October 4 1999

ARTICLE TOOLS

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On a cold night in early March 1943, Metropolitan Stefan, head of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church in Sofia, Bulgaria, came to a stop at an isolated railroad crossing. A train was slowly passing by. From its cars, Stefan heard cries—the sobs of men, women, and children begging "for mercy, for help, for water, for air," as he wrote immediately in protest to Bulgaria's king.

The train he had seen was carrying Jews from Bulgaria's western territories, which Bulgaria had newly acquired by treaty from Germany, to the gas chambers in Treblinka, Poland. Over the next few days, those cars would deport over 11,000 Jews to their deaths. Stefan, who was already vigorously opposing Bulgaria's new Law for National Defense that severely restricted the rights of Jews, now promised himself he would renew his efforts to help his country's Jews.

Only recently, with the collapse of communism, have the details of Stefan's work as well as that of his fellow priest Metropolitan Kyril, and the keen political maneuvering of Dmitur Peshev, vice-president of Parliament and an Orthodox Christian, been publicly acknowledged in Bulgaria. What these three men and other people of like mind accomplished through their opposition can be seen in one telling statistic: more than 50,000 Jews resided in Bulgaria before the war; by war's end that number had actually slightly increased. That Bulgaria's Jews were largely spared is all the more remarkable considering that Bulgaria was allied with Germany and had thousands of German troops on its soil. Here is the untold story of the massive rescue of Bulgaria's Jews—a story of faith in God, of clear-headed convictions, and of righteous action.

By the beginning of World War II, a pro-German government had been ...