San Antonio Daily Light

"A JEWISH MAYOR."
Lecture Delivered By Rabbi Elkin At The Temple Friday Night.

Rabbi Elkin, before his Temple Beth El congregation last Friday evening delivered the following forceful lecture on the burning question of the hour:

We want our lady friends to decide as to the truth of the following joke which appeared a short time ago in one of our papers. It read that if a lover calls his beloved a "cat" she will feel complimented and the lover will feel for many an hour the ecstasy of a loving glance bestowed on him. But hell itself has furies not to be compared to those of the elderly woman called by that name which to the young maiden has brought a rush of happiness. Therefore it all depends whom you call "cat."

The same uncertainty and ubiquity inheres to that word "Jew." Suppose the word was used in conversation with a rich and prosperous Jew. The latter would flatter himself that the word was being used with that same meaning with which one would pronounce the name of the most prominent figure and character of the new Testament, not to say anything of the characters of the Old Testament. But suppose the word is used in conversation with a poor Jew. The latter would naturally call up the meaning of that word as he knows it from the persecutions which have driven him to seek a refuge in this land of the free and the home of the brave. Or if acquainted enough with the refinements of our modern civilization, he might conjure up in his mind that meaning of the word "Jew" which our latest dictionaries give to the verb, namely, "to overreach, to cheat, as in the sentence to jew one out of a dollar."

In a pitiable condition. Take for instance, myself. Now I am not rich, neither am I exactly poor. When the word "Jew" is used in my presence, it is necessary for me to know the person before I can get at the meaning of the word. The speaker may be sarcastic and I may be thick-skinned enough to suppose he is employing the word in an intelligent way. In such a conversation I call up to mind the names of the men who have made religion for the world. Who will blame me if the names come up which are spoken with reverence from the pulpit of the Jewish, Christian and Mohammedan churches? What would the churches of the world do without the psalms of David and is not the wisdom of Solomon current among the proverbs of all nations? Has not Renan told us that the prophets of Israel are the "soul-life" for all ages? And did not a preacher of this city take a text from the Jewish prophet, Habakkuk, to call attention to the thought that a city falls through unrighteousness? Truly, wonderful is the "Jews'" book when preachers of modern times call attention to the corruptions of the ballot box and the consequences thereof by reference to the destruction of Jerusalem by the potentate of all Asia, Nebuchadnezzar, whose ambition it was to make his name a terror to the inhabitants of the Nile!

Remembering then what some Jews have done for the whole world, we do not consider ourselves selfish when we hold out the proposition that the world can very well pass by the other meanings attached to the word, and this very justly! Remember that some of our faults are not altogether of our own making. You say to me, your "Cross the creek" Jew has peculiar ways and manners. True! But his peculiarities should be reminders to you of those refinements which the "most Christian king" of Russia practices toward his Jewish subjects. But more than likely this very Jew, whose vote is supposed to be corralled because a Jew happens to run for mayor, will some day be owning his own business and then he will have the right to think of his name in terms which history has placed side by side with a Moses and an Isaiah!

Now we hold that in consideration of the services rendered by Judaism and further because some of our faults are not due to our own making, the name is worthy of use far different than that which is given to it when a Jew happens to run for mayor in a city, not ten thousand miles away from us. We will not specify nor is there any need. We will say that there is little delicacy, not to use any harsher word, shown in that stroke of genius which runs that a certain candidate considers himself the Moses appointed to lead this city out of the slough into which it is, correctly or incorrectly, supposed to have fallen. Again there is not much gray matter of the brain used up in the thought that the "cross the creek" Jewish vote is corralled and safe for a certain candidate.

Do my fellow citizens of San Antonio know that the Jewish vote of San Antonio is a myth born in the minds of envy and jealousy? Has not the call for another candidate, non-Jew, been signed by some Jewish names? And I think this is eminently correct. We do not vote as Jews but as Americans. But because we are Jews and worship the God who made the heavens and the earth, therefore do we the more believe in the liberty and freedom of our American citizenship. The Ten Commandments written above this and the constitution stand in very close relationship. And the more will we vote as Americans when Moses and Washington are the center around which revolves the most precious possessions of mankind, God, humanity and liberty.

This last fact known to you all is enough to show you what is not our purpose in speaking to you this evening in favor of any candidate. I believe that all of you can read and the platform, the promises and the records of the three candidates are before you, and you have shown that you will know how to exercise your privileges. If then I know beforehand that you cannot be influenced to vote as Jews, what then, is my purpose in speaking to you on this subject?

To protest and protest emphatically against the thought that in case a Jew were elected as mayor of San Antonio, the same fate would overtake our city which came upon Babylon and Jerusalem. We hasten to say that we do not believe that the Rev. Rose intended such a conclusion. But you know what the German says: "Gedanken sind frei" and as long as the people have brains they will think. The Rev. Rose himself has told us that when he was the superintendent of the relief work, Jewish merchants were among the contributors to his unselfish work and we are certain that the Jewish merchants of this city would have been among the first to help him in his attempt to hold another Mid-winter fair. We hasten to mention these few facts in order to avert any possibility of misconception. We know the Episcopal church to possess such liberal minds as Bishop Brooks, not to mention our own Dean Richardson.

If then we point out an error in the sermon of Rev. Rose, it is because of