The Maccabaean

filled the function of a religious center, in so far as they preserved the continuity of tradition; but since they were scattered over the face of the globe and were not organized, they could not serve as adjusters of old teachings to new needs without at the same time differentiating Judaism in one land from Judaism in another; to keep it uniform they kept it changeless. The bones and arteries of Judaism hardened.

ee IEEE EOI EE NE NEE NOS What is it that will make a wretched man revive if he is sick of life and weary unto death? What will make him arise and gird his loins and work? Only the re- kindling of hope will do that. And the hope of Israel has been rekindled. Our past has been revived and our present energized by the hope of a great national future. In the rejuvenation of a people, as in its first youth, the economic, political, educational needs receive attention before the spiritual. Everywhere to-day Jewish society ie heine oreanized into local state. federal. nan-Tewish

bodies. These attempts are the inevitable forerunners of the reorganization of our religious life which will take place after our return to Palestine, how soon or late thereafter no one can foretell.

In coming to these conclusions I have moved far from the teachings of the Society for Ethical Culture to which bonds of affection still bind me, and to whose merits I hope I am just. If I let my mind range across the panorama of life and try to chart it geographically, I see the continents, the islands, the shallows, the streams of thought, settling into place within their bounds. It is as an island detached from its mainland that I then see the Society for Ethical Culture; and the questions which come to me, and to which I think I know the answer, are: “From which one, continent or isle, will the water of time wash the sands upon the shore of the other? Of which one will the sands lose consistency, and be carried intn ctrance and dictant zanec ?”?

THE Jewish woman has always had a lofty position in the history of her people and of the world as well. In ancient or modern Jewry the woman was considered neither the slave of man nor was she confined in a harem.

Jewish history and Jewish literature show that the position accorded to woman was lofty and dignified. In spite of the fact that the ancient Jews saw the woman of the Orient placed in an inferior position, although the social conditions were not in any respect as they are to-day, the woman was considered the equal of man.

In the first two chapters of Genesis there are two records as to woman’s origin that describe her as no. less endowed than man,

The following story from the rabbis is illustrative of their regard of woman's creation: A heathen once said to a rabbi, "Your God is a thief. He came to Adam while he was asleep and took one of his ribs."

The rabbi said, "Permit me to tell you a little occurrence. A few nights ago a robber entered my house and stole a silver goblet, but he left a gold one in its place."

“What a generous thief!” exclaimed the heathen. “Even such a thief is our God,” rejoined the rabbi, “He took away Adam’s rib but left Eve instead.”

When a particularly tender relation is pictured by the prophets, a mother's love is often employed to symbolize the thought. The Book of Proverbs is full of expressions of reverence for the mother, who is the teacher of all virtues.

A curse is foretold for the man who forgets to reverence his mother. The exalted position given woman in Jewish teaching is a remarkable contrast with her inferior position in the Orient throughout antiquity.

Jewish family life is noble and holy; in the home the wife's rule is paramount; in domestic affairs the wife's rule is supreme. "I never call my wife, wife," said Rabbi Jose, "I call her home, for it is the wife who makes the home."

Another rabbi wrote: He who sees his wife die before him has, as it were, béen present at the destruction of the sanctuary itself: around him the world grows dark.

The women of Israel endured the bitterest persecutions and tortures during the dark middle ages, but always remained firm in their faith. Thousands of them were tortured in the dungeons of the Holy Inquisition, some were pitched from towers, others were burned alive. In Spain the king himself lit the fagots that consumed a company of Jews and Jewesses. Their constancy was so marked that they were believed to be sustained by the devil.

The love of the Jewish woman for her holy faith and her people burned with as strong a light in her breast as in the breast of her brother or husband. She often chose death for herself and a trial far more awful for her children rather than to submit to forceful baptism. No people can show a longer or more noble list of willing female martyrs.

Is it any wonder then that to-day when the Jews' noblest aim is to establish a home for our people who have suffered and bled and wandered homeless for so many centuries, we should find woman in the foremost ranks of our movement?

The Jewish woman with her great love for home, with the full realization of the blessings of home, feels very keenly what a home for her nation would mean, and is therefore working side by side with her brother in this great cause.