The Way It Should Be
by: Schvach Yid

In the November 16^th edition of The New York Jewish Week, Jonathan Mark posted ‘the way’, and his lesson is greatly appreciated. In his article titled Chabad Gathering: No Jew Left Behind, found at:
http://www.thejewishweek.com/viewArticle/c36_a1031/News/New_York.html, Mr. Mark noted the recent comment by Conservative (and Orthodox) Movement leaders about Chabad Lubavitch as ‘the religion closest to Judaism’, and then directed the almost entire 6 column-long article to all the positive good work done by the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s schluchim (emissaries) on behalf of world Jewry. No animus, no lashon harah, no sinat chinam.

Mr. Mark highlighted the friendship of Satmars and Lubavitchers in Beijing, China, rather than emphasize the standard age-old conflict between the two groups.

This is the way it should be. Lubavitchers and Satmars should get along, as should all Yiddin (not to mention all of humanity), and I shouldn’t post negative, critical blogs (they’re my specialty, you know). Mr. Mark is correct in his estimation that the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s schluchim are ‘pure and the closest thing to Heaven’ for Jews who are geographically stranded and isolated, for Jews who are lost in their personal lives, for any Yid who yearns for Yiddishkeit – even just for a single refrain of Lecha Dodi or Adon Olam – for those who need emotional support from a familiar voice in the wake of personal catastrophe. For these, the schluchim of Chabad never fail to 'put out' and come to the rescue.

Ein yid bis ein yid, and ‘every Jew is precious’, whether one’s face is sculpted into the rock of the side of a mountain, or one has a Nobel Prize, or one is battling substance abuse, or one is sitting in a federal prison for tax or investment fraud, or whether one is just ‘average’, Chabad is the place.

There’s a mikveh in Beijing, China, thanks to the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s schliach and funding provided by the Satmar Chassidim.

Here’s a related digression. I know a family, the husband is Modern Orthodox, his wife Lubavitch. He smartly emulated HaShem’s directive to Abraham to listen to his wife Sarah, and so they raised their kids in the wife’s minhag. The oldest of their children, entirely Chabad raised and educated, married a Satmar – emes.