Witness, Lessons from Elie Wiesel's Classroom, by Ariel Burger

What a very interesting read. The book is written about Elie Wiesel from the viewpoint of a former student then a teaching assistant and finally as someone whom Wiesel mentored through his life. Ariel Burger starts out talking about his upbringing in the Jewish faith in a family where one parent was orthodox and the other parent was apathetic. It makes for a strange upbringing.

As a teenager Burger wonders about life, death and why God is not more approachable.

Then as a student of Elie Wiesel's he becomes infatuated with the intelligence, the stories, the moral's and ethics of a Jewish man who lived through the Holocaust and especially through Auschwitz. What is the more important is that Wiesel does not try to cram knowledge down the throats of his students but instead he helps them to ask the right questions and seek the answers that will change their lives.

Burger eventually leaves the teaching assistant role and travels to Israel where he hopes to complete his studies. But after being there a year Wiesel shows up and they have a conversation that changes Burger's life and makes him a disciple of the wise teacher.

I loved the examples from Wiesel's classroom ,but more important I loved the way that Burger explains what he learned and how he learned it under the leadership and discipling of Elie Wiesel.

This is a great book for anyone wanting to know three things:
     1. How an Orthodox Jew survived the camps of the holocaust.
     2. How this intellectual became a professor at the University of Boston
     3. How a teacher impacts his students and further disciples those who want to truly grow.

Enjoy!