Remah Cemetery

The Remah Cemetery,[1] or Remuh Cemetery,[2][3][4] also known as the Old Jewish Cemetery of Kraków,[5] in Kraków, Poland, is an inactive Jewish historic cemetery established in 1535.[3] It is in the Renaissance Kazimierz district of the city beside the 16th-century Remah Synagogue, at 40 Szeroka Street. In 1800, the cemetery was closed and the nearby New Jewish Cemetery was built at 55 Miodowa Street. The cemetery gets its name from Rabbi Moses Isserles, whose name is abbreviated as Remah, who is buried there. Izaak Jakubowicz, donor of the Izaak Synagogue is buried there.[4]

Tombstone at Remah Cemetery
Remah Cemetery
Remah

During the German occupation of Poland, the Nazis destroyed the cemetery tearing down the walls and hauling away tombstones to be used as paving stones in the camps, or selling them for profit. The tombstone of the Remah (Rabbi Moses Isserles) is one of the few that remained intact. The cemetery has undergone a series of post-war restorations. As is common in contemporary Poland, all tombstones unearthed as paving stones have been returned and re-erected, although they represent a small fraction of the monuments that once stood in the cemetery.[3]

Notable gravesites

The cemetery holds the gravesites of many notable Polish Jews,[3] including:

  • Rabbi Moses Isserles, whose name is abbreviated as Remah, (ca. 1525-1572), buried there along with his family;
  • Mordechaj Saba (called Singer), head of the Kraków Talmudic Academy from 1572 to 1576;
  • Joseph Kac, head of the Academy from 1576 to 1591.
  • Nathan Nata Spira (1583-1633),[5] Kraków rabbi and head of the Academy from 1617 to 1633;
  • Jozue ben Joseph (1590-1648), also head of the Academy;
  • Joel Sirkes Bach, (1561-1640), rabbi of the Kraków Jewish community and head of the Academy;
  • Isaac Landau Lewita, rabbi of Kraków's Jewish community from 1754 to 1768;
  • Isaac Halewi, Kraków's rabbi and head of the Academy from 1776 to 1799.[4]
  • Rabbi Yom-Tov Lipmann Heller, (1578-1654), a Bohemian rabbi and Talmudist, best known for writing a commentary on the Mishnah called the Tosafot Yom-Tov.
  • Yossele the Holy Miser, central figure in a well-known tale of Jewish folklore.
  • Avraham Yehoshua Heschel, Chief Rabbi of Kraków.[5]

See also

Media related to Remuh Cemetery in Kraków at Wikimedia Commons

Notes and references
  1. Jeffrey S. Gurock (2015). The Holocaust Averted: An Alternate History of American Jewry, 1938-1967. Remah Synagogue and Cemetery (Prologue). Rutgers University Press. p. 2. ISBN 0813572401.
  2. Site Information (2016). "Remuh Synagogue and the adjoining Cemetery, Krakow". Introduction, location map and aerial view of Remuh Synagogue. Sacred Destinations.
  3. "The Remuh Synagogue of Krakow, Poland". The Database of Jewish Communities. The Museum of the Jewish People at Beit Hatfutsot. 2007. Retrieved July 31, 2013.
  4. WCSS (2004), The Old Cemetery beside the Remuh Synagogue (Internet Archive) Cemeteries in Cracow [Kraków]. Retrieved July 31, 2013.
  5. Sherwin, Byron L. (1997). Sparks Amidst the Ashes: The Spiritual Legacy of Polish Jewry. Oxford University Press US. ISBN 978-0-19-510685-5.

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