Reading “Trudel’s Truth”
Posted: January 2, 2012 Filed under: History, Remembrance, Yiddish 3 Comments »
For some time I’ve been wending my way through a very unique new blog entitled “Trudel’s Truth: A Young Woman Writes Home From a New Land.” Here’s a description from blog author Leonard Grossman:
In 1933, my mother, Gertrude “Trudel” Adler, who grew up in Frankfurt, Germany, wrote in her diary, “There is no future for Jewish youth in Germany. I think I shall go to Palestine.”
Her family and friends in Frankfurt asked. “Why would you leave Germany?” What did she see that they didn’t?
She didn’t get papers to go to Palestine, so when family in Chicago sent her papers, the 21 year old young woman came here.
Seventy-seven years ago, on May 8, 1934 she boarded a ship in Hamburg. Instead of keeping a diary, she wrote frequent letters home describing her adventure. On May 9, 1934 she wrote her first letter home. In her third letter she wrote “Please save my letters and if possible get them to me some day since I am to busy to keep a diary.”
More than 50 years later she translated the letters into English. I have begun posting excerpts from her letters. Hopefully, each post will be posted exactly 77 years to the day from the date on which it was written. The letters will be accompanied by snapshots and memorabilia she kept in an album I have recently recovered and supplemented by contemporary materials.
I found the following note with the handwritten translations of Trudel’s letters:
Following is a translation of my letters to my dad and two sisters, not a diary. I figured they had enough worries without my adding to it. Father had lost his seat on the stock exchange, which he had held for fifty-three years. Mother died only months before, I, the youngest of three sisters, left home–maybe forever.
In her memory, I started this blog on May 8, 2011, Mother’s Day in the United States. May this blog be a tribute to all those who bravely set forth for a new world as skies darkened across Europe.
Leonard Grossman
One of Trudel’s sons
I have the pleasure of knowing Leonard personally – as well as his brother/Trudel’s other son Ray (who is a member of my congregation.) Trust me, you will be as thoroughly moved as I was at discovering this blog. Truly a reclamation project of the most sacred kind.
To give you a sense of this lovely time capsule, here’s a taste from one of Trudel’s early letters – dated May 10, 1934, entitled “On Board the SS Manhattan.”
My very dear ones,
It is really too beautiful to be true. But it is true thank God and I am enjoying it as much as possible. We are now in the Channel and on my handwriting you can see our boat is shaking quite a bit.
After I closed my letter yesterday we had to change clothes and after supper we danced on a slippery dance floor. At midnight two girls and five males went to the cabin of two of the men and had a drink, cookies and chocolate. At 2:00 a.m. we all finally went into our own cabins.
At 8:15 a.m. this morning Eugene Hollander with whom I sit at the tables, picked me up for breakfast. At 9:30 a.m. twelve of us went like a little caravan through Le Havre. Since all twelve of us are non-Aryan I heard more Hebrew and Yiddish than I used to hear in a year. I mailed the letter to you there.
We all stopped for a cognac And were back on board at 12:30 for dinner. Ernst Calin, who used to work with Ernst Cahn who used to work with you, Doddo? He would like to join our group but we do not care for his company. Especially my table partner, who is very intelligent guy–that’s why we are friends, ha, ha, ha. He talks many languages and was all over the world in all big cities.
After dinner I rested and then I jumped into the very salty Channel pool and swam for about ½ hour, then a shower and now laying on deck to make my light rose cheeks darker.
By the way all immigrants were thoroughly searched for money etc. Not only I.
This morning before breakfast we ran around the deck about 15x to get a good appetite. We have to take advantage of this excellent food. I am too lazy to write others but you but received a few letters.
This afternoon in Le Havre about 100 more people came on board. I hope I do not get a roommate. It is so nice to be alone in my cabin.
Hopefully the weather stays as nice so I can come to the USA looking like a Negro.
Sorry I am writing so mixed up but I tell you things as they come in my mind. Last night I noticed that our ship can shake much more. The dance floor seemed to slip away under our feet but we all stayed upright. I hope we will dance again tonight, although I am now so tired that my eyes can hardly stay open. Greetings to everybody.
Loads of love and kisses your much to be envied,
Trudel.
P.S. We are all so happy and healthy together and feel so free!
Joseph Remade
Posted: December 23, 2011 Filed under: Judaism, Miketz, Poetry, Torah Commentary 1 Comment »
joseph was brought up from the
dungeon scrubbed clean his hair
shaved and stripped naked layer by painful
layer until he realized it’s not me it’s
never been me god has been dreaming
these dreams for us all along
then he was dressed in robes of the finest
linen a royal ring was slipped on his finger and
a gold chain was placed around his neck he was given
the name zaphenat-paneah but joseph secretly named himself
manasseh that means i don’t mind the pain any more and
ephraim that means come i am ready
to feed you
(Genesis 41:14,16,42,45,51,52)
New Musical Greetings for Hanukkah!
Posted: December 21, 2011 Filed under: Hanukkah, Holidays, Music 1 Comment »Happy first day of Hanukkah! If you’re looking for ways to light up this dark season, here are two gorgeous musical Hanukkah greetings courtesy of Pharoah’s Daughter. Check out these great versions of Hanukkah classics “Maoz Tzur” (above) and “Al Hansim” (below). Both were filmed at the 2008 Rabbis for Human Rights – North America Conference in Washington DC.
(Anyone else growing weary of the utterly overused yet still somehow requisite German-folk setting we Ashkenazim use for Maoz Tzur? I’m going with this one when I light the candles tonight…)
Joseph Prepares for Descent
Posted: December 16, 2011 Filed under: Judaism, Poetry, Torah Commentary, Vayeshev 2 Comments »
and jacob said go see
to the peace of
your brothers take off your
coat peel off your
outer skin fling yourself down
the rabbit hole down
straight down into the darkest of
prisons into the narrowest of
places you’ll be free when
they carry out your barest bones will
you do this for us
and joseph said i am
ready
(Genesis 37:13-14)
Jacob Gets His Blessing
Posted: December 9, 2011 Filed under: Forgiveness, Judaism, Poetry, Religion, Torah Commentary, Vayishlach 1 Comment »
he tells him let me go the sun is rising but
jacob doesn’t hear all he hears is esau the elder esau the
stronger esau his father’s favorite who had eagerly
entered his father’s tent he’s hearing those awful
cries don’t you have a blessing left for me bless me
too father bless me too the words bursting out of
the tent please please bless me too
father over and over and over their bodies are writhing the
dark water splashing against the cold night air please bless
me too father bless me
he pins him against the slope of
the riverbank now jacob is screaming please bless me father he
shakes him like a limp rag doll sobbing i will not
let you go until you BLESS ME
the sun peeking over the jabbok jacob
looks down at his face and sees
his father beaming with love and pride at
long last his mother saying
it is safe to come home now my son his
brother saying seeing your face is like
seeing the face of god jacob blinks water
from his eyes the river is silent still mirror
clear he stands up sees the sun
and slowly limps his way across
the water
(Genesis 27:38, 32:25-27)
Basya Schechter Sings Heschel!
Posted: December 6, 2011 Filed under: Music, Poetry, Yiddish 1 Comment »Been listening nonstop lately to Basya Schechter’s new album, “Songs of Wonder.” I’ve long been a big fan of her and her band Pharaoh’s Daughter – I particularly love the way she effortlessly synthesizes so many different kinds of world musical influences to create Jewish music that is both original yet somehow utterly authentic in its energy.
In her new solo effort she has set the Yiddish poems of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel to music. If you didn’t know the venerable Jewish theologian/civil rights activist had written poetry, you’re probably not alone. As it turns out, Heschel wrote them when he was just 26 years old and still a doctoral candidate in philosophy at the University of Berlin. They were published in a wonderful bilingual edition in 2007 – according to the Amazon review:
(This) is the intimate spiritual diary of a devout European Jew, loyal to the revelation at Sinai and afflicted with reverence for all human beings. These poems sound themes that will resonate throughout Heschel’s later popular writings: human holiness, a passion for truth, awe and wonder before nature, God’s quest for righteousness, solidarity with the downtrodden, and unwavering commitment to tikkun olam. In these poems, we also discover a young man’s acute loneliness, dismay at God’s distance, and dreams of spiritual and sensual intimacy with a woman.
For her album, Schechter assembled a posse of the best of the best musicians from the downtown NYC Jewish music scene and recorded ten songs that melded the young Heschel’s spiritual yearnings to her trademark eclectic Jewish sound. It’s a fabulous, mesmerizing album.
If you’re like me and you live outside subway distance of the Upper West Side/Lower East Side, just click above to see her performing “My Song.” (The music starts at about 1:07). And you should check out this very thorough piece on her by the Forward’s Alexander Gelfand.
We Are Climbing Jacob’s Vortex
Posted: December 2, 2011 Filed under: Dreams, God, Poetry, Religion, Torah Commentary, Vayetze 3 Comments »
jacob came upon a certain place and
stopped there for the night for
the sun was setting he took a
stone placed it against
his head and lay down in
his dream he saw a ladder set
on the earth its top reached the heavens
angels going up and down according to
freud don’t call it jacob’s ladder he’d probably call
it jacobs phallus after all he’s reckoning with his childhood
passion to please his mother just look where
that got him and according to jung the
ladder is the axis of communication between jacob’s ego
and self in other words he’s building a stairway
from lower to higher realms of
consciousness the hindus might say
the stone on jacob’s head opened his anja
chakra did you know that spiritual
energy from external environments enter your
body through this gateway and did you also
know that this spot corresponds to
the pineal gland which descartes believed
was the seat of the soul and the
point of connection between body and
the intellect or maybe this certain place was a
vortex and when his head rested upon
it earth energy spiraled up whirling
toward the open heavens then came roaring
back down whispering i am
with you i will protect you wherever you
go i promise
(Genesis 28:11-15)
Isaac Digs a Well
Posted: November 25, 2011 Filed under: Bible, Poetry, Toldot, Torah Commentary 1 Comment »
so isaac departed from there and
encamped in the wadi of gerar where
he dug anew the wells
which had been dug in the days
of his father abraham digging
deep he’s clawing at the
dry dead earth those long
buried voices leaking out
gurgling up like hidden springs burst
open cast out that horrid slave woman and her son
now take your other son whom you love so very
very much and bind him up tight don’t
worry god will provide for the sacrifice my
boy so he named that well sitnah that means
pain his eyes so filled with his hot
tears he doesn’t notice at
first the ground growing softer and
sweeter who is this woman
walking in the field toward me
i am your god fear not for
i am with you i will bless you i
will keep you safe so isaac changed
the name of the well to rechovot that means
god had torn open his bindings and
gave his soul wide open space to
roam when he woke up his servants
came to him and told him about the well they
had dug and said to him we have
found water
(Genesis 26:18, 21, 32)
On Giving Thanks
Posted: November 23, 2011 Filed under: Poetry, Thanksgiving 2 Comments »
“Thanks”
by W.S. Merwin
Listen
with the night falling we are saying thank you
we are stopping on the bridges to bow from the railings
we are running out of the glass rooms
with our mouths full of food to look at the sky
and say thank you
we are standing by the water thanking it
smiling by the windows looking out
in our directions
back from a series of hospitals back from a mugging
after funerals we are saying thank you
after the news of the dead
whether or not we knew them we are saying thank you
over telephones we are saying thank you
in doorways and in the backs of cars and in elevators
remembering wars and the police at the door
and the beatings on stairs we are saying thank you
in the banks we are saying thank you
in the faces of the officials and the rich
and of all who will never change
we go on saying thank you thank you
with the animals dying around us
our lost feelings we are saying thank you
with the forests falling faster than the minutes
of our lives we are saying thank you
with the words going out like cells of a brain
with the cities growing over us
we are saying thank you faster and faster
with nobody listening we are saying thank you
we are saying thank you and waving
dark though it is
Joseph’s Final Dream
Posted: December 30, 2011 | Author: Rabbi Brant Rosen | Filed under: Dreams, Poetry, Reconciliation, Torah Commentary, Yayigash | 2 Comments »he looks down at his kneeling brothers peels
off his robe of fine egyptian linen reveals his tattered
bloodsoaked coat and says i am your brother joseph the
one who has dreamed who has waited so long for this moment the
one for whom you never had one kind word the one
whom you cast into an empty lifeless pit the
one whom you sold to traders like so much dead
meat the one who was taken down to egypt in chains while
you sang so sweetly to our father your son was surely
gutted by a wild beast oh
yes i am the one who slept for years on that
stinking dungeon floor with nothing but these dreams
of vengeance to keep me alive and now you grovel
here before me asking for my food for my pity for my
compassion then joseph seized the child benjamin and
had him impaled outside the city gates his servants
woke him and said if you please master there are eleven
israelites asking for you and they claim to be
your brothers
(Genesis 45:4)