Reb Dovid Mordechai Kopilkov, a resident of Nevel in the Vitebsk region, was a chassid of the Rebbe Maharash, Rabbi Shmuel of Lubavitch, and later of his son, the Rebbe Rashab, Rabbi Sholom Dovber, whose birthday falls this Shabbat. His son, born in 5649 (1888–1889), was known as Gavriel Kagan. The father was Kopilkov and the son Kagan? A fascinating story lies behind the change of name.
The son’s original name was Shlomo. He was studying at the Tomchei Temimim yeshiva in Dokshitz when he reached the age of conscription into the Russian army. Jews regarded conscription as a terrible decree, since a Jewish soldier had little chance of maintaining his Jewish observance in the Russian army. They therefore made every effort to avoid military service.
As the date approached for Shlomo to appear before the army’s medical board, his father traveled to Lubavitch to seek the Rebbe Rashab’s advice and blessing to save his son from conscription.
Common Methods
Reb Dovid Mordechai described the methods commonly used in Nevel to avoid the draft. Every few months, an army medical board arrived in town, consisting of doctors from elsewhere. Without any prior connection to these doctors, it was very difficult to “come to an arrangement” with them. The usual practice was therefore to obtain a medical certificate stating that the young man was ill on the day of his examination. This automatically postponed his appearance for three months. He would then appear before a board of local doctors, with whom it was easier to negotiate an exemption.
The Rebbe listened and said, “I think your son would do well to appear on the date assigned to him and not postpone his examination for three months.”
The instruction made no sense to the father. Why put his son’s head into the lion’s mouth when there was a tried-and-tested way to obtain an exemption? He convinced himself that he had probably not heard the Rebbe correctly and proceeded with his original plan. He obtained a medical certificate for his son, and the examination was immediately postponed for three months.
But when Shlomo arrived on the rescheduled date, he discovered that this time the board consisted of doctors from out of town. Three months earlier, on his original examination date, the board had consisted of local doctors!
Now there was nothing he could do. The medical board declared the young man fully fit for military service, making him subject to conscription.
Returning to the Rebbe
Shlomo now needed a true deliverance. Ashamed and embarrassed, his father traveled once again to the Rebbe in Lubavitch. The Rebbe neither rebuked him nor reproached him for disobeying. He reflected briefly, then advised Reb Dovid Mordechai to obtain false identity papers for his son under another name and send him far away, somewhere he would not be recognized.
“But what will I do when they impose a fine of three hundred rubles on me?” Reb Dovid Mordechai asked anxiously.
This was the fine imposed on any father whose son deserted the army—an enormous sum in those days. The law also stipulated that if the father could not pay the fine in cash, his house, shop, and all his other property would be confiscated.
“Do not worry,” the Rebbe reassured him. “There is a certain plan that will spare you from having to pay the fine.”
He offered no further explanation.
After leaving the Rebbe, Reb Dovid Mordechai tried unsuccessfully to understand what he meant. Perhaps the “plan” referred to an anticipated change in the law imposing fines on the fathers of deserters, he thought. Whatever the explanation, this time he was careful to follow the Rebbe’s instructions completely.
Within a few days, Reb Dovid Mordechai obtained false papers for his son and sent him to study in Chernigov, which was then considered a good refuge for young men evading military service. From that moment onward, Shlomo Kopilkov became Gavriel Kagan, the name he would bear for the rest of his life. In Chernigov, he entered Tomchei Temimim yeshiva (the Chabad yeshiva), which operated under the spiritual influence of the renowned mashpia, Rabbi Dovid Tzvi Chein.
A Certain Plan
Meanwhile, Reb Dovid Mordechai began asking knowledgeable people about the law requiring him to pay three hundred rubles. None had heard of any expected change.
Then, one day, a policeman appeared at his shop and placed a thick bundle of documents before him. “You must pay a fine of three hundred rubles and sign these papers,” the policeman said, and left.
Reb Dovid Mordechai was alarmed. Since he could not read Russian, and there were so many documents, he needed knowledgeable friends to explain what he had to do. He gathered the entire stack and brought it to them. But as soon as they glanced through the papers, broad smiles spread across their faces.
“It seems there has been some mistake, or the policeman got confused. Instead of delivering the notice requiring you to pay the fine, he handed you the entire file concerning your son and his desertion!”
Reb Dovid Mordechai immediately understood what this meant. Before long, the entire bundle had been thrown into the stove and reduced to ashes. Along with those documents, Shlomo Kopilkov’s name—and the very record of his existence—vanished from the army’s archives.
Only then did Reb Dovid Mordechai understand what the Rebbe had meant when he spoke of “a certain plan” to cancel the fine.