The Last Seder: A Memory of Light
Before the forced silence of the Secret Annex, there was the quiet celebration of Passover. In April 1942, just a few short months before they would go into hiding, the Frank and van Pels families came together. They shared a Seder meal, a timeless ritual of remembrance and hope.
For Hermann, a cousin of Auguste van Pels, it was a moment etched forever in his memory. “It was the last Seder evening I spent with a family,” he recalled. His words paint a vivid picture of a home filled with warmth: the “cultured mother” Edith, the “charming father” Otto, and the two sisters, Margot and Anne. The entire household, he noted, “exuded old Jewish culture.”
But it was Anne who left the deepest impression. Hermann remembered her face, with its “huge, dark, expressive eyes.” It was Anne, as the youngest at the table, who spoke the traditional Hebrew question, the “Manischtano,” the “four questions” that open the Seder. Her voice, filled with an ancient tradition, filled the room. No one at the table could have known that this intelligent and charming child held a genius for writing, a genius that would one day change the world.
This memory of a peaceful Seder meal stands in stark contrast to the fate that awaited them. It was a last moment of shared joy, a final act of tradition before their lives were violently and irreversibly changed. This year, as Pesach begins, we remember that this story is not just one of loss, but one of light, a memory of a family celebrating life and culture even as darkness loomed.