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From: burton@fortune.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish
Subject: Re: Holocaust - (nf)
Message-ID: <2707@fortune.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 7-Mar-84 15:05:50 EST
Article-I.D.: fortune.2707
Posted: Wed Mar  7 15:05:50 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 8-Mar-84 08:40:39 EST
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Organization: Fortune Systems, Redwood City, CA
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#R:ihuxt:-29800:fortune:39800006:000:1629
fortune!burton    Mar  7 09:36:00 1984


Maybe, just maybe, Hitler and Eichmann intended to war only upon observant
Jews, but I can assure you that the populace in such countries as Poland
missed that subtlety.  They enthusiastically pointed out to Germain authorities
those Jews who might have "passed."  (There were, of course, exceptions, 
includin the woman who gave my mother a place to hide, fixed her up with
identity papers - her own deceased daughter-, and actually taught my mother
enough to be able to pass herself off even in church.)

More generally, I would like to say the issue of revenge on Hitler cannot simply
be discussed according to observance.  There are converted Jews, often as a
result of intermarriage, who are more observant than their Jewish spouses.  
Such converts, however, are not "culturally" Jewish, and commentators are
worrying that this influence could hasten "assimilation".  

Further, it is not possible,  except among the ultra-Orthodox, to define
Jews according to the level of observance. 

Still further, for people like my parents, who did not see G-d intervene in
the Holocaust, there are serious doubts about observance.  *Survival* may not
seem like much to people who are comfortable in the U.S. and whose biggest
exposure to war has been a draft notice (which they somehow avoided).  But,
to people who lost everyone they knew because of starvation, the gas chambers,
random killings by non-Jews, war actions, etc.

  Philip Burton      101 Twin Dolphin Drive
  Fortune Systems    Redwood City, CA  94065	   (415) 595-8444 x 526
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