The Maid's Forgiveness

An elderly woman from the city of Kleinvardein once arrived in Yerushalayim and asked where the kever of Rav Shaag was. When she was asked why she had come all that way just to daven at his kever, she told this story.

"My mother was our holy Rav's maid almost one hundred years ago. At that time Rav Shaag had been entrusted with a large sum of money to safeguard. He was so deeply engrossed in learning Torah that he accidentally left the money in the sefer he was learning from. When he finished studying, he closed the sefer and put it back on the shelf.

"After some time the owner of the money came to ask for it, but the Rav could not find it. He began to suspect that perhaps his maid had taken it, so he repaid the owner from his own pocket.

"When Pesach approached, the Rav was cleaning the pages of his seforim, looking for crumbs of chametz, and he found the money in the sefer he had been studying. Upon discovering his mistake, Rav Shaag realized that he had suspected his innocent maid. He called her and explained the whole matter, and asked her to forgive him as tears streamed down his face. He added that he was willing to grant her whatever she asked.

"My mother told him that she was moichel him completely, and that she would ask for only one thing, his berachah. She had been married for fifteen years and had no children. Our Rebbe blessed her and said, 'This year you shall have a child.'"

The elderly woman continued, "I am that child, born of his berachah. All her life my mother yearned to come to the Holy Land and daven at the kever of that tzaddik. Now Hashem has given me the opportunity to come and fulfill my mother's wish."