Trudy Gold
Moral Courage in Extremism: Janusz Korczak

Trudy Gold - Moral Courage in Extremism: Janusz Korczak

- Hi, everyone. It’s great to see you today. And thank you for those of us who joined us last night and for the rest of the sessions this week in honour of Rabbi Sacks and in partnership with the Rabbi Sacks Legacy Trust. I’ve popped on today before Trudy’s session where she’s going to look at leaders because we wanted to share a video with you that Shawna will play in a minute. When I was studying at business school, we were asked to speak to five leaders we respected and asked them a series of questions. I had a personal relationship with Rabbi Sacks. I was one of his close protection officers and knew him well over a decade. And so I reached out to him to see if he would be prepared to answer my questions. Never did I expect that he would use that opportunity to produce a leadership video for me that then actually was rolled out at Harvard Business School and shared that year amongst many of the cohorts in the classes. So we thought it’s a quick video that we would share with you all before Trudy then kicks off her session. And so Shawna, if you can share the video.

CLIP BEGINS

• For me, the defining moment was the reaction to the publication of my book, “The Dignity of Difference”, which was my response to 9/11, and it was published on the first anniversary of 9/11. I had felt that 9/11 was going to shape the future of the world. And that, as an act of religiously motivated violence, we had to recognise the potential for violence in religions, and respond to that. So I wrote this very, very strong book, perhaps too strong, called “The Dignity of Difference” in which I argued that the great religions had to make space for one another. This was a radical thing to say. And for many of my rabbinical colleagues, not only in Britain but around the world, it was simply too radical. And the reaction was quite sharp and difficult. In essence, I, as a Chief Rabbi, as defender of the faith, was accused of, really, I suppose, one has to say heresy, which is an awkward position to be in if you are a defender of the faith. And the attacks were so strong and so widespread that I reached a point of what I can probably call black despair. I was not able to see a road from here to there. And that’s when I had the revelation, as near as I’ll come to hearing a voice from heaven, saying, “Do you realise that if you resign over this, if you allow yourself to be defeated, it won’t be you who is defeated? Simply, it will be everyone whoever put their faith in you.” And that was when I realised that leadership is not primarily about the leader, it’s about keeping faith with everyone who asked you to lead. And at that moment, the whole tenor of my life changed.

It stopped being personal. It was not about me. It was about ideals, and it was about people, and about not letting them down. And having changed direction 180 degrees and no longer seeing this is an attack on me personally, I acquired a strength, which I’d never had before and has never left me since. And that was when I realised there are these defining moments. And either you let them defeat you or you refuse to let them defeat you. And Nietzsche rightly said, “Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” So that, for me, was the defining moment. My values, principles, and boundaries actually had a very concrete shape because, believe it or not, there was an age before smartphones. And that age was dominated by something called the Filofax, and that is what I used to have. And so on the first page of my Filofax, which I wrote and the date is here, 21st of August 1991, that is 10 days before I became Chief Rabbi, I wrote my life principles to be known as a Jewish leader who took seriously love of God and love of human beings, to have done something concrete to promote values like spirituality and altruism, to have raised respect for Judaism among both Jews and the wider world, to have made people feel and exercise the full range of their possibilities. Now, if you put those in a place that you can’t avoid seeing them at the start of every day, and for that matter, at the end of every day, it kind of keeps you on track. Because Macmillan rightly said, Harold Macmillan, the British Prime Minister in the late ‘50s, when asked what were the biggest problems of being Prime Minister, he replied “Events, dear boy, events.” So any leader is going to be buffeted by cross winds, by the sheer force of events. And unless you remember and do so daily what your principles and objectives actually are, you will be buffeted.

So that’s how I kept them going. How did I discover my strengths and passions? Well, because there’s a negative way of discovering them when people tell you stuff that you really don’t want to hear. So a lot of people used to tell me, “You know, Sacks, you’re just not a people person,” which is problematic if you’re a religious leader. So I realised that was not one of my great strengths. And I discovered that it turns out to be a lot easier speaking to 1,000 people than speaking to three, because you can speak to 1,000 people even if you’re not a people person. So that was when I discovered things like public speaking and writing were my strengths, much more so than the small group interactions because I’m just not a great people person. And then, sometimes people just tell you things. I remember a guy who I had almost no interactions with over the years, but just let slip said, “Sacks, you have a passion for ideas.” And I suddenly said, “Ah, that’s it! I never realised that before, I have a passion for ideas.” So sometimes, people will tell you in a positive way. Sometimes, they’ll tell you in a negative way. And every time they tell you something in a negative way, the real art is to then choose to work with people who are strong where you are weak. So being not a great people person, I tried to build teams that had great people, people at the top of them. And that’s basically how you do it by critical reflection, by listening hard, by seeing your unexpected successes, and realising that your failures are just not really failures. They’re just little nudges from heaven or from earth, saying, “You’re in the wrong territory. Get back to where you really can do what you have to do.” How do you build an integrated life? I have to say that was one of my big weaknesses because I always took seriously that couplet from the Poet W. B. Yeats, “The intellect of man is forced to choose perfection of the life or of the work.” And I was a kind of perfection of the work type of person, not a perfection of the life type person. To take a crazy extreme example, I don’t think you would have invited Beethoven for dinner. I don’t think he had much in the way of small talk, or Nietzsche for that matter. People who’re very focused on the work, they’re not great at the life. So you do certain things when that happens.

Number one, you married somebody who has a bigger heart than you have. So Elaine was always the person who was my good conscience who said, “I know you don’t want to do it but that’s a family, that’s a friend. You’ve got to do it.” And when you know that you’re married to somebody with a bigger heart than you, they help you to do that correct life balance. Second thing, of course, is religious rituals. Judaism has this wonderful thing called Shabbat where you can’t write, you can’t watch the television, and you can’t work. So you spend time with family, with community praying, thanking God all the rest of it. That is, I think, the oldest and best time management seminar in history. So the Shabbat really forces you to develop that life-work balance. And the third thing is you learn pretty much from your kids. I mean, I’ve always assumed that children are there to teach, not to be taught. And I was always inspired by them, and I saw how they built integrated lives. And I think I learned from them. How do you build a team? Well, one I’ve already suggested is recognise where you’re weak and surround yourself by people who are strong in those areas. So, for me, that was getting somebody who was a really good people person, somebody who could handle organisation without bursting into tears, the kind of thing that I tend to do and having to do anything practical.

And it’s just incredibly supportive and life-enhancing when you’re surrounded by people who are just better than you at all sorts of things. Number two, the most important thing in building a team is empowering them to say the single most important word in the human for vocabulary, which is no. “Not a good idea, Rabbi Sacks, or Sir Humphrey in "Yes Prime Minister.” used to put it, Courageous Rabbi Sacks, which is the nice way of saying the same thing, lie down until the moment passes. Empower your team to step in and stop you making the big mistakes. And number three, build a team of people whose ethical standards are as high as or higher than yours, and they will force you to be guided by the better angels of your nature. And I’m happy to say that that’s exactly the kind of teams that we’ve built and the current one, which is the best that I have ever had. The difference I sought to making the world was to make Judaism speak to people who are in the world because it’s quite easy being religious in a house of worship in a synagogue or church, or even actually at home or in the school. But when you’re out there in the marketplace, how do you retain those really strong values? And secondly, the challenge that came from university. I was studying philosophy at a time when there were virtually no philosophers who were religious believers or policemen who were prepared publicly to confess to that. So the intellectual challenges were real. So how do you make Judaism speak to people in those worlds, the world of academic life, the world of the economy?

And in the end, I realised that to do that credibly, I had to actually go into the world myself whether it was broadcasting for the BBC, or writing for The Times, and getting a little street cred in the world itself, which actually then broaden the mission. And I found myself being asked by politicians and people like that to advise them on their issues, which forced me to widen my boundaries. So I think you take any road, you may well find yourself without deviating from that road, driving into landscapes that are much bigger than you ever thought the road would take you to. And that’s really how it’s a challenge. What did I learn about leadership that I’d like to hand on to others? Number one was the thing that made me a leader in the first place. I never dreamt being a leader. It was the last thing on my list of life objectives. But there were times, critical moments in my life, when I met people who believed in me much more than I believed in myself. And that actually inspired me and empowered me to go and become a leader myself, which I’ve never really wanted to do. So that is a good principle which has two implications: number one, seek out the people who may show you your potential and number two, do the same for others. If you find people with that potential, communicate to them your belief in them, which is probably the most empowering and inspiring thing you can do. Number two, be aware that all the difficulties and all the pain are ways of making your life richer and more meaningful and you yourself, a bigger and stronger human being, than you would ever have been otherwise.

That was the thrust of the great Theodore Roosevelt’s speech on leadership, it’s the man in the arena or the human being in the arena, who actually knows the toil and the tears and the sweat. And so I would say, what I learned is that the pain is the gain in a very real sense. And thirdly, the surprise discovery that you actually had something you never believed you have. For me, the biggest surprise was persistence. I was kind of guy who used to say, “If at first you don’t succeed, give up.” That’s fine if you’re only doing things for your own sake. But if you’re a leader, you can’t give up. And you suddenly discover, you have a persistence that you didn’t know you had. So keep going, inspire others, and continue to stay true to your basic principles. And that way, you may still have some pretty rocky times, but you will reach your destination and bring a lot of other people with you.

CLIP ENDS

• Well, good evening, everyone. And I think that was a very inspiring analysis from the late Rabbi Sacks on leadership. We’re living in very interesting times. We’re living in times that are very dark where our political leadership, in many ways, is wanting, but we’re also living in times of contemplation where many of us are reaching out, making new friends, finding limitless potential within themselves and within others. And what I want to say is, for me, Lockdown University has been an absolute salvation. Not only has it given me a purpose to get up and actually do some serious work for a change, but also, I’ve met so many incredible people through it and it’s the sharing of ideas. Rabbi Sacks talked about the beauty of ideas. And that’s something that, in a way, we can reach out. And even in dark times, it’s what can comfort us. And thinking of dark times, I’ve been trying to work out what on Earth does one do when, not only is the outside world very, very threatening, when the outside world seems more and more hostile, I’m actually trying to meet all sorts of different people from different backgrounds. The tragedy is the individual in the main is fine. It’s what happens with group mentalities. But having said all that, I’ve got my own way of cheering myself up, whether it’s reading a passage by Isaiah Berlin just for the beauty of his work, whether it’s listening to a wonderful piece of classical music, like, I suppose at the moment, it’s Tchaikovsky’s “Pathetique”, or having a visit to see a wonderful musical, which I did with my grandson, “Anything Goes”.

It was written in 1934. It was very much the really smelt of Weimar. And yet, it was beautifully sung, beautifully danced. And to see it through the eyes of someone I love was absolutely extraordinary. Now, why am I saying these things to you? Because these are all opportunities. And if we think we are living through dark times, and if we’re worrying about leadership, I want us, if I may, to take a step, perhaps the darkest time in Jewish history and illustrate how certain individuals went way beyond anything that we imagined. And they became what I would like to call the Tsaddiqim. I was thinking about when it was suggested that I come up with my heroes on this particular week, and I thought about heroes, and I thought about the people I enjoy lecturing on, people like Disraeli, Heine, La Salle, Winston Churchill, they’re all marvellous. And perhaps Winston Churchill is a hero, but they’re not really heroic, are they? They’re interesting, they are clever. They walked to the world. They walked the world with incredible style, and they did make a difference, but heroic, no. And also, I want to distinguish between the Greek notion of hero. And I looked it up in Webster’s Dictionary, a mythological or legendary figure of divine descent, endowed with great strength and ability, who can overcome adversity. And one of the benefits of Lockdown University is I have got some amazing colleagues, most of whom lecture on our programme. Now, I was talking to Professor Piman about this. And he said, “You’ve got to read "The Odyssey”.“ I haven’t read it since I was a student. And what is "The Odyssey” about? It is of course the story of a man, Odysseus, who creates a Trojan horse through guile and cunning. He’s at the siege of Troy. He takes the Trojan horse. He goes into the Greek city with the Trojan horse, and of course the men come out, the Greeks come out and the battle’s over. And I’m thinking, “This isn’t heroic. It’s guile.”

And then, of course, he goes on his great journey, and he’s having to overcome challenges all the way to his home. Now, these are interesting people, but they’re not moral people. And what I’m also interested in, and this is something that Rabbi Sacks, he really emphasised, it’s moral leadership I’m more interested in. I think we have a dearth of that at the moment in the Western world, and that’s our tragedy. So I turned then to look at the definition of a Tzadik. A Tzadik just means a righteous one. And my monodies on the Tzadik king is very interesting. He says, “One whose merit surpasses his inequity.” Look, we are born neutral, are we not? We have in us the good instinct, the bad instinct. And what he’s talking about is, how do we overcome the bad instinct? The Hasidic Tanya, this is Schneur Zalman of Liadi who wrote it. True title can only be applied to one who has completely sublimated his natural animal and vital soul into holiness. And then I want to turn to the legend of the Lamed Vavniks, the 36 Righteous Men. There is a wonderful statement in the Talmud, that when you die, you won’t be asked where you like Moses. You’ll be asked, were you like you? Will you receive? Will you actually achieve your possibilities, your potential? But the Lamed Vavniks go even further. The Lamed Vavniks, it’s folklore. And the notion is, that the world that the Almighty allows the world to continue because it rests on 36 righteous ones. It’s a tale, it’s a lovely tale. But on the other hand, in my study of history, I have found people who I do consider to be Lamed Vavniks. And one of the greatest to me is, of course, the great Janusz Korczak. So I’m taking us now… Can we have the slides, if you don’t mind, Shawna? I’m taking us now into the hell of the Warsaw ghetto. Rabbi Hugo Gryn once said, “To understand Marxism, overturn the 10 Commandments.”

And of course, a quote of the monster of them all, Hitler, “I can never forgive the Jews for inventing moral conscience.” By the time you get to the invasion of Poland and the total notion of the lack of any kind of humanity, and the closing up of the Warsaw Ghetto where Jews, over 500,000 people, were pushed into a tiny piece of Warsaw where basically it was 13 to a room, the calorific Russians were under 400 a day. There was typhus, there was lack of sanitation. He’s going into hell. And in that hell, there were characters in their different ways who completely rose above it all, that the majority of people, they lived their lives and tragically died, the good, the bad, the ugly. There were very complicated characters like Adam Czerniaków, who was the leader of the Judenrat, but a leader who had no real power because it was dictated by the Nazis. What the Germans did, they officially gave the power to the Jews. The Jews had to set up their own Jewish policemen. And Czerniaków, like many of the ghetto leaders, believed in the beginning, if he obeyed orders, the people would be saved. And it was only in the end… So he did obey orders, and it was only when he realised that the children were going to be murdered, that he committed suicide. And then there are the young resistors, Pavel Frankel representing the Revisionists, Mordechai Anielewicz who represent the left, these young, incredibly brilliant fighters who when they knew they were going to die, they rose up like lions. And of course, that extraordinary moment when the revisionist actually hooked, unfolded the Star of David over the ghetto, which became the resonance of that. And in many ways, it led to the Warsaw uprising itself. Chaim Kaplan, one of the great diarists, the amazing Emanuel Ringelblum. It is always said of the Jews that we are a people of history, and we record, we record, we record. If it’s any satisfaction, those who go against the Jews, their names will be remembered forever.

They recorded everything that was happening, including, of course, what is going on with the amazing Janusz Korczak. There was Zygielbojm who’d escaped who was in London. He was in the Polish government in exile. And when he knew what was happening in the Warsaw Ghetto, and when he knew that the allies weren’t going to intervene, even though on December the 17th, 1942, there had been a minute silence in the House of Commons, this is now May 43, he commits suicide to bring the world’s attention to the fate of his people. Now, these are all to me, these are leaders, these are moral leaders. Anielewicz was 23 years old when he died, Frankel was 25. I mean, you are looking at young people, and they were brilliant people. With Mordechai Anielewicz, he went back into the ghetto. They made their decision. He realised that it was his duty to lead his people in physical attack. There were, of course, the diarists who believed in recording. There were those who held religious services. There were those who used culture. I mentioned culture before because it’s incredibly important in dark times. And what we are going through now is so minimal compared with real darkness. But in dark times, I was saying to you, turn to culture because it does… If you like war view. And there were plays in the Warsaw Ghetto. There were lectures, there were religious services, there was a lending library, every kind of political movement. They had a meeting to commemorate the anniversary of the October revolution of 1917. That, of course, was the left. The revisionists had meetings, the Bund had meetings, all quarrelling with each other as Jews all was due even in horror. And yet the life does go on. But the reason I decided, if I could only really talk about one individual and with him, I’m going to also add the woman, Stefania.

My pronunciation is so bad, and it’s so important I get this right, Wilczyńska, because she was with him through the days of the orphanage, and she died with him and the children. And she doesn’t get as much recognition as he does. And also, I want to bring into the mix the extraordinary rescuer, Irena Sendler, who was allowed into the ghetto to check on typhus epidemics and did so much to help with food, moral, courage, medicine, rescue. So against the darkness, there are always those who turned to the light. And the question that has always puzzled me, and this is real moral leadership, what is it in times of extremists that makes a few extraordinary individuals turn to the light? Look, we know about the beasts of the field, we know about the Nazis. We spend far too much time studying them. Why do we study evil? Why do we find evil So fascinating? Isn’t it time for us also to find goodness satisfying? I’ve been very lucky in my lifetime because I was enhanced at teaching Jewish history when some of the most remarkable people I’ve ever known were there. People like Jack Kagan who survived the Bielski and came to this country, came to England, and really did so much in education, was an extraordinary man. Felix Shaf, who was the vice chairman of the Janusz Korczak Association, among a hundred other things, and it was he who talked to me so much about Janusz Korczak. And there are some who are still alive who will be very angry if I mention their names, but close friends, and they know who they are, and also people that I’ve met through Lockdown who add to knowledge, who have this incredible zest for knowledge and life. And let’s now turn to Janusz Korczak because is there any clue in his life? His dates are 1878 to 1942. We don’t know the exact date of his death. We know when he was deported, and it’s very likely he was immediately murdered. But he was born in 1878 in Warsaw, which was, of course, part of the Russian Empire. Janusz Korczak was the pen name, by the way, of Henryk Goldszmit.

Now, Janusz Korczak was, obviously, from an early day, from early years, an incredibly clever man. There’s no question of that. His grandfather had been a physician. His father was a lawyer. He came from an enlightenment family. Those Jews in the reign of Alexander II had an opportunity to study. And he was not a very religious man, but he was an incredibly moral man. And his family life was relatively happy in the early years. And this is very important because most people who are strong rescuers do seem to have stable early backgrounds. But tragically, in 1890, when he is only 12 years old, his father had a complete mental collapse and he went into a home where he died in 1896. Now, this is a terrible tragedy. For the family, they become impoverished because they’re having to pay fees for the father to be looked after properly. So what does the young Henryk do? He’s at school. He needs to earn money for his mother. So he is very bright, and he earns money actually as a tutor to other children at the school. He then went on to study medicine at Warsaw University, and he’s torn between a literary career and a medical career. He actually said that in the end, he made a very interesting description of himself, if I can, of course, find it. Excuse me a minute because it’s certainly worth finding. He said, basically, he was a physician by training, but an educator by love.

So he studies medicine, but at the time, he says, “Writing is only words, medicine is deeds,” And in 1898, he did spend a lot of time writing short stories. He had a wonderful gift with words, the words danced. He entered a competition, the Jan Paderewski Competition. And for that, he took the pen name, Janusz Korczak, after a figure from a very popular book. So he becomes known in his literary work as Janusz Korczak. So between 1898 and 1904, he’s studying, but he needs to earn money for the family so he writes for several Polish newspapers. And in his spare time, he’s living in a very poor district of Warsaw. And by this period, if you look around the turn of the century, something like 40% of the Jews of Eastern Europe were on poor relief, and he’s involved in trying to help the poor children, particularly the children in the poor districts of Warsaw, not just Jews, but Gentiles, Catholics as well. He cannot bear the suffering of children. And this is something that comes to him very, very early on, that this is something he cannot cope with. Anyway, politically, he believed passionately in social justice. He was never ideological. He didn’t like ideology. So I don’t want to call him a socialist, I want to call him a man who believed in social justice. His first book, he writes his first book, he becomes a very popular writer, it’s called “Street Children” and it gives a very realistic description of his experiences of life in the Warsaw slums. In 1904, he finally qualifies as a doctor. He specialises in paediatrics, and he starts to work in the Warsaw Children’s Hospital.

He’s made his decision amongst the poor children of Warsaw and this is where he first meets Irena Sendler. She’s younger than him, but she went to Warsaw University. By this time, there was terrible anti-Semitism, and she used to sit on the Jewish benches. Jews in the Warsaw University had to sit on separate benches, and she also began a career as a social worker. And he actually said, “If you want to reform the world, you must reform education.” He’s gaining more and more recognition as an important writer, “Children of the Drawing Room,” and then of course, in 1905, he is called up into the Russia-Japanese war. He serves as a military doctor and this is what he writes, “War is an abomination because no one reports on how many children are hungry, ill-treated and left without protection. Before a nation goes to war, it should stop to think of the innocent children who will be injured, killed, or orphaned. No cause, no war is worth depriving children of their natural right to happiness. One must think first of the children before making revolution.” He always put people before ideals. Then after the war, he earns quite a lot of money now. He’s become very famous as a paediatrician. And he earns a lot of money from looking after the rich, and he doesn’t charge anything for treating the poor. He further studies in Berlin, and he then later meets up with the extraordinary Stefania Wilczyńska, who was herself born into a very wealthy family. She was trained as a teacher. She actually trained in Liège and in Geneva. And she came to the Jewish orphanage in Warsaw in 1909. And in 1911, he sets up his own orphanage, and she goes in with him.

And basically, apart from her time in Palestine, she’s going to stay with him right up until the end. Now, as director of the Jewish orphanage in Warsaw, he was absolutely revolutionary. What he did was, I mean, his methods are so forward-thinking that people deal with them today. There’s a wonderful little book called, “A Voice for the Child: The Inspirational Words of Janusz”. It was edited by Sandra Joseph. And in 1997, the UNESCO made it the Year of the Child, and it was also the year of Janusz Korczak because he becomes gradually known as one of the most famous children’s educators in the world. What he does is, he’s dealing in an orphanage with incredibly poor children who have lost all hope. So what did he does? He creates a parliament for the children. He gives the children a voice, he gives the children their voice, and he founds a newspaper. And later on, his newspaper, he’s going to persuade a Polish, a Warsaw Daily to put a children’s page in the newspaper, the first ever in the world. Can we have a look at the picture of the orphanage if you don’t mind, Shawna? Thank you. That is the children’s orphanage. He gradually reduces his medical duties, keeping on only a few rich patients.

He is a military in World War I. Again, he’s called up. He’s a military doctor with the rank of lieutenants. And his experiences after the war, just think of the incredible upheaval. There’s a war, there’s war between the Soviets and the Poles. And he comes back to Warsaw. And what he does is he also sets up children’s camps for the destitute. Working with kids, trying to understand what they needed, trying to understand their need for culture. And I think this is incredibly important that he got it. He really got, the kids needed culture. They needed their voice to be heard. They needed to have the opportunity. If he did something wrong, he would come before the children’s court, Stefania was really the house mother and the deputy of the orphanage. And when he had to go to war, it was her who looked after the orphanage. So can we have a look at some of his books, please? The next slide. Here, you have “King Matt The first”. This is a wonderful children’s book, which is the story of a young boy who becomes king. And it’s a bit like the that some of you will know. And in “King Matt The First”, the child wants to set up a kingdom of complete justice, he wants to create a utopia, but he gradually begins to understand that it’s also that you cannot have leadership without responsibility, which is an incredible lesson for every leader today, and this is in a children’s book. And also, he’s very important. This is the book edges by Sandra Joseph called “How To Love A Child: The Inspirational Words of Janusz Korczak”.

And can we see the next slide, please? Yes. This is him. He is the third up, fourth down on the steps with fellow colleagues when he was at the university. And can we see the next slide, please? You see him with some of his orphans. Don’t they look happy? By 1912, I should have mentioned, education had completely triumphed over medicine. He would still keep a few rich patients because he needed the money. And he said this, “A spoon of castor oil is no cure for poverty and sickness.” What he wants to do is to revolutionise society. And he does it through example. And what he did was, he didn’t care about luxury, he didn’t care about materialism. He actually lived in a room over the orphanage. Now, it was during the horror of war that he wrote his most important book, “How To Love A Child”. He also establishes in 1922, this is after the Polish State has been created, an orphanage for Catholic children. His book, “King Matt”, which I just shown you the cover of, was published in 1923. And another novel, “If I Was Small Again”, it’s the story of a grown man who turns into a young boy. And it’s in 1926 that the little review written by children of the orphanage is the first time it’s going to be read in a national newspaper. He also becomes a radio personality. He’s international, his books are being translated. He travels. He meets all sorts of interesting characters. He’s gradually becoming known as the best, the most interesting forward-thinking educator really in the world. So he has his own radio programme where he promotes the rights of children. In his earlier years, when he was in the slums of Warsaw, he would often go to the courts to look at how badly treated young children were if they were brought before the courts, that there was absolutely no humanity. Now, in 1934, his great friend, Stefania, goes to Palestine.

And he goes over there because he’s incredibly interested in what is going on, particularly with the kibbutzim and the children’s houses. He loves Palestine. He goes there in 1934 and in 1936. Now, ironically, by the time you get to 1936, there’s a terrible upswing of anti-Semitism in Poland. Pilsudski, the father of Poland, as he was known, to both the Jewish and Gentile population, yes, of course there was anti-Semitism. But after the death of Pilsudski, it gets completely out of hand. There are pogroms, the rise of the right, and it’s becoming very, very, very tense. And a lot of people do not realise that Janusz Korczak is in fact a Jew. And it’s the anti-Korczak press of the Polish right wing that leads to his estrangement from his non-Jewish orphanage because he believed he had his orphanage for Catholic children, he had his orphanage for Jewish children. And he was running both, but it was the anti-Semitism of the right wing. How dare a Jew interfere with children. And yet, this is a man, one of the most extraordinary individuals. He really was in my mind, he was a leader, but he was also a Tzadik. Now, in 1938, Stefani decides she’s going to immigrate to Palestine. He has the opportunity to go, but how on earth can he leave his children? And at this stage in particular, he was going through the courts of Warsaw, look at the juvenile courts, defending destitute and abandoned children of the streets who were often given very long sentences. And then, of course, the Warsaw Ghetto. And he was very, very famous. He also had a lot of friends in Żegota. Żegota was an organisation to save Jews. Ironically, it was quite anti-Semitic in its infancy. It was very Polish. It said, yes, it was very Catholic, yes, the Jews did kill Christ, but on the other hand, we don’t want them murdered. And there were people in the Polish underground who wanted to get him out of Warsaw. And he made the decision, or maybe it was no decision. Some of the people who write about Korczak said there was nothing to write about.

And Stefania has come back, and the two of them go into the ghetto with the children. And it’s in the ghetto that he faces his greatest challenge. I’ve already given you a glimpse, and I know many of you have read a lot about this. I’ve given you a glimpse of the appalling, appalling tragedy that was unfolding in the ghetto, the deprivation, the deaths in the street, typhus epidemics. And yet, ironically, there was also a post office that ran right up until the great deportations. So can we have a look at some more slides, please? I’d like you to have a look. That’s Stefania. And that, of course, is the saintly Irena Sendler. I mean, a few words on Irena Sendler. As I said to you, she was… And maybe we can understand where she comes from because her father had been a doctor not far from Warsaw. Also, he sounded to be ecstatic because he treated the poor for nothing, including the Jewish community in his town. There was a typhus epidemic. He contracted typhus. The community wanted to help the mother and child, the mother was very proud, and she wouldn’t take anything. And when Irena went to university to study law and literature, as I said before, she always sat on the Jewish benches, and she was part of a group of very interesting Jewish women activists who they moved towards the illegal communist party of Poland. They were all social workers.

And it’s out of this group that when the war breaks out, they, of course, the Slavs were treated abominably, but the Jews were treated… Well, in the end, birth was sentenced of death for the Jews. And it’s Irena Sendler and her friends who go into the Warsaw Ghetto to help particularly with the children. She is credited with managing to smuggle 2,500 children out of the Warsaw Ghetto. And what is a marvellous about Irena Sendler, when these children were placed quite often with nuns, there were some very righteous nuns in the nunneries, in the monasteries, they placed children. The children were baptised. They took Polish names, and they had to learn a catechism. What Irena Sendler did was to keep a list of all the Jewish children. And it was that list because she thought that one day, they would have to be returned to their people. And in fact, she was captured by the Gestapo. She was very badly treated, she was tortured. She actually managed to pass the list to another friend who buried it. She was sentenced to die. But luckily, members of Żegota managed to bribe the guards, and she was freed. I should mention that for a Pole who aided a Jew, they didn’t just lose their lives, their whole family lost their lives. So anyone who did that, it was a very, very special thing to do. Now, after the war, when 50% of the Polish Communist Party was Jewish, there was a man called Berman, and Irena gave the names of the Jewish children. And tragically, of course, most of the parents were dead, but they got the children out of Poland unlike many Catholic authorities who refused to give the children back, which of course was sanctioned by Pius XII. It’s another story for another time.

And of course, I wanted to show you those two women because, as I said, Irena and Stefania, Stefania who also didn’t have to go into the ghetto, but felt that they had to be with the children. And it’s in the ghetto. And this is when Jonathan Sacks talked about culture. He realised he had to keep their souls alive. He had to keep their minds alive. So children performed plays. He would go to the smugglers to try and get money for the children. He did to medical supplies for the children. He had nearly 200 children in his orphanage. And how was he to feed them? And that was his prime concern. He became quite ill. And those of you who have the strength to read the Ringelblum’s diaries or to read Chaim Kaplan’s diaries, you can read all these stories for yourself because a miracle happened. Kaplan, of course, and both Kaplan and Ringelblum perished, but their words didn’t. The Ringelblum Archive was actually buried in under Warsaw. And they were found, most of them were found after the war. And there’s a brilliant book by David Roskies, which deals with this so we know, that’s why we have so much detail of the Warsaw Ghetto. Doctors were monitoring the effects of starvation on their own bodies. This is heroism, this is leadership, this is moral leadership. And isn’t it fascinating? At such a dark time, there were people who became what they could have been if we want to take that Talmudic statement. Anyway, the last attempt to get him out of the ghetto, he said, “You wouldn’t abandon your own child in sickness, misfortune, or danger, would you?

How can I leave 200 children now?” He did become more and more despairing. His last extract from his diary, “I’m angry with no one. I do not wish anyone evil. I’m unable to do so. I do not know how one can do it.” But what was absolutely extraordinary, about a week before the final deportation of the children, they performed a play called the “Post Office”. Now, remember, there was a post office in the Warsaw Ghetto. It was a story by an extraordinary Bengali writer. He’s known as the bard of Bengal. His name is Rabindranath Tagore. His dates are 1861 to 1941. He was an incredible writer, a poet, a mystic. He was a very, very special man. He was a social reformer. He really shaped the whole notion of Bengali literature. He becomes world famous. And he wrote this story of the post office. In many ways, we can understand why Korczak chose this story for his children. It was the story of a child, Amal, who was confined to his home by an incurable disease. He was illiterate. And everyone would make fun of him because he would stand in his courtyard and he would ask passersby, because he can’t leave the courtyard, he has an incurable disease. Then he asked them about the places they go to, and they’re constructing a new post office. He’s absolutely fascinated by this. And it grabs his imagination. And he believes that one day, he will receive a letter from the king. And of course, everyone promises, everyone laughs at him this promise.

And he believes that one day, the king will send his physician to heal him. And ironically, in the end, the physician does come with a herald to announce. But by then, Amal is dead. It’s too late to save him. But in many ways, he saved himself spiritually. And this really was the message that, I think, Korczak wanted his children because he knew what was going to happen. Now, there are so many stories of the last march of Janusz Korczak. Irena Sendler herself wrote it. And I wrote a story, and I’m going to read you what she had to say. He walked at the head of the tragic procession because it’s going to take them four hours to walk from the ghetto to the collection point on the Umschlagplatz. He held the younger child. He walked at the head of the tragic procession. He held the younger child in his arms. With his other hand, he was leading another infant. That’s how various people have recorded it in their memoirs, whereas other recorded differently. But it doesn’t mean anyone has made a mistake. One can only remember that the route was long from the orphanage. It lasted four hours. I saw them and then they were turning from Zelazna Street into Leszno Street. And I’m going to read you one, I think very beautiful reading. Remember it was the Ukrainian guards who came to the children. And the day was Wednesday, the 5th of August. Ukrainian police surrounded the house, another evil of the Nazis. They used the Lithuanians and the Ukrainians in Poland. Horrible screams, “All Jews out.” And then in Yiddish, “Quickly, quickly.” The efficient organisation for which the orphanage, thanks to Stefa is well-known, can now be seen in operation. The children who surprised in the middle of their breakfast have their normal days routine upset.

They descend quietly and line. Ms. Stefa and the doctor go down with the children without forgetting to take the green flag with them, the flag of the orphanage. We returned to the legend. According to eyewitnesses, the children were dressed in their holiday clothes as they were going for a trip or a holiday in the country. Some say they wore their ordinary clothes, where others say they had blue knapsacks with them. Another version says that their arms were folded on their breasts. However, those who have personally seen a deportation or have personally made their fearful way to a Nazi assembly place assure us that those times were not particularly suited to special effect. Perhaps the common sense of Stefa who did not follow the good doctor in his illusions caused her to make sure that the children were wearing the best clothes possible when they set out on their long, long way. Somewhere or other, Korczak’s children were always distinguished from the general poverty around them. Even on ordinary days, their clothing was clean and neat. That is why the impression made by this small, quiet, well behaved group, which was following the doctor with complete confidence was so pleasant and aesthetic. Janusz Korczak walked at their head. We know at the time he was weak and then he had been ill. His feet were swollen and his heart was giving him trouble. I doubt whether he had the strength to carry two of his charges, even the tiniest ones, as the legend alleges.

They were pulled, stopped, crowded together and pulled along in the burning heat of August, accompanied by cruel cries and rifle blows. If Korczak really took some child with painful feet into his arms, it was probably the five-year-old Romcia Stockman, daughter of two of his pupils, Rosa and Yosef, who had returned to work with him in the orphanage. It is possible that Korczak heard the feverish, tired, sweating hands of two children as they drummed with their little feet to his right and his left. Did Korczak tell them they were going for a picnic to the country? We cannot know. But the terror, the fear of death and of deportation must have affected all of them. And it’s very doubtful whether it was possible to dilute them, at least the older children, with a fiction of this sort. It is, however, almost certain, that to the very last moment, he assured the children of something which he no longer believed that they were going to work in agriculture in the forest, felling trees. Did they sing? Possibly, yes. For years before that, the little Jewish boys used to march in pairs with young Korczak at the lead. Our eyes still see them walking slowly and quietly, the doctor’s companions in spirit. His travelling companions in their fateful journey, Stefana, Mr. Henryk Osterblum, the veteran bookkeeper of the home, Felix and Balbina Gzieb, Natzia Boz, Rosa Stockman, Sabina Leiserowicz, Dorka Solnicka, the four Moniushes, little Hanka with the lung trouble, Yolek who was ill, Abrasha of the burning eyes, who only a short time ago so successfully played Amal, the child about to die.

And you, the others, brave and courageous as those that I’ve just mentioned in your work for children, together with them in the ghetto in death. The teaching and medical staff, thousands of children, hundreds of pedagogues and doctors, all of them anonymous and forgotten. Your name and your symbol is the legend of Korczak to the accompaniment of the green waving flag. They will go onto eternity in all time, in all countries of the world, from the scaffold of the ghetto and from the smoking crematoria of Treblinka . They travel to eternity. Okay. How come one say anything after that? Except that this man to me, he overcame human really propensities. He was, for me, humanity in leadership and at its best in extreme circumstances. And thank God in our lifetime, my lifetime, we haven’t really been tested. And who knows how we’ll be. But I think I still like to think back to the legend of the 36 righteous men. And it’s quite complicated because at the moment, I’m struggling with Isaac Abarbanel because what I’m doing in my next lecture, I’m taking him to Italy. And then of course, it’s his son who’s going to work for Cosimo de’ Medici, and it’s all going to pull together. And he was a great man in his way. He was a great Talmudist. He wrote commentaries. He believed in the salvation of these people, but he put his faith in Princes. Korczak never did. And there was something that is so strong in Janusz Korczak that I just decided in this week, when we are honouring a great leader, it’s important to remember, I think, the man who to me was a Tzadik.

Thank you very much. Okay, should we have a look at questions? I dunno her name.

Q&A and Comments:

Emil. Trudy, I’m thrilled you’re covering Janusz Korczak as my granddaughter had a Yad Vashem where she twinning with a young girl who was unable to have one because of the Holocaust. The service was held next to a statue of Janusz Korczak, she was learning about at school in Canada. I should have mentioned to you that there are many memorials to Janusz Korczak. In fact, I had them on the slides. There is a very important one in the cemetery in Warsaw. There’s another one in Yad Vashem. And there is a memorial stone at Treblinka as there is for Stefania.

Eva liked the taught by Rabbi Sacks. Henryk Goldszmit, yes. Each individual has a life force, as you know, but I think we take it for granted. Yes, it’s only when we are tested, I think, that we really have to understand what we are capable of. And I am finding, ironically, in lockdown, as I said, I’ve made some really deep close friendships with people who have completely surprised me.

And this is Anna. It’s very important to educate students about the extraordinary act of spiritual resistance. Yes, Anna, I totally agree with you. And this is Eva. He definitely is the moral pillar of human dignity. Korczak is pronounced Korczak. I tried to get hold of Freda who wasn’t answering her phone today, because as I said to you, in the old days, Felic would transliterate for me. I have a blind spot with pronunciation. I’m just hoping that before I get back to Poland, Freda will come back. Okay, what else are we…

Oh, this is from Monty. If you feel down, read a poem every day by Yehuda Amichai. They give me an insight into life. Monty, that’s brilliant. It’s a brilliant idea. I really meant what I said. Look, in those terrible times, they perform a play. There are lending libraries, there are books. I think important, when we feel down because of lockdown and because just how unstable the world is. I mean, as I said to you, I read Isaiah Berlin. This is going to sound trivial, but I watch Fred Estaire dance. I’ll listen to Leonard Cohen. He’s my generation, remember. I’ll do things that… Because his poetry to me really does inspire the human spirit. I might watch a film, I might watch “Some Like It Hot”. I might watch “All About Eve”. Great talent. You see, this is another thing. In a time, yes, you can read the important spiritual things, but to me, to see what the human body is capable of, ice dance, listen to sublime music. Sometimes when you look at music and art, I mean, the work of Vermeer, my ambition, my bucket list is to see every Vermeer painting in the world. There are certain things that we can do that do make us feel better, that make us feel that the human condition is worth it, and frankly, to study characters like Korczak. Yes. His educational principles and respect to follow the path of taking along.

Q: What was his religious faith?

A: He wasn’t religious, really. He was agnostic, but he is touched by the divine, I think.

Yes, the World of Art, Homer, it was heroes quite different. It was quality not based on people’s action, on their being descendants of the gods. Yes, exactly. They’re beautiful and stirring and yes, relevant even in translation. Yes, of course, they are, but it’s not about goodness. It’s fascinating, os it not? And this is the subject of a completely different presentation. The western world believes that it’s founded on the work of the Greeks and the world of the Greeks and the world of Judaism, Christianity.

The Ringelblum book was written by Samuel Kassow.

Q: What was it David Roskies wrote?

A: I was looking. He also did something.

Anyway. Yes, Joan, one thinks one has no more tears. I mean, I’ve read it so often, but it wells you up. I mean, there’s nothing. And I think it makes me think of that line of George Steiner, he said, “Jewish parents, even if parents who were never touched by the show, nevertheless, we hold our children too close for all the children that couldn’t be held so close.”

Yes, he wrote the first ever Bill of Rights for children.

Yes, the 1924 League of Nations Bill of Rights, he was very disappointed in it. I haven’t had time to give detail of everything. But yes. And I hope that many of you, you see the point about lockdown university. Why don’t we just face it? We’re just sharing ideas with each other. And I learned so much from some of the emails that you sent to me.

This is from Emily. My family was murdered in Treblinka, too. They were small children. Oh God. Irena Sendler was not Jewish. Yes, exactly, Gladwin. Yes, she was not Jewish, and that was what’s so important. Irena Sendler. Look, righteousness is international. The legend of the 36 just men, they don’t have to be Jews. What did Jonathan Sacks say? There are many parts to the truth. Irena Sendler was a righteous person amongst the 35,000 righteous who are honoured in Yad Vashem.

Q: What happened to the family of Korczak?

A: He didn’t have any family. He didn’t have children.

Yes, in the Genscher cemetery of him, very simple, very moving.

Yes. “Irena’s Children”, great book. Yes.

Oh, this is from Barbara. I passed the Warsaw Uprising Memorial in Riverside Park on the Upper West side, it’s well looked after. And there is explanation on a board, but most people do not appear to notice it. We have a real problem with education, do we not? Ironically, even though the show in theory is taught everywhere now, the Americans signed up to the IHRA decoration, IHRA. Schools are meant to teach it, but somehow, this is another presentation, it seems to have been dejudaized. It’s that terrible quote of Howard Jacobson, “They can’t forgive us all, of course.” Another time, another place.

Korczak, this is from Edna, was more than an exemplary of humanity. Yes.

This is from Marcia. I have written a book based on my personal interviews with 10 persons who had lived in the orphanage prior to the show. It’s been translated in public, fantastic, in Russian and Ukrainian. Extraordinary. And yes, and there was a very good artist who was also an orphan. He went to Israel, and he did some wonderful drawings of Korczak from memory. I live on Korczak Avenue. It’s called Sculptor of Children’s Souls, that is so beautiful.

This is from Sheila. I remember reading Mary Berg’s diary of her time in the ghetto. She describes the journey of Korczak and the children, and it was published in 1944. Yes, there were many accounts. It must have been so powerful. Many, many people, just imagine 200 little children, four hours, people who survived. And from the Aryan side, even some of the guards were close to tears. Thank you for that. Yes.

Yes, Roskies wrote about the Warsaw Ghetto. Yes. But he did talk about Korczak. Oh, this is for me. Thank you, Eve Halla, with best regards from us, the European Janusz Korczak Academy, Germany.

Oh, that is so lovely of you. Eve, get in touch with me.

Q: What happened to Stefania early on?

A: She died with the children.

Georgina, he was following Alfred Adler’s teaching to treat kids with regard and respect always. Yes, yes, yes. It is interesting. This was turn of the century. People were thinking about children. And ironically, so many of them were born Jewish. Is it because Jews are outsiders? And it’s as outsiders, we move the world and change the world? I read his children’s book as a child in Polish. It’s a wonderful story, which I still remember five years later. Well, that’s lovely. Oh, I’m using my ballpen.

Yes, the monument in his memory in Warsaw, Michael, is very, very special. Thank you very much. Shawna, I think that’s the end of the questions. Shawna, Carly, who’s there?

• [Shawna] Yes. Hi, I’m here. Well, again, Trudy, this has been a incredibly moving and incredibly important topic. We thank you as always for your insight and your incredible knowledge. And I’d like to say good evening, good afternoon to all of our listeners, and we’ll see you back here at 2:30 for our afternoon webinar. So take care, everyone.

• 7:30, 7:30 our time, Shawna.

• [Shawna] Yes. 2:30, Eastern time, yes, correct. I’m in New York.

• Can I just say, without people like Shawna, and Judi, and Carly, I couldn’t do any of this because I am technologic… Just as I can’t pronounce foreign languages, I’m also technologically dyslexic. So thank you very much, everyone, and God bless.

• You’re most welcome.

• Bye.