High Fashion
"Your young men dress like bums," complained the lawyer to the Lubavitcher Rebbe.
This story was told by Rabbi Yosef Silverman of Pittsburgh, an Ascent associate, to his former Torah instructor, Rabbi Tuvia Bolton, who composed and circulated the following report.
Yosef had a good friend, whom we will call Chaim, who learned in the 770 Eastern Parkway Yeshiva in Brooklyn and used to go on "Tefilin Campaign" every Friday with a group of his friends.
[The driving force behind this dynamic, pro-active type of Judaism is the Baal Shem Tov's teaching that every Jew is essentially very close to G-d and wants to do all of His commandments. It's just that they have to be reminded, awakened and sometimes even defrosted in order to realize it.]
Chaim used to take the subway with four of his friends to the sky-scrapers in the heart of Manhattan and go visiting the exclusive offices one after the other looking for 'unaffiliated' Jews that perhaps wanted to put on tefilin.
Generally they got positive responses and a few Jews even put tefilin on for themselves. But one law firm was like an impenetrable iceberg. The non-Jewish lawyers were friendly and good humored but the Jewish ones had no time. And those that might have been interested were quickly discouraged by the head of the firm.
He was a no-nonsense every-moment-is-precious hard as nails attorney who was worth several hundred dollars per hour. When he was anywhere in the office, even in his room, there was no chance that our heroes could even pass the front desk. And if he chanced to come out of his office he would have them evicted; he'd mumble something to the receptionist on the way to his room and in a few minutes she would politely ask them to leave.
This went on for about half a year, they made zero headway but they didn't give up. In any case it was only one of the offices on their route and some Jews have to be asked a thousand times before they agree. At least they would get in the first few hundred.
One Friday they arrived just as their subway was pulling out and were waiting for the next to come when one of the vendors there, a Mexican fellow who set up a table and sold pens and other small items, approached them, pointed to Chaim, held up a black tie and said, "You need a tie."
"No thanks." Chaim said politely. "I don't like ties. But thanks anyway."
"No!" The Mexican insisted "You NEED a tie. You are an important person with a white shirt. Such a person needs a tie. Here, I sell you the tie for less. I give you a reduction. Five dollars instead of seven. Good? Take it!"
"Nope! Sorry. I don't want a tie!" Chaim protested calmly. "Thanks anyway. but sorry, I don't want it!"
But the fellow wouldn't take no for an answer. For the next five minutes he kept it up. "This tie is just for you! If you wear it you will look good! I know what I am saying. You need it." etc, etc.
Chaim tried to protest more assertively, "Hey! Leave me alone. I don't have money for a tie, okay? And I won't wear it anyway. None of us wear ties!" But to no avail. The Mexican was not giving up. Finally the boys decided the only way to get rid of him was to simply buy the tie.
Each friend smilingly chipped in a dollar. Chaim gave him the five and took the tie, happy to finally have a little peace and quiet. "Okay?" one of the fellows said. "Now are you happy? We bought the tie!"
"NO!" The salesman said. "I'm not happy! You must WEAR the tie! What, you think I sold for me the tie? No! It's for you! You MUST wear it. It will make you look good. See?" And he grabbed for the tie.
"Look," Said Chaim exasperatedly, "Leave me alone! It's my tie now and I'll do what I want with it. I don't have to wear it if I don't want. Do you understand? Not only that, I never wore a tie in my life and I don't even know how to make a knot! So do me a favor and leave me alone. Okay, amigo?"
"Oh! No problem!" he answered "I show you how to tie it. Here, look. Give me the tie, bend over a bit ... I put your collar up like this. See." And before Chaim knew it the fellow had done it -- Chaim was wearing a tie! He shrugged, thinking to himself that as soon as he gets on the train he'll take it off.
But the Mexican knew his business. "Ah! It is beautiful!!" he stepped back and said admiring his own work. "Now you must promise me that you won't take it off."
"What? You mean I have to wear it the rest of my life?" They all laughed including the salesman. Chaim was wondering why the subway was taking so long. "Why can't you just leave me alone?"
"Sure," he answered. "Just promise me you will wear it today. So you give it a chance. Good? Promise? You see it looks so beautiful! You must promise!"
"Who are you anyway?" Chaim exclaimed. "Did my mother send you or something?" The others roared with laughter.
But then, for some reason, Chaim surprised himself by suddenly blurting out "Okay! Okay! I'll leave it on today."
At that moment the subway came roaring in, they all got on and twenty minutes later they were in Manhattan, involved in putting tefilin on Jews. They had already forgotten the Mexican and the bizarre episode with the tie.
Finally came the turn of the 'ice berg' law firm.
They got out of the elevator on the fifteenth floor, entered the large marble-floored reception room and smiled at the receptionist. A few of the gentile lawyers smiled and said hello as they rushed from room to room.
Then appeared .... the boss!
"Why are they here?" he said to the receptionist. Then, not waiting for an answer turned to them and said sternly, "Who are you? What do you want?"
"We're from the Lubavitcher Rebbe and we came to see if there are Jews here that want to put on tefilin," one of them answered, preparing to get evicted as usual.
He looked at them silently for a second or two like a wolf about to pounce on his prey. Then he pointed at Chaim and said. "YOU! I want you to follow me!"
It didn't look good. After all, this guy knew all the laws. He was the head of the firm! It could be that somehow they were trespassing. Maybe he would call the police. But Chaim, without thinking too much, followed him down a wide, highly polished corridor into his plush office.
The lawyer closed the door behind them, turned to Chaim and said. "I want to put on tefilin."
After a few years of wrapping tefilin on people, nothing really surprised Chaim anymore. After five minutes he had finished the 'mitzva'.
"You probably want to know why I finally agreed to put on tefilin, right?" The attorney asked. "Well, I'll tell you."
"I might look like a successful man but the fact is I'm having several big crises in life. Our firm is losing several very big cases and suffering other financial setbacks. Not only that but I'm having some personal problems as well. I'm not used to being on the helpless side but I needed help. I didn't know to whom to turn, I mean, someone who really cared. As lawyers, we live a pretty cold life sometimes.
"Then, yesterday I happened to see one of the cards you fellows left here with the Lubavitcher Rebbe's picture on it, and it struck a note. I began to wonder if perhaps he could do something. After all, I did put on tefilin after my Bar Mitzva for a while. Anyway, maybe you won't believe this, but last night I had a dream.
"I dreamt that I saw the Lubavitcher Rebbe. He smiled and I asked him if he could help me. He answered, 'But I send you a group of young men every Friday with tefilin!' To which I replied, 'What, those ragamuffins? They look like a bunch of vagrants! Why, none of them even wears a tie!!'
"The Rebbe looked at me and said 'You want a tie? Okay, I'll send someone with a tie!' And I woke up."
"So when I saw you with a tie I knew that it wasn't only a dream."
The attorney began putting on tefilin regularly and a close friendship developed between him and the fellows. As far as anyone knows his problems were alleviated.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[Adapted by Yrachmiel Tilles from
the rendition of his friend and colleague Rabbi Tuvia Bolton, the popular
teacher, musician and storyteller, in his weekly email for the yeshiva which he
heads, Ohr Tmimim (yeshiva@ohrtmimim.org ; ww.ohrtmimim.org/torah)].
Biographical
note:
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the Lubavitcher Rebbe (11 Nissan
1902 - 3 Tammuz 1994), became the seventh Rebbe of the Chabad dynasty after his
father-in-law, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, passed away in Brooklyn on 10
Shvat 1950. He is widely acknowledged as the greatest Jewish leader of the second
half of the 20th century. Although a dominant scholar in both the revealed and
hidden aspects of Torah and fluent in many languages and scientific subjects,
the Rebbe is best known for his extraordinary love and concern for every Jew on
the planet. His emissaries around the globe dedicated to strengthening Judaism
number in the thousands. Hundreds of volumes of his teachings have been printed,
as well as dozens of English renditions.
Yrachmiel Tilles is co-founder and associate director of Ascent-of-Safed,
and editor of Ascent Quarterly and the AscentOfSafed.com and KabbalaOnline.org
websites. He has hundreds of published stories to his credit.