You Either Feel It or You Don't

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As a kid, I was fascinated by Alexandre Dumas' story The Corsican Brothers, about conjoined twins who were separated at birth.

Separated — not just by a scalpel — but by a family war that sent one twin to Paris and the other to the island of Corsica. But that wasn't the kicker. The real power of the story was that — separated as they were — the brothers could each feel what the other felt.

That idea inspired me. Sometimes, I would imagine having a friend who was so close that we could each feel what the other was feeling. Who knows? Maybe that's why, later in life, I was drawn to mentors who cared so much about their fellows that they literally felt for them.

Carl Rogers, one of the pioneers of Humanistic Psychology, talked of the need for a therapist to have empathy — the ability to get inside the world of and identify with the patient.

Rogers described empathy as the ability "to perceive the internal frame of reference of another with accuracy and with the emotional components and meanings which pertain thereto, as if one were the person."

But, Rogers cautioned, the therapist must always maintain the distance of the "as if" condition.

Then there are individuals who go beyond empathy. When "there was thick darkness over the entire land of Egypt … no person could see his brother." Rebbe Yitzchak of Vorka,(d. 1848), comment- ed, "There is no darkness as deep as not seeing — and not wanting to see — your brother, caring only about yourself."

Two centuries before Carl Rogers, a man came to beg for help from Reb Yitzchak's son and successor, Rebbe Menachem Mendel of Vorka. The man begged the Rebbe to pray for his son, who was so sick that the doctors had given up on him. Reb Mendel sadly shook his head. "I wish there was something I could do. But the Gates of Heaven are closed. I cannot pray for him."

The broken man could barely ride his rickety wagon back to his village. As he plodded along, suddenly, he heard horses galloping behind. He turned around and saw a wagon with a team of huge white horses bearing down on him.

The wagon pulled up and out came Reb Mendel, who told the startled father, "I told you I couldn't pray for your son. That is true. Heaven has blocked my prayers. But there is one thing I forgot — I can cry with you." And at that, Reb Mendel sat down on the ground and began to cry. He cried and cried, in great heaving sobs. Finally, he stopped, calmed himself, and told his gabbai (assistant), "Bring a l'chaim. We broke through!"

Can such a depth of feeling for others be learned? I don't know. Perhaps that is the litmus test for a Rebbe. Even more than wisdom, the job description calls for total compassion and dedication to others. Some things can't be learned. And some things can't be taught. Someone complained to my wife that she followed my wife's challah recipe precisely, but it didn't taste the same.

My wife said, "I can give you my recipe, but I can't give you my hands."

Maybe there are some things we have to unlearn. Could it be that we are born with the capacity to feel deeply for others, but we learn to lose it along the way?

When my son Meir was around 6, I was tucking him into bed one night and he asked me to read him a story. It was late and he was way past tired. I said, "It's too late; you have to go to sleep already." He didn't argue, but he asked, "Can you tell me a tzaddik story?"

That I couldn't refuse. So I told him the story of Reb Mendel crying for the sick boy.

"Did the boy get better?"

"Yes, I think he did."

"Then why are there still tears in my eyes if I don't want them to be there?"

I hope and pray that he can keep that feeling, and those tears. And never need to use them.

For most of the more than 600 days since the outbreak of the war on Simchas Torah/October 7, my wife has been wearing a "Bring Them Home Now" dog tag and a new piece of masking tape every morning, with a number marking how many every morning, with a number marking how many days it's been. And every day, she recites Tehillim (Psalms) for the remaining hostages — name by name.

So, you ask, why don't I do the same? Don't I care about the hostages? I do daven and say Tehillim, but it's just not with the same feeling.

So, you ask, why don't I do the same? The Talmud (Chullin 105a) quotes Mar Ukva bar Chama talking about his father, who was so devout that he didn't eat milk and meat within the same 24 hours.

"I am like ‘vinegar that came from wine' compared to my father. If he would eat meat today, he would wait until tomorrow before eating dairy, whereas I wait only from one meal to the next."

So, someone asked, why did he bemoan the difference; why not just do the same?

Because just doing the same would be mere imitation. Not true devotion. You either feel it or you don't.

After my wife and I heard that Israel bombed Iran, we were both convinced that this was the big one; these are the "birth pangs of the Messiah" I mentioned that the Chofetz Chaim (d. 1933) had such abso lute faith in the coming of Messiah that he kept a suitcase packed.

It was already Thursday night, and we knew that Moshiach wouldn't come on the Sabbath or Sabbath eve. I don't know much about geography, and even less math, but my wife quickly made a calculation of where Sabbath ends last, and she figured out what time Sabbath ends in Japan.

On Sunday, I found a new addition in the corner of our room:

A packed suitcase.

Previously:

• There's No Place Like Homeland
• A Bittere Gelechter: Gallows-, Galus-, and Grief-Humor

(COMMENT, BELOW)

Mordechai Schiller is a columnist and award-winning headline writer at Hamodia, the Daily Newspaper of Torah Jewry, where this first appeared.