In recent years, editions of the FKŻ were dedicated to the elements. We have shown you how earth, water, fire and air function in the Jewish tradition and what they mean, both symbolically and practically. With this year’s edition we begin a new thematic cycle. You will learn about the different facets and faces of Jewish spirituality and mysticism: from Kabbalah to Hasidism, from Safed to Borough Park, from Rabbi Joseph Karo to Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks.
We will begin our journey through spirituality with the most important prayer – Shema Israel and the love that always accompanies this prayer. Like never before, now we need to listen and to be heard, to love and to be loved. We invite you to Kazimierz from 23 to 30 June, 2024.
Hear, o Israel, to the voice of love.
Are we still able to find a common place, word, value, something that can give us a sense of unity and reconciliation, irrespectively of who we are and where we come from? Thanks to which we will be able to resist the madness of leaders and the madness of crowds demanding punishment for people and nations for the crimes that they did not commit? Without this thing only the Jews will always be to blame for everything? Without this feeling we will never come to terms with the crimes committed against innocent victims in Israel, Gaza, Poland, Africa, Europe, Ukraine, Russia, Iran, China, Tibet, North Korea, Iraq, Turkey and in all corners of the bloodstained Earth. The dead will gain nothing from our dead compassion. Those, who remain silent in the face of increasing evil and later on turn to the manifestation of rage and false sympathy, will never ease their conscience. What is missing in our life that it becomes just another circle of hell? Only one thing: love.
What we need is just normal, un-winged, tangible, everyday love. The opposite of love is the indifference to the fate of the victims and cynical compassion. Beware that your compassion is not managed by evil people.
Thirty six years ago I guarded the Festival from becoming a tool of politics. And so it will be as long as I am here. We are not here to save the world. We are on an impossible mission – we cerate a community of people speaking diverse languages, belonging to various nations and religions who find some bond with the world of Jewish ethics and culture which lie at the root of the human civilization. This is the civilization of Life which lasts thanks to Love.
Poetry does not save us, neither does art nor culture. All the more, religion does not save is. It is love – אהבה that does. And compassion.
Judaism was the first religion in history that placed love at the heart of spiritual live: Love thy God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. Love thy neighbor. Love the stranger. And what we love most – because God is there – is the life itself. This is our greatest strength. This allowed our forefathers to survive all kinds of persecution. This helped the survivors to sustain the Holocaust. This gave the Jewish nation the courage to rebuild the land and the state of Israel. That is why our greatest prayer during the day is “Inscribe us in the Book of Life”. We do not ask for richness or fame, fame or success. We do not pray to avoid the trials or hardships. We just ask for life. This is Judaism: life in love and love for life. The rest is only comments (Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks)
It is love that teaches us sincere compassion, without which the world is like an empty vessel.
We live on the love for life and for Jewish culture – we unite around it and it defines the dividing line which separates us from the civilization of hatred and death. We create a community of people who believe in love. And together we write a comment which is the 33rd Jewish Culture Festival. Everybody has the right for their own comment.
Listen, o Israel, to the voice of love and speak to the world with the voice of love. Let the world hear you. Let it listen to you.
Janusz Makuch
Would you like to help us to organize 33rd JCF?
photos: Edyta Dufaj, Janusz Makuch