#9 R' Hilel Potshefer

00:00 I just want to start by thanking all those who subscribed to the channel. If you didn't yet and you can subscribe, would very much help us to continue. You can do so by clicking on the link in the show notes. It helps a lot the show, helps us continue. Yeshikoyach. Reb Hilal Perutkin, otherwise known as Hilke Potchefer, was born and raised in the city of Potchev. He first learned in the Lubavitch Yeshiva there. And then he moved to Lubavitch to Temechat Memem. Due to his advanced kishreiness, already the age of 13, he was advanced to the Ulam Hagodol, to the big zal, which was quite a rare occurrence. The year of Tafresh Ayinalef, the Rebbe Rashab opened up Yeshiva after Asamas in Eretz Yisrael in Hevrain, and he sent a group of bachrim to open up the yeshiva, amongst them Reb Alter Simchovich, Reb Hachafagan. And one of them was Hilke Potchefer. He was famous to be a big oved, a maskil, a tamet chacham. Reb Moshe Leib Shapiro, later years, was the Rosh Yeshiva of Terese Mes, when Terese Mes already moved from Hevrain to Yerushalayim. So Reb Moshe Leib Shapiro didn't actually come from a Lubavitcher home. He first learned in the Yeshiva Etz Chaim, and then he moved to Terese Mes. What turned him on to Chassidus? When he was a bachar in his first while in Terese Mes in Hevrain, his minhag was a Friday night after Kabbalah Shabbos, after the seudah. He will go back to the zal to sit

01:37 and learn Gemara for a few hours, especially in the long winter nights. Once, one Friday night after the seudah, he came to the zal to learn, and he noticed this bachar that came from Russia. He knew him by the name of Hilke. He was still standing by the corner of the zal, and he didn't yet start Kabbalah Shabbos. He was still standing there by his beinanus, mechassidus, before davening. This was already a while after the yeshiva finished and after the seudah already. And he was standing by the side of being misbeinen. After a while of being misbeinen, after a few hours, from the hislavus, from the inspiration that Hilal had from this beinanus, a tnuah came out of his heart. The famous tnuah that's miyuchas to Hilke Potchefer will play in the end. Moshe Leib Shapiro described it, it came mamash me'oy mekalav. The expression that he used was, er is gigangen vi alicht. He went like a candle. It shook Moshe Leib Shapiro's heart so much that he couldn't continue learning. He saw a Likutu Torah lying on the table. So he closed his Gemara and he opened up a Likutu Torah and started to learn. After a while, Hilke Potchefer started to sing again the same tnuah. And it moved Moshe Leib Shapiro so much that he couldn't even concentrate on Likutu Torah. He closed the Likutu Torah and he opened up a Tehillim and he said Tehillim b'chiyus while listening to Hilke davening and singing. And that's what turned him on for

03:17 chassidus. Later, Hilke Potchefer came back to Lubavitch. He was drafted to the Russian army, where over there he refused to eat pasakom and because of that he became very sick and he eventually passed away. And here is a tnuah, a bahusat tnuah from Hilke Potchefer.