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People constantly let me know that
Poles are the world's worst anti-Semites. They let me know that anti-Semitism
is not a problem, rather Polish identity is.
By extension, of course, all Bohunks are the world's worst anti-Semites: Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Hungarians, Slovaks, etc.
We started the Holocaust. We are the hotbed of anti-Semitism in the world today. We must be punished for being who we are. Our identity must be obliterated, and a superior identity installed.
I am told this by tenured faculty on university campuses, including Indiana University, where I was a graduate student, and the campus where I work now. I was told this the other day by a library employee in New Jersey.
I receive emails letting me know this, as well. Often the emails are obscene, so obscene I've consciously chosen not to share their contents except with a trusted few. The email, below, from an author identifying himself as Victor Lapides, is exceptional, in that he is polite and well-spoken and he identifies himself by name.
I googled him, using his email address. All I could find was a message about restoring antique furniture. He appears to be a nice, normal guy. I admire his correct use of the English language, and his aesthetic and conservative approach to good furniture. I'm sure if I met him in person, we'd get along well.
I don't think it's Mr. Lapides' fault that he is certain that Poles are the world's worst anti-Semites. After all, that is common knowledge.
Rather, I look to Polonia to begin to take effective action. If you are a Polonian and you want to take action on these matters, buy and read "Bieganski." Then go here.
Mr. Lapides' email:
"Wandered across this [this blog] by chance. Sure wish it were the whole truth and not just one side. Unfortunately, one scene in Shoah tells a very different story. All dressed up in their Sunday best and standing on the steps of the Catholic church in their town in Poland (I forget which), contemporaneous to the making of the movie (1970's, I think), a group of townspeople told Lanzmann (the filmmaker and interviewer) how fitting and necessary it was for all (or most) of the Jews of Europe to have been killed. A riveting scene, unforgettable. I have been told by East European Jews that Poland is one of most antisemitic countries in the world, possibly the most."
By extension, of course, all Bohunks are the world's worst anti-Semites: Lithuanians, Ukrainians, Hungarians, Slovaks, etc.
We started the Holocaust. We are the hotbed of anti-Semitism in the world today. We must be punished for being who we are. Our identity must be obliterated, and a superior identity installed.
I am told this by tenured faculty on university campuses, including Indiana University, where I was a graduate student, and the campus where I work now. I was told this the other day by a library employee in New Jersey.
I receive emails letting me know this, as well. Often the emails are obscene, so obscene I've consciously chosen not to share their contents except with a trusted few. The email, below, from an author identifying himself as Victor Lapides, is exceptional, in that he is polite and well-spoken and he identifies himself by name.
I googled him, using his email address. All I could find was a message about restoring antique furniture. He appears to be a nice, normal guy. I admire his correct use of the English language, and his aesthetic and conservative approach to good furniture. I'm sure if I met him in person, we'd get along well.
I don't think it's Mr. Lapides' fault that he is certain that Poles are the world's worst anti-Semites. After all, that is common knowledge.
Rather, I look to Polonia to begin to take effective action. If you are a Polonian and you want to take action on these matters, buy and read "Bieganski." Then go here.
Mr. Lapides' email:
"Wandered across this [this blog] by chance. Sure wish it were the whole truth and not just one side. Unfortunately, one scene in Shoah tells a very different story. All dressed up in their Sunday best and standing on the steps of the Catholic church in their town in Poland (I forget which), contemporaneous to the making of the movie (1970's, I think), a group of townspeople told Lanzmann (the filmmaker and interviewer) how fitting and necessary it was for all (or most) of the Jews of Europe to have been killed. A riveting scene, unforgettable. I have been told by East European Jews that Poland is one of most antisemitic countries in the world, possibly the most."
I hear this foolishness all the time. All we can do is keep talking about the truth.
ReplyDelete[As I don't know how to select a profile to post, my practice is to post as anonymous - Victor Lapides]:
DeleteIt's not for nothing that one hears these things. In 2009 the Anti-Defamation League published a poll on attitudes toward Jews in seven European countries: Austria, France, Hungary, Poland, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom. On the question whether Jews are responsible for the death of Christ, Poland far surpassed all other countries polled. In several other categories, Poland held among the most anti-Jewish attitudes; the odd ranking of Spain at or near the top of the list I gather is a fairly recent phenomenon having something to do with anti-Israel campaigning by a conservative political party in Spain. To view the poll, go to http://www.adl.org/Public%20ADL%20Anti-Semitism%20February%202009%20_3_.pdf, or do a simple google search if that fails.
And although anecdotal accounts are never really fair, a writer visiting Poland states in 2010, "Almost every street in Lodz has anti-Semitic graffiti," and "when you talk to people in the street you hear some of the most anti-Semitic delusions." This is on the website of a pro-democracy human rights organization called Stonegate Institute whose URL I neglected to jot down but is easily found through a simple search. VL
Don't forget that Poles tend to be more expressive of their views than the more reserved, politically-correct western Europeans. Thus polls of the ADL type can be misleading.
DeleteAlso, Jewish responsibility for the Crucifixion of Christ is not just believed by some Christians, but also by some Jews--who not only take responsibility for it but also make a matter of pride in it, according to some interpretations of the Talmud.
Do not jump to anti-Polish conclusions. Consider graffiti. Anonymous falls into a number of non sequiturs. Even if anti-Semitic graffiti is indeed more common in Poland, it does not necessarily follow that Poles are more anti-Semitic than other nations.
DeleteTo begin with, graffiti has a cultural component. What if Poles are more prone to do graffiti than many other peoples? That is only one variable that needs to be controlled.
In fact, Poles have been known to be quite creative in their graffiti. For instance, during the Nazi occupation, when Germans reserved the best buildings for themselves by posting NUR FOR DEUTSCHEN (For Germans Only) signs, the Poles would draw hangmen's nooses next to the signs, infuriating the Germans.
Considering their long history of being ruled by totalitarians, graffiti may have long endured as one of the few anonymous ways of Polish expression, even though formal totalitarianism had ended long ago.
Another major factor in graffiti is its rate of removal. Poles, unfortunately, are not exactly known as a cleanliness-oriented people. What if graffiti in Poland is more common primarily because it can accumulate over a longer period of time--because it takes longer to be removed than in most other nations?
Finally, much "anti-Semitic" graffiti is not directed against all Jews, but specifically against the Holocaust Industry and its efforts to extort tribute money from Poland. The cartoon of the hook-nosed Jew coming to Poland to fill his bags with money, and one with the elder Jew pointing to Warsaw's skyline and saying to his son, "Some day, this will all be yours", for example, fit into this category.
[posting as usual as "anonymous" because I don't know how to select a profile. Victor Lapides]
DeleteJan, I don't know what to say . . . you've outdone yourself!
[posting as "anonymous", as I don't know how to choose a profile to post - Victor Lapides]
DeleteEver since this started, I've searched my memory for what these Russian Jews told me about the Polish. I remember adamant positions about antisemitism in modern Poland. Did they say "most antisemitic in Europe" or their part of Europe and limit it to that, and did I expand on the notion to say "possibly most antisemitic country in the world"? I have to admit that I might have done that, especially given my own perception of the character of antisemitism in Arab lands. But I think some reading which I've done lately renders my statement very difficult to defend. Based on what I'm learning, I didn't grasp the very virulent antisemitism that grips today's Middle East, an animus which goes well beyond anti-Zionism and takes on the comprehensive kind of hatred of Jews which I always thought of as much more a European/Christian phenomenon. I do live in the States and haven't been to the Middle East - or Eastern Europe, for that matter - and statements on a subject such as this should be made only with the greatest of care, and I never would have broadcast mine in a public forum like this if it were up to me. Victor Lapides
I really don't understand why Americans think that all Jews are experts on all things cancerning Poland and Poles. Even if some of those American Jews are from Poland or Eastern Europe. Sometimes ignorance of those Jews is shocking. Just imagine that some of them spend childhood in Poland and didin't even learn to speak polish correctly. Or that they were saved by Poles and still consider us worse than Germans (or Nazis, they never say Germans, to scared perhaps). And the younger generation is even more ignorant. Many times I have read comments like: "Poles were most anti-semitic. My grandma told me that. And she was saved by Poles, so she knows YOU well." Maybe those anti-semitic Poles should have SAVED someone else. As for Lanzmann and his movie, yes I've seen it. Didin't like it. Translation is often incorrect or many words are not translated at all. I can only wonder what kind of text was in american version of Lanzmann's movie. And I remember scene that Mr. Lapides mentioned. When asked "why do they think all this happened to the Jews?" townspeople said "Jews were the richest ones". One of them told a story about rabbi (hearsay). And that was all. No rasist comments. In that scene Polish Jew is standing among those Poles and he does not look terrified in my opinion. Dear English speakers, if I made mistakes in your language, I'm sorry. Feel free to correct me. But lessons of Polish language I don't need.
ReplyDeleteLUKASZ : really don't understand why Americans think that all Jews are experts on all things cancerning Poland and Poles.
Deletebecause the Jews have a strong lobby in the USA.
In my opinion Americans think that all Jews are experts on all things in general.
Lukasz, I invite you to do something to change this situation which you obviously do not like.
ReplyDeleteThere is a difference between a personal email and a blog post. I now regret sending these thoughts to Dr. Goska on what I've seen and heard, to have such a hurtful phrase selected and memorialized in a headline for all the world to see. Proper procedure would have been for Dr. Goska to ask me if I minded my email being posted. Victor Lapides
ReplyDeleteMr. Lapides, a few things.
ReplyDeleteFirst, contrary to your post, "all the world" does not read my blog. Blog counters indicate that a handful of people read your post, and probably none of them have caused you any harm at all.
Second, your email was not personal. I don't know you. There was no personal content in your email. You referred only to Poland and your conviction that Poland is the world's most anti-Semitic country.
You suggest that it is my job to protect you from the consequences of your own words.
Why should I protect you in that way?
I receive a steady flow of emails from anti-Polish bigots. These emails insult, denigrate, curse and damn me, my family, my ancestry, my culture, and an entire nation.
Why should I protect you or any sender of any such email from any consequences of your words?
I'd really appreciate an answer to that question.
Why is it okay for you and people like you to send bigoted, anti-Polish emails to Polish Americans like me, but not okay for others to know of your activity?
I'd like an answer to that question, too.
In any case, I'd be greatly surprised if you encounter any negative consequences as a result of your email being posted here. You have a common name -- many Victor Lapides turn up in Google searches -- and my blog is not read by vengeful people who will harm you in any way.
Rather, my blog is read by published and prize-winning poets (Mr. Guzlowski, above), novelists, scholars, and gentle spiritual seekers.
We aren't the scary Polaks people like you insist we are.
If anyone contacts you, it will be in a gentle and respectful way, as part of an effort to create and sustain dialogue between Poles and Jews.
My guess is, though, that there will be no consequences in your life for your email being posted to this blog.
So, Mr. Lapides, rather than clinging to your angry victim stance, why not see this exchange as an opportunity to converse with the people you so readily condemned? Why not reconsider your bigotry? Why not encounter real, live Polish people, rather than the stereotypes that populate your imagination?
[Until I learn to select a profile to post, I continue to post as "anonymous".] Victor Lapides
DeleteBy law, reproduction of any content in this blog that is written by me, in whole or in part and for any purpose, is not permitted without my written consent. VL
[As is my practice, I sign on as "anonymous" because I don't know how to select a profile to post - Victor Lapides]
DeleteDr. Goska, I'm just curious. Which one of your regulars is Mr. Peczkis - prize-winning poet, novelist, scholar or gentle spiritual seeker? VL
Very interesting conversation. I stumbled over it having been searching for information relating to Nicholas Anelka and his reverse nazi salute on the football field.
DeleteI live in sleepy Norfolk in the UK. I originate from a small town of 30,000 inhabitants of which 10,000 are Polish. I'm sorry to say that my personal experience is that there seems to be an awful lot of them that are racist, sexist alcoholics. In fact the typical Polish male looks like a skinhead, covered in tattoos, drunken, aggressive and oh so loud. This is a town that has 10,000 Portuguese also! Portuguese have integrated wonderfully over the last ten years or so, although it was a little rocky initially. I just can't imagine that the Poles will ever integrate. As for being anti Semitic, I can't say. I don't think anti semitism is something that rears its head outside of Muslim communities and so I wouldn't notice, especially since there are no Jews in the rural areas.
I read the "Poland is the most antisemitic country in the world" blog with interest.
ReplyDeleteI checked with Iran and they're deeply offended. They tried so
hard....
Lebanon and Syria were crying so hard they're
inconsolable....last I heard they were sitting on a couch, eating quarts of Chunky-Monkey.
It's hard to take such a statement seriously.
I'd be interested in how Mr. Lapides supports that argument, rather than make closeted, outrageous statements.
So, please site your sources, Mr. Lapides. I'm all about the teachable moment and would like an opportunity to correct your understanding.
Otto
You know about the psychological defense mechanism of projection. You accuse someone of something that you feel yourself. The paranoid schizophrenic who accuses others of attempting to poison him is really projecting his own hostility against others.
ReplyDeleteThe Polonophobes are using projection. They are projecting their own bigotry upon the Poles as a cover for their own bigotry. Since Poles have no political power, they are a safe target to attack.
I have studied Polonophobia for a long time. For a detailed resource on this subject, please click on my name in this post.
I have also studied the matter of pogroms in Poland in some detail. For a resource on this, please paste-in and go to:
http://www.amazon.com/Polish-Pogroms-39-45-Jedwabne-41-Kielce-46-Przytyk-36-amp-18/lm/R3KAKVOIKECAL5/ref=cm_lm_byauthor_title_full
My original email to Dr. Goska was after reading the entry faulting Rabbi Polak of Boston, who wrote something about Poland "coming to terms" with its treatment of Jews, or words to that effect. My intention was to suggest that Polish mistreatment of Jews during and after the war, though they're far from alone in that, can't be denied, from everything I've read, seen and heard. I found Rabbi Polak's original remarks and find his writing there reasonable. Re-reading my email, it would probably have been better to limit the statement "most antisemitic" to Europe and not the world, although I think once you factor out the political enmity for Israel in Arab countries, you are left with a brand of antisemitism that for me can't be compared with the enmity fostered by the Catholic Church in Europe for centuries. Take that scene in Shoah from in front of the church, for example (Chelmno, I think). Here you have this lone Jew returning to Poland long after the slaughter of his people there. Would you not say that it takes a special kind of loathing for a townsman to step forward, and aggressively state that the Jews brought on the Holocaust themselves, for killing Christ, I think, in the very presence of this man, one of the few survivors of the Chelmno killing? I'd have to see the movie again to study it, as it's been many years and can find only an untranslated clip on Youtube and a rough transcript elsewhere on the web, but this chilling scene and the demeanor of the rest of the crowd didn't suggest that they took exception. As for posting my personal email in public, I wasn't afraid of "retribution," exactly. I knew my comments could be seen as incendiary and shared them with Dr. Goska privately but wasn't looking for a public forum. It is in fact improper to post someone else's writing without their permission, and I accept the fact that Dr. Goska doesn't understand that or doesn't care. It is a general protocol in publishing, and just plain good manners. I might add that the inflammatory headlines Dr. Goska uses in the blog are in exceedingly poor taste and are provocative if not even a little perverse. It does appear that Dr. Goska doesn't shy away from a little contention. As for Poland itself, I know it's a complicated story and Poland produced many "righteous gentiles," and I don't believe for a second that any country can be said to have no good people, and never have believed it. Without getting anecdotal, I think Pope John Paul was a great and good man, for example, and I believe I love him. God knows the Polish suffered at the hands of the Nazis and the Russians, as well. If I single out Poland in my original email, maybe the sheer number of Jews in Poland before the war lends itself to horror stories about the treatment of Jews there, and fosters the reputation that I have heard of and which I noted, and which Dr. Goska acknowledges him/herself without any help from me. After all, was there gratuitous killing of Jews going on in other countries besides Poland after the war, into 1946? I don't know, but I do know of stories in Poland. Nevertheless, I think you can set aside the issue of a hierarchy of antisemitism in Europe, and just say that that region of the world in general probably takes the honors for hatred of Jews. That my father's parents left the Ukraine in the 1890's for America is a blessing indeed. As for antisemitism itself, I believe it's a variety of envy over a sort of a spiritual and psychic freedom that the Jews retained in the Christian era and has very little to do with greed, money, brains, talent, or even killing Christ. I'm way short of developing the idea but believe it to be so. I don't know how to select a profile to post this, but "anonymous" seems to have worked in the past. By Victor Lapides
DeleteI wouldn't worry about your comments being posted on Dr.Goska's blog Mr.Lapides. As she says, she only has a small readership. Plus us Poles/Polonians are constantly being vilified by America's media and its Academe, so we are pretty much used to it. And hasn't American Polonia has been restrained and good-humoured in the face of it?
ReplyDeleteFor example,this was published in the Autumn 2006 issue of the Haverford Alumni Magazine. It was by one David Langleib, and is called "The Black Squirrel's Burden". In part it said:
"While the community has several problems, most of them come
back to the high density of Polish people infesting its rowhouses. Mocking Poles for being stupid is perhaps the last form of politically correct prejudice, as well as the most accurate. The other day I asked a local Polak shopkeeper if heard the one about the Polish guy who tried to fill up his gas tank by driving the car in reverse. The shopkeeper didn't respond because hed accidentally put his pants on his head that morning and the waistband was cutting off his hearing."
Polish people "infest" the area they live in. And what do you do with an infestation?
The exterminatory language Young Master Langleib used seems pretty much like hatred to me.
But there was no rioting in the streets or anything, just some polite letters of protest. And the article was removed.
And chillingly the official history of WW2 seems to be being rewritten so that it becomes a fight between the Evil Axis Powers of Poland, Poland and Poland and The Gallant Allies America, America and America.
This is getting so intense that several British MPs were moved to issue the following press release about the constant redefining of Nazi concentration camps as Polish:
“The location of most of these camps by Nazi Germany in what was then occupied Poland does not justify the description "Polish". We do not refer to ancient amphitheatres in France as "French" but as "Roman"; we do not refer to the Krak des Chevaliers castle in Syria as a "Syrian" but as a "Crusader" fortress; we do not refer to the former colonial slave forts in Ghana as "Ghanaian" but as "British"; we do not refer to Guantanamo Bay camp in Cuba as "Cuban" but as "U.S.". In each case the symbol of oppression is associated by its description with the perpetrator and not the territory in which it is currently sited.”
So Poland's reward for fighting on the Allied side during WW2 was betrayal the moment the war ended, and vilification ever since. I have come to expect it and am pleasantly surprised when it doesn't happen.
Your comments didn't pleasantly surprise me, but that is all I would want to say about them.
The silver lining here is that this all helps me to be "no part" of the world and its politics. I am putting my trust in the God of Abraham, the true God, who has promised us our "exquisite delight in the abundance of peace" right here on the earth.
While we are waiting for Him to act and restore the earth to Paradise, don't we need to take great care that we don't let the world and its politics get us stirred up against each other?
The U. S. has a chronology of ethnic hatreds. In the turn of the century waves of immigration, it was perhaps Italians, Jews, Polish; before that, it was the Irish; and throughout, the blacks. Some recede into history, like I think the Italians for the most part, and the Irish in its entirety. The hatred for the Irish was widespread and bitter in this country, really surprising when I first learned of it. Who knows this today? Not many, I guess. I've thought that there are demographic factors as well. Certain ethnicities came over with an urban experience and education, like the Germans, I suppose, or later on the Koreans, and I don't perceive that there was/is much in the way of home-based prejudices, as opposed to the Irish and probably the Polish and Italians, who came over poor and less well educated. - Victor Lapides
DeleteHello Mr. Lapides. Yes, I think that is probably the way things usually work - in England and other countries too. The first immigrant generation has a very hard time, and then settles down and becomes part of the main, as it were. I suppose it was a harsh, but effective, way of forcing new immigrants to assimilate.
DeleteBut something different has happened re Poles in America.
""The 1970s represented a kind of watershed for Poles in Minnesota... Nationally, the entertainment industry and media singled out Polish Americans for stigmatization, and stores across Minnesota carried bigoted "Polish joke" products that were widely used. Because they had little mainstream media presence, many Polish Americans,
especially young people, internalized these stereotypes. If students did not keep quiet, they faced harassment and abuse from classmates and sometimes even teachers. With the Polish White Eagle Association,his stigmatization led to occasional pressures to remove the word "Polish" from the group's name as early as the 1960's."
(Poles in Minnesota, John Radzilowski, Minnesota Historical Society Press, pp.67-68)
Poles had long been settled in the U.S. But suddenly they were deliberately singled out - I assume for political reasons.
And it goes on to this day. So, as I said, its something I have had to get used to.
On the plus side, it has helped me with my neutrality. Its hard to describe what a golden country America seemed to me, an English schoolgirl in the 1950's.
And also it is one of the things that makes God's word shine out like a beacon in a very dark place. My Creator has told me to "honour" my father. As I loved him very much that is what I want to do, so it draws me to God, and away from "the world".
Rabbi Lapides wrote: "My intention was to suggest that Polish mistreatment of Jews during and after the war, though they're far from alone in that, can't be denied, from everything I've read, seen and heard."
ReplyDeleteYes, and if Rabbi Lapides is honest, he will admit that negative Jewish attitudes and actions against Poles and Poland cannot be denied either.
Using Lanzmann and his SHOAH as a serious source of information is beyond ridiculous. By using the kind of selective cutting and pasting that Lanzmann did, one could prove anything--even that the US is an extremely anti-Semitic nation. BTW, Rabbi, did you know that the vast, vast majority of returning Polish Jews reclaimed their property without incident?
Rabbi Lapides writes: "If I single out Poland in my original email, maybe the sheer number of Jews in Poland before the war lends itself to horror stories about the treatment of Jews there.."
There it is! 4/5ths of the world's Jews came from that area--the original Pale of Jewish settlement under tsarist Russian rule. It also means that the locals had to deal with, and compete with, Jews more so than virtually any other place on Earth.
Rabbi Lapides writes: "...that that region of the world in general probably takes the honors for hatred of Jews." Now the Rabbi is going in circles and still providing no proof for his assertion. Accumulated anecdotes prove nothing. After all, there are many anecdotal claims of Jews being largely dishonest, but this does not prove the premise true.
Rabbi Lapides believes that "As for antisemitism itself, I believe it's a variety of envy over a sort of a spiritual and psychic freedom that the Jews retained in the Christian era and has very little to do with greed, money, brains, talent, or even killing Christ."
This begs the question about Muslims, Protestants, freethinkers, etc., in Poland who also retained a form of "spiritual and psychic freedom", yet were well received. Perhaps the true Jewish "spiritual and psychic freedom" included a sense of Jewish superiority over the goy, and a sense that Jews are above Poles and really owe Poland nothing--save that needed to avoid persecution.
I have studied Polish-Jewish relations in some detail, and have a list of self-reviewed books, from various perspectives, on the subject. To see them, please click on my name in this posting.
Hi, I've had a very busy day and must confess I have not read all the posts in detail (just skimming.) JP, I don't think Mr. Lapides has identified himself as a rabbi. If he has, I missed it. I'm sure you were thinking of Rabbi Polak, referred to in a previous post.
ReplyDeleteVictor Lapides, thanks much for writing more. I know that what you have written seems sensible to you and to many people invested in what I call the Bieganski stereotype.
ReplyDeleteI'd like to convey an invitation to you. Please read my book, "Bieganski, the Brute Polak Stereotype."
You don't even have to buy it. You can get it through inter-library loan.
If you read the book, you will soon see that what seems reasonable to you now is a cultural construct that needs to be interrogated, no less than the idea that Jews are somehow scary when they handle money needs to be interrogated.
That pernicious idea holds great currency (no pun intended) today. There are people just as intelligent and well-informed as you who can adduce evidence to support the idea that Jews have some special, almost diabolical relationship to money.
Those people are wrong, no less than the people who cling to the Bieganski stereotype are wrong.
I'd love it if you would have a look at my book.
I hope you will consider it.
If I'm not mistaken, the role of money-lender fell to the Jews by Church edict because it was bad business and not permitted for Christians to be involved in.
DeleteYes, I have a copy of Danusha Goska's "Bieganski" and I do recommend it if you want to understand what has been happening. However, when I do recommend it to my fellow Polonians, I also recommend a strong dose of Psalm 37, as what it reveals is very distressing. Remember I loved my dear aged Polish father very much. "Bieganski" is strong medicine. I only take it in small doses, interspersed with a lot of studying of the Inspired Scriptures, both Hebrew and Christian Greek.
ReplyDeleteAnd if you are a Rabbi, Mr Lapides (or then I suppose it should be Dr.Lapides), I have some questions I would love to ask about the rabbinical interpretation of Messianic prophecy in the Book of Daniel. If you are, and IF you want to hear my questions, Dr.Goska has my private email and she is welcome to pass it on to you. By the way, I must first tell you I am a Jehovah's Witness, and many people would not want to speak to me on account of that.
I've got other questions too... IF
And hello Jan P - I have read some of your reviews in Amazon and want to say thanks. You are working away in an area which has been arranged so that there is no level ground for us (Poles/Polonians) to stand on. If I dwell on it all too much, it gets to me a bit and I find i just want to say: "Yes we ARE More Horrid Than Anyone Else in Time and Space AND we shot Bambi's Mother" - and stomp crossly off. So I am grateful to those like you and Danusha who manage to do a lot better than that. What we have to be so careful of is that we don't let it get to us, and make us so angry that we start behaving badly. We all have the template of Jesus who, when he was reviled, did not go reviling in return.
Now he was a perfect man - the exact equivalent of Adam before he sinned. We, Adam's children, are so far from that. So its a struggle.
I am finally able to smile from this experience. I am not a rabbi, I'm a reformed Jew, as secular as they come. If I have a problem speaking to Jehovah's Witnesses, I have a problem indeed. As far as Messianic prophecy in Daniel, I don't have much religious education - just a typical American Reformed Jew, Sunday school, enough Hebrew school to fake it through an Orthodox service. However, one of the few specific issues I looked into in adulthood was on what the Jewish messiah is because it's so fundamental to the Jewish/Christian divide, and the general and accepted Jewish sense is that the messiah is not a divine being but a new leader in the enlightened mold of King David, a longing ever since Judaism and the Holy Land fell into disarray in the generations after David and Solomon, who were around the 10th-9th century B. C. I think you could say the Jewish messiah is figure of a political nature (or perhaps royal, in its original conception), but was never a religious one, and still maintains that character today. But don't quote me, as they say. Of course, you can read the Old Testament and there is a Jewish interpretation and a Christian one from tiny everyday matters to big ones like "meshuah" (in Hebrew,) or Messiah. After all, translation from Hebrew to Greek and then I think maybe Coptic and to English over the course of 3,000 years is a dicey business. The Christian believer can point to Isaiah (I didn't know it was in Daniel, too) and show you what he'd call definitive evidence of Messianic foretelling, and the Jewish educator or Rabbi can show you where it actually means something quite different. Idiom and conceptions of language and its evolution in meaning from then to now are such that knowing what an ancient language was saying, and more important what it is meaning in its world-view of the time, and whether it's being literal or figurative, is a dicey business that requires the combined mastery of several modern disciplines. The word "translation" doesn't begin to express the effort to assign the correct meaning to it. The Talmud is an immense body of argument/analysis/interpretation over Jewish law and custom and practice set down along the 4th-8th centuries A. D. and I guess maybe even then they were debating the meanings in the Old Testament, or Torah, but I don't think the issue of the messiah ever lacked clarity in its fundamental sense. (I like everything archaeological and antique, and love all the shows on PBS on digs in the Holy Land, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Greek and Roman ruins, etc. etc.) But Sue, I don't know much at all and though it's really nice that you ask, you've just read very close to the sum total of my knowledge on the Old Testament and I really don't want to say something wrong. Please excuse me. You could email me, but I'm afraid you'll find that the well is about dry. Victor Lapides
DeleteSue - on second thought, let's limit the communication to this space and not email. As I review this experience, I'd rather have any thoughts on these subjects shared with the others. It would probably enhance understanding on subjects already undertaken here, which is what brought me here in the first place. I'm no help on the Bible anyway. Thanks. Victor Lapides
DeleteAre you still there Victor? Only if so, I would like to talk about the Messianic prophecy in Daniel. Because if you, or any of us, should ever hear someone say that about the Holocaust, it would provide the Scriptural refutation. The Hebrews prophets were inspired to tell us what would happen after the Messiah was cut off in death "with nothing for himself". Once again, I want to say that they were telling the truth. We can believe them. If people only knew what the Bible said, they would be able to dismiss these wrong ideas so easily.
DeleteI would like to inform Mr. Lapides that during and after the war Poles were not masters in their own country. Maybe in American cities crowds were celebrating fall of Berlin, but Poland wasn't America. No champagne, no dancing on ruins of Warsaw. It was more like New Orleans after Katrina hurricane. Only here "hurricane" lasted for five years on much larger scale. And after it was over there still was a lot of violence in the country. Poles were killed, Ukrainians were killed, and Germans, and Soviets. And last but not least, Jews also were killed. Estern Poland was a war zone (Ukrainian Insurgent Army vs Polish Home Army vs Soviet Red Army). Western part was called Wild West and not without reason. Jewish survivors coming back from German or Soviet camps to their homes were naive if they expected a warm welcome. Yes, there were post-war pogroms in Poland (Kielce, Cracow). There was also chaos, hunger and a lot of hate. Upper class of educated Poles was almost destroyed. Masses of uneducated Poles were demoralized by brutality of occupation. Many polish people lost their homes in part of Poland that was given to "Uncle Joe". If they took abandoned home of other family (Jewish or whatever) they would not give it back. Suffering makes all humans insensitive to suffering of others. It makes men also suspicious and easy to manipulate. Also banditry was a plague spread in entire post-war Europe. Poland was not special in that matter. Deaths of innocent victims were inevitable. Personally I'm ashamed of Jedwabne, Kielce and every other tragedy caused by my countrymen. And if a Pole kills a Jew, American or German anywhere on this planet, I will have another cause to be ashamed. But I will not feel guilty. Not my fault, not my sin. I will not give apology. I don't have right or responsibility to do that.
ReplyDeleteI also want to inform Mr. Lapides that post-war pogroms happened in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Soviet Union. But those facts are not well known in the West. Maybe Americans were more interested in situation in Poland. Especially after Yalta.
I do appreciate your thoughts. Thanks. Victor Lapides
DeleteI do have the fullest respect for what you've set down here. In fact, I plan to print it and save it. On your earlier post, not just Jews but Americans in general are pretty naive about the realities of life overseas. (We have a recent president, whose name begins with "B", who started a couple of wars with a simple view of people in those countries, and how easy it would be. Incredibly naive.) But I'm pretty sure you minimize the meaning of that whole scene at the church. I do believe the man who stepped forward talked about a rabbi who tried to soothe a bunch of Jews about to die (I'm not sure, but I think in a camp or some other killing field during the war), by telling them that it had to be, it was their sin in killing Christ for which they all had to die. As for that Polish Jew standing there, I don't think he was terrified either. You should be able to imagine what he was feeling, though. Victor Lapides
Delete"I also want to inform Mr. Lapides that post-war pogroms happened in Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Soviet Union"
ReplyDeletePost war pogroms happened in the UK and the US.
I hope readers here will purchase and read "Bieganski." Knowledge is your friend and ally.
Sorry for mistaking Mr. Lapides for a rabbi. I could have sworn that I heard of a Rabbi Lapides.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the kind words of those who have studied my reviews.
Yes, pogroms occurred in various locations, not only in Poland. Let us not forget that pogroms also occurring in the other direction. In a nation where Jews were 1% of the population, Jews constituted 37% of the leadership of the hated Bezpieka (U. B.; Communist security forces), responsible for the torture and murder of tens of thousands of Poles in 1944-1947.
As for Jews killed when they came to reclaim their properties, these amounted to 300-600, a drop in the ocean compared with the total of at least about 300,000 returning Jews. A tragedy, to be sure, but hardly a "Holocaust after the Holocaust" or "Poles finishing Hitler's job" or some such Polonophobic canard.
My suspicion is that if Jews joined Communist security forces there was some self-preservation factor to it. I know nothing about this. I'd have to check the population of returning Jews because my grasp of those numbers is not good at all. I wonder if they returned temporarily, only to leave for the U. S., Israel or other places. If today's Jewish population in Poland is that great, I sure didn't know it. I'm going to google it now. Victor Lapides
DeleteLooks like from what I read there might be about 20,000-40,000 or so Jews in Poland today. Also looks like before the 17th century Poland was a welcoming place for Jews, and things turned badly from the Russians in the 18th or 19th century, but my knowledge on this is slight. It might also be that shifting borders of Russia and Poland might have today's Poland taking some blame for Russian treatment of Jews. But I don't know much about any of this and am just groping around in the dark. Victor Lapides
DeleteFrom a previous post, not sure of the poster:
ReplyDelete"If I'm not mistaken, the role of money-lender fell to the Jews by Church edict because it was bad business and not permitted for Christians to be involved in."
Please read "Bieganski," in relation to this question, specifically, beginning page 57.
"I am not a rabbi, I'm a reformed Jew, as secular as they come"
ReplyDeleteMr. Lapides, have a look at "Bieganski," specifically chapter five, in relation to you, as a secular Jew, voicing the Bieganski stereotype (Poland is the most anti-Semitic country.)
Mr. Lapides, Sue is a Jehovah's Witness, I am not. I've never tried to convert anyone to any religion.
ReplyDeleteI will disagree with you, though, about a Jewish interpretation of Messianic prophecy and a Christian interpretation of Messianic prophecy.
In fact there are many Jewish converts to Christianity, and there always have been. Most of the first Christians were lifelong Jews.
There have long been Jews who come to prophecies like Isaiah 53, the suffering servant passage, and see Jesus there.
Does that mean that the only correct interpretation of OT messianic prophecies is the Christian one?
No, it means that there are some Jews who interpret OT messianic prophecies as Christians do. Of course these people usually convert.
So, the argument that there is always a mutually exclusive Christian way of seeing things and a Jewish way of seeing things is not reflective of the facts on the ground.
Prophecy, by its nature, can be interpreted in multiple ways.
I realize that it's interpreted different ways. My understanding is that the traditional Jewish view is the one I stated. I'd be interested to know how secular Bible scholars see it. Victor Lapides
DeleteAll this talk about some Christians believing that the Holocaust was God's punishment of Jews for rejecting and Crucifying their Messiah has another angle. Some rabbis, then and now, ALSO believe(d) that the Holocaust was God's punishment of the Jewish people. In the Bible, there were many times when God's anger burned against His people--as, for example, in the events leading up to the Babylonian captivity.
ReplyDeleteWell I am glad you got one laugh out of it all Mr.Lapides. You just have to laugh sometimes. We - us Poles - were once accused by an American publication of stealing the River Danube during world war 2. A feat of engineering so amazing that I rather thought we would be running the world by now. If you would like to talk to me, please ask Dr.Goska for my email, only the Book of Daniel contains one of the most important and powerful Messianic prophecies of all. It tells what year the Messiah will appear on the earth, and what will happen after his death. It is clear and unambiguous. And wonderful. All the Bible writers are Jews - they were the only people entrusted with the Inspired Scriptures. And they are not liars they are telling the truth.
ReplyDeleteAs the Christian Greek Scriptures tell us:
"What, then, is the superiority of the Jew, or what is the benefit of the circumcision? A great deal in every way. First of all, because they were entrusted with the sacred pronouncements of God." - Romans 3:1,2
That was a privilege given only to the Jewish people, and they faithfully carried out their commission.
The world though is full of lies. And I have come to realise that we are lied to on a scale that I had never dreamt of. That is another silver lining to the Vilification Cloud. Being lied about has helped to wake me up I think. I've had to stop and think, and look more closely.
And if you do read Dr.G's "Bieganski" I hope it will make you think seriously about the Bible writers claim that, for the moment, "the whole world" is lying in the power of the one who is called "the father of the lie".
We need, therefore, to be very careful about believing what we are told when it is clearly designed to make us (the human race) fear, hate and fight each other.
"some Christians believing that the Holocaust was God's punishment of Jews for rejecting and Crucifying their Messiah"
ReplyDeleteI'm a lifelong Polish-Slovak-American Catholic. I've lived among Poles and Slovaks and Catholics and Christians all my life, in the US, Poland, and Slovakia.
I have never, ever, not once, not ever, not even close, heard any Polish person, Slovak person, hyphenated Slavic American person of any kind, or any Catholic come anywhere close to saying that the Holocaust is God's punishment on Jews for rejecting Jesus.
Never. Not once. Not ever.
I did once hear a self-identified Christian say this. She was a blonde bus driver on the Warwick bus between Warwick, NY, and NYC. She said this in the 1980s. She said it near the Willowbrook Mall.
I didn't know this woman. Had no history with her.
This happened twenty years ago and I was so shocked and horrified I can describe her to you, and the moment, and the location.
Some insist that we Poles and Christians say this before we brush our teeth every morning. In my experience, that insistence is bullshit.
Never? Not ever? Not once have you heard any Polish person say that the Holocaust was God's punishment on the Jews for rejecting Jesus? Are you reading your own blog? Do you understand the meaning of that church scene in Chelmno? Did you read my previous posts? Did you see Shoah? Victor Lapides
DeleteMy mistake. I shouldn't have made the post immediately above. I'm guessing you had that scene and previous references to it in mind, and may have meant "apart from" or notwithstanding that scene. Victor Lapides
DeleteThis comment is not directed against any person here. The idea that Jews see the bible one way and Christians see the Bible another way ... I just don't buy it.
ReplyDeleteI don't believe that there is a Jewish mind and a Christian mind.
There is the human mind, that is the same across all nationalities and ethnicities and religions.
I just did a Google search on these terms:
jews convert christianity isaiah 53
I found any number of websites listing Jews who converted to Christianity because they came to read one famous OT messianic prophecy the way that Xians read it. I don't know if this is a good website, but here is one:
http://www.israelinprophecy.org/ENGLISH/live_site/brief_list-most_famous_messianic_jews.html
I'm not saying that these people were right. I'm saying that they read the OT one way, and those who did not convert read it another way.
Similarly, there are people born Christian who read these same prophecies and reject them and convert away from Xianity.
And poor Sue, who was given a good Catholic education, went astray and is no longer Catholic. (Sorry, Sue. Could not resist. But I'm praying for you. ;-)
Human beings interpret prophecy in human ways. No Jewish mind. No Christian mind. Just a human mind.
Hello all, yes I was a Catholic Convent Schoolgirl from the age of 4 to 18. And I am grateful to this day for the good basic education I got. Sadly I wasn't taught very much about the Inspired Scriptures - Hebrew or Christian Greek. After my schooldays I was agnostic for many years, but always wondered, and was attending a small local Protestant Church when two Jehovah's Witnesses knocked on my door. And I listened. However, what i do want to say is that in all my churchgoing days I too never heard this strange idea about the Holocaust being God's punishment on the Jews...
ReplyDeleteI wonder, Mr. Lapides, if you are aware of the extent of the campaign against Poles and Poland? It is so powerful that it had every member of the Polish Free Forces who contributed so much to the victory against Hitler being classified as "fascist brutes" the very moment the war ended.
I haven't seen Shoah, but it sounds very much on-message.
I imagine that you could find people in every country in the world to say terrible things on film, if you wanted to. However what we need to keep in our hearts is that Jehovah loves those who try to make between peoples, not those who try to exacerbate existing tensions.
Mr. Lapides' suggestion that the Jews joined the Communist security forces out of a "self-preservation" factor is rather lame. The Nazi threat was gone forever. If anything, Poles were in need of self-preservation, from the Soviets, much more than Jews! And, owing to the severity of past Russian anti-Semitism, Jews should have been more afraid of Russians than of Poles. In any case, by choosing to support Poland's enemies--and this by no means the first time--Jews once again chose to provoke Polish anti-Semitism by their actions.
ReplyDeleteDr. Goska is spot-on in questioning the validity of Poles saying that the Holocaust is God's punishment against Jews for the rejection and Crucifixion of their Messiah.
This charge comes up often in Holocaust memoirs. So does the one accusing Poles of believing that Jews engage in ritual murder, and the one about Poles wanting to build a monument to Hitler in gratitude for having solved Poland's Jewish problem once and for all. Yet they keep coming up in Jewish Holocaust memoirs. Judging by their repeat appearance, perhaps these are entirely, or almost entirely, Polonophobic archetypes. Again, perhaps they are actually projections of Jewish hostility against Poles.
Years back, I had many discussions with my elders about these subjects. They remembered Jews from before WWII. I did not meet EVEN ONE Pole who verbalized a belief in ANY of the things mentioned above that Poles are accused of believing.
Below is a link to an interesting wikipedia page on Daniel's prophecy of 70 weeks.
ReplyDeleteI can't put too much credence in these things because they always require interpretation, and interpretations always vary. Very well-informed Protestant theologians think that 666 is yet to come; very well-informed Catholic theologians think he was Nero. Both have good arguments. Why privilege one interpretation over the other?
Wiki on Daniel: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophecy_of_Seventy_Weeks
I do not have anything to add to the main discussion regarding Poland being the most antisemitic country in the World.
ReplyDeleteBut regarding the situation during World War Two one thing is often forgotten or not emphasized enough. Polish territories which were under German and Soviet occupation 1939-41 and from the summer of 1941 under German occupation was not only inhabited by ethnic Poles. Large groups of Belorussians and Ukrainians lived in Polands eastern lands, the so called Kresy. Around Nazi-German death camps like Belzec or Sobibor the population were probaly mostly not Polish. Now, sometimes when I read books about the Holocaust I always get the impression that these Ukrainian and Belorussian minorities did not exist, although they did and there presence in the Polish countryside those terrible years must be highlighted more.
Now, on the matter of Polish Jews in the Communist security forces or legal system. It is a undisputed fact that Jews were over represented in Communist administration. I do not think that they joined the new apparatus beacuse of fear or self-preservation. They did it beacuse they were pragmatical and adapted to a new situation, just like many non-Jewish Poles did. But the over representation can be explained by the fact that Polish Jews did not have the same patriotic feelings towards Poland, a country that had treated them rather harsh during the pre-war years. Prof Gross argues that these Jews can not be seen as Jews, only as Communists. (I wonder, does he apply the same logic in the case of Jedwabne, thus, the Jews of that town were not murdered with the assistance of Poles, only antisemites?)
Still, even if one can explain why so many Jews joined the Communist security forces and administraion, there should be no hiding of the fact that most of the judges who sentenced Polish underground soldiers to their deaths after mock courts 1950-53 were of Jewish decent. It is beyond me how this fact still can be regarded as sensitive or even controversial since it does not say anything about the Jewish people as a whole. Just like Jedwabne does not say anything about Polish-Jewish relations during WWII or about the Christian Poles as a whole.
I missed to mention something about my self, and I do not like when people have opinions but hide who they are.
DeleteI am a Swedish-Polish writer of non-fictional books and articles about WWII. Information about me can be found on my publishers webpage (Norstedts agency) but for some reason the page does not work right now.
This exculpation about Jews being over-represented in the Communist security forces because they were "harshly treated" in Poland does not hold. To begin with, Poland's Jews were privileged from DAY ONE because, for example, they were largely exempt from the manual labor of the vast majority of Poles. Second, Jews were strongly over-represented in Communism long before there was a resurrected Poland. Third, Jews were (and are) massively over-represented in radical leftist movements even in places such as the USA, where--by any standard--Jews have it very well.
DeleteI guess it all boils down to Jews seeing themselves as a separate people, not owing permanent loyalty to anyone, and tending to support those who they perceive to be powerful, or who they perceive to be the wave of the future. Such a course of action, of course, provokes anti-Semitism, as among Poles.
Seems like useful history to me and good information. Victor Lapides
DeleteMy comment immediately above applies to Mr. Szulc. Victor Lapides
DeleteHello Artur, I must look you and your books up. I can be found on my blog, which is a bit Diary of a Nobody - it is really my personal diary and mainly read by extended family and some friends. I am the daughter of a Polish para who managed to make it to the UK just after Dunkirk - and who was, of course, not able to go back. I only became aware of this agenda against Poles and Poland 20 plus years ago, when we became expats. And I must never forget how grateful I am to the God of Abraham that he sent his witnesses to my door at round about the same, so that while learning about it I was also learning to deal with it. I think I could have turned into a bitter and angry person otherwise.
ReplyDeleteSue,
DeleteSadly enough, my books are in Swedish. But you can read about them, in english, following this link
http://www.norstedtsagency.se/books/Published/2010/Senhost/szulc_artur-i_stalins_vald-inbunden/
Danusha, you mention Bible prophecy above, specifically the amazing 70 weeks prophecy in Daniel. The relevance to what we were discussing is that the prophecy does say that after the Messiah is cut off in death, Jerusalem and the Temple will be desolated. As they were in 70 C.E. when the Romans under General Titus came like a flood and destroyed the city. That is the end of the prophecy. There is nothing further. And aren't we strictly enjoined not to to add anything to the Inspired Word? Once you do start adding things, then it is possible (I suppose) to come up with the idea that the Holocaust was God's punishment - rather than the ungodly actions of a genocidal dictator.
ReplyDeleteThere is a lot of prophecy in the world, but Bible prophecy stands alone. It is specific history, written in advance. And I was surprised to realise that it interprets itself, once you accept both Hebrew and Christian Greek Scriptures as inspired.
For example, the Beasts of Revelation and "the mark of the beast". How can we understand what the "beasts" are unless we have studied the Book of Daniel, which tells us clearly and simply what they are?
Artur Szulc, thanks so much for posting and congratulations on your books. I wish you every success with them. And I like your photo on your webpage.
ReplyDeleteDanusha Goska, Thank you!
ReplyDeleteI just found you blog today and I find it one of the most interesting blogs I have ever encountered.
Obviously, I don't agree with every comment that everyone posts on the blog. I usually don't say anything about comments I disagree with.
ReplyDeleteI'll make an exception now, though. I don't agree that Jews don't owe permanent loyalty to anyone, which appears in a previous post.
I think, first, of my Jewish friends, who have been tremendously loyal to me.
I also think of Jews who have been very loyal to Poland. There is a previous blog post on this very topic.
Certainly there are, and always were, notable Jews loyal to Poland, and helpful to particular Poles.
DeleteWhat I was talking about was general trends. For a Jewish opinion on this matter, please read my review that comes when you click on my name in this post.
The previous link from my name was incorrect.
DeleteThe correct link is:
http://www.amazon.com/Pogromy-v-Ross-i-Russian/dp/B003IPDZ1A/ref=cm_cr-mr-title
Danusha Goska: You should know that Jan Peczkis is a regular contributor to a virulently anti-Semitic site. Polish readers can learn more by checking out the following link:
ReplyDeletegrypa666.wordpress.com/category/jan-peczkis/
This person does not belong in a forum whose members aim to combat racism. Read his blog to find out why.
That is a flat lie, and the cowardly anonymous poster should be ashamed of himself/herself.
DeleteLook up the link above. The reference to me is purely of an imformative nature, and was a mass-message sent out by me and posted by someone else.
I do not endorse anything at any site. I merely alert readers to be aware of and to study my works, just as I had done here on Dr. Goska's blog.
Otherwise, I have sparred with anti-Semites over my acceptance of the fact of the Holocaust, and my refusal to support Jews-rule-the-world conspiracy theories.
And, yes, I strive to combat racism, specifically the most widely-accepted racism of all--against Poles and Christians. If you don't believe me, just click on my name in this posting.
This anonymous character, apart from his unmitigated gall in dictating who does or does not belong on this forum, even says:
Delete"Read his blog to find out why."
First time I heard that I have a blog. Will you please tell me WHERE?
I'm shocked! Victor Lapides
DeleteThe link takes me to Amazon where Jan Peczkis has reviewed hundreds of books. Nothing nefarious. Shame on you Mr. Lapides!
Delete[posting as anonymous, because I don't know how to pick a profile to post - Victor Lapides
DeleteJoy, the link starting "grypa666" and posted by anonymous above is in Polish, which of course I can't read, but I can easily make out loads of references to Jews, antisemitism, Zionism, and a picture ridiculing Elie Wiesel, and another picture overlapping a Jewish star with I think the Russian eagle symbol. And Peczkis's name can be seen on the site, though I don't know in what context. (The first time I tried to get on it was unsuccessful and somehow I did see that Amazon thing you're talking about, but trying again got me onto the Polish language site. Anyway, I read his posts here and he leaves little to the imagination. Check it out and tell me I'm wrong. Victor
To the contrary--if you are going to attack me, YOU be specific in your insinuations.
DeleteAs we are getting some comments through i am hoping you are back on line (to an extent) Danusha? And I hope your arm isn't hurting too much.
ReplyDeleteIce... its makes me shudder to remember in childhood making slides to make ice more slippery... what were we thinking of?!
Re the above accusations about Jan Peczkis, I think if you want to make accusations it is always better not to do so anonymously.
I haven't read the site, or the mysterious(?) blog, life is too short. But the problem here is that we - Poles/Polonians - have been put into a very clever Catch 22. If we don't protest the "All Poles Are Fascist Brutes" agenda, then that must be because its true. But if we do protest it, that proves that we are "fascist brutes", and we are so bad that we are denying it.
As I said, life is too short, given that it all ends up in the same place.
But it seems important to say that if the site anon mentioned is claiming that "the Jews" rule the world - and noting that Jan P is NOT saying that - then, first, the Jews have my sympathy. Its bad enough being constantly blamed for the horrors of WW2, the theft of the River Danube and the shooting of Bambi's mother (as us Poles are), let alone being asked to take the blame for the whole mess that we, the children of Adam, are in.
But doesn't this underline the importance and urgency of the Christian preaching work? Because the Christian Greek Scriptures tell us clearly and simply who is really ruling the world.
For example, at John 14:30, Jesus referred to Satan as "the ruler of the world". And at 2 Corinthians 4:4, Satan is called "the god of this system of things".
Satan, and the demons. They are in charge of the present system of things. Isn't that why we are being asked with increasing urgency to be "no part" of the world?
sue thanks so much 4 expression of concern
ReplyDeletemobility impaired
find it really hard 2 stand up for example and of course only one hand for typing
limiting how many pain killers taking but they are strong -- make me spacey / nauseated
so cant really respond as i'd like to accusation, above
here's my best shot:
anonymous posts r cowardly and worthless
true of all anonymous posts, not just this one
wish i could type more on the value of posts signed with a real first and last name but can't
2 -- vague accusations r also cowardly and worthless
if someone said something u disagree with, quote it word 4 word and cite it
anything less is mcarthyite
3 -- all concerned parties should be allowed 2 discuss important issues
no one is so pure that he or she can produce a list of those worthy 2 speak and those unworthy 2 speak
that's a robespierre tactic -- listing the pure and the impure
in america we have the first amendment. if ideas r objectionable, then man up and disempower them with ur own ideas, not by sending those with whom u disagree to siberia, literal or metaphorical
Well I should agree from my own experience and my 'entourage " with Polish in general and my wife who also is a Polish that yes ,there is a lot of antisemitism. My cousin at one time invited a group od Polish for a party, one they got drunk and assuming he's Lebanese they thought he would share their anti antisemitis , but my cousin asked them to leave his house once they mentioned that Hitler missed to exterminate them all. Had same experience when i visited Poland many times, with the family of my wife , the nephew of my wife who's 22 years old stating the same opinion that Hitler should have finished them . I am sorry to say wherever i travel in Poland and am talking side streets of Krakow as example where you see the Swastika all over the buildings walls. A good experience in Bedzin ,near Katowice , where all 60,000 Jews were exterminated , my wife was driving and asking for the train Wagon monument for the Jews , we stopped to ask a lady and she said she doesn't know, and after we foudn that the monument was 50 meter away at the corner of her house, I knew from her face that she was lying. Now what I dont agree that to shift the blame on Poles, as many of them saved many Jews , and if the Poles are antisemitic this doesn't make them responsible for the Holocaust. The Jewish sometimes play silly game when it come to Polish and what bother me is you hear more critics from the Jews against the Polish than the German ( I have to say also that the Jews are RACIST ALSO., as the Old Testament is a racist book ) ,the treatment of Palestinian is similar to the Nazis except the oven part , letting the people of Gaza live without having a sour system for years under occupation is not better than Nazis, making fun of the Arabs and Palestinian in Hollywood that is cntrolled by the jews is the same as the Nazis .Human being is full of crap,German,Poles , the American cheered for hITLER BIG TIME , and Ford Motors sent donation to the Nazi party prior to taking power. George Bush grandfather made deals with Hitler , all crap.no one is better. The whole responsibility of the Holocaust went unpunished, Canada returned the Jewish that were trying to escape Germany back to Germany, Texas gulf clubs used to have signs " No Black ,Dogs Or Jews allowed". This the Western Christianity , thank God that I don't belong to it, I am a Christian Lebanese , and thank God in the Christian middle east we never burned women as witches as the Church in Europe did ,we never blesses the beheading of people as the European church did.The Holocaust happened when the Christ was replaced by Hitler and Worshiped as God, same as Mussolini . I like the part in Godfather 3 when the Cardinal tell Al Pacino that Christianity in Europe is like the pebble in the fountain, for years it sit there ,but when you crack it open is it still dry from the inside, and that is the European Christianity ,wet from the outside and dry from the inside. May monuments .many cathedrals but Nazi Germany went unpunished , 20,000 SS guarded Auschwitz where over 120,000 Polish also died , and 500,000 Gypsies, but only 20 High ranking SS in Auschwitz were brought to Trial, and many of them lived happily in south America, Kitchener Canada, and USA ,until now and they prosper and they have decedents ,and Canadian,US and South American Government knew exactly who and where they are , stop blaming Poles and other , all Hypocrisy!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteSeveral years ago a friend's daughter went to Europe with a group from her Jewish school (in the States) and visited Auschwitz. They also visited a Jewish cemetery in the area, and while inside, with the gate open and the padlock hanging from it, some local(s) shut the gate and locked them inside. That wasn't their only rough experience, as I remember. Victor Lapides
DeleteHello Gabe 043, isn't the problem here the politics that spin the history of WW2? I should think I could, if i wished, find anecdotal evidence about any country or people anywhere that would put them in a bad light. We are all the imperfect, dying children of disobedient Adam - us Poles/Polonians the same as anybody else.
ReplyDeleteHowever, God has asked us to look at others in a positive way, and taught us that love "does not keep account of the injury", so I try to stick with that (as much as my imperfect self will allow me!)
You are right about the hypocrisy and the double standards. They seem to be getting more blatant by the day. So i always feel it is worth pointing them out, as that does show the politics of it.
I hope your arm is improving Danusha. Do you know how long you will be in plaster?
sue thank you 4 ur continued concern
ReplyDeletethink i'm supposed 2 b immobile 4 1 month at least
mr lapides u cling so tightly 2 the bieganski stereotype i can only hope you'll educate yourself and read the book
but of course u appear comfortable in your bigotry so you have no impetus 2 do so
there is no way 2 reach those who feel comfortable holding prejudices i fear
Don't worry. I'm still loveable as ever. Victor Lapides
DeleteHello Victor, I see you are still with us... I wish I could talk to you privately but have to leave that to you. But in the context of this blog issue, would a discussion of the Anne Frank story be helpful? Only I want you think how the story of Anne and her family might be told if it happened in Poland, as it well could have, given Poland too was under Nazi occupation, and an even more brutal one. Because wouldn't the story be told in a completely different way? Wouldn't the emphasis all be on the betrayal by the local policeman, and it would be "proof" that all Poles are More Horrid Than Anyone Else in Time and Space AND they Shot Bambi's Mother etc. Same tragic events, but totally different spin. And, by the way, I think that the way it is told, with the emphasis on the goodness and heroism of the rescuers is exactly right. I am not wanting that to change. I am just asking you if you would think about what a different emphasis could be put on it if the politics of WW2 required.
DeleteSue, I think this effort is about done but thanks for the thoughts. Victor Lapides
Deletemr lapides reminds me of scott from cape cod
ReplyDeletea guy who phones radio talk shows and tells anecdote after anecdote about jews
sabotaging innocent non-jews and the money supply and international banking
no doubt each anecdote is true enuf
the problem is scott's conclusion -- that jews are somehow categorically diff from non-jews
i cannot believe that -- not about any group
so i work to educate myself
something scott from cape cod and other comfortable bigots never do
Regarding Recent Posts:
ReplyDeleteAs for those who experienced hostility towards Jews in modern Poland, please click on my name, in this post, to be directed to a review of mine that delves into these matters.
The constant need for fund raising requires that the Holocaust be continually promoted. Changing the perpetrators keeps the ads from getting stale, with history only an inconvenient encumbrance.
ReplyDeleteNemo
I would like to make a few clarifying remarks about "information" given in Gabe043's post. The pre-war population of Bedzin was just around 50,000, of whom, according to the 1939 town census 22,167 were Jews. At the time the town had a Jewish mayor but there were never 60,000 Jews resident in Bedzin. Moreover there are/were more than a few Holocaust survivors many of whom live in australia including my father, his sister, aunts and several cousins. I wonder how the figure of 60,000 Jews in pre-WW11 Bedzin and the idea that all were annihilated has gained traction?
ReplyDeleteBedzin has a 14th century castle which was built on the foundations of an 11th century fort destroyed during the Mongol invasion of 1241. Nearby is a church with a plaque put up by Jewish survivors which thanks the wartime parish priest for sheltering/hiding Jews from the Germans.
All this is public knowledge yet what you, Gabe043, knew about Bedzin, which I assume you gained from your wife and her family, was quite wrong. You might like to know that at present there is a lot of restoration going on in Bedzin including the Mizrachi house of prayer. The motives of the woman asked for information clearly included a degree of hostility to Jews. A distant cousin of mine had a similar experience when asking for directions to the Jewish cemetery. I can't help but wonder if the reactions would have been any different if he (and by extension your wife and you), had asked about directions to the castle and the cemetery? My relative didn't even know there was a castle, apparently being only interested in his own family history. That didn't seen odd to him but it seemed odd to me. What about you?
So you are from Bedzin. Very interesting. So did Rutka Laskier, the "Polish Anne Frank". To read my review of her diary-book, please click on my name in this posting.
DeleteMy father's family - assimilated Polish Jews - was from Bedzin but my mother's family - ethnic Poles - was from Sosnowiec and Czeladz, where some of them live still. I was born in Warsaw but lived with my grandparents in Sosnowiec for three and a half years before returning to Warsaw when my parents were finally allocated a flat and could move out of their bathroom-less and toilet-less bed sit.
ReplyDeleteI will look up your review of Rutka Laskier. Thank you.
Most of Poles don't like when tourists ask them about Holocaust monuments and cementeries. We hear too often that Poland is one big mass grave of Jewish people. Some of us may react with anger when asked. Some will simply lie. Gabe043 probably wasn't the first one who asked that woman about wagon monument. Maybe she was fed up with that question.
ReplyDeleteI don't like where this discussion is going. I know stories about Jews in communist security, I also know stories about Polish szmalcowniks who betrayed their countrymen. This talk is starting to remind me an old joke from Soviet era. American-Russian dispute:"You, Russians, break human rights in your camps!" "And you, Americans, persecute black people!"
Sadly we, Poles, don't like to remember Polish Jews who were loyal and heroic. Instead talking about traitors on both sides, why don't we mention people like Baruch Steiberg, Bernard Mond, Henryk Jedwab, Stanisław Aronson or Berek Joselewicz. If Jews could have been such good Poles, doesn't that say something about us? Doesn't that say something about Poland if they were willing to die for her?
Hello Lukasz. Yes, it does sometimes feel as if the current Official Version of Polish history begins and ends with Auschwitz. Nothing apparently happened there before or afterwards - except anything that Professor Jan Gross happens to write about. I don't involve myself in Polish Jewish issues as I feel (rightly or wrongly) that they are so politicised that there is no level ground for me in them. But I do think it well worth illuminating the blatant double standards - which demonstrate the politics. And I think that we should follow the lead of our Creator, Jehovah, the God of Abraham, the true God, and always try to look on others in a positive way - not a negative critical way. And I think that this agenda can be discussed without going against that. Also we need to remember that God has told us that love "does not keep account of the injury", as "the world" is pushing us very strongly in the other way - albeit in a very selective way. As George Orwell might have said: "All injuries are equal, but some are more equal than others."
DeleteLet us not give credence to false symmetries. The US treatment of blacks in the past, however unfair, cannot remotely be compared with the ghastly and systematic denial of human rights under tsarist Russia and then the Soviet Union.
DeleteAs for Poles preferring to dwell on Jews who betrayed Poland rather than those who supported her, the question becomes whether Jewish loyalty or disloyalty was more common--I am speaking about the times when Jews were in a position that they did not reasonably HAVE to support Poland. Furthermore, to the extent that the Jews were a nation-less people who were allowed to live in Poland as a favor from the Polish nation, loyalty to Poland was something expected--not a favor but a due.
In any case, could it be that Poles prefer to talk about Jews who were disloyal to Poland because Jews prefer to talk about Polish anti-Semitism rather than about the ways that their ancestors had provoked, or at least facilitated this anti-Semitism?
Also, could it be that Poles prefer to talk about Jews who were disloyal to Poland because Jews prefer to bad-mouth their experience in Poland instead of remembering all the privileges they had--privileges which most Poles did not have?
Mr. Pieczkis, I was quoting a joke. It simply came to my mind when I was reading posts above. Maybe its to old to be funny, but it shouldn't be treated seriously even now. I would always chose U.S.A. (even in it's darkest moment of history) over Soviet Union. And I think most of my countrymen would agree with me.
DeleteAs for Jews in communist service, how many could that be? Few hundred? I don't think it's enough to condemn all Polish Jews.
Jewish experience in Poland is often seen in the shadow of Holocaust. It's unfair image. Shoah came from Germany, a foreign land. Life of many Jews in Poland was no fairy tale, especially those of poor backround. But comparing their fate to fate of slaves is nonsense. They didin't came on slaveships. They didin't work on cotton plantations. If it was so bad, then only masochists would stay.
Joke or no joke, you had cited it as a valid example. Glad that we now agree on the non sequitur.
DeleteTo speak of "few Jews" as UB leaders is disingenuous because there was only a limited number of leadership positions available. There were thousands of them. Even then, some 37% of UB leaders were Jewish in a nation whose population was only 1% Jewish. This is a HUGE disparity. And it was by no means the first time that Poland's Jews had supported Poland's enemies to a very significant extent.
It is not a matter of condemning all Jews. Far from it. It is about getting Jews to finally own up to their own wrongs against Poles instead of engaging in selective historical memory by only complaining about Polish anti-Semitism. Get it?
Lukasz, please see this series of blog posts:
ReplyDeletehttp://bieganski-the-blog.blogspot.com/2011/02/polands-importance-to-jews-jews.html
Again, I urge Polish readers to click on the link I mentioned above (grypa666) for more information on Jan Peczkis. He, of course, claims to have nothing to do with this vile site, claiming that he only sent out a mass email (which makes you wonder about the company he keeps). Let's hear him explain why his name prominently appears in the site's category list.
ReplyDeleteReaders of this blog should also check out the following blog:
http://piotrbein.wordpress.com/2010/03/14/judeomasons-are-at-it-again/
This blog entry, authored by one Piotr Bein (a crackpot basement dweller who blames Zionists for the Holocaust and advocates the crackpot theories of David Duke and other such luminaries), introduces Jan Peczkis as (check the link, it's all there) follows:
"Just to refresh with whom we are dealing again, here are several reviews by our American-Polish reviewer on Amazon.com."
Our reviewer? Care to comment, Jan Peczkis?
For shame.
Molly
The shame is YOURS, Molly. You are resorting to guilt-by-association, a standard left-wing tactic. Oh well, nothing new.
DeleteBTW, the notion that I am "his" reviewer is simply his opinion. I am no one's reviewer except my own. I am an independent thinker.
If you choose to bring up Piotr Bein, which not represent him fully in terms of what he is saying? On the page you bring up, he talks about how outspoken priests are being silenced. That is why he brings up my reviews.
Well said, Dr. Goska.
no one should be blacklisted. we should talk to each other, and take on each other's ideas with words.
ReplyDeleteblacklisting is a disgusting tactic of the world's robespierres and mccarthys and hitlers and stalins.
stop recommending it here. understand?
a second point. just because someone is quoted by antisemites does not mean someone is antisemitic. antisemitic sites quote the adl, the nyt, etc
if anyone here wants to make a concrete, specific and civil objection to anything anyone else here has posted, please do so. please stop posting innuendo and snide insults.
JEWS TORTURED AND MURDERED VOLUNTEER TO AUSCHWITZ
Deletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Witold_Pilecki
Witold Pilecki (May 13, 1901 May 25, 1948; codenames Roman Jezierski, Tomasz Serafiski, Druh, Witold) was a soldier of the Second Polish Republic, the founder of the Secret Polish Army (Tajna Armia Polska) Polish resistance group and a member of the Home Army (Armia Krajowa). As the author of the first intelligence report on Auschwitz, Pilecki's operation enabled the Polish Government in Exile to convince the Allies that the Holocaust was taking place.
During World War II, he volunteered for a Polish resistance operation to get imprisoned at Auschwitz concentration camp in order to gather intelligence and escape. While in the camp, Pilecki organized a resistance movement and as early as 1940, informed the Western Allies of Nazi Germany's Auschwitz atrocities. He escaped from the camp in 1943 and took part in the Warsaw Uprising. He remained loyal to the London-based Polish government in exile and was executed in 1948 by the communist secret police Urzad Bezpieczestwa on charges of working for "foreign imperialism" [...]
After 1945 Poland was occupated by Soviets and so-called "Polish" communist regime was totally based on Polish-origin Jews which came to Poland with Red Army. They had main positions in government and local authorities, they had abt. 90% in UB (communist secret police) authorithies and min. 40% in UB total.
They tortured and murdered dozens of thousands Polish patriots between 1945 and 1956.
As they tortured and murdered Witold Pilecki, war hero, volunteer to Auschwitz.
Some of Jews who participated in tortures and so-called court-sanctioned-murder of Pilecki:
Henryk Podlaski ( Hersz Podlaski, son of Mojzes Podlaski and Szprynca Austern)
Rubin Szwajg ( son of Dawid Szwajg)
Lew Hochberg. ( son of Szoel Gohberg and Rejzla Waintraub)
Jacek Rózanski (Józef Goldberg),
Adam Humer
Józef Czaplicki
Roman Romkowski (Natan Grunspan-Kikiel)
Piotr Smietanski executed Witold Pilecki with a single shot to the back of the head. Piotr Smietanski emigrated from Poland to Israel after 1968.
http://www.doomedsoldiers.com/volunteer-to-Auschwitz.html :
Witold Pilecki was interrogated and tortured by: Col. Jozef Rozanski, Lt. S. Lyszkowski, Lt. Krawczynski, 2nd Lt. J. Kroszel, Lt. Tadeusz Slowianek, 2nd Lt. Eugeniusz Chimczak, and Lt. Stefan Alaborski*, all famed for their brutality and inhumane treatment of political prisoners. The horror of the interrogations lasted for over six months. Pilecki's interrogations were personally supervised by Colonel Roman Romkowski. The other prisoners incarcerated at the Rakowiecka Prison at the same time as Pilecki stated, that his entire body was black and blue as a result of endless beatings, and that all of his fingernails were torn off. Pilecki had told his wife that Auschwitz was child's play in comparison to the horror he had endured at the hands of his communists tormentors.
*all Jews
Interrogation methods of Jewish UB:
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz: The Dialectics of Pain: The Interrogation Methods of the Communist Secret Police in Poland, 1944-1955. Glaukopis, vol. 2/3 (2004-2005). Part 1
http://www.projectinposterum.org/docs/chodakiewicz1.htm
Many Poles complain that negative comments about Polish behaviour are always generalised so that all are tarred with the same brush and here we have a perfect example of someone doing exactly the same by heading their "contribution" to this thread "JEWS TORTURED AND MURDERED etc etc...
ReplyDeleteLook Wosiu, some Jews were communists as were some Poles and some Jews were capitalists as were plenty of WASPS. What's it prove - absolutely nothing. Your entire post here about about Jewish communists in Poland is irrelevant to the discussion and Pilecki, had he read your post, would I am sure, have given your argument short shrift, as would Jan Karski.
Hi Peter, Wosiu, Danusha and all, Isn't the point here the double standards? Anything can apparently be used as proof positive that "all Poles" shot Bambi's mother/stole the river Danube/started the great fire of London*.
DeleteIf that is going to be the state of play, then it should work both ways. But it doesn't. Of course, I would very much rather that no-one was generalised about in this way. It is never right or fair.
And we will all benefit ourselves if, in the face of these pressures from the world, we can remember that love "does not keep account of the injury".
It helps me to know that while the world chooses to ignore Stalin's victims, the Creator of life does not.
Jehovah has told us so right from the start. “What have you done? Listen! Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground."
The millions and millions killed by Stalin and his willing executioners are not hidden from, nor forgotten by, the true God. If you wish, I can send you some information published by The Watchtower Society about what happened to Polish and other Eastern European Jehovah's Witnesses at the hands of the Stalin regime.
*strike out accusations which do not fit the current Handbook of Political Correctness (I can no longer keep up)
Let us refocus this discussion. Is Poland truly the most anti-Semitic country in the world? If so, it should be impossible to locate even one Polish Jew who had not personally suffered from Polish anti-Semitism. In fact, I have come across several Polish Jews who wrote that, at least while growing up, they had personally experienced no Polish anti-Semitism! To see my new list of these self-reviewed books, please click on my name in this specific posting.
ReplyDeleteAll this talk by a certain vocal element of the Jewish community that about how Poland is the world's most anti-semitic country blah blah blah makes no sense since Jews disproportionately CHOSE Poland to live in for ONE THOUSAND YEARS. I'm sure there were some bad Poles since there is good in bad in all groups of people.
ReplyDeleteBut if there was this overwhelming anti-semitism in Poland.....24 hours a day....7 days a week....365 days a year....for ONE THOUSAND YEARS...then WHY did most Jews CHOOSE to live in Poland...for ONE THOUSAND YEARS??????? That's nuts!
If Poles were as anti-semitic as these Jews claim...then Jews have to be the most INSANE or FOOLISH people in the world!
A lot of this "Polish people are the worst anti-semites in the world" I see when I have read Jewish nationalist ethnic newspapers like the "Jewish Press" and the Jewish "Forward". But the very strange thing about these newspapers is that while they go on and on and on and on....blasting Poland for its "long history of anti-semitism"....they also IRONICALLY talk about how Jewish culture had FLOURISHED and grew a lot in Poland. HOW can this be???
Its too bad these Jews always criticizing Poland....never talk about the great rabbi Moses Isserles who said...."If it were NOT for Poland...the existence of the tribe of Israel would have been unbearable". Indeed rabbi Isserles is correct. Yet Poland NEVER EVER gets credit for letting Jews into Poland when most other countries kicked them out. Jews NEVER give Poland credit for ANYTHING. So if the Poles were this horrible....WHY did Jews continue to CHOOSE and STAY to live in Poland for ONE THOUSAND YEARS??? That makes no sense unless they are crazy or foolish.
Most of the greatest Jewish rabbis and philosophers came from POLAND....NOT other countries. Gee I wonder why. It must have been all of that "Polish anti-semitism" that allowed this to happen.
And if Poland was this horrible to Jews....WHY didn't they leave Poland hundreds of years ago???
You cannot deal with Jewish-Polish relations as if they were simple. Casimir the Great invited Jews into Poland and both the kings and the nobles were very generous in giving them autonomous rights in the land. The great opponent of the Jews throughout Polish history was the Catholic church. Its reasons were not racial but religious, but the difference sometimes is meaningless. Jews were loyal to Poland through the last Polish partition in 1795. Thereafter many of them chose to place loyalty to Austria, Prussia (Germany) and Russia above loyalty to a disappeared Poland. Many were voluntarily or forcibly russified; other chose German culture. This tended to alienate them from Polish nationalism which by the end of the 19th century came to be rather antisemitic. Those Jews in Poland between WWI and WWII were often more inclined to favor Russian culture than Polish culture, especially the ones from the Baltic states. This prevented the old symbiosis of Jews and Poles to return.
ReplyDelete