The High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah (the Jewish New Year) and Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) are prime time for rabbis. On these Days of Awe, above all others, sanctuaries are filled to overflowing with Jews seeking spiritual connection or simply to embrace timeless traditions. With all… Read more »
Rabbi David Ebstein, right, speaks to Congregation Bet Shalom members and friends at Yad Vashem in Jerusalem in July 2014. From left, Kathy McGuire Rubin, Paul Araiza, Helena Lamb, Elinor Engelhard, tour guide (name unknown) and Bernard Engelhard.
There were three rabbis who deeply influenced me as a young man: my director at Camp Ramah in Wisconsin, my Hillel director at Washington University and the rabbi of my hometown synagogue. All three were marvelous role models, learned men and righteous Jews. My hometown family rabbi, Rav Bill… Read more »
Rabbi Yossie Shemtov, regional director of Chabad Tucson, right, and Tucson Mayor Jonathan Rothschild light the grand menorah at El Presidio Park in 2011.
My aspiration to become a rabbi and lead a Jewish community dates back to my childhood years in New York, having been raised in the Grand Central Station. I am not referring to the landmark train station in midtown Manhattan. “Grand Central” is what we called my parents’ home… Read more »
Rabbi Stephanie Aaron celebrates her birthday during a special oneg Shabbat with members of Congregation Chaverim on June 19.
A Reform rabbi and an Orthodox rabbi were my mentors, my guides and my inspirations to become a rabbi. Rabbi Joseph Weizenbaum, z’l, the Reform rabbi of my youth, my bat mitzvah, and my teenage understanding of Judaism, was certainly the rabbi who led the way, who motivated me… Read more »
Rabbi Billy Lewkowicz, right, with Rabbi Moshe Klein at the writing of a Sefer Torah for the Foothills Shul at Bais Yael, Oct. 19, 2014.
I grew up in South Africa in a vibrant Jewish community. As a child I was encouraged to join Jewish youth groups. I loved the activities and discussions. However, about Judaism I had many unanswered questions. Then it all unraveled. There was a youth Shabbaton in Johannesburg. It was… Read more »
Rabbi Yehuda Ceitlin of Chabad Tucson holds a Sunshine Club program at Atria Valley Manor in December 2014.
The spacious room was lined up with green cushioned chairs ready for another session of “Chat with Rabbi Yudi” at a retirement community in Tucson. As I walk in, I found a single person sitting there. “It’s just me …” she sheepishly said. “Will you still stay?” “Of course!”… Read more »
Rabbi Thomas Louchheim teaches in the Congregation Or Chadash Religious School on Sept. 29, 2013, using the St. Joseph Torah Scroll that had been donated by a congregation in Missouri, which Or Chadash had repaired in 2013.
I always wanted to be a lawyer. As a project in elementary school, we were asked to determine what classes in high school and college we would need to take to prepare us for our chosen professions. I interviewed one lawyer, sent letters to a few law schools and… Read more »
Rabbi Batsheva Appel, left, and Temple Emanu-El congregant Susan Brish hold the lulav during Sukkot services on Oct. 10, 2014.
It was either astronaut or rabbi. As a fifth grade student, the homework assignment was to prepare a drawing about what we would like to be when we grew up, and I handed in two very different drawings. One of me as an astronaut and the other of me… Read more »
Rabbi Robert Eisen points to the Torah being held by Fay Green, left, and Hyla Windham at Congregation Anshei Israel’s Mitzvah 613 Celebration on Dec. 16, 2012.
How I became a rabbi is easy to describe: I went to undergraduate school and rabbinic school; spent the requisite number of hours studying, writing papers and preparing for exams; and had a student pulpit for three years of “hands-on training.” But why I became a rabbi is something… Read more »
Rabbi Ephraim Zimmerman and Esta Goldstein of Saddlebrooke hold an old Megillah scroll at Oro Valley Meet Yourself: A Celebration of Diverse Cultures on March 22.
I grew up in Chicago, number seven in a family of 11 children. Being that I was born into a Chabad family, I was involved in Jewish outreach since I was in elementary school. My first experiences were when my father used to take me with him to the… Read more »
Rabbi Samuel M. Cohon with members of the Temple Emanu-El Youth Choir during the "Greatest Hanukkah on Earth XVI" celebration in December 2014.
My grandfather was an important Reform rabbi — he wrote one of the four platforms the movement has ever produced — and my father is a prominent cantor and rabbi, but I never thought about becoming a rabbi growing up. When I began singing in my teens I did… Read more »
Rabbi Helen Cohn, left, talks with Congregation M’kor Hayim congregants Ann Markewitz, Grace Hartman and Bob Chasan earlier this summer.
I grew up in a secular but Jewishly identified home. Once I left for college, and later married a man who wasn’t Jewish, my connection to Judaism was limited to occasional family seders. Years later, single again and on a business trip in New England, I decided on a… Read more »
Rabbi Israel Becker celebrates with young congregants at Congregation Chofetz Chayim’s Chanukah party on Dec. 16, 2014.
The triumph of my parents’ survival from the Holocaust was to raise a Jewish family and live a vibrant Jewish life. Their deep love of Judaism, their understanding of the need to protect it and their joy in sharing it proved to be formative influences in ways that I… Read more »
Crissi Blake (left) and Nina Isaac, co-owners of Milk and Honey (Jason Blake)
Opening Milk and Honey Breastfeeding and Postpartum Support Center is a dream that was a long time coming for co-owners Nina Isaac and Crissi Blake. The women met 15 years ago, after Isaac’s first child was born. “My baby was colicky and Crissi taught infant massage,” says Isaac. “It… Read more »
NEW YORK (JTA) — We love to kvetch about how early or late Rosh Hashanah falls — as if we have any control or say when the holidays will appear. But this year, the Jewish New Year falls on the early side for us Americans, right after Labor Day… Read more »
(The Nosher via JTA) — Pomegranates, or rimonim in Hebrew, are one of the most recognizable and highly symbolic fruits in Jewish culture. Originating in Persia, these reddish, thick-skinned fruits (technically a berry) begin to appear in markets at the end of summer and are readily available for holiday… Read more »
(The Nosher via JTA) — Like most Jewish holidays, Rosh Hashanah brings to mind certain traditional food customs, the most well-known being the dipping of apples in honey. And while a classic apple pie or cake is a lovely way to mark our hopes for a sweet new year,… Read more »
Elaine Lisberg Elaine Lisberg doesn’t like to live in the past or dwell over what she’s accomplished. “To me, life’s all about moving forward.” A lifelong devotee of Jewish causes and educational nonprofits, Lisberg has transitioned from active volunteer to trained professional, then to professional volunteer and now officially considers herself… Read more »
Allan Mendelsberg at the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation’s Great Strides walk in Tucson on March 29
Allan Mendelsberg serves on the community advisory board for the Special Olympics. He began volunteering for the organization when he was a high school student in Denver. “I really enjoyed working with the kids and when I moved to Tucson to attend the University of Arizona, I just stayed… Read more »
(L-R): Patrice White, Naomi Present, Max Harris and Barbara Holtzman of Congregation Chaverim are recognized for their service to Poz Cafe at Tucson Interfatih HIV/AIDS Network in March.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, a diagnosis of HIV or AIDS was essentially a death sentence. Pharmaceutical representative Patrice White was fresh out of grad school at that time and employed as a social worker for the local hospitals. “It was just awful,” says White of the… Read more »
