No Travel After Chatzos

Rav Elozor of Kozhnitz had a custom. He was very strict about travel on Erev Shabbos and would never travel after midday, no matter how short the distance and no matter the circumstances, without exception.

Once he was traveling home on Erev Shabbos. When they were only a few miles from their destination, the Rebbe noticed that it was chatzos. Since it was midday, and he was careful not to travel after chatzos on Erev Shabbos, he refused to go any further and ordered the gabbai to stop.

"We will spend Shabbos here in this village," the Rebbe explained to the shocked gabbai. When the gabbai went to arrange their lodgings, he found that fewer than ten Jews lived in the village, and that wherever they stayed, the food and provisions would be simple and meager, certainly not the Shabbos delicacies they were accustomed to in honor of Shabbos.

"Rebbe, please, we are just a few miles from home. We must continue." declared the gabbai, as the Rebbe shook his head in refusal. "But Rebbe, it is only another half hour," he pleaded, "and there is no food here in honor of Shabbos. They don't even have a minyan."

All his protests fell on deaf ears. "You know," Rav Elozor explained calmly, "that under no circumstances do I travel after chatzos, and so I will go no further." With that, the Rebbe went to immerse himself in the river to prepare for Shabbos.

Meanwhile, while the Rebbe was immersing, the gabbai set off toward Kozhnitz. He decided that if the Rebbe was so obstinate as to stay, he could still gather Shabbos food and bring it back with time to spare. When he reached Kozhnitz and word spread through the city that the Rebbe was spending Shabbos alone, with no minyan, just half an hour away, the chassidim gathered, and scores of yungeleit and bochurim began making preparations to travel to the Rebbe. When the gabbai returned to the small village with the Shabbos food, tens of chassidim came with him, and the Shabbos became an uplifting, spiritual experience for all.

The Rebbe was greatly pleased, and he told the chassidim a story.

The holy Chozeh of Lublin owned a special white bekesche that he always wore when he was honored as the mohel at a bris. Once, the chassidim noticed that the Chozeh put on the white robe even though he was not performing a bris, and since there was no bris the entire day, their wonder only grew. It was the custom that on Purim the talmidim were allowed to ask any questions they wished. The chassidim asked the Chozeh, "Why did the Rebbe wear the white robe even though he wasn't a mohel today?" The Tzaddik answered them with a story.

There was a wealthy but miserly merchant who came to Lublin to conduct some business. He was delayed, and with half an hour to Shabbos he found himself in Lublin with no relatives or acquaintances with whom to spend Shabbos. As he was stingy, he did not wish to rent a room or pay for lodgings. Having run out of other ideas, he decided to head to the Rebbe's court. Although he was not a chassid, he trusted the chesed of the Rebbe and the chassidim to provide him with food and a place to stay for Shabbos for free. And so it was.

On Motzoei Shabbos he went to the Rebbe with a kvittel and a pidyon, a note of petition with his name to ask for the Rebbe's blessing, together with a small donation. It was a paltry sum indeed. He was so miserly that his half-coin donation was merely symbolic. The Rebbe nonetheless accepted both the pidyon and the kvittel, blessed him, and he went on his way.

After the miser passed away, his soul rose to the heavenly worlds and continued until it reached a certain point, where one of the angels stopped him from going further.

"Stop. You can go no further," said the angel, "for you have a blemish in your bris."

"What? How can this be?" protested the miser. "I once visited the Tzaddik, the Chozeh of Lublin, whose eyes can see from one end of the world to the other. If I had a blemish, wouldn't he have let me know and rectified the matter?"

The angel took the miser's protest and argument to the court, which ruled that he had a good point. They ruled that he had permission to ask the Rebbe for a tikkun, and so he did. That is why the Chozeh wore the white bekesche he normally wore for a bris: he had rectified that Jew's bris.

"And now," Rav Elozor concluded to his chassidim, who had come to spend Shabbos with him in the village, "if that miser was not a chassid, and only visited the Rebbe on the pretext of saving himself the cost of a hotel for the weekend, and only gave a paltry half coin as a pidyon, yet in Heaven they saw fit that the Chozeh should do him a favor and rectify him with a tikkun, just think how much more so are you true chassidim, desiring favor and blessings, since you came specifically to spend Shabbos here with me. Just think what blessings and favors await all of you." And he promised them all manner of berochos.