Reflections on the 80th Anniversary of Kristallnacht (Keynote at University of Dayton Kristallnacht Commemoration)

We are here, marking the anniversary of Kristallnacht, yet again in the wake of another wave of violence against Jews… For some in the Jewish community, it feels like the walls have started to close in.

In the last week alone:

1.    A congressional candidate proclaimed that there would be no peace in Israel until all Jews and Muslims converted to Christianity.[1]

2.    A synagogue in Irvine, California was vandalized and had the following text—without censorship—spray-painted on it: “F Jews.”[2]

3.    An Orthodox Rabbi in New York was harassed in the subway, as two men called him—again, without censorship—an “effing fake Jew,” as a crowd of onlookers watched and did nothing.[3]

4.    An arsonist set fire to 7 Brooklyn synagogues and Jewish schools.[4]

5.    And vandals entered a Reform synagogue and scrawled the messages “Jews better be ready,” “Hitler,” and “Kill all Jews” on its interior, forcing the synagogue to cancel its evening’s planned programming for fear of violence.[5]

This is all, of course, on top of what is arguably the most jarring, upsetting act of antisemitism in American history; that on Saturday morning, one-and-a-half weeks ago, a Jew-hating murderer—motivated by the politically-stoked paranoia that Jews are the source of all of society’s ills—marched into a synagogue in Pittsburgh and opened fire on the Jews inside, men, women, and children, who were there to enact and celebrate their identities as Jews, to praise their God.

We are here, together—Jews and non-Jews—to proclaim that we will not have our names, our identities as Jews or Christians, as people of any kind, any faith, any ethnicity, or any persuasion, used as bywords in the commission of violence that desecrates our God and our world.

We are here together, and, as Jews, we have been here before…

The ancient Rabbis of the Babylonian Talmud, who composed many of Judaism’s earliest texts nearly 2,000 years ago, taught of their own past persecutions: The Roman Government once issued a decree that Jews could not engage in the study of Torah. [And yet,] Rabbi Akiva [one of the great Sages and teachers of the Jewish tradition, was found] gathering communities in public and doing precisely that….it was not long[, of course,] before Rabbi Akiva [was arrested] and imprisoned in the jailhouse…[Ultimately,] when they took [him] out for execution, it was time to say [the most important of Jewish daily prayers, the “Shema,” which proclaims that Jews are bound to our Sovereign, our God.] [The legend teaches that] th[e Romans mercilessly tortured Rabbi Akiva], ripping at his flesh with bars of iron, and [yet] he, [nevertheless, astonishingly,] continued to accept and acknowledge God’s greatness, saying the Shema prayer]!!! His disciples said to him, according to the story: “Master, even now?” He said to them: “All the days of my life I have been troubled by [the biblical] verse, you shall love your God…with all your soul, [which I thought must mean that] even if [God] takes your soul, [you must praise God!]…. I thought, ‘When will I [ever] be able to fulfill that?’ And now[, now] that I am able to, should not I fulfill it!?” They say that he held out on the [the final Hebrew word of the prayer, the word which proclaims God’s singularity—]echad, “one”—until [the moment] his soul departed, and that a heavenly voice [even then descended] and proclaimed: “Happy are you, Rabbi Akiva, whose soul departed on [the word] echad.”

BUT God’s ministering angels[, apparently not satisfied,] said before the Holy One Blessed be God: “Such Torah—such a dedicated Jew—and such a reward—that he should merit such a death!?”

We are here again…

Such Torah, and such a reward…? Such Torah—that the martyrs of Tree of Life synagogue in Squirrel Hill chose to go to synagogue on a Saturday morning to pray as their tradition dictated—and such a reward—that they were gunned down praying their Sabbath prayers?

We are here because we will not have another Kristallnacht. In 1938, in the space of two days, hundreds of synagogues were burned and vandalized; Jewish business, homes, cemeteries, and hospitals all were destroyed; dozens of Jewish men, women, and children were killed, and, shortly thereafter, thousands upon thousands, were sent off to join the impending millions upon millions of their brethren—our human brethren—who would be killed for no reason other than their faith.

Our being here is a testament to the fact that the world must only tolerate one Kristallnacht.

Unlike in the aftermath of Kristallnacht, in the aftermath of Pittsburgh, the multitudes were not those who opposed Jews but those who supported them. Nearly 100,000 men, women, and children—the majority not even Jewish—have stood up in the last week-and-a-half to join services, and vigils, and other community gatherings to announce that they will not be counted among those who sit idly by while their Jewish brothers and sisters are slaughtered.

As a Jew in 21st-century America, I say baruch hasheim—thank God—that we have, apparently, learned some of the lessons—the clearly evident moral imperatives—that ought to be gleaned from the spilt blood of Jews whose lives were stolen from them.

In Judaism, we traditionally wish, regarding those who have died, that “their memories be for a blessing.” If their memory—if the memory of those who died in Europe in the 20th century and in Pittsburgh on October 27th—is to be a blessing, then it will mean that we will move into a future in which we will stop shirking our ethical obligation to make the world into a more just place. It will mean mourning the Jews who died in Pittsburgh on the 27th along with the black man and woman who died in Louisville on the 24th along with Sikhs who were murdered at their Temple in Wisconsin in 2012, along with those of every persecuted group in Europe—Jews and others—who died from 1933 to 1945, along with every single human being whose life has been cut short—not by God!—but by hate.

We are here, remembering the dead and the injured, and we are here together as a symbol that we will not let any oppressed group be harmed in our name, without our rising up to their defense. Our being here, through pain and suffering, slaughter and carnage, is a sign of our defiance, of our resolve.

Despite it all, despite the seemingly-insurpassable obstacles that could have blocked our paths, that could have prevented us from arriving to this moment, to this place, we are here. We are here to show—as a testimony honoring the lives of all those who have been murdered—that we who support the intertwined, triad of causes—of righteousness, of peace, of love—are not going anywhere.

As we read in Ecclesiastes, הַחוּט הַמְשׁוּלָשׁ לֹא בִמְהֵרָה יִנָתֵק—a threefold cord is not readily severed. Let our threefold cord, our values, be our guide. And may God help us to make our world a little more whole.

And together we say: Amen.

[1] https://forward.com/fast-forward/413488/gop-candidate-no-peace-in-israel-until-jews-muslims-convert-to/?attribution=blog-article-listing-1-headline&attribution=blog-article-listing-1-headline&attribution=blog-article-listing-1-headline

[2] https://www.facebook.com/lauren.gindi/posts/10214611488895285

[3]https://twitter.com/Laura_E_Adkins/status/1058137979254984704/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1058137979254984704&ref_url=http%3A%2F%2Fjewishjournal.com%2Fnews%2Fnation%2F241330%2Ffacebook-removes-rabbis-post-detailing-harassment-farrakhan-supporters%2F

[4] https://www.rawstory.com/2018/11/arsonist-sets-fires-7-brooklyn-synagogues-jewish-schools-nyc-councilman/?fbclid=IwAR30RB4tQPFGIvrpzB38DTnFRSMx2pJIk3gdqahpqDtdGdKnS5GRKArbbRI

[5] https://www.rawstory.com/2018/11/vandals-spray-paint-kill-jews-brooklyn-synagogue-hosting-progressive-political-event/