All of my adult life, I have been active in the struggle for civil rights and social justice. The sources for this passion were my personal experiences as a child and youth, my upbringing at home, the profound influence of my congregational rabbi, the impact of study of the prophets at rabbinical school, and the impact of the Holocaust on my life.
My Canadian-born parents had attended college but did not complete their studies. My family, during my childhood, went through a number of periods of economic hardship. In the early ’40s after not being able to pay the rent for a number of months, we were evicted from the house we rented. During World War II it was impossible to find housing. We were forced to move to an agricultural rural community outside of Montreal where we were the only Jewish family in the community and I was the only Jewish child in an enormous school. About a year later, we moved back to Montreal. My mother and I lived with my grandmother and two unmarried aunts. I slept in a bedroom with one of my aunts. My brother Marvin, six years older than me, lived in an apartment with relatives, and my father lived in a hotel.
This was the most unhappy time of my childhood. We knew what poverty was about. Everyone tried their best to be warm with us, but each of us knew that we were an imposition and an interference in the privacy of others. Today, I know we were lucky. There were many in similar circumstances without family willing to sacrifice and take them in.
As a child, that had never occurred to me. All that I understood was that the family was so poor that we could not be together. During this period, I think that my brother suffered the most. At least my mother and I lived in the same house. Then our economic situation improved. Around 1944, my brother saved the day. He knew of a British war refugee family that was returning to Great Britain; we got their apartment and were reunited as a normal family.
We never lived in a “Jewish neighbourhood.” At home, I never heard a racist remark or disparagement of another person’s religion. Black students studying with me in high school often came to my house to prepare homework. For me, this was part of the normality of my life.
The environment at home was very different from that of the schools I attended and the broader communities in which we dwelt. Frequently, I fell victim to anti-Semitism. I felt the pain in my bones and my psyche. Often I was called “dirty Jew” and heard other disparaging remarks from schoolmates and neighbours (some of them friends), teachers (both in public school and in high school), shopkeepers or just people on the streets. It was not uncommon for me to be called “Christ killer,” “cheating Jew,” “money-grabbing Jew,” “kike” and to hear, “too bad Hitler didn’t kill all the Jews.” Anti-Semitic jokes were common amongst teachers and friends.
As I was a young child residing on streets without other Jewish families, my neighbouring friends were all non-Jewish. Most of these friends were not anti-Semitic, but sometimes I heard painful remarks. My best friend’s mother, a wonderful human being, once called me aside and told me, “You must go home before my husband returns from work. He does not permit Jews in our home. You can play with Dick [her son] in our house and as much as you want while my husband is at work, but it will be very bad for Dick and for me if my husband finds you here or knows that you have been here.” Now, 60 years later, I can still visualize the scene and feel the pain – mine, her’s and Dick’s.
Another type of pain was in my battered bones and bloody bruises from having been physically attacked and beaten on my way to school and on the way home from school. Normally, these beatings by schoolmates were accompanied by a litany of encouragement from the anti-Semitic chorus of the audience of onlookers.
I particularly remember a trauma shared with my father. My father, a salesman, invited me to join him on a four- or five-day sales trip covering well over 1,000 miles. Usually, we stayed at hotels at night. One day, we walked into a very large and famous store with his samples and catalogues. After about an hour, he came out beaming with a very substantial order. The store owner shook my father’s hand, said goodbye and how wonderful it was to see his old friend again. My father was absolutely elated with his warm reception at this store and his significant sale.
A few hours later, as evening approached, my father, looking for a hotel and finding no rooms available, said, “My friend, the owner of that store, has a magnificent lodge. Let’s go and sleep there.”
As we were driving through the sumptuous grounds towards the lodge, I saw a small sign on the grass: “No Jews or dogs allowed.” Either my father didn’t notice the sign, or he chose not to mention it to me. We entered the hotel and this same friend ran to my father before he could approach the desk, put his arm around my father’s shoulder and said to him, “I am sorry Harry, but I am sure you understand,” and off we went to continue to look for a hotel.
My father was clearly hurt, though he did not say a word, but I have never forgotten that moment.
Rabbi Allan Levine was born in Montreal. He currently lives in Israel.
