2023/2024
Collection 19

The Metal Shofar

1943; Nice, France

It was Rosh Hashanah — the first day of the Jewish New Year — in September 1943. Usually my great-grandmother’s family would go to synagogue on this important day and hear the shofar, or ram’s horn, being blown.

This year was different. My sixteen-year-old great-grandmother, Hadassah (had AH suh),
and her family were hiding in an apartment in Nice (nees), France, because the Nazis were in control. If Hadassah and her family were found, they would be killed. No one could leave the apartment, including her father, mother, brother, and one of her father’s students. Someone who was not Jewish would secretly bring them food. Hadassah spent the days trying to read a book she had found in the apartment, For Whom the Bell Tolls,(1) in an unknown language she was teaching herself — English.

Right from the apartment window, Hadassah could see metal train tracks. Military trains carrying weapons and bombs would loudly pass by on their way into Italy, making the apartment rumble.

When the holiday of Rosh Hashanah started, Hadassah looked at her father’s shofar and asked, “How will we blow the shofar?” If any of the neighbors heard the wailing sound through the walls, they would know there were Jews hiding.

Hadassah’s father did not look scared. “We will time the blowing of the shofar to a passing train.”

The morning of Rosh Hashanah, Hadassah and her family crowded into a tight hallway in the middle of their apartment. They stood there with wide eyes, waiting in the silence. All they could hear was the soft sound of breathing. Then, finally, their ears heard a small clattering sound. They could feel the vibration of the floor shaking through their feet. The walls were trembling, and the roar of the metal train cars got louder and louder. Everyone looked up at Hadassah’s father. At the moment that the train whistled, her father lifted the shofar, put it to his lips, and blew. His knuckles turned white as he clutched the shofar. Tooooo! the train thundered. Toooo! echoed the shofar.

The “earthquake” ended as the train pulled away. Hadassah’s father put the shofar down. Hadassah felt relieved and happy. Quietness returned as the family stood there. But before they could move, there was another sound: Suddenly the bell rang.

Hadassah’s family looked around at each other, remaining frozen, moving only their eyes. Her father shook his head. They would not answer the door. In fact, they would never know who the person was on the other side.

The family later sat down to their Rosh Hashanah feast. This year it was just green peppers. That was all the food they had for several days. To this day, when my great-grandmother eats a fresh green pepper, she’s right there, back in the apartment, waiting for the train to come so she could hear the shofar.

Ezra Hillel Klein; New York, USA

1. For Whom the Bell Tolls, a novel about the experience of an American fighting in the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) was written by famous American writer Ernest Hemingway, who had served as a newspaper reporter from the battlefields of that war. The novel was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.

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