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Book Review  by Ida Nasatir

The Challenging Years by Stephen Wise
January 13, 1950—Ida Nasatir book review—Challenging Years by Stephen Wise—Southwestern Jewish Press, page 3 : Challenging Years is not a conventional biography, nor is it a dull recital of personal diaries, triumphs and successes. Dr. Wise with his fine sensitivity and aristocratic temperament, would have disdained doing anything like that. "I would not try to tell the story of these years," he writes in the forward, "if they were to be nothing more than the story of one man's life." In reality, this work is not one man's book, but a resume of the collective heart and experience of the Jewish people. Its pains, its faith, and hopes throb in its pages. Dr. Wise stood out from the crowd: he was different from other men. He bore the burden of his people with a graver and more hurt heart than any other man. And he spoke out for his people. He would not be muzzled, either by the American fascists, or by the frightened and timorous men of his own people. Dr. Wise won his greatest reputation as an orator. He filled it with Jewish content. He taught Jewish men and women to bear their Jewishness with pride and dignity. He was the Jews' greatest apostle to the Gentiles. He preached in as many Christian pulpits as any rabbi in history. But no matter where he spoke or on what platform he stood, he never lost his spontaneity and freedom of his Jewish utterance. He won the fellowship of the Christian world NOT by minimizing his Jewishness, but by asserting it boldly and militantly. He spoke with passion, and with a deep sincerity. To listen to him was an unforgettable experience. When students preparing him for the rabbinate asked him for guidance in the art of public speaking, his advice was: "Have something to say: BELIEVE in what you are going to say, and say it clearly and without fear...A voice of honey is no substitute for the salt of thought.  Dr. Wise was a Zionist before Herzl, before Nordeau, even before the convening of the first Zionist Congress. Zionism had become to him a life-long journey. In his own words, "I journeyed to Basle merely as a delegate to a conference. I returned home a lifelong servant of the cause." Stephen Wise was a man of noble tasks and historic achievements. His autobiography reflects all of this, and hence, Challengeing Years reaches heights of real greatness.