The ceiling in our laundry room showed signs of peeling. At first, bits of paint fell off, then a little more, and then there was a huge green, ugly stain. All this led me to the conclusion that something was not right in the floor above mine. I called a professional, and he confirmed my conclusion. It seemed there was a burst pipe, which could be fixed only by removing the tiles in the apartment above mine.
An elderly woman who is, unfortunately, not religious, but is friendly and willing to help out, lives in the apartment above mine. When she heard about the problem she said she would be happy to help us, but she wanted to call someone on her own.
I agreed. An Arab worker came to her house and claimed that the problem was just a matter of properly sealing the pipe. He would take care of it. It was strange, because at the time when the stain on our ceiling was beginning to get darker, the woman was hospitalized and had not even been home. There was no water running in her home at the time, so how could this be a problem that just needed sealing?! But she accepted what he said and gave him permission to do the work. In order to avoid problems, she told him he could take a key from the neighbor and enter her home in case he came at a time when she wasn’t home.
Several days passed, and this woman had many mishaps. She kept falling. Every time this happened, she called one of the neighbors to help her get up. She is an older woman, and falls are quite common at her age, but this seemed like to much. When I heard about it I felt very bad for her, and I also suspected it might have something to do with the mezuzah on her door. I noticed the mezuzah was too small, and who knew if the klaf inside it could even be called a “mezuzah”?
One time, she fell so hard that she couldn’t get up. It was hashgachah that the Arab worker arrived soon afterward, and when he discovered her on the floor he called Hatzalah, and she was taken to the hospital.
At this stage, her son from abroad understood the situation and came to Israel to take care of her properly. When he spoke with me I told him, “Your mother needs a yeshuah! Her last fall was just part of a series of falls that happened to her. I think you must check the mezuzah at the entrance to her home.”
He agreed, bought a kosher mezuzah, and affixed it to the entrance of her apartment. He took off the old mezuzah and showed it to me. Indeed, it was exactly as a I had suspected: Many of the letters were smudged, and the words “on the ground” were missing altogether, which explained her many falls and the problem with her “ground” – the mysterious leakage under her floor tiles.
Her son was quite moved. A mezuzah! Look what a mezuzah can do! I’m sure this did something to his relationship with Torah and mitzvos. He continued to care for her devotedly, and he also called a reliable worker, who lifted her floor tiles and found no reason for the moisture in our ceiling. He suggested that perhaps there was some connection to the water flowing from one of the neighbor’s apartments, but
