Visit at Rabbi Morgenstern

My dad,Ze'ev Tzudiker studied Torah with Mendel Morgenstern in the "cheder" in Rabbai Zelig Morgenstern"s Yeshiva. They were good friends until they grew up, My dad had to leave the "chder" and start working to help the family and Mendel was sent to study in the great Yeshiva of "Chaachmei Lublin".

Two years ago I arranged a meeting between both of them. They were excited to see each other. They were both in their 90's already but looked like small children again.

Here 's what I wrote about what the Rabbai told me-

The meeting between my father and the rabbai was so emotional that I could hardly speak.The two spoke and spoke and for a short time became small children in the cheder again. I will certainly need another meeting with him to complete the whole picture.

Rabbai Mendel Morgenstern is a charming nobel person and his wife too .He is now 90 years old and he has his own Yeshiva which is called Sokolow-Kotzek beit-midrash . (He is the grand-grandchild of the Great Rabbai of Kotzek)

He told me he survived the war by himself. As his grandfather told him,he ran away from Sokolow to Wilna,stayed there for half a year and then it was conquered by the Russians again,which enabled him to escape . He flew to Japan,wandering to India and China and then in 1942,came to settle in Israel. He had another sister who was the only one to survive the war out of the 19 people they were.his sister,Pearl,passed away last year.

The Rabbai and his wife have 7 children- 5 girls and 2 boys .

I sked him about visiting Poland and he said he wouldn't ever step his leg on this land. he said that the Poles were always as antisemic as the Nazis . The relationships between Jews and non-Jews in Sokolow were tense and a lot of times the Jews were victims of Pogroms.

He also told me that because of his grandfather's reputation in religion.Sokolow became a Jewish central place to which students from all around poland and even from abroad came to study in his Yeshiva.

It turned out that everything my father remebered and told me was very accurate. He confirmed to me the fact that there was a small jail in his grandfather's house. He also confimed the fact that his grandfather practiced medicine . When I asked him did he study medicine,he said that one of his grandfather's students was adoctor- and they had an agreement. Rabbai Zelig M. taught him talmud Torah and the doctor taght him medicine. He used to make accurate diagnosis better than official doctors. He was very self- confident about his observations. The farmacy in town respected his medications .

Hecame home to Sokolow the evening before the war broke out (it was Thursday,the 31th of August).His Parents prepared him a hiding place in the Boidem full with sand and intended him topractice going into it in case a war starts for the next day but the bombs came earlier than expected, the next morning before 7 ocloc'k while he was still in bed.

I showed him pictures I took of Sokolow in my visits there and also kasia's pictures of her exhibition. I told him about our group and our intentions. He listened curiously but said nothing. He looked in a great pain.

The Rabbai published his grandfather's writings. He wrote 2 books- She'erit Itzchak and She'erit Israel which deal with religious matters.

May his soul rest in peace.

Shoshi Shatit

Rabbi Morgenstern passed away

Rabbi Mendel Morgenstern, grandson of Sokolow rabbi Yitzhak Zelig Morgenstern, passed away today at the age of 92 in Bnei Brak, Israel. May his sould rest in peace.

http://www.bhol.co.il/Article.aspx?id=62780

Rabbi Yakov Mendel Morgenstern

Yakov Mendel Morgenstern, son of the Sokolower rebbe, was the rabbi of the Great Synagogue in Węgrów. On erev Yom Kippur in 1939, just a few weeks after the Germans captured the town, SS officers invaded his home. Reports of what happened next differ slightly in details, but the tragic outcome is the same.

The SS officers dragged Rabbi Morgenstern to Market Square in the center of Węgrów and ordered him to undress. Then they gave him a broom and demanded that he gather the manure in the square (which was plentiful, as horse and buggy was the prevalent mode of transportation in Węgrów) and carry it to the town dump in his shtreiml [fur hat].
As the rabbi tried to do what he was told, he was stabbed with a bayonet. What happened next is not certain. Either the initial bayonet went into Rabbi Morgenstern's abdomen and he died immediately or he was tortured by several bayonet thrusts and died while he was working.
After Rabbi Morgenstern was murdered, the Great Synagogue in Węgrów was closed. It was destroyed by the Nazis.

Out of the Past

We just returned from a trip to Poland, a trip to Sokolow Podlaski, a trip to the past.  What past was it?  It was my family’s memories past, the town’s past, Poland’s past.  A trip to bridge the pain and losses of the past, a trip to find signs of and links to those we lost and those we never knew and a trip to look for signs of hope that the suspicions and hatreds and abuses of past times could be overcome and new bridges built.

My family had lived in Sokolow for generations.  They were born there, grew up there, walked the city streets and countryside, made friends, got married, had normal lives.  My father and mother were only in their early 20’s and were sweethearts  when Germany invaded Poland on September 1, 1939.  They were in the town when it was bombed, and they were there when the German army invaded Sokolow on September 10, 1939.  Beatings and abuses of the Jews rapidly escalated and when my mother was attacked, she and my father decided they had to leave.  During a short period when the Soviets pushed the Germans back, my father got a horse and buggy and took my mother, her sister, her sister’s fiancée, and their mother and fled across the Bug River to Drohiczyn, to Russian territory.  His mother, his sister, and two brothers and aunts and uncles refused to leave reasoning, “How bad can it be?  Where can we go?  We know no-one in Soviet Russia.  How would we live?”

Pamiętamy o ofiarach getta

Ambasador Izraela Zvi Rav-Ner, Naczelny Rabin Polski Michael Schudrich, harcerze na czele z komendantką Sokołowskiego Domu Harcerza Bożenną Hardej, władze miasta, uczniowie, nauczyciele i wychowawcy wzięli udział w uroczystości upamiętniającej likwidację sokołowskiego getta.

Jom Kippur to jedno z najważniejszych świąt żydowskich o charakterze pokutnym. Przez cały dzień w synagodze odbywają się nabożeństwa, podczas których wyznaje się swoje grzechy, wysławia boże miłosierdzie oraz wspomina zmarłych. 21 września 1942 roku święto Jom Kippur odbyło się w Sokołowie Podlaskim po raz ostatni. Następnego dnia rano getto zostało otoczone przez Niemców oraz pomagających im Ukraińców. 22 września rozpoczęła się eksterminacja ludności żydowskiej Sokołowa. W ciągu kilku następnych dni do obozu śmierci w Treblince wywieziono ok. 6 tysięcy osób. Prawdopodobnie wszyscy zginęli kilkanaście minut po przyjeździe. Tego dnia spotkaliśmy się, by wyrazić naszą pamięć o tamtych tragicznych wydarzeniach.

Kazimierz Miłobędzki

Testimony written by Kazimierz Miłobędzki, one of Righteous Among the Nations, who helped Perla Morgenstern (Newman), granddaughter of Rabbi Yitzchak Zelig Morgenstern (in Polish)

Kazimierz Miłobędzki

 

„Kto ratuje jedno życie jakby świat cały ratował”

Sokołów Podlaski, 1986

Wspomnienia z Getta w Sokołowie Podlaskim

Nazywam się Kazimierz Miłobędzki ur. 10 października 1919r. w Sokołowie Podlaskim. Moimi rodzicami są Stanisław i Helena. Sokołów Podlaski do 1939r. liczył około 12 (dwanaście) tysięcy obywateli, w tym około 4000 obywateli narodowości żydowskiej. Mieszkańcy narodowości polskiej trudnili się kuśnierstwem, które było podstawowym zatrudnieniem oraz szewstwo. Obywatele narodowości żydowskiej trudnili się kamasznictwem, krawiectwem i innymi zawodami. Żydami byli: jeden dentysta, jeden lekarz, dwóch felczerów, jeden fryzjer i jeden fotograf. Poza kilkoma sklepami polskimi cały handel znajdował się w rękach obywateli pochodzenia żydowskiego.

Sokołów był spokojnym miasteczkiem. Wszyscy obywatele w Sokołowie żyli lepiej czy gorzej w zależności od środków utrzymania.

Beit Midrash Sokolow - Kock in Bnei Brak, Israel (2011)

photo: Michael Traison

photo: Michael Traison

The house of Rebbe

1940s. This was the house of the Sokolover Rebbe, Yitzchak Zelig Morgenstern (1867-1939), one of the best-known Tzadiks in all of Europe. Tzadik is a title generally given to personalities in Judaism considered saintly. A descendant of the tzaddikim dynasty from Kock, he served as Sokolow rabbi from 1899 until his death in 1939. He founded a large Yeshiva in the town - Beth Isreal (House of Israel). Was also a trained medical doctor and he took an active part in the political life of the town. He was one of the founders of the Agudas Yisroel party, and was a powerful activist. He died of natural causes.
2009. The building is now a restaurant. This photo was taken before it opened.