Stories Of Greatness

Our Sages have gone into great detail to explain why Parshas Korach is juxtaposed to the previous parshah, describing the mitzvah of Tzitzis. About the tzitzis it is written, “You shall look upon them and remember all the commandments of Hashem and fulfill them.” Yet Korach did just the opposite; rather than look at the tzitzis and do the right thing, he looked ahead to the dynasty that would emerge from him and this caused him to sin. He even went so far as to scorn the mitzvah of Tzitzis by standing before Moshe Rabbeinu and inquiring: If a talis that is entirely composed of t’cheiles (bluish dye thread) cannot exempt itself from the obligation, how can four threads of t’cheiles exempt it? (Midrash)

Rabbi Levi Welton is the rabbi of the Lincoln Park Jewish Center in Yonkers. He tells an amazing story of how he recently decided to visit his parents in Sacramento, California, on a random Shabbos in the winter. He went to daven Shacharis at the closest shul, a Chabad minyan, and when he was there, there was a kiddush in shul after davening. An out-of-town family was there that Shabbos celebrating their daughter’s bas mitzvah and chose the Chabad center for the celebration. It was a beautiful kiddush, replete with singing, Torah inspiration, and some hearty l’chayims.

Someone once asked Rav Chaim Pinchas Scheinberg zt”l why he had such extraordinary self-sacrifice for the mitzvah of tzitzis. He answered very simply: “Chacham leiv yikach mitzvos” – The wise of heart will seize good deeds. (Mishlei 10:8) He would often cite the Gemara: “Grab and eat, grab and drink, for the World in which we are leaving is like a wedding” – Eiruvin 54a. He wanted to “chap” as many mitzvos as he could. When he was asked how he could wear so many pairs when they were so heavy, he would respond, “Would you have such a question if you would be carrying gold?” To him, his layers of tzitzis were layers of pure gold.

Freedom was not something that was lost in Russia when the Soviets took power and established the USSR, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. In fact, the government was zealously restrictive in Czarist Russia, as well. There was no freedom of speech, and certainly no freedom of the press. The Central Bureau of Censorship, known as the CBC, appointed a network of censors across the country, with subordinates in the local villages reporting to their superiors in the larger cities. Every newspaper, every publication, every book was checked prior to its circulation. If a censor chanced upon even a single sentence that struck him the wrong way, the media was condemned – never to see the light of day.

As a young man, Rabbi Avraham Berkowitz chose to spend a few summers helping the local shluchim at Chabad-Lubavitch of Alaska. He would routinely stand outside the Alaska Visitors Center in downtown Anchorage with a pair of t’filin and packets of information about Jewish programs, greeting tourists disembarking from the scenic cruises along the Alaskan coastline. If they were Jewish, he would let them know where they could find a minyan or a good kosher meal.

All his life, Rav Chaim Kreiswirth zt”l was involved in collecting tz’dakah for the poor and needy and helping other people. In the latter part of his life, Rav Kreiswirth was extremely active raising hachnasas kallah funds for poor orphans, as well as supporting Yeshivas Merkaz HaTorah, where he was the Rosh HaYeshivah. Baruch Hashem, he was quite a successful fundraiser, in no small measure due to an amazing story that he was very much a part of.