Irene Eber

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Irene Eber (born December 29, 1929 in Halle / Saale , née Geminder; died April 10, 2019 in Jerusalem ) was an Israeli sinologist of German origin. She was Professor at the Louis Frieberg Center for Asian Studies at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem and Senior Fellow at the Harry S. Truman Research Institute . She last lived and worked in Jerusalem. Her father was the general merchant Chaim Geminder from Mielec , her mother Helene Gänger from Leipzig.

She wrote a translation of the Bible into Han Chinese . In her autobiography I am alone and bang from 2004 she describes memories of the Jewish life in Poland of her childhood and her rescue from the Nazi murderers as well as her feelings when visiting these places in post-communist Poland.

To the autobiography

Irene Eber, a survivor of the Holocaust , reports on her travels to Poland, to the places of childhood and the places where her family and many people were annihilated. Even today there are painful impressions. It describes the day of the extinction of Mielec . Mielec was made the first “ Jew-free city” in occupied Poland on March 9, 1942 . Back in Mielec in 1980, she no longer sees any traces. It describes the days in the Ghetto of Dębica , Podkarpackie Voivodeship, a transit ghetto with the function of a German concentration camp . Halle, Brünnlitz (Brněnec) , Krakow , Prague , Regensburg , Cham (Upper Palatinate) , Munich , Frankfurt am Main and Zeilsheim are further stages in life, Halle is the last before the border to Poland on an October night in 1938 before the so-called Poland Action .

She explicitly addresses the problem of forgetting . She contrasts this directly with remembering . Your question: “Doesn't writing down individual memories also contribute to forgetting the overall context?” Will remain unanswered for the time being.

She first illustrates the problem using a Jewish parable by the two Hasidic rabbis Baal Shem and Israel von Rizin . To find solutions to problems or to ask questions, Baal Shem went into a certain forest and said certain prayers by a fire. The next generation still knew the place and the prayers. But again the next generation only knew the place in the forest. Rabbi Israel von Rizin could only tell the story of Baal Shem and actually knew nothing about the technique of cheering, the location and the prayers themselves.

Still, remembering is important, but as a member of her generation she asks future generations: What are we really left with after visiting a modern Holocaust museum?

Others

Stumbling blocks in front of Irene Eber's parents' house for her murdered father Yedidia Geminder and her murdered cousin Frieda Riesel

Stumbling blocks in Halle , relocated on August 24, 2009 by Gunter Demnig from Cologne, are a reminder of her family's last civilian apartment in Germany.

Works

  • I am alone and afraid: a Jewish girl in Poland 1939–1945. Translated from the English by Reinhild Böhnke . Beck, Munich. 2007. ISBN 3-406-55652-3 .
    • Original: The Choice - Poland, 1939–1945. 2004. Schocken Books Inc., New York. ISBN 0-8052-4197-3 (English)
  • Chinese tales . Together with Martin Buber , Alex Page
  • The Jewish Bishop and the Chinese Bible: SIJ Schereschewsky (1831-1906). Brill Academic Pub. 1999. ISBN 90-04-11266-9 (English)
  • Bible in Modern China. The Literary and Intellectual Impact. Steyler Verlagbuchhandlung, 1999. Together with Nicolas Standaert, Arnulf Camps and Jost Zetzsche .
  • Influence, Translation and Parallels. Selected Studies on the Bible in China. Together with Marián Gálik. Steyler publishing bookstore. ISBN 3-8050-0489-3 (English)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Barbara Hoster: In memoriam Irene Eber (1929-2019) . In: China today . tape 38 , no. 2 , 2019, p. 75–77 ( china-zentrum.de [PDF] Title originally “In memoriam Irene Eber (1930–2019)”; year of birth subsequently corrected).
  2. ↑ Details on the Geminder family from Mielec , from the memorial book for the dead of the Holocaust in Halle
  3. ↑ Mitteldeutsche Zeitung Halle from August 25, 2009: Report from Halle
personal data
SURNAME Eber, Irene
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Geminder, Irene (maiden name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Israeli sinologist
DATE OF BIRTH December 29, 1929
PLACE OF BIRTH Hall
DATE OF DEATH April 10, 2019
Place of death Jerusalem