A Haskama And A Story

The sefer Degel Machaneh Ephraim contains the haskamos from many great tzaddikim, including Rebbe Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev, the Maggid of Koznitz, the Chozeh of Lublin, the Ohev Yisroel, Rebbe Menachem Mendel of Liska, the Be'er Mayim Chaim, and Rabbi Yosef Shaul HaLevi Nathanson.

During the Holocaust this sefer was printed in Hungary. The 1942 printing includes the haskamos of Rabbi Mordechai Brisk and Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Ehrenreich, both of whom were murdered in Auschwitz.

Before going to the gas chambers in Auschwitz on the 11th of Sivan, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Ehrenreich turned to one his disciples and said, "We are now going to sanctify Hashem with simcha"

This story leaves me speechless. This is a level that I cannot even fathom.

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Note: Both Rabbi Modechai Brisk and Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Ehrenreich went to gas chambers in Auschwitz on June 2, 1944. On June 2nd, sixty years later, my son was born.