In writing this week’s cover story about the Bostoner Rebbe ztz”l, I was faced with the happy dilemma of having too much material to include in the allotted space. One of the things I didn’t address in depth was the source of his ability to connect with searching American Jews and draw so many of them near to Torah.

There surely are many factors that helped suit him well for that mission. He was a unique amalgam of a well-spoken, American-born chassidic rebbe. He had insight into people and wisdom to share and was able to find a way to relate to any type of person from any background, who in turn could relate to him as well. But sometimes even people with those attributes aren’t successful at moving others to transform their lives.

Several people I spoke with mentioned that the Rebbe had a greater belief in people’s potential than they themselves had, which enabled him to bring out great things in them. He once proposed a shidduch between two young people in his community in Har Nof. The young man was known to be outstanding in every way, and when the Rebbe mentioned the idea to the young lady, her reaction was, “The Rebbe must not know me very well. I’m just a regular Bais Yaakov girl, not in that boy’s league.” The Rebbe gave her a stern look and said to her, “I do know you. And I also know who you can become! And if you aspire to be someone suitable for that bochur, you will become so. I want you to think about it and get back to me.” They are now long-married.

But there are two other facets of the Rebbe that would seem to be even deeper sources of his success; we might say they were two sides of a coin. One is that his love for his Creator moved him to want other Jews to feel that way as well. When you want something that badly, you’ll do whatever it takes to be successful. As Meir Wikler said to me, “The Bostoner Rebbe was the most written-about chassidic rebbe in his lifetime and never turned down an interview. I once asked him why he gave away his time in that way. He said to me, ‘Meir, if it brings one Jew closer to the Eibeshter, it’s worth it.’”

Then there was the lack of an ego to get in the way of the Rebbe’s relationship with another Jew. If someone is going to change around his life under your guidance — whether you’re his kiruv mentor or his rav or high school rebbe — he’s got to be really secure in the knowledge that your interest in him is about him, not you. He will sense whether you’re reaching out to him as an outgrowth of your own love of G-d or if there is some self-interest mixed in, and the less of the latter and the more of the former there is, the more successful that outreach will be.

Dr. Wikler recalled the time that a friend of his, a very committed Bostoner chassid, decided for personal reasons that he needed a different type of rebbe. He gravitated toward another rebbe, changing his levush to reflect the move. Yet he continued davening in the Bostoner beis medrash, which was an ongoing embarrassment, since it was clear to everyone there that he had switched his allegiance.

Most people who invest so much in another would have a hard time seeing one of their devoted followers leave, but the Rebbe didn’t mind being a stepping stone to another derech. Eventually, the fellow moved out of Boston, and when he came to say goodbye, perhaps with a little discomfort, the Rebbe set him at ease and seemed to be genuinely happy for him, giving him a warm parting brachah. When Dr. Wikler met the man the next day, all he could say was, “You have a very special rebbe.”

“His success,” Dr. Wikler elaborated, “was his failure, in that someone else might have wanted everyone in his sphere to be just like him and follow in his ways, but the Bostoner just wanted to draw people close to the Ribbono shel Olam, and if you found another derech in avodas Hashem that was good for you? Gezunderheit. There are many Bostoner chassidim today, but there’d be ten times more if all the people he influenced had become Bostoner chassidim. But that wasn’t his goal. He loved every Yid, and he just wanted the best for them in gashmiyus and ruchniyus.”

Rabbi Dovid Gottlieb also shared a memory of a talmid chacham in the Bostoner shul who was quite vocally critical of the way the Rebbe would blow tekios on Rosh Hashanah. “So the Rebbe made this person the makri, who would now be the one to pasken on the tekios. Who does that?! Another person would fume about this person’s gall, criticizing the Rebbe in public. But he brought him in with ahavah, assuaged his ego, built him up. That was the Rebbe.”

Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 789. Eytan Kobre may be contacted directly at kobre@mishpacha.com