The Kaliver Rebbe - כג ניסן

Yahrtzeit Yomi #1030!! כג ניסן The Kaliver Rebbe רב מנחם מנדל ב״ר יהודה יחיאל טאוב קול מנחם אדמו"ר מקאליב (1923 - 2019) --------------------------------------------- Yearning for Yerushalayim SOL A KOKOSH MAR AS the long night draws to a close, Hungarian families turn to the song written by the Kaliver Rebbe that spread throughout prewar Hungary, a moving poetic expression of the yearning for Geulah. The first rebbe of the Kaliver dynasty, Rav Yitzchak Isaac Taub (1744–1821) of Nagykálló, Hungary, was a great rebbe and locally known, like Dovid HaMelech, as “the Sweet Singer of Israel.” He composed many popular chassidic melodies, often adapting Hungarian folk songs and adding Jewish words. He taught that these specific tunes originally came from the Beis Hamikdash and were lost among the nations over the years, and that he found them and returned them to the Jewish people. He said that the proof of this was that the gentile who would teach him these songs would forget them as soon as he learned it. One of these tunes — arguably the most famous — is “Sol a Kokosh Mar.” It spread throughout Hungary as a song of dveykus and hope in the spoken language, using the parable of a beautiful bird who wants to return to its home, Yerushalayim, and concluding with “Yibaneh hamikdash, ir Tzion temaleh… then, it will happen.” (Some versions continue with the words “Why has it not yet happened...umipnei chata’einu galinu mei’artzeinu...”) The Kaliver Rebbe who survived the war, Rav Menache