Tag #109251 - Interview #78794 (Jozef Hen)

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I attended schools for Jewish youth. I started going to the 1st grade of public school when I was six years old.

It was Krelman's school, the classes were taught in Polish. My love for the Bible was born there; I owe it to my teacher, Akerman. He couldn't even speak Polish well, but he had great acting talent, he spoke colorfully with great style. I started learning the Bible in Hebrew when I was seven years old. I memorized by heart the original of the First Book.

The first two books of the Pentateuch [Genesis and Exodus] were especially important for me. Each teacher had problems with the Pentateuch, because the 3rd book [Leviticus] talks about unspeakable things, like menstruation, abortion etc. Akerman skipped these pages, because it bored us. We mostly saw the Bible as a great adventure.

In addition to the Bible, my love was the history of Poland. When I was six years old and sick with the scarlet fever, I read a lot. Mother bought me a brochure about Queen Jadwiga [Queen Jadwiga (1374-1399): crowned Queen of Poland in 1384, wife of Wladyslaw Jagiello, enthroned in 1386.

After her death she began to be worshipped, canonized in 1997]. I didn't go to school for a month. The children progressed significantly in their fractions and I progressed significantly in reading. I loved reading my sisters' world history handbooks. I remember Zakrzewski's handbook. History is still an impulse for my work until this day.
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Interview
Jozef Hen