Farbrengen 19 Kislev 5753, Kfar Chabad

00:00 Speaker 1 What everyone had to say. Two Arabs objected at the end, but everyone else... You chair the committee. When I came in here and the impure device was there, I asked for permission to speak. You didn’t give it to me. Afterward I sent you a letter and demanded that, if you didn’t give me permission, I would make a scene. And then you tell the journalists I sat there for an hour and a half. But I asked the moment I came in, and you refused. That was it for me. Television came in, and that was that. I left. What I meant was—last Shabbos I went to daven. I had a bar mitzvah to attend. Baruch Hashem, I have twelve hundred students every year, across six grades. Every year I have two hundred bar mitzvahs, not counting the weddings, Baruch Hashem, and I go to all of them. I went to a bar mitzvah all the way at the far end of Petach Tikva. I walked. I carry my tallis when I walk, even though the eruv in Petach Tikva is, uh, electric—I mean, computerized, and can be relied on. I walked with my tallis. In the morning there were no cars. I came back around twelve, after the kiddush. There were lots of cars on the road. Wherever I passed with my tallis, the cars stopped and waited. So I said, if drivers have respect for a tallis, the Knesset will have respect for a tallis too. That’s when I decided to come to the Knesset with my tallis. But I already knew what might happen, so I just arranged for the photographers to be there. I didn’t tell them why. I took the Shas with me, and that’s an achievement. Today they already let me go up with a Shas. The first time, they started shouting at me, “That’s not accepted in this House,” and so on. Today, as the lesser of two evils, they already agree that I can go up with a Shas for every speech, every address in the Knesset. Tomorrow I’m going to speak about, uh, Shoshani’s proposal to lower the age for starting school to four. I’m demanding age three. We’ll discuss it tomorrow, and I’ll speak about it. I want to explain why Shoshani’s program for excellence—what

02:13 Speaker 1 is excellence? Outstanding students. The Jewish people have always educated outstanding students. That’s how it is: there have always been outstanding students, and they draw the others along. That’s excellence. And starting at age three is a Jewish program. I bring them teachings of our Sages. Tomorrow—don’t worry, tomorrow, when I get up from my seat, three attendants will escort me. I promise you, they’re already afraid. Then I go up with the Shas, and behind the Shas I put the tallis so they won’t see it. I don’t know, they sensed something. The Speaker of the Knesset says, “Hand over the package.” He doesn’t know what it is—the package. He says he’s trained in bomb disposal, and if there’s a bomb in the package, I should hand it to him. I had actually planned to go up during the day, because my turn was during the day, but there were interjections and interruptions, and people shouting “hypocrite” and “donkey”—that sort of thing, on that very day. So by the time night came, I decided I wouldn’t say a blessing at all. I’d go up, wrap myself in the tallis, and come down. I just... But when I saw that the Speaker wanted the package, and while I was “lingering”—I drew out “and he lingered” with a shalsheles, very slowly—I saw him trying to signal the attendants to come over. So I immediately began saying the blessing. Shilansky took out a kippah—he took out a kippah, and didn’t have time to tell the attendants. I said “Adonam,” as I intended, and at the end I said “tallis” instead of “tzitzis,” so it wouldn’t be a blessing; I only wanted to stop the attendants. It was received somewhat differently, with all the... In any case, I went up with a tallis, and after forty-five years the Knesset of Israel saw a tallis. And I want to tell you: Rabbi Porush came over to me afterward and said, “This, this is a chillul Hashem.” I told him, “Rabbi Porush, when you went up a week ago—three weeks ago—and tore your garment over Shulamit Aloni, do you know what the secular people said to me? Something worse than ‘chillul Hashem.’” He said, “But I acted

04:34 Speaker 1 according to halachah. I read the Shulchan Aruch.” I said, “I read it too: ‘You shall be holy, for I, Hashem your G-d, am holy.’” Rashi says, “You shall be separate”—separate from sexual immorality, for wherever you find a safeguard against immorality, you find holiness. Wherever they bring an impure device into a building, holiness must be added to that building. And I want to tell you: let the mockers mock and the scoffers laugh. If you knew how many calls I received from kibbutzim, from secular Jews: “Rabbi Ba-Gad, you sanctified the Name of Heaven.” “Rabbi Ba-Gad, it reminded me of my father, my grandfather.” You know, someone called and said, “That’s the first time I’ve seen a tallis.” Do you know what a pang that gave me in my heart, what emotion I felt in the Knesset? And so I say to you, the Shulchan Aruch opens with its first section: “Do not be ashamed before people who mock you.” And I want to tell you about the greatness of the Rebbe shlita. I remember Chabad forty and fifty years ago, and thirty years ago—how people mocked them and laughed at them and dismissed them. The Rebbe shlita paid no attention to anyone, and over fifty years, a whole generation, the Rebbe shlita proved that he had prevailed: Didan Notzach. There is Chabad everywhere in the world, and today people no longer dare to mock and laugh, because they know who prevailed. So I tell you, today the Knesset Committee discussed me and what punishment to give me. They can discuss it or not discuss it. I say, how do you know whether a fish is alive or dead? A dead fish goes with the current; even a plank floats with the current. A live fish swims against the current, and that’s how you know it’s alive. We are in a difficult position in the Knesset, both the opposition and the religious members. The situation is difficult, worse than you think. The desecration of holy things is terrible; the hatred is unbelievable. A newspaper reporter came up to me

07:01 Speaker 1 this week. She said, “I don’t want to hear you make a blessing over a cup of water at the Knesset podium.” I told her, “Madam, but that’s democratic. I go up to speak, my throat gets dry, and I want a drink. I can’t drink without saying ‘Shehakol nihyeh bidvaro.’” So she said, “Say it quietly, so nobody hears.” I told her, “According to halachah, people should answer amen to my blessing.” No, that’s religious coercion. Do you understand? It’s religious coercion if I do it at the Knesset podium—and I deliberately said it aloud. Ladies and gentlemen, I tell you, I didn’t enter the Knesset so they could teach me what to do. Baruch Hashem, I’ve educated generations upon generations of students. Not they, not the journalists, not the television people, and not even the religious members of the Knesset. Forgive me for saying this, because it pains me: the religious members came up to me and were the first to laugh at me. I asked them, “Wait a moment. They brought in a device contrary to everything I stand for. Why did all of you keep silent and not raise your voices in protest at this chillul Hashem? The first parliament in the world to dare do such a thing. You kept silent about that chillul Hashem. But when I went and did something out of the ordinary, you condemned me. So I am ‘a man with spirit in him,’ able to go against the spirit of each and every person.” That is what is demanded of us, and with Hashem’s help, that is what we will do. The days are difficult, but if we manage to unite—and I say this here: Meretz united, and from Heaven they received a reward. All of us, all of us split into tiny fragments, all of us, and we received a punishment from Heaven. So we must come back together, all of us. Then, with Hashem’s help, we will achieve our goal, and with Hashem’s help, we will merit that the Rebbe shlita returns to full health and leads us to Melech HaMoshiach speedily in our days, amen.

09:28 Speaker 2 Yasher koach, yasher koach to Rabbi Yosef Ba-Gad. Of Rabbi Ba-Gad one can certainly say that he is a fish swimming forward. A fish always keeps going forward. We wish Rabbi Ba-Gad that “Ba Gad”—“good fortune has come”—should always be fulfilled for him. Before we move on to the niggun of the Four Stanzas, a few announcements: Kiryat Malachi, the bus leaves in two minutes. Gershon Rothschild, please go outside; your daughter is waiting for you. And... Naftali Schreiber, they’re waiting for you outside too. Ladies and gentlemen, we want to express our thanks and blessings, and say yasher koach to the Kfar Chabad committee for organizing this wonderful celebration and farbrengen; to its chairman, Rabbi Lehrer, to Rabbi Menashe Hadad, and to the entire committee team, who worked so hard to prepare such a beautiful farbrengen and celebration. To Mr. Moshe Mona Rosenblum’s orchestra and his fellow musicians, the Kol Shar choir, and Shmuel Richter with the sound system. Yes, and to everyone who prepared the lovely refreshments; and to you, dear audience. The niggun of the Four Stanzas. Moshiach Now.