Chessed Without Limit

Young children would run after Rav Shimshon in the streets of Ofakim and call out their news to him: "Rabbi, Rabbi, we are going to Savta for Pesach." Although his mind was immersed in spiritual preparation for the seder night, he came down to the children's level and took an interest in what mattered to them.

One boy, who was putting on tefillin in preparation for his bar mitzvah, did not know that the yud, the knot of the shel yad, should touch the bayis. Rav Shimshon went over and pointed this out in a friendly way. The boy, struck by his gentleness, began to argue that it did not have to be so.

Rav Shimshon was among the first to own a computer, and his laptop was perhaps the first in Eretz Yisroel. He would type up the chiddushei Torah of young talmidim and use the opportunity to guide them in how to write, polishing the language, checking its accuracy, correcting and improving it. "Look here," he told one avreich, and he took a Reb Chaim from the bookcase and showed him that every piece opened with a difficulty in the Rambam. "Reb Chaim also teaches us how to write. One should start with a kushya right at the beginning. Then the reader cannot leave the piece until he sees the answer." He would also type the children's sheet, so that they would develop the desire to write.

Once, at the barber, he was offered the next turn ahead of the line, and he refused. In the meantime an elderly man came into the shop. The Rav rose in his honor, and naturally everyone else rose as well. Seeing how the Rav honored the old man, the other customers offered the first turn to the Rav instead.

He would make light of his wide-brimmed hat and say, "When the Beis Hamikdosh is rebuilt and we go up to be seen there, I will have somewhere to hide from His glorious greatness."