By COLlive reporter
After being sold out in two months, a new expanded edition of Dear Rebbe by Dovid Zaklikowski, is being hailed as explaining, “How can a Chassidic group, which has made no compromise with secular culture, have such broad appeal?”
In an article on the JNS news agency, Sarah Ogince explains that the book takes an intimate look at the Rebbe, “And in the process, Zaklikowski gleans lessons for anyone seeking to communicate across the barriers of politics, culture and faith.”
Dear Rebbe, which takes a hard look at the correspondence of four iconic figures from the 20th century Jewish scene, and the Rebbe’s correspondence with them, tells of how the Rebbe opposed the donation of sculptor Jacques Lipchitz to the Israel Museum in Jerusalem, which he did not want to become a secular city.
After several long letters, the sculptor and the Rebbe still disagreed. “Yet—and this is the point—the Rebbe did not allow the argument to sever their connection,” Ogince states, “When it became clear that he could not persuade Lipchitz, the Rebbe simply ended the discussion, writing, ‘It is my policy in my relationships with other people to seek out points of agreement rather than disagreement.’ … The implication is startling: When disagreement leads to dissension, perhaps the problem is not that we hold our views too strongly, but that we don’t hold them strongly enough.”
Explaining this phenomenon, while tying it into the work of the Shluchim across the globe, JNS states that Zaklikowski includes a lengthy prologue that traces the Rebbe’s advocacy for Jewish pride. “Real pride, writes Zaklikowski, delicately balances humility towards G-d and others with strength from one’s own unshakable convictions. Real pride forms connections rather than severs them.”
The new edition, which includes an additional 100 pages, and over fifty new photos and documents, can be purchased on HasidicArchives.com, and in bulk here.
