Jewish Internet Pioneer’s Brick-and-Mortar Legacy in Baton Rouge
by Tzemach Feller – chabad.org
In the late 1980s, Rabbi Y.Y. Kazen recognized that the future lay in what would soon become the World Wide Web. This vision would lead him to found Chabad-Lubavitch of Cyberspace, also known as Chabad.org. By the time Kazen tragically passed away in 1998 at the age of 44, The New York Times hailed him as a “web pioneer.” His brainchild, Chabad.org, has been dedicated in his everlasting memory ever since.
This weekend (12 Kislev) will mark 25 years since YY Kazen’s passing. And while the rabbi’s digital legacy is massive—Chabad.org saw 55 million unique visitors last year—his youngest son, Rabbi Peretz Kazen, is now embarking on an ambitious campaign to build the first brick-and-mortar memorial for the virtual visionary. The younger Kazen and his wife, Mushka, are co-directors of Chabad at LSU and Baton Rouge, La., and the new project they envision is the YY Kazen Campus at Chabad of Baton Rouge.
“Jewish life in Baton Rouge is robust, inspiring and uplifting,” Kazen told Chabad.org. “It is a smaller community but a very vibrant community, made up of people who are interested in experiencing their heritage and ready to explore it in deep ways.”
For the past eight years, the Kazens have operated their Chabad center in Louisiana’s capital city out of their modest home, as well as rental spaces around town.
The Kazens teach Jewish classes and courses and host celebrations out of rented spaces. Rosh Hashanah saw a shofar sounding on the levee overlooking the mighty Mississippi River. The Chabad Jewish student group they lead on the campus of Louisiana State University (LSU), which serves the 300 or so Jewish students enrolled in the university, gathered for Shabbat and holiday celebrations at a local student union.
But absent—until now—was a space that could truly be called home for Chabad of Baton Rouge. As the Kazen family marks YY’s 25th yahrtzeit, Chabad of Baton Rouge has launched a campaign with the slogan, “From bytes to bricks, his legacy will live on.”
“This campus will not just be a big leap; it will be a monumental shift in everything that’s happening for the sake of Jewish life here in town,” Kazen said.
The campus will include a large Jewish library, classrooms for children, a mikvah, student lounge, and a multi-purpose social hall for programs and Jewish events.
In creating a space to enhance Jewish life, Kazen said he is drawing on what his father did in the digital realm. “Driven by boundless optimism and infinite love for Jewish people the world over, my father strived to enhance Jewish life and Jewish learning for people on every part of the Jewish spectrum, every age, every level of knowledge and background,” Kazen explained. “In a microcosm, that’s what this is going to do for the Jewish community and everyone that encounters this facility in Baton Rouge.”
Much as his father envisioned a site that would serve Jewish people of all ages, regardless of how much—or how little—they knew about their heritage, the younger Kazen has set out to build a home for Baton Rouge’s Jewish community that will reflect those ideals.
“My father’s vision was to bring the light and warmth and beauty of our heritage to people in a way that they can come to and appreciate and value and grow from,” Kazen said. “That is what we’re going to be doing in this space.
“It is going to be a physical manifestation of the vision he carried out in the virtual space.”
To donate one or more bricks or otherwise contribute to the new YY Kazen Campus at Chabad of Baton Rouge, please visit their funding page here.
