HIS NESHAMA ASKED FOR A SECOND CHANCE

Nothing in the energy that oozes from his very being, in the refined face, and the captivating smile, gives away the convoluted life story of the soloist in the Chassidic folk band Hatizmoret Ha’amamit, Neria Muell. * A fascinating life journey that started in a Chabad elementary school in Yerushalayim, continued in Tomchei T’mimim in Netanya, veered off sharply due to a deep inner struggle that led to an adolescent rebellion. * In a candid interview, Neria talks about his unusual life, life on the banks of the Banias, wandering through Europe with a horse, donkey and goat, and performances of Chabad niggunim at music festivals in Spain and returning home. * It is never too late.

In the evenings, Neria Muell is usually busy tearing up the stage with Naor Karmi’s Hatizmoret Ha’amamit.  You can see him wearing a kasket (cap) which has become a signature, a short beard framing his refined face.  When he sings, he doesn’t see anything; and that’s no cliché.  He is entirely swept up in the niggun, he dances, jumps and sings, spraying energy everywhere, flooding the stage and sometimes the dance floor with his tremendous intensity.

In the mornings you can meet him at the shul in Tekoa, davening with d’veikus or learning with his chavrusa.  “Until recently, we learned Chassidus.  Lately, we started learning Gemara. I feel this is part of my tikkun, of my settling down,” he says with a bashful grin.

Otherwise, Neria Muell is a full time musician which includes playing music, singing, rehearsals and recordings.  He and his wife are raising their two children on the desert yishuv of Tekoa.  He dreams of combining music and chinuch.    “One day, I’ll do it,” he says, with his gaze fixed somewhere in the distance.

Neria is thirty and you would never know by looking at him that he has had a complicated life, which included rebellion, pain, dilemmas, conflicts, wild freedom, searching, hunger, curiosity, learning, disconnecting and connecting, all this motivated by a burning, stormy, hungry neshama.

“When did you decide to do t’shuva?” I asked him.

“I don’t define myself as someone who did t’shuva,” he said carefully.  “You know what it means to do t’shuva? T’shuva is a huge word.  I don’t think I’m on that level.  I learn Torah, try to serve Hashem, and do what He wants, to the best of my ability.  I am still on the journey and haven’t yet reached the destination, but at least I know I’m on the way.”

PICTURES OF THE REBBEIM IN HIS CRIB

Neria was the sixth child, the ben z’kunim to a Yerushalmi family that was half Lubavitch.  His parents are both educators.

“Shortly before I was born, my mother began taking an interest in Chabad through Chassidus classes given in the neighborhood.  She became quickly drawn in and switched my two sisters from the Chorev school to Beis Chana.  Both of them, by the way, are shluchos today, abroad.  So my father and three older brothers and sisters considered themselves national-religious and my mother, two sisters and I lived as Lubavitchers.”

Neria was born after the transformation, straight into the world of Chabad.  “There were pictures of the Rebbeim in my crib as opposed to teddy bears and ducks,” he laughed.

He attended the Chabad school in Yerushalayim.  “They instilled a tremendous amount of values, Chassidishkait, everything associated with ruchnius in us.  Chassidus, the Rebbe and mivtzaim were fascinating to me.  Gemara learning was not my strong subject. I also suffered from problems with attentiveness and concentration which did not contribute to my ability to sit and learn.”

Neria was a good, Chassidishe boy and there was soon an unwritten agreement between him and the staff of live and let live which continued, more or less, throughout his years in elementary school.

TALENT WITH NO OUTLET

Besides being drawn to ruchnius, mivtzaim and Chassidus, Neria was interested in music from a young age. 

“It’s a talent that I got as a gift from heaven,” he says.  “But in the Chabad framework of the time there wasn’t much I could do with it.  Aside from an extracurricular course in playing the organ that we had in fifth grade, I did not feel that this talent was worth much.  The feeling was that they were expecting me to be a lamdan, Chassidish, and that’s it.  Nobody paid attention to the creative, colorful parts of me.”

Neria finished elementary school.  “My family suddenly realized that I was going to yeshiva and staying in a dormitory and each one tried to pull me in their direction.  But I grew up from day one as a Chabadnik and was not considering changing direction.  I wanted to be accepted into a good yeshiva, to start afresh and to apply myself and succeed in my learning.  I registered for the Chabad yeshiva in Netanya.

“It was an amazing year.  They enveloped me in warmth and love; I have only good memories of that time.  Academically, I did not change much.  Gemara was still not my strong subject, but I blossomed in Chassidus.  My neshama was drawn there.  I loved my mashpia and would walk him home and talk to him. 

“Once a week, Rabbi Rosenblatt would take us to a shul in the neighborhood, bring refreshments, and would teach us unfamiliar niggunim.  That was the highlight of my week.  I also blossomed when it came to mivtzaim. I felt I was succeeding in using my talents where I wasn’t as successful in other areas.”

At the end of the year, Neria told the hanhala of Tomchei T’mimim that he decided to switch to a yeshiva high school (with secular studies).  His official reason was that he wanted to matriculate, but he had other reasons.

“I myself could not quite explain why I wanted to leave.  I knew that matriculating was just an excuse.  There were a number of issues.  First, I was torn.  The family members who tried pulling me toward them did not stop.  I was receptive to them because I had started feeling frustrated at yeshiva.  Although I had grown up in a Chabad atmosphere, still and all, my house was open, liberal, and the black and white yeshiva world was a bit intimidating to me.”

FRUSTRATED AND TORN INSIDE

“The yeshiva realized this and showered me with love.  R’ Orenstein was truly considerate towards me about this whole issue. I felt that he loved me.  He accommodated me in so many ways so I would feel good in yeshiva, but ultimately, my frustration with the learning triumphed.  I felt that I could not spend all my time just talking to my mashpia, learning Chassidus, and doing mivtzaim.  I thought that when it came to the other subjects I would not attain the level of the yeshiva.  When they learned Gemara, I felt they were talking in another language. I did not have the tools with which to handle the material and I was sick and tired of dealing with constant failure.”

Neria’s self-respect did not allow him to reveal these thoughts.  Outwardly, he continued to maintain his official reason, that of matriculating.  In order to prove to others and himself that he did not leave because of the level of the learning, he chose the yeshiva high school with the most Torah in the curriculum that he knew of and registered in Mitzpeh Yericho.  Over there, they learned at the accelerated pace of a daf a day.  Neria was determined to fill in the gaps in his learning.  He forced himself to sit for hours over the Gemara every day.  His efforts paid off.

“In Mitzpeh Yericho I also had a terrific year.  I flourished academically and managed to handle Gemara.  And the teacher allowed me to go up to the yeshiva g’dola to learn emuna and Tanya and that was great.  On the other hand, the split that I began to feel in Netanya turned into a huge chasm in Mitzpeh Yericho.  I was embarrassed to be chareidi and tried to go with the flow, yet I felt like a Chabadnik.  I was different than all the kids who came from Beit El, Ofra, and Givat Shmuel.  I felt that my neshama was being torn asunder.  Outwardly, I continued to smile and show everyone that life was rolling along, but inside, I was suffering.  Until one day I decided, enough is enough.  From that point on, my way out was very quick.”

THE NIGGUNIM UNDERSTOOD ME

“My reaction was extreme.  My neshama was in turmoil.  I rejected everything and did not want to hear about anything.  My family was shocked by my sudden religious deterioration and tried to put me into an environmental yeshiva that included nature studies and outings and then a yeshiva with a music program.  I went along with them but I wasn’t really into it and was thrown out of both places.

“It was a very hard time for my parents.  I rebelled against every possible structure and every social norm.  Internally, I was constantly in turmoil and lived in a permanent state of restlessness. My only anchor to normal life at that time was music.  Chabad niggunim were the only thing that I did not oppose.  On the contrary, they were my home.  I found myself in insane situations, suddenly singing niggunei hisorerus that we learned with R’ Rosenblatt.  I embraced them warmly and they adopted me in turn.

“Today I understand it.  I love music and know many styles, but niggunei hisorerus, deep Chabad niggunim, cannot leave you indifferent.  It does not go easy on you but hits you straight in your most vulnerable spots.  I felt that music accepts me as I am, that it understands my inner process as no one else understands it.”

While all Neria’s childhood friends were preparing to continue on to yeshiva g’dola, he packed a small bag and traveled north where he hoped to hike and do some soul searching.

“On the banks of streams in the north, I met some guys, more or less my age, from various backgrounds.  We hiked together, made bonfires, cooked, and mainly sang.  At that time, something inside me began to be rebuilt.  For the first time I felt a sort of quiet, of peace within myself.  I think that the connection to nature which was not present until then in my life helped me a lot to get myself together internally.”

As for the last yeshiva programs he had been in, Neria felt he had left in anger.  His anger was directed mainly at the religious establishment.

“I felt I had missed out.  I felt that they didn’t really see me for who I am and were expecting me to be something I was not.  Today, as a father, I know that along with picking a good educational approach that suits the parents’ worldview, it is important to see in each child that which makes him unique and strengthen it.”

But even within the anger, Neria always lived with an obvious conflict.  “For a period of time, nothing interested me in Torah and mitzvos.  I did not want to hear about anything, but whenever I took my guitar and played, what came forth from me were t’fillos and talking to Hashem.  I always had songs of prayer and thanks to the Creator.”

SHEPHERD

He became a shepherd on a farm near moshav Yavne’el.  “At night, some of us shepherds would congregate and sit and play music.  Throughout that time, my connection with Hashem was very strong. It was then, of all times, that I felt close to him and I would talk to Him.

“The funny thing is that we had so many discussions about Judaism and faith.  Since I was the only one with a religious background, I told them a lot about Judaism.  So it turned out that I lived with anger and conflict with this world while I was strengthening others and telling them what I knew and remembered.  We would make Kiddush together and pray.  They became more interested and some became baalei t’shuva.

“My motto in life then was, ‘I am a free person who does what he pleases.’  I did not want to feel beholden to anything and I wanted to get rid of my pangs of conscience, but inside I was torn and chained between worlds.  I was constantly conflicted and had unresolved questions about the way of life I had chosen.  But I did not want to allow this to interfere. I just kept shouting to the world through my way of dress, speech, way of life, and any other means, that I am a free and happy man.”

After a year of shepherding sheep, while his friends were planning for a year on K’vutza, he decided that Eretz Yisroel was too small for him and he could only find true freedom in the great big world out there.  “I had no money and did not know English or any other language aside from Hebrew. And then I landed in France.”

FROM FRANCE TO SPAIN WITH A HORSE AND A GOAT

“In France I met a group of Italians.  They had a horse that they came with from Italy.  On the way, we bought another horse and a donkey. I bought a pregnant goat which gave birth to three kids.  Equipped with tents, we walked together to southern Spain.  I quickly acquired additional musical styles and that is how we lived for a long time, going places, playing music, continuing further.  Here and there, in big cities, I would be excited to see a shul or Chabad House, but I kept my distance.

“This long period abroad made me appreciate the place I came from, the tradition, Judaism.  It allowed me to look at it from a more universal perspective. From a distance, suddenly everything looked different to me. When I disconnected from the class outlook that is prevalent in Eretz Yisroel it all became cleaner, simpler.

“At some point I looked at myself and saw how connected I really was.  I realized that no matter how much I denied it, a Jewish soul pulsed within me and I could not escape it.  This is my identity and I could not run away.

“I began having amazing hashgacha pratis stories. I met non-Jews who were thrilled to meet a Jew and they treated every crumb of spirituality or Jewish music with awe.

“I remember a gypsy clarinetist who asked me to teach him something Jewish.  I played for him the Chabad niggun of ‘Shim’u shim’u rabbosai v’hatu ozen.’  He sat down and in all seriousness wrote down all the notes as though this was a deep teaching.  It was abroad where I found myself playing more and more Chabad niggunim, which I couldn’t play with my friends in Eretz Yisroel because of the associations it created.  I would play Carlebach, but with Chabad niggunim I felt I couldn’t handle it. While abroad, I would play Chabad niggunim entire nights at all kinds of music festivals.  It made me feel good about myself.

“At that time, two friends from Eretz Yisroel joined me.  Until then, I traveled with Italians.  There we were, davening, making kiddush, kabbalas Shabbos. One of these friends had become a baal t’shuva.  Another thing which I was particular about all those years was t’villa.  Whenever I had the opportunity, I immersed, not for pleasure but for tahara (purity). I was particular about seven immersions.  Although this was usually in streams or springs, I always did it according to all the rules.  This is one of the things which kept me constantly connected.”

“AROUSAL FROM ABOVE”

“I returned to Eretz Yisroel.  This happened entirely as an ‘arousal from above.’  We were in Spain and thought of continuing to Morocco, but we had a problem with visas and decided to go to Turkey.  We thought we’d finance the tickets in our usual way, by playing in the street, even though we had to raise a lot of money.  We decided to travel and play in Gibraltar where there is a large Jewish community. 

“It was a few days before Pesach and when they heard we were planning on going to Turkey, they told us – it is just not possible for you to spend Pesach without your family.  And they bought us tickets to Eretz Yisroel!

“Although going home was not in our plans at all, we had gotten the tickets as a gift and we reasoned that it would cost us less to continue to Turkey after Pesach from Eretz Yisroel.

“At this point, hashgacha elyona decided that my wandering days were over, and arranged things so that I remained in Eretz Yisroel.”

GOING HOME

Neria was much more relaxed at this point.

“I had a close friend who had become interested in Judaism and took me to shiurim.  One day, we were up north and a Katyusha rocket landed nearby and nothing happened to us.  The next day, this friend was already fully immersed in Torah and mitzvos and it also made a great impact on me.”

Neria returned to Yerushalayim and rented an apartment in Ein Kerem.  He decided to give his neshama a second chance.  Slowly, gradually, he went back to a religious life.

“Mitzvos suddenly had a different significance for me.  Every laying of t’fillin moved me, every mitzva filled my entire being.”

He wanted to establish his music and registered for a music school in Yerushalayim.  At first he played with all kinds of bands and small groups but the turning point took place when, with incredible divine providence, he met Naor Karmi and his Hatizmoret Ha’amamit.

“We tried some pilot projects and did some things together.  We saw that we worked well together and since then, we’ve been together.”

The connection between Neria Muell and the band was no less than perfect.  With outstanding talent he was able to bring authentic Chabad niggunim to the stage with the “twists” of R’ Rosenblatt of Netanya, and to give them the special flavor of a folk band.  The band, one of the most sought after for events and weddings, produced an album this year of lively, happy music.

Of all the songs and niggunim that Neria plays and sings, there is one song that perhaps, more than the rest, describes the sincere quest that expresses the search and travels that he lived through.  In the song, “Aseini Yehudi Pashut” from Yossi Levy’s album, “Mesima Efsharit,” one line keeps repeating, “Make me a kosher Jew and also a simple one who goes in Your ways with sincerity.”

FROM MY PERSPECTIVE

I spent a long time with Neria and heard his story that poured forth.  When he finished, we began discussing his insights from his unusual life story.

“What is the main insight that you gleaned from your experiences?” I asked

“My mother’s approach, even in the most insane times, was to be positive.  She respected me and wanted to let me know she loved me as I was.”

***

When I left, on my way back to Yerushalayim, knowing that we need to learn a way in avodas Hashem from everything we see and hear, I thought about the story I had just heard. My first thought was how important it is to build up the strengths of children, a point Neria also spoke about.  There are children who are more drawn to spiritual subjects like Chassidus, those who are of a more analytical mind and are more drawn toward Gemara, and some who are not academically inclined but are talented in other ways, in art, music, organization, sports.  A child’s talents are gifts from Above and we cannot dismiss them.  We need to encourage our children to maximize them in order to give them a feeling of success.  It is very hard to remain loyal to a system which causes you to feel like a failure time and again.  If you know how to utilize the child’s strengths, then even a talent for soccer can turn into an impetus for Gemara study.

Another point I thought of was how Neria said that of everything he absorbed in yeshiva he was left with two things, negina and t’villa.  That’s the chinuch of Tomchei T’mimim.  Not to pat ourselves on the back but to remind us of the enormous power of those things that are not directly learning related. The farbrengens, the niggunim, stories, mivtzaim. All these things remain engraved forever, long after we have forgotten the sugyos and machlokes between Rashi and Tosafos.