What We Eat - United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism

SUMMER 2012 / 5772 VOL. 5 NO. 4

J 

CTABLE OF CONTENTS SUMMER 2012 / 5772 VOLUME 5 NUMBER 4 

This magazine is a joint project of the United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, Women’s League for Conservative Judaism, and FJMC 

6 LETTERS 

8 Women’s League’s SARRAE G. CRANE 

offers some Reflections on the Kiddush 

Ladies 

9 FJMC’s RABBI CHARLES SIMON has 

some suggestions For Fathers of Adult 

Children 

10 RICHARD SKOLNIK introduces 

Tomorrow’s Visionary Leaders from Nativ, 

United Synagogue’s program for post-high 

school students in Israel 

11 RABBI NEIL GILLMAN discusses books 

on Jewish life In the Bookshelf 

12 WHAT WE EAT 

Looking at Kashrut 

Through a Conservative Lens 

For RABBI EDWARD FELD, kashrut must interweave 

ritual rules and regulations 

with modern challenges 

14 CJ REVIEWS 

NEW KOSHER 

COOKBOOKS 

FRAN GINSBURG finds value 

beyond the recipes in cookbooks 

– and also shares some recipes 

JEWISH TRAVEL 

19 

WHAT’S JEWISH ABOUT CAMPING? 

Even though MAXINE SEGAL HANDELMAN did not 

grow up camping, she now spends a Shabbat each 

summer with 60 friends and family in one of 

Wisconsin’s beautiful state parks 

21 

A JEWISH MUSUEM IN SAINT JOHN? 

SHIRLEY MOSKOWinvites you to enjoy the Jewish sites 

in Canada’s oldest city 

23 

ON A MISSION TO ISRAEL 

On a recent trip to Israel, RABBI ROBERT SLOSBERG 

was exhilarated by the thriving Masorti movement but 

discouraged by some of its challenges 

26 

ISRAEL FOR KIDS 

There is a lot to do in Israel for children of all ages, 

from petting zoos to scavenger hunts in Jerusalem, 

according to AVITAL COHEN 

28 

FACTS YOU MIGHT 

NOT KNOW ABOUT MASORTI 

There is a great deal to know about our movement in 

Israel, according to RABBI ALAN SILVERSTEIN 

29 

A PERSONAL MIRACLE 

THE FIRST MASORTI 

RABBI IN UKRAINE 

RABBI TZVI GRAETZ 

introduces a young man 

whose journey is inspiring 

30 

JEWS IN GEORGIA 

A photo essay 

34 

WHY ARE YOU WEARING THAT CAMEL 

AROUND YOUR NECK ... 

There are many ways to introduce the weekly 

Torah reading. JOANNE PALMER describes one of 

them 

35 

...AND WHAT’S THAT ON YOUR HEAD? 

His collection of kippot reflects BERT STRATTON’S 

23 years playing clarinet at weddings and bar 

mitzvah parties 

36 

YAY FOR JEWISH SUMMER CAMPS 

Camp doctor SHARON SILVERMAN POLLOCK can’t 

JEWISH SUMMER CAMPS 

rave enough about the benefits of sending kids to a 

Jewish summer camp 

37 

IN MEMORY OF A FRIEND 

His experiences at Camp Ramah help 

ADIN YEHOSHUA MEIR mourn the death 

of his closest friend 

38 

CAMP FOSTERS 

COMMUNITY 

REBECCA KAHN asks 

what we can do to 

get more 

Conservative kids 

to Jewish camps 

40 

RAMAH FOSTERS COMMUNITY 

National Ramah Director RABBI MITCHELL COHEN 

is proud that Ramah accomplishes so much 

without sacrificing Jewish content 

42 

MAKING IT MATTER 

After USY, Ramah, and Koach, our committed 

young Jews often look elsewhere for meaning in 

their lives, worries RICHARD S. MOLINE 

44 

A RUACH FAMILY SERVICE 

Sensing a void in her synagogue’s programming, 

PAMELA KIRSCHNER WEINFELD and friends created a 

service for school-aged children and their parents 

46 

TRANSFORMING TEFILLAH 

BONNIE RIVA RAS describes how congregations 

offer new ways to experience Shabbat 

48 

SKYPING 

THE MINYAN 

A friend saying kaddish 

in the Hague joins RABBI 

DAVID LERNER’S minyan 

in Massachusetts 

50 

WOMEN SPEAK 

BAT MITZVAH: TAKE TWO 

Describing one bat mitzvah with two celebrations 

50 years apart, LISA KOGEN illustrates the 

trajectory of this now common coming of age ritual 

52 

WORDS OF THE WEEK 

It’s easy to grow your Hebrew vocabulary using a 

new program devised by FJMC and DAVID P. SINGER 

56 UNITED SYNAGOGUE’S NEW BYLAWS 

JOANNE PALMER reviews the changes that will make 

United Synagogue more agile and responsive to 

the needs of its member kehillot 

57 

HEARING MEN’S VOICES 

A SIGNATURE PROGRAM OF FJMC 

ART SPAR edits a discussion among some FJMC 

mentschen 

ABOUT THE COVER 

The Hesed House Social Club, in Rustavi, 

Georgia. Photo by Amir Halevy, who 

participated in the Jdocu journey to 

photograph Jewish communities worldwide. 

See more photographs beginning on page 30. 

Cover design: Josef Tocker 

CJ — SUMMER 2012 5

EDITORS 

Rhonda Jacobs Kahn 

Joanne Palmer 

ADVERTISING DIRECTOR 

Bonnie Riva Ras 

DESIGNER 

Josef Tocker 

PUBLISHING CONSULTANT 

Doug Steinberg 

EDITORIAL BOARD 

Dr. Robert Braitman, Chair 

Bernice Balter 

Michael Brassloff 

Renée Brezniak Glazier 

Shelly Goldin 

Rosalind Judd 

Dr. Bruce Littman 

Rachel Pomerance 

Elizabeth Pressman 

Evan Rumack 

Marjorie Shuman Saulson 

Allan M. Wegman 

ADVISORS 

Dr. Stephen Garfinkel 

Jewish Theological Seminary 

Rabbi Cheryl Peretz 

Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies 

CJ: Voices of Conservative/Masorti Judaism 

is a joint project of 

FEDERATION OF JEWISH MEN’S CLUBS 

Michael Mills, President 

Rabbi Charles E. Simon, Executive Director 

UNITED SYNAGOGUE OF 

CONSERVATIVE JUDAISM 

Richard Skolnik, President 

Rabbi Steven C. Wernick, Executive Vice President 

WOMEN’S LEAGUE FOR 

CONSERVATIVE JUDAISM 

Rita Wertlieb, President 

Sarrae G. Crane, Executive Director 

The opinions expressed in this magazine are 

those of the authors and do not necessarily 

represent the views of the publishing organizations. 

Advertising in CJ does not imply editorial 

endorsement, nor does the magazine 

guarantee the kashrut of advertised products. 

Members of FJMC affiliates, United Synagogue 

of Conservative Judaism congregations, 

and Women’s League for Conservative 

Judaism affiliates receive this magazine as a 

benefit of membership. Subscriptions per 

year: $20. 

Please direct all correspondence or changes 

of address to CJ: VOICES OF CONSERVATIVE/ 

MASORTI JUDAISM at Rapaport House, 820 

Second Ave., 10th Floor, New York, NY 10017- 

4504. 917-668-6809. Email: palmer@uscj.org 

or rkahn@wlcj.org. To advertise, email 

ras@uscj.org or call 917-668-6809. 

CJ: VOICES OF CONSERVATIVE/MASORTI 

JUDAISM is published quarterly by United 

Synagogue of Conservative Judaism, 820 Second 

Ave., 10th Floor, New York, NY 10017-4504. 

Canadian Copies: Return Canadian undeliverables 

to 2835 Kew Dr., Windsor, ON N8T 3B7 

PM 41706013. 

6 CJ — VOICES OF CONSERVATIVE/MASORTI JUDAISM 

Letters 

CHANGING CULTURES 

I have just finished reading Michael Mill’s 

article, “Cultures Can Be 

Changed” (Spring 2012). 

I endorse every word about 

men being part of the whole 

rather than loners. What 

puzzles and intrigues me, 

however, is what I don’t read. 

Unless my eyeglasses need 

changing, the word 

“woman” doesn’t appear 

once in the entire text. As 

a result, the article sounds 

exactly like what appeared n the monthly 

newsletter put out by the Conservative synagogue 

my family attended in Chicago 75 to 

80 years ago. 

Yes, my father was active in the men’s club, 

but my mother predated him by almost half 

a decade with her membership in the sisterhood. 

In those prehistoric times, women 

were virtually shut out for membership on 

the board of directors. Incidentally, I don’t 

find the word sisterhood – a term often 

denigrated in the 21st century as a relic of 

bygone eons – anywhere in the article. Am 

I missing something? 

What fractures me most of all is the Grand 

Canyon-size chasm between the article and 

the cover of the same issue of CJ, an overt 

plug for women’s participation in synagogue 

hierarchy. Shouldn’t you be functioning on 

the same wavelength? 

DAVID R. MOSS 

Los Angeles, California 

WOMEN RABBIS 

In D. Korenstein's letter to the editor in 

the Spring 2012 issue, the 

author writes the his synagogue 

“hired a senior 

woman rabbi. Within a few 

years a significant portion 

of the membership was 

gone.” I object to the automatic 

assumption that the 

cause of the declining membership 

was attributable to 

the hiring of a woman rabbi. 

Many synagogues are experiencing 

shrinking membership numbers. 

The causes are demographic, philosophical, 

financial, religious, etc. Many are con- 

(continued on page 53) 

ADD YOUR VOICE! 

Conservative Judaism is made up of a plethora 

of voices. Our movement is wide-ranging. Members 

of our kehillot, sisterhoods, and men’s clubs 

share core beliefs and practices and at the same 

time have singular or even unique takes on our 

philosophy, theology, and customs. 

CJ runs stories that illustrate both our similarities 

and our differences. Often we run more 

than one take on the same subject. 

We want to hear more of those voices. We 

want to hear from you – your reactions to our stories, 

and your suggestions for stories developing 

in your communities. And if you speak better 

through the lens of a camera, please send us photographs 

that focus on the issues we discuss: 

Jewish life here and abroad, Israel, halachah, 

and Jewish traditions and learning.

THERE IT WAS AMONG 

the weekly Shabbat 

announcements: Kiddush 

is provided by the sisterhood. 

If it happened to be 

sponsored by a bar mitzvah 

family, it was assumed that the sisterhood 

ladies had set it up. The kiddush ladies were 

the members of the sisterhood. And for most 

people that was the basic equation. Sisterhoods 

had meetings and then their members 

set up kiddush and the ongei Shabbat. They 

also might have helped decorate the sukkah, 

adding their touches to those of the children 

of the religious school. 

But a look around any synagogue should 

have revealed much more. Who ran the 

Judaica shop? The sisterhood ladies. Who 

was in charge of ordering the kippot for the 

b’nai and b’not mitzvah? The sisterhood 

ladies. Who made shalach manot baskets 

for Purim? Who sponsored the flowers for 

Shavuot? Who promoted the gift honey for 

Rosh Hashanah? Who sent Chanukah care 

packages to the congregation’s college students? 

Who were the key participants in the 

PTA and the Youth Commission? Again, 

the sisterhood ladies. Which arm of the congregation 

could always be counted on for 

a significant contribution? Of course, sisterhood. 

The sisterhood ladies were far more than 

a coffee klatch enabling Shabbat attendees 

to enjoy a little wine and sponge cake. They 

were – and continue to be – at the core of 

any synagogue’s life. Without the dedication 

of kiddush ladies our congregations 


REFLECTIONS ON 

THE KIDDUSH LADIES 

BY SARRAE G. CRANE 

would be a shadow of themselves. They did 

what women do so well, creating a warm, 

welcoming community by making people 

feel at home. They studied and learned more 

about Judaism, created Jewish homes, incorporated 

Jewish values personally and into 

their families’ lives. The bonds that were created 

in the sisterhood strengthened Judaism 

for many generations. 

If we turn the clock back nearly a century, 

to the early years of Women’s League, 

the organization of Conservative sisterhoods, 

we discover that Women’s League 

and sisterhoods had a much larger agenda 

than worrying about what to put out for 

kiddush. One of Women’s League’s earliest 

projects was the creation of an offcampus 

space for Jewish students in the 

vicinity of Columbia University, Barnard 

College, and the Jewish Theological Seminary. 

That concern continued to be 

expressed through its Torah Fund campaign, 

which saw the need and underwrote 

the creation of the Mathilde Schechter 

dormitory at the seminary. It was renewed 

last year when Women’s League adopted 

the Koach kallah, a Shabbat retreat for college 

students across North America, as a 

project. (We are delighted that through 

our efforts and support, Koach almost doubled 

the number of attendees from last 

year!) We are committed to the perpetuation 

of Conservative/Masorti Judaism 

and are proud that our board has voted 

to continue our support of the Koach 

kallah. 

But Women’s League has not only looked 

outward. We have looked inward as well. 

For decades Women’s League has produced 

publications to enrich the lives of Jewish 

women, running from The Jewish Home 

Beautiful in 1941, to our most recent 

Women’s League Hiddur Mitzvah Project. We 

have fashioned material and developed training 

programs that enable our women to 

deepen their knowledge of Judaism and 

intensify their liturgical skills. 

In recent years more of us have entered 

the work force, many in time-consuming 

professional positions. Those of us working 

nine to five plus often have neither the time 

nor the energy left to fulfill the traditional 

roles of the sisterhood ladies. Yet we still 

expect kiddush to be there on Shabbat morning. 

And we still are women who actively 

identify as Jews, seek to enrich our Jewish 

education and observance, and want to be 

part of a network of women who share the 

values of Conservative Judaism. The mission 

of Women’s League is as relevant today 

as it was when we were created by Mathilde 

Schechter in 1918. To expand that network, 

we have embarked on a systemic and strategic 

look at our future. 

And for future reflection . . . . On the 

recent Conference of Presidents Mission 

to Israel, we journeyed to Amman for a day. 

In addition to meeting with King Abdullah, 

we were hosted for lunch by Israel’s 

ambassador to Jordan, Danny Naveh, who 

had cooked for us and was in the kitchen 

preparing fabulous desserts. It is clear that 

the kitchen is no longer only the province 

of women. Perhaps in the future it can 

be the kiddush men and women who provide 

this essential element of synagogue 

life as we re-imagine the ways both men 

and women contribute to our congregations. 

We are proud to be the next generation 

of kiddush ladies and so much more. We 

know that it is the day-to-day things that 

we do that secure the structures that enrich 

our lives as Jews. 

Sarrae Crane is executive director of Women’s 

League for Conservative Judaism. CJ

FOR FATHERS OF 

ADULT CHILDREN 

BY RABBI CHARLES SIMON 

EVERY PARENT STRUG- 

GLES to balance making 

decisions for our children 

with empowering them to 

be independent. It’s rarely 

easy. As our children become 

adults all too many of us believe that our 

ability to influence their decisions is inversely 

related to their level of independence. Fathers 

who feel their influence lessening are often 

conflicted. We are proud of our children and 

their emerging independence, 

but we still 

have to live with the 

decisions that these 

young adults make. 

We acknowledge the 

possibility of failure 

and feel somewhat 

frustrated because we can’t assure success. 

Indeed, we know that even if we could “fix 

it” that could hinder the maturation of our 

sons and daughters. 

Unfortunately, too many parents, and 

specifically fathers, fail to understand that 

even after our children have made decisions 

with which we are not comfortable 

we still retain the ability to influence their 

decisions. I can’t tell you how many times 

fathers have approached me and expressed 

their pain and upset because one of their 

children has chosen to marry or partner 

with someone who was not Jewish. “But 

what could I do?” they ask. “What can 

I do?” 

We are beginning to 

understand more about a 

father’s ability to influence 

his children. 

In the past my responses have always 

been “Don’t obsess with what you could 

have done. There is so much that you can 

do!” My responses to fathers have become 

even stronger as a result of what I have been 

learning about fathers. 

We know a great deal about mothers and 

how they influence their children. We know 

that in a majority of situations the decision-maker 

regarding a family’s religious 

commitment and practice is almost always 

the woman. It doesn’t 

matter if she is Jewish 

or not. If she decides 

the family will be Jewish, 

the children will be 

Jewish. In addition 

many sociologists 

believe on the basis of 

the data collected over the past 30 years 

that her children will identify as Jews and 

seek to live, in some manner, Jewish lives. 

We are beginning to understand more 

about a father’s ability to influence his children, 

even adult children who are no longer 

living at home. Last year, at an FJMC weekend 

retreat, I piloted a lesson plan to fathers 

whose adult children no longer live with 

them. I asked the group how many of them 

texted or emailed or called (I know that 

sounds archaic) their children regularly 

to wish them a Shabbat shalom. The 

response was mostly negative: “I never did 

it before.” “They will wonder why I’m 

doing it.” “My children are in their late 

30s.” 

I encouraged it and was pleased the following 

morning to see a group of men with 

smiles on their faces because their children 

had texted them back. They were begin- 

Rabbi Charles Simon is the director of FJMC 

and author of Building a Successful Volunteer 

Culture: Finding Meaning in Service 

in the Jewish Community, Jewish Lights ning to realize their actions could still 

Publishing: Woodstock, Vermont. (continued on page 25) 


HAVING RECENTLY 

celebrated the festival 

of Shavuot, which 

commemorates matan 

Torah – the giving of 

the Torah to the Jewish 

people – I know that it is a gift to be handed 

inspiration that extends the afterglow of 

this beautiful festival. 

For me, inspiration arrived in the form 

of feedback about the stellar achievements 

of our Nativ program in Israel 

(www.nativ.org), which has been creating a 

cadre of college leaders for the past 31 years. 

This program, which has trained more than 

1,000 remarkable young people, garnered 

the highest ratings from a recent independent 

Jewish Agency-sponsored evaluation 

aimed at examining all long-term 

Masa-funded study/volunteer programs 

in Israel. (Masa is an organization that connects 

young Jews with programs in Israel.) 

Nativ’s impressive graduates provide our 

movement with the human resources necessary 

for charting a bold new course for the 

new millennium. 

The latest crop of Bogrei Nativ – Nativ 

graduates – have hit the ground running, 

charged with the formidable challenge of 

reinvigorating our kehillot in North America 

and reinventing the Conservative movement 

for a new generation. Visionary and 

cutting edge, their influence is critical to the 

vitality of our movement. 

Meet some of our recent Bogrei Nativ. 

TOMORROW’S VISIONARY 

LEADERS FROM NATIV 

BY RICHARD SKOLNIK 

Richard Skolnik is the international president 

of the United Synagogue of Conservative 

Rabbi David Goldberg Russo, Nativ 23 

David, from 

Hamilton, Ontario, 

was an active member 

of ECRUSY, 

and in 2003 he was 

USY’s international 

president. 

Ordained at JTS 

this spring, David has taken a position as 

rabbi at Anshe Emet Synagogue in Chicago. 

He met his wife, Rebecca Russo, when they 

both were international USY officers, and 

she also was on Nativ 23. Rebecca is the 

director of engagement at Hillel of Northwestern 

University. 

“Nativ provided me with the unique opportunity 

to explore Israel, study at an incredibly 

high level, develop critical leadership skills, 

all in the context of a fun, social experience. 

Many of the relationships that I developed 

on Nativ are still ones that I rely on today, both 

personally and professionally. My experiences 

studying in the Conservative Yeshiva and 

the opportunities that I had to explore my Jewish 

identity certainly helped me on my path 

toward becoming a rabbi.” 

Aliza Sebert, Nativ 27 Aliza is from New 

York City, where 

her father is the 

rabbi of the Town 

and Village Synagogue 

in lower 

Manhattan. In her 

last year at Brandeis 

University, she is 

president of Hillel’s theater group and executive 

musical director of Ba’note, the Jewish 

women’s a cappella group. For the last 

two summers she has been a division head 

at Camp Ramah in the Berkshires. 

“Nativ was an experience that I will never 

forget. It is an amazing program that allowed 

me to grow, learn about myself, and gain independence 

before going off to college. It gave me 

a greater level of appreciation and love for 

the land of Israel, and allowed me to create 

friendships that have already strengthened and 

will stay with me for the rest of my life.” 

Maya Dolgin, Nativ 25 Maya, from Huntington, 

New York, 

was a student at 

Solomon Schechter 

High School of 

Long Island. After 

Nativ, she graduated 

from Wellesley 

College, where she 

was president of Hillel. She has worked at 

Camp Ramah in Nyack for the last seven 

summers, and this summer she will be division 

head and coordinator of the Israeli staff. 

Maya was on the staff for the Nativ 30 

kibbutz group. Last year she made aliyah, 

and now lives in Jerusalem, where she is 

Nativ’s assistant director. 

“My year on Nativ 25 set me on a path that 

has been immensely fulfilling. It helped to 

strengthen the skills and values that I learned 

during my years studying at Solomon Schechter 

and working at Ramah Day Camp in Nyack. 

On Nativ I strengthened my love for Israel and 

Judaism, and learned how to translate this 

passion into something accessible to others, 

which led me to return to Israel in 2010 as 

a madricha – counselor – for Nativ 30. My 

year of staffing Nativ allowed me to gain yet 

another perspective on Israel. I was able to 

see the country through the eyes of a group 

of young Jewish leaders who were living in 

Israel for the first time and wrestling with 

Judaism. (continued on page 33) 

10 CJ — VOICES OF CONSERVATIVE/MASORTI JUDAISM

BY RABBI NEIL GILLMAN 

Democratizing Judaism by Jack J. Cohen, 

Academic Studies Press, 2010 

Rabbi Cohen, longtime spokesperson for the 

Reconstructionist movement, has served, 

among other positions, as Hillel director at 

the Hebrew University and member of the 

faculty at both the Jewish Theological Seminary 

and the Reconstructionist Rabbinical 

School. This volume is a summary of his more 

than 70-year association with Reconstructionism, 

his personal relationship with the 

movement’s founder, Mordecai M. Kaplan, 

and the wide-ranging moral and religious 

issues that he has encountered in his decadeslong 

work in Israel and that have engaged him 

in a very personal way. Cohen is endlessly 

engaging. His biographical notes on Kaplan’s 

life and teaching, his detailed and largely evenhanded 

discussion of the many criticisms leveled 

against his teacher, and his attempt to 

apply his personal thinking to the issues that 

rage within the state of Israel today are compelling. 

The snippets from Kaplan’s personal 

diary that illuminate his feelings and thinking 

are particularly fascinating. 

The Bible and American Culture: A Sourcebook 

by Claudia Setzer and David A. Shefferman. 

Routledge, 2011 

This is indeed a sourcebook, as the editors 

claim. (Setzer is professor and Shefferman is 

assistant professor of religious studies, both 

at Manhattan College.) It should be used 

as a sourcebook rather than read cover-tocover, 

but – and this is barely an exaggeration 

– it should be shared with all Americans, 

of all ages, who are involved in searching for 

particular biblical references, Jewish and 

Christian, that appear in American life and 

Rabbi Neil Gillman is the Aaron Rabinowitz 

and Simon H. Rifkind emeritus professor of 

Jewish philosophy at the Jewish Theological 

Seminary. 

culture. Topics include the uses of biblical 

texts in the debates on slavery. Homosexuality, 

feminism and civil rights, and biblical 

sources that appear in art, fiction, music 

and poetry are all here. Lincoln’s biblical references 

in his second inaugural, Martin 

Luther King Jr.’s last speech before his assassination, 

and a poem by Emily Dickenson 

are included as well. A rich index facilitates 

the volume’s use. It belongs on the bookshelves 

of all knowledgeable Americans. 

Today I Am a Woman: Stories of Bat Mitzvah 

Around the World, edited by Barbara 

Vinick and Shulamit Reinharz. Indiana University 

Press, 2012 

The editors, both affiliated with the Hadassah-Brandeis 

Institute, where Reinharz is the 

director as well as a professor of sociology, 

have assembled a substantial anthology of 

personal testimonies about how young 

women from around the world reflect on 

their bat mitzvah experiences. The testimonies 

come from Africa, Asia, the 

Caribbean, the former Soviet Union, and 

Latin America, as well as from more familiar 

places, just around the corner from where 

we North American Jews live. The narratives 

may center around the bat mitzvah itself, but 

in the process we learn about Jewish life in 

widely different Jewish communities around 

the world, about what it means to become 

an adult woman, and most important, about 

the power of a ritual that far too many American 

Jewish families understand as simply an 

opportunity to have a party. The photos scattered 

throughout are endearing. 

The Sabbath Soul: Mystical Reflections on the 

Transformative Power of Holy Time by Eitan 

Fishbane. Jewish Lights, 2012 

The core of this book is a series of texts drawn 

from the writings of chasidic masters on 

the various dimensions of the Sabbath expe- 

rience. The selection, translation, and commentary 

on each text are by Fishbane, who 

teaches Jewish philosophy, mysticism, and 

chasidism at JTS. Readers who are familiar 

with Abraham Joshua Heschel’s classic work 

on the Sabbath should benefit from Fishbane’s 

anthology. He has selected texts from 

throughout chasidic literature, his commentaries 

generally clarify texts that frequently 

are elusive, and his notes suggest further readings. 

But what is important is that these texts 

are not designed for study, or only for study. 

Rather they are in the form of meditations 

that should be absorbed slowly and with care 

and be allowed to permeate our own awareness 

as we too experience the Sabbath day. 



WHAT WE EAT 

Looking at Kashrut 

Through a Conservative Lens 

BY RABBI EDWARD FELD 

WHAT IS THE CONSERVATIVE 

movement’s approach to kashrut? 

It is the observance of traditional 

food laws as seen through the lens 

of a set of values that is central to 

our contemporary understanding 

of Judaism. 

The hallmark of Conservative Judaism is 

its appreciation of both tradition and modernity. 

It is a Judaism that lives within contemporary 

society and culture. In North 

America, it embraces the promise of the new 

world, the blessings of freedom, democracy, 

and equal opportunity. At the same time, 

its commitment to Jewish religious life 

creates community, develops Jews whose 

values include a sense of responsibility to 

others, upholds the sacredness of life, and 

informs a personal spiritual practice that 

allows an ongoing relationship with God. 

To navigate the Jewish heritage within 

this North American matrix, Conservative 

Judaism turns to the tradition in all 

its fullness – to the minority opinion as well 

as the majority, to roads taken and not taken. 

Talmudic texts, medieval philosophic formulations, 

mystical understandings, folk 

stories, and more all are grist for this mill. 

Conservative Judaism has an approach to 

religious practice that is deeply informed by 

history, the knowledge of change, and the 

multiplicity of opinions and perspectives, 

Rabbi Edward Feld is the senior editor of 

the new Conservative machzor, Lev Shalem, 

and is now at work on a siddur for Shabbat 

and holidays. 


along with a sense of purpose 

derived from our contemporary 

situation. 

This formula ought to be played out 

in our observance of kashrut. We need an 

American Jewish approach to our traditional 

food laws that also takes into account the 

circumstances of Jews in an open democratic 

society. We engage with society at large over 

drinks, at dinner, at parties, in restaurants, 

and at home. We Conservative Jews need 

not separate ourselves from life by eating 

only in establishments under rabbinic supervision. 

Rather, we can participate in the larger 

culture while maintaining our distinctive 

Jewish consciousness. Thus, entering a restaurant 

and checking which items conform 

to kashrut – what we may order within a 

broad reading of the law – is a way of integrating 

into society while maintaining our 

particular religious consciousness. 

It is not accidental that the Talmud 

includes many of its food laws in the tractate 

Avodah Zorah, the volume dealing with 

relations with the surrounding pagan culture. 

Food laws in the Talmud are a way 

of constructing a barrier between Jews and 

the larger society. Roman and Persian cultures 

were perceived as threatening. Restricting 

diet minimized the contact between Jews 

and non-Jews. 

We now live with a different relationship 

to the society around us, so the regulations 

governing what and how we may eat 

must be adjusted to reflect that reality. This 

is not a matter of changing our relation to 

the mitzvot spelled out in the Torah but 

of recognizing that many rabbinic laws are 

responsive 

to specific 

social conditions. 

Many 

rabbinic rules 

are meant to 

regulate a person’s relationship to society, so 

it is reasonable to assume that as conditions 

change these regulations must change to 

reflect the new reality. 

In the tractate Hulin, which deals directly 

with laws of kashrut, the Talmud adopts 

a more liberal position than the one enunciated 

in Avodah Zorah. There, a taste test 

is set as the standard of kashrut: Food cooked 

in a pot that had been used to cook nonkosher 

meat is considered to be kosher if no 

taste of the non-kosher food remains. This 

standard can be applied easily to eating in 

a restaurant that uses the same pots and pans 

to cook non-kosher meat and vegetarian 

offerings. It demands care and still permits 

openness. 

But the way Conservative Jews keep 

kosher is not simply a matter of finding 

leniencies. There is no “Conservative 

kashrut.” Kashrut is kashrut, at least as it 

relates to shechita – ritual slaughter. But 

for Conservative Jews, it is also much more. 

One of the hallmarks of the Conservative 

approach to Jewish law is its sensitivity to 

ethical issues. The recent creation of Magen 

Tzedek, a certification that kosher meat has

een processed in a way that is both halachic 

and not abusive to the labor force, is an 

important example. Judaism’s strong opposition 

to cruelty to animals underlays many 

aspects of kashrut. The Rabbinical Assembly 

has passed resolutions condemning hoisting 

and shackling animals as a means of 

kosher slaughter, so it should be relatively 

easy for Conservative synagogues to insist 

that their caterers not use meat slaughtered 

in this way. Indeed, if Conservative 

synagogues brought the full weight of their 

collective purchasing power to bear they 

could effect a major change in the industry. 

On the same ethical grounds, we can 

insure that the proper treatment of animals 

becomes a standard for personal practice. 

Families should buy eggs laid by free-range 

chickens. We should oppose farming practices 

that turn chickens into factories, housing 

them in tight cages, with fluorescent 

lights shining on them 24 hours a day, so 

that they will produce the maximum number 

of eggs with the smallest possible amount 

of human labor. Similarly, as much as we 

can we should buy the meat of free-range 

chickens. It is one thing to feel that eating 

meat is necessary, but quite another 

to deprive animals of their natural life. We 

need not consume food produced through 

cruelty. Interestingly, Empire Kosher, the 

largest commercial producer of kosher chickens, 

proudly announces that its chickens are 

all free roaming. 

For the same reasons, we should buy grassfed 

beef. American cattle growers often 

use feed that cows never would eat in nature. 

Sometimes the feed contains ground up 

blood and animal products, though cows 

are vegetarian by nature. 

A congregant of mine who had thought 

about keeping kosher, but worried about 

how difficult his life would become were he 

to try, once saw my wife and me eating in 

a Chinese restaurant. It inspired him. “I 

didn’t realize that it was so easy to keep 

kosher,” he said, and went on to adopt 

kashrut as a standard for his own life. 

For Conservative Jews, keeping kosher is 

both easy and demanding. It is an exciting 

and responsible way to live in the modern 

world Jewishly and to live a life that 

is holy. CJ 


NEW KOSHER 

COOKBOOKS 

BY FRAN GINSBURG 

ANY COOKBOOK OF 

value today is more than just 

a compendium of recipes or 

instructions. It has an overriding 

message or theme. 

Recipes are easy to come by. 

How often have I gone to the internet because 

I want to use a particular ingredient or have 

decided to make lamb stew? Click. Dozens 

of recipes are at my fingertips. Looking for 

the technique to make homemade ricotta? 

There’s an app for that. 

Each of these new kosher cookbooks 

has a message beyond measures and ingredients 

lists. Each provides a context for your 

cooking, and like kashrut itself, each gives 

meaning to our foods beyond flavor or 

sustenance. 

I liked all these books, but my favorite 

is June Hersh’s The Kosher Carnivore, published 

by St. Martin’s Press. June burst onto 

the kosher cooking scene with her brilliantly 

presented anthology/cookbook Recipes 

Remembered. She writes with an enthusiasm 

that makes me want to rush into the kitchen 

and cook. Her style is personal and warm, 

generously sharing knowledge and advice 

as if with a younger sister. No doubt, to June 

food is a celebration. Cooking is fun. And 

Fran Ginsburg presents cheese classes and tasting 

events through her company, The Dairy 

Man’s Daughter. She is also a development 

consultant for Jewish communal organizations 

and a member of Congregation Beth 

Sholom in Teaneck, New Jersey. 


with humor and wit, she graciously invites 

us all to participate. 

Most of the well-composed recipes are 

approachable even by a novice cook. With 

helpful hints and technique descriptions 

peppered liberally throughout, nothing 

seems too daunting. The different cuts of 

meat are explained and creative uses for leftovers 

are provided. While the focus is 

squarely on meats and poultry, a well-edited 

repertoire of vegetables, starches, and soups 

compliment any meal. 

While she provides recipes for some classics, 

this book is not at all the same-old sameold. 

The Kosher Carnivore reaches liberally 

into the cuisines of different cultures to make 

the book fresh, creative, and enticing. 

Throughout, June encourages cooks to 

speak with the butcher to get the best and 

special cuts, something most of us don’t 

bother to do. With June’s encouragement 

we can reverse a trend toward uniformity, 

CJReviews 

Any cookbook of value 

today is more than just a 

compendium of recipes or 

instructions. It has an 

overriding message or theme. 

connect with our past, provide meaningful 

work for kosher butchers, and serve delicious 

variety to our families. 

For all who enjoy meat and poultry this 

book is a winning addition to your cookbook 

collection. 

The Kosher Revolution by Geila Hocherman 

and Arthur Boehm, published by Kyle 

Books, is a beautifully illustrated volume 

that will be enjoyed particularly by those 

itching to try flavors and combinations that 

have been forbidden until now. The authors 

take full advantage of the expanded availability 

of kosher foods, using nut milks as 

thickening agents, Asian condiments, and 

the like. Kosher cooking always has reflected 

the cuisine, culture, and ingredients of the 

lands in which we live. Jews have been adapting 

recipes and substituting ingredients to 

comply with the requirements of kashrut 

for as long as we have been cooking. The 

real revolution is in the availability of new 

certified kosher products. The Kosher Revolution 

uses these ingredients and displays 

a world of new possibilities, introducing the 

kosher cook to prosciutto made from cured 

duck breast or crab cakes made from surimi 

and Old Bay seasoning.

Each of the recipes indicates whether it 

is dairy, meat, or parve, with helpful substitutions 

offered to change things up. 

Recipes are written clearly, often with a personal 

and helpful introduction. Once your 

pantry is complete most of these recipes are 

quite manageable, though a few might be 

more complicated than an everyday cook 

might enjoy. The book includes a generous 

list of meatless mains (potentially making 

those nine days in summer a culinary 

highlight), sides, and sweets. The book 

includes a helpful list of websites where you 

can buy some of the harder-to-find ingredients 

and a useful ingredient exchange, 

so that the adventurous cook can create new 

recipes with confidence. 

Keeping kosher requires thoughtfulness 

and contemplation. It does not limit us 

to a particular cuisine, method, or set of flavors. 

Borrowing from a range of cuisines, 

this book helps us feel that we can have it 

all! Bored with your repertoire? This book 

is for you. 

Taking a more scholarly approach, Gil 

Marks, in Olive Trees and Honey, from Wiley 

Publishing, presents a comprehensive selection 

of vegetarian recipes from Jewish communities 

around the world. Well known 

to those curious about Jewish culinary history 

or trends, Marks understands Jewish 

life through the context of food. Vegetarians 

(and all cooks) looking for inspiration 

will find it in this expertly researched and 

well-written volume. 

This hefty textbook includes a brief history 

of Jewish food traditions from all corners 

of the globe, a descriptive section on 

seasonings and spices, and lists of holiday 

foods from communities as far away as Calcutta 

and as familiar as Italy. Ever a teacher, 

Rabbi Marks liberally includes biblical references, 

information about the ancient spice 

routes, and maps illustrating the differences 

in omelets and dumplings around the world. 

Each of the sections, on soups, grains, pastries, 

and so on, is preceded by abundant 

information about cultural norms, food 

availability, history, and migratory patterns. 

Recognized by the James Beard Foundation 

with its prestigious award, the hundreds 

of recipes are clearly written, and when 

similarities exist among several cuisines, 

they are noted as variations. Rather than 

discourage a cook looking for a recipe, 

the skillfully organized index and glossary 

make the book useful and important 

on many levels. Can there really be so many 

variations of Sabbath stews? Or so many 

uses for chickpeas? Have you ever pined for 

a new way to cook eggplant? You need look 

no further. 

Olive Trees and Honey is more than a cookbook. 

It gives us a means to hold on to 

elements of our culture that otherwise might 

be forgotten as Jews continue to leave the 

lands of their parents, and as we all move 

toward more universal, simple, uniform, or 

factory-made preparations. 

I can’t wait to read Gil Marks’ new Encyclopedia 

of Jewish Food. I trust that like this 

book, it will go far beyond just recipes that 

are delicious and exciting to include social 

and cultural history and help each of us 

become a participant in the timeline of Jewish 

life. 


SIMPLER BEER-BASTED CHICKEN 

From The Kosher Carnivore 

Basting is a great way to ensure a juicy 

chicken, but every time you open the oven you 

let precious heat escape. A better method is 

to baste the chicken from the inside out. There’s 

no delicate way to explain this process. Take 

a can of beer, be sure to pop the top, and 

then push the can into the cavity of the chicken 

so that the bird is perched upright with the can 

of beer in its tush. The beer infuses the cavity 

with constant moisture, and the metal can 

helps conduct the heat consistently from the 

inside out. The result is an incredibly moist 

chicken that roasts very quickly. If your chicken 

is on the wagon, try filling the can with chicken 

stock, herbs, and freshly squeezed lemon juice 

or any flavorful liquid such as cola or ginger 

ale. 

1 (3 1/2 - to 4-pound) chicken 

1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt 

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black 

pepper 

1 teaspoon garlic powder 

1 teaspoon sweet Hungarian paprika 

1 teaspoon freshly chopped rosemary 

leaves or 1/3 teaspoon chopped dried 

rosemary 

1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil 

1 open can of beer 

2 bay leaves and fresh herbs, optional 

1 large onion, quartered 

6 unpeeled garlic cloves, optional 

1 to 1 1/2 cups chicken stock 

Pat the chicken dry inside and out, and 

remove any packaging hidden in the cavity. 

If time allows, place the chicken on a paper 

towel-lined plate and let it hang out in the 

fridge for an hour. When ready to roast, preheat 

the oven to 450 degrees and lower your 

oven rack to its lowest position. Take the 

chicken out of the fridge. 

Combine the seasonings in a small bowl 

(this helps prevent cross-contaminating your 

seasonings while working with the chicken). 

Take a pinch of seasoning and rub it inside 

the cavity. Drizzle the oil over the entire bird 

and then sprinkle the outside with the seasonings. 

Pop the top of the beer can (toss in 

some fresh herbs or bays leaves if you like 

for added flavor) and carefully place the 

chicken upright on the can. Jiggle the legs 

in position so the chicken appears to be 


sitting and does not topple over. Place the 

bird, upright, in a shallow roasting pan and 

scatter the bay leaves, onions, and garlic, 

if using, and add 1/2 cup of the stock. Place 

in oven. Lower the oven temperature to 425 

degrees. After 30 minutes, add 1/2 cup more 

stock and continue roasting, until an instantread 

thermometer registers 160 to 165 

degrees when it is inserted in the thigh, about 

30 minutes more. Transfer the chicken to 

a carving board and cover with a piece of 

aluminum foil; the internal temperature will 

rise 5 to 10 degrees while the chicken rests 

and the juices will redistribute throughout 

the bird. Do not handle the can – it will 

be very hot! 

Place the roasting pan directly on the 

stove, skim off some of the fat, and add more 

stock if necessary to create the gravy. If 

you roasted the garlic cloves, squeeze them 

to extract the roasted garlic and mash it into 

the sauce. Discard the skins. Let the gravy 

simmer until heated through. If you prefer 

a thicker gravy, make a slurry by mixing 

1 teaspoon of cornstarch with 2 

teaspoons of cold water, stir back into the 

pan, bring to a boil, and repeat if necessary. 

When ready to carve, use an oven mitt 

carefully to remove the beer can from the 

chicken. Carve the chicken and serve with 

the gravy drizzled on top. 

Serves 4 

SEPHARDIC CHEESE-STUFFED 

EGGPLANT (Berengena Rellenas de 

Queso) 

From Olive Trees and Honey 

The first time I made stuffed eggplant, 

following a different recipe from this one, I 

was enormously disappointed in the results, as 

the vegetable tasted insipid and too firm, even 

after baking for an extended period. Then, an 

informative Sephardic grandmother advised 

to parboil the eggplant to give it a creamy texture. 

Other cooks panfry the eggplant rather 

than parboiling it, but I find the frying requires 

more effort and adds extra calories. There 

are numerous versions of stuffed eggplant, 

adapted to whatever ingredients are available 

in the pantry. This cheese-filled version makes 

a savory entrée for a light meal or a delicious 

side dish. 

2 eggplants (about 1 pound each), halved 

lengthwise 

4 tablespoons olive oil or vegetable oil 

1 onion, chopped 

2 to 3 cloves garlic, minced 

2 tablespoons fresh parsley 

1 cup fine fresh bread crumbs 

1 tablespoon chopped fresh chives or 1 

teaspoon dried oregano and 1/2 teaspoon 

dried basil 

About 1/2 teaspoon table salt or 1 teaspoon 

kosher salt 

Ground black pepper to taste 

1 cup (5 ounces) crumbled feta, 1 cup 

(4 ounces) shredded Cheddar or Nuenster 

cheese, or 1 cup (8 ounces) ricotta 

cheese 

1 large egg, lightly beaten 

1/4 cup toasted pine nuts, 1/4 cup coarsely 

chopped capers, 1/2 cup chopped pitted 

black olives, or any combination 

(optional) 

1 to 2 tablespoons olive oil for drizzling 

Scoop out the cores of the eggplant (a 

melon baller or grapefruit knife works well) 

leaving a 1/2-inch-thick shell and reserving 

the pulp. In a large pot of salted boiling 

water, cook the shells until tender, but not 

soft, about 3 minutes. Drain. 

Coarsely chop the reserved eggplant pulp. 

(It might appear like a lot, but it will cook 

down.) In a large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons 

of the oil over medium heat. Add the onion 

and garlic and sauté until soft and translucent, 

about 5 minutes. Add the remaining 

2 tablespoons oil, then the eggplant pulp 

and parsley and sauté until softened, about 

10 minutes. Remove from the heat and 

stir in the bread crumbs, chives, salt, and 

pepper. Add the cheese, egg, and, if using, 

the pine nuts. 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Oil a 

large baking pan. 

Lightly salt the insides of the eggplant 

shells and stuff with the pulp mixture. 

Arrange in the baking pan and drizzle with 

a little oil. Cover and bake for 20 minutes. 

Uncover and bake until golden, about 10 

minutes. 

Serve warm. 

Serves 4

PIGNOLI COOKIES 

From Kosher Revolution 

Years ago I had a date with a boy who 

brought me a box of pignoli cookies from 

Little Italy. The cookies were an instant hit 

(alas, he wasn’t) and became a great favorite 

of mine. They’re simple to make, pareve, and 

perfect for Passover. The nuts give the cookies 

a buttery richness even though they’re nondairy. 

Just what you want from a pareve cookie 

as addictive as these. 

8 ounces almond paste 

1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar 

1/2 cup sugar 

1 large egg white 

1 teaspoon almond extract 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract 

1 cup pine nuts 

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Line 

2 cookie sheets with parchment paper and 

set aside. 

In a food processor, combine the almond 

paste and sugars and process until the mixture 

reaches the consistency of sand. Transfer 

to the bowl of a standing mixer fitted 

with the paddle attachment, or a medium 

bowl, and add the egg white, vanilla and 

almond extracts. Beat on medium speed 

or by hand for 4 minutes. 

Place the pine nuts in a small bowl. Next 

to it place a small bowl of water for wetting 

your hands. Wet your hands and form 

1 1/2- to 2-inch balls with the paste mixture, 

making 5 at a time. Drop them into 

the bowl of nuts and press down gently so 

the nuts adhere to the bottom of the dough. 

Transfer to a cookie sheet nut side up. 

Repeat, filling each prepared cookie sheet 

with about 15 balls. Bake until puffed and 

beginning to color, 15 to 18 minutes. 

Remove from the oven, and cool on the 

parchment paper on a countertop. When 

completely cool, peel the cookies off the 

paper and serve. 

30 cookies CJ 

Since its earliest days, sisterhoods throughout 

the Women’s League network have 

been publishing cookbooks as fundraisers 

as well as simply to share their members’ 

favorite and most delicious recipes. To find 

out more, go to www.wlcj.org/shopping and 

resource center. 


18 CJ — VOICES OF CONSERVATIVE/MASORTI JUDAISM

WHAT’S JEWISH 

ABOUT CAMPING? 

BY MAXINE SEGAL HANDELMAN 

IDIDN’T GROW UP CAMP- 

ING, but my husband did. 0000 

Every summer his family would 

spend several weeks at Devil’s Lake 

State Park in Wisconsin. After college 

he decided to go up to Devil’s 

Lake with some friends. It started with maybe 

a dozen single twentysomething friends, for 

a long summer weekend. They hiked, canoed, 

swam, and celebrated Shabbat. Each year they 

returned to Devil’s Lake, even as the group 

grew. 

The journey from single to married to families 

never slowed us down. In 2001 four pregnant 

women were part of the tent-building 

crew. I sat at the fire with one hand on my 

swollen belly, the other hand on my friend 

Ann’s even larger belly, and as both babies 

kicked in utero, I rejoiced in our children’s 

first playdate. In 2002 four babies, ranging 

from 6 weeks to 11 months old, crawled about 

the campsite. Our standards for clean babies 

went out the window. It took a really long 

time to break down camp that year. 

Everyone took part in a meal crew, making 

one meal and relaxing for the rest, a system 

that serves us well now that the group 

exceeds 60 people, with kids ranging from 

toddlers to teenagers. We are a Jewishly 

diverse group, ranging from modern Orthodox 

to non-observant. The food is kosher 

and nut-free, with gluten-free and vegetarian 

options at every meal. We take care 

of the earth as we strive to live off it. (Well, 

not entirely. This is car camping, after all.) 

Maxine Segal Handelman is United Synagogue's 

early childhood education consultant. 

She has been camping her entire married 

life, and her daughters each went on her first 

camping trip in utero. 

Scenes from Devil’s Lake 

Most families have acquired a set of camping 

dishes to use at every meal. Some families 

have two sets of camping dishes, to 

be washed in the meat or milk three-bin 

washing systems (soapy water, plain water, 

and bleach water for disinfecting). 

Every year we have to promise the park 

rangers that the fishing wire we are stringing 

through the trees around our entire 

campsite will be gone by the time we leave 

on Sunday. We don’t even try to explain 

to them why we need this eruv to make carrying 

items around our campsite permissible 

on Shabbat. 

Shabbat at Devil’s Lake is a palace in time. 

(Except of course for the one year that it 

started raining as we made kiddush Friday 

night and didn’t stop until Saturday 

night as the sun set, but we try not to think 

about that year.) We set up picnic tables 

in a big circle around the fire, built up so 

it will last long into Shabbat. One of the several 

rabbis leads the group in Kabbalat Shabbat, 

paced to hold the interest of all the kids 

and the adults, peppered with singing and 

a good story or two. Tea lights are lit on 

the tables, grape juice and wine passed 

around, homemade challah blessed and 

shared. Dinner is a feast – sometimes tincan 

stew (made in 10 gallon cans collected 

for weeks before the trip) or chicken fajitas 

– and the singing around the fire pit can 

go late into the night. Stars shine brightly 

at Devil’s Lake, especially compared to the 

city streets of Chicago where I usually do 

my gazing. Friday night is the perfect time 



to bring a blanket to a nearby field and watch 

for shooting stars. 

Hiking and swimming are all within walking 

distance of our camp site. Shabbat is 

a day to explore nature or kick back with 

a good book (or both – Shabbat is long in 

the summer). At first, we new parents 

climbed the bluffs with children riding in 

backpacks. When she was 2, our younger 

daughter made the climb by herself to the 

top of the bluff, about half a mile up, and 

then she climbed into a backpack and slept 

the rest of the hike. 

Now, having grown up at Devil’s Lake, 

the children are master hikers, taking on 

more challenging boulder fields every year, 

helping their friends along. Kids of all ages 

run in packs, watching out for each other 

and creating their own experience. 

One year, we grown-ups were treated to 

a variety show with skits and dance numbers 

performed by all the kids. Another year, 

among the cords of wood we bought for the 

fire were some odd bits left over from some 

building project. That year, the boys spent 

hours creating cities and superhero worlds 

with those wood pieces. 

Havdalah at the campsite is a sublime 

moment. As a new fire grows in the fire 

pit, we gather around, 60 or more of us, 

singing and swaying, smelling spices often 

created from plants and flowers collected 

near the site. And as the last notes of 

“shavuah tov” fade away, the kids scramble 

to pop marshmallows onto the sticks 

they have foraged and do what they have 

been waiting for all of Shabbat – make 

s’mores! The guitars come out, and the songbooks, 

and we sing folksongs and Indigo 

Girls late into the night. 

I didn’t grow up camping. But my kids 

will. They can put up a tent and break one 

down. They can shlep water without too 

much kvetching, pick up a daddy longlegs 

spider by the leg to get it out of the tent (oh, 

wait, that’s me, they still don’t do that), row 

a canoe, pee in the woods, and take pleasure 

climbing a boulder field with their 

friends. They thrive in this camping community 

that now includes friends from all 

over the Midwest. I just hope they let me 

come back and join them when they start 

a camping group of their own. CJ

A JEWISH 

MUSEUM 

IN SAINT JOHN? 

BY SHIRLEY MOSKOW 

WHATEVER WERE 

they thinking when 

they named the only 

Jewish museum in 

Atlantic Canada the 

Saint John Jewish 

Historical Museum? 

Yes, it is located in Saint John, New 

Brunswick, Canada’s oldest city, but to give 

a Jewish institution the name of a Catholic 

saint is unusual. Since the museum is unique 

in the province, it could have been called 

the New Brunswick Jewish Historical 

Museum, or simply the Jewish Historical 

Museum. The name gives a hint that this 

is no ordinary museum and that Saint John 

is no ordinary city. 

Founded in 1986, Saint John Jewish Historical 

Museum was created and is maintained 

by the dwindling congregation of 

Shaarei Zedek Synagogue as a loving tribute 

to the heritage of the Jewish community 

and to the city that befriended it. 

The museum occupies an impressive stone 

building at 91 Leinster Street. When it 

was built in 1897 by a ship owner as a 

wedding gift for his bride, it was reputed 

to be the best home in the city. It is prominently 

featured on the self-guided Victorian 

Stroll, which includes such noteworthy edi- 

Shirley Moskow, a former newspaper editor, 

is a Boston-based freelance writer with specialties 

in the arts and travel. She has published 

two books and contributes to such 

magazines as AmericanStyle, Caribbean Travel 

& Life, and Antiques and Fine Art. 

fices as the elaborate Second Empire house 

at 167 King Street East and the massive Italianate 

row houses on Orange Street. 

In the heart of the city, the museum is 

popular with travelers from all over the 

world, especially passengers on the cruise 

ships that dock at Market Square. It is many 

people’s first contact with Jewish culture, 

and the high school student guides answer 

questions about Jewish ritual and the lifecycle 

events portrayed in the galleries – a 

EUROPE 

Explore Venice, Florence, and Rome or 

learn about the rich Jewish history in 

Toledo, Granada or Prague. Discover Berlin 

or Vilna. Tour Cracow, Warsaw and Lublin 

and visit the concentration camps in 

Poland. Learn about the past, present, and 

future of these unique Jewish communities 

on a one-of-a-kind kosher tour with 

meaningful Shabbat experiences. 

table set for the Passover seder, a video of 

a woman making bagels, a marriage ketubah. 

Visitors often are curious about the theater 

seats in the sanctuary. Hollywood producer 

Louis B. Mayer, who was born in 

the Ukraine, grew up in Saint John and celebrated 

his bar mitzvah at the synagogue. 

His mother, Sarah, was known as the first 

lady of Shaarei Zedek. After Mayer established 

himself in the movie business, he 

shared his good fortune with friends. Con- 

ISRAEL 

Tour from North to South with an itinerary 

to meet your synagogue’s needs. You will 

explore our people’s rich history while 

learning and experiencing the modern State 

of Israel and our dreams for the future. 

The staff at the Fuchsberg Jerusalem Center has more than 35 years experience 

planning trips for Conservative groups to Europe and Israel. Contact us so we 

can plan your synagogue’s next meaningful excursion overseas together. 

Website: www.uscj.org.il E-mail: david@uscj.org 


gregants became film distributors and owners 

of theater chains. One donated the sanctuary 

seats. 

The Jewish community contributed to 

Saint John’s cultural life in many ways. A 

poster in the corridor commemorates life at 

Millie and Ben Guss’ home, which was a 

hub for music lovers. Everyone in the family 

sang and played an instrument. During 

the many years that Ben was president 

of the community concert series, guest artists 

often practiced in their living room. Daughter 

Faith recalled that “when Glenn Gould 

practiced on our piano we sat on the steps 

to the second floor landing … like quiet little 

mice with huge ears.” Son Jonathan 

remembered that “Yitzchak Pearlman spent 

the afternoon at the house before a concert. 

He played chess with me at the dining room 

table…. He was very good.” These are the 

intimate memories that the heimisch 

museum aims to preserve. 

Brushing aside old memories, 90-yearold 

Isadore Davis, who celebrated his bar 

mitzvah in the synagogue, proudly declared 

that today Shaarei Zedek is “Conservative 


and egalitarian.” But the first Jews in the 

port city were Orthodox. Solomon and Alice 

Hart, who emigrated from England and 

came to Saint John in 1858 by way of New 

York, are considered the first permanent 

Jewish settlers there. The Harts prospered 

from Solomon’s tobacco business, and as 

more British Jews followed, the city became 

a cigar manufacturing center. For a while, 

the Harts held religious services in their 

home. When they lost a young daughter 

in 1873, they dedicated land for a Jewish 

cemetery. 

In 1881, there were 15 Jewish families 

in Saint John. Using contributions from 

people of all faiths, they built the city’s 

first synagogue, aptly named Ahavith Achim 

(brotherly love). Alice opened a nursery and 

taught in the Hebrew school. The following 

year, she organized Daughters of Israel 

“to help the needy and nurture the sick.” In 

1882, their daughter Elizabeth married her 

English cousin Louis Green in Saint John’s 

first Jewish wedding. 

By 1891, there were 43 Jewish families in 

the city. A decade later, the census shows 

nearly 300. The influx of Ashkenazim, fleeing 

Eastern Europe and the pogroms of 

the Russian empire, introduced an exotic 

flavor to the city. They practiced customs 

the locals did not understand. They spoke 

little or no English, only Yiddish. The men, 

who were mostly peddlers, dressed in black 

and had long beards; the women covered 

their heads with kerchiefs and dressed in the 

peasant clothes of the shtetl. Nevertheless, 

they found a comfortable home in Saint 

John, and in 1906 they founded the Hazen 

Avenue Synagogue. Although both congregations 

were Orthodox, they had little 

to do with one another. They reflected different 

cultures; their customs were different; 

there were class differences; they spoke 

different languages. Their services were different 

and each had its own rabbi. 

Both congregations thrived and outgrew 

their buildings. When the city’s handsome 

neo-Gothic Presbyterian church became 

available in 1919, they managed to set aside 

their differences to merge, launching a 

golden era. The combined congregation, 

comprised of about 200 male members, 

chose the new name Shaarei Zedek. 

Jews participated in the vibrant life of 

Saint John. They founded successful businesses. 

In 1977, the city elected Samuel 

Davis as its first Jewish mayor. (His father, 

Harry, a cabinetmaker, crafted the ark and 

reading table in the museum.) Benjamin R. 

Guss became the first Jewish judge and 

Erminie Cohen the first Jewish senator. 

In the 1950s, however, younger people 

began drifting away. To be more modern, 

Shaarei Zedek affiliated with the Conservative 

movement. But the pull of opportunity 

in the big cities was strong. 

Membership declined to about 40. There 

has been no rabbi since 1982. In 2008, 

the congregation sold the church building, 

its home for almost 100 years. 

Shaarei Zedeck has functioned for years 

under the able administration of Dan Elman, 

a lay reader, who organizes services, sends 

out yahrzeit reminders, leads classes to teach 

adults how to conduct services, and fills 

in as the Hebrew school teacher. 

The museum’s success has ushered in a 

new optimism. Marcia Koven, a descendant 

(continued on page 33)

Masorti Leadership Mission participants in the Knesset synagogue where they held an historic egalitarian minyan.United States Ambassador Dan Shapiro 

and Emily Levy-Shochat, chair of Masorti in Israel, are in the photo at right. 

ON A MISSION TO ISRAEL 

BY RABBI ROBERT SLOSBERG 

THE WHIRLWIND 

four-day Masorti leadership 

mission to Israel 

in January 2012 was a 

real eye-opener. I was one 

of a group of 21 Conservative 

rabbis and lay leaders from around 

North America who had come expecting to 

see recent developments in our nearly 65 

Masorti kehillot. But we also were there to 

express solidarity with Israelis committed 

to pluralism and to challenge government 

officials over policies that favor minority 

Orthodox extremists over the majority’s democratic 

values. 

On the one hand, the mission was exactly 

what I had anticipated. Still, I was unprepared 

for just how overwhelmed I would be 

by everything we encountered. I was particularly 

moved by young Israelis’ excitement 

over the Masorti movement, and their 

embrace of the democratic, pluralistic, open 

practice of Judaism that we offer. Israelis are 

connecting to Masorti through the educational, 

religious, and social programs and 

community service opportunities available 

in our kehillot; through the Noam 

youth movement and the network of Marom 

chapters for college-age and young adults; 

Rabbi Robert Slosberg is the spiritual leader 

of Congregation Adath Jeshurun in Louisville, 

Kentucky. 

and through the political activism the movement 

organizes to protest discrimination 

against women and against non-Orthodox 

streams in Israel. 

The personal stories of Masorti congregants 

deeply moved me. For many, the 

Masorti kehilla is their first exposure to a 

way of Jewish life that encourages the equal 

participation of the entire family. My Israeli 

rabbinic colleagues, who despite financial 

sacrifices serve our movement with distinction, 

are dynamic teachers and spiritual 

leaders. It isn’t easy to impress a roomful 

of Conservative rabbis, but we were dazzled 

by text study with several rising young stars. 

Nathalie Lastreger, the new spiritual leader 

of Kehillat Sinai in Tel Aviv, who will be 

ordained soon, mesmerized us with the tale 

of her personal journey, from marriage to 

an ultra-Orthodox rabbi to the impassioned 

Masorti professional and human rights 

activist she is today. 

Rabbi Hanna Klebansky, an olah from the 

former Soviet Union, is defying the unequal 

treatment of women in Israel in a most 

unorthodox way. Late into the night, after 

putting her five children to bed, Rabbi Klebansky 

sits at her desk in a tiny corner of her 

living room writing a Torah scroll. It was 

a thrill to hold and pass around one of the 

64 panels she will eventually complete. 

We heard from Masorti rabbis, kehilla 

leaders, and local officials about the posi- 

Rabbi Robert Slosberg 

tive impact Masorti is having on life everywhere, 

from large cities to small towns and 

villages, from relatively affluent communities 

to those facing significant poverty and 

other disadvantages. 

The gan (kindergarten) at Kehillat Eshel 

Avraham in Beersheva, one of Masorti’s larger 

communities, has a waiting list nearly as large 

as its enrollment of 230 youngsters. At the 

large plot of land that the city is interested 

in providing the kehilla for a second gan, we 

learned about the congregation’s long-range 

vision for an elementary school as well. 

Elsewhere in the Negev, at Kehillat Netzach 

Yisrael in Ashkelon, we lunched with 

Rabbi Gustavo Surzski, lay leaders, and graduates 

of Masorti’s Noam youth movement. 

These young Israelis, undoubtedly the next 

generation of Masorti leadership, are living 



and working at an absorption center for 

Ethiopian olim as part of Noam’s Shin-Shin 

community service program in the year before 

army enlistment. Listening to the director of 

the absorption center praise these bright 

young men and women, I realized that the 

future of our movement is in great hands. 

We heard from enthusiastic leaders of several 

new kehillot in Tzur Yitzchak, Petach 

Tikvah, Holon, and Pardes Hanna about 

how they are building their communities. 

Rabbi Hanna Klebansky showed the group the 

megilla scroll she inscribed. 

In Karmiel, Rabbi Mijael Even David and kehilla leaders showed off the new addition 

to their building and shared their plans 

for continued growth. 

In Kfar Vradim, just south of the Lebanese 

border, we were moved by the persistence 

of Mayor Sivan Yechieli in helping the kehilla 

realize its dream for a new home. For nearly 

10 years that dream was on hold, as government 

ministries under the control of 

ultra-Orthodox parties blocked efforts to 

construct a facility. Even though Sivan is 

not observant, he could see the importance 

of the Masorti kehilla to the Kfar 

Vradim community, and he was determined 

to make the building happen. 

Pluralism has made its way onto the radar 

of many of Israel’s leading political figures. 

At our opening dinner, Tzipi Livni, 

who then was the head of the Kadima party, 

offered some very forceful words in support 

of democratic values. Her appearance, given 

the timing in a critical primary season, was 

testament to her view of Masorti’s growing 

stature. We met, too, with Meir Dagan, 

the former head of Mossad, and with Rabbi 

Uri Regev, the head of Hiddush, a Jerusalembased 

organization promoting religious freedom 

and diversity. And one of my proudest 

moments was meeting U.S. Ambassador 

Dan Shapiro at the American embassy. He 

and his family are regular and active members 

of our Masorti kehilla in Kfar Saba. 

Finally, during our visit to the Knesset we 

held the first egalitarian prayer service to be 

held in the synagogue there since the building’s 

dedication in 1966. The service was 

lead by Rabbi Jennifer Gorman, a Conservative 

rabbi. It followed a morning of 

meetings with government ministers and 

Knesset members, where we made the point 

that religious pluralism and democracy are 

matters of major concern to diaspora Jewry,

and that Israel’s political landscape must 

change if Israel is to redefine the increasingly 

anti-democratic relationship between 

religion and the state. 

We talked to Dan Meridor of Likud, who 

is deputy prime minister and also minister 

of intelligence and atomic energy, and to Uzi 

Landau of Israel Beiteinu, minister of energy 

and water. We also talked to MKs Yohanan 

Plesner and Orit Zuaretz of Kadima and 

Isaac Herzog of Labor. We were delighted to 

discover that they, too, were familiar with 

Masorti’s contributions to Israeli life. 

I flew home awed and inspired by the 

growth and depth of Masorti in Israel, yet 

frustrated knowing that the movement’s 

amazing work is being accomplished on a 

shoestring budget. For a number of kehillot, 

the biggest challenge is finding funding to 

hire a rabbi or rabbinic intern. The government 

provides less than $50,000 to all Masorti 

programs and services, compared to the more 

than $450 million it provides to Orthodox 

institutions. It pays the salaries of about 3,000 

Orthodox rabbis and not one Masorti rabbi. 

In truth, the budget of the entire Masorti 

movement is less than that of some individual 

congregations in North America. 

And as I flew home I also considered 

this appalling fact: Conservative/Masorti 

converts to Judaism meet the traditional 

requirements of Jewish law, but because their 

conversions are not accepted by Israel’s official 

rabbis they cannot get married in the 

Jewish state. The hoops that even those of 

my congregants who were born to Jewish 

parents must jump through if they wish 

to marry in Israel are daunting. It is hard for 

me to fathom that I have fewer religious 

rights in my Jewish homeland than I do 

in the Commonwealth of Kentucky! The 

continuing lack of pluralism in Israel and 

discrimination against non-ultra-Orthodox 

Jewry is simply unacceptable. It is critical 

that we support Masorti in Israel and express 

the need for change. 

So I flew home from Israel feeling exhilarated, 

depressed, and determined. Exhilarated 

by the possibilities of Jewish life there, 

depressed by the challenges other Jews put 

in our way, and determined to be part of the 

solution that will make Israel the home it 

should be for all Jews. CJ 

Charles Simon 

(continued from page 9) 

influence their children. Late afternoon 

we met as a group and I asked how they were 

going to respond to their adult children 

when they were asked why, all of a sudden, 

they wished them a Shabbat shalom. 

“Because it is important to me,” they decided 

to reply. Six months later, they are still doing 

it. Hopefully, it will be passed on to their 

grandchildren. 

A world of information is becoming available 

to help men learn to become more effective 

fathers. It’s one piece of FJMC’s Hearing 

Men’s Voices Initiative. Hearing Men's 

Voices provides the venue for men to talk 

about the issues that affect their daily lives, 

including their roles as fathers. As they 

engage in these conversations they both 

mentor and learn from others at the same 

time. Many of these issues are also explored 

on Mentschen.org, the online address for 

conversation for Jewish men. CJ 


VISITING ISRAEL WITH 

your kids is fun, exciting, 

and educational. It is an 

adventure that you and your 

children will remember forever. 

There’s so much to do 

and see that it’s important to plan ahead to 

make the most of your trip. 

If you’re wondering about how you’ll manage 

with language issues and safety, don’t 

worry. There are many activities geared 

toward English speakers. Most Israeli guides 

are fluent in English. Israel’s safety regulations 

are on par with those in other developed 

countries, so all you need to think 

about is how much fun you and your kids 

will have. 

Here is just a sampling of ideas to inspire 

you. Your little ones can enjoy fun gyms, 

petting zoos, arts and crafts, puppet plays, 

donkey rides, or bee farms (yes, bee farms!). 

For slightly older kids with lots of energy, 

think Action Park, ATV/jeep rides, kayaking, 

rock climbing, and horseback riding. 

There are plenty of educational experiences 

available as well: museums, tours of 

factories, learning the art of ancient spices, 

silk, and honey, and scavenger hunts exploring 

the various neighborhoods of Jerusalem. 

Avital Cohen, MSW, is the founder of Israel 

Kids, a new website for activities, local events, 

and services in Israel, for kids and families. 


Young bee keepers pet some 

of the animals at Devorat 

Hatavor. 

For fun in the sun don’t miss out on glassbottom 

boat rides, the dolphin reef, and 

Israel’s national parks. 

For direct access to these sites, go to 

www.uscj.org, scroll to the bottom, and click 

on the cover of this magazine. From there, 

you can click on this article. You also can go 

to Israelkids.co.il. 

Central 

• Pe’alton Gymboree has locations 

throughout Israel (Toddlers) http://www. 

pealton.co.il 

• Beedvash in Kfar Chabad is a petting 

zoo (Ages 3+) http://beedvash.co.il 

ISRAEL 

FOR 

KIDS 

BY AVITAL COHEN 

Outside the Diaspora Museum, Beit Hatfutzot in Tel Aviv. 

• Diaspora Museum, Beit Hatfutzot, on 

the Tel Aviv University campus, to learn 

about the ongoing story of the Jewish people 

(Age 6+) http://www.bh.org.il 

• Tnuva factory visitor center in Rehovot 

demonstrates how milk gets from the cow 

to your fridge (Ages 6+) http://www.visittnuva.co.il 

• Tel Aviv’s Sportek Climbing Wall 

offers rock-climbing lessons (Ages 9+) 

http://israelkids.co.il 

Jerusalem 

• Train Theatre offers puppet plays, 

story telling and more. (Ages 2+) http://

www.traintheater.co.il/english 

• Bowling Center is a great way to 

spend a rainy day (Ages 6+) http:// 

israelkids.co.il 

• Jerusalem Scavenger Hunt (Ages 9+) 

http://www.jerusalemscavengerhunts.com 

• Ammunition Hill Museum to learn 

about the liberation and reunification of 

Jerusalem (Ages 9+) http://israelkids.co.il 

• Keyad Hadimyon, outside Modiin, not 

far from Jerusalem, for arts and crafts (Ages 

3+) http://www.hadimyon.co.il 

South 

• Philip Farm in the northern Negev 

for donkey rides and other fun activities (All 

ages) http://www.philipfarm.co.il 

• Eilat’s Yisrael-Yam (glass bottom boat 

ride) for a relaxing ride along the Red Sea 

(All ages) http://israelkids.co.il 

• Dolphin Reef (Eilat) to watch dolphins 

in their natural habitat (All ages) 

http://www.dolphinreef.co.il 

• Kiryat Gat’s Action Park offers thrilling 

rides, games and more (Ages 6+) http:// 

www.action-park.co.il 

• Eilat’s Camel Ranch for adventurous 

horseback riding (Ages 6+) http:// 

www.camel-ranch.co.il 

North 

• Devorat Hatavor in Moshav Shadmot 

Devora, for a bee farm and petting zoo (Ages 

3+) http://www.dvorat-hatavor.co.il 

• 101 Kilometer, south of Paran, home 

to the largest reptile farm in the Middle East, 

for ATV/jeep rides (All ages) http:// 

israelkids.co.il 

• The Galilee’s Etz Habakbukim (Bottle 

Tree) to learn to make ancient spices (Ages 

6+) http://www.ein-tzurim.org.il 

• Achziv Beach National Park, north of 

Nahariya, has stunning views and natural 

and artificial seawater pools (All ages) 

http://www.parks.org.il 

• Hagosherim kayaks, in Hagoshrim, 

offers an adventurous kayak ride down the 

Jordan River (Ages 3+)http://www.kayak. 

co.il 

Go to Israelkids.co.il to get a full list of 

fun activities for children as well as discount 

coupons for many of these attractions. CJ 


FACTS YOU MIGHT NOT KNOW ABOUT MASORTI 

BY RABBI ALAN SILVERSTEIN 

• Masorti is the name of the Conservative movement in Israel. 

It stands for religious pluralism and democratic values in an egalitarian 

Judaism. 

• Masorti is dominated at its grassroots by sabras as well as 

by olim – immigrants – from Latin America, the former Soviet 

Union, and Muslim lands, unified via the Hebrew language. 

• Masorti of 2012 is young and getting younger all the time. 

Its kehillot abound with kindergartens and nurseries filled 

to capacity, with 600 bnai mitzvah ceremonies annually, 

with almost 2,000 members of Noam, the nationwide youth 

movement, and with 500 summer campers at Ramah/Noam. 

• Over the last few years, Masorti has grown from less 

than 50 to 63 kehillot, springing to life in such towns as 

Tzur Yitzhak, Holon, and Petach Tikvah. 

• Israelis are becoming increasingly aware of Masorti. An 

Avi Chai/Guttman Institute survey released in January shows 

that 30 percent of Israelis have attended services at a Conservative 

or Reform congregation. Yizhar Hess, the movement’s 

chief executive, frequently is invited to write op-eds in the 

Israeli press and is interviewed on radio and television. The 

movement and its leaders are gaining influence within the 

Knesset, as well. 

• The rabbis in Masorti communities are dynamos. Veterans 

such as Mauricio Balter and Roberto Arbib have been 

joined by a new generation of young and passionate colleagues 

including Elisha Wolfin, Tamar Elad-Appelbaum, Chaya Rowen 

Baker, Gustavo Surazki, Yoav Ende, Dubi Hayun, and Jeff 

Cymet. 

• Once you leave Jerusalem, openness to Masorti increases 

dramatically. For example, in Kfar Vradim, a new building 

for our Masorti kehilla came into being because of strong 

support from the secular mayor and his colleagues. In Beer- 

Rabbi Alan Silverstein, PhD, is the chair of the board of the Masorti 

Foundation for Conservative Judaism in Israel and the spiritual 

leader of Congregation Agudath Israel in Caldwell, New Jersey. 

The Bookshelf 


Mortality and Morality: A Search for the God 

after Auschwitz by Hans Jonas, edited by 

Lawrence Vogel. Northwestern University 

Press, 1996 

This generous selection of papers by one 

of the most influential Jewish thinkers of 


the 20th century deals with moral, religious, 

and ethical issues in the wake of the Holocaust. 

Jonas, a German Jew who studied 

with and was a friend of philosophers Martin 

Heidegger, Rudolph Bultmann, and 

Hanah Arendt, was himself exiled by the 

Nazis, fought in World War II and the Israeli 

War of Independence, and ended up on the 

sheva, the municipality has designated land for a second Masorti 

kindergarten in a developing part of the city. 

• Masorti’s kehillot include thousands of dues-paying members. 

Under rabbinic guidance, the members of these kehillot 

reach out to the community at large through nurseries and 

kindergartens, Noam, life-cycle ceremonies, absorption of olim, 

assistance to those below the poverty line, advocacy of ecological 

concerns, outreach to Israeli Arab communities, and the provision 

of special needs bar/bat mitzvah training and ceremonies. 

Masorti touches more than 75,000 Israelis annually. Impressively, 

the Avi Chai/Guttman Institute survey reveals that nearly 

500,000 Israelis self-identify as Masorti or Reform. 

• Vaani T’fillati, the Masorti Shabbat and weekday siddur, 

which is published by Israel’s largest publishing house, has 

been a best-seller. A Masorti machzor is being prepared. These 

egalitarian liturgical reflections of Israeli life offer prayers for 

Yom Ha’Atzmaut, Yom HaZikaron, entering the IDF, and other 

life-cycle events. 

• Masorti is central to the spectrum of Israeli Judaism, offering 

the only regular egalitarian Shabbat morning minyanim. 

Masorti also offers a halachic approach that is both flexible and 

traditional, addressing issues such as the religious permissibility 

of visiting the Temple Mount, of trading land for peace, 

of women serving in the IDF, and so on. 

• The Israeli public is ever more receptive to our message. 

In the most recent poll, 63 percent support official recognition 

for both Masorti and Reform. A growing number of secular 

Israelis indicate that they are “open to” encountering aspects of 

the Jewish tradition within their lives in a “noncoercive” manner. 

These are code words for Masorti, Reform, and the liberal 

elements of modern Orthodoxy. 

As the evaluators of the Avi Chai/Guttman Institute poll 

conclude: “The results of the survey are evidence that Israeli Jews 

are committed to two significant values: preserving Jewish tradition 

on the one hand, and upholding individual freedom of 

choice on the other.” In sum, the fact is that Masorti Judaism 

is emerging as part of a broad Israeli-Jewish consensus. 

faculty of the New School for Social Research 

in New York. The essays are suffused with 

his major concerns: the moral impulse, 

the meaning of a human life, and the possibility 

of faith in God after the Holocaust. 

These essays do not make for easy reading, 

but they are all rewarding and they open 

new vistas of thinking. CJ

A PERSONAL MIRACLE 

The First Masorti Rabbi in Ukraine 

BY RABBI TZVI GRAETZ 

JEWISH LIFE IN UKRAINE 

has changed and grown tremendously 

since the end of the Soviet 

era. One of the biggest changes was 

inaugurated in March 2012, when 

the first Conservative/Masorti 

rabbi took up a permanent post in Kiev. 

The story of Rabbi Reuven Stamov (his 

first name originally was Roma) and his long 

journey back to Ukraine is nothing short of 

miraculous. Reuven was born in Simferopol 

in Crimea – a region of Ukraine – in 1974. 

His family was Jewish but entirely secular. 

He was teased at school for being a 

Jew, but during his childhood he never really 

had the opportunity to explore what that 

meant. As the Soviet period came to an end, 

many Ukrainian Jewish families left, relocating 

to Israel or other places. The Stamovs 

decided to stay in Ukraine, however, and at 

18 Reuven became involved for the first time 

in Jewish educational activities. He began 

to understand the purpose and rituals of the 

festivals, gained a rudimentary understanding 

of Hebrew, and developed a passion 

for Masorti Judaism. 

Throughout the 1990s, Reuven’s commitment 

to Judaism, the Jewish community, 

and Jewish and Zionist education grew 

as he became involved in the Ramah summer 

camp in Ukraine operated by Midreshet 

Yerushalayim. A division of the Schechter 

Institute for Jewish Studies, Midreshet 

Yerushalayim focuses on Russian-speaking 

Jews in Israel and parts of the former 

Soviet Union. Camp Ramah-Yachad gave 

Rabbi Tzvi Graetz is a graduate of the 

Schechter Rabbinical Seminary in Jerusalem 

and the executive director of Masorti Olami 

and Mercaz Olami. 

Reuven a religious home, a place where 

he could grow as a Jewish communal leader, 

teaching campers about Masorti Judaism 

and developing his own knowledge and practice 

at the same time. 

Reuven says that he began to want a more 

spiritual, meaningful, and observant Jewish 

life from his very first Camp Ramah experience. 

This eventually led him to move 

to Israel in 2003, and shortly afterward he 

came to the logical conclusion that his destiny 

was to become a Masorti rabbi. That 

would allow him to share with others his 

love and understanding of a Judaism that 

was traditional and modern, spiritual and 

intellectual, and committed to both Israel 

Email info@margaretmorsetours.com 

and the diaspora. 

Reuven studied at the Schechter Rabbinical 

Seminary in Jerusalem for nearly 

seven years, receiving support from Masorti 

Olami, the worldwide Masorti movement, 

via the Schorsch Fellowship, which supports 

rabbinical students committed to working 

in developing Masorti communities 

in Europe. During his studies he continued 

to work with Midreshet Yerushalayim in 

partnership with Masorti Olami. He traveled 

to Ukraine several times each year to 

run seminars, summer camp, and a successful 

conversion program, as well as many 

other projects that created the foundation 



Jews in 

Georgia 

JDocu is a group of amateur photographers, 

friends who know each other from Israel’s 

thriving high-tech world. They have set 

themselves the task of documenting Jewish 

communities around the world. These 

pictures are from the photographers’ journey 

to Georgia, in the former Soviet Union, 

to document what is left of the Jewish community 

there after the exodus of Jews from 

the region that began in the 1970s. 

The photographs were first exhibited at 

Beit Hatfutsot: The Museum of the Jewish 

People, in Tel Aviv, in March 2012, with 

support from the American Jewish Joint 

Distribution Committee and the Jewish 

Funders Network. 

See more of the group’s art at jdocu.com. 

An empty container for a Torah Scroll 

stands in the old synagogue in Oni. 

Tali Idan 


Just before Shavuot, girls in Rustavi get ready for a festive portrait. Yossi Beinart 

A bagel stand on the main road from Tbilisi. Atalla Katz

Dr. Shalva Buziashvilli, the last 

Jewish doctor in Rustavi, and his wife. 

Tali Idan 

Books are illuminated by light from the window 

in a deserted synagogue in Kutaisi. Eli Atias 

A tzedakah box in a closed synagogue. Tali Idan 

The abandoned synagogue in Kutaisi. 

Amir Halevy 



A women in the Jewish club in 

Rustavi. Yossi Beinart 

A scene from the synagogue 

that no one visits anymore. 

Yossi Beinart

Richard Skolnik 


the same issues that face Israelis and diaspora 

Jews on a regular basis. I hope that I continued 

facilitating this growth in others this 

year as the Nativ assistant director. I will forever 

be grateful for all that I have learned over 

the years of my involvement with Nativ, most 

importantly the understanding that all 

Jewish journeys are intertwined and neverending.” 

Aaron Sherman, 

Nativ 26 Aaron is 

from Santa Rosa, 

California. While 

he was on Nativ he 

was in the Hebrew 

University – 

Yerucham track, 

and afterward he 

went to the University of California at Davis. 

There, Aaron was involved with the Israel 

student group, and he spent a semester 

interning for Secretary of Defense Robert 

Gates in Washington, DC. Aaron has spent 

every summer since Nativ staffing USY Eastern 

Europe/Israel Pilgrimage, first as a counselor 

and then as a group leader. After 

graduating from UC-Davis, he staffed Nativ 

30’s Yerucham group, and now he is the 

communications/speechwriting intern at 

Obama for America’s headquarters in 

Chicago. 

“Nativ not only gave me experiences of a 

lifetime, but it taught me how to live my 

life. From what I love about davening to my 

thankfulness for Shabbat each week, almost 

everything about how I live a Jewish life I 

either learned, built upon, or discovered while 

on Nativ. Without Nativ, I wouldn’t be the 

educated, passionate, committed Jewish young 

adult I am today.” 

A wholehearted yashir koach goes to 

Nativ’s director, Yossi Garr, and his incredible 

staff, who work tirelessly throughout 

the year to educate our students in such 

an outstanding manner. Nativ graduates are 

our bridge to the future, our inspiration, 

and our most precious resource. CJ 

Saint John 


of an early 20th century immigrant, established 

the museum and was its first curator. 

She began by hiring Katherine Biggs-Craft, 

a college classmate who is not Jewish and 

by her own admission “knew virtually nothing 

about Judaism.” It was a fortuitous choice 

nonetheless, and when Koven retired, Biggs- 

Craft became curator. The museum archives 

now attract scholars from all over the world. 

The American Association for State and 

Local Libraries, the Church and Synagogue 

Library Association, and the province of 

New Brunswick all have honored it with 

awards. CJ 

TO ADVERTISE CALL 

917-668-6809 


WHY ARE YOU WEARING THAT 

CAMEL AROUND YOUR NECK? 

BY JOANNE PALMER 

SO WEARING THE TIE 

that’s an overall matzah print 

on Pesach makes perfect 

sense. 

The tie with the big whale 

for the afternoon of Yom Kippur, 

when the haftarah is the story of Jonah, 

yeah, that’s pretty obvious too, once you think 

about it. (Rosh Hashanah morning and Kol 

Nidrei, on the other hand, call for a simple 

white tie to match the kittel.) 

These ties are a very basic introduction 

to the very many ties of Frederic S. Goldstein, 

gabbai and third-generation face of 

Congregation B’nai Jeshurun on New York 

City’s Upper West Side, familiarly referred 

to as BJ. 

The one with hearts on it? That’s for 

Parashat Va-era, when Pharoah’s heart was 

hardened. (Va-era often is read in February, 

but no, it’s not for Valentine’s Day.) 

The game quickly gets harder. What about 

the tie with the Cat in the Hat? There are 

no cats mentioned in the Torah, and certainly 

there is nothing about top hats. It’s 

because the Cat in the Hat is a creation of 

Dr. Seuss, and in Parashat Beshallach, when 

the people sing the Song of the Sea, we 

are told that they are celebrating God’s having 

hurled horse and driver into the sea. 

Horse and driver? Suess vrachvo. Oh! Got it! 

Freddy, who is an Excel guru in civilian 

life, started teaching about computers at 

Baruch College in 1970, back when computers 

and he both were young, and he 

teaches there still. He is the grandson of the 

Reverend Jacob Schwartz, who was BJ’s cantor 

from 1914 to 1953. (BJ was a founding 

member of United Synagogue, which 

was chartered in 1913, just a year earlier.) 

He traces his interest in parashah neckwear 

to his grandfather. 


Photos by Andrew Sherman 

“My mom” – Bobbye S. Goldstein – 

“would dress me in a suit when I was a little 

boy when we’d go to shul,” he said. “It 

was a time when everyone was dressed more 

formally. I would sit up in the balcony. 

My grandfather would sit on the bimah and 

look up at me and he’d rub his tie, and I 

would rub my tie. I would be sitting in 

the middle of 1,000 people, but it was as 

if I could hear him saying ‘Hello, Freddy,” 

and I was yelling back to him ‘Hello, 

Grandpa Jack.’ I like to believe that’s how 

my tie thing started.” 

Freddy has always worn a tie, even when 

he was an undergraduate in the 1960s, when 

they were not at all in vogue. 

“I can’t remember when I first started with 

the parashah themes, but among the first 

idiosyncratic ties I had was one with watermelons,” 

he recalled. It’s from Parashat 

Beha’lotekha, where the Israelites, who for 

a change are complaining, say that they used 

to have melons back in Egypt. The word for 

melons in biblical Hebrew, avatichem, is the 

word modern Israelis use for watermelons. 

Et voila! 

Some of Freddy’s ties are literal – animals 

for Parashat Pinchas, which describes sacrifices 

in what might be too much detail. At 

least one day of Sukkot calls for a tie with 

a citron on it, and Shemini Atzeret – the 

eighth and last day of the festival – demands 

a tie with pool balls, one of them sporting 

a great big number 8. He has a rainbow 

tie for Parashat Noach, and one with 

stars for Lech Lecha, where God promises 

Abram that he will have as many descendants 

as there are stars in the sky. 

Sometimes Freddy gets ties as gifts – like 

the one showing Moshe coming down 

Mount Sinai with the tablets in his hand, 

which clearly appeals to a very niche market. 

Others he buys himself. He went to the 

M&M store in Times Square for its iconic 

M&M tie. He wears it when two parshiyot, 

Mattot and Massei, are read in the same 

week. The habit might get expensive, but 

there are ways to cope. “You can buy a regular 

tie starting at $30 and going way up, 

and you can get tourist ties for a few dollars,” 

he said. The tourist ties, needless to 

say, tend toward the garish.

AND WHAT’S THAT 

ON YOUR HEAD? 

BY BERT STRATTON 

MAYBE A COLLAGE 

artist could do something 

with my assortment 

of yarmulkes, 

which I’ve collected 

during the 23 years 

I’ve spent playing klezmer clarinet at weddings 

and bar mitzvahs in Cleveland. 

My Guatemalan yarmulkes – crocheted 

by Mayan Indians – come from hipster weddings. 

These multi-colored Mayan kippot 

are especially big hits with female rabbi 

brides. That’s a niche. 

My most heimisch lids are bubbie-knit. 

For one party, a grandma knit 150 

yarmulkes. I took about five leftovers. 

Skull cap. Those are harsh words. I have 

some blue suede yarmulkes, distributed 

by A1 Skull Cap Co. out of Brooklyn. The 

yarmulkes don’t breathe. I like a yarmulke 

that breathes, crocheted or knitted. 

Camouflage kippot. I have a few. My band 

Bert Stratton plays clarinet in the klezmer 

band Yiddishe Cup and is the author of the 

blog Klezmer Guy: Real Music & Real Estate. 

He is a member of Park Synagogue in 

Cleveland. www.klezmerguy.com. 

Occasionally his ties have a more personal 

meaning. His father,Gabriel F. Goldstein, 

was a chemist, a pioneer in plastics, 

and Freddy honors him at his yarzheit by 

wearing a tie with some of the signs of his 

discipline, chemical symbols or a balance 

scale. 

Freddy points out that as much fun as 

his hobby is, and as creative as it allows 

him to be, at its core it is serious. His life 

played a bar mitzvah where 

the theme was Zahal (that’s the 

Israel Defense Forces). The bar 

mitzvah boy’s father wore combat 

boots and a full Israeli army uniform. The 

band wore IDF T-shirts, except our trombone 

player, who is a pacifist. 

Sports-themed lids happen too. One time 

we had to wear basketball jerseys and kippot 

at a bar mitzvah party. There even was 

a cheerleader squad. The girls did gymnastics 

formations while cheering “Mazal 

tov, let’s shout hurray. It’s Jeremy and Sam’s 

bar mitzvah day.” Another cheer was “I 

say ‘oy,’ you say ‘vey,’ Jeremy and Sam are 

men today.” 

My band’s keyboard player often starts 

gigs by asking, “Is this a yarmulke gig or 

not?” He’s a gentile. I have explained that 

some are half-and-half: yarmulke for the 

ceremony, no yarmulke for the party. 

My Conservative rabbi wears a “throwaway” 

yarmulke, the black satin number 

used by funeral homes and synagogues. My 

rabbi doesn’t want to look different from his 

congregants, I guess. I don’t have the guts 

to ask him why. 

My white satin yarmulke from December 

9, 2007 is imprinted with the groom’s 

has connected him to the rhythms and 

assumptions of the Jewish world in profound 

ways. Not only was his grandfather a cantor, 

for many decades his grandmother, Lottie 

G. Schwartz, was the president of the sisterhood 

(yes, B’nai Jeshurun also had an early 

connection to Women’s League for Conservative 

Judaism). Freddy’s other grandfather, 

Herbert S. Goldstein, was the rabbi 

of the West Side Institutional Synagogue, 

name, Ananth Uggirala. His parents, from 

India, were Anjaneyulu and Manorama 

Uggirala. I had to announce them. Memorable. 

You need the right kind of yarmulke clips 

if you’re a musician because you move 

around a lot. Bobby pins are the worst. They 

take your hair out. Duck bill clips – also 

bad. The best are the little surfboard barrettes. 

If you don’t have good clips, you’re in 

trouble, particularly at outdoor gigs. 

I remember one Israeli guy marching 

with the chuppah outdoors, while smoking 

and balancing a drink. His yarmulke 

blew off. He scooped it up, put it back 

on, and took a drink. Secular Israelis, they’re 

funny. 

I wore a yarmulke for a week when I hitchhiked 

out west. This was decades ago. I 

had just seen a photo of Bob Dylan wearing 

a yarmulke at the Kotel. None of the 

drivers who picked me up commented. My 

hat was just a hat – to them. To me, it was 

a religion. CJ 

and his other grandmother, Rebecca Fischel 

Goldstein, was the president of that kehilla’s 

sisterhood. “I’ve been in shuls all my life,” 

Freddy said. So the game is a logical one 

for him. To do it properly it is necessary 

to study the parashah thoroughly. The idea 

of such study, week after week, comes naturally. 

Putting the tie together with the 

parashah is a puzzle, far more art than 



YAY FOR 

JEWISH SUMMER CAMPS! 

BY DR. SHARON 

SILVERMAN POLLOCK 

AS A PEDIATRICIAN AND 

specialist in adolescent behavior 

and emotional development, 

I want to encourage 

parents to send their kids to 

Jewish summer camps. I can’t 

rave enough about the invaluable meaning, 

depth of connection, and enduring worth 

that immersion in a Jewish summer camp 

experience offers. 

Not only is camp a great place to form lifelong 

friendships, I believe that it is an inoculation 

against teenage angst and deleterious 

risk taking and a remedy for teen disillusion. 

Twenty-first century teens need a place where 

they can learn to tolerate inactivity and distress 

safely, and to experience social life as real 

human interactions, not screen facsimiles. 

Camp is that place. 

My office is in the San Fernando Valley. 

Beyond earthquake fault lines, there is much 

more trouble rumbling through my community. 

In the past few months there have 

been three teen suicides, one heroin death, 

three alcohol poisoning deaths, and many 

lucky survivors of extreme party nights. Why? 

Some were related to grades and perfectionism, 

others to intolerance of breakups 

and emotional despair, and some were just 

experimentation gone wrong. Many of the 

victims were Jewish. While parents who read 

about Wendy Mogel’s blessings of wounded 

knees and bad grades and Amy Chua’s battle 

hymn of tiger moms who are worried 

about how their kids will get into the right 

colleges, too many teenagers are looking 

Sharon Silverman Pollock, M.D., is a pediatrician 

with a practice in psychopharmacology. 

She is a doctor at Camp Ramah in Ojai, 


to check out in some way. 

According to Monitoring the Future, a 

yearly survey of teens across the country, 6.6 

percent of high school seniors – that’s 1 

in 15 – use marijuana daily. How can we 

prevent that? Jewish summer camp. According 

to adolescent specialist Ken Ginsberg, 

M.D., social growth and connections provide 

the attributes that will help kids develop 

the resilience they need as they become 

teenagers. Those resilience attributes are 

competence through experience, confidence 

rooted in competence, fostering close connections, 

building character, feeling a significant 

contribution to a community, and 

learning both coping and control. If we can 

help kids find social success and forestall the 

more distressing benchmarks of teen risk 

taking, they will gain more experience at 

establishing their personalities in the larger 

world. 

Kids do risky things for many reasons. 

One is that somehow it makes them feel 

good despite all the harm it creates. Kids 

can quote you line and verse about the negative 

consequences of substance abuse. But 

they still use alcohol and drugs and cut themselves. 

They are depressed, and they commit 

suicide. We need to create places and 

opportunities where kids can benefit from 

positive experiences. 

If we empower young people and still 

allow them to take risks, they will grow 

strong in their concept of themselves. The 

risk taking built into summer camp includes 

leaving the safety and comfort of home and 

interacting socially with more kids. Summer 

camp experiences are designed to create 

resilient adolescents. Camp helps develop 

self-confidence and social competence by 

growing interpersonal and core mindfulness 

skills, as well as some mastery in regulating 

emotion and tolerating distress. 

I won’t say that it’s something only Jewish 

summer camp does. The Jewish community 

offers it in kehilla and community 

affiliations, USY and Kadima, and schools 

that instill values of tzedakah and community 

service. Parents should be invested 

in connecting their kids to these communities. 

Kids are taught morality and the difference 

between right and wrong in 

environments that are centered in Jewish 

values. Camp does this through educational 

programs, music, sports, drama, daily routines, 

arts, and food. Parents also should 

model these behaviors. 

At camp, everyone is understood to be 

created betzelem elohim, in God’s image. 

Still, the same painful parts of puberty are 

packed into campers’ duffle bags – girl stuff, 

boy struggles, fitting in, and body image 

struggles. At camp, though, campers learn 

to meet distress and to cope. 

Yay Jewish summer camp! That is why 

I am a camp doctor and my kids have been 

raised in camps and have become great mensches. 

That is why I train the counselors 

in adolescent behavior and how to include 

different kids, recognizing behavior as issues 

of self-expression. I love and support the 

Jewish camping movement. 

California. CJ 

All photos courtesy of the National Ramah Commission.

AM A FORMER RAMAH 

I 

camper and staff member stricken 

with grief at the sudden death of 

my lifelong friend and fellow 

Ramah camper and staff member, 

Eric Steinthal, z”l. In the wake of 

his death, I feel compelled to tell the story 

of how Camp Ramah in the Berkshires has 

transformed and shaped my life, and the lives 

of our group of friends. 

I first met Eric as a 10-year-old at Ramah 

in the Berkshires. We were in the same bunk 

– A-16 – and have been close friends ever 

since. Over the next few years, our group of 

camp friends grew to 10. We didn’t just hang 

out together in camp; sleepovers and shuttling 

between each other’s houses were the 

norm all year. Our backgrounds were varied, 

and represented all facets of Conservative 

Judaism, from kids like me who 

attended day schools and were immersed in 

Jewish learning and culture, to kids who did 

not observe kashrut or Shabbat. Yet when 

we gathered in Ramah every summer we 

were all equal. We all observed Shabbat. We 

all kept kosher. We all went to tefillot every 

day, and wore a tallit and tefillin every morning. 

We all said the motzi before we ate, and 

we benched after every meal. And Shabbat... 

Shabbat in camp is magical. The day-to-day 

Adin Yehoshua Meir, an energy engineer, lives 

in Hoboken, New Jersey, with his wife, Jordana. 

IN MEMORY 

OF A FRIEND 

BY ADIN YEHOSHUA MEIR 

Adin and Eric 

The 10 friends 

routine is replaced by something more spiritual, 

more kadosh, more holy. Even as young 

kids we understood that Shabbat is very different 

from any other day of the week, and 

it was camp that taught us that lesson. 

For us, camp did not end with the summer. 

Kids who did not eat kosher at home 

told their parents that they wanted to start 

keeping kosher, observing Shabbat, and even 

leave public school for Jewish day school, 

as Eric did. 

Our group grew tighter as the years passed, 

and many of us attended Solomon Schechter 

high schools, deepening our bonds. As we 

entered college, many of us continued to 

work in camp, but eventually we had to enter 

the real world and get jobs. But we still held 

onto our friendships, which culminated 

every year with the Ramah Berkshires Labor 

Day alumni weekend reunion. This was the 

most important weekend of the year. I 

refused to schedule my wedding over Labor 

Day because I did not want to miss it! Many 

of us met our wives and significant others 

during that weekend, and indeed it is where 

I met my wife, Jordana, almost six years ago. 

My Ramah friendships shaped and 

defined my life. It is easy to take for granted 

that nine other people will be there for 

you whenever you need them, but I can 

never take that for granted again. 

Our friend, Eric Jay Steinthal, who died 

suddenly on Saturday, March 17, was the 

center of our circle. It was Eric and his 

fiancée Jodi Siskind who hosted all of our 

poker games and get-togethers. Their apartment 

was our home base. Eric embodied 

the concept of menschlichkeit, and his quiet 

and unassuming demeanor and self-confidence 

made him extremely popular 

throughout the Ramah community. He was 

even the commissioner of the Ramah 

Alumni Basketball Association, and a member 

of the Berkshires Alumni Hanhallah 

– its board. 

After hearing the terrible news, four of 

Eric’s friends, all from Ramah, rushed to the 

hospital to try to give his family support and 

comfort. The next day, more than 15 of 

us gathered at my parents’ house. We spent 

the day and night telling funny stories, 

trying to get through the nightmare. Eric’s 

funeral was the hardest day of my life. It was 

filled with memories, love, and most of 

all, Camp Ramah. Eric’s life revolved around 

camp, and to a certain respect the camp 

alumni community revolved around Eric. 

We are all trying to make sense of a tragedy 

that no parents, no siblings, no partners, 

and no friends should ever have to endure. 

But we have comfort. We have our bonds, 

forged together at Camp Ramah. They 

can never be broken. I cannot imagine having 

to endure this terrible pain without them. 

Even in the face of overwhelming tragedy, 

we find support, love, and hope that will 

enable us to continue without our friend. 

For all of us, that is what Camp Ramah 

stands for. 

May Eric’s memory be for a blessing. CJ 


Camp 

Fosters 

Community 

BY REBECCA KAHN 

Rebecca Kahn graduated from Tufts University 

in 2003 and has an M.A. in public 

administration and nonprofit management 

from the NYU Robert F. Wagner School of 

Public Service. 


OVER THE PAST FEW 

months, it seems that every 

time I open my inbox I see an 

announcement from the 

National Ramah Commission 

about a new grant it has 

received. 

This is no accident. For more than 60 

years, the Ramah camps have been leaders 

in Jewish camping. They have pushed 

the field to bring the best in Jewish education 

into camp, in both professional development 

and programming. The eight 

Ramah camps have set the standard for 

ongoing leadership development of its staff 

and campers. This year, the Ramah camps 

have been awarded two important grants. 

One of them is a $1.8 million grant from 

the Avi Chai Foundation and the Maimonides 

Foundation that will fund an 

alumni program called Reshet Ramah. 

Another grant from Avi Chai, this time of 

$144,000, is to fund training opportunities 

for camp specialists at Ramah camps as well 

as the camps run by the Union for Reform 

Judaism.

I went to Camp Ramah in the Berkshires 

for nine summers, and I credit my experience 

as a camper, staff member, and executive 

leader on the alumni association board 

to my being where I am today, both personally 

and professionally. My commitment 

and involvement in Jewish life and the Conservative 

movement is 

a direct byproduct of 

Ramah, Solomon 

Schechter day school, 

and my family. I have 

spent the past eight 

years as a Jewish professional, 

working to 

engage children and young adults in Jewish 

life through Israel programs and Jewish summer 

camp. 

This March my extended camp family, 

and I had to grapple with the sudden death 

of our friend, Eric Steinthal. I looked around 

the room at his funeral and was struck by 

the power of my Ramah community – we 

grieved together, celebrated his life together, 

and I hope provided some comfort to his 

family, his fiancée, and his inner circle of 

Ramah friends. It was strange and comforting 

to be surrounded by this amazing 

extended camp family grieving and crying 

instead of laughing and dancing, which 

we do each year at Camp Ramah’s Labor 

Day Alumni Weekend. 

According to the National Ramah Commission, 

fewer than 10 percent of eligible 

Conservative movement-affiliated children 

go to a Ramah camp. If camp creates community, 

then we all should rise to the challenge 

of helping create more community for 

more of our children. We know that when 

children go to camps whose values and philosophy 

are deeply rooted in Jewish life, the 

odds that those children will become adults 

who participate in the Jewish world and 

identify with it are greatly increased. That 

is why we need to grow the number of 

children enrolling in this transformative 

experience. 

Ramah is an extraordinary place. It nurtures 

leaders for the Conservative movement. 

We also know that not every family can 

imagine or will want its children to grow up 

to become rabbis, teachers, or Jewish com- 

We all should rise to the 

challenge of helping create 

more community for more 

of our children. 

munal professionals. I think Ramah is the 

best but it is not for everyone. It might sound 

heretical, but not all Conservative Jews want 

their children praying daily, engaging in 

Jewish text-based study, or being immersed 

in a religious setting during summer vacation. 

And whether we agree or disagree, isn’t 

it our collective responsibility 

to make sure that 

these families find an 

appropriate Jewish community 

for their children 

over the summer? 

As a community we 

have to grow Ramah 

participation – but we also can’t give up 

on the other children of our movement. 

Is it possible to develop summer experiences 

that meet Conservative Jews where 

they are in their observance, not where we 

think they ought to be? A place where they 

can explore their Judaism? Is there room for 

a different brand of Conservative camps that 

would reach more of our constituents? There 

are plenty of excellent Jewish mission-driven 

camps that meet the standards of the Conservative 

movement’s membership; do we 

have an obligation to promote these camps 

to our families alongside Ramah to make 

sure that every child has a rich Jewish summer 

experience? 

By neglecting to engage in a larger conversation 

about Jewish overnight camps and 

other Jewish summer opportunities, are we 

simply giving up on the majority of families 

who send their children to secular 

overnight camps (which generally tend to 

attract lots of Jewish kids) and missing an 

important opportunity to engage these families 

in a meaningful way? To ensure the 

future of this vitally important movement, 

to which I am proud to belong, we need 

more than 10 percent of our children going 

to Jewish camps each summer, whether those 

camps are Ramah, another Conservative 

movement camp, or other Jewish missiondriven 

camps. 

We need more opportunities to engage 

all Jewish children in Jewish camping. Every 

family should have a strong community 

so they too can celebrate joy and share loss 

together. Jewish summer camp is a great way 

to develop our community. 

CJ 


RAMAH FOSTERS COMMUNITY 

BY RABBI MITCHELL COHEN 

RREBECCA KAHN’S 

article on the need for all 

of us to encourage more 

children of Conservativeaffiliated 

families to attend 

Camp Ramah and other 

Jewish summer camps is to be applauded. 

Indeed, Rebecca echoes the sentiments of 

so many who praise our growth in recent 

decades and advocate for even more aggressive 

expansion. 

We are proud of the last 20 years, when, 

in the face of declining demographics in 

the Conservative movement, Ramah has 

attracted and retained 30 percent more 

campers, so that we now host more than 

Rabbi Mitchell Cohen is director of the 

National Ramah Commission of the Jewish 

Theological Seminary. 


9,000 children, teens, and young adults 

each summer. We have built new overnight 

camps (Ramah Darom in Georgia in 1997 

and Ramah Outdoor Adventure in Colorado 

in 2010), opened new day camps (in 

Philadelphia and Chicago), and added 

capacity to our existing camps to make room 

for more children who come from a wide 

variety of educational and religious backgrounds. 

What makes us most proud, however, 

is that we have accomplished all this without 

compromising our commitment to the 

highest standards of intensive Jewish experiential 

education. This, I believe, is the 

source of the cohesive lifelong friendships 

and Jewish commitment that thousands 

of alumni cite as the legacy of Ramah, credited 

by so many as the source of the most 

positive and joyful Jewish experiences of 

their lives. 

Rabbi Julie Schonfeld, executive vice president 

of the Rabbinical Assembly, recently 

wrote: “As Conservative leaders, it is hard 

to remember how to dream because our Jewish 

religious vision symbolizes something 

that the community knows is necessary but 

fears is unachievable. Miraculously, advocates 

and skeptics agree about Ramah. Let’s 

take yes for an answer. If we get behind 

an effort to dramatically grow the Ramah 

system, we will be surprised by who comes 

along with us.” 

So my response is yes! Let’s all work 

together to radically increase the number of 

Conservative families attending Ramah and 

other camps that have strong programs of 

Jewish identity-building. And yes, let us 

continue to develop new and cutting-edge 

methods of teaching Jewish content, with 

the understanding that our families represent 

the broadest spectrum of Jewish prac-

tice and various levels of education. 

But we can accomplish all this without 

sacrificing Jewish content. Ramah has shown 

that with the proper guidance from young 

role models, constant innovation, and 

tremendous care and sensitivity, we can 

indeed attract children from all levels of family 

observance and bring them, on their own 

path, to greater commitment to Judaism. 

The Conservative movement does not 

need any more attempts to attract more 

adherents by lowering expectations. Ramah 

is one of the movement’s success stories 

because we stand for something. We must 

be open to change, and our camps are centers 

of experimentation and innovation. The 

real challenge is to continue to grow and 

innovate, and to bring the Ramah experience 

to a wider percentage of North American 

Jewish families. Our professional and 

lay leaders strive to accomplish this every 

day. But we cannot do this alone. We call 

upon all our Conservative partners to heed 

Rebecca’s call for growth, but within a 

Ramah system that has proven itself over 65 

years, is willing to answer the call for modernization 

and innovation, has attracted the 

support of the top foundations of Jewish 

life, and has maintained, not compromised, 

Jewish standards. 

In his keynote speech at the 60th anniversary 

celebration of the Ramah camping 

movement in 2007, JTS Chancellor Arnold 

Eisen said: “We need more Ramah, more 

camps, more campers, more leaders, more 

mitzvot, and more prayer that’s enlivened 

by the wholeness of self that comes about 

only in a camp setting.... I want to have more 

and more human beings at Ramah who 

understand the gift that they have been 

given, the ability to develop answers for 

themselves to the eternal questions of why 

the Jews, why Judaism, how to live Torah, 

how to partner with God. And to do all 

of this inside of the Jewish time and space, 

of wholeness and of joy that are not easily 

available elsewhere.” 

Ramah looks forward to decades of 

growth, to bringing into our camps more 

families with an even wider spectrum of 

practice, and to our alumni continuing to 

strengthen our synagogues and schools, 

to help build a stronger Conservative movement 

and a brighter Jewish future. CJ 


MAKING IT MATTER 

BY RICHARD S. MOLINE 


IN FEBRUARY I HAD THE 

privilege of teaching at the Koach 

Kallah, the annual gathering of college 

students sponsored by United 

Synagogue’s college outreach department, 

under the superb direction 

of Rabbi Elyse Winick. The weekend, which 

included tremendously spirited singing and 

davening, serious study, and wonderful social 

activities, brought together some 150 students 

from more than 55 colleges and universities 

across North America. The kallah was held at 

Boston University and made possible primarily 

by the generous support of Women’s League 

for Conservative Judaism. 

That’s the commercial (and a good one it 

is). Now to the tachlis – the real content. 

It’s no secret that our movement is under 

siege, whether it’s from the press, some of 

our affiliates, or any number of other outside 

sources. Yet if you were to have walked 

into the room during any part of the weekend, 

you would wonder what the problem 

might be, or even if there was one. 

Granted, 150 college students is hardly a 

major sample, but the fervor and commitment 

they show for Conservative Judaism 

are nothing short of inspirational. So if things 

are so good, why are they so bad? 

I taught a session Friday night called 

“What Makes Us Conservative Jews and 

Does It Really Matter?” We talked about 

ideology, relevance, and the facts on the 

ground. The session was packed, and while 

I hope it was instructive for the students, 

I know it was incredibly valuable to me. 

We do a great job providing our young 

people with topnotch experiential Jewish 

education, whether in Kadima or USY, 

Camp Ramah, or other Jewish youth groups 

or camps. Many of our teens carry these 

experiences with them to the college campus, 

primarily at Hillel but also through 

informal gatherings with friends. Deeply 

moved by what they’ve experienced, they 

Richard S. Moline is United Synagogue’s chief 

outreach officer.

are primed to lead full Jewish lives. 

And then they come home. 

In fairness, it is difficult to replicate intense 

peer experiences outside camp, a youth 

group, or a college campus. On the other 

hand, when you have been part of a strong 

Shabbat community and suddenly find 

yourself in a place where no such community 

exists, especially on a peer level, it is 

extraordinarily frustrating. It can send a 

wrong message, which no one means to send. 

It can tell young people that the Shabbat 

that they have valued, the Shabbat experiences 

they have treasured throughout their 

time in USY, Ramah or on campus – forget 

it. The meaning they’ve been encouraged to 

give Shabbat – let it go. You’re out in the real 

world, we tell them, and the real world does 

not have time for Shabbat. 

The result of this mixed message often 

is that people who have come to value a 

Shabbat community do find one, no matter 

what its ideology. The power and support 

of community often trump belief and 

practice (and such communities are not limited 

to right, center, or left). 

I know people in their 20s who grew up 

in the Conservative movement but now 

go to modern Orthodox synagogues. I 

recently asked one of them why. Her answer 

was not a surprise. “It’s simple,” she said. 

“I went to the local Conservative synagogue 

twice. Both times, there were a lot of people 

in the sanctuary. Nobody took the time 

to talk to me and I left as I came – anonymously. 

The first time I went to the local 

Orthodox synagogue, I had an invitation to 

Shabbat lunch before we even got to Musaf.” 

Quite a few of the students at the Koach 

kallah spoke about the disconnect between 

clergy and laity, between ideology and practice. 

“In my experience,” one student told 

me, “the rabbi is the only person who seems 

to care about what we stand for. Everybody 

else picks and chooses.” 

What struck me most about these comments 

is that so many of these students 

feel a desperate need for validation. They 

want to be part of the movement, and I 

am convinced they are not alone. They are 

seeking a traditional egalitarian Judaism, 

where people are fully engaged in all aspects 

of Jewish life. Many find it in the scores 

of independent minyanim or chavurot that 

have emerged in recent years. Others create 

their own opportunities in neighborhoods 

across North America. Some of these enterprises 

are quite informal; they have no clergy 

and meet perhaps once a month on a Friday 

night. Others meet every Shabbat morning 

and include study and social service 

projects during the week. 

Some people look at these enterprises 

as threats. One colleague has suggested that 

the proliferation of independent groups 

could mean the decline of the synagogue. 

Rather than view these creative and vibrant 

groups negatively, I would suggest we 

embrace them. Even though many of them 

don’t want to be labeled in this way, they 

represent one of the greatest successes of the 

Conservative movement in modern times. 

Our support does not mean that we diminish 

our existing kehillot; rather, it is the natural 

extension of Solomon Schechter’s notion 

of klal Yisrael, the community of Israel. 

Of course, we have to work on making 

our own communities more welcoming 

(many do a wonderful job already), but we 

also must be realistic. Many kehillot simply 

don’t have the critical mass (do we say 

critical minyan?) to nurture and sustain a 

peer community for people in their 20s. But 

when we encourage the kehillot that do incubate 

young communities, we are laying the 

groundwork for revitalization, creativity, and 

spiritual growth. In doing so, we must understand 

that many of these groups will not want 

to carry a denominational label of any type. 

That, too, can be viewed as an opportunity; 

to see it as a threat is myopic at best. 

The role and definition of the synagogue 

are changing. We must identify and support 

the communities of caring, committed, and 

passionate young Jews who will redefine our 

purpose and develop a traditional egalitarian 

Judaism that will bring meaning to 

their lives and the lives of the generations 

that will follow. 

The college students who gathered in 

Boston for the Koach kallah, thanks to 

Women’s League, sent us a strong message. 

They are committed to our future, but they 

are not sure whether we are committed to 

them. We have to listen to them carefully 

or we will be left behind in the dust. CJ 


A Ruach 

Family Service 

BY DR. PAMELA KIRSCHNER WEINFELD 

IN MAY 2010, RABBI MICHELLE 

Robinson held a meeting at Temple 

Emanuel in Newton, Massachusetts, 

to find out why so few 

school-aged children showed up at 

Shabbat morning youth services. 

Although there was a thriving pre-school service, 

there never seemed to be more than a 

handful of school-aged kids at the service for 

them. Was the town’s amazing Saturday morning 

soccer program an insurmountable obstacle 

to a successful youth service? 

The outcome of that meeting – a monthly 

lay-led family service – rejuvenated the youth 

services, brought the parents closer together, 

and strengthened their connection to Temple 

Emanuel. We even added to the synagogue’s 

membership roster! We hope our story 

will inspire you to imagine what might be 

possible at your own synagogue. 

The idea for the Ruach Family Service 

took shape at that May meeting. A few parents, 

beginning with the understanding that 

working parents are away from their kids all 

week, said that they would like a family service 

so they could be together on Shabbat 

morning. Advocates of the family service 

described their vision – the room would 

have to be full. People had to know they 

would see their friends there. The service 

should be real. There would have to be a 

true a sense of kavannah – intention. It 

Dr. Pamela Kirschner Weinfeld, a dermatologist, 

lives in Newton, Massachusetts, with 

her husband, Dr. Mark Weinfeld, and their 

children, second- and third-generation members 

of Temple Emanuel. You can reach her 

at pweinfeld@gmail.com. 


should be monthly and the families should 

participate. It would have to be special. If it 

were, families would make an effort to 

attend. 

I had shown up at the meeting desperate 

for a service that my 8-year-old son could 

relate to. He did not like singing with the 

guitar in the youth service. The excitement 

in the room about a family service was 

palpable, and we knew we had to build on 

the momentum. I volunteered to lead the 

first family service and insisted that we have 

it right away – in July! Because there were 

no other kids’ services offered in the summer, 

it seemed simple enough to try it. 

Given the emphasis placed on the importance 

of a full room, my main focus was 

to assign as many parts leading prayers as 

possible, so that families would commit 

to showing up. To make leading prayers 

exciting, we made illustrated laminated cards 

for each prayer – we call 

them honor cards. We 

added leadership cards, 

which the kids fill with 

star stickers for each 

prayer they lead. To 

entice the kids to attend, 

we advertised heavily, 

focusing on the makeyour-own 

ice cream sundaes with fun toppings 

that we’d have at the kiddush after the 

service. I also planned a question and answer 

session about the parashah, with candy for 

anyone who tried to answer a question. 

We sent out a lot of emails and sent up a 

lot of prayers. 

We picked a small classroom because our 

expectations were low, but 30 people came 

and the room overflowed. The kids did a 

great job leading the prayers (with a little 

assistance) and they liked the questions (and 

the candy!). David Goldstone, one of the 

original proponents of the service, offered 

an important suggestion: “You need something 

for the parents. You need a d’var 

Torah,” and he agreed to give it himself each 

month. He also agreed to co-chair the family 

service and helped recruit more families 

for the next one. David mailed me 

highlighted copies of sections from Rabbi 

Elie Kaunfer’s book, Empowered Judaism, 

stressing constant innovation as key to a successful 

community endeavor. 

Because the classroom had been so full 

for that first service, we moved our next service 

to a social hall. “Shock and awe” is a perfect 

description of how we 

felt when 80 people showed 

up – in mid August! That’s 

when we knew the July service 

really had been a hit. 

David gave an engaging 

parashah summary and 

d’var Torah, and then I led 

a lively Q & A session and 

gave out Twizzlers. Both parents and kids 

loved it. During the prayer portion of the 

service, I handed out the honor cards while 

helping the kids lead the service, but soon 

we learned that leading and organizing the 

service at the same time was just too hectic. 

We needed more help. 

Fortunately, more parents volunteered. 

Increasing parental involvement turned out 

to be key to our continued success. Par-

ents who became 

more involved in 

organizing the service 

became committed 

to attending, 

growing the service 

while also preventing 

burn-out on the 

part of the original 

organizers. The many roles allowed people 

with various skills to participate in different 

ways. 

David continued to give his Torah summaries 

and divrai Torah each month, and 

I kept my role as chazzanit and leader of the 

Q & A. Anthony Lehv sent out humorous 

(and serious) email announcements. 

Jenny McKee-Heinstein and Nicole Gann 

recruited kids to lead the kids’ parts. Julie 

Chivo premade name tags from lists of members 

and their school-aged children and 

greeted all who attended with a warm smile, 

so that everyone felt welcome. Michael 

Robinson read Torah so we could add a short 

Torah reading. Ana Volpi ushered the service 

– that is, she lined the kids up to minimize 

the time we spent waiting for each 

child to lead the next prayer. Marc Stober 

coordinated Torah readers, and Cheryl Stober 

created a Facebook page. Once we had 

more volunteers, we avoided duplication of 

efforts using a shared Google document, so 

that the organizers could enter each assigned 

part and everyone else could see it. 

We innovated constantly. We chose a new 

room with a carpeted floor to limit the 

distracting noise of the wooden floor in the 

social hall. In addition to nametags, we 

started having each family introduce itself 

before Adon Olam to make sure that the 

service stayed warm and inviting. The synagogue 

staff and leadership were extremely 

supportive, not only of the service but also 

of the changes and new ideas. 

The biggest stumbling block proved to 

be finding the right siddur. It was important 

to us to have a genuine service, with 

prayers in Hebrew and no musical instruments, 

which we felt made kids’ services too 

concert-like. When two parents separately 

confessed that they were struggling with the 

prayers, we realized that we needed a simpler 

siddur with a full transliteration. Rabbi 

Robinson suggested that we make our own. 

Marc Stober volunteered to be editor-inchief. 

To create artwork, we organized an 

art brunch on a Sunday morning at the synagogue. 

We provided paper, markers, and 

stencils. The parents ate bagels and chatted 

while the kids made magic. 

The kids love seeing their own artwork 

in the siddur! In addition to making sure 

that there was a full transliteration and translation 

for every spoken prayer, Marc added 

such features as bold type for the parts the 

congregation sings together. Thanks to our 

siddur, the parents who needed transliter- 

ations have become regular attendees, and 

we have attracted many families with different 

levels of knowledge. In fact, one 

parent later confided to me that the reason 

she feels so comfortable with our all- 

Hebrew service is that because the kids are 

learning, she is not embarrassed that she 

is learning, too. 

We are amazed to see how much everyone 

has learned. It truly has been incredible 

to see the kids, even the shy ones, coming 

forward to lead a prayer, with the whole 

room rooting for them, and to see their faces 



TRANSFORMING TEFILLAH 

BY BONNIE RIVA RAS 

ONE SIZE DOESN’T 

always fit all, particularly 

when you are talking 

about people’s 

spiritual needs. The traditional 

Conservative 

prayer service doesn’t always work for everyone. 

Kol Emeth in Palo Alto, California, is a 

kehilla that is looking for creative ways to 

experience tefillah in a new way. “We are 

experimenting with multiple minyanim,” 

Rabbi David Booth, one of the three rabbis 

at Kol Emeth, said. Choices for its Saturday 

morning program, which is called Kol Shabbat, 

include a study group using the Mitzvah 

Initiative curriculum from the Jewish 

Theological Seminary, a coffee and schmoozing 

room for parents of children in a Shabbat 

school program, and a new Hebrew class 

that is a gateway into the service. The programs 

are of varying lengths; when they 

are over participants often go into the sanctuary 

and join the service there. A community 

Shabbat lunch follows services every 

week. 

When Kol Shabbat is in session, it generally 

draws about 200 adults and 100 children 

from its 613 family members. “Shabbat 

attendance has gone up,” Booth said. “We 

are appealing to parents who want to be 

in the synagogue but may not want to come 

into the main sanctuary. We want families 

to be here together for a whole Shabbat 

experience.” 

Around 2005, Shabbat synagogue attendance 

was declining at Temple Emunah, 

a 535-member kehilla in Lexington, Massachusetts, 

so a committee was formed to 

grapple with ways to turn it around. The 


next year, the committee decided to adopt 

the Synaplex model for Shabbat because 

“people experience Shabbat and tefillah in 

different ways,” Rabbi David Lerner said. 

Lerner is the head rabbi of Temple Emunah. 

Synaplex, which ran from 2003 to 2010, 

was part of STAR (Synagogues, Transformation 

and Renewal). “The model allowed 

congregations to rethink the way they did 

Shabbat and to find multiple entry ways 

into the synagogue,” its founder, Rabbi 

Hayim Herring, said. “The model gave congregations 

a way to invite people into the 

synagogue to be part of a Shabbat community.” 

Participating kehillot made their own 

choices and found the things that worked 

best for them. About 90 Conservative 

kehillot took part in Synaplex officially but 

many more have adopted a similar style 

of multiple minyanim. The program is over 

but the number of kehillot using its framework 

is growing. 

Temple Emunah began a more-or-less 

monthly program called Choose Your Own 

Shabbat Adventure, which begins with 

breakfast and then offers several options, 

including meditation, yoga, or a traditional 

Pesukei D’Zimra. It began in 2006 and still 

is going strong today. The Torah service 

selections include a traditional Torah reading, 

text study, and bibliodrama. There 

are up to 20 different options but the congregation 

always ends up together as one 

community. Shabbat morning attendance 

went up from 100 people to around 450 on 

those special Shabbatot. 

Friday evenings are just as innovative. “We 

wanted to bring in people who celebrate 

Shabbat in different ways and combine it 

with something social,” Lerner said. This 

includes three summer Friday evenings, 

when the proceedings begin with a barbeque, 

outdoor Kabbalat Shabbat with musical 

instruments, candle lighting, Maariv (held 

outdoors whenever possible), and a community 

Shabbat dinner, ending with traditional 

singing. Scattered throughout the 

year there are also creative Minchah, Maariv, 

and Havdalah services that end with social 

events. 

Some kehillot hold multiple minyanim 

every week. Shirat HaYam of the North 

Shore in Swampscott, Massachusetts, is one 

of them. It offers roughly 10 different 

options for adults on Shabbat morning, 

beginning with breakfast and including alternative 

tefillot with Rabbi Baruch HaLevi in 

the chapel and a traditional Shacharit led 

by the cantors in the sanctuary. There is also 

Limmud School (sort of a hybrid 

Synaplex/Hebrew school) for children on 

Shabbat mornings. And there is a Shabbat 

café where people can nosh and 

schmooze. The minyanim join in the sanctuary 

for a healing service and a d’var Torah, 

text study, or bibliodrama, and the children 

come into the sanctuary for a spirited and 

musical ruach rally. Then there is Shabbat 

kiddush lunch for the community. “My 

philosophy is that there is no one way to 

speak to God,” HaLevi said. He estimates 

that around 250 to 300 people attend. This 

is up from around 40 on a pre-Synaplex 

Shabbat. 

Smaller kehillot can create innovative worship 

experiences too. “We have different 

themes during the year to provide different 

types of tefillah experiences in the main

service on either Friday or Saturday,” Rabbi 

Daniel Schweber said. He is rabbi of Shaare 

Tikvah, a 175-family kehillah in Scarsdale, 

New York. “The congregation offers 

early morning yoga or a slower, more musical 

Pesukei D’Zimra, aptly called Stop and 

Smell the Psalms,” he said. On some Shabbat 

mornings the service will focus on Torah, 

and bibliodrama is added after the main 

service. Creative Shabbat services are held 

once a month. 

A few times a year, Shaare Tikvah holds 

a themed Friday evening service that includes 

a dinner. During daylight savings time, when 

Shabbat starts late, the kehilla holds a musical 

service with instruments. Service attendance 

goes up on the Fridays when there 

is a special service and dinner. 

Themed services do not have to be limited 

to Shabbat. The leaders of daily 

minyanim also use innovative planning to 

attract more participants. “Temple Emunah 

is the only shul in the area that still holds 

a daily minyan, and we are always looking 

Ruach Family Service 


(and their parents’ faces) afterward, shining 

with delight. The kids have all become more 

confident with experience, and we now have 

several who can belt out multiple prayers. 

To celebrate these accomplishments and 

the service’s first anniversary, we gave out 

personalized trophies with Jewish stars to 

all the kids. Now they have a concrete symbol 

that their effort at services is just as 

important as their effort on the soccer field. 

They also have enduring memories of fun, 

lively, beautiful Shabbat mornings spent 

at synagogue with family and friends. 

After a few months working together, my 

husband and I invited the Goldstones over 

for Shabbat dinner. We realized that evening 

that creating our service also was about building 

community. We started extending more 

invitations, and the friendships that are 

developing have strengthened everyone’s 

ties to each other, to our service, and to Temple 

Emanuel. 

The year after the founding of our service, 

the synagogue launched a monthly sixth- 

for new ideas to strengthen them,” Lerner 

said. Last year, two minyan leaders, past president 

Fred Ezekiel and Cathy McDonald, 

came up with a friends and peers model. 

In that model, groups of people who work 

together, are alumni of the same university, 

or share interests or background in some 

other way, are invited to the 

Minchah/Maariv minyan, which also 

includes a food and schmooze element. 

Themed minyanim are held on evenings 

when it can be difficult to gather a quorum. 

Themes have included MIT alumni, CUNY 

alumni, the men’s club softball team, cycling 

enthusiasts, and Israel advocates. The list 

keeps growing. 

Each month, the synagogue bulletin carries 

an article about the minyan. People who 

are 10 for 10 – who attend ten minyanim 

– are recognized in the bulletin. “The minyan 

isn’t full but the themed minyans have 

helped,” Lerner said. “This model can be 

used by other communities to build and 

strengthen minyanim.” CJ 

grade-led Discovery Service inspired by it. 

This new service is attracting 20 or 30 kids 

each month, an attendance level that would 

have been unthinkable two years ago. In 

addition, several non-affiliated families who 

heard about our service from friends and 

started attending have gone on to join our 

synagogue. 

Founding the Temple Emanuel Ruach 

Family Service has enriched our lives as Jews, 

as families, and as a community and congregation. 

Now it’s your turn! Use our story 

as your blueprint. It’s an endeavor worth the 

effort. All you need is a minimum of three 

or four committed families, someone who 

can help lead the service, and someone who 

can talk about the Torah parashah. If you 

have someone who can chant a brief Torah 

excerpt, that’s a plus. Don’t forget the Twizzlers 

and ice cream, of course. Go ahead and 

try it.You are welcome to adapt our prayer 

book! 

You can read more about ruach Shabbat 

family services and see the siddur at 

Temple Emanuel’s website. Go to temple 

emanuel.com/ruach-shabbat-family-services. 

CJ 


HALACHAH IN THE MODERN WORLD 

SKYPING THE MINYAN 

BY RABBI DAVID LERNER 

PEOPLE WERE GIVING 

me strange looks.00000000 

I guess it was to be expected 

– I had come into the minyan 

and opened up my laptop, 

which now was making 

strange noises. People were curious about why 

the rabbi would be disturbing the sanctity of 

the daily minyan by playing with his email. 

At the end of services, the mourners 

observing yahrzeit got up to recite the 

Mourner’s Kaddish. At that point I turned 

to the laptop and looked in, and a woman 

on the screen stood up to recite the Kaddish 

with them. 

I explained to the minyannaires that we 

had a new participant in the Temple Emunah 

daily minyan. Her name is Maxine Marcus, 

though everyone calls her Max. She lives 

in Amsterdam and works in the Hague, 

where she serves as a war crimes prosecutor 

at the International Criminal Tribunal 

for the former Yugoslavia. 

The story behind the story: My wife, 

Sharon Levin, and Max have been close 

friends since they participated in USY’s 

Poland Seminar/Israel Pilgrimage 25 years 

ago. Theirs was among the first USY groups 

to visit Poland to see the instruments of 

the Nazi death camps. Both Max and Sharon 

were profoundly moved and transformed 

by that experience. 

Max’s parents were survivors of the Holo- 


caust. Her mother was deported from the 

Hague in 1942 at age 12 and was imprisoned 

in more than 10 concentration camps. 

She spent her 14th birthday in Auschwitz 

and endured unspeakable horrors, tortured 

by the infamous Dr. Josef Mengele. Growing 

up in the 1970s and ’80s, Max heard 

these stories and internalized a profound 

commitment to Judaism and a deep sense 

of justice. 

During her college years, Max spent her 

summers volunteering at a Bosnian Muslim 

refugee camp helping the victims of war 

crimes, often Muslim women. My wife also 

was a volunteer during the Yugoslavian war 

in the early 1990s. After law school, Max 

worked for human rights in Africa and eventually 

wound up in the Hague. 

In recent years, Max had been dealing 

with her parents’ aging and the cancer that 

Rabbi David Lerner is the spiritual leader 

of Temple Emunah in Lexington, Massachusetts. 

He is president of the New England 

Rabbinical Assembly and co-chairs the 

RA’s Commission on Keruv, Conversion and 

Jewish Peoplehood. Max Marcus and her mother, Stella Marcus, z’l. 

eventually took 

her mother’s 

life. She discovered 

that it 

is not easy to 

say Kaddish in 

Amsterdam. She and I realized that she could 

participate in our daily minyan through the 

free internet video calling service known 

as Skype. 

But would it be kosher? Interestingly 

enough, 10 years ago Rabbi Avram Reisner 

wrote a teshuvah, a religious responsum 

for the Committee on Jewish Law and Standards 

of the Rabbinical Assembly, explaining 

that should such technology arise (Skype 

had not yet been created), it would be permissible 

for someone to join in a minyan, 

although not to count in the quorum of 10, 

and to recite the Kaddish. While it also

would be allowed through the phone, it 

is much better to have a real-time audiovisual 

link. 

After examining dozens of sources and 

precedents from thousands of years of Jewish 

history, Rabbi Reisner concluded that 

a minyan may not be constituted over the 

Internet, an audio- or video-conference, 

or any other medium of long distance communication. 

Only physical proximity, that 

is being in the same room with the shaliah 

tzibbur (the prayer leader), allows a quorum 

to be constituted. 

Once a quorum has been duly constituted, 

however, anyone hearing the prayers 

in that minyan may respond and fulfill his 

or her obligations, even over long-distance 

communications of any sort. A real-time 

audio connection is required. Two-way connections 

to the whole minyan are preferable, 

though connection to the shaliach 

tzibbur alone or a one-way connection linking 

the minyan to the mourner is sufficient. 

Email and chat rooms or other typewritten 

connections do not suffice. Video connections 

are not necessary, but video without 

audio also would not suffice. 

Rabbi Reisner defines a hierarchy of preference. 

It is best to attend a minyan for the 

full social and communal effect. A real-time 

two-way audio-video connection, where the 

mourner is able to converse with the members 

of the minyan and see and be seen by 

them, is less desirable. Only in exigent circumstances 

should you fulfill your obligation 

by attaching yourself to a minyan 

through a one-way audio medium, which 

essentially is just overhearing the service. 

As long as someone who is physically 

present in the minyan recites the Mourner’s 

Kaddish, a participant at another location 

may recite it as well; this is not considered 

a superfluous blessing. 

As you can see, Skyping into the minyan 

is permissible according to Rabbi 

Reisner’s teshuvah. It has been a powerful 

experience, as members of the minyan got 

to know Max, schmoozing with her for a 

minute or two over Skype after minyan. This 

has been a great blessing. It is a reminder 

that our minyan is not just a gift to each participant 

– allowing us to experience the 

power of God, prayer, and community – 

but it also reaches out to include all who 

participate, even those on the other side 

of the Atlantic Ocean. 

Last summer, Max visited Temple Emunah 

in person. For the first time, our members, 

who had never been in the same room 

with her but felt close to her through her 

Skyped recitation of the Mourner’s Kaddish, 

were able to meet Max. 

Today, we occasionally Skype in members 

who are ill as well as members of other 

shuls who have heard of our Skype minyan. 

It is our hope that many shuls will add this 

option to their daily minyans. 

Kol Yisrael areivin zeh ba’zeh – all Israel 

is responsible for one another – whether 

in person or through the internet. 

You can see the full text of Wired to the 

Kadosh Barukh Hu: Minyan via Internet, 

at rabbinicalassembly.org/teshuvot/docs/ 

19912000/reisner_internetminyan.pdf See 

also the RA Spotlight http://www.rabbinicalassembly.org/story/skyping-minyan?tp= 

323. CJ 


W Bat 

ON THE EVENING OF 

Friday, June 5, 1959, 13-yearold 

Roberta Hirshfield celebrated 

her bat mitzvah at the 

Astoria Center of Israel in 

Queens, New York. 

A bat mitzvah still was a relatively rare 

occurrence. Roberta, however, had attended 

Hebrew school and weekly Shabbat services 

for many years, so it seemed a logical progression. 

For her bat mitzvah, she and another 

girl in her Hebrew school class shared the 

berakhot (blessings) for the haftarah and then 

the haftarah itself. Roberta’s partner led 

Aleinu and Roberta led Yigdal. 

The families then went on to the social 

hall, where the guests were treated to a catered 

oneg Shabbat. The next morning, of course, 

the members of the Astoria Center of Israel 

heard a repeat of the haftarah that Roberta 

chanted the night before – but this second 

reading was the one that counted as the synagogue’s 

official haftarah recitation. 

Nevertheless young Roberta was thrilled 

with this milestone. It did not occur to 

her at the time to compare her own accomplishment 

to that of her brother Stuart, who 

was 4 1/2 years older. Stuart’s bar mitzvah 

was marked by his aliyah to the Torah on 

Shabbat morning and celebrated with a 

splendid kiddush, and again that night with 

an even more opulent party, complete with 

a live band and a multicourse sit-down meal. 

Also unlike Stuart’s religious rite of passage, 

there was no hefty photo album, just 

a few snapshots of a proud young girl in a 

Lisa Kogen is education director of Women’s 

League for Conservative Judaism. 


omenSpeak 

Mitzvah: Take Two 

BY LISA KOGEN 

fancy white dress. But most significant of all, 

Roberta never again was called upon by 

the Astoria Center of Israel to demonstrate 

those skills that she so ardently had acquired 

over more than 8 years of Hebrew school. 

It was now 50 years later. Roberta Hirshfield 

Schreiber – wife, mother, and grandmother 

– had watched as several generations 

of women participated in the no longer 

exceptional bat mitzvah ceremony when 

girls are called to the Torah by their Hebrew 

names on Shabbat morning, wearing their 

own tallitot. They recite the blessings, read 

from the Torah, and lead services, full and 

equal participants in the congregation’s 

ritual life. It was time, Roberta decided, that 

she too should become an active participant 

rather than a mere spectator. 

After consultation with Rabbi Gary Parras 

of Temple Israel in Orlando, Florida, 

where she has lived for many years, Roberta 

again honed her Hebrew reading skills, this 

time to include the Torah trope. On a Shabbat 

morning in June, close to her original 

bat mitzvah date, Roberta Schreiber was 

called to the Torah by her Hebrew name, 

Raza Tova bat Zev veChannah. She recited 

the blessing, read from the Torah, and later 

made kiddush with the kiddush cup that 

was presented to her at her first bat mitzvah. 

This time Roberta wore a tallit, beautifully 

decorated with images of the 

matriarchs. The following day she invited 

her guests to a party, complete with a live 

band and a multicourse sit-down meal. 

But more significantly, Roberta subsequently 

became a regular in the rotation of 

the Yad Squad at Temple Israel, the synagogue’s 

cadre of lay Torah and haftarah readers. 

In her dvar Torah Roberta spoke about

Samson’s mother, the subject of her haftarah, 

who had no identity of her own 

beyond being Manoach’s wife and her son’s 

mother. Roberta spoke about her own journey 

from her first to her second bat mitzvah 

as a spiritual quest, and as a reflection 

of women’s progress. 

Roberta’s two bat mitzvah celebrations 

are more than just a human interest story. 

Rather, they give a face to the trajectory 

of modern Jewish feminism over the past 

50 years. 

This year, 2012, the bat mitzvah celebration 

is the topic of much discussion. 

This March marked the 90th anniversary 

of Judith Kaplan’s bat mitzvah, the first one 

celebrated in the United States. It was a 

momentous event – extraordinary really – 

and no doubt partially attributable to the 

fact that Judith was the musically gifted 

and Hebraically knowledgeable daughter 

of Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of Reconstructionist 

Judaism. But despite Kaplan’s 

progressive vision, which profoundly influenced 

Conservative Judaism, bat mitzvah 

celebrations remained relatively rare 

until after the Second World War. 

By the 1960s, the Friday night bat mitzvah 

had become a regular rite of passage in 

most Conservative synagogues. Like the 

bar mitzvah, the bat mitzvah served as a 

public coming of age. But like the 1959 

bat mitzvah of Roberta Hirshfield, the ceremony 

was a construct. Except for leading 

a few permissible prayers, non-liturgical 

readings often were picked because they 

were about women (Deborah, Ruth and 

Hannah were very popular) or were taken 

from the week’s haftarah. Unfortunately, a 

young girl’s bat mitzvah generally marked 

the end of her inclusion in the religious life 

of the synagogue, not the beginning. 

Once the bat mitzvah became established, 

other issues arose. What about the status 

of a girl after celebrating her bat mitzvah? 

Was this to be a one-time event, where she 

acquired skills that would never be used 

again? While formal approval to extend aliyot 

to women came in 1955 in a minority opinion 

from the Rabbinical Assembly’s Committee 

on Jewish Law and Standards, most 

congregations followed the majority opinion, 

which did not sanction the practice. 

It was not until the early 1970s, with the 

grassroots pressure from women for full 

parity in religious ritual and then the 1973 

CJLS takkanah (rabbinic enactment) allowing 

women to be counted in the minyan, 

that the pace of egalitarianism accelerated. 

In short order the bat mitzvah was integrated 

into the Shabbat morning service 

and became the equivalent of the bar mitzvah. 

The process, beginning with Judith 

Kaplan in 1922, had reached its logical 

manifestation by becoming commonplace. 

But this change did not affect only young 

women. As bnot mitzvah became equal 

partners in the religious lives of their congregations, 

their mothers, aunts, and grandmothers 

began to seek entrée as well. With 

egalitarianism the rule rather than the 

exception, women – many of whom had 

grown up with little or no Jewish education 

– embarked upon ambitious programs 

of acquiring Hebrew literacy and studying 

classical Jewish texts. Women’s entry into 

what was once the exclusive domain of men 

led to the development of new Jewish 

women’s rituals, including the adult bat 

mitzvah. 

Over the past several decades, hundreds 

of synagogues across North America have 

offered a wide variety of adult bat mitzvah 

classes and learning opportunities for 

women. The benefits accrue not only to 

the women who derive personal satisfaction 

from the acquisition of the skills 

required to daven and read Torah, but to 

congregational life as well. As more and 

more congregations rely on laity to read 

Torah and lead services, the inclusion of 

women has increased the ranks of learned 

and actively engaged communities. 

For nearly a century, Women’s League 

for Conservative Judaism has been devoted 

to providing a wide variety of educational 

initiatives to its members. Mirroring developments 

in synagogues, thousands of 

Women’s League members have participated 

in adult bat mitzvah programs. The 

phenomenon was so popular and the 

demand so great that in 2002 Women’s 

League commissioned a bat mitzvah curriculum, 

Etz Hayim He, for Conservative 

congregations. Educators have hailed the 

two-year course of study, written by Dr. 

Lisa Grant, who received her PhD from 

the Jewish Theological Seminary, as a model 

of adult learning. In addition, starting in 

the early 1990s Women’s League created 

Kolot Bik’dushah, a society of qualified Torah 

readers and prayer leaders. To date, nearly 

a thousand women and post-bat mitzvah 

girls (Banot Bik’dushah) have been admitted 

to the ranks of this elite society. 

When a Jewish child is born, whether 

male or female, the parents entreat the Creator 

that they might raise him or her to 

“a life of Torah, chuppah (marriage) and 

ma’asim tovim (good behavior/good 

deeds).” It wasn’t so long ago – barely a 

generation – that the opportunity for 

women to be raised to a life of Torah was 

pragmatic and bound to domestic obligations 

– keeping a kosher home, raising 

Jewish children, and observing private 

mitzvot. Today a woman’s life of Torah can 

include all areas of Jewish living, both 

private and public – and the bat mitzvah 

has become, finally, a celebration of 

beginning. CJ 


WORDS OF THE WEEK 

BY DAVID P. SINGER 

IN THE 1970S THE FEDERA- 

TION of Jewish Men’s Clubs developed 

the first broadly based adult 

education Hebrew reading program 

in the Conservative movement. 

FJMC’s Hebrew literacy program was 

based on the concept of laypeople teaching 

one another using two traditional texts, 

Shalom Aleichem and Ayn Keloheynu. More 

than 200,000 people throughout North 

America have learned to read Hebrew and to 

participate more meaningfully in our prayer 

services thanks to this program. 

Last year, the Temple Israel Men’s Club 

of Natick, Massachusetts, a member of 

FJMC’s New England region, and I added 

a new element to the program. Not long ago 

I passed my 20-year mark at Temple Israel 

and I realized that if I had learned an average 

of just one Hebrew word a week during 

Shabbat services, I’d now know more than 

1,000 Hebrew words. Using the approach 

that if we learn a little bit at a time we can 

acquire a substantial vocabulary, FJMC and 

I have created the Divrei HaShavua – Words 

of the Week initiative. If we look at learning 

Hebrew as a lifelong process rather than 

a one-time class, the challenge of learning 

a new language becomes surmountable. 

Each week, the program’s website offers 

five Hebrew words from the Torah portion 

with their English translations and transliterations. 

Synagogues insert the words into 

their Shabbat flyers and weekly emails. The 

words are selected by volunteers from Temple 

Israel of Natick and by men’s club members 

from California to Toronto to Florida 

whom I met at the 2011 FJMC international 

convention. A sample of the table of words 

for parashat Noach is shown below: 

David P. Singer, a founder of his men’s club, 

is a vice president of FJMC’s New England 

region. 


To participate simply copy the weekly 

table from the website into a Shabbat flyer. 

My feeling is that no one should leave the 

Shabbat morning service after reading the 

story of Noah without knowing the Hebrew 

word for flood (kucn) or the story of Joseph 

without knowing the word for dream (oukj). 

Divrei HaShavua has the potential to stimulate 

interest in the parashah for everyone, 

including those who often don’t feel 

Camel Around 

Your Neck 


science; the more you know about the 

parashah’s details, the more nuanced the 

connection between the tie and the reading 

can be. 

It’s educational for the rest of the kehilla 

as well. People look at his tie and try to 

figure the connection out. “In most shuls, 

people ask what the rabbi said,” Freddy said. 

“At BJ, they ask what the rabbi said, and 

then they ask what tie the gabbai wore.” 

Freddy still has one tie on his wish list. 

He would like one with a big red letter C 

– that’s Beshallach again, for the crossing. 

a connection with the Torah service. This is 

one small step to help make services more 

accessible to current and potential synagogue 

members. It might even inspire some 

people to participate in the FJMC’s Hebrew 

literacy program or in another Hebrew class. 

For more information about Divrei 

HaShavua, go to www.fjmc.org and click 

on Activities and then Hebrew Literacy or 

email words@nerfjmc.org. CJ 

ch:verse Hebrew transliteration English 

6:9 tsadik righteous 

6:14 teva ark 

7:6 mabul flood 

9:12 berit covenant 

10:8 gibor strong, mighty 

Words provided by Marty Levine of Bet Breira Samu-El Or Olom in Miami, FL 

Camels, olives, pieces of silver, Mickey 

Mouse – an entire world of Torah hangs 

around one man’s neck. CJ

Letters 


solidating, closing, or otherwise changing. 

My own is considering a wonderful rabbi 

who happens to be female. The Reform temple 

has doubled in membership during the 

current term of their rabbi, a woman whom 

everyone there loves. 

Look at the true issues that drive membership, 

especially the relevancy of the synagogue 

in peoples’ lives. The argument that 

it has much to do with gender is underresearched 

at best. 

HARRIS SHILAKOWSKY 

Brockton, Massachusetts 

LIGHT UNTO THE NATIONS 

I heartily agree with Rabbi Joseph H. Prouser’s 

proposal (“Acknowledging American Exceptionalism,” 

Spring 2012). I have long felt that 

the United States was given the mission to 

be a light unto the nations. Despite its struggles 

with various human failings, it has to 

some extent already achieved that goal. There 

is hope that as time passes, it will move 

further in that direction. It would be well to 

adopt the Harachaman prayer suggested by 

A Personal Miracle 


for a vibrant Masorti movement in Ukraine. 

Reuven met his wife, Lena, in 2004 on 

one of those trips. The couple now has 

two daughters, Miriam and Alisia. 

Reuven’s path to the rabbinate was not an 

easy one. His studies were intensive, 

demanding, and all in Hebrew – most of his 

colleagues in rabbinical school were native 

Hebrew speakers. He combined the usual 

academic disciplines of Jewish history, Talmud, 

halachah, and Mishnah with his regular 

visits to Ukraine. 

Reuven feels that completing rabbinical 

school and achieving his goal of becoming 

the spiritual and community leader he 

dreamed of being is a personal miracle, 

driven by his own connection with God. 

Reuven is charismatic, approachable, and 

lovable. He is bright, warm, and charming, 

and clearly he understands the challenges 

Rabbi Prouser. 

DR. STANLEY SCHEINDLIN 

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 

MORE ABOUT THAT COVER 

I read with great interest the letters to the editor 

stemming from the cover photo of the 

Winter 2011/2012 issue. The photo 

prompted a fascinating colloquy between me 

and my rabbi, which served to uncover some 

false preconceptions (I presumed – wrongly 

– that it was a picture of two men holding 

hands) and led to some solid learning that 

touched on the custom and practice of wearing 

tefillin, current gender issues within the 

Conservative rabbinate, and more. I suggest 

that the photo itself has enduring didactic 

value, one I would certainly like to put 

into play in my shul’s School of Jewish Studies. 

I think showing it to children within our 

movement and asking them what they see in 

it will lead to many fruitful conversations 

about important issues of Conservative Jewish 

thought and practice. 

JOEL F. BROWN 

Past President, 

Am Yisrael Conservative Congregation 

Northfield, Illinois 

of developing Jewish life in his home country. 

Throughout his studies he never forgot 

that his purpose was to share his passion 

for Judaism with other Ukrainian Jews. 

In a moving address at his ordination ceremony 

in February, Reuven told the assembled 

guests – faculty, staff, family, and friends 

– that the week’s Torah reading, Beshallach, 

recounted the miracle of the parting of the 

Red Sea. He drew a parallel between this 

LOST SYNAGOGUES 

Having been a member of the Laurelton Jewish 

Center for more than 50 years, until its 

closing several years ago, I resent that Ellen 

Levitt (Spring 2012) made Bernie Madoff 

seem to be its only claim to fame. There 

was much more to our history than Madoff. 

Rabbis Saul Teplitz and Howard Singer 

were our religious leaders. Dr. Morton Siegel, 

who became director of education at United 

Synagogue, was principal of our huge Hebrew 

school. Other former Laureltonians who have 

contributed positively to our society should 

have been cited, rather than that one disgrace 

of a man. While there is not a Laurelton Jewish 

Center any longer, just look around the 

Jewish United States and Israel and you will 

find former LJC students in leadership positions. 

I am an example. Having been a vice 

president at LJC I am now a vice president 

at Congregation B’nai Sholom Beth David, 

one of the most vibrant Conservative synagogues 

in the New York area. 

And by the way I still live in Laurelton. 

ALICE PURUS 

Laurelton, New York 

miracle and the miracle in his own life. In 

his view, both the Israelites crossing the Red 

Sea and his developing an entirely new Jewish 

identity required support and cooperation 

from many people, a belief and 

commitment to God, and of course God’s 

involvement to complete the action. Reuven 

is one of only a handful of Ukrainian Jews, 

beginning with little or no understanding 




JW MARRIOTT SPA & RESORT

Register online at www.wlcj.org 

DELEGATE FEES (Rates for commuters and 

hotel guests are the same. Hotel registration is separate.) 

FULL-TIME DELEGATES (Includes meals 

from Sunday dinner through Wednesday lunch) 

Early Bird Special 

(through September 28) $935 

First Time Delegate Special 

(through September 28) $835 

After September 28 $1000 

PART-TIME DELEGATES (Includes any 3 

or 6 consecutive meals) 

3 consecutive meals $340 

6 consecutive meals $680 

HOTEL REGISTRATION: Hotel registration is 

not included in the convention registration fees and 

must be done directly through the hotel. The special 

rate for Women’s League delegates is $200 for all 

three nights, double occupancy. 

WOMEN’S LEAGUE CONVENTION 

Every two years, members of Women’s League for 

Conservative Judaism gather for four days of 

outstanding speakers and leading scholars, inspiring 

services, valuable workshops, in-depth training and 

leadership development, region meetings and parties. 

This year’s convention, in exciting Las Vegas, 

promises to be better than ever! While what happens 

in Vegas might stay in Vegas for some people, our 

delegates will leave ready to greet the new dawn of 

Women’s League with a focus on personal growth, 

creating healthy sisterhoods, and celebrating 

Conservative/Masorti Judaism. 

Plans include: 

• Being a Conservative Jew: Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow, by Rabbi Elliot Dorff 

• An Evening of A & E: Fun (and some learning) celebrating the arts, both high and 

popular 

• A Night on the Town! Take advantage of the pleasures our host city has to offer 

• The unveiling of the new Women’s League Strategic Plan that will usher the organization 

into the 21st century as a vital, integral network for all Conservative Jewish 

women 

• Jewel in the Crown Awards to sisterhoods that demonstrate their commitment, 

excellence and creativity in programming. Last year over 100 sisterhoods won. You 

don’t want to be left out in 2012! 

• Celebration of 70 years of Torah Fund 

• Tribute to Honorary Convention Chair Blanche Meisel 

• Tikkun olam project supporting veterans, with featured speaker Rabbi Bonnie Koppell 

• Innovative workshops for personal fulfillment 

• Specialized programming for sisterhood presidents 

• Authors corner 

• Installation of officers and board 

• Great shopping in the exhibit hall for Judaica, toys, books, jewelry, and more 

Enjoy discounts for first-time and early-bird registrants 

FEATURED SPEAKERS 

Rabbi Bradley Shavit Artson, dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies 

Rabbi Elliot Dorff, Rector, Sol & Anne Dorff Distinguished Service Professor in 

Philosophy at the American Jewish University 

Dr. Arnold Eisen, chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary 

Rabbi Bonnie Koppell, Associate Rabbi of Temple Chai in Phoenix, Arizona, and 

Command Chaplain of the 807th Medical Command (Deployment Support) in the U.S. 

Army Reserve, where she holds the rank of colonel. 

Rabbi Gail Labovitz, associate professor of Rabbinic Literature at the American 

Jewish University 


UNITED SYNAGOGUE'S NEW BYLAWS 

BY JOANNE PALMER 

ON MARCH 18, THE 

United Synagogue of Conservative 

Judaism’s board of 

trustees voted to accept new 

bylaws. This was the second 

reading for those bylaws, and 

the second time they passed. Both times, 

the vote in favor was overwhelming, much 

higher than the already formidable-sounding 

two-thirds majority that was required. 

With that second vote the bylaws were 

accepted, along with new standard operating 

procedures to support them. United Synagogue 

now will begin its second century 

in 2013 as a revitalized, reshaped, and reenergized 

organization. 

The bylaws are a direct result of the strategic 

plan that the board accepted last March. 

It took courage for many of the board 

members to vote yes, and that they did so 

anyway was a testament to their commitment 

to United Synagogue. One of the changes 

the bylaws now mandate is that the board 

will be smaller, and another is that board 

members are expected to give United Synagogue 

not only time and energy but also 

to see it as a philanthropic opportunity, and 

an opportunity, moreover, that they can share 

with their friends. Many board members, 

some of whom had been with us for years, or 

even decades, had to vote themselves off 

the board. That was pure self-sacrifice, and 

we honor them for it. 

The new bylaws will make United Synagogue’s 

governance more agile and responsive, 

not only by reducing the size of the board 

and the number of committees the board 

oversees, but also by redefining the partnership 

between the executive committee, 

the board, other lay leaders, and United Synagogue’s 

staff. The committees will oversee 

the areas that the strategic plan recognized as 

core to the organization’s mission – kehilla 

strengthening and transformation, education, 

young adult engagement, and assisting 

new and emerging kehillot. (A kehilla, or 


sacred community, is the term the framers of 

the strategic plan have chosen to describe the 

various communities that make up United 

Synagogue, feeling that the change in wording 

reflects the change in orientation.) The 

new bylaws will increase the organization’s 

accountability to the member kehillot. That 

accountability will be institutionalized in the 

relationship between the General Asssembly, 

which will be composed of a member from 

each kehilla. There are many mechanisms 

that will speed and oversee that process, 

demand a new focus on priorities, measure 

whether those priorities have been achieved, 

and empower staff to implement the changes. 

United Synagogue also will engage with 

lay leaders who are not on the board in a 

different way. We will recruit them to offer 

their services as kehilla ambassadors or expert 

volunteers, sharing their expertise, teaching, 

and training. 

Leadership training is one of the areas where 

our member kehillot most want help. Leaders 

would like help in making themselves 

more effective at the positions to which 

they have been elected. They would like to 

be able to grow not only managerially but 

spiritually, and they would like their kehillot 

to become places where people come for spiritually 

and emotionally transformative experiences, 

to learn more about their people and 

themselves. They also would like help in identifying 

and training the next generation of 

kehilla leaders. In response to that need, 

we have expanded and reimagined Sulam. 

That program used to train new and prospective 

synagogue leaders; now, it has become 

a three-part enterprise that includes Sulam 

for Current Leaders, Sulam for Presidents, 

and Sulam for Emerging Leaders. The goal 

– we would call it a dream but it is achievable 

– is to train 5,000 leaders in the next five 

years. Think what that will do for Conservative 

Judaism! 

Another change that has resulted directly 

from the strategic plan and the new bylaws 

is the system of kehilla relationship managers. 

Our KRMs are our grassroots support system. 

United Synagogue and Conservative 

Judaism represent and embody Jewish life as 

the product of eternal truth, millennia of history 

and tradition, and openness to the world 

as it is now. It is the vital center of North 

American Jewish life, the place where tensions 

are negotiated and challenges are faced. 

The new bylaws, with their new understanding 

of the relationship between the central 

organization and the kehillot, are a 

necessary tool, a way to help us balance on 

the high wire. 

“I am very proud of the collaboration 

between our professional staff and our lay 

leadership in crafting these new bylaws,” international 

president Richard Skolnik said. “The 

endgame is to provide a refocused energy that 

truly has an impact on the services that we 

provide to our more than 600 kehillot.” 

“The vote is a major achievement in United 

Synagogue’s reorganization,” CEO Rabbi 

Steven Wernick said. “It aligns new strategies 

with governance, staff, and structures. 

Our leaders affirmed the wisdom of our mission, 

vision, and strategic plan, our commitment 

to excellence, and the value we 

add both to our affiliated kehillot and to 

the larger Jewish world. 

“‘The person who occupies himself with 

the needs of the community – it is as though 

he occupies himself with Torah,’ the Talmud 

tells us. United Synagogue’s leaders listened 

to the needs of its community of kehillot, 

and it acted on them. This courageous vote 

will lay the foundation for our next 100 years.” 

The new bylaws are the next step in the 

path that has taken us from the creation of 

the coalition of Conservative leaders that 

hammered out the strategic plan to now. We 

look forward to the strengthening and revitalization 

of United Synagogue and of Conservative 

Judaism. We will achieve that work 

together. CJ

HEARING MEN’S VOICES 

A Signature Program of FJMC 

EDITED BY ART SPAR 

The 2011 Rosh Hashanah issue of CJ included 

the article “A Mentsch is Born,” about FJMC’s 

Hearing Men’s Voices program. Since that time 

HMV programs have proliferated across the 

continent. Eight mentschen gathered for a (virtual) 

conversation in early December. 

Moderator Paul Davidson (Temple Israel, 

Sharon, Massachusetts): Each of us is a 

Hearing Men’s Voices leader. Our goal 

tonight is to share our best practices with 

each other. Who’d like to begin? 

Mark Givarz (Congregation B’nai 

Amoona, St. Louis, Missouri): Our HMV 

theme this year is spirituality. On Rosh 

Hashanah we did a Hearing Men’s Voices 

program as an alternative to the Musaf service 

on the second day. (We modified the rules 

to allow women to join in.) The topic was 

seeking God. We formed two circles of about 

14 people each to discuss the questions: 

Do you ever seek God? If so, have you found 

God? The groups talked for about 90 minutes, 

and we could have gone on for hours. 

The big discovery was that people can find 

spirituality in alternative ways to prayer. 

Neal Fineman (Temple Israel, Sharon, 

Massachusetts): Our guys are passionate 

about their participation. We average about 

16 guys; there’s usually a lot of laughing; the 

guys enjoy it. It’s really catching on. We don’t 

have to make phone calls anymore. They 

just come. 

Bob Braitman (Temple Shaare Tefilah, 

Norwood, Massachusetts): Men who come 

to HMV aren’t necessarily involved in other 

synagogue activities. I went to one program 

and I didn’t recognize any of the faces. Since 

I go to services regularly, I realized that 

the HMV guys were completely different. 

By introducing HMV into synagogue life, 

we’ve created a completely new on-ramp to 

the Jewish community. In his article in 

this issue of CJ, Rabbi Charles Simon’ writes 

about guys who aren’t turned on by traditional 

prayer. 

Mark Travis (Temple Beth Judea, Buffalo 

Grove, Illinois): Our HMV group has been 

attracting about 15 to 20 people per session. 

How do we get people involved? We conducted 

a survey among young guys in their 

30s and 40s. They told us that they don’t 

need any more formal religion. They get 

enough from their wives and synagogue. 

They wanted time with other men to socialize 

and discuss issues men have in common. 

The one topic all the men share is children. 

How should we talk to our children? 

Like Paul said, the most important recruitment 

tool is being asked by another man 

to participate. Our slogan is “I hear voices, 

voices at home, at work, at play, voices in 

the synagogue, from my family, but…who 

hears my voice?” 

Bruce Gordon (Congregation Olam Tikvah, 

Fairfax, Virginia): I’m just getting 

started, but HMV has perceptions that need 

to be overcome. Should the leader be a 

trained psychologist? Can we do this without 

years of experience? I’m helping get 

groups started in Fairfax, Rockville, 

Potomac, Gaithersburg, and in the Tidewater 

region. What advice can you offer me? 

Bob: One of the greatest misconceptions 

about HMV is directly related to Bruce’s concerns 

about not being a health care professional. 

He’s asking himself whether he’s 

qualified to run a session. It’s my experi- 

ence that lay people, not professionals, have 

run the best sessions. The most important 

criteria for group leadership are to be a good 

listener, to be empathetic and show caring. 

It’s about being heard. It’s not about a professional 

providing wisdom. The leader should 

come across as, “I’m a guy like you, let’s talk.” 

Gary Smith (Adath Israel Congregation, 

Cincinnati, Ohio): At our last HMV session, 

we asked each of the participants to 

discuss the most important lesson or statement 

that their father or grandfather taught 

them that most changed their life; in other 

words, a life lesson. There were multiple 

generations in the room, and the men were 

blown away by the similarities and differences 

shared by men of different ages. But 

what was most effective was that we only 

knew each other for years as a name and 

a face. Who knew what they were like inside? 

Now we know each other. We can interact 

and have a more man-to-man conversation. 

Now we don’t just say hello. We stop 

and talk, ask questions, share something 

about ourselves. We truly involved Jewish 

men in Jewish life. 

Bob: I’ve attended several gatherings where 

men have been brought to tears. I was 

shocked the first time. Have any of you had 

that experience? 

Neal: I was brought to tears a few times. 

It happened to me in an HMV session at 

the FJMC international convention. I was 

among strangers. I was just thinking about 

my relationship with my father and I lost it. 

I didn’t know these people, and I didn’t know 

how they would react because a lot of them 

were new to HMV, but that’s what I needed 

to do. But I was brought to tears, and it was 


a wonderful release. It was good for me, and 

I wanted to share with them that you can 

do this kind of thing. 

Paul: I’ve been in numerous sessions hysterically 

laughing and crying, and every place 

in between. There are too few places where 

men can speak in a safe manner. I’ve seen 

guys linger after an HMV session not wanting 

to part with each other because they’ve 

formed bonds. Now I see guys hug when 

they see each other in shul. Sometimes when 

I see an HMV buddy, we give each other 

a knowing glance because we’ve shared something 

very deep. 

Art Spar (New York, New York): HMV 

doesn’t create emotion. The emotions are 

already there. We’re creating an environment 

to release them or experience them. 

These emotions are residing there all the 

time and we create something that allows 

them to come to the surface. 

My HMV experience in Manhattan has 

been interesting. We’ve brought together an 

eclectic mix of guys from rabbis to non-shulgoers. 

We meet over dinner. Our first meeting 

was in a kosher Indian restaurant. The 

next time it was pizza and salad at my house 

with a bottle of scotch and some wine on the 

side. We’re not part of any synagogue or men’s 

club but we use FJMC materials. We’ve gotten 

to know each other, our roots and our 

dreams; and we plan on continuing as long 

as we enjoy it. We’re just a bunch of Jewish 

men involving ourselves in Jewish life. 

A Personal Miracle 


of Judaism, who have been inspired to educate 

others about Judaism. In his ordination 

address, he also explained that Beshallach 

is in the book of Shemot, the book that we 

call Exodus but whose name literally translates 

to Names. The list of names of those 

people who have helped him academically, 

spiritually, and even financially is incredibly 

long, but he could not have reached 

his goal without each of them. 

Reuven acknowledges that now that he 


Paul: Is it better to meet at a synagogue 

or at home? 

Art: I’ve been to both. The informality of 

a home setting allows guys to connect in 

ways that a synagogue does not. 

Bob: Very few synagogues have comfortable 

spaces. I remember a meeting in a library 

sitting around a conference table. It was not 

intimate in the way it would have been in 

a living room. The big problem with the 

synagogue is the formality of the setting. It’s 

not the fact that there’s a Torah down the 

hall, it’s actually the space itself. And temple 

classrooms are worse with the little chairs! 

It’s too bad but most synagogues are not 

warm spaces. 

Paul: Why are you so passionate about Hearing 

Men’s Voices? 

Bob: Many men today don’t know how to 

form relationships. We get most of our relationships 

through our wives as couples. We’ve 

lost the art of conversation, and we’ve lost 

the art of community. I want a place where 

men can come together, in a forum that isn’t 

threatening, to talk about things that are sitting 

in our hearts and minds, in plain sight, 

or that we’re completely unaware of. HMV 

is an extraordinary resource – there’s no other 

venue like it. The dividend is it will strengthen 

our synagogues, our clubs, and our communities, 

but the real value is that it makes 

our lives richer. 

has completed one challenge, another has 

opened up as he tries to bring Masorti 

Judaism to the estimated 100,000 Jews who 

live in Ukraine. For the last 20 years, 

Midreshet Yerushalayim and Masorti Olami 

have worked to create a base of supporters 

and a core of Masorti communities in 

Kiev, Chernovitz, Donetsk, Kharkov, and 

other cities around the country. The work 

of developing committed, passionate, and 

stable kehillot with ongoing Jewish lifecycle 

and calendar programming still is to 

come. We are sure that his determination, 

along with a little help from God, will enable 

Reuven to meet these challenges. 

I remember running a session about the 

high holy days. It forced me to think about 

what the Days of Awe meant to me. I discovered 

that it wasn’t only the religious aspect 

of the day that draws my focus. It’s the memories 

of being at my father’s side, holding 

his hand, that opened a floodgate of feelings 

that are always there but rarely experienced. 

Paul: In the Jewish world, there’s nothing 

else like Hearing Men’s Voices. 

Art: There’s nothing more important than 

human contact. We have lots of mixed sex 

settings, but men are unique, our experiences 

are different than women’s. There’s 

something about a men-only session that 

allows that uniqueness to shine, to flower. 

The camaraderie is special. I enjoy it, I need 

it. 

Neal: It’s powerful. It’s a place to find your 

passion. I’ve never been to a session I didn’t 

value. You see your own life in the expression 

of others. There’s common ground 

we all share. Hearing it from others adds 

a powerful perspective to our own lives. 

Paul: It’s a non-competitive experience with 

no performance expectations. You don’t have 

to know Hebrew. There are no skills 

required. CJ 

Should you visit Kiev or other cities in 

Ukraine, we invite you to spend Shabbat or 

a festival with a Masorti community and see 

just how well things are going. CJ 

Advertise in CJ 

FALL 2012 

Ad Reservations due 

June 18 

TO ADVERTISE CALL 917-668-6809

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