1947 HOLOCAUST SHOA SURVIVORS TALMUD MUNICH JUDAICA Start Price USD 8,000.00 Current Price USD 8,000.00 Time Left - Bid Count 0 Buy It Now Price - Reserve Price - Start Time Thursday, November 20, 2008 End Time Saturday, December 20, 2008 Location Jerusalem the Holyland See more about '1947 HOLOCAUST SHOA SURVIVORS TALMUD MUNICH JUDAICA ' Description (THE ABOVE MUZE DESCRIPTION IS THE CLOSEST TALMUD EDITION IN YEARS THAT I FOUND. IT IS NOT THE TALMUD EDITION BEING SOLD, RATHER THE FOLLOWING DESCRIPTION IS THE EDITION YOU ARE BUYING) You are about to view one of the most historically important set of books in recent Jewish History. It is a set of 19 volumes of the Talmud, known as the SURVIVOR'S TALMUD PRINTED IN SEPTEMBER 1948 IN OCCUPIED POST WAR GERMANY - AMERICAN ZONE. To get a good understanding of the significance of this set of rare books, I found the following article on the CENTER FOR JEWISH HISTORY WEBSITE in New York City, and I quote: The Making of the US Army Survivors' Talmud(Jun 5, 2003) by Dr. Kenneth Libo Ph.D and Michael SkakunMade possible by a generous donation from the Smart Family Foundation. The twentieth century shattered every precedent for good and evil. World War II and the Nazi campaign to destroy Europe's Jews brought a continent to its nadir. In the war's aftermath, Jewish Holocaust survivors were by far the most desperate of Europe's refugees. Here, in the midst of mass trauma, an uncommon chapter of decency slowly emerged: the publication of the Talmud by the U.S. Army for Holocaust survivors in Displaced Persons camps. Today this Talmud in nineteen volumes numbers among the American Jewish Historical Society's most prized possessions. Recently, Michael Feldberg, Executive Director of the American Jewish Historical Society, launched a traveling exhibit covering this singular event which appeared first in the first floor exhibition space of the Center for Jewish History. Upon liberation in 1945, in Germany alone 85,000 homeless Jews, having been categorized according to nationality, were crowded together with eight million non-Jewish refugees -- Poles, Hungarians, Romanian, Ukrainians, Lithuanians. Frequently, they were subjected to anti-Semitic assaults. Within months that number was tripled by a constant flow of survivors from Communist countries stretching from Poland to Soviet Asia. All of these Jews were housed indiscriminately in barracks together with the very people who had collaborated with the Nazis in killing their co-religionists. At first the American occupying army didn't know what to make of the Jewish survivors. All too typical was the reaction of General George Patton who described Jewish DP's at a prayer service "as the greatest stinking bunch of humanity I have ever seen." Patton's insensitivity notwithstanding, President Truman dispatched Earl G. Harrison, a former U.S. Commissioner of Immigration to conduct an inquiry into the needs of Jewish refugees. Harrison was accompanied by Dr. Joseph Schwartz, European director of the Joint Distribution Committee. What Harrison and Schwartz uncovered was so horrifying that it shocked President Truman into ordering General Eisenhower to make the plight of the Jewish survivors a priority. In particular, he emphasized the importance of getting the Jews out of concentration camps and into decent housing - if necessary in housing requisitioned from the German civilian population. Truman added: "I know you will agree with me that we have a particular responsibility toward these victims of persecution and tyranny who are in our zone. We must make clear to the German people that we thoroughly abhor the Nazi policies of hatred and persecution. We have no better opportunity to demonstrate this than by the manner in which we ourselves actually treat the survivors remaining in Germany." The U.S. Army could do only so much. The heaviest burden fell on the shoulders of the Joint, short for the Joint Distribution Committee. Dr. Joseph Schwartz was in charge.. Under his direction two thousand Joint personnel provided meals for 250,000 survivors. In addition, they operated one hundred fourteen schools and kindergartens, seventy four religious schools, and twenty four clinics, hospitals and orphanages in DP camps in Germany and Austria alone. It was a Jewish Marshall Plan run entirely on voluntary contributions Through the combined efforts of religious and Jewish army chaplains, the re-establishment of yeshivas and talmud torahs in the DP camps ensured the centrality of learning to the Jewish ethos. The Foehrenwald yeshiva (see MY PASSOVER HAGGADAH BEING SOLD ON EBAY FROM THIS CAMP)  served as the administrative headquarters of all the talmudic academies in the American zone. In 1946 a delegation of DP rabbis approached General Joseph McNarney, the commander of the American zone, with the urgent request of publishing a Talmud, most of them in Europe having been destroyed by the Nazis. Without much persuasion needed, General McNarney was quick to concur and the American military set to work.. Scare paper and ink supplies were found and the Carl Winter Print Plant in Heidelberg was requisitioned. Two sets of the Talmud were brought directly from New York to serve as prototypes as no complete edition of the Talmud could be found in the American zone. The dedication printed in each of the 19 volumes reads as follows: This edition of the Talmud is dedicated to the United States Army. The Army played a major role in the rescue of the Jewish people from total annihilation, and their defeat of Hitler bore the major burden of sustaining the DPs of the Jewish faith. This special edition of the Talmud, published in the very land where, but a short time ago, everything Jewish and of Jewish inspiration was anathema, will remain a symbol of the indestructibility of the Torah. The Jewish DPs will never forget the generous impulses and the unprecedented humanitarianism of the American Forces, to whom they owe so much. The publication of the Survivor's Talmud was an historical first: never before had a national government seen fit to publish this glorious culmination of Jewish learning. For the Holocaust survivors housed in the DP camps who had been deprived of every vestige of life and learning, the Survivors' Talmud proved to be a scholarly blessing. Imagine for a moment, a Holocaust survivor having been saved from the clutches of German inhumanity to the people of Israel, opens up a volume of Pesachim, the tractate dealing with the Passover Festival, and begins to study all the intricate details of the Pessach festival, when just a year before he and his entire family were the fire offerings that the German nation forced upon his people. What feelings must have gone through his mind, if not to hope for a time when he will return to his homeland and rebuild the Holy Temple and pray to G-d; and perhaps only then will he begin to understand the suffering that he and his Nation had gone through all those 20 centuries of wanderings through lands not theirs, on account of being G-d's representatives on this earth! It is this edition of the Talmud that you will own, you and/or your family or Institution will be privileged to pass on to future generations. This Talmud edition is complete and waiting to be "redeemed" to a worthy Institution that will continue to teach the people of Israel and the rest of humanity that there IS A GOD AFTER THE HOLOCAUST and that he cares for His people, as he does for the rest of mankind. Ths Talmud edition is a testimony to the power of Faith in G-d and the eternity of the Jewish nation, wherever they may be, and despite all the persecutions -past and modern Arab inspired anti-semitism- we can proudly say AM YISRAEL CHAI - THE JEWISH NATION LIVES!! The following is an article I found in THE REVIEW from May 1949, published in London. It details that this set (not this one in particular) was given as a present to the first President of Israel, Chaim Weizman. Increase your sales with an Auctiva Showcase. Free Trial.   My Service Box To see the rest of my auctions click By Judaicaman Place a Bid!