Learning, History, Culture – Page 19 – Lithuanian Jewish Community

Yehuda Bauer is Dead

Holocaust survivor and scholar Yehuda Bauer passed away October 18. He was 98. He was buried at Shoval kibbutz in the Negev.

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky, the entire Community and the World Jewish Congress mourn the passing of Yehuda Bauer and extend our deepest condolences to his family members and all who knew him.

WJC president Ronald Lauder said: “I was deeply saddened to hear about the passing of Prof. Yehuda Bauer, who taught generations of students and others about the Holocaust. I will never forget our last discussions at the International Forum on Holocaust Remembrance and Combating Antisemitism in Malmö, Sweden, in October 2021 and the passionate speech he gave on that occasion.”

2024-10-23

Ninth Fort Authoritarian Regime Reading Contest

The Ninth Fort Museum in Kaunas hosted their 6th reading of texts by students called “Silent Wall, Touched by Words” last week.

Kaunas Jewish Community chairman Gercas Žakas addressed the students, judges and audience, saying: “In my name and that of Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky I thank Ninth Fort Museum director Marius Pečiulis and the entire staff for holding this important event, and I thank the students and the teachers who have prepared them, for their time spent, sincerity and sensitivity.”

The students read texts about the Holocaust, the Nazi era and the Soviet era in Lithuania. The Ninth Fort Museum includes a tunnel system were Jews were imprisoned before being shot inside the Ninth Fort. Exhibits include cells with extant graffiti by murdered Jews. In the Soviet era the Ninth Fort was a de facto Holocaust memorial, if not in name, with a monumental abstract Soviet statue which remains the center piece of the museum grounds. After Lithuanian independence they became a museum showcasing Soviet atrocities as well as Nazi crimes.

2024-10-22

Palanga Jewish Community Invites You to Herring Lecture at Jonas Šliūpas Museum

Herring fishing and consumption stretches back millennia and became an integral part of Jewish cuisine centuries ago. The Jonas Šliūpas Museum is hosting a lecture by Jewish cuisine specialist Dovilė Rūkaitė on the Jewish culinary history of herring at 5:00 P.M. on Wednesday, October 23, in Palanga.

The museum recently opened an exhibit called “From the North Sea to the Christmas Table” about herring which included an interesting archaeological find: part of a cover and barrel for a 19th-century herring selection and conservation system.

Rūkaitė plans to speak on the significance of Jewish merchants and populations in popularizing the fish in Europe and will also discuss some of the classic recipes which use herring.

Time: 5:00 P.M., October 23
Place: Jonas Šliūpas Museum, Vytauto street no. 23A, Palanga
Duration: About 1 hour

The lecture is free and open to the public.

2024-10-22

Jewish Scouting Season Opens

Weekly meetings of Jewish scouts are taking place again starting at 3:00 P.M. this Sunday at the Lithuanian Jewish Community in Vilnius. The gathering should last around one hour. Jewish scouting teaches scouts Jewish culture, civic-mindedness, responsibility, independence and a number of other skills and values, and includes a lot of fun and games as well. This group is intended for scouts and potential scouts aged 6 to 18. FOr more information contact Michail Kofman by telephone at 860645o94 or send an email to skautai@lzb.lt.

2024-10-222024-10-22

Mandolin Virtuoso Avi Avital to Perform in Klaipėda

Israeli mandolin master Avi Avital will perform with the Klaipėda Chamber Orchestra works for mandolin and baroque arrangements at the Klaipėda Music Hall at 6:30 P.M. on October 26. His repertoire includes world beat, jazz and the opera of Vivaldi, Bach and Bartók, among others.

For more information, see here.

2024-10-21

Women’s Club Meeting Friday

Dear reader,

The Women’s Club will be expecting you again this Friday, and this meeting will be especially fun and delicious as we make quiches and pastries.

This time of year is special, the High Holy Days, and we cannot avoid the holiday spirit. THis Friday we celebrate the Feast of Tabernacles, Sukkot, when we sit down at the table together with our families and also treat those who come by. So, dear homemakers, we will learn to make the Israeli dish pashtida, sometimes called a kugel, which resembles a quiche, and layered apple pastries.

A good time is guaranteed.

Please register before noon on Thursday by sending an email to zanas@sc.lzb.lt or by calling (+370) 678 81514. Space is limited.

Time: 6:30 P.M., Friday, October 18
Place: Bagel Shop Café, Pylimo street no. 4, Vilnius

2024-10-15

Condolences

Maratas Šeimanas passed away October 13. He was born in 1937. He was a Lithuanian Jewish Community member and Saul Kagan Welfare Center client. Our deepest condolences to the wife and son he left behind.

2024-10-15

Yom Kippur

Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement and remission from sin, the most important holiday on the Jewish calendar, will be observed Saturday. No matter how religious or not, no Jew risks travelling, bathing or eating during Yom Kippur. The holiday must be observed correctly, so the Lithuanian Jewish Community and the Bnei Maskilim progressive Judaism community invite you to observe the holy day together with us and Rabbi Hanoch Fields from the United States.

Program of events at the LJC in Vilnius:

October 11

6:30 P.M. Kol nidrei

October 12

10:00 A.M. Torah reading
5:00 P.M. Yizkor
5:15 P.M. Neila
6:30 P.M. Blowing of the shofar
7:00 P.M. End of fast, shared feast

Registration required. To register, contact viljamas@lzb.lt

2024-10-102024-10-10

Somber Tone as Seniors Citizens Celebrate Rosh Hashanah on Eve of October 7

Senior citizens and elderly members of the Lithuanian Jewish Community gathered for a different kind of Rosh Hashanah celebration at the LJC in Vilnius on the weekend.

With the anniversary of Hamas’s October 7 invasion and mass murder of Israelis last year, there was less of the usual music and fun and more prayers in Yiddish and Hebrew performed by Choral Synagogue cantor Shmuel Yaatom. The cantor’s wife Natalja Cheifec spoke about the history and traditions of Rosh Hashanah and the role of the woman in the Jewish family.

2024-10-09

Panevėžys Celebrates the New Year

The Panevėžys Jewish Community celebrated Rosh Hashanah last week with music and food, including apples and honey. The prayer was performed before blowing the shofar. Yekaterna Radionova performed Jewish melodies on violin and members of the Community wished one another well in the coming year.

2024-10-09

Natalja Cheifec’s Lecture Series Continues with Discussion of High Holy Days

Natalja Cheifec’s #EDUKACIJOS discussion club invites you to join the zoom call at 5:30 P.M. this Thursday, October 10. She’ll discuss Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, and what these holidays mean to Jews, traditions for observance and what to avoid to protect yourself from misfortune.

Zoom credentials available here:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfRZKhoOgl_UbN-IxT4SO7m4uerwQONUveXaWQvFMKDghE-1A/viewform

Everyone is welcome.

2024-10-09

Kaunas Ushers in the New Year

The Kaunas Jewish Community celebrated Rosh Hashanah with gusto and flair, and with a large number of Community members, friends and musicians.

Participants ate and chatted, and listened to Jewish melodies, which led to dancing. There was a quiz to test knowledge of the holiday, well-wishes for the coming year and prayers for more peace, love and human warmth in the world.

2024-10-07

Rosh Hashanah in Šiauliai

The Šiauliai Jewish Community came together to celebrate Rosh Hashanah Thursday evening. It began with a prayer and blowing the shofar horn, followed by breaking of challa and apples with honey, other dishes, well-wishes for the coming year 5785 and a glass of wine with a hearty “lechaim!”

2024-10-07

Makabi Sporting Extravaganza

On September 29 the Lithuanian Makabi Athletics Club held their annual sports celebration for young and old alike to try their hand at a number of different kinds of sport, from chess and frisbee to volleyball and basketball. This year’s celebration included a workshop on krav maga, the Israeli martial art. The competition and workshop concluded with lunch and a discussion of the Makabi club’s future.

2024-10-072024-10-07

Knife-Wielding Masked Teenagers Take Over Palace of Sports in Old Jewish Cemetery

Photo: Police at Palace of Sports by Paulius Skučas

A group of 50 masked, knife-wielding teenage boys has turned the crumbling Palace of Sports complex built on top of the old Jewish cemetery in Vilnius into their gang clubhouse and have threatened pedestrians in the area, including children, with their weapons, as well as attacking a lone security guard in charge of the site, according to Paulius Skučas, an LNK television reporter who posted on Instagram as well as did a Lithuanian state radio interview about the situation.

Skučas posted photos of the incident on Instagram with textual explanations:

This is how the Palace of Sports looked after the massive attack by teenagers this evening. Police and security stood guard for several hours. It seems the gang of teenagers are so uncontrollable and undetainable that all the residents of the surround neighborhoods and buildings have become hostages.

2024-10-042024-10-04

Shofar Procession through Vilnius

Dear Community members,

In celebration of Rosh Hashanah a shofar procession will make its way from the inner courtyard of the Old Arsenal next to the Tower of Gediminas, in honor of grand duke Gediminas who invited Jewish merchants, artisans and craftsmen from European cities to come settle in Lithuania, and wind through Cathedral Square to end up at the Vilnius Old Town Hall on Wednesday, October 2.

Shofar horns and shofar blowers from the Baltic states, the Ukraine, Israel and Great Britain will take part in the procession and sound the ancient ram horn instrument, dispelling evil and announcing the new year 5785.

The Lithuanian Jewish Community will hold a reception at the Old Town Hall following the procession.

Schedule (approximate):

October 2

4:00 P.M. Ceremony to kick off the march, inner courtyard, Old Arsenal, Arsenalo street no. 3

4:30 P.M. Procession along Arsenalo and Vrublevskio streets

4:40 P.M. Procession through Cathedral Square and along Pilies and Didžiosios streets

5:05 P.M. LJC reception for participants at Old Town Hall with sampling of holiday dishes

5:45 P.M. End of event

2024-10-01

Bnei Maskilim Progressive Judaism Community Invites You to Celebrate Rosh Hashanah

Dear reader,

As Rosh Hashanah draws near, the Jewish new year 5785, with its accompanying holiday, we invite you to join in with our community’s holiday prayers and events.

This year one of our guests will be former US Army chaplain Rabbi Hanoch M. Fields.

During the celebration we will pray, sing and sample sweet symbolic foods, for example, apples with honey, so that the New Year would be sweet and filled with delight.

May this New Year bring everyone health, peace and happiness!

Shana tova u’metukah!

The cost is 20 euros per person. For more information and to register, send an email to viljamas@lzb.lt.

Time: 6:30 P.M., October 3
Place: Third floor, Lithuanian Jewish Community, Vilnius

2024-09-30