Meaningful Interviews: Rabbi Yaakov Homnick #2- R Hutner refused million dollars; Words about Rebbe

welcome to meaningful interviews part two with rabbi yaakov hamnick we're discussing uh rabbi hutner zak sal his relationship with kobach with yaakov's own experiences his father was a talent movik of uh robert hutner and uh today i'd like to talk a little bit about the i believe you grew up uh part uh part in the cronies flatbush that area and um your uh association with chabad and from there if you could also talk more about you know rabbi hutna's kesha with the rebbe or not cashier you know so you decide how you want to approach this whole topic go ahead i just put in a a different microphone is it better or worse i think it's better okay good so let's this it's a attachable microphone i forgot to put it in the first time um so uh i grew up in east flatbush and we ne we never walked to crown heights but like i said we would go uh my father had this many he would take his stories to divorce and sometimes we would cast her out of his minion that was a bonus now what my father did do was uh i always ended up going to very odd summer camps because my father did not he was yeah he didn't have a lot of money and he was always looking out for ways uh at least that was part of his motivation a lot of times was to get a good deal but the fact is i think that he also wanted us to get exposure to different currents of thought and and human argument behavior so the fact is i went to all the entire day camp before i went to i wouldn't go to sleepway camp until i was 10 years old and uh and and even then i went to salem at camp but it's almost to give you a flare so uh when i was in salem camp i was so scared of the rebbe walked around with a stick all day that i was like the best helmets i've never been i've never been such a good time in the valley right but he used to walk around the rabbit and he used to say there was hardness dad smelling kim in the plots but by giving me tight sakai so i understood and i i mean i don't know if he would have the ghost hit me anyway as a as an actual sinister guy in the camp but i don't want to take any chances and at that time by the way my father didn't have a bed yet he grew in bed for visiting days it was kind of short and uh and and the rabbit was so proud of me we learned the third cracker condition the rabbit wanted to show up how well i'm doing so he asked me to read the mission for the for the class but he might my father here and david you know divine comedy but they have to make that the mission they gave me to read was had i had a cadaciously busy museum so but before i ever went to sleep i came we went to i went to italy and we had a rabbi i think i had the same rabbi for two years uh who he had a club foot so you maybe know who it is what was his name i don't remember his name he had a club foot he had one shoe that was especially built to be because one foot was longer than the other uh i don't i don't know rabbi muniz rabbi writes this plot no i don't think it's anything else i mean it's not ringing a bell anyway it was rabbi smith rabbi smith no no i'll be honest if i remembering right the first year he was my rapper i didn't notice the shoe and the second yeah i noticed it was a little bit old but he would you know it wasn't so obvious and he didn't walk around too much and during class he said to this sony so i came to i was in early tour and and so then another thing was that in all interior they would take us to medford in 770 once in a while maybe every two weeks or something and go to the rebel's menu for mexico and uh and then at the end we would all yell yeah the they had us to camp had us to yell there was way before there was any milestones yet stuff going on yeah yeah but you thought i'm surprised they said they did that in 1968 already absolutely before 68 i already went to salem so you were doing it in 66 and 67. interesting okay absolutely and yeah and uh we you know we enjoyed it and we're proud of it you know people see our name right now why don't it was a nice experience uh and again as good the whole way that i was brought up was to respect all rivers all all say this oh you know not to try to figure out you know my my my daddy's uh bigger than your daddy right we didn't operate though so so uh so i went there that was that was my first uh connects with the voucher and it was very pleasant i only have good everyone knows i don't have any trauma associated with that just it was a nice experience uh i don't know if it was more or less than any other day camp but it was a day camp we learned we did activities everybody was nice it was it was a pleasant uh memory one of my brothers later ended up in gandhi's role in the catskills for the summer because i remember we visited him but i don't remember which brother was but i never did by the time when i if the tail went camping 10 years old then they started sending me a camper and uh so that's a different thing now what am i answering again um michael just general chad was still about it well yeah did you later when you were a buffer when you were yeah so here's the thing so here's the thing that i did and honestly i don't know if you'll find another literature shiva bush anywhere from my time that did this it could be a will but it's certainly a mere demute but i used to every arab shabbos they i used to learn the rebbe's uh piece on the rash author uh they published it in the in the argument yeah yeah i don't know if it's called the augmented animals called the morgan chanel where i remember what stage in history was but but but on rachel turner i wasn't so interested in general but and but alan rashford uh and it was there like every week so and i would learn it i learned to carefully a lot of times i'd look up the uh final kindness your mama comes here now the thing is you have to understand that where i was where i was coming from is i was well aware that is some [ __ ] precedent would think that everything there ever says is gold i was also well aware that there's some you know anti irregular people who think that whatever he says is you know so is the opposite and so i was very conscious of that uh it always annoyed me when labout is would call people miss knock him i said nobody's been snagged him anymore people are here then i was missing and that was always an annoyance to me but they always try to divide the world because he remembers that but the point was so i would you know and my maha always was that i want to be kabul semester misha umrah i i want to learn tara and and i have some kind of you know built-in uh clock you know built-in uh standard of what i think is solid and when i you know what i in lessons so i very i trusted my instincts at a certain age that and so i would learn the piece every week and i had a a lot of regard for it uh i mean there was some weeks wise where i helped is right some weeks were all right it's a you know it's october you know i'm excited about it but and i tell you a trick that i did one time i don't know if i need a capper for this or not but my review review it was not his child he ended him as yeshiva pretty much not exactly but pretty much and uh so and he was i mean when i was 17 years old i was in this year when i was eight years old i started to go to him for child studies every shot and so one week i said to him you know it is akashi and arashi and the mizrahi is laying like this and and uh you know the moscow was always saying like this but but you could ask akasha like that one like this and then we're like that so wait maybe the mouth is like this i basically told him over to rev his whole piece without telling him who it was and he was full of his violence and he liked it a lot then i told him who it was you know it was like all right he didn't say anything negative but he was it was yeah he didn't expect that so and i so what i a little bit did it as a wise guy because you know because again i was a real cabo samus meshamer guy from the earliest years and my father many ways was behind me though so i i want i never wanted that like orchestra ever said it's possible that's ridiculous if the rabbit said it it's it's it's always parmesan i almost ridiculous it it has to be judged on its merits like everything else and a lot of this is good and we should be open to learning it so my mela you know if somebody wants to come now and say that the reason why i wrote home i saw arashi's because that was absolutely better it was terrible you know someone can make that theory you know who knows but but the fact is i'm just showing you that i was you know i and amish i learned it every week and by the way that's why later on i was very pained when the mashiach thing started accelerating and all of a sudden there's more and more mashiach every week yeah of course i should really explain also i i used to only read that rashi thing which was a limited version of the series but lady is once i wasn't looking for the paper every week i would get to see if this that they they'd bring them to shul right and i lived in earth israel and i used to dive in and and the southern uh the spanish on shops and so and so it was a procedure place so for sure it was always every week i went through the rivers thing and like i said i had weeks so i thought it was amazing and rings right there was all right and weeks all bothered by things one of the things that always annoyed me you know you know you may not enjoy this but what always annoyed me was when you know he would ask good question and then all suddenly this discussion where is too complicated for that kid to understand so that became a form of caution every rashi had to be understood by the 10 year old kid and and i never bought that premise at all and i thought that was an odd promise and as he is my boy you know i i think i i there's so many rashes that disprove that there's a promise including many rashes we don't even tell you what it's worth it tells you uh in in sprayer says this is well explained to the tourist gun and he doesn't tell you what the trust kind of says so he's not telling that to be beneficial you know so i i don't really go through a whole debate about it but the point is i that was something that i felt was it gave me a flavor of somebody who who who didn't learn you know regard for coming used to say that the guy that the goddard wouldn't learn like ramaisha feinstein they they're a little bit not good even you know they they didn't have to fight it out uh with with people that were there it was all the way up the line so i would get a little bit of that flavor under evidence come on you know if you had a real tough carousel all the years you want to like keep asking this question we're like come on put those questions inside well but i'm just saying but that's it i'm telling you this is someone who really enjoyed it respected and and and in many cases i was i decided like i was in my career like yes this is the terrorist there was rafi's wrong the demons wrong the rebels right if i thought it was right i have no problem saying who's right so so so um was there any point in your in your in your life that you being that you were exposed from foreign you know that was obvious and uh you you knew about lepavich did you ever have a desire to be a husset no uh now my family in in the ukraine uh my father's father's family were atmosphere which of course bro is from the chernobyl right it is in that whole line and uh and we were very proud of that and including the fact that suppose in our family tradition we were taught that my great-grandfather uh my father's father's father had experienced a moifus from the atmosphere the different to me at the bigger memphis before we get into that the bigger my office was a director of grab a talk to go to the united states in yeah you know not too many people were doing that and the rabbit told you know gave some kind of half talking i don't well i shouldn't say that that that's more of my mother's side we had to have talked about the rep at least came about and uh and they they claimed it was amorphous with the rather you know uh i'll tell you what i'll tell you very quickly with the microphones because my great grandfather killed the good he had a mice like mushroom painter the guy was beating up again and he couldn't be servants so he and he was a very strong guy he clubbing the guy and then suddenly the guy looked dead to him you know i don't know he wasn't a doctor the guy might have just been deeply unconscious but he thought the guy was dead and he and he ran to the river you know the agave gotta let me in right away it's an emergency and he said i got this dead guy man in the alley what do i do so the rabbit sent somebody with him and said you know there's always sugar going over here everyone's used to it so you pick up the guy and walk him out of town like he shook him the two of you walk him out of town and then once you're ready out of the range of people then you drop him in towards someone so and that's what he did and then there ever said but but now you have to take your because there was a company that single sewing machine company was offering him to to bring him to america to sell because he was selling well in europe they throw sell on these sides so he he had to stay on the golf which he wasn't taking but the rev said now's the time to take the oil you know leave the country you know and that and that was so that's part of our whole family uh you know right okay but but i'm talking about you know like uh becoming an active question you never had that desire no no no no no and and i'm telling you forget it in a way yeah it was cultivated more the other idea you know uh to appreciate kabbalah samus and misha uma don't make the mistake that the they did with yourself always be open to see an autumn gutter and then but i also tell you know the funny thing about me i don't know you know maybe it's more of a mindset i mean another people i'm talking about but i i always any time that a speaker was too charismatic i would stop going to it was i used to go to a girl [ __ ] like my father was would take us to a gershwin southeastern and but i saw he's too hypnotic because by the end of it you're convinced he's absolutely right just from the his ability to control the crowd and to deliver his delivery and after a while i said i'm not going anymore my father was upset to me with the obvious toyota you know and i said i can't go to somebody who's got magic i'm afraid once it's magic i don't want to be you know i don't know if he's taking me to the right place so i don't want i don't want to follow magic i want to follow logic that was and and remember shapiro and eric's israel it was the most verdict of market share i mean in tremendous volume of material used to he was and his lady is he didn't even have a job you're just running give me sure i'm 40 50 and each february's town different tiger and is it unbelievable but but i after a few times i stopped going because i said hey i'm too hypnotized i don't want to be hypnotized right and it's hebrew it's so beautiful every word i i didn't even deter he went out the turtle i just loved listening to april but i said not good i and so i i had an aversion to those people who are so charismatic that you might follow them uh even not based on content just based on the atmosphere and i said you know what when mashiach really has begun himself then he can sweep me off my feet all he wants but until that time i have to be more critical okay so rabbi huckner and the rebber what you said mentioned last time that the ego the egocentricity issue but um did you ever discuss labavich and the rabbit with rabbi hunter no no i never did not not even in a small way did you dig your father yeah my father did so my father again my father was a strength cooper when my father was so close to the tear of what we talked to him hours a day and uh i uh you know what i'm shirking at him i was like if you know shuriken had my flexibility he had been attacked he had been he was a time of time he had been a family before he felt reported wasn't treating him right right but uh shuriken you're saying your father uh oh yeah would speak for hours and then you mentioned rough shuriken yeah yeah that's right so so so i have america with a grandson of a shirt so i know from his side what his family thought and and he said that at one point when they were angry at your foot that they were burning him you know they said atlanta says this is the guy's toast who's the potomac so you know so it's a it's it's a it's a tragic comic kind of a thing but it to me it sent me a strong message and it's really true and i always got to my father the feeling that now she should sit and spend the housing and he would talk with him about his views of everything so so my father was used to saying all the time what robotner told him about the barbecue which he said i just want to talk he's a bokeh bashas an atomic and but to me they never uh won me over as an art argument because if you if someone's in bucky bishop talk about what and and today's generation i think he's got to be way ahead of pretty much you know other any other candidates to be the rebel who are you gonna you have someone who's blocking the shots and talking about the myth acquittal yeah you have a candidate like that you know i mean so so i and i heard it and i thought like that's like a thing for condom among themselves to say you know i didn't think that's the thing i have to be guided about right i understand now the the did the you that your father that the close tom meet them did and other tell me that they look at robert hutner as a hail again a halogen you know what a halogen means yeah yeah i don't i yeah oh it's you're getting you're getting married and by us you know the rabbit gives a breath you don't get you don't give a break was there a sense of helicite of kidusha beyond the mashuga and beyond the gemura you know was he really was he really was he perceived as in in tahara in fiducia honestly i i can't answer it fully i'll give you some flavor i will tell you that there was a rule that you couldn't announce your [ __ ] until he met the carlos yeah for a long time and then he stopped that rule and and he stopped he stopped and then eventually so they stopped the rule and people announced and then brought the call then eventually he stopped meeting the cows all together people asked for brian schester his song with you know what's wondering if she would change his policy on that and he said that he he says listen you know he's becoming a a you know more of an out there he is than he and he he's being more mocked by himself that he's that he's stopping to see the cows so you know all of these things didn't explain himself too much he had to do an analysis where it's coming from but but that was definitely a thing that you could not announce to think till there was a kind i'll tell you a story off of that which is a fascinating story it's not exactly responsive but uh when i was a kid we used to dive in a certain show where my grandfather was the guy by the wall or the president and uh [Music] and one shabbos that came and there was a man called my father he was a wealthy man in the diamond business a hungarian jew he called my father he has to die again he screamed me at my father what kind of that's the way repeats it does you know that's a remy that's no review and he's by reading rohit and my father's taking it my father's trying to a little bit better say something but he mostly showed up and let the guy talk right like the michigan office you know after style and and so i always wondered what was that about what was going on in that thing so finally some years later when i was older though at that time maybe 11. but some years later when i was old enough i asked my father what was going on there and i remember the name of the man and but i didn't so he explained to me what happened he said that this man um his and he was yelling therefore they broke up his daughter should have that i heard from the original conversation so he explained to me that what happened was that this the man's daughter got engaged and then some garcia who had been in the concentration camps called them up and told them don't you know that the mother was a [Music] signer to the ss guys in the camps there were some women that were providing services that had variety to the ss guys and and so when they told them that and maybe they were hardcore survivors themselves they weren't going to be downhill source of that so the parents came to reputation and said we have to break the [ __ ] up we're not interested in making sure if we're a lady with this uh history so witness said to them listen uh i don't want to be beside these people uh by making this the the thing it'll come out and damage the other children and damage this girl and anyway let me break the shadow for you that's it and so when they called the guy in and he gave my whole cross-examination this dad about the girl he said i decided this girl's not for you you got to break the [ __ ] and the guy yeah i'm analyzing i see the personality types no good so this man was screaming at my father with so you know with so much pain angry at reporting for breaking the [ __ ] that you know would do what kind of high-handed behavior is this for rasheely thinks that while about to break a [ __ ] but meantime the emphasis was that he saved this man's whole family by breaking the [ __ ] of himself because later that man's son made a murder [ __ ] the daughter also married right yeah nice guy whatever it was but the point is that by putting the tech in the heat he was able to really be milestone his family so so you know there were certain things he was willing to do that were very selfless and very you know so that does that make him exactly as sad like a goddess i don't know but so and and those things weren't that widely nobody would tell me them i have to know it because they're not through my fault i'll tell you one of them i said that the man to this day doesn't know he's still alive and my father knew it which was that there was a man who who went to have to be a rebbe and and their first school decided that they want to fire for whatever the reason was they would they're not happy they're fire them a lot of these schools was down they were quick to fight cook trigger finger had a quick trigger so what has said to them you don't fire him let me take care first he argued with that he tried to talk about it but then he said all right you're committed to this let me find him instead of your fire so so everyone took in this this fellow is make a meeting with him company says listen i have to tell you i'm very impressed with what you were able to do with this year being a review and i i'm the main reason why i encourage you to cover everything so i want you to have the confidence that you can be a raven and now that your deaths established i need you back in the code and he said what trivia it's going great am i loving it he says you love me you're good you'll do it a couple years any time you become a bigger town of course when you learn to come for a couple years you go back up and you'll be even better and so he so he took the heat of you know was firing the guy that's not so bad because he didn't fire him he brought him into the cuddle and he did it to save him from the trauma of being fired from his first job and later and let's say two years later guy went out became a rabbit been through every 40 years there was a well-known success for him right right so let's talk a little bit about uh his uh family his family his wife his daughter if if you're open to that and if you know a little bit about it um what what you know okay i mean about rabbits and breweria um her writing uh and her bjj the seminary is uh you know uh covered that tata and that has produced uh the nation's role and leaders and his wife his wife i think she was a friedman right um i forget her maiden name was friedman i thought it might have been after but i could be wrong alter alter that could be choosing from a guerrilla yeah now there's something i saw in the footnotes that you looked at that you you were not aware of so i want to make you aware of which is that uh she was an american girl and she had a degree from hunter college and uh the green one a degree in what i don't know it's something you know it just have a degree you know okay because she wasn't good she was going to work but she had a degree and her father was a girlfriend no maybe lipschitz his name will have that positive yeah lipstick slip shits lipsticks yeah that's it that's it right so he was a garrett hussein and uh he had one son one dormant and he wanted the daughter to make that [ __ ] anyway he went to portland to warsaw specifically to look for [ __ ] of his daughter and someone read this [ __ ] and uh and she ended and he was a millionaire back in the 1930s uh and so uh so he wanted to should have her and reportedly said to her that he wants to live in arts israel and she said listen i grew up in america i'd rather live in america so uh he said i'll make you a deal i mean they negotiated and that's where they arrived at that show come with him for a year to ask israel and if at the uh if at the end of the year she can't if she's still uncomfortable then he'll go with her for here at the mark and then for the entity he's still uncomfortable then they'll have to figure it out whether they're gonna go back to try it there's australia got bombed again they'll have to figure it out but they're going to do one year here and one year there so beginners drone with all these mices with the learning game with the guys he slapped the guy you know who this design land for mcboy is something like this yeah and i think i think i heard that it was rabbi khale it was later arrested but you know but it was all friendly and and like old time you know it was their wedding nobody resented it right and and uh so he clearly had a great year or maybe extended to about a year and a half i think if you look at the dates but then she burned to america but it was also with the same condition that he has to find you know a place and uh he started in america with uh he started this uh this you would give on me to share nah now you're gonna want me to see you and you're giving and they got a bunch of kids from from brownsville over there that went and from those original guys a lot of them they're still in behind them to this day their mr alaska became the principle of the hostile principle and mr last who was was reported as ashamed she was only lifted recently so uh and and other sons worked in the ashima of some form or other so those were two of the names i remember they were in that original group and so he had a little house off with them then he got the job and rjj and robert lynchton told me my son is a is a marriage relations grand daughter so i religiously told me he was an old man right he's revealed she said you know i'm the one who got to putting uh started really he says yeah because i was impressed with him in the in bronzeville and i told my schwerer mandel of it and i showed my shrimp after him and he said this is one of the guys because ramen love it was like playing chess like in the ways like the wild trump was doing he was playing chess with like let's fill up america with the right robe and the right principles right it was very unselfish figure so uh so so so remember i was grateful for the job in rjj and but this is very important for you to know also it relates to some of the footprints yeah so so after i gained rjj or maybe two-way was being successful as the principal and uh my grandmother was on the woman's auxiliary board my father said to me only mention my mother once my father says i did something and he says you remind me of your mother well that was it so he worked with her and you know she was the latest exhibit but the point was uh he was doing well in rgj if for a year or two enough uh that he gave them an ultimatum and he said either you open a high school or i'm out here so they said all right the board got together and they made a meeting and said no we're not ready to open the high school so uh maybe he stayed like another year well he was but he knew already once in high school so remember which i think may also been involved but they heard about it at faculty that he would might be available because he wants to make a high school and they didn't have a high school either that board voted to make a high school and make him the principal so so he was the principal of the high school and elementary when he started but the point was they made a high school to get him as their principal thank you for that information so so um but during the the tata and the the the yamatova did you fee when you were you you were in this house i didn't answer about the revision i apologize right that's what actually wanted to hear no i apologize i i just explained to you about the cards in the background okay and and another very important advice was that my father got this from there was a man named i think his name was isaacson who was very active in time and uh in the you know in the late lay people positions and my father asked him where how did you get about franklin what's your childhood you don't have kids that want to travel and anything like this he says because i was reporting his personal accounts i did his taxes he says and when israel was nifta uh he left two million dollars 1960 he left two million dollars of fortune and he and uh and according to the will it was going to go after his son and after the daughter and and and the son never got married right so in many ways the daughter is the one who had some future going uh and reportedly told the accountant do whatever paperwork you have to do but i'm not interested in jerusalem turned down the million dollars she said so now so they were all shocked the lawyers nobody ever heard of such a thing he turned down his trailer now he had he got a lot of money from the swedish very you know the daughter had apartment buildings that her father had given her you know like nothing type of money took where he didn't see it but he wasn't going to take kerosene so it's somewhere in this the account told my father that the irs was convinced there's some kind of scam going on and they were auditing him like crazy for years afterwards to see where is he going to slip himself a million dollars back and he and so not only did he you know he had these serum on top of it because he did that but but again there's not a thing he advertised nobody knew that my father was a curious guy and he pushed the account to tell him confidential inside stuff so you know he was he was capable of and who sees these others he's capable of taking a big hit without anybody knowing about it it wasn't for the transfer it was to do the right thing right now so it's anyway so back to uh with the reference and i want to say this is very important the rabbits was a very nice lady she was she was you know tisha cabbage you didn't see any carbon safer from her she was the quiet i'm i think she's the quietest woman i ever met she was just quiet she didn't talk when she opened her mouth she's always intelligent and she liked to give candies to the kids and she would like if she passed through her hands it's not sure kennedy very super nice lady quiet unassertive except that she was she was there running these buildings and one time i remember my friends were coming home from they lived on the block with us across the street so so if a group of tenants was complaining to about the rent and she didn't want to bring them into the house with the resheshiva so she's standing on the porch with these like three going all angry at her she said that again she was like stoic because she hardly talked at all she was stoic and she let them bless them we were just watching it was fascinating so that she was this type of person now later [Music] you know she was lifted very shortly after the hijacking i don't know how many people realized maybe a month later or something like that so so it happens like this and that in the hijacking uh she got out of the first group she so she was home earlier you know we're sitting there we're watching her on the board she's home right we're all intimidated by us i don't know how many people want to greet her maybe some of them but we you know but she was home but then she got pneumonia and she died very shortly and uh a lot of people time it who knows something you could never know but she said because she did a mysterious netflix in the desert by you know in the desert by day it's very hot and my night is very cold and she gave raven her husband she gave her sweater because he didn't have a sweater and they didn't think they're going through a cold climate and they didn't have a sweater and she gave him hot sweater all through the ordeal he was wearing housework it wasn't you know a mama shivish it was it was a general enough sweater that he could wear and and people felt that in a way she gave her life because maybe she was more sensitive to the cold than he was maybe she needed to swim anyway that was who knows i'm just you know for the sake of history that was a thing to have and uh now and uh yeah the other thing that i have now also with her i want to say this that i might say that my mother has shown my mother died when i was 10 years old i don't have a lot of memories but it was one year where hamburglar was the middle of moving back from far rockaway to to coney island avenue and they and they weren't set up in either place to make simple story according to what i saw in your in your book that they got in trouble first of all yeah somebody told me that yeah so could this be part of the reason why they couldn't do it in paraguay so they did it in yeshiva eastern part it was not far from 770. right when i was dead for two years in elementary school so so we all walked that's the one time we all walked to eastern park and uh so my mother-in-law sean came home and said i cannot believe what it said that because the reversal is i never saw anything like that in my life what she said there was some you know uh chatty girl who was totally self-centered not aware of our surroundings was talking to some other girl across there's a snowshoe and she had her elbow on the rabbit's shoulder she probably didn't realize that she thought it's a bookcase so i don't know when she elbow was on the robinson show she's leaving with her elbow under emerson's shoulder talking to this girl it's going on for several minutes direction didn't make a peep so just to understand the you know the type of sadiq we're talking about right yes um thank you we will uh continue with our next part immediate sham and this was a wonderful um second interview thank you very much my pleasure