Texts of Holocaust-Lamentations, op. 63

TEXTS OF HOLOCAUST-LAMENTATIONS, OP. 63

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  • Composed/Words by Mr. Eero Järvilehto
  • (With Words from The Holly Bible, The Book of Lamentations)

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 PART: 1. Text by Mr. Eero Järvilehto, translated by Mr. Topi Ylinen

 Initial Prayer: ”In Memoriam”

  •  (Slide: 1.)

We murdered over six million people, over six million people. All of them innocent. Innocent children, a million and a half. Old men and women, women, men, fathers, mothers… We murdered you like the dust of the earth, like the stars in the sky. No family, no house untouched by us, unspoiled by us, no hearts spared from being shattered by us.

We, the ravening wolves, we burned your shrine, we stole your property, we divided your families and took them away into imprisonment, to be annihilated. We slew you with hunger, with pestilence, with weapons, and with fire. Like the ravening wolves, we tore wives and husbands away from each other, and never again did they meet, nor hear of each other’s fates. Only agony and misery bleeding inside them, until their strength wasted away.

We, the ravening wolves, tore children from the arms of their mothers. ”TAKE ONE, LEAVE THE OTHER! MAKE YOUR CHOISE!” we yelled, ”OR YOU WILL LOSE EVERYTHING!” And yet, you did lose everything, from your family only you survived, you alone.

Woe for the crying, the howling. Woe for the agony, which we, the stone-hearted, emotionless champions, murderers, posing as heroes, brought about. Woe for the hardness of our hearts, the wickedness of our hands, the coldness of our eyes. A dead eye was more loving than our eyes.

Woe to us, for destruction will catch us, doom will cast us down, the hills will fall upon us with the wrath of God, when his just and righteous judgement strikes us. Woe for our impenitence, our pride, did we not learn a thing? Woe to us, liars, murderers, false heroes, villains.

O Lord, break the hardness in our hearts, rive us the mind of a penitent before it is too late, too late… I cry for the impenitence of my people, the hardness of my heart. Over than six million people, six million people… Innocent children, a million and a half. Old men and women, women, all kinds of people, like the sands of sea, like the stars in the sky. I cry for your memory, your memory and your descendants. For those who survived… For all of you…

I cry, I am speechless…

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 PARTS: 2. – 6. Texts are from The Holly Bible, Book: Lamentation – (complete)

  • (Slides 2-35)

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PART: 7. Text by Mr. Eero Järvilehto, translated by Mr. Topi Ylinen

Conclusion Prayer: ”The Lord, have mercy on us”

  • Slide: 36.

O Lord, I praise you, for you have changed the fate of your people, you have saved your people from the hands of their persecutors. I thank you, o Lord, for you have not completely forsaken your people, you have fulfilled your promise, for your own name.

  • Slide: 37.

O Lord, have mercy on me, have mercy on all of us gentiles, we are guilty before your eyes, we have stained our hands with innocent blood, we have become unclean. Lord, our guilt is too great to bear, our clothes are covered with blood, our hearts are hardened like stones. We are good for nothing, but to be cast out, to be forgotten in oblivion.

  • Slide: 38.

O Lord, forget not those who hold you in awe, forget not your people, Israel. Lord, I cry, have mercy on me, have mercy on our people. We are guilty, murderers, liars. Do not let our hearts harden, grow proud and say: ”We need no Lord.”

  • Slide: 39.

O Lord, if you forsake your people, what will befall us? If you, O Lord, forsake your people for a time, for destruction, then what will befall us wretched gentiles, if you forsake us? I cry, forsake not your people! O Lord, have mercy on us, have mercy on us! Forgive us our sins, cleanse our bloodstained clothes and hands. Cleanse our unclean hearts, and forgive us our sins. Hear my plea, O Lord: ”HAVE MERCY, Have Mercy, have mercy…”

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PART 8.: Instrumental

  • (Slide 40)

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THE END!

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Texts are included in My compositions:

  • op. 63, Holocaust-Lamentations – reader, chamber ensemble, 8 women’s voices, (include: 2 solo parts)
  • op. 133, Prayers for The Broken Ones – Interludes for My Poems – reader, flute, piano