“The Jewish Tragedy”

The first page of a sermon by Rabbi Herman Abramowitz entitled “The Jewish Tragedy”, delivered on Yom Kippur in 1941.

Transcription:

Today, my friends, seems to be an appropriate occasion to consider our position as Jews in the world. Yom Kippur is the time when all Jews feel a closer bond of kinship to one another, and therefore should be in a better mood to consider their common fate and destiny.

It would be commonplace to declare that as Jews, we face a tragic situation. In our world of today, which is full of tragedy for individuals and whole nations, it was foolhardy to expect that our condition could be any better. In fact, we have already long been warned that bad as general conditions might be, we must always expect ours to be much worse. In the words of the Talmud, no matter whatever calamities befall the world, Israel is always sure to get a double share of them and the truth of this, has only been too amply illustrated by history and experience.

When a depression struck the world, the economic position of the Jew was affected in exactly the same way of that of his neighbour. Then a war broke out, the Jew made the same patriotic sacrifices, and the enemy’s bombs and shrapnel did not discriminate in his favor. But while he thus shared in whatever misfortunes befell his country, he suffered such further misfortunes as his own countrymen heaped upon in addition. For in times of trial and trouble, the unthinking masses must have needs of some scapegoat on whom to blame their troubles and always are there the demagogue to give them the Jew as such a scapegoat. In times of depression, they begrudge and envy the Jew the little he has. In times of…..