In Memory
November 8, 2018 |
These days I find too few hours to pursue my own historical scholarship on medieval Europe. On Saturday, though, events in our own land brought to mind names of people my research has made familiar to me.
Joseph, son of Jechiel haKohen, his wife Chandlin and his daughter;
Yechiel haKohen, his wife Jutta and his three children;
Isaac, son of Baruch haKohen, his wife Jachnet, his son the
young Baruch, his mother-in-law the elderly Hanna, his daughter
Minna, her young son Koplin, and her [other] six children;
Jacob, son of Baruch haKohen, his wife Tube, his young son
Michel, his unmarried daughter Dolce and his [other] four children;
Yechiel, son of Yekutiel haKohen, his wife Miriam and his eight children;
Dolce, daughter of Yekutiel haKohen, and her six children....
Wives and husbands, daughters and sons, grandparents. Names kept alive only by the Nuremberg Memorbuch. Names of 562 people burned to death on the eve of Saint Nicholas Day in 1349. Names of Jews.
Emperor Charles IV, so fondly remembered in Prague, inspired the mob that murdered them.
Urban renewal, medieval style: erasing Jewish homes and a synagogue to build a market square and a church. Add fear stoked by the greedy, powerful men in the emperor’s ear. Together they inflamed on that holy night the dehumanizing hatred that flickers within my own Christian tradition. In that city, Christian feet tramped church stairs formed from cemetery stones (pictured).
For a Christian historian to remember in words the names of Jews—it is too little.
And then there was Saturday. More names to write. A new book of memory. Another city.
I have no words of solace today. No actions to take. None to recommend.
I do have dear friends, and colleagues, and a treasured partnership between our own Xavier University and Hebrew Union College—now embodied by a historian and a Biblicist who help bind our institutions together. And so, on this All Saints' Day, I will hold them close, and stand alongside them, and work to remember how to hope.
David Mengel
