Choni Davidowitz
Four times a year Jews throughout the ages recite what is probably the most profound and moving prayer honouring those who have passed away. Included among these are those twho perished as martyrs in the Holocaust.
These are the words from the Yizkor prayer: “May G-d remember the souls of the holy and pure ones who were killed, murdered, slaughtered, burned, drowned, and strangled, for the sanctification of the name, through the hands of the German oppressors, (Yemach Sh’mom v’ zichrom), may their name and memory be obliterated…”)
In addition to Yemach Sh’mom, we are taught (Sanhedrin 45b,and Rambam Hilchot Sanhedrin 15;9), that one is forbidden for us to derive any benefit whatsoever from those countries which oppressed Klal Yisrael with unspeakable horrors.
In our times, how can we continue to walk around these countries and say: “Here and there this and that persons were killed, burned, stoned, plundered and abducted? There is not a single Jewish family in which one of its members perished in these murderous countries.
How is it possible to look at these places anymore? How can anyone with pure emotions associate with such places after they inflicted us so intensely that nothing in our entire history can compare to i?”.
I believe that to fulfil the “commandment” of Yemach Sh’mom, and our Sages’ instructions regarding remembering those countries, especially Germany, no Jew should ever set foot, or associate with them in any way.
It is with great dismay that one hears of influential Orthodox groups who are spending much time and money in resurrecting Judaism in these murderous countries, more so since the rebirth of our own land so soon after the Holocaust and nearly 2 000 years of exile.
Is this the way to obliterate the name and memory of our oppressors? Is this the way to accept the greatest gift of love – Eretz Yisrael – that G-d gave to His people?
Hashem will surely avenge the blood of our martyrs in His own time. All of Israel should remember our holy men women and children, who were murdered by obliterating the names and memory of those killers and the countries.
Golden Acres, Johannesburg
