ta m ta muz 5764 • june 2004 u.s.a. $3.50/foreign $4.50...

Tamuz 5764 • June 2004U.S.A. $3.50/Foreign $4.50 • VOL XXXVII/NO. 6

Tamuz 5764 • June 2004U.S.A. $3.50/Foreign $4.50 • VOL XXXVII/NO. 6

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OBSERVEROBSERVERJewishJewishTHE

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EDITORIAL BOARD

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RABBI ABBA BRUDNYJOSEPH FRIEDENSONRABBI YISROEL MEIR KIRZNERRABBI NOSSON SCHERMANPROF. AARON TWERSKI

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Tamuz 5764 • June 2004U.S.A.$3.50/Foreign $4.50 • VOL XXXVII/NO. 6

25

Statement of Policy

IKVESA DE’MESHICHA - HEARING THE FOOTSTEPS...

6 Learning the Lessons… or Living Them Again,Rabbi Nisson Wolpin

11 “Don’t Take Our School Away,” Mayaan Jaffe

14 Rabbi Avrohom Kalmanowitz l”xz, 40 Years After His Passing,Rabbi Avrohom Birnbaum

THE GENERATION AFTER CHURBAN EUROPE – PLUS ONE

23 “Aneinu… For We Are in Great Distress” – Today,Rabbi Elkanah Schwartz

25 The Mystery of 1964, Rabbi Yaakov Salomon

29 The Survivor, Mrs. Naomi Lobl

30 Avoda Mitoch Atzvus –Serving Hashem Amidst Sadness,Rabbi Yaakov Shlomo Weinberg

BOOKS IN REVIEW

36 Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld:“Hero” – Or “A Life Fully Lived”? by Rabbi Moshe Eisemann – on Dr. David Kranzler’s Holocaust Hero

38 The “Cantonist” Epoch in Tsarist Russia, by Rabbi Hillel Goldberg – on Dr. Larry Domnitz’s The Jewish Children’s Army of the Tsar

40 The Depth and Beauty of Yerushalayim, by Rabbi Boruch Leff – onRabbi Moshe Eisemann’s Harp Strings and Heart Strings

ON THE AGENDA

46 A Torah, Not a Template, Rabbi Avi Shafran

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IKVESA DEMESHICHA / HEARING THE FOOTSTEPS Nisson Wolpin

NON-TRANQUIL TIMES

In times of crisis, we tend to fall backon our old, faithful support systems– or safety nets, if you will. A drop

in income? There are savings in the bank.Evicted from your apartment? Parents,relatives or close friends will opentheir doors for you. The SUV is out ofcommission? Take the sedan. Or a cab.Or a bus.

The same is true on the national level,as well as in the international arena.Dedicated allies, loyal trade partners, like-minded coalition members, alternativesuppliers of vital materials. Someone isusually there to step in or bail you outin your desperate situation.

Usually…. Hopefully…. Most of thetime, anyway.

The current era hardly consists oftranquil times. On the internationalscene, no country is truly secure fromterrorist activity. Specifically, Americastands almost alone in its interventionin Iraq. The nation itself is torn by uncer-tainty regarding foreign policy as well asdomestic priorities. The economy isunstable. The price of oil has reachedunprecedented heights.

Similarly, Israel is isolated in the worldcommunity and is roundly condemnedfor any pre-emptive strike against ded-icated murderers, while Arab perpetra-

tors of hideous crimes rarely even get aslap on the wrist. Moreover, anti-Semitism has become common in manyEuropean countries, once again.

On yet a different level, sense of shameand decency in America has eroded tothe point of nonexistence. Some statesare considering recognizing1 same-gender marriages, legitimizing thatwhich the Torah terms repulsive.Leading firms’ CEOs as well as electedand appointed officials have been con-victed of insider trading, embezzlement,and fraud, leading to a society where“almost anything goes.”

Is there a lesson for us to learn, a mes-sage the Creator is sending to us throughthe flow of events?

THROUGH THE LENS OF A DIFFERENT CRISIS

Just over 30 years ago, we were goingthrough a similarly confusing,threatening down-spin, during and

in the aftermath of the Yom Kippur War.On that fateful Day of Atonement in1973/5734, Arab armies had sprung amulti-pronged surprise attack on Israel.Part of the Israeli leadership panicked,and the invincible hero, General MosheDayan, exclaimed,“We are on the brinkof the Third Churban!”Only through the

intervention of America, under the(unpopular) leadership of PresidentRichard Nixon, did Israel receive atimely shipment of arms to help it over-come the invading forces. Yes, Israel didwin the military battle, but where did thisleave us?

After the victory, oil prices in Americareached unprecedented levels, and part-ly as a result, the cost of sugar, coffee andother imported goods spiraled upward.Jews in general and Israelis in particularwere no one’s hero. In fact, the slogan onsome streets was: “Don’t burn oil, burnJews.” The sense of desperation was anunspoken “Where do we go from here?”

At the national convention ofAgudath Israel of America thatNovember, the late Rosh Hayeshiva,Rabbi Moshe Feinstein l”xz, addressedthe situation:

This is a time of crisis for Israel, butwe must not lose faith. The Torahinstructs us, “Be wholehearted withHashem your G-d”(Devarim 18,13),andRashi comments that we should notspeculate as to the future, but rather, wemust realize that we are in good hands.

Wars do not follow natural guide-lines. They are fully miraculous eventsand are directly manipulated by theHand of G-d. I shall cite just two his-torical events that bear this out: Undernatural conditions, Bar Kochba, whose

6 The Jewish Observer, June 2004

1 Massachusetts already has.

forces were stronger than the Romanarmy, should have been victorious overthe Romans. He erred, however, whenhe asked Hashem not to interferewith the course of the battle by help-ing either him or the enemy. For thishe was punished, and vanquished(Gittin 57a and Midrash Rabba Eicha2:4). One cannot say,“I’ll do it alone,”but rather one must be fully aware that“Hashem is the Master of war” anddirects all warfare without even theguise of a natural order.

By contrast, Yehonasan, with onlyhis weapons carrier to assist him, tookon the Philistine Army, saying,“Thereis nothing preventing Hashem fromdelivering the enemy, whether to manyor to few” – and, indeed, they were vic-torious (Shmuel I, 14,6). Of course, asa rule, one must not rely on miracles.Yet, Yehonasan did, even in war, out ofthe fullest realization that nothing inwarfare is ever short of the miraculous.2

The Rosh Hayeshiva lamented the factthat we, too, attributed the Israeli victoryto its military prowess.That was the wronglesson to gain from the course of events.He drew from the Mishna at the end ofMesechta Sota to show the folly of relyingon one’s own strength. The Mishnadescribes the era known as “IkvesadeMeshicha” – literally, the Footsteps ofMessiah,when people can,so to speak,hearhis footfalls as he draws near:

With the footsteps of the Messiah,insolence will increase, and inflation willsoar; the vine will give its fruit but winewill be dear; and the government willbe guilty of betrayal, and there will beno rebuke; meeting places will be usedfor immorality…; border dwellerswill wander about from city to city,without pity; the knowledge of schol-ars will be lost; those who fear sin willbe despised, and the truth will be hid-den; youths will shame old men andold men will stand up for youngsters;the face of the generation will be likethe face of the dog; [and] the son is notashamed before his father. On whomcan we rely? [Only] on our Father inHeaven.

THE MISHNA’S LESSONS FOR THE WAR’S AFTERMATH

Reb Moshe pointed out that peo-ple generally feel reasonablysecure when the social, political

and economic support systems of theirlives are in place. But should each of theseprops be knocked away from them, theycome to the realization that “We have noone to rely upon but our Father inHeaven.” Indeed, he declared, what wehad been experiencing was a livingembodiment of that Mishna’s lesson.

Reb Moshe then referred to theusual setting of absorbing a lesson – theclassroom. Once the teacher has clari-fied the relevant concept, and the proofshave been enumerated, the conclusionsshould be clear. The students are testedon the material. If they pass the test, fine.When the dismissal bell rings, they cango home. But should an inattentive ordistracted student not respond proper-ly to the questions, the rebbi or teacherwill keep him after school. His friendsmay wait impatiently in the playgroundwhile the teacher repeats the lesson – withgreater emphasis, underscoring thebases for the conclusions. The studentsquirms and sweats. Will he learn and passthe test?

In regard to our own situation in 1973,said Reb Moshe:

After suffering material and spiri-tual deprivations, the Mishna predictsthat we will come to realize that we canrely only on Hashem. All the sufferingwe endure until then is geared towardbringing us to this ultimate realization,and the sooner we come to it, the soon-er will we be spared more lessons.During the War of ’67, we wereexposed to the Hand of G-d. Had weall been fully aware of what we had wit-nessed and the impact of all the sto-ries we had heard, if we but had learnedthe lessons that He is the only sourceof our victory, we would not have need-ed this recent war – the Yom KippurWar – to awaken us!

As long as we persist in attributingsuccess to “my might and the power ofmy hand,” we are still in need of fur-ther lessons that there is no such thing;

“my might and the power of myhand” are nonexistent.3

Not having absorbed the message ofthose earlier events, the Master of theWorld has “kept us after school,” so tospeak, to continue teaching us our les-son, with even greater emphasis than inthe past.

MESSAGES FROM HISTORY– REPEATED AGAIN

In the thirty-plus years since the RoshYeshiva’s distillation of the lessons ofthat war, we still have not absorbed

the message, and the very same lessonsare as timely as ever. Today’s society ingeneral, and the Jewish community inparticular, are being haunted by the verysame crisis situations, only with muchgreater intensity.

Let us survey today’s scene from theperspective of the Mishna’s description:

• In a society built on people’s basicdecency and etiquette, we are con-stantly being confronted with an “in-your-face” mode of expression. In thewords of the Mishna, “Chutzpa yasgei –insolence will increase… and meetingplaces will be used for immoral purposes.Those who fear sin will be despised.”

• There was a time when elders wererespected, and their experience wasvalued. Not in this era of the YouthCulture. We can again quote the Mishna:“Youths will shame old men and old menwill stand up for youngsters.”

• Remember when prices were stable,people were sober, and investments weresecure? But today,addictions are common,and in the case of some key needs such asoil, housing and dairy products, inflationis rampant.Says the Mishna:“Inflation willsoar, the vine will give its fruit, but[because of demand] wine will be dear.”

• The government in America wasonce popular, the political and financialleaders were respected and trusted, andthe ruling coalition in Israel had beenvoted in by a vast majority. But currently,the opposite is true in case after case.

Headlines scream of betrayal of theinterests of investors by America’scorporate heads and the trust of vot-

The Jewish Observer, June 2004 7

2 Translation, as published in The JewishObserver, Nov. ’73. 3 From the same article

ers by political leaders. [At this writ-ing, today’s paper – The New York Times,May 28, ’04 – reports of the indictmentof the former governor of Alabama forcorruption and bid-rigging; more onConnecticut’s governor’s mishandlingof funds; the Federal Reserve’s order toCitigroup to pay $70 million for abus-es in personal and mortgage loans; thecivil suit against Richard A. Grasso, for-mer head of the NY Stock Exchange,that he repay more than $100 millionof his “excessive” $139.5 million paypackage; and the corruption and waste

on the part of the NEC BusinessNetwork Solutions, and the demandthat it be charged with $20.7 millionin fines and restitution.] It is precise-ly as the Mishna predicted: “The gov-ernment will turn to heresy [that is,betrayal of its mission], and there willbe no rebuke [or review by the courts]of the accusations.”

• Israel’s borders were once secure, butno longer. In the three-and-a-half yearssince the Intafada was launched, the vio-lence began with stones hurled over thewall from the Temple Mount onto the

plaza below on Erev Rosh Hashana, esca-lating to rashes of devastating suicidebombings. As the Mishna had predict-ed: “The border dwellers will wanderabout… without pity.”

• The courts of law and the legisla-tures had honored morality, at least asa basis of society. And while visual anddramatic arts violate all respectful lim-itations, at least the villain got hiscomeuppance in drama and literature.But no more. As the Mishna said it:“Those who fear sin will be despised, andthe truth be hidden.”

• The authority of the rabbis was onceuncontested. And pursuit of Torahknowledge was long considered thehighest calling among Jews, based on amillennia-old system and sacred tradi-tion. But in Israel, the virulently anti-reli-gious Shinui Party has instituted aradical reduction in government supportfor Torah-study institutions, cuttingoff stipends to hundreds of heretoforethriving kollelim, as well as shrinking vitalallocations to elementary and second-ary schools and for essential religiousservices and salaries for personnel.Don’t we hear echoes of the Mishna’s pre-scient comment? – “The knowledge ofscholars will be lost.”

So the lessons come home. In theabsence of conventional supports for alife of decency, integrity, and security, theconclusion should be incontrovertible:“On whom can we rely? [Only] on ourFather in Heaven.”

THE LESSONS COME HOME

Frustration and disillusion shouldnot lead to despair, only to a reap-praisal of where our trust and alle-

giances are to be assigned. Once we learnthe lessons, we will not be “kept afterschool” by a Taskmaster Who does notrelish repeating the message with yetmore dramatic exposition. Our under-standing of the dynamics of survivalshould make it unnecessary for Him toreinforce our recognition that: “Onwhom can we rely? [Only] on ourFather in Heaven.” Neither governmentsnor financial systems, neither society’sinnate decency nor its sense of respect


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will make us secure. We will look onlyto Him to keep us safe and secure.

Perhaps we might gain a bit moreinsight by reviewing one of the incidentsthat was recorded in the aftermath of theYom Kippur War, as reported by the lateRabbi Shraga Grossbard l”xz, then headof Israel’s Chinuch Atzmai educationalsystem:

In a shul in Zichron Moshe, a youngman, after being called up to theTorah, bentched goimel – the blessingto G-d for having survived a life-threat-ening situation. I asked him what hadoccurred. He began his reply in mat-ter-of-fact tones, but he quickly chokedwith emotion:

“The other three who were with mein the tank were not religious, so I wasalone in my Tehillim saying. Then ashell struck the hatch, and, in effect,sealed us inside. The tank started toburn, and we realized that there was noescape.

“The others eyed me anxiously, andone of them broke out with a plea,‘You’re a dati. You know what to do.What does one say at the last minute?’

“I told them ‘Shema Yisroel,Hashem Elokeinu, Hashem Echad.’Together we screamed: ‘ShemaYisroel….’ Then, miraculously – couldit be anything but a miracle? – anoth-er shell hit the spot where the first onehad landed. The hatch blew open andwe all scrambled to safety…. So nowI bentched goimel.”

[To this, Rabbi Grossbard added:]It struck me that perhaps that was allthat G-d had wanted from them: to real-ize that they were at His mercy.Knowing this, and expressing it inShema, is enough. Then the trap canbe sprung, their fate unsealed.

Now, it seems that last moments areindeed approaching. It is time that werecognize it and join voice, shoutingtogether “Shema Yisroel HashemElokeinu Hashem Echod.”4

Apparently, we did not respond thenas was expected. Are we perhaps moreready today to join voices in declaring“Shema”? Are we finally prepared to liveup to the call of the hour? ■


4 From another article in the Nov.’73 JO.

THE VORT

• The Vort celebration is to bediscontinued. The L’chaim (held at the time that the engagement isannounced) should also not turn into aVort.

THE WEDDING

• Only 400 invited guests may be seated at the chassuna seuda.

• The kabbolas panim smorgasbordshould be limited to basic cakes, fruit plat-ters, a modest buffet, and the caterer’sstandard chicken or meat hot dishes.

• The menu for the seuda is limited to 3courses followed by a regular dessert.

• No Viennese table and no bar.

THE MUSIC• A band may consist of a maximum of5 musicians (one of the musicians may actas a vocalist) or four musicians and oneadditional vocalist.

• A one-man band is recommended.

FLOWERS & CHUPA DECOR

• The total cost of these items for theentire wedding should not exceed $1,800.

FOR THE FULL VERSION OF THE SIMCHA GUIDELINESAND THE ACCOMPANYING KOL KOREH,

please email [email protected] or call 212-612-2300

Simcha GuidelinesSimcha Guidelines

Rabbi Shmuel BirnbaumRosh Hayeshiva, Mirer Yeshiva

Rabbi Elya SveiRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva Gedola of Philadelphia

Rabbi Shmuel KaminetzkyRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva Gedola of Philadelphia

Rabbi Yaakov PerlowNovominsker Rebbe

Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak FeigelstockRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva of Long Beach

Rabbi Moshe WolfsonMashgiach, Yeshiva Torah Vodaas

Rabbi Aron Moshe SchechterRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva Chaim Berlin

Rabbi Yosef RosenblumRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva Shaarei Yosher

Rabbi Eli Simcha SchustalRosh Hayeshiva, Bais Binyomin, Stamford

Rabbi Yisroel RokowskyRabbi Yisroel Simcha SchorrRoshei HaYeshiva, Yeshiva Ohr Somayach

Rabbi Aryeh Malkiel KotlerRosh Hayeshiva, Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood

Rabbi Yisroel Tzvi NeumanRosh Hayeshiva, Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood

Rabbi Dovid Tzvi SchustalRosh Hayeshiva, Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood

Rabbi Yeruchem OlshinRosh Hayeshiva, Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood

Rabbi Mattisyahu SalamonMashgiach, Beth Medrash Govoha, Lakewood

Rabbi Elya Ber WachtfogelRosh HaYeshiva, Yeshiva Gedolah of

South Fallsburg

Rabbi Chaim Boruch WolpinRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva Karlin Stolin

Rabbi Zecharia GelleyRav, Khal Adas Jeshurun

Rabbi Lipa MarguliesRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva & Mesifta Torah Temimah

Rabbi Dovid KviatChairman, Conference of Synagogue Rabbonimof Agudath Israel

Rabbi Shlomo MandelRosh Hayeshiva, Yeshiva of Brooklyn

Rabbi Ephraim WachsmanRosh Hayeshiva, Mesivta Meor Yitzchok

We the rabbinical signatories — barring familial obligations — and unusual andextraordinary circumstances — will not participate in or attend a wedding celebration thatdisregards these guidelines. (Rabbinical Listing in formation)


Mayaan Jaffe

Two Schools: “Prettier” Versus “Better”

While in Israel last month toaddress Lev L’Achim’s massiveannual gathering of bnei

Torah, three members of the MoetzesGedolei HaTorah (Council of TorahSages) of Agudath Israel of America –Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky, RabbiAharon Schechter, and Rabbi AvrohomChaim Levin — visited the Sha’arei Tzionelementary school in Ashdod. Little couldthey have imagined, as they listened tothe moving stories of the children, thatjust a few weeks later the fragile trailershousing the school’s 260 students wouldbe completely removed by oversizedmoving trucks. Sha’arei Tzion thusbecame the latest battleground in theongoing efforts by secular residents andlocal authorities to prevent the spreadof religious schools in Israel.

On their visit to Sha’arei Tzion, theRoshei Yeshiva were brought to tears whenthey heard Liel, 12, relate how she foughtwith her secular parents to learn in aTorah school. When her parents refusedto buy her modest clothing, Liel pur-

chased her only skirt with the money shehad been saving her entire life. Today,Liel and her family are well on the pathto teshuva.

Sharon, 11, an immigrant fromFrance, told how she learned in a near-by secular school with large, air-condi-tioned classrooms. Asked which schoolwas nicer, she told the Roshei Yeshiva,“The school across the street is pretti-er, but this school is better.” Given thechance to ask the Roshei Yeshiva for aberacha, Sharon timidly requested thatshe be blessed to grow stronger in herteshuva process.

The physical contrast betweenSharon’s previous school and Sha’areiTzion could not be starker. Sha’arei Tzionis housed in makeshift mobile homes –little more than a thin sheet metal exte-rior covering a cardboard interior. In thewinter, the roofs leak and the childrenfreeze. In the summer, they swelter, with-out fans or air conditioners. The class-rooms are crammed and there is almostno space to play outdoors.

Across the street, a large modernschool building stands empty for wantof any students. Yet, despite Sha’areiTzion’s desperate need for a building, the

Ashdod municipality has refused to allo-cate it either the empty school buildingacross the street or any other buildingin the city. The municipality has evenrefused to issue a permit for Sha’areiTzion’s current location. Without apermit, Sha’arei Tzion has not been ableto continue payments on the trailers thatit inherited from a previous school onthe site.

The Rechovot Precedent

In recent years, the burgeoningnetworks of religious schools inIsrael have had numerous obstacles

placed in their path by secular author-ities. In addition, Israeli courts, fromthe Supreme Court on down, have beenvery sympathetic to complaints ofsecular residents about the location ofreligious facilities in their neighbor-hoods, even where those facilities pri-marily serve neighborhood residents.In the most dramatic case, the IsraeliSupreme Court overruled theRechovot city council, which hadvoted overwhelmingly on three occa-sions to allocate a piece of land for aLev L’Achim Center.

Mrs. Jaffe, of Jerusalem, is a freelance writer. Thisis her first appearance in these pages.

Dismantling theSchool of Ashdod,

Breaking the Heartsof its Children

Without ever visiting Rechovot orknowing anything of the neighborhoodin question (which has a religiouslydiverse population and is, in any event,separated by a four-lane boulevard fromthe proposed Center), the Court forcedLev L’Achim to abandon construction ofthe Center in which, relying on the city’spromises, it had already invested hundredsof thousands of dollars.

So it was no surprise when theAshdod District Court ruled favorablyon a petition by secular residents of theneighborhood in which Sha’arei Tzionis located (and in which most of its stu-dents live), especially after hearing fromthe municipality that it favored removalof the school. The mayor admitted can-didly that he expected the parents ofSha’arei Tzion students, most of whomare still not fully observant, to cave inand send their children to the local sec-ular schools.

Massive Moves in the Morning

In the middle of the school day, justa few weeks after the visit of theRoshei Yeshiva, massive movers inter-

rupted the morning learning and beganhoisting the trailers with all the school’sequipment inside. Children and parentsdid not even have time to remove the stu-dents’ personal belongings before themovers began.

When a group of third-through-fifth-graders returned from a field trip to seetheir school in mid-air, they sobbeduncontrollably.

“My Siddur! My Siddur is in that car-avan,” a little girl cried.“How will I daventomorrow without my Siddur?”

Another child, fifth-grader Ishai,started praying.“Please, Hashem, if Youwill save my school, I will stop wearingpants and watching TV.”

Her gentle head hanging forward, tearsstreaming down her face, fifth-graderDanit exclaimed,“I don’t understand. Inthe morning we had a beautiful littlehome. Now we have nothing.”

Tehilla, a 12-year-old who has beenlearning at the school since first grade,said that as she watched the workmen

Above: Rabbi Aharon Schechter - Rosh Yeshivas Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin, blesses newly religious youth during avisit to the Sha’arei Tzion Torah School in Ashdod as the Lev L’Achim Chairman, Rabbi Menachem Cohen, lookson. Photo by Mayaan Jaffe.

Rabbi Shmuel Kaminetsky, Rabbi Avrohom ChaimLevin, and Rabbi Aharon Schechter visit the Sha’areiTzion elementary school in Ashdod

Dais at the reception for the visiting Roshei Yeshiva

break apart the school, she felt her heartwas breaking, too.

“I went into one of the classrooms andI saw the teacher’s writing on the black-board. I looked at all the beautiful dec-orations and the sifrei kodesh, and I justcouldn’t take it anymore,” she saidthrough the tears. “This is my house.They are destroying my home. When theworkers nearly pushed me out of theclassroom door, all I could do was cry.Finally, I sat down and davened,” Tehillasaid.

Tehilla comes from a totally secularhome. Her parents chose to enroll herin Sha’arei Tzion after speaking with oneof Lev L’Achim’s enrollment workers.Later, she said, she and her parents forgeda “deep connection” with the institution.

Tehilla admits that originally she wasopposed to attending a Torah school.

“I was against the school and theteachers. But their love, patience andunderstanding brought me close. Theywould hug me when I was upset, andwork with me each step of the way. NowI am so proud of my accomplishmentsand I feel beautiful in my long skirts,socks and long sleeve shirts. My moth-er covers her hair and my family is keep-ing Shabbat.”

The Unanticipated Response

This particular saga, at least, has ahappy ending. Mayor Tzvi Tzilkerhad not counted on the reaction

of the mostly secular parents to the lossof their children’s school. They stormedhis office that night. Shocked by the vehe-mence of the parents’ response, the citycouncil not only ordered the return ofthe trailers, it even allocated money topay off part of the outstanding debt onthe trailers.

The following Sunday morning, a

group of 50 parents went again to themayor’s office and threatened to holdclasses on the lawn of City Hall if a per-manent structure was not found. MayorTzilker replied, “There are many won-derful secular schools in Ashdod.Why don’t you enroll your chil-dren there? Who needs aTorah education?”

But the parents wouldnot relent. Their childrenhad already sufferedenough in the secularsystem, they told themayor, and theywould settle fornothing other thanSha’arei Tzion.

Miri, the moth-er of three boys inSha’arei Tzion, spokefor all the parents, whenshe said, “The publicschools in Israel offernothing for us. No otherschool in the area offerssuch a high level of educa-tion coupled with Torah andmiddot tovot. You can search all overAshdod for a spiritual place to send yourchild. You will find this is the only one.”

The best the mayor would promisewas that Sha’arei Tzion could maintainits trailers for another year. But he wouldnot commit to finding a permanentstructure, as required by law, despite theexistence of a suitable building rightacross the street.

So next year, 400 Jewish children willat least have a religious school to learnin. The roofs will leak, and they will suf-fer from the heat in the summer and thecold and rain in the winter, but insidetheir flimsy walls, they will be learningTorah with great thirst. ■

EDITORIAL POSTSCRIPTAs we continue to pray for “Acheinukol Beis Yisroel” – around the worldand in Eretz Yisroel – we do not hes-itate to lavish millions of dollars onsimchos, failing to respond to theproclamation of Gedolei Yisroel thatwe exercise restraint. Wouldn’t it ele-vate a simcha if a card would graceevery table with the following mes-sage:“The monies saved by adheringto the Rabbinical Guidelines ForSimchos are being dedicated to fund-ing construction of the building ofthe Sha’arei Tzion School in Ashdod,as well as other worthy causes.”

Dr. Aaron Twerski


THE GENERATION AFTER CHURBAN EUROPE – PLUS ONE Rabbi Elkanah Schwartz

Aneinu Hashem… Answer us, OL-rd, answer us on the day of our fast,for we are in great distress…. For You,O L-rd, are He Who answers in timeof trouble, Who redeems and deliversin all times of woe and stress.

The brief “Aneinu” prayer recitedon fast days was composed manygenerations ago.Yet the sages who

composed it knew that until the com-ing of Moshiach, there would be no peri-od in the Jewish experience when thestatement “we are in great distress”wouldbe out of place.

Even though each fast day marks aspecific event, or series of events, in ourhistory, it also becomes an occasion torefer to the current state of “great dis-tress.” And it becomes fitting to remindourselves of how, through the centuries,each generation of Jews experienced its“great distress.”

For our current generation, review-ing the “great distress” of ChurbanEurope, the recent period of destructionof European Jewry, is particularly vital.It is still close enough to be personal,while already far enough to be distant.An urgent element is the fact that it isslipping ever further away. We have muchground to cover before, all too soon, thepersonal ties that we still maintain

with that generation become lost.Three of the public fast days – Tzom

Gedalia, the Tenth of Teves, and the Fastof Esther – occur during the school year,when youth groups are also active. Theother two fasts, on the Seventeenth ofTamuz and on the Ninth of Av, occurduring camp season. Educators areoften hard put as to what to do for thosedays. We need an approach for each ofthese five fast days – in the schools, inthe youth groups, and in the camps.

These chinuch institutions should pre-pare appropriate programs, using sur-vivors, teachers and videos, carefullyselected. Such programs, however, canneither provide all the basic informationthat our youth need, nor include in themenough of the vital hashkafos that theyshould learn from the great tragedy.Hence the Roshei Yeshivos called on TorahUmesorah to institute the Zechor YemosOlam program, to develop a curriculumfor our schools and to train teachers toimplement it. A goodly number ofschools have cooperated in this program,but it should be clear that much, muchmore must be done in this respect.

Churban Europe is often defined interms of the destruction of Six MillionJews, but it also means the destructionof Jewish institutions and Jewish com-munities. It means that synagogues andschools, homes and centers of Jewishlife, yeshivos and Chassidic courtswere destroyed. And then, we must note

that the institutions and communitiesthat the post-Churban generations arebuilding in America, Israel and otherplaces around the world, all provide liv-ing proof of the vitality of the Jewishpeople and their capacity to survive inthe face of suffering. The growth ofTorah life today, then, should be appre-ciated as the legacy of that which wasdestroyed, but not defeated. Everyachievement for Torah derives from theashes of those whose lives were cut shortin pursuit of similar achievements.

Implicit in remembering is theneed to understand what was saved andwhat survived, and why. For as muchas we must learn about who sufferedand what was destroyed, so much moremust we learn and understand why weare destined to be living and surviv-ing. This is one of the messages of thediscussions that follow. ■

Rabbi Schwartz serves as Rabbi of CongregationKol Israel in Brooklyn, NY, and is a staff mem-ber of the American office of Chinuch Atzmai-Torah Schools for Israel.

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THE GENERATION AFTER CHURBAN EUROPE – PLUS ONE Rabbi Yaakov Salomon

The year was 1964. The World’s Fair opened in FlushingPark. Some far-out location called Vietnam dominated thenews. The Mets played their first game at Shea Stadium.

And Dallas’ “grassy knoll” was becoming a familiar term in theAmerican lexicon. Those were the headlines that danced in themind of a twelve-year-old New York City boy.

That boy was me.Life was good, I recall. Lots of friends, loving parents, “Leave

it to Beaver,” my trusty Vada Pinson black outfielder’s glove, andan older brother to show me the ropes. What could be bad?

I suppose that in my own naïve way, I was decidedly unawarethat there was anything special or distinctive about being a childof Holocaust survivors. Everything seemed so very normal. Infact, it was.

As it turns out, many of my baby boomer friends were of sim-ilar ilk. Their parents had also either spent years in camps of vary-ing degrees of horror, or had barely escaped the clutches ofcatastrophe on more than one occasion, and lived to tell aboutit. But looking back, I find it odd that we were all so obliviousto our unique lineage. We never compared notes, never won-dered if were “different,” never discussed how our parents’ suf-fering and deprivation may have affected us, never seemed toeven notice that we were members of this proud yet sad club.Not in class, not in the synagogue, not even during sleepoverswhen the darkness sheltered our fragility. Never.

And I guess that’s how our folks really wanted it to be.“Blendin, be normal, forget the past, look ahead…,” read their unspokenbanner of post-war parenting. I suppose that they had hadquite enough of being part of an exclusive grouping of anykind. Being special does have its disadvantages, you know.No. Now was the time to de-emphasize our dis-tinctions and hope for a brighter, or at least, nor-mal tomorrow.

And if this society of kids of survivors was,in fact, bent on changing its moniker to “ClubInconspicuous,” then surely I was prime can-didate for President. Despite having spentover 3 years in the torture cavities of Puskow,Mielec,Wieliczka, Flossenberg, Leitmeritz,Dachau, and Kaufering, my father, ofblessed memory, never, ever uttered a sin-gle word to us about the butchery and car-nage he had witnessed there daily. It wasas if life on this planet somehow beganin 1947 – when he arrived on Ellis Island.

It’s not like we didn’t know that“something” dreadful had happened. Wesaw the “KL” that had been eternalized onhis wrist, we knew about the huge bump hecarried beneath his black, shiny yarmulke, andwe cried when we were awoken by his terri-

Rabbi Salomon, CSW, is a psychotherapist in private prac-tice in Brooklyn. He is a frequent contributor to these pages,most recently with “Repairing Hashem’s Family” (Mar. ’03). Thisarticle originally appeared in Aish HaTorah’s websitewww.aish.com.


fying nocturnal screams and tremors. Oh,we knew. But the horror was just tooghastly to verbalize. The “pink ele-phant” could not be spoken about. Thechildren had to be protected.

The only exception to this pact ofsilence was when Daddy took me toRiverside Park just about every Shabbosafternoon. It was there that Paul andDanny and Joey and the rest of my fel-low club members would join me for aweekly Freeze–tag or Ring-o-leeviogame. But it wasn’t long before I noticedthat while we were busy darting and leap-ing on and off base, and releasing our pre-adolescent tensions, our fathers formedan enclave of their own. The spirit andanimation of their discussions alwaysseemed a trifle inappropriate; until oneday, I happened by within earshot anddiscovered that it was there that theyswapped horror stories, never to be for-gotten. It seems every week for two hoursor more, these valiant heroes turned theclock back 20-plus years and comparedtheir dreaded experiences, to relive andrecount what their eyes had witnessed andtheir hearts had endured. It was a sup-port group of the most therapeutic kind.

WHEN THE MYSTERY UNFOLDED

The mystery unfolded that summer.Like every year, I was safelyensconced in my home away

from home – my summer camp nearNew Paltz, New York – when I receiveda letter from home. This itself was a rathercommon occurrence in the pre -emaildecade of the 60s. Preposterous as itsounds, people (especially parents withkids in camp) would actually sit downat a table or a desk, pick up a ball-pointpen and some blank paper (ruled orunruled), and communicate news fromhome and abroad. The paper would sub-sequently be inserted in an envelope (#7or 10), which was then addressed,sealed, stamped and brought to a mail-ing receptacle. Days later, the letter invari-ably arrived.

After the usual maternal exhortationsto wear a sweater at night, learn how toswim, and eat my veggies, Daddy wouldcustomarily add a few obligatory greet-ings in his forced, but loving, brokenEnglish. But this letter was different. Nomessage from Daddy. He would neversay very much anyway, but I alwayslooked for his unfinished, yet ever so sin-cere message of missing me and lovingme. It wasn’t there. At 12-years-old, thatstruck a chord.

When I couldn’t speak to Daddy onmy weekly call home, an explanation hadto be tendered.“Oh,”Mom stumbled,“hewent to Israel to attend your cousin’s wed-ding.” Plausible enough. But not for1964…and not for my father…and notwithout months of preparatory excitement

and anticipation. I knew it didn’t smellright, but hey, I was only 12 and heavilyinvolved in Color War and batting lead-off. Priorities, you know. I let it slide.

And so it remained – a minor mys-tery – tempered somewhat by Daddy’sreturn home two weeks later, armed withwedding pictures, a silver candelabra forMommy and Jerusalem trinkets for theboys. Perhaps I was wrong.

THE QUESTIONS WE NEVER ASKED

Fast forward nearly 40 years. Daddyis with us but in spirit and mem-ory now, and big brother Izzy has

grown fascinated with Daddy’s earlieryears in particular, and our familygenealogy in general. In frenetic fashion,Izzy assumes the identity of an impas-sioned world-class detective, gripped withthe unyielding determination to shedlight on the questions we never dared ask.

What were Daddy’s formative yearslike?

Where did the family come from? What were they known for? Where were they before and during the

war? How many were killed? Who else, if anyone, survived? How?Did Daddy begin a family before the

war?What happened to them?What horrors did he witness?How did he stay alive?…and where did he go in July of 1964?Izzy traveled…to Poland, to

Israel…and he asked questions. Heread. He surfed. He called. He wrote. Hewondered. He dreamed. He interviewed.He cried. He uncovered. He discovered.He was stymied, exhausted, confused,elated, obstructed, and jubilant.Sometimes, all at the same time. But mostof all, he was driven. Driven by a pas-sion to know, to understand, and to con-nect.

And he found answers – at least someof them – that help to fill part of the voidwe grappled with for so many years. The“research” is ongoing and more answersmay be forthcoming. Some questions willnever be answered and perhaps that is


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how it should be, but the mystery of 1964is a mystery no longer. A short time ago,he received correspondence from theProvincial Court of Bochum, Germany.In it was a transcript dated July 21, 1964.It was Daddy’s verbatim testimony at atrial for Nazi War Criminals.

“In April of 1942 I was arrested by theJewish police. I had heard that theGestapo ordered the Jewish police to arrestyoung, strong, able-bodied boys and men.The police had a list of about 100 names,and I was one of them.”

Daddy then identified Nazis, unfa-miliar to most: Johann, Labitzke,Rouenhoff, Bornhold, Brock. It seemsthat all of them must have been on trial.I trembled as I read on. I can hear hisgentle voice speaking.

“The prison cell was so overcrowdedthat we had no room to stretch out at night.

“Before shipping out, we were assem-bled in the prison courtyard and had toline up in three rows. I stood in the mid-dle row. About 8 to 10 Jews stepped for-ward and declared themselves sick. OneJew, for example, had bloody feet.”

It was incredible to read the words myfather had said, describing events that I

never could have heard him say direct-ly. It was a glimpse into a corridor thathad been closed off to all of us as longas he lived. His next words merged theunspeakable with staggering historicalirony.

“A second Jew pulled up his shirt andshowed some scars. These sick people weretold to step aside. Hamann pointed to thewall, and they went there.

“I saw these SS people from Puskowapproach the sick Jews and stand nearthem. Then I heard Hamann calling out‘fire,’ and the SS men fired. The 8 to 10sick Jews were shot to death.”

My jaw dropped. Reading the eyewit-ness account of my very own tender, lov-ing father bearing witness to watching Jewsbeing shot to death is an experience thatdefies description. But learning that theNazi in charge of this particular blood-bath was Hamann, the namesake of thevillainous protagonist of the Purimstory, whose intent was to exterminatemasses of Jews, was truly mind-boggling.

“I am the only survivor of those sentto the Puskow Labor Camp.”

And with that, Daddy’s testimonyended.

PRESIDENTIAL THANK YOU

My understanding is thatthese Gestapo thugs allreceived sentences of life

imprisonment. Whether they actual-ly served them full-term is unknownto me.

Daddy, I have spent many adult yearswondering what really happened to youbefore 1947. I believe it is something thatall children of survivors would do well tolook into. But looking back now, and know-ing that I am now privy to but a speck ofthe terror you lived through, I say thankyou. Thank you for making me Presidentof Club Inconspicuous. Your lovingshield was a blanket of normalcy for twolittle boys who love you now, even morethan we ever did.

Life was good, I recall. You made it thatway. ■


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Iam known as “the second genera-tion.” As everyone knows, thatmeans: a child of survivors of

Hitler’s concentration camps. Yes, I amthe pain, fear and atrocities, onceremoved. My parents were both survivorsof Auschwitz. They were not left withscars from their experiences in the war;they were left with open, gaping woundsthat would not heal in their lifetimes. Onecannot recover from losing five wonderfulchildren, parents, brothers and sisters,friends and neighbors, and to a lesserextent, from losing one’s home, posses-sions, and means of livelihood.

I was born from those ashes, but ofcourse, could never make up for this—a pain that I couldn’t even understand.My parents, who had been married toeach other and were reunited after thewar, had very different styles of remi-niscing about it. My mother would tellme stories about the concentrationcamp, but tried to present it in a lightervein. She told me how they would sleepten in one bed, and when one person hadto turn over, they all turned over. At somepoint, it began to sound like fun. Myfather never spoke about personal expe-riences—rather, he talked about aktio-nen, military and work experiences.

They never spoke of their lost chil-dren. I don’t remember how old I waswhen I became aware of their existenceand subsequent deaths, but it was at avery young age. At some point, I foundpictures of them, and from conversa-tions overheard, I pieced together theirstory. This opened a world of specula-tion and fantasy that fed the imagina-tion of a very lonely only child. I woulddream over and over about how wewould meet. I knew that I could neverspeak to my mother or father aboutthem. Even their names were a mystery.Until one year, at Simchas Torah, I dis-covered that my parents had dedicat-ed a Sefer Torah in their memory. Theirnames were embroidered on the man-tle of that Sefer Torah. As the mendanced around and around, my eyesfrantically followed that Sefer Torah, in

an effort to learn the names of my deadbrothers and sisters.

As I became older, I learned that myparents had had twin boys, who had beentaken to Mengele’s camp for “experi-ments.” A cousin told me that a friendof my father’s had seen them alive at theend of the war, and that my parentssearched for them for years all over theworld. To this day, I harbor a faint hopethat they will someday miraculouslyappear in my life.

The Story Goes On and On

My childhood, as a child of sur-vivors, was not a conventionalone.“Second generation”implies

that there will be more to follow, and forme the story goes on and on. As my chil-dren and, later on,my grandchildren filledmy life, there was always the specter of chil-dren like these who were wrenched fromtheir mothers’arms and slaughtered, onlybecause they were Jewish. There is a sad-ness,born of my parents’sorrow and pain,that permeates and colors my life.

But there is another side to this story.My parents were survivors. They survivedconditions and circumstances that fewhuman beings could. They were sustainedby their strong belief in Hashem, and bya spirit that couldn’t be squelched. Whenmy mother was niftar, at age 93, and myhusband was maspid (eulogized) her, heused the passuk from the parsha of theweek:“Vayidom Aharon—and Aharon wassilent.” Aharon had no complaints toHashem about the loss of his children. Myhusband said that in all the years that heknew my mother, he never once heardanything emerge from her mouth thatcould, in the slightest way, be construedas a complaint about her terrible loss.

Such indomitable strength cannot goto waste, and my parents somehowbequeathed it to me. Lo and behold, theyproduced another survivor. Throughoutmy life, when faced by even the greatestadversity, I have always felt an inner well-spring of strength that never fails to amazeme and see me through. Surely, along witheverything else, this is part of my lega-cy from my parents—the survivors. ■


Mrs. Lobl lives in Jerusalem with her family. Shehas work published in Horizon and in a soon-to-be-released book, edited by Sarah Shapiro.

THE GENERATION AFTER CHURBAN EUROPE – PLUS ONE Naomi Lobl

Contrary to what some assume, noinclination or orientation is con-demned by the Torah. It is Jewishly

axiomatic that only acts and willful atti-tudes (like nurturing improper desires)can be prohibited, never innate procliv-ities. But there are acts, however, that theTorah clearly regards as immoral –regardless of the actors’ inclinations or self-definition.

In the context of contemporary pop-ular culture, that might seem unfair, if notdownright cruel. Why interfere withfeelings? Why limit the expression of deepand sincere feelings? But human beingsare subject to many unsummoneddesires, and can experience deep urges foran assortment of illicit acts, both commonones like slander and more rare ones likemurder.

The Torah is not a template onto whichwe lay what we wish to do. It is a code ofbehavior for those who (apologies to JFK’sspeechwriter) seek not to tell G-d what Hemust do for us, but rather what we mustdo for Him. The premise of the Torah’s

moral code (much of it, as per the ShevaMitzvos B’nei Noach, intended for all ofhumankind) is that living a divinely-direct-ed life means controlling,not venting,urgesthat run contrary to its mandates.

The Talmud even asserts that peoplewith greater spiritual potential have con-comitantly stronger proclivities to sin. Bychoosing not to succumb to, but ratherto fight, those urges – to channel their ener-gies instead to doing G-d’s will – they real-ize their deepest potentials.

Our Mesorah is replete with narrativesthat make that point. One of the mostfamous,of course, is the story of Yosef,whomerited the epithet “tzaddik” preciselybecause he withstood a great temptationto submit to his natural desire.

Part of being human is being subjectto desires, and that includes desires forbehaviors deemed improper by the Torah.But no predisposition or desire, no mat-ter how strong, is beyond the most pow-erful and most meaningful force in theuniverse: human free will.We are not mereanimals, responding to whatever urges

overtake us.We are choosers.And at everymoment of our lives, can choose right orchoose wrong. If we subscribe to the beliefthat we are here not to “be what we are,”but rather to “be what we can,” we mustendeavor to choose right.

One of humanity’s saving graces overhistory, the Talmud teaches, has been itsrefusal to legitimate certain forbidden rela-tionships. It is distressing that much ofAmerican society and popular cultureseems to be abandoning respect for fun-damental aspects of the Torah’s moral codeintended for all of mankind. Jews, though,must not allow themselves to be pulledaboard the cultural bandwagon.

We must instead remind ourselves that,no matter how the society around us maydevolve, we remain answerable to a trulyhigher, and unchanging, Authority.

The current American cultural milieuwill redefine morality as it sees fit. So, forbetter or worse, will religious organiza-tions and movements. But truly Torah-conscious Jews, whatever their affiliationor lack of one, whatever they are told bythe media or politicians or even clergy,know that we are a people chosen to showthe world what it means to bend humanwills to that of the Creator.

Our father Avrohom, our Mesorahteaches us,was called the “Ivri”– the “other-sider”– because “the entire world was onone side”of a conceptual river, and he “onthe other.” Nothing is more fundamen-tally Jewish than to stand apart from theZeitgeist and affirm timeless truths in theface of an unbridled society.

As heirs to a timeless and holy wisdom,and bearers of the responsibilities it entails,we Jews live up to our name and our mis-sion when we resist society’s shiftingmores.We must all endeavor,here as every-where, to be a light, even – no, especially– in an increasingly darkening world. ■

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Rabbi Shafran serves as Agudath Israel ofAmerica’s Director of Public Affairs and as theAmerican director of Am Echad, the AgudathIsrael-inspired educational outreach effort andmedia resource.

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