Dreams After the Passing

After the shivah for the Malach, his wife came to Fastov to receive what he had left her. His followers tried to comfort her, but she could not be consoled. That night she dreamed that she entered a great and beautiful palace, where she saw her husband, his face radiant with joy, together with several distinguished elders. He told them that his wife had always said he was too abstemious, and that she had been right, and he asked her forgiveness in their presence. "I forgive you with all my heart," she replied.

He went on to say that the Torah permits her to remarry, especially since she was only twenty-four years old, and he would not stand in her way. But if she agreed not to marry another, he would cover all her expenses and her children's, and each child would already have a fitting match waiting when she returned home. When she got home, her children soon found good shidduchim, and her business improved and provided for all her needs. The Malach continued to appear in her dreams whenever it was needed.

When the wife of Rav Nachum of Chernobyl passed away, Rav Nachum thought of marrying the Malach's widow, and he sent the Malach's son, Rav Shalom Shachna, to speak with her. On the way to his mother's home, Rav Shalom Shachna dreamed that his father stood at the entrance of a magnificent palace, his hands reaching up to its ceiling, and called out, "Who dares to enter my palace?" When he woke, Rav Shalom Shachna understood that he and Rav Nachum had overstepped.