Slutsk, Belarus (page 426)

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{Page 426}

Self-Defense in Hlusk

by Shmuel Lief (Miami Beach, Florida)

Translated from the Yiddish by Sol Krongelb

Translator's note: This translation essentially follows the author's original style and structure. Some Russian and Yiddish words have been carried over without translation to help convey the flavor of the original. In many cases, the original text provides the definition; when deemed necessary, a translation has been added in brackets. Where I was able to, I have added explanatory footnotes for some of the customs which may not be familiar to the contemporary English reader.

Katonah, New York
March 11, 2001

Hlusk ¹ was a small shtetl in the province of Minsk. Jews constituted about three quarters of the general population. ² The 25 per cent Christians (meshchanes) ³ spoke Yiddish mixed with Hebrew words and lived on good, neighborly terms with the Jews, except for Sunday or a holiday, when they got themselves drunk and broke their Jewish neighbors' windows and not infrequently beat them, but not by any means because of anti-Semitism but just to pass the time.

Hlusk was no different from the other surrounding shtetlach [plural of shtetl] – mostly poor people (except for a few wealthy individuals); crooked houses; dirty, unpaved streets. The principal livelihood was derived from the market, for which the poor peasant-farmers came to town 2 or 3 times during the week. At the market there were 120 stores arranged one opposite the other in 4 rows, besides some ten or so stores in the side streets near the market. The remaining Jews engaged themselves in shoemaking, tailoring and other small trades. There were also many wagon drivers who would transport parshoinen (that's how they called their passengers) to and from the railroad. The nearest railroad was in Bobruisk, 50 viorst⁴ away.

There was great competition in all aspects of earning a living. The shopkeepers would drag the peasants by their garments into their own shops. Even the kheder⁵ teachers competed in the tuition fee and in their flattery of the balebatim⁶. Only one person in the shtetl had no competition – Reb Noah Itche Khloneh's ⁷. He was the only candle maker in the shtetl and surrounding region, and therefore he was also called Reb Noah Lichtmacher [Candle maker].

Reb Noah was one of the most pious and respected balebatim in Hlusk. True, he was not wealthy. In winter, when a lot of slaughtering was done and there was enough tallow to make candles with an excess to send to the soap factories in Bobruisk, there was an income. But when the summer arrived, it was not so good because practically no slaughtering was done, and Reb Noah, along with the shochtim⁸ and butchers, had no livelihood. So in the summer, Reb Noah became a sodovnik, that is, he rented a fruit-orchard from a poritz [land owner] and, if G-d helped, and the trees were not overrun with worms, and there was not too much rain and hail, they got by till winter.

Hlusk had a yeshiva where some ten or so young men studied. The head of the yeshiva was the renowned gaon Baruch Ber Lebowitz, z”l.

Because of the yeshiva there were a lot of aidyms af kest⁹ which the wealthier balebatim took [as husbands] for their daughters. Many of the Hlusker yeshiva students are now prominent rabbis in America.

In 1905-1906 after the revolution there appeared in Hlusk, as in many other cities, groups of ruffians [known as] the Black Hundreds who incited the meshchanes and peasants in the surrounding hamlets against the Jews. The Hlusker Poali Zion formed a self-defense [movement] against pogroms.

One of the principal leaders of the self-defense [movement] was Nissan, Reb Noah Lichtmacher's son. Nissan was a real ben Noach¹⁰, a young man, 17 years old, tall, strong, bold and energetic. He was assigned to manage the entire self-defense arsenal. Nissan hid all the arms somewhere in his father's house, but when the police began to make “obysken”¹¹ in Jewish houses, he transferred the arms to the rabbi's synagogue and stashed it in the attic under some old, torn holy books. And it happened one day that the chimney sweep was in the synagogue attic cleaning the chimney and found the whole arsenal. This occurred in the summer in the time between the afternoon and evening prayers. ¹²

Reb Noah was studying a page of gemorah with the other Jews. The chimney-sweep told of the treasure he found. After a short deliberation among the synagogue Jews and Reb Noah, it was decided that all the arms which were discovered should be thrown into Bobe Penyeh Liebe's well. (For decades, she [Penyeh Liebe] was the only Jewish midwife, and everyone called her Bobe.) Said and done! After maariv [the evening prayer] the entire arsenal was submerged in the well.

The arms could not be retrieved from the well unless all the water was drawn out, so the [self-defense] group came up with an idea. They spread the word that a dead cat was found in the well, and the well had to be cleansed.

They found a time when Reb Noah was away, performed the “cleansing” of the well and rescued the arsenal of the Hlusker self-defense.

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Footnotes:

The current name is Glussk. Return

According to the 1897 Russian census, Hlusk had a total population of 5,328 people, of which 3,801 were Jews. Return

Jews, as well as all other Russian subjects, were classified as being a member of one of the following legally defined classes: guild merchants, townspeople or middle class (meshchane), artisans or agriculturists. (The two additional classifications, nobility and clergy, were not relevant to Jews.) Boonin (Harry D. Boonin, AVOTAYNU Vol. IX, No. 1, pp 18-25.) points out that “the words Middle Class may not correctly convey the poverty connected with the shtetl” and that almost all Jews appear to have been classed as meshchanes. The use of the word meshchanes in the present context appears to be an explicit reference to those Christians in Hlusk whose economic status was comparable to their Jewish neighbors. Return

A viorst is a Russian measure of distance equal to about 3500 feet (about a kilometer). Return

Kheder is the traditional Jewish elementary school. Kheder is the Hebrew word for room, and indeed, the kheder in the shtetl was often a one-room school. Return

The word balebatim is derived from the Hebrew and literally means “masters of the house.” The term connotes reputable, responsible persons who were the community leaders. Return

Reb is a title of respect usually reserved for learned or otherwise respected individuals. It does not mean rabbi. Names of an individual associated with the person (e.g. a parent or spouse) would often be added to distinguish the person from others with the same name. Thus, Reb Noah could have been the son of Itche Kloneh's. As noted in the next sentence of the text, a person's occupation could also be added to his name as an identifier. Return

The plural form of shochet, a person who slaughtered animals in accord with Jewish ritual requirements. Return

An aydim is a son-in-law; kest means board (as in room and board). Study of the holy texts was highly regarded in the Jewish community, and it was a source of particular pride for a father to have his daughter married to a scholar. A father, if he had the means, might go so far as to provide financial support so that his son-in-law could devote himself to the study of Torah, in which case the son-in-law would be referred to as an aydim af kest. Return

Ben Noach literally means son of Noah and is a term used to refer to non-Jews or gentiles. Gentiles, like all people, were bound by the covenant G-d made with Noah after the flood as described in Genesis, but only Jews were required to follow the laws of the Torah, which they later received at Sinai. In the context of the present article, the author is making a play on the fact that Nissan's father is named Noah while also suggesting that Nissan was the sort of person who took direct action to deal with a situation without much regard to how the Torah and Jewish tradition might teach us to act under those circumstances. Return

Yiddishized plural of the Russian word obysk, which means a search of the premises. Return

An observant Jew says the morning, afternoon and evening prayers daily within prescribed time periods which vary with the season. In order to accomplish the afternoon and evening prayers with only one trip to the synagogue, worshippers, especially during the short days of winter, would say the afternoon prayers as late in the afternoon as was permissible and then wait a brief while till it was time to say the evening prayer. The summer months, with their many hours of daylight, allowed considerable leeway as to when the afternoon prayers could be said. This fact, combined with the late sunset, gave rise to the summertime practice of saying the afternoon prayers somewhat before sundown and then engaging in study till it was time for the evening prayer. Against this background, the author's description of the time makes it perfectly natural for Reb Noah to have been in the synagogue studying with other Jews as described in the next paragraph. Return

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