WHAT ARE THE CHANCES?

“Psssst,” I heard from behind me in the middle of the last class of the day. I turned around and saw Shmuli, my good friend.

“Shmuli,” I whispered. “This is not the time, we’ll talk after class.”

“But Mendy,” Shmuli insisted.

“Is it so urgent?” I blurted out as out of the corner of my eye I could see the teacher looking at us.

“Okay, you’re right,” I heard Shmuli say. “But let’s talk right after class.”

I tried to forget about it and concentrate on the lesson. As usual, our teacher ended the last class with a few words about the Geula. “Boys, another day has passed and the Geula still did not come. That’s terrible. We are still in galus. But tomorrow, surely will be the Geula!”

I waved my hand and when I was called upon I said, “But yesterday we said that and thought so and the day before that and all the days before that, so what makes us so sure that the Geula will be tomorrow?”

It was late and the lack of patience on the part of my classmates is why our teacher said, “I will answer that when we are more focused. That will surely be in the time of the Geula. Good night.”

Everyone rushed to leave and only Shmuli and I remained in our places, waiting for the classroom to empty out.

As soon as the door closed behind the last boy, Shmuli whispered to me, “Guess what … I heard that the principal is about to announce a special contest.”

What was so special about that, you want to know. The reason is simple. It’s because we have always loved learning contests and in nearly every one of them, we lead the way.

“Fantastic,” I enthused. “Did you hear any of the details?”

Shmuli enjoyed my curiosity and dropped the bomb. “The contest is to learn Tanya by heart and for every line of Tanya, you get a raffle ticket.”

“Wow!” I shouted. “We can accumulate lots of raffle tickets!”

Over the next few days, our classmates did not understand why we hardly joined their games during recess. They did not know that the learning of Tanya by heart that we were busy with would almost guarantee that we would be the winners of the first prize in the contest, which was a set of Likkutei Sichos Parshiyos.

All their efforts to pressure us into telling them whether there was something we knew which they did not were futile.

When the principal came into our classroom and announced the contest we acted surprised, but we were already in the middle of learning chapter twelve. We had already earned hundreds of raffle tickets.

All the students in the school, from the highest classes down to the lowest, were busy learning Tanya by heart. Every line of Tanya was worth a raffle ticket! Have you ever heard of such a contest? The principal appointed testers and there was no such thing as free time. Every free moment in school and at home was devoted to learning more lines.

You realize that Shmuli and I did not have to spend much time studying. We were almost always on line to be tested. Everyone knew that we had put in a lot of work and were almost guaranteed to win the first prize.

The days passed and it was soon the end of the contest. Raffle tickets were put into a huge box which contained thousands of tickets.

The assembly began and after some opening remarks, the principal began the raffle. On a special table were the prizes with the top one being a set of Likkutei Sichos Parshiyos. The principal mixed the raffle tickets as well as he could and then called up a first grader to remove the winning tickets. “Please tell us your name and how many lines of Tanya you were tested on,” said the principal.

The little boy’s voice could be heard over the microphone. “My name is Zalmy and I was tested on ten lines.” The principal smiled and said, “So you have ten raffle tickets. Now please take out the first ticket, which will be the winner of the tenth prize.”

The principal took the ticket Zalmy had taken out and read: The winner is … Zalmy!

We were all surprised and after a moment of silence, there was applause.

I thought, Zalmy won this time, against the odds, but the next time he has no chance of winning.

“And the winner of the second prize is … Zalmy!”

“Again?” I heard voices around me exclaiming. “How is that possible?” The principal was as surprised as anyone but he recovered and said, “If Zalmy won a second time, then he deserves it. Now for the third winner.”

This time, another student took out a raffle ticket and the principal announced, “The third winner is… Zalmy again.”

This repeated itself with all the drawings until the tenth. Zalmy won time after time to the amazement of all.

Then it was time for the tenth drawing and Shmuli whispered, “We have no chance. Zalmy is going to win again.”

“What are you saying?” I replied confidently. “He has only one ticket left in there.”

“True, but he won all the raffles until now.”

“So what? His winning goes against the odds and he has hardly any chance of winning now. His unreasonable winnings until now don’t give him any more than one chance out of the thousands of tickets to win now.”

“I’m telling you,” insisted Shmuli, “I feel he will definitely win.”

“You feel, but I know that he has hardly any chance at all.”

Our teacher who was standing nearby heard our debate and spoke up. “Mendy, remember your question about the Geula?”

“Yes,” I said.

“You yourself answered the question. The Rebbe says that the Geula should have come already. So we can think and feel that the galus will continue, as it has until now, in an illogical way, but we know that it won’t because the reality of a Jew being in galus for one more moment makes no sense at all.”

“You know what?” whispered Shmuli to me. “If I win, we will share the set.”

The principal pulled out a ticket and read, “The winner of the set of Likkutei Sichos Parshiyos is … Shmuli!”