JEWS form an integral part of South Africa's European
population and play an important role in the life of the Republic. The latest
official figures are those of the 1960 census, which set the Jewish community
at 114,762 out of a white population of 3,088,492 and a total population (all
races) of 16,002,797. The number must be larger today, but not much there is no
longer any appreciable Jewish immigration: some Jews leave each year to settle
in Israel or elsewhere: the census shows that the Jewish community has age
levels higher than the rest of the population, which implies a declining growth
rate in relation to other sections. When these factors are offset against South
African Jewry's 1936- 1960 rate of increase, a conservative estimate for the
community today would be about 118,000.
DISTRIBUTION
The 1960 census records 73,051 Jews in the Transvaal, 32,104
in the Cape, 6,189 in Natal and 3,157 in the Orange Free State. Roughly half of
South African Jewry lives in Johannesburg (57,707). When the figures for the
East Rand (6,110), West Rand (2,510), Pretoria (3,576) and
Vereeniging-Vanderbijl Park-Nigel (861) are added, 60% of South Africa's Jews
live in the Rand-Pretoria complex. Cape Town and the Peninsula (23,866) account
for another 20%. The remaining 20% is spread over the rest of the country, from
substantial Jewish communities in Durban (5,231), Port Elizabeth-Uitenhage
(2,811), Bloemfontein and district (1,347) to smaller communities ranging from
a few hundred Jews to a handful of Jewish families in rural towns.
OCCUPATIONS
South Africa's Jews are spread over a wide range of
occupations. They do not, as some people think, have a major share in the gold
mines, and they play only a small part in heavy industry. But they are well
represented in secondary industry, finance, commerce, the professions and the
arts. In the country areas they are mostly engaged in commerce, but some have
also gone into agriculture; a few are among the country's leading farmers. In
the cities they also figure in the skilled trades: there are Jews who are
cobblers, painters, decorators, carpenters, bus drivers, miners, gardeners, as
well as Jews who work behind office desks and shop counters. There are Jews in
the poor suburbs who struggle on small earnings: Jews who live comfortably in
the middle-class suburbs; and affluent Jews in the luxury suburbs. In short,
they are part of the weft and woof of South Africa.
Jews figure prominently in wholesale and retail commerce,
and in some areas have played pioneering roles. The bazaar chains and
supermarkets which have helped the public get cheap goods were started and
still are run mostly by Jews. They pioneered and today play a prime part in the
South African clothing industry. They figure largely in the entertainment
industry and have established many of South Africa's theatres and cinemas.
In the professions, Jews figure prominently in medicine and
law; to a lesser extent in chemistry, dentistry, architecture and accountancy;
to a still lesser extent in engineering and technology. There are several Jews
among the Bar's Senior Counsel, and some have been elevated to the Bench. In
medicine, Jews are among the country's most distinguished surgeons and
specialist physicians. There is a fair proportion of Jews in the teaching
profession and a small proportion in the Civil Service. There are several
Jewish journalists, though only a couple are, or have been, in the editorial
chair of any general newspaper.
Several Jews are lecturers or heads of departments in South
African Universities: some have attained prominence beyond our shores. Jews
also figure substantially among the students at South African Universities, and
play a prominent part in student affairs.
A field in which South African Jews were slow starters but
have gradually made their mark is sport. Where the early Jewish immigrants were
inclined to consider sport out of character, their children, growing up in
South African schools, took to it as part and parcel of South African life and
many have won places in local, provincial and national teams. Here and there
Jews found their way barred by clubs which blackballed them: nothing daunted,
they formed their own sports clubs. Today a better spirit prevails, and Jewish
sportsmen are generally welcome, while the Jewish clubs are accepted as an
integral part of South African sport, and share in the national sporting
calendar.
PUBLIC SERVICE
Jews play an important part in South Africa's public life.
They are to be found among the members and supporters of all political parties,
participating as citizens who follow their personal predilections. By and
large, there is no question of a "Jewish stand or a "Jewish
vote". A Jewish candidate of one party will without compunction oppose a
Jewish candidate of another party. In the ups and downs of South African
politics, there have been few occasions when specifically Jewish issues have
been involved. During the Hitler years, pro-Nazis cultivated anti-Semitism, and
the Jewish community girded itself to fight the danger. That it triumphantly de
fended its citizen rights was tribute to its courage and resourcefulness, as
well as to the tolerance and goodwill which South Africa has traditionally
displayed to its Jewish community. There are still individuals who peddle
anti-Semitism and maintain contact with neo-Nazis in other lands: there are
some clubs which do not admit Jews to membership: and there are firms which
employ Gentiles only. But anti-Semitism as a political issue has disappeared
from South African life. No South African Government, regardless of which party
has been in power, has discriminated against Jews or treated them as other than
full and equal citizens.
There are Jews among the Members of Parliament and the
Provincial Councils. There are few if any towns in the Republic where Jews have
not served on the local municipal authority or risen to mayoral office. Many
have rendered valuable contributions to civic progress. Jews also serve widely
on other public bodies on school and hospital boards, library and museum
committees, university councils, and scientific, cultural and philanthropic
organisations.
CULTURAL CONTRIBUTIONS
Culturally, South Africa's Jews have acted as a leaven,
liberally patronizing art, music and the theatre. The late Oliver Walker, music
and theatre critic of The Star, used to say that without Jewish patronage, most
of South Africa's concert halls and theatres would have to shut shop. In some
cultural fields, individual Jews started new trends. Sarah Gertrude Millin
blazed the trail to realism in South African literature and is internationally
known as South Africa's greatest writer; the University of the Witwatersrand,
awarding her an honorary doctorate, said: "Mrs. Millin has become par
excellence the interpreter of South Africa to the English-speaking world".
Moses Kottler, Irma Stern, Lippy Lipschitz played kindred roles in introducing
new trends into South African art: Muriel Alexander, Leonard Schach, Leon
Gluckman in the theatre. There are other South African Jewish writers,
painters, sculptors, producers, actors; and some distinguished South African
Jewish musicians.
THE IMMIGRANTS
The roots of South African Jewry go deep into the country's
history. The first Jewish immigrants were pioneers who found their way to these
shores 150 years ago in response to the call of adventure - men like Nathaniel
Isaacs, who in 1825 explored the wild hinterland of Natal and opened the way to
European settlement there; the brothers Benjamin and Joshua Norden, who came
with the 1820 Settlers and pioneered trading operations beyond the Eastern Cape
border; Maximilian Thalwitzer, who started the merino sheep industry; the
brothers. Aaron and Elias de Pass, who introduced cold storage to the Cape and
laid the first slips for the docking and repair of ships at Cape Town and
Simonstown; the Baumann family, who contributed to the development of early
Bloemfontein. There were Jews among the immigrants drawn to South Africa by the
discovery of diamonds in 1867 and gold in 1886 men like Barney Barnato, Alfred
Beit, David Harris, Sammy Marks, who played significant roles in the early
mining days. From the 1880's to the 1920's came Jewish refugees, mostly from
Lithuania, fleeing the pogroms of Eastern Europe, and taking mainly to commerce
here: hardy, industrious, well schooled in Judaism, they became, both in
numbers and character, the dominant element in South African Jewry. In the
1930's came Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany and Central Europe: they brought
new talents to South Africa in several fields, and developed branches of trade
and industry which had not been effectively worked before.
It is the South African-born children. grandchildren and
great-grandchildren of these immigrants who make up the bulk of the Republic's
Jewish community today. Attending school with their English and Afrikaans
fellows, they have grown up as an integral part of the South African people.
Learning Afrikaans as well as English at school, they are reasonably bilingual:
the Jewish doctor is able to attend patients in Afrikaans or English, and
Jewish lawyers and advocates plead their clients' cases in either language, as
the occasion may require. By virtue of living predominantly in the large
cities, the Jewish community is, in the main, English-speaking: but use of
Afrikaans is increasing, and it is an indication of the trend that many Jews
now also read Afrikaans newspapers. A few Jews have taken to writing in
Afrikaans. and the poems of Olga Kirsch and Peter Blum have won critical
acclaim.
COMMUNAL LIFE
In its communal life, South African Jewry is well organised,
with bodies which cater for diverse interests religious, fraternal,
educational, cultural, and philanthropic. In the welfare field it has built
institutions for the Jewish aged, orphaned and handicapped which have won the
highest praise from non-Jewish experts. At the same time, Jews also liberally
support non-Jewish welfare work, without distinction of race, colour or creed
orphanages and aged homes, creches and soup kitchens, child welfare, Armesorg,
St. Johns, St. Dunstans, the Red Cross, the Salvation Army and non-European
charities all receive generous donations from South Africa's Jews.
Although the present generation is not as religiously
observant as the older generation, South African Jewry is still bound by
religious ties. The spectrum may range all the way from zealots to agnostics
and even some atheists, but most are middle-of-the-road in their religious
attitudes, whether Orthodox or Reform, and are not strict about ritual
minutiae. Congregational statistics (neither comprehensive nor entirely
reliable) suggests that a majority of South African Jewish families (not
individuals) are members of Hebrew Congregations, though many attend synagogue
only once or twice a year.
South Africa's Hebrew congregations are autonomous bodies,
each controlling its own affairs, with religious authority vested in its
spiritual leader. Most of them, however, are affiliated to representative
organisations which endeavour to strengthen Jewish religious life - the
Federation of Synagogues of South Africa, which covers the Transvaal, O.F.S.
and Natal: the United Council of Orthodox Hebrew Congregations of the Cape and
South West Africa; and, on the Reform sector, the S.A. Union for Progressive
Judaism. Rabbis and Ministers have similarly established their own representative
institutions.
THE BOARD OF DEPUTIES
The central representative institution of the community is
the South African Jewish Board of Deputies, with which most of the country's
Hebrew congregations and Jewish societies are affiliated; its biennial congresses
(which decide the Board's policies and elect its executive council) constitute
a broad cross-section of South African Jewry. The Board was founded on the
basis of separate entities in the Transvaal in 1903 and the Cape in 1904,
"to watch and take action with reference to all matters affecting the
welfare of Jews as a community"; the two entities merged into one body
after Union. Lord Milner (High Commissioner of the Transvaal in 1903) welcomed
the Board as an institution which would be of assistance to the Government in
its relations with the Jewish community: where in the past divergent views had
been presented to him by different Jewish spokesmen, the Board of Deputies,
being a representative body, would be able to speak with one voice on matters
affecting Jewish interests. This has remained the Board's prime function to the
present day. It has intervened with the authorities to prevent Jewish
immigrants suffering discrimination or disability on account of their race. It
has helped Jewish immigrants to become naturalised citizens. It has maintained
contact with Jewish organisations abroad and has assisted in universal Jewish
causes. It was jointly associated with the S.A. Zionist Federation in convening
the South African Jewish Congress of 1916 which supported the demand for Jewish
minority rights in Europe and the recognition of the Jewish claim to Palestine.
During two world wars it assisted the South African war effort by attending to
problems specifically affecting Jewish soldiers, as well as participating in
the provision of comforts for the troops. In the 1920's it supported the scheme
for the enlarged Jewish Agency for Palestine (created in terms of the League of
Nations Mandate) and is officially represented on the Agency. Domestically, the
Board of Deputies renders a multitude of services to the Jewish community,
including work in the field of adult education and programming for Jewish youth
and university students; it also runs a central Jewish museum and library, and
it renders invaluable assistance to small country communities which are no
longer able to maintain organised Jewish life on their own resources.
THE ZIONIST FEDERATION
The South African Zionist Federation is the representative
body through which Zionist work in the Republic is centralised. To it are
affiliated the various Zionist groupings, organisations and societies, and their
delegates elect the Federation's executive council at biennial conferences.
Established in the early years of the century, the Zionist Federation enjoys a
status co-equal with that of the Board of Deputies. Its manifold departments
deal with organisation and information, fund-raising, youth training, women's
work, immigration to Israel, the popularisation of Hebrew, etc.
South African Jewry is predominantly a Zionist-minded
community and this has given the Zionist Federation its stature and influence.
Zionism (the movement for the establishment of the Jewish National Home) has
had the sympathy of successive South African leaders and Governments. General
Smuts played an important part, when he was a member of the Imperial War
Cabinet in 1917, in the negotiations for the Balfour Declaration. which became
the Charter for the eventual establishment of the Jewish State. Tielman Roos
took the lead in promoting the 1926 Declaration by General Hertzog's Government
in support of the Jewish National Home. The Smuts Government of 1948 accorded
de facto recognition to the newly- established State of Israel, and the Malan
Government of the same year conferred recognition de jure. Dr. Malan was the
first Commonwealth Premier to visit Israel, and on his return spoke with
fervour of the new State's achievements. The pro-Zionist policy has continued
through the Governments of Mr. Strijdom, Dr. Verwoerd and Mr. Vorster,
notwithstanding stresses that have entered the relationship between the South
African and Israeli Governments over the past few years as a result of Israel
aligning herself at the United Nations with those member states which have
censured and voted against South Africa's racial policies.
In the Middle East war of June, 1967, South African
sympathies were overwhelmingly with Israel. Press and radio highlighted the
Israeli victory and drew parallels between the position of Israel and that of
South Africa as bastions of Western civilisation at either end of a continent
in which there is much hostility to each.
Many Gentile South Africans spontaneously offered
contributions to the Israel Emergency campaign which the SA. Zionist Federation
initiated: some even offered to join the 800 young Jewish men and women who
went as volunteers to render non-combatant service in Israel (proportionally
the largest group from any Diaspora community, and in number second only to the
volunteers from Britain). The South African Government, while following a
policy of neutrality to the war, gave special permission for the proceeds of
the Emergency Appeal to be remitted to Israel, notwithstanding the national
currency restrictions.
Women and youth play important roles in South African Jewish
communal life. There is an organised Zionist Youth movement which has several
groupings - Habonim, Bnei Akiva, Betar, Hashomer Hatzair: they conduct
programmes of cultural and outdoor activities and annually run successful
vacation camps. Synagogue youth and university youth similarly have their
representative organisations.
WOMEN'S WORK
Women in some respects hold pride of place for the services
they render South African Jewry. “The overall picture of Jewish women's
activities in South Africa today," says Adèle Sherman in a study of the
field ("Women's Work in South African Jewry" in "SA Jewish Year
Book 1957/8), is one of widespread action in every phase of Jewish, Zionist,
civic and general life, and the organisation and co-ordination which women have
achieved has yet to be equalled by their menfolk The Women's Zionist Council,
founded as a department of the S.A. Zionist Federation, today has 128
affiliated societies As its work programme, the Council undertook (1) the
education of the Jewish mother to arm her child with the confidence which a
glorious history gives to a nation to awaken. every Jewish woman in the land to
a sense of her duty towards her race, to enable her to be a torch-bearer of
Jewish culture and to do her share towards the achievement of all national
aspiration; (2) the formation of Women's Zionist Societies throughout the
country; and (3) fund-raising - all Zionist work that could be done by women,
with special emphasis on the importance of Jewish National Fund box clearances.
To support its educational pro gramme, the Women's Zionist Council disseminates
folders on Israel and on Jewish matters among its member societies: branches
arrange cultural meetings and cooperate with other groups in arranging
functions which give added meaning to Jewish Festivals like Purim, Sukkoth, to
etc. There has been the innovation of systematic study of the Bible. Since
1948, the Women's Zionist Council has also published its own magazine, “News
and Views".
The other main women's organisation is the Union of Jewish
Women of Southern Africa, which has 64 branches throughout the Republic, the
Rhodesias and South West Africa. "Its policy is to render service to the
Jewish community as a whole, to the South African people, irrespective of race,
colour or creed, and to Israel … Goodwill meetings are a regular activity of
the U.J.W., into which non-Jewish groups, such as the Vroue Federasie, the
Women's Agricultural Societies, N.C.W. branches, etc., are enthusiastically
drawn. The participation of U.J.W. branches in welfare work is impressive. They
are concerned with problems of the under-privileged and the under-nourished -
with the aged, with the mentally ill, with the sick and with children. They
express their concern in a variety of ways - by introducing feeding schemes for
non-Europeans, such as soup kitchens or the supply of essential foods to
creches, nursery and primary schools: by the provision of non-European family
centres: by work for S.A.N.T.A., Red Cross, Blood Transfusion, etc. Their visiting
of the sick is systematic and thorough, and they take with them comforts such
as magazines, cigarettes, fruit and sweets. They provide transport to hospitals
and clinics and assist in occupational therapy aid work. They arrange outings
and entertainments for orphans and the aged. U.J.W. branches have set up many
Friendship and Golden Age Clubs to combat loneliness and the feeling of
inadequacy to which old people so often succumb." The U.J.W. also runs a
thriving Adult Education Division, which serves branches with tape recordings
on Jewish Festivals, history, culture.
The spectrum of Jewish communal work is broad and includes
specialised agencies like the Vocational Guidance service run by the S.A.
Ort-Oze, as well as friendly societies and Fraternal Orders like the He brew
Order of David and the Bnai Brith. There is still a considerable, though diminishing,
number of Yiddish-speaking Jews in South Africa, and the S.A. Yiddish Cultural
Federation strives to cater for their needs and promote a knowledge of Yiddish
among their children. Its activities include the running of a Yiddish Nursery and
Folk School and the publication of a Yiddish monthly, Dorem Afrike.
While congregations and other bodies raise their own
finances among members, there are two country-wide Jewish fund campaigns in
which all co-operate the Israeli United Appeal, which raises funds for causes
in Israel, and the United Communal Fund, which helps meet the budgets of
national Jewish organisations like the Board of Deputies, the Boards of Jewish
Education, the Federation of Synagogues, the Union of Jewish Women, etc.
JEWISH EDUCATION
An interesting development of recent years has been the
establishment of Jewish Day Schools. Traditionally, Jewish education in South
Africa was conducted by the Cheder or Talmud Torah (afternoon classes run by
Hebrew congregations, which - quired the attendance of the children of members
after their day's studies at Government schools). Jewish educators, however,
had long felt that this system was inadequate, and a movement developed
overseas to create Jewish Day Schools which would combine general and Jewish
education. Side by side with South Africa's Talmud Torahs, which still account
for some 6,800 pupils, fifteen Jewish Day Schools, with a total of 5,500
pupils, have been established in the main cities. These Day Schools provide a
full education, following the Government syllabus from the primary standards to
matric: they also include Jewish studies (Hebrew language, Jewish religion,
history and literature) as normal school subjects. The Jewish Day Schools enjoy
a good relationship with the State schools, and frequently engage with them in
inter-school competitions and sport.
The Jewish community has also built up an excellent network
of Hebrew Nursery Schools, conducted according to the standards laid down by
the Nursery School Association of South Africa, and having an enrolment of
nearly 3,000 children.
Where, a generation ago. Hebrew teachers had to be imported,
South African Jewry is today providing many of its Hebrew teachers from its own
ranks. The Rabbi Zlotnik Hebrew Teachers Training College in Johannesburg has
graduated over 100 teachers since its inception in 1948. Similarly, although
most Rabbis and Ministers still come from abroad, South African Jewry is today
training an increasing number of its own clergymen.
THE JEWISH PRESS
The community is well served by a vigorous Jewish press.
Leading the field is the Southern African Jewish Times, an independent
weekly with a broad news coverage and the largest circulation of any Jewish
journal in South Africa: it is generally ranked with the London Jewish
Chronicle as one of the best newspapers in the Jewish world. The Zionist
Record and S.A. Jewish Chronicle, also a weekly, is the organ of the
S.A. Zionist Federation and, while having a general Jewish news coverage.
concentrates more particularly on the Zionist scene. The Jewish Herald
is a weekly newspaper published by the Zionist Revisionist Organisation and
mainly devoted to propagating the Herut point of view. The Afrikaner Yiddishe
Zeitung is the only Yiddish newspaper in South Africa. All the weeklies
carry articles and reviews, in addition to the news, and have lively correspondence
columns, in which communal issues are keenly debated. There are several
monthlies, chiel among them Jewish Affairs, which is published by the S.A.
Jewish Board of Deputies and ranks among the best Jewish cultural magazines in
the Diaspora,
REFERENCES
The Jews in South Africa, edited by Gustav Saten and Louis Hotz (Cape Town, 1955); chapters on South Africae Jewry in My Judaism. My Jews, by Edgar Bernstein (Johannesburg, 1962); papers in SA Jewish Year Book, 1950 to 1961 edited by Leon Feldberg (Johannesburg); papers in South African Jewry 1965, edited by Leon Feldberg (Johannesburg); papers in the present volume of South African Jewry: From Refugee to Citizen by Frieda Sichel Cape Town 1986; files of the S.A Jewish press.
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