Stefan Zweig, the noted German-Jewish novelist, believes the Jews of today must not seek to flee from their fate but should look it straight in the face and accept it. Dr. Zweig made this conviction known in a written contribution to a symposium held here on the subect "Whither Jewry." The symposium was arranged by the Friends of Das Freie Wort, a Yiddish periodical which has been appearing here for more than a year under the editorship of Dr. I. N. Steinberg, former Russian Minister of Justice.
The novelist wrote that the question "Whither Jewry" was difficult to answer, because Jewry at the present time lacks the social, religious and national unity it once possessed. It was hard, he said, to ###d a single formula for a people ###come multifarious and, to a large extent, strange to itself in language and mode of life.
"A powerful wave of hatred," Zweig continued, "has seized hold ###us and shaken us to our depths," ###d, while perhaps this manifesta###on is not the worst of its kind ###at Jews have had to endure, the ###esent situation is unusually dangerous largely as a result of a diminution in the importance to Jews of their religion, which gave Jews of former days "something for which they were prepared to live and die."
"We must find a new faith, so that we shall have new strength," concluded the writer. "Crisis will ##ver be overcome by outward measures, but only and always ###
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
