VOA标准英语2013--Exhibit at Berlin Jewish Museum Stokes Debate

 

Exhibit¹ at Berlin Jewish² Museum Stokes Debate

The exhibit at Berlin’s Jewish museum seeks to answer frequently asked questions about Jews.

Are all Jews religious? What makes food Kosher?

What do Jews wear on their heads and why? And who can become a Jew?

One display is a plexiglass cube³, open at the front, where a Jew sits every day but Saturday, the Jewish Sabbath, answering questions from museum-goers.

On a recent day, Signe Rossbach, a Jew from Berlin, sat in the cube and talked to non-Jews who approached. She said she wanted to participate because most Germans have never met a Jew.

"They don't meet any Jews, most of them, and I thought this was a great idea," she said.

A German-Canadian couple were surprised by the cube, but they liked it.

"I always seem to find that Germans, my husband being one, and his family, are very undereducated when it comes to knowing who the victims at their hands in the Second World War were," said Karen. "They don't really have any understanding of what a Jew is culturally."

"We come from that generation, we still have part of that guilt⁴ in us, even, even though we never did anything personally," her husband Robert said.

Curator Michal Friedlander, also Jewish, says she was motivated by the fact that many young Germans say the Holocaust⁵ was so long ago, there's no need to discuss it anymore.

"We want them to remember the terrible history but perhaps there is a new way to enter into dialogue," he said.

Historian⁶ Alexander Hasgall, another visitor, said the box is a good idea.

"This exhibition is an experiment. It can really fail, when we see everyone’s just laughing, and nothing else," he said. "But maybe it opens new ways to deal with Judaism, taking into account that German society is evolving⁷, and Jews are a part of this society.”

The exhibit runs until September 1 this year. 

1 exhibit   

vt.展览，展出，陈列；n.展览品；陈列品

参考例句：

• Next week those goods will exhibit in that shop. 下个星期，这些货物将在那家商店展出。
• The economy continued to exhibit signs of decline in September.9月份，经济继续呈现出衰退的迹象。

2 Jewish   

adj.犹太人的，犹太民族的

参考例句：

• The coin bears a Jewish symbol.硬币上有犹太标记。
• They were two Jewish kids;I was friendly with both of them.他们是两个犹太小孩；我同他们都很要好。

3 cube   

n.立方体，立方形；立方；vt.使自乘两次

参考例句：

• The cube of 3 is 27.3的立方是27。
• A cube has six sides.立方体有6个面。

4 guilt   

n.犯罪；内疚；过失，罪责

参考例句：

• She tried to cover up her guilt by lying.她企图用谎言掩饰自己的罪行。
• Don't lay a guilt trip on your child about schoolwork.别因为功课责备孩子而使他觉得很内疚。

5 holocaust   

n.大破坏；大屠杀

参考例句：

• The Auschwitz concentration camp always remind the world of the holocaust.奥辛威茨集中营总是让世人想起大屠杀。
• Ahmadinejad is denying the holocaust because he's as brutal as Hitler was.内贾德否认大屠杀，因为他像希特勒一样残忍。

6 historian   

n.历史学家，编史家

参考例句：

• As a historian,he was most typical of the times in which he lived.作为历史学家，他是他所处时代最有代表性的人物。
• He calls himself a historian,but his books are a mere journalism.他自称为历史学家，但是他的书都是些肤浅的通俗作品。

7 evolving   

adj.进化的，展开的v.演变，进化( evolve的现在分词 )；（动植物等 ）进化，进化形成

参考例句：

• Language is constantly and gradually evolving. 语言在不断地缓慢发展。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Our galaxy is a continuously evolving system. 我们的星系是一个不断演化的星系。 来自辞典例句