For the Jewish community the most important building in the shtetles of the Pale was the synagogue. Their construction consisted of brick and stone, or wood. Many were beautiful examples of contemporary or older style architecture. The synagogue served as the religious center of the community. Here Jews congregated regularly for prayer, commemorated a long list of Jewish holidays and educated their youth.
The synagogue of Tiktin, one of Poland’s oldest, constructed in 1642, looked like a fortress and had a long spiral staircase leading to a turret on the roof for scouting approaching enemies. To enter the synagogue one had to descend seven steps representing seven letters in the Hebrew word Memaamakim meaning from the depth: “From the depth I called to You, Oh God.” Next to the entrance, there was a wide slit in the wall covered with iron bars, which served as the opening of the tzeddakah (charity) box. Over the box was a poem written by the Ibn Ezra, a great eleventh and twelfth century Jewish man of letters. It said:
A person frets over the loss of his money,
But does not fret over the loss of his days,
Yet his money will not help him,
And his days will not return to him.
Charity redeems from death.
Rabbi Shepsel Tepperovich was the only rabbi in Tiktin, and he was the source of all Torah wisdom for the fifty percent of its citizenry that were Jewish.
Next to the old Synagogue was a small house where Jewish men gathered to study the Torah, and where Jewish youth learned Hebrew, Jewish history, lore and culture.
In 1843, Nicholas I was Czar of Russia. He characterized the Jews as “the leeches of the country.” He had instituted one of the most onerous laws in Jewish history when, in 1827, he decreed that once a Jew reached the age of twelve, he was required to serve in the Russian army for twenty-five years. At twelve, he attended the same schools as the Russian soldier’s sons. The purpose was simple; while serving in the military, a Jew had the option to convert or die.
In general, Jews had to endure ill treatment by their officers. Priests subjected them to various tortures in order to accept baptism. They were awakened in the middle of the night and compelled to kneel until they accepted conversion or collapse; they were given high salt meals and denied water; they were beaten and tortured, and it was the rare recruit who was able to hang on to his faith.
Jewish communities had a quota of Jewish twelve-year-olds to supply to the military. This quota was a certain number of conscripts per each thousand males. Who would go? Who would not go? In some areas, children of the poorest Jews were forced into service. Influential Jewish leaders had this task and hired ‘khapers’ to fill the quota. In essence these hired men were salaried kidnapers.
The Jewish conscripts were kept in cantonments and as a result they were called cantonists.
CHAPTER 3
Kolakoff followed on horseback as the rabbi and his seven students walked down the hill the one-half kilometer to the town. The rabbi accompanied the boys to their homes and then he walked alone toward his home.
Kolakoff said, “Nice looking boys, rabbi. They’ll make fine soldiers. I know you’ll be proud of their service to the Czar.” Kolakoff’s smile turned into a quiet laugh as he turned his horse and trotted off in the opposite direction.
Kolakoff was the local official responsible for ensuring that the proper numbers of twelve-year-old Jews “joined” the service once per year. Since the Jews were forced to live in a solitary area, it was a simple matter to take a census, and therefore arrive at the exact number of twelve year old Jews who would “volunteer” to serve Nicholas I.
As the rabbi walked alone toward his house, he thought of how the Czar’s blatant attempt to decimate the Jews by his twenty-five year conscription mandate had the effect of creating an aura of distrust and hatred within the Jewish community itself. Who would go? Who would not go? The authorities would accuse those Jewish families whose boys would or could not go of injustice and of protecting their own.
Anything that disrupted the organizational structure of the Jewish community and pitted Jew against Jew served the Czar’s purpose, which was to destroy the Jewish community and end Judaism in his empire. The Czar hoped to accomplish this goal by converting or killing the conscripts, and by disrupting Jewish life forcing many to emigrate. Rumor had it that his plan was to relocate the rest into an as-yet-unidentified place of exile. The rabbi felt there was truth in it.
He entered his small, wooden house where his wife, Anna, greeted him. She was two inches taller then the rabbi and had long, pitch-black hair always covered by a homemade, colorful babushka. In contrast to the rabbi, the corners of her mouth, always turned up in a slight smile, added an angelic appearance to her face, and the rabbi, in private, called her his Mona Lisa.
Their marriage was an arranged one as was the custom in the early part of the nineteenth century. Time, familiarity and children resulted in a love built upon mutual respect. She was six years younger then the rabbi. They had three children: two recently married daughters, Shana and Maram, one living in Bialystok and the other in Kishinev. A three-year old son, Jacob, blessed the rabbi and his wife later in life.
Another, and immediate problem, was on the rabbi’s mind. There was a growing Jewish minority in a state of unrest over the conscription problem. The leaders of this group looked to the rabbi for direction. The militants among them were advocating local and even national resistance.
To help the rabbi assess the mindset of the militants he called a meeting. Since the rabbi had heard the murmuring of discontent, he elected to talk to the leaders to ascertain what he could do to prevent the certainty of bloodshed if the movement evolved into a state of uncontrolled and unregulated passion. He waited for the men to appear.
Three men were the spokespersons for a sizeable group of discontented Jews. The rabbi considered these men the most intelligent in their small community. They were men who could hold their own discussing religion with the rabbi, and they had emerged as the leaders.
The men arrived one at a time over the course of twenty minutes so as not to arouse any suspicion by arriving in a group. Anna had set the kitchen table with a bottle of wine and sponge cake, and then retired to another room. Jacob was asleep. After the last man had arrived, they all sat down at the table. The rabbi recited the blessing over the wine, and the men proceeded to dip their sponge cake into the small wine glasses.
The carpenter, Isaac Prushkin, was the first man to speak. The rabbi observed his intense expression. He never smiled and his face reflected a constant state of depression. Prushkin’s lips, hidden behind his long mustache and thick black beard, his half-closed, dull eyes, his tendency to stare downward, all enhanced this impression. He picked up his head, stared at the rabbi and said, “Rabbi, some of us have had enough. It’s time to take a stand. Can we sit by and watch them take our sons and force them to convert? Are we entitled only to enjoy our sons for twelve years? Is our purpose to raise boys for the Czar’s army? Better we should not bring any children into the world. A Jewish husband and wife are no better then a cow and a bull whose purpose it is to raise meat for slaughter. We do the same. Death is better than what we are doing.”
The rabbi was startled because as Prushkin spoke in an ever increasing crescendo, his face remained expressionless.
The other two men remained silent, but nodded in agreement.
“The Czar would be happy for you to think like that, Isaac, because then he would have you killed. He would have one less Jew to deal with, and after you were dead, your son would still be in his army. What would be accomplished?”
Prushkin’s unblinking eyes stared into oblivion.
After a moment of silence, Morris Berganoff, a powerful and handsome blacksmith with black wavy hair, hands like leather, and muscular arms discernable even under his shirt, added with anger, “You