Poland Essay

Poland Essay

Many people would say that the Holocaust was the most evil thing to happen to the world, and one location it affected more than many others is Poland.  Poland, where there was a thriving Jewish community before the Holocaust, ended up with a miniscule one after the war.  Though the Jewish community in Poland today is almost nonexistent, there are still some sites that represent life, such as Krakow, and a couple that also represent death, like Maydanek.  During the Holocaust, there were many different people who rebelled against the Nazis, and committed Iberleben (rebellion), such as Janusz Korczak, a caretaker of children, and Immanuel Ringelblum, a historian.  It is also the job of those still living to never let ourselves forget what happened then, and to always keep the memories in our heads, so we never lose the knowledge we’ve gained.  Though Poland was certainly not utopia for Jews before the war, the Nazis made it a living hell for everyone in it, but luckily we are able to study what was left behind and learn about it.

Judaism today is one of the smallest major religions that exists, but before the Holocaust, there was a large Jewish community in Eastern Europe.  One site that truly represents this pre-Holocaust life is the city of Krakow.  Today, there are 5 synagogues still standing in Krakow’s old Jewish district from before the war.  If there were 5 synagogues in one small area, there were enough Jews for 5 synagogues.  There were even multiple types of Judaism concentrated into that small area.  One very famous Rabbi buried in Krakow is Rabbi Yom Tov, who was known to be a very intelligent scholar of Judaism.  One story about him is that, in Krakow, there lived a rich man who was known for not giving any money to the community.  So it was logical that, when he died, they could barely get a minyan together for the funeral.  However, when the hospital noticed that they didn’t get new medicine, and other people stopped getting support, Yom Tov realized this rich man had been helping secretly.  He then requested to be buried next to this guy who nobody had liked.  This site makes you feel happy, that even during the Pogroms and everything, people still managed to form a thriving Jewish community, although it was put to an end when the Nazis came to power.  Although there was plenty of life before the Holocaust, there was also plenty of death during and after.  One particular site that represents this is the concentration camp of Maydanek.  Though not as many people died there as at some of the other camps, it was still a spot what a multitude of Jews were executed.  One particular story is that, close to the end of its existence, the Nazis brought out 18,000 prisoners and told them to dig trenches to “defend” the camp, and then shot them all.  What is extremely ironic about this is that 18 is a number that is supposed to represent life in Judaism.  This place just leaves one with a sense of eeriness, and it makes you worried about what is happening in the world, and if something like this could ever happen.  It seems almost impossible that there was such a thriving community before, and over two thirds of it was killed.

During the Holocaust, though many people were far too scared by the Nazis to do anything to fight back, there were some people who did rebel in their own ways against the Nazis.  One such person is Januzs Korczak, who was a caretaker for kids before the war.  When the war started, his friends offered to get him out of Poland, but he said that he had to stay and help the children.  During the early years of the war, he ran an orphanage, and what was unique about his orphanage is that the kids made most of the decisions.  He treated the kids as his equals, as opposed to as lower than him.  When the Nazis were leading him and the kids to their deaths, he had them go with dignity.  Now, while some might say this is cowardice, there is so little anyone could have done, that to show the Nazis that their torture won’t work is a very legitimate form of rebellion.  Another form of rebellion some might consider unusual is that which was done by Immanuel Ringelblum.  When the war was nearing a close, the Nazis tried to destroy everything in order to cover up everything.  Ringelblum started collecting everything he could in order to document this period.  Were it not for him, we may not have much evidence about this period at all.  Thanks to his bravery in collecting artifacts, we now have valuable information on the Holocaust.  Though neither of these strategies is the most typical strategy for rebellion, they are both very effective ways to show the Nazis that we will not take this lying down.

Rabbi Emil Fackenheim once wrote: “Jews are forbidden to hand Hitler posthumous victories, they are commanded to survive as Jews, lest the Jewish people perish.”  To me, this means that we can not allow ourselves to forget what happened to us during the terrible times of the Holocaust.  If we do forget about it, then we fail to learn from our mistakes of the past, and something like this could potentially happen to us again.  We all need to work to remember this, because if we do not, we run the risk of letting the Nazis win by allowing them to cover up their tracks.  In order to ensure that we do not forget the Holocaust, we must make sure that they teach it in the school systems.  Ensure that people are educated about it from a young age, and that way, they will know about it for their whole lives.  If we fail to educate the general population about this, we run the risk of losing all this knowledge.  I agree with what Rabbi Fackenheim says, in that we can’t let the Nazis win by forgetting about what happened.  Though the Holocaust may be over, it is our responsibility to carry on the memory.

Though it is absolutely awful that the Holocaust happened, we can avoid it happening again by remembering what it was like.  We can think of the sites where there was life, and how happy people were, like in Krakow, and then think of the places where death was abundant, like Maydanek, and how angry everyone was.  If something like this ever does happen again, unfortunately, we can fight back, just as some people did back in the times of the Holocaust, like Janusz Korczak, and Immanuel Ringelblum.  Most importantly, we can never allow the Nazis to win by forgetting what took place and risking it happening again.  We should never even give something like the Holocaust a chance to arise again.  Though the Holocaust was horrible, it is our responsibility to remember it and make sure that it never happens again as long as humanity is still around.