A Tale of Love and Darkness

RAV ALEXANDER ZISKIND of Horodno (at that time in Russia, but later Poland, Belarus.), who died in 1794, is known in rabbinic tradition as YVShH, after the initials of his best-known work, Yesod Ve-Shoresh

Ha-'Avodah ("The Foundation and Root of Worship"). He was a mystic, kabbalist, ascetic, the author of several influential ethical writings. It was said of him that "He spent his life shut away in a small room studying Torah; he never kissed or held his children and never had any conversation with them that was not directed to heavenly things. " His wife ran the household and brought up the children on her own. Nevertheless, this outstanding ascetic taught that one should "worship the Creator with great joy and fervor. " (Rabbi Nahman of Bratslav said of him that he was a hasid avant la lettre. ") But neither joy nor fervor prevented Rabbi Alexander Ziskind from leaving instructions in his will that after his death "the Burial Society shall perform on my corpse the four death penalties entrusted to the Sanhedrin," until all his limbs were crushed.