Lithuanian Jewish Community

Regional Jewish Communities Celebrate Passover and Send Greetings

Gennady Kofman, chairman, Panevėžys Jewish Community:

Happy Passover, one of the most important holidays on the Jewish religious calendar.

Passover holiday greetings to all. We wish you a happy time talking with your families.

This is the evening of sacrifice which took place before God led the Israelites out of Egypt. During Passover we eat unleavened bread, matzo. The first, second and last evening are marked with a large dinner with strict traditions: the head of family reads a passage from the Book of Exodus, prayers and a collection of liturgical hymns. A hand-washing ceremony is performed before eating. Before the end of the holiday meal a beautiful cup with grape juice is placed and the door is left open, and this is called “Elijah’s cup.”

2021-03-312021-04-09

Lithuanian Prime Minister Sends Passover Greetings to LJC and Litvaks around World

Lithuanian prime minister Ingrida Šimonytė greets the Lithuanian Jewish Community and Litvaks throughout the world on the occasion of the religious holiday Passover.

“I sincerely greet the Lithuanian Jewish Community and all Litvaks on the special religious holiday Passover. It is connected with traditions kept for millennia which recall the exodus from Egypt and commemorates the fundamental values, the spiritual rebirth and liberation of the Jewish people. Sadly, for the second year now Lithuanian Jews and Jews around the world greet Passover in difficult conditions and not all families are able to come together for the ceremonial seder dinner. I want to sincerely wish you that this holiday celebrating liberation and the spring would increase your faith that all obstacles will be overcome. Be healthy and happy, and may wisdom and endurance follow your every step, may a sunny mood fill your hearts and homes. Hag Pesakh sameakh, a happy Passover holiday!” the Lithuanian prime minister said in her greeting.

2021-03-30

Passover Greetings from LJC Chairwoman Faina Kukliansky

2021-03-26

Israeli Ambassador Yossi Avni-Levy Sends Passover Greetings

2021-03-26

The Seder Table: A Jewish Tradition Unchanged for Millennia

Passover, the most important Jewish holiday which lasts for eight days, begins on March 27 this year. The date for celebrating Passover is set by the lunar calendar: the first full moon after the vernal equinox. The name of the holy day comes from “pesakh,” meaning passed over, recalling the story of the Angel of Death which passed over the Israelites before Moses led the slaves out of Egypt.

“The symbolic meaning of this holiday is that it wasn’t separate Jewish families which came out of Egypt, but a single, united Jewish people. The Jewish people throw off the yoke of slavery and leave in order to reach the Promised Land, and there create their nation,” Lithuanian Jewish Community chairwoman Faina Kukliansky explained.

Passover Traditions over the Millennia

Keeper of Jewish cultural and religious traditions Natalija Cheifec said although the exodus from Egypt occurred more than 3,300 years ago, Passover traditions have remained almost unchanged over the many centuries. The main feature of the eight-day holiday is the seder dinner when the Hagada is read out, prayers are made and people sit at the seder table and eat from the seder plate, or ke’are.

2021-03-26

Fayerlakh Musical Greeting on Passover

The Lithuanian Jewish Community wishes all Community members a Happy Passover! Take a listen to the musical greetings from the Fayerlakh Jewish song and dance ensemble below.

2021-03-262021-03-26

Happy Passover

2021-03-26

EJC: EU Grant for Jewish Communities Confirmed

Dear Presidents,
Dear Friends,

For the last few years, one of SACC to the EJC’s objectives has been to increase its cooperation with the European institutions to enhance security, support and preparedness for our communities.

The European Council Declaration of 6 December 2018 on the fight against anti-Semitism underlined that the security of Jewish people is an immediate necessity and requires timely action.

Our engagement with the European Commission, in particular at the Working Group for the Protection of Public Spaces, has strengthened our belief in the importance of working together with other communities and finding synergies in the fight against hatred and terror.

Helping other communities with the security challenges that they face is of course in line with Jewish core values and with our mission.

2021-03-26

WJC Video Guide to Passover

A time to reflect, learn and continue to fight for justice, freedom and rule of law

Katharina von Schnurbein, coordinator on combating anti-Semitism and fostering Jewish life, endorsing the tradition of asking questions in a video guide to Passover produced by the World Jewish Congress (WJC), reflects on the following:

“It’s been thousands of years since Moses led the Jews out of Egypt, yet Jews still read the story of this miracle each year. What can the world learn from the story of Passover in 2021?”

2021-03-26

Hagada in Three Languages for Community Members

The Lithuanian Jewish Community is making available Hagada for the first night of Passover in Hebrew, Lithuanian and Russian. To order, call +370 678 81 514 from 10:00 A.M. to 6:00 P.M. and pick up your order at Pylimo street no. 4 in Vilnius before 2:00 P.M. on March 26.

2021-03-24

Maša Rolnikaitė, Girgoriy Shur Holocaust Books to be Given to All Lithuanian Schools, Libraries

by Eugenijus Bunka

When you speak with those who aren’t there, it’s called Memory. Therefore Maša Rolnikaitė’s book “I Must Tell” [Turiu papasakoti] and Grigoriy Shur’s “Entries: Chronicle of the Vilnius Ghetto, 1941-1944” [Užrašai: Vilniaus geto kronika 1941-1944 m.] are books of Memory. And in memory of those whose lives were cut short, as they began or half-way through, who were consumed in the flames of the Holocaust.

Not one of the people mentioned in these books died a natural death. That inherent human right was taken from them.

They died without notice in World War II, but Maša and Grigoriy who had stood with them spoke loudly.

If a Red Army soldier hadn’t found Maša frozen, lying in a snow drift on the final death march from the Stutthof concentration camp, this book would not exist. The diary she kept hidden on her person would have been buried with her. But she survived and now in eighteen languages her story tells the world what humanity may never allow to happen again.

2021-03-242021-04-02

LJC Makes Virtual Sabbaths with Global Communities a Regular Thing

The Lithuanian Jewish Community has been using the Zoom platform to hold virtual Sabbath celebrations with Jewish communities around the world, including lessons on Jewish subjects and meetings with Liberal or Progressive Judaism congregations.

On March 19 the LJC held a joint virtual Sabbath with Rabbis Alexandra Rait and Igor Zinkov at the London Liberal Synagogue.

Rabbi Alexandra’s ancestors came from Plungė, Lithuania. Her great-grandfather N. Levit was also a rabbi. Her grandfather left Lithuania for New York, but ended up in Dublin instead. It seems the ship’s captain lied to the young man about their final destination.

Rabbi Alexandra Rait said her family visited Lithuania several years ago and toured Vilnius, Kaunas and Plungė. She recalled ushering in the Sabbath in an abandoned synagogue in Plungė where her ancestor had led prayer services. “There was no electricity and we read the prayers by candle light. There was loud thunder, and it rained. … We also visited the mass murder site in Plungė. My cousin was working with the Tolerance Center in Plungė.” She recalled how her family financed a commemorative marker at that mass murder site. “We also met the last Jew from that shtetl, the famous woodcarver and sculptor Jakovas Bunka, and his son Eugenijus,” Rabbi Rait said during the virtual Sabbath last week.

Rabbi Igor Zinkov was born in Chelyabinsk to a family of secular Jews with roots in Odessa and Kiev.

2021-03-23

Historians Protest Genocide Center

Lrytas.lt

“On Friday the working group adopted a conclusion proposing the parliamentary leadership ask the parliament to consider whether Adas Jakubauskas is the appropriate person to hold the post of general director of the Center for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of Residents of Lithuania,” working group director MP Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė told BNS.

Six members voted in favor and one against this conclusion. Radvilė Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė said everyone was interested in seeing a strong Genocide Center which would operate smoothly and represent the interests of the Lithuanian state.

“… It has become clear A. Jakubauskas has not been successful in insuring the smooth operation of the institution,” she said. “The director of the Center has not been successful in solving arising problems in a constructive manner. The method of operation selected has only increased stress and conflict within the center he directs. Also, the constant public reports about the situation in the Center diminishes the exemplary reputation of this institution.”

Peasants Party MP Jonas Jarutis voted against the finding, saying he was disappointed other members of the working group had taken the easy way out.

Over a dozen historians and academics staged a protest Friday outside the Genocide Center in Vilnius. They said they wanted to show support for historian Mingailė Jurkutė who was terminated. She also took part in the protest. Protestors also said they wanted to bring attention to Center director Jakubauskas’s attempts to restrict freedom of speech and inquiry.

The leadership of parliament, that institution’s nominal board of directors composed of the heads of major factions there, could initiate Jakubauskas’s removal from the post of general director, as could a parliamentary committee, or a call by MPs with one-fifth voting for this.

Full story in Lithuanian here.
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2021-03-222021-04-02

History of the Alytus Synagogue: From House of Prayer, to Salt Storehouse, to Poultry Hatchery

Cultural Infrastructure Center

The Cultural Infrastructure Center of Lithuania is completing renovation work on the synagogue in Alytus. Emergency preservation work followed by renovation led to a fuller restoration and the building is now housing a section of the Alytus Museum.

The old synagogue on Kauno street in Alytus, Lithuania, appeared in total ruin just five years ago, with boarded-up windows and bricks falling from the walls. Experts saw even worse things at work.

“The condition of the outer wall was poor… In spots several bricks were missing, and in some places even larger sections of bricks had fallen out. The mortar on the lower portion was visibly damaged by moisture or salt which it will still take several years to drive out of the building walls. The façades on the southern side of the building were especially damaged. We found the interior also deeply damaged, with the floor dug up and windows and doors removed,” Cultural Infrastructure Center acting deputy director Viktoras Vilkišius said.

Strong Jewish Community Formerly Lived in Alytus

The first wooden synagogue was built in the western section of Alytus in 1856 apparently at the same site the currently restored synagogue occupies. It was a small building heated with a stove and housed a school and the rabbi’s living quarters.

2021-03-192021-03-19

Celebrate Sabbath with Liberal Jewish Synagogue in London

The Lithuanian Jewish Community invites you to a virtual Sabbath celebration with the Liberal Jewish Synagogue in London March 19. A virtual tour led by Rabbi Igor Zinkov begins at 7:15 P.M. Lithuanian time, followed by Kabbalat Shabbat at 8:45 P.M.

Registration form: https://forms.gle/epwPn31GTD5qoHpf8

2021-03-192021-03-23

New Dead Sea Scroll Fragments, World’s Oldest Basket Found in Desert Cave

6,000-year-old child skeleton also found in Judean Desert cave. It is the first such discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in 1947 and the early 1950s.

Some 1,900 years ago, Jewish refugees fleeing the Romans made their way to the Judean Desert. Among the belongings they carried with them were scrolls featuring the biblical books of Zechariah and Nahum. Two millennia later, fragments of those texts have reemerged, the Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced Tuesday.

It is the first such discovery since the Dead Sea Scrolls were found in 1947 and the early Fifties.

In recent decades, the caves have been targeted by looters eager to find artifacts to sell on the private market. For this reason, a few years ago, the IAA, in cooperation with the Civil Administration’s Archaeology Department, launched a rescue operation to survey all the caves in the area.

The findings, which include not only the biblical fragments, but also dozens of artifacts dating back as early as 10,000 years ago, have been astounding.

2021-03-18

Conservative Paulė Kuzmickienė to Head Lithuanian Parliamentary Commission on Historical Memory

Member of parliament Paulė Kuzmickienė has been chosen to succeed Valdas Rakutis as chairwoman of the Lithuanian parliament’s Commission on Battles for Freedom and State Historical Memory. Paulė Kuzmickienė is a member of the Conservative Party/Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party faction in parliament. Fourteen members of the Commission voted in favor of her, one against and one abstained Wednesday. The move must still be approved by the parliament.

Outgoing chairman Valdas Rakutis resigned the post in late January after causing scandal with his remarks on the Holocaust. On International Holocaust Remembrance Day he published an article saying Jews had collaborated with the Nazis and Soviets. His statements were criticized by the Lithuanian Jewish Community, foreign diplomats and leaders in the Lithuanian Christian Democratic Party.

2021-03-182021-04-08

Lithuanian Parliamentary Working Group to Present Conclusion on Genocide Center Friday

Lrytas.lt

Radvilės Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė, head of the Lithuanian parliamentary working group convened to inquire into problems at the Center for the Study of the Genocide and Resistance of Residents of Lithuania, says while MPs hold different opinions regarding the state history institution, they were unanimous in the finding dialogue won’t bridge the divide between the Genocide Center’s leadership and some of its staff.

The working group plans to release their findings Friday.

“We decided to make a final decision Friday morning. The views of commission members are somewhat at odds, but basically everyone who spoke said the Center is experiencing problems and it doesn’t appear there is a desire to come to terms,” Morkūnaitė-Mikulėnienė told ELTA Wednesday.

She pointed to the Center’s leadership as the main culprits, saying that became clear when general director Adas Jakubauskas fired historian Mingailė Jurkutė.

Full story in Lithuanian here.

2021-03-182021-03-18

Bagel Shop Café Selling Passover Seder Packages via Internet

The Bagel Shop Café is offering prepared Passover seder meal kits this year. One package costing 45 euros serves two but contains enough to share with children as well. Orders will be accepted until March 24. To order, go to the internet form in Lithuanian at http://bit.ly/Pesach_užsakymai

2021-03-162021-03-24

Bagel Shop Café Offering Passover Matzo

The Bagel Shop Café at the Lithuanian Jewish Community at Pylimo street no. 4 in Vilnius is offering Passover matzo for sale from March 15 to March 26. The café will operate from 10 A.M. till 3:00 P.M. from Monday to Friday. A one-kilogram box of matzo costs 5 euros and payment may only be made using a bank card.

2021-03-16