Launching a religious revival among Jews in the Soviet Union is proving to be an uphill struggle, mainly because the liberalization of Soviet society has opened the way for the mass exodus of Soviet Jews.
That was evident at the second Congress of the Union of Jewish Religious Communities in the Soviet Union held here last week.
The podium was graced by distinguished rabbis and halachic sages from Israel and the United States, who came to offer advice and encouragement. But the 200 delegates in the audience, mostly men over 60, seemed to be at a loss about what to do.
Having worked all their lives to preserve the tattered remnants of religious life, when official government policy opposed all religions, they are now free to do as they please.
But they do not know where to begin. Nor do they have the tools or the knowledge of Judaism to revive the synagogue as a center of communal life.
Most serious is the growing shortage of Jews to fill the synagogues. The mass aliyah in the past year has drastically reduced the Jewish population in many areas.
In the large Ukrainian city of Kharkov, for example, over half the Jews have gone to Israel in the past year. Their departure coincided, ironically, with the government’s return of the synagogue, a large building that had been used as a community gym.
Kharkov’s Jewish community lacks the money to restore and furnish the building or buy the ritual accessories.
The building therefore remains empty except for a small room used as a makeshift chapel, where the Torah scroll is kept in an old refrigerator instead of a proper Ark.
A DOZEN SYNAGOGUES RETURNED
All over the Soviet Union, about a dozen synagogue buildings have been returned by the government in the past two years, to be used for their original purpose.
There are about 100 cities and towns with significant Jewish populations, and practically all of them now have synagogues. But apart from a dearth of congregants, there is only a handful of Soviet rabbis and religious teachers.
The Union of Jewish Religious Communities was formed a year ago and has 77 member communities. It is headed by the leaders of Moscow’s Choral Synagogue, Rabbi Avraham Shayevitch and the congregation president, Vladimir Federovsky.
Shayevitch said that the fact that “great rabbis” came to the congress from Israel and America “gives us great strength and hope for the future. Democratic change has enabled us to have ties with Jews all over the world. We expect much help from Jews abroad.”
The distinguished guests included, from Israel, Sephardic Chief Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, Haifa Chief Rabbi Shear-Yeshuv Cohn and Rishon le-Zion Chief Rabbi Simcha Hacohen Kook.
Participants from the United States included Rabbi Moshe Sherer, president of Agudath Israel of America; Rabbi Arthur Schneier, president of Appeal of Conscience Foundation and senior rabbi of New York’s Park East Synagogue; Ralph Gold-man of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee; and rabbis from the Lubavitcher Hasidic movement Chabad.
In the past two years, Chabad and its Israeli affiliate, Shamir, composed of Soviet immigrants, have sent rabbis and teachers to several dozen Soviet communities.
The chief rabbi of Kiev and the Ukraine, Rabbi Ya’acov Bleich, is a Karlin-Stolin Hasid from Brooklyn. The head of the rabbinical court of the Union of Jewish Religious Communities is Rabbi Pinhas Goldschmidt of Israel.
A NEW YESHIVA STARTED
A plan was announced at the congress to create a central rabbinic authority for the Soviet Union, headed by Rabbis Goldschmidt and Shayevitch, which would work in coordination with the Chief Rabbinate of Israel. One of its tasks would be converting people of Jewish ancestry who want to immigrate to Israel.
Reciting a list of urgent needs, Shayevitch said Soviet Jews must have more religious literature in Russian, more schools and more yeshivot.
During the congress, the formation of a new yeshiva in Moscow was announced. It has an enrollment of 20 students from various parts of the Soviet Union.
It is sponsored by Moscow’s Choral Synagogue and Agudath Israel of America. One of its purposes is to train indigenous religious leaders for Soviet Jews. Two other yeshivas in Moscow are sponsored, respectively, by Chabad and Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz of Jerusalem.
Goldschmidt, the head of the new yeshiva, appealed to the delegates to find two or three young men in their communities willing to devote themselves to five years of study, who could then return to serve their communities.
“We need locally trained leaders,” he stressed. “Synagogues without rabbis are dead.”
The delegates were looking forward to an “invasion” of 50 emissaries from Israel who will conduct Passover seders in 30 communities.
That program, sponsored by Israel’s Ministry of Religious Affairs and the Joint Distribution Committee, will also provide kosher food for 10,000 people at the seder.
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