Sometimes giving kavod means listening to people. Everyone has a story. To some, the story may be boring and negligible, but, to the person relating the story, it is his life.
Rav Moshe Shapira’s father had a brother who was murdered in Auschwitz. The brother, Rav Shraga Feivel, had been a Rosh Yeshivah in a suburb of Antwerp. When Rav Moshe made a trip to Antwerp for a speaking engagement, his father asked him to research whether anyone knew how his brother had been murdered. [Sadly, we have no record of yahrzeits for many of the Holocaust’s victims.]
While he was in Antwerp, Rav Moshe discovered that a Jew who was living in Monsey, N.Y., had travelled with Rav Shraga Feivel on the train to Auschwitz. This man was one of the fortunate survivors of the infamous death camp.
While it would have been easy for Rav Moshe to make a long-distance call to Monsey, he felt it was improper kibud av not to go to meet the man, listen to his story and, perhaps, piece together the last moments of Rav Shraga Feivel’s life. Rav Moshe went to Monsey. (This was probably during his tenure as a Rosh Yeshivah in Stanford, CT.)
He met the man, who was now an elderly widower living in a small, shabby basement apartment. The story the man related was captivating: “The Nazis took us away shortly after Sukkos, 1942. We clung to one another, reciting Tehillim in the misery of the cattle car. We arrived at Auschwitz at noon, and we were immediately sent to the Selektzia. He [Rabbi Shapira’s uncle] was immediately sent to the left side and, within, two hours, his holy neshamah returned to its Heavenly Source. I was sent to the right, resulting in three years of pure Gehinnom. It was through chasdei Hashem and miracles from Above that I survived.”
The man related a number of miracles by which he was spared death. He spoke for a few hours, and Rav Moshe listened intently: an elderly survivor and a brilliant Rosh Yeshivah. The stories were not new, but the Rosh Yeshivah sat there reverently, on the edge of his chair, treating the survivor with the respect that he deserved. At that moment, the survivor no longer felt like a relic, a burden to be tolerated. He was alive and vibrant. Indeed, a Rosh Yeshivah was listening to his story! He was now a teacher, a carrier of the flame that had been kindled in pre-World War II Europe, which he was transmitting to the next generation via this Rosh Yeshivah.
When Rav Moshe listened, he gave the man back something which the Nazis tried to take from him: his humanity, his voice. Rav Moshe Shapira gave it back to him by according him the derech eretz he deserved.
