So after the earthquake of 1837 they
all moved to Jerusalem and started the Ashkenazi Yishuv of
Jerusalem.
So when Rabbi Pinchas died in
Dokshitz, his son Rabbi Alleh (that's Yiddish for Eliahu) was
elected Rabbi of Dokshitz. Of course Alleh was named for the
pride of the family, the Vilna Gaon. The stories in the family
about Rabbi Eliahu Kremer (Alleh) were that he was a young man
when he came to Eretz Israel. I am not quite sure of that and
am not sure if Beileh was his first wife because when he came
to Jerusalem he left grown up sons in Europe and arrived only
with his youngest daughter Mir'l. In Jerusalem he had another
son, Menachem Mendel Kremer. Another story of Rabbi Eliahu
Kremer is that he was very rich and sensitive. He insisted on
using tableware of silver and sleeping on silk bed
sheets.
On the other hand, Rabbi Eliahu was
very liberal: he insisted on teaching his daughter. This is
remarkable - in Jerusalem girls were only taught basic reading
so they can read their Sidur and pray, and basic arithematic so
they can work and provide for the family when their husbands
learned Torah. Not Rabbi Eliahu - he taught his daughter
exactly as he taught his sons: language, Tora and Gemorah, and
arithematic. He said he was doing this so "she can marry a
great Rabbi, like his close Yeshiva friend, Rabbi Eliahu
Neuman". So Mirel admired Rabbi Yaacov Tzvi (Hirsch) Neumann
from her early childhood. Eliahu died when Mirel (her full name
was Sheineh Mirel) was a girl.
Story #3: There is a story, started by
Mirel, that when she lived in Dokshitz as a young girl, there
were many gypsies near Dokshitz. Since they used to steal,
Mirel was ordered by her mother Beileh never to allow a gypsy
in the house. One freezing morning, when Mirel was alone at
home in Dokshitz, an old gypsy woman knocked on the door,
begging for bread. Mirel, against her instructions, pitied her
and let her in, and served her a warm soup and bread. The
grateful gypsy wanted to reward Mirel so she read her future.
She predicted that she'll live in a far away country, and she
would marry two old men. Well, soon the first prophecy was
fulfilled: Rabbi Eliahu took his wife and daughter and moved to
Jerusalem where he settled in the Old City. Of course, then it
was not called the "Old City because there was no "new city."
After his death many wanted to marry the beautiful and clever
girl, but she refused them all. After Rabbi Hirsch Neumann's
wife Leah died, she said she'll only marry him. He had no
children since Leah couldn't give him children. Of course
Beileh, her mother, refused because by then he was an old man,
and she was a young girl. He himself, as her trustee by her
father's will, refused and tried to arrange suitable marriages
for her. However she was very stubborn and refused them all, so
in the end she got her wish and married Rabbi Yaacov Tzvi
Neumann. She bore him children, one after the other, but they
all died. There is a story that he sent her to Vienna to his
brother Dr. Karl Neumann, who was Kaiser Franz Josef's
physician. The story says that Mirel had met the Kaiser before,
in Jerusalem when he visited, and he saw that the building of
the Churveh synagogue in the Old City was not finished and had
no roof. He asked for the reason, and there was a hush, and
then Mirel said, in German that "the synagogue has taken off its hat for the
Kaiser." The Kaiser who always
had an eye for a beautiful woman, roared wth laughter and
understood the reason, and before he left Jerusalem he left the
Jews enough money to finish the synagogue. Still the name
"Churveh" stuck with the synagogue. Somehow, in books, this
story is attributed to Rabbi Nisan Beck, but the family story
is that it was Mirel who received the money from the
emperor.
Story #4: Anyhow, when my great
grandfather sent Mirel to Vienna to his brother, Mirel took a
walk one Friday morning in the city park. The Kaiser too had
the habit of walking in the park, so when he saw Mirel he
stopped, and they had a long serious talk. So long in fact,
that Mirel never returned home for lunch. So long, that when it
was nearly time to light Shabat candles, Mirel was still
missing and the family was worried. Then just before Shabat the
Kaiser's carriage drew to the physician's home. Knowing the
carriage, Karl rushed out thinking he is needed in court, when
the carriage door opened and out stepped the Kaiser, and then
Mirel. The Kaiser thanked Mirel for the day, bid the family
Shabat Shalom and drove off.
I was told once that someone of the
family doubted the story so he looked in old newspapers and
found the story recorded.
Story #5: Now Mirel married Rabbi
Hirsch Neumann and lost many pregnancies, but in the end she
had two daughters ( one died at the age 5) and one son, Moshe
and one son, Moshe Eliahu Neumann, my grandfather. After her
husband's death she married his friend, and her other trustee,
Rabbi Meyer Maizel, and with him she had another girl. So the
gypsy's prophecy came true.
Mirel was known to be beutiful, quick,
with a retort ready for any question, knowledgeable so that
when women came to ask the Rabbi questions, she was the one who
replied. She was known as "Rebitzin of the Old City" and
admired by all. She died in 1935 and each girl born in the
family in the years after got the name Miriam, after Mirl. When
I was born my father's family insisted I be Miriam, after
Mir'l. My mother thought Aviva was appropriate to a girl born
in Pessach, so they all settled for Aviva Miriam. But I had
cousins like Miriam, Mickie, Merry, Mimmie and Mirie. All of
course named for Mirel, my great grandmother.
If I think of other stories of Mirel,
I'll write.
Wait - there is the story, again
started by Mirel, or at least we know it because Mirel used to
tell it to my father and grandfather: the story is that when a
Neumann (or Neeman) dies, a dog is howling. It was like that in
the Old City, that a dog howled when my great grandfather died.
But Mirel who had lost many children, claimed the story was
true. I heard it many times from my great-aunt who heard it
from her mother Mirel, and from my father. I remember when my
grandfather died, I accompanied my father when he went to issue
a burial permit. A German Shepherd dog was sitting on the
opposite pavement. My father looked at it and repeated the
story, which I heard many times. I remember remarking that it
is very quiet, and we entered the building. Just as we mounted
the first step, the dog pulled back his head and howled like a
wolf. I swear I froze on the spot, but my father nudged me,
whispered "I told you so" and mounted the stairs. A dog, or
maybe the same one howled when my uncle Matitiahu died, and - I
swear - when my father died. I was sitting at home, after the
funeral, when I heard the howling. My uncle Itzchak claims it
is nonsense but I can vouch that I heard it THREE times at
deaths of my grandfather, my uncle and my father.
Aviva Neeman
<aneeman@netvision.net.il>
-
- On May 30, 2004, a
meeting and memorial service for the Victims of the Shoah in
Dokshitz and Parafianov
took place in Tel Aviv.
-
- Photos appear below.
- Photo 1
- Photo 2
- Photo 3
- Photo 4
- Photo 5: Aviva
Neeman
- Photo 6
- Photo 7
- Photo 8
- Photo 9
- Photo 10
- Photo 11
- Photo 12
- Photo 13
- Photo 14
- Photo 15
- Photo 16
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