Ears to Hear 30 | Moments of Faith in Kvutzah 5754

00:00 Speaker 1 And Hashem did not give you a heart to know, eyes to see, or ears to hear.

00:08 Speaker 2 Ears to Hear. Audio programs for the students of the Temimim, from the International ATA.

00:14 Speaker 6 That there is one direction, and only one, and this is where things are going and what is happening. So I’m telling you unequivocally: if, a minute before those announcements were made, or afterward, they had said, “Okay, medically speaking, it’s over, and now the Rebbe is getting up and revealing himself,” people would have considered that the most, most logical thing that could happen. Logical—I’m talking about logic now, yes? I don’t know what was in each person’s heart, but I’m telling you what the feeling was. And again, the friends in my group and my other friends—they hold a range of views within Lubavitch today. That has nothing to do with what I’m saying. I’m not talking about what happened afterward or how people understood it. I’m talking about that very moment, that very period. That possibility was there both before and after—throughout that whole night of Gimmel Tammuz. I have no idea what I felt then. What I do know is that it was clear to me that this was what was happening: somehow, the Rebbe was revealing himself here. I didn’t know how.

01:30 Speaker 7 Sholom aleichem to all the students of the Temimim in Tomchei Temimim Lubavitch yeshivos throughout the Holy Land and the entire world. We’re beginning the thirtieth program in the Ears to Hear audio series. This program is steeped in and permeated with a spirit of steadfast hiskashrus to the Rebbe, Melech HaMoshiach, shlita, and with our cherished concern for the actual reality of the days of Moshiach. In this special program ahead of Gimmel Tammuz, we’re sitting down to talk about the group of 5754, those extraordinary moments of faith, and what preceded them, with Rabbi Shloimel Halperin, rabbi of the Chabad community in Tel Aviv and one of the founders of the Beis Moshiach newspaper. As one of the Temimim in the group of 5754, he’ll tell us about that remarkable year and those remarkable moments, share them with us, and talk with us about the moments from which we draw faith, a spirit of hiskashrus, strength, and resilience even in the situation we face today. Sholom aleichem, Rabbi Halperin.

02:31 Speaker 6 Sholom uverachah. There’s a custom of beginning by honoring one’s hosts. I’m sure everyone listening knows about the work ATA does; we don’t need to explain it. It gives life to everyone. ATA gives life to everyone, as the familiar slogan goes—including us. It lets us remember, and not just remember, but live with what the Temimim live with, in the way the Temimim live. So thank you, truly, for coming and awakening in us—and continuing to awaken—all those most important points, the points of emunah, as they say.

03:04 Speaker 7 Thank you, thank you, Rabbi Halperin. Baruch Hashem, we’re sitting down for a special program about the group of 5754 and the atmosphere of that time. We could, of course, begin with arriving for the 5754 group, with 27 Adar 5754 [?], with Gimmel Tammuz 5754, and see—and witness—the extraordinary pure faith that existed then, especially among the students of the Temimim, and how they inspired everyone with that faith. But perhaps, to understand it more clearly and on a firmer foundation, we should go back a little and hear what the atmosphere was like in the preceding years. Let’s talk about the atmosphere of the “years of wonders” for a bochur in the senior yeshiva. You were a bochur there in 5751, 5752, and 5753. How was everything received? What was the atmosphere around Moshiach—all the events of 11 Nissan, the sichos, what came before them and what followed? How did you take it in, and how did it become such a broad, powerful motivation for all your activity in matters of Moshiach?

04:04 Speaker 6 Well, we really need to start somewhere. So—

04:07 Speaker 7 No, it’s a complex question. There are a lot of details.

04:11 Speaker 6 That’s all right. As I was starting to say, you always have to choose some starting point. So let’s choose the end of 5750, the “year of miracles,” and even before that, and then the year of “I will show you wonders.” Let’s try to imagine what it was like for a bochur—or for any of us—to live in that period. Not just what we know from books and accounts, but what it actually felt like then. Imagine for a moment: you’re living at a time when something happens every week. Almost every day, something new happens, in two ways. Something new happens with the Rebbe: the Rebbe tells you of revelations—the “year of miracles,” as we said, and then “I will show you wonders.” That comes from above. We’ll get to other things in a moment. And you see it. You see that you’re living in such a time. You’re living through the collapse of the communist regimes, for example. The fall of the Iron Curtain is considered history today, but think of a Chabad bochur, a bochur learning in yeshiva, who sees the mashpi’im of the previous generation, and of his own generation too. For them, the word “Russia” is synonymous with persecution and everything that went with it. Suddenly you can travel to Russia. Suddenly people are arriving from Russia; you talk to new immigrants. You hear more Russian, you hear about all these things. It puts you in a different atmosphere, a different world—a new world where something is happening every moment.

05:44 Speaker 7 Both in the Rebbe’s sichos and in what’s happening in the world.

05:47 Speaker 6 Of course, exactly. The feeling is that the Rebbe says something and it happens. You don’t have to wait thirty or forty years, or even forty days much of the time—not even like Moshe Rabbeinu. The Rebbe speaks of things ahead of time, but you’re already seeing them with your own eyes. You don’t even notice that you’re seeing them with your own eyes. Even years earlier, with politics in the Holy Land and all sorts of other things, you saw it and lived with that feeling without anyone having to tell you. Then came the whole subject of the Gulf War and the period leading up to it. The Rebbe promised you that Eretz Yisroel was the safest place in the world, despite everything that was happening and all the fear in the streets. You lived knowing that Eretz Yisroel was the safest place in the world. They were distributing gas masks everywhere, so you went to get one because the Rebbe said not to act differently from others—but you laughed about it. Everyone was buying who knows what: sealing tape for the windows and doors. They brought in Patriot missile batteries, the predecessor of the Iron Dome, so to speak, and everyone was preparing. Meanwhile, the Rebbe was speaking to you about the time when Melech HaMoshiach is revealed, and [unclear], yes, about that Midrash, and about him standing on the roof of the Beis Hamikdash. The Rebbe was describing it to you, and that was how things were. I still remember when the Gulf War began. I was in a shul in the Bayit Vegan neighborhood of Jerusalem, a well-known Litvish stronghold, and one of the prominent Litvish figures came up, shook my hand, and said, “I have to say, well done. This time it worked out for you. Your Rebbe was right. Our rabbis warned of another Holocaust, and the Rebbe said there wouldn’t be missiles.” That was what he said. Then the missiles started that night. But even when they started, you knew nothing would happen. You saw thirty-nine missiles fall, and nothing happened, uh—

07:37 Speaker 6 And almost no one—

07:38 Speaker 7 The atmosphere in the streets was that—

07:40 Speaker 6 You could see—

07:41 Speaker 7 Something was happening.

07:41 Speaker 6 Something was happening all the time. Then the Rebbe merely hinted that the war would end on Purim. He didn’t even say it explicitly; he just told someone that he would be home by Purim. You could have explained that in other ways, but the war ended on Purim. That was how it was with everything. That was the situation you lived in. Things were happening in the world, too. At the time, you didn’t necessarily know that you were living through a historic period, but you felt it. There’s an expression people sometimes use even now: “the right side of history.” That’s where you felt you were, on the right side of history. It was the most exciting time, as I said, to be a Chabad chossid, the most exciting time to be a chossid of the Rebbe, in every respect. You heard it from the Rebbe: this is a revelation, this is something—and it was clear to you that this was how it was. It couldn’t be otherwise. After all, if five years earlier someone had told you that a person would come to you from Russia, or that you would travel there, you would have looked at him as though he were crazy. And now you saw it happening. You saw it with everything. If someone had told you about the Gulf War—that suddenly there would be a war, that the United States would mobilize the whole world and fight Iraq as it attacked Israel—people would have wondered what planet you’d landed from, right? And the same was true of almost everything that happened. But here it was, happening. So it followed naturally.

08:55 Speaker 8 Where does all this lead us?

08:56 Speaker 6 They bring us to the point where anything is possible, anything can happen, everything is moving forward. Nothing is far-fetched; nothing happening today is outlandish. Say anything you like—say that tomorrow morning the Rebbe Melech HaMoshiach will be revealed. That isn’t just some belief, some hope, some vague idea. It’s something quite clear. I—

09:17 Speaker 8 In other words, precisely because of the changes taking place around the world, they could also say, both intellectually and emotionally, “Look—”

09:24 Speaker 6 And he spoke about those changes. No, and the Rebbe also tells you about the changes. The Rebbe is speaking in a way people hadn’t spoken before. So you see both things. It’s not just that you see changes around the world and can say, “Well, there’s a war here now, a war there.” The point is that it matches exactly what you’re hearing from the Rebbe. You hear from the Rebbe that we’re living through an extraordinary period, a time of wonders, and you see wonders with your own eyes. It isn’t some abstract idea. You don’t even need faith or an explanation. When the Rebbe says to open your eyes, at that time it really means opening your eyes—or perhaps just not closing them. You don’t need to make an effort to see. It’s clear to you, simply clear. I started to say, like that story I told. I also remember driving with someone else, talking and talking about these Chabad people and what they wanted. “Well, I hope they succeed in bringing Moshiach.” But that was the atmosphere. How does the Rebbe describe it? “The world will already be filled with talk of Moshiach,” right? So there was a whole language around it, without needing elaborate arguments, explanations, or close readings of the sichos. Today people analyze the sichos of 5751 and 5752 much more closely than we did, because we didn’t need to. You heard them with your own ears and read them; even a superficial reading brought you into a different world. And then—

10:41 Speaker 8 So as Temimim in a large yeshiva, you’re describing a situation where you felt something was happening in the world. This wasn’t ordinary, and what was happening in the world was reflected in the sichos. Exactly—something was changing. It was an extraordinary time.

10:55 Speaker 6 But I’ll tell you, as a bochur, you weren’t even excited that something extraordinary was happening. You didn’t stop to wonder about it. You just got on with it.

11:02 Speaker 8 Yes.

11:03 Speaker 6 That’s it, because that was how things were. It had already become normal for you. The Rebbe says things will happen a certain way, and they happen that way. Suddenly, as I said, the Gulf War seems normal to you, its ending seems normal to you—everything seems normal. Perhaps the moment when something tells you that this isn’t normal is 28 Nissan 5751. But even then, people have spoken and will speak about the shock and everything that came with it. I want to talk about what came afterward, or what was happening at the same time. Yes, it was a shock. On the other hand, it was a shock at a time when you were, so to speak, already shaken. The Rebbe says this is an extraordinary time, so extraordinary things are being said.

11:46 Speaker 8 Wild things.

11:47 Speaker 6 Yes, yes, yes. As the times are, so are the things. So somehow it fit into that too. For all the shock it caused—and it was a shock—it wasn’t as though something had come out of—

11:56 Speaker 8 It’s not as though the shock of 28 Nissan 5751 happened—

11:58 Speaker 6 Out of nowhere. Yes, it didn’t happen in a vacuum, because ultimately we were always ready for surprises. So this was a surprise. It was a shock; it was all of that. But what happened immediately afterward? A shock of another kind—what was happening? The sichos. From then on, the talk was only about Geulah and Moshiach. There was almost no other subject. Everyone knows the edited sichos today and everything. Yes, in Dvar Malchus and in their edited form they appear one way or another—but even in the Rebbe’s plain, unedited words, everything is about Moshiach.

12:32 Speaker 9 Unedited, and very raw.

12:33 Speaker 6 And they sang—yes, they happened to sing a niggun connected with the Geulah, by Divine Providence. It helps bring the Geulah. Yes, literally. It simply happened by Divine Providence. They happened to sing it, right? And the Rebbe says, “Then let’s speak about it,” right? As if it had given us the occasion. So: Moshiach. Study matters of Geulah and Moshiach. Likkutei Sichos on matters of Geulah and Moshiach. And then there was the tremendous change that people may be less aware of: the Rebbe distributed Dvar Malchus, a booklet called Dvar Malchus, with his holy hand. His own sichos—not maamarim of the previous Rebbeim, not Tanya, not anything else, but a booklet entirely of sichos on Geulah and Moshiach and on [unclear], whether that is well known today or less well known, though it should be well known. The Rebbe placed it in each person’s hand. So there’s no—

13:24 Speaker 9 Something is happening here.

13:25 Speaker 6 Something is happening here. You can feel it.

13:26 Speaker 9 My Chabad friends, “Yechi”—that’s on a whole other level—

13:28 Speaker 6 Yes, and I’ll tell you that even that was absorbed into everything else. There was always a combination of things here. Some people always wanted the Rebbe to say “Yechi Adoneinu,” wanted the Rebbe to encourage “Yechi,” and wanted to proclaim the revelation and the coronation—all the activities of Rabbi Dovid Nachshon, [unclear], Shmuel [unclear], Zimroni, and everyone else, right? All of that was there, but it fit into the general atmosphere. That’s exactly what I’m trying to say. There were particular people who came and always wanted to push ahead, but it fit exactly with what we felt as bochurim, and probably [unclear] as well. It wasn’t—yes.

14:03 Speaker 9 In Brooklyn at that time, proclaiming “Yechi” didn’t sound like some strange thing. It sounded like something the atmosphere called for.

14:09 Speaker 6 Yes. Again, there were questions about the details: whether to say it in front of the Rebbe, what the Rebbe would say, what the Rebbe would—yes. But the idea itself didn’t come as a surprise. Even if you thought someone was going too far, you didn’t think he was crazy. Okay? Even the people most opposed to it, the coolest and most intellectual people, those who tried to approach everything in an [unclear] way—still, at most they thought it wasn’t right. There could be disagreements of one kind or another, but nobody said, “Where did you get that from?”

14:38 Speaker 9 Yes.

14:38 Speaker 6 It was clear where you got it from. If anything, what wasn’t clear was how you could not get it from there. And then—let’s think further. The sichos kept coming. You could point to something new in each week’s sicha. I still remember how we would receive the edited sichos. Once I traveled with Rabbi Lishitzky [unclear], and he showed me another sicha, another passage, another sentence. Even for us, each time meant finding new things, finding the remarkable and startling points. There was so much of it that you didn’t even notice it all. That’s what I was saying: for thirty years now we’ve been examining every detail. Another sentence: “Look what the Rebbe says here.”

15:12 Speaker 9 Perhaps we really need to make another whole program about that atmosphere—how each and every sicha—

15:16 Speaker 6 Yes, good. We won’t get into all that, but let’s take an example. Let’s fast-forward a little, right? And come to the sicha about prophecy: “There is a prophet in Israel.” Could anyone even—Now you can find precedents, because it isn’t as though the Rebbe had never said such things. As people say, the Rebbe had said everything before, right?

15:32 Speaker 9 Likkutei Sichos and so on, and when—

15:34 Speaker 6 The Rebbe had said it all—yes, the Rebbe didn’t “invent” anything, in quotation marks, right? Fine. But think about reaching Elul 5751, right? The sicha of Parshas Re’eh and all its points. “There is a prophet in Israel,” and you must announce it and publicize it—even before that, in Parshas Eikev. The Rebbe is telling you to announce it and publicize it. However you announce it and however you publicize it—whether you say it with “Yechi Adoneinu” or say it another way—the Rebbe tells you to announce it and publicize it. Then comes “There is a prophet in Israel.” I remember Sichas HaShavua from that time: “This is the man, this is the prophecy, this is the prophet.” [unclear]. Later, people said, “Well, the Rebbe actually—”

16:15 Speaker 9 Meant—

16:16 Speaker 6 Meant the Rebbe, the Frierdiker Rebbe. I said, “No problem. Put out ‘There is a prophet in Israel’ with a picture of the Frierdiker Rebbe. What’s the problem?” Right?

16:23 Speaker 9 The people who argued that didn’t put one out either.

16:25 Speaker 6 But never mind—that’s the point. I’m not trying to take issue with anyone now. I’m trying to describe what it was like. Think about hearing, all of a sudden, that there is a prophet, and that there is someone we have merited to have, whom Hakadosh Boruch Hu has appointed, with all that talk of being chosen. And that there is the existence of Moshiach and his revelation—all those expressions. Then it’s clear to you what world you’re living in. It’s clear to you what you’re doing. There’s simply no question. Then Tishrei comes—

16:53 Speaker 9 Did things move up a level in the winter of 5752?

16:55 Speaker 6 Probably, yes. But as I said, it was a step up within what was already happening. You were already in a certain state—

17:03 Speaker 9 It’s a highway; you can’t resist it anymore. [unclear].

17:05 Speaker 6 Friends of mine who are prominent mashpi’im today described it as living with [unclear]. But you see it even more afterward. Yes, you see that all of reality is according to Torah, and all of reality is G-dliness. All of reality is what the Rebbe says it is. So yes, you see it. And then the kuntres Beis Rabbeinu Shebebavel comes out, and things come along that you don’t... How do you say it?

17:25 Speaker 9 Jarring.

17:25 Speaker 6 To another mashpia, yes. And after that, the Kinus Hashluchim, yes. Even before that, in Tishrei 5752 itself, the Rebbe is standing and looking at you as you pass by with the four species. You know what I mean. Everything keeps moving forward, and then there are sichos every evening. I used to be there on weekdays, and it’s a shame, but with sichos every evening, every evening you knew. Let me describe what it was like as a bochur in Israel: if the Rebbe went to the Ohel—and on many of the days when the Rebbe went to the Ohel, you didn’t know when he would return. But even if he didn’t, after Maariv, whether it was winter or summer, you had to keep track of the time and check whether there was a broadcast. In other words, you had to stay awake every night until one, two, or three, depending on the time, and check whether there was a sicha. You didn’t know in advance; you didn’t even know a minute in advance. You had to wait until the end of Maariv and see whether there would be a sicha. Why? Because there could be a sicha every evening. Maybe less so in Cheshvan, but once Shvat arrived—everyone knows. And when Adar I arrived, all the more so. But already in Shvat, and before that with the sixty days, and all the Rebbe’s expressions and everything the Rebbe said... How do I put it? It was very hard to be surprised by anything. Quite the opposite. It was heading in a very clear direction, and you had no possibility of thinking otherwise, feeling otherwise, sensing otherwise. Looking back now, when I try to think about what we thought then, I could say all kinds of things, but at the time there was nothing like that. Why would there be? Why would there be any thought that this wasn’t it?

19:17 Speaker 9 So here we’re wrapping up the first part, where we come to understand that special atmosphere—the important atmosphere of 5751 and 5752. How did you receive everything that was said? How did this whole journey become such a strong foundation for the faith that chassidim later expressed at the moment of faith on Yud Shvat? But before we get to Yud Shvat, after your vivid, impassioned description of 5751 and 5752, suddenly 27 Adar arrives. How did you take it?

19:46 Speaker 6 Right. “Suddenly” is exactly the right word. But that’s why I stopped earlier, I think, at the point where I said that nothing could surprise you anymore.

19:55 Speaker 9 Yes.

19:55 Speaker 6 In other words, if something suddenly happens that you never imagined could happen, that’s all right. Of course, that’s not what—27 Adar wasn’t that. But the idea is that, as I described, the Rebbe goes to the Ohel, and we know that afterward we can expect a broadcast. Why do we expect a broadcast? Because the Rebbe had already spoken about “B’chol yavocha Yisroel” and about another day of joy and another day of joy. So to you it’s already obvious. You don’t even ask whether there will be a sicha, only when the Rebbe will return from the Ohel. You’re surrounded by it all the time. And then suddenly they tell you, “Wait, wait, wait, something is happening.” The Rebbe isn’t coming back; the Rebbe is coming back like this; an ambulance arrives; this happens, that happens. The reports about 27 Adar begin.

20:35 Speaker 10 Did you receive the news relatively quickly?

20:37 Speaker 6 In real time. We were on the broadcast line, in the broadcast room and all that, so we weren’t somewhere else. But yes, the point is that we were in that kind of situation, in a place where—

20:53 Speaker 10 Suddenly something happens.

20:54 Speaker 6 Something happens, but you’re waiting. I remember the situation: we were waiting for the broadcast on that line, ready to relay it over some internal radio or whatever it was. Then reports started coming in that something was happening—something at 770, something at the Ohel, something. All the rumors and talk and reports began coming in. In any case, we were as up to date as we possibly could be, as confused as we possibly could be, and as unsure of what was happening as we possibly could be. But our friends at 770 were exactly the same. There wasn’t much difference between those inside 770 and those of us in Israel at that moment, in those hours. But again, the atmosphere was such that it was clear to you that this was one more thing happening.

21:37 Speaker 10 Right. It’s not as though on 27 Adar you suddenly emerged from some cloud. You were in that cloud, and here was another stage. You felt that; you didn’t need anyone to explain it to you. It was part of the picture.

21:48 Speaker 6 Not at all. Things were said then that might seem absurd. The Shabbos after 27 Adar was the most joyous Shabbos. Why? Because the Rebbe had said that healing would come “with abundant song and music.” Did he say that? Didn’t he? Nobody cared. And there were people—and it wasn’t just different people; it could be the very same person—who, on the one hand, heard all the matter-of-fact medical reports. I remember that when people suddenly saw what equipment was being brought in, which doctors were arriving, and so on, they understood that this was serious. It wasn’t just a compressor. They understood that something different was happening. Right?

22:26 Speaker 10 Yes.

22:26 Speaker 6 Okay. In any case, I’m not talking about people being naive or innocent, not knowing what was happening and being sold stories that the Rebbe’s health was only improving, that nothing had happened, and that in another day or two the Rebbe would come out and everything would be fine. Yes, it was clear to us that in another day or two the Rebbe would come out, because that was the direction things were going—not because someone needed to conceal some condition from us, but because that was the situation. Oh, something happened, something happened. It’s not that people didn’t daven or say Tehillim, and each person emphasized other aspects to himself, but there was no contradiction at all. As I said, you were prepared for unexpected things to keep happening, and it was clear to you that this was another stage on the way to the Geulah. How, and in what way? But if, on 27 Adar itself, you had told someone about the most severe stroke imaginable, and then another one and another one—whatever you might have told them—and you had said that the Rebbe would come down to a farbrengen on Shabbos, that would have seemed natural to us. In fact, we were asking whether the Rebbe would come down to the farbrengen. “Didn’t you know he was in no condition to do that?” Anyone who knew, knew what they knew, but that wasn’t the point.

23:31 Speaker 10 This is a way of looking at things. You’ve emphasized it a great deal throughout the program. There’s the natural, legitimate way that people look at the world—which we almost seem to be making fun of—alongside the atmosphere the Rebbe brought the chassidim into at that time: being on another plane, with a distinctive way of seeing the world, where there is someone who is different.

23:52 Speaker 6 It was something. And I’m saying that everything—the world itself—had prepared us for that too. Since this was an extraordinary time when extraordinary things were happening constantly, another extraordinary thing happened, another unexpected thing. But it was clear to you where it was heading. In other words—

24:11 Speaker 10 So 27 Adar was, in effect, a chapter, a stop along the way in that whole atmosphere.

24:15 Speaker 6 From our perspective, yes.

24:15 Speaker 10 It’s hard to say that, because ultimately this was something that happened to the Rebbe, and it’s still hard for us. But we know it was part of the process. How do you fit into this—

24:25 Speaker 6 Especially us—I want to say that perhaps it was especially true of us Temimim of that time, the relatively younger generation. There were people who had really lived with the Rebbe as things had been many years earlier, perhaps relating to him like a father. I’m not denying that it was probably much, much harder for them to see all this. But for us, the Rebbe—there was nothing natural about the Rebbe. Everyone knows the Rebbe is not bound by nature; everyone knows there is a Rebbe in the Jewish people who is not subject to the limitations of nature, and so on. But for us that was simply obvious. I’m describing people from a whole range of circumstances, but among us there wasn’t even room to consider that the Rebbe could be subject to any natural limitation. When certain mashpi’im spoke in every possible way about the Rebbe’s health and the need to safeguard it, we didn’t understand what they were talking about. Not because—

25:26 Speaker 10 You weren’t dismissive.

25:26 Speaker 6 No, no, no, G-d forbid. There are people who always know better and look down on it all, and people who heard what was said. But what is the connection between the Rebbe and the flesh-and-blood person who—

25:38 Speaker 10 In other words, you had reached a certain point regarding the Rebbe, with a simple certainty that he would save [unclear].

25:42 Speaker 6 Yes, but also regarding the Rebbe himself.

25:44 Speaker 10 …

25:44 Speaker 6 I mean, even regarding the Rebbe himself, so to speak, the fact that the Rebbe has a physical body—we didn’t really attach any significance to that. Let’s put it that way. Okay? So that was 27 Adar, and—

25:58 Speaker 10 And how do we move on to the next chapter, then?

26:00 Speaker 6 So, one second. Let’s go through a few things, a few points that are important for us to relive. Then comes the period when we don’t see him, and [unclear], and so on. But through all of that, the Rebbe continues answering questions and everything. Even on the most serious matters—there was some counterrevolution in Russia, for those who remember, and hurricanes and things like that. I mean, the Rebbe was dealing with the most serious matters. To us, it was obvious that the Rebbe was answering, and obvious that the Rebbe was taking care of things. Why? Because something had happened, and now the doctors and the physiotherapists had to come in, and I don’t know what else? Again, it was the atmosphere. I remember 11 Nissan 5750 in Israel—the biggest [unclear]—with all the songs and everything, and at the same time, prayers, chapters of Tehillim, and tears, wanting the Rebbe to be healthy. All of it went together with the strongest faith, without any contradiction, without anyone saying, “Wait, if that’s so, how can this be?”

27:06 Speaker 10 But now, as we move to the next stage in the story—we’re moving forward: 5751, 5752, and now we’ll talk about 5753. This chapter seemingly belongs very much to the overall atmosphere, to what gave the greatest— I don’t know. I can’t define it, certainly not intellectually, and not emotionally either, because we weren’t there. Was 5753 really something more intense in terms of emotion, faith, and confidence?

27:32 Speaker 6 Let’s talk about it and see. Yes, let’s see what comes out.

27:35 Speaker 10 Okay, Tishrei 5753.

27:36 Speaker 6 Tishrei 5753. I remember the atmosphere around Tishrei 5753: should we travel or not? I’ll put it this way: everyone says, “Men muz forn”—you have to travel. Whether what Reb Mendel said was about 5753, 5751, or 5755, I don’t know, but fine—which years exactly are we talking about? Let’s say that even those who didn’t travel, or didn’t consider traveling, were thinking: “I’m traveling because I want to see, and now we can’t see him.” So it wasn’t despair.

28:06 Speaker 10 Superficiality.

28:06 Speaker 6 No, no, no, not even superficiality. Today it’s easy for us to say that, because we’ve spent thirty years without seeing him. But I’m talking about then. A person says: he travels for Tishrei in order to actually receive something—to hear the Rebbe’s voice, to hear this and to hear that. And now that isn’t there. So some people didn’t travel, but not because they had given up on the situation, G-d forbid. They thought that, under the circumstances, there was no reason to go. Some thought that way. But many others didn’t. I don’t think I was considered one of the more fanatical bochurim then. It was hard to define these things; we didn’t have the labels people use today, like “Moshiachists” and “extremists” and so on. But I don’t think I was one of the big fanatics. On the other hand, maybe precisely because of that, nothing got in my way. I mean, of course you go.

28:50 Speaker 10 It was simpler to come for Tishrei 5753 than for Tishrei 5755. Let’s be honest.

28:55 Speaker 6 Oh, much more so. Fine. If we get to 5755 in this conversation, we’ll talk about it. I don’t want to analyze it retrospectively now. I do want to relive it. But yes, traveling for 5753—you know what? Traveling for 5753, believing and hoping—and not just hoping. It was a hope that came with wanting to be there when it happened. Okay? Wanting to be there when it happened, because it was very likely—more than very likely—that something would happen. Things were happening all the time. True, nothing had happened in the past two months, but generally, yes. And Tishrei—I kept thinking, what kind of face would I have if the Rebbe appeared on Rosh Hashanah and I wasn’t there? Yes, why couldn’t the Rebbe have appeared a month earlier? But a month earlier I wasn’t supposed to be there. Tishrei was when I traveled every year, so suddenly I wouldn’t go now? Why? Why not travel? Then I arrived at 770. Maybe I even arrived before [unclear]; I don’t remember exactly which day. And I met a Jew whom I respect and value, to this day. He looked at me and said, “Tell me, why did you come?” I have to say, that was the first time in all those months since Adar that it occurred to me there was even room for that question. That there were people in the world—what a strange reality—for whom it wasn’t obvious that you had to come for Tishrei 5753. As I said, for people who were used to being with the Rebbe every day and davening with him, his absence was so conspicuous that they could ask that question. But that someone could think I’d come for nothing—and I don’t mean “for nothing” in terms of what we talk about today, about the very—

30:47 Speaker 6 fact that the Rebbe is there, the connection to him, his place, and the kuntres Beis Rabbeinu, which already existed. I’m not talking about that. I mean the simplest, most physical things, what physical eyes can see. That someone could think there was no reason to come from that perspective. I’m not talking about other considerations now. That someone could think, “Wait, perhaps we won’t hear the Rebbe’s voice.” That someone could imagine such a reality. And again, as someone who considered himself rational at the time, it shocked me. It made an impression on me: Wow, there are people like that. There are people who don’t understand why I keep running to 770 now, wanting to see what’s happening, wanting to be there. For some people, it really bothered them. That possibility existed. I didn’t judge them or anything, but it was something. Suddenly, when you say “the leader of the world”—yes, thank G-d, we have the leader of the world in every area, from politics to desires and so on. But when it came to this aspect of faith, that there was a world that thought differently—that was the first time I remember encountering it. I don’t know, but the idea suddenly struck me: Wait, why did I come? What do you mean, why did I come? To be with the Rebbe. He looked at me with this almost pitying expression. Then Tishrei came. People started talking; they built a balcony and so on. And he said to me—we were in touch almost daily—“Maybe, maybe, maybe there’ll be something. Maybe something will happen. Maybe. Don’t be disappointed.” He was trying to temper my expectations, and he believed too, you know. But yes: don’t be disappointed, and so on. On the other hand, yes.

32:32 Speaker 6 And I keep telling him about it excitedly. Yes, they were building, and people said the Rebbe would come out. They said this, they said that—they said a lot of things. But then Rosh Hashanah arrives, and the Rebbe does come out. Suddenly something is happening. And then Tishrei 5753—maybe you’ve done a program about it, or maybe you’ll do one. You could do a whole program about it. A hundred and one whole programs. That’s not the subject here, but I want to include it as part of what was happening. There was Rosh Hashanah, with the revelations of Rosh Hashanah, and afterward the balcony—the different stages with the balcony, this balcony and that one. I remember Yom Tov Sukkos, when the Rebbe came down to 770. Yes. I remember that. I remember sitting in a sukkah, and someone telling me that earlier, that same day of Sukkos, the Rebbe had come out after davening. Children had passed by the Rebbe, and the Rebbe encouraged them, and there were all kinds of things like that happening at 770. I remember someone came and told us. I was sitting there with a young married man, and when we heard it, we said, “We can’t sit here anymore. Let’s go to 770.” Well, we completely lost our appetite. We went to 770, and then people started saying, “The Rebbe is coming down! The Rebbe is coming down!” I ran like a madman about half a block from 770, because it was a few minutes before. I banged on the door of a sukkah on the other side and shouted, “Farbrengen! Farbrengen! The Rebbe is coming down—a farbrengen!” And the most down-to-earth Americans sitting there said to each other, “Is he crazy?” “No, anything can happen.” Anything can happen. I mean, even those Americans, as down-to-earth as they were—in Tishrei 5753, anything could happen, including a farbrengen when the Rebbe came down. I hurried back to 770. I stood there. I have no idea what I saw, what it was. It—

34:15 Speaker 6 I was standing very close. But you’re not exactly fully aware at a time like that—not for the reasons other people lost consciousness, but because you don’t grasp what you’re seeing. You don’t understand what you’re taking in. You’re nothing, but you’re there. I was there. And the Rebbe came down. That line he slipped in—“Anything can happen.” Anything can happen. Yes. A heading that really explains that whole period. Exactly. Anything can happen. There was nothing that couldn’t happen. And so, by that afternoon, all of Crown Heights had already come to arrange niggunim and sing. Maybe the Rebbe would come out again; maybe the Rebbe would come down. They had already prepared a place downstairs and a place upstairs and everything, because suddenly a farbrengen was possible. And I remember meeting that fellow and saying to him, “Why did I come? Now it’s already happened. Why did I come?” He was one of the people I had called over. I told him, “If I hadn’t come, you wouldn’t have been at the farbrengen.” That was really the atmosphere of Tishrei 5753, and of the rest of that year, with all the extraordinary events it held. 17 Tishrei, and all those things. All of it followed the same general direction, the same atmosphere: at the gates of the Geulah, if you want to call it that, heading straight toward Moshiach, toward the Geulah. Absolutely. And the Rebbe encouraged “Yechi Adoneinu.” People don’t grasp that at all, either. I remember Simchas Torah, when the Rebbe encouraged it for the first time, and the discussions beforehand about how to introduce the “Yechi” so that the Rebbe would approve it—or wouldn’t. You have to understand, everyone was holding back, because if the Rebbe had made that motion with his hand even once, as he sometimes did, that would have been it. It would have meant another few—

35:52 Speaker 6 months without “Yechi,” so to speak. And then, on Simchas Torah, the Rebbe encouraged the “Yechi,” and people danced there and talked about it. So yes, that was the atmosphere of all of 5753. That was the atmosphere. Again, there are fellows who were in the 5753 kvutza who can probably describe 5753 itself at 770 better. But I’m describing it from our perspective—even though I wasn’t at 770, that atmosphere was unmistakable. Because what was happening now? Now it was the stage of “Yechi Adoneinu Moreinu VeRabbeinu Melech HaMoshiach Leolam Vaed.” Incidentally, that was the headline every week in the official weekly paper of Chabad chassidim in the Holy Land: “Yechi Adoneinu Moreinu VeRabbeinu Melech HaMoshiach Leolam Vaed.” Yud Shvat came, and everyone was discussing it. The official Chabad position was that this was the revelation of Melech HaMoshiach. Some at the extremes spoke of more than that, but the official position was that it was the revelation of Melech HaMoshiach—not yet the true and complete Geulah, with Hashem’s help. These are all details you really could devote a program to, each one. I’m describing the atmosphere: what I was living, what I was feeling. That atmosphere the rabbi is talking about, all these details and everything that followed from them—that’s the atmosphere in which we arrived at 5754, above all. You spoke about Tishrei 5754. So when I arrived for the 5754 kvutza, it was obvious to me that I was coming to a kvutza of “Yechi Adoneinu.” It was obvious. There was already a routine; there were Moshiach pagers. You had all the ways of knowing that there were revelations after every davening, that the Rebbe encouraged “Yechi”—if not every time, then every few days. There were set times, one time and another. It was obvious to you that it was happening here, and obvious that something was going to happen. All the time, you knew something was going to happen. We had no idea what—

37:28 Speaker 6 when, how, how much, or why. We also heard the news about the Rebbe’s health. It wasn’t that we didn’t hear it or weren’t kept informed. There’s no room to go into it at length, but later in 5754, during the winter and so on, I also had a certain role in passing news on to Anash. It was all anonymous, so it’s less relevant here. But we were aware of everything. I’m not talking about people from whom something was hidden. There were some who were naive, and that’s fine too, but— Yes. No, I’m not talking about naivety. I’m not talking about people who didn’t know what was going on. This question really troubles me, and I want to talk about it for a moment. How do you bring those two things together as a Tamim who hears the reports—or is even one of the people responsible for passing on reports about the Rebbe’s health—alongside strong emunah and “Yechi Adoneinu,” the expectation of the Rebbe’s revelation? How do you put both of them on the same table? I gave you the answer just before: that feeling that, for us, what it says in Tanya—that “the life of a tzaddik is not physical life”—yes, but we weren’t... It wasn’t just something written in Tanya, you understand? We didn’t need to reconcile one with the other. There was a reality called the body. There was a reality of doctors, treatments, a state of health. That was real. It wasn’t that it didn’t exist; it mattered to us, too. We davened about it. We went to prayer gatherings because we loved the Rebbe. We wanted him—and each person felt that on his own level: one because he wanted to see the Rebbe, another because he genuinely cared

39:16 Speaker 6 From the Rebbe, one—never mind that now. That’s alongside the understanding that the Rebbe is above all this. But that’s exactly what I’m saying: it isn’t even an understanding. I’d call them two channels that hardly ever meet. No, that don’t meet. Two parallel lines that don’t meet, right? One has nothing to do with the other. You don’t imagine it. You know what? I think this story was told, maybe even here. I think Angie Bistritzky[unclear] described it. It may be a hard story for a Tomim today to hear. Because of his role, he was inside, in the room, and even helped with physical things, like helping the Rebbe eat. Then a question came in. He described all the details, but it was a question about an operation, a matter of life and death, right then. You couldn’t say, “Let the Rebbe rest a little first,” or anything like that. It’s hard to talk about. They asked, and the Rebbe said yes. No. Yes. I don’t remember all the details; they’re written down and have been published. But anyway, the Rebbe nodded his head. He answered, and they asked again. They wanted to be sure they’d understood what the Rebbe was saying. Once, twice, three times. In the end, the Rebbe settled it in the clearest possible way, and that’s what they did. Then he stopped. Reb [unclear] told me—told the story. In any case, he stopped and thought to himself, “Wait, what am I doing here? If the Rebbe is like this...” I don’t know; I’m describing what he thought, or what he said he thought. Nothing more. And suddenly the Rebbe turned to him and gestured, “Nu, keep going.” That, broadly speaking, captures it. So I didn’t know

41:01 Speaker 6 that story at the time, but for us that’s exactly what was happening. They were two lines that both had to be there, each making room for the other. Two things happening at once. I’m not even getting into the explanations. Both had to be there. Some mashpi’im knew how to explain it all precisely, with what was revealed and what was hidden, interpretations and sichos, and that’s all fine. People sat at farbrengens, farbrenged and talked about it all. But you wanted to know what our lives were like, not just the explanations. As I said, anyone could offer explanations then, and anyone can today; nothing has changed about that. I’m talking about the feeling—exactly like the feeling he describes when he was right there, inside. Now, when I wasn’t inside, what could I see? This was something I heard, and so was that. The Rebbe’s condition was what it was, and then there came a period when the Rebbe wasn’t there—when we couldn’t see the Rebbe. After Cheshvan, we no longer saw the Rebbe. I really want to ask about that, after this extraordinary account. We’ve gone through 5751, 5752 and 5753, and now we’ve begun 5754. You arrive for the 5754 group, knowing, as you described, that the storm is still in full force. You didn’t know what was going to happen on 14 Cheshvan. No, you didn’t think about that, but— Even on 14 Cheshvan we didn’t know, nor in Kislev, Teves, Shvat or Adar. That’s what I want to explain: from our point of view, 14 Cheshvan—only today do people come and say there was a date called 14 Cheshvan. Exactly. Of course you don’t know at that moment. But even a week or two later, it seems like a technical matter. You want it to happen. Just as there had been times when suddenly the Rebbe didn’t come out for

42:34 Speaker 6 four days. Exactly. So it was another day the Rebbe didn’t come out, and another day, and another day. But it wasn’t just another day: it was another day on which the Rebbe might come out. So here’s what I want to ask: with that whole atmosphere and that tremendous, powerful faith, unlike anything I know of in Chabad chassidic history, how did you reach 27 Adar 5754? How did you reach Gimmel Tammuz 5754 carrying all of that? Wait—27 Adar came a few days after the well-known eye operation, and the story with Ari Elush[unclear] and so on. That, too, was an extraordinary story in an extraordinary period. So it remained extraordinary. And then came what’s called the second 27 Adar. I described it to someone recently: I still remember someone coming and telling me there had been another stroke. I said to him, “You mean the one from two years ago, right?” That was the feeling. Wait, wait—what are we talking about now? Until it became clear. It was hard, of course. But again, this was an extraordinary time, after months in which, on the one hand, you didn’t see the Rebbe. You heard the Rebbe: when you went to the small zal at night and tried to listen, you could hear the Rebbe coughing from his room. Sometimes you heard the Rebbe [unclear]. Sometimes treatments had to be done, and suddenly the Rebbe would come out. There were all sorts of things like that, which you experienced firsthand if you were one of the bochurim who knew where to be and what to do. And you’d watch videos of the Rebbe’s farbrengens when the Rebbe was five [unclear] away from you.

44:15 Speaker 6 You understand? That was the feeling. But then came 21 Adar, and again it was something extraordinary. Another extraordinary thing had been added to an extraordinary time, and another thing. And now, suddenly, the Rebbe was in a hospital. The Rebbe was at Beth Israel, not even in 770. That was something else altogether. But again, it was an extraordinary situation. Then began the whole routine at Beth Israel, that remarkable period—but that isn’t our subject here.

44:49 Speaker 11 Did you go straight away?

44:50 Speaker 6 When you go? No. I mean, there was no reason to, because in another moment they’d do [unclear], like they had yesterday.

44:57 Speaker 11 In other words, things were still completely unclear.

44:59 Speaker 6 I don’t know what their plans were, but afterward, yes, right away. All right. Whether we went a few hours later or a day later—I have more images from that time than anything else. I didn’t write a diary then. I mean, we got updates from the lobby, and there’s—

45:16 Speaker 11 Something that conveys the atmosphere.

45:17 Speaker 6 Exactly. So I can describe scenes, because there were so many things. Let’s say that by Shabbos I was certainly there. Then they opened the synagogue downstairs at Beth Israel, and there was that whole period of learning there and coming there. Some people were there all day; others came during breaks from their sedarim[unclear], and so on. Personally, I spent every Shabbos there from 21 Adar until 2 Tammuz, which was a Shabbos. I was there for every Shabbos, Yom Tov—everything. I slept there with the bochurim in the auditorium across the street, in some high school. Only in hindsight do you realize how astonishing that was. Wait, why would the City of New York let you sleep in a school? But there was the school, with mattresses and so on. All those arrangements were there. Some people had more organized, somewhat more comfortable places, and many walked over from Crown Heights on Shabbos afternoon or at other times. But on Shabbos, for instance, I remember why I stayed. People asked me, “What is there to do there on Shabbos?” I said, “On a weekday, if the Rebbe appears—excuse me, I mean, if someone tells me he’s appearing—I hear about it immediately and run over. But what happens on Shabbos? I’d have twenty-four hours without knowing what’s going on.” I couldn’t—I’m telling you, for that “simple” reason, at least that’s how I felt. I couldn’t be far from the center of things, because clearly something was happening there.

46:38 Speaker 11 Something special. Wow.

46:39 Speaker 6 Something was happening there. And then there was the Seder night, on Motzaei Shabbos. It was relatively empty at first because many people tried to make their Seder elsewhere, and many came later on foot. But we made the Seder there, under unusual conditions. It really, really was a whole period—Beth Israel was a period in itself. I remember “kindness and faithfulness to the House of Israel.” Someone mentioned that phrase in an interview. It really was faith at Beth Israel. That’s what being there was.

47:08 Speaker 11 Faith was at Beth Israel.

47:09 Speaker 6 Yes, yes. And people could come down from the Rebbe’s room and talk about physical matters, all sorts of things—I don’t know quite how to describe them. At the same time, the debate, or the discussion, was about exactly how we were to bring about the revelation: how to make the announcement, how, where—here or there.

47:27 Speaker 11 In other words.

47:28 Speaker 6 It went together. Together. Not one or the other. Of course there were always people who leaned more one way and people who leaned more the other way, but that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about how the two things worked together. And then Gimmel Tammuz came. Okay, after a Shabbos there—you could describe every Shabbos there, every day, and the farbrengens there. All kinds, with all kinds of people.

47:54 Speaker 11 There.

47:54 Speaker 6 Absolutely. People came from all sorts of places. Sometimes they stayed for a whole Shabbos, sometimes not. Anyone who was there will remember the hospital auditorium on one side and the high school gym on the other. For anyone who was there, those places mean something. And all the talk about clear faith. The arguments were about whether doing something was contrary to the Rebbe’s wishes or in keeping with them. Even those who were most opposed back then—the argument against saying “Yechi” wasn’t that it couldn’t be so, but that, in their view, the Rebbe didn’t want it said that way. I’m not taking a position here; I’m saying that the argument, the discussion, the whole conversation was always about what the Rebbe wants now. Not what he wanted in the past—what he wants now.

48:43 Speaker 12 And about the Rebbe’s revelation and all that.

48:44 Speaker 6 It was the same thing I said before: anything could happen. Let’s say that even on Motzaei Shabbos, going into Gimmel Tammuz, when the situation was already—those who knew the situation at a certain point knew. First of all, the fact is that most of us, if not all of us, went back to 770. We’d been there for Shabbos and went back, even those who were there regularly. But often on Motzaei Shabbos you’d go to pick things up; there wasn’t any sense then that you had to stay put. And again, if at that moment—

49:14 Speaker 12 Who went back to 770 with you?

49:16 Speaker 6 I remember we took the train, and there was even some problem with the train. I remember those details. There was no reason not to go. They said there might be a development? Fine, they said a lot of things. And if you had come to people right then and told them what had happened—or whatever—but if you had told them, “The Rebbe has just revealed himself, stood up and encouraged the singing,” that possibility, the one I just described, would have sounded much more realistic to ninety percent of the people than the other possibility.

49:52 Speaker 12 To that extent?

49:53 Speaker 6 Absolutely. Absolutely.

49:54 Speaker 12 Because what you just said is based on what—

49:59 Speaker 6 Anything could happen.

49:59 Speaker 12 We’ve been talking about for the last eighty minutes.

50:01 Speaker 6 Exactly, exactly.

50:02 Speaker 12 “Anything could happen” meant the Rebbe’s revelation.

50:05 Speaker 6 Yes, yes, of course. Exactly. There was one direction and one direction only, and that was where things were heading. So I’m telling you unequivocally: a minute before those announcements were made, and even a minute after, if someone had said, “Okay, medically it’s over, and now the Rebbe has stood up and revealed himself,” people would have considered that the most, most logical thing. Logical. I’m talking about what they thought was likely to happen, okay? And not only that. I don’t know what was in each person’s heart, but I can tell you what the feeling was. And again, the friends from my group, the people I was with—they hold a range of views today, like the range of views in Lubavitch. What I’m saying has nothing to do with that. I’m not talking about what happened afterward or anything like that. I’m talking about that very moment, that very period. That possibility was there both before and after—all through that night of Gimmel Tammuz.

51:07 Speaker 12 Maybe I want to pause and really get into that. What did you experience personally? I mean, when they came—

51:14 Speaker 6 I’ll tell you: it was a breaking point. First of all, no one said—well, what did they say, how did they say it, and so on. My parents in Israel aren’t Chabad, and they were already convinced they needed to call and check that I was still sane, since I’d stayed. I couldn’t understand what they wanted from me. People said, “Your parents are worried,” and I thought, what happened? What happened? So, personally, I have a sort of partial blackout. What do I mean? I remember a great deal, and at the same time I remember nothing. I remember images, feelings, things I did. There are images, and there’s even a little documentation of things we did. But right then—I have to say that, for me personally, it was a kind of shattering. I didn’t feel shattered, but that’s because you reach a point where, in a sense, you don’t feel anything. The feeling is so overwhelming that you don’t feel it at all. Nowadays people talk a lot—even mashpi’im talk about it—about being present, being in the moment. No. I don’t have that. I can’t tell you. You can hear it in my voice, but I can’t... I work on describing feelings in my life, okay? But I can’t. That’s it. I can’t. There may be a thousand explanations for it in psychology and the study of the mind. I have no idea what I felt then. What I do know is that it was clear to me that this was what was happening. That

52:58 Speaker 6 somehow the Rebbe was revealing himself here. I didn’t know how. I no longer had... Some people immediately brought out Midrashim about a few hours, the last three hours, and so on. I respected everyone, but I had no idea. Yet it was clear that it was happening and not happening at the same time. Okay?

53:18 Speaker 13 And the feeling about the Rebbe’s revelation was that something had happened here, or the world was saying something, but we were now on alert for something else.

53:28 Speaker 6 No. I mean, some people felt one way and some another. For me, it wasn’t even a matter of listening to what the world was saying, except for the practical order of things—what was going to happen now, and no more than that. I know that I was around people who didn’t tear their garments, okay? People who laughed at those who did, and people who danced. I danced, but I also understood those who didn’t. Or rather, no, I didn’t understand those who weren’t dancing. But I wasn’t one of those saying, “Oh, how wonderful, the revelation,” as it’s sometimes described. That wasn’t what I thought. It was dancing out of faith, not out of joy. I’d distinguish between the two. Perhaps some people managed to feel joy; perhaps they didn’t even need to.

54:10 Speaker 13 Slowly, you are managing to get there.

54:11 Speaker 6 No, I’m giving you my analysis now.

54:14 Speaker 13 Not intellectually. Tell me what it was like for you.

54:16 Speaker 6 Was I happy? No. Did I dance? Yes, I danced. And as I said, did I feel joy then? No. No, no, no. Sadness, probably. Shock, probably. But faith, certainly. I danced because one had to dance now, because that’s what you do when Moshiach reveals himself. Okay? That’s what you do, because now is the revelation of Melech HaMoshiach. Again, I’m trying to convey the intensity of it. It was simply overwhelming. There’s an explanation that some things are so intense that the soul can’t contain them, so you put them, as it were, in another world. Whatever the mechanism is called—you don’t need to know the psychological terms. But then you go back to 770, and suddenly some of the lights are turned off, and you see people who have torn their garments, and Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu arrives and starts quoting words of eulogy. I couldn’t... Where did you get that from now? And as I said, it wasn’t that I was happy rather than sad. I was as sad as he was. But where did a eulogy come from now? That was the feeling. Where was this coming from? A day or two, maybe a few days later, I remember they held a gathering for the bochurim, with the administration and so on. One of the mashpi’im began explaining that if we said “Yechi Adoneinu” now, it would be understood to mean that, even before, when we said it, we had meant it only in this particular way and not another. I remember saying to the bochurim—I thought perhaps I didn’t understand the Yiddish. I understood Yiddish from the Rebbe’s broadcasts, but I hadn’t grown up with it. For a moment I thought I didn’t understand Yiddish at all. I said to them, “Is that what he

56:02 Speaker 6 said?” Okay?

56:06 Speaker 13 Mm-hmm.

56:07 Speaker 6 And one of the bochurim said, “Yes, that’s what he’s saying.” I said, “Is he normal?” I mean, he was telling me that—basically, the implication was that Gimmel Tammuz was in some way similar to Yud Shvat. That’s what came across, if I’m reconstructing what he said, right? That there was some resemblance. Of course, he had a thousand qualifications about how they were different and all that. With all the opposition of that mashpia, right? He made sure to stress that it wasn’t the same thing. But the very thought that it was similar in some way, right? And now, for heaven’s sake, you’ve just come back from Montefiore [?], and it’s supposed to be similar? No. No, but I’m saying again, it hadn’t happened yet. There had been all the sichos, the things we’d learned, and the farbrengens we’d held and listened to all year, from mashpi’im and so on. And Rabbi Yoel, as he was then—with all the... I mean, we also had the intellectual tools to explain everything, of course. And if you find me [unclear] there, at that very farbrengen—that’s where the story of Vehu Yigaleinu and the coming of Moshiach began.

57:10 Speaker 3 So here, this is really the point—

57:12 Speaker 6 At that point we began to grasp that there was the real reality, the one we were living, and there was the other reality described in the newspapers. Okay? Right there—if you want to talk about how Gimmel Tammuz continued to affect us, it was in those moments, that week. And I’m saying this for the first time, because now, as I’m talking about what the point was, right? There was the issue that the Chabad newspaper wouldn’t stop printing “Yechi Adoneinu,” right? That made us very angry. Fine. And they came out with “We have become orphans, and there is none...” and I don’t know what else, and so on and so forth. Yes, it all made us angry. Fine, but getting angry isn’t a plan of action, right? It was the moment we realized we were talking about two different realities that had nothing to do with each other. The question wasn’t whether to travel or not to travel, right? That wasn’t what the discussion was about.

58:08 Speaker 3 Something fundamental.

58:09 Speaker 6 Fundamental.

58:11 Speaker 3 Indeed.

58:11 Speaker 6 They put up signs—yes, but even “Melech HaMoshiach,” in terms of writing “Melech HaMoshiach,” or even writing “Yechi,” is one thing. This was about living “Yechi.” I mean, on Gimmel Tammuz, had we become orphans or hadn’t we? Now we know we hadn’t. We know we have a Rebbe. We have a Rebbe. We know there is Geulah. We know there is Moshiach. We know there’s what gets broadcast from 770 in the Chabad and non-Chabad media, though sometimes it’s sort of broadcast—

58:44 Speaker 3 A lot of the non-Chabad coverage comes from the Chabad coverage.

58:45 Speaker 6 Obviously. It has no connection to reality. To me, no connection whatsoever. Maybe on the surface—on the surface, on the surface—we’re talking about the same stones. But as for the reality, there’s no... You know, to me, what they were doing was lying.

59:05 Speaker 3 And that’s what led you, a group of Temimim, to establish the Beis Moshiach newspaper.

59:09 Speaker 6 Certainly.

59:09 Speaker 3 Of which you had the privilege of becoming editor-in-chief.

59:12 Speaker 6 Certainly. At first there was the book Vehu Yigaleinu, which came out then. And as for how that came about, I can’t... There was a group—I wasn’t actually part of its inner circle—but I helped a little too, because anyone who could... I had already written a little for Peninei Geulah and so on. Anyone who could put three sentences together in proper Hebrew was—

59:30 Speaker 3 A member, and—

59:30 Speaker 6 And there were quite a few of you who were also familiar with the subject, right? So you were recruited in some way to help explain it. I remember that then—

59:38 Speaker 3 Producing a book like that in a month isn’t a small job; that’s already—

59:42 Speaker 6 Much less than a month, because they only decided on Gimmel Tammuz. It was clear that we had to—

59:46 Speaker 3 Put the truth on the table.

59:47 Speaker 6 First of all, articles like that had already appeared earlier, and there were things written before that needed to be cleaned up. An insane amount of work. I’ll tell you honestly, and here I really did have a part. I’m not saying this out of modesty: I have no idea how it happened. I remember the conversations and all that, but what I remember is the realization that we had to convey what we felt and what we knew. It was clear to us, but we had to put something out there, because there were words for it, there were explanations. For the first time, we delved into the theory as well. I know they call it theology. I mean, into the written material. To find those maamarim and find the things mashpi’im had already spoken about before.

1:00:28 Speaker 3 To write.

1:00:30 Speaker 6 Yes, to gather, edit, write, improve. Yes, all of it, all of it, all of it. But that’s the technical work. I’m talking to you about the feeling. That’s what we’re talking about now. I mean, there’s the interesting detail of how they did it back then. When it comes to Vehu Yigaleinu, I don’t have an answer about exactly how they did it. But I do know what brought it about. It was that we said: What we know, apparently not everyone knows. That assumption that what’s clear to us... Suddenly we realized, wow. If someone keeps reading only what’s being published today, they won’t know the truth. Not that they won’t know what I know. I’m not interested in publicizing what I know. But people simply wouldn’t know the truth. I remember the “wow” of Vehu Yigaleinu across the whole spectrum—even among people who today are considered the strongest opponents. Without that material, you lose your way, because it’s the compass. Right? I mean, because it’s something that—

1:01:28 Speaker 3 It’s like many people say: Vehu Yigaleinu was the Beis Moshiach of its day.

1:01:32 Speaker 6 Exactly, that’s—

1:01:33 Speaker 3 What today—

1:01:34 Speaker 6 Talks about Moshiach. Exactly, exactly. Now, that’s historical analysis. I’m not... I’m talking about that moment when it happened: suddenly there was an entire book saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, this is the truth. This is the Rebbe. This is the Rebbe’s teaching. This is the clear, official position of Chabad Lubavitch, of the Rebbe shlita, Melech HaMoshiach.” Right? That was it.

1:02:07 Speaker 3 And from there we get to Beis Moshiach.

1:02:09 Speaker 6 It’s the same idea. It’s the same idea, except that now it comes out every week.

1:02:12 Speaker 3 Already then. So let me ask, just on a practical level: besides the feeling you’ve described, had there already been talk of a Chabad newspaper or magazine for Fridays, or—

1:02:23 Speaker 6 Listen, I don’t know. I don’t know. So I’ll describe a few anecdotes, and maybe that will give us something. I remember Rabbi Benny Edel [?] coming to me and saying, “Listen, we have to do something.” That much was obvious. He’s talking to me, and we both agree we have to do something. But the difference between us is that he’s a man who builds things, while I’m a man of theory. So as far as I’m concerned, we have to do something. Okay, we have to do something. For him, that means next week you show up with a newspaper. Yes. Yes. No, we didn’t even know that. I mean, it was already at the printer. But then came the next sentence: “If you don’t do it, it won’t happen.” Right? I mean, the way to recruit someone—the best way to get people to act, as everyone knows. Right? “Take it on yourself. That’s it. Goodbye. There are a few young married fellows here, fired up and thoroughly committed to the cause. They’ll help you. Go to so-and-so.” Right? I’m not naming names now. They deserve every bit of credit. I simply haven’t spoken with any of them; I don’t know where each of them is today. But I do want to stress to the bochurim that there were many people, thank G-d, each of whom is now in his own place and doing his own work. If you open the first issues of Beis Moshiach, you can find certain names, while others remain behind the scenes to this day, and the credit is theirs. I, too, was Shemesh ben Chaim [?], I think. No, I don’t remember if that was ever used. At some point Alper [?] was mentioned too, but not on the articles themselves—not on anything. So I don’t know how many pages the first issue had. Look at issue one. People remind me of it: “It is hard to write at a time like this, but we have no choice but to write”

1:04:01 Speaker 6 And you’ll find it there—yes, that was the feeling. These were pages printed with what were then advanced computer programs, using design software called Einstein and Q-Text [?]. For the old-timers who know what I’m talking about: very advanced computers, right? A 486 was the height of it. So when you ask me whether we thought of making a big newspaper: yes, there was talk about it. I remember that after a few weeks, people came to discuss what would have to be done so that this wouldn’t happen. It would be funny to call it a competing newspaper, but they did come. And I remember—we talked about it and said that, for now, our demands were very modest. Even on the inside cover, it could be as unobtrusive as possible, right? And they should give Rabbi Leivitz [?] and Ginzburg, the people who had written before, a place. In other words, there should at least be room for that view and those things. We said that’s how it is now, but in another year, when the newspaper has editors and people who make their living from it and market it, it’ll be a different story.

1:04:59 Speaker 4 They didn’t agree.

1:04:59 Speaker 6 I mean, there was—I didn’t conduct the negotiations, so I don’t know what was said. I’m only talking about the feeling, right? The feeling was that we were doing something. What brought that home was the responses we got. The responses were exactly the same as with [unclear]. The responses were... At first it reached Eretz Yisroel by fax, and they pinned it up, right? The way they used to pin up the updates on the notice boards of the Rebbe Rashab. “A Tomim’s Diary in 770”—that was its name. As far as I’m concerned, that’s still the name of the newspaper today, right? “A Tomim’s Diary in 770.” That was Beis Moshiach. There’s a Tomim in 770; there’s life in 770.

1:05:34 Speaker 4 770.

1:05:35 Speaker 6 Yes, that’s fine, but you know what I mean. And it wasn’t just crying, either—things were happening. You could see it in people, just from the responses. I don’t think—no, I mean, as a bochur you don’t think at all about what happens to what you write, right? You write it, send it off, go to make copies, and come back a few hours before Shabbos with the copied pages from the copy shop. That’s it. And suddenly we realized that something was happening here. But I have no interest in talking about it to glorify it. Maybe you’ll do a separate episode about Beis Moshiach. I’m talking about the feeling. The feeling was: yes, you have to convey one thing—the truth. That’s all. Not “you have to convey the ideology,” not “you have to convey the extreme positions,” not “you have to convey all sorts of expressions we use today.” And that’s fine; that’s how the world works. But at that moment, the feeling, the knowledge, our thinking—both with [unclear] and with this, and with everything, in every conversation I had with someone, and also in the lead-up to Tishrei 5755, with the lineup of the gathering and everything that was going on then—the point was the truth. That’s all. Nothing else interests me. What interests me is the truth, that the truth be conveyed. Something real is happening here: the revelation, the Geulah, the preparation, along with the other things and so on. But there is something real here. The message of the truth is missing, so we supply it. If it isn’t missing, we don’t need to supply it. But this is the truth, and it remains. That’s what remains to this day. I mean, what are you left with? That it’s the truth. Period. That’s it. We can talk about everything else—what was nicer, this gathering or that gathering in that year, 5755, a wild year, right? And all the things that happened afterward and continue

1:07:16 Speaker 6 to this day in one form or another. But one point has to be clear. There is a truth, and it is the truth because it is the truth. Not because I arrived at it through a close reading of a sicha of the Rebbe. I didn’t arrive at the fact that the sun rose today through a close reading, either. I didn’t understand it only from a sicha of the Rebbe. Of course, if it weren’t for [unclear], then that reality wouldn’t be true either. So obviously I need those things; everything flows from the Rebbe’s words. But the reason is that it’s true. That’s all. So about this truth: one of the people who wrote back then wrote to people about Gimmel Tammuz, “Things that can’t happen don’t happen.” That was his line. Okay?

1:08:03 Speaker 4 About Gimmel Tammuz.

1:08:03 Speaker 6 Yes. Things that can’t—but that’s exactly the point. Is it true? If it was true up to 2 Tammuz, then it was also true on 4 Tammuz, and on 11 Tammuz, and in Tishrei, and in Tammuz 5714. It’s the same truth. Truth doesn’t change. The circumstances—how to say it, when to say it, how it finds expression, what to do here and what to do there, whether to make a path or build a palace or make an extension or whatever—those are important, essential matters. And careful reading and learning, and everything people do, are of the greatest importance. But there is only one starting point: it’s true. That’s all. And truth doesn’t change. We don’t have a truth that was true yesterday but not today, or a temporary truth, or a relative truth, or a partial truth. It’s the truth. Is it true that there is Hakadosh Boruch Hu? Yes. Is it true that there is a Rebbe? Yes. Is it true that the Rebbe is revealed as Melech HaMoshiach? Yes. So that’s the truth. Now, you might ask, you might say—

1:09:03 Speaker 4 Thank you very much, Rabbi Alperin, for this special program, which helps us come alive to the atmosphere of 5754—and not just that, but everything surrounding it. Thank you very much, Rabbi Alperin. With Hashem’s help, may we merit to be deeply immersed in the true and complete Geulah, and to hear this program again afterward, with Hashem’s help.

1:09:22 Speaker 6 And even then, the truth won’t change. Yechi Adoneinu Moreinu V’Rabbeinu Melech HaMoshiach l’olam va’ed.

1:09:27 Speaker 4 Thank you very much, Rabbi Alperin. Thank you.

1:09:31 Speaker 5 Ears to Hear. Audio programs for the Temimim from World Atah. For more programs, dial star 6358. Yechi Adoneinu Moreinu V’Rabbeinu Melech HaMoshiach l’olam va’ed.