Three Catholic monks saying kaddish (the prayer for the dead) for a converted Jewish baron today startled a local synagogue congregation out of its customary Sabbath equanimity. The monks entered the synagogue in the middle of the service and stayed to the end to say the kaddish. Asked for an explanation by the elders of the congregation after the service, the monks told the following story. They explained they had come to say kaddish in accordance with the terms of the will of the late Baron Otto von Taussig. The baron, who was born a Jew, became a convert to Christianity and then military adjutant to the late Emperor. In this capacity he accompanied the Emperor to the city of Przemysl where the Jews received them with the traditional bread and salt.
Among those Jews was a girl with whom the baron fell in love, but the parents of the Jewess refused to give their consent to marriage although the baron agreed to return secretly to Judaism. As a result of this the baron became melancholy and began to lead the life of a recluse. On his deathbed he willed his entire estate to an order of Catholic monks who maintained hospitals and welfare institutions for those unfortunates who had been rejected by society. One of the conditions of his willing the property to the monks was that every year on the anniversary of his death they should visit a synagogue and say kaddish for him.
Today was the anniversary of the baron’s death and the monks came to the local synagogue to say the prayer for the dead.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
