The Chinese-Speaking Chassid Who Worked for the Treasury | Mitchell Silk | Behind the Bima #194

Don't tell me you've heard that joke already. Actually, I've been asked to recite a Tang Dynasty poem. It translates roughly as follows, the white sun sets over the mountains. The Yellow River flows into the sea. If you would like to get a thousand more miles of vision on the central plains of China, you should go up one additional flight in the pagoda. Welcome back behind the Bema. Always a pleasure to be joined at my dear friend and colleague, my brother Rabbi Philip Moskowitz. It's a great conversation today. The honorable Reb Mosha Mitchell Silk. I would say the most unusual person, the combination of the lives he leads. I don't know that anyone has before. Super excited to get to that. But before we do, Rabbi Moskowitz, I'm noticing you're wearing a very nice pair of shoes today. Um and it made me think >> I was not expecting that. No, you didn't see that coming. It made me think cuz it's been in the news recently how President Trump he got I don't know he always did this, but more recently he's very into giving out floor shine dress shoes >> dress shoes to people he likes. And then they feel obligated or pressured to wear it. Not always the right size for them. Media's picking up and zooming in on all of that. But it made us both think about a good friend of ours. Super generous, super kind. And he also has that similar hobby. He loves to get shoes for people he cares about. >> I remember the first time he did it. I think one of my children opened the door on a Sunday morning. They're like "Daddy, were you expecting a pair of shoes at the door?" >> [laughter] >> I said, "Oh, don't worry. I I could guess who it's from. But it's very generous of that person." And um and it it's good for us because we're basically in the same shoes all week long. And you do need a upgrade. Shine. >> all the time. No question about it. >> You're a shoe shine person, right? You shine your shoes? I don't shine them that often. I do occasionally. Definitely after a trip to Israel, but um I believe in it. I believe in a nice shine. I do. You know, it's there's no more There used to be people at the airport. If you got there early enough, there was the shoe shine guy at the airport. It's a lost art. You don't find the the shoe shine people anymore. >> You do not find the shoe shine people anymore. >> It was part of my childhood. My father had downstairs in the basement his desk drawer. He had first the canister that you had to >> Sure. >> You had to pop it open. You had to pop it open. Exactly. Then you had the brush that you would you know, and then >> Now you Your father did it? No, I mean I must I must have seen him do it and at some point I took over. It was my job. >> So it's so funny you say that. I have such fun memories of shining my father's shoes and I took pride in it. Like it was a lot of fun for me before Yom Tov. >> favorite part? The brush and the rubbing it in? No, definitely the end where you like brush it really quickly. Yeah, yeah, that was definitely my favorite part. >> somebody to like put it on. The question was where do you put the shoe to hold it in place when you do the sh- >> Right. Yeah, there you go. Now my kids are going to listen to this and crack up because if you were to go into my closet right now, you would see that I have a shoe shine kit in my closet. Partially because >> yet? It's been opened. Usually before Pesach around then I'll I'll shine my shoes. But for me there's like a nostalgic component to that of my childhood and doing it for my father. I'm still waiting. No one in my family has yet stepped forward and offered to shine my shoes, but this could be an invitation to them. It is you know, these little things it's funny that we both have the same memory considering how you think I'm so much older than you are. But anyway, it's it's interesting we have the same memory, but it's a positive memory. Meaning at the time it was a chore. At the time it was probably annoying, but looking back you say that helped make me who I am. Like a pride in a properly shined pair of shoes. Do people have that anymore? I feel like today's generation like oh my shoes aren't shined. Throw them out. Go on Amazon. [laughter] Order a new pair. >> Right, right. opposed >> like go to the basement, take out the kit, shine them. And that's sparkle, that's shine, that That going into Yom Tov with like a uh uh Now listen to me say that because there are a lot of things about my childhood that I clearly did not enjoy and probably resented. Shiny shoes wasn't one of them. Like I I I remember volunteering for it. I enjoyed it. Now, my mother might comment on this and say I have revisionist history, but I but I I have like very fun memories of that. But I agree. Like what will our >> What's What's one of the chores that was annoying to you? Well, I I seem to remember I did things around the house that apparently my mother does not remember. So, [laughter] I remember vacuuming. I'm going to go with your mom on this one. I remember cleaning bathrooms when we needed help with that. My mom does not have a memory of that stuff. Um it may or may not be a running joke in my household where my kids make fun of me and say, "Oh, Dad, is that you know?" But But I seem to remember helping out around the house a lot more than my mother remembers. Right. But I have I have great memories of that. Shoveling? Were you a shoveler? I was absolutely a shoveler. Actually, in fact, I have a very funny story. I have a cousin who's from an area where they didn't have a lot of snow. >> I just interviewed someone the other day cuz I'm picturing we're obviously not in the Northeast, which got a lot of snow this winter. But as people shoveled, they just put their AirPods in, they listen to seven podcasts and while they shoveled, broke their back. When we were young, there was no there were no like with the headphones, with a Discman, like and there was no >> what did you do? See, for me, that was part of the fun was when everyone went out to shovel, it was your whole block was outside at the same time and it was like a a cold block party basically where everyone was shoveling. If you finished early, you were pitching in and helping your neighbor. >> Right. I have great memories of shoveling. >> A lot of people turned it into a business. My friend our friend Shy Young was the one all over turned into a business, hire other people, leverage it. >> what he did? >> Oh, yeah. I saw actually somebody posted a meme the other day when it last snow stormed in New York. It was a picture of the kid shoveling. He's like, "Keep an eye on that kid. That's the next, you know, zillionaire or whatever." Like Yeah, the entrepreneur who was doing those kinds of businesses, delivering the newspaper on the bike, shoveling, looking for those little opportunities. I feel a little bit like it's I don't know, maybe it's the affluence in the Jewish community, though clearly not everyone is affluent, but that sense of entrepreneurship or doing it or picking it up or taking that responsibility. >> we should go back to the shoe shining and shoveling? I regret see if my children listen to this cuz I will hear their feedback if they do. If I don't hear anything from them, it means they didn't listen to this episode. But I regret can't have regret. Shalom aleichem but if I were to regret something about my parenting, it's that I didn't do the same my parents did in terms of having strict here are your chores, your responsibilities, your contribution to the family, how do you play a role? My kids are amazing and they're all great. And the truth is they all do contribute in meaningful ways that probably I'm not even aware of some of them from cooking and planning and setting tables and do they do enormous enormous amounts. But sort of the and by that I mean mostly are the ones who are taking the garbage to the curb on Sunday night and Wednesday night and some of the other of those. I also vividly remember when I was a kid we had a housekeeper once a week for a few hours. Right. And the night before we got the >> up. >> The housekeeper's coming tomorrow, you need to clean your room. >> It used to drive me nuts. I was like, why am I cleaning up for a housekeeper to come in but that that was like a weekly >> Well, why was that? Because at least the way it was taught to me was the housekeeper's job is not to pick up your dirty laundry from the floor. They're not there to they're not there to put your garbage away. They're there to do, you know, other tasks. They're dusting, they're cleaning the bathrooms, there's a laundry element, whatever it is. But cleaning after you cuz you're a slob is not what they're hired to do. And there are a lot of things today that >> Now you have older children obviously than I do. So are there things that your children now your married children come back to you and remember certain things about the childhood that you're surprised about? Like certain things that you did at that at the time you didn't even pay attention, you didn't think they were memorable, but now 10, 15 years later your older daughters would say, "That was a memory that I cherish." >> I bless you that you will see this soon. May it come to pass. I have I have amazing grandchildren. They're delicious, they're incredible, they're amazing, they're each perfect. But it's possible one of them recently was was acting up a little bit and might have a parent one of the parents might have gotten some feedback even from school acting a little bit. I said to you like on the one hand I'm like sympathetic and how could it be and that grandchild is perfect and where does that come from? The other piece of me was like like that child now. [laughter] But so many feelings about my parenting. Like not so simple, not so easy, not so straightforward. What do you do now? You know, so you know, my kids look back and they do definitely interpret with their child that much more favorably and nostalgically and positively. I think we all do when we when we look back at that. So Pesach this is a perfect segue to Pesach also because I think this has seeped its way enormously into Judaism in a negative way. Whereas there were certain you can call them chores that revolved around the Jewish holidays that today just become commercialized and outsourced and they're and they're easy. You know, from from the sukkah I vivid memories of putting up the sukkah with my father. We had bamboo poles and you had to punch them and tie the string around them and get them up into the into the attic of the of the garage and spread out the poles and I would want to try Let me just say you this is like such an insight into me. I would put the whole bundle up, untie the string and just try to have them and then my father would say, "Do it right. Do it properly." You know, my you could picture this. You have to alternate the poles the thick and the thin and you have to do it take your time. Do it right. Don't force it. Don't force it. That was like my whole you know, childhood mind trying to find efficiencies and do it quickly and get it done with. >> [laughter] >> Correctly. He would do it correctly and precisely and properly. Now but from putting up the sukkah to I vivid memories with my mother like chopping the charoset we had this wood chopping bowl one of the few things my grandparents had from Europe was this chopper chopping the charoset or preparing the maror. And today everything's like you go to the store they're selling salt water. They're selling a jar of salt water because someone can't add salt to water in their own home. Or Hanukkah. Did you set up the menorahs in your house? I well some of the nights. My my daughter did the rest of the nights. No, no, when you were growing up. Oh, of course, yeah, for sure. You had to pour the oil and you had to light the candles. >> thing through the wick. You had to make sure you didn't spill any of the oil. But there's a love and a passion and a nostalgia and memories and and today it's like I don't know. Did someone set up the menorahs? Did anyone buy the pre-made uh things? And that really at its core, we've both spoken about this in sheer amounts rushes. That really is what Pesach is about. We talk about the history of our people and telling a narrative. I know you've given drashes about this. It is telling a family story and it's those little jokes, it's those little you know, family idiosyncrasies that you make fun of every year. Sitting at the seder and saying, "Oh, do you remember when we used to do it that?" That's part of telling the seder story as well. 100% so I it's okay to have the efficiencies and technologies and the commercialized. We used to check it pick out hadas menorah bows and a lulav. Today they all come >> what I don't even know what that stuff was. The like The furry >> The furry stuff that you used to get all over your stuff. >> pre-packaged with a hashgacha. You don't know. Yeah, so a lot of it's wonderful. A lot of it is a great convenience and comfort. But I think we would do well to still find the opportunities for our kids to be involved in ways that they will always remember the things that will become part of their consciousness and generational and So, I think we can No, I wish that was part of the messaging of our schools. This is going to get me into trouble. That's okay. It's it's the minhag now that schools give off earlier and earlier before Pesach so that kids can help out around the house. Now, that in an ideal world is a beautiful model. If the kids help out around the house. So, I think part of the messaging of we're going to give you off three, four, a week early is on condition that each one of you doesn't do whatever you're going to do on your free days, but that you're actually going to volunteer and help out in your family. And if your family doesn't need help and is going away, you and I both know a lot of people that would welcome any help in the community who who desperately need I love that idea. Maybe you should get off with assignments. Like you need to get back to us how you helped each day, what you did, what tasks, you know. And if you're going away for Pesach, who are you going to volunteer for? Who are you what are you going to visit an elderly? There's so many chesed opportunities, especially around this time of the year. That to me would like take that model to the next level. >> people clean their car for Pesach for some pay. Right. Yeah, that's not a bad model either. They're out there. They're out there. They're out there, which is good. So, back to the shining shoes. Shining shoes. >> it's all about that. But there what there was a pride in like I I took a pair. Don't you agree with me that we're in a disposable society? You'd be like oh these shoes are done, I'll just throw them out and buy a new pair. Yeah, of course. You just have to look at my Amazon account to know that. [laughter] >> Yeah, as as opposed to like the idea that I'm going to shine them. I'm going to bring them into the shoemaker, maybe replace the soles. But what is it about shining shoes? >> replace soles of shoes? >> replace I maybe I I don't know, maybe my mom did. But what is it about shining shoes? Cuz even the way you just spoke about it, there was like a nostalgia. There's something about shining a shoe that's different. >> me back to >> a pride in in doing something? Is it a pride in the way you look? Like what is it that gave you that like a schmuck feeling? >> Like this looks like dreck at the beginning and at the end I made it look beautiful and it took a little bit of work. But as I said it, I smelled Right, that I can smell the smell of the of the shoe shine. Yeah. And I can see the brush and then the other brush. There was the little brown brush that you put it on, dab it on. >> Yeah. Then there was a thick big brush that you >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And then there was that >> there's the favorite best part which was the cloth Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And that was yes, I I hear the sounds, I smell the smell, I'm transported back to that. I don't want to make it like I was shining shoes every day but or every week. >> Hey, listen. But on the occasions that I did A young entrepreneur would have By the way, so prominent and embedded in us was this that my brother still remembers a conversation he had. He was in in in Bnei Brak again with the author of Shmiras Shabbos Kehilchasa of Neuwirth where he asked him, are you allowed to shine shoes on Chol HaMoed? Interesting. It was a Chol HaMoed shaila which was interesting. You only ask that if you're somebody who's accustomed to shine shoes. Um and Reb Neuwirth's answer was equally interesting, maybe even more. He said, "What's your father's minhag?" Which is a real posek. He understands that even when something is subject to a machlokes, but what's your father's minhag? The idea is not to be as machmir as you can or to look for the biggest cool there is. His question was what's your father's minhag? Now I'm excited cuz when we come to shul on Pesach the first night, I'm going to look at your shiny shoes and one of two things is going to happen. Either either someone's going to buy you a new pair of shoes or you're going to buy a new pair or you're going to shine them and I I want I'm going to I'm going to ask you. I want to see that gleam in your eyes when you tell me that you do you shine your shoes? >> I'm embarrassed. I'm embarrassed and humiliated and ashamed to admit that today, even when I do shine a pair, I don't do it the old way. I get one of those, you know, in the bottle. Just turn it over. It's cheating. Just just you know, make It is It is a proper way. You might be inspiring me right now. I might go from here to order a kit. You're inspiring me to tell my son that he's going to be shining my shoes this year before I want to give him that memory. I don't want to rob him of that opportunity. >> be doing him a favor. >> I'd be doing him a favor. >> You would be robbing him. It would be terrible parenting if you didn't have him shine your shoes. There you go. for this Pesach. There you go. All right. We're looking forward to getting ready for Pesach soon on Pesach break behind the bima. We got a lot going on. We're not on break, but behind the bima we will be. But until then, we got a great conversation with the honorable Mitchell Silk, Moshe Silk, as I said, an Admor of Chassid, a Treasury Assistant Secretary, Under Secretary, speaks Mandarin Chinese. He's a fantastic, phenomenal person, a scholar, an author, and it was amazing to have the privilege of sitting down with him. Looking forward and excited to bring this conversation. It's a great pleasure to go behind the bima with a very, very special guest. I'm particularly excited to listen, learn, and uh understand better the honorable or in international his excellency, but uh Mitchell Moshe Silk, the first Chassidic Jew who uh hold the held a senior position in the US administration as the Assistant Secretary of the Treasury, mechaber seforim, an author of biography of Reb Mordechai of Nadwarna, something that we feel very connected over and I want to discuss. And uh just an incredible person. So, thank you so much for allowing us to go behind the beamer. Thank you so much for having me, Rabbi Goldberg. It's great to be here. I I don't even know where to begin because you're you're so fascinating, as you know, um the five languages that you speak, um an expert in Chinese law and finance, uh somebody who was a member of the administration, all without compromising an iota of your identity as a Hillel Hasidic Yid. And uh and of course all that goes with it in terms of Torah and observance. Um where did it all get started? Expert in Chinese law, I know that you learned Chinese, the language or one dialect of it, in an unusual way. It wasn't necessarily in school or because you signed up for it. Today, someone would go on an app or download it. Where did you start? I started actually hashgacha, which is a big part of my new book, A Seat at the Table, Divine Providence. Um I started not actually not far from here. I was born in Chicago. Um to uh into a a very uh nondescript homogeneous middle-class family. We lived in the suburbs. Um the Nadworna comes in through my maternal grandfather, who was born in the shtetl of Nadworna, came here in 1920 when he was 20 years old. Mhm. Um What made him I'm I'm going to interrupt if it's Okay, only cuz I want to learn more, not cuz I want to Not a problem. Not a problem. And we will find our way back together. >> Yeah, yeah. So, what 1920, there wasn't a huge migration. Um what made him come? Um the circumstances in Nadworna, like like so many other shtetlakh in what is now Western Ukraine, were were extraordinarily challenging, to put it nicely. Um physically, as a term in in of physical safety and also in terms of economics, um were extremely challenging. Uh my great-grandfather was a cipher, as was his father in the shtetl. And uh there were eight children. Uh three of them died young of malnutrition, and uh one of of of typhoid. Um the remainder grew up in in harsh conditions. If they weren't being attacked by the Cossacks, and I have some really horrific stories that my grandfather used to tell me about uh one of his family members being beaten in a burlap sack until until you could noticeably see blood coming out, and then being thrown into his own burning house. Uh it was either that and or uh hardship and hunger. My grandfather wrote about him and his sister going out to to beg for food. Uh and his mother using shavings um from a lumber yard um to uh to beef up the meat, as it were, to make to make the meals more filling. Mhm. Um Those are good reasons to come. Yeah, so >> it means leaving your Rebbe and leaving your shtetl. Yeah, interestingly, the Rebbe was not in Nadworna at that time. Uh he he he traveled for some years and ended up in Bishnitzer, where which is where your your wife's family comes from. Um but uh his oldest brother came to the States before World War I. Uh and then brought uh a sister and a brother. And my grandfather was the brother, one of the younger ones. Um my my great-aunt, who's no longer with us, came first. My grandfather came in 1920. There was one other sister that was scheduled to come. She had a ticket. She made it to the port in Hamburg. She was um as all others uh meant to take a test in order to get on the ship. >> Right. Uh she was not literate. Um very concerned and so she headed back home, eventually got married, had children, and unfortunately unfortunately was lost in the Holocaust. >> Mhm. So he came uh in 1920 to Chicago. Uh both of my parents are American-born in Chicago, first generation. Uh Were you raised as a Hasidic Jew or you just knew your background? >> an interesting [clears throat] question. Um I feel that I was raised as a Hasidic Jew because you know, Hasidic 50, 60 years ago was very different. I don't want to let on, you know, given my youthful appearances, how old I am, but you know, very different than today. Uh Hasidic is very, very, very different. I feel that I grew up Hasidic without the trimmings, as it were, and without the trappings. My grandfather uh cut off his payos and and cut off his beard, shaved his beard when he came, like so many others that came. He dressed like an American, like pretty much everybody else, except for the Rebbe Shach in the area, who had shuls uh in Chicago. Um but I feel that what I got at the Shabbos table uh with my grandfather and what I got at the Yom Tov table is exactly the same feeling as I have when I sit at my Rebbe's table in Borough Park, just a block away from us. My My Rebbe is the the Nadvorna Rebbe, the the oldest of the the Rebbes today. Uh he's European-born um and the nusach and the feeling is exactly the same. Mhm. So even if the schools that you went to and even if the outer trappings didn't but real Hasidic is in the heart and in the neshama. And I And the other parts are important, too, but they're secondary to what's happening on the inside. >> Absolutely, and I I feel that I could not have had a better Rebbe than my grandfather. >> Mhm. So we moved from Chicago to Florida when I was just after bar mitzvah. My parents unfortunately divorced shortly after we moved here. I felt that I needed to help my mother out financially and so I went out and I got a job. It happened that I had some friends who had moved into our neighborhood from Hong Kong. Family with five kids, three of whom were in my immediate age group, three boys. A Jewish family? Chinese family from Hong Kong. Chinese Chinese from Hong Kong. Um we lived a couple of doors away from each other. >> Right. And they didn't speak English very well. They didn't really know that much about America. Uh so I I I helped them out where I could. Um helped them with their English, helped them acclimate into the country. And uh some months into it I got a job at their family's restaurant. Mhm. I started out as a dishwasher. Uh and I also did I I was a prep cook. I I cut 100 lb sacks of onions and cabbage. Um and then I got my big promotion which was to bus boy and then finally front of the house as a waiter. It was about a couple of weeks into the job as a waiter that I figured out that if I wanted to maximize my earning potential with tips I had to learn the local lingo in order to [snorts] get the food out of the kitchen hot and quickly for my customers. Wow. How old were you at this time? I was call it 14 15. >> as a 14 year old you already were having an economic strategic financial You weren't the 14 year old doing the bare minimum just collect your paycheck and go home. You were thinking how can I make this economically savvy and efficient and productive and maximize earnings? I would like to say that I was laser focused at the time Rabbi and that I had my eye on that assistant secretary for international markets job at the Treasury Department but that wasn't the case. I I was really really interested in China. I I felt that it was uh there was a mystique to to Asia. And it was an interesting learning process. I became fluent in Cantonese. Much to my chagrin a couple of years into it. I discovered that while 95% of the Chinese in America at the time spoke Cantonese because of you know traditional historical immigration patterns from Southeast China only 5% of the Chinese in China speak Cantonese and so I I said to myself if I want to make a career dealing with China in some way I need to learn Mandarin. So right after high school I went to the an intensive course during the summer at Middlebury College. I did 9 weeks of of Chinese there Mandarin. Which was equal to an academic year. And then I went to Taiwan to study at the National Taiwan Normal University for a year. And and was was became back fully fluent in Mandarin transferred into Georgetown School of Foreign Service where they have a you know very a lot of requirements including language fluency and so I immediately tested for my fluency in Chinese and there were no courses for me to take. So I took one graduate course and then I ended up teaching as a teaching assistant first and third year Chinese at Georgetown while I was doing my undergrad. So you speak five languages Cantonese Mandarin Hebrew English and Yiddish. Three of those more understandable Hebrew English Yiddish is more relatable or familiar to us. The other two obviously are very unusual for people we know in general and from people call it in particular which was the hardest language that you find. I I I don't want to say that I have a thing for languages. Um my typical response is that if I want to learn a language, it's because I'm very, very interested in it. Uh and I find that the interest carries. Mhm. Um and I've I've never found any of those languages to be particularly challenging. It was It's kind of interesting uh just as a at a little bit of a a detour off of the question. When I came back from Taiwan, um I I took a year of Spanish. And and I I I couldn't I couldn't deal with the conjugations, right? And I I I never really learned Spanish properly. I'm not fluent in Spanish. I wish I were. Um but I to me the explanation for my not doing well in Spanish is because I really just wasn't interested. So There's your life lesson. What you're passionate about in the in no matter the situation. >> Absolutely. >> passionate, what you're excited, you'll pick up quicker. At 14 in the restaurant, I mean, did you open books? And like I said, there was no Duolingo at the time. Um did you just hang out with the with the chefs and the other busboys and listen and practice and how how did you pick up the language? >> I I I drove my friends crazy asking them, "How do you say this? How do you say this? How do you say this?" There were no books. Um I want to say that Yale or maybe the uh National War College, one of these places, um maybe had some tapes at the time. But there really was nothing available. So let and let's fast forward a little bit. You're a practicing lawyer. You have an expertise in in Chinese law in China because of your I assume because of the language and the interest in its culture and its economy gave you that expertise and ultimately your rise to be nominated, approved as uh the honorable Assistant Secretary of the Treasury. As I said, all without compromising who you are, which we'll get back to is amazing. Do you ever in your life stop and look back and say, "What if that family from Hong Kong hadn't moved around the corner? What if I didn't become friends with that family, wasn't exposed to that language, that culture, didn't take an interest, didn't get a job, didn't learn the Cantonese, didn't What What would have happened? I mean, what What if a family from Mexico moved around the corner? What if a family from Spain, France, somewhere else moved around the corner? Was it a function of the family that moved around the corner, or do you think that you had an affinity for that language, that culture altogether? That you would have found your way towards either way. Very, very hard for me to answer the question. Um what I can say is that growing up in Chicago, which was, you know, immediately preceded us moving to South Florida, uh I I found um the mystique of Asia to be very, very gripping, very pulling. Um you know, went when I used to interview at, you know, as a younger when I was younger and interviewing for for positions in law firms, people would ask me what what peaked my interest in China. I used to tell them, and now I'm dating myself, The Green Hornet. Uh there used to be a series on on TV that uh featured Bruce Lee as as in interestingly as a Japanese character, even though he was Chinese ethnically. Um but, you know, I I found the Asian mystique to be interesting. It was pulling. Uh what if the the family hadn't moved to Florida? Very hard for me to say. It you know, the the my friendship with this this family in in particular, the couple of boys that were in my immediate age group, was foundational for for my life and for my career. >> Are you still in touch? Uh not so often, but still in touch. They They live in Boynton Beach. Oh, okay. >> Still around, yeah. Oh, wow. Okay. It would have all been a kosher Chinese place. Yeah. Um and at this point, you have the Hasidus in your in your kishkes from your grandfather, but the educational track probably is not. At what point do you return to say I'm going to raise my children in a more hardcore, with all the trappings and the externals of returning to my Hasidic roots? On Did that come later? At what At what point did that become clear to you? I I I I spent more time uh looking into my family's roots um to understand more than just what I picked up around the Shabbos table from my grandparents. Uh during my I would say during my college and law school years, I a real big turning point for me was when I was in college and my grandfather passed away. Uh I realized that I didn't I didn't really know that much about him. I didn't know what Nadvorna [clears throat] meant, for example. I didn't I didn't even know where it was. I mean, I knew it was in Europe. Um and I can say that it was it was pretty much at that point where I um I started a journey um that led to the preparation and presentation of the book that you've just recently gotten. And we we printed it uh in samples so far. We've not formally published it yet, but it's called Upwards. And uh it describes the life and the lore of the first rebbe, the Rebbe Mordechai. It's thick. 642 pages. >> Footnoted, really everything sourced, and incredibly comprehensive and amazingly impressive. >> Yeah. And so, you know, that was a big turning point. Um I spent a lot of time uh learning about Nadvorna, the shtetl. I learned I spent a lot of time learning about the Hasidic dynasty of Nadvorna. Um I like I I always knew how I wanted to raise my kids when they were born. Uh sorry, before they were born. Um and we we've given our children very good solid Jewish educations. And your wife was on board? My wife uh my wife is uh actually was born in Borough Park um and she descends from the most illustrious illustrious of lineage. Um she her both of her grandparents were descend from the Sanz dynasty from the the from the Divrei Chaim they descend from the Yismach Moshe the Aitz Chaim Lev the Rab the the Reb Reb Elimelech the Chernobyl the the the Hornsteipler >> Hall of Fame. >> So, she she was she was definitely on board. Um and uh what we've really tried to do is ensure that our kids have the best of both worlds. Um we want them to know about the mesorah. Um we want them to to not just in the single dimension of of outward trappings but the the inner dimensions. And my wife and I are very very insistent that the kids get a solid and a good secular education as well. Is that complicated if they're growing up It depends on the crop. It depends on the crop of kids, you know, we we have eight kids ranging from mid-ish 30s down to 15. Um and the older kids it was a little bit more of a balance. Um the younger kids um also I would say maybe even more challenging than the older ones. Um life slowly in our worlds have become a little bit more polarized over time. Um I'll give you an example. I uh our youngest daughter is in in Bais Yaakov Bais Yaakov Bais Yaakov in Borough Park. Um I very much wanted her and my wife to come down on this trip. I was speaking uh I spoke on Sunday in Williams Island. Um we have this meeting today. Uh as I mentioned to you before we started, my my mother and one of my sisters is buried here. And I have a sister here who lives here. So, I wanted my daughter to come along to hear the speech um to go visit her grandmother and her aunt, to visit with her aunt who's living. And Vina Yakov wouldn't Maybe my daughter's going to get thrown out of school for my saying this, but they wouldn't allow her to come because they don't want the girls to come to Florida. Little did they know that it was in the '30s in Florida. >> Absolutely. >> sanua time in history to be in Florida. >> So, you know, like uh life has become a little bit more polarized, and so therefore to realize our goals to ensure that the kids have solid secular education um is a little bit more challenging. On the other hand um I fought very hard in my role um with the Pro Bono Legal Services Network of the Ego Desistrol, and having been one of the founding persons of the No Stars.org fight against the New York Times to stand up for our education system, which I think is is is one of the best, if not the best, education systems in the world that produces that produces great great kids, well-rounded kids. Um and so, you know, for for our kids that are in Hasidic schools in Borough Park the secular side is a little bit uh more challenging, but I I was just having >> You supplement at home on the side. >> Absolutely. I was just having this conversation with Eric Cohen who moved on from the Tikva Foundation about about this secular versus Kodesh balance, and uh we're working on it from all directions. And you're unusual in that fashion, but the truth is if a person is committed and devoted, they don't have to give up. They can figure out what they're going to supplement if it's a if it's a value. So, your children are on a track that they one day could be assistant secretary of the Treasury? Why not secretary? Why not secretary? >> Why not? Right. 100% We want We want our children to surpass us. Yeah. >> So, why not? >> be my greatest honor that that my son has a you know, or or daughter earns a rank that's higher than than my rank. So, let's talk about that rank and how you got there. You're practicing law. Pioneer of trade law with China. Energy and infrastructure was >> Energy and infrastructure. And the administration identified you because of your expertise. How did they first In a word. In a word, that's that's what it was. Um Again, an element of of hashgacha. I talk about this a lot in the book, um A Seat at the Table. Um but at this point, uh we're talking about mid mid uh 2010s, about 2016 or so. Um I was a partner at at a a great global law firm called Allen & Overy. They've since merged and are now called Allen & Overy Sherman. Um and I was back in New York. I'd spent 13 years in Hong Kong um from 1992 to '05. Came back to open up the China desk of Allen & Overy in New York and continued to do energy and infrastructure work. So, I I was doing a lot with China and Chinese banks. And also a lot in the energy and infrastructure sectors. And I had a partner, younger junior partner to me, um who I did a lot of the banking work with. Um extraordinary fellow, his name is Heath Tarbert. Um he had prior to coming to Allen & Overy worked in all three branches of government uh in very senior positions. He was a clerk on the Supreme Court. Um he worked in the White House and he also worked on the Hill for the Senate Banking Committee. And uh he came to our firm as a lateral uh with an expertise in bank regulatory work. I had a lot of Chinese banking clients. Um from time to time a couple of them would get into trouble. Yeah. As it happened with one of our banks. Um and so Heath and I worked on this matter to to help out this bank work its way through the regulatory issue that they had. And while we were working on on that matter, um I had the opportunity to go to Taiwan. I was asked by the Ministry of Finance to go over and lecture. And I decided it would be good to bring Heath along. We were lecturing to 300 very senior bankers and regulators on uh the US anti-money laundering laws. And it was it was a very interesting scene. Uh it was a big beautiful auditorium filled with bankers. Heath and I had the stage. And uh it was we had a we had a we we traded off speaking. Uh I would speak in Mandarin. Mhm. And he would speak in English. Uh and it was extraordinarily complimentary. Uh even though Heath didn't understand a word that I was saying, but it clapped. It really really went well. >> coordinated in advance. We we we had a we had a PowerPoint. And we knew what each and the other was going to speak to, but we we didn't rehearse it, you know. And it just came off extraordinarily well. After that meeting I brought Heath in to meet a very old and good friend of mine uh a gentleman by the name of Ma Ying-jeou. Who had just finished up his second of two terms as president of Taiwan, the president of Taiwan. So we went in to visit with him. It was a great visit. Uh we came back to the States and shortly after that Heath got appointed to a very senior position in Treasury right after President Trump won his first election. And at that point I had been practicing law for 30 years. I was I was at the point at which I was starting to think about winding down. I had a two to seven year runway at that point to kind of exit out of the firm. Our my old firm it was a lockstep firm and you'd work for X number of years and and so I was in the middle of the beginning of my discussions about that ramp down period with the firm when President Trump won the election, Heath got appointed. I mentioned to him that I would be interested in serving. And as it turns out the gentleman who had been appointed as under secretary for international affairs, David Malpass, who went on to become the president of the World Bank looked at my resume and said we have to have Mitch because the president campaigned on a bunch of important issues, but one of them was China and the other was infrastructure. So I was brought in to be the China and the infrastructure person. I originally went in as deputy assistant secretary. Within about a year I got the appointment for assistant secretary. What was that process like? You had to be approved? It was um the longest and most nerve-racking uh process that you can imagine, Rabbi. You know um your name gets put forward. You're vetted by PPO within the White House, presidential personnel office. Um after you're vetted on finances and on ethics and on background and on politics um you get you get put forward. President approves it. He appoints you. Once you're appointed um you have to then go through this the committee within the Senate that deals with your area. Mine was the Senate Banking Committee. So you start the process all over again, but with the Senate. >> Right. So they have to vet you financially. They have to vet you ethics-wise. >> Like first you date the girl, then you got to go out with her parents, then you've got to go out The whole of the whole of the little bit more little bit more than that. >> Yeah. Uh and assuming that you get through the vetting, uh then you you get a hearing. My hearing date took quite a while. Um eventually had the hearing. It was It was extraordinarily nerve-racking. As it turns out, other than my 5-minute intro, which is available on the internet, people can look it up. It was a pretty good intro. Uh I didn't draw one question. There were two very controversial uh appointees that were on my panel, and they drew drew all of the fire. Were you disappointed to not at least have some exchange? I'm sure you did an enormous amount of preparation I was perfectly fine with it. I felt bad for Mr. McCormick, who drew all the fire. I invited him out to lunch at the Treasury dining room after uh after our confirmations. But um and then once you've been through the hearing, you have to be voted out of the committee, and then put to vote on the floor of the Senate. And so >> all this time, but it's an unofficial capacity, or you're not even allowed to start working? Uh it's a really interesting question uh that that comes up under the Vacancies Law. Um I was work I was in the building from October 16th, 2017, uh and continued working. I wasn't uh I I didn't go through the process until 2018-2019. Um I was probably in the seat of Assistant Secretary on an acting basis for about 9 months Mhm. before I was formally confirmed. And it's really interesting from the standpoint of protocol, because within the building uh everybody will recognize you as the de facto Assistant Secretary. Right. Um any other bureaucrat, like career bureaucrat, particularly like for example at the State Department when you used to travel, they would refer to me as as my lesser rank as Deputy Assistant Secretary. >> [snorts] >> Of course, you know, as you mentioned at the beginning, right? Um, statutory a statutory confirmed position, you get the lifetime title of the honorable in the United States. >> Right. According to State Department protocols, um, once you're confirmed outside of the United States, formally, foreign countries are meant to refer to you as His Excellency. So, sometimes I kind of I feel like when I go to a a post outside of the United States now, Right. for all of the indignities that I had to suffer from my friends at the State Department at the time, I kind of feel like, hey, >> His Excellency. When you go to Israel, do they refer to you? When you're arguing with the cab driver, you say, "Excuse me, I'm His Excellency." Doesn't doesn't carry over there. It doesn't carry over. Um, obviously, the administration that you were part of was incredibly I I don't want to say friendly to the Jewish community and the observant community. It had members of the observant community in it. I remember um, being at an event in in President Trump's first term at the White House, and there was a Jewish event, and several of my friends and I were other rabbis colleagues were there. And you know, you linger because when you don't go every day, you linger and you try to take out of it as much as you can. And Ambassador David Friedman, who I didn't know well at the time, now he lives here in Boca, and I consider him a friend, he walked by and he saw us rabbis, he said, "What are you waiting for, the kiddush or something?" And I that that really said to me what this administration was like. So, did you find it easy or easier to navigate in terms of leaving for Shabbos Yom Tov, keeping kosher, the sensitivities that an Orthodox observant Jew observant Jew would need, was the administration open to? The The administration, and particularly my secretary, Secretary Mnuchin, who by the by, is actually a descendant of the the family. Really? >> Just like for the record, they're good. Um, but the administration, particularly the secretary, were were unbelievably accommodating. And um, I don't think it was because like necessarily the the Jewish element or the conservative you know, Jewish Orthodox element. Um, the administration, and particularly our secretary, recognized, and Secretary Mnuchin said this very frequently, that we all were giving up a lot to serve our country. In my case, uh, I I was in Washington from Sunday to Thursday every week. I went home every Shabbos. Uh, so I was schlepping back and forth every week. My wife and kids were without me during the week in Borough Park. They stayed in school. Um, my comp, uh, as an assistant secretary, was a single digit percentage of my comp at at my law firm. And he and others recognized that we were all giving up quite a bit to serve. Um, and so they were very good about it. I I had the discussions before I went in about Shabbos. Uh, I spoke with my under secretary. I spoke with the secretary. Um, Jack Lew, uh, was the secretary immediately prior. I called and spoke with him. And I I knew from the beginning that it certainly would not be more challenging than the situation that I had lived in for 30 years in a in a high performing law firm where we were serving the largest and most important corporates and financial institutions in the world, sometimes on on some of the most pressing matters. Um, and it it worked out fine. I mean, there was only one uh, instance, uh, where there was a clash. Uh, it it actually happened on Yom Tov. Um as you may recall in February and March of 2020 uh we had a we had a little bit of a uh little bit of a a kind of medical issue that uh you know, sprouted up all over the world that that led to a a little bit of a financial crisis. So, on March 26th, the Treasury Department got gifted a bunch of programs under the $2.2 trillion CARES Act to implement. And I uh inherited the the airline relief program. Mhm. Uh which grew into a $94 billion program. Uh it was a program under which I I saved about 600,000 jobs in the United States. And um the statute said says that the Treasury Department was obligated to dis- make the first disbursement of payments under that particular program within 10 days. Now, the 10 days was not from the date of passage of the statute, which was March 26th, but rather 10 days from the acceptance of the first application. So, we started with nothing. We started from scratch. Imagine um having im- imagine being given the obligation to uh run a a whole bank, which is effectively what it was, without anything, without any infrastructure, any people, any applications, nothing. >> Right. It turned out that the 10th day after the statute um was the first day of Pesach that year. Mhm. And the day before we had a lot of incoming from the Hill, particularly from Democratic senators, including Mr. Schumer, um about whether we're going to get money out, whether we're going to get money out, whether you get money out the next day. And we explained to them, and and they they must have known this, that that's not what the statute said, but I was very concerned that we were going to have a big issue. >> Right. Um I went home. Uh I told the head of my front office that he should come over later in the evening to let me know what happened the rest of the day and whether we should expect any fireworks the next day. Um we were just finishing up our seder. My my guy came in, said everything looked calm, check in the next day. I consulted with my rebbe and also rebbe Shamshoum um the day before about walking in to Treasury on the first day of Pesach. >> Right. I davened at home. It was in COVID. There were no minyanim. And wearing my full regalia, bekishe and hat, tie. And again, I apologize for not wearing a tie today. >> No need. You're a Hasidic. >> [laughter] >> I uh I I I walked in. I walked in after davening before we made kiddush. >> What was that thought process about walking in in a bekishe? Um I was concerned about I was concerned about two things, one more than the other. I was very concerned about um my safety, actually. Um it [clears throat] was not a pleasant time in Washington. Um it was a time of a lot of social unrest. Um and uh and it was also a time when the city kind of lost con- lost a little bit of control. Um there were a lot of not well people on the streets, and there were a lot of homeless encampments. Um and we had we had situations, myself and my sons, where where people would accost us verbally because of the way that we looked. Um and so it's a little bit concerned walking through Dupont Circle. Um I didn't have any issues that day. My son actually came to meet me a little bit later, and and he had a little bit of an issue. Um so I was a little bit concerned about like Annie's safety, personal safety. All all was fine. I walked >> [laughter] >> pretty fast. >> Right. Uh I was I wasn't concerned but like my second the second thing that was going through my head is that people are going to look at me like I'm a little bit weird. I'm going to look a little bit like a Martian and I I know that I'm a Martian. Like I know that I'm weird. People call me an anomaly but I know that I'm weird. It's okay. Um but you know, I look like very much not not of the norm. >> Right. Um the Secret Service guys were good because they they see everything, right? And and I knew them all very well. At the first gate, at the second gate and and at the third entrance, the final front entrance to the Treasury Department. Um when I walked in to my office and I just need to like give you a little bit of imagery. Uh the the office that I occupied was a part of uh uh one of the oldest historic suites uh in the Treasury building and main Treasury is the oldest still functioning federal office building in the country. Mhm. And uh when President Lincoln was assassinated uh Andrew Johnson who succeeded him uh actually conducted his affairs from one of the offices within the suite that I sat. There was the Johnson office, the Andrew Johnson suite, one office, a common area, and then my office. Um and so Andrew Johnson conducted the business the affairs of the president in that office after President Lincoln was assassinated for a number of weeks because he wanted Mrs. Lincoln to settle herself and move on on her own time. Uh and so I I walked into this very majestic suite. I knew who was going to be there. There were a couple of of uh, very senior, you know, secretarial personnel. They kind of looked at me. >> [laughter] >> Uh, dressed not as I would typically dressed during the week, but they were okay with it. Um, the Under Secretary, then Under Secretary Brent McIntosh, a very close friend, who's now General Counsel of City Bank, also kind of took a look at me, but he said, you know, >> Like the threads. >> Right. Uh, and uh, I asked whether everything was okay, and they said everything was fine. And I went home. Got it. But that was the, you know, uh, that was really That was the exception. That was that was the extent of uh, of challenge. I mean, everybody was was very very understanding. Um, but there there is one kind of different angle, or or different dimension of the issue that you're getting at, which is that dressing the way that I dress, which I I dress like this every day of the week. I always wear a tie to work, white shirt, black suit, black hat. Um, I knew I always knew, uh, whether it was walking by Secret Service, walking in the halls of the Treasury Department, sitting in a very important meeting in the Situation Room, um, interacting with Ministers of Finance, or Ambassadors from foreign countries, I always knew that all eyes were on me, because I I looked different. Uh, and I knew that every gesture, every word, Right. um, every every movement, uh, would be under scrutiny, and would be the difference between a kiddush Hashem and a chillul Hashem. Mhm. And I'd like to say that, you know, we we scored a lot of points on the board. Um, a lot of the times it was because I didn't say anything, which is important. >> [laughter] >> Knowing when to speak and when not to speak. And and and and some of the time I I actually, you know, Seattle Des Moines came up with some good ideas like like and I write about this in the book. Um I will admit to you, Rabbi, that there was more than one or two occasions where I actually pulled off a pretty good joke. A good Jewish joke, including in the situation room. So, sometimes Jewish humor helped out, but but I was very very focused, very nervous, pressured. Um uh based on how I thought I might be projecting. So, like that really was the worst of it and it wasn't an insignificant issue. It was it was every second of the day, you know, I remember walking on the White House complex um and all of a sudden um Vice President is coming with his entourage. >> Right. And you know, one wants to be presented and projecting in the right manner. You know, Vice President is a very Vice President Pence is a very religious person. And there I was. It was it was winter. I was wearing an overcoat, my suit, my hat. Uh and he looked at me. I I didn't know him personally, but I think that he was very pleased to see a religious person on the grounds of the White House and we shook hands and and it was good. Amazing. That's really amazing. Were there any particular moments with the President in the Oval Office, on any of the uh trips that you had to take, any conversations, other dignitaries? Were there any particular moments when you look back that really stand out? I um I talk a lot in the book about my four P's. Um I've spoken about one of the P's quite a lot. Um providence, perfection progress over perfection, perseverance. But one of the P's that I focus on a lot in the book is personal touch. And um I found that one really important element of achieving and being successful in my position um was obviously I mean obviously one has to have good ideas. One has to formulate good policy. Um one has to present the policy in the right way. One has to get people on board with the policy to get it approved internally so that you can implement the policy externally. Um but you know, my work I was I was working with foreign dignitaries all the time. I was in international affairs. I was one of the most senior financial diplomats of the country. And I found that I was most effective not in the conference room but actually at and not not at the negotiating table but rather at my dinner table. Mhm. And with every engagement that I had uh ranging from the Panamanians to the Colombians to the Chileans to the Argentinians to to a bunch of countries in Asia uh I would always invite people over for dinner on the evening that we would have meetings during the day. I would always cook them a very nice meal. I would serve them some very nice Israeli red wine. Um and that's where I got my best work done. >> Mhm. And It was the night preceding the meeting to set the stage or it was the night after the meeting to continue a conversation? >> It It depended mostly it was on the night after the meeting mostly but that's that was just you know, a question of logistics and timing. Um you know, I'd like to give you like one concrete example before I I give you the like the most impactful uh illustration I'll just start with the Panamanians. I That was our first engagement in infrastructure finance. Um I felt it was really important to have a good relationship with them. Uh and uh I I prepared a kosher version of a Mexican dish called chicken mole. Now, when you say you I, me. >> You actually cook in the kitchen. >> mean, I worked in a restaurant for many years. >> That's a fair point. That's a fair point. You had graduated all the way up. >> my wife most of the time was in New York. She did come from time to time and prepared Shabbos and we would have a lot of people over on Shabbos, but for these engagements, I did most of the cooking almost all the time. And, uh, I prepared this Mexican dish called chicken mole. It's It's chicken with chocolate. Um, and, uh, the Panamanians loved it. Uh, it was it was their food. I had the Mexicans over as well and served them their own Mexican dish of chicken mole and I called it holy mole. >> [laughter] >> Uh, and it, you know, it it did the trick, you know, but the best illustration that I can point to is the engagement that I had with the Vietnamese. Uh, and there were there were three different levels of it starting with the ambassador of Vietnam to to America, was based in Washington. Uh, I would typically meet with the ambassadors at the beginning of of my programming to explain what I was trying to achieve and how it was good for their country and also good for our country. Um, and so I invited the ambassador around for dinner. I went to the embassy and met with him. He came over that night and he came for dinner. We had a bunch of other senior officials that came. Um, and he very very much liked the dinner. It had a It had a real impact, the desired outcome. Uh, he went back and explained the programming to the relevant ministries uh, and the leadership in Vietnam and I was invited over for formal meetings on our infrastructure finance infrastructure financing programming. And so I went over and I was introduced with the number two official of the country. Uh, person that used to run the Central Bank of Vietnam and at the time was the head of the Economic Commission of their Politburo. Um, and we we had a formal session. Um, it was a a rather rather tense session in front of the media. I thought, and I was very honored that I thought that he wanted to speak to me just about my infrastructure financing program. It actually turned out that the day before I arrived in Vietnam the Treasury Department had designated Vietnam as a currency manipulator. Um, which is a an area that the Treasury Department looks at. It impacts on on trade. Uh, and so Vietnam was not not very happy with the designation. >> And it was a little bit of a surprise attack. Not my area. But there you are sitting in front of the cameras and I had to respond. Um, Chairman Binh, who was the gentleman that I was dealing with, felt that he did his um, I responded in a in an appropriate way uh, in furtherance of our national interests. Um, the exchange, I think, was a constructive and a good one that um, that engendered respect, mutual respect. Um, so when Chairman Binh came to the United States the next time with a full delegation of 20 people I invited him around to the house in Borough Park. Hm. Um, we cooked up a a very very fancy meal replete with my own homemade herring my homemade infused vodka, my wife made some wonderful chicken, she made some potato kugel and uh, we had some very nice Israeli wine. Um, and it was it was a great evening of food and of discussion. And Chairman Binh and I corresponded quite a bit personally um, in the intervening couple of months. And the next formal visit that I took to Vietnam, he actually reciprocated and arranged a kosher meal for me at a big state dinner. And in between that, the ambassador in DC insisted that I come around to the embassy for a kosher meal. And I a home-cooked meal. Cooked by the chef of the embassy, and I explained to him that it's rather challenging. Very, very complicated. He didn't give up. Um, thankfully, my assistant at the time was a young lady who was from and we ultimately settled on one single dish. The logistics that went into that bowl of Vietnamese beef noodle soup took about 2 months. Uh, they went out and they bought all new pots and pans and cutlery and everything just for one little dish. Uh, we had to run over there and deal with lighting the fire and and serving when they were cooking. We had a little bit of a mishap because the chef wanted to use a tenderizer that had a that had a hashure but had a dairy element in it. And it was beef noodle soup, so we got over that diplomatic incident. And it was a very meaningful lunch of Vietnamese beef noodle soup. >> Amazing. Amazing. So, we go from diplomat incredibly high-ranking Senate-approved position His Excellency to author of the Artscroll translation of Kitzur Shulchan Aruch, the only translation in English that exists, I believe. Well, Rabbi Monk put out a translation. I don't I don't believe it's I've not really reviewed it very carefully, but I don't think it's the complete translation. There are some that have had issues with the quality of the translation, but I believe that the Artscroll is the first complete English translation. Yeah, and the Artscroll was kind enough to share with me. I I've used it and quoted it in the in the parsha sheer that we're privileged to host and of course it doesn't need me to say, but uh really fantastic. You were careful to include the Hebrew, too. Lest one only read the translation that they have access to the to the original language and commentary. What drew you to the Kedushas Levi and Admor Na Chassid of the world of Chassidus that you could choose to translate? It wasn't the Noam Elimelech and it wasn't uh the so many that you could have. What Why specifically the Kedushas Levi of Levi Yitzchak? It's a great question and before I answer that, I want to um uh speak to one or two points from the introduction to your question. So, first of all, I I must make a clarification that it wasn't just me uh that worked on this project. I had a team of extraordinary extraordinary translators, a whole team that I worked with for the better part of 30 years. Um You you saw Rabbi Teitelbaum a little bit earlier helped on the tail end. Rabbi Weinberg from uh Kansas City. Um the main uh the main translator is Rabbi Mosha Wesneski who's in Yerushalayim. But we had a whole team. Uh it wasn't just me. I I I edited every word. Um and uh so I'm I must give them credit. Um And you also uh mentioned the the whole of the uh Kedushas Levi with the Hebrew. So, it just triggered a memory, a very recent memory of of a little bit of time that I spent with um the Reb Meilech Biderman in in Yerushalayim. I I presented him with the set when I went in to see him a couple of months ago. Uh and he he was he was fascinated with it. He of course does not read English. Um but I made the clarification when I presented it to him uh the following. I said to him, "Rebbe, I have gedruckt the Kedushas Levi of Loshon Kodesh in Gantz'n. I I printed the whole of the Kedushas Levi in Hebrew. I have no language to give English so I see some hidden. I just I just put a few English letters in between. Sounds better in Yiddish, but that's the story that I told them. Um, so why the Kaddish is Levy? It's an interesting story. Um, I mentioned a little bit earlier um, the impact of my grandfather's passing uh, and and what it had in the kind of spark that it lit. And uh, I'd say a year or two years after my grandfather passed away, as I was researching the Dvirna Khasidus, I uh, I learned that there was a safer that's attributed to the Rebbe Mordechai, who's the first Rebbe, which is called the Maymar Mordechai. And um, at that time, I ArtScroll was kind of just starting. Um, they obviously had the Megillas Esther, which was the first translation that they did. Um, Mishnayos was was coming out. Maybe the first Gemara was out at that time, I don't really recall, but ArtScroll had some work coming out. Feldheim had some work coming out, and of course, Lubavitch was doing great work, English translated work at that time as well. And I kind of said to myself, >> [clears throat] >> if we can have Kitzur Shulchan Aruch in English, if we can have Mishnayos in English, if we can have Lubavitch Khasidus in English, why can't we have Dvirna Khasidus of English? And so, I I said to myself, it would be interesting to do a translation of the Maymar Mordechai. And that was when I first met Rabbi Wisnevsky. Uh, and I started on two projects. One, the lore of the Rebbe, and the other, the translation of his Torahs. The lore of the Rebbe finally came out in Upwards. Um, and the translation of the Maymar Mordechai, I I it was the first of all of the works that I actually completed. It was done within a year or two of commencement of work. Um, that would have been in the late-ish '80s, early '90s. Um, and I I haven't published it yet. I I plan on publishing it this year. Um, but the reason why I didn't publish it and have not yet published it, which gets to your question, is because I felt that if I had any interest, which I did, in producing a series of translations of Hasidic classics, which I would like to do more of, and it's just a limitation of time and money. Right. Um, that you really have to start with something big. So, you >> You were running the Treasury. There should be no limitation of money. [laughter] You could print it. >> I love I I do. I used to say it to people in Borough Park used to ask me what I do at the Treasury. I said they were making me to sit in the basement and count all the dead instruments. I finally hit a couple trillion. Um, but I never had access. The best The closest that I got to actually having money from the Treasury is when you would go in, you would get They had souvenirs available that we would give out, which were packets of shredded currency that equaled $25. Chief of staff used to say that if you could put them back together, you could spend them. That you couldn't fatten a bill? That the government would pay for the translation of the Imrei Mordechai? >> Absolutely not. >> Couldn't you make that into some bill? Absolutely not. So, um, I I said to myself that if one wants to do a proper series, you know, they're putting out gantz, you know, Talmud Bavli and gantz Yerushalmi and gantz this and gantz that and, you know, now Shulchan Aruch Aruch 13 volumes, like extraordinary translations. I said, "Well, so, if you want to do that, you have to start with with a a big opener." So, you mentioned Kedushas Levi and Noam Elimelech in the same breath. My plan was to start with both of them, and I had originally two teams. >> [clears throat] >> The Kedushas Levi got off the ground. The Noam Elimelech we found just a little bit too challenging based on the resources that we had at the time. So, I put that to the side and we continued with the Kadusha Slavey. My thought was that if if we would start with something big and well-known and recognizable, that would be the good opener to follow with something like the Mama Marta. Um, it took 30 years. Um, I finished one complete translation, showed it around. People thought it was not ready. I spent about another 7 to 10 years on it. I finally presented it to Artscroll again. They said it needs more work. Um, and it was it was during my first year at Treasury that Artscroll agreed um, to run the translation and it took us another almost 3 years um, to polish, get ready, supplement, and [music] uh, like you'd mentioned, English and Hebrew together. There there there is no other way that we could have thought up. And when I say we, um, the time and the attention and the care and detail that Rabbi Slatowitz, Rabbi Sherman, and Rabbi Brander of Artscroll put into the set was extraordinary. It was exceptional. Rabbi Slatowitz uh, had a a vision and a standard. Um, Rabbi Sherman looked after a lot of the technical, um, accuracy of the translation and and and accuracy and and readability. But Rabbi Brander, speaking of the English and the Hebrew together, we had we had we it was it was a challenging period of 6 to 9 months to get the um, layout, which was all Rabbi Brander's wizardry, um, that ended up To make it work out. I wonder with the advent of AI whether you can now continue the series in a much more expeditious fashion. AI can't you would have to obviously revamp the translation, make sure it's readable, make sure it's accurate, add whatever footnotes supplemental material that AI can't do, but maybe it gives a big runway or head start that you otherwise would have spent a lot of time on. >> you know, you've hit the nail exactly on the head. Um and you know, what I would say is that I and my team could be doing much more um and the only thing that we're lacking is funding, but I but I I want to kind of unpack that. Cuz I don't want to focus on the funding side of it. I don't want to focus on the AI side of it. As we were coming out with the Kadishas Levi, I really wanted to go further with with other titles. Uh and I have a whole lineup that I would like to do, many of whom are my wife descends from. Um and I I I do have an AI solution. Um there is a a brilliant person uh in Eretz Yisrael, an American who specializes in in this particular area. And we we experimented and built on his repository um which was mainly of Rishonim. Um we built on the repository um by feeding in a lot of of our translation work with the original. Um and we did a couple of test runs and you're absolutely correct, Rabbi. Um it it saves a ton of time. It's not It's not by any means nor ever could be a replacement uh for the human mind and the human eye. Um but just to generate the drafts off of which my team could polish is an immense time saver. It's huge. Hashem is amazing giving us these gifts regularly. So, you mentioned your wife and from whom she descends. Your wife Yocheved, my wife is a Yocheved and uh you take pride in your wife your ancestors and I take pride in my wife's ancestors who are buried next to your Rebbe. Who are buried in in Bushtyno. My wife and I went this past summer to Hungary and Ukraine. Uh the western part of Ukraine, if there's a safe part of Ukraine, the safe part of Ukraine. When members of our family were concerned, I said, "We are as far from the war in Ukraine as Florida is from New York. You know, where we're going, you don't have to worry." And we had an extraordinary experience, uh which my wife actually wrote up in an article in Mishpacha Magazine. Maybe we'll put it in the show notes, people can can read that story of how we found the graves of her great-great-grandparents who were buried next to Reb Mordechai Leifer of Dvorna. Um my wife's great-great-grandfather, Reb Moshe Brookstein, is buried actually in the Rebbe's palace. They were incredibly close. He wasn't technically an Dvorna Hasid. He was Chortkover Hasid. But uh the Rebbe there's a whole story. It's in your book. Of the crumbs from the kugel, from the the shirayim at the tish. The Rebbe gave a bracha from the crumbs. Moshe Rabbeinu became wealthy from the broken tablets. You can become wealthy from the crumbs. And from that he had the idea in the lumber yard where he was working to start a new company of the crumbs, of the scraps of the of the shreddings of the wood to turn them into canes. That time that a cane business was perfectly. And he became very wealthy in Bushtyno. And so much so when we got to Bushtyno, we were expecting cuz my wife had heard her whole youth from her grandparents in their childhood of the palace and the community and they were among the wealthiest. And we expected opulence and majesty. And we did not find that in in Bushtyno today. Maybe there was once a time. It wasn't today. And the miracles involved in actually finding that house. And the greatest miracle of them all, which she has in the article, is that literally a few days before we left um surfaced in our own community under our own nose somebody who had found in sheimos 10 years earlier and held onto it till he posted on Ancestry and the good fortune of my wife going on in preparation of the trip and discovering the original handwritten letters from Reb Mordechai from Brookstone that we brought back with us to to the cover his own handwritten letters. The whole story is really is really extraordinary. So I definitely feel a connection and a closeness to that and then our own experience from there going to Switzerland where we found ourselves hiking at the top of a mountain and there was one of the couple and it turned out to be a son of the last Rebbe in the brother of the current one and we went to we met with the Rebbe of time. I continue to learn and quote his farm which I'm very excited by so feel very connected to farm and and your book is I read cover to cover because of my great interest and so comprehensive and everything you want to know and more about including my wife's family in there so we're very grateful to you for including that. If you had to in one sentence what what what is it is if a person says cut they know cut represents extreme truth radical truth. You say perhaps you know and you have a lot of different you could say in a word what it is. What is it is if you could say in a word what it is? What is Really two levels to answer at. >> [clears throat] >> One is who was the Rebbe and what did he stand for? Um and the second is as an extension of that what did he expect of his them? Um I tried to encapsulate the Rebbe in one word. Um and a little bit of a kind of sneak preview here. I I took many of the stories of the book which is true to historical fact as best as I could ascertain from many different sources. I took many of the stories and I used those as a basis to write an historical novel. Um which features the Rebbe as the central character although he doesn't talk in the novel. I've just finished writing that. And the title that I've given to that book is transcendence. And the reason why I call it transcendence is because as you will have seen from the title of my my book upward um the subtitle is in heaven and on earth which is to say that there are some rabbis who are purely nigla that are uh steeped in here and now and there are others that are nister that are somewhere else. Um there are very few if any rabbis that were both nigla and nister both with their money on with their people all of the time completely focused on them and at the same time operating above. And it's for that reason that many people attribute some of the behavior of the rebbe as very odd. And in my view they just they they did not understand or don't understand or can't comprehend how the rebbe was operating at both levels. I put this question to Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz, shalom alav shalom, and that was his explanation to me. People could not fathom how the rebbe was operating in both spheres at the same exact time. Uh as an extension of that like what what is an advana chassidus all about? I can only speak from the standpoint of what I observed of my grandfather and what I've observed of my own rebbe for the past 30 years which is that the rebbe is uncompromising in learning. As I mentioned to you before we started, my rebbe was one of the earliest talmidim of Rav Aaron. Uh he's one of the four people in the world. This is what I've heard. I I've not validated it. One of the four people in the world that received smicha from Rav Aaron. But at the same time the rebbe is an old world European born rebbe. Um so the position is to to be uh uncompromisingly involved and steeped in learning while propagating our lore. And and our ways and our traditions. If I could put it that way. It's not a It It technically is a Khagas Hasidus. But there is definitely a a Chabad a cognitive element to the Hasidus as well. >> I I can't wait for everyone to have their hands on the book and to learn more about and to have a greater appreciation. There's so much more to talk about. Thank you for the time. Just an extraordinary story and it's still unfolding. We can't wait to see what you do next bringing the masters to an English speaking audience through Artscroll, bringing the Hasidus of Nadworna through his biography and this historical fiction I didn't even know about. Looking forward to that too. And everywhere else that your your career your public and private life take you. Thank you for making the time and letting us go behind the Bema together. And I must reciprocate the thanks for having me here and and also to come to the physical premises and see how you're literally bursting from the seams with two brand new very large uh building. So, thank you again for having me. Thank you. Thank you for listening [music] to Behind the Bema. If you enjoyed the show, please subscribe, rate, and review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcast. We'll see you next week for another peek behind the Bema. >> [music]