“Why did I come here?” he kept asking himself. “Here I am, wasting the time of one of the spiritual giants of our generation! I have presented him with an intricate business problem with which he has no way of helping. What’s more, I have spent a great deal to come, and most importantly, I’ve delayed taking the steps needed to solve my problem.”

What motivated these thoughts?

In 5727 (1967), a traditional Jew began drawing close to Lubavitch in his local community. As he became more involved, he realized that Lubavitch was more than a local movement. He traveled to Eretz Yisrael, and was impressed with the network of educational facilities Lubavitch had established there. He then began to study the Rebbe’s thoughts, and was further impressed by his wisdom.

Now, he was a wealthy man and a generous donor to Jewish causes. Suddenly, in the midst of coming close to Lubavitch, he suffered a major financial setback. His business was threatened by bankruptcy and government investigation. When the local Lubavitch representative learned of his difficulties, he advised him to speak to the Rebbe.

“Like a drowning man clutching at a straw,” he thought, he had latched onto the idea.

When his local shliach had called Rabbi Chodakov, the Rebbe’s personal secretary, to arrange yechidus, Rabbi Chodakov had explained that the waiting list was full for the next few months. When the shliach explained that the issue was urgent, Rabbi Chodakov replied that the list for yechidus on the coming Sunday was not that long. “If the man would come and wait until yechidus is over,” he continued, “I will probably be able to squeeze him in before the Rebbe goes home.”

And so the man traveled to New York with one purpose in mind to see the Rebbe. During the trip, and while waiting to see the Rebbe, he had plenty of time to prepare himself. Most of the time was spent composing a 16-page letter which explained his business difficulties in great detail. When he entered the Rebbe’s room, he gave the Rebbe that letter.

The Rebbe looked at him and asked if he could describe the problem in his own words.

He answered that he could, but that it would not do justice to the issue; in the letter, he had explained every aspect clearly. So the Rebbe began to read. Surprisingly, each page took him about three minutes.

It was then, with the only sound being the ticking of the clock, that the man began having the thoughts mentioned at the outset. “For after all,” he thought, “the Rebbe is reading without a single pause. He hasn’t asked one question. There is no way he can fully comprehend the matter with such a reading. He’s just reading to be polite. I should never have come here.”

While he was having such thoughts, the Rebbe continued reading with absolute concentration. After slightly less than an hour had passed, he completed the letter and then spoke to his visitor.

First, the Rebbe asked him if he knew the meaning of bitachon (usually translated as “trust in G‑d”). The visitor answered that he did not, so the Rebbe told him: “Bitachon means feeling as confident and happy in the midst of one’s problems as one would feel if they had already been solved.”

Then the Rebbe told him not to reduce any of his regular donations to charity. For example, if he had always given a chai (Hebrew for 18) when he received an aliyah, he should continue to do so despite the difficulties he was experiencing.

And then the Rebbe advised him to check his tefillin.

When he heard that, the visitor protested: “I just bought a new pair in Kfar Chabad! They were the most expensive available, and supposedly of the highest quality. Must I still check them?”

“Have them checked anyway,” the Rebbe responded.

The Rebbe then proceeded to his visitor’s business difficulties. He asked him three questions: two rhetorical and one requiring a piece of information. From these questions, the man realized that the Rebbe had comprehended the matter in its entirety.

The Rebbe then proceeded to give the visitor several sentences of measured advice. The visitor recorded them mentally, sensing that this would be the most accurate appraisal of his situation that he would ever receive.

On the following day, he took his tefillin to the aged scribe, Reb Yeshayah Matlin, to have them checked. After a few hours, Reb Yeshayah called and explained that these were perhaps the most perfect pair of tefillin he had ever seen. Everything the calligraphy, the compartments, the straps was of the highest quality. There was, however, one difficulty; the passages had not been inserted in the proper order, and so the tefillin had been defective. Reb Yeshayah had corrected the problem, and now they were acceptable.

The man returned home and hired a team of lawyers to help him overcome his difficulties. To describe the situation to them, he used a copy of the letter he had given the Rebbe. The lawyers’ reading took much longer, and was continually punctuated by questions. In the end, he felt their analysis was far less clear than the Rebbe’s, so he shared the Rebbe’s advice with them and used it to steer a path through his problems.

After two years, he was able to extricate himself from his difficulties and return to his former affluence.