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FEBRUARY 18, 2021 | The Jewish Home
46
The Wandering
Jew
Siyum in Lublin
B A LT I M O R E J E W I S H H O M E . C O M
THE BALTIMORE JEWISH HOME
APRIL 8, 2021
Part I By Hershel Lieber
T
his story actually began way before 1996. My friend, Menachem Daum, is my brother-inlaw’s brother. We became close soon after our families merged in 1972, and when we started davening together in the Gerrer Shtiebel, our relationship intensified. We had a lot in common in that we both were mesmerized with “the Old Country,” Poland, and its prewar Jewish history. I traveled there often, and Menachem made a number of trips there as well. We shared our insights and experiences, and though we may have differed on some issues, there was so much common ground that kept us comfortably unified. Menachem is a noted filmmaker whose highly acclaimed films “A Life Apart” and “Hiding and Seeking” brought him recognition beyond our immediate community. Menachem’s talent was sought after for filming weddings and other life cycle events, and I have used him often. Throughout our relationship, I was aware of Menachem’s fascination with Harav Meir Shapiro, the Lubliner Rav. He read a lot about him, researched his biographical information, pored over photographs and newspaper accounts, and filmed interviews with the Rosh Yeshiva’s talmidim, such as Rabbi Mordechai Yehuda Lubart. He was
With my friend Menachem Daum
Yeshivas Chachmei Lublin
awed by the Lubliner Rav’s multi-faceted talents and his vigorous energy that made him such an accomplished leader at a relatively young age. Menachem’s dream was to produce a documentary about Rabbi Meir Shapiro, a dream that he finally realized with the production of “Only with Joy” in 2020. In 1996, Menachem approached me with a novel idea. He proposed that I organize a trip to Poland with the centerpiece of that journey being
a siyum of a Daf Hayomi Mesechta in the original building of the famed Yeshivas Chachmei Lublin. He, of course, would join and film the event. Instinctively, I took on the challenge without thinking much about the logistics. When I started mapping out an outline of the trip with Menachem, I realized how much of a novice I really was and that I had to connect this project with a travel agency that specializes in travel to Poland. The most fitting person I could think of was Rabbi Nachman Elbaum of Ideal Travel, whom I have dealt with previously concerning Poland. After meeting with him, we divided the duties of organizing the journey, which was named “Return to Lublin.” I would be in charge of advertising and promoting the event, planning an itinerary, and getting the permission of the authorities to hold the siyum in the former Yeshiva building, which was, at that time, a medical college. Nachman would be in charge of airline and tour bus arrangements and the hotels that we would stay at. We both would share the responsi-
bility of the food requirements. The six-day trip was planned for August 8, and during the months preceding that date, I was quite occupied to ensure that everything would be in place and the plans well organized. That summer, Pesi and I were in Poland for the Ronald Lauder Summer Retreat. We planned to be there from August 1 for three weeks. We arranged to take off from our lecturing at the retreat for six days so I could lead the “Return to Lublin” journey. We traveled to Warsaw from the retreat, which was located in the Beskids Mountains in southern Poland. I met Rav Nachman in the Nozyk Shul, and we went to the airport to meet our group. The larger group of fourteen people arrived in the morning, and six others joined us later in the day. Among our group were a number of personalities including Rav Yaakov Finkelstein and his son Ruvain from the Yeshiva of Bayonne, Rav Lipa Margulies and Rabbi Yakov Applegrad from Yeshiva Torah Temimah, and Rabbi Chaim Fuhrer and Rabbi Yosel Schiff. Most of the men came with their wives. Rav Chaskel Besser and his son Naftali, Menachem Daum, and Avraham Horowitz from Israeli TV arrived later in the day and went directly to Lublin. Our first day consisted of a jampacked program. We traveled by coach bus, and our first stop in Warsaw was the second-largest cemetery in Poland. The bais olam has the kevarim of countless rabbanim, roshei yeshivos and admorim. We walked around with the help of Jan Jagielski, an expert on Jewish Polish history for over an hour, making many stops to be mispallel at the gravesites of so many tzaddikim. Our next stop was at the Jewish museum, where the assistant director, Grazina Pawlak, presented a short version of the account of the Warsaw Ghetto. We continued to the
