A week after Purim, life is back to normal in most parts of the Jewish world. But for a small town in Poland, normality was briefly suspended a week later on the 21st of Adar; the anniversary of the death of the famed and much loved father of the chassidic movement, Rabbi Elimelech of Lizhensk.
For the righteous he is known as the Noam Elimelech, after his exceptional commentary on the Torah. For the traditional he is immortalized by the famous Yiddish song ”Der Rebbeh Elimelech.” For more than two centuries since he departed this world, Jews have traveled from far and wide to pray at his grave. In the early years, these pilgrimages were arduous journeys of many days if not months, by means of steamship and horse-drawn carriage. In times of uprising, pilgrims risked their lives and were even shot among the gravestones. However, this year the Jews would come in peace and in their thousands. And this time they would arrive in grand style.
Not having much in the way of chassidic roots, I never would have gone along had my best friend Avrumi not chartered a 400-seat jumbo jet for a fellow travel agent in New York. He told me that visits to the grave had changed the lives and fortunes of so many people, that it must be worth a try. With the anniversary falling this year on a Sunday, the large contingent of American travelers had to rush out of their homes after the Sabbath to catch overnight flights to London to connect with the special charters.
In London, once our aircraft was boarded, an all-male crew handed out special amenity kits to the hundreds of chassidic passengers. No British Airways cabin attendant had ever given out kits like these. They contained a memorial candle, a miniature whiskey bottle for a le’chayim with two cookies, a pen and scroll of paper to write out kvitelach (notes of supplication to be deposited at the grave) and a tiny packet of tissues for the occasional tears.
After takeoff, in place of the usual air miles announcement, the PA system came alive with Tefillat Haderech (the travelers’ prayer). Instead of an in-flight movie, passengers listened to a speech about the Rebbe and traded stories of chassidic folklore. This being ”his plane,” Avrumi had upgraded me to a first class seat, giving me the peace and quiet to read some of the history of Lizhensk from web pages I had downloaded the night before.
One survivor’s memoir recorded that it had been a beautiful town, full of greenery and with a vibrant Jewish community in which people assisted each other to ensure that ”the disgrace of starvation would not occur in our midst.” As anti-Semitism was imported from outlying cities, students faced daily tribulations at the high school where the abuse of teachers and non-Jewish students made life, in her words, like a gehinnom (hell). She told of how Jewish youth could not find their place: “It is no wonder that, for the most part, they dreamed of Aliya to Palestine or emigration to other lands across the ocean. There was no employment, neither for those who possessed diplomas nor for those who did not possess diplomas, for all the doors were locked in front of the Jews. I myself felt best in the small room of the “Gordonia” organization, among Jewish women. There we danced the Hora and talked about Palestine.”
She had left Lizhensk a few days prior to the start of the Nazi deportations and now lives in Israel.
Another child of Lizhensk wrote a graphic account of the early pilgrimages to Reb Elimelech’s tomb, which had been surrounded by the graves of his children and disciples. ”When there was a joyous event in a family, such as the marriage of a son or daughter, the orphaned brides and grooms would come to the cemetery to invite the souls of their dear ones to come and participate in their wedding. Parents would also come to weep for those who did not merit to witness this joyous event.”
