With good fortune and success we are beginning the section called "Shalsheles HaYachas - Brief Chapters from the History of the House of Our Rebbeim". In the "Hayom Yom" calendar, in the first edition that the Rebbe printed in the year 5703, the "Shalsheles HaYachas" was printed for the first time - a listing containing very concise chapter headings of the activities of the Chabad Rebbeim throughout all the generations, the seforim they wrote and their family members, all arranged according to the order of times and years.
Editions of the Shalsheles HaYachas:
There are clear sources that the first edition of the Shalsheles HaYachas, printed in 5703, was written by the Rebbe Rayatz - or at the very least was taken from his diaries - and the one who edited it for printing was the Rebbe. In the first edition of "Hayom Yom" in the year 5703, the Shalsheles HaYachas included our Rebbeim up to the Rebbe Rayatz and up to the year 5703, and there it concluded.
Over the years, additional editions of "Hayom Yom" were published. The next edition in which an addition was made to the Shalsheles HaYachas was the edition of the year 5717, already during the Rebbe's nesius. There, for the first time, the Shalsheles HaYachas was printed with the completion of the story of the previous Rebbe's life, as well as with the beginning of chapter headings about the Rebbe up until that year, until 5717. And so it remained for years, without any addition beyond that.
The first time that the sequence of years was completed with the events and matters connected to the Rebbe from 5717 onward was in the year 5742. The Jew who began to edit "Hayom Yom" anew, Rabbi Zeligson, may he live long, wrote the continuation of the events from 5717, brought it in to the Rebbe, and the Rebbe made corrections, added things and omitted things. And then the listing was printed by the Rebbe up until the year 5742, and in this way material was added in each subsequent edition, as the Rebbe would complete more.
On 28 Sivan 5751 - a very special date, fifty years since the arrival of the Rebbe and the Rebbetzin in the United States - a kovetz was published called "Kovetz 28 Sivan Yovel Shanim", in which was printed, in a focused manner, only the history of the Rebbe's life until 5751. The Rebbe himself distributed this kovetz to each and every person. From this entire introduction it emerges that the whole listing which we will learn, with G-d's help, little by little, is very precise and very important.
And perhaps it may be said that this is an introduction before entering the palace of Hayom Yom, in which one must know what a chassid is and how he lives. The wording of the Mishnah is "know from where you came", and afterward - where you are going. One can say that beginning with the Shalsheles HaYachas is in the category of "know from where you came": first we will know the root, the sources and the order of the unfolding of our Rebbeim, and after we know from where we came, we will also know where we are going, and we will be able to enter the Hayom Yom calendar and learn the entire course. This is merely as an opening.
We will now read the first passage of the Shalsheles HaYachas, which appears before the details about the Alter Rebbe. These are a few lines about the great-grandfather of the Alter Rebbe - the Maharal of Prague - and the order of the generations from the Maharal of Prague until the Alter Rebbe.
And it opens and says: "The gaon, Marana veRabbana Yehudah Livai, may the memory of the tzaddik be for a blessing" - "Marana veRabbana" means our teacher and our master, and "Yehudah Livai" is the name of the "Maharal of Prague". "Maharal" is an acronym for: Moreinu HaRav Livai, and Livai is his family name. The histalkus of the Maharal of Prague was on Chai Elul of the year 5369, when he was ninety-seven years old.
The Torah of the Maharal of Prague is, one may say, a root for the teachings of Chassidus. For example, when the Alter Rebbe writes on the title page of the Tanya that the sefer is "culled from seforim", there is a tradition among chassidim that the intent of "seforim" refers, among others, to the Maharal of Prague. It is known that the Maharal of Prague was a very great mekubal, and also a mekubal in practical Kabbalah; and the most famous story about him is that he created a golem - a creation that is through practical Kabbalah.
It continues and says who the Maharal of Prague is: "from the stock of the geonim who trace their lineage to David ben Yishai" - that the Maharal of Prague is a descendant of David HaMelech, and there is a lineage from David HaMelech until the Maharal of Prague. This sentence was taken from the gravestone of the Maharal of Prague, upon which these words are engraved. And by the Maharal of Prague, the matter was taken from the gravestone of his great-grandfather, who was called by the same name - Rabbi Yehudah Livai, known as Rabbi Yehudah Livai the Elder - upon whose gravestone it is already written that he is from the stock of the geonim who trace their lineage to David ben Yishai. This, then, is the first one who appears here in the Shalsheles HaYachas, the Maharal of Prague, who is the root for all the continuation of the generations of our Rebbeim.
Seven generations from the Maharal until the Alter Rebbe:
We will see briefly the unfolding of seven generations, from the Maharal of Prague until the Alter Rebbe, about whom we will begin to elaborate, with G-d's help, further on. What we know about the son, the grandson, the great-grandson and so on, is from the Sefer HaZichronos of the Rebbe Rayatz, in which details about each one of them are set forth. We will bring briefly one point about each one:
a) His son, Rav Betzalel: In Sefer HaZichronos it is related that he was called "Reb Betzalel Charif". He was very talented, and his special talent was in delivering a shiur to students. He passed away in Germany at the age of sixty-four.
b) His son, Rav Shmuel: the grandson of the Maharal of Prague. It is related about him that he was very talented in beautiful handwriting, in a uniquely special craftsmanship of the hands. One of the special things related about him is that when he was sixteen years old he wrote a Sefer Torah on an extremely tiny parchment - there is a description there of a minuscule size - and brought it as a gift to his grandfather, the Maharal of Prague, and his grandfather derived great pleasure and delight from the special gift he received from his grandson: a Sefer Torah written in miniature script. It is further related about him that when he passed away in Prague they wished to bury him near his grandfather, but there was no room, since the cemetery in Prague is very crowded. It is related in Sefer HaZichronos that a miracle occurred above the way of nature, and the ground expanded, and room was created to dig a grave for Rav Shmuel literally next to his grandfather, the Maharal of Prague.
c) His son, Rav Yehudah Leib: It is related about him that he was very talented and a great lamdan, and he authored a sefer called "Kol Yehudah" on Shulchan Aruch Orach Chaim.
d) His son, Rav Moshe: called in Sefer HaZichronos "Reb Moshe of Poznan". He participated in the bar mitzvah of the Alter Rebbe, and at the age of ninety-one he merited to be at the bar mitzvah of his great-grandson, the Alter Rebbe.
e) His son, Rav Schneur Zalman: He is the first in the dynasty to be called by this name, after his mother's father, who was called Schneur Zalman. It is related that he was engaged in the diamond trade.
f) His son, Rav Baruch: the father of the Alter Rebbe. There is an opinion, and there is a whole discussion about it, that the full name was "Yisrael Baruch", and there is a gravestone which some say is his, upon which "Yisrael Baruch" is engraved. But in practice he is known to us by the name Baruch alone. And why is he not known to us by his first name, Yisrael? So it is related: from the time he became close to the Baal Shem Tov, he did not want to call himself by the name of his Rebbe - for the name of the Baal Shem Tov was Yisrael - and therefore he ceased using the name Yisrael, and because of this he is known to us only by the name Baruch.
g) His son, Hod Kevod Kedushas Admur HaRav Schneur Zalman: He is the Alter Rebbe.
The Alter Rebbe is thus the seventh generation from the son of the Maharal of Prague, and here begins the dynasty of the Chabad Rebbeim. About this we will continue, with G-d's help, in the coming lessons, and we will relate more and more details about each one of our Rebbeim.