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Torah 'rescuer' should be held accountable
By Menachem Z. Rosensaft
Professor of law
In an attempt to buttress the tarnished credibility of Rabbi Menachem Youlus, the Washington, DC , area Torah scribe who boasts that he has "rescued" over 1,000 Holocaust-era Torah scrolls, Save a Torah, Inc., Youlus's 501 (c) 3 tax-exempt organization, has now issued a report by two allegedly "independent" scribes to the effect that the Torahs Youlus peddled to different congregations were more than 70 years old and had been "written in Poland or other parts of Eastern Europe."
As if that has ever been the issue.
Youlus, you may recall, represented that two of his Torah scrolls had supposedly been buried in a so-called "Gestapo body bag," whatever that is, in a mass grave on a pig farm in western Ukraine; he said that he had discovered another one under the floorboards of a barracks in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany; and he professed to have dug up yet another in what had been the cemetery of Oswiecim, the Polish town adjacent to the Auschwitz death camp, and that he had miraculously reunited this last scroll with four missing parchment panels that Jews from Oswiecim had taken into the camp and had entrusted for safekeeping to a Jewish-born priest who remained in Oswiecim after the war and eventually sold them to Youlus.
Since the publication earlier this year of a meticulously detailed Washington Post Magazine exposé in which Martha Wexler and Jeff Lunden questioned Youlus's veracity, Youlus has not come forward with a single document or a single witness to substantiate any of his claims.
Moreover, some facts are simply not in dispute: There is no historical evidence whatsoever of the Nazis, who regularly burned and desecrated Torah scrolls, ever burying any sacred Jewish religious artifacts in mass-graves alongside murdered Jews. Youlus actually peddled the two "mass-grave" Torah scrolls to five separate congregations. He could not possibly have found any Torah scrolls in Bergen-Belsen since British troops burned that camp's barracks to the ground in May of 1945 to contain a typhus epidemic. And there is no record of anyone even remotely fitting the description of the priest in Youlus's bizarre Auschwitz Torah story ever having lived in or near the town of Oswiecim .
Rick Zitelman, Save a Torah's president, has now issued a statement in which he claims that the two "independent" scribes "found no evidence to contradict any information provided by Rabbi Youlus to the purchasers of his Torahs." Since all the scribes were asked to do was determine the age and general geographic area of origin of the Torahs in question, and whether or not they are ritually suitable for synagogue use, Zitelman's declaration is as meaningless as it is spurious.
Rabbi Gal Berner of the Kol Ami Congregation in Northern Virginia apparently asked the scribes whether the " Bergen-Belsen " Torah "could have survived in a box from the 1940s to 2002." Their response: "We just can't tell. If water did not get to the Torah, it is possible that the Torah could last." Never mind that no Bergen-Belsen barracks were in existence after May of 1945, let alone in 2002.
As far as Zitelman is concerned, Youlus should be allowed to go on functioning as a scribe with impunity. Even worse, some prominent members of the Jewish community actually defend Youlus publicly.
Carol Pristoop, executive director of the Pearlstone Conference and Retreat Center near Reisterstown , Maryland , told the Baltimore Jewish Times that even though Youlus's actions "could be possibly fraud . . . This man, in many ways, is doing a mitzvah." Dr. Moshe Shualy, the Ritual Director of Baltimore's Chizuk Amuno Congregation, says that even though "there have been misstatements," he believes that Youlus is "being crucified." "Should we judge him because he says things that don't sound quite right?" Shualy asks rhetorically.
Stephen R. Krawitz, Esq., a member of the Conservative Synagogue of Westport, Connecticut, writes in the New York Jewish Week that he considers Youlus to be "a tzaddik, a righteous man" who "is doing God's work on behalf of the Jewish people." And Robert Kushner, who purchased one of the mass-grave Torah scrolls for the Beth El Congregation in South Hills, Pennsylvania, wants to let Youlus off the hook after receiving a sworn document in which Youlus reiterates, without more, his original account of the scroll's provenance. "Whatever he may be," Kushner told the Pittsburgh Jewish Chronicle, "I cannot bring myself to believe that an Orthodox rabbi would swear and confirm to a lie."
Why and how anyone could still defend Youlus is beyond me. His misrepresentations not only play straight into the hands of Holocaust deniers, but he has raised thousands of dollars under false pretenses from people who trusted him, including idealistic teenagers who were conned into donating significant portions of their bar and bat mitzvah gifts to Save a Torah.
Any exploitation of the Holocaust for crass commercial purposes is appalling. Creating false Holocaust histories for Torah scrolls is despicable. Youlus's scheme is at least as reprehensible as Binjamin Wilkomirski's much-acclaimed fake Holocaust memoir which turned out to be a work of fiction written by a Christian clarinetist named Bruno Dösseker, born Bruno Grosjean in Switzerland , not Latvia .
Instead of being given a free pass, Youlus's shadowy activities should be thoroughly investigated. Where did he get his Torah scrolls, and from whom? Were they stolen, and if so, to whom do they belong?
If nothing else, Menachem Youlus violated the trust of well-meaning individuals who thought they were supporting the rescue of Torah scrolls and instead have discovered that they unwittingly helped facilitate a truly contemptible scam. He and Save a Torah must be held accountable, both legally and morally.
Menachem Z. Rosensaft is Adjunct Professor of Law at Cornell Law School , Distinguished Visiting Lecturer at the Syracuse University College of Law, and Vice President of the American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and Their Descendants.
By Menachem Z. Rosensaft |
March 16, 2010; 10:00 AM ET
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Posted by: QCoverage | March 24, 2010 1:40 AM
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Yes I know what I am talking about If the Camp was totally burned where do the floorboards come from if there is no floor left. The few articles found from the entire area of the Camp shows that the fire has been intense and no building remained standing. No I did not get my knowledge from the website
Posted by: salan2 | March 22, 2010 2:24 PM
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don't know what youre talking about with the bergen belsen no digging rule this was taken from the the bergen belsen memorial website
so basically things were found not everything burned up and you have no idea of what you are talking about but nice try
http://www.bergenbelsen.de/en/ausstellung/bodenfunde/
Archaeological Finds
Objects which were found in the grounds of the former camp during archaeological digs are shown in 20 display cases. These objects include mugs, pots, knives, forks, the soles of shoes, leather belts, frames for glasses, tools, barbed wire, parts of huts and many other items.
The finds were unearthed by groups of young people who carried out digs in the grounds of the former camp between 1991 and 2006. During their search for traces of the camp buildings, they found the objects near the foundations of the huts, the delousing baths, the kitchens and the watchtowers, as well as in the submerged fire water reservoirs and the latrine pits.
Posted by: QCoverage | March 21, 2010 12:28 AM
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I am amazed to read that Rabbi Menachem Youlus declared that a Thorah was burried and was found under the floorboards of a barrack in Bergen Belsen Concentration Camp.
That was/is not possible because as Menachem Z.Rosensaft wrote the entire Camp was burned on 25 May 1945 I know because I was there.
I believe it was in 1958 that the Memorial Grounds Bergen Belsen was declared a Jewish Cemetery which forbids any digging of the land and certainly no digging can be can be made into the Massgraves
So where then did they find the Thorah in Bergen Belsen? It will be impossible for Rabi Menachem Youlus to proof bejoint reasonable doubt that in fact a Thorah was
found in Bergen Belsen
salan2
Posted by: salan2 | March 19, 2010 8:31 AM
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In addition why is knowing the age and general area of the torahs irrelevant? if they are holocaust torahs then it is not a scam - even if the stories themselves are not 100%. The veracity of every detail in the story should not be an issue - especially since there is absolutely no proof that he made up a single fact.
If anything i believe that the author of this article and of the wp article should be held accountable for their unsubtle attempts to slander an innocent and well meaning man. the need for a 24 hour news cycle and self-promotion should not override the requirements of justice and honest reporting.
Posted by: QCoverage | March 18, 2010 12:48 AM
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In addition why is knowing the age and general area of the torahs irrelevant? if they are holocaust torahs then he is not perpetuating a "scam" - even if the stories themselves are not 100% true. The veracity of every detail in the story should not be an issue - especially since there is absolutely no proof that he made up a single fact.
If anything i believe that the author of this article and of the wp article should be held accountable for their unsubtle attempts to slander an innocent and well meaning man. the need for a 24 hour news cycle and self-promotion should not override the requirements of justice and honest reporting.
Posted by: QCoverage | March 18, 2010 12:47 AM
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I am not a holocaust scholar but this article sounds ridiculous - a) In October 2007 the redesigned memorial site at bergen-belsen was opened, including a large new Documentation Centre and permanent exhibition on the edge of the newly redefined camp, whose structure and layout can now be traced.so we know exactly where the barracks were.
b)also he never said that nazis were the ones who buried the torahs in mass graves it was jews to save them from desecration by the nazis - do your research
the rest of the proofs are very nitpicky
in addition just because th wp says something doesn't make it true - there are probably few records anyhow because the governments from which the torahs were rescued would probably never let them leave the country due to them being "national treasures"
oh and about the body bag argument that just falls apart by reading the article carefully - it never says the jews were buried in body bags and it never says that nazis were the ones burying the torahs - again read the article
and it is very likely that menachem youlus was not interested in commenting for an article that was very obviously a hackjob (by two authors who are not regular contributors to the wp as far as i know ?)
An overwhelming majority of the torah scrolls have been found to be kosher and they were sold at far less than their market value
The torahs were independently verified - this can be done through handwriting analysis and through analyzing the ink and the decay of the parchment
they concluded that he did not lie about the age or general area from which the torahs came from
in conclusion in a society where there are more than enough real scandals to discuss - don't create your own
Posted by: QCoverage | March 18, 2010 12:44 AM
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when i meant that you didn't know what you were talking about i was referring to your statement that there is no digging allowed in the area. In addition there were remains of buildings found there. the floorboards were probably an exaggeration either by the wp or the scribe however it is definitely possible that a torah could have been found in the area