Tefillin and Mezuzah Gemach: Monsey, New York

The pride and joy of my safrus office is my Tefillin and Mezuzah Gemach. I currently have 22 sets of tefillin that I lend out plus a fairly large number (I’m now quite sure how many because they are never all in one place) of mezuzos. I try to keep every minhag of tefillin available: Rashi, Rebeinu Tam, Chabad, S’faradi, and Ari. In addition I have right handed and left handed sets. I even have one set with extra long retzuous for very tall people. I try to have on hand several of the more popluar sets such as Ashkanez righty. The sets are available for one week. After that if you still need them I will charge you $10.00 per week. If you borrow tefillin while I am working on your own set of tefillin I will give them to you for free until I am finished working on them. After that, I give you one week to return them and then I charge you $10.00 per week.

The Tefillin and Mezuzah Gemach takes a $600 deposit for the use of tefillin and a $60 deposit for the use of mezuzos. The deposit could be in the form of check (which I do not deposit until it has become clear to me that my tefillin and mezuzos are simply not returning), check, or credit card. This money would allow me to purchase new tefillin and mezuzos for the gemach in the unfortunate event that the items are not returned. I know what you are thinking: How could someone borrow tefillin and mezuzos and not return them? I will give you two examples. Once someone borrowed mezuzos, gave me a deposit check that their friend wrote, put them up, moved out, forgot about the mezuzos, and the house was demolished! When I called the person who wrote the check, their response was, “it couldn’t be, so and so is such a tzadik, he couldn’t have forgotten”. But when they called so and so up and asked him if they returned the mezuzos, because the gemach guy is accusing them of not returning them, they were in for a very big supprise. The other example is the person who borrows tefillin from the gemach, every day thinking to himself, “I must go return those tefillin”, but every day he is so busy he just doesn’t get around to it. But since he knows that his check is going to be deposited, he manages to find a few minutes to swing by! Funny how that works.

Sometimes people think that I am giving tefillin away. This is not the case. In situations of great need there are sometimes community resources available. You may contact me for further details about these programs.

The Tefillin and Mezuzah Gemach loves donations. If you benefit from the gemach try to put some money in its peshuka (piggy bank).I still have a long way to go before I have reached my goal of making it the best tefillin and mezuzah gemach in the world! Maybe you gave a good set of tefillinaround that nobody is using. The reason I underlined, italicized, and bold faced the word ‘good’ is because I’m not looking for every body’s great uncle’s tefillin that they found twenty two years ago when they were clearing out his attic. A good rule of thumb would be that if they smell musty, they are not what we are interested in. The reason for this is that I am only looking for tefilin that people will be really happy and comfortable wearing them, and secure that they are 100% kosher.

One more thing: If you are borrowing tefillin or mezuzos because you need something to use while yours are being worked on, I would like to recomend a good sofer. Give me a call and I give you his name (if you haven’t figured it out already).

If you need any information about the gemach please Rabbi Michaels at 845-290-2546