Today, Adar 9, marks the 85th anniversary of the arrival of the Sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe Yosef-Yitzhak Schneerson to the United States of America, which marked a turning point in the history of the development of the modern Jewish movement.
There are many stories and testimonies about this historical event, for it is known that the steamship on which the Rebbe came to America (this sea voyage lasted 12 days) arrived in New York port the day before, on Monday, the 8th day of the second month of Adar 5700 (then it was March 18), but it arrived at 6:00 p.m., and according to the laws of the time, passengers of a ship arriving in New York port later than 4 p.m. were not allowed to go ashore until the next morning. It was for this reason that the Rebbe entered the land of the New World on Tuesday morning, the 9th of the second of Adar 5700, and thousands of people came to the port to greet the Rebbe RAYatz. When the Rebbe’s descent from the ship showed itself, the crowd erupted into shouts of “Sholom Aleichem!” and many also recited the blessing of “Sheheheyanu.”
Envoys from all American Jewish organizations showed up to meet the Rebbe. Even the mayor of New York City sent his official representative to the meeting. After a short meeting in the harbor hall, the Rebbe left for the Greystown Hotel in Manhattan. There the Rebbe settled at the beginning of his stay in the United States.
At an evening organized in honor of his arrival that day, the Rebbe said: “One begins with a blessing. Thanks be to G-d, the Blessed One, for saving us and bringing us out of the gorge into the open… I hate to disturb the heartfelt mirth of those present here and to disturb my own heartfelt mirth, but the great pain of our brothers and sisters who are languishing mercilessly does not give me rest… The cry of our brothers and sisters, and especially of the many yeshiva students of Poland, haunts me in every place and at every time. And I cannot give rest to my soul until G-d, the blessed One, helps me and delivers them…”.
The head of our generation, the Seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe Menachem-Mendel Schneerson, described the significance of this day in Jewish history as follows: “9 Adar is the day on which the center of HaBaD Hasidism moved from the upper half of the globe to the lower half, with the arrival of the previous Rebbe, my father-in-law, the head of the generation, in the United States for a permanent residence…. His statement that “in the lower half of the globe the Giving of the Torah did not take place in its revealed form” is well known, and hence it is clear what great news happened with the arrival of the Previous Rebbe on 9 Adar in the USA – for it was in the lower half of the globe that the center of HaBaD Hasidism, the inner Torah – the “soul of the Torah” – became located. (Yisvaadus, 5750 (1990), vol. 2, p. 343). And on account of this, a similar thing happened with regard to the idea of Liberation, that there is a True Liberation, an Eternal Geula, after which there will be no exile, for the “eternal people,” on account of the completeness of the revelation of the “eternal Torah” – both the open Torah, (and) the inner Torah, in such a way that it is “one Torah.” (Yisvaadus, 5750 (1990), vol. 2, p. 345)”.
The Sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe accepted American citizenship nine years later, on 16 Adar 5709. The once popular website Yeshiva.ru describes these events as follows: “On Thursday, Adar 16, at one o’clock in the afternoon, a special legal delegation from the U.S. government arrived at the “Seven Seventy”, a building located at 770 Eastern Parkway, in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn, New York City, which was purchased by the Sixth Rebbe and which became his “synagogue, yeshiva and house of good deeds”. The Rebbe RAJatz received them dressed in a silk hood and shtreiml (i.e., Sabbath garments). At his right hand stood his son-in-law, Rabbi Menachem-Mendel Schneerson.
After greeting the members of the delegation, the Rebbe RAYatz said: “It says in the Midrash about the present situation that when our father Avrohom received the command, ‘Go yourself from your land, from your homeland, and from your father’s house, to the land that I will show you,’ – ‘At the hour when… he passed through Aram-Naaraim… he saw that they were eating and drinking… Said [Avrohom:] “I wish I had no inheritance in this land!”‘ When he reached Sulma Shel-Tzur, he saw that they were busy weeding… and hoeing… Said [Avrohom:] “I wish I had an inheritance in this land!” The Holy One, blessed be He, said to him: ‘To your offspring I will give this land’.” Likewise, in our case: after all my wandering and wandering from place to place, from state to state, – now, by the will of Providence, I have found a place suitable for guiding the spread of Jewry and the ‘spreading of springs outward’ from there – here in America”.
After the conversation, the RAJAC Rebbe signed the various documents required for citizenship. At the conclusion of the meeting, which lasted about half an hour, the RAJAC Rebbe said goodbye to the members of the delegation and others with a smile and exchanged handshakes with them.
The head of our generation, the Seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem-Mendel Schneerson, said on this occasion, “A special law was passed in Congress so that my teacher, my father-in-law, the Rebbe, could take citizenship [while] in his own home. Because when the head of a generation needs something, separate laws are issued on this occasion.”
In those years, America felt, as it does today, that it was the world’s most important country. American Jews shared this misconception, believing that their country had special advantages over the other countries of the Galut. The Sixth Lubavitcher Rebbe dispelled this misconception when he said after arriving in the United States, “America iz nit andersh!” – “America is no different from other countries.” At that time, it was hard to imagine that in America Jewish families would be able to continue the way of life adopted in the townships of Eastern Europe, that children would go back to cheders and yeshivas, that a new generation would grow up, not ashamed of its origins, continuing the “golden chain” of generations.
One of the tricks of the evil element, “yetzer a-rah,” – to whisper to the Jewish soul, “Torah, tradition is fine. But times change, and there is not always and everywhere a place for the traditional Jewish way of life.
Even before coming to America, the Rebbe had been confronted with this destructive idea for Jewry. The Bolsheviks began uprooting the spiritual roots of Russian Jewry, closing synagogues and persecuting all those who engaged in religious activity. Rabbi Yosef-Yitzhak became the Lubavitcher Rebbe in 1920. In those days, “reasonable Jews” believed the only possible path to national salvation was a line of concessions and appeasement to the authorities. The Rabbi countered this suicidal pragmatism with a strategy of the offensive of the Jewish spirit. He opened (in the twenties!) dozens of yeshivas and synagogues, mikvahs and kosher food distribution points. In 1927, the Rebbe RAJatz was sentenced to capital punishment, which was successively commuted by the court first to ten years of exile to Solovki, three years of exile to Kostroma, and then to deportation from the USSR.
Were the Rebbe’s efforts in vain? After all, in the thirties the yeshivas he founded were closed and their students were imprisoned in camps.
But what is happening now in the former Soviet Union, what has happened in America over the past five decades, is a direct result of the Rebbe’s approach to the question of the place of the Jew in the world.
He sowed the seeds of selflessness, taught people to see that there is no place or circumstance where a Jew cannot walk the path of his ancestors, no power that can take away the Torah from us if we do not let it out of our hands. Nothing can stop a Jew who knows what he lives for!
