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TALES
FOR THE SHABBOS TABLE
This week’s section
describes in great detail the deathbed scene of Yaakov and how
he blesses each of his twelve sons until his final moment.
But the Talmud (Pesachim 56a) tells us that at this time Yaakov
suspected his
sons of idolatry. Perhaps they believed in more than One G-d.
To this they replied by assuring him;
Shma Yisroel etc. HaShem ECHAD…. “Hear
Israel (Yaakov’s alternate name) HaShem is our G-d, HaShem
is ONE”
(And Yaakov exclaimed, “Boruch Shem
K’vod etc” – ‘May the glory of G-d’s
name
be
blessed for ever’ - which is the reason these words are
added to the ‘Shema’
prayer
to this very day).
This is not understood. Why would Yaakov,
especially at such a serious and
intense moment, suspect his sons of such a thing as idolatry?!
And, on the other hand... what was he so worried about? What
difference does
it
make how many gods his sons worshiped? Better he should worry
if they are
honest or kind.
To answer this, here is a personal story.
Several years ago my wife and I took
a trip to Holland for a few days. As a Chassid Chabad I try to put Tefillin on Jews whenever possible.
Jews, even
the
most unobservant, are often surprisingly pleased to be asked
and amazingly
willing to comply. So I have custom that any time I am on a
daytime flight to
or
from Israel I try to put Tefillin on the Jewish passengers.
The flight to Holland was in the night,
which is not the time for Tefillin.
But
on the early morning flight back I took out my Tefillin and
went to work.
I soon realized that although on most
flights it is necessary to ask
passengers
if they are Jewish … on this flight it wasn’t. There
is no problem recoginzing a Dutch passenger from an Israeli.
The Dutch hardly move. They just sit
in semi-frozen, stoic poses reading
their
papers or just looking ahead as though hypnotized by the drone
of the
engines.
The Israelis, on the other hand were constanly moving; adjusting
something,
talking, getting something out or putting something back or
just gesturing and
wiggling.
So I just zeroed in on anything that
moved.
I had a few successes and a few refusals
until I came to three young Isreali
fellows, obviously friends, sitting next to each other. Each
one was decorated
with progressively more disgusting degrees of tatoos, metal
piercings and
strangely dyed hair than the next, as though they were living
advertisments
for
decadent Amsterdam; ‘WE WERE THERE’!!
I approached the one closest to the aisle,
held out the Tefillin to him and
asked, “Would you like to put on Tefillin, my friend? It
only takes a minute,
just one, and you’ll enjoy it!”
He looked at me with sheer disgust and
his entire body, beginning with his
head,
shook ‘no’ as though I was offering him to eat a dead
cat.
Undaunted, I turned to his friend next
to him and made the same offer, “Nu,
what
about you? What do you say?”
He promptly reacted by tilting his head
over and back, closing his eyes and
letting out a fairly loud snore to convince me he had really
be asleep all
along.
Still opitimistic I turned to the one
sitting near the window and yelled out
over the din of the engines, “What about you my friend.
Put on Tefillin?”
He looked up from the magazine he was
reading, shrugged his shoulders, turned
one palm up moving it from side to side while wagging his head
in bewilderment
which is Israeli for “What did you say? Are you talking
to me??”
I held the Tefillin out and repeated
“Tefillin! Tefillin! Want to put on
Tefillin?”
I could tell that the one closest to
me was loosing his patience and was just
about to say something like “Don’t you see that…..”
When the one I was asking
smiled and joyously replied, “SURE!” As he stuck out
his arm for me to begin.
The one feigning sleep opened one eye while the first one was
tried to
disguise
his surprise and disappointment by looking back down at the
book he was
reading.
Meanwhile I noticed that in the row in
front of us a rather distinguished
looking gentleman had noticed the commotion and was craning
his neck around
looking alternately at me. He was peaking between the seats
to see what was
going on.
I smiled and asked him in English, if
he was perhaps Jewish. He shook his
head no, but he kept staring.
So I asked him if he knew what we were
doing, he again said no. So I told him
to please wait and I would explain.
When the Israeli finished I removed the
Tefillin, shook his hand, offered his friends one more chance
and, when they again refused, shook their hands as well and
moved forward to the the non-Jewish fellow.
I asked him his name and he replied,
if I remember correctly, Hans. I had to
speak over the noise of the engine but it didn’t require
much effort. In fact
it
added a bit of privacy to the conversation. I explained that
these are a
commandment in the Bible to the Jewish people to show that G-d
is not just in
heaven but here on earth as well.
I explained that they are made of leather
pressed into two hollow boxes each
containing one of the four Biblical passages relating to this
commandment.
I suddenly had an inspiration, “Do
you know what the main portion says in
these
boxes?” I asked rhetorically. He shook his head no.
“It is the main prayer of Judaism:
‘Listen Jews….. G-d is ONE’. Do you know
what that means Hans?” He again shook his head no. “It
means that G-d is the
ONLY being and He alone creates all existance, each and every
thing … from
nothing, EVERY INSTANT!”
I saw he was facinated. “That means
that G-d creates YOU as well, Hans. G-d
creates you every instant and do you know why?” He innocently
shrugged his
shoulders.
“Because… G-d loves you! That’s
why. So if He loves you, Hans, and creates
you
for free… then you should do something for Him for free!”
and I explained a
bit
about the seven Noahide Commandments.
Suddenly he loosened his safety belt,
stood at full hight, fixed his tie and
jacket, raised one finger into the air and shouted at the top
of his lungs,
“This Rabbi is CORRECT! And I want
to appoligise to him for what our people
have done to his people! We have taken a man and tried to make
him G-d….. And
we
have attempted to eliminate THE HOLY COMMANDMENTS!!”
He said each word louder and louder until
the last few caused everyone within
five rows in each direction, to look up. Seemingly oblivious
of his
surrounding, he shook my hand warmly, looked me deeply in the
eyes, again
fixed
his tie and sat down… occasionaly shaking his head ‘yes’
emphatically as
though
he was mentally repeating and affirming his statement.
This answers our question.
Worshiping only one G-d is not a matter
of arbitrary numbers. The difference
is
much greater.
One who worships many powers or ‘gods’
ALWAYS does so for selfish reasons; for
power, success, knowledge, a place in the world to come.
The real meaning of G-d is ONE is that
there is NO OTHER EXISTANCE.
If a person mearly cosolidates all the
gods into one but still has the feeling
that he himself is a separate, real existance (or as one Chassid,
Rabbi Meir
Blazinski ob’m, said “I believe that G-d is bigger
than me, smarter than me,
stronger than me, is all around me ….. but there’s
still a ‘ME’ in the
middle!”) then he is still not really worshiping ONE G-d.
That is what
bothered
Yaakov.
The Midrash (Shmot Raba 3) relates that
a gentile Matron once scoffingly
challenged Rabbi Yosi Ben Chalafta saying, “My god is stronger
than yours!
Your
Bible says that when Moses saw your G-d in the burning bush
he just hid his
face
(Exodus 3:6). But when saw the serpent (ibid 4:3), which is
my god, he ran
away!
So which is stronger!!?”
But Rabbi Yosi calmly replied. “Exactly
the opposite. Where could Moses flee
from the Creator of the heavens and earth whose Being fills
the entire
creation?
Could he go to the sea or to the sky? But from your snake, after
two or three
steps he was out of his reach.”
And this is what Yaakov was worried about
on his deathbed. The last moments
of
a Tzadik are the culmination of his total life’s work;
revealing the ONEness
of
G-d in creation.
And the ONLY way this can be done is
through the Jewish people. ALL the
Jewish
people. ONLY if the Jews observe the Torah with the feeling
that there is
NOTHING but G-d…. only then can this wonderful and joyous
truth be revealed.
That is the simple meaning of “HaShem
is OUR G-d, HaShem is ONE”(See Rashi on
Deut. 6:4). And Yaakov was worried that perhaps his sons had
missed this
crucial point.
The Talmud tells us (Taanit 5a, see Rashi
here 49:33) that Yaakov really
didn’t
die. And, in fact, the ESSENCE of this ONEness of G-d is the
cessation of
death; that death itself will become life… as it did when
the Torah was given.
Simply put, this is the job of the Moshiach; as the Lubavitcher
Rebbe did and
his Chassidim are still doing….. to bring ALL the Jews
to do the Torah with
joy
and truth. Only then will be revealed the fact that Yaakov worked
so hard to
reveal; G-d is ONE. It all depends on us to see….
Moshiach NOW!!!!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad, Israel
TALES
FOR THE SHABBOS TABLE
This week we read of the
blessings Jacob gave to his sons before he died.
Why did Jacob have to bless his sons?
Doesn't G-d control blessings? Why did he have to bless each
one separately? Why not just one general blessing for all of
them? How do blessings work?
To answer, here is a story I heard recently.
In the Chabad community in Crown Heights,
there is a woman who is very active (I wasn't told her name
but for the sake of the story we'll call her Sarah) who told
of how she became religious.
Although she and her brother were brought
up in a "reform" home where Torah was of little or
no importance, he attended a few classes at a Chabad House in
New Jersey and became interested, but she remained unimpressed.
She even spent several Sabbaths there
but, although it was a pleasant experience, she decided to seek
spirituality elsewhere.
She enrolled in a seminar of Scientology
or some similar idolatry and prepared for new adventurous vistas.
But because the seminar was to begin only in two weeks time
she decided to spend a last Shabbat at Chabad.
That Shabbat, like all the others at
Chabad, was peaceful and uneventful (in fact she never was quite
sure why she went in the first place) and shortly after it ended
she was already heading for the front door with her bag packed.
On the way out she passed the Chabad
house director and said good bye but he was so busy calling
people on the phone and simultaneously arranging the room for
some program that was about to happen, he didn't even notice.
She moved closer, waiving and smiling
trying to catch his attention and said, "Rabbi, I just
wanted to say thank you for the Shabbos" and turned to
leave.
But he signaled for her to wait, finished
his call, hung up and said, "Hey! Why don't you stay for
the lecture? It's a great speaker, Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Hecht
from Chicago, you'll really enjoy it. C'mon, he'll only speak
for an hour or so, unless you have somewhere really important
to go and he tells fantastic stories."
It sounded harmless enough so she put
her suitcase in a corner and began helping everyone set up the
room. Just as she was beginning to have second thoughts about
staying the Rabbi arrived.
He was an older man, perhaps in his late
sixties, but he had a contagious smile and warm eyes that made
her forget her qualms. Everyone took their seats and the lecture
began.
He was really an excellent and friendly
speaker. But after just a few minutes he suddenly interrupted
what he was saying and said,
"My dear friends please excuse my
changing the subject but I just remembered a strange thing that
happened to me and I want to share it with you.
"A long time ago, shortly after
the war, I flew to New York from my home in Chicago to have
a private audience with the Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi
Yosef Yitzchak of blessed memory.
"I entered into his room, gave him
a paper upon which I wrote all my questions but instead of reading
it he looked at me and said: 'Rabbi Hecht, do you know who was
just in here to see me? Rabbi Boyer the well known philanthropist'"
The Rebbe's holy eyes were red as though
he had been crying.
"I remember thinking to myself that
this was very strange because the Rebbe would never reveal to
others what was told him in private. But he continued; 'Rabbi
Boyer told me that he had just returned from a tour of refugee
camps in Europe. He said there are thousands of Jews in these
camps; broken souls, all that remains of European Jewry.' The
Rebbe began weeping aloud. He dried his eyes and continued:
"'He explained, that even though
he is a Misnagid (opposer of the Chassidic way) he came to visit
me because of a young boy he met there wandering through one
of the camps.
"'The boy was about twelve years
old, wearing a 'kippa (Yarmulke) and his clothes, even his shoes,
were so old and torn that he looked like a truly lost sheep.
So he went up to him, took out a ten dollar bill from his wallet
and offered it to him.
"But the boy shook his head 'no'
and said in Yiddish that he didn't take gifts and that he didn't
need anything.
"'When Rabbi Boyer insisted. The
boy looked up at him and said, 'If you want to give me something,
then I want to see the Rebbe! Buy me a ticket to see the Lubavitcher
Rebbe in New York.!'
"Rabbi Boyer was astounded. Here
is a young boy who probably had been through hell, lacking everything,
and what is going on in his mind? What is he thinking about?
He wants to see the Lubavitcher Rebbe! Just imagine what an
education he must have had to teach him that.
"Of course Rav Boyer couldn't afford
to give him such a gift but did promise him that when he arrived
back in New York he would go see me and mention his name to
me.
"Then I asked him to tell me about
the various refugee camps and when he finished (here the Rebbe
began weeping almost uncontrollably) I asked him if there is
anything he wanted. He answered that he wanted me to bless him.
So I blessed him that he should have 'nachas' (satisfaction)
from his offspring.' Then the Rebbe turned to my letter."
Rabbi Hecht apologized again to the crowd
for telling a story out of context, and he continued his lecture.
When he finished and everyone applauded
said thank you and left he noticed that one girl was sitting
in her seat, her face in her hands weeping; it was Sarah.
He and the Chabad House Rabbi approached
her and asked if anything was wrong. She dried her eyes. Smiled
a smile of thanks and said,
"I'm sorry for crying, excuse me
but I couldn't help myself. You see…. that Rabbi you spoke
of in your story, Rabbi Boyer …. He was my grandfather.
"That blessing the Rebbe gave him
must have been for me! G-d wanted you to tell that story tonight
so I would hear it ."
She changed her mind about the cult and
decided to dedicate her life to being the type of Jew that would
give her grandfather (and hundreds of generations of grandfathers
before him) 'nachas'.
This answers our questions.
It's true that blessings are only in
the hands of the Creator. But Since G-d told Abraham "And
you will be a blessing" (Gen. 12:2) Jews have had the power
to bless as well. Not because G-d has relinquished His power
but because each Jew is a 'part' (Deut 32:9) and a 'son' (Deut.
14:1) of G-d!
Blessings 'draw down' G-dliness from
a spiritual to a revealed state. In the spiritual worlds there
is no evil or disease etc. The problem is how to bring it down
to earth.
For instance in our story; it is certain
that, in the age of Moshiach, EVERY Jew will eventually return
to Judaism (Rambam, Hil. Tshuva 7:5) but the Rebbe's blessing
was able to bring it into the world sooner.
So it was with Jacob. He was able to
bring out from the spiritual the hidden goodness in store for
each of his sons. And because each son was different he had
to bless each separately.
This is very important to each of us,
today.
The Rambam explains that in the days
of the Moshiach there will be no war, disease, hunger, strife
or lacking because the Creator will be revealed in His creation.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe said that we are
NOW in the age of Moshiach.
Like Jacob, we all have the power to
use the G-dliness in each of us to reveal the G-dliness in the
world.
All we have to do is just open our eyes;
begin to think, talk and do only good and soon we will see the
ultimate blessing …
Moshiach NOW!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad Israel
Torah Online Site: http://www.ohrtmimim.org/torah
TALES
FOR THE SHABBOS TABLE
This week's section tells
of the blessings that Yaakov gave to his son's
before he died.
But it seems that these blessings were
a consolation prize for what he
wanted to give them. He wanted to reveal to them when Moshiach
would
arrive! (See Rashi 49:1)
At first glance this is not clear. The
blessings he gave to his sons
were wonderful; Blessings of power, success, wisdom and victory.
Even
blessings to Yehuda about Moshiach. How could revealing the
date of
Moshiach's arrival be better than that?! And what is so special
about
the date Moshiach will arrive?
Exactly the opposite. One of the major
forces that would hold the
Jewish people intact through these thousands of years of suffering
in
exile would be the hope that Moshiach would come immediately.
If they
knew that redemption was so far away, it would be destructive
to the
Jewish spirit.
But on the other hand, if it is such
a good thing, then why didn't G-d
let Yaakov reveal it?
To understand this here is a story.
Evening was falling. In another few minutes
would be Yom Kippur, the
holiest day of the year, and the large room was filled to capacity.
But a strange unearthly silence filled
the Synagogue. No one seemed to
move. The congregants either looked down at the floor, or straight
ahead, as though they were more dead than alive, like some sort
of strange black and gray picture.
The year was 1945 just after the war,
the place; a refugee camp
somewhere in Germany. Jews fresh out of concentration camps
had gathered
in a barracks-turned-Synagogue to pray.
The unanimously chosen "Rabbi"
of this one-time congregation was none
other than the famous Kloisenberger Rebbe. His holiness and
erudition
were unquestionable, but even more amazing, he had retained
his sanity
after loosing his wife and 11 children to the Nazis.
The minyan (congregation) was composed
of all sorts of Jews. From
ultra-orthodox, to those that had never been in a Synagogue
before. But
they all had one thing in common. No one but them could possibly
understand what they had been through.
The Cantor began singing, and the congregation
followed. There was much
genuine weeping that night, until they got to the confession
prayer
called "AL CHAIT" where we request forgiveness for
the sins we did with
our eyes, our hands etc. through brazenness, through callousness
etc.
Suddenly one of the congregants stood
up and stamped his foot. "NO!!" He
screamed "NO!"
Everyone turned and looked at him. One
or two tried to gently calm him
down. "NO!" he looked at them and yelled.
"What? I should ask forgiveness
to G-d for sins I did with my eyes or my
hands?
These eyes saw my own children killed!
These hands had no time to sin,
they had to work for those German devils day and night!
What? I was brazen?! I didn't dare lift
my head for three years! I was
callous? I gave my last bread to people I didn't know!
NO NO! IF anyone has to ask for forgiveness,
G-D has to ask!
THAT'S RIGHT! G-D SOULD ASK ME FOR FORGIVENESS!
He gave the Nazis eyes
to see and hands to torture, and brazenness and callousness
to rape and
kill. So let Him ask forgiveness from us!"
The entire minyan fell silent again,
and all eyes filled with tears
turned to the Klosenberger Rebbe. What would he say?
After several seconds of pregnant silence,
the Rebbe cleared his throat
and said...
"You...are...right"
And everyone burst out in uncontrollable
weeping. Men fell to their
knees, and others just put their faces in their hands and wept
and wept and wept.
After the crying had subsided and the
room fell quiet once again, the
Rebbe continued where he had left off.
"But I want to tell you why I asked
G-d for forgiveness
In our camp the guards used to amuse
themselves every morning by playing
a sadistic game. They would line us up and pick five inmates.
These
unfortunate souls would be forced to carry a load of bricks
up a steep
flight of stairs in front of everyone. If one brick would fall,
they
would add another two in its place, and if the prisoner himself
fell,
they would slowly torture him to death before our eyes.
So it was every morning. True, the rest
of the day wasn't much better.
It was unbearably cold, our clothes were infested with lice,
and we were
given almost nothing to eat. Everyone was sick, and prisoners
were
dying like flies. But the worst and most humiliating was that
morning
ordeal.
It got to the point that the prayer each
of us said before we went to
sleep was,
"G-d, merciful G-d, please let me
die in my sleep. Please don't let me
wake up tomorrow morning." And I used to say it also.
That is what I just asked forgiveness
for;
It never entered my mind to ask G-d to
set me free! I forgot that there
could be such a thing as being FREE!"
After several minutes the prayers resumed.
This is the point of the story. The goal of Judaism is to bring
Moshiach. As the Rambam explains in the end of his all-encompassing
work; when Moshiach arrives everyone will see the true oneness
of G-d,
and be interested only in the truth.
In other words, the world will be FREE
of all falseness and people will be FREE to serve HaShem. Things will be like they are supposed
to be.
Just as we were set free from Egypt, even more so will be the
freedom of
the future redemption. (Micha 7:15)
But as important as it is, this goal
seems impossibly far away (even for
those as righteous as the son's of Yaakov) people forget they
can be
free. That is why Yaakov wanted to reveal the earliest possible
time
that Moshiach can come.
The arrival of Moshiach depends on our
work (Rambam Laws of Tshuva 7:5).
If the son's of Yaakov were encouraged by the fact that
Moshiach''arrival was immanent (it would be much earlier than
it is
now), they would have worked all the harder to bring him, and
they probably would have succeeded.
This would certainly be better than all
the blessings their father gave
them, because then the world would be filled with G-dliness
like it was
going to be at Mount Sinai, where all possible blessings were
included.
But there still remains the question;
if it was such a good thing, then
why did G-d prevent Yaakov from revealing it?
The answer to this is something like
why did G-d make the Holocaust. For
some reason He wants to squeeze every drop of service possible
out of
the Jewish people. If Moshiach would have come earlier, something
would
have been missing.
I do not understand this answer, and
the Lubavitch Rebbe related that
before he was three years old he too did not understand it and
was
obsessed with the idea of the Moshiach coming and making sense
of all
the pain and suffering of these thousands of years.
One thing for sure...we need Moshiach
NOW and it all depends on each of
us.
Moshiach NOW!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad Israel
Torah Online Site: http://www.ohrtmimim.org/torah
TALES
FOR THE SHABBOS TABLE
This week’s section
tells of the dramatic last moments in the life of Yaakov, the ‘Chosen’ of the fathers.
Yaakov was not an individual person but
rather a ‘general soul’ something
like Adam, the first man. In fact the Talmud (b.metzia 84) and
the Zohar in
several places compares his ‘beauty’ to that of Adam
because both were
perfect examples of what G-d intended when He created man.
In fact, in one sense Yaakov was even better … because
Adam died.
The Torah tells us that after Yaakov
finished blessing his sons he; “Drew
his feet into the bed, expired, and was gathered to his people”.
But it
does not say, “He died”.
The Talmud (Taanit 5b) explains this
omission; “Yaakov Avinu (the patriarch)
in fact did not die” … (‘it just seemed that
way’ explains Rashi and
Tosefot). “Just as Yaakov’s offspring are alive, so
he is alive.”
Yaakov was embalmed, mourned, even buried
(Kiriat Arba is called so because
Yaakov is one of the four Holy men buried there) but he did
not really die.
What does this mean? And of what practical
use is this to us?
Here is a story I hope will illustrate.
Once, a very distraught woman showed
up in the town of Lubavitch. Religious
women usually did not wander about all alone one hundred years
ago, but this
poor woman had made an arduous one-week journey because someone
told her
that the Lubavitcher Rebbe could help her.
“Is this where Rebbe Shalom DovBer is? I must see him.”
She pleaded to one
of the Rebbe’s secretaries. “I’ve come from so
far away, and your Rebbe is
my only hope. Please, I must see him! Only he can help me.”
But her cries were to no avail; the Rebbe wasn’t receiving.
“If you write your request on a paper I promise that I
will give it to the
Rebbe and the Rebbe will see it, but I can’t promise more
than that. I’m
sorry.” He said apologetically.
With no other choice the poor woman found
a quiet place to sit and wrote her
request.
She was an ‘aguna’; a living widow. Her husband strayed
from Judaism about
two years ago and then upped and left her. She had no source
of income,
three hungry children to feed and she could not remarry without
receiving an
official divorce bill (called ‘Get’) from her husband.
But it was
impossible to track him down, and no one even knew where to
begin.
The woman was at the end of her wits; she had no money, no husband,
no
experience and now… her last hope; the Rebbe, was vanishing
before her eyes.
“The Rebbe probably won’t even pay attention to my
letter.” She said to
herself. But she handed it in and hoped for the best.
The answer was fast in coming. Less than an hour later the Rebbe’s
secretary
stood facing her with good news.
“The Rebbe says that you should
travel to Warsaw.”
She was overjoyed! But her smile faded
as she realized that there was no
more to the message.
“But where in Warsaw? What should I do there?”
“That is all the Rebbe answered,” answered the secretary.
“I’m sorry, there
was no more.”
She even wrote in another letter asking for some details, but
… no answer.
When the Chassidim heard the story they
took up a collection and bought her
a round-trip train ticket with enough money to live for a month.
A few days
later after a two-day journey, there she was; standing bewildered
in the
Warsaw train station with her old suitcase and no idea where
to go or what
to do next.
People were rushing by her, occasionally
someone almost knocked her over,
but she just stood there. She had the address of a hotel on
a crumpled
piece of paper in her hand. She took it out of her pocket but
she didn’t
want to walk anymore, she was tired, she just wanted to give
up. “The
children are in good hands”, she thought to herself. She
was alone and
confused and she wanted to cry, someone else bumped into her.
“Maybe I’ll
just go back home,” the thought was still in the corner
of her mind when she
heard someone say, “Excuse me”.
She snapped out of her reverie and saw
standing before her a neatly dressed
Jew with a reddish beard. “Excuse me,” he said in
Yiddish, “I notice that
you are standing for a long time, are you feeling all right?
Perhaps I can
be of some help? Are you waiting for someone?”
“I’m here because the Lubavitch Rebbe said …”
and she mechanically repeated
her entire story.
“Tell me,” Said the man when
she had finished, “what was your husband’s name
and how did he look?”
“Ehh, well…” She was still in a semi-daze, “his
name was Fival but I’m sure
he changed it. And he was heavyset. He walked with a sort of
a limp, and he
had a thick black beard, but I’m sure he’s shaved
the beard off, and I think
he has a sort of mark on his forehead. It’s been two years,
who knows how
he looks now.” She almost began to weep again when he interrupted.
“I think I know where he is. Please
follow me. It’s not far from here.” He
escorted her out of the station down the street to a large busy
intersection
and gave her directions how to go from there to a certain tavern.
“I think
that your husband is sitting in the back of that bar playing
cards and
gambling.”
After everything she’d been through
she asked no questions. She just nodded
to the stranger and began walking according to his directions.
And after an
hour she found it! She took a deep breath and entered the dimly
lit tavern,
dragging her suitcase and feeling terribly out of place.
She made her way through the smoke and noise to the back of
the room and
stared blankly at the figures sitting there, waiting for her
eyes to adjust
to the dark.
Suddenly one of the gamblers turned,
looked at her and let out a cry of
horror. “Yaaaa!! Sara!!! How did you know I was here??
How did you get
here.??!!” She could see clearly now, and the man who was
speaking looked
something like her husband, he was thinner with no beard …
but it was him! When she explained how the Rebbe had sent her and how some Jew
gave her
directions from the station he began pacing back and forth like
a mad man,
running his fingers through his hair, waiving his arms and repeating
to
himself, “I don’t know any Jews, I don’t know
any Rebbe!! How could anyone
know? How?!!”
He was so affected by the miracle that
he began weeping, and then fell to
his knees begging her forgiveness. One thing led to another
and one month
later, he shamefacedly returned home with her and repented completely
of his evil ways.
The next year she traveled again to Lubavitch,
but this time to thank the
Rebbe. The Rebbe’s secretary arranged that she would stand
outside the
Rebbe’s door and when the Rebbe would come out, she could
thank him
personally and give him a letter of gratitude.
She took her place and stood there, holding her letter and waiting
nervously, this was the first time she would actually see the
Rebbe!
Then the big moment arrived, the door opened and the Rebbe emerged!
She took one look at him…went into a swoon, and fainted
unconscious on the
floor!
When she came to, the doctor was kneeling
over her. “You were so exited
that you passed out.” He explained, as she began to sit
up.
“Was that the Rebbe?” she asked, “Was that him?”
“Why certainly,” the doctor answered, “Why do
your ask? Didn’t you know that that was the Rebbe?”
“Because” she looked the doctor
in the eyes, “THAT was the man who I saw.
He was the one who helped me in the Warsaw train station!!”
Later the Rebbe’s secretary made
some calculations and figured out that the
day she was speaking of was the same day that he had entered
the Rebbe’s
room and found him sitting motionless for a long time, oblivious
to his
surroundings as though he was ‘somewhere else’.
Strange as this story is, there is a
similar one that is even stranger about
how the Fourth Rebbe of Chabad, Rebbe Shmuel actually made an
appearance in
a Government office years after he was dead, in order to help
a young man
get exempted from the army!
I think that the explanation for all
this, and its connection to our ‘Parsha
’ can be found in a book written over 400 years ago called
“Avodat HaKodesh”
by Rabbi Mair ben Gabbai.
There (Part 2 chapt. 19) he explains
that every Jew really has an eternal,
true, PHYSICAL body in addition to the external false one. This
true body
never dies and is an inheritance from Adam, who was created
to live forever.
According to Rabbi Ben Gabbai, when Adam
sinned he brought death not only on
himself but also for all future generations: He not only defiled
his own
true undying body but he also neutralized it so that it was
not passed on to
his children. Yaakov redeemed this body.
Yaakov was so dedicated to Truth (It is his attribute; Emet
L’Yaakov) that
he actually re-activated this true body (in addition to his
normal ‘external
’ physical one, which is why he seemed to die ‘externally’
but ‘truly’ he
lives on) and even passed it on to his offspring, (as the Talmud
continues,
“Just as Yaakov’s seed are alive so he lives”)
just as Adam was supposed to
have done.
Therefore the Jewish people (called ‘Israel’
after their eternal namesake)
will continue to exist forever, and they, and only they, are
fitting vessels
for the Infinite True Will of G-d; The Torah and its Commandments.
There were, continues Rabbi Ben Gabbai,
other Tzadikim after Yaakov that
also activated this eternal body. Among them: Moshe and King
David (both
are also described in the Talmud as ‘not dying’),
Eliyahu the prophet (his
live body went into heaven) Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi (after his death
he would
come home each Shabbos and make ‘Kiddush’ for his
family - Ktuvot 104a( and,
interestingly, Moshiach will also do so – (Yalkut Shimoni
367).
That is what it means that Yaakov was
a ‘general soul’ and was similar in
beauty to Adam; he redeemed this eternal, ‘true’ body
that is the real
essence of man and passed it on to all generations.
What does all this mean to us?
This ‘Truth of Yaakov’ that
is within each of us, reminds us that the body
is much holier and more eternal than even the soul, and that
this physical world, not the upper spiritual heavens, is the only place that
the true
essence of G-d is to be found.
When one really contemplates this, he/she is guaranteed to experience
a
resurrection, a personal ‘raising of the dead’; namely
an indescribable
feeling of Joy and Happiness…. a delight to be alive and
able to do G-d’s
Commandments in this world…with the physical body.
It is this ‘Simcha’ that we
will experience in its fullest in the Days of
Moshiach “Then will our mouths be filled with laughter”
(Psalms 126), which
is the subject of the teachings of the Baal Shem Tov, and which,
if we open
our eyes, we can experience today.
As the Lubavitch Rebbe said, Moshiach
is here! Standing before us!! We
only have to open our eyes and see..
Moshiach NOW!!
Rabbi Tuvia Bolton
Yeshiva Ohr Tmimim
Kfar Chabad Israel
|
PARSHA
MOSHIACH
IN THE PARSHA
WEEKLY
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