Episode 19: The Baal Shem Tov Leads the Hidden Tzaddikim

00:01 Continuing the story of Rabbi Yaakov Karpil, Rabbi [unclear] Yitzchak, the town of Shari, and Hirsch Leib—the hidden wanderer who came to Shari and began to influence it with his good spirit—we now tell of the Baal Shem Tov. He was the one who sent Hirsch Leib to Shari and brought about the town’s transformation for the better. Here is the story: At the age of eighteen, Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov was already a respected member of the group of hidden tzaddikim. At that time, the group was led by Rabbi Adam Baal Shem of Ropshitz. Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov, who would later found the Chassidic movement, was already working at that young age to forge a new path—or, more precisely, to introduce new ideas into the existing approach of the hidden tzaddikim. He had in mind new tasks that he believed belonged to the hidden tzaddikim and that they should carry out as they traveled among Jewish cities and towns. Rabbi Yisroel shared these ideas with one of the hidden tzaddikim, Rabbi Mordechai, who was very close to him and regarded him as his guide. Rabbi Mordechai passed Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov’s ideas on to Rabbi Adam Baal Shem of Ropshitz, the leader of the hidden tzaddikim. Rabbi Adam asked Rabbi Mordechai to join with another hidden tzaddik, Rabbi Kehos, and with Rabbi Yisroel himself to develop a plan based on these ideas. They would then present it at the gathering of hidden tzaddikim that was due to take place shortly. At that gathering, Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov proposed, among other things, that the hidden tzaddikim sent to cities and towns devote themselves to specific tasks. For example, wherever teachers for young children were needed—especially in villages where Jewish families did not employ teachers and their children grew up without learning anything—the hidden tzaddikim there would serve

02:56 as teachers. These tzaddikim would also regularly teach adults who, for various reasons, had been left without an education and knew nothing about their Judaism. This undertaking required considerable funds. To that end, Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov chose two hidden tzaddikim: Rabbi Aharon Dovid, a carpenter in Brody, and Rabbi Shlomo Chaim, a tailor in Lemberg. He charged them with raising the money needed for the undertaking to succeed, and they were very successful. At about the same time, Rabbi Kehos came to Shari. He was one of the three whom Rabbi Adam Baal Shem had charged with developing the new ideas concerning the work of the hidden tzaddikim. Rabbi Kehos visited Hirsch Leib, who, as we know, had long been teaching Torah to simple Jews. Early in their conversation, Rabbi Kehos asked Hirsch Leib about Yaakov Karpil. He told him, “I came here as an emissary of Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov. Rabbi Yisroel told me that in Shari there is a simple Jew named Yaakov Karpil. He has a good heart, and through his deeds he has reached a very high spiritual level. Yaakov Karpil’s deeds made an impression in Heaven. Yaakov Karpil and his wife, Tzippah Bracha, performed an extraordinary mitzvah. However, Rabbi Yisroel related, the Satan brought an accusation against him before the Heavenly Court and demanded that he be handed over to be tested. And so it was: Yaakov Karpil fell ill. He withstood the test and remained steadfast. For that reason, Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov announced that Yaakov Karpil and his wife, Tzippah Bracha, would be granted their great wish and blessed with a son. They would also be blessed with wealth.” Hirsch Leib was astonished by what Rabbi Kehos told him. He was now hearing for the first time that Yaakov Karpil had gone through difficult times and that, because he had given all his possessions to

05:54 save a Jewish child from conversion and an entire family from distress, he had fallen deeply into debt. Rabbi Kehos had brought 150 rubles, which he had been given to help Yaakov Karpil out of debt and enable him to begin trading. Rabbi Kehos thought Yaakov Karpil would refuse to accept the money as a donation or anything of the sort, or even as a loan, so he asked Hirsch Leib to find a way to give it to him. “The two of us will go to Yaakov Karpil’s home,” Hirsch Leib said. There, he introduced Rabbi Kehos as a traveler about to set off on a long journey who wanted to leave some money in safe hands. On the advice of his friend Hirsch Leib, he explained, the traveler had decided to leave the money with Yaakov Karpil, with permission to use it for any purpose he wished until Rabbi Kehos returned from his journey. Well, Yaakov Karpil was hesitant at first to take responsibility for someone else’s money. But after his teacher Hirsch Leib and the visitor, Rabbi Kehos, urged him, he finally agreed to take it. Rabbi Kehos immediately left Shari. Yaakov Karpil used part of the money to pay his most pressing debts, and with the rest he bought merchandise and began selling it in the villages. He was very successful. Before long, his fortunes had turned and he had become a wealthy man. Not much time passed before Tzippah Bracha told her husband that she was expecting a child. It came as a great surprise to them: Yaakov Karpil was already sixty-three, and Tzippah Bracha was fifty-seven. At first, they were very worried that, G-d forbid, something might happen to the baby or that the child might be born with a disability. To their great joy, however, they had a healthy son, and from the moment of his birth it was clear that he would develop well. His parents named him Yosef Yitzchak

08:50 after Tzippah Bracha’s father. He was the one we mentioned earlier, who would later marry Devorah Leah, the sister of Baruch, father of the author of the Tanya and founder of Chabad. The mysterious Hirsch Leib remained in Shari for several more years, spreading Torah and teaching the simple Jews. Thanks to his work, many of them advanced in their studies and made great progress. Of course, no one knew that Hirsch Leib had come to Shari on a special mission for that very purpose. When he had successfully completed his mission, however, he was given another one and had to leave Shari. Before he left, he went to see his first student, Yaakov Karpil, who, thanks to him, had become a learned Jew—someone who knew his way around a sefer. And thanks to the kindness of the Baal Shem Tov, who had sent him 150 gold rubles, he had also become very wealthy. Until then, Yaakov Karpil had known nothing about the Baal Shem Tov or his new approach to serving Hashem, the way of Chassidus. Hirsch Leib had kept it secret from him. Now, however, Hirsch Leib revealed to Yaakov Karpil, first, that he himself was a hidden tzaddik and, second, that the money Yaakov Karpil had received as a loan came from the fund of the hidden tzaddikim. Hirsch Leib told Rabbi Yaakov Karpil at length about the Baal Shem Tov, about Chassidus, and about the work of the Baal Shem Tov’s emissaries, the hidden tzaddikim, in spreading the teachings of Chassidus. Rabbi Yaakov Karpil was deeply moved. He returned the money to Hirsch Leib and also donated 300 rubles to the fund of the hidden tzaddikim. Yaakov Karpil also told Hirsch Leib that he wanted to learn the way of Chassidus and the path of the hidden tzaddikim, and to join them. He asked Rabbi Hirsch Leib to take him along on his travels. Hirsch Leib agreed, and for several months Yaakov Karpil traveled together with him

11:31 with Hirsch Leib, the hidden tzaddik. Afterward, Yaakov Karpil returned to Shari, filled with powerful impressions of the hidden tzaddikim he had met along the way and of their tremendous efforts to bring their fellow Jews closer to their Father in Heaven. All this was under the guidance and direction of their teacher, Rabbi Yisroel Baal Shem Tov, whom Yaakov Karpil had also been privileged to visit with Hirsch Leib and who had made a deep impression on him. Yaakov Karpil was blessed with a son, Yosef Yitzchak, in fulfillment of the Baal Shem Tov’s blessing, and he decided that his son would be raised in the ways of Chassidus. The child proved to be gifted in every way. He had exceptional abilities. By the age of three, Yosef Yitzchak could already read and knew all the blessings by heart. By five, he knew Tanach and certain Mishnayos well. It was clear to everyone that he was a true prodigy. Yaakov Karpil asked one of the visitors who came to Shari to serve as his son’s teacher. Apparently, the visitor was one of the hidden tzaddikim who had not concealed his identity from Yaakov Karpil. More than that, it seems that this hidden tzaddik had been sent especially by the Baal Shem Tov to teach young Yosef Yitzchak. At the same time, Yaakov Karpil also took an interest in the progress of Dovid, the boy he had saved from conversion and sent to study in a yeshiva. When Dovid grew up, Yaakov Karpil arranged a match for him with one of his brother’s daughters. Yosef Yitzchak studied with the hidden tzaddik for six consecutive years, and in time became a great Torah scholar. On that hidden tzaddik’s advice—which, apparently, was given at the Baal Shem Tov’s instruction—Yaakov Karpil then sent his son Yosef Yitzchak to Minsk to study in the yeshiva there. Minsk was renowned at the time as a great Jewish center, and they immediately recognized the young man’s greatness and gave him the title “the prodigy from Shari.” Yaakov Karpil, who had already been older when Yosef Yitzchak was born,

14:17 was now an old man. He decided to retire from business. He divided his businesses among his son and the husbands of his brother’s and sister’s daughters, whom he had cared for as though they were his own children. He and his wife, Tzipa Bracha, moved to Minsk. They wanted to be with their son, especially after Yosef Yitzchak had become renowned in Minsk as a prodigy and everyone placed their trust in him.