96. Reb Elimelech Makes A Whole City Do Teshuvah

00:17 My dear friends, the following story is written up in a number of places in slightly different ways, but the general story is the same. The story is about Reb Shmelke of Nikolsburg. Reb Shmelke of Nikolsburg was one of the talmidim of the Maggid, of the Mezritcher Maggid. He was also a friend of Reb Elimelech of Lizhensk. Eh, Reb Elimelech of Lizhensk was once in the mikveh, and he heard a voice from Shamayim that said that Reb Shmelke of Nikolsburg is having a lot of problems from his community. The people in his community were German Jews. Nikolsburg is in Germany. They weren't Hasidim. They didn't understand what Hasidus is, and they didn't understand how their Rebbe, their Rav, Reb Shmelke, is a great tzadik. They thought he was doing strange things. He was davening for a long time, and, uh, you know, his whole way of serving Hashem was very strange to them because they were German Jews. You know, German Jews do everything very exactly the way it says you gotta do it. They follow instructions, and then they go home, and they have a good time. So Reb, Reb Shmelke had a lot of tzoros from them. They made him a lot of problems, and they, you know, they wanted to, to fire him and send him away. So Reb Elimelech heard this voice that said that anybody who's gonna help Reb Shmelke will, will be, uh... Will have a big zechus, a special zechus. So Reb Elimelech decided to travel to Nikolsburg to

02:04 see what's the matter. When he came to Nikolsburg, um, he came to one of the cities, um, and before he arrived at Nikolsburg, he came to one of the cities. Reb Shmelke heard that Reb Elimelech is coming, so he went and traveled to that one city outside-- near Nikolsburg to meet Reb Elimelech and to welcome him to his city. Now, then he invited him to come to shul, uh, 'cause Reb Shmelke was about to give a drashah for the community. And in the drashah, Reb Shmelke was giving some deep inyanim, you know, concept, a pilpul in Gemara and then Hasidus. You know, deep inyanim. When Reb Shmelke finished, Reb Elimelech said to Reb Shmelke, "Give me permission to, uh, to say a few words for your community." And Reb Shmelke said, "Okay, no problem." Reb Elimelech stood in front of the Aron Kodesh and said, "I wanna tell you guys a story." He said to the community. The shul was full of people. He says, "There was once a very famous posek, a count. His name was Pototsky. He traveled from Poland to many, many countries. He liked to visit the world. He had with him a wagon driver and a secretary. Right? They would take care of his financial things, of all his things, and the wagon driver was driving them to all kinds of places. So once they came to a country where nobody knew who they were. So the wagon driver and the secretary made a pact. They made a, a deal

04:02 between themselves. Says, 'Listen, let's kill the posek and, um, I, the secretary, you'll be the new posek. You'll pretend. You'll put on his clothes. You'll be the posek.' And the wagon driver will say, 'We'll become the secretary.' Everybody will be promoted one level, okay? So the, the secretary and the wagon driver, the balagola, made like a little of a plot, right? To kill the posek. And they did that. They killed him. And the secretary just said, 'Okay, I'll be the posek now. I'll put on his clothes, and I'll take all his money,' 'cause he had a lot of money with him. And now they traveled together, he and the wagon driver, the balagola. The balagola was now officially his secretary, and he, the, the secretary, was now the posek, and they traveled from country to country. Now, once they were traveling somewhere. They had a lot of money. There was no problem with money because they, they robbed, took away all the money from the posek. So the, the secretary, who's now become officially the new posek, um, got sick somewhere in the city. So he invited some doctors in that city, in that town. They should come and see what he needs. Maybe he needs medication. So they gave him, like, very gentle medication, like expensive medication, but that was very gentle, not, you know, not so strong. But he took the medication. It didn't help him. So finally they called a simple doctor. Not, not a big doctor. Till now he had big

05:50 doctors, you know, fancy doctors, like very famous doctors in the city. But he said, 'Okay.' Finally they called, like, a simple doctor. And you know, he's a guy from a village. You know, the village doctors. Village doctors are not so great and not so good. When they called this village doctor- Um, he gave him, like, a very strong medication, you know, because he was, like, a simple doctor. He didn't know how to give, like, very gentle medications. He gave him, like, a strong, strong medication and, like, you know, like a medication you give to peasants. People that are... You know, peasants are usually have very strong bodies because they work hard in the field, so they need different types of medication because their body is different. When you work hard in the field like a peasant, then you need different type of medication. So the, the, the simple doctor who was used to giving medication to peasants gave this poet, right? Who was not really a poet. He gave him th-this type of medication. And below... And look what happened. He became better. So when the big doctors gave him the nice fancy and gentle medication, it didn't work. And this simple village doctor was able to cure him with these rough, strong medication, 'cause this is the kind of medication he was used to give. And so the, the... He went back to the big doctors, the poets, the big, and said, "How come you couldn't cure me and this simple, stupid doctor was

07:29 able to cure me?" He says, "What did he give you?" "He gave me these very strong medications." He says, "Tell me the truth. Are you a peasant, or are you really a poet? A nobleman, like a poet." "Oh," so he said, "Well, really, I was a p- a, I was a peasant, but, uh, I became a poet." He says, "Ah, in that case, we understand. We thought you were dressed like a poet, like a nobleman that is used to delicate stuff, and so we gave you delicate medication. Had we known that you were just a peasant, then we would've given you a much stronger medication. Like, your body needs a different type of medication." So Reb Lemel said, "You see, this is a mashal. The Reb Shmalake of Nikolsburg thinks that you guys are, like, very, very Talmid Chaham. You understand deep in Yanim. He doesn't, you know, he, he doesn't know what it means for a Jew to do an Averah because he's such a tzadik. He can't even imagine even doing Averahs. He thinks, you know, everybody's like him. You know, they learn, and they, they, they love Hashem, and they can't even think of doing an Averah. So that's why he gives you these deep Drashes which are fitting for big Talmid Chaham and big Hasidim, so that's what he gives you." He says, "But you know what? I am a small doctor. I'm a simple doctor, and now I'm gonna give you rough medications, like strong medications, medication that's fitting for

09:09 crude people, people like, like peasants." And he started telling them all the Averahs they did. The Reb Lemel started revealing to them every single Averah each person did in the last few days. And he showed them, and he said, "You see?" He pointed to the front of the Shul by the Mizrah. All the important people sit in the front by the Mizrah wall, and all the rich people. And he pointed to each one and says, "You did this Averah, you did this Averah, you did this Averah." He told them all their Averahs, and they all realized that Reb Lemel knows everything. So they all got all... They started all crying and started doing Teshuvah. And, um, finally, they realized that they had mistreated Reb Shmalake. And Lemel told them, "You see? Your Rebbe is... Your Rav is such a great tzadik. He thinks you're also tzadik because he's, he's so... He, he can't even imagine that you're doing an Averah. But I know the truth about you, and I told you everything that you did. Now you gotta go and ask forgiveness, Mechilah, from your Rav and be nice. From now on, I want you to be nice to him." So they said to him, "You're right. Well, from now on, we're gonna be nice to Reb Shmalake." "But," they said, "There's one problem we have with him. He hardly sleeps at night." Reb Shmalake was known, he slept maybe, maybe two hours a night, sometimes even less than that. And they said that he's

10:43 very tired. We can see on his face he's tired. Can't be a Rav who's always tired. A Rav has to have his mind clear and fresh, so he can think about the questions people ask him and the Din Torahs that he has to do between people that have disputes. You have to have... And they see him learning all night, all the time. So Reb Lemel says, "Okay, that's a valid complaint." So when he went back to the house of Reb Shmalake, he told Reb Shmalake, "Listen, they all now wanna do Teshuvah, and they wanna appease you, but there's one complaint I think they're right. They're right about. You need to sleep maybe one hour longer. Instead of two hours, sleep three hours. And they're right. A Rav has to have a clear head. You can't be tired and exhausted like this." And Reb Shmalake says, "No, he's able to do it. He's done this all his life." And he said, "No, no, no. Try. You'll see. You sleep one hour longer. You'll see your whole day will be different." And that night, Reb Shmalake listened, and he slept and slept. Instead of two hours, he slept three hours. The next morning, he came to Shul, and Reb Shmalake would daven Shacharis for the Amud. And that morning, because he slept an extra hour, his davening was very different. With so much excitement, he was singing. People were like, "Wow." They couldn't believe what they were hearing. It was so sweet, so beautiful the way he

12:19 was singing. It was a regular day in the middle of the week, but he's, he davened with such excitement and, and, and, and simcha. People were, like, amazed when it came to Az Yashir, which we say in the morning on Shabbat Shacharis, um, where we talk about the song that the Jewish people sang when they were crossing the sea, when Hashem split the sea for them. So when he said the Shira, he suddenly started singing with such excitement, everybody in the shul was like, felt that they were actually crossing the Yam Suf. He says people felt literally they were in the Yam Suf singing together with Reb Shmuelke and Reb Moshe Rabbeinu, and Moshe Rabbeinu, and all the Jewish people, they're singing Az Yashir. That's how it felt. They felt the great miracles, the, the, the revelation of Hashem, so much so that people, not realizing that this was only in their minds, they started picking up the bottoms of their jackets, the bottoms of their jackets, so they wouldn't get wet, right? They were afraid they would get wet. But then they, they realized later this was just because Reb Shmuelke said the davening in the Az Yashir with such a special way that they felt like they were by the Yam Suf. So then Reb Shmuelke realized that when he slept one extra hour, everything was different. His davening was different. His learning was different. This is one version of the story with the way I heard it from a Rebbe, a famous

13:53 Rebbe in, uh, Europe, and, uh, he heard it from other tzadikim before the war. But there are slightly other versions of the story, but not for now.