Hidon

לא אמות כי אחיה

“I Shall Not Die – Rather I Shall Live” [Psalms: 118]

Nowhere is Yom HaShoah more poignantly commemorated than in Israel, the Jewish state that rose from its ashes. On that day, tourists flock to Yad VaShem and local residents attend the memorial services held in their respective communities. Traffic stops and two minutes of solemn silence are observed throughout the country to allow the “Sridei HaShoah,” the survivors of the Holocaust, a term that can be extended to include every Jewish person alive today, to reflect – to mourn those who have passed and to resolve that the Hitlers of the world shall never know the taste of victory.

There is, however, a Yom HaShaah tradition in Israel that is unfamiliar to most Jewish people living in the Diaspora. Each year, just after Passover, a group comprised of seventy young men and women from all over the world convenes in the Holy Land. They are a diverse group, representing a broad spectrum of nationalities, religious observance, and languages. They are, however, united by a common passion and a common tongue: TaNaKh, the Bible. More than a book, more than a pursuit, the TaNaKh is lingua franca for these students who have come to Israel to compete in the annual Hidon HaTaNaKh, the Worldwide Bible Contest held in Jerusalem on Yom HaAtzmaut, Israel’s Independence Day. Having ploughed the Bible’s breadth and depth, their fluency bonds them; their “give and take” is marked by references, allusions, and “inside jokes” that go over the heads of those who merely dabble in Biblical study and put the young scholars in a league of their own. And every year, after participating in a number of public ceremonies commemorating Yom HaShoah, these seventy students sit for a rigorous set of exams testing their fluency in the Bible; no detail is too small, no name too obscure for them to bring forth from the vast storehouse of knowledge that each has accumulated. It is no coincidence that these tests are administered on the day that is known as Yom HaShoah v’HaGvurah – The Day of Holocaust and Heroism.

Heroism is a broad concept that takes on a great many definitions. The fighters of the Warsaw Ghetto come to mind at once; after all, Yom HaShoah marks the anniversary of the end of their struggle against the obscenity of Nazi violence. But there were other heroes, many others. For some, heroism was expressed by engaging in physical combat; for some it was expressed by the refusal to surrender their dignity and/or their faith. The Holocaust cost the Jewish people some six million heroes, and their blood cries out to us for justice. This justice takes on a great many definitions as well. How best to seek justice? What is more important, perhaps, how best to pay tribute?

Some have sought justice by hunting down Nazis and bringing them to trial. Some have devoted their lives to causes that promote tolerance throughout the world. Books have been written, monuments dedicated, and museums built. For some survivors, the greatest justice and most meaningful tribute lay in building a Moledet, a homeland for the Jewish people – a place where, as Robert Frost put it, “When you have to go there, they have to let you in.” These brave men and women rolled up their sleeves, exposing the numbers on their arms, and did what needed to be done – whether this meant building settlements or defending them.

There is, however, another form of tribute to the memories of the Holocaust and its heroes, at once tribute and revenge against those who would rid the world of the Jews and their heritage, who would burn their sacred texts and defile Torah scrolls. And that is the embracing of those very texts, studying them, reveling in them, instilling their lessons in the depths of the hearts and minds of our youth. This is the tribute paid by the contestants in Israel’s Annual Bible Contest; this is the ultimate response to those who, “in each and every generation stand against us to destroy us.”

The Torah, like the Land of Israel, is compared to milk and honey. Revenge is indeed sweet. Am Yisrael Hai.