_Before the Menorah Society of New York University, May 12, 1914_
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IT seems to me that it is not only of value to the Jewish students,
but to the whole university, that there should be a body here devoted
to the study of Jewish tradition, Jewish literature and Jewish
history. You are emphasizing something that is of permanent value to
your associates here in the University who are not of the Jewish race
and the Jewish faith. The Christian Church finds in the Jewish
Scriptures some of the finest and most precious of the things it
cherishes from the religious point of view. Our civilization in these
occidental countries is deeply indebted to the history and the
literature of the Jewish race. From time to time that indebtedness
comes to stronger expression, and we may expect that in the future the
sense of that indebtedness of our whole people to that which is the
immediate concern of the Menorah Society will be more keenly felt.
If you go back in the history of this country you will find a time
when our New Englanders were especially indebted to what they as
Christians called the Old Testament. There was a time in Colonial
days when the earlier portions of this literature exercised a mighty
influence over these new commonwealths. As you read the history of New
England you cannot help being profoundly impressed by the influence of
the Hebrew literature upon the life of the seventeenth century. The
names and references to the Jewish people are all interwoven with New
England history. I was thinking of a curious illustration of this fact
only a short time ago. You know the old poem of "Darius Green and His
Flying Machine" that has come into astonishingly new popularity in
modern times. It contains, you will recall, an enumeration of the
brothers of Darius, and four of the five names are taken from Hebrew
history. The appearance of these Jewish names in such large numbers is
coincident with a reappearance of Hebrew spirit in our Colonial times,
all modified of course by Christian tradition, but presenting a most
important and essential ingredient of the time. This apparently
trivial illustration simply shows that which is to be found in our
whole culture. It is profoundly significant in regard to our American
culture.
So it seems to me that the Menorah Society has work of two kinds--to
bring together our Jewish students on a higher plane of sentiment, and
at the same time to put new emphasis, in all parts of the University,
on the invaluable things which the Jewish race has contributed to the
civilization of the world. So I feel that I may look to you of this
organization to bring to New York University a new emphasis upon these
great things which are the common heritage of our scholastic society.
I trust that you will feel that there is a genuine warmth and a
genuine interest in the welcome that I extend to you,--not a welcome
to the University alone, but a welcome to this new service in this
University, in which every movement such as this has work to do for
the good of all.