Reb Aron Tenenbaum saw chassidic royalty, faced death in seven concentration camps, rebuilt a successful life in Italy, and finally realized his dream in Jerusalem
When he met the Sanzer Rebbe shlita and was feted as one of the last survivors of a holy world gone black he explained how a young boy of 16 could preserve his Yiddishkeit all alone holding on to the ethics of his fathers and mentors both in a place of barbaric degradation and in a foreign city where complete freedom beckoned
H
e was the Sanzer Rebbe’s guest of honor the object of a great deal of excitement in Netanya’s chassidic court. They even gave him a three-page spread in their periodical. After 60 years as a successful businessman in Milan Italy Mr. Aron Tenenbaum now 92 relocated to Jerusalem in 2011. But what made him a celebrity among the Sanz-Klausenberger chassidim was the discovery that Mr. Tenenbaum could share rare firsthand memories from the prewar empire of Sanz.
Aron Tenenbaum was born in 1923 in the town of Brigel situated in the part of Galicia that was a center of Sanzer chassidus. An old-time self-effacing Jew Mr. Tenenbaum knows what all the fuss is about — his eyes have seen greatness and his memories are clear and incisive.
He was a chassidish boy in a small shtetl in Galicia a nameless inmate in seven concentration camps and an affluent Italian Jewish businessman. Today Mr. Tenenabum is a retired great-grandfather in Jerusalem yet the raging tides of time have not affected his deepest core.
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