Anti-Semitism Not The Issue

It is really throwing a hand-grenade into the middle of a political or academic dispute to charge "anti-Semitism!" and it is just as disruptive to claim that one has been falsely accused of anti-Semitism when nothing of the sort has happened. This is the kind of hand-grenade that Professor Frank Moore Cross throws in his December 13 commentary on the Semitic Museum dispute. I don't think that any reader of Martin Peretz's November 29 Guest Commentary, "Sabotage of the Semitic Museum," could have thought Peretz was suggesting that anti-Jewish views had anything to do with Professor Lawrence Stager's position on the Semitic Museum. Indeed, I would guess that most readers would have assumed, as I did, from Professor Stager's work and title, that he was Jewish. It was also clear from Peretz's article that the issue was whether the scope of the Museum and its exhibits should be limited to concentrate on the ancient Near East. Let the argument be conducted on the issues, on many of which Cross's letter throws important light. Whatever the role of anti-Semitism 60 or 70 years ago, it has nothing to do with the dispute around the Museum today, and Martin Peretz was not suggesting otherwise. Professor of Education and Sociology, Emeritus