A Jewish festival in southern Poland
Rabbi Ellis conducting the havdalah service in Katowice
A humus making workshop in southern Poland, in a town with scarcely more than 100 Jews? That was just one of the culinary and cultural events at the “Sababa” festival held in Katowice last month.
Sababa means “cool” in modern Hebrew slang and the local organizers set out to showcase the Jewish heritage of the Katowice region which, before the Nazis invaded in 1939, was home to over 10,000 Jews. Today, there are only 120 Jews officially registered as members of the Jewish community, but an estimated 1,000 “hidden Jews” and possibly more reside in the area.
To address this growing need, in November 2011, Shavei Israel appointed its first emissary to Katowice, Rabbi Yehoshua Ellis. Originally from Kansas City, Missouri, Rabbi Ellis served as a community volunteer in Warsaw before moving to Katowice, where he is leading a full roster of activities: classes (including the popular “Judaism from the Beginning”); prayers (Katowice’s Yom Kippur services had a full minyan for the first time in many years); a youth group; and Shabbat meals.
Rabbi Ellis studied at various yeshivot in Jerusalem before receiving his rabbinical ordination from the Shehebar Sephardic Center. He is also a certified shochet (a ritual kosher slaughterer).
The Sababa festival featured a tour of Jewish Katowice; an exhibition opening by an Israeli artist; and a Havdalah ceremony to mark the closing of Shabbat, held at the site of the New Synagogue in Katowice, which was torched by the Nazis in September, 1939. Rabbi Ellis led the ceremony in which close to 70 people participated. Professional photographer Krzystof Krzeminski took some very lovely photos of the ceremony – he has given us permission to reprint them here.