5 Tishrei 5668 (September 13, 1907) – Passing of the Chassid Reb Mordechai Schneerson

00:00 Speaker 1 Yemei Chabad on the fifth day of Tishrei. Uh, this is in the year תרס"ח, which puts this, uh, hundred and, uh, whatever, hundred and now hundred and six years ago. Okay? It's hundred and six years ago. So it's somewhere like in... Uh?

00:22 Speaker 2 Nineteen oh six, nineteen oh seven.

00:23 Speaker 1 Yeah, something like that. Uh, that was the passing of the great genius, the great Chassid, Reb Mordechai Schneersohn. Um, this was the-- He was the son, as we mentioned several times, that Tzemach Tzedek had seven sons, and the oldest one of his sons was Reb Baruch Shalom. And we also, uh, went through the lineage that the Rebbe, okay, our Rebbe, he's a son after a son. He comes from the oldest son of the Tzemach Tzedek. His name was Reb Baruch Shalom. And Reb Baruch Shalom had a son whose name was Reb Mordechai, Reb Mordechai Schneersohn, and his yahrtzeit is on the fifth day of Tishrei, and he was the rabbi of the city of Vitebsk. Now, this is an interesting story about the Reb Mordechai. Uh, he was appointed as the rabbi of the city of Vitebsk while he was very young. And the following story is related that in the beginning, when he became the rabbi, he decided that there was a certain individual who was the shochet. He was one of the people that performed the ritual slaughtering of the animals. Now, by the way, a ritual slaughterer is required to be of outstanding religious, uh, behavior we expect from him because he is feeding everybody meat. Everybody eats from him, we rely on him. And something, a small mistake could render the meat not kosher, and then he would be supplying, uh, people with non-kosher food, and everybody's relying that he did the proper job. Same thing is also true with a

02:11 Speaker 1 scribe. A lot of times when a scribe writes the tefillin and the mezuzahs and they sell it, you have to be sure that what they're doing is precise because it's very hard to tell a lot of times. Well, we can check them over, but there are certain things that we can't even check, that we can't even tell about it. So it's very important that the person should be a reliable person and that the person should be somebody of stature that we can trust. But the rabbi, the new rabbi, was a young man, and he said that this particular shochet is no good, and he prohibited to eat from his shechita. He says, "Cannot." And this was an old established shochet who had a large family and had many supporters, and everybody was afraid of him. He was like a big shot in the city. And even the butchers of the city were all backing the, this, this shochet. But this new rabbi did not back down. He did not, uh, get scared, neither from the shochet or nor from his many supporters, and he ruled publicly that he cannot shecht. He cannot be anymore in that position of a ritual slaughterer. The shochet, he made fun of the rabbi's ruling. He continued to serve as a shochet. So when this Reb Mordechai saw that his words aren't being affected, they're not being listened to, so on Shabbos, he went to the Beit Knesset. There was a special shul in which the butchers davened over there,

03:51 Speaker 1 and that was the shul where that shochet also davened. So the rabbi was honored with an Aliyah. So the rabbi went over to the Torah, held the Torah with both of his hands, and he announced with a loud voice, he says, "With the power of the Torah and the power of my holy fathers, I am prohibiting for this shochet to be a shochet." That was in front of the shochet, in front of everybody over there. When he finished his words, he went down from the bimah, and he left the shul. Big, uh, tumult, uh, transpired over there, and the entire city was amazed of the, uh, rabbi's unyielding strength and how he publicly took on everybody. And at the end of the day, the rabbi was victorious. That shochet was forced, removed from his position. Now, this is, um, uh, something, especially nowadays, you know, everybody is afraid to take a stand, especially, you know, sometimes, you know, in a synagogue, in a shul in which there are powerful people, maybe sometimes people that contribute a lot, maybe sometimes people that have voiced their opinion, very opinionated. And the rabbi, uh, finds himself in a position, uh, that he doesn't wanna take on, and he doesn't wanna start up with some of the, uh, you know, powerful people. And he's, uh, he's, he's under-- sometimes they're under contract. He's afraid, he's afraid for his contract, for his livelihood. But that's not what a rabbi is supposed to be. A rabbi is supposed to be a

05:31 Speaker 1 servant of Hashem and lead the community and not be led by the community. And when the rabbi sees something done-

05:38 Speaker 2 I've seen that a couple times.

05:40 Speaker 1 It's very important. But you know what? At the end of the day, I think even though there may be a short-term fallout sometimes, but at, at, at the end, the respect and the admiration for the rabbi, as in that case, that only increases, only grows. I mean, it-- sometimes it's hard to judge, and we don't see it that way immediately. But at the end of the day, if you do take a stand, and you do stand up for what's right, and the rabbi does do what is halachically required of him... And one of the verses, uh, beginning verses of the, uh, elementary, uh, instructions for a rabbi is lo yira miguefnei ish, not to be afraid of any person because judgment belongs to God, and therefore you gotta do what God wants and not, uh, be afraid of people. But it's easier said than done. You know, a lot of times it takes a lot of inner strength and a lot of, uh, uh, you know, to be able to, to do what's right. But this is an inspiration, something that we see that took place.