Rabbi Simon Jacobson, a towering figure in the Chabad-Lubavitch movement and author of the best-selling book Toward a Meaningful Life, reveals he once had an “incredible” meeting with Argentina President-Elect Javier Milei.
The Libertarian Populist Milei, whose victory over his socialist rival Sergio Massa on Sunday evening shocked the world, is an ardent admirer of Judaism, and has even studied the Torah and considered converting to the Jewish faith from Catholicism, Breitbart News reported.
This past year, Milei visited Ohel in Queens, New York, the final resting place of Menachem Mendel Schneerson, the seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe, and also met with a chozer, a rabbi who has held the distinct merit of transcribing the Rebbe’s long and rich talks over Shabbat, according to COLlive.com.
Milei enthusiastically discussed the visit in an interview on Argentine television.
Jacobson was a chozer for a number of years and, in a video published to his popular YouTube channel on Tuesday, the esteemed rabbi revealed it was he who met with Milei.
“It was a few days before Rosh Hashanah [Jewish New Year], September 10th to be exact, and I was invited to meet him in Crown Heights in an office and to present to him my book Toward a Meaningful Life in Spanish, and I shared a little background on myself and the book,” he said.
Jacobson also discussed with Milei his duties of being a chozer.
“I was honored and blessed to be a chozer, someone who memorized verbatim hours and hours of the Lubavitcher Rebbe’s talks delivered on Shabbat and holidays when no notes are taken and no recordings are made,” the rabbi told the free-market economist. “We had to remember it verbatim, we’re talking here sometimes four to five hours […] five hours is about 100 pages. The next step was writing it up, researching it, annotating, and then publishing it.”
Jacobson then explained how Milei became elated when the rabbi gave him a copy of his book.
“You should have seen how his eyes lit up, he was absolutely fascinated by the process of the remembering and that this was all documented in a book,” Jacobson said. “His excitement made me excited.”
Milei asked Jacobson what his secret was for remembering the Rebbe’s wide-ranging remarks, the rabbi said.
“It’s all about listening and to empty your mind of the temptation to process and be like a dry sponge,” Jacobson told the Argentinian. “A dry sponge retains, a wet one does not.”
“The smarter you are, the more brilliant you are, the more it can work against the process of absorbing,” the rabbi added.
Jacobson then blessed Milei, telling him he should win the election, and urged him to read the chapters on leadership and government in his book.
“It was a very meaningful moment and little did I know that he would be elected,” the Jewish leader stated.
Jacobson concluded by congratulating Milei on his stunning victory.
“I give you my blessing in the name of all of us. You should indeed be successful in not only being a political leader, but a spiritual leader with a vision,” the rabbi said.