Parshas Naso

Af­ter Reb­bet­zin Chana passed away, the Rebbe asked R. Zal­man and his son Yis­roel to watch over the Reb­bet­zin’s home and pos­ses­sions. For the Reb­bet­zin’s haka­mas hamatzeiva (plac­ing of the mon­u­ment at her gravesite), R. Zal­man or­ga­nized a minyan of men to daven there on that day. On the day of her shloshim , R. Zal­man again ar­ranged for a car of chas­sidim to visit her gravesite and re­cite the spe­cial chap­ters of Tehillim for that oc­ca­sion. R. Zal­man no­ti­fied the Rebbe, who thanked him deeply for it.

In a heart­felt let­ter af­ter the Reb­bet­zin’s pass­ing, R. Zal­man shares with the Rebbe what he had spo­ken at a gath­er­ing, “Now, the [Rebbe’s ] fa­ther and near him, in Gan Eden, is his brother R. Leib, and his mother of right­eous mem­ory, as the Zo­har says that the women have ‘their cham­bers. ’ (I thought this was writ­ten in par­shas Naso but I can’t find it there, so if it’s pos­si­ble to please write it.) Nu, the [Rebbe’s ] mother told me se­cret mat­ters, how the Rebbe Shlita was born from a bracha of the Rebbe Rashab… ” On the side of the page, the Rebbe noted the sources in Zo­har, and asked R. Zal­man to please write what­ever he heard from Reb­bet­zin Chana.

Reb Pe­sach Malas­tovker¹⁰ had an enor­mous in­flu­ence on my zeide, Reb Mordechai Yoel. “Do you know why I in­vest so much time with you?” R. Pe­sach once asked him. “Be­cause your zeide Mordechai learned my first chap­ter of Tanya with me and brought me to the Rebbe. ”

10. One of the Alter Rebbe’s younger chassidim, who, after the Alter Rebbe’s passing, became a chossid of the Mitteler Rebbe and the Tzemach Tzedek. ↩

The Rebbe once said, “You have no idea of the pre­cious­ness of a Jew­ish child. R. Peretz was a child who es­caped from Gali­cia — and how won­der­ful is the fam­ily that grew from him!” (The Chein fam­ily and the chos­sid R. Meir Sim­cha Chein of Nevel.)