Erev Yom Kippur: Sweet Cake and a Sweet Year

My1 revered father-in-law once related:2 “The Baal Shem used to say that distributing lekach on erev Yom Kippur is an ancient custom.3 While doing so the Baal Shem Tov used to say: ‘I am giving you sweet cake — and may G-d give you a good year!’ My father [the Rebbe Rashab] used to conclude, ‘…a good year, a sweet year.’”

[The Rebbe added individual blessings to some of the chassidim who filed past his door for lekach.4]

Comment

FOOTNOTES
1.	This is an unauthenticated record of the Rebbe’s words when distributing lekach (sweet cake) during the morning of erev Yom Kippur, 5711 [1950].
2.	Brief notes (rashei devarim) relating to the morning of erev Yom Kippur, 5707 [1946]. See also Sefer HaSichos 5700 [1940], p. 11.
3.	See: Elef HaMagen on Mateh Ephraim, sec. 604, para. 38; Sefer Taamei HaMinhagim, p. 327; Sefer HaMinhagim — Chabad, p. 58 (and in English translation: Sefer HaMinhagim: The Book of Chabad-Lubavitch Customs, p. 123).
4.	To one chassid who approached him with a request for lekach on Motzaei Yom Kippur, after the fast, the Rebbe said: “This is not the appropriate time for the erev Yom Kippur custom of giving lekach, but here, you can nourish yourself with something lush for a whole year…” — and the Rebbe handed him a slice of honey cake.To those chassidim who did not manage to receive their portion on erev Yom Kippur, the Rebbe gave lekach on Hoshana Rabbah or on Shemini Atzeres, together with a blessing worded as on erev Yom Kippur.

From the talks of the Lubavitcher Rebbe; translated by Uri Kaploun More articles... |

Translated from the teachings of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson in Toras Menachem by Rabbi Uri Kaploun.

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Volume 3


	Publisher's Foreward


	Rosh HaShanah: A Cry of Awe from the Soul


	Teshuvah: An Entire Soul, An Entire People


	Erev Yom Kippur: Sweet Cake and a Sweet Year


	Erev Yom Kippur: Nourishing Body and Soul


	The Sukkah: A Stage on One's Way Out of Egypt


	Simchas Torah: Blessings by the Bucketful

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After turning to the Rebbe for guidance in every conceivable situation for over forty years, When a Chassid feels the void of not being able to see his Rebbe, he Instinctively turns to the words of the Rebbe at a similar time. Proceeding Together contains the earliest talks and letters of the Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem M. Schneerson, soon after the passing of his father-in-law and predecessor, the Sixth Rebbe in 1950.


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