The observance last month of the UN-sanctioned International Holocaust Memorial Day once again raised the issue of a multiplicity of Holocaust memorial days. Does this add to the stature and significance of Holocaust remembrance, or just the opposite? And what does each of these memorial days signify?
Once World War II was over, the Jewish people felt a need to follow the traditional requirement of reciting Kaddish for the departed. This is normally done on the anniversary of a person’s death. What should be done, however, in instances where the day of death is not known, as was the case with many, if not most, of the Shoah victims?
Israeli Chief Rabbis Herzog and Uziel determined, late in 1948, that the most appropriate day for the recital of Kaddish on behalf of those whose day of demise is not known is the fast day Asara B’Tevet (the tenth day of the Hebrew month of Tevet).
Indeed, the first time the fast day arrived after the chief rabbis’ decision – January 11, 1949 – Jewish communities worldwide accepted it as the “Yom Kaddish Klali,” the day of general Kaddish for all victims of Nazi persecution who perished with their precise day of death unmarked.
Originally the 10th of Tevet signaled the beginning of the siege of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, leading to the destruction of the First Temple. Later, the Sages attached to that day other events, such as the order by King Ptolemy of Egypt to translate the Bible into Greek by seventy sages, which to the rabbis marked the beginning of the process of Hellenization and degeneration, and the tragic death of Ezra, who in the rabbis’ eyes was a close second – if not an equal – to Moses our Teacher.
The rabbis did that, in full awareness that the yahrzeit of Ezra was really on the 9th of Tevet, and the anniversary for the Septuagint was the 8th of Tevet. They found it necessary to combine dates so as not to crowd our calendar with days of mourning and sorrow.
Therefore, it seemed reasonable and practical to also utilize the 10th of Tevet as the Yom Kaddish Klali for the victims of the Shoah whose date of death remained unknown.
Combining events for a joint memorial is not unknown in the Jewish tradition. When the First Crusade in 1096 wreaked havoc in the Jewish communities of Worms, Speyers and Mainz on different dates, the rabbis of the time decided to mark the destruction of these flowering Jewish centers on Tisha B’Av (the ninth day of Av).
Why then could not the Shoah be latched on to Tisha B’Av, an idea that in fact was considered by a number of Jewish community leaders? The answer lies in the uniqueness of the Nazis’ destruction process.
This wasn’t a butchery where the Nazis literally waded in rivers of Jewish blood, comparable to so many tragic episodes in Jewish and world history. No, the Nazis constructed a carefully designed, well-oiled machinery designed to accomplish the total annihilation of the Jews, down to utilizing the parts of their bodies for the advancement of their economy and conducting medical experiments on them for the greater welfare of Western Man.
The 10th of Tevet answered a deep need for religious expression on a profoundly personal level. It did not satisfy the need of a nation to express its communal horror at a diabolical attempt to liquidate it to the last infirm old and the last newborn infant. For that purpose, Israel’s Yom Hashoah was set by an ordinance of the Knesset on April 12, 1951.
Beginning with the eve of the day thus set aside, all entertainment and dining facilities are to be closed, flags on public buildings are lowered to half-mast, commemorative services are held for the martyrs and the heroes of resistance, in the morning the sirens are sounded for two minutes calling on the country’s residents to unite in memory with the victims, schools hold commemorative assemblies, and more.
The original Knesset proposal envisioned the 14th day of Nissan, the anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising (April 19, 1943) as Yom Hashoah; this, however, proved problematic, as that date is the eve of the joyous festival of Pesach. So it was moved to the 27th day of Nissan, which falls between Pesach and Israel Independence Day.