He was completely unsuspected until six months before the war ended, when he fled to Switzerland and his wife and baby went underground in France.
His mother Regina Neufeld was born in Lackenbach, one of the famous seven Jewish communities or Sheva Kehillos (Siebengemeinden) in the Burgenland, Hungary, now Austria.
The family moved to France because Jacob was unable to work as a shochet, a trained ritual slaughterer, in Switzerland.
Beginning in 1933, he simultaneously studied Semitic languages at the prestigious École pratique des hautes études, where he received the Diplôme de l’EPHE, a postgraduate degree.
The citation to the Order of the Brigade reads as follows: As chief of artillery communications has participated from September 1939 to February 1940 in the engagements in Alsace in the region of Bitche.
Has contributed to maintain the fighting spirit around him and to uphold the morale of the engaged units.A second citation for the Croix de guerre 1939-1945 (France) was to the Order of the Army, with palm.
The Jewish population consisted of numerous refugees, including a large segment originating from Alsace and other regions occupied by the Nazi invader.
[2] In Brive with Edmond Michelet, later to be a senior minister under Charles de Gaulle, he participated actively in the French Résistance Movement "Combat" against the Nazi occupation.
He received the Croix du combattant volontaire 1939–1945, the Medaille Commémorative de la Guerre 1939–1945 with the bar "France".
The Citation says: Despite the exceptional risks which were attached to his ministry, has participated in an active, permanent and unselfish way to the organisation of the resistance in all the region.
Six months before the end of World War II, the Germans finally understood that the Rabbi of Brive was an active member of the Résistance.
Antoinette Feuerwerker obtained from Jacques Soustelle, a future minister of Charles de Gaulle and later his opponent, but then a leader of the Résistance, information how to reach clandestinely neutral territory, in Divonne-les-Bains.
[3] His activities included liaising with the former Prime Minister of France, Édouard Herriot and the Roman Catholic primate of the Gauls, Cardinal Pierre-Marie Gerlier, later, recognized as a Righteous Among the Nations, by Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, Israel.
In 1946, he was elected rabbi in Neuilly-sur-Seine, near Paris, where he established a Cercle d'Etudes (Study Circle) at 12 rue Ancelle.
The money destined for the Aliyah Bet ship Exodus was hidden, without his knowledge, by his wife, Antoinette Feuerwerker, under his bed, since no one would suspect him.
In the Cercle d'Etudes du Marais he formed at 14 Place des Vosges, in the heart of Le Marais, the lecturers included: Raymond Aron, Robert Aron, Henri Baruk, le Père Marie-Benoît, Jean Cassou, Georges Duhamel, Marcel Dunan, Edmond Fleg, Henri Hertz, Louis Kahn, Joseph Kessel, Jacques Madaule, Arnold Mandel, Szolem Mandelbrojt, François Mauriac, Edmond Michelet, Pierre Morhange, François Perroux, le Père Michel Riquet, Pierre-Maxime Schuhl, André Spire, Jean Wahl, and many others.
Situated in one of the most beautiful squares in Paris, the Place des Vosges where the Victor Hugo Museum is located, the club, where the discussions are sometimes stormy, is one of the liveliest and most picturesque spots in the Jewish quarter of the French capital.
In 1963, General Charles de Gaulle nominated him to be officer of the Legion of Honor (Légion d'honneur), for his work for the French Navy.
In 1966, he moved with his family (six children: Atara, Natania, Elie, Hillel, Emmanuel, and Benjamine) to Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
He was the editor of the French section of the Voice of the Vaad journal, called "la Voix du Conseil".
For this work L'Emancipation des Juifs en France de l'Ancien Régime à la Fin du Second Empire (Albin Michel: Paris, 1976), he was awarded the Broquette-Gonin Prize for history from the Académie Française.
He organized the appearance of the famous Hazzan Moshe Koussevitzky, at the Synagogue de la rue des Tournelles, in Paris.
He also was a guest on several occasions on the radio show, animated by Alain Stanké, called "La musique des nations" of Radio-Canada.