holidays – Page 2 – Melava Malka Stories

A Menorah On A Car Kindled A Soul

I had the most unusual phone call. A man called up anonymously, no caller ID, and asked, “Can I speak to a rabbi?”
“Yes, sure,” I answered.

Tishrei with the Alter Rebbe

The winter of that year—5547 (1786)—was most severe, the first snow falling in Liozna during the festival of Sukkot.

Shofar at the Kotel

In those years, the area in front of the Kotel did not look as it does today. Only a narrow alley separated the Kotel and the Arab houses on its other side.

The Community In Adelaide (Part 2)

“My family arrived in Australia two years ago.

The Community In Adelaide (Part 1)

During the first years that I lived in Sydney, Australia I was contacted by the Jewish community in Adelaide.

The Passover Miracle

When Chassidic master Rabbi Tzvi Elimelech Spira (known as the Bnei Yissaschar after the book he authored by that name) was ten years old, his father took a position as a teacher in a distant town.

Moshe The Tavern Keeper’s Kaparot*

It was the evening before Yom Kippur. One of the Chasidim of Reb Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev approached the Rebbe and asked if he could be present when the Rebbe does kaparot*.

Tisha B’av In Mezhibuz

It was Tisha b’Av night and the congregation was waiting for their rabbi who had left a couple of weeks prior and told them he would be back for Tisha b’Av. But he was nowhere to be seen.

Hashgacha Pratis Story Part Two

Story until now: Rabbi Eizenbach is invited to farbreng in Meron on Shabbat Mevorchim Menachem Av. Here he meets Yaakov (not his real name), a Litvish bochur, who had recently returned from New York where he went to the Ohel of the Rebbe to request a bracha for a shidduch. Now Yaakov asks the participants at the farbrengen to lift their cups and say a L’Chayim that the bracha should be fulfilled and he should get engaged soon. Please read on…

Hashgacha Pratis Story Part One

It happened once five years ago…