Chassidic Story #243

FRINGE BENEFITS

In 1965 Yaakov Greenberg had to travel to Houston, to accompany his father-in-law who had flown in from Israel for treatment at the famous hospital there. Before leaving his home in the Boro Park section of Brooklyn, he asked his friends and acquaintances for advice about how to survive Jewishly in the heart of Texas. How would they be able to find kosher food, a minyan to pray with, and so forth?

No one was able to help him precisely, but they all said that his best hope was to investigate whether there was a Lubavitch representative in the city. Until then, Yaakov had never had any contact with Chabad. Not that he was opposed to the outgoing Chasidic movement, but the opportunity had never thrust itself upon him and he himself was not interested. So although he lived close to Lubavitch World Headquarters and the Rebbe's home and shul in Brooklyn, ever since he and his wife had moved from Israel to the USA, he had never gone to see the Rebbe.

Now, however, he realized Chabad was his best hope. He obtained the telephone number of Rabbi Shimon Lazerov, the original Lubavitch representative in the state of Texas, who lived in Houston, called him and explained his situation. Rabbi Lazerov immediately extended a warm invitation.

Yaakov and his father-in-law were grateful for the offer, but as they said afterward, they couldn't possibly have anticipated the extent to which Rabbi Lazerov would succeed in helping them. He even managed to arrange kosher food for the hospital stay.

What flabbergasted them even more than his enthusiasm to help them and the generous bestowal of his time and resources, was all that Rabbi Lazerov had accomplished in his relatively short time in Houston. Who could ever imagine that in a Jewish wasteland such as Texas in the 60's, there could be chasidic synagogue with a growing community, never mind a mikveh!

As amazed as Yaakov felt, it was only a fraction of the astonishment of his father-in-law, who kept exclaiming over and over how extraordinary it was to be able to feel so comfortable and at home in such a faraway place as Houston. After the completion of his medical treatment, before he left to return to Israel, he asked Yaakov to please go and personally convey in his name to the Lubavitcher Rebbe his appreciation and wonderment over such an impressive accomplishment.

Yaakov agreed to his request, of course, but without thinking too much about what it entailed. When he found out through a preliminary phone call to the Rebbe's secretariat that it wasn't so simple as just a short drive to the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn and strolling into "770," the Rebbe's shul, he began to have second thoughts. After a few frustrations-the many procedures involved, including making an appointment far in advance, long waiting lists, and post-midnight meetings-he decided that he could just as well fulfill his obligation by writing a letter. This he did, in it expressing his and his father-in-law's feelings of gratitude and how impressed they were with all that the Rebbe's representative in Texas had accomplished there.

Although writing a note instead of delivering the message personally did not seem such a big deal to Yaakov, it turned out to be so for his father-in-law. When he visited him the next year in Israel, and in response to his eager query told him he had written because it was too complicated to arrange a visit, his father-in-law was visibly upset. He asked him to please make another effort to speak to the Rebbe in person.

When Yaakov returned to New York, he was immediately swallowed up by the demands of his business and his everyday affairs. Once again, he did not give a strong priority to his promise to go see the Lubavitcher Rebbe, as his life quickly fell back into its regular patterns.

Two more years went by. A phone call came from the Holy Land: his father-in-law had passed away. He and his wife quickly made arrangements to fly to Israel as soon as possible in order to be there for the funeral and the week of mourning.

When they returned to Brooklyn, Yaakov found in his mailbox a letter from his father-in-law! From the date inscribed at the top, it was clear that he had written it on the last night of his life. It was like all the letters he sent them approximately once every two weeks, except for the P.S. he had added at the bottom.

There he wrote, "I am reminding you of the request I made while we were still in Houston, and which I repeated when last you came to visit two years ago: please go to the Lubavitcher Rebbe and express in person my gratitude and appreciation for all that Chabad has accomplished in Texas and for the great kindness shown to us there."

This time Yaakov took the mission with the utmost seriousness. It was almost is if it were a deathbed request, which in Jewish Law is binding. And certainly it was his father-in-law's final words to him.

That same day he went to 770 Eastern Parkway, Lubavitch World Headquarters, for the first time in his life. He spoke to one of the Rebbe's secretaries and told him that he must be allowed to see the Rebbe, "because my father-in-law gave me a mission to do so on the last night of his life."

Somehow the mysteriousness of his statement had an effect on the famously imperturbable secretaries, and they agreed to give him an appointment that same week, on Thursday night.

When he arrived, he was asked if he had written a kvittel, the Yiddish term for a note. When he replied he had no idea what note was being referred to, the secretary he had become acquainted with instructed him to write on a piece of unlined paper his name, mother's name, and the message or a brief outline of it that he wanted to deliver from his deceased father-in-law.

After writing the note he sat and waited. It took three hours until he was admitted into the Rebbe's room. At first he was struck speechless. Of course he had seen photographs of the Rebbe before that night, but seeing him face to face was immeasurably different.

The Rebbe shook hands with him and took the note. He gave it one quick glance and remarked, "But you already wrote to me about this. Indeed, I'm the one that has to thank you for the pleasure you gave me through such positive feedback about the activities of our representative there. I would have written you to that effect, but frankly, I expected to see you in person here. One has to presume that an agent will fulfill his mission, especially if it is from his father-in-law, because then it is also tied in somewhat with the mitzvah of 'Honor your father'."

Yaakov felt as if he were dreaming. All he could manage to say was that at least he was fulfilling it now while it was still within the thirty days of mourning for his father-in-law.

The Rebbe thereupon said to him, although not in these exact words, "The numerical equivalent of lev [heart] is 32. The total number of tzitzit strands on a four-cornered garment is also 32. The main theme of tzitzit, as we proclaim everyday when we read the Shma Yisroel prayer, is "You shall look upon them and you shall remember G-d's commandments. Just as it is forbidden for the heart to cease working for even a moment, Heaven forefend, so it is forbidden for a Jew to be even for a moment without this "You shall remember." A Jew must never lose awareness of G-d, His Torah and the commandments for even a single moment, no matter what situation he finds himself in. Whether day or night, whether awake or asleep, he must always have this consciousness. That is the explanation why we Chasidim wear our tzitzit garment even when we sleep."

Yaakov had no idea why the Rebbe was telling him all this, but before he could concentrate his thoughts, the Rebbe had already returned to their original discussion, just as if he had never digressed.

"Your father-in-law was a patient at that major hospital in Houston where they have a number of excellent doctors with well-deserved reputations. But that is not the only place with excellent doctors. Nor is New York. The true doctor, the primary healer is G-d Almighty, for it is He who empowers physicians to heal. And He is present in every place and He can accomplish whatever He wishes. He is not just a specialist in one particular heart problem or another; even if the heart stops working, what is called today "cardiac arrest," we know that people can be saved. Is that not a return from death? Nevertheless, we are not intimidated. Three times each day we pray, "You enliven the dead, You are powerful to save."

The Rebbe then showered a big smile upon Yaakov, blessed him and his family, thanked him for coming, and shook hands with him in farewell.

Yaakov was very positively affected by his personal encounter with the Rebbe, even though there was much he didn't understand. He had enjoyed the Rebbe's words of Torah, connecting tzitzit to the heart, but why had the Rebbe said it to him? And what was all this about heart specialists being everywhere and rescue from cardiac arrests?

Yaakov was known to say afterwards that if he had been a chasid perhaps he would have realized there must be personal significance for him in the Rebbe's words, but as a descendent of a long line of non-chasidim he never had a clue.

Three more years passed. Yaakov was in Hong Kong on business, and was sitting in his hotel lobby chatting with another Jew from New York who was also there for business reasons. They were talking about how it seemed they would have to stay in Hong Kong longer than planned because heavy snow storms in New York had caused cancellation of all airline flights to there.

His next memory was two days later, when he woke up in the emergency room of the local hospital, surrounded by doctors, nurses and his wife! She had found a way to fly in immediately after receiving the emergency phone call. After he had recovered his senses a bit, they told him that he had suffered a cardiac arrest. The doctors were referring to his recovery as a resurrection!

At that moment Yaakov suddenly recalled with striking clarity his audience with the Lubavitcher Rebbe and the "strange" things the Rebbe had said to him then. For a moment he was emotionally overwhelmed by the memory. Then, he insisted that his wife immediately telephone to the Rebbe's office in Brooklyn and ask them to relay to the Rebbe what had happened to him, and his request for a blessing for a complete recovery.

The next morning, before leaving for the hospital to visit her husband, Yaakov's wife received a phone call at the hotel from one of the Rebbe's secretaries. He read her the Rebbe's response: "I mentioned the request for his complete and immediate salvation and recovery at the place of my father-in-law, the Rebbe. Certainly he remembers what was said to him about wearing a tzitzit garment also at night and even when sleeping. At the very least he should do so from now on. May he have good news."

His wife couldn't understand at all what had happened. When Yaakov filled in the details of his nocturnal interview with the Rebbe, she practically shouted at him: "How can it be that the Rebbe told you to sleep with a tallit katan and you haven't done so!"

Right then and there in the hospital Yaakov began to keep his tzitzit on even while he slept. He committed himself to doing so every night without exception.

One day the next summer, when they were vacationing in their summer bungalow, he suddenly felt chest pains. He told his wife, who made arrangements for him to be taken to the local hospital. It was only on the way there that he remembered that the night before he hadn't worn his tzitzit to sleep.

After that he didn't miss a night. Nor did he have any further health problems.

Translated and adapted by Yrachmiel Tilles from V'Rabim Hashiv M'avon, vol. 1, pp. 193-198. The author, Rabbi A.D. Halperin, writes that he heard this story himself from Yaakov Greenberg, at a Yud-Tes Kislev celebration in Miami in 1980.

Biographical note:
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (11 Nissan 1902 - 3 Tammuz 1994), became the seventh Rebbe of the Chabad dynasty after his father-in-law, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, passed away in Brooklyn on 10 Shvat 1950. He is widely acknowledged as the greatest Jewish leader of the second half of the 20th century. Although a preeminent scholar in both the revealed and hidden dimensions of Torah, and fluent in many languages and scientific subjects, the Rebbe is best known for his extraordinary love and concern for every Jew, regardless of their affiliation or location. His emissaries around the globe, dedicated to strengthening Judaism, number in the thousands. Hundreds of volumes of his teachings have been printed, as well as dozens of English renditions.