Short & beautiful story about Rav Aryeh Levine z"l

SJcookie

Wed, Jul 17 2013, 7:26 pm

An upper echelon administrator in one of the Israeli school systems streams recounted his experience as a dormitory child in one of Jerusalem’s institutions many decades ago. The food served in the institution was fairly meager and the young boy was always hungry. One day the institution served chocolate pudding and the boy took his portion and wolfed it down and then got back in line and asked for another portion. The server refused his request with a nasty remark. Frustrated and angered the boy then turned over the entire chocolate pudding pot and spilled its contents on the ground.

The boy was beaten for the act and publicly reprimanded and humiliated by school officials. He was told that his eventual fate as to whether he would be expelled from the institution would be decided on the morrow by Reb Aryeh, the spiritual mentor of the institution.

The child spent a sleepless night weeping over his fate. Next morning he met Rabbi Aryeh who asked him to sit next to him. He asked him “Did you spill over the pot as they said that you did?” The child admitted his guilt. “Will you do such a thing again in the future?” Reb Aryeh asked. “No, never again,” said the child. Reb Aryeh asked him then, "Do you really like chocolate pudding?” “Yes,” he answered. Reb Aryeh said, “I too love chocolate pudding so I have here two containers of chocolate pudding so let us sit down here together and eat chocolate pudding.” At that moment, the educator said, I realized what it means to be a Torah Jew."

Story taken from:
http://www.rabbihorowitz.com/P.....ticle