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From: R. Kovacs
Subject: Registry concerns
Date: 4 Shevat 5781
I have been quiet in this thread because I am not sure what to say.
My grandfather told me once about a list. Not the lists you are thinking of, though we will come to those. An earlier list.
In his town, before the war, the kehilla maintained a register. Who was born, who was married, who died. Who paid membership dues, who was in arrears. Normal community records. Every Jewish community kept such records.
When the Germans came, they asked for these records. Some communities had hidden them. Some had destroyed them. Some handed them over, believing cooperation was safer than resistance. In Munkacs, the records were in the rav's office. I do not know what happened to them.
After the war, survivors had to prove they were Jewish to claim assistance, to immigrate, to remarry. The records that endangered them were now records they needed. What had been a weapon against them became, in absence, a weapon against them again.
I tell this story not to make a point but because it is what I think about when we discuss registries.
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