If I was born 100 years ago in mainland Europe, what type of Jew would I be?

I would be 21 years old when Hitler became Chancellor of Germany, perhaps just graduated from university. I would be deciding on my future career... would I have gone into education? Would I have wanted to change the world and enable young people to add value to their lives through getting good qualifications? Would I have been engaged in a Jewish youth movement? Would I have belonged to Hashomer Hatza’ir, the oldest Jewish youth movement, or perhaps Poalei Zion? Would I have been a Zionist and made plans to emigrate to Palestine?

Would I have gone to synagogue services regularly?  Would they have been orthodox services or progressive services? Would I have lived in a cosmopolitan European city like Berlin, Vienna or Prague? Or would I have lived in a small Jewish community such as Uhrineves in Czechoslovakia or Baranovich in the USSR?

How would have I defined myself? Would being Jewish be important to me or would my nationalist identity come first? Would I have seen myself as a Jewish German or a German Jew? Would I have been nervous about Hitler’s rise to power or dismissed him as a madman? Would I have stayed away from Jewish businesses for fear of implicating myself? Would I have made sure I shopped in ‘Jewish’ stores to give those shopkeepers a much needed boost? Would I have worried when I lost my job teaching in a non Jewish school or been stripped of my gym membership? Would I have been excited about the Olympic Games? Would I have tried to leave Europe in 1938 when it was clear things were not going to get better anytime soon? Would I have been one of the 90,000 Jews arrested and sent to concentration camps during Kristallnacht? Would I have been cheered at the thought of Britain declaring war on Germany? Would I have been proud or embarrassed to wear a yellow star?

Would I be happy to pack my bags and be relocated to a ghetto? A small overcrowded area where deprivation and disease were widespread? Would I have profiteered from ghetto life and smuggled food into the ghetto and resold it an inflated price? Would I have resorted to crime to try to feed my family? Would I have joined the resistance movement? Would I become a member of the Judenrat and collaborate with Nazi officials in the belief it might save me? Would I have been happy to be used as slave labour?

When ordered to relocate to the East would I have just packed my bags? Would I have got on cattle truck happily believing that things couldn’t get worse than the ghetto? Would I have believed the rumours of extermination? Would I have survived up to three days with no food or drink on the way to an unknown destination?  

Would I have been sent to the left or the right? If I was sent to the left, at what point would I realise what was going on? Would it be when I had my head shaved? Would it be when I looked around and realised that most of the people with me were the infirm, elderly or children? Would it be when I saw that the soap was really stone? Would it be the moment the iron doors were closed..?

If I was sent to the right would I have been given a job that would have guaranteed me survival? Would I be a musician? Would I be a maid in Mengele’s household? Would my fingers been suitable to work in an armament factory? Would the Nazi’s be fooled by my poor sowing skills and put me to work fixing Nazi uniforms?

Would I have survived the meagre rations, the typhus and the constant selections? Would I have thrown myself against the electrified barbed wire having lost all hope? Would I still believe in God?

WOULD I SURVIVE?

I don’t know the answer to any of these questions but when I think about the Shoah, I cannot help but think that the 6 million Jews were unlucky enough to be victims of the world they lived in.  Let’s not be victims of the world we live in.

Never again.

This Pesach, I’m setting myself free!

The great thing about Passover for Jews, is that you can be sure on Friday night, Jews all over the world whether, orthodox, progressive or secular will be participating in a Seder to mark the beginning of Pesach and will be retelling the story of the Exodus.

Seder is one of those landmark events that makes us reflect on the year that has past. We remember those who are not with is this Seder, we reflect on how much our children have grown up since last year and we think about how much has changed in our lives since the previous year.

This year I’ve read a great deal about the meaning of the Exodus story and how it’s our moral imperative to include in our Seder the plight of those who are still exploited such as child labourers and women. In decades passed we have been urged to remember Soviet Refuseniks, those suffering in an Apartheid South Africa and this year we have been urged to remember those in Syria who are fighting for their freedom. However, whilst these things will be featuring at our Seder this year, I am calling attention to the newest type of slavery, an affliction that affects us all; the burden of being constantly in contact.

Last week, Rabbi Miriam Berger said in an interview with the Jewish Chronicle that “many of us should put a blackberry or apple on our Seder plate to represent the technology and pace of life which enslaves us today”. Never a truer word said in jest was my response. Having just spent a weekend as an emergency contact with parents whose children were on trips in Amsterdam and Prague I truly felt the burden of responsibility and I felt as if my freedom had been taken away. Not because I was being exploited or taken advantage on but the fact that I had to be on the other end of the phone if I was needed meant that what I did was restricted.

As more of us than ever have Facebook and Twitter accounts, blackberry’s and I-phones the ability to stay in touch is truly amazing. I and others are in contact with people I never would have been in contact with had it not been for modern technology. Births, engagements and career changes have all been announced via Facebook. Opinions and reactions to current events are shared via twitter. PDA’s been that the office is with us wherever we go. Basically, the yoke of technology is strangling us but we are unable to shake it off.

So, what can we do about it? Well this Seder night for a start I am going to ask everyone to turn their phones off. There will be no virtual Seder at our house this year! I am also going to set myself a challenge for Pesach. I am going to celebrate freedom by not checking my email first thing in the morning and last thing at night. If an email is not an emergency I am not going to reply to it on my day off! I am going to turn my phone off when I go to the cinema rather than put it on silent. Why am I doing all this? Because this Pesach, I am setting myself free from the technology that whilst amazing stops me relaxing!

Chag Pesach Sameach- May your retelling of the Exodus story be meaningful and may you always be free!