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Wolfratshausen: Rabbi Weiss rooted in bathhouse

2022-06-18T15:40:41.595Z


Wolfratshausen: Rabbi Weiss rooted in bathhouse Created: 06/18/2022, 17:34 By: Franca Winkler It was like returning home for Rabbi Asher Weiss (2nd from left), his family once lived in Waldram. © Bathhouse Waldram – Since the closure of the Jewish DP camp in Föhrenwald in 1957, there have probably never been so many rabbis in the Isar valley at once: as part of the three-day European Rabbi Con


Wolfratshausen: Rabbi Weiss rooted in bathhouse

Created: 06/18/2022, 17:34

By: Franca Winkler

It was like returning home for Rabbi Asher Weiss (2nd from left), his family once lived in Waldram.

© Bathhouse

Waldram – Since the closure of the Jewish DP camp in Föhrenwald in 1957, there have probably never been so many rabbis in the Isar valley at once: as part of the three-day European Rabbi Conference, which was attended by 250 rabbis from 43 countries in Munich this week, one recently attended group from Israel and Germany spontaneously visited the bathhouse as a place of remembrance.


"I suddenly got a call at work that a delegation from the former Jewish DP camp in Föhrenwald would like to visit us in about an hour," reports Badehaus Verein Chairwoman Sybille Krafft.

"Then things went well for us," she adds with a wink.

Everything was prepared in no time at all and kosher drinks were procured - a gesture that made the important clergyman happy.


Board member Eva Greif led the German Rabbis Shmuel Aharon Brodman and Yehuda Aharon Horovitz as well as the Israeli Rabbis Avraham Koszman, Yossi Spring, Asher Weiss and Elieser Simcha Weiss through the museum and showed the guests in particular the rooms and exhibits with which Föhrenwald was the "last Yiddish shtetl on European soil” is documented in the exhibition.


The religious scholars lingered in awe in front of a picture of Rabbi Jekusiel Yehuda Halberstam, who was so important in the history of religion, reports Krafft.

This famous "Klausenburg Rebbe" had a cruel fate: his wife and eleven children were murdered by the Nazis.

Jewish ritual bath

"I have lost everything, but not God" - this quote has been handed down from him and can be read today on an exhibition wall in the memorial.

Halberstam once had a decisive influence on religious life in the camp and also ensured that a mikveh, a Jewish ritual bath, was set up here.

Among the group of visitors was Rabbi Asher Weiss - "one of the most important rabbinical figures in the world," said Rabbi Brodman of Munich.

Rabbi Weiss, who comes from the Hasidic Sanz-Klausenburg dynasty, has a very personal story in common with Föhrenwald: For him it was “a return to his homeland”, as he explained in German.

Because his parents had once married in this Jewish DP camp and his older brother was born in 1947 in Föhrenwald.

"The visit touches me very much," he said in parting.

Before returning to Munich, the guests drove through Waldram and in particular to the former New Jersey Street (today's Korbinianstraße).

The rabbis were housed here during the camp and probably the father of Rav Asher Weiss also lived here, Krafft suspects.

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-06-18

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