Intermarriage...Or Maybe Not

I wonder what they think of "intermarriage" when a gentile who is actually an  Anusi or Anusit marries a fellow Jew. The Nagy-Trudnyak and Korsch-Munka couple are a fine example of this. Nobody would've guessed (unless they really were paying attention or weren't in denial) that Mihaly and Anna Munkova Trudnyak were Anusim and bnei Anusim, whether or not they were "meshumadim"--which becomes a long discussion, because then the question becomes whether or not Yeshua would have led them to possible yeshuat had he not had them become Anusim ("possible" meaning that he may have led them, but whether or not they accepted is questionable. Their daughter Mary certainly did; and based on the fact that she even later said that we were Ukrainian [Great-Granddad was born in Cuman during a visit to Vil'gel'm Andrulevich in Buzhanka, and there were Trudnyakovs in Odessa.], I can safely assert that she knew that we are Jews.).

As far as the Trudnyaks, by the way, Anna's brother Ǎǔgǔstinǔs Samuel was the last one to be baptized (There is no baptism record for her, although there is one for the sister for whom she was named--given the birth date, July 27, 1888, that she gave for her own birthdate [which was a day after her sister's baptism date in 1884].). Mihaly and his sister Maria were baptized, but they were descended from Anusim Yosef Eleazar and Rosalia Dudayová and Mária Preczelmayerová, none of whom were baptized at birth.

My Response To "Taking My First Trip to Ukraine, Under the Watchful Eyes of Jesus"

Firstly, I think that brushing away the "holy water" was unnecessary. Unless one puts meaning behind an item or object, the item or object is just the said item or object--at least in cases where the object is not inherently signified or set apart as something. Secondly, when Malina wrote about how her "dad stood slouching in a back corner pew", I was reminded of my own Crypto-Jewish granddad falling asleep in the back of the church that he had his family attend (about which I was told by my aunt Mary--who was, although we are Ashkenazi, named for both of her then-living grandmothers [Mary Trudnak Czarnecki (z"l), the granddaughter of Mária Nagyová Trudnyaková; and Marysia "Mary" Rusnak Gaydos, a Levite and a granddaughter of Mária Nováková Rusznáková]. She distinctly remembers that Pop-Pop would fall asleep in the back of the church while Grandma would Dad and Aunt Mary with her in the church service.).

Thirdly, I relate to Malina's point about how "this is not how I envisioned my first trip to the country where my maternal grandmother... and her entire family fled during pogroms". As someone who just discovered that I'm Jewish and a bat-Anusim a while back, I myself am trying to recover of much of my Jewishness as possible (I was honestly raised to believe that my dad was fully Slavic [Polish, Lithuanian, and Czechoslovakian--I had no idea that he was an Ashkenazi Jew and Matrilineal Levite.]). Granted that I personally believe that one is still Jewish when he or she believes in Jesus (as I myself do), but I agree that a Jew is (to say the very least and maybe understating at least a little bit) remiss to have a Vaticanist ("Catholic", "universal") wedding. I also had to convince my sister and her to-be husband to incorporate some Messianic Jewish traditions into their to-be home (Granted that their officiant will be a Messianic Jewish pastor, but the wedding will still be traditionally Protestant and not Messianic Jewish--and as much as I love my to-be-in-law brother, I was hoping that my sister would find a fellow Jewish believer to marry.).

Example of Not-So-Obvious Jews: Andrew and Julia Fosko Rusnak

The Rusnaks (Rusznaks, Rosnaks, etc.) were Levites. Gyorgy "György Kvetkovits" and Erzsébet Molnárová Rusznák converted out of P'rushi Judaism during Anti Semitism and self exiled to what is now Zláta Idka. Andrew's dad was Jákáb Rusznák, and the Foczkos were Crypto-Jewish Levites themselves. Andrew even specifically wrote to Juliana Foczková, asking her to come to America and marry him. One can safely assume that this is because Juliana was a Levite, and for several reasons--including that at least some the Rusnaks who stayed in traditional Judaism married intratribally (e.g., Ieshaihau Iehiel  HaLevi Rosenblite and Miriam Rosia HaLevit Rosnoková Rosenbliteová ), and there were at least quite a few marriages between the families of Juliana's parents (István Foczko and Johanna Hanzóková Foczková, whose mother was a Lázárová--although whether she was a kohenet and descendant of Ele'azar HaKohein ben-Aharon HaKohein ben-'Amram HaLevi [אלעזר כהן בן אהרן הכהן בן 'עמרם הלוי] cannot be determined). The reasons mentioned hearken to Numbers 36:5-12 (despite the P'rushi attempt to lift of the ban on intertribal marriage).

For more on Anusim (Crypto Jews), see the Jewish Virtual Library's "Anusim".

It reads in part, "In Jewish sources, the term anusim is applied not only to the forced converts themselves, but also to their descendants who clandestinely cherished their Jewish faith, attempting to observe at least vestiges of the *halakhah, and loyalty to their Jewish identity." Anusim and bnei-Anusim like Andrew and Julia could and/or did not observe everything due to dread of Anti Semitism (e.g., "Following the establishment of the Inquisition, Jewish observance by New Christians became dangerous as well as difficult." In the same way in Europe, Andrew's grandparents had to actually be "acquitted" to marry, thus proving their conversion genuine in the eyes of the Slovakian-Hungarian Vaticanist Church.).