The Mystery of Krakow
On the Wonderous Past of Krakow • The Desperate Burial of Torahs • The Establishment of the Plaszow Camp and the Bombing of the Funeral Home • Where Did the Torahs Go? And where is the Rama Rabbi’s Torah? • 80th Anniversary of the Chilling Events
By: Simcha B. Markson
The Wonderous Past of Krakow
As an introduction to the story of the sixty-year-old mystery about the Torahs that were buried in the funeral home of the new cemetery in Krakow, we will open with a brief description of the life of the Jewish community that existed in the city for hundreds of years.
As an introduction to the story of the sixty-year-old mystery about the Torahs that were buried in the funeral home of the new cemetery in Krakow, we will open with a brief description of the life of the Jewish community that existed in the city for hundreds of years.
Thanks to the geniuses and sages of Krakow – the second largest city in Poland – who had a positive impact on the life of the community, it was awarded hundreds of years ago with the most honourable title: “Kehilat Kodesh Krakow” (the Holy Community of Krakow).
A large and magnificent Jewish community lived in Krakow in southern Poland (formerly called Western Galicia); it was one of the first Jewish communities in Poland. It had hundreds of synagogues and Torah institutions, thousands of Jews, pious and G-d fearing scholars, people of form, chassidim, and people of action. Until that bitter and hasty day when they were suddenly cut off by the Nazis who took the city by storm, exiled its inhabitants to ghettos and camps, and in their fury desecrated the synagogues, destroyed them and used them for their personal uses, in order to desecrate the holy in a purposelly
A large and magnificent Jewish community lived in Krakow in southern Poland (formerly called Western Galicia); it was one of the first Jewish communities in Poland. It had hundreds of synagogues and Torah institutions, thousands of Jews, pious and G-d fearing scholars, people of form, chassidim, and people of action. Until that bitter and hasty day when they were suddenly cut off by the Nazis who took the city by storm, exiled its inhabitants to ghettos and camps, and in their fury desecrated the synagogues, destroyed them and used them for their personal uses, in order to desecrate the holy in a purposelly disgraceful way.
The deportation square in Krakow
As it appears in ancient Polish documents, Jews lived in the city of Krakow for more than six hundred years. At first, there was a relatively small number of Jews there, and despite this, in the year 5110 (1349-1350), there was already a synagogue, a mikvah (ritual bath), and a cemetery. Over the years, the community grew until it became a metropolis and a major city for Jews. What mainly caused the development of the Jewish community In the city, was the immigration of hundreds of Jews, who came there from several countries, to establish their residence in the nearby Kazimierz (in Yiddish: Kuzimir). Today this neighborhood is a suburb of Krakow, but in the past it was a small and independent town close to the big city.
King Kazimierz III (Kazimir the Great, also known as the “King of the Peasants and the Jews”) decided to give his patronage to a small settlement that existed on an island in the Vistula River, and to establish a city in it that would be named after him. He thus made it a center of attraction for Jews, both from Poland and from neighboring countries, who settled in the city and built synagogues there.
A few years later, as a result of the fact that the Jews of Krakow played important roles in the economic and commercial life of the city, their gentile neighbours became jealous of them and began to bully them. Soon the Jews of the city began to suffer terrible persecution, which was manifested in pogroms and the restriction of their rights. Not much time passed, and a deportation order was issued against the Jews who were ordered to pack their belongings and move to Kazimierz. Even when Kazimierz was later annexed to the city of Krakow, and became a neighborhood within the big city, for many years, until the year 5627 (1866-7), the Jews were not allowed to leave their area and establish their residence in the center of the city.
Over the years, Krakow became a significant city for the Jews. Great men served in the rabbinate of the city, of which the Rama rabbi is particularly famous. He was born in Kazimierz and served as rabbi, rabbinical judge, and head of a yeshiva. His instructions and leadership were established in the city as unbreakable rules, even after many years hpassed since his passing. Thousands of Jews were led by the light of the great rabbis of the city, until the Jewish community was cut down. Nowadays, from all of its glorious past, only a few synagogues remain, which are like a small reminder of the Jewish community that lived in the city for hundreds of years.
The stone gravestones of the cemeteries in Krakow, which are considered to be rare in all of Eastern Europe, also give testimony to the glorious heritage of the historical Krakow. The most important among them is the cemetery located next to the Rama Synagogue, which was founded about four hundred and sixty years ago.
Uprooted gravestones in the ancient cemetery in Krakow
In connection with this, we note the article written by Y. Shoham in the Bais Yaakov monthly (Adar-Nisan 5728/1968), even before the fall of the Iron Curtain, and at a time when entering the state of Poland involved much efforts. He described with shock the hostile attitude of the Poles towards the glorious past of Polish Jewry: “From the thousand years of existence of about a thousand Jewish communities all over Poland, mainly cemeteries and silent gravestone that tell about the past and what is no longer. And the Polish, do things in the cemeteries as much as possible.” “Indeed,” he pointed out, “there are several cemeteries that have been officially recognized as a ‘protected place’. Among them is the ancient historical cemetery in Krakow, where renovation work is being carried out and ancient gravestones are being discovered that were covered in dirt and earth for hundreds of years.” “Personally,” says the writer, “I was very impressed that in Krakow there is a particularly sympathetic atmosphere for the preservation of antiquities, and this also has a positive effect on the attitude towards the cemetery and the graves of the righteous in it.”
The most famous synagogues in Krakow are: The Altschul (the Old Synagogue), the Rama Synagogue (built in 5313/1553 by the Rama rabbi, Rabbi Yisrael Isserles z”l, in memory of his wife z”l. Later, when the synagogue burned down, a permit was obtained to build a synagogue there out of stone], the Hoicheh Shul [the High Synagogue, so called because the floor of the place of worship in the synagogue is a floor above ground, different from what was customary at that time], the Izaak Synagogue [Built in the year 5398/1638 by a wealthy Jew named Rabbi Yitzchak Yaakobovitz, known as Reb Isaac Reb Yekel’s], and the Kupa (treasury) Synagogue [a synagogue founded from the community treasury].
During WWII, in all places that the Nazis were, they burned all holy places, including synagogues, and cemeteries were destroyed, so that the Jews would be forgotten. And out of all the Jewish communities, out of the glorious past of Polish Jewry, only two “Jewish quarters” have survived in their entirety, the ghettos in Krakow and the city of Prague in the Czech Republic.
Unlike most of the synagogues in Poland, especially in the big cities like Warsaw, Lodz, and Lublin, most of the synagogues in Krakow were saved from destruction and burning. After the deportation of the Jews to the ghetto in the Podgorze district, the German authorities confiscated the synagogues that remained behind. Unfortunately, they converted them for personal use. in desecration of their holiness, but this is the way in which they were saved. For example, the Altschul became a uniform warehouse for the German Air Force, and the Izaak synagogue was also converted into a warehouse for the needs of the army.
To this day, two cemeteries and a few synagogues are still preserved in Krakow. But where are the Torahs? For decades, the fate of the Torahs remained shrouded in mystery. Some of the Torahs were hundreds of years old, some of them also had the honour of being housed in synagogues and study halls of the greatest and most illuminating people of the ages. Among them, the most famous is the Torah written by the Rama. Everyone knew that the Torahs were hidden in a secret place, but their fate during the war was unknown.
For more than sixty years, their fate remained a mystery, until about twenty years ago, it unfortunately became clear that the fate of the Torah books was the same as the fate of the Jews of the city who were destroyed by the oppressors. They were both burned by the Nazis, who sought not only to kill the Jews, but also to destroy their bodies and destroy every trace of the religion, but by the grace of G-d, their plan did not succeed.
The Hiding of the Torahs in the Ghetto
Upon the outbreak of WWII, the Nazi soldiers turned the streets of Krakow into a battlezone and imposed fear and the terror of death on the city’s Jews.
In Adar 5701 (1941), upon the establishment of the ghetto in the Podgorze district, Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig decided to risk his life and try to save the sacred items left in the synagogues.
The rescue operation took place on the 21st of Adar, the last day of the deportation to the ghetto. With the help of the Jewish community, which provided him with people and freight wagons, Rabbi Yaakov collected about one hundred and fifty Torah scrolls from all the synagogues in the city, along with several other Judaica items, embroidered tablecloths from the Rama synagogue, and also ancient community registers. And out of fear of what might happen to them, he hid them all. One of the privileged books he collected, was the Rama’s Torah together with the Tikkun (guide to Torah reading) of the Beit Yosef rabbi, which was located next to it inside the Torah ark. He put the precious treasure in a building intended for the Judenrat at 2 Limanowski Street, by the main entrance gate to the ghetto. It was a race against time, because the treasure had to be moved by nine o’clock in the evening – the time of the final closing of the ghetto.
The wall surrounding the cemetery in the centre of the Jewish quarter in Krakow
The Risk to Save Torahs
And before we continue describing the heroic actions of Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig, here is the place to note in passing that the self-sacrifice of Jews during the war years to save Torahs was not unique to the city of Krakow. There are many testimonies that describe how Jews tried, sometimes with real devotion and under the eyes of the Nazi devil, to save the holy items from the impure clutches of the Nazis. Among other things, such an occurrence is described in the city of Bendin, when the Germans set fire to one of the synagogues, upon entering the city already in the first days of the war. “Although every Jew who came out of his home was shot on the spot, when the flames broke out in the synagogue, some Jews were rushed inside, led by Mr. Schlesinger, his son, and son-in-law. They approached the Torah ark, and without noticing the flames that spread all around, each of them managed to save two Torahs. However, as they approached the entrance of the burning synagogue, they were all shot by the wicked ones and died holy deaths, may G-d avenge their blood” (cited in Sefer Kiddush Hashem p. 27).
It often happened that the attempts to save the Torahs were also made by Jews who had been far from Torah and mitzvah observing prewar, but now in these troubled days, the Jewish spark was awakened in them. For example, what happened in the city of Piotrkow, after the Germans took thirty Torahs from the city’s synagogue and buried them in an open field under the sky; Mr. Avraham Weishof, one of the leaders of the Bund party and a former member of the city administration, decided to try to secretly take the Torahs, despite the strict guarding of the place. Together with some of his friends, he broke into the lot, and almost in front of the policeman, quickly collected all the Torahs, and returned the same way they came. When the policeman returned, after a short time, he did not find a single Torah. Weishof and his men distributed the Torahs among the Jews. And a few days later he loaded them into the cart of the chevra kadisha (burial society), took them out to the cemetery, and buried them there.
Burying the Torahs in the Cemetery
Upon the completion of the operation to bring the Torahs to the Krakow Ghetto, individuals who worked for the community, began to sort, clean, and arrange the precious and sacred treasures. However, it was clear that they could not yet be satisfied, because at any moment the Nazis might appear and confiscate the treasures. For this reason a special meeting was convened with the participation of about ten rabbis of the ghetto. The proposal that was on the agenda was to bury the Torah books, thus saving them from burning and desecration, G-d forbid. The rabbis were inclined to accept the offer, but on the condition that the Torahs be buried in clay pots, which may ensure the preservation of the parchment. However, this proposal was dropped, since it was clear that the purchase of hundreds of pottery could not be carried out without the knowledge of the Germans.
The solution that was finally accepted, came from Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig himself. He proposed to move the Torahs to the large funeral home in the new cemetery at 3 Abrahama Street. The cemetery (inaugurated in 5692/1931-2, and was the last one established by the ancient Jewish community of Krakow) was located in the south of the Podgorze neighborhood, next to the cemetery at 25 Jerusolimska Street.
The funeral home of the new cemetery, at Abrahama Street 3
At the entrance to this cemetery, there was a huge funeral home. It was a great and multi-dimensional structure, with three wings built in an impressive and engineered way, the middle of which rose to a height of 20 meters. Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig’s idea was to hide the Torah books in the attic of the funeral home. At that time, there was no talk of establishing a the Plaszow camp on the cemetery’s grounds, and it is no wonder that the idea of burying the Torahs in the cemetery seemed to be extremely successful.
A few days later, the operation of removing the 150 Torah scrolls from the ghetto and moving them to the new cemetery began, in order to place them in the roof space of the middle structure with a large and hollow dome, in the firm hope that the building would survive and with it the Torahs inside. To this end, the Judenrat took advantage of the Jews who worked as labourers at the cemetery, and they delivered Torahs every day and hid them in the attic of the funeral home.
After the operation, which took place with true dedication, was crowned a success, they locked the iron door, plastered the entrance to the attic and removed the ladder that could be used to climb up. Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig and the entire team with him engaged in the work of saving the Torahs, returned to the ghetto with a sense of satisfaction, and the Jews of the ghetto breathed a sigh of relief.
It is worth noting that even after the operation to save the Torahs, there were still some Torahs left in the ghetto area. In the book “The Pharmacy in the Krakow Ghetto”, pharmacist Tadeusz Pankiewicz mentions the presence of several Torahs in the ghetto. And so he told:
“When the ring around the ghetto residents got tighter and tighter, we decided to build a special hiding place in the first room of the pharmacy. Here, in a place not visible from the outside, we kept Torahs and handled them according to Dr. Armer’s guidance. who said that whoever saves one Torah, it is as if he saved the entire world. We knew that Torah scrolls must stand upright, covered with embroidered velvet jackets. That’s how we kept them and that’s how they got to be kept with us until the end of the war.” After the war, he transferred the Torah books to the “Jewish Historical Committee” in Krakow.
The Construction of the Plaszow Camp Distrupts the Plans
In the first years of the war, the conditions in the Krakow ghetto were less difficult than in other ghettos, such as in Warsaw or Lodz. But this did not last long, and the end of the Krakow Ghetto began to approach. It was in the autumn months of the year 5703 (1942). The Nazis started building the first barracks of the terrible Plaszow camp, the mere mention of which makes one cringe.
A memorial built on the grounds of the Plaszow camp
The area of the camp was expanded again and again, until it finally encompassed the area of the cemeteries on Jerusolimska Street and Abrahama Street. The gravestones were smashed, the stones were ground up, and the gravel from the gravestones became the camp’s pavement; the entire area was plowed until no trace of the burial plots remained. [Today, there is one solitary tombstone in the former area of the Podgorze cemetery, the tombstone of Chaim Yaakov Avrahamer, and in recent years the tombstone of Mrs. Sarah Schenirer was also renewed].
The magnificent funeral home, however, with the precious treasure inside, was not yet destroyed by the Germans. The commander of Plaszow, Amon Goethe, may his name be blotted out, decided to turn the place into horse stables, with the purification rooms being used as a barn for other things and a goose coop, an act that must have offended the Jews imprisoned in the camp. But with all the terrible pain, a handful of people, led by Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig, still knew that above the unclean horses and animals, Torahs, curtains for Torah arks, and other sacred objects lay in holiness and purity.
Amon Goethe tortured and murdered Jewish prisoners every day, for fun and for sadistic pleasure. Due to the evil and cruelty of his actions, he earned among the camp residents the dubious title that described him and his actions: “The Butcher of Plaszow”. On 2 Adar B 5703 (March 9, 1943) Goethe commanded the liquidation of the Krakow Ghetto and the transfer of all its inhabitants (about ten thousand Jews) to the Plaszow camp. Dozens of SS men served under him, including Ukrainian volunteers who were known for their level of cruelty, which was no less than that of their commanders. [About a year after the war ended, on the Tamuz 1, 5706 (June 30, 1946), Amon Goethe was brought before the Supreme Court of Poland in Krakow, on the charge of mass murder of about ten thousand Jews. He was sentenced to death and was hung not far from the Plaszow camp, on the Elul 17, 5706 (Sept. 13, 1946), exactly seven years to the day – on the Jewish calendar – that the war broke out].
The Plaszow camp, which was named after the nearby village, was built by Polish slave labourers and was intended as a jail for prisoners. For over a year, it was used as a forced labour camp, until Tevet 5704 (December 1943), when it officially became a concentration camp. After its area was expanded several times, in 5704 (1943-4), its area reached about 880 dunams. Before the evacuation of the Krakow ghetto, there were about two thousand prisoners in the camp, but later there were multiples more. [Postwar, several memorials and commemorative and informative plaques were established at the camp. Now, unfortunately, the camp does not exist in the minds of many residents, who despise the place where many of the Holocaust victims – may G-d avenge their blood – are buried, and this despite the fact that in the past many efforts had already been made to fence and preserve the place].
Bombing of the Funeral Home
Several months passed, and the huge funeral home was still standing. But in the middle of the year 5704, when the Nazis began to operate the death trains – those infamous shipments from all the borders of Poland to death, with which they sought to carry out their malicious Final Solution – the Nazis decided to enlarge the Plaszow camp and put in a railroad, in order to speed up the rate of the transports (shipments to the camps) and the Jews removal. For this purpose, all the buildings that were on the planned route were destroyed, including the headquarters building and the funeral home. The left wing with the low dome was blown up first. And a few weeks later, the central part of the funeral home was also blown up. About this event, which left a great impression on the Jewish prisoners, there are testimonies from the survivors of the camp, as well as photos taken by the Germans themselves.
The bombing of the funeral home in the Plaszow camp on Tamuz 19, 5704 (July 10, 1944)
To illustrate, in his diary from when he was in the Plaszow camp, Avraham Busk recorded what happened on the 19th of Tamuz 5704 (July 10, 1944): “The building where bodies were purified was blown up with explosives.” The diary, written for 17 months and hidden in a bottle under the foundations of one of the barracks, was discovered after the war by the author’s brother, Yosef Busk. Since the diary was written under underground conditions, with a clear danger for the author, it is no wonder that the event is mentioned in a short sentence and without elaboration.
However, on the other hand, Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig described in his book, written after the war, what he remembers from the moment of the explosion of the funeral home:
“The commandant of the camp prepared a big celebration for this event; he invited a group of his friends to witness the explosion of the building, and the invited public from the city watched with great pleasure, how another Jewish creation was going down. And this is the description of the event: on a beautiful and clear day, at 1:30 in the afternoon, the trumpets announced that the moment of explosion was approaching. All roads within 300 meters were closed. When the third trumpet sounded, the explosion was detonated by pressing an electric button, and the dust with red smoke rose to a height of several hundred meters. Only when the smoke cleared could it be seen that the entire central building had collapsed beneath it. The sight of the explosion was witnessed by almost all the prisoners, both from the housing barracks and from the workshop barracks, and feelings of pain and lust for revenge were in their eyes.”
Following the explosion of the building, only the right wing remained, as it housed a pumping station used by the Nazis, but it was also destroyed after the war. A huge mound of stones that remains from the outer walls of the funeral home, today marks its location [in the area behind the renovated headstone of Sarah Schnirer].
The mystery that remained for decades after the war was: what happened to the Torahs that were hidden in the funeral home? Were they damaged and burned with the explosion of the building? Or was the treasure discovered by the Germans earlier? And is there a slim chance that they were preserved elsewhere?
Remains of the funeral home (courtesy of Ghetto Fighters House)
Rabbi Yaakov Shtandig was present on the day of the explosion, and this was because he was tasked with preparing the work of demolishing the building, by virtue of his work in the camp’s construction office. It is clear beyond any doubt that if the treasure had been discovered at that event, he would have known about it. But doubts still gnawed at him: Had the Torahs been discovered before, or perhaps after the explosion of the funeral home? Had the holy books reached the impure hands of the Nazis who then perhaps moved them to another place? In his book about the Plaszow camp, written immediately after the end of the war, Rabbi Shtandig asked researchers and historians to solve the mystery, and he wrote:
“I do not know when it happened, and I do not know if anyone knows when the Germans found my hiding place and where they took everything. Presumably the treasure was moved outside the camp, even outside Krakow. On the spot, that is, inside the camp, the treasure was not destroyed, because we would have known about it. It seems to me that in Frankfurt am Main there is a German institute for Tanach (Torah, Prophets, and Writings) research. Who knows, maybe the local propaganda office in Krakow transferred the treasure to the institute in Frankfurt, and it is the role of the historical committee to investigate and search for the treasure.”
Although he saw the explosion of the building, his hope was that the Torah books were preserved somewhere. However, later it became clear that, unfortunately, this was a false hope.
Solving the Mystery
It was in Elul 5762 (summer 2005), the researcher and historian, Uriel Feinerman, miraculously discovered the solution to the mystery.
It was following information that came to him, about an eyewitness who witnessed the chilling event of the explosion of the funeral home, where the Torah books were also burned. It was Mrs. Trager (née Lax) who was born in the town of Zaricha, Czechoslovakia, to a family of Munkacs chassidim. After the German invasion of Hungary and a journey of wandering and suffering, on Iyar 27, 5704 (May 20, 1944), she arrived at the Auschwitz camp, and three days later, in the month of Sivan, she was transferred with her two sisters to the Plaszow camp, where she was imprisoned for a period of three months. Later she was transferred again to Auschwitz, until she was finally liberated in the Bergen-Belsen camp.
Immediately upon her arrival in Plaszow, she was put in a children’s barrack, and a few days later, she was taken to work in the cemetery grounds, along with a group of dozens of female prisoners.
In 5765 (2005), when it became known that she had witnessed the explosion of the building with her own eyes, she was asked about what happened there, and this is what she said: “In the cemetery there was a building that they put us into, there were Torahs and Gemaras. The Torahs were without the coverings on them. When we were told to take them out with our own hands, we started to cry. Until then, we had never touched a Torah without a jacket. The female prisoners searched for pieces of cloth, so that the Torah books would not be placed directly on the ground. We arrived at a pit, and there we were ordered to put the Torahs inside. The Germans poured fuel and set them on fire, to the dismay of all of us. The chilling event took place on the second day of Shavuot, the Germans knew that the day was the Jewish holiday of giving the Torah, and they did it precisely on that day, in order to cloud our spirits.”
Her sister, who is two years younger than her, added more details, which more clearly complete the chilling event: “We were put into a large building with a round dome. Inside it were shovels intended for burying the dead. We went up the stairs to the attic and from there we took out the Torah books. There were about a hundred girls in the work commando. We took the Torahs and Gemara, and we walked to the other side of the camp, to a large pit where they would shoot prisoners. As we did not want to place the Torahs on the impure ground, we struggled to get pieces of cloth and we placed them on the ground. When the Torah books were burned, we cried bitterly and we were distraught.”
Chain of Events
After receiving the gruesome testimony from the eyewitnesses, the researcher Uriel Feinerman summed up and reconstructed the course of events in an accurate manner: On the last day of the month of Adar 5701 (winter 1941), the Torahs were transfered to the funeral home in the Abrahama cemetery. A few days later, the left wing of the funeral home was blown up, in order to lay a railroad into the Plaszow camp in its place. From there, the train of the Jews who were sent to an unknown destination left on 21 Iyar (May 18).
On 26 Iyar (May 23), the transport from Auschwitz arrived. Five days after the great selection, a transport of 900 women from Hungary arrived from Auschwitz. On the first day of Sivan (May 27), the – the above-mentioned sisters arrive at the Plaszow camp. This transport also arrived in Plaszow via the Auschwitz camp.
Jewish heroism before the eyes of the Nazi devil
On Sivan 7, the second day of the Shavuot holiday, the Torahs were burned. Dozens of female prisoners were taken to the funeral home to gather the Torahs. The left wing of the building was already no longer existent, thus the Torahs were probably still under the big dome. The women prisoners collected the books and were led to the other side of the camp, to the hill where the executions of the Plaszow prisoners took place, which today is the foot of the monuments. The Germans poured gasoline on the Torahs and set them on fire.
On the bitter day of Tamuz 19 (July 14), the funeral home was blown up. That day, the second and biggest explosion of the funeral home took place. It was Monday, two days after the fast of the 17th of Tamuz (actually, the fast that year was on the 18th of Tamuz because that year, the 17th was on a Shabbat and fast days are not held on Shabbat, so it was pushed off by a day). And we have no choice but to conclude with the Mishna in Tractate Taanit (26b), which mentions the five events that happened on the seventeenth of Tamuz: “The tablets (of the Ten Commandments) were broken, the daily sacrifice was nullified (by the Romans), and the city walls of Jerusalem were breached, and Apostamus burned the Torah, and set up a statue in the Temple.”
And in order to end the page on a good note, we will bring here a special and original idea written in the book “Peninei Rabbeniu HaGriz MiBrisk” (The Pearls of our rabbi, known as “the Griz,” of Brisk). His words: “Only a foolish gentile can imagine that it is possible to burn the Torah, and is it possible to burn the Torah? After all, from the burning of the Torah – Torah is created! Our holy rabbi wrote in the Mishna (in Taanit) that ‘on the seventeenth of Tamuz, Apostamus burned the Torah,’ and when a Jew says these seven verses, he fulfills the seven commandments of learning the Torah. And if he repeats them a hundred times, he fulfills seven hundred commandments. And if he repeats this a thousand times, he will fulfill seven thousand mitzvot of learning the Torah.”
Photos courtesy of: Uriel Feinerman, Ganzach Kiddush Hashem, Yad Vashem, and the chasidic researcher, Rabbi Yisrael Berliner
The Rama’s Torah
In 5319 (1559), the Rama requested of the Beit Yosef rabbi (Rabbi Yosef Karo), who lived in the holy city of Tzfat (Safed), to send him a copy of the Tikkun Sofrim book attributed to the Ben Asher rabbi. The Rama paid 100 gold ducats for the Tikkun, and in return he received the five books of the Torah written on parchment. Based off of this, he wrote a Torah and put it in the synagogue that his father founded in Krakow for the ascension of his mother’s soul. [Some say this took place in the year 5330/1570. And according to another version, as stated in the name of the Bobover Rebbe, Rabbi Shlomo Halberstam z”l, it was the Beit Yosef who gave the Tikkun Sofrim to the Rama as a gift in exchange for writing an appendix to his book, the Shulchan Orech (Code of Jewish Law).]
The Torah along with the ancient and precious Tikkun Sofrim were locked and bolted in the Rama’s synagogue in Krakow. The Torah was only taken out of its ark three times a year: on Yom Kippur, on Simchat Torah, and on the Shabbat before Lag BaOmer (the anniversary of the Rama’s passing). Also, when an important guest arrived in the city, he was honored to read from the Rama’s Torah. The authors of history works on the Rama note that in this Torah, apart from certain changes in the form of the letters according to tradition, there were also fourteen changes in omissions and additions. The book of the Torah was long and narrow, and its letters were larger than usual (expanded by Rabbi Yehoshua HaLevi Leibowitz in the chapters about the history of the Rama in the book “Torat HaOlah”).
Rabbi Shlomo Halberstem, the Bobover Rebbe z”l, told that his father, the Kedushat Tzion z”l, had the opportunity on the Shabbat of the week of the Torah portion of Vayetzeh to go to the Rama’s synagogue in Krakow, and to honour him, he got to read from the ancient Torah. When he got to the verse “and He will guard me on this way,” (Genesis 28:20), he noticed that the letter “nun” was a bit cut off. After Shabbat, the Torah was fixed. And he expressed that it was this reason from among all the reasons that he went up to read the Torah precisely for this verse, in order for the letter to be corrected properly and correctly (as told in the book “Magen Avot”).
In the midst of the war, the Sefer Torah was transferred from the Rama’s synagogue to the study hall of the Rebbe of Skawin, Rabbi Simcha Frankel-Teumim z”l, may G-d avenge his blood. As the liquidation of the ghetto approached, he handed over the Torah to Rabbi Chuneh Glantzer, may G-d avange his blood, who lived outside the walls of the ghetto, as he was a Czech citizen. After the war, it was assumed that the Torah survived the horrors of the war, but years later it became clear that its fate was the same as the fate of most of the Jews of Karaka; it was burned along with all the other Torahs.
In the Torah ark of the Rama synagogye, next to the aforementioned Torah, was the Torah written by the Rama’s father, which was also carefully preserved till the war’s outbreak. For the great honour bestowed upon it, it is told, that during the dancing on Simchat Torah, the right to carry the Torah was sold at a high price, and this was the only time that this Torah was taken out of the ark.
The gravestones of the Rama and his family members in the ancient cemetery in Krakow
A few years ago, around the year 5770 (2009-2010), an antiques dealer came to Israel and offered the original Torah of the Rama for sale. In order to confirm that the Torah was indeed the Rama’s, the book was submitted to a professional laboratory tests for identification. The findings proved that its age was indeed appropriate for the period, approximately four hundred years old. The style of writing was also similar to this period, as well as the quality of the parchment, all of which led to the conclusion that the matter was seemingly obviously true. But in addition to these tests, they also checked the text of the Torah, whether it was also similar to the Torah that was supposed to be written by the Rama. And since the Torahs we normally have are different than the “keter aram tzova” (known in English as the “Aleppo Codex”) style of writing, by 14 letters, then if one wanted to confirm that the Torah belonged to the Rama, one must check that those letters are written in the “keter aram tzova” style or not. After a careful examination, it was surprisingly discovered that all fourteen letters correspond exactly to the style of “keter aram tzova.”
However, after a forensic examination, the forgery was revealed in all its ugliness. It turned out that it was done by forgers who wanted to make money by vile means. How was this discovered? It was found out that seven of the 14 letters written in the “keter aram tzova” style that are different from our regular Torahs were forged later, and did not match the age of the Torah. After all, the antiquities dealers “adapted” them to the style of the Rama’s Torah so that it could be attributed to him. If there was still any doubt about the matter, not much time passed and the proof that it was a serious forgery received a significant boost, and this time from the testimony of an eyewitnesses who saw the holy Torah go up in flames. [Rabbi Yochanan Hershkovitz expanded on this in “Medor Lador,” from the lessons of the great lecturer Rabbi Yisrael Goldwasser. One can learn more in “Alei Sefer,” part 19, page 5.]
To complement the story, we will briefly tell what the “keter aram tzova” is, and how a copy of it came to the the Beit Yosef.
Aleppo, in northern Syria, was referred to by the Jews as “Aram Tzova.” There is a hypothesis, that it was named after on the Aramaic tribes whose kingdom was centered in the city. This city was home to one of the most famous Jewish communities in the world. According to tradition, the ancient synagogue in the city was built during the Second Temple period. This synagogue is most famous for the fact that it merited to have the “keter aram tzova” preserved in it. It was an ancient and accurate manuscript of the Tanach, written by a great devoted scholar who worked in Tiberias over a thousand years ago – Rabbi Aharon ben Asher. Over the years the “keter” traveled across different communities and countries, including Tiberias, Jerusalem, and Egypt, until it reached Aleppo, Syria. Later, the Beit Yosef sent a special emissary who stayed in Aleppo for eight months and made an exact copy of the “keter.” This copy probably stayed in Tzfat until it was stolen by antique dealers.
“Our Dancing has Turned into Mourning” (Lamentations 5:15)
By: Simcha B. Markson
The events of Simchat Torah 5784 (Oct. 7, 2023) will not be forgotten soon. The hard and bitter news that came from the communties in the Gaza envelope, engufled the entire Jewish People in sorrow and grief. Everyone tried to rise above the rumours that were spread everywhere, tried as much as possible not to violate the joy of the holiday, and hope that at the end of the holiday, we would be heralded with good news. But unfortunately, as the hours went by, the extent of the terrible disaster, the likes of which has not happened since the days of World War II, both in the amount of casualties in a very short time, and also in the tragic and brutal manner in which they were murdered, became clear.
Classified IDF documents from the period of the Yom Kippur War have only just been published, from which the serious failure of the security chiefs at that time is evident. No one imagined that as 50 years passed, when the army in the State of Israel was considered the strongest in the Middle East, such difficult and chilling events would occur, reminiscent of the Middle Ages under the shadow of antisemitic gentiles and wild mobs that from time to time led riots and pogroms against the Jews. For many hours, the residents of dozens of communities were subjected to an unprecedented attack, without the assistance of the security personnel who proved that a people cannot rely only on other people.
These days, when the entire Jewish People is united in praying for the well-being of the captives and the wounded, sharing the grief of the bereaved families, and hoping for a better future, now is not the time to say why this happened in the midst of a day when the Jewish People were rejoicing with the Torah, nor is it the time to draw conclusions and look for culprits, but it is our duty to learn and understand that God is the Master of wars, and as we say in the Yom Kippur prayers: “Like the anchor in the hand of the sailor. He holds it at will and casts it at will. So are we in Your hand, oh good and forgiving G-d.”
Another moral can also be deduced from the fact that technologies, even the most advanced ones, cannot prevent disasters when the decree has been decreed from Above. Millions and even billions of shekels were invested in fortifying the borders, but in actuality the huge investment was of no use. Technology has proven itself again, for the umpteenth time, that it is limited by narrow and finite human powers.
In a time of “vayidom” (loosely translated as silent or speechlessness), it is appropriate to mention an event that occured a short time after the end of WWII. It was at a gathering of rabbis held in the city of London, when some members of the public pointed out the spiritual decline and disregard for the observance of the Torah and mitzvahs, that was prevalent in various communities on the eve of the Holocaust, and they said that this was the main cause of all the severe calamities.
When the genius Rabbi Yechezkel Avramski z”l heard this, he stood up and responded firmly to them: “We find in the Torah that when Aaron’s two sons died, it is not mentioned during the period when it was still warm (still fresh news) what the reasons that caused the terrible punishment were [even though though sages list different versions of what the reasons were, they were not said at the time of the event], rather, the Torah just says “vayidom Aharon” (and Aharon was silent). We are now in the warm period after the disaster that struck the nation. Certainly, every Jew, following what happened, must reflect on his actions and reflect on repentance. But! There is no place for ‘hanging the collar’ on anyone, and no one is allowed to place the blame on others, now is a time of ‘vayidom.’”
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In our time, like the tzadikim (righteous people) said after the end of WWII, for several reasons, it is not acceptable to issue decrees and amend regulations following serious events. But this was not the case in past generations, as for example, when severe riots took place in the middle of a Simchat Torah day in the city of Krakow in Poland.
It was in the middle of the hakafot service, when the Jews of Krakow were rejoicing and dancing with the Torah. In the middle of the fourth round of dancing, while the multitudes of worshipers in the ancient synagogue (the Altshul) were rejoicing in honour of the Torah, Jew haters suddenly broke into the synagogue, forcefully pulled out a group of Jews, took some of them captive, and murdered others. Bitterness and sadness enveloped Jewish Krakow. A tragic funeral was held at the end of the day, when at the end the dead were buried side by side in a single grave, and covered by a single tombstone.
This tragic murder penetrated the hearts of the residents and its rabbis, until they established a custom from that year in the ancient synagogue, to dance only three and a half rounds at Simchat Torah. In the middle of the fourth round, the rounds are stopped and we remember that sad year, the year 5397 (1636), when the rounds were stopped in the middle of the fourth lap under such terrible circumstances.
According to tradition, since that event, in the middle of the fourth lap, it is customary to return the Torahs to the ark, and the whole crowd sits on the ground and says the verse “yigdal Elokim chai” (exhalted be the living G-d) to the tune of lamentations in memory of the martyrs and the pure. Some add that the worshipers would then turn their coats inside out, and sit on the ground to recite lamentations and the Selichot prayers.
Various versions have been written about this event. According to one of the versions, the students of the Christian priests broke into the synagogue together with their teachers, and carried out a great slaughter, and hundreds of the worshipers were killed in sanctification of G-d’s Name, may G-d avenge their blood (Sefer Chagim U’Moadim page 66 and others).
In the magazine “HaMagid” published in the year 5618/1857-8 (year 1, booklet 47, page 186), a native of Krakow, Rabbi Mordechai Weissman Hayut z”l, wrote that this happened in the year 5230/1469-10, during the reign of King Kazimir who was kind to the Jews. It was due to a local gentile rebelling against the kingdom; the event caused unrest among the empty and timid gentile residents whose anger burned in them, and without thinking twice, they decided to take their anger out, of course, on the Jews. They entered the synagogue and slaughtered mercilessly.
In “Nimukei Orach Chaim (5669a) though, it is written that the custom of Krakow was no different from the other communities who used to dance in three rounds. And the reason why they did another half lap is to walk towards the bimah (platform) to read the Torah. He added that in the last generation, some people tried to change the custom in the ancient synagogue and dance seven times, but the audience did not allow them to change the custom, and they were right, because who would enjoy it if it was in contrast to what the rabbis ruled, and against those who prayed in the old synagogue, and also the against the Rama, who prayed there sometimes.
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The three murdered individuals are buried in the ancient cemetery in Krakow; on their gravestone, the following words are engraved: “Here the three martyrs are buried.” Several versions exist as to their murder. One version given in various sources, indicates Shavuot as the day when Jewish blood was spilled in the Jewish quarter of the city. According to this version, it started due to a fight that broke out between several gentile boys who were teasing the Jews. The scuffle turned into a big riot, until the city guard brutally restrained the agitated crowd.
The gravestone of the three martyrs in Krakow (Courtesy of Beit Tzadikim- Bobov)
The gentile boys waited for the Shavuot holiday in order to take revenge on the Jews in the most severe way. And in the middle of the holiday commemorating the giving of the Torah, they broke into the synagogue, kidnapped dozens of worshipers, and began inflicting murderous blows on them. Seven Jews were drowned that day in the river and murdered, in sanctification of G-d’s name; three of them are buried together at the grave for the three martyrs. However, another version was told by the Bobover Rebbe, Rabbi Shlomo Halberstam, who attached great importance to this holy landmark (the grave).
And this is what he said during his great trip to Poland in 5735 (1974-5), when he prayed the Maariv prayer in the ancient synagogue in Krakow, at the end of a day of prayering in holy places in the cemetery. Speaking about the events of the ancient synagogue, he said, according to the mentioned version, that the disaster happened on the day of Simchat Torah in the middle of the third round.
It is also said that when the Rabbi Shlomo Halberstam senior, one of the prior Bobover Rebbes, visited the ancient cemetery in Krakow, he was stopped by this gravestone of the three martyrs. Those standing next to him noticed that his holy face had turned red and his stature had changed. Seeing this, they grabbed him and took him out of the cemetery. Due to their fear that his great devotion might be dangerous for him, and they said that from then on, he never went to visit the cemetery in Krakow again, and even started going to graves less.
Although, as mentioned, in the past they used to make rulings as a memorial to the martyrs who were killed in santification of G-d’s Name, it is not customary to do so today. However, it is our duty in view of the immense and unimaginable dimensions of the disaster, to strengthen ourselves and multiply in good deeds, for the upliftment of the souls of the martyrs, for the healing of the wounded, for the safety of the captives, and for the good news of salvation and consolation.
