My husband is friends with a man who is 60 going on 16. He’s always out where the teenagers hang out in the middle of Jerusalem, Ben Yehuda. Late at night, young people go there to hang out, but some show signs of falling into a lifestyle that can be risky and become a prison. Yakov understand what internal and external prisons are like. He could probably make his own map. He spend 35 years dealing drugs until he inexplicably (he can’t even really account for it. Sounds like pure Divine Providence) turned his life around.
He grew up in Tel Aviv in a fiercely secular home. Yakov never had the desire to visit Yirushalaim because it was “too holy.” Avoiding all things religious was an ideology in his family. Unfortunately when he was 15 years old, he fell prey to the allure of illegal drugs (which in those days were actually quite rare in Israel), and began selling almost as soon as he was using. The drugs gave him a feeling of power and influence. He said he was often made fun of for being short, so the drugs made him feel tall and important.
Yakov ended up doing a big deal in Amsterdam. The guy actually ran off with his money and Yakov was desperate…he really needed this money. Something inspired Yakov to say “G-d, if I get my money back, I promise I’m going to go live in Jerusalem and become religious.” The thief’s girlfriend came knocking on his door and told him that she was leaving the guy and returning Yakov his money. Although Yakov got his money back, he forgot about his promise to G-d. Well, for the time being…
Actually, he didn’t forget, the promise kept nagging him. He went to a rabbi to try to nullify the vow, but the Rabbi told him (and this is according to Jewish Law) the oath couldn’t be invalidated, because a Jew’s soul has already promised to keep commandments (all Jewish souls were present at Mount Sinai when Moshe-Moses- received the Torah). It wasn’t long before Yakov was caught by the police. They tied him to a tree and he said he wasn’t going to go anywhere until they gave him tefillin (prayer devices with small scrolls of Torah verses inside). The police laughed at him, but made sure he had tefillin in jail.
Yakov spend 3 years in jail, but when he was released, he became a fully observant Orthodox Jew and now works with at-risk youth. He is happy to share his story with people who are ready to listen. If you are ever on Ben Yehuda in Jerusalem at night and see a Chassidic Jew hanging around with the teenagers, you might want to go strike up a conversation with Yakov.