(Courtesy: Rabbi Tal Moshe Zwecker)
Another version of this story is in Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram’s Horn, Chapter 3-6 – The Ram’s Horn of Passover.
Once, when the Rebbe Maharash of Lubavitch was traveling through Berditchev, he saw a group of elderly Tolna chassidim carrying buckets of water and scrubbing the walls and floor of a little shul in preparation for a visit from their Rebbe the following day.
When the Rebbe asked them why they were doing all the work themselves instead of letting the younger chassidim help them, they answered, “We are doing this ourselves because we want to have healthy angels to assist the advocating angels who come out of the tekios, the blasts of the shofar.”
“You know the Yehi Ratzon that is said after the tekios of Rosh HaShanah — the one that mentions ‘the angels that are formed from the blowing of the shofar, and from the tekia, the shevarim, the teruah, and the tekiah, (kshr”k),’ [the identifying letters of the Hebrew words that signify the various sounds of the shofar]?
Well, one Rosh HaShanah the holy Rav Levi Yitzchok of Berditchev said: ‘Sweet Father, compassionate Father! Just in case the angels that proceed from the shofar that Levi Yitzchak the son of Sarah Sasha has just blown are weak angels, let their place be taken by the holy, healthy angels that were created by the toil of Your people in preparation for Passover, as they cleaned their kitchen utensils in order to fulfill their mitzvah as perfectly as possible: kratzen (scouring), shobben (scraping), rieben (rubbing), and kasheren (making kosher)!'” — [for the initials of these four Yiddish words are also kshr”k]. (Likkutei Dibburim of the Rebbe Rayatz of Lubavitch, Vol. I p. 280)
This teaching was brought to my attention by Art Finkle. It comes from a posting by R’ Tal Moshe Zwecker.
Shofar, Angels, and Passover
Another version of this story is in Hearing Shofar: The Still Small Voice of the Ram’s Horn, Chapter 3-6 – The Ram’s Horn of Passover.
Once, when the Rebbe Maharash of Lubavitch was traveling through Berditchev, he saw a group of elderly Tolna chassidim carrying buckets of water and scrubbing the walls and floor of a little shul in preparation for a visit from their Rebbe the following day.
When the Rebbe asked them why they were doing all the work themselves instead of letting the younger chassidim help them, they answered, “We are doing this ourselves because we want to have healthy angels to assist the advocating angels who come out of the tekios, the blasts of the shofar.”
“You know the Yehi Ratzon that is said after the tekios of Rosh HaShanah — the one that mentions ‘the angels that are formed from the blowing of the shofar, and from the tekia, the shevarim, the teruah, and the tekiah, (kshr”k),’ [the identifying letters of the Hebrew words that signify the various sounds of the shofar]?
Well, one Rosh HaShanah the holy Rav Levi Yitzchok of Berditchev said: ‘Sweet Father, compassionate Father! Just in case the angels that proceed from the shofar that Levi Yitzchak the son of Sarah Sasha has just blown are weak angels, let their place be taken by the holy, healthy angels that were created by the toil of Your people in preparation for Passover, as they cleaned their kitchen utensils in order to fulfill their mitzvah as perfectly as possible: kratzen (scouring), shobben (scraping), rieben (rubbing), and kasheren (making kosher)!'” — [for the initials of these four Yiddish words are also kshr”k]. (Likkutei Dibburim of the Rebbe Rayatz of Lubavitch, Vol. I p. 280)