Reconnecting to Judaism in Israel’s Original All-Jewish City 

Today, if you look carefully, among the trendy cafes, chic boutiques and modern office buildings of Tel Aviv as it celebrates its centennial, you’ll find surprising evidence of both new and old spiritual life in Israel’s original, custom-built, all-Jewish city. It’s the last thing you’d expect to find along Rechov Bialik, one of central Tel Aviv’s most beautiful streets that’s home to the Reuven Rubin Museum and Bialik House—bastions of secular culture from Tel Aviv’s early days. But there it is at number 19—a Hasidic shtiebel. In fact, the modest building, with its bright blue wooden doors and simple illuminated sign is still in use as a synagogue today. Between the 1940s and 1960s, this was the synagogue of the Admor of Husiatin, one of a number of Hasidic courts that flourished in Tel Aviv during that era.

The largely secular founders of Tel Aviv, who stood on the sand dunes in 1909 to proclaim the birth of the new city, would in all likelihood be quite surprised to see how many institutions of Jewish learning and synagogues are dotted across the landscape of contemporary Tel Aviv. From the point of view of religious life, the Tel Aviv of 2009 reflects the city’s character as a place of innovation and forward thinking. In its centennial year, Tel Aviv plays host to everything from a women’s post-high school midrasha learning program to a secular yeshiva, with a National Religious Zionist yeshiva and three or four independent Modern Orthodox minyanim and learning centers thrown in for good measure.

Before we examine the innovative expressions of contemporary Judaism in Tel Aviv, it is worth taking a look at how religious life evolved in this city on the beach. Reuven Gafni, an expert on Israeli synagogues, was raised in Tel Aviv. “It’s very hard to imagine it now,” says Gafni, “ but the area around Sheinkin and King George Street was where many small Hasidic courts were to be found during the 40s, 50s and even into the 60s.” Gafni names the court of the Tchortkov Hasidim on Malchett Street and the Nodvorno nearby. “Today you find hardly any functioning synagogues in that area,” he laments. Over the past fifteen years, Sheinkin Street has become synonymous with Tel Aviv boutique and café life. Gafni points out that the Central Ashkenazi Synagogue on Rechov Borachov in the same area no longer holds weekday services. Over on Rechov Bar Ilan, however, there’s a small shtiebel of the Gur Hasidim that was founded and built in the 1970s, where regular minyanim still take place.

Interestingly, other Hasidic rebbes who survived the Holocaust also chose to reestablish themselves in Tel Aviv rather than in Jerusalem after World War II. Followers of Rabbi Aharon Rokach, the Belzer rebbe, bought a house at 63 Rechov Achad Ha’am where the rebbe held court until his death. Today at that same address, a multi-story complex that includes a Belz school and yeshiva as well as a spacious synagogue has taken the place of the modest house of the rebbe. Gafni notes that the buildings of the three Hasidic sects illustrate the attitude of each of them to their Tel Aviv surroundings. The slightly dilapidated Husiatin shul on Rechov Bialik, just around the corner from the old City Hall of Tel Aviv, relies on passers-by and religious people who work nearby to help make up their minyan. They also open the building for weekly Torah classes for men and women and encourage neighbors to attend. Over at the tiny Gur Beit Midrash, the emphasis is on keeping to themselves. The shtiebel has preserved the look of Eastern Europe and makes no attempt to blend in with its Tel Aviv surroundings or its secular neighbors. The grandiose Belz complex, on the other hand, makes a statement of their presence in the neighborhood, but its imposing presence makes no pretense at being inviting or open to non-Belzers.

Contrast all this to the activities of the Modern Orthodox National Religious community in Tel Aviv. Only a few of them have any kind of significant physical presence in the city, but their spiritual impact is impressive. Rosh Yehudi, for instance, was started in 2000 by a group of educators with the backing of businessman Israel Zeira. The center on Rechov Bograshov strives to provide substantive Jewish learning and experiences to Israelis who are seeking to reconnect to their Judaism. With an intensive, high level Beit Midrash program and open participatory Shabbat and holiday services, Rosh Yehudi has proven to be a magnet for hundreds of young professionals in Tel Aviv. “The amazing Shabbatot spent at Rosh Yehudi greatly helped me start observing Shabbat with immense joy in the company of wonderful friends. Rosh Yehudi was a porthole to the loving, giving, religious public,” says Rami Rachamim, a lawyer in his thirties.

In 2006, Rosh Yehudi expanded and refurbished an old synagogue on Rechov Bar Kochva that had been closed for years. Today it is filled with men and women between 20-50 years old, dressed in all manner of styles, who are there to study, pray and socialize. One of the more popular initiatives of Rosh Yehudi is their Bar Mitzvah program. Recognizing that, for many Tel Aviv teenagers the Bar Mitzvah meant nothing more than an elaborate party, educators at Rosh Yehudi have started to offer parents a Bar Mitzvah package that includes personalized lessons with their son, organizing the Shabbat of the Bar Mitzvah, and a trip to the Kotel where the Bar Mitzvah is called to the Torah.

A more formal institution is Midreshet Tel Aviv, a women’s learning program established in 1996 for young religious women from the Tel Aviv area who are headed for Sherut Leumi—National Service. Situated on a small campus in the Nahlat Ytitzhak neighborhood in northwest Tel Aviv, Midreshet Tel Aviv offers a wide array of programs from a Religious Zionist perspective for 400 young women. Along with the formal year-long studies, regular enrichment day programs attract women from the community to study along with the students. Midreshet Tel Aviv also hosts a one-year Overseas Program in English for recent yeshiva high school graduates. Several other hesder and National Religious yeshivot of varying sizes are also based in Tel Aviv: Yeshivat Aviv Hatorah, Yeshivat Maale Eliyahu and Yeshivat Orot Aviv. However, it is synagogues that attract people to stay in a city.

Minyan Ichud Olam is a dynamic Modern Orthodox community of professionals and students from diverse geographical and cultural backgrounds, and from all across the religious spectrum, who find themselves in Tel Aviv because of professional or academic opportunities. Since 2000, Minyan Ichud Olam has maintained a lively Shabbat minyan that meets on Ben Yehuda Street in central Tel Aviv and is attended by hundreds of immigrants well as native Israelis. The specific goal of Ichud Olam is to revitalize religious life in Tel Aviv by creating a vibrant community that focuses on chessed (social action projects) as well as prayer and learning. “There was a spiritual void in the city,” says Dena, a member of the community. “We hope to be able to reverse the trend of young observant people moving out of the city,” she noted.

The Tel Aviv branch of Yakar, a Jerusalem-based Modern Orthodox community, has a similar philosophy and outlook and like Ichud Olam conducts Carlebach-style Shabbat prayers. Yakar, under the leadership of Rabbi Yehoshua Engleman, meets at 6 Rechov Yericho, off Rechov Basel. One grateful Yakar member, Dr. Hillel Wahrman, a professor at Bar Ilan University says, “I notice that more and more of the better and more active of the Modern Orthodox and secular traditionalists of Tel Aviv are starting to appear at Yakar Shabbat prayers.” Until he discovered Yakar, Dr. Wahrman explains, “It was upsetting for me to realize that this culturally rich, colorful and eventful city had almost no Jewish experience of quality to offer me. Tel Aviv has much culture; it is the business center of Israel, and it is truly a city that never sleeps. It is quite a wonderful exciting city to live in, yet Jewish tradition is hardly noticed, and the options are usually non-stimulating, with declining communities of fewer and fewer members who can create significant prayers, link together as a community and bring about Jewish intellectual stimulation. This was a sad realization for me.”

For Rabbi Arnie Singer, a recent immigrant from New Jersey, Tel Aviv presents an exciting challenge. As a musician and vocalist and author of The Outsiders Guide to Orthodox Judaism and Deep Waters (a collection of insights into the Parsha), Rabbi Singer has already begun to use his talents to enhance the spiritual life of Tel Aviv. “I began teaching a Torah class in English at our home a few months ago. There are a lot of English speakers looking for opportunities to learn Torah, and I thought it was a niche that I could fill. The class has grown tremendously, and there is a demand for more, so I'm considering moving to a real venue and setting up a learning center in the very near future,” Rabbi Singer enthuses.

The venerable religious institutions of Tel Aviv’s earlier years have faded and many had despaired of the city remaining a hospitable place for the Torah-observant, but the fluttering of efforts of recent years are beginning to bear fruit and the next hundred years of Tel Aviv’s history may yet yield some surprises.

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