Reb Reuven, the brother of the legendary R’ Shraga Feivel Mendelowitz (1886-1948), was a grocer in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. On the day of the funeral of R’ Shraga Feivel, thousands of people gathered at Mesivta Torah Vodaath on South Third Street to pay their final respects to the man who was an architect of Torah in America. (The funeral procession had made its way from Monsey, where it had begun in Bet Midrash Elyon.) On the way to his brother’s funeral, Reb Reuven was walking to the Mesivta when he suddenly went into a grocery along the way.
The people who were walking alongside Reb Reuven were taken aback. What could be so important to divert his attention from the matter at hand? In respect of Reb Reuven’s piety, no one said anything. When he was asked about it during the shivah, the answer he gave symbolized the special nature of the Mendelowitz family.
There was a poverty-stricken man who came to Reb Reuven’s grocery every morning for bread and milk for his family. Reb Reuven never charged him but to preserve the man’s dignity he wrote the amount due on a balance sheet that he knew – and the poor man knew – would never be claimed. It was an unspoken pact between them.
“During the shivah my store will be closed,” explained Reb Reuven, “and this man will have to go to the other grocer for his family’s bread and milk. I wanted to be sure that the grocer wouldn’t charge him so I went in to assure him that I would cover the cost!”
If that’s what the grocers of that generation were, one can only imagine how extraordinary the Torah leaders were. (Reflections of the Maggid)
Reprinted from the Parshat Toledot 5784 email of Shabbat Shalom from Cyberspace.
