Names Not Numbers

On 27 January 2025, on Holocaust Memorial Day, Temple Emanuel of Greater New Haven. Orange, CT, marked the 80th anniversary of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camp liberation.

On Sunday, January 26th, the Temple Emanuel Religious School honored this date and their special connection to the Jewish community of a small Czech town of Horazdovice. The Temple Emanuel Holocaust Memorial Torah scroll MST#1178 comes from Horazdovice. For decades, all Temple Emanuel Bnei Mitzvah students read from this very special Torah, bringing it to life on the day of one of the most important Jewish milestones of their lives. That Sunday, Temple Emanuel students learned about the history of the Horazdovice Jewish community and were able to connect to the Jewish history in a very meaningful and personal way. Temple Emanuel Members learned that one of the ways Nazis dehumanized their victims was by taking away people’s names and tattooing the numbers on their arms. A special program, “Names Not Numbers,” allowed students to create personalized pebbles with the names of Jews of Horazdovice who were deported from the town. The goal is to create a memorial section with these pebbles in the beautiful Temple Emanuel Garden to remember each one of those people by their name with love and care. This special program was initiated by Peter Stolzman and supported by Barbara Weber Rosenthal Holocaust Education Fund and Nancy and Mark Weber, and Temple Emanuel are very grateful for their ongoing support and encouragement.