Everyone's Rebbe

On Sunday, June 12, 1994 I participated in the most inspiring and emotional funeral I have ever witnessed. The world's greatest Chassidic leader of our time, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson, was laid to rest at the old Montifore Cemetary in Queens, New York.

I had a strange feeling departing from the cemetery. In one sense I was happy to finally be leaving the area of the dead. In another sense, I was caught up in a most extraordinary situation.

As I was leaving I was told that together with the thousands who came to pay respects to the Rebbe, we would have to leave using the long route. Thus, we had to make a three mile walk through the cemetery and back to the buses that were waiting for us.

The main road led through the old cemetery. It took us to a double roadway. On each side of the road were old gates attached to granite portals inscribed with the names of communities that had come and long been gone. Here I saw the groups called "Lansleit" of Kremanchuk, Paltave, Ienfrak, Galica, Romania, Hungary, White Russia, Germany, Old Poland, Marmish, Lizensk and so many more. Then there were the American groups: New York Mens Club, Coney Island Boys, Bronx's Hebrew Alliance, the Fellowship of B'nai Brith and many anglicized groups and families.

All the long forgotten were there witnessing history in the making. The proud founders of our families were all bearing witness to the event unfolding. They had been the first to gain a place in this piece of land called America, the land of freedom for tens of thousands. The sacrifices they made to remain Jews in the "Goldehneh Medina", the golden country, as it was called by the green horns, is and was their legacy.

Here in the wet rainy place were thousands of people walking at a very slow and deliberate gait. There was this strange feeling, a peculiar awareness of many people that I could not see. Here I was walking far in the back and seeing the mass of people. They were coming from everywhere. All the side streets in the old cemetery led to this main walkway. From where I was I could make out the profiles of old men and women weeping, Rabbis, learned colleagues and students walked as if in a trance, wondering what should and what could they do. Here were people from every country. The dress of many were foreign to me. The language heard that day ranged from Yiddish, Hebrew, French, Portuguese, Italian, Persian, Spanish and the king's English spoken by the elite of the British Empire. But the tears were all in the Mama Loshen, the mother tongue! The sorrow was universal. It knew no boundaries.

Then there were young mothers walking with their children, who would every once in while break loose and run onto the gates and rusty fences. They were walking ever so lightly, gently balancing themselves between the poles with the long chains marking the property lines between one lodge plot and another. The childrens playful walk was the walk of innocence and purity. What a big and safe playground this place was to them. Every person was Jewish and friendly. Death and the seriousness of the day were not visited upon the children.

Yet here was a stillness taking place that I cannot explain. Something was happening right before my eyes. I felt a spirit but could not place it.

As I walked on and on, past the many areas where the dead were buried, I saw more and more people walking. Where were all these people coming from? Could it be that the dead were walking out of their graves joining us in the funeral? "Were the dead coming alive?" I asked myself. That would explain the never ending lines of people walking by; those many languages and different modes of dress. "It must be the resurrection that has been a belief and prayer for thousands of years coming true," I thought.

For the past 40 years the Rebbe had spoken about the coming of the Moshiach; the time when all people would return and there would be the great in-gathering of the lost tribes. All Jews would remember that they belong to a very old but great nation. Our brethren from the far-flung countries would return and join as one mighty people, a nation of special people.

At this funeral I knew that the Moshiach was hard at work. The return was happening. Witnessing the masses, I was experiencing a rehearsal of what will happen when the True Moshiach will be revealed.

As the rain hit my face I felt that the very heavens were crying. Perhaps the heavens were being washed for a very special guest, my Rebbe, your Rebbe, our Rebbe.