Thread by @OshiBloom

In the summer of 1982, Shlomo Auman, zichrono levracha, a kollel student and soldier in Tzahal at the Hesder Yeshiva, Yeshivat Shalavim, fell in battle during the early weeks of the first Lebanon War. His father is Prof. Yisrael Auman, an American oleh who won the Nobel prize in

Mathematics a number of years ago. Prof. Auman was a student of Rav Yisrael Gustman z”l, one of the great gedolei yisrael of Jerusalem of the 20th century. Rav Gustman was born and raised in Vilna before WWII , was a dayan in Vilna, and had his young son murdered by the Nazis

before he escaped to fight with the Partisans in the woods. He eventually came to the United States and then settled in Israel in the early 1970’s.

R. Gustman went to the shiva home of Dr. Auman right after the funeral on June 17, 1982: The family had just returned from the

cemetery and would now begin the week of shiva -- mourning for their son, brother, husband and father. (Shlomo was married and had one child. His widow, Shlomit, gave birth to their second daughter shortly after he was killed.)

Rav Gustman entered and asked to sit next to

Professor Aumann, who said: "Rabbi, I so appreciate your coming to the cemetery, but now is time for you to return to your Yeshiva." Rav Gustman spoke, first in Yiddish and then in Hebrew, so that all those assembled would understand:

"I am sure that you don't know this, but I had a son named Meir. He was a beautiful child. He was taken from my arms and executed. I escaped. I later bartered my child's shoes so that we would have food, but I was never able to eat the food -- I gave it away to others. My Meir is

a kadosh -- he is holy -- he and all the six million who perished are holy."
Rav Gustman then added: "I will tell you what is transpiring now in the World of Truth in Gan Eden -- in Heaven. My Meir is welcoming your Shlomo into the minyan and is saying to him ‘I died because I am

a Jew -- but I wasn't able to save anyone else. But you -- Shlomo, you died defending the Jewish People and the Land of Israel.' My Meir is a kadosh, he is holy -- but your Shlomo is a Shaliach Zibbur – a Cantor in that holy, heavenly minyan."
Rav Gustman continued: "I never had

the opportunity to sit shiva for my Meir; let me sit here with you just a little longer."