Yosepha Rose

[Aryae Coopersmith]

Recorded at the Reb Shlomo Shloshim and reunion at Aryae's home in El Granada, California, October 30, 1994

Yosepha: When I met Shlomo I was really young. (laughter) No really! Maybe 14, maybe even earlier, 13, cause it was in Los Angeles. It was before the House of Love and Prayer.

Natalie: San Diego in the 1960s.

Yosepha: No! Los Angeles!

Natalie and others: (background comments on this) Your name was Janey.

Yosepha: Janey - right! Shlomo gave me my name. I mean, I found my name at the House of Love and Prayer, which in and of itself, I think lots of us found our names and that part of ourselves there.

I was really young and I think it was in Los Angeles in a big temple that was in, like, on the way out towards the Valley, up the Canyon… this big temple. And Aryae, and Miriam was there, and Eliyahu, and we were dancing, and it was just in this empty room. I remember that the room was big and there were very few of us, so if felt really empty.

Someone: Leo Beck.

Yosepha: Leo Beck, yeah. Thank you. And then we started dancing. We started dancing and singing. And we danced and we sang, and we danced and we sang. And it just went round and around and around. And eventually at some point we stopped. We had been dancing kind of in a circle in the middle of this big room, and there was blood all over the floor. We stopped and I went, “Oh my gosh! What happened? Did somebody hurt themselves?” And everyone had no sensation of having hurt themselves. Finally I looked at my feet, and I had danced through the calluses on my toes. My feet were just bleeding. But it didn’t hurt. (laughter) I didn’t know they were my feet that were bleeding on the floor. I was really young, 13 or 14.

And I think, it’s an incredible privilege to have had that kind of experience. That what everybody here is talking about, is having that experience where you don’t know where your arm stops and the next person’s arm begins. You don’t know whose blood is on the floor because nobody’s feet hurt. I mean they’re not “your” feet. You’re so wrapped up in the transcendence of it. To experience that, through a person, through each other, is a rare gift. And I’m here because you are the people that I experienced that with. That was the transforming experience of my life. I mean, that gave me my name, that gave lots of us our names and our identities. We layer on top of that because that was 25 years ago, but that’s the core.

[reuven sabel aka golden gater rebbe aka proshevitzer rebbe aka proszowicer rebbe]

most beautiful time of zier anpin is the time of shalosh seudos, the third meal of shabos

[reuven sabel aka golden gater rebbe aka proshevitzer rebbe aka proszowicer rebbe]

now that we are all 40 years older we should really think about how to make that sweetest feeling last forever both in this world and the world to come.

[reuven sabel aka golden gater rebbe aka proshevitzer rebbe aka proszowicer rebbe]

the time of the zier anpin was the most beatiful