In 1936, as a 24-year old rabbinical student at the Hebrew Union College (HUC) in Cincinnati, Sidney Ballon apparently had a part-time pulpit in East Liverpool, Ohio, a town of under 25,000 people at the time (half that size today). I don’t recall ever hearing him speak of his student pulpit experiences. My curiosity prompted me to do some research which led to a wonderful discovery. I reached 96-year old Dr. Herschel Rubin, a lifelong resident of East Liverpool who, after I briefly introduced myself, inquired, “Was your father’s name Sidney?” That was about all he remembered of him, but it was gratifying for both of us to make the connection. Rubin added, given that it was close to a 300-mile journey by train and streetcar from Cincinnati to East Liverpool, the rabbinical students from HUC would come and stay for the entire High Holy Day season.
Temple B'nai Israel, East Liverpool, built in 1921,
now named Temple Beth Shalom, after merger with Orthodox congregation
Rubin did not remember student rabbis coming at other times of the year, but the Ballon archives provide ample evidence of his delivering sermons on numerous other occasions from 1936 through 1938 when he was ordained. A sermon from March 1937 marks the fifteenth anniversary of the congregation’s building. That was corroborated by Rubin who has a photo in which he is pictured as a small boy at the groundbreaking in 1921[i]. It’s hard to say what the significance of all this is other than a sweet connection to a distant era.
Among the very earliest sermons from this period is the following, a passionate plea for peace in the face of the looming war in Europe. Ballon looks back at the government and industry deception that profited from the first world war and idealistically feels that with this hindsight we should not allow ourselves to be duped into engaging in future wars. He takes a strong stance for pacifism.[ii]
The common voice today must take a stand not against war in general, but against one specific war--and that one is the next one.
(Five years later we will discover that, after war is ultimately declared, the young rabbi will not lose his convictions nor his idealism, though he tempers them with the realistic acceptance of the need to defend the nation against Japan and Germany.) He begins this sermon below with a flashback to the innocence of his childhood memories of the first Armistice Day.
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Among the vague
memories of childhood there are very few things that can be recalled with any
great degree of clarity and certainty. Only the most unusual and impressive
circumstances so fix themselves upon the mind, that in later years their
picture may be vividly recaptured. Such an occasion was Armistice Day 1918.
Young though I was as that time, there still remains with me a vivid recollection of the day. I can still hear the shrill sound of factory whistles in the morning, announcing to the anxious populace that at last the peace had come, the war was over, the boys would soon be back. I can still recall being taken to the center of the city where the mad celebration of victory took place in the evening. What a frenzied throng was there, shouting jubilantly and rejoicing. Everyone was drunk with excitement and reckless with joy. Flags were waving, streamers flowing, as through the streets swept the happy citizenry, singing their war songs and shouting their cheers, pausing only now and then in their wild march to hang the Kaiser[iii] in effigy, and burn his supposed corpse in the street. Underneath this hysterical joy there may have been many a tear. The agony and suffering of the preceding months could not be so quickly be erased. For some the Armistice meant the speedy return of dear ones, but for many also it brought the sad realization that there would be no return, that the happy homecoming planned from the very day of departure was never to be. But even those who suffered most, rejoiced. The sacrifice had been great, but the achievements were likewise great. Those who gave their lives and those who suffered did so for a holy cause. Liberty and freedom had been saved from the trampling feet of the barbarous Hun, and the world made safe for democracy. The war to end war had been fought and won, and in the dying flames that consumed the effigy of the luckless Kaiser perished also the last vestiges of the injustice and intolerance. Here we were at last at the dawn of a new era of peace and liberty such as the world had never known before. Armistice Day 1936, provided a shocking contrast. Eighteen years after the war to end war all Europe waits merely for the [bell to ring] to start all over again. The machinery of peace, so optimistically hailed upon its inception is completely broken down. The World Court has failed. The League is impotent. One false move on the continent of Europe, and the smoldering sparks of its suspicions will again burst into a flaming fire, and we wonder whether there is anything that can be done. Must we sit idly by and watch once more as the world takes a running jump over the precipice? This time the fall will be a longer and a deeper one, and perhaps it will be impossible to clamber back again up the side. Are we then doomed to silent, helpless waiting for the inevitable collapse? It is strange that we should find ourselves in such a predicament for we know now more than ever before what the last war really meant. The illusion of 1918 did not last very long. Time passed and the hysteria wore off. Like a drunkard who arouses himself from his stupor and surveys his stupidity with disgust and self-reproach, so we finally came to our senses and realized the cost of the war. With the sum that was spent on death it has been pointed out that we could have built a beautiful home, furnished it with costly furniture, place it on a spacious state and given this home to each and every family in every country that participated in the war. We could have given each city of more than 20,000 inhabitants in everyone of these countries a 5 million dollar library and a 10 million dollar university. And with the remainder we could have established a fund providing an adequate steady salary for an army of 250,000 teachers and nurses. And the cost in lives! If on some Armistice Day, instead of watching the healthy vigorous steps of youths in trim uniform with shiny buttons, as they march to the blaring of military music, we could review a parade of those who died in the trenches! Four months the procession would last, marching ten abreast, all through the day and all through the nights without a stop--two months and a half for the dead of the allies and over six weeks for those of their enemies. But even so we might have said, “Why count the cost when the fruits of victory were so great? A tremendous price, but are not liberty and democracy worth it?” But we learned still more, and we realized that liberty and democracy were merely blinds. We thought we were fighting for principles. The only purpose we now know was profits, and these were not for the men who fought. We had been completely taken in by an avalanche of propaganda. We had been sacrificed as a burnt offering upon the altar of greed. Our American financiers had gambled on the defeat of Germany. One company had made a loan of 500 million dollars to England and France. Other bankers, and even the government followed suit. Unfortunately, Germany began to gain the upper hand. And so out came the news of atrocities committed upon poor defenseless children. Out came the slogan that the world must be made safe for democracy. And in we went to save the bankers’ millions. Our munitions makers, too, had to earn their daily bread, and so while bullets poured into the bodies of our soldiers, dollars poured into the treasuries of our corporations. For every three Americans killed in battle an American millionaire was made. The profits realized from the sale of munitions sent Dupont stock up 5000% in value and United States Steel and Bethlehem Steel watched their income soar to astronomical figures. The price of the war was great to be sure, but it was worth it--to the merchants of death and the bankers. In the face of such disillusionment we might think the lesson would have been learned. We might think the realization of these facts would do more to end the war than was expected even of the war itself. But again we would be wrong, for the world today is ready to repeat. Facing things realistically one must admit that the chances of averting the war in Europe as matters stand now are very slim indeed. No one likes to be pessimistic about such things. We like to hope to the last moment that a way to peace will be found, but the greatest optimist today, if he be realistic at all about the question, can hope only to postpone but not avert another conflagration in Europe. Everywhere people want peace, yet the forces of economic and political circumstances brush aside all resistance and draw the masses after them. Europe appears to be doomed. The question is only one of time. We in this country, however, are in a situation quite different from that of Europe. We have plenty of land for our people, plenty of resources to fall back upon. We are not beset by the troubles of difficult neighbors if we but set ourselves to the task. We can definitely escape the clutches of another war and thus preparing ourselves for peace. Who knows but that perhaps Europe, too, will learn to follow. Back in the 1790’s, President Dwight of Yale University said that “it is probable that whenever mankind shall cease to make war, this most desirable event will arise from the general opposition to war by the common voice.” We in America today must raise this common voice. You may say that if this is all that is required then we are already prepared for peace, for truthfully no one in America today wants war. We all want peace. But the same was true in 1916. Then as now, the entire nation was opposed to sending our men to fight on foreign soil. Wilson was re-elected that year on the strength of his promise to keep us out of the war. And yet, when the showdown came, we went in, we clamored for battle, and unpopular was the man who in the face of overwhelming opposition dared to take a stand for peace. Then, as now, we were certainly opposed to war, yet the trouble was then, as it also is now, that what we were against was war in general. Wars in general we admitted were wrong, and even when we entered the fight this principle still prevailed. However, the particular battle upon which we were entering was excusable. Most war was needless, but this particular one was righteous, waged for a holy cause. The common voice today must take a stand not against war in general, but against one specific war--and that one is the next one. Braced firmly by the conviction that the next war is the one that is wrong, we will not be swept off our feet by any future flood of propaganda as we were in 1917. We will not be led into the false distinction between good wars and bad ones. It was easy to deceive us in those days. We were unprepared. But now we know what sort of propaganda to expect. We know who will reap the benefits of the conflict. Should the occasion again arise, we ought not to be tricked, for what ever they tell us, we must be convinced that it is this very next battle that we must not join. The militarists tell us that the best defense is an offense. Well and good! Let us turn their own strategy against them and wage an offensive for peace. It is too late to talk peace when the crisis is already at hand. The foundations of peace must be laid long in advance. If the common voice would make it clearly and explicitly known that the masses of this country would absolutely refuse to participate by any manner of service in any future war, there would be no future war. The churches could stop war, it its members would insist upon following the commandment, “Thou shalt not kill.” Labor could stop war if it refused to provide the instruments of death. No nation will venture to fight unless its people are in a suitable frame of mind. When there are large groups of its citizens, however, who refuse to yield to a war psychology, whose reason is strong enough to permit them to give in to artificial hysteria, war cannot be waged. The people cannot be used to fight against their will; and without the bodies of drafted men to feed its hungry mouth, the monster of war must starve and die. The road to peace is a hard one. The obstacles that stand in its path are many, the sacrifices to be made in its behalf are great. Yet we must not give way to a paralyzing sense of futility. Our name must be on the record of every organization working toward peace. A voice must lend its strength to that common voice which must shout for peace. Progress to be sure is slow, but man in his drive for perfection moves steadily onward. For the present, we pray that we may be endowed with the courage and strength to face the crisis with intelligence. We pray that we may learn and understand how to direct our energies and our spirits to the improvement of humanity rather than to its destruction. Let us but think and live in terms of peace and in terms of justice to mankind, and ultimately the day must come when “Nation shall not lift up sword against nation, Neither shall they learn war any more.”[iv]  |
Temple B'nai Israel, East Liverpool OH - 11/13/36
[i] This photo and other documentation may be found in Jewish Communities on the Ohio River: A History, Amy Hill Shevitz, The University Press of Kentucky, 2007
[ii] It is likely that Ballon was influenced by Abraham Cronbach, an outspoken pacifist and professor of social studies at Hebrew Union College from 1922 until his death in 1965.
[iii] Friedrich Wilhelm Viktor Albrecht of (1859 - 1941) was the last German Emperor (Kaiser) and King of Prussia, ruling the German Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia from 1888 to 1918. An ineffective war leader, he lost the support of the army, abdicated, and fled to exile in the Netherlands.
