300,000 Newspaper Inserts: “The Rebbe – An Appreciation”

A 48 page booklet about the Rebbe’s teachings reached nearly 300,000 homes this weekend in the United Stated and Israel. Subscribers to the Yediot Acharonot, the Forward, The Jewish Week and The Cleveland Jewish News found a pleasant surprise in their newspapers on Thursday and Friday as the brochure slipped from the pages of the newspaper into their hands.

Since the booklet was written, over one million copies have been distributed in four languages through Shluchim, at the Ohel and by Bochurim on Mivtzoim and Merkos Shlichus. Two additional chapters have been added to this special printing.

Many have been touched and inspired through this short but inclusive booklet. Professor Velvl Greene writes, “… it speaks to people whose lives were entwined with the Rebbe as well as those who knew him only as a name. The brochure will have an impact on those who are already familiar with the Rebbe’s work and teachings and will introduce the Rebbe to those who never met him, never knew what the Rebbe taught, stood for, or what he did.”

From a Shliach’s inbox: “…Then the brochure came. As I read it I realized how much one person could do. I realized that the Rebbe devoted his life to his doing what he did. It inspired me to say “what am I going to do to make sure that every family that wants to have their child get a Jewish education, can get it at my synagogue, even if their child does not fit in ”the normal mold“.

A story (as told by the Shliach in Europe):

There is an individual in our community, an intellectual in nature, with whom I have been meeting regularly and studying Talmud and Chasidic philosophy and have had many long discussions together, on many topics in Judaism. He enjoyed the intellectual study, but stubbornly balked at any form of observance.

As you probably remember, about a year ago the Shluchim office announced the opening of a “tefillin bank.” Responding to that, we began a tefillin campaign. As a result, ten people in our community started to put on tefillin daily, but this friend, as I expected, reacted: “Don’t even think about talking to me about tefillin,” he said. At this point he was already coming every Monday to our morning services. But he was the only person in the room praying without tefillin.

When we talked about it he would say, “Look, I am not religious and I have no intention of becoming religious. Putting on tefillin would cross that border from the non-religious to the religious. And I’m not ready to do that.” He would also tell me: ”When the Rebbe launched this campaign, he knew very well that one mitzvah brings another in its wake. So I don’t want to take the chance, as I’m not about to change my lifestyle.” He assured me time and again that with this issue I won’t get anywhere. “Forget it, Rabbi. I will NEVER EVER put on tefillin.” I have to admit, I had my doubts that I would ever succeed.

Last year, a week after Gimmel Tamuz (the Rebbe’s Yahrzeit anniversary), this friend walks into shul, a big smile on his face and a beautiful pair of tefillin in his hand. I could not believe my eyes. He actually put on the tefillin. When I later asked him what happened, he told me the following: “Last week, at the gathering in honor of the Rebbe’s Yahrzeit, you distributed the brochure ‘The Rebbe – An Appreciation,’ I stayed up all night reading it from cover to cover. Something that I read there struck a chord within me and I thought to myself, how much I regret that I never saw the Rebbe in person. I had this sense that had I seen the Rebbe, I would definitely have put on tefillin. The least I can do is to start putting on tefillin from this point on. So I called a Judaica store and ordered the tefillin. I ask them to overnight it to me.”

Since the booklets have been distributed, many people have sent feedback as well as requests to receive more booklets.

The Gimmel Tammuz newspaper distribution in Israel has been sponsored by Ben Federman. Special thanks to The Print House for their ongoing support.

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