My Story 43

The new millennium found us isolated, fearful for our own safety as well as the country's, and fairly hopeless. My applications for rabbinic positions around the world were either getting rejections, or simply being ignored. To make matters worse, rockets were now falling in our area on an almost daily basis. Sima's brother had a job that brought him in contact with many powerful American Orthodox rabbis. One of them was Pesach Lerner, the head of the Young Israel movement at that time. He told Lerner of our predicament, and Lerner said that there would be no problem getting me a position in the U.S. He was expecting my call.  My seventeen-year absence from the American scene caused me to be ignorant of much that had transpired in the interim. For reasons I have described elsewhere, Young Israel, which had been founded as a reaction to the "Old World" ways of the Orthodox leadership, (Mordecai Kaplan, the founder of the Reconstructionist movement, had been a founding figure in Young Israel), had, in the meantime, become part of the Right Wing of Orthodoxy. Sima and I both remember  Young Israels without "mechitzot" (partitions between men and women) and Young Israel social dances. Now, Young Israel was completely aligned with a position to the Right of Yeshivah University, and they were vocal in their disdain for the entire Y.U., OU, and RCA stranglehold on Judaism. What's more, by 2000, they were even denying that Young Israel had ever been anything but Right Wing. I had no idea of any of this. I called Lerner. I told him briefly what we were going through. By not being a member of the Rabbinical Council of America (for which one had to either have ordination from Yeshiva University or have some powerful connections), doors were being slammed in my face. He said "Yeah, they're terrible. Don't worry, we have plenty of positions for you. How big a mechitzah do you need?" I was taken aback by the question. Since the 1950s, the mechitzah had become the very symbol of Orthodoxy, separating it from non-Orhtodox forms of Judaism. Moshe Feinstein had even written an opinion that it was a Biblical requirement (though neither in the Bible, Talmud, RAMBAM, or Shulchan Aruch). Others saw it as an ancient custom, whose violation was a sign of slipping away from halachah. My halachic mentors, both Sepharadic and Hungarian, saw the mechitzah-less synagogue as a problem, but not so much of a problem that a good-intentioned rabbi should not seek a position in such a community. In fact, until about 1980, the placement service of the RCA was putting YU graduates in synagogues without mechitzah, both those that identified as Orthodox and those that identified as Conservative. I told Lerner "I don't care about the height of the mechitzah". "What?!?! Then you are a Conservative rabbi! We"ll both pretend this conversation never took place". He quickly hung up on me. I realize that it is not nice to say, but I will go to my grave cursing Pesach Lerner. I will never grace him with the title "Rabbi".We contacted two powerful rabbis, who had both held high positions in the RCA. They were both old and in failing health. One was Sima's family rabbi, and the other, the rabbi who had taken me under his wing in 1971 in Columbus, Ohio. They were both supportive of me, and contacted the then kingpins in the RCA. A meeting was set up with their Israel representative. The representative gave me much valuable information on the current state of American Orthodoxy. Yes, he said, he could find me a position, but it would take at least three years. I told him that I could not wait that long.  He emailed me with two leads, one in Palm Springs, the other in Pawtucket , Rhode Island. I applied to Palm Springs, but never got the courtesy of a reply. I knew a rabbi in Providence, Rhode Island. He informed me that the Pawtucket community had already hired a rabbi. I understood that I was facing a dead end. I consulted major rabbis, who felt that as my back was against the wall, it would be justified to take a non-Orthodox position. I thought this far-fetched, as I was already considered too Right Wing for most Orthodox congregations. As I checked into the idea, I found that it was not as crazy as it sounded. Most Orthodox congregations were trying to maintain a certain set of standards and traditions. Spirituality was not a consideration.  Since the '80s, many fundamental changes had come into Conservatism, which, by 2000, had brought it from the largest of the movements in America, to the smallest. Conservative rabbis were of insufficient numbers, and were priced out of the reach of smaller congregations. Many were hiring Orthodox or Reform rabbis, or even those with bogus credentials. Perhaps I COULD find a place open enough to listen to my message. I began sending resumes. I  lined up four interviews. Sima and I set out on a two-week trip to the States (Sima had not been back since our 1984 move, I had been back only once, for a week, in 1992, visiting my Mother before her death). We knew that our survival hinged on the results of this trip. Tearfully, we embarked. We put our family in the charge of our eldest son, Nachman, who was all of twenty-two. My brother-in-law graciously allowed us to use his home as our base of operation. Our kids back in Shoqeda emailed us messages of encouragement. These two weeks would determine our survival. We prayed, We cried. We hoped. Of the four interviews, one looked promising. It was in Island Park, New York; a small Long Island community. But nothing was definite. We returned to Israel, not sure if salvation was on its way, or whether we had gambled our last money in vain. We got back to Shoqeda two days before the Shavu'ot holiday. Circumstances developed that meant that we had to get out of Israel fast. We would not have the luxury .of a month or two to see how things developed. I was back in the U.S. a week later, Sima came a week after that. As the events of those days are still very painful for me and my family, I will leave out the details. Suffice it to say that everything came caving in on us, and we had to go into an uncertain future.