Copyright 2024 Joseph Shulam
Joseph Vactor passed away on Dec. 29th. 1997. It was the seventh candle of Hanukkah on that day when Joseph Vactor went to be with the Lord. It was fifty-two years from the time that God saved him from a sure death during the Holocaust. How providential can a message be in such a time as this? Everyone who visited our congregation in Jerusalem noticed and admired our brother Joseph. He was an extraordinary person. And Joseph Vactor epitomizes the dichotomy between tears and joy in our lives.
If you have visited Netivyah, you will remember Joseph Vactor as the older man who always sat in the front. He had long hair and a long beard. He had blue eyes with the radiance of kindness. Joseph Vactor was never ashamed to correct anyone who made a mistake regarding the Bible. I suppose that the best Scriptures that could explain Joseph Vactor to those who did not know him would be:
"Therefore, having these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God." (2 Corinthians 7:1)
Very few people I have ever met took these words of God in the seriousness that such a command would demand.
Joseph was born in Hungary in 1915, just before World War I. All his life, Joseph lived as a devout God-fearing Orthodox Jew. When in 1944, the Germans marched what was left of the Hungarian Jews on a long winter march, on foot, to the death camps. Joseph and his brother David were among those who went on that march. Until that time, Joseph and David had no clue of Yeshua, the Messiah. They were Orthodox Jews, lived as Orthodox Jews, and had minimal contact with the Gentile Christians who were their neighbors.
During this death march in the winter of 1944, Joseph saw a corpse on the side of the road. The dead person was an Orthodox Jew, which could be seen from the clothing that he was wearing. In the hand of this corpse, something from black leather looked like a billfold. Joseph bent down and took that black leather "thing" from the dead man's hand. Only when they were already in the death camp of Bergen-Belsen, and only when they could find a moment of privacy did Joseph Vactor open the little leather pouch? It was not a billfold. It was a leather-bound New Testament in Hungarian, the only book that Joseph and David, his brother, had to read during the days of their captivity.
I learned that Joseph had begun to eat green leaves and things one can find in nature during the war years. I learned from Joseph that he continued to eat green things like leaves from trees, raw vegetables, and what vegetables were left in the market at the end of the day so that he could live without needing to depend on this world and other people. He wanted to be free from the boundaries of his flesh and walk in the Spirit of God without fear from and dependence upon man. We do not have to do what Joseph did or start eating green and strange things to walk in the Spirit of God. However, we need to find out what things bind us to this world and our lives fleshiness, making us over-dependent on the flesh and not dependent enough on the Spirit of God that gives us life.
We buried Joseph on the Mount of Olives overlooking the Judean Desert and the Mountains of Moab. Concerning this world, our brother Joseph lived in physical poverty, but in the Lord, Joseph was very wealthy.
Just a few years ago, when Joseph was younger, he could complete any chapter from the Bible if you could give him the first verse. In the middle of the lesson, he was known to correct anyone who made a significant mistake or misrepresented what the Bible teaches. Joseph Vactor did not care if you were a president of a University or a member of the congregation. He called you on your mistake with much love and kindness, but at the same time, with great passion for the truth.
Despite Joseph's poverty in material things, the Lord opened the possibility for him to be buried with the wealthy Jews from the most devout families buried on the Mount of Olives. Just think about this man today, and imagine if you could be happy with the Lord if your only possessions were Yeshua, the Messiah, and Eternal life.
Joseph Vactor was a great example of the tears and joy of living a Christian life. In the winter of 1992, one of the most brutal winters that we had in Israel, a large woman slipped on ice in the Jerusalem Machane Yehuda Market and fell on top of Joseph and broke his leg. Joseph was taken to the hospital, and a cast was put on his leg. He was brought to the Ne>vyah building. Our sisters and brothers took care of Joseph for about half a year while he needed to use a wheelchair; even when he was in great pain, Joseph was rejoicing in the Lord. He said it was a great privilege for him to experience his broken leg. He concentrated on what he could learn about people in wheelchairs and what focused on positivity even though he could not run around the marketplace and gather vegetables.
Since World War II, Joseph Vactor has been sleeping outside. Joseph ran away from the labor camp outside Beren Belzen during the war. It was just a few months before the war's end, and Joseph lived alone in the forest for three months in the winter of 1944. During that time, Joseph learned to eat the leaves from the trees and other things that one can find in nature. If I would eat what Joseph lived on for one day, the next day, you would have to bury me.
I met Joseph Vactor for the first time in 1973. A group of students from the Yeshiva (Rabbinical College) I studied at wanted to settle in Judea, in Tekoa, where Amos the prophet lived. I loaded my car with Orthodox Jews who studied in the same Yeshiva. We drove to Tekoa, and as I was driving, I looked through the mirror and saw two Orthodox people looking through one of the Bible correspondence courses that I had written and printed. It brought some fear into my consciousness. On the way back to Jerusalem, after all the other students left the car, these two Orthodox Jews lifted the pamphlet and asked, "Who wrote this?" I answered that I did it. They asked me, "And do you believe what is written here?" Yes, I said to them. "We also believe that Yeshua is the Messiah," they said. Since that time, 1974, our paths have not parted.
Joseph, who started to believe while in the concentration camp during the war, spoke to David, his brother, about Yeshua. They did not know that there were other Jews who believed in Yeshua, the Messiah.
Joseph continued allowing Yeshua to shape his life daily. I remember in 1975 when Joseph was beaten by a group of Orthodox Jewish thugs at the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem. He was beaten for his faith in Yeshua and because he passed pamphlets at the wall calling upon the Orthodox Jews to repent.
Joseph Vactor was 82 years old when he went to be with the Lord, but his service to the Kingdom of God is worth many such lifetimes. We depart from our brother Joseph Vactor with tears and joy, as he has been faithful under extreme circumstances.
I want to say one last thing about Joseph Vactor. Joseph lost his whole family, his father and mother, three sisters, and a wife in the Holocaust. He served in the labor camp under the Nazis. He could have been very bitter about what the Germans did to him. But Joseph was compassionate toward the Germans who visited our congregation. He was always considerate that we did not hurt the feelings of the Germans., and he forgave the Germans for what they did to him. He did it with the power of God and the Holy Spirit, and God cleansed his heart from all bitterness and filled it with great love.
We will miss Joseph Vactor from our congregation and our lives. But, if we walk through the valley of tears with the Joy of the Lord, we will see Joseph and all the other saints throughout eternity.