The prophecy in the Zohar about the children of the generation of Geula has come true. * A group of T’mimim who felt that this was a burning issue decided to take action. * The difficulties, the mother who complained about the delay in publishing – the full story behind the series “D’var Malchus L’Yeladim” published by Tzivos Hashem in Eretz Yisroel.
If you want to describe what has happened most recently regarding the publishing of books for children and youth, there are no better words than a Geula revolution.
The selection of books for children has grown significantly. Not just story and adventure books fill the shelves, but also books with quality content that draw the child deep into the world of Chabad. Older Chassidim of the previous generation are not likely to have been exposed to the tremendous Chassidic knowledge which children are exposed to nowadays.
Still, even with the abundance of books the publishers have been providing us with, a series of books of another sort altogether recently caught my attention. This series was published by the Tzivos Hashem youth movement in Eretz Yisroel and it is meant as a sort of continuation to the D’var Malchus L’Noar that preceded it, although it is significantly different.
When I visited the bookstore near my home, the owner suggested that I buy the new book that the distribution agent had just left in his store. For close to an hour I held the book as I looked through it; I simply couldn’t put it down. The deep content which is presented in language suitable even for children, held me riveted. I was determined to interview those who produced this amazing series, which presents these fundamental sichos to the soldiers of Tzivos Hashem.
Inquiries at the Tzivos Hashem office led me to a group of bachurim who are in 770 this year on K’vutza. They were happy to tell me how the book came to be and about the positive feedback they have gotten from Anash and schools.
A B’SURA OF GEULA
Can you give us a brief overview for the benefit of those who are not familiar with the series?
It’s a real revolution for anyone involved in educating children of the seventh generation. In this new series, the sichos of the D’var Malchus are reworked so they are suitable for children. Each sicha appears in three different formats. First, a synopsis of a point in the sicha is written in easy to understand language. Then, there is a mashal (parable) that conveys the content of the sicha in story form, imprinting the point of the D’var Malchus on the child’s memory. Finally, there is a short poem in rhyme which enables the child to review the point of the sicha once again, without their feeling that they’re constantly reviewing the same thing.
To demonstrate how children enjoy the series, we heard about a Chabad family that just spent an entire year on the D’var Malchus at their Shabbos table. At the meal, one of the older children reviewed a point in the sicha. Then one of the younger girls reviewed the mashal. Finally, one of the youngest children read the poem to a Chassidishe tune that he “composed” for the poem that week.
The father told us that the children look forward all week to this and sit riveted to their seats in order to see how their brothers “perform” as they review the D’var Malchus in their own style. “It transformed our Shabbos table,” he said.
If we can sum up this series with two points, it would be: 1) the series is suitable for all ages and 2) the content is arranged in an easy and experiential way which motivates the child to read and learn on his own.
HOW DID IT ALL BEGIN?
I was amazed to discover, yet again, how like all good things, this project began at the initiative of young bachurim who are the spearheads in everything associated with the Rebbe’s inyanim.
So how did it happen – bachurim decided to publish a series of books?
Not exactly. It began when a group of us bachurim were sitting in yeshiva in Tzfas and talking about the fact that with all the good activities and programs that were done to instill the importance of learning the D’var Malchus among children, we still had not succeeded in getting children to realize the importance on their own and be enthusiastically involved in learning it.
After looking into the matter we realized that what was missing was awareness among the children of this important topic, and those involved in chinuch were not able to convey the message in a way that spoke to them convincingly. So we collected dozens of meshalim that convey the importance of learning and being involved in the sichos of the D’var Malchus. We consulted with a member of the educational board of Camp Oro shel Moshiach, R’ Meir Wilschansky, who is experienced in producing publications aimed at explaining inyanei Geula and Moshiach to children.
Then we produced a booklet called, Pokchim Einayim – Lama v’Eich (Opening Our Eyes – How and Why). The booklet was given out among the bachurim who work with children and are in contact with children of Tzivos Hashem. They “farbrenged” with the kids and revived the idea of learning D’var Malchus by children.
We did not anticipate how successful this would be. A short time after the booklet was printed, hundreds of copies were given out to counselors in various camps and the idea took off.
GETTING UNDERWAY
It’s still a long way from one booklet with a few dozen pages to a beautiful series of books! How did it happen?
After the children got excited about it, we discovered the root of the problem. We heard about more and more children who were inspired to learn the D’var Malchus but gave up after a few weeks. The various editions that were available at that time were not suitable for all types of children.
The camp counselors, directors, the counselors in Tzivos Hashem clubs, and anyone who was involved in this area, spoke to the children in “lights without vessels.” They demanded of them and explained to them that this is our chayus and our “order of the day” in these final moments before the Geula, but the vast majority were lacking the most critical thing: sichos rewritten on their level.
At that point, a dynamic Chassidishe young man got involved. His wife is in chinuch and the two of them began urging us to continue the work we started and to edit another series of sichos from the D’var Malchus that would be more accessible for younger children.
We asked a mashpia who greatly encouraged us. We wrote to the Rebbe and after opening to a positive answer, we got to work.
How do you take a long abstract sicha consisting of fourteen sections and turn it into a brief easy point that children can relate to, while preserving the authenticity of the sicha? How do you decide which mashal is suitable and which topic in the sicha to focus on?
Before writing the sichos and finding the meshalim, each member of the editorial team studied the sicha and wrote down the main points as he understood them. Then we met and discussed the chiddush of the sicha and tried to reach a consensus about the right approach to take to present it to children.
In order to enable children to concentrate throughout the learning of the sicha and retain the sequence of ideas we decided to write things very briefly so a child would be able to read the sicha quickly, get the point, and review it.
While working on the sicha, the rest of the members of the editorial team worked to come up with possibilities for meshalim. Two days later, we met again and chose the most suitable, the most easily grasped, and most relevant mashal to the lives of children. In every story or mashal we made the child the focus of the story, so our target audience would feel an emotional connection to the content being conveyed by means of the mashal.
PUBLISHING
How did Tzivos Hashem get involved?
In the winter of 5773, the offices of the national organization of Tzivos Hashem were gearing up to launch a national campaign to prepare the children of Anash for Yud-Alef Nissan. At that point, we already had edited material on an entire seifer of Chumash. We tried our luck and sent the material we had to the director of the organization, R’ Levi Nachshon. He reviewed it and loved it. We hadn’t anticipated that he would take it seriously and rush its publication.
The work, that until then had been done relatively slowly, got a big push and we went into high gear. The material was carefully gone over by R’ Chaim Levi Yitzchok Ginsberg, mashpia in Yeshivas Tomchei T’mimim in Rishon L’Tziyon. It was sent back to us with his helpful notations that helped us be more precise in working over the sicha and focusing the children more on the Rebbe’s chiddush and its connection to them, the children of the generation of Geula.
Apparently, despite our efforts, we did not always manage to target the chiddush of the sicha. After getting his comments, there were sichos that we rewrote completely.
After hundreds of hours of work, we submitted the first collection to R’ Nachshon which included all the sichos for the book of VaYikra. The material was sent on for editing that would make the language suitable for children. Then it had to have vowels inserted, be proofread and paginated, and when this lengthy process was completed, sent to the printer.
It took a year and a half from when we began the project until we saw the first books. The volume was printed with a striking, colorful binding and was given out to soldiers in Tzivos Hashem and then reached the bookstores. The enthusiastic feedback that we got motivated us to complete the job.
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE?
There is a similar series called D’var Malchus L’Noar that was also produced by Tzivos Hashem. It deals with the same sichos and is meant for children and youth. What is the difference between the series?
The name of the previous series gives you the answer. It is for noar which means children from ages of 12-14 who have the ability to focus on relatively deeper material for half an hour and learn the entire sicha with the complete flow of ideas as they were said in the original sicha.
Not every child is capable of this. There are many children who have a hard time dealing with sichos that are that long. In this new series we edited the sicha and present it in a much shorter format so that it would be suitable for these children or younger children.
After the books reached Lubavitcher communities, we heard about a very young child who learns the sicha and the mashal on his own and then tells it to other boys in school during “Chassidishe recess.” And that is not unusual. The new series enables any child to do this.
In addition, in the previous series the editors tried to include the entire flow of the sicha. There are many sichos that include a number of points that are explained at length. Many children lose sight of the forest for the trees and get confused and frustrated. In the new series, we focused on only one point in order to leave the child with as much substance that he can readily grasp and enable him to remember it better.
The main thing is that in this series, each sicha has a mashal which turns the learning into an enjoyable experience (see sidebar for what the Rebbe says about the pedagogic value of chinuch and conveying messages in this way). Now, learning the D’var Malchus is no longer the province of more intellectually inclined children. Every parent who wants to enable his children to acquire the messages of the D’var Malchus can buy them this series and the kids themselves will want to spend hours reading it. The parent won’t find it necessary to nudge them to do so.
When a child reads the edited sicha and then the mashal and the poem, he is reviewing the point of the sicha three times. This lets it sink in and remain in his memory long-term.
POWERFUL IMPACT
Do you have any stories to illustrate that the series is a success?
There is no question that the series has captivated the children. Just recently, we heard from a friend in Eretz Yisroel who went home on an “off” Shabbos. On the bus he sat next to a soldier in Tzivos Hashem who was going to visit relatives in the south. On the way, he took out a volume of D’var Malchus L’Yeladim and was glued to it.
A mother called the office of Tzivos Hashem at the beginning of Cheshvan and asked whether it was possible to get the volume of B’Reishis which hadn’t appeared in the stores yet. When she was told no, she said her children were the ones who were urging her to buy the next volume in the series!
I can go on and on, about a local weekly newsletter for Anash in Tzfas which prints the sicha that appears in the book in the column for children, or about a salesman in a big bookstore in Yerushalayim who said a boy came into the store with his parents and disappeared. They found him sitting in a corner of the store reading from D’var Malchus L’Yeladim, and many other stories that show that children enjoy the series.
LAUNCHING PAD
With the completion of this series, are you planning on taking a break or do you have other projects that you’re working on?
We just started working on a booklet for children that will explain in the simplest way, the necessity according to Torah, of the eternal physical life of the Rebbe MH”M.
We have many plans for the future. In the meantime, we are focusing on this job and when we finish it, we can begin working on other ideas. We pray and hope that the Rebbe will “ruin” our galus plans and be revealed to all with the true and complete Geula!
NO MORE EXCUSES
To conclude, we will quote the mashpia, R’ Chaim Levi Yitzchok Ginsberg, who explains the importance of this series:
The enormous importance in learning and living the D’var Malchus is a given and something which has been spoken and written about in every possible place. These are the last sichos, for now, that we heard from the Rebbe in which he prepares us for the current situation.
Learning these sichos, in which the Besuras Ha’Geula and the Goel are woven throughout, is what enables each of us to “live Moshiach” in a genuine, p’nimius’dike way. It is the most direct and easy way to hasten the hisgalus of the Rebbe.
This is true for all sectors and ages, but is all the more so for the children of Tzivos Hashem who are called “Meshichoi,” for their very existence calls out “Geula,” and they are at the forefront in bringing about the hisgalus.
This new series opens a new window to the light of Geula for young children. Today, boruch Hashem, all the Yetzer Hara’s excuses are eliminated and every parent and teacher to whom inyanei Moshiach and Geula are dear, can urge his children and students to learn the sichos of the D’var Malchus in this terrific series.
WHAT DOES THE REBBE SAY?
One of the difficulties that those learning the sichos of the D’var Malchus encounter is the deep terminology which is used, such as, “uniting upper and lower,” “revealing the essence of the neshama,” and other lofty and abstract concepts that often stymie young and old.
Sometimes it seems that explaining these deep Chassidic ideas is not for little children, but the Rebbe has a different approach. With his Geula vision, he instructs us to see to it to adapt even the deepest ideas so they are on the level of children.
Even the loftiest and deepest ideas in Torah can be explained to youngsters, whether in years or knowledge, by using an example and mashal so that the concept descends and devolves from level to level to “three thousand meshalim” until the lowest possible level, but at the same time, the mashal is precise and fits the nimshal in all details aside from the fact that the mashal speaks on a lower level. Consequently, when the garment of the mashal is removed, one receives the actual nimshal in the most literal sense.
… this is the lesson from what was said before, it is necessary to try and explain every topic in Torah including the deepest ones, even to children, whether young in age or young in knowledge.
Especially when you take into account that this Jew already learned the entire Torah – for being in his mother’s womb “a candle is lit over his head … and he is taught the entire Torah!” … And since this is the case, what is surprising about needing to and being able to teach him all parts of Torah even the deepest parts of Torah! (Sicha R’ei 5746, Hisvaaduyos vol. 4, p. 310)
In the sicha of Shabbos VaYechi 5747, the Rebbe emphasized that explaining Chassidus to children hastens the Geula and the Zohar says explicitly that this applies only to our generation: especially after “it is permissible and a mitzva to reveal this wisdom” … that the “wellsprings” themselves come forth in a way of spreading even to the “outside,” an outside of which there is no further outside, literally to every single Jew, even to the little children, for all of them need to leave galus “with this composition of yours that is Seifer HaZohar… they will go out with it from galus in mercy” … that as the Yemos HaMoshiach approach, even ordinary children will be able to be knowledgeable in the secrets of the inner parts of Torah. (This was edited by the Rebbe!)