You could fill a library with books focused solely on the Jews of New York’s Lower East Side. So too the ‘Shalom Y’all’ subgenre that expounds on the Jewish peddlers who hawked their wares across the American South. The same is true for the Rust Belt, West Coast and even Canada, eh? But for some reason the Hebrews of that great Zion straddling the Hudson River and Atlantic Ocean, New Jersey, get short shrift despite being one of the largest centers of Jewish life in the entire world.
The Garden State was relatively late to the game of organized Jewish community in the Northeast. First synagogue in New York? Sherith Israel established 1654. Pennsylvania? Mikveh Israel established 1740. Both of those communities continue to thrive. The dirty Jerz? No longer extant B’nai Jeshurun was founded in the holy city of Paterson in 1847.
That is not to say Jews were absent from the social fabric of colonial New Jersey. In 1718, the trader Moses Levy is colorfully referred to as ‘a Jew here’ on a petition to King George I. If we rewind even further back to 1681, William Penn described ‘the Indians who [he] found there to be closely resembling Jews’ noting that both rended their clothes as a sign of grief. Penn concluded in a letter to England that he was inclined to believe the native population of New Jersey were ‘descended from the lost Ten Tribes.’
Whether the original inhabitants chose to live in Atlantic City and Seaside Heights because their ancestors were Israelites who fled across the Mediterranean Sea following the destruction of Solomon’s Temple, we’ll never know. More certain is that many a Jewish refugee who arrived on Ellis Island decided to flee not only religious persecution in Europe but New York City income tax to settle in the one state left in the union that doesn’t let you pump your own gas. Better yet, Ellis Island is 83% located in Jersey as decided in the 1998 Supreme Court decision New Jersey v. New York. For many Jewish refugees, New Jersey was incidentally where they took their first steps as new Americans.
Innumerable schools, synagogues and federations blossomed out of the state’s red clay soil. Bedroom communities like Cherry Hill sprung up in the south with ever more like Elizabeth, Livingston, Englewood and Teaneck in the north. Settlement went well beyond the suburbs. Many Holocaust Survivors took to chicken farming in places like Flemington and Vineland. Beit Medrash Govoha, the second-largest center of Jewish learning in the entire world, resides in Ocean County’s Lakewood (the largest, Jerusalem’s Mir Yeshiva was rescued by Chiune Sugihara and spent part of the war years in Kobe).
New Jersey’s penchant for instilling love of Jewish life is undeniable as can be seen in Tokyo. Today’s JCC president and longtime Torah reader both hail from the state as does the rabbi’s father, two board members, the beer sponsor at our Purim party and our newest member family. All relish comparing the ease of pulling a ‘Jersey Slide’ on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway to driving on the Chūō and Tōmei. Don’t believe me? Just ask them ‘What’s your exit?’ They’ll get it.
How fortunate we are then this week to celebrate the Bat Mitzvah of Nina Tischler, a daughter of Union County’s Westfield and Kansai’s Kyoto. Despite the vast geographical distance between her upbringing in Minato-ku and where Washington crossed the Delaware, Nina has dutifully participated in the favorite pastime of many a New Jerseyan Yid, attending summer camp, specifically Eisner where they famously bang the tables in rhythm during Birkat haMazon.
Hopefully one day, an enterprising student at Rutgers or Princeton will write a fuller history of New Jersey’s Jewish community. That paper may even emerge out of Seton Hall’s Institute of Judaeo-Christian Studies, the oldest academic institution in the world dedicated to Catholic-Jewish relations. Until then, we invite you to join Nina Tischler’s Bat Mitzvah this Saturday morning where after the candy is thrown, the community will likely fist pump like Mike ‘The Situation’ Sorrentino (thankfully not Jewish) from that great MTV documentary ‘Jersey Shore’.
Mazal Tov Nina and the entire Tischler family!
Services
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, May 17th
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Emor
Bat Mitzvah of Nina Tischler
Saturday, May 18th
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, May 24th
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Behar
Bar Mitzvah of Eli Starobin
Saturday, May 25th
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
RSVP: https://jccjapan.jp/event-registration/
Kabbalat Shabbat
Lecture by Scholar-in-Residence Rabbi Eliezer Lawrence
Permission to Believe: Encountering Doubt as a Radical Act of Faith
Friday, May 31st
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Lecture: 8:00pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, June 7th
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Bamidbar
Kiddush sponsored by the Scheer Family in honor of Asher Adi’s 3rd birthday
Saturday, June 8th
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Shavuot Eve – Cheesecake and Class (in that order)
Class title TBD. Suggestions welcome
Four kinds of sliced, Cholov Yisroel cheese. Six kinds of kosher cheesecake.
Tuesday, June 10th
Services: 6:30pm
Dinner: 7:00pm
Class: 8:00pm
Shavuot Morning
Wednesday, June 11th
Services with Yizkor: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, June 14th
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Nasso
Bat Mitzvah of Mia Bavli
Saturday, June 15th
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Kabbalat Shabbat
Friday, June 21st
Services: 6:00pm
Dinner by reservation: 7:00pm
Shabbat Parshat Beha’alotcha
Bar Mitzvah of Jeremy Epstein
Saturday, June 22nd
Services: 10:00am
Kiddush: 12:00pm
Friday Night and Shavuot Dinner Reservations can made on our website: https://jccjapan.jp/shabbat-meals-sign-up/
Events
Sephardic Jewish Cuisine Cooking Class
In this intimate setting, limited to just 12 participants, you’ll have the opportunity to master the secrets of two mouthwatering dishes: Tagine and Tunisian cigars.
SOLD OUT (sign up for the waiting list below)
Sunday, June 2nd
10:00am – 2:00pm
Materials Fee: 2,000 JPY
Violins and Hope
From the Holocaust to the Symphony Hall: a photographic journey documenting the man and work of Israeli master luthier (violin maker) Amnon Weinstein who set up a project to restore violins that survived the concentration camps and ghettos of the Holocaust, even when their owners often did not.
Sunday, June 23rd
7:00pm – 9:00pm
Event Registration Page: https://jccjapan.jp/event-registration/
If you have an idea for an event or a topic you would like to share with others, please visit our website: https://jccjapan.jp/event-committee-inquiry/
Announcements
Thank you to everyone who attended the Israeli Embassy’s Yom HaZikaron Memorial Day Ceremony. We had the privilege to hear remarks from Ambassador Gilad Cohen, Defence Attache Omer Bavli and former State Minister of Defense Yasuhide Nakayama as well as prayers led by the Walzer and Strulov families. The ceremony began with a flag lowering carried out by a Druze matriarch whose family members have made the ultimate sacrifice for Israel.
Tokyo American Club is hosting Young Adult author Marissa Moss, of the ‘Amelia’s Notebook’ series and ‘The Woman Who Split the Atom: The Life and Work of Lise Meitner’, about the female Jewish physicist who developed the theory of nuclear fission after escaping Nazi Germany. The event will take place Wednesday May 22nd from 7:00pm-8:30pm. If you are interested in attending, please reply to this email.
Scholar-in-Residence: On Friday night, May 31st at 8:00pm, visiting Rabbi Eliezer Lawrence will present a lecture titled ‘Permission to Believe: Encountering Doubt as a Radical Act of Faith’. Through the mystical teachings of Hasidic masters the Ba’al Shem Tov, Rabbi Nachman and the Post-Modernist Rav Shaga”r, we will explore how doubts and struggles with core Jewish beliefs can actually be the building blocks to an even deeper rootedness in spirituality.
Friday night, May 31st will also be the overseas Bar Mitzvah of the Alper Family who are flying all the way in from Austin, Texas to celebrate with us. Please consider attending service and signing up for dinner so that we can show them a little Southern (Shibuya-ku) Hospitality.
Class in Japanese: Would you like to learn about an archaeological study of Israel? Nihongo-ga wakarimasuka? Prof. Keiji Hirakawa is a rare Japanese who has been digging in Israel over 34 years. His first encounter with Israel was in 1983 when he engaged in ethnographic research about the people’s lives, food, and religions there. He will give his talk “ISRAEL: Over the Sea Galilee (イスラエル―ガリラヤ湖をめぐって―) on June 11th from 1:00pm about the research findings based on his study over the site, Ein Gev and his experiences with the local people near the Sea of Galilee. The lecture is a JIFA event but JCJ members are welcome to attend. Admission is free.
Shavuot is almost upon us despite boxes of matzah still sitting on many of our kitchen countertops. Thankfully the kosher cheese and cheesecake have already arrived. See above under Services for the schedule of activities.
Yiddish Club with Jack Halpern: Please contact Jack at jack@cjki.org if you are interested to join. All levels are welcome, from beginner to advanced. Much more than just language, the club’s monthly meetings explore Yiddish culture as well.
Shabbat Emor
Candle Lighting: 6:23pm
Havdala: 7:25pm