Before long it became the classic “Ani Maamin”
Several weeks ago, ArtScroll released an uplifting and inspirational book called Faith Amid the Flames, written by my brother Yosef Chaim Golding. The book is the life story of his father-in-law, Reb Yosef Friedenson — and while this isn’t a book review or even a plug, it is a story about the larger-than-life Reb Yossel that is so appropriate for these days.
The year was 1978, and Suki and I were about to release our first album with MBD — the Yom Tov album V’chol Maaminim. Although the songs were all based on the niggunim of the Yamim Noraim, we felt it needed a Yiddish song to round it out. It was during the Three Weeks, and my brother Yosef Chaim told me he was going up to White Lake to visit his father-in-law. I decided to join the trip, as I always felt close to Reb Yossel and his Rebbetzin Gittel. To be honest, no one made a better stuffed cabbage than she did, and who doesn’t have room for some delicious chaluptches?
When I got there, Reb Yossel asked me what I was working on. I told him about the album, and he immediately said “I have the perfect song for you!” He then stopped, looked me straight in the eye and added, “This is a holy song.” He was talking about “Habeit MiShmayim U’re’ei.” The lyrics were written by Reb Chaskel Rottenberg Hy”d, and the tune was composed by Reb Yosef Mandlebaum a”h, the gabbai of the Bobover Rebbe ztz”l. The niggun was sung in the concentration camps, specifically on the way to the gas chambers. We only used two of the verses (the song actually has four), but when MBD sang the song in the studio, the entire studio staff was mesmerized by this special niggun.
Once he arrived in America, Reb Yossel spent most of his life in the Agudah office writing about the gedolim who did and didn’t survive the Holocaust. I believe it was he who suggested to Rabbi Moshe Sherer that at the Siyum HaShas they should sing the famous “Ani Maamin,” which they’ve been doing ever since. Some of you are surely familiar with the dramatic story about the salvation of that particular Ani Maamin. But in speaking to my friend Reb Shaul Shenker, a nephew of Ben Zion Shenker a”h, not only did he confirm the story, he added information most people don’t know.
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