His main concern was to honor the Shabbos. And so bit by bit another belonging was sold off or bartered for provisions lekavod Shabbos. As the family mourned the loss of yet another furnishing or trinket, Itzik smiled with happiness at having something to sell.
When Shabbos Hagadol approached, their impoverished dwelling was starkly bare. Each passing day found Itzik more distressed. How would he obtain supplies for Pesach? The mere thought of being unable to fulfill the mitzvos of arba kosos and of eating matzah tore at his innards.
Erev Pesach saw no change except for the cries of his loved ones begging for at least a dry piece of matzah. As the sun began its descent, their bleak surroundings became gloomier still, with the lack of a white tablecloth to bedeck their Yom Tov table and no candlelight to grace their home’s interior.
Itzik’s wife calmed her children by relating the wondrous story of Yetzias Mitzrayim, but their reprieve was short-lived. As they wailed in aching hopelessness, their mother barely managed to wipe her own tears away.
Quietly letting himself out the door, Itzik wandered into the woodland. The setting sun’s golden rays bathed the new season’s growth in brilliant hues. His gnawing hunger forgotten, Itzik sang songs of praise to Hashem, delirious from the sheer joy of the beauty around him.
The more he sang, the brighter and lighter it became, until he shed one solitary tear of despair.
A rainstorm suddenly unleashed its fury, flooding the entire area. Thunder, accompanied by flashes of lightning, reverberated in the air. In the midst of the torrential downpour, Itzik stood and sobbed in unison with the skies, overcome with guilt at having sinned by allowing himself a momentary negative thought.
The more he cried in remorse at his misdeed, the harder it rained, the deluge seeping into the bais medrash in nearby Trisk where the Trisker Maggid led his chassidim in Maariv prayer. The wind extinguished the holiday candles, enveloping the shul in darkness.
As the thunderstorm raged, Itzik’s wife and children cowered in fear while Itzik himself reverted to lightheartedness when he recalled that on Pesach one joyfully celebrates God’s miracles. With a new spring in his step and song of prayer on his lips, he made his way home.
“Master of the Universe!” exclaimed a troubled Trisker Maggid. “What has transpired on this night of Pesach to deprive me of a visit from Eliyahu Hanavi?”
Heaven provided the holy Maggid with the answer, and he promptly set out to the neighboring hamlet with parcels of food and provisions.
The eyes of Itzik’s children shone with wonder. They soothed their starved bellies as their parents thanked and blessed the kind stranger who had come to suffuse their home with the glow of a resplendent Seder table.
At the recitation of Shefoch Chamascha, a regal visitor with a long white beard entered and exclaimed, “Ah, here you are, Trisker Maggid. Good Yom Tov!” The tailor’s wife and children had fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion, and the three men talked Torah until daybreak.
Eliyahu Hanavi addressed the Trisker Maggid. “You didn’t know about your neighbor. When you have a neighbor who is in need, you are supposed to be mindful of him and of his needs.”
The Trisker Maggid spent both Sedarim with the tailor and his family and later declared, “If one climbs too high in the heavenly spheres, he is at risk of overlooking humankind. One who considers himself to be high up is in danger of falling to the lowest of depths.”
One born under the sign of Aries is of a charitable nature and will pull out all stops to help another in need.
The Jews were redeemed in the merit of their having retained their Hebrew names, language and dress code despite their oppression at the hands of the Egyptians. While the observance of mitzvos lo saaseh (negative commandments) guards a person from harm, it is the performance of positive commandments – demonstrative of servitude to God – that earns one his or her reward. The merits achieved in the subsequent fulfillment of the mitzvos of bris milah and korban Pesach secured our redemption.
Eliyahu Hanavi, known as the Malach HaBris, comes to bear witness at every bris milah and visits each of our homes on Seder night to bless those who abide by Hashem’s commands – and then carries our zechusim to the Throne of Glory, where he beseeches God on our behalf to hasten the revelation of His hidden light.
