Mrs. Sylvia Gelman
Mr. & Mrs. Martin Freiberg, Mr. & Mrs. Nathan Fink, members of the Fink and Waks families, Prof. Andrew Markus and Mrs. Miriam Munz of Monash University's Australian Centre for the Study of Jewish Civilisation, Julie Grossbard of the Jewish Museum of Australia, Ladies and Gentlemen.
My name is Sylvia Gelman.It is my special privilege this evening to chair a panel discussion on the leadership role in the Jewish community of the late Mina Fink, of blessed memory.
The panel is composed of Mr Nathan Fink who will speak on behalf of the family; Mr Max Zilberman, one of the Buchenwald Boys, Mrs Malvina Malinek OAM, past State and National President of the National Council of Jewish Women; and Mrs Saba Feniger who, until her fairly recent retirement, was honorary curator of the Jewish Holocaust Museum.
I have been asked to provide a word portrait of the woman who became a legend in her own lifetime. The panelists, in the chronological order of Mina Fink's leadership activities, will speak about her organisational work and it's impact on the community. Individuals in the audience may then offer further new material.
All of us here this evening would have known the public Mina Fink, the Mina Fink of committees, of organisations - the United Jewish Overseas Relief Fund, the Australian Jewish Welfare and Relief Society, the National Council of Jewish Women, the State Zionist Council of Victoria and the Jewish Holocaust Museum.
Fewer may have known much about her private life.
Born in 1913 in Bialystock, Poland Mina Miriam Waks was the second of three children and the only girl. Tragically, she lost both parents before she was eight years old. The family was split up - the older brother went to live with their paternal grandparents; Mina and her younger brother went to live with their maternal grandparents, in what has been described as genteel poverty.
A highly intelligent girl and an assiduous student, Mina matriculated in 1932 and would have gone on to the university. But the direction of her life was about to be changed. Leo Fink, who had migrated to Australia in 1928 returned to his native Bialystock in search of a bride and there he found the lovely lively Mina Waks. They were married in 1932 and set off immediately for Australia. English had not been among the subjects she studied, but her suburban non-Jewish neighbours soon taught her English conversation. Daughter Freda was born in 1933 and son Nathan in 1935, then Mina brought her two brothers from Poland.
During World War II Mina worked as a volunteer at the Rockingham Convalescent Hospital. World War II politicised Leo and Mina. They abandoned their social life and immersed themselves in community service. They set up the United Jewish Overseas Relief Fund in 1943. Leo was the Foundation President from 1943-47 and Mina was the President of the Ladies Group from 1944-47. Speaking about the work of the United Jewish Overseas Relief Fund, Rabbi Wyshkowski said: 'it is the only institution in the history of Australian Jewry that has brought together every strata of the Jewish Community, all with one unified purpose in mind - the saving of their fellow Jews.'
But Mina also worked for the general community as National Council for Jewish Women's delegate to the National Council of Women in Victoria and as a Member of the Melbourne Lady Mayoress's Committee. In 1974 a grateful government bestowed on her Membership of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire - M.B.E. - for community services.
Throughout some 40 years of my involvement, first in Jewish sport and then in the growth and development of Mount Scopus Memorial College, I had been acutely aware of the tremendously vital community work being done by this remarkable couple - Leo and Mina Fink. However in all of that time I had not personally met either one of them.
In October 1969 I invited Mina Fink to come to Mount Scopus College to speak to the Year 12 girls about community service in general and, in particular about the work of the National Council of Jewish Women of which she was the National President.
I met a strikingly beautiful woman, simply but elegantly dressed. A quotation from a thirteenth century Persian poet (Djala Al-Dîn Rûmi) flashed into my mind. He had written 'a woman is a ray of divine light.' Indeed Mina Fink was a ray of divine light. When she spoke, she radiated enormous energy and enthusiasm. Inspired, she in turn inspired us.
Her every waking hour seemed to be filled with 60 minutes of thought, of action, not only for those she knew and loved but also for people and worthy causes, here and overseas - for Jews and non-Jews. Her commitments were so many and so varied that we wondered how one person could possibly do so much - so well! We were all enthralled by her words.
Mina Fink was a feminist - in the best sense of that word. She believed that women should not only have political, economic and social rights but that they should also exercise the responsibilities inherent in those rights!
Mina Fink saw the liberation of women as a positive step toward the betterment of all humankind. And in this, her support was not limited to the Jewish community. For example, when the National Council for Women of Australia undertook the building of a Hall of Residence for the native women to enable them to attend the University of Papua-New Guinea, it was Mina Fink who mobilised the National Council of Jewish Women to assist in the necessary fundraising. Mina Fink was courageous. She spoke out boldly and fearlessly against any form of discrimination - against anti-Semitism and against anti-Zionism. When Ida Nudel was sentenced to four years in a Siberian prison camp for wanting a visa to migrate to Israel, it was Mina Fink who led a National Council of Jewish Women delegation to the Russian Embassy in Canberra protesting against the deprivation of Nudel's human rights.
If we do not learn from the mistakes of the past, from the tragedies of History, humankind is doomed to repeat them.
Mina Fink knew this and knew that children and adults must be taught that hatred is destructive. It destroys the hated - the victims, it destroys haters and the aggressors; it destroys those who stand idly by - the indifferent, the uninterested, the uninvolved. She knew that people must be constantly reminded that they are each responsible for the other. That is why she worked so hard to help establish the Holocaust Museum and to ensure that Holocaust survivors were trained as guides. Mina Fink was passionately fond of Israel - the land and the people. She wanted to help make the desert bloom, to help the quality of life of the people.
The great French scientist Louis Pasteur said that an idea can only become a reality when it finds an open mind. Mina Fink had a mind open to ideas, to suggestions, to every twist and turn in the daily news; ready to act and react. Mina Fink was a leader, not only one who led, but also one who encouraged others to take up leadership responsibilities.
In 1969, a week after the earlier mentioned invitation to speak to the Year 12 girls at Mount Scopus College, Mina Fink rang me, inviting me to join the National Board of the National Council of Jewish Women of Australian for their 1970-1973 Triennial Conference. This offer came at the most propitious moment. I had already made arrangements to retire from teaching at the end of 1969. So, as one door was closing another was opening, revealing new challenges, new opportunities.
This was an invitation I readily accepted. However, in November 1972 when Mina said she wanted to nominate me as her successor as President of the National Council of Jewish Women of Australia, I refused. Taken completely by surprise, indeed, incredulous, I laughed, saying 'Mina you must be joking! Thank you, but no thank you.' I thought that that was the end of the matter. Little did I know that, having made her decision Mina was not to be denied. What followed was a period of coaxing with gentle pressure; then cajoling with increasing pressure. Finally, she resorted to coercion by co-opting my husband, I was caught in a pincer movement. I capitulated.
So, I followed Mina Fink as National President of National Council of Jewish Women of Australia, later as Vice-President of the International Council of Jewish Women, as Delegate to the National Council of Women of Victoria of which organisation I later became President.
In my earlier years in sport and at Mount Scopus College I had chosen to be involved. In the later years from 1970 onwards it was Mina who had chosen to involve me. This, of course, is one of the roles of a good leader. For her persistence, I am profoundly grateful. She gave my life new directions, new dimensions.
Mina Fink could well have personified the Eshet Hayil of Proverb 31 - 'She stretched out her hand to the poor, she put forth her hand to the needy. Strength and majesty were her garments. She opened her mouth with wisdom and the law of loving kindness was on her tongue.'
Ladies and Gentlemen, I think that, for this meeting's purpose, it is appropriate for me to conclude my remarks with the final line of Proverb 31, as I call on the panelists to speak, to - 'Let her works praise her in the gates.'