Mikeitz - Chanukah: An End to Darkness
Dear friend,
Here is a beautiful Chanukah message penned by Rabbi Zalman Wishedski, Chabad rabbi of Basel, Switzerland, which we hope you will enjoy as much as we did.
It was his first Chanukah in jail: a musty, stuffy cell in the infamous Kiev prison. The year was 1950.
His wife and children, at home in Chernovitz, knew nothing of his condition, or even if he was alive. That year, his 10-year-old son lit the menorah. With tears in his eyes, the boy asked G‑d for one more Chanukah miracle: that his father return home.
He could not know that at that same moment his father, too, was lighting a Chanukah candle. As the other inmates crowded around him, hiding him from the jailers, he closed his eyes and struck a match . . .
He was accused of following “Rabbi Schneerson of Brooklyn,” of working secretly to strengthen Judaism in the Soviet Union, and he did not deny it. He was beaten and tortured, but not broken. They placed him in utter darkness, but even there he managed to bring light.
The man’s name was Moshe Wishedski, and he was my grandfather. His young son, Ben Zion Wishedski, is my father. Stalin is dead. The KGB is defunct. But Moshe Wishedski lives on. For this Chanukah, my 10-year-old son, Moshe Wishedski, will light a big, beautiful menorah, and this time without tears, but with joy and song.
Happy Chanukah!
The Chabad.org Editorial Team
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