A few hundred years ago, in Morocco, in the city of Tafilalt, a young rabbi emerged by the name of Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira, better known as the Abir Yaakov in the Moroccan world. Slowly but surely, he became well known as a very holy and great rabbi who was able, through his blessings, to bring miracles to people. People came to him from everywhere to be blessed for health and success in all walks of life.
During his time, the people in Morocco were extremely poor and had difficulty supporting their families. Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira decided that it was his duty to help these poor families. He began traveling from city to city in Morocco to collect money for them. One day, he ended up in southern Morocco, in a city where people were able to donate money. There was a man of very high standing and tremendous piety who had the merit to have Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira in his home. He was elated and did everything to make the rabbi’s visit easy and pleasant. He showed the rabbi his room, and they went to sleep that night.
In the morning, at sunrise, the host woke up and went to the rabbi. The rabbi got up, and as they were getting ready to leave, he began looking for his small suitcase. Lo and behold, it was gone; it had disappeared into thin air. In it, he had his Tallit (prayer shawl) and Tefillin (phylacteries), and he felt very bad that it was gone. But even more importantly, it contained all the money he had collected in the many cities he had visited for the poor people. He felt very, very bad about this, and the host certainly felt very bad as well.
Word got out in the city that the holy Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira’s suitcase had disappeared. Everybody searched all over, but to no avail. The suitcase had disappeared as if the ground had swallowed it. Rabbi Yaakov felt very bad that the money the Jewish people had donated for the poor would not reach them. So the people of the city made an emergency collection and came to Rabbi Yaakov Abuchatzeira with a nice amount of money. He was very happy, although it did not even reach 50% of what he had collected.
The people were surprised that Rabbi Yaakov was concerned only about the money. He did not even care that the suitcase also contained his writings of Torah, which he had worked on for years and years, and that they too were gone. But he said nothing about it. After the people had searched for the suitcase for a while, they went over to him and asked, “Rabbi, how come you’re not concerned about all the writings you wrote?” He grinned and answered, “All these years, I wondered if my writings are deserving of being printed. I prayed to Hashem to show me a sign that if my writings are not worthy, they are not worthy of being printed. So it must be that they are not worthy of being printed.”
The people were surprised by this answer, and it became the conversation piece of the town. The pain and suffering from the loss of the suitcase was felt not only by the Rabbi and his host, but by all the people of the city.
One day, toward evening, there was banging on the host’s door. He opened it and saw men in front of him who looked like gangsters. They looked very frightening, so he started to close the door. They stopped him and said, “Excuse us, please.” With their heads bowed, they said, “We need to speak to the Holy Rabbi. Please let us speak to him.” The Rabbi instructed the host to let them in. The four gangster-looking men walked in, bowed their heads, and handed him his little suitcase.
The Rabbi looked at them in bewilderment and asked, “You found my suitcase? Where did you find it?” They were amazed that he did not even suspect they might have stolen it. They were dumbfounded and could not speak until the head of the gang opened his mouth and said, “Rabbi, we are gangsters, we are crooks, and we heard that you came to town. We knew that you must have a suitcase full of money, so we stole your suitcase. But when we were trying to escape from the town, there was a little stream of water that we had to pass. We stepped into the stream, which didn’t even reach our ankles. As we were crossing it, the waters became roaring waters and reached our necks. We were almost drowning. We ran for our lives in the opposite direction and escaped. The waters went back down to a little stream, up to our ankles. Once again, we went into the stream, and once again the same thing happened. The waters became roaring, and we almost drowned. We ran for our lives back to the city.
“Finally, we decided to leave the suitcase behind, and we walked across the stream with no problem. We remained until our ankles. We realized that the reason the waters were roaring was from the heavens above. The Shamayim (from the heavens above) decided that we are crooks and had stolen the suitcase of a holy Rabbi, and the heavens would not let us get away with it. So we decided right then and there to come back and bring the suitcase back to you. Now we’re asking you for forgiveness. Please make sure we don’t get punished as we deserve to get punished.”
Rabbi Abuchatzeira turned to them and said, “I forgive you fully, but on condition that you accept upon yourselves to make Teshuvah, to repent, and decide in your minds that you will no longer be gangsters and will no longer steal.” They put their heads down in agreement. As they were leaving, they said they would make Teshuvah and no longer steal.