Rebbe’s Response to Bochur’s Moshiach Question

Transcript

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

This letter that I want to share with you is an answer to many lecturers — Chabad, not Chabad, philosophers, scholars. Somebody wrote to the Rebbe that he listens to lectures and he asks questions and he doesn't get answers. Really, a person writes that he doesn't always find the right answers to his questions. Now here's the Rebbe's answer. Does the Rebbe sign this letter? So I'll read it to you the way it is:

"You should not feel discouraged by this, inasmuch as even old scholars who have engaged in Torah study for many, many years cannot always answer all the questions."

So if a person lectures and they have questions, they can say they don't know — it's fine. I mean, I never heard anybody say "I don't know." I don't know why, but they can say they don't know.

"This is not surprising, inasmuch as a human being is a created being and cannot possibly understand the wisdom of the Creator. However, even if one does not know all the answers, it does not have to influence in the least, God forbid, one's adherence to the Torah and observance of the mitzvos."

You have to do it — it doesn't matter whether you understand it or not.

"If you will look into this matter more carefully," the Rebbe writes, "you will realize that most of those people who ask questions are not really interested in the truth, but only seek justification of themselves and their conduct, both in the eyes of others as well as in their own eyes. Their consciousness is bothered for having abandoned the way of life of their ancestors throughout the generations, many of whom actually gave their lives for Yiddishkeit, whereas they themselves have recklessly exchanged their obligation and spiritual treasures for the material comforts of life.

I do not agree with you that one should expose oneself to a non-religious environment in order to prove one's religious conviction and spiritual strength. On the contrary, every Jew, even the greatest tzaddik, prays every day, and at the beginning of the day, 'lead me not into the hands of temptation,'" and he underlines that it is only when God Himself puts one to the test that one has to be firm and prove himself worthy. "As for discussions and debates, this may be [all right] between rabbis, but laymen should avoid such things except where absolutely necessary."

So we see from this letter that the Rebbe — not that a person should answer everything, and the people that ask questions, it really bothers them.

The Rebbe writes somewhere about the difference between the Rambam and the Alter Rebbe. The Rambam had to deal with people that didn't believe in God; the Alter Rebbe already dealt with people who believed, but we had not to weaken them but to strengthen them. Nowadays everybody believes. If a person tries to get into conversations — maybe — but they eat fine, they sleep fine, they go play fine, they go to different games. Does that bother them? In the time of the Rambam it bothered them; now it doesn't bother them. So maybe they just want to waste time. So the Rebbe [says] that you always have to answer, but it has to be [the right time and place].

It reminds me — somebody wrote to the Rebbe about a road test. He wants a license, and he writes to the Rebbe why he needs a license: so that he could go for the rabbi, to give out matzah or to put on tefillin for people, so he needs a car. So he's asking the Rebbe — can you imagine? The Rebbe understood, so he answered him: "You're putting your desire in my [hands]? You want a license, why?" — telling him that sometimes a person — we don't know — every case is different.

Same thing with people who ask questions. Lecturers spend a lot of time, and I don't know, nowadays, if it's [worthwhile] that we should do according to the Rebbe. And there are other letters like that.

Now I want to share with you another paragraph, another letter. Somebody writes:

"Greeting and blessing. I received your letter of July 18th, in which you write about a number of questions which seem to bother you. I must say that I was disappointed to see the nature of your question, for I had hoped that if you had any questions at all, they would be in Gemara or Tanya or the like, instead of which your questions have to do with predictions concerning the future, which in no way have bearing on you and your immediate environment, and I cannot see what benefit you could derive from brooding about these questions. This would have been true even if you had filled yourself to overflowing with Torah; how much more so, as I note that there is still a great deal of room for increasing your devotion and diligence in your Torah studies."

So people that ask certain questions — they should learn, learn, learn, learn. Don't go into these questions, also about Moshiach.

"However, in order not to leave you completely unanswered, I will very briefly answer some of your questions" — he didn't want to leave him just like that; that was kind.

"With regard to the prediction which you read in the name of some book as to what the world will be like in 1999" — this was [unclear, possibly referencing year 5757] — "namely, that there will be someone who will unite the whole world under one all-embracing religion, and you ask my opinion about it — surely you know that the answer is to be found in the Torah many times, where the end of days is described. It may also be found in the Rambam, at the end of [unclear — possibly Hilchos Melachim] and at the end of [unclear]."

Then he writes that he heard — someone said he heard from someone that Moshiach would come in a certain year.

"Surely you know the text of the Ani Maamin, where it is said, 'I will wait for his coming every day,' and although the text of the siddur is not printed in all the siddurim, it does not have it — these principles of our faith are basic with every Jew. Thus it is obvious that Moshiach can come any day."

And then he has more things which I don't even want to read.

There's another letter here — a person writes to ask whether Moshiach can be a woman, or whether it has to be a man. So the Rebbe had to answer this. The Rebbe told him: learn, don't think about Moshiach. Of course we believe every day Moshiach will come, but it's very easy to say "Moshiach," to scream "Moshiach," but what you have to do is learn, and this will bring [the geulah] — this is the answer of the Rebbe here.

So for the people that have questions, I think we got the answer. Next week we will continue our weekly program. Thank you all.