The World That Was: Lithuania: A Study of the Life and Torah Consciousness of Jews in the Towns and Villages of Lithuania

by Yitzchok Kasnett

First-person accounts from such people as Rabbi Mordechai Gifter, Rabbi Nochum Zev Dessler, Rabbi Avigdor Miller, and Rebbetzin Zlota Ginsburg; histories of famous and little-known places, more than 100 photographs, stories, maps and statistics about the way it was and the people who shaped today's yeshivah world.

Genres: Jewish

143 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 1997

Reviews

[Marsha Altman]

This book is made for American Haredi (Litvak black hatters) schools, with assignments and study guides. It propagates the Lakewood-based American religious mythology that Eastern Europe was somehow a great place to be, except for all the crushing poverty and evil gentiles, and also some bad Jews who were not religious and no good came of them, except that they went on to actually found the cultural institutions of Judaism in America that would allow Haredi culture to later thrive in an American system.. As a cultural study this book is fascinating and I highly recommend it.