Last Rabbi

Shadeve Jewish Branch of the Union for the Liberation of Vilnius, headed by the rabbi Mordechai Henkin. Courtesy of Panevėžio kraštotyros muziejus.

Love one another. Live peacefully without getting into conflict with anyone. So taught Šeduva rabbi Mordechai Henkin. He arrived in Šeduva in 1925 with his wife and five children. They lived in the town for sixteen years. From what we can tell, he is the longest-serving rabbi in the history of Šeduva.

Henkin was a hardworking leader. He learned to speak and write Lithuanian. He supported Lithuanian territorial claims to Vilnius region. He taught Judaism to Jewish students at the local high school. His articles were published in the Lithuanian-language Jewish newspaper Apžvalga. He tutored the town's young people and run-of-the-mill workers in the study of the sacred texts.

In the world at that time there wasn't a lot of the mutual love and respect Mordechai taught. Horrific hatred, enmity and jealousy ran rampant. He was murdered in mid-August of 1941, just a month after the Germans invaded. Local white arm-banders took him into the forest and shot him, probably after bullying, beating and torturing the rabbi. Within the course of just a few weeks the entire Šeduva Jewish community suffered the same fate.