Article
Humor as a Defense Mechanism
during the Holocaust
Interpretation: A Journal of
Bible and Theology
2015, Vol. 69(2) 183­–195
© The Author(s) 2015
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DOI: 10.1177/0020964314564830
int.sagepub.com
Chaya Ostrower
Beit-Berl College, Kfar Saba, Israel
Abstract
This article documents narratives of fifty-five Jewish Holocaust survivors who were teenagers during the
Holocaust period and highlights their ability to cope with Holocaust atrocities by using various types of
humor as a defense mechanism.
Keywords
Holocaust survivors, Humor, Defense mechanism, Self-directed humor, Scatological humor, Sexual humor,
Gallows humor
Introduction
The Holocaust was a traumatic time for the Jewish people, a period of trial and tribulation never
before experienced.1 Despite this fact, or perhaps because of it, there was humor and laughter during the Holocaust in the ghettos and in the concentration and death camps. Humor became a unique
weapon of those who felt helpless and could not rebel or resist. As survivor Felicja Karay said:
Humor and satire played a tremendous role, in my opinion. . . . It was a cemetery all right, and
exactly for that reason, the mere fact that we wanted somehow to preserve our personality . . .
they wanted to make robots out of us. This was the integral part of our inner, mental struggle
for our human identity, the fact that we could still laugh at things. . . . Humor was an integral
part of our spiritual resistance. And this spiritual resistance was the pre-condition for a desire to
live, to put it briefly. . . . No matter how little it occurred, no matter how sporadic it was, or how
spontaneous, it was very important. Very important!
1
This article is based on my book (published in Hebrew) If Not for Humor, We Would Have Committed
Suicide (Jerusalem: Yad-Vashem, 2009). An English edition, It Was Humor That Kept Us Alive (Jerusalem:
Yad-Vashem), is forthcoming. All the interviews are quoted almost verbatim, except for minor corrections to facilitate understanding. These interviews took place between 1996 and 1998 in Israel. All the
interviewees gave their permission to publish their full names and their stories.
Corresponding author:
Chaya Ostrower, Beit Berl College, Prof. Shor 23/6 st’, Tel Aviv, 62961, Israel.
Email: ochayo@macam.ac.il
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Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 69(2)
This article is based on semi-open ethnographic interviews. The fifty-five participants (thirtyone women, twenty-four men) were Jewish Holocaust survivors who were adolescents during the
Holocaust (1933–1945). Each of them was asked to tell about humor during the Holocaust. Humor
was defined as “anything that made you laugh or smile.”
Functions of Humor
Humor is a complex phenomenon. Even though “humor” can be defined (as it was for the interviews) as anything that makes a person laugh or smile, there is no generally accepted theory of
humor, or even an agreed-upon definition. Those who study humor note it is composed of three
experiences: intellectual (wit); emotional (levity or gaiety); and physiological (laughter or smiling). Each element can be experienced independently, but when all three are experienced in conjunction, we call it “humor.”2
Humor always contains some measure of self-observation or truth.3 Humor can be cruel or healing; it can express love, hatred and aggression. However, even the saddest humor is never depressing, but contains a kernel of optimism.4
Under the nightmare circumstances of living in the ghettos and camps during the Holocaust,
laughter was a form of rebellion against reality. Humor was the weapon of those whose lives were
utterly in the hands of the executioners, those who were powerless to rebel or resist in any other
way. The residents of the ghettos and camps gathered up their strength and knew that they had to
endure the war waged against them by the Nazi regime. Thus, the ghetto residents formulated the
inner command “Do not cry,”5 and they used humor as a defense mechanism.
Defense mechanisms are automatic, psychological strategies, subconscious measures that protect the individual from external or internal pressures, which might include thoughts, memories, or
emotions that threaten the individual or arouse unbearable anxiety.6 All defense mechanisms share
two characteristics: (1) they are denials or distortions of reality, and (2) they operate
unconsciously.7
2
3
4
5
6
7
Steven Sultanoff, “What is Humor?” Therapeutic Humor 9 (1995): 1–2.
George Vaillant, “Ego Mechanisms of Defense and Personality Psychopathology,” Journal of Abnormal
Psychology 103 (1994): 44–50.
Chaya Ostrower, “What is Humor? What is the Purpose of Humor? Why Do We Laugh?” Unpublished
paper delivered at the International Conference on Humour: Texts, Contexts (University of Kerala, India;
6–8 December 2013).
Moshe Prager, ed., Min Hametzar Karati (Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook, 1955), 21.
Phebe Cramer, “Defense Mechanisms in Psychology Today: Further Processes for Adaptation,” American
Psychologist 55 (2000): 637–46.
Brian Luke Seaward, Managing Stress: Principles and Strategies for Health and Well Being (6th ed.;
Sudbury, MA: Jones and Bartlett, 2009), 88.
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Ostrower
Sigmund Freud viewed humor as the highest, most mature form of human defense mechanism,
and the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders also places humor as the highest
adaptive defense.8 According to Freud, humans mainly use humor in situations where negative
emotions arise, such as sadness or fear.9 The essence of humor, according to Freud, is that the individual spares himself or herself the distressing and painful effects that the situation causes by
canceling the emotional possibility of sorrow through humor. In this way, humor enables people to
cope with harsh situations without being overwhelmed by emotions.10
Survivor Lily Rickman put it this way:
The whole thing was so grotesque, it just wasn’t real. I didn’t see the reality, so I escaped to this:
I created a world of laughter. . . . Usually, among the girls there were some who understood the
humor, because those who didn’t understand drew away. “Look at what’s happening to us and
what we look like, and you are still in a good mood!” I replied, “No, I’m not in a good mood.
I have two choices, either to laugh or to cry.” And I thought it was easier to laugh at it. It’s not
happening to me. . . . I think that laughter and humor means not to take things in the form of what
we see, but to dress it in a different format, to make it something else. Because it was absurd,
all that time. It is simply inconceivable that they could do to people what they did to us. . . . the
fact that I was able to view the most shameful conditions as grotesque—that is what helped me
to stay alive.
There is no doubt that humor is one of the most elegant, effective defence mechanisms in the
human repertoire. Humor can emerge when human beings experience negative emotions such as
sadness, anxiety, or fear. When individuals perceive humorous elements in negative situations, they
gain another perspective on the situation and avoid feeling the full impact of negative emotions.
Humor and laughter are an important mechanism for coping with many of the psychological pressures human beings face in life, and they have an important place in safeguarding our emotional
and physical health.
According to Avner Ziv, humor has five major functions: (1) aggressive, to achieve superiority
and as a response to frustration; (2) sexual; (3) social; (4) defensive, as black/gallows humor and
self-directed humor; and (5) intellectual.11 Following content analysis, additional types have been
defined. Scatological humor is often a subcategory of sexual humor, and humor about food is a
subcategory of defensive humor. Following are examples of how these five major functions apply
to Holocaust humor.
8
9
10
11
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (4th ed.; Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric
Association, 2005), 807–9.
Sigmund Freud, The Joke and Its Relation to the Unconscious (New York: W. W. Norton, 1989),
283–93.
Sigmund Freud, “Humor,” International Journal of Psychoanalysis 9 (1928): 1–6.
Avner Ziv, Personality and Sense of Humor (New York: Springer, 1984), 2–3.
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The Aggressive Function of Humor
Aggression is a general term for a variety of actions, including assault and hostile behavior.
Aggression is an instinctive impulse, usually a response to fear or frustration. Since the manifestation of aggression can cause destruction, every society upholds laws that restrict its expression.
Each society also creates mechanisms for expressing aggression in a socially acceptable manner.
According to Freud, humor is a process that involves sublimation, and its primary function is to
express sexual and aggressive impulses.12 During the Holocaust, humor and laughter became a
necessary channel through which the Jews could express their anger and bitterness. The aggressive
function of humor expressed both a sense of superiority and frustration.
Aggressive Humor as a Feeling of Superiority
Jokes that are aggressive, vulgar, or cynical amuse the listener because they gratify and sublimate
the hostility imprinted in each of us. Aggressive humor allows the person in distress to see himself
or herself as superior to the enemy and enables the person to release aggressiveness bottled up
inside and to strengthen self-esteem.13 Aggressive humor gave Holocaust victims the perception of
being superior to their German executioners. Some examples of aggressive humor directed against
the Nazis are given below:
[Adolf] Hitler, [Hermann] Goering, and [Joseph] Goebbels meet at “Kaiserhof ” for a meal. They
agree that each would order a chicken, though Goering orders two for himself. But as so often
happens, the eyes can eat more than the stomach, and there’s a chicken left over. What to do?
They agree that the first person who passes by the window where they are sitting will be invited
in and given the chicken. After a moment’s wait, a man passes. He is called in. And it was a Jew!
“Verfluchter Schweinhund [you damned son-of-a-b----],” Hitler addresses him, “according to our
agreement you shall have this chicken, but only on the condition that everything you do to the
chicken, we will do to you. If you snap off a drumstick, we’ll break one of your legs; if you tear
off a wing, it will cost you an arm; and if you wring the chicken’s neck, your neck will suffer the
same fate. So eat; the chicken is yours, you Judeschwein [you Jewish swine]!” The Jew stands
for a moment, then picks up the chicken and plants a juicy kiss right on its rump.14
Hitler and Goering were once out driving. Passing through a village, they ran over a pig. Goering
thought he should find the farmer and apologize for what had happened. He was gone a very
long time and received very fine hospitality. When he returned, Hitler asked why he had stayed
so long. “Well, there was much celebration in the house over what I told them,” Goering replied,
“and finally I had to join in.”
“What did you tell them?”
“That the pig was dead.”15
12
13
14
15
Freud, “Humor,” 1–6.
Freud, Joke, 242–43.
Kathleen Stokker, Folklore Fights the Nazis: Humor in Occupied Norway 1940–1945 (Madison, WI:
University of Wisconsin Press, 1997), 7.
Ibid., 56. “Pig” was a term that Jews used to describe the Nazis.
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The Germans came into Warsaw and everywhere they went they would say: “Juden raus
und Deutsche herein!” [“Jews out, and Germans in!”]. And this is how they got to the Jewish
cemetery.16
On a moving train, a Jew spots an SS man17 searching for Jews hiding. One Jew rushes into the
toilet to hide, he does what he needs to do, and the German goes on looking. Finally, [the SS
man] knocks on the toilet door. The Jew doesn’t answer. He finally attempts to open the door
screaming: “SS!” [“Ess, ess” sounds like “eat, eat” in Yiddish]. The Jew answers: “Das Dreck
ess allein.” [“You eat s--t.”]18
Aggressive Humor in Response to Frustration
Aggressive humor facilitates the expression of hostility in response to frustrations, allowing the
ability to attack without facing the prospect of punishment. Aggressive humor has many varied
forms, from direct “hits” to sophisticated word-play. Some examples are given below:
[Chaim] Rumkowski19 lies down and sleeps the sleep of the working man. Behold, his first wife
Madam Feiga appears in his dream. “Feiga my dear,” the old man says, “what a shame you
already died and did not merit seeing your husband in his current status as King and Caesar of
Israel.” “And if you are king, then aren’t I Queen?” she claims. “But there is no king without a
nation and no queen without a nation; don’t I have a nation too?” The old man ruminates over
his thoughts, then suddenly cries out loud, “I promise you, my dear queen! I will send my people
slowly but surely to you, so that you can be queen there over many members of the people of
Israel.” He promises and carries out his promises!20
A police chief came to the apartment of a Jewish family and wanted to take some things away.
The woman cried that she was a widow with a child. The chief said he’d take nothing if she could
guess which one of his eyes was the artificial one. She guessed the left eye. She was asked how
she knew. “Because that one,” she answered, “has a human look.”21
Horowitz (Hitler) comes to the other world. Sees Jesus in Paradise. “Hey, what’s a Jew doing
without an armband?” “Let him be,” answers St. Peter. “He’s the boss’s son.”22
The prime topic for the greatest laughter and greatest envy in the camp at Auschwitz . . . was
the Scheisskomando, the commando that hauled the shit, sorry for the expression, the feces.
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
Told by Helena Birenbaum in interview.
“SS” stands for Schutzstaffel, the elite German paramilitary. The SS controlled the German police forces
and the concentration camp system.
Told by Mariasha Fialko.
The chairman of the Judenrat (Jewish council) in the Łódź ghetto.
Dapim: Studies on the Holocaust (Hebrew; Haifa, Israel: The Yitzhak Katznelson Ghetto Fighters House,
Hakibbutz Hameuhad, and the Institute for Research on the Holocaust at the University of Haifa, 1951),
143–44.
Emmanuel Ringelblum, Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto (New York: Schocken Books, 1974), 84.
Ibid., 40
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There were no public lavatories with drainage; instead people would go with diarrhea to the pits.
Afterwards, the Scheisskomando would come, collect it, and carry it for kilometers to a place
where it was stored. . . . And we used to laugh; first of all, they stank to the high heavens! But
they were considered the richest ones because they used to search and find tons of diamonds and
gold and gold teeth. They rummaged through the stuff all the time, those from the Commando.
This was something to cry and laugh over, cry and laugh: the most expensive diamonds would
be in the shit, the Scheisskomando used to immerse their hands [in it], because you could sell
these things and buy food.23
The Sexual and Scatological Function of Humor
The sexual function of humor includes two closely related types of humor: sexual and scatological.
The objective of sexual humor is to arouse sexual feelings, but only a thin line separates it from
scatological humor. Scatological humor involves the same region of the body as sexual functions,
and therefore overlaps in purpose.24 While sexual humor is connected to sex, and scatological
humor is connected to feces, one person may view a certain type of humor as sexual and even
romantic, while another will view it as scatological and vulgar.25
Sexual Humor
According to Freud, laughter at an off-color joke not only liberates emotional energy, but also
permits enjoyment of forbidden thoughts.26 However, sexual humor and laughter-arousing circumstances in the ghettos and camps during the Holocaust were distinct from such responses in “normal” life. Sexual humor in the camps was not discreet and indirect, as it would be under normal
conditions. Instead, it was direct and blatant. It is no wonder, then, that when the interviewees
discussed sexual humor, they described its vulgarity, grossness, and its macabre nature. Most of the
survivors who addressed this subject in the interviews laughed as they recalled these jokes or sang
off-color songs. Some laughed out of enjoyment, while others laughed in embarrassment, but all
remarked that this language was, and remains, foreign to them outside the camps. Several simply
remarked, “That was a very gross song.”
There were also crude jokes, but far fewer of them. The erotic element rarely made its
appearance, except for in Skarżysko, a camp with men. Among the women alone, almost never.
Never. . . . Aha, “cousins, cousins,” that was very powerful. . . . Let me explain in brief: people
who were very hungry did not have erotica in their heads because food was more important.
Nevertheless, those who had enough to eat—and every camp had some of those—were the ones
who circulated the vulgar jokes. No doubt, it was in every camp. I’m not even talking about a
camp like Auschwitz, in which it appeared one hundred percent. But even in other concentration
23
24
25
26
Told by Eitan Porat.
Alleen Nilsen and Don Nilsen, Encyclopedia of 20th-Century American Humor (Phoenix, AZ: Oryx
Press, 2000), 112.
Ibid., 261.
Freud, “Humor,” 1–6.
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camps. There is no doubt that there were dirty jokes. Among whom? First of all, among those
privileged Jews who were not hungry and second, among those who had more contact with the
women’s camp. . . . Besides, there was a whorehouse in Auschwitz. Not for the prisoners, but
for the SS men and the guards. . . . The very fact that such a thing existed provoked crude jokes
here and there, there is no doubt.27
Vulgar jokes existed because we knew there was no hope, that every moment, another day,
another month was without hope. It was simple to encourage whenever there was a chance
because the next day we could die, so why not?28
Scatological Humor
The term “scatological” comes from the Greek skōr (genitive case skatos), meaning “dung” or
“excrement.” Thus, scatological humor pertains to bodily functions in the lavatory, to which public
reference is considered impolite and even taboo in many cultures. Scatological humor stems from
the taboo that relates to biological necessities, and its effectiveness is rooted in the shock value of
hearing public reference to these activities. Since the SS did not usually enter the area of the latrine
in the camps, the latrine became the social meeting place for the prisoners, where they could talk,
barter, joke, gossip, and disseminate rumors. This was the origin of the expression Radia Tuches
Agentur—“Radio Backside Agency.”
The bathroom was for everyone. There was a big pit, and over it were long planks that everyone
sat on. They gave it a name: R.T.A.—Radia Tuches Agentur—as that was the place for hearing
the news. . . . Yes, R.T.A. There was no embarrassment—everyone sitting in a long row, telling
jokes. . . . In Polish, they gave it another name: J.P.P. —jedna pani powiedziała (“One Woman
Said”).29
You know, from the moment we entered the camp . . . there was no possibility for privacy.
We had to bathe in public, to defecate and urinate in public. There was a line; we sat there
and talked there. I also laughed a bit. I said, “My coffeehouse in Auschwitz, in Birkenau,
was in the latrine.” Everything took place there: gossip, exchange of information, bartering,
everything.30
The Social Function of Humor
People find it easier to laugh with friends than with strangers. Humor acts as a kind of lubricant for
social interaction, contributing to social processes such as intensifying group cohesion, reducing
tension, and creating a positive atmosphere. Every humorous expression is unique and dependent
27
28
29
30
Told by Felicja Karay.
Told by Rina (Risha) Treibich.
Told by Nechama Chernotsky.
Told by Rina (Risha) Treibich.
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on the sociocultural background of the
group members.31 Therefore, an analysis of humor must take into account the
sociocultural context in which it takes
place.32
The composition of the camps was
heterogeneous, and a great variety of
people shared a common fate in the
crowded living conditions. Many survivors who were interviewed for this
research pointed to the fact that prisoners
who arrived at the camps with acquaintances or friends from home, or who made
friends in the camps, had an easier time
adjusting. There were many advantages
to being part of a group; a solitary individual had a much harder time surviving
on his or her own. Jokes were told mainly
in groups whose members were comfortable with one another.
Jews in the Ghetto of Kutno, Poland. April 1, 1942. Photo
Credit: Art Resource, NY.
When you were with people, and it didn’t
matter if it was in the ghetto or the camp
or Auschwitz, after a moment of silence
. . . you lived within, you always lived with other people, you were not alone. . . . And
whoever had a sense of humor would express his humor there as well. . . . I’ve always been
the type that loves laughter when I’m in company. . . . Everything you say can be said with
humor. . . . During the bad moments, like in every situation, whether it’s during a war or in
peacetime, or if someone feels bad inside and doesn’t open up to anyone and doesn’t want
anything, so OK, he keeps silent and doesn’t laugh. But there is always humor in groups. . . .
Even though there was no theater and no professional stand-up performers, there were natural
stand-up performers and that’s all you need. There is always one. In every group, under all
circumstances, there’s always one. . . . the type that’s happier and the type that’s sadder, the wise
one, and the fool.33
The humor and jokes that were common during the Holocaust must be understood in the context
in which they occurred. The prisoners were sucked into the pathological atmosphere of the camp,
31
32
33
Ziv, Personality and Sense of Humor, 40–53.
Walter Duncan and Philip Feisal, “No Laughing Matter: Patterns of Humor in the Workplace,”
Organizational Dynamics 17 (1989): 18–30.
Told by Yehuda Feigin.
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and the sense of humor they had in their previous lives was no longer relevant. The jokes made in
the camps often were harsh, brazen, and offensive. Generally, prisoners adapted to this new sense
of humor only after a period of adjustment. A situation that was funny to veteran prisoners was
often terrifying and repulsive to new prisoners, testifying to the long-term prisoners’ gradual adaptation to the brutality of the camps. From the lively stories the old-timers told and the expressions
they used, the new prisoners were able to derive information on how to survive, what were the
norms of the cooperative lifestyle in the pathological world of the camp, and how to relate to the
reality of their new lives. This was the educational, didactic function of humor in the camp; a successful joke could replace long explanations and illustrate the situation better than relating numerous details.34
Defensive Humor: Gallows Humor, Self-Directed Humor, and
Food
Gallows Humor
A form of defensive humor, called “gallows humor,” is a vehicle for reducing anxiety that accompanies an awareness of death. Humans are capable of joking about death because we celebrate the
fact that we are alive. By joking about death, we tell ourselves that we are unlike the dead. We
laugh at the dead because laughter helps us feel superior in comparison.35 Gallows humor is also a
means for raising the societal morale of the oppressed, to endow them with elements of resistance
to their oppressors and perhaps to undermine the morale of the tyrants who have caused suffering.
In other words, gallows humor is a means of self-protection and emotional escape from a brutal
reality.36 Like hope, gallows humor allows an afflicted person to focus on the unbearable and bear
it.37
A boy, about ten years old, was brought to the gas chamber at Auschwitz extermination camp
along with some other children. While the other children cried and shouted, this child burst
out laughing. An SS man approached the child and asked him why he was laughing. The child
replied, “You are bringing me to my death, and for this I’m supposed to wait in line?” The SS
man took the child out of the line, and the child was saved.38
There was a famous joke in Warsaw, but not only in Warsaw: Two Jews meet, and one of them
eats a piece of scented soap. The other Jew asks him, “Moishe, how come you’re eating scented
34
Zenon Jagoda, Stanisław Kłodziński, and Jan Masłowski, Oświęcim nieznany (Krakow: Wydawnictwo
Literackie, 1981), 137–59.
35 Chaya Ostrower, “I Laugh Therefore I Am: Humor as a Defense Mechanism in the Holocaust,” unpublished paper delivered at the 23rd International Society for Humor Studies Conference (Boston University,
5–9 July 2011).
36 Antonin Obrdlik, “‘Gallows Humor’: A Sociological Phenomenon,” American Journal of Sociology 47
(1942): 709–16.
37 George Vaillant, Adaptation to Life (Boston: Little Brown, 1977), 117.
38 I was told this story by a woman who attended one of my lectures. The child was a relative of the woman.
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soap?” Moishe responds, “If they’re going to turn me into soap, at least I’ll smell good.” My
God, there were things like that.39
In Plaszów we didn’t have soap. Those who talked about soap used to say, “Wait, wait, when we
get to Auschwitz they’ll make soap out of us.” In Plaszów we already knew about Auschwitz,
as I told you, and they used to say, “Yes, wait and see, yes, there we will have soap. That’s the
place of the personalized soap industry.” The researchers claim that it’s not true—I don’t know,
but the jokes about it were.40
Self-directed Humor
Another form of defensive humor is “self-directed,” or the ability to laugh at one’s own weaknesses. Like gallows humor, self-directed humor is a defense mechanism that contains an element
of power. Only a self-confident person can reveal his or her weaknesses.
Since the harsh reality of life in the ghetto and the camps imposed inordinate stress on human
beings, the Jews grasped at self-ridicule to turn their harsh reality into an object of laughter, and
they used self-directed humor as protective ammunition against attacks of despair. As Lila Holtzman
said, “Most of the humor was self-directed humor. It was directed against ourselves, events, circumstances, immediate situations, what was happening to us.” Some examples:
The Führer asks Frank, “What evils and misfortunes have you brought upon the Jews of Poland?”
“I took away their livelihood; I robbed them of their rights; I established labor camps, and we are
making them work at hard labor there; I have stolen all their wealth and property.” But the Führer
is not satisfied with all these acts. So Frank adds: “Besides that, I have established Judenraten
and Jewish Self-Aid Societies.” The Führer is satisfied, and smiles at Frank. “You hit the target
with the Judenraten, and Self-Aid will ruin them. They will disappear from the earth!”41
A Jew alternately laughs and yells in his sleep. His wife wakes him up. He is mad at her. “I was
dreaming someone had scribbled on a wall: ‘Beat the Jews! Down with ritual slaughter!’” Wife:
“So what were you so happy about?” Husband: “Don’t you understand? That means the good old
days have come back! The Poles are running things again!”42
The first time that I took the things like this, not so conventionally, was when they cut our hair in
Auschwitz. That was something terrible. We went into the shower and came out of it. It all went
so fast, we did not understand what it meant, and so fast, we didn’t have a moment to think. And
after they cut my hair off . . . suddenly, I saw some girlfriends of mine, that I’d known for a very
long time. You couldn’t recognize them, and then I started laughing. I don’t know, many cried.
They cried for their long hair, and then I started laughing, and they asked: “What, are you out
39
40
41
42
Told by Felicja Karay.
Told by Orna Birnbach.
Chaim A. Kaplan, Scroll of Agony: The Warsaw Diary of Chaim A. Kaplan (Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1999), 205.
Ringelblum, Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto, 79.
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of your mind, what are you laughing about?” I said: “I never had this before, a hairdo for free,
never in my whole life.” Yes, that is what I said, “I never had a hairdo for free before,” and I still
remember, they looked at me as if I was crazy.43
Always, whenever they beat us we had to run. I always asked this friend: “Do you know how
many meters we ran?” She asked: “Why is it important to you?” I said: “Important, important.
I know there is a hundred meters, two hundred meters, I want to know how much I ran, I need
to know my achievements.” So, there were those who said: “She is out of her mind, she’s nuts,”
but some laughed, sure there were some. I had friends, they joked also, not only was I the clown,
but everyone took part, and contributed, and it made life a lot easier, a lot easier. I made fun only
with those who wanted to hear. Not everyone wanted to hear.44
Humor about Food
Humor about food was a form of defensive humor that was very prevalent in the ghettos and camps.
This type of humor is also a function of a defense mechanism: food and the exchange of recipes
were associated with another reality that the prisoners could only dream about.
There was a lot of humor over food. What does a person talk about? About what he lacks! The
first thing was food. Because every single animal, what does it look for? Not diamonds and not
houses, but food.45
The Holocaust survivors who were interviewed for this study observed that humorous conversations about food served as a defense mechanism against the constant hunger pangs they suffered.
The many recipes exchanged between camp prisoners became famous as their reputation spread, as
well as stories about the wide variety of dishes and foods that the prisoners ate in their imagination.
Jean Amery wrote in his book:
No, we were not afraid of death. I clearly recall how comrades in whose blocks selections for the
gas chambers were expected did not talk about it, while with every sign of fear and hope they did
talk about the consistency of the soup that was to be dispensed.46
There were all kinds of groups that built around them defense mechanisms. There were those
who exchanged recipes all day. We were supposed to stay in our bunks on Sundays. Recipes were
passed through the bunks—how much sugar, how much flour, how much this or that. Someone
next to me gave many recipes and then all of a sudden her mood changed and she didn’t want to
participate. They asked if I knew what happened to her, I said: “I think she burned her cake.”47
43
44
45
46
47
Told by Lily Rickman.
Told by Lily Rickman.
Told by Yehuda Feigin.
Jean Amery, At the Mind’s Limits: Contemplations by a Survivor on Auschwitz and Its Realities
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1980), 18.
Told by Lily Rickman.
194
Interpretation: A Journal of Bible and Theology 69(2)
The Intellectual Function of Humor
Humor is a kind of enjoyable game that allows word play, distortions of meaning, and violations
of the laws of logic. Thus, humor allows intellectual freedom to think in ways that deviate from
conventional thought, to enjoy absurd situations, and to solve problems in unconventional ways.48
For example:
A Nazi woman enters a butcher shop in Berlin. She looks around suspiciously and then asks:
“Is this a pure German butcher shop or a filthy Jewish one?” “My dear lady,” said the butcher.
“How can you even think of such a thing? Of course this is a pure German butcher shop—only
pigs come to shop here!”
There’s a Jew riding in a streetcar. When he comes to the Hitler Platz,49 he cries “Amen!”50
There were two Jews in the ghetto, Kohn and Heller, who organized a kind of tram with horses,
it looked like a railway car with horses. They called it the Kohnhellerka because the owners were
Kohn and Heller. Now you must know that in Warsaw, the Warsaw Ghetto, there were tons of
lice, and people died from diseases caused by the lice. . . . Masses died from typhus. Now there
was this well-known Polish historical writer of fiction, Jozef Ignacy Kraszewski, who wrote
a novel called Cottage Behind the Village, in Polish that’s chata za wsią. . . . Now what did
the ghetto residents do? They used that title and called this horse-drawn coach chata ze wszą.
I remember that. In Polish it sounds like almost the same thing, it rhymes with the book title,
but it means, “A cabin with lice.” They called it that because it was a very dangerous means of
transportation, as it was full of lice.51
A mother gives food to her child, and the child asks, “Momma, who are the worst people, the
very worst people in the whole world?” The mother says in Yiddish, Ess, ess mein Kind—
that means “Eat, eat, my child”—but in Yiddish, it sounds like “the SS, my child.” Each time
someone gave someone else some food, he/she would say, Ess, ess mein Kind.52
Conclusion
Existence in ghettos and camps was pathological. Similarly, the elements of humor that appeared
in these places were far from our regular, everyday comprehension of the term humor. This humor
was special and distinctive, its subject matter and means of expression were so varied, that it cannot be evaluated according to standard criteria and concepts. The difference between the quality
of laughter in death camps and that of comical experiences in everyday life outside the camps can
be seen in the fact that comic situations appeared in relation to the most negative and painful emotions. This is the uniqueness of Holocaust humor. It was created under pathological circumstances
48
49
50
51
52
Ziv, Personality and Sense of Humor, 79–81.
The noun Platz refers to a city square, but the verb platz means “burst” or “explode.”
Ringelblum, Notes from the Warsaw Ghetto, 68.
Told by Ruth Sheinfeld.
Told by Nachum Monderer-Manor.
Ostrower
195
of constant threat to one’s life and health, under never-ending and extreme stress, often in situations
that are incomparable to anything people had known previously, situations that outside the ghetto
or camp would evoke fear and repulsion, rather than humor.
One of the Nazis’ aims during the Holocaust was to humiliate Jews. Self-directed humor
strengthened these Jews, thus serving as an effective defense mechanism. Furthermore, when they
laughed at themselves and their situation, their self-directed humor allowed them to do the exact
opposite of what the Nazis intended. They were able to maintain their humanity, “to feel that we’re
still human.” The expression “maintaining the image of humanity” appeared time and again in the
interviews.
It is important to emphasize that humor during the Holocaust did not objectively diminish the
horrors that the survivors underwent. However, it did diminish their subjective feeling of these horrors. It helped the survivors to look at horrors from a different perspective. Most of them emphasized that humor helped them cope with the horrors they experienced, and humor had protected
them. At the same time, they did not ignore—nor could they ignore—that they were, indeed, living
in the very heart of darkness and horror. Humor was their magnificent way of coping with these
horrors, and their narratives are a fabric of horror stories interwoven with strands of macabre
humor.
The generation of Holocaust survivors who are still alive is aging. The youngest among them
are now in their eighties and nineties. This is the time to study and record everything related to their
lives during the Holocaust, including those topics of silence, the subjects that have been, and still
are, taboo.
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