Miracles in the Minutiae

Hashem’s Protection: Hanging by a Thread

Denise Berger

So often in life, we are afraid to be true to ourselves. We want to fit in and go with the flow, seeking safety through acceptance. In the following anecdote, not only did the writer’s husband resist the pressure to change himself for the sake of blending in, but that resistance was the very thing that spared the couple from harm.

Since childhood, my husband has always been a proud Jew. He always had a kippah on his head and always wore his tzitzit with the strings hanging out, no matter how many family members asked him not to.

One Saturday night, when we were still engaged, he took me to dinner in Manhattan, which meant taking an elevated train from Brooklyn. The train stop was on a platform, up several flights of stairs.

thought they were going to start up with us. We tried to go down the stairs but the boys were already heading up. We quickly turned around. My husband guided me to stand next to the only other person on the platform.

The boys ran up to him and started talking to him very heatedly in Spanish. He replied even more heatedly and after a short exchange, they left. The man then explained that they wanted to rob us and had asked him to look the other way. He had threatened to beat them up if they even dared to try.

My husband could not stop thanking this stranger. The man then pointed to my husband’s tzitzit and said that his grandfather used to wear those strings, too.

a graduate of UC Irvine where he studied Mechanical Engineering and Business Management. After college, he advanced his Torah studies at various Yeshivas in New York and Jerusalem. With over 20 years of community service, he is a social entrepreneur, co-founding several community organizations including Bayit.LA. He can be reached e@joojcapital.com.

Eman

As we were waiting, my husband noticed two teenagers on the platform across from ours; they had been traveling in the opposite direction, and when they got off my husband saw them point at us and begin to descend the stairs toward our side.

Being a street-smart New Yorker, he told me to follow him because he

This experience happened more than twenty years ago, and the impression on the couple is still as strong as it was that night on the nearly deserted subway platform.