18:53:54
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Bidding Information
Lot #
26001
Auction End Date
2/16/2010 11:38:30 AM (mm/dd/yyyy)
Title Information
Title (English)
Changing the Calendar
Title (Hebrew)
consequent dangers and confusions
Author
[Only Ed. - Community] Dr. J H Hertz
City
London
Publisher
Oxford University Press
Publication Date
1931
Collection Information
Independent Item
This listing is an independent item not part of any collection
Description Information
Physical
Description
Only edition. 16 pp. [1] insert, 216:141 mm., light age staining. A very good copy bound in the original wrappers.
Detailed
Description
From the introduction: The following pages are substantially the Statement made by me to the League of Nations Calendar Reform Committee of Enquiry (British) on December 10th, 1930. The proposed change of calendar discussed in this Statement, viz., the introduction of a so-called ‘blank day’, is a serious danger to religious freedom, and would prove a source of confusion to mankind. My primary concern is, of course, its effect upon the religious and economic life of the Jewish people; but the considerations adduced by me bring out, I trust, its evil results to Humanity at large.’ Hertz, who was born in Slovakia, was taken in 1884 to New York. He was the first graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (1894). After acting as rabbi in Syracuse, New York (1894–96), he was appointed rabbi of Johannesburg, South Africa. His outspoken opposition to Boer discrimination against the uitlanders ("aliens") and religious minorities resulted in his deportation (1899–1901) but he returned to office on the conclusion of the Boer War. He went to the U.S. in 1911 as rabbi of the Orthodox congregation Orah Hayyim in New York and in 1913 was elected chief rabbi of England. Here, he threw himself into the duties of his office with courage and energy, showing his profound sympathies with the recently arrived foreign elements. He publicly criticized Russian anti-Jewish policy, fought against Liberal Judaism, and his powerful advocacy of Zionism in the name of religious Jewry was partly responsible for the successful outcome of the negotiations which led to the Balfour Declaration in 1917. Later, he fought courageously against Nazism and its echoes in England and strongly criticized the policies adopted by the Mandatory government in Palestine, which he visited frequently. In 1925 he attended the opening of the Hebrew University and later was a member of its board of governors. His works (apart from his doctoral thesis on the philosophy of Martineau) were principally of a popularizing nature, but filled a greatly felt gap: e.g., his Book of Jewish Thoughts (1917), of which hundreds of thousands of copies were printed, and his commentaries on the Pentateuch (1929–36) and on the prayer book (1942–45). A three-volume collection of his minor writings was issued under the title Sermons, Addresses and Studies (1938).His appearances on the public platform were usually exceptionally impressive. He showed courage, and his brief occasional letters to the London Times, at times of emergency, the product sometimes of days of hard work, could influence public opinion. Characteristic was his letter published on May 28, 1917, in which he effectively and indignantly denied that the attack on Zionism by the two "official" leaders of the Anglo-Jewish community, C. G. Montefiore and D. L. Alexander, represented "the views held by Anglo-Jewry as a whole or by the Jewries of the overseas dominions." He was no respecter of persons. The authoritative article in the Dictionary of National Biography quotes what was said of him: that he never despaired of finding a peaceful solution to any problem when all other possibilities had failed.
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Listing Classification
Period
20th Century:
Checked
Location
England:
Checked
Subject
Halacha:
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Homiletics:
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Other:
Calendar
Characteristic
First Editions:
Checked
Language:
English
Manuscript Type
Kind of Judaica
