Learning, History, Culture – Page 221 – Lithuanian Jewish Community

Academic Insight into the Holocaust Experience

by Ruth Reches

A well-rounded understanding of the psychological and other effects of the Holocaust is relevant both in the academic and social spheres. It is imperative that we grasp the extent of the Holocaust and understand it fully in order to avoid such a disastrous phenomenon in the future. There are many academic sources which portray and fully examine the Holocaust from the moral, philosophical, economic, political and other points of view. Psychological research on the Shoahm however, has only just begun. Without such research an understanding of the extent of the Holocaust is incomplete and the evaluation of its meaning incorrect.

Catastrophes and especially their psychological impacts always capture the attention of psychologists. There is a wide variety of research focusing on the psychological effects of, for instance, natural disasters or military conflicts. A common feature in researching these catastrophes is the fact that scholars concentrate on temporally more proximate consequences. Usually such research is carried out right after the event takes place or in the course of a few years. Long-term psychological effects are under-researched but it is this particular area which is of key importance: it allows us to evaluate the fundamental outcomes which do not fade easily.

2016-01-122017-05-15

Grandson of Vilna Rabbis Awarded Prestigious Science Award

JTA reports a son and grandson of Vilna rabbis has been named the winner of a prestigious science award for his work in mathematics.

Solomon Wolf Golomb, a University of Southern California professor, will receive the Benjamin Franklin Medal given out by the Franklin Institute for his work on the leading edges of science and engineering. Golomb is to receive the Franklin Institute’s 2016 Benjamin Franklin Medal in Electrical Engineering for his work in space communications and the design of digital spread spectrum signals–transmissions which provide security, noise suppression and precise locations for applications such as cryptography, missile guidance, defense, space and cellular communications, radar, sonar and GPS. The award will be presented at the Philadelphia-based institute at a ceremony in April of 2016.

The Franklin Medal was the most prestigious of the awards presented by the Franklin Institute since 1824. With other awards, it was merged into the Benjamin Franklin Medal in 1998. With this award, Golomb will join the ranks of previous Franklin Medal recipients and distinguished laureates, which include Albert Einstein, Marie Curie, Stephen Hawking, Elizabeth Blackburn and Andrew Viterbi PhD ’62, the alumnus for whom the USC engineering school is named.

2016-01-11

Mourning, with Breaks

by Sergejus Kanovičius

Every time an important anniversary approaches, I get uncomfortable. Even frightened. Especially when the anniversary is connected with an incalculable, perhaps incomprehensible number of victims. Frightened, because soon those who according to rank must speak, will, with the prerequisite voice of mourning. Grave words filled with bureaucratic condolences and sympathy will ring forth, then vanish in emptiness, as if a wind had blown across the frozen fields and furrows of Lithuania.

2016-01-072017-07-12

Remembering the Holocaust Victims of Panevėžys

The Panevėžys (Ponevezh) Jewish Community has compiled a small book called “Nežudysi” [“You Will Not Kill Us”]. It contains information gathered from issues of the newspaper “Išlaisvintas Panevėžietis” [“Liberated Ponevezher”] published in the early years of World War II. The surviving articles allow us to reconstruct images from the tragic moments the Ponevezh Jewish community experienced at that time. A new city administration was formed in June, 1941, which was led by a commandant and the Nazis. Very quickly a so-called Jewish Quarter was established through which passed more than 13,000 Jews. The ghetto lasted 40 days. All of its inmates were murdered so quickly and efficiently that even now it is impossible to make complete lists of the victims. The book also discusses the small portion of the Jewish population which managed to escape during the first days of war. It also details Jewish property in Panevėžys and its seizure, mass murder sites and Jewish cemeteries. The chapter called “Gatvės vaiduokliai” [“Ghosts of the Street”] tells the story of Joint Street, which the new city administration renamed June 22nd Street in the desire of pleasing the Nazi occupiers. There is also much space devoted to the Righteous Gentiles of Panevėžys who risked their lives to save entire families of Jews. The last part of the book provides a list of documents and articles at Lithuanian archives and libraries awaiting scholarly attention. The text is printed on a red background symbolizing the spilling of the blood of innocents to focus the reader’s attention on the meaning of the text. A ceremony to present the new book is scheduled for January 29, 2016 in Panevėžys.

2015-12-31

Review of Mini Limmud Conference 2015

Organizer Žana Skudovičienė at the podium at Mini Limmud 2015.

The Mini Limmud conference is a large educational and entertainment event for Jewish families. The three-day program with overnight stays and entertainment at a hotel was instituted so that everyone might find something of interest and importance in learning about Jewish history, traditions, religion, Yiddish culture and current events. This year the organizer was Žana Skudovičienė. Responses by participants were positive and they expressed their thanks as well as a preference for more interesting speakers next year. Organizer Skudovičienė said they hadn’t been able to invite all the speakers they wanted this year.

“It’s hard for me to evaluate my success because this was the first year I was the organizer,” Skudovičienė said. “Junona Berznitski organized all the earlier Limmuds and I just participated as an MC, and I just had to worry about my clothes and appearance, create some scenes and write a text. But now it was a great challenge for me. I met all the potential speakers and selected only the most interesting people. These all agreed to participate, but there were others who wanted to participate but couldn’t because of plans made earlier. People requested we get reporter Viktor Topaller but everything was limited by funding. We were in touch with Viktoras Šenderovičius who wanted to come but couldn’t, but plans to next time. I wanted to find more Judaism and Jewish history experts, not necessarily from outside the country. Giedrius Jakubauskis delivered an extremely interesting presentation. Attendees were happy with the presentation of Saulius Šaltenis’s new book “Žydų Karalaitės dienoraštis” [“Diary of a Jewish Princess”]. They bought up all the copies of the book brought to Limmud, and we might have brought more from the publisher.”

Conference participants enjoyed meeting Israel’s ambassador to Lithuania Amir Maimon and were eager to learn about Israeli current events. There was a real discussion and people were concerned with why Israel always seems to be at the losing end of the propaganda war in the media. There wasn’t enough time for a comprehensive answer from the ambassador, but we hope to continue this discussion at the Community.

2015-12-30

Ukrainian President Calls on Israel to Take a Stand on Conflict with Russia

Poroshenko shakes hands with Knesset chairman Yuli Edelstein while Israeli president Reuven Rivlin claps during special session held December 23, 2015. Photo courtesy of Hadas Parush/Flash 90

“Russia supplied systems to Syria that can change the balance of power in the region,” Poroshenko warns in speech to Knesset

Israel should take a side in the Ukraine-Russia conflict, Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko said in his address to the Israeli parliament the Knesset Wednesday.

“When evil wins in one place, it will try to continue to another,” Poroshenko warned. “We need to act in coöperation and Israeli politicians should make their stance towards Ukraine very clear.”

Poroshenko said that over the last 21 months, 9,000 Ukrainians were victims of “Russian-funded terror,” and warned that the 17,000 Jews on the Crimean Peninsula may find themselves in danger.

“The occupiers have started encouraging anti-Semitism,” he said.

2015-12-26

Holocaust Information Exempted from EU Data Protection Measure

The International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance and the World Jewish Restitution Organization have both issued statements hailing a decision by the EU to exempt Holocaust materials from a draft regulation on data protection called the General Data Protection Regulation.

IHRA reports that although the law won’t be considered until next year, “after two years of research and analysis, IHRA had determined definitively that researchers and research organizations were already being denied access to Holocaust-related materials on the premise that the GDPR would not permit the use of these materials.”

2015-12-21

When Czesław Miłosz Met Chiune Sugihara, Sort of

by Geoff Vasil

Czesław Miłosz is sometimes called Lithuania’s Nobel Prize winner, although he never claimed to be Lithuanian. Neither did he call himself Polish exactly. His “national identity” was as complex as that of his uncle, Oskar Miłosz, the “French symbolist poet” who was the son of a father from a noble family from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and a Jewish mother.

Czesław Miłosz was born in the village of Šeteniai (Szetejnie) just outside Kėdainiai on June 30, 1911, a period when Lithuania was firmly inside the Russian Empire. He moved to Vilnius and attended the Sigismund Augustus Gymnasium, then studied law at Stefan Batory University (Vilnius University), visiting his uncle Oskar in Paris in 1931. Oskar Miłosz ran in exalted literary circles including some very famous names from the period. This might have influenced the younger Miłosz in helping found the Polish literary circle Żagary in Vilnius that same year. After being graduated from the law faculty he went back to Paris for a year, and then worked at Radio Wilno when he returned to Vilnius.

He spent the period right up to World War II in Vilnius before removing himself to Warsaw, where he helped rescue Jews and was eventually recognized as a Righteous Gentile as well as later becoming a winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature. He describes the period when Lithuania and Vilnius hung in geopolitical limbo in a chapter in his 1959 autobiography, Rodzinna Europa, published in English as Native Realm in 1968, called “Peace Boundary,” the name then used by both sides to describe the Molotov-Ribbentrop line under the peace agreed by Hitler and Stalin.

2015-12-21

Picture Gallery of Mini Limmud Conference (Sunday)

Click “read more” to see the entire gallery.

2015-12-21

Picture Gallery of Mini Limmud Conference (Saturday)

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2015-12-21

Picture Gallery of Mini Limmud Conference (Friday)

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2015-12-21

Opening of Exhibition of Litvak Art Accompanied by Music Performed by Levickis

The Tolerance Center of the Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum unveiled a new art exhibit December 16 called “Shalom Israel! Litvak Artists.” The show includes 37 works by 24 Litvak artists from the museum’s collections, the Lewben Art Foundation, the Lithuanian Exiles Art Fund, the attorney’s office Valiunas Ellex and other private collections. One of the more surprising items at the opening was a musical presentation by Martynas Levickis, accordion player and one of Lithuania’s most famous virtuosos. Levickis performed works by Paganini, Rossini and Vivaldi.

Deputy museum director Dr. Kamilė Rupeikaitė welcomed guests to the event and Valiunas Ellex director Rolandas Valiūnas, Lewben Art Foundation director Indrė Tubinienė and Lithuanian MP Emanuelis Zingeris spoke. Zingeris said Litvak artists kept putting Lithuania on the map even when the country was occupied and acted as Lithuanian ambassadors to the world. He said their Lithuanian origins were indicated next to their works at the most famous galleries everywhere.

Art history expert and curator Dr. Vilma Gradinskaitė presented the idea behind the exhibit and pointed out that almost all of the works on exhibit were being shown publicly for the first time. Two contemporary artists, R. Savickas and A. Jacovskytė, even created works especially for this exhibition. Dr. Gradinskaitė said: “Some of the paintings and graphics works, drawing and medals executed in various styles reveal a dual process in the development of Jewish art and demonstrate how Litvak artists shaped Israeli art, as well as how Israel’s natural environment and local folk-art traditions affected the artistic expression of Litvak artists, including scenery, manner of painting, color palette and mood.”

2015-12-17

Vilnius Yiddish Institute Announces Summer Program for 2016

The Vilnius Yiddish Institute at the Vilnius University announces the Vilnius Yiddish Summer Program for 2016 to take place from July 17 to August 12, 2016, and offering four levels of intensive language instruction for beginners, intermediate, higher intermediate and advanced students.

For more information please contact Indrė Joffytė, program coordinator: info@judaicvilnius.com

http://judaicvilnius.com/

Vilnius Yiddish Institute
Universiteto g. 7
Vilnius 01513
Lithuania

2015-12-17

Sugihara Film Second Only to the New James Bond in Japan

Name-recognition of Lithuania’s second city Kaunas is growing like mushrooms after a heavy spring rain in far-off Japan. The Japanese premiere of the new film about the Japanese diplomat Chiune Sugihara, “Persona non Grata: The Chiune Sugihara Story,” took place in early December and has achieved huge success.

Lithuanian ambassador to Japan Egidijus Meilūnas said the film is currently being shown at over 300 theaters in Japan and is second only to the new James Bond film in terms of popularity. Brochures about Kaunas are also being provided to the public at the movie theaters and other public spaces. Japan seems to be buzzing about the film, with many television programs discussing it and broadcasting images of Lithuania and Kaunas.

“Kaunas is being advertised very heavily right now,” ambassador Meilūnas said.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

Film trailer here.

Official film site page in Japanese on Sugihara, Kaunas and Lithuania here.

2015-12-17

Jewish Cultural Tourism Route Association Established

The Jewish Cultural Route Association was officially established at a meeting at the Lithuanian Economics Ministry on December 5, 2015. The group is tasked with drafting and developing a Jewish cultural tourism program with a consistent itinerary of sites in Lithuania.

The meeting at the ministry was called at the initiative of the Cultural Heritage Department. Department director Diana Varnaitė presented the plan there and State Tourism Department director Jurgita Kazlauskienė presented the idea of a Lithuanian Jewish cultural tourism program as a competitive product in the market.

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky spoke at the meeting and said it wouldn’t have been possible to achieve the results achieved so far without the participation of all the various institutions involved. “I would like to thank you for the efforts made to preserve our cultural heritage and to present it to the world. Synagogues and Jewish cemeteries are today being renovated and put in order. There is still some suspicion in talk about us, characterizing relations with Jews as ‘us and them,’ but I would disagree with that sort of attitude,” she said.

2015-12-16

Jewish Cultural Heritage in Lithuania

The Cultural Heritage Department under the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture has posted a PDF document called Jewish Cultural Heritage in Lithuania:

Jewish Cultural Heritage in Lithuania

Jews settled in the territory of historic Lithuania during the rule of Grand Duke Gediminas in the first half of the 14th century. Economic and historic conditions in the Lithuanian lands proved to be conducive for the emergence of a unique community of Lithuanian Jews, which later became known as the Litvaks. The growing Lithuanian Jewish communities attracted rabbis, who were knowledgeable and experienced in the field of education. Jewish quarters were formed in each town, with a synagogue and a synagogue yard as a prayer house and schooling and administrative centre of the local community. As the authority of Lithuania-based rabbis grew and the Lithuanian Jewish communities prospered, yeshivas, Jewish spiritual high schools, were founded in various Lithuanian towns. From the end of the 19th century, and with yet greater intensity after World War I, a network of secular educational institutions developed in the Republic of Lithuania, in Vilnius, and in the surrounding areas, offering instruction in the Yiddish and Hebrew languages. Local printing houses produced sacred and secular books needed for the educational process. All this collectively created a solid foundation for the Jewish press and high culture—theatre, art and literature—to grow and flourish. The Lithuanian Jewry, like Jewish people everywhere else in Europe, was subjected to the horrors of the Holocaust in 1941–1945. Their cultural heritage fell victim to the destruction alongside its creators. In present day Lithuania, the quiet witnesses of this formerly glorious culture can be encountered in various Lithuanian towns and villages.

2015-12-16

Maestro Anatolijus Šenderovas at the “Destinies” Series at the LJC

The twenty-second installment of the “Destinies” series regularly organized by Lithuanian Jewish Community deputy chairwoman Maša Grodnikienė featured one of the most famous of contemporary Lithuanian composers, National Prize recipient Anatolijus Šenderovas. Kamilė Rupeikaitė-Mariniuk, PhD, deputy director of the Vilna Gaon Jewish State Museum and an expert in cantillation and music, led the conversation with the composer.

Šenderovas, considered modern composer of unique talent, spoke cheerfully of his life and his musical career. Lithuanians seem quite proud of their composer. His works are performed by many musicians and orchestras, and new variations upon them constantly appear. Many people turned out for the “Destinies” event and left the auditorium inspired by his amazing energy.

2015-12-11

Square Named after Emmanuel Levinas in Kaunas

December 11, BNS–The Kaunas city council executive body has agreed to rename the square next to lift carrying passengers to the neighborhood of Žaliakalnis after the philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, the municipality reported Friday. Levinas is considered one of the most famous of Kaunas’s sons. He was born and lived there. Viktoras Bachmetjevas, an early proponent of the project to rename the square, said the proposal is four or five years old.

“I was thinking about how Levinas was one of the most important people ever born in Kaunas, and that there is almost no sign of him here. As a resident of Kaunas, I felt it my duty to increase the number of those signs. If he becomes an attraction in the city, that will be the best way to remember him,” Bachmetjevas commented. Levinas was an existentialist philosopher and a professor at the Sorbonne. He was born and lived in Kaunas’s Old Town and met his future wife there, whom he later married in Paris. His family living in Kaunas were murdered at the beginning of World War II.

A street in Kaunas was named earlier in his honor and there is a memorial plaque to mark his place of birth on a building on Karaliaus Mindaugo prospect.

BNS

2015-12-11

New Exhibit of Litvak Artists

2015-12-10