Who Is Just a Little Boy

The Imrei Chaim would recount teachings of his uncle, the Ateres Yeshua of Dzikov. The Ateres Yeshua once observed two people in conversation. One asked the other, "Why do you allow your son to play with such unwholesome friends?" The other replied, "Ah, it is not so bad. Why are you making such a fuss over nothing? He is just a little boy." The Dzikover turned to the astonished man and said, "How do you know that he is just a little boy? Maybe he is an eighty-year-old man who has come back to this world to rectify, through tikkun, whatever he ruined in a previous gilgul."