We are in the twenty-sixth lesson in the chain of the generations, in the final part of the chapter on the life of the Rebbe Maharash. Today we will learn about the Rebbe Maharash's daughters and about his seforim.
"His daughters" of the Rebbe Maharash:
"1) Marat Devorah Leah. Her husband was the Rav and chassid Rabbi Moshe Aryeh Leib Ginzburg, Vitebsk".
She was the Rebbe Maharash's eldest daughter, older than her brothers - the Maharaza and the Rebbe Rashab. We will relate a few things about her.
The Rebbe told on several occasions - one of them was on Simchat Torah 5713 - that once something happened to her and she began to cry, and they gave her something to calm her down. She said: "I am not stopping my crying, I am only taking a break". The Rebbe told this story and drew a lesson from it regarding a farbrengen: "We are not stopping our farbrengen, we are only taking a break until the next farbrengen".
Another story from her childhood: it is told that the Rebbe Rashab, when he was a child, once asked his father, the Rebbe Maharash, why the last day of Pesach is a Yom Tov - the first day is a Yom Tov because we left Egypt, but what is the reason for the last day? Before the father answered, his sister Devorah Leah, who was then a small girl, said that when a full week passes and Yidden are careful throughout an entire week, they become happy and joyful - we managed to hold to the task for a whole week, and therefore we make a Yom Tov. The story continues that the Rebbe Maharash came with his sons and his daughter to the grandfather, the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, and told him the whole exchange and Devorah Leah's answer. The Tzemach Tzedek said about her answer: "That is a good intellectual explanation".
More from her childhood: the arrangement was that every day the children of the Rebbe Maharash, the Rebbetzin Devorah Leah and the Raza, would come to the grandfather, the Tzemach Tzedek, and say "Shema Yisrael" and "Baruch Shem", and the Rebbe would give them in return a half-kopeck coin.
And another interesting matter regarding the grandfather's gifts to the children. The Rebbe Rayatz relates that the Tzemach Tzedek would give very small sums of money to his grandchildren so that they would learn Nach by heart - for every chapter they knew by heart he gave them a five-kopeck coin, and for children this was certainly a large sum. Devorah Leah too, being his granddaughter, learned Nach by heart and received. One day Devorah Leah saw one of the grandchildren walking around with a ruble and a half - one hundred and fifty kopecks. She asked him: "How did you receive such a large sum?" He said to her: "You should know, the grandfather gives ten kopecks for every chapter of Mishnayos, and five for every chapter of Tanach. Today I learned ten chapters of Mishnayos and ten chapters of Tanach, and that is why I received one hundred and fifty kopecks". This appealed to her, and she went and applied herself and learned ten chapters of Mishnayos by heart. The next day she came to the grandfather and said to him: "Today I am owed one hundred and fifty kopecks". He asked: "How did you arrive at such a large sum?" She said: "I too learned ten chapters of Mishnayos by heart, plus ten chapters of Tanach". The Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek said to her: "For Mishnayos I do not pay". She said: "If so, I will not learn Mishnayos any more". He said: "That is exactly what I want. Mishnayos are not for you".
She was very wise, and an exceptional scholar; when her brothers would return from cheder, she would test them in Gemara. And when she grew older, the Rebbe Rayatz relates, from the year 5656 - when he was sixteen - a new source of chassidic stories opened up for him: he visited his aunt, his father's sister, Devorah Leah, who possessed stories she had received from the Rebbetzin of the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, the Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka - things she had seen herself and things she had heard from the Rebbetzin of the Alter Rebbe. She was a source of stories, and in his words: a new source of stories opened up for me through her.
A final point: it is told that when she heard of her father's passing, she took it so hard that she stood for three days with her face to the wall and heard nothing of what was going on around her. It was extremely difficult for her to accept it and to calm down. This was the Rebbetzin Devorah Leah, the first daughter of the Rebbe Maharash.
The second daughter, "2) Marat Chaya Mushka, her husband was the Rav and chassid Rabbi Moshe HaKohen Horenstein", the son of Rabbi Zalman Shaul. He was an unterfirer at the Rebbe's chuppah: when they escorted the Rebbe to the chuppah, on one side he was taken by his father-in-law, the Rebbe Rayatz, while the Rebbe's father was then in Russia and could not come out for the wedding, and therefore Rabbi Moshe HaKohen Horenstein, the son-in-law of the Rebbe Maharash, was the unterfirer who took the Rebbe from the other side.
And who took the Rebbetzin to the chuppah? Afterwards the Rebbe returned, and the Rebbe Rayatz and his Rebbetzin took the Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka to the chuppah; and behind them, as an unterfirerin, went the Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka, the wife of Rabbi Moshe HaKohen.
The son of that same Rabbi Moshe HaKohen Horenstein, Menachem Mendel by name, was a son-in-law of the Rebbe Rayatz: the Rayatz had a younger daughter named Sheina, and her husband was Menachem Mendel Horenstein, the son of that Yid, Rabbi Moshe HaKohen Horenstein. He is mentioned in "Hayom Yom" in the teaching of 1 Nissan, where it is brought that the Rebbe Rashab, his brother-in-law, instructed him that during the month of Nissan, when the "Yehi Ratzon" that follows the Nesiim is said - even though he is a kohen - he should say the "Yehi Ratzon" on all the days, and he explained to him that the matter is relevant to him.
"His seforim" of the Rebbe Maharash: "1) Likkutei Torah on three parshiyos. 2) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel", which contains all his maamarim arranged by year, twenty-six volumes [as he details: "Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5626. 4) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5627. 5) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5628. 6) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5629. 7) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5630. 8) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5631, 2 volumes. 9) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5633, 2 volumes. 10) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5634. 11) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5635, 2 volumes. 12) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel, Mayim Rabbim - 5636. 13) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, V'Kacha - 5637. 14) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5638. 15) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5639, 2 volumes. 16) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5640, 2 volumes. 17) Likkutei Torah Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5641. 19) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel, Sefer - 5642 (in print). 20) Likkutei Torah - Torat Shmuel, Droshei Chatunah. 21) Igrot Kodesh"].
Let us speak about the first sefer he mentions, "Likkutei Torah on three parshiyos": a sefer that was published after his passing, which was, as mentioned, in the year 5643. The Rebbe Maharash himself prepared the maamarim: he took maamarim whose source is in the "Torah Ohr" of the Alter Rebbe, inserted into them the hagahot and explanations of his father, the Rebbe the Tzemach Tzedek, added many hagahot and explanations of his own, and prepared them for print. He prepared thirty-two maamarim for printing - and as we recall, we related in previous lessons that before his passing he said to the Rebbetzin that he was ascending thirty-two levels upward, and the reference is to the thirty-two maamarim he had prepared.
But there was an unpleasant story connected with this. The sefer was not printed in his lifetime, and it is known that after his passing he had opponents, and even among the chassidim not everyone was bound to him, and there were those who tried to besmirch his name after the passing. Through various schemes the opponents of the Rebbe Maharash intervened and succeeded in introducing errors into the printing of the sefer "Likkutei Torah on three parshiyos": they removed from it all the explanations of the Rebbe Maharash and left only the explanations of his father, and then they said: "See, he takes from the Alter Rebbe and from his father and attaches it to his own name as though it were his". By removing the explanations, they caused his name to be besmirched, and since then the sefer has not been printed again as a sefer in its own right. But this is his first work, which the Rebbe Maharash himself prepared.
And why is it called "on three parshiyos"? Because he only managed to prepare it on Bereishis, Noach and Lech Lecha - the first three parshiyos of Chumash Bereishis. After that, as mentioned, come all the maamarim of the years that he said, and finally the Igrot Kodesh, a sefer containing the letters and holy epistles of the Rebbe Maharash.