The next time the Ponovizher Rav visited the orphanage, he asked about this child and why he wasn't there, and the staff told him that the irreligious mother had taken him home. The Rav immediately went to the woman's home in Tel Aviv. It was Friday afternoon, but his pain of losing a Jewish child was so great that he couldn't push it off. When the mother saw the Rav, she said, "If you came to convince me to return our son to the orphanage, I want you to know that there is nothing to talk about! I was in Auschwitz..." and she told him that after all the tzaros she went through, she abandoned Yiddishkeit. The Ponovizher Rav didn't respond – he just sat there and cried.
When this son turned seventy, he came to the rosh yeshiva of the baal teshuvah yeshiva and said, "The Rav's tears chased me for sixty years, and that's why I am here today to do teshuvah."
Melamdim and magidei shiur shouldn’t follow this counsel. When fathers ask how their sons are doing, they should lavish praise when due. The message is that parents shouldn’t stop shedding tears and praying for their children.
The Pnei Menachem told a personal story. He related that his mother was the Imrei Emes's second rebbetzin and had children of her own. One of her sons was called up for the draft. She went to the Imrei Emes to request that he daven for her son, and he did so. But she was still worried. She went to her mother, who was the Imrei Emes's sister, and asked her to go to the Imrei Emes, and to ask him again to daven for the bachur. When her mother came to the Imrei Emes, the Imrei Emes gave a havtachah, his guarantee, that the bachur wouldn't be drafted. When the Imrei Emes gave this havtachah (promise), everyone calmed down, and baruch Hashem, there was a salvation.
The Pnei Menachem said, "My mother asked the Imrei Emes, 'If you knew my son wouldn’t be drafted, why didn't you tell me? I was so worried.' The Imrei Emes replied, 'A mother must daven. I knew there would be a yeshuah, but your tears were needed. Had you known for sure that everything would be okay, you would stop davening and crying, and your tears were needed for the yeshuah!'"
The Pnei Menachem told this story to the father, who wanted to know why he didn't give a more flowery report when he asked him about his son. The Pnei Menachem replied, "This is why I didn't elaborate on your son's success. I didn't want you to feel that everything was wonderful. A parent must daven."
Hashem tells Rachel (Yirmiyahu 31:15), מבכי קולך מנעי, "Refrain your voice from crying." But it wasn't only Rachel who cried. Leah also cried, as is implied in the words (Bereishis 29:17), רכות לאה ועיני, "and Leah's eyes were moist." She was crying that she shouldn't become Eisav's wife. Rashi writes, "Rivkah had two sons (Yaakov and Eisav), and Lavan had two daughters (Rachel and Leah). People were saying the older daughter to the older son (Leah for Eisav), and the younger daughter to the younger son (Rachel for Yaakov).” Leah was worried that she would marry Eisav, and therefore she cried. Hashem doesn't tell her to stop crying because Hashem loves such tears. Tears for spiritual success are desired tears.
The Torah (Bereishis 32:1) tells us that Lavan blessed his daughters. The Sforno writes, "Chazal teach us that a birkas hedyot, the blessing of a simple person, shouldn't be trivial in our eyes. The Torah tells us that Lavan blessed his daughters to teach us that when a father blesses his children, it is with all his heart, and no doubt the brachos will take effect because this is the segulah of a brachah from a human, who was created with a tzelem Elokim, as it states (Bereishis 27:4), נפשי תברכך בעבור, 'So my soul can bless you.'"
