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Classic rabbinic style now highly irrelevant
ARNOID AGES PBtUSB THE NIAGAZINBS
The Sermon is Dead: Hillel Silverman, writing in the Recon-structionist (Feb. 18) argues that the classical rabbinic style of preaching is now highly irrelevant and "a frustrating exercise in futility".
Perhaps,there was a time, in the early days of the American-Jewish community, when English-speaking rabbis had a role in congregational pulpits.
But with a constituency that is
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today highly literate for the most part» there is no place for the rabbi who mouths psychiatry, sociotogy or philosophy. Many of his listeners are more knowledgeable in these areas than he is.
Rabbi Silverman describes a service in his own congregation (Sinai Temple, Los Angeles) where worshipers were invited to dialogue with the rabbi.
"I moderated the discussion," writes Silverman; "The comments, opinions, questions and objections during these heated sessions were stimulating and provocative^ on a high spiritual and intellectual level."
"If nothing else, the dialogue served to eliminate the barrier that divides rabbi-on-the-pulpit from congregant-in-the-pew."
It should be noted that the same issue of theReconstructionistcar-ries widely critical essays on Rabbi Silverman's innovations.
American-Jewish Writing: William Styron, author of the best-selling 'Confessions of Nat Turner', feels that Norman Mailer and other American-Jewish writers represent no more than an interesting regionalism in literature.
"Modern Jewish writing," he says in the Intellectual Digest (March 72) "seems to me to represent a distinct outcropping of cultural regionalisni, phenomenally vital at this. particular moment but no more to be wondered at than its immediate predecessors: the south of Faulkner, Warren and company."
The Attraction of Mysticism: The upsurge of interest in Hassidism and Jewish mysticism in general among American college-age youth is surveyed by Byron L. Sherwin in a recent issue of Congress Bi-Weekly.
He traces the relative unpopularity of mysticism in past years to^ the influence exercised by the! traditions of German-Jewish scholarship, particularly that of Heinrich Graetz.
Another eliement which prompted the minimalization of mysticism in American Jewish life was the extraordinary role of Mordecai^ M. Kaplan "who; has continually challenged the legitimacy of that which is not rationally defensible in Judaism."
Sherwin shows^ howeveff that mysticism is not a legitimate expression of one aspect of Judusm hilt that some of its greatest teachers affirm that it is the essential element in Judaism.
MORDECAI M. KAPLAN. . .challenges mysticism
Israel's Link With Sinai: Mid-, stream (Feb. '72) features apiece by Meron Medzini of the Hebrew university on the role of Sinai in history.
His major concern is the ways in which the great nations of the past from Egypt to Turkey to Britain have utilized th^ Sinai area.. The writer also presents an incisive analysis of Israel's relationship to the arid wastes of Sinai from the time of Moses to the Six-Day-War.
A final section details the concrete ways in which Israel is currently exploiting Sinai's resources : "the movement of tourists at Sharm- el Sheikh and at St. Catherine, oil flowing from Abu Rudeis, fish from the Bardawill Lagoon in the north."
Writes Medzini: "Airfields, roads, hotel and motels have been built in the last four years. The bedouin have become accustomed to Israel's administration. Egypt's leadership realizes that the longer the Israelis stay in Sinai, the more difficult it will be to wrest it from them."
A Rabbi Reminisces: Joachim Prinz describes what it was like to* be a rabbi in Germany during the first days of the Hider regime in a recent issue .of the Jewish Spectator.
As the pressure against Jews mounted, a new sense of identity gripped the community. Synagogues were full. The reading of the Megillah on Purim made sense in a new way.
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The injury or death of a child is a terrible price to pay for believing that you could drink and drive with safety.
You can't.
As soon as you have more alcohol in your bloodstream than your body can use up, it interferes with your ability to think, act, and see properly. Your reactions slow down. You can't stop as quickly or steer your car as efficiently as when you're sober.
You risk the lives of yourself, your family, your friends, and anyone else who is unlucky enough to be along for the ride or travelling on the same roacl.
The next time you stop off at a bar or go to a party:
1, Dm't drink an alcoholic beverage if you intend to drive,
2, If you drink, take a taxi or let a sober driver take the wheel,
3. If you think you can drive as efficiently after drinking as you did before, think again - it just isn't so,
4. If you excuse your behavior by saying, * It can't happen to me, remember that it can happen, and it only has to happen once.
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