Category Archives: Poznan

Pavement of Memory

17 Tuesday Apr 2018

Posted by in Cemeteries, Commemoration, Heritage work, Memory, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Poznan

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“We recover history…we record history.”

That is what the Jewish Community of Poznan wrote when they announced a new memorial, “Pavement of Memory,” built with fragments of Jewish tombstones that were recovered during roadwork in Poznan.

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“Pavement of Memory” composed with fragments of matzevot (Jewish Tombstones), Poznan                            Source: Janusz Marciniak

When the road crew dug up the old pavement, they noticed some stones with strange writing on them. Realizing the letters were in Hebrew, they contacted the Jewish Community. The fragments are too small to make out names or details about whose tombstones they were, but at least they have returned to the cemetery where they belong. All over Poland, fragments like this are being found, out of place, reinforcing road beds, bridge foundations, and lake beds. They were harvested during the terror of the Nazi occupation, and sometimes afterwards under state socialism. With only ghosts to look over them, Jewish cemeteries became a source for scarce building materials.

The extraordinary thing is that when public spaces are designated as repositories of Jewish memory and culture, objects return to them. As cemeteries are cleaned up, fenced, and marked, tombstones come back. In some cases, it’s as if people have known for a long time about these objects. They felt they were out of place and it has sat uneasily on their minds. They are relieved to finally know where these objects should go. In others, as with this road project, people are surprised to find these fragments, but they feel a sense of obligation to honor the memory of the past. To put things back into place.

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“Pavement of Memory” at the memorial site in a corner of Poznan’s Jewish cemetery.

These fragments are back home on a wall in the corner of the Poznan Jewish Cemetery.

“Pavement of Memory” was designed by Janusz Marciniak, who also designed the memorial at the Jewish cemetery in Piła and did a series of installations in the Poznan synagogue when it still housed a swimming pool. Janusz’s design is simple and powerful, honoring the integrity of each fragment by hanging them in three rows of ten. And yet together, like a mosaic, they make a unified statement.

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Detail of macevot fragments in Pavement of Memory

The words on the memorial plaque, in Polish, Hebrew and English, read:

Był czas, kiedy z macew robiono bruk. Czas, w którym najdosłowniej rozbijano, deptano i kaleczono pamięć o ludziach pochowanych pod macewami. Niektóre z kamiennych okruchów tej pamięci przetrwały i dziś ta pamięć łączy się z wdzięcznością dla wszystkich, którzy przyczynili się do jej ocalenia. „Z owocu swoich ust nasycony będzie człowiek dobrem, a odpłacone mu będzie według tego, co zrobity jego rece” (Prz 12, 14).

הייתה עת שבה עשו ממצבות אבני מדרכת, עת שבה היו באופן ממשי מנתצים, רומסים ופוצעים את זכרם של האנשים הטמונים מתחת למצבות. אחדים מהשברים של אבני הזיכרון

אותן הזיכרון מתאחד שרדו, וכיום עם הכרת טובה לכל אלה שתרמו להצלתו. “מפְרִי פי־אישׁ יִשְׂבַּע־טוֹב וּגְמוּל יְדֵי־אָדָם יָשִׁיב לוֹ” (משלי י”נ יד).

There was a time when matzevot [Jewish tombstones] were used for pavement; a time when the memory of the people buried under the matzevot was most literally broken, trampled, and maimed. Some remnants have survived and today this memory is connected with the gratitude to those who contributed to its rescue. “A man shall be satisfied with good by the fruit of his mouth, and the doings of a man’s hands shall be rendered unto him” (Prov. 12:14).

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Bird on an old boulder tombstone in the corner of the Poznan Jewish Cemetery that has been designated as a memorial site.

Erik Ross, a priest, blogs about Poznan’s Jewish history and heritage

15 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in antisemitism, Catholicism, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Poznan

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I came across some extraordinary posts about the fragments of Jewish life in Poznan, written by Erik Ross, a priest of the Dominican order, whose blog appears in the Times of Israel.

His posts are heart-wrenching and entertaining, full of photos, personal reflections, and difficult facts.

In Walk down Jew Street, he describes the frescoes in the Church of the Holy Blood of the Lord Jesus (Kościół Najświętszej Krwi Pana Jezusa). The church is on what is now called “Jewish Street” but inside, the recently renovated paintings depict the story of the desecration of the host by three Jews. Most striking to me, Ross points out the many places around town where this story is renewed–in the weekly opportunities to get miraculous water from the well below the church (where according to legend the Jews tried to wash off the blood that ran from the stolen hosts where they had stabbed them); in the fresh gold leaf on the Latin words recounting the story in the Corpus Christi Church, as well as three newly painted doll-sized figures of Jews around a well under a fragment of alter (marking the site where the stolen hosts were discarded in what was originally a swamp, reclaimed by a priest who brought them to another church, but then miraculously flew back to the swamp leading to the decision to build the church there).

But you should read his post, which goes into much more detail.

Frescos over the alter depicting the profaning of the host, Church of the Most Holy Blood of the Lord Jesus in Poznan

Ross has also written Fake Lake, about the beautiful Lake Rusałka that was built with Jewish slave labor and reinforced with Jewish tombstones, and Swim-a-gogue about the pool that until recently filled the main sanctuary of the synagogue (I’ve written about it too, in Swimming in the Synagogue).

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Lake Rusałka, where the CityTrail runs are held in Poznań. Built with the forced labor of Jews during World War II, many of whom died in the process.

 

 

The Curious Tale of the Fake Rabbi

29 Tuesday Nov 2016

Posted by in Identity, Jewish Culture, Polish-Jewish relations, Poznan, stereotypes

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Purim 2015
http://www.gloswielkopolski.pl/

Not long ago, a reporter revealed that that the man acting as Poznan’s rabbi was not in fact a rabbi. He called himself Jacoob Ben Nistell and claimed to be an Israeli from Haifa, but it turns out he is actually Jacek Niszczota, a Catholic Pole from Ciechanów, a town 60 miles north of Warsaw.

I’m not quite sure what to think of the story, but it resonates with Ruth Ellen Gruber’s characterization of much of Jewish activity in contemporary Europe as “virtual.” In her book Virtually Jewish: Reinventing Jewish Culture in Europe (2002), Gruber describes the myriad ways Jewish spaces, performances, and even people are in fact idealizations, representations, or stylizations of Jewishness. They are done up in “Jewish style” but often without actual Jews. This has occurred throughout Europe, where the interest in all things Jewish far exceeds the capacity of the tiny or absent populations of Jews to fulfill. Instead, non-Jews renovate synagogues, restore cemeteries, run Jewish restaurants, perform Klezmer music, and lead Jewish heritage tours.

Jacoob/Jacek’s self-presentation as Hasidic rabbi can be added to this long list of virtual Jewish performances, with the important qualification that his role was deceptive. He claimed to be a real Hasidic Jew, not someone just dressed up as one. He wore his hair long, with the distinctive side curls. He also dressed in a black brimmed hat and long black jacket. I don’t believe his intentions were malicious. Nor am I sure how much he deliberately deceived people, and how much people saw him as they wanted him to be. When I met him, he didn’t tell me “I’m a rabbi.” Rather, he said “They call me a rabbi,” his sweet smile and amused tone suggesting he was willing to go along with what others were saying about him. He did, however, claim to be from Israel. I didn’t quite believe him; more accurately, I questioned whether I heard him correctly because it didn’t fit my reading of him. He seemed Polish to me. Others tell me he put on an Israeli accent, but I can’t always recognize accents of Polish speakers. When I talked with him about a possible interview, he did not refuse, but he did not seem very eager either so I never pursued it. He seemed quirky and harmless, a bit of a happy jester.

Nevertheless, Jacoob/Jacek was deceptive and his actions are highly offensive. I saw him at a number of commemorative events: praying at the grave of Akiva Eger, a respected early 19th century Poznan rabbi; saying kaddish at the unveiling of the commemorative monument and lapidarium in Wronki; leading prayers at the Jewish Religious Community in Poznan. What got him caught was the media attention he received when he appeared at an ecumenical meeting with a Catholic priest and a Muslim imam. Someone from his hometown recognized him and alerted the media.

At that point, it became clear that there had been rumblings among Israelis and other Hebrew speakers that Jacoob/Jacek didn’t actually know Hebrew. Rather he read texts phonetically, putting emphasis and accents in the wrong places.

So that leaves me with the question why no one at the Jewish Religious Community (which is an official religious association for practicing Jews) challenged the veracity of his claims. Either they were genuinely deceived or they chose not to do anything about it. It’s problematic either way. If they didn’t know, it reveals how tenuous their knowledge of Jewish religious practice, culture, and language is. If they did know, it suggests they allowed the deception to go on. Even though Jacoob/Jacek was never declared a rabbi officially, I did hear him referred to affectionately as “our rabbi” (“nasz rabin”) and he was allowed to lead prayers in contexts that everyone expected would be done by a real rabbi. The Jewish Religious Community has a legal status. It is supposed to be the official institution for practicing Jews. What it turned out to be instead in this case is part of the virtual Jewish space. The idea, look, and performance of Jewishness was deemed sufficient.

I feel sympathy for Jacoob/Jacek, who has disappeared since his deception was revealed. I wonder what compelled him to pretend he was Jewish, and why he adopted the stereotypical form of a Hasidic Jew. It’s anachronistic in so many ways. Being any kind of Jew is a rarity in Poland, and the only Hasidic Jews in Poznan are occasional foreign visitors. Even historically, when Jews lived in Poznan in greater numbers, very few were Hasidic. This was even pointed out to me by a prominent member of the Jewish Religious Community. He gestured toward Jacoob/Jacek and assured me that even in the past, Poznan Jews tended to be more modernized.

“Who, 30 years ago in this country, would have pretended to be a rabbi, to say nothing of 70 years ago?”asked the Chief Rabbi of Poland Michael Schudrich in an article in the Times of Israel. He described Jacoob/Jacek as “very sweet and smiley,” much the same as I saw him.

Swimming in the Synagogue?

20 Sunday Mar 2016

Posted by in Commemoration, Jewish Culture, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Post-World War II, Poznan, Pre-World War II, Synagogues, World War II

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How, realistically, can Jewish heritage be preserved in Poland? Some projects are easy to get behind, like the lapidarium in Wronki. Others fall into more problematic ethical territory. The fact remains that there are many more sites in need of preservation than there are funds for such projects. And yet, I would argue that because of the magnitude of the destruction of Jewish life in Poland, every fragment has enhanced value.

The survival of a building as grand as the New Synagogue in Poznań is thus of particular worth. As with most remaining synagogues in Poland, the New Synagogue was not destroyed because it was repurposed. The Nazis converted the building into a swimming pool; after World War II, it remained a municipal pool until 2011. Although there has been ongoing public debate about more appropriate uses of the space, which at some point was passed back into the hands of the Jewish Community, the main reason the pool was finally closed was because of its deteriorating condition.

The New Synagogue was built in 1907 on Stawna Street between Wroniecka and Żydowska (Jewish) Street, just a few blocks from the central market square of the old city. Intended for Poznań’s wealthier Jewish citizens, the imposing structure had a seating capacity of 1200 and a large copper-covered cupola. Its size and grandeur is all the more striking, considering the Jewish population of the city was under 6000 when the synagogue was built, and further dwindled to perhaps 3000 right before World War II (statistics from Virtual Sztetl).

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Poznań’s New Synagogue in 1907 when it was first opened and in 2011, around the time the swimming pool closed (photos from: http://www.januszmarciniak.pl/synagogue)

As these photos show, the German occupiers also removed the cupola and other ornate features, leaving a far less elaborate structure. For several years, starting in 2004, artists like Janusz Marciniak were involved in installations and commemorative events that used the pool as a focal point. Some of these include Marciniak’s  Atlantis (2004),  Alphabet (2005), and 9/09/1939 (2006).

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Poznań’s New Synagogue in 1907 when it was first opened and in 2011, around the time the swimming pool closed (photos from: http://www.januszmarciniak.pl/synagogue)

The Jewish Community, together with others interested in preserving the New Synagogue, proposed restoring the building to its prewar shape and condition, and housing a Center for Dialog and Tolerance. Unfortunately, the plan failed to gain the institutional support and financial backing necessary for it to be realized.

But now there is a new plan in the works, to turn the synagogue into a hotel. In and of itself, that is not the worst outcome; investors will preserve and upgrade the structure, which will include a mini-museum with information about the building’s origins and the history of Poznań’s Jews. So while a museum, or memorial, or center for dialog and tolerance would be preferable, at least the synagogue won’t be torn down, as some city leaders suggested as recently as 2006.

Artist’s rendering of the proposed hotel project. The prewar copper-clad dome is reimagined in glass. Photo from article in Gazeta Wyborcza
Elements of the pool being disassembled. Photo by Łukasz Cynalewski

But putting another pool in the synagogue is, as my husband put it, kind of tone deaf. It’s insensitive to the cruel history of the place.

A recent article in Gazeta Wyborcza about the planned hotel begins with the following fable:

(my translation) “Summer 2020. Early morning at the hotel on Wroniecki Street at the corner of Stawna Street. In a luxury room in the former Jewish synagogue Alessandro Gianini, a tourist from Rome, wakes up. He flew into Poznan the night before and stayed in the modern hotel with intriguing architecture. In the guidebook, he read that the glass copula of the building recreates the old outline of an imposing synagogue. Now he wants to look around the city.

“But before Alessandro sets out for the Old Market Square, he goes down to the second floor for a swim in the hotel pool. The swim helps to relax and awaken him. He changes, and full of life goes down to the ground floor to the restaurant. After a light breakfast and a cappuccino, he heads to the exit. In the hall, however, he sees an open door to a small space. A sign in English hangs on it: “Museum of the Jews of Wielkopolski.”

“Intrigued, Gianini looks inside. He sees large boards–reproductions of sepia-colored photographs. On the first of these–a long swimming pool under a high vaulted ceiling. On the wall of the pool–a fascist eagle.

“Surprised, the Italian looks at the caption below the photo: “In 1940 Nazi occupiers profaned the synagogue, removing the Star of David from it and building a pool inside of it.

“Alessandro suddenly feels ashamed. Because of his morning swim in the place where 80 years earlier Nazis showed complete contempt for the feelings and religion of Jews, and then sentenced them to a horrible death. He is ashamed and embarrassed. And more than anything surprised that history could be repeated in this cruelly perverse way…”

(the original Polish is in the article)

I don’t know anything more about these plans, except for rumors I heard while I was in Poznań last year, and the contents of this article. Perhaps if they do include a pool, it will be located in some new addition to the structure, in a less offensive place than the main sanctuary. I certainly hope so.

Memory in Fragments: the talk at UA

31 Thursday Dec 2015

Posted by in Brześć Kujawski, Buk, Cemeteries, Family, Heritage work, Israel, Jewish Culture, Lutowiska, Memory, Poland, Polish Culture, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Polish-Jewish relations, Post-World War II, Poznan, Pre-World War II, Research Methodology, Skierniewice, Synagogues, World War II, Wronki, Włocławek

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The lecture I gave at UA September 3, 2015 about my research during my Fulbright Fellowship is now available on vimeo. I’ve never seen myself lecture before. It’s a little unsettling. Still, here it is, flaws and all (for instance I know that Poland entered the European Union in 2004, even though I misspoke here).

I talk a little about the Fulbright Program–the kinds of grants available and some tips for applying.

It’s also a good introduction to my ideas about reassembling Jewish life: the strands that I’m following, what has been lost, what can be recovered, and how memory projects at sites throughout Poland intertwine with my own search for my family history. I hear echoes of some of the scholars I’ve read–Iwona Irwin Zarecka and Marianne Hirsch, as well as my sometime collaborator Malgosia Wosińska. There is no way to bring back what has been lost, but fragments of the past can be reassembled to form a new kind of life that allows for connection with what used to be and what yet might be.

Purim po Polsku

03 Friday Apr 2015

Posted by in Jewish Culture, Poznan

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As I look forward to the Passover celebration at the Gmina Żydowska (Jewish Community) in Poznań, I’m remembering Purim which occurred last month. Purim is a fun holiday; people dress up, give gifts, and tell the story of Esther who outsmarts the evil Haman and saves the Jews. The celebration also involves feasting and drinking.

Hamentashen

Hamentashen

The evening started with a brief introduction to the holiday, conducted in the form of questions and answers. Purim is celebrated on 14 Adat (on the Hebrew calendar) in most places, on 15 Adat in walled cities. I learned that Purim is particularly associated with Jerusalem, which is why holiday preparations were already in full swing when I was there in February. The candy stores, basket sellers, and costume shops in the Mahane Jehuda Market were busy with customers.

Four things should be done on Purim; the story of Esther is told, donations are given to the poor, presents are given to family and friends, and you are supposed to have fun. Everyone was given a gift box that included a booklet in Hebrew, a noisemaker, toys, and snacks. Copies of the story of Esther were passed out, and participants took turns reading it out loud. Any time the name “Haman” was mentioned everyone stamped their feet and sounded their noisemakers. Haman was advisor to the Persian King Ahasuerus who conspired to kill the Jews, but he was outsmarted by Mordecai and Esther, Queen of the Persians. Celebration and feasting are supposed to commemorate these events.

Everyone received a gift box

Everyone received a gift box

Guests filled two long tables; some wore funny hats. There were visitors from Israel, Germany, and the US, and I sat beside Jose Maria Florencio, conductor for the Pomeranian Philharmonic in Bydgoszcz. A native of Brazil, he came to Poland 30 years ago to get a masters degree and never left. After discovering his crypto-Jewish heritage, he converted and is now a practicing Jew.

Głos Wielkopolski published an article with more photos.

Photo by Waldemar Wylegalski, Głos Wielkopolski 3-5-2015

Photo by Waldemar Wylegalski, Głos Wielkopolski 3-5-2015

Jews in Wielkopolska

14 Saturday Mar 2015

Posted by in Heritage work, Polish-Jewish Heritage, Polish-Jewish relations, Poznan, Wielkopolska, Wronki

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Regions in Poland still reflect the different administrative regimes within the Russian, Prussian, and Austrian Empires that controlled Polish territory from the late 18th century until World War I. The experience of Jews in Poland varied across these boundaries, as well. It’s a bit like the continued influence of North-South differences in the US, particularly with regard to African Americans’ experiences. History can dig channels that influence the flow of events far into the future.

Map source and more information about the partitions of Poland: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/466910/Partitions-of-Poland

Map source and more information about the partitions of Poland: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/466910/Partitions-of-Poland

Wielkopolska Province, where I’m living, was under German/Prussian control during the period of partitions. Older residents in particular tell me this German influence has contributed to the region’s sense of order and relative economic success. Historically, regional residents were more interested in taking pragmatic steps to improve daily life (what has been called “organic work”) than in romantic battles for independence that were destined to be defeated. Some refer to this region as “Polska A” in contrast to the more backward and poor “Polska B” in eastern Poland. Some also complain that in recent years state and EU funding have tended to go to other regions of Poland, and that this is a residue of outdated perceptions that Wielkopolska is the least in need of development aid as well as distaste for the German influence that makes some consider the region “less Polish.” Channels can be redirected.

The highest percentage of Jews in Wielkopolska dates back to the first half of the 19th century. Jewish outmigration after then has been attributed to a number of factors. The first is economic; Jews saw more opportunities for themselves in larger German cities. They had often been educated in German schools, spoke German, and could move west without crossing political borders. Second, the German state offered rights of citizenship for ethnic and religious minorities. Many saw more opportunities to study at universities and build careers or businesses in what they perceived as the more developed west. Third, especially from the late 19th century and continuing when Poland regained independence after World War I, Jews were escaping growing Polish anti-Semitism. The National Democrats, with their platform defending the purity of the Polish state against ethnic and religious minorities, were particularly strong in Western Poland. Many Jews continued from Germany to the United States, chasing the promise of greater social equality as well as economic opportunities. In the interwar period, Palestine became the preferred destination.[1]

By the time World War II started, Jews constituted a tiny proportion of the population of cities like Poznan and towns like Wronki. In Poznan, there were maybe 2000 Jews, while in Wronki there were perhaps 30. This early emigration and the small numbers affect the kind of memory work that can be done in Wielkopolska. Many Jewish institutions (hospitals, schools, and even synagogues) had already closed their doors well before the war; Jews were less visible for the Poles who remember prewar life. There is another issue that has tended to limit Polish scholarship about the Jews of Wielkopolska. They often identified more closely with German culture than with Polish. This is visible even in the material fragments that have been recovered. I am thinking for instance of tombstones commonly inscribed in Hebrew on one side and in German on the other.

So overall, the fragments of Jewish life in Wielkopolska are older, the memories are more distant, and fewer residents have had direct experiences with Jews and Jewish culture. These factors pose a challenge to heritage work—it can be harder to find artifacts worthy of preservation, and more difficult to convince local residents and funding sources that these stories need to be told.

[1] I’ve read and talked to a lot of people about this, but thanks especially to Tomasz Kawski for explaining it so clearly.

Memory and forgetting in Poznan, part 2

29 Monday Dec 2014

Posted by in Heritage work, Jewish Culture, Memory, Polish-Jewish relations, Poznan, Synagogues

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Monument to the victims of the Poznan labor camp

Monument to the victims of the Poznan labor camp

Despite the cold, Anka, Małgosia and I visited a few other sites associated with Jewish culture and history. The monument to the victims of the Poznan labor camp is on Królowa Jadwiga Street even though the actual detainment site was a block away in the old football stadium. The socialist-era monument is a tall concrete pillar with what looks like a menorah at the top. Anka pointed out the dedication on back of the monument stating it was erected on the 40th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising; even sites commemorating local events reproduce the idea that the Holocaust happened elsewhere—in cities such as Warsaw and Krakow.

The actual stadium was abandoned in the 1990s when a new one was built for the Warta football team. Warta is Poznan’s smaller club, rival to Lech, who got a big new stadium for the European football championship Euro 2012. Małgosia conducted ethnographic research in which Warta fans turned out to be the only ones who know the function the stadium served during the war. Essentially, it was a work camp where Jews were briefly held before being shipped off to the death camps. Many detainees were shot right there on the spot. We walked through the broken down gateway, up a set of stairs to an earthen berm surrounding what used to be the playing field. Today, the site is covered with trash, and trees grow everywhere including where the bench seating used to be. Only the concrete supports of the benches are left. Goal posts stand on the field, left over from 2012 when local teams competed in a kind of lighthearted protest against the massive outlay of funds for Euro 2012.

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Looking out from the old football stadium toward the outdoor market and new high-rises.

Looking out from the old football stadium toward the outdoor market and new high-rises.

For the most part, this is forgotten space, despite its proximity to the center of the city. It is separated from Królowa Jadwiga Street by a dilapidated outdoor market. On this frigid day, there were no customers, just very cold sellers who urged us to their buy their wares. I was told the outdoor market used to be bigger. When they were in high school, it was the place to get real Adidas and blue jeans. With all the competition from new shopping centers, the market has shrunk. There is an ongoing debate about what to do with the old stadium—what primary purpose should the space fill? Should it be a place for sports activities? A nature preserve? A place of commemoration for those who suffered and died there? Or should it become another housing development or mall?

What is the origin and meaning of this sculpture? Why is it in the newly named Square of the Righteous among Nations of the World?

What is the origin and meaning of this sculpture? Why is it in the newly named Square of the Righteous among Nations of the World?

Heading back toward the center of the old city to thaw out at a café, we chanced upon an unmarked, decaying stone sculpture. I think it was Małgosia who said it suggests some sort of Holocaust memorial. Then we noticed the sign designating the area as “Square of the Righteous Among Nations of the World.” I’ve since learned that this is a new name, approved by the city just this year.

We made two more brief stops on our tour. We peaked into the Church of the Most Holy Blood of Christ (Najświętszej Krwi Pana Jezusa) on Żydowska (Jewish) Street, where I showed Anka and Małgosia the ceiling frescos depicting Jews profaning the host.

Frescos over the alter depicting the profaning of the host

Frescos over the alter depicting the profaning of the host

In Sinners on Trial, Magda Teter outlines the historical context in which this story was told:

On Fridays, as late as 1926, and perhaps even up to the eve of World War II, in a small Catholic church on what has been known as “the Jewish street,” a few meters off the main market square in the city of Poznań, the faithful did not sing the prayer Kyrie Eleison, “God Have Mercy, Christ Have Mercy.” Instead, the church followed a liturgy that diverged markedly from the approved official liturgy of the Catholic Mass. The song’s text that replaced the words of the Kyrie Eleison told of Jewish desecration of the host in Poznan:

O, Jesus, unsurpassed in your goodness,

Stabbed by Jews and soaked in blood again

Through your new wounds

And spilled springs of blood

            Have Mercy on Us, Have Mercy on Us, Have Mercy!

The hearts of stone from the Jewish street

In the house once known as the Świdwińskis’

Sank their knives in You

In the Three Hosts, the Eternal God

            Have Mercy on Us, Have Mercy on Us, Have Mercy!

The song recounted the story of three hosts stolen by a Christian woman from a Dominican church in Poznań in 1399. According to the story, she delivered the three hosts to Jews who desecrated them, “stabbing” them with knives. Unable to dispose of them, the Jews took them outside the city and buried them in swamps. The hosts miraculously emerged to reveal themselves to a shepherd boy. The Christian woman and the Jews were punished by the magistrate, and the Church of Corpus Christi was constructed on the site after the miracle (2011: 89-90).

Teter goes on to suggest that this story might have been used as a rationale for building a new church on Żydowska Street. Pani Alicja, the head of the Poznan Jewish Community, told me that she has been waging another battle to have an informational plaque installed in the entranceway of the church explaining that the story of the profaning of the host is a legend, not historical fact. To date, church representatives have only agreed to post an explanation in the basement where most people will never see it.

The exterior of the former "new" synagogue in Poznan. The words "Pływalnia Miejska" (City Pool) can be made out above the long windows. The pool was closed just three years ago in 2011.

The exterior of the former “new” synagogue in Poznan. The words “Pływalnia Miejska” (City Pool) can be made out above the long central windows. The pool was closed just three years ago in 2011.

Our final stop was the former synagogue near the end of Żydowska Street. When built in 1907, it was considered the “new” synagogue. It could hold 1200 worshipers, and was richly ornamented with a copper dome. During the war, the Nazis stripped off the dome and transformed the synagogue into a swimming pool. It continued to function as a pool even after the Jewish Community regained possession of the building in 2002. Małgosia has seen the interior. She described how the bottom of the sanctuary was tiled with the pool at the center, but the upper part remained just like a synagogue. She also said she has been in the attic above the wooden beams of the sanctuary which is still filled with old papers and books. The building is in bad shape and in need of major renovation. Efforts have so far failed to turn it into a Center for Dialog and Tolerance (see this essay by Janusz Marciniak, which includes photos of the exterior in 1907 and today. An essay by Teddy Weinberger describes his visit to the synagogue when it was still a pool; he includes photos of the interior as a place of worship and as a swimming pool).

Memory and forgetting in Poznan

29 Monday Dec 2014

Posted by in Cemeteries, Heritage work, Jewish Culture, Polish-Jewish relations, Poznan

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Małgosia and Anka at the Jewish cemetery. The building in the background holds trash bins for surrounding apartments. The resident we spoke with felt uncomfortable about having them in a cemetery.

Małgosia and Anka at the Jewish cemetery. The building in the background holds trash bins for surrounding apartments. The resident we spoke with felt uncomfortable about keeping the trash in a cemetery.

In early December, I visited the Poznan Jewish Cemetery for a second time with Anna Weronika Brzezińska, a professor at the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology at Adam Mickiewicz University, and Małgosia Wosińska, a doctoral student at the same institute. We chose the coldest day of the season for our tour of sites associated with Jewish culture. Still, it was great to get the perspective of other ethnographers on some of the places where Jewish heritage is marked and unmarked in Poznan.

The gate into the courtyard was locked as usual, so Anka pushed the buttons on the intercom until a resident answered and buzzed us in. Anka shared her knowledge of the history of the cemetery (see some of this in my previous post). On a copy of a map from 1900, she pointed out how large the Jewish cemetery was, and how it abutted two large Catholic cemeteries. All were established in what at the time was the outskirts of the city to make room for development of the city center.

Commemorative graves and old tombstones recovered around the city. The apartments overlooking the site were built just outside the cemetery walls in the early 20th century.

Commemorative graves and old tombstones recovered around the city. The apartments overlooking the site were built just outside the cemetery walls in the early 20th century.

Poznan continued to expand so that by the early 20th century, there was another initiative to reclaim these cemeteries for other purposes. First, buildings were built along the roads, including the apartments on Śniadecki Street (visible on the other side of the wall behind the tombstones) and the Poznan Trade Center (Targi Poznańskie) on Głogowska and Grunwaldzka Streets. During World War II, the Jewish tombstones were removed and repurposed for roadways, sidewalks, and other building projects. The Catholic cemeteries (which already seem to have been at least partially missing in the 1927 photo) were also damaged, though they were not the object of systematic wartime destruction as was the Jewish cemetery. After World War II, in the 1950s, the socialist government liquidated what remained of all of the cemeteries in this area. This served a dual purpose for the secular socialist regime—so the land could be developed, but also because the cemeteries were affiliated with religions.

It changes things to realize it was not just the Jewish cemetery that was redeveloped, but also Catholic ones. Later, when we passed a park across from the train station, Anka said it used to be yet another Catholic cemetery. Taken together, they indicate a general attitude about the past—a willingness to forget, especially when specific ties to specific people are broken. State socialism also had its effects—the challenges of normal everyday life that made Poles reluctant to look to the past or the future, and the authoritarianism with which urban development was realized. This isn’t to say that Jewish memory wasn’t deliberately erased from the city landscape, but rather to put those practices into a broader context of erasure and rebuilding.

The commemoration project was controversial. Months earlier, Pani Alicja at the Gmina Żydowska explained to me that they can’t reclaim land that has been built on. This would have ruled out most of the former cemetery land because it is under the Poznan Trade Center. The only alternative was in the courtyard, but some residents protested against putting it there. I asked Anka if residents had known beforehand that their homes overlook a cemetery. She said maybe, but they would have had other things on their minds. Also, many families moved into the area after the war ended so they would not have ever seen the cemetery.

As we headed to a back gate to look at the other side of the cemetery wall, an elderly man approached on his way out from his apartment. He gladly unlocked the gate for us and paused to chat. He said he has only lived there since the 1970s, but his wife remembers playing in the empty field behind her apartment when she was a child (in what used to be the cemetery). She sometimes came across human bones sticking out of the sand.

He said some residents didn’t like the idea of the memorial, but he had no objection. On the contrary, it was a neglected space before, with broken-down garages and lots of trash. He tries to tell people about the history of the place when they visit. However, there aren’t many visitors. The few who come are usually from abroad. He hasn’t witnessed any ceremonies occurring in the courtyard. This seems odd to me. Surely some heard the prayers and chants during the Kaddish in September, but I didn’t see a single person look out their window. When asked Anka and Małgosia about this later, Anka defended the residents, saying only bathrooms and kitchens face the courtyard. Most people have no reason to look out those windows.

The resident also told us about a large wooden cabinet adorned with three carved roses that his wife’s family found in their apartment when they reclaimed it (during the war, all Polish residents were forced out and Nazi officers lived there). Once, they had a visitor who asked if they had Jews in the family, explaining that the cabinet probably came from a prosperous Jewish family around Lviv. Perhaps a German officer liked it, claimed it, and brought it back to Poznan. The number of roses (one, three, or five) represents increasing status within the Jewish community.

As we prepared to leave, Małgosia remarked that Jewish culture remains hidden in plain sight, even in places like this where the effort has been made to preserve it. Because of the locked gates, most people can’t come in.

How do you remember Jewish lives when nothing remains?

27 Saturday Dec 2014

Posted by in Cemeteries, Heritage work, Jewish Culture, Poznan

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A defining question of my study is turning out to be: How do you remember Jewish lives in Poland when nothing remains? Or when there are only scattered traces?

I certainly started with next to nothing when I began the search for my own family story. Since then, I have found so much—most extraordinarily many living relatives. I’m gathering up the fragments of the past—a half remembered story, a photograph, a birth record. And pieced together, something fuller is emerging. It’s still impossibly far from the rich lives that have passed, but it nevertheless gives me a much better sense of where I come from.

All this resonates with an article I read in the Atlantic, which although it is about the tension between science and belief in God, makes the point that the more knowledge we gain the more we become aware of how much we still do not understand (“Why God Will Not Die” by Jack Miles, December 2014, pp. 96-107). Miles explains, “Scientific progress is like mountain climbing: the higher you climb, the more you know, but the wider the vistas of ignorance that extends on all sides” (p. 100). Maybe this is what my search is destined to be like. Every relative I find points to many more ancestors and descendants who remain to be discovered. Every historical artifact hints at another vast realm of Jewish culture that remains hidden.

So how do you remember Jewish lives when nothing remains? When I met pani Alicja Kobus, the head of the Gmina Żydowska (Jewish Community) in Poznań, she told me about numerous ways in which the Gmina has fought to commemorate Jewish heritage throughout the region. Pani Alicja calls herself a bulldozer; she keeps at it no matter what obstacles she faces. She doesn’t give up. She also attributes her success to cudy (miracles), and to the material and spiritual support provided by numerous allies. Among the projects she described to me, one stands out—the reclaiming of a section of the Jewish cemetery. The story is pretty extraordinary.

The Jewish cemetery on Głogowska Street was established in the early 1800s, in what at the time was the outskirts of the city. The Poznan city leaders liquidated a number of cemeteries in the city center, including the old Jewish cemetery near what is now Plac Wolności, so the city would have room to expand. A photo taken in 1927 (on the webpage of the Poznańska Filia Związku Gmin Wyznaniowych Żydowskich w RP/ Polish Branch of the Union of Jewish Communities in the Republic of Poland) shows the Trade Center in the foreground and the Głogowska Street cemetery in the background.The cemetery was devastated by the Nazis during World War II, and the tombstones were either destroyed or carted off for construction projects. During the communist period, the adjoining Targi Poznańskie (Poznan Trade Center) was expanded into the former cemetery site.

Pani Alicja says it took something like eight years to create a memorial at the cemetery site. She focused her energies on a strip of land between some apartment buildings and the Trade Center, where a row of mismatched, ramshackle garages stood. Reclaiming the space for a cemetery memorial required the support of city officials, local residents, and international interest groups, including the descendants of Rabbi Akiva Eger, a highly regarded Talmudic scholar who was buried in the cemetery in 1837.

As pani Alicja tells it, opponents to the project were slowly persuaded, or they met with misfortune. One elderly woman refused to sell her garage, saying “I don’t want Jews in my courtyard.” Alicja responded, “You already do have Jews in your courtyard” (pointing out that the whole space was within the cemetery grounds). Not long after, the elderly woman passed away. A member of the city government who opposed the project got caught up in a scandal and resigned. Other residents were swayed by the promise that the neglected space would be renovated, with new gates and building facades. Finally, in 2007, the commemorative site was completed.

The memorial site is hard to spot from the street. The best clue is the Stars of David that ornament the new metal gates closing off the courtyard from the busy street. Inside the gate, granite plaques mounted on the archway wall outline the history of the cemetery, the rabbis who were buried there, and the international sponsors of the project (Committee for the Preservation of Jewish Cemeteries in Europe, and the British descendants of Rabbi Eger). The text is repeated in Polish, Hebrew, and English. In a narrow strip of grass sloping up to a plaster-covered brick wall (where the garages used to be) stand six tombstones commemorating Eger, his wife, and other descendants who were also rabbis. The black stones are inscribed with Hebrew writing. White gravel fills a rectangle in front of each stone, the foot marked by a metal roofed glass enclosure for candles. Old stone tombstones lean against the wall, while a few stones with large, rough writing are scattered on the grass. These grave markers were found around the city, many dug out of roadways and other wartime construction projects.

The site is closed to the public because it is in a private, locked courtyard. The first time I visited was when rabbis and others came from Zurich and England to say the kaddish on the anniversary of Eger’s death. They gathered around the grave and sang and prayed for about an hour, nodding as they read in unison. The visitors were all male; they wore black hats and long coats, their payot curled in front of their ears. Observers from the Poznan Jewish Community watched at a respectful distance, except for a few key members including Pani Alicja who stood with the visitors.

Kaddish for Rabbi Akiva Eger, October 6, 2014

Kaddish for Rabbi Akiva Eger, October 6, 2014

It struck me that throughout the kaddish, I didn’t see a single resident of the surrounding buildings. As it got dark, I could see the lights in many apartments. Didn’t they hear the singing? Weren’t they interested in what was happening right outside their windows?