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לזכות שלום דוב בער בן לאה לרפואה שלימה וקרובה בתוך שאר חולי ישראל
Rebbetzin Chana’s Memoirs are a treasure trove of rich recollections of good times, as well as her and her husband’s harrowing experiences. Written in a most humble and understated style, her memoirs are a great inspiration for us, today.
“It felt as if our whole life had stopped” Beis Nissan, 5712/1952
This day [Beis Nissan] always reminds me of memories of something or other. It’s already 32 years, I believe, since the passing of the Rebbe, Rabbi Shalom DovBer of Lubavitch, of blessed memory.
I remember when the news arrived. Generally, contact by mail or railway was very poor. Nevertheless, in this instance, we learned about it that same day.
I have no words to describe the impact of this news. It felt as if our whole life had stopped. That’s how it was in our home, and for those who were close to us, and particularly among members of the Lubavitch community. My husband, of blessed memory, wept aloud, something he almost never did.
All those mentioned here found out immediately—I don’t remember how. Right away, more than twenty of them came to our home and brokenheartedly sat shivah, weeping intensely.
I recall how an engineer named Y. L. Koren, came in. He was a freethinker and thoroughly irreligious. Nevertheless, seeing how everyone, young and old, together with my husband—whom he described as having an exceptionally stalwart character—were all so brokenhearted, he wept with them together.
He told me that although he was such a total freethinker, nevertheless, when he learned that the personage who held such a sacred position among Jews, and to whom his followers were so devotedly attached, had passed away, he felt compelled to weep with them together, feeling their same sense of loss. Even when he left our home, he couldn’t calm down and cried hysterically in the street.
— An excerpt from the memoirs of the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s mother, Rebbetzin Chana ע״ה. Written Beis Nissan, 5712/1952
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“Today is Beis Nissan,” he stated. “It would be proper to deliver a Chasidic discourse…” Written Beis Nissan, 5712/1952
I have not written for so long… For some reason I am finding it difficult.
Today, 2 Nissan, reminded me of the first time that I travelled to my husband’s place of exile for Passover. The year was 1940. Physically, my husband was not well on this day. It was only two months after the grueling etap to exile, and the living conditions there were worse than I had imagined they would be. Yet on this day, he forgot about everything.
“Today is Beis Nissan [the 20th Yahrtzeit of the Rebbe Rashab],” he stated. “It would be proper to deliver a Chasidic discourse—but there aren’t too many listeners. I would like to pen a dissertation but, alas, there is no paper on which to write. Contemplation will need to suffice—may G‑d grant me the strength to think.”
— A week before Pesach I travelled to the city of Kzyl-Orda and brought back two notebooks, powder with which to prepare ink, and a small bottle to serve as an inkwell. This gave my husband indescribable joy, and he immediately began writing. He took to the writing with more enthusiasm than to eating the bread that I had brought for him after such a long and arduous hunger period. —
My husband sat for a while immersed in his thoughts, and then began speaking about the Rebbe, Rabbi Shalom DovBer, completely oblivious to his surroundings and his state of affairs.
The heat was then so intense that it was impossible to sit fully dressed. I recall how in the evening, I brought my husband a fresh change of clothes, and at around 10:00 in the morning the shirt was already covered in black specks… This was caused by fleas, which soiled the shirt over the course of the night. It was simply intolerable. After a while, we managed to find rooming with less fleas.
When my husband spoke, he would always glance at the stains on his shirt, and would transport himself to a completely different world. He absolutely refused to allow himself to take these difficulties to heart.
— An excerpt from the memoirs of the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s mother, Rebbetzin Chana ע״ה. Beis Nissan, 5708/1948
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“Today is Beis Nissan. Oh, the Rebbe!” Beis Nissan, 5715/1955
This is the eleventh year that I am alone. Today [I feel as if] I am back in Chi’ili in 1942. Memories don’t die, and particularly memories such as these I am unwilling to forget.
In any case, the two of us, my husband and I, were sitting together at a small table knocked together from boards. Near us was a window which, whenever I could—when its light wasn’t needed—I used to cover so that my husband, of blessed memory, shouldn’t see the hogs that always roamed about there, which made him very uneasy.
Where can I find words to express what he endured that night?
He just said simply, “Today is Beis Nissan [the 22nd Yahrtzeit of the Rebbe Rashab]. Oh, the Rebbe!” He sank into a reverie for an hour or more.
At that time we had no pen or ink for writing. I understood that some great and profound concept was bursting through his mind that begged to be expressed, but no one was there to whom to communicate it.
He did not react at all to his surroundings, as bitter as the situation was. There was nothing I could say to him, until he himself made a great effort to emerge from that world where he had been.
Indeed, he ought to have lived in very different conditions. But I don’t want to dwell on that now. By 1944 he had other Jews with whom to communicate, but no more than that…
May G‑d grant long life and success to his children. May I be able to live as I ought to live, and may Soviet Russia cause no problems.
—From the memoirs of the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s mother, Rebbetzin Chana ע״ה.
Written Beis Nissan, 5715/1955
Memoirs of Rebbetzin Chana is Copyright by Kehot Publication Society
