24 Jun WHERE OTHERS SAW THE END, HE SAW THE BEGINNING IN TRIBUTE TO THE LUBAVITCHER REBBE, FOR HIS 31ST YAHRZEIT

Stop Pounding
Rabbi Sam Wolfson
was giving his
speech to the Jewish
Federation about the
“Tragedy of Jewish
Assimilation.”
Toward the end of his long speech, the Rabbi
clapped his hands… waited 10 seconds… and
clapped his hands again.
The Audience looked puzzled. The Rabbi then
explained that every time he clapped his hands,
some Jew married a non-Jew.
Immediately, Morris jumped up from his seat in
the audience and shouted, “Nu… So Stop With
Your Clapping!”
A Blossoming Staff
It is a baffling story. The portion of Korach tells
of the “Test of the Staffs” conducted when
people contested Aaron’s appointment to the
High Priesthood. Hashem instructs Moses to
take a staff from each tribe, each inscribed with
the name of the tribe’s leader; Aharon’s name
was written on the Levite Tribe’s staff. The
sticks were placed overnight in the Holy of
Holies in the Sanctuary. When they were
removed the following morning, the entire
nation beheld that Aharon’s staff had blossomed
overnight and bore fruit, demonstrating that
Aharon was Hashem’s choice for Kohen Gadol.
In the words of the Torah (Bamidbar 16):
“And on the following day, Moses came to the
Tent of Testimony, and behold, Aaron’s staff for
the house of Levi had blossomed! It gave forth
blossoms, sprouted buds, and produced ripe
almonds. Moses took out all the staffs from
before the Lord, to the children of Israel; they
saw, and they took, each man his staff.”
What was the meaning of this strange miracle?
Hashem could have chosen many ways to
demonstrate the authenticity of Aaron’s position.
What is more, three previous incidents have
already proven this very truth: the swallowing of
Korach and his fellow rebels who staged a revolt
against Moshe and Aharon; the burning of the
250 leaders who led the mutiny; and the
epidemic that spread among those who accused
Moses and Aaron of killing the nation. If these
three miracles did not suffice, what would a
fourth one possibly achieve? What, then, was the
point and message of the blossoming stick?
One answer I heard from my teacher was this:
The blossoming of the staff was meant not so
much to prove who the high priest is (that was

already established by three previous earth-
shattering events), but rather to demonstrate

what it takes to be chosen as a kohn gadol of
Hashem, and to explain why it was Aharon was
chosen to this position. What are the
qualifications required to be a leader?
From Death to Life
Before being severed from the tree, this staff
grew, produced leaves, and was full of vitality.
But now, severed from its roots, it has become
dry and lifeless.
The primary quality of a Kohen Gadol, of a High
Priest, of a man of Hashem, is his or her ability
to transform lifeless sticks into living orchards.
The real leader is the person who sees the
possibility for growth and life, whereas others

see stagnation and lifelessness. The Jewish
leader perceives even in a dead stick the potential
for rejuvenation.
Let There Be Life
How relevant this story is to our generation.
Following the greatest tragedy ever to have
struck our people, the Holocaust, the Jewish
world appeared like a lifeless staff. Mounds and
mounds of ashes, the only remains of the six
million, left a nation devastated to its core. An
entire world went up in smoke.
What happened next will one day be told as one
of the great acts of reconstruction in the history
of mankind. Holocaust survivors and refugees
set about rebuilding on new soil the world they
had seen go up in the smoke of Auschwitz and
Treblinka.
One of the remarkable individuals who
spearheaded this revival was the Lubavitcher
Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson
(1902-1994), whose 31st yahrzeit is this coming
Sunday, the third of Tammuz, June 29. The
Rebbe, and other great Jewish sages and leaders
from many diverse communities, refused to
yield to despair. While others responded to the
Holocaust by building memorials, endowing
lectureships, convening conferences, and writing
books – all vital and noble tributes to create
memories of a tree which once lived but was
now dead — the Rebbe urged every person he
could touch to bring the stick back to life: to
marry and have lots of children, to rebuild
Jewish life in every possible way. He built
schools, communities, shuls, Jewish centers,
summer camps, and yeshivas, and encouraged
and inspired countless Jews to do the same. He
opened his heart to an orphaned generation,
imbuing it with hope, vision, and determination.
He became the most well-known address for
scores of activists, rabbis, philanthropists,
leaders, influential people, laymen and women
from all walks of life – giving them the
confidence to reconstruct a shattered universe.
He sent out emissaries to virtually every Jewish
community in the world to help rekindle the
Jewish smile when a vast river of tears threatened
to obliterate it.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe urged his beloved
people to use the horrors of destruction as an
impetus to generate the greatest Jewish
renaissance and to create “re-Jew-venation.” He
gazed at a dead staff and saw in it the potential
for new life.
His new home, the United States, was a country
that until then had dissolved Jewish identity. It
was, as they used to say in those days, a “treifene
medinah,” a non-kosher land. Yet the Rebbe saw
the possibility of using American culture as a
medium for new forms of Jewish activity, using
modern means to spread Yiddishkeit. The Rebbe
realized that the secularity of the modern world
concealed a deep yearning for spirituality, and
he knew how to address it. Where others saw the
crisis of a dead staff, he saw an opportunity for a
new wave of renewal and redemption.
Who was the Rebbe? One way to answer this
question is this: He has that unique ability to see
crisis as opportunity. Where others saw the end,
he saw the beginning. Where others saw
disintegration, he saw the potential for birthing.

It remains one of the most empowering messages
for each of us as an individual, and all of us as a
collective.
The Phoenix
Rabbi Yehudah Krinsky, one of the Rebbe’s
secretaries, related the following episode.
“It was around 1973, when the widow of Jacques
Lifschitz, the renowned sculptor, had come for a
private audience with the Lubavitcher Rebbe,
shortly after her husband’s sudden passing.
“In the course of her meeting with the Rebbe,
she mentioned that when her husband died, he
was nearing completion of a massive sculpture
of a phoenix in the abstract, a work commissioned
by Hadassah Women’s Organization for the
Hadassah Hospital on Mt. Scopus, in Jerusalem.
“As an artist and sculptor in her own right, she
said that she would have liked to complete her
husband’s work, but, she told the Rebbe, she had
been advised by Jewish leaders that the phoenix
is a non-Jewish symbol. It could never be placed
in Jerusalem!
“I was standing near the door to the Rebbe’s
office that night, when he called for me and
asked that I bring him the book of Job, from his
bookshelf, which I did.
“The Rebbe turned to Perek 29, pasuk 18, “I
shall multiply my days like the Chol.”
“And then the Rebbe proceeded to explain to
Mrs. Lifschitz the Midrashic commentary on
this verse which describes the Chol as a bird that
lives for a thousand years, then dies, and is later
resurrected from its ashes. Clearly then, a Jewish
symbol.”
“Mrs. Lifschitz was absolutely delighted. The
project was completed soon thereafter.”
In his own way, the Rebbe had brought new
hope to this broken widow. And in the recurring
theme of his life, he did the same for the spirit of
the Jewish people, which he raised from the
ashes of the Holocaust to a new, invigorated life.
He attempted to reenact the “miracle of the
blossoming staff” every day of his life with
every person he came in contact with.
To Expel or Not to Expel?
Rabbi Berel Baumgarten (d. in 1978) was a
Jewish educator in an orthodox religious yeshiva
in Brooklyn, NY, before relocating to Buenos
Aires. He once wrote a letter to the Rebbe asking
for advice. Each Shabbos afternoon, when he
would meet up with his students for a study
session, one student would walk into the room
smelling of cigarette smoke. Clearly, he was
smoking on the Shabbos. “His influence may
cause his religious class-mates to also cease
keeping the Shabbos,” Rabbi Baumgarten was
concerned. “Must I expel him from the school,
even without clear evidence that he is violating
the Shabbos?”
The Rebbe’s answer was no more than a
scholarly reference: “See Avos Derabi Noson
chapter 12.” That’s it.
Avos Derabi Noson is a Talmudic tractate, an
addendum to the Ethics of the Fathers, composed
in the 4th century CE by a Talmudic sage known
as Reb Nasan Habavli (hence the name Avos
Derabi Noson.) I was curious to understand the
Rebbe’s response. Rabbi Baumgarten was
looking for practical advice, and the Rebbe was
sending him to an ancient text…

I opened an Avos Derabi Noson to that particular
chapter and found a story about Aharon, our
very own High Priest of Israel.
Aharon, the sages relate, brought back many
Jews from a life of sin to a life of purity. He was
the first one in Jewish history to make “baalei
teshuvah,” to inspire Jews to re-embrace their
heritage, faith, and inner spiritual mission. But,
unlike today, during Aaron’s times to be a sinner
you had to be a real no-goodnik. Because the
Jews of his generation have seen G-d in His full
glory; and to rebel against the Torah way of life
was a sign of true betrayal and carelessness.
How then did Aharon do it? He would greet each
person warmly. Even a grand sinner would be
greeted by Aharon with tremendous grace and
love. Aharon would embrace these so-called
“Jewish sinners” with endless warmth and
respect. The following day when this person
would crave to sin, he would ask himself: How
will I be able to look Aaron in the eyes after I
commit such a serious sin? I am too ashamed.
He holds me in such high moral esteem. How
can I deceive him and let him down? And this
person would abstain from immoral behavior.
He Gave Them Dignity
We come here full circle: Aharon was a leader, a
Kohen Gadol because even his staff blossomed.
He never gave up on the dried-out sticks. He
never looked at someone and said, “This person
is a lost cause; he is completely cut off from his
tree of any possibility of growth. He is dry,
brittle, and lifeless.” For Aaron, even dry sticks
would blossom and produce fruit.
This is the story related in Avos Derabi Noson.
This was the story the Lubavitcher Rebbe
wanted Rabbi Berel Baumgarten to study and
internalize. Should I expel the child from school
was his question; he is, Jewishly speaking, a
dried-out and one tough stick!
The response of an Aharon is this: Love him
even more. Embrace him with every fiber of
your being, open your heart to him, cherish him,
and shower him with warmth and affection.
Appreciate him, respect him and let him feel that
you really care for him. See in him or her that
which he or she may not be able to see in
themselves at the moment. View him as a great
human being, and you know what? He will
become just that.
*) The nucleus of this idea was presented by the
Lubavitcher Rebbe to a group of young Jewish
girls—the graduates of Beis Rivkah High School
and counselors of Camp Emunah in the Catskill
Mountains, in NY, on Thursday, Parshas Korach,
28 Sivan, 5743, June 9, 1983. Credit to the late
Rabbi Jonathan Sacks for his masterful
elaboration.