An Outsider Comes Home to 5000 Chabad Colleagues
Tonight I attended the international Chabad emissary conference – the Kinus Hashluchim HaOlami – for the first time in sixteen years. When I was the Rebbe’s emissary at Oxford University I came annually. But with my split from Chabad over my inclusion of non-Jewish students at Oxford, I stopped.
A lot has changed in that time. The man responsible for my firing from Chabad was himself fired. My close friend Cory Booker, whom I made president of our organization and who became the symbol of the non-Jewish outreach that cost me my position in Lubavitch, has become an American political superstar and one of the most sough-after speakers in the American Jewish community and will be the guest of honor at next month’s Colel Chabad dinner. Most significantly, the Rebbe passed away a few months after the last conference I attended.
So it was with some trepidation and more than a little lingering pain that I joined my former colleagues in Chabad’s annual celebration of its global network of Ambassadors.
How did it feel? Like being reborn. Like coming home and having a central riddle of one’s life make sense again.
What motivated a modern-orthodox boy of eight to fall in love with a Hassidic Jewish group who in the 1970’s was largely dismissed as a cult? More than anything it was this: Chabad made me feel like my life mattered. In a private audience the Rebbe told me I was born for great things. I was part of an eternal people who had vastly contributed to the dissemination of G-d’s light in an otherwise dark world. Through persecutions and holocausts, assimilation and intermarriage, materialism and ignorance, that people were now endangered. And there was a sage who lived in Brooklyn whose English was broken but whose determination was resolute. He would, before he died, breathe new life into a fading nation. He beckoned me to join him as an agent of Jewish renewal.
Chabad became the passion of my life. Defying my parents’ strong objections I left home at fourteen to be part of the Rebbe’s dream of a global Jewish renaissance and never looked back. A few years later I was his official representative at an important center of higher education, surrounded by impressionable young minds who thirsted for spiritual purpose.
I knew then in theory what I witnessed tonight in practice: Chabad would one day take over the Jewish world. Why? Because of the grandnest of their vision and the passion with which they executed their mission. Other Jewish organizations sought to educate the people about their tradition. But Chabad sought to raise the earth’s inhabitants to a higher G-d-consciousness and to make Judaism the driving force in every decision of daily life. The passion and dedication of Chabad emissaries was infectious. They did not preach the Torah. Rather it coursed their veins, seeping out of every pore. Hassidic teachings about the approachability of G-d and the accessibility of a higher spiritual reality was grafted onto the average Chabad activists’ very DNA, becoming an inseparable part of their character and personality.
Witnessing the fulfillment of that premonition tonight at the conference was an awakening. Chabad is no longer merely a Jewish movement. It is Judaism. I find it astonishing that Prime Minister Netanyahu flew in from Israel to attend the Jewish Federations Annual General Assembly but bypassed the Chabad Shluchim conference. If an Israeli Prime Minister wants to be part of the gradual unfolding of modern Jewish history then he has to address Chabad. No other organization even comes close to its global reach and grass roots impact. And it is growing exponentially.
When I last attended the Chabad Shluchim conference there were a few hundred of us from about twenty countries. We all fit into a small ballroom. A decade and a half later there are 5000 from 80 countries. No doubt, with its staggering birthrate and about half of all its members dedicating themselves to a lifelong posting, by the year 2020 Chabad will be fielding more than 15,000 emissaries in nearly all the world’s nations and will be the mainstream Jewish branch in most. In countries like France, Russia, Australia, and Britain this has largely happened. But even in countries with robust and highly developed Jewish communities like the United States and Canada the smart money will be on Chabad to emerge as leader.
Of course, it is not just Chabad which has changed so dramatically over the past 16 years. I have changed as well. My love for Chabad is just as deep, but I am past my infatuation. I see flaws that need to be corrected. The leadership must strive to be more democratic. A growing nepotism must be reversed in favor of the meritocracy which was responsible for Chabad’s astonishing cultivation of entrepreneurial talent. Most of all, if it is to impact the mainstream rather than just the Jewish world Chabad must finally overcome its Jewish insularity and embrace the Rebbe’s collective vision of a global Messianic awakening.
Indeed, what was most missing from the gathering tonight was the Rebbe’s tangible presence. Chabad was never about money. Indeed, for me it was a refuge from modernity’s corrosive materialism. But a global movement with an enormous budget must honor the heroic philanthropists who make their work possible. But it must be done in a manner that never compromises the Rebbe’s defining characteristic of treating paupers and billionaires as being of equal and infinite value.
But whatever my reservations, the electrifying spectacle tonight more than compensates. Not long ago the Jewish people were made to believe that if they were to succeed in the modern world they would have to make accommodations with strict adherence to tradition. Scraggly beards would have to be shaved off. Large families would have to give way to two kids and a dog. Names like Elazar and Tova would have change to Leo and Tiffany. Yeshiva and smicha would have to be forfeited in favor of Wharton and a Masters. Even orthodox Jews embraced this vision, if not in the name of progress than at least in the name of survival.
And yet, the movement that has superseded them all is that which continues to believe that Judaism is so potent that the world will slowly bend to accommodate it rather than the reverse.
Sam
“But with my split from Chabad over my inclusion of non-Jewish students at Oxford, I stopped.”
So I see Shmuli’s version of events, in which he plays the martyr whom the Rebbe promised would go on “to great things.” (P.S. I wonder what he considers the “great thing” to be – going on schlichus or huggin women on Shalom In The Home.)
Does anyone know the full story of what happened – why he was fired?
ykm
go nissi its nice to see you
It kills you you-re the outsider
You were fired because for all your grand talk, you believe yourself to be bigger than Chabad. I don’t see anything’s changed. You still believe you can teach everyone else & no one in Lubavitch has got a clue. Who are YOU to tell Chabad what to do & how to do it? It still kills you that no one from the establishment gives a hoot about what you have to say. You remind me of a kid who keeps pressing his nose against the window, begging to be let in. Ain’t never gonna happen.
Can you please go away? You don’t speak for us, you speak for yourself as a self-serving “superstar-wannabee.” I’m sick of hearing about you & from you. Webby, I don’t understand why CrownHeights.info gives him a voice. He’s a nothing with a massive ego.
Elki
Dear Shmuley, you write elogquently, even poetically.I watched the magnificent event right here on CHI, and as you did, I, tool, felt that the future of Judaism was in that space last night.
But, Shmuley why the need to add:
“… But it must be done in a manner that never compromises the Rebbe’s defining characteristic of treating paupers and billionaires as being of equal and infinite value.”
Why add a BUT? What would have been wrong with a sincere expression of belonging and appreciation for all the spiritual grandeur? The word BUT almost always kills all that came before it. I hope you continue speaking writing inspiring and being inspired.
Nepotism...
The leadership must strive to be more democratic. A growing nepotism must be reversed in favor of the meritocracy…
how true! finally someone should say the emes. Shlichus is too corrupt! how many yungerleit can’t find shlichus or fail due to greed, egotism and favortism etc.
To Shmuley Boteach
B”H
I agree with some of what you write. But here is the ikar:
If you want to change the system, do what the Rebbe wants, etc., then do it. I’m sure if you had an exemplary shlichus, everyone would want to copy you and you wouldn’t ace to spend time annoyingly criticizing everyone… You have some points, but they failed the first time because you may think you love the Rebbe, but you can’t be a chossid if you don’t follow halacha… Case in point: Your article in support of gays in the Wall Street Journal. You can’t purify yourself in a mikva while holding on to a shaigetz…
It’s not your fault. It’s just your modern orthodox upbringing coming back. But you can’t be modern orthodox with a Chabad twist. Ain’t gonna work… May you be blessed to see the emes and be able to carry out all that the Rebbe blessed you to!
english boy who knows
one of the big issues at oxford was that the lchaim society was open to non jews as well, meaning that on friday night there were tens if not hundreds of non jews sitting down to dinner with the jewish students, when your whole purpose is to be mekarev the jewish students making sure they marry “in” its understandable that it evoked a strong reaction. the straw that broke the camels back was that rabin was invited to speak (right after oslo circa summer of 1994, the powers that be felt that it was inappropriate that a chabad shliach should bring him down after he disregarded the rebbes opinions etc. ironically on the day that he was scheduled to speak there was a suicide bomb and he flew right back to israel. the rabbi who shmuelly says fired him tried very hard to keep him in the fold against the wishes of the head shliach al asar, and suffered alot of anguish in the aftermath regarding the whole parsha. vedal.
Oh Yawn,
So you came to the kinnus after 16 years. Who cares? Why do you have to write a whole story about it. You have always been an attention seeker, this article fits right in with your character.
proud 2 be chabad
dear shmully, yes you can come home. welcome . your talents and integrity are a gift from hashem and its inspiring to see them channeled for the good.
Android
Why can’t we can be open enough to hear what shmuely has to say , maybe he is saying something that we can learn from! We as Lubavitchers tend to be very pompous when everyone doesn’t act like a clone of ourselves! The Rebbe didn’t put everyone in boxes!The Rebbe had “shluchim” in places we will never know of who he was connected to who were not shomer mitzvot! How hypocritical of us to not have Ahavas Yisroel for Shmuely while espousing it at the Shluchim Convention!!
Shliach
I wonder who the shliach that was involved in firing shmuley and ended up to be fired himself was? Shmuley you hit it on the nail. KolHakovad!!
Like Rabbi Gorelik from Milan said when he was told to “get rid” of a sliach “Communism ended”. Enough is enough!!!
aaa
To 11,
The shliach who had Shmuly fired is still a shliach. no matter what stalin says. Just because communisim still exists in certain areas of the world cannot take a way shlichus from a man who gave his life to the rebbe and shlichus.
CHT
If they accepted Shmulik, who knows some days they will accept Meshichistim.
Shmuly fan
To #7
Very interesting. Shmuly got fired because he brought Rabin to speak at campus. Two years ago Peres was “honored” to speak at the levaya of the Holtzbergs. Disgrace to everything we should stand for. Peres’s policies is what caused thier murder. If you disagree look up the Rebbe’s sichos on the matter.
yc
hi nissi (YKM)