Poland day 1: The Journey to Uncover the roots of the Zionist Revolution and the Youth Movements Rebellion:Texts, Peulot, and Thoughts.

"We are not in the terrible Holocaust forest, so we can't plumb the depths of the full significance of what happened there- but we can learn from the words of those who were there- even if those words are nothing but the shadow of what occurred. We use symbols likely to help us get near the vent itself and to understand it. Otherwise, the Holocaust would pass from the world together with the generation upon which it was visited. One who makes the extreme claim that the right to describe the Holocaust, to discuss it, to analyze it, and to thereby be tormented by it, is reserved to tot he survivors, and to them only- is like one who has pronounced a sentence death on his understanding of the decisive even of that period. The main problem is how to inculcate awareness of the Holocaust among the following generations. If we say the Holocaust occurred on another planet, we will have provided a way for humanity to avoid it by running away from the reality of it, and in this case, it will be seen as something terrible, mysterious, and not related to us. If, in out eyes, the problem is primarily the interventrion of God or Satan, then we no longer have a need to search for historical understanding. Responsibility will then fall, not on the Nazi's, but rather on a mysterious and heartless supernatural force. We Will have therefore removed any human responsibility, other than bland and meaningless generalities such as: 'Fateful judgments,' 'in-human relations between people' and other such empty sayings."
-Professor Yehuda Bauer, Hebrew university of Jerusalem.
The Worst thing about the Holocaust was not the fact that the Nazis were inhuman. THe worst thing was that they were human, just like you and me.
Day one: Walk through Jewish quarter in Kazimierz:
Our first evening in Poland, after a six and a half our bus ride, we arrived in the Jewish quarter of Kazimierz in Krakow. Here, the Jews lived their lives in the Diaspora, they were a community within a community, but got along quite well. in 1833, the population was 10,820. The community flourished. Schools, synagogues, and businesses were all present. In 1846 when the Krakow Republic became part of Austria again, Jews stayed in Kazimierz until 1868, when the two communities of Krakow and Kazimierz merged. In 1868, Krakow was emancipated and Jews were permitted to settle in Krakow proper. Soon, followers of the Jewish Enlightenment became the leaders of the Jewish Religious Council. Jews had their place in the culture, and all went well for the 19th century Jews, more or less. In the early 20th century however, Anti-Semitism broke out, and pogroms became a regular occurrence. But, that did not stop the Jewish communities to grow more and more. By the start of WWII, there were 60,000 Jews in Krakow.
Throughout the day there was a theme of sichot questioning the concept of the community within the community, and how these Jews viewed their own identity, seeing as they were Jews living in Diaspora with no real home, or, was that their home?
This was the topic of our night peula.
-Jew boy; By Julian Tuwim:
Singing in the yard, bundled up in rags
A poor little child, a crazy Jew-boy.
People expelled him, God his wisdom confound
Generations and exile confused his tongue.
He scratches himself and is made to dance, cries and wails, all at once.
For he is lost, and he is a beggar made.
The master in the 1st floor looks down upon the madman:
"Look, poor brother, on this my sad kin".Where have we gotten to? Is our way so lost,
Strange and repulsive throughout our whole world."
This leads to a series of discussions. Tuwin paints a picture of a big brother type character looking down on a little Jewish kid, confused and lost. This poem paints the picture of Tuwin's view of Diaspora Judaism. Tuwin is a Jew who has become completely assimilated, he no longer sees the importance of Judaism. He expresses, that there is no way for Judaism to exist, and there is no point for it to exist in a country that is not meant for the Jewish people. He's asking, what has Judaism come to? "Where have we gotten to, is our way so lost. Strange and repulsive throughout our whole world?" Tuwin is expressing that Judaism is lost, as more and more Jews become assimilated, leaving their peoplehood behind, or become part of a different people hood.
-This leads to a question to think about for all of our Jewish identities, which is a continuing discussion for all of us: What are the complexities of being a secular Jew in the Diaspora?
-What does it mean to be part of a people hood, and what is the difference between people hood and religion?
-If we are part of a people hood, shouldn't we share a center for our people hood(a state), rather than have various centers throughout the world?
-Do the Jewish People need a center? If no, then are we connected?
Here is Tuwin's piece titled, "I am a Polish Jew." 19,4.1944.
"If i had to establish my nationality, or more correctly my national sentiment, I am Polish for the simplest possible reasons, almost primitive reasons, mostly rational, and some irrational; nevertheless, without "mystic" characteristics. Being Polish is not an honor, not magnificent, and not a right. I have never met anyone who is proud that they breathe.
Polish because I was born and raised in Poland as well as educated and went to school there, because in Poland I was happy and miserable. Because from my exile, I wasn't to return to Poland even if i would be promised great heavenly pleasures somewhere else.
Polish because willow and birch trees are closer to me than palm and citrus. Machkievich and Chopin are dearer to me than Shakespeare and Beethoven. THey are more dear to me for reasons which also i cannot establish in any logical way.
Polish because I took part in the shortcoming of the Poles. Polish, because I hated the Polish fascists more than any other fascists of any other nation. I think that is an essential aspect of my Polishness.
Perhaps, foremost, Polish because that is my will."
Part two:
"We the Jews of Poland, We that are eternally living-those who were lost in the ghetto and camps: we who are the shadows of their ghosts, those who will return from across seas and oceans to the land and will work in shock in the ruins, in our bodies which remain whole in the image of the nightmares of our souls, which still exist seemingly.
We who are the truth of the graves. and we, the illusion of the existence. we the millions of casualties, and also we the thousands or tens of thousands of seemingly not casualties, and also we the thousands or tens of thousands of seemingly not causalities. We are one endless mass grave. We are the cemetery which has never been, and will never be again one like it in history.
We, whose brains were splattered on the walls of our small, meagre apartments so as to kill us in our masses-just for being Jews."
here are my questions again: What are the complexities of being a secular Jew in the Diaspora?
-What does it mean to be part of a people hood, and what is the difference between people hood and religion?
-If we are part of a peoplehood, shouldn't we share a center for our peoplehood(a state), rather than have various centers throughout the world?
-Do the Jewish People need a center? If no, then are we connected?

"God, who created Auschwitz?"
"And I, in this truck, rolling along, a naked frame among naked frames, am being sent now by a yawning German man to the creamatorium. I watch him and his yawn, and suddenly I ask myself: Does he hate me? It would seem that he doesn't even know me. He doesn't even know my name, just as i don't know the names of all of us, being brought now to the creamatorium. All I know for certain abot this German is that he now wants, on this cold morning, to stay in his warm bed, without having to waken with the dawn because this truck loaded down with raw materials has to get to the crematorium. At the same moment, I am shocked as never before in my life: If that is who he is, he could be standing here instead of me, a naked frame in a truck, while, I, I could be up there in his place, on this cold morning, looking after this delivery, and millions like it, bound for the crematorium- and like him I would yawn, since I would prefer, like him, to remain laying in bed on a cold morning such as this. And he, like me now, would watch me in the truck as it drives away. And would he, the wretch, think then of me, the SS man, as i think of him now? Aha, dear God, compassionate and forbearing, am I him, am I the one who created Auschwitz?! Isn't it enough that this German in my vision, with the symbol of the skull of death on his helmet, his tattooed hands in a black SS jacket, could he be in my place, while I- and that is the real shock- I could be in his place?!
Aha dear God, the supreme being of Auschwitz? Light up your countenance to the works of thy hands, so that I can know who is it that dwells in me and is being sent now to the crematorium-and why? And who is it that dwells in me and sends me to the crematorium-and why? You who know that at this moment, the both of us, the sender and the package, that we are equal as men! The works of your hands, in your likeliness, and in your image.
-K. tzetnik