Vilnius, September 25, BNS–A proposal has been made to establish a World Litvak Museum and reopen the Jewish research institute YIVO in Vilnius, and to commemorate Jews who contributed to the restoration of Lithuanian statehood at the Government, to pay homage to Jewish heritage.
The proposal was made at a conference at the Lithuanian parliament Sunday by the historian Alvydas Nikžentaitis. He said it would make sense to put the museum presenting the history of the Jews of Lithuania at the site of the former Great Synagogue in the center of Vilnius. “The most important goal of all would be to restore the Great Synagogue, the place where Jews, without regard to viewpoints, all gathered, where the most import things were deliberated. This is the place, I think, where the World Litvak Museum should be built,” the professor said at parliament.
“It wouldn’t just be about the Litvaks who are no longer alive, it could also honor the most famous descendants of Litvaks. I imagine it as similar to the NBA Hall of Fame, where Lithuanians and Jews could annually select people who have made the greatest contributions to world culture,” Nikžentaitis said.
The Great Synagogue was one of the most important Jewish centers from the end of the 16th century till the Holocaust. The synagogue was damaged during the war and the Soviets razed the ruins to the ground in the 1950s.
A primary school now sits on part of the former synagogue territory and there have been archaeological digs there for the last five years in a row.
The idea of the museum has been the subject of discussion in Lithuania for over a year now. Proponents point to Poland where the POLIN Polish Jewish History Museum has been established in the former Warsaw ghetto territory. That museum devotes much space to Jewish life in Lithuania.
Jewish Research Institute
Nikžentaitis said YIVO, the Jewish research institute which operated in Vilnius between the two world wars, could also return to Vilnius. The institute is now based in New York City and received some of its salvaged pre-war archives there after the war.
“[I propose] seriously considering re-establishing the international Jewish institute, with the participation of YIVO representatives, here in Lithuania, perhaps as a branch of YIVO,” he said.
Currently YIVO in New York and the Lithuanian Central Archives and the Martynas Mažvydas National Library in Lithuania are digitizing documents for general public access.
Professor Nikžentaitis called for commemorating Jewish heritage at Government House on Gedimino prospect in Vilnius. He said Jews who had contributed to the restoration of Lithuanian statehood could be honored there.
“Jews who were delegates to the Lithuanian Council and the surnames of Jewish affairs ministers could appear on the Government building. It should be considered whether soldiers of Jewish origin who were awarded the Order of Vytis could be honored at this location,” he proposed.
To Strengthen Lithuanian-Jewish Relations
Nikžentaitis said signs commemorating Jews would help strengthen Lithuanians’ ties with the current resident Jewish community and would aid them in taking a more dispassionate look at history.
“Without forgetting the Holocaust, we must also emphasize other moments of history, so that finally we might discover that living connection with the surviving Jewish community, with our Jewish history, and perhaps then we might better understand and come to terms with, including emotionally, that tragedy which took place 75 years ago,” the historian said.
Attention to Jewish History
In the initial period after Lithuanian independence, Jewish heritage and the Holocaust were unpopular topics for Lithuanian historians, and more attention was paid crimes of the Soviet regime. Lithuania was sometimes criticized by the West for failing to take measures to prosecute Nazi collaborators.
The most important political steps were the apology president Algirdas Brazauskas made to the Israeli Knesster in 1995, and the good-will law on 37 million euros of compensation for seized Jewish communal property adopted in 2011 on the initiative of Lithuanian prime minister Andrius Kubilius.
Over the last decade cultural figures have become increasingly more outspoken about the Holocaust. Sigitas Parulskis’s novel called “Tamsa ir partneriai” [Darkness and Company], set during the Holocaust, earned him the title of Person of Tolerance, and Rūta Vanagaitė’s book “Mūsiškiai” [Our Own] about Lithuanian complicity in Holocaust crimes created a great stir this year.
Signs of Jewish heritage, symbolically and literally, are increasing in Lithuanian cities and towns, including the Vilnius Jewish Public Library and a new street sign in Hebrew and Yiddish. Holocaust anniversary commemorations in rural locations in Lithuania were larger than ever before.
Despite these promising indicators, the Jewish Community and some cultural figures decry a lack of reform in education which would make Lithuanian Jewish history an integral part of the Lithuanian educational curriculum.