Remembering Irena Sendler

In the sixth entry of his series explaining selected Kinot, Rabbi Moshe Taragin elaborates on the massacres that occurred in the spring of 1096 as depicted in Kinah #25 "Mi Yiten Roshi." He delves a bit into the historical background of those unfortunate mass murders, pointing out that there were gentiles sympathetic to Jews, who remained defiant against the brainwashed, philistine masses thirsty for blood. They did their best to resist decrees to hand over Jews and saved as many as they could, given the circumstances.

In a world where everything can appear calm, though seething hatred against Jews still exists in overt and clandestine ways, it is good to remind ourselves that the entire world isn't always out to get us. Even when popular opinion swings against the Jewish People, there are those righteous among the gentiles who will step forward and take our side, regardless of the risk to their own lives.

Irena Sendler was one such person.

Irena Sendler, circa 1944. From The Lowell Milken Center.

As a nurse and social working living in Warsaw during the German occupation of Poland, she endeavored to save as many Jewish lives as she could, utilizing her job and aiding the Polish Underground movement. At first, she and her assistants falsified over 3,000 documents to help Jewish families escape.

Later, she joined  Żegota, the underground Polish Council to Aid Jews, the only organization of its kind in any occupied European country, where she continued her work, specializing in smuggling children out of the Warsaw Ghetto and became the head of the Zegota's children's division.

Sendler utilized her position in the Social Welfare Department to devise a stratagem to smuggle young boys and girls to freedom. Under the guise of performing inspections intended to prevent the spread of typhus, she and her co-workers hid children in ambulances and even parcel packages to sneak the children past Nazi inspection. Having succeeded, the were transferred to a number of orphanages, and the lists of their names kept hidden with the intent of reuniting the children with their parents after the war.

In 1943, Irena was found out, imprisoned, beaten, and sentenced to death by the Nazis. She was able to bribe her German captors en route to her execution, and survived the remainder of the war in hiding. Following the end of the war, she and her colleagues passed their lists of Jewish children to a colleague in the hopes of reuniting them with their parents. Alas, few of the 2,500 children saved were able to be returned to their families, most of whom perished during the war.

Irena's story was largely forgotten under the regime that controlled Poland following the war. Yad Vashem finally recognized her in 1965, and more recently, her story has been publicized by the Life in a Jar project.

While we are in the midst of contemplating the loss of the Beis Hamikdash, we can find some encouragement in the fact that there are those among the nations of the world who have supported us, and will continue to support us, as we make the final push for the ultimate redemption.

Two Tips To Prepare For Tisha B'Av

I heard these ideas from Rabbi Yechezkel Freundlich:

Rabbi Yaakov Emden (I think that's who he quoted) wrote about the idea of why this particular galus that we are currently enduring has lasted for so long - nearly 2000 years. While many have attributed this to our people continually being mired in the sins that caused the destruction of the Beis Hamikdash - namely Sinas Chinam, lack of proper respect, failing to say the brachos before we learn Torah - Rabbi Emden said that there is a different reason why we have caused the exile to endure for such a lengthy period of time.

We don't mourn properly for that which we have lost.

To a degree, this seems to be understandable, since none of us ever experienced the Beis Hamikdash when it existed, and therefore it is hard for us to find personal meaning in connecting to the mourning practices that we observe during the 3 Weeks and on Tisha B'Av itself.

Rabbi Freundlich offered two ideas that could be very helpful in making these forthcoming 3 weeks productive in preparing for Tisha B'av - if the Moshiach should not arrive before then (which I hope he does).

1) Often, most people don't open the Kinnos until the night of Tisha B'Av and thus have very little familiarity with it - on top of the fact that we all get exhausted several hours into the morning reading of Kinnos. Rabbi Freundlich suggested that everyone take 5 minutes a day during these 3 weeks to read a Kinnah, understanding the English available to us - and thus utilize these tools that our sages have given us over the centuries to connect to a proper sense of mourning and understanding of our loss.

2) Quite a few of our 19 brachos in Shemonah Esrei discuss our yearning for Hashem's salvation, the ultimate redemption, the arrival of the Moshiach, and the rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash. It would behoove all of us to take a closer look at these brachos and give them a greater focused attention as we say them and think about their meaning.

In particular, he suggested the sentence from Es Tzemach Dovid - "Ki lishu'ashcha kivinu kol hayom" - "For Your salvation we hope all the day." Meditate on what it means to really desire HaShem's yeshua, and how we can actively hope and pray for the final redemption.

I think both of these ideas are very helpful in transforming these 3 weeks from a time of complaining for lack of shaving and music, to a time period of meaningful reflection wherein we properly utilize the time Chazal has emphasized is a time frame to focus on mourning what we have lost - and what we hope to have - G-d willing soon and in our lifetime - once again.

A Taste Of Things To Come

This past Shabbos, I was learning the sefer Imrei Baruch by Rav Baruch Simon, a Rosh Yeshiva at YU, and wanted to share two pieces that I found there that are related to the period of the 3 Weeks and Tisha B'Av.

The Gemara in the tractate of Ta’anis (30B) says that anyone who mourns for Yerushalayim will merit to see it in its rejoicing, and one who does not mourn for Yerushalayim will not see its rejoicing. The Maharal in the 23^rd chapter of his work, Netach Yisrael explains this Gemara. He writes that one who knows he is lacking something in his life can look forward to something that will complete his existence, but someone who feels as though his life is already complete cannot feel a sense of longing for anything. Thus, according to the Gemara, one who actively mourns for Yerushalayim has cultivated within himself a vacant space that will be filled with the joy of Yerushalayim’s rebuilding. By contrast, one who believes that life is great the way it is has no ability to appreciate a future that has been completed by the rebuilding of the Beis Hamikdash, and thus cannot experience it.

Rav Simon adds that it appears as though Hashem is acting toward the person in a midah k’neged midah (measure for measure) fashion. Someone who considers Yerushalayim important enough in their hearts to realize he is incomplete without the city and Temple standing in their grandeur will merit to have that hole in his life filled by the comfort of the city’s rejoicing. By contrast, one who believes his existence his full and perfect without Yerushalayim are excluded, since he feels there is nothing missing in his life.

The Chasam Sofer elaborates on a very interesting concept related to this tradition that one who mourns for Yerushalayim will merit to see it be comforted. He notes that the word “to see” is written in present, not future tense, as one might expect. The reason is due to the wholly different nature of our mourning for Yerushalayim, when compared to other nations’ response to past tragedies. For other nations in the world who take time to remember tragic events in their history, there is a sense of total loss, of remembering what is no longer here and gone forever. This is not so by the Jewish people and our mourning for Yerushalayim. As we know from the story of Yaakov and Yosef’s sale, Yaakov would not be comforted despite his children’s best efforts. There, Rashi explains that this was because the natural order created by Hashem is that a person should gradually find solace and begin to forget the intense pain of a true loss of life as time goes by, a phenomenon which does not exist for someone who is missing but still alive and could return. So too is it with our mourning for Yerushalayim. While we are saddened by its absence in our lives, we know, deep down, that one day (hopefully soon) Moshiach will come and we will once again be able to experience the spiritual splendor of the Beis Hamikdash, just as we did in times of old.

This year, Tisha B’Av falls out on Shabbos, which means the observance of the fast itself will be pushed off until Motzei Shabbos and Sunday. When I first realized this, I thought that for once the Jewish people would be observing the opinion of Rabbi Yochanan, who says that had he been there when the fast day was established, he would have made it on the 10^th of Av, since the majority of the Beis Hamikdash burned then and only started to burn on the 9^th. However, it still didn’t quite sit well with me that I’d be spending the actual day of Tisha B’Av enjoying Shabbos, eating foods, singing zemiros, and spending time with friends and family.

Then it hit me.

We are all aware of the idea that Tisha B’Av is called a “moed” or holiday, based on the verse in Eicha 1:15. Based on this, we don’t say tachanun during the day, and the rabbis tell us that in the future, Tisha B’Av will actually become a day of celebration once the Beis Hamikdash is rebuilt. This, of course, means that the day will be transformed from one of sitting on the floor, fasting, refraining from greeting one another to a day of dancing, feasting and rejoicing.

This year, due to the structure of our calendar, we are privileged to have a taste of things to come. We will be able to experience Tisha B’Av as it is meant to be experienced, not as a day of mourning but as one of celebration. True, we must not let this idea go to our heads and cause us to forget the fact of the matter that the Beis Hamikdash is not yet rebuilt, but I hope we can utilize this opportunity to prepare our minds for the great change that will occur with Moshaich’s arrival.

Hopefully, this year’s observance of Shabbos on Tisha B’Av will prepare us all for the true celebration and happiness we will experience next year with the coming of Moshiach and the rebuilding of the 3^rd and final Beis Hamikdash!

Tisha B'av Thoughts

Here we are again, another Tisha B'Av is upon us.

We weren't strong enough, good enough, righteous enough...

We didn't do enough mitzvos, learn enough Torah, daven enough tefillos, or do enough teshuva...

We harbored too much resentment of our neighbors and friends, we didn't forgive enough, we didn't try to make peace enough, we didn't look for enough opportunities to help another...

Our chessed wasn't enough, our tzedaka wasn't enough, our kavana for brachos wasn't enough...

Bottom line: we didn't care enough, want it enough, beg for it enough, cry for it enough...

And now another Tisha B'Av is here - a fast day, and not a mo'ed. No Moshiach, no rebuilt Yerushalayim, Beis Hamikdash, no shirei levi'im, no kohanim performing the avodah...

Just nothing.

Again.

Why can't we be better, care enough about each other and about the Beis Hamikdash to have it rebuilt in our lifetime?

We haven't derserved it almost 2,000 years... so how can we merit to properly deserve its return to our lives?

We don't even know what we're missing. As my Rav said, it's like asking a blind man if he missing seeing the world - there is simply no comprehension of the loss we choose to live with each and every day of our lives - in galus and in Eretz Yisrael, because we're all in this together.

I was reading the YU Tisha B'Av To-Go packet for 5771 (find past years here) and something Rabbi Kenneth Brander quoted in his introductory remarks struck a deep chord with me:

Rav Naphtali Tzvi Yehuda Berlin explains in his introduction to Sefer Bereshiet that the calamity of the Diaspora occurred when those involved with Torah study were not willing to recognize that there are multiple gateways of service to God. “The pious, the righteous and those steeped in Torah study were not virtuous in their interactions with others. They had baseless hatred of others in their hearts. They looked askance at those who served Hashem differently … thinking that they were zadukim and apikorsim, apostates and heretics. It is for this reason that death and civil unrest [came to our people], and all the evils that happened in the world culminating with the destruction of the [second] Temple occurred.”

It's as true nowadays as it was then that it's scary - and it's keeping the Beis Hamikdash from being rebuilt.

Too many "frum" Jews look down upon their brethren, whether they are very right wing looking down on their more modern brethren, chassidish looking down upon yeshivish, or shomrei Torah u'mitzvot of any banner looking down upon their less religious brothers and sisters with disdain. It's horrible, simply outrageous, and it shouldn't happen, ever.

Enough is enough.

Enough with the sinas chinam.

Bring on the ahavas chinam.

Bring on the Moshiach.

And bring back the Beis Hamikdash - amein, kein yehi ratzon.