Bringing the First Fruits - Rabbi Yaron Yitzchok Lederman shlita

00:02 Speaker 1 You’re listening to “Lema’an Yishme’u,” a podcast from Machon Halacha Chabad.

00:09 Speaker 2 Hello to all our listeners. Today I’m speaking about hachnasas orchim, welcoming guests. Like the other laws and mitzvos of the Torah, this mitzvah has its sources and details, its laws and customs, and stories of tzaddikim connected with it. I want to stress that stories of tzaddikim are very important too. We’ve just come through Chanukah, and not everyone notices that in the middle of the Amidah, in the middle of Modim, we tell a story of the deeds of tzaddikim, beginning with Mattisyahu son of Yochanan the Kohen Gadol. How does a story enter the middle of Shemoneh Esrei? It teaches us that stories of tzaddikim help educate—Chanukah is about education—children, adults, and ourselves. They are very important. Let’s turn to hachnasas orchim. Every day in davening we say in the morning blessings: “These are the things that have no fixed measure: leaving the corner of the field for the poor, the first fruits, appearing at the Beis Hamikdash, acts of kindness, and Torah study.” And: “These are the things whose fruits a person enjoys in this world, while the principal remains for the World to Come: honoring one’s father and mother, acts of kindness, going early to the study hall morning and evening, visiting the sick, and welcoming guests.” Hachnasas orchim is mentioned among these mitzvos that have no fixed measure. We say it every day. The passage we say is actually made up of two parts: “These are the things that have no fixed measure,” and then, “These are the things whose fruits a person enjoys.” The Mishnah in Pe’ah gives only the first part. The second is drawn from the tractates Kiddushin and Shabbos, as we’ll mention later, with Hashem’s help. But what are the sources? In the Mishnah in Shabbos, page 126b, we learn: “One may move even four or five baskets of straw or grain to make room for guests or to prevent the disruption of study in the beis midrash.” Stores of straw

02:30 Speaker 2 or grain may be moved on Shabbos if I need the space to seat guests, for hachnasas orchim. That’s what the Mishnah says. The Gemara continues: “To make room for guests—Rabbi Yochanan said: Welcoming guests is as great as going early to the beis midrash, for the Mishnah teaches, ‘for guests or to prevent the disruption of study in the beis midrash.’” So it compares the two. Rav Dimi of Neharde’a said, “It is greater than going early to the beis midrash.” Why? Because the Mishnah mentions guests first, and only afterward the disruption of study in the beis midrash. The Gemara goes on: “Rav Yehudah said in the name of Rav: Welcoming guests is greater than receiving the Divine Presence, as it is written, ‘And he said, Hashem, if I have found favor in Your eyes, please do not pass from Your servant.’” That was when Avraham Avinu spoke as the angels came to visit him while he was ill. He asked Hashem not to pass by, went to welcome the guests, and left the Divine Presence waiting. The Gemara then speaks about this world. Rav Yehudah bar Sheila said in the name of Rabbi Asi, in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: “There are six things whose fruits a person enjoys in this world, while the principal remains for the World to Come, and these are: welcoming guests, visiting the sick, concentrating on prayer, and going early to the beis midrash.” That is the source in the Gemara concerning hachnasas orchim. Comparing it with Torah study also teaches us that a person’s Torah study has little value if it isn’t accompanied by sensitivity to others. Torah study is not simply a person’s intellectual, spiritual, and moral development. An individual studies Torah as part of our people, connected to the whole of the Jewish people, not as an isolated individual. “Who chose us from among all the nations,” and only then, “gave us His Torah.” It’s very important to know this. When a guest arrives and feels like a stranger in a new place, unfamiliar with how things work, and a person is not sensitive to that, his Torah is not Torah. We learned that welcoming guests is greater than receiving the Divine Presence. Here is Avraham Avinu, standing and speaking with Hakadosh Boruch Hu as He appears to him, and in the middle of it he sees three men approaching. Maybe they have no food? Maybe they’ve lost their way? In that situation, he cannot simply continue speaking with Hakadosh Boruch Hu, with the Divine Presence. Avraham understands that if he is not sensitive to others, he cannot receive the Divine Presence. So he asks, “Please do not pass from Your servant.” Once he has taken care of the guests and fulfilled his basic duty as a human being, he can return to speaking with Hakadosh Boruch Hu.

04:40 Speaker 2 There is another Gemara. We’ve learned mainly from Shabbos 127, but interestingly, in Chagigah it’s page 27. There the Gemara says that the table around which a person hosts guests is comparable to the altar in the Beis Hamikdash, and the food served to the guests is comparable to the offerings brought on the altar. Again, the Gemara speaks of the importance of hachnasas orchim. Some say, though, that we need to understand that the hospitality described as greater than receiving the Divine Presence concerns poor guests who have nothing to eat. A wealthy person who finds himself somewhere with no place to eat is also, for the moment, in the position of a poor person. But guests who live nearby and have food to eat are not included in that level of hachnasas orchim. Why? Because they are close enough to home to eat there. Of course, even if I do not fulfill that particular mitzvah of hachnasas orchim with people who live nearby, I certainly must not dismiss the importance of welcoming them. Receiving friends warmly and kindly increases the love between them, and all of this is part of the mitzvah, “Love your fellow as yourself.”

06:59 Speaker 2 Now, does hachnasas orchim apply to guests who have money as well as those who don’t? It’s very interesting. When the Rambam discusses the mitzvah of hachnasas orchim, primarily in Hilchos Avel, chapter 14, law 1, he presents it as part of “Love your fellow as yourself.” There he does not specify that the guests have nothing to eat. On the other hand, at the end of Hilchos Issurei Mizbe’ach, the Rambam writes: “The same applies to anything done for the sake of the good G-d: it should be of what is fine and good. If one feeds a hungry person, one should feed him the finest and sweetest food at one’s table. And so it says: ‘All the choicest portions are for Hashem.’” Here, then, feeding a hungry person falls under “All the choicest portions are for Hashem,” according to the Rambam—or so it would seem. There’s another point. Some mitzvos are still fulfilled even if a person performs them sadly. But a mitzvah between one person and another, which includes hachnasas orchim, loses almost all its value if it is done without a loving attitude toward the other person. So someone who wants to fulfill hachnasas orchim must, of course, care for the guests, their wishes, their well-being, and their dignity. He should greet them joyfully and try to meet their needs. If they are distressed, or he sees that they are sad, he should comfort them with words. That is part of hachnasas orchim. The seforim relate a story told by a Jew: After World War II, a refugee came to their home, and they hosted him for several days. On Shabbos, they honored the guest with leading bentching. When he reached the passage “Have mercy, please, Hashem our G-d,” and said the prayer, “Please do not make us dependent, Hashem our G-d, on the gifts of flesh and blood or on their loans, but only on Your full, open, generous, and ample hand, so that we will not be shamed, nor disgraced, nor humiliated,” the guest could not hold back his tears and burst into sobs.

09:17 Speaker 2 This is an example of the guest’s discomfort, of what he may be going through. That is why the Sages said it is not enough to give him a good meal; you also have to make him happy and put him at ease. That is very important. The mitzvah of hosting guests does not end with bringing the guest in, feeding him, making him feel at ease and honoring him, as we have discussed so far. It also includes escorting the guest. That is part of the mitzvah. Our Sages say: Whoever escorts his fellow even four amos will not come to harm. Four amos. The mitzvah of escorting someone is a very great thing. The act of escorting a guest shows him that his host loves him and finds it hard to part from him. This is especially important when the guest leaves wondering whether he was a burden to his host, whether perhaps he was not really wanted. But when he sees his host come out and accompany him, he leaves with a good feeling: they really were happy to have him and loved him. That is one aspect of the mitzvah, as part of hosting guests. But there is another aspect to escorting someone: it is also a segulah for protection on the road. The Shelah writes: Come and see how great the power of the mitzvah of escorting a guest is. Both the one who escorts and the one being escorted are protected from harm all day. They are protected all day from all kinds of misfortune. A person leaves an inhabited place and goes somewhere uninhabited, exposed to all kinds of dangers; the road itself is less safe. His emotional and spiritual state may be less secure as well. So when the host accompanies the guest at the start of his journey, he joins him. Through the very act of escorting him, it is as though the guest is not setting out alone: “I am with you. I am protecting you all the way.” He will not come to harm. According to halachah, one should escort a guest at least four amos beyond one’s property. Some also accompany the guest with their eyes, watching until he is out of sight. Escorting someone is a very great thing. We saw

11:42 Speaker 2 this with the Rebbe as well. When guests came and then left to continue on their way, the Rebbe would come out and watch, and would not go back inside until he could no longer see them. There is something significant about this kind of escorting as a mitzvah. I want to point out that this matter of escorting is brought in the Rambam, and I will quote what he says in the Laws of Mourning that I mentioned earlier. In chapter 14, halachah 1, the Rambam writes: “It is a positive mitzvah ordained by the Sages to visit the sick, comfort mourners, attend to the dead, help a bride enter the marriage canopy, and escort guests. Although all these mitzvos are ordained by the Sages, they are included in ‘Love your fellow as yourself.’” They are included in the mitzvah of “Love your fellow as yourself.” What does that mean? “Do for your fellow in Torah and mitzvos all the things you would want others to do for you.” Notice how escorting guests is emphasized. The Rambam does not even mention hosting guests here; he seems to mention only escorting them. Some commentators explain why the Rambam specifically mentions escorting: the other things he lists here, such as visiting the sick, are mitzvos performed in person, and the part of hosting guests that is performed in person is escorting them. But this includes the mitzvah of hosting guests. Then, in halachah 2, the Rambam gives more detail about hosting guests. He says: “The reward for escorting someone is greater than for all the others. It is the practice established by Avraham Avinu and the path of kindness he followed: he fed travelers, gave them drink and escorted them.” So he mentions feeding them, then giving them drink, then escorting them. “Hosting guests is greater than receiving the Divine Presence, as it says, ‘And behold, three men...’ And escorting them is even greater than welcoming them.” He concludes, in halachah 3, actually: “The Sages said: Whoever does not escort a guest is as though he sheds blood.” In halachah 3 he says: “A person can be compelled to escort a guest, just as he can be compelled to give tzedakah.” So this is a very great matter.

13:51 Speaker 2 What we have just said about escorting being a mitzvah is very significant. I want to point out that if we learn the mitzvah of hosting guests from Avraham Avinu and his guests in Parshas Vayeira, then it is clear that hosting guests means giving them physical nourishment as well as spiritual nourishment. It is all connected to the mitzvah of hosting guests. As it says later in the parsha, “He planted an eshel in Be’er Sheva.” An eshel may be a tree, but Rashi also says it was an inn: food, drink and escort. That is what Avraham Avinu, the embodiment of kindness, provided with this eshel. And it says what Avraham did there: “He planted an eshel in Be’er Sheva, and there he called in the name of Hashem, G-d of the world.” Do not read it as “he called,” but as “he caused others to call.” When someone came and ate, Avraham Avinu would tell him afterward: “You need to bless Hakadosh Boruch Hu.” When the person started asking what, who and why, Avraham Avinu would tell him to pay, and charge him a very large sum. After all, they were in the desert; everything cost double or triple there. Eventually the person would bless Hashem. Now, there is an obvious question here: this seems coercive. What good is his blessing if he says it under pressure? But the Rebbe explains that deep down, they wanted to bless Hashem. So what was stopping them? The kelipah concealed that desire. Through Avraham Avinu’s words and his firm approach with them, he simply broke through their outer kelipah, revealing their innermost point—that they truly wanted to bless Hashem. So Avraham Avinu planted the eshel in Be’er Sheva to bring people to bless Hashem. There is a story about a disciple, a disciple of the author of Toldos Yaakov Yosef, who was a disciple of the Maggid and the Baal Shem Tov, who came to the Noda BiYehuda. It is known that the Noda BiYehuda did not bring in the book of

16:13 Speaker 2 the teacher of the author of Toldos Yaakov Yosef, the Maggid of Mezritch. While they were speaking about the Baal Shem Tov, the Noda BiYehuda asked the author of Toldos Yaakov Yosef: “How great is the mitzvah of hosting guests?” The man replied: “Hosting guests is greater than receiving the Divine Presence.” The Noda BiYehuda asked him: “How did Avraham Avinu know that it was indeed greater? How did he know that?” The man answered that Hashem had to take the sun out of its sheath so that guests would not come and Avraham would not go to welcome them. If receiving the Divine Presence were greater, Avraham would not leave the Divine Presence. The very fact that Hashem took the sun out of its sheath shows that hosting guests is greater. The Noda BiYehuda asked the author of Toldos Yaakov Yosef: “Where did you get that answer?” He replied: “From my Rebbe, from my Rebbe.” So the Noda BiYehuda took the book of the author of Toldos Yaakov Yosef and kissed it. There are further details concerning the mitzvah of hosting guests. As we know, the signs of a kosher animal are that it has split hooves and chews its cud. They say that the mitzvah of hosting guests has these signs too: the host sits down with the guest, cuts slices of bread for him, and eats along with him. He does not leave him alone. That is part of the mitzvah of hosting guests. So we see those signs here too. But despite the importance of sitting and eating together, there are also times when you should leave the guest to sit by himself and give him a little room to breathe. Some guests feel embarrassed to eat in the host’s presence, so taking that into account is also part of the mitzvah of hosting guests. The host needs to welcome each guest according to that guest’s outlook and situation. There is an even higher level in welcoming guests: not acting like the host at all, so that the guests think one of them is the host. There is a similar story about my grandfather, the father of

18:36 Speaker 2 My mother’s family lived—at first, my parents lived in Hebron, then in the Old City, and then in Mekor Chaim. They were known for their extraordinary hospitality, welcoming both ordinary people and tzaddikim. Once they overheard several guests sitting together and saying to each other, “It’s so, so nice to eat here. The host is never around.” They didn’t know that the host was sitting right beside them. My grandfather was sitting there eating with them, but he never acted like the host. So they said, “It’s nice that there’s no host here,” so to speak. That’s an important level of hospitality. Now, another point about guests: It says, “Hashem appeared to him in the plains of Mamre, while he was sitting at the entrance of the tent in the heat of the day.” Rashi says he was looking to see whether there were any passersby whom he could bring into his home. Some explain that his welcoming passersby means he brought people who had transgressed back to Hashem. That is the meaning of “passersby”: people who have committed transgressions, whom he brought back to Hakadosh Boruch Hu. These are people who need help. It is brought in the holy books of one of the Rebbes of Alexander, whom I visited with Chabad rabbis some forty or forty-five years ago. It was in connection with the question of who is a Jew. We went to see him; he was the grandfather of the current Rebbe. In the book, he cites the words of Rabbi Yonasan ben Uziel, who explains that Avraham Avinu was just about to eat and invited the angels to join him then, and they agreed. He asks why Hakadosh Boruch Hu arranged for them to be his guests and eat at his home. He explains it with a story, an interesting story. One of his holy ancestors, a disciple of Rabbi Yitzchak of Vorka, had already been appointed a Rebbe in his youth. He lived in the town of Turchin and would still travel to his own Rebbe. There, a certain chossid and his son became attached to him. One Shabbos, while he was

20:57 Speaker 2 in Turchin, the son of that man—the man who had become attached to him—came to spend Shabbos there. Unfortunately, he fell ill there. Ah, his mother fell ill there. He came to the beis midrash—he fell ill there, sorry, he fell ill there, and his mother came to the beis midrash. She cried out that she would not leave until the Rebbe healed him: he had fallen ill while staying with the Rebbe, so the Rebbe had to heal him. What did the Rebbe do? He summoned a wagon driver and said, “We’re going.” When the woman saw them leaving, she thought he was trying to slip away and escape, so she began shouting for them to stop, but she couldn’t stop them. She started running after them. The Rebbe did not go far; they stopped somewhere nearby. What happened there? A certain man saw him and recognized that he was a tzaddik. He invited the tzaddik into his home for a cup of tea, and the Rebbe agreed. After drinking it, the tzaddik instructed the wagon driver, “Now we can go back home.” When he returned, he learned that the boy had already recovered. What happened here? What’s the story? What happened? So they asked the tzaddik what he had done. He had fled. He hadn’t fled; he had stopped and entered someone’s home along the way. The tzaddik said, “I saw that I had no way to heal him, so I decided to travel far away, to where my friends live, and be their guest. The moment I became their guest, I would become an object of holiness. I would be a guest, and hosting guests is a mitzvah, so I would become an object of holiness. Once I was an object of holiness, I would have the power to give a special blessing.” That was his reasoning. “But when someone invited me in at the nearby village and I became his guest, I had already become an object of holiness right then. So I went back home, and everything was fine: the boy had recovered.” Based on this, he explains: Avraham Avinu was ill,

23:09 Speaker 2 and it was the third day after his bris milah. He was looking for a way to receive a blessing for healing, so he was happy to welcome guests. Why? The guests would become objects of holiness, and then they would bless him and he would recover. It’s the same idea, the same concept of an object of holiness. So we’ve learned something about the mitzvah of hospitality: the host performs a great mitzvah and benefits from it, and the guest benefits too, because he becomes an object of holiness. This is actually greater than receiving the Divine Presence. When one receives the Divine Presence, one is certainly receiving a great guest, but no change takes place in the Divine Presence—no change at all. When one hosts a guest, a change takes place in the guest: he becomes an object of holiness. This may also explain something interesting about the Alter Rebbe’s conduct when he was released from prison. As is known, after fifty-three days of imprisonment, instead of entering the home of the chossid Reb Mordechai of Liepli, he entered the home of an opponent of Chassidus and stayed there for three hours. The Rebbe said that those three hours were worse than all fifty-three days. But in the end, while he sat there, they offered him a cup of tea, and he drank it. What did he say? “Out of respect for my host.” I remember the Rebbe speaking about this story to teach us the greatness of Ahavas Yisroel: although the Alter Rebbe said it was harder for him than the entire imprisonment, he still drank a cup of tea out of respect for his host. In light of what we’ve said, perhaps we can explain that, in addition to his own greatness, he wanted to add another dimension: to become an object of holiness. The moment he became a guest, he would become an object of holiness, one could say. That could explain it. One of the rabbis of Jerusalem happened to be a guest of some of the great Torah scholars in Bnei Brak. Once, it was already nighttime when he arrived—at the Chazon Ish’s home, I think. He

25:17 Speaker 2 arrived there at night. Well, he couldn’t get back to Jerusalem. It wasn’t like today; there was no transportation, so he thought he would stay in the synagogue. But they invited him into their home, and suddenly he saw the Steipler carrying the bed frame and the Chazon Ish carrying the bed. He said to them, “Why are you exerting yourselves over this? I can help.” They told him, “This is the first time we’ve seen the esrog—the object of holiness—give us instructions. You have no right to give instructions. You’re the guest. Don’t give instructions. This is our responsibility; it’s our mitzvah.” Yes. Sometimes there are challenges: guests come who are not very clean, or guests who are difficult. There can be great challenges in hosting people, especially on Shabbos. You want the house to be calm, quiet, and peaceful, and it isn’t simple. When we were in Kfar Tavor, we ourselves had all kinds of guests. On the Shabbos before Pesach, some specifically wanted to eat their bread in places that had already been cleaned for Pesach, and you had to contend with them. Hospitality brings great challenges. Yes, but in the merit of being careful about hospitality, even toward unwelcome guests, one also merits being rid of various problems caused by unwelcome guests—like coronavirus, hurricanes, all these phenomena that today are unwelcome guests. I must mention a lovely story about an unwelcome guest. I don’t remember who it was. A tzaddik once said to his son before his bar mitzvah, “You know you’re approaching your bar mitzvah, and you’re going to receive an important guest. Have you prepared yet? You need to prepare to receive the guest.” The boy said to his father, “Father, I’ve been preparing since I was little, since I was three years old.” “Okay, then tell me: how are you preparing?” So he said, “When the yetzer hara came, the guest wanted

27:47 Speaker 2 “To come in to me, I said: ‘It’s no great feat for you to come now. You have no partner, no one to quarrel with. Wait, wait; your turn will come.’ So to this day I haven’t let him in.” So that is his great hospitality—and my great preparation for the guest I receive. There are stories of tzaddikim who welcomed guests. There was a great tzaddik, Rabbi Moshe Leib, who took in all kinds of wounded guests. He washed them, laid them in his own bed, and gave his bed to his guest. Another great tzaddik was Rabbi Shlomo of Zvhil. All kinds of guests came to him. There are many stories of how they cared for guests with tremendous love, even though they suffered because of them, and the community suffered too. They asked people not to interfere, but to give the guests what they wanted. That is a high level. I can’t tell all the stories, and I don’t have time to go into them; with Hashem’s help, another time. There is the well-known story of the holy Baal Shem Tov. His birth is connected with the mitzvah of welcoming guests. Once, his father, Rabbi Eliezer, was tested from Heaven: a guest arrived on Friday night with a pack on his shoulders. Rabbi Eliezer did not say a word to him about it. He accepted him as he was, gave him food and drink, and put him to bed. In that merit, Hakadosh Boruch Hu gave him the beautiful gift of the Baal Shem Tov’s soul. Yes. The story says that in the end he revealed to his father, to Rabbi Eliezer, that he was Eliyahu Hanavi, who had come to test his hospitality. This is something remarkable, and here we learn something seemingly astonishing: if Rabbi Eliezer had not welcomed guests properly, all the light of Chassidus in the world might never have come to be. We merited all the light of Chassidus in the world because of this—because of hospitality, and because of kindness in general, we merited the revelation of

29:46 Speaker 2 that great light. It is a wonderful thing. And speaking of guests, it is important to me to tell you about one of my ancestors, the Yismach Moshe. He was known to be constantly waiting and longing for Moshiach Tzidkeinu. There was a time when his son-in-law was away from home. The time had come for him to return, and they were waiting for him. One Friday afternoon, the Yismach Moshe was at the mikveh. Someone told him, “He’s here, he’s here!” The Yismach Moshe rushed to put on his clothes to greet Moshiach. Then he saw that the guest was his son-in-law. Well, he was happy to see him, but he shed tears: when someone says, “He has arrived,” they should mean that important guest, Moshiach Tzidkeinu. That is a story about the Yismach Moshe. And while we are speaking about welcoming guests, here are two more stories about the Chofetz Chaim. He was carrying the guest’s bedding, and the guest said to him, “You could give that to a non-Jew to carry. Why are you doing it?” The Chofetz Chaim replied, “Should I give the great mitzvah of welcoming guests to a non-Jew?” Another time, at the Friday-night meal, he delayed saying Shalom Aleichem to the angels until after the fish course. Everyone wondered why he was not saying Shalom Aleichem. He explained that he could see the guests were hungry, so he said, “The angels can wait. I’ll make Kiddush now.” And that is what he did. It is also told that once a guest arrived on Friday afternoon, utterly exhausted, and lay down to rest. The Chofetz Chaim told his family to eat, while he himself waited until late into the night for the guest to wake up. Then he told him to daven, made Kiddush, and ate with him. The guest saw that it was already four in the morning and was amazed that the Chofetz Chaim had waited for him all that time.

32:16 Speaker 2 Speaking of important guests, I had a grandmother, my mother’s mother, who lived in Dvinsk and was close to the two great rabbis there, the Rogatchover and the Ohr Sameach. Through her family she was close to the Rogatchover, who was the Chassidic rabbi, but she also visited the home of the Ohr Sameach. She always loved seeing the Ohr Sameach and the Rogatchover leave the shul together. It gave her great pleasure. She used to say that in the town of Dvinsk, people were already washed and dressed by early afternoon, ready to welcome the important guest of Shabbos. Yes, it is important not to overlook our own lovely guests—our children. Our children are very important. They are important guests, no less important than anyone else, and we need to invest in them and strengthen families. There are also people who have not been blessed with families. We must daven for them in the merit of welcoming guests. That is very important. It is told that the Alter Rebbe did not have children, so he came to ask his teacher, the Maggid of Mezritch, for a blessing. His teacher said to him: Dovid Hamelech says in Tehillim, “How can a young man keep his path pure?” Why does it say, “How can a young man merit”? Through his guests—through the merit of welcoming guests. So he devoted himself to welcoming guests, and then his firstborn son, Dovber, was born. He named him after his teacher, the Maggid of Mezritch. Bringing joy to guests, even through song and music, is a very great thing. The singing around the Shabbos table penetrates the souls of those sitting there, including the guests. It is very important. An article has just come to my attention about someone who was present at a gathering of rabbis and rebbetzins, where they were not talking about politics. One of the fellows there, who did not look all that religious outwardly, suddenly began singing Shabbos songs—Karlin songs, Vizhnitz songs. Another one

34:38 Speaker 2 began singing Chabad songs. “Well, how do you know these songs?” someone asked him. He replied, “I may look like this on the outside, but inside, a fire burns in my soul—the fire of Chassidic song, from when I was very young, from my parents’ home and its Shabbos atmosphere. You can’t erase that. On the contrary, that is the Yiddishkeit inside me.” The author of the article goes on to say that this recalls the Jews who returned after the Holocaust and went to monasteries to identify Jewish children. One of them cried out, “Shema Yisroel,” and the Jewish children began to cry and continued, “Shema Yisroel, Hashem Elokeinu, Hashem Echad.” It was in those children’s hearts from the way they had been raised. The same is true of song and music: what enters through song remains forever, and that too is part of welcoming guests. At Kiddush Levanah we say: “Had the Jewish people merited nothing more than greeting the presence of their Father in Heaven once a month, it would have been enough.” It is a great privilege to greet our Father in Heaven once a month. And welcoming guests is greater than greeting the Shechinah. That tells us that we need to welcome guests much more than once a month, and that it is even more important. There is another story—I keep turning to stories, because stories of tzaddikim bring the important meaning of welcoming guests into us. It is a very great thing. One of the well-known speakers, Rabbi Biederman, relates two stories. One is about the holy Rabbi of Kobrin. He tells it like this: When the gaon Rabbi Chaim of Brisk was a child, he became very ill. All the doctors had given up hope for him. At that time, the holy Rabbi of Kobrin came to Brisk and went to visit the boy’s grandfather, the chossid Rabbi— The grandfather began with a cry: “My dear grandson Chaim is gravely ill.” The holy Rabbi of Kobrin said, “Let’s go visit the sick child.” When they went in

37:02 Speaker 2 The holy Rabbi entered the room and began: “It says in our parsha, Parshas Vayeira, ‘And he is standing over them beneath the tree,’ and so on.” The question is: Why does it say “is standing,” in the present tense? It should have said, “And he stood.” This teaches us that whenever a Jew fulfills the mitzvah of hospitality, Avraham Avinu, the pillar of kindness, comes there and stands ready to take part in welcoming guests. And our Sages said: A precious stone hung from Avraham Avinu’s neck. Any sick person who saw it was immediately healed. Since you are fulfilling the mitzvah of hospitality with me, Avraham Avinu is here, and surely the sick child will be healed. And that is indeed what happened: the child recovered. Yes. It isn’t easy. It isn’t easy. To fulfill this mitzvah of hospitality, one needs great self-effacement before Hakadosh Boruch Hu. Great self-effacement. When a person has his ego, it really is hard for him to withstand the tests we’ve described, and others as well. There was a chossid—I heard it was Reb Zalman, though I’m not sure who it was—who asked the Alter Rebbe in yechidus for a blessing for his needs. What did he say? “I need money.” This man, Reb Zalman, had lost his fortune. So he asked the Alter Rebbe: “I need money. I need money to provide food and drink for my children,” and so on. The Alter Rebbe became absorbed in deveikus, and then said to him: “You only speak about what you need, but you don’t say what—what are you needed for?” Well, the chossid fainted. When he came to, it was as though he had forgotten his requests. He stayed with the Alter Rebbe for a long time, immersed in Torah and prayer. Yes, the idea of “I need” also applies to spiritual matters: a person studies so that he will become a scholar. A person prays so that people will know he prays well. There are personal motives. The Alter Rebbe says: Don’t think, “What do I need?” Think, “What am I needed for?” Yes, when we know how to direct our actions according to what we are needed for, it becomes easier to fulfill this mitzvah of

39:27 Speaker 2 hospitality as well, together with the overarching mitzvah of “Love your fellow as yourself.” Ah, in closing, I want to share something I saw about the tzaddik, the holy Rabbi Hillel of Paritch. As is known, Rabbi Hillel of Paritch was a tzaddik. They called him “half a Rebbe,” and he was distinguished by his deveikus, his Torah study, his prayer, and his service of Hashem through prayer. Yes, he had known the Mitteler Rebbe and the Tzemach Tzedek. He was a great chossid, deeply devoted to serving Hashem. Once, on Shabbos, Rabbi Hillel finished praying with the congregation and left the shul with the other worshippers to go home. Everyone was astonished: What had happened to him? His usual practice was to spend many hours in prayer, not to leave with everyone else. They asked him, and he answered: “I have a guest for Shabbos. What are my prayers worth if a Jew wants to eat?” They were amazed—a tzaddik of such stature! But he understood that if he did not give his guest food, his prayers were worth nothing. What have we learned from all this? The importance of hospitality. We have understood that “hospitality is greater than receiving the Divine Presence.” We have understood what we began with in Maseches Shabbos: that one may clear away even straw and grain, even four or five baskets of it, to make room for guests or for the sake of Torah study in the beis midrash. According to the Gemara we learned, the Mishnah mentions guests before Torah study. Hospitality comes first and is even greater—greater than receiving the Divine Presence, greater than prayer and Torah study. That is why it is so very important to excel in this mitzvah of hospitality. Yes, we are awaiting the important guest, Moshiach Tzidkeinu, who will come and redeem us. There is no doubt that by excelling in hospitality—offering food and drink, love and joy, song and music, and all good things—we welcome this guest and breathe new life into him. There is no doubt that this is part of how, with Hashem’s help, we hasten our welcome of this important guest. May Moshiach Tzidkeinu come and redeem us

42:17 Speaker 2 soon, in our days, amen.