Crucible of Terror. Max Liebster

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      As children, we were far removed from the worries of the postwar generation. We heard adults speak often about the World War and the hated French occupation of the Ruhr, the land of iron mines. Or they talked of inflation, lamenting the ever-rising price of groceries and the diminishing value of the mark. What cost 40 marks to buy in 1920 when I was five, cost 77 marks a year later, and 493 marks a year after that. As bad as those increases were—prices doubling and tripling each year—in 1923 inflation went wild. In January of 1923, that same 40-mark item would have cost 17,972 marks; by July, 353,412 marks; by August, 4,620,455 marks; by September, nearly 99 million marks; by October, 25 billion marks; and by November, more than 4 trillion marks. People needed a wheelbarrow full of money—21 billion marks—to buy one loaf of bread! I only knew that Father gave me 10,000-mark notes to play with.

      The grown-ups often discussed politics—Socialists, Communists, Worker Party, Zentrum Party—all words with no meaning to us young ones. One thing we did know: People were out of work, including some of our fathers and older brothers. Some, it was said, had to stand in long soup lines. There were rumors of unrest in the cities.

      Things were no better in the Lauter Valley. The two small factories, a paper mill and a manufacturer of prussic acid, had only a handful of orders to fill. Even the main industry of the valley—stonecutting—had dropped off considerably. There was little demand for cut and polished red, gray, or blue granite for monuments, buildings, and gravestones. For the young children of the common people, the prospect of work was nonexistent.

      My mother’s cousins Julius and Hugo proposed to my parents that when I finished school, I could stay with them and their elderly mother in Viernheim. They could use my help in the Oppenheimer Brothers store. They would also send me to a business school nearby to receive training as a salesman. This offer provided some peace of mind for my family.

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      By now, Ida worked as a maid, and Hanna, my quiet and studious sister, was being trained as a secretary at the paper mill.

      As for me, I was about to become a man—the time had arrived for my Bar Mitzvah. In preparation for the big event, I went to the town of Bensheim every Sunday. Our rabbi lived here, at the entrance of the Lauter Valley. On foot or by bicycle, I savored the seven-kilometer trip through lush meadows. I was the only candidate from the valley preparing for the Bar Mitzvah reading of the Torah. The rabbi, an open-minded and respected man of great patience, helped me with the pronunciation of the text. I struggled with the strange Hebrew characters, and it was even harder to remember what they stood for. Understanding is not the important thing, I was told, but rather the exact pronunciation of the Hebrew text in the sacred language of God. By the time I was 13, my reading was going smoothly. I eagerly awaited the day when my boyhood would end and I would be counted as a man. Then I could be included in a minyan, a group of ten adult male Jews, who had to be present to hold a public Jewish prayer service, such as Kaddish, a special prayer that the bereaved recite for the dead.

      The big day arrived. I felt nervous and excited at the same time. The rabbi came to our little synagogue. He gave a heartfelt welcome, stepped down from the platform, and sat among the men in the audience. My mother and sisters sat in the balcony, the place for the women. My heart pounded as I climbed the two steps and opened the little door of the engraved wooden barrier separating the Jewish congregation from the platform. Here in this special place, the holy writings were usually kept in a sculpted wooden closet, hidden from the view of the audience by a burgundy curtain. Awaiting me on a pulpit in the middle of the stage lay the Torah scroll, unrolled to reveal the portion of Scripture I would read. The holy scroll was bathed in the light of a candelabra with seven branches.

      For days I had been dreading the sacred reading. Now my stomach was in knots, and my mouth felt like cotton. Behind me, I could feel the presence of the whole community. Like me, they either wore hats or yarmulkes, and some bore on their shoulders the Tallith, a blue-and-white-striped prayer shawl with silver seams and fringes. Some men would take the fringes, touch their personal prayer books, and kiss them each time God’s holy name appeared in the text. I learned that as sinful men, we should not pronounce the most sacred name, written in the four Hebrew letters called the Tetragrammaton. It had to be replaced by Adonai, which means “Lord,” or by Adoshem, which means the “Lord of the Name.” Never should the holy name cross our sinful lips. I used a silver pointer to trace the words from right to left upon the scroll. My reading became confident and fluent. I stepped down to be congratulated by all. I was now a man.