Clinging to Our Principles | Rabbi Uren Reich

This מוסד is called very appropriately, Vayimaen. וימאן means to stubbornly refuse, even when it's painfully difficult. Yosef HaTzaddik was feeling overwhelming pressure being a strange foreigner in a place where אשת אדוניו was in power, and was pressuring him, as the Gemara says. וימאן means to stubbornly refuse and to cling to your principles. And וימאן is not only in Shemiras Einayim. וימאן takes the strength of character to do what we know we have to do, and not do what we know we dare not do. I'd like to share a story with you that I heard recently from my aunt, the story the way she remembers it as a child, about my grandmother, Mrs. Steinbuch of London. Mrs. Steinbuch of London was a young widow in her thirties, with nine children, when her husband, R’ Asher Steinbuch, passed away tragically. And she brought them up heroically, with tremendous determination that they should grow up to be בני תורה, and יראים ושלמים. When the war broke out, one of the greatest difficulties in bringing up her children during the war was that she could not contact her father, who lived in Switzerland, who was a great Talmid Chacham, and she couldn't continue to ask him all her questions. And at one point, London was being bombed relentlessly by the Germans, and Sir Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of England, made a public announcement that there's going to be a boat going out to America, and they're hoping to take 2,000 English children. It made a lot of sense for her to send children to America. She had קרובים in America. And the children were very excited at the prospect of going on a trip on a boat to America. She said to the children, I will not do it without asking a Talmid Chacham, his דעת and his הסכמה. At that time, the only one she knew close to her that she could ask was R’ Elya Lopian zt”l, and she went to him and asked this question, Should I send my children to America? And he said: This is a question that needs גורל הגר”א, and I do not do גורל הגר”א unless I fast. I don't have the כוח to fast except Monday and Thursday, when I fast, anyway. So I'm going to do it Thursday. She came to him on Friday morning and he said he wasn't capable of fasting yesterday. It'll have to wait till Monday. She was very taken aback. It was a day before the boat was going. She came to him on Monday and he said to her, Mrs. Steinbuch, I am so sorry. I felt very sick, I couldn't fast, and I will not do a גורל הגר”א without fasting. My grandmother, because she was such a strong-minded person when it came to עניינים of יראת שמיים, told her children, It’s out of the question for me to do a thing like this, without the הסכמה of a Talmid Chacham, and therefore you're not going. There was a tremendous disappointment in the house. A day later, they heard on the radio, Mr. Churchill made a special announcement. I have sad news to share with the English people. The boat that took the children to America was torpedoed by a German submarine, and most of the children on the boat have died. וימאן. When a person has principles that they know are right, and they have the כוח to adhere to them, we cannot begin to fathom how much we gain בעולם הזה ובעולם הבא. Let's hold onto that one word, וימאן.