The following messages I found to be very profound and moving and I
submit them for your consideration.

       .\ .\.\

 * Originally By: Clay Williams
 * Originally Re: Never Again!          1/2
 * Original Area: FIDO-Judaica

                        YOM HA'SHOAH 5754

Never Again . . .

I have heard those words expressed in so many ways.  I've heard them 
yelled in anger, rage, and challenge; mouthed in tearful lament of 
unquenchable grief; spoken in solemn promise to those who died so 
horribly and to all who suffered and survived; and whispered as prayer 
to G-d as petition and hope.

Never Again!

A defiant challenge and vow to a world that stood by and did nothing.  
An assertion of destiny from a people who have been hounded, 
ridiculed, debased, slaughtered, reviled, murdered, raped, and 
dehumanized all through out the centuries in Europe.  A realization, 
finally, that THIS Holocaust was but the last, great slaughter that 
had been going on, uninterrupted, for over two-thousand years.

Never Again.

A point in time as a demarcation between the past and the future.  A 
change in the soul of the sons and daughters of Abraham, Isaac, and 
Jacob.  "No longer will we be your scapegoat and fodder:  from this 
day forward you will not treat us so.  We will not stand it.  Enough 
is enough.  We cannot trust you so we will have our own homeland and 
from there we will control our own destiny and security; live our 
Torah and know our own ways."

Never Again.

A work, a project, a dream come true.  Dry bones brought back to life.  
Weeping in the night and joy in the morning.  The building of a 
homeland from nothing.  The young, strong, and defiant came.  They 
toiled and sweated and built kibbutzim and cities from waste lands.  
Rivers would flow in the desert!  Swamps and marshes would flourish!  
And those damaged and devastated could be refreshed and safe and 
healed.  Never Again!  It was good.

Never Again.

For children born years after those days of horror, a light, a 
teaching, a retelling.  So as not to forget.  Teach these things to 
them, bind them upon your hearts, place them upon your doors, never 
forget.

Never Again.

A Jewish phrase only?  Many seem to think so.  To some gentiles they 
are words as foreign as Hebrew prayers.  They think that this has
nothing to do with me.  I wasn't there.  I didn't do it.  I wasn't 
involved.

Yet those words go forth and are heard not by Jewish ears and hearts 
alone.  For some reason, in the world there are a few who ask not 
"What do these words mean to you?" but, "What do these words mean to 
me?"  

Was that not why they were said?  Are you so surprised that a gentile 
would respond?  Weren't the history books in his elementary school 
library for him to read too?  Wasn't the documentary on television
intended to show him as a child what happened and to cause a change in 
his heart?  It did.  A seed was planted and, without his knowledge, it 
grew.  And so a phrase for "others" became a life-guide for him too.

Never Again.

His surprising "Samson's Strength" as he, a quiet and shy eight-year-
old, challenged the bigger thirteen-year-old boys on the school bus 
who were harassing the Jewish students with "Christ killer!  You
killed Christ!"  "No they didn't!  Leave 'em alone!"

His Solace and Comfort as he walked home bloodied and beaten and cold, 
his new winter coat stolen -- after all, they were bigger, you know -- 
but they were WRONG!  At least the others got away; those bullies were 
too busy with him to worry about them.  And Never Again with him 
explaining to her:  "Ma, I had to!  They were pickin' on 'em and it 
was wrong!"

As the years passed, Never Again grew inside him, slowly, without 
notice.

Never Again.

An Anchor of Support to the reeling mind of a teenager who has just
learned from his beloved great-grandmother that her father was a grand
wizard of the KKK when he was alive.  Shock.  Mouth open in an "o" of
surprise and dismay.  And Never Again looking at him as a "Tevya's
Fiddler" wondering what this news would do to the young man's soul as
he learned that he too came from a people of hate.  Each wondering if
the other would abandon him now.

Never Again.

His Companion, his Friend, his Support as a young man of college 
years.  His "Never Again Fiddler" saying "Go on, it's right!" as he
went against the grain and signed up for Hebrew classes.  Never Again 
with him as his friends looked askance and asked him "Why?  Gonna go 
'jew' on us?"  Never Again with him as he got rid of those friends, 
and still with him when the Jewish students in his class didn't quite
understand why he was there.  But it was right.  Never Again was no
longer a seed, but a tree now and the "Fiddler" played in his heart.

Never Again.

Walking with him as he crossed the doorway, dry-mouthed-something-in-
my-throat scared, into the synagogue on Friday night.  "What am I 
doing here?"  Never Again leading him on, playing a tune of Shalom and 
Welcome.  Such a wonderful place.  Will I be able to understand after 
four years of Hebrew?  Are they staring at me?  Do they know I'm not
one of "them"?  <Gulp>  Feeling as exposed as Jews in Spain must have 
felt in the reconquista.  Knowing that the sign of the covenant, 
absent on him, could reveal him as "not one of us" as surely as it did
them in the past.  The coin on the other side?  So this is how it 
feels to be considered "different."

But look at the Ark, the Eternal Flame, and the Scrolls.  G-d is here, 
oh Blessed Be He, and I am safe.  And yes, I can understand what we're 
singing now!  "Hine mah tov u'manayim, shevet acheem gam yachad!"  
Never Again, you were right, I am glad I came.  

Never Again!

Stood with him on that lonely windy hill in the back woods of Kentucky 
staring at the grave of his great-great-grandfather.  Wondering, under 
the gray overcast sky of that cold October afternoon, if what he was 
going to do would be sacrilegious.  But knowing he had to make this 
stance and knowing the motive and spirit of his heart was right.

Never Again standing with him and six-million as minyan and witness
watched as he placed the yarmulke on his head asking G-d to forgive 
him if what he was doing was wrong, but knowing it was not.  And 
there, in the backwoods of Kentucky, on hills that have never heard 
Hebrew, over the grave of a man who lived hate, the words were heard:

          Yisgadol v'yishkadash shmai rabbo . . .

Not to honor him nor mourn him, but to show him that hate cannot live.  
That what he lived for was futile, that it could not win.  For even 
from his very loins came one who would not hate and would stand over 
him years later saying the prayers of those he hated.  But, yes, in a
way to mourn; not the man, but the man that was killed when hate won 
his heart.  And finally an

          Amen.

A cut, and a tear of cloth -- and a rip with the past of his family's 
secret hatred.  "Not in me!  Never Again!"  And the sun broke through 
the clouds.

                                        - Clay Williams
                                          Phoenix, Arizona
