1 | R e s p o n s a F r o m t h e H o l o c a u s t

Bein HaMetzarim 5773 | Rabbi Garry Wayland

Gemara Sanhedrin 74a
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By a majority vote, it was resolved in the upper chambers of the house of Nithza in Lydda that in every
[other] law of the Torah, if a man is commanded: 'Transgress and suffer not death' he may transgress and
not suffer death, excepting idolatry, incest, [which includes adultery] and murder.
When R. Dimi came, he said: This was taught only if there is no royal decree, but if there is a royal decree,
one must incur martyrdom rather than transgress even a minor precept. When Rabin came, he said in R.
Johanan's name: Even without a royal decree, it was only permitted in private; but in public one must be
martyred even for a minor precept rather than violate it. What is meant by a 'minor precept'? Raba son
of R. Isaac said in Rab's name: Even to change one's shoe strap


a. Did the Nazi persecutions count as a royal decree (Shaat Hashmad)?
b. What are the parameters of murder, immorality and idolatry?
c. When did going above and beyond the letter of the law require martyrdom and when did it require
survival?

1. The Ban on Shechita Rabbi Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg, Berlin. Taken from Rabbinic Responsa of the
Holocaust Era, Robert Kirschner, p44

I wrote my treatise at a time of terrible distress, at a time when a sharp-edged sword was lying over the neck
of Israel, the wicked Nazi government having imposed a ban on shehitah if performed without stunning. At
first the Jews helped themselves by importing meat from abroad. Afterwards the Nazis prohibited with their
cruel devices the import of kosher meat from abroad. They did not permit shehitah even for the sake of the
elderly and dangerously sick. There was great danger that the majority would not withstand the temptation
and would succumb to the prohibition of eating nebelah. In the meantime a rumour spread that the
leaders of the Jewish Community of Berlin intended to introduce meat bought from non-Jewish butchers in
its institutions, hospitals and homes for the aged, etc. The Governing Board of the Community, although it
consisted mostly of Reform people, always complied in matters of kashruth with the Orthodox Rabbis. Now,
however, they maintained that in a time of such emergency they were forced to use nebelah and terefah
meat being advised by the doctors to do so. This rumour touched every soul. In our distress we decided to
seek the advice of the great Rabbis of Lithuania and Poland whether in such circumstances stunning before
shehitah was permitted I went to Wilno, Warsaw and Lublin for that purpose. The Gaonim Hayyim Ozer
Grodzinski of Wilno and R. Meir Schapiro of Lublin, asked me to write a Responsum on this matter.

My Responsum included in this book is the reply to this problem. It is true that I inclined towards the lenient
view. However, I knew beforehand that the Geonim of Lithuania, Poland and the leaders of orthodox Jewry
in other countries would never agree to a change in the matter of shehitah which has been current from
time immemorial. I myself hesitated to deal with a matter which is the foundation of the Jewish way of life. I
spoke about this several times to the Rabbi, Gaon and Zaddik Ezra Munk, Ab Beth Din of the 'Adath Yisrael'
of Berlin. (He was the head of the department dealing with the matters of shehitah in Germany and
opposed the method of stunning by electricity.) I said that we must not seek hetherim to change the
method of shehitah. The orthodox Jews will not listen to us. They will rather suffer hunger and afflict
themselves and refuse to be defiled by eating meat of animals slaughtered according to the method
decreed by the wicked enemy of the Jews, the head of the Nazi government, our arch-enemy and many
thousands like him will perish from the world, our holy Law, however, will endure for ever. The Jews in
Germany must resist this temptation for the sake of the holy Law and for the sake of our brethren in other
countries. If, God forbid, we are lenient in this method of shehitah we are certainly exposing to danger the
Jewish method of shehitah in the whole world. We should rather show the world that we are ready to make
sacrifices for our holy religion. Thus our enemies will see that by prohibiting shehitah they will not cause
us to give up our faith. . . .

2 | R e s p o n s a F r o m t h e H o l o c a u s t

Bein HaMetzarim 5773 | Rabbi Garry Wayland

2. Life in the Holocaust Rabbi Ephraim Oshry, Kovno Ghetto.




















Two days before Passover, Goldkorn was returning from his labor in the evening. He was stopped by
German police and searched. A small bag of flour was found on his person. When the Germans realized
that a Jew, despite their strict orders to bring no food into the ghetto, had dared violate their edict, they
beat him violently and viciously all along his entire body, but the worst of it was that they broke all of his
teeth. Yes this Jew, throughout all of his suffering, accepted it with love for his Creator, knowing that he had
made it possible for so many others to fulfill a precious mitzva. Afterward, Goldkorn came to me with a very
serious problem. As he spoke, he broke into tears. With my broken teeth, how can I fulfill the mitzva of
eating an olive-sized piece of matza? Since I come from a chassidic family, whose custom is never to eat
matza that is soaked (gebroktz) on Pessach, how can I break that custom now? Is there any way for me to
fulfill the mitzva of eating matza?
Response: The tradition of not soaking matza is a stringency. Halacha does not forbid soaking matza. I
allowed the questioner to soak the matza in water even though he was descended from Chassidim whose
custom was not to eat soaked matza on Pessachbecause he had no other way of fulfilling the mitzva, a
mitzva for which he had risked his life. I did however instruct him to obtain permission from a beis din of three
people which would annul the implicit vow of the tradition of his forbears that he had upheld all his life not
to eat soaked matza on Pessach.
After we set up a beis din which annulled his vow, he proceeded to fulfill the mitva of eating an olives
bulk of matza together with all the others who, thanks to him, fulfilled this mitzva. Although his whole body
was aching and scarred from the vicious beating the German animals had inflicted upon him, there was no
end to his joy and his thanks to G-d for granting him the privilege of eating matza despite his wounds and his
broken teeth.


3 | R e s p o n s a F r o m t h e H o l o c a u s t

Bein HaMetzarim 5773 | Rabbi Garry Wayland

Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Meisels Rabbinic Responsa of the Holocaust Era, Robert Kirschner, p113
4 | R e s p o n s a F r o m t h e H o l o c a u s t

Bein HaMetzarim 5773 | Rabbi Garry Wayland

3. Rebuilding. Taken from The Echo of the Nazi Holocaust in Rabbinic Literature, Rabbi Zimmels, p197

A decision about women released from the concentration camps was also given by R. I J. Weiss in
Grosswardein in 1946. He was asked, should women liberated from concentration camps be regarded as
'captives', i.e. be unable to return to their husbands who are kohanim, or if they are unmarried, be unable to
marry kohanim. The questioner adds that he had been told that very often inmates of concentration camps
would be able to testify to the fact that a woman did remain 'pure' (i.e. did not have intercourse with a non-
Jew). However, one might not be able to rely on their evidence since those people might be disqualified
from giving evidence as they were irreligious. The Rabbi nevertheless decided that the women may return
to their husbands who are kohanim or marry kohanim. 'As the matter is of great urgency and is pressing (ha-
lahaz zeh ha-dehak) affecting thousands of Jewish daughters and taking into consideration the leniency
expressed by our Rabbis in such a case we are permitted to look for grounds to adopt a lenient view.'
Among the various reasons was that the woman could not have saved her life by having intercourse with
her captors as heavy punishment for infringing the Rassengesetz would have been imposed on those who
had intercourse with a Jewess. Although they would not always have been killed they would have been
removed from office or would have had other punishments and been in disgrace. Although they intended
evil against us God meant it for good' (cf. Gen. l 20) in permitting the women to return to their husbands as
well as kohanim marrying girls who nhd been in concentration camps.



Rabbi Yechiel Yaakov Weinberg (1884-1966). Born in Poland, and studied in Eastern European yeshivot.
Moved to Germany, eventually became rector of Hildesheimer Rabbinical Seminary. Was trapped in
Warsaw Ghetto, although survived the war as was held as a Russian prisoner of war. Responsa collected in
Seridei Aish, dealing with many issues arising from the Holocaust.

Rabbi Ephraim Oshry (19142003). Born in Lithuania. Rabbi Oshry wrote his responsa on scraps of paper,
which he buried in hopes of returning and reclaiming them after the war. At some point, the Nazis placed
Rabbi Oshry in charge of a warehouse of Jewish books that had been gathered in Kovno. By so doing, they
inadvertently gave him the access to Jewish books and rabbinic literature that he needed to write his
detailed responsa. In his book Mi-ma 'amaqim (From the depths), Rabbi Oshry testifies that his Holocaust-
period responsa were issued with virtually no amendments or additions.
Mi-ma'amaqim (four volumes) was published in 1959 in New York, where Rabbi Oshry had taken up
residence after the war. (His other works are listed in the bibliography at the end of this guide.) The responsa
in this guide, culled from Mi-ma'amaqim, deal with several halakhic issues connected with Jewish survival in
the Kovno Ghetto. Although the lessons of one ghetto are hard to apply to another, it is reasonable to
assume that similar problems existed in other ghettos in Eastern Europe. Therefore, these questions, or at
least some of them, presumably perturbed many Jews during the Holocaust. (taken from Ephraim Kaye,
http://www.yadvashem.org/download/education/conf/KayeResponsa.pdf)