Classroom activity:

Czech Memorial

Scrolls

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This resource is aimed at both primary school students and secondary school students, and is designed to be used on (or around) Holocaust Memorial Day, January 27, to introduce your students to the Holocaust through the stories and journeys of the Czech Torah scrolls. This classroom activity can be a starting point for a greater scheme of work on the Holocaust (and subsequent genocides), or on Judaism, or can stand alone. Contents Introduction to Holocaust Memorial Day page 1 Introduction to the Czech Memorial Scrolls page 1 Activities Activity 1: What is a Torah Scroll? page 2

Activity 2: Geography page 3 Activity 3: Historical and Religious Significance of the Scrolls page 4 Activity 4: Legacy page 5

Where Next? page 6 The scrolls Scroll #310 (orphan scroll) page 7

Scroll #1176 from Vlasim page 8 Scroll from Ostrava page 9 Scroll from Horazdovice page 10

Maps Map of Europe highlighting Czechoslovakia page 11 Map of Europe page 11 Map of UK page 12 Holocaust Memorial Day is the day for everyone to remember the millions of people killed in the Holocaust, Nazi Persecution and in subsequent genocides in Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia, and Darfur. 27 January marks the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the largest Nazi death camp. The Czech Memorial Scrolls is a collection of 1,564 scrolls that were brought to Prague, in Czechoslovakia, in 1942 to protect them from being lost, destroyed or stolen by the Nazis. After the Holocaust, the scrolls were brought to London, and from there they were sent to communities and museums. Below there are case studies of four Torah scrolls. You could split your students into groups and give each group one of the scrolls in the appendix. The group will follow the story of this scroll throughout the lesson and towards the end of the lesson each group will be asked to share the story of ‘their’ scroll with the rest of the class. This resource has been prepared with the support and cooperation of The Memorial Scrolls Trust www.memorialscrollstrust.org

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Activity 1: WHAT IS A TORAH SCROLL? Begin by giving each group a picture of ‘their’ scroll, or by displaying pictures of all the scrolls for your class to see. Ask the students:

What do you know about these scrolls?

Who typically uses this scroll? What do they use it for and when?

What is the text on the scroll? Which language is it in?

Is it damaged in any way?

Do you think it is valuable? Ensure your students are fully aware before continuing:

Trace the Locato r map of Czech Republic A non-kosher Scroll is not suitable for synagogue use and has to be checked by a scribe to see if it can be sufficiently repaired for ritual use. A Scroll is holy because it contains the name of God and it must also be perfect. This means that it may not have tears or rips, each letter should be as black as the day it was written and should not have turned brown or be flaking off. It must also be treated with respect, and not placed on the floor, for example. A damaged Scroll can never be kosher. Kosher means "fit for purpose" or "suitable" so perfection is a requirement.

A Torah scroll, written in Hebrew, contains the five books of Moses, known in English as

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. Traditionally, Jewish people

believe that the Torah, from God, is a guide for how to live their lives and it contains 613

commandments including the Ten Commandments. A portion of the scroll is read in each

synagogue every Sabbath, and it takes a year to complete the cycle. The Torah is

considered sacred; the text cannot be touched directly and if the Torah is dropped the whole

congregation must fast. It is an honour to read from the Torah, and this honour is reserved

for adults.

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Activity 2: GEOGRAPHY

In groups, the students should trace the journey of their scroll, from its place of origin, to Prague, to London, to its home today. You can either use the maps below (print these out or project them onto the wall) or encourage your students to draw their own. They should firstly mark each of these locations on the map and then attempt to work out the route the Torah Scroll took – if this is possible. If not, can we guesstimate the route?

Once they have established the route, the students should attempt to determine how many miles their scroll traveled, by what methods of transport.

Finally, they should write a report, detailing what the scroll would have seen and experienced on its journey. This could be in the form of a newspaper article, a poem, or a diary entry. You could ask your students to consider different elements, such as the geographical features, the people, the environment.

WHERE DO THESE SCROLLS COME FROM? The scrolls featured here are part of a larger collection, of almost 1,600 Torah scrolls, which were all rescued from the Holocaust by the Prague Jewish community. They came to Prague from Bohemia and Moravia, and after the war, in 1964 most were brought to London, before being dispersed all around the world.

As your students may know, Europe before the Second World War looked very different from

how it looks today. This may be an opportunity to discuss the way Europe changed and to

clarify the different terms. You could also use the maps (below) to show the changes.

After the First World War Bohemia and Moravia merged together with other regions and

territories to form Czechoslovakia. Prague, which had been the capital of Bohemia, became

the capital of Czechoslovakia.

In 1938, Adolf Hitler took control of the Sudetenland, a region within the Bohemian lands in

Czechoslovakia. In 1939, Nazi Germany invaded the rest of Czechoslovakia and the Jews

living there were immediately at risk. The scrolls were of such significance to the Jewish

communities all over Europe, that they did their best to save them, and sent them to Prague

for safe keeping, along with other ritual objects, in the hope that they would one day be

returned to their home communities.

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Activity 3: HISTORICAL AND RELIGIOUS SIGNIFICANCE OF THE

SCROLLS

Your students should now consider why so much effort was put into saving the scrolls. Why was it so important? Think about historical connotations as well as religious ones.

What do the scrolls tell us about the past, and about the Holocaust?

Each of the scrolls below has a different past and can help illustrate European Jewish life before the Holocaust, and the struggle that Jews went through in the Holocaust.

Hot air balloon debate: Imagine all of the scrolls were travelling together in a hot air balloon, which is rapidly sinking under the weight of the scrolls. Each group has to present arguments why their scroll should remain in the balloon – think about what their scroll represents. Give each team time to work on their arguments before making them present in front of the class. Then ask everyone to vote on which one scroll should be saved – but they cannot vote for their own. Remind students what each scroll represents – essentially a whole community – and that these scrolls were, incredibly, all saved.

The Nazis persecuted Jews in all of occupied Europe, appropriating their possessions,

destroying items of religious significance, forcing them to live in ghettos, and transporting

them to concentration camps, where many of them were murdered. Between 1941 and 1945,

the Nazis attempted to annihilate all of Europe’s Jews. This systematic and planned attempt

to murder European Jewry is known as the Holocaust.

Some Jewish communities lost everything in the Holocaust and so these scrolls, which

already held religious significance, are the last remaining artefacts connected to those

communities. They are therefore all the more precious.

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Activity 4: Legacy After the Holocaust 1,564 scrolls were brought to London, at great expense, by Ralph Yablon, a member of Westminster Synagogue in London. The scrolls were then restored by the synagogue to ensure that they would be fit for synagogue use. The majority of scrolls were then sent to communities around the world.

Ask your students why so much effort was put into bringing the scrolls to London and to restoring them?

What purpose could the scrolls have now, in addition to being used for religious ceremonies?

The journey of the scrolls did not end in London, and each of the scrolls that your students are looking at has gone on to a different community. Why do your students think they were sent out, rather than being kept in a museum in London (which some of the non-repairable scrolls were).

Ask your students to think about an item of religious or similar significance that means a lot to them. Could they bring this in, show their classmates and explain its significance? If they do not have an item of religious significance, is there an artefact (eg book or photo) that means a lot to them?

Encourage your students to create their own exhibition using their item of significance.

Where do your students think the scrolls should go now, and why? You could follow this with a variety of different activities: Look at the lesson plan of Hedy and her memory book – your students could make their own memory book, documenting their items of significance: http://www.hmd.org.uk/education/lesson-plan-hmd-2014-hedy-and-her-memory-book-ages-7-14

Look at the artwork by Gideon Summerfield – he painted Holocaust survivors with an item that they chose, which was significant to them. Why did they choose the items they did? http://www.hmd.org.uk/sites/default/files/classroom_activity_-_art_and_the_holocaust_with_looted_art_case_final_0.pdf

Hidden histories – read these stories of survivors of the Holocaust and of the genocide in Bosnia, who each selected an item of significance to be photographed with and to talk about. Why are items so important to people?

o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/martha-blend-hidden-histories o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/kemal-pervanic-hidden-histories o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/sabina-miller-hidden-histories o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/lily-ebert-hidden-histories o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/jack-kagan-hidden-histories-0 o http://www.hmd.org.uk/resources/stories/iby-knill-hidden-histories

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Where next?

Prepare an exhibition of your students’ items of significance and share it with the whole school.

Visit your local synagogue to see a Torah Scroll and to learn more.

For more information on the scrolls and to arrange a visit the small permanent exhbition at Westminster, please see www.memorialscrollstrust.org

Ask your students what they would like to do next… would they like to know more about the Holocaust?

For more information on the Holocaust and subsequent genocides, please see our website: hmd.org.uk For lesson plans, assemblies and classroom activities on the Holocaust and subsequent genocides, including a closer look at art and the Holocaust, and poetry and the Holocaust, please see: hmd.org.uk/year/education/2014

encourage your students to take a step for Holocaust Memorial Day and share this action with everyone else who has taken a step through a special website: journeys.hmd.org.uk

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Scroll #310 (orphan scroll)

The Czech town of origin of this scroll is unknown which suggests that somewhere on its journey from Prague, it became separated from its numbered label. All the scrolls were collected in Prague in 1942. They were sent from synagogues which were all still surviving, even as their communities were being transported to the death camps. After the war, this scroll was stored in a disused synagogue (a Hussite church today) in the Prague suburb of Michle. It arrived with the other 1564 scrolls at London’s Westminster Synagogue, on February 8th 1964. This scroll was then lent to Bangor in Wales where it was used for a number of years. The congregation of Bangor died out and the scroll was rescued from an antique shop and carried, almost unnoticed, through the streets of Llandudno. Next year the scroll will be lent to the West London Synagogue where it will form the central part of a new educational installation. It will be the starting point for all Synagogue visits. The scroll will play a vibrant part in the telling of the Jewish story, using its own story to tell that of the refugee, the Holocaust survivor, the orphan, as well as the story of Jewish life today in London.

The photo shows the scroll being carried through the streets of Llandudno.

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Scroll #1176 from Vlasim

Vlasim was one of the many collection points from which Scrolls came to Prague which suggests that this Scroll came either from Vlasim itself or from one of several nearby communities. We have no way of knowing where it might previously have been. After passing through London, the Scroll went to the Queenshill Synagogue, an Orthodox synagogue in Leeds, from 1965 until 2004. It was returned to the Memorial Scrolls Trust because it had become unkosher through age and use. In 2010, it was lent to the German Hygiene Museum (sic) in Dresden for an exhibition about various faiths. It was a gesture of reconciliation that this scroll could travel to Germany. It was loaned to Radlett & Bushey Reform Synagogue in 2011 where it has found a long-term and loving home.

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Scroll from Ostrava

This scroll was sent from Ostrava, and then on to Prague and then to London. Once in London, the scroll was lent to Kingston United Synagogue for them to use in their services. The members of the synagogue wanted to know more about their scroll, its journey and the community it had come from. Through their research, they found photographs, documents and archives and they have even managed to bring lost family members back together. They have laid ‘Stolpersteine’ (memorial stones embedded into the pavement) in front of houses in Ostrava where Jews once lived and have sponsored all sorts of cultural activities. They have established strong and regular contact with Ostrava through their frequent visits and have found people in the town who are always ready to assist them with research and information. The scroll is still used in their services.

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Scroll from Horazdovice

This scroll comes from the small Bohemian town of Horazdovice, about 100 km. southwest of Prague. Very little was known about the journey the scroll had taken, or about the Horazdovice community. A few years ago, the Westminster Synagogue set up a scrolls committee whose first task was to organise a commemorative service in order to remember the Jews of Horazdovice who had perished. On the Yad Vashem internet site, someone found that all the pages of testimony from Horazdovice had been written by one man. Shlomo Fischl had made it his life’s work to commemorate as many of his neighbours as he could. The synagogue invited him to come from Israel to the service. As the mourner’s prayer, kaddish, was said for those who had perished and their names were read out, tears were pouring down Shlomo’s cheeks; Shlomo had known every one of them. It was an unforgettable moment. He goes back to visit Horazdovice annually and the following year, a dozen or so people from the synagogue arranged a trip there to coincide with Shlomo’s visit. He led them through the town, stopping at the sites of former Jewish homes and places of Jewish interest such as the cemetery, ending at the small railway station from where the Horazdovice Jews were sent on the first leg of their journey to Terezin and Auschwitz.

Shlomo is now one of the very few survivors still alive. These scrolls are often the only extant reminders of the Jews who once lived in these small communities and they are a potent link to a past that has been totally destroyed. The synagogue in Horazdovice was destroyed under the Communist regime in 1980.

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Map of Europe highlighting Czechoslovakia:

Map of Europe:

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Map of the UK: