The Forgotten Coins

by Dovid Zaklikowski for Hasidic Archives

With the Soviet Union’s economy in ruins, a thriving underground market for gold and foreign currency emerged. The communists themselves needed foreign gold and currency, so they opened large department stores for foreigners, where goods unavailable elsewhere could be found. These stores also allowed tourists to shop for their needs without seeing what was really available to the average citizen, or the long lines people endured just to purchase their basic necessities.

The stores also served another purpose: trapping those who possessed illegal currency. Citizens who went there and paid with gold would soon find the secret police at their door. Through threats, or if necessary force, the authorities would extract confessions about hidden valuables. The first question was always how much they had. If the amount they admitted to did not match the authorities’ expectations, they were tortured until the “missing” amount was revealed.

If they could not produce what the Soviet police believed they had, they were imprisoned. Rabbi Levi Yitzchok Schneerson, the renowned Torah scholar and fearless Jewish leader, would advise those who came to him: “It is not worth going to jail and suffering all the torture for some money.” He urged them to hand over all the funds they had.

The real danger came when someone truly had no money, foreign currency, or gold to give when the police came knocking. This happened once to Rabbi Levi Yitzchok himself, when he was ordered to surrender any foreign currency, jewelry, or gold in his possession. He knew that he had nothing, but such an answer never satisfied the officials.

Then he suddenly remembered a few old gold coins he had saved to one-day use for false teeth. He handed them over to the police and was spared.

“G-d provided me the ‘cure’ before the challenge,” he would joyfully retell the story, “In the merit of those coins, I was saved.”

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