ONEG SZabat PROGRAM
Jolanta Hercog, Krzysztof A. Rozen
To continue the mission of Ringelblum’s associates - to preserve the memory of Polish Jews, the Jewish Historical Institute, along with the Association of the Jewish Historical Institute of Poland established the ONEG SZABAT PROGRAM. As its co-ordinators, we want the knowledge of the Ghetto Archive and its creator to become commonplace. The Ringelblum Archive belongs to the "Memory of the World", and the Oneg Shabbat group has been honored for ethical leadership.
Memory of the World
In 1999, only three documents were listed on the UNESCO "Memory of the World” register: the autograph of Nicolaus Copernicus, the manuscripts of Fryderyk Chopin and the Ringelblum Archive.
In the justification of the selection the Polish UNESCO Committee pointed out: “The underground archive of the Warsaw Ghetto is a unique collection both because it concerns the largest ghetto established by the Nazis (also containing materials relating to the fate of the Jewish community in various other areas of the Nazi occupation), as well as due to the circumstances of its creation. It was created by a team operating underground, of whom almost all of its members including the founder, historian Emanuel Ringelblum, died as Holocaust victims.”
If we look at this choice from a perspective of general knowledge of documents chosen by UNESCO, this is initially a surprise: the works of Copernicus and Chopin are known to the world, but the history of the Ringelblum Archive is only known to a few persons. The second is a call to action - the Ghetto Archives was created for “future generations”, and those who created and preserved them, believed that this treasure would alarm the world about what happened in the 20th century.
'Everyone understood the significance of the work. They understood how important it is that the vestige of the tragedy of the Polish Jews remained for future generations,' Ringelblum wrote about his colleagues.
19-year-old Dawid Graber, who was hiding in the cellar of the ghetto with a trunk filled with documents, wrote in his Testament:
What we could not shout out to the world, we buried in the ground.
I do not want acknowledgements.
That is not why I gave up my life, my energy.
I would like to live to the day we are able to dig up this great treasure and reveal the truth. Let the world know, let those who did not have to experience it enjoy life.
Dawid died the following day, 3 August 1942. His colleague and comrade placed the following words into another trunk: I do not know my fate. I do not know if I can tell you about what happened afterwards. Remember, my name is Nachum Grzywacz.
We established the Oneg Szabat Program to remember.
The Archive survived. It survived the fire of the burnt city; it did not give in to water that found its way into the trunk. It was found and extracted from a sea of rubble in Warsaw.
For 70 years, employees of the Jewish Historical Institute have been leaning over the documents left by the Oneg Shabbat group. They protect them from destruction; compile them and make them available to researchers.
Last year, a team of several dozen translators and editors, historians, sociologists and linguists under the scientific editorial supervision of Prof. Tadeusz Epsztein completed many years' work on the publication of a thirty-seven-volume, full edition of the Ringelblum Archive.
The Oneg Shabbat group preserved the memory of Jews enslaved in the Warsaw Ghetto and their deaths in the extermination camps. It began a struggle with the Germans through intellectual resistance and work. Its Ringelblum Archive (Underground Archive of the Warsaw Ghetto) is the most significant testimony of the Holocaust.
Father Patrick Desbois opening the training session. All photos in the article: Yahad - In Unum