CHAPTER VI Profiles in Modern Jewish Courage In 1965 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is presented an award by his old friend Rabbi Jack Rothschild who organized the first official interracial dinner in Atlanta, in honor of King’s winning the Nobel Peace Prize (Courtesy of the Ida Pearle and Joseph Cuba Community Archives and Genealogy Center of the William Breman Jewish Heritage Museum) TABLE OF CONTENTS, CHAPTER VI Profiles in Modern Jewish Courage A. Cultures of Heroism • Courage, Bravery and Cowardice: Definitions and Famous Quotations . 238 • The Rabbis’ Heroism: Self-Conquest. 239 by Yeshayahu Leibowitz Raoul Wallenberg • The Changing Face of the Rabbis’ Hero. 241 by Noam Zion • The Greek Tragic Hero . 242 by Bernard Knox • The Crisis of Heroism in Contemporary Society: Everyone’s Need to be a Hero. 245 by Ernest Becker • The Righteous Gentiles: The Psychology of the Rescuers and the Origins of Moral Courage . 246 by Samuel and Pearl Oliner and Krzysztof Konarzewski • The “Ordinariness” of the Righteous Gentiles. 252 by Samuel and Pearl Oliner B. In the Cause of Human Rights: Acts of Civil Courage 1. The Prophetic Preacher: Jack Rothschild and the Temple Bombing (segregationist Atlanta, 1958). 255 by Melissa Fay Greene Marshall Meyer 2. The Community Organizer, Saul Alinsky: “Let Them Call Me Rebel” (the Chicago Slums, the 1960s) . 263 by Sanford Horwitt 3. “Silence is Deadly:” Marshall Meyer and Argentina’s Reign of Terror (Buenos Aires, 1976-1983) . 272 234 C. In the Service of Human Needs: Tzedakah Heroes and Miracle Workers 4. Beit Shalva’s Founders: Malky and Kalman Samuels and the Dream House for Special Needs Children Yossi & Kalman Samuels (Jerusalem, 1999) . 280 by Sherry Makover 5. Jay Feinberg: The Hero with Bad Blood (USA, 1980s) . 285 by Danny Siegel 6. Dawn Krieger, Magic Me, and the Elderly (USA, 1990s) . 287 by Kathy Levin Shapiro D. In the Defiance of the Nazis: Spiritual and Military Resistance 7. Father Andre: The Bed of a Righteous Priest (Belgium, 1940-1945) . 291 Chana Szenes by Herbert Friedman 8. Janusz Korczak: The King of Children (Warsaw, 1942) . 294 by Betty Jean Lifton and Yitzchak Perlis 9. Leo Baeck’s Spiritual Resistance against the Nazi Regime (Berlin, 1933-1943, and Theresienstadt, 1943-1945) . 304 by Leonard Baker and Albert Friedlander 10. Chana Szenes: “Happy is the Match” (Budapest, 1944). 307 by Peter Hay E. In the Cause of Israel’s Survival: A Physical and an Ethical Struggle 11. The Rabbinic Art of Smuggling: A Heroic Lawbreaker (Germany, 1946 and Colorado, 1947). 319 by Herbert Friedman Yoni Netanyahu 12. Yoni Netanyahu: The Philosopher-Soldier and the Rescue of the Hostages (Entebbe Airport, Uganda, July 4, 1976) . 323 by Iddo Netanyahu and Chaim Herzog PROFILES IN MODERN JEWISH COURAGE 235 INTRODUCTION “There is a time for everything under heaven . a time to embrace.” — ECCLESIASTES 3:5 If you see a group of tzaddikim — Good People — standing near you, stand up and hug them and kiss them, and kiss them and hug them again. — ECCLESIASTES RABBAH 3:5, 1 hy should there be a large collection of modern Jewish These particular people were chosen not profiles in courage in a book on Hanukkah? After all, only for the inspiring tales of their confronta- Wthese heroes do not belong to the period of the Maccabees tion with military enemies, but for their over- nor do their stories take place on Hanukkah. Most of them all struggles with human oppression, physical demonstrate courage in areas very different than the military daring of illness and moral dilemmas. Uniquely, many Judah the Maccabee, the brilliant tactician. of them have left us their introspective The answer is that, for the authors of this reflections on the quandaries of courageous anthology, Hanukkah is not only about living. These extraordinary people have left commemorating the ancient past nor us a partial record of their doubts, struggles exclusively about victories in battle. The and insights about their vocations in life. We point of the remembrance is to identify the can learn about a heroism which is expressed kind of courageous faith that showed itself in not only on the battlefield by those with the Maccabean Revolt but continues to absolute conviction, but in everyday life as express itself in other realms in the well as in moments of extremity by persons contemporary era. In the “Maccabees’ whose mixed motivations are accessible to us. Megillah” at the beginning of the companion The realms chosen reflect some of the great volume, The Hanukkah Book of Celebration, public causes of the Jewish people in the last we retold the historic tales of the Jews who one hundred years. In no sense is the roster of faced Antiochus and the Greeks. Now we heroes complete or representative of the vast wish to recall the most dramatic moments in variety. Considerations of accessibility and the lives of Jews and a few Righteous Gentiles readability dominated the selection process. who lived in our era and who can be role First, there is the political struggle. In the models for us. Cause of Human Rights: Acts of Civil Courage COURAGE, BRAVERY AND COWARDICE: DEFINITIONS AND FAMOUS QUOTATIONS Definition: Courage Courage comes from the Latin cors, cord (heart as in “cardiac”) and it means “to have heart,” that is “to be courageous,” while “to lose heart” is to be disheartened, to be discouraged. When hearts are together, then there is “accord” (cors). Originally courage, like heart, referred to all of one’s inner emotions, but after the 17th century the term courage was narrowed to apply to bravery. 236 portrays the Jewish part of the democratic Rabbi Leo Baeck was a German Jewish spirit- revolution in the world. Jews have been ual leader who kept up the highest level of activists both because they were often victims civilization in the midst of Nazi barbarism in of discrimination themselves and because they the Czech ghetto Terezin. The youthful continued to believe in the prophetic tradition Chana Szenes, who parachuted into Nazi- of justice for all. The examples are taken from occupied Hungary, was also a poet whose the American Civil Rights Movement as well poems became popular songs after her death. as the struggle against the murderous The final area of particular significance to dictatorship in Argentina. Two rabbis — one twentieth century Jews has been the rise of Reform and one Conservative — and one the modern State of Israel. The heroes in secular Jew are represented. Courage in the Cause of Israel’s Survival: A The second grouping is In the Service of Physical and an Ethical Struggle include an Human Needs: Tzedakah Heroes and Miracle American rabbinic smuggler and an Israeli Workers. These are exceptional people, in so- anti-terrorist commando. Their concern was called ordinary times, who met challenges that not only the physical survival of the Jewish we experience daily and acted extraordinarily. people, but its intellectual and moral strength. Two of the heroes are ultra-Orthodox Jewish For example, Yoni Netanyahu, brother of parents who moved from North America to former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Jerusalem, where their son became a special not only participated in the Entebbe rescue of needs child. The others are younger, a 12 year hostages, but wrote touching and revealing old girl and a young man of 23. Age is no letters about the struggles of a young man impediment to becoming a Tzedakah hero. At caught between his private aspirations and his any age one can work to change the way public calling. human needs are met in one’s society. These For those interested in a general conceptual people can be called “Miracle Workers” and treatment of courage we have collected some should be honored on Hanukkah, the holiday brief but very enlightening essays about Jew- of small and great miracles. ish and Greek notions of the hero as well as a The third field of endeavor is defined by the very insightful psychological profile of the Nazi threat to Jewish survival, In Defiance of Righteous Gentiles who rescued Jews in the the Nazis: Spiritual and Military Resistance. Holocaust. These principles open the chapter These four heroes include a resourceful, in the section entitled Cultures of Heroism. selfless Catholic priest and three Jews with We believe that the celebration of literary ability as well as courage. Janusz Hanukkah and the enhancement of human Korczak is the father of orphans who wrote courage in pursuit of higher causes will be magnificent children’s stories before and served by this inspiring collection of dramatic during his ultimate test in the Warsaw Ghetto. contemporary tales. Definition: Bravery Definition: Cowardice Bravery comes from the Latin barbarus (the wild, uncivilized, savage Cowardice comes from the Latin cauda barbarian) still implicit in the term “Indian brave.” But the wildness or coda (tail) and seems to mean some- came to mean bravery in war or more negatively bravado, meaning one who runs away like a dog with its boastful or threatening behavior, an ostentatious display of boldness. tail between its legs. PROFILES IN MODERN JEWISH COURAGE 237 A. CULTURES OF HEROISM PREFACE — JEWISH, GREEK AND PSYCHOLOGICAL FACES OF THE HERO “Mankind’s common instinct has always held the world to be essentially a theatre for heroism.” — WILLIAM JAMES, PSYCHOLOGIST “Each cultural system is a dramatization of earthly heroics; each system cuts out roles for performances of various degrees of heroism: from the ‘high’ heroism of a Churchill, a Mao, or a Buddha, to the ‘low’ heroism of the coal miner, the peasant, the simple priest; the plain, everyday, earthy heroism wrought by gnarled working hands guiding a family through hunger and disease.” — ERNEST BECKER, THE DENIAL OF DEATH he Greeks and the Jews contributed different aspects to the Western In this piece he lashes out against the commonly held notions of heroism.