Jewish Post, Indianapolis, Marion County, 3 January 2003 — Page 18

NAT 14 January 1. 2003

Tu B’Shvat Continued from page 9 art He Who causes the grass to spring up for the cattle and herb, for the service of man, to bring forth bread from the earth. How manifold art Thy works, O Lord! In wisdom hast Thou made them all; the earth is full of Thy property. Vegetarianism also reflects concern for animals and all of God's creation, since for many people it is a refusal to take part in a system that involves the cruel treatment and slaughter of 9 billion farm animals in the United States alone annually and, as indicated above, that puts so much stress on the earth and its resources. 8. Both Tu B'Shvat and vegetarianism are becoming increasingly popular today - Tu B'Shvat because of an increasing interest in and concern about nature and environmental issues, and vegetarianism because of increasing concern about health, the treatment of animals, and also the environment and the proper use of natural resources. 9. On Tu B’Shvat , the sap begins to fill the trees, and their lives are renewed for another year of blossom and fruit. A shift toward vegetarianism means, in a sense, that there is an increased feeling of concern for the earth and all its inhabitants, and there is a renewal of the world's peoples' concerns about more life-sustaining approaches. In 1993, over 1,670 scientists, including 104 Nobel laureates - a majority of the living recipients of the prize in the sciences - signed a "World Scientists' Warning To Humanity." Their introduction stated; "Human beings and the natural world are on a collision course. Human activities inflict harsh and often irreversible damage on the environment and on critical resources. If not checked, many of our current practices put at serious risk the future that we wish for human society and the plant and animal kingdoms, and may so alter the living world that it will be unable to sustain life in the manner that we know. Fundamental changes are urgent if we are to avoid the collision our present course will bring about." The scientists' analysis discussed threats to the atmosphere, water resources, oceans, soil, living species, and forests. Their warning; "We the undersigned, senior members of the world's scientific community, hereby warn all humanity of what lies ahead. A great change in our steward-

Peck

ship of the earth and the life on it is required, if vast human misery is to be avoided." With the world's ecosystems threatened as never before, it is important that Jews increasingly discover the important ecological messages of Tu B'Shvat. Similarly, it is also urgent that Jews and others recognize that a shift toward vegetarianism, the diet most consistent with Tu B'Shvat, is not only an important individual choice today, but increasingly it is a Jewish imperative since the realities of modern intensive livestock agriculture and the consumption of animal products are inconsistent with many basic Jewish values, as well as a societal imperative, necessary for economic and ecological stability. Richard H. Schwartz is Professor Emeritus, College of Staten Island. He is the author of Judaism and Vegetarianism, Judaism and Global Survival, and Mathematics and Global Survival. http://jewishveg.com/schwartz.

Gertel Continued from page 6 against the view that the gods could be manipulated by magic and taught of a God Who makes ethical and spiritual demands upon one's psyche and actions. It is telling that in the same episode the nun who does the weather has a "crisis of faith." Seeing a certain pair of shoes in a store window tempts her into dancing in a bar with strangers, getting drunk on rum, and taking a leave of absence from her vows. Likewise, Jake's bawdy Jewish grandmother (Suzanne Pleshette), who is depicted as a gambler with debts, resists appearing as a (raunchy) "commentator" on Jake's show until the star bribes her, even against Jake's wishes, with new clothing for every show. In the Hebrew Bible, God's transcendence of magic is associated with God's refusal to be moved by bribes and the exhortation that the rank and file folk, as well as their judges, have a solemn obligation not to pervert justice with bribes. Can any reliable ethics, not to mention science or world view, emanate out of the New Age emphasis on magic and en-ergy-control which is glorified in this episode to tire detriment and mockery of the classical religious traditions?

Continued from page 7 Sweden? We can't discuss how virtually every senseless act of death and destruction has been acted upon by Arab males between the ages of 21 and 40. Why can't we even talk about it without human rights groups filing lawsuits to protect these immoral people and their actions? Is it because we're afraid to speak out against the Islamic world? Do we cringe because we're afraid of being vocal against the sons of Allah? Every other culture or religion seems to be fair game. However, the Islamic religion seems to have a pretty big lobby, which is backed by all that oil which somehow makes the rest of us turn a blind eye. When these barbarians who reside somewhere in the 7 lh century are pandered to by our government and press, it makes me ashamed of belonging to either. Arlene Peck welcomes reader comments at: [email protected], www.arlenepeck.com.

Silver Continued from page 11 ing terrorism against the Hebrews of Israel. The author, Enaden Freitach, writes that the Jews of Israel deserve to be slain because of what they have done to Arabs. Jacobson is appalled and wonders whether American newspapers would have run articles defending Hitler in the Nazi period. Sure, he writes, there is something called "freedom of speech," but that doesn't warrant freedom of calumny. He writes that some of the Israeli journalists suffer from both an inferiority complex and ignorance as to why there is a Jewish State. It reminds him of a conversation he had years ago with Egypt's Gamal Nasser, who echoed Hitler's attitude towards the Jews. With regard to the piece in Ha-Aretz, Jacobson doesn't say whether the paper ran a rebuttal. Perhaps readers of this newspaper who read Ha-Aretz might have that information. Friendly Pontiff Shortly before Pope John Paul II met with Cardinal Law, he met with the president of Israel, Moshe Katzav. In an amiable encounter, both men

agreed that the bond between the Vatican and the Jewish State should be stronger. In the Algemeiner Journal we read that not only is the Pontiff friendly towards Israel, but so is the Italian Government, which at one time was pro-Palestinian. Sam Silver may be reached at 2730 NW Timbercreek Circle, Boca Raton, FL 33431.

Gold Continued from page 12 Dr. Gold may be reached by snail mail at: 112 Avenue B, Rutland, Vermont 05701-4503 or eventually by e-mail at :dr [email protected].

Neusner Continued from page 13 and its lessons — is best represented by the classic. The Education of Henry Adams (1907), an autobiography in form, a meditation on culture in effect. That Hertzberg aspired to replicate that model is explicit in his concluding pages. How does The Education figure? Telling the story of how he moved from the world of his birth into the modern world of uncertainty, Adams presents principal themes of modernization of American and Western culture in the form of an autobiography, through chapters of his life meditating on the culture that shaped his circumstance. So too, in coherent, thematic, propositional essays on the chapters of his life Hertzberg has made a statement of Judaism through the medium fully realized by Henry Adams. He tells the story of his life, by way of illustrating what has happened to the Jews and to Judaism. More to the point, he makes each chapter of his life into an exemplary essay on a given issue or development in American Judaism. The chapters unfold in the temporal sequence of everyday life, Hertzberg's life; beginnings, education, career, chapter by chapter. But each chapter forms a meditation on the meaning of the events portrayed therein. The personal becomes exemplary and bears witness to a larger truth Hertzberg means to convey. It is not principally a work of

self-celebration at all. That is what I mean when I say, despite the temptation to review the man, the book is the thing. That is an aesthetic achievement, one of solid, thoughtful writing — and, by the way, awfully fine editing. What, exactly, does Hertzberg do? He tells of his origins in Poland, in a Hasidic dynasty, and his father, a Hasidic master uncommonly wise in the sekhel of Judaism. He shows how the issues of the immigrant generation and their children — the uncertainty of the immigrant, the growing up and away of the second generation — played themselves out in his upbringing and education. He captures the America of the '20s, '30s, and '40s, the brutal anti-Semitism of, among other institutions, the academy and the professors. Puzzled at how to hold together the inherited tradition of the Torah and the modern learning of the university, he found his way to the Jewish Theological Seminary of America and to Conservative Judaism. He describes his years in the JTSA, as have many other alumni in their memoirs, as singularly unpleasant. Louis Finkelstein and Saul Lieberman do not emerge as winning figures by any means: the one comes to memory as a mean-spirited politician and manipulator of other peoples' lives, the other as an erudite but basically stupid misanthrope. Zionist and Israeli political personalities, nearly every one of whom Hertzberg met in his many communal roles in American and world Jewish institutions, emerge as limited and short-sighted and querulous. But the book settles only a few scores. Rather, it is rich in praise and appreciation for many fine Jews, and more than a few honorable gentiles. By Hertzberg's repeated criterion, "Would this person shelter me when the Nazis or Communists come around next time?" most of the gentiles in these pages qualify. In the heightened tension of this man's lifetime, in which a large part of his family perished in death-factories, that is no trivial judgment that he makes. There is no chapter of 20th century Jewish affairs that he does not invoke, no public issue or debate on Jewish public policy that he does not reContinued on page 15