Rare Words Never Heard Before: The Story of Rabbi Michael Gol shlit"a's Journey, Part 2

Continuation of the moving story of Rabbi Michael Gol shlit"a's journey, head of the 'Mageney Eretz' Yeshiva in Jerusalem and one of the veteran and renowned students of the esteemed Rabbi Eliezer Berland shlit"a.

The First Prayer from the Depths of the Heart

"The second point was when I was supposed to be asleep, but I heard my mother pleading with my brother to leave the place he was at (at that time he was already married), but he told her he was just searching for the truth. 'Convince me that the truth is elsewhere and I'll go,' he told her. My mother began to persuade him that we are Jews, I remember it was the first time I turned to Hashem from the depths of my heart. All my life I prayed Shacharit, Mincha, and Maariv, but I never felt myself praying to Hashem. I remember how I turned and pleaded with Hashem from the depths of my heart, crying and asking Him to show me the truth in the world, where to draw close. We didn't even connect it to Judaism, we talked about needing to draw close to the complete person, that's what we called it then." This is how we ended the first part of Rabbi Michael Gol shlit"a's conversation, and this is how he continued.

Tell Me, Who is the Tzaddik of the Generation?!

"Suddenly someone came in and saw my father crying and asked him the reason for his tears. My father told him about the situation with my brother, and that person promised to send someone who understands it. A man named Menachem Philipovsky came to our home, a scholar from Bnei Brak who, years ago, when our teacher Rav Berland shlit"a studied in Volozhin, was his study partner. He was a special Jew who drew close to Rav Berland and was truly an admirer of his. Years later, I asked him, 'Tell me, Menachem, you're a Litvak, so why did you push us to Breslov?' He replied, 'I knew only Breslov could interest you, you are only Breslov'! I remember he came to our home and my brother asked him, 'Tell me, who is the tzaddik?' Menachem began to mention names of different tzaddikim, among them the Steipler, Rabbi Cheshin, and another whose name I don't remember. But my brother pressed and said, 'There aren't three, in every generation there is only one tzaddik!"

Philipovsky Tries to Keep the Path Open with Us

"The conversation was very intense and seemingly wasn't supposed to continue, but Philipovsky saw me in uniform and asked where I served. It turned out that the operations officer in our unit, who was my friend and had since been discharged, was religious and also Menachem's study partner. He said, I will come with him next time. In fact, it turned out he almost gave up on us and wanted to come with the study partner to save the matter with us. I was happy to see him, his name is Avi Eisen, in the army we had many heart-to-heart talks."

The Story Behind the 'Brown James Bond'

"Many have asked me in the past why I used to carry the 'James Bond' brown bag that served me as a tefillin bag? The story behind the bag is truly history. My brother at that time traveled to the USA to meet that man, at the same time my father dreamed that my grandfather, his father, returned home from abroad and brought him as a gift the 'James Bond' bag that my brother used at that time. Later, my grandfather continued and spoke with him in the dream about the children's return to teshuvah."

I Told You to Remove the Impurity, Not the Son

"Later, my father had another dream about his father where my grandfather entered the house angry and struck the wall while saying, 'Remove the impurity from the house.' My father in the dream burst into tears and asked, 'What, should I expel my son?' My grandfather replied, 'Not the son, remove the impurity'. At that time, my father asked my brother to remove all the material related to the subject from the house, and my brother did so. On Shabbat, my brother was a guest with us, and at the Shabbat table, my father asked him why he didn't remove the impurity from the house. My brother replied that he did, and my father pressed, 'After all, Grandpa came to me in a dream and told me to remove the impurity from the house.' Those were the two dreams."

The Dream Becomes Reality

"One day, my father was lying on the bed, facing a wall with a cabinet that never fully closed. It was the wall on the other side of which my grandfather had struck hard in the dream. My father looked and suddenly remembered that this was the wall my grandfather had hit on the other side in the dream. Immediately, he climbed up to the cabinet with a ladder and found the 'James Bond' brown bag with a picture of that man inside. On my brother's next visit, my father showed him the picture, and my brother apologized, saying he hadn't seen it. In a conversation I had with my brother afterward, he was really shaken by the fact that our grandfather came in a dream and warned about impurity in the house, and in addition, in the second dream, he came with the brown bag."

Rabbi Shalom Arush Draws My Brother to 'Shuvu Banim'

"All this occurrence caused cracks in my brother, and the family took advantage of it to draw him to a lesson by Rabbi Cheshin zt"l. Immediately after the lesson, my brother approached Rabbi Cheshin and told him everything that had happened. Rabbi Cheshin said, 'Stay away from fire, stay away from fire'. That evening, Rabbi Shalom Arush (then still Shalom Arush) arrived there, and after hearing Rabbi Cheshin's words to my brother, he approached to inquire. A conversation developed between them, and he took my brother to 'Shuvu Banim' that very night. They went to the field for Hitbodedut at night, and when they returned, he studied with my brother the Torah that the rabbi had studied with them."

"During that time, Dror Tzanani (now Rabbi Moshe Tzanani) also drew close, and our teacher Rav Berland studied with him Torah 65 from Likutei Moharan - 'My daughter, do not go to glean in another field', the Torah that speaks about the importance of drawing close to the tzaddik, the owner of the field. And Rabbi Shalom, who remembered that this Torah had captivated Tzanani, therefore studied this Torah with my brother. They studied all night, afterward my brother prayed Shacharit there and stayed with them all day."