The following is the moving story of Yosse’le, a sweet child from central Israel, who stuttered terribly and merited to recover with the power of answering amen. This story was sent to us by a family member.
“Abb-b-a...I-I-I w-w-want to g-g-g-o to sh-sh-shul....” Yosse’le asked with great effort as he lowered his eyes in shame and from the intense exertion. The father looked at his son’s weary face, and his heart clenched. Yosse’le his dear son! He’d begun to talk before he turned two, and from then on, he’d never stopped chattering. Now, he could hardly utter the shortest of sentences. Talking was extremely difficult, and the shame exacerbated the constant stutter.
The stutter struck Yosse’le out of the blue, without any advance warning. His life was transformed almost immediately. Instead of his constant stream of talking, he could utter only broken sentences and halting syllables. At first, his surprised parents were not sure if his stutter was due to tension from a number of tests he was taking at the time in cheder, or perhaps it was an effect of the flu he had been sick with the week before, from which he had not totally recovered.
But when the stutter continued, and even grew worse, they began to worry, wonder and pray. They asked the advice of experts in the field, visited top doctors, tried all kinds of various treatments – and nothing helped.
Having exhausted all avenues, the father decided to visit HaRav Chaim Kanievsky to ask for advice and a brachah. He joined the line on the famous staircase on Rashbam Street, and whispering Tehillim for his son’s recovery.
His turn arrived. Rav Chaim listened to his woes, and responded briefly and piercingly: “Be strict about answering amen,” was what he said to the surprised father. Before he turned to go, Rav Chaim added: “Being that you are a talmid chacham, you should also engage in the subject of answering amen, and write a halachic essay on the subject.”
The father didn’t ask anything more. He turned around and left the home in silent submission.
When he arrived home, the father sat down in his study and began to write a comprehensive halachic essay on the obligation of answering amen. He delved into sugyos, clarified the words of the Rishonim, and slowly, his essay took shape and grew, until a month later, it spanned some thirty closely written pages. The essay was masterfully crafted, and the conclusions were clear and organized.
On the day he finished writing, the father wanted to return to Rav Chaim to show him what he had written.
As he was at the door, Yosse’le addressed him: “Abba, where are you going?”
The father emitted a cry. “Yosse’le!! Say that again! What did you say?”
“I asked you where you are going,” Yosse’le said simply and coherently. This time, it was the father who was rendered speechless. The flow of words from his son’s mouth sounded like a melodious song. The stutter had disappeared without a trace. The question that Yosse’le had asked him was just the beginning of a stream of clear, eloquent sentences that he began to utter, without a trace of a stammer that he’d been suffering from so badly.
