It’s been a bit of a surreal week, to say the least. We spent the remainder of Sunday in the company of Cheryl and David Solomon, Phil and Ruth Farkas and Abigail Hirsch, setting up a tour of the Oskar Shindler Factory Museum, and sampling two of Krakow’s “finest” kosher restaurants, Falafel Shelanu and the Kosher Delight Branch next to the Kupa synagogue. If we had any doubts about the amazing professionalism and logistical prowess of the J-Roots team before (which we did not!) we were humbled by our mishaps in organizing these few simple things. Besides not reserving for the museum in advance, being taken advantage of by cabs (after an Uber and our group could not figure out how to meet up), and not calling the bigger Kosher Delight restaurant to see if they had space (they did not!), everything worked out for the best and we have things to laugh about.
So, we are back home, working to process what we saw and observed in the week in Poland. Clearly, the amazing comradery and support that our one-of-a-kind group gave to each other has been sorely missed by all, as there are dozens of WhatsApp messages being shared daily. There are so many lessons that we learned from visiting the remnants of the tragedy of the Holocaust, and so many important events and stories that will remain in all of our minds. I could not presume to do justice to all the important lessons, but would like to try and highlight a few points.
I would venture to start on a positive note. We learned a lot about resilience and hope. Whether it was from Zvi’s stories and testimonies of the survivors that he has brought back to Poland, from the family histories of those members of the group who are children of survivors, the stories told by Willie, Chaya, Ruby, Phil and others about their families harrowing escapes and about rebuilding their lives in North America, and especially from our amazing travel partner, Josef Lewkowicz, we tangibly saw what people could accomplish despite hardships that none of us can fathom. Survivors created new lives, families, businesses, and networks. Even with the constant specter of the camps, the expulsions, and the degradation clouding all their thoughts, as in the poem read to us in Auschwitz, people found the strength to press on. Was that universal? Unfortunately, no. Was it the most audacious thing that one can imagine? Absolutely yes. Just read the poem “The Survivor” by Primo Levi. This short poem captures the horrors that flow through any normal person’s head after this most traumatic of experiences (see below).
http://famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/primo_levi/poems/3720
Yet, they survived, and in many cases, thrived. I have heard Mr. Lewkowicz's testimony before, but will never tire of his energy and the outlook he wants us to have. We can all learn a tremendous amount about resilience, about keeping focused despite all that is creeping into our heads, and about having a bit of chutzpah and being able to bring more good into the world.
Conversely, the next point is about injustice and cruelty. We are witnesses to the history of some of the most dastardly deeds humans have ever committed against other humans. The testimonies of mass killings and plans for extermination of the Jewish nation included forms of debasement, degradation, and death that are unspeakable. Yet we must speak about them. We must at all costs be willing to talk, expose and protest these horrors. Many people say that with social media, this could not happen again. Monday morning, I met with 4 members of my research team, including a scientist from the Ukraine, a student from Lebanon, and one from Iran. They are all living examples that despite 24-hour news coverage, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, atrocities continue. People do not only not learn from history, but those who wish to have power, and those who hate, do not feel that the atrocities of the past have any bearing on what they do in the present. I won’t start listing all that is going on in our world today, but we all must keep very conscious of the fact that the tragedies of the Holocaust can be repeated again. God forbid they are repeated to the scale of 6,000,000 Jews and 50+ million others who died as a result of the Nazi’s war on humanity. There is no question that these tragedies continue to occur. When will humanity learn?
Finally, I want to just underscore Zvi Sperber and Rabbi Poupko’s key messages about maintaining Jewish culture, learning, and pride, in spite of the taunts, threats and ultimately the death sentence that the Nazis brought upon the Jewish Populations of Eastern Europe during the Holocaust. Poland had been one of the key places that Torah study flourished over the centuries. Other Eastern European countries such as Lithuania, Latvia and Russia were also bastions of preserving Jewish learning and culture. Also, Jews contributed to workers’ movements, unionization, the sciences and arts. During the war, we not only fought, but studied Torah in the Warsaw Ghetto and even in concentration camps. People wrote poetry and importantly, people chronicled what was going on in the towns, ghettos, and the camps, including people who were in hiding and those who had escaped. We should not only take tremendous pride in how these people held up their heads and stated clearly that they are Jews and wanted to preserve our Jewish way of life, the two-thousand-year history of the study of Torah and Jewish law, and our wish to be a light unto the nations, we should emulate this. In fact, we need to embody it, with an exclamation point!
Our group was very special; the participants have been active in the Jewish community and many are very passionate advocates for the community, for Tzedakah projects, and for Jewish learning. As we inch slowly away from the intensity of the trip, let’s retain this passion, and continue our efforts to both continue our personal journey in Jewish education and advocate for others to climb on board.
We look forward to seeing many of you at the Kiddush at BIBA!
Barbara and Bruce
The Survivor by Primo Levi
Once more he sees his companions' faces
Livid in the first faint light,
Gray with cement dust,
Nebulous in the mist,
Tinged with death in their uneasy sleep.
At night, under the heavy burden
Of their dreams, their jaws move,
Chewing a non-existant turnip.
'Stand back, leave me alone, submerged people,
Go away. I haven't dispossessed anyone,
Haven't usurped anyone's bread.
No one died in my place. No one.
Go back into your mist.
It's not my fault if I live and breathe,
Eat, drink, sleep and put on clothes.'
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