pdf available - Multiple Choices

history was connected with the region of Chelm."
In Nathan Hanover's Yaven Metzula , it is
clearly stated that "in the land of Volhynia, in the
community of Ludmir, Lubemla (Luboml), Lutsk,
Kremenitz, and surrounding communities, the
[Cossacks] mass-murdered thousands of Jews."'
And m i it nu avan [by Faibisz, son of Rabbi
Fait1), Luboml is specifically mentioned and the
number of dead in the town is stated: ". . . and
from there he went to Lubemila (Luboml), and
there, out of 600 homeowners, almost all were
murdered."'
Shmuel Faibisz was the son of a contemporary
of the fatal events in 1648 and 1649; yet it can
be accepted that his accounting of 600 dead is
based on assumption rather than actual statistics.
However, the figure can provide us with an approximate
number of Jews in Luboml in this
period. Here another difficulty presents itself: the
author uses in his "statistics" an abbreviation
that has to be deciphered.
The usual and accepted translation of B"B is
ba'ale batim homeowners. We noted that the
historians who touch upon this specific portion
of Jewish history interpret the aforementioned
abbreviation in the same way. However, we are
having difficulties accepting this as fact.
If we accept the preceding presentation, then
we have an exaggerated number of Jews living in
Luboml in that period. The word "homeowner"
refers to a head of a family, and considering that a
Jewish family in that period consisted, on average,
of four-five members, including families without
children, the Jewish community of Luboml during
the period of 1648-49 would have had about
2,400-3,000 Jews in totala highly exaggerated
figure.
Our translation of the above-mentioned abbreviation
B"B is not "homeowners" but benei
berit "Son s-of-the-covenant," or souls, and this
is more likely the real number of Jewish inhabitants
of Luboml in those years.
The names of those killed in 1648 and 1649 in
Lubomland of those killed in the next few
dozen yearsare not known. There is one exception,
but he was killed in Tolchin, not Luboml.
His name was Moyshe Ber Shmuel, and he was
the sexton [shamosl in Luboml. He was called Ber
Mirwar.
THE EARLY DAYS 11
The two witnesses were also from Luboml:
Yehuda Leyb an d Temerl, daughter of Aron. This
was reported in the book Avodat HaGershoni by
R. Gershon Ashkenazi (Frankfurt am Main, 1699).
From various descriptions of the fatal years of
1648 and 1649, reported by second-generation
survivors, we learn indirectly about the position
occupied by Luboml's Jewish community in the
broad spectrum of the surrounding Jewish life.
In the previous citation from Yaven Metzula ,
Luboml is mentioned together with the large
communities of Ludmir, Lutsk, and Kremenitz,
and is encompassed in "the surrounding communities."
From this, as well as from other materials, we
can deduce that before the Chmielnicki massacre,
at the end of the first half of the 17th century,
Luboml had an important Jewish community,
and occupied a visible position in the inner
Jewish life of the surrounding region.
Such total destruction as the Chmielnicki
murderers executed in Luboml must have contributed
to the complete cessation of development
of the Jewish community. There remained
no Jewish settlement to speak ofand who would
begin to rebuild a Jewish life?
If, by a miracle, some Jewish families did
remain in Luboml, they were not capable of
executing the task.
Maybe the Jews from the surrounding area?
But they too were victims of the Chmielnicki
murderers. However, Jewish history proceeds
without logic.
Immediately following the Chmielnicki pogroms,
Jews began to rebuild the settlement. Jews
came from the vast, surrounding forests where
they had been hiding from the massacres. It is
possible that many refugees whoas is usual in
such terrible timesran where their eyes took
them, remained in their newfound homes after
the pogroms ceased.
One thing is sure: the old Jewish inhabitants
of Luboml were annihilated and the new Jewish
settlement began with completely new elements.
It is obvious the Jewish community in the
town did not form in one or two years, but the rate