“The only person who is a hero is my wife.” is probably a statement that every husband should utter regularly in order to recognize the amazing contributions that a wife and mother provides to the family unit, but when this was uttered by Dr. Jan Zabiński in reference to his wife Antonina Zabiński it was most certainly true. This statement stuck with me today as we walked around the Villa Under the Crazy Star at the Warsaw Zoo. This statement seems to be yet another example of the selfless nature of these amazing individuals, although I have to believe that perhaps a bit of this sentiment was uttered by Dr. Jan Zabiński (and by many, many husbands across the ages) in order to stay happily married. Perhaps I’ll learn this when I watch the movie depicting their story as I have not yet had the chance to catch this particular film and see how their husband/wife relationship is depicted by Hollywood.
Our time at the Warsaw Zoo caused me to wonder what causes someone to change from a bystander to an “upstander”? As a “Gentile” myself, I looked at the Zabińskis amazing story and wondered what the real-world situation was truly like for them. What events did they witness prior to this that caused them to devote themselves to saving others with a different belief system than themselves when they could have likely stayed safe? Could my wife and I have done this? Each one of us likes to think that we would also have been someone who would stand up to the Nazi regime, but the true context of situations such as this are much more complicated than a simple yes/no question. Would we answer in the same way when a weapon is pointed at our children or when a regiment of soldiers and tanks marches past our home? Would we indeed be able to stand up when our neighbors are being herded to a ghetto, but our home is skipped simply we somehow choose to worship in what someone perceives as the “right” way? In the small booklet from the Zabiński house, Dr. Zabiński answers these questions forthrightly for himself and his wife by saying “It was my obligation as a human being to help them. Nothing more than common decency.” As we learned today, it was far more than this.
