It is said that once the Rav was sitting in his room in Brisk. On his desk were many letters from all corners of the world. Questions were sent to the Rav from all over the world. And the rabbi would patiently open the letters and answer their questions.
At the same time, there was a knock on the door and after receiving the permit, the town's butcher named Yehuda, a young Jew who was very close to the rabbi, entered. During the conversation, the rabbi opened more letters. "Do you see this letter?" he asked the slaughterer sitting across from him, "This letter came from America. There is a severe shortage of experienced and God-fearing slaughterers. They are begging before I send them a shochet. But I don't have a shochet to send there." After many minutes, the shochet left the rabbi's house thoughtfully. He is blessed with many children and a limited livelihood in a poor community like Brisk. Poultry and meat were scarce commodities and he did not have enough work to support his family and meet their needs. And now a solution to all his problems came to his mind...
At his home, Rabbi Yehuda's wife waits for her husband, but her husband does not return. Her son Avraham the Great asked to go to the synagogue and look for her father. For her second son, Yaakov, she asked to look for him somewhere else. When the children returned, night had already fallen, and the father did not find him. In despair, she went to the rabbi's house, fearing that her husband was there. But to her great disappointment, he was not there. "Your honor," she cried bitterly, "my husband has left noon and has not yet returned. We looked for it everywhere possible and couldn't find it. I'm afraid that a disaster may have happened to him, God forbid!" Rabbi Yehoshua sank into his thoughts, and after many minutes he raised his eyes and said painfully: "I am afraid that your husband has decided to go to America," he said to the astonishment of the slaughterer's wife. "America?" the woman murmured, incredulous. "What does he have to look for there? Here he has a home, a family and children. Why did he leave and say nothing?" The woman began to cry incessantly, unable to believe what she heard. The rabbi waited for a while and said: "Your husband was here today at noon, when I was busy answering the various letters. I came across a letter from a community in America looking for a slaughterer. I told this to your husband innocently. I think he decided to do something and went there to be a shochet," he said sadly.
The woman received the news with bitter pain. In the America of those days, the voice of the Torah was not heard. It was almost devoid of any spiritual content, and the danger of assimilation was enormous in those days. Soon the rumor spread like wildfire. Everyone was talking about the act of the slaughterer. "Judah left his wife and children and went to America!" they said. All the Jews of the city were frightened by this. But the one who took this upon his conscience was Rabbi Yehoshua. He feared that it had happened because of his words. And from that day on, he began to pray for the spirituality of Yehuda the slaughterer. Every day he would remind him in his prayers, begging God to remain at his spiritual level and not to descend to the bottom, G-d forbid.
Time passed, and a year later, a letter was received at Yehuda's home. Indeed, Rabbi Yehoshua was correct in his assumption that Yehuda had traveled to America. In his letter, the shochet asked his wife and children to come to him overseas. He also attached a considerable sum of money to his letter. "What am I supposed to do now?" the woman wondered. "Is it worthwhile to go to him, or if I refuse, they will hurry back here?" At the end of the matter, she turned to the rabbi and expressed her doubts. "I think you should join the head of the family," the rabbi replied after a long thought. "Despite the poor spiritual state there, in my humble opinion you should travel and reunite. Have a good trip," he congratulated. From that day on, Rabbi Yehoshua had a list of other names to mention in his prayer – the wife and children.
Later, the shochet immigrated to the Holy Land with his family. Then, to his surprise, he heard that the rabbi of Brisk, Rabbi Yehoshua Leib, was also in Jerusalem. He was overwhelmed with enormous excitement. Memories of the old days flooded him and he went out to visit his rabbi. With a beating heart, he knocked on the door of the house. The Rebbetzin opened the door and immediately recognized the person standing at the door. "Rabbi Yehoshua," she called excitedly to her husband. "You are already exempt from responsibility! They're already here!" When Yehuda heard the story, he understood everything. Only now did he understand how he, out of all his friends in the Americas, held to his Torah. How could he not be swept away into vanity despite all the difficult trials he had undergone? Why did he remain in his ultra-Orthodox dress and did not change his outlook? It was through the power of the prayer of his teacher, the Gaon and the Tzaddik, Rabbi Yehoshua Leib Diskin.
