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Thousands
“Write To Moshiach And See Miracles”
By
Shneur Zalman Levin”
We reported about the massive campaign which
took place in Eretz Yisroel on Yud Shvat, called “Write to Moshiach
and See Miracles,” in which people were encouraged to do just that. A
quarter of a million brochures explaining the significance of connecting
to the Rebbe were distributed throughout the morning. Stands were set up
around the country where people could write the Rebbe and receive
answers in the Igros Kodesh.
In the Katamon neighborhood of Yerushalayim,
the day began as any other day. People hurried off to work and women
went shopping. Two Tmimim stood near a stand displaying a sign
which said “Write to Moshiach and See Miracles.” People looked at
them curiously. Some walked on, while others remained in order to write
to the Rebbe. The bachurim patiently guided them. “This is not
hocus pocus,” explained Pinchas. “You are writing to the Rebbe, and
you have to believe that the Rebbe reads your letter. You have to
prepare for this by taking on a good hachlata, and giving a coin
to tzedaka. You must take this very seriously.”
An Israeli stopped and inquired about
writing to the Rebbe. He hesitated for a while, and then decided to
write. He put on a kippa and then sat down in the shade to write,
as tears flowed from his eyes. He was asking the Rebbe for a bracha
for children, because he had been married many years and had not yet had
children. The answer he opened to was in Volume 5, dated the first day
of Rosh Chodesh Adar. The Rebbe begins the letter by saying that he
received his letter of Yud Shvat! The Rebbe said that he should increase
his study of Nigla and Chassidus, and he encouraged him to
strengthen his bitachon (trust) in Hashem regarding gashmiyus
and parnasa, and certainly regarding children – with a
blessing for good news.
At just about the same time, Shneur and Levi
manned a stand in the business section of Yavne. They distributed the
brochure and invited people to write to the Rebbe. A woman asked for
assistance in formulating a letter. Her husband had been killed in a car
accident and she was raising her children alone. She asked for a bracha
for strength to overcome her overwhelming situation. Her eyes were red
from crying. She opened the Igros Kodesh to Volume 16, p.
332: “A prisoner cannot release himself... Since Chazal obligated
you to search...may the command of the Torah to increase in joy
in the month of Adar be fulfilled, with open and obvious
good...through a shidduch and marriage...”
There was a stand in the Diezengoff Center.
A resident of Tel Aviv, who had already heard about writing to the
Rebbe, hurried home where she wrote a number of requests on separate
pieces of paper. Then she went to the stand where she wanted to insert
all the requests together in the Igros Kodesh. The Rebbe
responded, “Since she is asking for brachos for many people,
she definitely should influence them to strengthen their fulfillment of
Torah and mitzvos.” The woman was moved and resolved to
strengthen in Torah and mitzvos.
Weeks after the campaign, people still call
Matteh Moshiach in Kfar Chabad asking for explanations and help in
writing to the Rebbe. The coordinators answer to the best of their
ability, and refer the people to their local Chabad House.
“It’s really unbelievable,” says Rabbi
Shmuel Hendel, “because we ask people to take on good hachlatos, which
are sometimes easy and sometimes difficult to do, and people accept
it.”
Here are some examples:
Two 15-year-old girls from traditional
households approached a stand and asked for a bracha from the
Rebbe. The letter they opened was addressed to Bnos Chabad in a high
school, and the Rebbe asks them to be more careful with tzniyus.
The two girls were very surprised, and they resolved to dress modestly.
A man wrote to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe
answered with a letter that explains the privilege and obligation of
observing the mitzva of taharas ha’mishpacha
(family purity). On the spot, the man resolved to take classes on the
topic, and to observe it from then on. Another life changed because of hiskashrus
to the Rebbe.
Thousands of hachlatos tovos were
made on Yud Shvat, whether to give tzedaka daily, to keep
Shabbos, light Shabbos candles, learn Chitas, observe kashrus,
and sometimes even to attend a shiur in Chassidus.
Sometimes the people themselves knew better
than the bachurim what the Rebbe wanted from them. At a stand set
up near the school for engineering in Tel Aviv, a man asked to write to
the Rebbe. Before putting his letter into the Igros Kodesh,
he resolved to give tzedaka every day.
He put his letter in and the answer in
Volume 11, p. 234 said: “The connection between two people who became
distant is through...studying the same topic, and this is a matter of
loving your friend like yourself.”
The bachur read the answer and
explained it to the man, but the man stopped him and said, “You
don’t have to explain it to me, because I understand what the Rebbe
wants on my own.” To the bachur’s surprise, the man said he
had seriously quarreled with his wife, and the Rebbe was telling him how
to reconnect.
A woman wanted to write a letter asking for
a bracha for shalom bayis. She got an answer in Volume 11,
p. 151. The Rebbe spoke about matan Torah and the Chazal
that says, “Great is peace, for the entire Torah was given in order to
make peace in the world, as it says, ‘Its ways are ways of
pleasantness and all its paths are peaceful.’ There must be shalom,
like the saying of the Tzemach Tzedek that Alef, beis, Gimmel,
Dalet stand for achdus-bracha (unity-blessing),
gaava-dalus (arrogance-poverty)... Try peacefully even if apparently
there is justification for...”
Hundreds of phone calls came into Nechayeg
V’Nishma (computerized phone audio library) in the weeks following the
campaign. Hearing the messages people leave is very moving. Many people
related their miracle stories.
There’s no doubt that this project left a
deep impression among thousands of Jews, through connecting to their
Father in Heaven and the Rebbe MH”M.
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