SHEVII SHEL PESACH SEVENTH DAY OF PESACH ACHARON SHEL PESACH - LAST DAY OF PESACH TUESDAY APRIL 22 EN FRANCAIS AVEC LE RAV M.

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1 MOSAIC EXPRESS Friday April 18, 2014 Nisan 18, 5774 Candle Lighting 7:26 pm Shabbat Ends 8:33 pm Next Weeks Candle Lighting Friday April 25 7:35 pm Shabbat Chol HaMoed Pesach Last days of Pesach, Sunday evening April 20 thru Tuesday evening April 22 SHABBAT CHOL HAMOED SERVICES Friday Night Mincha/Maariv...7:25pm Shacharit... 9:30am Children s Program :45am Boy s Program :00-12:10pm Rabbi Levi s Youth Minyan.10:30am Mincha...7:25pm Maariv...8:33pm CLASSES Chassidus.....8:45am Men s Class by Mayer Chaikin...6:25pm Women s Class :40pm DAVENING TIMES SUNDAY APRIL Shacharis.....9:00 am Mincha/Maariv...7:30 pm MONDAY APRIL 21...Shacharis...9:30 am Mincha/Maariv...7:30 pm TUESDAY APRIL 22 Shacharis....9:30 am YIZKOR....11:15 am Mincha...6:15 pm Followed by Moshiach s Seudah Yom Tov ends...8:38 pm Please wait one hour before eating chometz to allow the Rabbi to buy it back for you. WEDNESDAY APRIL 16 THRU FRIDAY APRIL 25 REGULAR WEEKDAY SCHEDULE Shacharis....7:00 am Mincha/Maariv...7:50 pm Followed by breakfast Yasher Koach to our Kiddush co-sponsors! Last Week Michael & Sarah Bybelezer Ronnie & Debbie Cons Michael & Barbara Chernack Evan & Osnat Feldman Mr. & Mrs. Freddy Gestetner Mikey Gottesman Meir & Helen Hakak Mark Lazar Itchy & Zeldie Treitel Kiddush co-sponsorship is $136 MTC Graciously Acknowledges This Week s Sponsors of the Day EN FRANCAIS AVEC LE RAV M. PINTO Michael & Elza Hirsch in honour of Rochel s birthday, Nisan 24 Cons families in honour of Shimmy s birthday, Nisan 24 To become a sponsor of the day, please contact ext 223 SHEVII SHEL PESACH SEVENTH DAY OF PESACH CHABBAT HOL HA MOED VENDREDI AVRIL 18.. Minha/Arvit 19h 00 CHABBAT AVRIL 19.Chahrit...9h 00 Suivi par la Dracha de Rav Pinto Chiour Hala ha...18h 40 Minha.. 19h 20 Seu'da Chelichit.19h 40 Arvit.. 20h 35 YOM TOV DIMANCHE, AVRIL 20 Minha/Arvit 19h 30 LUNDI, AVRIL Chahrit.... 9h 00 Suivi par la Dracha de Rav Pinto Minha/Arvit.. 19h 30 MARDI, AVRIL 22...Chahrit... 9h 00 Suivi par la Dracha de Rav Pinto Minha... 18h 15 Suivi par la Seudah de Machiah Arvit... 20h 40 SUNDAY EVENING APRIL 20 LEARNING AND FARBRENGEN AT MTC from 11:45 pm Shevii Shel Pesach, the seventh day of Pesach, commemorates the crossing of the Red Sea - the culmination of the Exodus. ACHARON SHEL PESACH - LAST DAY OF PESACH TUESDAY APRIL 22 MOSHIACH S SEUDAH - MEAL following Mincha at 6:15 pm The last day of Pesach focuses on the future and final redemption. The Baal Shem Tov instituted the custom of celebrating this day with an additional festive meal. YOM TOV CANDLE LIGHTING TIMES Sunday April :29 pm Monday April after 8:36 pm* *Light from a pre-existing flame. Hampstead s Yom Tov Accommodations Tolerance for overnight parking from the evening of April 14 to April 22. A special curbside garbage collection will take place on Friday April 25. Yasher Koach to the town of Hampstead! MTC wishes a hearty Mazal Tov to Berkowicz and Zigman families on the birth of a daughter, Aderes Tova, to Daniel & Naomi Zigman Montreal Torah Center Bais Menachem Chabad Lubavitch Joanne and Jonathan Gurman Community Center Lou Adler Shul 28 Cleve Road, Hampstead Quebec H3X 1A Fax mtc@themtc.com Mosaic Express l 1

2 The Freedom Connection By Tzvi Freeman PESACH TORAH READINGS We are limited by the very fact that we have human form. There is no freedom in following our whim, only further slavery to our own limited selves. Freedom can come only by connecting to something infinite and beyond us. And so Moses was told, When you take the people out from Egypt, you shall all serve G d on this mountain. and finally A blind man is sitting on a park bench. A Rabbi sits down next to him. The Rabbi is chomping on a piece of matzoh. Taking pity on the blind man, he breaks off a piece and gives it to the blind man. Several minutes later, the blind man turns, taps the Rabbi on the shoulder and asks, "Who wrote this?!!" The readings for the four INTERMEDIATE DAYS OF PASSOVER include: 1) Instructions to commemorate the Exodus by sanctifying the firstborn, avoiding leaven and eating matzah on Passover, telling one's children the story of the Exodus, and donning tefillin (Exodus 13:1-16). 2) A portion from the Parshah of Mishpatim which includes the laws of the festivals (Exodus 22:24-23:19). 3) A section describing Moses' receiving of the Second Tablets and G-d's revelation to him of His Thirteen Attributes of Mercy, which likewise concludes with the laws of the festivals (Exodus 34:1-26); when one of the "intermediate days" of Passover is Shabbat, this is the reading read on that day, and it begins 12 verses earlier, with 33:12). 4) The story and laws of the "Second Passover" (Numbers 9:1-14). On the SEVENTH DAY OF PASSOVER we read how on this day the sea split for the Children of Israel and drowned the pursuing Egyptians, and the "Song at the Sea" sung by the people upon their deliverance (Exodus 13:17-15:26; full summary with commentary here). On the EIGHTH DAY OF PASSOVER we read Deuteronomy 15:19-16:17. Like the reading for the second day, it catalogs the annual cycle of festivals, their special observances, and the offerings brought on these occasions to the Holy Temple in Jerusalem. The Eighth Day's special connection with the Future Redemption is reflected in the Haftorah (reading from the Prophets) for this day (Isaiah 10:32-12:6). Tuesday April 22 2 hours after sundown First bagels out! Free Delivery available on orders over $50 on Wednesday April Lucerne Food Container Arrives in Nepal, Just in Time for Passover Chabad.org his was the year of the volunteer T when it came to Passover in Nepal. Due to a strike by the Israeli Foreign Ministry last month, a container of Passover supplies for use at the seders addressed to the Israeli embassy in Nepal and needed to be signed for by an official presence there got stuck in port in Kolkata, India. Although the strike ended on April 3 and the container filled with matzah, wine, Haggadahs and other supplies was released, most guessed that it would never make it to Kathmandu on time. Yet Rabbi Chezky Lifshitz, co-director of the Chabad House of Kathmandu and the Chabad House of Pokhara with his wife, Chani was resolute that the seders would go on as planned. He noted that (Continued on page 6) 2 l Mosaic Express

3 The Exodus, Part II By YANKI TAUBER Over 2600 Matzah Boxes Distributed! Hap- ome people experience freedom S canoeing across a pristine lake in the unspoiled wilderness. I feel free when my excuses run out. There's something I very much want to do. But I also don't want to do it. So I blame my wife, my kids, my age, my youth, my childhood, my landlord and my employer. It works for a while -- a day, a month, a year -- but finally, inevitably, there comes the point at which there are no excuses left. What a relief! I take a deep, exhilarating breath. I feel fifty pounds lighter. Now it's just me and me in the ring -- my inner self and my outer self, my motivated self and my inert self -- and let the better man win. n the Torah reading Bo, we read how I the last of the Ten Plagues finally broke the spirit of the Egyptians and, after four generations of slavery, the Children of Israel marched triumphantly out of Egypt, matzahs baking in the sun. Time for the credits to start scrolling up the screen? Not quite. Instead we get a frame reading "Seven Days Later" and the opening scene of the Torah reading Beshalach. The Israelites are walking serenely through the desert, when they look over their shoulders to see the Egyptians chasing after them. Seems that marching out of Egypt is not going to do the trick. We're going to have to split a sea first before we can proceed on to Sinai. What's going on? Haven't the Egyptians been decisively defeated, their gods shown to be worthless, their proud Pharaoh utterly humiliated? Hasn't he come running in his pajamas in the middle of the night, literally begging Moses and Aaron to take their people out of his land as quickly as possible? Who, then, is this mighty Pharaoh materializing like a mirage in the desert, hot on our heels with an army of war chariots and horsemen? Chassidic teaching explains that there are, indeed, two distinct stages to the human quest for freedom. That's why we have Bo and Beshalach. That's why we have the first and latter days of Passover. That's why we have the Exodus from Egypt and "The Exodus, Part II"-- the Splitting of the Sea. There are two types of slavery. There's a kind of slavery in which the chains that shackle our souls are externally imposed- -like when your boss fires you, your landlord raises your rent and your mother-in-law invites herself for the weekend. Then there's the internal slavery that comes from our own, selfimposed shackles--our anger, our vanity, our laziness, our greed. It's easy to think ourselves free when we overcome an externally-imposed limitation. We're shocked and surprised to discover Pharaoh pursuing us after we've escaped his Egypt. But the Pharaoh we see closing in on us in the desert is a Pharaoh that we took out of Egypt with us. We've been freed from the Egypt that closed us in from without, but we have yet to transcend the Egypt in ourselves. To do that, we have to split open our sea, penetrating the depths of who and what we are to uncover our truest self. Yasher Koach to our Matzah Delivery Team! TNGA KIA Mesivta Boys Nathaniel Blank Sarah Eldor Brenda Wiseman Dayna Wiseman Ascher Berros Menashe New Yisrael New Tzvi Harrison Tzemach Shpindler Yossel Zirkind Yosef Sperlin Pinchas Krasnanski Zev Nussbaum Ari Treitel Menashe Treitel Menashe Treitel Mendel Treitel Mendel Treitel Rosie Treitel Velka Rosenfeld Esty Rosenfeld Miriam Smith Aviva Smith Chana Harrison Neshama Shizgal Leah Junik Mushka Silberstein Dassi Lurie Michael Minkowitz Moshe Minkowitz Mendel Minkowitz Naftoli Minkowitz Mushka Minkowitz Tonya Minkowitz Yehuda Minkowitz YASHER KOACH - THANK YOU To JJ Maislin of Maisliner Trucking for bringing in the Matzah Mosaic Express l 3

4 Seeing the Blind A STORY By BORUCH SHLOMO CUNIN cause riding in a car or subway is not permitted on Shabbat and Jewish holidays. I was 16 and had to get home to 167th and Jerome Avenue in the Bronx, which was pretty far away. When I approached the Rebbe, he handed me matzah and asked if I could deliver some to a certain family. s the sun was about to set, my train A broke down in the middle of the Bronx and I had to walk. Heading in the general direction of Pelham Parkway, I kept asking people where the address was. I remember one helpful soul who told me, "Son, you've got a long way to go!" Earlier that afternoon, a group of students in Brooklyn had finished baking the last of the Passover matzah. It was 1958, and the Lubavitcher Rebbe had a custom of giving hand-baked matzah to people as a spiritual gift before Passover. He would stand for hours, greeting people and handing them matzah. The Zohar says matzah is the "bread of faith," and simply eating it nourishes the soul. The Rebbe would give matzah first to the people who had to travel far, be- Ideally, I would have taken a taxi from the subway station, asked the driver to wait, delivered the matzah, and gotten home in time for our Seder. But life is seldom ideal. Eventually, I found the address, which turned out to be a housing project. I knocked on the door and out came a man with no shirt, tattoos and a potbelly. "What is it?" he snapped. In the Bronx, it's proper etiquette to snap when greeting someone. "Excuse me, are you Mr. So -and-so?" I asked. "Yeah," he said. I no- 27 Days Left! DRAW 2014 We invite you to join our Corporate or Event Sponsors. We re counting on your support! Get involved in MTC s life-line fundraiser of the year! Chairpersons: Sara Eldor Darrell Garfield Dr. Jacob Tink O U R C O R P O R A T E S P O N S O R S LAZAR EQUITIES NATIONAL DISPATCH SERVICES J SUSS KITCHENS O U R E V E N T S P O N S O R S TAN-KAR Design et Couture Simantob Darwiche 4 l Mosaic Express

5 ticed the loaf of rye bread sitting on the table, definitely not a traditional Seder food. I said, "The Rebbe sent me." "The Rebbe? Oh, please come in," he said. The tiny kitchen contained only a small table, some chairs and a hot plate. I didn't understand what I was doing there, GOAL 4500 TICKETS 1905 Sold! delivering matzah to a family that wasn't celebrating Passover. Then I thought, perhaps that's exactly why I was there. I asked the man if he would like to have a Seder. He agreed and called for his wife to come in. She entered, visibly pregnant, with two beautiful little girls, maybe five or six years old, trailing behind. Both girls were blind. We cleared off the table. I put a hat on the man's head and said, "Okay, we're having a Seder!" I tried to remember the blessings in the proper order, but it was difficult without a Haggadah. We ate the matzah and used water and paper cups to recall the four cups of wine. I tried to think what the Rebbe would do if he was here. I looked at the little girls and at their mother, about to have another child, and began to tell them some things I had learned from the Rebbe. I told them that we have to have faith. On this night, G d liberated our ancestors from slavery, and He liberates us, too. The husband and wife seemed to hang on every word, like they were getting nourishment just by listening. I told them that on Passover, we journey through our personal Egypt to freedom, and that G d doesn't put on our shoulders more than we can carry. Once you know that, and believe it, you're already liberated. We sang songs with the children and time flew. At 1:00 a.m., the woman put the girls to bed and it was time for me to leave, but I had to ask the man how he knew the Rebbe. It turned out he was a tanner and was acquainted with a rabbi who worked (Continued on page 6) MTC DAY CAMP AGES 2-3 JUNE 30- AUGUST 15 9:00 AM - 2:00 PM For more info, call Nechama x258 Or nechama@themtc.com Register at 0 April 23 THE THEIF AND THE IDOLATOR The Talmud declares at the end of Tractate Sanhedrin that stealing is akin to idol-worship. Now while we can appreciate that stealing is a heinous transgression, what, however, is the singular connection to idolatry? visit to watch it live and view previous classes SPONSORED BY THE MIRYAM & BATYA MEDICOFF LECTURE FOUNDATION Mosaic Express l 5

6 (Continued from page 2) travelers to the country had started lugging Passover items in their backpacks and suitcases to help out, and he talked about making grape juice from scratch, if need be. In the last few weeks, hundreds of kilos of matzah and Haggadahs have arrived with scores of tourists. Normally, volunteers assist anyway, though this year proved remarkable in the efforts to make up for the languishing shipment. You can come one week before the seder, and you can see hundreds of Jewish people singing and cutting vegetables, Chani Lifshitz has said in the past. We have a carrot team and a cucumber team; it s really nice to see. The Lifshitzes, with the help of rabbinical students sent by Chabad-Lubavitch World Headquarters, organize four seders annually for thousands of Israeli backpackers who venture to Nepal, many of them young men who have completed their obligatory military service. The biggest is held in the capital of Kathmandu, where some 1,000 to 1,500 Jews come together to celebrate the holiday; there is another English-language seder, as well as two large ones in the cities of Pokhara and Manang. On Monday, the container arrived. It included 1 ton of matzah, 2,000 bottles of wine, 3,000 pieces of gefilte fish and other traditional Jewish foods. Local volunteers from all over the world helped unload the container and bring the kosher-for- Passover items to the Chabad House. Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, vice chairman of Merkos L Inyonei Chinuch, the educational arm of Chabad-Lubavitch, said we re pleased that the provisions arrived in time for Pesach and everything came together in time for the sedarim. This year, according to the rabbi, the table was set for more than 1,000 visitors at an upscale hotel in Kathmandu. The first seder already began, with the story of the Exodus being told to all those present, amid enough food for everyone. (Continued from page 5) at another section of the meat plant. Several months ago, his wife had become pregnant. Since they had a disease that caused their children to be born blind, their doctor recommended an abortion. The man was very depressed and didn't know what to do. So he asked this rabbi, who suggested that he write a letter to the Lubavitcher Rebbe. The Rebbe wrote back, saying that they should have faith in G d and have the child. 16 th Annual WOMEN S OHEL TRIP Sunday-Monday, May 4-5 As I was about to leave, the man said, "You know, my wife and I weren't sure about this. How are we supposed to have faith? How are we supposed to forget what is and have hope? We didn't think it was possible. But tonight, hearing about faith and how G d gives us the strength to overcome our personal Egypt, well, now we understand." Their son was born fully sighted. Over time, I lost track of this family, but years later I learned that the daughters had married and that each had several children, all sighted. To really describe the Rebbe's love for hundreds of thousands of Jews and non- Jews all over the world would be impossible. The best I could do is to write about a poor family in the Bronx, living in a housing project for the blind. And how the Rebbe had faith hand-delivered to their door. RESERVE! zeldie@themtc.com Please let us know that you re coming b4 Pesach Reservation Deadline: Monday April 28 Trip: $125, Hotel: Single Occupancy $95 Double Occupancy $50 6 l Mosaic Express

7 An inspiring story for your Shabbos table HERE S my STORY UNDERGROUND CHABAD NETWORK RABBI MOSHE LERER ב ה שבת חול המועד פסח, י ט ניסן, תשע ד Shabbos Chol Hamoed Pesach, April 19, 2014 Iwas born in Brooklyn where my father had a dry goods store that had the distinction of being the only one on Moore Street to be closed on Shabbos. Besides being a model to me of a Torah Jew, my father made sure I got a yeshiva education. I attended Yeshiva Torah Vodaas from where I received my rabbinic ordination, though I also received degrees from Brooklyn College and Yeshiva University. My first encounter with the Rebbe, when he wasn t yet Rebbe, was on January 29, 1950 at the funeral of the Previous Rebbe, Rabbi Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn. There were such a huge throng at the funeral, and there was so much pushing and shoving. I was right in front of the open burial plot and all of a sudden the crowd surged forward so hard that I almost fell into the grave. It was a split second decision, but I had the presence of mind to jump across instead, and I landed next to the future Rebbe. After he became Rebbe, I would go, from time to time, to a farbrengen at the Chabad Headquarters at 770 Eastern Parkway. I remember these festive occasions vividly. The Rebbe would be sitting at the table with people all around him, and you could plainly see the respect and honor with which the chasidim held him. When he spoke, you could hear a pin drop everyone stood in awe of him. As well they should. What he accomplished on this earth, what he did in bringing Jews back to Torah! There isn t a corner on G-d s earth where you can go and not find somebody there who is an emissary of the Rebbe, transmitting what he had preached. And, of course, the Rebbe sent his emissaries to Russia long before anyone, when Russia was Communist, and when it was very dangerous to be active there. In 1982, I went to Russia. I was involved with the Long Island Committee on Soviet Jewry and I, along with another fellow, were chosen to go. Once I was chosen I wanted to do something concrete there not just go, visit and talk. So I contacted Lubavitch and I was introduced to two people, Rabbis Moshe Levertov and Gedalia Korf. I said to them, I m going to be going to the Soviet Union for two weeks, and I d like to do something for Lubavitch, because I know you people do tremendous work over there. They gave me a duffel bag full of things to take like mezuzahs, tefillin, siddurim, copies of the Tanya, matzah, and so forth. I prepared carefully for the journey, so that the Soviets would not suspect what I was up to. I had no papers that said that I was a rabbi; I even had a different social security card; no driver s license, nothing. For the first and last time in my life, I wore dungarees and a dungaree jacket, with a dungaree cap. My Chabad contacts told me what to do. They tipped me off to certain things; they told me what to say, what not to say, where to go, where not to go. They gave me addresses and names of people to see in Moscow and Leningrad. The day before I left for Russia, there was a farbrengen at 770, and they brought me to the Rebbe to a get blessing for success in this mission. The place was very crowded and they pushed me up I think I walked over some continued on reverse An oral history project dedicated to documenting the life of the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, of righteous memory. The story is one of thousands recorded in the 900 videotaped interviews conducted to date. Please share your comments and suggestions. mystory@jemedia.org

8 continued from reverse heads and stood on somebody s hat. But I got to the Rebbe and shook his hand, and he gave me a blessing for the journey a blessing which saved my life, as it turned out. In the Soviet Union, I was very closely watched in my hotel room I found a microphone as big as a quarter hidden in the lamp. I had been warned not to talk in the room about anything important just about the weather or sports, but not about politics, and not in Yiddish or Hebrew. Among others, I met with Mottel Lifshitz, Chabad s underground kosher slaughterer, and a fellow by the name of Reb Getche, who was very active in Chabad s underground network. When he found out that just before I arrived in Russia I was at a farbrengen with the Rebbe, he asked if I had brought some of the Rebbe s vodka for them. But I hadn t known to ask for it, so I had not. He was so very disappointed if I had only thought to ask, it would have meant so much to these people to have something directly from the Rebbe to hold on to. I also got a chance to meet with the tzaddik of Leningrad, Yitzchak Kogan, who was also very involved in Chabad s underground activities. He asked me to officiate at a wedding, so I met with the bride and groom, and I learned that the groom didn t have a tallis or tefillin. I told him it would be my privilege and my pleasure to give him my own personal tefillin as a wedding present. I needed it yet for the next morning prayers, but, right after, they would be his for the rest of his life. But something happened, and he didn t show up at the meeting place we had made up. I felt badly. Maybe I should have given him the tefillin the previous day but I have never missed putting on tefillin in my life, so how could I? As I got on the bus going back to the airport in Leningrad, I saw a man running. He had come for the tefillin. I gave it to him, and we spoke briefly in Hebrew. But the tourist guide heard us, and she informed against me. As soon as I got to the airport, they stopped me. What do you have in your suitcase? they demanded. I had nothing, because I had given everything away. But they took me to an interrogation room anyway bare walls, one naked light bulb. And they started in on me: Who are you? What are you doing here? Where is your passport? It was very uncomfortable. I was saying the Vidui, the deathbed prayer, under my breath. I was thinking that they would send me to Siberia and nobody would ever know where I was. But after about a half hour, they let me go. And I am absolutely sure I know it in my bones through and through that it was because of the Rebbe s blessing. The Rebbe had said that I would succeed, that I would accomplish what I set out to do, and that I would return home safe and sound. And that s what happened. Since 1976, Rabbi Moshe Yitzchak Lerer has served as the chaplain of Pilgrim Psychiatric Hospital in Brentwood, NY. He is an active member of Hatzolah and the Rabbinical Council of Far Rockaway and the Five Towns. He was interviewed in Brooklyn, NY in January, לע נ ר ישראל יעקב וזוגתו מרת קריינא ע ה לאקשין ע י בניהם ר נחמן ור אברהם ומשפחתם שיחיו This week in. > , the Rebbe re-instated an old custom that chasidim drink four cups of wine during the customary Moshiach Seudah Moshiach s Feast celebrated on the last day of Pesach. The Rebbe explained that while the four cups of the Seder night commemorate the Exodus from Egypt, the four cups of the last day of Pesach celebrate the redemption to come through the righteous Moshiach Nissan > , the Rebbe launched the coming year as Shnas HaChinuch The Year of Education, urging that special effort be made for every Jewish child to receive a Jewish education. Throughout the ensuing months, the Rebbe continuously urged community leaders and Shluchim to do their utmost in this area Nissan 1. Toras Menachem Vol. 8, p. 117 and Toras Menachem Vol. 16, p Sichos Kodesh 5736 Vol. 2, p. 118 In honor of our dear Rebbe by Anonymous You can help us record more testimonies by dedicating future editions of Here s My Story A project of: JEWISH EDUCATIONAL MEDIA interviews@jemedia.org myencounterblog.com Eastern Parkway Suite 403 Brooklyn, NY Copyright, Jewish Educational Media, 2013 Generously printed by