Ukraine -- Hebrew University research expedition to Galicia begins

Researchers from  Hebrew University in Jerusalem have begun another foray into Ukraine as part of the ongoing Jewish Galicia project. The group, headed by Dr. Vladimir Levin, will document Jewish heritage sites, including former synagogues, around the town of Nadvorna.

I posted about the project last year, after I met  Levin at a conference in Vilnius. Click HERE for that post.

Read a story about the expedition in Jerusalem Post story by clicking here

Ukraine -- Profile of Meylakh Sheykhet

 Meylakh Shekhet, Sam Gruber, and me in L'viv

I'm delighted to share this link to a profile in Canada's National Post  of my friend Meylakh Sheykhet in L'viv, who has devoted much of his life to identifying and preserving Jewish cemeteries and sites of WW2 mass execution.  Specifically, it describes one of Meylakh's current projects, an attempt, with Canadian aid, to restore the Jewish cemetery in Sambir, near L'viv.

Ever since he ventured into the Ukrainian countryside and saw the remnants of bulldozed Jewish cemeteries, and ever since he saw Holocaust mass graves that lie unkempt in the forests there, Meylakh Sheykhet has fought for the right to remember.

Over the past 20 years, Mr. Sheykhet has found and worked to restore more than 150 Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine and neighbouring Belarus, cemeteries that were destroyed or forgotten under Soviet rule.

With his greying beard and traditional Jewish dress, Mr. Sheykhet is known in Ukraine and beyond as the guardian of Jewish cemeteries. His voice is calm but impassioned as he speaks of his mission to preserve the history of a once-thriving Jewish community.

“When I witnessed the lost cemeteries for the first time, with their tombstones broken and bowed to the earth, I felt deeply connected,” said Mr. Sheykhet, who is in Toronto this weekend to address Ukrainian and Jewish audiences on his efforts. “I cannot explain it, but they called out for my protection.”

Among the villages assailed by the Nazis is the western Ukraine town of Sambir, which is home to Mr. Sheykhet’s latest quest: A centuries-old Jewish cemetery, where a Holocaust mass grave also lies.

On the first day of Passover in 1943, more than 1,200 Jews were shot and buried at the cemetery in Sambir, which was called Sambor when the town was part of Poland. Today, the cemetery — its tombstones destroyed in 1974 — doubles as a garbage dump and an overgrown pasture for cattle grazing.

Mark Freiman, president of the Canadian Jewish Congress, made his own pilgrimage to the cemetery in 2007, paying homage with his brother to their grandparents and aunts and uncles who perished there during the Holocaust.

“All of my instincts told me I had to undertake an effort to memorialize this place,” Mr. Freiman said from his Toronto home. “Seeing the place, touching the stones, and lighting a memorial candle in front of the mass grave made the history entirely real and entirely personal.”

Mr. Freiman’s partnership with Mr. Sheykhet began in the fall of last year, and has so far sparked the beginnings of a historic assessment of the site. Their work, sometimes lonely and with few allies, picks up where another Canadian’s efforts left off.

Read more by clicking here

Meylakh was on a speaking tour in Canada and several articles about him and his worked appeared. Click HERE   for a lengthy piece in Shalom Life.

He told Shalom Life that initially, he decided to take part in volunteer work to preserve the graves, while continuing his professional career.

“I meant (to just do it) for a while but it has happened for life,” said Meylakh who is also the director for Ukraine for the Union of Councils for the Jews in the Former Soviet Union. He added that he eventually realized it was not possible to do both and decided to focus on preserving Jewish cemeteries full time.

Meylakh has made it his mission over the last 10 years to protect and preserve as many Ukrainian Jewish cemeteries and mass graves as possible.

He explained that during Soviet times, the authorities denied the legitimacy and existence of Jewish cemeteries and mass graves, while using propaganda to accuse Jews for all sorts of crimes and turning the Star of David into an evil symbol. As he was familiar with this history of falsification, he felt that he could be useful in navigating the complex bureaucracy in Ukraine; during that early days after communism fell, Western visitors and dignitaries were getting the run around from the government which was giving them all sorts of excuses why it could not protect the cemeteries.

The cemeteries had even been removed from all maps and any mention of their existence was erased as if Jews never existed. Prominent Jews and rabbis who visited the country were even told that there were no laws on the book to protect cemeteries when the opposite was true.

“I made everything possible to show that they were mislaid and that the rule of law did exist for the burial sites and that the bureaucracy must follow it up and they have to respect the Jewish grave sites as required by international agreements and the rule of law of Ukraine,” he said.

So far, Meylakh has been involved in investigating more than 150 sites, producing documentation and physically protecting a third of those. However, he explained that there are literally thousands of such sites, currently in poor condition, that need to be protected.

“They need a lot of work, they need a lot of monetary investment and most important, they have to be reconstituted in a legal way because they have to be put back on city and town maps,” he said.

One would think after so many years of heroic dedication and hard work, the job would now be easier; sadly, today it is the exact opposite because of the short-sighted economic policies of the Ukrainian government.

 Read More by clicking HERE

Jewish Culture/Music/Etc Festivals 2010

 Posters for last year's Quarter6Quarter7 Hanukkah festival in Budapest. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

                                                                                            

A number of Jewish culture festivals of all sorts take place around Europe in the spring and summer (and beyond). Some are dedicated just to music. Some to film. Others are much broader. As far as I know, there is no central web site where you can find information on all of them. I will begin to post information here on dates and venues. I ask my readers to please send me information to include!

The culture festivals and other smaller events make good destinations around which to center a trip. Some, like the annual Festival of Jewish Culture in Krakow, are huge events lasting a week or more, which draw thousands of people and offer scores or sometimes hundreds of performances, lectures, concerts, exhibits and the like. Other festivals are much less ambitious. Some are primarily workshops but also feature concerts. Many of the same artists perform at more than one festival.

 The list will be growing and growing -- and again,  I ask my readers to please send me information and links to upcoming events. Thanks!


ALL OVER EUROPE -- 11th annual European Day of Jewish Culture. The first Sunday in September -- Sept. 5. Events take place in nearly 30 countries. The theme this year is Art and Judaism.

AUSTRIA

April 22-27 -- Vienna --  Stay Jewish! (Film Festival)

October 14-November 14 -- Vienna -- Yiddish Culture Autumn (web site under construction)

November 6 -  21 -- Vienna -- KlezMORE festival (this year's program is not up yet)

CROATIA

Aug. 23-31 -- Opatija -- Bejahad 2010


CZECH REPUBLIC

July 8-11 -- Boskovice -- Boskovice Festival. Mainly jazz, but also an emphasis on Jewish culture, given the importance of the well-preserved former Jewish quarter, cemetery and Jewish museum in the restored synagogue.

July 29-31 -- Trebic -- Seventh edition of the Trebic Jewish Culture Festival, held in the Czech Republic's most extensive preserved former Jewish quarter

FRANCE

April 9 - July 18 -- Paris -- Radical Jewish Culture exhibit (and concerts), Jewish Museum

June 13-28 -- Paris --  6th Festival of Jewish Cultures

July 5-9 -- Paris -- Klezmer Paris festival Lots of workshops from an all-star international team of  musicians and teachers.


GERMANY

March 5-14  -- Fürth -- Fürth International Klezmer Festival (12th edition)

July 3-August 2  -- Weimar -- Yiddish Summer Weimar

October 17-31 -- Dresden -- The 14th Yiddish Weeks Dresden

November 20-30 -- Munich -- The 24th Jewish Culture Days, Munich (devoted this year to Jewish Berlin)

HUNGARY

April 2-4 -- Budapest -- Mini-Israeli-Film-Festival, Kino cinema club

August 5-8  -- Bank Lake -- Bankito Festival

August 26-Sept. 6 -- Budapest -- Jewish Summer Festival


 ITALY

 March 11 -- Barletta --  Festival Musica Judaica 2009-2010

April 17-21 -- Ferrara -- Festival of the Jewish Book in Italy


April 23-May 23; Sept. 26-Oct. 31 -- Casale Monferrato -- OyOyOy Festival

NETHERLANDS

April  18-25    -- Leeuwarden -- Yiddish Festival Leeuwarden (takes place every other year)

Oct. 28-31 -- Amsterdam -- International Jewish Music Festival

POLAND

April 9-11 -- Warsaw -- Festival of New Jewish Music

April 20-25 -- Warsaw -- Jewish Motifs International Film Festival

May 23-28 -- Wroclaw -- 12th Simcha Jewish Culture Festival (note -- other events take place May 5-9, with the gala re-opening of the newly restored White Stork Synagogue)

May 15-23 -- Warsaw -- "Otwardatwarda" festival

May 23-26 -- Warsaw --  13th Jewish Book Fair

 June 13-19 -- Sejny -- Musicians' Raft

June -14-16 -- Bialystok -- Zahor Festival of Jewish Culture

June 19-20 -- Chmielnik -- The Eighth "Meetings with Jewish Culture" festival

June 22-26 -- Piotrkow Trybunalski -- Days of Judaism

June 26-July 4 --Krakow -- Festival of Jewish Culture --20th Edition!

 July 13-17 -- Kazimierz Dolny -- Klezmer Music Festival

July 23-25 -- Poznan -- 4th Tzadik Jewish Culture Festival

August 11 -- Lublin -- Shalom. Meetings with Jewish Culture

August 12-14 -- Rymanow -- Shabbat in Rymanow

August 28-Sept. 5 -- Warsaw -- Singer's Warsaw Jewish Culture Festival

ROMANIA

May 24-27 -- Timisoara -- Jewish Culture Days


May 26-29 -- Bucharest -- Czech Nine Gates Festival

June 19-22 -- Sighet -- Sighet Jewish Festival

September 2-5 -- Bucharest -- World of Yiddish Festival

RUSSIA

March 29-April 4 -- Moscow -- Yiddish Fest


SWITZERLAND

March 6-April 25 -- Geneva - Printemps Sefarade

U.K.

Feb. 27-March 7 -- London -- Jewish Book Week

June 21-24 -- London -- Cantors Convention

August 8-13 -- London -- KlezFest

Ukraine

July 25 -- L'viv -- LvivKlezFest

Ukraine -- Report on Cemetery Clean up and exhibit at Sniatyn

More on Ukraine -- Check Sam Gruber's blog for a long post and photographs about an "archeology of memory" project this past  summer organized by the Center for Urban History in L'viv to clean up the Jewish cemetery in Sniatyn, rescue tombstones that were used to pave a courtyard, and stage an exhibition.

The Center's web site reports:

The goal of the project was to return the attention of the inhabitants of Sniatyn to the multi-national and multi-religious heritage of their city with the help of the two week program of a volunteer camp made up of youth from Ukraine, Poland and Germany. The program included fixing up and recording the architectural cemetery ensembles of the city. Concurrently the camp become an opportunity for participants of the volunteer group to become acquainted with the heritage, as well as contemporary life of Sniatyn. The work of the volunteers focused on two cemeteries in Sniatyn - Jewish and Christian, which are found not far from one another. The Christian cemetery is still used as a place of ritual events. The Jewish cemetery is in a state of neglect and ruin, and gravestones are being destroyed by spreading tree roots. Both cemeteries are monuments to the culture and history of the city, witnesses of the life and death of Sniatyn’s past inhabitants.

 Nineteen young people took part in in the two week project at the end of July and beginning fo August.

The project was realized by the Centre for Urban History within the framework of the program "Memoria", which was initiated by the foundation "Memory, responsibility and future" and was led together with the Stefan Batory Foundation. The goal of the program is to inspire young people to look for traces of shared culture and history in the border territory. The geographical focus of the program is Central and Eastern Europe, where for centuries people from different cultures, religions and languages co-existed. The Second World War and the Holocaust, deportations and changing borders after 1945 almost completely destroyed the diversity of these territories.  That is why, within the framework of the "Memoria" program, events are organized with the participation of young volunteers from Germany, Poland, Czech Republic, Lithuania, Russia, Belorus and Ukraine, which are aimed at the preservation of historical monuments, acquaintance with different aspects of border area history and culture and formation of contacts with the inhabitants of these populated points, where the camps take place. 

Ukraine -- New Report on Jewish Cemeteries in Kiev Region

Lo Tishkach, the international organization involved in documenting and preserving Jewish cemeteries, has just published a detailed report on the cemeteries and World War II Holocaust mass grave sites in the Kiev (Kyiv) region of Ukraine, which can be downloaded as a file.

This report on the Jewish burial grounds of Kyiv Region, or Oblast, is one of the results of a number of education and research projects undertaken by the Lo Tishkach Foundation in the spring and summer of 2009. It catalogues 52 Jewish cemeteries and 29 Holocaust-era mass graves. The publication, which can be downloaded HERE, also contains details of two mass graves dating from 1919, when many Ukrainian Jews were murdered in the wave of pogroms committed in the aftermath of the Russian revolution.

Thanks to the efforts of local partners and with the support of the Genesis Philanthropy Group, this material is now available for Kyiv Oblast, the area around Ukraine’s capital and its largest city. During the spring and summer months of 2009, 83 burial grounds in the Kyiv Region were located, visited, surveyed and photographed, creating a unique record of the region’s Jewish heritage.

The report gives the history of the cemetery and of the local Jewish community (in many cases destroyed in the Holocaust), as well as details of access, location and demarcation of the cemetery; graves, gravestones, memorial markers and structures; condition and threats.

Lo Tishkach surveys in the Kiev Oblast of Ukraine have shown that the following works are urgently required on the cemeteries listed below. 

Baryshivka Jewish Cemetery – Identification marker, fencing

Bohuslav Jewish Cemetery – Completion of fencing, vegetation clearance

Borodianka Jewish Cemetery – Fencing, reparation of broken monuments, vegetation clearance

Boryspil Jewish Cemetery – Identification marker

Brovary Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Byshiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker, restoration of remaining matzevot

Dymer Jewish Cemetery – Vegetation clearance, fencing, restoration of metal grave markers

Hermanivka Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, memorial plaque

Hnativka Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Hornostaypil Old Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Hornostaypil New Jewish Cemetery – Identification marker

Hostomel Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Hrebinky Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Kaharlyk Jewish Cemetery – Vegetation clearance, fencing

Kivshovata Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Kodra Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Kozyn Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Kyiv (Zvirynetske) Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Makariv Jewish Cemetery – Identification marker

Medvyn Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, vegetation clearance, identification marker

Obukhiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Pereiaslav-Khmelnytskyi Jewish Cemetery – Fencing

Piatyhory Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker, restoration of gravestones

Poliske Jewish Cemetery – Completion and restoration of fence, vegetation clearance

Rokytne Jewish Cemetery – Completion of cemetery wall

Rozhiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Rzhyschiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Skvyra Old Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Tetiiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Trypillia Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Vasylkiv Old Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Volodarka Old Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Volodarka New Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, identification marker

Voronkiv Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Yahotyn Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker, gravestone restoration

Yasnohorodka Jewish Cemetery – Delineation of cemetery boundaries, fencing, identification marker

Ukraine -- New Resource for Jewish Heritage

 Synagogue, Bolekhiv, Ukraine, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

I want to highlight a rich and exciting new web resource for Jewish heritage in Ukraine that I learned about at the seminar in Vilnius this week on preserving and promoting Jewish heritage in Lithuania.

This is the Jewish History in Galicia and Bukovina site, which compiles extensive databases, photo galleries, articles and other material gleaned on expeditions carried out by the Center For Jewish Art at Hebrew University. (One of the scholars involved with the site, Dr. Vladimir Levin, also took part in the Vilnius seminar.)

The project Jewish History in Galicia and Bukovina is designed to preserve the once vivid world of Galician and Bukovinian Jewry. Our goal is to save historical documents and vestiges of Jewish material culture in Galicia and Bukovina before these historical records and objects disappear. We intend to make them available to the wider public as well as to the growing community of researchers worldwide through this website.

The project begins with the region of southern Galicia, which was known as the Stanislawów Voivodship (województwo stanisławowskie) in interwar Poland and is known as the Ivano-Frankivsk Region (Ivano-Frankivs'ka oblast') in today's Ukraine. In this region, primary attention is paid to four communities around Ivano-Frankivsk (Stanislawów): Bohorodczany (Brotchin, Bohorodchany), Lysiec (Lysets', Łysiec), Nadworna (Nadvirna, Nadwórna) and Solotwin (Solotvyn, Sołotwina).

The core of the project Jewish History in Galicia and Bukovina is an electronic database of primary materials pertaining to Galician and Bukovinian Jewry. Ultimately, the database will include: archival documents, newspapers articles, oral history testimonies, and documentation of Jewish cemeteries and communal buildings. The database also includes information regarding Jewish communities, Jewish communal organizations and the lives of individual Jews in the region. The project's website also includes part of the archival catalogue of the Central Archives for the History of Jewish People in Jerusalem (CAHJP).

The project Jewish History in Galicia and Bukovina was initiated by a generous donation from a private foundation that wishes to remain anonymous. The project is conducted under the auspices of the Leonid Nevzlin Research Center for Russian and East European Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in cooperation with The Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People in Jerusalem. Other organizations, such as the Sefer Center in Moscow and the Center for Jewish Art in Jerusalem also take part in the project.

.The site includes search options, interactive databases and other aides. It looks great!

Ukraine -- A New Plan to Restore All Jewish Cemeteries?

Jewish cemetery, Busk, Ukraine, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

I'm posting this little article from the Federation of Jewish Communities in the CIS, stating that the Chabad-linked Jewish community in Zhitomir, Ukraine, headed by the very energetic Rabbi Shlomo Wilhelm, has "begun a massive project to restore and preserve approximately 1,500 Jewish cemeteries scattered throughout Ukraine." According to the article, an office for this project opened this past week. But it doesn't look to me, from what is reported, that there is real funding.

It says that a "detailed inventory" of all Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine will be prepared "with information as to the degree of neglect, damage and defacement."

Jewish cemetery, Brody, Ukraine, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

It is not clear to me if this initiative has any connection with the cemetery inventory that the Lo-Tishkach organzation is carrying out in Ukraine. This is what Lo-Tishkach describes as "a three-year FSU educational project to catalogue all of the Jewish cemeteries and mass graves in Ukraine and the Baltic states." It says that surveys of 216 Jewish burial grounds have now been performed in eight of the Ukraine’s 25 regions, and that data from these surveys in now being processed.

Participants, who are drawn from local youth groups and universities, carried out comprehensive surveys at each location, illustrated by detailed photographs, and gathered vital information on the areas’ Jewish life, history and culture. The data collected from these surveys is currently being updated to the Lo Tishkach Database (see the list of recently updated records on the homepage) and will shortly be presented in a series of publications providing an up-to-date record on the situation of Jewish burial grounds in Ukraine. 

Many sites urgently in need of care were identified during the surveys, details of which are available here. Contact us at info@lo-tishkach.org to find out how to help save these sites.

Co-ordinated by the Lo Tishkach Foundation and supported by the Genesis Philanthropy Group, the project seeks to practically engage young Ukrainians with their culture and history, encourage reflection on the lessons of the Holocaust, develop values of volunteerism and civic responsibility and collect valuable information for the Foundation’s database.

The Zhitomir-project says that funding has come from the "well-known 'Chevra Kadisha' organization." But there is no indication of methodology.

The funding for this ambitious project is coming from the well-known "Chevra Kadisha’ organization. Many of the Jewish cemeteries that will be part of this project are located in towns and villages where there is no longer a local Jewish population or where there are very few Jewish residents. These cemeteries contain Jewish graves that are currently in a terribly neglected state and are often subjected to attacks by local vandals.

The office from which this project will be managed opened this past week. In the first phase of the project, a detailed inventory of all Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine will be prepared, with information as to the degree of neglect, damage and defacement. The staff will attempt to compile lists of famous individuals who are buried in these respective cemeteries.

The second phase of the project involves putting the cemeteries back in order and organizing their regular maintenance.

The initiators of this project are hopeful that the World Zionist Organization will provide financial backing and organizational assistance in implementing this project. According respect and honor to the deceased is an important part of Jewish tradition.

Read article at the web site

It is important to recall how vast, complex and difficult an operation it will be to again survey the Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine. A survey was carried out -- to determine threats and status, and also to identify the sites -- in the 1990s, overseen by the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad. It was published in 2005 and can be downloaded by clicking RIGHT HERE. Dozens of people were involved, and the Commission's list and report remains the most inclusive to date.

Jewish cemetery, Sadhora, Ukraine, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

Ukraine -- Big Turnout at Berdichev

The Federation of Jewish Communities in the CIS reports that there was a record turnout this month to mark the 200th anniversary of the death of Rabbi Levi Yitzhak, an early Hasidic Master who spent the last 25 years of his life in Berdichev (or Berdychiv, in Ukrainian).

Born around 1740, he was a disciple of the tzaddiks Shmuel Shmelke of Nikolsburg (Mikulov, Czech Republic) and the Maggid of Mezhirech.  Levi Yitzhak was one of several charismatic rabbis who made their home in Berdychev. He believed in the innate goodness of human beings, and his optimism and good cheer imbued his teachings. In particular, he believed that people could serve God in their daily actions as well as through prayer, and even prayed and wrote in Yiddish so that ordinary Jews could understand his words.

Berdichev is legendary in Jewish life and lore. Jews settled here in the early 18th century, and the town developed into an archetypical shtetl, and great Yiddish writers set stories there or used it as models for fictional towns. In 1897, its more than 41,000 Jews made up 80 percent of the town. There were said to be at least 80 synagogues and prayer rooms, but the town was also a hotbed of the Socialist Labor Bund.

Rabbi Levi Yitzhak's tomb in the large Jewish cemetery is a place of pilgrimage. Protected by a newly refurbished ohel as big as a small house, it stands surrounded by thousands of tombstones. The cemetery has undergone clean-up work -- but when I visited in 2006, it was very overgrown.

 Berdichev Jewish cemetery 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

Inside, his grave is covered by a simple slab, flanked by racks to hold candles.

Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber, 2006

Here's what the web site of the Federation of Jewish Communities said about the commemorations:

The activities were overseen by Chief Rabbi of Berdichev Moshe Taller, who is also a Chabad-Lubavitch emissary serving in the region. The local Jewish community carried out the necessary preparations thanks to the financial support of Mr. Aaron Meiberg, who made this contribution to honor his parents’ memory.

One of the special projects commemorating the 200-year anniversary was the publishing of a booklet with excerpts from Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s teachings as well as a book of Psalms with commentary by Rabbi Levi Yitzchak.

The number of visitors to Rabbi Levi Yitzchak’s gravesite on or around the yartzeit was more numerous than usual. For their convenience, the Jewish Community Center organized a hospitality center at the cemetery, where visitors were able to get kosher food, have use of restrooms and special water containers for the ritual washing of hands after visiting a grave were also made available. Additional lights were also installed at the cemetery for those people coming at night. The police provided for the visitors’ safety, while the city government arranged a pedestrian crossing for the visitors in front of the cemetery.

On Tuesday, 25 Tishrei (October 13 this year) everyone was welcome to participate in a special meal in the central courtyard of the city’s synagogue. Many rabbis and public figures attended the meal, including Mikhail Yudanin, a board member of the World Congress of Russian Jewry, who is a friend of the Jewish community of Berdichev. Mr. Yudanin received an honorary certificate in appreciation for his support of the Jewish community’s growth and development.

Mayor of Berdichev Vasiliy Mazur, who actively contributed to the reception’s organization, greeted the visitors. He noted that Berdichev owes its world-famous name to the Jewish people (in the past, the city was considered the unofficial Jewish capital of the Russian empire), and expressed his hopes that Jewish life in the city will continue to undergo a revival.

 Read Full Article

Hava Nagila in Czernowitz

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

On Sept. 6, during my trip to Romania to work on my (Candle)sticks on Stone project, I made a day trip to Chernivtsi, Ukraine -- A.K.A. Czernowitz or Cernauti -- just across the border. The city has changed, at least in outward appearance, since my last visit three years ago: 2008 marked the 600th anniversary of the town, and there was considerable investment expended in clean-up, paint-up and fix-up.

We strolled down the lovely main pedestrian street, admiring the fine buildings along it, newly painted in pastel candy colors. Suddenly, we heard the familiar strains of Jewish music -- first a Yiddish folk song, and then Hava Nagila.



The music was coming from up ahead, it wasn't exactly clear from where. I thought it might be something connected to the European Day of Jewish Culture, which was being celebrated that day. But no -- it was just a wedding (or, rather, an apparent series of weddings). Not Jewish, though. The couples and their friends exited the church and came to dance on the pedestrian way, near a little park. Here a band was set up under a red, white and blue tent. And, we were told, face-paced klezmer and Israeli songs were a big hit.

I had come to Czernowitz, in fact, to take part in a European Day of Jewish Culture event -- the presentation of Simon Geissbuehler's new book on Jewish cemeteries in the Bucovina.

Local Rabbi Kofmansky at the book presentation. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

There had been a presentation event in Radauti the day before, hosted at the new Gerald's Hotel, which had contributed some sponsorship to the book, but in Czernowitz it took place at the Jewish culture building (Jewish National House) and was organized by Jewish institutions. I was gratified that in his talk Simon quoted from the Introduction of my "Jewish Heritage Travel" to describe his own feelings:

When I first researched this book, I became absolutely mesmerized, even a little obsessed with what I was seeing. I wanted to visit, touch, see, feel as many places as I could. I almost felt it a duty. As I entered broken gates or climbed over broken walls into cemeteries where a Jew may not have set foot in years, I wanted to spread my arms and embrace them all, embrace all the tombstones, all the people buried there, all the memories.

Jewish National House. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

The building is where the historic international Yiddish congress took place in 1908. The meeting drew 70 delegates representing many political and religious factions -- they included luminaries such as the authors I.L. Peretz and Sholem Asch. There were heated debates over when Hebrew, which was then being revived, or Yiddish, whch was spoken by millions of Jews, could be considered the Jewish national language. In the end, a resolution was adopted that declared Yiddish "a" national language of the Jewish people, along with Hebrew. Click RIGHT HERE for a web site that includes papers, photographs and other material from that congress.

The Jewish National House was built at a time when all major minorities in the city erected imposing cultural headquarters. On our walk through the city, we passed the German National House and the Romanian National House.

Today it houses a number of Jewish organizations as well as new new little Jewish museum, opened in 2008. It's just a two-room exhibit, and there are not a lot of artifacts on display (many of them, though are quite interesting every-day objects, including advertisements, houseold items and even a fur streiml), but the story of Czernowitz Jews is told in photographs and narrative panels that are -- amazingly -- translated into English.

Streiml under glass. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

Romania/Ukraine -- The Bucovina Cemeteries Guidebook is Launched

Jewish cemeter, Gura Humorului, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

Swiss Diplomat Simon Geissbuehler's guidebook to Jewish cemeteries in the Bucovina region straddling the Romania-Ukraine border was launched last week in Bucharest and has been getting appreciative reviews in the local media. The book is available in various languages.

'This work is a combination of a tourist guide and an art album and I'm speaking of the fact that the text written by Simon Geissbuhler is in the form of a traveller's journal, but the images in the album make one think the work is an art album', said Adrian Manafu, the editor of Noi Media Print publishing house that published the volume.

Manafu, moreover, believes the Jewish cemeteries in Bucovina can be deemed genuine works of art. He explained the work refers the cemeteries in historical Bucovina, an old Romanian territory that has been shared by Ukraine and Romania after World War Two.

Read full story

I was glad to see that an article in one of the local media highlighted the sorry fact that the wonderful Jewish cemeteries in Bucovina are woefully ignored. The journalist Annett Muller picks up my own contention that these cemeteries could form the basis of a fascinating artistic a spiritual tourism route -- and she points out how the famous "Merry Cemetery" in Sapanta, with its brightly painted grave markers, is a popular attraction, even if it is in a fairly remote location. Few people realize that there is also a Jewish cemetery in Sapanta, well maintained and well marked.

Jewish cemetery in Sapanta, 2006. Photo (c) Ruth Ellen Gruber

I wrote the Foreword to the book, and Simon kindly pointed out an article in the local media where this was highlighted.

I am hoping to get to Radauti at the end of the summer, when a launch of the book is scheduled to take place there -- at the same time, I'll be working on my photo documentation of the beautifully decorated tombs of women in the Jewish cemetery there, a project for which I received a grant from the Hadassah Brandeis Institute.

Romania/Ukraine -- New Guidebook Launch

By Ruth Ellen Gruber

"Jewish Cemeteries of the Bucovina," a new guidebook-brochure to Jewish cemeteries in the Bucovina region of Romania (and Ukraine) is being published this month. It was written (and photographed) by Simon Geissbühler, a Swiss diplomat based in Bucharest and will be available in English, German, French, Romanian, and Ukrainian.

The official launch is June 25 in Bucharest -- see the inviation above -- but there will be another launch in Radauti, on June 29.

I contributed the Foreword to this guide -- the cemeteries in this region, with their sculptural, wonderfully carved, tombstones have long been among my favorite Jewish heritage sites (and not just because the region is where my paternal grandparents came from.) My project (Candle)sticks on Stone focuses on these carved stones, particularly house women are represented on them by depictions of candlesticks.

Needless to say, I'm delighted to see this book come out, and I hope it attracts attention to these wonderful but overlooked places, which are located in the same region as Romania's splendid, and much more famous (and visited) painted monasteries.

Here's my Foreword:

A hand reaches out, grasps the branch of a tree and breaks it sharply off. The image is extraordinary, even surreal; so vivid that you can almost hear the crack of the wood.

The tree is the Tree of Life and the hand is the hand of God -- or maybe that of the Angel of Death. The portrayal, found repeated over and over in the Jewish cemetery in Radauti, in the Bucovina region of northern Romania, is one of the remarkable sculpted images found on Jewish tombstones in scores of Jewish cemeteries scattered over this part of East-Central Europe.

I first visited Radauti more than 30 years ago, in the bitterly cold December of 1978. It is the town from which my grandparents emigrated to the United States, and it is here, in the Jewish cemetery, that my great-grandmother Ettel Gruber lies buried.

Tilted now to one side, her tombstone is marked with the depiction of candlesticks that traditionally denote the tombs of Jewish women. Ettel, who died in 1947, was "a positive and dedicated woman, fair and kind in all her doing," her epitaph reads. She "offered hospitality and charity to the poor and set a full table for the Tzaddikim."

Jewish cemeteries are often described as "Houses of the Living," and, even when overgrown and abandoned, lives and life stories endure here in sculpted form.

Jewish tombstone decoration combines religious and folk motifs that in many cases refer to the name, lineage, profession or personal attributes of the deceased. Numerous gravestones bear symbols referring to death, such as broken candles and broken flowers as well as the hand of God breaking the branch from a tree. But many more refer to life.

Among the more common carved symbols are two hands in the spread-fingered gesture of priestly blessing on the gravestones of a Cohen (priest), that is, a descendant of the biblical High Priest Aaron. Another common symbol is a pitcher, or ewer, marking tombs of Levites, or descendants of the ancient tribe of Levi, priestly assistants who traditionally washed the hands of the priests.

Books mark the graves of particularly learned people; hands placing coins into charity boxes denote those who were particularly generous. Candlesticks -- as on my great-grandmother's gravestone -- often mark the tombstones of women, since in Jewish ritual women bless the candles on the Sabbath. The candlesticks are sometimes simple representations; others show ornate, almost braided candelabras, and some carvings include hands blessing the flames.

The images of a variety of animals also frequently decorate the stones. Lions may symbolize the tribe of Judah or personal names, such as Lev or Leib. Carved stags indicate names such as Zvi or Hirsch. Birds often appear, and mythical beasts, such as the winged griffin, are also common. There is often, too, a wealth of other decorative carving such as flowers, vines, grapes, and geometric forms.

All this imagery, and more, is found in the Jewish cemeteries of the Bucovina region. The decorated tombstones here, in fact, represent especially striking and sometimes startling examples of artistry, design and virtuoso stone-carving.

Baroque tombstones from the 18th and 19th centuries in particular employ a richness of texture and imagery that approaches that found in the rococo decoration in some churches. In some places carving styles are so distinctive that you can discern the work of individual, now anonymous, artists.

Few Jews live in the Bucovina today; the cemeteries thus form powerful memorials to a civilization that was wiped out in the Holocaust. Moreover, the liveliness and fantasy employed by the stone-masons adds a new dimension to how we may regard the spiritual, intellectual and artistic lives of Jews who lived in traditional East European shtetls.

To me, these elaborate sculpted gravestones are just as important manifestations of faith through art as are the marvelous painted monasteries that are also found in this region. Yet few people know of their existence, and even fewer ever visit.

With this important new guidebook, Simon Geissbühler introduces these wonderful places to a broader public and opens the way for spiritual pilgrims of all faiths and beliefs to experience their power, beauty and historical significance.

Ruth Ellen Gruber
Morruzze, Italy