Sacred fire

A collection of Torah discussions on the biblical portions of the week and the Jewish holidays, delivered in the Warsaw ghetto by Shapira (1889-1943), the Rebbe of Piaseczno, between September 1939-July 1942. The book comprises a torah of suffering, combining traditional Jewish theology, hasidic ideas, and personal insights of a devout Torah personality who shared the pain of his people while retaining his faith. Among the theological ideas stressed are fear of Heaven, the combination of God's judgment and mercy, and, finally (from March 1940), God's pain. A basic motif is the martyrdom of Rabbi Akiva and his affirmation of the unity of God. Discusses the dehumanization of the Jews, and their loss of faith as a result of their being traumatized (he refers to the loss of self), and the concern that the scale of suffering would dull a Jew's compassion for individual fellow Jews. (From the Bibliography of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism - The Hebrew University of Jerusalem)