Orthodox Jews Convene

A torch from Cleveland blazed at the national convention of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America in Manhattan last week. The rabbis there encouraged the flame with the breath of their warm agreement. No torch of Orthodox Judaism ought ever to go out.

The Cleveland torch was Abraham A. Katz, scholar. No rabbi, he knows the windings of Talmudic law expertly. No philologist, he knows the Semitic dialects. Once he decided to memorize every word and its definition in Webster's 2,373-page Dictionary. He succeeded through several letters, until necessity forced him to earn a living. He became an expert accountant, then auditor. He saved money and invested it. Soon he had his competence. He could return to his books.

Three years ago he belonged to the Anshe Emeth Congregation (Jewish Centre) in Cleveland. Its original members had immigrated in the 1880's from P'selvah, Polish village near Vilna. There most of them had been Yeshivah Buchers (religious students). They and most of their descendants in Cleveland are vigorously Orthodox.

To the spiritual leadership of that congregation three years ago went Rabbi Solomon Goldman, more learned in Talmud than even Mr. Katz, but slightly, very slightly less Orthodox. He suggested and, through synagog politics, persuaded the men & women to sit together during his services. That innovation was terrible to righteous minds. It violated ancient Jewish, Semitic, Oriental traditions. Women should hide themselves in the House of God.* Mr. Katz was vexed. Many of the congregation left. In Cleveland where the P'selvah Katz clan numbers almost a thousand, there is a saying: "to fight like a Katz." Abraham A. Katz remained with Anshe Emeth Congregation to fight Rabbi Goldman. He has not yet conquered.

Last week Mr. Katz was in Manhattan for the Orthodox Congregations convention. There he heard the convention asked to approve men & women sitting together in synagogs, and he blazed. "Jewish law is clear on the subject. We need no argument on that here. Five hundred years from now the Orthodox synagog will find the women and the men still seated separately, and we do not want to depart from the law today!" The rabbis agreed with him. They decided to establish a national board of Jewish education to train children of the Orthodox in Hebrew knowledge and Jewish religion. Already many U. S. cities have independent, uncorrelated local boards of Jewish education, distinct from temple religious schools.

*Mohammedan women do not kneel with men folk in the pit of the mosque. Even in new Christian churches in China, Japan and elsewhere in Asia, women until recently sat in a special section railed or curtained off for them.