Ep. 60: How American Chassidim Were Made with Rabbi Leibel Altein

00:00 Speaker 1 Can you describe to me, like, what, what the process is of, uh, of, of this decision?

00:04 Speaker 2 I can't describe it, no. I don't know how to describe it.

00:11 Speaker 1 Okay. If you can't, you can't.

00:14 Speaker 2 I'll just give you one small word, a simple observation,

00:18 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

00:18 Speaker 2 Let's say. divulge eleph af dos, I'm saying. Let's imagine Albert Einstein came into a classroom of s- of teenagers, and he, he threw a sentence, and that sentence is 说话 in his great chidushim in physics or whatever it was.

00:45 Speaker 1 I'm Yossi Kamen. Welcome to Among —”Chidim” by Darher, an ongoing farbrengen about life as a Hasid, our vibrant connection with the Rebbe, and inspired living shaped by the way he teaches us each and every day. Shalom Aleichem, Rabbi Oltein. How are you?

01:03 Speaker 2 I'm not a rabbi.

01:05 Speaker 1 Just like a-

01:06 Speaker 2 Mr. Oltein.

01:07 Speaker 1 No semikhah?

01:08 Speaker 2 No.

01:09 Speaker 1 Okay. I, I, I, uh, semikhah without the certificate seems to be a lot, a lot, worth a lot more, I guess.

01:14 Speaker 2 What?

01:15 Speaker 1 The semikhah without the certificate seems to be a lot more.

01:20 Speaker 2 I dropped out of yeshiva. I'm a dropout. A yeshiva dropout.

01:25 Speaker 1 Okay. I, I, I would love to hear that, about that. But let's start a little bit earlier. Uh, before we get to you, I wanna hear a little bit about your parents and also your zeide, Reb Yisroel Jacobson. Um, maybe bikitzur and im itz you could tell us a little bit, tell the samemechah of, of Reb Yisroel Jacobson. And, uh, I mean, I know we can talk for hours just about him, so maybe bikitzur.

01:50 Speaker 2 You want to start with my parents? I'll start with my parents, okay. My father was born in America, תשע"ט. His parents came from Galicia, both his mother and his father. He was born on the Lower East Side, then they, his parents moved to Brownsville. It's damn interesting. He once told us that when he was a, mamash a kleine kind, h- his father sent him to yeshiva. He went to elementary school to Chaim Berlin, which was in Brownsville, East New York. But he once told us that when his mamash, the first time he went to yeshiva, to get to yeshiva, they had to take two buses and cross, you know, a busy street. I don't know, it was Eastern Parkway. So the first time he had to go, his father took him, and he showed him which buses you have to take, which street you have to cross. The next day in the morning, he took him to the door, "Geh in yeshiva."

02:47 Speaker 1 On his own.

02:48 Speaker 2 Azoy er geyen a moleke chinuch, rishtey's.

02:51 Speaker 1 Okay, a different world today.

02:54 Speaker 2 Today they would arrest the channel, the, the parents for child abuse.

03:00 Speaker 1 Right.

03:00 Speaker 2 A kop onem. So he went. For elementary, he was in Chaim Berlin. And then later, for mesivta, he went to Torah Vodaas. This is already the tzaddiks. And the tzaddiks, my zeide, Oliver Sholen-

03:21 Speaker 1 Sholen Jacobson

03:21 Speaker 2 ... Jacobson, had a shir tanya with bochurim from Torah Vodaas, a kvutz of bochurim. So my father gr- joined this group.

03:33 Speaker 1 So your zeide was from, he learned in Yeshivat Lubavitch.

03:36 Speaker 2 Okay, so you wanna hear about my zeide. Bikitzur and im itz. My zeide was born in the middle of the תשע"ט. When he was 11 years old... So his, the cheder in his, in his shtetl, he was already too advanced. He had to go to a yeshiva. Besides, in cheder he had a melamed. There was also someone who, who taught him and his sister limud languages. They taught him Ivrit, whatever. And my zeide said he excelled in it. So when he had to go to yeshiva, there was a yeshiva in Russia. I forgot what the name was. Lida something. It was a modern yeshiva that had limudei kedoshim, limudei chol. So this teacher wanted my zeide to go to that yeshiva, and he wrote him a mlotzah they should accept him. So, so my zeide's father, he came from Chabad families, but he himself wasn't a, psatere a, you know, a heyser Hasid. But he, he was a Nusach HaAri yed, a big talmid chacham. He's my alter zeide. But not, he wasn't psatere heyser Hasid. Good. There was no active Lubavitchers in his... He said maybe there was one or two, but he had no shaichus to Lubavitch whatsoever.

05:09 Speaker 1 In the shtetl?

05:10 Speaker 2 In the shtetl. So he was on the train station. They were waiting for the train to go to the yeshiva in Lida. When they were sitting, standing on the, on the train sta- waiting, so a Yid comes over to them. He sees they're waiting for that train. He tells them, "You're waiting to go to the yeshiva in Lida?" So they say yes. So he starts telling them when you get there, he tells them w- where they should, which part they should dorm in, which area. They shouldn't go to one section because in that section there can be bochurim who on Shabbos smoke and learn Gemara. So that was the first He tells him, "You're waiting for the train to l- to go to that yeshiva?" He says, "" And he points to a shikse, a half-naked shikse at the train station. "Shikim dortin. ""

06:25 Speaker 1 We don't know who, who it was.

06:25 Speaker 2 They didn't know who it was, no. It's like it's mamash from himmel. A male from himmel to Lubavitch.

06:29 Speaker 1 We don't know who, who it was.

06:30 Speaker 2 They didn't know who it was, no. It's like it's mamash from himmel. A male from himmel to Lubavitch. So when they heard that, "Go to, go to Lubavitch." So they, they, they came, end coming to Lubavitch. My Zayde was 11, 12 years old. He went into the Chadorim in Lubavitch. It's-- There, there was the yeshiva, but after the yeshiva, they started making Chadorim for, for kleiner kinder. So he went to Pinos, and they accepted him. So he was in Lubavitch. I think this was, this was about Semech, Semech Zayin or Semech Ches. I'm not sure which. I don't remember exactly which year. So he learned in the Chadorim. Then they say there was, just like now there was, you learn in, you learned in... There was, like, Morristown, then 770. When, um, I went to yeshiva, it was Newark in 770. So Lubavitch was also like that. When you finished the Chadorim, you went to the, the free yeshiva, Shtetin. You stayed there for a year and a half, then you went to Lubavitch. That's when my Zayde was Shtetin. Then he came to the Zahl in Lubavitch. I'm not sure which year. Semech Tes or Ayin. My Zayde was in Lubavitch till they left Lubavitch mamash. He s- he was there after the Rebbe Rashab, Hashem, went to Rostov. The yeshiva was nog gebedene Lubavitch for a little bit. For a year or two, the yeshiva was still in Lubavitch. So my Zayde was there mamash to the very, very end. When the last

08:12 Speaker 2 wagons left Lubavitch, he was there.

08:15 Speaker 1 Hmm.

08:15 Speaker 2 This was-- He was, I think, till about maybe Ayin, Ayin Ches, Ayin Tes. He got married in Taf Resh Peh. And he lived-- He-- After he got married, he lived where my bubbe was from, Homel. His parents... He used to travel sometimes from his house to his parents' house, back and forth. His parents emigrated to, to the USA in Taf Resh Peh Gimel. My Zayde had granduncles, his Zayde's brothers, who came to America in the early 1900s, or even maybe 1890, '90s. I'm not sure exactly when. They were here in America already. So they encouraged my, my elder Zayde a- and his brothers to come emigrate to America. They were shochtim. My s- elder Zayde was a shochet, and his brothers were also shochtim. So they came to America in Taf Resh Peh Gimel. After they were here a few years, they wanted my Zayde to come with his family. My Z- by then, my Zayde was already had, had h- two, two daughters. My, my aunt, my mother were born in Russia. So they, they worked on getting him papers to be able to come to America. So in Taf Resh Peh Vav, they actually came. But before then-

10:00 Speaker 1 Your, your grandparents.

10:01 Speaker 2 My Zayde, yeah. My Zayde and bubbe-

10:03 Speaker 1 That was a very rare thing for a Hasidim to, to come then.

10:06 Speaker 2 Yeah. What happened was, before then, my Zayde asked the Friediker Rebbe if he should come to-- He says his parents want him to bring him to America, if he should come. So the Rebbe said, "Yes, you should go." Then he was at Yechidas another time, and the Friediker Rebbe told him, "Homel." So after the Yechidas, it's like the Rebbe told him he should go to America, and here the Rebbe told him he should come and in Homel. I forgot who it was. for Friediker Rebbe. When he came out of Yechidas, so he, uh, so that he was-- This Mekubav one was by the Friediker Rebbe, and he told him that. My Zayde So the Friediker Rebbe said, "papers Homel." So my Zayde says that it took three months to the day to get the papers.

11:19 Speaker 1 Wow. So he was in Homel, then he got-

11:23 Speaker 2 In Homel, and he got the papers, and he came, and he s- and he, he got the papers. He finally got the papers and the money he needed to go, and he, he left Russia. I think he left Russia is when he actually left Russia. He came to Riga. I think he was in Riga.

11:53 Speaker 1 Took so long?

11:55 Speaker 2 Yeah, until he-

11:55 Speaker 1 From Av till, till-

11:57 Speaker 2 Yeah

11:57 Speaker 1 ... Kislev.

12:01 Speaker 2 Yeah. It took, waited till, till, that's how long the procedure took.

12:07 Speaker 1 Right.

12:09 Speaker 2 He had to wait. There was a whole procedure to g- to get the visa. Officially, he came as a rov in a, in a shul, so they had to verify, so the consulate in Riga had to verify that it's true, and then they stamped it. So it took a long time till ev- all the papers went back and forth. I think he came to America on Haytavis.

12:34 Speaker 1 Okay.

12:38 Speaker 2 But then he got the first letter from the Friediker Rebbe, gimmel shvat, toferish beis vav. The letter was as a, a, a letter that as a gedenken, the achrayus was a truck to, to the, to zijn, tzum taten heises, tzum Rebbe.

12:53 Speaker 1 Rebbe Rashab.

12:54 Speaker 2 Yeah. The achrayus of mefar zayn chassidis s- s- speziel for the yugent lehor mechash- mechashakeh ohr. It's, I forgot. It's a, a page and a half letter, gimmel shvat, toferish beis vav. This was like, uh, the mission statement for us coming to America.

13:14 Speaker 1 It's like a, like a shlichus.

13:16 Speaker 2 Yeah.

13:18 Speaker 1 I think I read in, uh, his sefer, Zichron Lebnei Yisrael, when he got to America, he, like, did a lot of effort to make sure that he could find a langa-

13:28 Speaker 2 Yeah, a langa rekel, yeah

13:29 Speaker 1 ... langa rekel, and, like, to keep the-

13:31 Speaker 2 Yeah, he, he... Yeah, when he came, that was o- Yeah. He had a, came with a langa rekel, but they w- one, uh, one is gone, veis a bisel lecher. So he says, "No, machan latkes, you know, you make a patch." They said, "Nef, ps," one that they had to nefke fer a naye. So he said, "Gol, ama geymschn shnaydern un mach an a naye." They said, "In America, it doesn't work that way. Everything is finished made," you know?

13:54 Speaker 1 Off the rack.

13:55 Speaker 2 Off the rack. And, and no stores sell langa rekel.

13:59 Speaker 1 Right.

14:00 Speaker 2 Whatever. And then came a shaal from parnassa. So like I said, he, he had uncles who were shochtim. He came to America before him, his father and... They were in shlachteises, they were very good roshe shochtim. They w- But they didn't wanna take him. He says, "You, you look like a batln. We can't take you in. You know, you're too batlnish."

14:21 Speaker 1 There's a beard and...

14:22 Speaker 2 Yeah, well, you know, a Lubavitcher bochur. So he said, "Lo mezuchen, ps, a rabbon," the sefer. So they looked around. Then there was already a gude chassid of Chabad in America. There was a rov, his name was Lokshin. So they went to him and asked... He was the official rav haroshi for all the Chabad shulim in, in, in Brownsville.

14:47 Speaker 1 There were many?

14:49 Speaker 2 Yeah.

14:49 Speaker 1 In Brownsville.

14:51 Speaker 2 So they looked around. The only one who was there before was Rabbi Simpson was already here. Actually visited Rabbi Simpson, whatever. Ev- Efrayim Canhelfen. Bekitze nimnits, they c- first they conf- finally found a shul from Yidden who had come from the shtetl where they came from from Russia. The name of the shul was Anshi Babrisk. But Babrisk, the shtetl my zeide came from was close to Babrisk. So a lot of people from the shtetl davened in this shul. S- My alter zeide was a, a, a respected member of the, of the k- of the kehillah in, in the shtetl. So when he came, so they gave him a... So they said, "Sure." So my zeide, they took my zeide for a test. He was there, and they, sof kosov, they would mekabel him. So he became a rov in the shul. One of the people davening in the shul, Meir Greenberg alav hashalom, his father davened in my zeide's shul. So Meir Greenberg, he was a kid. He got the, uh, meidelek kop. And my zeide said to him, "Naf shick in the yeshiva, learnin'." But since he, he never was in yeshiva before, so when he came to yeshiva, they put him in a lower grade because he w- he poshit, he didn't know enough to be in the, uh, in the grades of his, his age. So his father came to complain to my zeide, "How can you send him to yeshiva?" So my zeide says, "Well, zuster, you know, you didn't wanna

16:33 Speaker 2 send him to yeshiva earlier, so..." B- So my zeide tutored him a whole summer that for the next year he was able to get into a class of his age. When it came, when Meir Greenberg came bar mitzvah, so my zeide says, "Nu, yer ze far em ir lernt Tanya." So he started teaching him Tanya.

16:52 Speaker 1 Was he from a Lubavitcher mishpacha originally?

16:54 Speaker 2 No.

16:55 Speaker 1 Yeah.

16:55 Speaker 2 Well, kind of a, kind of a Lubavitcher mishpacha.

16:58 Speaker 1 Okay.

17:01 Speaker 2 So my zeide started teaching Meir Greenberg Tanya, and then some other bochurim, chaverim of his started being mitstarf.

17:12 Speaker 1 The Hechts.

17:13 Speaker 2 What?

17:13 Speaker 1 The Hechts.

17:14 Speaker 2 Yeah. The Hechts or one of them, some of them. Yeah, there were others.

17:20 Speaker 1 A whole group.

17:21 Speaker 2 A whole group. This was the beginning of Chassidis in America. So s- came a group. First it was only the bochurim, Meir Greenberg and his chaverim. They were from Tel Vadas, Tel Vadas. Then the, the group started gr- growing from other yeshivas also. They used to come to my zeide. My zeide taught them Ch- Tanya, started teaching my morim, farbrengen with them. Bekitze, they became mekusharim, bekitze nimnits. My ze- my father already wrote to the Friediker Rebbe, "Nadvoradshecs from America." He has, I think, a letter from the Friediker Rebbe from Nadvoradshecs noch efiu.

18:02 Speaker 1 So your father basically joined this group-

18:04 Speaker 2 This group

18:05 Speaker 1 ... of bochurim.

18:05 Speaker 2 Yeah.

18:06 Speaker 1 So he's a mekarev of Yisroel Jacobson, who later becomes his shver.

18:11 Speaker 2 Yeah. This group became bigger and bigger, and it made a big mapecher in America. Because the Bochum who learned Chassidus, they weren't zekehu tanglish. Nig zenza Yiddishe shmayim, erentskait. The Friediker Rebbe called this group Achi Tmimim. That's the original Achi Tmimim. Not the Yeshiva, but the Bochum who learned Chassidus.

18:43 Speaker 1 So they're an extension of Tmimim, basically?

18:45 Speaker 2 Yeah. Friediker Rebbe then wanted that from every yeshiva should be one nitzig for the whole yeshiva. So each yeshiva had a nitzig in charge of that yeshiva. A lot of interesting letters from the Friediker Rebbe. One of the interesting letters is he writes there should be kavea azman on Tuesday to learn Chassidus, and he wants to know exactly when they come. He also said that anash, they should learn in Hamoke Merkozi, and that anash should take turns to, to be there when they learn, so if they have shailus, they have someone should be there to answer them. But he wrote, "Ich vil mechavezayn dishos ven ze learnem."

19:28 Speaker 1 He wants the, the Friediker Rebbe wants to know?

19:29 Speaker 2 Friediker Rebbe in Otwock, in, in Europe, want, we mechaven the hours when the Achi Tmimim are learning in America. A lot of reiche meises about the Achi Tmimim. The Rebbe then sent, the Friediker Rebbe sent Reb Itche the Masmid to be here. He, one time he was here. He wanted to come a second time, but the papers didn't work out. So he sent a different chossid from Riga, Reb Mottel Cheifetz. Reb Mottel Cheifetz was a, a varm lebedike chever man. So he used to farbreng with the Bochum a lot. And when he came back to, to Otwock, to the Friediker Rebbe, I think it was Otwock already. So he, he gave a doch. He came before Shavuos. So Friediker Rebbe said, "That's s- time, zeit is kurz." He was a sheychet, so before Shavuos he was busy with it. He says, "So he'll take a, a kolodike gruse." He writes, "The kolodike gruse hot genumen a langits." The Rebbe looked at every single name. He wanted to know every single bochur, vegen dem bochur, vegen zayn mishpoche. He writes a meir-- He writes ma zeide meiridike, "Vi the, vi the Friediker Rebbe's ponim hom geloichtn shas" he was reading the names.

20:58 Speaker 1 Wow.

21:00 Speaker 2 Whatever. The kids of these bochum, dose gehen die sofrim tein dem Tmimim.

21:06 Speaker 1 Later when the Friediker Rebbe came.

21:07 Speaker 2 When the Friediker Rebbe came.

21:08 Speaker 1 One second, but then there was also a whole group that went to Otwock.

21:11 Speaker 2 Wait, that, yeah, that was... Okay, later.

21:15 Speaker 1 Okay.

21:17 Speaker 2 Then, so two of the bochum decided to go to Otwock. Berl Levy and Avrum Barnetsky. They decided they wanna go learn in Otwock, and they take a went. They was like the American boys coming to the primitive Otwock, whatever. All but, but on chol hamoed there, hoche ze gegebn gute chavruses. Then my uncle went, Shlome Zalmen Hecht or so.

21:52 Speaker 1 Who also married the Reb Yisroel Jacobson's daughter.

21:54 Speaker 2 He was married already.

21:55 Speaker 1 Yeah, I meant, yeah.

21:55 Speaker 2 But the plan was that he should go after his chasune to go learn in Otwock nog der chasune.

22:01 Speaker 1 This was a thing b'chlal in yene zeytn. There was such a thing, I mean, even in Europe, to go af- to go after you're married for ups, uh-

22:08 Speaker 2 Whatever

22:09 Speaker 1 ... a year.

22:09 Speaker 2 So they went out, they came to Otwock. So my, my aunt, Amerikane meidel gloicht nog der chasune in Otwock, you know. So the rebbetzens, the Beis HaRav, hoched der poshe makarov geven poshet. Iz dos kenen ein shtel, vis poshet. They mamesh like, they took care of her mamesh vi a kind.

22:31 Speaker 1 Vi-

22:31 Speaker 2 The kids are so... What?

22:33 Speaker 1 Your father was also part of this?

22:34 Speaker 2 No, this was before, this was before. Later, a few weeks before the milchonah, but there were letters I think from Chochev. "Eyb, bring in nog bochurim in Otwock." So in Tofsh Sadik tes, about a month before the war, I zeide put together a gr- a group of bochum, six bochurim, to go to Otwock. My father was part of those six bochurim. They went to Otwock. They came to Otwock mamesh right before the milchonah.

23:10 Speaker 1 We had two, um, in, in the recent, uh, the "Hem" magazines, we had two articles the last few months just about, uh, this.

23:17 Speaker 2 Yeah. Avrum Hecht wrote it in English.

23:18 Speaker 1 Yeah, from him, yeah.

23:20 Speaker 2 Yeah. So they came, they came. The first Friday they were there, the bombs started falling. The Friediker Rebbe told them they should go to, run to-- They were in Otwock. They should go to Riga. They said they had to go to Varsha and go to Riga. And he, they should wait in Riga for him to come there. So f- it was a Friday night. They took the train to Varsha. They came to Varsha Friday night. Where were they gonna stay? They thought they'll go into a hotel, but to go into a hotel, you had to sign your name. So Shabbos, so they didn't know what to do. So they went to ask a shailah. One of the rabbonim in, in Varsha then was Reb Menachem Zemba, uh, famous goyen.

24:13 Speaker 1 He's by the Rebbe's chasune.

24:15 Speaker 2 So he told them, "Alle Yidden hobn musa zayn, sheychet hobn musa zayn" V'sus, dayenesht. "Ve-shas Atchak, chasmir mit a shini."

24:27 Speaker 1 Nekud.

24:27 Speaker 2 "Vu-peh," they found a place where they didn't have to ch- chasmir. So after Shabbos, they, they went on a train to go to Riga. By then, the, the w- the, the, the war was already-- The bombs were flying all over the place. So they f- they were on the train to Riga. The Nat- the Nazis, Yemach Shemam, the planes were trying to bomb the trains that were going. So when the train went, stopped, so a lot of people decided to get off the trains. It's sakones. The Nazis are bombing the trains. They got off on the station. The bochurim, the Rebbe said, "Ven af farn in Riga. Vu seist mir daroygen farI stop, we're forward, no? We're not ‹nishnaspo›. What happened at the end? The Nazis in ‹Machshmon› saw the people getting off the trains on the station, so they came down, and they straight, you know, the, the s- s- they load... They came down, and they were fi-- They killed people on the train station.

25:34 Speaker 3 They bombed the train station.

25:35 Speaker 2 Yeah. The people who's on the train. Meanwhile, some Polish planes came, and the, the Nazis train-- planes ‹zaynen antlofen›. So the trains in coming ‹besholm› in Riga.

25:50 Speaker 3 So listening to the Rebbe saved their lives.

25:52 Speaker 2 Yeah, for sure. They came to-- They were in Riga. In, in Riga went ‹grezach›, a bit of the ‹Massman› gave in, Rabbi Chofetz, Rabbi Elichai Malchus. So when the ‹bochim› came, so they all ‹him zich farnumen› with the, with the American ‹bochim›. They frat a bit of the ‹Mashman›, used to give him a ‹shichsidus› and for bringing him with they. I-- My father once told me that I get ink the ‹fabringen› from which of the ‹Massman› in Riga. It's like ‹fabringen› of sixty-nine. He says his, his sword is still burning from the sixty-nine. He was like, "This is Elichai, I'm not in Riga." The rich of the Massman.

26:39 Speaker 3 Interesting.

26:44 Speaker 2 So they were in Riga. So the-- At that time, it was known that the Nazis are soon coming into Latvia. So, so the elder Hasidim there told the ‹bochim›, "You have to run back to America. Save yourselves, go back to America." The ‹bochim› didn't wanna go. The Rebbe said, "You guys are gonna warten." So they didn't wanna go. Our ‹sof kosof›, the Hasidim, um, ‹gekretchet› rates again. So then was they ‹takuwent›. They left, they left, they left the Riga and came to America. Later, there was a letter from the Friediker Rebbe. "Hayet tochen." Uh, uh, uh, the ganze zeit abgedayget was tut zuchman. When I gebetten zul warten, you know, ‹gonish›. I mean, in derech haTav, there was no communications then. It was the middle of the war. Whatever, but...

27:44 Speaker 3 That's what happened. Maiseshaya.

27:46 Speaker 2 Maiseshaya is Kahaya. So he made it back to America. Or another one of the ones who was there, I'm not sure if he was at this ‹kutz›, or if he also one who went before. Yitzchak Kolodny, ‹olav sham›.

28:01 Speaker 3 I think he was... If I remember correctly, I think he was like in a ‹khutza› before. I think.

28:05 Speaker 2 In a ‹khutza› before, I think also.

28:06 Speaker 3 I think so, yeah.

28:07 Speaker 2 I think I once heard from Yisroel Gordon about Yitzchak Kolodny, that when he c- when he came back to America... So all the ‹bochim›, what did they do? So they, they were going back to Tel Avodah to learn in yeshiva. It was before the Friediker Rebbe came. They were in Tel Avodah. So they told me, they said Yitzchak Kolodny, he can't-- I cannot learn ‹aseh divi›. So he, he sat in the shul, I forgot on the east side or wherever it was, and ‹gehaltn› the, the, this is ‹doron› from ‹Tenchet Mim›.

28:42 Speaker 3 Uh-huh.

28:42 Speaker 2 I cannot, I cannot ‹haltn›, I cannot learn ‹vi› in yeshiva. I cannot ‹haltn vi› this ‹doron› from ‹Tenchet Mim›.

28:47 Speaker 3 Uh.

28:48 Speaker 2 That's I think I heard from Yisroel Gordon also.

28:51 Speaker 3 Is it?

28:53 Speaker 2 The kids, so they came. When the Friediker Rebbe came for ‹sheitach›, they all went into ‹Tenchet Mim›.

28:58 Speaker 3 So he, he, the-- Your father Taka went back at Tel Avodah, and the Friediker Rebbe comes.

29:02 Speaker 2 They all went in Tel Avodah.

29:03 Speaker 3 They started ‹Tenchet Mim›, so those are the first ‹mim› in the yeshiva.

29:06 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

29:06 Speaker 3 This group.

29:07 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

29:09 Speaker 3 So your father learned in seventeen seventy.

29:11 Speaker 2 Learn in seven-

29:12 Speaker 3 Tav Shin, Tav Shin Alef.

29:14 Speaker 2 Yeah. My f- my father learned in seventeen seventy. In the beginning of Tav Shin Beis, on a Motzei Shabbos, he, he was sitting in the ‹zal›. He gets a tap on his shoulder. Chaim Lieberman's tapping his shoulder. "The Rebbe will descend." So he goes upstairs to the Friediker Rebbe, so Friediker tells him that he received a letter from the Lubavitcher Shul in Pittsburgh. It was in a bad neighborhood, so the ‹ali yunge› young, young families moved out to a better neighborhood. And the alt-- the elder Yidden, then you will not learn. If it, uh, they bet in a brebem every camps, shicken ze psarovt helped take care of them. So Friediker said, "As of forward in Pittsburgh, Lubavitcher Shul in Pittsburgh." Then it was mamash a few days before Yitzchak Kisselov. I don't know how. My kids have figured out it was the night of December 7th, the night of Pearl Harbor.

30:24 Speaker 3 Hmm.

30:25 Speaker 2 I don't know. But ‹bekitze›, before Yitzchak Kisselov in ‹yenet seiten›, where is then the Friediker Rebbe? My father was an elder Rebbe. So they got our, "Zayn my Friediker besfabringen, zen dem Rebbe." So he want-- I ge- ge- gebetten dem Rebbe if she can oblige me up Yitzchak Kisselov. Friediker said, "No, for more than the free." So my father went the next morning, train station, went by train, comes to Pittsburgh, comes to the train station of Pittsburgh. He thought, "No, Friediker have to wish him. There'll be a welcoming committee." He gets off the train, train station's empty. But he had a telephone number for the president of the shul, so he calls the number. The guy answers, says, "Who are you?" So he says, "The Friediker sent me to help him." He says, "What can you help us?" And he slams the phone down. But gets it s-

31:30 Speaker 3 Nice Kabbalist pun.

31:31 Speaker 2 Yeah. So my father had the address of the shul, so he, "I'll go to the shul." So he went. He, he come, he came, comes to the shul. While he's standing, sitting in the shul, the postman comes into the shul with a special delivery letter. There was a shamas in, an older shamas in shul. Older shamas gives a look at the letter, and he throws it into a closet. After the shamas walked out of shul, my father was curious, so he gives a look. The letter's from the Friediker Rebbe. It was the letter from the Rebbe to make known they sent him.

32:12 Speaker 3 I get... They didn't, so they didn't know yet that he was coming, right?

32:15 Speaker 2 No. So my father stayed. He was the Rov there. My father, when he was there, the Friediker Rebbe told him that the hetsos seiner, sein, from Chechem, the Friediker Rebbe's prut is the Chechem. He should send him a list of hetsos, and Friediker Rebbe will send him the money. My father used to say, "After cooking, we shook him 11, nine ticket Seiten." I was like, "The Montzach Zochte." We, we, every time he went to the store to buy something to eat, he'd think three times what he should buy.

32:57 Speaker 3 Right.

32:58 Speaker 2 Every prut is on Mamish of Rebbe's Chechem. Bekitze, as he's gegangen, then a Zeit is a durch. He saw that in the afternoon when public schools closed, Yiddishe kinderndrehen zich on gas and tun gornishent. So he went on the, out on the street, and on gegant schleppten kinder. Kum erein in shul, and he started teaching the kids. Eglempten zey. Chumash, Mishnah, and Gemara. So he... Then noch, so he had, bis he had got a ganze kite. Then er gestat noch kinder. A zweyte kite. Noch a vile, ot beracht zich, this is only a, this was in one section of Pittsburgh. I can gehen a zweyte shulne, and schleppten noch kinder. Kach ave. But he couldn't teach all at once, so he, er geschleppt chavedim from 770 to come help him. When he wanted to expand more, so he asked the Friediker Rebbe. So the Friediker told him that this is Achit Mimim, and it's all a shailas ve'hot. He should ask the Shag. The Shag is the menahall of clothes from Temchetimim. So any question he has, freig him by the Shag.

34:22 Speaker 3 So he basically founded the Achit Mimim school in Pittsburgh?

34:26 Speaker 2 Yeah, whatever.

34:26 Speaker 3 And that, was that the first Achit Mimim?

34:28 Speaker 2 It, it was actually the first one, yeah. But it was, it was an afternoon school.

34:33 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

34:33 Speaker 2 What we call nowadays a Talmud Torah.

34:35 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

34:36 Speaker 2 But it's, it expanded to new shulnes. It was g- My father was still a bocher. So it came a point that the Friediker Rebbe ma- Also my father's already an elter a bocher. That someone has to an elter, an elter enough, ibin him in this whole operation. So my wife's grandfather, Shalom Pozen, was in Chicago. So the Friediker told my Shalom Pozen to move to Pittsburgh and take, take over the whole operation. So he came to Pittsburgh, and he ch- he made a regular, a regular school from this. With a Kaddish in the morning, with a Tehillah in the afternoon. So the school, in its sea of a school, he, he was the one who established.

35:24 Speaker 3 Shalom?

35:25 Speaker 2 Yeah. But his, but the, the garden was for my father.

35:30 Speaker 3 Oh. So he, so ultimately he came back to New York?

35:36 Speaker 2 Then later, yeah, at the end of Tosfon Gimel, he came back. It was this... In Tosfon Gimel, he came back to New York, and he got, got engaged.

35:46 Speaker 3 So is there a story about the shidduch with the Friediker Rebbe? With the... I'm seeing... It was his, Rabbi Yisroel Jacobson, New Year's Zaidim. So one of his, one of his Talmidim, so.

35:57 Speaker 2 Yeah, of course him.

35:58 Speaker 3 So he made the shidduch, Misamoh.

35:59 Speaker 2 Yeah. Yeah, sure. He had his letters from the Friediker Rebbe bringing the shidduch to my father.

36:10 Speaker 3 So maybe you could tell me about your mother, because I know there's a lot, uh, there's a special, uh, yachas that the Rebbe had with her and, uh-

36:17 Speaker 2 Yeah, my mother, well, my mother, my mother was born, like I said, she, she was born in Russia. She came to America one and a half years old. Sh- She grew up, you know, and she went to public school. There was no, there was no Bais Yaakov those times. My mother had a gaynishe kop, poshit. She was like top in the class, whatever. So any chinuch she had was from the home. So her understanding was a ch- a chasid meant is from looking at my Zayde. She says... Just to give you an illustration, my momma's kop. My father used to learn- Drei proklam Rambam. Ob er klennen, ef er nemmen a Rambam. My mother used to sit next to my father, and my father hat gelent af un kol Rambam, jeda halocha, oge teichste halocha, un maz gevent halocha. Der my mother vet on gim fregn. Sie het nisht oge lost. Ja. Iuste mamme, she hebet zwey boch, yeshiva bochom. Die iste lojn fri proklam Rambam.

37:34 Speaker 3 Definitely unique.

37:36 Speaker 2 Yeah. My mother was like a big debater. Any, on any, every, wherever. She had very strong dais, you know? No peshatas. She didn't go for any peshatas or anything, and you could argue f-for hours with her, and she wouldn't budge, you know? Whatever. A stark kop.

38:08 Speaker 3 So I wanna ask about the Yiddish heim.

38:12 Speaker 2 Okay.

38:13 Speaker 3 But maybe, maybe, maybe, maybe it's better, better to go chronological order. So your parents got married.

38:18 Speaker 2 My parents got married in Tosfont Dalet. My father, after he was in Pittsburgh, they got married in Kislev Tosfont Dalet. In the summer of Tosfont Dalet, he started the yeshiva in New Haven.

38:36 Speaker 3 So that was the establishment of it?

38:38 Speaker 2 What?

38:38 Speaker 3 That was the establishment of the yeshiva?

38:39 Speaker 2 Yeah. He started the yeshiva, befel mames.

38:42 Speaker 3 Okay. Two y- So far, two yeshivas under, under his belt.

38:45 Speaker 2 Yeah.

38:46 Speaker 3 That are still around. Yeah.

38:50 Speaker 2 Then s-s... I don't know exactly when he wrote to the Friidike Rebbe that, that he, he knows the area of the Bronx. I don't know exactly how. Could be because my elder Zayde lived in the Bronx, because his great uncle, he had a great uncle, like I said, who came and they l- they moved into... They lived in the Bronx. So I imagine that's why he moved to the Bronx.

39:21 Speaker 3 Your father's-

39:22 Speaker 2 My Zayde Rebb-- Zayde Jacobson's-

39:24 Speaker 3 Ah

39:24 Speaker 2 ... parents.

39:25 Speaker 3 Ah, okay.

39:25 Speaker 2 They lived in the Bronx. So could be that's how he said he-- that's why he knew the Bronx. There was a very big Nusach HaAri shul in the Bronx. The Rav there was the Moloch.

39:50 Speaker 3 Who also had, uh, his own thing going on in Tel Vadas, but-

39:54 Speaker 2 Yeah, that's a separate shul-

39:55 Speaker 3 The, the, the-

39:55 Speaker 2 ... okay. I was trying-

39:56 Speaker 3 Same time as your Zayde.

39:57 Speaker 2 Yeah. That's a separate shul, okay. But, but my elder Zayde, like I said, he was a, a Hoshov Yid, so he, so he davened in that Nusach HaAri shul. Eh? And, uh, he was like, I don't know if he was a Onges and a Mispal Elderten. So BeKitza. So when he t- So the Friidike Rebbe told, like I said, everything Shaiach, like Achi Tmimim has a Shachas to Rashag. Lupel went back and forth. Lupel, he w- he, he started the yeshiva in the Bronx. The... I think it was Tosfont, I'm not sure if it was Tosfont He or Tosfont Vav. He started Achi Tmimim in the Bronx. And they moved to the Bronx. The yeshiva lasted until the end of Lomeds. By then, the whole Bronx was going from vice for, for Lovenshocher. There were no Yidden left there. So that's the Bronx.

41:21 Speaker 3 So that's, and that's, so that's where you were born, and that's where you grew up.

41:24 Speaker 2 I was born in the Bronx, yes.

41:25 Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah. Okay, fine. So, um, maybe you could tell me a little bit about... There's a lot of letters from your mother to the Rebbe. Like m-may-maybe you could tell me something about it.

41:40 Speaker 2 I don't know. The letters, they're printed. I was also... A lot of letters. But the, there's a very famous letter. In Yiddish it's without a name, but it's to my father. My mother was, she was brought up in the Depression years, forshesa, so she was very farkretscht, and had to move from one place to another. Every, every gashmiyus ziker, you know, the... It was very depressing for her. So sh- So my father once wrote to the Rebbe that my mother's is, uh, down. Is, uh... So the Rebbe wrote on the bottom, "Bitei shul chosid, ishte shul chosid, uba'atzm baal smeichna, baal smidahs," something like that. "Atsus min-"

42:33 Speaker 3 Di-di-ditonas, I think.

42:34 Speaker 2 What?

42:34 Speaker 3 Di-ditonas. Is that-

42:36 Speaker 2 What? Ditonas, yeah.

42:37 Speaker 3 Yeah.

42:38 Speaker 2 Ditonas, baal smidahs, atsus min hayom hu.

42:43 Speaker 3 How does she have atsus from... Vikumtus, uh-

42:45 Speaker 2 Yeah.

42:48 Speaker 3 Uh-huh. So she-

42:50 Speaker 2 So then-

42:51 Speaker 3 Yeah.

42:51 Speaker 2 Okay. Then I think it was the end of the yuds was the Yiddish heim. Yiddish heim had the Yiddish and the English, so I don't know exactly why. There was an editor for the English. For whatever reason, so, so sh- I don't know exactly how it happened. She became the editor from the English chelek of the Yiddishe Heim. So just like the Talks and Tales, the same with the Yiddishe Heim. The Yiddish Chadakov was the magiya, as if you had to know English. So the Rebbe himself was magiya, say the Talks and Tales in English, or say the Yiddishe Heim in English.

43:47 Speaker 3 So your mother's the editor of Yiddishe Heim.

43:49 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

43:49 Speaker 3 And the Rebbe is editing every article.

43:52 Speaker 2 Every, every issue, yeah.

43:53 Speaker 3 Every issue. So that means that every single English article in the Yiddishe Heim, the Rebbe looked over? Is that what it means?

44:01 Speaker 2 Yes, every single, every single article.

44:04 Speaker 3 Till Tosh Nanalev, I think.

44:06 Speaker 2 Till Nanalev, yeah. Then the Rebbe wrote, I think it was Nanalev, "Ein az, ein az man gromeid lagia, vo es mach oleh."

44:17 Speaker 3 The Rebbe's relying on her?

44:18 Speaker 2 Yeah.

44:21 Speaker 3 So are there, are th- are there any interesting kiruvim or siachos that your mother got because of the Yiddishe Heim?

44:35 Speaker 2 I think this was the reason. In Tosh Chafai, when the Rebbe gedruk to Likutei Teyre. So m- so what, the Rebbe tuizikl sen menshen, yeder eyn a tem zakig ven iz geben tuizen dollar far the hag, hagdosha.

44:53 Speaker 3 People paid for the printing of the Likutei Teyre?

44:55 Speaker 2 Of Likutei Teyre.

44:56 Speaker 3 It's $1,000 each.

44:58 Speaker 2 Rebbe tuizik-- aleyn tuizikl sen menshen. Zakig ven sen menshen. So one of the 10 was my mother. The Rebbe, every one of these 10 people, the Rebbe gave a Likutei Teyre. His liku-- These 10 people could make their own hagdosha. But the Rebbe, the, the, the one that the, the Rebbe print on his mother's name, Rebbe Tzechanan's name. That was the Rebbe's hagdosha.

45:27 Speaker 3 So one of the hagdoshas was for, was for Rebbe Tzechanan?

45:30 Speaker 2 That was the main hagdosha.

45:31 Speaker 3 Oh, okay.

45:32 Speaker 2 So the Rebbe gave Likutei Teyres, the one with the Rebbe's hagdosha. Each one of these 10 people got, got-

45:39 Speaker 3 Oh, you, you're saying that th- th- these people had their own hagdosha also?

45:43 Speaker 2 Yeah.

45:43 Speaker 3 Oh, okay.

45:44 Speaker 2 Each one. I have a Likutei Teyre what my parents printed it on the name of my brother, Ovrushom.

45:54 Speaker 3 So when he, he was alive? In Tosh Chafai?

46:02 Speaker 2 L'zchus, not English, l'zchus.

46:04 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

46:05 Speaker 2 In Yiddish, l'zchus.

46:06 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

46:07 Speaker 2 L'zchus my brother, they printed it. The kitsa, but on the Rebbe's-- The one that the Rebbe gave, the Rebbe inscribed every Likutei Teyre. He wrote two or three shuras, the loshon of the Sharbat, "B'broch u'lesedras halavovos l'oved Hashem," and then he signed his name. So Likutei Teyre, so Chadakov had Likutei Teyres. S- so my father was once in Crown Heights, he wanted to pick up the Likutei Teyre. So Chada- Chadakov said my mother has to come get the Likutei Teyre. Then the Rebbe told my mother she should teach the kallas far the chasuna. So it's like the madricha for the kallas. So she had to come from B- Bronx to Crown- Crown Heights. A train ride was not a very geshmakhe ride. It could take at least an hour and a half, if not more. A car ride is a half hour. And the train itself, it didn't go through the most geshak- geshmakhe neighborhoods. The train ride was an L train. It went through South Bronx. South Bronx is famous for mention was vays in the history. From New York, South Bronx was mefusel in gantz America as one of the worst neighborhoods in the whole America. The biggest slum areas. I mean, I went to yeshivot. When I used to go to yeshiva, I went to Beth Randin. Every Sunday morning, I would take the train. So it passed through. You passed through the South Bronx, you looked out the windows on L train on top. You looked out the window, all you

48:09 Speaker 2 saw was buildings, burnt out buildings for miles and miles with the windows wooded up. Looked like a bombed out city, mamash.

48:21 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

48:23 Speaker 2 So my mother was very uncomfortable. So my mother ess rebbe chod Chadakov maybe a konson she should be able to come with a taxi. So Chadakov agreed to pay for the taxi for my mother to come to Crown Heights to teach. Ken zikh forshteyn Chadakov was all far taxi.

48:46 Speaker 3 If he, if he agreed for that, it must have been important.

48:48 Speaker 2 A mesir nefesh. Pail mamash.

48:53 Speaker 3 Uh-huh. Um, what was the Rebbe's involvement with your-- And your, your brother wasn't well his whole life. What was the Rebbe's involvement with that?

49:03 Speaker 2 So, so here we have to go a little bit maybe to the Sregim because-

49:10 Speaker 3 That was my next question.

49:12 Speaker 2 Okay. It has a k'shayas, that's what I wanna say.

49:14 Speaker 3 Okay, fine. So we have the S- Srege Altayen.

49:17 Speaker 2 Yeah.

49:17 Speaker 3 Which I think was once the Srege Jacobsons. What's the story?

49:20 Speaker 2 My, my Srege. But teva he was an askan. What's mean an askan? That he was a dor, a zach-- eis gav zochid tzibur. In fact, when my mother asked the Rebbe about printing a sefer, the zachraynus of my zeide. So-- Or the, or the, the story of the hatsalah of Friediker Rebbe. The Rebbe wrote, nisht no how-- I don't remember the exact loshon. It's printed in... "Haskome, bavadi vepen ken lerne van dem asach in hascones nochutza uvafrat Chabadis."

50:07 Speaker 3 Your, the story of your grandfather i- is the story of hascones n-

50:11 Speaker 2 Hascones, yeah.

50:13 Speaker 3 Hascones Chabadis.

50:14 Speaker 2 Yeah. So bekitso my zayde, like I said before, came in 5600-

50:17 Speaker 3 And he wa- he was also heavily involved with rescuing the Friediker Rebbe.

50:21 Speaker 2 Everything.

50:21 Speaker 3 Yeah.

50:21 Speaker 2 He was heavily involved. Like if he was part of the Vaad Harabbonim of Brownsville, he was busy with, in, in yede zach fun shtarking Yiddishkeit here in America. Every mes of Chabad in those years, my zayde's hand was in the, in the middle. Temchetimim, Beis Rivkah, whatever, Chevre Kadisha. Every mes from the early years, my zayde was involved. Bekitza, my zayde came 5600 to America. The only Chosid he knew then was Rabbi Simpson, alav ha-shalom. So at the end of 5600, before, before Sukkos, so he went to Rabbi Simpson, and he asked Rabbi Simpson, "Vu nemt men doen esrog? A Yanover esrog."

51:19 Speaker 3 He-

51:19 Speaker 2 So Rabbi, so Rabbi Simpson told him, "In America, there's no such thing."

51:22 Speaker 3 There's no Calabria Yanover-

51:23 Speaker 2 "No, no such thing as a Calabria esrog. Go to the East Side and get an Eichos Dodik esrog." My zayde couldn't accept it, so my zayde told him, "Next year, I'm gonna have a, a Yanover esrog. Not only-- I'll have one for you, too." Kach ave. My zayde, my zayde knew in, in Italy there was a Yid who supplied Europe with esrogim. Like he didn't own the fields, but he, he was the one. He lived in, I forgot in which city, but he-- There's letters from the Rebbe Rashab noch to the Yid.

52:08 Speaker 3 He was the way people got Yanover esrog in, in Europe.

52:11 Speaker 2 Yeah. So my zayde contacted him. Co- contacted I think even the yeshiva in Warsaw, and he ordered esrogim. He got esrogim, box of esrogim. Not only one, he got a whole box. Verstehst? So for Sukkos 5600, hot a shen got a Yanover esrog far zich un far Rabbi Simpson far noch Yidden. The f- In the beginning, how'd they get esrogim? Esrogim grew wild. It's not-- There was no-- It wasn't an orderly way. So they used to hire a goy to go to the fields, to, to, to the places where the esrogim grew, and the goy cut the esrogim and sent to the Yid. They sent them to America. No one looked vos arin esrog this is, so the esrogim were, you know, they weren't exactly dishenste esrogim. So like this, as it started, my zayde started-- More and more people started wanting Yanover esrogim, so my zayde started ordering more and more esrogim. And he, he bought, you know, and he paid a good price for them. Until the goyim s- s- gezenn az do, do, that something's developing here. So he started, you know, taking care more, vos, vos meshigt do, whatever. So azoy in tsukh un tvikel the whole thing. When the F- Friediker Rebbe came to visit America in 5600. So when he came in 5600, so the Friediker Rebbe al- also ordered esrogim.

53:53 Speaker 3 From your zayde?

53:54 Speaker 2 No, before then. He ordered f- they should send from Europe esrogim to him. They came to my zayde's address because the address in America for Chabad was my zayde's address. So the Friediker Rebbe's box of esrogim came also to my zayde. Chacham Fagin also came with the Friediker Rebbe to America. Chacham Fagin was a shtikl mechutan with my zayde. Whatever. So he stayed by my zayde a lot. So my zayde had his esrog, his boxes of esrogim. So Chacham was by my zayde in the house, and he saw my zayde's esrog. So he tells my zayde, "Yisroel, dein esrog iz veyn a rechshaneh vid dem Rebbe's esrog." So my zayde said, "Nu, nem d'esrog un bring es dem Rebbe. That's all." Kach ave. Friediker Rebbe looked at-- Later, chalil medah, I think my zayde went into the Rebbe for a broche. The Friediker Rebbe, az, azhoy zhe gezagt, "S'iz gor nisht ken golus esrog."

54:57 Speaker 3 It's not golus. We have a, we have a esrog.

54:58 Speaker 2 Yeah. "S'nisht ken golus esrog," says the same guy.

55:00 Speaker 3 Nisht ken golus esrog.

55:04 Speaker 2 Whatever. Friediker Rebbe wanted a pay. Mein zayde nisht shol tem ken gelt, whatever. But bekitza there was a mafis with the meise. Got my aunt, Rebbetzin Hecht, she was a small girl then. She was cross-eyed. So my zayde brought her into the Friediker Rebbe for a broche. So when she-- They came in, so the Friediker Rebbe turned to my aunt. She was a small girl. I don't think she was even 10 years old yet, and he called her over. She should, she should-- So he, sh- he walked-- She walked over to the Friediker Rebbe. The Friediker Rebbe told her, "Kuk mir in di eygin." So she looked the Friediker Rebbe. Then the Friediker Rebbe turns to my zayde, "Vos vilstu? Iz zi zat a gleych?" She walked out healed bekitza minutes.

55:57 Speaker 3 Wow.

55:57 Speaker 2 So that was the mafis. Friediker Rebbe also told my zayde should bring a lulav. He told him all the simanim vos a lulav darfn dem. That's how the whole thing az man nemt- Far voksen mit dem moch from a-

56:11 Speaker 3 That's where it comes from?

56:12 Speaker 2 That's where it comes from.

56:15 Speaker 3 The Remach would have to have the moch.

56:16 Speaker 2 Yeah.

56:19 Speaker 3 That was very hard, uh, as a kid going to Alta in Esregim trying to find one with the moch. Now, now they come in packages.

56:25 Speaker 2 Yeah. The kids are... So that's how, that's how the thing started. Tofrish pri Zayim. Next year, next year she's hundred year old.

56:37 Speaker 3 Wow.

56:39 Speaker 2 So-

56:41 Speaker 3 And once the Fidek Rebbe came to America-

56:43 Speaker 2 Once Fidek-- So the, so once the Fidek came to America, so my Zayde supplied Beis HaRav with Esregim. I think from the beginning, the Rebbe was the one who took care by the F- F- Fidek. The, the choosing the Esregim, and the Dalet Minim, the Rebbe took care of it.

57:01 Speaker 3 So your Zayde was always working with the Rebbe on this, on this?

57:03 Speaker 2 I, I think, I believe so. The kids are so, my Zayde supplied Beis HaRav with Esregim all the years. I think Toshuv Tes Vov or Toshuv Tes Zayim, the Lubavitcher Rov in Milan, Italy was Rav Palov or something. So he wrote to the Rebbe that the Goyim are being markev.

57:29 Speaker 3 This whole Ishov Morkov Esregim st-

57:32 Speaker 2 Yeah

57:32 Speaker 3 ... began, the whole-

57:33 Speaker 2 Yeah

57:33 Speaker 3 ... the whole problem.

57:34 Speaker 2 That's when he was megal the problem. Originally, when it was in wild fields, so there was no problem. But once the Goyim started making, you know, fields dedicated for Esregim for Yidden, so then the Esreg tree is a very weak one. So they had to strengthen it, you markev it. So then the Rebbe told my Zayde, "Eddaf a link vorn and be beydik every tree to make sure it's not a Morkov."

58:09 Speaker 3 Hmm.

58:09 Speaker 2 And he had to have, and the Rebbe told him he has to have zayn tzvey Eidis.

58:13 Speaker 3 Huh.

58:16 Speaker 2 Two people should be beydik every tree. So my Zayde started going every summer to Italy. At that time, the Rebbe gave my Zayde money to be meshtatef in the whole thing, a heshtatus in the hetes. Every year since then, the Rebbe used to send out to my Zayde. And when my Zayde was nifti, my father took over. He sent out to my father every year, $501 every year.

58:43 Speaker 3 To g- for the travel to Italy?

58:45 Speaker 2 Yeah. For the hetes in the, a shutrus in the gesheft. I remember my Zayde going to Italy when I was a young bocher in the chofs. My f- I remember we used to go to the country. In the middle of summer, my father would disappear for f- for a month.

59:04 Speaker 3 Hmm.

59:05 Speaker 2 My father used to travel with my Zayde. My Zadie used to tell us it's a bush. Esreg is a bush. It's not a big tree. It's a bush full of thorns, and the harkov a lot of time was on the bottom, even under the, under the ground. So you were fucked up from krichen av the red and dig up. If you see, psst, you could tell if there was like a little mound of earth. So you had to dig with your hands until you can see where the Goyim were markev. So it was an aveidis pedah-

59:38 Speaker 3 Yeah

59:38 Speaker 2 ... kitz nimus. It wasn't s- a big, you know, automated work. It was bushes krichen av the red. It was like dark, so Isaiah had a flashlight to be able to see what's doing under the red. Krichen av, av, four. The kids, so Isaiah is gegangen yort zi yor every year. The Rebbe would send out the beginning of the s- summer, the heshtatus in the business, and then the Rebbe fucked bashtelnes regem. Nit naf azich, you know, the Rebbe fucked tael in the shluch, the heyp shluchim eruv sukis.

1:00:22 Speaker 3 To all the Sregim that Rebbe g- Rebbe chose.

1:00:24 Speaker 2 Yes. So every year was a different amount.

1:00:27 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:00:27 Speaker 2 According to how, how many people the Rebbe was fand. Uh, so the Rebbe ordered the Sregim. Andre Yidden ham ech tsu geshellt dem Rebbe nes Sregim.

1:00:36 Speaker 3 From other places?

1:00:37 Speaker 2 It w- No, even from Calabria.

1:00:40 Speaker 3 Okay.

1:00:41 Speaker 2 Mit, mit gibem dem Rebbe men es. But bashtelt of the Rebbe, bashtelt for my Zayde-

1:00:46 Speaker 3 Yeah. It's okay

1:00:46 Speaker 2 ... my tata. And he used to pay for it. The, the Rebbe used to side the, the fim Hunderdor on side was eb gezollt far Sregim was all in cash, $100 bills.

1:01:00 Speaker 3 When did the Rebbe pay for it?

1:01:02 Speaker 2 So the Rebbe paid, we waste a hallow the Meister, the Fidek Rebbe had gezollt Hanukkah zeit. The Rebbe schreibt as zogt nach sich a zertsach gedungen amol. I mean, is that a shash von lechem? Ergo tzol, tzol far, far, far sukis. Aber the Fidek Rebbe had nisht gewollt.

1:01:22 Speaker 3 Right. But the Rebbe, but the Rebbe-

1:01:23 Speaker 2 So the Rebbe also had a geton vidish world.

1:01:26 Speaker 3 So he paid the Hanukkah time.

1:01:27 Speaker 2 He paid Hanukkah time.

1:01:28 Speaker 3 In cash?

1:01:30 Speaker 2 Yeah. So my father, my father, O Shalom, had stacks of $100 bills from the Rebbe.

1:01:35 Speaker 3 Right.

1:01:37 Speaker 2 So when he wanted to give matanos so einekl gezaynen, um, they say, "Hengem ayem." So the matanos was $100 bill from the Rebbe.

1:01:46 Speaker 3 And this is all the years-

1:01:48 Speaker 2 Til Toshanung Beis

1:01:49 Speaker 3 ... til Toshanung Beis the Rebbe-

1:01:50 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

1:01:50 Speaker 3 ... is paying cash, and your father would go into the Rebbe to receive it, or was... No.

1:01:54 Speaker 2 What happened was, so when, when it came, when this, when we had to give the Rebbe the Sregim, so usually it was the night of Yud Gimmel Tishrei. Far un far brengen efshar fil. So my father used to bring the Rebbe suitcases of a Se- a Su-

1:02:10 Speaker 3 You, you were part of it also?

1:02:11 Speaker 2 No.

1:02:11 Speaker 3 No. A fil.

1:02:14 Speaker 2 My father would bring, let's say, 30re segum, 50re segum. And in Gan Eden HaTachton, they put a long table the whole way through, and my father would unpack the suitcase. Then the Rebbe would... I don't-- I'm not sure if my father was there when the Rebbe chose the segum, but my father always had a yechidus with the f- with the Rebbe. The Rebbe would, had a yechidus. Those yechiduson, so they would ask him all kinds of que- things. There's a lot of things about what's doing in, in Italy with the fields over there. But a lot was private family things. So that's when a lot of times my father would ask the Rebbe about my brother, He needed special help. He was totally paralyzed. I think he had ALS, they call it. MS or AL- ALS, I forgot which one. I'm not sure what he had, but he was totally paralyzed. And the Rebbe used to s- tell him what, give heiros what to do. I think it was Tosha Nun Nun Alef. My father always wanted some mir reinschleten un a chekel un es gevoldt. After the Rebbe finished picking the segum, so he called my father back in, and my-- all the rejects, my father would take all the rejects and pack them back in a suitcase un a risgin. So one-- And the Rebbe's nog geshtanen dorten. So one time, I forgot it was Tosha Nun Nun Alef. So after my, my father packed it up, so the Rebbe asked my father,

1:04:03 Speaker 2 "Al geys a lein shleten dos?" So, so my father said, "Mein zun shaiten do un dresen." So the Rebbe came out of Gan Eden HaTachon. I was standing tach in the hallway, and the Rebbe-

1:04:13 Speaker 3 Because you were helping tach your father, mesammen.

1:04:15 Speaker 2 I was gonna shlep it back to the car.

1:04:17 Speaker 3 Yeah. Uh-huh.

1:04:17 Speaker 2 So the Rebbe s- threw open the door. He saw me. A magatom et nand. Der shlep a geys shlep. That's the extent of my involvement.

1:04:31 Speaker 3 Okay. Uh, but I'm mesammen behind the scenes, you're involved also. There's also a whole business of selling a segum. That's a whole thing, right?

1:04:39 Speaker 2 My father, my father didn't come to Crown Heights to sell the segum. He used to hire people to, to sell for him. Heschel Seitel, alav ha-shalom, used to sometimes sell the segum for him. My cousin Yossi, old time. Then came a time he asked me to, to help out in the store. So for a while, I started so-- I started helping out in the store. Not by myself. I just, I said, "I used to go and..." But I didn't run the whole thing. I was busy in the sichas, you know. I wasn't a shayecht to-

1:05:19 Speaker 3 Which we'll talk about soon.

1:05:21 Speaker 2 Whatever. I wasn't shayecht that I should take over a business. But then after my father moved to Yerushalayim, my parents moved to Yerushalayim, so then I took over the business.

1:05:39 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm. So, um, so the-

1:05:43 Speaker 2 And so my father, alav ha-shalom, used to go to Italy after my zayde's petirah, Tosha Lamed Heh, even before then. In Tosha Chof Tes, my zayde suffered a, a massive heart attack. So in the summer of Chof Tes, the, the doctors didn't let him go already. So then my father s- went to Italy, and Meish Elazar zang gezunt s-s-started with... I think Meish Elazar started with my zayde. He told me a lot of times he picked a segum with my zayde already.

1:06:29 Speaker 3 'Cause he was there, you know?

1:06:31 Speaker 2 He was there, yeah.

1:06:32 Speaker 3 Yeah.

1:06:32 Speaker 2 So he helped my zayde. But after my zayde s- went, stopped going, so my father and Meish Elazar were the ones who picked the segum. In Tosha Lamed Vav, my father suffered a heart, a major heart attack. So he, the summer of Lamed Vav, he couldn't go already. So then Shmulik Rodel started going with Meish Elazar.

1:07:00 Speaker 3 He was also lived in, in-

1:07:01 Speaker 2 What?

1:07:01 Speaker 3 He lived there.

1:07:02 Speaker 2 He lived in Milan, yeah.

1:07:03 Speaker 3 Yeah, yeah.

1:07:03 Speaker 2 Shluchim hamayan, Milan, yeah.

1:07:04 Speaker 3 Right. Uh, okay. So, um-

1:07:08 Speaker 2 So since then, so Meish Elazar and Shmulik Rodel were the ones who picked the segum for the Rebbe all the years. And Meish Elazar zang gezunt, he still goes on the field when he has kerach, sheinisht keyn gamar. But both of them trained their children in the chochma v'etz klaiben a segum.

1:07:29 Speaker 3 So they work together with you?

1:07:31 Speaker 2 Yes. Yes, so-

1:07:32 Speaker 3 So if you wanna buy a segum from a place that, uh, the Rebbe has a shutvis, you have to buy from Oishein the segum.

1:07:39 Speaker 2 That's it. The kitsa nimret.

1:07:40 Speaker 3 Kitsa nimret, okay. Um-

1:07:43 Speaker 2 It's a grobkite a bisl to zogn, to nutzen the Rebbe's nomen for business.

1:07:47 Speaker 3 For business, but it's, uh-

1:07:49 Speaker 2 It's a grobkite, pozolston. Iz ich zog es nisht.

1:07:51 Speaker 3 I said it.

1:07:52 Speaker 2 You said it.

1:07:53 Speaker 3 Okay.

1:07:54 Speaker 2 Okay.

1:07:54 Speaker 3 That's it. Uh, one plus one equals two. Uh-

1:07:56 Speaker 2 I don't know.

1:07:58 Speaker 3 You don't have to.

1:07:58 Speaker 2 Kabbalah samus mi shamayim, so.

1:08:00 Speaker 3 Okay. Very good. Um, so I wanna move on a little bit to you.

1:08:06 Speaker 2 To me?

1:08:07 Speaker 3 I think we're ready. So you're born in the Bronx.

1:08:10 Speaker 2 Born in the Bronx. Went to my father's yeshiva till I was about 11 years old.

1:08:18 Speaker 3 So what was the first... So you, you're not living in Crown Heights. What was your first, uh, like seeing the Rebbe, saying, "Samia Yechidas"?

1:08:25 Speaker 2 I don't remember exactly the first time.

1:08:30 Speaker 3 You had a Yechidas by your upsherenish?

1:08:32 Speaker 2 I don't remember. I think... I don't remember. Maybe I remember a little with my brother's upsherenish. I'm not sure.

1:08:44 Speaker 3 Younger brother?

1:08:45 Speaker 2 My older brother.

1:08:45 Speaker 3 Older brother.

1:08:46 Speaker 2 Was born in Tosfon Ches. Tosfon Zayin. Not Tosfon Ches. I don't remember. I think I remember coming for 770 als a kind. I mean, we used to come very often to my Zayde's house for Pesach, for other times.

1:09:00 Speaker 3 And he was living in Crown Heights then?

1:09:01 Speaker 2 My Zayde? Sure.

1:09:02 Speaker 3 Yeah. So you grew up being around, uh, around the Rebbe.

1:09:06 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:09:06 Speaker 3 So what, what, what is your, like your earliest, uh, times remembering the Rebbe? Not a time. I'm saying like what, what was the machze? What was the tzire? What, what was going on? You came to farbrengens?

1:09:19 Speaker 2 I only remember two machzes, very vague. You know, I don't have clear memories. I remember davening in the kleiner zal upstairs, Yontif, fuck, you know, packed in the kleiner zal eiben. And I also remember Simchas, a little Simchas Torah in the chalash. I wasn't in the chalash. I was with my mother. The vaibishul was around... The chalash goes down, but around, like where the, where the building is, the left side, the apartment building. So the w- the women used to go around, used to look down in the sh- chalash.

1:10:07 Speaker 3 Like by, by behind the gate?

1:10:09 Speaker 2 Yeah. So you look, you, they used to look down into the chalash. So I was with my mother, I remember, by the chalash, a little Simchas Torah. I think that was when Agrisa Bahola, Farat Reisa. I was a little kid. I don't remember, I don't even remember what year it was, was of them. Uh, my father used to shlep me to farbrengens.

1:10:30 Speaker 3 So those years you were learning... So, I mean, so that, that, those are your early memories from the Rebbe.

1:10:35 Speaker 2 Okay. My father used to shlep me to farbrengens as a kid. I remember going to, to the halls.

1:10:42 Speaker 3 The farbrengens in the halls?

1:10:43 Speaker 2 Yeah, I remember. I remember my father shlep me to a hall, that's all. A gedink goneshe, mamish goneshe.

1:10:48 Speaker 3 So this is in the, this is in the Yuds?

1:10:50 Speaker 2 Yeah, in the Yuds. I remember my fa- A gedink a, a whole title, I remember w- yech shonen mit the kinder, psst, I remember, psst, I don't know, some vague memory of a whole title, but...

1:11:02 Speaker 3 Hmm. So you're learning in the Bronx, um, for the whole elementary you learned there?

1:11:08 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:11:10 Speaker 3 So you didn't go to Beth Rivendin?

1:11:11 Speaker 2 What?

1:11:12 Speaker 3 You didn't go to Beth Rivendin?

1:11:13 Speaker 2 No.

1:11:13 Speaker 3 You were in your father's yeshiva?

1:11:14 Speaker 2 Yeah. I went to Beth, I went to, to Beth Rivendin, I think, El Chof Alef, I believe.

1:11:24 Speaker 3 When you were already-

1:11:25 Speaker 2 11 years old

1:11:25 Speaker 3 ... 11. So you basically grew up, it's like a, it's like a shluchis basically. Like, like, uh, you're growing up in the Bronx.

1:11:31 Speaker 2 In the Bronx, yeah.

1:11:32 Speaker 3 There's no other kids. Like a, like, like shluchim's kids grow up today.

1:11:35 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:11:35 Speaker 3 Like that, that type of thing.

1:11:36 Speaker 2 Yeah. Weren't a lot of frumme-- We lived in a neighborhood where there weren't a lot of frumme Yidden.

1:11:43 Speaker 3 Right. So you end up going to Beth Rivendin at 11 years old.

1:11:49 Speaker 2 11 years old, yes, I went to Beth Rivendin. My brother was already in Beth Rivendin before me.

1:11:54 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm. So, and then you're learning in the, the, then you had your bar mitzvah, you're already in the Lubavitch mesgadas.

1:12:01 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:12:03 Speaker 3 And you had Yechidas for ba- for your bar mitzvah, I imagine.

1:12:06 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:12:08 Speaker 3 Is there anything that you wanna... Is there anything from those early years when you were younger from Yech, from Yechidas that, that's worth sharing?

1:12:14 Speaker 2 I don't remember anything. Any, I don't remember any Yechidas before. My bar mitzvah, my father hob mir tsu gegribt a pilpul sholelu fierech. In other words, not for a kid to say.

1:12:29 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:12:30 Speaker 2 Psst, a gedreite shtickel, a shtickel bachayim. It was, my father sat with a pen, you know. Those days he wrote it out on, on paper, 20 pa- pe- written pages. A gepruft, gepruft mir ein haken in kop. Ob ich ven a kinder nisht men shayach zu farshteyng. When I went, we went to Yechidas, the Rebbe asked me, "Vos gehe ich zogen?" So I s- s- so I, so the Rebbe sefer hed me on the nigle. So the Rebbe hob dong gebin fregen. The suggia is geven vegen ibud eidos lashmo. It's by tefillin or mezuzah, psst, psst, psst, Sefer Torah, tefillin, mezuzah, psst. So the Rebbe tong gebin gefregen. I tried to answer, ober the Rebbe t nisht ogen vos. You know, er gekvetscht un gekvetscht till I got stuck. Me kids a nimets. My father was embarrassed for me. I was gonna go from... All I remember is that in the broche, the Rebbe gezogt az z- az zayn bay mir ibud eidos lashmo vis im vurn teireh. That's all I remember. I think he said teireh mishpatim.

1:13:50 Speaker 3 You didn't know what that meant then?

1:13:52 Speaker 2 At that time?

1:13:53 Speaker 3 Yeah.

1:13:54 Speaker 2 Probably not.

1:13:57 Speaker 3 Uh-huh.

1:13:59 Speaker 2 That's all I remember from the bar mitzvah Yechidas.

1:14:03 Speaker 3 Okay. So I imagine once you're in, uh, whatever they call it, yeshiva high school-

1:14:07 Speaker 2 In Beth Rivendin

1:14:07 Speaker 3 ... in Beth Rivendin, mistameh you started becoming a little more-

1:14:11 Speaker 2 Pseichen Yonen.

1:14:12 Speaker 3 Yeah, Pseichen Yonen.

1:14:13 Speaker 2 Okay, yeah, whatever.

1:14:15 Speaker 3 I think you told me that, uh, psst you listened to, yeah, tapes. You listened-

1:14:20 Speaker 2 That was later on.

1:14:20 Speaker 3 Okay.

1:14:21 Speaker 2 But in l'chatchilah, this is, this is Tosfon Chof Beis, Tosfon Chof Gimel. So... Like I said, we used to come a lot of times to my Zayde for Yontif, for Pesach, and more for, for, for Simchas Torah. So like, like this, I used to go every Shabbos, used to go back home to the Bronx for Shabbos. But once in a while, I, I stayed in Crown Heights f- for Shabbos and Vorchim. When I was... After bar mitzvah, a lot of times I would stay for Shabbos and Vorchim by my Zayde. Not every Shabbos and Vorchim, but, but a lot of times. I didn't understand the farbrengs. It was over my head completely. I do remember that the first mol hapse fashtane was the Rebbe read the Yiddish Talmud when the Rebbe read the sicha Vos iz a Chosid.

1:15:30 Speaker 4 Ah, the Lamtentse.

1:15:31 Speaker 2 Yeah. I remember the Rebbe did tell the maise. Those-- The ershter mol hapse fashtane was the, the verte far dem.

1:15:36 Speaker 4 Right.

1:15:37 Speaker 2 The maise.

1:15:37 Speaker 4 The whole story, yeah.

1:15:38 Speaker 2 The story. Okay, that, that was, I think, forgot Chabad Zecharia Gimel Chof. I forgot which year it was. Chabad Zecharia Gimel. I remember shticklech. I remember kleine vertlech I remember from the Rebbe, like Chof Daled Achron Shofar. The Rebbe gedert wegen im hu gezogt the Kodesh Baruch Hu Mitzrayim, Ha'ei onnu v'neinu v'nei v'neinu. The Rebbe gedert as Viegulus Mitzrayim is a pul nimsheches. I remember when the Rebbe said the maise wegen-- A Rebbe wegen pul nimsheches. Uh, the Rogatchover zogt as kiddushin is a pul nimsheches. So I forgot, he said V'chaim or I forgot. Something as the Rogatchover. He says, "Komt a yitza mazal tov."

1:16:49 Speaker 4 Chasuneh gat.

1:16:50 Speaker 2 It's yitz chasuneh gat, a pul nimsheches. The Rogatchover again, just the, the mazal tov is eicher the pul nimsheches, something like that.

1:16:57 Speaker 4 They only need one.

1:16:57 Speaker 2 Yeah. It's a pun. So I remember the Rebbe said, you know, Deileman tzuch tzuch lacht a bisl. But I remember that, that farbrengen. That was Chof Daled.

1:17:08 Speaker 4 So you're starting to, uh-

1:17:10 Speaker 2 B'seich Onions, Chof He is when the Rebbe don't gave molenen the Rashis. So then, also I learned in Bedford every Sunday. Chof He already was a mesivta. Every Sunday, the Beis Yel used to-- The whole mesivta would sit around a big hes, and the Beis Yel would chazer the farbrengen.

1:17:35 Speaker 4 For the, for the kids?

1:17:36 Speaker 2 For the kids, yeah. So, I guess, so when he used to chazer the Rashis, you know, Rebbe used to, he used to chazer, uh, with a Sopher Berurah. So we, we were able to chap, chap. So later, when the Rebbe said the fab-- by the farbrengens, so the, the Rashis were already easier to follow, you know? Kashas, midemfas.

1:17:54 Speaker 4 You're saying you got used to the style-

1:17:57 Speaker 2 You got used to the-

1:17:57 Speaker 4 From the Beis Yel's chazara, right?

1:17:59 Speaker 2 We were able to understand it, yeah.

1:18:00 Speaker 4 Yeah.

1:18:01 Speaker 2 So, so then we, I-- So then I started un-- We started understanding the sichas already. The Rashi sichas, I feel a bar mitzvah, you know, a, a mesivta bochur was easier to follow. Wasn't tief in yona machsidis or the komplitzite nigle. So Chof He, abba chong im farshteyne a bisl shim de sichas. And tsu bisl, I started farshteyne andere zach neicht in az erdig in in kolle. So Chof He, abba chong mit galten shoin a bisl mehr der sichas. Then Chof Zayin we already learned by the Beis Yel officially chassidus.

1:18:40 Speaker 4 In Bedford?

1:18:41 Speaker 2 In Bedford.

1:18:43 Speaker 4 So, like, were you, you-- By that time, you're already dir every Shabbos at the farbrengens?

1:18:50 Speaker 2 Chof Zayin I would say much more, yeah.

1:18:53 Speaker 4 So were you, like, were you, like, part of-- Were you, like, going to chazara? Were, were you doing that type of thing right away, or are you still, these things take time?

1:18:59 Speaker 2 I used to go to chazara, yeah. I used to go to chazara, yeah.

1:19:07 Speaker 4 Okay. So what happens afterwards? You, you-- I know you were in Sicha in Mel-

1:19:11 Speaker 2 I need more chicken. What happened?

1:19:12 Speaker 4 No, I'm saying I know you're in Sicha I know you're in Sicha in Melbourne. That was-

1:19:15 Speaker 2 A lot later.

1:19:16 Speaker 4 That was after you were learning in Sim Chatem already?

1:19:18 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:19:19 Speaker 4 So, so just give me chronologically what happens. You, you, you-

1:19:21 Speaker 2 So Toshon Chof Zayin I-- my last year in Bedford. Chof Zayin and Chof Ches I learned in Newark under Rebbe Saul Nigle, Rebbe Meir Machsidis.

1:19:39 Speaker 4 And that's when you were, uh, listening to tapes of, of previous years?

1:19:43 Speaker 2 No. That was in Bedford. Chof Zayin in Bedford still. Toshon Chof Zayin in Bedford.

1:19:51 Speaker 4 What happened?

1:19:54 Speaker 2 So I had two chaverim who had tape recorders. In those years, a tape recorder wasn't the little tiny cassette. It was gigantic machines with reels.

1:20:06 Speaker 4 Reel-to-reel.

1:20:07 Speaker 2 Reel-to-reel. Actually, I had three chaverim. An, Aharon Yankov Goldstein from Ann Arbor. So, so he, he had the tapes from his father from all the old years.

1:20:25 Speaker 4 From the yutz.

1:20:26 Speaker 2 From the yutz noch. Well, who had tape recorders? But my chaver had a tape recorder, so I borrowed the tape recorder from my chaver in the dormitory, and the tapes I borrowed from Aharon Yankov. He gave us tapes. So Thursday night, lights out was officially nine thirty. So after-- There was a dormitory council or whatever. So after lights out, ten, ten thirty, I used to take the machine, go down to the, to the basement where the kitchen was, plug in the tape recorder, and go gave him the tapes, whatever. Then there was no, there weren't Sichas Kodesh, all the Sichas. It was, it was poshut unavailable. So I used to write. I used to write Nekudos. I couldn't write as fast as I could. I started writing the Farbrengens.

1:21:29 Speaker 4 So you're getting used to the Melacha?

1:21:31 Speaker 2 What?

1:21:32 Speaker 4 So you're getting, you're, you're training yourself, you trained yourself whatever for the-

1:21:35 Speaker 2 Whatever, yeah

1:21:36 Speaker 4 ... to, to write, to write Tanakh a little bit.

1:21:38 Speaker 2 In Chof Hei, there was a while in Chof Hei that Peshats and Farbrengen, I used to go to a table, a bochur to sit was not shayer then, but I took a pad, and I wrote Peshats the Rebbe spoke.

1:21:53 Speaker 4 During the week?

1:21:54 Speaker 2 Yeah, Farbrengens during the week. I wrote Peshats maise. As fast as I could, farshteytsu?

1:22:00 Speaker 4 So you're just doing this for yourself because you want to under-

1:22:01 Speaker 2 Yeah, myself

1:22:02 Speaker 4 ... because you want to understand the Rebbe.

1:22:04 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:22:04 Speaker 4 That, that, that's basically what you were, what you were doing. And the, the reason why you were listening to the Yiddes was for no reason. It's because you had, that's what you had available.

1:22:12 Speaker 2 Yeah, poshut.

1:22:12 Speaker 4 Yeah.

1:22:14 Speaker 2 Yeah, there was-- I used to sit sometimes till 6:00 in the morning, poshut six hours straight listening to Farbrengens, yeah.

1:22:22 Speaker 4 Ah.

1:22:23 Speaker 2 It wasn't available those, you know, those years everything was a chidush, you know?

1:22:27 Speaker 4 Okay. So-

1:22:30 Speaker 2 This was Chof Zayin. Chof Zayin and Chof Ches, I was in New York. Chof Tes, we came to 770.

1:22:36 Speaker 4 And then the whole Shlichus to Australia happens.

1:22:39 Speaker 2 And yeah, at the end. Chof Tes, we learned in 770. In the, in the middle of the winter, I forgot exactly when, I get a tap on my shoulder. Benyomin Klein calls me out of the zal. That Rebbe's, in Chof Zayin, HaRebbe shick der shluchim Australia. My brother was on the kvutze, six bochurim. Chof-- So this was Chof Tes. So Benyomin said, "Rebbe will shick noch a, noch a kvutze." "Eben, eben maskim tzu a rufshteln mein nomen in the reshimah vos the Rebbe wird klehnen."

1:23:27 Speaker 4 So he-

1:23:28 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:23:28 Speaker 4 ... he, you a- he's asking you to put your name on-

1:23:31 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:23:31 Speaker 4 ... this thing.

1:23:31 Speaker 2 "Tenoim, the elderen dafen maskim zayn, and you have no gezunt problems, whatever." So farshteytsu? I said yes. My havrusa nigle then was Shmuel Kaplan from Baltimore. So he was also. But Benyomin called each one separate when the tzveite kenes only then the andere. So officially, we didn't know each other. We learned together, but the whole winter s- when Aveh Matuach was gezayn.

1:24:15 Speaker 4 Without speaking to each other about it.

1:24:16 Speaker 2 Yeah, so just looking at the, the ten- the tension.

1:24:20 Speaker 4 Mm-hmm.

1:24:20 Speaker 2 So we understood, eynikem tzayten, that we're both under the same tension. Azoy iz do the gantz winter. Shushan Purim, the Rebbe gave then Dovid Rostmolish, shalom, mashke tzu farbrengen, machen a hisvadus gedolo. End of Purim farbrengen. So Shushan Purim, chal always the te- the day after the greste farbrengen was a nacht fun yechidus alamal. The Rebbe used to nehmen a yechidus al hach archim. So Rav Dovid was in cheder sheini. Farshteytsu? Shushan Purim. S'genen ketav leiv haMelech. Hisvadus gedoy, whoa. Farshteytsu? S'goil a Yiddem. So farshteytsu the bochurim were pushing to enter Rav Dovid. But in mitn mit am ol, I was standing there. Rebbe-- So Benyomin gives me a tap on the shoulder to go into Chadakov's room. So in Chadakov, Chadakov tells him that eben auf der reshimah for in Australia.

1:25:36 Speaker 4 Shushan Purim?

1:25:37 Speaker 2 Yeah. Herschel Greenberg zol zayn gezunt. So he, he also went. He saw, he said he saw the tzetl with the Rebbe's, that the Rebbe tarungel, geringelt a name.

1:25:50 Speaker 4 So the Rebbe had a reshimah of all the bochurim and the Rebbe-

1:25:51 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:25:51 Speaker 4 ... and the Rebbe knew.

1:25:52 Speaker 2 He said he saw, I think if I remember correctly, he said he saw the Rebbe's ksav on-

1:25:57 Speaker 4 Oh

1:25:57 Speaker 2 ... on the tzetl. Whatever. Mikitzim. So this was Shushan Purim. L'peel we had to get visas. What happened was the first shluchim went on tourist visas. So when they wanted a-- So the government there hot sheyn, you know, once ze veshtanden zey m'hakt a tscheinik. So they want us, us to come on student visas. A student visa was much more-

1:26:22 Speaker 4 Complicated

1:26:23 Speaker 2 ... complicated. So it took time until the visas came. L'peel we left on Shehecheh Nisann. No, not-- On Shehecheh Nisann we were in yechidus. Shehecheh Nisann was Thursday. That Thursday, the whole Lipsker, alav hashalom, brought us a Sefer Torah from Morocco. Yemei Kriya, he brought it in to, to the Rebbe's minyan. And k- k- we bochurim, so we rolled into Kriyas HaTa-- I rolled into 770 for Kriyas HaTorah. And I come into the hallway, and I see in the zal, alle steinen auf the bank. Because mit a reingebracht nei sefer, gezungen "Zis is a simcha."

1:27:12 Speaker 4 The Rebbe came down?

1:27:13 Speaker 2 The Rebbe was davening for Kriyas HaTorah. No, this was upstairs in the zal.

1:27:16 Speaker 4 Up- oh, upstairs. Okay.

1:27:16 Speaker 2 Upstairs in the zal. The Rebbe heard three of seasons of Zalman the other day. And so after davening, then it was the beginning of Nisan. Then the s- the kitchen was on seven forty-nine. That's where the yeshiva kitchen was. But from Rosh Chodesh Nisan was closed Pesach. So ha-- so where did the bochurim eat? There were buses that took the bochurim to Beth Din three times a day to eat breakfast, lunch, and supper. The bus driver was a Peilishe junge man. His name was Pearlman, I think. Pearlson, I forgot his name was, what his name was. After davening, Chadowk used to go into the Rebbe. Chadowk came out from the Rebbe's room with a bottle of wine. The Rebbe So Chadowk brought in the bottle of wine t-to the zal and told Mechol Meanwhile, this Peilishe guy, he was sitting of shpilkes. "Bochurim geitz!" You know, he was trying to, to drive them to the bus.

1:28:38 Speaker 4 To, to get breakfast.

1:28:40 Speaker 2 He had to go to Beth Din. Chadowk came running out of Merkes. The Rebbe Er is sheyn farshtanden, veist du, vis epes. So az Chadowk gejesn, zol nisht vorden. So vi s'teyt in di zal, upstairs, in di zal. Mechol is avek gezest. Um gang nemen fun Rebbe's vein. Everyone wanted a sort of chai fun Rebbe's vein. Zitz da Pearlman nut. Un plotzling, di Rebbe kumt arein in zal. Plotzling, un a geit. Mechol was sitting under the windows facing the Olam Kodesh. So the Rebbe is, is aroge gangen around and sat down next to Mechol. Un ge gosn lo chaim fun di vein. Geit doch a minut zwey. Cheydesh, iz erlech em, Rish Hashanah. Di Rebbe heb tön di maimer. Di Rebbe said, "Di maimer. Cheydesh." Plotzling. On a chones. That was Thursday morning, Rosh Chodesh Nisan. In mitnad, the Rebbe demanded epes vegen Sefer Torah. Epes, me kash geganen pes mit Sefer Torah. In the afternoon, so they told us, "Am a geit arein genef yechidas sum Rebbe." We were going after Shabbos to Australia. So we're going in yechidas noch Mincha. Told us, the Rebbe geit uns geb matzah. So we should prepare paper bags to, to put on the matzah. So after Mincha, we all went into yechidas, into the Rebbe's room. The Rebbe was by his desk. The Rebbe said, "The sicha, the sicha is printed already." And then the Rebbe said we should take matzah. The Rebbe didn't give us matzah. The box was in the back of the room. Then

1:31:00 Speaker 2 the Rebbe gave us gilt of mos chitim in Eretz Yisroel in, in Australia. He gave every one of us a twenty, a ten, a five, and a one. Thirty-six dollars.

1:31:13 Speaker 4 In American currency?

1:31:14 Speaker 2 In American currency, yeah. This was Thursday after Mincha. I don't remember the yechidas. I gave him to the Rebbe. The Rebbe was magiya the yechidas Thursday afternoon. Thursday night was officially a tses hamisholom mit ham yeshiva fun di bochurim. So the Rebbe gave out the sicha mugia in time for the tses hamisholom. There was not mamash like seven, eight lines of ksav yad. Ha'ores, mar makemes on the, on the gedicht geshibn. I gedenk, the Rebbe started off, "Azeh vishen aducht the kol ha'shol os ko-koshis."

1:32:08 Speaker 4 There was the kvitzas ready.

1:32:09 Speaker 2 The first, yeah. "Ve'tir ken ufton koheinu ve'koheinu." So on the words koheinu ve'koheinu, the Rebbe zeicht a Gemara Sanhedrin. Reb Sholom, olav hashalom, ve'tem achav gen zol leynen d-- So far sheitz ach af nor he said what the Gemara Sanhedrin is. A meise vi fil vaibish limem elochot genumen koheinu ve'koheinu epes. A mechlekes in Gemara vi fil vaibes dos meint koheinu ve'koheinu. But ikar eichkeit was this word I always liked, the chaza. When the Rebbe-- On the pis that where the Rebbe, which the Rebbe said, "I git mos cheit-chitim of Australia." So the Rebbe geshibn ayin to alter Rebbe Shuchan Oraich. Siman tof kuf chaf tes. Siv vov if I remember. Dorten, the alter Rebbe read, "Em a kumt in a shtot, ven iz, veert men chiyuv ze gebin mos chitim." Dorten s'teit az, az eem, eem a lebt in a shtot dreysik teg veert men chiyuv ze gebin. See, Vov heh ton, tate ba med vor um, a muren, ei me kunt logurshum. Aber der vos kunt amanas lishtakea, meshayim miyad.

1:33:30 Speaker 4 Yad.

1:33:31 Speaker 2 So this is the vort. Officially we went for two years. We were coming home after two years.

1:33:39 Speaker 4 Right.

1:33:40 Speaker 2 But Rebbe geshibt nein. Unze ha, moes chitem, mi hob nadin fun lishtakea. There's no such thing in haslichas for Rebbe temporary.

1:33:48 Speaker 4 Right.

1:33:49 Speaker 2 Shas befort af a minut, izos a kvi es ladl, adl el mei lom. S'a vort. Poshut, na ze izos a chassidishe heges, aber dos a, a psag din l'maise poshut.

1:33:59 Speaker 4 Yeah. So before we go back to Australia, I forgot to ask you something. I just wanna move back, uh, a little bit before we continue to Australia. And there was a story that you had with, um... I think it was in Yechidas about, about L'Mod Cheil with yourself. Can you tell me about that a little bit?

1:34:20 Speaker 2 Yeah. One Yechidas, yeah. I asked the Rebbe, yeah, I want to-- my parents wanted me to finish high school. My mother mainly. I wanted to quit English. Now which year was it? I think it was, it was the summer of Chof Hey. I asked the Rebbe I wanted to quit English, but my parents don't want. So the Rebbe said I should talk my Rosh Yeshivas or Rebbe with my elders. I went then by Yankel Shrayer, o"s. He spoke to them, but he didn't get anywhere. Then was Rabbi Tenenbaum, o"s. He was in the know. He, at Yagepeld, would have dreys. Maisel. The next year, pis, there was a whole gesheft. I was... It was a question of skipping a class, 'cause the yeshiva wanted to take hef the kita and skip them a class. Somehow Rabbi Tenenbaum tanked it up my elders that if I stop going to English, he'll be able to skip me. So pel, that's what happened. So I didn't finish English, so I skipped out of English. This, this was going into Tofshon Chof Ov. That was the m- that's the whole maise.

1:36:09 Speaker 4 That's what happened?

1:36:10 Speaker 2 That's what happened.

1:36:10 Speaker 4 No, it's interesting. So, um, let's go back to Australia. So you had the, uh, the Rebbe's Hagos with the Musar Hasgal.

1:36:18 Speaker 2 Then we went.

1:36:19 Speaker 4 And then you went to Australia.

1:36:20 Speaker 2 We went to Australia.

1:36:23 Speaker 4 You were there for two years?

1:36:24 Speaker 2 Two years, yeah. Till Tofshon Lamed Alef.

1:36:27 Speaker 4 Anything you wanna m-mention from that kuffe that's important? You were there, you learned, you were with the-

1:36:34 Speaker 2 I learned

1:36:34 Speaker 4 ... with the Kehilla.

1:36:35 Speaker 2 Yeah. There were six bachurim, and they did all the-- the other bachurim learned in the yeshiva. There was no official Rosh Yeshiva yet in yeshiva. So every ba-- from the six bachurim, each one learned, taught three or four bachurim, Nigla and Chassidus. Came Rosh Yeshivas . Rebbe. There for two years. We came back right before Yahrabf Nisan, Tofshon Lamed Alef. We had an interesting story coming back. In Australia, there was a Yid, Reb Isser Kluvgant. He was the Rebbe's cousin. Kluvgant was from the Hanovsky family, I believe. He had an older brother, Meir, who was left in Russia. But they had Yerusha, a pair of tefillin, Miyuchas to the Baal Shem Tov when Reb Isser went out with all the, the Rusish Yidden. So this pair of tefillin was by his older brother, Meir.

1:37:47 Speaker 4 In Russia?

1:37:48 Speaker 2 In Russia. When Reb Isser left Russia, so his older brother said he doesn't wanna keep the tefillin here 'cause, well, who knows what it's gonna be. He sh- so he gave it to him to take out of Russia. So this pair of tefillin was by in Reb Iss-Reb Isser's Yerushas. Then his older brother was Niftar in Russia, so he Yashan the tefillin. This happened right before we came back. So he decided, "Azal chatun, tafan kishken dem Rebbe." I got a chassidishe heges. So he decided he's gonna send back the tefillin with us.

1:38:25 Speaker 4 Baal Shem Tov's tefillin?

1:38:26 Speaker 2 To send the tefillin. But so our kvutze, Herschel Greenberg was lang gezunt. He was the elder bachur. He was like the eldster from all of us. So he, so he picked him and told him, "Hey, I'm making you a shliach to bring the tefillin to the Rebbe." But he told him that he wrote to the Rebbe he wants that it, azal say, "Yishar, geben du dem haskidas. Azal geben dem Rebbe miyad miyad." So we came back. So we wrote to the Rebbe, "Mezain ongekomen." And Herschel wrote to the Rebbe, "Azal ha- azal hot a tefillin for Reb Isser. Un Reb Isser tum gezogt azal geben dem Rebbe in hand." So he asked the Rebbe, "Ven zal it iz geben?" The Rebbe wrote back, "Yahrabf Nisan acharit tefillin shacharis." It was the next day in the morning. The Rebbe went to the eyl. So they, the bas-kis told us we should all be waiting ganeden at achten, is before the Rebbe goes out to the eyl. So we were all standing there. Herschel had the, the bash, the tefillin. Then Lamed Alef was the time when the Rebbe gekachsam kibush haeylom al yedei limud haTorah. And the Rebbe had spoken Shabbos Hagadol a sicha Pesach Pesach, amazal gantz Pesach lennen ibber meisef zeyn limud haTorah. Behemte zut kibush... The, the Rebbe was magiyer dis shtickel of the sicha. So when we ca- we were ganeden at achten, the Rebbe had the Michdav Klalie from yene Pesach. He gave each one of us the Michdavwriting of

1:40:15 Speaker 2 Chloe on the paper from the sicha, and Heschel had the tefillin. The Rebbe was standing in the doorway of, of Gan Eden Ha'elyon. The Rebbe took a step forward towards us, but he kept his foot that the door should not slam. Le-- especially of Mashatanen, because when Heschel gave the Rebbe-- So the Rebbe took the tefillin with two hands, so he didn't wanna use one hand to keep the door. S-so he shouldn't have to open the door with the handle with his hand. So when he-- After he took the tefillin, he kicked the door back open with his foot, and he went in with the tefillin. That... But what happened was, when we were coming to New York... So we stopped in Hawaii, we went through customs in Hawaii. So when we went through customs, we all had our tefillin in our handbag, and they looked, they checked our handbags. So, some mamzer dorten by the customs, he made everyone open up the tefillin bags and open up, take out the tefillin from the compartment, which after that they put diamonds there . The only tefillin that they didn't ask to open was the Baal Shem Tov's tefillin. Uh.

1:41:34 Speaker 5 I think I read somewhere that it was like the bachur were able to look at it.

1:41:38 Speaker 2 What?

1:41:38 Speaker 5 Like for a f-- a day or two it was like sitting-- It was like the bachur were able to look at it.

1:41:42 Speaker 2 I don't remember.

1:41:43 Speaker 5 Yeah, I read that somewhere.

1:41:44 Speaker 2 I don't remember that.

1:41:46 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

1:41:47 Speaker 2 I remember the Alter Rebbe's tefillin.

1:41:48 Speaker 5 Oh, maybe I'm mixing up the Alter Rebbe's tefillin.

1:41:50 Speaker 2 The Alter Rebbe's tefillin, I believe, was Tosafot Chovov. There was a Yid in-- from Montreal, his name was Zalman Gurevitch, and he brought from Warsaw the Alter Rebbe's tefillin. Then the Chafetzim from the Rabbeim were in Warsaw, and you were able to get stuff out of, out of there. In a museum there, but you were able to get it out. That's why there was, there was a lot of holy writings from, from the Friediker Rebbe, but some was like a vulgate w-it was taken from there, from Warsaw. He brought the Rebbe the tefillin. I believe it was a hundred and twenty Tosafot Chovov. The Rebbe then said, after he received the tefillin, I think it was after Mincha. And he said-- I forgot who was h-holding them. He said, "Everyone who wants to touch the tefillin should go to the mikvah first." So after Mincha, there was a long line, and it went through. That I remember. I was a bachur in-

1:42:58 Speaker 5 Yes, that's-

1:42:59 Speaker 2 In Bedford Stuy.

1:43:01 Speaker 5 I mixed up. Okay.

1:43:01 Speaker 2 But the Baal Shem Tov's tefillin I don't remember.

1:43:04 Speaker 5 And those are in the library?

1:43:06 Speaker 2 It was in the library. It's in the library, yeah. I remember the Alter Rebbe's tefillin, there was a whole thing with the shin on the, on the shel rosh. The tzura of the shin was different than the way the Soferim used to do it. So there were bochurim who had-- took aluminum foil to make, you know, to press it on the tefillin to be able to make, to get to imprint the tzura of the shin. There was a batim maker in Montreal, I forgot his name, and they sent it to him, that when he makes the shin it will also make them shin. Nowadays, everyone makes their own shin.

1:43:42 Speaker 5 So that's the shin that we use is based on that.

1:43:45 Speaker 2 Yeah. The chiluk was i-in the, in the bottom of the shin. A mole, first there was like a V, an upside down V. And from the, from the bottom, from the top of the V, they made three strokes. But the Alter Rebbe's tefillin was like a, like this, but it was a very long regel. A mole wasn't a long re-regel. It was like... It didn't come to a point at the bottom.

1:44:21 Speaker 5 It didn't go down.

1:44:22 Speaker 2 It was like flat on the bottom.

1:44:23 Speaker 5 Uh.

1:44:25 Speaker 2 It was like a b-upside down box like this. The bottom was flat.

1:44:30 Speaker 5 So not pointy?

1:44:31 Speaker 2 Not pointy. But now the bottom of the shin is a lo-- was a long, it's a long regel.

1:44:37 Speaker 5 Right.

1:44:37 Speaker 2 That's what I remember from the Alter Rebbe's tefillin.

1:44:39 Speaker 5 Um, so you c-you come back from the schlichas. So this is fifty-seven fifty-two. The Yemei Mashiach. It's the-

1:44:46 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm. The Yemei Mashiach.

1:44:48 Speaker 5 Surprise for Brengen.

1:44:48 Speaker 2 The surprise for Brengen, I can think.

1:44:51 Speaker 5 Yeah.

1:44:53 Speaker 2 It was a surprise for Brengen.

1:44:57 Speaker 5 And you stayed in seven seventy until you got married.

1:45:00 Speaker 2 I stayed in seven seventy, yeah. So then was Shnas HaShivim-

1:45:03 Speaker 5 Yeah

1:45:03 Speaker 2 ... fifty-seven fifty-eight.

1:45:05 Speaker 5 So what do you wanna share about Shnas HaShivim?

1:45:06 Speaker 2 So, so that's when the bochurim made a gift to the Rebbe, a gift of the Rebbe. So the gift the bochurim made then that we should learn after Seuda. The Seuda Sichos, seventy minutes after Seuda, from nine thirty to ten to, to ten till eleven.

1:45:25 Speaker 5 So that was something that you were involved in-

1:45:27 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:45:27 Speaker 5 ... in starting?

1:45:28 Speaker 2 That was when I was still a young bachur, yeah.

1:45:31 Speaker 5 And the Rebbe was connected to, to this thing?

1:45:34 Speaker 2 I don't remember.

1:45:36 Speaker 5 Something about, um, the, the ten percent from the Keren HaShirim.

1:45:41 Speaker 2 What?

1:45:42 Speaker 5 Ten percent from the Keren HaShirim.

1:45:45 Speaker 2 Oh, that, that was something. Uh, about-- We'll soon get to it.

1:45:47 Speaker 5 Okay, what was that?

1:45:49 Speaker 2 One second.

1:45:50 Speaker 5 Okay.

1:45:50 Speaker 2 This was also here. So we learned Sichos. There was a-- Became a big koch in Likutey Sichos by the bochurim. But that's how HaOdas HaTimiim began. From this learnings, the Sichos, so for states also started- Tchongy Pukpo nasach, fregen un emfrin. Tzvishen zich.

1:46:12 Speaker 5 In seven seventy, da ist das eben.

1:46:13 Speaker 2 Ja, der Bochum in seven seventy. I forgot vem es eingenfallen. Dis, a blil drucken shailes schubus in de sichas. So mit, mit ogar typed a bletl. And we stenciled it. I don't know if I explain what a stencil machine is. A blue stencil, ein bletl. And we used to, ah, fernander, throw, throw the bletl ach on the tables in seven seventy. Und das ist, das, das ist gegangen fir Alf Nissen through the summer. I didn't ish, wer es eingenfallen. Old time es eingenfallen, so machen von der alle blatl ach machen ach Kuntrus. So von dis, so there was a Mareches. Nachman was on the Mareches. I was on the Mareches. Zalman Shansky over shon. Mit, mit uysgekludden haores vos me getrach uar besser haores. Un mit a soger typed a Kuntrus. And we order Pesach Dover. Un mik shrim dem Rebbe, we wrote the Rebbe that we wanna print a Kuntrus from all the haores. And we gave him to the Rebbe a copy of the Sharvalat, of the, of the, of the cover. Said Haores Hatmimim. And we said narische Bochum, zengewem. Wrote the Rebbe, as we will drucken the Kuntrus. Is of course in better sex on the dollar. That's all. So the Rebbe by Haores Hatmim, the Rebbe geshrim for vos is munshray ulandra, ganz Anash.

1:48:10 Speaker 5 Anash.

1:48:11 Speaker 2 So that's why I changed the Haores Hatmim of Anash. And I don't know, it said six hundred dollars. So the Rebbe wrote ten percent for mosquitoes, kibushar ayin aluf meizes.

1:48:24 Speaker 5 Wow.

1:48:28 Speaker 2 Is, is, is vos, is, vos is mein Rebbe na meizes, meint a greise, a greise Binyan, a greise Yeshiva, a greise Shul, a greise Beis Chabad. Bochum lachum geshirim Haores. A fun zichas, se gorn eino fun de ayin aluf meizes. Mein Rebbe, se gorn tayvid ein. It's interessant. Von dem, vos is a ruse gewachse von dem. Heite zeiten Haores. Wie viel Haores drucken zich a van Rebbe sichas? Tuisendte Kuntreisim haben se gedruckt von dem. Se gorn a ayin nitzchi uar deide deides von dem.

1:49:05 Speaker 5 Yeah. Many meizes.

1:49:08 Speaker 2 What?

1:49:08 Speaker 5 Many meizes. Yeah. So is that how you got involved in, uh, in the sichas?

1:49:16 Speaker 2 No, so this was doch Lamed Beis.

1:49:17 Speaker 5 Yeah.

1:49:18 Speaker 2 Doch Lamed Gimel. The noch is gorn the meizes Rebbe. Yen a yor, hot of Rebbe nish magi gorn de sichas Lamed Beis.

1:49:27 Speaker 5 Lamed Beis. There's no sichas. No such a sichas.

1:49:31 Speaker 2 But in beginning Lamed Gimel, hot Rebbe ongegebn noch a mol magi sein.

1:49:37 Speaker 5 What, what Knachim are we talking about?

1:49:40 Speaker 2 What?

1:49:41 Speaker 5 Which Knachim look at the sichas?

1:49:42 Speaker 2 When?

1:49:43 Speaker 5 Lam, like Lamed Gimel. Like what is it? Which Knachim is that?

1:49:46 Speaker 2 Lamed Gimel is, it was Cheyud.

1:49:51 Speaker 5 Cheyud. Okay.

1:49:53 Speaker 2 The Rebbe started Lamed Gimel, started from Breishes, being Maggia. I used to dreize cholat in the VAD. I was close with Nachman, so I used to dreize cholat.

1:50:03 Speaker 5 So Nachman was already doing it.

1:50:04 Speaker 2 Nachman was already in the VAD already.

1:50:06 Speaker 5 He's older than you.

1:50:07 Speaker 2 What?

1:50:08 Speaker 5 He's older than you. He was, he was a yungerman, he was a bachur.

1:50:12 Speaker 2 Lamed Gimel, he was a b-- a yungerman already.

1:50:14 Speaker 5 Okay.

1:50:15 Speaker 2 I think so. I'm pretty sure. A lot of davka. Yeah, yeah, I think he was already a yungerman. I was surely a bachur. So I used to dreize cholat and whatever. And I think Lamed Gimel, Ben Sheva over shon hot ugeshelt at, at end of Lamed Beis when the Rebbe tot ugeheert Maggia sein. So Ben Sheva hot ugeshelt a nays, a nays VAD zu, zu greiten de sichas.

1:50:44 Speaker 5 Ben Tze Shem Tov.

1:50:45 Speaker 2 Ben Tze Shem Tov, yeah. Levi Shapiro, Levi, Levi Kaplan over shon.

1:50:49 Speaker 5 Because he, he felt that we need a new VAD in order for the Rebbe to start-

1:50:52 Speaker 2 The Rebbe tot farbundim mit, with Sefer Haichem, no?

1:50:55 Speaker 5 The Rebbe wanted the Beel to focus on Sefer Haichem.

1:50:58 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:50:58 Speaker 5 So Levi Ben Sheva needed a new VAD.

1:50:59 Speaker 2 So Levi Ben Sheva said, "So det nev nays hevra." A mol getracht kenik, es in shayach a chutz Rebbe el.

1:51:06 Speaker 5 Right.

1:51:08 Speaker 2 But Ben Sheva, weiss er, a mensch, weiss er. Say, er hat a weg geshelt a nays VAD, un the Rebbe tot s'angenumen, un the Rebbe tot geib Maggia sein. Forgot when the Rebbe stopped being Maggia. I think it was Pesach zeit Lamed Gimel. The Rebbe stopped for a few weeks, but then the Rebbe started again. Forgot exactly how it happened with Levi Shapiro chatchilah. That's when he, he-- they offered him the, the Rosh Yeshiva in Miami. So the question was he, like he couldn't vivet a kennet on beider Sachen. If I remember correctly, he said if he has somen af nor dor, some helfen epes, then filti he e kent on beidem. So that's when I went into the-- So I, they asked me to come work in the VAD, work on the sichas.

1:52:09 Speaker 5 So you're a bachur?

1:52:10 Speaker 2 Still a bachur in Lamed Gimels, in the middle, summer Lamed Gimel. But what happened then later on in, in Ov, what the Rebbe Genumen label Kap Novashon Geschiktnen Tzvah. So then there was a void, official void. So that's how I went, came into the Tzad Harabit.

1:52:37 Speaker 5 That's how you became the, you know-

1:52:38 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:52:38 Speaker 5 ... Rebbe Vad.

1:52:39 Speaker 2 Yeah, I'm Gimel, I'm a David.

1:52:42 Speaker 5 So what's the job of Vad of the Sichas? What, what do you have to do?

1:52:45 Speaker 2 You have great in the Sichas of, of our goal.

1:52:50 Speaker 5 So what does that mean?

1:52:53 Speaker 2 Nemen haSicha was a sheyach to the vorach, and tzugrikim for the Rebbe, for goal.

1:53:01 Speaker 5 So you had all the hanochos of all the years? How do you do it?

1:53:04 Speaker 2 Yeah, of course we had hanochos. We had hanochos, we had, we had, we had reshimus of sichas were sheyach to a certain shach. In other words, we had reshimus, like f-for Pascha Bereshis, you can use this sicha, this sicha, this sicha, or Pascha Nehem.

1:53:25 Speaker 5 So the, the Vad would make these reshimus through the-

1:53:28 Speaker 2 We had it by ourselves. We forgot how the, the reshimus started. It's a blatt of sichas. We saw a sicha. On Rosh Chodesh, laying in a sach yorn, and you saw a sicha that, that's not printed, it's not mogi yet, but it can be used for a certain Pascha. So we added the reshimus, so the reshim became bigger and bigger.

1:53:52 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm. So the aveda is to take the si- take a sicha.

1:53:58 Speaker 2 What?

1:53:58 Speaker 5 So can you describe to me, like, what, what the process is of, uh, o-of the, of the sicha?

1:54:03 Speaker 2 Can't describe it, no.

1:54:12 Speaker 5 You can't, meaning you won't or, or, or-

1:54:15 Speaker 2 I can't.

1:54:16 Speaker 5 Can't. What does it mean?

1:54:18 Speaker 2 I don't know how to describe it.

1:54:25 Speaker 5 Okay. If you can't, you can't. So what was the-

1:54:31 Speaker 2 I'll just give you one small vort. A simple observation I'm saying. Let's imagine Albert Einstein came into a classroom of s- of teenagers, and he, he threw a sentence, and that sentence is physics or whatever it was. But he said a s- a sentence that a teenager could, can repeat it. And let's say the teenager, someone has a good mind, a good zikhoren, and he writes down the sentence. Is this Einstein?

1:55:28 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

1:55:33 Speaker 2 Is, is farshtey, a Rebbe Garet Azach, Niglo Chassidis, whatever it was, a Rashi, whatever it is. When the Rebbe-- Der Inyan, by Rebbe's given, she says, "Imagine you have a Yid, kol ha'teirah kulah," and he says this one line, "Tzemach bezayn haRashi." Is what's likht in them, that one line. Farshtey techa lain. In order to understand what that r- line really means, so first you have to learn the sugia, mit alam meforshim, ad, ad ya chi yodi magaz. And then, and that, that line can have layers and layers. It's only even kenin farshteyn what do likht in this sure, farshtey? I'm just g- trying to explain it in a way that you should be able to understand what I'm saying.

1:56:35 Speaker 5 So you're saying this is the function of the kudosichas?

1:56:38 Speaker 2 Yes. A transcript was the Rebbe gezogt, but try to understand what's the Rebbe gezogt takur. What's the Rebbe takur gezogt? So farshtey, so, um, um, am ratzim, farshtey, so viful zeit had genumen to learnen, farshtey, to gen darum, to farshtey, to darum, to, to gen oneven trachten epes a, a harel one layer deeper than the simple pshat, what the Rebbe said. When a mol, habin nit farshtanen, habin ken fregnen dem Rebbe, that was one of the gr- the greatest zachen, a rebio flekt un zit zihlen, that laicht noch yud shvat. So er gemen zicher, a Rebbe teriz gen dem ktsaf undem mein morm.

1:57:28 Speaker 5 Write it.

1:57:29 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:57:29 Speaker 5 Like the, like the Rebbeim did.

1:57:31 Speaker 2 Mein morm undem sichas. Undem Rebbe gezogt, "Nein. I feel musha genem chazora, nur, zo machen ha nochos." So he used to say, "Von dem iz a ruz ikomen, ad nekent ibe fregnen dem Rebbe, hin un zrik, again and again, biz der zach iz klur gevorn." Farshtey?

1:57:55 Speaker 5 So, and that was a big part of, of the-

1:57:58 Speaker 2 So that's-

1:57:58 Speaker 5 Of the-

1:57:59 Speaker 2 That's the first line. You want a description. I can't describe it. I'm just explaining one small nekuda vagen vositz a gehandelt doch.

1:58:08 Speaker 5 Right. So-

1:58:10 Speaker 2 Before we could even start preparing a sicha.

1:58:17 Speaker 5 And asking the questions was often.

1:58:20 Speaker 2 Sure.

1:58:21 Speaker 5 Even though the sichas could have been from years before.

1:58:24 Speaker 2 Yeah, sure.

1:58:28 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm. And, uh, what, what was the process of, um... There was how many hagadahs, like can you tell me, take, take me through the basic process of, uh, how, how it worked?

1:58:37 Speaker 2 The Rebbe would megiya every sicha two times. S- it's hard to describe nowadays what a typewriter is. It's like telling people what a dinosaur is. But used to type up, type up the sicha. You look in Sichas Kodesh now, the old Sichas Kodesh, so you see what a typewriter looked like. So he used to give him the sicha, double space, a lot of space between the lines, so the Rebbe would edit it, so he had a lot of space in between on the side of the paper. That would be the hagadah number one. After the Rebbe was megiya the first time the sicha, then it went to the printer. It was typeset. In those years, typesetting was not like today when you print, say, for y- you, everything you do on the computer. Y- you had all the graphics are on the computer. In those years, the machines for printing were called Linotyp, Linotype machines. Linotype's machines was based... It was hot metal, like burning hot, soft, and when you typed, it imprinted a piece of metal, one line. On that one line, it imprinted whatever you typed in. So one line at a time, one shoot at a time was typed. So let's say your page, you had columns. You would type, let's say, a whole column. But when you typed it, it was one thin column. So a sicha, let's say, is eight pages, let's say. Eight pages, every page has two columns, 16 columns. But on, in the original, it was one

2:00:53 Speaker 2 long 16 columns, one long, one long thing of six- of 16 columns long of ty- of, of, of type. So in order to proofread it, if there were mistakes on the typing, so the printing shops had a machine that it would, it would take this long, long, let's say 16 pages, one long 16 page, one column, and it would come out on a, on a long sheet of paper. A thin column, a long column. This was called galleys. That's what it used to be called. This was all, all books were printed that way at that time. So, so when you proofread it, you read through that long column. If you found a mistake, so there was a mistake on that line. So how do you correct it? So the printer had to f- re- retype that one line, and then he had to go through the metal, all the metals, find the line of metal that had the mistake, throw it out, and replace it with the new one. And then obviously he made another one to see maybe when he retyped it, he made a mistake. That was the second proofread. So the Rebbe was, after this, after the, the sicha was typeset, so first we proofread it ourselves, and simple typos were corrected, and then another one was made until it was clear from all print typos. And then it went into the Rebbe for a second time, the galleys, a set of galleys of the whole sicha, the sicha itself, with the

2:02:56 Speaker 2 Maamarim Kehillos separate. The Rebbe would then edit a second time the sicha. This wasn't for proofreading. The proofreading was done already. And here's a lot of times the Rebbe, davka on the second time, would write whole inyonim that weren't on the first hagadah. That was the second. A lot of time the Rebbe would write a piece, for example, short, concise, in Lashon Kodesh, and he would say, to translate this into Yiddish, ulaharchev, it was not word for word. But, you know, to-

2:03:35 Speaker 5 Expand.

2:03:36 Speaker 2 Expand. It should be written out. The Rebbe would say to add Maamarim Kehillos. A, a lot of times you can see on the first hagadah, sometimes the Rebbe would write a short piece. He would leave like a little circle on the side. The circle always meant that the Rebbe was going to go over it again a second time. A lot of times when the Rebbe wrote a Maamarim Mokim, the Rebbe wrote a Maamarim Chazal, and he didn't write the Maamarim Mokim, but he would leave a little circle to fill in the Maamarim Mokim. And then after, after the hagadah, we didn't understand something, we would ask the Rebbe, and sometime the Rebbe would megiya a third time.

2:04:18 Speaker 5 Not always.

2:04:19 Speaker 2 What?

2:04:20 Speaker 5 Not always.

2:04:20 Speaker 2 Not always. Sometimes... In other words, sometimes the Rebbe just answered the question, but sometime after the Rebbe answered the question, so that caused the whole pieces had to be rewritten.

2:04:34 Speaker 5 Right. So if nothing needed to be rewritten, then-

2:04:36 Speaker 2 If nothing had to be rewritten major, so then-

2:04:38 Speaker 5 Right

2:04:39 Speaker 2 ... it didn't. But if something major had to be rewritten, so we could ask the Rebbe a third time. The Rebbe would sometimes megiya a third time, certain pieces at least.

2:04:47 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm. Um, and you were only working on the, on the sichas, not on the Maamarim?

2:04:56 Speaker 2 No. Only the sichas.

2:04:58 Speaker 5 On, only, only the Kuntzer Sichas?

2:05:00 Speaker 2 Yeah, only the Kuntzer Sichas.

2:05:01 Speaker 5 So you were involved in ha- in the Chazal and in writing Hanachos, like that?

2:05:05 Speaker 2 A little bit. Sometimes I've-- Certain times I wrote certain... I wor- I worked, I worked a little bit and sometimes on some Hanachos I wrote. Sefer, Sefer Hanakos Yidish and Sefer Halakhah, a little bit. Very s- very little bit.

2:05:24 Speaker 5 Once in a while. Um, so I wanna, so I wanna ask you maybe specific, uh, sichas. So first of all, there's a sicha of, um, Tav Sha Mem Beis with something to do with the Rebbetsin.

2:05:42 Speaker 2 Mem Beis?

2:05:43 Speaker 5 Yeah.

2:05:44 Speaker 2 I don't remember.

2:05:47 Speaker 5 So wh- when the Rebbe spoke a sicha, Bekasha, the Rebbetsin had a, a, a injury.

2:05:53 Speaker 2 Not sure. Could be when the Rebbetsin fell, and then h- it was Chamishash Haba'ov the Rebbe said, "Hadenon lehiyo, yo- lehiyo Yom Tov l'Yisroel." And the Rebbe is-- wanted to be magiya the sicha, the Hadenon, um, sicha of Tanus. I forgot which year it was.

2:06:21 Speaker 5 So it's connected to the Rebbetsin?

2:06:23 Speaker 2 I think

2:06:24 Speaker 5 Why? Chamishash Haba'ov?

2:06:27 Speaker 2 Yeah.

2:06:29 Speaker 5 Okay. Um, and also, so you were doing this as a bachur, but then you got married in the middle. How did, how did you end up, uh, doing this afterwards?

2:06:43 Speaker 2 Well, I worked Lamed Gimel, Lamed Daled, then Tov Shelamed He. Again, the Rebbe stopping magiya sichas. What, what the Rebbe said in the beginning of Tov Shelamed He is . So we started in the beginning of Tov Shelamed He, every week we printed a sicha,

2:07:10 Speaker 5 The Va'ad did this?

2:07:11 Speaker 2 Yeah. What was interesting, a lot of those sichas after Shabbos, the Likut was printed. The Rebbe sent out the Likut with the Hashmata, a new HaOhr on the sicha.

2:07:30 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:07:30 Speaker 2 And the Rebbe showed a .

2:07:34 Speaker 5 Yeah.

2:07:34 Speaker 2 Even though it was , what the Rebbe added HaOhrs on the sichas. In later years, we used a lot of these sichas for Likutey Sichos that the Rebbe was magiya.

2:07:49 Speaker 5 Later on.

2:07:49 Speaker 2 Regularly. Later years, yeah.

2:07:52 Speaker 5 So-

2:07:52 Speaker 2 So, so, so at the end of Tov Shelamed He, when it came to Tov Shelamed Vav, so we decided

2:08:04 Speaker 5 You're already a younger man at this point.

2:08:05 Speaker 2 What?

2:08:06 Speaker 5 You're already a younger man at this point.

2:08:07 Speaker 2 Yeah, I got married Kislev Lamed He, yeah.

2:08:10 Speaker 5 And there's a question if you should stay in the sichas or-

2:08:13 Speaker 2 When I went into Yechidus for my chasuna, I asked the Rebbe if I should go into Kehilah. I was a dropout, like I said, because, because of the sichas. So I was-- I di- I didn't keep sitting in the yeshiva 'cause I was already in-- working full-time on the sichas. So what happened was, to go into the Kehilah, you needed a sefer from an whole that you're shomer hasderim. I wasn't a shomer hasderim. Rabbi Mendel, kol ha'kavod, told me, "I'm gonna give you a sefer anyway," that to be mamish they should take me into Kehilah. When I went to Yechidus, I asked the Rebbe if I should go to Kehilah. The Rebbe didn't answer me. Nish nei, nish ye. What was my shailah? My shailah was because if I-- As I didn't, I didn't write it clear to the Rebbe, but my machshava was that should I go into Kehilah or I should stay in the sichas, even though the Rebbe's not being magiya the sichas, or safek safek, the Rebbe will do the sicha on riskin. So my-- So that was the primis of the shailah. The Rebbe didn't answer me. So, in mein kop is when poshit. The Rebbe will zog in geinishen Kehilah to mine the sichas. Hop sekhar alein. That was the way I understood it. So I never went into Kehilah.

2:09:38 Speaker 5 Straight to the sichas.

2:09:39 Speaker 2 I stayed with the sichas. So in Tov Shelamed Vav, .

2:09:46 Speaker 5 To start the chaggot.

2:09:48 Speaker 2 What?

2:09:48 Speaker 5 The Rebbe should be magiya again.

2:09:49 Speaker 2 Yeah.

2:09:50 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:09:50 Speaker 2 And the Rebbe no-- unkaind, he just started being magiya the sicha. We gave him the sicha, there was magiya. So from Tov Shelamed Vav, that's when I started again working on the sichas now. From Tov Shelamed Vav to Tov Shun Beis.

2:10:19 Speaker 5 There was no hefsek in the sichas.

2:10:20 Speaker 2 No hefsek.

2:10:21 Speaker 5 Every single week. There's-

2:10:22 Speaker 2 Every single week till Vayakhel Lun Beis, yeah.

2:10:28 Speaker 5 Vayakhel-

2:10:29 Speaker 2 The last-

2:10:30 Speaker 5 That was the last one.

2:10:31 Speaker 2 The last Likut.

2:10:31 Speaker 5 Yeah. It was always interesting to me to look in Hanakos. Sometimes you can see that the Rebbe references something in the farbrengen that's touches upon something that's in that week's Likut.

2:10:44 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

2:10:44 Speaker 5 Like some-- O-once in a while you see such things. Yeah, does that make sense?

2:10:49 Speaker 2 What?

2:10:50 Speaker 5 Sometimes in the farbrengens you can see something that's connected to-

2:10:53 Speaker 2 Could be, sometimes

2:10:54 Speaker 5 ... to, to-- So it's, it's a very interesting thing. The Rebbe has farbrengens every week. There's new farbrengens, and there's a whole other-

2:11:01 Speaker 2 A separate, a separate, a separate line .

2:11:04 Speaker 5 Yeah. It's like a separate line of the Rebbe's torah coming out also every week.

2:11:07 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

2:11:07 Speaker 5 I think, um- That was also, that was a, a Ɣbikach every week. There's a, there's a Lita from the Rebbe.

2:11:13 Speaker 2 hundred percent.

2:11:13 Speaker 5 What can you tell me about the Hashka that you saw the Rebbe putting into the Sichas?

2:11:20 Speaker 2 In Derech HaTever, what the Rebbe wrote B'fedrash, the reason why the Rebbe stopped at the end of Tosha Lamed Dalet was because it was taking too mu- hagah was taking too much time. He wrote B'fedrash. Tosha L- Tosha Lam Gimel Lamed Dalet, the years that it was in Loshon Kadesh originally, was very, very, very, a lot of hagah. You saw B'gashmius. We call the Rebbe Drengele Totten. Geshibn, ibi geshibn. I think it was much more than in the later years. I think after T- after Chov- Chovrei Shvat, the Rebbe stopped being Maguid twice to Sichas. I think, I'm not 100% sure.

2:12:18 Speaker 5 Stopped being?

2:12:19 Speaker 2 Stopped twice, only once. I don't remember clear.

2:12:24 Speaker 5 So you're saying, Pasha, it took, it took, uh, B'gashmius, it took, it took a lot of the Rebbe's time.

2:12:31 Speaker 2 Yes. That's-- there's no question.

2:12:33 Speaker 5 And how, how quickly would the Rebbe-- Like, what was the say the-- how quickly did the Rebbe-- was, was the hagah?

2:12:40 Speaker 2 A lot of times, they saw the Rebbe taking, taking home at night and coming the next morning with the Likut. So he, chassidis, he was up the whole night. I don't know how many hours. I'm, chassidis.

2:12:53 Speaker 5 There was a time that the Rebbe would-

2:12:54 Speaker 2 In the later years, when the Rebbe was Maguid to my Morim, so they saw it. Those who were sitting on Gan Eden HaTachton, the Rebbe would come out in the middle of the night and put out a Sicha in the middle of the night, 2:00 in the morning. Yes, Chaim Shaw will tell you.

2:13:09 Speaker 5 Yeah. We had him on.

2:13:12 Speaker 2 What?

2:13:13 Speaker 5 He, uh-

2:13:13 Speaker 2 You had him. So you know all the details, okay.

2:13:14 Speaker 5 We did, we did an interview. I think there was a time that the Rebbe also was Maguid on Ma'amar, like on Lil Tisha B'Av.

2:13:21 Speaker 2 I don't know if he was Maguid on Ma'amar. He, he, he wrote a Ha'aram. It wasn't on the Ma'amar. It was on the Hadran. Chelek Yud Dalet, like, could have Sichas, I believe. The Rebbe said a Hadran.

2:13:36 Speaker 5 Yud Dalet?

2:13:37 Speaker 2 Give me Yud Dalet.

2:13:38 Speaker 5 Yud Dalet?

2:13:39 Speaker 2 Yud Dalet. Chei Menachem Mov. English Yomin. You see?

2:13:51 Speaker 5 Yeah. Oh, about, about making Siyumim.

2:13:53 Speaker 2 Yeah. No, not about. The Rebbe said a Siyum on Sichat Habrachah Me'et Kotn.

2:13:57 Speaker 5 Uh-huh.

2:13:58 Speaker 2 Then the Rebbe, see what here, Yibakuk Do. So here, the whole Chelek, see it says, "Tamid Echachomim Eilamla Od Tzadikim."

2:14:09 Speaker 5 So you're saying that was done on Tisha B'Av.

2:14:11 Speaker 2 So one of these Ha'arams.

2:14:13 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:14:16 Speaker 2 Forgot which one. The Rebbe sent out Lil Tisha B'Av Noch Ma'idov.

2:14:21 Speaker 5 After Echah.

2:14:22 Speaker 2 What?

2:14:23 Speaker 5 After Echah.

2:14:23 Speaker 2 After Echah. I believe Ron Over Sholom, he was mamash meshuga.

2:14:30 Speaker 5 Never happened before.

2:14:31 Speaker 2 Lil Tisha B'Av.

2:14:35 Speaker 5 So, and the, the sons-

2:14:36 Speaker 2 'Cause I remember, uh, he was, he was, he was a grand dayt of a Dichelet, so he told us stories then. I remember he told us he, he, Erza Shen Gem, he worked at Nog- he, he, Ga'arav Mayer Rebbe Noch in Tosha Yud Noch. Nofa Yud Shvat. He told us then about one time a kuntis came out. A kuntis from F- it's a kuntis of my Morim, and the Rebbe sent him to Bausch and-

2:15:13 Speaker 5 The printer

2:15:13 Speaker 2 ... to print for print. But the Kitzurim, uh, weren't, weren't ready yet.

2:15:22 Speaker 5 The Fiji Rebbe's Ha'amanim.

2:15:23 Speaker 2 Yeah. And the F- the Rebbe told him to wait. He'll, he'll soon have the Kitzurim. The Rebbe gave him the Kitzurim. He said, "The Kitzurim, the Rebbe wrote, 'Kodem Eys V'Tech Shuley.'" Is the Kitzurim was like the Rebbe's Kitzurim.

2:15:45 Speaker 5 Nice.

2:15:46 Speaker 2 I remember he told us Lil Tisha B'Av. I remember clear.

2:15:51 Speaker 5 So those are, uh-

2:15:51 Speaker 2 He wasn't like-- He was, he was searching his spirals from the, the Rebbe sent out, so he told the story.

2:15:57 Speaker 5 So he told us it's, it's Inyan. So, so that's what he-

2:16:00 Speaker 2 So he told us that the Kitzurim, the Rebbe gave him the Kitzurim. It was tight, but the hagahs, the Rebbe was Maguid with, you know, added it and with his, his sofus, with his kav. "Kodem Eys V'Tech Shuley."

2:16:17 Speaker 5 Was it? Was it written by the Rebbe?

2:16:19 Speaker 2 I don't know. I'm just saying this, this is what I remember.

2:16:22 Speaker 5 Right.

2:16:23 Speaker 2 If it was not actually written by the Rebbe, the Rebbe does Vesach Nish.

2:16:26 Speaker 5 I think I heard people-

2:16:27 Speaker 2 What?

2:16:28 Speaker 5 People, people theorize that. I don't know.

2:16:30 Speaker 2 They theorize it, but he said that when the Rebbe gave it to, to, to bring to the printer, the hagahs on it was like, "Kodem Eys V'Tech Shuley." The Rebbe rewrote pieces mamash, "Kodem Eys V'Tech Shuley."

2:16:43 Speaker 5 Besides the Likut HaSichas, there was also some times that the Rebbe asked a certain Ha- Sicha to be prepared for hagah, right?

2:16:52 Speaker 2 What?

2:16:53 Speaker 5 For, I mean, for example, there's, like, a, a Sicha on the Inyan.

2:16:57 Speaker 2 On?

2:16:57 Speaker 5 Like on the Inyan, like, um, uh, the Sicha about, uh, about g- not getting operations before, uh-

2:17:06 Speaker 2 Yeah

2:17:06 Speaker 5 ... uh, before Shabbos, yeah?

2:17:08 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

2:17:08 Speaker 5 It's in, it's in Hesavus HaLikut HaSichas. It's in the back, right?

2:17:11 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

2:17:12 Speaker 5 A ma-- But it's not, it's not just a regular format of Likut HaSichas. Is that something that the Rebbe asked the Vaad to prepare? These type of things?

2:17:21 Speaker 2 A lot of those things were prepared for Hamor or Hapardus.

2:17:28 Speaker 5 So that was done by the, the VAD?

2:17:29 Speaker 2 No. Reveal used to, a lot of, used to prepare these things.

2:17:34 Speaker 5 Mm.

2:17:34 Speaker 2 Like in, in Yonah Zotero Sachsidus.

2:17:37 Speaker 5 Right.

2:17:40 Speaker 2 Or the Hadron on the Rambam.

2:17:42 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:17:44 Speaker 2 So it was printed the first time in, in Hapardus.

2:17:47 Speaker 5 Which Hadron?

2:17:49 Speaker 2 You say that, you say this. The big Ha- the Hadron Al-Rambam.

2:17:52 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:17:52 Speaker 2 The famous Hadron Al-Rambam.

2:17:55 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:17:55 Speaker 2 The Rebbe said it, Tov Shem Lamd Hei, I think.

2:17:59 Speaker 5 Yeah. But it was many years later.

2:18:05 Speaker 2 Many years later.

2:18:05 Speaker 5 Like Mem- Mem Hei, I think.

2:18:07 Speaker 2 It was printed in Mem Hei.

2:18:08 Speaker 5 Mm-hmm.

2:18:09 Speaker 2 But, but it was... No, it was, the first time it was, it was Hamuge, it was in Vahapardus Alamed Hei.

2:18:18 Speaker 5 Then Beshaite?

2:18:19 Speaker 2 Yeah. Kamacho.