Travelling in Lithuania
We are travellin in Lithuania. It seems very fitting that we should be visiting this country during the Three Weeks.
The Three Weeks is ythe period between the 17th of Tamuz and the 9th of Av. That is the traditional mourning period for the destruction of the Holy Temple. (The 17th of Tamuz is considered to be the date on which the Romans broke through the walls of Jerusalem, that ws the beginning of the end of the Second Temple.)
I bring this up because Lithuania used to have a vibrant Jewish community. It was the intellectual center of the Jewish world for about 200 plus years.
In 1940 this all came to an end. First the Soviets invaded. Then on June 22, 1941 the Germans invaded. Within the three years of the German occupation 96% of the Jewish population of this country. The the Russians came back. They refused to allow any Jewish life to return to Lithuania.
What is left is a community that is totally ignorant of their own past.
So as we travel around this country, it is just sad to think about what was and what is.
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About the Author: Shlomo Bar-Ayal is an Israeli-American, or an American-Israeli (I could never get that right) who is unabashedly pro-Israel, pro-US and a great guy.
He has an open mind to opinions that he agrees with.
Besides blogging on whatever he feels like blogging about on any given day he enjoys learning Talmud, davening, being the candyman in his synagogue, smoking his tobacco pipe, giving tours at the Grand Lodge of New York, being involved in Freemasonry, and partaking in an adult beverage every now and then