A Jewish Chaplain in France Part 1

A Jewish Chaplain in France.

by Lee J. Levinger.

FOREWORD

The tendency to "forget the war" is not admirable. Such an att.i.tude is in effect a negation of thought. The agony which shook mankind for more than four years and whose aftermath will be with us in years to come cannot be forgotten unless the conscience of mankind is dead. Rabbi Levinger's book is the narrative of a man who saw this great tragedy, took a part in it and has thought about it.

In all the wars of the United States Jews partic.i.p.ated, increasingly as their numbers grew appreciably. They served both as officers and privates from Colonial days. But not until the World War was a Rabbi appointed a Chaplain in the United States Army or Navy for actual service with the fighting forces. President Lincoln appointed several Jewish ministers of religion as chaplains to visit the wounded in the hospitals, but the tradition of the Army up to the period of the Great War, rendered the appointment of a Rabbi as chaplain impossible. The chaplain had been a regimental officer and was always either a Protestant or a Catholic. The sect was determined by the majority of the regiment. When the United States entered the Great War, this was clearly brought out and it required an Act of Congress to render possible the appointment of chaplains of the faiths not then represented in the body of chaplains. Twenty chaplains were thus authorized of whom six were allotted to the Synagogue the remainder being distributed among the Unitarians, who were not included in the Evangelical Churches, and the other smaller Christian sects which had grown up in America.

In order to meet the requirements of the War Department and in consonance with the spirit of unity which the war engendered, it was necessary for the Jewish organizations to create a body which could sift the applications for chaplaincies and certify them to the War Department, as being proper persons and meeting the requirements of the law of being regularly ordained ministers of religion.

Judaism in America is far from being a united body. Its differences may not be such as rise to the dignity of separate sects but they are considerable in belief and even more p.r.o.nounced in practice. Membership in the various Rabbinical and synagogue organizations is voluntary and each synagogue is autonomous. In the face of the awfulness of the war, these differences seemed minimized and through the cooperation of all the Rabbinical a.s.sociations and synagogue organizations, a Committee was created under the general authority of the Jewish Welfare Board which examined the credentials of all Jewish candidates for chaplaincies and made recommendations to the War Department. So conscientiously did this Committee perform its duties that every Rabbi recommended as a chaplain was commissioned.

As the law exempted ministers of religion and theological students, no person could be drafted for a chaplaincy. Every clergyman who served was a volunteer. It is therefore greatly to the credit of the Jewish ministry in America that one-hundred and forty men volunteered for the service. As there are probably less than four hundred English speaking Rabbis in the United States, many of whom would have been disqualified by the age limit and some by their country of origin, the response of the American Rabbinate to this call, is a most gratifying evidence of their patriotism and of their sense of public service.

Rabbi Levinger's narrative is his own, in the main and properly enough a personal one, but it is representative of the work of some thirty men some of whom ministered to the troops who did not go abroad whilst others had the opportunity of being in the midst of the Great Adventure.

Every one who saw the troops overseas, could not doubt the real service of the chaplain or the appeal that religion made to the men in uniform.

However the armchair philosophers may have viewed the war, it strengthened the faith of the men who were engaged; hundreds of thousands of young men turned to the chaplain who would have been indifferent to him at home. That this was true of Jewish young men is certain and if there has been a reaction on the part of these young men who returned from the war, let it be blamed not so much upon religion, as upon the disappointment in the soldiers' minds at the att.i.tude of the millions of their fellow citizens who remained at home and who want to "forget the war." The soldier who came back and found that his fellow citizens had their nerves so over-wrought by reading of the war in newspapers that they immediately entered upon a period of wild extravagances and wilder pleasure, might very well have had his faith, newly acquired if you choose, shaken by this evident lack of seriousness on the part of his fellow countrymen.

I shall not commend Rabbi Levinger's book to his readers, because if the book does not commend itself, no approbation will. As an officer of the Jewish Welfare Board whose purpose was to join with other organizations in contributing to the welfare of the American soldiers and sailors and particularly to provide for the religious needs of those of the Jewish faith, I want to express the obligations of the Board to the Rabbis who without experience or previous training for the purpose, entered upon this service and carried it through with distinction. Had it not been for them, the overseas work of the Board would have been comparatively limited and many a Jewish boy would have been deprived of the comforts and solace of his religion.

I cannot help but think that the chaplain himself derived much benefit from his service. In sections of the synagogue, as I believe in sections of the church, men are on many occasions a minority in the congregation and ministration is largely to women and children. It meant something for the chaplain to have great congregations of men, and of young men at that, and I am inclined to think hardened his mental and even spiritual fiber. It emphasized too the importance of emotion and sentiment as against mere rationalism. The worship meant more than a preachment, and sympathetic human contact for a minute was worth a barrel of oratory.

The fine spirit of liberality which grew up among the chaplains of the various faiths, reflecting as it did the comradeship of the men themselves, should not and will not be lost. The brotherhood of man will be a mere abstraction until individual men can act as brothers to one another. The ministers of religion, if they have any G.o.d-given mission above all others, surely have that of leading men, however different their physical and spiritual equipment, into the bonds of a common brotherhood. By this way and this way alone will mankind arrive at lasting peace.

CYRUS ADLER.

October 19, 1921.

PREFACE

This book is the result of the profound conviction that we are forgetting or ignoring the lessons of the World War to Israel, America and humanity. During the war such words as morale, democracy, Americanism, became a sort of cant--so much so that their actual content was forgotten. Now that the war is over and their constant repet.i.tion is discontinued, the grave danger exists that we may lose their very real influence.

These personal experiences and conclusions worked out by an army chaplain as a result of his overseas service may have some historical value also, especially as the same ground has not yet been covered by any Jewish chaplain or welfare worker in the American Expeditionary Forces. The role played by Jews in the army and navy of the United States and the Jewish contribution to the morale of the forces overseas deserve preservation, both as a reminder to ourselves and to the nation.

When the possibility of this book was first discussed in Paris with the late Colonel Harry Cutler, Chairman of the Jewish Welfare Board, he spoke of writing a foreword for it. Since his lamented death, Dr. Cyrus Adler, his successor as acting Chairman, has consented to fulfill the same friendly task. In addition to Dr. Adler, I acknowledge my great indebtedness to Mr. Harry L. Glucksman, Executive Director of the Jewish Welfare Board, for giving me full access to their records; to Mr. John Goldhaar for his personal reminiscences of the welfare work overseas; to Captain Elkan C. Voorsanger for the invaluable suggestions based upon his vast personal experiences; to Justice Irving Lehman, President of the Young Men's Hebrew a.s.sociation, for his encouragement and friendly advice; to a host of coworkers and friends in both France and America for the brilliant deeds and cordial comradeship which are here embodied; and finally to my secretary, Miss Hattie Tanzer, for her invaluable a.s.sistance in seeing the book through the press.

Much of the material used here has already been published in the form of articles appearing at various times in the _American Hebrew_, _American Israelite_, _Biblical World_, _B'nai B'rith News_, _Hebrew Standard_, _Jewish Forum_ and _Reform Advocate_.

LEE J. LEVINGER.

New York, May, 1921.

CHAPTER I

THE CHAPLAIN'S FUNCTION

In giving the story and the opinions of a Jewish chaplain in the American Expeditionary Forces, some statement is necessary of the work of the chaplains as a whole. Chaplains are an essential part of the organization of a modern army and it is notable that General Pershing repeatedly requested that the number of chaplains be doubled in the forces under his command. Hardly a narrative of soldiers' experiences exists without due place being given to the chaplain. In every army in France, chaplains were frequently cited for heroism and in innumerable instances suffered and died with the men in the ranks.

There are two popular impressions of the purpose of the chaplain in the military service; the one sees him as a survival of mediaevalism, blessing the weapons of the men at arms; the other welcomes him as a faint harbinger of a dawning humanitarianism, one of the few men in an army who does not have to kill, but is there to save. Some people think of the physician and chaplain as having non-military work to do, as being a kind of concession to the pacific spirit of our generation.

The actual work of the chaplain is quite as unknown to the general public. People wonder what he does between weekly sermons, much as they wonder what the minister or rabbi does during the six and a half days a week that he is not preaching. In fact, I have been greeted with frank or hidden incredulity whenever I admitted that in the army I used to preach up to fifteen times a week, but never had time to write a sermon.

People wonder sometimes whether the soldiers and sailors can bear so much preaching, sometimes what else they demand of the chaplain. In fact, to the non-military mind the whole subject seems shrouded in mystery.

To the military man the subject is extremely simple. There is no mystery about it. The chaplain is in the army as the physician is, as the thousands of other non-combatants are, for a strictly military purpose.

It happens that the non-combatants may use non-military methods. One may drive a locomotive, another carry a stretcher, another sit in an office and make out papers. All are essential to the military machine; none is in the service for any special humanitarian purpose; none is present as a survival of mediaevalism, but all to take part in the grim conflict of the twentieth century. The work of a physician in the military service is the very utilitarian one of saving men's lives and returning them to the front. The work of a chaplain is the equally essential and practical one of stimulating the morale of the troops.

Many factors bear upon the morale of a body of men,--their physical environment, the strength and spirit of their individual units, the temper and ability of their leaders. In our army we were very fortunate in the activity of various civilian organizations which labored among the men in the service with the backing of our entire citizenry, or at least of large and influential groups. The home service of the Red Cross and other non-military organizations was of great importance in keeping up the morale of the families left behind and through them of the men overseas. These important organizations, however, were under the handicap of doing civilian work among soldiers--a handicap whose seriousness only a soldier himself can ever realize. Some months after the war was over, the army recognized its obligation by appointing morale officers for both larger and smaller units, with others under them to supervise athletics, entertainment, and the like. The civilian organizations then conducted their activities under the orders of the morale officer.

But nearest of all to the men, because themselves a part of the actual military machine, were their own chaplains. The chaplain was under the same orders as the men, took the same risk, wore the same uniform, and naturally was regarded in every way as one of their own. I have even heard old army men scorning the new advances of all these new war-time societies. "We have our own chaplain," they said, "He looks after us all right."

The chaplain was first the religious guide of his men. He knew how to talk to them, for talking, not preaching, was the usual tone of the army or navy chaplain. He knew how to speak their own "lingo," slang and all.

He knew the spiritual appeal which was most needed by these boys, transplanted, with all their boyishness, into the deep realities which few men have had to face. He knew their boyish shyness of emotion, but with it their deep, immediate need of such emotions as the love of home and G.o.d, to sustain them amid dangerous hours of duty and tempting hours of idleness. This religious need alone would have been enough work for the chaplain, even with the intended increase in numbers to three per regiment, or one chaplain for every twelve hundred men. The need for religion was evident in the training camp, the hospital, the transport, the trenches; it was evident everywhere, and the chaplain must be everywhere to satisfy it.

But in addition the chaplain had much welfare work of a more general kind to transact in connection with the various welfare agencies. One man wanted advice about getting married before leaving for the front; another had trouble at home and desired a furlough; another found himself misplaced in his work and would like a transfer. A Jewish boy came in to ask that a letter be written to his pious father; the old man had not wanted him to enlist, but would feel better if he knew there was a rabbi in the camp. Another had a request for a small service (a minyan) that he might say the memorial prayer on the anniversary of his father's death. And still another presented a letter from his home community, for he was a fine musician and wanted to help out at a concert or a "sing."

The many requests for service and the occasional offers of service made the circuit constantly from a possible teacher to a number of boys with defective English, from a potential comedy team to a crowd of eager listeners, from a timid boy with personal troubles to their remedy, either by a change in circ.u.mstances or by convincing the boy himself.

Sometimes a complaint of religious prejudice had to be adjusted which might work grave harm in a company unless it were investigated and either proved groundless or remedied.

In a later chapter I shall have an opportunity to go into this more deeply. All that I want to bring out here is the important and usually misunderstood fact that American boys are restive under authority. They object vigorously to the domination of another's mind over theirs. And this objection too often took the form of bitter resentment against their officers. Therefore the final and most delicate work of the chaplain was to befriend the enlisted men against the oppression of their natural enemies and tyrants, the line officers. The army often reminds one of a school, the men are so boyish. In this regime of stringent rules which must be constantly obeyed, of short periods of intense and jovial recreation, of constant oversight by authority, the average enlisted man regarded his commanding officer much as the average small boy regards his school teacher, from whom he flees to a parent for sympathy.

That role of sympathetic parent was precisely the one which the chaplain was called upon to play for these boys in uniform. Not that he believed everything he was told, or took sides unfairly, or was always against authority. Simply that any boy could talk to him, as he could only to the exceptional commanding officer, and that every boy was sure that the chaplain would help him if he could. Being himself an officer, the chaplain could talk to officers more freely than any soldier could. And not being a line officer, he did not himself issue commands to any one except his own hard-worked orderly or clerk.

Thus the chaplain was fortunately placed. If he was even partially congenial, he was the one man in the army who had not an enemy high or low. The soldier looked to him for friendly aid. The officer referred to him as the great cooperating factor in building up the spirit of the troops.

During the stress of actual warfare the work of the chaplain changed in character though not in purpose. At the front the chaplain was with his boys. During a "push" he took his station at the first-aid post and worked from there as the first place to meet the wounded and dying who needed his physical or spiritual aid. He stood beside the surgeon on the battle field, he was with the stretcher-bearers searching for wounded and bringing them to safety. He rode from post to post with the ambulance driver, or tramped up to the trenches with a ration party. And wherever he went he was welcomed for his presence and for the work that he tried to do.

After a battle, when the men retired to rest and recuperate, the chaplain had to remain behind. He stayed with a group of men for the last terrible task of burying the dead. And when, that sad duty over, he returned to the troops in rest, he could not yield for a time like the others, to delicious languor after the ordeal of the battle field, hospital and cemetery. Then the chaplain must take up his round of duties, knowing that after the battle there is many a prayer to be said, many a hospital to be visited, many a soldier to be befriended. His task has just begun.

The military object of the chaplain is clear, to stimulate the morale of the men. But his methods were most unmilitary. Instead of reminding the men of the respect due him as an officer, the wise chaplain took his salutes as a matter of course and tried to draw the men personally, to make them forget all about military distinctions when they came to talk to him. The minute a chaplain insisted upon his rank as an officer, he lost his influence as a minister. Rank was useful to the chaplain in so far as it gave him free access to the highest authorities; it became the greatest obstacle to his work whenever the boys began to talk to him as "Lieutenant" or "Captain" instead of "Father" or "Chaplain." In the military as in the civil field the religious message can come only by personality, never by command.

The chaplain appealed for the men whenever he felt that the appeal was justified and had some chance of success, but never when it would be subversive of military discipline. He remembered always that he was in the army, a part of a great military machine, and that his presence and his work were to make the men better, not worse soldiers. He met the men personally, with their various needs and appeals, and often his best work was accomplished in short personal interviews, which would not look at all imposing on a monthly report, but which made better soldiers or happier men in one way or another. He encouraged every effort at recreation for the men, and often took part in these efforts himself.

This last applies especially in the navy, where the chaplain aboard ship is the whole staff for religious, recreational, and welfare work.

In the main the work of the chaplain differed little, whatever his religion might be. He was first of all a chaplain in the United States Army, and second a representative of his own religious body. That means that all welfare work or personal service was rendered equally to men of any faith. The only distinction authorized was between Protestant, Catholic and Jewish services, and even to these a "non-sectarian"

service was often added. Wherever I went I was called upon by Jew and non-Jew alike, for in the service most men took their troubles to the nearest chaplain irrespective of his religion. The soldier discriminated only in a special case, such as the memorial prayer (kaddish) for the Jewish boy, or confession for the Catholic. The office at once insured any soldier that he had a protector and a friend.

But as there were only twelve Jewish chaplains in the entire American Expeditionary Forces, we were instructed to devote our time so far as possible to the Jewish men. At the best it was impossible for one man to fulfill the constant religious and personal needs of the thousand Jewish soldiers scattered in all the units of an entire division, as I, for one, was supposed to do. When instead of one division a Jewish chaplain was a.s.signed several, his troubles were multiplied and his effectiveness divided. Naturally, most of the work of the Jewish chaplains had to be devoted to the needs of the Jewish soldiers, which would not otherwise be satisfied.

Any one who witnessed the labor and the self-sacrifice of chaplains of all creeds in the American army must preface an a.n.a.lysis of their work with a heartfelt tribute to the men themselves. I think that these men were a unique aggregation--devoted to their country and its army, yet loving men of all nations; loving each his own religion, yet rendering service to men of all creeds; bearing each his own t.i.tle, yet sharing equal service and equal friendship with ministers of every other faith.