The American Jewish world. [volume] (Minneapolis ;) 1915-current, 1921-12-16
THE AMERICAN JEWISH WORLD

valid or inadequate. But is their ra-
tionalism that deep? No! Bible
study is difficult and exacting. 1t re-
ouires concentrated thinking. And it
is much easier to sit back comfort
ably and listen to glib, eloquent,
clever speaker pick flaws in the Bible,
without any reading or contemplation
of their own. But is that rational
istic? Is it rational? Can their
tutor in destructive criticism really
feel proud of such gullible, credulous,
unouestioning disciples?
If there must be nationalist crltl-
cism of the Bible, does it mean the
same to the Jew as to the non-Jew.
The Jew produced the Bible; it has
been his companion in suffering and
in Joy. Does not the Bible deserve
the reverence and love of the jew?
What made Jewish life so noble, what
made it stand out as beacon light
in the benighted ages of ignorance, II
not The Book? Where did the world
get it's morality; what has dragged
the world out Of the depths if not
the Bible? When the ancestors OF
nationalist lecturers were running
about, not so many centuries ago,
naked and british savages, while the
Jews were already civilized and
civilizing force, what gave the Jew
his olden superiority, if not the BIZ
BILE? Must the Jew then be so eager
to hear the Bible belittled?
"But," say some Jewish attendants
at nationalist lectures, che is not in
turing us, he is showing how absurd
other religions are. If anything, he
is praising Judaism, by contrast"
How childish such talk is! Do not
the Jewish rationalists realize that
if the God-idea is made ridiculous in
another religion it undermines Juda-
ism as we'll? Judaism differs from
other faiths in it's dogma and prac-
tice, in it's conception of God. But
deny the existence of God, and are
you not destroying Judaism as well?
We are not pleading for narrow,
unquestioning fanatical faith. By all
means let them question and inves-
tigate. But let them be truly ration
al,-and by rational we mean sensi-
BILE, reasonable. Let them spend the
time, patience, money they devote to
nationalist lectures in really trying
to learn the Bible, not from Destroy
ers or detractors, not even from the
Bibles supporters or opponents, but
from their own first-hand study and
thinking. Only then can they claim
to be rational Rationalists.
And yet, why need we be exer-
cised? When there is ribald nasty
fling, on the stage, against the Jew
or Judaism (and only too often by
an "entertainer" who is himself Jew
ish), do not some Jews guffaw and
applaud the loudest? Then why be
surprised to find Jews in the ranks
of those who help heap ridicule upon
what has always been the dearest
treasure of the Jewish people,-the
Bible? In this age when entertain
ment is the aim and end of life, when
the pugilist learns" more than the
professor, and the movies outrival
morality, why not get entertainment
in picking the Bible to pieces?
Yet we cannot refrain from being
thankful that certain good old ances-
tors of some "Jewish" Rationalists
were spared the anguish of beholding
their offspring worshipping at the
shrine of this latest idol-Rational-
ism. Critical study of the Bible is
nothing new in Judaism, but such