Foreign Countries (1942-1943)

166 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK PART TWO: FOREIGN COUNTRIES I. BRITISH COMMONWEALTH 1. Great Britain BY THEODOR H. GASTER* ON THE morning of September 7, 1941, exactly a year after the modern "Fire of London," the narrow thoroughfares of the City were the scene of a unique and moving spectacle. The historic alleys, once the site of London Jewry, were thronged with some thousands of men and women, many in uniform and not all of them Jews, who had come from the four quarters of the metropolis to attend an open-air memorial service conducted by the Chief Rabbi in the ruins of the bomb-wrecked Great Synagogue. Instinct with pathos and imagination, compact both of memories and of hopes, the service typified the life of English Jews during the past year. Surrounded by the havoc of war, its normal structure disturbed and its services disrupted, the community bravely endeavored to regroup its forces and to keep its flag flying amid the dust and heat of the battle. The main task was to transform the existing machinery, or as much of it as remained intact, to meet the needs of a now scattered and decentralized community. With its numbers dispersed over countless small towns and villages, its children billeted in districts remote from Jewish contacts, its communal personnel largely absorbed in the war services, its finances depleted and many of its buildings damaged or destroyed, English Jewry faced a problem of maximal re- organization with minimal resources. Educational, religious, dietary and philanthropic facilities, previously concentrated in London and the larger cities, had now to be extended to outlying areas. Refugees from bombed districts had to be accommodated and tended, and the several mushroom *Orientalist, formerly on the research staff of the American Jewish Com- mittee. REVIEW OF THE YEAR 5702—GREAT BRITAIN 167 "colonies" which had sprung up all over the country had somehow to be welded into a single unified community. Moreover, in addition to these domestic anxieties, the community accepted the responsibility of constant vigilance for the welfare of Jewish refugees from Axis countries, especially for those who, by a whimsy of official logic, had been classified as "friendly" and yet interned. Education A major problem was that of providing religious instruc- tion for the young, most of whom had been dispersed over the "evacuareas." Following the revelation that sixty per cent of the Jewish children in Britain were at present without religious training, the Board of Deputies of British Jews launched an appeal, in October 1941, for a further £50,000 (200,000 dollars) to enable it to develop its network of centers and hostels. The response, however, was disappoint- ing, and at a London conference on December 14 a repre- sentative committee was appointed to explore the possibility of raising the necessary funds by various forms of communal taxation. The feasibility of this proposal, however, remained in doubt, and there were many, like the Chief Rabbi, who regarded a system of voluntary self-assessment as the better method. Meanwhile, other bodies were also active on the educational front, their efforts consisting mainly in the establishment of rural centers. Significant in this respect was the work of the Haboriim movement, the Hechalutz B'Angliah, an organization of young refugees from Europe who are preparing themselves for eventual emigration to Palestine, and the orthodox B'rith Chalutzim Dathiim, which opened a new kibbutz (collective settlement) at Bromsgrove, Worcestershire. The great Jewish schools 'of the metropolis continued their activities in the country. The Jews' Free School — believed to be the largest day-school in Britain — removed to Isleham and Soham, in Cambridgeshire, the pupils aiding the war effort by sugar beet singling and poultry farming. Similarly, the Jewish Secondary School continued at Shefford, Bedford- shire. Nor was higher education neglected. Early in July 1941, 168 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK courses for the training of qualified Hebrew teachers were established at Leeds University through the efforts of the local lodge of the B'nai B'rith, while a little later a lecture- ship in Modern Hebrew Language and Literature was founded, under Jewish sponsorship, at the same seat of learning, the position being occupied by Dr. Simon Rawi- dowicz, former president of the British Tarbuth Association. In November, following the death of Nathan Laski, doyen of Manchester Jewry, memorial bursaries for local Jewish students were established at the university of that city, while in London an Institute for Jewish Learning, modeled on the Jewish People's Colleges of Europe, was created under influential patronage. An Institute of Higher Educa- tion was also founded, in November, at Manchester. The educational efforts of the community were, however, not unattended by internal disputes. The chief cause of friction was a jurisdictional conflict between the Chief Rabbi and the Board of Deputies, as to the supervision and control of Jewish Education. The former, insisting that religious education fell properly under his own spiritual jurisdiction, had set up his own committee, the Religious Emergency Council, shortly after the outbreak of the war, and had persisted in following an independent program and policy. The Board, on the other hand, maintained that Jewish education was part of a larger communal reconstruction for which it was the appropriate agency. Eventually, however, a compromise was reached, and the Chief Rabbi agreed to cooperate with the Board upon certain conditions, one of which was that only those bodies whose teaching was Ortho- dox should have the right to appoint delegates. This stipu- lation, which must sound strange to American ears, must be viewed in the light of the fact that Reform and Liberal congregations in England are exceedingly few in number, representing no such proportion of the community as in this country. Nevertheless, it occasioned some degree of oppo- sition on the part of those who felt that the reconstruction of the total Jewish community should not be tied to the religious views of one section, and on May 12, 1942 the Chief Rabbi reported to the first annual meeting of his own body (which remained in existence) that he was facing constant obstruction, inspired largely by Liberal and Reform elements. REVIEW OF THE YEAR 5702—GREAT BRITAIN 169 Religious Coordination No less urgent than the problem of education was that of coordinating the several mushroom communities which had been springing up in the evacuation areas. Awareness of this need led to the convening of a conference at Manchester, in October 1941, to discuss proposals for a united synagogal organization for the whole of the country. The conference, attended by delegates from London, Leeds, Manchester, Glasgow and Liverpool (in which cities live 81% of English Jews) appointed a committee to report at a subsequent convention. To the same end, the various congregations of Glasgow (15,000 Jews) agreed, in May 1942, to encourage the formation of a local United Synagogue. At the same time, provincial congregations began to turn more and more to the United Synagogue. Some of these were situated in the bombed areas, and therefore suffered from depletion of active members. Others, on the contrary, were in safety zones, but were therefore faced with the necessity of providing increased services beyond their limited resources. A nucleus was thus formed for the eventual extension of the United Synagogue, hitherto a London institution, to the provinces. Another important step towards the development of religious life in the evacuation areas was indicated in the report, on December 23, that the government had approved a plan submitted by the National Council for Jewish Relig- ious Education for the construction of portable synagogues to be used in rural districts. Significant also were the more modest efforts of provincial Jewish communities, such as Northampton, Glasgow, Bedford, Cardiff and South Wales, all of which increased their religious facilities in order to care for the growing number of evacuees. Reconstruction and Relief The task of coordinating the new centers did not entail a neglect of the old. In London, the Bernhard Baron Settle- ment, leading institution of its kind, offered the use of its under-ground shelter to Jews and non-Jews alike. Similar non-sectarian hospitality was extended also by the authorities of Harold House in Liverpool. Additional assistance was 170 AMERICAN JEWISH YEAR BOOK also provided in the form of new homes at Brasted, Kent and Highbury, London, under the auspices of a special Jewish committee for the relief of aged and infirm coreligionists rendered homeless by the raids on the capital. Several London institutions, the bombing of which was reported last year, resumed activities in new premises, though usually refusing to move out of the neigborhoods which they had formerly served. Among these were the Jewish Free Reading Room, which re-opened in the heart of London's East End, the West Central Jewish Club and the West Central Jewish Lads' Club. The last-named un- dauntedly selected premises immediately next door to its old shattered home! Similarly, synagogues, both in London and the provinces, re-opened in a surprisingly short space of time. Such welcome developments, however, could scarcely outbalance the major disaster which English Jewry has suffered in the destruction of its principal edifices. Eloquent of this loss were the figures released by the United Synagogue on

Load more