Learning

Vampires in Medieval Jewish Texts: What Are They Doing There?

Haaretz reports on an unexpected find in old Hebrew texts and commentaries from Europe.

Secure in their monotheism, Jews may scoff, but some of the earliest texts on vampires were written in Hebrew by their coreligionists.

by Elon Gilad

The vampires which abound in popular culture today are, for the most part, a literary embellishment of an old Slavic belief that under certain circumstances, the dead can rise from their graves at night and kill their neighbors, friends and family.

Modern Jews might scoff at vampire culture, secure their monotheism rules out belief in such nonsense. But they should hold their tongues. Some of the earliest texts on vampires were written in Hebrew by their coreligionists, albeit after learning about the plague of the undead from their neighbors.

2016-02-15

Lithuanian Jews, Fostering Lithuanian Independence since 1918. An excerpt from Vilius Kavaliauskas’s book

Election poster. Vote for List Number 13–the Jewish List.

A translated excerpt from Vilius Kavaliauskas’s book “Pažadėtoji žemė – Lietuva,” or “Lithuania, the Promised Land”:

After independence was reestablished and the Lithuanian state was established on democratic principles on February 16, 1918, one of the most important events in Lithuanian Jewish history was the Jewish Affairs Institute established by the independent state in 1919, which in essence performed the functions of a government ministry. Dr. Maksas Soloveičikas became minister without portfolio.

From 1918 to 1926 Lithuania’s Jewish population successfully involved themselves in the country’s governance structures and actively ran for posts in elections to municipal bodies and the parliament of the Republic of Lithuania. There were a number of Jewish members of the ministerial cabinet of the Lithuanian government as well: minister without portfolio for Jewish affairs [sic] Jokūbas Vygodskis, Maksas Soloveičikas, Bernardas Fridmanas (from Panevėžys, judge at the Panevėžys District Court in 1925) and Simonas Rozenbaumas.

Doctor of philosophy Maksas Soloveičikas (1883-1957) was exceptional for his erudition and education. He studied in Petropol [Petrograd, Leningrad, Saint Petersburg. etc.], Germany and Switzerland. He was an active member of the Zionist movement and a Jewish press correspondent. He spoke Russian with his fellow ministers. In 1921 he was elected to the World Zionist executive committee in London.

The cabinet of ministers tolerated the Jewish community’s aspiration to turn the ministry into a political institution while the Vilnius question remained unsolved. When the Christian democrats came to power in 1924, the accreditation for the ministry was withdrawn and the ministry ceased to exist.

2016-02-15

Chess Tournament to Celebrate Lithuanian Independence Day Held at LJC

A chess tournament held by the Rositsan and Maccabi elite checkers and chess club dedicated to celebrating February 16, Lithuania’s pre-war independence day, began at the Lithuanian Jewish Community on schedule at 11:00 A.M. on February 14.

Tournament director and FIDE master Boris Rositsan welcomes contestants and gave the floor to Vytautas Landsbergis, the first chairman of the independent Lithuanian parliament, Lithuanian independence leader and avid chess player. Not only avid, but good: he won a match against Marytė (Marija) Kartanaitė, Lithuanian chess master many times over, at the LJC. “Playing chess, it’s important not to lose the initiative and not to give up,” Landsbergis said. “It’s important how much space you occupy. The opponent, it seems, is pressuring you to give up, but don’t lose the initiative. It’s nice chess players are honoring February 16, and that Boris Rositsan wants to demonstrate Lithuanian history through chess. Chess is the school of life and part of the culture of our country, and influenced our independence,” he commented.

Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky spoke and characterized chess players as educated and honorable people. This year has been named the Year of Kazys Grinius, the interwar Lithuanian president and a Righteous Gentile who was also a fine chess player, and who rescued chess player Dima Gelpern from death during the Holocaust.

2016-02-15

Opening of Exhibit “YIVO in Vilnius: The Legend Begins”

You are invited to the opening of the exhibit “YIVO in Vilnius: The Legend Begins” at the Lithuanian National Museum at Arsenalo street no. 1 in Vilnius at 4:00 P.M., February 18. Exhibit curators: Dr. Lara Lempertienė and Dr. Giedrė Jankevičiūtė.

The exhibit was created to celebrate the 90th anniversary of the creation of YIVO in Vilnius. It includes previously unseen material from Lithuanian state collections on the history and work of YIVO. It demonstrates how YIVO’s work gave stimulus to the intellectual life of the Jews of Vilnius and the wider Central and Eastern European arena. It also presents the city and urban community as a source of inspiration and as the historical and cultural hearth and sustenance for the institute’s work. The exhibit was first shown at the Galicia Jewish museum in Cracow from September 30 to November 8, 2015. The exhibit to open in Vilnius contains additional material.

2016-02-11

Israeli Scientists Discover Early Detection Method for Lung Cancer

by Michael Ordman

Scientists at Tel Aviv University and Rabin Medical Center have discovered they can detect lung cancer early in smokers by performing a CAT scan at the time they are admitted as pneumonia patients. Often the pneumonia is caused by young cancer cells blocking airways.

According to the American Journal of Medicine, lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer mortality in the US, associated with a 5-year survival of 17%.

The most important risk factor for lung cancer is smoking, which causes approximately 85% of all lung cancer cases. Only 15% of patients are diagnosed at an early stage.

2016-02-07

Lithuanian Jewish Community Webpage Adds Academic Section to Mark 25 Years of Lithuanian Independence

Many scholars and academics took part in the early days of the Lithuanian Jewish Community during the period when Lithuania was reestablishing national independence. They formed their own Union of Scholars. This organization is no longer active. The Community would like to revive the Union of Scholars in the name of its noble founders who did so much for Lithuania and the Jewish Community, including historian and sociology professor Izraelis Lempertas; physics professor Adolfas Bolotinas; philologist, lexicographer and Lithuanian language reformer Chaceklis Lemchenas; and many others. The time has come to continue the Union’s work. We, members of the Lithuanian Jewish Community, are not just citizens of the Republic of Lithuania and consumers, we are creators. Scholarship and research is of utmost importance to us. We can set learning against the ignorance of anti-Semites. A new generation of productive scholars has matured in the Jewish Community. Although learning knows no communal boundaries, academic studies provide us with more self-confidence and significance, and therefore we will support in multiple ways scholarship and research in all fields. We begin our new Learning section with an introduction to the psychological and other effects of the Holocaust. Mazl tov!

• Academic Insight into the Holocaust Experience

2016-01-12

Dita Shperling: Germans Did Not Distinguish Lithuanians from Jews

“During the first days of the war the Germans who came to Kaunas couldn’t tell the difference between Jews and Lithuanians, but Lithuanians helped them to do,” Kaunas ghetto prisoner Dita Shperling recalled, citing the words of the German soldiers themselves.

Dita (Yehudit) Schperling and her husband Yuda Zupowitch

Dita Schperling tries to travel every summer to Vilnius from Israel where she lives. She agreed to discuss her experience in the ghetto with staff from the LJC webpage.

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