Dr. Isaac Rivkind recently wrote:
“I am writing this with deep grief and with the feeling that if ‘I will not tell, I will have to bear my sin,’ I cannot remain silent anymore. I cannot bury my feelings in my heart….
“An Israeli boat, bearing the name ‘Shalom’ which is one of the names of the G-d of Israel, flying the blue-white flag, whose colors symbolize the Tallith – is ready to cater Hazir to accommodate a trefah kitchen. What shame and degradation! Doesn’t this mean that the Hazir has struck its claws into the very foundation of our state. It happened once before two thousand years ago, and then the land of Israel shook all over.
“Don’t the leaders of ZIM understand this? Let it be said openly and clearly: If the leaders of ZIM have no feeling and understanding for this, then they are not worthy to head the company. If they are but petty sea merchants ready to bargain away the legacy and traditions of our people for the doubtful prospect of gentile customers, then they have no moral right to direct Israel’s national shipping line…
“If the state of Israel is oversensitive to ‘what the gentiles might say,’ then it is not a sovereign state, but a continuation of the Golus, of it servility and cowardice…
“… missionaries are criminals. They engage in religious coercion and soul snatching. Whoever protects their acitivities in the name of freedom of religion, makes a mockery of both freedom and religion.”
These are a but a few paragraphs from an article by Isaac Rifkind which appeared recently in the Hebrew weekly “Hadoar.” It attacked vehemently the Israel government’s lenient attitude towards the missionary activities and the proposed installment of a Trefah kitchen on the S.S. Shalom.
Some of the readers were surprised. They knew Rivkind as a secluded scholar. They read in “Hadoar” and other publications his studies and articles on Jewish bibliography, lore and culture. They never knew that he was also a passionate publicist, speaking up in the defense of Jewish values and traditions.
To others the article did not come as a surprise. They had known Rivkind long before he became completely absorbed in his studies. Forty-five years ago he was one of the great protagonists of the Mizrachi. He traveled all over Poland and with firey speeches spread the ideas of religious Zionism. Even later, after he had withdrawn behind his books. Rivkind was to frequently leave his study to take an active part in Jewish public affairs.
When we visited Rivkind last week in his apartment on Riverside Drive, the bibliographer and his wife Yehudit were reluctant to speak about his life. Rivkind pointed to his books and numerous publications: “My writings are my biography,” he said.
He is the scion of a famous Polish Jewish family. His grandfather Abraham Ber was Rosh Yeshiva in Grodno. His maternal grandfather Sender Diskin was one of the rich Jewish merchants of Tsarist Russia. A great philanthropist and Hovev Torah, he established in his home town Lodz the Yeshiva Torat Hessed, the first Yeshiva in Poland to introduce the Lithuanian method of Talmud Study.
Isaac spent his youth in Lodz and Warsaw. After his Bar Mitzvah his parents, Baruch Daniel and Gitel, sent him to the famous Yeshiva of Volozhin. He remained there for three and a half years and then continued his studies in the Yeshiva of Ponovez.
It was while he was a Yeshiva students that Rivkind made his debut as a writer and “asken.” In Volozhin he began to be active on behalf of the Hoveve Zion movement. At the age of eighteen he sent his first articles to the Hebrew press.
After leaving Yeshiva, Rivkind threw himself whole heartedly into Zionist work. In 1917 he founded in Lodz the “Zeire Mizrachi” which later became “Hapoel Mizrachi”! In subsequent years he was instrumental in the establishment of Zionist groups in many towns in Poland.
In 1920 Rivkind arrived in the U.S. For some time he was active in the Mizrachi, but then dedicated himself completely to scholarly research.
Important volumes such as “Bar Mitzvah, a Study in Jewish Culture History,” “The Fight Against Gambling among Jews,” the monumental “Jewish Money in Folkways, Cultural History and Folklore”, and numerous weighty studies have been the fruits of his intensive research during forty years. These publications have established Rivkind as one of the ranking Jewish bibliographers and writers on the history of Jewish culture of our time.
While he has been engaged in his own studies, Rivkind has also encouraged and helped with his knowledge other scholars in their work. Numerous authors have publicly acknowledged the great help they derived from Rivkind.
Many a time, Rivkind left his study to participate in charitable endeavors and to take an active part in communal affairs.
“The Tachlis of man is not the pursuance of the particular profession his is engaged in – but to render aid to his fellow man, to help his people. For this reason we must be ready to interrupt our work in order to rush to the aid of a man who is in need. We must be ready to sacrifice our time and our own work for the good of our people,” Rivkind says.
He has done so. In his own way, he has helped many who have turned to him for assistance. He has offered his services to his people. From the beginning of World War II until the establishment of the State of Israel, Rivkind served as president of the “League for Religious Labor in Eretz Israel.” He sacrificed his time ad energy and directed in a voluntary capacity the activities of this body. “It was a time when the help of every Jew was needed,” Rivkind remarked.
With the establishment of Israel, Rifkind again withdrew completely to his studies.But from time to time, in between his scholarly publications, he speaks up on problems which agitate the Jewish world. He speakes with conviction and passion. His recent article in “Hadoar” was a case in point.
The Jewish Press, Friday, January 3, 1964