Rabbi Daniel Hershkowitz was the President of Bar Ilan University
from 2013-2017, he is also an Israeli politician, mathematician, and community
Rabbi. About 12-13 years ago, Rabbi Hershkowitz
was a visiting Scholar-in-Residence at the Jewish Center in Manhattan for
Shabbos.
At Shalosh Seudos, there was a Q & A session, and someone asked,
“Rabbi Hershkowitz, what made you decide to become a communal leader?” He answered, “Rabbi Hershel Schacter”, and he
then told the following story.
As many of you know, Rabbi Hershel Schacter, Rabbi
J.J. Schacter’s father, was a chaplain in the Third Army’s VIII Corps and was the
first US Army Chaplain to enter and participate in the liberation of the
Buchenwald concentration camp on April 11, 1945. Rabbi Schacter remained in Buchenwald for months,
tending to survivors’ physical, emotional, and spiritual needs.
On that first
day, April 11, 1945, Rabbi Schacter was walking through the camp when he came
upon a 17-year-old man. This young man
was Rabbi Hershkowitz’ father. Rabbi
Schacter asked him, “what can I get for you?” expecting him to ask for food,
clothing, or some other basic need. Instead
the young man told him that the ENTIRE time he had been in the camp, he had
managed to keep his tefillin with him and put them on EVERY DAY. Only recently, the Nazi’s discovered the tefillin
and confiscated them. So, he asked, “Is
there any chance you have tefillin that I could put on?”
Rabbi Schacter
reached into his bag, and took out his own, personal tefillin, and handed them
to the young man. “These are yours –
keep them.”
21 years
later, young Daniel Hershkowitz put on tefillin for the first time, and the
ones he put on were those same “Buchenwald tefillin”.
That story,
said Rabbi Hershkowitz, inspired me to live a life dedicated to the Jewish People.
Rabbi J.J.
Schacter had served as the Rabbi of the Jewish Center for 20 years, so after
Shabbos a number of people called him after Shabbos to tell him what had
happened.
And he said
he had never heard this story. His
father never told him.
But, he said,
it now explained a Dvar Torah his father would frequently share and why he felt
so passionately about it:
One of the
most well-known prophecies of Yechezkel HaNavi is the prophecy of the Dry
Bones. Yechezkel is taken to a valley
where he sees nothing but bones, and Hashem commands him to bring these individuals
back to life, and he does.
It is clearly
a nevua about the future of Am Yisrael and a time when Hashem will bring us
back to life and back to Eretz Yisrael as a Nation.
And the
gemara in Sanhedrin 92b has an interesting discussion about the identity of these
individuals whom Yechezkel brought back to life, and it offers 2-3 explanations:
1) רבי אליעזר אומר: מתים שהחיה יחזקאל
עמדו על רגליהם, ואמרו שירה ומתו.
Rabbi Eliezer: They came
back to life, sang shira, and died again.
2) רבי אליעזר בנו של רבי יוסי הגלילי
אומר: מתים שהחיה יחזקאל עלו לארץ ישראל, ונשאו נשים והולידו בנים ובנות.
These individuals came back to life,
moved to Eretz Yisrael, they made aliya, got married and had families.
3) עמד רבי יהודה בן בתירא על רגליו
ואמר: אני מבני בניהם, והללו תפילין שהניח לי אבי אבא מהם.
Rabbi Yehuda ben Beseira stood up and said: I am from the grandchildren of these individuals,
and here are the tefillin my grandfather left for me from this group!
It is such a perplexing gemara, and Rabbi Hershel Schacter used to
use this gemara to describe the three different approaches of different types
of Jews after the shoah:
1)
There
were Jews who were liberated, they “came back to life” to a certain extent, but
religiously, they died again. These were
many Jews who simply could not remain connected to Judaism in any way after
their horrifying experiences. Rabbi
Schacter himself would point out that we are not at liberty to judge anyone who
responded this way. This is simply a
description.
2)
The
second group were Jews who did not remain connected to religious observance,
but they did maintain a strong connection to Am Yisrael and, in particular, to
Eretz Yisrael. These were Jews who literally
“Alu L’Eretz Yisrael” they made Aliyah and created the infrastructure for the future
State of Israel. When the state was
established, there were 600,000 Jews in the Medina. 25% of that group were survivors.
3)
Rabbi
Schacter wanted to argue that Rav Yehuda ben Beseira’s statement is not simply
building on group 2, but it was a third group, a group that even after all they
had been through, after all they had experienced, the absolute horrors of
losing their entire families and being tortured for years, remained steadfastly
devoted to Am Yisrael, Eretz Yisrael, AND TORAT YISRAEL. Jews who upon liberation did not ask for food
and water, they asked for their TEFILLIN!
Said, Rav J.J. Schacter, my father would tell this dvar Torah ALL
THE TIME, and I NEVER UNDERSTOOD why he felt so passionately about it, until I
heard this story from Rabbi Hershkowitz.
I always find this space – the days between Yom Hashoah and Yom
Hazikaron/Yom Ha’atzmaut to be fascinating ones. It’s a time when there are
communal events throughout communities, appropriately so, to commemorate the
holocaust, to commemorate those who gave up their lives for Medinat Yisrael,
and to celebrate the rebirth of our people in our Land.
And I always find myself asking, what should these events mean to
us? What does it mean to remember
Jews who lost their entire families for no other reasons than being Jewish and
then somehow found the strength to start again, building a Jewish State,
building Jewish communities, and raising Jewish families?
There are many possible answers to this question, but this morning
I will offer one: We remember these
heroic Jews, Jews who gave up their lives for their Yiddishkeit and Jews who
rebuilt their lives afterward, so that we can learn to never, ever, take
ours for granted.
We live at a time where the details of observance are relatively
easy, but it is that very EASE that breeds a new, different type of nisayon – the
challenge of APATHY.
So, perhaps as we remember those who paid the ultimate price to be
able to put on tefillin, we use that memory as an opportunity to galvanize
ourselves, and to be more careful, more consistent in how we put on our tefillin.
As we remember those who would have literally given ANYTHING for
the opportunity to learn mishnayos in a beis medrash, to daven mincha in their
living room, or to cook a meal for a neighbor, let’s commit to do so ourselves.
Because when we live more passionate, more dedicated Jewish lives,
we give value and meaning to the sacrifice of those who lost their lives for
their Judaism.
As we continue to make our way through these days of remembering
our past with our eyes towards our future, let us commit to turn those
memories into action. To remember
those who sacrificed it all, by committing to live dedicated, passionate Jewish
lives.