Rabbi Avigdor Nosikov
In my travels, I meet people whose existence is impossible to believe in until you meet them in person.
Rabbi Moshe Taub, known as the Rebbe of Kalov (Nagykálló in Hungarian), the “Kaliver Rebbe,” was born in Hungary, later moved to the United States, and founded a community in Brooklyn. Over the course of decades, he devoted a great deal of energy, time, and money to visiting Jewish communities around the world and strengthening and supporting them.
7 years ago, the rabbi received a devastating diagnosis: amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.
This is a disease of the nervous system that leads to the gradual wasting of all the muscles and death from respiratory arrest. Instead of resigning himself to it and falling into depression, at the age of 65, the rabbi began actively exercising his eye muscles, since they are the last to lose their mobility in this disease. Using a monitor that tracks the direction of his gaze, he learned to write and communicate with the outside world. It should be noted that the disease does not affect the patient's mental abilities in any way.
Rabbi Taub has been completely paralyzed for 4 years; only his left eye still moves.
With it, the rabbi writes books, actively advises and assists communities around the world (although he now rarely leaves his Brooklyn home), helps people and Jewish organizations spiritually and financially, and finds the strength to receive visitors for hours every day. Today, his secretary has to lift his eyelid so that the rabbi can write using his eye, yet despite this, Rabbi Moshe Taub finds the strength to live, doing what he loves. To live for others, to live for himself.
In response to my unusual request to take photographs and make a video to offer an example of a love of life regardless of circumstances, Rabbi Taub wrote “Sure!” with his left eye.
May G-d grant him health and a long life!
Pictured: Rabbi Taub today — and in the past, on his travels around the world.