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Once upon a time, when life seemed so much more innocent and the grandparents of today were yesterday’s youth, a steady stream of young and old were drawn to the open doors of 20 Garden Court in Far Rockaway – the “tent” of Avrohom and Florie Gross, of blessed memory.
It must have been the warm ambiance of their humble yet welcoming home. Or maybe it was their broad shoulders and understanding hearts… or perhaps the beckoning aroma of home cooking and baking. Actually, it was all of these and more. Each guest, every visitor was treated as a family member at all times.
Just ask Country Yossi’s Yossi Toiv. Or Reb Shmuel (Shmelke) Brazil (of Regesh and Ohr Chodosh fame). Yossi Lieber will tell you about the early days, when the up-and-coming singing group would try out their newly-created musical numbers in the Gross household. Reb Avrohom Gross and his clan were the rapt approving audience, their rave reviews and heartfelt praise and plaudits the harbinger of the aspiring singers’ popularity to come.
Thirty-two years ago on the 24th day of Tammuz, Reb Avrohom Gross ben Menashe, a”h, was prematurely taken from his devastated family. The tremendous loss was painfully felt by his immediate kin as well as a huge extended family that had regarded him as a rebbe, mentor, father and friend.
Reb Avrohom Gross exuded a kavod habrios extraordinaire – a genuine affection and deep respect for his fellow man, even those he was unfamiliar with. One of his nephews vividly recalls helping his uncle out at the House of Israel seforim store on Queens Blvd. on a busy Erev Sukkos.
As he tells it, a young well-attired businessman walked into the store (co-owned at the time by Avrohom Gross and Menashe Weissman). Reb Avrohom promptly dropped what he was doing and ran over to the gentleman to greet him with a hearty “Shalom Aleichem, Rabbi!”
The nephew was perplexed, to put it mildly; this clean-shaven, bareheaded young man hardly resembled any rabbi he was acquainted with. But the event turned even more bizarre when Reb Avrohom picked up a lulav, showed it to the man and said, “Rabbi, you remember the lulav from last year? And the esrog? Good. Now let’s look at the hadassim.”
The next several minutes were spent showing this “rabbi” the various sources detailing the use of the hadas and reviewing the basic halachos regarding the Arba Minim. Considering the enormous seasonal pressure of that hectic time, Reb Avrohom seemed to be spending an inordinate amount of time with this one customer, answering questions with the patience and warmth that was, well, typical of Avrohom Gross.
When the gentleman finally left with some newly purchased sets of lulavim, the young nephew could no longer contain his curiosity. “Uncle Avrohom, what was that all about?”
Turned out the man was a Reform rabbi from Maine who would visit the store whenever he was in town. On a previous occasion he had walked into the store before Sukkos, looked around and asked, “Is business so bad that you are becoming a fruit and vegetable store?”
That was when Reb Avrohom realized that this rabbi who presided over a congregation of hundreds had never heard of the Arba Minim. And so he naturally took it upon himself to teach the man whatever he could. The newly enlightened rabbi had then purchased several sets of the Arba Minim to take back to Maine so that his entire congregation could perform this beautiful mitzvah.
From then on the rabbi would stop by yearly to gain additional knowledge and bring Reb Avrohom’s captivating insight to hundreds of lost Jews in Maine.