Communism and the Rabbis

This sermon might have been more properly entitled Anti-un-Americanism and the Rabbis, because it's really less about communism and more about the witch hunt perpetrated by Senator Joseph McCarthy and his ilk in the early 1950s. Here, my father expounds on the idea of freedom of the pulpit.

For it is the great tragedy of our nation today that anyone with a liberal thought, anyone who dares to think in an original manner is damned with the label of communist.
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A FEW WEEKS AGO IT WAS REVEALED that testimony before the Velde[1] Committee[2] of the House of Representatives that has been investigating un-Americanism linked the names of two prominent rabbis with communist activity in this country. These men, both now dead and unable to defend themselves personally, are Judah L. Magnes[3] and Stephen Wise[4]. It is not my purpose tonight to offer any defense of these men. The charges, are preposterous. They have, in any case, been challenged and answered by able Jewish spokesmen, among them the president of our own Union of American Hebrew Congregations[5], and fortunately I do not think that any responsible person took them very seriously. I would like, however, to point out briefly the character of these two men and their interests, because I think that this will give us an insight into the significance of these charges and help us understand better why the McCarthy[6]-Velde type of investigating committee is not a defense of but a threat to the American way of life.
 
The name of Judah L. Magnes is possibly not too familiar to most of you in spite of the fact that he was a prominent rabbi. His career, however, was an interesting and a significant one. Magnes was a graduate of the Hebrew Union College in the class of 1900. Following his graduation he studied abroad, was instructor at the Hebrew Union College for a while, held a position in a congregation in Brooklyn, and in 1908 became Rabbi of Temple Emanuel of New York. He did not last long there, because he advocated a more traditional manner of worship than Emanuel was prepared to accept, and he resigned in 1910 and went to another New York congregation.[7] Magnes was active in many cultural movements in the city and help to establish the JDC[8] to bring relief to distressed Jews in Europe following World War I. During that war he was a pacifist, and he maintained his pacifist philosophy up to 1939 when the terrors of Hitlerism led him to change his stand. Magnes was very active in the Zionist movement, and particularly in the early years of his career when such activity was detrimental for a Reform rabbi, and perhaps, this too, hastened his departure from Temple Emanuel. In 1925, when the Hebrew University was founded in Jerusalem, he was made its first Chancellor, and in 1935 assumed the title of its first president. He thus lived out the remainder of his life in Jerusalem. Next to being president of the Hebrew University, Magnes, I believe, will be remembered chiefly for his espousal of a bi-national state in Palestine. In spite of his early Zionist activity, and his belief in the need of a Jewish homeland, he founded the so-called Ichud Party[9] or Unity Party in Palestine, and in the years when the controversy with Britain of how to settle the problem of Palestine was at its height, Magnes advocated that the Jews and Arabs cooperate in the joint management of a bi-national state on equal terms. He had a very meager following in this thought, and was denounced by Jews and Arabs alike. His plan was impossible of achievement, but he was never convinced that it was not in the best interests of both Jews and Arabs. Magnes was an energetic man and a great organizer. He was stubborn and a stickler for principle. He has been called a champion of lost causes, and even from the brief biography I have given, it is apparent why. But he did not hesitate to speak his mind on anything, even though his point of view did not have popular approval. When he passed away he was mourned in the words of The Reconstructionist magazine, as a “soul whose virtues one rarely encounters in our times.” He was hailed as a courageous exemplar of the ethical idealism that is characteristic of the Jewish tradition at its best. He was said to have given not mere lip service to the Jewish ideals, but to have sought to give them concrete embodiment. He was described as one with a passionate devotion to justice, great intellectual integrity, love for humanity, and a prophetic zeal in creating better human relations — as one who was kin to the prophets of Israel and who shared with them an uncompromising attitude toward that which seemed evil and unrighteous.
 
The name of Stephen Wise is more familiar to us. He too was cut in the prophetic pattern, and was a man of great principle. In 1906 before Magnes had come to Emanuel, Stephen Wise had been offered the position. He stipulated, as one of the conditions, that he would have the right to speak freely on any subject, but he was told that the pulpit of Emanuel was subject to the control of its Board of Trustees. He, thereupon, refused the offer of the most important Reform congregation in the country, and founded the Free Synagogue, which was free not in the sense, as many think, that there is no dues, but in the sense that it's rabbi is free to preach as his conscience dictates. Stephen Wise's action at that time had a profound influence upon congregational life, and today the principle of the freedom of the pulpit is fairly well-established in Jewish life. Stephen Wise is remembered as a great Zionist, but he did not confine himself to Jewish affairs alone. His energy was inexhaustible and his activity varied. He was a crusader in many causes, and became involved in many public controversies. He was active in politics, and he helped in the downfall of the corrupt city administration of Mayor Walker.[10] He was devoted to the labor movement, and campaigned for shorter hours for women and against the evils of exploitation in the needle trades. Once when he lashed out against the injustices in the steel industry, many resignations from his congregation followed. He thought then it would be better, perhaps, for the congregation if he resigned, but his board refused to accept his resignation, even though a million dollars were lost to his Temple building fund because of the cancellation of pledges that had been made. This was Stephen Wise, a fearless fighter for what he believed right, a man who minced no words. His philosophy of preaching was that, as a rabbi, he was not supposed to please the congregation but to wake them up.
 
These descriptions of Rabbi Magnes and Rabbi Wise give the clue as to why the investigating committee would be delighted to smear them. For it is the great tragedy of our nation today that anyone with a liberal thought, anyone who dares to think in an original manner is damned with the label of communist.
 
We scoff at the communist world because it is saddled with a party line. We have here, however, an element which by the process of intimidation in our own country is trying to cram a party line down the throats of Americans, a party line which stems from political and economic reaction. McCarthy and Velde are not sincere in their search for un-American influence, nor can they be, because they themselves are un-American. They are taking advantage of the crisis in world affairs, due to communist aggression, to sow the seeds of suspicion in this country against anything that is of a liberal tendency. They foster the creation of anti-communist hysteria in the name of a pseudo-patriotism which ignores the difference that exists between really destructive communism and a healthy progressive liberalism which is the sustaining power of a democracy.
 
Magnes had been a pacifist. Magnes had supported a movement in Palestine for a bi-national state, which it so happens the communists did favor, but not for the same reasons as Magnes who had only the best interests of the Jews at heart, which the communists did not. Wise was a crusading liberal outspoken in the cause of labor, a friend of FDR.[11] Thus these two men made perfect targets for the un-Americanism committee just as some of the leading liberal Christian clergymen have also been under fire. But these men were certainly not communists. Liberal, yes, idealistic, yes, outspoken, yes, but as rabbis who spoke in the name of the prophetic Jewish tradition, they certainly could not be subscribers to the godless philosophy of communism. But anyone who speaks in prophetic terms is suspect to Velde and McCarthy and by smearing the liberal [personalities] they hope to strike fear into all the clergy, and to influence the pulpit to confine itself to the preaching of harmless religious platitudes instead of a challenging social message.
 
It's interesting to note that by the standards of the Velde committee perhaps the entire Central Conference of American Rabbis[12] ought to be judged communistic. Although not all individual rabbis have the talent or the temperament to be so outspoken as Wise, nevertheless, the conference as a whole has passed a number of resolutions and made a number of pronouncements which the un-Americanism committees would surely identify with communism. In recent years the CCAR has called for strengthening of the international authority of the UN. It has condemned all forms of discrimination against minority groups. It has defended the union shop and collective bargaining. It has supported compulsory health insurance. It was against the Mundt-Nixon bill and the McCarran Act. [13]It is for the FEPC[14] and action on civil rights. It is against the Taft-Hartley[15] bill, and has spoken out against the greed which it says the profit system makes inevitable. It has called for specific disarmament plans, a UN police force, and urged the US government to consider every proposal made for peace and good faith. And McCarthyism itself has been condemned.
 
There may be disagreement agreement among us about these issues, but none of these things represent communism. There is no thought to overthrow the government of the United States. There is only a deep prophetic concern for the welfare of our people as a whole, and the welfare of our people cannot be served by the stifling of such free thought even if these ideas should happen to be all wrong. We have come to a point where our people are becoming afraid to think at all or to express themselves at all. It has been pointed out that young people whose refreshing idealism is indispensable are today afraid to think or to join organizations, which later on they fear may cost them their livelihood. We are witnessing an attempt at thoughts control which can be every bit as dangerous as that imposed by Hitlerism. Once we succumb to the McCarthy/Velde philosophy then we too are in the grip of fascism which has sneaked in on us under the guise of anti-communism.
 
If the effort of McCarthy and Velde to intimidate the clergy should succeed, then democracy in America would indeed be at a very low ebb. The CCAR, however, has declared that:

The equation of all criticism and reforms with communism represents a vicious obstacle to all social progress in a democracy. There is reason to suspect that this may have been a conscious device to intimidate the spokesmen of liberal religion, and to discourage their communicants from following them. Because we believe this to represent a very real danger to the freedom of American thought we urgently recommend… that members of this conference refuse to abdicate their prophetic responsibility to expose political, social, and economic corruption wherever they may be found. Especially in such times as these when so many other voices have been silenced, is it incumbent upon us not to be intimidated. We reaffirm the sacred duty of religious leaders and teachers to act as the conscience of society.
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It may well be that in trying to control the pulpit these groups have finally dashed themselves against the stone wall which will destroy them. In spite of seeming indifference to religion in America today, and in spite of the crass materialism of the American way of life, there is a deep regard for the pulpit, and the attack upon the pulpit may cost our so-called un-American committees their public support. This we fervently hope will come to pass.



[1] Harold Himmel Velde (1910 –1985) was an American political figure from Illinois. While United States Congressman for Illinois' 18th congressional district he was chairman of the House Un-American Activities Committee between 1953 and 1955.

[2] The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. It was well known for its role in investigating alleged disloyalty and subversive activities on the part of private citizens, public employees, and those organizations suspected of having ties to the Communist Party. The committee's anti-Communist investigations are often compared with those of Senator Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy, as a U.S. Senator, had no direct involvement with this House committee.

[3] Judah Leon Magnes (1877 –1948) was a prominent Reform rabbi in both the United States and Mandatory Palestine. He is best remembered as a leader in the pacifist movement of the World War I period, his advocacy of a binational Jewish-Arab state in Palestine, and as one of the most widely recognized voices of 20th century American Reform Judaism.

[4] Stephen Samuel Wise (1874 –1949) was an Austro-Hungarian-born American Reform rabbi and Zionist leader. In 1906,  Wise made a major break with the established Reform movement over the "question whether the pulpit shall be free” and in 1907 he established his Free Synagogue, starting the "free Synagogue" movement. In 1914 Wise co-founded the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In 1922 Wise founded the Jewish Institute of Religion, an educational center in New York City to train rabbis in Reform Judaism.

[5] The Union for Reform Judaism (until 2003: Union of American Hebrew Congregations), is the congregational arm of Reform Judaism in North America, founded in 1873 by Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise.

[6] Joseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy (1908 – 1957) was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in which Cold War tensions fueled fears of widespread Communist subversion. He was noted for making claims that there were large numbers of Communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers inside the United States federal government and elsewhere. Ultimately, his tactics and inability to substantiate his claims led him to be censured by the United States Senate.

[7] From 1911–12 Judah L. Magnes was rabbi of the Conservative Congregation B'nai Jeshurun.

[8] American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (JDC)is a welfare organization that offers aid to the many Jewish populations in central and eastern Europe as well as the Middle East through a network of social and community assistance programs. In addition, the JDC contributes millions of dollars in disaster relief and development assistance to non-Jewish communities.

[9] Ihud (Hebrew: איחוד‎, 'Unity') was a small binationalist Zionist political party founded by Judah Leon Magnes, Martin Buber, Ernst Simon and Henrietta Szold in 1942. The party was dedicated to Arab–Jewish reconciliation, and advocated an Arab–Jewish state that would be part of a broader Arab Federation.

[10] James John Walker, often known as Jimmy Walker (1881 – 1946), was Mayor of New York City from 1926 to 1932. A flamboyant politician, he was a liberal Democrat and part of the powerful Tammany Hall machine. During a corruption scandal he was forced to resign.

[11] Franklin Delano Roosevelt (1882 –1945), commonly known as FDR, served as the President of the United States from 1933 to 1945. A Democrat, he won a record four presidential elections, leading the United States during a time of worldwide economic depression and total war.

[12] The Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR), founded in 1889 by Rabbi Isaac Mayer Wise, is the principal organization of Reform rabbis in the United States and Canada. The CCAR is the largest and oldest rabbinical organization in the world.

[13] The Mundt-Nixon bill was a proposed law that would have required all members of the Communist Party of the United States register with the Attorney General. It was passed by the United States House of Representatives, but not the United States Senate. Later, Sen. Pat McCarran then took many of the provisions from the bill and included them in legislation he introduced that became the McCarran Internal Security Act, which passed both houses of Congress in 1950.

[14] Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC) was created in 1941 in the United States to “[ban] discriminatory employment practices by Federal agencies and all unions and companies engaged in war-related work." It also required Federal vocational and training programs to be administered without discrimination. The FEPC was intended to help African Americans and other minorities obtain jobs in the homefront industry during World War II. In practice, especially in its later years, the Committee also tried to open up more skilled jobs in industry to minorities, who had often been restricted to the lowest-level work.

[15] The Taft–Hartley Act, enacted in 1947, is a United States federal law that restricts the activities and power of labor unions. The act, still effective, was called the "slave-labor bill" by labor leaders.