The Meloh HaRo’im was a disciple of Rav Mendel M’Riminov, and he would often frequent his rebbe’s home. There was nothing like sitting with the rebbe and observing how he ate, spoke, learned, and interacted with others. To the Meloh HaRo’im, the inspiration and knowledge gleaned from just watching how the rebbe lived was worth thousands of lectures in mussar.

The Meloh HaRo’im always found it difficult to leave the rebbe when his visit came to an end. No matter if he had come for just a Shabbos or for an extended month-long stay, he loathed to leave behind the rebbe, and the spiritual sustenance he represented.

But he had a life, a family, and students of his own waiting for him, and so he would regretfully take leave of his rebbe after an uplifting visit, already eager for the next time he would merit to bask in the tzaddik’s presence.

At the end of one lengthy visit to Rav Mendel M’Riminov, the Meloh HaRo’im reluctantly prepared to leave and went in to the rebbe to say goodbye. With a deep feeling of longing, he breathed in the pure air in the rebbe’s study and felt his heart warm under the rebbe’s steady gaze. How he wished he could remain longer!

He bent his head forward, and Rav Mendel blessed him warmly. He kissed the rebbe’s hand and backed out of the room. As much as he wished to stay, it was time for him to go home.

His feet treaded out the front door, but his heart remained inside, with the rebbe. Holding his small suitcase, he looked yearningly at the rebbe’s home, thinking of all the inspiration he had gleaned during his visit. Making a quick decision, he put down the case and went back into the house. He was leaving, but he wanted to get one more story, just one more nugget of inspiration, out of his holy mentor before he went back home.

The rebbetzin, standing in the kitchen, looked surprised to see him again. “Can I help you?” she asked kindly.

The Meloh HaRo’im gave a rueful smile. “Please, Rebbetzin, tell me just one more story about your distinguished husband,” he requested, and it was hard to miss the pleading in his voice. “Tell me just one more story about my rebbe, a story that no one knows.”

“A story that no one knows,” she repeated slowly, hesitantly. She was quiet for a moment, and the Meloh HaRo’im could see that she was thinking of something but weighing whether or not to relate it.

He waited patiently.

“Alright,” she conceded at last. “I’ll tell you a story, but you must promise not to retell it until after both my husband and I pass away. Once we are both niftar, you will be allowed to relate the story. Do I have your word?”

The Meloh HaRo’im hurried to assure her that she did, and so she began to speak. This is the story she related:

“Our home is a poor one. My saintly husband, Rav Mendel M’Riminov, is a tzaddik and talmid chacham who spends his day learning and devoting himself to his chassidim. We don’t have a steady source of income, and live with the bare minimum.

“A tremendous sum of money passes through our home on a constant basis in the form of pidyun gelt, which is money that chassidim give my husband to dispense to tzedakah when they need a yeshuah. All of this money is given to tzedakah; not a single coin finds its way into our pockets.

“Somehow, however, we always have what we need for Shabbos. There has never been a Shabbos without challah and fish, chicken and wine. We don’t always know how, but Hashem takes care of us, week after week. There were some weeks that we barely had anything to eat the whole week, but I knew that when Shabbos would come, we would have what we needed.

“One week, the house was completely empty. It was already Thursday, and there was nothing in the house to cook with, let alone eat. I had no idea how we would have food for Shabbos, but I was determined not to disturb my husband’s learning. As a rule, I never bother him with these kind of trivialities; I want his mind to be completely on his learning and not on our financial worries.

“I kept waiting for the miracle to happen; for someone to stop by with a gift of a few coins or a neighbor to bring me some extra food that she happened to have had around, but nothing happened. Thursday passed, and I increased my prayers, but the neis didn’t happen the way I had imagined it would.

“I woke up at dawn on Friday morning, tiptoeing past my husband’s study, and noticed that he was still learning. As you are surely aware, the rebbe customarily stays up all Thursday night to learn, and he was still engrossed in a page of Gemara as I passed.

“I stood outside the study, thinking of the empty cupboards and the empty table and debating inwardly whether I should disturb my husband. No, I told myself firmly. I would allow him to learn worry-free, and Hashem would surely take care of us.

“As I stood there, lost in my thoughts, my husband came out of the room. He was holding his tallis bag, ready to go to the mikvah and then to Shacharis, and there was a joyful smile on his face. I saw his smile, and I felt calm. Everything would be okay.

“After my husband left, I busied myself with cleaning up the house and getting it ready for Shabbos. There was no food to cook, but I spread the pristine white tablecloth over the table and set out the place settings. Then I sat back and waited. There was nothing else to do.

“The hours ticked by. At some point, I decided to go into my husband’s study and see if I could find anything there. I’m not sure what propelled me to do this, but I had a sudden urge to check if I had forgotten some money in the study somewhere, somehow.

“I walked into the room and noticed immediately that the table seemed a little crooked. Something was propping up one of the legs, making the table tilt slightly. I gave the table a small shove, knocking the table leg off of whatever it was standing on. As the table righted itself, I bent down to retrieve whatever had been resting beneath the leg.

“It was a coin.

“I couldn’t believe it! The miracle had happened! It was a coin large enough to enable me to purchase whatever we needed for Shabbos. Clutching the coin tightly, I ran to the market and purchased candles, wine, a piece of chicken, and challahs. There was even some money left for cake to give to the chassidim who came by on Friday night.

“About an hour before Shabbos, my husband came home, his face glowing with holiness, his beard still damp from the mikvah. The aroma of Shabbos delicacies filled the house, and I waited for him to ask me about it, but he didn’t seem to wonder about it at all. A man of few words, he looked at me and asked as he did every week, ‘To’ameha?’

“I went to the stove and put a tiny piece of each dish onto a plate for my husband to taste from the Shabbos food.  Together, all the bits of food amounted to less than a kezayis.  He sat down at the table and I served him.

“When he finished tasting the food, I blurted, ‘Aren’t you going to ask me where I got all this food from? How I was able to pay for it?’

“He looked up. ‘But I know where you got it from,’ he said simply. ‘You got it from under my table, didn’t you?’

“I was astonished. ‘You knew it was there? How did it get there?’

“The rebbe stood up. ‘I had a tremendous nisayon, but I withstood it, and that is how the coin got there.’

“I looked at him searchingly, waiting for him to elaborate, and he continued. ‘I was in middle of learning when I suddenly remembered that there was no money in the house for food for Shabbos. As soon as this thought entered my mind, I pushed it away. I knew it was a distraction to my learning, so I turned back to my Gemara and tuned the thought out.

“‘But the yetzer hara kept bothering me. It would not leave me alone. Mendel, it planted a thought in my head.  Your kids are hungry. Your wife is hungry. You do favors for the whole world; what about your family? I banged on my shtender. No! I thought determinedly.  I will not allow myself to be distracted.

“‘I turned back to my Gemara, but then I felt my feet push up against something hard. I looked down and saw a coin on the floor. Immediately I understood that this coin was the Satan, sent to distract me from my learning. I could either choose to get excited by the miracle or remain focused on my learning, and with tremendous willpower I forced myself to ignore the coin, pushing it under the table leg where I would not easily be able to retrieve it.

“‘I made a decision that come what may, I would not pick up the coin,’ my husband told me. ‘For me, it was only a distraction. But Hashem wanted us to have the money, so you went into the room and found it.’”

The rebbetzin gave a smile. “In the end, my husband withstood his nisayon, and we had food for Shabbos,” she told the Meloh HaRo’im. “Not only that, but after I heard the rebbe’s side of the story, I went back into the room and started digging in the dirt floor under his table. I found two more coins. One day, a woman came to me crying over her poverty, and I gave her one of the coins. The last one I kept, as a reminder of the miracle that Hashem performed for us.”

Have a Wonderful Shabbos!

This story is taken from tape # A401