The Soul of the Matter
A man came to me, all shaken up. His wife had awoken in the night in a fright. In her sleep, she had felt a woman press her eyes very hard. She was extremely traumatized by this experience and asked what she was supposed to do.
I thought long and hard about this. Suddenly, I remembered reading about a similar incident the past Shabbat. A certain tzaddik was approached by people who complained that unknown figures had disturbed their sleep. The tzaddik asked whether these Jews had recently uprooted a tree, to which they answered yes. He then explained that the tree may have contained a gilgul of a previous neshamah. With the destruction of the tree, the neshamah was prevented from receiving its tikkun. It had now come to scare those responsible.
I told this story to the man who stood before me. I asked whether he or his wife had recently uprooted a tree. He answered yes, and added that recently, a few family members had met their demise.
I sank into thought, and then said, “Listen, I can’t be sure, but it may be that the neshamah of one of your family members found refuge in that tree in order to find a tikkun. By chopping down the tree, you caused that neshamah untold pain. This is why it came to disturb your wife.”
I advised the man and his wife to make a tikkun for this neshamah according to a method prescribed in a sefer. I hoped that this would lay the matter to rest. I have no idea whether or not he did as I said.
Sadly, I heard that a few days later, one of his family members fell asleep with a lit cigarette in his hand. The cigarette fell upon the blanket and ignited it, causing a terrible fire, in which the smoker died.
