The Segulah the Rebbe Gave for Fear of Flying

Welcome to our weekly program, The Inside Story of Chabad in America, through the Mindel archives.

In our previous program I mentioned an amazing story about the Rebbe's father — a Chanukah story, a miracle — and the Rebbe gave a picture of his father and of the Frierdiker Rebbe to this person, so that he could always see it. So we were talking about the importance of carrying a picture of a tzaddik.

The Rebbe once said — this was in the early years — that... we learned last week the story of the wife of Potiphar and Yosef. He is called tzaddik. There are two people who are called tzaddik. Why? Because by them it says the word tzaddik. [The other one] went through it once, but by Yosef it happened every single day. Even though [the other] went through it only once, if it would happen every day, I don't know if he would be able to overcome it. That's why the word tzaddik is used for him as well.

It was also mentioned that this was in the early years, that Yosef overcame what the wife of Potiphar wanted. Why? How? Because he saw the image, the face of his father, and that prevented him from doing it.

So we see from here that carrying a picture — or something — in your pocket wherever you go prevents you from doing something you're not supposed to do in this world.

Now, it's not only a picture — even a dollar. The Rebbe said: whoever has a dollar, carry the dollar in your wallet all the time, because you always have to have this in your pocket, so that it will prevent you from doing things that you're not allowed to do in this world.

Also, we know — we mentioned this once — that in the early years people had bad dreams, so the Rebbe said — and I have letters [about this] — that one should put a picture in the room where he sleeps, where the child sleeps, so that it will prevent him from having bad dreams. So we see that a picture, or something holy, is important.

Having a dollar from the Rebbe is the same thing. The Rebbe stood giving out dollars all day, and this is a bracha, so everyone always has with him a dollar.

Now I want to tell you a story — the last one. It has nothing to do with Chanukah, but it's a story — it's good to tell stories on Chanukah.

First of all, I want to tell you that when I was younger, I was afraid to fly — I had a fear, I couldn't fly. I asked the Rebbe about this a few times, and the Rebbe answered me: carry with you a dollar, and he said to me, make sure to check your tzitzis, that they should be 100% kosher, and that will save you, I guess.

So we see from here that carrying [something holy] saves you from a lot of things.

I also want to tell you another story that happened. You know, when the Rebbe used to give out dollars, my children went almost every week to get a dollar. They brought it home, and I wrote down the name of my children and the date of the dollar, so I collected — you wouldn't believe it — from my children, my wife, myself. I collected a lot of dollars — maybe about 775, I had a bunch — and I put them away in the house. Of course, some dollars I gave away — the Rebbe gives you a dollar so that he makes you give as well, so we gave away another dollar, but these particular dollars we kept, and I always had them in the house.

One day, in the afternoon, my wife went out with a stroller with one of my children, and I had a robbery in my house. When we came back, we discovered the robbery — one of the things that they stole were the dollars. They stole other things too — okay, they stole the [unclear], I'll buy another one — but the Rebbe's dollars, all the dollars that I had kept, were stolen. And I felt terrible — I mean, I couldn't get over it — but what can I do.

About eight, nine months later — eight months later — a [unclear] store, a lady calls me up and says to me, "Is your name Shapiro?" I said yes. She says, "A man came here a few weeks ago — this was about eight months later — with a bunch of dollars, and he bought stuff. This is an African-American person, and he gave me these dollars, and I saw names on them. So I was holding the dollars, and people came into the store, and I asked, do you know a Shapiro? People didn't know. But the other day somebody came in, and I asked, and he said, yes, I know who he is — so I'm calling you. I have the dollars."

This was eight months later, so I went to the store, and she gave me the dollars — almost all of them; a few dollars were missing, but almost all of them I got back — eight months later. This is one story.

Now, a while later, I saw in the Jewish Press — it's a paper that comes out weekly — an article where somebody wrote that he was driving somewhere in Pennsylvania. He passed the turnpike, and he passed a toll booth, and the person at the toll booth gave him change — gave him change — and he takes a look: a dollar with "Sholom Ber Shapiro" written on it — a dollar, it says "Sholom Ber Shapiro." But he wasn't Chabad, he didn't know who that was. Anyway, he kept it, but he didn't do anything with it — he put it in his pocket, he didn't do anything with it. Anyway, a while later, he happened to give it to somebody — he gave it to somebody, it's not important the name — in Monroe [?], and that dollar went through a lot until I got the dollar back from Monroe [?]. This was probably one of the dollars that this person had stolen from me, and had gotten from a toll booth somewhere.

So you never know — you never know why — the dollars, or a picture — a person should always have a picture in his pocket of a tzaddik, or a dollar that the Rebbe gave, so that it will be a protection — always remembering, like he remembered the picture of his father, and that prevented him from sinning.

This is our story for today. Next week we'll continue our weekly program. Thank you.