127. Reb Pinchos Koritzer Sacrifices His Little Son To Save The Jewish People

00:01 Kinnalach this week was Zayin Cheshvan. It's, uh, was a y-- it's a special day for many reasons, but also it was a Yahrtzeit of a very famous Rav. His name was Rabbi Meir Shapira, the Rav of Lublin, who founded a very famous yeshiva, Yeshivas Chachmei Lublin, it's called, and for many other reasons he's famous. He was a big gaon and a big Rosh Yeshiva, and he had many, many great talmid and talmidim. Each one of the talmidim were also big talmidi chachamim. And but he-- Rabbi Meir Shapira didn't live very long. He lived into his 40s. Then he got very sick suddenly, and within a few days he passed away. Rabbi Meir Shapira was always happy, always Simcha. No matter how difficult times were, he was always Simcha. Even on the day when he passed away, his talmidim came to stay next to him, next to his bed. He wrote a little note because he couldn't speak. As he wrote it on a note, "Please say l'chaim and dance around my bed." He want them to dance with a Simcha. Now, why did he have the Simcha? What was his big deal with Simcha? Why was Rabbi Meir Shapira so Simcha? So there's a very interesting story behind it, and that's the story I'm going to share with you. Rabbi Meir Shapira was a descendant of the very famous tzadik, Talmud of the Baal Shem Tov, Reb Pinchas Koritzer. Reb Pinchas is the Pinchas Shapiro, right? The same last name as Rabbi Meir Shapira. Rabbi

01:39 Meir Shapira was a direct descendant, father to son, all the way to Reb Pinchas Koritzer. Reb Pinchas Koritzer had one of his sons was Meir. Meir was the ances-- the great-grandfather of Rabbi Meir Shapira. Rabbi Meir Shapira was named after him. The story goes like this. Once in, um, Poland and Russia, there was a huge epidemic. Many, many people died. Men, women, children. It was terrible, terrible. It kept spreading. It kept killing more and more people every day. People s-s-started panicking and very scared. And many of the Jews surrounding the cities of Koritz came to Reb, Reb Pinchas. They came crying to him and saying, "Rebbe, help us. Daven for us. People are dying." Reb Pinchas tried. He davened. He said Tehillim. Um, he was a... Had the Ruach Hakodesh, so he could see what goes on in Shamayim. And he tried very hard to take away the terrible gezera, the terrible decree against the people. And so he tried. He davened, davened. We see that nothing he does worked. His tefillahs didn't work, and no matter what he tried to do, it didn't work. And he was very, um, very upset about it. He didn't know what to do. The people were crying every day, and his heart was aching. He, he felt so broken inside that he can't help the people. So one day he said, "You know what? I'm gonna do something crazy." He opened the Tehillim and said some Tehillim and cried and said, "Hashem, I have a son. His name

03:40 is Meir." Now, this son, Meir, was al-- like his most beloved son. He loved his son very much. He, he even hinted that this son will be the next Rebbe after him. He will take over. He thought that Meir was a very special neshamah. That was like almost like they say, the apple of his eye. That means it was like very... He loved him so much, like he thought about him the whole time. Very close to his father. So Reb Pinchas Koritzer said to the Ribish, "Hashem... Listen, Hashem, I, I can't seem to destroy the gezera and people are dying. I, I will give you my son. Take my son, Meir, away, and that should be a kapara for the whole Jewish people, and the gezera should, should go away." In other words, Reb Meir-- Reb, Reb, Reb Pinchas Koritzer was willing to give up his son, so his son would pass away, his most beloved son that he loved so dearly, only to protect and save the Jewish people from this terrible, terrible epidemic, the magefa, that killed thousands and thousands of people every day. And as soon as Reb Pinchas said that, the magefa stopped. And his son, Meir, got very, very sick the next day. He got very, very sick. And he got sicker and sicker every day. It looked like the doctors couldn't help him. They said that he's gonna die. When people heard what had happened, that Reb Pinchas Koritzer gave his child away to Hashem, uh, as a kapara

05:43 for all the other Jews, so the magefa would stop. So they realized the terrible thing that had happened, that Reb Pinchas Koritzer is gonna lose his precious, precious son that he loved so much because he wanted to save their lives of all the Jewish people. So they came running to him, says, "Rebbe, Rebbe, Rebbe, no, don't worry about it. We-- Let the magefa be. We don't want you to lose your son." It's too much of a price to pay to lose your, your special son, Meir. And Meir says, "No, no, don't worry, don't worry. I, I, I wanna, I wanna protect the Jewish people. I wanna make sure that the Gezeirah doesn't come back. Let Hashem do what He does." So people cried to him, says, "No, we don't want any more people..." Thousands of people kept coming to his door and says, "Rebbe, no, no, no. We're, we're, we're, we're forgetting, forget-- We're, we're, we don't care anymore about the Magefah. You can let it-- it can happen again, let it come back, but please don't let your son die. We know how special he is to you." Reb Meir, uh, Reb Pinchas' heart was, like, squeezed. He felt such pain in his heart, he didn't know what to do. Here the people are crying to him to please, please save his son, and not to let his son die for the sake of other people. They are willing that they should die from the Magefah rather than that his son should die. They

07:03 cared so much about their Rebbe. Reb Pinchas' heart was, like, squeezed. He didn't know what to do. So finally, he opened up the Aron Kodesh in the shul and started crying in front of the Sefer Torah. Says, "Rebbeinishe Leolam, Hashem, You know that I gave my son wholeheartedly, with all my heart, I gave him away to You as a kaparah, as a forgiveness for all the Jewish people so they wouldn't die anymore. What can I do that people don't want me to do it? People are gonna be so heartbroken if they see my son die. I don't know what to tell them. Hashem, look at the pain of the people. They're so upset, they're crying. They don't want my son to die. Please save my son." And so within a few days, Meir started getting better. Instead of getting worse, he started getting better, better and better till he became healthy. He became later a famous Rav, the Rav of Shpativka, and Rebbe Meir Shapiro was his descendant. Rebbe Meir Shapiro would say always, "My great-great-great-grandfather, Reb Meir, the son of Reb Pinchas Koritzer, his whole life was given to him as a present by Hashem. He wasn't supposed to live, 'cause he was supposed to die instead of the Magefah, of the, of the epidemic. But then Hashem gave it to him, his life anyways. So his life was a gift." So Rebbe Meir Shapiro said, "My life is also a gift." 'Cause if he, Meir, my great-great-great-grandfather, wouldn't have lived, he would have

08:56 died when he was six, the way he was supposed to. He almost died when he was six. If he had died then, I wouldn't have-- I wouldn't be alive. So I'm alive because he got a free years of life as a special gift for free, which he wasn't deserved, he wasn't supposed to have it. And therefore, I have all my years for free, therefore I'm B'simcha. Can a person not be B'simcha when you know your whole life is given to you for free? Given to you as a gift, as a present." And that is the reason Rebbe Meir was always happy.