The Unheeded Cry

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Chapter 1: A Biographical Sketch




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RABBI CHAIM MICHAEL DOV WEISSMANDL, known as Reb Michoel Ber, was born in Debrecen, Hungary on Marcheshvan 4, 5664 (1903). When he was still a child his family moved to Tyrnau (in Slovakian, Trnava); there his father, Reb Joseph, served as a shochet.



Although Tyrnau was a Christian town which contained many churches and a seminary for the priesthood (it was even popularly known as "Little Rome"), it nevertheless had a Jewish history. In the fourteenth century, it had been the home of Rabbi Isaac Tirna, who wrote Minhagim, an important book of customs (published in Venice, 1591). Before World War II there were approximately four hounded Jewish families in Tyrnau of whom more than half were Orthodox.



At first Rabbi Weissmandl studied in a local cheder but then when he was older, he commuted daily to the nearby town of Sered where he studied under Rabbi David Wesseley, who headed a small yeshivah there.



Reb Joseph Weissmandl had three sons and two daughters. Rabbi Weissmandl was the oldest and in the late years he always spoke of his father with deep affection and great respect. Once he revealed that his father was exceedingly meticulous in reciting the special midnight prayers (Tikkun Chatzot) and when he saw that his sons were asleep, he would weep and pray only that he merit devout and scholarly sons.

Rabbi Weissmandl suffered a great psychological shock when his father died in 1941. At that time he was living in Nitra. On a Friday, just before the onset of Sabbath, a stranger approached him in the street and asked him, "What was the name of the patriarch Abraham’s mother?" Rabbi Weissmandl did not understand the point of the question, so the stranger repeated it several times adding, "If you do not answer, you will be sorry." That Saturday night, he received the news that his father had died. Rabbi Weissmandl believed that there was a connection between his father’s death and the stranger’s question. Late the same night when he opened a book about the laws of mourning called "Mishmeret Shalom" he found the following sentence: " ‘Amatlai the daughter of Karnavo the mother of the patriarch Abraham’ is a remedy in a time of danger." He then understood that his father must have been ill at the time he was asked the question. Rabbi Weissmandl frequently told this story to his colleagues and pupils.


After his father’s death, Rabbi Weissmandl used to travel frequently to his mother’s home to comfort and encourage her. He was brokenhearted and became very introspective. He let his hair grow long as a manifestation of his mourning and only had it cut just before Shevat 14, when he traveled to the Sheva Berachot (marriage celebrations) of his brother-in-law, Rabbi Shalom Moshe Ungar. For the rest of his life, Rabbi Weissmandl remembered his father in love and pain.




AT THE AGE of twelve, Rabbi Weissmandl wrote an original lecture (p’shetel) to deliver at his bar-mitzvah. However, when his grandfather, R’ Menachem Meir Berthauer of Pressburg, arrived to take part in the celebrations, he offered to give the bar-mitzvah boy ten gold crowns if he would forgo delivering the lecture in public. The grandfather was a humble man who was fully aware of his grandson’s brilliance; therefore he was apprehensive that the acclaim which the boy would receive might turn his head and make him proud. Rabbi Weissmandl acceded to his grandfather’s request and used part of the money to buy Rabbenu Bachya’s commentary on the Torah. The circle of Rabbi Weissmandl’s life closed when he died while studying that same book.



The lecture he had prepared for his bar-mitzvah did not go to waste. Thirty-six years later he delivered it to the pupils at his yeshivah. He lectured for an hour and the audience was deeply impressed by his brilliance and erudition. At the end, he made an off-hand remark that it had been his bar-mitzvah speech which he had not delivered at his grandfather’s request.



For some time Rabbi Weissmandl studied at the yeshivah of Rabbi Joseph Zvi Dushinsky in Galanta but he gained the bulk of his education from Rabbi Samuel David Ungar, the rabbi of Tyrnau and later of Nitra. Since Rabbi Weissmandl was deeply attached to his first teacher, Rabbi David Wesseley, the transfer to Rabbi Ungar was psychologically very difficult for him. For two years he studied alone without attending the yeshivah in Tyrnau. Only after he realized Rabbi Ungar’s great humility and after he had heard the fervor with which he recited the Ahavah Rabbah ("Great Love") prayer, did Rabbi Weissmandl become attached to him. From then on, he remained Rabbi Ungar’s faithful and devoted disciple until they were separated in the final expulsion of the Jews from Slovakia in 1944.

While he was still a yeshivah student, Rabbi Weissmandl had an outstanding knowledge of the very complicated laws of mikva’ot (ritual baths which must be constructed according to exceedingly complex and rigorous rules) and of mathematical formulas required in order to build a mikvah (ritual bath). In fact, he helped in planning the mikvah which was part of the Tyrnau public baths complex.




In 1931, Rabbi Ungar was invited to become rabbi in Nitra and the young Rabbi Weissmandl tried to dissuade him from accepting the invitation on the grounds that Tyrnau was an ancient famous Jewish community. Rabbi Ungar, however, insisted on going to Nitra and articulated a strange feeling he had. "My heart tells me," he said "that there will come a time when there will not be a yeshivah in any other place but Nitra and I want to be there." When Rabbi Ungar moved to Nitra, his faithful student went with him.



As a seventeen-year-old yeshivah student, Rabbi Weissmandl published three short volumes of novellae (Talmudic interpretations) he had heard from his teacher. He did this on his own without obtaining Rabbi Ungar’s permission and when he realized that his teacher did not approve he cancelled his plans to publish further volumes which he had prepared.



For a number of years, Rabbi Weissmandl served as the "Chazor Bochur" in the yeshivah and as the "Gabbai de-charifus" (i.e., the student in charge of assigning students to lecture in-depth on Talmud every Sabbath) and in 1931 published a volume of his research called ""Hilchot Ha-chodesh""(the Laws of Fixing the New Moon). At times he worked on various inventions and intended to support himself from his inventions and be independent.



RABBI WEISSMANDL made several journeys to visit the great Torah sages in Poland and Lithuania. Among others, he visited the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman, the Gerer Rebbe, the Chofetz Chaim and Rabbi Chaim Ozer Grodzinsky. In Vilna, Rabbi Grodzinsky asked him, "Tell me, you come from a town near Pressbury, the city of the Chatam Sofer – do they still study Torah there as intensively as they did in the past?"

Since Rabbi Weissmandl did not have sufficient money for a prolonged stay in one place, he bought a railway tourist ticket which allowed him to travel all through Poland, when the train arrived at a town he would get off and visit the Jewish cemetery there or the rabbis and rebbes in that town. At night he would continue his journey.




Rabbi Weissmandl was an expert at deciphering ancient manuscripts and frequently compared them to printed versions. He traveled to Oxford, England, three times to continue his research at the famed Bodleian library collection of Hebrew manuscripts. On one occasion an ancient manuscript was brought to the library while he was there and the resident scholars identified its author mistakenly. Rabbi Weissmandl revealed the true author to the chief librarian and from then on he was treated with great regard. He was given the rare privilege of using the library’s facilities even when they were closed to the public. During his visits to Oxford, he recorded variant readings from the manuscripts as well as hundreds of unpublished rabbinic responsa which he intended to publish.



In Oxford, Rabbi Weissmandl became acquainted with a non-Jewish scholar who had a phenomenal knowledge of Talmud; he quoted entire tractates from memory. Rabbi Weissmandl was very impressed with his knowledge and memory but whenever he mentioned that scholar he used to say that his knowledge, although phenomenal, was artificial because one must sense the spirituality and inner meaning of Torah.



As a youth, Rabbi Weissmandl was an extremely diligent student and particularly spent days and nights in study when he was preparing a new edition of "Sefer Kikayon de-Yonah," a Talmudic commentary which the Nitra students were accustomed to study. In those days he slept very little, and for months at a time he never undressed to go to bed. In less than a year he reviewed the fifteen tractates of the Talmud included in the above-mentioned book which was ultimately printed by the governors of the Nitra yeshivah with Rabbi Weissmandl’s notes and emendations. At the end of the volume, he added notes to Sulchan Aruch Even Ha-Ezer on the basis of a manuscript he had discovered in Oxford. Rabbi Weissmandl also wrote an introduction to the book, giving the biography of its author and directing some pointed remarks in elegant style to those who were likely to criticize the book. In free translation, this is what he wrote:

It is a clear and indisputable truth that all possible excuses for mistakes – whether unintentional or deliberate – will be in vain. The supporter has no question while no answers will satisfy the critics. When a man wants to judge his fellow generously, he needs no aids and all the excuses in the world will not stop one who wants to do the opposite. Therefore, it is only logical and sensible not to vindicate oneself with pleas and supplications at the beginning of a book like a beggar, hat-in-hand …




Many glosses … were overlooked, sometimes unwittingly and sometimes by forgetfulness or because of lack of time or space. Clearly, if the book had been printed without notes or glosses at all, as it was in previous editions, nobody would have objected. However, now that it has been printed with corrections – to whatever degree we have succeeded – some readers will defend our efforts while others will take offense. This is no novelty; it has always been so …



This is what a publisher must tell every honest reader and he who thinks it in his heart must articulate it with his lips. Now, let all those who object rest easy, and let the critic not be consumed by bitterness. May he be blessed who accepts an honest answer and as for him who refuses to accept – let him be blessed too.

ON SHEVAT 14, 5697 (1937), Rabbi Weissmandl married Bracha Rachel, the daughter of his teacher Rabbi Samuel David Ungar. For the tenaim (engagement) party, which was held some time earlier, the bridegroom had returned from England, where he had been pursuing his research in Oxford. At the celebration, he gave a brilliant lecture which lasted for two and one half hours. In his discourse, he discussed the legal aspects of sivlonot (gifts which a man gives his future bride). At the beginning of his talk, he recounted that in Oxford he had found manuscripts containing several problems on the subject raised by an ancient Torah sage, Rabbi Simon Sharabi. Rabbi Weissmandl intended to resolve these questions. He proceeded to explain, on the basis of the manuscript sources he had discovered, the custom of the Jews of Oberland (Upper Hungary) not to commit the engagement conditions to writing.




Rabbi David Meisels of Satoraljuajhely, who was present at the celebration, was so impressed that he told the yeshivah students who were there that if one of them could repeat the lecture, he would ordain him as a rabbi on the spot. As a wedding gift, he granted the bridegroom rabbinical ordination and enthusiastically praised his Torah knowledge. Rabbi Ungar, the father-in-law, said that he had nothing to add and limited himself to saying, "The bridegroom is pious through and through!"



Both before and after his marriage, Rabbi Weissmandl was very active on behalf of the Nitra yeshivah, and in fact, he was Rabbi Ungar’s right-hand man. There were periods when he taught one of the classes in the yeshivah. In 1936 he gave the "simple lessons" which at that time studied the Talmudic Tractate Shevi’it. This class was intended for rapid surface rather than in-depth study to give the students a wider knowledge of Talmud. Rabbi Weissmandl, however, taught it in great depth citing dozens of external sources including manuscripts he had found in Oxford. When he would finish a subject, he used to say, "Everything I have said is ancillary to the subject and I have not yet touched on the actual subject!"

Even in his youth, Rabbi Weissmandl exhibited two clear character traits. On the one hand he was a serious, settled man and on the other he was capable of humor and gaiety. When he recited the kinot (dirges said on Tishah Be-Av), or when he described the tortures of hell in his sermons, he would weep bitterly and his audience would join him in weeping. But on happy occasions and particularly on Purim he would climb on the table and entertain the company with barbed witticisms and jokes.

He was a magnificent and persuasive orator. In the Nitra yeshivah it was customary to hold a meeting of all Rabbi Ungar’s former and current students every five years. In one such gathering in the 1930’s, men who had studied with Rabbi Ungar when he was a dayyan (a rabbinical judge) in Krompachy participated together with students from his days in Tyrnau and Nitra. This was a meeting of fathers and sons who had studied Torah at the same source. At these gatherings, Rabbi Ungar would address his students on matters of ethics and piety; the job of discussing the practical and financial situation of the yeshivah was left to Rabbi Weissmandl. On this occasion too he did his job. He had been in Vienna prior to the meeting, so the governors of the yeshivah sent him a message requesting him to return for the meeting and to prepare himself to tell the gathered students about the serious financial difficulties the yeshivah was facing. When he began his presentation, he told his audience about the governors’ message to talk about the needs of the yeshivah and added, "To what can this be compared? To a man with a toothache who people tell how to cry when the dentist hurts him! Does he need to prepare himself to cry!? When it hurts, you cry! The yeshivah has no funds. That hurts and that is why we are crying! There is no need to prepare yourself to cry – it comes naturally!"




Rabbi Weissmandl often accompanied his father-in-law on his journeys, and in 1935 they traveled to Eretz Yisrael. When he visited the Western Wall, he was overcome with religious fervor at the sanctity of the site and in a postcard to R’ Menachem Moshe Felsenburg he wrote: "Be Blessed with a blessing from Zion the Magnificent; from Zion out of which goes forth the Torah and whose holy stones are better than all the innovations of the Jews in our sacred land."



When he returned from Palestine, he preached a sermon in the synagogue of Zeirei Agudath Israel in Vienna, recounting what he had seen. With great emotion, he described the Mount of Olives where the dead are buried facing east because the Messiah will come from that direction. Rabbi Weissmandl also accompanied his father-in-law to the Knessiah Gedolah, the main convocation of the Agudath Israel world organization.


THE BURGENLAND RABBIS SAVED BY HIS EFFORTS
RABBI WEISSMANDL’S ACTIVITIES during the war constitute one of the most striking examples in Jewish history of total dedication and sacrifice in order to save Jews. Here, we will only describe his activities in general terms; in later chapters dealing with the Holocaust and the destruction of European Jewry we will go into detail.






In 1938, when Austria was conquered by Nazi Germany, the first victims were the Jews of Burgenland. They were stripped of everything they owned and expelled to Vienna, where they stayed without any means of support. Rabbi Weissmandl risked his life to travel to Vienna to consult there with the community leaders to see what could be done to help the deportees. The Nazis then gathered approximately sixty rabbis, mostly from Burgenland, and put them on a ship which sailed towards Czechoslovakia. The ship was harried from port to port, because the Czechoslovakians refused them entry and the Austrians would not take them back. Rabbi Weissmandl flew to England, where he succeeded in being received by the Archbishop of Canterbury (the head of the Anglican Church) and by the Foreign Office. He explained the tragic situation, and as a result of his endeavors the rabbis were granted entry-visas to England.

After the Munich Agreements (Sept. 30, 1938) and the Vienna Award (Nov. 2, 1938), parts of Slovakia were annexed by Hungary and a considerable number of Jews there were ruled to be "stateless" and expelled by the Hungarians into the no-man’s land between Slovakia and Hungary. In a telegram dated November 23, Rabbi Weissmandl turned to Samuel Hoare, the British foreign minister, and to the Archbishop of Canterbury and begged them to intervene on behalf of the refugees. In the telegram which was sent from Nitra, he said:




In the last five days Hungarian authorities have expelled thousands of Jews with great cruelty, in rain and darkness, to the no-man’s land along the Slovakian border. In our great trouble I beseech Your Excellency to intervene.



The Archbishop of Canterbury passed the telegram on to the Foreign Office on the same day and added a note saying that he had met Rabbi Weissmandl and respected him – "He is worthy of credence." On the following day, however, the Foreign Office rejected the plea. It advised that the telegram be ignored and not answered, since the subject was not included in the Munich agreements.



AT THE BEGINNING OF THE PERSECUTIONS OF THE Jews in Slovakia, Rabbi Weissmandl planned the emigration of several hundred Jewish families to Canada, among them families from Nitra and Tyrnau, but the plan was never realized. Later, Jews from Nitra and Tyrnau were among the first to be sent to Auschwitz, where they were forced to work in the construction of the crematoria and deal with the bodies of the victims. Ultimately, they too were killed. When they arrived in Auschwitz, instead of Canada, the people of Nitra and Tyrnau made a gruesome joke, "Well, we’ve arrived in Canada."



In 1942-1944, Rabbi Weissmandl was active in the Hatzalah (Rescue) Committee in Pressburg (Bratislava). The leadership of that committee included Rabbi Armin Frieder, Mrs. Gisi Fleischmann, Dr. Tibor Kov`acs, Ondrej Steiner and Dr. Oskar Neumann and others.




In February 1942, a notice was issued calling on all Jews born between 1897 and 1926 to register with the police in order to establish their "work capacity". Recognizing this as a Nazi ruse, Rabbi Weissmandl advised the yeshivah students not to register since it would then be easier for them to escape if necessary. He also called on all the Jews to prepare "bunkers" and hiding places to use, should the situation deteriorate.



In March 1942, deportations started from Slovakia to the Lublin area in Poland; from there the deportees were later transferred to Auschwitz. After some 58,000 Jews had been expelled, Rabbi Weissmandl succeeded, through a man named Karol Hochberg, in bribing the S.S. officer, Dieter Wisliceny, who was in charge of the expulsion of Slovakian Jews. For $50,000, the expulsions were halted for two years and in the meanwhile negotiations were underway to save European Jewry as a whole. This program was called the "Europe Plan."

In the course of his activities in the Hatzalah Committee from 1942 to 1944, Rabbi Weissmandl continuously traveled back and forth between Nitra and Pressburg.




Most of his week was spent in Pressburg doing committee work and only towards the Sabbath did he return to his family in Nitra. When he came home, he would give Rabbi Ungar a detailed report of his week’s activities and consult with him as to his future rescue efforts.



During one of his journeys in a railway train, a copy of the Neue Zuriche Zeitung containing an account of the murder of tens of thousands of Jews in the Nazi gas chambers fell from his pocket. He was arrested and charged with propagating hostile literature against the Germans, but managed to gain his release through bribery.



Rabbi Weissmandl’s arrest did not deter him from devoting himself to his stressful and dangerous rescue work. One day, because of the intensive tempo of his life, he suffered severe chest pains. The physician who examined him diagnosed a heart attack and ordered immediate hospitalization. He would have to rest for a prolonged period and cease all activities. However, two days later when he heard that a Jewish old-age home in one of the towns was in danger of liquidation, he immediately left his sick-bed and traveled to the town to save them from expulsion.



GRADUALLY, HEART-BREAKING LETTERS from the Jews who had been expelled to the Lublin area in Poland began to reach their relatives in Slovakia. In their letters, the deportees described the executions, sickness, cold and hunger which they suffered in their place of exile. They informed their relatives that for jewelry, clothing, and similar articles they could buy basic foodstuffs such as bead and potatoes from the native Polish population. Rabbi Weissmandl, together with other leaders of the Hatzalah Committee, purchased various items of jewelry and transferred them by messengers – often German officers and soldiers – to the Lublin area. The deportees acknowledged receipt of the shipments and sent letters back to their relatives by the same messengers. This aid and the contacts they made gave the deportees the physical and psychological strength to bear – at least temporarily – the terrible suffering imposed on them, thereby saving them from immediate destruction.

In 1943, one of the German messengers was arrested while he was in possession of a list which Rabbi Weissmandl had sent to the Lublin camp detailing how the shipment of jewelry should be distributed. As a result, Rabbi Weissmandl too was arrested and held for a lengthy interrogation by Kukula, an official of the Ministry of Finance. During that interrogation Rabbi Weissmandl told his interrogators everything that was happening to the deportees in the Lublin area; how old men, women and children were suffering and dying of cold and hunger. Rabbi Weissmandl explained that he had only wanted to aid these helpless deportees, and he argued that he had merely broken a minor law in order to help innocent people. When Kukula heard the description of the Jews’ suffering, even his stony heart melted and, with tears in his eyes, he sighed, "After all, I too have children." In the meantime, Rabbi Weissmandl was still imprisoned, and he tried to find a way to let his colleagues on the Hatzalah Committee know what he had admitted and revealed to his interrogators. He was afraid lest somebody else be arrested and wanted to avoid contradictions and discrepancies which might result from other interrogations. On Hoshana Rabbah (the last of the intermediate days of the Sukkot festival) he told his guards that he would not eat unless they allowed him to go to a sukkah to recite kiddush on wine. This was a ruse, since kiddush is not recited on that day. His wish was granted, and two guards took him to the sukkah of one of Pressburg’s Jews. When it became known, many people came to the sukkah and Rabbi Weissmandl, while pretending to recite the kiddush, gave his audience an account in Hebrew of what he had told his interrogators. After he was returned to prison, he had further conversations with Kukula who later permitted the Jews to send parcels to their coreligionists who had been deported to the Lublin area. Unfortunately, the arrangement did not last long, because the deportees were soon transferred to the death camps.


SERED  R WEISSMANDL AND FAMILY ARRESTED: SS OFFICER ALOIS BRUNNER

IN THE FALL OF 1944 the Partisans’ Revolt erupted in Slovakia; as a result, the Germans decided to put an end to Slovakia’s Jews and the deportations were resumed. On Elul 19, 5704 (September 7, 1944), a few days before the recitation of selichot (penitential prayers) in preparation for the High Holy Days, Rabbi Weissmandl, his wife and five children (4 daughters and a son) were arrested in Nitra. Together with the rest of the Jews, the Weissmandl family was taken to a camp in Sered, Slovakia. From this camp, transports were sent to Auschwitz. In command of the expulsion of Slovakian Jewry was a cruel SS officer named Alois Brunner. Eichmann had prevented Dieter Wisliceny, who had previously been in command, from returning to Slovakia.


Rabbi Benzion Ungar murdered
The Hatzalah Committee people were trying to find a way to return Rabbi Weissmandl to Pressburg, since they urgently needed his aid and advice in their work. The leaders of the Committee therefore informed the authorities at the Sered camp that they were required by the security services in Bratislava to prepare a special list of Jews and that without Weissmandl they could not do it. They requested that he be allowed to visit the capital if only for a short time and Rabbi Weissmandl received "a holiday" to go to Pressburg for one day. He did not return on time, so Brunner called in his brother-in-law, Rabbi Benzion Ungar, the rabbi of Piest’any. He was interrogated about Rabbi Weissmandl’s activities and how he had disappeared. Later he was taken out and executed while wrapped in his tallit and reciting Shema Yisrael.