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The Jews who have arrived would nearly all like to remain here.

quote by Peter Stuyvesant
Added by Lucian Velea
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They Aint Makin Jews Like Jesus Anymore

(kinky friedman)
Well, a redneck nerd in a bowling shirt was a-guzzlin lone star beer
Talking religion and-uh politics for all the world to hear.
they oughta send you back to russia, boy, or new york city one
You just want to doodle a christian girl and you killed gods only son.
I said, has it occurred to you, you nerd, that thats not very nice,
We jews believe it was santa claus that killed jesus christ.
you know, you dont look jewish, he said, near as I could figger
I had you lamped for a slightly anemic, well-dressed country nigger.
No, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore,
They dont turn the other cheek the way they done before.
He started in to shoutin and a-spittin on the floor,
lord, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore.
He says, i aint a racist but aristitle onassis is one greek we dont need
And them niggers, jews and sigma nus, all they ever do is breed.
And wops n micks n slopes n spics n spooks are on my list
And theres one little hebe from the heart of texas is there anyone I missed ?
Well, I hits him with everything I had right square between the eyes.
I says, Im gonna gitcha, you son of a bitch ya, for spoutin that pack of lies.
If theres one thing I cant abide, its an ethnocentric racist;
Now you take back that thing you said bout aristitle onassis.
No, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore,
We dont turn the other cheek the way we done before.
You could hear that honky holler as he hit that hardwood floor
lord, they sho aint makin jews like jesus anymore!
All right!
No, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore,
We dont turn the other cheek the way they done before.
You hear that honky holler as he hit that hardwood floor
Lord, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore.
Everybody!
They aint makin jews like jesus anymore,
They aint makin carpenters who know what nails are for.
Well, the whole damn place was singin as I strolled right out the door
lord, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore!
No, we aint makin jews like jesus anymore,
We dont turn the other cheek the way they done before.
Well, the whole damn place was singin as I strolled right out the door
lord, they aint makin jews like jesus anymore!

song performed by Kinky Friedman
Added by Lucian Velea
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Filippo Baldinucci on the Privilege of Burial

"No, boy, we must not"—so began
My Uncle (he's with God long since),
A-petting me, the good old man!
"We must not"—and he seemed to wince,
And lost that laugh whereto had grown
His chuckle at my piece of news,
How cleverly I aimed my stone—
"I fear we must not pelt the Jews!

"When I was young indeed,—ah, faith
Was young and strong in Florence too!
We Christians never dreamed of scathe
Because we cursed or kicked the crew.
But now, well, well! The olive-crops
Weighed double then, and Arno's pranks
Would always spare religious shops
Whenever he o'erflowed his banks!

"I'll tell you"—and his eye regained
Its twinkle—"tell you something choice!
Something may help you keep unstained
Your honest zeal to stop the voice
Of unbelief with stone-throw, spite
Of laws, which modern fools enact,
That we must suffer Jews in sight
Go wholly unmolested! Fact!

"There was, then, in my youth, and yet
Is, by our San Frediano, just
Below the Blessed Olivet,
A wayside ground wherein they thrust
Their dead,—these Jews,—the more our shame!
Except that, so they will but die,
Christians perchance incur no blame
In giving hogs a hoist to stye.

"There, anyhow, Jews stow away
Their dead; and,—such their insolence,—
Slink at odd times to sing and pray
As Christians do—all make-pretence!—
Which wickedness they perpetrate
Because they think no Christians see.
They reckoned here, at any rate,
Without their host: ha, ha, he, he!

"For, what should join their plot of ground
But a good Farmer's Christian field?
The Jews had hedged their corner round
With bramble-bush to keep concealed
Their doings: for the public road

[...] Read more

poem by Robert Browning from Pacchiarotto (1876)
Added by Veronica Serbanoiu
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Holocaust Latvia Begins

Holocaust Latvia begins
on June 22,1941 when
the German army invaded
the Russian Soviet Union;

and the Baltic States
of Lithuania, Latvia,
and Estonia which had
by Soviet military forces;

recently been occupied
after a proud period
of independence after
World War One finished.

Murders of Jews
Communists began
almost immediately
by Einsatzgruppen;

perpetrated by German
killer squads known
as Special Task Groups
Special Assignment Groups;

the German Security Police
Sicherheitspolizei or Sipo
the Security Service of the SS
the Sicherheitsdienst or SD.

The first recorded murders
were on the day after invasion
on the night of June 23,1941
in town of Grobina near Liepāja;

six Jews were killed
in the church cemetery
by Sonderkommando
1a members deployed;

with the 14th Army
Nazi German
Einsatzkommandos
were a sub-group;

of five Einsatzgruppen
mobile killing squads
up to 3,000 men each
composed of 500 to 1000;

[...] Read more

poem by Terence George Craddock
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The Crucifixion of Christ

Composed, by Special Request, 18th June 1890

Then Pilate, the Roman Governor, took Jesus and scourged Him,
And the soldiers platted a crown of thorns, and thought it no sin
To put it on His head, while meekly Jesus stands;
They put on Him a purple robe, and smote Him with their hands.

Then Pilate went forth again, and said unto them,
Behold, I bring Him forth to you, but I cannot Him condemn,
And I would have you to remember I find no fault in Him,
And to treat Him too harshly 'twould be a sin.

But the rabble cried. Hail, King of the Jews, and crucify Him;
But Pilate saith unto them, I find in Him no sin;
Then Jesus came forth, looking dejected and wan,
And Pilate saith unto them, Behold the Man.

Then the Jews cried out, By our laws He ought to die,
Because He made Himself the Son of God the Most High;
And when Pilate heard that saying the Jews had made,
He saw they were dissatisfied, and he was the more afraid.

And to release Jesus Pilate did really intend,
But the Jews cried angrily, Pilate, thou art not Caesar's friend,
Remember, if thou let this vile impostor go,
It only goes to prove thou art Caesar's foe.

When Pilate heard that he felt very irate,
Then he brought Josus forth, and sat down in the judgment-seat,
In a place that is called the Pavement,
While the Blessed Saviour stood calm and content.

The presence of His enemies did not Him appal,
When Pilate asked of Him, before them all,
Whence art Thou, dost say from on High?
But Jesus, the Lamb of God, made no reply.

Then saith Pilate unto Him, Speakest Thou not unto me,
Remember, I have the power to crucify Thee;
But Jesus answered, Thou hast no power at all against me,
Except from above it were given to thee.

Then Pilate to the Jews loudly cried,
Take Him away to be crucified;
Then the soldiers took Jesus and led Him away,
And He, bearing His Cross, without dismay.

And they led Him to a place called Golgotha,
But the Saviour met His fate without any awe,

[...] Read more

poem by William Topaz McGonagall
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Absalom and Achitophel

In pious times, e'er Priest-craft did begin,
Before Polygamy was made a sin;
When man, on many, multiply'd his kind,
E'r one to one was, cursedly, confind:
When Nature prompted, and no law deny'd
Promiscuous use of Concubine and Bride;
Then, Israel's monarch, after Heaven's own heart,
His vigorous warmth did, variously, impart
To Wives and Slaves; And, wide as his Command,
Scatter'd his Maker's Image through the Land.
Michal, of Royal blood, the Crown did wear,
A Soyl ungratefull to the Tiller's care;
Not so the rest; for several Mothers bore
To Godlike David, several Sons before.
But since like slaves his bed they did ascend,
No True Succession could their seed attend.
Of all this Numerous Progeny was none
So Beautifull, so brave as Absalon:
Whether, inspir'd by some diviner Lust,
His father got him with a greater Gust;
Or that his Conscious destiny made way
By manly beauty to Imperiall sway.
Early in Foreign fields he won Renown,
With Kings and States ally'd to Israel's Crown
In Peace the thoughts of War he could remove,
And seem'd as he were only born for love.
What e'er he did was done with so much ease,
In him alone, 'twas Natural to please.
His motions all accompanied with grace;
And Paradise was open'd in his face.
With secret Joy, indulgent David view'd
His Youthfull Image in his Son renew'd:
To all his wishes Nothing he deny'd,
And made the Charming Annabel his Bride.
What faults he had (for who from faults is free?)
His Father could not, or he would not see.
Some warm excesses, which the Law forbore,
Were constru'd Youth that purg'd by boyling o'r:
And Amnon's Murther, by a specious Name,
Was call'd a Just Revenge for injur'd Fame.
Thus Prais'd, and Lov'd, the Noble Youth remain'd,
While David, undisturb'd, in Sion raign'd.
But Life can never be sincerely blest:
Heaven punishes the bad, and proves the best.
The Jews, a Headstrong, Moody, Murmuring race,
As ever try'd th' extent and stretch of grace;
God's pamper'd people whom, debauch'd with ease,
No King could govern, nor no God could please;
(Gods they had tri'd of every shape and size
That Gods-smiths could produce, or Priests devise.)

[...] Read more

poem by John Dryden
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Hate That Dare Not Speak Its Name

The hate that dare not speak its name,
the hate that Muslims feel for Jews,
has now become the very same
that Nazis demonstrated––views
that Christian nations held for ages.
to trash the people that God chose
according to the Bible's pages.
Too many nation states oppose
the peaceful coexistence prophets
promised would occur when swords
would no more generate large profits,
but turned into plowshares. Their words
sometimes disguise their targets whom
they don't call Jews, but they describe
as Zionists, preparing doom
for members of the Jewish tribe.

Haman's sons all live, brought back
to life no longer hung on gallows,
and now are ready to attack
all Jews, and roast them like marshmallows,
as they once did in Spain to those
they called New Jews although they had
converted––could not change their nose,
whose length has always proved they're bad,
and many of them would be burned
alive on sacrificial pyres,
as Christian as the priests who turned
against them, claiming they were liars.

The hate that Haman felt towards
the Jews of Shushan had no name,
based on the theory Jews had hoards
of gold. Ahasuerus' dame,
Queen Esther, saved them then, but we
must make sure that the hate that hides
behind deception now will be
exposed. 'Beware the Ides
of March! ' ignored by Julius, proved
to be correct. We must beware,
lest men by hateful lies are moved
to do what hate makes bad men dare.

Though we’re all forced to live with Haman,
we must not ever compromise
with hate, but make it speak its name, an
attitude that lives on lies,
and kills with its deceptive lyin’,
conflating with its hateful fury
all Jewish foes as friends of Zion

[...] Read more

poem by Gershon Hepner
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Nazi Death Squads Enter Eastern Europe

Einsatzgruppen ultimate genocide killing machines
plans so heinous Satan glorified as his SS hells legions;
task forces sowed vile atrocious monstrous Nazi deeds
SS paramilitary death squads systematic mass killings;

originally killing by indifferent civilian herd shootings
typically seek primary target Jews Gypsies Communists;
political categories Polish intellectuals Soviet prisoners
early prey physically mentally handicapped homosexuals;

rabid intolerance eradicated Nazi perceived imperfections
great musical voices minds selected for mass executions;
Einsteins Stephan Hawkings earth rare intolerated genius
unique human diversity frog marched to foul gas chambers;

Einsatzgruppen operated throughout invasion territories
occupied by German armed forces following invasions;
like Poland and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics
Einsatzgruppen systematically carried out evil operations;

ranging from repellent murder of individuals to operations
which lasted over two or more days vast horrific massacres;
at Babi Yar Kiev Soviet Ukraine 33,771 killed in two days
at Rumbula forest near Riga Latvia 25,000 killed in two days;

who testifies 33,771 Kiev Jews were massacred in two days
at Babi Yar official reports by Einsatzgruppe to headquarters;
infamous September 29-30 1941 SS and German police units
auxiliaries under awful guidance of Einsatzgruppe members;

(mobile killing unit) C slaughtered their naked Jewish victims
as quarry marched into a ravine Einsatzgruppe detachments;
shot all women children elderly without mercy in small groups
in subsequent months following the massacre German authorities;

stationed at Kiev rounded up killed thousands more Jews
at Babi Yar and non-Jews including Roma (Gypsies):
executed too were Soviet prisoners of war Communists
100,000 people estimated murdered at Babi Yar massacres;

Latvia during first six months of Nazi occupation Germans
local collaborators slaughtered 90 percent of the 95,000 Jews;
July 1941 invasion 40,000 Jews live in Riga in fear first days
of occupation savage attacks are launched upon Riga's Jews;

racist pogrom arresting beating torturing raping Riga Jews
Latvian 'civilian' nationalists begin burning synagogues;
with families inside thousands are driven toward beaches
nearby woods shot murdered a surviving 32,000 victims;

[...] Read more

poem by Terence George Craddock
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The Prioress’s Tale [from Chaucer]

'Call up him who left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold.'

I

'O LORD, our Lord! how wondrously,' (quoth she)
'Thy name in this large world is spread abroad!
For not alone by men of dignity
Thy worship is performed and precious laud;
But by the mouths of children, gracious God!
Thy goodness is set forth; they when they lie
Upon the breast thy name do glorify.

II

'Wherefore in praise, the worthiest that I may,
Jesu! of thee, and the white Lily-flower
Which did thee bear, and is a Maid for aye,
To tell a story I will use my power;
Not that I may increase her honour's dower,
For she herself is honour, and the root
Of goodness, next her Son, our soul's best boot.

III

'O Mother Maid! O Maid and Mother free!
O bush unburnt! burning in Moses' sight!
That down didst ravish from the Deity,
Through humbleness, the spirit that did alight
Upon thy heart, whence, through that glory's might,
Conceived was the Father's sapience,
Help me to tell it in thy reverence!

IV

'Lady! thy goodness, thy magnificence,
Thy virtue, and thy great humility,
Surpass all science and all utterance;
For sometimes, Lady! ere men pray to thee
Thou goest before in thy benignity,
The light to us vouchsafing of thy prayer,
To be our guide unto thy Son so dear.

V

'My knowledge is so weak, O blissful Queen!
To tell abroad thy mighty worthiness,
That I the weight of it may not sustain;
But as a child of twelvemonths old or less,
That laboureth his language to express,

[...] Read more

poem by William Wordsworth
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Genesis Of Genocide

GENESIS OF GENOCIDE

Jewish history comes with homily,
the seder shared by all the family
the best example. When men talk about
the Holocaust the homilies they're taught
homogenize the fate that menaced us
the Jews, with that of gentiles. Genesis
of genocide is changed: the hermeneutic
of revision makes it therapeutic
for those who wish to drive Jews from their land.
"The Jews, " they say, "have like the Nazis sinned,
creating victims just as Nazis did,
replacing Hitler with the settlers' God, "
revisionists exclaiming "Out of order! "
when hearing at the end of every seder
the mantra, "Next year in Jerusalem! "
while they as chauvinists condemn
the Jews, in spite of their thousand years
of blood and sweat and toil, and lots of tears,
as then in Jewish wounds rub salt, declaring
that there were other holocausts, comparing
other genocidal horrors to
what happened to the Jews, a point of view
that totally distorts significance of what,
in Wannsee, Hitler's minions chose to plot,
reducing the Solution that was Final
to a competition's quarterfinal.
The greatest homily of Jewish history
is Jews' survival, a great mystery
which it's impossible to overhype,
based on the theme of their great anthem, hope.

The last part of this poem was inspired by an emotional outburst that I had after Gerald Duchovnay told Linda, Florence Zhou and me about how he teaches students in Texas about the Holocaust by using the Shoah to explain to them "the holocaust in Sudan."
Ed Rothstein ("Memories of Holocaust, Fortified, " NYT,4/22/11) writes from Skokie:
Before the $45 million Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center opened here two years ago, there was some urgency in completing its 65,000-square-foot building, which now stands so incongruously monumental in the midst of Chicago's suburban landscape. At one time,7,000 Jews bearing the scars of the Holocaust had lived in Skokie with their families, and they were aging. Many had contributed artifacts to the museum; some participated when it was just a storefront on Main Street; some had their oral histories recorded for its exhibition and their lives chronicled in the institution's imposing companion book, "Memory and Legacy."…..
If we want to find a lesson in the events, for example, is it that individuals should not be bystanders or that nations should not be appeasers? Is the lesson that everybody should have a social conscience, or that a different kind of political action is needed when such forces emerge? Was the Holocaust a product of intolerance or an expression of more specific archetypal hatreds?
One of the challenges faced by Holocaust museums as survivors die is to understand their experience by seeing it through more than their eyes, to examine the past without homogenizing it with platitudes, to offer history without homily.
This poem echoes one that I wrote on 2/17/09, inspired by a statement by the Lubavitcher Rebbe:
TOMORROW MORNING, EARLY

"Will there be another holocaust? "
they asked the Rebbe of Lubavitch.
For an answer he was never lost.
"Of course there will be. Man is savage."

"When will this happen? " they inquired.
"Morgen in der frih, " he said,
Tomorrow morning, early, has transpired,
and millions are already dead.

[...] Read more

poem by Gershon Hepner
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An Oak Wood Piano on Kristallnacht

The SS guard hit Zindel Grynszpan on the head and he fell
Into a ditch. Father, he heard the voice of his son, you must
Go on. Zindel took the hand of his son and climbed out of
The trench. With his wife, a son and daughter on his side
They continued the march. But the SS guards did not stop
The savage whipping of the deportees. Blood was flowing
On all sides.

The Grynszpan family were Polish Jews from Hanover.
When the Nazis came to power they became outcasts.
In October 1938 they were expelled from Germany
And deported to Poland in a group of 12,000 Jews.
They were taken by train to the frontier town Neubenschen
And from there on foot to the German-Polish border.
When they reached the border heavy rain started to fall.

The Nazis confiscated their money. They had no food to eat.
Polish officers arrived and began to inspect their papers.
They admitted the refugees with Polish passports,
Housing them in military stables. Old, sick and children
Were herded together in most inhuman conditions.

One of the first things that Zindel did in Poland was to send
A postcard to his seventeen year old son Hirsch in Paris.
When Hirsch Grynszpan read the family’s tribulations
He became furious. His heart was filled with rage and hatred
And he decided to avenge their sufferings. On the morning
Of November 7, Hirsch entered a gunsmith’s shop on rue
Faubourg Saint-Martin and purchased a 6.35 calibre pistol
With a box of 25 bullets, for 235 Francs.

Then he took a ride on the Metro to the Solferino stop
And walked to the German Embassy at 78 rue de Lille.
Hirsch told the receptionist that he has some documents with him.
He was received by Ernst vom Rath, the third secretary.
When the German diplomat closed the door Hirsch pulled out
The gun. “You are a filthy Kraut”, he said, “and in the name of
12,000 persecuted Jews here is the document”. He fired five
Bullets from point blank range at vom Rath. The diplomat died
Two days later of his wounds.

The assassination came as a godsend thing for the Nazis.
Hitler denounced it as part of a global Jewish conspiracy
Against Germany. It became a pretext for the well-orchestrated
Pogrom of Kristallnacht, the night of broken glass.
During the night of November 9-10,1938, in every place
Throughout the Third Reich, Storm Troops attacked Jews
And Jewish institutions.

Hitler’s henchmen burnt down or destroyed in Germany

[...] Read more

poem by Paul Hartal
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Raschi In Prague

Raschi of Troyes, the Moon of Israel,
The authoritative Talmudist, returned
From his wide wanderings under many skies,
To all the synagogues of the Orient,
Through Spain and Italy, the isles of Greece,
Beautiful, dolorous, sacred Palestine,
Dead, obelisked Egypt, floral, musk-breathed Persia,
Laughing with bloom, across the Caucasus,
The interminable sameness of bare steppes,
Through dark luxuriance of Bohemian woods,
And issuing on the broad, bright Moldau vale,
Entered the gates of Prague. Here, too, his fame,
Being winged, preceded him. His people swarmed
Like bees to gather the rich honey-dew
Of learning from his lips. Amazement filled
All eyes beholding him. No hoary sage,
He who had sat in Egypt at the feet
Of Moses ben-Maimuni, called him friend;
Raschi the scholiast, poet, and physician,
Who bore the ponderous Bible's storied wisdom,
The Mischna's tangled lore at tip of tongue,
Light as a garland on a lance, appeared
In the just-ripened glory of a man.
From his clear eye youth flamed magnificent;
Force, masked by grace, moved in his balanced frame;
An intellectual, virile beauty reigned
Dominant on domed brow, on fine, firm lips,
An eagle profile cut in gilded bronze,
Strong, delicate as a head upon a coin,
While, as an aureole crowns a burning lamp,
Above all beauty of the body and brain
Shone beauty of a soul benign with love.
Even as a tawny flock of huddled sheep,
Grazing each other's heels, urged by one will,
With bleat and baa following the wether's lead,
Or the wise shepherd, so o'er the Moldau bridge
Trotted the throng of yellow-caftaned Jews,
Chattering, hustling, shuffling. At their head
Marched Rabbi Jochanan ben-Eleazar,
High priest in Prague, oldest and most revered,
To greet the star of Israel. As a father
Yearns toward his son, so toward the noble Raschi
Leapt at first sight the patriarch's fresh old heart.
'My home be thine in Prague! Be thou my son,
Who have no offspring save one simple girl.
See, glorious youth, who dost renew the days
Of David and of Samuel, early graced
With God's anointing oil, how Israel
Delights to honor who hath honored him.'
Then Raschi, though he felt a ball of fire

[...] Read more

poem by Emma Lazarus
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Jesus the King

On the hill of Calvary
Hung up on a tree,
Stripped bare for all to see-

Jesus, King of the Jews,
The carpenter of Galilee,
Dying for me and you.

The soldiers and priests
Shaking dust off their feet
While his followers few, did weep.

Hah, Jesus Christ the King! ?
Hear them in mockery sing
Great Caesar be our only King!

But though they reviled,
And though they mocked.
He cried, 'Father forgive; they know not.'

For he was the great I am,
A shining light, brighter than the sun's flame.
Almighty God robed in flesh, Son of Man.

Jesus, the one who will and has been,
The one who of all will one day be seen
The Creator of every living being.

Despite their mocking,
And though they denied him:
He was still their King.

Tis still the same today,
Whether you like it that way:
Jesus the King, here to stay.

You can defy him, in defiance raise,
But one day, him, everyone will praise.
You will praise, it's just about what place.

You can curse him, spurn his love.
Shake your fists at the sky above.
Nothing you do will be enough.

Because he made you, therefore your King.
Doesn't matter if you don't like him,
Won't ever change a thing.

He has been the King,
Is the King,

[...] Read more

poem by Joses Tirtabudi
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Bible in Poetry: Gospel of St. John (Chapter 8)

To Mount of Olives, Jesus went;
He came to Temple in the morn;
The people flocked to Him at once;
He sat and taught them many things.

The scribes then brought a woman caught
In adultery, and made her stand;
They said to Jesus, ‘O teacher,
This woman is an adulteress,
And got caught in the very act.
As Moses commands us to stone
Such women, so, what do you say? ’

They wanted to test Jesus thus;
So they could charge him in some way;
But Jesus wrote something on ground.
They persisted in asking Him,
So, Jesus said, ‘let one of you
Without a sin, then throw first stone.’

Again, He bent and wrote on ground;
Each one of them then left in turns;
The woman stood near Him alone;
Then Jesus asked her, ‘Where are they?
Has no one condemned you as yet? ’

The woman replied, ‘No one, sir! ’
Then Jesus said, ‘Neither do I;
So, go; from now on, do not sin.’

Then Jesus spoke to them again,
‘I am the one light of the world!
Who follows me won’t have darkness;
But will walk in the light of life.’

The Pharisees then said to him,
‘You testify on your behalf;
Your words remain unverified.’

Then Jesus answered and told them,
‘What I speak can be verified,
Because I know from where I come;
I also know to where I go;
But, you know nothing about both!
You judge by looks but I don’t judge!
But if I should, it is valid,
Because I am not all alone;
My Father is with me, who sent; .
But even in your law ’tis writ,
‘Two men’s words can be verified;

[...] Read more

poem by John Celes
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Crazy Jane On God

That lover of a night
Came when he would,
Went in the dawning light
Whether I would or no;
Men come, men go;
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
Banners choke the sky;
Men-at-arms tread;
Armoured horses neigh
In the narrow pass:
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
I had wild jack for a lover;
Though like a road
That men pass over
My body makes no moan
But sings on:
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
Before their eyes a house
That from childhood stood
Uninhabited, ruinous,
Suddenly lit up
From door to top:
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
Oh, that lover of a night
Came when he would,
Went in the dawning light
Whether I would or no;
Men come, men go;
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.
All things remain in god.

song performed by Van Morrison
Added by Lucian Velea
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Little-Known Death Factory

Operation Barbarossa,
The German invasion of the Soviet Union
commenced on June 22,1941.
Behind the rapidly advancing Wehrmacht forces
mobile SS death squads, the Einsatzgruppen,
went into action. They killed Jews,
Soviet prisoners of war and political commissars.

The historian Raul Hilberg estimated
the number of Jewish men, women and children
murdered by the Einsatzgruppen
in the ravines of Babi Yar, in the forests of Riga
and many other places at 1.3 million.

On the outspread yards of a former kolkhoz,
a dusty Soviet collective farm,
the SS task forces set up a secret death factory.
Its horrible assembly lines creaked and cried
in the outskirts of Minsk of Byelorussia,
near the village of Maly Trostenets.
Here the Nazis murdered thousands of Jews,
Soviet prisoners of war, partisans, Gypsies
and other Byelorussian civilians.

And then, on May 19,1942,
the first transport of Jews from Germany,
Austria and Czechoslovakia arrived.
Maly Trostenets became
a Vernichtungslager, an extermination camp.

Men, women and children
Were shot daily in the forests.
Others, thousands of them,
were killed in mobile gas chamber vans,
on the way from Minsk to Maly Trostenets.

Special groups of prisoners threw the corpses
Of the murdered into deep pits of mass graves.

The 'final solution',
the euphemistic code used in Hitler's Reich
for the extermination of the Jews,
was conducted in great secrecy.
The guards were ordered under oath
to shut their mouth.

The perpetrators of the massacres tried
to obliterate the evidence
that the camp ever existed.
As the Red Army advanced

[...] Read more

poem by Paul Hartal
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Bible in Poetry: Gospel of St. John (Chapter 11)

A man called Lazarus was ill,
Brother of Mary, Bethany;
This Mary had anointed Lord’s feet
By perfumed oil, dried by her hair!

So, Mary sent word to Jesus,
‘Master, the one you love is ill.’
(Meaning her brother Lazarus)

When Jesus heard, then He remarked,
‘This illness isn’t to end in death.
But for the glory of God’s works
And that the Son be glorified.’

Now Jesus loved Martha, Mary
And Lazarus who’d fallen ill;
He went to Judea later;
His disciples told Him, ‘Rabbi,
The Jews had wanted to stone you,
You want to go back to that place? ’

Then Jesus answered, ‘Are there not
Twelve hours by day for one to walk?
None stumble then for world has light.
But when he walks alone at night,
He stumbles as he has no sight!

Then Jesus said, ‘Friend Lazarus
Has gone asleep, let me wake him.’
They said, ‘If he sleeps, he’ll be saved! ’
But Jesus talked of deathly sleep,
While disciples, of slumber deep.

Jesus told, ‘Lazarus is dead! ’
Let’s go to him that you believe.
So, Thomas said, ‘Let’s die with him! ’

When Jesus reached Lazarus’ house,
He had died four days earlier.
Bethany lay two miles away!

Some Jews arrived to comfort them;
When Martha heard Jesus would come,
She went to meet; Mary sat home.

Then Martha told Him, ‘Lord, if you’d
Been here, my brother wouldn’t have died.’
‘But even now, I know whatev’r
You ask of God, He will give you.’

[...] Read more

poem by John Celes
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The Restaurant Keeper

In the City of Toronto there was once
a restaurant owned by a man named Imre Finta.
Born in 1912 in Austria-Hungary, Finta spent
his years of youth in my hometown Szeged,
immigrating to Canada after the Second World War.

Settling in Toronto, in 1953 Finta bought
the Candlelight Restaurant but it did not go well,
so he closed it. Then he opened The Moulin Rouge
on Avenue Road at DuPont Street.
The old fashioned Hungarian gentleman greeted
his guests warmly, politely kissing the right hand
of his female patrons.

I had never dined at the Moulin Rouge
but I encountered Finta in a brickyard and
at the railway station of Szeged in the summer
of 1944. At that time I was eight years old
and Finta, aged 32, was a Captain
of the Royal Hungarian Gendarmerie.
He was also a Nazi collaborator who supervised
the deportation of 8,617 Jews to slave labour lagers
and death camps. I was one of them.

A few months earlier, on March 19,1944,
the German Army occupied Hungary
and Adolf Eichmann arrived in Budapest.
His Mission was to implement in Hungary
the “Final Solution”, a Euphemism the Nazis
used to disguise the mass murder of the Jews.

In June 1944, swearing gendarmes pushed
a group of Jewish prisoners from the ersatz ghetto
of Kistelek onto a freight train. My mother,
my three year old sister Vera and I were
among them. We travelled thirty kilometres to
Szeged where the gendarmes led us to
an abandoned brick factory that was turned into
a makeshift concentration camp.

The brickyard camp commandant was
SS captain Angermayer, whom I remember
as a tall and lanky silhouette moving among
the prisoners in a black uniform.
He was assisted by ruthless gendarmes
in cock-feathered hats, armed with
bayoneted rifles and swords,
who terrorized the captives.

Living conditions in the makeshift ghetto

[...] Read more

poem by Paul Hartal
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Bible in Poetry: Gospel of St. John (Chapter 5)

There was a feast for Jews just then;
Went Jesus to Jerusalem;
There was a pool called Bethesda;
In which there lay the ill, blind, lame.

There was a man who had been ill
For years thirty-eight, lying there;
As Jesus knew his long illness,
He asked, ‘Do you want to be well? ’

The sick man answered Him, ‘Oh, Sir,
I haven’t someone to put me there,
In pool of water that’s near-by;
Someone else gets there before me.’

Then Jesus told the man who’s ill,
‘Arise, take up your mat and walk.’
And instantly, the man turned well;
It happened on a Sabbath-day.

Jews told the man who had been cured,
‘On Sabbath, you shouldn’t carry mat.’
He said, ‘The man who made me well
Told me to walk and take my mat.’

They queried him, ‘Who told you so? ’
There was a crowd around the place;
By then, Jesus had slipped away;
The man didn’t know, that Sabbath day.

Next, Jesus found the man again,
And said to him, near the temple,
‘Now well you’re, don’t sin anymore,
So that worse things do not happen.’

The man then left and told the Jews
That Jesus only made him well;
Because on Sabbath, Jesus healed,
To persecute Him, Jews began.

So, Jesus told, ‘My father works
Until now; So, I also work.’
The Jews therefore tried all the more
To kill Jesus who Sabbath broke,
And made himself to God, equal.

So, Jesus answered them and said,
‘Amen, amen, I say to you,
A son can’t do a thing by self;
He sees his father and so does.’

[...] Read more

poem by John Celes
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Of the Jews (50 A.D.)

Painter and poet, runner and discus-thrower,
beautiful as Endymion: Ianthis, son of Antony.
From a family on friendly terms with the Synagogue.

"My most valuable days are those
when I give up the pursuit of sensuous beauty,
when I desert the elegant and severe cult of Hellenism,
with its over-riding devotion
to perfectly shaped, corruptible white limbs,
and become the man I would want to remain forever:
son of the Jews, the holy Jews."

A most fervent declaration on his part: "...to remain forever
a son of the Jews, the holy Jews."

But he did not remain anything of the kind.
The Hedonism and Art of Alexandria
kept him as their dedicated son.

poem by Constantine P. Cavafy
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We're Jews, my family, and Jews break down into two distinct subcultures: book Jews and money Jews. We were money Jews.

quote by Ira Glass
Added by Lucian Velea
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