Page 56 - HANUKIYA

The Zanz Rebbe was a young yeshiva student

at the time, but he was already opinionated.

He announced that he would not agree

to go, unless he was promised that all the

parties involved would accept his ruling. They

refused at first, but in the middle of night,

they knocked on his door and announced that

they would obey. ‘Within a day,’ concluded

the rebbe, ‘there was peace and tranquility

there.’”

His knowledge and, most of all, the force of

his imagination [Aramaic], he clearly acquired

from his rabbi, the holy sage Admor Erlau

Rebbe ZTSVK"L. For years, he was one of the

court’s patrons. He also contributed to and

established on the institution’s buildings.

The Erlau Rebbe deeply loved him. When

the rebbe was asked to demonstrate his

deep love for his students, he gave him an

vANVEUexceptional gift: his personal siddur prayer
book. On the siddur’s front page, the holy
rabbi lovingly wrote to the beloved student,
“In honor of my dear and beloved student,
etc., etc.”
In his life, Hoffman has seen hundreds of
old siddur prayer books, but when he picks
up the rebbe’s siddur, a quite simple ordinary
siddur, he is emotional. “Look,” as he flips

The rabbi’s son. Paintining and inside the painting is a painting of a holy through the pages to the 18th prayer. They
by Isador Kaufman. place. are yellow and worn on the edges. “Every time
that I look at this, I see the tears of my rabbi.”
Unexpected image. Reading arts. A gold and ivory pointer
Thus, this boy, who so may people in the He moved to the United States following
his marriage. He prospered there and became
world have been impressed by his well-known among the institutions’ managers
portrait, is none other than the and emissaries. He does not care to talk about
previous Skver Rebbe. It is also the it. “Who is it good for,” he repeatedly says,
solution to the letters. Instead of begging, “Let’s talk about the Torah scrolls.
“Torah Crown”, the Viennese artist That is what interests people on eve of the
wrote “Sacred Honor”. The three Festival of the Giving the Torah.”
middle letters are clear: Skver
Rabbis Zohan (-son of the Skver In the United States, he also became a
Rebbe). That is how you “study” a follower of the righteous Ribnitzer Rebbe,
painting. may his virtue protect us. “You have no idea
what a seraph he was,” says Hoffman in
Top American art researchers nostalgic voice. “No one had a greater love of
who examined the hypothesis, Israel. The holy spirit was openly present in his
were awed. “Only you could have beit midrash.”
achieve this result,” they wrote to
Hoffman. Of course, here too is a story. “When my
younger son was born, I thought to give the
honor of being godfather to one of the rabbis

Admor Skver Rebbe to whom I was close, but he refused. He told

Yaakov Yosef ZTS"L He also has a story about the city. He me, ‘It is better to give this to one of the

heard it himself from the Maran holy sage righteous men of the age.’ I had already met

Admor the Sanz Rebbe Shefa Chaim ZTSVK"L. the Ribnitzer Rebbe. To my surprise, before

“On that visit, the rebbe told us that, in his the rabbi left to the beit midrash to conduct

youth, he was invited to decide a very complex the circumcision, he sent me to the sexton,

Torah tribunal. It was a very complicated who directly asked, ‘The Rebbe wants to

story that involved all of sacred objects in the know whether you asked anyone else to be

56 city. The judge, the slaughterer and the rabbi. godfather before him?’ That rabbi, standing