Malka Adler - The Brothers of Auschwitz

I sat in the corner swallowing tears of shame and prayed to God that my rabbi the melamed would go blind. That my rabbi the melamed would limp and have a permanent stutter. No, no, may his tongue fall into the snow and stick there for eternity, I wish, I wish, that he’d come into the room, open his mouth wide, want to say Leiber, read from the book, and all that would come out would be mmmm. Mmmm. I wish, I wish. I know the rabbi decided I’d rebel against him. That I deliberately didn’t want to read, to make him mad. But I didn’t. I couldn’t remember the Hebrew letters.

I also got it from rabbi the melamed because of the Sabbath.

My brother Yitzhak and I agreed to bathe in the Tur’i Remety River on the Sabbath for a few candies. Older children said, if you go in the river on the Sabbath, we’ll give you all the candies we have in our pockets, want to? They showed us the nice candies in their pockets. We stripped quickly and waded into the river. We got no candies. One of them immediately ran to call our rabbi. The rabbi arrived in his Sabbath clothes and large hat. My brother and I decided to dive. We held hands, took a deep breath, and hop. Down we sank. One, two, three, four, five, we ran out of air. We raised our heads. Ah, the rabbi was waiting for us at the river. He shook his head, and I saw a belt hovering over me.

At home I complained about the rabbi.

I said, the rabbi hits me with his belt. Father, it hurts.

Father said, Leiber, you study hard, d’you hear, and off he went.

I went to mother, mother, help me, it hurts. Mother was silent.

My sister, Sarah, put her book aside and said, Leiber is right, father needs to do something, mother, you tell him.

Mother took a candy from the drawer, gave it to me and said, the rabbi knows what’s good for you. The rabbi decides, Leiber, and you have to listen to him, understand? I was silent. Throwing off my shoes, I jumped outside and ran barefoot to the forest. I heard mother shouting, Leiber, Leiber, come back. I didn’t go back. I only went back when it got dark and I was hungry.

A few days later, the Czechs recruited the rabbi. Soldiers on horses were dragging a cannon. The rabbi sat on one of the horses. I sat in the ditch and he rode past me. His face was a whitish gray color, his body had shrunk, and under my woolen hat I felt happy, I called out, there is a God, there is. Because I didn’t want him to speak to me. I never saw him again.

Then the Hungarians came and life in the village was turned upside down. The Hungarians sacked the Czech teachers. Replacement teachers arrived from Hungary. Anti-Semitic teachers. They immediately separated Jewish and Christian children. Mainly for sports lessons. Christian children were given wooden weapons to train with before being recruited to the army. The children trained in the yard, right-turn, left-turn. They were known as Levente. They turned us Jews into servants. We had to cut firewood. In the meantime, the village was full of rumors.

The shoemaker whispered in the synagogue that they were taking Jews and burning them. Shooting them at enormous pits, spreading lime, firing, then another layer. The grocer said the Germans were putting Jews in cars, closing the door tightly and pouring poison inside. Then they throw them to the dogs. At home, around the table with a glass of tea, mother said God would help and Hitler would burn like a candle. Father said, Hitler will burn up like a feeble tree. The bald neighbor came in and said first they should pull out his teeth, one by one, with rusty pliers. Then the childless neighbor came in and said, the British will come soon, they’ll hang Hitler on a rope, damn him. They always killed Hitler at the table. Rabbis even came from the city, two I didn’t know, one plump, one short and not so fat, they said, Jews, there is nothing to worry about. The plump one said, we have a powerful God. He will take care of us. The short one wiped away the white crumbs at the corners of his mouth and said, very true, trust in God alone. But I was very worried and stuck to Shorkodi.

A handsome young man, he was from the Jewish Forced Labor Battalion. The Hungarians brought them from Budapest to cut wood for the Germans. Shorkodi ate supper with us on the Sabbath. Shorkodi said, listen Leiber, I have a large perfume store. When the war is over you’ll come with me to Budapest. I’ll teach you to work in the store. I didn’t know what perfume was but I waited for the day. Every day I waited. Even when they killed my best friend, Shorkodi, because he took the train to Budapest without permission. He wanted to visit his parents and return. I waited even after the men from Budapest disappeared. I waited even when I knew the end was coming for the Jews.

And we had a chance.

In 1943, a shaliach – messenger, came from Israel to our village. A young Betar man with velvety hair and shoulders a meter wide. He had a low thick voice, and he spoke as if Hitler was standing behind the door. He said he’d come to save Jewish youth from Hungary. He came into the synagogue and begged to take at least the youngsters to Israel.

Give me the children, the children. I approached the Betar shaliach , don’t know why, but I wanted to hang onto his hand and not let go. He smiled at me and put out a large, sunburned, scratched hand. I wanted to shake his hand.

Father stood between us. Father said, Leiber, go home. I ran home. I didn’t know what Israel was but I thought, first of all, we’re getting out of here. I banged the door and fell upon mother.

Mother, mother, I want to go to Israel. I want to go with the shaliach .

Mother pulled at her apron and pinched my cheek. Hard.

Mother said, is that what the rabbi taught you, huh? We go to Israel only when the Messiah comes.

I stayed. I knew we’d missed our chance.

I waited for the Messiah. First I sat with my left leg crossed over my right, an hour later I changed legs, crossing my right over my left, for twice as long, and changed. I sat on the steps behind the house. I opened my shirt, showed him my entire chest, I wanted to open my heart to him, I put my palm, fingers stretched, over my heart, I heard it beat, tuk-tuk. Tuk-tuk. I seized the beats in my fist, threw my hand forcefully over my head, then I opened my mouth and called him, come Messiah, come, come to me.

In the meantime I listened to the radio.

I heard Hitler on the radio. His voice was like the barking of the big dog in the neighbor’s yard. I heard heil, heil . I heard Juden , and Juden like cursing. I heard incredible singing from thousands of throats. I felt as if the enthusiastic singing on the radio wanted to fix me to the wall and squash me like a mosquito.

I was certain the story would end badly for Jews. As bad as it could be. Even though I didn’t understand the reason and I wasn’t yet fifteen.

Yitzhak: Maybe we deserved it, we were cheats and liars.

Dov: Don’t say that.

Yitzhak: Man-eaters. The Jew in the diaspora wasn’t honest.

Dov: Not true, don’t say that, it’s how traders are, it’s impossible

to buy for a lira and sell for half a lira.

Yitzhak: An ordinary goy was honest. A Jew looked for

ways to earn, make a living.

I liked wandering round the market.

The noisiest place in town. I didn’t want to study. Didn’t want to sit on my ass the entire day in front of my teacher’s mouth. I liked wandering about the market, traveling to places I didn’t know with my father. I liked meeting the man with the vegetable stall. He’d say to me, Yitzhak, you’ve grown, grown, want an apple? I liked meeting the man with a general store. He had burners, lamps, a nut-grinder, a small saw with a special handle, a bird-cage, and work tools. He had an interesting story for me. Sometimes I’d sit apart on the stairs and learn how to buy and sell goods.