Rabbi Dessler and the Baal Ha'Tanya

Motek

Sun, Sep 14 2008, 2:17 pm

Rabbi Yehoshua Geldzahler, a son-in-law of Rabbi Dessler, reminisces

by R' Yochonon Donn

Although R' Dessler considered himself a Litvak (he was actually born in Latvia) he delved deeply into Chassidic thought and sefarim. His magnum opus, the Michtav M'Eliyahu, was based on the writings of Rav Tzadok of Lublin and Rav Menachem Mendel of Vitebsk's "Pri Ha'Aretz".

In Homel, where R' Dessler grew up, he became acquainted with a brilliant Lubavitcher chasid known as R' Itche Masmid. R' Itche introduced him to the sefer Tanya from he which he studied the rest of his life. Because his brother-in-law, R' Daniel (may Hashem avenge his blood), son of the Alter of Kelm, had instructed him to "learn everything," he explored the writings of all the various Chasidic masters - Chabad, Breslov, Peshischa etc., and learned from all of them.

The subject of dreams was a real and fascinating one in R' Dessler's home. R' Yitzchok Beck, a member of R' Dessler's kollel in Gateshead, remembers one remarkable dream involving R' Dessler's extraordinary hiskashrus with the Baal Ha'Tanya.

In 1947, the Ponevezher Rav, R' Kahaneman, recruited R' Dessler to be the mashgiach in the Ponovezh yeshiva in Bnei Brak. However, as a condition, he insisted that R' Dessler move to Bnei Brak and never return to Gateshead. Members of the Gateshead kollel were understandably upset at the departure of their leader.

That Shabbos, as he was winding down his mussar shmuess, he suddenly announced to his audience. "Don't worry! I will not be going to Ponovezh under the present terms."

R' Dessler reported that the night before, the Baal Ha'Tanya had come to him in a dream and repeated the pasuk, "If the anger of a ruler flares up against you, do not leave your place" (Koheles 10:4). He understood that as an instruction for him not to depart Gateshead without the possibilty of returning. Several years later, when the Ponevezher Rav agreed to his condition that he be allowed to return to Gateshead at least twice a year, he moved to Eretz Yisrael to become the mashgiach.

The vision of the Baal Ha'Tanya was by no means unique, stressed R' Geldzahler. He heard from a son-in-law of Rabbi Yaakov Landau, rav of Bnei Brak, that whenever R' Dessler encountered a difficulty in learning, the Baal Ha'Tanya would appear to him in a dream and resolve it. This apparently reflects the profundity of the shiur in Tanya that he gave in the Gateshead kollel.

It is also symbolically significant that Rav Dessler passed away on 24 Teves, the same yartzeit as the Baal Ha'Tanya.