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CONTENTS

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EDITOR-IN-CHIEF:M.M. Hendel

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ENGLISH EDITOR:Boruch Merkureditor@beismoshiach.org

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FEATURED ARTICLES

6 WHEN THE REBBE STOOD UP IN EXCITEMENTNosson Avrohom

14 SPLITTING THE SEARochele Haramati

18 WHAT WE LEARN TODAY, MOSHIACH WILL SHOW US VISUALLYR’ Moshe Yehuda Reichmann a”h

26 “YOUR CHILDREN WILL BE GOOD JEWS AND GOOD HUMAN BEINGS”Nosson Avraham

WEEKLY COLUMNS 3 D’var Malchus22 Parsha Thought25 Thought31 Crossroads34 Tzivos Hashem

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EVERYTHING MUST NOW BE REVEALED IN HASTEWhen the Rebbe instructs us to publish a book or pamphlet, he intends that we publish it as widely as possible, so that the subject matter may be understood by the greatest number of people. This includes issues previously hidden and known only to a select few in an entire generation. * Chapter Two of Rabbi Shloma Majeski’s Likkutei Mekoros Vol. 2. (Underlined text is the compiler’s emphasis.)

1. This farbrengen is connected with Chaf MarCheshvan, the birthday of the Rebbe (Rashab), whose position was filled by my revered father in-law, the Rebbe. Moreover, the Rebbe was his inheritor, who is tantamount to the one who bequeaths (Bava Basra 159a), as well as his only son.

The general concept of and the special virtue of a birthday was revealed through the Rebbe [Rayatz] (HaYom Yom, pg. 44). Later, he instructed that this message be published in order for it to be publicized to everyone.

The Rebbe utilized print media for publicity because the press is far reaching, gaining exposure not only to a select few, and not only to a particular group with special customs (including this custom), but to all Jews. And this broad publicity also applies to ideas that maintain relevance through

time (and thus are heard) for generations to come.

That is, the importance of marking a birthday was totally unknown until the time came when the Rebbe disclosed it. And when it was revealed by the Rebbe, the publicity he sought to promote this formerly unknown idea was simply radical – from one extreme to the other:

Before the concept of observing a birthday was revealed, even the elite were unaware of it; only singular individuals knew. But when it was revealed, it was publicized (not only to a select few or to very close adherents, but) to all Jews, and even for generations to come.

2. There are those, however, who seek to be provocative by asking: What is the source for the idea of celebrating a birthday? What cause is it for rejoicing? And where is there precedence for such a thing?!

If it is something that is indeed proper and good and necessary, how could it be that it remained unknown throughout all previous generations?!

The answer to this question is that we find many Torah concepts that were first revealed in a particular epoch. The ideas were previously unknown until the time came when the concept was finally taught.

Even regarding the Written Torah, we find that much was revealed after Mattan Torah. How much more so with regard to the Oral Torah, teachings that “a scholar innovates in the future,” for prior to the “scholar” innovating this teaching, it was unknown to us. (Although it was indeed “given to Moshe at Sinai,” it is nevertheless a concept that the “scholar” reveals and innovates.)

Prior to a certain point in history the concept had not been revealed in Torah. Thus, before its origination it was

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not obligatory. Needless to say that until the time came for the matter to be revealed, it did not possess the quality of “it is greater that one is commanded and performs it [than performing it voluntarily].”

This phenomenon is understood even by “a five year-old [who] learns Scripture,” for he sees in the Written Torah that some things are only revealed after time. How much more so when he becomes “a ten-year-old [who] learns Mishna,” when he observes it on a broader scale in the Oral Torah. And when he becomes “a thirteen year old [who performs] Mitzvos,” being now obligated in Mitzvos, he then sees how it applies in the realm of practical halachic rulings.

3. The same principle applies to Torah as a whole:

It says in Midrash that “Adam

HaRishon was fit to have had the Torah given [to humanity] through him,” however, “He made everything beautiful in its time,” and the Giving of the Torah actually took place twenty-six generations later.

At first glance, this Midrash is puzzling. Since “He gazed into the Torah and created the world (u’bara alma)” and the entire world was created “for the sake of the Torah, which is called ‘reishis,’” the Giving of the Torah should have taken place immediately at the beginning of Creation. Nevertheless, we say that “He made everything beautiful in its time,” and the time for the Giving of the Torah only arrived after twenty-six generations!

Similarly in our case, with regard to celebrating a birthday. There was a time when the concept of celebrating a birthday

was unknown. But eventually, when the time was right, my revered father in-law, the Rebbe, revealed it (as the Rebbe said regarding a number of things: when the time came for it to be revealed, it was revealed).

As stated above, throughout the entire Torah there are matters that are first revealed only when a particular time arrives – both with regard to Biblical laws and how much more so with regard to a “Jewish custom.”

Our generation is distinguished with having numerous previously unknown teachings revealed. Since the time has now come when everything must be revealed with haste, “achishena,” therefore, they cannot be shelved for a later date.

(The address given on Shabbos VaYeira, 20 MarCheshvan, 5740;

Likkutei Sichos Vol. 20, pg. 386-7)

In Crown Heights area: 1640/1700AM worldwide, online: www.RadioMoshiach.org

USA NEW phone: 347 990 1136

forgotten who gave us this land, settling instead for excuses and explanations, e.g., “The facts are that we truly wanted to make peace with the Arabs, but they refused.”

These recent public diplomatic and ambassadorial appointments have aroused much criticism from the political left in Israel. In their perception, this

deprives them of their last basis for support: the ability to say that the world is against us and we can’t justify our presence in Yehuda and Shomron. Thus far, such an approach has worked quite well for them. They send their finest representatives to stammer before the nations of the world, and these nations reject the ridiculous claims that we came here and drove out the Arabs only because we had

nowhere else to go. Now, the new diplomacy is taking shape, as it seeks to restore a little of our lost respect in the eyes of the world and preserve our valued international relations.

Now, all that’s left for us to do is hope that this new spirit will also pervade Israeli politics. Who knows – maybe the Prime Minister of Israel will eventually be convinced as well?

Continued from page 33

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Boruch Hashem, Elul 5770

HUNDREDS OF FAMILIES ANXIOUSLY LOOKINGFORWARD FOR YOUR GENEROUS ASSISTANCE!To every member of the Lubavitcher community:

During this month of preparation for Rosh Hashonoh, the ”head” of the New Year, we fondly recall ourRebbe’s words that this is an especially auspicious time for strengthening our deep bond ofHiskashrus with the ”Rosh Bnei Yisroel,” the ”head” of the Jewish people and leader of the generation. Our Rebbeim explain that an important way to strengthen Hiskashrus is by participating inthe Rebbe’s activities and concerns, consequently, by supporting an organization thatbrings together a number of these activities, the Hiskashrus is greater and stronger. Suchan organization is Kupas Rabbeinu, which seeks to continue many of the Rebbe’s activities and con-cerns without change from the way he would conduct them himself. Every year at this time, the Rebbe would call upon us to contribute generously to help needy familieswith their extra expenses for the coming month’s many Yomim Tovim. This also coincides with the spe-cial emphasis during this month of giving extra Tzedokah, (indicated in the Hebrew letters of the word”Elul,” as explained in many Sichos etc.), as a vital way of preparing ourselves for the new year andarousing Divine mercy upon us. See sicho in the Hebrew text of this letter.We therefore appeal to every individual man and woman to contribute generously to KupasRabbeinu, enabling us to fulfill the Rebbe’s desire to help all those who anxiously await ourhelp. The greater your contribution, the more we can accomplish.Please do not forsake them!Your generous contribution to Kupas Rabbeinu will be the appropriate vessel for receiving the abun-dant blessings of the Rebbe, who is its Nasi, that you may be blessed with a Ksiva Vachasima Tovafor a good and sweet year, materially and spiritually. May it help to bring the full revelation of Moshiach- our Rebbe - immediately now!

Wishing you a Ksiva Vachasima Tova for a good and sweet year,

In the name of Vaad Kupas RabbeinuRabbi Sholom Mendel Simpson Rabbi Yehuda Leib Groner

P.S. Of course, you may send to Kupas Rabbeinu all contributions that you would send to the Rebbe; allwill be devoted to the activities to which the Rebbe would devote them.

You may also send Maimad, Keren-Hashono (this coming year 5771 - 385 days), Vov Tishrei, Yud GimmelTishrei Magbis etc. to Kupas Rabbeinu.

P.S. Please send all correspondence only to the following address.

KUPAS RABBEINU / P.O.B. 288 / BROOKLYN, NEW YORK 11225Eretz Yisroel address: KEREN KUPAS ADMU"R / P.O.B. 1247 / KIRYAT MALACHI / ISRAEL

eup, rchbu,j, bahtu, f"e tsnu"r nkl vnahj

7333-657 )817(

Kupas RabbeinuLubavitch

(718) 467-2500 P.O.B. 288 Brooklyn, New York 11225

URGENTREQUEST!

5775

5776 – 385

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WHEN THE REBBE

STOOD UP IN EXCITEMENTBy Nosson Avrohom

R’ Bentzion Cohen of Kfar Chabad merited dozens of special signs of affection

from the Rebbe. The most famous of them took place in 5730 when the mashpia, R’ Shlomo Chaim Kesselman, was preparing for a trip to the Rebbe. Many of the bachurim accompanied him to the airport including Bentzion Cohen. In his pocket was a check he had received from his mother and he gave it to the mashpia as “shlichus mitzva” money.

When R’ Shlomo Chaim had yechidus, he gave the check to the Rebbe and said he had received it from Bentzion Cohen. The Rebbe then inquired about R’ Cohen’s progress in Torah and mitzvos. The mashpia told the Rebbe about his progress and mentioned a resolution Bentzion had made, to meditate every day before davening on a topic in Chassidus.

Hearing this, the Rebbe stood up and excitedly asked, “Bentzion thinks Chassidus

before davening?”Those who learned in 770 at

the time and remember with what passion and drama R’ Shlomo Chaim described this scene at several farbrengens, are moved till today.

Another kiruv, one that R’ Bentzion merited personally, was when he had yechidus and the Rebbe asked him when he was going to Eretz Yisroel. When R’ Bentzion said a date, the Rebbe got up and said, “You are a Kohen, so bless the Jews in the holy land.”

When I related this anecdote to R’ Bentzion, he did not take pride or even enjoy talking about it, for those who know him know that he is a Chassid who exemplifies bittul. He is a genuine Chassid and mekushar to the Rebbe, utterly dedicated to the Rebbe’s instructions. His life is devoted to the Rebbe’s mivtzaim. He visits the Asaf HaRofeh hospital daily and helps people put on t’fillin and creates

an atmosphere of hope and encouragement.

***Bentzion was born in

Indianapolis, Indiana. His parents, who came from religious families – his father was a Litvak who learned in Slobodka and his mother was from a Ruzhiner Chassidic background – dropped their religious observance when they arrived in America. The home he was raised in was liberal in outlook. Kiddush was made and they only ate kosher meat, not much more than that. On Shabbos, his parents would drive their car to the Conservative synagogue.

“I heard about Chabad when I was young. My father published an independent liberal newspaper which was printed in 15,000 copies and distributed all over the country. Thanks to this, he had connections with Chabad Chassidim and one of them would send him shmura matza every year for Pesach.

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“I went to public school and all my friends were gentiles; I was the only Jew. When I became bar mitzva, we had a ceremony but I did not put on t’fillin.”

There were eight children in the Cohen family and this was the largest family in the area. One became a professor of biology at Seattle University, one is a computer programmer, a third is a teacher, two sisters are social workers, one sister heals with Chinese medicine and the youngest sister is a professor.

“I would go a few times a week in the afternoon to a Hebrew class arranged by the Conservative movement. I benefited from these classes after nine years of study when I graduated high school and my class went on a two month trip to Eretz Yisroel, paid for by the movement.

“I enjoyed the trip and felt drawn to Eretz Yisroel. After only a month I decided to remain in the country, come what may. I didn’t want to waste time and so

I registered at Hebrew University where I studied chemistry, mathematics, and physics.

“At that time, I was in a constant search; my soul knew no rest. I would sit for hours and read science fiction books. One time, I went to a bookstore in Yerushalayim and looked for something to read that would fill my free time. I came across a book that described the origin of yoga and what its advantages and goals are. I found it interesting and bought it.

“The more I read of it, the more the subject interested me. The reality I lived with in the US, where the goal was a constant pursuit of glory and blindly striving by exploiting others drew me toward these teachings. I felt that I had finally found what I was looking for. After I finished the book, I bought other books on yoga and I read them avidly over and over.

“I felt relaxed, calm, and happy. I was thrilled when a yoga course opened at the student

dorm. It was run by a fellow who had just returned from India and who had studied these teachings. We learned how to do yoga and meditation and we spent hours on meditation, creating for ourselves an imaginary inner peace.

“I would sit in my room and meditate. Interestingly, it was these teachings that strengthened my belief in G-d. It was only after I did t’shuva that I found out that this was avoda zara.

“After a year at the university I returned home, deeply immersed in the teachings of yoga. On my first Shabbos at home, my parents dragged me to the Conservative temple though I felt perfectly fine praying on my own. I read the words of the Siddur and also did yoga. When the prayers ended I did not even realize it and continued my meditation and yoga. My mother was frightened and asked for explanations but I pushed her off with various excuses.

“In hindsight, when I think of that period, I realize I was

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absorbed in a very deep search for self. I did crazy things, which bordered on the insane, thinking at the time that it was the right thing to do. I actually looked at everyone with pity. I was sure they were all immersed in materialism. I was open to listening to everything and did not stop searching.

“My first disconnect from yoga and my connecting to Judaism was when I boarded a ship back to Eretz Yisroel. Before we set sail, my father’s partner, Yechezkel (Charlie) Roth, came to say goodbye. He was one of the first talmidim in Tomchei T’mimim that the Rebbe Rayatz founded in America. He had gone off the derech and we spoke for such a long time that I suddenly found myself opening up to him. I enthusiastically told him about the yoga I had studied and my meditation exercises. He deflected all my attempts to explain to him what was so wonderful about yoga and instead, told me that Judaism also has meditation and it appears in a book called Tanya.

“I didn’t give credence to what he said and I took his claims

“His face was blue and we were terrified. Then the

miracle occurred; at the entrance to Kfar Chabad

the marble popped out and he quickly recovered. That’s

when we understood the special bracha in the Rebbe’s

letter.”

Bentzion as a boy

The one Jewish boy in public school

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with a grain of salt. I was young, and listening to someone older than me was not something I did.

“Toward the end of our conversation, I told him that I had a dream of flying to India and searching out the source of yoga. At that point, he lost his patience with me and said, ‘Instead of going to India, a place of diseases, go to Kfar Chabad where you will find true peace for your soul.’ He then sat down, there and then, and wrote a letter to someone by the name of Zushe Posner. I had never met him before; I later found out that the two of them had been childhood friends who learned together.

“My kiruv process to Judaism began incidentally on the boat. There were two kitchens, one kosher and one treif. As soon as I entered the kosher kitchen they included me in a minyan. In hindsight, maybe it was because of my conversation with Charlie that I agreed to take part in the minyan. That was the first time I davened with a minyan.

“These were my first steps in the direction of a life of Torah and mitzvos.

“After I landed, I went straight to the university to continue with my second year of studies. I decided to drop the sciences and registered for courses in Jewish philosophy. The professor was Mrs. Nechama Leibowitz who was greatly mekarev me. I loved her classes which were presented in a clear and amazing manner.

“I did not drop my idea of flying off one day to India. In my free time I studied the languages spoken in India.

“Then one day I got an invitation from Zushe Posner. He had gotten Charlie’s letter and asked me to come and spend Shabbos with him in the Rakevet neighborhood in Lud. At the time,

R’ Bentzion doing mivtza t’fillin

One of the letters R’ Bentzion received from the Rebbe

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R’ Zushe arranged Shabbatons for students and many came back to Judaism thanks to him.

“It wasn’t easy for me to decide to go to him for Shabbos. My final decision was accompanied by much ambivalence but I finally decided

I had nothing to lose.“I arrived at R’ Zushe’s

house Friday afternoon and he welcomed me with a friendly handshake and immediately suggested that I put on t’fillin. I had already learned about t’fillin (and what they are made of)

and refused for the reason that it went against the principle of not being cruel to animals. In my yoga studies this was a cardinal principle. It took a long time for R’ Zushe to explain that you did not have to slaughter or kill an animal in order to make battim for t’fillin. I finally agreed half-heartedly.

“Later, we went to shul. I remember an old shul, not with the pomp and beauty I was used to in the Conservative synagogues that I had prayed in, in my childhood.

“The Shabbos meal was problematic. I did not dare touch the fish or meat that was served but the Chassidic niggunim and the relaxed atmosphere made a tremendous and unforgettable impression on me. I felt swept up in the atmosphere. The interesting thing is that when I went back to the university on Sunday, I suddenly felt out of place.

“I slowly began to realize that secular culture is all bluff, and that all the seeming admiration one had for another was nothing but hypocrisy. My Jewish philosophy studies were more and more appealing and I had already started looking into where I could learn Torah for real, no more Jewish studies and philosophy but authentic Torah which is not mixed with fantasies that people made up.

“I finally decided to take classes at university half a day and to learn in yeshiva the other half.

“The first yeshiva I went to was a Litvishe one. The rosh yeshiva who interviewed me said he did not have a program for guys like me and if I wanted to learn Torah I would have to pay a bachur to learn with me privately. I didn’t have the means to do

R’ Bentzion blowing the shofar on the spot where a bomb went off, opposite the hospital in Tzrifin

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that so I said goodbye. Someone recommended a yeshiva for English speakers, which was in the Har Tziyon neighborhood of Yerushalayim. The rosh yeshiva there told me, “You can do your yoga here and learn Torah too, do what you want.” When I walked into the main hall of the yeshiva I saw what he meant. Every bachur was doing what he felt like doing, one was meditating, another was playing a guitar, etc. This was not a place for me.

“The following Shabbos I visited R’ Zushe in Lud again and told him about my conundrum. He advised me to go learn in the yeshiva in Kfar Chabad. At first I thought that was out of the question since I wanted to learn in yeshiva only half a day. But I was finally persuaded to try it out for a day.

“When I got to the yeshiva I met Sholom Dovber Wolpo who warmly directed me to a group of American students. They convinced me to stay for a Gemara shiur the next day with R’ S. Z. Gafni. I enjoyed the shiur and stayed another day and then another day until I had abandoned university altogether.

“A year later, I flew to New York where I learned for a year and a half in Hadar HaTorah, a yeshiva for baalei t’shuva. Then I went back to Kfar Chabad and learned for two years in the yeshiva g’dola. Then I married and learned in the kollel in Kfar Chabad.

“A few weeks after R’ Shlomo Chaim came back from the Rebbe and told everyone the story with the check, I came down with a severe case of hepatitis and I spent weeks in the hospital. Being sick and in the hospital made me feel very down. To my surprise, one day as I lay there, I received a letter from the Rebbe which

was a follow-up to the yechidus R’ Shlomo Chaim had with the Rebbe. The letter, from 18 Shvat 5730/1970, said:

I was happy to hear good regards about you from R’ Shlomo Chaim Kesselman who also informed me of your progress in Torah study, Nigleh and Chassidus, and observing mitzvos b’hiddur. R’ Kesselman also gave me your contribution, which was designated for the “twenty fund” that you surely heard about.

I hereby send you my blessing that you go from strength to strength along with your entire family. As I have already had occasion to mention, a Kohen has special obligations as well as privileges because of his elevated stature. These obligations include the main obligation, “They [the tribe of Levi] shall teach Your judgments to Yaakov, and Your Torah to Israel” (D’varim 33:10). This pertains, of course, also to your father and brother as well as to your mother and sisters because the daughters of

Aharon the priest also benefit from an elevated status among Jewish women. Above all else, and I’ve already emphasized this in the past, when Hashem places obligations and special tasks upon a person, together with them He provides the powers and opportunities to carry them out.

With blessings.“I cannot describe in words

what a shot of encouragement this letter from the Rebbe gave me. Although I was still dejected because of my condition, the Rebbe said a Kohen has to teach, so I got out of bed, took a Gemara, and began to lecture on the sugya with whomever I met. This letter from the Rebbe ended up being a turning point in my condition.

“After I recovered I was still weak for a long time. My friends in yeshiva suggested I go home to the US to rest. I stayed home for three months during which time I went to 770 several times. Each time I went, I merited kiruvim from the Rebbe. Most interesting were the Rebbe’s

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demands—I would say even strong demands—that I keep in touch with my parents.

“One year, at kos shel bracha on Motzaei Shmini Atzeres, the Rebbe asked me whether I had already been to my parents. This happened several more times. That is what pushed me to adopt the mitzva of honoring parents also by writing to them once a week.

“My father, who as I mentioned, published a popular Jewish newspaper, published these letters in a special column. Later on, in one of the Rebbe’s letters to my father, I saw a reference to this column with the Rebbe writing that he knows me personally. This letter was from 4 Cheshvan 5730:

Mr. Gavriel CohenThe Jewish Post and OpinionGreetings!I acknowledge receipt of

your letter from the eighth of October.

Enclosed is a copy of my letter to Mr. H Golden, which speaks for itself.

I take this opportunity to convey to you my delight in meeting with your son Bentzion and personally getting to know him after our correspondence. I also want to thank you for the regards that he brought from you and the family.

It is known that good is never-ending. May G-d enable you to go from strength to strength with the nachas you receive from your son Bentzion and from all your children.

With blessings.“Once, at kos shel bracha, the

Rebbe gave me wine and when I started moving on, the Rebbe called me back and brought me more wine and said, ‘This is for your father.’ Then he called me

T’FILLIN EVERY DAYR’ Bentzion Cohen relates:My father, after celebrating his bar mitzva, did not continue putting on

t’fillin for more than a few days. His mother told him that if he did not put on t’fillin he would not get breakfast. So he took a rope, tied it on his hand and then showed his mother the marks so she would think he had put on t’fillin. One day, my grandmother discovered his trick and she wrung her hands in despair and screamed.

When I became a baal t’shuva, every time I would go home I would put t’fillin on with my father. One time, when I suggested he put on t’fillin, he told me he had already done so and that he had decided to put t’fillin on every day.

He told me that his decision had to do with a miracle from the Rebbe. There was an Orthodox rabbi in his city who had three daughters. After many years the Rabbi and his wife finally had a son but their joy quickly turned to distress when the baby became sick. The boy’s condition continued to deteriorate until it became critical.

The father called to ask the Rebbe for a bracha and the answer was that he should check his t’fillin. He sent his t’fillin to Chicago to be checked and was told that the battim were pasul. Amazingly, as soon as they were fixed, the child’s condition began to improve until he became well again.

At his bris, the father told this miracle and it made a tremendous impression on my father. He resolved that from that day on, he would put t’fillin on every day.

“He sent his t’fillin to Chicago to be checked and

was told that the battim were pasul. Amazingly,

as soon as they were fixed, the child’s condition began to

improve until he became well again.”

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back yet again and said, ‘This is for your mother.’ I was taken aback by these signs of affection and did not understand them. A few days later I understood. Doctors had discovered a malignant tumor in my mother and then in my father too. The Rebbe’s wine was ‘the cure before the blow.’ Both my parents recovered miraculously.

“As I returned to Judaism, there were a number of letters from the Rebbe to my father, and over time a special relationship formed between the Rebbe and my father.

“One day, when I was in yeshiva in Kfar Chabad, I heard that my father had had yechidus with the Rebbe and the Rebbe spoke to him for more than an hour about the state of Judaism in America and how to change direction. That yechidus, even though the Rebbe did not speak directly to my father about his personal situation, had an effect, making a tremendous impression on him. My father subsequently closed the office on Shabbos and began walking to shul.”

***“At the beginning of Tammuz

5738, I received a ‘routine’ letter from the Rebbe at the end of which it said: ‘I double my blessing that you raise your son Levi Yitzchok ...’ I did not understand why the Rebbe singled him out. Not many days passed and all became clear.

“On Shabbos, he swallowed a marble which got stuck in his throat. His face turned colors and he could not breathe. We were helpless. We rushed him to a nurse who lived opposite our house and she told us to rush him to the hospital. His face was blue and we were terrified. Then the miracle occurred; at the entrance to Kfar Chabad

the marble popped out and he quickly recovered. That’s when we understood the special bracha in the Rebbe’s letter.

“Another time, I was exhausted and fell asleep while saying Chitas. A few days went by and in a letter I received from the Rebbe about a completely different topic, it said in the margin, ‘Surely you are particular about the three shiurim that are applicable to all.’ I was stunned. I saw how the Rebbe knows everything and sees everything.”

MIRACLE CUREThe following is an incredible story that happened to R’ Bentzion in the

course of his outreach at the hospital in Tzrifin:One day, I went to one of the departments where a young woman was

hospitalized following a hit and run accident. The woman had been lying there for months with the doctors trying one thing after another including operating on her foot ten times! Every time I saw her husband, he was willing to put on t’fillin.

One day, I came into the room and the woman said she had just had surgery in which they amputated ten centimeters from her foot and still, her condition had worsened.

I had a volume of Likkutei Sichos with me. I told them about writing to the Rebbe and guided them in how to do so. They wrote a letter and the page they opened to was in Parshas Ki Seitzei where the Rebbe speaks about making a railing around a roof so that you don’t have “damim” (blood) in your house. I explained that they needed to do good deeds so that “damim,” i.e. undesirable things, did not happen.

The husband said that the day before his wife was hit, someone suggested to him that he purchase t’fillin, but his wife refused since, she said, he wouldn’t use them anyway. On the spot, the husband committed to putting t’fillin on every day and to keeping Shabbos. Their difficult situation really pained me and I could not help it, I burst into tears. When I got home, I wrote to the Rebbe about their plight and put the letter into a volume of Igros Kodesh.

The answer I opened to was amazing and clear and ended with “refua shleima.” I immediately informed them that they had nothing to worry about.

When I went the next day, they told me the doctors might amputate her entire foot and the family was very agitated. They were waiting for the opinion of the top doctor who would come the following week. I continued to reassure them and to give them hope that if the Rebbe blessed them, it would be all right.

When that doctor came, he absolutely rejected amputation and sent the woman home, telling her to return in six months for another exam. Half a year later, all was well.

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SPLITTING THE SEAFinding one’s bashert can be a challenge. Not surprisingly,

it is compared to the splitting of the Yam Suf. Rochele

Haramati presents some of the dilemmas and questions of

those seeking a shidduch to Rabbi Zalman Notik, mashpia in

Yeshivas Toras Emes, in Yerushalayim.

WHEN TO BE INFLEXIBLEHow old are you?This innocent question is

not meant to pressure anyone or make them uncomfortable, but Ruti is embarrassed every time she has to respond. It comes up at farbrengens and when she’s on mivtzaim. She wants to feel young and free of worries, but how can she? The clock does not stop ticking and she hasn’t found a shidduch yet.

Her recent date was excellent, the conversation flowed, but to her consternation, at the end of it, the young man took out a Smartphone. She could see how he was up to date with every possible technological device. They call this a Chassidishe bachur?! she thought bitterly.

But maybe she was the

problem? Maybe, today there are no bachurim who are yerei Shamayim, Chassidish, who stand strong against that which is foreign to her? She had heard how people called her picky and unrealistic. Maybe she had to do what her friend Esther confided in her that she did. Esther said she had no choice but to concede a bit on her level of tznius so dating would work out for her.

“Today’s bachurim aren’t Chassidish as they once were,” she maintained. “We have no choice but to make accommodations.”

Well, she did not want to compromise on her values and did not know what to do.

In shidduchim (as in marriage), is it good advice “to be smart and not right?” Are yiras Shamayim matters things

we can be flexible about? What can be done when today, the reality is such that the girls’ level of yiras Shamayim is usually higher than that of the bachurim?

R’ Notik: Of course you should not be flexible. The men have to be motivated to rise up to the spiritual level of the women. On the contrary, you need to look at the current reality not as something negative, but as a taste of Yemos HaMoshiach when “a female will surround a male” and “a valorous woman is a crown for her husband.” It is this reality, in which the spiritual level of the woman is higher, that is the fully rectified reality for Yemos HaMoshiach. The woman has the power to bring the man up to her level, to influence the husband to have set times for

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learning Torah and to disconnect from inappropriate forms of entertainment.

Are you saying a woman can marry someone on a lower spiritual level and make him her project?

From the outset, a girl needs to look for someone suitable, who matches her spiritual level. Marriage is not a yeshiva. You don’t marry in order to teach. But in the event that they married and they see that her spiritual level is higher, it is very important to work on this, but it has to be done respectfully and not like a mechaneches.

Likewise, she needs to consult with her mashpia about how to influence her husband without lowering herself, but of course, this is not a reason

for divorce. The husband needs to be influenced in “ways of pleasantness and peace.” He needs to be raised up while not adversely affecting the shalom bayis.

Are you saying then, that on dates, a girl should not make accommodations on tznius and the use of technological gadgets?

As far as shidduchim, there could be a bachur who has gadgets he shouldn’t have, but in other respects he is a very Chassidishe boy. There isn’t a categorical answer to this, but there is no question that these phones endanger the institution of marriage to some degree and cause a lot of confusion and lack of proper familial communications. It’s important to address this issue.

If the bachurim knew that the girls would reject them for these phones, it could cause many of them not to use them, knowing that it would adversely affect them in shidduchim. As to whether to pursue a certain shidduch when he uses a phone like this, a mashpia should be consulted.

LAMDANUS AND MIDDOSYaakov ran, huffing and

sweating, toward the bus stop, hoping to catch the bus that was there. Unfortunately, he missed it by a second and he had no choice but to wait for half an hour for the next bus. Yaakov does not take these things to heart and he is not the type to waste time. He began scanning the passersby to see who might be a potential

On the contrary,

you need to look

at the current reality not as

something negative, but as a

taste of Yemos HaMoshiach.

It is this reality, in which the

spiritual level of the woman

is higher, that is the fully

rectified reality for Yemos

HaMoshiach. The woman

has the power to bring

the man up to her level, to

influence the husband to

have set times for learning

Torah and to disconnect

from inappropriate forms of

entertainment.

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customer for mivtza t’fillin. To his good fortune, the bus

stop was busy. Buses came and went, people got on and got off. Hardly anyone refused to put on t’fillin. Yaakov was very pleased.

A bus was coming. Was it his? No. When the bus arrived it picked up everyone waiting there and Yaakov remained alone. He looked around and suddenly noticed a black briefcase on the bench. His heart began pounding. It was a suspicious item and the week before there had been a number of attacks. Maybe…

One minute. Yaakov stopped his wild imagination and began thinking logically. When he got to the bus stop the briefcase was not there, he was sure of that. And he had not seen a single person with Arab features, so probably someone had forgotten his briefcase and that was all.

He hesitantly approached the briefcase and gingerly opened it. Before his astonished eyes he saw piles and piles of money. Whose money was this? Who had forgotten this vast amount of money at a bus stop?

He took a paper out of his pocket and wrote on it, “Hashavas Aveida” with his phone number and put it up on the wall of the bus shelter. His bus came a few minutes later and he boarded it while holding the black briefcase. He prayed that he would be able to fulfill the mitzva of returning a lost item to its owner.

When he got home, he told his mother about the briefcase and asked her to be sure to answer the phone because maybe the owner of the briefcase would call. When he went out for Mincha-Maariv, his mother sighed and thought: Yaakov is such a great bachur. It’s already a year since he came back from shlichus with the goal

of getting married, but he hasn’t found a shidduch yet.

She knew what wonderful middos Yaakov had, and he deserved a quality girl, but what could be done when the best girls were looking for someone smart who is a lamdan and not merely for a plain, good, yerei Shamayim?

The phone rang and she answered it. An unfamiliar nervous voice asked, “Did you find a briefcase?”

“Yes,” said Yaakov’s mother and she gave the man her address. Within an hour, a Chassidic man appeared. He provided identifying signs and was given the briefcase. He could not stop thanking Yaakov and his mother. “A few hours ago I came back from England where I worked hard to raise money for our yeshiva. I guess that in my exhaustion I forgot the briefcase with all the donations at the bus stop. But it was all worth it so that I could meet a bachur with such yiras Shamayim and fine middos.”

It seems that the bracha that a boy be a Chassid, yerei Shamayim and only then a lamdan (acronym: chayal=soldier) is not quite the order which people are looking for in a shidduch. For many people, the lamdanus comes first, like in the Litvishe world.

What importance should we attribute to lamdanus in a Chassidishe bachur, and how much weight should we give to good middos and being a mentch?

I think the question is unrealistic since I don’t see that many outstanding lamdanim around… Anyway, a Chassid has Chassidishe middos, good middos, he goes in the ways of Chassidus, he carries out the

Rebbe’s takanos, Rambam and all Chassidishe minhagim. A yerei Shamayim fulfills the halachos that pertain to yiras Shamayim. A lamdan refers to love of Torah, someone who uses every free moment for learning. A lamdan is not about knowledge but about an attitude toward Torah study.

How much of an emphasis should be placed on a bachur’s middos?

The Rebbe’s guideline is to stress three things: good middos, yiras Shamayim, and feeling attracted. That means that good middos are a critical element. If the boy and girl have good middos, they can bridge many differences, but if good middos are lacking and there is stubbornness and unwillingness to compromise, every little disagreement will likely turn into a huge conflict.

DOR YESHARIM“What? You didn’t check with

Dor Yesharim?” Rivka asked her friend in disbelief.

“I didn’t do it, nor do I plan on doing it,” said her friend matter-of-factly. “In our family nobody does it because we rely on the Rebbe to decide about a shidduch as our ancestors throughout the generations did.”

Rivka did not respond but she wondered how anybody would be willing to consider her friend for a shidduch when the reality today is such that everyone is checked by Dor Yesharim.

A week later the friends met again and Rivka could tell from the sparkle in her friend’s eyes that something was going on. Despite her great curiosity, she refrained from asking anything and waited eagerly for good news which she heard two weeks later. Her friend was a kalla!

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At the vort, her friend said, “The shlucha for whom I worked as a counselor last summer saw someone at the Kosel who looked just like me, amazingly similar. Next to her walked a bachur whom she knew from mivtzaim. When she saw them from afar, she was sure it was me walking with him, but when they got closer, she could see it was not me. The bachur nodded to the shlucha and introduced her to his sister. The shlucha quickly explained why she was looking surprised and said she knew a Chassidishe girl who looked just like his sister and maybe he should meet her. He accepted the suggestion and here we are!”

Wow! Incredible story. Is checking with Dor

Yesharim that important or could a couple suffice with a bracha from the Rebbe (in the Igros Kodesh)? And what should happen when a couple wants to conclude a shidduch and they write to the Rebbe and see no bracha whatsoever?

Dor Yesharim is very important. Checking can prevent terrible diseases. There is no reason to write to the Rebbe before checking with Dor Yesharim just like you don’t write to the Rebbe before seeing good middos, yiras Shamayim, and an attraction.

When you don’t see an answer in the Igros Kodesh, the mashpia of the boy and girl should be spoken to. Sometimes, the mashpia will see an answer, but in general this is not a question

that can be decided in the pages of a magazine.

SIMILAR OR DIFFERENT?He’s Ashkenazi, there’s no

way he’ll agree! He’s not merely religious from the home, he’s from a Chassidishe home.

Gili tossed and turned in her creaking bed in the dormitory of the midrasha. Her mashpia told her, “Think positively and it will be good. We’ll suggest it and hope he’ll respond, at least agree to a meeting.” His younger sister was a shlucha in the midrasha and was very excited about Gili the baalas t’shuva. She told her brother about Gili and said she felt they were suitable. Both were so good and smart and successful.

Gili’s thoughts seesawed between despair and hope and she fell asleep. In a dream, she saw herself holding a little redheaded boy with freckles and blue eyes. She tried to offer him kubana (Yemenite bread) but he pushed the plate away. She woke up suddenly and lay there without moving. It was just a dream but she felt it had to be considered. It was no simple matter. Their backgrounds were so different. They might have a common language, maybe even a common vision, but maybe not. Maybe it would be easier with someone more similar.

In a situation where a girl is interested in a shidduch that is so different from her, should she be alerted to the fact that it’s harder? Maybe those who

are so different shouldn’t meet? Can suitability be measured by externals such as background and ethnicity or maybe only personality and deeper character issues?

One of the problems in shidduchim is when parents are looking for a shidduch that suits the parents but does not suit their son or daughter. They are drawn to something completely different than what their parents think is good. You need to listen to the heart whispers of a boy or girl. Parents can make suggestions but not lay down the rule. More freedom to make decisions needs to be given to the boy or girl in shidduchim. Guidance yes; dictating to them, no. A bachur needs to marry someone who suits him and the same goes for the girl.

Marrying someone different, is that an advantage or a disadvantage?

There’s no such thing as advantage or disadvantage. For one couple it’s a plus and for another couple it’s a minus. A boy and girl who are different from one another marry because they are attracted. They see the differences as a challenge. What they have in common is the fact that they are both open to the challenge. Generally speaking, the backgrounds should be similar and there should be common interests, but sometimes, the parties involved are drawn to a different background and other areas of interest.

ADD IN ACTS OF GOODNESS & KINDNESS

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WHAT WE LEARN TODAY, MOSHIACH WILL SHOW US VISUALLYFarbrengens and stories of Chassidim from

the notes of R’ Moshe Yehuda Reichmann

a”h, mashpia in Yeshivas Toras Emes in

Yerushalayim.* From a t’shura for the

Rabinowitz-Yaroslavsky wedding.

CHAI ELUL IS OUR SIMCHAS BEIS HASHOEIVA

A summary of what I said on Chai Elul 5721 at Yeshivas Toras Emes:

1) In a sicha for Chai Elul 5703, the Rebbe Rayatz relates that on Chai Elul 5653 (fifty years before the sicha was said) he went to his father, the Rebbe Rashab. His father said to him with great joy, “A gut yom tov to

us! Today is the birthday of our two great luminaries. Monday, Chai Elul 5458, is the birth date of the Baal Shem Tov and Wednesday, Chai Elul 5505, is the birth date of the Alter Rebbe.

The Rebbe goes on to write, this was the first time he heard from his father such an emphatic “gut yom tov.”

From this we can see what Chai Elul meant to the Rebbe Rashab, and in what manner

he sensed the yom tov of the birthday of the two great luminaries that he spoke in this way, and with this emphasis, and revealed this to his only son. We can only imagine what a Gan Eden-like atmosphere that was.

This feeling is also expressed in the continuation of what the Rebbe said in the sicha:

“Chai Elul is ‘our Simchas Beis HaShoeiva.’ Regarding the Simchas Beis HaShoeiva, the Yerushalmi says ‘from there they would draw ruach ha’kodesh.’ Yona ben Amitai received his spirit of prophecy from his rejoicing at the Simchas Beis HaShoeiva. So too, on the great day of Chai Elul, we need to draw a pure spirit from this day.”

Based on what it says in Likkutei Torah that the month

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of Elul is the time when the king is in the field, and we all have permission to welcome him – the idea of permission is the conferring of strength from above. With this strength we can draw a pure spirit and be aroused to repentance. This power is drawn into the month of Elul in general and on Chai Elul, our Simchas Beis HaShoeiva, in particular.

(In a humorous vein, I remember that my brother-in-law, R’ Alter Simchovitz, once walked into yeshiva during Elul and saw that the zal was empty; hardly any bachurim were there learning. He expressed his surprise to me, “In Elul they don’t learn?!” I told him that this is an explicit Likkutei Torah that in Elul there aren’t the

usual s’darim in yeshiva. For in Likkutei Torah the question is asked, since the great quality of Shabbos and Yom Tov is derived from the revelation of G-dliness on these days, and since the 13 Attributes of Mercy shine during Elul, which are the loftiest of lights, shouldn’t these days of Elul be Yomim Tovim? And on Yom Tov there is no yeshiva.)

THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MOSHKE AND BINYAMIN2) The Alter Rebbe once

asked: What is the difference between Moshke and Binyamin (referring to his Chassidim, R’ Moshe Vilenker and R’ Binyamin Kletzker)?

Said the Alter Rebbe: Binyamin is good for himself but is not fit for the world, while

Moshe is good for the world but not fit for himself.

R’ Gronem the mashpia asked, when you ask “what is the difference between this and that,” they must perforce be similar. When saying that Binyamin is good for himself and Moshke is not good for himself, that shows they are completely different! So why ask what the difference is between them?

R’ Gronem said, since R’ Moshke was good for the world and it is known that he had tremendous oratorical abilities and he would review a lot of Chassidus (at first he would say the words of the Alter Rebbe, word for word and even with his niggun. Then he would say, “Now let’s put together our own package,” and he would start to

R’ Moshe Yehuda Reichmann (right) and R’ Moshe Aryeh Leib Shapiro farbrenging in Toras Emes. Standing and giving out mashke is Menachem Fleischman.

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explain things in his own way. Since he had such a positive impact on the world, this elevated him to the point that it was even possible to ask, “What is the difference between Moshke and Binyamin?”

THE CHIDDUSH OF MOSHIACH

A summary of what I said on Chai Elul 5722 in Yeshivas Toras Emes:

1) In the sicha of Chai Elul 5703, the Rebbe writes that Chai Elul is our additional Simchas Beis HaShoeiva. Seemingly, the month of Elul is a time of spiritual accounting and a time of merirus (bitterness). Although the Baal

Shem Tov infused chayus into the avoda of “Ani L’Dodi,” and got rid of the sadness, still there is merirus instead, and merirus is the converse of the inyan of Simchas Beis HaShoeiva!

The way to resolve between these two – merirus and simcha – is based on what it says, “and be joyous in trembling,” and like the Zohar says, “joy fixed in the heart on this side and tears fixed in the heart on the other side.” Since the merirus and simcha are derived from two different things, it is possible to have two opposite things together.

The same is so for Chai Elul, since this is the birthday of the two great luminaries, the Baal Shem Tov and the Alter Rebbe,

through whom the revelation of p’nimius ha’Torah began to be revealed, which is the hisgalus of Moshiach.

The story is known that they once asked the Alter Rebbe – after he had revealed so much of p’nimius ha’Torah, what would Moshiach innovate? And he answered that the chiddush of Moshiach would be the “aha.” This would be like a person who learns something in all its details, but he never saw the actual thing. Later, when the thing he toiled over is shown to him, he says, aha! That part is that detail I learned about, and this part is the other thing I was learning, etc. Seeing the thing allows him to take pleasure in the thing itself.

So too with Chassidus. Now we learn it and Moshiach will show it to us (Moshiach is about seeing G-dliness)!

When it comes to the revelation of p’nimius ha’Torah, which was started by the great luminaries, Elul is our Simchas Torah. On the other hand, the learning of Chassidus gives us the awareness of what state we ought to be in, and what state we are actually in, hence the merirus.

Since the merirus and simcha are derived from two different issues, it is possible to have both of them together!

TAKING DOWN THE ASHES2) In the section of trumas

ha’deshen (separating the ashes) it says, “and he takes off his clothing and wears other clothing.” This section is said in Shacharis before the korbanos and before the ketores and before the Mishnayos of “Eizehu mekoman.” The trumas ha’deshen is the first thing, and therefore the foundation of the entire t’filla.

A WARMING FARBRENGENIt is known that a Chassidishe farbrengen is a mainstay of Chassidic life.

Its role is to illuminate and warm up all of a person’s powers, to refine them, and to make them vessels for the Infinite Light that is within Chassidus. As the Rebbe writes (in a letter of 25 Iyar 5711, Igros Kodesh, volume 4, p. 302):

A farbrengen together in a warm, Chassidic environment … like the Rebbe, my father-in-law said, a Chassidishe farbrengen warms the head and heart down to the heel of the foot and when you return home from such a farbrengen you bring the light and warmth into the house, so the home becomes more illuminated and warmer than it was until then.

In 5699, after the passing of the mashpia, R’ Alter Simchovitz a”h, the Rebbe Rayatz chose his brother-in-law, R’ Moshe Yehuda Reichmann a”h, to succeed him as mashpia in Yeshivas Toras Emes (both were sons-in-law of R’ Zalman Havlin who was sent by the Rebbe Rashab to found Toras Emes).

R’ Moshe Yehuda Reichmann was known for his unique service of G-d and his farbrengens were full of much Chassidic content. After his passing he left a collection of notes in which he wrote explanations in Chassidus and pearls from its world. Included in this work, he also wrote what he said at a number of farbrengens that took place in Toras Emes in the 60’s.

You could have put a splinter of wood next to

him and it would have ignited from the fervor he

had when he said this blessing.

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“Prayers were established in place of korbanos” – regarding a korban, Rabbeinu Bechaya says that it is “kiruv (drawing close) of the powers and the senses,” and this is the idea of prayer, to draw close the powers and the senses to G-dliness.

Every Jew has a G-dly spark, it’s just that it’s concealed and we need to blow on it in order to turn it into a fire. In the physical world, when you want to turn a spark into a flame, you take a bellows and use it forcefully on the spark and then it bursts into flame.

So too with prayer. The meditation during prayer is like the bellows with which we blow the G-dly spark that exists within each one of us until it becomes a flame of love for Hashem.

But before davening, before the blowing, we need to separate and pick up the ashes, i.e. when there is a pile of ashes on the spark, blowing won’t help. As much as you may blow, the spark won’t ignite. You first need to remove the ashes off the spark and then use the bellows.

This is the avoda that must happen before the start of t’filla. It starts with the bedtime Shma of the night before which is the idea of “and he takes off his clothing and wears other clothing,” thoughts of repentance that release the soul from its dirty garments and then he can approach prayer.

A DAILY SPIRITUAL ACCOUNTING

3) In the Zohar it says, “the truly meritorious, each day they look at their souls as if this day it is leaving the world,” i.e. when a person is ending his mission in this world and his “merchandise” is finished in

the market of this world, then his spiritual accounting is more intense. This is what the daily spiritual accounting is supposed to be like, or at least once a week before Shabbos, as it says in Tanya, that’s when the worlds are elevated in their source – and the spiritual accounting of the month of Elul needs to be for the entire year!

I heard from my father-in-law, R’ Zalman Havlin, that R’ Zalman Zezmer, Chassid of the Alter Rebbe, said before he passed away that he could give a spiritual accounting for the previous seven years, on every thought, word and act that he did.

A SPLINTER IGNITED BY FERVOR

4) The “world” says that when the holy R’ Avrohom, son of the Maggid, would be up to “birchas ha’yotzer,” you could have put a splinter of wood next to him and it would have ignited from the fervor he had when he said this blessing.

The Tzemach Tzedek said regarding this, “Do you think this is an exaggeration? No! It is not an exaggeration at all!”

We find something like this told about the Baal Shem Tov that he once set out with a gentile and while they were in the forest it became bitter cold and the gentile suffered greatly. The Baal Shem Tov touched one of the logs of wood with his holy hand and it caught fire from the G-dly fire in his hand.

R’ Havlin told me that in 5662, when he ran the yeshiva in Horodoshitz, he traveled to Lubavitch to take care of yeshiva matters. When he finished taking care of things and set out to return to Horodoshitz, he met

Rebbetzin Rivka, mother of the Rebbe Rashab. She said to him, “Zalman, don’t go. There will soon be a farbrengen.”

My father-in-law wondered why this was so, in the middle of the week. Afterward he found out that R’ Moshe Orenstein, the Rebbe Maharash’s son-in-law, had a serious court case and that day it was decided in his favor and the Rebbe Rashab said to set up a farbrengen but only for select individuals to participate.

At this farbrengen, the Rebbe told about his own life, how he worked on himself in every respect. When he spoke about his avodas ha’t’filla, he said that when he reaches the bracha of yotzer, he contemplates how the seraphim say Kadosh and how they recognize that the Infinite Light is holy and separate, and this causes them to have “brands of fire” as is explained in the Chassidic discourses on the verse, “seraphim standing above him, etc.”

Afterward, the Rebbe went on to say, he contemplates how the Ofanim say “boruch” and this arouses in him a jealousy of the divine service of the angels. However, when he reaches the Shma, the song of the souls, then the feeling is of “Where angels, what angels?”

As it’s explained in Chassidus regarding the difference between “mehalchim” (goers) and “omdim” (standers), that angels are called standing and neshamos are called goers as it says, “And I will place you as mehalchim among these omdim.” Angels, as lofty as they might be, are only omdim, but neshamos are goers and this is incomparable! It’s g’vul (limited) versus bli g’vul (infinite)! This is the inner “soul process” of a tzaddik!

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SYNCING THE BODY WITH THE SOULBy Rabbi Heschel Greenberg

REVEALED AND HIDDEN BLESSINGS

The harshest words of rebuke in the Torah can be found in this week’s parsha. The Talmud states that it is read before Rosh Hashanah, but interrupted by another parsha. This tells us that all of the year’s curses, including the curse of continued Galus, shall cease, and a new year of blessing, particularly, the final Redemption, shall commence. We pray, hope and are confident that G-d will bring an end to all of the past negatives and that the forthcoming year will be, exclusively, one of blessing.

We cannot be content to ask only for the cessation of all the curses; we must also request that they be transformed into blessings.

Moreover, Chassidus teaches us—based on a story in the Talmud—that these curses are indeed sublime and hidden blessings. When we ask for the end and transformation of the curses, we are actually asking G-d to reveal their hidden

dimension.Many Torah commentators

have demonstrated how we can reinterpret some of these harsh verses in ways that expose their hidden meaning as profound blessings.

In that spirit, let us attempt to discover the hidden blessings in the following verse:

“And you shall serve your enemy whom G-d shall send against you, in hunger and in thirst, in nakedness and in want of all things; and he shall put a yoke of iron upon your neck until he will have destroyed you.”

HELPING YOUR DONKEYThe phrase “you shall serve

your enemy” can be understood in a positive light. Between the words “serve” and “your enemy” is the Hebrew word es, which though not usually translated, is often understood to mean “with.” We can now restate the phrase as: “And you shall serve together with your enemy.”

This thought echoes the teaching of the Baal Shem

Tov (whose 317th birthday we observe this week, on Chai Elul):

It is written: “When you will see the donkey of your enemy collapsing under its burden, and you are inclined to refrain from aiding him, you shall nevertheless aid him.” (Shmos 23:5) The Baal Shem Tov applied this moral instruction to the body (chamor, “donkey,” also means “materiality”). Initially, you may see your body as your enemy, resisting your soul’s objectives, collapsing under the “burden” of the mitzvos. You may therefore be inclined to fight the body by denying its needs and mortifying it. Says the Torah: You must aid your soul’s “enemy.” Purify the body, refine it, but do not break it. Work with it.

When the Torah adds that this is the enemy “whom G-d shall send against you” it implies that G-d Himself makes the marriage between our G-dly soul and our body. Don’t look at your body as something working against you; it was given to you specifically to work with your soul.

PARSHA THOUGHT

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The import of this teaching is that we have to recognize that our perceived enemy is not truly our enemy but is waiting for us to harness its energy to that of our soul. Together they form a formidable team.

THE SUPERIORITY OF THE BODY

When we serve G-d in a bifurcated manner – by being spiritual at times such as Shabbos or during prayer, but leaving our bodies out of it – we can only access a revealed blessing. But when we engage our body in our spiritual pursuits and work with what we thought of as our enemy, we can reach an elusive and more sublime G-dly blessing. The source of the physical body is actually higher than that of the soul.

This explains why, according to Nachmanides and the consensus of Kabbalists and Chassidic masters, the ultimate reward for the soul will be to reside within the body after the Resurrection of the Dead. Even those souls that have reposed for millennia in the highest realms of paradise, basking in G-d’s light, unhindered by the physical world, will then experience an even more transcendent aspect of G-dliness, which eludes us now.

SOURCE OF COMPLETE JOYThis verse follows one in

which the Torah describes the reason for all misery; it is when we don’t serve G-d with joy.

It maybe suggested that the verse about serving with our erstwhile enemy is the way to restore true joy. The reason a person does not serve G-d with joy is that the body is left out of the spiritual experience of the soul. Only the soul feels nurtured,

inspired and uplifted. The body’s lack of interest drags the person down so that even the soul’s joy is marred.

There is a parable attributed to the Baal Shem Tov about a prisoner who receives a letter from his father and wants to dance, which his jailors forbid. So he gives them alcohol and they begin to dance in their intoxicated state, while the prisoner is free to dance because he received a letter from his father.

Our soul must work in concert with the body to experience true joy. Indeed, the body will also feel the joy that the soul feels because, deep down, even the physical body and the Animal Soul want to conform to G-d’s will.

Where can we find evidence that the body can be receptive of the soul? And where do we see that the soul desires a relationship with the body?

The answer comes in the next few words of the verse:

GOURMET SOUL FOOD“…In Hunger and in Thirst.”Why does the body feel

hunger and thirst?The Baal Shem Tov taught

that the soul is hungry and thirsty for the G-dly sparks in the food. They are of such a sublime nature that the soul cannot access them without the physical act of eating

and drinking.This tells us two things:First, the soul needs and

craves an association with the body. It is the only way it can get “gourmet” soul food. The sparks of holiness embedded in the physical derive from a higher source than that of the spiritual. Thus, the soul craves to engage with the body in the act of eating and drinking to extract and absorb the spark. Without the body there would be no eating and drinking and therefore no access to the Divine sparks.

Second, the fact that the hunger and thirst of the soul is detected and manifested by the body proves that the body is, in no small way, receptive to and in sync with the soul.

What, one may ask, about the most evil people whose bodies are clearly out of sync with their souls but who have hearty appetites?

To afford free choice to all people, everyone must be endowed with the same physical and physiological tendencies. But the root of the body’s hunger is its G-d created propensity to be receptive to the soul unless a person acts in ways that grossly corrupt the body.

THE SOUL’S NEED FOR GARMENTS AND STUFF “…in nakedness”Even the need for garments

Dignity is not initially something the body craves;

a baby has no interest in clothing and the dignity

it provides. One must mature to be able to appreciate

the need and benefit of clothing. This happens when the

soul has made some inroads into the body and makes it

feel the need for modesty and dignity.

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for the body and our natural state of modesty is based on the needs of the soul. Garments bring dignity to the person who wears them. Dignity is not initially something the body craves; a baby has no interest in clothing and the dignity it provides. One must mature to be able to appreciate the need and benefit of clothing. This happens when the soul has made some inroads into the body and makes it feel the need for modesty and dignity.

The sense of nakedness and the need to be clothed is the body’s reflexive response to the needs and wants of the soul.

Why do most people hunger to acquire things? No animal seeks to accumulate stuff for its own sake. It will hoard only what it needs for survival but not real-estate, jewelry, money and other stuff, in ever increasing amounts.

This hunger is deeply rooted in the soul’s desire to transform the world around us. We were placed here to conquer and rule the earth. Conquest in this context means to transform our

environment into a place where G-d’s presence can be felt; a place where G-d can reside.

A human’s body has a natural desire to accumulate property because it is responding to the soul’s desire to conquer the world in a G-dly way. Here too we see the potential that soul and body have to work together.

This too is alluded to in the next phrase of the verse:

“…and in want of all things;”So far the verse has focused

on bodily needs that parallel, and to some extent reflect, our soul’s needs. The hidden blessing here is that the soul and body will enjoy a blissful and harmonious relationship.

IRON ON OUR NECKSThe grim conclusion of the

verse points to a much different aspect of the body that seems without redeeming value because it is totally against everything the soul stands for:

“…and he shall put a yoke of iron upon your neck until he will

have destroyed you.”This refers to the basest

aspect of the body, when it becomes rebellious and wages war with the G-dly soul. Iron is a potent symbol of destruction. It is the only material that was not permitted to be used in constructing the Holy Temple because its very nature alludes to bloodshed. In the worst-case scenario, the soul feels the full weight of the mortal body and its Animal Soul crushing its neck, the nexus of the mind and the heart, the two most important parts of our personality with which we serve G-d.

Even this base aspect of the body and the Animal soul is not truly a hindrance to working with the G-dly soul. The hidden blessing here is that the G-dly soul takes the iron yoke and turns it around to use it in the creation of the Third Bais HaMikdash, in which iron will be used unlike its two predecessors. The hidden blessing of iron will be revealed in all of its glory!

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THE REBBE’S MONTHBy Rabbi Naftali Estulin

Shliach, Los Angeles

The Chassid, R’ Avrohom Maiyor would say that the two months of Elul and Tishrei are “the Rebbe’s months,”

since what makes them special and an auspicious time is in the merit of Moshe Rabbeinu. It is not necessary to learn drushei Chassidus to know this. It’s enough to open a Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, the beginning of siman 128, where it states: “These days are more choice for repentance, being days of mercy and favor, for on Rosh Chodesh Elul, Moshe ascended Mount Sinai to receive the second Luchos. He remained there for forty days and descended on 10 Tishrei which was the completion of the atonement. Since then, these days have been dedicated as days of favor and the 10th of Tishrei as Yom Kippur.”

The foundation and start of these days of favor are directly connected with Moshe Rabbeinu. Moshe is the one who first aroused mercy during these days and surely he, and the Moshe Rabbeinu in every generation, draws this favor into every single year.

The fact that during these days many Jews are inspired to repentance, knowing that these days are more auspicious and are a time of divine favor, comes from the power of the Moshe of the generation, the Rebbe.

This ought to be deeply ingrained

in every Chassid and even by those who are not Chassidim. They should know that the Rebbe is the one who concerns himself with arousing divine favor for each person. This knowledge will surely arouse a special merit, the merit of our Rebbeim up to and including the Rebbe MH”M. Then the arousal to repentance and the time of favor will be on an entirely different plane.

As the Rebbe once explained, the practice to sing “Avinu Malkeinu” (the Alter Rebbe’s niggun) before each t’filla on Rosh HaShana including Maariv, even though we don’t say Avinu Malkeinu then, is to mention the merit of our ancestors, i.e. the merit of the Alter Rebbe.

WHY NINE?When living with the Rebbeim,

and trying to connect to everything about the Nasi HaDor, we find some very interesting things. For example, the number nine.

There are a number of things connected to Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur that have to do with the number nine. That we say three extra chapters of T’hillim a day during these days was received by tradition from Rebbe to Rebbe at the age of nine. It was like that for the Mitteler Rebbe, the Tzemach Tzedek, the Rebbe Maharash, the Rebbe Rashab,

and the Rebbe Rayatz.During the t’filla for Rosh

HaShana we have nine blessings, and on Erev Yom Kippur we circle the chicken for Kaparos nine times around our head.

What is special about the number nine? It says in the fourth chapter of Gemara Brachos, “What do the nine (blessings in the Amida prayer) of Rosh HaShana correspond to? R’ Yitzchok of Carthage says that they correspond to the nine ‘mentions’ (i. e. the name Y-H-V-H) that Chana said in her prayer.”

When Chassidim speak about “Chana,” they immediately think about the mother of royalty, who brought the Rebbe, the ninth from the Baal Shem Tov, into the world.

It is interesting to note that this statement of Chazal is quoted in a maamer that the Rebbe Rayatz said on Rosh HaShana 5629, the year the Rebbe married, which connected the Rebbe to the Chassidim and turned the Rebbe into the ninth generation of Chabad Chassidus.

From Chana, the mother of Shmuel, who established the Malchus Beis Dovid, we go in our generation to Chana, the mother of the Rebbe, whose fiftieth yahrtzait was this year, and who brought into the world the one who will bring the completion of the Malchus Beis Dovid.

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“YOUR CHILDREN WILL BE GOOD JEWS AND GOOD HUMAN BEINGS”This amazing story began nearly forty years

ago with the Rebbe’s shluchim in Missouri at

a large bar-mitzvah that took place on the

instructions of the Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach,

and concluded about a month ago at Moshav

Magshimim, near Yehud, at the bar-mitzvah

celebration of HaTamim Menachem Mendel

Rosen. What happened in the meantime during

those years? And who revealed the results of the

shliach’s activities shortly before his passing?

By Nosson Avraham

Translated by Michoel Leib Dobry

On Erev Rosh Chodesh Tammuz, Rabbi Dovid Rosen, the Rebbe MH”M’s shliach in

Moshav Magshimim, near Yehud, celebrated the bar-mitzvah of his son, HaTamim Menachem Mendel Rosen.

“A few months before the scheduled day of the bar-

mitzvah, as my wife Yafit and I started organizing the event, we had absolutely no doubt where it would take place. It was clear to us that despite the logistical problems, it would be held on the moshav,” said Rabbi Dovid Rosen as he began his incredible story, which is making the rounds throughout Anash communities.

“One of the important links in this story is Rabbi Sholom Dovber Alperowitz, of blessed memory, who passed away a few months ago. It can be said with the utmost certainty that in the merit of this man, who briefly worked on the Rebbe’s shlichus in S. Louis, Missouri, where my parents lived, I, and

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my twin brother Naftali living in Tzfas, were educated in Chabad institutions and established Chassidic families.”

How did this happen? And what is the connection to the bar-mitzvah of the shliach’s son on the moshav? Rabbi Rosen brings us the story now:

THE REBBE’S SURPRISING INSTRUCTION

“My mother Rochel was born in New York to an egalitarian Jewish family, and she got involved with the teachings of Chassidus when she was a student at the University of Maryland.

“During the month of Elul, shortly after beginning her studies in College Park, she met Rabbi Moishe Silverman, the Rebbe’s shliach in charge of campus outreach activities, as he mingled among the students in search of Jews. When he found a Jewish student, he would blow the shofar for him. This continued for several hours as she looked on. She was deeply moved by the shliach’s dedication and concern, and she became a regular guest in the Silvermans’ home, even participating in Chabad programs on campus.

“She soon began to follow the path of Torah and mitzvos. She left college and made her way to Minnesota, and with the guidance of the shluchim, she registered as a student with the Bais Chana Women’s Seminary, run by the shliach Rabbi Manis Friedman. My mother loved the teaching staff there, and she took her initial kiruv steps with the help of the rabbis. She eventually became engaged to my father, who came from a much stronger Jewish background than my mother. His parents and family belonged to the Litvishe community.

“After their engagement, my mother declared that she wanted to go in with my father for a yechidus with the Rebbe before their wedding, as was customary in those days, and receive his blessing. At first, my father’s parents expressed their fierce opposition to his meeting with the Rebbe, but my mother was determined and they eventually gave their consent. My parents went in for yechidus a few weeks before their wedding in 5735, and my mother requested a bracha for success in arranging a place to live and the means to make a proper living. However, she forgot to ask for a bracha for children.

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“The Rebbe blessed my mother in everything she requested, and then he added in English: ‘Your children will be good Jews and good human beings.’ She left the yechidus with great joy and emotion, particularly from the Rebbe’s final bracha.

“Immediately after the sheva brachos, my parents received an offer to relocate to S. Louis, Missouri. It was home to a small Jewish community, and its leaders wanted to expand and bring more Jewish families to live there. Their idea was to found a seminary for girls as a way of drawing young women from all over the United States to learn in the city. In addition, staff members came to establish their permanent residence in S. Louis, and the community naturally grew. My father took a position with this new institution, and he and my mother packed

their belongings, said goodbye to their families, and headed for the Show Me State.

“About a year later, in the summer of 5737, another guest came to settle in S. Louis, the Rebbe’s shliach, Rabbi Sholom Ber Alperowitz, of blessed memory, and his wife (may she live and be well). The Alperowitz children were already grown up and had gone to raise their own families. They still had one young child left at home, a twelve-year old boy learning back in Crown Heights. A few months later, on Erev Rosh Chodesh Teves 5738, it was a stormy winter night. Local residents were advised to remain in their homes due to the turbulent weather conditions. Suddenly, my mother went into labor, and with the help of paramedic and ambulance services, she was transported to the hospital in time to give birth to me and my twin brother

Naftali. “A month after we were

born, Rabbi Alperowitz’s son reached the age of thirteen. The Alperowitzs had been planning to travel back to New York, where they would celebrate a proper Chassidic bar-mitzvah for the extended family, close friends, and acquaintances. There was no kosher catering in Missouri, and since the shluchim were relatively new in the area, they still hadn’t managed to establish contact with the city’s business community.

“However, the Rebbe had a different idea in mind. In a reply sent to Rabbi Alperowitz, the Rebbe instructed the shluchim to make a public bar-mitzvah celebration specifically in the place of their shlichus and invite the entire Jewish community.

“The change in plans required considerable reorganization, and the shluchim worked quite vigorously to arrange this. As the joyous day approached, invitations were sent to all members of the city’s Jewish community. While they didn’t know how many people to expect at the grand hotel hosting the event, it drew a very large crowd, including my parents who brought my brother and me along in a double stroller. It was a celebration that most Jews in Missouri had never experienced before, and it also gave many of them an opportunity to meet the shluchim for the first time.

“At a certain point, Rabbi Alperowitz asked everyone to be quiet, and his son furrowed his brow with intense concentration as he began to recite the bar-mitzvah discourse by heart. My father looked at the shliach’s son with great excitement and amazement. He turned to my mother and said, ‘I want our sons to be just like this young man.’

In his letter to Rabbi Alperowitz, the Rebbe instructed him to organize the bar mitzvah specifically in the place of his shlichus

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During this period, my parents were Torah-observant Jews, albeit not Chabad Chassidim. This bar-mitzvah celebration sharpened my father’s desire to send us to learn specifically in Chabad educational institutions, and it created a great emotional closeness to Chabad.

“Not long afterward, in 5740, two Jewish families left the S. Louis community. The Alperowitzs returned to New York, while my parents emigrated to Eretz Yisroel, establishing their residence in Yerushalayim’s Sanhedria neighborhood. My mother often told me that she feels that the Rebbe sent the Alperowitz couple to the remote location where they were living for the sole purpose of bringing them to Lubavitch...

“Upon our arrival in Eretz Yisroel, my father didn’t forget his promise, and he sent us to learn at the Chabad Toras Emes cheider in Yerushalayim.

“While we often heard at home from our parents the story behind the fact that we learned in Chabad institutions, they never told us the name of the shluchim.

In fact, when we finally asked them to tell us the names of those shluchim, they had already forgotten. Incredibly, my brother and I both learned in Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim in Kiryat Gat, and it never dawned on us that the yeshiva’s mashpia, Rabbi Meshulam Zusha Alperowitz, was the son of the shluchim in whose merit we had gone to learn there...

INFORMATION FOUND, CIRCLE CLOSED

“Many years passed, and my son Menachem Mendel reached the age of thirteen. Together with my work with the Chabad yeshiva in Ohr Yehuda, we are privileged to serve as the Rebbe’s shluchim on Moshav Magshimim, near Yehud. Naturally, my wife and I decided that regardless of the difficulties, we would make the bar-mitzvah celebration on the moshav. After all, my brother and I had joined the king’s army only in the merit of how impressed our father was by the shliach’s son on the day of his bar-mitzvah.

“Once it was decided to make

the bar-mitzvah in Magshimim, not in Kfar Chabad, I resolved that I must find out, once and for all, the identity of those chassidim on shlichus in S. Louis at that time who led us along the path to Lubavitch. I felt that this represented the closing of a circle. I called a friend who learned with me in Yerushalayim, Rabbi Mendy Greisman, the Rebbe’s shliach in northwest Arkansas.

“I told him the story and he was very moved. He immediately noted that his son was also about to have a bar-mitzvah, and he had been considering the possibility of making it in Eretz Yisroel or some other Chabad center. However, he saw this story as a clear sign from the Rebbe to organize his son’s bar-mitzvah celebration specifically in the place of his shlichus, using the opportunity to spread the wellsprings of Chassidus.

“I asked him to inquire for me among his friends, the more veteran shluchim, who had been on shlichus in S. Louis in the late seventies. He promised to help me out, and the very next

The Rosen twins – R’ Dovid and R’ Naftali – with their father on the day of their bar-mitzvah

R’ Dovid Rosen with his thirteen-year old son, Menachem Mendel

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day, he already had an answer. He knew who those shluchim were, and he even contacted the Alperowitz family and told them the whole story. They were astounded, overwhelmed by the

blessed results of the bar-mitzvah celebration that the Rebbe had asked them to make in Missouri.

“When I called to speak with them personally, Mrs. Alperowitz told me that her husband lives

the Rebbe’s instruction in that matter with every fiber of his body, telling people about it at every opportunity. Regrettably, I wasn’t able to speak with Rabbi Alperowitz, as he was already very ill. However, by Divine Providence, his wife did tell him the end of the story before his passing.

“Needless to say, during my son’s bar-mitzvah celebration last month, together with the reciting of the traditional maamer, I also told this story, which sharpened the Baal Shem Tov’s message on the Divine Providence found in every detail of our lives.”

* * *As Rabbi Rosen concluded his

story, he expressed his deep regret over the recent passing of Rabbi Alperowitz. He said that he had been planning to meet with him at the upcoming International Shluchim Conference.

“While I can’t necessarily characterize this story as a ‘Baal Shem’ske maaseh,’ I haven’t the slightest doubt that G-d had arranged for Rabbi Alperowitz a”h to hear the end of the story before he departed from this world.”

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POLITICAL CORRECTNESS DOESN’T WORK We must bring G-d into the story. If we are in Eretz Yisroel because of the Balfour Declaration or a decision by the United Nations General Assembly, if we are here by an act of kindness and not by our own right, then indeed, we are living on property belonging to others. If someone – the United Nations, Balfour – showed us compassion by allowing us to live here, then indeed, we have to keep apologizing all the time for stealing someone else’s land.

By Sholom Ber Crombie

Translated by Michoel Leib Dobry

1.Up until a couple of weeks

ago, Danny Danon was one of the leading right-wing hawks

in the Israeli government. The young Knesset Member, who fought virtually on his own within the previous left-of-center government and the current one,

has become a symbol of the battle to preserve the territorial integrity of Eretz Yisroel. Today, Danon is on his way to the United Nations to represent the struggle for shleimus ha’aretz on the most difficult battlefront for Israeli diplomacy.

Danny Dayan, former Yesha Council chairman, is also considered a central figure in the Israeli nationalist camp. Dayan is now en route to Brazil – one of the most vitally important countries in Israel’s public diplomacy campaign regarding world trade relations and more. Dayan will have to fight the anti-Israeli boycott, divestment, and sanctions in the coming years on one of the most decisive and divisive fronts in our international affairs.

It seems that someone in the higher echelons of Israeli policymaking has decided to move from apologies to public

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diplomacy. Perhaps this was none other than that once young ambassador who used to stand resolutely with the Tanach against the world, claiming our right to Eretz Yisroel with absolute determination. This time, he may have again recalled what the Rebbe had told him when he was Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations. At the time, the Rebbe explained to him that the UN is a house of lies and in order to drive out the falsehoods, he has to light a small candle – “a little light dispels much darkness.”

What happened to Israeli public diplomacy since that encounter at Hakafos on Simchas Torah 5745 between the Rebbe and the man who later became prime minister of Israel? “Shortly after I came here to the United Nations as ambassador – and this was many years ago, I met with the Lubavitcher Rebbe,” Binyamin Netanyahu later recalled. “It was the night of Simchas Torah. There were thousands of Chassidim in the hall. He asked to speak with me. We started talking. He spoke Hebrew, perfect Hebrew… Five minutes, ten minutes, and the Chassidim were getting very restless… After forty minutes, he stopped…The Rebbe said many things to me that night, but he said one big thing. He said, ‘You will go into a house of lies,’ that’s how he referred to [that] particular institution. ‘Remember that in a hall of perfect darkness, if you light one small candle, its precious light will be seen from afar, by everyone. Your mission is to light a candle for truth and for the Jewish People.’

“That is what I have tried to do ever since,” he concluded. “This is what we are all asked to do. There is only one way to dispel the pitch-black darkness of Holocaust denial and the hatred

of Jews: present the truth in a courageous manner, repeating it again and again and again…”

2.However, when the Prime

Minister of Israel stands at the rostrum of the United Nations General Assembly and proclaims that a ‘Palestinian’ state must be created in Eretz HaKodesh, he has taken our rightful claim to the Jewish homeland and pulled it out from under his feet. Even if he would justify our right to defend ourselves against our enemies, this would be a victory on points, not on the battlefield. Their central claim still remains in force: this is not our land ch”v. The Arabs claim that this is their land: they had been here and we drove them out. And what is our response? ‘They are murdering and slaughtering us, and it is our right to defend ourselves...’ The average person cannot accept such a claim, for in his estimation, there is no reason for someone to protect himself in a place where he has no moral right to be. If you have a problem,

pack up and leave. In the eyes of the world, the unfortunate Arab is always being oppressed. Even when they condemn the frightful acts of bloodshed by terrorists, in the same breath, they display tremendous tolerance and understanding toward those who have been wrongfully deprived of their homes.

Up until now, we’ve had some excellent emissaries at the United Nations and throughout the world. They passed top-level courses, acquiring fine qualities in rhetoric and extraordinary diplomatic skills. Yet, while they managed to achieve much popularity and develop a sense of empathy for their mission, they found many doors closed to them. With all their personal chemistry, the heart eventually connects to the downtrodden people banished from their land far more than to the aggressive conqueror that periodically endures murderous terrorist attacks.

The problem has never been with our ambassadors’ unique talents, rather with their narrative. Instead of using public diplomacy, they have been making apologies.

“Listen to a story,” the standard Israeli spokesman would claim. “Six million of our people were murdered only because they didn’t have their own country and an army to protect them. Then, after we went like lambs to the slaughter, we decided to ask for a place of refuge where we could be safe and protected.” And why are the Arab refugees who fled during the War of Independence to blame? Here’s where the apologies begin.

It turns out that there’s only one argument that can stand up against the world – the one that the Rebbe demanded

United Nations ambassador Danny Danon

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on numerous occasions from people dealing with the issue of international relations:

We must bring G-d into the story. If we are in Eretz Yisroel because of the Balfour Declaration or a decision by the United Nations General Assembly, if we are here by an act of kindness and not by our right, then we have no right to be here. If someone – the United Nations, Balfour – showed us compassion by letting us live here, then indeed, we have to keep apologizing all the time for stealing someone else’s land.

3.Suddenly, a new generation of

diplomatic spokesmen has arisen, people who don’t apologize and are not embarrassed to talk about the Tanach, our right to Eretz Yisroel, and the Divine promise of “I will give this land to you.” This has resulted in some fascinating alliances with many people from the world at-large. They include some prominent United States Senators from the Republican Party, who are prepared to join us in advancing a new public relations approach, which is essentially the oldest of all. As a result, belief in the Tanach, which the Rebbe frequently said is shared by the whole world, has become the best line of defense. It provides us with logical arguments that Eretz Yisroel is our homeland, and therefore, that’s why we’re here. Even from a historical standpoint, these claims strengthen the best possible facts: Jews have been living in the Holy Land for an uninterrupted string of generations stretching over thousands of years since Avraham Avinu.

One of the leading spokesmen for this new PR offensive is Yossi

Dagan, who initiated the project arranging hospitality in Yehuda and Shomron for intelligence representatives from all over the world. He once told about a meeting he had with a member of the United States Senate, who claimed emphatically that we have no right to control the “West Bank.” Dagan proceeded to take out the maps and show the Senator the location of Shilo, Beit E-l, Mt. Grizim, Yosef’s Tomb, Emek Dotan, and all the places that our forefathers had inhabited as mentioned in the Tanach. Suddenly, the Senator held his head in his hands in a display of sheer amazement, as he realized that the “West Bank” was none other than the Biblical Samaria. It turned out that prior to that meeting, not a single Israeli diplomat had ever told him

this fundamental truth. Officials from the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs travel throughout the globe, representing the IDF and Eretz HaKodesh, equipped with apologies and excuses – and without any rational explanations.

A few weeks ago, Yossi Dagan was selected as chairman of the Shomron Regional Council, the leading settler representative body in Yehuda and Shomron. This appointment grants him the authority to implement the new explanatory policy at formal conferences as an official envoy of Eretz Yisroel and head of the largest municipal council beyond the Green Line, unapologetically representing the Holy Tanach.

Dagan, only thirty-four years of age, represents the new generation: He makes no excuses and doesn’t just utter slogans. He’s not embarrassed to wear a kippa on his head and he’s proud of his Jewish faith. He walks unashamedly in all corners of the globe and speaks about G-d as the only true “proof of ownership” on our rights to Eretz Yisroel. The first generation of the settler movement dealt only with building – “another dunam, another goat.” Today’s younger generation knows how to build impressive projects, but it also understands that there are other struggles that cannot be abandoned. It does not neglect the international arena for diplomats who have

The problem has never been with our

ambassadors’ unique talents, rather with their

narrative. Instead of using public diplomacy, they have

been making apologies.

Former Yesha Council chairman Danny Dayan, Israel’s new

ambassador to Brazil

Continued on page 4

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THE LITVISHE RAV WHO WAS A SHLIACH

OF THE REBBEBy Nechama Bar

Helen sat on the couch, her eyes swollen with tears. She herself did not know how long she was sitting like that, staring into space, feeling helpless.

The familiar footsteps of John, her husband, who had just walked into the house, jarred her out of her reverie. But she did not have the en-ergy to get up and greet him warmly as she usually did.

“What happened, Helen?” John asked worriedly.

Tears choked her up and she could barely get out the words. “Judy… Judy...”

“What happened to Judy?” John asked frantically.

“Don’t ask. She called this morning and told me … that she decided to marry that black fellow. The one who used to come here often.”

“Oh no!” John sank on to the couch.

“I spoke nicely, I pleaded with her, and I even cried out from the bottom of my heart that she should leave him. I re-minded her again and again that she is a Jew and she must marry a Jew, but … she wasn’t interested. According to her,

it’s her life and nobody is go-ing to change her mind.” Helen sighed deeply.

Although Helen and John were not religious, in their darkest dreams they did not imagine that their dear daugh-ter would marry a goy!

John was practical and wasted no time. He called his friend, a Lubavitcher, to ar-range a meeting for him with the Rebbe. John knew of many miracle stories which he heard from his friend and he knew that only the Rebbe could help them here.

Not long afterward, they had an appointment for yechi-dus. The two of them sat in the Rebbe’s office, waiting for his advice and blessing.

The Rebbe looked at them lovingly. John and Helen felt that the Rebbe knew precisely what was happening with them and their daughter, as though their lives were spread out be-fore him. A wonderfully uplift-ing feeling gave them the con-fidence that they were in good hands.

The Rebbe advised them to go to a certain rabbi of a cer-

tain community. The two of them left the room feeling sur-prised. They did not know that rabbi and did not understand why the Rebbe was sending them to him. This time, it was Helen who said they should not delay but go to the rabbi im-mediately, that same day.

After checking out the ad-dress they set out. They found the rabbi’s house easily. They knocked at the door with hope in their hearts.

“Listen, I am not a Chas-sid of the Rebbe. I am a Litv-ishe rav and greatly admire the Rebbe, but … I don’t understand this. I don’t know you, or your daughter, and certainly not her boyfriend. What can I do?”

“How can I help you?” asked the rabbi.

Helen told him the story and ended with, “The Lubavitch-er Rebbe sent us to you. You are the one who can save our daughter!”

The rabbi wrinkled his fore-head. He was perplexed. He shrugged his shoulders and tried to come up with ideas of how he could help, but he came up with nothing.

34 � • 20 Elul 5775

TZIVOS HASHEM

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Continued on page 05

“Listen, I am not a Chas-sid of the Rebbe. I am a Litv-ishe rav and greatly admire the Rebbe, but … I don’t understand this. I don’t know you, or your daughter, and certainly not her boyfriend. What can I do?”

Helen did not give up. She had a strong faith in the Rebbe as though she was his Chassid. “The Rebbe sent us to you and the salvation will come through you. I have no doubt about it.”

When the rabbi could not come up with anything and he saw that the couple was not going to give up, he asked for their address and the ad-dress of the black man.

“We will see whether I can come up with anything. I will let you know.” He said this skeptically and sent them on their way.

All that day, the rabbi could not stop thinking about his meeting with John and Helen. He tried again and again to figure out why the Rebbe had sent the couple to him and how he could help, but came up with nothing.

He walked toward his shul to learn a little and clear his head, but found it hard to con-centrate. He paced around the shul.

“Hello rabbi, how are you?” came a voice from the shul kitchen. It was one of the black workers at the shul.

“Thank G-d,” said the rabbi

briefly.“Rabbi, you look worried.

Maybe I can help you with something? My mother always said that I need to know ev-erything, but it pays to tell me because I can help with every-thing,” he chuckled.

The rabbi tried to avoid him because, as usual, the man was

putting his nose

i n t o

matters that did not con- cern him. But this time, the man did not stop. “Come on, tell me, what do you have to lose?”

He pestered the rabbi until the rabbi gave in and told him what was on his mind.

“A Jewish couple came to me that I don’t know. Their daughter wants to marry a black guy and … I don’t know if you know this … but a Jew cannot marry someone who is not Jewish. They asked me to help them and convince the girl to leave her boyfriend.

“I feel bad for them, but believe me, I have no idea how to help them. I took their ad-dress and the address of the black guy and told them that if I manage to come up with something, I will let them know. That’s the story.”

“Rabbi, you came to the right place! As I said before, I can take care of everything. My mother would say that I have

the power of persuasion and you cannot refuse me. I’m telling you, I managed to

convince friends that sour wine is a deli-cacy. Give me the

black guy’s ad-dress and I will take care of it.”

T h e r a b b i was tak-en aback by this. It

seemed far-fetched, to say the least. But the man

was stubborn and did indeed have the powers of

persuasion, and he man-aged to get the address from

the rabbi.A few days went by and the

rabbi got a phone call. He heard the excited voice of Helen.

“Rabbi, you saved us! I can’t begin to thank you! Our daugh-ter left her non-Jewish boy-friend!”

The rabbi was happy to hear it even though he did not understand how things had worked out so well. Apparently, the black worker had done a good job convincing the man to leave the Jewish woman.”

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