Essential Music of the Holocaust: Ani Maamin

How can music be essential to the Holocaust? Eliyana Adler (article referenced below) writes that singing should be considered an important element of resistance, and laments that it is not often so considered, for example, citing Prof. Yehudah Bauer’s omission of music in his discussion of Resistance. Whether or not it was effective—music and songs did not often ultimately save lives, the production and performance of works of music was a significant act of defiance, and a cultural record that played and continues to play an important role in ensuring that the Holocaust does not erase the memory of what happened. Perhaps for this reason, songs of the Holocaust were and remain part of nearly every memorial to the Holocaust.

The most well-known of these is no doubt the anthem Ani  Ma’amin. The words come from a liturgical summary of the 13 principles of Maimonides (from his commentary on Chapter 10 of the Mishnah tractate Sanhedrin), worded as a Credo for synagogue recitation, “I believe in perfect faith…” This is the twelfth principle: “I believe in perfect faith in the coming of the Messiah, and even though he tarries, I await him, every day, to come.”  It is difficult to reconstruct the history of the song Ani Ma’amin, and even the exact melody. The two examples above were copied from websites about Modzhitz Hasidic melodies. Those looking carefully at the music may note that one of the versions has more of the accidentals and modality of traditional Jewish music (e.g. lowered second note and raised third of the scale, rather than the standard minor key). As for the history of the song’s composition, the general outline of the story readily emerges from reviewing material easily available on the internet in Hebrew, English and to a certain extent in Yiddish.

http://www.modzitz.co.il/%D7%90%D7%A8%D7%9B%D7%99%D7%95%D7%9F/%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%A4%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%95%20%D7%A9%D7%9C%20%D7%A0%D7%99%D7%92%D7%95%D7%9F/235/%D7%94%D7%97%D7%A1%D7%99%D7%93%20%D7%A8%D7%91%D7%99%20%D7%A2%D7%96%D7%A8%D7%99%D7%90%D7%9C%20%D7%93%D7%95%D7%93%20%D7%A4%D7%A1%D7%98%D7%92%20%D7%9E%D7%95%D7%95%D7%A8%D7%A9%D7%94  
http://modzitz.org/story001.htm
http://www.chabad.org/library/article_cdo/aid/107189/jewish/Ani-Maamin.htm  
(see other links available from these sites).

R. Azriel-David Fastag (1890-1942) was one of the two most prominent developers of the songs for which the court of the Modzhitzer rebbe was famous. Fastag was noted as a composer and singer in Warsaw; 1500 people were said to have paid for tickets to come to services he led, with a capella (choir).

Fastag was among those deported from Warsaw to their deaths at Treblinka in 1942. The story goes that the words of Ani ma’min appeared to him and he began singing this song on the cattle-car—and gradually everyone joined in. He challenged those in the car to volunteer to try to bring this song to the Modzhitzer Rebbe, reportedly offering “half his portion in the world-to come” to anyone who would do so. Two young men volunteered and were able to jump from the car. Only one survived and he was able to get to safety and to deliver the music to the Modhzitzer Rebbe.

Up to the escape from the cattle car, most of the reports are pretty much the same. Often the accounts note that the singing could be heard outside the cattle-car. While most retellings refer to Fastag, Simon Zucker—who, like most others, ascribes the melody to the Modzhitzers—says it was the Rebbe of Grodzisk Mazowiecki, R. Israel Shapiro, who led his followers in singing this song.

Reports about how and where Fastag’s melody came to the Modzhitzer rebbe’s attention differ in details. Some appear to have the young man come to the Rebbe in Israel or in New York; others have him send a messenger to hand-deliver the melody. In some, it is the boy himself who wrote the notes, others recount that Fastag annotated the music and gave it to the young men. Still others say the young man sang the melody to someone who was able to write it down once he had escaped to safety.

Some of the websites I surveyed have a full account of the story, but ass a postscript saying the story should be considered a literary creation, and not necessarily an accurate presentation of the facts of the matter. The Modzitz.org website says the account of R. Azriel David Fastag is “based on HaRakeves HaMisnaggenes, “The Singing Train," a story by P. Flexer in M.S. Geshuri's Negina v'Chassidus b'Veis Kuzmir u'Bnoseha  and a story in Sichas HaShavua # 654”—so perhaps we should assume that the story, as it is usually told, is derived from Flexer’s account (as of this writing, I have not been able to examine Geshuri’s volume or the Sichat hashavua).   

To my mind, the most detailed and believable version of the story of how the melody arrived at the Modzhitzer’s court is that the surviving young man reached Switzerland, put the melody into writing, and eventually had someone deliver it to the court of the “Imrei Shaul” (Rabbi Saul Yedidya Elazar Taub 1886-1947) in Brooklyn, New York. It reached the Modzhitzer Rebbe on the day he was celebrating the Brit Milah of a grandson. The Rebbe opened the message and asked R. Ben-Tzion Shenkar to sing the song. R. Yitzhak Huttner was there as well. R. Huttner had known R. Azriel-David Fastag in Warsaw, and had eaten in his home. Obviously, the message and one last niggun from R. Fastag made an outstanding impression.

Ben-Tzion Shenkar was a young man who had sung with Cantor Joshua Pilderwasser, had studied music and composition, and became a disciple of the Imrei Shaul about 1940. Thus if this version of the story of Ani Maamin is true, it is an early example of Shenker’s immense significance in Jewish music. The melody quickly gained recognition, and was described as the “Song of the Ghetto” or “Melody (nigun) of the Ghetto” and was sung in America and Palestine in remembrance ceremonies.

If in fact the melody was known only because it was sung the Modhzitzer’s court in April 1945 in New York, it was not sung in the ghettos or at Auschwitz, achieving its fame only after the war as the quintessential song of Holocaust remembrance.

(Citations in Eliyana Adler, “No Raisins, no Almonds” Shofar, 24:4 2006, 55:  Kazcerginski, Lider, xxxiv, Mlotek and Gottlieb, We are Here, p. 76, Rubin, Voices of A People, 425, Simon Zucker, The Unconquerable Spirit 27. Adler writes about Ani Ma’amin pre-existing the Holocaust; she writes in such a way that I am not sure whether she considers the words only to have pre-existed, as obviously they did, or setting the words to this melody as well).  

Whether or not it was sung during the Holocaust itself more widely than in a single cattle car, Ani Maamin was incorporated early on into memorial ceremonies for Yom Ha-Shoah, into liturgies for Israel Independence Day, and memorial programs on, e.g. Israel Radio.

 (Dalia Ofer, The Strength of Remembrance: Commemorating the Holocaust During the First Decade in Israel JSS 6:2 2000, p. 36).

Seth Ward

Four years ago, I gave a talk about Muslims and Jews, and the ramifications of their voting patterns for Democrats and Republicans. I spoke at what was, I believe, the ill-fated but valuable entity already called CCCE (and once called Community Education). And I continue to include charting trends in these communities in my professional purview.

 

I did not really have any reason to cover the Mormon vote in 2008.

 

George W. Bush had courted the Muslim vote, and in 2000 and 2004, the Muslim community took this into account (as they did, especially after the attack on the World Trade Center and the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan, US policies towards the Islamic world). In 2008, the Muslim vote  for the Democratic party reflected reactions to George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq, and recognition of Obama’s personal history—Obama spent time growing up in Indonesia, the largest Muslim-majority country, and his grandfather was a Muslim, for at least part of his life. It’s noteworthy that the latter fact was more important than considering the candidate’s grandfather, father or indeed himself as an apostate—and I do not think many American voters who are Muslims hold the misguided notion that Obama is himself Muslim, despite the startling percentage of Americans (in some surveys, over 10%) who treat this claim seriously.

 

I am writing this in part because my attention was drawn to one of the most important and fundamental surveys of religion and voting, the report of the Pew Memorial Trust. Although the way the Pew survey was done, there was little likelihood they would get sufficient data to make projections about Muslim, Jewish and Mormon voters, and they focused on the changing role of religion in the US electorate, but mostly white, African-American, and Hispanics who identify as Christians of various types, or as "nones"--persons with no religious affiliation. But, it is certainly possible to look into the Muslim, Jewish and Mormon communities and discuss the trends and their significance.

 

It’s not clear how important these votes will be, but it is noteworthy that while Muslims and Jews are a small portion of the electorate, they are reasonably well represented in enough “swing states” that they could easily claim significance in winning the election. Muslims are certainly a large enough percentage of voters to make an electoral difference in the swing state of Virginia. Other swing states such as Florida, Colorado and Ohio have enough Muslims that their vote could be said to make a difference if they tended towards one party or another and the results were close. Mormons are probably enough of a force in Nevada, possibly in Colorado. The Jewish vote could be decisive in Florida and Nevada, and probably in Ohio and Colorado.

 

Pew’s charting of ethnic/racial distinctions are clearly important, as are the “religiosity” items such attendance at religious services and other practices.  Indeed, these kinds of things show up as important distinctions in many studies of Jewish and Muslim communities.

 

I have not seen much material about Muslim choices in the current race, although some are nervous about Romney’s strong language regarding Iran, Libya, Israel and elsewhere in the Middle East. I need to track this more carefully.

 

Jewish Republicans are far more vocal than ever before, although it is hard to determine if the percentage is highly distinct from the usual 25%. Jews who attend the synagogue multiple times per week (not per month!) tend to track more highly for Romney—generally this correlates with certain segments of the Orthodox and especially Ultra-Orthodox communities. The AJC (American Jewish Committee) did a survey on Sept. 27 that projected 65% for Obama and 24% for Romney. Undecideds were asked for their preferences as of the date—and apparently most were able to say they were leaning one way or another; rounding these numbers and adding them in it’s about 71% for Obama and 27% for Romney. (Disclosure: I made up these last numbers: the report I saw did not do this addition).

 

The most striking differential is that Orthodox Jews, usually considered about 10% of the overall Jewish population (in this sample the percentage was 8.3%, favored Romney over Obama 54% to 40%, while the other categories are pretty close to the overall average. The gender gap is present among Jewish respondents 69/19% women vs. 61/29% men. The survey asked whether respondents approved of the way Obama is handling various issues; the most striking approval rates to me were to the question about whether he was handling the abortion issue well. Clearly National Security, Israel and Iran are important issues for these voters. In some cases, the level of support or approval for Obama differed from the overall level of his support.

 

Muslims largely supported Clinton, but also George Bush and George W Bush. They voted for Obama in large numbers in 2008. This time around, there appears to be disappointment with Obama: at home, there is still profiling and some of the provisions of the PATRIOT act that the Muslim community dislikes were renewed; overseas, many are dissatisfied by the nature of US involvement in Muslim countries, drone attacks, and so forth. I do not think there is a great amount of sympathy for Romney, though, so it is not surprising to me that the necessity to vote emerges more than support of (or opposition to) one or the other candidate–in my very unscientific survey of website statements about this issue. 

 

Mormons typically support the Republican party, and this year support for Romney, a Mormon, exceeds the level of Mormon support for the ticket in 2008.

 

Is there any significance to this all?

 

In terms of who is elected—the Mormon, Jewish and Muslim voting blocks could be influential in a few states, such as Virginia, Florida, Ohio,  Colorado and Nevada. Given the closeness of the election, any of these states could be viewed as the deciding state.

 

Many perceive a widening gulf between Republicans and Democrats in general in the United States, and this is mirrored in the gulf between the politics of Orthodox and non-Orthodox Jews. Orthodox Jews tend also to be more conservative on a number of social issues. Israel and various other foreign policy issues remain of broad interest to the Jewish electorate; although Republican policies towards Israel seem in my humble opinion to reflect the kinds of approaches more closely associated with Christian Zionism and Neoconservatives (and Jewish neo-cons are not primarily Orthodox), these approaches resonate well in the Orthodox Jewish community. It should be noted that Jewish republicans are by no means overwhelmingly Orthodox—the percentage of the Orthodox community supporting the Republicans is much higher than it is among Conservative, Reform, and other affiliated or non-affiliated Jews, but the Orthodox form a small percentage of the overall community.

 

Looking over several surveys, it seems that the greatest issue in the Muslim community today is getting out the vote. Many Muslims find both major parties to have problematic and attractive aspects when compared to their opponents, and American Muslims do not seem to have the history of supporting the one or the other party, as is typical of Jews and Mormons.

 

Mormons typically support Republican candidates, and have a substantial infrastructure to support voting. It seems to me that Mormons mobilizing the vote could have a substantial impact in Nevada, and a smaller yet not insignificant impact in Colorado.

 

To the extent that I can determine from reviewing surveys and reportage, Jews still support the Democratic Party much more often than the Republican Party. But, Jews appear to resemble the general American community more and more in terms of how religiosity and similar considerations affect their voting preferences; a detailed statistical analysis might show that, when allowances are made for some of these concerns, Jewish demography—largely urban, less religious etc.—is such that when held constant for some of these considerations, Jewish voting preferences are even less distinct from the general electorate. Even on Israel, Jews may appear to interpret candidates’ positions in such a way that they match their party loyalties.

 

Any change in the Mormon voting orientation is less likely to come to the fore in the current election. And Muslims appear to be investing energy in getting more involved in the political process.

 

Seth Ward

I discovered recently that some of my articles and essays archived on my computer are either unreadable in the current computer environment or were completely compromised. Here are links from the Wayback Machine on archive.org. Please remember that these items were filed in the 1990s and that the du.edu email address listed on them is no longer in service: use sward@uwyo.edu 

Papers, Publications and Essays

By: Dr. Seth Ward

Sepharadim, Converso Descendants, Crypto-Jews

·  Review of a cookbook based on recipes developed from ingredients mentioned in Inquisition records

·  Crypto-Judaism in the U.S. Southwest

·  Profiles of Converso Descendants in the U.S. Southwest

·  Profiles of Converso Descendants in the U.S. Southwest: Lecture in Los Angeles, August 1999

·  Sephardim and Crypto-Jews: A Definition of Terms

·  Sepharad: A brief history of the term.

Lively opinion on Jewish Topics

·  Quranic sources on The Chosen People and Holy Land

·  The Jewish Street

·  Hebrew Literacy

Papers and addresses on other Jewish issues

·  Luther and the Jews

·  Does Judaism have a Catechism?

·  Are Hamantaschen like communion wafers or Christmas Cookies? Inpraxation and a Jewish Typology for food

·  The Jewish Year: The zero-date of the Era

·  Tisha Beav: In what year was the Temple Destroyed (Or: What does the year 5761 mean?)

·  Passover

National Narratives and History

·  On the Holocaust in North Africa, Sephardim and the Islamic World

·  The Battles of Kosovo as National Narrative

New Testament and Jewish Sources

·  The Presentation of Jesus: Jewish Perspectives on Luke 2:22f.

Selected additional documents for teaching, introductory lectures; course syllabi

·  Follow links from Home Page

This essay started as a Dvar Torah for October 3, 2012—the night of the first Presidential Debate between Mitt Romney and Barak Obama, and has only been lightly edited.

My talk this evening has little to do with the Torah readings for Sukkot or for that matter, with the Parashat Hashavuah. Those were my first thoughts for a subject to be sure, but I recently received a review copy of The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture, by Yoram Hazony, a political philosopher whose volume The Jewish State: The Struggle for Israel’s Soul created quite a stir with its analysis and critique of (inter alia) the orientation of the academic world in Israel. Hazony argues that the Tanakh must be part of the discourse of philosophy in the academic world, a “work of reason”—of philosophy--as much as those based on Greek philosophers. Given tonight’s Presidential debates, I turned to Hazony’s chapter with a subtitle “A Political Philosophy.”

Commenting on a verse from I Samuel, Hazony concludes that “the Hebrew Bible can be seen as going farther in the direction of endorsing democratic rule than any of the classic texts of Greek philosophy.” Perhaps American democratic ideals reflect 18^th century European thought more than the ancient Greeks, but that is not particularly important for us: his comments are based on his reasoning from Hebrew Bible and are relevant to our own democratic process.

The verse records words God is said to have spoken to Samuel (I Sam 8:7)
 שְׁמַע בְּקוֹל הָעָם, לְכֹל אֲשֶׁר-יֹאמְרוּ אֵלֶיךָ  “Accept the voice of the people in everything they say to you.”
But this is only part of the story: He sees this as Divine acquiescence in what is practical and indeed necessary—and contrary to the prophet’s judgment—yet still problematic: in this verse, Samuel is told that they are rejecting God himself: Ki Oti maasu—“they have rejected Me.” In a note, Hazony compares this to God telling Abraham to listen to Sarah to do what is practical and necessary, although against his better judgment, and expel Hagar and Ishmael.

Yet Hazony adduces a second source of political legitimacy from Samuel’s speech when the people suggest that maybe they had sinned when they asked for a king. (1 Sam chap. 12), noting that “The legitimacy of the state cannot derive from the consent of the people alone.” (151) as Samuel says he will instruct them

 בְּדֶרֶךְ הַטּוֹבָה וְהַיְשָׁרָה. “in the good and the right path.”

Thus the Hebrew Bible argues for a political system of dual legitimacy: the interests of the people, and the demand for the Good and Right. In Hazony’s words: “the people and their representatives… [make] demands on the king in defense of their own interests,” while the government is also urged towards the good and right by the Prophets. 

Thus, according to Hazony, we have a reasoned argument for a doctrine of limited government, differing from the imperialism of Egypt which enslaved the Israelites and the expansionism of Assyria and Babylonia, but also differing from the anarchy of the period of Judges which caused civil war and disunity. The Laws of Kings from Deuteronomy call for the King to refrain from amassing horses, wives and gold.  These rules are designed to preclude the king from waging constant warfare, from complicated international alliances, (cemented by marriage), and excessive taxation and plunder. The ideal political system is a limited state governed by law, not by arbitrary whimsy of the government and by self- aggrandizement. This is why the King is to write a copy of the Torah and keep it with him.

Solomon shows the difficulty of maintaining this balance. Solomon impresses all with his wisdom achieves peace and builds the Temple. But he exacts heavy taxes, has entangling alliances through his wives, and gathered many chariots and horses. (1 K 10:14-11:4). The law of the King, says Hazony, is not only to keep the King oriented towards God, but loyal to his people and sympathetic to them “so that his thoughts be not lifted above his brothers” (Deut. 17:20). Could Solomon possibly have met this criterion if he only drank from silver vessels, and taxed the people to build himself a palace larger than the Temple itself, and sumptuous palaces for foreign wives? Doesn’t the forced labor imposed on Israel remind us of the forced labor endured in Egypt?

Hazony argues that the Bible wrestles with two types of government options: an imperial state, leading to bondage, and anarchy, leading to dissolution and civil war, and argues that the State must steer a clear course between the two extremes, seeking “the good and the right.” Government must understand that virtue comes from limitations – on borders, on armies, on foreign entanglements, on income, on the raising of the government above the people. The Political mission of man is to steer clear of both extremes, of the twin threats, “thereby assuring the sympathies of both man and God and the political longevity of the kingdom.” (160).

I do not know how exactly Hazony would apply these principles to modern Israel or modern America. For readers of his book who, like him, come from a modern Orthodox or similar background, the content of his reconstruction will not be all that surprising. But the book is more exactly an argument aimed at academic scholars and departments, arguing that the Hebrew Bible is a crucial component in the development of Western thinking and those who ignore it or relegate it to “revelation” rather than reason are misguided. In other words, he is not necessarily arguing that readers should accept the political philosophy as correct, just as a philosopher explaining Plato or Aristotle might emphasize interpreting their ideas and understanding their significance.

I will leave it to you to interpret the ideas about good government Hazony asserts derive from a study of the Bible as a work of reasoned argument and their significance, including their application to large states, such as the USA, or to the contemporary State of Israel, and how these ideas about legitimacy, power, and ”the good and the Right”  relate not only to an actual or ideal Israelite sovereign, but to general goals of government, and the pitfalls that befall politicians.

Seth Ward

FW: Religion Today. The "Mosque" near Ground Zero: Thinking it Through

Response to an inquiry regarding Green Mosques and Synagogues:

 

Many synagogues are worried about the environment and similar issues, and many Jewish communities include environmental issues in their ritual calendar by discussing the divine imperative about not destroying trees (and by extension, wasting any resource), especialy when the relevant passage is read in the synagogue, and by an environmental approach incorporated in "seders" for 15^th of Shevat (“Tu Bishevat”), a date about halfway between Winter Solstice and Spring equinox (late January, early February) that was used to mark the beginning of the year for certain types of agricultural purposes and temple offerings related to trees.

 

COEJL would be the place to look for Synagogues going Green

http://www.coejl.org/~coejlor/ebulletin/31.php

 

Here is an initiative from Baltimore:

http://www.bjen.org/greening.html

 

If you are interested in the spadework, you can probably get Google or another computer search enginge to search synagogue bulletins for more “greening” info, or contact these and similar organizations.

 

I’ve heard about a number of Muslim organizations that are green oriented. I had not heard about “Green Ramadan” before looking into this: it is mentioned in a news release from January of this year at http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1262372189305&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout

This article delineates efforts in the Washington DC area and in Illinois.

 

The “Green Ramadan” idea ought to resonate well among those who are favorably disposed, seeing the role of green as an Islamic color. Of course those who are not favorably disposed could easily reject this as being unfavorable to Islam… Reading through the articles that come up from a Google Search, I found both Islamic groups that encourage it, and say Islam has taught it all along, and those who think it is counter to Islam or an attempt to impose Western ideals. It is true that to the extent that Google can mark what is most popular, the anti-environmentalist position came up at the top—in the context though of comments made by Syed Hussein Nasr, as reported in Cross Currents, that I would characterize on the whole as emphasizing human stewardship rather than dominance (to use religious terminology sometimes used in religious discussions that reflect Genesis).

http://www.crosscurrents.org/islamecology.htm

 

Shared work on environmental issues are among the goals of a movement to “twin” mosques and synagogues. I see a lot of reports about such cooperation, but have tried to determine the degree to which there is real cooperation or just talk of cooperation.

 

What I cannot do is estimate the relative importance of the Green movement in the context of all the other issues facing the various Jewish and Islamic communities of the US today, the extent to which environmental issues are actually being addressed within either community, or the actual extent of cooperation between Muslim and Jewish communities resulting from environmental issues.

 

I have written a paper about Tu Bishevat which talks a little about environmentalism. In the process of editing and reediting it, I suspect that I do not have a really good copy of any version of the paper to share with you but I would be happy to discuss my findings if you are interested.

 

Please do not hesitate to contact me for any further info.

 

Seth Ward 

 

 

 

 

Dear Seth,
Do you know of any synagogues or mosques that are “going green”?
Paul