Lehisraanen Episode Four: Rabbi Shlomo Fleishman

00:00 Speaker 1 Hello and welcome to “Lehisraanen,” the podcast that brings the vitality of Beis Chayeinu. On the podcast, chassidim join the Rebbe’s shliach, Rabbi Nachum Goldschmidt, and tell him about the special moments and experiences they had with the Rebbe at 770. This week our guest is Rabbi Shlomo Fleischman of Nachlas Har Chabad. He’ll tell us how he came to Chabad Chassidus, about his studies at the Chachamim high school in Israel, his trip to the Rebbe in the early years, and his studies in the year of [unclear]. Together with him, we’ll refresh ourselves and connect with the Rebbe. We’ll hear what he experienced and saw, and feel and experience it ourselves. As mentioned, the podcast is hosted by the Rebbe’s shliach, Rabbi Nachum Goldschmidt. Produced by Aharon Freiman. Enjoy listening. Lehisraanen.

00:34 Speaker 2 Hello and welcome to another episode of the Lehisraanen podcast—to return to those refreshing, vibrant days the chassidim spent with the Rebbe. This time we’re with the chossid Reb Shlomo Fleischman of Nachlas Har Chabad. Welcome, Rabbi Fleischman. Tell us, when did you first go to the Rebbe? And before that, how did you come to Chabad?

00:56 Speaker 3 Yes. We’re a Hungarian family, and I was born in Hungary. My parents moved to Israel when I was still very young. We lived in Jerusalem, mainly in the Pagi neighborhood, Sanhedria [unclear], and Rabbi Tuvia Blau, may he be well, was there. He opened an evening yeshiva in the neighborhood. Children would come after school and study for an hour in the evening. We also davened together there, and davened together in the morning too. We got lots of prizes at the evening yeshiva. I think there were three branches in Jerusalem then. There was one in Beis Yisroel, and there was Menachem Hillel [unclear], a"h, and Naftali Roth. Naftali Roth was in another neighborhood, and he opened one in Pagi. The children there were from the neighborhood, not Chabadniks. The chossid Dovid Fisher and some other boys were there too. Every so often he’d hold farbrengens for us and bring chassidim to farbreng with us. We were little children, you understand.

02:25 Speaker 2 What ages?

02:26 Speaker 3 It started when we were eight or nine, and then we went for several years, until bar mitzvah. We were—

02:33 Speaker 2 What did you study in the evenings? What did you study?

02:35 Speaker 3 Everyone studied [unclear], [unclear]. Yes, but he really taught us Chassidus and Torah, and we davened too. Over time we switched to nusach Chabad. When bar mitzvah came around, he explained what Chabad tefillin are, with the shin and everything. So I told my father, “Those are the kind of tefillin I want.” They weren’t [unclear], but they had the Chabad shin. That’s how he made us love the Rebbe and Chassidus. We also had our own minyan on Shabbos morning. And even when we davened in the regular shul on Shabbos, we gathered around him. We spent a lot of time in his grand, magnificent home—which was a room and a half. Yes, we’d be at his house all the time—

03:32 Speaker 2 So these were simply children from the neighborhood who came to learn, and he instilled Chassidus in them [unclear].

03:37 Speaker 3 He instilled in us a love for Chabad. When we were approaching bar mitzvah, he said, “Boys, you need to study at Tomchei Temimim.” So I told my parents. I was studying at Dushinsky, which was thoroughly Hungarian. They had a junior yeshiva there, and you were expected to continue on. I told my parents I wanted to study at Chabad. There was no [unclear] then, so it would be in Lod. They wouldn’t agree. What did Chabad have for them? Nothing. They were chassidim. Anyway, the evening yeshiva really pampered us. They’d organize trips. All the branches of the evening yeshiva would go on trips from time to time. So I told my parents we were going on a trip. The “trip” was to Lod to be tested by Rabbi Eliezer Rubitz. They gathered several boys who were around bar mitzvah age. I was actually still just before my bar mitzvah, right around that age. Some were already past it. About seven of us boys from the Jerusalem branches of the evening yeshiva went by train with Reb Yosef Blau, a"h. Our parents were told we were going on a trip. And we were tested. Reb Eliezer tested us in the old shul of—

05:10 Speaker 4 The Chabad neighborhood.

05:12 Speaker 3 The Chabad neighborhood in Lod. Fine, and we were accepted. A little while after we were accepted, I told my parents, “It wasn’t really a trip. It was…” Suddenly they agreed. They agreed. Yes, I wrote, and they agreed, and I really did move there. My father even accompanied me to the yeshiva to speak with [unclear]. Tuition was ten liras. Anyway, I was accepted, and I immediately wrote to the Rebbe. I still have the letter. The Rebbe replied, “Your letter was received” [unclear]. The whole story [unclear]. It was a beautiful letter.

06:03 Speaker 4 So this was right around your bar mitzvah.

06:05 Speaker 3 My bar mitzvah was in Tammuz, and I started in Cheshvan.

06:09 Speaker 4 In the Cheshvan after your bar mitzvah.

06:10 Speaker 3 Cheshvan 5722.

06:11 Speaker 4 After your bar mitzvah.

06:12 Speaker 3 I started after my bar mitzvah, on Shabbos [unclear].

06:14 Speaker 4 I just want to understand something for a moment. You say you wrote to the Rebbe?

06:18 Speaker 3 Yes.

06:19 Speaker 4 So at the evening yeshiva, the Rebbe was, in a sense, present? How—

06:21 Speaker 3 Yes.

06:22 Speaker 4 That’s very interesting. There was no, no—

06:25 Speaker 3 At the evening yeshiva, all of us students also wrote a letter to the Rebbe, perhaps before Rosh Hashanah, and there’s a reply from the Rebbe. There’s a reply with all our names. I don’t know whether the Rebbe signed it; I don’t remember. But I have it here.

06:43 Speaker 4 In other words, even without the means of communication—there were no broadcasts, and only the occasional letter or sicha reached you—

06:49 Speaker 3 One picture of the Rebbe—

06:50 Speaker 4 He managed to instill a feeling for the Rebbe?

06:54 Speaker 3 Very much. Very much. First of all, we loved him dearly.

06:58 Speaker 4 Right, right.

06:59 Speaker 3 He loved us. Yes, he loved us. He also showed us letters he’d received from the Rebbe about [unclear] children, and what the Rebbe had promised him for the following year. He showed us those letters. He’s a good rabbi. Anyway, I started there, and I received the Rebbe’s letter when I was already in Lod. They told me, “You’ve received a letter from the Rebbe. You need to speak to a chossid, show him the letter, and have him explain it to you.” I tell this story because it moved me deeply, and I remember it to this day. I went into the zal—the zal of Kfar Chabad was also in Lod then. I went in between the study sessions, and Reb Micho Steinmetz, a"h, was sitting there. He was studying during the break. I went over to him and said, “I’ve received a letter from the Rebbe, and I’d like you to explain what the Rebbe writes.”

08:21 Speaker 4 He was simply an older bochur at the time.

08:22 Speaker 3 He was a bochur who used to travel to the Rebbe. Anyway, he took the letter. He stood up, put on his jacket and hat, and stood while he read it. That made such an impression on me [unclear]: this is a letter from the Rebbe, and this is how you read it. So he read the letter and explained it to me. The image of him at that moment stayed with me. Receiving a letter from the Rebbe is—

08:56 Speaker 4 A serious matter.

08:57 Speaker 3 Yes, a serious matter. You had to ask an older bochur or an older chossid. And there he was, getting dressed [unclear]—he put on his jacket, that Hungarian-style rekel with the fastening on the side, and his hat, and stood to read it.

09:11 Speaker 4 Wow.

09:12 Speaker 3 I remembered that all along, and I still have that letter. Well, I studied there when there were two classes. First-year class was with Yankel Katz, and second-year class was with Zelig Feldman. There weren’t three classes, only two—chug beis and chug gimmel. Meanwhile, some bochurim had traveled to the Rebbe for Tishrei, and they came back and told us about it.

09:45 Speaker 4 Their experiences.

09:46 Speaker 3 The bochurim’s experiences. They also went to various places. I remember one was Netanya, and I joined the bochurim at a farbrengen there. I don’t remember exactly where in Netanya, but we heard from them. We were sort of accompanying the bochurim who’d returned from the Rebbe. The new niggun then was “Stav Ya Pitu” [unclear]. Everyone was singing it.

10:18 Speaker 4 The niggun the Rebbe taught at Stern Seminary [unclear].

10:20 Speaker 3 “Stav Ya Pitu” [unclear], and after that there was “Ki [unclear].”

10:23 Speaker 4 “Stav Ya Pitu” [unclear] was chug gimmel, yes.

10:25 Speaker 3 “Ki [unclear],” and after that—

10:27 Speaker 4 Chug daled, yes.

10:28 Speaker 3 Yes, and “Hu Elokeinu.” Those were the niggunim, and you had to know them. “Yes, yes, you already know the song? You don’t know the song?” That’s how we got drawn into everything. This was already at the yeshiva in Lod. Folkan [unclear] taught us Tanya. He’d come from Kfar Chabad and study Tanya with us. Not in great depth, but he taught us Tanya. We lived in the dormitory there and didn’t go home very often. The first time we went home after starting in Cheshvan was Chanukah. Moshe Aharon Teichman, a"h, taught us a kuntres—what were the first maamarim? Easy maamarim. That was the first Chassidus we studied. In Elul, chug—

11:21 Speaker 4 So you were several friends from Jerusalem.

11:23 Speaker 3 A lot—that’s forty. There were forty students in Jerusalem. Forty, with long coats and Jerusalem-style hats. Yes, forty guys were from Jerusalem. From Elul, second year, third year. When did I study in second year? Third year? I had already moved to Kfar Chabad.

11:43 Speaker 4 To Kfar Chabad.

11:43 Speaker 3 I was fifteen.

11:45 Speaker 4 They were already in Kfar Chabad then.

11:46 Speaker 3 Ah, they were already in Kfar Chabad. They moved in third year, on 19 Kislev. They moved to Kfar Chabad. At first, for a few days, they would go back to their dormitories every night. After that they stayed there permanently, and that was that. Reb Sholom Chaim moved there, but during those two years we would go to Reb Sholom Chaim’s farbrengens in Kfar Chabad, to all the farbrengens.

12:14 Speaker 4 Meaning that from Elul we would travel to the farbrengens.

12:16 Speaker 3 No, no.

12:17 Speaker 4 That was in Lod itself, sorry.

12:18 Speaker 3 Those two years.

12:19 Speaker 4 I see. So the boys from the junior yeshiva would also come to the farbrengens of—

12:23 Speaker 3 We would watch Reb Sholom Chaim farbreng with the boys, during the farbrengen and afterward. Yes, a lot of people from other yeshivos came then. There wasn’t that hostility yet. [unclear] Slabodka was packed; crowds would come, Litvish boys would come, and Reb Sholom Chaim would farbreng. We didn’t understand that much. Maybe they called him Reb Sholom Chaim, but by then we were already attached to Reb Sholom Chaim. You could see what a mashpia he was, and that he was from Lubavitch. Now, we Chabad boys had already moved to Kfar Chabad with that class. We stood off to the side—Yankel Katz and Zelig and the others. Well—

13:09 Speaker 4 Chabad boys.

13:10 Speaker 3 Chabad boys. And at the end of the year—

13:12 Speaker 4 You moved up to that.

13:14 Speaker 3 Yes. So in Tishrei—the junior yeshiva now, there aren’t any left, but then we were already in Kfar Chabad by Tishrei. There were married men who would come to the yeshiva for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The boys would go home from the yeshiva; Sholom Chaim would let them go. On the night after Yom Kippur he would hold a farbrengen and say how you should behave at home, and leave on time, and study, and daven properly too. Then the next morning we would travel home. Married men would come just to be at the yeshiva, together with the yeshiva and with Reb Sholom Chaim. Former students, already married with children, would leave home and come for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. Well, that’s how we studied. Then it was ’24, ’25, ’26, ’26, ’27. Yes, ’27. A group went in ’26, a group that included Rabbi [unclear]. They were supposed to return after half a year, from Tishrei until Pesach. That was the permission they received. ’26. In the end, they extended it for them until after Tishrei. That meant no group went in Tishrei of ’27. No group went. Ah, so the group that was supposed to go in ’27 went for Pesach instead. And for how long? From Pesach until the following Pesach. That was the approval they received. So we, who were supposed to go in ’28, said we wouldn’t be able to go, because they wouldn’t allow two groups together. We’d end up going in ’29. Meaning we’d miss an entire year. Now, there was Shraga Ber [?], who had already gone with the ’26 group and returned. He had a grandfather, Zelig Slonim, and he had a friend who was a Knesset member, Yankel Katz [unclear].

15:30 Speaker 4 From Mapai.

15:30 Speaker 3 From Mapai. He arranged it. Shraga Ber [?] went, I went, and Eli—Eli Stolick, Eli Stolick, Eliyahu Stolick [?]. Yes, he was in the yeshiva.

15:42 Speaker 4 Stolick.

15:43 Speaker 3 Stolick was from—

15:44 Speaker 4 From Karon HaEtz [?].

15:45 Speaker 3 Yes, from Karon HaEtz [?]. Karon HaEtz [?]—he’s from here.

15:47 Speaker 4 Yes.

15:47 Speaker 3 Anyway, there were three of us, three boys. He said, “I’ll arrange it for a year, but it’s easier for me to arrange six months for you. Afterward I’ll extend it.”

16:02 Speaker 4 That’s what the Knesset member said.

16:04 Speaker 3 Yes, we went to see the Knesset member. He saw us and was impressed. Sadly, he was killed in a traffic accident in Adar.

16:14 Speaker 4 That same year.

16:15 Speaker 3 Yes. And we were left with no answer and nothing to go on. We were supposed to return after Pesach. Anyway, at kos shel brachah on the last day of Pesach, we approached, and Shraga Ber [?] told the Rebbe what had happened—that we no longer had any way to ask for an extension. So the Rebbe asked, “Efraim Wolf, it won’t cause a problem?” In short, he said, “No.”

16:48 Speaker 4 Translate that.

16:49 Speaker 3 Huh?

16:50 Speaker 4 Translate it.

16:51 Speaker 3 He said no.

16:52 Speaker 4 No, Efraim Wolf—

16:53 Speaker 3 Ah, Efraim Wolf said it wasn’t a problem, it wouldn’t be a problem.

16:56 Speaker 4 For you to stay.

16:58 Speaker 3 For us to stay and ask to continue on. Yes. And what actually happened with the group from Pesach ’27 until after Pesach ’28, who did arrive? They arrived for Pesach, and there were two groups at Pesach ’28. Yes, we were there too—

17:17 Speaker 4 There were only three of you altogether.

17:18 Speaker 3 The three of us. We thought a group wouldn’t arrive, but it did.

17:20 Speaker 4 At Pesach, though.

17:21 Speaker 3 We figured they wouldn’t arrive, so we took action on our own to get there, rather than wait another year. Yes, so we went to [unclear]. Anyway, we wrote a letter explaining that we had been supposed to—this and that—he had been killed, and so on. No, they rejected it, rejected—

17:40 Speaker 4 The military service.

17:41 Speaker 3 We filed an appeal against the rejection.

17:44 Speaker 4 Ah, they rejected your application.

17:45 Speaker 3 They rejected the application, and I filed an appeal. Anyway, it dragged on until Shabbos Mevarchim Elul, and then we traveled—

17:54 Speaker 4 To Israel.

17:54 Speaker 3 To Israel, the two of us. Shaiber [?] said, “Shabbos Mevarchim, a month before Elul—I’m not traveling.” He stayed. He stayed until after Tishrei. Anyway, ah, we were at [unclear], and the Rebbe gave a sicha. The Rebbe gave a sicha on Shabbos Mevarchim Noach, if I’m not mistaken—Shabbos Mevarchim Cheshvan. He spoke about the new boys and gave a sicha.

18:22 Speaker 4 To the new boys who had arrived.

18:24 Speaker 3 As always, about the study schedule, the yeshiva, the administration, and everything.

18:30 Speaker 4 Meaning that as far as the Rebbe was concerned, whether three arrived or a whole group arrived, the number made no difference at all.

18:35 Speaker 3 It was a short sicha like that. Maybe the Rebbe even mentioned it twice.

18:40 Speaker 4 Why was it really only the three of you? Could it be that the others were waiting for approval?

18:44 Speaker 3 No, there weren’t, there weren’t others who—

18:47 Speaker 4 Of that age.

18:48 Speaker 3 There weren’t. There was a group, but they stayed. They stayed until Pesach. They really did travel later, after six months, not after a year as we had thought. Well, then Tishrei came, and we traveled—

19:01 Speaker 4 Wait, before that... I’d like you to share a little, if you don’t mind, about what Sholom Chaim was like.

19:08 Speaker 3 Ah, you want that?

19:09 Speaker 4 A little. Then we’ll come back, we’ll come back.

19:11 Speaker 3 Yes. At Sholom Chaim’s farbrengens, there were always some boys from other yeshivos who would come, and he would draw them close. Later, all those who came actually ended up at Tomchei Temimim. Boys from Ponevezh would come here to Kfar Chabad for Shabbos, too, to farbreng with Sholom Chaim, and on special dates as well. Those boys later transferred to Tomchei Temimim. One of them was Lipa Kurzweil, who studied in Chabad. Yes, interesting, interesting. There were two brothers—I won’t name them. You know some of them. One would come from Ponevezh to farbreng with Sholom Chaim; he really connected. Later he brought his younger brother, and both of them would come for Shabbos and for Sholom Chaim’s farbrengens, whenever there was a special date. Eventually they both decided to transfer to Tomchei Temimim. So each of them wrote separately to the Rebbe. The Rebbe answered the younger one; the Rebbe did not answer the older one. And that’s how it turned out. The younger one entered, and today he has sons and grandchildren and shluchim—a wonderful, large, extended family that we know. The Rebbe didn’t answer the older one, and he later became a rosh yeshiva at a Litvish yeshiva. That’s what the Rebbe Rashab [?] said: “I choose names.” Yes, Sholom Chaim’s farbrengens were always after the study schedule. They would study first. No, no, they didn’t cancel the nighttime study schedule. So it would be nine, nine-thirty, and he would come to farbreng from ten until ten-thirty. For yahrzeits and birthdays, the farbrengens would last two and a half or three hours. Yes, there were major dates in [unclear] and Kislev, and then it would be—

21:19 Speaker 5 All night.

21:20 Speaker 3 He would farbreng all night. Every talk of his was—I call it positive brainwashing. Yes, he would speak in a steady flow for forty minutes, fifty minutes, pouring it out, pouring it out. It washed your brain.

21:37 Speaker 5 Didn’t you once tell me, when I lived here in Nachlas Har Chabad, that Sholom Chaim was an educator?

21:41 Speaker 3 He was.

21:41 Speaker 5 You may even have used the word “pedagogue” once or twice.

21:43 Speaker 3 Yes. Now, Thursday night—that was his night for yechidus.

21:50 Speaker 5 Not yechidus.

21:51 Speaker 3 Yes.

21:52 Speaker 5 Personal conversations.

21:53 Speaker 3 Personal conversations. His home was open, and people would come to him. He’d give them a cup of tea, and they’d talk. Talk. At four-thirty in the morning, or even later, he would come to the yeshiva. Boys would be sitting there, boys would be sitting there. Since he came to visit them, the boys would sit there, packed tightly together. There were some who—

22:21 Speaker 5 He would visit and speak with groups of boys.

22:24 Speaker 3 Yes, he would talk with them. Anyway.

22:28 Speaker 5 What was his secret?

22:29 Speaker 3 Huh?

22:29 Speaker 5 He was close to the boys. What was his secret?

22:32 Speaker 3 He was a yeshiva student.

22:34 Speaker 5 Sholom Chaim was a yeshiva student.

22:36 Speaker 3 A yeshiva student, a yeshiva student. Yes, he would daven there in the yeshiva. Afterward he would go into the kitchen, take some container, put a little food in it, and walk home with his basket. A yeshiva student. Yes, that’s what he was. He was one of the boys. He wasn’t the boss; he was a yeshiva student. Yes.

23:06 Speaker 5 And they simply felt comfortable opening up to him, talking to him.

23:09 Speaker 3 Yes. He would also initiate conversations with the bochurim himself. I just read in the paper that a Weiser passed away.

23:24 Speaker 5 Yes, Rabbi Weiser.

23:26 Speaker 3 Yes, I didn’t know this. He came—he was a Belzer. He took his bundles and said, “I want to learn the inner dimension of Torah.” So he came to Kfar Chabad and met Shalom Chaim. Shalom Chaim asked him, and he said, “I came to learn the inner dimension of Torah.” “Who are you?” and so on. He understood that Weiser had come on his own, not through his parents. Where would he go in the yeshivah? He needed a bed and everything. He slept at Shalom Chaim’s place for a while.

23:50 Speaker 5 In his house.

23:51 Speaker 3 Yes, in his house. Later, they got him into the yeshivah and settled him in. So he had a good connection with him too.

24:02 Speaker 5 Let’s go back to your parents for a moment. How did they take this whole change, your becoming a Chabad chossid?

24:07 Speaker 3 In my case?

24:07 Speaker 5 Yes.

24:09 Speaker 3 It wasn’t just me. My brother Menachem also became a Chabad chossid. All my sisters went to study in Chabad institutions too. First they were in Jerusalem. Afterward they went to Kfar Chabad, got married there and studied there. But only one married a Chabad chossid, Bergman. The others were with the Rebbe too; all of them were with the Rebbe.

24:33 Speaker 5 So there was an influence on the whole family.

24:35 Speaker 3 Yes, my parents too—my mother and father. My father only went after—after 27 Adar. But my mother went into yechidus too, perhaps even twice, because she had a sister in the United States and would visit her from time to time. So she went into yechidus. Interestingly, my cousin brought her. He brought her to Crown Heights. They lived in Williamsburg and were Pupa chassidim. She had an appointment.

25:11 Speaker 5 For yechidus.

25:12 Speaker 3 My brother Menachem was there. When her turn came, how would she manage? She didn’t know Hebrew, and certainly not English. So my cousin brought her in.

25:24 Speaker 5 To yechidus.

25:25 Speaker 3 My cousin went in with my mother. Well, my mother finished, and he hadn’t even written a note, nothing. So the Rebbe took a piece of paper and a pencil and asked him, “What’s your name?” His mother’s name, his children—the Rebbe wrote it all down. All his life he would say, “I’m the only one for whom the Rebbe himself wrote the kvittel.” There’s the whole—

25:51 Speaker 5 Usually [unclear] writes the kvittel.

25:53 Speaker 3 The Rebbe himself wrote it. The Rebbe blessed him, and things went well for him. He passed away, sadly, less than a year ago. He was a successful man, a wealthy man. Tauber, Shmulik Tauber. He was also with Hatzolah, so after 27 Adar he flew there too, for everything.

26:13 Speaker 5 To the Ohel.

26:14 Speaker 3 To the Ohel. They notified everyone—how do you say it? They notified all of Hatzolah, and all the Hatzolah people from [unclear] came.

26:19 Speaker 5 The Rebbe wrote his kvittel for him.

26:21 Speaker 3 The Rebbe wrote the kvittel and blessed him, and he said, “I feel the Rebbe’s blessing. I feel how good it is.”

26:28 Speaker 5 What happened with your mother in yechidus? What language did the Rebbe speak?

26:33 Speaker 3 Yiddish, probably.

26:35 Speaker 5 Yiddish.

26:35 Speaker 3 Yiddish. Her Hebrew was like that of all the newly arrived Hungarian women. She gave him a blessing; she wrote about [unclear]. Yes, I think she went in another time too. My father went, but that was already afterward; he saw the Rebbe from the balcony.

26:57 Speaker 5 All right, let’s get back to your group.

26:59 Speaker 3 But the house changed. There was a picture of the Rebbe—

27:03 Speaker 5 And all the influence of the yeshivah—the yeshivah in [unclear].

27:06 Speaker 3 All the influence of the yeshivah in [unclear].

27:08 Speaker 5 How many Jews came from that yeshivah? Dozens, I mean.

27:11 Speaker 3 A lot.

27:12 Speaker 5 Rabbi Freiman [?], Kanievman [?], came too.

27:14 Speaker 3 Yes, lots and lots.

27:18 Speaker 5 All right, back to your group. Let’s start with the group. So you arrived for Tishrei.

27:21 Speaker 3 In short, as I said, we didn’t have a group, so we arranged it ourselves. Of course, we had the yeshivah’s permission: “If you’ve arranged it, then go, go.” We traveled through Paris—Paris, Luxembourg—like all the wealthy people. Then we were at the yeshivah near Paris.

27:47 Speaker 5 Brunoy.

27:48 Speaker 3 Brunoy. It was right around Chai Elul. The yeshivah was empty. Everyone had already gone to the Rebbe; it really wasn’t functioning anymore, and then we arrived. We arrived in the morning, and Reb Nissan welcomed us. I tell everyone that he made us breakfast, and nobody believes me. He made us omelets; we ate. Nobody believes it. And boruch Hashem, we saw Reb Nissan, the great Reb Nissan, and his son.

28:19 Speaker 5 Rabbi Yosef.

28:20 Speaker 3 Rabbi Yosef. We had the privilege of seeing them. We were there for about half a day or so, and that was it. After that—

28:28 Speaker 5 Did Reb Nissan ask whether you needed something to refresh you?

28:31 Speaker 3 No, I don’t remember what we talked about, but he took care of us. After that we traveled on and arrived. On the day I arrived, the Rebbe was speaking to the women, as he did twice a year, right? On Rosh Hashanah and—

28:47 Speaker 5 In Iyar, before Shavuos.

28:49 Speaker 3 Before Shavuos. So I probably saw the Rebbe for the first time at Minchah. But for the sicha, the arrangement was that the women were downstairs and all the men were upstairs in the women’s gallery. After the Rebbe spoke to them, they would approach him and speak with him. Later, when there were many women, they would just hand in notes, but then they would approach, and each woman would say something, speak with the Rebbe and give him a note. That was that same night. The next morning, we were at the scheduled Chassidus study session. After the session, the telephone rang. There was a telephone near the room of—

29:34 Speaker 5 The room of—

29:34 Speaker 3 Rabbi Kor [?]. There was a telephone there then. Usually nobody answered it, because if you did, they’d tell you, “Bring me this, bring me that.” But this time a bochur went over. I don’t know his name. He picked up and spoke. Afterward he came to us and said, “Do you know what that call was? Do you know what that call was? A woman called and asked, ‘Is this Lubavitch?’” He said, “Yes.” She said, “I want to tell you something. Last night I was with the Rebbe.” This was the time of the hippies, when sons and daughters would disappear from home. They lived like animals in the city squares, dirty, not washing or anything. In short, that’s how they lived. You know, the protests against—

30:25 Speaker 5 Yes.

30:26 Speaker 3 Against—

30:26 Speaker 5 [unclear].

30:27 Speaker 3 The Vietnam War.

30:29 Speaker 5 The late sixties.

30:30 Speaker 3 Yes, the late sixties. “And yesterday I was with the Rebbe, and I cried.”

30:34 Speaker 5 That’s what the woman said.

30:35 Speaker 3 Yes. “‘I cried. I haven’t known anything about my son for four months—whether he’s even alive, whether he has a home, food, clothes, whether he washes. I cried to the Rebbe. The Rebbe comforted me: “Don’t worry. He’s alive, he has a home, he has food, he has everything.” That’s what the Rebbe told me. I got home, and a few hours later, after four months, the telephone rang. And who was it? My son.’”

31:05 Speaker 5 Wow.

31:06 Speaker 3 “‘And what did he say? He repeated—he repeated what the Rebbe had said: “Mom, don’t worry. I have a home, I have food, I have clothes, and everything is fine.”’ She said he repeated the very words the Rebbe had told her.”

31:19 Speaker 5 And she called to tell them about it.

31:21 Speaker 3 Yes, she wanted to tell them. Well, I heard the story and thought, miracles are happening all around here. Surely something like this happens every moment. But that’s what happened.

31:32 Speaker 5 That was your welcome to 770.

31:34 Speaker 3 Huh?

31:35 Speaker 5 Your welcome to 770.

31:36 Speaker 3 That was what lay behind it.

31:38 Speaker 5 Yes.

31:38 Speaker 3 Behind it, yes. All right, here at the Rebbe’s—well.

31:44 Speaker 5 Yes.

31:45 Speaker 3 We learned that you need miracles. That was right in the hippie era.

31:50 Speaker 5 Tishrei.

31:50 Speaker 3 The day, the day—

31:51 Speaker 5 Those hippies.

31:52 Speaker 3 The day before, yes. There was still a study session, and we came, and anyway—Pikarsky. Pikarsky was the one who picked up the phone.

32:00 Speaker 5 Ah.

32:01 Speaker 3 He picked up the phone.

32:02 Speaker 5 Yes.

32:03 Speaker 3 Well, Tishrei was Tishrei, and it was special too. 770 was still the small 770.

32:11 Speaker 5 Before the first expansion.

32:13 Speaker 3 Before the first expansion, but half a wall had already been knocked down. I mean, you could stand on the other side, and people climbed onto the half-wall, so there was a bit more room.

32:25 Speaker 5 Explain it, because people can’t see your hand gestures. What do you mean—could people sort of climb over it?

32:28 Speaker 3 Not climb over it. There, you—

32:30 Speaker 5 Ah, so it came up to about the middle of your body, and you could see over it.

32:34 Speaker 3 In the shul itself, it was impossible to see. The Rebbe wasn’t on a platform; he was simply standing on a carpet. You couldn’t see anything. From there you could see a little.

32:47 Speaker 5 If you stood in the expanded area, yes.

32:48 Speaker 3 Yes, during the shofar blowing. The strength it took was incredible, enormous. I stood there with half a foot on some corner of a bench just to see something, because the bochurim had taken the spots—the bochurim slept there. How much space was there? Four meters from the bimah to the wall, to the Aron Kodesh, perhaps even less.

33:09 Speaker 5 Which platform do you mean?

33:10 Speaker 3 The bimah.

33:11 Speaker 5 The bimah in the shul.

33:12 Speaker 3 How big was the shul then? A person in that first crowd, you know. Yes. And the bochurim actually slept there all night, taking turns going to put on [unclear], all for Maftir and the shofar blowing. That’s how it was. Yes. I remember when the small machzorim came out, we bought them. You didn’t need a big machzor to stand there. The pages for the shofar blowing in my small machzor are completely black. I have it somewhere—the pages are black from all the pushing, and torn. But that was how it was. You heard Maftir, because it wasn’t a big place, but you couldn’t see. Right. You couldn’t see the Rebbe. No, the Rebbe—no, no. There was no sound system, not like there was years later. So that was Tishrei, Rosh Hashanah. There were short sichos; there was Tashlich. Yes, and some very important guests came to the Rebbe.

34:26 Speaker 5 Who were they?

34:27 Speaker 3 One of them came for the first time: Noach Goldschmidt, with his wife.

34:32 Speaker 5 Yes, that was his first time. The only time he was there.

34:34 Speaker 3 The only time. They said he went in for yechidus. So we bochurim waited to see. Avraham Fried was there then, and he went in. He didn’t usually go in for yechidus. Generally he wouldn’t take up the Rebbe’s time, but this time he went in, and he passed away that year.

34:51 Speaker 5 Yes, he passed away in Elul, that same year.

34:54 Speaker 3 So he went in and came out—yechidus. “I was in yechidus.” No, he didn’t go in regularly; he didn’t want to take up the Rebbe’s time. But this time he went in and came out. That’s what they told us. Yes, Noach Goldschmidt went in with his wife, and the Rebbe coughed. So she asked, “Don’t they bring you tea in the middle?” The Rebbe would sit—

35:18 Speaker 5 For hours into the night.

35:19 Speaker 3 I don’t know if it was then, but I remember one night of yechidus that went from eight until nine. I don’t remember if it was then.

35:28 Speaker 5 In this story, anyway, there was one night from eight until nine. Thirteen hours.

35:32 Speaker 3 I remember. Yes. So she asked, “Don’t they bring you a cup of tea? Shall I go out and get one?” She asked the Rebbe, “I’ll ask for a cup of tea.” The Rebbe had coughed. So the Rebbe said, “That’s not it.” That’s how they tell it. And he showed her—showed her a little package.

35:52 Speaker 5 Yes, yes, he showed her a package of—

35:55 Speaker 3 Yes, he said, “It’s not from that. It’s not the kind of cough that needs tea.” That’s how they told it. Yes, that’s what they said. There was another story too, a great mofes, that happened then. A friend of Bubi’s [?] arrived.

36:12 Speaker 5 From Stolin.

36:13 Speaker 3 From Stolin. Because then all the Russians came. The Rebbe asked all the new immigrants from Russia to come at his expense and stay with him. They were at his shul. That went on for several years. That year too, he went in for yechidus, they said. Before he had left Russia, there was a man named Zalman Levin, Zalman Korshiker [?], who lived here in Nachlas Har Chabad. Reb Boisha [?], I think, also lives in America now; later he moved to the United States. So while the others had already left—in ’66, ’67, ’68—he was still sitting in prison.

36:59 Speaker 5 Zalman Levin was still in prison there, under the Russians.

37:01 Speaker 3 Yes. So he asked Zalman Leib, he asked him to mention him when he was with the Rebbe. But several years went by; perhaps he came in ’66, ’67, [unclear]. He wrote up his yechidus, the yechidus—

37:18 Speaker 5 He wrote, ah, a pan before the yechidus.

37:20 Speaker 3 He wrote the pan himself and signed it “Zalman Leib Stolin.” Yes. So the Rebbe opens it and reads it. And at the end the Rebbe says, “Zalman Levin.”

37:33 Speaker 5 Wow.

37:34 Speaker 3 So he corrects him. He says, “Zalman Leib.” The Rebbe looks at him as if to say it again: “Zalman Levin.” Twice, or three times. And then he caught on that the Rebbe was reminding him of the person he was supposed to mention to the Rebbe.

37:50 Speaker 5 Wow.

37:51 Speaker 3 That’s the story they told then.

37:54 Speaker 5 Wow. There was also a story with his wife, about her brother, Yankele Kapka. Wasn’t there?

37:58 Speaker 3 Ah, what?

38:00 Speaker 5 His wife asked about her brother, Yankele Kapka, that he should be allowed out. I think it went like this—the Russians had said that when hair grew on the palms of their hands, they would let him out. So she cried, and the Rebbe told her, “Don’t worry, he’ll get out.” And he got out quite soon. That’s what I remember from Bnei Brak. They were both in Bnei Brak, after all—Zalman Leib and Reb Yankele Kapka.

38:20 Speaker 3 That’s what happened.

38:22 Speaker 5 But what was it like for you, as a bochur who had come from Jerusalem and Lod, to see Tishrei, to see the Rebbe? What was it like?

38:29 Speaker 3 Look, Tishrei—

38:30 Speaker 5 Even though it wasn’t [unclear], still, as a youngster—

38:33 Speaker 3 Tishrei—Tishrei is like being inside the spin cycle of a washing machine. You don’t—

38:41 Speaker 5 You haven’t taken it in yet.

38:42 Speaker 3 Right. They put us on a list, gave us a number, to go on the procession and go to a shul for the Simchas Beis Hashoevah. We walked for two hours; it rained, and— We came back to the farbrengen soaked from head to toe. Then came the Rebbe’s hakafos. I remember, as soon as it ended—the hakafos were quite long, with the farbrengen and then the hakafos; perhaps we finished at five—and then suddenly—

39:15 Speaker 5 Five—you mean on the night of Simchas Beis Hashoevah.

39:18 Speaker 3 Simchas Beis Hashoevah, yes.

39:19 Speaker 5 No, the Rebbe began—the Rebbe came in for that on the night of—

39:22 Speaker 3 He went out, and they prepared the—

39:23 Speaker 5 Space for hakafos.

39:24 Speaker 3 For hakafos, yes. And then, when the Rebbe began the hakafos, with the Torah beside him and everything going on—after the hakafos, when they ended, I suddenly felt myself come down to earth. I saw that I was soaked, my shirt was black, my shoes were torn, I was hungry and thirsty, and my feet hurt. Until then I hadn’t felt any of it. Nothing. I was, as I say, in the spin cycle, and the hakafos—the Rebbe lifted everyone up. That was it. And suddenly, the third meal and everything—it was like being carried along for, not moments, but hours, when you’re immersed in it and you’re not yourself. You walk all the way to a shul in Boro Park. Then you speak there too—a little kid, a young bochur, speaking in front of everybody. And you dance and go back, and run quickly, and rain is falling. You’re soaked, but you don’t feel a thing. You come in and catch the end of the farbrengen. Then the hakafos, and you’re not yourself. Suddenly you’re yourself again. You start noticing yourself—your aching feet and your head. It’s Gan Eden. We were in Gan Eden, whatever happened. Yankel was in Gan Eden. We really were in Gan Eden. That was the highest Gan Eden. The whole year was Gan Eden; even with the turmoil and the war, it was a year of Gan Eden. The highest Gan Eden. And then suddenly it’s Simchas Torah—look, right away it’s Simchas Torah. Another very, very moving thing is Shacharis—Shacharis on Simchas Torah morning. There isn’t a big crowd, because everyone’s exhausted after the hakafos. Yes, but that was later. It wasn’t that same year. I told Berchi [?], “Come, I’ll find you a place. Let’s get some sleep so we can get up for davening and be there.” We went to Chaim Boruch’s room. I decided to go in. We slept there on the floor. We got up for davening. It was practically empty. Yes, and afterward, the aliyah—the aliyah to the Torah.

41:51 Speaker 6 The one where the Rebbe goes up with the previous Rebbe.

41:55 Speaker 3 That’s also one of the moments of Tishrei, when the baal korei, Schusterman, reads. He can barely get the words out, with such emotion. He would always sway as he read, “Our teacher and our Rebbe…” He was always overcome at that point.

42:18 Speaker 6 With the names.

42:19 Speaker 3 “Rabbi Yisroel, son of our teacher and master…” You feel that you’re really in another realm.

42:27 Speaker 6 And the Rebbe is standing off to the side, as it were.

42:29 Speaker 3 Off to the side. That’s another of those moments of Tishrei when you can’t see what’s happening, but you can see that they’re dealing with—

42:40 Speaker 6 Another world.

42:42 Speaker 3 Another world. That too was no small thing. The Rebbe instituted it. Perhaps that was also [unclear], when they called the Rebbe Rashab that way. Yes, that too was one of the great moments: the shofar blowing, the hakafos, and that aliyah. Yes.

43:01 Speaker 6 After that.

43:02 Speaker 3 The hakafos aren’t so long. I mean, during the day there are three and a half hakafos.

43:09 Speaker 6 Yes, only the Rebbe dances.

43:11 Speaker 3 No, afterward everyone goes around and the Rebbe waits, but it doesn’t take long. The main, extended hakafos are on the night of Shemini Atzeres. Not during the day; and on the night of Simchas Torah there are the hakafos. One year later—perhaps it was on Chof-Ches [?]. No, I don’t think it was on Chof-Ches [?], because the Rebbe was already on the platform. It was later. So the Rebbe told Duchman to announce that they were honoring Jerusalem with a verse, or with the kapitel—I don’t remember which. Duchman announced, “Let all those who came here from Russia stand up.” That was the honor. The Rebbe would stand close to the wall, with his shtender against the wall, and Duchman would stand next to the Rebbe, then turn around and announce what the Rebbe had told him to announce. So the Rebbe turned and gave him a tap on the back. That was—

44:13 Speaker 6 He said “all”—he said “all the Jews”—

44:15 Speaker 3 Should stand up.

44:16 Speaker 6 “All the Jews from Rus—”

44:17 Speaker 3 The Rebbe had told him “Russian Jews.”

44:19 Speaker 6 Meaning, he said “all the Russians”—

44:21 Speaker 3 Yes.

44:22 Speaker 6 And the Rebbe told him, “I said to say ‘Russian Jews.’”

44:24 Speaker 3 No, the point was all those who had come from Russia, because there were guests, guests from Russia.

44:31 Speaker 6 Those who had come.

44:32 Speaker 3 Yes, and the Rebbe told him to honor the Russian Jews.

44:36 Speaker 6 Ah.

44:37 Speaker 3 The Rebbe told him—

44:38 Speaker 6 He said those Russians who had come, but the Rebbe actually meant—

44:41 Speaker 3 He didn’t just mean it; he told him explicitly—

44:43 Speaker 6 To honor the Jews who were still in Russia.

44:44 Speaker 3 The Rebbe looked at him, gave him a pat on the back, and said, “[unclear].” He said, “Russian Jews,” and then he made the announcement the way the Rebbe had corrected him. Then they understood what the Rebbe had said at first. The Rebbe had given the Russians the honor of reciting a verse. There were representatives who had come, all right, but—

45:03 Speaker 6 Really, he honored everyone.

45:05 Speaker 3 Whenever his student Duchman made announcements, the Rebbe would laugh. There were jokes; he would twist things around. Anyway.

45:16 Speaker 6 After Tishrei.

45:18 Speaker 3 Huh?

45:18 Speaker 6 After Tishrei, [unclear].

45:20 Speaker 3 After Tishrei, after Tishrei. So everyone went home, and the normal routine began. You had to be there. The Rebbe would come on Mondays and Thursdays for the Torah reading, and for Minchah and Maariv. There weren’t so many people then, not that many. It was twice a month, on Erev Rosh Chodesh and Rosh Chodesh. Yes, and it wasn’t as late as it became afterward, either. There were years when the Rebbe came and I davened Minchah with the Rebbe at 10:00 at night, 10:30.

45:55 Speaker 6 Yes.

45:56 Speaker 3 Yes, even later. Before we came—

45:58 Speaker 6 Once it was really late.

45:59 Speaker 3 Twelve o’clock, literally twelve.

46:01 Speaker 6 A few minutes before twelve.

46:02 Speaker 3 It was never like that then. Now, every morning the Rebbe would come alone. Every day he would walk from home by himself and come in whenever he came in. On Mondays and Thursdays he came earlier, because the yeshivah was davening and he came for the Torah reading. The Rebbe didn’t daven Shacharis with the congregation, only Minchah and Maariv. But he would come in and listen to the Torah reading. On other days he came a bit later. He would walk from home, alone, without anyone accompanying him, and arrive when he arrived. The yeshivah carried on. Sometimes he would cross the street and go to the mikveh.

46:55 Speaker 6 Kastel [?].

46:55 Speaker 3 Kastel [?] mikveh. Yes, once I was there—we were there—and the Rebbe appeared. Yes—

47:01 Speaker 6 While you were in the mikveh, he would arrive—

47:03 Speaker 3 Yes, yes.

47:03 Speaker 6 What did you do?

47:04 Speaker 3 What did we do? Some were already dressed, so they ran away. Others weren’t dressed, so they hid until the Rebbe finished. He would put three dollars into the pushka there. Of course, the bochurim immediately exchanged the bills. There weren’t Rebbe dollars yet then.

47:23 Speaker 6 Did you have any contact with the Rebbe?

47:24 Speaker 3 Huh?

47:25 Speaker 6 Apart from seeing him at davening.

47:28 Speaker 3 You mean notes and questions?

47:31 Speaker 6 Notes, questions—did you follow the Rebbe on his way?

47:34 Speaker 3 So—

47:35 Speaker 6 How did it show itself, so to speak—

47:35 Speaker 3 Here’s how it was. Often, when the Rebbe was walking, someone would open the door for him. Sometimes it was late. Once I held the door, and it was quite late; I shouldn’t really have been there anymore.

47:54 Speaker 6 Late in the evening.

47:55 Speaker 3 Yes, at night.

47:56 Speaker 6 After the month, like now—

47:57 Speaker 3 No, it wasn’t always after the month. It could be late then, too. Sometimes it was late. So the Rebbe turned, gave me a look, and without saying it, it was as if he were asking, “What are you doing here?”

48:08 Speaker 6 What are you doing here?

48:09 Speaker 3 Yes. Now, every month, every Rosh Chodesh, the administration would go in to the Rebbe and give a report. We were bochurim studying there. So after Rosh Chodesh Teves, after the month of Teves, Rabbi Mentlik came to us and said, “We spoke with the Rebbe.”

48:36 Speaker 6 Say it in Hebrew, say it in Hebrew. There are also—

48:48 Speaker 3 We went in to the Rebbe and gave him a report, and we also mentioned the group of bochurim—we were only three—and said—

48:56 Speaker 6 The new bochurim who had arrived.

48:58 Speaker 3 Yes.

48:58 Speaker 6 We’ll translate.

48:59 Speaker 3 In the month of Teves.

49:00 Speaker 6 Yes.

49:00 Speaker 3 We told him about the bochurim who had arrived, that they kept the study schedule and so on, that they were learning well, and that the Rebbe had nachas from it. That’s what he came to tell us.

49:12 Speaker 6 Why did he feel a need to come and tell you?

49:14 Speaker 3 Why not?

49:14 Speaker 6 No, but it wasn’t that he had something against you.

49:16 Speaker 3 No, he was very warm. Mentlik had no children. He loved the bochurim very much and cared for them, materially and spiritually. He was very warm, very gentle—a whole world unto himself. Then something happened that I connect with this. There was Kiddush Levanah in Teves. That’s rare in America, to be able to say Kiddush Levanah in Teves. So the Rebbe said, “Shalom aleichem, shalom aleichem.” I was standing six or seven people away. The Rebbe passed over everyone and said, “Shalom aleichem.” At that moment I felt something from head to toe, a kind of current. Afterward I had to go downstairs into 770 and sit for twenty minutes until my body calmed down from that “shalom aleichem.” I connected the two things: the Rebbe said “shalom aleichem” to me. Although I hadn’t spoken to the Rebbe, he knew who I was—the one Mentlik had spoken about. So that was something. That “shalom aleichem” was [unclear].

50:42 Speaker 6 Wow.

50:43 Speaker 3 “Shalom aleichem.” That was in Teves. In Shvat I went in for yechidus.

50:48 Speaker 6 Before we get to the yechidus, just a second. That winter, there were a few weeks when the Rebbe spoke about something on Shabbos.

50:55 Speaker 3 The Rebbe spoke about—

50:55 Speaker 6 Besides that one person who spoke.

50:57 Speaker 3 Ah, yes, that happened. At that point the Rebbe hadn’t yet made those statements and spoken out about “Who is a Jew” and [unclear]—

51:04 Speaker 6 That started later.

51:05 Speaker 3 That started later.

51:07 Speaker 6 What was it? They spoke about the campaign, about Mivtza Tefillin.

51:09 Speaker 3 Someone spoke—

51:10 Speaker 6 There was a rabbi in one of the major organizations.

51:13 Speaker 3 He spoke forcefully.

51:15 Speaker 6 He said about it—

51:17 Speaker 3 That Rabbi Yitzchak—Yitzchak, whom he fed [?]—that he brought him—

51:23 Speaker 6 That he had supposedly bribed him. That’s what he said.

51:26 Speaker 3 No, that he brought him food, so he loved him. And then that person said that Lubavitch brings all sorts of people close because of what it can get from them.

51:35 Speaker 6 This was right at the beginning of the controversy over Mivtza Tefillin, really.

51:37 Speaker 3 Huh?

51:38 Speaker 6 That was when the controversy over Mivtza Tefillin and outreach began, really.

51:42 Speaker 3 Yes. The Rebbe was not pleased that he had said it. So he said, fine, he said it about Lubavitch—but to speak that way about Yitzchak Avinu, too? He should travel to the Me’aras Hamachpelah and ask Yitzchak Avinu for forgiveness for saying that. That was one Shabbos. Well, some fellows went and did something—I don’t know what—broke something on his windows or on the door handle. So the following week the Rebbe spoke very sharply against those who had done it. That was that story. But before I traveled—going back a little to Elul—I was at the Kosel, and they had lowered the ground by three levels. This story has already been written down.

52:35 Speaker 7 We should explain that this was a few months after the Kosel was liberated.

52:39 Speaker 3 Yes.

52:39 Speaker 7 [unclear].

52:41 Speaker 3 They lowered it by three lev—today, when you go down to the Kosel, you walk downward, right?

52:44 Speaker 7 Yes.

52:44 Speaker 3 Back then it was level. They lowered it by three levels; I don’t know why. They lowered—

52:48 Speaker 7 They dug it out and lowered it.

52:49 Speaker 3 They lowered it by three levels and uncovered another three rows. Those stones had been exposed to a lot of rain all that time, so they were flaking in layers. The stones were literally peeling, because the rain had penetrated them.

53:02 Speaker 7 Mm-hmm.

53:03 Speaker 3 You touched the Kosel and pieces of stone came away in your hand. I said, “I’ll take a stone that fell off and bring it to the Rebbe.” Well, I came home, and my mother said, “Oh, we’ll make a snuffbox and set it into that,” and so on. That’s what my mother said.

53:23 Speaker 7 The simple sincerity of a Jewish woman, with good intentions, too.

53:27 Speaker 3 No snuffbox and no... All right, I took it as it was.

53:30 Speaker 7 As it was.

53:31 Speaker 3 As it was. And afterward, after Tishrei—I didn’t want to do it during Tishrei—I sent it in to the Rebbe and wrote that it was a stone that had fallen from the Kosel Hama’aravi.

53:44 Speaker 7 You wrote through the secretary, of course.

53:45 Speaker 3 Yes, “a stone that fell from the Kosel Hama’aravi.” The Rebbe circled the words “a stone that fell from the Kosel Hama’aravi” and wrote above them, “Find out whether it is permitted to take a stone that falls from the Kosel Hama’aravi.” After it was looked into—I don’t remember if he wrote “[unclear]” or not. I don’t think so. So I went to Rabbi Zalman Shimon.

54:13 Speaker 7 Wait—did he keep the stone or return it?

54:15 Speaker 3 Return it? Of course not.

54:16 Speaker 7 He returned it.

54:17 Speaker 3 He kept it.

54:17 Speaker 7 Ah, he kept it.

54:18 Speaker 3 Yes, to this day.

54:20 Speaker 7 Yes, and you went to Rabbi Zalman Shimon.

54:21 Speaker 3 Rabbi Zalman Shimon, and I told him the story.

54:23 Speaker 7 Rabbi Chodakov.

54:24 Speaker 3 “First of all, you should know that the Rebbe didn’t ask for this clarification for himself. It’s for you.”

54:31 Speaker 7 [unclear].

54:32 Speaker 3 Yes, “I’ll give you an answer.” A week later he came to me and said there were opinions this way and opinions that way. Anyway, that’s the story. I found out, and that was that.

54:42 Speaker 7 Did you write to the Rebbe?

54:43 Speaker 3 No. He told me, “The clarification isn’t for the Rebbe; it’s for you, not for the Rebbe.” So that was it. The stone is there, like all the gifts to the Rebbe in... It was in...

54:58 Speaker 7 Then Shabbos came.

54:59 Speaker 3 Now, this is how it was. The Rebbe would sit for an hour and a half or two hours after Kabbalas Shabbos. Then he would go home. The yeshivah’s schedule on Friday night included a very long study session. There were also [unclear], and people spoke.

55:21 Speaker 7 At those [unclear], they would present pilpulim.

55:22 Speaker 3 Pilpulim. And even when there weren’t any [unclear], the study session was very long—two hours, two and a half hours. That was how it was. I saw that whenever the Rebbe went home, bochurim would accompany him from a distance, about ten meters behind. I saw it once or twice, and [unclear] in the morning and so on.

55:43 Speaker 7 The same bochurim?

55:44 Speaker 3 Huh?

55:45 Speaker 7 The same bochurim?

55:45 Speaker 3 Not always the same bochurim.

55:46 Speaker 7 I’m just translating the Yiddish.

55:48 Speaker 3 Yes. So I asked how I could get involved in this. I wanted to accompany the Rebbe too. They said, “Sign up,” and so on. In short, nothing came of it. Then I saw them heading out, so I said, “I’m going, I’m going.” There were three of them, and I was the fourth. I didn’t walk right alongside them, but a little behind. Yes, and the Rebbe was walking, people were saying “Gut Shabbos,” all sorts of things. It was winter. There was Zelig [unclear]. He came, and the Rebbe—

56:23 Speaker 7 Came face-to-face with the Rebbe.

56:24 Speaker 3 Yes, and he didn’t realize it was the Rebbe. Yes.

56:27 Speaker 7 He didn’t realize it was the Rebbe.

56:28 Speaker 3 He didn’t realize, [unclear]. By then it was too late. The Rebbe told him, “[unclear],” but he didn’t notice. Anyway, one of the bochurim kept—

56:40 Speaker 7 Telling you to leave right away [?].

56:41 Speaker 3 That I should leave, that I should leave. But no, I didn’t listen to him. “You’ve already been here eight times.” I wanted to have that privilege too. So we walked. On his route, before the church, the Rebbe crossed to the other side. Then he turned onto President Street and crossed, even cutting across the grass. He got home, closed the door, and checked the window. Yes, there was—

57:07 Speaker 7 Checked the window to see what? That the bochurim were leaving?

57:09 Speaker 3 No, he checked the window to see if it was closed. That was his regular practice.

57:12 Speaker 7 If the window was closed.

57:13 Speaker 3 Yes. Afterward, that bochur gave me a hard time. “The Rebbe doesn’t want people walking with him at all. The Rebbetzin agreed that they should go—she asked them to—but only three bochurim. Why did you join them?” I said, “Well, you saw I was determined, and I was the fourth one, [unclear]. What do you want me to do? I wanted to go.” That’s how I went for several weeks. It was a very pleasant walk, accompanying the Rebbe on Shabbos, without waiting in line or anything, because if you waited, it would take years. That was also one of the—

57:51 Speaker 7 Did the Rebbe acknowledge the bochurim?

57:53 Speaker 3 No, the bochurim were about ten meters behind. The Rebbe would walk, looking in the windows, slowly. He’d stroll along, a leisurely walk. And just as he would come on foot by himself in the morning for Shabbos, he would walk alone.

58:08 Speaker 7 In the morning, people accompanied him in the morning too.

58:10 Speaker 3 I don’t remember the mornings. Maybe people accompanied him, maybe not. During the week, nobody accompanied him. He would come whenever he came, alone on foot. Yes. So that was another enjoyable thing. There was another walk my wife and I took with the Rebbe—forty-five minutes around Crown Heights. That was on Pesach, [unclear]. The Rebbe went to the yeshiva. The Rebbe went to the Tehran children. The Rebbe went to [unclear], the girls there. We also [unclear] for forty-five minutes. In short, the Rebbe went around Crown Heights. Oh, it was already at forty-forty—not at the Seder, at four-and-one.

59:00 Speaker 7 Yes.

59:00 Speaker 3 We were there on Pesach. Yes, that was afterward. The Rebbe came to visit us at the Seder at four-and-one, and by then it was already forty-forty.

59:09 Speaker 7 In ’39.

59:10 Speaker 3 In ’39, yes. So we walked with the Rebbe for forty-five minutes around Crown Heights, until he went home. That’s a story in itself, by the way. Yes.

59:23 Speaker 7 For yechidus.

59:24 Speaker 3 What?

59:25 Speaker 7 Yechidus. Shvat.

59:27 Speaker 3 For yechidus, as a bochur, it was 3 Shvat. Of course, we signed up right away, and they gave me a date, 3 Shvat.

59:37 Speaker 7 Was that date connected to your birthday, or...?

59:39 Speaker 3 No, my birthday was in the summer. That was the second yechidus.

59:43 Speaker 7 Ah.

59:43 Speaker 3 It’s just that when a bochur arrives, he goes into yechidus for the first time.

59:47 Speaker 7 That’s how it was then. It changed later.

59:50 Speaker 3 Besides that, the second time was in the summer, on Gimmel Tammuz. It was my birthday and also before my trip. I want to tell you something about that too. In short, I went into yechidus. You write everything to the Rebbe. I wrote a lot, perhaps too much, so the yechidus lasted—you won’t believe how long—three [unclear].

1:00:13 Speaker 7 Wow.

1:00:14 Speaker 3 So he read all the—

1:00:17 Speaker 7 Now, before the second yechidus: when you say you wrote, did someone guide you?

1:00:20 Speaker 3 What?

1:00:20 Speaker 7 Did someone guide you? I—

1:00:22 Speaker 3 Yes, in general.

1:00:23 Speaker 7 Who?

1:00:24 Speaker 3 They tell you that you need to write, that you write about your concerns. There were a few questions and a few other things. It was a fast day, and you went in at eleven or twelve. In short, we had been waiting for it, waiting for it, and rehearsing in our minds what it would be like, how I would go in, and how... The anticipation was filled with awe, tremendous awe: you’re going in to the Rebbe, going in to the Rebbe. I had been walking around the Rebbe’s room for months. You know, there’s the room and there’s the Rebbe, and you don’t go in there. If you do go in, it’s only for yechidus. All of that melts away the moment you open the door. Now the Rebbe receives you like a guest, with a different expression. All the awe melts away. You begin to feel such warmth and love. That’s how it feels. That’s how it feels. In short, I asked a few questions, about various matters.

1:01:35 Speaker 7 In the note.

1:01:36 Speaker 3 In the note. The Rebbe answered some of them in the second yechidus. Yes, the second one. That’s it. He told me a few things. One of the things I had asked about was that during the Six-Day War, I missed putting on Rabbeinu Tam tefillin. The Rebbe had already written to me before that, from a certain age, to put on Rabbeinu Tam. Back then people would ask. At the time, you didn’t ordinarily start putting on Rabbeinu Tam tefillin at bar mitzvah. At nineteen, people would ask; if the mashpia said to ask the Rebbe, you asked.

1:02:09 Speaker 7 So you asked while you were still in Eretz Yisroel?

1:02:11 Speaker 3 Yes. The Rebbe answered, and I had already started. But in the yeshiva there wasn’t a Rabbeinu Tam tefillin prayer for the bochurim; they used Nusach Ashkenaz. There were about ten other bochurim, and everyone would put them on with them. During the Six-Day War, [unclear]. So I missed putting on Rabbeinu Tam tefillin, and, unfortunately, I also missed the Korban Pesach. So I wrote to the Rebbe. I wrote that I had missed Rabbeinu Tam once, and also the Korban Pesach.

1:02:41 Speaker 7 The Korban Pesach at its proper time.

1:02:42 Speaker 3 At the time for the Korban Pesach. But actually, that was in the second yechidus.

1:02:47 Speaker 7 In the second one.

1:02:47 Speaker 3 No, it was in the first yechidus—yes, I asked then. I didn’t ask that in the first one. And the Rebbe said—this was at the time of the farbrengen, yes?—that whoever studies the Torah of an offering is considered as though he offered it. This was a major chiddush that the Rebbe told me, a Torah insight. So, accordingly, study the laws of tefillin in Nigleh and Chassidus, and the laws of the Korban Pesach in Nigleh and Chassidus. Whoever studies the Torah of an offering is considered as though he offered it, so that can also make up for the past. That’s a major chiddush. That isn’t the plain meaning. So, accordingly, study.

1:03:28 Speaker 7 Well, that’s the interpretation. That’s the interpretation the Rebbe gave.

1:03:30 Speaker 3 Yes.

1:03:31 Speaker 7 You’re saying that isn’t the plain meaning.

1:03:32 Speaker 3 It isn’t the plain meaning. The Rebbe introduced that chiddush.

1:03:34 Speaker 7 It’s like what he said at the farbrengen, because there was a farbrengen before the yechidus.

1:03:37 Speaker 3 He mentioned it on Shabbos, yes. I was twenty then, and the Rebbe also spoke a lot about “at twenty, to pursue.” He spoke about Pirkei Avos. There was also a sicha on “at twenty, to pursue.”

1:03:48 Speaker 7 That was in 5727.

1:03:49 Speaker 3 Yes. Maybe it was the day after the yechidus that he spoke about “at twenty, to pursue.” I was twenty; maybe it was the Shabbos before. I don’t remember. In short, that’s what the Rebbe said. He said, “Look”—and this is the chiddush. That’s what I mean when I say it makes up for the past. “Whoever studies the Torah of an offering is considered...” means that now it’s as though you’re offering your burnt offering, even though you’re outside Eretz Yisroel, you aren’t a kohen, it’s nighttime, and you’re ritually impure. But that it—

1:04:14 Speaker 7 Has an effect and [unclear].

1:04:15 Speaker 3 [Unclear].

1:04:16 Speaker 7 The Rebbe makes it happen.

1:04:17 Speaker 3 Yes.

1:04:17 Speaker 7 When he tells you that, it makes it happen.

1:04:18 Speaker 3 I took on a chavrusa and studied until davening. Tanya by heart. A lot in yechidus.

1:04:26 Speaker 7 In the first yechidus.

1:04:26 Speaker 3 In the second yechidus too, he said that, in general, you need to have Mishnayos or Tanya engraved in your memory, so that when you go somewhere you can’t open a sefer, you can think about them. Yes, so I said [unclear]. In short, I came out of yechidus.

1:04:46 Speaker 7 Wait, what happened in the first yechidus?

1:04:47 Speaker 3 What?

1:04:48 Speaker 7 What happened in the first yechidus?

1:04:49 Speaker 3 In the first one there were also questions—a few things concerning bochurim and so on. I wrote who I was, where I came from, and so on. In short. So when I came out of the second yechidus, the Rebbe had said, “Review Mishnayos by heart, and Tanya, so you’ll have them in your head.” I went in, put it up there, and said—

1:05:16 Speaker 7 [Unclear].

1:05:17 Speaker 3 [Unclear]. I found Mishnah five. Mishnah five was in Zevachim. The Rambam’s great [unclear]. The Rambam also says [unclear]. I took it and immediately reviewed the first Mishnah of Zevachim, right after that. Yes, [unclear]. It was there; I put my hand on the table. There was the Mishnah. I said, “Let’s take this and review it.” The Rambam’s great Mishnah—that’s what it says. Now, in the second yechidus, I had to fly back to Eretz Yisroel. All the excuses had run out. I wrote that we were leaving. Stolick, [unclear], and I were going back; we were leaving on Sunday and arriving on Monday. We asked for a bracha. I asked for a bracha. While the Rebbe was giving the bracha, he asked, “When do you arrive?” I had written it; the Rebbe could see it.

1:06:31 Speaker 7 Meaning, the Rebbe asked, “When do you arrive there?”

1:06:33 Speaker 3 Yes, “When do you arrive?”

1:06:34 Speaker 7 I’m translating.

1:06:34 Speaker 3 In Eretz Yisroel. So I said, “Monday.” I had written it. I didn’t say [unclear] Monday. All right, he continued.

1:06:42 Speaker 7 I wrote Monday, I wrote Monday.

1:06:44 Speaker 3 I didn’t say that I was arriving already. I don’t know anymore. The Rebbe went on and asked me again, “When do you arrive?” Twice, or even three times. And I answered again, “Monday.” Well, when did I arrive? I didn’t arrive on Monday.

1:06:58 Speaker 7 Monday. Well, we arrived on Tuesday.

1:07:00 Speaker 3 Huh? We arrived Tuesday night instead of Monday. Some agent had misled us, saying we didn’t need a visa to enter Paris, and we didn’t have one. So we were stuck outside like that for almost—really, with no food or anything. We had—

1:07:16 Speaker 7 Without Rabbi Litzani’s[?] omelets.

1:07:18 Speaker 3 We actually had three phone numbers for the yeshiva, and we got them to let us call. Not one of the calls went through. So we sat there outside, in front of everything—the police, border control, all of it. Three bochurim sitting there, with all sorts of colorful people from all over the world passing by through the night. We were just three bored guys sitting there. We didn’t know what would happen. We didn’t know whom to speak to in French. Nobody came. That was from Monday afternoon until eleven on Tuesday. At eleven, a German flight attendant came. I don’t know how they knew, and then we started talking. Deutsch. We spoke Yiddish. She said, “You’re coming with me. Don’t leave my side.” She took us to a bus, and we went to another airport. She boarded the plane with us and got us seated. It wasn’t our flight—we’d already missed our British Airways flight—and we arrived in Eretz Yisroel. What happened that day, guys, was the first hijacking, to Algeria. The guys called—friends from America. “They’re gone. We can’t find the bochurim.” They called my mother; they called his mother. Wow. Nothing. In short, we had no idea. When we arrived at the airport at night, we didn’t go home; we went to the yeshiva. Then they told us. Ah, that’s interesting. Huh? You don’t go home; you go to the yeshiva. You went back—to the yeshiva, yes. I hadn’t told my parents when I was coming. I’d come sometime during the week. We went to the yeshiva, and there weren’t phones there either. There was one phone in the yeshiva, and it was locked up. Ah, we called the United States from there too. “Hey, where are you? You’ve only just left the Rebbe, and something’s going on here. They’re looking for you. They don’t know that you’ve already...” I don’t know. In short, an [unclear] story. But that’s what happened. The Rebbe asked, “Where have they gotten to? Where have they gotten to?” Twice, definitely. That’s it. So we arrived on Tuesday. Then on Wednesday—

1:09:32 Speaker 3 We went home as usual, by bus and train. Let’s go back for a moment. After half a year, we had Pesach—huh? Purim, Pesach. After half a year came Purim, yes. Nothing special happened on Purim. Pesach. Huh? On Pesach there was the Seder night. The Rebbe came to visit us, to see, to look at the Seder plates and [unclear]. Where was that? At Schaefer Lane[?]. Schaefer Lane[?]. It was just us Israelis; there were almost no Americans there. And after that, the Rebbe went out— Wait, what did he show? Huh? What did he comment on? No, he saw something in the kitchen, asked about it, and so on. That was the arrangement: the Rebbe would come visit the bochurim on the first night. In short, afterward—[unclear]. We came, and the Rebbe was already upstairs. The Seder had begun, the door was open, and we went in and stayed for the whole Seder. We were there for the whole Seder. I was behind the Rebbe, both nights. On the night that— In short, during the night a lot of people came, the table shifted, and a bottle of wine spilled. So on the second night they wouldn’t let people go up anymore. They wouldn’t let them go up. And the person standing at the entrance, not letting the bochurim go up, was the Rebbetzin. The bochurim argued with her, and so it went. So whoever had gotten in stayed in. Afterward they closed the door, and only at [unclear] did they open it. Some people climbed through the window to get in. Yes, they climbed in through the window—two stories up. Two stories. Behind—you’re standing behind, but— Huh? You go in—behind the Rebbe. On the first night. Both— Did you get in first on the second night too? Yes. On the second night the Rebbe didn’t come, so we reversed the order. Shulchan Orech was at about [unclear], and two or three of us arrived just as the Rebbe was finishing giving out matzos to everyone going upstairs. We didn’t notice and went in— The people going upstairs, the Rebbe gave them matzos. Before that—on the second night. On both the first and second nights, the Rebbe gave matzos—

1:11:51 Speaker 3 To those going upstairs. Yes, those people. For the meal, he gave them the matzos beforehand. Yes. We didn’t notice, and we ran in through the lower entrance. The Rebbe had just finished with the last person and held out matzos to us. Wow. I said, we really just missed it, because the Rebbe had been giving them out—he would come and give each person matzos on Erev Pesach. Right. Later there was an arrangement for the kollel to distribute them. You’d already received some on Erev Pesach, so you tell the Rebbe, “I already got some.” “I got some.” No, you just take one. That’s how we ran in. Did the Rebbe react? Huh? Did the Rebbe react? No, he pulled it back. That was it. He had already held it out, as it were. So we got there, and then there was the whole episode with the Rebbetzin. It wasn’t at the main door. There’s a place where you come down from upstairs, and there are stairs there too. Yes. It was closed off there; they closed it. Do you know those stairs? The inner ones? No, not from Gan Eden Hatachton, not those stairs going upstairs. I mean the ones where you come down from above to below, those sloping stairs. Yes. So there are stairs going up there too. Yes, yes. Where the Rebbe goes up from the small hall, from the hall to upstairs. No, no, Rabbi, that’s not the place. No, not to the second floor. Ah. Where the Rebbe goes up from the hall below. Yes. Upstairs. There are stairs. They had closed it off there; they would put up a barrier. Yes, there. Basically, the central stairs of [unclear]. That’s why— No. You’re talking about the two in Gan Eden Hatachton. Stairs. Yes, in the center, in the center of the building. Yes, no, they aren’t used much. But the bochurim wanted to get in there, and the Rebbetzin was blocking them. So we went up and got in. We weren’t a big group either. Did the Rebbe react to your standing inside? No, nothing. It was, well, much of it until—until what? Until the second part, mostly to himself.

1:13:59 Speaker 3 Siddur Reb Shabsai[?] and so on. But afterward, ah, in the second part he says it aloud, part of the Seder. What does he say? Huh? How would you describe it? Aloud. [unclear]. Yes. “Give thanks to Hashem, for He is good, for His kindness is everlasting.” Aloud and with a pleasant melody. “May the soul of every living being bless...” He said that whole passage from the second half to himself. There was a chazzan. Yes, yes, yes. There was all the... Yes. But most of it he said to himself. On the first night he was even ahead. Afterward he would look and study the Siddur Reb Shabsai[?] that he had beside him. That’s it. Eating—he hardly ate anything. Fish, salt, the things everyone knows. No, tell us the things everyone knows too. What about the fish? Huh? What was it? Tell us the well-known things too. A lot of people today don’t know. Yes. What did he put on the fish—salt on the fish? He would take the saltshaker and fill his hand, fill his hand. Fill his hand with salt. Salt—and cover the whole piece of fish with it, from what I saw, and eat the first part, then do it again on the second half. After he ate the first part of the fish, covered in salt. Again. He put a lot on again? A lot, a lot. He would wipe with napkins. Bochurim would take [unclear], soak up vinegar, and... There was also a chair for the Frierdiker Rebbe. There weren’t any [unclear] there, but the Rebbe was particular that no one touch it or move it—the Frierdiker Rebbe’s chair. Yes, the Rashag was there and the Rebbe: the Rashag on the right and the Rebbe on the left, as it had been. He was very particular. There was pushing, and he made sure no one touched it or moved it. Afterward there was the farbrengen. Explanations of the Gemara. Everyone was asleep. The Rebbe had his eyes closed. No l’chaim, and hardly any niggunim either. No niggunim either. Deep subjects, specifically—all those explanations of the Gemara. The guys came after breakfast, already tired. It was late on Erev Pesach; they’d already had a Seder. What was the Rebbe speaking about?

1:16:25 Speaker 3 No, two hours, two and a half hours, something like that. There was another story on Shavuos, when the Rebbe saved me—and himself. I happened to be standing up on the platform; I don’t remember why. It was Shavuos. On the Knesses Yisroel platform? No, on the farbrengen platform, at the end of the farbrengen. It was Yom Tov, before Kiddush Levanah. Yes, and people started pushing. They were coming from every direction to stand there for Maariv. The Rebbe was making Havdalah, and meanwhile people were already coming in. I was standing right behind the Rebbe’s chair, and the pressure was so great that I felt I was about to collapse onto the chair, right onto the Rebbe. I held on as long as I could, and at the very last second I didn’t know what to do. Was I supposed to shout? I was actually falling onto the chair, and the Rebbe turned around. “What’s all the pushing?” he said. “What’s all the pushing?” Who was he saying it to? To the people over there. He turned like this and said, “What’s all the pushing?” So without the shamash saying anything, he saw you—he sensed you. No, he saw it. He saw the other side too. The Rebbe was doing Kiddush Levanah on the other side; he saw the pushing. So this was during Kiddush Levanah? No, not yet. Before Kiddush Levanah; it hadn’t started. Yes. Yes, it was [unclear], and after that everyone moved back. Another second and I would have fallen onto the chair and onto the Rebbe. Yes. And then you returned to Israel in Elul? Huh? You flew back? You returned to Israel. We flew back after Shavuos. The Rebbe spoke a great deal about hashgachah pratis. A few Shabbosim earlier, there had been the story about hashgachah pratis, when, after his imprisonment, he went to—wait a second. So I said, where is hashgachah pratis? [unclear] prove the Baal Shem Tov’s teaching about hashgachah pratis. Yes. So he sent—yes. [unclear] asked the Alter Rebbe to prove to him

1:18:41 Speaker 3 the approach. Sifsei Chachamim. So the Alter Rebbe told him. The Rebbe also spoke about Rashi and Sifsei Chachamim, at length. About the bird, the bird he sent. All of it, Sifsei Chachamim, at length. There are passages about what kind of bird each one is, what kind of fish. Those were the sichos. And then there was the whole story of our trip, when we arrived and there was no food. I had a small bag of almonds, and the three of us ate from it for about two days. You mean on that return trip, when you got stuck at the end. For us, that was hashgachah pratis. Right. The Rebbe’s sichos. When did you next go back to the Rebbe? After that, it was already after my wedding, in the winter of ’73. And after that they didn’t interview me. [unclear] No, ’73, ’76—I was there in ’78, and by then I had been many times. But the first time, it took five years. When you came here to Nachlas Har Chabad, was that on the Rebbe’s instruction? Yes. What happened? In yechidus, in yechidus. No, it was about my [unclear]. I was engaged, and he said Nachlas Har Chabad. Rabbi Mendelson is asking you—Rabbi Yoel Mendelson. Yes. The Rebbe told him to live in Nachlas Har Chabad, on instructions from above. Yes. What year was that? ’71? ’71. Right after the two years had passed. Two years in kollel. When I finished kollel, in ’73, I went into yechidus. I wrote to the Rebbe that I was finishing the kollel in Nachlas Har Chabad. What should I do? What did he suggest? The Rebbe told me—and to this day I don’t know why he told me specifically, and no one else—[unclear]. In Hebrew? Huh? Stay in Nachlas Har Chabad. P-p-promise that you’ll learn well and keep the schedule. The kollel schedule. Yes, the kollel. And...? And learn for another year. Yes. I went to Rabbi Avraham Wolf, and Rabbi Avraham said, “The Rebbe told you. He didn’t tell us. Ask him.” Yes, and there’s

1:20:56 Speaker 3 a record of it with the Temimim. There are all the letters from the Bnei Temimim. The Bnei Temimim wrote to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe answered that it was advisable to live there. So you stayed another year in Nachlas Har Chabad. Who was Rabbi Avraham Salzman? Who was there? Salzman was there. There was Sholom Ber [unclear], there was [unclear], there were many—but the Rebbe didn’t say that to anyone else here. Two years, two years. The Rebbe, in principle, had that two-year arrangement. Yes. Not here, though. That’s how it is today, and that’s how it was then. To this day I don’t know why. I have some sense that... My wife and I worked a lot on the mikveh here. There was no path to the mikveh, no wall, nothing. So my wife looked for the— We bought towels and soap, and she looked for things at home. We worked on the mikveh for many years. How many years? Those years. It could be that...

1:21:53 Speaker 8 Thank you very much for listening to this episode of Lehitra’anein. Our guest on this episode was Rabbi Shlomo Fleischman of Kfar Chabad. Thank you for listening. Hosted by Rabbi Nachum Goldschmidt; produced by Aharon Freiman. See you in future episodes. Lehitra’anein.