Rabbi Israel's Daughter
RABBI ISRAEL'S DAUGHTER
The Baal Shem's daughter Udel was a grown girl. She said to him, "Father, when shall I know my husband?" Rabbi Israel loved his daughter; he stroked her hair. She said, "Father, shall I be a mother of children?"
Rabbi Israel told her, "Your husband is hidden among the scholars who come here to me. You must wait until a sign points him out to you."
On Simchas Torah, the feast of the Law, there was joyous dancing in the house of the Baal Shem Tov.
The students danced, and Israel danced with them, they danced with wildest ecstasy for love of the holy Torah. And in the midst of their mad whirling, one
of the students lost his shoe. It flew right off his foot. Then he sang out a popular verse:
The shoe on my foot,
A mother will rock
The babe in her cradle!"
Just then Rabbi Israel cried to his daughter, "Udel!"
Then the girl became so confused she didn't know where to find the student's slipper. So she sat down and took off both of her own slippers and gave them to the young man.
And she married that man. And from their union two sons and a daughter were born. One son grew up to be the Tsadik of Sadilikov, and the other was Rabbi Baruch of Medzibuz. The daughter was named Feige.