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The main article calls the payments to the Germans "bribes". "Ransom" is a more appropriate term since the payments were based on negotiated agreements originated by Rabbi Weissmandl, and the Nazi who received them (Wisliceny) apparently got approval from high Nazi officials in Germany. The Germans were apparently willing to stop the transports from Slovakia for $50,000 (now maybe worth $500,000). After much difficulty, Rabbi Weissmandl obtained the funds as a loan and the transports stopped.
The "Europa Plan" was even more ambitious and important, but the down payment to pay ransom to the Germans could not be obtained.
Rabbi Weissmandl was one of the authors of the "Auschwitz Report" - based on Spring 1944 debriefing of two Auschwitz escapees: Wetzler and Rosenberg (later called Vrba). The Report was widely circulated by the Working Group. A Jew of Romanian-Hungarian origin, George Mantello (Mandel Gyuri), in Switzerland publicized it immediately after he received a copy via Budapest in mid-1944 - after start of the Hungarian transports to Auschwitz. This led to an unprecedented Swiss press campaign, street protests and intense, concerned and indignant masses in Swiss churches demanding an immediate stop the Holocaust.
Regretfully major Jewish rescuers like Rabbi Weissmandl, George Mantello, Gizi Fleischmann, Hillel Kook (alias Peter Bergson), Recha Sternbuch and Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld - and major events such as the Swiss grass roots protests were never duly recognized in spite of significant historical evidence, research and numerous history books.
There is much controversy and argument related to the rescue and more unbiased historical research is required urgently.
Professor Bauer, for example, who is quoted in the article, in a recent discussion with this comment's author completely denied the rescue efforts of a major Jewish rescuer: Hillel Kook (also known as Peter Bergson during the war). His statement was: "Hillel Kook didn't save anyone!"). This is very disconcerting coming from someone whom many consider THE authority on the Holocaust and from someone who in Israel trained many of today's Holocaust researchers. In contrast, some historians (e.g. in "A Race Against Death" - reference below) credit Hillel Kook and his rescue group with being the key contributors to saving over 200,000 people - due to incessant,inspired and successful activism in the USA which led to establishment of the War Refugee Board which sponsored the Wallenberg mission to Budapest.
In one of his books Prof. Bauer expresses astonishment about an ultra-orthodox man like Rabbi Weissmandl pleading to bomb the rails leading to Auschwitz. It was inconceivable to Prof. Bauer that a very religious Jew like Prof. Weissmandl could even think of a pragmatic and activist plan - at a time when much of the free world was at best apathetic. Books by historians Dr. David Kranzler and Dr. Abraham Fuchs, and testimonies of those who knew Rabbi Weissmandl during the Holocaust present a very different view of Rabbi Weissmandl's achievements than Prof. Bauer.
Dr. Abraham Fuchs, The Unheeded Cry (also in Hebrew as "Karati ve ein oneh")
Ben Hecht, Perfidy (also in Hebrew - as Kachas)
Prof. David Kranzler, Thy Brother's Blood
Prof. David Kranzler, The Man who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador's and Switzerland's finest hour
Prof. David Kranzler, Holocaust Hero: Solomon Shoenfeld - The Untold Story of an Extraordinary British Rabbi who Rescued 4000 during the Holocaust
Jenö Lévai, Zsidósors Európában (published in 1948 in Hungarian, about George Mantello and the major Swiss grass roots protests against the Holocaust)
Rabbi Michael Ber Weissmandl, Min HaMetzar (From the Straights), in Hebrew
David Wyman and Rafael Medoff, A Race Against Death - Peter Bergson, America and the Holocaust
VERAfilm, "Among Blind Fools" (documentary video)
[2] (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillel_Kook), Hillel Kook on Wikipeda
[3] (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaim_Yisroel_Eiss), Chaim Yisroel Eiss on Wikipedia
It is true that Rabbi Weissmandl's actions both spawned controversy (e.g. the refusal of Saly Mayer of the JDC to work with him) and were misinterpreted by others (e.g. Professor Bauer's comment expressing surprise that an Orthodox Jew would suggest bombing Auschwitz railroad lines). But that's no reason to question the neutrality of this article. Instead, let's write up the different takes on Rabbi Weissmandl's activities within the article itself. Don't forget the letter sent to him by Nathan Schwalb, who wrote that the Jews had to pay for the right to settle the Land of Israel with blood, implying that the religious Jews of Europe should die while Zionists should be rescued and sent to Israel. Weissmandl quotes this letter from memory in his book. Since the letter is not extant, it's his word against the Zionist fellow's. But as others testify [4], Weissmandl did have a tremendous memory... Yoninah 14:19, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Zero0000, I've removed the following text from the page:
Weissmandl's own summary of the charges is his
Ten Questions to the Zionists. Bauer refutes many of these claims.
because jewsagainstzionism is an
unreliable source, and so it cannot be used on Wikipedia. I have no trouble with the content itself, if you can find reliable sources for it.
Jayjg
(talk) 22:49, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
We have a minor dispute over writing "Weissmandl's accusations against the Jewish organizations" (the original wording I used when I started the article) versus "Weissmandl's accusations against the Zionist organizations". I'll explain my choice of words. The particular organizations Weissmandl accused were the Jewish Agency, the World Zionist Congress, and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (the Joint). The first two are obvious Zionist, but the Joint was not Zionist (at least, not officially). So saying "Zionist organizations" is not quite right. I propose to write "Jewish organizations" in this place, but to expand the earlier paragraph where this is mentioned to name the three organizations. Any objections? -- Zero talk 12:44, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Zero0000 says that he removed "highly non-encyclopedic edits" because this "is not a eulogy!” Please tell me what's unencyclopedic about what was written. If you think that parts of it are unencyclopedic; I can understand that. So be so kind and leave what to you is considered enyclopedic. Are mediocre or lowly unencyclopedic edits acceptable? What consists a eulogy? Is what is said at a eulogy forbidden to Wikipedia?
Also reversions need to be identified as reversions; otherwise they are considered edits. Reversions disguised as edits or edits disguised as reversions is pure vandalism. Itzse 17:36, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
The not explaining it more; is not the problem. If you would have deleted a few words with an explanation that it's not encyclopedic; that would have been fine. The problem is that you didn't bother to make it encyclopedic or delete only those words that are unencyclopedic; you decided to delete it all because reverting is easier then editing. WP allows aggressive editing; but not aggressive deleting. You need to have some consideration for someone else's work.
If it's not NPOV; then make it NPOV. If it's uncited; then even if you challenge that information, doesn't give you a right to delete it, before you place a cite tag; unless you know for a fact that it's not true. The content of my edits, I think, you don't challenge, so why delete entire edits? It's wrong, and I would recommend that you reread the WP rules and see for yourself that no WP rules were violated.
WP:OR states that "unpublished facts" which you are the source, is a violation; but what I wrote, is common knowledge and I'm sure that it's published somewhere. Wikipedia encourages editing and adding facts to articles. There is no requirement to have the sources of your edits at your fingertips before editing; only to edit in good faith. If you made a mistake someone out there will catch it and correct it; but deleting wholesale entire edits is unacceptable.
My interest here is to supply information, as this article is dry. To simply write an article to read like a death certificate is meaningless. If he was brilliant then the article should describe him as such, unless there is a debate on that; and so on and on. Yes, "utmost devotion" and mesiras nefesh does describe this man and it needs to be in the article, and if it's written unencyclopedic then it needs to be made encyclopedic. Itzse 18:51, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Emesz, you're adding large amounts of material without attributing it to a reliable source. Please see our policy on sourcing, Wikipedia:Attribution, which says that anything challenged or likely to be challenged must have a reliable, published source or it may be removed, and the sources have to be in the form of inline citations to be of any use. That is, you must say after the sentence where you got it from, including page numbers if it's a book.
Also, please review our WP:3RR policy, which says you may not revert more than three times in 24 hours; any undoing of another editor's work counts as a revert. If you violate 3RR, you may be reported and blocked from editing. Many thanks, SlimVirgin (talk) 02:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Moved from Main page Itzse 18:28, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
The incorrect spellings Weissmandel and Weismandel, if left here, can help people find this. The word Nitra can also help. Rav Weissmandl's work on Gimatria is mentioned in www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter3-23b.html
What does history mean in this case? History of what? It should be made clearer, for me and for people reading the article. Thanks, Yodaat 15:57, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
I did some reorganizing and made a guess (only!) about the 2 redundant paragraphs that I combined on the new community.
For a feature article, I'd suggest (1) more clarity and sourcing for the key Holocaust narrative, (2) photos or other images to make it look more interesting?, (3) some authoritative comments about, maybe selected quotes from his books. His family and legacy? HG 21:39, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
It is almost like somebody from Machon Meir wrote this. There is *no* mentioning of his Ten Questions to the Zionists, and *no* mentioning of his strong opposition to the Zionist state. This must be fixed. -- Rabbeinu 12:55, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Weissmandl's bribes delayed the deportation of Slovakian Jewry for 2 years; they did not stop it completely. In the end, both he and everyone else were deported. Therefore I reverted the misleading lead language, "who became known for helping to save the Jews of Slovakia" back to "who became known for his efforts to save the Jews of Slovakia."
Re: the quotes from Yehuda Bauer: Bauer looks like a chameleon figure here. First he says the bribes were ineffective, then he says they were effective. This paragraph needs to be re-written so it doesn't look like Bauer is contradicting himself.
I also downgraded the rating on this page from B to C. The whole treatment of Weissmandl's work during the war is sketchy and unbalanced. Yoninah ( talk) 09:41, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
The importance of Bauers writing in 1981 is, to show that Bauer himself felt that “some” facts do point in the direction that Weissmandel’s bribes helped. However the 1996 book seems like a contradiction. The problem is that in his 1996 book he doesn’t mention his own arguments which favor Rabbi Weissmandel’s claim. It is also worth noting that Bauer has a tendency of trying to defend the handling of established Jewish leaders in “every case”. (Kastner, Mayer, Weiss, Jewish agency dealing with brand, etc.) As Rudolf Vrba puts it, “Bauer is seeking to defend the Israeli and Zionist establishment no matter what it takes”. While in the same time trying to minimize in “every case” the success of anyone that didn’t fit that criteria(self activists like kook, Weissmandel, Vrba,). One would have to question if Bauer’s strong Zionist convictions are playing a role in his conclusions, and if Bauer can be considered a reliable source when it comes to the matter of Jewish rescue efforts during the holocaust. Berkshires
My comments are actually on the talk page.. however I am not sure why Rudolf vrba’s opinion should not be considered a source. < Berkshires ( talk) 01:40, 10 November 2009 (UTC)>
I have not written any conclusions; the fact of the matter is that Bauer writes from 2 different positions. Since Bauer doesn’t quote his position & arguments that he has written in an earlier book, it is difficult to conclude, a) if there was a change of mind and what new information he had that triggered it B) That Bauer himself is not sure, since there are some facts that point in either direction C) that it is just a contradiction.
As for Vrba as a source, I think it is very much relevant to this page, since there is disagreement by historians (fuchs, kranzler etc. and Bauer etc.) shedding light on which historian might be considered more reliable.< Berkshires ( talk) 01:53, 11 November 2009 (UTC)>
From all the discussion here and the research I have done, it seems that Bauer has actually “3” positions, in 1981 that the bribes where successful in causing the germens to halt the deportations, in 1996 it seems that his position is that bribing had little effect, and was just a coincident.., in 2002 (page 179-180) it seems that his position is the bribes where successful, but by changing the Slovakia’s position. I have made some corrections in the article to accurately reflects Bauer’s position.
It is difficult to conclude what Bauer’s position really is, since he doesn’t cite in each case the arguments he himself made. I would say that kranzler’s position has been much more consistent.< Berkshires ( talk) 00:57, 12 November 2009 (UTC)>
Zero0000 let me just quote what “you” have written on wikipidia on August 2003
”When the Nazis, aided by members of the puppet Slovak government, began its moves against the Slovakian Jews in 1942, a group of Jews calling themselves the Working Group began a campaign of opposition. Their main activity was to pay large bribes to German and “Slovak” officials. The transportation of Jews was in fact halted for a long time after they began to bribe the Nazi official Dieter Wisleceny. However, some historians, notably Yehuda Bauer, are of the opinion that the transportation was delayed for other reasons and that the “bribes” had little actual effect. The Working Group was also responsible for the ambitious but ill-fated Europa Plan which would have seen large numbers of European Jews “bought” from their Nazi captors.”
If Bauer’s position has always been that bribes (German or Slovakia) halted the deportation, then you would have to admit that your article was highly misleading.< Berkshires ( talk) 04:55, 12 November 2009 (UTC)>
Although Rabbi Weissmandl sounds like a remarkable man how could he publish a book in 1958 if he died in 1957? I don't know anything about Rabbi Weissmandl and don't know where to find the correct dates of these events. 74.241.10.9 ( talk) 08:51, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
@ Bloger: The problem with making Working Group a non-piped link is you are linking to a disambiguation page, not an actual article. It needs to be either unlinked entirely, or made into a red link: something that would make its title unique, like Working Group (resistance movement). (You can probably choose a better one--I don't know enough about the subject.) - Gorthian ( talk) 21:36, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
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To editor Chesdovi: What did he invent? I have the book of Fuchs which your source is a very brief review of, but as far as I can see the only inventions it mentions are the stories he made up to fool the Nazis. That doesn't make him an inventor, and without a proper source for this it has to go. I also object to "discovered codes in the Biblical text" which seems to say in Wikipedia's voice that these "codes" are a genuine phenomenon. I'm sure you know that this is a fringe claim. It should be mentioned that he revived the idea of skipping letters which had previously had only a tiny following, but only things that actually exist can be "discovered". Zero talk 09:42, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
Once, in the 1950's, I visited him at his Mt. Kisco NY community in the month of Adar, a short time before Purim. He asked me, "Did I ever tell you how many letters there are in the Book of Esther?" "No," I replied; "I have no idea." "Well, I know," he continued. "There are 12,196 letters in it altogether." "That's incredible," I responded. "But what do we do with this information?" "...Is there significance to this number?" He smiled. "Bring me a Chumash" he said. I brought one to him, whereupon he told me: "Starting from the first instance of the letter alef, if you count an interval equal to the number of letters in Megilat Esther—12,196 — you arrive at a letter Samekh. If you continue another 12,196 letters you get to a letter tof; and if you keep going for another 12,196 you land on a letter Resh. And, of course, alef-samech-tof-reish spells Esther! Is this not amazing?" "It certainly is," I answered enthusiastically. And then I added with a grin, "but is there a connection to Mordechai too?" He looked crestfallen. "I don't know. Yet. Try me again next year." The next Adar I made sure to visit Rabbi Weissmandl again. "What about Mordechai?" I asked. "I also found a hint to Mordechai," he announced. "Our Sages pointed out that there is a hint to Mordechai in the Torah, where the verse states, 'You shall take the finest fragrances: 'mor dror…' [myrrh]." ['Mor dror' has the same first two syllables as 'Mordechai,' and its Aramaic translation by Onkeles, 'mira dichya,' has the same consonants in the same order as 'Mordechai.' The verse is Exodus 30:23, which is in the Torah portion that in most years is read in the week in which Purim occurs! He continued: "Now, if from the letter mem in mor dror in that verse you count forward the number of letters in the Megilah, you come to a reish. And if you keep counting successively 12,196 letters you will get a Dalet and then a Kaph and then a Yodh – spelling out Mordechai! This is truly even more amazing." [1]
--- Best, Chesdovi ( talk) 15:05, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
@ Chesdovi: Thanks for pointing out the sentence I missed in Fuchs. It doesn't justify calling him an inventor; more a failed inventor, but the issue is not notable enough to mention. Regarding the codes, you can see on the same page that they couldn't confirm Weissmandl's claim. This is not surprising since (1) No two editions of the Tanach are exactly the same, (2) Counting letters by hand as Weissmandl did is very difficult and he often got the wrong answer even for small counts. As for "genuine", this is a word with two meanings. Of course there are many words that appear in the Tanach with equal skips, so in that sense they really exist. Much more important is whether these "encoded" words are present deliberately, rather than as the prosaic outcome of probability theory. To establish the former, one has to show that randomness is not a sufficient explanation. It is a fact that even a sequence of random letters as long as the Tanach has about 60% chance of having both "Mordechai" and "Esther" with a skip of 12,196. Even much shorter passages have stuff encoded. Your quotation "Once...amazing" has more than 2700 English words encoded in it, including more than 100 with 6 or more letters. There are even lots of biblical names such as Aaron, Adam, Aharon, Amos, Enoch, Isaac, Moshe, Noah, Ruth, Sarah, Seth, Shem and Uriah. Regards. Zero talk 05:28, 7 September 2021 (UTC)
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![]() | Text and/or other creative content from this version of Chaim Michael Dov Weissmandl was copied or moved into Bratislava Working Group with this edit. The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists. |
The main article calls the payments to the Germans "bribes". "Ransom" is a more appropriate term since the payments were based on negotiated agreements originated by Rabbi Weissmandl, and the Nazi who received them (Wisliceny) apparently got approval from high Nazi officials in Germany. The Germans were apparently willing to stop the transports from Slovakia for $50,000 (now maybe worth $500,000). After much difficulty, Rabbi Weissmandl obtained the funds as a loan and the transports stopped.
The "Europa Plan" was even more ambitious and important, but the down payment to pay ransom to the Germans could not be obtained.
Rabbi Weissmandl was one of the authors of the "Auschwitz Report" - based on Spring 1944 debriefing of two Auschwitz escapees: Wetzler and Rosenberg (later called Vrba). The Report was widely circulated by the Working Group. A Jew of Romanian-Hungarian origin, George Mantello (Mandel Gyuri), in Switzerland publicized it immediately after he received a copy via Budapest in mid-1944 - after start of the Hungarian transports to Auschwitz. This led to an unprecedented Swiss press campaign, street protests and intense, concerned and indignant masses in Swiss churches demanding an immediate stop the Holocaust.
Regretfully major Jewish rescuers like Rabbi Weissmandl, George Mantello, Gizi Fleischmann, Hillel Kook (alias Peter Bergson), Recha Sternbuch and Rabbi Solomon Schonfeld - and major events such as the Swiss grass roots protests were never duly recognized in spite of significant historical evidence, research and numerous history books.
There is much controversy and argument related to the rescue and more unbiased historical research is required urgently.
Professor Bauer, for example, who is quoted in the article, in a recent discussion with this comment's author completely denied the rescue efforts of a major Jewish rescuer: Hillel Kook (also known as Peter Bergson during the war). His statement was: "Hillel Kook didn't save anyone!"). This is very disconcerting coming from someone whom many consider THE authority on the Holocaust and from someone who in Israel trained many of today's Holocaust researchers. In contrast, some historians (e.g. in "A Race Against Death" - reference below) credit Hillel Kook and his rescue group with being the key contributors to saving over 200,000 people - due to incessant,inspired and successful activism in the USA which led to establishment of the War Refugee Board which sponsored the Wallenberg mission to Budapest.
In one of his books Prof. Bauer expresses astonishment about an ultra-orthodox man like Rabbi Weissmandl pleading to bomb the rails leading to Auschwitz. It was inconceivable to Prof. Bauer that a very religious Jew like Prof. Weissmandl could even think of a pragmatic and activist plan - at a time when much of the free world was at best apathetic. Books by historians Dr. David Kranzler and Dr. Abraham Fuchs, and testimonies of those who knew Rabbi Weissmandl during the Holocaust present a very different view of Rabbi Weissmandl's achievements than Prof. Bauer.
Dr. Abraham Fuchs, The Unheeded Cry (also in Hebrew as "Karati ve ein oneh")
Ben Hecht, Perfidy (also in Hebrew - as Kachas)
Prof. David Kranzler, Thy Brother's Blood
Prof. David Kranzler, The Man who Stopped the Trains to Auschwitz: George Mantello, El Salvador's and Switzerland's finest hour
Prof. David Kranzler, Holocaust Hero: Solomon Shoenfeld - The Untold Story of an Extraordinary British Rabbi who Rescued 4000 during the Holocaust
Jenö Lévai, Zsidósors Európában (published in 1948 in Hungarian, about George Mantello and the major Swiss grass roots protests against the Holocaust)
Rabbi Michael Ber Weissmandl, Min HaMetzar (From the Straights), in Hebrew
David Wyman and Rafael Medoff, A Race Against Death - Peter Bergson, America and the Holocaust
VERAfilm, "Among Blind Fools" (documentary video)
[2] (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillel_Kook), Hillel Kook on Wikipeda
[3] (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaim_Yisroel_Eiss), Chaim Yisroel Eiss on Wikipedia
It is true that Rabbi Weissmandl's actions both spawned controversy (e.g. the refusal of Saly Mayer of the JDC to work with him) and were misinterpreted by others (e.g. Professor Bauer's comment expressing surprise that an Orthodox Jew would suggest bombing Auschwitz railroad lines). But that's no reason to question the neutrality of this article. Instead, let's write up the different takes on Rabbi Weissmandl's activities within the article itself. Don't forget the letter sent to him by Nathan Schwalb, who wrote that the Jews had to pay for the right to settle the Land of Israel with blood, implying that the religious Jews of Europe should die while Zionists should be rescued and sent to Israel. Weissmandl quotes this letter from memory in his book. Since the letter is not extant, it's his word against the Zionist fellow's. But as others testify [4], Weissmandl did have a tremendous memory... Yoninah 14:19, 31 May 2006 (UTC)
Zero0000, I've removed the following text from the page:
Weissmandl's own summary of the charges is his
Ten Questions to the Zionists. Bauer refutes many of these claims.
because jewsagainstzionism is an
unreliable source, and so it cannot be used on Wikipedia. I have no trouble with the content itself, if you can find reliable sources for it.
Jayjg
(talk) 22:49, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
We have a minor dispute over writing "Weissmandl's accusations against the Jewish organizations" (the original wording I used when I started the article) versus "Weissmandl's accusations against the Zionist organizations". I'll explain my choice of words. The particular organizations Weissmandl accused were the Jewish Agency, the World Zionist Congress, and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (the Joint). The first two are obvious Zionist, but the Joint was not Zionist (at least, not officially). So saying "Zionist organizations" is not quite right. I propose to write "Jewish organizations" in this place, but to expand the earlier paragraph where this is mentioned to name the three organizations. Any objections? -- Zero talk 12:44, 22 November 2006 (UTC)
Zero0000 says that he removed "highly non-encyclopedic edits" because this "is not a eulogy!” Please tell me what's unencyclopedic about what was written. If you think that parts of it are unencyclopedic; I can understand that. So be so kind and leave what to you is considered enyclopedic. Are mediocre or lowly unencyclopedic edits acceptable? What consists a eulogy? Is what is said at a eulogy forbidden to Wikipedia?
Also reversions need to be identified as reversions; otherwise they are considered edits. Reversions disguised as edits or edits disguised as reversions is pure vandalism. Itzse 17:36, 25 January 2007 (UTC)
The not explaining it more; is not the problem. If you would have deleted a few words with an explanation that it's not encyclopedic; that would have been fine. The problem is that you didn't bother to make it encyclopedic or delete only those words that are unencyclopedic; you decided to delete it all because reverting is easier then editing. WP allows aggressive editing; but not aggressive deleting. You need to have some consideration for someone else's work.
If it's not NPOV; then make it NPOV. If it's uncited; then even if you challenge that information, doesn't give you a right to delete it, before you place a cite tag; unless you know for a fact that it's not true. The content of my edits, I think, you don't challenge, so why delete entire edits? It's wrong, and I would recommend that you reread the WP rules and see for yourself that no WP rules were violated.
WP:OR states that "unpublished facts" which you are the source, is a violation; but what I wrote, is common knowledge and I'm sure that it's published somewhere. Wikipedia encourages editing and adding facts to articles. There is no requirement to have the sources of your edits at your fingertips before editing; only to edit in good faith. If you made a mistake someone out there will catch it and correct it; but deleting wholesale entire edits is unacceptable.
My interest here is to supply information, as this article is dry. To simply write an article to read like a death certificate is meaningless. If he was brilliant then the article should describe him as such, unless there is a debate on that; and so on and on. Yes, "utmost devotion" and mesiras nefesh does describe this man and it needs to be in the article, and if it's written unencyclopedic then it needs to be made encyclopedic. Itzse 18:51, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
Emesz, you're adding large amounts of material without attributing it to a reliable source. Please see our policy on sourcing, Wikipedia:Attribution, which says that anything challenged or likely to be challenged must have a reliable, published source or it may be removed, and the sources have to be in the form of inline citations to be of any use. That is, you must say after the sentence where you got it from, including page numbers if it's a book.
Also, please review our WP:3RR policy, which says you may not revert more than three times in 24 hours; any undoing of another editor's work counts as a revert. If you violate 3RR, you may be reported and blocked from editing. Many thanks, SlimVirgin (talk) 02:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
Moved from Main page Itzse 18:28, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
The incorrect spellings Weissmandel and Weismandel, if left here, can help people find this. The word Nitra can also help. Rav Weissmandl's work on Gimatria is mentioned in www.torah.org/learning/pirkei-avos/chapter3-23b.html
What does history mean in this case? History of what? It should be made clearer, for me and for people reading the article. Thanks, Yodaat 15:57, 29 March 2007 (UTC)
I did some reorganizing and made a guess (only!) about the 2 redundant paragraphs that I combined on the new community.
For a feature article, I'd suggest (1) more clarity and sourcing for the key Holocaust narrative, (2) photos or other images to make it look more interesting?, (3) some authoritative comments about, maybe selected quotes from his books. His family and legacy? HG 21:39, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
It is almost like somebody from Machon Meir wrote this. There is *no* mentioning of his Ten Questions to the Zionists, and *no* mentioning of his strong opposition to the Zionist state. This must be fixed. -- Rabbeinu 12:55, 20 May 2007 (UTC)
Weissmandl's bribes delayed the deportation of Slovakian Jewry for 2 years; they did not stop it completely. In the end, both he and everyone else were deported. Therefore I reverted the misleading lead language, "who became known for helping to save the Jews of Slovakia" back to "who became known for his efforts to save the Jews of Slovakia."
Re: the quotes from Yehuda Bauer: Bauer looks like a chameleon figure here. First he says the bribes were ineffective, then he says they were effective. This paragraph needs to be re-written so it doesn't look like Bauer is contradicting himself.
I also downgraded the rating on this page from B to C. The whole treatment of Weissmandl's work during the war is sketchy and unbalanced. Yoninah ( talk) 09:41, 9 November 2009 (UTC)
The importance of Bauers writing in 1981 is, to show that Bauer himself felt that “some” facts do point in the direction that Weissmandel’s bribes helped. However the 1996 book seems like a contradiction. The problem is that in his 1996 book he doesn’t mention his own arguments which favor Rabbi Weissmandel’s claim. It is also worth noting that Bauer has a tendency of trying to defend the handling of established Jewish leaders in “every case”. (Kastner, Mayer, Weiss, Jewish agency dealing with brand, etc.) As Rudolf Vrba puts it, “Bauer is seeking to defend the Israeli and Zionist establishment no matter what it takes”. While in the same time trying to minimize in “every case” the success of anyone that didn’t fit that criteria(self activists like kook, Weissmandel, Vrba,). One would have to question if Bauer’s strong Zionist convictions are playing a role in his conclusions, and if Bauer can be considered a reliable source when it comes to the matter of Jewish rescue efforts during the holocaust. Berkshires
My comments are actually on the talk page.. however I am not sure why Rudolf vrba’s opinion should not be considered a source. < Berkshires ( talk) 01:40, 10 November 2009 (UTC)>
I have not written any conclusions; the fact of the matter is that Bauer writes from 2 different positions. Since Bauer doesn’t quote his position & arguments that he has written in an earlier book, it is difficult to conclude, a) if there was a change of mind and what new information he had that triggered it B) That Bauer himself is not sure, since there are some facts that point in either direction C) that it is just a contradiction.
As for Vrba as a source, I think it is very much relevant to this page, since there is disagreement by historians (fuchs, kranzler etc. and Bauer etc.) shedding light on which historian might be considered more reliable.< Berkshires ( talk) 01:53, 11 November 2009 (UTC)>
From all the discussion here and the research I have done, it seems that Bauer has actually “3” positions, in 1981 that the bribes where successful in causing the germens to halt the deportations, in 1996 it seems that his position is that bribing had little effect, and was just a coincident.., in 2002 (page 179-180) it seems that his position is the bribes where successful, but by changing the Slovakia’s position. I have made some corrections in the article to accurately reflects Bauer’s position.
It is difficult to conclude what Bauer’s position really is, since he doesn’t cite in each case the arguments he himself made. I would say that kranzler’s position has been much more consistent.< Berkshires ( talk) 00:57, 12 November 2009 (UTC)>
Zero0000 let me just quote what “you” have written on wikipidia on August 2003
”When the Nazis, aided by members of the puppet Slovak government, began its moves against the Slovakian Jews in 1942, a group of Jews calling themselves the Working Group began a campaign of opposition. Their main activity was to pay large bribes to German and “Slovak” officials. The transportation of Jews was in fact halted for a long time after they began to bribe the Nazi official Dieter Wisleceny. However, some historians, notably Yehuda Bauer, are of the opinion that the transportation was delayed for other reasons and that the “bribes” had little actual effect. The Working Group was also responsible for the ambitious but ill-fated Europa Plan which would have seen large numbers of European Jews “bought” from their Nazi captors.”
If Bauer’s position has always been that bribes (German or Slovakia) halted the deportation, then you would have to admit that your article was highly misleading.< Berkshires ( talk) 04:55, 12 November 2009 (UTC)>
Although Rabbi Weissmandl sounds like a remarkable man how could he publish a book in 1958 if he died in 1957? I don't know anything about Rabbi Weissmandl and don't know where to find the correct dates of these events. 74.241.10.9 ( talk) 08:51, 26 May 2011 (UTC)
@ Bloger: The problem with making Working Group a non-piped link is you are linking to a disambiguation page, not an actual article. It needs to be either unlinked entirely, or made into a red link: something that would make its title unique, like Working Group (resistance movement). (You can probably choose a better one--I don't know enough about the subject.) - Gorthian ( talk) 21:36, 2 June 2014 (UTC)
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To editor Chesdovi: What did he invent? I have the book of Fuchs which your source is a very brief review of, but as far as I can see the only inventions it mentions are the stories he made up to fool the Nazis. That doesn't make him an inventor, and without a proper source for this it has to go. I also object to "discovered codes in the Biblical text" which seems to say in Wikipedia's voice that these "codes" are a genuine phenomenon. I'm sure you know that this is a fringe claim. It should be mentioned that he revived the idea of skipping letters which had previously had only a tiny following, but only things that actually exist can be "discovered". Zero talk 09:42, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
Once, in the 1950's, I visited him at his Mt. Kisco NY community in the month of Adar, a short time before Purim. He asked me, "Did I ever tell you how many letters there are in the Book of Esther?" "No," I replied; "I have no idea." "Well, I know," he continued. "There are 12,196 letters in it altogether." "That's incredible," I responded. "But what do we do with this information?" "...Is there significance to this number?" He smiled. "Bring me a Chumash" he said. I brought one to him, whereupon he told me: "Starting from the first instance of the letter alef, if you count an interval equal to the number of letters in Megilat Esther—12,196 — you arrive at a letter Samekh. If you continue another 12,196 letters you get to a letter tof; and if you keep going for another 12,196 you land on a letter Resh. And, of course, alef-samech-tof-reish spells Esther! Is this not amazing?" "It certainly is," I answered enthusiastically. And then I added with a grin, "but is there a connection to Mordechai too?" He looked crestfallen. "I don't know. Yet. Try me again next year." The next Adar I made sure to visit Rabbi Weissmandl again. "What about Mordechai?" I asked. "I also found a hint to Mordechai," he announced. "Our Sages pointed out that there is a hint to Mordechai in the Torah, where the verse states, 'You shall take the finest fragrances: 'mor dror…' [myrrh]." ['Mor dror' has the same first two syllables as 'Mordechai,' and its Aramaic translation by Onkeles, 'mira dichya,' has the same consonants in the same order as 'Mordechai.' The verse is Exodus 30:23, which is in the Torah portion that in most years is read in the week in which Purim occurs! He continued: "Now, if from the letter mem in mor dror in that verse you count forward the number of letters in the Megilah, you come to a reish. And if you keep counting successively 12,196 letters you will get a Dalet and then a Kaph and then a Yodh – spelling out Mordechai! This is truly even more amazing." [1]
--- Best, Chesdovi ( talk) 15:05, 6 September 2021 (UTC)
@ Chesdovi: Thanks for pointing out the sentence I missed in Fuchs. It doesn't justify calling him an inventor; more a failed inventor, but the issue is not notable enough to mention. Regarding the codes, you can see on the same page that they couldn't confirm Weissmandl's claim. This is not surprising since (1) No two editions of the Tanach are exactly the same, (2) Counting letters by hand as Weissmandl did is very difficult and he often got the wrong answer even for small counts. As for "genuine", this is a word with two meanings. Of course there are many words that appear in the Tanach with equal skips, so in that sense they really exist. Much more important is whether these "encoded" words are present deliberately, rather than as the prosaic outcome of probability theory. To establish the former, one has to show that randomness is not a sufficient explanation. It is a fact that even a sequence of random letters as long as the Tanach has about 60% chance of having both "Mordechai" and "Esther" with a skip of 12,196. Even much shorter passages have stuff encoded. Your quotation "Once...amazing" has more than 2700 English words encoded in it, including more than 100 with 6 or more letters. There are even lots of biblical names such as Aaron, Adam, Aharon, Amos, Enoch, Isaac, Moshe, Noah, Ruth, Sarah, Seth, Shem and Uriah. Regards. Zero talk 05:28, 7 September 2021 (UTC)