The Rebbe Spoke to Me

It was Shabbos parshas Yisro in Warsaw, Poland, and Rav Avrohom of Slonim-Baranovitch held his tisch among many chassidim. A yungerman who was suffering greatly from ill health came to the tisch and heard the Rebbe’s divrei Torah.

“‘And Moshe approached the fog, the opaque darkness where Hashem was’ (Shemos 20:18).

“There are three types of darkness that affect the life of a Yid: clouds, darkness, and fog. Each is more difficult than the one before it, and fog is the most difficult of them all.

“A darkness as thick as fog is so opaque that even when you light a torch it cannot help you see. Moshe was able to bring light even into such a darkness for Bnei Yisroel, to help them understand that even there, in the fog, is Hashem.”

The yungerman heard these words through the fog of his own pain, and he was deeply moved. After the tisch he entered the tzaddik’s inner room and cried out, “Surely, Rebbe, you meant those words just for me, didn’t you?”