Personal Reflections

Chabad.org has many articles and information about the Rebbe for Gimmel Tammuz here. The area that I like the most is the one that contains personal stories about the Rebbe from people of all walks of life. It can be found here.
.

Gimmel Tammuz - 15 Years

17 Adar 5749 (1989)
Click on photo for larger view

Rabbi Shimon Posner of Chabad of Rancho Mirage (somewhere in America!) has written a thoughtful piece about the Rebbe. After 15 years there is not much to say. I suppose that we should at least reflect on how we can live our lives in the way that the Rebbe wanted to improve ourself and the world around us.

Walking down 34th Street you see the camera-clad map-wielding tourists heading towards the entranceway of the Empire State Building. They stop and look up, they lean back, lean all the way back until just before they lose balance, and they start clicking pictures -- of a wide, wide wall.

The more self-conscious and sophisticated ones blush when the passing New Yorkers suppress a sly grin. It is only once the tourist gets to Seventh Avenue that they gain any perspective of this magnificent, elegant landmark soaring above an already impressive skyline -- and how it is head and shoulders above Spokane.

Was the Rebbe a rabbi? Well yes, but no. Forget it, I'm not going to be able to explain what the Rebbe was, what the Rebbe is. It is now, as I write these lines, fifteen years already since his passing, and I don't have any perspective. I see legacy; newlyweds who never even spoke with the Rebbe that are chomping at the bit to do his work even before they've unpacked their wedding gifts.

So if I can't give any perspective on the Rebbe why do I write of him? I see that his idea – which raised more eyebrows than interest fifty years ago – is now considered normative Jewish experience; Jewish children will be more inspired than their parents’ generation. When I came to Rancho Mirage, a kind soul suggested that we’ll be getting lots of calls for people who want to say kaddish in a traditional synagogue, like the one their parents frequented. Once in a long while we get such a call. Regularly, just ten minutes ago in fact, we get a call for help with getting kosher food: their grandchildren are visiting.

So if I can’t give any perspective on the Rebbe why do I write of him? For the exercise: the mere exercise will allow a place for the perspective to develop – and will show the void of having no perspective. Lots of people who take their given expertise very seriously predicted what would happen to Chabad once the Rebbe would pass on, especially the youth. None that I know of spoke of a legacy which becomes more dynamic, not less. I would not have thought it.

Many of those aforementioned couples are not fully aware of it, but they are not the first. It was their grandparents’ generation that was arrested and served in Siberia’s gulags. In the blank next to the word “crime:” was written the word that sentenced them: Schneersonist. Most of these Schneersonists had never seen the Rebbe then; those who did not survive, never met the Rebbe now. The Bolsheviks meant Schneersonist pejoratively.

President Dubya on a trip to Russia, a couple years back, spent forty minutes longer than planned in a synagogue where Shneersonists were arrested, where one of those newlyweds had come back to -- can I say it without sounding hackneyed? -- breathe Jewish life into the embers of the Jewish spirit.

No, no this is not perspective, this is just a wide, wide wall. Perspective you want? Keep walking.

Gimmel Tammuz - 14 Years!!

From Chabad.info

Another year has gone by.

I am reproducing this article by Yanki Tauber from Chabad.org which is much more positive than I am feeling at the moment.

I remember hearing the news early Sunday morning (Israeli Time) and rushing to the airport. I remember arriving at the cemetery hours after the funeral, in midst of the throng still pouring in, as it would through the night and the days and nights to follow, from all over the world.

We (my wife, my 20-month-old daughter and myself) came with the clothes on our back, thinking we'd be taking the return charter flight to Tel-Aviv that very night. We stayed seven days, most of which I spent holed up in an office at 770 Eastern Parkway working on a special issue of Week In Review, a weekly digest of the Rebbe's teachings which I edited at the time. I remember observing with growing amazement what was happening -- and what was not happening -- in the Chabad-Lubavitch community.

Just about everything imaginable was happening -- except for the natural, predictable thing which everyone expected to happen.

There was shock and incredulity. There was grief and agony. There was passionate disagreement and fervent expectation and many, many unanswered and unanswerable questions.

But there was not despair. There was not paralysis. Every one of the Rebbe's emissaries, disciples and followers was saying to him or herself, "what should I be doing now?" And doing it.

I remember thinking: The Rebbe, who has redefined virtually every aspect of life, has also redefined death.

---

Such was the Rebbe's way. He would, for example, consider the concept "work". With sure and lucid steps, drawing on the wisdom of Torah and the truth of everyday experience, he would show that work equals creativity, creativity equals human partnership with the Creator, and human partnership with the Creator is the raison d'être of human life.

This truth, of course, was stated thousands of years ago by the Scriptural verse, "Man is born to toil." But that statement, which had always struck us as a melancholy if inescapable fact of life, became, in the Rebbe's hands, the key to understanding what makes us tick and to achieving meaningfulness and fulfillment in our daily labors.

He did the same with "marriage," "love," "rain" and "rockets". He would take a natural phenomenon, a cultural curiosity, an everyday activity, and by the time he had finished analyzing and applying it, it was something altogether different. No -- it was the very same thing it always was, but in the clarity of his insight its essence was exposed, revealing how scant and shallow was our previous conception.

In one of his talks, the Rebbe quoted the Talmudic dictum that "Sleep is one sixtieth of death." Well, said the Rebbe, if sleep is a form of death, then death is a form of sleep. Sleep is not a termination or even an interruption of life -- it is a time of foment, the means by which body and soul recoup their energies for a fresh and refreshed onslaught upon the coming day. So is death. Death, said the Rebbe, is a "descent for the sake of ascent," a retraction of the arrow of life so that it can be impelled by the bow of vacuity with redoubled force.

How? When? Why? The unanswered questions remain unanswered. But we know what we need to do. And we're doing it. You can go see for yourself -- if you reside on planet earth, chances are that you are within driving distance of a Chabad-Lubavitch center.

The Rebbe has trained us well.

Seen at the Ohel

No Aussies here - just a view of the Ohel on 3 Tammuz

Levi Morozow

Mendel Raskin

Yossel Gutnick

Shimshon Yurkowicz & Mordy Gutnick

Dovid Leib Grossbaum

Waks

Aussies seen at the Ohel on Gimmel Tammuz. Check out all the photos on Shturem, Shmais, COL and CrownHeights.info and also here.
.

Gimmel Tammuz - 13 Years

This video is not new but I feel appropriate for today.

A slide show of the Rebbe.

Achdus is the Answer

Click on the above images for a larger view

A relatively new website Anash.com is running an Achdus campaign in preparation for Gimmel Tammuz. The flyers above explain it pretty well - the organisers are asking everyone to make a resolution which will increase in Ahavas Yisroel and Achdus amongst Chassidim.

They use some quotes from the Rebbeim to emphasise their point. The one that hits home to me is:

When the essential [service of] Ahavas Yisrael is lacking, what’s the point of Chassidus and Yiras Shamayim?
(From the Rebbe Mahrash, brought in Hayom Yom, pg. 77)

I hope that this campaign takes off and is treated seriously by all.

Gimmel Tammuz Reflections

The Rebbe with Rabbi JJ Hecht at a Lag BaOmer rally

Rabbi Yossi Braun sent out this poignant email of his thoughts as we approach Gimmel Tammuz.

Rebbe Oh Rebbe!
Reflections for Gimmel Tammuz
By Rabbi Yossi Braun

My fingers are numb, the keyboard buttons are stiff and rigid, the mouse has frozen and the computer screen is staring me right in the eye appearing as one mass of blurriness. I want to scream and shout; tell the world his glory…

I want to give a message loud and clear in CAPS, BOLD AND UNDERLINED – Let my people know….

But it’s not happening. The words have become stuck in my throat. And my fingers are not cooperating.

I just can’t. I’m at a loss for words.

I have zero answers and loads of questions, doubts, confusions and uncertainties.
This is the wrong day, date and occasion. No, I can’t come to terms with it. I hate it.
The most eloquent speaker, the most meaningful metaphor, the most moving story – it just doesn’t work for me.

No explanation can do justice. No theory can cure the wound.
There is this huge gaping hole in my heart and no rationale can fill the hole and bridge the gap. You just can’t mend a broken heart.

But depression, melancholy and grieving is so off the mark too.

And “remembering his legacy” and “getting on with life” is just so amiss, so wrong and anathema to everything we stand for.
It’s called “losing the plot”. Missing the point. Totally off.

No, silence is not an option either.

Something must be said. Related. Announced. And possibly even shouted from the hilltops.
But what is that “something”? How do we go about it? Where is the secret formula?
It doesn’t exist. There is no secret formula

Which brings me back to the beginning: My fingers are numb, the keyboard buttons are stiff and rigid, the mouse has frozen…..

We’re lost, confused and torn. Torn between reality and another form of reality. Between heart and mind. Between The Truth and our truth. Between the present and the future.

Sure, we know and understand: the Rebbe is here like before. With us and in us. Nothing has changed.

Yet, the heart is still aching: nothing has changed yet so much has changed; so much is lacking and wanting.

Certainly, we believe with perfect faith, we acknowledge the fact that Moshiach is coming any second; it’s going to be something like never before. But, “we need some spirits ‘til we get to the bar”.

Rebbe Oy Rebbe! How we long to see your holy face again and draw inspiration from your holy countenance! If only we can hear your voice once again. One more time.

Shir Hashirim feels so relevant like never before.

Oh Rebbe! “Show me your appearance, let me hear your voice, for your voice is pleasant and your appearance is comely”.

I remember the farbrengens; I remember the Rebbe’s voice. How good were the days when “I delighted and sat in his shade and his fruit was so sweet to my palate”.

“On my bed at night, I sought him whom my soul loves; I sought him but I did not find him. I will arise and go about the city, in the market places and in the city squares. I will seek him…”

Hey. Wait a minute. I hear something. True. I’m in a deep slumber but my heart is awake and beating fast. It’s coming. Here it is.

“Kol dodi dofek. My beloved is knocking: Open for me, my sister, my beloved….
I opened for my beloved, but my beloved had hidden and was gone. I sought him, but found him not; I called him, but he did not answer me”.

A moment of truth, but it’s all gone. What now? So where do we go from here?

We all have those moments where it rings so true. Where we experience a glimpse of the future, a taste of “living with Moshiach”. Where we begin to appreciate our higher calling.

This was a moment which needs to be savoured. It was a moment where the heart has detected some of the brainwaves. It became in touch with The Truth. It has been washed, if only for a moment, with the Torah Truth.

“Behold, he is standing behind our wall, watching through the windows, peeking through the lattices”.

We ought to take those fleeting moments of inspiration and invest them. Build on them. ACT ON IT.

Create an ongoing dialogue between your heart and mind. The gap can be bridged and will be bridged. You can sync your heart with the reality of Torah. Align your emotions with the promise of a future.

It works. Action is the place where heart and mind can meet.

Through “following in his footsteps”, learning about Moshiach and keeping his directives, it will happen. It will be for real. In this world. B’gashmiyus mamosh. And imminently, very very soon.

“The sound of my beloved, behold, he is coming, skipping over the mountains, jumping over the hills”.

Gimmel Tammuz Thoughts

Rabbi Shimon Posner is the shaliach in Rancho Mirage, California. This article comes from his weekly community email.

34th ST. BETWEEN FIFTH AND SEVENTH
By Rabbi Shimon H Posner

Walking down Thirty-Fourth Street you see the camera-clad map-wielding tourists heading towards the entranceway of the Empire State Building. They stop and look up, they lean back, lean all the way back until just before they loose balance, and they start clicking pictures – of a wide, wide wall.

The more self-conscious, the more sophisticated blush when the passing New Yorkers suppress a sly grin. It is only once the tourist gets to Seventh Avenue that they gain any perspective of this magnificent, elegant landmark soaring above an already impressive skyline -- and how it is head and shoulders above Spokane.

Was the Rebbe a rabbi? Well yes, but no. Forget it, I'm not going to be able to explain what the Rebbe was, what the Rebbe is. It is now what, thirteen years already since his passing, and I don't see any perspective. I see legacy; newlyweds who never even spoke with the Rebbe that are chopping at the bit to do his work even before they've unpacked their wedding gifts.

"Look into the eyes of the one who has gazed upon the Rebbe!" the shtetl Jews would declare. Look at the lucky one who had made the trip-- by foot usually, by horse and buggy if they possessed what was considered wealth – to spend a Rosh Hashanah, a Succos, with the Rebbe. Perspective?

I see that his idea -- which raised more eyebrows than interest fifty years ago -- is now considered normative Jewish experience; Jewish children will be more inspired than their parents' generation: tradition for a generation without memory. When I came to Rancho Mirage a kind soul suggested that we'll be getting lots of calls for people who want to say kaddish in a traditional shul: like the one their parents frequented. Once in a long while we get such a call. Regularly, just ten minutes ago in fact, we get a call for help with getting kosher food: their grandchildren are visiting.

So if I can't give any perspective on the Rebbe why do I write of him on his yartzeit? For the exercise: the mere exercise will allow a place for the perspective to develop -- and will show the void of having no perspective. Lots of people who take their given expertise very seriously predicted what would happen to Chabad once the Rebbe would pass on, especially the youth. None that I know of spoke of a legacy which becomes more dynamic, not less. I would not have thought it.

Many of these couples are not fully aware of it, but they are not the first. It was their grandparents' generation that was arrested and served in Siberias Jews. In the blank next to the word "crime:" was written the word that sentenced them: Schneersonist. Most of these Schneersonists had never seen the Rebbe then; those who did not survive, never met the Rebbe now. The Bolsheviks meant Schneersonist pejoratively.

President Dubya on a trip to Russia-former Soviet Union-CIS-or whatever, spent forty minutes longer than planned in a shul where Shneersonists were arrested, where one of those newlyweds had come back to -- can I say it without sounding hackneyed? -- breathe Jewish life into the embers of the Jewish spirit.

No, no this is not perspective, this is just a wide, wide wall. Perspective you want? Keep walking.

More Gimmel Tammuz Photos

From COL - Photos from the Ohel - Gallery 4 and Gallery 5
From Shturem - Photos from the Ohel here and here by Shaya Katz
And some great photos from Reuters photographer Mike Segar on CrownHeights.info here


Also from COL - Photos from the Rebbe's home here
.

Gimmel Tammuz at the Ohel

Amazing photos from the Ohel are featured on some of the Chabad sites on the web:

• CrownHeights.info
• COL - Gallery 1 (Y. Blinko photographer for all 3 galleries)
• COL - Gallery 2
• COL - Gallery 3
• Shturem.net (Shaya Katz photographer)
• Shmais
  

Twelve Years!!!

It is difficult to believe that it is already 12 years since we last saw the Rebbe.

Chabad.org has a great site about Gimmel Tammuz here.

.

The Ohel

See more photos from the Ohel here.

Community Tribute

[Photo from the mid 1970s]

Rabbi Mendel Gluckowsky spoke very well on Motzoei Shabbos in my (not so) humble opinion. Fortunately the MC was very brief - usually they want to give a long speech as well - and Gluckowsky spoke for about an hour.

He had a number of ideas that he wanted to emphasise which he did clearly with quite a few relevant stories. Two of the main points were ideas that I wanted to bring out in my post last night - the individual attention and concern that the Rebbe gave to everyone and the importance of mivtzoim.

Gluckowsky illustrated the importance of mivtzoim with a story of the Chiddushei HaRim who was walking in the town when a rich man passed in his carriage and offered him a ride. During the trip the rich man asked him why Hashem has given him all these riches. The man confessed to not keeping Torah and Mitzvos and said that he has read in Shema that we should not pursue false gods as it will lead to punishment by heaven. He asked if I do not do mitzvos why am I so wealthy. The Chiddushei HaRim answered that the wealthy man had already supplied the answer. The fact that he had recited the Shema shows that he has some merits which is why he is wealthy.

He related other stories about mivtza tefillin etc which all emphasise the chizuk and benefit to be derived from doing a mitzva even once. The Rebbe wanted us to have a positive effect on the world around us.

He spoke about how the Rebbe cares for everyone with many stories about the brochos received from the Rebbe. He mentioned a story with the Capland family - Shlomo Capland obm used to be a melamed in the schools here in Melbourne.

All in all it was an inspiring evening and worth attending.

Gimmel Tammuz!!!

11 years! It is difficult to believe that 11 years have passed since the histalkus of the Rebbe.

One thing appears obvious to me - we must continue the Rebbe's work by doing, or at least contributing to, mivtzoim. OK, I know that this is nothing new. Some of you may say it is the "party line" or whatever but the fact is the Rebbe put most of his emphasis into caring for yidden everywhere. This caring is carried out in a practical way by reaching out to other jews and bringing them closer to yiddishkeit. (I will write more about this in another post)

The Rebbe treated every single Jew, and non-Jew, as an important person in themselves. Looking at the lines of people waiting to spend a few moments or even seconds with the Rebbe during "dollars" on a Sunday morning one would see Jews and non-Jews from all places and walks of life. During Sukkos when the Rebbe said a sicha every evening there were shtreimals and spodics along with the borsalinos and knitted kippot in attendance. These scenes I witnessed personally.
There is the story of the policeman who named his son Mendel in honour of the Rebbe...these and other inspiring stories show the public face of the Rebbe's caring.

An older couple (not Lubavitchers) were in New York in the late 1980s and I had arranged for them to attend a group yechidus. One comment made an impact on me - the woman said that after the Rebbe spoke everyone filed past to give the Rebbe a note and receive a dollar to be given to charity. With the 100 or more people in attendance she expected the Rebbe to be giving the dollars out in a casual manner. What struck her was that the Rebbe looked at every person and directed his attention at them individually as they walked past.

The story that I witnessed personally happened one summer Friday night in 770. [By way of introduction it is well known that the Rebbe was extremely careful to use his time to the fullest. They say that when the Rebbe returned to his room after davening that by the time Laibl Groner walked into the room - a few seconds behind the Rebbe - the Rebbe was already seated with a sefer open.] I was davening near the front of shul close to the Rebbe. When davening finished the Rebbe would turn around and say "Good Shabbos" to the people close by and then walk back to his office. On this occassion there was a man and his disabled son (it appeared that he had a mental disability) standing close to the Rebbe. The Rebbe stood and waved at the boy who at first didn't see the Rebbe. It took about 60 seconds for the boy to notice the Rebbe and during this time the Rebbe was standing, waving and smiling at the boy until he was noticed.


The Rebbe cared (cares) about every Jew. Maybe this Gimmel Tammuz we should resolve to do the same.

A request

As it is approaching Gimmel Tammuz I would like to post some stories of the Rebbe. We have all read dozens of stories but I would like to hear of events that happened to you or someone close to you. It would be great if the story related to Australia in some way but that is not essential.

I will be posting a couple of stories - one which I witnessed and the other told to me by a close friend regarding their yechidus with the Rebbe.

If you have something to share please email me at aussieecho@gmail.com. I think we will all benefit from hearing positive stories and messages.

Gimmel Tammuz events in Melbourne

This year it appears Rabbi Mendel Glukowsky from Rechovot in Israel is being brought to Melbourne to speak at various Gimmel Tammuz events. He will be speaking at a number of functions at various Chabad Houses and shuls and at the main community event this motzoei Shabbos at the Werdiger Hall. This community event is usually quite good with a couple of "minor" speeches and the main address by the guest speaker. Then comes what is now de rigueur at all major Chabad events and farbrengen - the video. (It seems that if one doesn't have a TV at home this is the next best thing!) Actually the video is usually quite good.

My only criticism is that there is a cover charge for the community event. I believe that if we want the "community" to attend and not just Lubavitchers it should be a free event - by all means request donations - but do not have a set charge. I understand that speakers cost money to bring out but if we really believe that the Rebbe was the Rebbe of all Jewry then we should try to attract all Jews to a function to honour him. The problem is that in Melbourne most of Chabad has become very insular and only the few Chabad Houses and some individuals are doing "outreach". The "powers that be" therefore assume that noone other than Chabadniks will be interested in honouring the Rebbe's memory.

Be that as it may, Gluckowsky is a good speaker and worth hearing.

Leading up to Gimmel Tammuz

This article appeared in the Jewish Week (from New York) and is a sad reminder that the Rebbe is no longer with us physically. Click here for the article.

We really need Moshiach now!!