More Important Than Watching a Video of the Rebbe

The Inside Story of Chabad in America — Through the Mindel Archives ## Episode 71: "More Important Than Watching a Video of the Rebbe"

Welcome to our weekly program, The Inside Story of Chabad in America, through the Mindel Archives. This program is a continuation of the last two programs, in honor of the 70 years since the histalkus of the Frierdiker Rebbe, this coming Yud Shevat. So I would suggest that before listening to this program, you click on the last two programs, and you'll be able to understand better the saying of the Frierdiker Rebbe that I'm going to read.

This is a saying that he said upon coming to America, which, as I mentioned in the previous program, Rabbi Mindel was told to write down, and he wrote it down. And then again, Rabbi Gourary [?] wanted a copy, and people may know about it. But I'm reading from Rabbi Mindel's notes, which he wrote in Hebrew, and I'm translating into English.

One of the sayings the Frierdiker Rebbe said, coming to America: "With God's help, we need to awaken Chassidic warmth. It should influence the American ice — it should melt. And the cold that melts becomes good through the G-dly fire of avodah and through simcha — true happiness."

This reminds me — my father once mentioned to me, he says, it says somewhere — I forgot the posuk he used — that when we're happy, the erev rav [?] is not truly happy. I asked, what do you mean? He says: we're happy — why are you happy? You're happy because you have a nice car. You're happy because you have a nice home. You're happy because you're going on vacation. That's called the happiness of the erev rav — it's not real happiness. Happiness has to be real happiness, doing G-dly, spiritual things. This is not called simcha.

This is the lashon the Frierdiker Rebbe uses here — that [people] came to America and try to avoid these things, and we should do the things that bring real happiness.

Years ago, the Frierdiker Rebbe says, when a Jew came with his family to America, and, baruch Hashem, he was settled with parnassa, his concern was building a mikveh, building a cheder, building a shul. He went to shul, he learned — he writes he learned Gemara, he learned [unclear] — but now he goes on vacation, he has parnassa, baruch Hashem, so he has vacation, or he has sports.

The Frierdiker Rebbe said in 1943: in America we are in golus among non-Jews; in Eretz Yisroel we are in golus among Jews. And he says it is much harder to be in golus among Jews than among non-Jews, because the non-Jew holds the Jewish body in exile but has nothing to do with the neshama. But the Jewish secular Zionist of those days, he writes, takes the Jewish soul into exile and tries to defile the neshama. That's the difference between the two types of exile — this was said in '43 — and [the situation] in America.

I know that we have English letters — some students from Stern College here in New York, Jewish girls, asked the Rebbe that they wanted to go finish their studies in Eretz Yisroel, and he said no. And the Rebbe explains in one place: when the girl is here, she learns in Stern College, she lives in America, so she knows she's Jewish, and she's different from the non-Jews. But if she goes to Eretz Yisroel and sees some kibbutzim that are not the way they should be, she loses her pride — she's not proud anymore of her Yiddishkeit. Besides, the Rebbe writes in a place that our ability in America is that we have to speak to the youth with kindness, mamash from the heart — as it comes from your heart, they will listen — that in America you should be a Yid with no compromising.

And since it's now before Yud Shevat, I thought I would also discuss the inyan of a chossid. So I just want to say a couple of things that the Frierdiker Rebbe says about what a chossid is. I just want to mention that this is all from the notes.

A Rebbe opens a window in a Jew's characteristics, and through that window the light of his G-dly soul shines. To be connected to a Rebbe is by learning his Chassidus, because the connection is only through Torah, not pictures — and I would say videos are the same, I guess the same thing as pictures. He doesn't say it this way — there were no videos then — but it means: learn Torah b'shkidah (with diligence), guard your mouth, and so on, and spread Torah and Yiddishkeit and avodas Hashem — meaning pnimiyus, not superficially.

Learn Torah. Without that, making pictures is hitzoniyus — externality. Live with the Rebbe's word. Now, some people — for them, looking at pictures of the Rebbe is important, or videos — but this doesn't make one a chossid. This is not everything. And it's become, I think, that many people look at video as very important. I mean, a picture of the Rebbe is important, for sure, but this is not the ikar — this is superficial. The ikar, the Frierdiker Rebbe says here, is to learn his Chassidus.

And the difference [between a Chabad chossid] and a chossid of other dynasties: the other chassidim rely on the Rebbe — the Rebbe will do everything, he will schlep them, pull them out. By Chabad, they have to do it themselves, not rely on the Rebbe. For sure we have to take hora'os from the Rebbe, for sure — but mainly, do it yourself. A chossid has to accomplish on his own.

A chossid lives with the Rebbe — a word of the Rebbe, a maamar, a niggun — of course this is important, but not the pictures. And this is called hiskashrus.

And you should always remember: you're a chossid. The Frierdiker Rebbe said you eat like a chossid, you sleep like a chossid, you talk like a chossid, you learn like a chossid, and you think like a chossid.

He says here another thing: just like there are different levels in Torah learning, there are different levels among Chassidim as well. The previous generations of Chassidim were on a higher level. He writes that years ago, by Chassidim, [unclear]. As I mentioned once, the Frierdiker Rebbe once said to Reb Nemtzov [?] — he's the one who [unclear] — "you searched for the truth [unclear], you found the truth; [unclear] — you'll live with the truth."

This is the message: when plain, ordinary Jews — anoshim p'shutim — saw the way a chossid learns Chassidus and davens like a chossid, with a Chabad niggun, and does a favor for another Yid regarding parnassa, even plain Yidden seeing this become elevated; the light of their soul starts to be revealed. By some Yidden, whatever you're allowed to do, you do, and whatever you're not allowed to do, they try to find heterim — loopholes. But by Chassidim: what you're not allowed to do, you're not allowed to do, and what you may do, you don't necessarily do.

Once a chossid came — he doesn't write it here, but I remember hearing it — and he said to the Frierdiker Rebbe, "Everybody steps on me in shul." He so [unclear — spread himself thin] that everybody stepped on him. So the Frierdiker Rebbe said to him, "Who told you that you should be mispashet [spread yourself so thin]? You spread yourself out so much that everybody steps on you. Don't be mispashet, and they won't step on you."

Years ago, every chossid — it didn't matter if he was a bit simpler — went to shul three times a day, learned a blatt Gemara; this was a davar poshut, this was a thing every chossid did. He says a chossid is a 24-hour chossid — when he sleeps, when he eats, you can recognize it; when he walks in the street, you can recognize it. So a chossid should know that when he walks, he has to walk with a hat, walk with a jacket, not walk like a bum.

A father has a responsibility; a mother certainly has a responsibility. If Hashem made you a father or a mother, you have a special responsibility to behave like a father and to behave like a mother.

When a chossid lives in a city, he says the city should know — should pay attention — that a chossid lives in that city. Chassidim should know who they are and where they come from. Every Yid and every household has a father, had a mother, had a zeide, a bubbe — every household has a history. They should never forget the zeides and the bubbes.

Now I hope that this program should be a lesson for everybody, and we should listen to what the Frierdiker Rebbe was saying. This talk is dedicated to you in connection with the 70 years [since the histalkus], and the Frierdiker Rebbe should have a lot of nachas from all his followers. [unclear] — as the Rebbe said, this is not insignificant — please learn that every Yid's avodah is to raise Chassidishe children, to raise generations, and this will bring the geulah sheleimah speedily in our days. And we'll continue our program Thursday night — next week's program. Thank you.