Charles Gardner reviews ‘Defying the Holocaust: Ten courageous Christians who supported Jews’ by Tim Dowley (2020)

Holocaust refugees airlifted to Lakeland tranquillity

New light is shed on the Holocaust heroine who paid the ultimate sacrifice.

The discovery of a handwritten will and more than 70 photographs has provided fresh insight into the life of a Christian martyr who perished at Auschwitz.

Just six months before the camp was liberated by the Red Army on 27 January 1945, the life of courageous Scot Jane Haining was snuffed out, aged 47, by Nazi butchers for the 'crime' of loving the Jewish girls under her care.

Priceless Discovery

The "priceless" finding in the attic of the Church of Scotland World Mission Council's archive in Edinburgh has once again brought Jane's story into sharp focus, four years after the publication of a new book on the subject.

From Matron to Martyr – One Woman's Ultimate Sacrifice for the Jews (2012, Tate Publishing) is authored by New Zealander Lynley Smith, a distant relative who travelled the world to research details for her magnificent portrayal of this brave woman from Dunscore, near Dumfries – the only Scot to be honoured with a 'Righteous among the Nations' award by the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem.

Commenting on the poignant discovery of her last will and testament, dated 2 July 1942 and bequeathing her typewriter, coat and other items to various people, council secretary Rev Ian Alexander said:

It is a wonderful document and tremendously exciting to have something that Jane Haining herself has written. It gives a sense she was fully aware of the risks she was taking...Scottish missionaries were advised to return home from Europe during the dark days of the Second World War, but Jane declined and wrote: 'If these children need me in days of sunshine, how much more do they need me in days of darkness?' ¹

Jane Haining's life was snuffed out, aged 47, by Nazi butchers for the 'crime' of loving the Jewish girls under her care.

Beyond the Call of Duty

Jane had been living and working in the Glasgow area before taking on the role of matron at a girls' home in Budapest, Hungary – the boarding establishment of a school run by the Scottish Mission to Jews.

So dedicated was she to what she believed was her life's calling that she refused to leave her post when given several opportunities to escape, and even being ordered home by her superiors who feared for her safety. But more important to her was the safety of the Jewish girls under her care, already suffering under relentless discrimination and persecution even before the Nazis marched into their country.

Many of their parents were forcibly split up by the authorities as they sent the breadwinning Jewish men away, ostensibly to work camps, leaving families destitute and distressed.

The children often took refuge in the arms of Jane, who loved to comfort them with hugs and prayers of assurance. When she was forced by new laws to sew yellow stars onto the uniforms of her girls, she sobbed uncontrollably. And when some of the poorer pupils had no footwear, she effectively cut off any remaining ties with her homeland by using the soft leather of her suitcase to make soles for the girls' shoes.

She could identify with those who had lost parents as her mother died in childbirth when she was only five (her baby sister Helen lasting just 18 months) and her father died soon after remarrying, leaving his grieving widow pregnant.

Jane refused to leave her post when given several opportunities to escape, and even when ordered home by her superiors who feared for her safety.

Death, Where is Your Sting?

Jane was eventually arrested by the Gestapo on a series of charges which basically amounted to the fact that she showed too much concern for the Jews. Leaving her girls distraught, she was moved around various local prisons before being corralled into a cattle truck, crushed in with some 90 other women in conditions worse than animals would suffer, with access to neither water nor toilets for the long and tortuous journey to Auschwitz in south-west Poland.

She died soon afterwards, allegedly of natural causes. But since she had a strong constitution and had held up well even when sharing her food with her fellow inmates in an earlier prison, she is more likely to have been either shot or gassed, like so many of the million-plus Jews estimated to have perished at this most infamous of all death camps.

A postcard written two days before her death indicated no ill health, but hinted at her impending 'promotion' to meet with her Lord in heaven.

Intriguingly, in a chapter titled A View from the Summit early on in the book, the author imagines the scene of Jane's arrival in paradise, which serves the useful purpose of taking the sting out of the horrors that ensue in the narrative. Indeed, the Bible speaks of how the promise of resurrection removes the sting of death!

Delighted by the new discovery, author Lynley Smith told me: "It shows that Jane was well aware of the danger she was in – something I have always said. Bearing in mind that her Bible was miraculously rediscovered in 2010, I think God is keeping her story alive as its message – her example of loving the Jews enough to die for them – is so urgent for today."

Jane is likely to have been either shot or gassed, like so many of the million-plus Jews who perished at Auschwitz.

Reaping with Songs of Joy

The book has been translated into Hungarian, a key Budapest thoroughfare has been named after her and the government there has also honoured Jane for her sacrifice. But in truth, anti-Semitism there is once more on the rise, inflamed by the policies of the right-wing Jobbik Party.

In fact, little appears to have changed since those dark days in 1944. Lynley has told me how, on a recent visit to Budapest to launch the Hungarian translation of her book, she witnessed a group of skinheads racing through the city, one of them giving a 'Heil Hitler' salute as he dashed past a policeman.

In 2010 Jane was awarded a Hero of the Holocaust medal by the UK Government. Yet she had sought no honour in this world except to do the will of God and love his Chosen People. Meanwhile the Church of Scotland Mission in Budapest, which was home to a sizeable Jewish population in the 1930s, marked its 175^th anniversary last weekend.

As I was meditating recently on Psalm 126 – that "those who sow in tears will reap with songs of joy" – I thought of Jane Haining, who wept uncontrollably as she was forced to sew yellow stars on the uniforms of the Jewish girls in her care. A harvest of life from the dead would surely follow, of which the re-birth of Israel was just the beginning.

As the Rabbi who wrote a foreword to Lynley's book said, "Jews need to know that true followers of Jesus are our friends."

References

1 Life of Scottish missionary who died in Auschwitz revealed. Jewish News, 15 September 2016.

As UK Christians remember the Holocaust this week (27 January marking the day in 1945 when Auschwitz was liberated), they have been reminded that it was spawned by godlessness and the rejection of faith.

Amalek Cruelty

Steven Jaffe,¹ a member of the UK's Jewish Board of Deputies, was addressing a largely Christian audience at a church in Sheffield, Yorkshire. He said the exodus from Egypt was immediately followed by the battle with Amalek, who had no reason to attack Israel. There was no territorial dispute or history of conflict, for example. And they attacked the sick and the elderly – those who were most vulnerable (Deut 25:17-18).

"The conflict with Amalek is not over", he said. Amalek denied God and his power in the same way the Nazis did, and the latter mirrored their lack of mercy. Jaffe recalled that Britain's former Chief Rabbi, Lord Sachs, was once asked where God was during the Holocaust, to which he is said to have replied: "Where was man?"

Growing Godlessness

My worry is that the growing influence of rank atheism in Britain and Europe will have a bearing on the future of anti-Semitism. The poisonous view that God does not exist naturally leads to godless behaviour and thought, even among those previously tutored in godly ways. The result is that even some who claim to have faith, and who perhaps stand in pulpits, start believing the lie that is proclaimed so often through almost every strand of media.

My worry is that the growing influence of rank atheism in Britain and Europe will have a bearing on the future of anti-Semitism.

It is indeed frustrating that, as fast as we spread word about the horrors of the Holocaust, vowing that it should never be repeated, the vile infestation of anti-Semitism creeps into every crack and crevice of our broken society, as the walls of our Judeo-Christian civilisation come crashing down around us.

Loathing of Israel

In polite Britain, hatred of Jews is generally not expressed openly, but often takes the form of a loathing of Israel, so that the very mention of the Jewish state is enough to raise the hackles not only of the politically-aware man in the street, but of the semi-biblically aware man in the pew.

As Jaffe told the Bush Fire Church, such loathing cannot be explained in rational terms. But he was spot on, I believe, in linking the phenomenon with a society that has thrown God out of the window. Pledges of never letting it happen again are not enough, in my opinion; without a recovery of faith in the God of Israel, there can be no guarantee that another holocaust won't take place.

In recent months, Iran has been boasting of how its nuclear deal last year "has provided an historic opportunity to...face threats posed by the Zionist entity"². It is well to recall that the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini, collaborated with Hitler, setting the stage for today's jihad against Israel.³ And yet, bizarrely, former Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and current Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas have both publicly denied that the Holocaust ever took place.⁴

In polite Britain, hatred of Jews is generally not expressed openly, but often takes the form of a loathing of Israel.

Holocaust memorial, Berlin. See Photo Credits.

Light in the Darkness

Against such a dark background, however, there is plenty of encouragement. The Sheffield gathering heard much about the heroic acts of so-called 'righteous Gentiles' like Sir Nicholas Winton, who rescued 669 Jewish children from Czechoslovakia in 1938. Generations of people – almost 7,000 of some of the world's greatest doctors, lawyers, teachers and inventors – owe their lives to the act of one man's efforts to help Jewish children escape the Nazis.

Last year in Leeds the Shalom Declaration was launched, with hundreds signing a commitment to pray for the peace of Jerusalem, fight anti-Semitism and promote solidarity with Israel. Steven Jaffe himself said that this is sending out a clear message of Christian support for Britain's Jewish community. "There isn't a corner of the British Isles that the Shalom Declaration has not been signed", he said.

On the faith front, we were told that "there are more Jews learning the Torah today in Israel that at any time in our history", preparing them well for the great event we are perhaps soon to witness when Jesus reveals himself on a grand scale to his brothers in the flesh.

Forgiveness Vital

Though many Jews quite understandably have a problem with this, especially with the Holocaust in mind, we are reminded that the key is forgiveness. When Joseph revealed himself to his brothers, he had already long since forgiven them for acting treacherously against him.

Pledges of never letting it happen again are not enough: without a recovery of faith in the God of Israel, there can be no guarantee that another holocaust won't take place.

British television viewers were recently treated to a remarkable Channel 4 documentary, The Girl Who Forgave the Nazis,⁵ recounting the story of how Hungarian Jew Eva Kor, now 81, a former inmate of Auschwitz, has publicly forgiven 94-year-old Oskar Groenig, the death camp's former accountant, who was recently sentenced to four years in jail for his part in the Nazi's evil scheme.

Eva and her twin sister Miriam were experimented on by the infamous Dr Josef Mengele, but survived the camp. Eva said: "It's time to forgive, but not forget...I believe that forgiveness is such a powerful thing...and I want everybody to help me sow these seeds of peace throughout the world."

This takes amazing courage. But it is worth remembering that Jesus, our Messiah, made the first move when he prayed as he died in agony on a cross in Jerusalem: "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing." (Luke 23:34)

"Praise the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits – who forgives all your sins and heals all your diseases..." (Ps 103:2-3)

"Seek the Lord while he may be found...for he will freely pardon." (Isa 55:6-7)

Charles Gardner is author of Peace in Jerusalem, available from olivepresspublisher.com.

References

1 Jaffe works with the British Board of Deputies as a Communal Engagement with Israel Consultant. See Board of Deputies website. Jaffe has previously reported elsewhere on Christian support for Israel.

2 Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, in Beirut, 12 August 2015. See Times of Israel coverage here, written by Newman/AFP.

3 Soakell, D. Christian Friends of Israel's Watching Over Zion newsletter, 21 January.

4 Ibid.

5 Originally broadcast on Channel 4, Saturday 23 January, 8pm. Still available on 4oD.