Thinking about what kind of hometown Auschwitz must have been for Karl, I watch the other exhibits through blurred eyes. They chronicle the growth of democracy, the "Economic Miracle," the collapse of communism, and unification. Several displays feature Germany's ongoing attempts to deal with its past, including the Nuremberg Trials, the reparations treaty with Israel, and the Auschwitz Trials. Concentration camp survivors are interviewed about their experiences, their lives today, and their efforts to win compensation.
Willy Brandt is shown life-sized kneeling in national contrition at the monument to the Warsaw Ghetto. I pull out a little drawer underneath him and read that seven percent more Germans in 1970 opposed this gesture as "overdone" than approved of it as "appropriate."
These exhibits make all the others--the jukeboxes, refrigerators, and Volkswagens--look hollow and superficial. Something is always missing, haunting the edges of the displays of consumer bounty.
I leave the museum and walk through Bonn and realize that something is also missing here. An important element has disappeared: the Jews. As a Gentile who grew up among Jews in the US, I can tell how much better Germany would be if it hadn't destroyed its Jewish community.
Fortunately, a remnant survived and kept their culture alive. Now, bolstered by recent immigration, Jews are reasserting their identity in Germany. The core group is 60,000--one percent of the number killed throughout Europe--but newcomers, mostly from the former Soviet Union, have more than doubled that figure. Berlin has several Jewish-run cafes, shops, bookstores, and the start of a real community, including the inevitable spats between new arrivals and the old guard. Throughout the country 80 Jewish centers are active; new synagogues are opening and old ones are enjoying new life. If they continue to come, they could make Germany add a new section to Haus der Geschichte: the rebirth of Jewish culture.
The work of the current immigration project is done by local Jews, but most of the financing comes from the German government as part of its Holocaust reparations program, an ongoing effort for 50 years. Politicians from all sectors except the far right are supporting it.
This new beginning is one of the most positive developments here, but its smallness and tentativeness point up the dimensions of what was destroyed. The never-to-be-forgotten fact is that from France to Russia, from Norway to North Africa, Germans killed every Jew they could find. The loss is beyond repair, beyond comprehension, leaving only grief and a bitter determination to protect those who remain.
This carnage also crippled German society. By murdering so many of its own citizens, Germany lost the dynamic of two counterpoised cultures, different, sometimes conflicting, but basically complementary. These two elements had enriched each other for centuries, producing some of Europe's greatest achievements.
Now, out of annihilation, a community begins again. The two groups greet each other cautiously: "Germany is a very different country today. Welcome."
"We shall see. Shalom."
