76. How Reb Nochum Turned Pain Into Happiness

00:15 Hello, ‹foreign language›. Just wanted to share a story with you. This is a Yom Tov of Sukkot, which is a time of simcha. We have to be happy. It's not always easy to be happy. Imagine you go to school, and a boy in the class was bullying you and not nice to you and was fighting with you and called you names. You feel very angry, you feel very upset. But the Torah says it's a mitzvah to be happy, even when it's hard, even when it's difficult. How-- what's the secret? How do you, how do you become happy? How does someone become happy? So here is a story. A story with the great tzadik of Nachum of Chernobyl, who was a Talmud of the Baal Shem Tov, and then he became a Talmud of the Maggid, and he was a friend of the Alter Rebbe. When he was a little boy, that's how the story goes, his tati unfortunately died. The tati died when he was very young. His mommy was alone. He was the only child, and she needed to have another husband. She needed to get married. So she got married to another man, who gave birth-- she gave birth, and they had children with this other man. Five children. She had five children. So Nachum was the son of the same mother of these five children, but not of the same tati. His tati had passed away. His brothers were children of the other tati, the step-tati of Rav Nachum. Now, this step-tati

02:00 was not a very nice man. In fact, he was quite mean to, to Nachum. He didn't like him much because he wasn't his son. He was somebody else's son. He only liked his own children, and he showed favoritism to his own children. He was very mean to Nachum. In fact, he made it so clear that he likes his children only and not Nachum, that every supper when he would serve at the table and give every child food, he gave his own children, the five children that were his children, he gave them large portions of food. When it came to Nachum, he always gave him a smaller portion. Even though Nachum was the oldest, he needed more food. When you're older, you're bigger, you need more food. But he would give him less food than the other children. And everybody knew that. It was very clear that the stepfather of Nachum is treating Nachum very badly, in a very mean way. But Nachum, he accepted it. He said, "Listen, that's what Hashem wants." One day, the father came home from a trip. The stepfather of Nachum came home from a trip, and he brought presents to all the children. He brought them a beautiful silver coin. Give each child a silver coin, but he only gave it to the five children that were his children. To Nachum, he did not bring a present. And little Nachum is watching how the father is giving each child this beautiful present, and the ch- children are so excited. And

03:31 he's standing there, and he's, "Oh, no, he doesn't have one for me. I'm not getting anything." He was very sad. Nachum went to, to another room and started crying. He cried and cried and cried and said, "Hashem, I heard that you, Hashem, you become the father of yesomim." Yesomim are orphans, children that don't have a tati. When their tati, physical tati, passes away, Hashem becomes their tati. "So my brothers have their tati, and he brought them a present. Now, since you are my tati, Hashem, I wanted you to give me the same present too, 'cause he's not giving me a present, the tati of my brothers, so I want you to give me a present too." And he cried and cried and cried until he hears a dangling sound on the table, and he looks down on the table, and he sees a silver coin just exactly like the one his stepfather gave to the other children. Nachum took the coin. He says, "Thank you, Hashem." Walks back into the room, and his stepdad, he sees that he's holding something in his hand, and asks, "What do you have in your hand?" He shows him, "Here, I have a coin." "How do you have that coin? I gave it to your brothers, not to you. Did you take it from your brothers?" He says, "No. Look, all my brothers have their own coin." So the father asks, "How did you get this coin?" "Well, my tati gave me a coin too." He said, "Who's your

04:56 tati?" "Well, I went to the other room, and I spoke to my tati, Hashem." That was very unusual. Wow. You could see that this boy was a very special boy and was going to become a very big tzadik. Many years later... Oh, first, before we go to many years later, one night, the parents were out of the house, and the food was sitting on the stove, staying warm for supper. The kids, the younger boys, younger children, Nachum's little brothers, were very, very hungry, and the parents weren't coming home. They came home very late. So Nachum decided to feed the kids. He was the oldest one. He gave each child a large portion of food. For himself, he take a small portion because his father did so. His father would give to all the children a large portion on the plate every night, and for him, only a small portion. So he knew this is what the father wants, the stepfather. So he gave the other children a large portion. For himself, he took a small portion because he knew that this is the rule in the house. He's gotta follow the rules. Then the parents came home, and they see that the children are eating by the table, and they're finishing their plates. So the stepfather said, "Who took the food from the stove?" And Nachum says, "I did, 'cause the children were very hungry, and I'm the oldest, so I wanted to give them food. But I promise you, I gave them a large

06:26 portion and gave myself a very small portion the way you always do to me, the way you always serve every night. I did not take more food than you always give me." So the father says, "Still, you're not allowed to touch anything unless you ask permission. You don't do anything in this house unless you ask permission first, and you took the food without permission," and he slapped him very hard. Nachum was very hurt. He tried to do the right thing. He tried to feed the little children, and he gave them a larger portion than himself. Why would this man, who is his stepfather, slap him like this? He was very upset, very hurt, but then he decided Hashem is in charge of the world and everything that happens, Hashgacha Protis, and he forgot about it. He decided to forget about it, not to think about it, not to hate his stepfather, and just to forget about it. Many years pass by. Rab Nachum became already a big, big Talmid Chaham, a Gawn, and a Tzadik, and he became a Talmid of the Baal Shem Tov. And then when the Baal Shem Tov was Nistalak, he then became a Talmid of a Chassid of the Mezritcher Maggid. And one night, he's sitting late at night in the Beis Midrash of the Mezritcher Maggid in Mezritch, and there's nobody in the Shul except for Rab Nachum himself, deep in learning. He's learning, learning Torah, and he's suddenly-- He's, like, startled. He sees next to him sits a

08:03 man with a long white beard. He didn't see the door open, door of the Beis Midrash open up. How did this man get here? He like just showed up. Sitting right next to him, long white beard with Payos. Looks like a very holy Jew, a Haliki Yid. Looks like a Tzadik. And Rab Nachum says, "Shalom Aleichem, who are you?" The man says, "I am Eliyahu HaNavi, and I came from Shamayim to teach you all the secrets of the Torah, secrets that you have never learned before." Rab Nachum at first got very excited. "Wow, Eliyahu HaNavi came personally from Shamayim to teach me the secrets of the Torah. Wow, it's amazing." But then he suddenly had this idea that he shouldn't do this without the permission of the Mezritcher Maggid, who was his Rebbe. And the Mezritcher Maggid lived in a room next to the Beis Midrash. So Rab Nachum immediately got up from his seat and told the old man, who said he was Eliyahu HaNavi, says, "I'm coming right back. Just gotta see my Rebbe for a minute. Wait here, I'm coming back." He ran over to the door, knocked on the door of his Rebbe, of the Mezritcher Maggid. Mezritcher Maggid opened the door, and he asked, "What do you want?" Rab Nachum said, "Rebbe, there's a man with a long white beard sitting next to me in the Beis Midrash. He says he's Eliyahu HaNavi. He's going to teach me the most amazing secrets of the Torah. Should I learn from him?"

09:34 Rab Nachum-- The Mezritcher Maggid says, "No. Don't you dare learn from him. He's not Eliyahu HaNavi. He's a liar. He's from the Satan. He's from the evil side. He's from the Sitra Achra. He's from the Klipos. He came-- This guy is dressed up like a holy Tzadik. He's not a holy Tzadik. He's evil. He wants to trap your Neshamah, and make it evil, and make it unclean. Don't even look at him. Just yell at him from a distance. Don't even go close to him. Don't even go within six feet of him. Yell at him, 'Get out of here, you evil, evil, evil. Get out of here.' Don't let him stay in the Beis Midrash." Rab Nachum was shaken. So shaken. "Wow, and I didn't realize." He ran quickly to the Beis Midrash and told the old man sitting there and said, "Get out of here. You're not Eliyahu HaNavi. You're a Shaygetz. You're, uh-- You're a-- You're a Tamei. You're not clean. You're evil. Get out of here. I don't want to-- I want you-- You're not allowed to come into Beis Midrash." And suddenly the man disappeared. He disappeared. Rab Nachum was saved. Somebody asked Rab Nachum the next day. Rab Nachum told over the story, so they asked him, "Nachum, how did you know that? How did you know to ask your Rebbe first? Anybody else would have just said, 'Wow, it's amazing. This Eliyahu HaNavi came to teach me Torah. Why don't we learn with him?' What made you think of this

11:09 idea that you should ask your Rebbe first?" And he said, "You know what? Many years ago, when I was a little boy and a stepfather who was not that nice to me, but he taught me an important lesson. One day, when he came home late and I gave supper to all the children, he gave me a slap in the face and made me cry, and said, 'The rule is you never take things without permission.' And I said, 'Ah, there's a reason why Hashem made me hear this.' Instead of being angry at him and upset at him, how he made me feel bad, he slapped me. I said, 'No, no, no. This is a good lesson. Maybe he taught me something important that can save me many years later.' And it did save me because I suddenly realized when this old man who said he's Eliyahu HaNavi, I suddenly remembered what that stepfather told me when I was a little boy, and how he slapped me in the face because I didn't follow the rule. The rule was you don't do anything without asking permission. So I decided I have to go ask permission." I asked permission from the Mesilati Yesharim, oh my God, this was the right thing to do. Because if I didn't do that, who knows what would have happened to me. I would have been part of the side of evil. Chas v'shalom. This is an amazing story. It teaches you how every bad things that happens to you, you can turn

12:34 it into something positive. You can say, "Hashem, there's a reason why Hashem made me hear this, why Hashem made me feel this, why Hashem made me go through this difficult and terrible and painful thing." It's because there's something that can help me later in life. It's a good thing. You can turn something bad into good. That is our mission. This is what Hashem may wants us to do. Turn darkness into light, pain into happiness. And that's what Samachto b'chagycha. Sukkot is a time where you can be b'simcha no matter what type of thing a day you had today. You can be b'simcha because Hashem is always with you, and everything that happens to you, even if it seems now that it's bad, it will turn out later that it actually was a good thing. Hashem is trying to help you. Good Yom Tov. However, it's important to add that just because a person is able to see the good that comes out even of a bad situation, of a painful thing, somebody hurt you, somebody did something wrong to you, you're able to turn it around and see that Hashem is trying to help you somewhere, and there's something good coming out of it, that is not an excuse for the person who committed this wrong and hurt, hurt the person. That person needs to do teshuva, and he's wrong, and he was bad, and he needs to ask forgiveness. The two things have nothing to do with each other. It's two separate things. The

14:08 person who does evil to someone else is bad and needs to do teshuva, and he needs to ask forgiveness. But the person who's being hurt can separate himself, can separate themselves from the person who hurt them by realizing that there's Hashem made me go through this for a special purpose, which maybe now I don't realize it, but in the end, maybe later on I will find out what the good that came out of this bad thing. So this is what we need to learn. This is like with Pharaoh. Hashem said to Avraham Avinu, "Pharaoh, uh, there will be a time when the, the Jewish people, the descendants of Avraham Avinu, will be enslaved in Egypt, and Pharaoh will hurt them." Hashem, why did Hashem tell this to Avraham? It's because he wanted them, wanted him to know that he's doing it for a good purpose, because he wanted the Jews to get the Torah. In order to get the Torah, they had to go through a difficult time in Mitzrayim first, so it will make them special and clean, and lift them up, and then they will be able to receive the Torah. But that has nothing to do with Pharaoh. Pharaoh is still evil, and he had to be punished. Because Pharaoh didn't do it because Hashem had a purpose. He didn't do it for Hashem's purpose. He did it because he's evil and mean. So these are two separate things. That's what the Alter Rebbe teaches us.