Episode 278 - The Rebbe Rashab in Mezhibuzh- The Remarkable Sefer Torah.

00:01 The Frierdiker Rebbe, son of the Rebbe Rashab, tells us about a journey the Rebbe Rashab made to visit burial places, known as tziyunim—the holy resting places of the Chabad Rebbes and other leaders of Chassidus. In Mezhibuzh, he visited the grave of the Baal Shem Tov; in Fastov, the grave of the holy Rabbi Avraham the Malach, son of the Maggid of Mezritch; in Anipoli, the grave of the Maggid of Mezritch; in Berditchev, the grave of Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev; in Haditch, the grave of the Alter Rebbe; and in Niezhin, the grave of the Mitteler Rebbe. The Rebbe Rashab visited all these places to daven there. When the Rebbe Rashab entered the Baal Shem Tov’s shul in Mezhibuzh, most of the people who had davened there had already gone home. Only an elderly man named Tuvya Leib remained. Tuvya Leib was the shul’s shamash. He sat there wrapped in a tallis and wearing tefillin, with several people standing nearby, and was telling them a story about the Baal Shem Tov that he had received from his father and grandfather. Because Tuvya Leib was very old, he could not actually do any practical work in the shul. But he was always there, occupied with Torah and davening, and he was also descended from members of the Baal Shem Tov’s household: his grandfather, Yosef Tzvi, had served as the Baal Shem Tov’s shamash for the last ten years of his life, and the Baal Shem Tov had blessed him and his children through the third generation with long life. For all these reasons, the people who davened there honored him with the title of shamash of the Baal Shem Tov’s shul. At the time of the Rebbe Rashab’s visit to this shul in Mezhibuzh, it was badly in need of repair. Most of the people who davened there were poor or elderly and could not pay for the work. The people of Mezhibuzh who had the means did not pay

02:49 attention to it. The elderly men who advised the community, headed by Tuvya Leib himself, were deeply distressed. They had a tradition that as long as the shul remained standing, there would be peace in Mezhibuzh, but if, G-d forbid, the shul fell, the entire town would be destroyed. So the elders and Tuvya Leib the shamash consulted together and decided what to do. From time to time, they would take a Sefer Torah known as the “Miraculous Sefer Torah” out of the aron kodesh. Anyone who wanted an aliyah would pay for it, and with that money they would repair the shul. When the Rebbe Rashab entered, Tuvya Leib was speaking about the holiness of that Sefer Torah. He said that many tzaddikim of earlier generations had come to Mezhibuzh specifically to receive an aliyah from it and to kiss the covering of the Baal Shem Tov’s Sefer Torah, which lay on the reading table. “Never”—and here Tuvya Leib began to cry—“did they sell something holy for money and gold.” For many years, apart from Hoshana Rabbah during the recitation of the Hoshanos, and Shemini Atzeres and Simchas Torah during hakafos, no one had dared take this Sefer Torah out of the aron kodesh. But now, because they needed money, they would take it out and honor wealthy people with aliyos. Tuvya Leib wept. Meanwhile, a Jew named Binyamin Berlin arrived and announced that the mikveh was ready and the wagon was ready to go to the cemetery—so that the Rebbe Rashab could immerse in the mikveh and then travel to the holy resting place of the Baal Shem Tov. The Rebbe Rashab asked Tuvya Leib to tell him about the Miraculous Sefer Torah, and this is what Tuvya Leib related. In the year 5512, that is, 1752 by their reckoning, there was, Heaven protect us, a great accusation against Mezhibuzh in Heaven, for reasons we do not know. Many men, women, and children became ill with various diseases. Some were dying, and there was a great outcry in the town, for

05:46 there was not a home without one or two sick people. Of course, everyone hurried to the Baal Shem Tov. They wept over the sick and begged him to daven for them. The Baal Shem Tov told them that he could not save them from this; only they themselves could save the sick. Only they themselves could weaken or annul the harsh decree. The Baal Shem Tov told them that in Shemoneh Esrei we daven, “May the service of Your people Israel always be favorable.” This means that the service of Hashem’s people, Israel, always brings about favor that can weaken and annul a decree. What is that service of Israel? It is the letters of the Torah. There are two ways to engage in it: reciting the letters of the Torah and Tehillim, and writing a Sefer Torah in which everyone participates. That is what the Baal Shem Tov said. Everyone immediately decided to write a Sefer Torah, and all pledged to take part in its writing. The Baal Shem Tov told his scribe, the tzaddik Rabbi Tzvi, that he himself would write two sheets of the Sefer Torah. The sick then began to recover. The Sefer Torah they wrote was called the Miraculous Sefer Torah, and it was the one there when the Rebbe Rashab arrived. By then, the Rebbe Rashab was living in the 1890s or around 1900. So this was the story he heard about that Miraculous Sefer Torah in the aron kodesh, which they now wanted to take out and use to give wealthy people aliyos, so that the money would allow them to repair the shul. The Rebbe Rashab davened Minchah, went to the mikveh, and from there went to the cemetery, to the resting place of our master the Baal Shem Tov. He remained there until late, then returned to the Baal Shem Tov’s shul to daven Maariv. He was fasting the whole time. He told Binyamin Berlin to ask Tuvya—

08:17 to ask the shamash and the elders how much they needed to repair the shul. They answered that there were two ways to do it: a moderate repair, costing about 300 silver rubles, or a thorough, high-quality repair, costing about 450 silver rubles. The Rebbe Rashab told Binyamin Berlin to tell them that this man—meaning the Rebbe Rashab; Berlin was to tell them that the man was a merchant from the town of Orsha in the Mogilev province. Why did he name that particular place? Because that was where the Rebbe Rashab was registered as paying the tax for a merchant’s certificate called a guild certificate. This man agreed to give the full amount needed for a thorough, lasting repair of the building, on condition that the next morning, Monday, they gather a minyan and read from the Miraculous Sefer Torah. They were to honor this man—the Rebbe Rashab—with an aliyah, with rolling up the Torah, and with putting on its mantle. All the conditions were as follows: A. They would daven early. B. The Rebbe Rashab wanted a minyan of the elders. C. Those called to the Torah would include both a Kohen and a Levi. And D. For the first three days afterward—Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, perhaps even Thursday—no one was to know what had happened. When Berlin informed them and they agreed, the Rebbe Rashab gave them 200 silver rubles as a down payment. Binyamin Berlin drew up a memorandum of agreement in his own name, with correspondence to be sent to the chossid Rabbi Meir Mordechai Chernin in Vitebsk. The Rebbe Rashab went to his lodgings, drank a cup of tea, ate some of the bread he had brought with him, and returned to the shul. He treated Tuvya Leib the shamash and the elders to liquor and porter—I don’t know what that is. They sat and farbrenged until late at night. The Rebbe Rashab went back to his lodgings to rest. While it was still night, he got up and went to immerse in the mikveh, where he found several of the elders already there. From there they went to the Baal Shem Tov’s shul and prepared to daven

10:52 as agreed. After davening, the Rebbe Rashab traveled once more to the holy resting place of the Baal Shem Tov, and from there he went straight to the railway station and the train.