181. The Robbers That Tried To Kill A Chossid Of The Alter Rebbe

00:15 The Alter Rebbe had a Hasid by the name Reb Yossel the Maggid. Reb Yossel the Maggid was sent by the Alter Rebbe to go collect money from different towns to help support the community of Hasidim in R- in Eretz Yisrael. As you know, the Reb Mendel, Horodoker, who was the Talmud of the Maggid and also a Rebbe of the Alter Rebbe, moved with, uh, with many of his Hasidim to Tiberias, and, um, they needed support. They needed money. There was no money there. So Alter Rebbe would send a lot of money, and he sent Reb Yossel the Maggid to rai- to raise money, and he would send them around from city to city. He would travel to foreign places, all over Russia and Poland and, and raise money for, for the Hasidim in, in Eretz Yisrael. Reb Yossel the Maggid would always have a lot of money with him because he always raised money, and he would travel, and so he would collect a lot of money, and he was very worried because to carry money, so much money with you, um, ganavim, that's what they're looking for. They're looking for someone with a lot of money. And sometimes they kill the person to get t- to steal their money. He was very worried about carrying so much money because he's putting himself in danger. So the Alter Rebbe told him that he must... When he travels, he should go and collect money. He shouldn't be afraid, but he should avoid one thing. When he

01:52 sees a house where the door, the entrance to the house is on the Mizrach side, the east side of the house, that's a house he should never enter. He shouldn't go in and shouldn't, for sure, shouldn't stay over there. And if he does that, everything will be fine. He shouldn't worry about, you know, people stealing his money or they're killing him. So he traveled and traveled. Once, it was a time of winter, it was a blizzard. There was snow coming down, heavy snow, and Reb Yossel, Reb Yossel was traveling in the forest. And when there's a lot of snow in the forest and it's dark, it's very hard to travel. First of all, you get lost because you can't see the road, because it's covered with snow, and it's dark in middle of the forest. So Reb Yossel got very scared because he didn't know what to do. He's in the middle of a forest and it's snowing t-terribly, and it's very hard to have the horses and the wagon travel in such deep snow. Finally, he sees from a distance a little light in the middle of the forest. He gets closer there and he sees there's a house and there's light coming out of the house. Uh, he knocks on the door and an older man, um, I think it was a Jew, it was a Yid, who invited him into, to the house. And the man was very, very nice to him and took care of him and gave him a warm

03:32 place near the stove and offered him some hot water to warm himself and told him, "You know, why don't you stay here overnight? And tomorrow, um, I'll show you the way how to get out of the forest. Hopefully, the storm and the snow will stop in the morning." Nu, so Reb Yossel, Reb Yossel the, the Maggid was very happy, and, um, before he went to sleep, he wanted to daven Maariv. And he's looking Maariv, davening Mizrach, he sees, oi, the, the, the door of this house is in the Mizrach, on the east side of the house. And he remembered Alter Rebbe warned him never to go into a house where the door is on the Mizrach. But what is he gonna do now? He can't go out. It's a blizzard outside. It's snowing like crazy. And, and if he's traveling, he's gonna get stuck in the snow. So he didn't know what to do, but he knew this is a dangerous thing. Alter Rebbe warned him not to go into such a house. So he didn't know what to do. He's thinking maybe he should go to sleep and try to leave in the morning. But what can he do? Suddenly, he hears a no-- a commotion downstairs. The owner of the house, the old man, had four sons. They were gangsters. They were robbers. They were killers. That's what they did. They would go out in the forest and catch people, kill them, and steal their money. So here's the four sons coming in,

05:12 and they already saw that there's a guest in the house because they saw the horse and the wagon of Reb Yossel outside, and one of them calls out, "Ah, we caught a fat fish. That's, uh, Reb Yossel." That means somebody that has a lot of money, and then we, we can, uh, you know, take good care of him. We're gonna kill him and steal his money. Reb Yossel hears this, and he gets terrified. Finally, the sons get to him and said, "Okay, Reb Yossel, where's your money? And, uh, get ready because we're gonna kill you." Reb Yossel asked them a favor. He said, "Listen, I beg you, before you kill me, let me daven first and let me say do teshuva and daven to Hashem, so Hashem should forgive me for all my averes, and then you can do whatever you want with me." And so they said, "Sure, no problem." Reb Yosele starts davening. Davens mehrev, and he cries, priyas, priyas. And then he does-- he says Vidui, which is the prayer you say before a person dies, where you ask Hashem forgiveness for all the aveiras. And he cries, and he davens, and he davens. Finally, he's finished, like late, late, almost early morning, he was finished with all his davening. So he's waiting for them to come. He sees they're not there. So he goes down and says... He says they all fell asleep. All four sons fell into a deep sleep. They were exhausted. They were waiting for Reb Yosele to

06:44 finish davening, but in the meantime, they sat down. Since they were very tired, they just all collapsed and fell in a deep sleep. But the father was awake, and the father had rachmanus on Reb Yosele, and he said to him, "Rebbe, I think you should leave now before they wake up. Leave now the house, and I'll pretend that I don't know what happened to you. You probably slipped out without me seeing, and you ran away, but I'm telling you, go. This is the direction to the city. Go straight right away. Take your horse and buggy and leave. Leave before they wake up." And that's what he did. Reb Yosele went onto his wagon quickly and whipped the horses and left as quickly as he could, and he went straight to the Yosne, to the Alter Rebbe. When he came to the Alter Rebbe, Alter Rebbe was upset with him and said to him, "I don't understand. You didn't listen to what I told you." Alter Rebbe told him it's the hamazal. You're lucky I was up all night trying to watch over you, that they shouldn't be able to harm you. And that shows that you have to listen. When the Rebbe tells you what to do, you gotta do it exactly the way he tells you.