What are you going to do to preserve a tradition that is the peculiar and unique culture that Judaism inculcates? The American Jewish community is not going to survive by lining up against its common enemy.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes the importance of actively preserving cultural traditions rather than merely reacting to external challenges.
Arthur Hertzberg highlights the need for the American Jewish community to focus on the proactive preservation of its unique traditions and culture, rather than solely uniting against perceived threats. He suggests that a community's strength lies in its commitment to its heritage and the values it embodies, which are essential for its survival and flourishing.
In practice
During a community meeting discussing cultural initiatives, this quote could be used to inspire action towards preserving traditions.
It wasn't until I came to New York and started to see the African American community, but also the Ethiopian community here, and started to eat the food, started to understand the music. I said, you know, I got to go and understand the culture. So me and my sister went.
I love having different cultures around, but when the parent culture kind of dissipates, you're left thinking, 'Well, what's going on?'
I have never read any Tolstoy. I felt badly about this until I read a Bill Simmons column where he confessed that he'd never seen 'The Big Lebowski.' Simmons, it should be pointed out, has seen everything. He said that everyone needs to have skipped at least one great cultural touchstone.
Enshrined in a language is the whole of a community's history and a large part of its cultural identity. The world is a mosaic of visions. To lose even one piece of this mosaic is a loss for all of us.
A truly common culture is not one in which we all think alike, or in which we all believe that fairness is next to godliness, but one in which everyone is allowed to be in on the project of cooperatively shaping a common way of life.
...culture is useless unless it is constantly challenged by counter culture. People create culture; culture creates people. It is a two-way street. When people hide behind a culture, you know that's a dead culture.
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