Tisha B'av Film (That Spark) 2014 Short Version

[Music] i had the opportunity to fly to los angeles and meet with a very special family and that's really where our story begins today my couple his son levy beautiful family i learned about their road to yiddishkeit i'm at 35 years old i was a trial lawyer living in west hollywood i had the kind of practice where i like to be in front of juries in court so other lawyers would bring cases that they thought needed they wouldn't settle or they had potential real value and they would bring them to me to do trials and my little brother who had become a baltimore about five five years earlier um told me that he knew an attorney it was an employment lawyer named michael eisenberg and josh koppel was a one of our favorite guests to have he was uh at a local college and uh he would tell me oh you got to meet my brother mike goppel he's like this hardcore philosopher philosophy major very intense trial lawyer you got to talk to my brother he's like tough as nails on this stuff and he could he could really use it and he comes walking up with this robe in a big furry hat and i don't know what the look of my face was but i see my little brother he gets his panic attack well i followed up with him probably about a day or so later we had lunch and i tell him you know i haven't lost in three or four years and he says his trial lawyer just inherited tons of money and he's gone so he's not he's not working anymore so he needs a guy who can do that perfect good shift yeah yeah and but within three or four minutes he goes you know what what are you doing for dinner friday night and i said that's that's the shabbat thing i said nah that's it he's come on for a meal i said nah like i'm really and he had this look on his face that um like i was a mark like he was like grinning at me and i was like what are you like i can see the way you're looking at me what are you but he was he was so unrepentant about it was kind of funny really yeah he was like a fox so i came for a shabbat dinner the meal of their house that friday night changed my life that meal changed my life wow incredible michael eisenberg extends an invitation my couple says yes and the rest is history but the story doesn't end there you see michael eisenberg was not born with a shrimal on his head so i asked him what was your upbringing like i mean i grew up in a conservative synagogue and you know my impression of growing up in a conservative synagogue is the judaism is defined by the holocaust stories and israel bonds i went on a summer abroad program at tel aviv university and um my grandfather should rest in peace my grandpa lou he was uh fighting cancer for a couple years and when i left that summer for that summer semester i knew that that was gonna be the last time i saw him and when i was there i got the news that my grandpa passed away and you know my grandfather only had two daughters my mom and my aunt so i was on campus that next day that when i heard that night next day it's a friday i'm on campus i see a guy walking with the yamaka this guy came up to me looked approximately my age and he came up to me he said do you speak english i said yes i do he said are you orthodox i said yes i am i said can i help you he said that his grandfather had just passed away and he wanted to know if he could say kaddish and where he could say kaddish and the reason he wanted to know if he could say kaddish was he said that his parents are still bor hashem alive can he say kaddish i said you know i don't know the answer to that question it's friday today why don't you come to my shul this evening and we can ask the rabbi that question and you know what why don't you come eat dinner with my parents tonight it was the first shabbos that michael had kept in his life and it it was a powerful experience for him so i i i really don't think i did very much do you know this man no could you could you look again real closely and tell me if you know him do you know do you know the child sitting next to him no looks like a firm kid but i i don't know that family you know this man that's michael he took and he took me under his wing and uh i guess that really made like my problem his problem and tried to get to the bottom of it so him you know sure well mike koppel yeah and michael eisenberg right a very very close friends okay very nice if not for michael eisenberg mike koppel who you see in that picture would not be there and if not from michael eisenberg that little boy sitting next to my couple would not be there okay because michael eisenberg right was the clive lipschitz to mike kappel wow this passes on that's unbelievable that really is incredible are you getting a chill yeah i am right now too wow [Music] do you