Stories Of Greatness

It was the chasunah of a relative – a happy time, a special time, and Reb Anshel was filled with gratitude to be there. A retired businessman with a large and ever-growing family immersed in lives of avodas Hashem, Reb Anshel is known and respected in the Toronto community and beyond. As a guest myself, I was also participating in the beautiful simchah. During the chasan’s tish, waiting for the badeken ceremony to begin, I noticed Reb Anshel coming out of the crowd toward me.

What is hashgachah pratis? Sometimes it is Hashem protecting an individual from harm in ways he never saw coming.

Rivka Toledano, a religious emergency room nurse, has seen a lot in her time, but on one occasion, she recalls a miraculous occurrence that she personally witnessed while working in a Canadian hospital. It was a cold December night, in the middle of a snowstorm, which means the ER can get pretty crazy. Chanukah was starting that very night, and Rivka was looking forward to completing her shift and going home to light the menorah with her family.

The Zohar states that 974 generations of souls were reincarnated in Lavan’s sheep. Before Yaakov’s arrival at Lavan’s home, they were trapped by the Sitra Achra. Yaakov rescued these souls by implanting emunah into them in the form of the rods that he placed in the water, and when the sheep gazed at the rods, the souls inside them were transformed with purity.

Throughout the entire parshah, we continuously read how Yosef, the favored son of Yaakov Avinu, suffered horrible humiliation, debasement, and extreme degradation. From the moment he was whisked away from his home and family to the abject slavery of an Egyptian master, finding himself thrown into jail for no fault of his own, it would have been logical for Yosef to become absorbed in his own pain, angry at the world. But Yosef did not become bitter. He remained sensitive to others and to his Divine mission in life. Not only did he perceive the anguish of Pharaoh’s servants, but he also reached out to help them. To Yosef, the fact that Hashem had arranged for him to notice someone in need indicated that it was his duty to help.

The following story is told over in chasidishe circles and has been handed down for generations. A local villager once traveled to the Polish town of Zidichov, to see the tzadik, Rav Tzvi Hirsch Eichenstein zt”l, with an urgent request. He was not a wealthy man, but an opportunity to lease a small inn near the city of Helmutz just presented itself and the local poritz was awaiting his decision. What would make this deal truly profitable, he told the Rebbe, was if he could dig a well of water behind the inn and use it for his guests, as well as to sell water to the local populace. As of now, if anyone needed water in the area, they had to travel into town. The question was where to dig and if he would find water.