Daily Digest of Public Opinion on Jewish Matters

[The purpose of the Digest is informative: Preference is given to papers not generally accessible to our readers, Quotation does not indicate approval – Editor.]

The American Jews are not “tired of giving” declares the Kansas City “Jewish Chronicle,” pointing to the recent successful drives in New York, Chicago and Philadelphia.

“In Philadelphia,” the paper writes, “they opened a campaign for $3,500,000 for their Federated Jewish Charities and at the opening meeting they literally fell all over themselves in their eagerness to announce their contributions. When the meeting ended they had announced pledges totaling over $2,800.000 ! Two million, eight hundred thousand dollars! What an outstanding accomplishment…. The Jews of New York have just completed a splendid drive for their Federated Charities, in which they went after only $4,000,000 and went over the top with $500,000 to spare.

“Let us not overlook Chicago. Our western metropolis has given its rival in the east a great mark to shoot at. With approximately one-eighth the Jewish population as New York, Chicago has just completed its drive for $4,000,000, J.D.C. campaign. This was accomplished also by the development of a high standard of giving.

“The American Jews are not tired of giving.” The more they have given the more they will give. The more anybody gives to a good cause, the happier they are. It is very hard to contemplate giving away hard-earned or easily-earned dollars for any cause, but we respond to our duty when it is put up to us squarely. The old standards of giving are gone with the old-style charity dole. We have reached the six figure stage of individual giving.”

TRACES THEORY OF INDIANS’ DESCENT FROM LOST TRIBES OF ISRAEL

The belief which some have held that the American Indians are descendents of the lost ten tribes of Israel has been traced back as far as the seventeenth century by Milton Waldman in his “Americana, the Literature of American History,” which has just been published. Mr. Waldman writes on this subject as follows:

“It was characteristic of the Puritans that they concerned themselves profoundly with a question which troubled their contemporaries of the South but little — the origin of the red man on this continent. The most arresting thesis is also characteristic – that the red men were the lost ten tribes of Israel. This debate continued during most of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries: its two best known briefs in English are Thomas Thorow good’s ‘Jews in America, or Probabilities that the Americans are of that Race’ (London. 1650) to which Sir Hamor L’Estrange replied two years later with ‘Americans No Jews or Improbabilities that,’ etc. Thorowgood continued the argument in 1660. in another work with the same title as the first. appending an essay by John Eliot. who tirnuly maintained the lost tribe theory. The debate then languished for a long time. until 1773, when Cotton’s (Cotron Mather) son Samuel published ‘An Attempt to Shew That America Must be Known to the Ancients. An answer came promptly from New York in the form of Diana’s Shrines Turned Into Ready Money’ by Timothy Prout, which as far as I know ended the matter for good.”