Oceans seem to evoke an emotional response in most adults and youngsters. "Deep Six" is a euphemism for throwing something overboard.

On page 50 of Dara Horn's book, "In The Image," she writes, After two weeks in this pit, Mr. Rosenthal finally reaches the Promised Land, and he and all the other Jews on the ship, crawled out of their steerage hellhole to go on the deck to see New York Harbor, the place of their dreams. They crowded over to the side of the deck as the ship pulled in right under the Statue of Liberty, and Mr. Rosenthal was as awestruck as every one else. But then Mr. Rosenthal noticed that the other Jews on the deck weren't just looking at the Statue of Liberty. Instead they  were actually pushing up to the edge of the deck as if they were looking at something in the water. Mr. Rosenthal pushed a little closer, and then he saw why they were all gathered on the side. They were throwing their tefillin overboard. Because tefillin were something for the Old World, and here in the New World they didn't need them any more.

Throwing tefllin in "der yam"--the ocean? A "shandeh un a charpeh" (a shame and a disgrace!)

Dara Horn feels that the story of the cast-off tefillin is true. She found many older people (75+) had heard the story before. A friend of the author had been to a museum in Canada which had a very small Judaica exhibit. There he saw a set of tefillin in a glass case. The caption on the glass case read: "A set of phylacteries recovered from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean."

When Ms. Horn was on a book tour in Florida, "in mitn drinen" (in the middle of everything), an elderly woman in the audience said that she saw the people throwing their tefillin overboard. And, in Memphis, two weeks later, another woman told her the very same thing.

Ms. Horn also relates another second-hand story. Aaron Lansky, who created the National Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, says that when his grandmother arrived in New York Harbor, she threw her Shabbes candlesticks overboard.

Is it a "bubbemayse"--literally, a "grandmother story" as in old wives' tale? What do religious leaders think of her story?

Rabbi James Michaels, of Washington, DC, said, "...the scenario isn't far-fetched. Many European Jews came to this country determined to leave the old ways behind. They have already been influenced by the secular movements (e.g. socialism, Yiddish folk-culture, etc.) which were well known at the time, or they may have simply seen the United States as a place where they could throw away the religious demands of their youth."

Yaakov Rosenblatt said, "I think it is metaphorical. But the fact remains: most Jews saw success as dependent on throwing out Judaism, which was very sad."

Rabbi David P. Hochman said that he had heard the phrase, but "it sounds more like a metaphor than a news report. Just like someone may 'drop their emotional baggage' or 'leave their inhibitions at the door.'" He adds, "There have been thriving religious Jewish communities built by immigrants in New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, and elsewhere since before the waves of immigration in the l890s and 1920s, so I don't attribute much value on such a blanket statement. Mark Twain's "the report of my death was an exaggeration' can be applied to many other modern novelists who may be projecting their issues with Jewish identity onto their characters...I daven in a minyan with an elderly Jew, originally from Vienna, who puts on his tefillin 6 days a week. I will ask him where his were beached."

Rabbi Jon-Jay Tilsen said that he had heard this legend before, but had never actually heard anyone who claims to have done this or seen it done..."In many families that I know, it was not the immigrants, but their children, who wanted to dispense with ritual practice such as tefillin."

Rabbi Adam Stein said, "Yes, an amazing thing happened at the turn of the twentieth century. Some 3 million traditional and orthodox Jews immigrated to America and dropped their Judaism. The next wave of traditional and orthodox Jews to come to America were those who survived the Holocaust and they found America devoid of organized orthodoxy. For most, it was a gradual process in which traditional Jewish attitudes and practice were seen as burdensome 'old-world' ideas, as America was more of a fast paced money making country. And, as I understand, a person who kept Shabbat on Saturday, quite literally couldn't find a job. So as far as tossing religious objects overboard upon seeing the Statue of Liberty, I think that is a bit exaggerated. Maybe someone, somewhere did it, who knows." ("Ver vaist?")

Daniel Aviya said, "Not only did I not hear of it but it sounds to me like some crazy story that you might hear from someone that hates Judaism."

He relates the story of Rav Mohe Fienstein ztal who picked up a container of milk of a particular company, looked at it and then put it down to take a container of milk of another company. When people heard that Rav Moshe put down (rejected) the first company, the company nearly went bankrupt! It was only when Rav Moshe told everyone (in an ad in the NY Times) that he only put down the first container because was empty, that things changed.

Aviya says that "anyone who knows a little bit about tefillin, i.e. holiness, cost...knows that it is absurd that a Jew would throw something like that [into the ocean] and have it destroyed. Like many images in the movies, it is not real."

Rabbi Dan Wiko (Ask A Rabbi) said, "I suspect that it is a metaphor for the immigrants assimilating into the new world. In counseling Holocaust survivors, I've come across those who, out of anger over what they had witnessed and survived, blamed G-d and accused "HIM" of turning "his" back on them and their loved ones, turned their back on "HIM."

Rabbi Wiko also found that those survivors who maintained their faith throughout those horrific times, were better able to adjust to their new life and needed far less in terms of counseling. "Many experienced both guilt at having survived while loved ones perished as well as a stronger  love for G-d for having allowed them to survive. Some of the latter invested their energies in helping the underprivileged or ill," said Wiko.

Sylvia Schildt said that "there were all kinds of misguided notions floating about so why wouldn't this have been one of the flotsam and jetsam here and there among the less educated. I suspect it wasn't all too common. Along with gold in the streets, etc. why not? It makes a nice but sad yarn."

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Marjorie Gottlieb Wolfe is the author of a new book titled, "Are Yentas, Kibitzers, & Tummlers Weapons of Mass Instruction? Yiddish Trivia."