PART I
This year the new school year began in Eretz Yisroel for the religious schools and the public schools at around the same time. This is somewhat anomalous, as the religious schools start on Rosh Chodesh Elul while the secular schools begin around September 1, which, in most years, are several weeks apart.
Religious people begin the school year at the beginning of the month of mercy, thirty days before the Yomim Nora’im, so they can properly prepare the students for these momentous days. The others start the school year when the law says to do so, not a day earlier.
PART II
Just three years before our story took place, in 1952, the Reshet Oholei Yosef Yitzchok school system was launched. This was a reshet/network that consisted of just four schools at the time. The Rebbe started this network of schools in order to educate thousands of Jewish children in the spirit of Torah, mitzvos and Chassidus. Some dynamic and dedicated askanim started the Reshet, with the Rebbe closely following their progress. The Rebbe was involved in a myriad of problems that cropped up, starting with permits and certification from government offices and ending with broken chairs in the second grade of one school.
It was the middle of Av 5715/1955 and summer vacation was underway when a colorful envelope arrived at the hanhala of the Reshet. If it was colorful that meant it came from abroad and an envelope from abroad meant it was a letter from the Rebbe.
The directors stood up, put on their gartels, and opened the envelope with the requisite awe. In the letter, the Rebbe wrote that since the official school year would be starting on September 1, which fell out in the middle of the month of Elul, the students would not be properly prepared for the days of Slichos and the Yomim Nora’im. The Rebbe considered this a tremendous loss and asked that the directors of the four schools move up the start of the school year.
The Rebbe knew that the government educational authorities would not look kindly upon this, to say the least, and would make it difficult. Nevertheless, the Rebbe asked that the start of the school year be Rosh Chodesh Elul and not the middle of Elul.
R’ Dovid Green, principal of the school in Kfar Saba, immediately told his staff about the earlier start to school. The staff, knowing their principal’s non-compromising attitude toward the Rebbe’s instructions, was willing to cooperate and properly prepare the students for the Yomim Nora’im.
Not many days passed and representatives from the education department in Kfar Saba (where the person who headed the municipality had once publicly declared that in Kfar Saba there would be no religious school, even if Chabad would fund it themselves) came to the school to see whether the rumor was true, that this school had opened before all the other schools. The officials were furious and they warned the principal to cease and desist immediately and fall in line with the directives of the Education Ministry. They added that if he did not respond to their demand, they would personally see to it that the school’s financial allotments would be affected which, as it was, were far from being enough to sustain the school. If that wasn’t enough, they also threatened to withdraw recognition of the school which would immediately affect its very existence. It was a most serious threat indeed.
R’ Dovid Green was not frightened by their threats. Nor did he have the time to start convincing or arguing with the municipal employees. He told them plain and simply: I did this after receiving instructions from the Lubavitcher Rebbe in New York to start school at the beginning of Elul. I am not beholden to you; I am only beholden to the Lubavitcher Rebbe. If this reason suffices for you, fine; and if not, also fine, and Hashem will help. I am not scared by your threats.”
When the city’s educational representatives saw that R’ Green was not capitulating, they angrily left. R’ Green remained in his modest office and continued working. There was no time to think about whether or when they would execute their threats.
PART III
The next day was to be the first day of school. The principal arrived early in the morning in order to open the building and make sure that the first day of school went off well.
To his great surprise, he met construction workers in the yard who were wielding heavy tools.
“Who are you?” he asked.
“We were sent by the city,” they said as they continued their work.
His heart fell. He was sure they had been sent to destroy the place by the people who just yesterday had threatened him. But as he stood and watched them, he noticed that they were sticking in iron pegs deeply, all around the open school yard. He rubbed his eyes in astonishment.
He soon realized that they had been sent by the education department in order to make a fence around the school and put up other buildings that were needed by the school. He was astounded. He had been asking them for two years to put a fence up around the school and to enlarge the school, but he was always rebuffed like a pesky fly.
He was sure that now, after he had defied the heads of the education department, they would immediately stop school funding. To his astonishment, the reaction was the opposite and completely unexpected – they were finally doing what he had been asking them to do for two years! There was no logical explanation for this, just incredible divine providence providing support to that outstanding principal who set aside all calculations and did what the Rebbe wanted.
R’ Green informed the Rebbe about all the details in a report.
***
The next surprise, which occurred about a month and a half later, was even greater. It was during the Simchas Torah farbrengen 5716, one of the uplifting, joyous farbrengens the Rebbe led every year. Beis Chayeinu was full with locals and guests who came from all over the world. After a niggun or two the Rebbe began a sicha about the need for bittul to the Nasi Ha’dor and the dedication needed to the Rebbe and his mosdos. The sicha was said tearfully and now and then the Rebbe stopped to cry. In the middle of the sicha, the Rebbe told this story in detail and derived a moral lesson from it for the rest of the Chassidim as he pointed out the bittul of R’ Green “who displayed the strength of hiskashrus.”
“For example, something that happened in Eretz Yisroel a few weeks ago:
Knowing the extent of the passion of the Rebbe, my father-in-law, to add a day, an hour, a moment of Torah study, I told the school in Eretz Yisroel in a letter to start some time before the official government mandated start of school, and they did so.
When this became known in the appropriate ministry, they went to that school where they started school two weeks early and made a “big commotion” about it – how was it that when the order was to start the school year on a certain day, they started learning Toras Hashem two weeks earlier?
They warned that this conduct, which went counter to the way the entire country did things, could not continue, and if they continued, they [the government] would stop giving them financial support and would cut ties with them.
What did that principal do? As he wrote me in a letter, he did not get into detailed discussions about the din (since he was dealing with someone who wasn’t knowledgeable in Shulchan Aruch) and said:
‘Listen, I received instructions in a letter to start school on the day that I started, so I did so. Therefore, if this is accepted by you, fine, and if not, also fine, G-d willing.’
After an answer like that, at the time, the person responded stormily to being told that ‘I have nothing to discuss with you,’ but the very next day a change from one extreme to another occurred.
For the past two years, the school has been unable to have a fence and additional buildings built by that ministry and suddenly, the day after that response, people from the ministry came and built all the buildings they refused to build for two years!
The principal of the school has no explanation for this, by natural means, and there really is no explanation. He did the opposite of what they wanted and when they warned him that they would cut off ties with him, he said he had received an order from here and carried it out, if they accepted it, fine, and if not, also fine. And what did they do? They came the next day and carried out all his demands that he hadn’t been able to accomplish for two years! The amazing thing is that nobody said T’hillim for this, nobody put a penny in a pushka for this.
This is nothing but outstanding success given from Above, which came about through Jews who have free choice, who seemingly would never consider such a thing and nevertheless, a public kiddush Hashem came about through them.
How did all this happen? When they said they received an order from so-and-so, who is crowned with a certain title, even though the person they were speaking with had no understanding of this title, still, it affected him to the point that immediately the next day they carried out all his demands that he had made for two years so that he was already tired and nearly despaired. All this happened only because he showed the strength of hiskashrus – by way of myself - to the Rebbe, my father-in-law, and consequently, he was nullified to the Rebbe, my father-in-law – without knowing him, and he in turn provided for him all the requested buildings through which there will be even more children, many times more, who will learn the Toras Hashem and will receive a proper chinuch.
If this happened far away and with a Jew who never saw the Rebbe, my father-in-law, and I doubt he corresponded with him, and I doubt he has any knowledge of Chassidus, and whether he was ever in the four cubits of a Chassidic education – all the more so regarding those who merited to see the Rebbe, my father-in-law, and his father, the Rebbe Rashab – who are all one and received details instructions from them.”
The Rebbe spoke at length in this sicha in order to spur on the Chassidim to learn a lesson from that anonymous principal, thousands of kilometers away from them, who fearlessly obeyed the Rebbe’s instruction and not only wasn’t he harmed thereby, but thanks to it, he was successful.
0***
In Lubavitch, the Rebbeim never gave out “medals” and “praise” for their Chassidim, even the most brilliant and devoted. The bond between Chassid and Rebbe and vice versa was an unconditional soul connection. But with R’ Dovid Green an exception was made and the Rebbe publicly extolled his hiskashrus, albeit without mentioning his name. May this be a lesson for generations to come.