Rabbis' Blog

This Shabbat will mark 82 years since the Rebbe miraculously arrived in America with his wife Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka from the European Inferno in the summer of 1941. Immediately upon his arrival, the Rebbe was appointed to lead Chabad’s outreach activities and publishing house and, within a decade, unleashed a spiritual revolution across the globe.

This coincided with the Previous Rebbe’s declaration that “Immediate Teshuvah (repentance) will bring immediate redemption.” Based on Maimonides’ teaching “The Torah has already promised that, ultimately, Israel will repent towards the end of exile and will be immediately redeemed,” he declared we entered an era when this will surely happen. During Passover of 1988 the Rebbe reflected on the fact that such urgency was unprecedented in Jewish history. “I myself did not think of it this way until I came to this country,” the Rebbe said.

Clearly, this was a watershed moment in our history. Aside from rejuvenating Jewish observance in a land rife with assimilation and spiritual apathy, the persistent presence of Chabad institutions around the world today is a direct result of what the Rebbe started doing once he arrived in America, all permeated with the urgency of the imminent arrival of Moshiach.

On numerous occasions, he emphasized how this great country is the best place from which such a renaissance could originate.

Here is one example. In 1991, President George Bush wrote the Rebbe a letter of congratulations in honor of the fiftieth anniversary of his arrival on American shores. Following is an excerpt of the Rebbe’s response:

Your good wishes, Mr. President, as well as those of the First Lady, are heartily appreciated. I can best reciprocate by invoking G‑d's promise to our Patriarch Abraham, "I will bless them that bless thee."

I welcome especially your remarks, my dear President, as a tribute to the Lubavitch Movement which I am privileged to head. That it has grown and flourished in this country is a testimony to the conducive climate and responsive human nature that combine to ensure that all positive efforts are abundantly fruitful.

By Divine Providence your kind letter was dated on the morrow of the anniversary of the Nation's birthday. It is well to remember that the founders of this Nation considered Independence Day as "a day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to G‑d Al-mighty." By Divine Providence also my arrival in the United States in 1941 coincided with the declaration by Congress that year, making July 4th a legal public holiday.

As we celebrate this special milestone, let us be mindful of the historic freedoms we have in our modern times and utilize them to fill the world with goodness and kindness, with the urgency that Moshiach’s arrival depends on one single good thought, deed or action of any individual.

The Rebbe’s correspondence was legendary. There was a time when the amount of mail delivered daily to Chabad World Headquarters in Brooklyn addressed to the Rebbe was exceeded only by the White House. He opened every letter and until the mid-seventies, most responses were sent as formal letters. As the numbers increased, the Rebbe often jotted down a short response on the margins of the letter or on a small note which was then dictated by a secretary to the recipient by phone.

While the original letters were destroyed for obvious reasons, thousands of these handwritten responses were preserved and, although we can only see one side of the conversation, they are a rare treasure of the Rebbe’s saintly wisdom, prophetic vision, and legendary sensitivity and love for every Jew.

Here is a loose translation of the Rebbe’s handwritten response to an individual that a friend shared with me yesterday:

“Thank you for sharing the good news. May you continue to always share good news - unlike your other letters which are filled with complaints (the original Hebrew word is translated literally as “sighs”) - May Heaven protect us - for decades now!! Even though it is publicly known that you succeeded in raising Torah observant children, helped many people etc. etc.”

I assume the recipient of this response was strongly engaged in Jewish life and activism and had a decades-long correspondence with the Rebbe. Without knowing what type of complaints this fellow was writing for years, here the Rebbe is celebrating the fact that he shared some good news and pointed out that he had much more good news in his life to share than complaints. While the stuff he was kvetching about could have been valid issues, focusing on them was not productive at all. And reading between the lines, it seems like many of the complaints resulted from viewing life from the wrong lens.

In this week’s parsha we learn how the Israelites traveled away from Mount Sinai where they had camped for close to a year and headed towards the Promised Land. After three days, people started grumbling about the constant traveling. G-d was angered by their misguided complaint - because the non-stop travel was meant to be a mad dash to reach the Land of Israel as fast as possible - and a terrible plague broke out.

Moses prayed on their behalf, but then they complained about the Manna - the heavenly bread which miraculously nourished them every day. Imagine that! They found problems with the food which tasted like almost anything you desired with no negative side-effects at all. Instead of appreciating the tremendous good in the Manna, they complained they couldn’t taste cucumbers, watermelons and leeks. 

Here’s an important lesson we can learn from this story. Firstly, complaining is a human default setting. Even in the presence of divine miracles it’s possible to view life negatively, so chances are that wherever you find a problem you’ll find a blessing if you dig a bit deeper. (Remember the joke about the optimistic kid and the pony?) And even if you encounter a real problem with no apparent blessing in sight, kvetching never helps. Focus on the many other good things around you, express your thanks and gratitude for the many blessings in your life, and most importantly, do more good things you can be proud of.