The Name on the Paper

By Judy Gruenfeld

As Pesach approaches, we are led from the humility of bondage in Mitzrayim to freedom and nationhood in our own land.

Throughout history countless stories have been told that have depicted personal journeys from captivity and persecution to liberation, and have shown examples of the indomitable Jewish spirit.

The following is a fictional account of one such struggle.  The facts contained therein, however, are unfortunately, all too true.                                                         

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Miriam Esther Grossberger was the daughter of Holocaust survivors.  Her parents had come to the United States after the war, broken, alone, and penniless.  Both of their families had perished in the inferno in Europe.  Only her father and mother remained alive from each family. There were no more grandparents, parents, aunts, uncles, sisters, brothers, cousins or friends.  There was nothing left in Europe for either of them but bad memories and heartache.  Each decided to leave the ghosts behind in the ruins that were once their hometowns and start life anew in America.

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David Grossberger, Miriam Esther’s father, was from a prominent family in Berlin.  They were wealthy merchants who catered to the needs of the upper echelon of Germany’s aristocracy.  They had become totally secular and assimilated and were caught up in German society and the privileges their position accorded them.  There was virtually no more connection to their religion, with the exception of circumcision and a family gathering on the first night of Passover.  There were no prayer books, and no rituals.  The only thing that made this night different from all other nights was the fact that they had matzah on the table next to the bread.  No one knew why he or she even bothered with these two rituals but, nevertheless, they continued, even though they were just empty expressions of a tradition long abandoned. 

Only David’s mother held tight to the traditions of her ancestors.  But since her husband had become enmeshed in German society and referred to himself as a “proud German citizen,” while denying or minimizing any affiliation with his Jewishness, his mother could do nothing to counteract the influence on their only son. 

David’s family had many friends in high places and they were sure their political and social connections would keep the family safe from the atrocities that were beginning to occur all around them.  They were not alone in their thinking.  Many well-placed Jews felt they would be safe and exempt from the ubiquitous butchering taking place in their native countries.  But they were dreadfully wrong. 

When push came to shove, a Jew was a Jew in the Germany of the 1930’s and 1940’s.  Though many were lured into a false sense of security, reality eventually caught up with them.  There was no escaping the brutality in which they were about to be engulfed.  The myth would prove to be just that, a myth, as they were eventually swallowed up in the abyss that was the Third Reich.  Much to the family’s horror, one blustery, winter morning, that will forever remain embedded in David’s mind, he, along with his entire family, was rounded up and deported to Auschwitz.  Their heartless captors met their cries regarding their connections with people in high places with laughter and derision.  All but David perished. 

While sorting out some of the ill fated inmates’ clothing, which was his job in the concentration camp, David found his proud father’s shoes and his dear mother’s dress.
A heartbroken David sobbed, uncontrollably, into his mother’s dress. 

“Mama,” he cried, “What has your G-d wrought on us?  How did your religion help you?  It’s all a sham!  I want no part of it!”

When other inmates were able to take out a hidden prayer book and pray from it in secrecy, David turned his head and his heart away.  When other inmates refused to eat on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, David shook his head, called them “fools” and ate his moldy bread and watery soup.

“You need all the strength you can get,” David admonished his fellow inmates.  Don’t be foolish.  Eat.”

“Nu,” said a rabbi in David’s barracks, “With what little we are given to eat, it will be much easier for us to fast.  Our stomachs are already used to being empty.  One day without moldy bread and watery soup won’t make much of a difference.”

“But, how can you still believe in and hold on to all these traditions after all we are being put through?  How can G-d allow such a thing to happen?  I cannot believe in a G-d who would allow such inhumane treatment to occur.”

“David,” said the rabbi.  “Tell me something.  Your disbelief, your assimilation into German society, your denying who you are and identifying with non-Jews, has this served you in good stead?  Has this helped to keep you safe from harm during these treacherous times?  Whether you like it or not, you are a Jew.  You will always be a Jew.  And if you ever forget that, an anti-Semite will invariably come along and remind you.  The Nazis make no distinction between you and me, between the observant and the non-observant.  But I do have an advantage over you.  Your Germans, your friends in high places, have all turned their backs on you.  Now, you may say that my G-d has turned his back on me, has abandoned me.  But I know different.  Those of us who believe are given the strength to go on.  We won’t give up on G-d or on ourselves.  And He won’t give up on us, either.”

David listened to the words of the rabbi, a distinguished and esteemed gentleman, who was a renound Torah scholar, walking around in tattered, striped prison garb, his bones almost protruding through his thin, translucent skin.  The guards spat on this holy man when they passed by him.  They laughed heartily at him and his piousness and tried to bait him, saying,

“You filthy Jew!  Where is your G-d now?” 

The rabbi well knew the answer to this question but he refused to engage in any sort of discourse with these sub-human creatures.  His body was imprisoned, this was true, but no one, not even these reincarnates of Amalek himself, could lay claim to his soul.

David was confused.  How could the rabbi still have such strong convictions in the midst of all this horror?  But he seemed to draw every ounce of his strength from his belief.  David did not know what to think anymore.  He did not know what to believe anymore.  He just wished this nightmare would end.  If he survived he might even be willing to give G-d a second chance, but he wasn’t sure.  He wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

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Anna Liebowitz, Miriam Esther’s mother, was from a small town in Poland.  Unlike David, she came from very modest beginnings.  Her family was not poor but neither were they rich.  Her father was a tailor and was very good at his craft.  He made suits and dresses for the religious and the not so religious, for Jew and Gentile alike.  Everyone trusted him.  He was an honest man who charged fair prices.  He had much more work than he could handle, but people were willing to wait for their clothing.  He would take
his time with each garment and would not allow anything to leave his shop until he was satisfied that he had done the best job possible.

When the war began moving closer to their hometown, the Liebowitz family considered emigrating from Poland, but where would they go?  There was no one to sponsor them and they did not have enough money for themselves and their four children to leave the country, much less start a new life elsewhere.  They would have to make due as best as they could and remain where they were.  With G-d’s help, they would be all right.  They would survive, one day at a time.

Once Hitler (may his name be blotted out) invaded Poland though, the Liebowitz family found themselves caught up in the maelstrom.  One Friday night, after Mrs. Liebowitz had lit her Sabbath candles, and the family was about to sit down to their meal, there was a loud and furious knock at their front door.  Someone was screaming to open the door and let him in.  The family members looked at each other, petrified.  Mr. Liebowitz went to open the door just as one of the SS was about to kick it in.

“You have one hour to pack some things!” the guard ordered.  “We will be back for you then!  If anyone is missing, the rest of you will be shot!”  He clicked his heels, exited the house, and continued down the street, rounding up all the other Jewish families in the neighborhood.

“What should we pack?” Mrs. Liebowitz asked her husband, the reality of the situation not quite registering.  “And for how long?  Where are they taking us?  Will it be cold?  Will it be hot?”

“My dear wife,” said Mr. Liebowitz.  “Do not worry.  Everything will be fine.  Just put a few things in a suitcase, a change of clothes, a little something to eat, maybe.  G-d will be with us.  You will see.  It will be all right.”

Mrs. Liebowitz did as her husband suggested.  She packed a change of clothing for each of the children and for herself and her husband.  She made them each a sandwich and put them in the suitcase, too.  She wrapped a pearl necklace and a gold bracelet in a handkerchief and put them under the clothes.  Then the family sat and prayed while waiting for the SS to return.  The guard who was posted outside their door did not bother them until their time was up.           

An hour later, as promised, they could hear shouting in the street.

“Jews, outside!  Every one of you!  We will search your homes before we leave and whoever is found inside will be shot on the spot!”

The Liebowitz family did as they were told.  Mother, father and four children hurried outside, not knowing where they were going or if they would ever see their home or each other again.  They were herded into a truck, leaving behind forever the life they had known.  It was a good life, and things would never be the same.

They were driven to the train station where they were herded into cattle cars.  They rode for days until they reached Auschwitz. 

Once there, the men and boys were separated from the women and girls.  They were then told to go to the left or to the right.  Anna was the eldest.  She and her parents were pushed to the right while her younger siblings were pushed to the left.  When Anna’s mother and father tried to grab their three small children, they, too, were pushed to the left.  Anna never saw any of them again.  But her faith in G-d never wavered.  It was this that got her through the war.

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When David and Anna were liberated from Auschwitz, they were barely alive.  They were both hospitalized for several months until they were strong enough to go to a Displaced Persons Camp.  It was there that they met.  Neither spoke the other’s language, but somehow they were able to connect and communicate on a deeper level.  They felt each other’s pain and identified with each other’s losses. 

While in the camp they learned English from the soldiers who were in charge.  They were both hungry for the family they had lost and found in each other a sense of oneness born out of their desperation and need to belong, somewhere, and to someone.  Whether they would have chosen each other under more normal circumstances, it is hard to say.  But these circumstances were far from normal and they both yearned to be whole again.

They decided to marry and immigrate to America.  Both Anna and David wanted to build their family again but Anna wasn’t sure she could have children because of all the inhumane experimentation done on her.  David told her it didn’t matter.  One way or another, they would have a family, they would be a family.  They would start all over again.  They would put down roots in America and build as many branches as they could.

They were married shortly thereafter and moved to America six months later.  David opened up a grocery story and Anna was by his side every day, helping him make a go of
it.  Business was good but Anna kept having miscarriage after miscarriage.  David never told his wife of his increasing pain after each miscarriage but tried to soothe her each time and help her through each loss.

When Anna finished the first tri-mester of another pregnancy she told David she was expecting.  She had never gotten this far before.  They were both elated and afraid to be too happy at the same time.  But, when six months later, Anna gave birth to a healthy baby girl, they were both beside themselves with joy.

With tears in his eyes, David said,  “Anna, I know we both lost our entire families during he war, and I don’t know if I have the right to ask this of you but, if it is all right with you, I would like to name the baby after my mother.”

Anna could not refuse him.  This or anything.  He was a good and loving husband and had told her a lot about his beloved mother who was a fine, righteous person.  And, although David was still not sure how he felt about G-d, he was willing to go along with his wife, and observe Jewish law, as his mother also would have wished.  Anna owed him this.

“Miriam Esther Grossberger, it is,” said Anna, and they cried in each other’s arms; tears of unparalleled joy mixed with tears of heart wrenching pain.

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They were not able to have any more children but Miriam Esther was all that a parent could hope for.  She was pretty, smart, obedient and devoted to her parents.  They were
the only family she had.  And while her friends had aunts, uncles and cousins, Miriam Esther was given enough love by her parents to make up for the lack.  She did not feel as if she were missing a thing.  Sure, some of her friends had extended families but Miriam Esther wouldn’t trade her parents for all the extended family in the world.

Occasionally she would ask her parents questions about the family she never knew.  They would tell her all about her wonderful grandparents, aunts and uncles.  As she got older, they told her, in an age appropriate way, a little about some of their war experiences.  They wanted her to be aware of the Holocaust but did not want to cause their precious daughter any undue fright.

When Miriam Esther was a senior in high school, her history teacher planned a trip to the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C.  She had been there once before on a class trip when she was in elementary school.  She would have liked to go with her parents but they did not have the wherewithal to live through the experience again even if they could walk away from it at any time.  Miriam Esther understood this and did not press the issue.

The following Monday morning the students boarded the bus and headed for Washington.  When they arrived at the museum, five hours later, they were all glad to get out of the bus and stretch their legs.  They purchased their tickets and headed into the museum.  As her ticket was being handed to her, Miriam Esther’s mind wandered back to one of the stories her father had told her.

“Papers!” said the SS officer as he saw her father, then a young boy, running down the street, and made him stop.  Her father stood, frozen in the spot, and proffered the papers in question, as he was told to do.

“Where are you going?” asked the stern SS officer.

“Just to the pharmacy,” her father said.  “My mother is ill and I must get her medicine.”

“Very well,” said the SS officer.  “But be quick about it!”

“Yes, sir,” replied the boy as he ran off in the direction of the pharmacy and ran home just as quickly, once he had procured the medicine.

As the students entered the museum, each was given a replica of a passport of someone who was killed in the war.  A short biography of each individual was written inside the “passport”.

“More papers,” thought Miriam Esther as she opened the one she was given.  She took one look inside, gasped for air and fell to the floor as she fainted.

“Help!  Help!  We need help here,” the teacher shouted as paramedics came rushing to the scene.

Fortunately, she was revived quickly.

“Are you all right?  What happened?” the teacher asked, relieved to see that her student was coming around.

She could not speak.  She silently held up the “passport” she was given upon entering the museum for her teacher to see.  The name, printed in bold letters on the top of the paper, was “Miriam Esther Grossberger”.

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I would like to wish everyone a zeesin Pesach.  Next year in Yerushalayim!