Objects

Photograph of Naftali Feigin holding his grandson Andrzej Krzysztof Feigin (Wróblewski)

It is part of the collection:

A photo of grandson and grandfather – little Andrzej Krzysztof Feigin (since the war - Wróblewski; 1935–2012) and Naftali Feigin (1882–1942?). They were probably photographed by Naftali's son, and Andrzej Krzysztof's father, Andrzej Feigin (Wróblewski).

Andrzej Wróblewski in the interview "Być Żydem… Rozmowa z Dagiem Halvorsenem o Żydach i antysemityzmie Polaków" (published by Niezależna Oficyna Wydawnicza, Warsaw 1992) outlines a picture of the family’s assimilation, progressing from generation to generation. It accelerated particularly in the last three generations of Feigin-Wróblewski, leading in the generation of Wróblewski's children to a complete break away from their Jewish roots.

Already Wróblewski's grandfather, Aleksander Feigin, who lived in the second half of the 19th century and died in 1917 before the end of World War I, was an assimilated Jew. We do not know exactly when he was born; in family trees that were commissioned by the family in the 1990s, there is a date of 1855 and his father's name: Eleazar; his mother's name is unknown. This date coincides with the information provided by Andrzej Wróblewski in the above-mentioned interview that his grandfather died at the age of 63, which would mean that he was born in 1854 or 1855 (see "Być Żydem...", p. 20). In the archives, however, another birth certificate has been preserved, and it is the only known birth certificate of someone with such a name and surname at that time (although it is possible that there is a coincidence of surnames): Mordka Aleksander Fajgen, b. in Lublin in 1856.

Although Aleksander Feigin certainly knew Yiddish, in the house founded by him and Rachel (we do not know his wife's maiden name), only Polish was spoken (see "Być Żydem...", pp. 20, 26, 27). The Feigins lived in the Vilnius Region. Alexander was a lawyer. On the other hand his brother was active in the Polish Socialist Party (ibid., P. 28), though Alexander too described himself as a socialist. Also his grandfather's sister, Emilia Feigin, was an assimilated Jew; as Wróblewski recalled: "she managed to achieve that her children, i.e. my father's cousins, were educated people. One was a doctor, the other a trader; I met him when he came back from Germany after 1933; the daughter was a teacher" (ibid., pp. 26–27). He further added about his aunt: "She did not know Jewish. I have not heard her grandfather address her in Yiddish. To complete the sociological family portrait: […] She was an unmarried woman for a long time. As I guessed later, she had a friend from the neighbourhood, a non-Jew, a college friend. So that in the moral sense it was already of a different quality" (ibid., P. 27).

The son of Aleksander Feigin, and the father of Andrzej Wróblewski, Naftali Feigin probably knew Yiddish, but he did not use it at home (ibid., P. 20). Like his wife, Berta, née Awerbuch, he received his medical education in Warsaw. Incidentally, we only know his Jewish name, but we do not know whether he used it; if it were so, the situation would be rare, as the names most often used in assimilated families were Polish.

In relation to their sons, the family met only the religious minimum: they were circumcised and held a bar mitzvah. Significantly, Wróblewski recalls that it was only in connection with the bar mitzvah that he visited the synagogue for the first time. "When I was being prepared for the act of confirmation, the rules, which would come into force when I reached thirteen, that is, when I become an adult man, had to be explained to me in Polish." (ibid., Pp. 32–33).

On the other hand, Andrzej Krzysztof Feigin did not even participate in the bar mitzvah. At the age of 13, he already had a different surname from the occupation period, Wróblewski, and he did not identify himself with Jewry (more on this in the note to the next photo in the archival group).

Another family member from Andrzej Wróblewski's generation, is Izaak Feigin (born 1911; electronics technician, probably his cousin), who emigrated from Słupca to Israel before the war.

czytaj więcej
Information about the object
Author/creator
Wróblewski, Andrzej (1909-1994)
Object type
photography
Time of creation / dating
20th century
Created place
Słupca (Wielkopolskie Province)
Technique
black-and-white photograph
Material
photographic print paper
Keywords
Copyright status
the object is not protected by copyright law
Owner
POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews
Identification number
MPOLIN-A34.1.3