Guide to the National Jewish Welfare Board Military Chaplaincy Records,
1917-1983
(bulk 1940-1974)

I-249

Series I: Minutes, 1940-1980.

Arrangement:

Arranged in three sections according to the format in which the minutes were kept. The minutes in the first section were in five large binders; the second section was loose in folders; and the third section had been kept in 24 small, year-by-year binders. The binders have been removed and their contents foldered. Minutes within each section are arranged chronologically.

Scope and Content:

This series contains minutes of plenary sessions and meetings of the Executive Committee and various other committees of CANRA-DRA-CJC from 1940 through 1980. Various documents are often appended to the minutes: lists and statistics on the status of the chaplaincy, including lists of chaplains on active duty or who were granted ecclesiastical endorsement; reports by the Executive Director detailing problems encountered and policy decisions made since the last meeting; reports of various committees; reports on overseas missions; analytical studies on certain issues of the time; major policy statements; lists of committee membership; and statements regarding the relationship between the NJWB and CANRA-DRA-CJC. The minutes also record the NJWB chaplaincy network involvement with service groups such as the Public Health Service and the federal penitentiary system. The first set of minutes, which precede and document the creation of CANRA, are the minutes of the NJWB Army and Navy Committee’s Committee on Religious Activities.

Large Binders of Miscellaneous Meeting Minutes

Loose Minutes

Small Binders of Miscellaneous Meeting Minutes

Series II: Annual Reports, 1943-1969.

Arrangement:

Arranged chronologically.

Scope and Content:

The reports in this series were submitted annually by the CANRA-DRA-CJC Chairman or Executive Director to the Executive Committee of NJWB. In these concise reports the year’s activities are summarized and major problems are discussed. Historical background is often given in the course of explaining important developments of the year. There is a gap in reports from 1957 to 1961.

Series III: Correspondence, 1927-1932, 1940-1974.

Arrangement:

Scope and Content:

This series contains correspondence on major organizational and policy issues with regard to Jewish chaplaincy in the U.S. Correspondence in the early 1940s is from the office of Philip S. Bernstein, then the Executive Director of CANRA, as well as correspondence received by Aryeh Lev at the Office of the Chief of Chaplains. Correspondence in later years was largely received or generated by Aryeh Lev while he was Executive Director of CANRA-DRA-CJC. Correspondents include Frank Weil, Louis Kraft, David de Sola Pool, Barnett Brickner, Louis M. Levitsky, Joseph H. Lookstein, Milton Weill, Max R. Wainer, Benjamin Rabinowitz, Max Davidson, Elkan Voorsanger, Morris Sandhaus, Solomon Freehof, Joshua Goldberg, Isaac Toubin, Max Braude and Bernard Segal. Army Chief of Chaplains William Arnold and his counterpart in the Navy, Chaplain Robert D. Workman were also often in communication. A large number of letters are from the representatives of the rabbinic organizations, including Central Conference of American Rabbis, Rabbinical Assembly and Federation of Orthodox Rabbis.

Correspondence covers such topics as the evolution of CANRA-DRA-CJC through the wars; the attitude of the three branches of Judaism toward joining in one agency to provide unified ecclesiastical supervision of the Jewish chaplaincy; CANRA-DRA-CJC’s power of endorsement and withdrawal; CANRA-DRA-CJC’s efforts to change an unfavorable ratio of the Jewish chaplains in the armed forces; and anti-Semitism (Folders 57 and 70-71). In addition to correspondence, there are press releases, clippings, minutes, reports and texts of talks.

An important record of contacts between CANRA-DRA-CJC and the military authorities are the memoranda titled “Washington visits” (Folders 73-75). These describe in detail the meetings of the representatives of the CANRA-DRA-CJC with the Chief of Chaplains of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and the Veterans Administration which were held periodically in Washington. This mode of recording the Washington visits was begun by Philip Bernstein and was continued by Aryeh Lev. Procurement, placement, and separation from the service of the chaplains, chaplain training, conferences, retreats, convocations, religious supplies and publications were the topics discussed at most of the meetings.

Series IV: Relations with Chaplains, 1918, 1936-1972.

Arrangement:

Arranged in two subseries.

Scope and Content:

This series consists of materials regarding relations between CANRA-DRA-CJC, individual chaplains and the Office of the Chief of Chaplains. Subseries 1 covers subjects such as procurement and endorsement, and Subseries 2 documents conferences and trips, as well as evaluating reports that were made during visits. Items include correspondence, reports, minutes, talk transcripts, Aryeh Lev’s detailed accounts of trips abroad, photographs and newspaper clippings.

Subseries 1: Subjects, 1918, 1936-1972.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

This subseries consists of correspondence, reports, survey responses, minutes and press releases pertaining to the procurement, endorsement, supervision, and training of Jewish chaplains in the armed forces. The issue of procurement and of proportional representation of the three religious branches in the military is discussed in the letters from and to major Jewish rabbinical organizations and their teaching institutions, the rabbinic seminaries. The voluntary draft which was self-imposed by the American rabbinate in 1941 and abolished during the Vietnam War in 1970 figures prominently in the letters. Correspondence with the Chiefs of Chaplains pertains mostly to establishing a fair chaplain-to-soldiers ratio for Jewish servicemen and to dealing with shortages of chaplains wherever they occur. Chronologically this correspondence focuses mainly on the times of national crises, which for the chaplaincy meant emergency mobilization: World War II, Korean War, Vietnam War. Correspondents include Aryeh Lev, Philip Bernstein, Issac Toubin, Barnett Brickner, William Arnold, Stephen Wise, David de Sola Pool, Louis Kraft, Morton Seidenfeld, Samuel Belkin, Louis Finkelstein, David M. Eichhorn, Edward T. Sandrow and Maurice Lamm.

Subseries 2: Conferences, Evaluations and Trips, 1941-1958.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

Chaplains’ conferences were introduced by David de Sola Pool and Aryeh Lev at the outset of CANRA. The first conference on the Jewish chaplaincy took place at Temple Emanuel in New York, April 1941, and the first conference of the Jewish chaplains was convened in Atlanta on February 20, 1942. The conference folders include talk transcripts, papers delivered, agendas, conference programs, reports and notes.

The Committee on Visits and Committee on Evaluating Reports were responsible for evaluating chaplains in the early 1940s. The “Chaplains Evaluation” folders include correspondence of these committees, reports on visits to the camps and chaplains schools, minutes of meetings of the committees, and evaluations of chaplains’ monthly reports submitted to CANRA. Correspondents include Aryeh Lev, Philip Bernstein, Louis Levitsky, Elkan C. Voorsanger, David de Sola Pool, Max A. Braude, Benjamin Rabinowitz and Max D. Davidson.

The visiting and conference programs were carried overseas to reach those Jewish chaplains who served with U.S. expeditionary forces. The first tour of Latin America, Asia, North Africa and Europe was made on behalf of CANRA and under the auspices of the War Department by Barnett Brickner as the administrative chairman of CANRA and Aryeh Lev as his military aide in December 1943-February 1944 (Folder 104). On the second major tour Philip Bernstein and Aryeh Lev covered the Pacific Theater of Operations in December 1944-January 1945 (Folder 105), and on the third major tour, just after the German surrender, William Arnold and Aryeh Lev visited Europe, including Dachau and Buchenwald, and they met with the Pope (Folder 106). After WWII, Lev continued to keep careful track of his trips. The contents of the trip binders include his detailed accounts of trips, correspondence, clippings, maps, minutes, reports, telegrams, radio addresses and photographs. See Series IX for more photographs from these tours. For more on these overseas tours, see National Jewish Welfare Board, Army-Navy Division Records (I-180): Series VI: Overseas.

Series V: Religious Services and Practices, 1940-1974.

Arrangement:

Scope and Content:

The setting of standards for Jewish religious practice and observance, and approval of religious supplies for the Jewish servicemen are major topics in this series, especially in relation to Kashruth and Passover arrangements. Included is extensive correspondence between the Army Chief of Chaplains and the NJWB on all aspects of Jewish religious practice. Also included are minutes, reports, and correspondence of those committees of CANRA-DRA-CJC which were established to supervise the observance of tenets of Judaism: Committee on Kashruth, Committee on Responsa, and Committee on Supplies.

The kashruth materials address the feasibility of separate kosher kitchens in the camps, the percentage of Jewish soldiers who conscientiously observe kashruth, preparation of canned kosher food, provisioning and distribution, the role of NJWB canteens, and communal hospitality. For more on Kashruth see National Jewish Welfare Board, Army-Navy Division Records (I-180): Subseries XVI: Kashruth. Passover materials consist of reports, clippings, program bulletins and sermons from Passover services, including documentation of a 1969 Passover service in DaNang, Vietnam. For more on Passover see National Jewish Welfare Board Records (I-337): Subgroup III: Veterans' Affairs, Series B: Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, Subseries 6: Passover). Responsa issued by the Responsa Committee can also be found here (many of which were published by CANRA in Responsa in the Time of War), together with queries from chaplains and correspondence by Solomon B. Freehof and other members of the Committee.

Individual correspondents include George G. Marshall, David de Sola Pool, Aryeh Lev, William Arnold, Louis Kraft, Herbert S. Goldstein, Boaz Cohen, Benjamin Rabinowitz, Frank Weil, Max R. Wainer, Jacob Rosenheim, Louis Levitsky, Joseph Lookstein, John Sills, Samuel Gershowitz, Leo Jung, Eric Offenbacher, Max Davidson, Edward Silver, Israel Miller, and Reuben Gross. Organizational correspondents include the UOJC, Young Israel, Rabbinical Council of America, United Synagogue, Rabbinical Assembly, Army Chief of Chaplains, Department of War, and the Department of Defense.

Series VI: Relief Work for Displaced Persons, 1943-1951.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

These papers recount the efforts of Jewish chaplains to rescue and rehabilitate Jewish survivors of the Holocaust, most of whom became displaced persons after liberation in Europe, as well as in China and Japan. The chaplains’ efforts are dramatically depicted in their letters to Philip Bernstein. Discovery of the concentration camps, conditions of the survivors, efforts at organizing normal life in the DP centers in Europe, cooperation with the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, the Army role in relief work – these are the subjects of the correspondence and reports from Europe and other war theaters which reached CANRA at that time. Among the correspondents are the chaplains Isaac Toubin, Herman Dicker, Morris Sandhaus, Eli A. Bohnen, Max Braude and Abraham Klausner; advisors on Jewish affairs in the Army Judah P. Nadich and Philip Bernstein; Joseph C. Hyman and Jonah B. Wise of the AJDC; and Chief of Chaplains Luther D. Miller. Correspondents also include Hannah Arendt, Israel Weisberger, and Aryeh Lev.

Series VII: Publications, [1917], 1920-1929, 1937-1971.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

This series documents the publishing activities of CANRA-DRA-CJC via correspondence and drafts related to the planning and execution of publications, as well as the final copies of newsletters, handbooks, educational booklets and brochures, and prayer books. For additional CANRA-DRA-CJC publications, see Series XI: Printed Matter and the National Jewish Welfare Board Records (I-337): Subgroup III: Veterans' Affairs, Series B: Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, Subseries 7: Prayer Books and Publications. For detailed background on CANRA’s distribution figures and publication strengths, consult Marek Web’s “Historical Resources on the American Jewish Chaplaincy in the Aryeh Lev Archives of the JWB Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy” (available in the YIVO Library and in the National Jewish Welfare Board Records (I-337): Subgroup I: Governance, Series C: Central Records Center, Subseries 5: JWB Administrative Files, Box 242, Folders 17-18.

Series VIII: Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy History Project, 1917-1977.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

Aryeh Lev’s initial idea for a Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy History Project grew out of his concern for a meaningful presentation of the history of the Jewish chaplaincy in the U.S. and of the pivotal role of the NJWB chaplaincy. In 1971, CJC approved Lev’s history project proposal and formed the Research Project Committee, headed by Rabbi Edward T. Sandrow, in order to begin the project. The materials in this series were gathered and created in the course of that project, which was never realized to the full extent of Lev’s original vision.

At the outset of the project, Edward Sandrow issued an appeal to the chaplains to send in their memoirs, diaries, and other materials on their experience in the service. Sandrow himself submitted a number of his private papers on his tour of duty in Fort Riley, Kansas, in Alaska, and at the New York Port of Embarkation, 1942-1945. Included among Sandrow's papers are chapters of the “Journal of a Jewish Chaplain in the U.S. Army,” extensive correspondence with Rabbi Judah Nadich in Europe on sending supplies for the Jewish DPs, and photographs. Among the chaplains who sent in their memoirs and other papers to Sandrow were David Greenberg, Gilbert Kollin, Fred Levin, Emanuel Rackman, Isaac Klein, Avram Soltes, Joel Iskowitz, W. Gunther Plaut, Herman Dicker, and Allan Podet (Folder 200). Rachel Felds, who had been the Activities Director of the Oakland (California) Jewish Community Center and responsible for the USO-JWB Program, sent in a cache of lively WWII-era correspondence (Victory Mail especially) she had received from military servicemen, most of whom were serving in the Pacific Theater (Folder 209).

This series also consists of published and unpublished works on Jewish chaplaincy (reports, masters theses, reprints, newspaper clippings), publications from congregations, NJWB and military releases, chaplains’ recollections, notices and schedules of Jewish services, invitations for religious celebrations, photographs and correspondence with scholarly researchers.

For more background on the project see Marek Web's “Historical Resources on the American Jewish Chaplaincy in the Aryeh Lev Archives of the JWB Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy,” which is available in the YIVO Library and in the National Jewish Welfare Board Records (I-337): Subgroup I: Governance, Series C: Central Records Center, Subseries 5: JWB Administrative Files, Box 242, Folders 17-18.

Series IX: Aryeh Lev Papers, 1936-1976.

Arrangement:

Arranged in four subseries.

Scope and Content:

The papers that Aryeh Lev generated or received in the course of his NJWB duties are throughout this entire collection, but the papers in this particular series relate to Aryeh Lev as an individual: his military service, his personal life, his career with NJWB, and his involvement and leadership in various organizations. Items include correspondence, military records, press releases, clippings, photographs and medals.

Subseries 1: General, 1937-1976.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

This subseries contains clippings and press releases about Lev in his work with NJWB, congregations, Young Judaea and other organizations; autobiographical writings; letters of recommendation, commendation and appreciation; records of his military service and reserve status; and personal correspondence with friends, family and colleagues. Materials which post-date Lev’s death were received or generated by Gilbert Kollin, who had stepped in as Deputy Director of CJC.

Subseries 2: Organizations, 1936-1976.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

This subseries documents Lev’s involvement in scouting, both with the Boy Scouts of America and on the Committee on Scouting of the Central Conference of American Rabbis, as well as his work with the Veterans Administration’s Chaplain Service and the Jewish Family Service. Items include correspondence, bulletins, notes for talks, and medals.

Subseries 3: Sermons, Speeches and Writings, 1939-1974.

Arrangement:

Arranged alphabetically.

Scope and Content:

This subseries contains texts of and research towards Lev’s sermons, speeches, published articles, reports and radio appearances.

Subseries 4: Photographs, 1940-1976.

Arrangement:

Arranged in four subseries.

Scope and Content:

Aryeh Lev appears in the majority of the photographs in this subseries. Other individuals represented include Barnett Brickner, Philip Bernstein, William Arnold, Robert Marcus, Jonah Goldstein, Nathan Landman, various Chiefs of Chaplains, chaplains of various faiths, and members of Lev’s family. Photographs were taken at CJC events, award ceremonies, chaplains’ conferences, and Office of the Chief of Chaplain events. Overseas tour photos are often staged group shots, not candids. Additional photographs of note show religious services conducted during and just after WWII (Folder 273), post-liberation Bad Nauheim Synagogue (Folder 262), Aryeh Lev with Franklin D. Roosevelt (Folder 263), Richard Nixon at a Boy Scouts of America Jamboree in 1953 (Folder 274). A few photographs are accompanied by relevant correspondence and printed materials.

Series X: Register of Jewish Chaplains in the United States Armed Forces, 1941-1983.

Arrangement:

Arranged in three chronological clusters, within which materials are arranged alphabetically by last name.

Scope and Content:

This series contains questionnaires that Aryeh Lev and later Gilbert Kollin solicited from Jewish chaplains in the United States Armed Forces between the 1940s and 1980s. The type of information requested on the questionnaires changes over time, but the questionnaires generally include data on the chaplain’s place of birth, citizenship status, marital status, education, language skills, branch of Judaism, rabbinical positions, organizational affiliations, and military assignments and tours. Some chaplains wrote colorful paragraphs in response to one particular field on questionnaires for “biographical facts of importance.” Photographs are attached to many of the questionnaires, as well as occasional copies of letters of commendation, information on deaths, correspondence, and clippings. For more materials on individual chaplains, see National Jewish Welfare Board Records (Subgroup III: Veterans' Affairs, Series B: Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, Subseries 1: Chaplains Files) (I-337).

1941-1949

1951-1979

1956-1983

Series XI: Printed Matter, 1918, 1937-1979.

Arrangement:

Arranged into three sections: printed matter issued by the NJWB, printed matter issued by the Armed Forces, and printed matter issued by various other entities. Almost all folder titles are the titles of the printed materials contained therein.

Scope and Content:

This series contains newsletters, handbooks, educational booklets and brochures, and prayer books, most of which were issued by NJWB for Jewish soldiers and chaplains. Many of the items in this series had once been kept in NJWB’s library. Publications are often undated; dates in brackets are rough estimates.

Items of note include include CANRA-DRA-CJC’s formal newsletter, "The Jewish Chaplain," as well as CANRA’s informal newsletter, "Schmoose Sheet for Chaplains." In Box 43, there are over 25 prayer books, including “The Haggadah of Passover for Members of the Armed Forces” (1943), “Prayer Book for Jewish Members of H.M. Forces (1940), “La Tefila du Soldat” (1944), “Readings from the Holy Scriptures for Jewish Soldiers and Sailor” (1942), and “Evening Services for the Sabbath and Week-Days” (1918).

For more CANRA-DRA-CJC publications see Series VII: Publications and the National Jewish Welfare Board Records (I-337): Subgroup III: Veterans' Affairs, Series B: Commission on Jewish Chaplaincy, Subseries 7: Prayer Books and Publications.

National Jewish Welfare Board

Armed Forces

Miscellaneous

Addendum: Office of the Chief of Chaplains Correspondence, 1924-1950.

Arrangement:

Arranged in chronological order. Folder numbers were assigned in 2012.

Scope and Content:

This addendum to the collection is comprised of correspondence exchanged between the War Department’s Office of the Chief of Chaplains and the National Jewish Welfare Board from 1924 to 1950. The original material is at the National Archives. Aryeh Lev had the material microfilmed in two reels, which have been separated into the AJHS Microfilm Collection. The materials in the folders are print-outs of the microfilmed correspondence. Correspondents include David de Sola Pool, William Arnold, Louis Kraft, Aryeh Lev and Benjamin Rabinowitz.