Rabbi Yosef Zohar: "I Ascended Higher and Saw How All Sins Create Harmful Spirits"

"Last Sukkot, I didn’t merit to perform the lulav ritual, didn’t put on tefillin, and didn’t dance on Simchat Torah..." When talking with Rabbi Yosef Zohar, one of the most active people in Beit Shemesh in the area of outreach, who heads the 'Bnei Melachim' yeshiva for wayward youth, his voice is choked. He recalls his situation just last year, and it is difficult for him to speak about it. It’s hard for him because the reason he couldn’t rejoice in the mitzvot of the holiday wasn’t because he didn’t know them or was far from Judaism, but because those days he was lying in Hadassah Ein Kerem Hospital after a severe multi-system injury caused by a serious accident he experienced. "Exactly a year ago, just days after Simchat Torah, I returned to Judaism and mitzvot. Only then did I start to reconnect with the mitzvot, understand what was happening with me," he says, reminiscing.

The conversation with Rabbi Yosef is startling. It's not just a story of an open miracle but also a tale of a chilling experience from the higher worlds. A true fight for life, culminating in miraculous recovery and victory.

"ZAKA Wanted to Cover Me"

"It was on the 7th of Av," he recalls the most significant day of his life. "I finished my regular daily class and hurriedly rushed to Bnei Brak. My mother was sitting shiva for her brother who passed away young, and I planned to come and console her. Since my car was parked on Highway 58, a main road leading to Beit Shemesh, I asked a young man I knew to drive me in his car to the road. After I got out, I crossed the first lane and then intended to cross the second lane to reach my car. At that moment, a Skoda car came speeding and hit me with full force."

Do you remember the moment you were hit?

"The truth is, I don’t. I only remember being thrown onto the road, and the first thought that crossed my mind was about my eldest son, who was studying in a yeshiva at the time. I thought about what he would do after I died when I would no longer be here, and that's it. That’s the only memory I have."

The rest of the details he learned from the young man who drove him there, as he stayed at the scene and saw the accident with his frightened eyes, and from other drivers passing by. It turns out that once the car hit him, Rabbi Yosef was thrown into the air, then run over again and thrown into the opposite lane. A bus passing by stopped with a screech of brakes, blocking the traffic. Meanwhile, the young man who brought Rabbi Yosef to the road rushed to him, held his tongue so he wouldn’t swallow it, and called the rescue forces.

The first paramedic to arrive was Yitzchak Levinger, a man who knows Yosef for many years. He later told him that his main artery was injured, and his entire head was swollen. "Yitzchak Levinger told me a sentence that illustrated more than anything the situation I was in," Rabbi Yosef recalls, shivering. "He said that after he washed my blood off his hands that treated me, he buried it in the ground because he was sure there was no chance I’d make it to the hospital, and he needed to bury the blood, like one buries the blood of a deceased, according to halacha. Later, after I woke up and understood what was happening to me, I met in the department someone who hugged and kissed me. He told me, 'I’m part of a medical team that was on its way that evening of the accident from a day seminar to Gush Etzion. When we passed by and saw the accident, we hurried to treat you. I can't believe you're alive.' Only then did I understand the great miracle that happened to me because the right messengers arrived at the right moments."

This person also told Rabbi Yosef that it took a long time until his pulse returned, and at one point, ZAKA arrived on the scene intending to cover him. "You lost six liters of blood," he told him, "there was no chance, but once your pulse returned, although it was very slow, we hurried you to the hospital immediately."

Rabbi Yosef notes that many Beit Shemesh residents who knew him told him later that they were already informed that there would likely be a funeral. Even the welfare workers from the municipality came to his house to prepare his young children for their father's absence. "I have, thank God, nine children who are healthy – the eldest in yeshiva and the youngest was, at that time, half a year old. It’s hard to describe the nightmare they went through during those days."

The Heavenly Court

When Rabbi Yosef arrived at the hospital, the best doctors rushed him into urgent emergency surgery, while his family sat in the waiting room, pouring their hearts out in prayer. "At that time, my mother was waiting for me in Bnei Brak, as I was supposed to arrive to comfort her, and she had no idea what was happening," Rabbi Yosef points out. "So my family’s task was twofold: to be with me and convince my mother that everything was okay because they didn’t want to burden her with unnecessary information. She was updated on my injury only after the shiva."

The following moments are remembered by Rabbi Moshe as terrifyingly chilling. "I remember myself lying on the operating table, being operated on by a Jewish doctor and two Arab orderlies. I know they are Arabs even though they don’t speak because I don’t see just their physical bodies but also things beyond that. Afterward, I see my wife and older sister sitting outside, reciting Psalms. I see them, even though they are beyond the wall.

"Then I reach the higher place, where I begin to understand how from all the sins I've committed over the years, harmful creatures are created. I suddenly comprehend how sometimes we do deeds in this world that seem small or insignificant; we try to minimize them and think, 'What have we really done?' But these sins ultimately harm us, and all the responsibility rests on us."

How do you see these things? Does anyone say them to you?

Rabbi Yosef speaks as if in a trance: "In the next world, there is no concept of speech; no one talks to you. Speech apparently belongs to this world; there, everything comes only from thought, a speaking spirit, not a physical thing. I reached a place where I see and understand everything, without the need to speak."

Rabbi Yosef pauses for a moment, requesting to rest. It’s difficult for him to recall those moments. "I was never a mystical type looking for signs of what happens after death or in the higher worlds; that’s why it’s so hard for me to remember what happened there. I really have anxiety about the things I saw," he says with a weary voice.

Another moment of silence, then he continues: "I see my life before my eyes, like in a movie. Quantities of deeds I've done over the years. I see how I argued with my father at age 14, how I stole a bun from the bakery at age 17, something else I did at 19... I'm ashamed to recount everything I saw, but one thing I want to mention, even though it pains me, is that I had an office near Beit Shemesh with a computer in it. Occasionally, I happened to watch YouTube and found myself often enjoying various videos, sometimes for hours. I’m very embarrassed to talk about it, but during those moments, I saw before my eyes how these prolonged viewings created harmful creatures, and I was their creator. Incidentally, later I wondered to myself how it’s possible that I went through Yom Kippur and yet the sins remained. The only answer I have is that perhaps I never truly repented, specifically, for each of these sins."

On the other hand, Rabbi Yosef notes that during his life, he also merited many acts of public merit, from his youth when he helped yeshiva boys to later when he engaged in assisting the helpless and saving lost souls. "To tell the truth, throughout my life, I always believed that the merits I would bring to the next world would pertain to my toil in Torah, but there it became clear to me that helping the unfortunate is no less important. I was privileged to help elderly people, regularly accompany them to synagogues, and take care of them. When I helped them, I never understood the great importance of it, but in the moments I was up there, I realized that when you help a Jew, you're essentially helping the Creator of the Universe. Just like that. At that moment, I understood most tangibly that the Creator is a good and loving Father, but he’s also a boss, and he expects you to fulfill your role and not just drift through life idly. I must note that this understanding opened my eyes because I’m a simple man; I always lived life in the big world, like we all live. I never understood how critical each of our actions is, how much power it has."

After seeing all the good and bad, Rabbi Yosef found himself before three judges – "I clearly saw that these were Rav Ovadia, Rav Mordechai Eliyahu, and Rav Fischer from the Haredi community. It’s not that they had beards, robes, and hats; they also didn’t have their usual faces, but I saw that these were them. They ruled that I should die, but in the end, something saved me and led to my return to the world. By the way, when I was there, I understood that there’s a person I know well who is about to leave the world and two women who are also about to depart. My wife says that after I woke up, the first question I asked was about that person; I really nagged about it, and everyone didn’t understand how I knew he had passed away."

These words are stirring and terrifying. I assume you must have shared them with rabbis as soon as you could

"Certainly, after I came back to myself, I told this to my rabbi and teacher, Rabbi Jacobson from Tifrach, and to Rabbi Arieli from Yeshivat Birkat Yisrael. They believed me and said I was chosen to be a messenger to instill more faith and love in the Creator of the universe."

The Heart Behind the Mind

It should be noted that during those stirring moments Rabbi Yosef experienced, the doctors continued to operate, categorizing him as "a critically injured person fighting for his life." After being taken out of the operating room, the doctors informed his family that his condition had improved but was "still critical and unstable."

It was a full month before Rabbi Yosef was moved from intensive care to the surgical department, and another month passed before he regained full consciousness.

Throughout this time, his devoted wife stood by him, watching with worry and prayer over every development. "The moments my husband began to speak were very moving," she recalls, "but they were also frightening because we didn’t know what he remembered and what was still affected. I introduced him to our children one by one – he remembered all of them, except the youngest. He didn't remember she was born; she was completely erased from his memory. We had to reintroduce them."

Rabbi Yosef’s wife emphasizes: "Throughout the recovery process, we saw great miracles that can’t be described. There were fractures in his body that simply healed by themselves, without any logical explanation. His return to life was also very rapid; I remember the day he was moved to rehabilitation. The doctor who received him asked him to write the first verse of the Torah on a board. He wanted to test not only his memory but also his ability to express things in writing. My husband took a marker and wrote in a straight line the verse: 'In the beginning, Hashem created the heavens and the earth.' The doctor couldn’t believe his eyes."

Is there a logical explanation for what happened here?

"I don’t have a logical explanation, but I can tell you one thing: The morning after Yosef's accident, I received dozens of phone calls from people I didn’t even know. One said to me: 'It’s clear he’ll return to himself and everything will be alright, he helped me so much with my kids,' another said: 'Thanks to him, my marital peace was saved, he will certainly recover.' Suddenly, I heard from so many places about my husband’s immense giving, heard things I wasn’t even aware of, and it proved to me that he had so many merits that surely stood for him. Additionally, I discovered something very interesting – as a result of the injury, a scar formed behind his brain in a very clear shape of a heart. My feeling was that his giant heart and endless giving were what protected his brain."

Rabbi Yosef barely remembers his initial hospitalization period. "My first memories are of being restrained by hands and feet so I wouldn’t harm myself, and my condition was terrible, but since then, thank God, the situation has improved day by day. Recently, I went to the department because I still had a few stitches from the surgeries, and I wanted them released. When I met the surgeons who treated me, they didn’t believe I was walking on my feet. They hurried to call the department head, and he said these words to me: 'I determined that you have no medical potential. For me, you were a vegetable. I didn’t expect there would be any change in your condition.'"

And how are you today – have you returned to full routine?

"Yes, thank God, I returned to a very normal routine. I walk, run, move around, continue to head the yeshiva, bring young men closer, and be a father to my children. But since the event, various things have changed internally for me, especially in guarding my eyes. I am not willing in any way to engage with computers, not even at the level of sending emails; I’m also extremely careful with theft and arrangements that might ultimately be interpreted as theft. It’s not that I act out of pressure, but out of the understanding that these things are simply not worth it but only harm. They seem good at first, but truly cause us only bad. I'm also much more of a 'home man' than I was before. I understand how much my family is worth to me more than anything."