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“"Among the many memorable things Dr. Fackenheim spoke of and/or published in his 87 active and productive years is his coining, in 1970, of the now-oft-referred-to expression, ‘the 614th Commandment’. Quoting Rabbi Fackenheim, Comper noted, “in Jewish tradition there are 613 commandments, sufficient for all situations future as well as past. But the tradition could not anticipate Hitler: the Holocaust was unpredictable, even for Torah.

“So what is this extra commandment that Dr. Fackenheim believes Jews should also live by?” asked Comper. “Let me restate the 614th Commandment,” he [Fackenheim] writes in one of his last essays, “That Jews are forbidden to give Hitler posthumous victories.

“When it comes to antisemitism, whether you look back 60 years, 600 or 6000, things that once seemed far-fetched — Kristallnacht, for example, or Auschwitz — have suddenly, brutally turned very real,” said Comper. “I am here today because I believe that this should not be a lonely battle, as it has so often been, for so many, for so long. And because I believe that this 614th Commandment is something we all should be living by."