Table of Contents

Part I

Introduction: New Light on a Dark History
Chapter One: The Price of Silence
Chapter Two: Trauma Mind and Body: The Paradox of Survival
Chapter Three: The Importance of Being Witnessed
Chapter Four: Awakenings
Chapter Five: The Terrible Gift

Part II

Introduction
Principle One: Facing the Loss
Principle Two: Harnessing the Power of Pain
Principle Three: Finding New Community
Principle Four: Resisting the Call to Fear, Blame, Dehumanize
Principle Five: Disidentifying from Victimhood
Principle Six: Redefining Chosenness
Principle Seven: Taking Action

About the Author

Rabbi Tirzah Firestone, Ph.D., is an author, Jungian psychotherapist, and founding rabbi of Congregation Nevei Kodesh in Boulder, Colorado.

Raised in a large Orthodox family as the younger sister of the late, groundbreaking radical feminist Shulamith Firestone (author of The Dialectic of Sex), Firestone’s spiritual curiosity called her to search beyond the confines of her family’s strict Jewish upbringing. Leaving home, she embarked upon a life-changing spiritual odyssey that she chronicled in With Roots in Heaven: One Woman’s Passionate Journey into the Heart of Her Faith. After immersing herself in a wide variety of spiritual practices and
worldviews, Firestone returned with fresh vigor to become a rabbi in a pluralistic and egalitarian Judaism.

Now Rabbi Emerita, Firestone’s research on the transformation of collective trauma draws on the fields of neuroscience, psychology, and Jewish literature. Through interviews, case studies, and autobiographical stories, she demonstrates how trauma residue passes from generation to generation and how it can be transformed.