The Daily Alaska empire., 1950-04-03
T H E SEE D AY s
 - B Y- GEORGE E. SOKO1.SKY
THE FEAST OF FREEnnM


 This week. Jews all over the world celebrate the Feast of Pass over, which represents one Of the great historic struggles for lih- erty Each year, Jews sit at the Seder Ga religious feast in the home) and recount the passage from Egypt to Israel. As the ser- vice is most often read in Hebrew, which the listeners generally do not understand, they wait im- patiently for the delicacies of the kitchen.
 But the essence of this holiday is not the festive joy, but the celebration of human freedom. It marks revolt from and re- nuciation of slavery. It establishes the doctrine of the inalienablc right of the individual man to lib- erty, as a gift from God. This be- lief is inherent in the Passover.
 A series of events followed the freeing of the Jews from slavery in Egypt, the climax of which was the statement of the moral law by Moses. It is difficult for our generation to realize the full mean ing of this event, particularly the contrast between the worship of he Golden Calf and the Ten Com ,,apdr,a,tS
 To this so-called sophisticated age, all this is fable, spoken per- haps to terrify a primitive people Yet, this aspect must be consid- sred: Liberty without restraint can be horrible. We witness it's extreme lgnneSs in such a reversion to he beast in the disclosure of horn- 0sexuality in the State Department md other agencies of government. n fact, we witness the anarchy of jur times in the inadequate public lorror at such a disclosure It is lot that we are wiser but rather hat we have so lost our sense of restraint that we take, as it were, n our stride every vice that hu- nan experience indicates can only cad to deterioration.
 What Moses gave in the Ten Commandments was a summary Of human experience, if you must re- ect divine inspiration. Thou shalt lot bear false witness -thous shalt not lie-how far have we departed rem that. As a working newspa- german, I encounter every day the hocking spectacle of great figures n our life, saying in public what hey know is not true, and then Iaying in private-"off the record" !" they call 1.-the opposite of what hey say in public.
 Bearing false witness is a hor- .ible vice because, carried to the engths to whiCh it is in these lays, it destroys the only basis hat can exist for human relations or the contract in business, for confidence between man and wo- man in marriage, for faith of )eorle in those who govern them.
 Lying is as easy as adultery md both too often cannot be un- covered. Yet, society based on ies, as on adultery, cannot long stand. So society in which the relations of parent and child are not grounded in respect, in truth fulness, will be without family system, each individual moving about like a stray cat. In such society, pity, compassion, charity and love soon disappear and noth- ing good can replace these quail ities.
 This, then, is the essence of the Passover Feast: It teaches man the value of liberty, but it also be- speaks restraint, self-restraint, that liberty may not become an an- archy. turbulent pursuit of individ- ual impulses, without regard to the whole community and in disregard of moral law.
 It was to a comparatively primi- tive people, not far removed from slavery in time or distance, that Moses gave the Ten Command ments, and who produced the Pen tateuch-the first five books of the Bible.
 It is difficult in our generation to realize that such dwellers of the desert, former slaves and the child ren of slaves could conceive of the loftiest ideals of human liberty and moral existence.
 Yet, they did. And what Is more, they carried their concepts of in- dividual liberty and social justice and moral law until it blossomed over the Earth, in many forms, and for it men lived and died. There have been many periods in human history when men widowed in the trough of horrible vicious ness, each pursuing his course with out regard to right. Yet, somehow, breaking through the dark clouds of faithlessness, stands on Mount Sinai the figure of Moses, crying to all the people:
 Turn ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods: I am the