We asked readers:Which song got you through a rough patch in your life or ignited a fire to help you access your best self?
ITwas 1992 and the Iron Curtain had fallen, bringing religious freedom to the Soviet people. Most of the Soviet Jews who had held on tightly to their religion had already left to rebuild their lives in Israel, while the Jews who remained in Russia had pretty much lost any remnant of their identities. As a Yeshiva University student, I was part of an initiative called Yeshiva and University Students for the Spiritual Revival of Soviet Jews (YUSSR), to help reconnect Soviet Jews to their heritage. We ran programs throughout the year in cities all across the former Soviet Union.
That Yom Kippur, I traveled to Novosibirsk, the largest city in Siberia, to help the Jews there connect to the holy day. I ran a program for Kol Nidrei on the night of Yom Kippur, then woke up on Yom Kippur morning to a dark sky and blizzard conditions. After trudging for two hours in the snow, I finally found the old shul that had been abandoned for so many years. When I walked in, I found ten aged men standing around listening as one of them read from an old worn-out machzor. There were ten elderly women huddled on the other side of the mechitzah, clutching their pocketbooks and standing in silence. They knew it was a holy day but had no idea what to do. As I approached them, they smiled at me and asked if I spoke Russian. I shook my head. “English?” I asked. “Nyet,” they replied. “Ivrit?” “Nyet,” again. “Yiddish?” they asked. I nodded and their faces lit up. Full disclosure — I do not actually speak much Yiddish. I do know part of one Yiddish song that my grandmother used to sing to me, though, and it came into my mind. I began to sing, “Oyfn Pripetchik,” a beautiful old song about children learning Torah. The womens’ eyes glowed with delight, and they all started swaying and singing with me. For the next three hours, in that little shul in Siberia, we sang “Oyfn Pripetchik” over and over and over again. The song lit up the darkness of that snowy Yom Kippur and offered hope in a little shul in Siberia.
—Shoshana Schechter,
New Hempstead, New York
November 28, 1966 was our special day. Added to the excitement of our wedding was the anticipation of the special song that Bentzion Shenker had composed just for us.
My chassan, Yoily Weiss, was a good friend to Reb Benzion and helped him in business, and Yoily asked him to create a song for us. Reb Bentzion was happy to be able to give something back.
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