Grew Up Around Lubavitch – But the Rebbe Changed Everything”

A Personal Journey from Borough Park to the Threshold of Geulah

In this very special episode of the Greeting Moshiach Podcast, Simcha Fisch and Levi Polichenco sit down with his father-in-law — a man whose personal history is deeply intertwined with Lubavitch, yet whose journey toward recognizing the Rebbe’s unique role unfolded gradually, honestly, and powerfully.

This conversation begins generations earlier, with a grandfather who worked in 770 during the Frierdiker Rebbe’s time, and traces a path through Borough Park, non-Lubavitch yeshivos, early exposure to Crown Heights, the parades, the farbrengens, and the unmistakable presence of the Rebbe himself.

Rather than arriving through structured Chassidus learning or ideology, this story centers on something far more direct: the Rebbe.

The experience of standing near him.

Hearing him say Gut Shabbos.

Watching history unfold in real time.

In Part 1, we explore:

• Growing up “around” Lubavitch without formally being Lubavitch

• Early debates about Tefillin and Moshiach — before having the sources

• The Rebbe as a living, present reality (not an abstract idea)

• First visits to 770 and the emotional impact of being near the Rebbe

• The pre-internet era: hotline recordings, tapes, and word-of-mouth

• The shift from Moshiach as a distant, mystical figure to a real אדם בשר ודם

• The mounting clarity of the early נ״א–נ״ב period

• The atmosphere leading into Yud-Alef Nissan and the Gulf War era

This is not a polished retrospective.

It’s a raw, firsthand account of how awareness developed as it was happening — before narratives were fixed, before camps formed, before history was written.

And this is only the beginning.

Part 1 brings us right up to the doorstep of Nun-Beis.

Part 2 will take us inside Nun-Gimmel itself.

Stay tuned.

The story is just getting started.

📩 Questions or thoughts? Email: [email protected]

—or comment below.

🛎️ Subscribe, learn for yourself, and live with the reality of Geulah now.

New to the podcast?

Start with our Foundational Episodes — where we lay out the core concepts behind everything we discuss, straight from the Rebbe’s words:

👉 Foundational Episodes

To buy the new book:

👉 https://a.co/d/c2an2sY

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