Episode 146: Eliyahu Reuven Tells About the Alter Rebbe in His Childhood

00:00 Since we’re telling the story of the Alter Rebbe’s childhood and youth, I want to bring a story that broadens the picture. A chossid named Eliyahu Reuven tells a story about the Alter Rebbe as a child. But who passes his story on to us? His grandson, Yosef Binyamin. Many years later, Yosef Binyamin was in the town of Horodishch, near Reinopol[?]. When the Frierdiker Rebbe came there for a sort of vacation, Yosef Binyamin came to him and told him about his grandfather and father. I’ll tell it now in the words of Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, the Frierdiker Rebbe: “At that time, a chossid of a very advanced age lived in Horodishch. His name was Yosef Binyamin the weaver. When we came to Reinopol[?],” Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak relates, “Reb Yosef Binyamin arrived a few days later and took lodgings in one of the houses along the dirt road between Reinopol[?] and the estate of the landowner Charpoki. His workers were busy with wool,” as we said, he was a weaver, “preparing their goods for the trading season. The chossid Reb Yosef Binyamin was very proud of his grandfather, Reb Eliyahu Reuven, who had been among the Alter Rebbe’s earliest chassidim.” We are, of course, still speaking of the Alter Rebbe as a child and young man. “The chossid Reb Eliyahu Reuven was a person of spiritual stature, a great scholar, a Jew of deep knowledge and a great kabbalist. He had studied all the works of philosophical inquiry in depth and was steeped in Torah and the avodah of Chassidus. The Alter Rebbe once said that in Eliyahu Reuven, the light of the soul shone in a clear, ordered way. Later, the Alter Rebbe chose Eliyahu Reuven as the teacher of his youngest son, the holy Rabbi Moshe. Eliyahu Reuven studied with the Alter Rebbe’s son, Reb Moshe, for ten years, from the age of eight

02:57 until the age of nineteen. The Alter Rebbe had a practice of examining the children each month on what they had learned that month, usually on the eve of Rosh Chodesh. The examination lasted about three hours.” We should also mention that the chossid Eliyahu Reuven was among those present in the small shul when Rebbetzin Devorah Leah declared, on the eve of Rosh Hashanah, before the Torah scrolls and everyone there, that she accepted upon herself whatever had been decreed for her father, the Alter Rebbe. We’ll tell that story later. “And on the Fast of Gedaliah, the chossid Eliyahu Reuven also held the little orphan Menachem Mendel in his arms at the funeral of his mother, Rebbetzin Devorah Leah.” Again, that is a story we’ll tell later. “‘This Shavuos marks sixty-five years,’ Yosef Binyamin told me, ‘since my daily sustenance became, at most, two or three lines of Tanya. The two or three lines of Tanya I study each day follow my grandfather Eliyahu Reuven’s instruction: to study from the first word printed on the Tanya’s title page through chapter 39, but not to study beyond that.’ Eliyahu Reuven was also a member of the ‘small Sanhedrin’ sent on a mission by the ‘great Sanhedrin’ that had assembled in the ruined town of Liadi. After the war with Napoleon, Napoleon had devastated all of Little Russia, including Liadi, where the Alter Rebbe had originally lived. In any case, the ‘great Sanhedrin’ ruled that the Rebbe’s family should return to Lithuania and settle in a town of their choosing. They selected a ‘small Sanhedrin’ to travel to Kremenchug and convey the halachic ruling of the ‘great Sanhedrin’ of Chabad chassidim to the Mitteler Rebbe, the Alter Rebbe’s son.” Yosef Binyamin relates that his grandfather, Eliyahu Reuven, was one of those who traveled to the Mitteler Rebbe. Yosef Binyamin also shows

05:41 the Tanya his grandfather Eliyahu Reuven gave him on the day of his bar mitzvah. For sixty-five years he has studied two or three lines from that Tanya every day as his daily sustenance. Yosef Binyamin continues telling me about his grandfather Eliyahu Reuven: “‘My father, Ephraim Moshe,’ Yosef Binyamin tells me, ‘was a farmer who owned land near Liozna. He worked it with non-Jewish laborers and was very busy during the sowing and harvesting seasons. When I was eleven or twelve, I developed a strong love for working the land. I studied in cheder, and my teachers were pleased with me—both with my studies and with my keeping to the study schedule. I was always the first pupil to arrive, but I devoted my free time specifically to working the land. I would get up early, hurry to daven at sunrise, and during the sowing and harvesting seasons, I would run to the fields to work myself and supervise the laborers. My father, Ephraim Moshe, had a large vegetable garden and fruit orchard, and tending them was my responsibility. I would get up early, bring water and water the garden before sunrise, then hoe and weed the beds. As I said, working the land did not interfere with my studies. Even so, my father, Ephraim Moshe, was unhappy about it and often admonished me. My grandfather Eliyahu Reuven, my father Ephraim Moshe, and I came to Lubavitch shortly before my bar mitzvah. When we arrived, my grandfather and father took me in to the Rebbe, the Tzemach Tzedek, the Alter Rebbe’s grandson, for a blessing. My father briefly told the Tzemach Tzedek about my behavior and my inclination toward working the land, and said, “Rebbe, tomorrow my son Yosef Binyamin becomes bar mitzvah. Please bless him that he should be G-d-fearing, not a lover of the land.” My grandfather Eliyahu Reuven said to the Rebbe, “Rebbe, bless my grandson Yosef Binyamin with a good memory,

08:06 that he remember everything he sees and hears in my home, everything he sees and hears now, and everything he will see and hear with the Rebbe and with chassidim. Then he will, as a matter of course, be G-d-fearing.” My grandfather Eliyahu Reuven brought me close to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe placed his holy hand on my head and blessed me. I did not hear the blessing, only its end. The Rebbe said, “May you have long, healthy years.” My grandfather’s request was indeed fulfilled. Baruch Hashem, I remember everything I saw and heard with my grandfather, with the rabbanim, and with chassidim. I also still have,’ Yosef Binyamin tells me, ‘the hat and kippah I wore when the Tzemach Tzedek blessed me and the Rebbe’s holy hand touched my hat. When my grandfather Eliyahu Reuven said to the Rebbe, “Then he will, as a matter of course, be G-d-fearing,” the Tzemach Tzedek replied, “You should know that for more than fifty years, my grandfather the Alter Rebbe, my father-in-law the Mitteler Rebbe, and I have urged that chassidim be G-d-fearing through avodah, not G-d-fearing as a matter of course.” My grandfather Eliyahu Reuven told me,’ says Yosef Binyamin, ‘that when the Alter Rebbe was eleven years old, his father, the great scholar Rabbi Baruch—whom we remember, of course—studied Choshen Mishpat with his son, the Alter Rebbe. Rabbi Baruch, who was among the greatest scholars of Seder Nezikin, said that he owed his knowledge of Seder Nezikin to his father-in-law, the great scholar Rabbi Avraham the gardener, who was an extraordinary scholar of Nezikin. When the Alter Rebbe learned that his grandfather, the great scholar Rabbi Avraham, had studied with me for several years in my youth,’ Yosef Binyamin relates, ‘I became important in the young prodigy’s eyes. From time to time he would ask me how his grandfather, Rabbi Avraham the gardener, had studied a particular sugya with me. Often the young prodigy would ask why I had not posed one question or another to his grandfather—questions he put to me, and I did not know how to answer. My father

10:42 The Alter Rebbe’s grandfather, Moshe Poizner—whom we know, of course, as Rabbi Moshe, and about whom we have told many stories—was an extraordinary Torah scholar. When he arrived in Minsk, he bought a large plot of land and built several buildings on it for himself and a few other families who had moved from Pozna and Prague. One of the buildings served as a shul and beis midrash. Moshe had many books, which were kept in a special room in that beis midrash. Before the Alter Rebbe was eight years old, he knew the names of all the books. A few years later, people saw that he knew not only their names but the contents of the books themselves. Everyone marveled at the extent of his seemingly boundless powers of comprehension and memory. Some of the scholars of Liozna were contemporaries of the gaon Rabbi Avraham Haganan. Rabbi Avraham Haganan’s two sons were known for their breadth and sharpness in learning, especially the gaon Rabbi Baruch, who was regarded as a gaon and as Rabbi Avraham Haganan’s foremost student in Seder Nezikin and Choshen Mishpat. They asked Moshe Poizner to give them a shiur on Tractate Nedarim two or three times a week. Yosef Binyamin relates: “My grandfather Eliyahu Reuven told me that he sensed the Alter Rebbe’s holy power when the Alter Rebbe was still young, even before he became engaged. How did it happen? ‘By nature,’ my grandfather Eliyahu Reuven told me, ‘I insisted on my own opinion. I was very stubborn. Even my teachers, though I respected them greatly, could not persuade me to change my nature and stop insisting that everything had to accord with my own opinion. Year by year, that tendency grew stronger, and what someone else said carried no weight with me. But as I grew older,’ Eliyahu Reuven told his grandson, ‘I began to understand that I had to change my nature and give weight to what others said too. Yet I could not bring myself to do it. By nature, I also grasped things quickly and was gifted. At first glance, I would grasp everything I was learning. Many great Torah scholars gathered for the Alter Rebbe’s bar mitzvah, including scholars from Vitebsk, Polotsk, and Minsk. It was truly a gathering like the Great Sanhedrin. Three gaonim stood foremost among them: the Alter Rebbe’s uncle, his father’s brother-in-law, the gaon Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, who was known throughout the region as the prodigy from Itshari; the gaon Rabbi Moshe Reuven, son of the eminent gaon Avraham Zev of Bishenkovitz, who succeeded his father at the great yeshiva of Bishenkovitz; and the gaon Rabbi Avraham Meir, a foremost student of the author of Seder Hadoros. The gaon Rabbi Baruch, the Alter Rebbe’s father, and the gaon Rabbi Moshe Poizner, his grandfather, held seven days of celebration. Every day there was a seudas mitzvah with many novel Torah insights, but the insights of the young gaon, the bar mitzvah boy himself, surpassed them all. All the gaonim ordained the Alter Rebbe and conferred on him the title of rabbi, and they recorded that title in the register of Liozna’s chevra kadisha as a record for future generations.’ And Eliyahu Reuven told his grandson: ‘Once I was sitting and learning in Rabbi Moshe Poizner’s beis midrash. At that time I learned with unusual diligence, and, as I said, by nature I learned aloud and at tremendous speed. I understood what I learned thoroughly, but I learned very quickly. The Alter Rebbe was then in the book room we spoke about earlier. When the Alter Rebbe passed by me, he said that although I was learning eagerly, I was going too fast. I told him that I was quick by nature. The Alter Rebbe told me, “One must change one’s nature.” I told him that I could not change mine. The Alter Rebbe said, “A Jew has the strength to change his nature through kabbolas ol. When a person trains himself, habit

13:18 I myself was also quick to grasp things by nature and had a good mind. At first glance, I would grasp everything I studied. Many great Torah scholars gathered for the Alter Rebbe’s bar mitzvah, including scholars from Vitebsk, Polotsk, and Minsk. It was truly a gathering of a great Sanhedrin. Three scholars stood foremost among them: the Alter Rebbe’s uncle, his father’s brother-in-law, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak, who was known throughout the region as the prodigy from Yitshari; Rabbi Moshe Reuven, son of the mighty scholar Rabbi Avraham Zev of Beshenkovichi, who had succeeded his father at the great yeshiva there; and Rabbi Avraham Meir, a foremost student of the author of Seder Hadoros. Rabbi Baruch, the Alter Rebbe’s father, and Rabbi Moshe Posner, the Alter Rebbe’s grandfather, arranged seven days of celebration. Each day there was a festive mitzvah meal with many novel Torah insights, but the insights of the young scholar, the bar mitzvah boy who would become the Alter Rebbe, surpassed them all. All the scholars conferred rabbinic ordination on the Alter Rebbe and bestowed on him the title “Rabbi.” They recorded that title in the ledger of the chevra kadisha of the town of Liozna as a record for future generations. And here Eliyahu Reuven tells his grandson: Once I was sitting and studying in Rabbi Moshe Posner’s beis midrash. At that time, I studied with extraordinary diligence, and as I’ve said, it was my nature to study aloud and at tremendous speed. I understood thoroughly what I was learning, but I learned very quickly. The Alter Rebbe was then sitting in the library we spoke about earlier. When the Rebbe, the Alter Rebbe, passed by me, he said that although I was learning with enthusiasm, I was learning too quickly. I told him that I was quick by nature. The Alter Rebbe told me, “One must change one’s nature.” I told him that I could not change my nature. The Alter Rebbe told me, “A Jew has the strength to change his nature through kabbolas ol. And when a person accustoms himself, habit…”

15:54 “Kabbolas ol,” the Alter Rebbe told me, “is a fundamental principle in Torah and in avodah.”