It was the first night of Chanukah, and Reb Dovid’le from Tolna was standing before thousands of Chassidim, who were there to watch the Rebbe’s avodah of lighting the menorah. They were waiting and waiting, but the Rebbe wasn’t saying the brachah. He was just standing there holding the shamash.
Then the Rebbe turned around, he was looking and looking, until he said, “Where is Shia the Hoicha? Where is Shia, the tall one?” There was somebody in town that was known as Shia the Hoicha. He was a very tall, skinny person. And the Rebbe said, “Shia, I need you. Where are you?”
Shia was standing there, terrified. Why would the Rebbe be calling for me? His friends said “Shia, the Rebbe wants you,” and they pushed him forward. Shia walked all the way to where the Rebbe was standing. The Rebbe said, “Shia, I have to ask you something, and you’re the only person that could answer this question.” The Rebbe then asked something that was very strange. The Rabbi asked Shia, “Tell me something, Shia, do you love your wife?” Everybody just stood there in shock. Shia didn’t know what to do. The Rebbe said, “Shia, I’m asking you, do you love your wife?” And Shia said, “Yes, Rebbe.”
The Rebbe said, “Since you love your wife, there are probably times that you want to tell her something very personal, some kind of secret. How do you do that? What do you do? So Shia said, “If I want to tell my wife a secret, I have to bend down, and then I can tell her a secret.” The Rebbe was pleased with this answer. The Rebbe himself was a shorter person, and so the Rebbe said, “Shia, show everybody how you do that.” Shia went ahead and bent down to the Rebbe. Then the Rebbe said, “But, Shia, there’s one thing you left out. Don’t forget the most important thing, Shia! Think, what else happens?” Shia thinks for a moment and then says, “My wife is so little, that she gets on her tippytoes to hear me.”
This is what the Rebbe was waiting for. He exclaimed: “Das is das. This is it!” He then proceeded to make the brachos with a passion and excitement like the Chassidim had never seen, and everyone joined along in singing and dancing.
Afterward, some older Chassidim approached the Rebbe to ask for an explanation. He responded that as he was about to light the menorah, he began to think, “Why would Hashem care about my little menorah? What difference does it make in the world? He has a whole universe. And then I began to think, what difference does my tefillin or my Shabbos make? Who am I that Hashem should even think of me?”
Then I remembered Shia, who is so tall and his wife is so little. Hashem is so great and we’re so small. But when you love someone, you bend all the way, all the way down from the highest world. But there’s one thing that Hashem asks from each and every one of us: that we stand on our tippytoes. To be a Jew means: today I’m going to try a little bit harder than yesterday. Like Rabbi Nachman said, “A bisseleh is oichet gut, a little bit is also good.” We can find a little bit more within ourselves, to do a little bit more than we did yesterday. Hashem Yisborach should give us the strength to find that small jar of oil within ourselves.
This article was found in Nekuda Tova Issue 25.
