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Mitzvos at the Jewish Teen Olympics

Last Friday was the finale of the JCC Maccabi Games in Memphis, Tennessee. The games lasted five days with over 1,250 young Jewish athletes and several thousand guests who came from across the United States, Canada, Mexico and Israel.

A special area of the JCC’s main lobby was designated for the Chabad “I did a Mitzvah” stand, which became an integral part of the Maccabi games. The stand was all thanks to the close relationship the Shliach to Tennessee, Rabbi Levi Klein, shares with the Memphis JCC.

The prominent location of the stand attracted over 1,000 teens, parents and coaches. 850 put on tefillin, many of them for the very first time. 250 teens took part in a mezuzah project, hundreds of others received certificates with their Hebrew birthday and many shabbos candle kits were distributed to the girls.

The highlight was the special “I did a Mitzvah” pin, created by CTeen, which also took part in operating the stand. Close to 1,000 pins were proudly worn by the teens and guests who indeed “Did a Mitzvah.”

In this video, friends celebrate with a teen who put on Tefillin for first time in his life.

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4 Comments

  • Maccabees

    Let me comment the the Maccabees fought against the Greek Culture who were the ones the started the concept of Olympics (which is an Avoda Zoro). The whole theme is worship of a perfect body not the soul.

    The Rebbe was very much against this concept. So how are we as frum followers of the original Maccabees going to something that signifies the opposite of them?

  • Milhouse

    #1 That’s where the Jews are. The Rebbe was dead set against zionism too, but we still do mivtzo’im at the Israel Parade. He was against Catholicism, but we just saw pictures of bochurim on Merkos shlichus putting tfillin on a Jewish monk. He was against most blotte in which yidden find themselves, but to help those yidden we have to go where they are. The whole concept of the Maccabi games is a perversion, and we should not *participate*, but we can’t ignore it and pretend that all the yidden who go there aren’t yidden.