Jun. 16, 2008
Dovid Eliezrie ,
THE JERUSALEM POST
Like many others, I wondered about the Chabad future after the Rebbe - Rabbi Menachem M. Schneersohn - passed away in 1994. I especially worried whether Chabad emissaries would attend their convention, scheduled for a few months later. Those fears dissipated when 700-strong showed up from around the globe.
Fourteen years later, the numbers are up again. Over 2,200 shlichim (emissaries) attended last year, reflecting a remarkable rate of growth.
One of the early challenges in the post-gimmel tammuz era (the Hebrew date of the Rebbe's passing) was Rabbi Shmuley Boteach's management of the Chabad L'Chaim society at Oxford University. He had involved large numbers of non-Jews in his programs, a radical departure from the Chabad norm, focused as it is on drawing Jews closer to their tradition. Some of his other activities also did not reflect Chabad standards.
During that confusing time, Chabad in the UK could have just turned a blind eye. Instead it made the decision that Shmuley's methodology did not meet Chabad policies.
No one doubted his creativity, his writing ability or his commitment to Judaism. Some said "it was nothing but politics - these older rabbis in London."
As Shmuley wrote in The Jerusalem Post last week (June 10), he feels to this day that he was in the right. In my mind, however, it was a turning point. Chabad in the UK took a courageous stand, insisting that our principles were sacrosanct. Coming shortly after the Rebbe's passing, it sent a strong message throughout the Chabad system that standards were not to be lowered.
THE LAST 14 years have been a period of both great success and serious challenge, internally and externally. The Rebbe had already laid the foundation for the transformation into a communal decision-making system by setting up an organizational structure guided by committees and boards. Rabbinical courts were appointed as the final arbitrators of policy and direction. More and more, Chabad become a consensus-driven culture.
Still the shift did not come without internal politics and dissension. When it comes to tough questions, the debate is, "What would the Rebbe have said?" or "What did he say?" in such a situation. There is debate and dialogue, and not everyone shares the same understanding of which precedent should apply.
CHABAD TODAY is the largest Jewish organization in the world, operating in 75 countries and 48 states. With over 5,000 rabbis and their wives on staff, there is no question that there will be issues. In such a large system there will be institutions that have financial or management problems. The Rebbe taught us to live up to high ideals, which, being human, we fail at times to reach. Chabad emissaries have the same frailties as anyone. At times those weaknesses trickle down to the institutions we are involved in.
There will be internal organizational politics. How many Chabad centers can we open, and who should run them? Who should be assigned to a suburb with great demographic potential? How do we resolve issues when there is internal conflict?
Chabad's expanding role in itself poses a new set of challenges. As Dennis Prager said recently to a group of Chabad rabbis, "For years Chabad was the outsider. Now you are becoming the establishment, and that demands a different type of responsibility."
Moving from the periphery to the mainstream must cause us to see our role differently.
INTERNALLY, CHABAD must address additional issues: How do we inspire our children to have the same passion and ideals that we learned firsthand from the Rebbe? How do we create viable communities of hassidim that meet the spiritual and educational needs of a more diverse and growing population in a wide variety of geographic settings? How do we live our lives to the high standards that the Rebbe aspired to?
How do we ensure economic stability for hassidim who do not enter into Jewish education or outreach? For instance, a leading Chabad rabbinical figure in Israel talked to me about the need to help his community develop more varied job skills.
None of these questions has an easy answer, and they cannot be debated in the pages of The Jerusalem Post.
Chabad is a culture of intense self-analysis. Be it in the local synagogue, in conventions both regional and international, or on the various Web sites, the dialogue and debate is real. Just this week members of Chabad rabbinical courts convened in New York to talk about many of these questions. What is striking about Chabad is the personal sense of empowerment that most of its hassidim feel, which enables them to express their opinions openly and strongly.
WITH ALL its challenges, Chabad is booming. The network of Chabad Centers is growing in many ways. In Russia, Judaism has been rebuilt from the bottom up. In Israel, Chabad serves as a bridge between secular and religious in a polarized society. In the US and other Western countries, Chabad centers are growing in suburbia, creating a new synagogue movement involving hundreds of thousands of Jews.
In campus and adult education there is phenomenal growth and innovation. Internally the hassidic community is learning to find solutions to different challenges with innovative yeshivas and seminaries. A new generation of Chabad rabbinical scholars is providing much-needed spiritual direction to hassidim.
There are problems. And there will be new ones in the future. Still, the system the Rebbe put in place is proving itself responsive and resilient, both in sparking a Jewish renaissance around the world and in creating a viable community for Hassidim.
The writer is a Chabad emissary in Yorba Linda, California.
rabbi@ocjewish.com
Showing posts with label conference. Show all posts
Showing posts with label conference. Show all posts
Monday, June 16, 2008
Monday, May 26, 2008
More than 100 Chabad rabbis gather at New City conference
Ben Rubin
The Journal News
NEW CITY - Before a packed room of fellow rabbis, Avremel Kotlarsky told the audience that they had made huge strides as an organization, but that it would take far more effort to continue growing.
"There is no free ride, this does not come easily," said Kotlarsky, executive director of the Chabad Lubavitch of Rockland center.
His remarks were part of a gathering of more than 100 rabbis from across New York and New England, who came to the center yesterday for a regional conference.
The goal Kotlarsky spoke of was the central mission of the Chabad movement - to provide and expand religious experiences for Jews around the world.
The meeting was the first time that the New City center has hosted the conference in more than 15 years, or since the facility opened in the early 1990s. The building houses a day camp, a Jewish day school, a synagogue and a Hebrew school.
"I think the fact itself that we are getting together shows we have a tremendous energy," said Rabbi Yisroel Goldberg, director of community outreach and adult education at the local center.
At the conference, the rabbis discussed contemporary religious questions, ways to strengthen the Chabad organization and basic tips on fundraising, networking and growth strategies.
The Chabad movement has more than 2,000 centers around the world and holds a global conference every fall in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, where the organization is headquartered. The conference usually brings in more than 5,000 rabbis.
The movement was started about 250 years ago by Rabbi Schneur Zalman from Russia. The organization does not do missionary work or attempt to convert non-Jews.
Although the movement is considered a part of Hasidic Orthodox Judaism, Goldberg stressed the importance of not labeling it because Chabad seeks to be inclusive to all Jews.
"Our sole purpose is to bring people closer to Judaism," Goldberg said.
Rabbi Aaron Konikov from Long Island said the local conference was an important way to reinvigorate the Chabad leadership, especially rabbis who live in communities where they are the only observant Jews.
"It brings motivation and friendship and recommits us to the mission and it continues to instill in us the fact that we're in this together," Konikov said.
"I think it's a wonderful turnout," said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, a representative from the Brooklyn headquarters. "It gives inspiration to each one of our shluchim (emissaries)."
The Journal News
NEW CITY - Before a packed room of fellow rabbis, Avremel Kotlarsky told the audience that they had made huge strides as an organization, but that it would take far more effort to continue growing.
"There is no free ride, this does not come easily," said Kotlarsky, executive director of the Chabad Lubavitch of Rockland center.
His remarks were part of a gathering of more than 100 rabbis from across New York and New England, who came to the center yesterday for a regional conference.
The goal Kotlarsky spoke of was the central mission of the Chabad movement - to provide and expand religious experiences for Jews around the world.
The meeting was the first time that the New City center has hosted the conference in more than 15 years, or since the facility opened in the early 1990s. The building houses a day camp, a Jewish day school, a synagogue and a Hebrew school.
"I think the fact itself that we are getting together shows we have a tremendous energy," said Rabbi Yisroel Goldberg, director of community outreach and adult education at the local center.
At the conference, the rabbis discussed contemporary religious questions, ways to strengthen the Chabad organization and basic tips on fundraising, networking and growth strategies.
The Chabad movement has more than 2,000 centers around the world and holds a global conference every fall in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, where the organization is headquartered. The conference usually brings in more than 5,000 rabbis.
The movement was started about 250 years ago by Rabbi Schneur Zalman from Russia. The organization does not do missionary work or attempt to convert non-Jews.
Although the movement is considered a part of Hasidic Orthodox Judaism, Goldberg stressed the importance of not labeling it because Chabad seeks to be inclusive to all Jews.
"Our sole purpose is to bring people closer to Judaism," Goldberg said.
Rabbi Aaron Konikov from Long Island said the local conference was an important way to reinvigorate the Chabad leadership, especially rabbis who live in communities where they are the only observant Jews.
"It brings motivation and friendship and recommits us to the mission and it continues to instill in us the fact that we're in this together," Konikov said.
"I think it's a wonderful turnout," said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky, a representative from the Brooklyn headquarters. "It gives inspiration to each one of our shluchim (emissaries)."
Thursday, November 15, 2007
Chabad emissaries gather for celebration and reunion
Ben Harris
Part professional development, part reunion and part celebration, the annual gathering of Chabad emissaries enables the shluchim to revel in a few days spent far from the isolation many endure.
Published: 11/13/2007
NEW YORK (JTA) --
While leaders of the Jewish federation world prepared to descend on Nashville for their annual General Assembly this week, Rabbi Yitzchok Tiechtel, a Chabad emissary in the Tennessee capital, packed his bags and headed north for another major Jewish gathering.The International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Shluchim, more commonly known as the Kinus, brought together Tiechtel and some 3,000 colleagues -- Chabad emissaries, or shluchim, serving Jewish communities in the farthest reaches of the globe.
Part professional development, part reunion and part celebration, the six-day conference here allowed the shluchim to revel in a few days spent far from the isolation many endure in posts spread across 72 countries and six continents. Though Chabad has labored to increase its partnership with the federation system in recent years, it was hard to escape the impression of two alternative centers of Jewry reflected in the concurrent conferences in Nashville and New York.
Tiechtel, who returned to Nashville on Monday to attend part of the G.A., brushed off the suggestion."What we do only adds to what they do," he said. "I don't see it as a competition."Indeed, most Chabad shluchim operate in areas where fellow Jews, let alone Jewish competition, are scarce.
Inspired by the teachings of the late Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Chabad shluchim have made lifetime commitments to bring Jewish life to areas where often they are the only established Jewish presence for hundreds of miles.
They regard themselves as the rebbe's soldiers, a motif invoked again and again to describe the sacrifice and commitment of shluchim and their families, who spend their lives far from the centers of world Jewry."We are not climbing a career ladder," Rabbi Nechemia Vogel, the London-born founder of the Chabad House in Rochester, N.Y., said in his keynote address. "We are the rebbe's shluchim. We stay at our posts." For Tiechtel, it was also a chance to reconnect with his siblings, six of whom serve as shluchim in cities as far flung as Berlin, Coconut Grove, Fla., and Tempe, Ariz.
At the Kinus banquet on Sunday evening, the Tiechtels practically filled their own table. The evening before, they had a chance for a more private reunion at a Japanese restaurant in Brooklyn. "We didn't have a chance to do that in many years," said Dovid Tiechtel, who runs the Chabad center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.The Kinus, which began in 1983 with about 60 rabbis meeting in a room at Chabad world headquarters in Brooklyn, has evolved into a major multimedia extravaganza broadcast live around the world.
This year it was held in a cavernous hall along the Hudson River in Manhattan, just yards from where the sixth Lubavitcher rebbe, Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, arrived in America 68 years ago. At a time when much communal angst is focused on how to attract an unaffiliated and disinterested younger generation -- topics that are high on the agenda for the leaders in Nashville -- Chabad’s growth continues unabated.
Twenty new centers have been established this year in California and Florida alone, with five in France and four in Argentina, according to Chabad.org. Chabad's campus initiative added 17 new centers in the United States and elsewhere. A total of 278 new shluchim have joined the ranks.
Nearly 5,000 people attended the Sunday banquet, including 1,900 lay leaders and family of the shluchim, requiring 20 more tables than last year.
One of the evening’s highlights, the annual roll call, listed each of the 72 countries where Chabad has a permanent presence, and the number of shluchim families that live there: 187 in France, 117 in Russia, eight in China, two in Congo, and one each from Georgia, Bolivia, Norway and Puerto Rico.On the sidelines of the Kinus, a children’s summit was held for the sons of the visiting shluchim, with 467 kids attending. The daughters and female emissaries have their own separate gatherings.
The Kinus also provided a chance to offer good wishes to departing shluchim like Osher Litzman, a 25-year-old Israeli who with his wife and infant daughter are departing for Seoul in the coming days.
They will remain in South Korea, Litzman says, "until the Messiah comes," adding quickly, "We hope he is coming today."Like generations of Chabad shluchim before him, Litzman is headed for a country where he knows no one and doesn’t speak the language, though the couple are studying Korean online. They expect to have their Chabad center up and running in time to host a Passover seder.
Asked how he intends to pay for everything, Litzman tilts his eyes skyward and smiles. In fact, support for Chabad's sprawling global operation is of a more earthly kind, coming from a cadre of benefactors that includes men such as Lev Leviev, the Uzbekistan-born mogul who immigrated to Israel as a teenager and is believed to be Israel's richest man. Forbes magazine, which lists Leviev as the 210th richest person in the world, estimates his net worth at $4.1 billion. Addressing the banquet in Russian-accented Hebrew, Leviev -- known as Reb Levi in Chabad circles -- said the shluchim were like soldiers operating "behind enemy lines." Leviev also related a well-known story about a meeting with Schneerson in Brooklyn in which the rebbe encouraged him to do business in Russia, a decision that was instrumental to his business success. More than a decade after his death in 1994 following a stroke, the rebbe's legacy still looms large in Chabad. A banner with his portrait towered over the hall and videos of him exhorting his followers in Yiddish played throughout the evening.
Shluchim regard themselves as the rebbe's personal emissaries and hold their conference each year on the first day of the Hebrew month of Kislev, the anniversary of the rebbe's recovery from a heart attack in 1977. "There's not a community in the world that's not touched by the rebbe's shluchim," said conference vice chairman Rabbi Moshe Kotlarksy. "So we can say Am Yisrael Chai. Am Yisrael Chai."
Part professional development, part reunion and part celebration, the six-day conference here allowed the shluchim to revel in a few days spent far from the isolation many endure in posts spread across 72 countries and six continents. Though Chabad has labored to increase its partnership with the federation system in recent years, it was hard to escape the impression of two alternative centers of Jewry reflected in the concurrent conferences in Nashville and New York.
Tiechtel, who returned to Nashville on Monday to attend part of the G.A., brushed off the suggestion."What we do only adds to what they do," he said. "I don't see it as a competition."Indeed, most Chabad shluchim operate in areas where fellow Jews, let alone Jewish competition, are scarce.
Inspired by the teachings of the late Rebbe Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Chabad shluchim have made lifetime commitments to bring Jewish life to areas where often they are the only established Jewish presence for hundreds of miles.
They regard themselves as the rebbe's soldiers, a motif invoked again and again to describe the sacrifice and commitment of shluchim and their families, who spend their lives far from the centers of world Jewry."We are not climbing a career ladder," Rabbi Nechemia Vogel, the London-born founder of the Chabad House in Rochester, N.Y., said in his keynote address. "We are the rebbe's shluchim. We stay at our posts." For Tiechtel, it was also a chance to reconnect with his siblings, six of whom serve as shluchim in cities as far flung as Berlin, Coconut Grove, Fla., and Tempe, Ariz.
At the Kinus banquet on Sunday evening, the Tiechtels practically filled their own table. The evening before, they had a chance for a more private reunion at a Japanese restaurant in Brooklyn. "We didn't have a chance to do that in many years," said Dovid Tiechtel, who runs the Chabad center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.The Kinus, which began in 1983 with about 60 rabbis meeting in a room at Chabad world headquarters in Brooklyn, has evolved into a major multimedia extravaganza broadcast live around the world.
This year it was held in a cavernous hall along the Hudson River in Manhattan, just yards from where the sixth Lubavitcher rebbe, Yosef Yitzchak Schneersohn, arrived in America 68 years ago. At a time when much communal angst is focused on how to attract an unaffiliated and disinterested younger generation -- topics that are high on the agenda for the leaders in Nashville -- Chabad’s growth continues unabated.
Twenty new centers have been established this year in California and Florida alone, with five in France and four in Argentina, according to Chabad.org. Chabad's campus initiative added 17 new centers in the United States and elsewhere. A total of 278 new shluchim have joined the ranks.
Nearly 5,000 people attended the Sunday banquet, including 1,900 lay leaders and family of the shluchim, requiring 20 more tables than last year.
One of the evening’s highlights, the annual roll call, listed each of the 72 countries where Chabad has a permanent presence, and the number of shluchim families that live there: 187 in France, 117 in Russia, eight in China, two in Congo, and one each from Georgia, Bolivia, Norway and Puerto Rico.On the sidelines of the Kinus, a children’s summit was held for the sons of the visiting shluchim, with 467 kids attending. The daughters and female emissaries have their own separate gatherings.
The Kinus also provided a chance to offer good wishes to departing shluchim like Osher Litzman, a 25-year-old Israeli who with his wife and infant daughter are departing for Seoul in the coming days.
They will remain in South Korea, Litzman says, "until the Messiah comes," adding quickly, "We hope he is coming today."Like generations of Chabad shluchim before him, Litzman is headed for a country where he knows no one and doesn’t speak the language, though the couple are studying Korean online. They expect to have their Chabad center up and running in time to host a Passover seder.
Asked how he intends to pay for everything, Litzman tilts his eyes skyward and smiles. In fact, support for Chabad's sprawling global operation is of a more earthly kind, coming from a cadre of benefactors that includes men such as Lev Leviev, the Uzbekistan-born mogul who immigrated to Israel as a teenager and is believed to be Israel's richest man. Forbes magazine, which lists Leviev as the 210th richest person in the world, estimates his net worth at $4.1 billion. Addressing the banquet in Russian-accented Hebrew, Leviev -- known as Reb Levi in Chabad circles -- said the shluchim were like soldiers operating "behind enemy lines." Leviev also related a well-known story about a meeting with Schneerson in Brooklyn in which the rebbe encouraged him to do business in Russia, a decision that was instrumental to his business success. More than a decade after his death in 1994 following a stroke, the rebbe's legacy still looms large in Chabad. A banner with his portrait towered over the hall and videos of him exhorting his followers in Yiddish played throughout the evening.
Shluchim regard themselves as the rebbe's personal emissaries and hold their conference each year on the first day of the Hebrew month of Kislev, the anniversary of the rebbe's recovery from a heart attack in 1977. "There's not a community in the world that's not touched by the rebbe's shluchim," said conference vice chairman Rabbi Moshe Kotlarksy. "So we can say Am Yisrael Chai. Am Yisrael Chai."
Diamond Billionaire Takes New York
Lev Leviev, the Israeli diamond billionaire, had a busy schedule during his visit to New York this week.
On Sunday, he flew to New York to appear in front of 4,300 black-hatted Chabad-Lubavitch rabbis. The Uzbekistan-born Leviev, who made his fortune cracking the De Beers diamond cartel, is the most powerful lay leader of the Chabad movement’s rapidly growing branch in the former Soviet Union, and he was given a standing ovation by the gender-segregated crowd.
Two days later, Leviev was still wearing his yarmulke, but this time around he appeared in front of women in low-cut dresses who had come for the opening of LEVIEV, the magnate’s flagship American diamond retailer on Madison Avenue.
Asked by the Forward about moving between such different worlds, Leviev said: “It is nice to put these worlds together, to make money and then convert the money into the spiritual. That is why I make money.”
Leviev was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, and immigrated with his family to Israel in 1971. He learned the diamond trade and, after coming up with an innovative method for processing diamonds, started his own diamond-polishing plant.
At the Chabad event, he spoke at length, in Hebrew, about the profound influence Chabad has had on both his personal and business philosophy. The late Chabad leader Menachem Schneerson blessed him, he said, when Leviev was a young man with no money to his name.
“I did better in every business venture since,” Leviev said.
His rise has not been without controversy. Leviev has been accused of profiting from diamond mines in apartheid-era South Africa, Angola and Burma. His closeness to Russian President Vladimir Putin has also raised some eyebrows.
This came to the fore at the store opening, when a group of protesters showed up behind the velvet rope that barred the entrance to the store. The protesters were most vocal in criticizing Leviev’s involvement in developing the Palestinian territories. But they also denounced his trade with the Angolan government, widely regarded as repressive, and his real estate holdings in New York City, which have come under fire from tenants’ rights groups.
Leviev “is destroying marginal communities in New York City the same way he’s destroying Palestinian communities in the Middle East,” said protester Ethan Heitner, who identified himself as a Jewish member of the group Adalah-NY.
A source close to Leviev said that the protesters were scapegoating the diamond merchant simply because he is an Israeli citizen. The controversies went unmentioned at the Chabad event — and they were also omitted from a lengthy recent story about Leviev in The New York Times Magazine.
“When you read The New York Times article, say a shehechianu, because this is the first time The New York Times has written an article without saying a negative thing in it,” said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky in his introductory remarks to Leviev’s speech at the Chabad banquet.
The banquet was the final event of a four-day long international Chabad conference that brought together lay leaders and shluchim (emissaries) who work in places as far-flung as Laos, Congo and Armenia.
Earlier in the weekend, attendees discussed new Chabad initiatives, which include not only the movement’s foray into online education but also a program that will give students the tools to decipher the Talmud. Leviev is president and chief donor of the Chabad-led Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS, the most powerful Jewish organization in Russia.
“It was most gratifying to finally have the opportunity to publicly recognize Mr. Leviev for catalyzing Jewish renaissance in the former Soviet Union, as well as for his trailblazing work in other parts of the world,” Kotlarsky said in an e-mail to the Forward. “The philanthropic philosophy that he lives by, which he presented at the banquet, was deeply inspirational to both rabbi and layman alike.”
While a few Hasidic men attended the store opening several days later, the crowd was dominated by celebrities like Isabella Rossellini and Susan Sarandon. In a nod to both sets of guests, the organizers served nonkosher hors d’oeuvres but warned the Jewish attendees.
In one effort to synthesize his two worlds, Leviev employed a running metaphor during his speech at the Chabad banquet. “Every Jew is a diamond,” he said.
On Sunday, he flew to New York to appear in front of 4,300 black-hatted Chabad-Lubavitch rabbis. The Uzbekistan-born Leviev, who made his fortune cracking the De Beers diamond cartel, is the most powerful lay leader of the Chabad movement’s rapidly growing branch in the former Soviet Union, and he was given a standing ovation by the gender-segregated crowd.
Two days later, Leviev was still wearing his yarmulke, but this time around he appeared in front of women in low-cut dresses who had come for the opening of LEVIEV, the magnate’s flagship American diamond retailer on Madison Avenue.
Asked by the Forward about moving between such different worlds, Leviev said: “It is nice to put these worlds together, to make money and then convert the money into the spiritual. That is why I make money.”
Leviev was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, and immigrated with his family to Israel in 1971. He learned the diamond trade and, after coming up with an innovative method for processing diamonds, started his own diamond-polishing plant.
At the Chabad event, he spoke at length, in Hebrew, about the profound influence Chabad has had on both his personal and business philosophy. The late Chabad leader Menachem Schneerson blessed him, he said, when Leviev was a young man with no money to his name.
“I did better in every business venture since,” Leviev said.
His rise has not been without controversy. Leviev has been accused of profiting from diamond mines in apartheid-era South Africa, Angola and Burma. His closeness to Russian President Vladimir Putin has also raised some eyebrows.
This came to the fore at the store opening, when a group of protesters showed up behind the velvet rope that barred the entrance to the store. The protesters were most vocal in criticizing Leviev’s involvement in developing the Palestinian territories. But they also denounced his trade with the Angolan government, widely regarded as repressive, and his real estate holdings in New York City, which have come under fire from tenants’ rights groups.
Leviev “is destroying marginal communities in New York City the same way he’s destroying Palestinian communities in the Middle East,” said protester Ethan Heitner, who identified himself as a Jewish member of the group Adalah-NY.
A source close to Leviev said that the protesters were scapegoating the diamond merchant simply because he is an Israeli citizen. The controversies went unmentioned at the Chabad event — and they were also omitted from a lengthy recent story about Leviev in The New York Times Magazine.
“When you read The New York Times article, say a shehechianu, because this is the first time The New York Times has written an article without saying a negative thing in it,” said Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky in his introductory remarks to Leviev’s speech at the Chabad banquet.
The banquet was the final event of a four-day long international Chabad conference that brought together lay leaders and shluchim (emissaries) who work in places as far-flung as Laos, Congo and Armenia.
Earlier in the weekend, attendees discussed new Chabad initiatives, which include not only the movement’s foray into online education but also a program that will give students the tools to decipher the Talmud. Leviev is president and chief donor of the Chabad-led Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS, the most powerful Jewish organization in Russia.
“It was most gratifying to finally have the opportunity to publicly recognize Mr. Leviev for catalyzing Jewish renaissance in the former Soviet Union, as well as for his trailblazing work in other parts of the world,” Kotlarsky said in an e-mail to the Forward. “The philanthropic philosophy that he lives by, which he presented at the banquet, was deeply inspirational to both rabbi and layman alike.”
While a few Hasidic men attended the store opening several days later, the crowd was dominated by celebrities like Isabella Rossellini and Susan Sarandon. In a nod to both sets of guests, the organizers served nonkosher hors d’oeuvres but warned the Jewish attendees.
In one effort to synthesize his two worlds, Leviev employed a running metaphor during his speech at the Chabad banquet. “Every Jew is a diamond,” he said.
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Chabad Gathering: No Jew Left Behind
Rebbe’s emissaries come back from 72 countries and 47 states.
by Jonathan Mark
Associate Editor
There is an old joke that Orthodox Jews tell: “What is the closest religion to Judaism?” Chabad-Lubavitch is the punchline. Everyone “gets it.” Everyone thinks they know about Chabad’s messianism, that a few Chabadniks believe that the rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, who died in 1994, is still alive.In fairness, the rebbe’s messianism or divinity is not advocated in any of Chabad’s official literature; it’s even reprimanded. But fairness has nothing to do with it.This past weekend, just about all the shluchim, nearly 3,000 of the rebbe’s emissaries to 72 countries and 47 states, along with 1,900 of their philanthropic backers, returned to New York for their annual convention. The rebbe was spoken of in past tense, the messiah in future tense.David Berger, chair of Jewish studies at Yeshiva University, recently wrote in the YU newspaper that because of its messianic pretensions, Chabad is “an existential threat to the Jewish religion.” He says Chabadniks ought to be treated with the same halachic mistrust that “Modern Orthodox Jews [have for] traditional Conservative Jews.”But Conservative Jews also are dismissive of Chabad. Andy Silow-Carroll, editor of the New Jersey Jewish News, reported that earlier this year, at the Jewish Theological Seminary, “someone mentioned ‘Chabad,’ and the roomful of rabbis and professors broke out into knowing titters. Dr. Alan Cooper, the JTS provost, rode the titters into a wave of laughter when he repeated the old line: ‘Chabad is the religion closest to Judaism.’”This year’s conference was held in Crown Heights, with the plenary banquet in Pier 94, a vast, several blocks-long former docking hanger on the Hudson River. One shaliach, Rabbi Shlomo Matusof, 91, flew in from Morocco. In 1950, Matusof, a war refugee and former prisoner in Stalin’s gulag, was about to board a ship to join his rebbe in Crown Heights but the rebbe asked him to go to Morocco instead. In the wake of Israel’s independence two years before, Jews in the Arab world were about to experience an upheaval. Matusof built 70 Moroccan Jewish institutions in the last 57 years. He stayed, even when most Moroccan Jews left, tending to the few who didn’t.As God would have it, Rabbi Matusof passed away Saturday night, in the Crown Heights he once thought would be home.Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the rebbe’s emissary to the Bronx, said that Sunday morning they announced Rabbi Matusof’s funeral would be at 11 a.m. After all these years, New York would be his resting place, at the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Queens, a few yards from his rebbe. Instead of a small funeral in Morocco, the old shaliach “had more than 2,500 shluchim at his funeral,” said Rabbi Shemtov.At Pier 94, Rabbi Shemtov remembered, “In 1985-86, 12 of us American boys were sent by the rebbe to be with Rabbi Matusof in Morocco. The dedication that we saw for Yiddishkeit, the love for Jews — now almost everyone of us is out somewhere in the world for Chabad. I like to think that we picked up some of his dedication.”Odd juxtapositions are the charm of these affairs. From the Bronx it was a few tables to Beijing, where Rabbi Shimon Freundlich, who was sent in 2001, is posted.Everyone knows Jews love Chinese food, often unkosher, and Rabbi Freundlich is the closest thing to those Jews, but with a twist. After opening a shul and a Jewish school, he opened a 75-seat Chinese restaurant in China — kosher, of course. They deliver anywhere in Beijing.No group ever displayed more antagonism to Chabad than Satmar. Yet Rabbi Freundlich was joined at the banquet by 20 Satmar chasidim grateful to have a chasidic port of call in China. To YU’s Berger, Chabad is “an existential threat to Judaism,” but when the uber-halachic Satmar businessmen come to Beijing, they happily daven and eat with Rabbi Freundlich. Satmars even contributed more than $150,000 to Freundlich’s new Beijing mikveh. The banquet is a place to renew old friendships. “We met last year,” says Congo’s Rabbi Shlomo Bentolila to a familiar face, “and here we are!”On holidays, the Congo Chabad sends circuit rabbis to Jews in Kenya, Nigeria, Lagos, Namibia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Angola, Rwanda and Zimbabwe. “There is no Jew in Africa who is out of reach,” said the shaliach. “We intend to offer something to every Jewish child, expatriate, or businessman, every Jew we can find.”In Kinshasa, “We have a shul, 40-50 people on a Shabbos. We have a kosher bakery, and 25 kids in our afternoon school.” From the podium, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky called the “roll call” of every country and state, beginning with Chabad of Cyberspace, the chabad.org Web site with links to numerous topics and 900 individualized sites for every Chabad in the world.Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, who 50 years ago first joined the rebbe’s secretariat and remains as the pivotal administrator of Chabad International, recalled that in 1984, when these gatherings started, there were only 60 shluchim, and only from the United States. It was always like a family reunion for the rebbe, said Rabbi Krinsky. After the roll call the room erupted into dancing, though there must be a better word to describe the prancing, leaping, pounding and stomping that had thousands of glasses on every table bouncing, rippling the wines, rippling the waters. Lev Leviev, the mega-philanthropist, was dancing with chasidim, hands on shoulders.Leviev had earlier addressed the gathering in Hebrew, recalling how the rebbe advised him in business, and praising shluchim who operate “behind enemy lines.” Nothing he said was as powerful as the joy in his dancing feet and smiling face.Hey, over there, were Tuvia Teldon and Anschel Pearl, shluchim on Long Island. And over there, hey, it’s Menachem Hartman, the 26-year-old shliach to Vietnam.On Shabbat in Ho Chi Minh City (old Saigon), Rabbi Hartman may be “the closest thing to Judaism,” or maybe there is no truer Judaism than his, in which no Jew is left behind. Surely, those who mock Chabad could get in on the action and find a young rabbi to devote the rest of his life to, say, the Beth Conservative Temple of Hanoi, or the Young Israel of Phnom Penh. While everyone’s joking, Chabad has also opened a Chabad House in Laos.Is there a future for Jews in Ho Chi Minh City?“For sure,” said Rabbi Hartman, beaming. “B’ezrat Hashem, we’ll be opening a kindergarten. Vietnam is the next tiger in Asia!”I was going to ask him what he thought about the jokes people tell about Chabad but I didn’t have the heart. Maybe on a sweltering Vietnamese night he might get to feeling lonely, and when that night comes I didn’t want him to know that Jews in New York were cracking jokes at his expense.This young shaliach would soon be on a plane, heading off to where most of us would never dare. He was the rebbe’s representative. He was pure, the closest thing to Heaven.
by Jonathan Mark
Associate Editor
There is an old joke that Orthodox Jews tell: “What is the closest religion to Judaism?” Chabad-Lubavitch is the punchline. Everyone “gets it.” Everyone thinks they know about Chabad’s messianism, that a few Chabadniks believe that the rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, who died in 1994, is still alive.In fairness, the rebbe’s messianism or divinity is not advocated in any of Chabad’s official literature; it’s even reprimanded. But fairness has nothing to do with it.This past weekend, just about all the shluchim, nearly 3,000 of the rebbe’s emissaries to 72 countries and 47 states, along with 1,900 of their philanthropic backers, returned to New York for their annual convention. The rebbe was spoken of in past tense, the messiah in future tense.David Berger, chair of Jewish studies at Yeshiva University, recently wrote in the YU newspaper that because of its messianic pretensions, Chabad is “an existential threat to the Jewish religion.” He says Chabadniks ought to be treated with the same halachic mistrust that “Modern Orthodox Jews [have for] traditional Conservative Jews.”But Conservative Jews also are dismissive of Chabad. Andy Silow-Carroll, editor of the New Jersey Jewish News, reported that earlier this year, at the Jewish Theological Seminary, “someone mentioned ‘Chabad,’ and the roomful of rabbis and professors broke out into knowing titters. Dr. Alan Cooper, the JTS provost, rode the titters into a wave of laughter when he repeated the old line: ‘Chabad is the religion closest to Judaism.’”This year’s conference was held in Crown Heights, with the plenary banquet in Pier 94, a vast, several blocks-long former docking hanger on the Hudson River. One shaliach, Rabbi Shlomo Matusof, 91, flew in from Morocco. In 1950, Matusof, a war refugee and former prisoner in Stalin’s gulag, was about to board a ship to join his rebbe in Crown Heights but the rebbe asked him to go to Morocco instead. In the wake of Israel’s independence two years before, Jews in the Arab world were about to experience an upheaval. Matusof built 70 Moroccan Jewish institutions in the last 57 years. He stayed, even when most Moroccan Jews left, tending to the few who didn’t.As God would have it, Rabbi Matusof passed away Saturday night, in the Crown Heights he once thought would be home.Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the rebbe’s emissary to the Bronx, said that Sunday morning they announced Rabbi Matusof’s funeral would be at 11 a.m. After all these years, New York would be his resting place, at the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Queens, a few yards from his rebbe. Instead of a small funeral in Morocco, the old shaliach “had more than 2,500 shluchim at his funeral,” said Rabbi Shemtov.At Pier 94, Rabbi Shemtov remembered, “In 1985-86, 12 of us American boys were sent by the rebbe to be with Rabbi Matusof in Morocco. The dedication that we saw for Yiddishkeit, the love for Jews — now almost everyone of us is out somewhere in the world for Chabad. I like to think that we picked up some of his dedication.”Odd juxtapositions are the charm of these affairs. From the Bronx it was a few tables to Beijing, where Rabbi Shimon Freundlich, who was sent in 2001, is posted.Everyone knows Jews love Chinese food, often unkosher, and Rabbi Freundlich is the closest thing to those Jews, but with a twist. After opening a shul and a Jewish school, he opened a 75-seat Chinese restaurant in China — kosher, of course. They deliver anywhere in Beijing.No group ever displayed more antagonism to Chabad than Satmar. Yet Rabbi Freundlich was joined at the banquet by 20 Satmar chasidim grateful to have a chasidic port of call in China. To YU’s Berger, Chabad is “an existential threat to Judaism,” but when the uber-halachic Satmar businessmen come to Beijing, they happily daven and eat with Rabbi Freundlich. Satmars even contributed more than $150,000 to Freundlich’s new Beijing mikveh. The banquet is a place to renew old friendships. “We met last year,” says Congo’s Rabbi Shlomo Bentolila to a familiar face, “and here we are!”On holidays, the Congo Chabad sends circuit rabbis to Jews in Kenya, Nigeria, Lagos, Namibia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Angola, Rwanda and Zimbabwe. “There is no Jew in Africa who is out of reach,” said the shaliach. “We intend to offer something to every Jewish child, expatriate, or businessman, every Jew we can find.”In Kinshasa, “We have a shul, 40-50 people on a Shabbos. We have a kosher bakery, and 25 kids in our afternoon school.” From the podium, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky called the “roll call” of every country and state, beginning with Chabad of Cyberspace, the chabad.org Web site with links to numerous topics and 900 individualized sites for every Chabad in the world.Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, who 50 years ago first joined the rebbe’s secretariat and remains as the pivotal administrator of Chabad International, recalled that in 1984, when these gatherings started, there were only 60 shluchim, and only from the United States. It was always like a family reunion for the rebbe, said Rabbi Krinsky. After the roll call the room erupted into dancing, though there must be a better word to describe the prancing, leaping, pounding and stomping that had thousands of glasses on every table bouncing, rippling the wines, rippling the waters. Lev Leviev, the mega-philanthropist, was dancing with chasidim, hands on shoulders.Leviev had earlier addressed the gathering in Hebrew, recalling how the rebbe advised him in business, and praising shluchim who operate “behind enemy lines.” Nothing he said was as powerful as the joy in his dancing feet and smiling face.Hey, over there, were Tuvia Teldon and Anschel Pearl, shluchim on Long Island. And over there, hey, it’s Menachem Hartman, the 26-year-old shliach to Vietnam.On Shabbat in Ho Chi Minh City (old Saigon), Rabbi Hartman may be “the closest thing to Judaism,” or maybe there is no truer Judaism than his, in which no Jew is left behind. Surely, those who mock Chabad could get in on the action and find a young rabbi to devote the rest of his life to, say, the Beth Conservative Temple of Hanoi, or the Young Israel of Phnom Penh. While everyone’s joking, Chabad has also opened a Chabad House in Laos.Is there a future for Jews in Ho Chi Minh City?“For sure,” said Rabbi Hartman, beaming. “B’ezrat Hashem, we’ll be opening a kindergarten. Vietnam is the next tiger in Asia!”I was going to ask him what he thought about the jokes people tell about Chabad but I didn’t have the heart. Maybe on a sweltering Vietnamese night he might get to feeling lonely, and when that night comes I didn’t want him to know that Jews in New York were cracking jokes at his expense.This young shaliach would soon be on a plane, heading off to where most of us would never dare. He was the rebbe’s representative. He was pure, the closest thing to Heaven.
Fill the evangelical vacuum
The rise of [Rudy Giuliani], with his refusal to follow Mitt Romney in pandering to evangelical morals, bespeaks an American weariness of these over-hashed issues and a thirst for a more holistic set of values. But now that the repudiation of evangelical morality has left a gaping hole, who and what are to fill the vacuum? Enter the world's oldest monotheistic faith and the earth's most family- oriented community.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, by contrast, was the first Jewish personality with a worldwide following to talk about bringing unadulterated biblical values to a mainstream non- Jewish audience. The Rebbe hammered the point repeatedly during his internationally televised speeches. Yet, it remains the one aspect of his visionary program that Chabad, after his death, has all but ignored.
Indeed, last weekend's International Conference of Chabad's Worldwide emissaries, which offered panels on subject as diverse as campus activities to life insurance policies, did not provide for a single discussion on bringing Judaism to mainstream, non-Jewish culture.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
The Lubavitcher Rebbe, by contrast, was the first Jewish personality with a worldwide following to talk about bringing unadulterated biblical values to a mainstream non- Jewish audience. The Rebbe hammered the point repeatedly during his internationally televised speeches. Yet, it remains the one aspect of his visionary program that Chabad, after his death, has all but ignored.
Indeed, last weekend's International Conference of Chabad's Worldwide emissaries, which offered panels on subject as diverse as campus activities to life insurance policies, did not provide for a single discussion on bringing Judaism to mainstream, non-Jewish culture.
Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction or distribution is prohibited without permission.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
Chabad kinus concludes
Billionaire philanthropist Lev Leviev addressed the International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Shluchim.
Speaking in Hebrew before some 4,500 Chabad rabbis and their supporters in New York Sunday evening, Leviev, a Chabad benefactor, celebrated the shluchim, or emissaries, who he said work "behind enemy lines" building Jewish communities in the farthest reaches of the globe. The six-day conference concluded Monday. The annual gathering brought together nearly 3,000 Chabad emissaries from 72 countries for a series of workshops and seminars, where they shared their collective knowledge and experience and offered mutual encouragement to emissaries who often work in isolated communities with little or no Jewish infrastructure.
The international roll call, a high-point of the Sunday evening banquet, highlighted the extent of the organization's reach. Rabbis stood as the names of the countries where they operate were announced, a globe-spanning catalog from New Zealand to the Congo to Alaska. Good wishes were offered to rabbis opening new Chabad outposts this year in South Korea, northern Cyprus, Serbia and the Dominican Republic. Inspired by the teachings of the late rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Chabad emissaries have made lifetime commitments to open Chabad centers in areas where often they are the only established Jewish presence for hundreds of miles. In recent years they have made increasing inroads onto American college campuses and are the leading force for the revitalization of Jewish life in the former Soviet Union.
Speaking in Hebrew before some 4,500 Chabad rabbis and their supporters in New York Sunday evening, Leviev, a Chabad benefactor, celebrated the shluchim, or emissaries, who he said work "behind enemy lines" building Jewish communities in the farthest reaches of the globe. The six-day conference concluded Monday. The annual gathering brought together nearly 3,000 Chabad emissaries from 72 countries for a series of workshops and seminars, where they shared their collective knowledge and experience and offered mutual encouragement to emissaries who often work in isolated communities with little or no Jewish infrastructure.
The international roll call, a high-point of the Sunday evening banquet, highlighted the extent of the organization's reach. Rabbis stood as the names of the countries where they operate were announced, a globe-spanning catalog from New Zealand to the Congo to Alaska. Good wishes were offered to rabbis opening new Chabad outposts this year in South Korea, northern Cyprus, Serbia and the Dominican Republic. Inspired by the teachings of the late rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, Chabad emissaries have made lifetime commitments to open Chabad centers in areas where often they are the only established Jewish presence for hundreds of miles. In recent years they have made increasing inroads onto American college campuses and are the leading force for the revitalization of Jewish life in the former Soviet Union.
Thursday, February 15, 2007
Female Chabad emissaries share experiences at NY gathering
When Dina Freundlich came to Beijing with her husband and two young daughters six years ago, there was no significant Jewish infrastructure. The community had never had a rabbi, there was no Jewish school, no kosher meat and only a very limited number of kosher food items were available.
Six years later, the community has grown tremendously. The Freundlich family, sent as Chabad emissaries, established a Sunday school and a Montessori school, and they brought over a butcher who enables them to supply kosher meat to four cities in China. They also spearheaded the building of a mikve (ritual bath), the first in China since World War II, which includes Chinese touches such as a pagoda and a carved dome ceiling, as well as a jacuzzi, multi-jet shower and massage services.
Approximately 1,200 to 1,400 Jews live in Beijing - employees of embassies, academics, students and foreign businessmen. About 3,000 Jews visit each year.
Freundlich is one of 2,000 female Chabad emissaries who came to New York from as far away as Singapore and Uzbekistan last week to learn from each other's experiences and to discuss the future of the movement. Topics addressed included the "revival" of world Jewry, contending with terrorism, leveraging the latest technology for spiritual outreach, and "breaking the ice" in new communities.
"Sometimes I go to bed thinking I've been pulled in a million directions, but I feel I've done something to make the world a better place," said Freundlich, who grew up as an emissary child in South Africa.
Chabad's emissary movement has trained and ordained thousands of rabbis, educators, ritual slaughterers and ritual circumcisers, together with their wives, to establish communities around the world aimed at Jewish outreach. Today there are roughly 4,000 emissary families, with growth of about 100 families each year.
"It makes me proud to fulfill the dream of the Rebbe [the late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson] to create a home for every Jew in the world, and I am proud to be a part of his team," said Freundlich.
The five day conference ended Sunday night at the Brooklyn Marriott, at a gala dinner that also served as a tribute to Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka Schneerson, widow of the late Rebbe. All the women were dressed in skirts and long sleeves, but it was clear that contemporary fashion had slipped through the cracks. Tight, form-fitting skirts, patent leather belts, and fashionable boots were all part of the evening attire.
Contrary to popular perception Chabad insists that women are not insular, nor are they secondary to men. On top of juggling large families, women run Chabad houses on college campuses, provide substance abuse counseling and share the responsibilities with their spouses.
"It is a perception that comes from judging things that are synagogue based, but Judaism is not a synagogue based religion," said Rivkah Slonim, an emissary at the University of Binghamton, where her and her husband run one of the largest and most successful Chabad houses in the country. "Ninety-nine percent of ritual doesn't take place in the synagogue."
Women and men are equally obligated to study the Torah required to observe mitzvoth, but women, unlike men, are not required to study above and beyond that because of their household obligations, Slonim said.
"The Rebbe going back all the way to the first, greatly encouraged women to develop every aspect of their personality including their intellect."
The late Rebbe recognized that in contemporary times, where women have more time, and are not just engaged in day to day household activities, they need to use their time to study Torah, according to Slonim.
Six years later, the community has grown tremendously. The Freundlich family, sent as Chabad emissaries, established a Sunday school and a Montessori school, and they brought over a butcher who enables them to supply kosher meat to four cities in China. They also spearheaded the building of a mikve (ritual bath), the first in China since World War II, which includes Chinese touches such as a pagoda and a carved dome ceiling, as well as a jacuzzi, multi-jet shower and massage services.
Approximately 1,200 to 1,400 Jews live in Beijing - employees of embassies, academics, students and foreign businessmen. About 3,000 Jews visit each year.
Freundlich is one of 2,000 female Chabad emissaries who came to New York from as far away as Singapore and Uzbekistan last week to learn from each other's experiences and to discuss the future of the movement. Topics addressed included the "revival" of world Jewry, contending with terrorism, leveraging the latest technology for spiritual outreach, and "breaking the ice" in new communities.
"Sometimes I go to bed thinking I've been pulled in a million directions, but I feel I've done something to make the world a better place," said Freundlich, who grew up as an emissary child in South Africa.
Chabad's emissary movement has trained and ordained thousands of rabbis, educators, ritual slaughterers and ritual circumcisers, together with their wives, to establish communities around the world aimed at Jewish outreach. Today there are roughly 4,000 emissary families, with growth of about 100 families each year.
"It makes me proud to fulfill the dream of the Rebbe [the late Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson] to create a home for every Jew in the world, and I am proud to be a part of his team," said Freundlich.
The five day conference ended Sunday night at the Brooklyn Marriott, at a gala dinner that also served as a tribute to Rebbetzin Chaya Mushka Schneerson, widow of the late Rebbe. All the women were dressed in skirts and long sleeves, but it was clear that contemporary fashion had slipped through the cracks. Tight, form-fitting skirts, patent leather belts, and fashionable boots were all part of the evening attire.
Contrary to popular perception Chabad insists that women are not insular, nor are they secondary to men. On top of juggling large families, women run Chabad houses on college campuses, provide substance abuse counseling and share the responsibilities with their spouses.
"It is a perception that comes from judging things that are synagogue based, but Judaism is not a synagogue based religion," said Rivkah Slonim, an emissary at the University of Binghamton, where her and her husband run one of the largest and most successful Chabad houses in the country. "Ninety-nine percent of ritual doesn't take place in the synagogue."
Women and men are equally obligated to study the Torah required to observe mitzvoth, but women, unlike men, are not required to study above and beyond that because of their household obligations, Slonim said.
"The Rebbe going back all the way to the first, greatly encouraged women to develop every aspect of their personality including their intellect."
The late Rebbe recognized that in contemporary times, where women have more time, and are not just engaged in day to day household activities, they need to use their time to study Torah, according to Slonim.
"Certainly the contemporary Chabad woman does not see herself as disconnected from Torah study."
The rift between motherhood and professional life is less of an issue in the Chabad world, according to Sara Esther Crispe, editor of TheJewishWoman.org, a Chabad website launched a year ago that offers intellectual, emotional and spiritual writings on a range of women's issues including motherhood, and marriage.
On top of juggling large families, the women run Chabad houses on college campuses, provide substance abuse counseling, and share in their husbands' responsibilities.
Chabad women and men are equally obligated to study the Torah, but the women are not required to study beyond that because of their household obligations, said Rivkah Slonim, an emissary at the State University of New York at Binghamton, where she and her husband run one of the largest Chabad houses in the US.
"The rebbes, going back all the way to the first, greatly encouraged women to develop every aspect of their personality, including their intellect," she said.
Sara Esther Crispe, editor of TheJewishWoman.org, a year old Chabad Web site that offers intellectual, emotional and spiritual writings on a range of women's issues including motherhood and marriage, said, "In the modern world, there is always a big rift, either you are a good mother, or you have a career. There is major pressure to choose, but these women [the emissaries] have shown that you can simultaneously do both."
Many of their daughters, "little emissaries," also came to New York for the conference, a rare chance to socialize with others like themselves. The kids participated in seminars on how to deal with cultural isolation.
At one point, they were asked to compare where they were from and where they get their kosher nosh (snacks). The girls were thrilled to be in New York, where they had all the kosher snacks they desired.
The night ended with a roll call by country, and then the emissaries were asked to rise by their decades of service. It began with just a few, and as the decades passed more and more women stood until the whole room was standing.
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