By Moshe Shlomo
We are sometimes hard pressed to come up with an original idea for a gift, whether it’s for a parent’s birthday or anniversary. People often look for something new, fresh, surprising, that will touch the recipient’s heart.
Leibel Khazanovich thought of what original gift he could give the Rebbe for this past 11 Nissan, the Rebbe’s birthday, and he found it! A photo of the Rebbe comprised of 1500 photos of Jews putting on t’fillin, which is part of the gift.
Leibel Khazanovich 23, and his chavrusa, Adam Nesenoff, who learn in the smicha program in Florida, came up with this novel idea of joining together 1500 Jews who gave of their time to do a mitzva in order to honor the Rebbe.
Before we talk about the present and how you went about it, I must say, wow, kol hakavod to you. 1500 photos and I bet there are more.
Leibel: Boruch Hashem. We work hard and try to reach as many Jews as possible. The truth is that I don’t want to start without Adam. He is really the inspiration for all this.
From the outset, Leibel warned me with a smile, “I sure hope you have enough time for us because the amount of stories equals the number of photos. Each picture, each encounter with another Jew, is a story. It is not just putting on t’fillin, but something much deeper. Through t’fillin you get into the neshama of another Jew. Sometimes you are completely unaware of a story that lies behind the picture. What you know for sure is that you changed another Jew’s life.”
As Leibel finished his last sentence, Adam walked in with his t’fillin bag strapped around his neck.
Adam: Sorry I’m late but you won’t believe what happened on my way here.
Leibel: There is not a day that he doesn’t encounter a Jew who never put t’fillin on in his life.
Kol hakavod to you. It’s good you had your t’fillin with you.
Adam (smiling): “You remind me about something interesting that happened to me a few years ago. At that time I was learning in a baal t’shuva yeshiva in Crown Heights. Most of the day I sat and learned in Yagdil Torah, opposite 770, where I davened. One day, on my way to Mincha, an older man came out of the train station and asked to put on t’fillin. I immediately took him into 770, borrowed t’fillin from a friend, and put them on with the man.
“Since that day, it makes no difference where, whether it’s on Kingston Avenue or Wal-Mart in the Poconos, I always have my t’fillin with me. Many of the pictures are of ‘chance’ encounters and as Chassidim we know there is no chance; it’s all by divine providence. I ‘happened’ to go into that store with my t’fillin and it so ‘happened’ that the guy behind the counter was a Jew, or the man waiting with me on line, and it so ‘happened’ that he has a Jewish grandmother on his mother’s side… It’s all from Above but it plays out in a series of opportune situations that move even me every time. At any time and any place you can find this ‘chance.’”
Leibel jumps in with a story:
“Listen to a story. My birthday was just a week ago. It was a Friday, a long mivtzaim day. Before I returned to Crown Heights, my chavrusa told me that Starbucks gives free coffee to those whose birthday it is. We walked in and while waiting on line we saw a young guy with a beard. Seeing our beards, he began suggesting what could be done with it, how to take care of it, etc. By the end of the conversation we learned he was Jewish. He immediately agreed to put on t’fillin. We told him that we just ‘happened’ to walk in to the store this week, even though we are in the area every week. He said he lives in a nearby neighborhood and he also ‘happened’ to pass by.”
I’m sure you can tell us about lots of “chance encounters” you’ve had, but first, where did you get the idea of taking pictures with everyone and how do people take to that?
Leibel: People who saw the picture don’t realize that it’s far more than just a selfie. When I take a picture with a Jew who puts on t’fillin, I don’t keep it for myself. I send it to him via email. When I have his email address I can keep in touch and be mekarev him more. Think a minute, the fact that a person put on t’fillin and agreed to have his picture taken means he feels good about what he’s doing. When I send him the picture he often puts it up on his social media feed where all his friends see him wearing t’fillin which gets them interested too. When they have occasion to put on t’fillin, they will remember that their friend did it, and they will do it too. So getting someone to put on t’fillin and taking a picture gets others to do mitzvos.
Adam: That reminds me of an interesting thing that happened to us. It was during the Kinus HaShluchim and the neighborhood was full of shluchim from all over the world. One day, a shliach from London told me that on the previous Sukkos, as he was doing Mivtza Lulav, he went over to someone who looked Jewish and suggested he say a bracha on the minim. At first the man declined but after a few minutes he came back and said that one time he put t’fillin on, on a flight to New York, with a young man he really liked. He said, “Thanks to him I will do another mitzva.” The man then took out his phone and showed the shliach the picture he had taken with the bachur. See what an impact it makes? Two years after he put on t’fillin, this person was willing to do another mitzva thanks to the selfie he took of himself wearing t’fillin.
Adam, as a baal t’shuva, and as someone who did not grow up in a Chassidic home, what has motivated you to take Mivtza T’fillin so personally and to do it so determinedly?
Adam: I don’t think the home someone grows up in makes such a difference when it comes to carrying out the Rebbe’s horaos. When they switched me from learning in a baal t’shuva yeshiva to a regular yeshiva, and I started living with the bachurim who had a koch in the Rebbe’s inyanim, I started getting seriously involved in mivtzaim. It’s not just Mivtza T’fillin; it’s all the Rebbe’s inyanim – Shabbos, kashrus, Moshiach. It was then that I started to understand the need to reach every Jew.
Please share some of the many stories you have.
Leibel: As I told you before, every picture is a story but there are always the more touching stories. I remember a story from the summer when I worked at a camp in Florida. We were in a big park along with several other Jewish camps. Of course, there too, I tried offering t’fillin to kids and counselors who hadn’t done so yet. One of the directors of another camp started making problems and he threatened me and said I’d better not dare approach his staff. I felt really bad that day.
At the end of the day, when we left the park, I went to a store to buy some things we needed for camp. In the store I saw an old man with a very Jewish face. It was after a long, hard day and I had no more strength to ask people whether they put on t’fillin yet. I chose not to ask him but one of the other staff members urged me to ask. I went over to him and asked whether he was interested in putting on t’fillin. At first he said no, but after a few convincing words he agreed. In the middle of the Shma, this 91-year-old man began to cry. When I asked him afterward why he cried, he said it was over seventy years that he hadn’t put on t’fillin. The last time he had put on t’fillin was when he was in high school but all his friends made fun of him and called him rabbi. “It was so moving, after seventy-three years, to be standing here with a real rabbi, putting on t’fillin and reading the Shma out loud,” he said.
Adam remembered a story that took place in Tishrei as he and his friends were in Crimea, where they were running the local Chabad House. After a full day of work, they went to a local cafe. At a table near them an argument broke out between two customers and the atmosphere was ugly. The owner came to sit with the bachurim and apologized for what happened. They got to talking and it turned out that he came from a Jewish family. The next day he agreed to put on t’fillin for the first time in his life. His relationship with Adam grew and last Pesach he sent a selfie of himself putting on t’fillin with the bachurim who went to his city. Since then, this man has become more interested in Judaism and in a few weeks he will be circumcised.
Your stories are inspiring! What putting on t’fillin can accomplish … It’s unbelievable. What are your plans for the future? Are there other projects you are working on?
Leibel: Definitely. Everything. Doing all the Rebbe’s mivtzaim. We need to go out and do. There is so much to do. We don’t need to look for them because they are all around us. We just need to want to take action.
With all your experience gained over the years, do you have advice for other bachurim?
Adam: We are not professionals but we’ve learned a thing or two. Sometimes, when talking about Mivtza T’fillin or the other mivtzaim, people (even Lubavitchers) are wary. You don’t need to be apprehensive. You need to know that the Jewish spark burns in everyone’s heart. Sometimes there are people who need a small push or need to be shaken a bit, but every person, deep inside, wants!
It’s like lighting a match. Sometimes, it doesn’t work the first time you try, but you don’t give up. You try again and again until it ignites. I think it is worthwhile taking a picture together, taking a phone number or an email address, and building a relationship. That way, with Hashem’s help, it will be possible to get another Jew more involved in Torah and mitzvos.
If there is something that I learned from all the experiences that I’ve had, it’s the following; it makes no difference where you go, even if it’s just for a minute, a stop in the local grocery store or running to shul for Mincha, always, but always, take your t’fillin with you. It’s worth it.
Leibel, do you have something to add?
“The day is short and there is a lot of work.” There are many more Jews who want to do “one mitzva” that will tip the scale and bring salvation to the entire world with the complete hisgalus of the Rebbe MH”M, and then the picture won’t have 1500 photos of people putting on t’fillin but hundreds of millions of Jews over the generations who did mitzvos which join together in one magnificent picture, the picture of Geula.
CHOOSE LIFE
Sometimes, unbeknownst to us, we do a lot more than what we see and know. Sometimes it is obvious and sometimes not. The mitzva that we do with a Jew continues to make an impact on him far more that we could expect. Sometimes it is literally a matter of saving lives.
“I had a good friend,” Adam related, “who was killed in a road accident (Gedalya Greenzayd) and we raised money and traveled the East Coast on a mitzva tank. The first week we were in Boston where we went to a local market and walked around. When we got to the end of the street we saw an older man who was trying to sell his artwork. He started telling us about how he had recently been through a very hard time and he was despondent to the point that he planned on ending his life.
“After we put t’fillin on with him, and read the Shma, he said he already felt much better and he was sure that things would change for the better. He said he was committed to working on himself, on improving, and getting out of his depression.”