Monthly Archives: November 2013

From time to time, since the early 1970s, whenever my husband would travel to New York, he always made it a point to request an audience with the Rebbe. On this particular occasion, he arrived a few days before Chanukah – the year was 1978. This was when my husband was working as chaplain at the Pretoria Central Prison, the biggest prison in South Africa where many Jews were imprisoned, a lot of them for their anti-apartheid views.

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As he later related to me, the Rebbe’s first question to him was, “What are you doing for the Jews confined in South African prisons?” My husband replied that he did what he could, although not much was permitted. He visited the prisoners regularly, brought them food parcels for Passover and Rosh Hashanah, and distributed prayer books. The Bible was the only book that the prisoners were allowed to have, and he would say to the prison wardens that the prayer book was “our Bible.”

“What about Chanukah candles?” the Rebbe asked.

“This would not be permitted,” my husband said.

But the Rebbe did not accept this answer: “Do you realize how much a little bit of light would mean to somebody incarcerated in a dark cell? How important it would be if they could light Chanukah candles? Can’t you arrange it?”

My husband promised that when he returned home, he’d try. “I will do my best to see that it’s done next year.” But again the Rebbe did not accept this answer:

“What about this year?”

My husband pointed out that he was in New York at the moment, far away from Pretoria and, besides, there was not enough time do anything. But the Rebbe simply said, “You can use the telephone. Make whatever phone calls you need, and see what you can arrange.” (more…)

My name is Dovid HaLevi Edelman, and I first came to Lubavitch in 1941, when I was sixteen years old – this was after I finished high school, the Chofetz Chaim Yeshiva in Baltimore.

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I was sent to study at the Chabad Headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway by Rabbi Avraham Elya Axelrod of Baltimore who said to me and my friends, “My Rebbe started a yeshiva in New York. It’s a beautiful building, and you’ll have fresh food and everything good.” So, on his advice, we went there.

I knew nothing of chasidism, because I was coming from Baltimore, where there were no chasidim around. But when the Rebbe Rayatz came to America in 1940, his picture was in all the newspapers including the Baltimore Sun, and I happened to see the paper with the Rebbe’s picture. When I saw his regal countenance, I was just astonished. So I cut out that photo and put it on top of my bed, even though I didn’t know who the Rebbe was. And then, a year later I was going to his yeshiva.

I came on June 3^rd, that was the day after Shavuos, in 1941.

Thirty days later, there arrived the Rebbe’s son-in-law, who would become the future Rebbe. He walked in and I was on the committee that welcomed him to 770. We yeshiva students took one look at him, and we fell in love at first sight. And he loved us back. (more…)

In 1960, I began working for NASA as part of the Planetary Quarantine Division, which was then charged with trying to find life on Mars. The Rebbe was very, very interested in the work I was doing. When we first met, he asked me if I knew what the Baal Shem Tov, the 18^th century founder of the chasidic movement, meant when he spoke of Divine Providence.

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I said that I did. The principle of Divine Providence which the Baal Shem Tov taught is that nothing a Jew sees and hears is random. Rather, it is all designed by Heaven to bring you closer to Torah and to G-d. There is nothing wasted.

And the Rebbe said, “If this is true for everybody, how much more true is it for a person who is exploring the stratosphere, or searching for life on Mars, or working in a medical laboratory dealing with diseases, or traveling all over the world and meeting so many people.”

He went on, “You must have a wealth of stories and anecdotes and events and impressions – each one of which demonstrates Divine Providence. You should keep a journal of these stories and events, and then try to analyze them to see what is the lesson you can learn from these things. And if you can’t figure it out by yourself, then bring them to me and I’ll help you.”

I followed his advice. And today I have a journal with hundreds and hundreds of stories and events, and I plan, some day, to disseminate these stories to as many people as possible.

Back then – this was the early 1970s – when word got around that I was working with NASA and looking for life on Mars, some chasidic Jews would rebuke me. They said, “You mustn’t do that. It’s forbidden by Jewish law. You shouldn’t be doing this kind of work.” Since, at this point, I had already begun my journey to Jewish practice, their words caused me concern – was I doing something wrong? I didn’t know what to make of these statements. Rabbi Feller suggested that the next time I would meet with the Rebbe, I should ask the Rebbe if that was, in fact, true. (more…)

My family immigrated to Israel from Ksar Souk, Morocco. We are Sephardi Jews of rich ancestry and this is why, when I was about ten, I began to wonder about an unusual picture that would hang on the wall of our home. Our Sephardi neighbors typically decorated their walls with portraits of Sephardi tzadikim – usually arrayed in turbans and robes – but we had a picture of a bearded man in a black hat, a suit, and a tie.

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One time, I asked my mother about him, and she told me this story:

She told me that many years earlier, this was in the early 1950s, after the birth of my older brother Shmuel and sister Simcha, she became pregnant again. It was a normal pregnancy, nine months, and a normal birth in the local hospital. But a half-hour after the birth, the baby died.

When this happened the first time, the family was very upset, of course. When it happened a second time, they were shocked. But when it happened a third time, they began to panic.

And then, my mother became pregnant again. During the pregnancy, she consulted with specialists and with rabbis. The doctors said that there was no health problem – that this pregnancy was completely normal, just as the others had been, and that they had no idea at all what could be wrong. Then one of the rabbis in our city, Rabbi Rachamim Lasri – a relative of our family from whom I also learned aleph beis in school before I immigrated to Israel – suggested that she turn to the Lubavitcher Rebbe.

At that time the Rebbe’s name was famous throughout Morocco because of the emissaries he had sent, some of whom our family was acquainted with. So, it was decided that Rabbi Lasri should write to the Rebbe. (more…)