Reading the Megilla in the “Lower Garden of Eden”

A story published in the newspaper Kol Yisrael, Adar 14th, 5704 (March 9th, 1944), “From the mouth of a refugee,” describing life in a cave on the outskirts of the Baranowicze Ghetto during the height of the Holocaust

It was not long before we were forced to pray in secret and in hiding places, and prayer became a very difficult task for us, the work of the heart (a phrase refering to prayer -Editor) […]

In those days, we had a saviour who made the work of prayer easier for us. It was a young man named Nissan Kreiditz, a student of the Chafetz Chaim, who managed to find us a safe haven to pray in.

In one of the dim hallways that wound in crooked strips near the ghetto, there was a pit, which was always covered with a wooden plank. The appearance of the pit was surprising: about sixty steps of dilapidated wood went down into it […] the thick of the earth, and led into an alcove […] The height of the alcove was about the height of a medium-sized person, and the heads of the people who entered it would touch the top of it, and the entire alcove contained only 15-16 people, in a crowded manner. Inside it, gloom and darkness prevailed, and no one was able to see each other in the alcove.

Various rumors circulated around this mysterious cave. Some said that this cave was dug during the previous World War for shelter and refuge. Some said that this cave was ancient, dug hundreds of years ago by robbers and cannibals who were then abundant in this place (…) There was indeed an inscription carved on the wall of the cave that probably stated the nature of the cave, but it was impossible to read it due to its age.

The aforementioned student, Nissan, discovered this cave before us, and it was kept as a great secret, of course. He taught us how to use this cave, to lift the thick plank at its mouth and enter (…)

This cave became a place of prayer and supplication. The young man arranged a low wooden stand inside the alcove, on which tallitot and tefillin, and several books of his rabbi, the Chafetz Chaim, were always placed. A glass cup with oil and a lit wick stood on the stand, and Nissan would provide the oil and wicks every day.

The joy in light of this “find” overflowed. From now on, the fear that prevailed during prayer was gone. We would secretly sneak into the cave in groups and pray with peace and clarity of mind.

This cave became the centre of interest for the local Jews, and the elders among us would call it the “Lower Garden of Eden.”

When one of us’s heart was filled with bitterness and anger, and his day was dark, he would descend into the cave and pour out his bitter soul and his anguish before the One Who dwells on high, and he would be relieved.

There was one whose soul thirsts and also yearns to praise the Creator, the Almighty, for His Divine Providence and His many mercies, and He cannot restrain His strength. The man went down to the front of the chamber, found a burning candle before him and a books of Psalms next to it, and he would light his lamp and his heart and flesh would sing to G-d, and he would be at ease. And there is one among us who received news about his son being killed, or his daughter being taken captive, or his sister being deported, and the man came to the cave, and opened the book of Psalms and read aloud “A ‘maskil’ to David while he was in the cave: A prayer with my voice to the Lord. I will cry out with my voice to the Lord. I will plead with him. I will pour out my speech before him; my distress I recite before him” (Psalms 142:1-3). It changed and sustained him.

It is impossible to put into writing the supreme inspiration that was embedded in the space of this cave and how happy those moments were when we were inside it. We were distracted from our bundle of worries. The soul clung to its owner and spread out of the body and connected to the Upper Source, the Source from which it was carved.

I remember the spectacle of the Megilla reading during the ghetto days, which was read inside this cave. We all stood crowded together on the steps of the cave that moved back and forth, and down inside the niche around the stand stood the leaders of the ghetto Jews, and next to them stood the same Nissan, reading the Megilla in his pleasant voice by the light of the flickering candles. There was not one among us who did not give up on the blotting out of Haman at any point.

When the cantor arrived at “Haman,” those standing there stomped the edges of their feet on the wooden floor with all their strength and enthusiasm, until the walls of the cave shook and trembled beneath them.

Some said that they had never felt so exalted in reading the Megilla as they did now. The longings for the repetition of those miracles returned and shook the treasure troves of our souls, and intense longings filled the entire space of the heart.

It was about two weeks after the days of Purim and one of the women of the ghetto cried out about her son, who had disappeared from sight and whose traces were unknown. She was the mother of Nissan, “the owner of the cave.” We were all shocked to hear that her only son, dear to all of us, had suddenly disappeared from the ghetto and was no more. The assumption was widespread among us that the Nazis had quietly taken him out of his bed and done with him what they did.

The grief of the ghetto residents was unbearable, and even greater was the grief of his elderly mother, who had always enjoyed her only son, and now he had been taken from her and she was left in distress.

Day and night we would hear silent cries coming from the house of that bereaved mother. Her voice shook us all, and when we heard the sound of her wailing, we too would weep on our beds for the same student who was taken from us (…)

The bereaved mother took her son’s mitzvah upon herself and was granted the mitzvah of lighting candles in the cave. It was a touching sight to see the old woman lift the plank at the mouth of the cave with her thin fingers, the can of oil and the wick shaking in her hand, and compassionately descend alone into the cellar, which her son who was taken from her in her old age, had led.

The story appears here, almost word for word, in Yiddish, in Menashe Unger z”l’s book