New York Jews and the Quest for Community: The Kehillah Experiment, 1908-1922

Description: New York Jews and the Quest for Community: The Kehillah Experiment, 1908-1922 ENGLISH VG CONDITION, SOFTCOVER An examination of Arthur A. Goren's New York Jews and the Quest for Community: The Kehillah Experiment, 1908-1922 (1970), serves as a useful means of bringing together some of the central motifs of the Jewish experience in modern America. The central area of concern in Goren's book is fundamentally related to the ideas and themes in Gartner's Jewish Education in the United States (1969). The attempt by partly or completely secularized Jews to enter into an organized community compact or gemeinde (or "kehillah" in Hebrew) with newly arrived traditional East European Jews, can be viewed as an attempt at communal and cultural synthesis: For (Dr. Judah L.) Magnes and his friends, the Kehillah venture represented a step towards realizing that vision.--So singular an undertaking entailed considerable experimentation: it required synthesizing Old World practices and New World skills. Goren states that the "dual process--the struggle to maintain ethnic integrity and to achieve social accommodation--is the ultimate concern of this book". 22 This process" of "synthesizing" is at the core of the attempt by the Jew to remain loyal to what he perceives to be his traditions and at the same time function normally as part of a broader secular society. Goren's work shows how the vast majority of Jews in the United States were swept away by the main currents in American education: The Jews of "uptown" New York, descendants of earlier migrations from Germany, had adopted a "Protestant-congregational model of communal polity". The "young professionals of the Bureau replaced scriptual authority with Dewey's educational philosophy". The powerful policymakers of the community appointed a director of education who "embraced the tenet of the public school as the sine qua non for a Jewish educational system". The minister of New York's Temple Beth El asserted: "Judaism must drop its orientalism and become truly American in spirit and form. . . . It will not do to offer our prayers in a tongue which only few scholars nowadays understand. We cannot afford any longer to pray for a return to Jerusalem. It is a blasphemy and lie upon the lips of every American Jew." The American Jewish educator, as conceived by some theorists, would be the dominant figure in the community because he was motivated by the ethical and professional standards of "modern educational practice" and be a "scientifically trained professional" and a "devoted democrat". And, that after the Kehillah experiment of 1908-1922 "most Jews remained interested in the minimum of separation from the larger society necessary for maintaining their Jewish identity. They would be content with a more modest vision of community" 23, which are Goren's own concluding sentences in his book. Goren declares that "the Kehillah's most substantial achievement--its educational system--rested upon the attempt to apply modern pedagogical insights to an archaic but hallowed curriculum." Not surprisingly, "the controversy it roused, convulsed the community" The Kehillah's "substantial achievement--its educational system" was riddled with inconsistencies and never received the huge financial backing ,it deserved from its own leaders. A major inconsistency was the dedication of the Bureau of Education, and its Director, to public schooling as a means to "help" Jewish education. Benderly, the Director, did everything in his power to undermine the potency of Jewish education received in the Talmud Torahs and Hedorim. He was basically committed to the secular ideal because his attitudes, approach, methodology and techniques represented the antithesis of traditional Orthodox Jewish education. Not surprisingly, Groren records that: (i) Not a single member of the education committee identified with Orthodoxy was promoted to the inner circle of policy makers. (ii) The yeshivah was anathema in the eyes of the "uptown" wealthy, receiving little support from the "downtown" men of means. (iii) Dushkin suggested that instead of teaching Hebrew or Bible or Prayers or Talmud, the Jewish schools should "teach Jewish children". (iv) Money was withheld from those schools that needed help most, namely the small Talmud Torahs and Hedorim. 25 The so-called "archaic but hallowed curriculum" that Goren refers to, Magnes sought to modify and modernize, and, Benderly, in effect, sought to nullify, was as archaic as the attempts at destroying it. The rise of the Hebrew day schools, the proliferation of European-type yeshivahs, and the growth of vast Hasidic communities, kehillahs in a greater sense, became living and not archaic disproof of all rationalizations for a fallen Judaism. Regrettably, Goren ends on a rather pessimistic note. Nowhere in his book is there any mention of the eventual establishment of a significant number of large kehillahs in New York during the 1940s, 1950s, up to the present. He appears to leave us with the impression that a "kehillah experiment" can never work in modern New York. In reality, the type of "experiment" that he dealt with collapsed, but subsequent "experiments" succeeded in Brooklyn and beyond. Perhaps it could be said that the "kehillah experiment" of 1908-1922 was a "trial run" at cooperation between diversely oriented secular and Orthodox Jews, after which the Orthodox realized that they would have to be more independent. In the light of developments during 1939-1945, and since then, the notion of applying "modern pedagogical techniques to an archaic but hallowed curriculum" becomes ironic. Perhaps the order should have been reversed? It has been the ancient and hallowed curriculum of Jewish Ethical Monotheism that has nurtured and defined humane and disciplined communities serving as an example to all. The policy of the Kehillah's secular backers and directors was misguided for they sought not to encourage Jewish growth but a blending into society at large. They lost a golden opportunity to really further Jewish education on a vast scale. A new pattern, albeit faint, was discernable in the decades preceding the Second World War. The latent traditionalist leanings of the millions of East European immigrants was illustrated by their desire for a kehillah. The fact that they were courted by the "uptown" wealthy was recognition that they were a force to be reckoned with. Even though prior to the Second World War, Manhattan was the hub of Torah and traditional life never seen before on such a scale in America, the break-down in traditional life was even greater. But something different was taking shape, and it was soon to be Brooklyn's turn to prove that traditional Jewish Orthodoxy need not compromise and synthesize in order to survive and flourish. We have over 500,000 books of Jewish interest in Stock, please make sure to check out our Our eBay Store Questions, comments, Requests? WE CAN BE REACHED AT 347ll78G492!!14G6508!14 Our storefront location is at Mizrahi Book Store 3108 Quentin Rd Brooklyn NY 11234 Visitors welcome during business hours COMBINED SHIPPING DISCOUNTS: There is $4 off each additional item paid for and shipped together, which makes the shipping just .99 for almost all additional items. Please note that purchases must be paid for at once, not individually to qualify for the discount. If you plan on adding additional items, please hold off payment until done purchasing. This discount should be deducted automatically, please contact us if for some reason it does not. STORE HOURS: Our storefront is located at 3108 Quentin Rd, Brooklyn, NY, 11234. Visitors are welcome during business hours. Store hours are: Sunday-Thursday 10 am - 6:30 pm and Friday 10 am - 2 pm. We are closed on Saturday and Jewish Holidays. For assistance in processing hours, we can be reached at our listed Mizrahi Bookstore phone number. INTERNATIONAL BUYERS: For most individual books, we ship first class mail via USPS. Price is by weight, and this service is tracked. For multiple purchases, we can combine postage manually and charge at cost. Please reach out to us for a quote if interested in shipping multiple items together internationally. RETURN CUSTOMERS: Return customers get 7% off every order, from the second shipment and on. This is not deducted automatically, please message us for a discount code to be able to apply it to the order. REFUNDS: We offer full refunds within 30 days of purchase. QUESTIONS: We are here for you and usually respond immediately, feel free to contact us with any questions or concerns you may have. 1ST EDITIONS: We try to be precise when marking the edition, but if you are looking for first editions only, please ask us to verify the edition before purchasing, to prevent any misunderstandings. First Edition can have multiple definitions unfortunately and best to clarify in advance. WANT LIST: Looking for something and don't see it? Let us know and we'll look out for you. We have an additional hundreds of thousands of books of Jewish interest in stock, that are not listed online. SELL US YOUR BOOKS: We purchase Jewish books and books of Jewish interest, used, rare and antiquarian books and collections. Languages we specialize in are English, Hebrew, Yiddish, German, Spanish, Ladino, Russian and French. We purchase over 200,000 Jewish books a year and will travel to purchase libraries. Please contact us for details DISCLAIMER: The descriptions we use for our books offered, may come from a variety of sources, such as standard reference books, auction catalogs, the Publishers' descriptions, online resources and customer reviews.... If you feel any specific description violated third part rights, please contact us and we will have it removed immediately. Get images that make Supersized seem small. THE simple solution for eBay sellers.

Price: 3.99 USD

Location: Brooklyn, New York

End Time: 2024-10-15T18:37:02.000Z

Shipping Cost: 4.99 USD