THE ORIGINAL DR. VELVEL GREENE & RABBI MOSHE FELLER MINCHA STORY
The original Dr. Velvel Green & Rabbi Moshe Feller Mincha story happened in the early 1960’s. Rabbi Moshe Feller, a native Minnesotan, returned to town as a Shliach (emissary) of the Lubavitcher Rebbe and founded Upper Midwest Merkos which later became a regional network of Chabad Centers and institutions. At the time, he was just starting out there and was eager to meet Dr. Velvel Greene, an active member of the Jewish community (though not religiously observant at the time) and a respected scientist. At first Dr. Greene thought he was a charity collector coming from Brooklyn, and tried to dismiss him with a check, but Rabbi Feller insisted on meeting in person. Finally, Dr. Greene agreed for Rabbi Feller to come to his lab for a short meeting at the end of the day.
Professor Greene’s lab had a NASA contract at the time, and being classified, Rabbi Feller needed clearance and had to be escorted inside Dr. Greene’s lab. Rabbi Feller spoke a bit about the mission of Chabad to the Upper Midwest and asked for Greene’s sponsorship for a fundraising dinner he was hosting. But, in the middle of their conversation, Rabbi Feller looked out the window and saw the sun sinking beneath the horizon. Without another word, he jumped up, pulled out a gartel (Chassidic prayer sash), and started quickly praying the “Mincha” afternoon services. At first the professor was shocked and upset, “Where I came from, nobody had even heard of afternoon services. I was very offended.” How ridiculous of Rabbi Feller to wait so long for an appointment and waste half of it on a prayer service! When Rabbi Feller finished praying, the professor announced that the interview was over. “And then my life changed forever,” he recalls with a twinkle in his eyes. Rabbi Feller apologized, and explained that what he had just done was more important than what he had come for. “If I hadn’t prayed then and there, the opportunity would have been lost forever,” he explained. Dr. Greene was deeply inspired and impressed, “People just didn’t talk that way.”
“That was the first time I heard a rabbi mention the word ‘G‑d’ seriously,” said Professor Greene. He immediately phoned his wife. “Remember how we were just discussing whether there were still people who would give their lives for G‑d? I just met one.” They invited Rabbi Feller to speak at their Jewish book club, and were significantly affected by his authenticity and wholeheartedness. After speaking with him until late into the night, they soon arranged a weekly study session. “It started as an academic curiosity for me,” Greene explains, “but it eventually became much more meaningful. I was searching for authenticity and I discovered Torah, the possession of all the Jewish people.”
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This Mincha (afternoon prayer) story was well-known and often retold in Chabad circles. (The above written version is adapted slightly from the Chabad.org website, see link for more on Dr. Greene’s spiritual journey). This year on Friday morning of the Chabad Kinus Convention I was looking for a free spot in “770” (The Rebbe’s synagogue) to put down my Tallis and Tefillin. The place was jammed, but I managed to find a spot. It turned out to be a good spot, for I got to see an old friend there, someone else who asked me a question, and I saw Rabbi Dovid Greene, Shliach to Rochester MN and the Mayo Clinic. I told him how much I loved his father’s Mincha story. He said, if you liked that story, here’s the sequel:
THE SEQUEL (1985)
Fast-forward to 1985: I (Dovid Greene) was then a Lubavitcher rabbinical student in Brooklyn, and came home before Passover with a friend to help with pre-Passover Mitzvah activities in Minnesota. That Shabbat we ate by my parents. My father (Dr. Velvel Greene) was then going through a phase where he had many issues and complaints with Chabad. It was never about the Rebbe, for he always felt close to the Rebbe, but he took issue with a number of things in Chabad and the Chassidim, and was complaining about them. At the Friday Night meal he got into a whole discussion about these issues, and was complaining and arguing on and on, and the same thing repeated itself at Shabbos Lunch. For myself, I could deal with it, but I was upset that my friend had to hear all this.
On Saturday Night after Shabbos we got a phone-call from New York. It turns out that the Rebbe shared the Mincha story (20 years later) at the Farbrengen. He said it without names, but everyone knew the Mincha story and everyone knew it was about my father and Rabbi Feller. The Rebbe’s retelling of that story, had an interesting effect. Now that I am older, I realize its what good marriage counselors often try to do with a fighting couple. Instead of assigning blame, and figuring out who is more right than the other, you try to bring back the old feeling, what made you fall in love with each other in the first place? That’s what the Rebbe’s retelling did, it brought my father back to that first encounter, to what made him fall in love with Chabad, to rekindle that old passion.
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THREE FAMOUS MINCHAS, AND A FOURTH
Jokingly, Rabbi Dovid Greene shared with me a humorous saying of Rabbi Moshe Feller about how well-known that Mincha story has become within Chabad (and beyond). “There are 3 famous Minchas in Jewish History: First was Yitzchak our forefather who founded the Mincha prayer. Then came Elijah on Mount Carmel who was miraculously answered by G-d due to his Mincha prayer, and most recently my Mincha in the lab of Dr. Velvel Greene!”
May I (Mendel Rubin) add one more Mincha, though anonymous and the story is not as well known. See the short “Mincha” story in back of Dr. Yaakov Brawer’s “Something from Nothing” book. It’s superbly written, most memorable and quite inspiring.