“In September 1933, the rav accepted his first full rabbinical position, that of bezirksrabbiner, or district rabbi, of Ichenhausen, Bavaria, which was an ancient kehilla in Southern Germany. This position included responsibility for the religious and educational needs not only of Ichenhausen, an old market town with a Jewish population of about 350, but also of several old, small kehillos in the hamlets and villages which dotted the countryside surrounding Ichenhausen.
“The young, energetic rav, fresh from his own yeshiva experience, planned to start a yeshiva and dormitory for German bachurim in Ichenhausen, in conjunction with the Frankfurt Yeshiva. This would have been the first such institution in all of Bavaria. In fact, in the spring of 1934, after a year’s planning and preparation – including gaining the permission of the Gestapo – the doors of the yeshiva opened but, sadly, stayed open for one day only.
On the second morning, all the streets in town were plastered with anti-Semitic posters by the local Hitler Youth thugs against this new Jewish “provocation” in their midst, and urged violence against it. The local police chief, who was not a Nazi, warned Rav Schwab that the Hitler Youth were preparing a pogrom against the yeshiva and its students that very night. Despite the bezirksrabbiner’s personal plea to the Gestapo chief in Ichenhausen, he was told that he had already notified his superiors in Munich that he ‘could not guarantee the safety’ of the yeshiva students unless they left town before nightfall, that night.
“The rav would sadly recall how, after his meeting with the Gestapo, he proceeded immediately to the beis hamedrash, which was vibrant with the kol Torah of his unsuspecting talmidim, and told them to close their Gemaras, pack their belongings, and head immediately for the train station to make the last train out that day. The rav accompanied his bachurim down the hill to the train station amid jeers and catcalls from the local thugs, paid all of their travel expenses, and saw them safely aboard the train. Other than suffering verbal abuse, the bachurim and the rav were not injured. But Rav Schwab could not risk the possibility of any harm coming to his bachurim.
“During the Ichenhausen period, in June 1935, the third of the rav and rebbetzin’s children was born. Now with a wife and three children, the rav actively sought a rabbinical position outside Germany. A month-long trip to Eretz Yisrael in the fall of 1935 for this purpose proved unsuccessful. Nevertheless, the constant taunts and threats by local Nazi thugs kept emigration from Germany a primary consideration in the rav’s mind.
“On Shushan Purim 1936, the rav was the subject of a libelous accusation that he had, in one of his sermons, publicly maligned Hitler, yemach shemo, and was brought before the Gestapo to explain himself. Making direct eye contact with the Nazi official, he forcefully explained that this was an outright lie. He had used the German word “vermittler” in his disparagement of the sin of the Golden Calf, which a spy had misunderstood as “Hitler.” After this explanation, he was told his case would be reviewed and he would be advised of the outcome.
“Needless to say, the rav feared for his life after that meeting. The rav records in his diary that he was advised in the middle of Iyar that the matter had been dropped. During this period of some two months, the rav slept only with his clothes on for fear that he would be arrested in the middle of the night, taken to jail, or out in the woods to be beaten and left there – as had already occurred to several others. If this was to be his fate, he would face it with dignity – and with his clothes on – as would befit a Jewish leader. This incident speaks volumes of the rav’s concept of kavod habriyos – especially that of members of the rabbinate, whom he conceived of as sheluchei d’Rachmana, God’s emissaries.”
