Foreign Language Press Service

[A Standard Type of Hebrew School] by Dr. S. M. Melamed

Daily Jewish Courier, Jan. 14, 1924

Chicago must have a standard type of Hebrew school. This school must be recognized as the standard of a Jewish school in Chicago by all classes of Jews--Orthodox, Reform, radical, indifferent. The problem of Jewish education will never be solved as long as Chicago does not have a standard type of Hebrew school. The leaders of the Chicago Jewish Charities make a serious mistake when they think that Jewish schools are needed only by Orthodox Jews. The problem of Jewish education is to them synonymous with the problem of the Talmud Torahs, and Talmud Torahs mean to them the Orthodox Jews. The leaders of the Charities must understand, once and for all, that Jewish education means general Jewish education; it does not concern only the Orthodox Jews. The problem must be solved from a broad, community point of view, if it is to be solved at all. The Orthodox Jews have a much broader conception of the problem of Jewish 2education than the Reform Jews, and they, therefore, demand a solution of the educational problem not from an Orthodox point of view, but from a general Jewish point of view. They do not want the Charities to do the Orthodoxy any favors; they want it to fulfill its duty to the community. If I were the official spokesman of the Chicago Orthodoxy at the Chicago Jewish Charities, I would discuss the problem of education from a purely community point of view. If the Charities want to do the Orthodoxy any favors, let it not even attempt to solve the problem of education.

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