Rabbi Yitzchok Breitowitz, like many Orthodox rabbis, has long advocated making aliyah, or relocating to Israel, a place where Jews, he maintains, can enjoy "a special relationship" with God...he conceded...[that]"Maybe it's time to listen to our own words."
Rabbi Yitzchok Breitowitz, like many Orthodox rabbis, has long advocated making aliyah, or relocating to Israel, a place where Jews, he maintains, can enjoy "a special relationship" with God.
His Zionistic exhortations, though, were often delivered from the pulpit of his synagogue ‹ Woodside Synagogue-Ahavas Torah in Silver Spring ‹ which is located roughly 6,000 miles from the Holy Land.
"There's something of the hypocrite in that," he conceded in an interview last week. "Maybe it's time to listen to our own words."
Breitowitz has done just that. In a recent e-mail to the Woodside congregation, Breitowitz and his wife, Sally, announced their plans to make aliyah, a move that may take place as soon as January.
"To all things there is a time," Breitowitz said in his e-mail, echoing the biblical book Ecclesiastes.
In the Breitowitzes' case, the time is ripe for relocating largely because their son, Moshe, is grown. (He was married two years ago and now lives in Baltimore.) "It would have been difficult to make aliyah with a son in adolescence," Breitowitz explained. "The adjustment issues would have been overwhelming."
For decades, Breitowitz has been laying the groundwork for the big move. In fact, when he took the helm of the Woodside shul in 1988, Breitowitz intended to stay only two years before settling in the Jewish state. But those plans fell through for logistical reasons. The Breitowitzes have since purchased an apartment in Jerusalem, where they intend to live (once the current tenant leaves). Breitowitz, meanwhile, has lined up a full-time teaching and counseling job at Yeshivat Ohr Somayach in Jerusalem, an outreach-minded institution he has been associated with for several years.
"Everybody knew that it would happen eventually, but nobody wanted it now," said Chanoch Kanovsky, president of the Woodside Synagogue. "Nobody is really emotionally prepared for it. This will leave a huge void. These are huge shoes to fill." A search committee is being formed, he said, cautioning: "Although we'll find a successor, there will never be a replacement."
"He's had a huge impact here," added longtime congregant Linda Rishe. "Some people are devastated, but we'll go on. Besides being brilliant, he's willing to talk to anybody. People are very, very attached to him."
Both Rishe and Kanovsky said Breitowitz, a figure of widespread renown, has helped put the Woodside shul on the map and likely has contributed to its growth over the years.
"He's raised the profile of the community tremendously," said Kanovsky, an attorney, who estimated that the synagogue now has about 115 families (up from about 80 a decade ago). "People from pretty far away," he added, "can identify Woodside" as the domain of Breitowitz. "I've heard that in Indiana, Cleveland, California ... ."
Meanwhile, local Jewish educators and rabbis from various denominations needed little prompting to contribute accolades when reflecting on their colleague. Almost to a person, they described Breitowitz as a singular figure in the Washington-area Jewish community and beyond.
An author, lecturer, law professor and Torah scholar, Breitowitz, 55, is an internationally recognized authority on the interface between bioethics and Halacha, or Jewish law, and he has written and spoken extensively on the subject.
"Many rabbis choose this career because we're generalists and would rather not spend all the time doing any one thing," said Rabbi Fred Scherlinder Dobb of Adat Shalom Reconstructionist Congregation in Bethesda. "But no one is a true Renaissance man in the way Rabbi Breitowitz is, with such wide-ranging knowledge and talents."
Those talents include an uncanny ability to meld secular and religious scholarship to make complex, controversial or otherwise daunting subjects accessible to almost any audience, a skill he has displayed in lecture halls locally and throughout the world.
"Being exposed to Rabbi Breitowitz is phenomenal," said Avi West, a senior staffer at the Partnership for Jewish Life and Learning in Rockville. "To watch him set up his argument, it's like he's carefully laying out a legal brief; it's really exhilarating. He's able to use the right vocabulary to describe things in a way that people can understand, without dumbing it down."
Listeners spanning the denominational spectrum ‹ as well as secular Jews and even non-Jews ‹ have heard Breitowitz discuss topics ranging from the halachic implications of cloning, stem cell research and organ donation to Judaism's take on ethics in the marketplace, the economic stimulus package and even the red state-blue state partisan political divide.
"He's one of the extraordinary teachers not only of the Washington-area Jewish communities, but of American Jewish life in general," said Rabbi David Saperstein of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, located in the District.
"He's amazing," added Rabbi William Rudolph of Conservative Congregation Beth El of Montgomery County in Bethesda. "He's the brightest man I know, certainly the brightest rabbi. He knows so much and he's able to impart it so well. This is a big loss for the community."
Breitowitz spoke at Rudolph's 2001 installation as senior rabbi at Beth El. "He's very open to speaking to all kinds of people, which is not always the case with people from his community," said Rudolph, referring to the Orthodox world.
Rabbi Jack Moline of Conservative Agudas Achim Congregation in Alexandria said he, too, "has always been impressed" with Breitowitz's "scholarship and willingness to share it," but he offered a minor caveat. While Breitowitz's "commitment to his Orthodoxy," Moline added, has "enabled many conversations across denominational lines, it has also disabled some participation across denominational lines."
Moline cited this example: Several years ago, Breitowitz participated in an interdenominational panel discussion at Agudas Achim at which he was "very complimentary" of the other panelists, Moline reported. But when he was asked where he would pray in a place without an Orthodox shul, Breitowitz said "very gently and with all due respect, he would stay home," according to Moline.
Moline said "that distressed me a little," adding: "It's an issue within all of Orthodoxy, so it's not a critique of Rabbi Breitowitz's brillance and his openness to learning with people. I have tremendous respect for him and I like him personally."
At the same time, he added, "I was a little taken aback that there was a place he was unwilling to go in the name of Jewish unity. Overwhelmingly, though, I regard him as a brilliant and generous scholar."
Born in New York City, Breitowitz grew up in the Hartford, Conn., area, the son of European-born parents who narrowly escaped the Nazi concentration camps, but spent several years in a Siberian work camp. (Breitowitz has a young brother, also an Orthodox rabbi, who lives in Toronto. Their 88-year-old mother, Helen, resides in the Ring House independent living facility in Rockville. Their father, David, died in 2003 at age 86.)
Although Breitowitz was not raised in a religious home, he attended Orthodox day schools, and as a result, became Sabbath-observant at age 7 or 8. "I was inspired by my teachers; they were so enthusiastic and sincere," he explained. "My parents were supportive, but there were some conflicts. Eventually, though, they fully embraced complete Torah life."
Breitowitz's involvement with Judaism deepened through his contact with visiting students from the high school program at the Orthodox Ner Israel Rabbinical College in Baltimore, where his parents enrolled him at age 14. He received his rabbinic ordination at Ner Israel in 1976, and then attended Harvard Law School, where he graduated magna cum laude in 1979.
For the next four years, he practiced law in Chicago, where he met and married Sally Naiman, who had worked extensively in the health care field after receiving a bachelor of arts degree in psychology. They returned to Baltimore in 1983, when Breitowitz joined the faculty of the University of Maryland School of Law, where he is now a tenured professor, specializing in bankruptcy and commercial law.
Breitowitz gravitated to the law, he said, because it incorporates talmudic-style logic, and to Jewish bioethics because it concerns matters "of very, very practical importance that must be addressed," and in a way that draws on both the secular legal cannon and the intricacies of Halacha.
As the rabbi's wife, Sally Breitowitz has made her mark on the shul and the larger community by providing pastoral counseling for members and others, instruction on family-purity-related matters, and perhaps most important, assistance for people who are in the midst of personal crises. "She has shepherded some people through some very hard times," said Rishe.
Breitowitz said the move to Israel is tentatively scheduled to take place between January and May, although he noted in his e-mail to the congregation, dated June 14, that "the exact date depends on [our] ability to sell our home and complete other logistical and financial arrangements."
Even after he relocates, Breitowitz said, he intends to maintain "some presence" in the Washington-area Jewish community through video-conferenced presentations, in-person lecturing and teaching, and other means. He plans to return to this area for several days every month "for a while," he said, to visit his son and his mother and take care of other matters.
In the meantime, he contemplates the move with mixed feelings. "It's never easy to leave," he said. "There are people we've formed close relationships with. And going to a new environment is challenging. When you're in your 20s, it's somewhat easier to adapt. But we have a religious duty to connect ourselves with the land of Israel. It's God's special land."
Sally Breitowitz said she, too, is motivated to live in Israel for many of the same reasons as her husband. "But there are financial and emotional challenges, too," she added. "And I have mixed feelings because of the strong friends I've made in Woodside. I wish they could all come with us."
(Source: Washington Jewish Week)
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