111. When the Rebbe Ate a Piece of Cake and Performed a Miracle

00:15 Shalom Aleichem, kinderlach. Yud Beis Tammuz, good Yom Tov for Yud Beis Tammuz, Yud Gimmel Tammuz. I wanna share with you a story about the Rebbe. I read the story in a Sefer called Ele Toldos Peretz. It's a life story of a great Hasid. His name was Reb Peretz Mochkin, and, um, I knew him, I saw him. He was a Hasid that came... He was a Hasid of the Rebbe Rashab and the previous Rebbe and then the Rebbe. And then at the end of his life, when he came over to the United States or to Ame- to Canada, he lived in Montreal. His best friend, one of his closest friends, was another famous Hasid who happened to be my Mashpia when I studied in Brunoy, Reb Nisson Lemanof. I'm sure some of you have heard his name. They were very close friends, and they wrote many letters to each other. And in that book, in that Sefer that I mentioned, the letters which Reb Peretz wrote to Reb Nisson, and Reb Nisson wrote back to him, and there, there is a story that is an amazing story that Reb Peretz tells Reb Nisson about what happened to him. Reb Peretz tells a story like this. This is written in 1955, תשתו. Reb Peretz writes from Montreal to France, to Brunoy, to Reb Nisson what just happened to him. His son, he has a son, Leibel, Leibel Mochkin, and Leibel Mochkin was married to his wife. Her name is Rivka. And, uh, Rivka became-- She was, uh...

02:07 She had a baby. Then she was expecting a second baby, and while she was expecting, she suddenly developed terrible pains in her stomach. Terrible pains. They went to doctors, and the doctors did some tests, and they found that there was some stones inside the gall. It's like one of the things inside the body with-- There was some collection of, of things that wouldn't supposed to be there, and it's causing a very, very big pain, and they said, "We need to do a surgery right away." She be- started becoming s- losing weight and becoming, like, looking sick, and, um, it was, it was very, very, very dangerous. People didn't know what to do. The doctors tried very hard to save her. She had the best doctors they could find, but the only way to save her is by doing a surgery. The doctors, though, said that she may not survive the surgery. The surgery is very, very hard surgery. It's like takes many, many hours, and she may lose a lot of blood. If she survives the surgery because she's young, she's strong, she, she might survive, you know, all the loss of blood, but they can't be sure. At that time, all of the Lubavitcher, the Hasidim Chabad from Montreal went to the hospital, and they sat Tehillim all night right before the surgery to make sure that the surgery should be successful. This was on Tet Shvat, the day before Yud Shvat, when the surgery was supposed to happen. It was decided that, of

03:56 course, Leibel, the husband of Rivka, cannot go to the Rebbe for Yud Shvat from Montreal because he needs to be next to his wife. He needs to take care of her. But the father, Reb Peretz, the old Hasid, right, the father of, uh, Leibel, he will go to for Yud Shvat to the Rebbe, and he will, uh, try during the farbrengen to talk to the Rebbe and ask the Rebbe for a special bracha. Reb Peretz did make it to Crown Heights and ended up Yud Shvat by the farbrengen in 770, and as he's sitting in middle of the farbrengen, a message came to one of the other people from Montreal that came also to the farbrengen. They had a whole bus of people that came to the farbrengen, a whole car. And, and so there was somebody, Rabbi Hendler, Hendel. Rav Hendel was the rav of the community of Chabad in Montreal. He was at the farbrengen. He got a message somehow from someone, an urgent message, that the situation with Rivka, the wife of Leibel, is very serious. She just went through surgery yesterday, the day before, on Tet Shvat. Today is Yud Shvat, and she developed a terrible situation where her life is now in danger because her, her, uh, her, her liver. Liver is a very important part of the body. Liver is what filters the blood. If the liver doesn't work, the person's gonna die. Her liver stopped working, and now she's in very serious danger that she may die. And

05:34 then he got another message saying that it's only a few hours before her neshamah is going to leave the body. She's gonna die soon. Reb Hendel found a way. It's the middle of the farbrengen, and Reb Peretz is sitting behind the Rebbe. So Reb Hendel, between the sichas when the Rebbe wasn't speaking, they were singing songs. He managed to get over to Reb Peretz and told him that the situation is very, very serious, and they only gave her a few hours to live. And, and, and, and he says to the Peretz, "Why are you quiet? Do something about it. Go to the Rebbe." And when the Peretz heard this, he was shaken, and he went over, got up from his seat, walked over to the Rebbe, and told the Rebbe the situation, that the doctors say that she's in a very, very serious situation, and that she's going to die in a few hours. He says the Rebbe didn't answer right away. He took a piece of cake from the table and put it in his own mouth and ate it. You know, the Rebbe always had lechach mezanus on the table by Farbrengen. In the beginning of Farbrengen, the Rebbe would drink a little wine, say l'chaim, have a-- first a piece of mezanus, and then l'chaim. As the Peretz between the Sikas came over and talked to the Rebbe, the Rebbe took a piece of mezanus, put it in his mouth, and chewed on it for a while, and thought, and didn't say

07:08 anything. And then he turned to the Peretz after a few minutes and said to him, "Here, you say l'chaim." He gave him from his cup some wine. He says, "You say l'chaim, and she will be well." The Rebbe gave a promise, "Ze ved zayn gezunt. She will be healthy again." And then he took a piece of cake from his plate and gave it to the Peretz and said to the Peretz, "You take this piece of cake, and when you get back to Montreal, you give it to her." Right? Like this will be a healing for her, a refuah. And the Peretz is thinking, what? In his head, he says, he writes in the letter, "I'm thinking in my head, what is the Rebbe saying? I should take this back to Montreal and give it to her? The doctor said she only has a few hours to live. It takes to get to Montreal eight hours. So how am I exactly gonna give her this piece of cake if she only is gonna live for a few hours?" And as I'm thinking that, immediately the Rebbe turns to me again and says to me, "Why is it her fault that you don't believe me?" The Rebbe knew in his head what the Peretz was thinking immediately, and right away told him, "It's not her fault that you don't believe me, because the brach of a tzadik, you have to believe, also have Emunah." But the Peretz was like questioning, "How is it possible that I'm gonna

08:43 bring her the cake and drive back to Montreal, which takes at least eight hours, and the Farbrengen is not even over yet? Uh, by the time I'm gonna get into the car to go to Montreal, it will be another few hours." And the doctor says she only has two, three hours to live. And the Rebbe immediately picked up his thought, Baruch Hakodesh, of course. And the Rebbe said to him, "No, no, no. It's not her fault that you don't believe me. That means she will, she will live, and she will be okay." The Peretz was like shocked that the Rebbe was able to read his thoughts. And he went back to Montreal, and they did the operation for the liver to work. It was successful. She lived many years. Maybe she's still alive. I don't know. But, uh, she had many kids a- she had several kids after that. And the Peretz explained a very interesting thing. Why is it that the Rebbe took a piece of cake first in his mouth and started chewing? At the moment he heard the news from the Peretz that his son's wife is in very, very serious danger, and the doctor says she's gonna die, the first thing the Rebbe did is take a piece of cake and put it in his own mouth and chewing on it and eating it. What was-- And then he turned to the Peretz and say, "She'll live, and she'll say l'chaim. Here's a piece of cake." Why did the Rebbe have

10:12 to eat the piece of cake first? And he says, it says in Sforim that the eating of a tzadik brings down berachos and hashot. A tzadik doesn't just eat because he feels like it, and it's fun, and it's a geshmak, and his tummy feels good, and his, uh, you know, it, it tastes good. No, a tzadik doesn't eat for these things because a tzadik doesn't have a desire for such things. Where when a tzadik eats, it's to serve Hashem. The eating of a tzadik is also serving Hashem. For us, we think when we daven, we serve Hashem. For a tzadik, when he davens, he serves Hashem, but when he eats food, he's also serving Hashem. And when he serves Hashem through eating, he brings down berachos and nisim for people that need help. Reb Nisan gets this letter from the Peretz, and he says to him, "I thank you for sharing this incredible story with me, which shows the great nisim that Hashem did with you and with your son and with your son's wife, and it reveals the great powers that the Rebbe has, that the Rebbe has godly powers from Hashem to perform miracles." And this is what the Alter Rebbe says in Tanya, that Hashem wanted to reveal that He is there in the world by having the tzadikim perform miracles, and that's the Rebbe. And, um, the Reb Nisan says, "I was extremely, um, excited when I heard the story, and I think you should publicize it because it's a mitzvah

11:52 to publicize a story like this so people see that Hashem makes miracles through tzadikim today too." And we all know, kinderlekh, that even after Gimmel Tammuz, the Rebbe continues to perform nisim. I can tell you nisim that I personally saw with my own eyes, incredible, after Gimmel Tammuz. So don't think for a moment that it was only before Gimmel Tammuz. I-- One day I will tell you more stories, and you will see how the Rebbe is continuously giving us nisim, berachos. We just need to be in touch with him, learn his Torah, and follow his mitzvos, his, his instructions, and Hashem will help us all to see nisim gluyim in everything. A gut yontif and a freilechen Yud Beis Tammuz.