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nation, but its content varies for each social class. The ruling classes impose their educational ideals on the other classes by talking about national education, but ‘when Minister Schwartz, the German Crown Prince, Herr Sliozberg and Hillel Zeitlin all talk about “national education”, it is easy to see whose interests each one of them is

defending’.469 _{By contrast, the proletariat wants to prepare children for their ‘life}

struggle’ and imbue them with the proletarian worldview, through the family. The initial article was about ‘devising a complete education of a specifically proletarian sort’. That B. B-ski describes as “a few principles” the examples in that article, and more detailed examples could not be provided ‘for understandable reasons’, shows his ignorance of the ‘simple alefbeys’ that the proletariat does not accept the type of education prescribed by the bourgeoisie.470

He even claims that only the German comrades should teach children proletarian social sentiments. He does not know how Jewish festivals could be filled with proletarian content since, for example, there are no proletarians in the Khanike story.471

In fact, the modern-day situation has close relevance to this story, as the proletariat is the only living example of a freedom

movement, the sole heir to the great biblical tradition of heroism and self-sacrifice, and the ‘living representative of the entire eternal striving of humanity for freedom and

466 _{Gelbard 68.}

467 _{Sambatyon – river discussed in rabbinic literature, said to stop flowing every Sabbath.}

468 _{B. B-ski’s article in Di naye tsayt may be the one referenced by Elias Schulman (5n18), ‘Di yidishe folks-shul,’ Di}

naye tsayt [Vilna], 1, 1908.

469 _{Genrikh Sliozberg, liberal lawyer, Attainer, model of nationalism and klal yisroel policy in Esther’s later articles}

(1863-1937). German Crown Prince Wilhelm (1882-1951). Hillel Zeitlin, mystical and journalistic writer in Warsaw (1871-1942).

light, of all historical struggles for freedom’. For religious families, the focus of Khanike, ‘perhaps the most beautiful national festival’, was the miracle; nationalist families now see in it a Zionist theme; but proletarian families endow it with the ‘most beautiful and noblest’ significance, about a determined struggle against national oppression, the only view void of hypocrisy and falsehood. Section III (87-89)

continues on the topic of replacing the content of traditional festivals. B. B-ski believes that removing the religious content from a child’s life leaves a void which will cause his yidishkayt to disappear completely.472

He ignores the fact that the old must pass on so that the new can be born. If assimilation is truly “lying in wait on all sides” as B. B-ski claims, nothing can be done about this, but a new yidishkayt will emerge, one that is mercifully free of ‘meshiekh, of Yonkiper, of tashlekh, of kapoyres’.473

B. B-ski’s words uphold the antiquated and show his ignorance of the fact that calling antireligiosity a “national danger” threatens the nation. In fact, ‘the future belongs to antireligiosity, to enlightened human thought that brings heaven down to the earth and makes people equal to gods’. Some of B. B-ski’s earlier comments about nationalists, the Jewish primary school and religiosity are discussed, and Esther wishes he would do as he accused her of doing and take a step backwards to the views expressed in his earlier comments, as this would in fact be a step forwards. Section IV (89-91) considers B. B-

ski’s ideas about the mystical and the fantastic in relation to general education,

including the question of whether to introduce mysticism into education. Mysticism has been used by the ruling classes as a tool to mask their interests. Introducing it into education would only increase this exploitation. About the fantastic, wonder tales can be very enjoyable and educational even for children who know that the stories are fiction.474

Words of Sholem Asch show that no tale is as wonderful as nature, and natural wonders (buds forming on a bare branch, etc) will delight children and reveal fantasy at work, as will creative activities. Therefore, proletarian families must demand free kindergartens. Their demand for a shorter work-day will enable parents themselves to obtain education, which will encourage them to struggle for national education and for a new order where education is not linked with class. B. B-ski seems to pine for a ‘golden age’ when the Sabbath was holy and, for children, “the other six days of the

471 _{Khanike – midwinter festival of light celebrating both a miracle that occurred in the Temple during the period of}

the Maccabean Revolt and the revolt itself. David E. Fishman links Esther’s concept of a transformed Khanike to actual proletarian Khanike celebrations in the inter-war Polish Yiddish school system (Rise, 108).

472 _{Yidishkayt – Jewish identity and culture.}

473 _{Meshiekh – the Messiah. Yonkiper [Heb. Yom Kippur] – the Day of Atonement. Tashlekh – repentance ritual of}

casting off sins into running water. Kapoyres – repentance ritual of transferring sins to an item which is then donated. David E. Fishman quotes from this passage (Rise, 103).

week were only a sad, long tail to the short Shabes”. In fact, it would be a crime for even one day to be sad and long for a small child. Good kindergartens using the children’s mother tongue can make every day joyful without the need for Shabes and yontoyvim. The answer to the question of national education parallels that for

proletarian education and does not lie in extinct traditions but in building new, vibrant ones. An additional error by B. B-ski concerns Esther’s argument that a mother can tell her children about “golden apples in the emperor’s garden” but not about the

Sambatyon. Esther calls this a “vulgar falsehood”, as is the activity of parents who ‘although non-believers, perform religious traditions and tell their children about hell and the bad people who burn there’, whereas stories about the Sambatyon are perfectly acceptable. !

‘He completely ignores those simple facts. He does not consider that the proletariat must fill the national form of education with its own content. He goes so far as to find it possible to say that the task of teaching young people proletarian and social sentiments is one for the German comrades but not for us. The Jewish workforce, it appears, suffers from an overabundance of proletarian and social sentiments; the Jewish worker family, it appears, is free of petit-bourgeois influences and experiences; the whole trouble with the Jewish labour movement is that Jewish children become familiar with socialism too early. And B. B-ski concludes the entire, remarkable (to put it kindly) sequence of ideas with the following severe judgement: “We can see that blindly copying (blind, of course, to the fact that such an activity does not exist on the Jewish street – Alef-R) the comrades outside Russia can be dangerous at times.”’ (87; par. 2)