My Great-Grandfather Elyakim fought to hold onto his Yiddishkeit, but didn’t see Yiddishe nachas from his descendants. In his own lifetime, that is
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M y great-grandfather a man named Elyakim was a religious man who grew up in Czechoslovakia served in the army during World War I spent the years of World War II in a labor camp and eventually moved to Israel.
His three children a son and two daughters grew up in Communist Czechoslovakia where remaining frum was all but impossible.
When Elyakim died in 1970 not one of his children grandchildren or great-grandchildren was religious. In a photo taken toward the end of his life he is wearing a white shirt black pants and a black yarmulke and is flanked by his daughter and son-in-law who are dressed like secular Israelis. Elyakim fought to hold on to his Yiddishkeit but he did not see Yiddishe nachas from his descendants. In his own lifetime that is.
When I was 23 years old my father told me that I should marry a Jewish boy. I had never heard such a thing before and I was quite surprised. When I had attended a public school in upstate New York my best friends had been a Chinese girl and a black boy. We celebrated my bat mitzvah with a swimming party at the local Marriott Hotel pool and my diverse group of friends — boys and girls Jews and non-Jews — were part of the celebration.
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