The Farmer's Message
Long before he was a Rebbe, Rav Simcha Bunim made his living as a merchant. It is told that he went to the market to buy grain and argued over the price with a Polish farmer. The farmer would not lower it. Instead he raised it, and said a single word, “Poprowice,” which in Polish means “do better.”
All the farmer wanted was a higher payment. But that night, back at home, Rav Simcha Bunim could not stop hearing the word. Poprowice. Improve. Do better.
He felt that it was meant for him. If even a Polish farmer was telling him to improve, he reasoned, then the time had come for teshuvah, and he decided right then to change his ways.
More stories of Rav Simcha Bunim Bonhart
All 7 ›Two RebbesA talmid of Rav Simcha Bunim relates that his Rebbe taught that everyone needs two rebbes, one from this world and one from the supernal worlds above, Olam HaElyon. The talmid…A Visit from the Tosafos Yom TovIt is told that once, as Rav Simcha Bunim sat with his talmidim, an elderly talmid chacham came to greet him. He remembered Rav Bunim from his younger days in Vadislav, and…Lost in the ForestRav Simcha Bunim once explained a teaching of the Baal Shem Tov (see Avos 6:2). The regret and the urge to return that stir in a person's heart are really a bas kol, a heavenly…Ready and WillingIt is told that Rav Simcha Bunim was once on his way home from Danzig when he stopped in the town where Rav Zalman Chasid lived, a man great in Torah and in good deeds but…
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