A free translation of an article appearing in the newspaper BeShevah.
The late famous Rabbi Shlomo Carlbach o"h flew many times around the world in order to perform his special music and was well known in the Airline World.
On one of his flights the Rabbi noticed one of the stewardesses mumbling her prayers from a siddur. He was surprised at this unusual occurrence.
He waited until she had finished her 'davening' and politely asked her 'Are you a Jewess?' She told him that she was a recent convert to Judaism, having been taught by an Orthodox Rabbi and she said 'as you can see I am now abiding by the strict rules of the religion.'
Shortly afterwards she returned to Shlomo Carlbach and said 'I see you are a Rabbi. Perhaps you will be able to help me with a pressing personal problem.'
Rabbi Shlomo inclined his head and pricked up his ears when he heard her words. 'Recently I have become friendly with a Jewish young man, and we both love one another very much. We would like to marry, but his parents are very much opposed to our 'Shiduch' on the grounds of my conversion. Unfortunately he does not want to go against his parents' wishes, as they have threatened to cut off all connections with him. He is very close to his parents and does not want to cause them grief.
Rabbi, perhaps you can help us.'
'I will try' said Rabbi Shlomo. He took the parents telephone numbers, promising that he would try to convince them to be in favour of the marriage.
On arrival at his destination, he contacted the young man's parents, but received a hostile and frosty reception. His attempts to convince the father to look at the situation from another angle failed utterly. In fact the father's anger grew even more until at the end he shouted 'Don't you know I am a Shoah survivor, and because of what the goyim did to us Jews, I now hate Goyim, and I will tell you, if my son marries this Goya (Gentile), I will kill him.'
At the end of this telephone call the Rabbi contacted the air hostess to tell her of his failure. She did not immediately answer him, but in her place, her father came to the phone. They conversed a little and Rabbi Shlomo told the girl's father of his attempts on behalf of his daughter.
The father then accused the Rav for 'mixing in' in the matter. At this
response Rabbi Shlomo tried to justify himself by saying 'In the Talmud it is written that the Almighty is busy for one third of his time in match making, and I am only trying to help Him step by step. What is clear to me is that your daughter and her young man are very much in love and it is a shame that they will not marry.'
The concerned voice of Rabbi Shlomo Carlbach touched the heart of the girl's father. He started to cry and said with feeling 'I will reveal to you a secret that I have not told to anyone, something that I was certain that no-one would ever know. I and my wife are Christians - but not genuine ones. Both of us are survivors from the Holocaust and because of what G-d did to the Jews - we hate Judaism. We brought up our kids as Christians in every way. They don't know the Truth.'
'If this is so ' said the Rav, excitedly, 'your daughter is Jewish from
birth, and there's no problem. The boy's father wants his future
daughter-in-law to be a genuine Jewess, and now it is clear that she is exactly this. Reveal to her the truth, and they will be able to marry.'
The air hostess's father concurred and the Rabbi then succeeded to convene a meeting of both sets of parents together in his hotel.
At the first moment of their meeting one of the fathers yelled out
'Yankele!' and the other responded 'Herschele!' - and they fell into one another's arms. Afterwards they explained to their respective, shocked wives that before the outbreak of W.W.2. they both learned at the same Yeshivah. Each one was sure that the other had perished in the Shoah.
Abundant memories came back to them. They remembered their lost childhood and spoke nostalgically of the pain. One of them said 'Do you remember how we dreamt of the future when we were Yeshivah students?'
The other one responded 'Yes, and we said to one another - when we grow up and marry, our offspring may well marry one another.
We forgot entirely, but Hashem did not forget.'
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Credit: Mendel S.
