Death of Daniel Farhi

August 23, 2021

Shaken and saddened by the death of Daniel Farhi, Les Enfants et Amis Abadi wish to pay tribute to him through the voices of all their members.

Daniel Farhi was also a friend of that wonderful couple, Odette and Moussa Abadi, whom he married in a religious ceremony in 1989.

Once the ordeals of the war were behind them, Odette and Moussa were married in a civil ceremony on November 3, 1959 in Paris, at the town hall of the 12th.

Odette called herself an atheist Jew, and Moussa, born in Syria, though brought up by an observant family, had no religious observance: Moussa was “on bad terms with God”. Yet at the age of 79, perhaps a little more at peace, they both decided to stand under the “chuppah” and quite naturally went to see a rabbi – but Odette could not prove that she was Jewish. It must be said that her mother and sister had not come back from Auschwitz; that was not enough of a passport, nor was Odette’s own deportation. That is how they came to know a liberal rabbi in the strongest sense of the word: a man open to his time, humane, who, on hearing the story of what the couple had done, asked them without further ado: “When would you like it?” It was quite simply a Talmud Torah day, with two people present as witnesses and children who sang after the blessing. A ceremony without pomp, which Daniel told us about so many times.

From then on, Daniel and his wife Paule were among the Friends of Odette and Moussa, and it was Daniel who accompanied them both at their deaths.
Throughout the following years, we – their “Enfants et Amis Abadi” – were accompanied at the commemorations by you, Daniel, who each time knew so well how to speak to us of them, recalling them with such friendship and respect. You welcomed us at the MJLF until 2012, then at Montparnasse cemetery around them, which was a considerable physical effort.

Thank you again – thank you, too, for knowing how, at those moments, to embrace believers and non-believers alike in the same “liberal” ceremony, inviting us to meditate on remembrance.
You shared with us a text by Chief Rabbi Louis-Germain Lévy, “Vous vous souviendrez” (You shall remember). We will remember you, Daniel, for “remembrance is a powerful thing”.

We offer our most sincere condolences to Paule Farhi, his wife, his children, grandchildren and the whole family.

Andrée Karsenti