A Gold Watch from the World Beyond: A Dream of a Mother's Love

Rachel Abramovich shares her story:

During World War II, when the Russians entered Vilna, my husband, my two small sons, and I were exiled to Siberia. When I stepped off the train, I was still wearing "European" clothes that revealed I came from "the world". At the Dzhamboz train station, impoverished local women surrounded me, all with one question: What do you have for sale?!

I answered that I wasn't selling anything, but they noticed my expensive wristwatch studded with diamonds. This watch was a keepsake from my mother from the time I lived with my wealthy parents in Poland, and it was very dear to my heart. My mother had passed away, and whenever I looked at the diamond-studded star-like watch, I felt as if my mother's face shone from it.

The women at the station were very insistent, especially the wife of the commissar. She pulled out a large bag of banknotes and said, "Don’t be stubborn; you will need this money here more than the watch." Her words were convincing, and in a moment of folly, I sold her the watch.

When I returned to my family and told them what had happened, my eldest son started to cry bitterly: "Mom, mom, what have you done? What did you do to us?" And I hung my head in shame.

When Sikorski's agreement came about, an opportunity opened for Polish citizens to leave after the war. But how would we leave, and with what? Ah, if only I had the gold watch in my possession. Meanwhile, my husband died. Starved to death. I was a wretched widow with two orphans. Without a penny to my name, and we were very hungry. My father was in the Land of Israel, and my brother in America. But before we could reach them — and find solace, we could perish.

Times were hard for me and my children. There were moments when some work was available, but now — nothing.

Strength failed, and you, precious gold watch — I sold you... If you were with me now, we would have been saved. We could hold on because by then, food parcels from abroad would have arrived, and we would have survived until liberation.

But now, I looked at my starving children and cried without tears. Fate had closed in on me. Amidst such weeping and despair, my head grew heavy, and my eyes closed, and behold, in my dream, my mother came to me. My mother truly. As if she were alive. And I cried, her cherished daughter, on her shoulder: Mother, mother, where will I go with my two children? I sold your watch. If I had it now, I would be saved. Mother, I'm in great distress.

And she shone her face towards me, stroked my head, and bestowed a kind smile upon me, saying — Don't cry, my dear daughter, you will find another watch in exchange for it.

Another watch?

Yes, my daughter, another watch in exchange for it.

I awoke, and it was a dream. The trouble remained. From where would my help come?

The next day, as I walked the streets of Tashkent in Dzhamboz, hungry and tired, my mind filled with plans on how to obtain bread for my starving children, three strong local Kazakh men walked behind me. Suddenly, I saw something glinting in the sand ahead. A flash! I feared the Kazakhs might notice what I still did not know, and I jumped, picked it up, hid it in my pocket without looking, and ran as fast as my feet could carry me. Running and running to our shabby hut, I called breathlessly to my children, 'Kids, I found something...'

I took out the item, and behold — a gold watch.

Without the diamond star design, but a gold watch.

That second watch sustained us in that darkness before the dawn. I sold it, and thus we could hold on until the food parcels from my father's family arrived. We returned to Poland, and from there, we moved on to freedom.

I can't understand it rationally, but my soul knows: just as the first gold watch was given to me by my living mother, my mother arranged for the second watch from the world beyond.

(From "The Other Reality" by Aharon Zeitlin)

The Departed Protect the Living

The prayer of the deceased protects the living... As it is written about Caleb "And they went up in the south and came unto Hebron" (Numbers 13:22), meaning — that Caleb went and prostrated himself on the ancestors' graves that they should pray for him to be saved from the spies' plot. Indeed, the deceased know of the living's distress and there is benefit in praying at their graves, for their prayer protected Caleb and saved him from the plot of the spies.

[In this context, it is also interesting to interpret the verses "And I will also surely bring you up" (Genesis 46:4) "and I will lift you out of your graves, my people" (Ezekiel 37:12) — that Hashem will raise Jacob our patriarch from his grave to witness the joy of redemption and the salvation of his children].

(Zohar, Shemot 16, Metok Midevash p165)