"Hello, Rabbi Friedman? Are you a 'kabbalist'?"
Manis Friedman, a Chabad emissary in Minnesota and a well-known lecturer, was surprised. "This must be a prank," he thought, and decided to play along. "Ab-solutely!" he replied.
"Excellent," said the caller on the other end. "Then you know how to cast out dyb-buks (a wandering soul needing rectifica-tion)."
"What kind of question is that?" Rabbi Friedman answered, amused.
"Great. We'll be at your house in forty minutes," the caller replied and hung up.
"Hello?!" Rabbi Friedman called out, but there was no response. It was Friday morning. Exactly forty minutes later, a young couple appeared at the door. He welcomed them warmly, but he could not ignore the woman's appearance. Her gaze was vacant, her face downcast, and her steps unsteady.
The Dybuk
"A dybuk has taken over my wife," said the husband, who introduced himself as David. He described the suffering he and the entire family had been experiencing recently. They had moved to Minnesota from Israel. According to him, his wife was receiving messages from a "figure" that had supposedly taken control of her. She behaved violently and endangered her husband and children. "We turned to ex-perts. We even checked the mezuzahs," he said despairingly. "We looked for a kabba-list, and they referred us to you."
"Listen," Rabbi Friedman replied, "during the phone call I didn't realize how serious this was. I suggest I pass the matter on to the Lubavitcher Rebbe, whose emissary I am. The Rebbe will help you, on one con-dition: promise me that you will follow everything the Rebbe instructs."
The couple nodded eagerly. After they left, Rabbi Friedman immediately relayed the details to the Rebbe's secretariat. An hour later he received the Rebbe's re-sponse: "Precision in the kosher standards of food and drink." Rabbi Friedman im-mediately called David and conveyed the Rebbe's answer.
"What does it mean to keep kosher?" the man asked innocently. With only a few hours before Shabbat, there was no time to kosher the kitchen and teach the couple all the laws of kashrut. Rabbi Friedman in-structed him to go to the supermarket and buy matzah and sardines, and that these should be their meals over Shabbat.
After Shabbat, Rabbi Friedman sat with the couple and taught them the laws of kashrut. A team from Chabad came and koshered their kitchen. Slowly, there was an improvement in her condition.
Passover Guests
Passover eve arrived. Rabbi Friedman welcomed guests to the public Seder. A woman he did not recognize stood before him and said with a broad smile, "here we are." Rabbi Friedman politely asked, "did you register?" The woman looked sur-prised. "But you invited us!" Rabbi Fried-man was stunned. It was the woman with the dybuk. The change in her appearance was dramatic.
One day the husband called him. "I want-ed to ask if it's possible to request a bless-ing from the Rebbe for me."
"Certainly," Rabbi Friedman replied. "Regarding what?"
"I haven't been able to find work since I was fired," the man said. David had previ-ously shared that once when he came to his job bruised from his wife's violence, his managers became suspicious of him and fired him.
"I'd be happy to help," Rab-bi Friedman replied. "Give me your name and mother's name, and I'll pass it on to the Rebbe."
Days passed and no response came. Rabbi Friedman called the Rebbe's secretary, Benjamin Klein. "Did the Rebbe receive the letter?" he asked. "The letter is on the Rebbe's desk," the secretary said, "and the Rebbe is refraining from answering it."
The Blessing
The next day Rabbi Friedman called again. "Perhaps there's an answer now?"
"Yes," the secretary replied. "The Rebbe wants to know her name and her mother's name."
"You surely mean his name and his moth-er's name," Rabbi Friedman said.
"No," the secretary clarified. "The wife's name and her mother's name."
Rabbi Friedman decided to speak with the woman. "How's your little dybbuk do-ing?" he asked humorously.
"He's fine," she replied cheerfully. Rabbi Friedman became alert. "What do you mean? I thought it disappeared."
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