Episode 96: Victory Over the Cruel Estate Manager, by Feivish Henoch

00:00 We continue with the astonishing story of the holy ascetic. The horseman—the estate manager’s servant who had been sent to bring the ascetic to the estate by force—returned and told his master that there was no way he could even contemplate taking such a holy man anywhere by force. For that, he was sentenced to a severe flogging with a braided whip, the kind that usually left a person unconscious or dead. The blows began to fall on his bare body, one after another. The air split with the crack of the braided whip, its mighty echo mingling with each fierce blow. Usually, in such cases, the first lashes raised red welts on the body. Soon afterward, streams of blood began to flow. The person being flogged would cry out bitterly, weep and beg for mercy. His battered body would shake as if with fever, and by the end of the ordeal he would either faint or breathe his last. The custom then was that, even after the flogging was over and the offender lay battered, bleeding, tormented and barely breathing, he still had to crawl with his remaining strength to the estate manager or the landowner and kiss the leather of his shoes. In most cases, the victim remained unconscious after the punishment. Once taken home, he would be confined to bed for days or weeks before recovering even a little. But in the case of the defiant servant, all the onlookers were astonished: the lashes left no mark at all on his bare body. He had already received ten blows, yet there were no red welts. His body did not even stir under the force of the tremendous blows, as though he felt no pain whatsoever. What could it mean? Were the whips too soft? Or were the men wielding them not strong enough? From his lofty seat, the manager ordered

03:07 new whips to be brought and stronger men to wield them with all their might. But none of it helped. The servant took the lashes as though they had not touched him at all. When the full number of blows had been delivered and he was released from his bonds, he remained standing as if nothing had happened. Of his own accord, he stretched himself out on the ground, crawled to the landowner, kissed his shoes, then got up and went home safe and sound. For the moment, the crowd was not thinking about how this had happened or what had caused it. Everyone was eagerly awaiting the next spectacle: what would happen to the holy ascetic when he was brought onto the platform and the landowner treated him as landowners so often treated unfortunate Jews, making them the victims of their antics for amusement. Earlier, the estate manager had sent five horsemen to Dubrovna under the command of a senior officer. They had strict orders to bring the ascetic back at any cost, even if force was required. Now the estate manager and the entire crowd waited on the platform for the messengers to return. But they came back empty-handed. The landowner’s anger blazed, though the commander of the horsemen had an explanation. “It was impossible to approach him,” he said. “When we arrived, waves of his sweet voice reached us and penetrated to our very bones. I went closer and saw him sitting with his eyes closed, singing his prayers. He neither saw nor heard what was happening around him. I was filled with awe for him. He was wrapped in a tallis, and a black leather box rested on his head. I summoned my courage and went over to deliver our message, but my feet could not move and my voice froze in my throat.” The estate manager interrupted him angrily and impatiently. “And what happened in the end?” he demanded. “I cracked my whip in the air,” said the commander, “to

06:05 let the ascetic know we were standing there. But he went on singing as if nothing had happened. By then, the other horsemen had seen that I was paralyzed, and they fled the beis midrash in mortal terror. I began wondering how I would get out of there alive. I was glad I managed it, because I feared I would remain rooted to the spot forever, with my arm extended in the air.” The horseman finished his story in great agitation. The estate manager was seized with boundless fury. “Disobedient servant! You failed to carry out my order.” He commanded that the horseman be given thirty lashes. This time, the blows took effect. The commander writhed in agony. Red marks covered his body, and then streams of blood burst from them. When the flogging ended, he lay unconscious, battered and bleeding. Buckets of cold water were poured over him, and only then did he somehow manage to crawl on all fours to the cruel landowner and kiss his shoes. Having dealt with the offending horseman, the estate manager announced triumphantly that he himself would go to Dubrovna to bring back the ascetic. “I will show all these people that they are nothing but weaklings steeped in superstition. The ascetic is no holy man—he is a madman and an idler. You will see him dancing and prancing here before us yet.” He immediately ordered horses saddled for himself and his escorts, and a carriage harnessed to bring back the ascetic. He also sent for the priest and asked him to accompany him. It is unclear whether he felt he needed protection from sorcery or some dark force he believed the ascetic embodied, or whether he simply wanted to add to the drama and ceremony of the occasion. The priest had already heard a great deal about the ascetic and felt awe for him. He refused the estate manager’s demand and advised him to abandon the idea of harming the ascetic. “This will not end well for you,” he warned, crossing himself as he spoke.

08:48 But the estate manager was determined to get his way at any cost; it had become a matter of personal importance to him. Meanwhile, word reached Dubrovna that the estate manager was coming with a band of horsemen to take the ascetic from the beis midrash and bring him to the landowner’s estate, willingly or by force. The rabbi and the community leaders held an urgent meeting. They decided to instruct the town’s Jews to stay indoors and not even look out of their windows, so that the non-Jews would have no pretext to beat them. A small delegation consisting of the rabbi and community leaders went to the beis midrash where the ascetic sat, to await the landowner and his escorts. They hoped that pleas and tears would persuade him not to harm the holy Rabbi Feivish Henich. As soon as the landowner entered the beis midrash, whip in hand and surrounded by his brazen escorts, the rabbi stepped forward and asked him not to harm the ascetic. “This is a holy man,” the rabbi told him, pointing to the ascetic sitting withdrawn in his corner, his eyes closed as he recited Tehillim. “Listen to his singing. Who could have the heart to humiliate him?” “I must prove once and for all that he is nothing but a fool,” the landowner stubbornly replied. As if to show everyone that this idler deserved no consideration, he rushed toward the ascetic and tried to shout over his melodious voice. But the ascetic did not stir. There was no sign that the holy ascetic sensed the danger before him. The landowner grew angry and began lashing out at him with his whip. For a moment it seemed the whip was about to strike the ascetic’s face, but suddenly it slipped from the landowner’s hand. His arm fell helplessly, and his body convulsed as though seized by a spasm. A searing pain shot through his arm and spread throughout his body. An agonized scream burst from his mouth. “Help!” he cried helplessly. Feivish Henich went on singing one verse after

11:32 Verse after verse and chapter after chapter, as though nothing had happened and he was unaware of what was going on around him. The landowner’s attendants stopped thinking about the recluse and thought only of their master, whose cries of pain and anguish terrified them. They carried him out of the beis midrash and, instead of seating him on his horse, laid him in the very carriage in which he had intended to take the recluse away. He was writhing in agony. They returned home mournful and downcast, and Feivish Henich’s name became revered by all. The landowner himself lay ill for six weeks, his whole body racked with terrible pain. Many times he sent messengers to the recluse to ask his forgiveness, but they could not speak with him: his eyes and ears were closed, and he opened them only for the Torah reading. The landowner consulted every doctor he could in search of a cure. The only solution the doctors found was to amputate the hand he had stretched out toward the holy recluse. They determined that the hand had to be amputated to keep the poison from spreading through his entire body. From then on, no one doubted the holiness of the recluse Feivish Henich. Everyone in the area, Jews and non-Jews alike, had witnessed the greatness of the man who recited Tehillim. At that time, a Jew named Zundel Moshe lived in Dubrovna. Zundel Moshe and his wife had no children. His wife then came up with an idea: all the childless women in the town would pool their money to build a special beis midrash for Feivish Henich, with a room inside it just for him. This was the beis midrash where Shmuel Nachum sat and studied. It was built in Dubrovna’s Barren Alley and became known as the Holy Recluse’s Shul. All the childless women who built the beis midrash for the recluse were blessed, and before long they had sons and daughters. Among those children was Avraham Moshe. Avraham Moshe the shamash had moved from the village to the town twenty

14:25 years earlier and become the shamash of this shul. In that role, he served the recluse as much as the recluse would allow. And as we related at the beginning, Rabbi Chaim the recluse had also been sitting in this shul and beis midrash for thirty years. Everyone recognized his greatness in Torah.