Seeing the Beauty of Shabbat
When I was in Mexico, Mr. Elie Kadi was my translator from the spoken Spanish to lashon hakodesh. This way, I was able to communicate with the people and help them out. A blind woman came with her mother and asked that I bless her with a complete recovery in the merit of my holy fathers. She begged to be able to see again.
I told her she must begin keeping Shabbat. I said that her blindness came in the aftermath of desecrating this holy day. The mother began meddling, claiming that her daughter’s sightlessness had nothing to do with chillul Shabbat. But I would not be swayed from my stance. I went so far as to say that her blindness began on a Shabbat.
The woman was finally struck speechless. She pulled out a calendar and checked the dates. Sure enough, the day her daughter went blind was a Shabbat. It was the day she had flagrantly violated the sanctity of Shabbat.
Both mother and daughter confessed to this terrible sin. They genuinely wished to correct their ways. I instructed them how to do teshuvah for desecrating Shabbat. After they accepted Shabbat appropriately, the daughter’s eyesight was restored.
