CHILDHOOD AND SHLICHUS FROM A CHILD’S POINT OF VIEW

This is a real description of my father who is not an “official” shliach. He works for a living, but to him it is obvious that the Rebbe’s shlichus is not limited to those who have the title of shliach, but is the shlichus of every one of Anash.

A typical weekday, four in the afternoon. My father is coming back from work, and we kids know that we have just half an hour to spend with him because at 4:30 the bar mitzva boy is coming. Every Tuesday and Thursday (or Sunday, Tuesday and Wednesday, the schedule doesn’t matter), a not-yet-religious boy comes to our house and my father prepares him for his bar mitzva. They spend an hour together in the living room while we children try to be reasonably quiet so they can learn. We know that our father is doing the Rebbe’s shlichus and we try to take part in this marvelous shlichus, at least by not disturbing. We want to be examples of the purity and refinement of those with a Jewish-Chassidic chinuch.

My father considers preparing the boy for his bar mitzva a real shlichus. He does not suffice with what you need to know “according to the book,” but enriches the boy’s heart and mind with knowledge and a deep, authentic Jewish sensitivity. When his father or mother come to pick him up, my father will talk with him or her for a while in order to try and influence the parent too, to come closer to Judaism. More than one or two of these boys who only came to learn how to say the brachos for the Haftora ended up in a Chabad yeshiva. Today they are Lubavitchers.

Many years have passed since the first boys came to our house, and my father still keeps in touch with the hundreds who passed through our house ever since. They are no longer children, of course. They are adults and some probably have grandchildren by now. But even they are excited each year when a few days before Rosh HaShana they get a call from my father. 

A week before Rosh HaShana he sits for hours at the phone and calls them all, one after the other, in order to wish them a Shana Tova and, while he’s at it, urge them to commit to another mitzva or good deed for the new year in order to hasten the Geula.

TIME OFF FROM WORK IS FOR SHLICHUS

My father’s work is split up over the hours of the day. Two hours here, two hours there. The time in between he uses for more mivtzaim. In the morning, after a Gemara shiur with an old Chassid who lives in the building, he leaves the house with a small bag containing mezuzos, a screwdriver, pliers, and a small hammer. He goes from neighborhood to neighborhood, from house to house, and offers to check mezuzos.

Oftentimes, he does not need to be a scribe in order to see that the mezuza is no good. Even the people themselves, who definitely don’t know the laws of safrus, realize that a mezuza printed on paper is not doing the job, and an empty plastic container is not a mezuza. In his small bag he has an album with pictures of interesting mezuzos he has found so that people realize how important it is to buy mezuzos in a reputable place.

There are days of the week when my father does not go out with his small bag. He leaves with a large bag of refreshments and goes to a senior citizen home in the center of town. There he sits with the seniors and tells them the Parsha, puts t’fillin on with the men, and gives the ladies candles for Shabbos.

On Fridays, when we come home from school, my father is usually not at home. He will return soon after doing mivtzaim, mivtzaim like the bachurim do. He stands at a stand in the center of town and offers t’fillin and candles to passersby.

USING EVERY OPPORTUNITY

When I did not feel well and had to go to a doctor in a nearby town, I saw how it is possible to use every opportunity to fulfill the Rebbe’s instructions. The doctors and secretaries at the clinic know that my father is the one to turn to with any of their questions about Judaism. He makes every effort so that they get a dose of Jewish learning while we are there. The man in the stationery store and the one in the toy store know that my father is the one to whom to direct all their Jewish questions. Before Pesach I joined my father in giving out handmade matzos. The Rebbe said to give out matza to every Jew you know. My father understood that this naturally includes all the owners of stores that we frequent, including the office of the lawyer that my father used twenty years ago. In recent years, the list has grown to over 100 people that my father gives matza to with a message of Geula.

Speaking of Pesach, I cannot help but mention the s’darim. While in most homes the Seder begins right after Maariv, at our house the Seder begins an hour and a half later. This is because my father goes to lead a Seder for inmates in a nearby prison, and only after doing his shlichus does he come home. Of course this means we have to speed things up in order to eat the afikoman by midnight, but our pride in our father doing the Rebbe’s shlichus makes it all worth it!

Every Shabbos morning my father goes to shuls to review Chassidus. In the rain and in the heat, nothing stops him from doing this shlichus of the Rebbe. He reviews a message of the Rebbe on the parsha and, of course, a message about the Geula and the anticipation of the hisgalus of the Rebbe MH”M.

Over the years, my father has come into contact with thousands of people and they do not wait for him to come to them but go to him whenever they have a Jewish need. Our small home has become a sort of Chabad House. At all hours of the day (and night) people call when they need advice and a bracha, and they ask my father to write a letter for them to the Rebbe.

My father started writing for others forty years ago. Georgian immigrants, who wanted to write to the Rebbe but had difficulty writing, went to my father and asked him to write on their behalf. After a while, my father received a letter from the Rebbe’s secretariat saying that since letters come from him from many people, the Rebbe said to explain to all of them that they need to make a “vessel” for the bracha and to explain that the bracha is like rain. When rain falls on a plowed field, the wheat grows, but when it rains on an uncultivated field, only thorns grow.

My father follows this horaa to the letter and whoever comes to our house knows that if he wants to ask for a bracha from the Rebbe, he must make a good hachlata. After accepting the Rebbe’s malchus with the declaration of “Yechi,” the letter is put in a volume of Igros Kodesh and my father explains what the Rebbe wrote.

Hundreds of miracles have occurred in our house. My father tells the most moving ones at the Shabbos table. Every Shabbos we are fascinated by his stories of the previous week. He also tells us of interesting things that took place during the week on mivtzaim. In this way, he includes us children in the Rebbe’s mivtzaim and gives us the desire to join the Rebbe’s vast army.

A note to the Tattys: I did not write my name on this column since I think this column can just as well be yours. Yes, you, an ordinary Lubavitcher who is reading this page, can fulfill the Rebbe’s shlichus just like my father. I did not write about some imaginary person. This is a real description of my father who is not an “official” shliach. He works for a living, but to him it is obvious that the Rebbe’s shlichus is not limited to those who have the title of shliach, but is the shlichus of every one of Anash.

Join the Rebbe’s army and your son can write about you everything it says in this column!