REMEMBERING CONSTRUCTIVELY

MEMORIAL SERVICE

SOCIETY FOR THE HISTORY OF CZECHOSLOVAK JEWS

Rabbi Norman Patz

March 27, 2022 – 24 Adar II, 5782

Consul General Kares, thank you for reminding us of Mrs. Lauscher’s tree, which she and her kindergarteners “planted” on Tu B’Shevat in 1944; Consul General Vrbovsky, thank you for reminding us that this is the 80th anniversary of transports from Slovakia departing from the railroad station in Poprad. Write ups of both of these events appeared in the memorial books by the Society in years past.

Because this is a leap year in the Jewish calendar, Purim is celebrated in Second Adar, the month that is added to realign our lunar counting with the solar cycle. That is why our memorial service, marking the 78th anniversary of the murder of the Czech Jews held in the Family Camp B2B in Birkenau is later than usual. The Jews of the Family Camp were murdered on Purim. Their deaths, together with the execution four months later of the Family Camp inmates who had been transported to Auschwitz-Birkenau in December 1943 and May 1944, this was the largest murder of Czech Jews in all of World War II.

This year’s service, the 76th, also marks the 80th anniversary of the full opening of Terezin which the Nazis cynically named a “model ghetto.”

Our service takes place as a ruthless dictator rains destruction and death in an unprovoked assault on Ukraine, horrifying in its brutality and its cruelty. Cantor Hirschhorn, who grew up in Kyiv, has written in the Ansche Chesed newsletter about her shock and upset. I hope you were able to read it. As we pray and work for the end of this war, we stand with Cantor Hirschhorn and all of those who are fearful for their families and friends and for every innocent Ukrainian civilian still there. May they be safe. May the bravery of the Ukrainians and their remarkable president not be in vain. May what is happening lead not to wider war but to Putin’s downfall. The daily reports about the Ukrainian people’s suffering and bravery are both devastating and inspiring. They must arouse especially painful memories in the consciousness of Holocaust survivors and their families.

“Remembering constructively” has been the title for all the sermons and meditations I have presented at the Society’s memorial services over the years. My goal, my purpose each year, is to help us honor the memory of our loved ones. Help us to heal, and to permit us to get on with our lives in positive ways. However horrific, our memories must not be an obstacle to living but an incentive to live in ways that bring credit to those whom we lost.

The latest edition of DSM, the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, known as the psychiatrists’ bible, asserts that grieving too long can be damaging to mental health. The volume has now added “prolonged grief disorder” to its catalog of mental disorders.

The purpose of my remarks and of this service has never been to prolong harmful grieving, and certainly not to dismiss memory. Rather, it is to help us use those memories to affirm life and to inspire us to live as those whom we lost would have wanted to live. We know they had little freedom, if any, to make choices. Their lives were not under their control. We must never let our memories or what we imagine happened to them be a source of shame or guilt for us.

Our great teacher Hillel warns us: “Do not judge your neighbor until you are in your neighbor’s position.” Hillel is instructing us not to pass judgment without full knowledge of all the circumstances (Avot 2:4). God forbid that any of our people should ever be in that situation again.

In the context of judging “neighbors” – which means, more generally, people who are known to us, I am thinking about Madeleine Albright, who died last week at the age of 84. Her accomplishments and her courageous outspoken advocacy of justice and her passion for democracy, emerging out of her family’s experiences, deserve our sincere admiration and praise, especially in this age of political dishonesty and hypocrisy. Yet some people are made uncomfortable by her troubled relationship with her Jewish roots. We know that ambivalence toward Jewish identity was a common characteristic among assimilated Czech Jews in the interwar period. As Tomas Kraus, head of the Federation of Czech Jewish Communities, observed “It is common for Jews from this part of the world to be ignorant of their Jewish roots.” The Korbel family’s flight from Nazi-occupied Prague and their conversion to Catholicism after their arrival in London, must be accepted as Joseph Korbel’s decision to protect his family and his position in the Czech government. We understand it even as we do not agree with it. That is in line with the Talmudic dictum teaching us that “the Merciful One exempts [from punishment] a person who is coerced.”

After Madeleine Albright became secretary of state, pressure mounted on her to acknowledge her Jewish ancestry. In 1997, the newspapers printed the names of her Jewish grandparents – her grandfather, Arnost died in Terezin and her grandmother Olga was murdered at Auschwitz. I made xerox copies of the relevant pages of Terezinska Pametni Kniha, the Terezin memorial book with all the names organized by transports, and sent them to her.

I got a nice thank you note via her press secretary, Jamie Rubin. A few months later, that August, Naomi and I were leading a congregational tour visiting Jewish sites in Central Europe. When we came to Terezin, we saw a line of black limousines parked outside the Small Fortress. The first limo had an American flag attached to the front fender. Curious, I approached the secret service agent, identified myself and asked who was the visiting dignitary. The secretary of State. She knows me, I said. May I wait to say hello to her? With their agreement, I sent the group on to begin their tour of the ghetto while Naomi and I waited.

Soon, Madeleine Albright, two of her daughters and their husbands emerged, led by Tomas Kraus and our friend, Vojta Blodig, deputy director of the Ghetto Museum. Naomi and I were warmly greeted by the Secretary, who introduced us to her daughters and their husbands. In

the course of our conversation, Madeleine Albright held out her hand and showed us two pebbles. “I’m going to Israel in a few weeks,” she said. “I am planning to put these stones on Yitzhak Rabin’s grave. I think that’s the right thing to do.” I assured her that it was indeed appropriate. Our meeting came to an end with formal handshakes.

Months later I sent her the report of our meeting which I had presented at this Society’s 1998 Memorial service.

Putting small stones on Yitzah Rabin’s grave! That’s a very Jewish custom. In that way, in her intense dedication to democracy, and in things like her expression of pride that her youngest grandson was training for his bar mitzvah, Madeleine Albright reclaimed her Jewish connections, however belatedly.

As Madeleine Albright put those stones on Yitzak Rabin’s grave, we, here in this service, are symbolically placing small stones on the graves of our loved ones – even – and perhaps, especially those whose burial place is unknown. We remember them. We remember. We do not forget.

Our greeting to one another is this: May God console us among the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem. Amen.

In other years we have had a printed book of memory. For this virtual service, I now read the names of dear ones who have died in the past year.

If you are able, please rise for the El Malei Rahamim and remain standing as we say Kaddish together. After kaddish, please be seated again and listen to the Largo from Antonin Dvorak’s New World Symphony, our Society’s signature way of connecting the old and new worlds in which we live.