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Pride of Ancestry No Hope
For Posterity
by Rabbi Abraham D. Price, Baltimore, MD
Genealogists are reaping a large
harvest from men and women whose credulity is more annoying than
their attempt to arrogate themselves above the so-called common
rabble. Men who through genius and other circumstances become
possessors of vast fortunes are seized with a desire to climb
their family tree and if possible to pluck a nobleman or two from
its boughs. This in itself may be a commendable thing but it has
one serious aspect. A phase of life fraught with many dangers. It
is not what our ancestors were. The world moves too fast--too many
events have transpired since then and they belong to the forgotten
past. The world is solely concerned with their descendants. The
mass of people eager to ape their ways have likewise given
themselves up to this worship and a character of snobbishness and
[has] supplanted the unaffectedness of our race.
All this has led to a vulgar display,
each vying with the other. And the American home is being
confronted with the growing national problem, the dearth of
prosperity. Our genealogists have failed miserably, for if some of
our wealthy citizens can trace their ancestry back to the feudal
lords, they have evidently forgotten that we all have a common
ancestry, the aborigines, and if our impulses are not quickened,
there is a possibility that we will revert back to that type. |