Semyon Semyonovich Krotsh

Continuation of the Sabbath service in the Kolomyya synagogue. Prayers, blessings and singing by the congregants are heard, with brief spoken exchanges. The transcript is largely garbled, so little detail can be made out.

Informal conversation with the congregants. Krotsh speaks of the Rebbe of Stefanesti, named as Matisyohu Friedman (?), a great tsadik taken to the Land of Israel and buried there. Kerler says the interviewers want to interview people later. A second man explains that no one is present who can read the Torah, so it is not read at this service. Plans are made to talk later or the next morning.

A second man's remark on the missing Torah reader and plans for an interview.

Kiddush lunch with the congregation. Kerler, Katz and others talk in Yiddish and Russian, and the congregants make the kiddush. A woman from Soroca and a man who lived in America speak of their origins. Kerler asks for Yiddish songs, including lullabies, and several people sing. The transcript is partly garbled and mixed with Russian.

The kiddush lunch is joined by talk about where people come from and requests for Yiddish songs.

Formal interview with Krotsh begins. Kerler introduces himself and the project, and Krotsh gives his name, birth in 1922 in Stefanesti, and the names of his parents and siblings. His father was a shoemaker and his mother a housewife. He recalls the huge crowds that came for the funeral of the Stefanesti Rebbe, Matisyohu Friedman (?). He speaks of the family's hard life, of his cheder, school and yeshiva studies, and of learning tailoring because there was no money. The town committee is explained as the body that paid the shoykhets and the rabbi.

Adds the names of his siblings, a sister in Nahariyya, and the town committee.

Krotsh recalls his cheder years and school studies in Stefanesti. He was the best pupil in the four-class school and remembers what he learned. He talks of his teachers and of studying Mishnah and Gemara. Kerler and Katz ask about the Yiddish word for 'grass' and an expression about writing, and a second man tells an anecdote about writing.

Krotsh recites or sings a fragment of rote translation learned in cheder, a Lag BaOmer rhyme and Hebrew songs from his school. Vider (S2) sings HaTikvah and another Hebrew song, and Krotsh recites a Hebrew poem. They discuss Bialik and other Yiddish and Hebrew writers learned in school, with a poem by Gordon (?) recalled in part.

Krotsh describes a typical day in the Hebrew school in Stefanesti. Romanian subjects were taught first, then Hebrew, and Yiddish was not taught as a subject, though he knew it from home and cheder. He did not know Romanian until he attended the state school. He tells of his employer, the tailor Yude Leyb, who refused to speak Romanian with his non-Jewish clients, and of poor children being given bread and milk by the committee.

Krotsh first mentions meeting a stranger who spoke Yiddish, then recalls prewar Passover: his mother's latkes, bringing Passover dishes down from the attic, matzo and matzo meal, and going to synagogue. He worked for a tailor who stopped work for the eight days of the holiday. Kerler, Katz and a second man then discuss the distinction between the Yiddish words for 'erlikh' (honest) and 'frum/frim' (pious), with examples such as helping the poor and learning Torah day and night.

Opens with an anecdote about a Yiddish-speaking stranger and covers the Passover items in more detail than the catalogue states.

Krotsh is asked for the Passover song and sings 'Ekhod mi yoydeyo' (Who Knows One), with some hesitation about remembering it. Afterwards he says it was sung in Hebrew rather than Yiddish, and there is talk about a prayer book and the Passover home.

Adds the exchange afterward about whether the song was sung in Yiddish.

Krotsh sings a Hebrew song and says the tune came from the tailor he worked for. He tells a story about a bearded Jewish tailor who was called up in the First World War and was released after the rebbe's prediction when two generals quarrelled. Kerler asks about the Romanian phrases in the story and then about the Stefanester rebbe's miracles.

Adds the story of the tailor released from army service through the rebbe's blessing.

Krotsh says that non-Jews never converted to Judaism in his town because Jews lived apart from their neighbors, but that many Romanians spoke Yiddish. Jews were the great majority in Stefanesti. He read in Yiddish and Hebrew in school, including Sholem Aleichem and religious books, and went to yeshiva while also working as a tailor from a young age.

Covers his reading and yeshiva/work as a child, not only relations with non-Jews.

Krotsh cannot recall the songs his parents sang, and a second man tells a song about a poor tailor in a Ukrainian shtetl, after which Krotsh talks about pogroms in Ukraine. He sings a Hebrew song to a Yiddish melody. He says there were no Yiddish newspapers in the Romanian-ruled town, only Romanian ones, and that Jewish organizations existed.

The newspapers and Romanian prohibition are covered, plus talk about Ukrainian pogroms.

Krotsh begins answering questions about terminology: the words for a cemetery (including a non-Jewish cemetery), and what 'a good Jew' (a gutn yid) means. He explains that a tsadik is not necessarily a good Jew and that people were sent to a good Jew, the rebbe, for advice with problems such as a daughter's marriage.

Includes the explanation of 'a good Jew' and visits to the rebbe.

Krotsh recounts stories he heard from his employer about the Stefanester rebbe's miracles, chiefly a tailor ordered to make a coat for a general who warned him by the rebbe's advice, and a prisoner who came to the rebbe. Kerler asks about dybbuks and Krotsh says only that he remembers hearing of them being exorcised.

The tailor/general story is the main narrative; the dybbuk question gets only a vague answer.

Krotsh describes the town as pious, with no unbelievers, and the rebbe's court with a garden and the rebbe's own room for prayer. He names eight prayer houses, including a beit midrash, the high synagogue, the tailors' synagogue and the rebbe's kloyz, and tells how the rebbe settled a cantor dispute. He answers questions about weddings, the badkhn/'gramer', the klezmer musician Khaim Berder (?) and songs.

Krotsh answers questions about holiday food, such as Hanukkah foods and Passover latkes, and about differences between Yiddish in Romania, Moldova and Ukraine. Kerler then puts questionnaire items with Russian prompts, such as greetings, thanks, a big and small word for a person, a house, a cut, windows, and Krotsh gives Yiddish equivalents and notes loanwords.

Includes the attitudes toward dialects and the questionnaire items.

Krotsh sings a song he knows from Moldova, after which Kerler continues the questionnaire with Russian prompts: words such as pot, gray, healthy as a house, kissel, ear, deaf, then comparatives (earlier, colder, higher, faster, nearer), 'he knows everything', 'listen to me', roof, ill and sentences about liking and not liking. Krotsh gives the Yiddish forms and comments on Moldavian and Ukrainian loanwords.

Most of the passage is questionnaire work; the song is only at the start.

Krotsh says he is unwell and talks about having been in the hospital. He mentions a friend who urged him to rest, and a woman he spoke to who could not talk Yiddish, and says few people speak Yiddish today. He laments the destruction of Yiddish and Yiddish books in Poland and elsewhere, and says he teaches himself to read Yiddish. He mentions three years in Israel, his marriage and three sons, only one of whom is still alive, and a son who was a doctor and was killed. Kerler asks when he came to Kolomyya, and Krotsh says 1949.

Also covers Krotsh's views on the loss of Yiddish culture, his time in Israel and the death of his wife.

Krotsh tells of the start of the war in Moldova, flight past Soroca to Rîbnita and evacuation to the Krasnodar region, where he worked on a kolkhoz. He fled further to the Stavropol region and Azerbaijan, then served in the army at Baku until 1947. A friend from Kolomyya persuaded him to go there; he found the border closed and stayed. He recalls the synagogue still marked with Hebrew lettering in 1949, how it was later converted and repaired, and how few Jews remain in Kolomyya, many in mixed marriages. Kerler and Katz ask about the numbers and about some local Jews.

Adds the numbers of Jews now in Kolomyya, mixed marriages, and talk about local individuals.

Returning to Stefanesti, Krotsh describes the town as a holy shtetl closed on the Sabbath and holidays, with the rebbe's influence. Asked about Purim, he recalls dressing up as a child and sings the Purim ditty about Moses forty days and nights twice. He sings Lekhu dodi in the way he remembers it. He tells how young men in disguise visited homes and sang for the host, describes mishloyekh-manes gifts, and begins a song about the Sabbath preparations of Jewish wives of long ago.

Adds the Purim visits by disguised young men, mishloyekh-manes gifts and a song about wives of the past.

Krotsh sings the song about where one finds wives like those of long ago. He recalls Yiddish theater coming to Stefanesti, his mother's love of it and a famous actress who died in Chernivtsi, and answers Kerler's questions about plays such as Mekhires Yoysef and Akeydes Yitskhok, which he knows from his Bible study rather than from the stage. He sings a variant of Lomir ale in eynem. Asked about Zionist activity, he says halutsim passed through, names several Jewish youth groups, and says there was no Bund or socialist party under the rebbe's influence.

Asked about Hanukkah, Krotsh talks about dreidels made of lead, a holiday he calls beautiful, and how Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur emptied the town streets. He sings or recites fragments of Kol nidre and High Holiday liturgy at Kerler's request. He says he learned Hebrew and could speak with visitors from Israel and America. The passage includes informal exchange with the team and a break, and ends with a High Holiday melody he begins to recall.

Adds a Hanukkah song attempt, talk about Hebrew, and informal chatter about the recording.

Krotsh sings a High Holiday liturgical piece, after which Kerler praises it and Katz begins to talk about inviting him to Vilnius.

The team talks informally with Krotsh and another man, who may be Vider, about the recording and about preserving what he remembers. They ask about a song on Moses and the other man sings the song about Jacob lying on the stone, which a young cantor performed in concerts. Kerler asks how it was sung, and they discuss making a break and a visit in the evening.

Back in the formal interview, Krotsh sings more liturgy and describes the Sukkot custom of eating and sleeping in the sukkah. He tells how he sold shmoes for money and how the sexton knocked on shutters to wake people for selikhes. Kerler asks about the bathhouse and mikveh, and Krotsh describes the bath and ritual bath of his shtetl. He tells how he spoke Yiddish at a government office in Israel when the clerk spoke Hebrew.

Adds Sukkot, shmoes-selling and selikhes customs, bathhouse and mikveh, and Krotsh's Israeli office anecdote.

Questionnaire work with the elderly Yiddish speaker: Kerler gives words and short sentences, often in Russian, and asks how they were said in his Yiddish. Items include 'to run away', honest, pious or holy person, the sign of the cross and crossing oneself, non-Jew, 'my head hurts', 'where are you from', 'please', a bouquet or garden of flowers, vodka versus brandy, 'in three days', 'you are right', 'to pray', and 'grandmother/midwife'. The speaker also says which words they did or did not use at home.

Gives the actual items of the questionnaire (religious terms, body ache, directions, midwife) rather than just calling it a survey.

The speaker explains that an old midwife-healer in his home town could say a charm or cure ('apshprekhenish') and describes how, as a boy of about thirteen, he hurt his leg while sledding down a hill near the town. After doctors, plaster and other treatments had not helped, his father took him to a blind folk healer named Molke Spodik (?). She felt the leg, heated it with hot water, and set it, after which he could walk. Kerler comments on the story and asks about the healer's name.

The healer is blind and the injury happened while sledding; also mentions an older woman healer (Rivke) and the doctors who failed to cure him.

The questionnaire continues, with Kerler and then Katz giving Russian and Yiddish prompts. Items include prepositions and pronoun sentences ('I speak with mother', 'I see her badly', 'I don't hear him'), words for well, potato, flowers, fence, attic, bridge, and a face; 'suddenly', 'someone', 'then', 'enemy', and the plural of 'wagon'; and a few phrases such as 'in the street' and 'five persons'. The speaker comments on which variants were used in Stefanesti and Moldova. Katz also asks about burrs thrown at girls' hair and about a death phrase. At the end Kerler thanks the speaker, and the passage runs into the start of the Russian interview.

Roman Bileichuk, interviewed in Russian, gives his surname and says he is from Kolomyya. He grew up without a father, with his mother working shifts in a weaving factory, and spent time in a boarding school. He finished eight classes and became a shoemaker at a shoe factory at about 17. He was an Orthodox Christian who obeyed his parents. After reading the Bible he began to doubt and read the Torah. One sleepless night he walked about three kilometres to the Kolomyya synagogue on Rosh Hashanah, where the gabbai Sasha received him. He has attended for two and a half years despite quarrels with his mother, and has written to Kyiv about conversion. He tries to keep Sabbath and the laws and reads Jewish papers and a prayer book.

Gives his birthplace, upbringing without father, work as shoemaker, Rosh Hashanah visit, plus his reading of Jewish press and prayer book.

Bileichuk speaks about his mother's Christian confession and his own earlier interest in Sabbatarian (Subbotniki) and other Protestant groups. He says he read their literature and concluded that they take from the Torah and misuse it, including tithing, and he describes arguments with them. He mentions studying with Sasha Babichenko and Kolesnikov at the synagogue, reading the weekly Torah portion, and feeling that he as a non-Jew has no right yet to teach others. He answers Kerler's questions about the Subbotniki, the New Testament and the groups he met.

Covers his mother's Christian confession and a detailed account of his own reading of Subbotnik literature and Torah study.

Bileichuk says he prays at home and wants the camera to tell people to look for truth in the God of the Jews. He prays for the Temple and for the sick and comments on 'old' and 'new' Israel. He values the old Israel with its Temple and finds the new one troubled by doubts, mosques, terrorism, and the lack of morality, including prostitution and the behaviour of rabbis and officials. He comes back to one God and to the binding of Isaac.

Includes his general call to the world to seek truth in Judaism and a critical view of Israeli officials.

Bileichuk describes the war in his family over his new faith: his mother observes Sunday, he cleans on Thursday for Sabbath, and he makes havdalah and prays alone at a small homemade bima facing Jerusalem, with a compass. He says the Christian Bible is distorted and wants the world to read the Torah. He dates his search to four or five years ago and recalls how a friend's New Testament and the Sabbatarians led him to the Torah. He says nobody may forbid his conversion, compares himself to Abraham, and mentions a woman partner and their wish to have a son. He criticizes conversion in Israel as a matter of money and bribery, and Kerler thanks him at the end.

Gives the early Christian and Sabbatarian steps of his search, a partner and planned son, and the criticism of rabbis taking money for conversion.