Wrapped in rustling cellophane, it arrived to us on the 19th of Kislev, 5776.
Radio programs were flooded with interviewees who spoke about the impact of the Tanya on their lives. Eliraz Sade, a reality TV refugee, interviewed me for a television program that was broadcast live from the 19th of Kislev central gathering in Kfar Chabad. He was curious to know what the author of the Tanya had to say about women.
In the background, we heard the voice of a Hasidic singer from Vizhnitz playing "Tsema Lech Nafsi," while I tried to explain to the interviewer that the longing and love to the core of the Jewish woman's soul for her Creator are gifts given to us by the author of the Tanya, who already knew then what awaits us in this generation.
Tremendous energies
Professor Habiba Pedia tried to explain how Freud's subconscious evaporates in the face of the subconscious or "divine soul" that the author of the Tanya reveals to us.
And Dr. Yechiel Harari shared with us all his inner journey to healing in Tanya. From a golden opportunity to take the academic world by storm to giving up worldly fame on the path to the joy of Tanya. "I found all the healing of the soul," he explained with great vitality to anyone who would listen.
Only now, after a ten-year journey following the author of the Tanya, has Harari printed his work, "Forever Every Moment Again" - a work that became a bestseller in just a week and is at the top of the list of books sold in stores.
Psychologist Rachel Wheeler told how the struggle between darkness and light that reaches the couch in her clinic, in this sad and lonely generation, is resolved when she offers her patients a practical solution from the Tanya.
Dr. Yakir Kaufman, director of the Herzog Hospital, surprised everyone when he took the stage at the Binyamin Ha'amah, adorned with a Hasidic beard and a large kippah, and told what we have all known for a long time: Man seeks meaning. And in our generation, a generation that is painful, tormented, afraid and terrified, when despite the material abundance found everywhere, there is a need for spiritual meaning. A need that is growing and taking over every part of the human soul.
He told about a study showing a survey of the human brain before and after prayer. He told about the appearance of a cell in the brain after a spiritual experience.
He also said that today it turns out that Alzheimer's and dementia are a direct result of stress in the brain, and that people who experience a life of meaning are less likely to suffer from "loss of self" illnesses, and hence that a life of meaning can leave the Jew healthy in mind and spirit.
There is no doubt that the last disease of the 21st century is called 'significance'.
It was not surprising to discover that 65,000 people visited the nation's buildings in the middle of last week. The holiday of redemption is celebrated for four consecutive days, and the large crowd that roamed the holiday complexes included all the variety of streams and circles in the Jewish people. There were national religious, mustard, settlers and leftists. Ashkenazi and Sephardic Haredim, Lithuanians and Hasidim. In short, all of them.
There is no need to go back and list all the singers who took the stage one after the other and performed tunes that are one and two hundred years old. There is no need to go back and describe the ecstasy in the audience. Nor is there any need to make an effort to summarize Rebbetzin Yemima’s speech, because two words will suffice – Messiah and redemption.
On the other hand, it is difficult to describe the tremendous energy that was in the hall as the entire audience, numbering thousands of women, connected to the most essential point – redemption! The redemption of the people of Israel was imminent and immediate. It seemed to me that only a small spark was missing to ignite the power of faith that filled the hall.
The dispute is over.
It turns out that the world can no longer be conducted in a one-dimensional manner. Even the Gentiles admit that the world includes a dimension that is unfathomable by physical means. It is true that we need to be vessels in order to feel the divine light that fills the entire world. To this end, the old Rebbe gave us the book of Tanya. The book of guidance for every Jewish soul. The book of preparation for the true and complete redemption in which the earth will be filled with knowledge, "and the whole world will not be concerned except with knowing God," in the words of the holy Maimonides.
A veteran group facilitator from whom I learn group facilitation, who describes herself as "a quintessential Lithuanian," sat there in the packed, crowded hall and left with "lights in her eyes," as she described it to me. "I had a spiritual experience like I've never had before," said the woman who had already married off all her children.
If she's excited, what will younger women who haven't yet had many experiences in life say?.
I feel like the whole issue of the dispute between Hasidim and Lithuanians, the one that led to the arrest of Baal Tanya, and the reason for this whole celebration, has long since become a thing of the past. It seems to me that today there is no Hasidim-Lithuanian dispute.
In a side note, yes, as a young man it's hard for me to forget that they were the ones who reported on the old Rebbe, but I have to thank them, because if it weren't for that sad event, we wouldn't have such a happy holiday every year. A holiday that they also celebrate more and more every year.
The only thing that comes to mind is that since we are just before the redemption, it is time to add to the prayer so that the Lithuanians will stop fighting among themselves and then the Messiah will surely come. Because they have already finished fighting with the Hasidim a long time ago.
And if it's still not clear to you, here's a story: I have family members who live in Kiryat Malachi. There's a classic Lithuanian yeshiva there of what they used to call "dissidents.".
Kora and the people of the nearby Nachalat Har Chabad neighborhood often invite the young men to Shabbat meals, so that many of those Lithuanian young men are exposed to and familiar with the Rebbe's talks and Chabad melodies.
My family members say that recently they have repeatedly encountered the same Lithuanians walking around the neighborhoods of Kiryat Malachi with loudspeakers, proclaiming that Rabbi Kanievsky said that one must strengthen oneself in the commandments because the Messiah is coming and "the redemption is near"...
Well, do any of you still think there is a dispute between the Hasidim and the Lithuanians?
• The author is the owner ""My choice"", event host, lecturer and radio broadcaster. For comments: [email protected]
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