Chapter 242 - The Continuation of the Story of Leib Pazin and Shmuel Berin.

00:01 The story continues with Reb Leib Pazin bringing 3,000 rubles to Reb Shmuel Brin as a loan and telling him how the Rebbe Maharash had sent him on this errand. Reb Leib Pazin told Reb Shmuel the whole story from beginning to end, as we explained earlier. Reb Shmuel listened with particular attention. When Reb Leib Pazin finished speaking, Reb Shmuel Brin said, “You did as the Rebbe instructed you, and Hakadosh Boruch Hu joins a good thought to a deed—especially when the deed has actually been done. But I will not take the money.” That very night, Reb Leib Pazin traveled to Lubavitch to complain to the Rebbe Maharash that Reb Shmuel Brin would not take the money the Rebbe had instructed him to give him. Reb Leib Pazin went in to the Rebbe Maharash and placed the bundle of banknotes on the table. Early Monday morning, the Rebbe Maharash’s second attendant, Reb Pinchas Leib Magid [unclear], arrived and brought Reb Shmuel Brin a sealed package from the Rebbe Maharash. Inside was a note in the Rebbe’s holy handwriting: “I am sending you 3,000 rubles to trade with until the rafts are sold in Riga. May you succeed.” Reb Leib Pazin took his bundle of money with him to pay his debts to the Moscow merchants for the merchandise that had burned, as well as a certain sum for new merchandise. When Reb Leib Pazin reached Moscow and told the merchants about the disaster that had befallen him, they accepted what he said. One of the leading merchants said they would certainly share in his loss, once they had checked the accounts and determined what percentage to deduct from his debt. They gave him new merchandise on credit, as much as he needed. A few days later, the merchants informed him that they had decided to deduct fifty percent of his debt, and that he could pay the remaining fifty percent over two years. That summer, Reb Leib Pazin won 15,000 rubles in a government bond lottery, and on the advice of

02:50 the Rebbe Maharash, he bought a great deal of flax at a low price. Its price tripled, and he succeeded in everything he did. Reb Shmuel Brin bought ready-made rafts, including ones lying on the riverbank. He sold some where they were and sent others by raft to Riga, earning large sums. Reb Shmuel Brin paid off all his debts and, on the advice of the Rebbe Maharash, bought a substantial house with a large plot of land. Today, this is how the four chassidim stand: Reb Michoel Aharon Piserovsky [?] is an elderly man; his sons, daughters, and descendants are wealthy businesspeople. The chossid Reb Nachman Lipzel [?] died young, leaving an estate of substantial houses, forests, and large businesses, and he passed away with a good name. Reb Leib Pazin is very wealthy, his sons are wealthy too, and he is counted among the respected members of the community. And last but not least, Reb Shmuel Brin has handed over his many businesses to his sons and sons-in-law. He lives comfortably on the income from the house he kept for himself, and his home is open to chassidim, men of good deeds, and Torah scholars. He is greatly respected even among the misnagdim, and certainly among the chassidim. We will go on to tell of several chassidim of the Rebbe Maharash, through whom we can get a sense of what Chassidic life was like in those days. A Jew named Dovid—Moshe Dovid Molier—would come to the Rebbe Maharash from time to time. He was a craftsman, and even while working he never stopped speaking words of Torah and reciting Tehillim by heart. The Rebbe Maharash said of him that Moshe Dovid Molier was on a higher level than the chossid Reb Shmuel Ber of Borisov. When Moshe Dovid ate his piece of hard bread with salt on Wednesday morning after davening, and then worked at his craft while reciting Tehillim, the Rebbe Maharash said, “At that time he is immersed in genuine teshuvah.” For Shavuos 5640—that is, 1880 by their calendar—the chossid Reb Shmuel Ber and the chossid Moshe

05:42 Dovid came to Lubavitch. They stayed there for several weeks. The Rebbe Rashab, the son of the Rebbe Maharash, related, “I observed carefully how they both davened, and the truth is that I envied Reb Dovid—Moshe Dovid—more than Reb Shmuel Ber.” The Rebbe Rashab added, “One can reach this state only by simply accepting the intellectual teachings of Chassidus.” In other words, one should not insist on understanding everything through intellectual reasoning. That chossid, Moshe Dovid Molier, for example, never kept money in his possession, because he distributed everything he had to the poor. But he would keep one coin for the cost of traveling to Lubavitch. He would say that this was the meaning of “one who benefits from the labor of his hands”: the labor of his hands brought benefit to his soul. That was Moshe Dovid Molier. And now we turn to the chossid Reb Zalman z"l Potolsky [?]. He, too, was one of the Rebbe Maharash’s chassidim. When he came to Lubavitch, the Rebbe Maharash would say a maamar of Chassidus especially for him. Once, in 5637—that is, 1877—the Rebbe Maharash repeated for him the maamar he had said the previous Shabbos before the whole congregation. But the following year, 5638, he said a new maamar for him. Now, the Rebbe Maharash was accustomed, in the middle of saying a maamar, to say a few words that seemingly had no connection to its subject. Sometimes they had some remote connection. In the maamar he said for Reb Zalman in 5638, the Rebbe Maharash explained the statement of our Sages that Rabbi Eliezer would give a coin to a poor person and then daven. The Rebbe Maharash said, “Davening must be full of vitality, brought about by giving to a poor person before davening. Then, by reviving the poor person’s soul, a person gains a great deal of vitality in his davening.” The Rebbe Maharash gestured with his hand to show just how great the spiritual flow brought down through davening after giving tzedakah is. Reb Zalman z"l Petrovsky [?] did every

08:46 thing deliberately and thoughtfully, and approached everything with an orderly Chabad-Ashkenazi method. He had a particular routine for traveling to Lubavitch and entering the Rebbe Maharash’s room, for the time he spent in Lubavitch, and for his return home. Reb Zalman was among the foremost scholars of Chassidus and among those devoted to avodah. For him, being in Lubavitch, hearing a maamar of Chassidus, and going into yechidus were profound inner experiences that held the highest place in his life. For inwardly devoted chassidim, the journey to Lubavitch and the return home were profound inner experiences. On his way back from Lubavitch, each of the prominent chassidim would stop in certain towns and villages to share with the chassidim what he had heard there and to repeat the maamar of Chassidus he had heard. They would also arrange a Chassidic farbrengen. The real welcome, though, was arranged when he returned home. All the Chabad chassidim, rich or poor, whether materially or spiritually, in knowledge or in avodah, took part in the celebration. Once, when Reb Zalman returned from Lubavitch and held his welcome-home farbrengen, he related something the Rebbe Maharash had said in the middle of the maamar: when you revive a Jew physically and give him enough to eat, there is reward both materially and spiritually. When the chossid Reb Chaim Ber, who was at the farbrengen, heard this saying, he began giving food before davening to passersby or simply to poor people, so they could eat it immediately after davening. The Rebbe Maharash said that the devotion and self-giving of the chossid Reb Chaim Ber toward the Rebbe Maharash had brought him to a bright and successful place in the avodah of mind and heart. There was also the chossid Reb Eliyahu Avaler. Reb Eliyahu Avaler grew up with his father, a simple chossid and grocery-store owner in Polotsk who had been a chossid of the Mitteler Rebbe. This was during the years of the Tzemach Tzedek’s leadership. The Tzemach Tzedek did much to encourage ordinary people to move to towns and settlements. When Reb Eliyahu Avaler’s father complained to the Tzemach Tzedek about

11:36 Because of his difficult financial situation, the Tzemach Tzedek instructed him to settle in a village near Polotsk. Rabbi Eliyahu’s father told the Rebbe that until now he had had no opportunity to do so, and even if the opportunity arose, he lacked the means to move to a village and establish a livelihood there. The Tzemach Tzedek told him, “I will lend you three hundred rubles, and Hashem will give you a good place. Just don’t spoil things. Everyone I lend money to succeeds, as do their descendants, for generations to come.” Rabbi Eliyahu Abaler’s father returned home and told an acquaintance what had happened. The acquaintance said that the owner of his estate wanted to sell it together with its flour mill. He proposed that they become partners: Rabbi Eliyahu’s father would buy the mill, while he would buy the estate. And so it happened. Over the next few years, the small village became a Jewish community whose residents led good Jewish lives, materially and spiritually. The chossid Reb Eliyahu Ber Beitchik Abaler had little learning, but he formed a strong bond with the Rebbe Maharash, the son of the Tzemach Tzedek. After his wedding, Reb Eliyahu Abaler asked the Rebbe Maharash how he should earn a living: should he remain in his birthplace, the village of Abal, or settle in Polotsk? The Rebbe Maharash answered that he should stay in Abal and blessed him with success. Indeed, Reb Eliyahu Abaler enjoyed good health and ample livelihood. Once, when Reb Eliyahu Abaler came to Lubavitch to see the Rebbe Maharash, the Rebbe told him, “Eliyahu, I envy you and the tests you face.” Reb Eliyahu was naturally clever, tall, and handsome, and materially he was very successful. Over the years he bought many plots of land in and around the town of Sliva. He also bought tracts of forest from estate owners in the area and would

14:05 send the logs to Riga, where he traveled every year to sell his merchandise. His business dealings with the local estate owners brought him into frequent contact with them and their families. He had to sit, talk, and socialize with them, which truly subjected him to difficult tests. When Reb Eliyahu Abaler turned seventy, he told the Rebbe Rashab, the son of the Rebbe Maharash, that throughout his life he had faced bitter tests that were extremely difficult for him. But the closeness the Rebbe showed him and the blessings the Rebbe bestowed on him had helped him, and, thank Hashem, he had not stumbled even once. Reb Eliyahu Abaler used to say that after 120 years, when he reached the World to Come and was given what he deserved, so that no trace of his physical self would remain, he would ask to be brought to his Rebbe. From this, says the Frierdiker Rebbe, we see how deeply the Rebbe Maharash’s words affected him. Reb Eliyahu was not waiting for a reward. He lacked nothing materially; spiritual matters he did not understand. His one hope was that after the harsh punishment he would receive, when no trace of his body’s physicality remained, his soul would merit to be bound to his Rebbe. This was the way of life, the longing, and the hope of ordinary people raised in chassidic homes in earlier generations.