My family moved to Crown Heights when I was five years old, and from that point on, pretty much everything revolved around the Rebbe. We prayed with the Rebbe in 770, attended his farbrengens, and included him in our personal events. If someone was celebrating a bar mitzvah or a wedding, they would give a bottle of spirits to the Rebbe’s secretaries on Friday. Then at the farbrengen on Shabbat, the Rebbe would call them over, mix some of his wine into the bottle and hand it over to them, so it could be used at the event, while giving them a blessing. If it was within the week after a wedding, the traditional Sheva Brachot blessings would also be recited at the farbrengen, in honor of the new couple.

Click here for full-color print version

At some point, however, maybe because the community got too big, people stopped handing in those bottles, and having the Sheva Brachot at a farbrengen became less common as well.

My wife Ella and I got married in 1983, the day after Yom Kippur. The following day we were scheduled to have a celebratory Sheva Brachot meal at a restaurant.

That day, Rabbi Hodakov, the Rebbe’s secretary, called my father-in-law, Reb Hirshel Chitrik, with an inquiry: The Rebbe, he said, wanted to make a farbrengen that night; would we be okay with holding our Sheva Brochot at the farbrengen? This was totally unexpected but of course the answer was yes. So, we finished up our meal at the restaurant earlier than planned and then we all rushed over to 770 to make it to the farbrengen on time.

Towards the end of the farbrengen, the Rebbe introduced the Sheva Brachot with an explanation. He began by referring to the great merit involved in participating in a wedding celebration, and then said, “Since last night – for certain reasons which I was involved in – some people were unable to participate in a wedding taking place then, we should have the Sheva Brachot here.”

My wife’s grandfather, Rabbi Yehuda Chitrik, then recited all seven of the traditional blessings, while I stood right near the Rebbe. It turned out that there was another couple getting married that night, and so they also had their Sheva Brachot after we did. It was an amazing experience, especially since in those days it wasn’t really done anymore. (more…)

When the Previous Lubavitcher Rebbe escaped from Warsaw in 1940, he was forced to leave his precious collection of books behind. Part of the library was rescued the following year, but the rest of it was lost for the next few decades. In 1977, a large portion of the books was discovered in a museum in Warsaw, and they were redeemed and brought to America.

Click here for full-color print version

A few months later, the Rebbe declared his intention to create an institution to publish and distribute the manuscripts of chasidic texts contained in the collection, and called for volunteers to get involved.

One of these manuscripts was a Tanya, the basis work of Chabad philosophy, authored by Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Liadi, also known as the Alter Rebbe. Only this manuscript of the Tanya was different from the printed version we have; it was the first draft of the Tanya.

At that time, I was working for Vaad L’Hafotzas Sichos, transcribing, editing and publishing the Rebbe’s talks. Over the next couple years, a few items from the collection began to see the light of day, and then, in the second half of 1981, the Rebbe wrote to the Vaad that we should undertake to print this original draft of the Tanya. (more…)

My father was a wanted man in the Soviet Union. In 1936, after years of narrowly evading arrest for the crime of promoting Jewish observance, he fled and arrived in Israel. He settled in Ramat Gan, where he helped found the “Sukkat Shalom” synagogue and served as its rabbi. When he passed in 1960, his will included a request that I be chosen as his successor. I was only eighteen and a half years old at the time, shortly after receiving rabbinic ordination from a few prominent Israeli rabbis, among them Rabbi Shlomo Zevin.

Click here for full-color print version

About three months later, I received a letter from the Rebbe, in which he expressed his condolences and support to myself and the rest of my family. I also heard from others that the Rebbe would ask about our welfare during those years, showing particular concern for my younger unmarried sisters.

In that same letter, the Rebbe encouraged me to keep the Chabad traditions of our shul; most of the congregants at that time were not Chabad chassidim, and had asked to omit the recital of the Tachanun prayer from Mincha, the daily afternoon service, as per the Sefard prayer rite. In this context, the Rebbe spoke of the special quality of Mincha, which made it an especially opportune time for the recitation of the Tachanun.

Beyond the customs of our shul, the Rebbe also took a keen interest in my official election to succeed my father as the rabbi of his synagogue, and he even worked behind the scenes to help in that regard. In several letters to Rabbi Zevin from that period, the Rebbe urged him to exert “all of his influence, with the utmost energy and strength,” toward this end.

Just before Rosh Hashanah of that year, my appointment was made official. Despite the many pressing matters weighing on him, the Rebbe took time out of his schedule on the day before Rosh Hashanah to write to the legendary mayor of Ramat Gan, Mr. Avraham Krinitzi, to personally thank him for the decisive role he played in my appointment. (more…)

There are two kinds of moshavim – Israeli agricultural settlements. A small portion of them were founded before the State of Israel by non-observant Jews; the majority, however, were founded by religious immigrants from Arab countries or by Romanian and Hungarian Jews, after 1948

Click here for full-color print version

For many years, I have served as the rabbi of the Moshavim Movement, an organization once associated with the non-religious Mapai party that helped found many of these settlements in Israel. While the religious Zionist HaPoel HaMizrachi helped found perhaps 70 settlements, there are 270 Mapai moshavim. In the early days, the difference between these two groups was that the religious Zionist ones didn’t have enough money, but they did have synagogues and Torah scrolls. Meanwhile, the Mapai moshavim had more money, but not enough synagogues and not enough Torah scrolls.

So, in approximately 1960, I went to America, where there were many defunct synagogues, to collect some of their Torah scrolls for the moshavim. At the time, I was also involved with the Histadrut, Israel’s main labor union, as well as the editor of Machanayim, a magazine published by the IDF chaplaincy.

When my brother, Pinchas Peli, heard about my trip, he arranged for Rabbi Berel Levy to come pick me up from the airport. “You’re coming to my house for dinner,” Berel told me, “and then we are going out. I’ve arranged an audience for you with the Rebbe.”

That is how, just a few hours after my arrival, I came to 770, and at about 2:30 AM I went into the Rebbe’s room.

“You are Rabbi Menachem Hacohen?” asked the Rebbe. “I thought there were a few of you: One of them is the editor, one of them the Histadrut rabbi, and another the author!” (more…)

I was a child of the Depression, born in 1933, to a non-Orthodox household in New York. I attended medical school and went on to work at several hospitals throughout the city, becoming chief resident in general surgery at Mount Sinai Hospital in Manhattan, as well as in academic surgery and private practice.

Click here for full-color print version

My connection with the Rebbe began in 1954 after my engagement to my wife Gladys – her grandfather was Rabbi Menachem Mendel Cunin, a prominent chasid, and her parents were close with the Rebbe’s family. Being exposed to the world of Chabad, and the Rebbe in particular, was quite a revelation.

Gladys and I would join her parents to visit the Rebbe’s wife, Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, and eventually I met the Rebbe independently. There were several occasions where I met him on the sidewalk and we stopped to talk. Later on, there were many times when the Rebbe, through his secretary or an invitation to his office, would question me on various medical matters that people had presented to him.

When my office was in downtown Brooklyn, the Rebbetzin would call to invite me over for cake and tea in the afternoon, if I wasn’t busy. The Rebbetzin’s cakes, I have to say, were a treasure; I know they were store-bought, but I have yet to find the store that made them. One afternoon, time flew by, and I was probably there for close to two hours. As I was getting ready to leave, she said, “My husband is coming home,” which I took as a cue to make my exit. (more…)

This story is an excerpt from the book My Story 2: Lives Changed. Get your copy today at www.jemstore.com.

My story begins at the University of Maryland, where I was studying engineering and where I was first introduced to Chabad. Although my parents weren’t religious, I had grown up in a traditional Jewish atmosphere, and I had gravitated to other Jews at the university, occasionally participating in Hillel House programs. It was there, in 1964, that two graduate students named Larry Levine and Joel Sinsky suggested that I explore Chabad.

Click here for full-color print version

I had no idea what Chabad was, what Lubavitch was, but I felt very empty inside – something within me was yearning to be satisfied – and I followed their suggestion to go to New York for Shavuot, when we celebrate receiving the Torah at Mount Sinai. Arriving at the Chabad Headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway, I sensed the excitement in the air, as though it was only ten minutes ago that G-d gave the Torah to the Children of Israel.

I was warmly welcomed in the home of Rabbi Yossel Goldstein, where I spent the holiday. I found it to be an amazing experience. I remember sitting at the holiday table while Rabbi Goldstein spoke words of Torah and feeling that something very mystical was going on. He said that every soul comes down into this world with a mission to fulfill, and wherever you find yourself is not an accident, but an act of Divine Providence – you are supposed to be right there. (more…)

I was born in Poland, in 1929, into a family connected to the Belz and Dinov chasidic courts. When the war broke out, I was ten years old, and on the same day the Germans invaded, we were expelled into the Soviet Union, and eventually wound up in Irkutsk, deep in the frozen Siberian taiga.

Click here for full-color print version

One day, a young bearded man appeared at the door of our home, to propose that I join an underground yeshivah. My parents, who did all they could to provide their children with a Torah education, even under those trying circumstances, leapt at the opportunity. That young fellow was a Chabad chasid.

Eventually after the war, we emigrated to Israel in 1950. There, I became reacquainted with Chabad, attending a Tanya class as a young man. After my military service, I went into journalism and again encountered Chabad, when I got to know Reb Berke Wolf, who served brilliantly as the movement’s spokesman in Israel.

In 1971 I visited the United States, still working as a journalist, but under the auspices of the Israeli foreign ministry, and put in a request to make a stop at Chabad headquarters.

Arriving at 770 at the appointed hour, I was informed by the Rebbe’s secretary that a quarter of an hour had been set aside for my meeting. The Rebbe then received me in his room with a smile, and invited me to sit. We ended up speaking much longer than fifteen minutes.

It had been four years since the Six Day War, and the Rebbe expressed his surprise that the Israeli government was not annexing Chevron. “There are several properties in Chevron that belonged to my predecessors,” he said, “and I would like the government to work towards recovering them.” (more…)

While studying as a young man in the Chabad yeshivah in Lod, Israel, a few of us senior students developed a strong desire to spend time in the Rebbe’s court, in the yeshivah at 770.

Click here for full-color print version

At the time, our entire yeshivah numbered less than forty students and there were ten of us, so the faculty was reluctant to let us go. But then in 1961, Rabbi Shlomo Chaim Kesselman, our dean of chasidic studies, proposed to the Rebbe a kind of student exchange program. While we traveled to the Rebbe, a group of American yeshivah students would come to strengthen the yeshivah in Lod. The Rebbe gave his assent.

The next step was getting student visas. The yeshivah in New York sent us affidavits declaring that they were assuming responsibility for us during our stay in the US. Then, our dean, Rabbi Efraim Wolf, began working on securing exit visas and conscription deferments from the Israeli military authorities, while we gathered the funds for our airfare. In those days, a ticket to the US went for some 1,200 Israeli pounds—about five times the average monthly salary!

We had asked for one year’s leave, allowing us to experience all of the festivals and special occasions in the Rebbe’s court, but the army granted us only one month. We decided to go anyway, and then apply for an extension from there. We joined a chartered flight of Chabad chasidim headed to New York for the holidays of the month of Tishrei.

In those days, the Rebbe would receive visitors for a private audience twice—once on arrival, around Rosh Hashanah, and then again before their return at the end of the month.

When it was time for my audience, I brought something with me: Outside my home back in Kfar Chabad, Israel, there were a few pomegranate trees growing, and I had picked the finest five I could find, as a gift to the Rebbe from the Holy Land. When his secretary Rabbi Laibel Groner presented them to him, the Rebbe instructed him to “leave one here, and bring the rest upstairs.” Upstairs in 770 was the Previous Rebbe’s apartment where the Rebbe would have the festival meals in those years. The first pomegranate, I assume, he took home. (more…)

Every year, as a yeshivah student in 770, I would participate in the summer visitation program run by Merkos L’inyonei Chinuch, Chabad’s education office. It was known as “Merkos Shlichus.”

In 1959, I was sent to the Caribbean Islands, together with my friend Yisroel Chaim Lazar. We started in Aruba, then went to Curacao, Trinidad, Barbados, Puerto Rico, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and ended up in Jamaica.

Click here for full-color print version

In Trinidad, two days before the fast on the 9th of Av, we mentioned to one of the local Jews that we were hoping to have enough people for the day’s communal prayers. “You know what?” he said, “you’re about to go to Barbados. There you’ll sooner be able to make a minyan.” Barbados only had twelve Jewish families, but he explained that it was a more close-knit community. Following his advice, we flew to Barbados the next day.

Back then, before arriving somewhere on Merkos Shlichus you didn’t know where to go, or whom to speak to. If you were lucky, you had a few names and addresses from someone who had been there before but, in this case, we didn’t even have that. We had, however, been interviewed by the Trinidad Guardian, which was like the New York Times of the Caribbean, so readers on Barbados knew that we were coming.

And so, when we landed in Barbados, a man greeted us at the airport with a message: “My master sent me here to see you. He said that I should take you to his house.”

We were very happy for the welcome and went to the house, where we waited for this fellow’s master to appear. After twenty minutes or so, in walked a Jewish man – you could see it on his face – who started speaking in Yiddish. “I read in the paper that you are emissaries of the Lubavitcher Rebbe and have come here to strengthen Judaism,” he began. “Let me tell you who I am.” (more…)

As a young man, I studied in the Lubavitcher yeshivah in Montreal, but I would spend some of the holidays in New York. Once, in the late ‘50s, I came to New York on the first intermediate day of Sukkot. As always, the Rebbe held a big gathering – a Simchat Beit Hasho’eva farbrengen, as we would call it – that night in the sukkah. Thousands of people used to come for this event, and I was one of them. The next day, I was summoned by the Rebbe’s secretary Rabbi Hodakov.

Click here for full-color print version

“The Rebbe saw you last night at the farbrengen,” Rabbi Hodakov tells me in his office, “and he asked me: ‘What is Nissan Mangel doing here in Crown Heights? He should be in Lakewood!”

“What do you mean?” I wondered out loud. Lakewood, New Jersey, is a bastion of Lithuanian non-chasidic Jewry in America, its Beth Medrash Govoha a famous yeshivah. The Rebbe had sent me there several times before to share teachings of Chasidut with the students, faculty and members of its Kollel for older students.

But this time, I tried making a case to stay in Crown Heights:

“I wasn’t here for Rosh Hoshanah and I wasn’t here for Yom Kippur; now that I’ve come to be with the Rebbe for Sukkot, I’m being sent to Lakewood?”

“Are you arguing with the Rebbe?” Rabbi Hodakov replied. “The Rebbe says you should go!”

Rabbi Hodakov instructed me to take along a lulav and etrog; I would be going for a few days, and of course I would need to perform this mitzvah every day of Sukkot. In addition, he also told me to bring hoshanos, the spray of myrtle used in the prayers on Hoshana Rabbah, the seventh day of Sukkot. (more…)