5 Elul · Yahrzeit
Yahrzeit/Hillula of Rabbi Moshe Aharon Pinto of Ashdod
Rabbi Moshe Aharon Pinto of Ashdod
Yahrzeit - 5 Elul
Resting place - Ashdod, Israel
He was born on Hoshana Rabbah in 1957 in the city of Mogador (Morocco).
Rabbi Moshe Aharon Pinto was the son of the holy and revered Rabbi Chaim Pinto HaKatan and a descendant of the great tzadik Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto, author of "Rif al Ein Yaakov," and Rabbi Yaakov Pinto, author of a work on the Zohar entitled "Mikdash Melech."
After his father warned him of the approaching Holocaust and he moved to Casablanca (Morocco), he decided to increase his detachment from worldly affairs, to pray more than usual, to beg the Creator of the world to annul the harsh decree, and to add more fasts to his existing fasts.
From the day the war began, he ate only bread dipped in olive oil, did not change his clothes, and for 5 years would go up to the roof of his house every Friday to wash and put on garments in honor of Shabbat. At the end of the war, his father appeared to him in a dream and asked him to change his clothes and stop mourning, since the war had ended. Rabbi Moshe Pinto was one of the tzadikim nistarim (hidden righteous ones). He did not want people to know about him, and he forbade people to speak of him. However, on the day of his passing, people testified to the miracles performed through the tzadik's blessings.
When he was in his thirties, he married a woman who was many years younger than him. After immigrating to Israel, he lived in Ashdod. For about 40 years he was removed from all the vanities of this world, secluded in his house, and did not go out even at a time of danger.
Due to his many sufferings and deprivations, his body grew weak, and by the age of 45 he had already lost all his teeth. When a dentist offered to fit him with dentures, he replied that he did not wish to enjoy the food of this world, because he did not want that fleeting, physical pleasure, but wished to eat only to sustain his body, and that if G-d had taken his teeth, he had no right to have them restored.
During his years of seclusion he wrote his book, but when he wanted to have it printed, he did not have the necessary sum of money. Rabbi Moshe Aharon asked his shamash, who sold lottery tickets, to bring him several tickets.
When the shamash brought the tickets, Rabbi Moshe Aharon took them, with the Ner Tamid he had lit in his house for the elevation of his father's soul, and asked the Creator of the world that if what he had written in the book was worthy of being printed, He should do him the favor, in the merit of his holy ancestors, of helping his ticket win the lottery.
A few days later a drawing was held, and one of his tickets won. The money he won was enough to print the book.
About three years later, in 5771, when he finished the second part of the book and wanted to print it in time for his son's (Rabbi Chaim Shimon's) bar mitzvah, he again lacked the necessary funds. Rabbi Moshe Aharon did as he had done the first time, and he was answered a second time.
Rabbi Moshe Pinto's neighbor had been medically diagnosed as infertile since the age of 12. Two and a half months before the tzadik's passing, she came to the Rabbanit to beg her to let her into Rabbi Moshe's room, without speaking to him or disturbing him. Upon entering the room, she saw Rabbi Moshe Pinto, despite his illness, give her a friendly sign and smile at her. Fifteen days later she became pregnant. The doctors could not understand it.
Rabbi Moshe Pinto suffered from many illnesses, foremost among them gangrene. Doctors at the famous Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem wanted to amputate both his legs. However, he always refused, saying that no descendant of Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto had ever suffered from such disfigurement. He would always remind the doctors: "I came into this world on two legs, and on two legs I shall leave this world." As he said this, he would raise his hands to Heaven and call upon his great-grandfather, Rabbi Chaim Pinto HaGadol. On the day he was finally scheduled for surgery, the doctor told the tzadik's entire family that he would try one more treatment. If it failed, the legs would have to be amputated, or Rabbi Moshe's life would be in danger. A miracle occurred. That very day his circulation improved noticeably, and the need for surgery disappeared. Freed from the gangrene, Rabbi Moshe said: "Now my suffering will begin!"
From that moment on, his condition grew steadily worse. He lost the ability to speak, hear, and see, and suffered from heart attacks. Each time, he would raise his hands to Heaven and kiss them as a sign of joyful acceptance.
The Admorim and rabbis who came to visit him during this time noticed two things: every time he touched his head, it was to make sure his kippah was in place, and every time he made a gesture, it was to draw people's attention to washing their hands.
And yet, from a medical standpoint, his brain had ceased to function. Despite everything, he basked in the light of holiness, and his spirit was always with his people, for whom he never ceased to pray. When his children brought him his tallit and tefillin, he would take them with his right hand, press them tightly to his heart, and weep quietly. He wept because he could no longer perform the sacred mitzvah of putting on tallit and tefillin.
His students gathered all his writings in order to publish a book. His miracles are countless. And even after Rabbi Moshe Pinto's passing, people could still receive help from him, for as our Sages say, "The righteous, even in death, are alive."
In 1984, before his illness, he gave his children two instructions:
1. They should publish commentaries on the Rambam's "Laws of Teshuvah." Afterward, the publication should be freely distributed to synagogues, schools, and community centers.
2. The Sefer Torah of the great tzadik Rabbi Yoshiyahu Pinto, written about 360 years ago, should be shown in all Jewish communities of the world. In his view, this Sefer Torah held a segula for destroying idolatry, which would hasten the coming of Mashiach, an event he awaited his entire life.
Rabbi Moshe never left his house. Our teachers say that this was because his father had asked him to take a vow to remain confined for 40 years. He lived 30 years in his house in Mogador and 10 years in Casablanca.
He built a synagogue and a study hall in his house, and he received thousands of people who came from everywhere to receive his blessing.
After his vow was fulfilled, at the end of the 40 years, he went to pray at the grave of his revered great-grandfather and asked him for release from the vow.
On 5 Elul 5746, after a long and agonizing illness that lasted three years, the tzadik Moshe Aharon Pinto, known as "the Light and Pillar of the World," passed away in Ashdod at the age of 73.
May the merit of the great tzadik protect our people!
(https://hevratpinto.org/tzadikim_eng/040_rabbi_moshe_aaron_pinto.html)