From Norman Bentwich
Professor of International Law, School of Law, Cairo, Egypt
YOU are indeed happy in the moment of your appearance. I am not of those who regard this world war as a terrible catastrophe. I can see in it with God's grace the preparation of a great uplift of humanity and especially the coming of redemption for Israel. But the more glorious the vision of the future the greater the need of light, and more light, to illuminate the present and to enable the young generation to advance steadily towards the vision and make it reality. That is what I believe the function of the Menorah Journal to be, and your first number is an earnest of the sincerity of your aim and the goodness of your means.
The Jewish people stand on the brink of a new era in which they are to resume their true function of the spiritual teacher of mankind. And American Jewry, it is a truism to say, has a vital and a leading part to play in moulding the destiny of the Jewish people. So we may adapt the old Rabbinic saying: "He who saves the soul of a single Jewish student is as though he saved the world." The Menorah Journal in holding up the light of the Jewish spirit to the young men and women of America is doing the work of humanity.
May I express the hope that the Menorah Societies will direct the gaze of their members to the land of promise and the land of the prophets, where the inspiration of Judaism has always come and whither the hopes of Jewry have always turned. Living as I do, in the reflection of Palestine as well as in the shadow of the Pyramids, I am very conscious of the need for a continued Passover from the ideas of the various Egypts that beset the Jewish people to the message that calls us, in spirit if not in body, to the land of our fathers. To-day in Palestine the light has begun to shine brightly again. Judaism has relit there its prophetic lamp, which in centuries of stress and darkness has never been permitted to fade away altogether. In our own time the Menorah has been re-established in the Temple of the land by a new band of Maccabees. But a single branch, so to say, of the seven branches as yet shows its clear light. But if the Jewish youth wills it, the whole Menorah may be lighted and shine full and clear to the world with fresh lustre. In our day there may be a new Hanukka, a rededication of the Hebraic light—if only we will it.
