To be a son of Litvaks — Association of Jews of Vilna and vicinity in Israel

To be a son of Litvaks/ written by Ephraim Lapid (who went by the name of Ephraim Lipnitski till the age of 23), the son of Litvaks from Mažeikē and Neistadt.

For 700 years, there was a Jewish minority in Lithuania and they established a community which was a source of great pride and joy: the Vilna Gaon - Rabbi Eliyahu, the Hafetz Haim – Yisrael Meir (HaCohen) Kagan, Israel Salanter from Salant – the father of the Musar movement, Eliezer ben Yehuda, Yehuda Leib Gordon, Avraham Mapu, Leah Goldberg and the well-remembered Ba’al Shem Tov – being just a few of the people of the Torah and the Book.

There were also younger ones who, in later life, became rabbis, such as Tzvi Pesach Frank, Chief Rabbi of Jerusalem, Rabbi Simcha Assaf, Rabbi Meir bar Ilan, the Minister of Education ben Zion Dinur, and the tireless activist Avraham Herzfeld, the Israeli justices Yitzhak Olshan and Aharon Barak, State Comptroller Miriam ben-Porat, Prof. Dov Levine and the journalist Herzl Rosenblum, Members of Parliament Dov Shilanski, Avraham Melamed and Sarah Doron. Other than these famous personalities, thousands of young Zionists came to Eretz Israel before WW2, and blended easily into Israeli society. In addition, there came thousands of Holocaust survivors, those who came with a legacy of the ghettoes and extermination camps, broken in both body, soul and mind, and who built wonderful families and were absorbed into our way of life.

I represent the second generation. For me, being the son of a Litvak means:

Growing up with Yiddish and Hebrew.

Hearing a great deal of sa-sa-sa peppered into the language – despite having to speak Hebrew fluently.

Hearing about the two gymnasia: the Hebrew Reali and the Shoeva in Kovno.

Appreciating the Yeshivas of Ponevicz, Slabodka and Telsze.

Realizing that there were Mitnagdim as opposed to the Hasidim in Poland.

Eating (carrot) tzimmes or prune tzimmes, blintzes or latkes (fritters) and kreplach (dumplings).

Knowing that ‘chaloshes’ means to faint and ‘oilm’ is an audience, the public.

Remembering that Yomtov is a Jewish festival and Yeshiva bocher is a boy attending a yeshiva.

Listening to ‘Hamotzi’ (a short prayer recited before eating bread) and being familiar with all the blessings and prayers.

And now, ‘tachles’ (make up your mind) without joking around, shmonzes / pichefkes (bric-a-brac).

The song that we, the second generation after the Holocaust, grew up with the song of the Partisans by Hirsch Glik and translated by Avraham Shlonski. Nechama Lifshitz was the first to sing this song over there. When she immigrated to Israel and sang the song at certain events, we would all stand up as if the anthem were being sung. There was not a single dry eye left in the house.

We shall all remember and internalize the message:

“Because the hour for which we have hungered is so near

Beneath our feet the earth shall thunder: We are here!”

שיר הפרטיזנים