Books: An unbelievable tale

In ‘Incredible,’ Rabbi Nachman Seltzer tells the true story of Rabbi Yossi Wallis and his life journey.

By GLORIA MOUND
Rabbi Yossi Wallis (photo credit: Courtesy)
Rabbi Yossi Wallis
(photo credit: Courtesy)
Incredible! From the Bronx to Bnei Brak: The Amazing True Story of Rabbi Yossi Wallis is aptly named. The author, Rabbi Nachman Seltzer, tells the life story of Wallis, born of Holocaust survivors in Petah Tikva and raised in the Bronx – at the time ridden with gang wars and offering a bleak future.
The story of Wallis’s parents’ and grandparents’ escape during the Holocaust shows extraordinary fortitude, an attribute clearly passed on to Wallis himself.
His father’s incredible escape from execution in Dachau and the ingenious way in which he smuggled himself on to a boat carrying legal immigrants sailing for Haifa in 1946 prepare the reader for the way in which Yossi overcame obstacles against all odds in one situation after another.
The Wallis family, with its roots in Poland, could trace its lineage back to the Marranos of Spain – those who hid their Jewish identity to escape persecution during the Spanish Inquisition. Wallis’s father, Judah, recalled that during his childhood in Poland, his family spoke Ladino, and had a precious book, an old and worn Humash (Pentateuch). Inside that volume, it was recorded that their ancestor, Rafael Valls, and two other family members, were the last to be burned at the stake in Majorca, Spain in 1691.
“‘I remember, as a child back in Poland, a Chumash that occupied a prominent place of honor in our home,’” Wallis recalled his father telling him.
“It was ancient, passed down from father to son for generations. When you opened the cover you’d find a list of all the people who had owned this Chumash.
Every father inscribed his name on the inside cover, and also wrote down what country the family was living in at that time. When the owner passed away and the Chumash was handed down to the next in line, his first task would be to inscribe how many years his father had lived and when he had passed away.
“This Chumash was a precious family artifact that was to be preserved at any cost. It would have been my greatest pleasure and honor to preserve this link to our history, but our entire family was sent to the camps and, as you know, there were no personal libraries there for the inmates’ use. The Chumash and most of the information contained on the front cover were lost forever. But there are a number of details that I remember, such as the name of the first person on the list and some of the countries that our ancestors passed through on their improbable journey through Europe to Poland.”
Wallis used the information his father was able to provide to travel to Majorca, track down his ancestors and their history and even receive a formal apology from the Spanish government for the public burning of Rafael Valls 500 years earlier.
Growing up in New York, Wallis joined a gang in the Bronx to protect himself on the dangerous streets. He ultimately formed a Jewish gang, and later obtained the opportunity for a good education. He served in the armed forces of both the US and Israel, followed by a successful business life.
Although Wallis was living the typical lifestyle of an American middle-class family, he nevertheless yearned for Israel and eventually made the move back to his birthplace.
A feeling of love of humanity and a desire to offer the most deprived an opportunity to better their lives pervades the book, but the most moving and breathtaking sequences are the accounts of courage and survival during the Holocaust.
Thanks to his intense faith, Wallis’s father found some kind of anchor in his heritage that enabled him to escape miraculously and survive to the end of the war and raise a family.
A number of pages are devoted to Wallis’s love of his motorbike, his dogs and other pets, but it is surprising that there is little mention of the women in this astounding family. Wallis’s mother, his wife, his daughters, are scarcely mentioned throughout the book. The women in his life – who must have played a monumental part in his family’s journey – are almost invisible.
Today Rabbi Yossi Wallis, CEO of the Arachim outreach program, with 138 offices worldwide, is a much sought-after public speaker. Reading this book is an educational and emotional experience for anyone, regardless of their origin or attitude towards Judaism.
The writer is executive director of the Casa Shalom-Institute for Marrano (Anusim) Studies.