Joliet Jewish Congregation

Welcome back to the Cantor’s Notes! The “notes” in the title refer to both the written words in this column, and the music I present at JJC during our High Holiday, Family and other Shabbat Services, Sunday School music classes, and music practiced outside of our shul.

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One song I learned recently for a Kristallnacht Service for the South Suburban Chicago CJC held at Shir Tikvah congregation, is Marshall Portnoy’s “I Still Believe.”

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A couple of notes:

Firstly, the name of the service, Kristallnacht, means “night of broken glass,” glass which was left in the streets on the night of Nov. 9, 1938. That night, hundreds of synagogues were set on fire during a pogrom by the German Nazis, as they broke the windows of stores owned by Jews, and attacked Jews, too.

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Secondly, one phrase that stands out from the song, “I Still Believe,” is “I still believe / In spite of everything / That people really are good at heart,” from Anne Frank’s The Diary of a Young Girl.  

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This sentiment is truly notable for its optimism, despite the dark days experienced by Jews including Anne Frank and her family, as they hid from the Germans during World War II. Frank wrote regularly in a diary that she received when she turned 13 years old, right before she and her family went into hiding for the next two years in an Annex they furnished for her father’s business in the Netherlands.

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Frank penned short stories, began writing a novel, and rewriting her diary as one longer, running story, when she learned of the request for listeners to hold onto war diaries and documents, which was conveyed over a Dutch radio program from the Minister of Education of the Dutch government in England.

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Although Frank did not survive the war, her diary did, taken by two helpers before the Nazis emptied the Secret Annex.

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Before her death from typhus and exposure at the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in February 1945, Anne’s plans had included publication and a future as a writer, and friends of her father helped him achieve this dream for her, when he published the diary in June 1947. Knowledge of the book grew, as it was eventually translated into 70 languages and seen across stage and screen. The Secret Annex was the name that Anne had planned for her published diary, and it became famous both for that, and as a museum, the Anne Frank House.  

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Kristallnacht is one of many dates observed every year. Each fall, synagogue life is busy with occasions: Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, Sukkot, Simchat Torah and rolling the Torahs back to the beginning, Shemini Atzeret and at JJC, our yearly Spaghetti Dinner.

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On Simchat Torah, our Sunday School danced with the Torahs around the sanctuary and the Social Hall, singing Hinei Mah Tovu, Bim Bam Shabbat Shalom and Mah Yafeh HaYom.

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On Sukkot, we waved lulavs and etrogs outside by our beautiful sukkah, which we had just finished decorating with paper chains, gourds and other colorful items.

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And at the beginning of November, we held the Spaghetti Dinner, which brings together the Joliet and Joliet Jewish communities each year.

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Despite many difficult aspects of our world today, including increased anti-Semitism, wars in Gaza and Ukraine/Russia, whether the election results turned out as we did or did not hope, there are potentially positive reasons to move forward, including Thanksgiving and Chanukah.

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And if it’s tough to look ahead, one may take heart with Anne Frank’s words: “I still believe In spite of everything, that people really are good at heart.”

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L’Shanah Tovah,

Cantor Jessica

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