Enlightened East

Jump into a Krakow taxi, and it’s easy to detect what the Jewish world has taken out of this part of Poland. Locals pronounce the name of their city “Krra-koov,” with a chassidish inflection. They talk of the “Remuh” shul, a major local landmark. The Yiddish spoken from Williamsburg to Stamford Hill bears the imprint of 1,000 years in Poland. Linguistically speaking, that’s what we’ve taken out of the place. How we arrived there is part of Krakow’s story.

The Jewish presence in Poland is documented from the 10th century on, as economic opportunities and relative freedom from persecution beckoned to the oppressed Jews of Western Europe.

The current Polish government is prickly about talk of Poles imbibing anti-Semitism with their mother’s milk — to the extent that there is now a law forbidding mention of “Polish death camps,” as that term implies that the Holocaust was in some way the fault of the Poles. Instead, “death camps in Poland” is the only permissible formulation according to the nationalists outraged at talk of Polish guilt.

But while its prewar culture was indeed steeped in the anti-Semitism that contributed to the Holocaust, in all fairness, Poland was once a beacon of tolerance, at least in medieval European terms.

In 1264, Prince Boleslaus the Pious promulgated the Statute of Kalisz, a groundbreaking statement of Jewish liberties in Poland. Between 1334 and 1539, two kings named Casimir and two called Sigismund re-ratified the freedoms, which included protection against forced baptism.

At a time when the Jews of Germany and elsewhere in Western Europe were subject to the threat of blood libels, pogroms and expulsion, Poland was a fount of enlightenment.

Those centuries were part of the Golden Age of Polish Jewry, which saw a west-east migration and the rise of one of the most influential and learned Jewish communities in history. Such is Poland’s centrality to the Jewish story that some 80 percent of today’s American Ashkenazim are said to have roots in the country.

Some of that history can be gleaned among the gravestones of the old beis hachaim of Krakow. Located behind the Rema shul, it contains a fenced-off enclosure that is the final resting place of Rav Moshe Isserles — the Rema — and his family.

Notably indicative of the community’s geographical origins, a plaque inside the adjacent shul calls the Rema’s father “Hachaver Reb Yisrael Isserel.” The Yekkish honorific is significant because Reb Yisrael Isserel was indeed German: A wealthy merchant and talmid chacham, he arrived in Krakow in the first half of the 16th century after the expulsion of the Jewish community from his birthplace, Regensburg in Germany.

Reb Yisrael Isserel was one of many thousands of Jews who traveled east to find security, in a great migration that turned Poland into the center of Jewish life. It’s a reminder of the fact that Minhag Ashkenaz — while codified by the Rema in Poland — arose in Germany.

Unending Stream

The graveyard tells another story — of the longevity of the city’s prominence. For a place that’s about the same size as a large shul, this beis olam is in a league of its own. Like Torah centers such as Bavel, one generation after another, Krakow produced gedolim. Walk one way from the Rema’s kever, and there’s Rav Yoel Sirkis, author of the Bach commentary on the Beis Yosef. Walk the other way, and there’s the grave of Rav Yomtov Lipman Heller, author of Tosfos Yom Tov on the Mishnah. In between there’s the Rebbe Reb Heschel, av beis din of Krakow, who restored the city’s Torah scholarship after the Tach V’Tat massacres of 1648–1649. There’s Rav Nosson Nota Shapira, a mekubal known by his work Megaleh Amukos and Rav Yehoshua Heschel, author of Maginei Shlomo on Shulchan Aruch.

The astounding list extends through the 19th century with the Chasam Sofer’s son Rav Shimon Sofer, until the prewar years, when the latter’s grandson Rav Yosef Nechemiah Kornitzer served as chief rabbi of the city.

Amid the gravestones is one — that of Rav Eliezer Ashkenazi, author of Maasei Hashem — whose inscription hints at the wide-open boundaries of Europe for those medieval Jews who took to the open road.

Decorated with the Aesculapius serpent — the famous symbol of medicine — the headstone hints at the extraordinary life of a wealthy gadol unafraid to express his opinion on many of the halachic controversies of the day.

Rav Ashkenazi was a posek, a contemporary of the Beis Yosef and a doctor, who was fluent in 12 languages, as well as conversant in physics and philosophy. Born in Venice in 1512, he was a talmid in Salonika — along with Rav Moshe Alshich — of Rav Yosef Taitazak. By age 26, he was already serving as a dayan in Cairo. For some unclear reason, he then headed to Cyprus, then returned to Venice, and left for Prague — where together with Maharal, he established the world’s first chevra kaddisha. He headed back to Venice, where he was involved in a controversial get, and went on to Cremona in Italy, where he was involved in a halachic storm regarding a case of chalitzah. He next set his sights for Posna in Poland where he was appointed chief rabbi, and five years later left for Krakow, where he was likely the av beis din.

Even by modern standards, these wanderings are extraordinary, and indicate that early modern Poland wasn’t an insular place but an important center on the global Jewish map.

Justifiably for such a titanic tale of greatness and impact across two continents, the inscription on Rav Ashkenazi’s matzeivah paints a picture of an era of upheaval: “I will mourn the stormy times, surely it is a wheel that turns.”

Looking In

The square outside the Rema cemetery is an interface between very different worlds. Surrounded by cafés and stores — many with Jewish-themed names like Hevre, Hamsa, and Jarden — it’s an area of gentrified, touristy nightlife that draws heavily on Jewish nostalgia.

It’s ironic, then, that the Jews of today look out of place. Chassidim, Sephardim, and many other frum subtypes spill out of taxis and minivans, but they’re not heading for the eateries.

Krakow is one stop along the vast trail of kevarim tourism that now snakes across Eastern Europe. If the Victorian era upper crust had the Grand Tour — a pilgrimage to the civilizational roots in classical Europe — today’s frum world has a roots journey back to the cradle of the yeshivah and chassidish worlds.

In that mass movement, Krakow and its faded glories glows bright. The focus for many visitors is the hachnassas orchim run by Avraham Zoldan. Next to the Rema shul, it is a one-stop clearinghouse for Jewish needs. Downstairs, there are near-constant minyanim and free coffee and cake for newcomers; upstairs is a restaurant where travelers can get some heimish food.

The mixture of Yiddish, English, and Ivrit is testament to the fact that today’s yahrtzeit pilgrim has no particular profile. In the restaurant, Boro Parkers rub shoulders with Holonites. Outside in the street, a beketshe-wearer is deep in conversation with a bunch of hoodie-dressed teens — all relaxing over a cigarette and basking in the glow of Jewish history.

The eclectic faces of modern-day Jews draw local photographers. One asks a group of chassidim outside the gates to the Rema shul to pose. He shows me some of the photos that he’s planning on exhibiting in a gallery. One striking black-and-white image shows a tall chassidish rav in full regalia, standing deep in thought while smoking a cigarette. The power of the picture is clear: It shows that here, in 21st century Krakow, those old authentic Jews still exist.

Overall, however, the overlap between modern Poland and its Jewish visitors is jarring. Today’s Poles treasure the sepia-toned Jewish past — but actual Jews are spectators.

Power of Princes

Warsaw is Poland’s modern capital, Krakow its ancient one. Whereas the current capital city is a soulless place — its uneasy mixture of Western and Stalinist architecture the legacy of the city’s total destruction in World War II — Krakow exudes a sense of history.

That’s especially the case in Kuzhmir, where there are abundant hints to the piety and glory of its fabled Jewish community. On one street is the Koveia Ittim LaTorah shul, its prominent sign a signal of the erudition of the old-timers. If it takes a village to raise a child, then the Torah greatness of this city was built on the culture of learning that permeated every corner.

The thickness of the walls of the city’s remaining shuls prove that even in tolerant Poland, there was always a sense of precarious existence. Standing at the Rema’s place at the front right of his shul, the sense of holy history is indescribable. What would he have seen from his seat? The high bimah, pews of tallis-wrapped mispallelim — and the thick walls of a fortress shul, necessary should the community need to shelter from any passing anti-Semitic storm.

Nowhere is that more obvious than the Old Shul of Kuzhmir, a massive stronghold of a building that dates back to the 16th century. Just inside the shul’s entrance is a tzedakah box that could double as a bank vault. Recessed into the thick walls, it’s dated 1603 and 1407 — the latter thought to be a reminder of an earlier box that stood in an older shul on the same site. In the massive masonry on top of the iron door is an acronym — mem, beis, yud, alef — that stands for a pasuk in Mishlei (21:14) praising charity given without fanfare: “Matan b’seser yichpeh af.”

Inside, a museum dedicated to the city’s Jewish history draws significant foot traffic.

Pictures of prewar Jewish life are arranged alongside artifacts from days long past. There’s a very ancient shtreimel protected by plate glass. The head-covering’s origin as a plush yarmulke rimmed by fur is obvious, even if that ancestry isn’t all that clear from its towering modern-day descendant.

Further along, an ornate lace wimple is an echo of those nameless generations of Jewish women who presided over their beautiful homes dressed in Shabbos finery.

One significant thing seems to have escaped the curators’ notice: the inscription on top of the aron kodesh. “Bi Melachim Yimlochu — through Me, kings reign,” is a quote from Mishlei (8:15), which means that earthly kings derive their power and legitimacy from following the teachings of the Torah.

Many pesukim referring to the Torah might be used to adorn an aron kodesh. Why this one?

It is surely because just a few minutes from the shul is Wawel Castle, a gigantic fortress that was home to Poland’s royal family for hundreds of years. Built on the Vistula River by King Casimir III the Great, Wawel is a symbol of the Polish state. Over hundreds of years, these kings and princes would come to the Old Shul — which acted as Kuzhmir’s Great Synagogue, official home to its chief rabbis — to pay respects to the Jewish community.

In 1927, during the days of the interwar Polish republic, a Jewish delegation headed by Chief Rabbi Yosef Nechemiah Kornitzer welcomed President Ignacy Moscicki to the shul.

There, carved into the masonry, he would have seen the statement of Krakow’s Jews, who long before had inscribed a truth about temporal power that might function as the epitaph for this glorious, vanished community. While kings and earthly magnates are surrounded by phalanxes and castle walls, true might lies in the Torah.

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 1080)