The ninety-three Bais Yaakov girls of Cracow: history or typology?

Analyzes a story about 93 students of the Bais Yaakov religious Jewish girls' high school in Kraków who, in July 1942, opted to commit suicide rather than be sent to a brothel for German soldiers. Many scholars doubt the authenticity of this story. It is impossible now to conclude whether this story of Jewish martyrdom is true or not. However, the girls' action conforms with the religious pattern of Jewish acts of "kiddush ha-Shem" (sanctification of God's name). Because of that, the story entered into religious Jewish poetry and fiction, was embellished with additional details, and was thus mythologized. Notes that the story helps modern Jewish theology to integrate the Holocaust into the age-old tradition of Jewish martyrdom.