2 My tate the chasid
Published in the Forverts on September 19th, 1946
By nature, tate was one of those types of people who would always be inspired by something. Needless to say, he was a chasid - a Makarover chasid. When he was able to tear himself away from his livelihood in the village, he left for Makariv to see the Rebbe1, and when he came back from there he was completely different and he would tell one story of the chiddush2 that he saw at the Rebbe’s, and he sang all the nigunim3 that he heard there.
In general, at our house in the small village of Zatishiye, there was such atmosphere that you could literally see and feel how tate’s faith in God and in his Makarover Rebbe were connected with everything - When the business went well and we didn’t have any problems with the landowner, tate was sure that it was thanks to the blessings and wishes that the Makarover Rebbe gave him. The first chance he got, he would go to the Rebbe and give him the fine fruit and be joyous together with the other chasidim.
And on the other hand if, God forbid, business went poorly and people had to endure the landowner’s caprices, they really needed to go to the Rebbe, pour out their bitter heart to him and beg for him to give his blessing and pray that God will help.
Also, when something struck the household and a family member became ill, tate, before anything else, went to the Rebbe and asked him to grant him refue shlema4. Believing in God and in him, holy Rebbe, was connected. Even with the nigunim that we used to sing at home, during a simche5, or just when you had joy in your heart…
In his enthusiasm for the Makarover Rebbe, it wasn’t enough for tate that he drove to him from time to time; He also brought the Rebbe to our home a few times a year. This brought great joy, and the local Jewish farmers from all the surrounding shtetls came to us in Zatishiye, weekly. During the seudoys shabbos6, people swallowed with admiration every word that the Rebbe uttered from his mouth during the dvar toire7 about the parshe8 of the week.
As enthusiastic as tate was about the Makarover Rebbe tzaddik9, you can imagine what happened when the Rebbe came to us in Zatishiye - when tate heard that the Rebbe had been spotted in his rickshaw at the gate of the village, he went out to meet him with a song, and while singing, he unharnessed the horse from the rickshaw. Taking the reins with both hands, he himself led the great Rebbe in the rickshaw to our home. You could see on his face that this gave him so much pleasure, and he considered it such a great mitzvah that he would not give it up for all the treasures in the world.
To this day, I still have that picture in front of my eyes and I see tate so clearly, as he is pulling the Rebbe’s rickshaw and his face shines with joy. I also remember what kind of joy there was in general at our house every time tate brought down the Makarover Rebbe; The Jewish farmers of the neighboring villages, all simple healthy and strong Jews, but ardently chasidic and very pious, were suddenly very different people. It was none other than the ruach-hakoidesh 10 that started floating them. Just as if a miracle had happened, all of a sudden the rustic arrogance left them and they entered into such a spiritual nobility that was never seen before.
And they sang with such fervor that it was a pleasure to listen to them, and they danced with such exuberance as if they were carrying themselves in the air… Among them, among the chasidim, for the first time in my life I saw how Jews danced. And I liked it so much that I went and danced with them… I was still a little boy then, and during the dance I fell on my feet. I was always trying to grab a hold of the tails of someone’s kapote11, and I skipped together with the chasidim who were so delighted by the presence of the Rebbe.
And when my tate saw that I danced, and in dancing all the chasidic movements movements and I was catching onto the nign, he really kvelled over it and he gave me a pinch on the cheek:
– Well done, Shmuel’ikel - he said - Well done.
The other chasidim also kvelled over the fact that I, a little boy, who was as small as an elf, joined in the round and so quickly picked up their style of dancing. And one of them, a gabe of the Makarover Rebbe, a man with a beautiful beard, a redhead, and with two long hands, very plump, said to my father afterwards:
– Just look, just look, Leyb Sender! He is indeed something unusual and delightful, the little one! … Nu, may God help, that he will be dedicated to the Toire, to the chupe, and to maysim toivm12… He is growing, isn’t he… He is a growing vessel…”
In my love of dancing, I planted myself between Jewish and goyishe dance. It didn’t matter to me, any sort of dance. It was enough for me to hear some nign, I would immediately start dancing to it. Even just around walking, I did in a dancing sort of way. And to this day, I don’t understand what I was so joyful for, what put me in such high spirits, that from the start I danced with such gusto…
But there came a time when I stopped dancing and could not be as happy as usual. This was when tate suddenly started to complain about his health.
– I’m sick, Feige - he often said to mame, - I’m very sick… and somehow my heart tells me that it’s not good. Really not good…
He then went to the Rebbe several times, and the Rebbe wished him a refue shlema, but it didn’t help. He still complained:
– I am sick, Feige. Very sick.
No matter how small I was, I still felt and understood that because he complains so often about his poor health, a very difficult time is falling on us, and it made me melancholy and depressed. And when I would forget about it, as is usually the way with a child, and I would start to sing some kind of nign, sometimes a Yiddish one and sometimes a goyishe one, and while singing, I began to dance along, mame scolded me:
– Shame on you, Shmuel’ikel. You should be ashamed of yourself; Tate is sick and you are acting joyfully…
Our whole house became a different place when tate fell ill. And nothing could be done about the illness, because in the village there was no doctor, no medical practitioner, and not even a pharmacy. No matter how much they begged tate to see a doctor in Vasilkov, or in Belaya Tserkov, he did not want to. We could not prevail upon him at all, and he the same answer to everything: “What can a doctor help me with? How long I am destined to live in the world, to be alive… The doctor will not give me more years to live; A man is in God’s hands…”
With great difficulty, we managed to convince him to let us bring a doctor from Vasilyvshchyne, some sort of “absent-minded” Jew, who had some kind of panacea for all diseases in the world. And he, the doctor from Vasilyvshchyne, gave tate some sort of drug, and told him that if things didn’t get better to call him again…
At that time, my oldest sister, Bas-Sheyva, became a bride, and it is worth telling the story of how this shidduch13 was made, because all around it was very typical of the Jewish life of that time:
Among the chasidim that my tate often met at the Makarover Rebbe’s court, there was one Pinya Radetsky. Radetsky, a Jewish landowner, lived in the town of Rybinka14, which is not far from Vasilyvshchyne, and just like my father, he was also an ardent chasid, a zealot, and he often went to the Makarover Rebbe’s. As it usually happens, at the rejoicings at the Rebbe’s court, people often drank l’chaim15 and wished for salvation for the Jews. And once, when my father was drinking l’chaim with Pinya Radetsky from the town of Rybinka, for a while they were already talking about this and that, whatever just came to the tongue; Each time, someone else poured a cup of whiskey and, as usual, an “order” started:
– L’chaim! May God will it so!
– L’chaim toivm u’sholem! God bless you, and so it will be!
So, little by little, they drank another glass and another glass, and showered each other with blessings and wishes, and in the conversation that took place between them, my father told Pinya that his wife is pregnant and he hopes that, boruch hashem16, the birth will pass peacefully. And when Pinya heard this, he got excited and told tate that his wife was also preparing to give birth. Soon, in the blink of an eye, it was already agreed between the two Makarover chasidim that if the wife of one gave birth to an boy and the wife of the other gave birth to a girl, there should be a shidduch.
They shook hands, made a tekiyat-kaf17. And so it was.
A short time after that, my mother gave birth to a girl and she was named Bas-Sheyva. Pinya Radetsky’s wife also gave birth to a boy, and he was named Aron18. And so, as agreed in the tekiyat-kaf, because the wife of one chasid gave birth to a girl and the other gave birth to a boy, it was said that it is beshert and this is a marriage m’hashamayim 19.
And so, my sister Bas-Sheyva, the oldest of all the children in our family, was already a bride immediately after she was born. And that’s how she was really treated even when she was still a very little girl: “Bas-Sheyva, the bride.” Tate loved Bas-Sheyva very much and showed her a lot of tenderness, not only when she was still a little girl, but when also when she was grown, and he was looking forward to the time when she would go to the chupe.
And just in that year, when it was decided to have Bas-Sheyva’s wedding on the Shabbes after Shavu’es20, tate’s health was already so poor that it was no wonder that he couldn’t think about anything other than whether or not he would live to see his first daughter’s wedding… You could tell from how he suddenly started working to move the marriage from Shabbes after Shavu’es to instead be two weeks before Pesach21…
– I want to be at the wedding of my eldest daughter. - he said - I want to take her to the chupe…
At that time, apparently, he knew in his heart that that he would not live for long. He felt it. Everyone in the family felt it. And therefore we decided not to wait for my sister Bas-Sheyva’s wedding until until Shabbes after Shavu’es, but rather two weeks before Pesach, as my father wishes…
And they began to prepare for the great simche, when, with God’s voice, they will lead to the couple, who were blessed with a tekiyat-kaf before they were born, to the chupe. And while preparing for the wedding, people also prepared for a funeral…
You had to think about it, even when you didn’t want to, because tate was already so sick and he was feeling so bad that you knew that he would not live much longer. He himself knew this more than anyone else. And that’s why tate often repeated the only thing that made sense to him at the time:
– I want to be with my eldest daughter at the wedding… I want to lead Bas-Sheyva to the chupe and I beg God, may he give me strength so that I may see before my death that my family honors the tekiyat-kaf…
And he counted the days that remained until two weeks before Pesach. And he looked forward to the good hour…I also counted the days left until the wedding. But I did not understand the silent tragedy that was taking place there. I was still too young to understand this. I just wanted dance at the first wedding in our family…
Rabbi, but specifically one who leads a chasidic dynasty↩︎
halakhic innovation; new way of doing something in orthodox Judaism↩︎
songs/tunes↩︎
healing↩︎
joyous occasion with religious connotation↩︎
sermon↩︎
Torah portion↩︎
righteous man↩︎
holy power↩︎
Long black coat that chasidic men wear↩︎
good deeds↩︎
match, as in matchmaking↩︎
now known as “Hrebinka”↩︎
Cheers; “to life”↩︎
formal Jewish agreement↩︎
According to their tombstones, they were born in 1859: Aron’s tombstone and Bas-Sheyva’s tombstone, making them about 10 years older than Sam↩︎
from heaven (Hebrew/religious term)↩︎
Shavuot↩︎
Passover↩︎
