Ep. 70 // "Horizontal Connections" w/ Rabbi Yossi Lipsker

00:00 Speaker 1 The only way-

00:01 Speaker 2 Hmm

00:02 Speaker 1 ... that there can be a perpetual coherence of Anash, and Chassidim, and a culture, and a community is if there is a, not just a vertical connection, but a horizontal connection as well. If you know the famous song, uh,

00:28 Speaker 2 Yeah.

00:29 Speaker 1 Because I think it was a given that there's no instance where there would be any kind of, uh, real significant farewell between a Rebbe and a Chassid. But not necessarily with Chassidim. He says, "That's something you're gonna have to work on." Welcome to Homesick for Lubavitch, a podcast where we explore Lubavitch identity in the year 2025. My name is Bentzi Yafetz, and I will be your host. Let's begin. All righty. L'chaim. Lechaim. L'chaim.

01:18 Speaker 2 We are here in the morning, don't let the l'chaim fool you, with Yossi Lipsker of Swampscott, Massachusetts, a suburb of Boston. Thank you very much for making the time.

01:29 Speaker 1 Thanks for having me. Thanks for the visit.

01:31 Speaker 2 Yes, it's, uh... When I walk into a room like this, I'm already-- It's already worth, it's already worth the trip, just the color, and the, the, the incongruence of the books, and the l'chaim, and everything. It's just perfect. It gets my day started.

01:46 Speaker 1 Holy dissonance.

01:47 Speaker 2 Ho-holy dissonance. Yes, exactly. Exactly.

01:51 Speaker 1 Fair?

01:51 Speaker 2 Fair. Fair. We'll, we'll talk about it. And for those listening who enjoy the podcast, please like and subscribe on all the platforms. And if you really like the podcast, help support it at hflpodcast.com/donate. Anyhow, uh, I think we kinda jumped in on the deep end before. Um, uh, but, but let, let, let's start with your story, because I sometimes forget to get back to it, or sometimes the conversation gets, gets, gets so good that we don't get back to who you are. So why don't you start off with a little bit of, uh, you know, where you grew up.

02:26 Speaker 1 Sure. So I-

02:27 Speaker 2 We, we have, we have similar backgrounds

02:27 Speaker 1 ... I grew up in Philadelphia, Northeast Philadelphia.

02:31 Speaker 2 Yes.

02:32 Speaker 1 Um, my parents, um, were sh- were shluchim. They're still, uh, shluchim, but, uh, they've relocated to Crown Heights. Um, and that's where we grew up. We grew up Northeast Philadelphia with a lot of Vietnam veterans, a lot of Holocaust survivors, and, uh, a lot of people that were not so much, um, spiritual seekers. They were looking for a home. They were looking for someone to notice them, someone to care for them. It was much more psychiatric than, uh, you know, deep theological discussions. Um, some of the Holocaust survivors were deeply troubled. They would come to our house, call our house all hours of the day and night.

03:33 Speaker 2 Hmm.

03:34 Speaker 1 Our Shabbos table was filled with, uh, people that were really struggling with their mental health, uh, and, uh, and, and others of course. Uh, it was, uh, always a nice variety. But it was more of, uh, a Chassid experience. Obviously, it was much broader than that. You know, my father was a teacher, uh, and then, you know, he was a shliach, and he, he spent his days walking around, uh, la-later years walking around Downtown Philly.

04:14 Speaker 2 Right.

04:14 Speaker 1 He was the rabbi for the Israeli community.

04:18 Speaker 2 Right.

04:19 Speaker 1 So that was his beat, the electronic, the electronic stores, and the jewelry stores.

04:24 Speaker 2 Sure. Va'ad Le'Dvar Eretz.

04:26 Speaker 1 Va'ad Le'Dvar Eretz.

04:27 Speaker 2 Va'ad Le'Dvar Eretz.

04:28 Speaker 1 Exactly.

04:29 Speaker 2 I always, I always skip the hey.

04:31 Speaker 1 So yeah, we grew up with the ethos of Shlichus, with the, the ambience of Shlichus. Crown Heights, of course, was our second home. We would go for all the post-Yom tov Kosel Bracha. So we would hop into the car Motza'ei Pesach, after Pesach, and, um, drive to New York, and we would be the last people in line for Kosel Bracha.

05:00 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

05:01 Speaker 1 And then we would go across the street to the, to the bakery and knock on the back door, and the guy would open and give us some ch- some bread, and I would get a big black and white.

05:14 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah?

05:14 Speaker 1 Of course.

05:15 Speaker 2 Motza'ei, Motza'ei Pesach already they had black and whites?

05:17 Speaker 1 They... By the time we got there-

05:19 Speaker 2 They already have the black and whites

05:20 Speaker 1 ... they were full, full on.

05:21 Speaker 2 But no pizza, just bread?

05:23 Speaker 1 No pizza. So, uh-

05:24 Speaker 2 Oh, it was a bakery, not a pizza store.

05:25 Speaker 1 It was a bakery, yeah.

05:26 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

05:27 Speaker 1 Um, obviously, you know, we would stop in S&Bench and get a, a hot dog or something hot just because we hadn't eaten.

05:36 Speaker 2 So full Lubavitch nostalgia over here.

05:38 Speaker 1 Full on.

05:39 Speaker 2 We're going full nostalgia.

05:40 Speaker 1 Yeah. Sometimes the farbrengens that were like Yut Zvat or, or Yahrzeit Avodah Zarah, so we would go earlier in the day. You know, we had a station wagon. Nobody wore seatbelts in those days.

05:55 Speaker 2 Right.

05:56 Speaker 1 And so the more people we could fit into the car, you know, it... I in-inevitably ended up in the back of the station wagon.

06:05 Speaker 2 Looking, looking backwards.

06:06 Speaker 1 Looking backwards.

06:07 Speaker 2 Right.

06:08 Speaker 1 And, uh, many, many times my dad would, uh, take Rav Yoeles over Shalom.

06:14 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah. The one that sat next to the Rebbe.

06:16 Speaker 1 The one that sat next to the Rebbe, and, um, and he was our... He would ride with us from Philadelphia and back.

06:24 Speaker 2 Right.

06:25 Speaker 1 My father had a place pretty close. I would sit on his lap, but I couldn't sit still. I was fidgety.

06:32 Speaker 2 Are you the oldest in your-

06:33 Speaker 1 No

06:34 Speaker 2 ... the oldest boy?

06:35 Speaker 1 The oldest boy.

06:35 Speaker 2 Oldest boy.

06:36 Speaker 1 Yeah. And I was watching all the, all my peers from Ole Tera, my, my age, scribbling, scribbling, scribbling in Yiddish, and I wasn't able to scribble in Yiddish in those days, so.

06:51 Speaker 2 And these days?

06:53 Speaker 1 Still can't. I mean, I can, I could write Hebrew, but not the, not the way... They, I mean, they transcribed the whole farbrengen.

07:02 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.

07:02 Speaker 1 I don't think they understood what they were writing. Some of th- they were young. They were kids, and so it was-

07:07 Speaker 2 Oh, so kids would, kids would be writing down words that they heard at the farbrengen?

07:10 Speaker 1 Exactly.

07:11 Speaker 2 Interesting.

07:11 Speaker 1 And so of course, we grew up with all the same com- out of town complexes.

07:16 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

07:16 Speaker 1 We didn't know Yiddish. We, you know, a lot of what these kids knew and took for granted, we didn't know.

07:25 Speaker 2 Right.

07:27 Speaker 1 But we figured it all out.

07:28 Speaker 2 Yeah.

07:30 Speaker 1 Um, the only time that we were there for a Yontif was Simchat Torah.

07:37 Speaker 2 You would go on for Simchat Torah?

07:38 Speaker 1 We would go on for Simchat Torah. This is my childho- my, some of my best childhood memories was my father would literally toss me into the shul, into, into the hes over there, or it was not a hes, it was just a box, and, um, I would crawl under, um, find my spot, and, you know, Baruch Duchman and his, and his father, alav hashalom, were always right on the other side. And, um, still etched in my memory, watching the Rebbe and, and the Rashag dancing. It was like even before I had the capacity to truly appreciate, you know, the magnitude of what was happening, I still recorded it, and, and it, it's stored there, and it's readily available to download. It's... And it was also very, um-

08:42 Speaker 2 Did you, do you remember anything else from Simchat Torah, or is that the only memory that comes to mind?

08:47 Speaker 1 Of course, I remember a lot from Simchat Torah. We used to go, uh, to Kiddushim, and my father was saying a lot of l'chaim in those days, and you had to kind of be on top of your game because, like, if I didn't keep my father in my sight, I probably would lose him in 10 minutes.

09:13 Speaker 2 Right.

09:13 Speaker 1 And then eventually I would find my way home. But, you know, talking about eight, nine, 10, 11 years old.

09:19 Speaker 2 Right.

09:19 Speaker 1 Uh, this was, uh, this was my character development because my toughening up. Because getting thrown into that maelstrom of sweat and, um, joy and, and, uh, kind of raw aggressiveness of pushing for the place and finding, and the stuffiness of it was intimidating.

09:46 Speaker 2 I'm sure.

09:46 Speaker 1 And it actually made us quite anxious, but there was no... We weren't cuddled in that sense, like, "Oh, you're gonna be okay." It was like, "Get in there." So I, I value that retrospectively.

10:01 Speaker 2 Yeah. It feels like walking into a tornado.

10:05 Speaker 1 It, it, a, a tornado-

10:06 Speaker 2 Like there's-

10:06 Speaker 1 ... is mild. I mean, it's, it was... It could be scary.

10:11 Speaker 2 Right.

10:11 Speaker 1 You know, if you had, uh, you know, some kind of, uh, OCD or, um, were scared of crowds or, you know. It was, it was rough. You had to-

10:24 Speaker 2 But even if you're, even if you're a, quote-unquote, "normal kid" and you're going from your suburban or whatever you want to call Northeast Philadelphia, but kind of suburban life, um, you know, row house instead of single family homes, but still, you still have a yard and some quiet, and then you show up as a kid in this, like, there, there's this movement, this train that's been driving at who knows how many miles an hour over Tishrei, and there's thousands of people just beating to their own, this own drum that's completely, like, disconnected from the world you come from, and it's not gonna stop for you, right? It's just... Like, I always think about, like, when the Rebbe, when the Rebbe walked in to, uh, 770, it's almost like when the president walks in, where, like, or if you've ever been around, like, a billionaire. When they walk into a room, everything just stops. Uh, like, like, your considerations are completely irrelevant.

11:21 Speaker 1 Listen-

11:21 Speaker 2 And it feels like that's what it was. I just-

11:23 Speaker 1 There was never a point at which I was shocked by it. I just remember it always being that way.

11:31 Speaker 2 Right.

11:31 Speaker 1 I, I, I don't remember ever saying, "Oh, we came to this place, and my oh my, this is really rough."

11:39 Speaker 2 Right.

11:39 Speaker 1 It was just-

11:40 Speaker 2 That's how it is.

11:41 Speaker 1 Yeah. You know, going, going Erev Yontif to, to, to get, uh, lekach and, and to bench Lulav and Esrog. Um, it was, it was a beautiful time.

11:53 Speaker 2 Were there any quiet parts of it? Was like, what, what was it like to be... Because so much of the memories of these times, I wasn't there, but I've heard a lot of them. So many of them always concentrate, uh, on, you know, the Rebbe Sakaf's dancing with the Rashag. Um, you know, the, maybe a little bit closer. It was, is, is, is there anything el-

12:13 Speaker 1 I have distinct memories of the Kiddushim On, on the nights of Simchat Torah that were-

12:19 Speaker 2 Oh, oh

12:19 Speaker 1 ... you know, eating pecha, my father walking around with, uh, Lebel Alefsky and, and-

12:24 Speaker 2 Kedoshim you mean like communal-

12:26 Speaker 1 In the sukkas

12:26 Speaker 2 ... communal kedoshim

12:27 Speaker 1 And then aft- yeah, befo- before Hakafos.

12:30 Speaker 2 What was it like in the morning at home? Like, people were having coffee like they usually have? Like-

12:34 Speaker 1 I don't remember those mornings.

12:36 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

12:37 Speaker 1 All... I remember the nights. I remember the, the Yom-- the meals.

12:42 Speaker 2 Okay. What were the meals like?

12:44 Speaker 1 All my uncles from Eretz Yisrael would come.

12:46 Speaker 2 Right. And, and this is a large family. How many?

12:47 Speaker 1 It's a lo- very... There's, you know, there was 14.

12:50 Speaker 2 Right.

12:50 Speaker 1 And at that time they were all alive.

12:53 Speaker 2 14 boys?

12:54 Speaker 1 14 boys and girls, so.

12:56 Speaker 2 So a bunch of uncles.

12:56 Speaker 1 Yes. And, um-

12:59 Speaker 2 And they're a lively bunch.

13:00 Speaker 1 A lively bunch. Uh, there was a lot of, um, you know, good-natured, uh, shteching going on.

13:09 Speaker 2 Brotherly-

13:09 Speaker 1 Brotherly shteching. Uh, they would give us... The high points for us was they would give us cigarettes- ... to go light the other We were eight years old, nine years old. So they were essentially, uh, just begging us to start smoking. So we would take two puffs and then bring back the, back the cigarette.

13:30 Speaker 2 Right.

13:30 Speaker 1 And that's where I learned Hebrew.

13:32 Speaker 2 Right.

13:32 Speaker 1 Those... In Tishrei I learned conversational Hebrew.

13:34 Speaker 2 Right. Right. Your dad's from Israel, right?

13:37 Speaker 1 I mean, he's from Georgia.

13:39 Speaker 2 But he grew-

13:39 Speaker 1 But he grew up in Lod.

13:40 Speaker 2 Right. And he moved to America.

13:42 Speaker 1 And the... I also remember the music. There were songs that the Lipsker family sang, um, that were, and everybody singing together.

13:55 Speaker 2 That's a Lipsker nigun?

13:56 Speaker 1 It's a, a nigun that the Lipskers sing.

13:59 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

13:59 Speaker 1 I don't believe it's... I, I don't think it's a Lipsker nigun.

14:01 Speaker 2 Uh-huh. Yeah. We had, we had, uh, Tzipi Jacobson on the podcast, so she spoke a little bit about the Lipsker family back in Kutais. Your, your, your grandparents were there as well?

14:11 Speaker 1 Yes.

14:12 Speaker 2 Yeah, and my grandmother, my great-grandmother was there when she was a widow already. So it, it's a family with a, with a kind of a distinct history. Very large family, but they, they kinda lived on, on their own, it seems, for a little bit.

14:26 Speaker 1 Yeah. And, uh, they struggled and, and, and they had a very difficult time.

14:32 Speaker 2 Yeah.

14:32 Speaker 1 But they, um, they persevered. They, they emigrated, and they created, um... They were the cornerstone of the Lod Chabad community. I mean, Beis Arye is the biggest Lubavitch shuls named after my zayde, alav ha-shalom.

14:48 Speaker 2 Right.

14:49 Speaker 1 Yeah.

14:49 Speaker 2 The, the supermarket in Lod is your uncle?

14:50 Speaker 1 Moti, Moti Market is, uh-

14:53 Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah.

14:54 Speaker 1 Yeah. They've cornered the, the market on grocery stores 'cause my, my first cousin Zammy has, has a-

15:01 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah?

15:02 Speaker 1 In-

15:02 Speaker 2 Your uncle-

15:02 Speaker 1 In marketing for Chabad, so.

15:04 Speaker 2 Your cousin and-

15:04 Speaker 1 Hipper Lipskers

15:05 Speaker 2 Well, Con- Co- Cons used to be a Lipsker store also, right?

15:08 Speaker 1 Sure. Next to Essen Bench.

15:10 Speaker 2 Right. In your time still?

15:13 Speaker 1 Yeah, for sure.

15:14 Speaker 2 Right. Yeah.

15:16 Speaker 1 So that was, he was my father's first cousin.

15:20 Speaker 2 So-

15:20 Speaker 1 So it was a great-

15:20 Speaker 2 So, so it was a mix, in other words, of, of going to the Rebbe but also family.

15:25 Speaker 1 Yeah. And we were left alone for large amounts of time.

15:30 Speaker 2 Yeah.

15:31 Speaker 1 In general, in general, we were very independent, not just in Crown Heights.

15:34 Speaker 2 Right.

15:34 Speaker 1 In Philadelphia as well. We were-

15:37 Speaker 2 But the times were different then in that regard

15:39 Speaker 1 We went where we wanted to go.

15:40 Speaker 2 Right.

15:40 Speaker 1 We came, you know, we walked. We, we were not supervised, uh, you know, in, in the way that we supervise our children. Not, I'm not saying that in a bad way. It's just-

15:53 Speaker 2 No, I'm just after, I'm just after pointing out that, um, you know, a lot of times with memories, there's like this... I think it's just a natural thing that you kind of find the central memory and the periphery gets blurred out. That's how we, that's how we sift memories. That's how we hold onto anything, is we hold onto something and let everything else kind of go away. And collectively, like when we talk about Simchat Torah, there's often like the yomims and all these things which are all focused understandably on the Rebbe and, um, the immediate vicinity of the Rebbe, right? But I'm not saying that there's a problem with that per se, but I do feel that for someone looking back to it, there's no f- real foothold of like what was it like to be an actual person that... Not a fly on the wall who saw the... What does it mean to be a person? Like, you ate a meal. What was that meal like? You went to sleep. What was that like? You woke up in the morning. What was that like? What was it like to be a person then, not just this abstract fly on the wall who happened to see what was going on, right? Like, people say like, "If I was at bench in 770." Like, who wants to be at bench in 770? You wanna be a person standing at a bench in 770.

17:02 Speaker 1 Right.

17:03 Speaker 2 And, and absorbing it as a human being. That's the whole point, right? So that's why I'm kind of-

17:08 Speaker 1 Obviously, I have more-

17:08 Speaker 2 That's why I'm thinking, as a-

17:09 Speaker 1 ... adult memories as a, as a bachur-

17:12 Speaker 2 Right

17:12 Speaker 1 ... where I moved out of the inside and, and had a place.

17:16 Speaker 2 You had your own cigarettes, basically.

17:17 Speaker 1 Well, yeah. And, and also had a place-

17:20 Speaker 2 Uh-huh

17:20 Speaker 1 ... which was quite good.

17:22 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

17:23 Speaker 1 But, uh-

17:24 Speaker 2 What was that like?

17:26 Speaker 1 It was very aggressive.

17:28 Speaker 2 Still aggressive.

17:29 Speaker 1 Ve- uh, much more.

17:30 Speaker 2 More aggressive.

17:30 Speaker 1 Much more, and-

17:31 Speaker 2 Because there were more people fighting over-

17:33 Speaker 1 Yeah. But I was always, um... I was lu- fortunate to be, like, have these bigger guys doing the big fighting.

17:45 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

17:45 Speaker 1 And I was just like sandwiched in, and I would, I would have that place for a good three, four years.

17:52 Speaker 2 What was the point of the aggression besides, uh, just not-

17:55 Speaker 1 Simply being-

17:56 Speaker 2 Besides that

17:57 Speaker 1 ... be- uh, securing a spot to have visual access and proximity to the Rebbe.

18:03 Speaker 2 And what's the point of that?

18:04 Speaker 1 The point of that is it's, uh, ex- exhilarating beyond... Well, let me back up. It's, the point of that is that's what we did.

18:13 Speaker 2 That's what I'm trying to get to.

18:14 Speaker 1 Okay?

18:14 Speaker 2 Yeah.

18:15 Speaker 1 So there was no that... There was no, like, objective, like- Premeditated. That was what was meant to happen.

18:24 Speaker 2 Right.

18:25 Speaker 1 But it was exhilarating, and as I grew older, I was conscious of how, um, uplifted I was and how-

18:37 Speaker 2 You were uplifted?

18:38 Speaker 1 Absolutely. Y- 16, 17, 18 years old, it was-- it shaped who I was. It shaped who I am, without a question.

18:48 Speaker 2 Homesick for Lubavitch is brought to you by Yuvala Media, a boutique video production company servicing the Chabad and Jewish community. Since opening 10 years ago, Yuvala Media has pushed the boundaries of artistic and thoughtful storytelling in the community with an insistence on there always being a memorable story as well as a beautiful and striking visual image that we believe is second to none. Over the years, we have worked with Chabad organizations around the country, as well as large organizations like Bonioela, Torah Umasora, and Atzalathon, guided by the belief that your story is absolutely worth telling with depth and creativity. If you are looking to tell your story with a video, please reach out to us at hello@yuvalamedia.com. Again, that is hello@yuvalamedia.com. A link can be found in the show notes. And now, back to the podcast. What's upshot uplifted? You're uplifted 'cause you saw something, uh, unique. You're uplifted because you felt something inside.

19:49 Speaker 1 It was, um, the most powerful spiritual experience I could ever fathom. It was, without even being, um, you know, literate enough or, or sophisticated enough to understand the, the fundamentals of spirituality from kind of a epistemologically.

20:21 Speaker 2 But, but, but-

20:22 Speaker 1 I was, I was, I was in it, uh, I could say in retrospect, um, it was ontologically soul-shattering. It was, it was-

20:36 Speaker 2 So let's put it into English. What you're saying, w- w- if, if I understand it correctly, it happened even if you couldn't explain it. That's what you, that's what you mean by ontologically? That's just how it was?

20:44 Speaker 1 No, it w- when I say ontologically, uh, what I mean is that it was a very real-

20:49 Speaker 2 Right

20:49 Speaker 1 ... and vibrant and, and, um, moving experience that was not something I could ever, uh, kind of gloss over.

21:00 Speaker 2 Huh.

21:01 Speaker 1 It was-

21:01 Speaker 2 It was as real, it was as real as this table

21:03 Speaker 1 ... it was huge. It was, it was-

21:03 Speaker 2 It was as real as this table.

21:05 Speaker 1 It was much-- It, it was, it was something different entirely than this table.

21:09 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

21:11 Speaker 1 It was, it was just being lifted to a higher place. Just literally lifted to a higher place. I, I suppose that young people going to festivals today, um, have a taste of that, Lahavdil.

21:28 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

21:29 Speaker 1 But-

21:31 Speaker 2 So that's what I'm asking. Was it from the Rebbe or was it from just the crowds and the... Like, do you, do you think-- And obviously this is-

21:37 Speaker 1 Look, looking at the Rebbe

21:37 Speaker 2 ... this is a Chabad friend. If you were in a room-

21:39 Speaker 1 Looking at the Rebbe was-

21:40 Speaker 2 But-

21:40 Speaker 1 ... e- extraordinary. I was like, "This is, this is holiness. This is God."

21:45 Speaker 2 What if it wasn't-

21:45 Speaker 1 Even if I had the vocabulary for God and spirituality, it was there. So the experience preceded the, you know, the kind of orient-- the, the kind of language.

21:56 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

21:57 Speaker 1 And so I, I, I matched the experience to kind of, uh, internal description only later in my life when I was-- But I retained the memory-

22:10 Speaker 2 Hmm

22:10 Speaker 1 ... sufficiently to be able to kind of articulate it to my own self and, and, and hold it as a, that kind of memory. It, it was an enriched memory. We can, we can go back and, uh, enrich our memories-

22:28 Speaker 2 Sure

22:29 Speaker 1 ... experientially with understanding.

22:32 Speaker 2 Sure.

22:33 Speaker 1 And I've definitely been fortunate enough to be able to do that with some of these, with the Rebbe turning around on Rosh Hashanah. You know, it's li- almost like an out-of-body experience.

22:48 Speaker 2 So that's become a stronger memory with time for you? It's become a more enriched memory with time?

22:54 Speaker 1 It's not so much a stronger memory or a weaker memory. I-- And, and unfortunately I don't have a good memory for details the way I would like to-

23:03 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

23:03 Speaker 1 ... the way some of my friends do.

23:05 Speaker 2 Right.

23:05 Speaker 1 Uh, but the, the general thrust of what was happening there, that this was a unquestionably a, a paradigm shift. It, it, it was a, a, a shift from one realm to another without a question.

23:23 Speaker 2 Right.

23:24 Speaker 1 And I can, I can access that.

23:27 Speaker 2 Hmm.

23:28 Speaker 1 But I also, I think less consciously, I know it's the bedrock of what has sustained me through over three decades of shluchus.

23:39 Speaker 2 Really?

23:39 Speaker 1 For sure. Yeah.

23:41 Speaker 2 Those memories?

23:42 Speaker 1 Those memories, for sure, and, and, and farbrengens. When I was, when I was a bachur, so a few of my friend, myself, Mendel Feller, I think it was Levke Kaplan, Boruch Taylor, alav ha-shalom.

23:58 Speaker 2 These are-- this is your age group?

23:59 Speaker 1 This is some of my age group. We had a place under the Rebbe's table to the, to the right side looking from literally under the Rebbe.

24:09 Speaker 2 Like where the heichers stood?

24:11 Speaker 1 Behind, in the table, you know. Talk about-- They talk about the tunnels in the 7/11.

24:15 Speaker 2 How old are you?

24:16 Speaker 1 I was 17, 18.

24:20 Speaker 2 But I thought kids used to sit under the table.

24:21 Speaker 1 No, not under the table, in the table. Like, no kids were there.

24:27 Speaker 2 What does that mean, in the table?

24:29 Speaker 1 It means we would have to crawl from the place where the Rebbe would go up the stairs to get-- We would crawl through the subterranean, um-

24:40 Speaker 2 Are you saying the-

24:40 Speaker 1 ... passageway

24:41 Speaker 2 ... that whole table, that whole long table?

24:43 Speaker 1 Yeah. The Rebbe's table.

24:44 Speaker 2 So you didn't see the Rebbe, you just heard him?

24:46 Speaker 1 No. We did see. So we were, we were one floor down.

24:50 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

24:51 Speaker 1 And we would push-- We would-- So the Rebbe was over here, we would push the board out and look up, and there was the Rebbe.

25:00 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

25:01 Speaker 1 And-

25:01 Speaker 2 So to your right were the Chassidim?

25:03 Speaker 1 So-

25:04 Speaker 2 To the right were the Chassidim standing behind the Rebbe, sitting behind the Rebbe, and then the Rebbe was right in front of you?

25:09 Speaker 1 Right in front of me.

25:10 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

25:11 Speaker 1 And so first of all, we could hear every word. Second of all, it was up close, and the Rebbe, I think, he knew we were there, and without sounding, um, you know, sacre- I think he got a, he had a, got a kick out of us being there.

25:31 Speaker 2 He, he said l'chaim to you guys down there?

25:32 Speaker 1 Absolutely.

25:33 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah?

25:33 Speaker 1 Absolutely. We, we pushed open, and he said, "L'chaim." But, you know- ... we had... It was very sweaty, very smelly, and, you know, you had to have, you know, you had to go to the bathroom before 'cause there was no getting out. And it was very... And it was dark.

25:53 Speaker 2 I can imagine.

25:54 Speaker 1 It was dark. And it was, again, a very surreal experience.

25:59 Speaker 2 Why did you choose that place? You couldn't find another place, or you wanted to be closer?

26:02 Speaker 1 First of all, out-of-towner. Hello. Out-of-towner, Shluchim's kids.

26:06 Speaker 2 Uh-huh. Nobody was saving a place for you.

26:08 Speaker 1 Nobody was saving a place for us. We were the ones on Shlichus.

26:12 Speaker 2 Right.

26:13 Speaker 1 But when we came, and we were old enough to be the Chassidus country-

26:18 Speaker 2 Right

26:19 Speaker 1 ... we were o-on the periphery, and we, we were like second-class, third-class citizens.

26:24 Speaker 2 Tzadik Gomers.

26:25 Speaker 1 Yeah. Tzadik Gomers is a compliment there.

26:28 Speaker 2 Oh, you're already gonna get, uh, special attention, yeah.

26:30 Speaker 1 Yeah. So we had to f- we had to scrap for everything-

26:35 Speaker 2 Huh

26:35 Speaker 1 ... to be... And I think it's, it's a phenomena that has probably not been dealt with. But, again, this whole thing-

26:44 Speaker 2 You're on the wrong, you're on the wrong, you're on the wrong podcast for that.

26:46 Speaker 1 Yeah. Oh. There's, there's no, there was no beta version for Chabad. There was no, um-

26:51 Speaker 2 Right

26:51 Speaker 1 ... it w- it, it just happened.

26:53 Speaker 2 Yeah.

26:54 Speaker 1 And we were in that.

26:55 Speaker 2 Yeah. Yeah. Sh- Shlichus, Shlichus seems like, uh, when they say that Shlicha went on a one-way ticket, they, they mean it literally and seriously. That's literally what happened. There was no plan for how, how do we land this plane. There was literally no plan. It's like taking off a plane and like, "Yeah, we'll figure out the landing when the time comes." Right? When, when God tells us to land, that's when we'll land. In the meantime, we're just gonna keep on refueling and remaking the plane in midair.

27:21 Speaker 1 Yeah. Listen, we went on Shlichus with $3,500. We didn't have a COL, uh, ch- charity campaign.

27:27 Speaker 2 You're talking about-

27:28 Speaker 1 Yeah

27:28 Speaker 2 ... you.

27:29 Speaker 1 Yeah.

27:29 Speaker 2 Yeah, but even before that, it was even more ridiculous.

27:31 Speaker 1 For sure. I mean, we, for us, it was already-

27:34 Speaker 2 Yeah, right

27:35 Speaker 1 ... we, we thought we h- we were like, uh, going in, in luxury.

27:38 Speaker 2 Yeah, no, you already had like a, a roadmap, right? Compared to, yeah. A- and of course not. Yeah. So, um, maybe, maybe we'll get back to that. Like it's... Look, it's, uh, I, I had, uh, on this podcast Mendel Posner, who was Alan Posner's kid. So his father was a Schlicha of the Friediker, but he's one of the first Shluchim's kids. And yeah, it was extremely rough for him to reintegrate into the yeshiva system, and he's dealing with it to this day. And, uh, I've heard from many others, and I'm sure there are even more that I've never heard from. It's a real thing, and-

28:15 Speaker 1 It's a real thing. We wore weird clothes.

28:18 Speaker 2 Yeah.

28:18 Speaker 1 We weren't wearing the same clothing as the kids in Crown Heights were wearing.

28:21 Speaker 2 Right.

28:22 Speaker 1 We just got whatever was discontinued in Marshalls.

28:25 Speaker 2 Right.

28:25 Speaker 1 And, and it, and it was- And we stood out.

28:29 Speaker 2 Right.

28:29 Speaker 1 You know? We wore flannel shirts and corduroy pants, and so-

28:36 Speaker 2 And you saw the world relative to the kids in Crown Heights. You'd, you'd seen things that they hadn't seen.

28:40 Speaker 1 For sure.

28:41 Speaker 2 Saw people that they hadn't seen.

28:42 Speaker 1 No, I grew up, uh, playing street hockey on my... I wasn't growing up in a necessarily, uh, in any way, shape, or form in an Orthodox community-

28:51 Speaker 2 Of course not

28:51 Speaker 1 ... let alone a Lubavitch community.

28:53 Speaker 2 Of course not. Yeah. Right. Right. And your, your parents are, your parents are having people over for Shabbos that aren't coming to Crown Heights tables, and so on and so on. Your classmates are different. Everything's different. And then you're told that you're the same as these people, and then they tell you that you're not the same. Right?

29:09 Speaker 1 There's-

29:09 Speaker 2 And they remind you that they're not the, that you're not the same.

29:12 Speaker 1 Yeah. There was definitely a, um, closed, close-knit circles that we were kind of crashing-

29:23 Speaker 2 Right

29:23 Speaker 1 ... when we came to, to Olitoiro for even, for example.

29:30 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.

29:30 Speaker 1 Let alone Gan Yisroel in the summer when we were younger was the same thing, but it was less intimidating because it was just everybody running around.

29:38 Speaker 2 Oh, yeah.

29:39 Speaker 1 But, you know, coming to yeshiva, we were, we were the outsiders.

29:45 Speaker 2 Yeah.

29:46 Speaker 1 And so we had to compensate in all kinds of ways.

29:49 Speaker 2 Yeah. I don't have any childhood friends. I mean, I had kids that I grew up with in Hong Kong, but after eight years old, I never saw them again. So maybe if I saw them s- you know, maybe if Facebook reconnects us, it'll be an interesting conversation, but I don't think you can call that a childhood friend. So that's like-

30:05 Speaker 1 We also grew up, the only Orthodox community that was there was rapidly anti-Lubavitch. It was like at a time-

30:12 Speaker 2 Right

30:13 Speaker 1 ... where there was this anti-Rebbe that, like we grew up, and we were called Lubabs. Uh, the, in the school we went to, Beth Jacob, they would hang pictures of the Rebbe in the, in the bathroom. I mean, it was very, very upsetting.

30:26 Speaker 2 This is even though Beth Jacob at the time was being supported by Chabad?

30:30 Speaker 1 100%. It, it, it made no difference whatsoever.

30:33 Speaker 2 So my, my grandfather was-

30:34 Speaker 1 I know

30:35 Speaker 2 ... was literally single-handedly raising money for that school. And yeah, it's just funny h-how that worked.

30:41 Speaker 1 Oh, the, the, those kids heard it from-

30:44 Speaker 2 Their parents

30:44 Speaker 1 ... their parents at home, who heard it from the rabbi in-

30:48 Speaker 2 The Rosh Yeshivas

30:48 Speaker 1 ... in the, in the, in the Orthodox shul, who heard it from the Rosh Yeshivas.

30:52 Speaker 2 Yeah.

30:52 Speaker 1 Yeah.

30:53 Speaker 2 Yeah.

30:53 Speaker 1 Without a question.

30:55 Speaker 2 No, my zeid, my zeid, uh, had a very long and interesting history with Rabbi Shwe and Rabbi Kamenetsky in Philadelphia. Um, a mutual respect, but also, you know, just they found themselves on two sides of- You know, uh-

31:09 Speaker 1 As did my father

31:10 Speaker 2 ... of, of, of, uh, of they found themselves on two sides of a fight that, like they were forced to kind of... Yeah, my, my Zayde always tells me that he, one of my uncles got married in front of 770. Um, and, uh, and Rabbi Shve from Philadelphia came to the Chuppah 'cause at the end of the day, they were friends. They got along. And people that don't know, Rabbi Shve was at those days, one of the, the American Mohelim.

31:37 Speaker 1 Elya Shve.

31:38 Speaker 2 And Elya Shve. And, and, uh, he was trying to keep a low profile 'cause he's not supposed to be in front of 770. And of course, uh, if you know my grandfather, you know that he called him up for a brocha .

31:49 Speaker 1 Of course. Good on him.

31:54 Speaker 2 Yeah.

31:55 Speaker 1 Make it awkward.

31:57 Speaker 2 Uh, no, just kind of-

31:58 Speaker 1 Let's make it awkward here

31:59 Speaker 2 ... I'm just gonna... No, I don't... My grandfather's not into making things awkward, but my grandfa- my grandfather, you know, let's just... I'm not, I'm not gonna speak for him, what his reasoning was, but the story is a, is a classic. Uh, yeah. Yeah, so it's, it's, it's very interesting, the, the whole shluchim's kids kind of, uh, dynamic. It's, it's you end up, you end up being in an island unto your- unto yourself, and then each family kind of has their own island because each shluchim's family is different than, than another shluchim's family. And every, every family grew up in their own community and their own... And yeah, it's, um, I don't know.

32:35 Speaker 1 You know, I've had a lot of conversations with fellow shluchim.

32:38 Speaker 2 Yeah.

32:39 Speaker 1 And with families in Crown Heights.

32:41 Speaker 2 Sure.

32:42 Speaker 1 And inevitably the conversation comes back to children.

32:47 Speaker 2 Yeah.

32:47 Speaker 1 Our children, like the generation that's coming. I don't know, is it Gen Z? Lubavitch Gen Z.

32:54 Speaker 2 Well, it depends how old you are is for your kids are, right?

32:58 Speaker 1 Yeah.

32:58 Speaker 2 But your kids-

32:58 Speaker 1 But there's enough of a different two distinct groups, two, two distinct generational groups.

33:06 Speaker 2 You're talking post-Gimmel Tammuz kids? Is that what you mean?

33:08 Speaker 1 For sure.

33:09 Speaker 2 Okay.

33:09 Speaker 1 I would say for sure post-Gimmel Tammuz kids, but maybe even... I, I, I think by and large that would be the case.

33:15 Speaker 2 Okay.

33:16 Speaker 1 And-

33:16 Speaker 2 Say for the sake of Lubavitch conversation.

33:18 Speaker 1 Yeah.

33:18 Speaker 2 That, that would be best.

33:18 Speaker 1 For the sake of Lubavitch conversation, in which, uh, the fact is that there are in shluchim's families and in many Anash families, children that are not religious.

33:31 Speaker 2 Yes.

33:31 Speaker 1 That are not Orthodox, that are not, uh, observant of Torah and mitzvahs, and it's very painful, but it's a conversation that everyone has to have and, and, and we are having it, and-

33:50 Speaker 2 Can you describe why it's painful?

33:53 Speaker 1 It's painful because we grew up in a society where it was a given-

34:07 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

34:08 Speaker 1 ... that, uh, V'hechev lev avos al banim was maybe a euphemism at best.

34:15 Speaker 2 Right.

34:15 Speaker 1 It was the opposite.

34:16 Speaker 2 Right.

34:17 Speaker 1 And, uh, it was V'hechev lev, uh-

34:19 Speaker 2 Avos

34:20 Speaker 1 ... uh, that-

34:20 Speaker 2 Banim al avos.

34:21 Speaker 1 Banim al avos. We, we were all expected to follow suit.

34:27 Speaker 2 Right.

34:27 Speaker 1 And so I think shluchim and Anash in general have had, um, in the last two decades, maybe even decade and a half, their expanded their, uh, horizons of what they imagine life was going to be like, uh, cons- considerably. Uh, having... And, and I think that's painful because when you have a certain, when you're, when you're brought up a certain way-

35:02 Speaker 2 Right

35:02 Speaker 1 ... and you perpetuate that and expect the cycle to continue and it doesn't, it's jarring.

35:14 Speaker 2 Yes.

35:15 Speaker 1 I think on a very basic human nature level, it's jarring. But it's, if you look at the wider picture, it shouldn't come as any shock in, in terms of understanding that our children are not our possessions. We don't own them.

35:39 Speaker 2 Correct.

35:40 Speaker 1 They're not, they don't belong to us. We are their custodians, we are their stewards. And so we have to expand our horizons and adjust to new realities, but we can still talk about how it makes us feel, and we can still kind of explore it and, and use... And so I think I like to explore it by looking at our, our literature, our wisdom, our, our-

36:12 Speaker 2 Mm.

36:13 Speaker 1 Because that to me is the, the most, the best way I know to, to explore what's happening with me, what's happening around me. So Torah. Torah is, uh, not just, uh, academic or something that I, I do as a shliach to teach people. Torah is something that is a reference for me. So-

36:38 Speaker 2 Yes. I walked in here, you were with a Sefer Gemara with, with the, with the highlighter and the lines.

36:43 Speaker 1 Yes.

36:43 Speaker 2 I, I don't mean to expose you, but I-

36:45 Speaker 1 No, that's okay. It-

36:45 Speaker 2 I found, I found that very touching.

36:47 Speaker 1 It's, uh... I mean, it, it, it's my lifeline. Learning is my lifeline.

36:53 Speaker 2 So you sit with the Gemara, and you highlight what you understand and write notes?

36:57 Speaker 1 If I, if I'm lucky, and I'm, I'm, I'm dialed in, then it's, it's, I feel like... And I have, I've prepared it, it could be like a Yechidus.

37:12 Speaker 2 That's how you feel?

37:14 Speaker 1 That's how I try to feel, h- how I try and set it up where... And when I read a, when I learn a maamar, and I l- and I, I read it only through the prism of my own experience, only through the-

37:30 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

37:36 Speaker 1 ... the, the architecture of my own personal experience.

37:39 Speaker 2 Right.

37:39 Speaker 1 And, and, and, and so-

37:42 Speaker 2 What this maamar is telling you, not what it's supposed to tell someone else.

37:46 Speaker 1 It's, it, it's not about what it's... A- and it's not something I think about consciously-

37:50 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

37:50 Speaker 1 ... but it, it comes up.

37:52 Speaker 2 Right.

37:53 Speaker 1 And whatever I'm struggling with, it's there.

37:59 Speaker 2 You feel like it's there.

38:00 Speaker 1 I know it's there. It speaks right, right to whatever it is I'm struggling with.

38:06 Speaker 2 This is specifically the Rebbe's maamar or any maamar, or any maamar?

38:09 Speaker 1 I work with the Rebbe's maamar.

38:12 Speaker 2 Okay.

38:12 Speaker 1 That's what I've, that's what I've, um, tried to do, endeavored to do because I feel that's my, that- that's my, uh, personal, uh, orientation.

38:27 Speaker 2 I see.

38:27 Speaker 1 And, and a natural orientation, and I, I'm a shliach of the Rebbe, so I feel like I have to make that, I have to work through that.

38:36 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

38:37 Speaker 1 But... And I'll read any other maamar. I'll read Zohar, I'll read literature, and I'll find myself automatically understanding it through chassid- I- in other words, oh, and the light goes on, and it, it gives me language or insight-

39:00 Speaker 2 Hmm

39:01 Speaker 1 ... into a maamar or a sicha.

39:04 Speaker 2 Sicha.

39:05 Speaker 1 And it's exhi- it's-

39:06 Speaker 2 Yeah

39:06 Speaker 1 ... it's exhilarating. But it's not just exhilarating, it's life-saving.

39:11 Speaker 2 Yeah. The Alter Rebbe says somewhere in a ma- in a maamar that, that when someone has a, a, a, a, a, uh, idea that they're in, that they're engrossed in, so then everything else that they learn and see somehow ties back to it. Right? So there, there, there's, there's this thing, you know... And, and like now in modern psychology, they, they've shown that, like, there's only a number of things that you can really focus on. So in a way, what's key is to have what's your center of gravity mentally. What's, like, what's, what are you really thinking about? And then every else, everything else that you think about or see or absorb is gonna be, like you said, kind of harvested and funneled into that core pursuit and, and, and gonna enrich it.

39:53 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

39:53 Speaker 2 Right? So if you're, if you're engrossed in Dostoevsky, and that's your foundation, so then chassidus is gonna explain Dostoevsky. Right? But if-

40:01 Speaker 1 Unfortunately, I've come to learn that Dostoevsky is a massive anti-Semite.

40:05 Speaker 2 No, no, I, I-

40:06 Speaker 1 And, um-

40:07 Speaker 2 I still like him

40:07 Speaker 1 ... to my great... He's, he's been ... They're falling like flies today. Um-

40:12 Speaker 2 I kind of forgive him. He was a Russian back in the day.

40:14 Speaker 1 That's true. And, and-

40:15 Speaker 2 What do you expect?

40:16 Speaker 1 And, uh, yes. And, um, and-

40:19 Speaker 2 He wouldn't have liked my zeide. I always knew that, and my zeide wouldn't have liked him. But whatever, what are you gonna do?

40:25 Speaker 1 Let's see.

40:25 Speaker 2 Uh, anyway, I-

40:26 Speaker 1 The Brothers Karamazov is probably the greatest novel ever written, and therefore you have to pay attention to it. Can't-

40:30 Speaker 2 The best part of Dostoevsky is I once heard about Rabbi, about Professor Lowenthal, that before he became a Lubavitcher, he read Dostoevsky in the summer. I don't know if he meant it seriously at the time, but he says now it's like a... Or maybe he means it as a joke, that he read it as like a chassidut to become a Lubavitcher. Like, how do you deal with this mad society? You gotta understand where they come from.

40:49 Speaker 1 Okay.

40:49 Speaker 2 Dostoevsky. But anyway, my point, my point was not to sing Dostoevsky's praises. My point was that whatever, if, if, if that's your, if that's your core pursuit, then chassidus will be brought into that.

41:00 Speaker 1 Right. We can come back to that in a second, but let me just finish my thought about-

41:03 Speaker 2 Sure. Sure, sure

41:04 Speaker 1 ... our children. Um, I read, I don't know, it was last year, um, from Rebbe Avrom ibn Rambam.

41:16 Speaker 2 Right.

41:16 Speaker 1 A question on why it was that Yitzchak favored Esav over Yaakov. And to me, that question resonated with the whole shlichus world. It's like, 'cause our parents were much more dialed into the baal teshuva than to our spiritual... Not in a bad way.

41:37 Speaker 2 Right.

41:37 Speaker 1 But because they assumed that we would just go with the program.

41:41 Speaker 2 Right.

41:41 Speaker 1 And so they used their... I'm not saying necessarily my parents, I'm just saying generally speaking-

41:50 Speaker 2 Sure

41:50 Speaker 1 ... there was, th- th- their koach hasbarah, their, their imagination was reserved for, and I don't wanna call a baal teshuva Esav, chas v'shalom. Uh, what I'm saying is, um, someone who looked different-

42:06 Speaker 2 You don't have to-

42:06 Speaker 1 ... dressed different.

42:07 Speaker 2 You don't have to tread so carefully. It's been discussed many times on this podcast.

42:10 Speaker 1 Good. Um, and so he says something beautiful. And, and, and right away it said, "Oh, that's the Rebbe. That's something the Rebbe would've said." And, and that's something that the, the Rebbe lived by. He says that, uh, why did he, he, he said, "Why did he give him the, why did he want to give him the bracha?" Because he thought maybe it would bring him, um, back.

42:40 Speaker 2 Back, yeah.

42:41 Speaker 1 Back home.

42:42 Speaker 2 Right.

42:43 Speaker 1 And so, okay, I can understand that, but where does that leave-

42:48 Speaker 2 Yaakov

42:49 Speaker 1 ... Yaakov?

42:49 Speaker 2 Right.

42:50 Speaker 1 So what does Yaakov do? Yaakov does what a lot of the children of Anash and shluchim are doing, is they get dressed up like Esav.

43:00 Speaker 2 Ah. He says that too. That's what he says. Or, um-

43:03 Speaker 1 No, that's what I say.

43:04 Speaker 2 Ah. That's a, that's a vort.

43:06 Speaker 1 And they say, "Okay, this is how we get noticed."

43:11 Speaker 2 That's a vort.

43:12 Speaker 1 "This is how we can get- The brachos that has been basically-

43:18 Speaker 2 Yeah

43:19 Speaker 1 ... been diverted to everybody-

43:21 Speaker 2 Besides us

43:21 Speaker 1 ... besides us.

43:23 Speaker 2 As we approach the two-year mark of this podcast, Homsik for Lubavitch has become a household name in the Lubavitch community, with thousands of views each week on YouTube alone, as well as thousands more on the various podcast platforms. We have a devoted audience that listens regularly to the conversations and shares their thoughts with their families and communities. If you would like to sponsor an episode or advertise on one of our episodes, please reach out to bensy@yuvalamedia.com. That's bensy@yuvalamedia, Y-U-V-L-A media.com. Yeah. That's, that, that's, that's one of the things that I, I, that I, that I, that I have an issue with, is romanticism of, like, the spiritual outcast or like the, or, or the, the, the, the religious outcast and casting them as spiritually sensitive and kind of romanticizing that, you know, if they're not religious, it's because they're deeper in tune with spirituality. And like, what do you think you're doing to every religious kid? You're telling them that they're dull and insensitive, and that's why they're religious. Like, you can't have it both ways. And yeah. It's, it's, it's, it's a, it's a big problem because on one hand, those kids also have an... The, the, the kids who are, who have left have a neshamah, and you're looking for that neshamah even in what they're doing, and you're trying to tell them that, and you believe that even though they look different or they've chosen a different path, there's still something there that's very deep. But when you try, when you romanticize

44:49 Speaker 2 it and choo- and choose it, that's when things start like you're saying. Like, "Why shouldn't I be like that? That's how I'm gonna get attention. If I come to farbrengen as a kid in jeans, the whole farbrengen's gonna turn to me and try to make a kar of me."

45:00 Speaker 1 Right.

45:01 Speaker 2 "If I come as a bocher in a black hat and a, and a, you know, and a, and a jacket that should've been in the dry cleaners or in, in the garbage a long time ago, people are gonna turn their nose."

45:10 Speaker 1 Right. So I mean, I think that Lubavitch might have looked a little bit different and, and Shluchim's kids maybe... Again, we, we can't rewrite the past. If, if one generation, if our, if the prior generation, if our generation, and maybe even our parents' generation spoke to us or we spoke to our kids the way we speak to Baalei Tshuva-

45:33 Speaker 2 Mm

45:34 Speaker 1 ... with the same non-judgmentalism-

45:37 Speaker 2 Right

45:37 Speaker 1 ... with the same, uh, patience and validation and understanding. I said we should've reserved that understanding first and foremost for our own children. That should've been the very, very first thing that we used our... If, if there was a limit to the reservoir of, of understanding, um, it should've been, we should've gotten first dibs on it. Somehow it seems like when it came to us, there was very little understanding. We were-- And I understand that there was a desire and a need to circle the wagons. It was, it was just, uh, growing up in a kind of an emotional schizophrenia-

46:18 Speaker 2 Right

46:18 Speaker 1 ... where with us we were circling the wagons.

46:22 Speaker 2 Right.

46:22 Speaker 1 And around us we were, like, opening them wide open and, and-

46:26 Speaker 2 YOLO. YOLO.

46:28 Speaker 1 Yeah. And we grew up in that kind of liminal space between, um, being enclosed and being integrated.

46:37 Speaker 2 Yeah. Complete recklessness and then complete safetyism both at the same time.

46:42 Speaker 1 Yeah. And you know, we grew up with, uh... The, the Northeast Public Library was basically a second babysitter.

46:51 Speaker 2 Right.

46:51 Speaker 1 And, and but what do you do in the library?

46:55 Speaker 2 You read.

46:55 Speaker 1 You read. And you know, it's like you don't stop reading.

46:59 Speaker 2 Right. And your parents probably didn't even realize what you were reading 'cause it, that didn't exist in their world when they were growing up.

47:04 Speaker 1 Fortunately for me, my parents were very... Never, never cracked down on me, "Oh, you can't read that. You can't do..." I grew up, I feel-

47:13 Speaker 2 Mm

47:14 Speaker 1 ... in a very, um, tolerant-

47:17 Speaker 2 No, but I'm saying in gen-

47:17 Speaker 1 ... home

47:18 Speaker 2 ... I'm, I'm not talking about your parents. I'm saying in general. In general, like that generation, in many ways they didn't realize what they were setting their kids up for because like, "Oh, you're gonna read. What's, what they gonna read already?" And it's like, no, the library isn't just kids books. Like it starts there, and then it works its way up, right? And there's, it's gonna be contradictions for a kid's mind at some point.

47:36 Speaker 1 Right. And I'm grateful to my parents for-

47:38 Speaker 2 Yeah

47:38 Speaker 1 ... sending me to the library and letting me read and not like growing up in a home that was censored and-

47:47 Speaker 2 Yeah. Look, I, I, I kinda feel, you tell me how you think. I kinda feel like this is just the natural progression. I, I think so long as you nee- so, so long as you feel a need to insist that everything was perfect from the beginning and has been perfect ever since, you end up getting caught in a bunch of contradictions that fall apart very quickly upon scrutiny. Like this point that you're making, like why were people, why were you so open to the Baal Tshuva and you weren't open to me as a kid? Why were you... Like all these things like how do, how do you see-

48:16 Speaker 1 Again, I'm not saying that-

48:17 Speaker 2 It's human nature

48:18 Speaker 1 ... that was, um, a universal experience.

48:21 Speaker 2 It was-

48:21 Speaker 1 I'm saying that-

48:23 Speaker 2 It was-

48:23 Speaker 1 ... I could see very easily-

48:24 Speaker 2 It was close to universal at the time, right?

48:26 Speaker 1 That there was a con- there was a certain con- uh, uh, a Ibrot v'gebonkeit that was for many people that I know the Ibrot v'geb- the Ibrot v'gebonkeit was the cracks through which people fell.

48:45 Speaker 2 Right. Yes, no, I-

48:46 Speaker 1 And, and again, it, it's... I wouldn't trade in my childhood for another one. I'm, I'm not a rebel. I'm not like angry.

48:58 Speaker 2 Of course not.

48:59 Speaker 1 I'm fine. I, I, I love being a shliach. I love being a Lubavitcher. I love it with all my heart. I'm, I'm... I wake up every single morning thrilled to be a shliach and to be part of Chabad, and it's just makes me so happy. And so I'm very fortunate that I have that, but I know that's not universal.

49:23 Speaker 2 Right. Right. No, what I'm saying is, is that, is that when you, when you, when you, when you insist that it was always perfect and everything, you, you had it, you had it all, you had your, you, you had, you ate your cake and you had it too.

49:39 Speaker 1 Lechayim perfect.

49:40 Speaker 2 Right? And so when you insist on that, it's very hard to explain it. But in my mind, the, the miracle of shlichus is that imperfect people went out and did imperfect work to try to achieve ultimately a perfect world, right? That's, you know, the reverse of the Zeno's paradox, where like if you go ha- if you go by halves, you never end up actually at the wall. The contention of shlichus is that people that can somehow, even though they're limited, they can somehow make it to the end. They can make it to the Ein Sof of Mashiach, right? Somehow that works. That's the contention of shlichus. That's the contention of Yiddishkeit, right? And so when you understand that way, imperfect people are gonna make mistakes, by definition.

50:21 Speaker 1 Of course.

50:21 Speaker 2 And, and they're gonna go on shlichus, and they're gonna assume that their kids are fine, because in their world it's all fine. And then they're gonna find out 30 years later that it wasn't fine, and then they're gonna switch course. So shluchim today, for example, if we're talking about shlichus, I, I, I'm not on shlichus anymore, but I have friends. Shluchim today are very makpid, a lot of them, to do one seder with their kids, and just with their kids. That was unheard of when I was growing up. But people, wait a second, isn't Pesach to teach our kids also? So one seder for the community, one seder for the family. People change course, and that's part of history. If you read any Jewish history, it's over- it's corrections and, and, and overcorrections and reactions, and it goes on and on. And so Gulag Archipelago, that's what it's all about. You know, we insist that it had to be perfect from tuf shin yud alef on, and then you start into... You, you have a problem with the narrative. The narrative just doesn't hold up, and it starts becoming more and more ludicrous. And you ha- you s- you need to start throwing more and more people under the bus, like the totalitarian Soviets did, where once they assumed that they had the perfect system, anything that didn't work out was always someone else's fault, and off to the gulags.

51:26 Speaker 1 Listen, I think that growing up, i- in retrospect, I, I found that Lubavitch was functioning on a multidimensional, two, at least two multi- two track, um, two-tiered tracks of, uh, the way the Rebbe spoke, the language that the Rebbe had, and the way the, for lack of a better word, the system, the, the educational system was functioning-

51:55 Speaker 2 Right

51:55 Speaker 1 ... uh, was for me, in retrospect, entirely at odds. The notion of, you know, the Rebbe as the ultimate heir of the Baal Shem Tov and, and, and the love that Avraham ben HaRambam talks about, 'cause he asks that question. He says rhetorically, "Why, why would I do it? Why would I favor Ab- at the end of the day, still, even though I think maybe the berakhah, why am I, why am I neglecting this one?" And so he answers something beautiful. He says, uh, "Ahavah mikalkeles et hashura."

52:39 Speaker 2 Right.

52:39 Speaker 1 Love, uh, upsets convention.

52:42 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

52:43 Speaker 1 And, and shura also is like a line, towing the line. And so in a certain sense, it was nice what he was saying, uh, what he was doing with Aisav, because we could als- we could... All the kids could be Aisav, and we could be interchangeable. Growing up, we could have also been Aisav. But the notion of not the underdog, but the person that needs the most attention gets the most love is, is not necessarily the healthiest or unhealthiest, but it's a, it's a fact.

53:18 Speaker 2 Right.

53:19 Speaker 1 And, you know, there's a certain... And the Rebbe was the e- embodiment of that love, and yet institutionally it was nowhere to be found. It was terrifying.

53:32 Speaker 2 Right.

53:32 Speaker 1 It was terrifying because you had to, you had to fit in, and there was a lot of coercion, and there was a lot of, um, cutting you down to size. I was like, "This is not adding up. This is not-"

53:45 Speaker 2 You felt that then?

53:47 Speaker 1 I didn't feel it then because I was very happy living in my own subversive little world w- no matter what was going on around me, and I was never too bothered by, uh, kind of the authoritarianism that I was engulfed in, because honestly, I just did my own thing. And I was not, I was not... I mean, I toed the basic line, but I, I, I, I did it my way, as, uh, was it Frank Sinatra said? Um, and so I got lucky in that way. But I think in retrospect, looking back, and especially looking now where the, the screws are tightening for, for kids in mositta and in, in zal, it's tightening this, this strictness and this almost fear and this sense of getting beaten down.

54:53 Speaker 2 Yeah.

54:54 Speaker 1 Which is, it breaks my heart.

54:56 Speaker 2 Yeah.

54:56 Speaker 1 Because I think the only way Lubavitch kids are going to be as enamored of the lifestyle that they were brought up in as we mostly were is through ahavah.

55:18 Speaker 2 Yes.

55:19 Speaker 1 And if we can't find that, then it's basically a shooting range. We're sh- we're picking them off one after the other. And I, I, I, I can't s- I think there's such a dissonance here, because that wasn't the Rebbe's, that wasn't the Rebbe's message. Of course, there's seder, and there's protocol, and there has to be boundaries. There has to be a system of doing things. I'm not advocating kind of, uh, this kind of educational anarchy. What I'm saying is that within the institutionalized paradigms and guidelines and infrastructure, it has to be permeated with, with love, with light, with, with feeling good. I wanna be here. And- I don't see it.

56:09 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

56:09 Speaker 1 And so, I don't know. I think the Rebbe is hoping that we do better.

56:25 Speaker 2 Yeah. So I wanted to go back to something you said, and I think it's gonna tie into what you're saying right now. Uh, you, you were, we were speaking about the pain of seeing kids change course, and you were talking-- you, you, you explained that pain as coming from, it's essentially the process of coming to terms with a, with, with change, which, which is one of the causes of pain, right? There's a pain that just comes from the body dealing... There, there's a pain of, like, being punched in the arm, and there's a pain of building muscle. They're, they're both pain on some level, but they're different, right? One is, one is like something bad happened, somebody punched you. There's nothing good in that. Another is that you're getting stronger, but your body has to basically kind of reorient stuff, and the muscles have to go through all kinds of breakdowns in order to build. It's painful, right?

57:15 Speaker 1 But I wanna, I wanna clarify that.

57:17 Speaker 2 Yes. That's what I'm trying to get to.

57:18 Speaker 1 So it's very important to, to, to say the following, that there are two things here. There are the adjustments that parents have to make when the bubble of their fantasies has been burst. It's their chashad. You have to be very careful not to send a message to your child and say, "You're a failure. You didn't meet my expectations, but I love you anyway." Not gonna work, and it's so, so devastating. To the contrary, "I love you. I just love every inch of you."

58:04 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

58:05 Speaker 1 "And I respect who you are, what you've chosen, even though it's not what I would choose, and... But I love you unconditionally, and you, you are-- you're not second class."

58:28 Speaker 2 Right.

58:29 Speaker 1 If we don't tell that to our children, then we're, we're withholding from them the bracha of Yitzchak.

58:40 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

58:41 Speaker 1 The bracha of Yitzchak might not be the kind of bracha that we thought we would be giving.

58:50 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm. The, the bracha that he wanted to give to Esav is what you're referring to.

58:55 Speaker 1 Correct.

58:56 Speaker 2 He didn't wanna have a son that he had to bench that way.

58:58 Speaker 1 Yeah. But guess what? The, the bracha, if we're gonna be parents to our children, the kind that our children need us to be, then we're not saying, "I bless you that you should be like me."

59:14 Speaker 2 Right.

59:16 Speaker 1 I-- we're saying, "I bless you that you should be happy."

59:21 Speaker 2 So what do you mean by that? 'Cause that, that's where I wanted to go with this. Because a lot of times what, what ends up happening is the conversation is like, okay, so this is open-minded talk where we just want our kids to be happy, uber alles. The only thing that matters is that they're happy no matter what.

59:35 Speaker 1 I didn't say that.

59:36 Speaker 2 No, no, I, I know.

59:36 Speaker 1 That's not what I'm saying.

59:37 Speaker 2 No, no, I know. That's, that's what I wanna clarify. A lot of times that's the straw man. We're like, "Oh, okay, so you don't care to raise your kids a certain way. You just, it's all free for all." I, I don't think that's what you mean. The-- I'm trying to... Let, let's, let's drill down a little bit to that. How do you, how do you handle on one hand the sense that you have as a parent that you want to educate your children a certain way because you have certain beliefs, and you have certain things that you believe to be eternally true? How do you balance that or, or, or hold that together with the, what you're talking about here, where if your child chooses something else, you're not just grudgingly accepting them and telling them, "Oh, you still can come to my house." But it's like, "No, no, I-- the main thing I want is that you should, you should succeed, and you should, you should be the person you're trying to be, and you should..." Right? How do you have those two together?

1:00:25 Speaker 1 So it's very simple. And again, not to oversimplify this, but we get a certain amount of time to raise our children. And in that time period, whatever it is, maybe till they're 18, uh, and I know there's a lot of people that will disagree with me on this, but we raise them, they become adults, and we do the best we can. We s- we screw up.

1:00:51 Speaker 2 What, what people disagree with?

1:00:54 Speaker 1 Because there are certain people that will be eighty-five years old and will be still raising their children.

1:01:00 Speaker 2 Oh, the Gemara. I mean, the Gemara is what you're saying. It's not like... It's 18 or s- whatever age, at some point the kid grows up. You, you're not, you're not allowed as a parent to do certain things at a certain point.

1:01:09 Speaker 1 Correct. So therefore, it's a moot, it's a moot point. When they are adults, it's a moot point to say, "Okay, I'm gonna still try and influence you to change your lifestyle."

1:01:26 Speaker 2 Right.

1:01:27 Speaker 1 It's just, uh, that, it's, that ship has sailed.

1:01:31 Speaker 2 Right.

1:01:33 Speaker 1 The question becomes, in general, how do we see ourselves as parents?

1:01:38 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:01:39 Speaker 1 I think if we learn Chassidus, and we understand the way the world was created, and we understand that, especially if we're looking through the prism of Chassidus, as opposed to Kabbalah, for example, we understand that tzimtzum is lo kipshuti. Tzimtzum is not kipshuti.

1:02:08 Speaker 2 Right.

1:02:08 Speaker 1 Meaning that- When time, when the elements of time and space, uh, go into motion, and inevitably we are, our influence has been reduced on our children, which is, of course, tzimtzum.

1:02:33 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:02:35 Speaker 1 The question then becomes, where do we move from there? Tzimtzum kipshute or shaleipshute? So there are certain parents-

1:02:45 Speaker 2 Mm

1:02:45 Speaker 1 ... that in a certain sense are extremists. And when I say... Extreme is probably the wrong word. They've, they've misunderstood their role as parents fundamentally. And when that role starts to become minimized, they're lost.

1:03:07 Speaker 2 Right.

1:03:08 Speaker 1 Because they have defined themselves primarily through their children, through the connection they have to their children. They're, they're helping them. The- They're saving them. They're, uh, the role, the outsized role they play. And in essence, they don't know how to be without being parents, and so that's really a narcissistic form of parenting, where the child is existing only-

1:03:48 Speaker 2 In your world

1:03:48 Speaker 1 ... in your world and relative to you. But for a healthy parent-

1:03:54 Speaker 2 Right

1:03:56 Speaker 1 ... they understand that there does come a point where they have to step back and let go.

1:04:06 Speaker 2 Right.

1:04:07 Speaker 1 Now, you have to be a mature adult-

1:04:11 Speaker 2 Right

1:04:11 Speaker 1 ... and a, and a, a well-rounded human being to understand that letting go of your children is not equivalent to them abandoning you.

1:04:22 Speaker 2 It's good for both of you.

1:04:23 Speaker 1 It's good for everybody.

1:04:24 Speaker 2 It's good for your child, and it's good for you, right?

1:04:27 Speaker 1 On the other hand, some people take it to the opposite extreme, like-

1:04:30 Speaker 2 Uh-huh

1:04:31 Speaker 1 ... "You moved out of the house, I don't really ever wanna kinda see you again." "Except maybe on Thanksgiving." In other words-

1:04:39 Speaker 2 I think that's a fraction of people

1:04:40 Speaker 1 ... there's, there's a sense that you're on your own now.

1:04:44 Speaker 2 Right.

1:04:45 Speaker 1 I know we, culturally, that's not, that's not the case.

1:04:50 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:04:51 Speaker 1 But there's a, there's a very delicate balance that needs to be established between remaining connected-

1:04:59 Speaker 2 Right

1:04:59 Speaker 1 ... and being, and smothering our children.

1:05:01 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

1:05:01 Speaker 1 So the tzimtzum shaleipshute is the healthy way, meaning we step back, but we're still there. That's the, the chid-

1:05:13 Speaker 2 W-

1:05:13 Speaker 1 What is the greatest chidush of the Alter Rebbe?

1:05:15 Speaker 2 It's a, it's a beautiful vort what you're saying, yeah.

1:05:16 Speaker 1 The greatest chidush of the Alter Rebbe is that the immanence of God, that God is right here. God is not-

1:05:23 Speaker 2 While allowing you to believe that He's not here so that you can make it your own.

1:05:28 Speaker 1 Correct.

1:05:29 Speaker 2 But He, but in His mind, He's here.

1:05:30 Speaker 1 He's here, and, and, and it's not like, uh, you know, the Vilna Gaon and, and-

1:05:35 Speaker 2 Distantly, yeah

1:05:36 Speaker 1 ... you know, it's like, well, how could the, the, the, the heylekh and sfirot be in this, in this vile world? Like, no. Like, bemalchu kolam, b'ontzehu kolam, it was, it was very foreign to them. And, and Alter Rebbe insisted-

1:05:51 Speaker 2 Right

1:05:51 Speaker 1 ... that the immanence of God means that the eyalut are here.

1:05:58 Speaker 2 Right.

1:05:59 Speaker 1 The sfirot are here, and that's why it's such an easy shift into the, into the nefesh for the Alter Rebbe, because it's, it's in the neighborhood. So even if there's a tzimtzum-

1:06:13 Speaker 2 Beautiful. Beautiful

1:06:14 Speaker 1 ... there's no real difference except mid'chidoy, not mid'chidenu.

1:06:19 Speaker 2 That's beautiful.

1:06:20 Speaker 1 And, and what that means is we're starting to be like God, 'cause God started out as a helicopter god.

1:06:27 Speaker 2 Right.

1:06:27 Speaker 1 Right?

1:06:28 Speaker 2 Ganedin, yeah.

1:06:29 Speaker 1 Ganedin, even by the Matan Torah, the Avister was, like, still struggling with it.

1:06:34 Speaker 2 Oh.

1:06:34 Speaker 1 And He did the first two dibros-

1:06:36 Speaker 2 Kaflah, kaflah

1:06:36 Speaker 1 ... and killed everybody.

1:06:37 Speaker 2 Kaflah, kaflah

1:06:38 Speaker 1 And Moshe Rabbeinu says, "Do you wanna, do you wanna have children that grow, or do you wanna just use them as a mirror? If you, if you wanna just devastate them, and you just like the idea of them, have a nice day."

1:06:53 Speaker 2 It's not gonna work.

1:06:54 Speaker 1 It's not gonna work. If you, if you do wanna do this project, let me tell them the, the other eight dibros. In a way, the Oifeneh Hamiskabel, through tzimtzum, through, through Seder Hishtalshelut. But never was it, uh, uh, intended to be a, a clean break. And so the Avister became helicopter, the submarine Avister.

1:07:19 Speaker 2 It's interesting, just like-

1:07:20 Speaker 1 Tzimtzum shaleipshute means the Avister goes from being helicopter Avister to submarine Avister.

1:07:26 Speaker 2 Submarine Avister, right.

1:07:27 Speaker 1 With, and the periscope.

1:07:29 Speaker 2 It's very interesting.

1:07:29 Speaker 1 The parents w- they're watching.

1:07:31 Speaker 2 Right, of course. They care.

1:07:32 Speaker 1 They're there. They're there.

1:07:33 Speaker 2 They care, they care, yeah.

1:07:34 Speaker 1 The Avister's here.

1:07:35 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:07:36 Speaker 1 Your parent-

1:07:36 Speaker 2 If you're looking for an event that is memorable, meaningful, and affordable, let me recommend This World is a Garden, a film and live concert production created by us here at Uvlah Media, inspired by Basse LeGani, the first mimer, the Rebbe said. If you're a regular here at HFL, you know that Basse LeGani is something that we think about and talk about a lot. And in this production, we use the power of cinematic filmmaking and a live concert by a string quartet to bring the beauty of Basse LeGani to your community and your audience in a way that they've never seen, heard, or experienced it before. The production has already been hosted by Chabad houses around the country and has drawn wonderful reviews Our package comes with everything that you need to put on the production, the film's original arrangements for string quartet, publicity materials, everything besides the string quartet, which we recommend that you hire locally to save on travel costs. To find out more about this production, please visit thisworldisagarden.com. Again, thisworldisagarden.com. And now, back to the show. It, it's interesting, it comes, it comes full circle. I think you'll appreciate this part. I re- I, um, I found it. There was once, one Shabbos, I just opened up a random Sefer HaMaarim of the Rebbe Rashab. Let's put it on the other side.

1:08:50 Speaker 1 Okay.

1:08:51 Speaker 2 Um, opened up a Sefer HaMaarim of the Rebbe Rashab, and he explained, uh, he explained the story of the hitting the stone. And he says, "Why, why was Moshe Rabbeinu punished for hitting the stone if he had been told..." First of all, what's the big deal? He was told, i- is it such a big deal? Okay, that's a simple question. But he was also told in Shemos to hit the stone, "V'chiki, ve-ve-v'chiki et hatzur," right? So if you're told to hit the stone then and it was fine, it... What's so terrible that he hit the stone now? So Rashab explains, kitsur, that over there, it, it was, uh, the tzur, and here's a sela. What's the difference between a tzur and a sela? He explains that the t- tzur at that time was referring to the Jewish people in a state of infancy or childhood. And like the Yalkut says that a, a, a, a young child, to teach him, you hit him with a rod, at least back in the day. But the Yalkut also says that when the child grows up, now you have to speak to him with words. You have to, you have to convince him with words. And so the sela, at 40 years into the Midbar, the Aibishter was telling Moshe Rabbeinu, "At this point, the Yidden are at the madrega of a sela. They're a m- they're a mature teenager or already becoming an adult." Uh, like it says that, uh, "V'lo nasan nashem lachem lev ladas," until

1:10:08 Speaker 2 this day. Now you have- they have lev ladas. They have yezem l'shmaya. They're ready, they're ready to be spoken to, not hit anymore, and you hit them. You didn't see their growth.

1:10:19 Speaker 1 And that's what, that, that takes us vast-

1:10:21 Speaker 2 That's what-

1:10:22 Speaker 1 Back to the system of, of how-

1:10:24 Speaker 2 That's the part that you're saying. At some point, you have to, you have to pre... Even Moshe Rabbeinu, the lover of the Jewish people who defended them for 40 years to the Aibishter, and he was the one telling the Aibishter that, "These are the peop- You can't give up on these people. They have more potential than you're, than you're allowing them." When it ca- when push came to shove, it was hard for him to see that it was time for them to become their own people.

1:10:46 Speaker 1 Freud and, and Winnicott have a different way of explaining it psychologically.

1:10:49 Speaker 2 What, that story?

1:10:51 Speaker 1 Yeah, that, that, that, that paradigm. You know, Freud talks about-

1:10:57 Speaker 2 Let's move the microphone closer to you

1:10:59 Speaker 1 ... the different stages of a child weaning off the mother, and Winnicott w- weaning off the mother, and he, um-

1:11:08 Speaker 2 Is it about narcissism?

1:11:09 Speaker 1 No, it's about, um, healthy attachment and-

1:11:14 Speaker 2 Right

1:11:14 Speaker 1 ... fostering healthy attachment by reassuring the child-

1:11:21 Speaker 2 Right

1:11:21 Speaker 1 ... that they're safe. Where does unhealthy attachment come from? When the child feels abandoned at an early age-

1:11:28 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm

1:11:28 Speaker 1 ... and hasn't gone through the appropriate si- uh, uh, secure attachment. Hasn't... So Freud said that there's a game that children play where they, they'll have something in their crib, for example, and they'll throw it out, and they'll use the word, um, "Oh. Oh, oh, oh." And he interpreted that in German as fart, as, uh, going away. When y- the child throws something out, it's their way of rehearsing the mother's leaving.

1:12:08 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

1:12:09 Speaker 1 And then, um, and it was actually a yo-yo. And then when the child pulls it back in, he says the words, "Ah, ah, ah," which is, um, symbolized by da or da in Yiddish, here.

1:12:26 Speaker 2 Uh-huh.

1:12:26 Speaker 1 So it's very much a fart and da, um, paradigm that is very much a, a, a, a, a absolutely perfect way of capturing, you know, the dialectics of, say, the Hishtalshelus of the, of the, the withdrawing and the, and the extending. And Winnicott says that weaning a child is them learning to let go of objects. So when a child drops something, they are act- in, in essence, they're freeing the object.

1:13:04 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:13:04 Speaker 1 They're freeing the object. Uh, it's like a Yetzias Mitzrayim. They're liberating the object to take on its own autonomous, uh, reality, and in doing so, they as well-

1:13:18 Speaker 2 They're practicing for themselves

1:13:19 Speaker 1 ... they're practicing for themselves. And I think that's where the, the vort in Chsi- the idea in Chsidus of Moshe Rabbeinu throwing down the Luchos and, and saying, "Yasher koichecha ma sheshibarta." The, the letting go was, in many ways, a way of letting go-

1:13:38 Speaker 2 A freeing, a freeing-

1:13:39 Speaker 1 Of the, o- of the Bnei Yisrael. And, and coming to the hitting part, you know, I take issue with the whole punishing with hitting. Like, that wasn't... That's true on a certain level. And, and-

1:13:52 Speaker 2 Oh, in the olden days-

1:13:53 Speaker 1 And-

1:13:53 Speaker 2 ... that's how they used to do it. That's-

1:13:54 Speaker 1 No, no, that's not what I'm talking about

1:13:55 Speaker 2 ... sort of how they did it

1:13:55 Speaker 1 We all got smacked.

1:13:56 Speaker 2 Oh.

1:13:57 Speaker 1 Um, I'm, I'm saying on, on, on a, on a theological level-

1:14:01 Speaker 2 I see

1:14:01 Speaker 1 ... I, I think there's numerous ways of looking at it. Of course, your, what you were saying is v- a very, um, legitimate, and I like that, but there was something deeper at play here that I think really touches on where we are as Chsidus today-

1:14:20 Speaker 2 Uh-huh

1:14:20 Speaker 1 ... without having the Rebbe, um, you know, in our midst, in the way that we had the Rebbe in our midst growing up, is that the hitting the rock and the punishment of not going into Eretz Yisrael was part of a plan. It was part of a predestined, uh, design. Just like it's part, there's a predestined design for a parent to let go of a child.

1:14:46 Speaker 2 Yes, absolutely.

1:14:48 Speaker 1 And so the Bnei Yisrael going into Eretz Yisrael sans Moshe Rabbeinu is part of the plan.

1:14:57 Speaker 2 Yes.

1:14:58 Speaker 1 And again, is it tzimtzum kipshuta or hispalshut? No. There's no such thing as tzimtzum kipshuta if you learn Tanya, if you learn the Rebbe's Maamar because however you formulate it, um, and I think there's obnoxious ways to talk about the way the Rebbe is on one hand with us and not with us, and then there's gorgeous ways of, of expressing that.

1:15:28 Speaker 2 What do you mean by obnoxious ways?

1:15:31 Speaker 1 When I was coming in to Crown Heights on Sunday morning at four o'clock in the morning for the levaya-

1:15:41 Speaker 2 Where... You were coming from where?

1:15:42 Speaker 1 From Boston. I was a shliach already.

1:15:43 Speaker 2 You were a shliach already.

1:15:44 Speaker 1 Of course. And I, I was listening to the radio of the news, and it was on every news channel. And they were broadcasting, of course, Bochurim dancing and singing outside of 770, and it left such an imprint on me. Like I was so sh- I was, my l- my life was shattered in the sense of the Rebbe being torn away, that it's taken me three decades to start to finally figure it out.

1:16:18 Speaker 2 Oh, you feel like you're figuring it out?

1:16:20 Speaker 1 Oh, abs-- I'm still figuring it out. Uh-

1:16:22 Speaker 2 But you feel like something's g- you've... Something's clicking?

1:16:25 Speaker 1 Yeah, I hope so. I mean, I still have a long way to go, but I knew what wasn't right.

1:16:31 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:16:33 Speaker 1 And I knew that that was so wrong.

1:16:36 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:16:37 Speaker 1 It was so wrong and so not Jewish, and certainly not Hasidish.

1:16:44 Speaker 2 You're saying not to be able to grieve?

1:16:46 Speaker 1 To deny-

1:16:47 Speaker 2 Yeah

1:16:47 Speaker 1 ... to deny the pain, and the grief-

1:16:51 Speaker 2 Mm

1:16:52 Speaker 1 ... and the sadness. And one has to wonder whether anybody taught in any meaningful way the first Basie Lagani.

1:17:08 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:17:09 Speaker 1 Where the Rebbe became Rebbe on... If you had to pick the hardest day on the Jewish calendar to become Rebbe-

1:17:23 Speaker 2 It was that day

1:17:23 Speaker 1 ... it was that day.

1:17:25 Speaker 2 Yeah, he became Rebbe through tears.

1:17:26 Speaker 1 Through such, and you listen to the my- to, to the, to the, the sobbing.

1:17:31 Speaker 2 Yes. It's uncomfortable to listen to.

1:17:33 Speaker 1 And it's, it's, it, it's truly viscerally painful to hear.

1:17:38 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:17:39 Speaker 1 But man, that's, that's, that's who we are.

1:17:45 Speaker 2 That's real. That's real stuff.

1:17:46 Speaker 1 That's so real, and like this is, this is the Rebbe.

1:17:50 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:17:51 Speaker 1 And, and the Rebbe wasn't dancing on Yud Shvat. I mean, are you kidding me?

1:17:55 Speaker 2 You're saying that Yud Shvat, the first Yud when the Rebbe-

1:17:57 Speaker 1 Yeah

1:17:57 Speaker 2 ... when the Rebbe passed away, no, he wasn't dancing.

1:17:59 Speaker 1 So, so-

1:18:02 Speaker 2 No, he was... Someone explained, someone depicted it as, I don't know, if to me or in a different interview that I saw, the Rebbe was, the Rebbe's eyes were red with, red, was shot red with tears from crying the whole night. Um, yeah. So

1:18:17 Speaker 1 So my point is, is that we have been -- I believe there's a pattern in the way the Rebbe has, has taught us and has instructed us, and I see that pattern from Taf Shin Yud Aleph all the way through, and once you see it, you can't unsee it.

1:18:37 Speaker 2 What's that pattern?

1:18:38 Speaker 1 The pattern is a rehearsal for adulthood.

1:18:45 Speaker 2 For, for, for entering into this role without

1:18:48 Speaker 1 Absolutely.

1:18:49 Speaker 2 Mm.

1:18:50 Speaker 1 And also a rehearsal with the, with the concrete knowledge that tzimtzum shulei kipshuta, that the Rebbe is so, so here with us.

1:19:00 Speaker 2 Right.

1:19:01 Speaker 1 And, and again, I don't always have the right words and the right, um, language for it, but it's not even a question that we're guided by... And any, any success that we have is directly attributed to the Rebbe. Any failures are our own. I believe that strongly. Um, I believe in-

1:19:26 Speaker 2 You don't believe that there are any costs that come from the top? You don't believe that shlichus fundamentally, uh, was going to entail sacrifices? Like just, just, just by the reality of it.

1:19:38 Speaker 1 Oh, no question.

1:19:40 Speaker 2 So why is that your fault? Why, I mean, not you specifically-

1:19:43 Speaker 1 I'm a human being. I make mistakes. No ma-- in other words-

1:19:47 Speaker 2 No, but even, but even if you live up to... You're saying, you're saying tech- uh, theoretically, if you were perfect, it wouldn't happen.

1:19:53 Speaker 1 If I was perfect, then I wouldn't make mistakes.

1:19:54 Speaker 2 But, but-

1:19:55 Speaker 1 But I wouldn't blame my mistakes on the Rebbe. That's for sure.

1:19:58 Speaker 2 No, no, no, but I... No, I, it's, it's not a matter of blame, but the idea that you basically are culpable for everything that goes wrong and the Rebbe is, is, is... That that's nothing to do with the situation that you were placed into by the Rebbe, I feel like that puts people in a very, uh, tight, isolated space where, where it's almost, it's almost like-

1:20:17 Speaker 1 I think, I think I hear you, what you're saying. You're, you're, you're basically... I'm, I'm, I'm a well-rounded enough human being to feel good about my accomplishments, put it that way, and to not be too hard on myself when I fail, but to learn just like any a shliach. Shlu- hashtag shlichim are people too.

1:20:36 Speaker 2 No, but me too, yeah. But no, but I'm saying a shliach whose child doesn't grow up the way he wants, if we wa- so like the idea that that's entirely his fault-

1:20:45 Speaker 1 Oh, I'm not talking about that.

1:20:46 Speaker 2 Okay.

1:20:47 Speaker 1 Not at all.

1:20:47 Speaker 2 Okay.

1:20:47 Speaker 1 I'm just saying like if I do, if I start a project, and I think it's important, and it doesn't get off the ground, so I'm not gonna beat myself up too much. I'm gonna take it into perspective. I'll learn from it. I'll grow from it. But- Um, I'll also accept responsibility for it.

1:21:05 Speaker 2 Oh, okay.

1:21:06 Speaker 1 That, that's all I'm saying.

1:21:06 Speaker 2 Fair enough.

1:21:07 Speaker 1 Um, I, I, I think it would be absurd for parents, whether they're shluchim or anash, to, to blame themselves for how their children are, number one. Number two, the notion of blaming oneself im- the implication is a, a wrong implication. That means that they're freaks and that they're not right. They're right. So for sure-

1:21:31 Speaker 2 I mean, their kids are freaks.

1:21:32 Speaker 1 Yeah. And, and I'm proud of-

1:21:33 Speaker 2 And pride is a-

1:21:34 Speaker 1 ... I'm proud of all of my children, no matter what life path they took, so why would I blame myself?

1:21:40 Speaker 2 Right. Right. Exactly. Exactly. I, I did wanna get back to that. We've, we've, we've branched out in many ways. I wanna make sure I get back to this point, 'cause it's a very important point. This, this... When we see a generation grow up younger than us, and you're of course much further along this journey than I am. My kids are still more or less within my confines. My oldest is 12. Uh, but that, that'll, that'll change soon enough, right?

1:22:06 Speaker 1 Yeah.

1:22:06 Speaker 2 It's happening-

1:22:07 Speaker 1 13 is right around the corner.

1:22:08 Speaker 2 Oh, she's 12, so she's already bas mitzvah. And, and 18 or whatever the age is, is, is there. I can, I can see it staring me in the face. Um, and I try very... And I, I, in my mind, I agree with your way of thinking about k- letting kids or, or believing that kids are their own people. But let's see h- let's see how I put it into practice. I'm not up to there yet. But when we're talking about a new generation, and, you know, we're talking about Moshe Rabbeinu, you're talking about the, the dor that's going to Eretz Yisrael, we're all better off, right? And, you know, Rashi, Rashi talks about how the Korbanos came. He brings a midrash that Moshe Rabbeinu tells Habersher, you know, "You told me that I'm gonna be gone. I'm not going in with them."

1:22:46 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm.

1:22:46 Speaker 2 "If,"

1:22:46 Speaker 1 Mm-hmm

1:22:48 Speaker 2 ... "kodeshem ish," you know, find the person who can take them over. And Habersher says, "Okay, Yeshurun Ben Nun. But now that you're, now that you've told me what to do about my kids, let me tell you what the, the, you know, let me tell you what I'm worried about." And he tell Korbanos, right? That they're gonna have to do it on their own. Um, we have this generation that's growing up different to the generation that we grew up as or we were the idealized generation. You're talk- You spoke earlier about a parent accepting their child taking their own path. But let's, let's broaden it out a little bit. I grew up a lot of times where like imagine the Rebbe came back to Crown Heights today, and he saw what people look like. Like what, what would it do to the Rebbe? And as I get older, I'm like, "This is so wrong. This is so wrong." Why, why do we believe that the Rebbe would come back and have negativity towards these people? You don't think he would understand exactly where they're coming from?

1:23:45 Speaker 1 I think it's much m- it's much more than that.

1:23:48 Speaker 2 Let's, uh, I wanna hear your thoughts on that.

1:23:49 Speaker 1 I think the Rebbe-

1:23:50 Speaker 2 Just come close to the mic.

1:23:52 Speaker 1 I think when the, when the Rebbe comes back and sees today's kids in Crown Heights, he's gonna be thrilled.

1:24:02 Speaker 2 Mm.

1:24:03 Speaker 1 Why is he gonna be thrilled? Because they're in Crown Heights. Where are they?

1:24:12 Speaker 2 Right.

1:24:13 Speaker 1 They're home. They're here. This is their home. This is their world.

1:24:18 Speaker 2 Right.

1:24:20 Speaker 1 And-

1:24:22 Speaker 2 And if they're not in Crown Heights? Still-

1:24:24 Speaker 1 I think we're speaking almost metaphorically-

1:24:27 Speaker 2 Right

1:24:27 Speaker 1 ... of, of being in an orbit or being in an orbit by being in a different orbit.

1:24:37 Speaker 2 Right.

1:24:37 Speaker 1 Sometimes that's also an orbit.

1:24:39 Speaker 2 Right. A counter orbit.

1:24:40 Speaker 1 Yeah. Um, if, if this is, you know, we're in the, the dark side of Darashvi, meaning-

1:24:51 Speaker 2 That's, that's a line, the dark side of Darashvi. That's a, that's a, that's a film line

1:24:55 Speaker 1 And I don't mean it, but I don't mean it in a, um, a negative way.

1:24:59 Speaker 2 No.

1:24:59 Speaker 1 I mean it in the most positive way that-

1:25:03 Speaker 2 Well, the sun doesn't shine on Earth, on every part of Earth 24 hours a day. There has to be a cycle, right?

1:25:08 Speaker 1 Right. In, in, I believe it was in Taf Shin Chaf Ches, there was a sicha the Rebbe said after Yom Tov when the Orchim were... Before they were going home, shluchim and Orchim. And the Rebbe was talking, uh, many things, but he, he talked about the word Tishrei, and explained that the word Tishrei has within it Reish and Shin, which is Rosh, meaning alluding to Rosh Hashanah. And saying that even though there are parts of Tishrei that are not Rosh Hashanah, that are not Rosh, but it's still encompassed within the name.

1:25:54 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:25:55 Speaker 1 And so it's still connected.

1:25:57 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:25:58 Speaker 1 And the Rebbe said, "Adayin nimshachim in yonei hayom tov," that, that it's, it's still going. It's still, it's, it's still there. And you, you look at a certain generation of children, and they don't look the same as we look, right?

1:26:26 Speaker 2 Right.

1:26:28 Speaker 1 So I'm not going to break it up into light and dark because who's to say that who's light and who's dark?

1:26:37 Speaker 2 Yeah.

1:26:37 Speaker 1 What I'm saying is, is that things at the end of the tunnel don't look like things in the beginning of the tunnel.

1:26:41 Speaker 2 Mm-hmm.

1:26:42 Speaker 1 The end of the days of Tishrei don't look like Rosh Hashanah, and nevertheless, they're part of Rosh Hashanah.

1:26:47 Speaker 2 Right.

1:26:48 Speaker 1 And, and what the Rebbe was saying was that the notion of our fraternal bonds are- Strong enough to encompass, uh, many shades. That's, this is my interpretation

1:27:16 Speaker 2 It's a, it's a, it's a beautiful interpretation

1:27:17 Speaker 1 Many, many shades of, of dark, light, um, enfranchised, disenfranchised. Um, again, I don't wanna put negative and positive. I just wanna say that the Rebbe's overarching theme at the time was-- And again, this takes us back to the whole shlichus. The Rebbe was, was paraphrasing the midrash of the king who feels guilty not being, not having spent enough time with his own-

1:27:55 Speaker 2 Sh'mini Atzeres

1:27:56 Speaker 1 Yeah, with his own children

1:27:58 Speaker 2 Right, Sh'mini Atzeres

1:27:58 Speaker 1 And, and he says, uh, "Bai ve'agale ani ve'ata."

1:28:02 Speaker 2 Just one day together

1:28:03 Speaker 1 And again, oh, I, I, uh, when I hear those words, you know, it's a, it's a paraphrasing of, you know, our children just wanting us, not in reverse. Like, imagine the child saying, "Bai, bai ve'agale ani ve'ata," not, not the parent.

1:28:23 Speaker 2 Right

1:28:24 Speaker 1 And like, uh, like a... And forget about re- the religious or Hasidish context, just any child and any parent, um, and, and the time that they spend together. You know, "The cat's in the cradle and the silver little boy blue and the man on the moon. When you coming home? I don't know when, but we'll get together then," and that never happens.

1:28:45 Speaker 2 I go put on Conga. We then sing these songs, but fair enough

1:28:47 Speaker 1 Yeah. Okay. But it, it captures the angst of, of children that want more from their parents.

1:28:55 Speaker 2 Right

1:28:55 Speaker 1 And, you know, also sometimes too late, parents wanting to have time with their children. And so the Rebbe always brought it up in, in the, in the kind of the cosmic spiritual definition of it, but then it took it home to understanding that these people were all going back to overseas. Many of them were shluchim. Don't-- There was no cell phones. He knew that they were struggling, and he st- "Kosher la'pri dasach."

1:29:27 Speaker 2 I think he also enjoyed their company. I was talking about the other day where I, like, I, I, as I've gotten older and I think about, I wasn't there obviously, but there are pictures of videos that I was coming out of 770, which, you know, maybe to someone outside Lubavitch, what's the big deal? He walked through the front door. But in Lubavitch, that's a big deal. The Rebbe didn't do that often, to walk out the front door and spend a half hour waving at them and just looking at them with a big smile on his face or sometimes serious, I don't know. But a lot of times I think he was smiling. And it's like, to me, I begin to think about, I think he push it, enjoyed spending time with them. I don't think it was this whole, like, every- not everything gets, like, turned into this spiritual thing, which is true, but, you know, yes, like you said, he knew what they, what they were going through, and he was trying to be mechazek them and everything. But I think he also simply was gonna miss them. And you meet, you meet these, you meet Lubavitchers, you hear about them, a lot of them were great people. And I'm j- I think he was looking forward to seeing them, you know-

1:30:20 Speaker 1 I think that's true, Bentzi, but I think there was something deeper and more melancholy at play over here. The Rebbe as the, as the architect of the, the single largest Jewish, um, revolution of, of outreach, the Rebbe didn't like that word, uh, uh, in history-

1:30:43 Speaker 2 Right

1:30:44 Speaker 1 Uh, had... You know, w- you talked earlier about the Rebbe said, "I'm taking achrayus." That wasn't just a platitude.

1:30:52 Speaker 2 No.

1:30:52 Speaker 1 The Rebbe was taking achrayus, and there's no question that the Rebbe was well aware that a lot of these people were struggling. They didn't have money. They didn't have the, the community. And, you know, this was 1968. It was relatively earlier in the shlichus, uh, develop- in, in the world of shlichus, and I believe the Rebbe was... I, I could, I could feel that the Rebbe was, was sad i- in, in a sense. He wasn't wavering in, in the slightest bit in his conviction, and that's why he encouraged and he was... But they were people

1:31:36 Speaker 2 I see what you mean

1:31:36 Speaker 1 And, and so the Rebbe said, "Kosher la'pri dasach." It's hard for me. I, I believe. I like to look at this-

1:31:44 Speaker 2 I see