Posted to Chabad News on

A Journalist View of Chabad at the Banquet

Jonathan Mark – The Jewish Week

NEW YORK, NY — There is an old joke that Orthodox Jews tell: “What is the closest religion to Judaism?” Chabad-Lubavitch is the punchline. Everyone “gets it.” Everyone thinks they know about Chabad’s messianism, that a few Chabadniks believe that the rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson, who died in 1994, is still alive.

In fairness, the rebbe’s messianism or divinity is not advocated in any of Chabad’s official literature; it’s even reprimanded. But fairness has nothing to do with it.

This past weekend, just about all the shluchim, nearly 3,000 of the rebbe’s emissaries to 72 countries and 47 states, along with 1,900 of their philanthropic backers, returned to New York for their annual convention. The rebbe was spoken of in past tense, the messiah in future tense.

David Berger, chair of Jewish studies at Yeshiva University, recently wrote in the YU newspaper that because of its messianic pretensions, Chabad is “an existential threat to the Jewish religion.” He says Chabadniks ought to be treated with the same halachic mistrust that “Modern Orthodox Jews [have for] traditional Conservative Jews.”

But Conservative Jews also are dismissive of Chabad. Andy Silow-Carroll, editor of the New Jersey Jewish News, reported that earlier this year, at the Jewish Theological Seminary, “someone mentioned ‘Chabad,’ and the roomful of rabbis and professors broke out into knowing titters. Dr. Alan Cooper, the JTS provost, rode the titters into a wave of laughter when he repeated the old line: ‘Chabad is the religion closest to Judaism.’”

This year’s conference was held in Crown Heights, with the plenary banquet in Pier 94, a vast, several blocks-long former docking hanger on the Hudson River.

One shaliach, Rabbi Shlomo Matusof, 91, flew in from Morocco. In 1950, Matusof, a war refugee and former prisoner in Stalin’s gulag, was about to board a ship to join his rebbe in Crown Heights but the rebbe asked him to go to Morocco instead. In the wake of Israel’s independence two years before, Jews in the Arab world were about to experience an upheaval. Matusof built 70 Moroccan Jewish institutions in the last 57 years. He stayed, even when most Moroccan Jews left, tending to the few who didn’t.

As God would have it, Rabbi Matusof passed away Saturday night, in the Crown Heights he once thought would be home.

Rabbi Levi Shemtov, the rebbe’s emissary to the Bronx, said that Sunday morning they announced Rabbi Matusof’s funeral would be at 11 a.m. After all these years, New York would be his resting place, at the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Queens, a few yards from his rebbe. Instead of a small funeral in Morocco, the old shaliach “had more than 2,500 shluchim at his funeral,” said Rabbi Shemtov.

At Pier 94, Rabbi Shemtov remembered, “In 1985-86, 12 of us American boys were sent by the rebbe to be with Rabbi Matusof in Morocco. The dedication that we saw for Yiddishkeit, the love for Jews — now almost everyone of us is out somewhere in the world for Chabad. I like to think that we picked up some of his dedication.”

Odd juxtapositions are the charm of these affairs. From the Bronx it was a few tables to Beijing, where Rabbi Shimon Freundlich, who was sent in 2001, is posted.

Everyone knows Jews love Chinese food, often unkosher, and Rabbi Freundlich is the closest thing to those Jews, but with a twist. After opening a shul and a Jewish school, he opened a 75-seat Chinese restaurant in China — kosher, of course. They deliver anywhere in Beijing.

No group ever displayed more antagonism to Chabad than Satmar. Yet Rabbi Freundlich was joined at the banquet by 20 Satmar chasidim grateful to have a chasidic port of call in China. To YU’s Berger, Chabad is “an existential threat to Judaism,” but when the uber-halachic Satmar businessmen come to Beijing, they happily daven and eat with Rabbi Freundlich. Satmars even contributed more than $150,000 to Freundlich’s new Beijing mikveh.

The banquet is a place to renew old friendships. “We met last year,” says Congo’s Rabbi Shlomo Bentolila to a familiar face, “and here we are!”
On holidays, the Congo Chabad sends circuit rabbis to Jews in Kenya, Nigeria, Lagos, Namibia, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Angola, Rwanda and Zimbabwe.

“There is no Jew in Africa who is out of reach,” said the shaliach. “We intend to offer something to every Jewish child, expatriate, or businessman, every Jew we can find.”

In Kinshasa, “We have a shul, 40-50 people on a Shabbos. We have a kosher bakery, and 25 kids in our afternoon school.”

From the podium, Rabbi Moshe Kotlarsky called the “roll call” of every country and state, beginning with Chabad of Cyberspace, the chabad.org Web site with links to numerous topics and 900 individualized sites for every Chabad in the world.

Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, who 50 years ago first joined the rebbe’s secretariat and remains as the pivotal administrator of Chabad International, recalled that in 1984, when these gatherings started, there were only 60 shluchim, and only from the United States. It was always like a family reunion for the rebbe, said Rabbi Krinsky.

After the roll call the room erupted into dancing, though there must be a better word to describe the prancing, leaping, pounding and stomping that had thousands of glasses on every table bouncing, rippling the wines, rippling the waters. Lev Leviev, the mega-philanthropist, was dancing with chasidim, hands on shoulders.

Leviev had earlier addressed the gathering in Hebrew, recalling how the rebbe advised him in business, and praising shluchim who operate “behind enemy lines.” Nothing he said was as powerful as the joy in his dancing feet and smiling face.

Hey, over there, were Tuvia Teldon and Anschel Pearl, shluchim on Long Island. And over there, hey, it’s Menachem Hartman, the 26-year-old shliach to Vietnam.

On Shabbat in Ho Chi Minh City (old Saigon), Rabbi Hartman may be “the closest thing to Judaism,” or maybe there is no truer Judaism than his, in which no Jew is left behind. Surely, those who mock Chabad could get in on the action and find a young rabbi to devote the rest of his life to, say, the Beth Conservative Temple of Hanoi, or the Young Israel of Phnom Penh. While everyone’s joking, Chabad has also opened a Chabad House in Laos.

Is there a future for Jews in Ho Chi Minh City?

“For sure,” said Rabbi Hartman, beaming. “B’ezrat Hashem, we’ll be opening a kindergarten. Vietnam is the next tiger in Asia!”

I was going to ask him what he thought about the jokes people tell about Chabad but I didn’t have the heart. Maybe on a sweltering Vietnamese night he might get to feeling lonely, and when that night comes I didn’t want him to know that Jews in New York were cracking jokes at his expense.

This young shaliach would soon be on a plane, heading off to where most of us would never dare. He was the rebbe’s representative. He was pure, the closest thing to Heaven.

Related Articles

24 Comments

  • everyoneisachossid

    I personally do not like this article. much to much room is given to David berger. At most he should have been a little footnote at the end of the article.

  • To everyoneisachossid

    YOu missed the point:

    Berger was made to look like the fool he is in this article.

    What a Fantastic article!! From an "outsider’s" point of view, could there be nicer portrayel of Chabad?

    Nachas far unz alein un avadai far’n rebbe’n!

  • we need Moshiach now!!

    sooooooooooooooooo sad!!!!!!!!!!!How can you talk about the Rebbe in past tense! The Rebbe is still our Rebbe!!! May HaShem help you all!!!!!!

  • sh

    20 years ago it was the bigest chilul hashem that chabad put up a tfilin sign now these peaple do it them self and say that thay were the first to do it

  • inspiring

    Beautiful article. May we all go from strength to strength and bring nachas to the ready, and already merit the geulah!

  • Sam

    "In fairness, the rebbe’s messianism or divinity is not advocated in any of Chabad’s official literature; it’s even reprimanded. "

    Oh really?! Who ever was the first to say "Atzmus uMehus melubash beguf…"etc. The Rebbe himself .

    "The rebbe was spoken of in past tense, the messiah in future tense." What’s there to be proud of with that?! Besides the point, I believe that most speakers did refer to the Rebbe in present tense i.e. "The Rebbe says…" not "the Rebbe obm said before he passed away…’

    So some facts are somewhat twisted.
    Thanks for the post.

  • Freedom of press

    Why does everyone repeat that story about Matusof flying in for his own funeral? The man has been living in CH for many years!

  • mendy lewin

    seems like every year the same article is rewritten over and over again……..
    i don’t know why he included berger though…..
    satmar like shimon as a person and a good kosher kugel when they starve they give money: those are a few dozens that travels to the far east and are mispoe’l cuz they see the real world as we do but most dont……..
    vietnam is the new chabad frontier in the far east…..real tough.

  • jack

    Sam, we’ll take for granted that you either fail to understand the concept or you fail to understand what divinity means.

  • nobody

    why cant you people from crown heights just stop complaining, nothing can be written with out having stupid sarcastic remarks from you negative people.

  • out-of-towner

    i think the origin of this so-called "joke" was elazar menachem schach.

    these shluchim are giving their lives to other yidden, moving to insane places, and people have the nerve to go on with this stupid "joke." the whole thing disgusts me.

  • Levi

    Rabii Matusof lived in CH for past couple years, but it makes it sound dramatic if because he was one of the first shluchim of the Rebbe AND he died right after the Kinus

  • FlatbushObserver

    Great article. Berger was made to look frugal which it did and which he is.
    A rabid chabad hater he doesn’t see how many scorn him even in my low key typical flatbush shul with all non-lubavitch congregants – typical comments are …oh Berger, forget him he probably got burnt once by chabad…and ax to grind or he just needs attention.
    The average Joe on the street appreciates Chabad for what they do, attempt to do, the sacrifice and selflishness they give and may they all remain strong and healthy.
    For those that don’t know Jonathan is a real stand up journalist I’ve been following his writings for years. very down to earth very real. He won’t say what isn’t!

  • To Sam

    Sam you are an uneducated and probably unemployed crown Heights’er. Unfortunately everything you touch fails.

    I suggest to you to start learning the Rebbe’s Torah everyday, and start acting according to what you are learning, then you may have hope.

    Before you do that, stop your ignoramus, illiterate and unschooled comments.

  • Spell Check

    Mendy –

    Judging by your spelling, you must have feel asleep, being that it probably took you hours to read.

  • to sam

    zugt di gemara… abaya says… but rava says…
    …your comment on my Rebbe really convinced many people in Crown Heights to leave Chabad. How Inspirational. Maybe you should replace Rabbi Matusof in Morocco… just put Tefillin on another Jew. Just CARE about someone other than yourself and mean it.

  • Chabad closest to TRUE Judaism

    When someone says, "Chabad closest
    to Judaism….," I take that to mean
    closer to Judaism then, let’s say,
    Litvish, Satmar, Breslov, etc.
    I mean, is there any group, except
    Chabad, practicing and promoting
    Judaism the closest way the Torah demands?