27 of Kislev

00:00 And this is the twenty-seventh day of Kislev, which is the third day of Hanukkah. The twenty-seventh day, you know, Hanukkah starts the twenty-fifth of Kislev, so that the twenty-seventh of Kislev is the third day of Hanukkah. This is in the year Taf Kuf, uh, Samech Alef. Um, this corresponds to the... It was a Sunday, December fourteenth, 1800. Okay? So that was the day that the Alter Rebbe was released from prison a second time. Uh, basically two years earlier when we had the big celebration of Yut As Kislev, that's one thing. But then we have again, we have, um, the celebration of the, uh, twenty-seventh day of Kislev, which is the time when he went out of prison the second time. Now, there was a little bit of a, of a difference. The Rebbe writes-- I just want to say to you, there is actually another view, um, that says that the Rebbe went out on the fifth day of Kislev. There's like a s- a dispute over there, and according to the Rebbe, it's both true. There was a certain sense of, I guess, redemption that took place at the twenty-seventh day of Kislev, and there's something that took place two days later on the twenty-ninth day of Kislev. Um, and, um, the Rebbe seems to imply that maybe he wasn't fully at that time, maybe something else could have been, they were both had to do somehow both of these dates. But the more accepted date, uh, is we go by the third day

01:36 of, of Kislev. And the, um, previous Rebbe writes that for two months, um, that is from the twenty-eighth day of Tishri till the twenty-seventh day of Kislev, um, the Rebbe was put in the Tiny Sovet. Tiny means-- Tiny Sovet means a small Soviet. It's not as severe as we had experienced two years before that. Uh, there he was in a, in a fortress, and it was in a-- where they held, uh, some serious, uh, offenders of, you know, people that were really a threat. Um, and that was a very, uh, a much more difficult, uh, situation. On this case, he was in a, um, basically in the offices. It was like a holding cell- Right ... in the Tiny Sovet, and there were more than twenty groups of, uh, uh, I guess, uh, officials and the scholars and, uh, of various kinds of philosophers, um, that participated in, um, trying to investigate the Jewish religion and the Kabbalah and the Jewish history, um, during the time when there was a Jewish court, when there was the Sanhedrin. And they had an interest to see, uh, how, you know, the Alter Rebbe's, uh, teaching, uh, fits in with that because as we will see, the, um, part of the complaints of the, um, the slander of the Rebbe was that he was sort of changing, and he was leading the Jewish people away from the- Different direction ... in another direction. Um, they, um, all these, um, investigations- Connects to the Rebbe ... uh, took, uh,

03:32 took place in the-- one of the rooms that were in the Tiny Sovet. And the Alter Rebbe would occasionally answer in Russian. He would answer them in Russian. Sometimes he would answer in Russian Kodesh. And his son, Reb Meir-- Reb Moshe, I'm sorry, he would translate what the Alter Rebbe said into Russian. And he would-- he was a very, uh, great intellectual, his son, and he also spoke many languages, as we learned. And he would, uh, articulate, and he would elaborate, and he would give explanations of the words of his father, of course, with the, uh, a fitting explanation with his father's approval. So what happened is, when they ended the Rebbe's investigation, and they, uh, looked into all these different things, so that was already on Sunday, as mentioned before, the twenty-seventh day of Kislev, and it was the third night of Hanukkah. And then the Rebbe got permission to move into a private residence. Um, but he was instructed that he must remain in the city of Petersburg. He's free to live where he wants, but he still has to lay his city in Petersburg. The officers and the, the, the officials recognized that the Alter Rebbe is a tremendous organizer, tremendous leader, and that it-- the majority of the Jews, uh, are actually following and, uh, going after the teaching of the Hasidim and their leaders in all of the Russian country. And the influence of the Alter Rebbe is also on the leaders of the other Hasidic groups, is, uh, very,

05:27 uh, prominent. And the Tsar, Pavel was the Tsar, he agreed to the suggestion of the, uh, officials of the government to totally free the Alter Rebbe, to allow him to conduct himself with the full, uh, tradition, uh, that the, uh, Alter Rebbe has organized as in the beginning. But one thing, he had one restriction, that he should temporarily remain in Petersburg. So the Alter Rebbe went over to a private home in Petersburg, and of course, the Jewish and the Hasidic community were overjoyed with the, again, with the, uh, exoneration, you know, getting the Alter Rebbe, uh, freed and, uh, free to do. Now, the Rebbe, previous Rebbe writes in one of his letters that on the-- after the second time in the year תכ"א, there was a tremendous victory for the teaching of Hasidus and the, uh, Hasidic customs with more force and with more power than even the first time. But the difference was that in the first time, it was really, uh, imprisonment, and he went out from, basically from imprisonment. He was incarcerated, whereas the second time, he did not sit in a prison. Yeah. And he was just in, in, um... There was also another difference in where the first time around, two years before that, the main slandering was as it relates to the Alter Rebbe himself. They said that he wants to become a king, the Jewish people, that he's gathering people, uh, to around himself. He wants to rebel against the government. He's trying to set up his

07:21 own thing. But in the second time, in תכ"א, it was mainly on the teaching of Hasidus. They took from the Magnim- What we learned that eventually... Yeah, I'm sorry. Was it the Magnim twice that kind of- Yeah, they were always involved in trying to get the Rebbe, uh, in trouble, the Alter Rebbe in trouble. Now, the, um, the, um, the end was that there was another person who was friendly with the Alter Rebbe. He convinced the government that if the Rebbe is going to move to his area, uh, so then the, the Rebbe would be able to be free, uh, to do, you know, as he, as he wanted, then the Alter, the Alter Rebbe moved, and that started a whole new period of, of the expansion of Hasidus with Alter Rebbe because there was a new, whole new, um... They treated him very well, and they were able to, to, um, to really develop in a, in a much stronger way. As I said before that, the other date would be, uh, the twenty-ninth day of, uh, of Kislev would be, um, um... Today is, of course, is Rosh Chodesh, you know, and that's the reason why we have this gathering, uh, of all the Rebbe's Shluchim on the, uh, Rosh Chodesh was, as I mentioned, that on Rosh Chodesh, uh, Kislev was the day that the Rebbe went home, uh, after not feeling well and suffering a, uh, uh, an incident during Simchas Torah, Shemini Atzeret in the schul. Uh, the Rebbe recovered,

08:57 um, in his room. They brought in all the equipment necessary. It was like a whole, uh, a hospital, like a field hospital. Right. And there was a lot of, um, a lot of anxiety, and there was a lot of concern, and there was a small period of time that the Rebbe was sort of unconscious, and there was a whole big debate between the, uh, doctors and the, uh, attendants that took care of the Rebbe. And, um, the doctors sort of were saying that there is no way they can give the Rebbe the full medical, uh, care in the room over there, notwithstanding all the equipment and everything that they can bring, but there's nothing like a- Hospital ...hospital where you have everything there. And, uh, but the Rebbe before, I guess, the Rebbe lost consciousness, he- Expressed ...said that he-- expressed his wishes that he doesn't want to go to the hospital, that everything that could be done could be done in the room over there. But in that dire moments when it seemed like very, very, uh, dangerous, like it was beyond, and there was a whole debate, you know, what do you do? Do you take, do you take the Rebbe and then, you know, against, you know, against his wishes, you know? And, uh, and they went and they asked the Rebbe- the Rebbets and the Rebbe's wife what to do. And, um, of course, you know, because the Rebbe would give everybody medical advice also, even though the Rebbe wasn't a

10:37 doctor, that wasn't his profession, but yet the Rebbe would give very sound and very, um, you know, reliable, uh, information, people that seek the Rebbe's guidance. And they said that the Rebbe's, uh, wishes should be-- that overrode. The Rebbe's wishes should be, uh, listened to, and Baruch Hashem, uh, everything worked out at the end. Now, we can only imagine, you know, if they didn't listen to the Rebbe, and we don't know how things would play out, you know. It-- But it took a tremendous amount of, of courage of some of the people there to defy, and the doctor's opinion or... And some doctors just said, "If that's the attitude, we're out of here, you know, because we're, we're scientists, and we're-- follow the medical science." Right. We're not- "And we don't believe in any supernatural things or any Rebbe things or things like that. We gotta go by the books, you know, and if this doesn't go by the books." But fortunately, there were enough that had, uh, more faith in the Rebbe and in the Rebbe's, uh, a-abilities and the Rebbe's instruction, and they listened to the Rebbe. And generally, the Rebbe said in, in medicine, and I think that that's something which the medical science will agree to, that a lot of the person's recovery and health depends on feeling- Psychological ...psychological. The person should feel good. If you put a person in a position where he doesn't wanna be, that could have a negative actually effect on his, on his recovery and

12:13 on his, his... And, uh, doing something that goes against the wishes of the person may actually cause the person to become more, uh- Ill ... more ill. Now, in this case, the Rebbe stayed in his room, and for the first time that he was able to leave, that was on Rosh Chodesh, uh, Kislev. That was the Rosh Chodesh Kislev. So we're going-- Today we're talking about the end of Kislev, the freedom of the Alter Rebbe which took place on the twenty-seventh day of Kislev. But the Rebbe- But the first-- the beginning of the month is Rosh Chodesh Kislev. It's Rebbe- And somehow the beginning and the ends are connected. So- Two celebrations ... so the whole month... There's more than two, by the way. We learn about a lot of celebrations. But somehow the month of Kislev has to do with the general redemption from the entire, uh, uh, Hasidic sort of in various different years and different stages. It looks like that the month of Kislev, on the twenty-seventh day of Kislev, of course, is still middle of Hanukkah, and Hanukkah lapses over into the month of Teves for several days because we have eight days of Hanukkah. Um, so that's, um, part of the, I guess, the general celebration of the month of, of Kislev. And, um, I guess that one of the, um, most important things that we learn from all these things is that the Hasidis, um, showed that there is something, there's a deeper layer than what's on the revealed.

13:50 Hasidis is the inner part. So that means you have, uh, something which you look at as it is in the surface. You know, you just look at it, and you see what you see with your eyes, but- Deeper ... but there's something more than what your eyes, what your eyes can see. That's what Hasidis reveals the insight. So in every aspect of it, uh, it reveals something deeper. And, you know, the Rebbe's work was mainly to reveal the deeper part in every, in every one of us that we have that extra depth, and we just gotta sort of scratch it and look for it and reveal it and bring it up. And, uh, so to actually bring it out in some practical, uh, not just a feel-good kind of thing of, uh, you know, it makes me feel good or not, but to do a mitzvah. And every mitzvah has the power to draw another mitzvah, as we see that one mitzvah grows another mitzvah. I once heard the Rebbe saying, and once read actually in a letter of the Rebbe, Rebbe says, you know, sometimes, you know, like I mentioned earlier, uh, you ask somebody to do a mitzvah. He says, "Don't bother me," you know. "Get away," you know. And sometimes, you know, in America, we have an expression, you know, mind your own business, you know. I mean, uh, sometimes, you know, the people go on the streets, you know, with the mitzvah tanks. Yeah. And then they will say, "Are you

15:11 Jewish? Uh, did you put on tefillin?" And sometimes you'd get a response, "None of your business," you know, or something, uh, something like that. "What do you care?" But... And, and, and the Rebbe said, very interesting, is, you know, that sometimes, you know, a person is very fast asleep. And then there-- the house is on fire. And then you come and you try to wake him up, and he says, "Wait a minute." He says, "I'm sleeping. I'm having beautiful dreams. I'm in La La Land. I don't wanna be woken up." But you know what? When you wake him up and you save his life, eventually he will thank you, even though right then he doesn't wanna be woken up. It might be He wants... Yeah. So a lot of these Jews or a lot of situations where people didn't wanna be shaken up. They wanted to stay where they are, left alone, you know. "Don't bother me." But eventually, they will not know how to thank you enough how to... The-- So the... Told a story yesterday about this rabbi in a university who, um, who unfortunately, the, the woman, she married, she married out of the faith. She married somebody non-Jewish. And then she was-- Unfortunately, she got ill. And she was, she, she had a, just a very little time, and she was going to die. So she asked her husband, her non-Jewish husband, she asked her husband to... She asked to see the rabbi. She wants to see the rabbi. So the

16:39 rabbi comes down and, you know, the Chabad rabbi comes down, and the woman says to him, "Look, you know what? I have one, one big concern of mine before I'm going to die, but I have one big concern. You know, my son, he's gonna be in two years from now, he's eleven years old. He needs to be bar mitzvah." She says, "I want you to promise me that you're gonna make him a bar mitzvah because his father is, is not Jewish, and he's not, he's not gonna make him a bar mitzvah." So anyways, so she goes ahead, and then next day or so, unfortunately, she dies. So he calls up the father, the, the shaliach calls up the father, and he tells his father, um, about what is... This was not next day. This was like a year, like a year before the bar mitzvah. He remembered, so he calls up the father and he says, "Listen, this was your wife's last wishes that she called me," you know, or he was there. He knew what she wanted. And he says that, "I need to start studying with your son for his bar mitzvah." And he said, "Listen," he says, "I'm very, very sorry," he says, "but the-- I married another woman now who's Ca- who's not Jewish. And I'm not Jewish. We practice nothing in our home. Our, our kid is growing up in a home which has no relevance or no connection to Judaism at all. There's no point in making a bar

18:03 mitzvah." He says, "Sorry, you know, I'd love to, but this just doesn't fit in the..." Okay. So Hanukkah, he didn't know what to say exactly at that moment. But then later on, he calls him back and he says to him, "Listen." He says, "I want you to tell me now, your kid is gonna grow older, and he's gonna go to college, and he's gonna come back home. He's gonna knock on my door," the rabbi says. You know, "And your kid is gonna tell me, he's gonna say, 'I know that my mother told you that before she died, that you should see to it that you're gonna teach my son bar mitzvah.'" So he's saying to this, to the father, he's saying to him, "You tell me, what am I gonna tell your son? What am I gonna tell him?" And, you know, and he realized. He says, "You know what? You're right." And then they, um, made him a bar mitzvah. And you know, of course, and on his bar mitzvah, he was like, uh, very elated, you know, and elated that, you know, that, that... And we don't know the end of the story yet. Could be whatever. You know, the end of the story is, uh, the... But shows you that, um, you know, what is a woman before she's dying, she-- even though she married out of the faith and she's- Yeah ... what was concerned her is that her kid should have a bar mitzvah. You know, that means-- shows a

19:26 tremendous amount of, that the root of one's Yiddishkeit, notwithstanding the fact that on the surface, they may not practice it, or they may not even acknowledge it, that it's there. No way. It's deep down, and when it comes to a moment of a test, that comes out, and she says what she's concerned before she dies and nothing else, she wants to make sure that her son has a bar mitzvah. So you know, but that's really there all the time. So that's why we gotta keep on banging on doors. And you know, and hopefully that we can make a difference and make this world a better place.