83. The Rov Who Became A Wagon Driver (Baal Hagolah)

00:15 Shalom Aleichem, children. And a good Yom Tov, L'shana tovah. Be-limud hachasidus, b'darko hachasidus, b'chasei v'chaseimu. This is a great Yom Tov, so I'm gonna share with you a story with the Alter Rebbe and the Mitteler Rebbe. An incredible story told by-- was originally told by the Rebbe Rashab, and he told it to the Friediker Rebbe. The Fried- Friediker Rebbe wrote it down in his diaries, so that's how we know the story. There was a man by the name Yosef. Reb Yosef. Reb Yosef was a big talmid chacham. He learned in yeshivas, and he was a very, very big masmid. He learned and learned. And then at eighteen, he got married. Got married to the daughter of a farmer, a villager. A farmer in a small village near the city of Berdichev. Berdichev, that's the name of the city. It's a very famous city. There was a lot of Hasidim came from there. Near the city of Berdichev was a small village. And there, there was this Jewish farmer that had a big farm, and he had a lot of money. And his daughter married this Yosef. And the farmer offered Reb Yosef to sit and learn day and night. He doesn't have to worry about anything 'cause he's gonna give him all the money he needs, all the parnasah. And so Reb Yosef moved to that village. He sat and learned day and night. Davened and learned. He was a big yirashamaim, so he wanted to serve Hashem with all his heart, so he had

01:56 to daven a lot and learn. But he had no shaiches to Chassidus. He has no connection to Chassidus. Now, living in the village for years and years, learned for fifteen years straight in the village, it's a little bit lonely for somebody like, um, Reb Yosef, who's such a big talmid chacham. The Jews in the village weren't very big talmidi chachamim. They were simple people. They were farmers. They knew how to take care of a, of a cow. They knew how to take care of a horse. They knew how to take care of chickens with eggs and how to milk a cow. They knew those things. But learning, they didn't have a lot of learning. So he was the only talmid chacham there, so he needed to-- someone to talk to, to talk to in learning. So one day, a guest was traveling through the village, and Re-Reb Yosef saw that this guest is a talmid chacham. But the guest wasn't planning to stay there. He was just traveling through. So Reb Yosef begged him and said, "Listen, if you stay here for a few days, I'll give you food. I'll give you a place to stay. Please stay for a little while." And outside, it's raining, it's muddy, and there's even snow coming. So the guest agreed, and for three, four days, Reb Yosef and this guest spoke in learning the whole day. They had such a good time learning, learning together and talking about different ideas and different sugyas, different parts of the Gemara.

03:23 They had a great time. Through the conversation, Reb Yosef became very impressed with this guest. And he saw that this guest was a real talmid chacham, and he asked him, "Where did you learn? Which yeshiva? Who taught you so much Torah?" And he said, "I learned most of my Torah by the Maggid of Liozna." The Maggid of Liozna was actually the Alter Rebbe. Alter Rebbe, in his younger years, was called the Maggid of Liozna. Uh, Reb Yosef never heard of the Maggid of Liozna, but he was so impressed. Look, a talmid of the Maggid of Liozna is such a big talmid chacham. I should go and learn from the Maggid of Liozna too. So he thought in his head, "You know, one day I should really travel there and see who this great gaon, the Maggid of Liozna, is." The guest left, and Reb, uh, Yosef continued to sit and learn day and night. And then after a few years, he was reminded of this conversation with this guest, and he decided he needs to travel to Liozna to meet the Alter Rebbe. When he came to Liozna and spent a little time there, he was very, very, very impressed with the Alter Rebbe. Not only in nigleh, in Gemara, but also was impressed with Alter Rebbe's-- the way Alter Rebbe taught a way of serving Hashem, avodas Hashem, and the way he taught Hasidus. He was very, very open. A new world opened up for him. And he decided to stay there for a

04:45 year. He asked his wife permission. He sent her a letter if she-- it's okay for him to stay there for a year, and she said fine. And so he spent a whole year by the Alter Rebbe in Liozna. Then he came back to the little village. And now, of course, he had a new way of serving Hashem because he learned from the Alter Rebbe the derech of Hasidus. And so he continued to daven and learn, and he had no worries. His father-in-law gave him everything he needed. He even gave him a place, a house to live on the property, on the land of the father-in-law. The father-in-law had a lot of land, and he had a house specially for his daughter and son-in-law. Unfortunately, they had no children. Then his father-in-law passed away, and the sons of the father-in-law, that means his brother-in-laws, they took over the business, and they continued to support him because they were very proud that their sister was married to this big talmid chacham. But then something happened, and the wife of Reb Yosef also passed away. Now Reb Yosef didn't have a wife, and also he had no children. The brothers of his wife, his brother-in-laws said, "You know what? We'll continue to support you. Don't worry. You can keep living here. We would be very happy if you live here with--" But he said, "No, no, no. Now that she passed away, I'm gonna move back to-- I'm gonna move to Berdichev, to the big city." And I'll

06:09 find a way to survive. I'll make a parnasah there." They said, "No, please, please, please. Our father, the farmer, your father-in-law, left money, and a portion of the money he left for you. Five hundred gold coins he left specially for you. You need to take that money with you." And Reb Yosef refused to take. He says, "No, I'm gonna go to the big city, to Vasinkovitch. I'll find a job. Maybe I'll become a teacher, a melamed." They said, "No, no, listen. It's not just for you, it's for his neshamah. It's a big zechus for his neshamah that his money goes to someone like you, a talmid chacham who learns Torah. We're not asking for you to take the money for yourself. This is the money that you will use for yourself. It will be a zechus for his neshamah." And Reb Yosef said no, so they went to the Beis Din, and the Beis Din paskened that the brothers are right. Reb Yosef must take the money because it's a favor for the neshamah of his father-in-law, who supported him for all these years. Now you gotta be nice and give him something back. Give him the zechus that his money is used for a mitzvah, for him learning Torah. And so Reb Yosef had no choice. He took the five hundred gold coins. Well, most of it he gave away to tzedakah, but a part of it he kept, and so he could sit and learn. But after a while, the money ran out,

07:24 so he took a job. Meanwhile, he moved to Vasinkovitch. He rented a room and became a melamed, a teacher. Did for a few different... Three, two different children. And the parents gave him money, gave him food, they gave him what he needed to live. So years went by. In the year tav kuf samech daled, Reb Yosef visited the Alter Rebbe again, went into Yechidus, and the Alter Rebbe said some very unusual things. The first thing Alter Rebbe said to him, "Reb Yosef, do you know all shishah sidrei Mishnah, the entire Mishnah, is ba'al peh?" Reb Yosef said, "Rebbe, I know the whole Mishnah is ba'al peh. Matter of fact, I am reviewing the Mishnah every month. I go through every day a little bit of Mishnah, and every month I finish the whole shishah sidrei Mishnah, just to make sure that I don't forget it, so I always remember it." That's it. Alter Rebbe didn't explain why, but he said only one thing. He said, "You should know that the word Mishnah has the same letters as the word neshamah." And that's it. Okay. Then the Rebbe, Alter Rebbe said to him, "I know your wife died. You need to get married again. I think you should marry another wife, and she should be young enough to have children, and I promise you you will have a son." Then he told him a third thing, and this was really shocking. He said to Reb Yosef, "You should know that for your neshamah, it's better that

09:04 you become a baal hagalah than being a Rav." Very strange words. Again, Reb Yosef was a big lamdan, big talmid chacham, a gaon. He knew the whole Shas, Bavli, Yerushalmi. He learned for fifty years. He learned Torah all day and night. So he knew the whole Torah. He was a big, big gaon. The Alter Rebbe says to him, "You should know that it's better for your neshamah to be a baal hagalah than to be a Rav." Okay. Reb Yosef was a little bit confused. What did Alter Rebbe mean by that? So he went back home to Vasinkovitch, and interestingly enough, as soon as he came back to Vasinkovitch, two days later, somebody came to him and said, "We have a shidduch for you. You should get married. There's a woman. She's the daughter of Nesanal the sofer. She was married. Her husband died. She's an almanah, but she's young. She also has a business. She has a grocery store, so she brings in parnasah. You can marry to her, and you can sit and learn because she's gonna bring in the parnasah." Reb Yosef remembered Alter Rebbe told him that he should get married, so he got married. And a year later, he had a, a son. He, he named his son Abba Zelig. Abba Zelig told that story that I'm telling you now to the Rebbe Rashab when he was young. It's a story about his father, Reb Yosef. Reb Yosef had a baby boy now, and he continued to learn. And his w-wife

10:40 was very proud of him, that he learned Torah, and she was able to bring in parnasah from the grocery store. Until one day, in the year tav kuf ayin daled, exactly ten years after the Yechidus Reb Yosef had with the Alter Rebbe, a group of people from the city of Lyaplya... Lyaplya, Lyaplya is a city in Russia, a very important city. They needed a new Rav. The previous Rav had passed away, and they heard about Reb Yosef, what a great talmid chacham he is. So they send a special group of people and asking him to become the Rav in the city of Lyaplya. That was the first time somebody offered him a position to be a Rav. But as soon as they came with the letter from the community, suddenly he had a vision. He saw, he remembered Alter Rebbe in Yechidus telling him the strangest thing. "Reb Yosef..." The word still rang in his head. "Reb Yosef, for your neshamah, it's better to be a baal hagalah than to be a Rav." So he immediately understood that Alter Rebbe was actually telling him something for this moment. Alter Rebbe saw, beruch HaKodesh, that one day he'll be offered a job as a Rav, and that's the time when he needs to think that he should not be a Rav, but for his neshamah, it's better to be a baal hagalah. So he told the group of people from Lepels I can't accept your offer. Go somewhere else. They left. But then he began to

12:22 think, "What did Alter Rebbe say? I shouldn't be a Rav, but I should be a Balagola. That's very strange." Balagola is usually a job for a Jew who is not very learned, doesn't know much about Gemara, Chasidus. He barely knows how to read. These are very simple Jews. They all day have a-- They have a horse, they have a wagon, and they know how to tie a horse to the wagon. They know how to tie the horse's harness on the neck. They know how to clean a horse, how to feed a horse, know how to avoid for the horse to give you a zetz, a kick with his feet. They're f- they're, they're, they're, they're buddies. They're good friends with a horse, you know? These are very simple people. Reb Yosef was respected as one of the greatest gaonim. He should be a Balagola? It's like asking a very big Rav to be a garbage collector. I mean, it's crazy, but Alter Rebbe told him that. He remembered Alter Rebbe clearly said that to him, so he didn't know what to do. He was a little confused. "What do I do? What does the Alter Rebbe mean to say? Okay, I realize that they came to offer me a job as a Rav and, and, and that's what the Alter Rebbe was speaking about. When the time comes, remember, you should not be a Rav. Turn them away, but you should be a Balagola." So Reb Yosef didn't know what to do, but then he

13:46 realized he must do it. The Alter Rebbe said so. So he knew that in Berdychiv there's a station, a station of Balagolas, wagon drivers. Just like we have a train station where all the trains come and they go to different cities. If you wanna go on a train, you have to go to the station. There you find the train that goes to the city you wanna go to. Same thing there in the bus station. So this was a Balagola station. So Yosef decided, "I don't even know how to touch a horse. Uh, I don't know how do you buy a horse, and how do you clean a horse? How do you feed a horse?" He had no idea. So he said, "Okay, I'll go to the station and I'll ask one of the Jewish Balagolas there to teach me." No, he felt a little bit embarrassed. Rebbe gonna think he's crazy. The great Talmid Chaham Yosef wants to be a Balagola. It's not a job for such a big Talmid Chaham. But he went anyways. On his way, the, the Balagolas see from a distance Reb Yosef coming, so one says to other, "Oh, Reb Yosef probably needs to travel to Vitebsk, to Lepels. No, I wonder where he needs to go now. He needs one of us to take him somewhere." But boy were they surprised when he arrived there, he said to them, "Listen, I decided to become a Balagola, and I need one of you to teach me how to be a

15:04 Balagola." All the Balagolas suddenly were shocked. They looked at each other and they said, "What? What's going on here? He must be joking." And they said to Reb Yosef, "Reb Yosef, you do much better in the Halachas of Hagalah." Hagalah is the Halachas, very difficult Halachas about kashering a pot. So they made a joke. "You know more about the Halachas of Hagalah, and maybe that's what you should teach people. Learn the Halachas of Hagalah, but not to become a Balagola." And it was a funny joke, but they thought that he was joking or maybe something happened to him, maybe he became a little crazy. Till one of the Balagolas, uh, Yitzchak was his name, nice guy, said to Reb Yosef, "Listen, I'll teach you. I'll teach you. Come with me to my stable. I have a few horses there. I'm gonna teach you everything." Right. So he took Reb Yosef to the stable, showed him how to harness, put the, the-- on the neck of the horse and how to tie it to the wagon, how to clean the horse and how to, um, you know, how to give him food and, and et cetera. And of course, Reb Yosef wasn't used to working with horses, didn't know that you have to be careful when you stand next to a horse. The horse can give you a kick with his hooves, and then you get hurt, or he can whip you with his tail. And Reb Yosef was like, didn't know what to do when

16:29 then suddenly he gets whipped in his face by the tail of the horse. And Yitzchak is screaming, "No, no, no. Be careful, be careful. You can't stand over there because that's a dangerous place to stand. You're gonna get whipped in the face." He almost lost his eye, Chas ve'Shalom. And then he got all filthy, you know. A Talmid Chaham usually dresses nicely, in nice pants, nice jacket, a nice kapote. And a, a Talmid Chaham should be lo- looking clean. That's what it says in the Gemara. But so he always walked on... Suddenly he's like filthy in this mud, and then the horse started going to the bathroom and, and made it on his feet, on his shoes. It was terrible. He was all filthed up and here was, you know, it was a wound on his face from the whip that the horse gave him with his tail. Uh, he was all like bloodied up and, and, and dirty and soiled with mud and all kinds of stuff. Finally, he finished the lesson, and Yitzchak taught him how to take care of a horse, and Reb Yosef couldn't wait to get home, change his clothes, and put on normal Talmid Chaham clothes, looking neat and nice. This... He got home quickly, runs quickly into his room to change. He changed into normal clothes, then he went to davven Mincha. Then he gave a shiur in Beis Midrash. Every day he would give a shiur in Gemara, and people would come and listen to him. Then

17:51 they'd have Maariv, and after Maariv, a few people came over to Reb Yosef, said, "Reb Yosef, we heard that you went over to the Balagola station today. Is that true? And then we heard that Yitzchak, the Balagola, took you to his stable and taught you how to take care of a horse. Is that true? What, what is this about? Uh, wh- wh- why did you do that?" And Reb Yosef didn't wanna answer the question. He just went home, ignored the question, and went home. But as he got home, he opens the door and he sees his wonderful wife She's crying. She's sitting next to the crib where the baby Abba Zelig was in, in the crib, and she's crying and sobbing. And Reb Yosef understood, "I know why she's crying. She probably heard that I went over to the Ba'al HaGolahs. Probably the news spread all over the city that I did this strange thing, and I decided to become a Ba'al HaGolah. And she's probably very upset that her great husband, the Rov, the Gaon, is now gonna be a Ba'al HaGolah. What got into his head? What kind of meshugas? What kind of nonsense got into his head?" So he was so, you know, upset that his wife was crying, so he went into his own room and sat down and started crying, crying bitterly. He says, "Rebonno shel Olam, help me. What, what do I do now?" And then he thought to himself, "But the Alter Rebbe told me to do that.

19:16 Why, why am I crying? But then on the other hand, what? I learned Torah for 50 years. Now all that Torah's gonna go down? I'm not gonna be able to... You know, I'm not gonna be able to learn anymore, and I'm gonna become a Ba'al HaGolah like these simple Am Ha'aretz, simple people that can't learn anything?" So then he thought, "The Gemara says that if you have a, a problem, you're confused about something, ask your wife. Ask your wife." So he went and asked his wife. He went out of the room. He saw his wife was sitting and crying next to the crib. He says, "My dear wife, I wanna talk to you." And he told her what happened 10 years earlier in Yechidus. "The Alter Rebbe told me in Yechidus I should get married. And look, I got married to you. Right as soon as I came home to Bershadky from that Yechidus, somebody introduced me to you, and we got married. And then he promised me a son. And look, Abba Zeligl, he's right here in the crib. But then he told me a third thing. He told me, 'Remember, Reb Yosef, that for your Neshama, it's better to be a Ba'al HaGolah than to be a Rav.' And just the other day, a group of people came from Lipka, and they asked me to be a Rav in their city, and I realized, oh, that's what Alter Rebbe meant. I should not accept the offer to be a Rav. I should become

20:38 a Ba'al HaGolah. So what do I do, my dear wife? You tell me what to do." As soon as his wife heard the Alter Rebbe told him this, she said, "What? What is the question? The Alter Rebbe told you to be a Ba'al HaGolah, and you're questioning, and you're confused, and you're torn? You don't know if you should do it or not do it? What's the-- Of course you should do it. And if you need money, I'm gonna sell my jewelry. I have jewelry which my father gave me, and I'll sell them all, and with that money, you'll be able to buy a wagon and a horse, and I'll be very proud of you. Just I was proud to be the wife of a big Talmid Chaham, now I'll be proud to be the wife of Reb Yosef, the Ba'al HaGolah." When Reb Yosef heard these words, wow, he was so impressed. But then he was also very upset, upset with himself. "How come I learned the whole Torah, I know the whole Shas, Bavli and Yerushalmi, and nevertheless, when the Alter Rebbe tells me to do something, I'm questioning. Maybe yes, maybe not. I'm torn. Here, my wife, she doesn't know how to learn, but she right away, when she heard Alter Rebbe said so, she wanted to do it i-immediately. And she told me to do it, so that means," he says, "she grew up in a Chasidic home, in a Chasidishe home. Her father, the son of the Sefer, was a Chassid

22:03 of the Alter Rebbe, and she always grew up in the house with Emunah and Tzadikim was, was... Everybody had Emunah Tzadikim. That was natural. That was normal. But I grew up amongst Misnagdim. We didn't have that kind of Emunah Tzadikim, and that's why I'm hesitating and I'm torn." And he started getting very upset. He started crying and says, "You know, Hashem help me. I should have the Emunah that my wife has." And of course, he decided to become a Ba'al HaGolah. He decided that he had a, a friend, a Chassid. His name was Reb Chaim Yehoshua. He lived in another city. He was a Ba'al HaGolah. This Reb Chaim Yehoshua knew the whole Tanakh by heart, whole Mishnah by heart, and he knew the whole Tanya by heart. And whenever he would go take trips, people needed him to drive them to somewhere, some place, he would review. He would say with his mouth Tanya by heart, Mishnah is by heart, all the time. He never stopped learning. Said, "You know what? Let me go ask him about how to be a Ba'al HaGolah." So he traveled to his friend, Reb Chaim Yehoshua. Reb Chaim Yehoshua first said to him, "You wanna be a Ba'al HaGolah? What's cra-crazy? You're such a big Talmid Chaham." He said, "Well, the Alter Rebbe told me." When he told him the Alter Rebbe said so, he said, "Of course, I'm gonna teach you. I'm gonna show you everything. First of all, yeah, I'll show you how to buy a

23:19 horse, to buy a wagon." He had the money from his wife now. His wife gave him the money. She sold all her jewelry, Reb Yosef's wife, and she gave him all the money. He took the money with him, and Chaim Yehoshua said, "Come, I'll buy-- We'll go shopping. We'll buy a horse and a buggy for you." And he told him, "Listen, you do what I do. Whenever you travel somewhere, you say Mishnah is by heart." Then Reb Yosef understood what the Alter Rebbe wanted to tell him in the Yechidus when he said to him, "Do you know the whole Mishnah is by heart?" Mishnah is Mishnah Oisios Neshama. Alter Rebbe was all telling him in advance that when he becomes a Ba'al HaGolah, he'll say Mishnah is by heart whenever he travels. So Reb Chaim Yehoshua showed him everything, and Reb Yosef became a Ba'al HaGolah. He started traveling from Bershadky to the towns nearby. Anybody who needs to go somewhere, he would take them like a taxi driver. And of course, wherever he went, he said Mishnah is by heart. One day, he was supposed to go to a city called Sena. He was supposed to take merchandise for a, a businessman to another city, to a city called Sena, and he had a-- His wagon was loaded with the merchandise. He traveled to Sena, but on the way, it was getting late, it was getting dark, so he went to a hotel, it was a Jewish hotel, to sleep, to stay overnight. There

24:37 was kosher food there. But somebody else came to that hotel. It was a Graf. A Graf is like a Paritz, very rich Paritz that owns a lot of land. And he came to that hotel. He had a secretary with him, a private secretary that was his right-hand man, very important man, and he also became rich because of the Graf, because he was so close to the Graf. So he had a very important job. He made a lot of money. And his name was Solomon Gametzky. Now, he happened to be Jewish, he wasn't from at all, he, he looked like a Russian. So they both came to that hotel. But then the Peretz decided to go stay with Agallach in the city nearby, and only Solomon Gametzky stayed in the hotel where Reb Yosef stayed. Solomon Gametzky was told by the Graf that, "I need you to go to Sena, that city of Sena to do some business for me." So Solomon Gametzky asked the hotel owner, "Do you have a wagon driver that goes to Sena? I'll pay him. I need somebody to take me to Sena tomorrow morning." So the hotel owner said, "Yes, there's this guy, Yosef, Reb Yosef from Bessarabka. He- he's going to Sena. He may give you a ride, and you pay him something." So when the Reb Yosef came into the hotel, he was outside learning a little bit in the garden, came into the hotel. The hotel owner s- says-- introduces him to this, this Solomon Gametzky, and

26:11 who looked very important. You know, he was the right-hand man of the Peretz. And he says to Solomon Gametzky, "This Reb Yosef is a, a Bala Cola. He can take you to Sena." So he asked Reb Yosef, "At what time are you going tomorrow? What time are you traveling?" He says, "After I finish davening." So he said, "But what time is that? I gotta know what time it is." He gets very angry. "Tell me what time it is." Says, uh, " 'Cause I need-- you know, I need to know so I can sleep till an hour before you leave, and then I can take a shower and eat my breakfast and then go with you." So Reb Yosef said to him, "Oh, in davening also." Reb Yosef knew he was Jewish. He said, "No, no, I don't daven. You can daven, I don't daven." So Reb Yosef said-- So the, the, the-- Solomon says to the hotel owner, "Listen, you wake me up an hour before this Yosef leaves. When you know he's finishing davening, he's almost finished davening, you wake me up and then I can get into the shower and eat breakfast and go with him." Says the hotel owner , "You know, you don't have to worry. There's no rush. You can sleep late because before ten o'clock in the morning, he's not gonna be finished with his davening." He davens for many hours. So the ho- the Solomon said, "Oh, forget it then. Just give me another wagon driver. I need

27:32 to leave very early in the morning, five o'clock in the morning. Forget about this Yosef." Fine. Solomon went to sleep, Reb Yosef finishes supper and daven mayiv, and he left, went into, um... went to his room. And Reb Yosef would go to sleep in the evening, and then he would get up by midnight to do Tikkun Chatzos. You know, when Jews get up in the morning, uh, middle of the night to sit on the floor and cry for the Churban Beis Hamikdash, it's done usually by people that really, really are saddened by the galus, the galus of the Jewish people and the galus of the Shechinah. And he was one of those very special people that used to get up every night at midnight and cry for the Churban Beis Hamikdash and say certain tefillahs, and then they would learn Torah till the morning and then daven. Meanwhile, Solomon is sleeping, and he suddenly is awakened by this terrible crying that he hears. He's like shaken. "Well, who's crying? What's happening?" He gets out of bed, the Solomon, he opens the door of his room, in the lobby is right there, and he sees who is sitting in the lobby. This Reb Yosef, this Bala Cola. He's sitting on the floor with a candle in his hand and a siddur in the other hand, and he's crying bitterly. He's never seen anything like it. And Solomon, he sees the crying and the davening of Reb Yosef, it suddenly made him feel terrible because he suddenly

28:59 was reminded of his own life and what happened to him. His real name was Shlomo Leib. He grew up in a home where his father was Rav Zvi, a big Talmid Chaham, a Hasid of Reb Shlomo Karliner, a great Hasid, a big Talmid Chaham in Yiras Shamayim. He, Shlomo Leib, grew up in Cheder, learned by a very good melamed, and then he got older, Bar Mitzvah, went to yeshiva, and then he got married. He even had a few kids. And then he had a bad friend. See, bad friends is not good. Gotta be careful. He had a friend who was, um... He was Avraham. Avraham was also Talmid Chaham. But one day, this Avraham, something happened to him, and he became an Apikores. He threw away Yiddishkeit, and he was friends with him, and he influenced Shlomo Leib to also become an Apikores. And you know what happened? After Shlomo Leib's father died, he decided to leave his family, his wife and his, and his, his two children, and he left. He left them alone. And Shlomo Leib is remembering all that and says, "How could I do this? I left such a beautiful wife. She was so nice to me. And my children were so wonderful." And why? Because I had a Yetzer Hara. And he started crying and, um, started getting very upset. And as he listened to Reb Yosef cry, he began to remember his own life, and he began to feel s- even more worse and worse and worse. You know,

30:38 he felt so terrible that he started sobbing and crying hysterically. Closed the door, he didn't wanna... And he couldn't sleep anymore. Reb Yosef finished Tikkun Chatzos, was learning, and then he started davening. He davened for so many hours, three, four hours, and you could hear every word. He davened with such geshmak, with such dveikus, with such kavana. And Reb Shloime, and Shloime Leib Solomon could hear every word, and he couldn't sleep because he was drawn to the words how Reb Yisroel was davening. He said, "My own father used to daven like that." And he's thinking to himself, "Oi, I wish I can go back to my Jewish wife." See, the problem was that Solomon, he had left his family, and he started working for the Graff. The Graff met him in a hotel, offered him a job, and then the Graff got married to the daughter of a very big Paritz. And so Solomon became the manager and the right-hand man of the Graff and the Paritz. Became very important man in the whole business. And that's where he met a non-Jewish woman, and he married her. They had three kids. Unfortunately, two of his kids died. He only had one son left. And Shloime Leib thinking to himself, "I'd love to go back to my Jewish wife, my Jewish children, but what can I do? I'm stuck here. How can I tell this to my non-Jewish wife, that I'm gonna leave her and leave my son?" And he got so upset, he started crying

32:25 and crying. Meanwhile, it's 5:00 in the morning, and the hotel owner comes, knocks on the door of, of Solomon saying, "Hey, it's five o'clock. You told me to wake you up, that you leave early in the morning. I actually got a Balagola from another town to come and pick you up at five o'clock." Oi. Shloime Leib opens the door and says to the hotel owner, "Tell the guy from the other town, the Balagola, that I'll pay him, but he doesn't come. He shouldn't come. I'm not gonna go with him. I'm waiting to go with this Jew, this Reb Yisroel. I'll wait till he goes." Okay, and he closed the door, and he kept sitting there and listening to Reb Yisroel the whole time. A few hours passed. Finally, Reb Yisroel finished. And, um... Meanwhile, Shloime Leib Solomon, before Reb Yisroel finished davening, he went to the hotel owner. He says, "Listen, do you have tallis and tefillin? I'd like to borrow tallis and tefillin." So the hotel owner, "Here, take my tallis and tefillin." He went to the room and he started davening, and he cried the whole davening. And then he finished. Meanwhile, Reb Yisroel finished davening. He went to g- to leave, to go to Senah with his wagon. He's told by the hotel owner, "You know that this guy, this... That the right-hand man of the Graff, uh, Solomon, he actually didn't leave in the morning at five o'clock. He decided, he says he wants to go with you. And another strange

33:51 thing happened. He said that he wants my tallis and tefillin. He wants to daven." Reb Yisroel realized that something is happening here and decided to stay and wait for, uh, Solomon to finish so he can take him where he needs to go. But after a few hours, Solomon opened the door and told the hotel owner, "I'm sorry, I'm not feeling well. I'm not going now. I have to wait till I get well. And please tell this Reb Yisroel, this Balagola, not to leave without me. I just wanna go with him, but he's gonna have to wait, and I'll pay him for his waiting and everything. But I, I don't wanna go without... I wanna go with him, davka. Only with him. Meanwhile, I'm sick, and I need to rest up till I get better." So Reb Yisroel decided to stay. But he got worse and worse. He got very, very sick. His fever, he got a lot of fever, a very high fever. Reb Yisroel went to visit him, and Solomon, who used to be Shloime Leib, decided to tell him the whole story. How he left his family, he married a, a goya and had a child, and how upset he is because he listened to Reb Yisroel's davening, especially when he said, "Ahavas Olam, Avinu, Avraham." "When you said those words, 'Hashem, you're so merciful, please make sure Shalomei Nevo, Shalomei Kolam, we should never be embarrassed because of our averus.' At that moment, I, like, couldn't take it anymore. I was burst

35:25 out in such hysterical crying because I realized how true it is for me, what a terrible thing I did." And he said to Reb Shloime-- He said to Reb Yisroel, this was the next morning, "Uh, please give me your tallis and tefillin. I wanna daven again since another day." Reb Yisroel gave him the, the, the tallis and tefillin. And after he finished davening, he said, "I have to lie down, and I got really sick." He got so sick that he became half unconscious, and he started saying words. Nobody knew what words he was saying, like things that were not... You know, didn't make sense. Meanwhile, people saw that he was getting sicker and sicker. People were afraid for his life. So they send a message to the Graff. The Graff heard that his right-hand man, who's very important to him, is, is so sick, so he sent his personal doctor to travel all the way to the hotel and try to cure him. "No," he said, "Bring him here. Bring him here to where I am. We'll get some big doctors to cure him. And don't tell him what happened to his wife. What happened was, three days earlier, his wife and child took a boat just to, for fun on the river where they lived, and the boat turned upside down, and they both drowned. Don't tell him because it's gonna upset him. He's gonna get even more sick. But try to cure him. We'll have to find a way to tell him the

36:53 truth, that his wife and kids died because we don't wanna upset him too much. It's gonna make him sick. First, let him get well, and then maybe slowly we'll have to tell him the truth." The doctor came there. He looked at him. He says, "Oh, my God, the guy is so sick. I can't move him because he has an infection in his brain." You can't move a patient who has an ex-- Somebody's sick in the brain. The brain is infected. You can't move him. You gotta leave him here. So he sent a message to the Graff, "I can't bring him to you. He's, he's so sick." So the Graff- Found a very big doctor in Vitebsk and said, "Please do me a favor. I'll pay you all the money in the world. Go to this hotel and see if you can give him medication." The doctor went and he looked, he examined him, he said, "Listen, there's not much I can do, but we can try to give him medication, but I don't have much hope. Looks like he's gonna die." S- they tried to give him medication, and then after a few days, he got a little bit better, and the doctor, the personal doctor of the Graff who was still there, went over to him and said to him, "You know..." He wanted to make him feel even better. He said, "Solomon should know your wife and son are soon coming to visit you," to get him excited, so maybe that'll help him

38:02 recover. But look what happened. Instead of feeling good and excited and getting better, when he heard his wife and son is coming to visit him, he collapsed and th- became unconscious again. He got worse. His fever started going very, very high up. The doctor got alarmed, "What do we do? Oy vey, he's dying. He's dying." Meanwhile, Rabbi Yosef decided to fast and to daven very hard for three days. He fasted three days and davened for, for Shloime Leib, for Solomon, 'cause now he knew his story, his secret, that he wants to go back to his Jewish wife. When he came back to the hotel and he was told that after the ‹foreign›, the doctor told him a- about his wife and, and son coming to visit, he suddenly became sick again and collapsed and became unconscious. He said, "Ah." He, he didn't say, but he knew the real reason is because he was reminded of all his averas, that he is married to a non-Jewish wife, and she even gave birth to a, to a non-Jewish son. So Rabbi Yosef said to the doctor, "Can I be with him for a moment alone? Since you tell me he's dying anyways, I wanna say Vidui." The last prayers you say with a Jew before he dies. Doctor says, "Listen, the guy is unconscious. You can't say Vidui with him." He says, "Just in case he opens his eyes, I'll, I'll get a moment when I'll be able to say Vidui." The doctor says, "Okay, don't worry.

39:29 Go." Rabbi Yosef goes into the room and he starts whispering, closes the door. He starts whispering in the ear of Solomon, "Your wife and your son, the non-Jewish wife, the non-J- Jewish died. They were drowned in the river." He said it three times, and suddenly he sees, Rabbi Yosef sees that the cheeks of Solomon are becoming more red. He's b- getting better. So he waited until suddenly, um, Solomon opens his eyes, and he's very confused. He looks around, and Rabbi Yosef turns to him and said, "I'm gonna say this again. Solomon, your wife, your non-Jewish wife and son, we just found out drowned in the river, and they're looking for her all over, and they can't find them in the river." When Rabbi Yosef, when, when Solomon heard this, you could see a change in his face. He suddenly felt better because it was a sign Hashem accepted his teshuva. There is hope for him, that he could do teshuva, because until then he thought, "That's it, I'm hopeless. How can Hashem ever forgive me for all the averas I did?" And so he got better and better, and when the doctor came once to the hotel to check on, on his pay, on, on Solomon, he saw that he was getting better. He said, "Wow, that's amazing. Um, let me tell the Graff that he's getting better." He sent quickly a letter to the Graff that he finally is getting better and better. So a message came from the Graff, "You know what? Tell

41:12 him to go to Vitebsk to doctors because he's still weak." The Graff didn't want him to go home because then he'll find out the truth that his wife and son is dead, and that will make him very, very sick. So let him go to Vitebsk for now. Uh, Solomon asked Rabbi Yosef, "Would you come with me to Vitebsk?" He said, "No, I'm sorry, I can't. I have to go to Senna. I have a job." So Rabbi Yosef and Solomon separated. Rabbi Yosef was hoping that Shloime Leib, now Solomon, will be able to go back to his J- real Jewish wife and kids. But he didn't see him. Rabbi Yosef went to Senna, went back home. When he came home to Lubyanski, he found out a lot of Hasidim are going to-- getting ready to go to the Mitteler Rebbe. So he very much wanted to go to the Mitteler Rebbe, so he decided to join them. He says 2,000 Hasidim came for that Shavuot. It was Shavuot time. For Shavuot, they came to the Mitteler Rebbe. It was a lot of Hasidim came. And that, and, and, and as he's walking down the streets of Lubavitch, this Rabbi Yosef, you know, he's very excited. He meets a lot of Hasidim that he hadn't seen in many years. He sees a man with a beard and payos and tzitzits, and the man walks over to him and says, "Rabbi Yosef, do you know who I am?" He says, "No." "I am Solomon, Shloime Leib." Rabbi Yosef

42:31 is shocked. "What? What happened to you?" He says, "Well, I went to Vitebsk, but then I told my, um, my Graff that he should do me a favor and let me go. You know, I should, uh, I should be able to leave the job." At first he didn't want, then he said, "Go ask. There's a holy man, a tzadik, a, a, a rabbin in Lubavitch. Ask him what he tells you to do." He says, "I came to Lubavitch, and the Mitteler Rebbe told me to leave the job, and of course, I went back to my wife and kids." And the Mitteler Rebbe wrote a special sefer called Pakeach Ivrim, t- teaching about teshuva, who did a lot of averas and now wants to do teshuva. How to do teshuva every single day and how to behave on a daily basis, never to fall back into the yetzer hara. 'Cause when you live so many years with a Yetzer Hara and you do everything Yetzer Hara tells you, it's very hard to leave that. So the, uh, the, the Mitteler Rebbe wrote a very specific, like a schedule, you know, what to do every day, and how to say Tehillim, and how to cry, and how to do Teshuvah every day. And, and they gave it... And that Sefer they say was written for this Shlomo Leib. So then that year that when, when, when Rabbi Yosef was in Lubavitch, he went into Yechidus the Mitteler Rebbe, and the Mitteler Rebbe told him like this, "My

43:54 father, the Alter Rebbe, just came to me from Olam HaEmes, from Olam Haba, came to him, and he told me, 'Tell Yosef Beshin Kovitche that Yosef Beshin Kovitche finished his job. He fulfilled his Kavannah, the purpose of being a Ba'al Hagalah, and that's it. He no longer has to. The whole purpose was so he can find this Shlomo Leib and make him a Ba'al Teshuvah through his davening.'" And the T- Mitteler Rebbe says, "You see, the Alter Rebbe took a big Rav and a big Lamdan, and made him a Ba'al Hagalah in order to help one Jew who was getting lost in the tumah, and the klipa, and the evil of the Yetzer Hara. And now he's telling me to take a Ba'al Hagalah and make him a Mashpia. I want you to be the Mashpia of the shul in Bershin Kovitche on the market shul." There was called a market shul. It was a Chasidishe shul. And the Alter- the Mitteler Rebbe said that you need to be the Mashpia there. And Rabbi Yosef became the-- sold his horse and his buggy, and he became a Mashpia in the shul in the marketplace. And he lived very, very lo- a long, long life. He used to go on foot by foot to Lubavitch. When he got very, very old and he couldn't walk on foot to Lubavitch, they told him, "No, we'll give you a horse and wagon. You can travel like, uh, with a horse, so you don't have to go on foot."

45:21 He said, "No, no, no. To Yerushalayim, you have to walk with your feet." Aliyah l'regel. Aliyah l'regel means to go with your feet. To go on a- with a horse, nah, adam. So he c- he didn't go unless he can walk with his feet. And many times the Mitteler Rebbe would ask Chassidim who came from Bershin Kovitche, "How is our elder Chassid, Rabbi Yosef the Mashpia?" And that's the end of the story.