Mrs. Elisheva Chai, the widow of Rav Meir Avshalom HY”D, spoke with Kol Chai Radio on Monday night, a few days following the tragic event in which her husband was murdered.
I always knew he was special, but his love for Torah, truth, and emes is only coming to light now, speaking to visitors. Mrs. Chai also confirmed the story reported by YWN-Israel, adding the rav only shared it with her two years following the event. She added that others told her that he requested to return to the world for 12 years, stressing she did not hear it from him, but others coming to the shiva confirmed it. YWN-Israel reported that he was murdered on the night of the birthday of the child related in the story, exactly 12 years to the day.
The rebbitzin stated they always believed in the koach of Rav Nachman M’Breslov, and she and her children continue to carry this belief. She added “I see so many broken people and so much pain” it is very difficult, increasing her davening for the geula. Mrs. Chai is now left to tend to their children, seven in number, ages 16, 15, 12, 9, 7.5, 6, and 2 months.
The rebbitzin called on her husband to “tear the Heavens apart” in his cry to bring Moshiach, stating the time must come since the pain is too great personally and for Am Yisrael. The rebbitzin called on the tzibur to learn mishnayos on her husband’s behalf, and to do tshuva, something that was so important to him during his life.
(Yechiel Spira – YWN Israel)
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12 Responses
May HaSh-m bring nechama to her family and may He avenge R” Meir’s blood not only with the 3 savages that have already been sent to gehenom, but by sending ALL these subhuman vermin to burn with them!
this is “confirmation”? that others “confirmed” it to her? who are those others, and what did they tell her, precisely?
yaakov avinu was the first to know he was going to die, and was thus blessed to get his affairs in order. if a man knew that he was going to die in precisely 12 years, is it really so credible that he would tell others about this but not his own wife? and if he had three children, now ages 16, 15, and 12, would he not seek some heter not to leave young orphans and a widow?
that is, his youngest is 2 months old. in the original story, his plea was:
“my son was born a few days ago and I want to be there to help raise him. I do not wish to leave a widow and orphan”
great. and so now he leaves a 2 month old orphan, a 6 year old orphan, and a 7 1/2 year old orphan, in addition to the other children, which his widow must care for. is she in a *better* situation? what in the world was he thinking, precisely 11 months ago?!
what does seem somewhat plausible is what the wife was able to personally confirm, that he told his wife that he was granted an unspecified number of years, and that this he experienced in his accident 2 years before.
kol tuv,
josh waxman
The thing that makes me skeptical about the story is that the accident supposedly occurred when the baby was a few days old. He was then granted another 12 years but he was niftar on his sons 12th birthday. Seems he got a few days less then 12 years. Heaven doesn’t mess up on these things.
Bury Rav Meir Avshalom’s killers in pig juice and advertise it to the world.
Suggest more Talmud Torah, more davvening and more deeds of kindness. Be careful of all goy including Me !!
A goy,
Gerry Mullen
Josh,
Perhaps he did not want to worry his wife about it and cause her undo stress.
It seems credible to me.
#3 – Maybe the promise to him was not 12 years from the date of the accident, but for his new-born son to have his father for 12 years.
#2 josh waxman – YOUR logic is not necessarily HaSh-m’s logic.
It is entirely possible that Hash-m granted his wish for his new baby to have his father for the first 12 years.
The fact that he had more children after this incident, has nothing to do with this. What HaSh-m’s cheshbon and plan is/was regarding the family and the younger children we will never know.
@6 maybe but that’s not what was said in the story
“YOUR logic is not necessarily HaSh-m’s logic”
i wasn’t talking about Hashem’s logic. I was talking about Rabbi Meir Avshalom Chai’s logic. The fact that he had more children absolutely has something to do with it. If he knew that he would be dying a week ago, he could have refrained from having further children. Namely, if he really knew this, then precisely one year ago, at least, at an extreme, he could have divorced his wife and then not have have an obligation of onah, much as Amram separated from his wife. After all, this was absolutely one of his explicit concerns, to not leave a newborn orphan without a father. at a lesser extreme he certainly could have found a heter to use a rhythm method of birth control. Rav Moshe Feinstein permits this after the couple have had two children, and would have difficulty raising more children. A case where there will be a 2 month old orphan certainly would seem to qualify.
that he didn’t, and also did not even inform his wife, while putting her in this situation, suggests to me that the 12 year bit is nonsense. I don’t think that Rabbi Meir Avshalom was a fool or a callous individual.
rather, this 12 year bit was likely invented by some overly pious fool who wanted to explain how all this was part of the Divine plan, according to his own limited and deficient reasoning. or it is a misunderstanding which organically grew out of the idea that Hashem granted him some unspecified number of years, such that this allotment must have been precisely 12 years, which is what he received.
kol tuv,
josh
#9 -Josh: Respectfully, I also do not think that Rav Meir was a fool or callous.
However, there are many “ifs” and “maybes” that we can never know.
First of all, certain personalities in Tanach who took it upon themselves NOT to do what is generally the right thing to do, because they felt they knew better, and that doing those things would have bad results, were later proven wrong and punished for it, and told that it was not for them to make those cheshbonos.
Also, it is possible that Rav Meir felt that perhaps in view of t’shuva or other positive acts he had done, that HaShem would grant him MORE than the 12 years originally promised, (we know that tshuva changes one into a new person, and a previous gezaira on the “former person” does not exist for the “new person”) in which case to have stopped having children would clearly have been a mistake.
As I said there is too much we can never know (at least not in Olam HaZeh) to be able to make any judgements about this story one way or the other.
AinOhdMilvado:
there are indeed many ifs and maybes. and rav meir is not around to tell us.
however, three points:
1) this is a somewhat “amazing” story, in that it is much closer to nes nigleh instead of nes nistar, which is rather uncommon bezman hazeh. therefore, i would need more confirmation than usual.
2) this is by no means the first “inspirational” story of this sort to surface after a tragedy. certain pious fools apparently consider it mitzvah to make up such stories. so there is reason to be suspicious.
3) besides this, there are certain irregularities in the story. that his wife knew a parallel story without the 12 years is quite likely indicative of something. and that it would require counter-intuitive chesbonos on Rav Meir’s part also is quite likely indicative.
sure, we can never know for certain (unless we interviewed everyone in the world, and got someone to confess to having misunderstood or modified this portion). but there are a lot of things we cannot be 100% sure of. however, this story is fishy. just as the talking Monsey fish story was fishy, though we cannot know 100%. and it seems that declaring that we cannot know, in the face of all these difficulties, is a mark of pious apologetics rather than rational thought. do you feel the religious obligation for this inspirational story to be true? as mentioned correctly on the previous thread (before the apologetic nonsensical reinterpretation kicked in), Rav Avigdor Miller z”tzl said that one is not mechuyav to believe all these stories. one can be a Maamin while still thinking that this sensational story seems problematic, and is in need of greater “confirmation”.
kol tuv,
josh
Why is this story the most impt fact of Rav Chai’s hy”d life?
He was an amazing father, husband, rebbe to talmidim, baal chesed and one who yearned for the geulah. May hashem comfort the family and bring us quickly to the geulah shelayman.