“He packed a trunk with his most precious belongings: the books which he received as wedding presents; the hundreds of letters of Rayatz which be catalogued and prepared for publication; his folder of Reshimot, containing his Torah thoughts and customs of Rayatz that he meticulously documented; the “unauthorized”photostated copies of Rashab’s discourses he had made ten years earlier, and the notes on Tanya and indices of Chasidic thought which he composed. Utilizing a personal connection to obtain a much coveted ticket, the couple boarded one of the last trains to leave Paris, on or before 11th June, joining the mass exodus of some 100,000 Jews who fled Paris before the German conquest of 13th June...
“We know that for the two months he was in Vichy, Menachem Mendel immersed himself in Torah, since he composed six long Reshimot during this short period, which fill some forty-three printed pages. For the most part, the Vichy Reshimot follow themes in the weekly Torah portions and in all likelihood represent notes of lectures he delivered in the synagogue. What is immediately striking in the text is a complete lack of reference to the troubles of the times; there is no hint that the ideas were penned by a man who was fleeing for his life from the Nazis. Instead, Menachem Mendel takes one or two ideas in the Torah portion and suggests an innovative twist, based on Chasidic thought. As ever, the discourses are extremely rich in sources, and clearly lacking access to a library of Jewish books, the author leaves a number of references blank with a view to filling in the exact page numbers at a later date. Considering the circumstances under which they were written, the depth and complexity of the material is quite remarkable. As in the turbulent years of his youth, one gets the sense that Menachem Mendel found some comfort from the dire and hazardous situation by retreating into abstract thought.”
Turning Judaism Outward: a biography of the Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson by Chaim Miller, pp. 130-131
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