May 5, 2016 has been designated as Holocaust
Remembrance Day is the U.S. I had
previously written about Lily Isaacs, the matriarch of the singing group, The
Isaacs. She had written her autobiography
in which she tells about her parents’, both Holocaust survivors, descriptions
of their experiences in the Concentration Camps. Lily was born in Germany and grew up in the
Bronx. Although I have known her for
several years, the subject was never brought up.
Ida Piller-Greenspan, a long-time resident of
Briarwood, wrote a book entitled “When The World Closed Its Doors”. Ida
and Maurice were living in Belgium, when the invasion occurred on their wedding
night. The tales were of their fleeing
and the attempts to get a Visa into any country that would allow them. Anti semitism was amok and countries turned
them down. Able to avoid being caught
and sent to a concentration camp, they finally made it to the U.S. Along with the book her artistic talents
left her legacy and two daughters, Rosie (who was a “college buddy”) and Liane
to pass the haunting stories down to the generations.
An Intergenerational Holocaust Freedom Seder, known
as the Munich Enclave, was recently held at the Harriet and Kenneth Kupferberg
Holocaust Resource Center and Archives located on the campus of Queensborough
Community College. Rabbi Abraham J.
Klausner, a U.S. Army chaplain and Josef Dov Sheinson, a concentration camp survivor,
created a Seder to celebrate the first Passover since the end of WWII.
They undertook designing a ceremonial Hagaddah
different from any other one being used naming it The Survivor’s Hagaddah. They were given out where Rabbi Charles Agin presided
over the ceremony at the Center. “How
often our people has had to defy prejudice and slander, hatred and oppression”,
begins the introduction. “We have survived all those who vowed to destroy us.
We lament those who perished at their hands.
We give thanks for our many deliverances and for the steadfast faith of
those who endured, whose love of life did not falter. They have left us an
example of courage never to be forgotten”.
The traditional Four Questions of why we eat matzoh,
eat bitter herbs, drink four glasses of wine and recline in our chairs at the
dinner table are replaced by, “why did I survive, why were my loved ones
destroyed and why do I continue to suffer.”
In the telling of the story the statement “We were slaves to Pharaoh in
Egypt” gave a new meaning in 1946. “We
were slaves to Hitler in Germany”.
“He took us out of there (Egypt), so that He might
bring us home, and give us the land as He had promised our fathers”, the
undying message. Having first taken
place in Munich, it came time for The Four Questions to be recited. Traditionally, they are recited by
children. “1,500,000 were murdered in
the Holocaust”, quotes this Hagaddah.
“Those in attendance fell silent, weeping until one man began asking the
questions and all the rest joined in.”
There is a traditional song, Dayenu, meaning, “It
would have sufficed”. Here, the changes
were made in the Munich Seder. “Had He
scattered us among the nations but had not given us the First Crusade, Dayenu.
Had he given us the First Crusade, but not the blood libel, Dayenu. Had He
given us the Badge of Shame, but not the persecutions of the Black Plague,
Dayenu. Had He given us the persecutions of the Black Plague, but not the
Inquisition, Dayenu. Had He given us the Inquisition, but not of the pogroms of
1648, Dayenu. Had He given us the slaughter in the Ukraine of 1919, but not
Hitler, Dayenu. Had He given us Hitler, but no ghettos, Dayenu. Had He given us
ghettos, but no gas chambers and crematoria, Dayenu. Had He given us gas
chambers and crematoria, but our wives and children had not been murdered,
Dayenu. All the more so, since all of
these have befallen us, we must make Aliyah, even if illegally, wipe out the
Galut, build the chosen land, and make a home for ourselves and our children
for eternity.”
“And there was silence”, the Hagaddah
continues. “How many stood aside, mute
and unconcerned, forgetting the divine command: ‘You shall not stand idle while
your neighbor bleeds’. For the sin of
silence. For the sin of indifference. For the secret complicity of the neutral.
For the closing of borders. For the washing of hands. For the crime of
indifference.”
Never Again, by Martin Gilbert, tells the history of
the Holocaust published in 2000. The
chant, “Never again. Never again” had already been coined to express during
protests and to remind us that we must not allow fear and false promises to
obstruct our judgements in who reigns.
“Next year, in Jerusalem” are the words stated at
the end of a seder. On May 14, 1948
Israel official became a Jewish State, separating it from Palestine. The pact, signed by David-Ben Gurion, took
place at the UN General Assembly, located at what now houses the Queens Museum
in Flushing Meadows Corona Park.
