Q&A: Eliezer Shach
Eliezer Shach
Question
I am a Chabad Hasid, and like most of them I spent much of my life, quite literally, reading the Rebbe’s writings and talks, or things about him. I saw that on several occasions you wrote that you heard from Eliezer Shach a story that happened to him when he went to receive a dollar from the Rebbe. It is hard for me to explain, but what he claimed he heard from the Rebbe really does not fit the Rebbe’s style at all; he had a unique language and manner of speaking that simply do not “line up” with that quote, and anyone familiar with the subject would feel that immediately.
My question is: did you hear this from him himself, or only in his name and the like?
Thank you very much in advance
Answer
You mean Ephraim. Rabbi Eliezer is his father. I heard it from him on the radio.
Discussion on Answer
He was standing in line for the dollar distribution, and when the Rebbe was told that he was Rabbi Shach’s son, he said to him that when he got back to Israel he should tell his father that this messianic carnival was not him but his Hasidim. He came to his father and conveyed the Rebbe’s words, and Rabbi Shach answered: he should say that to his Hasidim, not to me.
Right, I got mixed up. By the way, his father’s name was Elazar.
You say you heard it from his own mouth when he was interviewed on the radio. Strange. It raises dozens of questions for me, most of which cannot really be expressed, because they are mainly a matter of instinctive feel. One of them is this: during the internal Chabad debates they turned over every stone and every syllable from the Rebbe in order to understand what he wanted, whether he wanted himself publicized as the messiah, etc.—so how is it that such a juicy statement is never quoted? Especially since it was filmed, like all the dollar distributions.
To me it is clear that he lied, nothing less.
Curious—what is the quote?