Ep. 29 // “On Lubavitch Community” w/ Mrs. Vivi Deren

00:00 Speaker 1 My grandfather, grandmother took the whole family to be at the pier when the Friediker Rebbe arrived in America. Tes Other in March of 1940. They were there for hours. And what were they doing? They were singing Nigunim.

00:14 Speaker 2 Huh.

00:14 Speaker 1 And my mother said it was the first time in her life that she heard these Nigunim someplace that was not her parents' table. And that was when she incorporated the idea that you can be part of a community even when you're not geographically together.

00:38 Speaker 2 Welcome to Homesick for Lubavitch, a podcast where we explore Lubavitch identity in the year 2024. My name is Bentzi Offson, and I will be your host. Let's begin. All righty. We are here. I am here with Mrs. Deren, Mrs. Vivi Deren, Stamford, Connecticut. Um, I, I, I, because I like to make everything about myself- ... I, I usually like to, uh, remember how I first met or encountered the person on the podcast. I think in this case, I, I met your children at, at some stage of my life. Uh, o-over different course, di- over different stages of my life. Ashi, of course, was my head counselor at some point, as he was for thousands of others. Um, I think he was my head counselor at the Shluchim Camp, the Camp Shluchim. Anyway, I know-

01:40 Speaker 1 He did that.

01:41 Speaker 2 Yes. I know Chezy from camp. Uh, Yossi's related to me. I know Mendy.

01:48 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

01:49 Speaker 2 Um, so yes. And, and of course, I heard many, many stories in camp from your husband, Rabbi Shol Deren. So, so that is the background. But this is the first time I'm meeting you, which is a, a great, uh, honor and pleasure. Thank you very much for coming on the podcast.

02:09 Speaker 1 Thank you for inviting me.

02:10 Speaker 2 And, uh, I must give a shout-out at the beginning to my very dear friend, Mendy Wolf, who is your nephew.

02:17 Speaker 1 My nephew, yeah.

02:18 Speaker 2 And the shadchan of this episode. So whatever happens, it's on you, Mendy. Um, I have, I have no concerns. So anyway, um, you know, there, there, there is a topic that we wanted to get to, um, which is in many ways about the generations of Lubavitch, the common denominators, the differences, the distances, the generation gaps, and how the Rebbe comes into all of that. And, uh, we will get back to it. But I figured, um, let's, let's first start with a little bit of a background, who you are.

02:58 Speaker 1 Okay.

02:59 Speaker 2 Uh, I, I know very often that starts with your parents.

03:02 Speaker 1 So, um-

03:02 Speaker 2 Unless it happens you have a larger than life father, but yeah. Um-

03:07 Speaker 1 Okay. I, I happen to be very fond of family history and genealogy-

03:13 Speaker 2 Uh-huh

03:13 Speaker 1 ... and just figuring out who's related to who, certainly in my own family, but not just in my own family. But, um, I'll start with that, and if I start going too far afield, uh, you can please feel free to-

03:27 Speaker 2 Okay

03:27 Speaker 1 ... you know, bring, bring it back to where you want to focus. Um, I was born in Nashville, Tennessee. My parents were sent there by the Friediker Rebbe, by the previous Rebbe. Um, they actually... My father came in Elul. They were engaged Elul of T- Tavshentes, 1949. Um, they got married-

03:54 Speaker 2 Just who-

03:54 Speaker 1 Yeah

03:54 Speaker 2 ... are your parents, for those who don't know?

03:55 Speaker 1 Who are my parents?

03:56 Speaker 2 Just their names.

03:56 Speaker 1 Okay. Yeah, yeah.

03:57 Speaker 2 Just their names.

03:57 Speaker 1 Okay. So my father was Rabbi Zalman Posner. My mother's name was Risia, but no- most people don't know that except now for the great-granddaughters that are named for her. She was known as Diddy. That was her nickname that stuck in the whole, for her whole life, certainly in family and any Lubavitcher connections, so, um, and-

04:18 Speaker 2 So Zalman and Diddy Posner.

04:19 Speaker 1 Zalman and Diddy Posner. And, um, my mother was a Kazinowsky. So Shloime Aron Kazinowsky and my Bubby Freda were her parents.

04:29 Speaker 2 Shloime Aron was your, uh, was your grandfather.

04:32 Speaker 1 Yeah, he's my grandfather. Um, and actually, I had-- I came to New York to go to school at the age of 10, which was, uh, my par-- I was basically homeschooled. My parents had started a day school when I was in like kindergarten. I was the third class, and then we were away from Nashville for a year, so the school fell apart and had to be restarted. They didn't have a grade for me. At this point, I was in the middle of third grade. So for two and a half years, I was homeschooled. Um, probably among the best educational years of my life.

05:07 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

05:08 Speaker 1 Uh, my father was my teacher for Limudei Kodesh. Um, we did not cover a lot of ground because he was running a school. He was running the shul. He was the rabbi of the community. He was translating, um, so much of Chassidus. He translated two parts of Tanya and, uh, m-many other, which is a whole 'nother story. Um, so time was very difficult. But the quality, I love learning Chumash till today because of how I learned with him, and I love learning because of how I learned with him. He taught me with questions. He... I had to figure out the pasuk. He's, "You know this, and you know this," sort of just even translating. But he, he made me think, and it came alive. It just came alive. When I learned Chumash with him, it was very- ... current. It was very present. Just, I, I guess it was his own love of learning that just came through. So even though when I came to New York, I, I, um, I was ahead of myself in Limudei Kodesh. I had a tutor for that, so I was way ahead of where any class was. In Limudei Kodesh, I was in my-- I was a grade lower. In other words, at my regular grade level, I had a lot of catching up to do. Um, and I came to New York then, um-

06:33 Speaker 2 One second. So it's very interesting.

06:34 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

06:34 Speaker 2 You're saying that, you're saying that you were, you were, uh, you were behind in terms of ground covered, but-

06:43 Speaker 1 Quantity

06:43 Speaker 2 ... but, but ahead, ahead in quality.

06:47 Speaker 1 I feel like I was. And I'm sure-- I know that I missed out on a lot of things other, other than that. I think-- other than the things that I was learning and loving to learn.

06:55 Speaker 2 Right.

06:56 Speaker 1 But, but there were a lot of things that we didn't cover. So some of it I was able to make up during my years in Beis Rivkah, and some of it I still have gaps, you know, that I'm trying to cover. But not just from that. It was just, um, there was, there was a limited amount of time that we could actually learn. But it was such a positive experience.

07:14 Speaker 2 Right.

07:14 Speaker 1 And it made me feel very anxious to learn more.

07:19 Speaker 2 Right.

07:19 Speaker 1 I also felt very capable and, and competent because of the way he drew me into it. Um, coming to New York, in those years, Beis Rivkah was m-many of the teachers only spoke Yiddish. I did not speak Yiddish at all. So it worked out for me that I had teachers who spoke in English and translated into Yiddish, but that was a whole another challenge. But, um, my parents did not have any thought of sending me away. They just, uh... You know, things were going along fine. I was, like, nine and a half, a little bit more Pesach time. Uh, my birthday's in the summer, Pesach time of that year. My father had yechidus, and the Rebbe asked him what's happening with my schooling, and my father was shy. He had nothing to answer. They, they had no thought of this is not a long-term plan for me to just sit at home. I mean, I would be part of... Like, he had a class for bar mitzvah boys that they learned Gemara. So I was in that class. Or he had, you know-- I knew everybody's haftera. I knew, um, a little bit of, you know, they were learning Chumash. It, it did not excite me at the time. So, but-

08:32 Speaker 2 How about, how about today?

08:34 Speaker 1 Um, it, it does. I'm, I'm thrilled that my granddaughter is, um, my granddaughter is studying in the Bat Sheva Learning Institute in Brooklyn, and she mentioned something about a halacha shiur. I said, "Do you learn Gemara?" And she said, "Yes, of course." And I was like, "Wow." And I think that's a piece as there are, I believe, many, many, many such pieces of things where the Rebbe gave an indication of something that should happen, and we didn't always pick it up. And sometimes things would be picked up in a way of, well, but the Rebbe didn't mean this, or the Rebbe... Whatever it was. But I think w-women learning Gemara in a, in a competent way, in a, in a, in a way that they can own what they're learning. Um, I think it was-- This was 1990 when the Rebbe said this. This, I think it was in May. I think it was this month. But whatever. Um, but this idea of women learning primary source, learning halachot, starting all the way back with Gemara, it's an incredible way to teach.

09:43 Speaker 2 Mm.

09:44 Speaker 1 And we should be incorporating that. So, you know, I'm baruch Hashem a great-grandmother. I'm trying to stay on top of what I'm learning and to try and learn new things, and I believe that that's the fountain of youth, is if you can keep learning new things. Um, so maybe I, I don't wanna close off Gemara, but at this point, it, it-- I'm, I'm glad that my granddaughter is doing it.

10:07 Speaker 2 Fair, fair answer. So-

10:09 Speaker 1 Or granddaughters

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10:52 Speaker 1 They're doing that-

10:53 Speaker 2 So the Rebbe asked your father about the plans for you.

10:56 Speaker 1 What the-- Yeah, what's... And they, there were, there were none. There were none. I think they were just gonna keep on going-

11:02 Speaker 2 Right

11:02 Speaker 1 ... um, at least for the foreseeable future. I wasn't even 10. And the Rebbe said that it was time for me to go away, and I should go someplace where I would not have to switch. In other words, for I was in fifth, sixth grade then. I would not have to switch, like, for high school. I don't know if the Rebbe spelled that out then. Which meant basically there, there were no Lubavitcher high schools anywhere. There were very few Lubavitcher elementary schools. So-

11:33 Speaker 2 This was before Beis Rivkah High School, right?

11:35 Speaker 1 This was... Well-- Oh, there was only Beis Rivkah High School.

11:38 Speaker 2 Okay.

11:38 Speaker 1 There was the high school, uh, but I'm saying there was only New York.

11:41 Speaker 2 Right. Okay.

11:42 Speaker 1 There were some other Lubav-- And Canada, but that was def- not even on the table.

11:47 Speaker 2 Right.

11:48 Speaker 1 And interestingly, m-my grandparents lived in, in Bensonhurst. They lived in America from 1926, '27. They came to America around that time And, um, my grandfather had two shuls in Bensonhurst. In 1940, when the Friediker Rebbe came, my grandfather was very instrumental. He was very part, very much a part of... Back in 1927, after he had just come here, and trying to imagine how those that were refusenik, how much English did they speak? What did they know? And they were traveling to Washington to get the Friediker Rebbe's sentence commuted to get him out of prison to... How did they, like the breittkeit, you know, the, the confidence, the, the commitment to be able to do something like that. But in any case, in 1940, when the Friedi-Friediker Rebbe came and stayed in America, he was very instrumental then in, um, he led the, the negotiations for the purchase of 770 and, and so on. He was... But moving to Crown Heights was never on the table. The Rebbe wanted him to stay, first the Friediker Rebbe and then our Rebbe to stay in Bensonhurst. Bensonhurst from Crown Heights is on three city buses. It's an hour traveling. Bais Rivkah at that time was on the other side of the moon. It was in, in Brownsville, which was three city buses and further, an hour and a quarter, an hour and 20 minutes. Bensonhurst is right next to Borough Park. Borough Park has Bais Yaakov. Bais Yaakov was putting up a new building. I would have a

13:26 Speaker 1 school bus that would pick me up and bring me home door to door. And the Rebbe said that I should decide. And I... We visited Bais Yaakov, and I, I was not happy. I couldn't put my finger on it too much, but I, I didn't feel good about it. And then we went to Bais Rivkah. And, um, I remember being greeted by a name that people just don't know today, Rabbi Golden, Itche Golden, who was from my grandfather's generation. In 1920, '21, he was a bachur in the Rostov. He was basically when the Friediker Rebbe was very, very ill, he was the bachur who was, like, taking care. And just, uh... And he was the-- He was running the Bais Rivkah plant. And he, he came out to greet us in the hall carrying a c- a, a, a can of Ajax, you know, cleaning some-something from this big washroom in one hand and with a big Shalom Aleichem from my father and just this warm welcome that just enveloped us the minute we walked into the building. And Rabbi Majesky, alav ha-shalom, was the, um, he was the principal, and he was very, um, very warm about me coming in. Uh, in Bais Yaakov, they had talked about, oh, that for sure I would have to go down two levels to fourth grade, and I... Then they-- It just made me feel like, you know, squashed tomato. And Rabbi Majesky was, "You know, till Hanukkah, you'll be in the fifth grade, and then we'll

15:09 Speaker 1 see." But just very, "You know, it's gonna be fine. We're gonna work this out." And so I felt good about that. But it was also the first time in my life that I was in a place that was not connected to my family, but I saw the Rebbe's picture on the wall.

15:26 Speaker 2 Hmm.

15:26 Speaker 1 So I knew I was at home. And I was, "I'm gonna go to Bais Rivkah. I'm gonna go to this school." And, um, and I did. Baruch Hashem. My grandmother, for a month, came with me every single day on the three city buses-

15:44 Speaker 2 Wow

15:45 Speaker 1 ... until she was confident that I knew my way. And I had... There was a little bit of an easy arrangement to get home. At least I had a school bus part of the way.

15:54 Speaker 2 Hmm.

15:55 Speaker 1 And I didn't go up Hanukkah time. I stayed in the lower class for three years, fifth, sixth, and seventh in Hebrew, which was the perfect teaching arrangement for me. And then in ninth grade, I joined, and that year I worked really, really hard. And, um, at the end of the year, I had a very good, Baruch Hashem, a very, very good report card. And I wrote to the Rebbe thanking the Rebbe for Bais Rivkah. And that what I loved the most was that the teachers were not just teaching subjects. They were teaching people that I f-- you feel like you, the teachers really care.

16:35 Speaker 2 Hmm.

16:36 Speaker 1 They really care about you. And the Rebbe answered me, "Tach, tach al ha-bsoros tevis," and with a bracha. Um, so it was a very... It was very personal.

16:52 Speaker 2 How did you... I mean, there's so many things I could, I could, I... So many directions I could go from that, I would say, uh, concise, uh, history. Um, but how did you, how did you see yourself in terms of coming from Nashville, Tennessee? I mean, I... This is something that obviously is a little bit more personal for me. You know, like, in those days, uh, you could probably count on your hand the amount of kids that were growing up-

17:24 Speaker 1 None. Zero.

17:25 Speaker 2 None. Okay, fine.

17:26 Speaker 1 Zero.

17:27 Speaker 2 So there was-

17:28 Speaker 1 I mean, there were kids there. I had friends, but there were no kids like me. In other words, there were no, there were no-

17:34 Speaker 2 There were no other Slonim's kids?

17:36 Speaker 1 In Nashville, Tennessee?

17:37 Speaker 2 No, no. I'm talking about in, in Lubavitch. In Nashville, I know you're the only Lubavitcher. That's where-

17:42 Speaker 1 We were the only Shomer Shabbos family.

17:44 Speaker 2 Right. That part to me-

17:45 Speaker 1 Yeah

17:45 Speaker 2 ... to be honest, uh, that's not so interesting to me. I mean, I grew up the same way. What's always more interesting to me is... Yes, in Nashville, you're the only Lubavitcher, but in Lubavitcher, uh, in Lubavitch or in Crown Heights, you're the only Tenne- you're the only Nashville- ... and whatever it's called. You're the only-

18:04 Speaker 1 So it was-

18:04 Speaker 2 You're the only Southern area.

18:05 Speaker 1 Yeah. It wa- it was very funny because, um- I was, I was definitely the first out-of-towner in the elementary school, and I think that that same year, I think, um, the, the, the first out-of-towner came to the, to the high school happens to be, uh... We share great-grandchildren, Devarah Shmotkin. She was Goodman, and I think she came from New Haven to the high school. I think it was the same year. But out of town, Bais Rivka was very, very small. Out-of-towners were, like, they didn't know what we were. You know, there was, um, I... For my... In high school, I made a map-

18:45 Speaker 2 Oh, who's they?

18:46 Speaker 1 Yeah.

18:46 Speaker 2 The kids or the teachers?

18:48 Speaker 1 The kids. The kids. The teachers didn't... We didn't discuss it really, so I don't know what they thought so, um-

18:55 Speaker 2 So sorry, you were making maps?

18:56 Speaker 1 Yeah. So I made, for our high school newspaper, I made a map of the world the way my friends see the world. It was a big- ... circle called New York. Around New York, there was a circle called Out of Town that had absolutely no relation to geography. In the circle around New York, there was Florida, maybe Chicago, but no connection of, like- ... they didn't, you know, nobody went anywhere, and nobody-

19:25 Speaker 2 Right.

19:26 Speaker 1 Then there was an ocean, and on the other side of the ocean, there was, um, Russia, Eretz Yisrael, and Paris. And the reason why there was Paris, because my classmates either were born in Paris after their parents came from Russia- ... after the war, or they were the first ones born in America. But Paris, everybody came from Paris. It was Russia, Paris- ... to New York.

19:51 Speaker 2 Yeah.

19:51 Speaker 1 And so the sense of the world, a, a girl... I remember a girl asking me, um, what language we speak in Tennessee. My mother was visiting. They saw her give me some change. "You have the same money? You have the same money in Tennessee?"

20:06 Speaker 2 Right.

20:06 Speaker 1 "And you're so lucky you've been out of town. I've never been out of America except to go to this stupid old-" "... to this stupid old country." So the, the perception, it was a different world altogether. I found out years later that The New Yorker magazine had a magazine of how New Yorkers see the world, and it's New York is this big blob, and then, you know-

20:25 Speaker 2 Right

20:25 Speaker 1 ... there's a, the Hudson River, and the, you know, a few things on the other side. And, but that, that was... I mean, people didn't travel anywhere like what they do now, the... not even-

20:36 Speaker 2 Right

20:36 Speaker 1 ... people that I grew up with in, in Nashville, the average person had never been to New York, ever.

20:41 Speaker 2 Right. Right. Right.

20:43 Speaker 1 So I was definitely a novelty.

20:46 Speaker 2 You were a novelty. Did, did they, did they see you... What... Did... I, I mean, what you're talking about is simply provincialism where, like, people grow up in, you know, in this-

20:58 Speaker 1 Well-

20:58 Speaker 2 ... their own bubble

20:58 Speaker 1 ... provincialism is a very New York characteristic anyway.

21:01 Speaker 2 Yes.

21:01 Speaker 1 At least-

21:01 Speaker 2 Exactly. So that, so that's why to me, what's even, what's even more interesting is, did they see you... Did they understand what this Lubavitcher... Like, I'm talking from a more Lubavitch perspective-

21:13 Speaker 1 Okay

21:14 Speaker 2 ... Lubavitch angle, you know. Like, what's this Lubavitcher, you know, Lubavitch from Tennessee like that doesn't fit? Like, was there any of that?

21:23 Speaker 1 No, there was... No, not really, because there was-

21:24 Speaker 2 Or shluchus, did they underst-

21:25 Speaker 1 There was, there was an, an awareness of shluchus.

21:29 Speaker 2 Okay.

21:30 Speaker 1 Um, none of the girls in the school at the time had, you know, were living on, on shluchus. But, uh, this is the early '60s, so there was something, something of an awareness. Not a lot, but it was definitely something that-

21:47 Speaker 2 I see

21:47 Speaker 1 ... grew as, um, as the years went by. It became more and more. I was, I think, probably a factor why it was easy for them to see me as normal, shall we say, was, um, people knew my grandparents on both sides.

22:04 Speaker 2 Right. Right.

22:05 Speaker 1 Both of my grandfathers learned in Lubavitch. Both of them had, you know, close friendships that even if they didn't see their chaverim from, you know, those years for another 30, 40, 50 years, it didn't matter. That, you know, there was-

22:21 Speaker 2 Right

22:21 Speaker 1 ... there was a closeness. There was a shared understanding. Um, there was, um-

22:29 Speaker 2 How about how you saw yourself? How, how did... Like, did you fit right in? Oh, it's your house. Yeah, I know, but it's your podcast. It's your house. All right. I'll cut him out. Okay. Shalom aleichem. I get cut out all the time. Aw. I won't cut you out. Aw.

22:50 Speaker 1 I don't have to cut it out.

22:53 Speaker 2 Your choice. Nice to meet you. Nice to see you. My honor. All right. So, um, like, you, you, you're mentioning that, that... You're mentioning that they were, that they understood where you were coming from, but did you feel like you fit in?

23:13 Speaker 1 So, all right, I'm gonna have to go back a little bit, a, a, a generation. My mother... My father was actually born in Eretz Yisrael, but my grandparents came to America when he was three years old, so he grew up in America.

23:29 Speaker 2 So just, just to point out-

23:30 Speaker 1 Yeah

23:30 Speaker 2 ... for those who have listened to the podcast, your, your brother is the older brother, your father is the older brother of Mrs. Gorelik.

23:37 Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

23:38 Speaker 2 So she, she spoke-

23:39 Speaker 1 Zelma Tzengisen, yeah

23:39 Speaker 2 ... right. So she spoke a little bit about her older brother, Zalman.

23:43 Speaker 1 Yeah.

23:43 Speaker 2 That's your father.

23:43 Speaker 1 That's my father, yeah.

23:45 Speaker 2 Yeah. If you want a little bit more of the family history-

23:47 Speaker 1 Yeah

23:47 Speaker 2 ... you can go to that episode.

23:48 Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah. Um, my mother grew up in New York her whole life, and New York in those years, she grew up in Bensonhurst, which even though there was a, a large Jewish population, it was not a large Frum population. And it was very much a given that the young people were not gonna continue what the grandparents had done, not because they were rebelling.

24:16 Speaker 2 Right.

24:16 Speaker 1 I mean, I'm sure there was plenty of that also. But the sense that America is different.

24:22 Speaker 2 Mm.

24:22 Speaker 1 America is just, it's a different place. It's a different world, and yeah, there are all of these opportunities and so on. So for some of the older generation, it, there was a wistfulness that they felt bad that it wasn't gonna be able to happen here. And for some, they were jumping headlong into these wonderful opportunities, and yeah, okay, so-

24:45 Speaker 2 By older generation, you mean your, your mother's generation-

24:48 Speaker 1 My mother's-

24:48 Speaker 2 ... or your grandparents?

24:48 Speaker 1 My grandparents' generation.

24:50 Speaker 2 Right. Right.

24:50 Speaker 1 So my mother grew up with the, in, in a c- a Jewish community that was very warmly and proudly Jewish, but kind of just accepting the fact that it's not happening here.

25:03 Speaker 2 What's not happening? From Yid-

25:04 Speaker 1 Yiddishkeit

25:05 Speaker 2 ... from Yiddishkeit?

25:05 Speaker 1 Yiddishkeit, yeah.

25:06 Speaker 2 Or the way it used to-

25:07 Speaker 1 From, from Yiddishkeit.

25:08 Speaker 2 So they were expecting their kids to not be Frum.

25:10 Speaker 1 Right. Or to be nominally Frum.

25:13 Speaker 2 I see.

25:14 Speaker 1 So a Seder for sure, even Friday night. But retail is retail or, you know, whatever it is.

25:20 Speaker 2 Right.

25:20 Speaker 1 And people would have opportunities. It was just either people were more enthusiastic about the great opportunities no matter the cost-

25:30 Speaker 2 Right

25:30 Speaker 1 ... or they were, "Okay, the opportunities are great," and they're wistful about the cost. But it was like a given there's a cost. Yiddishkeit is not happening here.

25:38 Speaker 2 Right.

25:39 Speaker 1 It's done.

25:39 Speaker 2 And, and this is, this is also Hasidim or just-- or you're talking about in general?

25:42 Speaker 1 Among many Hasidim there was that.

25:44 Speaker 2 Right.

25:45 Speaker 1 There was that. I just, you know, there was a, a, a point, uh, that I noticed in, um, in the Hair magazine.

25:51 Speaker 2 But one second.

25:52 Speaker 1 Yeah.

25:52 Speaker 2 I, I, the Friediker Rebbe said America is nisht landish.

25:55 Speaker 1 When did he say that?

25:56 Speaker 2 When did he say that?

25:57 Speaker 1 When he came back.

25:58 Speaker 2 Right.

25:58 Speaker 1 In 1940.

25:59 Speaker 2 Right.

26:00 Speaker 1 And there was a lot that had to happen to translate that into action.

26:05 Speaker 2 No, my question was, it wasn't like today whenever you bring up that, that idea that America is different or that the generation is changing. People are, "But the Friediker Rebbe said America is nisht landish." Was it not at that time, like you're saying that even Hasidim had come to accept that things would change. Was it not-

26:21 Speaker 1 So in the-

26:22 Speaker 2 They were not so adamant

26:23 Speaker 1 ... my mother's years of growing up in the, you know, like she was born in 1927, so in the '30s when she was growing up, that idea... You know, when my grandfather left Russia-

26:36 Speaker 2 So you're saying this was before the Friediker Rebbe said it

26:38 Speaker 1 ... before he said that.

26:39 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

26:39 Speaker 1 And that when, when he left Russia and he went to Rostov to, uh, you know, zegen and zach, to, to say goodbye to the Friediker Rebbe before coming here.

26:51 Speaker 2 To your grandfather.

26:52 Speaker 1 Kazanovsky, yeah. My mother's father.

26:54 Speaker 2 Right.

26:56 Speaker 1 So in that yechidus, the Friediker Rebbe said to him, "Mir ven zach nachzen. We will yet meet. We'll meet again."

27:03 Speaker 2 Hmm.

27:03 Speaker 1 My grandfather told me that his immediate response was, "Ven zal ich kumen? When should I come?"

27:09 Speaker 2 Right.

27:09 Speaker 1 He said it never crossed his mind. Now remember, this is 1926 or so, so this was before the arrest of the Friediker Rebbe. It was before that whole pasuk. It was before the idea of a rebbe coming to America, it, it didn't compute. N- it didn't even-- It's not like people dismissed it. It didn't-

27:28 Speaker 2 Right

27:28 Speaker 1 ... it didn't even come up.

27:30 Speaker 2 Right.

27:30 Speaker 1 So they're in America, and there, and the, there's the, a lot of interesting things about the history, and there were those who fought very, very hard to maintain what they had, and they worked very hard to give their children a very positive connection, a very pos- very positive content. But the idea of living in a completely different world, that was a given. So why did I go into this whole thing? Because one of my mother's earliest memories or strongest memories says it was a day till the end of her life she would talk about it as a day that she could remember from early in the morning until at night, every single detail. It was one of the most formative experiences of her life. My mother went with her whole family. My grandfather, grandmother took the whole family to be at the pier when the Friediker Rebbe arrived in America, Tess' other in March of 1940. I think the boat docked in the afternoon, if I'm not mistaken. Whatever it was, he had the family up before dawn. They shouldn't be late. He was not taking any chances, and they were there for hours. And what were they doing? They were singing Nigunim.

28:49 Speaker 2 Huh.

28:50 Speaker 1 And my mother said it was the first time in her life that she heard these Nigunim someplace that was not her parents' table.

29:01 Speaker 2 Hmm.

29:02 Speaker 1 And that was when she incorporated the idea that you can be part of a community even when you're not geographically together, that community is not a, de- defined by geography. So she had this sense of community. She had this sense of belonging. She had this sense of my people. And yes, in a broad sense, you feel that with all Yidden, but that this connection of Hasidim crystallized for her, and it stayed that way for her whole life.

29:33 Speaker 2 Hmm.

29:33 Speaker 1 That, uh, she never wanted to live anywhere other than New York. She had no, um, maybe to travel or whatever, but she was very happy living in New York. And when the Friediker Rebbe told my father to apply for this position that was referred to, to the Friediker Rebbe to be the rabbi of a Orthodox shul in Nashville, Tennessee, for the first number of years that my parents were there, people could not understand why a young rabbi would throw his life away to run a cemetery, because that was the function of Orthodox rabbis in those years.

30:09 Speaker 2 Right.

30:11 Speaker 1 What gave her the strength to be able to do it, how she could see herself having grown up in Bensonhurst, which in some ways was, it was out of town.

30:20 Speaker 2 It wasn't Crown Heights.

30:21 Speaker 1 In other words, it was not, it was not... Crown Heights wasn't yet Crown Heights.

30:23 Speaker 2 Crown Heights wasn't Crown Heights.

30:25 Speaker 1 But like they said, there was not a com- a physical community.

30:29 Speaker 2 Right.

30:29 Speaker 1 But she knew that she belonged to a community.

30:32 Speaker 2 Right. That, that, that's so fascinating. I was talking about it to your aunt. Although sh- I think she had a different take on it, but yeah. I mean-

30:39 Speaker 1 Well, she's a little bit later.

30:41 Speaker 2 Yeah. No, but it is fascinating.

30:42 Speaker 1 I mean, she grew up a little bit too.

30:43 Speaker 2 No, but it's fascinating the, the, the, the, the fact, like you just said, Crown Heights wasn't Crown Heights. Like the, the, the Lubavitchers in America at the time were, were on the outside, right?

30:53 Speaker 1 Hmm. For sure. There was a handful of people.

30:56 Speaker 2 Right. No, but it wasn't only-- but it wasn't even just geographic. It was like philosophically. Like America was, like you said, like w- which to me is such a telling anecdote that your grandfather- It never occurred to him that the Fidika would ever volunteer-- would, it wasn't voluntary in the end, but would ever move to America. He visited. He visited in between.

31:17 Speaker 1 And this was before that.

31:18 Speaker 2 Right. But he visited, but even then he had the ch-chance, I suppose, to settle down. No, he, uh, like, yeah, I mean, this is, this is basic history. The Frum Jews in Russia and, and Eastern Europe were vehemently opposed to moving to America because they felt that's where people go to assimilate. Not they felt, they knew.

31:37 Speaker 1 So my, my father's father, and I don't know if my Aunt Bessie discussed this part, but my, my grandfather, Shalom Posner-

31:47 Speaker 2 Right

31:47 Speaker 1 ... his grandfather came to America.

31:51 Speaker 2 She didn't mention that, no.

31:52 Speaker 1 His grandfather came to America. It was probably around the turn of the century. He had one son and several daughters. That son, uh, who was known as Itche Zalman, I don't know if he was a Bachar or if he was married and did not come with his family. He took one look at America, and he said, "I'm, I'm not gonna be able to raise a Frum family here," and he went back.

32:20 Speaker 2 That's right. She didn't mention that. She did mention that you had other relatives who weren't religious or-

32:24 Speaker 1 Okay. So when they came, they were-

32:26 Speaker 2 Right

32:26 Speaker 1 ... 'cause here was my, my great-great-grandfather with all of his, with all these daughters.

32:33 Speaker 2 He was a Lubavitch Hasid also?

32:36 Speaker 1 I'm not sure. My grandfather's father was. And there's-

32:40 Speaker 2 Itch-Itch-Itche

32:41 Speaker 1 ... this Itche Zalman that my father was named for.

32:43 Speaker 2 Itche Zalman wasn't-

32:44 Speaker 1 Wasn't Lubavitch

32:45 Speaker 2 ... Lubavitch Hasid. But you don't know if his parent... But they were from-

32:47 Speaker 1 Right

32:47 Speaker 2 ... but they were from-

32:47 Speaker 1 They were Frum. Yeah. They were Frum. They were definitely-

32:49 Speaker 2 From Russia

32:50 Speaker 1 ... from Russia.

32:51 Speaker 2 Russia.

32:51 Speaker 1 And, um, I-I don't know that much about them, but y- they were definitely Frum when they came here.

32:58 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

32:59 Speaker 1 And my grandfather had an aunt. She was one of the youngest, maybe the youngest, and we knew her. She passed away in 1987, and we knew her. And she always... She stayed very close to the family. And I remember once, you know, talking to her, and she was describing, this was actually in a, in a different conversation, describing what it was like to go to work on Shabbos when she had to, she thought she had to. She said that it was a sewing thing, and that the first week she was crying so hard that she couldn't handle the sewing machine because it was wet with tears. And the next week she didn't cry as much-

33:42 Speaker 2 Hmm

33:42 Speaker 1 ... et cetera. She says, "And by the time she realized that she didn't have to work on Shabbos," now these were her, her words, "that there was no Shabbos to come back to."

33:53 Speaker 2 Wow.

33:55 Speaker 1 So, and the children assimilated, um, which was, again, it wasn't a rebellion thing. It was just, it was basically considered inevitable.

34:05 Speaker 2 Right.

34:10 Speaker 1 My mother grew up before there was, there was no Bais Yaakov yet.

34:15 Speaker 2 Right.

34:16 Speaker 1 She was in public school. She was tutored, um, when she was, like, in, in high school. Rebbetzin Chaiken was her tutor, and that was how she, you know, she could, um, you know, obviously to, to read she was taught before translation, some Chumash and, and so on, but she was so, so, so fiercely proud of the education that, that I got and that my sisters got.

34:46 Speaker 2 So you, you, you mentioned there, you mentioned a few times already, very interesting, this, this idea of, of community that's not tied to a specific locale, and it's already become a, a sort of running theme here where, you know, your, your grandfather has to bid farewell from Russia, but he's still connected to Lubavitch even though he moves to America. And then your mother growing up and the realization when they're singing on the pier, and that sense of identity with a group that perhaps was not manifest until that, until that moment, so she hadn't seen it or, or, or, or seen what that looks like yet. And then you had mentioned earlier coming to Bais Rivkah School. Um, what's that?

35:33 Speaker 1 There's something else.

35:34 Speaker 2 Yeah, go ahead. Sure.

35:35 Speaker 1 I mentioned that my mother hadn't seen it except at her parents' table.

35:40 Speaker 2 Right.

35:40 Speaker 1 What did she see? Because the few Hasidim, sorry, the few Hasidim who were in the New York area at that time, they would get together very regularly.

35:51 Speaker 2 Oh, okay.

35:52 Speaker 1 So she saw Hasidim. And-

35:55 Speaker 2 Like who, for example?

35:56 Speaker 1 Um, Rabbi Jacobson, Rabbi Simpson-

35:59 Speaker 2 Okay

36:00 Speaker 1 ... later Reb Shmuel, but I don't know if he, he was, he wasn't there yet. But in the '30s, um, Rabbi Yechanan Gordon.

36:07 Speaker 2 What were all of them doing there? They, they had all been sent specifically by the Fidik Rebbe to come to America, or some of them was-

36:12 Speaker 1 So I don't, I don't know specifically of how they came here. Some were, um... They were Rabbanim. Some were shochtim.

36:17 Speaker 2 Your grandfather, how, Kazarnowsky, how did he end up in America?

36:20 Speaker 1 My grandfather came, when he came after n- I think it was after 1923, to come to America, you had to be s-basically not just sponsored. You have to have a job waiting for you.

36:31 Speaker 2 Right.

36:31 Speaker 1 So my grandfather had a half-brother in Russia, in not... In Rochester who got his shul-

36:39 Speaker 2 A half-brother?

36:40 Speaker 1 Yeah. In other words, they had the same, m- the same... I'm not sure if it was on his mother's side or his father's side.

36:47 Speaker 2 So one of his parents had emigrated to America, basically.

36:49 Speaker 1 No. No. Just the... I, I think the brother had come on his own.

36:52 Speaker 2 I see. Another Russian-born-

36:55 Speaker 1 A Russian-born, uh, sibling.

36:57 Speaker 2 Who was Lubavitch or...?

36:58 Speaker 1 No.

36:59 Speaker 2 No.

36:59 Speaker 1 No. He came... No, his family was not Lubavitch.

37:02 Speaker 2 No, but his half-brother had grown up... Oh, your grandfather's family was not f- He didn't come from a Lubavitch family.

37:06 Speaker 1 I don't think so.

37:07 Speaker 2 I see.

37:08 Speaker 1 I don't think so.

37:08 Speaker 2 So he had a re-

37:08 Speaker 1 No, there, but there was a connection with his mother that I know about. So I'm, I'm not sure about his father.

37:13 Speaker 2 She had a relative. He, he had a... Sorry to all the Kazarnowsky's if we're-

37:16 Speaker 1 Yeah.

37:17 Speaker 2 ... if we're, if we're dinging your yichus over here.

37:18 Speaker 1 Oh, for sure there's gonna be-

37:20 Speaker 2 Not so-

37:20 Speaker 1 "No, how did you say this? How did you say that?"

37:22 Speaker 2 Not, not s-

37:22 Speaker 1 I'm not to- so sure about them. I do know That his mother did have a strong connection, and I can tell you the s-

37:28 Speaker 2 Oh

37:28 Speaker 1 ... some stories with that which actually involve your great-great-grandmother, something like that?

37:33 Speaker 2 Which, which one? Uh, this, this is getting, this is getting too in the weeds. I just wanna make sure that we don't-

37:39 Speaker 1 It's a good story, but anyway

37:39 Speaker 2 ... I just wanna make sure that I'm happy to hear it.

37:41 Speaker 1 Okay.

37:41 Speaker 2 So let's hear it.

37:42 Speaker 1 But let's, but yeah, well, let, let's let me-

37:44 Speaker 2 Which great-grandmother?

37:46 Speaker 1 Um, the one that your mother is named for.

37:50 Speaker 2 Oh, Esther Golda Shemtov.

37:52 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

37:52 Speaker 2 Futerfas.

37:53 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm. When she was a little girl.

37:54 Speaker 2 She was, she was close with your or she knew your-

37:57 Speaker 1 No.

37:59 Speaker 2 Okay.

38:00 Speaker 1 No. No, actually they-

38:02 Speaker 2 So let's hear the story

38:03 Speaker 1 ... I'm, I'm, it's... No. I, I conflated two stories.

38:08 Speaker 2 I see.

38:08 Speaker 1 I know a story with her, with Rebbetzin Rivka, and a story with my great-grandmother and Rebbetzin Rivka, so I was conflating the stories.

38:16 Speaker 2 And the story-

38:16 Speaker 1 So I don't think they actually-

38:17 Speaker 2 ... the story about mar-

38:17 Speaker 1 ... knew each other

38:18 Speaker 2 ... the story about marrying a bocah when she grows up?

38:21 Speaker 1 Yeah.

38:21 Speaker 2 Yeah. We s- my, my, my great aunt told that on the podcast.

38:23 Speaker 1 Yeah. She told it to me.

38:24 Speaker 2 Yeah, it's a beautiful story.

38:25 Speaker 1 She told it to me. And I, why she told it to me is an interesting things I'll say. So coming back to this, so yes, my great-grandmother also had this connection, and in my mind I kind of like just melded them. But no, they're not connected as far as I know.

38:39 Speaker 2 So I, I just wanna make clear we're not un-geshing any Cos- Coskows here. If they think they're gesh, we are not undoing any of that.

38:48 Speaker 1 Um, we can come back to gesh in a minute 'cause I just read a very, very interesting thing from the Frydiger Rebbe about that.

38:54 Speaker 2 Okay.

38:54 Speaker 1 He speaks about three types of Hasidim. They're the Hasidim who are like, it's almost like levels of connection. The top level is through learning chasidus.

39:05 Speaker 2 Right.

39:06 Speaker 1 The next level is Hasidim of Nusach.

39:09 Speaker 2 Okay.

39:10 Speaker 1 And the next level is Hasidim of Geshe. In other words, it's nothing to do with their life, it's just that they happen to be descendants. They, that they are descendants of people who were Hasidim, but it doesn't say anything about them.

39:23 Speaker 2 Well, now we've gotten everybody angry.

39:25 Speaker 1 That's just fine. It's just fine.

39:29 Speaker 2 Okay.

39:29 Speaker 1 It's fine.

39:30 Speaker 2 So, so, so, so, so you were saying that your, your parents would have these Hasidim over in, in-

39:36 Speaker 1 My grandparents

39:37 Speaker 2 ... yeah, sorry, your, your grandparents would have these Hasidim over-

39:40 Speaker 1 Right

39:40 Speaker 2 ... and as your mother grew up seeing these Hasidim-

39:42 Speaker 1 Yes

39:43 Speaker 2 ... come together.

39:44 Speaker 1 Yes.

39:44 Speaker 2 But she hadn't ever seen it take place publicly in a public-

39:47 Speaker 1 Right

39:47 Speaker 2 ... space.

39:48 Speaker 1 Right.

39:48 Speaker 2 Until-

39:49 Speaker 1 And certainly not with numbers. Until March 1940, she was 13 years old, and the Frydiger Rebbe came to America.

39:55 Speaker 2 And that's almost, it sounds like that's when the community of Lubavitch was finally ready to go public. Like-

40:03 Speaker 1 Well, it was, it was, the numbers were growing.

40:06 Speaker 2 Right.

40:06 Speaker 1 So I, I wanna come back to the '30s for a little bit-

40:09 Speaker 2 Okay, sure

40:09 Speaker 1 ... to the part that I, that I can, can recognize and to trace a little bit because they were not just sentimental people who were, you know, "Remember the good old days. Remember, you know, what it was like in Lubavitch. Remember in yeshiva. Remember farbrengens by the rebbe, and this mashpia and that." They weren't just remembering.

40:29 Speaker 2 Hmm.

40:29 Speaker 1 They had a very, I think a very... I, I don't know that Chabad totally cornered the market on it and that it's only in Chabad. Not, not gonna go so far. But definitely in inherent, intrinsic part of being a Lubavitcher, and that was a Hasid makht a svivah.

40:53 Speaker 2 Hmm.

40:53 Speaker 1 You create your environment.

40:56 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

40:57 Speaker 1 You create your environment. It is a very empowering idea. There's a lot of responsibility there, but it's also gives you a sense of, of what you can do.

41:09 Speaker 2 Hmm.

41:10 Speaker 1 A sense of purpose, a sense of mission. So one of the things that I'm, I've said this many times, and I feel it more and more in life, my parents never were apologetic to us about our life. Ay, nevachlet, we don't. Never even occurred to me to... You know, I knew once when in, in my earlier years, I didn't even see cousins once a year.

41:34 Speaker 2 Hmm.

41:34 Speaker 1 Later it was at, you know, that much. But it didn't occur to me to feel bad that we were being deprived, that there were no other Shemoneh Shabbos kids, that we didn't get to see our cousins. Oy, it's so hard. Oy, it's so hard. I never had got a whiff of that from my parents.

41:50 Speaker 2 Hmm.

41:50 Speaker 1 The sense that I had was, um, they loved life. They loved us. They loved what they were doing. They were happy.

42:01 Speaker 2 Hmm.

42:02 Speaker 1 They were happy. And neither one of them was the rah-rah, you know, let's sing songs kind, although my mother loved Nigunim especially. But it, it wasn't, it wasn't, um, a personality trait. It was a character trait, that I'm where I'm supposed to be, and I like it here.

42:20 Speaker 2 In Nashville?

42:21 Speaker 1 Yeah. Yeah.

42:22 Speaker 2 They were very positive about it.

42:23 Speaker 1 Very positive about it.

42:25 Speaker 2 Hmm.

42:25 Speaker 1 And people would always ask my mother, and then I found out later, I mean, that I found out later, people would always ask me, "Where do you like it better? You like it better in Nashville or..." And my answer was always, "I don't even compare them. They're just so completely different." I loved being in Nashville when I was there. I loved being in New York when I was there. But that was for me as a kid, as a 10-year-old. But for my mother, she, she didn't give up-

42:50 Speaker 2 Hmm

42:50 Speaker 1 ... you know, the, their, uh, her sense of, of what she missed, although she once told the only physical thing that she really, really missed was being near the ocean. But-

43:00 Speaker 2 Bensonhurst

43:00 Speaker 1 ... no, in being in Nashville.

43:02 Speaker 2 Oh.

43:02 Speaker 1 Nashville is landlocked.

43:04 Speaker 2 No, I'm saying she missed-

43:05 Speaker 1 Yeah. She, from her-

43:06 Speaker 2 She missed from, from her-

43:06 Speaker 1 Right. Right

43:07 Speaker 2 ... growing up in Bensonhurst.

43:08 Speaker 1 Right. In, in New York, you mean.

43:09 Speaker 2 Right, 'cause no-

43:10 Speaker 1 Right

43:10 Speaker 2 ... 'cause Crown Heights isn't near the ocean.

43:11 Speaker 1 Right.

43:11 Speaker 2 But Bensonhurst is closer, right?

43:12 Speaker 1 Yeah. Right. That's true. But-

43:14 Speaker 2 Right. Uh, we're just going back-

43:15 Speaker 1 Ocean breeze

43:16 Speaker 2 ... we're, we're just going back to the circles 'cause if you grew up in Crown Heights, now the circle is Crown Heights, and-

43:21 Speaker 1 Yeah.

43:21 Speaker 2 ... all of Brooklyn is outside that circle.

43:22 Speaker 1 Yeah. But people move now.

43:24 Speaker 2 Fair.

43:24 Speaker 1 People move around.

43:25 Speaker 2 Fair.

43:25 Speaker 1 So it's, it's different.

43:26 Speaker 2 Fair.

43:26 Speaker 1 No, but that, that sense of, um- You know, so we had, we had normal, happy childhood of my parents were not the entertainment bureau. They were not constantly planning. I mean, there were things that we did as a family. I'm not gonna say that didn't happen. But, um, we figured a lot of things out for ourselves-

43:48 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

43:48 Speaker 1 ... which was, I think, very typical of that time in America that adults did not see their role as having to provide entertainment. And so it was not, you know, "Well, what are we gonna do?" It just didn't, didn't work like that. Not that we never did things, but it wasn't like your job is to entertain me and make sure that I'm not bored.

44:05 Speaker 2 Right.

44:08 Speaker 1 Anyway, but the main point that I wanted to bring out-

44:10 Speaker 2 Where do you think, where do you think Lubavitchers-

44:11 Speaker 1 Yeah

44:11 Speaker 2 ... got that from? 'Cause, uh, it's a very, it's a very important-

44:14 Speaker 1 That-

44:15 Speaker 2 ... part of Lubavitch identity. This idea that it's almost like Lubavitchers or Lubavitch in general was never... Like, I think there's a, there's a few ways of looking at it. Lubavitch was never r- dependent on being part of a community. Yes, I know because I've already been, I've already been chastised. You know, your grandfather grew up in, my great-grandfather grew up in Neville. There was a community in Neville. I know there were communities. I know there were communities. But by and large, Lubavitchers, you, you see in their also they were scattered. The, a lot of the rebbeims sent Lubavitchers or the earlier rebbeims sent Lubavitchers to, to run these taverns and inns on, in the boondocks, you know.

45:01 Speaker 1 So-

45:01 Speaker 2 So the, the, there's a, there's a... At the very least there's this k- there's this sense that Lubavitch isn't dependent on a community.

45:07 Speaker 1 Right.

45:07 Speaker 2 And like you said, like Chazzan Mach the Sefer. But then it begins to feel almost like Lubavitchers or like community's almost antithetical to Lubavitch. Like the idea-

45:16 Speaker 1 Okay. So, so-

45:17 Speaker 2 So where do you think that comes from?

45:19 Speaker 1 I, I, I think the value is a very basic value. Sorry. The value is a very basic value. Um, when we were kids, um, um-

45:29 Speaker 2 I caught some of the microphone back

45:30 Speaker 1 ... one of the... What?

45:31 Speaker 2 No, that's fine.

45:32 Speaker 1 One of the, um, teachers in the school, there was, um, an Israeli Mizrachi affiliation who was getting his doctorate. In fact, his story is, um, Moshe Mandelbaum. His story is in the, um, my story, one of the books of my father connected him to the Rebbe. Um, and his wife taught in the day school, and he taught on Sundays 'cause there was also, you know, what my father would call the Sunday cheder, but it was, you know, Sunday school. And the Sunday kids were mostly public school kids, and his wife taught, um, in the day school. In any case, he told my father that he was talking, teaching my brother's class about, uh, I guess it was Parsha or something, you know, it was gracious. And my brother said to him, "Was Avraham Avinu Lubavitch?" He loved the question, and he got it right away. You know, Echad Hay Avraham.

46:32 Speaker 2 Right.

46:32 Speaker 1 You know, and that's-

46:33 Speaker 2 Oh, that, that, that part. I thought-

46:35 Speaker 1 That part. Yeah

46:35 Speaker 2 ... I thought you were talking about the, like, telling peop- getting people to make a bracha. But Echad Hay Avraham.

46:39 Speaker 1 Echad Hay Avraham. I mean, there's probably a whole bunch of things there, but he, he got w- You know, why would a kid, um... Because that's a big piece of it, the hospitality piece, and as a, as a way, you know, bring them into Chabadus-

46:52 Speaker 2 Right

46:52 Speaker 1 ... and then they're gonna... That, that's the way to get the Yiddishkeit. But remember that he started out doing this the only one in the world. He had no- nobody to learn from, nobody to show him, nobody to guide him. So that, but that care-- I mean, Baruch Hashem, since he blazed the trail, but l- you know, we don't have to invent ourselves in that same way. But this example of being the one... So I remember one time, this was in the '60s. By the way, what the teacher answered him, he says, "Oh, that's a very, very good question. You're gonna have to ask Hamora Sarah," his wife, who teaching the class during the week. So he said, "So I gave her the job of answering it." But anyway, was Avraham Avinu Lubavitch. So as a teenager in the mid-60s when things were starting to go a little bit haywire in terms of, um... It was before the student activism stuff, but in terms of, um, fashions for women were becoming not so edel, shall we say, mid-60s. And I was in my father's office, and, um, a young woman was interviewing him for her school project or something. And he was talking about having the, um, you know, the strength to be different, not to be afraid to be different. And, um, so she was, you know, challenging him with that. "Well, what happens if the whole world agrees with you? Then how are you gonna be different? And so what happens to your

48:27 Speaker 1 value of being different if you persuade everyb- If you're successful, isn't that gonna be, you know, the failure of your idea?"

48:35 Speaker 2 Hmm.

48:35 Speaker 1 So he asked her, "What is the opposite of a conformist?" And she said, "A non-conformist." He said, "No."

48:45 Speaker 2 Hmm.

48:46 Speaker 1 "A conformist looks at society and copies. A non-conformist does exactly the same thing, looks at society and does something else."

48:56 Speaker 2 Right.

48:56 Speaker 1 "But they're both doing the same thing. It's not the opposite. It's two sides of one coin. Look at what everybody else is doing."

49:02 Speaker 2 Right.

49:02 Speaker 1 "So what's the opposite?" So he said, "The opposite of a conformist is a person of principle."

49:08 Speaker 2 Hmm.

49:09 Speaker 1 "I'm gonna do the right thing. If I'm the only one in the world doing the right thing, so I'm the only one in the world doing the right thing. And if there are 7 billion, 14 billion, or whatever it is, that's great."

49:20 Speaker 2 Right.

49:21 Speaker 1 That's a very basic part of integrating Hasidus.

49:26 Speaker 2 Hmm.

49:26 Speaker 1 So you n- that knowing who you are is not a reflection of how other people see you. Now, for a teenager, for, you know, it, it's when you, when you lock into that, it's very empowering. It's not always such an easy process.

49:43 Speaker 2 Hmm.

49:43 Speaker 1 Um, you know, something that I, I, uh, also at this stage, a lot of my stories, especially about my childhood are things that I've said over a lot. But I remember at one point, my, my brother, the next, the one that's closest to me in, in the fam- in, in age, we're walking to shul with my father, and we see that, you know, people are like... You know, we were uncomfortable with how people would stare at him. He didn't even notice. He couldn't care less. His hat, his beard, his tzitzits, and in those years, either a hat or, you know, certainly a beard and tzitzit, a yarmulke was not something. You did not see this on the streets of Nashville, Tennessee in the '50s and '60s. And, but he didn't notice. I mean, he was, he's, he knows who he is.

50:32 Speaker 3 Right.

50:32 Speaker 1 He knows who he is, so he had no issue. But we were little kids, so we were, you know, kind of uncomfortable. So if it, if it was somebody, it was, it was in the street, so we would just stare at their shoes. When you stare at somebody's shoes, so they get uncomfortable, they start looking at their shoes, you know. So that was our way of, you know, as, as little kids, that was our way of... But what we incorporated, what we had to try to, to integrate was this, this idea of being so comfortable in your own skin that whatever anybody else says just rolls off your back.

51:06 Speaker 3 Hmm.

51:07 Speaker 1 But I think some, one of the things that I found most frustrating, and I still do, and people will say this, you know, people, "Well, it's easy for you. You grew up that way."

51:16 Speaker 3 Hmm.

51:17 Speaker 1 Like as if somebody programmed me at the age of five or whatever age, and then I just go off on automatic pilot, and now I'm set for the rest of my life. When you see a five-year-old keeping Shabbos, tells you a lot about the five-year-old. When you see a 30-year-old keeping Shabbos, you have no idea. Maybe they grew up with it, maybe they didn't. But one thing is for sure, even if they grew up with it, if he's 30 years old and he's keeping Shabbos, it's because at some point, this person made the decision, maybe not in so many words, maybe not because of an internal struggle, maybe yes with an internal struggle, but at some point took ownership.

52:00 Speaker 3 Hmm.

52:01 Speaker 1 This is mine. That's not the sign of a gap. That's not the sign of something being wrong. It's the sign of a healthy development to growth. Adolescence is part of how the Aibishter programmed us.

52:15 Speaker 3 Right. Yeah. I mean, there's, there's, you know, there's always a sense, uh, the world, the world, you know, ever since the postmodernists took over, and, you know, whether one likes it or not, much of the way we think of our, of ourselves and we think of the world is, is shaped by how they, by they, how they thought it, how they thought of it. You know, it's the catchword has been authenticity. Everybody's into being authentic today and to being, you know, you have to be honest, you have to be real, you have to be authentic, right? And so there's always, there's always a sense that where do you see authenticity? When someone rebels, then you know they're being authentic, right? Or when someone, when someone, even if it's not rebellion, if someone chooses away from how they grew up, by definition, that's, that's a sign of authenticity, because why would they do it if, if not for the fact, right? And if someone stays, then they're not authentic. Um, you know, it's-

53:10 Speaker 1 Do you see how limited that is and how limiting?

53:13 Speaker 3 No, no, I, I don't agree with that take. I don't-

53:15 Speaker 1 Right. Okay

53:15 Speaker 3 ... I don't agree with that take. You know, and there's also, there's even, there's even a trend now, and I, I kind of understand where they're coming from, but there's also a trend of, you know, like the kids who leave Yiddishkeit, those kids have a deeper spiritual feeling, which is feeling locked up in this religion, and everyone else has what to learn from them. And while, while one can say, meaning while there may be something to learn, and very often is something to learn from what they have to say and what they think, like there is from anybody, and while it is s- it is sometimes or maybe even often the case that there is a very deep spiritual sense of, uh, search or, or, or questioning that's, that's, that's pushing them in a different direction, the idea that you can only find it there and not in the, quote-unquote, "boring", you know, or just regular person, I think is quite damaging. A- and I, and I think that's why this, the, the, the anecdote with your father, the one that you just said, is, is very powerful, you know, that being a non-conformist is in many ways the same thing as being a conformist in the sense that you're letting the world frame the terms of the debate, right? The world says, "Okay, this is what we're about. This is what the story, this is what the game is, and now you-- everybody chooses two sides of the, of the game," right? The ultimate

54:42 Speaker 3 goal is to say, "No, no, you don't tell me which game we're playing. I tell you which game I'm playing. Why do I tell you? Because I have a tradition. I have a belief of what the game really is, and I don't really care how you frame it. If, if you happen to fall on my side, great. If you don't, I'm gonna continue doing my thing." Right? Um, but, you know, it, it, it, it, it, it sounds great, and there are, you know, there's no question that the story of Lubavitch is very much a story of the tradition of Avraham, of, you know, Echad Ai Avraham. I, I don't think there's a question about it. Like, like l- you know, the more I think about it, other, other, even other, other, other groups of Chassidis, other Chassidim, they're all very much defined by the city they grew-- m- meaning back in, back in Poland. They, the town that they, that they lived in was the Chassidis that they were part of, and that's why very often you hear stories of them. They moved to a different town, and they joined the other group. Lubavitchers were scattered all over the place. Like there was, like this idea that the whole Lubavitch community was ever in Lubavitch is just not true. Most of them didn't live in Lubavitch.

55:52 Speaker 1 Right.

55:52 Speaker 3 Right? And until Tench Etzmim was established, I don't think there ever was a really solid presence there. Um, even the Rabbeim weren't there a lot of the time. They were, they were traveling. They were, they, a lot of them needed to Go for health reasons, uh, uh, and, and askanus. So the idea that there was like this just kind of cloistered community where everyone gained strength in the community just it, it's certainly, certainly not the, not the story of Lubavitch, and the story of independence and independent thought is for sure a feature of Luba- of the Lubavitch story. I just, you know, I th- I think ultimately it just, it, it asks a question of what does a Lubavitch community look like when everyone is so independent-minded? But like what you're saying is, is that independent-minded is not in the opposition of being with other people, or like if there's other people who have the same principles as I do, wonderful. I don't have to be, you know, an iconoclast. I don't have to be the only person. But I think it's, I, I think, I think it's com- I think it's not so simple. Like, I think very often when you're brought up with that kind of iconoclastic way of thinking, where a Hasid macht a svive, and you kind of bulldoze the environment with your principles-

57:10 Speaker 1 Wait a minute.

57:11 Speaker 3 One second. I thought-

57:14 Speaker 1 Not bulldoze. Not bulldoze. That's not Lubavitch.

57:19 Speaker 3 Okay. But when you, when you are, when you are-

57:22 Speaker 1 Cultivate.

57:23 Speaker 3 Okay. Uh, fair. Fair. That's the way it should... But, but when you are put under pressure, right? When you are put under pressure, you know, whether it's a child growing up in a, in a community with very few other people like them, whether it's, whether it's a shliach that goes out to another town, whether it's the Hasidim that were just living in Brooklyn before there were other people to come, yes, there is a sense of cultivating, but there's also a sense of defiance, is there not? It's not all so pretty and elegant.

57:53 Speaker 1 Um-

57:53 Speaker 3 There is a certain sense of... Like even you mentioned earlier that there were plenty of Hasidim that came to America that, that weren't so strong. They kind of let their kids, they kind of gave up on, on, on their kids holding the line. They're like, "Okay, this is..." So the people that stood, they, they... No? Is it all ver- Is it all that, that, that elegant and tidy?

58:13 Speaker 1 I don't know if elegant and tidy would be a -

58:16 Speaker 3 All right

58:16 Speaker 1 ... word that I would use for it. I would say-

58:17 Speaker 3 Well, cultivate, cultivating sounds, sounds very-

58:20 Speaker 1 Well, I, I, I think it's a question of how we, how we look at community.

58:31 Speaker 3 Right.

58:32 Speaker 1 You know, if you... My father was the rabbi of the shul for roughly 50 years.

58:42 Speaker 3 Right.

58:44 Speaker 1 Many of the people in the shul that he taught, very often if when the Yiddish, their Yiddishkeit started to mean a whole lot more to them, they would move, and this is an experience that many, many, many shluchim have had.

59:04 Speaker 3 Mm.

59:05 Speaker 1 That they move to, um, a, a larger community with more opportunities for education for their children, for high school and, and beyond. Um, if it's a question of looking at what the community is, it's very hard to gauge accomplishment. But if it's a question that you're looking for impact, you're looking for impact, you're looking, and it, it's an idea that I think is more characteristic of our time right now than any time before, although obviously it's always there. The attempt to look to echad echad, the individual connections. We're not looking to build a community for the sake of the community, like, "I'm here, and I have to make sure that this community is g-" Of course, you wanna be a positive force. Of course, you wanna build communities. But really what we're looking at is impacting lives.

1:00:10 Speaker 3 But that's precisely my point.

1:00:12 Speaker 1 Yeah.

1:00:12 Speaker 3 Is that, is that, is that there is, that's a very deep part of the Lubavitch ethos. There's no question about it. And so today, in many ways, I feel like that runs in opposition to having vibrant Lubavitch communities. And I think as, as Lubavitch communities do grow, and, and there are more and more around the country, and I'm sure around the world, I think that's one of the tensions that are being sorted out now, which is, you know, there, there is a beautiful strength in community. I think you look at, you look at the frum communities in, in, in, in America, including Lubavitch communities, and the different moises that they have, but that only communities could pull off together, whether it's the famous, you know, Hatzalah and the Shmirah and these things. But then there are all kinds of quieter organizations, right? It's a beautiful thing, and it's a beautiful s- and it's a very strong power. But in many ways, that takes away from the individual and the individual's need to resourcefulness to be for himself. On the flip side, the Lubavitch, the Lubavitch ethos of being a strong individual, I think can rub up against the community. Like, what do I need a community for? Or-

1:01:21 Speaker 1 No, no, no

1:01:21 Speaker 3 ... or am I, or am I missing something if, if I give too much to the community?

1:01:28 Speaker 1 So I'm, I'm not an expert on Lubavitch communities. I- ... uh, lived in-

1:01:32 Speaker 3 Fair enough

1:01:33 Speaker 1 ... Crown Heights for two years of my life when my-

1:01:35 Speaker 3 Fair enough

1:01:35 Speaker 1 ... husband was in Kollel. But I would say that of, I have very deep ties to Crown Heights, and I'm very fond of Crown Heights. And I would say that the people in Crown Heights who impressed me the most in the years that I was very much there, even though I didn't live there, and in all the years since, are the, what is the idea of seeing yourself as one? One what? You mentioned, was talking about Avraham, right? So I was talking about the, being the one, but he was a giver.

1:02:09 Speaker 3 Right

1:02:09 Speaker 1 He was a giver. He saw himself not in terms of what he can get from the community, but he was giving, giving, giving, giving. And I think of the people that I know in Lubavitch community or in any community, um, I mean, in Crown Heights or wherever, is that those people who look at their lives as, "What am I contributing? What am I giving? Am I a giver?"

1:02:34 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:02:35 Speaker 1 And that's, that's the, the same Avraham Avinu. So it's not like I, I, I don't intend for anything that I'm saying to be anti-community.

1:02:44 Speaker 3 No, I-- And no-

1:02:45 Speaker 1 Okay

1:02:45 Speaker 3 ... I didn't understand. I didn't-

1:02:46 Speaker 1 You didn't get that.

1:02:46 Speaker 3 No, I didn't. No, no, no.

1:02:46 Speaker 1 You didn't get that. That's fine.

1:02:47 Speaker 3 I certainly didn't, no.

1:02:48 Speaker 1 But I think that the-

1:02:49 Speaker 3 And I'm also, I'm also not anti-community. I think it's just interest- when you talk about the Lubavitch kind of individualism, you know, like America, America likes to talk about rugged individualism, but of course, this is a d- this is, this is coming from a different place. You talk Avraham. I think the question that needs to be thought about is, how does that fit into a communal ethos?

1:03:11 Speaker 1 So in, in a communal ethos, the, the more people you have who are looking out for what other people need, for what can I give, how can I contribute, that leads to only the most beautiful and strong and vibrant and healthy community. Um, it was something that you could feel. I was in Israel, um, about six weeks ago for a week. It was-- I've been there many times in my life. It was the most incredible trip that I ever had. Um, and the thing that was so striking was that, that feeling of achdus among people, not because, not achdus in the group of people that are like me-

1:03:54 Speaker 3 Right

1:03:54 Speaker 1 ... but just across the board where barriers, you heard it, you saw it, you felt it, you could touch it.

1:04:01 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:04:01 Speaker 1 The barriers came down, and people, what is it that, that ties us, that binds us? And I think the impetus, the engine that drives that is, what can I give you? What do you need from me? How can I help you? How can I support you?

1:04:16 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:04:17 Speaker 1 Even little things like the way people e- traffic, the way drivers look out for each other. You don't find the, you know, the nightmare of Israeli traffic from not so long ago. It's like you feel people, they're saying, "Let, let me cut him a little slack. Who knows what he had to deal with this morning."

1:04:34 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:04:34 Speaker 1 And just in, on the bus, in the, in the grocery store, wherever it is, that sense of... And that's what I mean by giving.

1:04:41 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:04:41 Speaker 1 That sense of what does somebody need from me that I can give? How can I help? How can I support? And in a Lubavitch community, when somebody comes in, and it's happened in, in, in places that were for, for many, many years just, you know, the Chabad house with serving the community and trying to help develop and raise, uh, the Yiddishkeit, and so on. When people who identify as Lubavitchers come into that community, if they come in with the attitude of how do we help this place grow, we're coming here with gifts that not everybody has. We have the benefit of the education, of whatever, all the different things, and now we're joining a community. How can we help this community?

1:05:29 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:05:29 Speaker 1 As opposed to, you know, what are you doing for me?

1:05:34 Speaker 3 I mean, I'm think- I'm listening to what you're saying. I, I think it's just a matter of, of rereading the line, A chassid makes a surrounding. I think very often the connotation of that is, you know, uh, it's, it's oppositional, right? It's, it's, it's, you know, there's, there's individual, there's a surrounding. The surrounding either takes, you know, either, either takes you over or you take the surrounding over. The... I think even that's the way the phrase is, the phrase starts, like a could make you, but a chassid right? And I think what you're saying is that there's another way to read it, which is probably just as accurate, and that it could be additive, right? Instead of you are oppos- oppositional to the c- to the you can also be additive to the right? Not necessarily does the always have to be seen in opposition to you.

1:06:25 Speaker 1 Right.

1:06:25 Speaker 3 It can be something that you can, you can lend a hand to. And, you know, I, I just want to be clear, I'm, I'm not suggesting that people don't know this, uh, or that, that people need my guidance on how to build better communities. I just think it's interesting in ter- you know, more theoretically. There are many beautiful communities, Lubavitch communities. There are many people doing great things in these Lubavitch communities.

1:06:46 Speaker 1 A hundred percent.

1:06:47 Speaker 3 And, and I'm not trying to critique them. It's just, I, I think when we're talking about the individual ethos of Lubavitch, I think it's interesting to talk about how that fits in with the c- with, with, with what we're seeing today, which is more growth of communities. And I think, I think there can be a tension there, and I think what, what you're suggesting here is that it doesn't have to be an opposition, and that's-- It goes back to the story also of your father, which, right? Where if, i- if, if, if being individual is about not being contrarian to everybody else, but being, uh, principled about what you do. So if you're in principle-- If, if it's about the principles, so if, if you need to be against it, then you'll be against it. But if you can be for it, that's also a good thing. It's the same-- It comes from the same place. But I do wanna go back, and this is one of the, this is the thing that we were gonna speak about at the beginning. You, you mentioned earlier that you came to Bais Rivkah, and, you know, now that we've gone through a lot of the, you know, kind of in a messy way, we've kind of gone through- ... the story. That's fine. That's just how conversations go. But, you know, y- you grew up, you grew up in Nashville. You grew up with parents who had grown up also in kind of isolation or, you know,

1:08:06 Speaker 3 not, not, not commu- not in these vibrant communities that reflected their Lubavitch values, and grandparents also that had lived that way. So- ... uh, it, this is a very deep part of your identity at that, at that, and your experience at that point. You said you came to Beis Rivkah, and there were two things that struck me when you, when you, when you told me the story of Beis Rivkah, which was... And, and to be honest, I was surprised by the story. I, I thought the way that you were telling the story, I thought you were gonna end up in Beis Yaakov. That's, that's... And I know that's how you set it up, but that's what I, that's how I understood. Okay, you know, Beis Yaakov's more convenient, and I'm a town girl. Your aunt went to Beis Yaakov. You know, she, that's what she said when I spoke to her. "Yeah, okay, go to Beis Yaakov." But you said there were two-

1:08:50 Speaker 1 She had... There was no alternative there.

1:08:52 Speaker 3 I understand. I understand.

1:08:53 Speaker 1 No, she'd loved her Beis Yaakov experience.

1:08:54 Speaker 3 No. Well-

1:08:55 Speaker 1 She was very happy about that

1:08:55 Speaker 3 ... yeah, yeah. Somebody, I think my great-grandfather wanted her father to lie about her age so she could go to Beis Rivkah or something. But yes, I understand. No, but I, I under- Uh, I was... The way, the way the story was being presented to me, I was like, "Okay, you're gonna go to Beis Yaakov, and you're gonna apologize for it." But you s- you, you s- you went to Beis Rivkah, and there were two things that stuck out to me. One of them was this, this, this picture of this Hasid who you had never met before, and I don't even know if he was close with your father, but there was this sense of familiarity and just a... He was also, he was not buttoned up. Like, he was running the school, but he was walking around with the cleaning detergent. Like, there wasn't this kind of, you know-

1:09:34 Speaker 1 Right

1:09:34 Speaker 3 ... like officialness or whatever. That was-- And so there was a warmth and a sense of family that you sensed right away. And then the next thing you said or another thing that struck, that stuck out to me was there's a picture of the Rebbe. And I don't think those two things are a contradiction, but I do think they're two different things. I think, I don't think they're the same necessarily, right? And this is what we were talking about before we started the podcast, right? W- w- what I sensed from your father and this Itche Golden, that they're meeting, was a sense of brotherhood and familiarity, which was something that was developed by either they knew each other from before, or they had a shared history or a shared, shared traditions, shared, shared h- you know, sh- so many things that they shared, and there was a, there's a very tight connection there. The picture of the Rebbe is a much more abstract thing. It's just a picture on the wall, right? It's, it's, it's a picture on the wall, and yet you said that's when you felt that, "Here is a place that I belong." I think that's the words that you used.

1:10:40 Speaker 1 I felt at home.

1:10:41 Speaker 3 You felt at home. I think, I think that's a very interesting thing, especially also, you know, now that we've spoken about community and individualism. Uh, what, what do you h- what do you think? Now that I've kind of isolated those two things, how do you see those two things? Are they the same? Are they different?

1:11:02 Speaker 1 So the first part is easier to tease apart. My father actually did know Rabbi Golden from, um, when he was a bachur. The Friediker Rebbe sent him and, um, another bachur to, uh, Mendel Baumgarten, to Europe, 1948, to visit the pleitim. They most of the time in Paris, but they vis- visited other places as well, but mostly in Paris. They were there, I think, for, uh, four or five months, maybe more. Um, officially it was to bring back a report on the pleitim. Unofficially, what we heard later, I didn't hear this from my father, but that a lot of the Anash were the Lubavitchers living in, in... Having left, just escaped from Russia, were worried about coming to America. How will they raise Hasidische children here? So here's one bachur who was born in America and another bachur who was raised in America from the age of three, and they're, you know, Hasidische bachurim with, uh, untouched beards, and they learn Hasidus, and they farbrengen. They're, you know, uh, kind of like to reassure people it's possible. You can come to America, and your s- your boys can look like them-

1:12:10 Speaker 3 Very interesting

1:12:11 Speaker 1 ... and, and act like them. That and I... No, I'd never hear that from my father. But I remember one time saying to my father that it feels to me like your experience in Paris was very, very formative in your la- in your life, like one of the most exper- you know, important experiences that you had. So he said that when they had Yechidus, um, after they came back and they gave over the report, and then, um, the Friediker Rebbe said to them, "Un vos hot ir gehat fun dem?" What did you have from this? And he laughed out loud. In other words, the, the impact that it had on them. And my father, for the rest of his life, there were certain farbrengens that he would recall, and you could see him reliving them and the people that he met and the impact-

1:12:56 Speaker 3 The farbrengens in Paris

1:12:57 Speaker 1 ... in Paris.

1:12:58 Speaker 3 Of Hasidim.

1:12:59 Speaker 1 Of Hasidim, yeah.

1:13:00 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:13:01 Speaker 1 And you could see the impact that it had. And it also, uh, you know... It, it was, it was very, it was very big for him. So yeah, he did know Rabbi Golden from then. There was that connection. And they, the people that he met who knew his father from the years in Lubavitch, and they were, they were kids. My grandfather was, like, 14 years old in Lubavitch-

1:13:25 Speaker 3 When he left

1:13:25 Speaker 1 ... when they left. Yeah. He was in Lub- Uh, uh, and then they learned in other yeshivas, but still.

1:13:29 Speaker 3 When Lubavitch broke up, he was a-

1:13:31 Speaker 1 He was 14 years old.

1:13:33 Speaker 3 Right.

1:13:34 Speaker 1 Um, but it was, you know-

1:13:35 Speaker 3 Still there

1:13:35 Speaker 1 ... obviously huge in hi- in his life. So, you know, there is that. There is that, that shared experience. Um, you know, and that, that warmth, uh, you know, it's... It, it should be a characteristic of, you know, of who we are as, as Hasidim. When you talk about the Rebbe, um, I do not recall my parents speaking a lot about the Rebbe when we were kids.

1:14:14 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:14:17 Speaker 1 And yet, I remember there was one year, it was yud chet tat tav shin chaf, so I was eight and a half, and my father said something to my mother in Yiddish, which I did not speak, but somehow or other I understood what he said. And what he had said was, "Ich hab gemacht reservatsyas" I made reservations. And I knew he was going, and I just right away I jumped in and I said, "Can I go? Can I go?" And, you know, the parents look at each other. You see, you sense a little bit of an opening, so you drive a Mack truck through it. So and I'm putting it, "Please, please, please, can I go? Can I go? Can I go?"

1:15:04 Speaker 3 Kids were like that back then too?

1:15:05 Speaker 1 Oh, no. No, no. Please, can I go? Please, can I go? And they said yes. So I, now I'm going. I remember the suitcase. I remember what I packed, and I'm going withwith them, and I'm going-

1:15:16 Speaker 3 I'm gonna ask you, you're the oldest, right?

1:15:17 Speaker 1 I'm the oldest, yeah.

1:15:20 Speaker 3 Okay.

1:15:20 Speaker 1 Um, and we were walking out of the shul. We were leaving from the shul when somebody was taking us to the airport. The phone rang. Somebody had passed away. My father had to stay. There was no trip. And what I remember so vividly is that, of course, I was hysterical. I was crying my eyes out, and my father didn't try to stop me. He didn't say, "Okay, okay," you know. You know, I remember him just, like, looking at me with a sad smile. Like he-- I felt like he totally empathized. And the sense that I got without him saying a word was that it's okay to cry that you can't see the Rebbe.

1:16:05 Speaker 3 That's why you were crying?

1:16:07 Speaker 1 Well, partly. I'm sure I was crying because I wasn't going on the plane, and I wasn't gonna, gonna whatever, have all the, the-

1:16:15 Speaker 3 Right

1:16:15 Speaker 1 ... glamour and the drama of that. But I did know that I was going to the Rebbe.

1:16:19 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:16:20 Speaker 1 And I, I do remember that feeling like the world went black that I couldn't.

1:16:25 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:16:26 Speaker 1 And, and the fact, like, it made such an impression on me because by nature, uh, uh, my father would've been more inclined to... If it was something else, he would've been more inclined to like, "Uh, okay, let's, you know, move on." You know what I'm saying?

1:16:41 Speaker 3 Right.

1:16:41 Speaker 1 The fact that he-- I felt validated.

1:16:44 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:16:45 Speaker 1 Now, in my mind, it was a trip to the Rebbe. And now what does that mean for an, an eight-and-a-half-year-old? I have no idea.

1:16:51 Speaker 3 You-- Had you ever been to the Rebbe before?

1:16:54 Speaker 1 Yeah.

1:16:54 Speaker 3 So you had been.

1:16:55 Speaker 1 I had been. Um, I had been. My parents took me for yechidas when I was about two, and then never again until I came to New York, and then, you know-

1:17:14 Speaker 3 So you-

1:17:14 Speaker 1 ... with my mother. And why they didn't was because my father had very long yechidas, and, um, and I was two year old. So I was sitting on the floor. My mother gave me her pocketbook to play with, and all of a sudden my parents see that the Rebbe's smiling broadly, and they're not talking about anything remotely amusing. And they glanced down, and I had dumped out her entire purse all over the floor of the Rebbe's office. And so my mother had to stand there while my father jammed everything in, and they didn't wanna take us to yechidas after that for a very long time. But I, I knew... Maybe I can picture till today what m- how my father would look when he, when he was on the phone with Masques getting an answer from the Rebbe.

1:18:04 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:18:06 Speaker 1 I knew that this was big. I knew that this was very, very big, and that it was something that, um... My parents always said that there was nothing about shlichus that they felt was hard or a challenge. And al- and this was in the days before you could, you know, order food and all of that kind of stuff, and even being far away and family. None of that really bothered them except for one thing that they found hard, and that was sending children away-

1:18:33 Speaker 3 Wow

1:18:34 Speaker 1 ... for, for, for school. And, and my mother said that there was s- the hardest thing was that there were people in the community who were like, "How could you do that? How could you send..." Even though I was gonna be living with her parents and so on, which was obviously a big piece of it, but still, "How could you do that? How could you do that?" One woman said to my mother, "I understand you. You're sending her away now s- you're sending her far now, so you'll be close later."

1:19:04 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:19:05 Speaker 1 My generation was the first ones of the real, you know, the student rebellion and all of that, and one girl in my original class, one married, uh, whatever, some Eastern religion thing, and one was in a commune in somewhere in New England, was married to a non-Jew, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. That but in, in 1961, nobody saw that coming.

1:19:28 Speaker 3 Right.

1:19:28 Speaker 1 And that one, she says that she clung to that.

1:19:31 Speaker 3 Your mother clung to that.

1:19:32 Speaker 1 My mother clung to that, that one drop of understanding that you're sending her far now, so you'll be close later. So what was it that motivated them? It was something. It came from the Rebbe. There wasn't a question-

1:19:44 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm

1:19:44 Speaker 1 ... that it was gonna happen. But it was not, there was not a martyrdom with it. There was not like... It was

1:19:52 Speaker 3 I'm not suggesting that there was. It just-

1:19:53 Speaker 1 I, I understand

1:19:54 Speaker 3 ... it just, it, I think 'cause this, this ti- this, this, this ties to the, uh, to the topic that originally we were gonna speak about, we can still speak about, which is you have a, you have a unpublished essay- ... that the Rebbe doesn't have. The Rebbe doesn't-

1:20:12 Speaker 1 God doesn't have grandchildren, and neither does the Rebbe.

1:20:14 Speaker 3 The Rebbe doesn't have grandchildren. What, so what do you mean by that?

1:20:17 Speaker 1 So what I mean by that, and it's something that is very basic to my understanding of who I am as a Jewish woman, who I am as a Hasid, who, who, who I want to be in this world. Each person, each person has to forge their own connection. This is not something new. This is not something post-Gmar Hatamos. This is not-- it has nothing to do with whether you're born into a Lubavitcher family or not. In some ways, there could be more of a challenge When you come from a Lubavitcher background, because you kind of think that it's your birthright.

1:21:13 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:21:14 Speaker 1 You kind of think that you own it. This is who I am.

1:21:17 Speaker 3 Right. It's a way of life.

1:21:18 Speaker 1 Uh, more than that. It's your whole identity.

1:21:21 Speaker 3 Right.

1:21:21 Speaker 1 I had an argument with a rebbe who was helping us out, um, one Yontif, and I said, "There's no such thing as being born a Lubavitcher."

1:21:29 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:21:31 Speaker 1 And he said, "Yes, there is." And he was, you know, bringing proofs of, you know, if you, if you're born to a family that, you know, uh, whatever. He quoted something or others. Like, okay, I'll, I'll concede your point. Maybe you could be, but if you don't work with it, then it's not gonna amount to anything.

1:21:50 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:21:52 Speaker 1 And, you know, there's the story about the, the guy that comes into a restaurant, and something about it just doesn't feel quite right. It's a kosher restaurant. He starts asking the owner, who was not exactly a chassid upon him of, uh, you know, he, the, the most inspiring in terms of, uh, his Jewish appearance. So he's asking him questions. He doesn't like the answers so much, and finally the owner points to a picture behind him on the wall, a guy with a beard, and he says, "Oh, that's my grandfather." He says, "You know, if your grandfather was behind the counter and he had a picture of you on the wall, I'd be a lot more comfortable." Um, there's the famous answer that exchanged when the Rebbe was speaking to George Rohr, and he had started the, uh, beginners minyan at KJ many, many years ago, and he used the term people who have no background whatsoever.

1:22:52 Speaker 3 Right.

1:22:52 Speaker 1 Right. It's, uh, uh, I'm not gonna go into the whole story now, but how the Rebbe totally did not accept that.

1:22:57 Speaker 3 Right.

1:22:57 Speaker 1 And everybody, everybody has a background. They are all the children of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, and Leah. Fine, and that, that's a given. And if you take it a step further, every single identifiable Jew today has-- You're not gonna go back 20 generations, not more than three, four, maybe five even. Not just that they're Jewish. The people who had mesirus nefesh for Yiddishkeit.

1:23:28 Speaker 3 Right. Otherwise they wouldn't be here.

1:23:29 Speaker 1 Otherwise they wouldn't be here.

1:23:30 Speaker 3 Right.

1:23:30 Speaker 1 They could have just, you know, filtered out. At the same time, you have to do the work.

1:23:39 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:23:39 Speaker 1 And I believe that that was one of the Rebbe's most dominant themes-

1:23:45 Speaker 3 Hmm

1:23:46 Speaker 1 ... from always. From always. Like in the very first farbrengen. The farbrengen, you know, you- Yud Aleph, Shevat, Tav Shin Yud Aleph, when the Rebbe said the maamar and officially accepted the Nasius. And in the sicha then the Rebbe says, you know, "Don't think that you, you appointed somebody, you know, and now everybody can just go, you know, live your comfortable lives." «Ir daf tan alein» You have to do the work.

1:24:18 Speaker 3 Yeah.

1:24:18 Speaker 1 And again, like it's something that feels like almost like a mantra for me because when I first-- It occurred to me, I didn't hear it, the understatement of history. The Rebbe says, «ment ich alven helfen» I'm not gonna be stingy about helping you. If there's something that I can help you with, I'll help you. But that's how the Rebbe's describing his role. You have to do the work.

1:24:39 Speaker 3 Right.

1:24:40 Speaker 1 You have-- So what does, what does that mean? So, um, in, in one of your, in your p- your podcasts, I, I was very taken with this idea of does being a, a chassid or a chassidul, I think it was with, um, Rabbi Drizin, where he was talking about, you know, the person who's just repeating what the Rebbe says-

1:25:00 Speaker 3 Hmm. Yeah

1:25:03 Speaker 1 ... or incorporating it, integrating it, making it your own. And, and this was something that I heard from my father my whole life. I don't remember having long discussions with him personally about ideas.

1:25:18 Speaker 3 Right.

1:25:19 Speaker 1 But I do remember sitting in shul and listening to him speak, and sitting at pagishes and listening to him speak. I always had a way in because I was his daughter, so I could go. It was the men's pagisha, the women's, it didn't matter. I could come and listen. And he, the ideas that he articulated, and one of them, th- that's the basis really of his book, "Think Jewish", were his speeches, his, his talks for the encounters with college students. And there's one chapter that I, I think like it should be required reading for everybody everywhere. "Between Challenge and Response: A Function of Faith." Says usually we think of faith in terms of emunah and, and so on. He says, but there's a different kind of... When we say the Torah is Nitzchi, it's an eternal truth, what does it mean? Are we just... Now, I'm, I'm paraphrasing this. I'm, I'm not quoting now. We're, we're not like a living, um, a li- we're not a living Sturbridge Village, you know, a living museum of how they lived, uh, 200 years ago and that's how we're gonna live now.

1:26:35 Speaker 3 Right.

1:26:35 Speaker 1 We're not just, you know, transporting it forward, this old way of life and we're doing now like they did then. No. It's always-

1:26:43 Speaker 3 Right

1:26:43 Speaker 1 ... in the context. When we say new, it means there's gonna be, there's a challenge-

1:26:48 Speaker 3 Right

1:26:48 Speaker 1 ... and there's a response.

1:26:49 Speaker 3 Right.

1:26:51 Speaker 1 Now, between the challenge and the response, there can be a gap.

1:26:55 Speaker 3 Right.

1:26:56 Speaker 1 So one of the examples that my father gives is the style of Jewish learning until the Enlightenment, until the Enlightenment, you know, bulldozed its way into Eastern Europe- So the focus of Jewish learning was basically on how, how to live as a Yid.

1:27:14 Speaker 3 Right.

1:27:15 Speaker 1 And is this-

1:27:16 Speaker 3 Halakha.

1:27:16 Speaker 1 Halakha is it, okay, so, so there was already for, you know, a good 200 years the all of the things that Chassidus brought in, and that it should be a more vibrant, more meaningful experience, the emotional experience of what davening should be, and the emotional involvement in mitzvahs, which if you just parenthetically, we, we have such a gift of vocabulary now for emotional intelligence.

1:27:43 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:27:43 Speaker 1 And when we-- And we-- It, it-- I-- For me personally, to understand the principles of Chassidus with that vocabulary opens up a whole new world. But whatever. But learning, the world of learning, the Jewish world of scholarship was focused on how.

1:27:57 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:27:59 Speaker 1 The Enlightenment, the move to America, and now everything is being questioned, and everything-

1:28:04 Speaker 3 Now it's why.

1:28:05 Speaker 1 That's why. So there was a gap. Now, there were responses to that gap.

1:28:09 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:28:11 Speaker 1 But there was space in between before the response could be articulated. One of the most moving tributes I personally ever heard of what my father's role was, and I believe continues to be because his, um, he has many students who, um, have taken what he pioneered and took it further, but it wasn't just translating into using a dictionary, translating words. It was translating concepts, translating ideas. In other words, to be able to understand the idiom-

1:28:51 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm

1:28:52 Speaker 1 ... not in the grammatical sense, to be able to understand the mindset of a Westerner, of, say, an American. Where, where are people thinking?

1:29:03 Speaker 3 Right.

1:29:03 Speaker 1 Where are they coming from? That kind of translation.

1:29:07 Speaker 3 Right. I mean, he, he had in many ways the challenge but also the gift of working with a completely blank canvas.

1:29:15 Speaker 1 Yeah.

1:29:15 Speaker 3 Like there, there were no cliches yet of like, you know, you, you wanna teach a, a Hasidic concept of, you know, of, uh, or whatever, whatever he was talking about, or, you know, the, the let's say, you know, basic concepts of, of Chassidus. There's literally at his-- He must have had zero cliches to fall back on. And, and like you also said, he had to, he had to explain it to, to people who were, you know, were, were foreign to it, and he had to speak to them in their language.

1:29:45 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm. So the, the-

1:29:47 Speaker 3 But-

1:29:47 Speaker 1 ... the description that I found very, very moving was, um, from, uh, Rabbi Vogel, Rav Feivish Vogel, describing my father's accomplishments and, you know, that he put things into words-

1:30:00 Speaker 3 Yeah

1:30:00 Speaker 1 ... that addressed the mindset of young Western thinkers, whether-

1:30:06 Speaker 3 But, but, you know, a lot of times people focus on that in terms of hafatsa, but what I'm drawn to in that anecdote or that praise of your father, which is not the first time I'm hearing it, and I also have read some of the things you've written, so I'm familiar with that too, is, you know, it's not just about hafatsa. That's a wonderful talent and a capability, but it's also it was his capacity to think as an individual.

1:30:29 Speaker 1 Exactly.

1:30:29 Speaker 3 Right? You, you-

1:30:30 Speaker 1 Exactly.

1:30:31 Speaker 3 Right. Right. But, but, but here's where to me it gets more complicated because, you know, let's say, let's say you-- let's say someone heard about your father, i-if someone knew about your father only from this podcast, right? So the last time they heard about your father was a story where your father was getting very upset, was it at Mrs. Gorelik herself or, or the sister of Mrs. Gorelik for, for staying too long in the Yechidas? And he, he sounds like a very, like, kind of like, like, like bulldozer kinda... You know what I mean? And I don't know. Uh-

1:31:05 Speaker 1 I've heard that story. I've heard that story, but I, I, I would-- I'd like to reflect on that story a little bit.

1:31:11 Speaker 3 No, but okay, but okay. But, but I-- But you understand-

1:31:15 Speaker 1 I know what you're talking about

1:31:15 Speaker 3 ... you, you understand-- No, but you understand what I'm asking.

1:31:15 Speaker 1 You want me to repeat it? You could. Yeah. I-- Yeah. You can go ahead.

1:31:18 Speaker 3 You understand what I'm asking, though?

1:31:18 Speaker 1 You can spell out the question if you'd like.

1:31:22 Speaker 3 As long as, you know-

1:31:23 Speaker 1 As long as I get it.

1:31:24 Speaker 3 Yeah. I mean-

1:31:24 Speaker 1 Okay

1:31:24 Speaker 3 ... it, it's, it's, it's, it's like people... There, there, there's clearly a tension there between the, between the, you know, the, the Chassid and, and the very dominant presence of the Rebbe, right? Which is very dominant in his or her life. And then-

1:31:43 Speaker 1 Okay

1:31:43 Speaker 3 ... the s- and then the... Okay.

1:31:45 Speaker 1 Okay.

1:31:45 Speaker 3 You've had enough of my questions.

1:31:47 Speaker 1 So-- No, no, no. I mean, you can, you can by all means elaborate on it, but I, I want to put that story into context there-

1:31:53 Speaker 3 Fair

1:31:53 Speaker 1 ... 'cause I think it's very, very-- it could be very helpful for us in, in the challenges that our generation is facing now. That conversation took place-

1:32:07 Speaker 3 Let's-- So let's recap the conversation.

1:32:09 Speaker 1 Go ahead.

1:32:10 Speaker 3 As far as I remember it, is that Mrs.-- your aunt, one of your aunts, not Mrs. Gorelik, her sister, right?

1:32:16 Speaker 1 My mother-in-law. Mrs. Darin.

1:32:18 Speaker 3 The-

1:32:18 Speaker 1 I'm married to my first cousin.

1:32:19 Speaker 3 Right. So-

1:32:20 Speaker 1 Right. So-

1:32:20 Speaker 3 ... Mrs. Darin, Mrs. Darin went in for Yechidas as a Kallah?

1:32:26 Speaker 1 No, no. She was already my-- They get-- My, uh, husband's parents were married a week after my parents. They were also married in Kislev taf shin-

1:32:33 Speaker 3 So they were in Yechidas after their wedding?

1:32:35 Speaker 1 Y- By then-- So this was the-- They got married, it was still bechaiv of the Friediker Rebbe. So this was now a year later, and they were all in New York for my Uncle Leibel's wedding.

1:32:47 Speaker 3 Right.

1:32:47 Speaker 1 My Uncle Leibel Pozner, zal avo zangia zunt, got married Lamid Shevat taf shin Yud Aleph.

1:32:53 Speaker 3 Right.

1:32:53 Speaker 1 So his was the first wedding after the Rebbe was Mekabel Nasiyus.

1:32:58 Speaker 3 Right.

1:32:58 Speaker 1 And the Rebbe said to my aunt's father, my-- the Chass-- the Kallah's father that, uh, "During this whole year, I didn't go to any weddings. Your daughter's wedding is the first wedding that I'm going to." Which just parenthetically-

1:33:13 Speaker 3 The Derens

1:33:14 Speaker 1 No. No

1:33:15 Speaker 3 No. The Derens are already married.

1:33:16 Speaker 1 Yeah

1:33:16 Speaker 3 The Derens are already married. Okay.

1:33:17 Speaker 1 Naale Posner's wedding. So her- my aunt's parents were not Chassidim, and I thought that that was, um, such a beautiful, just a tiny little thing, your daughter's wedding. And he's talking to the father of the kallah-

1:33:30 Speaker 3 Right

1:33:30 Speaker 1 ... and-

1:33:31 Speaker 3 The mechutan

1:33:32 Speaker 1 ... your d- yeah, your daughter's wedding. In any case, so this yechidus was around this time.

1:33:37 Speaker 3 The yechidus with your other aunt, Deren.

1:33:39 Speaker 1 My, my mother, yeah. This is she, when she was saying how, how wonderful it felt and that she felt like she just didn't want to leave.

1:33:47 Speaker 3 Right.

1:33:48 Speaker 1 And in the story, the way my Aunt Bessie tells it, and I'm not quarreling with her, but it's very interesting to me because she describes how my father was just frantic. "What? You stayed. How could you stay? How could you take that of the Sat-" so on and so forth. Now, I have a hard time... And again, I'm not doubting it. I have a very hard time picturing my father that way 'cause it's-- I, I, I file it under a completely different heading.

1:34:17 Speaker 3 Huh.

1:34:19 Speaker 1 And I file it... I'm not even sure that he was in New York that whole year. This is a year after yud chet taf shin yud, after the petechas of the Friediker Rebbe. The first time my mother was ever on a plane was to come to New York for the levaya. My father had been on a plane. I don't even know if they came to New York during that year. My father did have interactions with the Rebbe during that year, and he felt that the Rebbe answered him as a Rebbe. But it was a very difficult year.

1:34:53 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:34:53 Speaker 1 Very, very difficult year. I heard from my grandfather, Kazenovsky, who was, you know, uh, as much as he showed, which was hardly anything, he concealed way more than he revealed. But that it was a very, very monumental task that Chassidim had to persuade the Rebbe to accept the Nassies. And I can't imagine that anybody was having an easy time.

1:35:19 Speaker 3 And your grandfather was very involved with the Rebbe.

1:35:21 Speaker 1 My grandfather was very involved. It was my mother's father. Um, and actually, there's something from my father's father, but leave that for right now. It's printed actually in Igros Kodesh. It was-

1:35:37 Speaker 3 Let's go-

1:35:37 Speaker 1 This was-

1:35:37 Speaker 3 Let's go back to-

1:35:38 Speaker 1 Get back to my father, right.

1:35:41 Speaker 3 Right.

1:35:41 Speaker 1 Um, they were... It can't have been anything other than a word that is very overused, maybe even trivialized inappropriately, but very real. They were traumatized.

1:36:01 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:36:01 Speaker 1 They were traumatized. And the process of, you know, like that, that first Chassid who jumped up on the table that night and said, "Mazel tov, you've met Reb Mareb. We have a Rebbe." That process had not yet taken hold fully for sure, and people were just discovering who the Rebbe was and what it meant to have a connection so that my father could lash out. They were, they were groping.

1:36:37 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:36:38 Speaker 1 They were groping. Now, just parenthetically, um, my father had-

1:36:45 Speaker 3 Just one second. I just wanna understand-

1:36:47 Speaker 1 Yeah

1:36:47 Speaker 3 ... what you're, what, what you're, what you're, what you're, the difference that you're making. You, you're saying that it wasn't coming from a place of, of like, "I'm, I'm a big Chassid."

1:36:57 Speaker 1 I don't-

1:36:58 Speaker 3 "You, what you did was wrong. I'm, I'm giving you-"

1:37:00 Speaker 1 No.

1:37:00 Speaker 3 It's more like, it's more just confusion-

1:37:03 Speaker 1 An emotional outburst

1:37:04 Speaker 3 ... confusion.

1:37:05 Speaker 1 Yeah. I don't know if confusion. Maybe. Maybe just-

1:37:10 Speaker 3 Well, that's what groping sounds like. Okay.

1:37:12 Speaker 1 Well-

1:37:12 Speaker 3 Yeah. You said groping, like, like not un-uncertain of how, what to, what to make of it, and is this the right thing, the wrong thing.

1:37:21 Speaker 1 Under certain circumstances it would be, and it-

1:37:23 Speaker 3 Right

1:37:23 Speaker 1 ... I, I, not, I don't think it was-

1:37:24 Speaker 3 When you're unsure

1:37:25 Speaker 1 ... a premeditated, this is how it has to be.

1:37:28 Speaker 3 Right.

1:37:29 Speaker 1 But one thing I, I can tell you that he, that he did describe for me that, that... And I'm not sure if it's in his book. But he had, you know, this idea that a Rebbe is born, a Rebbe is not made, and that there were things that the bachurim in seven seventy, in the '40s, and he was there, you know. His years as a bachur were those years. They had all kinds of interactions with the Rebbe's brother-in-law, with Rashack. And they were light, and they were, there were, there was some humor, there was a banter, there was-

1:38:09 Speaker 3 Right

1:38:09 Speaker 1 ... you know, there was, it was not, uh, whatever, just some of them are funny, some of them persist down till, till, till, till today. But it was, it was not, not at all heavy, not at all... You know, it was like, "Well, he's in this role, so we have to treat him..." Uh, uh, you know-

1:38:27 Speaker 3 Right

1:38:27 Speaker 1 ... nothing, not crossing boundaries, but they were not awestruck.

1:38:31 Speaker 3 Right.

1:38:32 Speaker 1 He said it never ever occurred to anybody. It just didn't happen that anyone had that kind of interaction with the Rebbe.

1:38:42 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:38:42 Speaker 1 That he, he just, by his being, he was connected. He would talk to people. One of my favorite, by the way, videos from that time, um, I mean, a video describing that time is Shimshon Stakel, Hashem, describing how the Rebbe was talking to him and offered to learn with him.

1:39:05 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:39:05 Speaker 1 But that, that, it's just so precious. It's so beautiful.

1:39:10 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:39:10 Speaker 1 That there's warm and there's hu- you know, human connection.

1:39:14 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:39:15 Speaker 1 But his, he commanded respect because of who he was.

1:39:20 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:39:22 Speaker 1 And, you know, if the Rebbe wanted someone to do something, if he asked him, he did something for a printer or this or that, there, there wasn't a question about it. The, to, to discuss something, there was no chavruta, you know, like, you know, we're buddies. Not... Even people who were older, it was just that, that very deep sense of respect was something that anybody that had any interaction with the Rebbe during those years, it was just there.

1:39:54 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:39:56 Speaker 1 So, you know, certainly for Chassidim who were in America who saw the Rebbe, knew the Rebbe, there was never a question.

1:40:04 Speaker 3 Mm.

1:40:06 Speaker 1 Not even a, a whisper of a question.

1:40:09 Speaker 3 But there was still, there was still, there was still sorting out to be done, is what you're saying.

1:40:14 Speaker 1 Uh, whatever. I mean, you know, that, uh, there was w- why, why it took a year, there's a whole lot, you know, a lot, lot of that. But my, my point is-

1:40:22 Speaker 3 No, I'm saying sort... No, no, that's not what my point. My point was that it was sorting out on, on, on the part of your father, 'cause you're saying even after the year it, it wa- it was still unsettled. There was still, there was still things that they were sorting out in their own minds, which is why he-

1:40:37 Speaker 1 So I don't know if I used the word, sorry. You said that I used the word groping, and maybe I did. I don't remember that. I just, I, I think it was, um... Look, there was no question that, and this is just a few weeks later.

1:40:50 Speaker 3 Right.

1:40:51 Speaker 1 There was no question that there was a sense of, um, I you'd have to say relief or gratitude-

1:41:01 Speaker 3 Right

1:41:02 Speaker 1 ... that, you know, uh. But I'm saying that in my father's reaction in the story that my Aunt Bessie told, that it wasn't, um... I, I think there's a lot of deep emotion that came out that way, but his way was not bulldozer ever.

1:41:24 Speaker 3 Hmm. You're saying it's uncharacteristic of him, and there must be a, there must be a different dynamic.

1:41:30 Speaker 1 He, uh, by the way-

1:41:31 Speaker 3 There must be something go- there must be something else going on.

1:41:34 Speaker 1 So my-

1:41:34 Speaker 3 I, I don't think, I don't think she meant it, by the way, as like, as a, to describe him, just-

1:41:39 Speaker 1 Right

1:41:39 Speaker 3 ... just to be fair.

1:41:40 Speaker 1 Right.

1:41:40 Speaker 3 I don't think that was the point. I- the, the story had come up to, to describe how the family had kind of reacted to the transition from one rebbe to another. And so that, that sense to me is very interesting because if I remember correctly, she used that, she sees that anecdote as an indication of how quickly-

1:41:59 Speaker 1 Yes, I agree

1:42:00 Speaker 3 ... the family moved from one to the other. No, but what you're saying is, is almost the opposite. That there was, there was, there wa- the tra- meaning in terms of acceptance it may have been immediate, but the transition was not yet-

1:42:12 Speaker 1 No. No, no, no

1:42:12 Speaker 3 ... that's not what you mean.

1:42:12 Speaker 1 Not at all. No.

1:42:13 Speaker 3 Okay.

1:42:14 Speaker 1 No, I'm not saying that at all. I'm saying that it would be uncharacteristic of him to like sort of lash out in that way at his sister with whom he was very close.

1:42:26 Speaker 3 Right. So why would he do it?

1:42:28 Speaker 1 So I think that that was just the emotional overload of that p- of that time.

1:42:33 Speaker 3 Right. But emotional overload indicates-

1:42:34 Speaker 1 Not confusion

1:42:35 Speaker 3 ... I would say, okay, so let's take out the word confusion.

1:42:37 Speaker 1 Not confusion.

1:42:38 Speaker 3 Let's say-

1:42:38 Speaker 1 Not even groping

1:42:39 Speaker 3 ... so let's take that word out too. Let's strike that, both of those words from the record. But, uh, it's still, it's still, it takes a, it, it, it does push back at the sense of kind of just, you know, one to another without meaning-

1:42:54 Speaker 1 Without skipping a beat

1:42:55 Speaker 3 ... meaning even if someone has kabal sale or someone, someone says in their mind that, "Yes, it's all the same," and one, you know, each rebbe is a hemshich of the other, you're saying there's still emotional turmoil, which is understandable. I, I don't, I don't say that in any way, uh-

1:43:10 Speaker 1 Right

1:43:10 Speaker 3 ... I mean, to me, to me-

1:43:11 Speaker 1 I, I would see the emotional turmoil in the fact that there was something very, something quite unique in this situation, and that is by the Rebbe Rashab. You know, I, I don't know what it was like for Hasidim then, and that it was gonna be the Rebbe Rashab or even the Rebbe Maharash, and there were other possible candidates. But certainly by the free-

1:43:34 Speaker 3 There's a lot of turmoil.

1:43:35 Speaker 1 Yeah. Okay. So whatever. So that's one thing. But let's say by the f- from the Rebbe Rashab to the Friediker Rebbe, there was no question.

1:43:43 Speaker 3 Yeah.

1:43:43 Speaker 1 But there was a lot of emotional stuff, so I would say over he- but at least, you know, they knew who-

1:43:50 Speaker 3 Right

1:43:50 Speaker 1 ... there was no, there were no misunderstandings.

1:43:51 Speaker 3 He was the, he was the heir apparent for many years.

1:43:54 Speaker 1 Yeah. And, and, and, and, uh, so they were not-- They didn't have to hold their breath-

1:44:00 Speaker 3 Right

1:44:00 Speaker 1 ... of what's gonna happen. Here, it wasn't so clear, and the fact, you know, the fact that the rebbe was resisting it-

1:44:09 Speaker 3 Right

1:44:09 Speaker 1 ... was, it, it didn't, it didn't promote peace of mind.

1:44:14 Speaker 3 Right.

1:44:14 Speaker 1 So I don't think it was a question of the difficulty of the transition per se.

1:44:18 Speaker 3 Right.

1:44:18 Speaker 1 How do you go from one to the other? I think it was a reflection of the like, "Phew," it happened.

1:44:24 Speaker 3 An emotionally exhausting year.

1:44:25 Speaker 1 An emotionally exhausting year, but not the difficulty of transitioning that way.

1:44:29 Speaker 3 Okay. So the reason I'm, the reason I'm kind of sticking on this-

1:44:33 Speaker 1 Yeah

1:44:33 Speaker 3 ... is, is, is not, is not to k- I'm not like a historian that needs to know exactly what happened at the story or trying to-

1:44:39 Speaker 1 Right. Right

1:44:40 Speaker 3 ... but to me it's, it's, it's, it's very, it's very important in the, in the sense that first of all, the, however you take the story, there's, there's, it, it, it opens up the, the idea of, of the rebbe as the not abstract thing. Because in abstraction, in abstraction, you know, yes, one rebbe is followed by another rebbe, rebbe, rebbe, rebbe, zero, shav, it's all the same, right? And you just move from one to the other without pause. But in the real world, right, meaning or in, in the world that's not abstract, when you go from the world of symbols to the world of, of messy feelings and, and ups and downs and days and nights and thing- you know, peop- uh, uncertainty. Things are, things don't w-work in straight lines.

1:45:32 Speaker 1 Right.

1:45:32 Speaker 3 Right? In that world, th-there is turmoil. Now, the turmoil may not be in the clarity of what should come next or where your loyalty lies, but there's turmoil just in, in, in, in like you described. Like, will, will he take it? Will he not take it? Will we have a rebbe? Will we not have a rebbe, right? There's turmoil there. And when you have it, it's, there's still, there's still exhaustion. And, and so... Sorry.

1:45:58 Speaker 1 No, no. Go ahead.

1:45:59 Speaker 3 So, so to me, so to me, why, why, why am I f- why, why am I, why am I fixated on it? Because, uh, going back to the story of the picture of the Rebbe in Bes- in Besifka, to me, there's, there's always this... Not always. To me, there's, there, there is, there is this idea of the Rebbe as an abstract symbol. Okay, these people, they, they, you know, their loyalties are with the Rebbe, my loyalties are with the Rebbe. I am-- We are a, we are, we are a community, right? But a community, to me, is much more about the Itche Golden connection with, with, with your father and, and, and, and the real connections that are built over experiences and shared loyalties to the Rebbe also. That's also part of it, right? You could even say it's a... You wanna say something?

1:46:50 Speaker 1 No, no, no. I'm, I'm just-- I'm, I'm listening. I'm, I'm moving things around- ... but I'm listening.

1:46:54 Speaker 3 Okay, fair enough. And I-

1:46:55 Speaker 1 Go ahead.

1:46:56 Speaker 3 All right. So to me there's, you know, there's, there's, like, th-there's a symbolic identity, let's say. You know, a Hasid, a Lubavitch Hasid is a Hasid of the Lubavitch Rebbe, right? That's a symbolic identity. But then there's a, there's a real, and I shouldn't use the word real because that means the symbolic isn't real, but there's a embodied... Let's just f- Because I'm not your father and I don't have the best vocabulary, an unsymbolic, whatever the opposite of symbolic is, or whatever is a lack of symbolic. The, the, the kind of messy identity which is more just a, a, a, a build-up of, of shared experiences and shared memories and shared relationships and Shabbos ta-- you know, sharing a Shabbos table together or learning a Mar-- learning a Marret together or, or sharing gossip together over the years. A co-collection of all these different things and that, that, that, that, that connect us as, as people, right? And, and, and so that's, that's, that, that's why, that's why I, I, I, I've, I've fixated on that because your father seems to be a fascinating, um, he seems to ha- se-seems to be a very striking example of both. That's, that's where I'm getting at, right? That's where I'm getting at. And, and that's why that story of Besifka is also very, uh, telling to me because it seems like he had both. Both very loyal to the Rebbe, and you growing up, the Rebbe was clearly a, a, a north star in your home, right?

1:48:40 Speaker 3 And a very, very important part of his identity. But you're also being very careful to make-- to point out that your father was a very unique individual person, right? Who, who would not just... Who, who... Uh, I don't need to talk in the, in, in the negative, even the positive. He had very deep relationships, individual relationships with people that I don't think they have to be in opposition to one another, these two things, the abstract and the, and the kind of messy identities. I, I don't think they have to... I think in many ways they support one another. You have the idea of the identity up here, and then you have the, the, the, the, the lived identity down here, and they kind of, they, they, they push it, they kind of, they maybe run in parallel, and they inform one another, right? You see what I'm saying?

1:49:34 Speaker 1 I see what you're saying.

1:49:35 Speaker 3 Well-

1:49:35 Speaker 1 So if you don't mind, I, I want to kind of s- pull back a little bit.

1:49:41 Speaker 3 Go ahead.

1:49:42 Speaker 1 Um, and it's, it's fascinating to me how much of our discussion is, you know, weaving back and forth about my father, his yarziet was just a week ago, by the way. Ten years. And one of the things that strikes me in this conversation that, um, I don't think I was ever able to quite articulate it this way, even for myself, is that for somebody who was as articulate as he was, and again, not just good vocabulary, but he could bring ideas, bridge all kinds of gaps because he could see where this one's coming from and see what this one is listening to, and he could just bridge gaps, but the way that he could talk about things. So he's the articulate person, and what I saw in him, and I can think of so many examples of it, things that were really, really deep and really meaningful to him, he could barely speak about.

1:50:49 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:50:51 Speaker 1 And I think in retrospect that I learned more from his silences than from his words.

1:51:01 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:51:01 Speaker 1 I said to you before that they didn't speak a lot about the Rebbe. I can picture him, uh, you know, writing down a l- uh, you know, a phone call from-- with Moskes. But I'm thinking about it now and that realizing that my father used to tell a story in completely different context about, um, someone he was, uh, I don't know if it's a true story or not, in Europe of a fellow whose, his wife passed away, and somebody suggested as a shidduch her sister, and the idea was brought to the father of these two sisters, and, um, he said no. He doesn't want his other daughter to marry the alman of his first daughter. And why not? He said, "Because he spoke so beautifully at the levaya." He said, "If at a moment like that, he could speak that well, then he didn't really love her." He doesn't want his, his second daughter to marry this guy. And I know that that was something that he, he carried deeply, that at moments of, um, y- when something strikes very deeply. My Oshie actually wrote a very beautiful article about my father. I think he wrote it... Could be that he wrote it when my father passed away. Um, when my grandmother passed away, which was, like, 30-something years ago. So this is in Teves. That Pesach, I could never go, we could never go to our parents really for Yontif because we had to be in our Beis Chabad wherever we were at the

1:52:49 Speaker 1 time. And, um, 'cause my husband is a, a regional shliach, so we've been in different areas in our shlichas, but we were basically that's where we were. So we sent, um, two of the kids. We sent Oshie and, and our daughter Chanis. We sent them to my parents for Pesach to make, uh... And they had a wonderful, wonderful Pesach. And Oshie's description of that when my father got up to speak for Yizkor. Now, this was the first time that he would be staying in shul for Yizkor. It was after his m- uh, when he was in the year of avelus for his mother, and, uh, this was a few months later. And, um, that he could barely speak. He said just a few words of introduction about it, and then he gave a motion of, you know, that the chazan should continue, and they announced Yizkor, and that was it. And Oshie's description of that, the impact that that had on him and, uh, you know, how he felt hearing that, and it was like he barely said two words. But you could see, you know, what he was... And I've seen that in other things in his life. And I think that one of the things, um, that a lot of people don't realize about him, and then especially because at the end of his life, he wasn't as his, um, he wasn't able to be as articulate a- as he was earlier, that he could not easily discuss his connection to the Rebbe.

1:54:30 Speaker 1 But I had enough indications of things that I saw that showed me how deep it was. So on the surface, people could see that he was talking about his stories that he had about the Friediker Rebbe when he was a, a young bocher. And people didn't realize that, you know, he, his, his... He wasn't as articulate in certain ways.

1:54:59 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:54:59 Speaker 1 But that the emotion was very deep.

1:55:01 Speaker 3 But if, if it wasn't so articulate, so then why does that picture on the wall make you feel at home?

1:55:07 Speaker 1 Because it, because I got the emotional message. When I think about it now, why was I in New York?

1:55:13 Speaker 3 Right.

1:55:13 Speaker 1 I was in New York not because my parents decided I have to go away. I was in New York because the Rebbe suggested it, and for my parents, that was... There didn't need to be any more reason. And the fact, in, in 1961, to send away a 10-year-old th- a thousand miles away. So I, I could say they didn't have to tell me that because the Rebbe said and because we trust the Rebbe, and so. It was too deep to put into words. It would not have, probably not have occurred to them.

1:55:45 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:55:46 Speaker 1 It probably would not have occurred to them, but it, it was just there. So I knew. See, when, uh, the Rebbe's picture on the wall was not an abstraction.

1:55:55 Speaker 3 Mm-hmm.

1:55:55 Speaker 1 The Rebbe's picture on the wall was an expression of something real.

1:56:00 Speaker 3 Hmm.

1:56:00 Speaker 1 This is mine. Now, in my father's book where he has something, uh, he has a chapter on what is a Rebbe, what is a chassid, and this was an idea that I had heard from him, that, um, it's up to each chassid to determine what his connection is going to be. It's not something that's imposed by the Rebbe.