I have very warm memories of growing up in Boston in a secure and loving home, of being surrounded by relatives, all of whom had fled from Eastern Europe, of attending a local Orthodox synagogue, and of studying at an after-school cheder (Jewish school). 

Judaism was very much alive in our home. So, too, Yiddish. All of this gave me a very strong sense of pride, of spirituality, of connection to an extended Jewish family. 

I learned early on about street-level anti-Semitism, but I also learned that America is a diverse country in which anti-Semitism is not condoned by the larger society. I felt a sense of security as a Jew; I felt I could aspire to do or be anything I wanted. And I wanted to be an actor. 

By the time I was ten, the US had just entered the Second World War and I began to perform for Jewish audiences to promote war bonds. That was the first, but far from the last, melding of my Jewish identity and artistic life.  

For example, playing the role of Morris Myerson, the husband of Golda Meir, in A Woman Called Golda was a special moment in my life as an actor and a Jew. It also gave me a chance to spend a month in Israel, one of three visits I’ve made which have reinforced my connection to the Jewish state. 

Arthur Miller, the playwright, once posed a challenge which I paraphrase: How can we make the outside world a home? How do we find a sense of belonging in that larger world? For me, being part of the larger Jewish family and a member of a congregation in Los Angeles have provided a means. 

Being Jewish is a gift, not a burden. I treasure that identity. It has been a source of the most important values of all: family, charity, wisdom, compassion, social justice, culture; those values that form the foundation of a civilized society. How can this heritage, this legacy of the Jewish experience, be anything but a treasure for its heirs today? 

When I was a boy, there was a particular blessing used in our local shul (synagogue). The four fingers of each hand  were split to create the Hebrew letter shin representing Shad-dai, the name of the Almighty. When we were creating the television program Star Trek, we needed a salute. I thought back to that hand symbol and proposed it. The rest, as they say, is history. 

Why did I think back to that hand gesture? Actors are always looking for something personal to bring to their professional lives. Maybe, then, it was the convergence of my spiritual and artistic lives. Maybe, in a way, I can call that salute my Vulcan shalom, my greeting of peace, my yearning for the blessing of peace: the age-old quest of the Jewish people, my people. 

Elie Wiesel 
Nobel Peace Prize Laureate, 1986 

I remember: as a child, on the other side of oceans and mountains, the Jew in me would anticipate Rosh Ha-Shanah with fear and trembling. He still does. 

On that Day of Awe, I believed then, nations and individuals, Jewish and non-Jewish, are being judged by their common creator. 

That is still my belief. 

In spite of all that happened? Because of all that happened? 

I still believe that to be Jewish today means what it meant yesterday and a thousand years ago. It means for the Jew in me to seek fulfillment both as a Jew and as a human being. For a Jew, Judaism and humanity must go together. To be Jewish today is to recognize that every person is created in the image of God and that our purpose in living is to be a reminder of God. 

Naturally, I claim total kinship with my people and its destiny. Judaism integrates particularist aspirations with universal values, fervor with rigor, legend with law. Being Jewish to me is to reject all fanaticism anywhere. 

To be Jewish is, above all, to safeguard memory and open its gates to the celebration of life as well as the suffering, to the song of ecstasy as well as the tears of distress that are our legacy as Jews. It is to rejoice in the renaissance of Jewish sovereignty in Israel and the re-awakening of Jewish life in the former Soviet Union. It is to identify with the plight of Jews living under oppressive regimes and with the challenges facing our communities in free societies. 

A Jew must be sensitive to the pain of all human beings. A Jew cannot remain indifferent to human suffering, whether in former Yugoslavia, in Somalia, or in our own cities and towns. The mission of the Jewish people has never been to make the world more Jewish, but to make it more human. 

Alfred H. Moses 
United States Ambassador to Romania 

I had the good fortune of being raised in a traditional Jewish home where the Sabbath was a day of rest, the holidays were days of joy, and the dietary laws were strictly observed. This set me apart from my friends and neighbors. 

Still, in my early years religious observance interfered with my favorite pastimes, playing football and baseball. The highlight of my week was seeing how many innings of baseball I could play before my father dragged me off to synagogue. But by my late teens, I took great pride in being a Jew who knew Hebrew, could recite the traditional prayers from memory, and was a wiz at Jewish Trivial Pursuit. 

The rise of Hitler, the devastation of European Jewry, and the creation of the State of Israel etched in my heart a sense of Jewish peoplehood that would later take me around the world in support of endangered Jewish communities. 

During my lifetime, I have seen enormous changes in the Jewish world. While external threats to the Jewish people have diminished, Jewish continuity in the United States is being questioned as never before. Young Jews ask me "Why be Jewish? In America today you can affirm your identity as a Jew or ignore it." The level of acceptance in our country makes both options acceptable. Being Jewish then is increasingly a matter of choice. 

To their question I answer: Judaism has a 3000-year-old tradition of infusing the spiritual into our everyday lives, not for personal redemption, but to uplift the lot of mankind through adherence to ethical and moral principles, and to preserve through this common endeavor a sense of  connectedness with a people. This, the essence of our Covenant, gives us tools to deal with the disparate and often confusing aspects of modern life. 

For me this has meant combining my career as a lawyer in private practice with communal and public service: as an officer in the Navy, later as Special Assistant in the Carter White House, then as President of the American Jewish Committee, and now as United States Ambassador to Romania, a country I first came to know through helping Jews and others escape from behind the Iron Curtain. 

In all these endeavors I have been inspired by the teachings of the Torah and the Talmud that each of us has an obligation to work to make peoples’ lives better.  

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