I learned many expressions of God's love from my father, of blessed memory. When my daughter was two, I received a letter from him at his retirement home in Florida.
Dearest children: I was two years old (just about Layala's age) and anti-Semitism was rampant in the land of the Czars. First, the cavalry racing through the streets... And the Jews of the town scattering like chaff on the wind. Then the search. Like lightening the new spread and everyone know at once, triggered by fear and a constant tension, which was a way of life. One day I was snatched by my mother and sister. My screams were ineffectively stopped with the hand over my mouth. And so into a cellar by way of a a trapdoor and then into a sub-cellar, my heart pounding like an anvil; and my mother's heart and my sister's heart playing in concert with my own. And then the breaking of chairs and tables, and the drunken cursing of the soldiers sent me into cold spasms of fear. If I was discovered, I would be slashed and dissected. I was as close to God then as a ever was in my life, before or after... my mother and sister were praying; our silent prayers thundered and reverberated in that cold, clammy sub-cellar and the reached their goal (HaShem). For were our loves not spared? After what seemed years, we knew by the silence that the danger was passed, but we slept in that awful dungeon night to be on the safe side. These traumatic experiences left my mother with deep melancholia.
My father was in America at the time working desperately to raise money for passage. For long periods of time we did not hear from him, and my mother became emotional... My mother, in her wisdom, said to me, "Totele, I am not going to worry any more, I have worried enough, and now I will let God take over. Is He not wiser than the whole world put together? Why did He spare our lives if He did not have a good reason?" With this she borrowed that special smile she had when peace of mind was hers and we knew all was well." -Rabbi Noach Valley
Dearest children: I was two years old (just about Layala's age) and anti-Semitism was rampant in the land of the Czars. First, the cavalry racing through the streets... And the Jews of the town scattering like chaff on the wind. Then the search. Like lightening the new spread and everyone know at once, triggered by fear and a constant tension, which was a way of life. One day I was snatched by my mother and sister. My screams were ineffectively stopped with the hand over my mouth. And so into a cellar by way of a a trapdoor and then into a sub-cellar, my heart pounding like an anvil; and my mother's heart and my sister's heart playing in concert with my own. And then the breaking of chairs and tables, and the drunken cursing of the soldiers sent me into cold spasms of fear. If I was discovered, I would be slashed and dissected. I was as close to God then as a ever was in my life, before or after... my mother and sister were praying; our silent prayers thundered and reverberated in that cold, clammy sub-cellar and the reached their goal (HaShem). For were our loves not spared? After what seemed years, we knew by the silence that the danger was passed, but we slept in that awful dungeon night to be on the safe side. These traumatic experiences left my mother with deep melancholia.
My father was in America at the time working desperately to raise money for passage. For long periods of time we did not hear from him, and my mother became emotional... My mother, in her wisdom, said to me, "Totele, I am not going to worry any more, I have worried enough, and now I will let God take over. Is He not wiser than the whole world put together? Why did He spare our lives if He did not have a good reason?" With this she borrowed that special smile she had when peace of mind was hers and we knew all was well." -Rabbi Noach Valley
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