Episode 119: Rabbi Yosef Yitzchok the Gaon Finds His Match in the City of Vitebsk

00:01 Today we’ll tell the story of the match: how Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, the prodigy from Sherei, became engaged to Devorah Leah. It’s an interesting story. Rabbi Yechiel Halperin, whom we’ve already spoken about, was a great Torah scholar in Minsk. He and all the great Torah scholars of Minsk held the prodigy from Sherei, whose reputation preceded him, in very high regard. At this stage, Yosef Yitzchak’s ties to Chassidus through his secret mentor, Rabbi Moshe Nissan, were kept hidden. Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak’s standing grew to the point that he was chosen as one of two representatives of the Smorgon yeshiva, where he had studied for several years, to an assembly of the Council of the Lands that was to be held in Lublin. The assembly was scheduled to take place during the upcoming fair there. Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak traveled with Rabbi Yechiel Halperin’s open consent and blessing, and in keeping with the wishes of Rabbi Moshe Nissan, the hidden tzaddik. Around this time, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak began carrying out important assignments under secret instructions from the movement of hidden chassidim. When he returned to Minsk from the Lublin fair, he became known not only as a great Torah scholar and a person of fine character, but also as a public figure with vision and sound judgment. Everyone in Minsk praised Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, the prodigy from Sherei. He had distinguished himself at the assembly of the Council of the Lands both through his Torah scholarship and through his abilities and understanding. Rabbi Yechiel Halperin of Minsk held him in increasingly high regard, and his influence in Minsk and the surrounding area continued to grow. Then, ahead of the next assembly of the Council of the Lands, this time at the fair in Vitebsk, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak was chosen to represent the Minsk community itself. The assemblies held during the fair brought together great Torah scholars from all the communities to enact measures needed at the time, clarify halachos, and exchange ideas in Torah. Each community sent its finest scholars to represent it with honor. The ties with the Vitebsk community were especially important to Minsk,

02:49 since Vitebsk was something of a sister community, although Minsk was under the influence of the Slutsk yeshiva, while Vitebsk was under the influence of the Smorgon yeshiva. Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, who was still unmarried, initially did not want to travel to Vitebsk because he feared it would take him away from Torah study. But his secret mentor, Rabbi Moshe Nissan, told him in the name of the Baal Shem Tov that he should go, primarily because he would find his match in Vitebsk. When the time came to leave, Rabbi Moshe Nissan sent Rabbi Malkiel, another hidden tzaddik, along with Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak. Rabbi Malkiel was presented as Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak’s personal attendant. His real task, however, was to study Kabbalah with him according to a particular course set by the Baal Shem Tov. A warm, heartfelt welcome awaited Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak in Vitebsk, both because of his reputation as a brilliant scholar and because he represented Minsk, which was highly respected there. Since he was still unmarried, people began inundating Yosef Yitzchak with distinguished marriage proposals, all of which he turned down. Then Rabbi Kaddish, the uncle of the orphaned Devorah, in whose home she was staying—as we recall, Devorah supported herself through her work as a seamstress—heard Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak deliver a brilliant, incisive Torah discourse one day in Vitebsk’s main beis midrash. An idea flashed through his mind: Yosef Yitzchak might be a suitable husband for his orphaned niece. At the same time, Kaddish was afraid even to suggest it. True, Devorah came from a distinguished family and was an exceptional young woman in her own right. But how could he propose a poor orphan as a match for a scholar like Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, whose name was known far and wide? After some more time had passed, and Rabbi Kaddish learned that Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak had rejected every match proposed to him, he gathered his courage and discussed the matter with his wife, Freida.

05:33 He also expressed his doubts that the prodigy Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak would agree to the match. He said to his wife, Freida, “They’ve proposed matches from the wealthiest families, with great Torah scholars. He rejected every one of them outright. Why would he agree to marry Devorah?” Freida disagreed. She thought that perhaps this was precisely the match destined in Heaven. She suggested that her husband send a matchmaker to Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak. Kaddish hesitated, worried that Devorah would be hurt if she learned that they had sent a matchmaker to Yosef Yitzchak and he had rejected the proposal. But Freida suggested sending someone close to them who could be trusted with a secret, so that even if the proposal was rejected, no one would know. Kaddish found a relative who knew how to speak persuasively. The man went to Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak and told him about Devorah, her distinguished lineage, and her life story. Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, the prodigy from Sherei, immediately felt that the hidden tzaddik’s words in the name of the Baal Shem Tov, about the match awaiting him in Vitebsk, referred to Devorah, and so he agreed. The tena’im were signed during Chanukah, and the wedding took place in Nissan. Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak told his bride about the hidden tzaddikim and revealed to her that his attendant, Rabbi Malkiel, was also a hidden tzaddik. He then asked Rabbi Malkiel to tell Devorah all about the hidden tzaddikim and the details connected with them. Meanwhile, an incident took place in Vitebsk that shook the community and all the Jews in the surrounding area. In other words, we’re in the middle of the story of Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak’s match with Devorah, and now a major event affecting the community takes place. The governor of Vitebsk summoned Zalman Leib, the head of the community, along with three of the town’s seven leading representatives, and imprisoned them. No one knew why. Nor did anyone know what had happened to the four

08:28 community leaders. That same day, soldiers raided the home of Avraham Segal, Vitebsk’s wealthy and generous philanthropist. They confiscated all the money and documents they found there. They arrested Avraham himself and took him to the governor’s residence. News of the arrests spread as a rumor throughout the city. Shopkeepers hurried to lock their shops. Craftsmen stopped working. Everyone gathered in the batei midrash. The city’s beis din called on people not to eat anything more that day, and everyone assembled to say Tehillim. The families of those arrested ran to the governor’s residence to find out what had happened to their loved ones, but, following the governor’s orders, no one answered their questions. The order was to drive everyone away by force. Women who remained there weeping were severely beaten. This added to the turmoil in the city. Nothing like it had ever been heard of in Vitebsk. Merchants and craftsmen all tried to find out through people in high places what had happened, but none succeeded. A meeting of the community leaders was called, and they decided to suspend all work and trade. They also decided that merchants with connections to local noblemen should try to persuade the noblemen to soften the governor’s heart. A special messenger was sent to the wealthy Jewish leaseholder Ze’ev Wolf, asking him to do everything in his power to save the Jews of Vitebsk from this trouble. At the same time, a delegation was sent to the governor’s residence to find out why the community leaders and Avraham Segal had been arrested and what had happened to them. When the delegation arrived, they encountered armed soldiers, who put them in a locked room and ordered them to stay there. The room was empty; there was not even a chair to sit on. The windows were barred. They were prisoners. Fear and dread gripped them. It was clear that a plot was being hatched, but no one knew the details. So these delegates, well-known community leaders, stood in a locked room and did not know what

10:49 do. One of the shluchim, an elderly and respected Torah scholar named Shlomo Aharon, was the first to recover and find words of comfort for his companions. “Come,” he told them, “let us trust in Hashem, do complete teshuvah, and call out to Hashem. He will surely save us from all harm.” To strengthen the confidence of the younger shluchim, he told them about something that had happened in Vitebsk ninety years earlier. In the youth of his grandfather, the gaon Nosson Dovid, the Jews of Vitebsk had put great effort into building a large shul in the center of town. It had not been easy to obtain a permit from the governor, a man named Semyon Mangorka[unclear], and they had had to bribe him. In the end, though, they managed to build the shul, and the joy of the Jews of Vitebsk knew no bounds. Several years passed. By then, Gavriel Chaim, the father of Shlomo Aharon, who was now telling the story, had become head of the community. On Rosh Hashanah, while all the Jews were gathered in shul for davening, a messenger from the governor appeared with an order that the head of the community and its seven leading members present themselves before him at once. When they arrived, they saw immediately that he was angry. He informed them that within a few days he would issue a decree closing every shul and beis midrash in Vitebsk, expelling all the city’s Jews, and confiscating a quarter of their property for the royal treasury. Having made this announcement, he imprisoned all the community leaders during Rosh Hashanah and refused to explain why. When word spread among the Jews of the city, an uproar broke out. The joy of Rosh Hashanah was completely disrupted, and the city was filled with turmoil and distress. Immediately after Rosh Hashanah, a series of fasts was scheduled. The Jews of the city were called upon to come to the rabbis and disclose hidden sins so they could find a way to make amends. People hurried to check their tefillin, mezuzos, and tzitzis. The elderly maggid, Gedalyah Zalman, who was blind, delivered words of stern rebuke

13:20 without pause and called on everyone to do teshuvah. Members of the chevra kadisha went through the city with tzedakah boxes, proclaiming, “Tzedakah saves from death.” On the fourth day of their imprisonment, the governor ordered the head of the community brought to him from prison, and also summoned the city’s leading priests. It was understood that the trial was about to begin. Fear in the city grew. Jews ran to the batei midrash to say Tehillim; others hurried to the cemetery to daven at the graves of tzaddikim. When the prisoners were brought to the governor’s residence, a large number of armed soldiers were there. The governor sat on a platform with a priest beside him, as though they were sitting in judgment. Gavriel Chaim, then the head of the community, knew Polish well. He opened with a speech declaring the prisoners—and indeed all the city’s Jews—innocent of any wrongdoing. He demanded an explanation for their persecution. At the same time, he declared that if, for some reason, they were to be punished for sins they had not committed, it would be better for the community leaders alone to bear the punishment, without harming the community as a whole. The governor’s reply was a stunning surprise. “For various reasons,” he said, “I cannot explain why you were imprisoned. Nevertheless, I have summoned you to tell you that you and every member of your community are innocent of all charges. And because I have caused you distress, I am exempting you from part of the poll tax. Now return home, escorted by a military honor guard and a band of musicians.” A mounted official rode at the head of the procession, followed by three horsemen, then the freed community leaders, with a group of soldiers behind them. The sorrow of the Jews of Vitebsk turned to great joy. Everyone thought the whole ordeal had come to stir the Jews to teshuvah, and that as soon as they had done what was required, the decree had been annulled. Shlomo Aharon told this entire story to the leaders of the Vitebsk community of his own day, who were themselves now

15:53 under arrest. One of the detained shluchim, named Azriel Yaakov, said that he too had heard the story Shlomo Aharon told, and had some very interesting details to add. Azriel Yaakov explained that the imprisonment of the community leaders had actually resulted from a wager between the governor and the city’s chief priest. The governor had told the priest that the Jews were more attached to their faith than Christians were to theirs, and, in the governor’s opinion, the priests were to blame. The priest replied that the Jews’ faith was merely outward and superficial: let them face trouble, he said, and all their faith would evaporate, because they would be angry with Hakadosh Boruch Hu for not helping them. They agreed to frighten the Jews. The governor issued his decrees and imprisoned the community leaders. Meanwhile, secret agents acting for the governor and the priest moved among the Jews, observing what was happening. It turned out that, contrary to the priest’s claim, the Jews had strengthened their observance of the Torah and increased their davening. The governor had therefore won the wager and informed them that the decree was annulled. The shluchim, now detained at the governor’s residence in Vitebsk, began to hope that their case too would end like the one in the story. For the moment, though, they remained in a locked room. After a while, the door opened and an official informed them that he would take them to the governor. They would, however, have to wait until the governor finished washing and feeding his beloved dog. In this way, the governor meant to humiliate the Jews and show them that his dog mattered more to him than their representatives did. The delegation followed the official dejectedly to a room where they were to wait their turn to enter. A long time later, the official came out and told them to prepare to greet the governor properly. After another wait, the door opened again. The dog appeared in the doorway, with the governor behind it, a whip in his hand. The governor said to his dog, “Go over to those men

18:19 and take the memorandum from them, then give it to the official.” He called out to the official, [unclear]. The shluchim said that their only request was to know why the community leaders had been imprisoned. The governor grew angry and said he would inform them of the charges after they had spent a long time in prison, and would also tell them how they could redeem themselves. “As for Avraham Segal, I can tell you that a severe punishment awaits him.” As soon as he finished speaking, he ordered the Jews to leave. They went away dejected, their mission a failure. They had learned nothing about the offense or the fate of the imprisoned community leaders. Attempts to obtain information about the prisoners by other means failed as well. The landowners through whom they had hoped to establish the necessary facts were then busy hunting in the Vileyka forests near Vilna. The leaseholder Ze’ev Wolf, also known as Ettinger, tried to make use of his connections with the owners of smaller estates, but they told him they did not want to get involved. The Jews therefore had no choice but to continue davening and fasting. The rabbis declared a public fast for a certain day, binding on men and women, young and old. Then, on that day, Malkiel, one of the hidden chassidim, came to Yosef Yitzchak, the prodigy from Shiri[unclear], and told him that a special messenger from the Baal Shem Tov had arrived among the hidden chassidim of Vitebsk. The Baal Shem Tov had instructed them to fast for three consecutive days and, in various ways, encourage the Jewish community to trust in Hakadosh Boruch Hu. The messenger sent by the Baal Shem Tov was the well-known tzaddik Rabbi Kahat[unclear], and he conveyed a surprising message in the Baal Shem Tov’s name: in ten days, deliverance would come to Vitebsk and mourning would turn to joy. The Baal Shem Tov had also instructed that this news remain a secret known only to a select few. Rabbi Kahat[unclear], the Baal Shem

20:51 Tov’s messenger, left Vitebsk that very day, and the hidden chassidim began the three-day fast as the Baal Shem Tov had instructed.