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‘Black Russia’ – that is what this parcel of land was called until the fourteenth century, that runs along the upper basin of the Neman River, and south of its banks; ‘Black Russia’ – to distinguish it from ‘White Russia’ that runs to the east of it. This Russia includes the cities of Novogrudok^[1] Nezbodziche, Zhditov. With the development of this area, the following towns grew up and became larger: Iwje, Lopotse, Navael'nja, Karelicy, Mir, and also Belica – and around it villages sprouted up: Bondary, Liniany, Krasnaya, Butily, Tabola, and others. The sense of the name ‘Black Russia’ has not been made clear even to this day, but the use of the term ceased from the fourteenth century on.

In the thirteenth century, the Lithuanian Duke Mindaugas (who died in 1263) united the separated Lithuanian villages into one large holding and fiefdom, and also expanded its borders by the annexation of ‘Black Russia.’ In the fourteenth century, with the conquests of the Grand Duke Gedymin (who ruled 1316-1341), and his annexations to the east, ‘Black Russia’ because a core element if the Slavic districts in the expanded possessions of Lithuania.

By the conquests to the east, Lithuania became a country of self-sufficient independence, whose Slavic population was larger than its Lithuanian population. In those days, no significance was attached to the nationality of their populations by the feudal lords. The lands were considered to be the essential fief of the king, regarding its ownership and laws of inheritance of the kinship and of the kingdom of the land. And the rights of ownership over each parcel of land was determined by it capture and taking possession of it. When the rule of the Tatars spread in Eastern Europe, two centers arose that attempted to annex the possessions of the Slavic rulers, who were attempting to throw off the yoke of the Tatars, but were weak in their attempts to set up independent nations. Once center was – Moscow, in which the nobles of the house of Rurik ruled, and the second, in the city of Vilna, in which Gedymin resided – these two competed for the relative domination of the Slavic valleys. And until the seventeenth century, the hand of the Gedymin followers was the dominant one. However, it should be understood why Gedymin did not sense to establish his capitol first in the city of Novogrudok – – in the center of the Slavic settlement, and did not sense the need to adopt their language as a second official language in his country.

Belica was tied to two principal cities for all of its existence: as a nearby neighborhood, these being Novogrudok and the city of Lida, which can be found approximately thirty kilometers north of Belica.

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Novogrudok, despite the fact that its name means ‘new city,’ was one of the most ancient of the cities in this region, in which up to the fourteenth century had no cities, and understandably, at the western end of this reach. Novogrudok was established by Yaroslav Wolodzmierowycz, the duke of ‘Black Russia,’ in the year 1116. It was destroyed by the Tatars in the year 1240, but was rebuilt by Gedymin in the fourteenth century, immediately after he captured that area. He constructed a strong fortification with a fortress, and established his capital here. However, because this city was located on an open plain, vulnerable to attack by the Tatars, he moved his capitol to Trakai, whose fortress was built on an island in the middle of a lake that had been widened.^[2] However, this was too close to the western border, the border of the Order of Crusaders [of Eastern Prussia]. These warriors were, for the most part, from Germany, and for this reason were called the ‘Teutonic Knights.’ These were the knights that were driven out of the Holy Land after the failure of the crusades.

Since they could find no other refuge, the popes saddled them with the objective of conquering the Lithuanian tribes, who were pagan, and to convert them to Christianity. The went up on the shores of the Baltic Sea, and captured the ‘Prussians’ – one of the tribes of Lithuania, and wiped it out entirely. From that time on, they adopted a policy of leaving the tribes of Lithuania and Poles together. This policy led to the unification of the Lithuanian tribes into one kingdom, and it was out of fear of the Teutonic Knights, that Gedymin sought to move his capitol city elsewhere. In the end, he found a satisfactory place that was surrounded by primeval forest, in which there were high hills, that had the appearance of a natural fortification. In the year 1330, he built his new capital city there, and its fortifications: and this was Vilna.

In the year 1507, Novogrudok became a provincial center, and the Voievode took up residence there in 1511. He was accorded the privileges of a city under the Magdeburg Laws. Only after the city was totally consumed in a fire in 1751, did it descend from its prominence, and did not return to it, and it became just another town among the remaining towns of the district.

The second city, to whose fate the fate of Belica was tied, was Lida. Lida too, was an ancient city of the western Slavic areas, and was considered the capitol city of the ‘Black Russian’ valley. It was established in 1180. In the year 1326, Gedymin erected its fortified tower, which stood as a guardian city during many difficult wars. It was only because of the many battles fought in its vicinity, and only because of the severity of the sieges laid to it, and to which the city was subjected, was it denied the opportunity to grow and spread out and to become one of the important urban centers of the country. It's very name bears witness to its antiquity, whose Lithuanian meaning – is a bare plain – a forest whose trees have been uprooted.

After the death of Gedymin, his two sons ruled in Lithuania: Algirdas with Kestutis. When Algirdas died, the Grand Duke Jagiello was made king, with the consent of his uncle, the oldest son of Algirdas. In 1380, Jagiello handed over the city of Lida to the Duke Vaidilas (Wojdylo) as a dowry present, who took the sister of Jagiello, Maria as his wife. The Duke Kestutis became angry at this, because he felt he had a claim to the hegemony over this city. He arrayed his forces on the north bank of the Neman River, and with them, he forded the river in the outskirts of Belica, and assaulted Lida. He captured its outlying areas, and tore them

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down, captured the city, took Vaidilas (Wojdylo) into captivity and hung him in the city square…

Belica developed and grew from a fishing village to a blossoming town thanks to its location. It was located beside the banks of two branches of the Neman River: beside the banks of the Nemanka^[3], and the Molczadka. The banks of the Neman can be found beside Belica, and between them is a valley. And there, the waters of the river flow down, and its stream does not get swept away. Because of this, the place is particularly attractive for bridges. By means of a tethered raft, it is possible to connect one side of the river to the other. For this reason, a station of a sort was established for negotiating the river. The region around it is rich in lumber, whose trees are attractive for lumber, boards that are thick and good for construction and manufacture. The boards that are tied together into rafts, go down the river until they reach the large cities of Grodno or Kovno, and are sold there. And there is a part of them that continue on, until the river empties into the Baltic Sea, to the city of Memel. From there, they reach the cities of Danzig, and the cities of the German ‘Ganza^[4].,’ to Denmark, and even England, who buy them for the construction of ships.

The Belica surroundings are rich in lakes that are replete with fish, that also populate the Neman River and its branches. The fisherman was a root source of sustenance to the village peasants in the nearby area. The land was fertile, and well-suited to the growing of wheat and corn, each according to its species, and there were fields of rich grass, good for pasture, and for raising sheep and cattle. Nevertheless, there were plenty of places that were covered in natural swamp and fields of clay. The peasants would also fashion cooking pots from the clay fields. However, today, such pots are made from aluminum. In the vicinity of the village of Jonzilow iron ore can be found, sulfur deposits, and sulfur springs. Iron works in the area were known from ancient times. Most of the ‘Kurgans,^[5]’ – the monuments over graves, in memory of heroes – the graveyard products of tribes of nomads, going back as far as the days of the Scythians, testify to this. Even in the excavations of the ‘Kurganu’ from the days of the Tatars, that would settle in the area, during the days of their conquests in the twelfth century, it is possible to find armaments wrought from iron that were forged from the iron works of the region.

From the accounts of the establishment of Novogrudok and Lida, it is possible to infer the time of the establishment of Belica. The appearance of a village settlement in this place is associated with the days of the establishment of the Duchy of Lithuania. It was at this time, that a station for the floating of lumber was established here, using the river current, for which the need grew greater with the need to build fortifications

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in the cities of Lithuania, that were erected in the time of Gedymin. As evidence that the town was established in those days, one uses the ruins of a fortress and tower that once distinguished the location. There are those who associate these fortifications to the time of Gedymin, but there are others who associate them with his son, Kestutis (1297-1382). The purpose of the fort was to guard the river crossing, and to serve as a deterrent to raids by the Tatars that sought to penetrate to the interior of the country, and that this place did, indeed, serve to hold off more than one of their assaults in the past. Even in the year 1240, the Tatars penetrated into ‘Black Russia’ through this point. when they torched Belica, who was at that time only a village, and in destroying Novogrudok, which was already a city at that time, their fortunes grew for a period of time.

Belica possessed all of the attributes needed to develop into a large city, as a station for transportation and conveyance for all manner of goods that were manufactured in ‘Black Russia,’ and it is vicinity – ‘White Russia,’ to the outside world within the range of the Neman, such as: tanned hides of cattle, the fur of foxes and bears, that were trapped in the forests, and a variety of agricultural produce.

In the wake of the frequent wars, Tatar invasions from the south, the Russians from the east, and the Livonian Knights (these were the Order of the Sword – an affiliated crusader group that had settled along the Baltic shore) from the north, and the invasion of the Teutonic Knights from the west, these resulted in the town being destroyed over and over again. As an example, at the beginning of the fourteenth century, the Teutonic Knights invaded, and in the middle of that century – again the Tatars, and this time, led by the heirs of

Genghis Khan. Each, in turn, put all the villages and towns in the region to the torch. The Tatars were turned back by the duke Algirdas (1347-1377) smiting them hip and thigh in a battle in a valley along the banks of the Dnieper River (1368).

In 1342, the wearer of the nation's crown, Grand Duke Jagiello, grandson of Gedymin, was a guest in Lida, before he was called to reign over Poland as well. He was in Lida at the time, on his way to Novogrudok, where his wedding took place (the first of them) to Sophia, the duchess of the land of Kiev. On the way back, his journey included Belica with great pomp and ceremony. However, not many days went by, and this marriage was annulled, and the duchess of Kiev was compelled to return to her father's house after being divorced. The reason for this was a matter of state. In 1385, Jagiello converted to the Roman Catholic faith and married Jadwiga, the Queen of Poland as his wife, and was proclaimed King of Poland. The explicit condition of the marriage was the conversion of the Lithuanians to Christianity, and their allegiance to the Catholic Church of the Roman Pope. It was by this means that a union took place between the crown of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania – a union, that it the fulness of time, brought about a national union between both countries. However, this union also brought pressure upon the Lithuanian people, and its culture, by the Poles. It also precipitated a divergence of religious sentiment in the country, because the west-Russian foundation in Lithuanian was strong (because of the Byelorussians, the White Russians), who belonged to the Byzantine Orthodox Church.

In 1392, the Teutonic Knights returned, allied with the Livonian Knights. At the head of this host stood the Graf Leinigen from Germany, with Lord Bradford from England, because their goal was to convert the remaining pagan idol worshipers among the Lithuanians, and the Russian members of the Byzantine Orthodox Church, to Roman Catholicism, by force of fire and sword. The knights reached Lida, and put it to the torch, and they did the same to all the cities around it, the large and the small, up to the banks of the

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Neman, with Belica among them. However, they were unable to capture the fort at Lida, and it withstood attack for many days, until relief came from outside. The Knights, at that point, were forced to retreat. This invasion caused the battle to escalate into the great war between Poland and Lithuania united against the Knights, that culminated in the brilliant victory of the allied forces in the Battle of Grunwald (1410).

In the year 1406, the Duke of Smolensk, Yuri Swiatoslawowicz crossed the Neman near Belica on his way to Lida, in order to free his captured wife, who was imprisoned in the Lida fortress by the Duke of Lithuania. He burned the city, by and large, but could not take the strong fortress, and was compelled to retreat from it, in fear of the enemy, who had rushed to its assistance from the south. In his great anger, he torched all of the cities and villages that were in his path, Belica among them.

About a half-century after these destructions, Belica was once again tried with being destroyed. According to the terms of the ‘union’ – the joining of Poland and Lithuania (the conditions whose force persisted until 1569, until Lithuania switched to becoming a possession of Poland), the King of Poland stood at the head of the united kingdom, even if in Lithuania itself, a duke that was subservient to him actually ruled. And when Sbedrigailo (who died in 1452) ascended to the duchy in Lithuania he said that one must rebel against the Polish hegemony, whose nobles were oppressing the Lithuanian nation, and taking advantage of them for their own benefit. He desired a separation between the two countries and to renew the independence of Lithuania. He arrayed his army in the east, and from there he went up to ‘Black Russia’ and captured the fortifications of Novogrudok, at the time he forded the Neman beside Belica, whose fortress he also captured. He then attacked the fortifications of Lida, – the linchpin of the country in the east. He was able to capture the city, but not the fortress. In this way, his rebellion failed. Sbedrigailo was compelled, bitterly, to recognize King Casimir IV (Jagiellonian) and as an embellishment, he received the district of Wolhynia as a possession. In the meantime, Belica remained in a state of ruin.

The Jews reached the cities of Lithuania and its towns from two opposite directions.

A small settlement of Jews had already arisen in Poland beginning in the eighth century, and it grew in the twelfth century as a result of the exodus of many Jews from the cities of Germany, Austria and Bohemia, because of the persecutions and slaughter of the crusaders. As early as the year 1264, the King, Boleslaw, granted the Jews of Northern Poland (‘Great’ Poland) his protection, as expressed in the document of privileges that he gave them. In the year 1334, the King, Casimir III ‘The Great’ broadened those privileges to all parts of his realm. There are those who say that he did so under the influence of his lover, – the Jewess, Esther'keh. Many Jews moved into Lithuania from Poland in the fourteenth century, at the invitation of the Grand Duke Gedymin.

The second stream came from the east. These were Jews of the Torah and Jews of the Rabbinical tradition from the conquered areas of the Lithuanians to the east. – these were the territories that at one time was encompassed by the kingdom of the Khazars, within in which many Jews dwelt, whose leaders, officials and rulers had accepted the faith of Moses and Israel. When the conquests of the Lithuanian dukes reached the shores of the Black Sea, they also found Jews in the territory of Wolhynia, and Galicia, in the duchies of

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Kiev, and came into contact with Jews in the Crimea of the Tatars. Gedymin invited them to his cities anew, to take up residence there, and to conduct commerce. And his son Kestutis took prisoners from among the Crimean Jews, in the battle near the city of Azov, and led them back to his land to settle there.

The Jews of Lithuania conducted trade, the making of loans with interest, and served the kingdom as tax collectors from the peasants, the nobility that owned estates. Their legal status was equivalent to that of the lesser nobility, these being the nobles called in Polish, the ‘szlachta.’ Their commerce, their activities, possessions, and their religion and customs were well protected by what was documented in the privileges.

However, they did not reside this way in tranquility for long. When the treasury of the duke was depleted relative to the debts he owed to his Jews, because the debts of the nobility of the land to the Jews grew large, the Grand Duke Alexander decided – he being the brother to the King of Poland – to confiscate all the property of his Jews. In the year `495, three years after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, he followed the example of Ferdinand and Isabella, and decreed an expulsion for the Jews of Lithuania. For those few who underwent baptism and converted to Christianity, he accorded property rights and the privileges of nobility. The rest left, walking stick in hand, with their packs, to begin their wanderings; the Jews of the eastern valleys turned towards the Crimea of the Tatars, and the inhabitants of ‘Black Russia,’ – to the Polish borders.

The expulsion of the Lithuanian Jews silenced the country's economy, and led to an ossification of trade. In eight years time, the Duke Alexander was compelled to retract his expulsion and to invite those whom he expelled to return to their accustomed places, and also promised them a return of all their lost possessions. Most of these did return to their former places of abode, but not always were they able to get a return of those possessions that were robbed from them. For many years afterwards, court cases continued between them and those new owners of their homes and fields.

It is necessary to put down, that before the expulsion of Alexander, no Jews resided in Belica.

Mostly, there is no doubt that the Jewish settlement in Belica was established shortly after the establishment of the communities in Lida and Novogrudok.

For Novogrudok was one of the very first of the communities in this area. In the archives of the high court of the city of Lida, there were (up to the destruction of the city during the Holocaust) under care, laws that were passed by the district court, that sat in session in the city of Grodno, at the time that Grodno served as the chief city of the entire large province, that took in all of ‘black Russia.’ These legal documents were discovered and researched , and eventually published in the books of Professor Sergei Bershadsky (a Ukrainian-Christian) who researched the history of the Jews of Lithuania. In his books, ‘The Archive of Russian Jewry,’ and ‘The Jews of Lithuania,’ he cited laws, in which the Jews of Novogrudok are mentioned.

And these laws go back to 1529! In this regard, for example, we find that in the year 1551, the Jews of Novogrudok were freed from paying a special tax to the government treasury. In a similar manner, according to the same source, it is explained that in 1563, the Jews of Novogrudok lived on only one street called ‘Podliaszaska,’ close to the fort. And therefore, the Jews, in that year, were ordered by the King Sigismund-

August to distance themselves from the fort (as a populace whose loyalty to the country was suspect!) And

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to settle behind it, on the Vyluska and Truszkowska streets, and to build their houses there.

There is yet other convincing evidence of the antiquity of the Jewish community of Novogrudok. The Jews of Novogrudok are mentioned in the book of Responsa of the Maharshal. The Maharshal is R' Shlomo Luria who lived in the years 5270-5333 (1510-1573). Her served as a Yeshiva Headmaster in the Lithuanian city of Brisk, and afterwards as the Headmaster of the Yeshiva of Lublin. In his book of Responsa, that was put together in the sixteenth century (sign 59), he relates a story about the Jews in the city of Novogrudok, in which a chaste and untouched Jewish girl was put to shame and abused, after she refused to dance a mitzvah dance with him….

Nevertheless, Novogrudok never had a very substantial Jewish population. It had days of decline. According to the Pinkas, ‘The Va'ad of the Lithuanian Countries’ (about which we will have more to say later), it is known to us that in 1623, the community was placed under the supervision of the Lithuanian Brisk community (this is Brest), which was the largest and most prosperous of the Lithuanian communities of that time. And this was a sign of its decline, that was caused in large by the war with Sweden, at the beginning of the 17^th century. It is from this that we know that in the year 1765, there were in Novogrudok, and its environs (it appears – together with Belica) 893 Jewish heads of household, paying the head tax. In Belica proper, at that time, there were 288 Jewish heads of household paying the head tax.

Also, the Jewish community of Lida was one of the ancient ones. It is estimated that it was established after the return of the Jews from the expulsion of the Grand Duke Alexander, in the first years of the sixteenth century.

The Jews of Lida, like the Jews of Novogrudok, who traveled east to conduct their business, to the city of Minsk, would cross the Neman River using the Belica crossings. It was here that the merchants collected themselves in a group at a station by the river, to convey their merchandise to Grodno and Kovno. Many of them engaged in forest products, for purposes of cutting down trees, and sending them in rafts down the river. There were those who made use of rafts for the purpose of transporting finished furs and hides to Memel and Danzig, on the shores of the [Baltic] Sea. These Jews were compelled to spend an extensive amount of time in those areas, there were those among them who saw fit to establish an entrepot city – Belica, and inns for lodging or residence. Among them were ones who saw it useful to establish hotels for the ‘nobles’ (called #JD”846^[6]’ in the local language – the workers that pull the rafts by rope in the upper river). And similarly, it was the case for the fishermen, and like them, the farmers of the area, and especially for the workers that cut trees in the forest. The intermediaries for the purchase of lumber and the jobbers that bought the agricultural produce spent an extensive amount of time here, and saw that it would be to their benefit to build their homes here. Over time, they established themselves here permanently, and also built themselves a synagogue, and in contrast, also purchased land for a cemetery. And it was in this way that the Jewish community in Belica arose, it would appear, after the middle of the sixteenth century.

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In those days, the position of Starosta was bought from the monarchy by one of the higher nobility. The payment of the price that the nobleman paid for this seat he paid out over time, deriving this from the taxes he would levy on the populace, and also hold part of it as profit for himself.

In the year 1505, there was a dispute between two sons of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility over the position of Starosta in Lida, between the house of Drozd and Ilinycz. The nobleman Drozd found himself an influential advocate with the Duke Alexander (who after the death of his brother in 1501also served as the King of Poland). This was the Duke Galinski, one of the advisors to the King, who because of his effort, the king took away the seat from Kryztof Ilinycz and handed it over to Drozd. When Alexander died, which took place in the city of Lida in the year 1506, and he was buried there as well, the Ilinycz family returned to demand the seat that had belonged to it, as a sort of ‘franchise.’ The dispute continued for a number of years. Only in the year 1522, when the district Sejm sat in session in Grodno, was the matter resolved, and the seat of the Starosta was given over as the property of the noble Jermy Ilinycz including also the city of Bristyczko, with the addition of Belica, and Lipniski, that were given to him as a hereditary holding. This was the same Jermy Ilinycz who in the fulness of time allocated land from his holdings in Belica to the Jews, who came there to settle in the middle of the town of Belica.

The Ilinycz family did not hold onto the office of Starosta for many years. This office passed into the hands of the szlachta, a scion of a converted Jewish family, this being Jan ben Josef Abrahamowicz; they did not change their name but rather left it in its rather prominently Jewish form. The reason for this, is Jan was the son of the renown customs official Josef Abrahamowicz who worked in the district and achieve a great deal of wealth and was welcome among the higher ranks of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility. In 1495, at the time that the expulsion order was decreed, Josef Abrahamowicz did not want to part from the substantial possessions that he had accumulated, both in land and buildings, that were being held by his as security for monies that the nobility owed to him. Because of this, he was baptized as a Christian, and received the standing of a szlachta….

Were we desirous of detailing the names of all the Starostas that served in Lida (and thereby also ruled over Belica), during all the days when Poland was independent, we would have to pinpoint all the names of the nobility in Lithuania that were famous. Among them were the families of Pac, Scipion, Radziwill, Sapieha, and others.

In the years 1520-1573 Sigismund II ruled and held sway, the last of the kings of the Jagiellonian lineage. From 1544, he served as the Grand Duke of Lithuania, and from 1548, he was King of Poland. Because of his efforts, in the year 1560, there was a full integration of the two countries that up to this time were separated by two legal systems. This enlightened king was an advocate of religious tolerance, and implemented such freedoms in 1572 throughout the length and breadth of his united realm. In 1550, the king turned over Belica as a possession, to the well-known Mikolai Radziwill, called ‘The Red.’ In Polish history, this Radziwill is known as an ardent disciple of Calvinism, in the Protestant Reformation movement. He turned over the Catholic church building in Belica to people of this persuasion. From that time onward,

Belica became a mainstay of this religious sect, who up to this time, suffered from persecution and

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harassment throughout the country. During the seventeenth century, all of the synods of the important members of this sect and the Calvinist leaders, who received a variety of issues for resolution, were held in Belica, and it its large, Calvinist church.

Seeing as we had mentioned a convert from Judaism above, who attained a high rank in the establishment in this district, it is appropriate to enumerate a number of these, who lived and worked in Belica.

One of the honorific titles that the Polish-Lithuanian aristocracy coveted was the title of ‘Marszalek of the Szlachta.’ This title was not connected to any specific privileges, such as honor alone, but rather it was expressed in being the [titular] ‘Head of the local Nobility.’ Every vicinity, and area around a town, of a suburb, or of a big city, had its own ‘Marszalek of the Szlachta’ that presided. In Belica, and its environs, between the years 1608-1626 four nobles served in this capacity in the following order: Samuel Wolowycz, Jan Scipion, Josef Moiszowicz, and Jakob Judka. the last two were the offspring of converts.

Sigismund III the King of Poland from the house of Vasa (the royal house of Sweden), who ruled in the years 1568-1632, returned and passed the law that every Jew who converted to Roman Catholicism was automatically granted the status of a szlachta. It was only in 1768, as a result of repeated demands of the proud Polish nobility, that the Sejm annulled this law, in order that the ‘nobility who were sons of Jerusalem’ not increase substantially in the country…

The issue of the increase in the number of converts among the nobility in Lithuania at the beginning of the sixteenth century became a regularly visible one because of the close contact between these two groups. In Lithuania, up to the year 1556, and in Poland until 1538, the accepted dress of the wealthy Jews was like that of the szlachta. Both groups were in the habit of dressing finely, with a sword buckled at their side, and to ride on horses in their travels, or in a decorated carriage. The Jewish tax collectors would dominate the debtors who were from the nobility, and would come to them, escorted by a cohort of soldiers that were assigned to them as part of their duty to the country treasury. The wealthy Jews were accepted in the company of the szlachta, and would participate in the festive occasions of these people and their parties. During that period, the royal court received news from the clergy about mixed marriages between Jews to the daughters of nobles without the Jewish partner undergoing a religious conversion…

It was only at the end of the century, that limitations were introduced on the social contact between Jews and

Christians. among these limitations: a prohibition against interaction with gentiles, and the designation of Jews by means of a separate style of dress.

In accordance with a decree of the Polish crown, the ‘Va'ad Arba Aratzot’ – the unified rule of all the Jewish communities in Poland and Lithuania – was established. The Va'ad was established in order to arrange and collect taxes and levies on the communities, that they were responsible for to be paid to the national treasury. This was done, because the government itself did not collect taxes on an individual basis from each and every person. It would levy a ‘community tax’ on the Jews, that were set to be allocated. It was up to the Jews

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themselves to allocate the tax burden among the communities in accordance with its size and financial capacity. And so, it was up to the Va'ad to allocate these tax burdens, to collect them when they were paid, and to pay them into the national treasury. Because the Va'ad wielded such enormous influence in the setting of tax rates on each and every community, it naturally became highly influential and a body of support and also compulsion in all the internal issues that these communities engaged in. All arrangements regarding community life for Polish-Lithuanian Jewry, religious, cultural, legal, all were set up by the ‘Va'ad Arba Aratzot.’ At first, the Va'ad was called a ‘Three Lands’ committee, (implying Poland Lithuania and Reisen, meaning southern Russia). Afterwards, it was changed to a ‘Four-Lands’ committee: Greater-Poland, LesserPoland, Lithuania and Reisen. The Va'ad was in the habit of having its sessions during the time of the annual fairs that would take place sometimes in Lublin, and sometime in Jaroslav, occasionally in the city of Kremenets, and in other cities as well.

A hundred years after it was founded, the communities of Lithuania separated themselves from the Va'ad Arba Aratzot, because of differences in opinion that surfaced among them, and they established a ‘Va'ad HaMedinot,’ which was separate, that included three districts: the district of Brisk, the district of Grodno, and the district of Pinsk. In the fullness of time, when the communities of Vilna and Slutsk grew, they also became attached to the Va'ad HaMedinot, as distinct districts. These two committees served as the mainstay of independence (self-rule) of the Jews, and a beautiful model for independent rule of our people within an alien people, for the entire span of our history. However, it lasted under our control for only 250 years. In the year 1754, during the reign of the King Stanislaw-August and in accordance with the decision of the Sejm, the ‘Va'ad Arba Aratzot’ was dispersed, and its activities brought to a halt. In accordance with the decision of the Sejm, each and every Jew would pay his taxes on an individual basis, as determined by the levy that the regime would impose on him. In a like manner, the ‘Va'ad HaMedinot’ in Lithuania continued to operate for an additional two years, and was dispersed in 1766 – before a full two hundred years.

The by-laws of the ‘Va'ad Arba Aratzot’ were transcribed into the formal records of the larger communities of that era. It was in this way, that we received the folios of Cracow, Lvov and Posen. and the by-laws of the ‘Va'ad HaMedinot’ were written down in three copies: the Brisk copy, that of Vilna, and an encompassing copy – that being the ‘Pinkas of the countries of Lithuania.’ These records serve us as a dependable source that can be trusted, in researching the legal, economic and cultural circumstances of the Jews in the unified state of Poland-Lithuania.

What was the economic power of the Belica community in its day – this too can be deduced from the entries in the previously mentioned writings, and can be deduced from the taxes were levied against it, by the Lithuanian ‘Va'ad HaMedina.’ In the year 1670 [5330] the ‘Va'ad HaMedina’ was obligated to provide ten thousand gulden to the treasury as a head tax. Against the communities of Brisk, and its environs – that was, at that time, the biggest and most important of the Jewish communities in the diaspora of Poland-Lithuania. a tax of 900 gulden was levied. Against Vilna, which at that time was still a small community, a tax of 180 gulden was levied. Novogrudok, based on its financial capacity, reached about half the level of Vilna, and was charged with 75 gulden. On Belica, the charge was only 20 gulden. For comparison purposes: Smarhon – 40 gulden, – about double. Also, in the year 1673, the same level of taxation was imposed without any change.

The ‘Va'ad HaMedinot’ would also levy taxes on its communities for its own agenda, to cover a variety of

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expenses. These taxes, also, were allocated on the basis of the economic capacity of the communities, and in accordance with the number of residents. In the year 5339, this being the year 1679, the following incomes are recorded by the treasury of the large Va'ad as follows: Brisk – 15 gulden and 26 groschen; Vilna – 4 gulden 10 groschen; Novogrudok – 1 gulden 5 groschen; and Belica – only 20½ groschen.

The picture changed markedly from end to end during the following century. In the year 1717, a tax was levied only on the Jews of Lithuania that was very high, in the amount of sixty thousand gulden (as compared with the ten thousand gulden of one hundred years beforehand), and against the Jews of Poland – 220,000 gulden. Of these, the levy against Brisk was 5, 135 gulden; Vilna – 1,100 gulden; Minks – 1,300 gulden; Belica – 600 gulden; and on Novogrudok – 400 gulden.

Here one can see the ascendance in value of the community of Vilna by contrast to Brisk, and the precipitous decline of the community of Novogrudok, and by contrast, the rise of the value of Belica. The reason for this change will be explained in what follows.

In the year 1648, the scourge, Bogdan Chmielnicki, raised the banner of rebellion, in the midst of the subordinate Cossacks, against their overlords – the Polish landed aristocracy, with the objective of liberating his country from their yoke. The forces of the Crimean Khan were seconded to him, and the united forces invaded Poland. The Cossacks hated the Jews much more than their Polish masters. This was because the Jews served as intermediaries and functionaries between the masters and the Ukrainian peasants, who were subordinated to them. And it was on them, the Jews, that the burden was placed to collect the taxes from the peasantry for the benefit of the landlords. Accordingly, all of the anger and rage was, first and foremost heaped on the Jews by the local populace, and they wreaked atrocities among them with manifest gruesomeness. During the years of this war, between the years 1648 and 1654, tens of thousands of Jews were killed at the hand of this Ukrainian scourge, who were butchered and slaughtered by the use of unspeakable tortures, as martyrs to their violence, in Sanctification of the Name. In the Ukraine alone, more than 300 communities were totally wiped out. As to the number of Jews killed in this Holocaust (referred to as the Decrees of Ta”Kh v'T”At) there are varied opinions. Those who give conservative estimates say on the order of 300,000 lives, while there are others who stand by a number of 600,000 people.

The result of the Chmielnicki rebellion was the partition of the Ukraine, with the part on the left side of the Dnieper River taken from Poland, and attached to Czarist Russia. From that time forward, the center of the Slavic peoples caused Moscow's position to grow stronger than that of Vilna.

The Jewish communities in Lithuania were saved from the predations of the Ta”Kh v'T”At years, because the Chmielnicki hordes did not reach its cities. However, in the continuation of these incidents, this Holocaust did not skip over them. In the year 1654, after a lull in battle, the Cossack forces again descended on Poland, now supported by the troops of the Czar Alexei Mikhailovich, for the purpose of annexing the Ukraine in its entirety to Russia, including that part on the other side of the Dnieper River, and with it, also the territories of White Russia, whose populace had been incited to rebellion against the Poles by the Cossacks as well. At the head of this huge host that ascended against White Russia, apart from the officers

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of the Russian army, stood the bloodthirsty Hetmans Anton Nibaba, Makhanenko, and Krivoshafka. In 1655, they cut down the following White Russian cities one after another: Mogilev, Gomel, Bykhov, Vitebsk, Minsk, and afterwards the Lithuanian cities of: Lida, Vilna, Kovno and Grodno. In Mogilev, the Jews were slaughtered in accordance with the orders of the head of the Czar's army. In Vitebsk part of them were slaughtered, and the remainder were plundered, forcing them to convert their religion, and exiling them deep into Russia. A pandemonium broke out among the Jews in White Russia, as the armies of the Czar, and the Cossacks drew nearer to the remaining cities that had become something of a general refuge for the Jews streaming to the cities in the west. The Jews of Vilna, Lida, Kovno, and Grodno left their homes, and fled to Zamut. The Jews in the more distant towns, such as Novogrudok and Belica did the same. Those who fled literally had their lives in their hands, and those that remained behind, or were captured along the way, were butchered mercilessly.

Even on the front that was on the right side of the Dnieper River, the Cossacks took the advantage, and smote the Poles and slaughtered the Jews until they reached Lvov.

The retreat of Poland invited Sweden to enter into the fray of battle, in order to grab its share of the spoils. Its king, Carl-Gustave X to whom the Baltic states of Ostland and Livonia belonged (Courland – at that time belonged to Poland), invaded Poland from there in 1655, and captured it in its entirety, together with slices of Lithuania and White Russia. Many of the Polish nobility, such as the Chancellor Radziewski or the Vilna Voievode, the Duke, Janusz Radziwill, supported the Swedes… (the latter turned over Lithuania to the Swedes). Then the order of battle was revered: the Russians came to Vilna as part of an agreement with the Poles concerning an armistice between them, and they opened a joint campaign between them against the Swedes (1656-1658).

The Swedes were the only side in these wars that did not carry out pogroms and attacks against the Jews. They contented themselves with imposing a captive tax on them, that impoverished the community greatly. However, because of this, the Jews were loyal to them, and paid the Swedes without any resistance, as the tax was specified. This matter caused them a great deal of trouble subsequently, at the time that the Poles returned to liberate their cities. They took revenge for the shame of their defeat and being routed – upon the Jews: people were butchered by being dismembered limb from limb, children were slaughtered in the arms of their fathers, women were raped, and those that fled into synagogues were burned alive inside them…

Immediately after the Swedish retreat from Poland, a peace treaty was signed between these two (in the year 1660) and Poland returned to fight against Russia with the objective of reclaiming the Ukraine, this time being aided by the Crimean Khan who was a Turkish vassal. The Russians were compelled to abandon White Russia, and during their retreat, Lida (1659), Novogrudok and Belica (1660) again suffered from plunder, abuse rape and murders. This war, leaving a trail of blood came to an end in 1667 when the two sides agrees to a thirteen-year truce. The Ukraine remained divided into two parts, defined by the course of the Dnieper River, with the left side belonging to Russia, and the right to Poland.

These tribulations inflicted a Holocaust on the Jews of Poland, Lithuania and the Ukraine. The latter was wiped out in most of its territory. In the wake of the war, came hunger and disease. Many were left with no protection, many were torn away from their kin. Many were sold off as slaves by the Cossacks to the Crimean

Tatars, who brought them to be sold in the markets of Kashty. There, they were redeemed by their brethren

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in Turkey, who used their monies and the monies of Jewish communities in Italy and Holland. Many wandered the highways and byways, in searching for the graves of their ancestors. Many Jewish women were seized by Cossacks and taken as wives. Among them, there were those who were redeemed from the hands of their captors by decree of the Polish king, Jan-Casimir, when he liberated his lands from the conquerors.

This awesome Holocaust that befell the Jews of Eastern Europe, in the wake of the Ta”Kh v'T”At decrees, with the wars that ensued from it, destroyed 700 Jewish communities either in part, or totally, and engendered a sense of resignation in the heart of the people. The single refuge from this oppression of the soul was found in the strengthening of the splendor of mysticism, which stood as a last resort, in the absence of any hope for the preservation and continuity of the people. Among the Jews in the west, mysticism became a form of solace for the hopelessness that the people felt in the wake of the exigencies of the time, going back even to the days of the beginnings of the Inquisition. Among the Jews of that generation, the yearning for redemption grew strong, which found its expression in the teachings of the ח”ן^[7] which includes the Kabbala and its various forms, which provided an answer to the reason for the sufferings of the people and its purposes, which are to be seen as nothing more than a harbinger of Messianic times. The teaching of mysticism struck deep roots in all the expanse of the Slavic Diaspora, and many chose to adhere to it for purpose of finding solace in the exigencies of the time, through thoughts of the ‘end of days.’ It was not only scholarly Rabbis and Yeshiva students who took it up, but also the simpler folk who drew their ideas from the secrets of the Zohar, and from the mouths of orators and sermon preachers.

The lore of mysticism prepared a fertile ground for the spread of Sabbatean Messianism within the Jewish community of Poland itself, both the Greater, and the Lesser, and in Wolhynia, Podolia, White Russia and in a small part, Lithuania itself. Sabbatean Messianism also found activists and skilled missionaries who did their work in the area with which we are concerned here. An example is, R' Israel son of R' Aharon Jaffa, who was the sitting Rabbi and Bet Din Senior of Shklov, who wrote many books, such as ‘Or Yisrael,’ ‘Tiferet Yisrael,’ and others. He traveled to many cities in Poland and Lithuania, in Vilna, Lida, Grodno, Novogrudok, Slutsk, Minsk, Lublin, Posen, and gave sermons in the synagogues there based on the stories of the Kabbala. He also was active in the dissemination of the ‘Ways of Mysticism.’ There is no doubt that his words also reached the people of Belica. It is possible to suggest that he may have even sermonized there on the subject of Sabbatean Messianism, since it was his habit not to skip over any community that lay in the ambit of his travel itinerary, whether it was large or small, in order to prepare those desirous of The Redemption with words of solace concerning the imminent arrival of The Redeemer himself.

One of the pillars of Sabbatean Messianism in Lithuania and Reisen was R' Hesh'l Tsorayf of Vilna, who was an advocate for the movement both orally and in writing. He, too, was an itinerant preacher to the communities of the district, but in addition to this, he was prolific in the dissemination of ‘revelations’ and prophecies about the Messianic King that had arisen in Izmir. R' Hesh'l Tsorayf also sent forged letters,

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against skeptical rabbis, to the heads of communities that were in particularly straitened circumstances. It appears certain that some of them must have reached the attention of the community leaders of Belica. In any event, there was a spirit full of messianic expectation and faith in Sabbatai Zvi, that blew through the district, and were well known in the entire breadth of area between Pinsk to Minsk, and groups of Sabbatean followers grew up in public in these two cities, as well as in Novogrudok, Belica, in Slonim and in other nearby congregations. All of this, despite the work, that in the centers of Torah study that were close by – in Vilna and Grodno, where enlightened Rabbis, who were men of influence and authority, endeavored to rein in the movement throughout the expanse of their jurisdiction, and attempted to marginalize the burgeoning boy of Sabbatean faithful.

The shameful denouement of Sabbatai Zvi, and his public conversion to Islam, caused two wings to form from the extremities of his movement: either to entirely give up on Judaism, and follow in his path, or to intensify dedication to a messianic ideal. In the ranks of the latter, the Vilna resident and Kabbalist R' Abraham Kunky lived and worked in the mid-17^th century. He was an itinerant preacher, who traveled to all of the towns in the district in question, and gave sermons on the issue of faith in Sabbatai Zvi after his conversion to Islam. He would explain the change of faith of the ‘Messiah’ by an esoteric argument based on the Kabbala of the Ar”I, as an act of assuming a scourge of discipline, and a descent into the depths of depravity, as a prelude to an ascent to a higher plateau. The Kabbalist Chaim Mal'akh, a scion of Poland who resided for a long time in Turkey, also attempted this kind of revisionism. He returned to Poland as a fund raiser, and here also propagated faith in Sabbatai Zvi, despite the fact that he had converted away from his faith. To both of them, it is necessary to append the great influence of R' Yehuda HaHasid, who established a new sect of ‘The Hasidim and Men of Action.’

The Kabbalist, R' Yehuda HaLevi (5395-5461)[1635-1701] came from the city of Siedlowca near Grodno. His oratorical skill enabled him to attract many students. Unlike the other sworn Sabbateans, who placed their faith in Sabbatai Zvi, in that a passive belief alone will hasten the redemption, R' Yehuda HaHasid espoused a faith that was active in bringing about the hastening redemption, that would be facilitated and brought nearer with the help of acts of contrition, accompanied by torture, fasting and suffering. And there was yet another way to hasten the redemption – making aliyah to the Holy Land. In the ‘Community of Hasidim’ that he established, there were many Kabbalists and outstanding scholars. The name, ‘Hasidim,’ was their name, and served in that capacity for a long time before the rise of the Hasidism as promulgated by the Baal Shem-Tov.

The Rabbis of Lithuania who dreaded all manner of messianic initiatives, did not understand the fundamental difference between the movement of R' Yehuda HaHasid and the remaining adherents of Sabbateanism, and they pursued him and his adherents. The journey made by R' Yehuda HaHasid to the Land of Israel was organized in 1701 under the direction of R' Chaim Mal'akh. The journey, and all of its difficulties and subliminal rhapsodies, is described in the book ‘Sha'alu Et Shlom Yerushalayim,’ (By R' Gedalia Massimiatic). Two of the men who made aliyah to the Land of Israel were R' Sholom-Shakhna Belicer and his brother, R' Yud'l-Wolf, who apparently carried the name of their birthplace – Belica. Both of them died along the way along with many others, and details about this are not available.

In the year 1700, the ‘Northern War’ broke out, and the cities of Lithuania and the upper banks of the Neman River, once again, saw the forces of the Russian Czar fighting on this soil against the Swedes. The Jewish

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communities, that had barely bound up their deep wounds, from the previous wars, were again terrified and further impoverished in both manpower and wealth.

In 1700, Czar Peter I {sic: The Great] entered into a tri-partite treaty with August II, the King of Saxony, and Poland, and the Kingdom of Denmark against Carl XII, King of Sweden. Peter's objective was, at that time, to establish a presence on the Baltic Sea, and by this means, to ‘tear open a window for Russia onto the rest of Europe.’ The adventurous cosmopolitan, Carl XII, an arrogant man, and wanting proximity to [sic: control of] the sea lanes near Copenhagen, forced Denmark to abrogate the treaty. He smote the Russians at the fortress of Narva in Estonia, and pushed on into Poland from Livonia by way of northern Lithuania. In 1702, the upper banks of the Neman were captured and the communities of Novogrudok, Belica, Lida assumed the burdens of the taxes associated with a conquered people.

From the east, the forces of the Czar Peter I drew close, to confront the Swedes, and in passing Vilna, they concentrated themselves beside Grodno, at a time when most of the Jews in the city had fled to the west. Carl XII moved to surround Grodno from the rear, and at that point the Russians retreated into the Ukraine. They went by a contorted way, by way of Brisk, and from there to the city of Kovel' to Kiev. Along the way, the Jews of Kovel' and Kiev suffered at their hands. In the meantime, Carl XII smote the Poles and their nobility, forcing them to abrogate their treaty with Russia. After this, in his hubris, he made a fateful strategic error, and decided to deepen his move into the Ukraine, in pursuit of the retreating Russians. Beside the city of Poltava, the Ukrainian Hetman [Ivan] Mazepa awaited Carl XII, who had betrayed the Russians, and allied himself with the Swedes. In heavy battle beside Poltava, Carl XII was defeated and wounded in battle, and he fled with Mazepa and escaped to Turkey.

For Russia, the results of this battle were particularly outstanding: it took possession of the Baltic states of Estonia and Livonia, it established its new capitol city, Petersburg as a city located on the sea, and in the end, it proclaimed itself to be an Empire – and its King – Peter The Great was proclaimed its Emperor in 1721.

As regarding the district of interest to us, a result of the ‘Northern War’ was the fact that the renown fortress of the city of Lida, that which had stood until now in the face of so many Czars that had assaulted it (even if it did not save the city itself from Russian troops in 1655, 1659 and in 1694), was torn down and destroyed completely by the soldiers of Carl XII of Sweden in the year 1702. Since that time, it has not been reconstructed, and remained in a state of ruin. The city of Lida then lost its status as a fortified city.

As to the Jews of Lida, Novogrudok and Belica, the consequences of the ‘Northern War’ heaped further destruction and penury upon them.

All of these tragic events, that took place in this region during the 17^th century, which we have recounted in the fifth chapter here, served to reduce the number of Jews in this region, and weakened its economic power. Therefore, it will come as no surprise, that in the records of the ‘Va'ad Medinot Lita,’ the following can be found recorded in the year 5424, this being the year 1664 (two years before the ‘Year of Redemption,’ according to Sabbatai Zvi), that the community of Belica owed the Va'ad an enormous debt, that had accumulated, and had reached a sum of 2,092 gulden. The community of Novogrudok was also mired in a like-sized debt to the Va'ad treasury, a debt that amounted to 2,600 gulden.

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By and large, even in the 18^th century, the situation of the Jews in Poland did not improve, with Lithuania included in it. So, in the years 1741-1744 once again, pogroms and slaughter were perpetrated in the eastern regions of Poland. On May 17, 1744, rebellious Ukrainians plundered and killed Jews in the town of Tshiminica, and in the year 1744, against the Jews of the cities of Amstislav^[8] and Uman. In 1751, the White Russian peasants rose up against the ‘Pans^[9]’ who oppressed them, and because of this, they slew all the Jewish families living in the village of Krasnaya beside Belica. In these riots, the entire city of Novogrudok went up in flames, which was mostly built up from wooden lumber boards, as was the case of the remainder of the towns in Poland and Lithuania. Those Jews of Novogrudok who managed to save their lives, remained in poverty without anything to their names.

During the 16^th century, the Jews of Poland and Lithuania suffered both in wealth and in population, and their numbers grew only slightly. However, there were places where their number dropped precipitously. In the middle of the 18^th century, the number of Jews in Belica declined, and stood at 288 souls…

The 18^th century passed over the Jews in our area, shadowed by the sharp conflict that spread in the wake of the contest between Hasidism and its opponents (the Mitnagdim). Belica sits midway between Grodno and Minsk, and is an equal distance to Vilna and Vitebsk; the belief and concepts reached it from these opposing extremes together.

Vilna, Grodno, with Lida, were, in those days, the centers of Talmudic scholarship in Lithuania. It was the Vilna Gaon, R' Eliyahu ben R' Shlomo-Zalman, (1720-1797) known by the acronym, The Gr”A, that elevated the importance of Vilna. He sought to enlarge and strengthen Torah even in the far-flung towns using his emissaries and many students who became eminent Torah scholars. Among the great scholars of the time we can count also, R' Eliezer ben R' Zvi-Hirsch, and R' Alexander Ziskind, among the Rabbis of Grodno. In Lida, counted among them, was R' Duvid'l ben R' Aryeh-Leib, called ‘der Lider’ by the common folk. In Pinsk, at that time, R' Avigdor ben R' Chaim occupied the Rabbinical Chair, one of the outstanding students of the Gr”A. The influence, that these men had, shone far beyond the mere ambit of where they served in an official capacity, and their voices resonated in faraway places, even in tiny Belica.

But by contrast, R' Menachem-Mendl sat in Vitebsk, who had served the Baal Shem-Tov during his lifetime, and afterwards was both a student and colleague to the Maggid of Mezerich. The Gaon, Schneur-Zalman of Liadi was counted among his pupils. R' Menachem-Mendl, under the direction of the Maggid Dov-Ber [sic: of Mezerich], went as an emissary, to win hearts for Hasidism, and visited all of the towns in the district, where he spoke and sermonized on behalf of Hasidism, both to the secular and religious leaders. He spoke in the synagogues of such cities as Minsk, Vilna, and even in small out-of-the-way towns. He visited Visneva beside Volozhin, in Iwje, Navael'nja, Novogrudok, Karelicy and Asmjany. Certainly, he would not have skipped Belica when he was in Novogrudok, even if its name is not recorded in the biography of this

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individual. He also took license to attack the Vilna Gaon but was asked afterwards to beg his pardon…

The Maggid, R' Dov-Ber, was permanently ensconced in Rovno for a long period of time, and his teaching of Torah was heard throughout the district. R' Aharon ‘The Great’ of Karlin attracted adherents in our district, and groups of ‘Anshei Karlin’ were organized in many locations, even in Vilna itself. Similarly, groups of ‘Hasidei Mezerich’ were organized in Minsk and Vilna, led by R' Menachem-Mendl of Vitebsk.

The town of Amdur^[10], beside Grodno, was an important center of Hasidism, headed by R' Chaim-Khaika, the student of R' Aharon of Karlin; this was a center that remained in existence for the entire life of its Rabbi, R' Chaim-Khaika.

The Rabbi, R' Levi-Yitzhak, ‘Israel's Defender,’ was the rabbi in the cities of Pinsk and Zaluch'ye as a young man, before he accepted the post of sitting Rabbi and Bet Din Senior in Berdichev, from where he grew famous. At the direction of his teacher and Rabbi – The Maggid of Mezerich – he traveled to all the towns of the area where he preached on behalf of Hasidism. He was in Horodec, and in Radaskovicy, in Mir and Nizovtsy, in Novogrudok, and based on its proximity to these places, also in Belica.

The Chabad style of Hasidism was also active in this area. As is known, the branched-out organization of Chabad is based on ‘emissaries’ and ‘missionaries;’ the ‘emissaries’ – for the collection of financial resources, and the ‘missionaries’ – for the dissemination of the concept. Both traveled from city to city, village to village, throughout the entire district and to all towns. And it was especially in the small and most severely stricken places that they had their greatest success, because they did not encounter oratorical opponents in such places that might prove to be dangerous to them.

In the year 5550 (1790) the number of Hasidim in the Minsk territory grew large, and they conducted separate prayer quorums, and meetings to take counsel with one another. And a dispute ensued between them and the Mitnagdim. Even in Vilna, a secretly convened ‘minyan’ was established, in the house of the wealthy man, R' Meir ben R' Raphael. In the year 5453 (1793) the number of Hasidim in Pinsk grew large, and from there, their influence reached the outlying towns in that area, and they proceeded to set up secret minyanim in Novogrudok and also in Belica.

In a number of places in the vicinity, the hand of the Hasidim grew strong, such that there were those among them who became heads of their community. In the year 5454 they were able to remove R' Avigdor ben R' Chaim from the rabbinical seat in Pinsk, who was a very active and sharp leader of the Mitnagdim. All of this, despite the fact that the authority of R' Avigdor was very great, and that affairs were conducted in thirty communities in the vicinity of Pinsk according to his word; and this includes the community of Belica as well. R' Avigdor turned to the Gaon, R' Eliyahu in Vilna, and aroused him to a heavy-handed action against the spreading Hasidism.

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In the middle of the century, there were differences and disputes even in Belica on the grounds of the clash between these two conflicting influences, each of which poached on the other's followers. It is only because they were a minority among the residence of the town, that the community was saved from being overwhelmed. And even until the middle of the 19^th century, there still was, on one side of the Great Synagogue in Belica, minyanim of Hasidim [sic: only]. However, we have not been able to establish what type of Hasidim these were, that is to say, according to which tradition and style they followed. However, over time, their work began to flicker out, in the wake of the migration of the townspeople to the big cities, and even due to emigration over the seas, and similarly in the wake of the pressure and excommunications imposed by the great Torah scholars of the Mitnagdim, who harassed them… the activity of Hasidism flickered, fell silent, and then vanished.

The consequences of the mysticism movements among Jewry differed greatly from one to the other. From the turning to the Kabbala, came the movement of ‘Hasidim and Men of Action,’ whose guardian and spiritual leader was R' Yehuda HaHasid, a movement that engendered aliyah to the Land of Israel. And similarly, the Hasidism that emanated from the school of the Baal Shem-Tov, that cut a deep furrow and flowering in the spirit of Jewry. But, in contrast, even on the ground where the Kabbala grew, there also was the Sabbatean Messianic movement, whose results were so tragic to our people.

One of the offshoots of the Sabbatean movement, that manifested itself a century after Sabbatai Zvi, was the movement of Jacob Frank, that led to a mass baptism in Poland, and the adoption of the Roman Catholic faith. We have not conducted a thorough research into the Frank movement, and we do not have details of its agenda, its means, its personalities and what happened to them. What is known, is that any number of these converts were able in the middle of the 18^th century, to achieve titles of nobility and landed estates in the various territories of Poland and Lithuania. The szlachta, extant in the Frank sect, did not separate themselves into a closed community, as for example, was the case with the Denoma of Sabbatai Zvi, but rather, they became assimilated in the second generation in their proximity to Polish society. They endeavored strenuously to be taken for Poles, trying literally, to obliterate their Jewish past.

We do not know how deep the impression of the Frankist movement was in our district. However, we do find a recognizable number of landed aristocrats between Belica and Novogrudok, whose origins can be traced to Frankist adherents and his coterie. Despite all of the subterfuges, and attempts to hide, the names of several residents of the area, known by means of reliable witnesses, at the time suspected – but without a basis – to be descendants of Frankist converts.

So, for example, on his estate beside the village of Liniany, near Belica, the owner by the name Szymanowski resided, from whom the composer Karol Szymanowski (1883^[11] - 1937) – one of the great Polish composers after Chopin – was one of his descendants. It is clearly known that this landowner was the grandson of the convert Samuel Moszkiewicz who was a well-known Polish historiographer of the time, who authored

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writings on the territory around Novogrudok, was born, and lived on his estate near Belica. In his writing, he assesses the family origins of a number of the residents in the area, but not even with a single word, did he recognize his own roots, and that he was related to the family of R' Shlomo Sega”l – one of the leaders of the sect.

The roots of the philosopher-mystic Andrzej Towianski, who was born in the village of Antoszwince (17991878), are very obscure, whose entire teaching is oriented to see Israel in it s spiritual and national glory, and was buffeted by a sharp mystical spirit that was Sabbatean and Frankist. His thesis, ‘The Thesis of Nature,’ was nothing more than a ‘translation’ into a Polish point of view, of the Lurianic Kabbala, and in a very large measure, the Hasidism in the spirit of R' Yehuda HaHasid. It included the foundations for the control of the spirit over the flesh, an order of prayer based on fervor (but recited silently), immersions for purposes of purification, a life of abstinence by subordination of the self, self-effacement, and a submission to the will of God, and a directed outlook towards ‘revelation’ and the redemption of the people (Polish Jewry!), along with the rest of humanity. This ‘Hasidism’ captured a number of renown personalities in the Polish intellectual world, members of its generation, and from the members of the following generation. Among the Jews that converted, Gershon Ross, a man from Vilna was drawn to it, a member of the well-known family of publishers, who converted in 1842. The relationship of Towianski to the Jews and to Judaism attracted to him his friend – the greatest of the Slavic poets – Adam Mickiewicz (1798-1855).

As is known, the members of the Mickiewicz family caused all documents, relating to his descent, to disappear after the death of the poet. In the museum named for him in Vilna (established in 1956) which is located in the house where he completed his poem ‘Grazyna’ (1822) there are no documents concerning his birth, and the birth of his parents. This is what I was told after a number of different attempts to research this matter there. The researcher Shmuel Safam has a picture in his possession of the well-known Polish historian Leonard Czodïko^[12], who was from the same generation as the poet. In 1834, the Polish historian wrote these lines in the year 1834: ‘Mickiewicz's father was from a noble family, but without any wealth,’ and he added: ‘His father is descended of a Jew who converted to Christianity…’ And if it is said that this matter [sic: conversion] took place approximately 35 years before the poet was born (in the year 1798), it follows then that the year in which his father converted was close to 1760, which was the year that the Frankist sect converted to Christianity (they were baptized between 1759 and 1763). Professor G(ershon) Scholem, in his book about the Frankists records a news item from the paper, ‘Allgemeine Zeitung des Judenthums,’ from the year 1838 (he says it was published while the poet was still alive!), which relates that in his childhood, Mickiewicz was in the habit of visiting his Jewish uncle (apparently – his uncle on his father's side – the evidence of /m/f/h and also his arrangement of the letters), his uncle who had not left his faith… (In this connection, see D. Lazar: ‘”Israel, the Older Brother,’; in ‘Maariv’ 17.9.1965).

The origins of the Mickiewicz family have been eradicated to the point that to this day, there is doubt about the place where the poet was born. By and large, this eradication, and the silencing of these sources are in themselves a loud witness and provide a strong correlation, which confirms the Jewish roots of the poet. Most of the researchers locate his birthplace in the land around the village of Osibiec, in the area of Belica on one side, and Novogrudok on the other side. Those who are concerned with fixing the name of the village

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usually satisfy themselves with just designating the area only: beside the town of Belica, or beside the town of Novogrudok.

Regarding the name of the poet's mother, the information about her is also shot through with missing data. We are certain only, that his mother Barbara, of the Majewski family, was the daughter of a convert from the Frank camp. Regarding this, there is very reliable attestation from Polish sources. this was written by the Lord, Xavier Branicki, according to the words of his friend – the poet himself, and he made this matter known in the introduction that he prepared of his Polish translation of the book ‘The Path to Return,’ by R' Gabriel ben R' Yehoshua Schussberg, that appeared in Paris a hundred years ago. (Se D. Lazar: ‘Bayn Shtay Neshamot,’ in ‘Maariv’ 5.2.1965). As is known, in the first generation after their conversion, the people of the ‘sect’ were in the custom of limiting marriage only to those within their own milieu… there are those that see in the name Majewski, a relationship to the estate ‘Majewka’ which is near the village of Bondary, which is in the Belica area.

It is interesting to note, that also the wife of the great poet, she, by happenstance, also has roots in the Jacob Frank sect. In the Frank milieu, the senior individual was the elder, R' Elisha Schorr from the village of Rohatyn in Podolia. Upon conversion to Christianity, he and his sons took the name Wolowski, which is the Polish translation of the name Schorr.^[13] The oldest son of R' Elisha Schorr – Shlomo, was called Franciszek Wolowski after his baptism; The name Franciszek – in honor of Frank himself. His daughter – Maria [Agata], married the landed aristocrat Szymanowski of the Belica district, whom we have already identified previously. As an aside, this Maria was a truly gifted pianist, to who the elder from Weimar – the great poet – J. W. Goethe, both listened to, and utilized (see the same reference: ‘Maariv’ 17.9.65). Szymanowski's daughter, Celina Szymanowska, was the beloved wife of Adam Mickiewicz.

These facts explain in a measured way, both the sharpness that Adam Mickiewicz hurled at the Jews, and also from another side, his pathetic relationship to the concept of messianic redemption of the Jews and the Poles together; of two peoples whom he saw tied to one another.

And if we are discussing Mickiewicz, a man from the Belica vicinity, we are not given license to silently skip over his love of this beautiful area, in which he was born and grew up. In his writings and letters, Belica is mentioned a number of times, with feelings of affection and deep nostalgia. With the exception of his epic poem ‘Pan Tadeusz,’ very few of the creations of the poet were translated into Hebrew. Because of this, we will present a couple of excerpts here.

At the time ‘Pan Tadeusz’ was written, neither the great or lesser ‘Kingdom of Poland’ existed any longer. Its territories had been divided up among its neighbors, and to it was left only the ‘Duchy of Warsaw’ as a concession of Napoleon, the Emperor of France, under whose aegis the Duchy found protection. Belica itself was to be found in that part of the territory under Russian Czarist rule, and was close to the boundary with the Duchy of Warsaw. In the seventh book of the action poem ‘Pan Tadeusz,’ a conversation is portrayed, that takes place among the szlachta of Dobrzyn, regarding the question of whether to take up the sword against their protagonists of the house of Suflic. The good and wise Jew, Yankl, holds forth in the face of

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the inflamed hotheads in order to attempt to quiet the stormy tempers. He counsels to act with restraint, and to wait until spring, for the invasion of Napoleon's army, which is destined to come against the Russians, as he says:

“… I am a Jew, wars were distant from me, when I was
In Belica. And all I saw were Jews to the border;
They say, that the French are encamped at the borders of Lososna, And a war is to break out yet by the spring of the year. Wait a bit…”

In the vicinity of Belica, the widened and deep lake called Switez can be found, garlanded by a forest of thick trees, and a beautiful ambience. A village by the same name is located at its shore. They are mentioned in several places in ‘Pan Tadeusz.’ Also the river, Osha, a branch of the Neman, which emptied into it near Grodno, and flows by the village of Switez, it too is mentioned in the poem. To the legend of the ‘Queen of the Lake’ who lives in the depths of its waters, Mickiewicz dedicates a marvelous ballad called ‘Switezianka’

In the Belica vicinity, members of the Polish-Lithuanian nobility resided on their estates, suffused with great wealth, and enjoying the fruits of the labor of their serfs. Themselves, they were oriented to spend their time hunting, entertainment, but also involved themselves in matters of science and intellectual pursuits. Accordingly, many of them achieved prominence in Polish history. Among them were people who served in government, scholars, and men of science.

From among them, it is worth mentioning Jan Czuczut, a scion of the village of Zhafebo (1787 - 1848), who was a friend and companion to A. Mickiewicz from the days of their studies at the school in Novogrudok, and from the years they studies at the university of Vilna. It was their collection, preservation and translation into Polish of the folk songs of the peasants, that they assembled in the White Russian style. It is also worth recollecting Tomasz Zann, a scion of the village Siedlice (1791-1855), who was a writer and poet of the romantic school, composing ballads and satires, that had a recognizable impact on A. Mickiewicz. It is also appropriate to set down the names of the natural scientist, Dr. Wladyslaw Dybowski, the philosopher Florian Bukhowic (died in 1856 and was buried in the village of Darevo), of the activist Julian Kursak, the patriot Tadeusz Rejtan^[14], the archaeologist – Samuel Moszkiewicz. All of them lived and worked in the area around Belica and its environs.

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During all of the days of Polish rule, the Jews of Belica engaged in wholesale and retail trade, in their town, and in the sale of goods in the nearby villages. They were proprietors of inns, ran saloons for the sale of hard drink, and proprietors of barbershops. They served as officials, intermediaries and collectors for the nearby landowners. As those who stood between the arrogant ‘landlord’ and the serfs, they became targets for the enmity of the exploited even more than the enmity of the exploiters themselves, and because of this, they became even more endangered during the times of rebellion, albeit rarely so. As skilled craftsmen, they met the needs of the peasants and the szlachta together. As beneficiaries from the protection of the landowners, who were stubborn by nature, they were beholden to their good will, and were compelled to tolerate all manner of dissipation and irrationality from the over-indulged nobility, who frequently abused them, and lowered them to the point of depriving them of their human dignity. Their legal, economic and social status, was never firm, and was vulnerable to being upset by the nobility that ruled them. Constraining laws would circumscribe their endeavors, sometimes more, and sometimes – less. This was the plight of the Jews of Belica until the end of the partition of Poland by Russia, Prussia and Austria, in the year 1772, 1793, and 1795. The final partition attached all of Lithuania and most of Poland to Czarist Russia.

As soon as the rule of Lithuania passed entirely into the hands of the Russians, the Russian lack of skill in organizational administration became immediately evident. Over time, these new rulers did not find the capacity to organize the management of the territories that were now under their jurisdiction. And Belica, which belonged to Novogrudok – its larger sister city – at first was attached to Slonim, which was announced as the provincial seat. In the fulness of time, after a while, even by 1797, the role of Slonim as the provincial capitol was cancelled and Belica (along with Novogrudok) were included in a new province, this being the province of ‘Lithuania,’ that encompassed the territories around Vilna and Grodno, and put them into a single, expanded province. This arrangement was quickly recognized as being flawed, and in the year 1801, the ‘Lithuania’ province was broken into two provinces: One for Grodno, and one for Vilna; Belica and also Novogrudok were attached to Grodno. However, in 1842, both of them became attached to Minsk, which was 151.5 km distant from them… while Lida, in the year 1801 was created as a provincial seat to the Grodno province, was attached in 1842 to the Vilna province.

The new regime did not take any initiatives on behalf of those territories that fell like ripe fruit into its hands. However, it immediately moved to implement a number of trial efforts to curtail the influence of the Jews, and to distance them from the villages, and in that way, to minimize the economic activity of the Jews. [Thus] began a period of the expulsion of Jews from villages, in which they had resided for generations. So, for example, during the reign of Czar Nicholas I (1796 - 1855) the Jews were expelled from the village of Krasno, which has already been mentioned above previously, this being the village that is beside Belica. There were several tens of [Jewish] families there, whose livelihood depended on working the various fruit orchards and vegetable gardens, and having ownership of the grain mill to produce flour. The expelled Jews were compelled to go to the cities, increasing the overcrowding there, along with the unemployment, and the village was permanently rid of its Jews.

In a similar manner, the condition of the Jews in Belica was impaired by a prohibition against working the land [leased] from the hands of the nobility. Land management also was prohibited, which afterwards, will of this, was permitted yet again. The limitations and prohibitions and permissions were interchanged among

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themselves, at times in accordance with the prevailing winds that were blowing through the upper echelons of the government, and the whims of the provincial governors. The sense of well-being of the ‘community’ became abridged, and its aim was directed at the collection of those taxes that were uniquely levied on the Jews, like the ‘korowka.’ This tax was levied on the sale of kosher meat, that was sold to Jews. The collection of the tax was first placed on the ‘community,’ but afterwards, it was allocated to specific Jews , who got the name ‘tax-collector.’ This arrangement led to the abuse of the position of tax-collector… in a similar manner, a rather large tax was imposed to enable avoidance of military service, and a high tax that permitted the conduct of commerce at a higher cost than that of people who were not citizens of the country. The ‘Pale of Settlement’ was introduced that limited where Jews could live, but only in the cities of Poland, Lithuania, and southern Russia (the Ukraine), that stood as a sign of land control and permission to live in the cities; however, it was completely prohibited for Jews to live throughout the expanse of Russia itself.

The Napoleonic Wars, led by Napoleon Emperor of France, who invaded Russia in 1812, were felt in the Belica vicinity, beside which, the French crossed the Neman River during their invasion (as was the case with most invasions that came for the west in previous generations), on their way to Moscow. The same was true of the battles that took place after their retreat, and their humiliating defeat, these also were felt near Belica. And the Jews of Belica suffered at the hands of both sides. especially from the fleeing French, that plundered everything they could, in their chaotic retreat.

The oppression of the Jews in Belica grew, and reached its zenith under the rule of Czar Nicholas I, who ascended the throne in 1825. Immediately following his coronation, he passes a decree that surpassed everything that had been done to Jews since the days of the Inquisition. In 1827, the tax that permitted relief from military service, that was used by Jews to avoid military conscription and the obligation of the draft which was otherwise universal, except for the Jews and their descendants, was nullified; this was done except for the sons of merchants who were in the ‘First Guild’ ( – paying up to 1,000 rubles per year), and a boon to craftsmen with a license, attesting to their special expertise, and also excepting clergy.

The tenure of service in the military, in those years, was 25 consecutive years. The draft eligible was obligated to present himself for service at the age of 18, and would be discharged from service at the age of 43. The same also was true for the gentiles. However, the young Jewish men who were 18 years old and draftable were not found suitable for service because they lacked knowledge of the language of the land. In response to this, caused the regime to draft into service children starting at the age of 12 and up, for the purpose of ‘educating them’ in an institution that was called a preparatory school for the children of the ‘Cantonists.’ Each community was given a specific quota of how many individuals to present to the conscription office. The community leaders, its Rabbis and Gabbaim, were held personally responsible to see to it that the quota was filled; if even one was missing, they were obligated a multiple of that in his place, because the decree was dependent and stood on: themselves personally being conscripted in the case where the stated conditions were not met. And because parents were in the custom of hiding their children, the count was invariably short. Because of this, the people appointed by the conscripting authority would indiscriminately kidnap children, while they were still very young, say age 8, and would attest to the fact that they were draft-eligible… the objective of this decree was to tear away children from the oversight of their parents at a tender age, and also from their normal surroundings, to distance them from the customs of their faith, and to force them whether for good or bad, to convert away from their faith. The conscripts from Belica, along with the remaining conscripts from the provinces of Lithuania, were sent to the contingents that were encamped in the Prass province beside the Kama River, in the foothills of the Ural Mountains. It is not

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possible to describe in words, the suffering and torture undergone by these Jewish children who were given over to the followers of the ‘дядя’ that is the Russian ‘Uncle,’ who had the responsibility to bring them to the point where they would consent to convert to Christianity. He would do this with the help of a whip and lash, systematic starvation, and other physical tortures, pressure and degradation. Many of those who came from Belica did not get to return to home after 35 years of living in alien places, after having been kidnaped at an age where the sense of religious and national identity had not yet established itself in the soul of the child. Most died on the way, from cold, in hunger, from diseases and from the agonies of having to ‘serve one's country….’ only very, very few attained the time of discharge, at an advanced age, and were given permission to live in the location where they were discharged, as Jews.

Because of this, at the time when the gentile population was growing at double or triple the size every 30 years, the number of Jews in Belica doubled only over the course of a hundred years! At the year 1765, there were 288 of them, and by the census of 1847, the number had grown to only 544 people.

In 1856, after 30 years of the inquisition imposed with the kidnaping of the Cantonists, the decree was annulled with the coronation of Czar Alexander II, along with the freeing of the serfs, and the Jews were given equal treatment along with gentiles from the standpoint of the rules of military conscription.

The Jews of Belica were indifferent to the Polish rebellions against the Russians, their oppressors, which erupted in 1830, and then again in the following generation – in the year 1863. However, the Polish owners of the landed estates in the area, took a very active role in both, and the Polish populace that lived in the Novogrudok area. In the two times after the suppression of the revolts, the local capture participants were sentenced to hanging, and their supporters to exile; to exile to the wilds of Siberia. The regime confiscated their estates, and sold or gave them to the nobility in the Russian security police. It was in this way that the bitter and hasty end came to the ancestral homes of many of the original Polish szlachta,^[15] which had an hereditary presence in the local soil. Noble Polish families, that had resided for generations on these estates and in their manors in the midst of these forests, where switched out in favor of new families that came from nearby. And the imposing fortress in Belica, in which well-known ancestral Polish families resided for generations, like the Radziwills, the Scipions, the Pacs, and the scions of Sapieha, this residential complex passed into the hands of Peter Wittgenstein in the year 1880 – a Baltic Baron of German descent, that had taken up residence in Courland.

In the wake of economic initiatives by the monarchy, industrial development began to develop in Russia in this period. Centers of manufacture blossomed in Lodz, Warsaw, Odessa and Bialystok, and they attracted many from among the residents of the towns that were becoming impoverished. This phenomenon gave rise to an internal immigration within the country, from the towns to the developing industrial cities. The wave of pogroms, that grew strong during the '80's that was organized by the regime, ripened the role of most Jews, into the revolutionary movement against Czarism, and in its wake, brought an upsurge in emigration

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to new lands. During the same time that tens of thousands of the Jews of Russia sought their fortune on the shores of New York, hundreds sought to make Aliyah to the Land of their Forefathers.

Accordingly, over the course of fifty years, the rising population which was counted in 1847, when compared to the new census of the year 1897, the number of the Jews in Belica grew very little. In that year, the count of all of the citizenry in the Novogrudok area was close to a quarter of a million people; In exact terms – 247,636. And the number of Jews among them was 34,918, apparently 14% of them. And Belica itself, which in 1847 had 544 Jews, in 1897, had only 697 Jews. In order to reduce the percentage of these, the authorities added the count of all the residents in surrounding nearby villages to the count of the town itself. Accordingly, the total count for Belica was recorded as 1,686 residents, of which 679 were Jewish, comprising 40.3% of the population; this, despite the fact, that they represented 75% of the actual residents. According to undocumented sources, but sources considered reliable, in the year 1905, the Belica population was only 1,000 citizens alone, in which the number of Jews had reached 750 men and women.

There were adherents to the Haskalah movement in Belica as well. Already, by the end of the 19^th century, there were many in the town who knew the national language and read its literature. For purposes of disseminating knowledge among the Jewish masses, through the Jewish papers of Russia, ‘HaCarmel,’ and ‘HaMelitz’ the scholar, Abraham Eliyahu Harkavy, who was from Novogrudok, wrote mostly in the Hebrew of the times. After a time, he became a distinguished professor at the University of St. Petersburg. When he was still an educator at the Yeshiva of Novogrudok, a group of talented young people were attracted to him, from the cells of the Haskalah in their city and the surrounding towns, to engage in the discussions of this group, attracting also young people from the town of Belica, and they shared together in the dreams of emancipation of Jews in Russia, and of the achievement of equal rights and of an enlightened and progressive Judaism.

In contrast to them, in the middle of the 19^th century, R' Israel Lipkin, known by the name Salanter, worked and preached among the Jews of Lithuania. He oversaw and gave birth to the ‘Mussar’ movement in Judaism, as a counterweight against Hasidism on one side, and Enlightenment – which precipitated assimilation – on the other. The core of his teaching was the rounding out of the traditional form of the individual (a selfsegregation (within limits, however), and the improvement of the individual and the community collective. His movement sought to overcome the ossification in religious life, and to give a ‘traditionalist’ impetus to the raise the level of traditional commitment on the part of the Jewish masses. He organized large numbers of groups to research the ‘Mussar’ movement, established libraries for the purpose of this research, beside the ‘shtiblakh’ used for prayer, and similarly for the Yeshiva institutions who espoused this objective. His efforts ran afoul of the rabbinate that was set in their ways, but came to overpower them, and grew strong. Among the great Yeshiva institutions that came to be considered as operating in his style, ‘the style of the commentators,’ can be counted Slobodka of Kovno, and the Mussar Yeshiva of Telz, Sluck, Radun, The ‘Commentary’ Yeshiva in Vilna, and those in Eishyshok, Mir and Zhaludok, Scucyn and Novogrudok. This latter one had a great deal of influence over the upper class youth of Belica, most of whom studies their. The better off Jewish families in Belica, would send their sons to the Novogrudok Yeshiva which was nearby, and there, they spent most of their young years in the study of the Torah and Mussar. There, they would hear the sayings of the founder of the movement, R' Israel Salant[er], full of his reasoning and insight. They included such sayings as: ‘A man must strive to better himself; because there is nothing worse than remaining in a condition of the status quo”….or, ‘Life is like a ladder, and a man is obligated to climb it, and raise himself!’ or, ‘There is no greater sin than to continue in the path that one is going, to do things in the way

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they have always been done, and to conduct one's life in the manner that it is being conducted!’

The extreme standard of the Mussar movement was borne aloft by the Rabbi, R' Joseph (Yoizl) Horowitz, the founder of the Novogrudok Yeshiva, who shone its teachings and its influence on the lives of the Jews of Belica. The ‘commentary’ of Mussar was in general put together in such a way that the community at large could accept its demands What one does not find almost at all in the austere commentary, is the asceticism that Rabbi Joseph-Yoizl preached. This strove not only to establish a fanatical brand of Judaism, that was totally centered on integrity and hewing to the straight and narrow entirely. It sought to try and transform the ordinary Jew into a n avatar of pure Mussar that had been cleansed. R' Joseph-Yoizl of Novogrudok taught: If you cannot overcome, you are obligated to overcome!’ or: ‘I never think: Is it possible? Rather: Is it necessary?’ And similarly: ‘If there is no way, I will pave it myself!’ R' Joseph-Yoizl Horowitz had a great influence on the Jews of Belica. His teaching did much to purify the established way of life that was extant in ordinary life, in family life, and the community of his city, in Belica, and in many of the other nearby places, and even those that were distant.

Before the First World War, a distinguished Torah Scholar served as the Chief Rabbi of Belica, who was also a Jew possessed of many other virtues. This is none other than R' Joseph ben R' Meshullam-Fyvusz Rudnick. He was also a master of the Halakha, skilled in casuistry, and also a man possessed of highly admirable character. He was born in 5635 [1875] in the city of Traby. He was educated at Volozhin, and at the Kollel in Kovno. He was given his ordination by the Great Rabbis of his generation: R' Shlomo Cohen of Vilna, R' Zvi-Hirsch Rabinowitz, the Bet Din Senior of Kovno, and R' Moshe Donichevsky, the Rabbi of Slobodka in Kovno. He was raised to be an ordained rabbi, to Halakha in the home of the Rabbi and Bet Din Senior of the city of Horodok that is beside Bialystok. As a wife, he took the granddaughter of the Rabbi Gaon Abraham Avli, the Bet Din Senior of Dvorchany, the author of book, ‘Ahavat Eitan’ (a commentary on the Mishna, that was published by the h0ouse of Ram in Vilna). R' Joseph ben Meshullam did much in Belica to advance Torah knowledge and the life of the community.

Already, in the first days of the Zionist movement, adherents could be found among the few Jews of Belica.

In the list of the lottery tickets distributed by the Zionist committee in Grodno, that was under the direction of Leib Jaffa k”z, it is recorded that in the year 1901-1902, 62 lotteries were purchased by the Jews of Belica (this in accordance with the central Zionist archives in Jerusalem). And if the number of the Jews in the town numbered about 750, it says that 8.2% of the general Jewish population participated in these lotteries. And this was an enormous number, when you consider that in the city of Grodno itself, the seat of the Zionist committee, they were able to sell only 102 such lotteries.

On the Neman River on a Summer Day

The End of Winter – On the Same Neman…

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the Soviet regime in 1918, and the Polish-Soviet war that broke out immediately afterwards. On April 9, 1919, Belica was captured by the armies of an independent Poland that had arisen from the dust, but on July

19, 1920, the Red Army returned in its heavy attack against Poland, at which time it reached the gates of Warsaw, at which point it suffered its defeat. On October 1, 1920, Belica was liberated by Polish troops. These wars led to the continued decline of Belica in general, and especially the Jews of Belica. Because of this, the Jewish population of Belica in 1921 stood at only 483 people, comprising 32% of the residents of the town, which counted over 1,500 residents. These – in contrast to the year 1900, in which there were 680 Jews, that comprised more that 40% according to an undocumented census.

The period of Polish independence did not bring any surcease to the Jews of Belica, as opposed to the relative relief felt by the Jews in the cities in central Poland. The town, which was proximate to the ‘iron curtain’ of the Russian-Soviet border, ceased, at that time, to serve as a means of transfer from Poland to the cities of White Russia. The closing of the border was one of the setbacks to the commerce in Belica, and the loss of the income from being a point of transfer caused a drop in external commerce, and a drop in its earnings. Many from the place, [especially] the young who were coming of age, left their nests, and went off to seek their fortune in other places, whether near of far, and even going off to countries across the ocean.

In September 1939, in the wake of the Ribbentrop-Molotov Agreement, Poland was partitioned anew, and Belica was attached to Soviet White Russia. This devious Agreement didn't serve Stalin for very long, and in July of 1941, Belica was captured by Hitler's armies. And when three or more years passed by, in the year 1944, Belica was again captured by the Russian Soviets, at which time not a single Jew was to be found in the town…

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Hebrew

1. S. Dubnow: “The History of the Eternal Peoples” Dvir, Tel-Aviv 5710 [1950]
2. Dr. Z. Graetz “A History of the Jews” Akhisefer, Warsaw 5690 [1930]
3. Prof. Y. Albogen “A History of the Jews” Jezreel Tel-Aviv 1956
4. Prof. M. Philipson “A History of the Jews in the Last Generations” Jezreel Tel-Aviv 1956
5. “The Book of the Jews of Lithuania” (Including the writings of Dr. Y. Klausner and others), Tel-Aviv
6. David Kahana “The Origins of the Kabbalists, Sabbateans, and Hasidim,” Dvir, Tel-Aviv 5686 [1926]
7. Prof. M. Balaban “Regarding the History of the Frankist Movement” Dvir, 5694 [1934]
8. A. Z. Eshkoli “The Tubinsky Movement Among the Jews,” Tel-Aviv 5693 [1933]
9. S. Dubnow: “The Pinkas of the Country of Lithuania,” Berlin, 1922
10. Sh”A Friedenstein “The City of Heroes,” 5640 [1880]
11. Sh”Y Fin “The Faithful City”
12. G. Scholem “Sabbatai Zvi” Am Oved, Tel-Aviv 5717 [1957]
13. Y. Heilperin “The First Aliyot of the Hasidim to the Land of Israel”
14. A. Kraushaar “Frank and His Followers” (Translated by N. Sokolov), Warsaw 1897
15. The appropriate sections of:
    1. The Encyclopedia of the History of the Great Men of Israel, Chechik, Jerusalem 5706 [1956]
    2. “The Jewish Encyclopedia” In general, Jewish, and Israeli pub. Encyclopedia Committee
    3. “The General Encyclopedia” Jezreel Tel-Aviv 1950
    4. “The Treasure of Jewry”

16. “The General Encyclopedia” Dubno-Fund, New York 1953
17. Shaul Ginsberg “Historical Works” New York 1937
18. Raphael Mahler “Statistics of Jewish Communities”

19. “Das Land Ober-Ost” (Verwaltungsgebieten Litaün und Bialystok-Grodno), Berlin 1917
20. Judische Enzyklopädie “Eschkol,” Berlin 1932
21. Dr. A. Kohut “Geschichte der Deutschen Juden” Berlin 1898

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Polish

22. S. Orgelbranda Encyklopedja Powszechna, Warszawa, 1903
23. Polska Encyklopedja Powszechna, Warszawa 1965
24. Słownik Geograficzny Królewstwa Polskiego, Nakładem Walewskiego, 1884
25. St. Witwicki “Towiańszczyna” Warszawa 1844
26. Wilno i ziema wileńska (Zbiór), Warszawa 1930

27. Yevreiskaya Entsiklopedia, Izo. Brokgauz-Efrom, S.P.B. 1980
28. A.S. Bierszadskii “Russko-Yevreiskii Arkhiv,” 1882
29. A.S. Bierszadskii “Litovskiye Yevrei,” 1883
30. Julii Gessen “Istoriya Yevreyev y Rossiyi” 1905
31. “Vsemirnaya Istoriya” Izo. Soc. Ekon.-Literaturi, Moskva, 1958
32. 32. Knizki “Voskhoda” za gody 1800-1905

Translator's footnotes:

1. In Yiddish, this name gets elided to Novardok. It is this latter form that is used throughout my translation of the Tomaszow-Lubelski Memorial Book. Return
2. Trakai Island Castle is located in Trakai, Lithuania on an island on the shores of Lake Galvé. The castle is sometimes referred to as “Little Marienburg”. The construction of the stone castle was begun in the 14^th century by Kęstutis, and around 1409 major works were completed by his son Vytautas the Great, who died in this castle in 1430. Trakai was one of the main centers of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the castle held great strategic importance. Return
3. Also Niemenek Return
4. Reference to the Ganza Sea Cogh sailing ship of the 14 Century, used by the Germans in trading. Return
5. Kurgan (Russian: is the Russian word (of Turkic origin) for a tumulus, a type of burial mound or barrow, heaped over a burial chamber, often of wood. The distribution of such tumuli in Eastern Europe corresponds closely to the area of the Pit Grave or Kurgan culture in SouthEastern Europe. Kurgans were built in the Eneolithic, Bronze, Iron, Antiquity and Middle Age, with old traditions still smoldering in Southern Siberia and Central Asia. Kurgan Cultures are divided, archeologically, into different sub-cultures, such as Timber Grave, Pit Grave, Scythian, Sarmatian, Hunnish and Kuman-Kipchak. A plethora of place names that include the word "kurgan" spread from Lake Baikal to the Black Sea. Return
6. Literally, boisterous ruffians. Return
7. The Hebrew acronym for Kohkhmas Nistar (Hidden Wisdom), a Kabbalist treatise was published by Moses de León (c. 1250 - 1305), composer and redactor of The Zohar, in the name of Simeon bar Yohai, the founder of Kabbala. Return
8. Possible Mstislavl near Smolensk Return
9. The Polish Nobility, from the Polish title ‘Pan,’ meaning Lord, or Master. Return
10. Called Ind(o)ura by the Christians Return
11. Karol Maciej Szymanowski (Tymoszówka, Ukraine, 3 October 1882 – 28 March 1937, Lausanne, Switzerland) was a Polish composer and pianist. Return
12. Leonard Borejko Chodïko (1800-71) was a Polish historian, geographer, cartographer, publisher, archivist, and activist of Poland's post-November-1830-Uprising Great Emigration. Return
13. Schorr in Hebrew is an ox. In Polish, wolowina is beef. Return
14. Tadeusz Rejtan (1742 - 1780) was a Polish nobleman. He was a member of the confederation of Bar and a member of the Polish Sejm from the constituency of Nowogródek (today Navahrudak, Belarus). Return
15. The Polish word for ‘gentry.’ Return

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