Chanukah Miracle Story Told by a Jew From Ekaterinoslav

Welcome to our weekly program, The Inside Story of Chabad in America, through the Mindel archives. In honor of Chanukah, I want to share with you a very interesting and amazing short letter that someone wrote to Rabbi Mindel, and Rabbi Mindel showed this letter to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe answered something very, very interesting.

Now, the letter was written in Yiddish — someone wrote it in Yiddish — and I'll try here to just translate it into English, more or less, if I can.

He writes like this: "When I came in the year 1924 from Poland to Russia, I lived in the city of Yekaterinoslav about thirteen years. In the years of the 1920s, in the Krai Department [?], a section of the Krai Executive Committee [?], the financial department, that was located on Kazanski Street, number 24, headed by a director, or manager, a Jew with the family name Schneerson. And as people spoke then, he was a very religious Jew."

A few years later I was wondering, because the rest of the other people from this department were mostly not Jewish, but in this case, in this one, it was a Jew — and not only a Jew, it was a religious Jew — and this brought a wonder; Jews were wondering, a big wonder, that this man was like a director or a manager of this department.

He writes: "I don't know where he is, where he went, what happened to him. I don't know where he is, and I was always wondering where he is."

A few years ago, he writes, "I came to this land, America. I was told, by the way, that there is a Schneerson, and here I reminded myself of that Schneerson in Yekaterinoslav from those years — was he related or a close relative to him?" That's how he writes. This was in the early years, in the 50s for sure.

He says it's not him — in other words, the thinking was that it's probably not the same person from Yekaterinoslav from then. Why? Because he is almost his own age. So he writes, "It couldn't be him. Maybe that manager, that director — was he a father of the Rebbe? Was he an uncle of the Rebbe?" So he doesn't know. So he's writing to Rabbi Mindel, where is he, or who is he.

"I was told," he writes, "he was a Godly man, at the same time working in the financial department for years. In my thoughts, I heard many wonders, miracles he performed." Again — is he related to the Rebbe?

Now he writes — this is interesting — "I want to tell you a few stories," but he only tells one: "This holy man Schneerson did a story of..." what this man Schneerson did. This was, as far as he remembers, in the year 1925 or so.

What does he write here? He continues with what he was told: this Schneerson was walking outside, and someone was walking towards him, a Jew. The Jew stopped Schneerson and said, "Reb, I am a Jew, and I need a miracle in my life, a big miracle. Give me a blessing," and he started to cry bitterly. And he doesn't write what the problem was — the Jew did not tell Schneerson what the problem was that he needed a miracle for.

So Schneerson answered: "Today is Chanukah, a time of miracles. Everything in this world is" — he writes in Yiddish — "everything is by," I guess this means, Divine Providence. And he asked him, "Did you light the Chanukah candles last night?" He answered, "No." So Schneerson said, "Come with me to my home." They went, and Schneerson gave him candles to light, and Schneerson told him that God watches over every Jew, and God promises that the blessing rests in the Chanukah candles. Then he said, "And even if a person has this and this problem, you will light the candles tonight, and God will bless you." This man did not — and he underlines this — tell Schneerson what the problem was. And thank God, this person moved later on to America and became a religious Jew. Is that Schneerson related to the Rebbe? That's how he writes to Rabbi Mindel.

Interesting. Then Mindel writes: "I showed the letter to the Rebbe. The Rebbe was very moved, the Rebbe was excited, the Rebbe was moved to see this, and took an interest, and the Rebbe invited him to come to his house to eat." And they ate and spent a long time in the house, and he says the Rebbe gave him, later on, two pictures — one picture was of the Frierdiker Rebbe, and one picture was of the Rebbe's father — and the Rebbe wrote something on the back, he doesn't write what, and he told him to carry this picture, I guess, to carry a picture of a tzadik.

This is the story — in other words, the man was the Rebbe's father. Now, this is an unbelievable story, because the Rebbe's father knew — he says — about the problem. He told him exactly, and the man did not tell him what the problem was. Amazing.

And you can learn a lesson here, that Chanukah is a time of miracles. We all need miracles — now, in the time of war, we need a big yeshuah, big, big miracles. And he says when we light the Chanukah candles, we should sit — the parents, the grandparents, the children should sit — and look at the candles and hear what the candles are telling them, and they should say over stories of tzadikim, stories that they can tell — this story also.

So that's what I wanted to share with you — this story, this letter that I found, which I found now; I had it a long time ago, of course, but I found this now in one of the books of Rabbi Mindel. Thank you very much.