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Elio Toaff (30 April 1915 – 19 April 2015) was the Chief Rabbi of Rome from 1951 to 2002. He served as a rabbi in Venice from 1947, and in 1951 became the Chief Rabbi of Rome.
In the wake of Pietro Badoglio's declaration of a cessation of hostilities with the Allies on 8 September 1943, Toaff and his family were forced to go into hiding, as Germany invaded Italy. He shut the synagogue when German troops arrived, an event coinciding with Yom Kippur that year, and, with the help of the Anconians, hid the members of the community in local houses and in parish churches. The adolescents and children were put on a boat sailing south to the area under the control of the Allies. The Nazis and their remaining fascist allies in Italy reacted to the armistice by organizing the first deportations for concentration camps and Arbeitslager. Toaff had been tipped off by the local parish priest that an attempt would be made to assassinate him, and he, together with his father, his wife Lia Luperini and their son Ariel Toaff, managed to take refuge in Versilia, thanks to the hospitality of the parish priest, don Francalanci. Toaff did not have the option of fleeing Italy, mindful of his father's words that: 'A rabbi does not have the same freedom of choice others have; he can never abandon his community.'Eric J. Lyman, 'Rabbi Elio Toaff who ushered in an era of closer ties between Jews and the Vatican dies at 99,' The Jerusalem Post 20 April 2015. He recalled later every Jew in Ancona survived the war thanks to the assistance given by their Catholic neighbours. Toaff was captured by the Waffen-SS during a raid, and was saved from being executed as others had been who were caught in the roundup, when the Austrian, with whom he had conversed a little in French, and who was in charge of the execution, gave the order to release him as he was digging his own grave. Catholic families helped them throughout their flight, which led them to a refuge also in Città di Castello where, in 1999, he was accorded their honorary citizenship. Toaff himself joined the Italian Resistance in the mountains of central Italy, working also to secure the safety of fellow Jews. His company was the first to enter the village after the SS executed the Sant'Anna di Stazzema massacre, in which 560 villagers were murdered. He recalled coming across a woman who appeared to be asleep but, on closer inspection, had been disembowelled, with her fetus nearby, ripped from the womb, and shot through the head.
From his experiences, Toaff stated that Italians were not anti-Semitic, that the survival of the Jews during the war was due to the assistance other Italians provided them during that period, and that Jews were perfectly integrated into their respective communities.Florette Rechnitz Koffler, Richard Koffler, (eds.), Uncertain Refuge: Italy and the Jews During the Holocaust, University of Illinois Press, 1995 pp.122-126 p.122,
Toaff resigned as chief rabbi at the age of 86 on 8 October 2001 and was succeeded by Riccardo Di Segni. On the eve of his retirement, Toaff said:
'A rabbi doesn't work only for his community or for the Jews. A rabbi has to talk to every human being who needs him. He belongs to everybody. He is for everybody.'
On 17 May 2012, he was awarded the Prize Culturae within the Italian National Festival of Cultures in Pisa.
Toaff died on 19 April 2015, 11 days before his 100th birthday.Eve Thomas, 'Elio Toaff: Chief Rabbi of Rome who stood with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican's drive to reach out to other religions,' The Independent 21 April 2015.
Pope Francis sent a telegram to Dr. Riccardo Di Segni, Toaff's successor as Chief Rabbi of Rome:
Toaff and his wife had four children: three sons, one being Ariel Toaff, and a daughter, who married Sergio Della Pergola and lives in Israel.Avner Falk, Antisemitism: A History and Psychoanalysis of Contemporary Hatred, Greenwood Publishing 2008 pp.66-67.
On 13 April 1986, Toaff was greeted by, and prayed with, Pope John Paul II during a visit to the Great Synagogue of Rome, the first by a reigning pope to a Jewish house of worship. Rather than extending his hand for a formal handshake, Toaff embraced the Pope.Frank J. Korn, Hidden Rome, Paulist Press,2002 pp.16-17. On 7 April 1994, Toaff co-officiated at the Papal Concert to Commemorate the Shoah at the Sala Nervi in Vatican City, along with Pope John Paul II, and the President of Italy Oscar Luigi Scalfaro.
Rabbi Toaff remained friends with John Paul until the pontiff's death and attended his funeral. He was one of the two people who the pope mentioned in his last will and testament, in which he stated: "How can I fail to remember the rabbi of Rome, and the numerous representatives of non-Christian religions?" The only other living person to be named was John Paul's longtime personal secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz.
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