“Ghetto is impotence. Cultural cross-fertilization is the only possibility for human development.”
Isaac Leib Peretz (1852–1915) Yiddish language author and playwright
Vegn vos Firn op fun Yidishkeit, 1911. S. Liptzin. Peretz. Yivo, 1947, p. 378.
Context: We should get out of the ghetto, but we should get out as Jews, with our own spiritual treasures. We should interchange, give and take, but not beg. Ghetto is impotence. Cultural cross-fertilization is the only possibility for human development.