Raphael Nachman Cohen: Difference between revisions

R' Raphael Nachman was born on 5 Shevat 5657/1897 in the town of Rudnia to R' Baruch Shalom and Slava Cohen. When he was eight years old, his mother - following his father's instructions - took him to Yeshivas Tomchei Temimim in Lubavitch, intending to leave him there to study. Upon arriving in Lubavitch, Rebbetzin Shterna Sarah expressed her surprise at the intention to leave such a young child alone far from his parents and advised the mother to bring him to the Rebbe for yechidus (private audience). When the 8-year-old boy entered alone into the holy chamber of the Rebbe Rashab, the Rebbe smiled at him, inquired about his learning and even tested him. During the yechidus, the Rebbe asked him if he slept wearing a tallis katan and yarmulke, and continued to ask and investigate the eight-year-old boy in great detail... Finally, the Rebbe gently asked: "Do you want to stay here?" - "Yes," the little one replied. "Won't you miss your mother?" - the Rebbe continued with a smile - and suddenly the dam of tears burst, and the little boy began to sob... The Rebbe immediately sent him out of the room, instructed his mother to return home with him, and right there wrote a letter to his father: "Your son is still a child who needs his mother. If in another two years, G-d forbid, Moshiach does not come - bring him here to study!"

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R' Pole got married to Mrs. Rivka Cohen, the daughter of Rabbi Yoel and Mrs. Freida Davidson.

In the year 5690 (1930), R' Pole was arrested by the secret police. He describes it in his book "Behind the Iron Curtain":<blockquote>"On the holy Shabbos, 18 Sivan 5690, I received a letter from the G.P.U. It stated: 'You must report to the G.P.U. office at 2 Lubyanka Street on Sunday, 15/06/1930, at 11:00.'"

"The next day, at 12:30 in the afternoon, I went to the G.P.U. offices. My father accompanied me to the door of the G.P.U. building. I received a farewell blessing from my father, entered inside and approached the information desk... The clerk pressed a button and a soldier appeared... The soldier led me downstairs, brought me into a room and locked the door behind him..."</blockquote>After several interrogations when they failed to extract any information from him about the mikvaos, the underground classes and yeshivas, they offered to release him on condition that once a month he would come to tell them a little about the Chassidim - what they do and what they talk about. But, R' Pole of course did not agree, and as punishment for this he was sent for three years of exile to the Urals in Siberia.

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Once while he was in the Urals, they came to him on Yom Tov and demanded that he sign a certain document. When he refused, they roughly threw him into a prison cell and threatened to send him to the island of polar bears - a place from which no one returns - but R' Pole stood with superhuman courage in his refusal and did not desecrate the Yom Tov. In the end, they released him - miraculously letting him go.

While in the village of Che - the northernmost settlement, almost at the pole, where the temperature was 75° Celsius below zero, his mother sent him warm boots by mail. Although she had informed him that they were checked for shatnez (forbidden mixture of wool and linen), R' Pole suspected that she had altered the truth out of concern for pikuach nefesh (life-threatening situation), so he did not wear them, and made do - despite the life-threatening danger - with simple shoes! As a result, he caught a severe cold and developed a fever. Only when he received a letter from "Aunt Yezha" (this was the 'letter nickname' for R' Yankel Zuravitcher, because it was dangerous to write real names in letters) in which he faithfully promised that there was no concern of shatnez in the boots, did he begin to wear them. All this - despite knowing that according to the law it was permissible for him to wear them from the outset, even without any investigation, since they were sent by a Jew. All the more so when not wearing them presented a genuine danger to life. "But how could I wear them initially?" he wrote to his brother, Leibe, who 'chastised' him for his 'stubbornness', "It is known that the acronym of shatnez (שעטנז) is 'Satan Oz' (שטן עז - 'powerful Satan')! And besides this - a sin remains in the three impure kelipos forever!"

It was customary in Ramat Gan that on Simchat Torah, all the Chabad families with their wives and children would gather in the home of Reb Falle, and he would farbreng with all the passionate warmth of his soul, as was his way. After the long and uplifting farbrengen, everyone - the chassidim in front, followed by the families and their descendants - would march in formation, with singing and dancing, toward the Rabbi's house to drink and farbreng a bit, and from there they would enter all the homes of the chassidim, staying in each apartment for a short "mini-farbrengen." The few Chabad homes in Ramat Gan were scattered throughout the city, so the procession had to cross main roads. Whenever they reached a busy road, Reb Falle would stand upright in the middle of it, stopping all traffic, explaining in a loud and joyful voice about Simchat Torah, encouraging Torah observance and mitzvot, and concluding with sweeping enthusiasm: "Today is Simchat Torah, we must rejoice, dance and even do somersaults!" And then, before the amused-astonished eyes of all the drivers and their passengers (most of whom knew him...), the enthusiastic Reb Falle would jump and do a somersault in the middle of the main road - and other chassidim would roll after him. This happened every time the procession crossed a road. This was Simchat Torah in Ramat Gan, year after year, with Reb Falle. The Rebbe mentioned him at the Purim farbrengen of 5716 (1956) after he had expressed at a farbrengen (after saying l'chaim) that the Chazon Ish (one of the greatest rabbis among the Lithuanian Jews who had passed away two years earlier) envied a Chabad child who studies Tanya (the Rebbe said that the postal service in Israel became wealthy due to the letters sent about this).

In his final days, when the Rebbe began to cry out loudly "Moshiach Now" etc. - he strengthened the faith in Moshiach and the confidence in his immediate arrival, and instilled it firmly in all his descendants. Reb Falle lived the faith in redemption every moment of the day.

Reb Falle merited to establish generations of chassidim, mekusharim, the Rebbe's shluchim throughout the world, and passed away at a good age in Kfar Chabad on 17 Tishrei 5748 (1987).