This week we mark the 80th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the night of broken glass. Have we really had enough time to forget?
I came into my Jewish-ness at B’nai Sholom in Huntington, WV under the tutelage of Rabbi David Wucher. Every year as the leaves began to change, the Gates of Repentance was closed, the lulav and etrog were put away and the sukkah disassembled, a sermon was given the second week of November remembering Kristallnacht.
From November 9-11, 1938, non-Jewish German and Austrian civilians ransacked and burned 276 synagogues and 7,500 Jewish businesses. Police and firemen were ordered not to get involved except if non-Jews or their property was in danger. There were 91 Jewish fatalities.
In the following six years the Holocaust took the lives of six million Jews in the most abhorrent of conditions. Six million is a big number. It is hard to wrap your head around, hard to visualize. In human history six million people have gathered in one place at one for an event only five times so it is not something to which most people have a point of reference. Even then it is hard to put a face, a family, a history, hopes, dreams, celebrations, defeats, times of joy and times of mourning to each individual of a group of six million. That, as Rabbi Wucher said annually, is why it is so meaningful and important that we remember Kristallnacht, that we tell the story. We can all say we know 91 people, their stories.
Eleven is another number that we can digest. Most of us can count on ten fingers the friends and family they know and love best. We know their lives, their stories, their hopes and fears, joys and defeats, and we know our own.
I recently attended an interfaith memorial service at the Temple I attend regularly. I wept openly at the reading of the names of those ruthlessly cut down at their time of prayer and reflection in their house of worship. I have been deeply troubled and effected by this tragedy. I needed to release my pain.
I wasn’t born a Jew. Until I was 20, I had no Jewish friends. Jews were just another “them” that I had heard of but with whom I had no experience. I converted to Judaism over a long process that began in my early twenties. Dissatisfied with the judgments and blindness of other faiths I found in Judaism a family that was open, accepting, helpful, and loving. I found a family that judged me not by whom I was, whom I loved, but on my actions and on my merits. I found a people that embraced education, truth, and science. I found a faith where questioning was not only allowed, but encouraged. Their people became my people, their god my god. I moved from within walking distance of B’nai Sholom to Cincinnati, the birthplace of the Reform movement and the Hebrew Union College, then some years later to South Florida, home of over a half a million Jews. Wherever you go, I will go. Wherever you stay, I will stay.
Through this somewhat Jewishly narrowed lens of life I forgot how truly rare and precious we are in this country and in this world. Although my life is pretty Jew-ish, we really only make up less than 3% of the population of this country, a very minor minority. The attack in Pittsburg at Tree of Life robbed us of 11 more.
I did not personally know anyone that was killed. I do not know anyone who knows anyone that was killed. The closest degree of separation is: I go to Temple with people that went to Temple with people there. Why then this profound outpouring of grief?
I mourn with their immediate families. Losing a loved one is never easy, but in this manner…
I mourn with their congregation. Every Jewish congregation is a tight-knit community. I could look around my own congregations and see the people from Tree of Life. Losing one of them is tough on the community, but losing eleven…
I mourn with the Jewish people for losing 11 of their own, of our own. We are truly so few…
I grieve with a nation where anyone, Christian, Muslim, Baha’i, black, white, Arab, Hispanic, or Jew is killed in their place of prayer. I grieve for a nation where the hate-filled speech from the top has trickled down and empowered people to act violently. No one should have to think about “Active Shooter” situations while they are praying, but I have…
This is a breathtaking event, but it isn’t isolated. There have been over 300 mass shootings in the so-called United States this year, almost one per day. Hate crime is at record high in general, and hate crimes against Jews is up 57% since last year. This is worth being upset about.
The police acted swiftly and efficiently to end this event. The Justice System will see to it that the perpetrator is justly punished. Will the hate, the rhetoric, the racism, the privilege and the fear of losing that privilege come to an end as well?
Few survivors of Kristallnacht said that they could see it coming. They lived in a democracy. Their citizens, they themselves, had a say in their governance. It was supposed to be a shining example. Their rights, their properties, their religion, their lives were protected. Then rose to power someone who lost the popular vote, that drummed up the sentiment, the hate, the fear. Afraid of the Jewish prominence in society and their rise in power after World War I the charismatic leaders of Nazi Germany fed hatred, racism, and propaganda to the poor and weak populous, then allowed them to release their wrath on the scapegoat minority, and suddenly one night, without much warning, the government no longer protected this minority.
Anyone that cannot see parallels is choosing not to.
Complacency is guilt. To think that all Germans were all Jew-haters is daft. It is fair to say that, like my friends and family growing up, most Germans only knew that there were Jews, and maybe knew a Jewish doctor or lawyer or grocer, but had no feelings one way or another toward them. It is hard to talk people into killing their friends, their neighbors, their classmates. It is much easier to incite people to hate the “them’s” and the “those people’s” that you don’t know, with whom you have little to no contact, people that look different, speak a different language, pray differently, minorities.
When I sat down at the memorial service, the World War 2 veteran to whom I sat next asked me if the police were still outside with bomb-sniffing dogs. I told him that they were. He shook his head sadly and said he didn’t like that, that he never thought he’d have to worry about coming to services at the Temple, not in America. I agreed.
From November 11, 1938 until May 8, 1945 the Nazi government murdered six million Jews. Once the fuse is lit, it burns fast. How long is our vision into the future? How far are we from our own Kristallnacht, when the masses, beaten up to a fervor, are released on the minorities without intervention? It hasn’t happened yet, but to say that it can’t happen is naïve, at best. The only way that we can at this point keep from lighting the fuse, is to blow out the match. We must all stop being afraid of losing our privileges and instead be ashamed of having them. In every aspect that a person is privileged there is someone that has to do without, and that is shameful. We must stop hating that someone for wanting an equal footing, and bring him or her up to it. We have to stop fearing the stranger seeking shelter, and share our bounty. And we must absolutely stop supporting the privileged white men that stir up mistrust and hatred in order to keep their power.
We find ourselves in a situation all too similar to that of Interwar Germany. A division is growing between the haves and the have nots. Nationalism is on the rise, education on the decline. Communication between people, parties, is nearly non-existent. The people with power are resorting to saying desperate things in order to keep that power. People are doing desperate things to support those people. We all want to “Make America Great Again,” but some people think that “America” only implies to them personally. A truly great America is one where everyone is housed, and fed, and healthy, and educated. One where everyone feels welcomed and loved, and everyone has enough, a country that shows its greatness by helping countries-people-achieve greatness too. If these are the ideals that we hold for individual greatness, and we are a democracy, a nation of individuals, these are the ideals of greatness that we should hope for our country, and require in its leadership.