mentalblog.com comments:
Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I had the impression that there was real interaction in the 50's and 60's - or is this just wishfull thinking?
I was not around in those days. I came after the heart attack of the Rebbe. I can only report on what I know. My point was to negate the comment of the Shaliach.
I remember Zushe Winner telling me back in 1990 that Lubavitch began to decline after Moshiach Sefer Torah, then the heart attack took it another notch down, and 5 Teves was the beginning of the very end, with the Rebbetzins petira the final blow...
this sounds right, CE. Yet there are thousands of people who think those were the 'good years'. It ain't so. In some way people who never seen the Rebbe are better off, they have not witnessed the dead man walking. I am talking 15 years before the stroke.
Yeah, I kinda agree...
Schneur's comment that “if he could do that the Rebbe would never have kept him around” is disturbing.
Indeed a recurring objection on this blog. I can't think of a more substantive objection to any leadership that the accusation that a leader surrounded himself with mediocrity. And although the “chief choizer” in many ways not mediocre at all, we all know what we are talking about. All the lackeys and not a single stand up individual. All of them, this could not have been coincidental. Why did the Rebbe surround himself and populated his institutions with complete morons?
schenur likes to push the envelope with similarly outrageous remarks; I have no use for that type of dialogue.
I wouldn’t say any of them are complete morons, they’re just humans with faults like everybody else. I think, and we have no idea what the Rebbe’s cheshbonos really were, that the Rebbe tried to take unusually qualified people, as opposed to most – if not all – other Rebbes who tended to fill their administrations with simpletons. The Rebbe probably had hoped for better results, but it’s easy for me to attack these people – I never had to walk a foot in their shoes. (However, I think that based on history, we probably should recognize by now that administrations really need straight people and not necessarily too many really “top-shelf” people.)
I don’t claim to have a list of better candidates for those jobs. Unfortunately, I think the Rebbe generally gave these people their space and let them do things their way (I would agree that perhaps the leash was too long) instead of micromanaging.
CE, we will have to disagree on the talent assessment of the Rebbe’s administration.
Who would you say displayed no talent?
the entire mazkirus.
R’ Hodakov was pretty highly qualified. Nissin Mandel was also pretty talented.
The rest were young and of the new generation – a lot of it probably has to do with being in the right place at the right time. Their talents my have seemed greater than they turned out be, or I should say were more limited than it may have seemed, but:
R’ Yoel was a very talented choizer. Leibel was a pretty capable guy (and was supposedly a gelernte Yid). I think Yudel is supposed to be an educated guy, and showed capabilities – I find him to be a very easy person to speak with. Benyomin Klein was always helpful… I dunno, these were all (my personal prejudices aside) well-meaning hard working folks. So, they’re human and have their faults and shortcomings, but who doesn’t?
I won’t argue that they have disappointed – but I don’t throw them under the buss just like that. And as much as it hurts me to agree with certain people, the real problem was that the Rebbe didn’t have a family member involved who cared about him or about any of this in a human way.
The mazrikus provided office assistance to the Rebbe. Their tools were from the 1960s - manual typewriters and antique filing cabinets. That Rebbe came to rely on his chauffeur seems to have been a bigger failure in the management team.
To CE. The mazkirus were exactly what the previous posting said they were. They were secretaries in charge of mail, driving, filing etc. Except for Rabbi H they were not given much responsibility.
R. Barry Gourary told me the following: Under his grandfather's regime Rabbi H and Dr, Mindel were back room people doing editin, translations etc.
In additino Mr. Gourary told me that his grandfather did have serious people about him. For example Chache Faigin Hayad was according to BG someone "vos men hot gekennt gayn zum tish mit" Meaning that he was a serious individual. BG reports that Chache and the rebbe had many shouting matches and disagreements about policy YET the Rayaatz loved him and kept him in his postion.
The RACHAL was another very serious person who had a job there not because of a failed shlichus or the ability to speak English (after all YK was born in the US) and his driver's permit which he apparently sometimes renewed..
Other rebbes also had serious gabbim , note the Satmar gabbai - Yossel Ashkenazi,the Belzer gabbai Sholom Fogel etc etc.
Next the real problem with the people close to the rebbe was that not one was a Chasid ben chasid, that is not one had any Messorah in Chabad , and understood what Chabad was. (of course the chief file er is the sole exception). But is it not strange that all the close peopel about the Rebbe were not Geza people.
Were there no Russian Chassidim who could help the Rebbe ?
As far as outrageous remarks, I believe Yoel's remarks between 1992-1994 make miny words look pretty tame. Would you not agree ?
All large Chassidic groups suffer from the leaders inability to give each and every follower the attention they demand and need.
But I think the 1980's were great days for Chabad . The rebbe was highly regarded by most other Chassidim and many came fro dollars. he Messianic potential was fantastic as long as no one openly spoke about it.I recall each and every issue of Kfar Chabad before the Yomim Tovim hinting at that. But once the cat was out of the bag it lost its power.
Schneur,
"The Messianic potential was fantastic as long as no one openly spoke about it."
One time when I was visiting at the Bostoner Rebbe's in 1973, another guest told me very tellingly and very knowingly that somebody had asked the Lubavitcher Rebbe ztzl if he was actually the Messiah, and that he would not deny it.
So there was a lot of that even before the eighties.
Geniuses have their peculiar ways. But if you look at Rebbes life you see that he was outside of the traditional Chasidic court. Even in Paris he was outside of the activities of Zalman Schneerson. He was in way a hermit.
The fact that even people closest to him, his public face, were as you describe Schneur, is a tremendous hindrance to him being able to influence people directly. I don’t know about Kfar Chabad that spent most of the eighties flaming Shach wars. I can only say how it felt for me.
"Were there no Russian Chassidim who could help the Rebbe?" It is my impression that the Rebbe made inroads among Polish chassidim - and had a clear policy to poach good bochurim from Litvish yeshivahs.
The Rebbe was always accesable in writing. Personal contact limited due to the multitudes seeking the contact. Similar to tha Alter Rebbe (see hakdama to Tanya) that's why the Rebbe instituted mashpi'im. It worked for most (and for those who it didn't the fault lies with the mekabel not the mashpia). Take it or leave it! "A farbrengen is a yechidus"!
There is the physical impossibility of tending to too many people directly, especially after suffering a devastating heart attack. Perhaps the Rebbe expected individual Chasidim to take groups of people under their wing.
Oh well,
Somebody has realized that the Rebbe was always surounded by yes men,and that's the way he liked it.Hodakov , to me at least seemed like the greatest yes man.Sad that nobody could've have stopped the messianic madness once the genie had left the bottle.Remains to be seen what will happen with Lubavitch:Regain sanity?Disintegrate into open was similar to the Sunni/Shite fights?Go Jonestown koolaid?Go Chritian like?
Actually, unTzig, it's been 13 years and what "will" happen has already happened. Some remained sane, the fight against certain shitos was strengthened over time, no one drank kool-aid, and your post is the only one that sounds like Xtian "love".
what has happened already!
97% of Lubavtichers believe the Rebbe is the Mssiah,
65% of them believe that is part of the cardinals of Judaism and Chassidism
35% beleive the Rebbe is alive in a body,
others though do not beleive them defend their right to beleive it and hold it in high regard...
Many customs have been incorporated in practice: make a shvil, say yechi at blowing shofar and at reciting Shema Yisroel and many other practices.
For all these one can see all the time in Chabad.info (what people write in DaasHakohol forum) and Beys Moshiach. And for the "moderates" one can see at Shturem.net and Col.Org.il to see how the moderates beleive. One of them is R. Kahn which has innovated that a tenet in shlichus is to sanctify the name of the Rebbe.
All the above is what actually has happened already...now let's see what is about to happen...
tuvye, and you get your "statistics" from... where?
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