underlying reason. I know all too well that I don't look 'wonderful' - maybe without a mirror I might delude myself with a vision of eternal youth. But I know my age, especially when courtesy is expressed more straightforwardly. When in a crowded

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The Common Weal

subway a younger person gets up and offers me her/his seat, the acknowledgment strikes me forcibly: they know it when they see it. And so do my acquaintances. Often, when greeted with 'You look wonderful,' I answer with a quip: 'Thanks, that's because I'm in my third age.' 'How's that?' 'Well,' I say, 'the first age is youth, the second is the middle years, and the third age is, 'You look wonderful!' I say it in good humour, and maybe I do look better than what she/he expected. So I'm not arguing, and I even get a laugh out of it. But to me, the well-meant greeting is a recurring reminder of the clicking time clock. Ageing is a complex process and is not at all fully understood, particularly not by those who feel its effects. And I do. The decrease in physical functions is beyond debate and applies to everyone, regardless of how that person is said to look. The contours of one's face change; the skin wrinkles, becomes discoloured and sensitive to bruising; eyesight and hearing decline; one shrinks in height (for some reason women do more than men); we are grey- or white-headed, and most men do not yield to the invitation to try and hide it, while most women I know have fewer problems with colouring their hair, since most of them are used to painting their faces and trying to look younger than their years. (Elizabeth is an exception; she treats her grey hair as an adornment.) Our muscles too diminish in mass, and that's why my tennis serves have lost their power and my tee shots their former distance. (I use lighter clubs now, with graphite shafts, and it helps a little. I might even splurge and join the titanium craze.) Fortunately, the brain is an exception, though scientists are not sure why. For those of us who keep mentally active there is little loss of acuity, if any, and what we might lose we make up by experience. Yes, we may be prone to forgetting some names, but I for one (like many others I know) feel that my thought processes and mental skills are unimpaired. Critics of my writing and speaking may disagree, and that is their privilege, but I

On Ageing and Obsolescence 7 am entitled to an honest self-view, since I am generally my own severest critic. To be sure, I have to take some measures to ensure alertness, and that includes some rest during the day else I might doze off during a lecture I hear at night. Ten to fifteen minutes will do the trick and produce a remarkable restoration of vigour. I fall asleep almost instantly and wake up refreshed. Getting Tested Since I turned eighty the 'government has issued me a driver's licence that is good for one year only. In Ontario, octogenarians are not allowed to drive a car unless they can pass a written examination on traffic regulations and a driving test to show that they're still 'with it.' Each time, I bristle at the indignity of this procedure. It is nothing but official stereotyping, for it has little to do with facts and everything to do with prejudice. Ageing drivers whose capacities are diminished will usually take themselves off the streets, or are encouraged to do so by their families. If they become less secure they will avoid the superhighway and stick to visiting the grocery store or some friend. Let them submit a letter from their ophthalmologist detailing their visual capacity (which is known to deteriorate) and unless other age groups are tested also — that should do it. In fact, the accident rate of people 75-85 years of age is lower than that of most other groups. How about regularly testing young men under twenty-five? They should be checked yearly, since as a group they have a terrible driving record, and consequently insurance companies jack up their rates accordingly. It is noteworthy that these same commercial enterprises leave people like me alone. But not the government of this province, which still caters to old-fashioned prejudice. I'll never forget the sign in our exam waiting room, announcing that the testing crew was very busy, and therefore there might be delays. The department hoped that we would understand. Well, I didn't, especially not after some two hours, when at last a man appeared who was to test my actual driving. He was about

8

The Common Weal

thirty years old and patronized me, treating me like a child whose comprehension is limited. I resolved right then to write a fighting missive to the Globe and Mail. I did, and I let all my feelings about the experience hang out, bitterly resenting the idea that the following year I would have to do it again: 'Meanwhile I'll have to prepare myself for next year's trial period. Maybe I ought to follow a friend's advice and drive 60 km to another testing station where the elderly are taken at the appointed time and always treated with respect. It would mean exchanging waiting time for driving time, and the cost of diminished self-esteem for the cost of the few litres of gasoline. It looks like a good bargain.'3 The article elicited an enormous response and even moved a much younger man whom I did not know, DJ. Janigan of Ottawa, to try and have the whole testing system abolished: T contend [he wrote] that it is a classic example of an unfair regulation which treats the elderly, the age eighty-plus in particular, as being incompetent unless proven otherwise ... [It is] simply an anachronism, a relic from earlier times.'4 Gary Posen, a former deputy minister of transportation in Ontario, and now executive director of Holy Blossom Temple, told me that my article shook up the department (only slightly, I'm sure), and lately there have indeed been some bureaucratic adjustments to our annual trial. I still hope that some way will be found to safeguard both our dignity and our civil rights. No highway slaughter will ensue when that occurs. (In the spring of 1997 some adjustments have indeed been instituted.) The underlying motive for these regulations reflects a prevailing societal judgment about the elderly: they have lost their ability to contribute to the common weal - a perception that is, in fact, part of the prevailing obsolescence syndrome. Obsolescence

It took me one day in the New World to understand that I had entered a fundamentally different society. The time was September 1935, and I was on my first ride on the New York subway. A man next to me was reading a newspaper and suddenly discov-

On Ageing and Obsolescence

9

ered that he had just about reached his destination. He went to the exit, leaving the paper behind. I quickly picked it up and rushed after him. 'Mister,' I said in my best English, 'you forget ze pepper.' The train stopped, the door opened. He looked at me with a mixture of condescension and contempt. 'Greenhorn!' he spat out and exited. And there I stood holding a valuable item that someone had wilfully discarded. In the old country we had never thrown anything away if some use could still be extracted from it. After all of us had read the news, Mother would cut a portion into little squares to be used as toilet paper; she would save some sheets for wrapping when she shopped; window cracks could be minimized with paper during the cold weather; going to a soccer match during the winter was more enjoyable if one's shoes were lined with newsprint; and there was always need for kindling matter. But throw it away? Never! Our suits were made of materials that were as near to being indestructible as possible, and when I finally discarded the blue serge suit I had brought to the United States it was perhaps a bit shiny, but otherwise as sturdy as ever. Similarly, in our home, women's fashion was served by making dresses over again; shoes were soled and re-soled. 'Old' meant good and serviceable; my grandparents' little house in Willingshausen bore the inscription '1783' proudly over its door. On this side of the ocean, old houses are considered declasse, unless they are tourist attractions. Only at Chautauqua Institution, where I lectured in 1988, did I encounter homes that displayed the year of their construction and have signs that might say, 'ca. 1898.' (The owner of an embarrassingly new structure got into the spirit and had a sign reading, 'ca. 1980.') During the Depression, of course, many people were forced to hang on to their old stuff, but nowadays our economy has become so structured that planned obsolescence is the very fuel on which it runs. A few years' service is all we should expect of items we purchase, and every advertisement tries to persuade us that 'new' means 'better' and is an improvement over yesterday's offering.

10 The Common Weal

It can be, but all too often the promised 'break-through' does not break with technical ageing as much as it breaks our pocketbooks. We know that our conserving habits will not arrest the economic bulldozer that shapes the landscape of North American life, but by our way of life we can enter a small demurrer to the trends that affect all of us far beyond the mere economic sphere. Planned obsolescence has already affected and changed our language, our values, our relationships, and the way we treat people, especially the old. The very word 'old' now has a negative ring to it. 'Old-fashioned' used to mean something worthwhile; today it conveys the opposite. 'New' had the derogatory ring of 'new-fangled' and therefore untrustworthy; today it means good and worth looking at. An old hat was cherished; 'old hat' is now a put-down. The 1960s changed our culture in many ways, especially in our value system. The 'now' generation derogated yesterday and its sham, and the older folk eventually gave in and declared themselves as not only superannuated but essentially superfluous as well. Values were reversed; history was indeed bunk, as Henry Ford the First had already judged it to be. High school and college students fled history classes and went to subjects where today and tomorrow would have their rightful places. A classical education was for odd-balls; Latin and Greek finally became truly dead languages and certainly no help to budding doctors, as they were once believed to be. Only antiques - things so old that their physical survival elicits wonder, if not respect stand out as a counter-trend and now fetch fantastic prices (regardless of whether they are beautiful or otherwise admirable). The reason seems obvious to me: antiques are society's guilt offering to the gods of planned obsolescence. Not until the latter part of my ministry did I make the connection between obsolescence and the loosening of marital relationships. In earlier days I would never ask a couple, during the premarital interview, whether they planned to be united for a lifetime - that was the universal expectation. To be sure, there were always those who were not quite sure about the big step

On Ageing and Obsolescence

11

and had reservations which they pushed to the back of their consciences. They knew, of course, that divorce was a possibility, but they certainly never verbalized it. Pre-nuptial agreements were unknown to everyone except lawyers. Then, one day, it happened. I was interviewing a couple about to be married. There was something in the couple's casual attitude that bothered me. 'Are you really sure that this for keeps?' I asked. They looked at me with an air of surprise. 'Of course not,' they said quite nonchalantly. 'We both hope it'll work out, but if it doesn't we'll split.' 'And try someone else?' I asked. 'Sure, what's wrong with that?' was the reply, delivered with a tone of genuine innocence. In the months and years after this revealing encounter I made sure to ask the question and all too often received a similar answer. There was a time when the Reform rabbis of Toronto made premarital counselling by a professional obligatory for all couples planning marriage;5 today such an attempt would be fraught with failure. Today most (though not all) partners are already living together when they decide to marry, and during the last decade I have found them volunteering the information. Living together has become so common that it may now be the norm, and those saving themselves for their wedding are (like virgins) distinctly old-fashioned. All of which, translated into economic terms, reflects a troubling aspect of our throw-away society. Partners are like goods, purchased with the understanding that they may not last for any length of time. Similarly, new partners will be better, and marriage will be improved. Divorce, once frowned on by society, is now commonplace and thoroughly accepted. Relationships become part of the fall-out of a pervasive system of disposability. There are, of course, other reasons for the steeply rising divorce rate: economic stress, women working, high mobility, and the like. But when we take it for granted that nothing material lasts for ever, we will subconsciously apply that perception to the nonmaterial aspects of our life as well.

12 The Common Weal The Aged

As soon as I turned sixty-five in 1977, I began to devote articles and speeches to the subject of age discrimination. My activitie caught the attention of the Globe and Mail, which published an editorial suggesting that I head a national coalition to protect the rights of the aged and move them to political action. I would have liked to throw myself full tilt into that battle, but my first responsibility was the Torah commentary, and the presidency of the Canadian Jewish Congress took up the rest of my time. I never lost sight of the underlying issues and continued to expose them as often as possible. I was then still serving on the Ontario Human Rights Commission and often had to deal with complaints about age discrimination. I believed then, and still do, that compulsory retirement at age sixty-five is a curtailment of civil rights. I know that good arguments can be made for this practice, which enjoys the protection of law, but the individuals who are affected and put out to pasture against their will are not generally impressed with an economist's projection or the findings of a social psychologist. They want to know what their civil rights are and find that in this instance they are deprived of them and that the law approves. To be sure, they are no longer cast into the wilderness and thrown to the wild beasts; now they are paid social assistance and in Ontario are entitled to free or reduced-cost medical and hospital care and drugs, and they enjoy other advantages, such as cheaper fares on public transport or when they step up to the cinema wicket. But withal, something very unpleasant has happened. The aged have been taken off the perch of respect and too often have been made the butt of ridicule, contempt, and even resentment. I abhor this trend, particularly because it has invaded the media and shaded our very language. Society may pay us off, but at the same time it manages to consider us brainless, sexless, useless, and a drain on the public purse. (I speak here of the fate of the aged in terms of their social obsolescence. In chapter 15 I turn to my own process of self-acceptance while growing older.)

On Ageing and Obsolescence

13

Brainless: On several occasions I wrote to a certain automobile manufacturer protesting an ad that showed an older woman trying to buy a car. The salesman treated her (with a wink to the audience) as an obvious idiot. She was lucky to be buying this particular product, he said, and he directed her attention to the vehicle's tires. She kicked them dutifully and was convinced. The fact that the ageing customer was a woman made the ad that much more offensive. The whole bit about 'old ladies with tennis shoes' is of this genre; they simply don't know that they are on the road to dementia and extinction. (The company has since abandoned this brand of advertising; evidently there were enough complaints.) Sexless: Neither men nor women over a certain age - whatever it is - are supposed to indulge in sexual activities. If golden-age males ever pursue it they are branded as 'dirty old men,' and women in search of male attention are dubbed 'vestry-hounds' or 'fag-hags.' In this prejudicial pattern Charlie Chaplin was an exception that proved the point, especially since the discrepancy between his age and Oona O'Neill's underlined the 'truth' believed to govern the sexual instincts of older men: they are looking not just for women but for young women, and the younger the better. Still, since men are still the preponderant purveyors of our mores, they are forgiving in the case of older men, but they will not extend the same courtesy to women past their youth who go with young men. These women are simply deemed disgusting, Flaubert's artistry notwithstanding. My predecessor in the Holy Blossom pulpit, Rabbi Abraham L. Feinberg, was also much taken with this whole subject. When widowed and nearing eighty, he married a much younger woman and subsequently wrote a book entitled Sex and the Pulpit.^ (The public soon spoke of it as dealing with sex in the pulpit.) Feinberg was always the radical who said unpopular and, if possible, outrageous things; and though the book did not enjoy commercial success, he himself did, and he repeatedly made his point on radio and television: sex was a subject one should talk about, he stressed, challenging churches and synagogues to discuss it frankly and openly. His book also gave advice to older

14 The Common Weal

persons on how to make the most of their libido. Indeed, society is very slow in accepting the whole premise of ageing as a normal procedure and cannot yet deal with geriatric potential. Useless: I have been more fortunate than most in stemming the older person's typical sense of social uselessness and consequent diminished self-esteem. Formerly it was who you were that determined your status, now it is, what you do. Work is identical with the person, and therefore unemployment is even in this respect the ultimate scourge. A person who does not work for compensation is a nobody, and that applies to the retired as well. Even a rich man who merely clips coupons will likely meet the question 'What do you do?' with 'I'm looking after my investments,' rather than 'Nothing, I'm retired.' This of course is also one reason why women who do not work outside the home and are therefore not compensated in cash enjoy less esteem than if they were putting in eight hours a day in someone's office or factory. (As homemakers they may also engender jealousy from their friends, but that is another matter.) Statisticians aver that by the time people reach the age of sixty they have lost only 1.5 per cent of their reaction time and that thereafter the decline will be insignificant if they keep themselves active mentally and physically. The sixty-five-year watershed has no particular physiological foundation. It came into being in Bismarck's time, in the Germany of 1889, when the Iron Chancellor reacted to the rising strength of the working classes with an apparent concession: he promised some form of social compensation to workers retiring at age sixty-five. He was quite safe in doing so, for very few reached that magic age in those days. During the Depression, Franklin Roosevelt's 'Brains Trust' revived the old number as the starting point for Social Security, and in time Canada did the same. In urban centres, the nuclear family has become the pattern, which allows for no inter-generational groups, as did the old extended family. Grandparents must now live by themselves, and if they cannot, they will be transferred to retirement or nursing homes.7 There they will have occasional visits from children and grandchildren, but the thread of continuity is broken for them,

On Ageing and Obsolescence

15

as well as for their offspring. Add to this the great mobility of the modern family, and all too often older people live far from their loved ones and cannot afford to visit them because of physical or financial obstacles. They are alone and will die alone, even if their families finally manage to stand around the deathbed. I am not sure how this dire problem can be solved, for ultimately each family has to do things its own way. But society bears part of the responsibility, which it cannot discharge by giving the retired some money. With health care now prolonging life far beyond earlier times, we must begin by stretching out a person's working years beyond sixty-five and let people work till seventy if they wish and if they can still satisfy the requirements of their job. A flexible retirement program will allow people to keep on working. That five-year additional working span will give meaning to many lives and also serve the important function of reestablishing some measure of respect for older persons. They need not be useless by definition, as they are now deemed to be. A drain on the public purse: This complaint reflects the ancient idea that the old should go away, and the sooner the better. Apparently the Canadian government agrees, at least subconsciously. Social insurance cards for ordinary, 'normal' people (i.e., those not yet ready for the ash heap) feature the Parliament Buildings in bright, pleasant daylight. Old age cards are very similar, but with one great difference: the daylight is gone, and Parliament is pictured in the dark, with but one light still shining. I know of no other public document as frank as this. Gone is all the pretense; 'Buzz off!' the plastic says to me: 'Your lights are going out, but you insist on hanging around. You're costing us money; so be a good citizen and oblige the public. Besides, we're trying to balance our budget, and you and the likes of you are making it difficult for us.' Anyway, that's the message I read, and I am annoyed. But it is true that in some respects I am a drain on the public purse, seeing that in Ontario my medical needs are generally met from taxpayers' moneys (though I too pay taxes and therefore share in the cost; but given the benefits I receive I am 'way ahead). I have long been of the opinion that social entitlements should at

16 The Common Weal

least to some degree be related to people's needs, and those well off should continue to carry their own weight. But successive governments have been loath to incur the displeasure of older voters. Meanwhile the number of those feeding from the common trough gets larger every year. Putting off retirement and keeping the older citizens on the labour roster would alleviate some of the burden. Even so, and especially because of our low birth rate, Canada's population pyramid will soon be completely inverted. The aged will be more numerous than the young, yet the latter will have to supply old-age benefits to the former if the present policies go unchallenged. Treating the pyramid as if all were well is bound to bring on national economic disaster, and even for this reason alone the limit of sixtyfive should be abolished. Meanwhile, elderly people near or below the poverty line are the most vulnerable element of our society. I took this subject on the road and put forward my ideas in many places.8 The elders are likely to agree; the young generally disagree. If, then, persuasion will not avail, politics can and must. In the United States there is an American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), which has considerable political clout; Canada's parallel association, the Canadian Association of Retired People (CARP), has not as yet reached that degree of potency. If matters are properly handled, an election can readily elicit better support for the elders' position, if the case is made clearly and forcefully. Benjamin Disraeli once said that youth is a blunder, manhood a struggle, and old age a regret, and a medieval Jewish writer judged old age to be a natural illness.9 I have never felt that way, and in my mother I had a better model to emulate. Quite clearly, biological age and chronological age need not coincide. We cannot all be as lucky as she; we need the right kinds of genes, a bit of luck, and above all the will to keep mind and body alert. 'You are as old as you feel' is a truism, but like all truisms it has a kernel of truth, banal though it may be. Old is not always good, but it often is, and more often than people realize.

CHAPTER TWO

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

A New Task In the spring of 1984 I had occasion to talk with Martin Goldfarb, the Liberal party's highly respected pollster/analyst, and I told him of my desire to be of some service to the government. Not long thereafter I received a phone call from John Roberts, federal minister of employment and immigration. He'd like to see me briefly. When he came the next day he was clearly running - not from something or someone, but chasing after the leadership of the Liberal party. Pierre Elliott Trudeau was set to resign as leader of the party, and therewith as prime minister of Canada. I had known John for some years and liked his ideas and style. He was a genuine liberal, a former university teacher, and now in charge of a tough department. While employment questions were temporarily on the back burner (the booming eighties were in full swing) immigration was a contentious matter, even though everyone agreed that in the long run it was the lifeblood of the nation's growth. Without it, the population was not replenishing itself, and Canada needed more rather than fewer people. The question was: Who should be admitted? Canada's conservative heartland wanted to maintain the European - and preferably northern European - immigrant, while many others around the nation refused to pay ariy attention to racial or national back-

18 The Common Weal

ground Refugee protection had suddenly became a national issue. I learned of this when John visited me. 'I have a job for you,' he said when he came to my office, 'and I know you'll do it well. We need someone to redraft the law dealing with refugee admission.' The matter appealed to me in principle, but before I could accept I had to know more about what was required.1 'If you say yes,' was his answer, Til have people in Ottawa explain the details to you. I've got to run. My schedule is tighter than is good for me.' 'When does this have to be done?' 'You've got a year,' were his parting words, and he was out of the door. It was an unorthodox way of getting someone to do an important job, but it worked for me. It reminded me of the way in which, six years earlier, Eddie Goodman, on behalf of Ontario premier Bill Davis, had proffered the vice-chairmanship of the Human Rights Commission.2 I probably should have turned the federal appointment down, for I had a lecture schedule to meet and had one more year to serve as president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR). But I am glad I didn't, for the assignment opened a door of intense interest to me. It brought new challenges, new people to meet, and a chance to do something worthwhile that had a national dimension. When the bureaucrats in Ottawa and Hull filled me in on the parameters of the task, I knew that I could do it creditably. For me, it was a perfect mix of human concern and legal judgment. For them, however, at least those at the top of the governmental apparatus, I was a less-than-perfect choice for a job that they would gladly have done themselves. Besides, whatever I would come up with would probably be like the other two efforts that already had been made (and of which I of course knew nothing at the time). Those reports had been duly filed, and no one had disturbed their resting place. The department's civil servants with some notable exceptions - disliked my appointment, which they considered an unwarranted interference with the

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19

work for which they had been hired. I was trespassing on their turf. Their reaction was reported to me by an insider. Shortly after I had started on my task there was a national election, which brought a change of government. The Liberals lost to the Progressive Conservatives, and the new prime minister, Brian Mulroney, appointed Flora MacDonald, formerly external affairs minister in Joe Clark's government, to head Employment and Immigration. We knew each other well; she had once or twice been to our home; and she confirmed my appointment, though the bureaucrats, I was told, had tried to dissuade her. They painted me as totally unprepared, a political amateur, pushed into this assignment by John Roberts because he wanted to assure himself of the Jewish vote. Most certainly I was a novice, but that is true for most ministers appointed to run departments, and usually they will receive another assignment at some time during the government's years in office. In each case the new minister must start from scratch and be briefed - which is to say, the civil servants will tell their new boss what they deem important. They are the government's guarantee of reasonable continuity, and not infrequently ministers find themselves unable to carry out their own plans. The bureaucrats can, if they are so minded, put roadblocks in the minister's way, without anyone being the wiser for it. They know the ropes; the boss doesn't, and when he/she finally catches on, the prime minister will stage a ministerial shake-up to increase the electoral chances of the government, and the game starts all over again. It usually stays the same - unless, of course, there is new legislation, which reflects the incumbent party's philosophy. I was quite innocent of all this; my seventy-two years of living had hidden from me the inner workings of government, which remain essentially the same, regardless of which party is in power. And just as politicians have one major program after they are elected - which is to be reelected - so do civil servants once they are in place: they want to preserve their territory. It is a built-in feature of most living creatures. Cal Best, then the leading bureaucrat in the department,

20

The Common Weal

briefed me. The important thing, he said, was to maintain the integrity of the country. Letting in refugees was the humane thing to do, but only up to a point. The interests of the nation had to be safeguarded, and that could best be done by people trained for the task. The only ones who fitted the bill were immigration officials, who knew that the protection of our borders came first. I sensed that my perception and the department's might differ seriously, but I did not anticipate how stubbornly the civil service would fight for its conviction of what should be done. Officials prepared a budget for me, which provided for work space in downtown Toronto, several lawyers, secretaries, an office manager, expenses for travel and conferences, plus my own stipend. Altogether I was given a half-million-dollar account, on which I could draw with the usual vouchers. I needed a competent lawyer to get me started. A respected professor at the University of Toronto recommended a young woman who had shown particular interest in refugee matters and human rights issues in general. That sounded good, and when I engaged Margarida Pacheco I had indeed made a capital find. She was a native of the Azores, had married her first cousin, who was a bank manager for the Royal Bank, and they had a young daughter. Margarida had a splendid command of refugee law and led me gently through the jungle of legal precedents, reports, and policies. I took her on for the length of the project, and she in turn hired our secretary, Mary Walsh, who had some experience in word processing, at the time a closed book to me. And what about the downtown office, with several lawyers and a manager? I could not see myself encumbered with a research team and other personnel. As for location, I did not want to spend extra time travelling downtown, and, besides, if we ever wanted to talk to refugees in person, a posh office would be a deterrent. So we located a simple two-room space, a five minutes' walk from Holy Blossom. Also, Margarida's husband worked across the street, a most convenient arrangement for both of us no parking problems or traffic hassles. Office furniture and an

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

21

Osborne computer were quickly rented, and a few weeks after my budget for the operation had been drawn up in Ottawa, we were off and running. Clearly, we were well under budget something that, in a perverse way, would later give me black marks with the bureaucracy. I'll come back to that painful part of my learning experience. Doing the Job

As I immersed myself in refugee legislation past and present, both in Canada and abroad, two approaches emerged, and they pulled legislative endeavours in two directions. One tended to favour the needs of the refugee; the other, those of the host country. The latter prevailed in Canada, which seemed to me as morally dubious. Here was a land that, except for its Native population, consisted of immigrants and refugees and their descendants. Were they saying, 'We are here, and the boat is full'? 3 And would they proclaim this in a land that was sparsely populated, or was their attitude really somewhat different? The more I contemplated the matter, the more it became clear to me that there were different perceptions of refugees' needs and rights. National protectionism, however ill-conceived, had the upper hand and tried to hold refugees at bay, especially when they were of non-European origin. It was a well-disguised re-run of Frederick Blair's policy of a generation earlier, when Jews fleeing from extermination were deemed undesirable, and only a handful were lucky enough to be admitted. Now it was Africans and Asians who were perceived to be threatening the stability of the nation, while 'white' Soviet refugees were readily admitted. But no one talked about such underlying beliefs, and, not surprisingly, I found myself searching for the best way to ease the entrance of any and all people who fitted the refugee criteria and were not a security risk to the nation. We organized public hearings in Toronto, Montreal, Winnipeg, and Vancouver. All of these were monitored by government officials, who never participated directly. I strove for the widest possible exposure to public opinion, gave media inter-

22

The Common Weal

views, and always stressed that Canada was a land of immigrants and refugees who had made it a great nation. But I also suggested that those who feared ready acceptance of refugees should examine their motives. Did they have economic doubts? The mid-eighties were a time of expansion and, despite occasional pull-backs, of prosperity. Or did they fear Asians and Africans as persons of colour? I was often asked whether Canadians did not have the right to keep their cultural profile intact. But Trudeau's policy of multiculturalism had already answered that query: all newcomers had a right to preserve their traditions. Would this policy slow or even prevent the integration of immigrants? Experience since its introduction has shown that no measurable alteration of Canada's character has occurred. Older parents rarely integrated or even learned to speak English acceptably, but their children almost invariably became Canadians like everyone else - with one difference: they grew up respecting their heritage. This was the idea, and despite recent attacks on it I continue to support the principle of multiculturalism. In earlier days, immigrants tended to play down or even hide their foreign origin; now they were encouraged to be proud of it. In my view, this freedom to acknowledge one's roots has made for greater appreciation of Canada as a good land in which to live and be truly at home. (More about this in the next chapter.) Contrary to opposing claims, the low level of nationalism in Canada has nothing to do with multiculturalism. I noticed it when I first arrived, in 1961, and found it in fact somewhat of a relief. The United States had gone through occasional spasms of chauvinism, and 'un-American' had, back in the fifties, become a label for treason. There is no 'all-Canadian' boy or girl next door, and the Canadian flag is not the sacred symbol that the Stars and Stripes is south of the border. The presence of an independence-minded Quebec has raised the level of Canadian patriotism somewhat, but like all else in the land, it is unobtrusive. Sometimes that is unsettling, and at other times, highly attractive. It is one of the reasons that I had no hesitation acquiring Canadian citizenship, and a second passport.

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

23

Much to my satisfaction, I found that my early training in the law stood me in good stead in my new post. Legal reasoning and philosophy know few boundaries. In July 1984, when I set out to tackle the project in earnest, it was exactly fifty years since I had received my doctorate at Humboldt University in Berlin. It was also the year mentioned in George Orwell's famous predictions,4 all too many of which had come to pass. Soviet citizens, many Jews among them, were fleeing their homeland to escape the grasp of Big Brother. It did not take me long to discover that the process of determining who was and who was not a refugee in the meaning of the law5 was weighted against the refugee, who appeared to be an unwelcome intruder into the Canadian realm. The immigration service stood watch over the borders, and if there was a legal dispute the Immigration Board would make the final determination. At the country-wide public hearings I held, the one-sidedness of the law was brought repeatedly to my attention. The fact that I myself had once been a refugee helped me to identify with the needs of those now begging for admission, but my presumed bias in this regard made me even less welcome among the top civil servants of the department. They had their plans, and I paid close attention to them, but in the end I did not make them mine. I went abroad to learn at first hand how other nations handled similar problems. I was directed to External Affairs (now called Foreign Affairs), where my itinerary was arranged. Unfortunately, my presidency of the CCAR made it impossible to include Asian and African embassies and consulates in my travels. I ended up by going to England, West Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and France. I was amply briefed by each of our embassies, which arranged for me to meet the best informants inside and outside the country's government. In some places, refugees were sent to a holding centre, there to await the decision on their application. The West German authorities were most anxious not to give these places the appearance of sanitized concentration camps, and the Italians, I found, were best in preserving a spirit of hope among people who could and would not return to the lands

24 The Common Weal

whence they had fled, but who had not as yet been accepted as legitimate refugee claimants. In the course of these journeys I quickly became accustomed to being treated as a VIP. Attaches arranged for everything; there were always people to carry my suitcase, and chauffeured automobiles were at my disposal. It was not hard to take, and, best of all, the work was interesting and the goal worth any effort I could make. In Switzerland, the boat still seemed to be full - or so the administrators led me to infer. Though the nation was infinitely richer than its neighbours, its compassion had not substantially expanded since the Nazi period, when all too many refugees had been turned back at the border. Switzerland still found it hard to accept refugees, even though the headquarters of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees was located in Geneva. There, of course, my concerns found resonance, while outside its buildings I detected little compassion. In France and West Germany, Roman Catholic organizations and individuals were the major engines of compassion and my chief contacts, while in England academics played a more significant role and proved very helpful in my research. Those were the days before the dissolution of the Yugoslav state, when Bosnia would become a synonym for brutal civil war, and Germany the major European catch basin for the relief of human misery. At home Margarida and I began to sketch the outlines of my projected report to the government. We saw eye to eye on all major issues. Clearly, our task was to strike a balance between the legitimate interests of the state and the needs of the refugee. But there was more to it than that: without an underlying philosophy, the report would be nothing more than a technical device that could be picked apart at will. An intellectual foundation, however, might prejudice the reader in one direction or another, and the system that we would devise would not be considered on its technical merits. I came to the conclusion that asylum needed a thorough investigation from a moral point of view, but there was not enough time to undertake this labour. (I would return to it

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

25

some ten years later, when I wrote a book on the matter.) I finally arrived at a compromise. We would first issue the technical report and then, separately, a historical and philosophical foundation for it. This proved an unfortunate decision; I did not anticipate that the government and/or bureaucracy would sabotage that part of the plan. The Report It had become obvious that we could not meet the one-year deadline, and we were granted a half-year's extension but would have to finish the work within the budget that we had been given. When the report was ready in the summer of 1985 it offered some eighty specific recommendations for legislative and administrative action. Part I - on the refugee determination process - was printed and submitted to the minister.6 The press conference that followed release of the report was extraordinarily well attended. The reporters, who had by this time been given a chance to read my submission, seemed positive about it, and, as I expected, their questions were directed primarily to issues of public controversy. The next day's press was generally supportive. The Montreal Gazette (15 June 1985) had this to say: 'Maybe Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut should be Deputy Minister. His report on refugees speaks to the highest aspirations of citizenship, whether we think of Canada or the world. It proposes bureaucratic structures intended to be both quicker and fairer. It's clear and it's reasonable ... Plaut would put dignity into the process - dignity for the refugee, dignity for us. As a refugee from Nazism fifty years ago, he knows what that means.' That the government thought otherwise became painfully obvious when I tried to make arrangements for presentation of part II. I found Flora MacDonald suddenly hard to reach, and when I finally presented it to her she received it perfunctorily and thanked me in an offhand manner that was new in our relationship. I realized that my worst fears were only too justified. Even the fact that I was returning $150,000 of unspent moneys elicited no visible impression of appreciation from her. 'Very

26

The Common Weal

nice,' she said, and Michael Wilson, the finance minister, to whom I related news of my parsimony a few days later, used exactly the same expression. I did not then know what to make of things, but friends at the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission (CEIC) told me bits of the inside story later. Returning some unspent money from a project such as mine was all right, but returning a near third of it was a bad show. It made those who rendered the original estimates look foolish, as if it was their habit to squander public funds. Concerned bureaucrats, I was told, insisted that their estimate had been correct but that I, totally inexperienced in conducting a study of this kind, had clearly done it in a slipshod manner. My inappropriate frugality was the proof of the pudding. I had not begun to study the subject adequately; I had not had enough professional help; and I had not studied refugee determination in all parts of the world where Canadian representatives were active (in this regard, as I have indicated above, my critics were correct.) A confidential report, soon leaked to outsiders, had it that at a policy conference with the minister a certain CEIC official had said it all: 'Plaut's report shows he's really ignorant of the whole business; he was engaged as a Liberal hack, and that's all he is.' The comment did not faze me, but I did not want to believe that MacDonald had, as I was told, listened to it in silence. The final show of the government's hand came when part II had been studied. I was informed that it would not be published and therefore a French translation was unnecessary. It would be filed; and since it was government property I did not feel empowered to make it public myself. The bureaucracy was now free to do its own planning, and the new Tory policy of favouring a restrictive policy could be incorporated in the draft which the CEIC proceeded to construct. It was not hard to let the press and other interested parties know that part II existed, and somehow copies got around, and the government was urged to make the whole document public. But MacDonald was advised to have none of it. The last thing that was desired at this time, she was told, was to discuss princi-

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

27

pies that might upset hallowed notions. In her apparent pullback from her earlier endorsement of my proposals, she exposed herself to bitter criticism from non-governmental organizations (NGOs) across the country. Howard Adelman had headlined the latest edition of his magazine Refuge with lavish praise for the minister, but in the next issue he attacked her mercilessly for having caved in to pressures from her civil servants as well as the cabinet. Her political weakness became evident when Mulroney took the day-to-day handling of the immigration portfolio away from her and handed it to a junior minister, Walter MacLean, a former clergyman with ample experience in the Third World. To be sure, he was technically responsible to MacDonald, who was still the head of Employment and Immigration, but the message was easy to read: MacDonald, who had once aimed to be prime minister, was not strong enough to stand up for what she believed in. I have never doubted that she did have the right impulses, but the lethal combination of a strong bureaucracy and a cabinet responsive to reactionary sentiment was too much for her. Yesterday's admired friend had become the NGOs'chief target of obloquy. The Public Arena

We dissolved our office, and I said a grateful good-bye to my coworkers, who had supported me so loyally. I made ready to return full time to my writing projects, but that was not to be. Instead, I was ineluctably drawn into the fray that the government's policy evoked among the NGOs, and which was liberally reported in the press. I received numerous invitations for lectures, among them to the universities of Alberta (Edmonton), York (Toronto), McGill (Montreal), Laval (Quebec City), and Oxford (England). Even the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) evinced a keen interest in my report and invited me to Washington to address the top people in the service, as well as representatives of the State Department and members of foreign embassies. This was one invitation I chose to accept.

28 The Common Weal Commissioner Nelson, head of the INS, introduced me, and as I listened to his words I could not help but remember that I had been in this place some forty-two years earlier, under vastly different circumstances. Then I had come here as a humble petitioner, not a lecturer. My parents were living in England (whence they had fled from the Nazis) while my brother and I lived in the United States. All attempts to have their affidavits approved had failed, and reasons were never given. Finally came the good news I had been waiting for: I was to appear in Washington and state my parents' case in person. I did so and was shortly thereafter informed that, once more, their application had been denied. Again no reasons were furnished; but years afterward I used the Freedom of Information Act to gain access to the files of the INS. I learned that the five examiners who had faced me at the time had voted four to one against me. Why? Because, first, as a declared Zionist I was considered an 'internationalist' and therefore unreliable; and second, because my father could not supply the addresses of his two sisters (they were being murdered in Auschwitz).7 And now, what a turn-around: the 'unreliable' petitioner of yesterday was lecturing to the very department that had so often rejected his pleas! It struck me as something in a theatre of the absurd. I was briefly tempted to refer to my earlier experience but decided against it. Instead, I put a good deal of passion into my lecture, hoping that my words might somehow assist other hapless applicants in days to come.8 In 1986, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees presented the Nansen Medal to the people of Canada - an award in which all our citizens took great pride. By a strange coincidence it was just then that the government constructed Bill C-55, which was to revise the refugee determination process. The bill accepted the basic structure of my report and went with model 'A,' which provided for a panel that would hear the claimant with fair dispatch. It also incorporated my suggestion for a new Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) as well as a number of other details. But in at least three major respects the real spirit of my report was aborted by the bill: it tainted the independence of the panel

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29

by making an immigration official part of it; it rendered a meaningful appeal nearly impossible; and it introduced a morally questionable but expeditious 'safe country' concept. I will spare the reader all the technical details. Suffice it to say that the NGOs turned thumbs down on the bill and lobbied strongly against it. There was little hope that the House would listen to them, for the Tories' overwhelming majority precluded that possibility. But there was still the Senate, which had a sizeable Liberal majority left over from the Trudeau days, and the battle would eventually be shifted to the Red Chamber. As time went on, the print and electronic media too became partners in what often appeared to me a sort of high-stakes game - except that we were playing with human lives. The Great Emergency

During the spring of 1986 an increasing number of Portuguese migrants arrived in Toronto. They claimed refugee status, saying that they were Jehovah's Witnesses and as such had been persecuted in their homeland. No matter that the majority of the arrivals did not have the foggiest notion what a Jehovah's Witness was, and no matter that we had no reports of the sect's being persecuted in Portugal. This was as clear an abuse of the refugee determination process as could be had — yet both the CEIC and the government remained curiously silent. Political scuttlebutt had it that the Tory government hoped to make friends in Toronto's traditionally Liberal core. The murky atmosphere surrounding the Portuguese mini-flood showed the low level to which the discussion of the refugee problem had sunk. But that was mild in comparison to what was about to happen. A year earlier a group of 150 Tamils had arrived in Newfoundland and unleashed a xenophobic backlash, and now another sudden shipload of refugees landed on the east coast. Some 170 Sikhs kissed the soil of Canada and declared themselves refugees from India. If the Tamils of 1985 had stirred up populist resentment in the country, the Sikhs engendered a paroxysm of anxiety.

30 The Common Weal

The media (assisted generously by Flora MacDonald's successor, Benoit Bouchard) blew the case up into a cause celebre. Day after day, for nearly two weeks, the Canadian people were treated to descriptions of suspected terrorists among the arrivals, of the war-like and aggressive nature of Sikhs in general, of the devious methods they had used to get here, and of how they were adept in abusing the refugee determination process. It all amounted to an almost-hysterical display of unnamed fears that were manifestly tainted by racist prejudice. How else explain this outburst against an 'invading horde' of 170, when only a few months earlier some five thousand white Portuguese had come without a word of protest? The government surveyed the scene and concluded that the time was ripe for a major move. Prime Minister Brian Mulroney took the extraordinary step of recalling Parliament, then in summer recess, in order to deal with the perceived national emergency. Obviously, so he wanted the nation to believe, we were in danger of being overrun by the Third World, or, anyway, by strangers in general, and if we could not properly secure our borders we would soon be totally inundated. After all, weren't there millions of refugees out there, and most of them ready to pounce on poor Canada? And so on. These weren't the exact words used by the government, but that was the gist of it. In consequence, new legislation was introduced - Bill C-84 - designed to give immigration officials wide powers to stem the expected flood that would surely follow in the wake of the Sikh invaders. When the bill became public we couldn't believe our eyes. Compared with its draconian provisions Bill C-55 had been a little lamb. CEIC officers could halt ships in mid-sea and look passengers in the eye; if they didn't like what they saw, they could turn the vessel back as carrying illegal freight. That was part of it, and the rest was similarly outrageous. While the government had been tightening the screws, Walter MacLean had apparently had enough and had resigned his post as junior immigration minister. (The rumour mill had it that his humanitarian approach to his duties had made his departure less than voluntary.) In his stead the Prime Minister appointed

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Gerry Weiner, who represented a Montreal suburban area where he had served as mayor. For a moment it appeared as if the government wanted to make a conciliatory gesture towards the refugee-aid community. After all, forty-five years after the nation had officially excluded Jewish refugees as much as possible, a Jewish MP had now assumed charge of its immigration department. There was hope that he would bring his own people's refugee experience to the whole process. Unfortunately, Weiner, no more than MacLean, was able to alter the thrust of government and its bureaucracy. But instead of putting his own declared convictions on the line, the new minister went along with the policy makers and defended them vigorously against the slings and arrows that the NGOs hurled against them. His popularity did not increase among the refugee protection sector. Since Bill C-84 was an emergency measure, it received immediate attention from the House, and a stream of witnesses made their way to Ottawa. I was invited as an 'independent expert,' which meant that the committee wanted me to testify for myself rather than for some organization.9 When I was finished and left the committee room I was met by the largest barrage of media people I had ever faced. They literally jammed the wide corridor. For a brief moment it appeared that the ensuing publicity surrounding my (and others') highly critical remarks about the bill might have an effect on public opinion. At any rate, the committee, realizing that the government's haste had backfired, made a few changes and subsequently introduced some amendments. But in the end it was the Senate that held up this disastrous piece of legislation. Two years after Parliament had been recalled to deal with the perceived national emergency, the amended versions of bills C-55 and C-84 had still not been passed into law. This was to no small extent the result of the persistent pressure exerted by refugee-aid bodies across the country. To be sure, the delay also produced an ever-increasing backlog of cases, which soon reached thirty, then forty, then fifty thousand. But the bureaucracy did not seem to mind. More cases meant a

32 The Common Weal

need for additional personnel, and at worst there could always be a selective amnesty of the kind that we had proclaimed before and which the United States instituted from time to time. I was also happy to see that the Jewish community turned to its best traditions and did its needed share in the effort. Through the efforts of Holy Blossom's Social Action Committee, an event of enormous impact was staged during the 1987 Passover season. A 'Third Seder' celebration, meticulously prepared,10 attracted two thousand people of all religious and ethnic groups. Aided by the media and a generous platoon of artists, they spread the plea for more humane legislation to all parts of the country. It was a stirring event, a high point in our nation-wide effort of consciousness raising. Summing Up

Since then, new legislation has created structures that resemble my proposals. An Immigration and Refugee Board, with threeyear appointees, performs reasonably well, though it still lacks a unified, nation-wide policy directive. There is an active Canadian Council for Refugees, ably led for some years by David Matas of Winnipeg and now by Sharry Aiken of Toronto. It carries on the tradition of Jewish involvement in an area that, at least when it comes to leadership, has regularly attracted some of our best people. But none of the new legislation has addressed some outstanding issues, which the Canadian public should discuss publicly.11 This book, being a memoir, is not the place for analysing refugee issues. A number of serious questions, however, still remain. How much does racial prejudice influence the law and its execution? How does the new head tax (a landing fee imposed on new arrivals) affect refugees and their families? Why is the proposed arrangement between the United States and Canada about the definition of asylum - from the Canadian perspective - a step in the wrong direction? The United States has suffered a severe attack of xenophobia and has prevented political refugees from entering Canada, turning them back at

The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate

33

the border and leaving them to a restrictive interpretation of refugee protection. Is it fair that accepted refugees are not allowed to become landed immigrants in Canada, because they cannot produce documentation of their identity? They often are unable to obtain such papers because there is no proper government back home or because such a government might consider those who have fled the country as traitors and would be unwilling to help them get established elsewhere. We should consider affidavits as substitutes for such documents. What is the real - and not just the commonly assumed - relationship between immigration and employment? Generally, in a time of unemployment, governments (and not just Canada's) respond by turning the immigration tap off or at least diminishing its flow severely. But does a larger influx of immigrants and refugees increase unemployment? Do these newcomers take jobs from Canadians? In the short run they may, and certainly they do so on occasion, but do they do it in the long term as well? Does not an enlarged Canadian population in effect increase rather than decrease employment opportunities? (As it is, we depend on a steady influx of new blood just to maintain the national population level.) Canada has about thirty million inhabitants. What number, say by the year 2010, would be a desirable goal to work for? Another question, arid much trickier. With lots of Asian arrivals coming to Canada, will the character of the country be affected significantly? What will happen to the traditional AngloFrench/European nature of our society? Will the low level of Canadian national feeling be further decreased? Will the spectacular growth of the Hispanic community in the United States find its parallel in Canada? I can understand the government's hesitation to ask a question such as this, but will we ever be mature enough to debate it in a rational manner? It is about such issues that we ought to speak. Sweeping the problems under the carpet may avoid some current embarrassment, but it does not advance the common good. A personal postscript: Increasingly I was being perceived as a

34

The Common Weal

champion of refugee rights and was immensely pleased when the Canadian Council for Refugees, at its 1989 convention in Vancouver, elected me its first honorary life member and presented me with a large, mixed-media image of three refugee women, by Nora Partrich. I look at it every day when I sit at my desk. It evokes an exciting and, on the whole, satisfying period of my life.

CHAPTER THREE

Canadian Mosaic

Quebec Conundrum

In late 1995 the people of Quebec went once again to the polls in order to tell themselves and the world whether they wanted to become a sovereign nation. By the slimmest of margins the answer was 'No,' and the leadership of the governing Parti Quebecois lost no time in informing Canadians that another such vote would be held as soon as feasible. Since then, an undercurrent of instability has upset the usually calm waters of Canada. It is strange indeed to think that, while a global survey shows Canada as the world's best place in which to live, a sizeable minority would rather go it alone. A lot of people outside Quebec are so fed up with the recurrent problems the French province seems to engender that they have given up and say, 'Let them go. We won't have peace until they do.' I do not belong to them; I value the unity of Canada as essential to fulfilling the great potential of the nation. But I have long supported the notion that Quebecers have a legitimate need that has to be met and that, unless it is met soon and willingly, Quebec im7/separate. In this respect I differ from the opinion of most federalists. Many, if not most of them are worried about the effects of Quebec's departure on the rest of Canada. Of course that is a concern, but we will never reach a resolution of the conflict if we are worried about ourselves only, and not also about the underlying aspirations of the Quebecois.

36 The Common Weal

It was my conviction then, and it is now, that Canadians should understand what motivates Quebec's nationalists: the problem will not go away, because the sovereigntists will keep it alive, and accommodation rather than threats will determine the shape of Canada, leading to a federated nation to which Quebec belongs, while exhibiting unmistakable aspects of sovereignty.1 I have been led to these conclusions to a significant degree because of my perception that the French factor resembles the Jewish factor in the population, in that both minorities have one essential need in common, which is to protect their own cultural inheritance. I spoke of this during my conversations with Rene Levesque some twenty-five years ago, when I stressed that Jews know (or should know) what independence means to a people.2 To be sure, our histories differ radically, for the dream of Zion is unlike the desire of the Quebecois to maintain their culture, but there is a convergence in that both peoples see sovereignty as the only viable solution. For two thousand years we Jews were a minority wherever we lived, and that status engendered unavoidable difficulties, both physical and cultural, whose elimination depended largely on others. Independence brings about new and complex challenges, but - as Israelis know all too well - they themselves and not others have the ultimate responsibility of shaping their lives. The Quebecois (that is, French Quebecers) are in this respect no different. They live as a small minority among more than 250 million English speakers in North America and face the daily need of warding off the enveloping 'Anglo' presence. All told, they have done very well to date, but they want to do better, and until they succeed, other Canadians will find themselves exposed to continuous turmoil. Perception is a powerful shaper of reality. The separatists deem themselves to be shackled, while in fact they already have many, if not most, of the trappings of sovereignty. They should remind themselves that no nation is 'sovereign' in the old sense, for we are all tied to one another by a multitude of bonds, from trade and technology to the endless possibilities of communication. The United States, relying on its great power, occasionally tries to impose unilateral sanctions on other nations, though

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with limited success, for its own politics too is a prisoner of international economics. In those matters that will ensure Quebec's cultural identity the province already is essentially sovereign. The challenge therefore is to have both Quebec and the rest of us realize this fact. Such understanding by a majority of Canadians would go a long way towards establishing a greater sense of mutual trust and would keep the channels of communication open. Currently we don't listen to each other and instead engage in provocation and counter-provocation (especially in the area of language protection), and it seems to take a natural disaster to show us that we are still together. The Canada-wide response to the devastation wrought in Saguenay by the flood of 1996 did more to establish rational discourse than threats of retaliation issuing from the federal government.3 There is, however, a complicating factor: the aspirations of the Native community. This was a point made strongly and repeatedly by Georges Erasmus, former national chief of the Assembly of First Nations, at one of the 'unity discussions' held across the land after the 1995 referendum. 4 Both Joe Clark, former prime minister, and Claude Ryan, former editor of Le Devoir and erstwhile Quebec cabinet minister and Liberal leader, were among the group in attendance, which involved only men and women who were not then in government.5 Ryan, as expected from a Liberal leader, asserted that all Quebecers were included in the provincial drive for selfhood, which position stood in opposition to the statement of Premier Jacques Parizeau, who, right after the referendum, had blamed 'minorities and money' for the defeat. Parizeau's was a clear admission that he and the people whom he led thought of minorities as outsiders who could never belong to the 'real' Quebec family. Citizenship was one thing, but membership in the clan was decisive, and Jews interpreted this statement as being directed primarily at them. They should not have been surprised, knowing the history of the province, which lamentably included long periods of anti-semitism. But, putting the nasty slur aside, there is the persistent reality of the QuebecJewish similarity, for the state of Israel was established as a

38 The Common Weal

Jewish nation, and nonjews - though they might be citizens are in that respect not fully part of it. There is little question that the unity of Canada is in trouble if we cannot convince the rest of the country that there are core values in Quebec's culture worthy of pride and enhancement. Canadians generally have a sense of decency, sharing and caring - though not everyone partakes equally in the nation's material benefits. Thus, Blacks still feel generally excluded,6 and so do Natives and Quebecers. To become inclusive to the greatest extent is Canada's real challenge and chance - though I still hold to my conclusion that Quebec's drive for independence, unless coupled with broad concessions to the Native population and a generous reception of these aspirations by the rest of us - will continue to foster the sense of instability that is Canada's greatest burden and will eventually lead to some form of separation. An aside: I am often asked whether, with my involvement in Canada's public weal, I still have ties to the United States. The answer is an unqualified 'yes.' I became a Canadian citizen without having to surrender my American passport. In my mind, the two allegiances support each other. I have now lived in Canada for more than three and a half decades, and I am likely to remain a Torontonian for the rest of my days. But I can never forget that it was the United States that took me in when I escaped from Nazi oppression, that it gave me a new lease on life, and that for three years I served in its army. Thus the whole North American continent is my living space, and I am grateful for that expanded opportunity. Multiculturalism

When back in the seventies Pierre Trudeau advanced the idea of multiculturalism as a national policy he was wholeheartedly supported by the majority of Canadians. They prided themselves on their acceptance of newcomers from Asia and Africa, continents that in the past had been deemed to produce undesirable refugees and immigrants. The new openness assumed the mantle of

Canadian Mosaic 39

moral urgency, especially when a widely read book by Irving Abella and Harold Troper exposed the nation's past immoral treatment of Jewish refugees.8 Also, in the struggle for national self-esteem, Canada could compare itself favourably to the United States, where the 'melting pot' had long been the ideal and appeared to denigrate the values brought to their new land by the immigrants. The U.S. message was clear: Cast off the old and embrace the new! Now Canada suddenly came up with a different idea and said to its newcomers: Keep the old and be proud of it. We don't want to force an integrationist culture down your throats; rather, we'd like you to continue cherishing your heritage and thereby create a novel ideal for the world - a nation where people live together in a multicultural rather than a conformist environment. In fact, federal money would support the maintenance and teaching of the varied traditions and thereby make Canada a veritable fabric of many colours. It was a vision rare in a world of increasing tribalism and nationalist confrontations, and it seemed vindicated when Rene Levesque's Parti Quebecois suffered a decisive defeat in 1980 in its attempt to pry the province loose from the national confederation. My task of creating a new refugee determination process for the country (see chapter 2, above) was commissioned in this climate of acceptance, but the national backlash became evident a year later when my report went to the government. Something had happened that at first slowed, then halted, and in the end reversed this whole trend. Enough voters made themselves heard to convince the Conservatives then in power that Canadian values were being short-changed by the new policy of multiculturalism. The recession of the eighties fortified this sense of being besieged by foreigners, immigrants, bogus refugees, and other 'unsuitables' who took advantage of Canadian largesse and patience. Stricter laws would be passed, and, more important, multiculturalism was now seen not as something to be welcomed and praised; rather, it became the whipping boy of a lot of people, and not only of the 'rednecks'9 - a group identified by some as racists, out of step with their time. There are many thoughtful Canadians who harbour no racial

40 The Common Weal

prejudices but are convinced that multiculturalism - however nobly conceived - has gone off the tracks. An article by Gina Mallet had the telling title 'Has Diversity Gone Too Far?' and a summary that read: 'Canadians are increasingly putting up walls around their separate cultures, communicating in the euphemisms of political correctness and insisting on asserting group rights over individual rights.' And further: 'Canada is like the proverbial Spanish shawl - one big fringe.'10 The best analysis of this problem has been provided by Richard Gwyn,11 whose concluding hope (in the form of a question) is: 'Can we reinvent ourselves into a Canada that is larger than the sum of its parts?' I share these worries, which include concern about the progressing erosion of the European cultural centre of Canadian education and public discourse. We can take so much out of that centre and replace it with the traditions, wisdom, and literary gems of our multicultural fabric, but if the centre yields too much - with Shakespeare becoming a marginal writer and the nation's history an irrelevant educational blip - multiculturalism has become a moth eating away at the national garment. Meanwhile the policy is with us, and its best features must not be cast away. We do, however, need a change of emphasis. The genuine appreciation of Canada must become a major educational objective and must replace Canadians' outworn habit of defining themselves first and foremost as 'not being Americans.' There are American traits that are indeed worthy of imitation, among them the pride of belonging to a great nation. Americans assert time and again with conviction that the United States is the best country in the world - despite its appalling racism and crime. Well, for me, there was and is truth in that asseveration, for America is a land with unique human attributes, among which openness, generosity, and individual independence are especially appealing. The majority of its citizens are genuinely proud to be Americans and have no hesitation in exhibiting their pride. Canadians can learn something from that; there is no reason why they should not develop a similar pride in the liberty and opportunities that Canada offers. I am not looking for chauvinism and exaggerated self-praise; I do

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wish, however, for a ready and more frequent recognition of its worth and potential. In 1996, a UN-sponsored global survey called Canada the number one country in the world when all factors that contribute to a good and decent life are taken into consideration, and that includes care of the environment, immigration, and treatment of refugees. I venture to say that not one in ten citizens is aware of these plaudits.12 Blacks and Jews

One important part of my active life had been directed towards making minorities feel at home in their habitat and helping other residents appreciate them as worthy partners in the national enterprise. This is why I helped to found the Urban Alliance and the North York Committee on Community and Race Relations13 and why my stint with the federal government in the area of refugee admission was tailor-made for me. My decision in the Pandori Case14 gave me entree to the Sikh community, and for some years I have received invitations sponsored by Hindu organizations and by the followers of the Aga Khan. My friendship with the late Wilson Head, fortified by our joint labours on behalf of the Urban Alliance and the advancement of racial equality, is now, alas, only a precious memory.15 My association with prominent members of Toronto's Black community, such as Bromley Armstrong and Bev Salmon, gave me reason to believe that the old bond between Jews and Blacks remained strong, even though in the United States the Farrakhan syndrome had helped to weaken it badly. But this bond became badly frayed when a controversy erupted over the projected production of Show Boat, a new staging of the old musical. A North York councilwoman alleged that Show Boat was 'a kind of hate literature,' and on a news program she charged that it was mostly Jewish men who had put on the show to denigrate Blacks, for the show allegedly portrayed Blacks as subservient stereotypes and glorified the old, racist U.S. south, and that therefore the plan of having it open the new Ford Centre for the Performing Arts was a public disgrace and an insult to the larg-

42 The Common Weal

est community of Blacks in Canada. She added that Edna Ferber, on whose book the show had been based, was also a Jew, and that it was Jews who were producing and ballyhooing Show Boat as the classic American musical and thereby were reinforcing an already latent racism existing in Canada. Such in part was the substance of her attack, and though she later apologized for some of her remarks, she had diverted a potentially rational discussion of the merits of the show into an argument about Jews. The Jewish issue' was picked up by Share, a Black publication. The production of Show Boat should be cancelled forthwith, it demanded, and if it was not, there would be pickets and demonstrations. As part of its strategy, the paper launched a series of attacks on the Jewish community. One writer criticized the United Way for continuing to support the show and added the gratuitous comment that Jewish communal agencies were receiving a disproportionate share of charitable dollars - as much as 45 per cent - suggesting thereby that influence and power rather than need were driving the United Way. Despite proof that exposed the figure as false, the writer refused to apologize. Instead, the editor of the publication, Arnold Auguste, wrote: Since I was accusing certain people of racism and insensitivity to Blacks as a race, I felt it quite necessary to the story to state the race of the perpetrators of this alleged racism. These news people should know that. Or is race only important when a Black person is alleged to have committed a crime? ... What bothers us most is that we are fighting not with White racists, our traditional enemies, but with individuals who belong to a group which have been our traditional friends and allies. Of course we feel betrayed ... Someone else said to me: 'You know, if that show was done by anyone other than Jews, the Black community would have had the full support of the Jewish community. But they won't go against one of their own.'

The shock that I experienced was not over the fact that some people should feel this way about us - there was ample prece-

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dent for it in the United States - but that the leaders of the Black community did not disavow this unwarranted attack on us. Their silence encouraged a new radical element among the Blacks to pick up the ball of anti-semitism and run with it. Black anti-Judaism and anti-semitism had apparently struck root in Toronto. Rabbi Dow Marmur, 18 who had developed good connections with Black ministers, managed to convene a small meeting of churchmen. I was present, and there was no question in my mind that these men were genuinely disturbed over the way in which the Black and Jewish communities had been driven apart. They promised to do their utmost to calm the troubled waters. Meanwhile, the Jewish community was caught in a dilemma. Ordinarily, when attacked it would respond vigorously through its agencies. But Jews and Blacks had worked together for so long that we hesitated to join in a public attack on this development in the Black community, knowing that it would help to deepen already existing white prejudice. Unfortunately, though the voice of Jewish anger and disappointment was muted, the controversy kindled in many Jews a growing disenchantment with Canadian Blacks and, by extension, with other minorities. I heard Jews who were children or grandchildren of immigrants rail against 'undesirable foreigners,' and I became the target of repeated criticism when I reprimanded such talk in my columns in the Canadian Jewish News. I called to my readers' attention that this kind of mindless accusation had been levelled against our people sixty years before, when we had been the 'undesirable foreigners.' I am not sure that it helped a great deal to point this out; evidently a lot of Jews had joined the great parade of stereotyping minorities, and Blacks were becoming a favourite object for stereotyping. Fortunately there remained a solid core of Jews who steadfastly held to their hopes for a harmonious society that included all and excluded no one. Despite this heavily charged atmosphere, the leaders of Ontario's branch of the Canadian Jewish Congress came to the assistance of the Black community when it was targeted by many citizens as 'vio-

44 The Common Weal lent,' in consequence of a shocking murder in one of Toronto's restaurants, with the murderer being Black. 'The assigning of collective responsibility has greatly troubled the Jewish community,' said the Congress.19 In the autumn of 1994, on Yom Kippur, when I was given the opportunity to preach, I chose this subject as my major theme. I asked the congregation not to focus on rabble-rousers but on the real issue. How would the Jewish community feel, I asked, if instead of Show Boat the entrepreneurs had chosen The Merchant of Venice, with Shylock the main and always-controversial figure? We wouldn't like it one bit and would demand that another opening production be chosen. To be sure, Show Boat had no Black Shylock; still, I held, we had to be sensitive to other minorities that felt threatened and demeaned. Perhaps we thought that Blacks should not be so sensitive, since there was really nothing wrong with Show Boat, as it was a period piece and nothing more. Yet, I reminded my listeners, didn't we always insist that others could never fully grasp how Jews felt, with our memory of our people's nearly two thousand years of persecution and ignominy? How then could we assume that we knew how sensitive Blacks should be? The centre-piece of Jewish history was our enslavement in Egypt and our subsequent liberation; similarly, the focus of Black memory was and is on four hundred years of slavery and the continuing racist reality of North America. Therefore, as long as Blacks perceived of this musical as objectionable I would stand with them as I had in the past, regardless of Share, and would not go to see the play. It was a personal decision, I emphasized, and I urged my hearers to take their own, informed stand. My talk received mixed ratings. Even some avowed liberals thought that my unquestioned support of the Black protest was wrong; I should see the play and then make my judgment. I agreed that this critique was credible, but that my own long-time struggle with racial prejudice had shaped my thoughts. Jews, after all, didn't think that defending The Merchant ofVeniceby saying that it was written four hundred years ago was much of a defence - it was still anti-semitic. Therefore we had little reason

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to say that the spirit of the U.S. Old South of the last century existed no longer. Racism was as real today as anti-semitism. The show opened to great plaudits. It was called a sensitive production, which featured the theme of 'OF Man River' throughout, as if to emphasize Black misery - surely a laudable objective. Jews saw the show, and so did Blacks, though (so I was told) in smaller numbers. The threatened vigorous protest that Share had threatened fizzled, and after a while the whole matter disappeared from public consciousness, at least as far as I could notice. Maybe, I began to think, some silent efforts by Black leaders had done their work, but I remained disappointed that there had been no public stand by them on the matter of antisemitism. A conference that featured a Black professor from Harvard who talked about the dangers of Black anti-semitism was a polite exchange of opinions, but little more. Meanwhile confrontations of Blacks with the police shifted attention away from Show Boat and concentrated on other tears in the communal fabric. People I knew were taking the side of what they called 'law and order' and dismissed any and all accusations against the police. I had a long conversation about this matter with Myron Gottlieb, who was a major figure in the large company headed by Garth Drabinsky that had produced Show Boat. It was a frank interchange, during which I learned of the earnest efforts that the company had made to clean the play of any possible racial overtones. The show had meanwhile opened with great success in always-critical New York, which had the largest Black population of any U.S. city, and where - despite the strength of Farrakhan and other proactive groups - no protest whatsoever had been launched. The development gave me much thought, and I promised Gottlieb that I would review my statement of the preceding High Holidays. I did, and after much soul searching I came to the conclusion that my decision not to see the show and instead take the reaction of my Black friends as a sufficient guide for action needed revisiting. The show was scheduled to leave the city, and I felt I had to see it before I could conclude this episode in my life. I

46 The Common Weal

found Show Boat to be everything its supporters had claimed. It was clear to me that, since I had preached on this matter on Yom Kippur, the coming Yom Kippur had to be the venue where I would speak on it again. I prefaced my morning sermon by briefly reviewing what I had said and why I had said it. 'Don't hurt us,' the Black community had pleaded, 'we already hurt enough,' and I had heeded their cry. I then continued: What I did not know then, but know now, was that the controversy had little to do with the show itself, but was used by a small, militant Black group to gain power in the Black community. They focused on Show Boat as a pretext and proceeded to use antisemitism as a prop. I, along with a good many Black people, felt betrayed, but we did not want to exacerbate the controversy and kept silent. Had I known how the controversy was managed I probably would not have spoken about it and in any case would have responded differently. I decided that - before the show left town - I would see it after all. I did, and in hindsight I will say that the real hero of the play was Julie, a Black woman, who represented courage, loyalty and decency more than any white person. Having made my original statement in this place, I render this explanation. The producers of the show deserve it, and so do you. At the same time, I will not cease to strive for racial understanding and will not allow anyone to divert me from my life-long effort to make this a better and harmonious community. I hope you will file this away in your memory, and I now turn to my Yom Kippur subject...

The mail I received in the weeks thereafter was supportive. The writers said that they felt better for my having made my explanation, and certainly I felt better. Since then, Black-Jewish relations have returned to a more manageable level. While magazines such as Share and Pride "welcomed a recent visit to Toronto by Louis Farrakhan and covered his rally extensively, they left the controversial views of the speaker about the Jewish commu-

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nity out of their reportage. Inter-group trust is fostered by such small steps. I hope that we will find our way back to each other; the current frail state of human rights demands it urgently. Two postscripts. First, in an unforeseen way, Elizabeth and I became once again identified with the Black community. A splendid apartment building on Eglinton Avenue, conceived by the social action committee of Holy Blossom Temple and built by the government of Ontario, bears the name 'Plaut Manor,' written large across its facade. Its inhabitants are overwhelmingly Black.20 Second, Canada's racial scene is, fortunately, far more promising than what is found in the United States. There, a distinct underclass has developed that consists overwhelmingly of Black people. Whether the 1995 'Million Man March' on Washington, DC, staged by Farrakhan, has been a positive influence remains to be seen. While he is today the chief public obstacle to improved Black-Jewish relations, there are signs of moderation. A new magazine, CommonQuest, has recently made its appearance, a joint publication by (Black-sponsored) Howard University and the American Jewish Committee. I hope it will find wide distribution.

CHAPTER FOUR

Human Rights: Sitting in Judgment

Face-lift Needed

I have recently reread my account of the Ontario Human Rights Commission in Unfinished Business. When I wrote that book I was still vice-chair of the commission and quite unable to criticize it in print. But I was not very happy at the time and frequently thought about resigning. Aside from its heavily political leadership and some members who were never quite certain what the whole matter of human rights was all about, I had begun to consider the law that had created the commission as being flawed. We certainly need a commission that advocates human rights, but as it is structured today, it is both moral advocate and legal partisan. It ought to keep these two functions entirely separate. Human rights apply to all segments of society, from the strongest to the weakest. It is the latter, of course, who are the focus of the Code.1 They are highly vulnerable, and their rights need to be made part of every Ontarian's consciousness. This work of education, especially about widely practised systemic discrimination, should be the main work of the commission and be carried out in schools, in the media, in business, and in all channels of communication. This is the commission's high moral task. At the present time, the commission investigates a complaint submitted to it; it then decides whether there is prima facie evidence to bring it to trial before an adjudicator; and if so, it will

Human Rights: Sitting in Judgment 49 fight the case at the formal hearings, along with the complainant (whose de facto lawyer it usually thereby becomes). But being a partisan in a particular legal proceeding should not belong to the commission's responsibilities, for it militates against its effectiveness. Though it may help to win a particular case, its partisanship causes it to abandon its higher ground. Not surprisingly, much of the business community has come to consider the commission an intruder into its affairs and therefore treats it as somewhat of an enemy. That should never be the case. Employers are not by definition unfair and unresponsive to human rights considerations. Some are so inclined, however, and precisely that deficiency should be the subject of the commission's work. Its single task should be to make all residents of the province aware of the existence of universal human rights, to acquaint them with the provisions of the Code, and to help employers, unions, and institutions of all kinds to make the equitable treatment of every person who comes within their purview a major part of their civic responsibility. Schools should teach about discrimination and make the Code one of their textbooks. The commission's staff can organize conferences and arrange for workshops in businesses and offices - wherever the public can learn what the bases of communal existence should be. It is a large task and, to boot, one that will be cordially supported by society. But whatever the commission currently does in this direction is hampered by its prosecutorial activities, thrust on it by the law - to the detriment of its larger goals. Currently, the activities o the commission are clouded by the intrusion of investigative officers and by its adversarial position in the subsequent lawsuit. And should the adjudicator rule that the respondent party must pay a certain sum or perform other remedial tasks, it is the commission that sees to it that the orders are carried out. In this sequence of activities the commission may win this or that suit, but these are pyrrhic victories, for at the same time it will lose the larger battle to make itself the unchallenged advocate of a great principle.

50 The Common Weal

The legal rectification of discrimination should be taken away from the Commission and handed to a special unit responsible to the attorney general, which would take over commission personnel currently occupied with investigation and legal pursuit. Thus the attorney general's office would have a civil litigation section added to its portfolio. Its agents would receive and investigate complaints; they would try to settle the complaint, and if they failed would, through their legal counsel, bring it before the adjudicator(s) of the Board of Inquiry, the independent agency now in existence. The suit would thus be handled by an office whose concern was the maintenance of the law, of which the Code has become a moral cornerstone. I discussed these ideas with Keith Norton, current chair of the commission, and with Tony Clement, MPP, who then handled the projected revisions of the Code the government has in mind. Both men were taken with my proposal, and I have hopes that it will be considered seriously. Adjudicator

With my federal assignment in refugee determination coming to an end in 1985, I cast about for a new area in the field of human rights, which remained at the centre of my communal concerns. My seven-year term as vice-chair of the Ontario Human Rights Commission was over, and it occurred to me that the one area I had never explored was the judicial side of the human rights process. I had always been the advocate and had helped to bring cases for judgment. (Adjudicators were then called 'boards of inquiry,' even though they usually consisted of just one person, and only occasionally of a panel of three.) 2 It had been fifty years since the Nazis had ended my budding legal career, and my term on the commission had rekindled my interest in law. To be sure, Anglo-Saxon law is different from what I had learned, but legal thinking is essentially the same everywhere, and the interpretation of statutes differs in its references but not in its thrust. Back in Germany I had considered the possibility of entering the judiciary, and now human rights

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offered me this possibility. On leaving the commission I asked that my name be added to the minister's panel of adjudicators. Theirs is an ad hoc appointment, of course, and not a career with salary and pension. Pay is by the hour and, though it covers hearings, preparation, and writing of judgments, is hardly more than a token. (Lately, the Ontario Board of Inquiry, the new administrative body that oversees the process, has appointed a number of full-time adjudicators.) Adjudicators function as quasi-judges. The hearings are very much like those in civil courts, except that the law gives adjudicators greater leeway to determine the admissibility of evidence and also greater freedom to enter into cross-examination. Thus we might allow hearsay evidence, which in court would be rejected. As an economy measure, the recording of all proceedings is no longer required as it once was, and personal note-taking by all parties, including the adjudicator(s), lends some uncertainty to the process. But otherwise the proceedings are the same, though judges sit on a podium, while adjudicators rarely do. Also, I was not addressed as 'Your Honour,' but as 'Mr Chairman,' and, most important, all our judgments have to be written. Mine usually covered between twenty-five and fifty typed pages, and all of them were subsequently printed in the Canadian Human Rights Reporter, a quarterly publication. I have asked judges how often they have problems in finding for one party against the other, when both sides swear that they speak the truth. I was intrigued with the answers that I received. One now-retired judge told me that he reached his conclusion early on and was never beset by any doubt. 'I have always slept well,' he added. Others were not so certain, and I definitely belonged to this group. Not infrequently a man is accused of having sexually harassed a female employee, a charge that he denies vigorously. Both he and the employee swear that their respective versions represent what happened. Since no witnesses were present at the disputed incident(s), who is to be believed? By definition, this kind of matter can be decided on circumstantial evidence only, and that makes certainty an elusive goal. On more than one occa-

52 The Common Weal sion I spent a sleepless night over the matter, knowing that my judgment would severely affect the life of either party. Once or twice I firmed up my conclusion only as I began to write. It was as if my word processor influenced my logic. Perhaps the two are related in that one follows the 0-or-l mode, and the other calls it true-or-false. I had fewer problems with decisions that required primarily interpretations of the law, including the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, often referred to as Canada's bill of rights. Perhaps challenges to my legal instincts paralleled my life-long interest in chess. There were times when I had composed and published chess problems, and now I composed and published legal moves and counter-moves. Still, the human element was always present; I could never forget, after all, that human rights and their violation were at issue. Usually, the complainant belonged to the disadvantaged part of our society, and the respondent to the more privileged. Human rights law wants to protect the former against improper incursions - still, it must not deprive the latter of their rights. Inequity

Already, during the years when I had served on the commission, I was struck by a certain inequity that was built into the law. Filing a human rights complaint is without serious risk and free of financial obligation. Complainants do not have to have a lawyer, for if the commission decides that there is prima facie evidence of discrimination it will carry the case, though sometimes complainants do arrange for personal representation. The respondent, in contrast, is immediately faced with a considerable legal expenditure, quite aside from whatever other harm may occur. If sexual harassment is alleged, the respondent's marriage may be in trouble because of the very accusation. The complaint may be justified or not; the respondent is always liable for monetary damages, whether as a consequence of the mere accusation or because of the imposed judgment of the adjudicator. To be sure, that situation also occurs to some degree in civil

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court, but there is a greater chance of having costs and damages assessed against the party that brought the suit. In human rights law, that recourse is rare. Complainant and commission (the latter with its in-house lawyers) therefore risk little or nothing, while the respondent may incur legal fees even when the judgment is favourable. My last case presented me with an opportunity to address this inequity. A woman had complained that her employment had been terminated illegally. She had been suffering from a type of phlebitis, and when in the course of her illness she was discharged she complained to the commission that her rights under the Human Rights Code against discrimination on the grounds of handicap had been violated. The respondent parties were no longer in business; one former employer was bankrupt and unemployed, while the other still owned her family home and had a low-paying, part-time job. If the complaint succeeded, any damages that would be imposed had to come from the sale of her home. The commission brought the case forward because in its view a judgment in a similar instance had been too narrow. There, adjudicator Daniel Baum had ruled that an illness had to meet certain qualifications before it could be classified as a handicap in the meaning of the Code.3 It was my judgment that the commission had proceeded with the case none the less because it wanted to see whether the minimum qualifications stipulated by the precedent judgment could be expanded. My ruling went on to say: Commission counsel suggested during the hearings that this Board need not feel itself bound by this decision. Obviously, the instant case was judged by the Commission to be a test case, and although its counsel averred that this was not the case it must be so characterized. To say this does not mean to censure the Commission, for it has every right to conclude that a certain matter - in this case, whether deep vein phlebitis fits the definition of handicap - warrants the consideration of a board of inquiry ... Instituting a test case is therefore an important privilege of the Commission.

54 The Common Weal

However, it is the opinion of this Board that such a privilege should be used with proper caution, for more than legal considerations are at stake. The Commission must also, as at all times, consider the issue of fairness. Human rights legislation is by its very terminology a body of law which aims at the equal treatment of all members of the polity. To be sure, it aims to protect first and foremost the weakest elements of society, and the Code is clearly devoted to this purpose. Yet in its pursuit of justice the Commission must consider not only the complainant but also the respondent. Every decision of the Commission to request a board of inquiry immediately saddles a respondent who wishes to be represented by counsel with a substantial monetary burden. In addition, the respondent may be exposed to social opprobrium by the mere appointment of a board (especially when charges of sexual harassment are involved); and a case which drags on for years before a decision is rendered may cause the respondent prolonged anxiety and tension, even if the board eventually finds that the law had not been broken. Thus, a degree of inequity has been built into the system. In ordinary civil litigation, the party instituting a suit bears the financial risk of failure, while under the Code this is normally not the case, except for the narrow provisions of s. 41 (4). And even then, the Commission itself does not suffer the same loss as would an ordinary citizen under similar circumstances. The Commission puts not itself but the taxpayer at risk. In effect, it itself is risk free. When it decides to request a board of inquiry it does so undoubtedly out of high motives, but its decision to proceed inflicts upon respondents a significant burden, even if their behaviour will in the end be judged to have been exemplary. Commission counsel warns that if every time the Commission loses a case costs would be awarded to the respondent, it would be an effective means of discouraging the full airing of numerous cases. That may well be so, but the law narrows the cost award by giving boards of inquiry the discretion to order a cost award only when particular circumstances justify it.

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Generally, the Commission is cautious when it comes to the question whether the factual evidence in the case warrants a board, and costs are therefore rarely awarded, unless the whole procedure is found to be flawed. Test cases are of a special nature. The Commission must keep in mind that when it tests the law it does so on the back of respondents. They pay for the exercise even if they win.

I held that the commission, having lost, had to bear the financial consequences of its decision and pay the legal fees incurred. Since the law was not clear that I had the right to so rule, the matter was appealed.5 Sexual Orientation

It so happened that I participated in adjudicating two cases dealing with sexual orientation that had an important social effect. One dealt with the complaint of a government lawyer who was living in a long-time relationship with a same-sex partner. He claimed that while he paid into the pension fund, as he was obliged to do, the government's pension benefits were not available to his partner in the same fashion as they would be to a heterosexual spouse. The issue was fought out in part on the basis of constitutional law. I served on a panel with two law professors, Peter Gumming of York University (since then appointed to the bench) and Bretell Dawson of Carleton University. After some two years of frequently adjourned hearings and internal discussions, we delivered a lengthy decision in favour of the complainant. The provincial government decided not to appeal, and in May 1996 the Canadian Parliament made adjustments to the federal Code, thus following our recommendation and the public support it had developed. Some months later, an Ontario Board of Inquiry ruled that legislation using the word 'spouse' should henceforth be understood to apply to same-sex partnerships as well. Our judgment was both welcomed and condemned. In Jewish

56 The Common Weal

Orthodox circles especially, I was held up in sermons as a destroyer of the family and an enemy of Torah law. In vain did I point out that I had helped to render a decision on the basis of Canadian, not Torah law. My legal references in this case were not the same. One rabbi scolded me and said, 'In that case you should have withdrawn from the case and declared a conflict of interest.' Well, I didn't.6 Sexual orientation was also the issue in what became known as the Waterman Case. The complainant, a self-declared lesbian, charged that her employer had discharged her because of her sexual orientation. One reporter wrote: 'After four long years, Jan Waterman's precedent setting case against National Life Assurance Company, claiming sexual-orientation discrimination, was adjudicated by the Human Rights Commission's Board of Inquiry on March 11, 1993. In his decision Judge ['Chair' was the proper title] Gunther Plaut said that human rights jurisprudence had established that "an infringement has occurred if an action is tainted by a prohibited ground. This is the case here, and I believe that Ms. Waterman's sexual orientation played a role in her discharge."'8 Catherine Bickley, counsel for the Ontario Human Rights Commission, commented: 'I feel it's an important decision; it's the first of its kind ... Also, the Board recognized that the employer had a problem with Ms. Waterman's openness about her sexual orientation. Equal treatment includes the ability to be open, not hide one's sexual orientation.' The Kirpan Decision

Another decision that had wide consequences was the Pandori Case, named after the complainant, a teacher in the Peel Region public school system. He was an observant ('Khalsa') Sikh who wore the five 'k's demanded by his religion - among them the kirpan, a small ceremonial dagger. His school board determined that neither he nor his ten-year-old son should hence-

Human Rights: Sitting in Judgment 57 forth be permitted to wear their kirpans on school property, basing its decision on the need for increased safety. It pointed to the rise in crime and violence and held that kirpans were weapons, whatever their religious significance might be, and that their introduction would represent a hazard. School boards were responsible for security, and their policy benefited all students and was not aimed at one particular group. The complainant's counsel argued that the arts and crafts shop in the school had more readily available 'weapons' such as saws and screwdrivers, to say nothing of baseball bats in the sports program. Further, he said, there had never been any school incident in the century during which Sikhs had lived in Canada; for a religious Sikh the kirpan was a ceremonial item and using it illegally would be a grave transgression and therefore most unlikely. Besides, the kirpan could be small and be worn under one's clothing, thereby reducing any hazard to a minimum. The hearings dragged on for a long time, with experts on the stand and journalists in the wings. The Peel Board of Education instituted a public campaign to influence me, and I was inundated with thousands of petitions to preserve the safety of school children. After the first letter or two I made sure to have my secretary open all mail that might bear on the case and file it away without showing it to me. I had not as yet made up my mind which way to go in my decision, and I did not want to be influenced by public appeals on one side or the other. As I often did in difficult cases I sketched out the issues I would and should consider for my decision. Recently I came across my notes in the case, and they accurately reflect my approach to decision making. At issue was the clash of two rights: the safety of children and the right to religious freedom. Here are a few excerpts from my lengthy pre-decision notes: Schools must observe reasonable limits in order to accommodate those freedoms which are guaranteed by [the Canadian] Charter [ of Rights and Freedoms] as well as by the Code. Thus, ordering children to remove yarmulkes or turbans, when these are worn for

58 The Common Weal religious reasons and not just as a whim, would likely be considered unreasonable, even though the school may otherwise have a certain dress code. The question is whether restricting the wearing of a kirpan is a proper exercise of school's responsibilities when freedom of religion is at stake. Pandori charged the Peel Board with racism. If that were demonstrated (putting aside for the moment just how 'racism' would be defined and proved), a certain intent would be added to the equation which might well tip the balance. Undoubtedly, social fear exists in certain parts of our society, but it has not been demonstrated in the hearings that Peel Bd. was so motivated. Quite on the contrary, the evidence shows that repeated and sensitive attempts were made by persons in authority to accommodate students who wore the kirpan. In the absence of contrary evidence I must refuse to speculate on base motives of the Peel Bd and treat its policy as it is framed: as a matter of safety. The basis of religious freedom is that each person is free to believe what he/she wants. But that is not the same as being able to practice it. Belief does not intersect with any one's right, practice does. The experience of that tension runs through history, e.g. Mormons (multiple marriages) or Jehovah's Witnesses (blood transfusions). In such cases society has claimed that it could rightfully set its standards against those of the believers. Applied to the case before us, Sikhs like anyone else are free to interpret their faith in accordance with their belief, but neither they nor any others are free to demand unrestricted practice of their faith. While such practice too is guaranteed by Charter and Code, that freedom operates only to the extent that it does not offend other rights. The community, in exercising its duty to establish public order, may on occasion see the need to restrict certain religious practices, but Canadian law requires the state to exercise the utmost care in pursuing this aim, so as to safeguard religion as much as possible. A perfect meld is, however, not always possible. When religion and state collide they will usually claim different standards that should apply. Religion will put forth a best-case scenario by saying: What we teach, believe and practise is a body of the highest moral and ethical concepts that benefit society and,

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to boot, have divine (or traditional) sanction. You must not restrict these practices in any way. The state, on the other hand, will put forth a worst-case scenario (much like an insurance company) and say: We appreciate your ideals but know that in actual life they are not always observed, and we must therefore institute certain measures to guard against likely offenses. We do this with great respect and regret, but we cannot live by your best-case scenario alone. Perhaps some day we will and can, but not for the present.

My decision then weighed religious freedom against the need for safety - both legitimate concerns of a free society. In the end I came down in favour of Mr Pandori and allowed the wearing of the kirpan (though I hedged the permission with some safety conditions). The Sikh community was of course overjoyed, but it was not alone, for the press vigorously supported my ruling.9 Not so seven members of Peel Region's council who were up for re-election and no doubt planned to make their appeal for greater school safety a plank in their platform. They voted to appeal my decision, even though both the chair and the lawyer of their school board advised against it, considering an appeal ill-advised and bound to fail. The latter were right; the appeal was roundly rejected, and for years thereafter I became a favourite of the Sikh community. To this day I regularly receive its major religious publication, which I read with much interest, for in many respects observant Sikhs resemble Orthodox Jews in their close attention to tradition. By their hirsute mode and turbans/black hats both openly demonstrate their religious convictions in a largely secular environment. My decision made front page in the Toronto Star,10 and a long editorial in the Globe and Mail11 strongly supported my decision and concluded: 'Making allowances for the customs and faiths of minorities in Canada rubs some Canadians the wrong way and probably always will. What will not pass unchallenged is the assertion that people who wear turbans and kirpans are doing something un-Canadian. Institutions such as the

60 The Common Weal

RCMP and the school boards with a mandate to recruit from and serve all groups, should be particularly tolerant of differences where there is no compelling reason not to be.' Since the Board of Inquiry now employs full-time adjudicators, the need for part-timers has greatly diminished. I have not been assigned any cases for the last few years, and the chances are that this is another chapter of my life that has come to an end.

Part Two: Living as a Jew

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CHAPTER FIVE

Israel: Love's Ambiguities

The Lebanese War

Back in the 1960s, and especially after the Six Day War, Jews in Canada and the United States had a love affair sans pareil with Israel. Our beloved could do no wrong; she was perfect in every way. If there were shadows, they were induced by others. If that explanation fizzled, the shadows were seen as temporary (don't shadows always lengthen and then fade?) and in any case could be rationalized by the extreme danger in which Israel still found itself. There was much discussion about Israel's 'Masada complex,'1 only this time the defenders would not commit mass suicide — on the contrary, they'd come through victorious, waving the flag. The slogan was afalpi chen- 'and yet.' Difficulty and setbacks were spurs to further effort, and we knew that Israel was emerging with colours flying high. Right or wrong, my Israel! But like the picture of Dorian Grey, it was a sentiment that could not last for ever, and it came to grief in the Lebanese war of 1982, which profoundly changed the perspective of the Diaspora Jewish community. Even in Canada, where the majority of the Jews passionately supported the Jewish state in all its aspects, the events of that year had an unforeseen impact - some of it good, but most of it destructive. We now know that the war - for that is what it became in short order - was not planned in the way it developed. Wars rarely do and this one followed the 'uncertainty script.' It was to be an

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incursion into the southern part of Lebanon where the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) had a strong foothold and whence it repeatedly raided Israeli settlements and towns (such as Ma'alot, where twenty-two women and children were killed one night). The operation was designed to eject the PLO and drive it farther north, where it would do less damage to Israel. But once Defence Minister Ariel (Arik) Sharon received the goahead from the cabinet he set out to execute a far more ambitious plan, about which he kept everyone, including Prime Minister Menachem Begin, in the dark. That plan became obvious after the clearing of the southern zone had been completed. There were casualties, but on the whole the action was carried out with the usual precision. The Israelis were hailed as heroes by the Lebanese, who had for years been terrorized by the PLO. If Sharon had stopped there, the world would have understood; the customary charade in the UN Security Council would have run its course, and the motion to condemn Israel would have been vetoed by the United States. But Sharon did not stop. He saw the quick success of his operation as an opportunity to destroy the PLO once and for all, and he pursued its forces all the way into Beirut. The farther north Israel went, the greater the swell of criticism around the world and, for the first time, inside Israel as well. Mass demonstrations erupted; one prominent officer resigned his commission; and the former welcome of the Lebanese turned into its opposite. By the time Sharon had reached Beirut and the PLO leaders and their support troops had fled by ship, Israel's image as the terrorized, besieged nation was supplanted by its opposite: the military giant in the Middle East, a small nation that bestrode its region by force of arms, like ancient Sparta. The critique from the media was devastating; it seemed as if the world had just waited for this kind of what it called 'Israeli aggression.' Nothing else seemed to explain the vigour of editorial attacks on the Jewish state; with all the injustices perpetrated around the globe day after day, none of the venom now spewed at Israel went their way. (Even the later reports of atrocities attributed to Bosnian Serbs were muted in comparison.)

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The public criticism of Israel, coupled with the marches in Tel Aviv protesting the Lebanon action, had a powerful impact on Jewish communities abroad, and this too was new. Until then, Diaspora Jews had supported Israel in just about everything it undertook, and their predominant liberal outlook had come to terms even with the conservatism of Begin, especially after the dramatic appearance of Egypt's president in Jerusalem and the subsequent peace accord at Camp David. Peace was at last in view; Begin and Sadat received the Nobel Prize, and the Jewish state had reached the pinnacle of popularity. However, the fickleness of the world's admiration was soon exposed. The Lebanese incursion turned Israel from hero into villain overnight, and when the massacres of Sabra and Shatila occurred, the media came down on Israel with a ferocity that was both unexpected and unprecedented. Sabra and Shatila were two refugee camps at the outskirts of Beirut. They had been strongholds of the PLO, which had dominated a portion of the city with brutal force. Now, with the leadership of the PLO on its way to Tripoli, the time of revenge came for Christian Lebanese forces, to whom the camps were the source of previous humiliation. But as long as Israel's forces were present, no such revenge could be exacted. Then, one night it happened. The Israelis were absent or looked away, and the Christians moved in. They slaughtered over two hundred men, women, and children, and when daylight broke the media arrived to flash the gruesome images to the world. To every Jew's deep chagrin, the headlines did not read: 'Lebanese Christians murder Muslim civilians' or the like, but 'Israel on bloody rampage.' In cartoons the Star of David was depicted as dripping with blood. While in Tunis the PLO was licking the wounds of its defeat, Israel had received a more lasting blow. Its Arab enemies now were able to exploit the opportunity by picturing the former victim as today's victimizer, and the world press readily chimed in. In the process, Menachem Begin, too, suffered grievously. I had met him when he paid his first visit to Canada as Israel's prime minister and had a memorable encounter with him.2

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Though I was not keen on his politics I liked him as a person and admired his gentlemanly ways, which still stayed with him from his youth in Poland and that he had preserved in the rough-and-tumble of Israeli politics. None of us could understand how he had given the go-ahead to Sharon and permitted him to expand a counter-terrorist strike into a full-blown war. His son Benny later claimed that Sharon had lied to his father and totally misled him about the ongoing operation. At any rate, the war and its bloodletting severely damaged Begin's psyche. He lost his confidence, and not long thereafter, after the death of a friend and then of his wife, he retreated into self-imposed isolation. His associates are agreed that it was the 'Sharon syndrome' that threw him into a depression from which he never recovered.3 He died in seclusion in 1993. Innumerable articles have been written analysing why the press colluded with the PLO in this campaign, and why it took so long to identify non-Israelis as the real murderers. But meanwhile, both inside and outside Israel utter confusion reigned. Israel had gained a pyrrhic victory in Lebanon: it had chased out the PLO but had lost far more. The effect on the Jewish community was permanent. In Israel, a significant part of the population had, in the midst of a war, objected to government policy, and in the Diaspora the former adage, 'Right or wrong, my Israel!' was buried by the avalanche of events. Jews in Canada too began to have their doubts about Israeli policies. They did not voice them at first, for criticism of Israel was not welcome in the community. One could joke about the Israeli postal system and compare it to Canada's; one could talk about the difficulties of doing business there; one could even talk about the rudeness of kibbutzniks - but one did not criticize Israel on basic policy. That had been considered beyond the pale. Now the old barriers were breaking down, and for the first time the Jewish community engaged in serious debate about the Lebanon question. The Peace Now movement, imported from Israel (where it was and is known as Shalom Achshav), began to speak out publicly and attracted some attention from the media. In the Jewish community it had been considered

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almost illegitimate, and it now gained admittance to polite society, albeit with the kind of suspicion that defined it as 'marginal,' not part of the mainstream. There was another element that entered the situation: Canadian Jews were feeling threatened. They had insisted time and again that anti-Zionism was a code word for anti-semitism; that those who came down hard on Israel were also coming down hard on Jews in general. Our sense of security turned out to be only skin-deep, and to discover that meant to sustain another shock. Here we thought that we had it made, only to realize that any Diaspora existence (be it here or even in the United States) had a sense of insecurity built into it. In earlier days, when the Israelis had raided Entebbe and freed their hostages in the centre of Africa, our gentile associates were delighted and, as a friend of mine reported, applauded when he came into the office the next morning. But after Sabra and Shatila the same people who had cheered a few years before now looked away. It was a painful time, and we needed to do something. I had not participated actively in Jewish communal work since 1980, when I had left the presidency of the Canadian Jewish Congress and had become head of the Central Conference of American Rabbis. Now suddenly I received a summons to come back and head an information campaign that would somehow reverse the national trend of criticism, would counteract the disinformation that was spreading like wildfire, and would also give the Canadian government a chance to identify with Israel once again, as it had done consistently for some years. The last-named was of course the primary task of the Canada-Israel Committee (CIC) ,4 but its work was hampered by the uncertainty pervading the Jewish community. I was asked to address myself to both issues, especially the latter. It was not a job that I relished; I too thought expansion of the Lebanese war a dreadful blunder. In the end I agreed to tackle it, because more than the war was at issue, for Israel past and present was now seen in an increasingly distorted light. For the media remained unrelenting, and the focus was invariably on Israel's behaviour, rarely on that of others. As late

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as the summer of 1988 the Globe and Mail carried (on the same page) a report of five thousand people massacred in Burundi and of twenty-five Palestinians wounded in clashes. Both events were accorded about the same amount of newsprint. And this in a newspaper whose negative coverage of Israel was rather mild when compared with other parts of the media. The general community needed balanced coverage, and the Jews required a restoration of their confidence. I stressed that the little nation of Israel could boast of achievements unparalleled in human history. In a series of releases I pictured Israel's democracy - the only representative of such a form of government in the entire Middle East - which seated an Arab as well as a Communist party in its parliament. My releases emphasized the nation's freedom of speech and expression; its social pioneering; its level of literacy and university access; its extraordinary contributions to science and health care; and, above all, its deep desire to live at peace with its neighbours. I rehearsed these matters to the general as well as to the Jewish community, listing them as further reasons why our own love of Israel should remain as strong as ever, and added that for us the Jewish state remained a towering presence. It had changed the course of our history dramatically, in ways we could not yet fully assess. It was a state like other states and yet unlike others, and we were part of its growth and nurture as well as its pains. The campaign I undertook with the help of a small team gave me many sleepless nights. In the end our efforts were judged to have had a modicum of success, especially since time itself was on our side. The appointment of the Kahan Commission in Israel underscored the democratic character of the state, and besides, other subjects absorbed the public. After a while the polls showed once more a strong pro-Israel sentiment throughout Canada, though the Arabs clearly were gaining ground. In retrospect, the fall-out from the Lebanon campaign was merely a forerunner of what was to come, which became abundantly clear when the Palestinian uprising (intifada) began to catch the public's attention. Moreover, the Lebanese war had divided not only Israelis but also the Diaspora community, which

Israel: Love's Ambiguities 69

until then had been united, and the rift that developed was (and still is at this writing) deeply worrisome. Where was my place in all of this? I had been an independent for so long that even in the altered political climate I chose to stay that way. I tempered my criticism with love, and spiced my love with criticism. In my articles I maintained a centrist position, though my life-long ideals tended to tilt towards the left rather than the right. When the intifada started in 1987 and the celebration of Israel's fortieth birthday was being planned, community leaders in Toronto insisted again that I serve as chair for the anniversary. They stressed that we had entered a new time of crisis and that there had to be someone to whom everyone could turn for reassurance. They reminded me that in 1973 I had served as national chair for Israel's twenty-fifth anniversary. I appreciated the call but felt that I had to refuse, for I had entered a busy schedule of presiding at human rights trials, and my literary and lecture engagements filled up the rest of my time. We finally compromised, and I agreed to accept the honorary leadership of the celebration. (However, that was not to be the last chapter. Eight years later, in the dreadful days of November 1995, when Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was murdered, my communal role would unhappily be tested again.0) Intifada

In December 1987, a spontaneous outburst of Palestinian resentment blossomed into a full-fledged revolt, which was fuelled by a new strategy and by the enormous attention lavished on it by the world's purveyors of news. The novel strategy was one of inversion: Israel was depicted as Goliath and the Arabs as David, and even as David was a mere youth this battle too would also be fought by Arab children. The strategists sent women and children to harass Israeli soldiers guarding the streets, and like David they hurled rocks and deprecations at Goliath. The Israelis in turn had no experience with civilian foes; their training was directed towards meeting an

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enemy in deadly, life-threatening battle. They knew nothing about crowd control. What followed is part of a well-known story. At first Israel responded with live bullets, then with physical punishment (beatings, arm-breaking) and mass reprisals (closing of schools, curfews), all put into practice to the accompaniment of inept public relations and vacillating dealings with the media. That was understandable, for the situation was unprecedented, and so were the numbers of media people in Israel. At one point some thousand correspondents flooded the country seeking hair-raising stories and occasionally even helping to stage them. But there was no question that the Jewish state appeared to behave like any other nation under similar circumstances; the story was news, and the press made the most of it. At times it seemed as if what took place in Israel and the territories was at the centre of the world's attention, and day after day the stories occupied the headlines. The Diaspora community was deeply upset. Pictures of weeping Arab women and children throwing missiles (stones at first, then fire bombs as well) at Israeli soldiers clad in battle gear were more potent than occasional articles presenting another side of the story. Predictably, Peace Now enjoyed a sudden surge among Jews, and the liberal and academic community joined in the condemnation of Israel and demanded independence for the Palestinians. A new state, they said, could not be denied them - though they did not say the same thing about Quebec or about Native claims. They echoed the indignation of an Amos Elon, Amos Oz, or Leonard Fein, who felt that continuation of the present situation would destroy the moral fibre of the Jewish state. I listened to these voices, and it would be disingenuous of me to deny that they struck a responsive chord in my soul. Already in the fall of 1967, after Israel had wrested the territories from King Hussein in the course of the Six Day War, I had warned that the Jewish state must abandon these areas as soon as possible, lest Jews be occupiers, which inevitably would warp their ideals. Mine was, at the time, a voice in the wilderness, and I have ever since held to that conviction.6

Israel: Love's Ambiguities 71

But Israel is a democracy, and it chose to hold on to the territories wrested from Jordan. It was easy to proclaim Israeli policies unwise or short-sighted, but I had to deal with what was and not with what might have been. And I freely confess that when push came to shove, as the saying goes, I tried to protect Israel from its detractors as much as I could manage in full honesty, and I conveyed my criticism of Israel to the Jewish community through its own media. Israel had enough enemies as it was, and I did not have to line up with them. Also, I had some difficulty with those strident voices that betrayed a secure sense not only of righteousness, but of Jewish insecurity as well. During the intifada and its attendant publicity, some of the Jewish critics seemed to get into the act primarily to show that they were not like Israelis, with their harsh methods, but that they were 'white Jews' who deserved to live in Canada (or the United States, France, or Britain). Such sentiment seems to be an accompaniment of Diaspora existence (as Israelis often point out to us). We who live in the Diaspora need both to be and to feel secure, and therefore we have a natural desire to protect our backs. I am no different in that respect, except that when I speak about an Israel under attack I like to be sure how much of my judgment relates to the welfare of Israel and how much to me. I do not prostitute my convictions, but the audience to which I speak makes a difference in how I phrase them. Were I to live in Israel, my speech would be vastly different. There I would speak to national issues with the same openness as I had done in the United States and as I have continued to do in Canada. In the summer of 1988 I addressed an international Jewish audience on these issues and concluded: I belong to those who believe that Palestinians also have a claim on the land. Two nations are pitting their demands against each other. I hope for a peaceful solution, but as long as there will be none - especially if Israel's enemies persist in rejecting it outright and hope to annihilate it - I stand foursquare with my own people and don't apologize for it. Besides, I remind myself, indepen-

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dent nationhood is not an inalienable right. If it were, why were we so upset over Quebec? Why don't we grant our Native People the right to establish an independent state? We don't even grant them the right to establish a province of their own! Are the British who love to criticize Israel ready to cut loose the Scots or Welsh or the people in Northern Ireland? Are the French, in their righteousness, ready to do it in New Caledonia? Instead, they send their troops over there to put down the uprising with the kind of brutality which would enrage them if Israelis would do the same. Morality is an ambiguous thing: it has one face for others and one for myself. Our enemies leave me no choice. In a confrontation I support Israel. Its people are my people. I do not choose its government and I do not have to like its policies. But my fate is bound up with Israel as a nation, and on balance it is a good, and in many ways already a great nation. Its governments are transitory; Israel is forever. The Mishnah says: 'Do not judge another person until you have come into his place.' It is a maxim worth remembering.7

Amid these ambiguities the strange role of the media, to which I have referred above, deserves special mention. What are the factors that so regularly propel Israel into the limelight of their attention? • Israel, and Jerusalem in particular, are holy places in the three major religions. For Christians, who constitute the majority in Western culture, the Holy Land has deep emotional significance, and for the revivalists among them it has also strong messianic implications. • The crisis in Israel has to do with Jews, and very little with concern for Arabs. Westerners are fascinated with Jews, who seem to have a somewhat mysterious quality. They are at times admired, at times feared and disliked, but never uninteresting. • There is a residue of guilt over the Holocaust in Western civilization, and the opportunity to be highly critical of Israel compensates to some degree for this sense of guilt.

Israel: Love's Ambiguities 73

• That feeling has a reverse side to it. People do expect something special from Jews, for they are not like everyone else echoes of the Chosen People concept of the Bible. Therefore, when Jews seems to act contrary to these expectations, it is news. • Negative reportage of Israel may also reveal latent anti-Jewish feelings. The medieval depiction of the Jew as the devil incarnate has not entirely disappeared. I thoroughly discount, however, the theory of gentile conspiracy, which is a mirror image of what the anti-semites say about Jews - that they conspire to control the world. .

The media reaction was repeated again in the fall of 1996, when a bloody battle erupted between Palestinians and Israelis. It was sparked by the opening of an ancient tunnel that was portrayed by Arafat's propaganda machine as undermining the structure of the Al Aqsa Mosque above it. Western papers repeated the charge and made Israel once again responsible for lighting the fires of a renewed Middle East conflict. Though subsequently it became clear that not one inch of the tunnel went underneath the Temple Mount, the impression of Israel's 'guilt' remained largely unconnected.8 (The question was not Israel's right to open the tunnel - it clearly had that right - but whether time and circumstance were appropriate. I believe that they were not - a position shared by many Israelis. Hindsight does improve one's vision.) New unrest plagues Israel as I pen these lines, in early April 1997, and no immediate solution save a national unity government - appears to be at hand. And once again, the media have replayed the old game of reporting Israeli news. The Montebello Fiasco

The rift that had now developed in the Jewish community became painfully apparent in spring 1988. I had received a letter from Geoffrey Pearson,9 in his capacity as director of the Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security, created

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by an act of Parliament as a kind of think tank dealing with political and social developments all over the world.10 Pearson wrote that the institute wished to arrange a two-day-long dialogue at Montebello, near Ottawa, between fifteen Canadian Jews and a like number of Canadian Arabs. Would I join? It sounded innocent enough; after all, I had met privately with Canadian Arabs of Palestinian origin. I phoned to ask who else was being invited and was given some names. Rabbi Dow Marmur was among them, and so were Shira Herzog (Bessin), Howard Adelman, and Michael Marrus.11 I knew two of the Arabs who were mentioned to me and was further informed that External Affairs Secretary Joe Clark would be in attendance and kick off the meeting. Would the media be present? Yes, for Clark's speech anyway. I (and as I learned later, several other invitees as well) wrote Pearson at once, objecting to such publicity, for it would skew any chance for real frankness. Besides, Clark had earlier that year given a controversial speech at the Canada-Israel Committee (CIC) conference in Ottawa, and though he had subsequently backtracked, its memory continued to rankle the Jewish community. I suspected that he might wish to use the publicity from such a gathering to strengthen his position further, and I did not want to be used as a foil for some political purpose. I would come for quiet talks - nothing more, nothing less. The institute called off the press and made the meeting private, though of course not 'secret.' The participants were reasonably frank with each other and the discussions were civilized. Of course, nobody 'negotiated' we talked. I learned that not all Arabs saw the future the same way and that many of them now viewed themselves as 'Zionists in reverse,' using Jewish terms (such as Diaspora, ghetto, selfhatred) for their purposes. They, in turn, heard the views of men and women committed to Israel and how they looked at the future - and that was it. Except for the fuss arising afterward, it was a non-event. There was some feeling that a second gettogether would be a good thing - but Dow and I had to leave early and were not present for that part of the discussions. The fuss about the gathering arose subsequently, when, at a

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meeting of the CIC, the president of one organization bitterly criticized the fact that the Jewish representation had lacked balance, for he - representing many Jews, he said - had not been invited. (He was also aware, though he did not say so aloud, that another president of a national organization had pulled strings to get himself invited at the last minute and that a well-known national figure had simply appeared, though the fifteen Jewish places had already been filled.) The CIC meeting became quite heated, and for a while the spectacle of personal pique parading with a halo of righteous indignation was sadly funny. After a while the event turned vehement and unpleasant. Sidney Spivak, chair of the CIC (who himself had been one of the invitees to Montebello and had attended), was attacked for not having submitted the issue of his own attendance to the directors of the CIC. Charges and counter-charges were made and the conduct of supposed guardians of Canada-Israel relations began to deteriorate badly. As a former chair I tried to bring some reason into the debate but failed spectacularly. People lined up on two sides: those who had not been invited and claimed a serious breach of CIC procedure, and those who had been at Montebello and insisted that this had not been a 'negotiating session' but merely a dayand-a-half s worth of personal and not official dialogue. The one issue that could and should have been discussed never came up at that time. Had External Affairs initiated the meeting in order to use it afterward as a blind behind which it could hide any new policy of so-called even-handedness?12 Had we who had gone to Montebello been naive and been used? With a fair contingent of 'doves' present, was it not a forgone conclusion that there would be disagreement among the Jewish attendees and that some of them would hold opinions quite close to those of the Arabs? Would this not entitle the government of Canada to give its policy a pro-Arab tilt? (Before attending, I had raised this question with several others and had suggested that we ought to have a private session in order to make sure that we would not serve any untoward purpose; but such a get-together did not materialize.)

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When the CIC meeting unravelled further I felt that my attendance served no further purpose and left. I knew that I had not heard the end of the matter, especially since another invitation was about to go out for a second Montebello dialogue. A free-for-all ensued in the Montreal press and spilled over into Toronto. Accusations were flung about; old grievances were aired; and the debate over the original issues started to become personal. The Montebello participants were depicted as having participated in 'subversion' of a sort, and in a national ad we were accused of having in effect uprooted all the guide posts of the community, including democracy, Canada, Jewish society, and the state of Israel. The critics had one major point in their favour. Montebello should have been discussed calmly at the CIC before anyone attended. But the confrontation that had developed among us was no longer concerned with process. It was inflamed by a highly vocal group to which talks with local Arabs appeared a sign of Jewish weakness and, besides, had the suspicious colouring of Peace Now. Leadership in the attack came mostly from Montreal, which used this 'incident' as a means of asserting a right-wing position and (so it seemed to me) of re-establishing its former pre-eminence. Clearly, a second Montebello would widen the split in our community. The controversy had now reached a stage where the very existence of the CIC, a major force in our national cohesion, was at risk. In retrospect, Montebello delivered a serious blow to the organization, from which it has never recovered. Just then, our whole debate became temporarily irrelevant. King Hussein suddenly surrendered his responsibility for the West Bank and Gaza to the Palestine Liberation Organization, and the latter was contemplating forming a government-inexile. The picture had altered radically, and as long as it was not clear to anyone what the change betokened, a second Montebello seemed ill-timed in any case. Spivak, some others, and I contacted Pearson's office and suggested postponement. Pearson agreed and sent out the following telegram: 'Recent and prospective developments in the Middle East, including Hussein's announcements and forthcoming Israeli elections have

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led to request from some members of Montebello Group that we postpone the second meeting until later in the year. Without presence of these participants dialogue would have less value and I have therefore decided to postpone meeting. Regret any inconvenience and hope that new dates can be agreed soon after consultation. Regards Geoffrey Pearson.' In an article that I had prepared for the Canadian Jewish News prior to receiving the telegram I had laid out some of the issues and concluded with what concerned me most: 'I hope that our own communal discussion will lose its confrontational tone. We Jews are very good at seeing disaster around every corner, but paranoia does not serve us well at a time of crisis.' With the advent of the New Year 5749, the Montebello controversy reached a halt, but the underlying issues both inside and outside the community were far from resolved. The always-present jostling for turf between the Canadian Jewish Congress and B'nai B'rith, and between Montreal and Toronto, was now amplified by new political and, increasingly, religious differences. Love Abiding

Love, especially mature love, is like a sharp knife with dents: it cuts well, but not perfectly. Our love is dented with the knowledge of certain idiosyncrasies or outright shortcomings of the beloved, yet this awareness does not diminish our love. Our relationship with Israel has been like that in these last decades; we are still in love, but differently, the way marital love changes over the years: we know our partner's strengths and weaknesses, and criticism does not mean that the love affair has ended. Even my former distance from Rabbi Reuben Slonim13 has narrowed to the point of disappearance. When his wife died I was a regular participant in the daily services at his daughter's home, two doors away from us, and would pick him up to go to services at Holy Blossom's minyan. We now sit together, pray together, and the past no longer obtrudes. I remain a lover of Israel and am a loving critic of its shortcomings. That is the function of an ally and the responsibility of a rabbi.

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My friends have often wondered why I did not express myself more forcefully for or against certain Israeli policies. Their black-and-white judgments haven't worked for me. I remember when my dear colleague Rabbi Eugene Borowitz today acknowledged as Reform's leading theologian - founded and was chief advocate of Breira ('choice'), an organization that preceded Peace Now. It called the West Bank 'occupied territory' (as did the media), while the government of Menachem Begin referred to it as Hashetachim (the Territories), without the adjective. Breira urgently advocated concessions to the Arabs and, equally important, considered the second-class status of Arabs who were Israeli citizens a grave injustice that must be opposed by Reform Jews - or any Jews, for that matter - who believed in liberty and justice for all. I agreed with all these propositions, yet there was something that held me back from supporting them outright. Critique from afar without bearing any of its consequences made me uneasy, and does so today. My children don't serve in the Tzahal,14 and no rockets are being lobbed my way. The unrelenting enmity of the Arab world and its chief allies, the Soviet Union and its satellites, was a reality that could not help but shape the national psyche. True, one should emulate the prophets, and even if one cannot lay claim to their lofty status one should remember their fearless imprecations of yore. But there is one fundamental fact that skews the comparison: the likes of Ezekiel and the Second Isaiah expected to return to the Jewish homeland and make its fate their own. I did not; and if I ever considered it I no longer do. I am a Diaspora Jew, with all the baggage that that reality implies.

CHAPTER SIX

Israel: Rabin and After

Between Left and Right

Like others before him, Yitzhak Rabin was a highly controversial figure during his lifetime and became a hero only after he was assassinated on 4 November 1995. For comparison, two American presidents come to mind, Abraham Lincoln and John Kennedy. The former was Satan himself to the Southern Confederacy, and the latter could not get his major legislation through a recalcitrant Congress. After his death Lincoln became the one whose Gettysburg address and second inaugural address framed the country's national ideals, and the impact of Kennedy's loss was such that his less distinguished successor could prevail on Congress to enact the fallen leader's bills without too much opposition. Rabin's murder produced a like effect. The man who was much embattled in his lifetime was virtually sainted after death, at least by a significant part of his nation. I had met him on various occasions but never seemed to get a sense of who he was; a certain remoteness enveloped him like a veil: you thought you saw him but never got a clear view. He was acclaimed the victor of the Six Day War, the man who fought the intifada with force and often with cruelty. Arabs and others remember him as the one who ordered his troops to break the rebels' bones if necessary. He could not get along with Shimon Peres and struggled with him repeatedly for the party leadership and the prime minister's office, which for a while they had to

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share. In 1995 he held the top spot alone, yet Peres - with his more agile mind and superior intelligence - proved indispensable to his success. They were an odd couple, and for me, Peres too was difficult to know - but the reason may have been my own hesitation to get too close. I too, like the Israeli electorate in May 1996, had a nagging feeling of distrust, despite his ultimate goal, which I supported. I trace my sentiment to a convention of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) in Toronto. Peres was prime minister at the time and in his address declared himself firmly in favour of religious pluralism and in opposition to the attempts of the ultra-Orthodox to obtain special privileges. He received a standing ovation from an appreciative audience, which did not fully grasp that they were listening to a man who like Rabin - was thoroughly secular, with limited respect for religion unless it had political uses. In his talk he said what we wanted to hear, and we believed it without reservation. A few days after he returned to Israel the papers reported that he had granted the Orthodox their request for special administrative advantages - the very thing he had, in Toronto, declared he would never do. 'Never' lasted three days, or maybe he had already struck the deal when he talked to us. Since then I have kept my distance from him, and so have the majority of Israel's Jews. They would most likely have voted for Rabin but failed to hand Peres the palm. Of course, broken promises seem to be part of being a politician, even if he/she is a shade better than the saying, 'Once elected, the politician's primary aim is to get re-elected.' One who actually fulfills campaign promises will shock the public thoroughly, for it's a bit scary when people break the mould. I have been a life-long liberal, though I haven't always favoured liberal politicians. I didn't like Likud as a party but was quite fond of its leader Menachem Begin and got on with dour Yitzhak Shamir when, during my presidency of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, Rabbi Joseph Glaser and I had an hour's talk with him. I met Binyamin (Bibi) Netanyahu only once, when I went to a reception in his home in New York, while

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he served as Israeli ambassador to the United Nations. At this writing his popularity has waned, relations with Arafat are near zero, and it is hard to predict where his leadership will take his nation. As a liberal I have long been convinced that peace will come to Israel only when an accord is reached with the Arabs - which is to say that I have supported the peace process emotionally. On many occasions I spoke and wrote about my perception that the basic struggle between the two peoples saw two rights battling with each other, which meant that only mutual compromise could bring about a permanent solution.1 Yet I was also painfully aware that on both sides religious convictions make true compromise difficult and - for fundamentalist believers on both sides - perhaps impossible. There are many Muslims who believe that a Jewish state has no place in their religious realm, which reaches from East Asia to the Atlantic, and that Jerusalem is their holy city; and there are many Jews who believe that the land is theirs, a gift from God, and that Jerusalem is for ever the Jewish capital. Both sides can have their due only if there is mutual trust, and that seems remote at this time. Some Jews believe that it is forbidden to surrender Jewish land, while others, rabbis among them, contest this conclusion and hold that the saving of lives is more important than land claims. Terror is the poorest of all solutions, whether committed by an Arab suicide bomber who blows up a bus with its passengers or by a Baruch Goldstein who kills Arabs at prayer. Both murderers believe with all their hearts that this is what God wants them to do. It is a religion for primitives and reeks of Satanism. Yet Yasir Arafat expressed his deepest sorrow on the death of a chief Arab terrorist, and some Jews lay flowers on the grave of Goldstein. Rabin had no use for religion altogether, and I think that he never fully appreciated the commitment it elicits from true believers. I have been worried about civil strife in Israel: settlers against other citizens and - to use a short-hand expression - the religious against the seculars. It is now idle to speculate what would have happened if Rabin had not been killed and had tried to

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surrender part or all of the Golan Heights, or had tried to relocate significant Jewish settlements on the West Bank. 'Land for peace' may be an easy slogan for Diaspora Jews to repeat approvingly; it doesn't sound so good when it is the land you yourself have cultivated for many years and have done so in the belief that you were serving a divine command, or that it serves the security of your people (see further the discussion below). I agree with Likud that till now the Israelis have been giving, while I have seen too scanty reciprocity, especially from Egypt. It made peace with Israel but has so far supported little more than an absence of war. Yasir Arafat wants to establish an independent state, but, along with Israelis, I worry whether this is a move towards peace or further, towards more serious confrontation, as he tells his followers. Meanwhile, Hizbollah regularly battles Israel in southern Lebanon, with mounting loss of life for both sides. Murder

I was out of town in November 1995 when I heard that there had been violence in Tel Aviv and that Rabin had been injured - I did not know that this was but the first report. Later came the dreadful news - a Jew had shot him in cold blood. Devastated like everyone else, I could not wait to get back to Toronto, and it was late on Sunday when I reached home. An urgent message greeted me: 'Call Manuel Prutschi at once!'2 When I finally reached him, he told me that the community would hold a mass rally the next day, when Rabin was to be buried in Israel. A committee had met during the previous night and had agreed that I should be the keynote speaker. I had no choice but to accept the difficult assignment. I could not manage to prepare anything that morning. CNN was broadcasting twenty-four hours a day from Israel, and we all were glued to the TV set. I felt incapable of gathering my thoughts and finally inquired about the structure of the community rally. My anxiety mounted when I learned that I was to be the last speaker, after some twelve others who 'promised' to

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orate for no longer than two minutes. I knew that the twominute limit would be disregarded by everyone, and the result would be repetition, boredom, restlessness, and a slow exodus long before the program was finished. The thought of it did not lift my depression, nor did it help me to focus on the task ahead. I finally began work on my script during the afternoon, when live reportage from Israel had given way to soft news: analyses, interviews, and reruns of the funeral. The rally's organizers hoped that North York's Centennial Hall (obtained at the last minute through Mayor Mel Lastman's intervention) would be decently filled, though there had been no time to advertise the rally. Everything was done by word of mouth. We planned to arrive at Centennial Hall a half-hour early and judged it to be ample time, especially since this kind of gathering was bound to begin late. Haifa mile from Sheppard Avenue we found huge crowds wending their way to the meeting, and traffic was stop-and-go. Young and old filled the streets, pressing forward. Scores of volunteer ushers tried to bring some order into the developing chaos. A nearby library took in some of the overflow, with the program shown on video screens, but there were thousands in the street whose best hope was to get close enough to hear the loudspeakers that had been mounted outside the huge building. Fortunately one of the security people recognized us and found a space for the car and a back door to the auditorium. What caught my eyes at once was the large number of young people, whom I had all too rarely seen at communal events. But this night was different. Rabin's death had struck the same chord in our Toronto youths as it had in the tens of thousands of young Israelis whom we had seen on television, burning their candles, mourning, and weeping. Crises have their way of bringing us together, and this rally was without precedent. Not only had Israel's prime minister been cut down, but ajew had done it and thereby shattered the self-image of our people all over the world. We had thought that we were different, and now we were shown to be like others after all.

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The set time for the rally had long passed when we finally arrived inside Centennial Hall, but everything ran late because of the masses of people. Moshe Ronen, chair of the central division of the Canadian Jewish Congress, was just about to start the rally; political officials of various stripes and levels and representatives of various Jewish and gentile organizations expressed their sentiments, with Ontario's former premier Bob Rae standing out among them, with his sense of timing and his poetic imagination.3 Speakers and more speakers - they all meant well and said essentially the same thing - but after an hour and a half people were becoming restless and began to trickle towards the exit. When my turn finally came, they paused for a moment, willing to give me a minute before departing. I reached the podium and for a few moments said nothing. People hushed each other, and it became very quiet. At 7 o'clock this morning, Toronto time [I said], sirens began to wail, with a deep cutting sound that announces danger or disaster. The sound came from Jerusalem and lasted for two long minutes. Life stood still in Israel, where it was 2 p.m., and Yitzhak Rabin was about to be buried. I felt I too was there as I heard the sound and watched the assembled get to their feet. Instinctively I too got up, and as I did I cried. Like Rabin I was once a soldier and don't cry often any more; today I did - and the sirens still wail in my ears. They wail with sorrow and anger - yet, when all is said, with hope as well. There, before my eyes lay the man who made war that Israel might live, and who lived that war might be abolished. Alas for him, and alas for our people, whom the mal'ach hamavefi has visited once again. I wept like David when he heard of the deaths of Saul and Jonathan, and in the language of David I say: eich nafal hagibbor, how has the mighty one fallen, tzar li aleicha, achiyitzhak, I grieve for you, my brother Yitzhak. I knew you in life, and you remain my brother in death.5 President Clinton, when he spoke this morning, told the world that this is the week when Jews read of the Akedah, the binding of Isaac. Abraham was ready to kill his son, but God prevented it.

Israel: Rabin and After The assassin, too, on motza'ei shabbatf thought he had heard the word of God, but in his blindness he did not see the ram in the bushes nor did he sense that he had not heard the words of Hakadosh baruch Hit7 and had taken the voice of hate to be the voice of God. How could he come to his dreadful conclusion, and even now assert that he is glad to have done what he did and only regrets that he failed to kill Shimon Peres as well? Because he belongs to those who don't believe in argument or democratic give-and-take. He was one of the many people around the world who do not want to listen to what others have to say, and who are prepared to settle the argument by force. First they abandon reasoned speech; instead they shout and then they shoot. The murderer was one of them; he believed in bullets, not ballots. More than that: the gunman does not understand what Judaism is all about. For in addition to Torah and the rest of Tanakh,8 what is the great document by which our people have lived? It is the Talmud, and that huge compendium is essentially a record of argument and counter-argument, of weighing one idea against another. Our Sages insisted on reminding us that in the service of God and Israel elu va'elu divrei elohim chayim, both sides of the issue are words of the Living God. Words, not violence. But words too can breed violence. When you call the prime minister of Israel 'traitor' and 'murderer,' sooner or later someone will come and take the defamation to heart. And someone did, alas, and now the prime minister is dead. There is now double reason to remember the warning of our sages: chakhamim, hiz'haru bedivreikhem, you who guide the people, watch your words! Israelis have learned to guard against external enemies, not against one of their own. Now they are like other nations in this way too - chaval? Still, the death of Rabin has reminded all of us once again that we are one people, united in our love for Israel. Look about you and feel the warmth of love - a love inspiring also the thousands who stand outside in the cold and proclaim their sorrow.

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We love the land and its people, and we know that all of its people want peace. They disagree vigorously on how it is best achieved, but the goal is still the same. We too, here in the Diaspora, disagree on the best way, and the discussion has not always been civil. In consequence we have grown farther apart from each other instead of meeting on the common ground of ahavat yisrael,10 and we too are prone to use violent language. In memory of Yitzhak Rabin let us recover that special quality which we once cherished: to be a united community, in which love for our people is greater than our political and even theological differences. We haven't met like this for a long time - it took murder most foul to bring us together. Let us not wait for the next tragedy; rather, may we assemble the next time out of our mutual love and common hope. Let me conclude on this note. Isn't it remarkable how our little Israel managed to bring eighty leaders of the world together? How even Hosni Mubarak, the president of Egypt who had never visited Jerusalem, was among the mourners? How King Hussein, also on his first visit to Jewish Jerusalem, called Rabin 'my brother'? If Yitzhak Rabin, in his death, could open the doors to friendship and hope for them, can he not do it for us as well? So, wear the blue-and-white ribbon during the shivah,11 and share with others your sense of mourning. We used to sing am yisrael chay^ when we got together. Just remember this: whether we as a people shall live is up to God; but whether we shall live as one people or divided against each other is up to us. Tonight, in honour of our leader Yitzhak Rabin, zichrono livrachah,^ let our finale reflect both heaven and earth. The people Israel, there and here, are united as one, and thus may we live for ever! Am yisrael, am echad, chay chay vekayaml^ In that spirit let us all, with one voice, sing Hatikvah together.15

The people not merely sang, they virtually shouted the words of national hope, and when they had finished they applauded for a full five minutes. Men came up to embrace and kiss me. It was my turn to cry. It was that kind of day.

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Land for Peace

It was always understood that the Rabin-Peres peace plan proceeded from a basic premise: the occupation of conquered territories had to end, and if necessary, there had to be concessions of land currently under Israeli control. The opposition, composed of secular nationalists and several Orthodox parties, disagreed profoundly. Not an inch of Israel could ever be called 'occupied,' for it was Israel's heritage, vouchsafed to it by none other than God. Therefore any trade of land for peace was out of the question and not debatable. The Golan Heights were one exception, for they were not part of the Holy Land; but since 1967 many settlements had been built there, and to give them up was deemed a crime reeking of treason. Hebron, one-time home of Abraham and the Ancestors' sepulchre, has been a special point of contention. In 1929 it had been the scene of brutal slaughter of Jews by Arabs, and while the Oslo agreements had foreseen a gradual redeployment and eventual evacuation of Israeli troops, this too was anathema to Likud and its allies. Unlike some of my liberal friends, I do not see the intra-Jewish struggle as one of good against evil, right against wrong. The settlers in the Territories went there originally at the urging of the government and buoyed by their religious and/or nationalist conviction, as well as being attracted by bargain prices for proffered living space. They built their habitats under difficult circumstances, and their children have known no other home. Evicting them under a peace agreement runs into fears and sentiments that cannot be summarily dismissed. My fundamental disagreement comes in the area of philosophical and religious considerations, centred on the notion that it is forbidden to surrender any portion of the Holy Land to gentiles. I have several reasons why I find this notion objectionable. One, the 'Holy Land' is described in at least four different ways in the Torah; there simply is no single agreed-on biblical border. Were we to go by one of the biblical precedents, we could claim land all the way to the Euphrates. Arabs often assert, in fact, that this is the ultimate objective of the Israelis. But the

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Torah cannot function as our geographical guide in this respect. We are free to interpret the Bible as we understand it, but we are not free to force others to agree, unless there is a democratic process that undergirds our convictions. Rabbi David Hartman, one of Israel's intellectual and religious gadflies and a good friend of mine, put it memorably when he said that Jewish texts not mediated by people who have a profound respect for democratic values will turn into moral barbarism. 'If that happens, Judaism will be a threat to the future of Israel.'16 Second, I believe that we cannot ride roughshod over Arabs' claims. Over the centuries, they too have acquired a right of possession. At the basis of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict lie two claims, each one asserting priority. The conflict can be settled temporarily by force, or permanently by compromise. Third, the land has always been considered to have been given us conditionally: only when we were righteous would we merit the gift. Isaiah says: 'Zion will be redeemed by justice, and those who return to it, by righteousness.'17 Preferring the holiness of land to the holiness of human life is not 'religious,' especially when the former leads to endless destruction of the latter. I am glad to say that there are Orthodox rabbinic voices in Israel that also take this stand, though up to now they have been in the minority among their theological confreres. The first directly elected prime minister of Israel, Binyamin Netanyahu, is not an Orthodox Jew, and therefore he has probably no unshakable ideological commitment on this score. He assures the world that the peace process is still alive, though it received a serious setback in late September 1996, when bloody riots stained our fragile hopes. The violence was the result of mismanagement on both sides of the conflict, and since then Arafat and Netanyahu have shaken hands once more, but the clash between Palestinian economic and political frustration and Israelis' fears for their security has not come closer to a permanent solution. Now, in the spring of 1997, the peace process is again endangered, and tensions are once again perilously high. What this betokens is still unclear at this writing.

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Exile or Diaspora - When Past Meets Future

The question of the validity of Jewish life in the Diaspora has been with us ever since democracies began to ensure the security of Jews in their realm. Before then, Jews in dispersion lived at the whim and mercy of capricious rulers, be they Christians, Muslims, or Communists. Jews considered themselves to be in exile, in golus, as they called it in Europe. Only God would or could end this dubious status, and only then would the exiles return to the Land of Promise. But with democratic nations ensuring safety and opportunity for all their citizens, Jews began to believe that perhaps God had had a change of mind and had provided another venue for them. In the nineteenth century the United States became the centre of this new conviction, and in 1855 it was expressed most memorably by a German-born rabbi, David Einhorn, in a famous sermon in Baltimore. The sermon dealt with the observance of the day on which the first and second Temples had been destroyed, in 587 BCE and 70 CE, respectively. Destruction had happened both times on the ninth day of the fifth month in the Jewish calendar, known as Tisha b'Av, observed by mourning and fasting. Rabbi Einhorn suggested that it become instead a day of rejoicing, for God had quite evidently chosen to give Jews the opportunity to spread the divine word to places such as the United States. No more mourning over Jerusalem; new hope beckoned in the New World. Einhorn's idea fell on arid ground.18 Similarly, there were many Jews a generation later who believed that the newfangled idea of political Zionism was a historical blunder. Rather than entice our people to a dusty corner of the Middle East, we should help them to achieve freedom in the lands of their residence. Germany especially became the core of anti-Zionist sentiment, yet at the same time it was also the very soil that bred political Zionism. Theodor Herzl and David Wolffsohn, both raised in the German cultural milieu, became the standard-bearers of the new ideology. The first Zionist meeting was to have been held in Munich, but the opposition

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of the Orthodox leadership was too strong, and the founding convention of 1897 was shifted across the border to Basel, a citadel of German-speaking Switzerland. (Preparations are now under way to observe the centenary of that historic occasion.) While the German-Jewish illusion of security was relatively short-lived, that was not the case in the United States, which set the tone for the other existing and developing democracies. There, as in Canada, England, Italy, and other lands, Jews felt themselves to be at home; they considered themselves to be living in Diaspora, but not in exile. Today, with democracy having ensconced itself in the West, the absence of Western immigration to Israel makes the case for that sensitivity more strongly than any ideological debate. Exile belongs to yesterdays, for, with but few exceptions, Jews have a choice between their present domicile and aliyah. If they choose to live their lives outside Israel their existence cannot be called 'exile'; it is tefutzot, Diaspora. When I left Germany in 1935 I was listed as having 'emigrated,' while I would have described my departure as 'flight.' Similarly, 'exile' is value laden; 'Diaspora' is purely descriptive. In another few years the number of Jews in North America will be equalled by the number of Jews living in Israel, and in another decade thereafter more Jews will live in Israel than in all the lands of dispersion together. There is no doubt that this demographic shift will have a profound influence on Jewish life, Jewish attitudes, Jewish identity, and even Jewish continuity. It is also likely to expand the widening distance between Israel and Diaspora. In Israel, there is a growing sense that Diaspora Jews are living in self-imposed exile and that, with mixed marriage and assimilation increasing and the birth rate plunging, those who choose to live abroad will rapidly shrink in numbers and virtually disappear as a force to be reckoned with. To put it bluntly: Diaspora Jewry will become irrelevant, especially if Israel's dependence on the United States decreases. In any case, the political influence that a strong and united American Jewish community once had at home will have been largely dissipated by that time. The

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former six and a half million will number only three or even two million, who will be balanced by a vocal American Muslim community and dwarfed by Black and Hispanic voting power. The process will be hastened if peace with the Arabs seems in reach, and temporarily slowed if it does not. Even that problem pales before another - the growing conviction among many secular Israelis that the Jewish past is no longer relevant to the Jewish future. The past consisted of suffering and created a history that was made not by the Jews themselves but by their non-Jewish masters. That has changed fundamentally, and thus, after a hiatus of nearly two thousand years, authentic Jewish history is once again being made. In this view, the years of exile, including persecutions and Holocaust, while fit for scholarly study, are not relevant to any aspect of contemporary Israeli life. Add to this the growing chasm between secular and Orthodox Jews, so bitterly apparent in the wake of Rabin's murder, and you have a society that has little time for Diaspora Jewry. Even now, its problems and achievements are rarely discussed in the Israeli media. We here may be seen as 'friends of Israel' rather than close family members, about whom one cares and worries. That is of course not the way we here look at things. We continue to treat Israel as family, even if Israelis consider us distant relatives at best. But even our way of dealing with Israel will change. We shall continue to support its institutions, though more selectively and no longer primarily through the United Jewish Appeal and Israel Bonds. Our major fund-raising efforts will be directed towards local and national institutions where we live. We alone can guarantee our future here, and we shall devote most of our communal energy towards that goal. Synagogues, educational enterprises, and departments of Jewish studies at the universities will be the main engines of Jewish identification. We shall visit Israel and send our children there for schooling and vacations, but primarily to strengthen owrjewishness. What will happen in times of serious crisis no one can predict, though I expect that the spirit of 1967 or the emotion that followed Rabin's murder will find new life.

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The Diaspora will certainly be diminished in importance but, in the long run, still vital to the future of the Jewish people. While we shall be fewer in numbers we shall be more intensely committed religiously and culturally. There has always been a Diaspora, and there will be one tomorrow, as long as there are Jews in the world. The Personal Stake

Until very recently my wife and I went to Israel at least once a year. To keep up this routine is no longer possible; it's now more like three times in five years. We have family over there, first cousins in Haifa and Kibbutz Hamadiya, and more distant relatives elsewhere. Joe Flamm, my Second World War buddy,19 lives in Jerusalem, and he and his Ghana are in fact like family. I lecture at the University of Haifa and at Ben-Gurion University in Beer Sheba (where a Plaut Chair in Project Management was established by Toronto friends). My subject is usually biblical. In past years, Haifa U. would plaster the city with placards that announced my lectures; now the publicity is muted, and attendance embarrassingly low. But in Beer Sheba with the help of Professor Danny Lasker and Rabbi Baruch Gold, there is always an ample and appreciative audience on hand, which makes our visits to this city doubly pleasant. It still exhibits its attractive pioneering facade and character. One would mind the outmoded facilities of the Desert Inn Hotel in other locales, but not there not now anyway. Today the Negev is still sparsely settled; tomorrow it will be the nation's backbone. The most important influence that Israel has on me these days is in my growing awareness that the Jewish future will depend largely on Israel, yet not exclusively so. In fact, if the prosperity of Western Jews continues, the distance between the two poles of Jewish existence may diminish. Even now much of secular Israel (which is the majority) is Western rather than Jewish, and many of its citizens have no longer any use for the old Zionist ideal of redeeming the land by the sweat of one's brow. Now there are a quarter-million foreign workers in the land (not

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counting Arabs from the Territories), and the secular portion of the population aspires primarily to the kind of middle-class life that is measured by economic well-being rather than by Jewish values, of which the majority has no inkling and in which it has little interest. No real opportunity exists at present for the injection of pluralistic religious values into a society that is polarized between a state-supported, rigid Orthodoxy and a largely secular majority. Today Israel still has to contend with external enemies, though its security is no longer at risk. The 'enemies' of tomorrow will be internal and will be embroiled in some form of Kulturkampf?® If religious/anti-religious strife should break out in earnest, the secular element will have no positive ideology except its desire to break the monopoly and stranglehold that the Orthodox have on the politics of the state. The Orthodox, in turn, will be sparked by the ideal of a truly Jewish state (rather than a state of Jews), guided by the divinely ordained statute. It is my feeling that, despite their stubborn resistance, the Orthodox will lose the struggle, and the political, social, and religious patterns of Israel will be dramatically changed. That transformation will also affect the future of Israel-Diaspora relations. When Israel turns fifty it will still be concerned primarily with its own needs, but at seventy-five or a hundred, in the days of my grandchildren and not-born-as-yet great-grandchildren, Israel may be ready to admit that it must integrate its wants and hopes with the Diaspora and consider that group for the potential that it will continue to have - exiles no more, but part of one worldwide community, flourishing the way it once did. I write, lecture, and work for that day. Those of us who have chosen to live as part of the Diaspora and enjoy its benefits have another responsibility, beyond what we owe to the Jewish future. Having cast our lot with the nation of our choice, we are obligated to support it with all our might. It is a case not of either-or, but rather of both-and. I lived for a quarter-century in the United States and thirty-five years in Canada and have attempted to contribute to the welfare of both nations. It is nothing for which I expected thanks - on the contrary. This is what I have owed to free and hospitable lands.

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I was happy to see that in 1996 Canada was rated by the United Nations as the best country in the world in which to live - taking into consideration a multiplicity of factors, from culture to social awareness, from economic reality to human decency. In Germany I had, in the days of the Weimar republic, received a first-rate education; in the United States I savoured freedom from oppression, served as a soldier, and learned what the rabbinate required of me; and in Canada I was given the opportunity to share the fruits of my labours with an open society and a responsive Jewish and general community. It has been a fortunate tripod of opportunities. Postscript: Forgotten Visit

The Jerusalem campus of Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR) is an architectural jewel, built in a prize location by world-renowned architect Moshe Safdie. In the sixties the college, in addition to its Jerusalem buildings, had campuses in Cincinnati, Los Angeles, and New York. It had repeatedly tried to acquire that property but had been thwarted by political-religious opposition. So, how did we finally obtain this enviable prize? I did not tell the tale in Unfinished Business because it had slipped my mind, and I did not recall the story until I read about it a quarter-century later. In an article devoted to retiring college president Alfred Gottschalk, the following appeared as part of an interview with him: Q: As president you have greatly expanded the Jerusalem campus and its programs and mission. How did you accomplish that with limited funds and the opposition of the Orthodox parties'?

A: In 1971 in a plane en route to Israel I read in a magazine that a deal had fallen through for a government-owned lot situated between the King David Hotel and the Hebrew Union College. I immediately went to see then Prime Minister Golda Meir, accompanied by Rabbi W. Gunther Plaut, Rabbi Dick Hirsch and Richard Scheuer. We made a passionate plea for that land. Golda, chain smoking her cigarettes, said 'fine, the land is

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yours. Go see Finance Minister Pinchas Sapir and work out the details.'21

Today the new complex houses the college library, a centre for archaeological studies, and multi-purpose social and educational facilities that have become popular both for international study programs and for personal celebrations for Jerusalemites in general. The campus is a gem and has helped to give our movement much-needed exposure to the Israeli public. However desirable this is, Reform in Israel has not been able to establish itself as a vibrant religious force in the country. It is caught in the struggle between an entrenched Orthodox establishment, which has control over wide areas of public life, and the secularist majority. It also has lacked the meaningful support of Reform Jews in the Diaspora. They are generous in many ways, and remarkably so in their home communities. But, with notable exceptions, they have not adequately contributed to their own religious institutions. Among these the World Union for Progressive Judaism requires a greatly elevated level of funding if it is to help advance the growth of liberal Judaism in Israel. The country badly needs a religious alternative, which we, together with the Conservatives, can supply. However, to begin with, both movements must make up their minds to make this an important part of their program.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Communal Concerns

Old-timers and Newcomers Gentile perceptions of the Jewish community may differ significantly from the reality. The belief that we are a closely knit aggregate of people pursuing common goals was largely accurate when we were relatively few in numbers. In Toronto's pre1939 days the majority of Jews lived close to downtown; the common high school was Harbord Collegiate, and only the socalled German Jews had uptown residences. German stood for 'Reform,' and when Holy Blossom Temple moved from Bond Street northward to Bathurst, well above St Clair Avenue, where the streetcars stopped and private transportation became essential, it became known as the 'church on the hill.' Affluence was identified with foresaking the old ways. The bulk of the community was centred around its synagogues; most Jews were still Orthodox, and, with riding forbidden on the Sabbath, proximity to one's house of worship remained essential. Down town Jewry was committed to Zionism, while middle-class, uptown Jews were of two minds. But all were united in their battle against systemic and personal anti-Jewish practices and occasional physical assaults, among which the 'Christie Pits riot' of 1933 still lingers in the memory of oldsters and has in fact merited a whole book.1 Most of the Jews who today call Toronto their home are hardly aware that sixty years ago this city was considered Canada's capital of anti-semitism.

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Montreal was in those days the undisputed centre of the Canadian Jewish community - in numbers, institutions, education, and contributions to common causes. The dormant Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) had been revived by Sam Bronfman, who relied for support on 'the families' - a small group of highly successful people that until recently determined what Montreal Jews should or should not do.2 When I first came to Canada, in 1961, Sam Bronfman was just giving up the presidency of CJC to a trusted lieutenant. Winnipeg's Jewish community, Canada's third largest at the time,3 was the most closely knit of the three cities; Yiddish was a vital force among its members, and their geographic isolation played its expected unifying role. The south side attracted the affluent who left the more traditional and more modest north side; but unity on major issues was never in question. Montreal and Winnipeg have essentially retained their character - not because they have been immune to change, but because they are both beset by attrition: their numbers are shrinking, for both cities have seen an ever-increasing departure of the young, albeit for different reasons. Threatened communities have a tendency to work together on vital matters. Vancouver and Toronto have been the major recipients of this inland migration, with Toronto receiving the bulk. Some 160,000,4 about one-half of Canada's Jews, now live in the country's largest city, and here the fracture is real. It has social, religious, and political components. The division between new immigrant and older settler is common to all places that have accommodated newcomers, but in Toronto it has taken on a special hue. Two relatively recent migratory waves are maintaining their own cohesive qualities, and both present special challenges for the rest of us. The Israelis among Us

No one seems to know their exact number; a conservative estimate is thirty thousand. They first arrived as a steady stream in the early 1980s and came for the age-old reason that has caused

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people to seek a new home: better opportunities and more peaceful conditions. I have had little more than tangential relations with this segment, for only lately has it shown intimations of integrating itself into our community. Though some hundreds of its members have all along been working as Hebrew teachers in our schools, and others have found a place among us, the rest have generally kept apart. Sufficient unto themselves, they have been nearly invisible. Many came to Canada with the expressed or repressed idea that they would eventually return to Israel, as soon as they would acquire a sufficient economic stake. These sentiments were reinforced by a real or perceived attitude that Jews who leave Israel are, so to speak, traitors to their nation - a subject that deserves a comment. There are two Hebrew terms (and their derivatives) that describe settling in Israel and its opposite - leaving the country permanently. The former is called aliyah, from the root 'to go up' (to Jerusalem); the latter is yeridah, from the root 'to descend' (from Jerusalem). The former conveys praise and admiration; the latter has the undertone of disapproval, even contempt. So popular sentiment went in Israel: we waited so long for a homeland, and now that we have it, some leave it, though we need every Jew to stay here and defend the state. Those who leave are betraying a trust. For an embattled nation, that was an understandable feeling. But I have never been able to understand how Diaspora Jews could in good conscience make the same judgment. They have chosen not to make aliyah and therefore have forfeited their right to derogate Jews who have chosen to be like them and become Diaspora dwellers. Yet several of my rabbinical colleagues in Toronto were quite vociferous about it and condemned the newcomers in no uncertain terms. The arriving Israelis, in turn, took this to be the feeling of the resident Jewish community and stayed away from it - and suffered psychological discomfort in the process. We here (or rather, those who spoke on this matter so loudly) reinforced the sense of guilt that the newcomers had brought with them and gave them good reason to stay away from us. They retaliated by considering us with

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some degree of contempt and persuaded themselves that as soon as they acquired a large enough economic stake they would go back to where they belonged and could feel at home. However, with the passing of time, changes have set in. Most Israelis in Toronto are now beginning to admit that this is the country in which they are bringing up their children and where they will stay. They are assisted in this altered self-appraisal by the fact that Israel itself has been turning from an intensely nationalistic, isolated nation into a partner in the global village. Still, the old identity surfaces from time to time. When the Yom Kippur War broke out, a fair number of Israelis went back to fight, and they turned out in large numbers for the community rally in memory of Yitzhak Rabin. Even the avowed secularism of the Canadian Israelis is breaking down. They are increasingly sending their children to Jewish schools (which usually have a religious orientation); they are beginning to contribute to Jewish charities, and some do so quite liberally. The burden of yeridah is now lifting from their shoulders. The Russians

Russian Jews are the other new component of our community. In the seventies, while I was still senior rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple, we had engaged an outreach director to involve congregation members in the activities of their synagogue and lead them to inject into their lives more of the teachings and practices of Judaism. 'Project Isaiah,' as it was called, had been the brainchild of Henrietta Chesnie, the first woman president of the synagogue. Felicia Carmelly, a multilingual social worker with an MA degree, was engaged, and just as she began her work the initial trickle of Soviet Jews arrived in the city. Their Jewish background was non-existent, and so was their understanding of life in a free country. It will be instructive to recount a few incidents of those years, for the latest wave of Russian Jews has benefited from the experiences of the earlier arrivals. For instance, none of them had ever been to a Jewish religious service. Felicia prepared them as best she could, and a dozen

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appeared one Friday evening at Holy Blossom. One of them was smoking a cigar and, when informed by the usher that smoking was not allowed at services, became quite indignant. His English was quite good, and he loudly proclaimed: 'In Soviet Russia they told me what to do, and I thought Canada would be different!' (Gentle persuasion did work eventually.) The newcomers - at the time about a thousand in number - had struck a committee to present a literary program. Its members sat with Felicia to map out the program, and they quickly agreed that it would be best if they chose one single Russian author. But whom? Everyone expressed himself (they were all men) - Turgenev, Chekhov, Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, and Gorky were suggested - and then they all turned to Felicia, awaiting a decision. 'No,' she said, 'that's not the way we do it here. You decide.' They stared at her, uncomprehending. Then they proceeded to arrive at a solution in the only way they knew: they started fighting. 'Tolstoy!' one shouted in frustration and hit a disagreeing committee member over the head with a volume of War and Peace. In the end the stronger man prevailed. Today's Russian newcomers are different, especially those who have come via Israel and have already tasted democracy's ways. They arrive as independent immigrants or through the family reunification program, and a small number of former Israeli residents have even managed to enter Canada as putative 'refugees.'5 Seven thousand families (about thirty thousand souls) are now in the city, while only a few thousand have settled elsewhere in Canada. As in Israel, they are distinguished by their high level of education and are making fairly rapid progress in their economic endeavours. In Toronto, largely through the efforts of Rabbi Yoseph Zaltzman (who arrived in 1981), they have organized a Jewish Russian Community Centre, have a congregation, and are now served by five rabbis. In away they are retracing the patterns of earlier Jewish immigrants, with their landsmanshaften and shules.^ Unlike the Israelis, however, they have not been hampered by a psychological barrier on their way to full integration. Also, unlike the Israelis, the

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great majority were raised in an anti-semitic and atheist Communist state, and many have opened themselves to the attractions of Judaism (albeit so far primarily to Orthodoxy). Some five thousand attended Yom Kippur services last year at the centre, and one thousand men submitted themselves to the rite of circumcision, which was virtually unobtainable in their home country. Already the young prefer to speak and read English, and in another quarter-century they will be indistinguishable from the rest of us. For the time being, however, they are an independent fragment of the community. Fractured Unity

While the newcomers are now on the way to join the existing community, the last fifteen years have seen the fragmentation of the older resident segment. The ever-present division between rich and poor has affected us in increasing measure. To be sure, it was with us when the community was young, but then the new arrivals had their own support groups, and they were buoyed by the expectation that after a while they too would escape their lowly status. That hope is still with today's poor, though they have grown up in Canada and haven't made it yet. What they lack, however, is the support that their grandparents enjoyed; they don't belong to landsmanshaften, and they don't speak Yiddish any more. They have grown up in an increasingly Godforsaking culture and know synagogues only from a fleeting appearance at the still customary bar/bat mitzvah rite de passage. Joining anything Jewish is often restricted to using the Jewish Community Centre for physical recreation and little more. No wonder they are among the disconnected and disaffected. Religious observance is another divisive element among us, and increasingly so. At one end, a humanist segment is participating in the growing abandonment of formal religion by society at large, and at the other are the Orthodox in their various groupings, with or without beards, with or without dress codes and hats (rather than mere yarmulkes) to distinguish them. As in Israel, what used to be called 'modern Orthodoxy' has sur-

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rendered its central place to a well-financed right wing with a tendency towards religious separatism. A third major contributor to this fragmentation has been the virtual disappearance of overt anti-semitism. As a state of mind and some remnants of invisible discrimination, it continues to exist, but it is relegated largely to the occasional act of vandalism. (The Black-Jewish fracture, discussed above, is of a different hue: there, it is Blacks who accuse us of prejudice, rather than the usual experience of the Jews as victims.) An earlier generation of our people avidly read the Jewish press, which sported a significant number of publications around the country, ranging from organizational house organs and student quarterlies to local weeklies and Yiddish papers. That number has shrunk, though Russian and Hebrew journals are lively new entries to the field. However, the public as a whole, especially its younger stratum, is slowly turning away from the printed press and obtains its information (such as it is) from television and radio. Jews are like any other people, only more so, says an oft-cited quip, and the former addiction to their Jewish newspapers has given way to print depletion. The Canadian Jewish News (CJN) is the nation's major weekly Jewish journal, covering Toronto and Montreal, and a significant number of readers elsewhere subscribe to it as well. With its wide array of contributors here and abroad, it is one of the few links in the chain of communal cohesion, which is the chief reason why I contribute a column to every issue and have done so without interruption since 1983.7 The other remaining centripetal factor is the United Jewish Appeal, but it too faces serious problems, for its contributors are increasingly giving to organizations that they personally support, in preference to the community pool represented by the Appeal. Last but not least in this disturbing scenario is the deep split among religious factions. In 1961, when we first arrived in Toronto, it was still possible to play host to all rabbis across the denominational spectrum and to establish a Rabbinical Fellowship that included everyone from left to right.8 Today such joining of religious representatives has given way to polarization and

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even demonization. For some years one Toronto rabbi has used his pulpit to make regular attacks on the Reform community, and we no longer sit down together as in days gone by. Communal affairs are nowadays held mostly in Orthodox synagogues, for right-wing rabbis might issue a ukase against participation in any other religious locale and would thereby effectively abort the event. (The impact of the political split in Israel on the Diaspora community has been discussed elsewhere in this book.9) The right wing of Orthodoxy has already ceased to support the rest of the community - though it expects support from it if needed. When private funding for the ultra-Orthodox dried up, the latter came to the community demanding that their children's Jewish needs be looked after. After some heated discussion that was indeed done, but reciprocity was not part of the deal. The right-wingers see this as perfectly logical: they work for God and are owed our help, while our ways are not God's ways and therefore illegitimate. Twenty-five years ago I had entree to many of these people and their leaders; no more. It is now becoming easier to relate to someone whose language I don't understand than with those who won't even talk with me. I am depressed about this sad and sorry development, which leaves me stranded on the shoals of pessimism. The pressure from the right has affected the Conservatives as well. For many years there was an understanding between them and their Reform and Reconstructionist colleagues that they would recognize each others' conversion procedures and accept converts as full Jews. But the Conservatives balk at doing this when the certificate is signed by a woman rabbi, and Reform in turn stands by its female colleagues. I am afraid that this issue is but a straw in the wind. For the time being, we will stay together in the Toronto Board of Rabbis (successor to the Rabbinical Fellowship) , for in addition to all else we non-Orthodox Jews face an Orthodox rabbinate that draws its strength from a growing community of adherents and from its moral support by the Israeli establishment. In their eyes (there are a few courageous exceptions), Reform, Conservatism, and Reconstructionism are in fact sectarians who undermine an age-old Jewish structure

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founded on fundamentalist principles.10 Thus the 'sectarians' are willy-nilly thrown together in the need for a common opposition to their disenfranchisement by political-religious politics in Israel. In this cooperation, forced though it may be, lies some hope for future communal regeneration. For that reason too I continue my efforts to sound the voice of unity. My column is part of this labour, but I write it gladly, for in the long run, I hope, there will be a change - especially if a new age will see our people veering away from embracing the right wing, with its religious intolerance.11 The likes of a Rabbi Gedaliah Felder, a giant among all wings of Orthodoxy, showed that respectful acceptance of non-Orthodoxy is both possible and desirable. Sadly, the Canadian Jewish Congress has been affected by the fragmentation of the community. It no longer occupies the position of an overall unifying force. Today it is overshadowed in Canada's cities by the Jewish Federations, which raise funds for communal, national, and international needs (including Israel) and thereby have a decisive voice in organizational life. B'nai B'rith has acquired a public presence through its League for Human Rights, and, though competition is good in the marketplace, infighting between Congress and B'nai B'rith has diminished the support for both and has given the federations a significant edge. The recent death of Alan Rose, for many years executive vicepresident of Congress, has been emblematic. His ability to deal with Canadian government and beyond was distinguished by professional expertise, to which I can testify from close observation during my presidential term.12 It was a time when (except for B'nai B'rith) all Canadian organizations functioned under the Congress umbrella - from synagogues and their associations to secular groups, from all factions of Zionists to students on their campuses. I remember the likes of Charles Bronfman, Irwin Coder, Jack Cummings, Philip Givens, and Sol Ranee attending my officers' meetings. Their voices resonated among our people throughout the country, as did those of Ray Wolfe and Murray Koffler, whenever their support was needed.

Communal Concerns 105 I regret to say that this type of broad-based leadership is no longer evident, a problem that has befallen the Canada-Israel Committee as well. Once known to every Jew in Canada, it has become today a group of lay and professional people who labour faithfully to keep Israel and Canada as close to one another as feasible, but who lack an element essential to work in the public arena: recognition and confidence from the Jewish masses. The signing of the Canada-Israel free trade agreement in the summer of 1996 was the kind of gala event that we have not had for a long time, but it was organized by the two governments and not by volunteer organizations. It was moving to see yesterday's Soviet 'prisoner of Zion' and now Israel's minister of industry and trade, Natan Sharansky, sign the document. Among the four hundred dressed-up guests he appeared in jacket and open shirt, unaffected as always, and when he sat down and took the pen to hand he shook his head in disbelief and said: 'I'm not sure how to do this. I have never signed anything in my life.' Good people continue to take their turn at the communal rudder, but we are splintered in our efforts and the fissures show no sign of mending. At one time Congress might have been able to meliorate this centrifugation, and if we live long enough we might yet see it happen again. On the brighter side is the establishment of departments for Jewish studies in both the University of Toronto and York University, which are attracting younger people to their courses and treat the wider public to series of outstanding lectures by imported luminaries.13 Christians and Jews

Sixty years ago pulpit exchanges between rabbis and Christian ministers were rare, and when they did take place they captured the imagination of many. It appeared as if traditional Christian triumphalism was giving way to reluctant acceptance of the mother faith as a continuing reality. But while Jews tended to treat this as the beginning of a new relationship, Christians saw

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it as no more than an interesting novelty - an emotional and intellectual imbalance that was from the beginning built into this area of mutual interest. The Holocaust and the emergence of Israel changed the picture somewhat. Christians became defensive about the former and apprehensive about the latter. The Holocaust happened amid the deafening silence of most Christian churches and left a trail of guilt, while the state of Israel became a theological thorn in the side of traditional Christendom, for its vitality negated the common Christian assumption of having supplanted Judaism, and this was one reason why for a long time many churches took a negative view of the Jewish state. (Revivalists and fundamentalists were among the exceptions: they saw the return of Jews to the Holy Land as a forerunner of the Second Coming.) And in Canada, conflict between the United Church and the Jewish community marred a good deal of the sixties and seventies. (I devoted a chapter to it in Unfinished Business.)*4 Though there have been notable attempts at rapprochement and even cooperation,15 the broader tapestry of this relationship has not changed. There are Christian-Jewish dialogue groups and the Canadian Council of Christians and Jews still holds its annual award dinners, but both the confrontations and the hopes of former decades have given way to a kind of benign neglect, except for Holocaust recognition in churches and schools, which is today the major arena of Jewish-Christian relations. Attention to yesterday (however important) has crowded out concern for mutual problems of today. Maybe all of this is also a reflection of the basic struggle for survival and for religious revitalization which has become the primary focus of many churches and synagogues. It leaves little room for activities that are considered extraneous, and I was glad to see the Council strike out in new directions when in 1997 it fostered a national colloquium on race relations, which I had occasion to attend. A shining example of interdenominational cooperation has evolved around the need to help the homeless. In Toronto, a number of churches pioneered an 'out-of-the-cold' program that offered food and shelter for one night a week in each

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locale. In 1996 Holy Blossom - many of whose members had been volunteers at St Andrew's Presbyterian Church in the city core - made its facilities available and was supported in this effort by other synagogues in the city, regardless of their religious bent.16 It is in the pursuit of social justice that all of us have a chance to join hands and thereby supplant superannuated tensions with up-to-date efforts to restore a human face to our society.

CHAPTER EIGHT

Reform Judaism: A Personal Journey

Finding My Way Almost from the moment that I became active in the Reform movement I became classified (so I was repeatedly told) as 'Orthodox' - a way of saying that I didn't quite fit. Though I used to bristle at this characterization, I no longer do. My critic had a point, and this is as good a time as any to deal with it. In 1935 I had left the womb of Europe and had emerged into that noisy, different, and often frightening world called North America. I had been brought up in a home that was traditional without rigidity; we were regular synagogue goers, but Dad, my brother, and I did not lay tefillin.1 We kept kosher and, as was the case in all German synagogues,2 wore head coverings at worship. My father was a charter member of our Liberal synagogue, which allowed men and women to sit together, but I was never sure what its liberalism betokened in other respects. Dad occasionally intimated that he had difficulties with certain biblical expressions or stories, and for some reason he never shared with me his doubts in these respects - and I never asked. I suppose that in those days I was not really interested. By American standards I was probably a Conservative Jew, with a spotty knowledge of Hebrew and a mild, but not all-consuming passion for Judaism. I knew nothing about the United States, except tales of untamed Indians roaming somewhere in the west. Karl May, a German writer who had never set foot in North

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America, had written these tales, which all German readers took to be authentic descriptions of this mysterious continent. So, when I attended my first Shabbat service in an American temple I had nothing to go by except my own religious experience, and I have already related what happened to us on that September day.3 That encounter with a world that I was about to join has probably ever since formed a subterranean stream in my consciousness: a hatless congregation, no prayer shawls, a minimum of Hebrew, no cantor, and a rabbi who threatened to evict us if we ever returned with headgear. I was a total stranger, frightened and potentially rejected even before I had taken my first step. Maybe I have always remained somewhat of a stranger. Not that I didn't try to shed that feeling - I did. In the early years of my active career in the pulpit I served classical Reform congregations;4 only when I came to Canada did the ambience change significantly. In Chicago I had little chance to enlarge the minuscule ritual of my congregation; in St Paul, Minnesota, I was successful to some degree, but I knew there was a limit that could be breached only at the danger of internecine warfare. Now that I look back on that period of my ministry I realize that I shifted my attention - wittingly or unwittingly - from ritual matters to tackling Reform's neglect of Jewish knowledge. In St Paul, I found that except for Friday night services and Sunday morning religious school, there was only one hour of Bible study a month, held for women on a weekday morning. 'Adult education' was not on the agenda, and perhaps the term did not exist anywhere outside of Chautauqua. When I left, I had introduced Shabbat afternoon study and havdalah,5 Hebrew school on weekdays, and lengthened hours on Sunday morning and had extended by one year the schooling of children before confirmation. In addition, I introduced regular retreats (then called 'returns') and a daily afternoon service, conducted by lay members. Sabbath and holy day services now had a 'soloist' and more Hebrew. Withal, there was something missing, and I began to notice it as I approached my fiftieth birthday. We belonged to a movement that was rich in social ideals and a sense of the aesthetic,

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but poor in helping us to lead identifiably Jewish lives. Few homes were distinguished by mezuzot6 or had Jewish books gracing their shelves; shivah1 lasted for three days, often for one day only. It was a lovely congregation with wonderful people, but now I realize why I was ready to move when the occasion arose. For most of my members, Reform Judaism knew of few boundaries, and this became the regnant mode. Personal observance was entirely a matter of choice; the term mitzvah had the meaning of 'nice' or even 'praiseworthy,' but in no wise referred to 'commandment,' its basic and real meaning. Authority and tradition had given way to personal autonomy, and it seemed that the latter had become the catchword of Reform. Habit and antisemitism kept us together as a community, while Torah and its commands had little to do with it. The meetings that a small group of Reform, Conservative, and one Orthodox rabbi held at Oconomowoc, Wisconsin,8 confirmed my theological stirrings. I had been harbouring especially concepts of covenant and chosenness, to which not long thereafter I gave expression in writing The Case for the Chosen People? The chief consequence for Jews of the covenant was mitzvah, and while there was room for interpretation Judaism without all authority was an oxymoron. But our old-line Reformers - rabbis no less than lay people - were resistant to that con cept, and in the four decades since then, the voices preaching 'autonomy without bounds' ring as loud or louder than ever. (Elsewhere in this book I make special mention of the humanistic issue, patrilineal descent, and homosexual rights.10) Increasingly, I found myself in the minority at rabbinical conferences and, as I would learn later, was considered 'right wing' or even 'Orthodox' by many of my colleagues. In retrospect I realize why I could not resist the call to become the senior rabbi of Holy Blossom in Toronto, even though it meant leaving behind the United States, all our social relationships, in addition to my standing in the community (which included my political connections with the likes of Hubert Humphrey, Walter Mondale, and Eugene McCarthy). The beckoning Jewish climate of Toronto was sui generis, warm and fervent - something I

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had missed and craved. None of this was crystal clear to me at the time; I gave way to inner urgings rather than to cool ratiocination. (My wife was hesitant, while my mother was ready for adventure.) Although personally I had no clear perception of Holy Blossom's nature, the fact that for more than a generation it had attracted highly distinguished rabbis, all of whom had left their mark on the Reform movement, conveyed a powerful message. Abraham L. Feinberg was a brilliant preacher and the country's most prominent social activist; Maurice N. Eisendrath was serving as president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC); Ferdinand Isserman too had gained fame as an avant-garde social reformer; and Barnett Brickner had been president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR). All of them were very much alive, and their standing doubtlessly helped me, their latest successor, to get the attention of the Reform leadership. In 1964 I persuaded Eisendrath to give me the go-ahead sign for a projected commentary on the Torah,11 and that same year I prevailed on Jacob Weinstein, vice-president of the CCAR and chairman of the program committee for the upcoming convention, to have it feature a full-scale review of Shabbat observance by Reform Jews. Both efforts represented my conviction that our movement had become so enamoured of modernity that it had lost track of its Jewish soul. Its lay members were generally ignorant and unobservant when it came to Jewish tradition; they claimed to be followers of Torah and stood up when the scroll was taken from the Ark, but they did not know what was in it or how it came to be the centre-piece of our religion. Nor did they observe much beyond the barest minimum: prayer had all but disappeared from their homes, and secular attractions kept them increasingly from attending Friday night services. We were in bad shape, but rarely talked about it in public. Instead, we pointed to our growing numbers, overlooking the fact that many of our new adherents chose Reform for the sake of convenience rather than conviction. Our Orthodox critics were all too correct in this respect.

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My efforts were partially successful. While the Torah commentary would become an instant success, making Torah study a serious venture for many Reform Jews, my attempt to revitalize Shabbat found less resonance. But it had a surprising effect in another area of Reform Jewish life, for it returned the concept of mitzvah to our movement and spawned a series of major efforts in that direction. The program committee for the 1965 convention in Cincinnati decided to devote an entire day to the study of Shabbat in the Reform movement and invited me to give a keynote address on the subject.12 Subsequently I was appointed to chair a newly formed Shabbat Committee, which issued the first mitzvah book of the movement13 and was followed by Gates of Mitzvah, Gates of the Seasons, and a reissue of the Shabbat Manual. Mitzvah was once again part of our parlance, if not yet sufficiently of our practice. Battles From my perspective this was progress, but others saw it as retrogression. My two chief opponents in this battle for the minds of the movement were two rabbis, both professors at Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), Alvin Reines and Eugene Mihaly, the former teaching philosophy and the latter, Midrash. Reines was the purveyor of the idea that Reform's true nature was described by autonomy or freedom of each individual Jew to decide what being Jewish meant for him/her. Judaism was therefore a religion that could not be defined except in terms of freedom, and thus a Jew might well observe the day of rest on a Thursday or Tuesday, if that day expressed the concept better than did the seventh day. Reines had considerable influence on some of his students, who on becoming rabbis established or changed congregations in the image of their teacher and formed an association to give it strength. It was therefore a 'coup' for the program committee of the UAHC to arrange for a debate between the two of us at a biennial to be held in New York City. We were given twenty minutes each to make our case - he for unfettered freedom,

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and I for the need to temper autonomy with the authority of tradition. The remaining twenty minutes went to questions and discussions from the floor.14 There was standing room only when the program began. In the actual debate my opponent had first draw. He developed his system in great historical and philosophical detail, and when his twenty minutes was up had not as yet reached his main point. The crowd was becoming restless, the chair made noises that the speaker disregarded or maybe didn't hear, and after nearly fifty minutes he finished, to sparse applause - accorded to him out of courtesy or relief. What was I to say? My prepared talk had become useless. But I had something he didn't have - experience with mass audiences and their endurance limits. So I said something to this effect: 'Obviously, there is no time for explaining my position in any depth, and so I promise to have you out of here in ten minutes or less (vigorous applause). I will only say this: Your freedom is total when contemplating Prof. Reines's thesis, but it is limited when you judge it as Reform Jews. Your and my freedom is limited by the needs of God and of our people. Reform Judaism is the child of an old tradition and aims to mold it to the needs of our times. It is of course a lot more than that, but certainly no less. Rest assured that Shabbat will be celebrated next Saturday. With that I rest my case.' The audience rose as one and applauded me for some time. The moderator tried to say something, but the people were already on their way out. I tried, unsuccessfully, to shake hands with Reines, and in the years thereafter he rarely spoke to me again.ID My other chief opponent was Professor Eugene Mihaly, one of the founders of the radically left-wing American Association of Progressive Reform Judaism (AAPRJ). He opposed my point of view twice in print and once in a face-to-face debate. Under the leadership of Rabbi Simeon (Shim) Maslin of Philadelphia, a pamphlet had been prepared setting forth the point of view of one hundred Reform rabbis who did not perform mixed marriages; Mihaly responded with an elegant publication of his own.

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The other, and more personal, written confrontation took place when, as chair of the Responsa Committee, I issued an advice to the president of the UAHC regarding the admission of a Humanist congregation to the membership of the Union. (That issue is discussed below in chapter 9.) The oral confrontation with Mihaly took place at a meeting in Jerusalem of the World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ). We were courteous to each other - in fact, throughout all of our battling we maintained a very civil relationship. I do remember that during his presentation I was struck by a sense of the absurd: here we were in the midst of Jerusalem, where Reform had a tough time establishing its legitimacy, and here one of our prominent scholars was seriously advocating that Shabbat was a day meet for concluding marriages, that intermarriage was not to be feared, and that he felt closer to a liberal Christian than to a Hasidic Jew. Here too I tried to let his arguments fall by their own weight, and they did. The membership of the WUPJ was not persuaded, and of course the Israeli press made the most of the 'sectarian character' of the Reform movement. As for Mihaly's national organization, the AAPRJ, it soon faded quietly into oblivion. My 'victories' also exacted a personal price. The movement was becoming polarized between the 'classical' Reformers (1885-style) and the proponents of a tradition-connected, yet liberal, movement who peopled our side. My advocacy prevented me for some years from being elected president of the CCAR. My name was brought forward several times during the 1970s, to no avail. Members of the nominating committee feared that my election would split the movement. One year there was a 4-4 deadlock that could not be broken, and the committee finally put forward a non-controversial candidate instead. It had been the CCAR's custom to choose its leaders in the order of their ordination years, so that presidents would be succeeded either by members of their own graduating class or by younger ordinees. Two of my classmates, Arthur Lelyveld and Eli Pilchik, had already served as presidents, and now the

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choice fell on Herman Schaalman, who had been ordained two years later than I.16 As the decade ended I had every reason to forget about this particular ambition of mine, which I had harboured for a few years. Besides, I had now retired from the congregational rabbinate, and no rabbi had ever been elected after retirement. I did not know that with the ongoing publication of the complete Torah commentary my colleagues' perception of me was changing. Two volumes had already appeared and been enthusiastically received by the movement and beyond. Apparently, the commentary was overshadowing political and theological divisions. When I came home one afternoon Elizabeth greeted me with a mysterious smile and said: 'You have a call from Joe Glaser17 and it's urgent. You are to call him right away.' 'Do you know what it's all about?' I asked. 'He insists he must talk to you personally.' When I called him he came right out with it. 'Today was a meeting of the nominating committee and you were unanimously proposed for the vice-presidency. If you accept you'll be president of the CCAR in 1983. Mazal tov, it's long overdue.' I was more than pleased, of course, and wanted to know whether the usual 'Orthodox versus Liberal' argument had arisen again. 'No,' he said, 'once your name was brought forward, that was the end of it. The election took five minutes, and there was not a single word of opposition.' I still remember how I felt at the time: the vote of my peers was a validation of my career, and vaingloriously I thought that I would make a difference and be a good president. It didn't turn out quite that way. In my vice-presidential role I needed to chair the program committee for the next convention and stand in for the president when the need arose. These tasks were not too demanding and did not interfere with my presidency of the Canadian Jewish Congress, which was slated to end in 1980. As the saying goes, I was on a roll.

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The CCAR Presidency

The period of my CCAR leadership coincided with my work on the reformation of Canadian refugee law and policy.18 I justified this dual responsibility by reasoning that every president before me had been holding a full-time job either in a congregation or at the College-Institute. No one had ever been president of the Conference once he had retired.19 I faithfully visited regional conventions, chaired our executive board meetings, and attended national and international conferences, together with Joe Glaser, who was always with me at these events. Yet, though he was very much at home at these inter-organizational gatherings and had many years of service to his credit, he was not a 'president' in name and therefore not eligible for certain honourary positions such as the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. Yet it was he, not I, who was the real leader of our Conference. Like every president before and after me, I was little more than a figurehead. While I appreciated Joe's penchant for operating quietly from the sidelines, I became increasingly convinced that his lack of the presidential title disadvantaged the CCAR. He was not on the same level as Alex Schindler, president of the UAHC, or Fred Gottschalk, president of HUC-JIR, for he was 'only' the executive vice-president. But while Fred and Alex and their confreres had occupied their posts for decades, every presidency of the CCAR was but a two-year interlude. For our voice to be heard properly, and in order to have adequate access to the media (which always look for the top person), Joe should become our president, while people such as I could be given some other honorific title. But when I discussed this with my officers, Joe would have nothing to do with it. That was a pity and, in my judgment, a serious error. No one in the Conference would have objected; most would have welcomed the change, recognizing its validity. Alas, Joe is no longer there to merit this boost, and I hope that when his successor is well entrenched the issue can be revisited, especially since Joe confessed, not long before he died, that in turning me down he had made a fateful mistake.

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I gave two presidential addresses, as was the custom. At Grossinger's resort, in 1984, I spoke of the need for study something to be required not only of congregants, but of rabbis first and foremost. That was received without objection, being motherhood stuff, though all too many of my colleagues 'had no time' in their busy lives to do any serious learning. (My friend and colleague John Moscowitz, who for many years has had his office next to me at Holy Blossom and often asked me when I would write about my views, told me that his first memory of me was hearing me give a talk in California, during which I stressed the need for study. I am glad that he listened, for study has given his rabbinate a special dimension of authenticity.) It was my second and last presidential address, delivered in Minneapolis the following year, that turned out to be a neardisaster. I told my colleagues something that they simply did not want to hear, and I failed to cushion it properly. It was not the main subject of my address, which dealt with the need of the rabbi to set standards; rather it was a side issue that I brought up, in part because it was exactly twenty years earlier that I had delivered my hour-and-fifteen-minute talk on the revitalization of the Sabbath. I had suggested at the time that we should reassess the Friday evening service, which had started as a stop-gap measure in the 1860s, had failed spectacularly around 1900, and thereafter became the centre-piece of religious life for most congregations. But it usually attracted all too few congregants, which made it a trial for many rabbis, rather than a time of spiritual fulfilment. My lectures in many parts of the continent had given me first-hand insight into the troubled minds of my colleagues, who knew that in the matter of worship their rabbinate could not be called a success. I became convinced, and have not changed my mind, that in our modern society, especially during winter in the snow belt, a service late on Friday night has difficulty written all over it: If we want to reintroduce prayer into the halls of Reform it probably can no longer be done on Friday nights. That's a hard pill to

118 Living as a Jew swallow. Our rabbis know it. Their boards know it. But they are not willing to confront the reality that lies behind it. Prayer and a Jewish life style belong first and foremost where the individual lives. I believe we have the most daring and capable group of rabbis ever assembled in any organization. I dream of your spending your extraordinary energy on having your members introduce a meaningful Friday night experience at home. What a magnificent success that alone would be! ... Suppose this is where all your energy would be spent, energy that you now spend on the frustrating and self-defeating enterprise of organizing a Friday night service that is measured - shall we be honest? not by its intensity of prayer, but by the number of those who come to attend it. Alas ... Coming to the synagogue on Friday night is not the [major] mitzvah that a Reform Jew should fulfill. Given the choice between celebrating Shabbat meaningfully at home and coming to the synagogue, I opted in the past, when I was a rabbi [in the active congregational rabbinate], for the former - that is, celebrating Shabbat at home - and not the latter. And I think, in your heart of hearts, so do you. So act on it, dear colleagues, act on it together. I urge the passage of a resolution to reassess - that's all - the effectiveness of Friday night services.20 The reception for my address was, to put it mildly, cold. Only a few were vigorous in their approval; the majority sat in stony silence. A bomb, in plain English. And the real storm was yet to come, for the media picked up this part of my talk and treated it as if it had been the central issue of the convention. The New York Times carried it; radio and TV snapped it up, and soon the whole continent knew of it: the Reform rabbis were going to abolish Friday night services. One rabbi from Mississippi told me that his congregation's president had phoned him and kept him on the line for forty-five minutes. 'Just what were you guys up to?' he had asked. My colleague added wryly: 'It's the longest span of time I have ever talked to my president about a religious issue.'

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Many letters jammed my mailbox in the ensuing weeks, and they ranged from hostility to expressions of gratitude. One rabbi in a large congregation in the eastern United States wrote me to the effect that he had been unable to attend the convention but had read about it in the papers. He felt that I had done the Reform movement irreparable damage and owed my rabbinic colleagues an apology. In response, I sent him the full text of my address, and he was gentleman enough to apologize in turn and forthwith invited me to be the scholar-in-residence in his fine congregation. I have returned there several times since. Why did I fail to make my point this time, when twenty years earlier the same suggestion was considered on its merits? First, I was now president of the Conference, and that gave the proposal a different punch. Second, in 1965 it had been embedded in a scholarly lecture, while now it was clothed in the garment of advocacy and rabbinic self-criticism, which came on too strongly and opened a festering sore. Many colleagues may have agreed with me but did not know what they would do in place of the evening service if it were abandoned. I remember that I was very depressed about it all. Public worship continues to decline and is increasingly devoid of real prayer. (I am one example of the latter assertion, and elsewhere in this book I shall return to my personal problem with prayer.21) Did I myself act on my own prescription? No, in Toronto people were still coming in large numbers on Friday night, and when I discussed the question I was met with the old saw, 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it.' But Holy Blossom too eventually proved the accuracy of my prescription. After I left the pulpit, signs of change began to appear. Whatever the reason, attendance diminished and in time shrivelled. Once the pattern of regular attendance was severed, a vibrant Friday night assembly could not be revived. Today, our congregation no longer has such a service; it has a family worship hour at 6 p.m., which is attended by some two hundred people, many children among them. The main service is on Shabbat mornings, with many hundreds of people in attendance and parallel opportunities for worship: one for families with children in the upstairs chapel, and a regu-

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lar, quite small, congregant-led 'minyan service' (which is the one my wife and I usually attend). All services are preceded by an hour's study, usually led by the senior rabbi. In looking back at my experience I try to comfort myself that our difficulties lie in a larger area and that the choice between Friday night and Shabbat morning is one only of degree, not of substance. The real question is: if time and technique, gendersensitive or insensitive prayer books, more or less Hebrew, added congregational participation or better cantors, or shorter sermons or no sermons at all are not the answer, what is it? Where is the centre of our problem? If indeed, as has often been said, our times are simply inhospitable to public worship (a conclusion put in question by revivalist movements), what should our strategy be? In order to answer that question I must confront my uncomfortable premonition that the modern synagogue may court serious decline. The Synagogue as Endangered Species

During these last few years I have come to believe that the synagogue as we have known it is facing the battle of its life. That may not be true for small communities, where it will remain a visible rallying point for our people; but in the larger cities, where most Jews live, the house of God has more and more become a service station catering to life-cycle needs and special events. Even the High Holidays exhibit a weakening of their former universal drawing power. The decline will first and foremost be noticeable in megacities, where genuine as well as bogus rabbis will increasingly function as independent operators, who, like filling stations, will serve people on request. Small minyanim or other lay-led groups will be environments where one can say kaddish or celebrate a child's bar/bat mitzvah. Why pay high dues to a temple with its salaried staff, when one can obtain similar services on request? Rabbinic and cantorial entrepreneurs arrange High Holiday services and attract people who don't want to belong to congregations (or can't afford the

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dues). So, why belong? Rabbis and cantors can be hired, like caterers and photographers, on a fee-for-service basis. After all, isn't that the way we relate to our doctors and dentists? Except for the Orthodox and small core groups of Conservative and Reform Jews, religious services as we have known them will shrivel further - and this despite the perceived hunger for spirituality that shows itself here and there, especially among the young. Large bar/bat mitzvah attendance of invited people cannot paper over the paucity of regular worshippers or the basic lack of interest of many guests in what should be a worship experience. The almost total absence of our youth from services is a sore on the body of our hopes for the future. We talk about religious discipline but find it supported by wish lists rather than deeds. Sunday schools, even when coupled with midweek Hebrew schools, will rarely produce truly knowledgeable Jews. Day schools do better, but they are generally not synagogue connected, nor do we have any real statistics about whether their graduates have a greater sense for the religious than do students not exposed to daily instruction. Whom then will temples serve tomorrow, except the elderly and those families who - while eschewing the corner-store minyan - will use the synagogue as a religious drive-through? Fewer and fewer youngsters stay on for confirmation, and even when they attend a service - for instance, the initiation rite of a friend - they will often leave after their buddy has performed. I don't know whether this sorry spectacle is only a Toronto or large-city phenomenon; to me it represents the foreshadowing of our feefor-service 'religion': the youngster attends the friend's performance, which represents the entitlement (the 'fee') to attend the subsequent party. Adults are not much different. To be sure, they won't go outside like the youngsters; they simply come late or even skip the service altogether and head directly for the luncheon table. The unhappy truth is that attending services for the purpose of worship has been dwindling for some time. Outside personal crises, prayer is no longer part of the average person's daily or

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even weekly life. Its diminution mirrors waning belief in an operative God, whom we no longer revere as the one who, for instance, 'heals the sick' (as the prayer book says) or performs other miracles - functions we now expect from human professionals whom we pay. The truly Orthodox - whether Jewish, Christian, Muslim, or whatever - have no such trouble, at least not for now. Their literal belief in Holy Writ, their daily discipline of prayer, and their closed environments in home and school have so far largely exempted them from the corrosion that the rest of us suffer. Moreover, they have preserved a missionizng spirit, which in the Jewish community is represented by Chabad and Aish Hatorah. Their members are possessed by the passion of truth; they know what God wants of them and speak of Him (no gender-neutral language here!) as someone they know well. We Reform Jews lack that kind of passion, but that does not mean that we are incapable of developing it, albeit in a different mode. There is spiritual hunger among our people, but we have not taught them how to express it. To my knowledge, our seminary did not and does not teach its students either to practise or to transmit the art and habit of personal and communal prayer. So the best that we could do was to exhort people to come to services, but when we got them there we paid little attention to their spiritual potential. Perhaps we thought that being in a synagogue would, by osmosis, create affection for and belief in God and carry over into their personal lives. We still urge them to come, but with lessened effect, for they don't seem to obtain what they really desire (even if they are unaware of their subconscious craving). A number of rabbis too have fallen victim to this syndrome, so that they themselves will not be found in a synagogue when away on vacation. The quickening of passion is our movement's greatest religious, intellectual, and social need, for - as Chaim Nachman Bialik once said - it transforms ideas and plans into action. We once exhibited social passion when our leaders (my late brother Walter among them) went on freedom rides to the American south at considerable personal risk. We still display social con-

Reform Judaism: A Personal Journey 123 cern when we open our temples to refugees or to the homeless, feeding and sleeping them on our premises. The 'Out of the Cold' program of Holy Blossom Temple has attracted five hundred volunteers, more than were needed, even for such tasks as staying up all night or cleaning the mattresses and premises the next morning. We nurture intellectual passion when we teach the many who really want to learn. The rousing success of Toronto's Kolel which in the 1995-6 season attracted well over a thousand students - is another example of what desire for education can accomplish and what those who guide our temples must learn to reacquire. Its rousing success has been due to the imagination of a small cadre of committed people as much as to the readiness of so many Jews of all ages for serious study.22 We feed intellectual passion by keeping alive the inquiring spirit, which begs for questions even more than for answers. My mind goes back to what I know of the pioneers of our movement in the nineteenth century. I read the records of the early rabbinical assemblies or scan the newspapers produced in those days. These people were passionate about Reform; they believed in it as the genuine article, not (as many of our people now secretly believe) a watered-down version of the real (read 'Orthodox') thing. Reform rabbis have not been passionate enough about this part of their calling; when they are, they are likely to receive a remarkable response. So we need to sit down and talk about where temples are today and where they must be tomorrow. They are an endangered species today, but there is hope if we acknowledge this and act on that recognition. As Hillel said, 'If not now, when?' I had dealt with these problems in a lecture given in 1975, during the centennial observances of the CCAR: This is how I see the synagogue of tomorrow: diversified, different in its various stages of search, no longer committed to the walls of the Temple, but a living community reaching out to its members, going into their homes, into their places of work, in an outreach program of great spiritual and physical proportions. No

124 Living as a Jew longer will our synagogues merely be the service stations where members come when they need us, but whence we take our spiritual nurture and bring it to our people ...: • members who are willing and eager to study; • members who are willing to commit themselves; • members who will not shrink from calling themselves partners in a holy enterprise; • members who will take the risk of shaping their environment to the social and physical visions of Judaism; • members who will not flinch when they are called to piety; • members who will come forward and say: 'Since I want to be a Jew, I want to live as one.' I must because I want, and I want because I must. What makes the way of success so difficult is freedom itself. We have wished for it, and now that we have it we don't know how to deal with it. Matters are no different in Israel, where secularism is even more rampant than here, if that is possible - it is certainly more vocal there. Here, there is still a kind of regretful bow in the direction of synagogue worship, but not much more - certainly not in the Reform movement. We have not managed to counter the freedom to abstain from prayer with the obligation to pray, imposed on us because we are children of the covenant. We haven't yet battled the core question of autonomy versus authority, which is at the centre of all freedoms. Which leads me to believe (and hope) that - at least for the time being - Reform itself is in a state of transition, a lengthy but temporary holding pattern. Saying so represents a kind of policy: hold on, for once we have managed to deal with freedom, we will also rediscover the need for obligation and authority. But verbalizing it does not free us from considering how frail the spiritual underpinning of our temples has become. The encouraging aspect in this discouraging contemplation is the growing recognition that obtaining a modicum of Jewish knowledge lies in our reach, more readily so than acquiring a sense of the Holy. Our times are hospitable to learning, and in Jewish tradition study of our sources has always occupied a cen-

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tral place. The study of Torah, we have been taught, is as important as all other mitzvot, because when we study we will be led to become mitzvah-conscious. I believe that, and I am therefore happy that at Holy Blossom, under the leadership of Dow Marmur and John Moscowitz, learning has burgeoned, and that in other congregations, too, as well as on the Internet, Torah study has struck new roots. This gives me hope that knowledge will indeed be the ground on which we shall eventually meet a demanding God again. The reader of these ruminations may wonder why, with the problems Reform Judaism has, I do not embrace Orthodoxy, which lacks them. The answer has less to do with my religious observance than with my intellectual apperceptions. I cannot accept Orthodoxy's assertion that the written Torah is the literal, unalterable expression of God's will, and that the oral tradition reflects it accurately. For me, Torah is the result of Israel's search for God, a long process wrapped in the mysteries of time, which continues in our day. Also, my mindset prevents me from asserting that I have hold of Truth. This is my weakness as well as my strength, and I choose to bank on the latter's enticing potential. Though certain Orthodox circles would like to read the likes of me out of the fold, I will keep alive my vision of Judaism as a religion open to different interpretations.

CHAPTER NINE

Reform Judaism in Search of Self

The Patrilineal Question

In the early 1980s a committee of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR) had been quietly meeting to consider a vital question of Jewish status. At the 1979 convention of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC), held in Toronto, Rabbi Alexander Schindler, president of the UAHC, had proposed - and the media made much of it - that in mixed marriages Jewish fathers had been disfranchised and needed to be given their proper acknowledgment. According to halachah} it is the mother who determines the status of her children. If she is Jewish, so are they; if she is not, neither are they. It is immaterial who the father is. Thus a child born to a gentile mother is considered a gentile in every respect - regardless of whether or not the father is Jewish. Consequently, Orthodox and Conservative synagogue and day schools would routinely reject children of a mixed marriage when the mother was gentile, while Reform rabbis rarely made a fuss about genealogical questions, with their sometimes-odd results.2 If the child would then proceed to bar/bat mitzvah, some rabbis would consider the ceremony equivalent to conversion, while others would require that formal conversion precede it. Meanwhile, it was enough that parents enrolled their child in order to afford it a Jewish education. Now Schindler raised this quiet practice to a matter of princi-

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pie. He chose 'patrilineality,' as the matter became known, as his key concern at the biennial convention of the UAHC in Toronto, in 1979. The halachah of giving overriding importance to the mother had to yield to gender equivalence, he declared. Clearly, this would also achieve a more pragmatic goal: it would give Jewish status to all children born of mixed marriages. Such unions were on the increase, and many Jews - Reform and otherwise had grandchildren who were traditionally considered gentiles and for whom conferral of Jewish status would be most welcome. Thus, aside from the halachic arguments in favour of updating the halachah, such a move would engender distinct political capital. Schindler pleaded that public acknowledgment of patrilineality was both needed and honourable. His proposal received thunderous applause from the audience, which was made up overwhelmingly of lay persons. They were ready to give Schindler's proposal their ready assent. But there were also others in the audience, especially rabbis, who were appalled at the prospect of blithely setting aside a time-honoured halachah, the history of which was quite unknown to the majority of the delegates. Within the UAHC there has long been, and still is, a discernible and not inconsiderable anti-clerical streak, and it was ready to assert itself. A resolution to affirm patrilineality was about to be passed. Rabbi Joseph Glaser was sitting next to me, and he, always the stalwart defender of rabbinic rights, jumped to his feet and tackled both the president of the Union and the groundswell of patrilineal support. He made a passionate appeal to let rabbis first of all wrestle with this problem, for Jewish status was after all a matter of rabbinic definition. This matter, he averred, touched on complex historical and social issues, which should be thoroughly examined by Reform rabbis and not be holusbolus voted on at a congregational convention. He promised that the CCAR would deal with the matter and report back to the UAHC at one of its forthcoming conventions. Joe's intervention prevailed, though few could have foretold how deeply the matter would eventually divide our rabbinate. After all, were

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we not all doing it? Why should our discussions change things dramatically? Subsequently, a committee was established by the CCAR, chaired by Herman Schaalman, who in 1972 had also headed the committee on rabbis' officiating at mixed marriages and had helped to steer the highly divisive issue to a compromise. I was a member of the Patrilineal Committee and attended several of its meetings. It was my impression that most of those in attendance had already made up their minds on the matter but then, perhaps so had I. Professor Ben Zion Wacholder of Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion was our resource person, and he was certainly impressive.3 He supported Schindler's initiative with historical arguments that helped to convince the undecided. In the course of formulating the report, I tried, unsuccessfully, for a different approach. It was my suggestion that we should begin by saying something along the following lines: 'The child who has a Jewish father is clearly halfjewish by descent, and therefore has a claim on becoming fully Jewish. We desire to maximize the opportunity of developing the Jewishness of the child.' I no longer remember the precise formulation I proposed, but the intention was to create a statement for which we would have the greatest support and blunt the expected bitter reaction of the non-Reform community. We were dealing with Jewish status, an issue affecting everybody. My position found little support. At the 1982 New York convention of the CCAR, Herman now president of the Conference - presented the committee's report. It ended by proposing a resolution that read as follows: 'Where only one of the parents is Jewish, the Jewishness of the child is derivable from the Jewish parent, and is expressed by participation in Jewish life.'4 The resolution was introduced by a series of speakers, all of whom disagreed about it to some degree, and after lively discussion it was referred back to committee. I pushed for a formulation that would give a limited role to the Jewish father by declaring that his child should not be considered a total goy and

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had, in fact a right to enter a process leading to conversion. This was nothing more or less than what we all had been doing, and I urged the committee not to disturb our fragile relationship with other movements by making declarations that would create a new definition of Jewishness. Once more, I was in the minority. The matter came again to a vote at the Los Angeles convention of 1983. The patrilineal declaration adopted there did two things: it deprived the Jewish mother of the right to give her child unequivocal Jewish status, as provided by the traditional halachah; and it balanced this diminution by granting her child, like that of a gentile mother and Jewish father, a presumptive status of Jewishness, which could be established by appropriate and timely public and formal acts of identification with the Jewish faith and people.5 I rose during the discussion to ask Herman Schaalman, as the chair of the committee, whether a vote for the resolution was meant to endorse also the preamble. He agreed that it was, whereupon I continued: 'If so, Mr. President, then is it not true that the first sentence of this document must be taken into serious consideration? I will read it for you: "The purpose of this document [including the operative clause] is to establish the Jewish status of children of mixed marriages [apparently only] for the Reform Jewish community of North America." In other words, we are now dealing with Jewish children in North America, and only with Reform Jewish children. Is that the intent?' The chair responded: 'That is the intent.'6 I had hoped that this intervention might demonstrate the folly of the proposed resolution, giving North American Reform children one kind of status and children of mixed marriages elsewhere a different one. Could we possibly redefine Jewishness in this manner, declaring it acceptable to have children recognized as Jews in one place and not in another? But the majority pressed ahead and approved the resolution in a slightly amended form, which remained unacceptable to me and a fair number of others.7 But there was more to it than the phrasing of the resolution. What bothered me as much was the air of triumphalism that we displayed. The tenor was: 'The others don't care about us, why

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should we care about them? We do what we think is right, and if they don't like it, too bad.' That sentiment had a logical startingpoint. The principle of the father's playing a role in determining the child's status was and is unquestionably sound, for the old sociological-political reasons that led to the present definition are no longer applicable today. Both parents now have equal rights regarding their children, and in divorce suits judges increasingly award custody to fathers. But simply overriding two millennia of Jewish history was the wrong way to approach the problem. It turns out that triumphalism has another side, for the Orthodox are today taking their revenge, and it is they who now simply disregard us and declare us heretical or dangerous or irrelevant. To be sure, patrilineality did not bring this about, but it confirmed the Orthodox in their attitude (see more below). I left the meeting greatly depressed. I saw difficult days for our movement. It was truly an irony that I was elected president of the CCAR at this very convention, for it had become the custom to advance the vice-president. Much later, when Dow Marmur and I discussed my role at that convention, he mused that if I had refused the presidency under such circumstances it would have made a real difference to the movement and might have turned it in another direction, away from its meandering all over the Jewish landscape, responding all too often to perceived modern imperatives. A bold move such as that might have stopped the discussion in its track and reminded the convention how radical a step it was about to take. That might have delayed the polarization, but in the long run it would probably not have made a bit of difference. In any case, it never occurred to me to do this. Having accepted the presidency I was now in the uncomfortable position of having to exercise damage control, for throughout much of the non-Reform community the outcry about patrilineality was loud and getting louder. It fell to me to explain the resolution to others, even though I made it clear every time that I personally was opposed to it. I did not do badly at the task, first

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at Brandeis-Bardin Institute, where I was lecturing,8 and later in Miami, where I addressed the annual convention of the (Conservative) Rabbinical Assembly (RA). I was much moved when the Assembly gave me a standing ovation and discovered to my surprise that there were Conservative colleagues who supported the patrilineal doctrine for their own movement. Among them were luminaries such as Harold Schulweis and the executive vice-president, Wolfe Kelman (now deceased). In the ensuing vote about sticking with the traditional matrilineal principle, Schulweis and company were roundly defeated. RA and CCAR were now officially opposed on a fundamental principle. In New York, Rabbi Joseph Glaser and I called on the leadership of the Rabbinical Council of America (RCA). In those days it represented the mainstream of North American Orthodoxy and participated in the Synagogue Council of America, where Reform, Conservative, Orthodox, and Reconstructionist leaders, lay and rabbinic, met to promote common ideals. (Times have changed; religious polarization has brought about the demise of the Council.) Joe and I met with RCA's president, Gilbert Klaperman, and Joe's counterpart, Binyamin Walfish, whom I knew from earlier days in Minnesota. We had a cordial conversation, and I explained what the CCAR had done, and what had led to it. Still, as with the Conservatives, the differences between us — great in any case — had already moved into the public arena, where the Orthodox had attacked us bitterly and had accused us of altering the very nature of Jewish identity. 'From now on,' Klaperman warned us, 'the differences between us will become a chasm, and some day we may have to set up a registry for marriageable Jews, whose lineage we can trust.' It is tempting to speculate whether all this would have happened if the CCAR had not embarked on the patrilineal venture. In retrospect, had the Reform movement rejected the redefinition of Jewish status, we would not have given the Orthodox a perfect pretext for depicting us as having moved beyond the edge of the community. This was especially true in Israel, but extended also to places such as Toronto - even though Reform rabbis both there and here rejected the patrilineal decision and

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stuck with the halachic norm. But in the long run the course of intra-Jewish relations would probably have been the same. Polarization was not new, and with Orthodoxy regnant in Israel and feeling its muscle in North America, its right wing was clearly on the way of going it alone and forswearing all association with other groups. The British model of total non-cooperation was already in the making. The 1996 elections in Israel provided the religious parties with additional power, and for the time being the die is cast: Reform (and, with it, Conservatism) are targets for further discriminatory action and on the way to being declared altogether beyond the Jewish pale.9 There was more fall-out from the resolution. It deepened the growing ideological split in our own movement between those who felt that Reform was entitled to reshape Judaism in accordance with its own insights, regardless of the k'lal,10 and those of us who were determined not to break the Jewish continuum and tried to wean Reform from its radical bent. When, at the 1996 convention in Philadelphia, civil same-sex marriage was approved by our colleagues without any serious discussion, both the internal and the external splits were deepened. We were separating ourselves more and more from the rest of our people and at the same time increasing the ideological tension between Reform's left and right wings. The fact that at the same time we were growing in numbers does not necessarily give this development history's stamp of approval. It simply means that we are gathering to our movement both those who cannot find acceptance elsewhere and those who see in us the perfect vehicle for considering religious particularity secondary to the prevalent view of the cultural mainstream, which treats religious differences as fairly irrelevant. All of this occurs at a time when it becomes increasingly clear that Conservatism and Reform belong together. Historically, Conservatism arose at the end of the nineteenth century as the conservative wing of the Reform movement, and today - when a united voice is needed to counterbalance the growing strength of Orthodoxy - our opposition is divided and foundering on the shoals of patrilineality and interfaith and same-sex marriages.

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(On my judicial ruling that civic pensions should indeed be granted to same-sex partners, see chapter 4, above). The Limits of Freedom

The direction of the Reform movement during the last twentyfive years has thus tended both towards isolation in the treatment of Jewish status and marriage and back towards the centre of Jewish life in our re-emphasis on mitzvot and ritual. But during these years, when much of the program of our movement was defined by Alex Schindler, we seem to have stressed outreach (to attract non-Jews) over inreach (to make Jews more Jewish). The outreach emphasis has tended to stretch the borders of Jewish tradition further and further, while inreach has pressed for greater attention to limits and for the need to preserve the bonds with tradition. The Responsa Committee of the CCAR has in some ways been the bell-wether of this struggle. In every nation, constitutions need laws to flesh them out, and laws need a judiciary to interpret their range and application. Jews, as a religious nation, have not been different. Torah has been our constitution, and the Sanhedrin of old was for a while the law-giving authority, to be replaced in time by rabbinic academies, where votes were taken and the law was thereby established. With the spread of Diaspora no authoritative institutions remained, and religious guidance devolved on leading scholars, who, by the authority of their acknowledged learning, helped to shape Jewish custom into law. There were differences between east and west, between Sephardim and Ashkenazim, but the very process (along with a common theology) guaranteed cohesion. Rabbis gave formal answers to questions of observance and thereby assumed functions similar to those of secular courts. The more famous the scholar, the more authoritative his answers, which became known as responsa (teshuvot}. In the twelfth century CE, Moses Maimonides was the regnant authority, and his compilation of what constituted Jewish law and prac-

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dee became a major guide for his people in all their habitations. Four hundred years later, the law was updated by Joseph Caro in Palestine, with notes by Moses Isserles in Poland. From then on the Shulchan Arukhl} became the accepted book on what a Jew had to do to lead a Jewish life pleasing to God. It remains to this day the cornerstone of Orthodoxy. The Shulchan Arukh is its inerrant code, and whatever development is being considered must be shown to be in consonance with it. In sharp contrast, one of the principles of early Reform was the belief that, while Torah could not be amended because of its divine origin, rabbinic law was not subject to the same restriction. Thus, while the ancients could declare even certain Torah laws inapplicable because of changed circumstances,12 Reformers applied the same right to later rabbinic interpretations, of which many rules in the Shulchan Arukh were the prime examples. While in this first period of Reform (in the early nineteenth century) its leaders always asked whether new proposals had rabbinic precedent, the next generation made modernity its chief rule, and rabbinic precedent something that could be safely disregarded. Yet there was always another stream, which regarded such precedent as worthy of serious attention. Its proponents wanted Reform to be the legitimate outgrowth of Jewish evolution, rather than a discontinuous mutation. The Karaites of a thousand years ago were such a sectarian variant and in time became separated from the Jewish people.13 The Orthodox establishment in Israel would like nothing better than to have Reform go the way of the Karaites. If we would not insist on being legitimate Jews we would receive generous government grants, just like Muslims, Bahais, and Christians.14 Reform has stubbornly resisted this trend, even though radical elements in our midst are marginalizing us increasingly. To be sure, they do it in the name of high ideals and say, 'We are the party of Amos, Micah and the Second Isaiah, who put social justice ahead of ritual. We are the true Jews when we follow them rather than those who pay attention to outmoded conceptions and practices that offend the modern spirit.'

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Aside from the fact that such an interpretation of the Prophets is a shallow exaggeration that takes attractive and quotable texts out of context,15 it makes pronouncements of the Canadian (or American) civil liberties organizations its major guides. I happen to be a member of such groups and pay my dues to them, for I approve of their general thrust in an ever more restrictive social environment, but in other than strictly technical legal issues I base my consideration first on my religious principles and thus bring to it definitive priorities that are not necessarily congruent with current civil liberties policy. Regrettably, for more years than I care to count, our Reform movement has been an all but automatic mouthpiece of such organizations and, in the United States, a virtual adjunct of the Democratic party.16 Its representatives regularly have a spot on the programs of the UAHC conventions, and on at least one occasion I can recall, not a single Republican representative was given a place in proceedings where political issues were being discussed.17 It so happens that I have never voted Republican, but I have always considered it a basic rule of Reform Judaism that a rational discussion requires one to hear all sides of the argument. Even more important, resolutions of the CCAR's Committee on Justice and Peace rarely mentioned Jewish teaching as their starting-point, and even when they did, the connection appeared more as a bow to tradition than its authentic outgrowth. I was therefore very glad to have that committee ask me in the early 1990s - when I was serving as chair of the Responsa Committee for a Reform responsum on nuclear war. Regardless of the merit of our answer, to ask us altogether was Reform at its truest. Which brings me to a discussion of the Responsa Committee itself. Responsa

Our movement, even in its most libertarian period (from 1885 to 1935), never altogether abandoned all references to tradition. Acknowledged scholars answered questions, as they had

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always been answered, by making the process of responding a faithful journey through the mass of traditional literature. Rabbis such as Gotthard Deutsch, Kaufmann Kohler, and Jacob Zvi Lauterbach were luminaries of their time, but-with Reform still in its radical phase - their impact was limited. This changed after the 1940s, when Rabbi Solomon B. Freehof s writings made responsa literature a full-fledged, though underused, category in our movement. He and his successor as the chair of the Responsa Committee, Rabbi Walter Jacob, issued rulings that became standard references for us and gave Reform halachah a sound foundation. Unfortunately, only rabbis use them, though now, with Internet possibilities, there is hope for a significant growth of our public. When Walter was slated to be president of the Conference he could no longer lead the Responsa Committee, and Joe Glaser urged me to take it over from him. I hesitated for I had none of the needed library resources at hand (an enormous number of specialized books were required),18 nor had my training prepared me for such a responsible enterprise. Still, the task appealed to me, for it had the potential of stemming the tide of hefkerut - the licence of doing what one pleases. If the Responsa Committee had fulfilled any function in the past, it made sure that not everything was permitted, though the limits of our vaunted autonomy were never explained. Much scholarship was adduced to show how previous generations had handled a specific problem, and if it was possible to find someone who had given a lenient answer we were likely to accord it full credit and say: 'Here is a precedent, and we follow it, even though regnant Jewish tradition does not.' I wanted to take the process further but could not see my way to assuming leadership of the committee. I finally made a concession: if someone could be persuaded to serve as vice-chair, someone who had a full command of the rabbinic sources and could lead me through their maze, I would take on the job. When indeed they found that person in a young Talmud professor from the Hebrew Union College - Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), I said yes. Mark Washofsky was precisely the

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person I needed: knowledgeable, a good teacher and writer, and - to make it even better - gifted with a delightful sense of dry humour. In the course of the last seven years we have become co-workers and friends, and he is now the new chair of the committee, while I continue to function as a kind of honorary counsel. Solomon Freehof had followed a particular way of handling questions. He examined the past for precedents and then proceeded to say either 'We follow the same rule,' or 'We don't do it any more.' In neither instance would he adduce elaborate reasons for doing or not doing. Often he himself adhered to another old guideline, 'See what the people do.' It meant looking at the Reform movement's general practice - which was more often not doing than doing. He rarely explained why we should follow his advice. I had long felt that in the long run this amounted to giving a hechsher (licence or permission) to our disregard of tradition. Jewish scholarship, it seemed to me, had to be channelled more productively and more positively. Mark and I therefore agreed on a very simple process: Start by asking, 'How would tradition handle this question?' Then proceed to ask, 'Is there any reason why Reform should do it differently?' Whatever our response, we had to validate it by reference to Reform principles and precedent, especially if we chose to depart from tradition. In that case we would have to demonstrate thoroughly that doing so was required by an official pronouncement of our movement or for some other cogent reason. Neglect and ignorance were not acceptable justifications. In following this procedure we also had to keep in mind that we were an arm of the CCAR, bound by its resolutions and pronouncements. We were not a 'Warren Burger court,' freely interpreting the law and going beyond it when it appeared appropriate to do so. I was enough of a constructionist to feel that we had to follow precise guidelines if possible and not march off in all directions at once. The decisions rendered under my chairmanship are slated for publication some time this year.

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The Humanist Issue A case in point was the application of Beth Adam, The Cincinnati Congregation for Humanistic Judaism, to join the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) as a member. Alex Schindler, then president of the Union, inquired of me (in my capacity as chair of the Responsa Committee, I presumed) whether the application should be accepted. I did not know at the time that he had also asked Professor Eugene Mihaly for an opinion (and perhaps others as well). I composed the answer after studying all the materials that Beth Adam had sent me at my request. I found them to omit any and all references to a supernatural power. Consequently, the congregation's liturgy did not include what we consider the basic formulations of the Jewish faith: Shema, Barechu, Kiddush, Kaddish, and so on, and of course would have none of the most popular songs, such as Yigdal, Adon Olam, and Ein keloheinu. The congregation's statement declared unambiguously: 'The use of prayer in services would be incompatible with such a theological system.' Without God, prayer makes no sense, and the Ten Commandments too made their exit, as did the concept of covenant. Still, Beth Adam called its belief structure 'Judaism,' which struck me as something of an oxymoron. Does any of this fit with Reform Judaism as we have known it, the kind of religious movement that the UAHC, according to its by-laws, is pledged to uphold? The natural source of what constitutes Liberal Judaism is found in the three platforms that have been adopted by our movement, in 1885, 1935, and 1976. All three declare that the cornerstone of Reform is God - no ifs, ands, or buts. For the majority of the committee, and for me, the answer was therefore clear: Beth Adam's objectives were outside the realm of historical Reform Judaism.19 Professor Mihaly issued a counter-responsum that took us severely to task, and this in turn caused Professor Michael Meyer, the respected historian of Reform Judaism (and not a member of our committee), to issue a thirteen-point critique of Mihaly's opinions. He concluded by say-

Reform Judaism in Search of Self 139 ing: 'What is being asked [by Beth Adam] is that the Reform movement, through the act of admission, make the symbolic statement: faith or lack thereof is wholly irrelevant to Reform Judaism. I am not in favor of making that statement.' Mihaly's elegant and elaborate pamphlet was picked up by the National Jewish Post and Opinion. It reprinted large parts of his argument and in addition painted me as a person who tried to stifle freedom of thought.20 In a letter to the editor (my old friend Gabriel Cohen, whose assent to the editorial surprised me no end) I wrote in part: I was shocked to read your editorial ... where you call the rejection of the application for membership in the UAHC 'thought control.' ... Let me draw a parallel: Someone who believes that democracy is for the birds applies for citizenship in the United States. It is one thing for someone who [already] belongs to develop ideas that are in clear contrast to the framework of the country; it is another to admit people who oppose the very foundations of the group they want to join. They will be rejected. Do individuals in our congregations hold ideas like those professed by the members of Beth Adam? Unquestionably. Atheism may be an option for individuals, but it is not a legitimate option for Reform Judaism as a movement. The answer which our Responsa Committee gave had to do with the Union and the nature of Reform Judaism, and in no way with thought control. You know of course that, meanwhile, the Trustees of the Union have overwhelmingly rejected the application. I shall be glad to send you the responsum that we issued.21 The rejection of the congregation's application by the trustees of the Union made national headlines. It was clear that our position had wide lay and rabbinic support, which holds that there are limits to freedom and that to recognize this constitutes the first step towards recapturing the spirit of the first Reformers and making our movement once again relevant to the lives of our people.

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Reform, Conservatism, and Orthodoxy

Reform Judaism has been harbouring two sharply differing views of itself. One - represented in their different ways by Mihaly and by Reines - believes that Reform means individual freedom, including the freedom to disregard the continuum of Jewish faith. The other, of which I have been a staunch advocate, holds that Reform without communal boundaries is bound for dissolution and oblivion. (This division is not unique to our movement. It has surfaced in other social areas, where it has been described as a conflict between liberalism and commmunitarian obligation, and without the latter, democracy is selfdestructive. Amitai Etzioni, an Israeli by birth, has pioneered this idea in the Western world, reflecting thereby the pioneering spirit of Israel's early settlers.22) Both of these views of Reform Judaism have strong partisans, one driving us away from k'lal and one attempting to bind us to it. Knowing the partisans on both sides, I have concluded that they are essentially not compatible with one another. We thus have today, in fact, two Reform movements, for which until now the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR) has provided a common roof. More than one observer has remarked that, if it were not for the rabbinic placement service23 and the rabbinic pension plan, we would long ago have split in two. But sooner or later even these pragmatic bonds will not manage to hold us together, and two issues will be the bell-wethers. One is a coming revision of the intermarriage resolution of 1972, and the other is the proposed recognition of same-sex unions as equivalent to the Jewish concept of holiness.24 In 1972 the CCAR reiterated that marriage between two Jews was the norm and that officiating at a mixed marriage was therefore discouraged. (The resolution went on to advise what should be done if in fact such unions had been concluded.) At the time about 40 per cent of Reform rabbis did officiate at such marriages, and that number has risen steadily. To a large extent, the reason is one of external pressures. In many congregations it is

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now common practice (despite all rules to the contrary) to inquire whether a rabbi seeking the post is ready to officiate at mixed marriages; to do so becomes a condition for engagement. The congregations that do not make this requirement are becoming fewer, and rabbis who do not want to so officiate find themselves increasingly shut out from desirable employment. What will the CCAR do about this? It will probably overturn the 1972 resolution and say something to this effect: We would rather have marriages between two Jews; but rabbis should not hesitate (and are hereby permitted) to officiate at mixed marriages. The resolution will pass, especially if couched in ambiguous terminology, and the fat will be in the fire. What are those to do whose conscience forbids them to officiate? They will seek for some other way of creating a rabbinic/congregational environment that will accommodate their needs. However, that split is not inevitable, for there are ways of bridging the seemingly unbridgeable chasm. At present only the outlines of this development are in sight. In biblical days there was an intermediate status between being a full member of the community and being a stranger. This status was called ger toshav, which is best translated as 'resident alien.' Ger toshav combined belonging ('resident') with no belonging ('alien') and denoted a stranger who had settled in the community and expected to stay but had not as yet embraced Judaism. Such a person had most rights, both civil and religious, but was excluded from some privileges. The rabbis held that the category of ger toshav disappeared along with the Jubilee Year. But I hope that we can revive it, which would make it possible to proceed in some ways like this: AJew has decided to establish a permanent home with a nonJew. The latter agrees that any children they will have will be raised as Jews. He/she has not excluded conversion to Judaism but has as yet made no commitment. I foresee a ceremony that will not be the kiddushin we now celebrate and will not have that name, though it will have some of its features and will confer on their union a related but not identical status. It will signal unambiguously and publicly that the couple will raise their children as

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Jews and give them a Jewish education, and add to it other affirmations that might be suitable. To arrive at such a venue will take much research and imagination, but I think that the climate for it is right and the need pressing. It is one hurdle we might surmount and thereby avoid drifting farther apart from each other.23 The other divisive issue is same-sex marriage, and I believe that some similar strategy must emerge. Here too one side wants to give the union of homosexual partners the status of kiddushin enjoyed by heterosexual partners. I am opposed to that, despite the fact that in a widely publicized case - sitting as an adjudicator in human rights court - I have helped to secure full pension OA rights for same-sex partners. That was, however, a Canadian legal decision, framed in a context different from Jewish tradition. I acknowledge that being gay or lesbian is essentially a genetic predisposition, and I respect the commitment of two homosexuals to live together in permanent union. But, as in the matter of patrilineality, I am opposed to a resolution of the CCAR in this regard. The asseveration of principle that gay and lesbian activists desire will divide us even more and lead to yet another breach in the already fragile fabric of k 'lalyisrael. I fully support a recent Reform responsum that deals with that issue. Its rational tone exhibits the two opposing views and concludes that, while the majority endorses the kind of position that I have adumbrated, the two opposing sides lack a common language to argue their case and therefore cannot come to a consensus.27 But should our radical left wing prevail and bring about a resolution that will make commitment ceremonies part of the official Reform structure, it will hasten the realignment of the Jewish religious spectrum. I say 'hasten,' for that development may occur over the long haul in any case. A little more than one hundred years ago the name 'Conservative' meant the conservative wing of the Reform movement. It separated itself from the spirit of the 1885 Pittsburgh Platform and, with the help of traditionally oriented Reformers, established the Jewish Theological Seminary. For years thereafter the Seminary exhibited its Reform origins in that its presi-

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dent was Louis Marshall, a member (and at some time president) of Temple Emanu-El in New York, the city's premier Reform congregation. At the time of the First World War the Conservatives formed a separate movement under the leadership of Cyrus Adler and Rabbi Solomon Schechter. Its members came from Orthodoxy and new immigration, and during the following two generations Conservatism became the largest segment of affiliated North American Jewry. Today, with the vast majority of all Ashkenazi Jews tracing their origins to eastern Europe, and Reform's German genesis having lost its significance, Reform now obtains its new adherents primarily from the Conservatives and has recently begun to outnumber them. This comes at a time when Conservatism too is rent by two opposing tendencies. One rabbinic faction (which I will dub 'left') lives in the tradition of its Reform origins: it innovates, though it does so 'conservatively.' The ordination of women rabbis is its flagship. The kind of crisis evoked in 1997 by the introduction of a 'conversion bill' in the Israeli Knesset will hasten its alliance with Reform. The other faction (dubbed 'right') abhors these forays into modernity as imitations of Reform and advocates positions that yesterday would have made an association with mainstream Orthodoxy a real possibility. The right-wingers have already formed an organization of their own and call it 'Traditional Judaism.' Though most of them have not as yet resigned their memberships in the Rabbinical Assembly, they may do so in the future - or, if they are by that time in the majority of their movement, may force the left-leaning members to resign of their own. Clearly, this conundrum is the same as that of Reform. In both movements vested interests stand in the way of realignment: institutions and their multiple assets - seminaries, placement procedures, affiliation with congregational unions, rabbinic organizations, and the like. All of these have their own lives and are not simply disposable. Certainly any faction will think ten times before it lets the opposition inherit everything. Therefore the actual process will probably look somewhat different. There will be crossings-over and loose associations with new names that

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rabbis will join, and then lay people will follow with similar groupings. Right-wing Reform and left-wing Conservative synagogues will undertake joint projects, and on the local level new rabbinic and lay-rabbinic organizations will arise. In other words, I foresee a gradual shift in emphases and more cooperation with some Conservatives, and less with others. Meanwhile, our own left wing will go its own way; it currently commands a significant portion of the CCAR, but that may change. Liberalism has often sought its salvation in radicalism, which in the present climate of hejkerut works all too well. Our future, however, lies elsewhere, and I return to that topic below. What of Orthodoxy? It not only exhibits the same left-right split, its old structures have already undergone serious change. When I started in the rabbinate, Orthodoxy was an 'also-ran,' a portion of the religious spectrum that in North America did not seem to have a future. Reformers indulged in triumphalism, and the growing Conservative movement in over-confidence. But Israel has made all the difference. There, Orthodoxy is, so to speak, the state religion, having been assured its hegemony by the status quo rule, inherited from the British Mandate.28 In addition, the worldwide rise of fundamentalism has affected Jews as well and has encouraged many to embrace Orthodoxy in its various forms. The Lubavitch Hasidim, guided by the organizing genius and stature of their late Rebbe, have made their appearance in all parts of the globe. The result has been a marked shift to the right in all of Orthodoxy, and the middle ground formerly occupied by the Rabbinical Council of America has shrunk perceptibly, with ever more rabbis and congregants moving to the right. Two generations ago, Yeshivah University in New York was hospitable to divergent views; it no longer is. Orthodox political parties in Israel are equally affected: Mafdal (the National Religious Party), representing the old mainstream, is now a minority compared to the right wing, occupied by Shas, Degel HaTorah, and Agudath Yisrael. Orthodox leaders who have bucked the tide and stand for religious pluralism have made themselves suspect in the eyes of their own movement and are deemed 'not truly Orthodox.' The

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two outstanding examples that come to mind are Rabbis David Hartman and Irving Greenberg. The former, originally from Montreal and now head of the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, has become a chief promoter of religious pluralism everywhere, but to the official rabbinate in Israel he is a persona non grata. Unfortunately, in the Jewish state the marriage of religion and politics has debased both. It has made Judaism anathema to wide sections of the population and thereby robbed the nation of religion's healing power, and it has corrupted Orthodoxy by granting it political clout. Similarly Greenberg, founder of the national education network CLAL in the United States, has been extraordinarily successful in attracting Jews across the board to the common cause of Torah, but most of his Orthodox colleagues no longer consider him one of their own. During the first half of the twenty-first century the realignment of religious forces, to which I have referred, will probably produce the following spectrum in North America. Reform's left wing will marginalize itself and further dilute its Jewish particularity. Reform's right wing will form an alliance with Conservatism's left wing and will become the movement of choice for the largest number of Diaspora Jews. Conservatism's right wing will ally itself with Orthodoxy's vanishing left wing and possibly reinvigorate it thereby. If not, Orthodoxy's old right wing will become its mainstream. It will have various shades of strict observance, for there will always be those who will be even more strict. The old Orthodox ate kosher food; the new Orthodoxy will consume only glatt kosher edibles; and there will be still others to whom the oft-told story applies: One of their stalwarts dies and on arrival in the olam ha-ba (the vague Jewish term for Paradise) is told that he is invited to a heavenly banquet with the choicest viands. He asks, as he did on earth, who certified that the food was kosher and is told that none other than the Almighty had attested its fitness. Tn that case,' says the newcomer, 'I would prefer a dish of fruit.' I hope that in this maze of countervailing forces the kind of Reform to which I subscribe will be at its best. It may of course

146

Living as a Jew

go by another name, but I hope that it will never lose its spirit of inquiry nor its close bond with our people. It will rediscover the presence of the Living God and foster learning and commitment, together with social awareness and action. The Jewish Diaspora will probably shrink in numbers, but it is my hope that smaller numbers may mean greater commitment and that the movement to which I have given so much of my life may overcome the challenges that face it. I am encouraged in this hope because the new presidents of the UAHC and HUC-JIR, Rabbis Eric Yoffie and Sheldon Zimmerman, respectively, have repeatedly averred that they intend to embrace that type of vision. My observations about Reform are expressions of worry, care, and love. I want our movement to live up to its full potential. A vibrant Reform movement is necessary for the future of Judaism.

Part Three: At Home and Abroad

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CHAPTER TEN

Magnum Opus

'Nothing Like It Exists ...'

Writers are often asked which of their books they consider their magnum opus. I was never asked that question, certainly not after 1981, when The Torah: A Modern Commentary was published. I had conceived the idea and, after a somewhat uncertain start,1 had contributed four out of the five commentaries and had edited the whole work (which in its popular, one-volume edition numbers 1,787 pages). It had taken me some seventeen years to do it, and it was my desire to finish the project that had led me to give up the congregational rabbinate. I have often wondered why the book has enjoyed such enormous success. Of course, it was the first complete Torah commentary in English since the Hertz Pentateuch and Haftorahs had appeared, in the late 1920s and early 1930s. So much had changed in the Jewish world and in scholarship; especially in North America our people had gone to university and were ready to respond to a book that spoke their language and took their scope of understanding into consideration. Even more important, Reform Jews were ready for learning. The new book managed to reach many of them, and congregations worldwide put it into their pews. (It usually didn't fit too well, because of its bulk, and I know of a number of synagogues that went to the expense of rebuilding their pews to accommodate it.) In addition, there were the reviews. Reviews are known to have

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an immediate impact on the success or failure of a Broadway play or a movie, and somewhat less so on a book. A book's fate depends to a large degree on advertising and word of mouth. But occasionally a rave review will make a difference, and I have no doubt that this was the case with the Torah volume. There were two reasons for it: first, the medium in which this particular critique appeared was Commentary, the most widely read intellectual magazine of that time; and second, the author was Professor Robert Alter, the acknowledged authority in the field of biblical literature. That combination would have been lethal had the review been highly negative, but since it was the exact opposite, it helped to propel the book to an unforeseen level of acceptance. To top it off, this was not a mere review tucked away in the back pages of the journal; it was a full-blown, five-page essay bearing the broad title, 'Reform Judaism and the Bible.'2 Alter's credentials were beyond dispute. He happened not to be a Reform Jew and was quick to comment on the difference between Rabbi Bernard Bamberger's Reform Jewish stance and mine:3 The most striking feature of the Plaut commentary4 as a document of American Reform Judaism in the late 20th century is its refreshingly nonsectarian character. Rabbi Plaut affirms in his preface that the work of the volume 'reflects a liberal point of view,' but there is a deliberate semantic slide from Liberal (capital L) as a synonym for Reform to liberal in the sense of non-dogmatic, empirical, intellectually open ... In fact, the illustration of the volume's liberal character immediately offered in the Preface is the discrepancy in outlook between the Bamberger Leviticus and the rest of the commentary ... [which] does not represent a single orthodoxy (lower case o), something that could also be said of the traditional Miqra'ot Gedolot.5 ... The Plaut commentary tends to present instances of Reform practice as one option that Jews have taken - varieties of Orthodox and Conservative practice are also frequently cited - and that it behooves Jews to consider, whatever choices of observance they themselves make.

Magnum Opus 151 Because Bamberger's and my approaches to Torah shared the pages of the same book, Alter proceeded to compare Bernie's more classical views with mine, and he took occasion to call William W. Hallo's five essays in the book 'models of wide learning and good judgment.' His evaluation of the whole work was extravagantly laudatory. He called it 'a splendid achievement' and added: 'For Jewish readers of the Bible, nothing like it exists in English or indeed in any language.' He concluded by saying: 'With the publication of this commentary, American Reform Judaism has come fully of age, maintaining the independence of its own viewpoints but proffering an imagination of sacred text and national existence that invites the participation of all modern Jews.' That same month another major review appeared, written by Rabbi Robert Gordis, a leader of Conservative Jewry, professor at the Jewish Theological Seminary, editor of the prestigious magazine Judaism, and himself a biblical commentator of great renown. He called the book 'a major event for American Judaism ... a superb embodiment of the new approach to biblical scholarship.' He acknowledged the need for the three levels of interpretation that formed the undergirding of the commentary - the historical, the traditional, and the contemporary - and concluded: 'In a work dealing with thousands of details of text, fact and interpretation, there will obviously be ample room for scholars to differ. But any reservations pale into insignificance before the rich feast for mind and spirit which this great work sets before us.'6 New adult study groups sprang up everywhere to study Torah, and the letters I began to receive made me very happy indeed. They told me of the book having saved their writers for religion and Judaism, for having kindled their love of learning, and the like. While my colleagues generally did not write me, they did much better: they introduced the book to their people and taught courses from it in their congregations or at the universities with which they were affiliated. They invited me to visit their communities, and nearly everywhere I went I found adult study groups whose members felt that they had already established a

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special bond with me. For they owned the book and often brought their copies and had me sign them. In many places the rabbi arranged sales-and-sign opportunities, and none was more successful than one night in San Diego, California, when 120 people contributed their money, and I, my autograph.7 How It All Happened

The commentary was the only full-size book of the twenty-odd I have written that has had the ringing endorsement of the market-place.8 This surprising success - surprising to me as well as to the publisher - engendered certain side-effects. As I wrote in Unfinished Business,9 the idea of creating a Torah commentary had long been a dream of mine. Rabbi Eugene Borowitz, when he was still serving as director of education for the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC), was responsible for my writing a commentary on the biblical book of Proverbs.10 That exercise had stimulated my long-harboured desire to dare write a serious, yet popular, study of the Torah. After a series of articles that I published in the Journal for Reform Judaism^ I felt that I was ready to try my hand at it. The UAHC seemed the likely publisher, and I decided to broach the idea to its president, Rabbi Maurice Eisendrath. We had a special relationship. Unbeknown to me, he had urged Holy Blossom Temple, which he had served between 1928 and 1942, to select me as its rabbi; he was an honoured guest at my installation; and I invited him every year to return to Toronto and preach on Yom Kippur. In 1964 the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR) was holding its annual convention in Atlantic City, and I met with him there, laying my ideas before him. Alex Schindler (then Borowitz's successor as the UAHC's director of education) was wholeheartedly in favour of the project and went with me. When we told Eisendrath that American Jewry had never produced a commentary on the Torah, and that we thought the time had come to do it, he agreed at once and gave Alex authority to proceed. I am happy to acknowledge that without Alex's support the book

Magnum Opus 153 would not have seen the light of day - certainly not under the Union's imprimatur. He set the apparatus in motion and convened the first of a number of working conferences. I was asked to be the editor of the volume and to lead off with a commentary on Genesis. Four other rabbis would handle the other books. But one of them turned back his commission, and so I came to comment on Numbers as well. Then the manuscript on Exodus was returned to the author, and with some reluctance I took on that task as well. The final disappointment was the untimely death of my friend Dudley Weinberg, who had not progressed past an introduction to Deuteronomy - and thus this job, too, fell to me. Only Bamberger had completed his assignment on time. The UAHC had never published a book of this size, and there was, understandably, no clear perception of how the large investment in time and money could be managed. For a while, therefore, the project dragged along, but then a large donation pushed it forward again. Deuteronomy was still to be done, but by this time the process, along with my exacting job as senior rabbi of one of the continent's largest congregations, had begun to exact its toll. I found that I could no longer fruitfully combine scholarly writing with my rabbinic obligations; something had to give. After long deliberation and discussion with my wife, I tendered my resignation from Holy Blossom Temple, the best job any rabbi could have wished for. But finishing the Torah commentary had now become my priority, and in retrospect I know that I made the right decision. I finished Deuteronomy and, as editor of the whole work, proceeded to put the five manuscripts together.12 In 1981 the Commentary was ready for publication in one volume. I was never shown a pre-publication version of the work and was unhappy about a number of its features when it finally appeared. The Hebrew was too small, smaller in fact than the English translation, which carried a subliminal message; and the weekly readings (parashiyot) were only sporadically indicated. I was perplexed to find that neither the spine nor the title page listed me as editor. This was highly unusual. Both the Hertz Pen-

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tateuch and the Soncino commentary listed the editors' names.13 I brought this matter to the attention of the Union's officials, but without success. I was given to understand that the book was to be known as the 'Union Commentary,' and my name on spine or title page would interfere with this policy. My wife was not satisfied and pressed me to talk to Alex Schindler himself. I finally overcame my hesitation and called him. He recognized the justice of my request and was gracious about accommodating me. The fourth printing carried my name on spine and title page. Other, more serious problems went back to the first stages of the project. Earlier Union commentaries had been published in English only, without a Hebrew text.14 The matter was heatedly debated by the committee that had been appointed to oversee the creation and production of the commentary.15 I had naively assumed that the inclusion of the Hebrew text was a given (after all, this was a commentary on the Torah and therefore different), while other members insisted on the 'no-Hebrew' precedent. One of the reasons brought forward was that 'Reform Jews generally don't know Hebrew,' and besides, the te'amim16 would further confuse a public already unprepared to read Hebrew. In the end an unhappy compromise was reached: to print the Hebrew, but without the te'amim. When the time came to set the Hebrew text (desktop printing had not yet come into use), no one could find a printed text without te'amim that could be photo-offset. It simply did not exist. So, someone was engaged for a large amount of money to hand-set it, which inevitably produced many errors for the first edition. Not surprisingly (not to me, anyway), the moment the book appeared, protests from rabbis and lay people alike demanded that the next edition have te'amim. The Union yielded and, for another significant sum, had them set back into the text, and in so doing made many new errors. The third edition had, at last, a proper text, but at what expense and embarrassment! Meanwhile, the acceptance of the book was remarkable.17 One printing followed another (with additional corrections),

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until in 1995 several hundred thousand copies had been sold in all parts of the world.18 Even U.S. president Bill Clinton received a copy.19 We knew that a book of this size and complexity - with Hebrew and English texts and thousands of references - would contain errors aside from the Hebrew text. We did not realize how many there would be. Readers would drop me notes about them, and with every printing we would make corrections. One day, I received a memorable letter from Isaac C. Stein, a Conservative rabbi in Bridgeport, Connecticut. He wrote me that he had spent two years studying the commentary, that he had looked up all the references, and that he was enclosing a list of errors along with a range of suggestions. It was a long list, meticulously prepared, and I acknowledged the benefits of his study in the preface to the fourth printing of the book and eventually had the privilege of meeting this modest and delightful scholar on a lecture visit to his city. One regret remained: the five-volume edition, produced in lovely large print and on fine paper, contains neither the te'amim nor any of the corrections. Also, like the entire first printing, it appeared exclusively in the 'red' edition, which signified that the books were to be read from left to right, as opposed to the 'blue' edition, which opened in the Hebrew way. The new Haftarah Commentary (see below) opens from right to left only, indicating the traditional format and that it is above all a commentary on the original, Hebrew text. Disappointments

It occurred to me to have the commentary translated into Hebrew, in order to give Israelis access to a liberal religious point of view. At the recommendation of Pinchas Peli in Israel,20 I engaged two knowledgeable teachers at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Aviv Meltzer and Mayer Gruber. They translated the text and adjusted some of it so that it would be suitable for the Israeli intellectual environment. Elizabeth and I paid personally for their labours, which stretched over many years, and,

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after being rejected by a number of publishing houses, we received a favourable reception from Koren, whose Hebrew Bibles excel all others in clarity and elegance. Its president was interested, and our negotiations proceeded to the point of drawing up the contract. I made a special trip to Israel in order to sign it and settle a few details. The signing was set for a Sunday morning; my flight back was scheduled for that evening. When I arrived at Keren's office I was handed the document, but, to my amazement and chagrin, found it to contain a phrase to this effect: The Publisher reserves the right to adjust the text where necessary.' Keren's president had been given to understand by the Orthodox establishment that either my text had to be adjusted to fit traditional perceptions or Koren would have to renege on our arrangements. Its failing to comply would mean withdrawal of official support for the firm - a threat that Koren had to take seriously. I went home, greatly dejected, wondering whether the rejections by other publishers could also be traced to official pressure. Through the munificence of Richard Scheuer, one of our movement's stalwarts, the Hebrew edition of Genesis eventually appeared, with Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion listed as publisher. But the College had no distribution facilities, and most of the books have remained in its store rooms. I let the matter rest for some years, then took it up again and enlisted the financial support of some Toronto friends.21 Rabbi Uri Regev, now head of the Religious Action Center in Jerusalem, volunteered to help me, and eventually we found a Tel Aviv publisher of educational materials who was willing to take the plunge. We agreed that I should engage Dr Joseph Roth, an educator who had published biblical textbooks, to adjust the text for high school and college needs. We were ready to go ahead when personal tragedy struck the publisher. His only son died, and soon thereafter he broke off all contact with Roth and me. At this writing, the project is on hold again. I try not to dwell overly much on the prospects or on the enormous expenditure of time and money, and I comfort myself with the thought that Torah

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will outlive me and that some day Israelis will get to see the commentary. After all, the Israeli version is there, ready for the taker. Lately, the new president of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC), Rabbi Eric Yoffie, and the director of the UAHC Press, Seymour Rossel, have been trying to get the project going again, for which I am most grateful. Haftarah Commentary

Haftarah is not, as the euphony may suggest, 'half the Torah.' It is a Hebrew word denoting 'conclusion' and refers in the liturgical setting to a reading from the prophetic books that follows the weekly Torah recitation. It thus 'concludes' the scriptural readings for the particular Sabbath or festival. Frequently the haftarah (plural, haftarof) is assigned to a Bar/Bat Mitzvah who learns to chant or read it as part of his/her celebratory rite. A problem arose when we discussed the inclusion of the haftarot in the Torah Commentary. Unfortunately, in all but a few instances these passages are rather difficult to understand without a suitable explanation. If they too would be commented upon, the whole book would become too bulky to be used in the pew, and it would have to be divided into several volumes. At the time, these alternatives did not appeal to the publisher, and as a compromise the prophetic readings were printed with only a brief, and necessarily insufficient, explanatory introduction to each selection. This shortcoming became ever more troublesome. From time to time I had discussed this matter with officials at the UAHC and had offered to write such a commentary. In 1993, at a convention, I raised the matter again with Rabbi Daniel Syme, then vice-president of the Union. This time he responded with a surprisingly urgent, 'Do it!' The go-ahead came a dozen years after the Torah book had first appeared. Subsequently I met with the new director of the UAHC Press, Seymour Rossel, a former executive of Behrman House Publishers, and the project was launched. We agreed that Rabbi Chaim Stern, the chief liturgist of the Reform move-

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ment, would create a new translation. Also, we would have as our associate a recognized Bible scholar from Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion in the person of S. David Sperling.22 The period from my conversation with Syme until publication was two-and-a-half years. I need to say a word on my collaboration with Chaim Stern. I had long admired him for his liturgical work, for his sensitivity to the nuances of language, and for his poetic formulation of many of our prayers. But I had never come to know him. Now suddenly we were thrown into a close partnership, which turned out better than either of us could have expected.23 We formed a natural team, trusting one another, each one open to criticism and suggestion. Chaim is also a good tennis player, and that was a bonus, for we began to see each other quite often. He invited me repeatedly to be the scholar-in-residence for his congregation in Chappaqua, New York, where I came to lecture more frequently than anywhere else. Chaim, though much younger than I, still belongs broadly to the 'old' generation, while Sperling is the age of our children. However, that gap was narrowed by Sperling's expertise and openness, and I am happy that he will be our partner for the next undertaking as well, the revision of the Torah Commentary, graced with a new translation by Chaim. When Chaim and I first talked about the project, we decided that it would be gender-neutral with regard to the Deity. This raises the whole question of gender-neutral and gender-sensitive writing. Both terms reflect an awareness that in the past the written and spoken word favoured the male gender even when both females and males were being described or referred to. Our Torah Commentary was a child of that past, and even as late as 1978-9, when I finished the book, I had been insensitive to the problem. I cannot remember when I awakened to the need to eliminate 'sexist' preferences from my speech and writing, but once I did I wondered why it had taken me so long. Centuries of male orientation in just about everything had made us overlook the palpable injustice perpetrated on women. Why speak of 'man' and 'he' when we mean humanity and all of us? The shift to gender-sensitive expression was easy for me, and I now bristle

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when I meet old-fashioned discrimination exercised by the spoken or written word. This is a development opposed only by male chauvinists. But when it comes to speaking of God we seem to have entered a different arena. One cannot use the plural, and the 'He/She' escape does not seem to work in this instance. Some rabbis, when they read the prayers, simply say 'God' every time the old text says 'He' when speaking of the Divine, and after a while everyone becomes uncomfortable with the inelegant repetitions. They distort the rhythm and replace it with linguistic boredom. The CCAR finally decided that the only way to solve this pesky problem was to create a service in which the Hebrew remained unchanged, while the English text was gender-neutral when it came to God, and this is precisely what Chaim Stern was asked to do. He brought it off with his usual imagination and poetic sense, and tomorrow's liturgy will be gender-sensitive in every respect. Yet there is opposition, and frequently by well-schooled and well-intentioned people who feel that they are caught between hammer and anvil: on the one hand they would prefer genderneutral texts, but on the other hand they want to respect the Hebrew original, which knows nothing of this newfangled sensitivity. They lean towards the latter sentiment, and I understand their concern. But I think that with a little bit of explanation we can solve their dilemma and persuade them to see the justice of the CCAR's position. No one claims that Torah and prophets saw God as male. In contrast to all ancient mythologies that pictured their gods as male or female super-humans, endowed with sexual proclivities, the Bible does not imagine the Creator of the world in such fashion but rather thinks of God as having no corporeality, and therefore no gender. How then can one express this in Hebrew? Unlike Latin noun endings or German articles, Hebrew knows only of either masculine or feminine endings and pronouns. Therefore, when referring to God, one is forced to use either one or the other form - and in an age (which lasted until yesterday) when society was unabashedly male oriented, God was

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almost always referred to as He. (There were some exceptions, as for instance when God was described as Shekhinah, which is a feminine noun usually rendered '[Divine] Presence.') God was thus 'a man of war' rather than 'a woman of war,' even though there was a female warrior called Deborah who conducted a victorious conflict.24 The lover of our sacred literature should therefore welcome any translation that can manage to overcome this dilemma, without in any wise altering the original. I would like to think that the ancients would have approved of our attempt to acknowledge our new gender sensitivity, for it is precisely what Jewish theology has always required. The launching of the new Haftarah Commentary took place in New York at the end of May 1996, and though the turn-out of the press was minimal, the UAHC Press had stimulated some interesting interviews, prime among them the one by Gustav Niebuhr of the New York Times. In a two-column report he gave a fair and appreciative picture of the book and concluded with a story that I have told often: To make his point that to read intelligently, a person must know context, Rabbi Plaut cited his own experience as a seminary student, fresh from Europe, in 1935. At Hebrew Union College in Cincinnati, where he had gone to study, his fellow students surprised him by showing him a newspaper headline: 'Reds Murder Cardinals.' 'I thought there had been a revolution in Italy,' Rabbi Plaut recalled. In fact, the story under the headline was about a baseball game, Cincinnati's decisive triumph over a rival St. Louis team. His fellow students, the rabbi said, 'wanted to introduce me to American ways.'25

At the invitation of the UAHC, Chaim and I are now planning to redo the Torah Commentary itself. Its scholarship is twenty years out of date, and its make-up leaves much to be desired. Whether or not the Haftarah Commentary will be incorporated is

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to be decided when the work nears completion, and that is still a long way off. Also, there is no full-scale precedent for a gendersensitive English Torah text, which Chaim Stern will create. I have little doubt that this aspect on its own will engender considerable controversy, for we are dealing here not with prophets but with Torah itself. The introduction to that volume will deal extensively with this issue. Meanwhile the project has occasioned an internal 'conflict of interest,' for I have to combine work on the new commentary edition with writing this book. But that quasi-collision has also its benefits, for it is good to change pace and vision once in a while. It gives me some distance for judging what I have written.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Books, et cetera

Short Stories

In 1977 Elizabeth and I spent some weeks in Spain and, for the better part of our stay, occupied a secluded cottage by the Mediterranean. We spent a lot of time walking the beach and, at night, reading by the fire. One evening I took my notebook to hand and started writing a story about us, a whimsical tale about a Torontonian sent forth to study ways and means of how to run other people's lives. His stay in Spain cured him of his plan. The tale, produced in one evening, whetted my appetite for writing more. The result was a slim volume of ten short stories that Malcolm Lester, erstwhile rabbinical student turned publisher, brought out under the title Hanging Threads.1 The stories owe something to two vastly different writers: O'Henry, whose surprise endings had entranced me ever since I learned to read English, and Kafka, whose enigmatic, often open-ended tales I had encountered as a youth. Hence the title, which accurately described the way the stories ended. Malcolm's company was new in the field; the short story genre had not lately enjoyed public favour, and reviews were hard to come by. I was (and remain) a nobody in the Elysian fields of fiction, and starting with short stories granted me no entree. In the few instances when I was noticed I faced a handicap that other raw recruits to the craft don't have: I was a rabbi. Reviewers approached my fiction with scepticism or even palpable prejudg-

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merits. They must have had a sense of the old German proverb, Schuster, bleib bei deinem Leisten, which may be broadly translated as 'Stick with what you know.'2 I soon learned what it meant to have one's writing written off- mostly by media disregard - but that didn't deter me. I found that penning fiction was fun, when other writing often was labour, however satisfying it might be. After the first disappointment I got used to the inattention (or worse), for it happened to me in the non-fiction field from time to time as well. It was admittedly a bit annoying to find one 'reviewer' dismiss my short stories as yet another contribution to the already overcrowded market of Holocaust literature. (Whatever the book is, it is not Sho'ah-centred - far from it.) Whoever composed this critique of Hanging Threads did so obviously without bothering to read it - an example of 'ripping off three parties at the same time: the public, the newspaper, and me. Some time ago an amateur theatre group at Holy Blossom surprised me pleasantly when they turned two of the tales into oneact plays.3 Some day I'll return to writing short stories, and a half-dozen lie in my drawer, anxious to see the light of day.4 As I found out soon enough, all fiction is bordered by realities. Life itself is its limitation, which is to say that fiction has non-fiction as its foundation, and the writer's imagination can stretch it only so far. The Letter That ineluctable dimension became apparent to me when I made the jump from short stories to full-blown novels. My first attempt was The Letter, a story set in Nazi Germany. Even though I had more than a passing acquaintance with its nasty ambience, I had to make sure that relevant historical sources backed up my memory. I couldn't get altogether away from research, but at least I had the freedom of moulding my characters as I saw fit. Or so I thought. It turned out that I was like the sorcerer's apprentice: the people I had created, once they were firmly ensconced on a page, shaped their own personalities and forced me either to go along

164 At Home and Abroad with what they had become or start all over. That of course didn't help, for then any new personae would display the same chutzpah and lead their somewhat independent lives. At first I thought that this was the result of my inexperience in the medium, and then I learned that I was far from alone. But why should I have been surprised? After all, as a rabbi I should have known that after God had created humans they became independent and defiant. Once given free will, they were and are free to disobey the very God who had formed them from the clay of the earth. The parallel is a metaphor, to be sure, but metaphors are often the pathways to understanding. God, one might say, was inexperienced when it came to the creation of humanity and then became disappointed with its performance time after time. Writers of fiction are godlike in this respect, and their characters often have their own ways, away from their creators' original intention. This is what happened to me, and I did the best I could and made adjustments as I went along. The idea for The Letter arose from reading Walter Laqueur's study The Terrible Secret Suppression of the Truth about Hitler's 'Final Solution' (Boston: Little Brown, 1980), which piqued my interest in a historical mystery: how did the Nazis decide on the systematic extermination of the Jews? At the time, scholarly wisdom generally held that physical extermination had not been part of the original Nazi plan, and if it was, as some claim, it was put off until circumstances would make it feasible. The possibility of carrying it out arose in the course of the war, when it could be put into manageable practice. The Wannsee conference chaired by Reinhard Heydrich proceeded with it on the basis of a letter by Hermann Goring.0 An oft-asked question concerns Hitler's part in it. For a plan of such dimensions - all of Europe's Jews were to be killed - the Fat One must have received an order from his boss. If so, what form did it take? Was it oral only (as historians tend to believe), or was it written and destroyed or lost later on? I built my novel on the assumption that there had indeed been a letter to that effect and that it had fallen into the wrong hands, which misstep occasioned a worldwide chase.

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The Letter was brought out by Canada's premier publisher, McClelland and Stewart, with a smashing jacket.6 It attracted movie interest, and I collected some fees for options, and even Charles Israel, one of the industry's best-known script writers, became involved, but nothing more happened. The big money was drying up; there were too many Holocaust stories on film and TV, I was told. Spielberg's Schindler's List had not yet appeared to puncture that assumption. Who knows but that some day my adventure story will be rediscovered by a movie entrepreneur. A complete draft for a sequel to The Letter is also begging for further attention. The publishers to whom I showed it were justified in turning it down, for now that I have the advantage of distance from it I know that much more work needs to be invested in it. Whether I'll do it is another question that I can't answer at this time. The Man Who Would Be Messiah

I committed one other fact/fiction project to paper - the biography of an eighteenth-century pseudo-messiah who brought much excitement and eventually much harm to the Jews. He was Jacob Frank, a thoroughly shady character, who bedazzled the downtrodden Polish Jewish masses. He had come out of nowhere, fooling simple Jews as well as Christian kings, and ended up as a baron in a German castle, leaving behind huge debts and a trail of thousands of disenchanted followers. He was also an adventurer given to sexual excesses that he clothed in theological garb, something no Jew before him had dared to do. Decades earlier I had first encountered Frank in German and Hebrew books, and I found that the more I read about him the more elusive he became. Was he a religious fanatic of sorts, or a charlatan, or both? The field was wide open for an imaginative biography. Soon I learned that I was not the first to have thought of it. One book had already been published, which did not stifle my intention to try my own hand at it. Also, at the British Museum in London, I came across some 150 hand-written pages

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of a nascent novel by the renowned Israel Zangwill,7 who evidently had abandoned the effort after an unsatisfactory start. I developed the idea of building several layers into the story and shared it one day with Elie Wiesel, when we had lunch in New York. We had been friends for many years. When and where our relationship started I can no longer remember, but I know that something clicked right away, and we saw each other rather frequently. I even brought him to Holy Blossom Temple for a Selichot service, at which a packed congregation greeted him.8 Our relationship grew closer over the years, and when his wife, Marion, gave birth to Elisha, he phoned and asked me to come to the b'rith? I was attending a convention of the Central Conference of American Rabbis in upstate New York, where Rabbi Abraham Heschel was giving a lecture. He too had been invited, and he arranged for a car to take us to New York. But I was suffering from a painful backache and could not contemplate the journey, something I always regretted.10 When I told Elie of the plot I had developed for the Frank book, he was quite taken with it. 'I want to write it with you,' he suddenly proposed. I was stunned, and happy to accept. We arrived at a way of jointly telling the story: he was to paint in the background, and I was to fill in the biographical material. It didn't work out, and when Elie received the Nobel Peace Prize he bowed out. He had produced 150 pages, he told me, but was dissatisfied. Still, that wasn't the end of the collaboration, for he wrote a preface to my book when it finally appeared.11 Speaking of Elie, I want to make grateful recognition of one other contribution he made to our relationship. When I was approaching my seventieth birthday, our son Jonathan (then rabbi of a congregation in Windsor, Ontario), set to work creating a festschrift for the occasion. He assembled a panoply of celebrities and friends who contributed to it, among them Elie Wiesel, Norman Cousins, and June Callwood. Elie's piece - an original short, short story, entitled 'Friendship' - was an evocative, autobiographical snippet of his first post-Holocaust years in France. It headed the contributions to the anniversary volume, the launching of which remains a precious memory.12 It con-

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tains not only important essays but also some excessive laudations, which, like those by Robert Gordis and Norman Cousins (found in the book's introduction), were the prejudiced opin ions of friends. The Magen David

My book on the Star of David resembled The Man Who Would be Messiah in one respect: it was the culmination of many years of gathering notes and research data. In the book's prologue I wrote: It was 1945. Allied troops were nearing the Rhine, preparing for the final assault on Nazi Germany. The 104th Infantry Division of the American forces had entered a little city and found it in shambles. What the air attacks had missed the ground artillery had finished. Only a few buildings remained standing, their roofless walls staring blindly into the winter sky. A church was among them, and I stopped to look at its skeleton. Its Gothic windows had been splintered; the innocent glass shattered like that of hundreds of synagogues throughout the land when, just over six years before, they had been victimized in the orgy of Kristallnacht. Then came the surprise. One window had remained intact. Its sole design was what Jews call the Magen David (Shield or Star of David) ... That a window so decorated should be the sole 'survivor' of the destruction seemed reassuring to a soldier returning to a land where his people had been defamed, devastated and destroyed. Yet at the same time the sight was startling: what was a Magen David doing on a church, and a German church at that?

What indeed? That question was the beginning of my interest in the symbol, its origin, and its special connection to the Jewish people, whose emblem it has become. A few years later, in 1949, I reported at a CCAR convention, in a session devoted to 'Work in Progress,' that I was gathering materials for a book on the

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Magen David. But not until many years later, in 1991, did the completed book see the light of day. Michael Neiditch, director of the Commission on Continuing Education of B'nai B'rith International, designed a book of unusual beauty, its illustrations interspersed handsomely with the print.13 Both of us reckoned that it would do well in the market-place, and both of us were disappointed. To this day Michael is puzzled about it. For my part, I am used to surprises, both good and bad. I write, and, once the book is out of my hands, it becomes independent, like an adult child who has moved out of the house. You hope for the best, but that's all you can do. Asylum

Subsequent to the publication of my report on refugee determination in Canada,14 Professor Howard Adelman, a good friend of mine and then the first director of the Centre for Refugee Studies at York University, whose contribution to refugee work in Canada was greater than anyone else's of whom I know, asked me to affiliate myself with the Centre and to give occasional lectures to the students. I agreed and subsequently was appointed adjunct professor by the university. I have greatly enjoyed the association and through it have met fascinating people. Some time later, Adelman suggested that I write a small book or monograph on the moral underpinnings of refugee admission, and I readily assented, especially since a grant from the Ford Foundation made it possible for him to secure a research assistant for me. I was able to engage Natalie Fingerhut, who had previously helped me prepare a paper for an educational project of the provincial government on 'Value Formation in Children.'15 It took me about a year to prepare the refugee manuscript, and it was published in 1995 under the title Asylum - A Moral Dilemma. York Lanes Press brought it out in soft cover in Canada, and Praeger in hard and soft cover in the United States. At the suggestion of Professor David Dewitt, then acting head of the Centre for Refugee Studies,16 both York Lanes Press and I do-

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nated our royalties from the book for an annual prize essay on refugee issues, and Holy Blossom Temple generously added to the fund. Librettist in Banff

I had learned to love music ever since I met Elizabeth, but never would I have imagined that fate would cast me into the role of librettist for an opera. It happened in the eighties, when Lothar Klein, professor and sometime dean of the Faculty of Music at the University of Toronto, came to chat with me. His background was Jewish, and of late he had reacquainted himself with his heritage and had chanced on Hasidic stories that intrigued him, especially those ascribed to Rabbi Nachman of Bratslav.17 An enigmatic, complex, spiritual figure, Nachman inspired thousands with his piety, unusual insights, and particularly his stories, which were told and retold and examined by his followers for their real meaning. Klein was fascinated with one of them, 'A Father and His Son,' and he came to me to make a surprising suggestion: he wanted to compose an opera based on this tale, and he asked me whether I would create a libretto. We talked about it several times, and eventually I agreed. A subsequent grant from the Chalmers Foundation helped our enterprise along. The story deals with a young yeshivah student who has trouble with his faith and decides that the only one who can help him is a famed rabbi in another community to whom miraculous cures are attributed. It happens, however, that this rabbi is a bitter opponent of the young man's father (who is also a rabbi), and the father absolutely forbids the hoped-for visit. In consequence, the youth is wasting away, and eventually his father relents and does, in fact, accompany his problem-ridden son on his journey. But the Tempter interferes, and the trip is aborted; a horse stumbles, an axle breaks, and though father and son reach the village of the miracle rabbi, the young man never gets to see him and dies from spiritual frustration. I decided to write the libretto (an art in which I had no expe-

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rience) in blank verse - something that harked back to some earlier literary experiments of mine. In the forties, in Chicago, I had composed blank-verse scripts for the confirmation class and had even invented (so I thought) the word 'dramalogue.'18 Subsequently I had discontinued the practice but was happy to try my hand at it once more. I sent the manuscript to Lothar, and in time he set it to music. It was not the melodic mode that I had known, and I found it difficult to relate to its 'modern' sound. When he finished the first act, he sent it on to Banff, hoping that it might be included in a workshop production during the summer season there. It was indeed, and one day I received an invitation to attend the presentation, which would consist of singing the parts. Years ago, Elizabeth and I had toured Banff and its breathtaking surroundings; this time I experienced it from the perspective of a resident artist, who is housed in a bungalow in the woods, free to write or compose in a fabulous environment. All too quickly the time came for the production, when Lothar's music and my text would be transposed into actual sound. Hearing one's own words spoken and sung from the stage was a new thrill for me - diminished, however, by my conviction that both music and libretto needed serious revision. I shared my feelings with Lothar, but unfortunately his wife took ill soon thereafter and subsequently died, leaving her husband too bereft to return to our joint project. Since then, it has rested in our respective drawers, and while I saw little hope that we would tackle it afresh, a recent chance encounter may yet turn out to be the beginning of a second go at the project. Other Writings

Meanwhile, I have been meticulous in observing my deadlines for my weekly columns in the Canadian Jewish News (listed in the Bibliography) which I have written without interruption since July 1980. Only rarely do I have to search for a topic; somehow there is always enough material on hand to stimulate my imagination. Problems arise only when I plan a longer trip, which

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forces me to prepare columns three or four weeks in advance. In such a case it is impossible to write on anything that is in flux, for when the article is published a number of weeks later it may be of no further public interest. If that does happen (as it does once in a while) I console myself with the thought that I am the person who has learned most from the exercise. Meanwhile I enjoy working with the staff of the paper and have received splendid support from its editor, Mordecai Ben Dat, just as I did from Patricia Rucker, his predecessor. The Canadian Jewish News has by now become my pulpit. But where, at Holy Blossom, I used to reach the youth, the paper does not afford me that possibility, for not many young people seem to read it. The editor is trying to address this shortcoming, and if he does he will be performing a minor miracle. Until recently I was the only remaining original member of the paper's advisory board. I had joined it when my dearly beloved and admired friend Ray Wolfe had become the paper's publisher, and when he died - far too early for all of Canadian Jewry - Donald Carr succeeded him. In the autumn of 1996 Carr wrote to advise me that I was being 'rotated out.' No doubt it was important to add fresh blood to the group, though I am saddened that another link with the past has been severed. Writing has by now become my major occupation. During these last years I have contributed to many a festschrift, anthology, dictionary, or other collective literary enterprise, and I continue to write for Jerusalem Report and L7W,19 but books remained my main focus. As long as the literary muse will stand by my side I will keep on, even though she has forced me to rise earlier and earlier every morning. Or is it the secret time clock that we all carry with us? Mine seems to wake me up, as if to say to me, 'Don't delay, do it now!' Lectures

Since I left the congregational ministry I have had occasion to travel widely and more often than ever before. Aside from annual rabbinic conventions that Elizabeth and I attended regu-

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larly (they meet in different North American cities every year, and in Jerusalem once every seven years), there are biennial meetings of the Union of American Hebrew Congregations, and triennial gatherings of the World Union for Progressive Judaism (usually held in Europe or Israel). During my presidency of the Central Conference of American Rabbis we visited its regions for their conventions, and in addition I belonged to numerous boards, such as that of the World Jewish Congress, which took me to Paris, London, and Amsterdam. But this was only a part of my peregrinations. Being retired from congregational obligations since January 1978, I could now freely accept the lectureships that came my way, which they did increasingly after the publication of my Torah commentary. They took me to just about every city in North America that had a sizeable Jewish population, and where Reform congregations would usually host me. Universities invited me on occasion, and I made special arrangements with the University of Haifa and Ben-Gurion University in Beer Sheva. On journeys lasting more than three or four days, Elizabeth and I would go together, and this has produced memorable work/vacations. We travelled yearly to Israel, twice to South Africa and Hawaii, and once to Australia. The trips have been perfect combinations, for, in addition to all else, our travel cost us relatively little. In addition to my (or our) travel expenses, I require a lecture fee, unless the occasion is a charitable event or communal rally. At first I was embarrassed to talk about lecture fees, and I was also unsure about the right amount. I guided myself by what we at Holy Blossom had been paying our visitors, and in time I came to ask for what I thought was proper. It was not easy to alter my self-image of being satisfied with little, for that had sometimes proved counter-productive. The less I had charged, the less important my hosts deemed my appearance to be, and the less effort they made to bring out the audience. The more they had to pay, the more eager they were to make my visit a success worth their investment. The advice that my father had given me when I went off to my first employment (as a tutor) was

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borne out time and again. 'Charge too little,' he had said in effect, 'and the butler will ask you to use the servants' entrance the next time; charge properly, and the family will invite you for lunch.' I understood, and was invited for lunch.20 Thus charging for my lectures has in part been a self-protecting device. Also, I have enjoyed the journeys, especially when Elizabeth has come along (though lately the airport hassle has taken some of the pleasure out of travelling). The scenario is attractive: I usually teach Torah, which, after all, has stood at my life's centre; I meet students of my books; I make new acquaintances; and the way I am received in some places was extraordinary. In the beginning I missed the pulpit, so that the lecture circuit served as a substitute, but in time the latter became stimulating and rejuvenating in its own way, for though I like writing for a public that I cannot see, talking to an audience creates a 'high' of different dimensions. Repeat visits are especially pleasant, for we encounter people whom we already know. Several congregations have invited me a number of times: Beth Israel in Hartford, Connecticut (Rabbis Harold Silver and Simeon Glaser); Rodef Shalom in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (Rabbi Walter Jacob); Beth El in Chappaqua, New York (where my co-worker Chaim Stern is rabbi); and Beth Emet in Evanston, Illinois (served by my late friend Rabbi David Polish and his successor, Peter Knobel). We have also paid a number of visits to the Twin Cities in Minnesota, where we lived for thirteen years (1948-61), and in the late summer of 19961 was invited to lecture during the 140th anniversary celebration of Mount Zion Temple, my former congregation. It was a lovely visit, but alas, every time we arrive we find fewer and fewer of our old friends and contemporaries. They have moved away - either to the abode on high or to a warmer, earthly clime. Wherever I go I try in advance to arrange a tennis game, and the competition is generally adequate and, not infrequently, overwhelming (though losing no longer decreases my sheer enjoyment of play). Lecture trips thus have many faces, and when the journey is to far-away places they provide memorable experiences.

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Occasionally I would advise Canada's Ministry of External (now Foreign) Affairs of my travel plans, which caused our representatives abroad to extend much attention and courtesy, greatly facilitating our stay. On one trip our ambassador made a splendid tennis partner - an accommodation not required by protocol, and especially appreciated because of that fact. Words Like Feathers

Speaking and writing have one major feature in common: the words that one communicates take on a life of their own. They may be quickly forgotten (by most) or long remembered (by a few), or lead a subconscious existence in someone's mind. Tradition says that words once uttered are like feathers, blown everywhere and hence untraceable. A recent letter from the United States reminded me of this phenomenon. It referred to a paragraph in Unfinished Business, where I told of an unhappy experience that our daughter, Judith, had in high school. Her guidance counsellor totally misjudged her, doubting that she would manage to graduate. We had another counsellor talk to her, and that person's conclusion was the very opposite: Judith would not only graduate but have excellent grades in college. That precisely did happen subsequently, and she went on to earn her MA to boot. Here's the essence of the letter, written some fifteen years after the book reached the public: I am writing a long overdue thank you note. Two years ago I recuperated from an accident and had the chance to catch up on my reading. One of the first books I picked up was your autobiography. At the same time I was grappling with my younger child's problem in public school. Your revelations about your daughter's experience in school led me to question the school's assessment of my child's capabilities. The result was that F. is now completing grade 4 in a private school. The previous teacher's opinion that F. would never learn how to read was proven utterly wrong, because she is now an excellent reader who loves to read, is more confident than ever and has good friends.

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When you lectured here I almost spoke to you. Unfortunately I hesitated and let the months pass. But it would be wrong for me not to thank you. It would not be melodramatic for me to say that your book helped me to save my child's life.

I thanked the writer for her thoughtfulness and told her that she in turn had given me added encouragement to write this book. Who knows where its feathers will fly and land?

CHAPTER TWELVE

Travels in Space and Time

Bomb in South Africa We had visited the republic before and, despite (or perhaps because of) its still regnant and repulsive apartheid, found the experience most memorable.1 The first lecture tour had been arranged by the World Union for Progressive Judaism; the second was to mark a special anniversary of Temple Israel in Johannesburg. A grand celebration had been planned, with the president of the republic and the Israeli ambassador in attendance. Television, radio, and the print media were to cover the festive service on a Shabbat morning. At about six o'clock that morning the telephone rang. An excited voice informed me that the synagogue had been the target of a bomb attack and had been partially destroyed. Temple Emanu-El had offered its facilities as a substitute locale, and the service would start an hour later than planned; the press had been informed. The bomb had been placed some time during the night against a side door of the building, and about a quarter of the structure had been damaged severely, including parts of the synagogue proper. Everyone speculated just whom the perpetrators had meant to target: the president, the ambassador, or the synagogue as a representative of the Jewish community. I am not sure whether the puzzle was ever solved. The press reported extensively on the bombing. One paper

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wrote: 'Whatever the reason for the attack, it is despicable. For it suggests the kind of vicious anti-Semitism that should have ended with the Holocaust, but continues among some fanatic anti-Semites. We make the point that this is wholly or partly an anti-Semitic attack.' Another reported on my address that morning: 'Rabbi Dr. W. Gunther Plaut, President of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, said in his sermon: "Anti-Semitism is a cancer, and wherever this disease is allowed to flourish it will eat away the very life-blood of the whole society ... An attack on Jews and Judaism is also an attack on Christians and Christianity, because it is God, not man, who is the measure of all things." These are sentiments with which we agree. This is the first time a synagogue has been damaged by a bomb, and we hope it will be the last.' Apartheid was beginning to fray at the edges. We visited Soweto again, the Black township at the edge of Johannesburg, and met some of its spirited leaders. Nelson Mandela was still in jail, but when he was released and made a world tour he addressed a huge dinner in Toronto, and I met him there. Subsequently I became a trustee of the Mandela Fund of Canada, organized by (Anglican) Archbishop Edward (Ted) Scott. The money collected was designated to create an infrastructure for the emerging Black community of the long-condemned state, which was abandoning the laws of apartheid. Abandoning its spirit will, I fear, take a lot more time, and not only in South Africa. Berlin: Sixty Years Later

My last visit to Berlin occurred in the autumn of 1994 and commemorated a special event in my own life. Sixty years before, in July 1934,1 had been awarded the degree of doctor iuris utriusque* by Humboldt University, which now wanted to observe this somewhat unusual anniversary by inviting me to come and give the annual address to the new students. I gladly accepted; this was closing the last circle. The university had been part of the Communist eastern sector of the city, and I had seen it since only

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from the outside. This time I was to revisit a place where for three years I had studied, sat in classrooms, library, and chess chamber, and where I had begun my transition to adulthood. I had started in 1930, finished law school during the first year of Hitler's regime, and my doctorate in 1934. During the commemorative ceremonies I was handed a photocopy of the official book in which graduates left their autographs for posterity - and there was mine, testifying to the dubious distinction of being one of the very last Jews in the country to obtain a degree. The president of the university, Marlis Diirkop, was gracious in her remarks. I addressed the assembly on the subject of my about-to-be-published book Asylum - A Moral Dilemma, a topic that was then especially apropos in Germany. In a strange, almost surrealistic way, the event was a homecoming. But as is usually the case when old sites are revisited, they are smaller than remembered. In my case, the present was darkened by decades of Communist neglect: the hallways were grey and badly lit; classrooms appeared bare and uninviting. The past was far from being eradicated. A number of professors from the Communist era were still teaching - a disgruntled lot, who felt that years of intellectual incarceration had disadvantaged them and that, while being kept on the payroll, they were paid less than their Western colleagues. Past and present don't always mix; for me, sixty years had narrowed the gap. I was grateful to the university for having remembered.3 Einstein via Hawaii

The two visits that we paid to the paradisaical islands proved once again that work and pleasure could be enchantingly combined. In February 1994 I was one of the 'pinch hitters' for a badly battered congregation in Honolulu. Elizabeth and I spent a delightful month, and we made a repeat trip two years later. The second visit had been arranged by a committee headed by Judy Goldman, whose husband, Robert, is the kind of person one rarely meets - a businessman-scholar (Elizabeth's late brother, Billy, also deserved that title). He was working on a

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highly competent book, tentatively entitled Einstein's God, and had consulted the Einstein Archives at Princeton University and at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. He had come across Einstein's letter to me concerning the relationship of relativity and religion, which I had asked the great man to clarify.4 But I had totally forgotten how I had acknowledged his missive, and Bob discovered my response and sent me a copy. So, some fifty-five years later I got sight of a bit of my own intellectual history (written in German of course): January 16, 1940 I am very much obliged to you for your ready and cordial answer to my question. Your formulation [of the relationship of science and religion] is shared by many modern scientists and can be considered to fit into the framework of today's definition of religion - though not into the picture of dusty medieval theology. Large circles of Christian and Jewish theology explain the ought of morality as being founded entirely within man. On the other hand, this does not answer the question why the spiritual and with it, the ought, do not fit into the concept of that kind of world view. Is the awe-engendering logic of the structure of the universe - which after all the unified field theory means to show - necessarily limited by physical matter? With respectful greetings ... Reunions in Australia

During a three-week lecture tour of Australia and New Zealand we had three memorable encounters. After an interval of many years we saw Walter Abraham again, an acknowledged architect in Sydney, a city that combines spectacular buildings and scenery. Walter was a distant cousin of Elizabeth's, who had visited us in North America. An ancestor of his had shifted his family's business from England (where the Abrahams had lived since the 1770s) to Japan and had married there; Walter's father had settled in Australia. For years we had been in touch, and our reunion was one of the highlights of our trip.

180 At Home and Abroad The city also afforded me a wonderful surprise. I had been scheduled to lecture in one of the synagogues, and as I entered the lobby a man about my age shook my hand, reached into his breast pocket, and drew out a photograph. 'Would you recognize me from that?' he asked. I could hardly believe my eyes, looking at the picture and then at him. 'Buchwalter,' I shouted, startling the people around us no end, and threw my arms around him. 'That was some fifty years ago! I am so glad to find you again.' Ernst and I had been on the tennis team that the German Maccabi had sent to (then) Palestine in 1935, to participate in the world Jewish Olympics.5 Afterward we had lost track of each other; I did not know whether he was dead or alive, and if the latter, where he might be. This was the fate with so many of us, who were scattered across the globe. He invited us for dinner, and we had a delightful time together, but have not seen each other since. In Adelaide I had another reunion. Brian Abrahamson, a professor of mathematics at the university, had been in Toronto in the 1960s and had joined Holy Blossom. He expressed much interest in my Adelaide lecture that showed the schematic arrangement of the ages of early biblical figures. 'I'm going to look further into this,' he promised after lunch at his home. Some months later he sent me a thick missive, a highly ingenious investigation of antediluvian lifespans, which I read with great interest. He is now retired, and we have remained in touch. Costa Rica One day a gentleman visited me in my study - a former member of Holy Blossom who had moved to Costa Rica. I remembered Marvin Sossin, and part of his family still remained at Temple. 'I am now the president of our small but vibrant Reform congregation,' he told me, 'and I'd like you to come down and give us a boost.' The result was a two-week journey that introduced us to a

Travels in Space and Time 181 remarkable place. Wedged between Panama and Nicaragua, two historically unstable nations that produce refugees and regimes relying on armies, Costa Rica has no army at all and has been a full-fledged democracy for a long time. Compared to the tradition of social and political turmoil in the rest of Central and South America, the little country is an island of peaceful endeavour, civic accord, and intelligent channelling of public funds. Where other nations expend a significant portion of the gross national product on arms, Costa Rica saves these expenditures and instead has built a social safety net, good hospitals, and schools. Violent crime is almost entirely absent, though petty thievery does exist - causing a lot of property owners to secure their first-floor rooms with iron bars. But many of these have nice and intricate designs, and one hardly notices their existence. At least that is what we saw in San Jose, the capital, where traffic is bearable and people's addresses are incomprehensible to all but postpersons and neighbours. You can write a letter to someone's residence or business and identify it broadly by street or area and add 'Two houses from Old Aldo's' - the name of a restaurant that closed its doors thirty years ago. I'm sure that there is a system to all of this; for me, it had the charm of neighbourly recognition in the midst of a sizeable city. The whole country is only a few hours' ride wide, touching on the Gulf of Mexico on one side and on the Pacific Ocean on the other. In between lie smaller towns and villages, as well as rain forests and jungle (popular tourist attractions). Spanish is the national tongue, Catholicism the predominant religion, and the United States a dominant cultural and economic influence. Jews are relatively few; they number a few thousand, mostly in San Jose. Their religious orientation tends towards eastern European Orthodoxy in North American garb; the Reform congregation is rather new and has so far been too small to engage a permanent spiritual leader - but that is bound to change soon. I was part of its roster of visiting rabbis. Elizabeth and I donated books for its nascent library in its new building. Its main problem is the development of native-born talent; so far the leaders are English-speaking immigrants. But that too is sure to be dif-

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ferent tomorrow, and its first full-time leader will no doubt be fluent in Spanish. Meanwhile, Marvin remains the motive power - more strength to him! Fortunately, Jews of various religious viewpoints still talk to each other there, and I was able to address community-wide functions. This is something I hope will not change. Chautauqua

The name betokens the venerable society that in the late nineteenth century created an opportunity for learning. Located not far from Buffalo, it attracted primarily upper-middle-class people - often disparagingly dubbed 'middle brow' - who were literate and wanted to upgrade their knowledge by listening to scholars, poets, novelists, artists, and others who opened new doors to understanding. Jews too began to attend, though in small numbers, and visible minorities were almost totally absent.6 In 1988 I received an invitation to be one of the society's guest lecturers, and Elizabeth and I spent a pleasant week in the gracious environs of the campus. Old homes, each proudly displaying its year of construction, dot the streets. I gave five lectures, dealing with religion in general, with the Bible, and with ageing - an especial favourite of mine, but not many audiences want to hear about the potentials and problems of 'grey power.' (Only once did I spend three full days at a Canadian university7 trying to make students understand what being old really means, but I am not sure I succeeded - maybe the gap between their experience and the subject-matter made it too difficult. I did, however, stress how young persons might approach the elder segment of society, and there at least I had some effect, as the vigorous discussions made clear.) At Chautauqua, of course, the topic was a natural, and it was the one talk of mine on which the Chautauqua Daily reported.8 I was addressing a chief concern of the registrants, many of whom were seniors. I presume that they are generally in the majority at Chautauqua, for the costs of travelling there, spending a week or two, and paying the registration and hotel fees are quite high.

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We were treated with great courtesy, saw a few old friends, and met some new and interesting people, but in the end I did not feel that I had reached my audiences. Though they were well mannered and attentive, I felt that I had not found the right intellectual-emotional connection. It happens once in a while, and it certainly did there. Music in My Ears

Back in 1962 I had been the narrator for Ernest Bloch's Sacred Service, performed at Massey Hall by the famed Toronto Mendelssohn Choir. In the autumn of 1995 I assumed the same role for the production of Arthur Honegger's King David, under the direction of Elmer Iseler. This time the location was Roy Thomson Hall, the premier musical locale of the city. Twice I participated in rehearsals and became fairly comfortable with my role. But at the performance on stage everything is different. Fortunately Iseler never failed to glance briefly at me when my cue came, and all went well. Text and music created a truly religious setting, and I felt that the splendid auditorium was transformed into a great temple, where I was not so much an actor as an interpreter of that unique and complex human being we know as David, son of Jesse. It was, in a way, like teaching Torah, buoyed by 150 voices and an extraordinary conductor. Plugged In

1985 was a banner year in our family. Elizabeth was visiting Cincinnati for a few days and would come back in time to celebrate a special birthday of hers. I cast about for a gift that would please her and had an inspiration. Perhaps it was time to join the new world of computer technology, which was then just hitting its stride. What's a special birthday all about if not to be able to prove that it is but the first day of a beckoning future? The guru who managed the little store at York University asked me why I wanted to buy a computer.

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'For writing,' I answered. 'I want a computer that's simple to handle and simple to learn.' He suggested that I take a course. 'Isn't there something I can use by myself, by reading instructions from a book?' I asked. He looked at me, silently assessing the potential of this grey elder to master something that most people were afraid to touch. 'Well,' he ventured at last, 'if you want to do it by yourself, then there's only one choice: Buy a Mac.' I knew that he wasn't referring to hamburgers, but I had no idea what techno-marvel he had in mind. He showed me a little box that looked like all the others on the shelves. 'This has just come out ... It's user-friendly, and it's the only one that can be understood without special instruction. It's not an IBM product or clone that most people buy, it's a Macintosh 512, the latest version. It comes with mouse and keyboard, cables, etcetera.' A mouse? 512? I felt unsure about the whole thing, but the die was cast. I had come, I had seen, and - pace Caesar - I had been conquered. I had three days before Elizabeth was due home, and I wanted to be prepared to teach her. After all, this was to be for both of us. So, there it stood, the latest arrival at our abode, challenging me with a blinking screen. I opened the book and started reading. Familiar words such as 'document' and Tile' clearly had a Mac meaning here. I looked for the glossary, but there was none. Other terms were similarly ambiguous. What was a 'header' or 'footer'? The book was not clear, not to me anyway. I plugged on and became increasingly frustrated. Maybe the next day would be better. Where was the 'user-friendly' attitude of the machine that the sales person had promised? It was nowhere in sight. At the end of another terrible day of mishaps, wiped-out writing, and inexplicable errors, I was ready to concede that I should have had instruction or that - horribik dictu - I had made a mistake and should have stayed with writing by hand. After all, if I could write the Torah commentary three times over in long

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hand, why change? Also, I had already 'written' Unfinished Business by dictating it from beginning to end.9 Why the rush into a mysterious future? Then, about an hour before I had to leave for the airport to pick up my unsuspecting wife, the clouds of incomprehension suddenly cleared, the terms made sense, everything came into focus, and I became a very happy man. When I brought Elizabeth home and showed her the birthday present, she was entranced, a bit afraid, but not too much, for I promised to teach her. 'It's easy as pie,' I assured her, crossing my fingers. It worked. We both used the 512 until I graduated to a Mac Plus. My wife didn't care what I bought. Frugal traditionalist that she is, she was satisfied with the 'old' computer. She had already started formatting her genealogical charts on it, and somehow the Plus performed slightly differently. She stayed with her machine until she finished her manuscript on the three hundred years of the Guggenheim/Wormser clan, and only then did the Mac Plus become her permanent friend. I had meanwhile gone to a PowerBook, a lovely portable that became my vade mecum. When York University came 'on-line' I bought a modem, took a class, and became part of the Internet community. But my main uses of it were not what is commonly associated with the term and concept. I don't 'browse' and have resisted the relevant software; I don't have colour and find Internet on blackand-white to be an odd couple. I have concentrated on library use, especially bibliographical materials, and e-mail. It has now become my habit to look at my e-mail account first thing in the morning, when the telephone lines are always open, answer letters forthwith, and then go on to my regular tasks. Somehow people at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) got wind of my dabbling with the medium and asked me to appear on a prime-time show introducing the secrets of the Internet to a puzzled public. So they came to our apartment one morning, watched me when I made coffee, pretending it was 6 a.m., showed me at the computer, and then interviewed me. When the production appeared on TV I led it off for some

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five to six minutes, and then the show went on to explain (and occasionally obfuscate) what Internet was all about and how to become a participant. The producers had used me cleverly when they began the program by showing this antique fooling around with the Internet. The conclusion that they wanted the viewers to draw was clear: if an old fellow can do it, anybody can. The show was a great success and was repeated several times thereafter, earning me a lot of comment. So the old writer's cramp has been replaced by an occasional stiff neck or backache, and - wouldn't you know it! - arthritis in the fingers of my left hand. Would that pesky disease ever have developed if I (being a left-hander) had reserved that hand for tennis and the right hand for writing? But, as Thomas Wolfe reminded us, one can't go home again, not even to pen and ink, and I'll be stuck with a more up-to-date cramp for ever and ever. Golden Moment

When the date of our fiftieth wedding anniversary approached, our children asked our permission to plan the celebration, a request to which we happily assented — with one condition: as always, we would not commemorate the event on the actual date. For the night of 9-10 November 1938 was Kristallnacht, when eleven hundred places of worship had been torched in Germany, when my father was in hiding, and when the Holocaust began.10 It so happened that 10 November 1988 fell on a Thursday, and so we chose the weekend for the occasion. Friday night, we entertained the family and out-of-town guests at dinner in the Temple's board room; Jonathan preached at services to a large congregation, and Sisterhood gave us a lovely reception. On Saturday night we enjoyed a dinner dance at the Primrose Club (then still a Jewish landmark), highlighted by reminiscences, made-for the-occasion poetry, shofar blowing by my three nephews (my late brother Walter's sons), my mother's presence (she was ninety-eight at the time), and a musical medley by six of our friends. On Sunday morning Judith entertained the out-of-town guests at brunch. We have pictures and a video

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tape to recreate these golden moments for us, which brought together many for whom we care and who cared for us. Death has since diminished their number (only three of the singing sextet survive), and among our contemporaries those who are widowed outnumber those who are not. But the real blessing of our 'golden moment' is that it has continued for us. We are no longer like Tennyson's Ulysses, venturing once more 'to sail beyond the sunset,' but we give daily thanks that we are still 'strong in will to strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.' We started out on an unhappy day for our people,11 and like them we have seen much, traversed adversity, and been granted the gift of perfect harmony and enduring companionship. Four Score Years

The initiative to celebrate my eightieth birthday publicly came from Dow Marmur, who broached the idea to me and asked my permission to proceed. I agreed, with one condition: there would be no solicitation of funds for a present. It turned out to be a heart-warming affair, which enjoyed an unusual distinction in that my mother was still present. How many mothers can celebrate a son's eightieth birthday? She was already confined to a wheelchair and had to be taken back to her hospital room before the evening had run its course, but she was there and took it all in stride. In a way, it was her celebration as well. The press reported on the affair: Hundreds of Rabbi Gunther Plaut's friends assembled at Holy Blossom Temple to honour him on his eightieth birthday. Ontario Premier, Bob Rae, and Canadian Jewish Congress President, Irving Abella, were among those who paid tribute to the man who is revered as a pillar of North America's Jewish community. [In Abella's words:] 'Gunther Plaut has been the heart and soul of this community,' Abella said. 'No one has been more important to the Jewish community in the last hundred years.'

188 At Home and Abroad Bob Rae said: 'Your voice has been the voice of reason for the whole community, not just the Jewish community. Everyone listens to you because you speak with compassion and love. You understand that there is too much hatred in this world, hatred that must be resisted. Your work has had an enormous impact on this country.'12

Rabbi Joseph Glaser, executive vice-president of the Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), had come from New York, and presented Elizabeth and me with special commemorative plaques and albums that acknowledged donations by devoted friends of ours.13 Susan Davis, president of Micah Homes, created the emotional highlight of the evening, when she announced that the splendid facility that the organization had built on Eglinton Avenue was to be named Tlaut Manor' to honour both of us. Plant Manor

In 1988 the Social Action Committee of Holy Blossom had directed its concern to assisting women who were the victims of domestic violence. Safe and affordable housing was needed for them, and the pursuit of this objective led to the formation and incorporation of Micah Homes. In time, the project was broadened to include decent housing for other disadvantaged persons as well. A ninety-seven-unit apartment building was planned, and, with funds from the provincial government, construction got under way. A dedicated group of people, primarily Temple members, had worked endlessly to master the art of cutting red tape and to become experts in such diverse areas as video security and tenant selection, and in everything else that touched on the future not only of a modern building but also on the lives of many people who looked for a break in the hopelessness of their existence. No attention was to be paid to religious, racial, or other backgrounds; nothing mattered except the need of each family or person. It was a massive effort of which I had little knowledge and

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to which I had devoted no time at all. It came therefore as a total surprise when we had a visit from Joel Slater, president of Micah Homes, who informed us that the board had recommended naming the facility after Elizabeth and me. We were cautioned that the building and its purpose were opposed by members of the community, so that, by associating ourselves with it, we might be exposed to possible unpleasantness. Would we be willing to lend our names to the enterprise under these conditions? And if so, would we have a suggestion for a suitable name? We were greatly moved by the proffered honour. The whole idea was tailor-made for us; its social objectives fitted perfectly with ours, and we were enormously grateful for the honour. The threat of possible controversy gave us added reason to join the effort. We accepted gladly and - seeing that the name Tlaut House' had a euphonic problem - proposed Tlaut Manor,' which subsequently was accepted. The building was dedicated in September 1993, in the presence of the province's premier, Bob Rae, a spate of civic representatives and party leaders, and a public that came to admire the jewel of Eglinton Avenue West. From then on, we have spent a goodly amount of time visiting and supporting the tenants and their programs; I now sit on the board and never fail to admire the men and women who give of their time to keep the standards of Plaut Manor as high as possible, to deal with its multiple challenges and, alas, fading financial support from the provincial government. The building has a community worker attached to it, who counsels tenants, assists in the functioning of a tenants' association, supervises a breakfast club, and helps to plan programs that give everyone a sense of community. Since the building opened its doors, dramatic improvements have taken place in the lives of those who call it home. The unemployment rate has dropped, and pride in the new abode is palpable, but one major fear persists - that government will drop its support and offer this and other public housing facilities to private concerns, to be run for profit. That would wreak grievous damage to a highly productive social enterprise. I hope

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that this will not come to pass. Fiscal efficiency in government is a commendable practice, but it must not become the 'be all' of its activities. Compassion, humane vision, and social morality come first, in my book. I have a hard time informing people both inside and outside of the building that the Plauts do not own Plaut Manor and have not paid for the privilege of having the building named after them. A poem in the publicity folder explains the building; it was written by Mehri Yalfani, one of the tenants:14 I'm looking for a person a name a memory I come from a city a town a village a street a house I come from a house with a window to the sunlight with a window looking to the sky I'm looking for my soul in this place I call home

Will it still be home once Plaut Manor is privatized? That appears to be the government's plan at this writing, and I dread the moment when this wonderful project will fall - as it well might - through a big hole in our social safety net.

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Marching In

For some years I had supported the activities of Canada's Maccabi organization, which every four years sent a contingent of athletes to the Maccabiah, or the Jewish Olympics. In 1935 I had been sent to the Games as a representative of the German Maccabi and had marched into the stadium in Tel Aviv - an emotional experience vividly inscribed in my memory.15 As the 1985 Games approached I was thinking that perhaps I ought to go along, and when my friend Alex Fisher, long a spiritus rector of the Games,16 urged me on, the die was cast, and I signed up. Subsequently, Alex and his friends appointed hockey legend Jean Belliveau and me as honorary chairs of the Canadian delegation. It was July, and Israel was predictably very hot. But when at last we marched into the stadium I was overcome with the memory of marching in fifty years earlier. I had been a participant then, ready to play my tennis matches; now I was a non-playing elder, representing the past. Then I had had to return to Nazi-infested Germany (to uphold the promise made to my father 17 ); this time - thank God - I would return to the freedom of Canada. The Doctor Was Out

In 1978 the University of Toronto had given me an LLD, and about three years later I received a call from my good friend Irving Abella, history professor at York University and well-known author, then chair of the faculty committee that proposed honourees to the university senate. He informed me with much pleasure that I had been nominated for an LLD, which would be awarded at the spring convocation. I was of course happy to hear the news; prophets often count for little in their home towns, and here were both of our universities making bows in my direction. It was October when Irving called, but by March I had heard nothing further and had not been informed when precisely the degree would be awarded. My travel schedule was already full, and I hoped that I would not be faced with a con-

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flict of dates. So I decided to find out, and when I called Irving he was evidently embarrassed. 'Didn't anyone contact you?' he asked. 'No,' I responded, 'when is the date?' Irving cleared his throat. 'There isn't going to be one. Really, no one called you?' 'No. Did the Senate actually turn me down?' 'Yes and no,' he answered, and his awkwardness was palpable. 'Someone pointed out that York rules prohibit the awarding of a degree to anyone who has received the honour from the University of Toronto within the previous five years. You got yours in '78, so there was no way to go through with it. Believe me,' he added soothingly, 'it had nothing to do with you. They just didn't want to set a precedent. I'm sure they'll propose you again at a later time.' I was amused, and actually relieved. I had really feared a conflict of dates, and the yes-and-no from York struck me as funny rather than serious. I assured Irving that he need not worry; I understood and bore no grudge. Besides, I would continue with my program of giving substantial portions of myjudaica library to the new Jewish Studies program at York. Thereafter I forgot about it - until in 1986 I received another call, and this time the degree was conferred with due ceremony.18 Another 'honorary' occasion presented itself in 1995, when our son Jonathan received an honorary doctorate from Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion. It had been the custom of the college to award a degree when its ordinees had served with distinction for a quarter-century, and I had been so honoured in 1964. Critics of this practice called it a 'survival degree,' and at least one rabbi I know had rejected the honour. I felt and feel differently about it. The rabbinate is a difficult profession, and surviving the first twenty-five years of service is not undeserving of recognition. Jonathan had already received an earned degree from the college, and this added acknowledgment of distinguished service was welcome to all of us and allowed us a nostalgic family reunion in Cincinnati, where the ceremonies took place.

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Meeting an Old Friend

Profiles is a quarterly published by York University, and as I leafed through the November 1995 issue (which sailed under the name 'Great Moments') I was startled to find myself looking into the mirror of my own past. It was an article entitled 'The Art of the Bookplate.' 'At heart,' wrote Michael Todd, 'bookplates are perhaps small emblems of ownership and creative design ... You realize [when you borrow a book from the library] that the book in hand isn't just an institutional volume, but that it once had a history as a possession in someone's personal library.'19 And there, among the examples pictured, was our own bookplate. I had created it during the early days of our marriage, and it had become part of all the books that we had at the time and acquired thereafter. Back in those days I dabbled in drawing and water-colours and sketched out our own 'ex libris.' It was Chanukah time 1938, and the menorah seemed as good a reflection of our life and aspirations as anything. Below the eight candles I inserted eight Hebrew letters, reading misefarim shel ('from the books of), and below that our two names - my own still spelled in the German way, with an umlaut. I have recently located the original zinc plate, and though lately I have neglected the lick-and-paste routine, my old creation appearing in Profiles reminded me that perhaps I should take it up again. Elizabeth's First

When Elizabeth, zoologist turned rebbitzin?® par excellence, made the acquaintance of genealogy, it took her relatively little time to become totally absorbed in it. She wrote articles for various magazines, was appointed contributing editor by one, and eventually decided to write full-length studies on the branches of her family. She began with her mother's clan and saw the fruits of her labours ripen when KTAV Publishing House in New Jersey brought out her 330-year memoir of the Guggenheim/ Wormser family. It turned out to be a quite massive work, with

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many stories and some sixty charts containing more than a thousand names.21 Through her I could relive the excitement of my own first book; every page, in fact every line, was important and required exactitude. There were endless calls to the publisher; there had to be corrections and further corrections, for Elizabeth the scientist wanted to be sure that everything was right and not just 'more or less right.' The day came on which she held the title page in her hand. It was wonderful to behold her pride and pleasure. The handsome book appeared a few months later, in early 1997. Dreams built on untold days and nights of labour had finally become reality. Sometimes she had voiced her fear that she might not live to see the volume, but when at last it arrived it was for her, and no less for me, a truly memorable moment. Beside all else, it is a remarkable, detailed study, and I eagerly await her next two books, dealing with my mother's family first, and my father's thereafter. Unforeseen Recollection

In November 1996 (it happened to be my birthday) I lectured in Detroit. Afterward, at the reception, a man in his forties shared with me an experience he had recently had. This, in substance, was his story. He had attended a shivah service in someone's home. The prayer followed the Reform ritual, and afterwards someone had remarked that such a service, while well meant, had little religious merit because it was 'only Reform.' Whereupon an older man stepped up to the critic, rolled up his sleeve, and showed him the tell-tale tattoo on his arm that identified him as a concentration-camp survivor. 'See this number?' he said. 'I was liberated at Dora by Rabbi Plaut. He's Reform. Don't ever talk that way about Reform again.' I can still feel the shivers running down my back as I recall the story.

Part Four: Personal Perspectives

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CHAPTER THIRTEEN

The Mutti Phenomenon

Grandma Moses derived a portion of her fame from the fact that she was a nonagenarian when she painted her pictures. Of course she was also very good at creating primitive images, but no one denies that viewers marvelled at both her age and her work. In her own way, Mutti - as everyone who knew her called my mother1 - was a reincarnation of Grandma Moses. For most of the last thirty-odd years of her life Mutti lived in her own two-bedroom apartment in Toronto, in Upper Forest Hill.2 She arrived in the city in 1961, and thereafter her life changed significantly. No more paid labour; from now on she did entirely what she wanted - up to a point, that is. She brought her Buick with her from St Paul, Minnesota, where she had been granted a driver's permit by a kindly examiner, who admired her persistence more than her ability to direct her vehicle. In those days, St Paul's traffic outside of a brief rush hour amounted to little more than an intermittent trickle, so why not reward the sixty-eight-year-old lady on her eighth attempt? Mutti was happy and in fact caused no one any harm; only her car was in need of occasional repairs. Alas, things were vastly different in Metro Toronto, and Mutti now added the dimension of fear to her already existing insecurity behind the wheel. The result was predictable. The garage to her apartment building seemed never wide enough to admit her big automobile, and the bills started piling up. Since Mutti balanced her own cheque book, she saw the handwriting on the

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wall, and when we gently suggested that maybe her money could be spent in better ways, she reluctantly agreed. We sold the old warhorse, and all of us breathed a sigh of relief (though hers was less audible than ours). Beyond this defeat, however, Toronto spelled victories of all sorts for her. She did volunteer work (mostly at Holy Blossom Temple) and in the process acquired new friends, almost all of them younger and some of them her grandchildren's age. She entertained, she read, she wrote letters to relatives all over the world, and after a while she visited them all, often repeatedly. She travelled to South Africa, to Europe, to many parts of the United States and Canada - all this in addition to her yearly visits to Israel, where she had a sister, brother, and relatives of various degrees of affinity. Whenever there was a wedding or bar/ bat mitzvah, she was there. When Yehudah, Walter's oldest son, was married in Jerusalem, she gave him her blessing in person; when Jonathan received his doctorate and when Joshua was ordained, she graced the observances in Cincinnati. Her grandchildren lived in Windsor, Toronto, Kentucky, Los Angeles, and on the U.S. east coast,3 and she was fortunate to enjoy the birth of four great-grandchildren.4 Even some formerly strained relationships meliorated sufficiently to become bearable and ultimately rewarding. Until age ninety-nine she went for some summer weeks to Bad Nauheim, a German resort, there to meet her two surviving sisters, Alice and Ada. Alice lived in San Francisco, and Ada in Haifa. All three had been widowed for a long time. University

But the crowning fulfilment of her added years had nothing to do with relationships. It arose from the reshaping of her own life. She was eighty-eight and was looking to do something new and exciting, when a young friend, Pearl Kazdan, suggested she might like to attend university, auditing classes at the School of Continuing Studies at the University of Toronto. She would drive Mutti downtown, Pearl added as an inducement.

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Mutti agreed on the spot, though she had no idea what a university was like. Her schooling at the turn of the century had ended in 'middle school,' something akin to finishing two years of our high school, and then she had spent a year in Nancy, in Alsace-Lorraine, at a girls' academy, where she learned French and was instructed how to run a household and be a lady. On marriage she passed from the rule of her father to that of her husband. She was supposed to abstain from any 'unwomanly' interest like politics, literature, and social controversy. She knew her place and didn't like it, but the circles in which she moved permitted little variance. She never fought my father with words; and when she felt that she needed to have her way she resorted to copious tears. Dad was helpless when she cried and always gave in. Mother was 'street smart' and clever enough to use her ultimate weapon sparingly. In addition, she had a lot of energy, of which Dad possessed relatively little, and in the end it was she who saved her and Dad's lives. When Kristallnacht came she realized that her German days were numbered. She phoned my Dad's niece in London3 and in short order received a visa for England. She was the one who ran the refugee youth hostel in Brighton for seven years, while Dad did public relations and taught some extracurricular classes to the boys. She did the same on this side of the ocean; she worked hard and, after Dad died suddenly in 1948, continued to sustain herself by working as a receptionist in a hospital. Any thought of continuing her education was never mentioned by her or us, if in fact it ever crossed her or our minds as a realistic possibility. Later I came to realize that all these years she must have wished for it secretly, ever since her sister Alice had received a PhD in chemistry back in the 1920s. With that exception, higher education had been only for the men in her family - her two brothers who died in the First World War and her sons - and for her grandchildren, but not for her. Once this new venture got under way, however, there was no stopping her. She started auditing a class in French literature and loved every minute of it. She learned the geography of the university:

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where the library was, and how books were checked out and returned. After a while it was easy, for nothing much was required of a student such as she. So, not surprisingly, she said one day: 'If this is all there is to university I might as well do it for credit. Then I'll really feel part of it.' She did it, enrolled for a course in modern Jewish history, and was rather shocked when she discovered that auditing had been an insufficient preparation for what awaited her. Though she was blessed with an agile mind and her advanced years had not diminished her capacity for thinking, she did not know how to study, how to write an examination or a term paper. She knew nothing about research, footnoting or bibliographies, and yesterday's carefree auditor became a stranger in a strange land. Undaunted, she charged ahead. She made lots of mistakes but did not let them deter her. At first she used regular public transportation; later she took advantage of Toronto's famed 'WheelTrans' system, which provides the handicapped and other qualified persons with door-to-door service for a minimal fare. The dispatcher soon called her 'Selma' and gave her ever-ready attention. She was not unaware that she was gaining admirers in the process. Fellow students who were seventy or more years her juniors looked at her with something amounting to awe. When she confessed to her instructors that she was too nervous to write an exam in class, they allowed her to write it at home. Withal, hers remained a rocky road to higher education, for she lacked an overview of civilization - but in that respect the majority of the students had even less of a clue and only a fraction of her love for learning. In effect, she taught the youngsters one thing the professors couldn't, by demonstrating that education was a lifelong enterprise. One professor told me that in one session, when he was discussing aspects of Nazi policy, she raised her hand and, when recognized, said politely but firmly. 'You're wrong, sir. It wasn't that way; I know, I was there.' She relished every bit of her experience and, needless to say, enjoyed her family's full support.

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At first, Mutti would show me her term papers for suggestions, but after a while she decided she could do without my help. A staff member at Holy Blossom volunteered to type her essays for her, and as the credits mounted up so did Mutti's confidence. She was becoming widely known. In earlier days people would ask her, 'Are you the rabbi's mother?' Now they would ask me: 'Are you Mrs. Plaut's son?' We had a wonderful time all around. During this time she gave an interview to Kenneth Bagnell.6 She told him something that I had never known: when she and Dad came over to the United States in 1946, he had said to her: 'Promise me one thing in this new world. Never criticize; always accept.' She elaborated: 'Some people may not understand it, but it has helped me in accepting new ways and new people.' Bagnell concluded: 'I said good-bye to Mrs. Plaut on that day in early summer, grateful to her, not just for seeing me but even more for her rare spirit which lightens our path and gives something beautiful and worth remembering.' Centenary When she was nearing her hundredth birthday I received a call from Arthur Kruger, then principal of Woodsworth College, which was Mutti's home base at the university. 'We'd like to do something for your mother,' Kruger said. 'What would you think of a nice party for her at the college?' I thanked him for his thoughtfulness and then asked him how many credits Mutti still lacked until she would get her BA. He looked at her record. 'Not many, about four or so.' 'May I make a suggestion?' I ventured. 'Of course.' 'Then, why don't you ask the university to give her an honorary BA. She is physically frail, and there's no telling what might happen before she gets all her credits together.' Kruger was quick to respond. 'That's a great idea. I don't know whether it has ever been done before; so I'll bring it to the president's attention, and he'll have to take it to the Senate.'7

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Kruger obtained the president's approval, but the proposition ran into one member's objection. She was doubtful, she said, because the university had never done anything like this before. Doctor honoris causa, yes, but never a BA. 'It will set a dangerous precedent, and we'd be stuck with it,' she warned. That remark brought forth a huge outburst of laughter. 'Think of it,' someone was reported to have said, 'we could be overrun by an army of centenarians!' The proposition was passed forthwith, and thus Mutti would become the first BA honoris causa. The date was set for 11 June 1993, some three months after she was slated to celebrate her birthday, on 1 April. (Actually, she once confided, she was born on 31 March 1890, but since 1 April was the birthday of German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck, she was registered by her patriotic parents as having been born on that day.) Her centenary turned out to be one huge celebration, much of it planned by Elizabeth. It began with Friday night services (when I had a chance to pay public tribute to her) and a reception in her honour; on Saturday night we hosted a dinner at the Primrose Club for the seventy out-of-town guests; and finally we had a Sunday brunch at Oakdale Golf and Country Club for them, for Mutti's Toronto friends, and for some of her university teachers. Special buses conveyed the guests from their hotel, one of the vehicles a VIP bus made available by George Cohon, president of McDonald's. It was at this affair that Arthur Kruger announced that Mutti was to be given her degree. Letters arrived from everywhere: from the Queen, from the prime min ister, the premier of Ontario, and the president of the United States, all of which she happily exhibited to her visitors. She had become a celebrity. The highlight came when she stood up to respond. She and I had worked together on her speech, which she read with great feeling, in a clear voice. Words are very difficult for me today, but what little I have to say comes from the heart. I can hardly believe that all this is happening to me, that I am a

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hundred years old. I look around and am happy to see that some of you are catching up with me, and I especially do I hope that my dear sisters, Alice and Ada, will make it also. It's quite a thrill, I assure you. May the Lord give them and all of you who are in the race of life strength and good health. Some of you dear ones, relatives and friends, came from great distances and even at great difficulty, and amongst you are my five grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. Most of you live far away and it's so good to see you. I am deeply touched by the presence of all of you who have come; your loyalty and love are unbelievable. And of course there are you who live in Toronto, you didn't travel far, but you are here and help to share these few gratifying hours. May the joy and tenderness of the day inspire all of us for the days ahead. After numerous earlier journeys in my long life I landed here in Toronto almost thirty years ago, and I hoped then and hope today that this will be my last stopping place. The move to Toronto became a very gratifying experience, giving me new opportunities and giving me a chance to meet so many lovely people in this city who showered me with so much warmth. I regard Holy Blossom Temple as my second home. Its rabbis and staff, and so many members have been wonderful to me and so very gracious, and I am deeply honoured. Long life is a blessing but it also has a price, and even if you are reasonably well you must pay it. The longer you live the more dear ones you lose who go to their heavenly reward. So, in this moment of gratitude I think of younger and older siblings who died when they still wanted to live. And of course I think of the two dearest who left me much too early, my beloved husband Jonas, who died so suddenly forty-two years ago; and my dear son Walter, who left us all bereaved twenty-five years ago - but thank God, his family are here, all of them, to represent him, and I am very grateful. I could stand here forever and thank all those who have helped to make my day, but I will mention only two. One is the University of Toronto. Going to university for the last twelve years has been a wonderful experience and has opened up a new and exciting world. It is represented here by Dean Kruger, and I want to offer

204 Personal Perspectives him and all who have taught me my profound gratitude for their generosity and many kindnesses. The other thanks go to Elizabeth and Gunther who have been your hosts this weekend and have made all of this possible. I know how much preparation it took and how much and how long they worried about it. I know you will want to join me and help me to express just a little of that gratitude to them. I can't sum up one hundred years in a few sentences, so most of what I would want to say must remain unsaid. When this day is over and the shadows of evening fall upon us one person's hundredth birthday will be a thing of the past, but a silent prayer will accompany all of you, dear family and friends. May the road of life stretch pleasantly and meaningfully ahead for all of you. A lot of people have said to me, 'ad meahv'essrim shanah.'8 It's an expression, although none of us expects to equal Moshe Rabbenu. But regardless, I want to turn the wish around and express it to you. May a long and happy life be your share.

There wasn't a dry eye in the brightly lit room. The day finally came that would set the 'dangerous precedent.' On 11 June Convocation Hall of the university was crowded with the families of the many hundreds of students who were to be awarded their BAs or would receive advanced degrees. When it was Mutti's turn, fourteen hundred people rose to their feet, applauding wildly. Mutti waved to them all, thereby prolonging the applause. Wisely she had forgone the opportunity to speak, and I substituted briefly, stressing that this moment was the potent demonstration of what education really meant: not a diploma, but first and foremost an enterprise of enlarging the mind. Therefore, I concluded, Mutti would be back in the fall to take more classes. This forecast produced another enthusiastic acknowledgment, though I was certain the number of those who would continue their own education purely for the sake of learning would be few. I wrote to the publishers of the Guinness Book of Records, but they wrote back that this was no record. They didn't say who had equalled Mutti's achievement.

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The media covered the event appropriately. The Toronto Daily Star ran a full-colour, large picture on the front page. An invitation came from one of the daily TV morning shows in Hollywood, but Mutti did not feel up to accepting it. She was interviewed for radio and Canadian television, and for inclusion in a sociological study. Meanwhile she was planning for her return to school. Slowing Down

Alas, that day never came. In early July, when we came home at night after having paid a condolence call, there was a message on the answering machine. Helga McGregor, a friend and neighbour, had responded to a phone call from Mutti that she needed help. When she arrived she saw Mutti lying crumpled on the floor, unable to move. Helga called an ambulance and then notified us. We found Mutti at Mount Sinai Hospital with a broken femur. She underwent an operation, but when we asked Alan Gross, her surgeon, what her prognosis was, he was not optimistic. Her bones were paper thin, he explained - advanced osteoporosis; it was a miracle that she had not broken them before. It was clear that her life would undergo radical change. Her independence would be limited; and since she refused to contemplate having someone live with her, she had to give up her apartment. It was a sad decision to make. Fortunately, a new facility had opened up practically across the street from her. Called 'Lifestyle,' it was an elegant seniors' apartment hotel with medical supervision. While Mutti recuperated in a rehabilitation centre, we dissolved her apartment and moved her belongings across the street, furnishing her new lodging to what we hoped would be to her liking. But after she moved in she became a different person. She was no longer mobile the way she had been. She now had to use a walker, and getting into our automobile proved more and more difficult for her. Living in a state of increasing dependence was more than she could cope with.

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She had already come to rely on Elizabeth and me for many decisions, but now she began to retreat rapidly into a state of helplessness and treated me as if I were her father. Still, she fantasized that she would return to university, especially when teachers and young fellow students visited her in the hospital. For a while she tried to adjust herself to her new environment, but a year later she fell once more and again broke her leg. We were fortunate to have her admitted to the new hospital at Baycrest - that grand institution for the Jewish aged which has become a model for North American facilities of its kind. It ranges from apartments (for those who can still live by themselves) to a home for the aged and a splendid hospital. Mutti tried its rehabilitation programs for a while, but it soon became clear that she would be wheelchair-bound from now on. We learned the art of transferring her into a car, for she wanted to join us at Shabbat morning services. We constructed a ramp to our back door so that she could be wheeled into our multi-staired home - but she never had a chance to use the ramp, and one day she indicated that she did not want to go to Temple any more. 'It's too difficult for you,' she said, but we understood her meaning. We knew that she had entered the last stage of her life. It was a difficult time all round. Mutti became highly anxious, and fearful of being left alone. Her former fierce independence turned into its very opposite. Even though her room in the hospital was only twenty feet from the nurses' desk, their nearness did not suffice. She rang the bell incessantly, and after a while I had to engage four women to tend to her needs. Only at night was she satisfied to be without them. Mutti seldom laughed, for she had an undeveloped sense of humour and was not by nature a happy woman. While the last twenty years had supplied her with many joys and satisfactions, she now reverted to her basic temperament. None of us could blame her, but that did not make it easier. Between Elizabeth and me, rarely a day went by without one of us visiting her; her telephone rang often with local and long distance calls inquiring after her well-being. When she turned 101, we celebrated her birthday at the Primrose Club, as we had

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done for decades past, but a year later she was no longer up to it, and we had to hold a modest party at the hospital. Her hearing deteriorated, which encouraged her isolation. She was withdrawing from life. As always, she asked people to come and see her, but when they did she said little, and soon there were fewer and fewer visitors of the multitude of friends who had once enjoyed her company. Her out-of-town grandchildren came, and that brought forth some renewed sparks of vitality, but they could not rekindle her flame of vitality. She attended my eightieth birthday party given for me by the Temple,9 and that proved to be her last outing. She prayed much, and her old and well-worn Union Prayer Book never left her lap or her bedside. Hers was a simple faith of the old kind; she approached God the way she had been taught in her childhood. When Elizabeth and I would visit her on Shabbat morning and hold a service with her, she would sing once again and with special fervour. In her last year these moments were the highlights of the week. I learned much about the ageing process during that time, and even more so about care-giving. We had been fortunate for so long in so many ways. For years Mutti had accepted rides from strangers; she used to run across busy Bathurst Street without the benefit of a traffic light, and horrified onlookers would tell us of the fright they experienced. Despite our pleadings she had kept on doing it, even as she performed her household chores with little regard for the laws of gravity. Except for an operation in wartime England long ago, her illnesses had been brief and not serious. But it was different now, and in retrospect I realize how stressful it was to take care of my mother. Aside from her personal needs I had to arrange for the employment of her attendants, who had to be supervised, corrected, and sometimes discharged. I had never been an employer, and keeping records for tax purposes as well as for compliance with various provincial and federal laws became an unforeseen task that would continue long after she had died. (Some bureaucrats refused to believe that she was dead and demanded her signature or a notarized testimony

208 Personal Perspectives that I was her legal guardian, which would ordinarily have caused me merriment, but wasn't funny at the time.) When, one day in November 1992, we reminisced about the lovely party that I had enjoyed on my birthday and said that now it was her turn and that April 1st was not too far away, she was silent for a moment. Then she declared quite simply: 'I won't be around to celebrate it. Why be around any longer?' I did not know then that she committed some of her final thoughts to paper; I found the yellow foolscap long after she was dead: Life. Statements. Hopes, wishes. After long deliberations and careful thinking, here I am, November 23, 10:16 A.M., 1992, in a rented place in a rented [wheel-] chair, and ask myself: what will it take to move this day to a conclusion? With the help of the Almighty? Try! If only not this day alone but other days would pass; that the passing would come quickly to an end. I know, you Almighty are looking down on me; you guide me, you help me to be honest and correct in what I am doing, and in my heart praising and esteeming you. The writing breaks off there. Almost suddenly, her vitality shrivelled visibly. She no longer read or even listened to the evening news, which had always been her vade mecum. The TV set now served only her helpers; she herself never used it again. She had given up on life. A few glimmers here and there; she was always happy to see Elizabeth, Judith, and me, but even these joys were losing their depth. And one day, after she had contracted pneumonia, she refused to eat. She died peacefully a week later, on 4 March, two days before Purim, just short of her 103rd birthday. She had been right in her forecast and even in this taught us something about the role of will in one's life. Farewell

Purim, the day of joyous abandon, was the day of her funeral. The service was held at Holy Blossom Temple, which had been

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her spiritual home for over thirty years. Eight hundred people came to celebrate with her as a final farewell. Jonathan and Joshua, her two rabbinical grandsons, read the prayers, and I gave the eulogy, which was in effect a celebration of her life. My eulogy ended with these words: 'So, rest in peace, Mutti. You did your work on earth and you did it well. You went easily and without complaint from one existence to another. And we, who are temporarily left behind, we will remember you. You are being buried on Purim, but you are Queen Esther for more than one day only. You will command our love and our memories forever.' The Canadian Jewish News devoted half of its front page to her death. Mutti had come to Canada as just another elderly lady; she died a famous woman - not because she had amassed wealth or exercised political influence, but because she had done the seemingly impossible: fulfill her lifelong hope to gain an education, and do it at a time in her life when all odds were heavily stacked against success. She possessed intellectual curiosity, a strong will, and dogged persistence, all backed by good genes. I'd like to think that perchance I inherited some of those genes. Her tombstone in our family plot proclaims: Selma bat Shelomo v 'Yulia

Selma Gumprich Plaut Mother of rabbis, she loved to learn 1890-1993 Died on Adar 12, 5750 May her soul be bound up in the bond of eternal life

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Letting Go

Things Once Loved

The memory of having come to the New World in 1935, during the Great Depression, with no money and few things to call my own, stayed with me for a long time. The catalogue of items I brought with me is short: a serge suit and overcoat, both meant to last a lifetime, and one tennis racquet freshly strung (I had learned that Hebrew Union College had a tennis court). And books: a small Oxford English dictionary given to me by Professor Joshua Friedlander (who later committed suicide to escape the terror of the concentration camp), a Hebrew-German prayer book for Sabbaths and weekdays, a Hebrew Bible plus a German translation by Leopold Zunz, and Theodore Dreiser's An American Tragedy. Dreiser's was the first English language book I had ever tried to read, and I had already slugged my way through a third of it - enough to persuade me that I had to finish it one way or another. Two years later, when I returned from Germany on what I have called an idiot's journey,1 I brought more books with me; and when in 1939 my parents fled the country they could export most of their possessions (except money and jewellery), and thus I came once again into possession of the antique desk that I had acquired with my father's help when I was a young man - a Biedermeier creation that bears the 1835 signature of the Zimmermann. (This book, like all my others, has been written on it.)

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Elizabeth, in turn, had brought into our home many lovely items from her family, who had come to the United States in the first part of the nineteenth century, and of course there were her books, to which she was as attached as I was to mine. She added a particular quality to our marriage that shaped my own outlook on life: except for the sentimental values she attached to things that conveyed personal memories, she was and is totally without a capacity for envy of any kind (with the single exception of not having a large family, which fate denied us). We have been in a hundred splendid homes that she admired for their beauty and good taste, without ever intimating that it might be nice to have this or that. She has always been satisfied to do with what we have, which has meant being surrounded by old things - old cars, old furniture, and the like - as long as they were serviceable. Fifteen years is the average age our cars attain before we are persuaded that the cost of upkeep outweighs their further utility. Our dishwasher was the first Kitchen Aid ever made, and was fifty years old when we finally disposed of it. This fitted with my own upbringing, when 'old' was considered an honorific attribute, not a put-down. Reluctantly I have accepted the fact that my children and grandchildren think otherwise, and my first and only GAP shirt is a hand-me-down from my grandson, greatly admired by all who know my conservative habits. However, there have been two notable exceptions in this 'dull' routine. We bought art objects to beautify our home - paintings, graphics, and sculptures - and we acquired books. I began building the library I had promised myself in the early days at Hebrew Union College, and then went considerably farther. I followed book auctions in the United States and Europe and began to notice that I was buying books not so much because I wanted to read them, but because I might want to consult them at some time. On several occasions I finally got hold of the volume I had pursued, only to discover that I had possessed the book all along. It finally dawned on me that these purchases had often little to do with building a working library, and more to do with the acquisitional instinct that I deplored in others. For a while I

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reasoned that there was a difference between wanting a BMW, a fur coat, or a ten-bedroom house and buying a book. But then I came across a discussion of this delusion (in one of Thomas Mann's novels, I think) that made me face the truth. Greed has many faces, and basically there is little to distinguish one type from another. I once consoled myself with the thought that, after all, I deal with ideas and 'they' deal all too often with pride, prestige, and protzen? but today the distinction has lost its protective function, for all this became past history when I entered the discard mode. Perhaps it is an accident that I started this book with a chapter on obsolescence and now, towards the end of my epistle, return to the theme. The joy of owning things is also exposed to the corrosion of obsolescence. For as we age, the pleasure of possession tends to diminish, and we begin to appreciate the lesson that Diogenes tried to teach. The sudden death of a dear friend brought a related issue into focus. He had been a highly esteemed rabbi, and when the shock of his demise had worn off a bit his congregation asked his widow to remove all his belongings from the temple premises, and the sooner the better. It was a cruel task for her, especially since she had not had a chance to think how to handle her husband's extensive library. Her tears and agony registered forcefully with us, and our family began to discuss how one could guard against this kind of eventuality. To be sure, we could not imagine that Holy Blossom would impose a similar deadline, but despite all its good will, the space that my books take up would have to be used in some way at some time. Thus, disposing of part of my large collection moved from being an option to the level of advisability. Jonathan, being a rabbi, would have first choice, and our nephew Joshua, also a rabbi, would follow suit. But both already had their own libraries, and neither had use for my German books or my specialized section on biblical commentary. I approached Jewish institutions and existing libraries in various communities, including Israel, but all of them wanted selected volumes only, not a large bulk. Negotiations with the Toronto Jewish Public Library also came to naught, even though

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I thought at the time that it would be a perfect place for my books. (I never knew what the problem was, but someone told me that it was the German component of my collection, which certain people were said to disdain as unsuitable.) Eventually, fate intervened. Toronto's York University was establishing a centre of Jewish studies, and the university library's Jewish section was meager. It was a perfect solution, and only one important problem needed attention: which books would I keep as necessary for present and future labours? To be sure, they would always be available, but York is a half-hour's ride away from us, which cannot compete with availability at arm's reach. So we went in stages, and once a year Ellen Hoffman, the university's chief librarian, comes with one or two assistants and we transfer a segment of the library. We have now reached the point where my desire to discard and my need to keep are coming into conflict, which has put a temporary stop to these annual visits. But they will start again, and soon. In the process I discovered that letting books go was far easier than I had feared. No heart-wrenching, no regrets marred the departure of items that had been dear to me and that I had pursued so passionately in the past. With a wave of the hand I now discarded them. 'Go ahead, take them,' I would say to Ellen, and afterward I would not even remember what I had given away. That was also true with my personal papers. They were of a different order, to be sure, but still in some respects the end result of collecting and preserving. In this case the recipient was the National Archives of Canada, in Ottawa. Thus I had a whole carton full of autographs, chief among them Albert Einstein's letter to me back in the early forties.3 There were letters written and received, organizational records, pictures, citations, and other personalia, all of which amounted over the years to hundreds of boxes that neither the Toronto nor the Canadian Jewish Archives could be expected to house, catalogue properly, and have available for ready reference. I know that there was some eyebrow raising because I had not preferred Jewish institutions, but I never regretted having offered this part of my possessions to the people of Canada - and both Elizabeth and Jonathan have also

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made their contributions to the Tlaut collection' in the nation's capital. Moving

All of this constituted a trial run for the real test of letting go. It came unexpectedly and marked a new stage in our lives. When we paid our first visit to Hawaii, in February 1994, we experienced rain almost every day, and the resultant dampness activated latent arthritis in one of Elizabeth's knees. Neither of us had any inkling of the debility that this was causing until we went to see Honolulu's famed Bishop Museum. The converted old mansion has no public elevator, and many of the collection's treasures are found on the second and third floors. Elizabeth concluded that this was beyond her capacity; her arthritis was becoming severe. It was a hint of things to come. When we returned to Toronto our upstairs-downstairs home presented her with the same challenge, and instead of talking about installing a chair lift we began thinking of selling our house. It was a new idea to both of us, and when we informed our children they were shocked. But clearly something needed to be done, and we made our decision quickly and put the place up for sale. That involved more problems than we had anticipated, for the apartment that we rented could not contain many of our possessions. Some went to our children, and others to art galleries, museums, and specialized libraries, most often in Toronto. Museums in New York, Washington, DC, and Cincinnati also became beneficiaries. I had particular problems disposing of long runs of magazines, yearbooks, and foreign-language literature. The University of Toronto's John P. Robarts Library took a number of my German books, but there were many other items that lacked the right kind of recipient. Eventually I called up colleagues and asked them to help themselves; and I extended the invitation also to neighbours and their children. What we discovered was startling and has become more so in retrospect: once our books and other possessions left the house

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they became strangers, and their departure left no trail of regret. Today I can't even remember who took what. The same was true of the house at 46 Ridelle Avenue that we had inhabited for nearly thirty-four years. Once we moved out, neither of us suffered any separation pangs. I had bought it in the summer of 1961 after a single morning's search, and, when asked how I could be sure that my wife would like it, I had answered: T am married to her and not to the house. If she doesn't like it we'll buy another.' That off-hand remark sparked rumours that we must be very rich, but the simple fact was that house ownership never sank roots into our psyche. And now it turned out that, even when once-prized possessions were gone, they were forgotten as if they had never belonged to us. Occasionally, when we remember some particular piece, we speak of it as something in which we have no further emotional investment. We enjoyed having it; and having it no longer merely underscores the limited value that things have altogether. We even received a reward we never anticipated, when we saw some of Kathe Kollwitz's pictures that we had donated to the Art Gallery of Ontario included in a recent exhibit. It was like meeting old friends again, and we watched with quiet pleasure how people looked at the pictures with interest and enjoyment written on their faces. We had started the process of selling our house in the spring of 1994, had sold it in October, and moved to our apartment in February 1995. Elizabeth, who had carried much of the burden of the move, was exhausted, and on the day we moved I had to take her to hospital. Fortunately all the tests were negative, and now she has returned to the best of her former self: highly motivated, working hard on her genealogical studies,4 and loving the ease of apartment living and the spectacular view of surrounding woods, the city's contours, and a bit of Lake Ontario. We have learned to appreciate that in youth we dream, in middle age we seek to acquire and build, and in life's last third we let go. It's good to do it while there is still time. We enjoyed having the things we had, and we were glad to divest ourselves of them when it was opportune. Our children and grandchildren,

216 Personal Perspectives as well as friends and, last but not least, members of the public now take their turn in deriving pleasure from them. There is a time for every experience under heaven ... A time for seeking and a time for losing, A time for keeping and a time for discarding.5 Passages Letting go means also, alas, surrendering friends and associates to the Angel of Death. I want to mention a few of those whose departure affected me grievously. William V. Strauss, Elizabeth's older and only sibling. Though brilliant and first in his class at Harvard Business School, he could not find a good job on graduation in the early thirties, because in those days Jews were not generally hired by the big concerns that surveyed the Ivy League's brightest prospects. While in time he did become a successful businessman, both Elizabeth and I felt that his rare intellectual talent was better suited to an academic post. He possessed a magnificent library, and we often discussed literary issues. When he retired from business I suggested to Hebrew Union College President Fred Gottschalk that he engage Billy as a dollar-a-year financial adviser. It was a perfect match, which saved the college large sums of money and brought Billy enormous satisfaction. Alas, he was a heavy smoker, developed emphysema, and died a slow death. We lost a thoroughly cultured man, the kind one finds all too seldom outside academe. Heinz Warschauer. He hailed from Berlin, was highly educated, and was a true intellectual. Interned in Canada as a 'German' (like a number of other prominent Jewish refugees), he tried his hand at journalism, and he eventually became one of the premier Jewish educators in North America. When I came to Holy Blossom he was its director of education - an enormous stroke of good fortune for me, for rarely did anyone arrive in a new position to find a staff headed by so gifted a person. Heinz enjoyed tremendous respect, both from his teach-

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ers and from his students, of whom there were some eleven hundred in 1961. He was one of the first presidents of the National Association of Temple Educators (in the United States and Canada), and his influence on the Holy Blossom community was pervasive. His death from cancer left me deeply bereft.6 Ray Wolfe, one of Canada's leading businessmen, was a quiet person who never promoted himself. His judgment was uncanny, his counsel invaluable, and his commitment to Jewish and general causes exemplary. Through his acquisition of the Canadian Jewish News he managed to exert a temperate, rational, and knowledgeable influence on the community. I am one of many in the community who sorely miss his presence, for when I needed him he was always there for me. (His wife, Rose, an active communal figure in her own right, has just finished her second term as chancellor of the University of Toronto, and their daughter, Elizabeth, is the current chair of Kolel. Their friendship has made it a little easier to bear Ray's loss.) JoshuaJ. Chesniewas my doctor, whose passing tore a large hole in my life, for in addition to his watchful medical caring, the Chesnies had become de facto members of our family. He too was retiring in nature, artistic, with a broad range of cultural commitments, a splendid music library, and art objects that spoke of taste and knowledge. Jon Reeves, a patient of his, remembered him in a moving poem as one who broke off small pieces of his own heart when serving others. (His wife, Henrietta, remains part of our inner circle. She was Holy Blossom's first woman president and serves as vice-president of the World Union for Progressive Judaism.) Max E. Enkin. He was the one who came to visit me in St Paul and urged me to consider becoming Holy Blossom's rabbi.7 A clothing manufacturer in Hamilton, he commuted from Toronto every day and still found time to be active in the community and especially in Holy Blossom. He had been its president and later became its honorary president, the only person on whom this distinction was ever bestowed. His integrity, clear judgment, unswerving commitment, and sheer humanity were universally respected, and honours galore came to him, among

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them admission to the Order of the British Empire and the Order of Canada. The likes of him appear but seldom among us, and I was very fortunate to have had him as my guide when I served the congregation. I shall always remember his intervention at the first board meeting I attended. At issue was a payment that was asked of the Temple, and the prevailing opinion held that no legal obligation for it existed. Max asked for the floor and simply said: 'Are you not forgetting that this is a synagogue and not a business?!' The bill was paid forthwith. He was truly religious in the best sense of the word. At his funeral I quoted from J.G. Holland's Wanted: 'God give us men. A time like this demands / Strong minds, great hearts, true faith and ready hands.' Max was such a man.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Faith, Family, and Future

Faith

Having carried the title 'Rabbi' for more than fifty years, having centred much of my life around the synagogue, and having written books that speak of God, I am believed to enjoy a special relationship with the Divine. But when it comes to God, I have found that nothing is simple, and the older I get the more doors in my religious edifice seem to open to unknown chambers. Only a few of the nearly nine hundred pages in my recently published Haftarah commentary lack a mention of God, but what I wrote in explanation of the book's prophetic passages required of me neither certainty nor theological precision. When I was young, belief was uncomplicated. The existence of God was a given; prayer had form and purpose, for it was founded on the premise that God knew everything and could do anything. My mother felt that she had a special relationship with Him (no question that God was a He), while Dad was very private about his spiritual life and never shared it with me. I knew he had problems with the idea that God had dictated the Torah to Moses, but - though he hinted at it on several occasions - we never pursued the matter, and, besides, it had no bearing on our liberal, yet quite meticulous attention to the synagogue and its services. After Hitler had cut short my law career, I took readily to my new environment in rabbinical school, prayed with intensity, and had moments of heightened spiritual

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awareness. A year and a half after I arrived in the United States I composed a simple poem that the editors of the Hebrew Union College Monthly chose to publish.1 Maybe they did so because I was a newcomer not only to the college but to the English language as well. I rediscovered the piece recently and reproduce it here because it rather vividly describes how I felt about my relationship with God: Ablaze the night with sparkling light! Above my head the sky is clad with rows of stars like silver bars. I am alone my heart is prone to stretch and grow, to glide and flow, to leave its place and merge with space; soon it extends to many lands. At last it fills all vales and hills, each cell and birth around the earth becomes the whole of every soul in joy and sigh. Then it mounts high above the sod and speaks to God. My heart is home. Gone is the foam

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of glittering light, and out of sight. The somber dawn betrays the morn.

Some fifteen years ago, I wrote (at the end of Unfinished Business) of faith's changing vistas: 'The moments of illumination which once I was privileged to experience have ceased. Why? Is there a flattening of spiritual awareness, even as there is a flattening of the emotions as the years go by?' The greatest difference in this regard came from worshipping in the pew. I thought it would be no more than a small change of location - after all, I would still be praying in the same sanctuary. I found out quite quickly that there is a vital difference. Up there, on the beemah, my prayers had a special dimension of fervour and intensity. I was absorbed in energizing my religious sensibilities so that I could transmit them to the congregants and bring them into the vortex of the divine. In the pew everything is different. I am responsible only for my own spirituality. I may sit in the crowd or next to my family, but I am isolated and my thoughts tend not to be focused. They wander quite often, and I think of myself rather than of God. During parts of the service I seem to be on automatic pilot, and I have since found out that others in the congregation share my problems. In addition, as the former senior rabbi, I am also observer and critic and have to struggle hard to divest myself of that diversion. I find that I must concentrate on prayer in a way different from before, so that for the first time in my rabbinic life I have learned what I should have known (but never thought about) - that the pew differs vastly from the pulpit. Fortunately, none of this obtrudes when I pray alone, but Sabbath worship is so central to my week that its prayer ambience has a way of being dominant. I find the element of holiness hard to catch, and, when I do, hard to hold. I now understand the Hasidic rabbi who was asked why he was sunk in meditation prior to the beginning of the service. 'I pray,' he answered, 'that I may be able to pray.' To know the problem is helpful, but it

222 Personal Perspectives does not end my recurrent frustration. In addition to all else, this may also be an aspect of ageing, for concentration is sometimes difficult to come by. I always thought that as you get older your sense of God's nearness becomes keener; in my case that has not happened, at least not in that sense. When I was younger I had more vivid, intensive religious experiences at prayer inside and outside the Temple. That has diminished, much to my chagrin. Getting older seems to brings up remembrance of things past and stimulates the desire to connect with days long gone. For me, this has meant returning to the religious accoutrements of the liberal environment in which I was raised. Once again I don yarmulke and tallit,2 thus forging a link with my younger self. I have also learned that in trying to surrender myself to the Divine Presence, my rational mind tends to assert itself. While I chant the prayers or speak them I may start to examine the content and at once find that ratiocination suppresses devotion. It is as if another voice intrudes and asks, 'Can you really say this with a whole heart?' Where does belief come in? Strange as it may seem, belief is not really the issue, at least not for me, and besides, belief as such is nowhere commanded in the Hebrew Bible. God's existence is taken for granted, and this certainty is contrasted with the worthlessness and stupidity of idol worship. Thus faith appears almost as a rational conclusion. Almost, but not quite, and the best way I can speak of the ground of my spiritual commitment is to describe it as consciously taking a chance on God's existence and presence. The world is full of sounds, music, and electronic messages, and all it takes is a proper modem, computer, radio, or TV to make them audible or visible or both. Prayer, I find, is like that: a kind of tuning in to what is out there all the time. But often the battery is low or the wires get crossed by meandering thoughts. My own batteries need recharging from time to time, and not infrequently I press the wrong button and type 'Me' when I wanted to type 'God.' Meanwhile I keep at it, in the morning and at night and especially on the Sabbath. That is the day I get my wires checked and bring the

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RAM back to capacity, and though it sometimes works for a brief moment only, that instant revitalizes me. At other times I fail and nothing happens, and so I try again. It was easier when I was in the pulpit, but no one warned me what it is like to be an ordinary congregant. When serving as an active pulpit rabbi I translated my concept of worship into a dynamic experience. I have always considered the service to be a religious drama, with highs and lows, that makes the congregation expect an emotional and/or rational climax. The beemah is not a stage but a staging area, whence one's prayers are launched. Rabbi, cantor, and choir help to start the process, and the congregation becomes a partner in the sacred enterprise - yet in the pew I often have problems being an interactive congregant. Maybe that is why some of my retired colleagues also have trouble finding a service that speaks to their needs. My wife and I, along with my former antagonist Rabbi Reuben Slonim,3 usually attend the small, lay-led minyan in the Temple's board room, and its pleasant, undemanding atmosphere makes it easier for me to concentrate on prayer. At other times, during the summer and of course during all festivals, we worship in the sanctuary or the upstairs chapel of Holy Blossom, where despite the lovely music and stimulating sermons - my prayer problems are more pronounced. The struggle is with myself, not with the synagogue. I comfort myself by thinking of the prophet Isaiah, who may have experienced a like problem when he spoke of seeking God as a first step to finding God.4 And after that, the search must start again - or perhaps the search is already the finding. Family and Work

Age and wrinkles arrive simultaneously, and both bring up the same question: 'Are you keeping yourself busy these days, now that you're retired?' If I've heard this question once, I've heard it a hundred times. It took me a while to find out just why so many people want to know how I spend my time. The answer is

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really quite simple: they have only a minor interest in my activities, for when I start to tell them they make ready to turn me off. They are in fact disappointed when I answer, for they want to hear something else, and it has more to do with them than with me. These questioners are retired or nearing the age when their much-dreamed-of leisure turns into something of a trial or becomes cause for anxiety. Being bored and being busy are the two modes of life between which much of life oscillates. Lots of people worry that their days will be or already are too long for them. What they would like to hear from me is how I manage the problem of empty time. In that respect, I have little to report to them. For I have too little time, not too much. And yet, as I write this, I know that I too have occasional glimpses of emptiness. They come when I am between two projects and the fleeting threat of emptiness touches me too. I never wanted to imitate Lin Yu-t'ang, the highlight of whose day was sitting in the garden and doing nothing but sitting and letting be. Fortunately, there is always the company of my wife, and she does what I do and faces the same challenges. She works in her study, and I in mine. Our companions during these hours of research and writing are ideas, records, books, and more books. Genealogy is her beat, even as Bible and Jewish studies have occupied me most of the time. She stays up late and works best in the waning hours of the day; I go to sleep at eleven o'clock and get up before six in the morning. This regime, which we have observed for many years, leaves little time for the kind of leisure in which most people indulge. We rarely see a new play or movie, despite the splendid fare available in Toronto. We occasionally go out for dinner so that Elizabeth does not have to spend time preparing the meal at home. (From 1995 on, our children in Detroit and Toronto have seen to it that a good many dinners rest in our freezer, ready for serving.) This way of organizing our time also means that by and by we see fewer and fewer people. But then, as sociologists and psychologists have shown, this is the 'convoy' factor. Its paradigm

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looks something like this. In the various stages of our lives we have different people around us who accompany us, care for us, or - more frequently these days - for whom we care. The convoy is largest when we are in our middle years and need to associate with many people for a number of reasons. But as we age, and professional or business demands shrink or disappear altogether, the convoy diminishes. We no longer crave to meet new people in the hope that we might find their company enriching, and instead begin to draw the wagons around us. Society too does its share in this diminution when it tends to exclude rather than include us. Formerly we were considered to have 'value,' while today we are seen as lacking it, at least to any socially marketable extent. Thus our own convoy is small, especially since our Toronto family has all too few members. We have a small group of close friends, and we get together with them, but much more rarely than we used to. At day's end much of our energy is spent, and we are happy to be with each other and sharing an old-time movie on television. Telephone calls now become a staunch part of keeping our remaining convoy close to us, and through its members we stay in touch with family and friends. Surprisingly, an old and disappearing activity absorbs us in fits and starts: the once-honoured habit of writing letters. Elizabeth has always excelled in it; she writes with enough detail to give the recipient a realistic taste of our lives. I always left this art to her, who has in this manner become the one who keeps us in touch with family and friends the world over, from Israel and Europe all the way to Hawaii. Lately I too have joined her writing train, since I discovered the ease of e-mail - though my missives are minuscule compared to hers. But our consuming passion has long been writing books or articles, which necessarily isolates us. A day without writing or research feels wasted. But then, for me, so seem two days without tennis or nine holes of golf or spirited walking; I see my mental capacities as a direct reflection of my physical health. Mens sana in corpore sano, the Romans used to say - 'a healthy mind in a healthy body.' I enjoy competition as a frame for exercise; just working out in

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the gym bores me to tears. I have made friends through tennis, much less so in golf. Why? I often wonder. Maybe because tennis tends to attract active people, whose centre of life lies elsewhere. They make room for the community, both in time and in money, while somehow many for whom golf is a daily routine seem to have few hours and interests left over. I don't know whether anyone has ever explored this further, and of course there are notable exceptions. Some of my best friends are golfers. These days my routine is simple. Breakfast by 6, and ready for work at 7, after I've read the Globe and Mail First I turn to my email correspondence and glance at the news services to which I have subscribed. I usually answer electronic letters right away and, when indicated, print out a copy for Elizabeth, so that she can read it when she eats her breakfast. Dictation comes next; I have a secretary for two hours three times a week. Writing follows and is taken up again after I return from visits to the office and other appointments. Our daughter, Judith, an imaginative and highly competent teacher who specializes in ESL,5 has become my weekend golfing partner and, more important, is now the one who hosts us for our Friday night prayers and dinner. Elizabeth was happy to surrender that privilege, and thus the old once-a-week family gathering has stayed intact and Judith's home has become our lovely and much-appreciated locus. Lately, she has moved closer to us, and this has become a source of mutual reassurance. We see our Detroit children, Jonathan and Carol, at regular intervals, but the four-to-five-hour drive limits their frequency. Jonathan has been a distinguished congregational rabbi for most of his career,6 but lately he has shifted gears. Noting the ever-worsening fiscal position of most non-profit organizations, he has managed to come to their help with innovative ideas, whose execution has become his primary pursuit. His wife, Carol, who taught high school for many years and then turned to family psychology, is in every sense another daughter rather than a daughter-in-law. Her and Jonathan's son and daughter are our only grandchildren. Both Daniel and Deborah, graduates of the College of the Pacific and University of Arizona,

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respectively, live and work also in Detroit just now, though with today's high rate of change in occupation all this may turn out to be temporary. Abundant love, emphasized by phone calls and holiday visits, goes a long way, though it cannot substitute for physical proximity, but we are grateful for the wonderfully close relationships with which we have been blessed. A first cousin's daughter, with husband and two children, also resides in Toronto, rounding out our small Toronto family. In some ways this is an aspect of the ministerial calling: we move with mate and children and leave behind whatever other family we have. Added to this significant 'downside' of our profession is what may be called the 'wind-and-chaff syndrome. Hitler picked us up, and those of us who escaped his killing machine were spread to the four winds like drifting chaff. Dad was one of seven and Mutti one of thirteen children who grew to adulthood. The only one to survive today is my mother's sister Alice, who received her PhD in chemistry in the 1920s and hopes to celebrate her centenary in October 1997. She lives in San Francisco, where her son Michael (my first cousin) is CEO of Macy's West. My late brother Walter's children are spread across the United States: Yehudah is a farmer in Kentucky; Carmi, a business man in the Los Angeles area; and Joshua, a rabbi in Martha's Vineyard and Boston. Their mother, Hadassah, until recently lived in Jerusalem and has now moved to southern California. Other cousins are found in Windsor, Winnipeg, Saskatoon, Vancouver, Minneapolis, Piedmont (California), San Diego, and other places, including Israel, Great Britain, Germany, and South Africa. Elizabeth, of old American stock, has her immediate family in Cincinnati, and others with whom she is in touch are spread throughout the United States and beyond. Family, of course, is only part of one's vital connections; friends form the other and more variable segment. Family, if at all meaningful, is rooted in blood, while friendship has another dimension. For me, who grew up in Germany, lived in Cincinnati, served for three years in the U.S. Army, and had congregations in Chicago, St Paul, and Toronto, only a few friendships

228 Personal Perspectives

have survived decades-long separations interrupted infrequently by brief reunions - and, alas, there is also the toll that the Angel of Death exacts. On our last visit to St Paul (in the summer of 1996) we found more friends in the cemetery than we saw in the flesh. That observation impressed itself strongly on Elizabeth and me, because, quite clearly, with every passing year we are faced with the Great Inevitability that awaits all of us. Meanwhile the two of us are grateful that we have each other, and that our marriage has reached the fifty-eight-year mark. If this catalogue appears to lack detail, it was meant to be that way. I've lived most of my adult life in the public eye, and family represents one of the few areas of privacy I have managed to preserve. Of Things to Come

'I am no prophet, and neither am I the son of a prophet,' the shepherd from Tekoa protested in the eighth century BCE.7 Yet every step we take is dependent on what we think will happen; it is, literally, predicated on our assessment of time and circumstance. We take chances at every turn, and I shall take some here - seeing that this is the last chapter of the book. While this is life's quiet time for me, the world at large is churning with revolutions of many kinds: in technology and politics, in family relationships and morals, to name but a few that impinge on us every day. • Technology. We shall communicate with one another more easily, but the danger we shall encounter arises from the very advance that the new sciences bring us. The medium will tend to come between us as a virtual persona and make us believe that face-to-face contacts are no longer necessary and, in fact, impinge on our shrinking personal space. For privacy will be tomorrow's most endangered species and we shall look for methods of protecting ourselves in new ways, for locks and bolts, guns and dogs cannot secure it for us. • Locomotion. Today, the claim is made that air travel is the safest way to go from here to there, and that may be so. But that

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claim will be threatened in the next few decades when the sky will be as crowded as our city streets are today. We will fly our own sky cars and become experts in parachuting, since the danger of crashing requires newer safety measures than today's airbags. • Morality. We haven't hit bottom yet, but we are getting closer. When we do - and the time is not too far away - we shall have a socio-moral revolt that promises to turn even the most anarchic into semi-conservatives and will possibly spawn repressive government. This will present us liberals (assuming that this term will still have relevance) with a dilemma: our stubborn defence of free personal space will clash with our desire to re-establish some order in the moral sphere. Canadians are familiar with the political term 'progressive conservative,' and as a moral goal it will gain wide support. Perhaps Robert L. Humphrey is right when he proclaims 'human nature's natural law' as our possible salvation. It is an aspect of philosophy to which I can relate. I have been a liberal all my life and am proud of the term especially when it describes openness, acceptance of others, and the ability to be self-critical. I do have my conservative side as well, and maybe that too is part of my liberal stance. • Religion. What is termed 'ultra-orthodox' today will be tomorrow's mainstream orthodoxy in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In the Jewish sphere, liberals will struggle for identity. Not until we regain a sense of passion will we turn ourselves from a turgid mass of 'members' into a revitalized movement that is both radical and reasonably observant. Even more important, we have to regain our sense of God-relatedness, whatever form and content it may have. Without a sense of the living God, Reform Judaism is irrelevant, even as an Orthodoxy that pretends to know God's will is the dead end of rational religion. •Jews. Israel will continue to struggle both with Islam's insistence that Zionism is illegitimate and with Orthodoxy's ascendancy within the state. Orthodox Judaism has a vision of the future, while secular Jews do not, and non-Orthodox religious Jews are too few at this juncture to make a difference. Their presence will matter only when a charismatic leader will emerge from their midst, someone who will combine religious/moral

230 Personal Perspectives

and social vision to point to a future that is neither narrowly Orthodox and righteous nor flaccidly secular and permissive. In the Diaspora, assimilation will reduce us significantly in numbers, but a core will emerge that is serious about being Jewish along with being open and informed. In sum

For God's own reasons, our vision of the future is limited, and both physical and metaphoric cataracts restrict it increasingly as we age. I have been very lucky in so many respects and have every reason to be deeply grateful for what I had and have, and for the opportunity to commit this memoir to discette and paper. A third volume is highly unlikely - but then, as I was careful to point out, I am no prophet.

APPENDIX A

Two Letters That Saved My Life

An Invitation Pres. Julian Morgenstern, H.U.C., Cincinnati, Ohio, to Rabbiner Dr. Leo Baeck, President of the Hochschule fur die Wissenschaft des Judentums, Berlin ... The second matter which I have to lay before you today, and which I am sure will prove equally interesting to you, is to inform you and, through you, the other members of the Faculty of the Hochschule fur die Wissenschaft des Judentums that the Faculty and Board of Governors of the Hebrew Union College have expressed their willingness to admit to the ranks of its students a number of capable and promising young German students who are now preparing for the Rabbinate in Germany, but who may desire, for one reason or other, to continue their studies at the Hebrew Union College. This action of the authorities of the Hebrew Union College is governed by the following conditions: The number of these students for the academic year 1935-1936 must not exceed five. They must first be properly accredited by responsible authorities, preferably yourself and your associates in the Faculty of the Hochschule. Their applications for admission to the College must be accompanied by a full statement of both their academic and their specifically Jewish preparation to date, likewise by a certificate of good health from a responsible physician and a responsible dentist. Their applications should be presented, if at all possible, not later than May 15th. And they, in turn, should present themselves in person for examination upon October 9, 1935. Such students, regularly admitted,

232 Appendix A will enjoy the privilege of residence in the Hebrew Union College Dormitory free of all costs, and likewise will have the privilege of participating in our established system of student self-support, so that they would thus be enabled, through cooperation of the College, to earn whatever funds they may need to supplement their room and board in the Dormitory. They must be or have been bonafide German citizens.

If these conditions can be satisfied, we shall be happy indeed to admit, as I said, up to five such students next fall. They will be admitted in whatever class of the Hebrew Union College we find them most adequately prepared for, and will be permitted to continue their studies at the Hebrew Union College under the conditions described above, for so long as they desire to remain here, and of course pending satisfactory conduct, until they shall have completed their preparation for the Rabbinate. What would come after that, of course cannot be determined now. But of course they must understand that they would be subject to the Immigration Laws of the United States of America. We shall be happy indeed to hear from you and your colleagues with regard to this matter at your earliest opportunity, so that we may in turn make our plans accordingly. [March or April 1935]

A Follow-up Pres. Morgenstern, H.U.C., to Dr. Ismar Elbogen, Hochschule. ... Gunther Plaut appeals to us, too, both because he knows some English, and otherwise because he has already finished his University work and therefore would be able to devote all his time here to the work in our College without the complications which attendance at the University here might require. Accordingly, if this, too, meets with your ideas and plans, I believe we would like to have Plaut as a student. June 21, 1935

APPENDIX B

A Missed Opportunity

Back in the early 1970s, Rabbi Stuart Rosenberg, the highly successful rabbi of Beth Tzedec Congregation, was an undisputed leader of Toronto's Jewish community. His Conservative congregation, located a block away from Holy Blossom, was the hub of innovative and highly regarded educational activities, and he and I had frequent opportunities to talk about the future of our community. In the course of our discussions, we lamented the fact that we needed a non-Orthodox rabbinical college, or Lehrhaus, on the model of the Buber-Rosenzweig college in Frankfurt, which flourished in the 1920s. It had been Jewishly ecumenical and immensely influential in bringing the adults into the vortex of Jewish education. Nothing quite like it had been developed since that time. We concluded that if we joined the immense potential of our Conservative and Reform communities, we could set a course for unlimited future development. We made our plans for a joint Lehrhaus, which would have no denominational colouring and would allow those who studied there to enter the Jewish professional field - become teachers, rabbis, or whatever - or simply attend for the sake of learning. We thought that students from the Lehrhaus could, if they desired, apply for admission to the seminary of their choice, and these institutions could enrich our community by the presence of some of their professors. We had no doubt that we could raise money for this path-breaking enterprise, and we received a tentative 'go-ahead' from the heads of HUC-JIR and the Jewish Theological Seminary. To begin with, these institutions would second to us one of their teachers in alternating semesters, and we would supplement the staff with local talent, of which there was no dearth.

234 Appendix B Stuart and I were understandably excited about the project - but then it happened that he became absorbed in an ever-deepening disagreement with his congregation until eventually he was discharged, even though he had a life contract. The ensuing legal dispute became a regular subject for media attention and left the Jewish community quite horrified. After some years the matter was settled out of court, but, in the process, much damage had been done to rabbinic-lay relations, and, alas, it also wrecked our splendid project. It had to be abandoned and has never been revived. Since then, Stuart and his wife, Hadassah, a popular and learned semiticist, have passed to their eternal rewards.

Notes

CHAPTER ONE On Ageing and Obsolescence 1 Unfinished Business: An Antobiography (Toronto: Lester &r Orpen Dennys, 1981), 000. Mother too has now left us, and chapter 13 in this book is devoted to her. 2 Some larger computers already feature word recognition. For more on my electronic assistant, see chapter 12. 3 Globe and Mail, 24 November 1992. 4 His article appeared in the magazine Fifty-Five Plus (June-July 1993), 31. He cited statistics that showed drivers aged seventy-five and older being involved in 3.3 per cent of driving accidents in 1991, while sixteen-year-old drivers accounted for 15.8 per cent. 5 The plan was instituted around 1970 with the help and guidance of Jerome Diamond, then director of the Jewish Family and Child Service of Toronto. His perceptive interviews caused a number of partners to review their relationship and postpone their wedding. For some years I supplemented this approach with post-marital review sessions held a year after the wedding, but finally abandoned the practice because it took too much of my time. Lillian Messinger was a great help in this short-lived experiment. 6 Published 1981, by Methuen in Toronto. 7 Actually, only about 8 per cent of the aged live in nursing homes, yet in the public mind being old is usually bound up with the image of helpless persons sitting in wheelchairs and staring vacantly ahead. 8 On one occasion I lectured on the subject at the University of Manitoba, in Winnipeg, during a three-day engagement. 9 Disraeli (1804-1881), Conigsby (1844), book 2, chap. 5; Immanuel ben Solomon of Rome (13th century), Machbarot, chap. 4.

236 Notes to pages 18-32 CHAPTER TWO The Boat Is Full: Refugees at the Gate 1 My long-standing commitment to speaking on matters of immigration and refugees, in both the United States and Canada, is described in Unfinished Business, 174-5, and my contretemps with John Diefenbaker on 224-5. Recently I came across an old bulletin of my congregation in Chicago and found that already on 25 April 1947 - now fifty years ago! - I had preached on the subject 'Open the Door, Uncle Sam!' At issue was a bill before the House of Representatives entitled 'The Emergency Temporary Displaced Persons at Mission Act,' which was designed to authorize the United States to undertake its fair share in the resettlement of displaced persons in Germany. 2 See Unfinished Business, 337. 3 The Boat Is Full was the title of a famous film about the Nazi period, and was in turn derived from A.A. Haesler's 1969 book, The Lifeboat Is Full. It described how a prosperous Switzerland prevented the entry of Jews fleeing Hitler. The nation's policy proclaimed that its economy and political balancing act would be endangered if it were to take in these desperate people. The whole problem of Swtizerland's moral lapse was revisited in 1996-7, when its government and banks at last had to confront their actions during the war and the post-war years. 4 Contained in his novel 1984, published in 1948. The book's opening line is, 'Big Brother is watching you.' 5 The definition in the UN Convention relating to the Status of Refugees (1951) had been made part of Canada's immigration law. 6 Published in English under title Refugee Determination in Canada and in French as Reconnaissance au Canada du statut du refugie (both published in 1985 by the Minister of Supply and Services). 7 See my account in Unfinished Business, 99. My parents eventually arrived in the United States in March 1945, while I was in combat in Germany, serving with the 104th Infantry Division of the American army. 8 Later, when I wrote the commissioner a letter of thanks, I did inform him of this bit of personal history. 9 Thus, for instance, Michael Schelew represented Amnesty International, Barbara Jackman the Canadian Bar Association, George Cram the Inter-Church Council, and Fred Zemans the Canadian Jewish Congress. 10 Chief among the many volunteers were Roger Hyman, Leonard Wise, and the chair of the event, Howard Adelman. 11 The issues were summarized in part II of my unpublished report.

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C H A P T E R T H R E E Canadian Mosaic 1 Some of these thoughts run parallel with those promoted by Thomas Courchene. 2 See Unfinished Business, 'The French Fact,' 251-2. 3 I elaborated on the need for defining our mutual needs in an article in Maclean's, 10July 1978, p. 8. I would today give more emphasis to the motivations of Quebecers and less to pressures the rest of us might put on them. 4 He was strongly supported by James Bourque, former deputy minister in the Northwest Territories. 5 Called 'Opportunity Canada,' the conversations were held at the Guild Inn in Scarborough from 4 to 6 May 1996. 6 See the next section, 'Blacks and Jews.' 7 This segment amplifies the discussion on multiculturalism found above in chapter 2, where the focus is on immigrant and refugee issues. 8 None Is Too Many (Toronto: Lester & Orpen Dennys, 1982). 9 The term arose in the American south, where it was applied disparagingly to rural labourers. 10 Globe and Mail, 15 March 1997. 11 Nationalism without Walls: The Unbearable Lightness of Being Canadian (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart, 1995). 12 In 1986 another UN survey had called Canada's acceptance of refugees the best in the world. 13 See Unfinished Business, 239 footnote. I wrote at the time that, 'in contrast to the United States, in Canada the alliance of Jews and other minorities has remained firm.' The Alliance later on saw fit to honour me in 1984 with its inaugural Race Relations Award. The North York Committee can be traced to my visit to Mayor Mel Lastman in 1979.1 was then president of the Canadian Jewish Congress and vice-chair of the Ontario Human Rights Commission. In that capacity, heading a subcommittee on community relations, I went (together with Mark Nakamura, the staff person assigned to us) and persuaded the somewhat reluctant mayor to take a plunge and establish the first such committee in Canada. I suggested he call it 'The Mayor's Committee on Ethnic, Community and Race Relations,' and that his action would set an invaluable precedent for the nation. He made one condition, however: 'I'll do it if you take on the chairmanship.' I demurred, because of my presidency of the Canadian Jewish Congress. I suggested Father Masseo Lombardi, then assistant director of the Office of Social Action of the archdiocese of Toronto, and Al Mercury, as vice-president of the Urban Alliance.

238

14 15 16 17 18 19 20

Notes to pages 41-50

The committee was established forthwith and eventually dropped the attribution 'Mayor's Committee,' becoming the responsibility of the whole city council. It served indeed as a model for other communities; for instance, the city of Toronto followed with its own structure not long thereafter, and so did other cities around the country. Ten years later, at a special ceremony, I was presented with a citation by the mayor, and served thereafter as honorary adviser. But several years ago the committee underwent some restructuring, and in consequence I received a form letter from Judy Sgro, a councilwoman in charge, who informed me that new members would be appointed, and asking if I would like to be considered. Thus ended my activity, and I am happy to know that under its current director, Richard Gosling, the committee continues to function and has spread to many new areas of civic endeavour. North York contains the largest aggregate of black and other citizens of colour, and despite occasional tensions there has generally been peace, if not always concord. (In August 1996 I received a phone call from Ms Sgro, apologizing for the above-noted form letter. It should never have been sent, she said, but she did not know about it until Gosling had brought it to her attention. Would I forgive her, and would I consent to continue as honorary advisor to the committee? Of course I agreed, on both scores.) Morley Wolfe now is the committee's chair and keeps me informed of its activities. See chapter 4 below. For further details see Unfinished Business, 237-9.1 was one of Wilson's friends and admirers who spoke at his memorial observance. Share, 29 April 1994. Issue of 13 May. Since 1983 senior rabbi of Holy Blossom Temple. Minutes of its Ontario regional offices, 18 April 1994. See chapter 12, below.

CHAPTER FOUR Human Rights: Sitting in Judgment 1 When I use it without qualification, Code is meant to designate the Ontario Human Rights Code, first published in 1962 and amended many times since. 2 Adjudicators determine, on the basis of legal precedent and constitutional considerations, whether the Code has been violated and therefore discrimination has occurred. In 1962 Ontario became the first province in Canada to create such legislation. The other provinces followed suit, and a federal Code was established as well.

Notes to pages 53-66 239

3 4

5

6

7

8 9 10 11

Adjudicators interpret civil, not criminal law; they may dismiss the complaint or find discrimination to have occurred and level fines and/or require the respondent party to make restitution and to avoid future breaches of the Code. The rulings can be appealed all the way to the Supreme Court of Canada. The case was Ouimette v. Lily Cups Ltd., published in Canadian Human Rights Reporter (July 1990), vol. 12, decision 3, D/19-34. The relevant section states: 'Where, upon dismissing a complaint, the board of inquiry finds that... in the particular circumstances undue hardship was caused to the person complained against, the board of inquiry may order the Commission to pay to the person complained against such costs as are fixed by the board.' Professor Baum had ruled similarly in Ouimette v. Lily Cups. Because at this writing the appeal has not been adjudicated, I have merely cited portions of my judgment that are a matter of public record. The decision can be found in Canadian Human Rights Reporter (September 1992), vol. 16, decision 23, D/184-224. It sets forth how Gumming and I differed from Dawson in our reasons, though not in the final conclusion, which was unanimous. The Board of Inquiry is decidedly not a creature of the Human Rights Commission, but an independent board set up by the Ontario Human Rights Code. This error of ascription is often made by the media and - despite many attempts at correction — is regularly repeated. Susan Rosen in Quote (April 1993). The full decision may be found in Canadian Human Rights Reporter (November 1990), vol. 12, decision 43, D/364-85. 25 July 1990. 27 July 1990.

CHAPTER FIVE Israel: Love's Ambiguities 1 A sense of being beleaguered and facing extinction. Masada was the last refuge of the Jewish Zealots during the nation's war against Rome (66-73 CE). Located on a 100-metre-high rock in the Judaean desert near the Dead Sea, it had been an ideal place for Herod to build a summer palace that also served as a citadel. The Romans besieged it for some time, and when at last they stormed it they found that the 960 defenders had committed suicide so as not to fall into the hands of the conquerors. 2 Unfinished Business, 275—7.

3 Sharon, however, survived the severe criticism levelled at him by the Kahan

240

4

5 6

7 8

9 10 11

12

Notes to pages 67-81

Commission, established by the Israeli government to investigate the Sabra and Shatila massacre. He served as minister of housing in the cabinet of Yitzhak Shamir and in July 1996 was appointed to a specially created post in the first cabinet of Binyamin Netanyahu. The CIC was acknowledged as playing an important role in interpreting Israel to the public, especially to government (see Unfinished Business, 260ff and passim). I had served for several years as co-chair, together with Norman May. See the next chapter. That position attracted considerable opposition. Its spokespeople reminded me that Jews were not allowed to give up land that had been vouchsafed to them by the Almighty, back in biblical days. But I felt then, and I feel today, that people come before land - even the Holy Land when human lives are at stake, and that we deserve the land only when we pass the test of righteousness. There are Orthodox rabbis in Israel who also hold this view, though this is at present still a minority opinion among the religious/national electorate. Excerpted from an address given on 13 August 1988. The citation is from Pirkei Avot (often referred to as 'Ethics of the Fathers'), 2:4. A trenchant article exposing this tendency was published by Charles Krauthammer in Time, 14 October 1996; see also my article in the Canadian Jewish News, on 10 October 1996. He had been Canadian ambassador in Moscow, and was a son of Prime Minister Lester Pearson. The institute is independent but has close ties with External Foreign Affairs. Howard Adelman, professor of philosophy at York University; Michael Marrus, professor of history at the University of Toronto; Shira Herzog, erstwhile director of the CIC, and since then director of the Kahanoff Foundation. 'Even-handedness' had long been a buzzword for tilting Canadian Near East policies towards the Arabs. Though on paper it looked like the ideal of fairness, it was in fact the contrary: it measured the impact on Canadian policy by Israel on one hand against the whole Arab world on the other.

13 See Unfinished Business, 279-80.

14 The Hebrew acronym for the Israeli armed forces. CHAPTER SIX Israel: Rabin and After 1 See my Asylum - A Modern Dilemma (Toronto and Westport, Conn.: York Lanes Press and Praeger, 1995), 82ff.

Notes to pages 82-96 241 2 He is the executive director of the Central Region of the Canadian Jewish Congress. 3 Rae is married to Arlene Perley, a confirmant of mine at Holy Blossom Temple; their children are being raised as Jews. Bob spoke at the rally in a personal capacity. 4 'The Angel of Death.' 5 Based on David's lament for Jonathan (II Samuel 1:25-26). 6 The end of the Sabbath, observed with special prayers. 7 Literally, 'The Holy One, blessed be He,' a Hebrew phrase often used to describe God. 8 A Hebrew acronym, denoting the books of the Bible. 9 'Alas!' 10 'The love of Israel.' 11 The seven-day period of mourning. We had all been given the ribbons as we entered. 12 'May the people of Israel live.' 13 'May his memory be for blessing.' 14 'Israel, united as a people, lives and will live on.' 15 The Jewish national anthem; the Hebrew word hatikvah means 'the hope.' 16 Commentary (May 1996), 31. 17 1:27. 18 Even before Einhorn preached his sermon, observance of the day had already dramatically decreased. 19 Unfinished Business, 115-21; picture facing 150. 20 The term was first applied to the struggle between the German government and the Roman Catholic church during the years 1872-87. 21 Reform Judaism (Spring 1995), 43. Rabbi Richard G. Hirsch has for many years served as executive director of the World Union for Progressive Judaisim; Richard Scheuer, New York businessman and philanthropist, has been a long-time benefactor of the Reform movement (about his involvement with the Hebrew version of my To rah commentary, see chapter 10, where other aspects of Reform's struggle to establish itself in the country are also touched on.) CHAPTER SEVEN Communal Concerns 1 Cyril Levitt, The Christie Pits Riot (Downsview, Ont.: York University, 1985). In August 1996 Global Television showed a documentary entitled 'The Battle of Christie Pits.'

242

Notes to pages 97-105

2 Among them were the Bronfman, Steinberg, Cummings, Reitman, and Pascal families. 3 It is no longer; Vancouver has taken its place. 4 An educated guess. 5 A number of women claimed that they were gentiles who had married Jews in Russia and who, upon arriving in Israel, had been persecuted because they were non-Jews, and some of them claimed that they had been forced into prostitution in order to sustain themselves. In Ontario, the Immigration and Refugee Board usually rejected these tales, but in Quebec they were more successful, until the matter became public and an administrative review corrected what had become a political charade. 6 Landsmanshaften are clubs whose members hail from the same town or district in eastern Europe, and some of them operate to this day; shuleis the Yiddish word for synagogue (derived from the German Schule, school). 7 The Tribune is published by B'nai B'rith. While it advertises itself as the largest Jewish paper in the country, it does not publish its subscription figures and is distributed free of charge to various places as well as to B'nai B'rith members. 8 See Unfinished Business, 201. 9 See chapter 5, above. 10 In the spring of 1997, a right-wing Orthodox rabbinical organization proclaimed that these movements were not Judaism,' which was widely interpreted to mean that their adherents are not really Jews. So far only one Orthodox rabbi in Toronto has publicly decried the statement. 11 As in most other denominations, Jewish Orthodoxy too is splintered. Thus the Hasidim are but one among a number of groups, though they are, because of their dress, the most visible. Moreover, there is no full peace among these diverse segments, as was demonstrated recently when one declared an important installation of another as religiously invalid. (This was a quarrel over the eruv, a wire-like demarcation that shows how far observant Jews may walk on the Sabbath.) 12 Not long after Alan's death, one of his staunchest critics also died, Torontonian David Satok. Acerbic and always asking uncomfortable questions, he was defeated when he ran for the Congress's presidency, but he never let this stand in the way of his continued participation. 13 Dow Marmur has for many years been teaching in the School of Theology of the University of Toronto. Also, for several seasons, the university's Department of Philosophy joined with Holy Blossom in running a highlevel symposium on 'The City,' which produced a plethora of insights into the complexities of communal existence.

Notes to pages 106-13

243

14 278ff. 15 Examples: In 1976 I took nine of the leading Christian clerics, including Protestants and Roman Catholic bishops, on a tour of Israel; my successors at Holy Blossom made repeated joined journeys to Israel with the clergy and members of Timothy Eaton Memorial (United) Church in Toronto (with Rev. Stan Lucyk becoming a vocal and devoted admirer of and advocate for Israel); and I was invited by the Roman Catholic bishop to preach on Israel at St Joseph's Church in Montreal. 16 Unfortunately, none of the Orthodox synagogues has so far seen fit to break its isolationist stance. CHAPTER E I G H T Reform Judaism: A Personal Journey 1 Phylacteries - two small leather boxes that contain parchments inscribed with biblical passages. The little boxes are placed (by means of leather straps) on one's forehead and arm at morning prayer. 2 With the exception of a tiny fragment that was known as 'Reform.' 3 Unfinished Business, 55f. 4 'Classical Reform' broadly describes the North American movement after 1885, when ritual, Hebrew, and tradition in general were held in low esteem. 5 The ceremony of taking leave from Shabbat. One year we studied the Book of Proverbs, and it was from these study hours that my commentary on the book emerged (published in 1961, the year I left St Paul). 6 Small scrolls with biblical verses that are affixed to the doorposts of one's home, in accordance with the command of Deuteronomy 6:9. 7 The seven-day mourning period following interment of a family member. 8 See Unfinished Business, 183. 9 Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1965; published also in Hebrew and French. 10 See the next chapter. 11 See chapter 10, below. 12 For details, see Unfinished Business, 208ff. 13 Published jointly by the CCAR and KTAV Publishing House, 1972. After its publication, the committee was renamed Reform Practices Committee and I became its first chair. 14 Levi Olan and Jack Stern also participated, one giving a general introduction to our debate, and the other functioning as moderator. 15 He did on one occasion. I was visiting the Cincinnati campus when he stopped me and said, loudly enough so that many students and/or professors could hear him: 'You are a destroyer of Judaism. Your responsum on

244

16 17 18 19 20 21 22

23

Notes to pages 113-29

our Humanist congregation [see below] is disgusting. A destroyer of Judaism!' He walked away, giving me no chance to reply, even if I had been inclined to answer. He did exhibit the passion of someone who has Truth by the tail. He was one of the five of us who had come together from Germany, in 1935. See Unfinished Business, 48 and passim. Rabbi Joseph Glaser was executive vice-president of the CCAR. See chapter 2 in this book. Once I had broken that precedent, Eugene Lippman too was elected after his retirement from his congregation. Yearbook, XCV (1985), 5-6. See chapter 15, below. Kolel was founded in the early 1990s by Stephen Morrison, a young and inspired lay leader, and has been blessed by the dynamism of its director and chief teacher, Rabbi Elyse Goldstein. CCAR Yearbook, LXXXV (1975), 172. In a lecture at a York University symposium (October 1995) I expanded the term 'service station' to cover all synagogues in their relations to people in the community, whether members or not.

CHAPTER N I N E Reform Judaism in Search of Self 1 Literally 'way to go' (often transcribed as 'halakhah') - the body of traditonal Jewish law and practice that, in the Orthodox view, has divine sanction. 2 Thus grandchildren of Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin would be considered Jewish (his son having married a Jew), while grandchildren of David BenGurion (his son having married a gentile) would not. 3 He later achieved international attention when he assisted in publishing hitherto closely guarded Qumran manuscripts. 4 CCAR Yearbook, XCII (1982), 76. Though Alex Schindler suggested (p. 68) that it had been passed unanimously by the committee, I cannot imagine having voted for it in that formulation. I assume therefore that I was absent from the last meeting of the committee. 5 Yearbook, XCIII (1983), 160. 6 Ibid., 156. Michael Stroh (who at the previous convention had represented the Canadian Reform rabbis in their opposition to the then-proposed statement) in vain urged the convention to delay any type of resolution (152f). 7 The resolution was later duly communicated to the Union, as had been agreed.

Notes to pages 131-42

245

8 The highly gifted Dennis Prager was then the director, assisted by Rabbi Joseph Telushkin, the kind of Orthodox rabbi who is both learned and open to other points of view. Prager has since established himself as a successful TV communicator, author, and publisher. 9 See further chapter 5, above. 10 A shortened version of k 'lal yisrael, the totality of of the Jewish people. 11 Literally, 'the ready-set table.' 12 Thus some laws were declared to be applicable only in the land of Israel, not in the Diaspora. 13 They were biblical literalists and refused to acknowledge the authority of subsequent rabbinic pronouncements, of which Mishnah and Talmud were chief examples. 14 In 1996, Rabbi Yisrael Rosen, a functionary in Israel's Chief Rabbinate, made such a proposal. 15 On this see my Haftarah Commentary (1996), 645 and passim. 16 To be sure, in this the CCAR reflected popular Jewish allegiance. In the 1996 elections, Jews are said to have voted 83 per cent for President Clinton, ahead of Blacks, Catholics, and Muslims, who also favoured the Democratic party. 17 When I inquired at the time of the UAHC leadership why this was so, I was given the unconvincing explanation that there had been 'scheduling problems.' 18 That requirement no longer exists, since most of the responsa literature is now available on disc. 19 There were three dissents, and this fact was communicated to Alex Schindler. 20 25 May 1994. 21 My letter was printed in the 22 June 1994 issue of the Post and Opinion. The text of the responsum will be found in Teshuvot for the 1990s. 22 Etzioni's chef d'oeuvre is The Spirit of Community: Rights, Responsibilities and the Communitarian Agenda (New York: Crown Publishers. 1993). I have discussed this in my book, Asylum -A Moral Dilemma, 73-80.

23 A joint enterprise by the CCAR, UAHC, and HUC-JIR, which helps rabbis obtain or change positions; the rabbis themselves have obligated themselves to abide by the Placement Commission's rules. 24 The term for a Jewish religious marriage is kiddushin- literally, 'holiness.' 25 See the discussion of the issue in Reform Judaism (Fall 1996), 52ff (a rabbi arguing in favour of officiating, and a lay person opposing it). 26 See chapter 4, above. 27 At this writing the responsum has not as yet been published.

246 Notes to pages 144-54 28 Under this rule, matters of family law were reserved to the religious (i.e., Orthodox) establishment, and this and related fundamental arrangements were not to be changed thereafter. Over the years, however, the powers of the Chief Rabbinate have steadily expanded. CHAPTER TEN Magnum Opus 1 See Unfinished Business, 214—17. 2 Commentary (February 1982), 31-5. 3 Rabbi Bernard Bamberger had contributed the commentary on Leviticus, which, like my commentaries on Genesis and Numbers, had been published separately some years before. 4 Alter was the first to give it that name, which has since been widely adopted. 5 Literally, 'Great Scriptures,' the most popular Hebrew edition of the Bible, with Aramaic translations and a collection of the most important classical commentaries. 6 Congress Monthly (February-March 1982), 21-2. On the 'saga' of the te'amim, see below. 7 About my lecture tours, see the chapter 'Memorable Moments.' 8 The little booklet called Children's Services for the High Holy Days, first published in the early 1950s (while I was rabbi in St Paul, Minn.), is the only other writing bearing my name that claimed a wide readership. I never kept exact records, and they are no longer available. I estimate that some 300,000 copies were sold. At first I published it myself; later it was acquired by KTAV. At one point I yielded to the entreaties of the CCAR and allowed it to use the services as their own. The text appeared, with some changes, in the Union Songster (New York, 1960), 131-50. Unfortunately that volume failed to live up to expectations. It was meant as a companion volume to the Union Prayer Book, but when that venerable publication was overtaken by Gates of Prayer, the Union Songster quietly went the way of all that is mortal. However, even today the KTAV edition enjoys modest sales - well over forty years after I first wrote these services. 9 214ff. 10 New York: UAHC, 1961. 11 Now called CCAR Journal. 12 Unfortunately, just as I began my editorial labours, Bamberger too died. He had seen the separate publication of his Leviticus commentary but was denied the experience of seeing the whole book. 13 J.H. Hertz and A. Cohen, respectively.

Notes to pages 154-64 247 14 The Union had published Freehof s volumes on Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Psalms, as well as Leo Honor's commentary on Kings and my own on Proverbs. All these appeared without a Hebrew text. 15 Chaired first by Rabbi Solomon B. Freehof and then by Rabbi Robert I. Kahn. 16 Musical annotations, which serve also as punctuation marks. They are routinely printed with every Hebrew edition of the Bible. 17 Study groups sprang up everywhere, and people wrote that the book had changed their lives or that it had opened up new vistas (so, for instance, the late astronomer Carl Sagan). 18 I found it in such diverse places as Durban, South Africa, and Perth, Australia. 19 My nephew, Rabbi Joshua E. Plaut, third son of my late brother Walter, presented it to the president when he and Mrs Clinton attended Rosh Hashanah services in 1995 in Joshua's congregation, in Martha's Vineyard, Mass. 20 An Orthodox rabbi, he was a widely read interpreter of Judaism. Alas, he died all too early. 21 A small group headed by Jack Rose. 22 He was trained at the (Conservative) Jewish Theological Seminary but now teaches at HUC-JIR in New York and is a member of the Central Conference of American Rabbis. 23 In the work on the haftarot Chaim was helped by his son Philip, a fine scholar in his own right, a collaboration that was acknowledged (as was Sperling's contribution) on the title page of the book. 24 Judges chaps. 4 and 5. Actually, the Hebrew ish milchamah (Exodus 15:3) should be rendered as 'warrior' rather than as 'man of war.' 25 Published 25 May 1996. Another long article about the book appeared in the Los Angeles Times, 31 August 1996. Hebrew newspapers too gave it some space. CHAPTER ELEVEN Books, et cetera 1 In the United States the book was published by Taplinger's in New York under the title The Man in the Blue Vest and Other Stories. 2 'Shoemaker, stick with your last' (the form on which shoes are made or repaired). 3 The transposition was expertly prepared by Carol Libman. 4 I published two or three of them in Viewpoints and Parchment. 5 Daniel Jonah Goldhagen's more recent Hitler's Willing Executioners (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996) belongs to the 'intentionalist' school, which

248 Notes to pages 164-78 says that German anti-semitism had always aimed at exterminating the Jews. It is a thesis I do not support. 6 Toronto, 1981. 7 (1864-1926). His King of the Schnorrers was a favourite of my father's, and I had therefore been brought up to admire Zangwill's literary prowess. 8 Literally '[prayers for] forgiveness.' A midnight service held before the advent of the religious New Year (Rosh Hashanah), instituted to prepare worshippers for the season of repentance. It was Wiesel's first time in a Reform synagogue, he told us. 9 The ritual of circumcision, performed on the eighth day of a Jewish boy's life. 10 Heschel (1907-1972), prime theologian and social activist, had briefly been my Hebrew teacher in Berlin, in 1934-5. See Unfinished Business, 41. 11 The Man Who Would Be Messiah (published by Mosaic Press in 1988; but the edition was faulty, and the publisher withdrew it and reissued the book in 1990 in Oakville, Ont., New York, and London). 12 It was entitled Through the Sound of Many Voices and was published by Lester & Orpen Dennys in Toronto, 1982. 13 Washington, DC: B'nai B'rith Books, 1991. 14 See chapter 2, above. 15 It was to have been published together with other papers commissioned by the project, but budgetary restrictions of a new administration aborted this. 16 The new director is Anne Bayefsky. 17 (1772-1811); Bratslav was a small town in Podolia (Ukraine) that achieved fame among Jews because of Nachman. A school of his followers exists to this day. 18 Many years later I found the word in Webster's International Dictionary, signifying the 'reading of a play to an audience.' 19 The abbreviation stands for Learning Torah With.... Published in California, it discusses the weekly Torah reading and is aimed at rabbis and educators of all denominations. 20 See Unfinished Business, 27-8, for details of my engagement by the Warburg family in Berlin. CHAPTER TWELVE Travels in Space and Time 1 See Unfinished Business, 312ff.

2 Signifying a degree in both civil and canon law. 3 After my return I wrote an article on my impressions, 'A Trip to Berlin: Closing the Circle,' in the Canadian Jewish News, 17 November 1994.

Notes to pages 179-93 249 4 Reproduced in Unfinished Business, 344-5.1 donated Einstein's letter to the National Archives of Canada. 5 See Unfinished Business, 44-7. 6 In this century the National Federation of Temple Brotherhoods has promoted a Jewish Chautauqua Society, which sends rabbis to college campuses, there to lecture on aspects of Judaism. 7 University of Manitoba, in Winnipeg. 8 28 July 1988. 9 Typed by my secretary of those days, Helen Libman. 10 See Unfinished Business, 81—2. 11 See previous note. 12 Canadian Jewish News, 12 November 1992. Rae also sang one of his own compositions. 13 They were made to the CCAR. The award bore the name b'yad chazakah ('with a mighty hand') and evoked the biblical image of God who had led Israel out of Egypt 'b'yad chazakah.' Contributions to the congregation were channelled into a new fund to aid students with learning disabilities. 14 Reprinted by permission of the author, a published poet. 15 Unfinished Business, 44-7; among the pictures is a photo of our delegation's march through the streets of Tel Aviv. 16 He and Joe Frieberg were also instrumental in making the Israel Tennis Centre into a potent force and helped to build Canada Stadium in Ramat Hasharon. 17 Mutti was with me in Palestine, but I can't remember whether she attended the opening ceremonies. 18 Other honours came to me during these last fifteen years (several have been mentioned elsewhere in this book): Order of Ontario; Inaugural Race Relations Award (Urban Alliance for Race Relations); Humanitarian Award (League for Human Rights of B'nai Brith); First honorary life membership (Canadian Council for Refugees); Civic Service Award (City of North York, on the tenth anniversary of the Committee on Community, Ethnic and Race Relations); opening the fiftieth anniversary of VE-Day observance at the Holocaust Museum in Washington; establishment of the Plaut Chair in Project Management at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (created by friends in the Toronto community); and the Eisendrath 'Bearer of Light Award' (Union of American Hebrew Congregations). 19 We had donated a significant amount of ourjudaica collection to York University, when it established a Jewish Studies Department (see chapter 14, below). 20 The Jewish term for'rabbi's wife.'

250 Notes to pages 199-217 21 The title of the book reflects the content: The Guggenheim fWormser Family A Three Hundred Year Memoir (Hoboken, NJ: KTAV Publishing House 1997). CHAPTER THIRTEEN The Mutti Phenomenon 1 The German word for mother is Mutter, and Mutti its diminutive endearment. Ordinarily only children would so call their mother, but in my mother's case the German origin of the term was hardly remembered and Mutti became her name for those who claimed some familiarity with her. 2 Dad had unexpectedly died in 1948 at age sixty-eight, while visiting my brother Walter in Fargo, ND. Thereupon Mutti moved to St Paul, where we had just settled, and then, in 1961, she followed us to Toronto. My parents' background was described in Unfinished Business, 5ff. 3 Jonathan (and Carol), Judith, Yehudah (and Aviva), Carmi, and Joshua. 4 Daniel, Deborah, Ma'ayan, and Benjamin. 5 Helen (Hertha) Ury was Levi Plaut's daughter (see Unfinished Business, 6 and passim); her husband, Fritz, an executive with Etam's, had a leading hand in the rescue operation. 6 Imperial Oil Review (1979), no. 5, 30-1. 7 The University of Toronto's governing body. 8 The Hebrew means, '[May you live] to 120 [years]' (the life span of Moses). MosheRabbenu is the Hebrew for 'Moses our teacher.' 9 See chapter 12, above. 10 The italicized words are a translation of the Hebrew text on the stone. CHAPTER FOURTEEN Letting Go

1 2 3 4 5 6

Unfinished Business, 72. German for 'showing off.' See Unfinished Business, 344-5. See chapter 12, above. Ecclesiastes, chap. 3. Rick Salutin subsequently wrote a roman a clef, A Man of Little Faith, the thinly disguised story of Heinz ('Oskar' in the book), whom he had greatly admired. In it, he made me into Heinz's antagonist, and when not long ago I spoke to him about it, he shrugged it off, saying, 'It's only a novel, not a biography.' 7 See Unfinished Business, 183-4.

Notes to pages 220-8 251 CHAPTER FIFTEEN Faith, Family, and Future 1 Issue of 1 March 1937. 2 The traditional prayer shawl, with ritually prescribed fringes, worn primarily at morning prayer. 3 See Unfinished Business, 279ff.

4 Isaiah 55:6. The statement is phrased in ambiguous language; Chaim Stern translates it: 'Seek the Eternal while there is still time' (The Haftarah Commentary, 511). 5 English as a second language; her public school students are recent immigrants, primarily from China. She also has 'Special Ed.' pupils, who need all sorts of help. 6 See chapter 12, above. 7 Amos 7:14. Some translate 'disciple' instead of'son.'

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Bibliography, 1982-1996

A comprehensive bibliography covering the years 1935-81 was published in Through the Sound of Many Voices: Festschrift for W. Gunther Plant, ed. Jonathan V. Plaut (Toronto: Lester & Orpen Dennys, 1982), 265-308. The current bibliography contains books, articles in books, my weekly columns for the Canadian Jewish News, articles for the Globe and Mail (Toronto), and pieces for other periodicals.

Books 1985 Refugee Determination in Canada [French edition in the same volume: Reconnaissance au Canada du statut de refugie]. Ottawa: Ministry of Supply and Services. 1985. 1988 Rabbi's Manual. Liturgy, ed. David Polish; Historical and Halachic Notes, ed. W. Gunther Plaut. New York: CCAR, 1988. 1990 The Man Who Would Be Messiah. Oakville: Mosaic Press, 1990. 1991 The Magen David - How the Six-Pointed Star Became an Emblem for the Jewish People. Washington, DC: B'nai B'rith Press, 1991. 1995 Asylum- A Moral Dilemma. Toronto: York Lanes Press, 1995; Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1995.

254 Bibliography, 1982-1996 1996 The Haftarah Commentary. With a new translation by Chaim Stern. New York: UAHC Press, 1996.

Articles in Books 1982 'Can we speak of Reform Halacha?' In Rabbinic Authority, ed. Elliot Stevens, 63-5. New York: CCAR, 1982. 'Progressive Judaism in the 1980's.' Golden Jubilee Book of the Southern African Union for Progressive Judaism (1982). 'When the tree tops whisper.' In American Guild of Organists, Examination Hymn Booklet. New York, 1982. (Reprinted from Union Songster, 20)

1985 'The Pittsburgh Platform in the Light of European Antecedents.' In The Pittsburgh Platform in Retrospect, ed. Walter Jacob, 17-24. Pittsburgh: Rodef Shalom Congregation, 1985. 1986 Contribution to tribute volume for Jacob R. Marcus, in Biz hundert un zvantzikl ed. A. Peck and J. Sarna, 56. Cincinnati: HUC-JIR, 1986. 'Progressive Judaism in the 1980's.' Community and the Individual Jew. Essays in honor of Lavy M. Becker, 19-26. Philadelphia: Reconstructionist Rabbinical College, 1986. 'Questions we need to ask.' In Challenging the Concept of Christianity, ed. R.R. Gadaez, 14-18. Edmonton: CSC Consulting Service, 1986. 1987 Address to the Canadian Council for Refugees, Contact, 2 no. 1 (1987), 5, in both English and French versions [extracts of an address in Montreal, 28 May 1987]. House of Commons, Proceedings on Bill C-55, no. 6. W.G. Plaut's testimony, 26-8. Contribution to What Peace Means to Me, 50-3. Published by the Department of External Affairs, Ottawa. 1988 'Causes of the Refugee Problem and the International Response' (comments on two papers). In Human Rights in the Protection of Refugees under International Law, ed. Alan Nash, 121-4. Ottawa: Canadian Human Rights Foundation, 1988. 'The Elusive German Jewish Heritage in America.' In The German-Jewish Legacy in America, ed. A.J. Peck, 87-94. Detroit: Wayne State University, 1989. Reprint of article in American Jewish Archives (November 1988), 273-80.

Bibliography, 1982-1996 255 Interview printed in Voices of Canadian Jews, ed. B.M. Knight and R. Alkallay, 3718. Montreal: Chestnut Press, 1988.

1989 'When Jews Differ Fundamentally.' In American Judaism: Present and Future, ed. Benny Kraut, 21-8. Cincinnati: University of Cincinnati, 1989. 1990 'Response' to Larry Hoffman's article 'Non-Jews and Jewish life-cycle liturgy,' Journal of Reform Judaism, 37 no. 3 (Summer 1990). Reprinted in Defining the Role of the Non-Jew in the Synagogue, 83-6. New York: UAHC, 1990. 1991 'Germans and Jews - the symbiosis that failed,' in Festschrift in honor of Dr. Robert Gordis, Judaism, 40 no. 4 (1991), 531-42. 'Reform Responsa as Liberal Halakhah.' In Dynamic Jewish Law, ed. Walter Jacob, 107-18. Tel Aviv and Pittsburgh: Rodef Shalom Press, 1991. 'Refuge or Asylum: The Canadian Perspective.' In Refuge or Asylum, ed. Howard Adelman, 73-80. Toronto: York Lanes Press, 1990. 1992 'German-Jewish Bible Translations: Linguistic Theology as a Political Phenomenon' (Leo Baeck Memorial Lecture, No. 30). New York: Leo Baeck Institute, 1992. 'Your Jewish Child Asks Why.' In Finding Strength in Biblical Tradition, 162-9. Ottawa: Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops, 1992. 1993 'Did God Really Say What Is in the Torah?' In When Your Jewish Child Asks Why, ed. K.M. Olitsky et al. New York: Ktav, 1993. 'Foreword.' In Pirke Avot - A Modern Commentary, by Leonard Kravitz and Kerry M. Olitsky. New York: UAHC Press, 1993. 1994 Bibliography. In DeutschsprachigeExilliteratur seit 1933, comp. H.W. Selinger, 1447-55 [condensed]. Bern and Miinchen: K.G. Saur Verlag, 1994. 1995 'Cain and Abel: Bible, Traditional and Contemporary Reflections.' In Preaching Biblical Texts, ed. F.C. Holmgren and H.E. Schaalman. Grand Rapids, Mich.: W.B. Eerdmans Publishing, 1995. 'Reform as an Adjective.' In TheJewish Condition (Festschrift for A.M. Schindler), ed. Aron Hirt-Manheimer, 350-62. New York: UAHC Press, 1995.

256 Bibliography, 1982-1996 1996 'Chosenness in Jewish tradition.' In Seeds of Reconciliation, ed. K.T. Hargrove, 7586. N. Richland Hills, Tex.: Bibal Press. From an essay first published in SIDIC. 'What did Isaac know?' In Learn Torah with ..., ed. S. Kelman andJ.L. Grishaver, no. 35:1. Los Angeles: Alef Design, 1996.

Weekly Columns in the Canadian Jewish News 1982 January 7 Observations and resolutions highlight year's concerns 14 In Poland and Internationally, Jews still marked as scapegoat 21 More than the Jews persecuted by the Nazis 28 Anti-Semitism in Poland unleashes reaction here February 4 Phenomenal hunger for Torah exhibited in American cities 11 Fundamental group 'proves' today's Jews are not Israel 18 Nuclear proliferation protest also community responsibility 25 Prejudice, misconceptions shown to be on rise March 4 $40,000 stands between magazine's health and demise 11 History nothing more, less than interpretation 18 Modern day Jewish sage not well known in Canada (Scholem) 25 Alas, diggers into past mired in politics of present April 1 Egypt's pharaoh of exodus depicted as victim and master 8 Some unusual ideas about preparing for the Seder 15 Survivalists seek protection from social upheaval ahead 22 Generosity of Oscar Voiles keeps publication going 29 Sometimes you can't discuss certain unpleasant situations (Bahais in Iran)

May 6 Rugged Sinai Peninsula abounds with Jewish history 13 Bar-Han University friends will endow chair for Wiesel 20 Overruling of Sarnia mayor vindicates community efforts 27 Christian Century calls for review of church's liturgy June 3 Book examines Canada's role in dealing with European refugees 10 There's a large gap between laws and their application 17 Quest of Israel for peace counts high in human lives 24 Israel action against terrorism does not call for an apology

Bibliography, 1982-1996 257 July 1 And now some good news from our friends in Israel 8 (No issue) 15 (No issue) 22 Superhuman efforts taken to minimize casualties 29 Truth slow in being heard in current Lebanese War August 5 Poor Hasbarah strains links with Diaspora communities 12 Twin Cities community exemplary in generosity 19 Analysis of Lebanese War helps bolster Israel's image 26 War justifies outrages on Jews? Sheer anti-semitic nonsense! September

2 9 16 23 30

Lebanon truth surfaces, but local haters unrelenting Approve of war or not, Israeli restraint unquestionable Decision regarding Shabbat expands human rights War should not distract self-examination at home State of Israel assures survival of Jews

October

1 14 21 28

Anti-semitism: uniting us once again Complexity clouds Mideast perspective T.V.'s presence made Beirut world event Letter displays an existing attitude

November

4 11 18 25

Here are some observations on turning seventy Invidious comparisons rob credibility Anglicans wonder about the silence Love of Israel is a part of local debates

December

2 Factions in a battle for power 9 Controversial Goldmann buried in silence 16 Misinterpret commission's function 23 Jews' concern in Australia like our own 30 New Zealand: Jews integrate in population

1983 January 6 Burial rites of the Maori not primitive 13 Nuclear policy of community found wanting 20 Schindler raises issue of dissent 27 January 30, 1933 - from fear to false security February

3 Is morality not our business?

258

Bibliography, 1982-1996

10 Policies make Congress fall short 17 Migrations make up history 24 Anti-semitism not the root of all evil for Jews March 3 Focus again on war crimes 10 Commission 'great comfort' to friends 17 The other side of Luther's religious legacy 24 Lachmo Anyo: liberation incomplete April 7 Coder: indefatigable president 14 'Winds' boring: did you see 'Oppermans'? 21 Hot issues - Ethiopian Jews and war criminals 28 Children need guidelines, clear answers May 5 The way - new cult groping here 12 Tremendous opportunities at plenary 19 Jerusalem assembly a must 26 Report from plenary: need wider scope

June 2 Revisionism still poses a big threat 9 Josephus' Jewish War extraordinary 16 Roosevelt tried, said Goldberg, and yet... 23 A gentile speaks out on Keegstra 30 Jews of NS give their all: Davidowicz July 21 Convention stimulates observations 28 British pay for refugees' world trip August 4 Friend ignored Kafka's desire to bury works 11 American Jews don't deserve this treatment 18 Le Carre book turns fiction into history 25 This mission spreads words, reaps benefits September 1 Bomb blast saw people close ranks 8 Our existence is essential for humanity 15 Rabbi faces responsibility as Mexicans turn to Judaism 22 Rabbi finds a spiritual paradise 29 Expelling Arabs is not the answer October

6 Different meanings for security 13 Seminar forever for free voice

Bibliography, 1982-1996

259

20 Nazi fighters erase myths of Holocaust 27 Concern grows as numbers steadily drop November 3 Israel is not alone in U.N. ritual 10 Rabbi's group tries to link Arabs, Jews 17 An infamous date to recall in history 24 UNICEF: The picture isn't clear December 1 Saudi society surrounded by strife 8 Security measures lax at dinner for Shamir; Human rights ignored by most nations 15 U.S. misread Syria interest in Lebanon 22 Rejection brought on Luther's wrath 29 Year ends with good, bad news

1984 January 5 Pogroms can happen anywhere 12 We must heed Orwell warning 19 Human rights group gets pat on back 26 Jackson candidacy a dilemma February 2 Israel-U.S. love feast could sour 9 Racist words a problem in democracy 16 Remembering can be easy to forget 23 Mideast role of Murphy leaves doubts March 1 Israelis don't pull punches with visitors 8 A new plan for restitution by Soviets 15 Fraud case leaves stain on Georgia 22 Bitterness for Germans still exists 29 Baycrest care for elderly leads the way April 5 State moves slowly into religious world; Eulogy for Bora Laskin 12 Handicapped victims of Nazi hell 19 Battle vs. racism loses edge 26 We must learn that we are one May 3 Jackson faces, not lessens bigotry 10 Kohl listens, but arms sale will likely go 17 We must not delay fight against racism 24 Swastika trademark in bad taste

260

Bibliography, 1982-1996

31 Israel's ideas can help all mankind June 7 Swastika trademark still in air 14 Mississauga deserves pat on back 21 No longer sympathy for Keegstra 28 No simple solutions for refugees July 19 Israel needs majority government 26 Great future for Judaism in Mexico August 2 How well do you know your rights? 9 Compassion helps build strong land 16 Maccabiah symbol of unity, hope 23 Feuchtwangler sounded tocsin for Nazi danger 30 Voting right should not be wasted September

6 13 20 26

Athletes display special spirit Fifty-fifty split predicted in U.S. vote Germans don't hide the past Winnipeg leads way with rabbi

October

4 10 17 25

West Bank map change significant Peres' return a symbol of integrity Pope's visit didn't close spiritual rift All's quiet on the Jewish front

November 1 Looking beyond images 8 Focus shifts for General Assembly 15 Not all U.N. deserves criticism 22 N.Y. State U won't budge on big lie 29 Jewish platform needed December

6 Refugee story packs power in symbolism 13 Judge's reasoning flawed 20 U.S. elections show Jews pro-pluralism 27 Thesis recounts lost culture

1985 January 3 America's shame out in limelight 10 Synagogue a monument to the past

Bibliography, 1982-1996 261 17 West Bank woes evade predictions 24 'Kahanism' must be confronted 31 Israel's detractors are blind February 7 Want to be ajewish Okie in Muskogee? 14 Rights panel work spurs frustrations 21 Military ties insufficient by themselves 28 Time arrives to confront the horrific March 1 Female rabbis are seen as part of the change 14 Newspapers hampered rescue effort 21 Cambodians deserve a chance 28 My mother turns back Father Time April 4 Spring of '45 brought joy, then horror 11 President meets with top rabbis 18 Deporting Zundel not so easy 25 Atrocities moved men to be heroes May 2 The past isn't make-believe, Mr. Reagan 9 Gathering gives hope for future 16 Meeting off; Pope avoids touchy issue 23 Rescue has honoured role in Mitzvot 30 Rabbi helps many to return to their faith June 6 Speech made at Belsen worth noting 13 Israeli youth take to tennis in a big way 20 West German survey gives rise to hope 27 Moralists keep silent on Lebanon July 4 Israel's swap of prisoners still puzzles 11 Fifty years later, nothing has changed 18 Hijacked plane captain sets it straight 25 Media can change, make news events August 1 (No issue) 8 (No issue) 15 Maccabiah gives Israel special lift 22 Treasures worthwhile viewing 29 Meeting Ethiopians heartening

262

Bibliography, 1982-1996

September

5 12 19 26

Where state kills, life is cheapened What explains the Righteous Gentiles? You can't judge a book by its title Our concern over South Africa must increase

October

3 10 17 24 31

'Dog' stories of rescuers are powerful PLO algebra requires close look Discovering the ways in San Jose Great aquifer holds promise for Israel Herzl seen with warts in musical

November

7 14 21 28

KKK finds a friend in Farrakhan Marriage with Israel strengthens Numbers tend to degrade 'individuality' Let's talk to moderate Ukrainians

December

5 12 19 26

Our media should have had Reagan Monthly gives Jewish issues new approach Government secrecy hid Nazis in U.S. Visiting rabbi from South Africa presents ideas

1986 January

2 9 16 23 30

German Jews make point in protests Help Israel by fighting 'Kahanism' Isolate supporters of terrorism King spoke to humanity in everyone Ontario law will relieve bad inequity

February

6 13 20 27

Intra-Jewish trialogue needed now Challenger tragedy has its lessons Terrorists don't fool Americans Soviet role in terrorism underscored

March

6 Jews must care for all people 13 US Jews found unity means clout 20 San Antonio: Texas fun, Jewish style 27 Excuses fly in explaining non-visits April

3 Progressives will seek to heal rift 10 Leitner's poetic strain grasps reader

Bibliography, 1982-1996 17 Exceptional pair defeat Nazi powers 23 CJC plenary holds exciting challenges May 1 Acceptance of pluralism can unite us 8 West German Jewry struggles for survival 15 Ex-refusenik thrills temple congregation 22 Group helps parents of Olim bridge the gap 29 Maturity, stability, seen in plenary June 5 Our spiritual moral health comes first 12 'Hitler sane' - but just what does it mean? 19 New charity will help all in need 26 Extremism must not prevail July 3 Austria isn't the only place 10 Terror seeks to impede peace-making 17 Amnesty International merits support 24 Anger lives once again in Israel 31 (No issue) August 7 (No issue) 14 Shakespeare not beyond criticism 21 Community has changed in twenty-five years 28 Two-pronged Soviet Jewry policy needed September 4 Christian attitudes to Jews 11 Let schools teach human relations 18 Wise-FDR meeting dramatized 25 Arab enmity washes over all Jews October 2 Tradition prompts shul pilgrimages 9 Lifeline of the people of Israel 16 Immigrants should be welcome 23 Feinberg blessed us with his life 30 Wiesel's Nobel also honours the human soul November 6 Letter cites urgent need for unity 13 West German mini-series perplexes 20 Goal of Est to transform individual 27 In Israel, the news comes first

263

264

Bibliography, 1982-1996

December

4 11 18 25

Religious pluralism right path La Rouche encounter unnerving TV special shows those on hope bridge Best gift: a greeting for refuseniks

1987 January

1 8 15 22 29

Composer's birthday to be marked Leo Baeck's light shines for us all Recent vote the reversal of UN policy Why was Magen David on a church? Anti-cult group warns about Est

February

5 12 19 26

West German student poll heartening Give Shabbat observers exemption We'll handle any trauma involved Whole exhibit brings back vivid scenes

March

5 12 19 26

US ruling threatens schools Quick fix refugee rules not the way Shoah lessons instructs teacher too Community grows aware of wife abuse

April

2 9 16 23 30

Deschenes report allays some fears Nativism is overtaking Canada Unhappy Shabbat incident Pollard case shows need for contact Tradition opposes the noose

May

7 14 21 28

Deadlock remains over MDA symbol Nothing to prevent dialogue Response to Shoah disappointing Stein shares her people's common fate

June

4 11 18 25

Herzog's German trip applauded Time to look at ourselves more critically Tennis serves unique role in Israel Immigrants are the key to our future

July

4 Spy case put Circassian on the map 9 The pope had to hear our protest

Bibliography, 1982-1996 265 16 Noose vote democracy in action 23 Zionist bright light remembered 30 (No issue) August 6 (No issue) 13 Callousness affects views on refugees 20 With a 'hero' like this? 27 Readers respond to columns September

3 10 17 24

Was diplomat a Romanian Wallenberg? Light, hope in new film by Rasky Chapter ends in Canadian Jewish history West German comment on Waldheim

October

1 8 15 22 29

Reflections on UJA trip to Israel Harmony U.S. group's objective Wannsee Conference film chills Canada's reaction probed Magazine helps to fill obvious gap

November

5 Community closes vaults for survival 12 Jews seek intellectual quick fix 19 Reviewer fails to see difference 26 Broadcast strike can't faze Israelis December 3 Tombstone restorers merit help 10 Historic U.N. vote recalled 17 Bible Belt's support still in doubt 24 Suicide statistics surprising 31 (No issue)

1988 January 7 Stir them all in same pot, writer urges 14 West Bank, Gaza, defy solution 21 Songwriter, publisher reach one hundred 28 Israel digs an intriguing experience February 4 Easy answers don't exist in new crisis 11 Media give their reasons good and bad 18 Mixed record for Israel in survey 25 Canada: a personal love story

266

Bibliography, 1982-1996

March 3 We must help AIDS victims 10 Reichstag fire helped Hitler 17 Our chance to say 'yes' to the dream 24 Our love for Israel never wavers 31 Hope, trust, patience needed April 7 Jud Suess foretold fate of Jews 14 Tale's moral still rings true today 21 Books bring back Berlin of youth 28 Does poet mean what he says? May 5 A call for human rights 12 Looking at the other Israel 19 Agency helps with loans 26 Rabbi's tenure short-lived June 2 Polarization threatens Jewish life 9 East Germans 'comment' on U.S. rabbi 16 Holocaust book may stir racism 23 Israeli Arab ambassador to Atlanta 30 Writer's comparison flawed July 1 Research never ends in Negev 14 Birobidzhan fraud clearer than ever 21 (No issue) 28 Anti-semitism exists despite glasnost August 4 Thinker spurns progress 11 New problems for Israel 18 Chautauqua a feast for the mind 25 Montebello was quite useful September 1 Territories leave clue to opinion 8 Seasonal seasons on lu'ach 15 Waldheim could learn from Kohl 22 Kahane disregards democracy 29 Holidays need meaningful sermons October 6 Extremism worldwide phenomenon 13 Memories for campaign for trees in '45 20 A tribute to a man of courage

Bibliography, 1982-1996 27 Jewish poet touchstone for Chinese November 3 Kristallnacht anniversary poignant 10 Fascinating untold story 17 Shultz's peach prescription 24 Would-be Messiah still intrigues December 1 Setting the record straight 8 Who is a Jew no issue for Knesset 15 Civil rights should be top priority 22 Jewish content disguised 29 (No issue)

1989 January 5 TV makes Wouk's tale a soap opera 12 Tragedy tests our spiritual strength 19 Mideast fights seen as top danger 26 Host families needed February 2 Nazi horror depictions fall short 9 Knudson was friend of Jews 16 Drivers of all ages need testing 23 Newcomers aren't the problem March 2 Good news found in New York 9 Games promote racial hatred 16 Same Jewish jokelore' for Purim 23 Costa Rican Jewry confident 30 Plenary's time to debate issues April 6 Maccabiah promises excitement 13 Pesach a time for questions 19 Important to play by the rules 26 WWII Seder was a true Exodus tale May 4 Jewishness comes from within 11 AIDS also a Jewish problem 18 Scientist left mixed legacy [Lorenz] 25 Why don't we make aliyah?

267

268

Bibliography, 1982-1996

June 1 A revolt against silence 8 Jews forgetting past lessons 15 Israeli law governs the Golan Heights 22 Have you made your ethical will? 29 West missed on Rushdie affair July 6 Good people taught me rabbi's role 13 Landmark occasion on the hill 20 (No issue) 27 Nazi actions extended beyond Jews August 3 Austria still anti-semitic, scholar says 10 Fiery passion moved John Hirsch 17 Portuguese Jews exist despite history 24 Neo-Nazis need to be watched 31 Japanese diplomat helped Jews September

7 14 21 28

Pluralistic journalism still thrives Orthodox and non-Orthodox must talk One Black who rejected Farrakhan 5749 proved a good, bad year for Jews

October

5 12 19 26

Article minimizes German role This battle will always be with us [on Bart Giamatti] Arno Mayer downplaying anti-semitism Islamic groups gain ground on West Bank

November

2 Mutual regard is foundation for fellowship 9 Revisionists have answers for everything 16 Jews helped by Italian Wallenberg 23 East Berlin's toughness no surprise 30 Allied actions not the same as Holocaust December

7 14 21 28

Germany's re-unification concerns Wiesel Rabbi Fein berg offers his views of Soviet Russia Few limits on religious intolerance (No issue)

1990 January 4 Sao Paulo rabbi notes political shift to the left

Bibliography, 1982-1996 269 11 Germany still has no cause to rejoice on Nov. 9 18 Soviet's medals symbol of tough times olim face 25 Reader sheds no tears for dead German POWs; Quiet leader's deeds a lasting memorial [Eulogy for Ray Wolfe] February

1 Religious intolerance makes inroads in Canada 8 A reunited Germany cause for optimism, anxiety 15 Diaspora Jewry must help settle Russian brethren 22 Jews should fight discrimination in all its forms March 1 Direction of Jewish state at crossroads this year 8 East Germany needs more schooling in democracy 15 Russian aliya in new battle for Jews to conquer 22 Driving Miss Daisy's stereotypes make me uneasy 29 A tough lady proves age is only a state of mind April 5 State of uncertainty exists over Israeli relations 12 Coverage of events in Israel called distorted 19 Environmental concern a part of Jewish tradition 26 Plenty of questions exist about Soviet Jews' exodus May 3 Palestinians must be ready and able to make peace 10 Prager provides favourable review of Allen's film 17 Lithuanian independence could bode well for Jews 24 New Ontario health bill may be bad for rabbis' health

June 1 Community forum aims to unite Jewish community 7 Rift between religious, non-religious examined 14 There's more to Israel than political games, intifada 21 Qualifiers not necessary to comments on Israel 28 Poll finds Russian nationalism a threat to Jews July 5 Mandela's now a symbol for victory of the heart 12 Couple's dream realized as museum is launched 19 (No issue) 26 Biography of Brother Daniel is fascinating tale August 2 German faith provides hope for country's future 9 American rabbi holds no brief for L.A. Law 16 A. Hutler was guardian angel to Jews of Radom 23 Jews of Iraq endured centuries of persecution 30 Enkin looked at life's problems from religious angle

270

Bibliography, 1982-1996

September 6 Church document helped build Catholic-Jewish ties 13 Jews must treat other religions, races with respect 19 New Year sees beginning of end for two Germanys 27 Ambience of Yom Kippur service unites all Jews October 3 Israel's position may be weakened by Iraqi crisis 10 Synagogues should not be surrogates for home life 18 Tevye's plight was different from modern Palestinians' 25 Outpouring of affection for Dalai Lama deserved November 1 Media bias brought into question by shootings 8 Ben-Gurion University has unlocked promise of Negev 15 Jewish sports stars getting direction from community 22 Censors try to take role of parents in selecting books 29 Something to worry about when Duke gets votes December 6 As in most capitals, politics is everything in D.C. 13 Revisionist literature taking more belligerent tone 20 Plenty of calendaric coincidences in Jewish history 27 (No issue)

1991 January 3 Groups' battle over turf only hurts the community 10 US media go to extremes in condemning Israel 17 Christianity losing out to Islam in Middle East 24 Improved US relations by-product of war 31 Extreme Islamic factions plan to destroy Israel February 7 Images from Israel impact on all Jews 14 Rabbi Schach's view debated throughout history 21 Ben-Gurion University pioneers efforts to integrate newcomers 28 Children donning gas masks shows true horrors of war March 7 Jews have moral obligations toward immigrants 14 News of local institutions underplayed by fundraisers 21 Saddam's not the only one preoccupied ... 28 Soviet Jewish aliya will transform Israel for the better April 4 Spiritual leaders must work together for common good 11 East Germany condemned both anti-semitism and Israel

Bibliography, 1982-1996 18 German church ruins led to search for symbol's origins 25 Loyalty of Jewish voters moving to the right over time May 2 Mayor of Berlin expresses support for Israel 9 Socialist view of Polish Jews now seems anachronistic 16 Rabbi Rosenberg remembered for impact on community 23 Jewish professors, students struggle with identity 30 Janowski, Hochhut had impact on Jewish life June 6 Negev desert holds great promise for Israel's future 13 Interreligious rivalry hurts Moscow's Jewish community 20 Jewish values, culture fall by wayside in Hollywood 27 Visit to my German roots completes life's circle July 4 (No issue) 11 Dershowitz tone should prompt self-evaluation 18 (No issue) 25 Staid archaeology journal tackles pornography issue August 1 Multiculturalism can exist with a Canadian identity 8 This is not the first time Bush has dealt with Israel 15 German court puts onus of responsibility on trial 22 Toronto community has come a long way in thirty years 29 Benjamin book shows how Jews were treated in the 1880's September 5 Real crisis exists in providing funds for Jewish education 12 (No issue) 19 Jews speak out to create better life for all people 26 Ottawa was slow to recognize new Israel state October 3 German boys' choir to receive unique experience 10 Type, numbers of Jews in world fascinating study 17 Changes in Soviet Union affect life of Jews 24 Dead Sea Scrolls are taking too long to decipher 31 'The Quarrel' is an authentic Jewish film November 7 Jews played a vital role in small towns 14 Dutch author had early effect on Johnson 21 Russian Jews do have well-founded fears 28 World history slowly being ignored

271

272

Bibliography, 1982-1996

December

5 12 19 26

Jewish survival a constant struggle [German Jews] Study of Jewish lobby misses key points [Miller's book] Russian anti-semitism deeply entrenched Russian Jews remain insulated

1992 January 2 (No issue) 9 Borovoy fights city hall within the law 16 (No issue) 23 Diaspora, Israel must be strong partners 30 Community needs all types of Jews February

6 US Jews shifting charity dollars 13 Jewish view not welcome during war 20 It's time to decipher Dead Sea Scrolls 27 Israel comes to terms with aging society March 5 Rabbi Felder's vision must be reflected 12 Columnist gets met with pile of mail 19 Winter storm brings out best in Israel 26 Begin inspired community during visit April 2 Aunt's book links two generations (Ada's library) 9 Fackenheim a special Jewish philosopher 16 CJC plenary important for all Jews 23 Female activist issues challenge to all 30 Human rights laws make Canada better May 7 Art exhibit reveals Nazi madness 14 Judaism welcomes scientific debate 21 How we identify with Jews in the news 28 Violence in Toronto awakens public

June 4 A retrospective look at a successful plenary 11 Odds and ends came early this summer 18 A look at our past and our future 25 Mummies part of the Bible's 'true' stories July 9 Informal constitution served Israel well 23 Jews not immune to changes in society

Bibliography, 1982-1996 30 A look at Latin American anti-semitism August 6 (No issue) 13 Old myths and new victims in Yugoslavia 20 Commentary taking second look at Israel 27 Christian pilgrims welcome sign of change September

3 10 17 24

Black leaders denounce anti-semitism German Jewry loses respected leader Sri Lanka disproves Ostravsky allegation A useful tool for the holidays

October

1 8 15 22 29

Jews should offer their hearts on Yom Kippur Yom Kippur a good time to discuss morality A disturbing look at today's teenagers German celebration borders on obscene Neturei Karta reject Israel and Zionism

November

5 12 19 26

Despite its faults, vote had positive side Human rights legislation is never irrelevant Every family must help the disadvantaged Unusual approach used for circumcision

December

3 10 17 24 31

How did Jews vote in U.S. and Canada? What really motivates German skinheads? Aliyah key to Israel's future society Silver lining found in recent ADL poll (No issue)

1993 January 1 Holy Blossom has an interesting name 14 (No issue) 21 Leo Baeck left his mark on society 28 Chesnie was a man with uncommon empathy February

4 11 18 25

Israel-Diaspora relationship still vital element U.S. election provides some interesting footnotes Assimilation statistics give cause for concern Biographies reveal character flaws of famous subjects

273

274

Bibliography, 1982-1996

March 4 Sephardim an important part of Judaism 11 Despite their isolation Japanese similar to Jews 18 Judaism connects physical and spiritual healing 25 Education is a lifelong occupation and joy [Eulogy for my mother] April 1 Intermarriage statistics don't tell the whole story 8 Pesach observance lapsed after Moses 15 Memories, understanding key to Yom Hasho'ah 22 New anti-semitic attacks call for new strategies 29 New therapy system required in Jewish tradition May 6 Fundamentalists have much in common; Yom Ha'atzma'ut 5753 13 Canada has rich history of multiculturalism 20 Citizens of French town stood out during war 27 Orthodox rabbi makes reading fun, instructive June 3 Visit to Germany reveals interesting trends 10 Tennis making a difference to children of Israel 17 Reproductive research makes Germans remember past 24 Giving in to violence a harmful delusion July 1 (No issue) 8 Research program elicits many responses 15 (No issue) 22 Teddy a key part of Jerusalem's landscape 29 Jesuit journal articles a hopeful sign August 5 (No issue) 12 Pilgrimage to Israel always a good idea 19 Scholar helped to develop Hillel into national institution 26 To those who say Holocaust never happened ... September 2 Washington's Holocaust Museum stirs controversy 9 Archeological find excites entire Israeli community 15 Ten years of weekly columns remains rewarding 23 We've come a long way from Yom Kippur War 29 History often an interpretation of selective facts October 6 Demjanjuk verdict evokes multitude of feelings 13 Yes, you can 'teach an old dog new tricks' 20 Memories came flooding back on October 3rd

Bibliography, 1982-1996 27 Jews have captured fair share of Nobel prizes November 4 Today's immigrants want just what your parents did 11 President's wife shone at Reform convention 18 Being a rabbi is a good job despite its ranking 25 University chair to study reason for suicide December 9 Canadians have plenty of reasons to be patriotic 16 Schindler's List a masterful work of movie-making 23 Ben-Gurion's dream comes to life in the desert

1994 January 6 Senior years can be best period in a person's life 13 Israelis worried about uncertainties of the future 20 Russia's Vladimir Zhirinovsky is certainly no joke 27 Torch-lit memories of Germany sixty-one years ago February 3 German young men receive fitting sentences 10 The church and the Jews 17 Ida Nudel in Israel - a muted voice 24 I have rediscovered travel by train March 3 Russia is no democracy 10 Rediscovering the Jews of Hawaii 17 Of Schindler's tale and a seventy-fifth birthday 24 What was in Goldstein's mind at Hebron? 31 The fifth question at seder: When do we eat? April 1 Shooting at people, not targets 14 The mystery of the unsuitable student 21 Something happened on the way from the airport 28 About people who say: 'Let's be fair to the Nazis' May 5 Save items that few people know about 12 Can you pronounce Dniepropetrovsk? 19 Making it to the top one hundred 26 What I learned when I met the Warburgs June 2 Butt out, please, you're too old 9 Germany is not the land I used to know

275

276

Bibliography, 1982-1996

16 Memories of visits to the old South Africa 23 Schindler's List from another perspective 30 Gentiles speaking Yiddish in Germany July 7 Germany remembers the murdered gypsies 14 (No issue) 21 Israel must press Arafat on MIAs 28 Imagine Shylock in a Tel Aviv theatre August 4 Being the person you were meant to be 11 How Peru got its Jewish prime minister 18 Why Lancmann didn't like Schindler's List 25 There are Jews who don't want their boys circumcised September 1 A useless diploma and a change of career 8 To fast or not to fast - there is no question 14 Don't despair; there is also some good news to report 22 Spotlight on stings and scams 29 I was one of those who came from Cuba October 6 How easy it is to forget 13 Biblical data find new confirmation 20 The problems of the Jewish Centre in Toronto 27 Time out for Muslim holidays? November 3 Mirror on the wall shows a Jewish face 10 Discovering new things about my mother 17 A trip to Berlin: closing the circle 24 Visiting the Washington Holocaust Museum December 1 Bigotry in the guise of scholarship 8 A remarkable story of success 15 Letting go - a senior's confession 22 Harry Rasky's 'Prophecy' - a special experience 29 (No issue)

1995 January 5 A bit of nostalgia 12 Violence for the sake of violence 19 The debunking of Israel's heroes 26 It's difficult to get rid of our past

Bibliography, 1982-1996 277 February

2 About dice and myths 9 Why Auschwitz wasn't bombed 16 Some desultory thoughts 23 A fateful letter March 2 Rabbis don't know all 9 Things weren't always the same 16 Lost art of writing ethical wills [Therese Strauss] 23 Each Israel visit has its own message 30 A strange reversal of history April

6 Just how much do people change? 13 Revisiting the United States 20 Is the U.S. really Israel's friend? 27 Fifteen minutes to eight; The day that changed my life [Dora-Nordhausen] May 4 When a friend dies [David Polish] 11 Remembering VE-Day 18 Celebrating VE-Day in Washington 25 Germans react to VE-Day June 1 Goldie Hershon's talk 8 Some summer tidbits 15 Racquets, not rockets 22 Berlin synagogue is dedicated 29 The Bernardo trial in perspective July 6 Who is this mystery guest? [Kirk Douglas] 13 (No issue) 20 Apology [Lutherans acknowledge Luther's anti-semitism] 27 The missing child syndrome August 3 Suitcases no longer packed 10 Getting the best out of Internet 17 Learning to read Hebrew 24 More on suitcases - Israeli style 31 Yiddish treasurer September 7 Monumental politics 14 Coming to America 21 Rosh Hashanah and the scientist

278 Bibliography, 1982-1996 28 Jonah and the great fish October

5 12 19 26

Catch 22 for Refugees Memorial on hold My bar mitzvah Seniors are not parasites

November 2 A frightening parallel [review of books by Benzion Netanyahu and Erna Paris on the Inquisition] 9 Farrakhan, Blacks, Jews 16 My brother Yitzhak [on the death of Y. Rabin] 23 Poverty fatigue 30 Thoughts on the assassination December

7 14 21 28

The Sharansky experience A history like no other Early Canada included Jews (No Issue)

1996 January 4 Germany's first woman rabbi 11 Historical tidbits 18 The Shabbat of our lives 25 Doubts about Song of Peace February 1 Austria begins to remember 8 Have brush, will travel [archaelogy in Israel] 15 I can still hear him sing [Jack Barkin] 22 Arguing before the Supreme Court 29 Syrian Christians [in Israel] March 7 Hawaiian Journey 14 Has Arafat changed his spots? 21 Rabin was not the first [about Arlosoroff] 28 Whatever happened to Ethiopian Jews? April 4 Some notes on the Pesach calendar 12 The Arafat speech 18 Chosen for divine service 25 Leah Rabin's visit to Canada

Bibliography, 1982-1996 May 2 Use it or lose it [reprinted in EntreNous (Toronto Ulyssean Society), May 1996, 10-11] 9 Reversing history 16 Who is ajew? [Nazi history] 23 Smash the computers 30 Goldhagen's thesis June 6 The more things change ... [Israel Tennis Centre] 13 Throw it out! For what? 20 A different election 27 Icon speaks [Adin Steinsaltz] July 4 Snitching 11 The box in the attic 18 New 'Merchant' 25 (No Issue) August 1 Goldhagen's book (again) 8 Missionaries at my door 15 91-year-old gets Ph.D. 22 Olympic Games 1936 29 Southern Baptists September 5 Christians in Israel 12 A new year 19 Looking back [an article on Jews by Mackenzie King, 1897] 26 Jewish literacy October 3 Blacks and Jews 10 Life on Mars? 17 The disputed Jerusalem tunnel 24 Nazism's propagandist [Goebbels] 31 Yitzhak Rabin - one year later November 7 The Shahak affair 14 Steinsaltz's lament 20 Opposites can work together 28 A classic remembered December

5 Von Bonn nach Berlin 12 The Gambling Bug

279

280

Bibliography, 1982-1996

19 Memorial in Berlin 26 (No issue)

Articles in the Globe and Mail (Toronto) 1982 January 21 Policing new code presents problems February

8 An ugly twisting of history March 3 Purveyors of Proliferation 13 Sadat, Review of book by Hirst and Beeson 22 An outsider's view of the universities April 7 Passover, Easter, stress redemption 19 A genius in the field of mysticism May 20 More than tidbits from a German review

June 1 The emancipation of Canadian Jews 24 Spearheading the drive for human rights July 13 Discovering the nuclear danger 26 A menace to Canada: the dollar coin August 2 The personal touch hospitals lack 9 Tennis transports one from life's dull cares 31 Euphemisms reveal what's hidden October

12 Change comes slowly to the Swiss November

2 On reaching seventy: gratitude and growing wonder December 6 Australia like Canada in some ways

1983 January 3 The little man needs a boost

Bibliography, 1982-1996 281 31 The day Hitler came into power February 7 'An eye for an eye' not an order to kill March 1 Staying alive as the house lights dim April 5 A sense of hope for closing the generation gap May 2 Educator, despite the label 28 Palestine and the least of evils [review of Mark Heller's A Palestinian State] 30 Aging with dignity July 5 Frightening aspect to the security bill 9 Israel is still a nation struggling to reach its goals August 1 The Reichstag fire still smolders 23 Non-whites advance amid absurdities September 5 Happy New Year - we're not alone October 3 Mixed feelings about Luther 14 Heroic survivors bury a myth November 1 Sect a victim of tyranny 14 Stumbling block in a dialogue between Jews and Christians December 6 A salute to U.N. on human rights

1984 January 3 Mixed marriages mean oblivion February 7 A sleeping giant in insurance March 6 Faded names and forgotten faces April 3 The thin edge of the wedge? May 1 World court needs a helping hand

282

Bibliography, 1982-1996

June 7 Courteous drivers bring light to a blackout July 5 Turner can set a high moral tone August 2 Whole pageant business degrading 14 Hypocritical games at end September 11 Left-handers rule the roost 28 Why some felt excluded during the Pope's visit October 30 Can Minnesota be a land of miracles? November 27 Clout of polls needs to be countered

1985 January 3 Closing the gulf between life, money 28 Twice boxing was given a kayo punch by society February 21 Seven years of gains in human rights March 28 Unusual mother belies the stereotype April 15 Common thread in celebrations

May 10 Machines are living things to computer-culture child 29 Doyle? Never heard of him ... [special non-commercial edition in honour of Richard Doyle] August 7 Basic question arises in a visit to refugee camps 26 The elderly don't deserve stereotyping September 16 Traditional time of contemplation November 20 Criminal hunt sore point for Jews, Ukrainians December 13 Freedom grows in the candlelight

Bibliography, 1982-1996 1986 January 2 Suicide being tackled by those who know 20 U.S. holiday a fitting tribute to Martin Luther King February 7 All life, not just space, a test April 1 The fasting senator: a hero or a bore? 25 Passover points to roots May 20 Exception to rules a heartening sight June 9 Refugee policy undergoes a shaping-up July 7 A fine record of battling world cruelty August 19 Tamils rate same help as any other refugees September 23 Religious schools deserve funding October 2 Shadow cast over High Holy Days 23 A prophet whose warnings chart the path to hope November 18 Hard questions on immigration beg for answers December 19 The religious equality issue is heating up in Israel

1987 January 15 Anne's spirit in music February 19 Religious freedom not just Sundays March 13 Ottawa morally wrong to shut door April 20 Passover is perennial reminder that human freedom is indivisible May 15 Barbie case a lesson for Canada

283

284

Bibliography, 1982-1996

June 25 Bill tilts off-balance in choosing refugees July 29 Important lessons in debates on hanging, refugees August 20 The attitude towards refugees has a parallel from 1939 September 12 A magic mix of experiences [review of Nancy-Gay Rotstein's poetry] 24 A fitting day to celebrate and reflect October 23 Esperanto still leaping language barriers at one hundred December 12 How and where the Holocaust started [review of Michael Marrus's The Holocaust in History} 16 Chanukah symbolizes a battle that rages on 1988

January 8 Until both sides agree to talk, there can be no lasting peace 22 Remembering the man [Martin Luther King] February 19 What is behind our fascination with Israeli unrest? March 4 Germany's Reichstag fire set a continent ablaze April 1 A time to pause, reflect and hope for the best May 12 Humanity incinerated its own heart [review of Andre Stein's Quiet Heroes}

June 2 The second coming of a literary lion [Feuchtwanger] July 18 Out to cheat death and overcome despair August 11 Taking up the issues on the Americans' turf September 9 A chance to celebrate the wonder of existence November 10 Bittersweet reflections on a day of infamy

Bibliography, 1982-1996 December

22 Why U.S. saw Arafat as a worm in Big Apple 29 Two solitudes: a split among Jews

1989 February

16 Resist rolling out the welcome mat April 18 Israel and Egypt's fate forever intertwined May 12 Latin Americans on the run find unique haven: Costa Rica

June 14 View from a shrinking pedestal October 2 Old Age Pension turns one hundred December

1 Springtime in Prague and the sun above again

1990 January 31 The day Ray became His Excellency April 9 Exodus from Soviet Union gives Passover new meaning May 25 Jews the victims of new anxieties over immigration September

19 Days of Awe December

28 Tackling an age-old problem

1991 March 29 A common quest for redemption September

2 Protecting the seeds of a new tomorrow (multiculturalism)

1992 January 20 Yesterday's horror, today's warning

285

286

Bibliography, 1982-1996

April 9 Body and soul (baseball and religion) October 2 The graveyard where the space age began November 24 Taking a driver's test at eighty (years, not km/hr)

1993 April 8 Letter to the ed. [Men's fashion] on Dopp Kit

1996 November 5 Lives lived (Elliott Lloyd Marrus) December

21 Distance marks Holocaust memoir [review of Drukier's Carved in Stone]

Articles in Other Periodicals 1970* 'Of Smell, Soap and Scissors.' Toronto Education Quarterly, 9 no. 2 (1970), 2-7. 1975* 'The Need for Religious Discipline' (lecture). CCAR Yearbook LXXXV (1975), 165-73.

1981* 'Anti-Semitism in the World Today.' Israel Yearbook on Human Rights, 11 (1981), 187-99.

1982 The Call of the Ram's Horn,' Jewish Digest (September 1982), 63-4. 'Reflections on the New Commentary,' Journal of Reform Judaism (Summer 1982), 88-90. 'Reform's concern with the Sabbath, 'Judaism, vol. 31 (Winter 1982). 'Whenever I hear the word "Morality", I run,' Viewpoint. Published by Creditel, Toronto (August 1982) ['Morality' misprinted 'Mortality']. Items omitted from earlier bibliography

Bibliography, 1982-1996

287

1983 'Manila folder' [short story], Viewpoints, 12 no. 2 (March 1983), 6-10. 'New Year's Message,' Canadian Zionist Federation, Annual Review (September 1983). 'Review of Morton Weisfeld et al., The Canadian Jewish Mosaic,' in Canadian Journal of Sociology, vol. 9 (1983). 'Review of Paul Cowan's An Orphan in History,'1 Review of Books and Religion, 11 no. 7 (1983), 1. 'Why is Israel different?' Macleans, 30 May 1983.

1984 'How we can help to end racism in Canada,' Toronto Star, 14 April 1984. 'Message,' Rosh Hashanah Annual 1984 of Temple Israel, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. 'Minorities have power,' Currents, 2 no. 2 (Summer 1984), 6-9. 1985 'The trouble with Friday Night,' Reform Judaism, 14 no. 2 (Winter 1985-6), 4. 1986 'Betrachtung zum Wochenabschnitt Beschallach,' Allgemeine judische Wochenzeitung, [Diisseldorf], 24January 1986. 'Die Bestandigkeit der Ehe,' Allgemeine judische Wochenzeitung, [Diisseldorf], 12 September 1986. 'Eulogy for Rabbi A.L. Feinberg,' Holy Blossom Temple Bulletin, 24 October 1986. 1987 'Esperanto still leaping language barriers at one hundred,' in Kandaske Listy, Toronto, 1987. 'How the Zionist flag was adopted,' Midstream, 33 no. 5 (1987), 34-6. Letter to the Editor (A Response to Zoberman), Viewpoints, 15 no. 2 (Spring 1987), 8. 'Living in two worlds - Reform Judaism in the Diaspora, 'Judaism, 36 no. 142 (Spring 1987), 187-94. 'Rabbi Plaut states views on Klein article,' National Jewish Post, 14 January 1987. 'The vision of the founders,' Baeck and Call [Leo Baeck School, Toronto], 7 February 1987. 'Wiesel - a voice of Human conscience,' Affirmation [Toronto], (June 1987). Reprinted in Focus on Equality [Toronto Board of Education], 1 no. 3 (1987). 1988 ' ... and then there's the country's good side,' Toronto Star, 31 May 1988.

288

Bibliography, 1982-1996

'The Festival,' article for the Pomegranate Guild's catalogue, 'How Beautiful Our Heritage - Sukkah Installation,' (Fall 1988), 2. Greeting to ROM, in program issued for gala dinner by Friends of Israel Museum on opening 'Treasures of the Holy Land,' 4 May 1988. 'How I see it: voting party or candidate?' Toronto Star, 25 October 1988. 'The Night of Broken Glass,' Reform Judaism, 17 no. 2 (Written 1988-9), 6ff. Reprint of 18 July Globe and Mail article in Voices, Newsletter publication by Distress Centre, Toronto, Fall 1988. Reprint of'Jiidische Eirwandering in deu U.S.A. Eigener Bericht,' mjiidisches Gemeindeblatt, Berlin, vol. 27 (1937) no. 47 (21.11), p.[l]. In DiejudischeEmigration aus Deutschland 1933-1941, Frankfurt a/M: Buchhandler Vereinigung, 1988, p. 190 (no. 411). Excerpted [by Gunther Plaut].

1989 'Abortion debate: neither side can have its way,' Toronto Star, 8 September 1989. 'Diaspora policy on Soviet immigrants' [Introduction to a Symposium], Viewpoints, 18 no. 4, 1989. 'Emancipation - the challenge of living in two worlds,' Judaism, 38 no. 4 (Fall 1989), 437ff., in The German-Jewish Legacy in America. 'TheJPS Commentary' (review), Conservative Judaism, 42 no. 1 (Fall 1989), 53-7. 'The Man Who Would Be Messiah,' excerpt in Viewpoints, 17 no. 1 (1989), 4. 'Unwanted intruders or people in flight?' Perspective, 13 no. 2 (Spring 1989), 456. 1990 'Confidentiality and threatened suicide' (Responsum), Journal of Reform Judaism, 37 no. 4 (Fall 1990), 59-63. 'Dangers lurk on the road to Germany unity,' Toronto Star, 28 February 1990. 'My third age,' Journal of Aging and Judaism (Spring 1990). 'Testing for AIDS' (Responsum), Journal of Reform Judaism, 37 no. 3 (Summer 1990), 59-66. 1991 'Commentary' [on aspects of the Donald Marshall Jr. affair], UNB Law Journal, vol. 40 (Fall 1991), 248-51. 'Our collective experience in human rights and solidarity: yesterday, today and tomorrow,' International Education Magazine, 1 no. 1 (1991), 4ff. [French translation opposite]. 'Reform perspectives' ('Focus on God,' a symposium), Reform Judaism, 20 no. 2 (Winter 1991), 18-21. 'The Russian Aliyah,' in Women's Canadian ORT, Focus, 13 no. 3 (1991), 5. 'Xenophobia and Racism,' Currents, 7 no. 1 (Spring 1991), 3. 1992 'Reform - torchbearers for a new approach to the old religion,' Toronto Star, 3 December 1992.

Bibliography, 1982-1996

289

1994

'Eighty-year-old drivers unfairly singled out for annual testing,' Toronto Star, 6 January 1994. 'The man who saved my life,' CCAR Journal, 41 no. 3 (Summer 1994), 20-2. 'Parashat Toldot' in Learn Torah with ..., published by Torah Aura, 1 no. 6 (27 October 1994), Iff. 'Restitution' [short story], Parchment 1994-95, 7-20. 'Schon alte Geschichte?' Interview for Humboldt (University of Berlin), 10 November 1994, 12. 'Steak and Sacrifices, 'Jerusalem Report, 7 April 1994. 'The Undeceived' (Parashat Toldot), Jerusalem Report, 19 November 1994. 'What does God require of us?' [Reprint of the symposium in Reform Judaism (Fall 1993), with A. Hertzberg, Emil Fackenheim, and Sherry H. Blumberg], in Wexner Heritage Review, no. 11 (July 1994), 24ff. 1995

'Toronto: citadel of reform enlightenment,' Reform Judaism (Winter 1995), 82-5. 'We have done well and can do better,' address to the 20th Anniversary Dinner of Urban Alliance, Currents, 8 no. 3 (1995) 3-5. 1996

'Jewish ethics and international migrations,' International Migration Review, 30 no. 113 (Spring 1996), 18-26. 'Noah and how we live with one another in our time,' Living Torah (published by UAHC), 1 no. 2 (13 October 1996). 'People of global spirit' [interview by Michael Johnston with Rabbi Gunther Plaut], Peace Magazine (January-February 1996), 16-17.

Photo Credits

Foto Fischer, Humboldt University, Berlin: Marlis Diirkop Tom Sandier Photography: Dedication of Plaut Manor Shelia Smolkin: Plaut Manor The Toronto Star/M. Slaughter: Mutti and fellow gradutate (L64C-6A) Charles M. Rafshoon: UAHC Convention Al Gilbert: Yitzhak Rabin, 1993

Index

Note: After an endnote reference, the text page is indicated in parentheses. AAPRJ. See American Association of Progressive Reform Judaism AARP. See American Association of Retired Persons Abella, Irving, 39, 187, 191-2 Abraham, Walter, 179 Abrahamson, Brian, 180 Ada (Mutti's sister), 198 Adelaide (Australia), 180 Adelman, Howard, 27, 74, 168 adjudicators, 50-2, 238-9n.2 (50) Adler, Cyrus, 143 African immigrants, 38 African refugees, 21 Aga Khan, 41 aged, 12-16; as brainless, 12-13; discrimination against, 12; as drain on the public purse, 12, 15-16; as sexless, 12-14; as useless, 12, 14—15 ageing, 4-6, 207-8; and brain, 6-7; and concentration, 222; and driving tests, 7-8; physical process of, 6-7 Agudath Yisrael, 144 Aiken, Sharry, 32

Aish Hatorah, 122 Al Aqsa Mosque, 73 Alice (Mutti's sister), 198, 199, 227 Alter, Robert, 150-1 American Association of Progressive Reform Judaism (AAPRJ), 113-14 American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), 16 American Jewish Committee, 47 An American Tragedy (Dreiser), 210

anti-semitism: disappearance of overt, 102; Quebec, 37; Toronto, 96 anti-Zionism, 67, 89. See also Zionism Arab claims, 88 Arafat, Yasir, 73, 81-2; and Netanyahu, 88 Armstrong, Bromley, 41 Art Gallery of Ontario, 215 Ashkenazim, 133, 143 Asian immigrants, effect and acceptance of, 33, 38 Assembly of First Nations, 37 asylum, as a moral issue, 24-5 Asylum - A Moral Dilemma (Plant), 168-9, 178

292

Index

Auguste, Arnold, 42 Australia: lecture tour, 179-80; travel to, 172 BadNauheim (Germany), 198 Baeck, Leo, 231-2 Bagnall, Kenneth, 201 Bamberger, Bernard, 150-1,153, 246 n.3(150),n.!2(153) Basel (Switzerland), 90 Baurn, Daniel, 53 Baycrest (Toronto), 206 Beer Sheba, 92 Begin, Benny, 66 Begin, Menachem, 64-6, 78, 80; Nobel Peace Prize, 65 Behrman House Publishers, 157 Beirut (Lebanon), 64 Belliveau,Jean, 191 Ben Dat, Mordecai, 171 Ben-Gurion University, 92, 155, 172 Berlin (Germany), travel to, 177-8 Best, Cal, 19-20 Beth Adam, The Cincinnati Congregation for Humanistic Judaism, 138 Beth El (Chappaqua, NY), 173 Beth Emet (Evanston, 111.), 173 Beth Israel (Hartford), 173 Beth Tzedec Congregation (Toronto), 233-4 Bialik, Chaim Nachman, 122 Bickley, Catherine, 56 Bill C-55, 28-9 Bill C-84, 30 Bishop Museum (Honolulu), 214 Bismarck, Otto von, 14, 202 Black community: radicalism in, 43; Toronto, 41; United States, 91

Blacks: anti-semitism of, 45; exclusion of, 38; and Jews, 41-7, 102 Blair, Frederick, 21 Bloch, Ernest, 183 B'nai B'rith, 77, 242n.7 (102); League for Human Rights, 104 B'nai B'rith International, Commission on Continuing Education, 168 Board of Inquiry. See Ontario Human Rights Code, Board of Inquiry The Boat Is Full (film), 236n.3 (21) bomb attack, Temple Israel (Johannesburg), 176-7 Borowitz, Eugene, 78, 152 Boston, 227 Bouchard, Benoit, 30 'Brains Trust' (Franklin Roosevelt), 14 Brandeis-Bardin Institute, 131 Bratslav (Ukraine), 169, 248n.l7 (169) Breira (choice), 78 Brickner, Barnett, 111 Brighton, refugee youth hostel, 199 British Museum, 165-6 Bronfman, Charles, 104 Bronfman, Sam, 97 Buchwalter, Ernst, 180 California, 227 Callwood, June, 166 Camp David peace accord, 65 Canada: Jews in, 90; United Nations rating, 94 Canada Employment and Immigration Commission (CEIC), 26, 29; refugee determination, 18-25;

Index report on refugee admission law, 25-7 Canada: External Affairs, 23, 173-4; even-handedness policy, 75, 240n.l2 (75) Canada-Israel Committee (CIC), 67, 105, 240n.4 (67); and Montebello Group,74-6 Canada-Israel free trade agreement, 105 Canada Stadium (Ramat Hasharon),249n.l6(191) Canadian Association of Retired People (CARP), 16 Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), 185-6 Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, 52, 57-8 Canadian Council for Refugees, 32, 34 Canadian Council of Christians and Jews, 106 Canadian Human Rights Reporter, 51 Canadian Institute for International Peace and Security, 73-4 Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC), 12, 43-4, 67, 104, 115; Montebello controversy, 77; rally on Rabin's death, 84; and Sam Bronfman, 97 Canadian Jewish News (CJN), 43, 102, 170-1, 209, 217; articles in, 256-79; Montebello controversy, 77 care-giving, 207. See also ageing Carleton University (Ottawa), 55 Carmelly, Felicia, 99-100 Caro,Joseph, 134 CARP. See Canadian Association of Retired People (CARP) Carr, Donald, 171

293

The Case for the Chosen People (Plaut), 110 CBC. See Canadian Broadcasting Corporation CCAR. See Central Conference of American Rabbis CEIC. See Canada Employment and Immigration Commission Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), 18, 23, 67,80,111, 140, 166; convention at Atlantic City, 152; and gender-sensitive liturgy, 159-61; and Joseph Glaser, 188; patrilineality, 126-8; presidency, 114-20, 130, 172; Responsa Committee, 114, 133, 135-7

Chabad, 122 Chalmers Foundation, 169 Chaplin, Charlie, 13 Chautauqua, lecturer at, 182-3 Chautauqua Daily, 182 Chautauqua Institution, 9 Chesnie, Henrietta, 99, 217 Chesnie, Joshua J., 217 Chicago, 227; classical Reform congregation in, 109 Children's Services for the High Holy Days (Plaut), 246n.8 (152) Christian-Jewish dialogue groups, 106 Christian Lebanese Forces, 65 Christians and Jews, 105-7 Christie Pits riot (Toronto), 96, 241n.l (96) CIC. See Canada-Israel Committee Cincinnati, 227 civil liberties, 135 civil servants, and Human Rights Commission, 18-19

294 Index CJC. See Canadian Jewish Congress CJN. See Canadian Jewish News

CLAL, national education network, 145 Clark, Joe, 19, 37, 74 classical Reform, 109, 243n.4 (109) Clement, Tony, 50 Clinton, Bill, 155; Jewish vote, 245n.l6 (135) CNN television, 82 Code. See Ontario Human Rights Code Cohen, A., 246n.l3 (154) Cohen, Gabriel, 139 Cohon, George, 202 College of the Pacific, 226 Commentary magazine, 150 CommonQuest magazine, 47 concentration-camp survivor, Detroit, 194 Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, 116 Conservatism: Beth Tzedec Congregation (Toronto), 233-4; and conversion procedures, 103; left-right tension within, 103, 144; meaning of, 142-3; mixed marriages, 126-7; and Reform, 132 conversion: and Conservatives, 103; Israeli Knesset, 143 convoy factor, 224-5 Costa Rica, 180-2 Coder, Irwin, 104 Cousins, Norman, 166-7 culture, value system of, 10-11 Gumming, Peter, 55 Cummings,Jack, 104 Davis, Bill, 18

Davis, Susan, 188 Dawson, Bretell, 55 Deborah (biblical warrior), 160 Degel HaTorah, 144 Democratic Party (U.S.), and Reform, 135 demographic shift, Jews in Israel, 90 Detroit, 226-7; and concentrationcamp survivor, 194 Deuteronomy, commentary on, 153 Deutsch, Gotthard, 136 Dewitt, David, 168 Diamond, Jerome, 235n.5 (11) Diaspora: and assimilation, 230; or exile, 89-92; and intifada, 70-1; and Lebanese war, 63, 65, 68-9 discrimination, 50; against aged, 12; systemic, 48 Disraeli, Benjamin, 16 divorce, attitude towards, 11 Dora (concentration camp), 194 Drabinsky, Garth, 45 Dreiser, Theodore, 210 driving tests, at age eighty, 7-8 Durkop, Marlis, 178 Einhorn, David, 89 Einstein, Albert, 178-9, 213 Einstein Archives (Princeton University), 179 Einstein's God (Goldman), 179 Eisendrath, Maurice N., Ill, 152 Elbogen, Ismar, 232 Elon, Amos, 70 Employment and Immigration, 19; budget for refugee legislation, 20-1, 25-6. See also Canada Employment and Immigration Commission

Index England: Jews in, 90; and refugee claimants, 23-4 Enkin, Max E., 217-18 Entebbe, raid on, 67 Erasmus, George, 37 eruv, 242n.ll (104) Etzioni, Amitai, 140 exile, or Diaspora, 89-92 Exodus, commentary on, 153 External Affairs. See Canada: External Affairs family patterns, 14-15 Farrakhan, Louis, 41, 45, 46-7 'A Father and His Son' (Nachman of Bratslav), 169-70 Fein, Leonard, 70 Feinberg, Abraham L., 13, 111 Felder, Gedaliah, 104 Ferber, Edna, 42 Fingerhut, Natalie, 168 Fisher, Alex, 191 Flamm, Joe, 92 Ford Centre for the Performing Arts (North York), 41-2 Ford Foundation, 168 France, and refugee claimants, 23-4 Frank, Jacob, 165-6 freedom: individual, 140; religious, 58 Freedom of Information Act, parents' visa application, 28 Freehof, Solomon B., 136, 137, 247n.l4 (154) French factor, in population, 36 Friday evening services, controversy over, 117-20 Frieberg,Joe, 249n.l6 (191) Friedlander, Joshua, 210 'Friendship' (Wiesel), 166

295

fundamentalism: Orthodox, 101-4; and peace, 81; rise of, 144 Gates of Mitzvah, 112 Gates of the Seasons, 112

Gaza, and PLO, 76 gender-neutral language, Torah Commentary, 159-61 Genesis, commentary on, 153, 156 German Jews, Toronto, 96 Germany, and political Zionism, 89 Givens, Philip, 104 Glaser, Joseph, 80, 115,116, 127,131, 136, 188 Glaser, Simeon, 173 Globe and Mail (Toronto), 68, 226; articles in, 280-6; on age discrimination, 12; on driving tests, 8; on religious freedom, 59 Golan Heights, 87 Gold, Baruch, 92 Goldfarb, Martin, 17 Goldman, Judy, 178 Goldman, Robert, 178-9 Goldstein, Baruch, 81 Goldstein, Elyse, 244n.22 (123) Goodman, Eddie, 18 Gordis, Robert, 151, 167 Goring, Hermann, 164 Gosling, Richard, 238n.l3 (41) Gottlieb, Myron, 45 Gottschalk, Alfred, 94-5, 116, 216 Great Depression, 9, 14, 210 Greenberg, Irving, 145 Gross, Alan, 205 Gruber, Mayer, 155 The Guggenheim/Wormser Family - A Genealogical Three Hundred Year Memoir (Elizabeth Plaut), 250n.21 (194)

296 Index Guinness Book of Records, 204 Gwyn, Richard, 40 Haesler,A.A.,236n.3(21) Haftarah Commentary, 155,157-61, 219 Haifa, Israel, 92, 198 halachah, 126-7, 129, 132, 244n.l (126) Hallo, William W., 151 handicaps, and human rights, 53 Hanging Threads (Plaut), 162-3 Hartman, David, 88, 145 Harvard Business School, 216 Harvard University, 45 Hashetachim (the Territories), 78 Hasidim, 242n.ll (104) Hawaii, 214; travel to, 172, 178-9 Head, Wilson, 41 health care, 15 Hebrew schools, 121 Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion (HUC-JIR), 112, 116, 128, 136, 146, 192; Jerusalem campus, 94; Toronto Lehrhaus, 233-4; publisher of Genesis Commentary in Hebrew, 156, 158; and William V. Strauss, 216 Hebrew Union College Monthly, 220 Hebrew University, Jerusalem, 179 Hebron, 87 Henry, O., 162 Hertz, J.H., 149, 153-4 Herzl, Theodor, 89 Herzog, Shira, 74 Heschel, Abraham, 166 Heydrich, Reinhard, 164 High Holidays, and the synagogue, 120 Hillel Foundation, 123 Hindus, 41

Hirsch, Richard G. (Dick), 94, 241n.21 (94-5) Hispanic community (United States),91 Hitler, Adolf, 164 Hizbollah, 82 Hoffman, Ellen, 213 Holland, J.G., 218 Holocaust: and Christian triumphalism, 106; and Western guilt, 72 Holy Blossom Temple (Toronto), 8, 96; call to W. Gunther Plaut, 11011; and Maurice Eisendrath, 152; out-of-the-cold program, 106-7, 123; outreach to Soviet Jews, 99; Plaut's resignation from, 153; Social Action Committee, 32, 47, 188 Holy Land: Christian, 72; in the Torah, 87-8 homosexual rights, 110, 142 Honegger, Arthur, 183; King David, 183 Honolulu, 178 Honor, Leo, 247n.l4 (154) House of Commons: Bill C-55, 28-9; Bill C-S4, 30 housing: public, 189-90; for women, 188 Howard University, 47 HUC-JIR. See Hebrew Union College -Jewish Institute of Religion humanism, 101, 138-9 Humanist congregation, 114 human rights: inequity, 52-5; religious freedom, 57-8; safety of children, 57; sexual harassment, 51-2 Human Rights Code, 238-9n.2 (50) Human Rights Commission, 18, 239n.7 (56); test case on handi-

Index 297 caps, 53-5. See also adjudicators; Ontario Human Rights Code Humboldt University (Berlin), 23, 177-8 Humphrey, Hubert, 110 Humphrey, Robert L., 229 Hussein, king, of Jordan, 70, 76 immigration, European, 17-18 Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB), 28, 32; refugee claimants, 23 inequity, in the law, 52—5 INS. See United States, Immigration and Naturalization Service interdenominational cooperation, 106-7 intermarriage, resolution, 140-1 Internet, 185-6; and learning, 125 intifada, 68-73, 79, 240n.6 (70) IRB. See Immigration and Refugee Board Iseler, Elmer, 183 Israel: as Christian Holy Land, 72; fund-raising for, 91; future of, 229; love of, 77-8; public criticism of, and intifada, 70-1; public criticism of, and Lebanese war, 64-5, 67-8; travel to, 172 Israel, Charles, 165 Israeli Knesset, 143 Israelis: rally on Rabin's death (Toronto), 99; as refugee claimants in Canada, 100, 242n.5 (100); in Toronto, 97-9 Israel Tennis Centre, 249n.l6 (191) Isserles, Moses, 134 Isserman, Ferdinand, 111 Italy: Jews in, 90; and refugee claimants, 23-4

Jacob, Walter, 136, 173 Janigan, D.J., 8 Jehovah's Witnesses, 29 Jerusalem, 227; and Muslims, 81 Jerusalem Report, 171

Jewish Chautauqua Society, 249n.6 (182) Jewish-Christian relations, 106 Jewish Federations, 104 Jewish Olympics, 180, 191 Jewish Russian Community Centre (Toronto), 100 Jewish Theological Seminary, 142; Toronto Lehrhaus, 233-4 Jewish Zealots, 239n.l (63) Jews: and Blacks, 41-7; demographic shift, 90; in future, 229; in Toronto, 96 Journal for Reform Judaism, 152

Judaism magazine, 151 Kafka, Franz, 162 Kahan Commission, 68, 239-40n.3 (66) Kanee, Sol, 104 Karaites, 134 Kazdan, Pearl, 198 Kelman, Wolfe, 131 Kennedy, John, 79 Kentucky, 198 Kibbutz Hamadiya, 92 King David (Honegger), 183 kirpan decision, 56-60 Klaperman, Gilbert, 131 Klein, Lothar, 169-70 Knobel, Peter, 173 Koffler, Murray, 104 Kohler, Kaufmann, 136 Kolel, 123, 217, 244n.22 (123) Kollwitz, Kathe, 215

298 Index Koren publishing house, 156 Kristallnacht, 167, 186, 199 Kruger, Arthur, 201-3 KTAV Publishing House, 193, 246n.8 (152) land claims, 81 land for peace, 82, 87-8 landsmamhafien, 100-1, 242n.6 (100) Laqueur, Walter, 164 Lasker, Danny, 92 Lastman, Mel, 83, 237-8n.l3 (41) Lauterbach, Jacob Zvi, 136 Lebanese war (1982), 63-9 Le Devoir (Montreal), 37 Lehrhaus, 233-4 Lelyveld, Arthur, 114 Lester, Malcolm, 162 The Letter (Plaut), 163-5 Levesque, Rene, 36 Liberal Judaism, 138, 144 Liberal party, 17, 19 Liberal synagogue, 108 The Lifeboat Is Full (Haesler), 236n.3 (21) 'Lifestyle' facility, 205 Likud, 80, 82; and Oslo agreements, 87 Lincoln, Abraham, 79 Lippman, Eugene, 244n.l9 (116) locomotion, in future, 228 Lombardi, Masseo, 237n.l3 (41) Los Angeles, 198, 227 LTW (Learning Torah with ... ), 171 Lubavitch Hasidim, 144 Lucyk, Stan, 243n.l5 (106) Ma'alot (Israel), 64 Maccabi: Canada, 191; German, 180, 191

Maccabiah. S^Jewish Olympics McCarthy, Eugene, 110 McClelland and Stewart, 165 MacDonald, Flora, 19, 25-7 McDonald's, 202 McGill University, 27 McGregor, Helga, 205 Macintosh computers, 4, 184, 185 MacLean, Walter, 27, 30-1 Macy's West, 227 Mafdal (National Religious Party), 144 The Magen David - How the Six-Pointed Star Became an Emblem for the Jewish Peopk( Plaut), 167-8 Maimonides, Moses, 133-4 Mallet, Gina, 40 A Man of Little Faith (Salutin), 250n.6 (217) Mandela, Nelson, 177 Mandela Fund of Canada, 177 The Man Who Would Be Messiah (Plaut), 167 marital relationships, and obsolescence, 10 Marmur, Dow, 43, 74, 125, 130, 187, 242n.l3 (105) Marrus, Michael, 74 Marshall, Louis, 143 Martha's Vineyard (Mass.), 227 Masada complex, 63, 239n.l (63) Maslin, Simeon (Shim), 113 MasseyHall (Toronto), 183 Matas, David, 32 May, Karl, 108 May, Norman, 240n.4 (67) media: Al Aqsa Mosque and Temple Mount issue, 73; and Israel, 71-3 Meir, Golda, 94 Meltzer, Aviv, 155

Index The Merchant of Venice, 44

299

Nakamura, Mark, 237n.l3 (41) Nancy (Alsace-Lorraine), 199 Nansen Medal, 28 National Archives of Canada, Plaut collection, 213-14 National Association of Temple Educators, 217 National Federation of Temple Brotherhood, 249n.6 (182) nationalism, U.S. versus Canada, 22

Mercury, Al,237n. 13 (41) Messinger, Lillian, 235n.5 (11) Meyer, Michael, 138-9 Micah Homes, 188-9 Michael (son of Alice), 227 Mihaly, Eugene, 112, 138-9, 140; debate with Plaut, 112-13 Million Man March (Washington, DC), 47 Minneapolis, 227; presidential address in, 117 minorities, 36 minyan service, 120 mitzvah, 110; concept of, 112 mixed marriages: children of, 126; Orthodox and Conservative schools, 126; Reform rabbis, 11314 Mondale, Walter, 110 Montebello (Que.), Jewish-Arab dialogue at, 73-7 Montreal: Jewish community in, 97; Montebello controversy, 76; refugee determination hearings, 21-2 Montreal Gazette, refugee determination legislation, 25 moral advocacy, and Ontario Human Rights Commission, 49 morality, in future, 229 Morgenstern, Julian, 231-2 Morrison, Stephen, 244n.22 (123) Moscowitz,John, viii, 117, 125 Mount Sinai Hospital (Toronto), 205 Mount Zion Temple, 173 Mulroney, Brian, 19, 27, 30 multiculturalism, 38-41; policy, 22 Muslim community, American, 91

New Zealand, lecture tour, 179-80 NGOs. See non-governmental organizations Niebuhr, Gustav, 160 Nobel Peace Prize: Begin and Sadat, 65; Elie Wiesel, 166 non-governmental organizations (NGOs): Bill C-55, 29, 31; response to refugee determination report, 27 North York Committee on Community and Race Relations, 41, 2378n.l3 (41) Norton, Keith, 50 'now' generation, 10 nuclear family, 14-15 Numbers, commentary on, 153

Nachman, Rabbi, of Bratslav, 169

Oakdale Golf and Country Club, 202

National Jewish Post and Opinion, 139

National Life Assurance Company, 56 Native people, in Quebec, 37 Neiditch, Michael, 168 Nelson, Commissioner, 28 Netanyahu, Binyamin (Bibi), 80-1, 240n.3 (66); and Arafat, 88 Newfoundland, Tamil refugees, 2930 New York Times, 118, 160

300

Index

obsolescence, 8-11, 212 'occupied territory,' West Bank, 78 Oconomowoc (Wise.), 110 Olan, Levi, 243n.l4 (113) O'Neill, Oona, 13 Ontario Human Rights Code, 48, 50; Board of Inquiry, 50-1, 55, 56, 60, 239n.7 (56). SeealsoHuman Rights Commission Ontario Human Rights Commission (OHRC), 48-60; and age discrimination, 12; and business community, 49; and employers, 49; legal role, 48-50; as moral advocate and legal partisan, 48 Order of the British Empire (Max E. Enkin),218 Order of Canada (Max E. Enkin), 218 Orthodox Jews, 101; and prayer, 122; and secular Jews, 91, 93 Orthodoxy: in future, 229; and mixed marriages, 113-14; modern, 101-2; North American, 131; right wing, 102-3; and Shulchan Arukh, 134; splintered, 242n.ll (104); as state religion in Israel, 93, 144 Orwell, George, 23 Oslo agreements, 87 'out-of-the-cold' program (Toronto), 106-7, 123 Oz, Amos, 70 Pacheco, Margarida, 20, 24 Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), 64-6; West Bank and Gaza, 76 Palestinian-Israeli conflict, 88; tunnel opening, 73 Palestinian uprising. See intifada

Pandori, Mr, 58-9 Pandori Case, 41 Parizeau, Jacques, 37 Parti Quebecois, 35 Partrich, Nora, 34 patrilineality, 110, 126-33 peace, in Israel, 81 peace accord, Camp David, 65 Peace Now (Shalom Achshav), 66-7, 70, 76, 78 Pearson, Geoffrey, 73-4, 76-7 Peel Board of Education, 56-60 Peel Region council, 59 Peli, Pinchas, 155 Pentateuch and Haftorahs (Hertz), 149, 153-4 Peres, Shimon, 79-80 Perley, Arlene, 241n.3 (84) phylacteries, 243n.l (108) Piedmont, (Calif.), 227 Pilchik, Eli, 114 Pittsburgh Platform (1885), 142 Plaut, Carmi, 227 Plaut, Carol, 226 Plaut, Daniel, 226-7 Plaut, Deborah, 226-7 Plaut, Elizabeth: The Guggenheim/ WormserFamily —A Genealogical Three Hundred Year Memoir, 250n.21 (194); Guggenheim/ Wormser genealogy, 185, 193-4; health, 214-15; personal papers, 213-14; possessions, 211; travel, 162, 170, 172-3, 182 Plaut, Hadassah, 227 Plaut, Jonas (father), 5, 186, 203, 250n.2 (197); liberalism of, 108 Plaut, Jonathan, 166, 186, 192, 198, 209, 212, 226; personal papers, 213-14

Index Plaut, Joshua, 198, 209, 212, 227 Plaut, Judith, 174, 186, 226 Plaut, Levi, 250n.5 (199) Plaut, Selma (Mutti), 186, 250n.l (197); death of, 208-9; and her car, 197-8; and honorary BA, 201-5; University of Toronto, 198-205 Plaut, Walter, 122, 186, 198, 203 Plaut, W. Gunther: - LIFE: on belief, 222-3; chair of Responsa Committee, 136; and computers, 183-4; Conservative characterization of, 108-10; debate with Mihaly, 112-13; dual citizenship of, 22; education, 23; eightieth birthday, 187, 207; on faith, 4, 219-23; honours, 237n.l3 (41), 249n.l8 (192); HUC-JIR Jerusalem campus, 94; and Israel, 92-5; keynote address on Rabin's death, 84-6; as lecturer, 171-4,176; as a liberal, 80-1; and music, 183; Patrilineal Committee, 128; personal papers, 213-14; and possessions, 210-14; retirement life, 2238; tennis player, 210, 225-6; travel with Elizabeth, 172-3; and U.S. ties, 38, 227; wedding anniversary, 186-7 - WORKS: Asylum - A Moral Dilemma, 168-9; 'A Father and His Son' (libretto), 169-70; Hanging Threads, 162; The Letter, 163-5; The Magen David — How the Six-Pointed Star Became an Emblem for the Jewish People, 167-8; poem in Hebrew Union College Monthly, 220-1; The Torah: A Modern Commentary, 12, 111-12, 115, 149, see also under

301

title; 'Value Formation in Children,' 168 - See also Holy Blossom Temple (Toronto); Human Rights Commission Plaut, Yehudah, 198, 227 Plaut Chair, Project Management, 92 Plaut Manor, 47, 188-90 PLO. See Palestine Liberation Organization polarization, of religious factions, 102-3 Polish, David, 173 polls, pro-Israel sentiment, 68 population, Jewish factor in, 36 Portuguese migrants, to Toronto, 29 Posen, Gary, 8 Praeger publishing, 168 Prager, Dennis, 245n.8 (131) prayer: and daily life, 121-2; and Friday night service, 117-20 press, diminishing importance of, 102 Pride magazine, 46 Primrose Club (Toronto), 186, 202, 206-7 Princeton University, Einstein Archives, 179 Profits, 193 Progressive Conservative government, federal, 19, 39 Project Isaiah, 99 Proverbs, commentary on, 152 Prutschi, Manuel, 82 Quebec: 1995 referendum, 35, 37; independence, 22; Quebec Jewish similarity, 37-8 RA. See Rabbinical Assembly Rabbenu, Moshe, 204

302 Index Rabbinical Assembly (RA), 131, 143 Rabbinical Council of America (RCA), 131, 144 Rabbinical Fellowship, 102 Rabin, Yitzhak, 79-86; murder of, 69, 82-6; rally at North York on death of, 83-6 Rabin-Peres peace plan, 87 racial prejudice, and the law, 32 racism, 44-5 Rae, Bob, 84, 187-9, 241n.3 (84) RCA. See Rabbinical Council of America recession, 1980s, 39 Reconstructionism, and conversion procedures, 103 Reeves, Jon, 217 referendum. See Quebec, 1995 referendum Reform, 109-10, 229; attacks on, from pulpits, 103; and Beth Adam, 138-9; and Breira, 78; classical, 109, 243n.4 (109); and Conservatism, 132; and conversion procedures, 103; in Costa Rica, 181; and domestic politics, 135; and freedom, 133-5, 139; in Israel, 95; leftright tension within, 132-3, 140-6; Plaut-Mihaly debate, 112-13; Plaut-Reines debate, 112-13; and study, 149; in Toronto, 96 'Reform Judaism and the Bible' (Alter), 150 refugee law and policy, 116; admission, 18-27; Bill C-55, 28-9; Bill C-84, 30; determination process, 28-30, 39 refugees: Asian, 21; needs and rights of, 21, 24 Refuge magazine, 27

Regev, Uri, 156 Reines, Alvin, 112-13, 140 religion, in future, 229 Religious Action Center (Jerusalem), 156 religious factions, in Canada, 101-5 religious pluralism, 80; difficulty in Israel, 93; of Orthodox leaders, 144-5 Republican party (U.S.), and Reform, 135 Responsa Committee. See Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR): Responsa Committee retirement, age of, 15-16 rites of passage, 101 Robarts Library, University of Toronto, 214 Roberts, John, 17-19 Rodef Shalom (Pittsburgh), 173 Roman Catholic church, and refugee claimants, 24 Ronen, Moshe, 84 Roosevelt, Franklin, and 'Brains Trust,' 14 Rose, Alan, 104 Rosenberg, Hadassah, 234 Rosenberg, Stuart, 233-4 Rossel, Seymour, 157 Roth, Joseph, 156 Roy Thomson Hall (Toronto), 183 Rucker, Patricia, 171 Russian Jews, in Toronto, 99-101 Ryan, Claude, 37 Sabra and Shatila massacre, 65, 67 Sacred Service (Bloch), 183

Sadat, Anwar, Nobel Peace Prize, 65 Safdie, Moshe, 94 Saguenay flood (1996), 37

Index St Andrew's Presbyterian Church (Toronto), 'out-of-the-cold' program, 107 St Joseph's Church (Montreal), 243n.l5 (106) St Paul (Minn.), 109, 197, 227-8 Salmon, Bev, 41 Salutin, Rick, 250n.6 (217) same-sex marriage, civil, 132, 142 same-sex unions, 55-6, 132, 140 San Diego (Calif.), 152, 227 San Francisco, 198, 227 Sanhedrin, 133 San Jose (Costa Rica), 181 Sapir, Pinchas, 95 Saskatoon, 227 Satok, David, 242n.l2 (104) Schaalman, Herman, 115, 128-9 Schechter, Solomon, 143 Scheuer, Richard, 94, 156, 241n.21 (94) Schindler, Alexander, 116, 126-8, 133, 138; and Torah Commentary, 152, 154 Schindler's List (movie), 165 Schulweis, Harold, 131 Scott, Edward (Ted), 177 secularism, 124 secular Jews, and Orthodox Jews, 91, 93 self-esteem, and ageing, 14 Senate: and Bill C-55, 29, 31; and Bill C-84, 31 separatism, religious, 102 Sephardim, 133 sex, discussion of, 13-14 Sex and the Pulpit (Feinberg), 13 sexism, in writing, 158 sexual harassment, and OHRC, 51-2 sexual orientation, 55-6

303

Sgro,Judy, 238n.l3 (41) Shabbat, 114; review of, 111-12; services, 109, 119-20 Shabbat Committee, 112 Shabbat Manual, 112 Shalom Achshav (Peace Now), 66-7, 70, 76, 78 Shamir, Yitzhak, 80, 240n.3 (66) Sharansky, Natan, 105 Share magazine, 42, 44-6 Sharon, Ariel (Arik), 64, 66, 23940n.3 (66) Shas, 144 Shatila. See Sabra and Shatila shivah, 110 Shalom Hartman Institute (Jerusalem), 145 Show Boat controversy, 41-6 Shulchan Arukh, 134 shule, 100, 242n.6 (100) Sikh community, 41; kirpan decision, 56-60 Sikh refugees, 29-30 Silver, Harold, 173 Six Day War, 63, 70, 79 sixty-five—year watershed, 14—15 Slater, Joel, 189 Slonim, Reuben, 77, 223 social entitlements, 15-16 social insurance cards, 15 social obsolescence, of the aged, 12 Social Security, and age sixty-five, 14 Soncino commentary, 154 Sossin, Marvin, 180, 182 South Africa, 198, 227; bomb attack in, 176-7; travel to, 172 sovereignty, and French Quebecers, 36 Soviet Jews, in Toronto, 99-101 Soweto (South Africa), 177

304 Index Spain, travel in, 162 Sperling, S. David, 158 Spielberg, Steven, 165 Spivak, Sidney, 75-6 'spouse,' definition of, 55-6 Star of David, 167 Stein, Isaac C., 155 stereotypes, minorities, 43 Stern, Chaim, 157-61, 173 Stern, Jack, 243n. 14 (113) Stern, Philip, 247n.23( 158) Strauss, William V., 216 Stroh, Michael, 244n.6 (129) study: Jewish tradition of, 123-5; of Torah, 151 Sunday schools, 121 Switzerland: and refugee claimants, 23-4; and wartime actions, 236n.3 (21) Syme, Daniel, 157-8 synagogue, future of the, 120-5 Synagogue Council of America, 131 Tamil refugees, 29-30 technology, in future, 228 Tel Aviv, 82, 191; Jewish Olympics in, 191; protest marches in, 65; publisher, 156 Telushkin, Joseph, 245n.8 (131) Temple Emanu-El (Johannesburg), 176 Temple Emanu-El (New York), 143 Temple Israel (Johannesburg), 176 Temple Mount, 73 The Terrible Secret: Suppression of the. Truth about Hitler's 'Final Solution' (Laqueur), 164 'Third Seder' celebration, 32 Timothy Eaton Memorial (United) Church (Toronto), 243n.l5 (106)

Todd, Michael, 193 The Torah: A Modern Commentary (Plaut), 12, 111-12, 115, 149; and gender-neutral language, 158-61; Hebrew text, 154; origins of, 1523; reviews, 150-1, 160; translation, 155-6 Torah: as constitution, 133; law, 56; study of, 125 Toronto: Jewish community in, 96; and Montebello fiasco, 76; 'out-of-the-cold' program, 106-7; refugee legislation hearings, 21—2; Russian Jews in, 99-101 Toronto Board of Rabbis, 103 Toronto Daily Star, 205 Toronto Jewish Public Library, 21213 Toronto Mendelssohn Choir, 183 Toronto Star, 59 Traditional Conservatives, 143 Tribune (B'nai B'rith), 242n.7 (102) triumphalism, 129-30; Christian, 105-6 Troper, Harold, 39 Trudeau, Pierre Elliott, 17, 22; and multiculturalism, 38 Twin Cities (Minn.), 173 Tzahal (Israeli army), 78 UAHC. See. Union of American Hebrew Congregations UAHC Press, 157, 160 UN. See United Nations Unfinished Business (Plaut), 48, 94, 174 Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC), 80, 111, 114, 116, 146, 172; Beth Adam, 138; patrilin-

Index 305 eality, 126; and Torah Commentary, 152, 153, 157, 247n.l4 (154) Union Songster, 246n.8 (152) United Church, and conflict with Jewish community, 106 United Jewish Appeal, 91, 102 United Nations: Canada's rating, 94; global survey, 41; High Commissioner for Refugees, 24, 28 United States: Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), 27;Jews in, 89-90; Judaism in, 108-10; as melting pot, 39; un-American label, 22 United Way, and Show Boat, 42 unity discussions, 37 University of Arizona, 226 University of Haifa, 92, 172 University of Toronto, 20, 217; Faculty of Music, 169; honorary doctorate, 191; Jewish studies, 105; John P. Robarts Library, 214; School for Continuing Studies, 198-201; Woodsworth College, 201-2 Urban Alliance, 41 Ury, Helen (Hertha), 250n.5 (199) 'Value Formation in Children' (Plaut),168 value system, changes in 1960s, 1011 Vancouver, 227; Jewish community in, 97; refugee legislation hearings, 21-2 Wacholder, Ben Zion, 128 Walfish, Binyamin, 131 Walsh, Mary, 20 Wannsee conference, 164

'Wanted' (Holland), 218 Warschauer, Heinz, 216-17, 250n.6 (217) Washofsky, Mark, 136-7 Waterman, Jan, 56 Waterman Case, 56 way to go. See halachah Weinberg, Dudley, 153 Weiner, Gerry, 31 Weinstein,Jacob, 111 West Bank, 78; and PLO, 76 West Germany, and refugee claimants, 23-4 Wheel-Trans (Toronto), 200 white prejudice, 43 'white' Soviet refugees, 21 Wiesel, Elie, 166 Wiesel, Elisha, 166 Wiesel, Marion, 166 Willingshausen (Germany), 9 Wilson, Michael, 26 Windsor (Ont.), 166, 198, 227 Winnipeg (Man.), 227;Jewish community in, 97; refugee legislation hearings, 21-2 Wolfe, Elizabeth, 217 Wolfe, Morley, 238n.l3 (41) Wolfe, Ray, 104, 171, 217 Wolfe, Rose, 217 Wolffsohn, David, 89 women: and gender-neutral writing, 158; rabbis, 103; self-esteem of, 14; victims of violence, 188 Woodsworth College, University of Toronto, 201-2 World Jewish Congress, 172 World Union for Progressive Judaism (WUPJ), 95, 114, 172, 176, 217 WUPJ. See World Union for Progressive Judaism

306 Index xenophobia, United States, 32-3 Yalfani, Mehri, 190 Yeshivah University (New York), 144 Yiddish, loss of, 101 Yoffie, Eric, 146 Yom Kippur War, 99 York Lanes Press, 168 York University (Toronto), 55; buying a computer at, 183-4; Centre for Refugee Studies, 168; honorary

doctorate, 191-2; Jewish Studies, 105, 192, 213; Profiles, 193 young people, absence of, from services, 121 Zaltzman, Yoseph, 100 Zangwill, Israel, 166 Zimmerman, Sheldon, 146 Zionism, 229; political, 89-90; in Toronto, 96 Zunz, Leopold, 210