Testimonial Tribute to Mr. Alfred Billstein Annual Dinner, Jewish Federation of Toledo, Tuesday, November 24, 1964

By Rabbi Leon I Feuer

I am deeply and very personally grateful for this opportunity to voice their well-earned and richly deserved tribute of our community to my very dear friend, Alfred Billstein.  We have been very close friends or nearly three decades.  I have been one of his staunchest admirers for reasons which I hope to suggest in a few moments.  Our friendship has been sealed by the fact that we are found by a common commitment to what I would describe as the two overriding causes of our time, economic justice and world peace.  The rabbis, our ancient teachers, said:  "The sword comes into the world because of justice delayed or justice perverted."  That very profound maxim, I think, provides the perspective from which both of us have very largely viewed the world and the time in which we live.

Quite inadvertently, Alfred provided me a few weeks ago with the best text or this tribute.  He told me that when he was a young boy he had been quite ill.  The doctors had indicated that the prognosis for his continuing to live was rather poor because he had, among other things, an enlarged heart.  This proved to be a quite inaccurate physical diagnosis, but it was a remarkably correct description of his character and spirit.  We are honoring him tonight, first, for the very simple reason that no man in this community, in proportion to his means, has been more generous or more eager in his response to appeals from worthy causes.  It has never been necessary to persuade, to argue or to cajole him into giving.  It has only been necessary for the advocates of a cause to present it clearly, rationally and intelligently.  Nor should it be necessary to add for those of us who know him, that he has never been sectarian or parochial in his philanthropic interests.  The agencies of the general as well as of the Jewish community have elicited his willing response.

Alfred Billstein is one of those rare men who really understand the uses of money.  And this is so because providence has not only been beneficient to him in a material way, but has also blessed him with the capacity to think.  Therefore,  he is a man who is possessed of a keen sense of social responsibility.  He has always wanted to make use of his substance and his gifts creatively; that is, to try to make a contribution toward improving the basic condition of man.  Somewhere in his subconscious there has always echoed the prophetic injunction, "To feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, and to bring the poor that are cast down to Thy house."

Apart from his generosity, it is the posture of his giving which is so admirable.  He does not seek and has never sought, nor does he desire or ever desired publicity, honors or offices.  In fact, he rejects all such motivations for philanthropy or leadership.  I was personally astonished that he allowed this dinner to be held in his honor.  Apparently, someone did an excellent selling job.

Those of us who feel that we know him best, and I count myself among that number, know however that generosity is certainly not the full measure of this man.  What is far deeper than his philanthropic instinct is his social consciousness.  He regards philanthropy as, at best, a stopgap, a temporary alleviation of social ills.  He knows that for the time being, while we await more permanent solutions, we must do everything possible to alleviate want, distress and human suffering.  But he is also convinced that this is not the real answer.  There must be a more permanent objective for our human efforts, a final end to the chronic problems of hunger and want and homelessness and war.   This may be a far-distant goal, and it may take humanity a considerable while to achieve it, but in the age of swift technological advance, we know that it is an accessible goal.  There always have been and there must always be some men who cherish the dream that this goal will be reached.  Alfred is that kind of man.  Such men are radicals in the best meaning of the term, which is, that they want to get at and believe that we human beings have the capacity to get at the roots of the social problems.  After all, has this not really been the historic aim of our faith, of our Jewish heritage, the burden of the teachings of the prophets of Israel.  Has this not been the goal of our Messianic strivings?  The fact that Alfred is this kind of person, that he shares this dream, is what for me makes him more of a Jew than the followers of prescribed rituals and those who wear the term "Jew" on their sleeves.

There is one additional reason why I admire this man so much and why I often wish that there were many more young people who would follow his example.  It always saddens me to see young people, bright and capable young people, graduate from college and settle into comfortable suburban niches, forgetting their youthful idealism and giving little or no thought to the needs and problems of their fellow men, little or no consideration beyond what they can get for themselves personally in the way of goods and comforts.  They have stopped thinking and have stopped being challenged.   Alfred is remarkable in that he has never lost interest in life, in the world, in his fellow men, in what is new and adventurous in the universe about him.  Every day is a novel experience for him.  Every day he wonders about what in this existence can be made new and better.  For him each day is filled with intellectual curiosity, with something new to learn, with something new to think about.  For him, in the words of our Prayer Book, God renews daily the work of creation.

So, Alfred, it is with a great sense of privilege and pleasure that I discharge the task which has been assigned to me, in token of the respect and affection of our whole community, to present to you this beautifully written and artistically framed resolution with the hope and the prayer that our kind Father in Heaven will permit you - and Brunette - to stay around for a long time and bless us with your presence.