SIGNED Jewish ART LITHOGRAPH Polish SHTETL Judaica SHABBOS CANDLES Holocaust

Description: Moshe Bernstein, Israeli painter, born in Poland, 1920-2006 Moshe Bernstein was born in Bereza, Poland. He graduated from Vilna Academy of Art in 1939. His family was wiped out in the Holocaust, but he survived the war and remained in Russia until 1947, when he attempted to immigrate illegally to the Land of Israel with Aliyah Bet. He ended up in a detention camp in Cyprus, where he remained until the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. He fought in the War of Independence. Bernstein's art focused on his memories from the shtetl. In 1999, the Massuah Institute for the Study of the Holocaust awarded him a prize for his "documentation of a vanished world." He also illustrated volumes of Yiddish poetry and other books. Education 1935-1939 Art Academy of Vilna 1974 sculpture under Zeev Ben Zvi in Cyprus Awards And Prizes 1980 City Medal, Tel Aviv Moshe Bernstein, Painter and Illustrator, Dies at 86 Born in Poland in 1920, Bernstein was a well-known figure in Tel Aviv's old bohemian circles and the art world. Dana Gilerman and Haaretz Correspondent Dec 11, 2006 12:00 AM 0 comments Zen Subscribe now Share share on facebook Tweet send via email reddit stumbleupon The painter Moshe Bernstein, a well-known figure in Tel Aviv's old bohemian circles and in the world of art, died late last week. He was 86. Born in Poland in 1920, Bernstein completed his art studies in the Academy of Vilna in 1939. His family was wiped out in the Holocaust, but he survived the war and lived in Russia until 1947, when he immigrated to Palestine as part of the "illegal immigration" (aliyah bet). He was caught and spent time in a detention camp in Cyprus. Bernstein's artistic path in Israel recalls that of other painters who reflected their memories of small Jewish Diaspora towns, or shtetls. At a certain stage, these artists were rejected by the local art scene. In the 1950s, '60s and '70s, the subject aroused public interest and recognition. In 1948, Bernstein participated in a group exhibit in the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, and in 1949 in a group exhibit at Artists' House (then known as the Artists' Pavilion). In 1954, he participated in another exhibition - of young artists - in the Tel Aviv Museum. In 1962, he had a solo exhibition at the Tel Aviv Museum, another in 1967 at the Haifa Museum, and a retrospective in 1973 in the Ein Harod Museum of Art. Interspersed among these events were shows at the Katz and Chemerinsky Galleries in Tel Aviv. A Bernstein exhibit, which included paintings of the shtetl, was shown in 1998 at the international theater festival in Parma, Italy. In 1999, he was awarded a prize by the Massuah Institute for the Study of the Holocaust, for his "documentation of the world that vanished at the beginning of his career." His paintings appeared on the walls of the defunct Kassit cafe in Tel Aviv, and in the Kiton restaurant - "places in which he ate and gave paintings," says gallery owner Zaki Rosenfeld, whose father, Eliezer Rosenfeld, worked with Bernstein. Bernstein's paintings always touched on memories of the Jewish town he was forced to leave at a young age. They were a constant reminder of the destruction of European Jewry, but also expressed great yearning. Bernstein wrote in the catalogue of the 1973 exhibition in Ein Harod: "In this exhibition, I once again bring you the experiences and dreams of my longed-for past, because for me it is an enchanted garden which I walk as if intoxicated by its fragrances and its beauty, and from which I draw the inspiration for my work." "Moshe was one of those young artists who gave expression to a different kind of experience in that period," says Galia Bar-Or, curator and director of the Ein Harod Museum of Art. "He is perceived as the kind of Jewish artist that gives sentimental expression to the memory of a Jewish culture that is gone forever. He also illustrated books of Yiddish poetry. He did the typography by hand, in black ink; and in his decorations around the sides there appeared that same figure of a Jewish girl, with a black braid and big eyes, and the houses of the town." Keep updated: Sign up to our newsletter Email* Sign up At a certain stage he began to concentrate increasingly on graphic art. Among others, he illustrated Israel Ch. Biletzky's book, "A Jewish Shtetl," which was published in 1986. "My father, who also came from the shtetl, worked with him for years, and loved his work," says Zaki Rosenfeld about Bernstein. "He belonged to that same vanishing group of artists who represented and preserved the cultural fabric from which they themselves came. When I turned the gallery into a gallery of contemporary art, he would walk down Dizengoff Street, look at the gallery, spit on the ground, make sure I had seen him, and continue on his way. There is no doubt that the face of this little man, and what he represented, will be missed on the Tel Aviv landscape."**** A shtetl (Yiddish: שטעטל, diminutive form of Yiddish shtot שטאָט, "town", pronounced very similarly to the South German diminutive "Städtle", "little town"; cf. MHG: stetelîn, stetlîn, stetel) was typically a small town with a large Jewish population in pre-Holocaust Central and Eastern Europe. Shtetls (Yiddish plural: שטעטלעך, shtetlekh) were mainly found in the areas which constituted the 19th century Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire, the Congress Kingdom of Poland, Galicia, and Romania. A larger city, like Lemberg or Czernowitz, was called a shtot (Yiddish: שטאָט); a smaller village was called a dorf (Yiddish: דאָרף). The concept of shtetl culture is used as a metaphor for the traditional way of life of 19th-century Eastern European Jews. Shtetls are portrayed as pious communities following Orthodox Judaism, socially stable and unchanging despite outside influence or attacks. The Holocaust resulted in the disappearance of the vast majority of shtetls, through both extermination and mass exodus to the United States and what would become Israel. Origins The history of the oldest Eastern European shtetls began about a millennium ago and saw periods of relative tolerance and prosperity as well as times of extreme poverty, hardships and pogroms. The attitudes and thought habits characteristic of the learning tradition are as evident in the street and market place as the yeshiva. The popular picture of the Jew in Eastern Europe, held by Jew and Gentile alike, is true to the Talmudic tradition. The picture includes the tendency to examine, analyze and re-analyze, to seek meanings behind meanings and for implications and secondary consequences. It includes also a dependence on deductive logic as a basis for practical conclusions and actions. In life, as in the Torah, it is assumed that everything has deeper and secondary meanings, which must be probed. All subjects have implications and ramifications. Moreover, the person who makes a statement must have a reason, and this too must be probed. Often a comment will evoke an answer to the assumed reason behind it or to the meaning believed to lie beneath it, or to the remote consequences to which it leads. The process that produces such a response-- often with lightning speed-- is a modest reproduction of the pilpul process.[1] Not only did the Jews of the shtetl speak a unique language (Yiddish), but they also had a unique rhetorical style, rooted in traditions of Talmudic learning: In keeping with his own conception of contradictory reality, the man of the shtetl is noted both for volubility and for laconic, allusive speech. Both pictures are true, and both are characteristic of the yeshiva as well as the market places. When the scholar converses with his intellectual peers, incomplete sentences a hint, a gesture, may replace a whole paragraph. The listener is expected to understand the full meaning on the basis of a word or even a sound... Such a conversation, prolonged and animated, may be as incomprehensible to the uninitiated as if the excited discussants were talking in tongues. The same verbal economy may be found in domestic or business circles.[1] The shtetl operates on a communal spirit where giving to the needy is not only admired, but expected and essential: The problems of those who need help are accepted as a responsibility both of the community and of the individual. They will be met either by the community acting as a group, or by the community acting through an individual who identifies the collective responsibility as his own... The rewards for benefaction are manifold and are to be reaped both in this life and in the life to come. On earth, the prestige value of good deeds is second only to that of learning. It is chiefly through the benefactions it makes possible that money can "buy" status and esteem.[1] This approach to good deeds finds its roots in Jewish religious views, summarized in Pirkei Avot by Shimon Hatzaddik's "three pillars": On three things the world stands. On Torah, On service [of God], And on acts of human kindness.[2] Tzedaka (charity) is a key element of Jewish culture, both secular and religious, to this day. It exists not only as a material tradition (e.g tzedaka boxes), but also immaterially, as an ethos of compassion and activism for those in need. Material things were neither disdained nor extremely praised in the shtetl. Learning and education were the ultimate measures of worth in the eyes of the community, while money was secondary to status. Menial labor was generally looked down upon as prost, or prole. Even the poorer classes in the shtetl tended to work in jobs that required the use of skills, such as shoe-making or tailoring of clothes. The shtetl had a consistent work ethic which valued hard work and frowned upon laziness. Studying, of course, was considered the most valuable and hard work of all. Learned yeshiva men who did not provide bread and relied on their wives for money were not frowned upon but praised as ideal Jews. Interaction with Gentiles The shtetl's main interaction with Gentile citizens was in trading with the neighboring peasants. There was often animosity towards the Jews from these peasants, resulting in extremely violent pogroms from the Gentiles on the Jews, resulting in many Jewish deaths[when?][where?][who?]. This, among other things, helped foster a very strong "us-them" mentality based on differences between the peoples[vague]. This can be seen in the play Fiddler on the Roof[unreliable source?]. Collapse The May Laws introduced by Tsar Alexander III of Russia in 1882 banned Jews from rural areas and towns of fewer than ten thousand people. In the 20th century revolutions, civil wars, industrialization and the Holocaust destroyed traditional shtetl existence. However, Hasidic Jews have founded new communities in the United States, such as Kiryas Joel and New Square. There is a belief found in historical and literary writings that the shtetl disintegrated before it was destroyed during World War II; however, this alleged cultural break-up is never clearly defined.[who?][3] The shtetl in fiction and folklore Chełm figures prominently in the Jewish humor as the legendary town of fools. Kasrilevke, the setting of many of Sholom Aleichem's stories, and Anatevka, the setting of the musical Fiddler on the Roof (based on other stories of Sholom Aleichem) are other notable fictional shtetls. The 2002 novel Everything Is Illuminated, by Jonathan Safran Foer, tells a fictional story set in the Ukrainian shtetl Trachimbrod. (Trochenbrod) The 1992 children's book Something from Nothing, written and illustrated by Phoebe Gilman, is an adaptation of a traditional Jewish folktale set in a fictional shtetl. In 1996 the Frontline programme Shtetl broadcast; it was about Polish Christian and Jewish relations ****** Shabbat candles (Hebrew: נרות שבת) are candles lit on Friday evening before sunset to usher in the Jewish Sabbath.[1] Lighting Shabbat candles is a rabbinically mandated law.[2] Candle-lighting is traditionally done by the woman of the household,[3] but every Jew is obligated to either light or ensure that candles are lit on their behalf.[4] In Yiddish, lighting the candles is known as licht bentschen ("light-blessing") or licht tsinden ("light-kindling"). History 1723 illustration of a Shabbat lamp According to Tobiah ben Eliezer, the custom is one "which Israel adopted from the time of Moses",[5] while Genesis Rabbah relates that "For all the days that Sarah lived, the Sabbath lamp stayed lit until the next Sabbath eve, and for Rebecca it did the same . . ."[6] According to Leopold Landsberg, the Jews adopted this custom from the Persians.[7] Jacob Zallel Lauterbach disagrees, arguing that it was instituted by the Pharisees to protest against superstition, or perhaps against (some predecessor of) the Karaitic refusal to have any light on Sabbath Eve, even were it lit before the Sabbath.[a][8] According to standard halakhic literature, the purpose of lighting of Shabbat candles is to dignify the Sabbath; before the advent of electric lighting, when the alternative was to eat in the dark, it was necessary to light lamps to create an appropriate environment.[9] One early-modern Yiddish prayer asks for the candles to "burn bright and clear to drive away the evil spirits, demons, and all that come from Lilith".[10] The practice of lighting an oil lamp before Shabbat is first recorded in the second chapter of m. Shabbat, which already presupposes it as an old and undisputed practice.[8] Persius (d. 62 CE) describes it in Satire V: At cum Herodis venere dies unctaque fenestra dispositae pinguem nebulam vomuere lucaernae portantes violas . . . labra moves tacitus recutitaque sabbata palles. But when the day of Herod[b] comes round, when the lamps wreathed with violets and ranged round the greasy window-sills have spat forth their thick clouds of smoke . . . you silently twitch your lips, turning pale at the sabbath of the circumcised. (trans. Menachem Stern) As do Seneca and Josephus.[8][11] Blessing The blessing is never described by Talmudic sources, but was introduced by Geonim to emphasize rejection of the early Karaitic belief that lights could not be lit before the Sabbath.[8] It is attested in a fragment in the St. Petersburg national library (Antonin B, 122, 2); it also appears in a plethora of Gaonic material, including the Seder of Amram Gaon, the responsa of Natronai Gaon, the responsa of Sherira Gaon, and others. Every source quotes it with identical language, exactly correspondent to the modern liturgy. Ritual Shard from a stand for a Shabbat oil lamp etched with the word שבת (Shabbat) in Aramaic script, c. 4th century, from the Horbat 'Uza excavations east of Acre Who lights The lighting is preferably done by a woman. Amoraic sources explain that "the First Man was the world's lamp, but Eve extinguished him. Therefore they gave the commandment of the lamp to the woman".[12] Rashi adds an additional rationale, "and moreover, she is responsible for household needs."[13] Maimonides, who rejects Talmudic rationales based on superstition,[14] writes only: "And women are more obligated in this matter than men, because they are found at home[c] and involved in housework."[15] Yechiel Michel Epstein writes (cleaned up): Sabbath lamps are just like Chanukah lamps, in that the obligation falls on the household. Therefore, even if a male member of the household has a separate room of his own, he need not light separately, because the woman's lighting accounts for every room of the house. If a married traveler has his own room, he needs to light separately, because his wife's blessing cannot account for another place entirely, but if he lacks his own room, he does not need to. A single traveler must light even if his parents are lighting on his behalf elsewhere, and if he lacks his own room, he must arrange matters with the proprietor.[16] Ideally, the woman lights her candles in the place she will be eating dinner. If another woman wants to light there, she may also light in a different room. Similarly, a traveler may light within his room even if he is eating elsewhere. Number of candles Today, most Jews light at least two candles. Authorities up to and including Joseph Karo, who wrote that "there are those who employ two wicks, one corresponding to "Remember" and one corresponding to "Keep" (perhaps two wicks in one lamp, reflecting the Talmudic teaching "'Remember' and 'Keep' in a single statement"),[17] advised a maximum of two lamps, with other lamps necessary for other purposes kept carefully at a distance to preserve the tableau.[18] However, Moses Isserles added "and it's possible to add and light three or four lamps, and such is our custom",[19] and Yisrael Meir Kagan added, "and there are those who light seven candles corresponding to the seven days of the week (Lurianics),[20] or ten corresponding to the Ten Commandments".[21] Starting with Yaakov Levi Moelin, rabbinic authorities have required women who forgot to light one week to add an additional lamp to her regular number for the rest of her life.[22] A recent custom reinterprets the two candles as husband and wife[d] and adds a new candle for every child born; apparently the first to hear of it was Israel Hayyim Friedman, though his essay was not published until 1965,[23] followed by Jacob Zallel Lauterbach, who mentions it in an undated essay published posthumously in 1951.[8] Menachem Mendel Schneerson mentioned it in a 1975 letter.[24] Mordechai Leifer supposedly said, "The women light two candles before children but after their first child they light five, corresponding to the Five Books Of Moses . . . and so it is forever, irrespective of how many children" but this teaching was not published until 1988.[25] Menashe Klein offers two interpretations: either it is based on Moelin's rule and women who miss a week because they were giving birth are not exempted (though all other authorities assume they are exempted) or it is based on comparison with Hanukkah candles, which some medieval authorities recommended be lit one per member of the household.[26] Hand waving In the Ashkenazic rite, after the candles are lit, a blessing is said (whereas, in the Sephardic rite, the blessing is said before the lighting). In order to avoid benefiting from the light of the candles before uttering the blessing, Ashkenazic authorities recommend that the lighter cover her eyes for the intervening period.[27] Today, many Jewish women make an exaggerated motion, waving their hands in the air, when covering their eyes; there is no specific source for this in traditional texts. The Sefer haAsuppot, attributed to the 13th-century scholar Elijah b. Isaac of Carcassonne, records that "I heard that [Rashi's granddaughter] Rabbanit Hannah, the sister of Rabbi Jacob, would warn the women not to begin the blessing until the second candle was lit, lest the women accept the Sabbath and then continue lighting candles."[28][29] Time The candles must be lit before the official starting time of Shabbat, which varies from place to place, but is generally 18 or 20 minutes before sunset. In some places the customary time is earlier: 30 minutes before sunset in Haifa and 40 minutes in Jerusalem, perhaps because the mountains in those cities obstructed the horizon and once made it difficult to know if sunset had arrived. Blessing HebrewTransliterationEnglish בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה ה', אֱ-לֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, אֲשֶׁר קִדְּשָׁנוּ בְּמִצְוֹתָיו, וְצִוָּנוּ לְהַדְלִיק נֵר שֶׁל שַׁבָּת.‎Barukh ata Adonai Eloheinu, Melekh ha'olam, asher kid'shanu b'mitzvotav v'tzivanu l'hadlik ner shel Shabbat.Blessed are You, LORD our God, King of the universe, Who has sanctified us with His commandments and commanded us to light the Shabbat lamp. In the late 20th century, some apparently began to add the word kodesh ("holy") at the end of the blessing, making "... the lamp of holy Shabbat", a practice with no historical antecedent. At least two earlier sources include this version, the Givat Shaul of Saul Abdullah Joseph (Hong Kong, 1906)[30] and the Yafeh laLev of Rahamim Nissim Palacci (Turkey, 1906)[31] but authorities in the major Orthodox traditions were solicited for responsa only in the late 1960s, and each acknowledges it only as a new and alternative practice. Menachem Mendel Schneerson and Moshe Sternbuch endorsed the innovation[32] but most authorities, including Yitzhak Yosef, ruled that it is forbidden, though it does not nullify the blessing if already performed.[33] Almog Levi attributes this addition to misinformed baalot teshuva.[34] It has never been a widespread custom but its popularity, especially within Chabad, continues to grow. *** ebay6333 folder 218

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