Female Chabad Emissaries Share Experiences at NY Conference
Brooklyn, NY — 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.
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.
tznius
Very nice article except “Tight, form-fitting skirts, patent leather belts, and fashionable boots were all part of the evening attire.”
Come on, lets work on our tznius…people do notice :-(
a trying to be dan lchaf schus CHer
Tight, form-fitting skirts, patent leather belts, and fashionable boots were all part of the evening attire.
Is this true?????
Is this the message we want to give????
Isn’t this what the kinus is all about????
Shluchim, you are the role models of the world. Let’s be more sensitive to this vital issue and emulate our dear and holy Rebbitzin in true bas melech panima style.
Rising..
What is wrong with a belt and warm fitted boots to keep me warm if its 100% tznuis??
Where is that “falling through the cracks”??
A reader from Carroll Street
i see at least 3 of us were disturbed by the same thing, tsnius. Yes, you have to also take in to account the reporter (maybe he’s describing the situation in a distorted way) but it shouldn’t urprise us. There’s a tsnius problem everywhere in Lubavitch. Some of our shluchos aren’t immune to everybody’s detriment. To their communities, to themselves and to Lubavitch. Hashem should give them the koach to pass this nisayon.
In Regards to the message from tznius
What is wrong with fashionable boots???tznius doesnt mean you have to look ugly and out style. “tznius” fashionable boots???? do you really think thats not tznius? we are happy thats what bothers you and thats what you were focusing on at the lovely evening, peoples fashionable boots.
to rising...
i think people were more reacting to “Tight, form-fitting skirts”. That is just wrong. Against halacha. Period. It was not talking about fitted boots.
A reader from Carroll Street
although boots can also be not exactly tsnius depending on the heel and how ostentatious they are. There’s nothing wrong with looking nice although I don’t know why people have to copy goyishe fashions (isn’t that what being “fashionable” is? correct me if I’m wrong)
The main thing though that stuck out and I’m happy people are complaining. It shows we’re still sensitive to the laws of tsnius) is the mention of the tight form-fitting skirts as to rising… pointed out. Again this is from the Jerusalem Post which isn’t necessarily so Lubavitch friendly to begin with so take it all with a grain of salt.
But I did notice reading in two different n’shei newsletters, readers reading about being disapointed in their shluchos and their tsnius so it sounds like there is somewhat of a problem everywhere. Hashem should give all the ladies of Lubavitch koach to pass this test!