1. Monday night of Parshat Shelach 5627 [1866], R. Yitzchak, the Neschiz rebbe and author of Toldot Yitzchak, said that when he was young it was easier for him to serve God fully, because he had more strength and because he felt the impression made upon him of the tzaddikim who were alive in those days. But now in his old age, serving God is more difficult.
2. It was in the year 5623 [1862], I believe, when he was in the town of Ratna after the Sabbath but before the evening prayers, that he complained that the generation is terribly orphaned.
He said that his brother, the Kavler rebbe, of blessed memory, had told how their father had told him, “My son, if a person does not literally feel the pangs of a woman giving birth within fifty miles circumference, in order to pray for her sake, how is he worthy of being called a tzaddik?”
R. Yitzchak said, “I paid great heed to that story.”
And he said, in his humility, “I am not one of those who can feel this. Nor do I know if the tzaddikim of our generation can.”
One of the people listening, from his household, said, “And if a person that knows and feels, does he tell others that he feels?” meaning to say that the rebbe did know and feel, but was concealing it.
The rebbe replied, “Perhaps in my youth, when I was stronger.” And he cut his talk short and directed that they begin the evening prayers, so as not to speak of these matters at length.
And once I heard the rebbe say—and I believe that at that time I was particularly careful to hear the story, and perhaps the first time I didn’t hear it properly—as follows. His father, the brilliant Moharam, told his brother, the Kavler, “My son, my son, in order to be a leader of the generation—a guter yid—one needs a great test: if within a fifty mile circumference there is a woman having trouble giving birth and that tzaddik does not feel her sufferings and birth pangs exactly as she does in order to empathize with her and help her, how can such a person be called a guter yid?” And the rebbe concluded, “When my father said this, I paid very careful attention, to understand why he is saying this before me, that I should hear this. And I understood why he said this.”
And the master hid the rest of the story, but implied that his father had told this for his sake. And it is known that at the time his father was alive, the rebbe was no more than ten years old.
3. The rebbe told as follows: “In my youth, when I recited a chapter of Psalms, I would help a woman having trouble in childbirth in the entire local area. And that much more when Hashem helped me recite five chapters of Psalms.”
The writer states: this implies that this includes even those women having difficult childbirths in the area who did not come to inform the rebbe.
And he suppressed the rest of the story, as was his holy way.
The writer states: Usually, when he could not sleep he would say that this is because of a woman having trouble giving birth in some town. And one time we saw him having a restless sleep and saying, “There must be a good package arriving somewhere—iss muz shoyn zayn ergetz ein gut pekele,” and the next day a messenger came on behalf of a woman who had had a very difficult childbirth at that time in a nearby town.
Zichron Tov
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