I had the great zechut to know Rebbetzin Jungreis personally – it wasn’t for very long and we were not very close, but enough so that it feels like I lost my grandmother. I met her by chance. I know there’re no coincidences, and all is orchestrated from Above, but at the time it felt totally random. In the beginning of 2015, while sweating during physical therapy after knee surgery, the back door opened, and in walked the Rebbetzin. I didn’t notice at first how fragile she was, or how tiny and thin. All I saw was a very pretty woman with a huge smile on her face and sparkling stars in her eyes. I was immediately drawn to her and was sure I recognized her from the picture on the back of her book Life is A Test which I had recently finished reading.
However, “We cannot disclose other patient’s names” was the reply I got when I asked a staff member if she was who I thought she was.
I gathered my courage and went to play with the weights next to where she was slowly paddling on the stationary bike, smiling. “Shalom,” I said in Hebrew, and her eyes lit up even more.
“Come, come,” she signaled, with her hand patting the bicycle’s handlebar, “stand next to me.”
And this is how we started talking. She had lots of stories; looking back, I deeply regret I did not memorize them, because now I cannot remember them all. What a missed opportunity. “What shall I call you?” I asked, and she smiled even more and said, “Rebbetzin! Call me Rebbetzin! I am The Rebbetzin.”
“Rebbetzin, you know,” I kind of complained after a few minutes of conversation, “I have to tell you, I cried while reading your book. You really made me cry.”
“Well, of course,” she giggled and then became serious for a second. “I cried when I wrote it,” and smiled again.
And that was it. I was in love. Just like that. The next week I noticed that the PT receptionist brought over to the Rebbetzin some groceries from the supermarket: a challah in a plastic, a few fruits or vegetables and maybe a couple of other knickknacks. The challah shocked me. “How can it be that this holy lady eats store-bought challah,” I thought and it made me sad. The next time I came to PT I brought with me a homemade challah and asked her if she would honor me with accepting it.
“Of course,” she said. “Thank you so much, you are so sweet.”
The week after that we met at the PT again. As soon as she waltzed into the room she called me “Smadar, your challah was so good. It’s been years since I ate a water challah, and yours was really, really good.”
I was on cloud nine. The next week I did not see her at therapy. I asked about her, but, of course, no one would give me privileged information. Since she previously gave me her email address – not just gave it to me, hovered over me and pointed with her finger to the letters I was typing to make sure I entered it correctly so there was “no chance you might not be able to get in touch with me if you need me” – I emailed her to ask her if it would be okay if I continued giving her my homemade challah every week, and where I could bring it to.
She emailed me back:
Dear Smadar,
Thank you so much. I enjoyed your challah immensely. Please G-D, I will be back at physical therapy soon. In the interim, if you could leave a note with the challah saying that it was for me and no one else and email me when you drop it off, someone will pick it up for me.
Shabbat Shalom and Chag Sameach. Much love and many brachot,
Rebbetzin
This was last October, just after Rosh Hashanah.
Her son, Rav Yisroel Jungreis, while giving his hesped, cried and said: “She wanted so much to hold on and stay for this coming Rosh Hashanah…” But she couldn’t. Hashem had other plans.
And so it was. I did hafrashat challah every week, asked for a refuah shleimah for my dearest Rebbetzin, and brought it over to the therapy place with a note: “This is for the Rebbetzin and no one else! Refuah shleimah, much love and Shabbat Shalom, Smadar & family.”
During the levaya, as I sat in the Agudah in Far Rockaway, listening to the eulogies, I realized how little I knew the Rebbetzin.
I heard Rabbi Reisman, other rabbanim and her children and grandchildren talking about her, saying their farewells with cracking voices and bursts of sobbing.
They talked about her relentless fight with the American Holocaust, assimilation; a fight that was always done with love.
She was propelled by pure love: love for every Jew, love for the Torah, love for her tradition, our people’s tradition, and love and the utmost respect and inspiration drawn from her ancestors and her family yichus. They talked about her kedusha that emerged from her deepest and sincere caring about others. And they talked about her humbleness and humility that had no boundaries but moved mountains and people.
And then it hit me. And I understood.
She did it for me. She didn’t really need my challah. She realized how happy she made me by accepting my challah, and because she had so much love and caring for everyone, she just wanted to love me too. She wanted to make me happy. She did it for me.
HaRav Dessler zt”l said that love is the outcome of giving. I felt it with all its might as my soul became tied with bounds of love to the Rebbetzin.
So what did I learn from this tiny giant?
I learned that love is knowing how to receive – even if you do not need anything, or this specific thing.
Love is knowing how to make the other person feel important and needed.
Love is knowing how to be very humble and how to accept from anyone.
Love is staying simple and accessible no matter how great you are.
