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Hello. I'm Nitsana Bellehsen.
It's May 19th, 2011.
I'm interviewing Moshe Rabinowitz
here in the Old City of Jerusalem.
The cameraman is Daniel Gal.
The soundman is Oni Elbar
and the producer is Alyona Bass.
Hold on.
Let's wait. Sometimes you have to wait for the noise to pass.
Can we start, Oni?
Yes. Is your microphone on?
Medium.
Okay, I need shade...
Okay.
There was a mosque here
that was apparently destroyed in the Six-Day War.
But as kids we called it Janje.
In Moroccan a mosque is called a Janje.
I've never heard the word.
Never?
We called it Janje,
I don't know if it comes from Arabic
or some other place.
But I'm starting here
and it's been destroyed.
We have...
What did you have to do with the Janje?
Nothing. We prayed here
and we saw it, that's all.
We prayed here, upstairs,
in the Habad synagogue,
and of course we saw it.
There was a tower there
where the sheikh sang
and recited the Koran.
We looked at it, that was all.
Moshe, could it be behind that tree?
Hold on, let's wait for... -Yes.
Here it is. I didn't see it.
It's still here.
Okay, it's behind that tree.
Okay. I wanted...
As kids, did you go inside,
did you have anything to do with it, or...? -What?
With the Janje? -No.
We heard him recite the Koran, that's all.
Did you like the place?
We liked the place in general,
we lived here, prayed here,
and studied here too.
So naturally it meant something to us.
This street is called Ha-Yehudim St.
Maybe I'll say a few words.
There was a grocery store here
that belonged to my mother's cousin.
Rabbi Mintzberg's daughter,
he was the last rabbi,
he came out carrying
the white flag.
And the grocery store was here.
We did our shopping here,
we didn't have much money
so we were lucky to eat brown bread,
white bread was a luxury.
My grandmother, who lived with us,
I'll tell you about her.
She used to get...
During the war, when there was rationing,
the doctor gave her authorization
to get white bread.
Explain that again.
What about your grandmother?
My grandmother...
was old.
She lived in our house.
I'll tell you more about her.
And the doctor gave her authorization
to get white bread,
which was a luxury,
so we had white bread.
This was during WWII.
Moshe, before you go on,
let's go back a second
and you tell the camera
your name and where you're from.
Okay. My name is Moshe Rabinowitz,
son of Shmuel Rabinowitz,
I'll tell you more about him
and also about my mother Miriam.
Her name was actually Mirel,
and my grandmother was a Bergman,
she was from a very famous family
in Jerusalem.
And we lived here in a neighborhood which I'll tell you about,
in Beit Rothschild.
I remember it from my childhood,
I remember living in Beit Rothschild.
The house with the arches.
And... that's it.
Can you just say your name, "My name is..."
And where you lived, where you were born...
I was born... -From the beginning. Your name and where you were born.
I was born... Again, my name is Moshe Rabinowitz.
I was born in 1936.
Three months from now
You were born where?
I lived here in the Old City
until 5708, 1948.
When I was 12 I left the Old City,
just before the siege,
just before the siege, with the last convoy.
There were convoys that I'll tell you about,
convoys from Jerusalem
in Terra Sancta,
where Heichal Shlomo is now, or the Kings Hotel.
Three cars left from there,
armored cars,
carrying flour and food,
and sometimes they let people in.
We left with the last convoy,
they let the whole family leave because of my grandmother.
So we left and we survived,
we didn't have to...
We didn't have to live under siege, when the city surrendered.
We moved immediately to Katamon,
which was where all the...
All the...
refugees from the Old City moved there.
Today we're going on a tour, in your footsteps,
in the Old City. -Yes.
Where do you want to take us first?
First we'll go to the ruins of the Rabbi Yehuda The Hassid,
the Hurva.
I grew up there and went to school there
for four years,
I went to school there for four years.
My friends,
the shamash (caretaker) of the Hurva Synagogue,
the Rabbi Yehuda The Hassid Synagogue,
his name was Freiman.
Shlomkeh Freiman.
His son was a good friend of mine,
we went to Heder together. Gad Freiman.
We went to school together.
He was deaf.
In order to hear
he had a kind of funnel,
it looked like a funnel.
He put it in his ear
and you'd yell into it and talk to him.
When tourists came
that was an attraction,
the way he greeted them with his "hearing aid."
He was also the shamash of Rachel's Tomb.
He was there too...
What was his job?
The shamash, actually he was the gabbai.
He greeted everyone, called them up to the Torah,
he organized everything.
And when everyone came,
he would...
And he cleaned the synagogue.
He didn't let anyone else clean it.
He wanted to clean the synagogue by himself.
What did it mean
to be the shamash of Rachel's Tomb?
Say that again?
What was his job as shamash of Rachel's Tomb?
There, too, he greeted people, people came to pray
and he greeted them when they came in.
He had the key,
they didn't let anyone in.
He had the key to Rachel's Tomb.
It was different back then.
It was very small.
It was very small,
unlike now, now it's like an atomic fortress.
It's a huge fortress.
But that was...
He gave the key to...
Rabbi Goren took the key from Freiman.
He took the key from him
and he was the first person to open...
He went with him and opened Rachel's Tomb.
If you don't mind,
it takes a little while for us to arrange the...
Since I know you want to go to the Hurva
we'll arrange getting in...
Do you want to go to the Habad synagogue?
Yes, let's start with that.
We can go there, I have a lot to tell you about it.
Good. That would be great. -Okay.
What? A blessing?
Okay, may he be healthy... -Noam ben Hodaya.
Ben...? -Chaya-Hodaya.
May he grow up to be God-fearing and Torah-loving
and serve the Creator.
Amen, may it be so and moreover
may God shine His countenance on him.
Amen.
Alyona...
We call this Habad Street,
named after the Habad Synagogue.
It goes all the way down there,
and I...
since I prayed here
and studied here
this was the place
where I spent a lot of time after Heder.
It was...
My father Reb Shmuel
established a yeshiva here
called Midrash Shmuel,
but it wasn't named after my father,
it was named after the Habad rabbi,
the fourth rabbi after the Ba'al Ha-Tanya, whose name was Shmuel,
and he was named after him.
So...
It was named after him,
Midrash Shmuel.
He was a Habad Hassid,
very serious, and attached to the Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzhak.
The previous Rebbe,
the last Rebbe's father-in-law.
And we were educated in this synagogue.
This synagogue
was called Tzemach Tzedek,
named after the third Habad Rebbe,
the author of the book "Tzemach Tzedek."
It was named after...
Tzemach Tzedek,
because in his time,
this synagogue was built in his time.
That's why it's called Tzemach Tzedek.
But then it was called "Die Habadske Shul."
The Habad Synagogue.
That's what it was called.
Let's see the inside. -Right.
You can cross the street, Moshe.
Moshe...
If they're praying we'll see...
I'll tell you about it here.
First of all,
tell me a little about where we are.
Where are we?
This is the Habad Synagogue,
which is...
It was built in the time of the Tzemach Tzedek,
who, as I said,
was the third Habad Rebbe.
In this place,
all in all
there were three families that prayed here.
My father
Shmuel Rabinowitz and his family,
the Haimson family,
his grandfather
was the shamash of the Tzemach Tzedek Synagogue, his name was Haim Ber,
his name was also Haim Ber, the Haimson family.
And another family, the Eisens. Binyamin Eisen.
He was...
Rabbi Orbach's cousin.
Why were there only three families?
That's all there were here.
Why were we only three families?
There were only three Habad families.
There was another family, the Schlesingers,
you'll probably hear about Yehuda Schlesinger.
Those three families founded the synagogue.
There was barely a minyan.
On weekdays there was no minyan.
On weekdays we went to other places to pray,
but on Shabbat, on Friday night
and Saturday morning,
there were only three families,
we barely had a minyan.
My father read from the Torah.
He was the gabbai,
and before Shabbat he'd come,
I remember,
there weren't candles,
there was olive oil,
olive oil lamps.
Later we had what we called "lomp."
What's that? -What's a "lomp"?
It's a kind of...
a kerosene lamp.
We had those.
There was also a Luxx, which gave more light.
That's what we had,
and my father would clean the synagogue
because we did the cleaning,
we did it by ourselves.
That was...
Why did they clean by themselves?
To show respect for the synagogue.
Simply to show respect for the synagogue.
It's a mitzvah to do it by yourself.
I'll tell you a story.
There was...
a man called the Taz.
He wrote the Shulchan Aruch.
He's one of the most famous rabbis.
Once he decided
to go to...
He decided to go into exile.
The concept of "exile"
meant simply...
Jewish sages
who didn't want to be recognized and venerated.
They went around like homeless people
with that kind of clothing,
they didn't beg for food,
if someone gave them food they ate it.
That was...
His wife knew that he didn't want to be recognized
so she went with him.
Still, he needed something,
and he heard there was a job available as the synagogue shamash.
So he applied.
The gabbai came and saw that he was there.
A few hours later he was still dusting the Ark.
The gabbai said: It's almost Shabbat,
you can't be the shamash.
He fired him.
Then he became...
He heard that the meat needed to be cleaned,
to remove the fat,
the forbidden part
from the meat.
He knew how to do it.
So he removed the...
He was good at removing the fat.
They saw he knew all the rules.
He came, and once there was
a girl who brought a chicken to the rabbi.
And the rabbi said...
The rabbi looked at it and declared it "treif,"
unclean.
The girl, who had nothing else to eat, burst into tears.
Then the Taz asked her:
"What's the matter?"
She said, "The rabbi
"said it's treif,
"and we have nothing else to eat."
So he said, "Let me take a look."
He said it was kosher.
So she went to the rabbi
and said, "The man who cleans the meat said it's kosher."
"What does he know?!"
So she went back to him, crying.
He said, "Go tell him
"to read paragraph such-and-such in the Taz
"and he'll see that it's kosher."
So his wife asked him:
"Why did you give yourself away?" They realized he was the Taz
and the rabbi came to apologize.
He didn't know.
So the Taz said:
"I'd go through anything,
"humiliation, anything.
"But I can't stand seeing a little girl cry."
That's the story.
We're now standing...
Go on. I had a question but I'll ask later.
Say what you were about to say.
That was a good story.
Where we're standing was a sentry booth.
A man lived there named...
Rabbi Hol, never mind, I'll remember his name.
Maybe you remember. Hol...
What did he do?
He was a Habad Hassid, heart and soul.
He knew a lot of melodies,
he sang a lot.
He used to come here
and eat with us
although we didn't have food at home.
But since my father worked
in the slaughterhouse as a kashrut supervisor
he had a little bit of meat
which he got every week.
Every week he got some meat.
So he had something to eat,
and my father would
take from his own plate and give it to him.
He lived here,
and on Rosh HaShana eve and Yom Kippur eve
he used to bring him food.
He brought him food...
"I can't eat it.
"True, it's a big mitzva, but I can't eat it."
He cried all day long.
And he was very strong.
When the Rabbi was released,
Rabbi Yosef Yitzhak,
when he was released from prison
in 5687...
I don't remember what the Gregorian year is.
Then...
He was released in 1917.
I think it was 1927.
So in 1927, when he was released,
when he was released from prison,
Rabbi Hol stood next to him
and sang the melody through the window.
He sang him the Alter Rebbe's melody,
the Four Bavot, the famous melody by the Ba'al Ha-Tanya.
Those were the Hassidim.
Rabbi Haimson lived here.
And my father.
I'll tell you a little story about my father.
It was Rosh HaShana.
On Rosh HaShana the Breslav Hassidim
have a custom of gathering together.
Now they do it in Uman, in Meron,
but back then there was no Uman or Meron...
there was Meron, so a few of them went there.
But for those who stayed in Jerusalem,
there was a Breslav synagogue here,
so they came here.
They didn't worry about food,
"God will provide."
What could you do?
On Rosh HaShana night
someone came
and whispered in my father's ear,
he whispered something.
My brother Nachum Rabinowitz, who died two months ago,
was there.
He looked and saw...
Suddenly he saw him
leave the synagogue.
He used to pray for hours
on Rosh HaShana.
But this time he left the synagogue
and ran with him. Ran.
The Karlin Synagogue was here.
At the end of the street was the Karlin Synagogue.
He went there,
that was the most popular synagogue in the area.
So he went in, and before the evening service
he pounded the table
and said:
"I want to tell you something.
"On Rosh HaShana everyone's income
"is determined for the whole year.
"How do they know how much each person needs?
"An angel comes and counts the number of people in the house,
"and that's how he knows how much each person will need.
"If everyone takes a few people
"home to eat,
"the angels will come and count them
"and grant them abundance."
Naturally, everyone invited a few Breslav Hassidim
and that's how they ate.
Even though they were all poor, they didn't have anything to eat.
That's a story about my father that I wanted to tell.
Wonderful story. Thank you.
Wonderful story. Thank you.
You said there were three families,
then you mentioned a few other rabbis.
We interviewed the Orenstein family
and it's clear that their family prayed here too.
When you mentioned three families
did you mean those who built it?
That's right, you just reminded me,
the Orensteins prayed here too.
The Orenstein family used to pray
at the Kotel.
They prayed at the Kotel
because Rabbi Yitzhak Orenstein was the Rabbi of the Kotel.
He was the Rabbi of the Kotel.
He prayed at the Kotel,
but back then
the British didn't let them read from a Torah scroll,
it was forbidden...
He had a room at the Kotel
when Rabbi Goren's Kollel Idra is now,
where he'd read the Torah and pray Mussaf.
So he didn't actually
pray here on Shabbat eve, he prayed at the Kotel.
As the Rabbi of the Kotel he prayed there.
His children
came here sometimes but not always.
Shmulik Orenstein was also here,
I remember him well.
They came,
but it was usually just three families
and there was barely a minyan.
And these three families founded the synagogue?
No. I told you, it was founded
in the time of the Tzemach Tzedek.
Downstairs was a Sephardic synagogue,
where the Habad House is now,
that was a Sephardic synagogue.
But...
They prayed there,
and by my time it was closed,
but originally it was there.
Why this synagogue?
Why did your family attend this synagogue?
Because we're a Habad family.
We attended this synagogue because we're a Habad family.
What do you mean, you're a Habad family?
We're Habadniks, that says it all.
That's like asking someone, "What is a Jew?"
That's a tough question, "What is a Jew?"
But to be a Habadnik...
First of all, everyone
has the potential to be a Habadnik,
not just the potential, he can actually be a Habadnik.
Not only in potential.
It means studying Hassidut,
the Zohar, the Ari-zal,
that is, the simple, logical explanation ...
to know everything one should know of the secrets of the Torah.
It's almost Lag Ba'Omer,
it's in exactly two days,
uh... Rather, Lag Ba'Omer is on Sunday,
which we call the giving of the secrets of the Torah.
That's what it means.
Being a Habadnik means simply to feel it, and beside that, of course,
you have to be connected to the Rebbe.
I want to tell you another little story.
In New Jersey,
in Elizabeth, New Jersey,
there was a rabbi named Rabbi Teitz.
He was the first rabbi who taught a page of Gemara
on the radio,
and it was very interesting.
I have a sister, Chaya Ludmir,
who you...
Her father-in-law was a Boyan Hassid.
He was the first person to go
and sell etrogs (citrons).
He grew etrogs and sold them.
His name was Reb Berl Ludmir.
He went there
and Rabbi Teitz bought a lot of etrogs
and lulavs (palm fronds), of course,
he bought a lot of sets for his congregation.
He was supposed to pay
after the holidays, he didn't have time before,
and after the holidays he called him and said:
"I want...
"I want the money. I have it coming."
So he said, "I won't pay you
"unless you come to me for Shabbat."
He had no choice. He stayed with him for Shabbat.
On Shabbat he asked him:
"What is a Hassid?"
That's like asking, "What is a Jew?"
or "What is a Habadnik?"
What is a Hassid?
He stood there like this and didn't know what to say.
So he said, "I'll tell you. It's right there in the Gemara."
The Gemara says that King David said:
"I will rise at midnight."
King David said, "I'm not like other kings.
"Other kings wake up three hours after daybreak.
"They take their time.
"I get up at midnight to thank the Lord.
"I will rise at midnight.
"Not only that, I deal with blood rulings,
"the laws of the amnion and the placenta,
"and not only that,
"everything I do,
"I consult
"with Mephiboshet my rabbi."
Mephiboshet was King Saul's son.
"I consult with him
"and I ask Mephiboshet
"what is...
"What is a Hassid?"
Someone who asks his rabbi about everything.
Okay, thanks for the answer.
What I'd like is
for the three of you to go in and see the synagogue.
Just a sec, I have another story to tell.
When I start telling stories it's hard to stop me.
There was a Jew here
named Shmuel-Haim Kubalkin.
He used to wake up in the middle of the night
and do Tikkun Hatzot (Midnight Rectification).
You don't know what that is, but...
The siddur has verses,
"Tikkun Hatzot,"
where you sit on the floor,
I don't know if he sat on the floor and wept...
Then he studied,
then he started to pray.
He didn't finish praying until the afternoon.
He prayed for hours and hours.
And the whole time he stood at a table, I remember the bench,
and he swayed and prayed,
and repeated every word.
That was amazing to see,
that Hassidic figure.
Another thing, we had a cantor here on Rosh HaShana.
A cantor.
His name was Reb Mendele Cohen.
He lived in Mea She'arim.
His way was, in Mea She'arim,
at 11:30 at night he would... Excuse me.
Excuse me, do you mind?
Thank you.
If you don't mind going inside...
At 11:30 at night, Reb Mendele,
in his tallit and tefillin,
would go to the mikve and do Tikkun Hatzot
and study...
First he'd study, then pray,
until the afternoon, and that was his service.
Then he'd have something to eat.
He was the cantor for...
He was the cantor here on Rosh HaShana and Yom Kippur.
He didn't sing melodies.
He had a heavy Russian accent
and he pronounced every word.
Every word was carved in stone,
every word.
And only two...
And only two...
And he'd only sing two melodies.
The only thing he sang
was "Aleinu" at the end of Mussaf,
and...
the passage describing how the priests would stand in the Temple
and bow down.
He sang those two things,
but the rest he said word for word and he wept.
I remember that.
As soon as Rosh HaShana began he started crying.
Once, the man who told my father about the Breslaver,
His name was also Cohen,
came to pray on the second day.
And on the second day they let someone else pray, not the cantor.
So he sang the melody...
of Rosh HaShana night,
and only in Habad do they say Kaddish before "Bar'chu" in the evening service.
The other Hassidim just say "Bar'chu."
He only sang the melody.
And after that he said:
(Yiddish)
How could you say a naked "Bar'chu"?
like a kind of dance. What is this?
You have to prepare for "Bar'chu."
So please prepare to go inside.
You can come in.
It looks like they're having a Bar Mitzva.
I heard them singing the Bar Mitzva tune,
someone's having a Bar Mitzva here.
Fine. -What's the crew for?
They're interviewing me. -About what?
For some archive, Moskowitz or something,
so I'm telling them about the Old City.
I'm telling stories. You can, too.
It's for the Moskowitz Archives. I don't know exactly what it is.
They're interviewing people who lived here.
Right here
is where Rabbi Haimson prayed.
And on this bench
sat Shmuel Kubalkin, who I told you about.
He sat on this bench and swayed the whole time.
Over here is where
my father prayed,
and we, his children, sat at his table.
And at the third table was Rabbi Schlesinger.
He prayed there with his sons. They stood there.
In the back, where you see the arches,
that's where people prayed who were called
"Oyvdim" (those who serve Gd) in Habad.
They prayed for hours,
they could spend 6 or 8 hours
praying the regular prayers.
One of them was Rabbi Wolf,
he was the headmaster of the main Habad yeshiva.
There was a man named Baruch Paris,
and, I think, someone named Meir Sonn.
They stood in the corner and prayed.
If you wanted to see what real prayer was like...
Amen.
What was it like to go back to your childhood synagogue?
I was in the U.S.
and in '67 I came back from the U.S.
and when I got here it was already (rebuilt),
and a few things
were different.
Things that weren't here before.
When I mentioned the oil lamp,
way up high behind the Ark
is that oil lamp, the "lomp."
I mean today.
Did it make you feel a certain way?
No, because I'm used to it.
After the Six-Day War, when I came back to Israel
in 1976,
I prayed here every Shabbat.
I walked from my house,
every time,
it's about 25 minutes on foot, not so bad.
I don't do it anymore, my legs hurt...
Why did you come here to pray?
Because it felt like
a Habad environment.
I have something else to say.
There was a man here, maybe I should mention it here...
don't you want stories? -No, it's fine.
In '67
a man named Moshe Segel moved in here.
Moshe Segel lived here for a while
and he moved in then.
He redeemed Tzemach Tzedek so the Arabs wouldn't touch it.
The Arabs didn't generally touch this synagogue.
They didn't touch it.
They left and he moved in.
He was the Jew who blew the shofar at the Kotel.
You'll probably hear that from other people too.
I remember how... In 5706, (1946)
two years before that,
I remember how he came to our house
because my father was in the Hagana.
We had a rifle and a machine gun.
We had an arsenal in our house.
We had weapons.
And he came running from the Kotel
so they wouldn't catch him with the shofar.
He came into our house and my father took the shofar
and hid it
so they wouldn't find it,
the British who were chasing him,
because blowing the shofar was forbidden.
They thought the Messiah would come but the Messiah didn't come.
I don't understand.
The British forbade us to blow the shofar,
but at the end of Yom Kippur when they blow the Tekiah Gedolah,
he'd blow the shofar. -Who was he?
Moshe Segel, the one I mentioned.
Moshe Segel blew the shofar
and he came to our house to hide
because the British were chasing him.
What did you mean about the Messiah not coming?
They didn't let us blow the shofar
because they thought that if we blew the shofar the Messiah would come.
That's what they believed.
Granted, he hasn't come yet,
but the British believed it,
I guess the gentiles realize what a great thing it is.
That's what Segal did,
he was a member of the Brit HaBiryonim movement.
They fought against...
They were a branch of the Irgun. -What did they do?
They fought the British.
They searched for him
but they didn't find him, he was hiding in our house.
That was Moshe Segal.
I also know who brought the shofar.
That's a story too, I'll tell you later.
I'll tell you later.
A pregnant woman brought it,
she brought the shofar.
Why was it important to blow the shofar?
If it was forbidden they could've blown it in the synagogue.
What was the big deal?
The British believed
that it would bring the Messiah, "Blow the great shofar,"
it's going to happen here.
They believed that.
You'd be surprised, sometimes the gentiles
understand things that we don't understand.
So why isn't the Messiah here?
That's the problem.
We don't know.
But apparently the gentiles knew.
Why didn't the British want the Messiah to come?
That's a good question.
I don't know what the gentiles do.
I don't know how they decide.
That's what happened.
Shall we go to the Hurva? -Yes.
Moshe? -Yes. -Come. -Are they coming down?
Oh, they're here.
Come outside.
Don't look at us, just come out.
Was this like this back then? -What?
Was this like this back then?
This was a butcher shop.
There was a grocery store here
that my brother who just passed away,
his mother-in-law owned the store.
What was the grocery store called?
"Alte's Grocery Store." Alte Zaltzer.
It was called "Alte's Grocery Store."
That was Sara-Pearl's Grocery Store
and this was Alte's Grocery Store. It was her store.
My brother met her here.
My brother Nachum.
Nachum got engaged here
and soon I'll tell you a wonderful story about that,
about Nachum,
about what he was,
he was an emissary of the previous Belzer Rebbe.
Aharon ben Rochme Basya.
Let's let the car pass.
Wait, let them pass.
My brother was the emissary of Reb Aharon of Belz.
He was his emissary to the Kotel.
I remember when Reb Aharon of Belz
came in 5704, in 1944.
He came to Jerusalem. He didn't have a beard
because they smuggled him away from the Holocaust.
I remember he came here and sat here,
they brought him on a chair. -Who?
The Belzer Rebbe.
I'm talking about the Belzer Rebbe.
I remember I shook his hand,
he wouldn't let boys under Bar Mitzva age shake his hand,
he'd wrap his hand in a handkerchief
and then shake their hand.
Why? -I don't know,
but that was his custom.
When my brother came to Israel,
the reception was in Motza.
Over in Motza.
So my brother went there with everyone.
My brother Nachum went with everyone
and they started dancing,
he came in a taxi
and they started dancing in front of him.
He heard him say to his gabbai...
his gabbai said
that the Rebbe wanted to make a "tisch."
A "L'chaim tisch,"
a drink and a snack.
He wanted to do it in the first synagogue in Jerusalem,
and when you come from there,
where Center 1 is now,
there was...
the "United Home for the Aged" it was called.
That's where they did it.
So instead of dancing with everyone,
when they came everyone danced,
he went straight to the synagogue
and saw that the tables and chairs were ready,
and he stood behind the Belzer Rebbe.
The chair had armrests,
so he realized that that was where he'd sit and he stood there.
The Belzer Rebbe came and all the Hassidim sat down.
He turned to him and said:
"Young man,
"tell the people of Jerusalem to marry young."
Later I heard that 400 years ago
they made a ruling that they should do that.
Do what? -Marry young.
That's what I heard.
He called him "Nachum Yerushalaymer," Nachum the Jerusalemite.
He had a gabbai named Hillel Vint
and he told Hillel Vint
to tell Nachum Yerushalaymer,
to tell him
to go to the Kotel
and not to pray for anyone,
not even for me.
And not to be lazy, to say his full name:
Aharon...
Aharon ben Rochme Basya,
to say his full name and not be lazy,
and to say whichever Psalm he wanted.
And not to pray,
just that, and what he blessed the Jews would come true.
Every week he did the same thing, on Tuesday,
and during the week whenever he wanted to go.
I'll tell the rest in a minute.