We are at the seventeenth lesson in the chain of the generations, in the third part of the life of the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek. We begin with the year 5600.
"5600 - an informer's report from the community of K." - a community whose name begins with the letter kuf - "that he" (meaning the Tzemach Tzedek) "opposes the practice of the communities in handing over Jewish children to the army".
As was told earlier, the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek worked a great deal to save Jews from falling, G-d forbid, into conversion, at the time when the government decreed that Jewish boys be taken for conscription. The maskilim were among those who fought against the Tzemach Tzedek: they sought to implant in the people an open enlightenment that ran counter to Torah, whereas he implanted faith in the Jewish people, and therefore they looked for every way to interfere with his leadership.
All the details connected to these lines and to the passages that follow are told in the booklet "HaAdmur Tzemach Tzedek U'Tenuas HaHaskalah", in which the entire course of events surrounding this matter is described in fine detail, and we will bring from it only brief points. It is told that the maskilim hired the services of a Jew who was a professional informer, a corrupt man who for money was willing to do anything and to write any letter and any matter; his nickname was "Hershele Choshech". While he was in the town of Krupki - that is the kuf mentioned here - he sent in a report of denunciation against the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, that he opposes Jews serving in the army, and it is told that this report was sent to the district governor, to the general in Vitebsk, and so on. Afterwards they sent a spy to Lubavitch, to observe what was happening from within.
And in that same year: "the denunciation by Mordechai Aharon G. in the name of the maskilim of Vilna and Volhynia" - this matter too is brought in that same booklet. The informer is Mordechai Aharon Ginzburg, who was a spy, and who visited Lubavitch, at the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, in order to examine matters up close. It is told that he was there twice in yechidus with the Tzemach Tzedek for a considerable amount of time, and heard two profound maamarim of his. (He himself later said to the maskilim who had sent him, that the profound wisdom of the righteous Rebbe is on such a high level, that all of their haskalah is considered literal foolishness compared to it.) Even so, he continued to look for a way to inform, and he visited all the towns of the chassidim in order to see their customs up close; and there is brought there a description including the names of the great chassidim, at each of whose homes he was and whom he saw.
After he returned, the maskilim prepared reports of denunciation against the Rebbe, and accused him of three central charges:
That he collects money for a foreign country, because he wishes to rebel against the government.
That he opposes army service.
That he opposes the spread of the study of haskalah.
It is interesting that in the summary of his visit, Mordechai Aharon Ginzburg described everything he had seen in the towns of the chassidim:
The chassidim have tremendous faith in the Holy One, blessed be He, and great faith in the Rebbe.
There was not one Jewish settlement in all the places where he was, in which he did not see Jews rising in the morning and reciting Tehillim, and on Shabbos reciting the entire Tehillim.
There was not one place in which the lady of the house did not tell him at least two or three stories of wonders about the Rebbe.
It never happened that a woman who wished to mention the Rebbe's name did not first wash her hands and dry them with a towel, and only then let his name out of her mouth.
And everything they fulfill with mesirus nefesh.
And despite all these descriptions, he issued a report of denunciation against the Rebbe.
The year "5601 - the denunciation by two kidnappers from Borisov". Two Jews from Borisov submitted a strange denunciation, that the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek was hiding in his home thirty boys who were supposed to be conscripted into the Russian army. Following the denunciation, the secret police were brought in to check what was going on, and the investigators went about Lubavitch for three consecutive days and searched everywhere. Of course they found neither thirty boys nor even half a boy - nothing was found; but the maskilim harassed the Rebbe constantly.
The year "5602 - he receives a certificate of honored citizen signed by the Czar" - the Czar signed a special certificate, in which the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek received the status of an honored citizen. It is not described here, and not in the sources either, what exactly happened in 5602 that brought the Czar to grant him such a certificate. It is possible - and this is only a conjecture, which is not written explicitly - that this came as a result of what we read earlier, that the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek established the colony in the Shchedrin forest, took a large part in it and settled it, and out of this came the great esteem toward him. It is worth noting that there are other places in which it is told that this was not in 5602 but in 5604, and they connect it to the reason for the success that took place in 5603, about which we will read shortly. In any case, there are differing opinions regarding the year; here it is written that he received a certificate of honored citizen in 5602.
The year "5603 - 1843" - it is interesting that this is the only place in which a secular year is noted - "he is asked to participate in the assembly of rabbis in Petersburg". The government at that time called an assembly of the leaders of the Jewish people, which discussed matters of religion, and demanded that each group among the Jews send a representative from among its important men to participate in the conference. It is told that the misnagdim chose Reb Itzel of Volozhin, the chassidim chose the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, the chassidim of Poland chose a Jew named Reb Yisrael Halperin, and the maskilim chose Betzalel Stern. The chief spokesman at the conference was the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, and every single thing that the government men investigated and asked and examined - he answered with words that were convincing and acceptable. About most of the subjects discussed there we have no information, but one subject is documented at length in the sefer "Beis Rebbi".
And as mentioned, there is a place where it is written that as a result of the impression he made then, the Czar wrote him the special certificate of honored citizen.
And another passage continues about that same conference in 5603: "and for his protest against the maskilim of Riga and Vilna, and his demand to permit the printing of holy books, and his protest against the prohibition of printing seforim of Kabbalah and Chassidus". At that time the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek also fought against the maskilim, and protested against the government's decision that forbade printing seforim - and this did not pass easily for him: "In the course of the hisvaadus", during his stay there, "he was arrested many times", but "his demands were fulfilled". In the saying of 23 Cheshvan in "Hayom Yom" it is brought that twenty-two times they arrested the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek in the midst of the conference and took him to house arrest, since from their standpoint he had gone a bit too far in his words.
And in another saying it is brought that the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek said about himself, when he asked himself how he had succeeded so greatly at that time: "By virtue of thirty-two thousand hours" that he labored over the maamarim of the Alter Rebbe - for thirty years he labored to write them down and gather them, and afterwards he printed them. By virtue of those thirty-two thousand hours he succeeded at the famous conference of 5603.
The year "5605 - he receives a certificate of honored citizen for all generations". In 5605 he received a certificate that was different from and upgraded relative to the previous one: in the earlier certificate it was written "honored citizen", and here - "honored citizen for all generations". And what is the difference between them?
It is written that when the government men came on later occasions to conduct searches in Lubavitch, after the Rebbe had received the certificate of "honored citizen", they searched among the members of the household - among all of them - but the Rebbe himself they did not touch, since for one who holds a certificate of "honored citizen", a special order from the minister is required in order to permit a search of him; but among the members of the household they did search. Yet after he received a certificate in which it was written "honored citizen for all generations", which means that the honor and the status are not his alone but also for his descendants, there were never again any harassments or searches or such things, not even among the members of the Rebbe's household - because they held a special certificate of "honored citizen for all generations".