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The horrific events that took place in the lives of the Jews during the uprising of the oppressor Khmelnytsky^[1], may his name be blotted out, the events known as the “Decrees of 5408-5409” [1648-1649], did not skip the Jewish settlement in Lutsk. In the period of 5408 - 5409, also our brothers in the city of Lutsk were subjected to plunder and prey like in all other cities near and far, and many of them were killed in various and strange deaths for the sanctification of God's name, they, their wives and sons.

The story of the act is found in an objective lecture in the book, Yeven Mezulah^[2], written by one of the Jewish refugee who was an eyewitness to the event. The acts and the events of the years 5408 - 5409 are a tragic chapter not only in Jewish history, but also in human history in general. We had to make a great effort to distract ourselves from them and erase their memory from our consciousness, so as not to despair of a good ending and hope for the future to come. And in the meantime, even before we could forget those years of murder, came upon us the Holocaust of the German Nazis, who were worst than their teachers, the Haidamakas^[3], and turned the Decrees of 5408-5409 into a minor edition of what had happened in our generation. Nevertheless, we are not free to draw a line on what happened a little over three hundred years ago. The lecture of the event comes as an eternal historical indictment on the part of our people for what their oppressors had done to them, and continue to do to them without a break for two thousand years. The voice of the blood of our ancestors, and our forefathers, cries out from the earth, and this voice should continue to be heard from the end of the world to the end, until the tyrants' stone heart will melt.

The horrific years of 5408-5409 are a period of horrors in the history of the Jewish people. These years were a time of trouble for the Jews in Poland, Wolyn and Ukraine by Khmelnytsky's Haidamakas, and from there the decree spread across the communities of Lithuania. Tens and hundreds of thousands of Jews perished without a trial, and the cruelty of beasts of prey in human form, and complete peace of mind prevailed in the civilized world.

Many reasons led to the Haidamakas uprising led by Bohdan Khmelnytsky (Chamil HaRasha [the wicked] in our people's mouth), which shortly after was joined by the majority of the Ukrainian people. The uprising shocked the Polish State in the middle of the 17^th century, and caused a holocaust on all the Jews within it, especially on those in its eastern districts. There was a sharp national contrast between the oppressed Ukrainian and the ruling Poles, economic and social contrast between the serf farmer and the land owner, religious contrast between the Parvoslav and the Catholic. The special power of the outbreak was based on the fact that the Ukrainian was usually a Parvoslav peasant, and the Pole was mainly a Catholic noble. The Jews in Ukraine were economically connected to the Polish nobility. The Jews in Ukraine were financially connected to the Polish aristocracy, but this connection did not make them an independent factor in this struggle. However, the blow hit the Jews with all its force more than any other group or class in the State of Poland. The uprising began in the Dnieper. But before Khmelnytsky managed to organize the Cossacks for a military campaign, the uprising of the serf peasants broke out in all areas across the San River to the east. The farmers organized themselves into gangs, attacked estates and cities, murdered and robbed. Maksym Kryvonis'^[4] gangs of, who ran rampant mainly in the Wolyn territories and Podolia until the arrival of Khmelnytsky and his army, excelled in their cruelty.

The surge of events reached Wolyn at breakneck speed, after the Polish army was defeated on May 26, 1648 near Kherson and, with the withdrawal of the Polish army to the west and all of Eastern Wolyn was given to the gangs to which Khmelnytsky's Cossacks later joined. These bloody years also left their traces in Lutsk, although no direct certificates of the tragic events remained in Lutsk, and the reason is probably because the pinkasim [ledgers] from that period have been lost.

However, there is no doubt that Lutsk Jews felt the murderous hand of the oppressor's gangs. It is known to us that he, and his gangs, visited Lutsk and its neighboring cities. The holocaust against the Jews of the country came in a terrible and terrifying manner, and this is no place here to repeat the details of these terrible acts of cruelty, which the generation's writers recorded for eternal memory.

Two books contain articles on “those days.” The book, Yeven Mezulah [Abyss of Despair] by Rabbi Nathan Nata Hannover, was written in an impulsive and emotional style that depresses the soul to the core, and the reader seems to be inside the terrifying sights: the persecuted Jews who are in mortal danger when they are attacked by the enemies who seek their blood, women and children seeking escape and refuge, the cruel death is getting closer and closer and there is no savior, a terrible slaughter and blood spills like water, the last sigh from the heart of the slain and their lips whisper! “We will avenge the spilled blood of your servants” [Psalms 79:10].

The book, Tit Hayavan [“Place of Suffering”] (Venice 5410 - 1650), written by the Viennese Jew, R' Shmuel Faibisch son of R' Nathan Feidel, has historical value even though it is not properly established and it should not be placed on an equal step with the first book. In any case, the material in it is not fictitious or imaginative. This book is also based on various sources and hearsay. The cities mentioned are real because they existed then. In both books the tragedy of Lutsk is described in a few words, and the words make a strong impression on us, being a first-hand account of the riots.

It is not known why the historians and witnesses of “those days” were content to include the name of the city of Lutz among the names of all the Jewish settlements in Wolyn and neighboring countries, who suffered then, without giving more details about the actual extermination of the Jewish population. While they describe in detail what had happened in the cities of Kremenets, Ostroh, Dubno and other places, they skipped the details of the killings in Lutsk and contented themselves with stating the fact of the extermination of the Jews in Lutsk. And also this detail - that the hidden in it is greater than the visible. The fact itself comes in different versions, and the equal side of them, that they all come in the purpose of brevity. Here, Rabbi Natan Neta Hannover^[5] summarizes in his book the murders in Wolyn in a short sentence: “Also in the country of Wolyn, in the Holy Community of Ludmir [Volodymyr Volynskyy], and in the Holy Community of Lubomla [Lyuboml], and in the Holy Community of Lutsk, and in the Holy Community of Kremenets and their branches, they made large

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killings of several thousand Jews,” without specifying how many Jews were killed in each location. While the Viennese, R' Shmuel Faibisch, describes the killings in a different way by dedicating a special sentence to each place. From him we find a few more details about Lutsk when he said: “And from there he went to the Holy Community of Lutsk where there were two hundred homeowners and great rich men, and there was a President of the Court and his name the honorable Master and Teacher Rabbi Man (Menachem), and almost all of them were killed.” It is not known whether some of Lutsk Jews managed to escape from the city and only those who remained were killed, or the Jews, who “were very rich,” protected their property and preferred to remain in the city, or stayed for another reason. However, there is no doubt that the description of the members of the generation requires an objective approach. The eyewitness of the destruction of the communities, and the mass murder of their people, do not need a special investigation into the details of the events and the number of the slaughtered. They want to give a vigorous expression of the size of the crisis as a whole in their articles. The sights of the horror, and the rumors of the horrors, join in their imagination to one catastrophic picture.

The Lutsk community that was destroyed was only one community out of hundreds. It is impossible to accurately determine the number of communities that were destroyed, and the number of murdered in those terrible years. HaGaon Rabbi Shabbatai HaKohen^[6] (the Shakh), wrote that more than three hundreds of important communities were destroyed and more than one hundred thousand people were killed. According to another article, seven hundred and forty-four communities were destroyed and approximately six hundred and fifty thousand people were killed in severe torture. The destruction was total. The Jewish community in Polish states, which excelled in the study of the Torah and important political order, was severely hit by these events and did not recover quickly.

In the stories of the events of the Decrees of 5408-5409, we find many revelations of courage of those who were tortured in a horrific way, stood the test and did not abandon their religion and faith. The martyrs, who converted out of fear, were few in number and after the days of forced conversion returned to their Judaism with the king's consent. Women and virgins, as well as boys and girls, sanctified the name of God and stretched out their necks for the slaughter, or they preceded their cruel enemies and killed themselves so as not to be handed over to their pursuers. Besides the historical records that provided us with the memory of the events, there are also some legends about soft and gentle virgins who gave their lives for the sanctification of God's name and the protection of their honor. From lamentations, Selichot^[7] and variations of El Male Rachamim^[8] or Yizkor^[9] we hear the sighs of the tortured and persecuted, and share ourselves in the grief of a painful nation.

According to the assumption of the historian Balinski-Lipinski, the Haidamakas gangs entered Lutsk on 22 August. The Karaites were also murdered by the gangs.

Slowly, slowly the Jews of Lutsk recovered from their disaster, rebuilt the ruins, and began to redevelop the trade. The authorities treated the Jews kindly and reduced their tax payment to a third of the general tax.

Translator's footnotes:

1. Bohdan Zynovii Mykhailovych Khmelnytsky was a Ruthenian nobleman and military commander of Ukrainian Cossacks. Return
2. Yeven Mezulah (lit. “Abyss of Despair”) is a 17^th century book by Nathan ben Moses Hannover. It describes the course of the Khmelnytsky Uprising in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth from a Jewish perspective. Return
3. The Haidamakas, were Ukrainian paramilitary outfits composed of commoners (peasants, craftsmen), and impoverished noblemen in the eastern part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Return
4. Maksym Kryvonis (a.k.a. “Crooked-nose”) was one of the Cossack leaders of Khmelnytsky uprising. Return
5. Rabbi Nathan Nata Hannover was a Ruthenian Jewish historian, Talmudist, and kabbalist. Return
6. Rabbi Shabbatai HaKohen (1621–1662) was known as the Shakh, which is an abbreviation of his most important work, Siftei Kohen (lit.“Lips of the Priest”). Return
7. Selichot (lit.“Forgiveness”) are penitential prayers recited before and during the High Holidays and other fast days throughout the year. Return
8. El Male Rachamim (lit. “God full of compassion”) is a prayer for the departed that is recited at funeral services and at visiting the graves of relatives. Return
9. Yizkor (lit.“May God remember”) is a prayer service in memory of the dead. Return

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