Years ago, while in Miami giving
a lecture on Rabbi Israel Meir Kagan, otherwise known as the Chofetz Chaim, the
most beloved Jewish leader in the pre-World War II world, I mentioned a story, perhaps
a legendary story, I had heard about a student in the rabbi’s yeshiva in Radin
who was caught smoking on the Sabbath, creating a scandal. But before he was expelled from the yeshiva,,
the Chofetz Chaim asked to see the student first and in two minutes, so the
story went, convinced the young man to give up the folly of his way.
I would give anything, I told
the audience, to know what the Chofetz Chaim could have said in two minutes
that one part of Israel has been trying for over thirty years to convince the
other part of Israel to believe.
But as I’m going on and on
about the Chofetz Chaim in this Florida hotel, I notice an older man in the
front row trembling uncontrollably.
After the lecture he ran up
to me and asked me where I had heard the story.
But even before I could tell him I didn’t recall, he grabbed my
shoulder, “I’m that man!” he exclaimed. “It
happened to me!”
All he said was, “Shabbes.
Shabbes,” with tears running down his cheeks.
Rabbi Shlomo Riskin
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