Mosh'ke Bimbad
At a very early age, in 1903, a callow youth of 15, I joined the "Bund" (League, socialist) party. With the revolutionary rise of various parties across all of Russia, Lithuania, and Poland. There were the Russian S.D. (Social Democrats), S.R. (Social Revolutionaries), the Jewish Bund. The Polish P.P.S. (Polish Socialist Party) and the various Zionist organizations--P.Z. (Poale Zion) Sejmists, Territorialists, etc.
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More than the other parties, the "Bund" appealed to the Jewish working masses. The oppression of the Jews by the unenlightened, autocratic Tsarist power brought the youth to revolt and the call to cast off the Tsarist power burned in young Jewish hearts.
The "Bund" carried the flag for the demand for the right to general, egalitarian, secret, and direct elections. We sang "There lives in Russia, Lithuania and Poland the Jewish Worker's League".
The Bund party in Disna was divided into kruzhki (small circles) Each circle had a leader. My first leader was Beylke, daughter of Moshe the tailor, who lived in Svinsk (Swine) Street (later, Kosotovski). She was the sister of Alter Rumer the baker. It was not long before I was transferred to a higher circle. My leader was Moshe'ke Bimbad from Zadvina. Moshe'ke was a furrier at that time. He worked with Leib the Furrier. In the market, along the river.
Sabbath after the noodle pudding I would cross to Zadvina with the ferry, where Moshe'ke was already waiting for us. His brother Norke and his sister Leah-Dove also belonged to his circle.We would go off into the forest. and sit on the grass. And Moshe'ke would read to us fom various books. That literature was never overly difficult. That was at the beginning of the enlightenment of the workers. To me, as the son of an exploiter, the idea appealed as a whoe -- to overthrough the existing obscurantist power, which was detested by everyone.
My papa, when he came to know that I had become a shtachnik (member of a revolutionary society), would tell me with a laugh: Sarah'ke of Yoshe ben Rachmiel the shoemaker with Velvl Yisrael the carpenter want to overthrow Nikolaev. We youths did not much concern ourselves about the laughter of our elders, as we were firmly convinced that we were fighting for a good cause and we would win. But just as my papa honestly believed the messiah would come, so we honestly believed that the revolution would come and Nikolai would succumb. The revolution came. The messiah has not come in my papa's time, and go figure whether he will come in mine.
In 1928 [the Hebrew has 1926] when my sister, her children, and I, came to Disne to see our parents, Moshe'ke Bimbad complained to me, why does my brother Shlomeh criticize him when he davens shabbat before the ark? Shmerl Zalman Yafeh is content, but not Shlomeh. I spoke to my brother Shlomo about it. And he told me: A shul is not a theater, a chazan by the ark should be a Jew who keeps the Sabbath, a pious Jew. Which Moshe'ke isn't.
When Simke Lov from Zadvina came to Israel, she told me that Moshe Bimbad the former Bundist doesn't shave and wears a yarmulke like a Jew from Meah-Shearim (Jerusalem). If my brother Shlomeh could see that, he would have struck himself al chate (in penance). It appears that the inclination to religion has been with him for a very long time. Even from the time when he had been taken up with his large business under Polish rule, he got a feeling that the finger of God was involved and as we say in our prayers, "uneshalmah parim sefateinu" (we will offer the sacrifices of our lips).
I hope that Moshe Bimbad will add something about that time.
If I make no mistake, pretty Mirke Levin from Zadvina from Zadvina was also a member of Moshe'ke's circle.
