SUKKOT

"By reason of our sins we have been exiled from our land, and removed far from our native soil, so that we are no longer able to go up and appear and prostrate ourselves before THEE, or fulfil our duty in the House of THY selection, the Great and Holy House that is designated by THY name, because of the (violent) hand that has been laid upon THY sanctuary. May it be acceptable in THY presence, O ETERNAL! Our G"D and G"D of our fathers, compassionate KING, that THOU mayest once more have pity on us, and upon THY sanctuary, in THINE abundant mercy. O rebuild it speedily, and enhance its glory. Our FATHER, our KING! Reveal the splendour of THY majesty unto us full soon; shine forth and exalt THYSELF above us in the sight of all living. Approximate our scattered ones from amongst the nations, and assemble our dispersed ones from the extremities of the earth. Bring us unto Zion, THY city, in jubilation, and unto Jerusalem, the place of THY Sanctuary, in everlasting joy..."

How often have I been dismayed at the assimilation , the self-deception and also all the filth that our people both in Germany and elsewhere throw at each other or besmirch each other with. How often am I made to feel ashamed at all the washing of each other's dirty linen, in the midst of our enemies - and to their amusement and joy! How often have I felt my heart constricted, strapped in like a barrel, when walking through the grounds of a concentration camp, visiting cemeteries by day or night, and thinking of our past and present and sometimes also our future. Please do not think that I am sitting in judgement, finger raised, on you! I am one of you and have neither cause nor right to strike! I was born in Hungary as the second child of two people who "came back". My father returned alone, my mother with one of her sisters. For my parents, as for so many others, their relationship was not so much one of love, as one of suffering. We children were born in 1948-49-52-52, and grew up as "substitute" - family for those murdered...I suppose that we, just like so many of us/you, grew up on Niezsches's saying, embraced by our parents as a result of their own experience, that: "G"D is dead!"

Even before I went to school or heard a fairy tale, I had already learned from my mother what roll call, gas chamber, the smell of burnt corpses, death march and so on mean...From my father I learnt silence, for at that time he never spoke of what he had experienced. He only always became very aggressive whenever his depression paused for a while...Which of us are there to whom all these stories are not familiar?

I will not bore you, because we all know them! Also many others acted as I did on reaching 21 ! I met someone from Germany who was not a Jew but rather had been a young Nazi... Yes, I wanted to prove to myselv that I could live! . Live with the enemy among enemies! So I married him, although he was twice my age, and moved to live with him in Germany.

Naturally, since being small, I had been searching for HIM who created us - who is supposed to be dead....and of course also in me the wish for peace and quioet for my soul was greater than all my feelings. Naturally, I was also trying to find myself (!!), as I too was one of the pitiable products of our lack of identity. Naturally, I was not able to excuse either myelf of us, and naturally I did not find peace. Nor did I have any children of my own, but adopted 2 Jewish and 2 non-Jewish children - 2 girls and 2 boys, 2 healthy ones und 2 disabled.

Naturally, I also did not find a home in germany but only a place to live, and became a citizen of the country. Naturally, I was neither in mental nor spiritual health, which also affected my physical well-being. Naturally, I was searching, and I naturally squinted at our beginnings, but naturally my life sank in this way at an absolute low. But from then on I ceased to look for an "substitute". I found the lies to cheap and had had enough of self-deception, but started instead to return to our beginnings and to HIM who has made us separate from all other peoples. Naturally, I was unskilled because I had been given neither belief nor religiosity! Naturally, I wanted to know and experience everything! But I naturally wanted no empty religiosity, where the ETERNAL G"D and HIS word become so insignificant! Nor did I want a "belief" that was blind and unsubstantiated, self-hypnotic, Christian-like, so to speak, and describing itself as progessive.

I am convinced, that the rules of the Torah alone are like a balustrade on the edge of an abyss, ensuring that we can find the way and do not fall in the fogs of this world. But I also believe that very many rabbinical teachings are more confusing than helpful and miss the essence. Instead of the way and the joy in the goal, it is the balustrade, twisted into barbed wire, that is made important.

So I have tried to live very consciously. And many things also became important to me! - among others, that it not our enemies but weourselves who do us the most harm, and that there is no one who can separate us from life and from HIM who gave it to us, and no one who so much resists HIS will as ourselves!

How comes that we are then the enemy no. 1 for our people, for the country, and for the ETERNAL G"D HIMSELF? How can we gather in the synagogues of the world and in all seriousness pray to HIM so that our entreaties be answered, if we act in the most elementary manner contrary to HIS instructions? How can we say, for instance: "This year (we are) still here, but next year (we are) in Yerushalayim."?

How can we expect from the others - both from our slaughterers as well as from the sleeping partners and collaborators - that they have learnt from the Holocaust and all the horrible events, when we are still worse than they who despite our murdered ones are not prepared or willing to learn? What can all the bigotry in Europe, Asia, Africa but also in America and Australia effect if we, following the example of our fathers, do not want to enter the Promised Land.-

" Numeri 14,1-11 Then all the congregation raised a loud cry; and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron; the whole congregation said to them, "Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why does the LORD bring us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey; would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?"

And they said to one another, "Let us choose a captain, and go back to Egypt". Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the people of Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had spied out the land, rent their clothes, and said to all the congregation of the people of Israel, "The land, which we passed through to spy it out, is an exceedingly good land. If the LORD delights in us, HE will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land which flows with milk and honey. Only, do not rebel against the LORD; and do not fear the people of the land, for they are bread for us; their protection is removed from them, and the LORD is with us; do not fear them." But all the congregation said to stone them with stones. Then the glory of the LORD appeared at the tent of meeting to all the people of Israel. And the LORD said to Moses, "How long will this people despise ME? And how long will they not believe in ME, in spite of all the signs which I have wrought among them?"

- With all our resistance and defensive stance . what punishments do we deserve? HE restored the Land to us, but what did we do? How many arguments did we create, conceive, invent, in order that we should not have to come to the Land. So did our forebears, didn't they?

When I became aware of what we do, I wanted to ask them all to return and to come home! I set out on my way and wished that I be heard! At that time, I myself still lived in Germany, for I too had my reasons! Among other things, I did not want, and could not, take my husband along with me, as our life developed the way it did for many others. I became ever more Jewish and in him, his German national conscience was constantly growing. Nothing in the Torah says that a woman can, may, should leave her husband, and therefore I waited for things to happen.. But then came the time when we should have carried out our homecoming. My youngest daughter was already past 20 years of age and no longer lived with us - and therefore I could leave it to her to decide as to whether she wanted to come or to remain, at least for the time being.

When the time was ripe, I set out on my journey in my car following the Sabbath on Sunday eve, pursuing the road taken by our forebears! - That meant: crossing Germany, Austria, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria, along the Black Sea and across Turkey, up to the Euphrate river (to the point to which Israel will extend its borders when the LORD will be KING in the Land that HE has given to us!), through Syria and the Kingdom of Jordan. and I arrived at the Israeli frontier near Akaba/Eilat before the stars in the sky illuminated the next Sabbath. On my way, I did not go to any hotel, contenting myself with 3 hours of sleep per night, portioned out.

My soul was overflowing with shame on account of our disloyalty towards THE ONE who called us HIS children. It was also full of mercy because of what our fathers had been through in the Dispersion, and I burst with rage over the present situation, because our people lives as if we had at best a golden calf to worship, not HIM WHO created the heavens and the earth as a father!

Of course, I also felt sorrow, not knowing how my children, who had meanwhile reached maturity, would decide and if I would ever see them again.

Why I am writing you all this? I wanted to let you know that we have no reason to be disobedient nor any reason for wishing or having to live in the Dispersion! I wanted you to know that I too do not have any reason to condemn, be it even only one of you, because I too am like you!

But I want to encourage you not to look at the circumstances and at what is possible and what is impossible, not to pay attention to what the others say or do - as we have only one single LORD, KING, FATHER and G"D. And we cannot now let this Rosh HaShana, Yom Kippur and Succoth pass by without remembering that we are as our fathers themselves were when the ETERNAL ONE bequeathed the Land to them and let them go from Egypt after the plagues, but when, because of their disobedience, they did not want to go to the Promised Land and subsequently had to die! After the plagues and the sufferings, culminating in the Holocaust, HE restored Israel to us! So what are we still looking for in Egypt (the world)? Are we and our descendants to be killed in the desert or in Egypt, when the LORD strikes the nations, as HE has promised HE would do?

The High Holidays are imminent. Please remember as to whether you want to continue telling lies to one another and to remain in the grips of disobedience - and if even now you want to wish insincerely to one another what you yourselves should be doing: to return home to the Land which had been promised to our forebears and to us!

I started my letter to you with a quotation from the prayer book and would also like to conclude it by one. By quoting a prayer which we are to pray every Sabbath but in whose spirit we only rarely act:

(PSALM 95) Come let us sing joyously unto the ETERNAL; let us jubilate unto the ROCK of our salvation.. Let uns enter HIS presence with thanksgiving, jubilate unto HIM with songs. For a great G"D is the ETERNAL, and a KING great above all gods. In whose hand are the depths of the earth, unto whom are the mountains' soaring heights: Unto whom are the sea, that HE hath made, and the dry land that HIS hands have fashioned. Come, let us bow, and bend, and kneel in the presence of the ETERNAL, our MAKER. For HE is our G"D, and we the people of HIS pasture , the sheep of HIS possession, this very day, if unto HIS voice ye will but hearken. Harden not your hearts as at Meribah, as on the day of Massah in the wilderness. When your fatheres tempted and tried ME, though they saw what I had wrought. For forty years was I wearied with that generation, and said, they are a people of erring heart, who have not taken cognizance of MY ways; so that I swore in MY wrath: They shall not come unto MY rest.

May the ETERNAL ONE bestow HIS peace to HIS people in Israel!

In Love

Your sister

Tikva

Tikva Bat Shalom

Yerushalaim

Israel