Edward McGlynn Gaffney & Marcia Sachs Littell 
Building Bridges Among Abraham’s Children [EPUB ebook] 
A Celebration of Michael Berenbaum

Contents

Acknowledgments

The Editors

Preface: Blessing an Illustrious Student: The Scholarship of Michael Berenbaum

Richard L. Rubenstein

Foreword: Giving Thanks for an Amazing Colleague: Michael Berenbaum as an Educator, Museum Builder, and Filmmaker 

Jeffrey Herbst

Introduction: Creating a Multi-Focused Festschrift: Michael Berenbaum as a Multi-Talented Bridge-Builder

Edward Mc Glynn Gaffney

Part One. Expressing Deep Thanks: Personal Tributes from Old Friends 

1. Expanding Horizons of Jewish Thought and Modelling Integrity:  The Lifelong Impact of a Campus Rabbi on a College Freshman

Jane Eisner

2. Grasping and Expressing Foundational Insights: An Anchor and a Pillar in Holocaust Studies

John K. Roth

3. Creating Living Memorials after the Catastrophe: Michael Berenbaum’s Contribution to Holocaust Education

Irving Greenberg

4. Befriending Our Family, Loving Books, and Building Museums: A Capacious Mind and a Generous Soul 

Stuart E. Eizenstat

5. Learning Most from One’s Students: The Highest Standard of Teaching Excellence

Carol Rittner, RSM 

6. Learning from a Patient Teacher: My Steady Friend Michael Berenbaum

Jeanette Friedman Sieradski

7. Teaching Teachers of the Shoah: The Recurring Impact of a Mentor and Friend 

Harriet Sepinwall

8. Opening Doors of Opportunity for Other Filmmakers: A Better Understanding of Hollywood

Deborah Oppenheimer

Part Two. Searching for Meaning in Ancient Texts: Biblical, Talmudic, and Midrashic Narratives and Theology 

Painting: Jacob Wrestling with the Angel 

Eugène Delacroix 

9. Wrestling with God and Contending with Fire: Jacob at the Jabbok and Moses at the Burning Bush 

Henry F. Knight 

10. Harvesting the Berry Tree: A Midrash for Michael Berenbaum (on Pirke Rabbi Eliezer 30–31)

Burton L. Visotzky 

11. Marking Jewish Identity in a Famous Memoir: Page One of Elie Wiesel’s Night

David Patterson

12. Seeing through the Prism of the Shoah: Biblical, Talmudic, and Hasidic Characters of Elie Wiesel

Joel Rappel

13. Honoring Father and Mother: An Impossible Possibility?

H. Martin Rumscheidt

14. Searching for Wisdom: Ethical Guidance in Proverbs, Psalms, Prophets, and Midrash

Joseph Blenkinsopp

15. Probing Deeply for Common Ground: Jewish Scholarship on Jesus the Jew

Edward Kessler

16. Transforming a Symbol: The Scandal of the Cross

Donald P. Senior, CP

17. Rereading “His Blood Be Upon Us”: The Blessing of the Blood of Life in Matthew’s Gospel

Frederick A. Niedner

18. Arranging Readings in the Lectionary: The Problem of “Troublesome Readings” in the Liturgy 

Dianne Bergant, CSA

Part Three. Rebuilding a Culture after a Catastrophe: Rabbinic Thought and Action

Painting: Rosh Hashanah

Arthur Szyk

Photos: Standing in the Need of Prayer: Beth Tefilla and Egalitarian Worship

19. Restoring Credibility and Revelation in a World Still Full of Atrocities: Religion, Ethics, and Culture after the Shoah

Irving Greenberg

Poem: “god” 

Robert Krell

20. Rethinking Theology after the Shoah: God as a Universal Force of Transformation and Healing 

Michael Lerner

21. Understanding Jewish Law: Fundamental Purposes, Modern Approaches to Its Observance, and Three Psalms in Its Praise 

Elliot N. Dorff

22. Acting Justly and Pursuing Peace: The Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism

David Saperstein

23. Agonizing and Preaching Boldly in the Pulpit: Rabbi Isaac Herzog in Dublin and Jerusalem

Marc Saperstein

24. Discerning a Role for God’s Law and Popular Governance: Rabbi Hayyim David Halevi on the State of Israel and Democracy

David Ellenson

25. Searching Our Souls and Confessing Our Sins: Small and Large Confessions for Yom Kippur

Arik Ascherman

Sculpture: Marble Bas-Relief of Rabbi Maimonides, United States Capitol Building

Brenda Putnam

Photos: Speaking in God’s Name in Public Fora: Rabbis Protesting on the Streets, in Congress, and in a Cemetery against Genocide, Racism, and Modern Warfare, 1943–1968 

Part Four. Promoting Growth in Understanding: Jewish Commitment to Education

Sculpture: Rabbi Maimonides, Córdoba, Spain

Amadeo Olmos Ruiz

Photos: Searching for Wisdom Wherever It May Be Found: Images of Jewish Learning

26. Building Edifices of Jewish Knowledge: Michael Berenbaum and the Third Encyclopaedia Judaica

David N. Myers

27. Introducing College Students to Jewish Customs and Beliefs: The Importance of Jewish Studies Programs 

Richard Libowitz

Poem: “They Sat in the Back”

Hannah Daniel

28. Searching for Holocaust Insights: Museums as Living Memorials and Dual Narratives in Holocaust Education

Holli Levitsky

29. Trusting and Contending in Jewish Education: Curricular Integration and Interaction

Gordon Bernat-Kunin

30. Sustaining Jewish Commitment to Education as a Central Value: Holocaust Education and Museum Building

Edward Jacobs 

31. Celebrating Freedom in the Cradle of Liberty: The National Museum of American Jewish History

Jonathan D. Sarna 

32. Illuminating Inclusive Freedom and Equipping Modern Abolitionists: The National Underground Railroad Freedom Center

Woodrow Keown, Jr. and Christopher Miller

Appendix: “Lift Every Voice and Sing” (The Black National Anthem) 

James Weldon Johnson 

33. Helping Teachers to Teach and Students to Learn: Facing History and Ourselves

Margot Stern Strom

Part Five. Reconnecting Abrahamic Collegiality and Building Beautiful Bridges: Interreligious Encounters 

Sculpture: Synagoga and Ecclesia in Our Time

Joshua Koffman 

Photos: Healing Wounds: Journeys of Friendship—Auschwitz, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Rome

34. Abandoning Ancient Enmity and Seeking Covenantal Partnership: The Relationship between Judaism and Christianity

Irving Greenberg

35. Learning through Dialogue: The Work of the ICCJ from Seelisburg to the Present

John T. Pawlikowski, OSM

Appendix A: An Address to the Churches—Ten Points of Seelisberg

International Conference of Christians and Jews (August 1947)

Appendix B: Address to International Council of Christians and Jews

Pope Francis (June 30, 2015)

36. Replacing the Teaching of Contempt for Jews: Jules Isaac and Historical Truths about Jesus and the Jewish People of His Time 

Norman C. Tobias

Appendix A: Eighteen Points to Rectify Christian Teaching about Jews and Judaism (1947)

Jules Isaac

Appendix B: Memorandum on Private Audience of Jules Isaac with Pope John XXIII, June 13, 1966

Cardinal Loris Francesco Capovilla 

37. Repenting for Sins against Jews and Harvesting Fruits of Mutual Respect: International Dialogue between Jews and Catholics after Vatican II

Cardinal Kurt Koch

Appendix: Pope Francis to Executive Committee, World Jewish Congress (November 22, 2022)

Pope Francis

38. Repudiating the Teaching of Contempt for Jews and Ending a Catholic Mission to Convert Jews: Nostra Aetate and the Jubilee Statement on Conversion 

Noam E. Marans

39. Sustaining a Quiet Revolution: Popes and Jews since the Shoah 

Dennis B. Mc Manus

40. Confronting Racial Antisemitism and Rejecting Contempt for Jews: Reform of Catholic Preaching and Teaching about Jews

Eugene J. Fisher 

41. Establishing an Enduring Friendship: Rabbi Marc Tanenbaum and Cardinal Johannes Willebrands

Judith Hershcopf Banki 

42. Doing the Will of Our Father in Heaven: Orthodox Jewish Statements on Jewish-Christian Relations

David Rosen

43. Rereading Dabru Emet and Its Successors: Jewish Statements on Christians and Christianity

David Fox Sandmel

Appendix: Reading Dabru Emet and Its Successors: Jewish Statements on Christians and Christianity

National Jewish Scholars Project (September 20, 2000)

44. Gathering the Fruits of a Half-Century on Reflection on the Shoah: The Annual Scholars’ Conference on the Holocaust and the Churches 

Marcia Sachs Littell

45. Attending to Complicity, Identity, and the Integrity of “And”: The Annual Scholars’ Conference on the Holocaust and the Churches

Henry F. Knight  

46. Repairing a Damaged Relationship: A Half-Century of Jewish-Lutheran Dialogue

Darrell Jodock and Emily Soloff

Poem: “Night Voices”

Dietrich Bonhoeffer 

47. Rethinking the Current Goal of Jewish-Christian Relations: Reconsideration Rather Than Reconciliation

Amy-Jill Levine

48. Moving beyond “Holy Wars”: Interreligious Dialogue as a Tool for Forging Sustainable Peace

Christoffer H. Grundmann 

49. Creating Spiritual Remedies for Our Social Pathologies: Reflections of a Religious Peacebuilder

Yehezkel Landau

50. Rejecting Revenge and Preserving Our Humanity: My Journey from the Parents’ Circle to a Treatise on Peace 

Yitzhak Frankenthal

Poem: “Mending Wall”

Robert Frost 

51. Healing a Mother’s Broken Heart: Letters to My Son and the Family of His Assassin

Robi Damelin

52. Expanding Dialogue among Jews, Christians, and Muslims: A Step Closer to Human Fraternity, World Peace, and Living Together

Cardinal Michael Fitzgerald, M.Afr.

53. Evaluating Jewish-Muslim Relations in the Middle Ages: Golden or Ghastly?

Reuven Firestone

54. Outing White Supremacy as a Threat to Jews and Muslims: Strategies for Confronting a Common Enemy 

Salam Al-Marayati 

55. Challenging Group Bias: Benefits of Contact and Dialogue among Jews, Christians, and Muslims

Faisal Kutty 

56. Educating Muslims about the Shoah: Memory and Meaning in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam 

Mehnaz M. Afridi

57. Knowing a Person by Her Actions to Help Others: The Discovery of the Prophet in His People

Ingrid Mattson

58. Striving for Justice and Protecting Human Life: The Universality of People-Centered Human Rights

Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im

Photos: Building and Maintaining Beautiful Bridges: Brooklyn Bridge and Golden Gate Bridge

Stained Glass: Stained Glass: Rainbow Shabbat

The Holocaust Project: From Darkness into Light

Judy Chicago and Donald Woodman

Part Six. Remembering for Our Future: The Shoah

Photos: Piercing the Darkness and Seeing Beyond the Shadows of the Shoah

Judy Glickman Lauder

Yellow Star, Theresienstadt

Railroad Tracks from Warsaw to Treblinka, Poland

Arbeit Macht Frei, Dachau Concentration Camp, Germany

Shoes, Auschwitz

Majdanek Death Camp, Poland 

Auschwitz-Birkenau, Poland

Chimneys

Poem: “O The Chimneys!”

Nelly Sachs

59. Seeing within and beyond Shadows: A Memoir of a Personal Journey

Judy Glickman Lauder

60. Seeing Darkness and Light through a Camera Lens: Judy Glickman Lauder’s Images of the Shoah

Michael Berenbaum

Multi-Media Art: The Holocaust Project: From Darkness into Light 

Judy Chicago and Donald Woodman

Treblinka/Genocide, Detail

Wall of Indifference, Detail

Bones of Treblinka

A. Historical and Scientific Research 

61. Studying the Holocaust: Why It Still Matters

Christopher R. Browning

62. Committing Makeshift Murder: The Disorganized Holocaust 

Peter Hayes 

63. Heeding Warnings from Holocaust History: The Perils of Fake News and Statelessness

Timothy Snyder

64. Resisting Forced Labor in Warthegau and Galicia: A Tale of Two Cemeteries 

Martin C. Dean 

65. Opposing and Protesting: Forgotten Individual Jewish Resistance in Nazi Germany

Wolf Gruner

66. Meeting Himmler: Norbert Masur’s Negotiation of the Release of Jewish Women from Ravensbrück

Stanley A. Goldman

67. Confronting Evil: Ilya Ehrenburg and the Holocaust 

Joshua Rubenstein

Poem: “Kol Nidre”

Abraham Sutzkever

68. Navigating Broad Seas and Difficult Straits: Michael Berenbaum’s Passage from Tikkun Olam to Grey Zones 

Jonathan Petropoulos

69. Honoring the Righteous Among the Nations: Yad Vashem’s Department of the Righteous

Irena Steinfeldt

70. Searching for Goodness and Supporting Courage: The Jewish Foundation for the Righteous

Stanlee J. Stahl

71. Saving Jewish Lives with Schutzpasses and Protected Houses: Carl Lutz’s Rescue Operation in Budapest

Susanne M. Reyto

72. Honoring Heroic Courage to Care: Lessons to Learn from Raoul Wallenberg

Irwin Cotler 

73. Granting Visas for Life: Courageous and Righteous Diplomats

Eric Saul

74. Confronting a Mixed Record: The Italians and the Holocaust

Susan Zuccotti

75. Heeding Dangers of Holocaust Distortion in Eastern Europe: The Case of Lithuania

Efraim Zuroff 

76. Collaborating with Germany in the Final Solution: The Shoah in Bulgarian-Occupied Greece

Paul Isaac Hagouel

77. Remembering an Orphan of Holocaust Studies: The Romaniote Jews of Ioannina 

Marcia Haddad Ikonopoulos

78. Listening to Sounds from Silence: Healing the Trauma of Child Holocaust Survivors

Robert Krell

79. Hoping that “A Remnant Shall Return”: Survival of “Displaced Persons”

Abraham J. Peck

80. Discovering Memories My Parents Never Spoke Of: Silence, Nachas, and Resilience in the Life of a Second-Generation Survivor

Rosalie Berger Levinson

81. Healing an On-Going Trauma: Burdens of the Second Generation

Klara Firestone

82. Opening a New Frontier in Holocaust Studies: New Approaches to Geoscience and Archaeology

Richard A. Freund

83. Finding the Mass Graves of Jews Killed by Bullets: The Work of Yahad—In Unum

Patrick Desbois

B. Ethical, Philosophical, and Theological Reflections

84. Clarifying Shoah Historiography: Jewish Religious and Theological Reflections

Zev Garber

85. Comparing Genocides: An Opportunity to Learn to Care about Humanity

Israel W. Charny 

86. Defining Genocide and Preventing Future Genocides: Never Again for Any Ethnic Group 

Carol Rittner, RSM

87. Holding Important Issues in Tension: Uniqueness, Integration, and Historical Context

Omer Bartov

88. Paying Attention to Antisemitism Today: Are Twenty-Nine Million Reasons Enough?

Yehuda Bauer

89. Taking Alarm at American Nazis in a Virginia College Town: Racist and Antisemitic Ideology, Rhetoric, and Symbols at the Charlottesville Rally 

Deborah E. Lipstadt

Poem: “Prayer for the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh”

Alden Solovy

90. Coming to Terms with the Holocaust: Appearances and Truths in Germany

Günther Jikeli

C. Diplomatic, Legal, and Political Issues

91. Abandoning Jewish Refugees from Nazi Germany: Evian, Kristallnacht, and the SS St. Louis 

Stuart E. Eizenstat

92. Recalling Nuremberg at Seventy-Five: The Greatest Criminal Trial in Modern History 

Michael Bazyler

Poem: A Wagon of Shoes / א פור פון שיכלעך

Abraham Sutzkever 

93. Remembering an Elided Ally: Soviet Contributions to the International Military Tribunal 

Francine Hirsch

94. Looming Larger Than Life: Benjamin Ferencz and the Nuremberg War Crimes Trials

Hilary Earl

95. Learning from the Nuremberg Trials: Ongoing Lessons for Our World 

Justice Rosalie Silberman Abella

96. Seeking Compensation for Slave and Forced Labor in World War II: A History

Deborah Sturman 

97. Blocking Claims for Restitution of Nazi-Looted Art: Judicial Abandonment of Federal Policy in World War II

Jennifer Anglim Kreder

98. Finding Hope for Restitution of Nazi-Looted Art?: The Holocaust Expropriated Art Recovery Act of 2016 

Raymond J. Dowd

99. Digitizing the Nazi Theft of European Jewish Culture: The Jewish Digital Cultural Recovery Project

Deidre Berger and Wesley Fisher

100. Probing the Provenance of Nazi-Confiscated Art and Achieving Harmonious Resolution of Conflicts: The Washington Principles and the Terezín Declaration

Richard Aronowitz and Eileen Brankovic

D. Memorials and Museums: Research Centers and Archives of Survivor Testimony 

Photos: Building a Living Museum, Learning Names, and Inviting Bystanders to Become Upstanders

101. Probing What the Holocaust Has to Do with America: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum

Chaim Potok

102. Connecting with the Conscience of Museum Visitors: The Ethical Orientation of the USHMM

Ralph Appelbaum and Paul Williams

103. Telling the Story, Getting It Right: The Permanent Exhibition of the USHMM and the Claude Lanzmann Shoah Collection

Raye Farr

104. Constructing Virtual Tombstones: The Photo Archive of the USHMM 

Judith Cohen

105. Advancing Study and Teaching of the Holocaust: The Research Center of the USHMM

Wendy Lower

106. Struggling to Preserve Memories: The Creation of the USHMM

Edward Tabor Linenthal

107. Making the “Most Lethal” Nazi Death Camp Unforgettable: The Construction of the Belzec Memorial 

Andrew Baker

108. Building a Living Museum in the Balkans: The Memorial of the Jews of North Macedonia

Edward Mc Glynn Gaffney

Appendix: Museums and Exhibitions Curated, Designed, or Developed by Michael Berenbaum

109. Reflecting on Loss, Memorial Art, and the Spaces in Between: The Berlin Denkmal and New York City’s 9/11 Memorial

James E. Young

110. Giving Voice to Holocaust Survivors: Interviewers of the Shoah Foundation 

Karen Jungblut and Ari C. Zev

111. Preserving Survivor Testimony and Expanding Horizons of Holocaust Education: USC Shoah Foundation’s Visual History Archive® and Documentary Films

June Beallor

112. Domesticating Holocaust Memory: “House” and “Home” at the USHMM and USC Shoah Foundation

Oren Baruch Stier

113. Thinking Oral Historically: Persons, Places, and Events in Holocaust Testimony

Michael Nutkiewicz 

E. Creative Arts: Poetry and Painting

Poets Poems

František Bass “Garden of Roses, Like a Boy in Bloom” 

Dietrich Bonhoeffer “Night Voices”

Paul Celan “Deathfugue”

Paul Celan “Nocturnally Pouting”

Hannah Daniel “They Sat in the Back”

Pavel Friedmann “The Butterfly”

Pavel Friedmann “Terezín”

Robert Frost “Mending Wall”

Jacob Glatstein “I Have Never Been Here Before”

Hirsh Glick “Quiet, the Night is Full of Stars”

James Weldon Johnson “Lift Every Voice and Sing”

Robert Krell “god”

Primo Levi “Shema”

Dan Pagis “Written in Pencil in the Sealed Boxcar”

Eva Picková “Fear”

Miklós Radnóti “Root”

Nelly Sachs “Chorus of the Rescued”

Nelly Sachs “O! The Chimneys!”

Nelly Sachs “People of the Earth”

Nelly Sachs “What Secret Cravings of the Blood”

Eva Schulzová “Evening in Terezín”

Alden Solovy “Prayer for the Tree of Life Synagogue in Pittsburgh” 

Abraham Sutzkever “Burnt Pearls”

Abraham Sutzkever “How?”

Abraham Sutzkever “Kol Nidre”

Abraham Sutzkever “A Wagon of Shoes”  

Elie Wiesel “Who Are You?”

114. Searching for Language Beyond Words: Holocaust Poetry  

Lawrence L. Langer

115. Defying Violence against Children: Poetry and Painting in the Terezín Ghetto 

Lori R. Weintrob 

116. Embracing Refugees of the Passover, the Shoah, and Our Own Times: Marc Chagall’s Exodus and the Crucified Jesus

Zac Koons

117. Listening with Love: My Father’s Visual and Narrative Memory

Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett 

118. Demanding Action—Not Pity: The Holocaust Art of Arthur Szyk

Irvin Ungar

F. Music 

119. Rescuing Music Composed in Concentration Camps: The Institute for Concentrationary Musical Literature (ICML)

Francesco Lotoro

Appendix: Two Songs Composed in Concentration Camps

120. Preserving and Performing Jewish Music: The Los Angeles Jewish Symphony

Noreen Green

Appendix: Dachaulied (Dachau Song), Lyrics by Jura Soyfer, Music and English Translation by Herbert Zipper

G. Cinema and Theater

121. Making Holocaust Films: Michael Berenbaum’s Cinematic Career 

Lawrence Baron

Appendix: Filmography of Michael Berenbaum

122. Documenting a Complicated Story: Empty Boxcars and the Shoah in Bulgaria and Its Occupied Territories 

Edward Mc Glynn Gaffney

123. From Cursing Jews for the Death of Jesus to Blessing Our Brothers and Sisters: The Revised Oberammergau Passion Play

Leonard J. Swidler 

124. Searching for Ideas with Consequences: Illustrations of Holocaust Insights from Cinema and Theater

John K. Roth 

125. Honoring Persons with Courage to Care and Rejoicing in the Survival of the Persons They Rescued: A Photo Essay on Rescuers and Survivors 

The Editors

Poem: “Shema” 

Primo Levi

Part Seven. Schmoozing with the Mishpacha: Letters from the Family and an Afterword 

126. Thanking Our Saba 

Jeremy and Hannah Grinblat

127. Wondering How My Abba Does It 

Mira Leza Berenbaum

128. Trading Insider Information on Best Dad Ever

Joshua Boaz Berenbaum 

129. Honoring My Courageous Father

Philip Lev Bayer-Berenbaum

130. Appreciating My Favorite (and Only) Father-in-Law

Tal Grinblat

131. Sharing Spiritual Lessons from my Father’s Life: Reflections on Parshat Re’eh on Abba’s 75th Birthday

Ilana Berenbaum Grinblat

132. Celebrating Michael 

Melissa Patack

133. Rereading an Afterword: Things ‘The World Must (Still) Know’

Michael Berenbaum

Contributors

Copyright Notices and Permissions

Index

Jeffrey Herbst is president of the American Jewish University. He served as president of the Newseum in Washington, DC. His scholarly work has focused primarily on Africa, with numerous books and articles on Ghana, Somalia, South Africa, and Zimbabwe. His latest book is Democracy Works: Rewiring Politics to Africa’s Advantage (2019).