Parshas Yisro

 

Hello again Junior Shluchim!
I’ve been waiting all week to tell you about my brand new lens that I have been working on. Remember the one I was talking about? I’ve decided to call it the MOST lens. Can you guess what that means? Yup, you guess it. The MOShiach Tzeiten lens! Because, like I was explaining last week, if I managed to make such a lens it would for sure be Moshiach Tzeiten because everyone would be able to actually see Hashem and everyone would believe in Hashem.

Now of course, making a lens isn’t too easy – if it was I wouldn’t be the only Yiddisher Lens Making and Seeing Professor in the world – but making a really extraordinary lens like the MOST lens would be extra hard. But I wasn’t too worried. Like Rabbi Ben Hey Hey tells us in Pirkei Avos, ‘lefum tzaara agra’, which means that the reward a person gets depends on the amount of work he or she puts into something, and so I knew that to make such a special lens, I would need to work extra specially hard.

Well, it took me quite a while to get all the materials that I needed for such a special project, and like any type of lens building I also need to do some ruchnius’diker hachonos too. So in actual fact it was already Parshas Yisro by the time I actually started work on the lens. But I wasn’t too worried; after all in Parshas Yisro we learn how the Yidden all got to hear Hashem say the first two of the Aseres Hadibros, just like they would through my new lens.

So off to work I went. First I had to make a frame for the lens. Now since this was going to hopefully be the last lens I would ever make – because for sure when everyone saw and believed in Hashem, Moshiach would finally come – I wanted the frame to be something out of this world. But, as I was checking the drawings I had made to see how big the frame would need to be, I suddenly remembered something that made me stop in my tracks. Actually, I wasn’t walking, but I was bending over my desk and I straightened up so fast that I forgot where I was and banged my head on my low-hanging light fixture, and spent the next few minutes jumping around the room holding my head, shouting in pain, and trying to remember what it was that had hit me that had made me jump up that had made me hit my head and that had made me shout in pain.

Then I remembered. In this weeks parsha, the Yidden had heard Hashem telling them the first of the Aseres Hadibros, but it had been too much for them and their neshomos had left their bodies. Now, I thought to myself, what if that happened while someone was looking through my lens. I mean, we aren’t really used to seeing Hashem, and what about if our bodies aren’t ready for it yet because we are still in golus? Maybe Dr Getzel was going to cause more problems than good. So very reluctantly, I collected up my plans for the MOST lens and put them aside for burning with my blue chometz toothbrush. I really couldn’t allow myself to make such a lens now while we are still in golus, and of course when Moshiach finally comes there will be no need for such a lens – we will all be able to see Hashem again just like by Kriyas Yam Suf and Matan Torah.

Anyway, I’ll be off for now, tune in next week for more news from the snow-covered fields of Iowa.

Dr Getzel

 

כ"ב שבט

רביצין חי‘ה מושקא Schneersohn was born in the Russian city of Babinovitch, which is near Lubavitch, on כ"ה אדר in 1901. She was the second daughter of theפריערדיקער רבי . From her earliest years, she absorbed the קדושה that surrounded her, in the house of her grandfather and her father.

On י"ד כסלו she married the Rebbe, in Warsaw, Poland.

The רביצין was one of the Rebbe’s greatest חסידים . It was she who encouraged the Rebbe to accept the נשיאות , even though she knew that it meant giving up her husband to the חסידים .  She said “Should 30 years of my father’s מסירת נפש come to nothing?” She also showed this התקשרות during the court case to decide who the library belonged to.
When the lawyer asked her: "To whom did the ספרים belong?" the רביצין famously answered: "My father himself, and everything he had, including the ספרים , belong to the חסידים .”

Her clear answer and the way she spoke made a deep impression on the judge and this was one of the reasons that he decided that the library belonged to the חסידים .

The רבצין passed away on Wednesdayכ“ב שבט תשמ"ח  after a short illness. Shortly before she passed away,רבצין  חי‘ה מושקא  asked for a glass of water. After saying the ברכה “ ...שהכל נהיה בדברו ” she returned her  נשמהto ה‘ . Fifteen thousand people gathered at her לוי‘ה to say goodbye to a true queen. The לוי‘ה was led by an official police motorcade.

 

 

ר‘ יהושע בן לוי said: When ה‘ spoke to the בני ישראל on הר סיני and said the first of the עשרת הדברות , their נשמות left their bodies. If so, how were they able to hear the second דברה , and to live afterwards?

The answer is that there is a special kind of dew that ה‘ is going to use at the time of תחיית המיתים to bring all the dead back to life. He brought down some of this dew on הר סיני and it brought all the בני ישראל back to life!

* * * * *

On הר סיני , the בני ישראל heard the sound of a שופר . Where did this שופר come from?

It came from the ram which אברהם sacrificed at עקידת יצחק . The ram's left horn was used for the שופר blowing on הר סיני . Its sound became louder and louder, to prepare them for the great revelation from ה‘ .

But the right horn is even bigger than the left one. It will be blown at the time of גאולה , when we will return to ארץ ישראל . This שופר is the one spoken about in the פסוק , "ביום ההוא יתקע בשופר גדול " - "On that day the big שופר will be blown".

 

The פריערדיקער רבי , ר‘ יוסף יצחק Shneersohn, sent a long letter to his daughter, רביצין חי‘ה מושקא , describing the personal changes several individuals went through as they became חסידים . Although it is a personal letter from father to daughter, the first 120 pages of it became public. The conclusion of the letter, however, remained private. The following story is taken from that letter in connection with רביצין חי‘ה מושקא 's יאהרצייט on כ“ב שבט .

One day there was excitement in the בית מדרש of Zaslov: two חסידים of the בעל שם טוב - the צדיקים : ר‘ נחמן Horodenker and ר‘ דוד Furkas - arrived on a mission from the בעל שם טוב . The בעל שם טוב had instructed them to raise the sum of sixty gold florins that very day. This money was needed for פדיון שבויים ; the entire sixty florins had to be delivered immediately by special messenger, for there was not much time.

The חסידים arrived just as the people were finishing saying תהילים . As soon as the חסידים finished speaking, a list was drawn up of all residents of the town who were the בעל שם טוב 's חסידים . A בית דין was put together to decide how much each person could afford to contribute. The בית דין appointed collectors to go to peoples' homes immediately and collect the tax. If there was anyone who did not have enough cash on hand, they could take from him some valuable as a deposit until the sum was paid in cash.

Within less than three hours, the collectors returned to the בית מדרש with the full amount of sixty gold florins. They had also drawn up a list on which they had recorded the names of those who had paid their amount in cash, those who had made pledges and given valuables, and those who had given loans guaranteed by the valuables taken from those who had not yet paid.

Just then, noises were heard in the entrance of the בית מדרש . Several women whose husbands were not at home had arrived: one of the women was the wife of a tailor who worked somewhere in the country; another was the wife of a peddler who went from place to place with a pack full of merchandise; a third was the wife of a מלמד at an inn.

These women had heard that the בעל שם טוב had sent חסידים to collect contributions for a great מצוה . Since no one had approached them to ask for a contribution, they had come themselves, bringing pledges (for they didn’t have cash on hand). One had brought her candlesticks, another had brought a קידוש becher, a third had brought a down-stuffed pillow.

The collectors, in turn, said that their mission was to demand cash or pledges from those whose names appeared on the list given to them by the בית דין . From people whose names did not appear on the list, they had no authority to accept cash or pledges. Upon hearing that their husbands' names were not even mentioned on the list, the women raised such a cry that even ר‘ נחמן and ר‘ דוד heard it, and became very frightened.

When the members of the בית דין learned that the collectors had returned with their mission accomplished, they hurried through the rest of their תפילות . Against their better judgment (for the husbands were very poor), they accepted the pledges from the women. The special messenger was sent to bring the sixty gold florins to the בעל שם טוב .

When the בעל שם טוב 's חסידים finished davening, a feast was prepared in honor of the great privilege the בעל שם טוב had given them. For the בעל שם טוב loved them so much that the had given them the privilege of participating in the מצוה of פדיון שבויים ; he was so devoted to the חסידים in Zaslov that he had sent to them the two famous צדיקים . All the חסידים were in such a joyful mood: you can't imagine how great their happiness was.

When the סעודה was finished, ר‘ נחמן spoke about the women who had cried while begging the collectors to accept their contributions toward the amount the בעל שם טוב had asked from the חסידים of Zaslov. "The Rebbe," said ר‘ נחמן , "is very fond of simple אידן . He says that a simple איד who says a קפיטל of תהילים with his whole heart and sincerely loves his fellow איד is favored by the Aibeshter more than great צדיקים .

"How amazingly genuine those women's tears were! Their only desire was for their husband's names to be included in the list of those asked to contribute money for the great מצוה of פדיון שבויים . A מצוה is so precious, and the בעל שם טוב so holy to them, that when their husbands' names were left off the list their poor hearts broke and they burst out weeping. How precious such tears are to the רבונו של עולם ; how sweet and delightful they are to the מלאך מיכאל and his 180 thousands legions of defending angels! Such genuine heartfelt tears can annul all evil decrees."

ר‘ נחמן then related an awe-inspiring story about an evil decree against an entire Jewish community. When a certain woman uttered a few truly sincere words that came from the depth of her heart while she wept freely, the decree was annulled. "If only we would weep on the holy יום כיפור with the same sort of tears with which our own women wept!" he ended.

(Adapted from ‘L’chaim Weekly’)

 

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