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November 2000 Issue

The Age Issue: How Young Rabbis Prove Themselves

By Allison Kaplan

The rabbis pulled a fast one during a moment of silent prayer on Rosh Hashanah. When the sea of bowed heads at Adath Jeshurun Synagogue in Minneapolis returned its gaze to the bimah, Rabbi Harold Kravitz had lost 10 pounds, sprouted thicker hair and looked as though he had shed a decade--at least.

"My, how young you've become, Rabbi Kravitz," this younger rabbi deadpanned, addressing the undeniable whispers head on. The crowd chuckled, and then the new assistant rabbi, 28-year-old Chicago native Aaron Brusso, moved on with the service.

He diffused the age issue successfully on this first appearance in the spotlight of Adath's packed sanctuary. But as Brusso has learned since, the focus on age--or youth, more specifically--doesn't go away that easily.

There was the time, one recent Shabbat, when an older woman stopped Brusso as he circled the sanctuary carrying the Torah. "Are you the Bar Mitzvah boy?" she asked.

"I'm not sure if that was tongue and cheek or if she was serious," Brusso laughs. "People are pretty well meaning about it."

Well meaning, sure. But our hang up with age is persistent, particularly when it comes to dealing with someone who by virtue of title we automatically think of as a community leader, a counselor, a teacher. It's strange to see the rabbi as a twentysomething who listens to the Barenaked Ladies. It's weird to have the rabbi look like one of your college pals. Or your child.

And let's face it, being the rabbi takes some getting used to as well. Brusso says his presence in a crowd of peers has been known to stop the telling of an off-color joke. "Oops, there's a rabbi present," the teller will say.

"I'm thinking, who are you talking about?" Brusso joked.

But make no mistake, Brusso knows what he's talking about, Senior Rabbi Kravitz said. "What I've said to him is when people get to know you, they see a lot of depth. It doesn't take long to come to trust someone with talent and integrity."

The age issue doesn't get in the way of the job, young rabbis agree, but rare is the introduction that does not involve some show of surprise.

"I'm in my fourth year and it still comes up," said Chicago's Temple Sholom Assistant Rabbi Jay Moses, 31. "Almost every time I meet someone new, they say 'gosh you're awful young for a rabbi.'"

Sometimes Moses--who still looks like he could fit in on the campus of his alma mater, University of Michigan--replies: "I'm working on that every day." Other times, he just says "thank you." If he feels like making a point, he might use this standard retort: "You're awfully young to be a (fill in the blank)."

It always ends there, Moses said. "I sound like a rabbi, even if I don't look like one."

Even in the year 2000, our vision of a rabbi is "that old white haired bearded man," says Associate Rabbi Debra Landsberg, now a five-year veteran at The Temple, a large Reform synagogue in Atlanta.

"Most people identify with the rabbi from their youth," said Landsberg, 34. "It doesn't matter how old they are, we remember them as older."

Whether you're a doctor, a lawyer or a rabbi, you've got to start sometime. Twentysomething rabbis are not a new phenomenon, said Kravitz, who was 30 when he was hired 14 years ago as Adath's assistant rabbi. But the job of assistant rabbi in many large congregations does seem to be changing, which is why younger rabbis may be more visible today than they were in past generations.

"There may have been a time when the role of an assistant was to be handed off things the senior rabbi didn't want to do," Kravitz said. "There was also a time when assistant rabbi was viewed as a job you take for a couple of years and then move on. People don't want to move if they don't have to--there's plenty to do and lots of room to grow."

Rabbi Moses agrees that the current generation of baby boomer senior rabbis, like Kravitz, is more willing to share duties with young assistants. "We're treated more like equals," Moses said.

As a result, it doesn't take long for a new rabbi to find his or her place--even in a congregation of more than 1,000, and even when most of the members are older than you.

"We don't necessarily have life experience, but we do have the wisdom of the tradition. We come out of school equipped with knowledge from the Torah," said Assistant Rabbi Charlie Savenor, 31, of Anshe Emet synagogue in Chicago.

You get used to the raised eyebrows when you introduce yourself as the rabbi (Before long, you'll be missing those days--"This job ages you very quickly," Kravitz said.) And you learn to laugh at being asked your age. Those technicalities aside, there are advantages to being young, some rabbis say.

"There are certain generational issues younger rabbis grasp," Savenor said. "We grew up in an age of multiculturism, in a time where computers were commonplace. We understand the way members of Generation X see the world."

Younger rabbis can also do a lot for the way Gen X sees Judaism, Moses said.

"Judaism has suffered from questions as to its relevance for modern Americans," Moses said. "When people who are young and seem normal go into the rabbinate--some people are able to look at Judaism in a new way."

Brusso first saw Judaism in a new way when confronted with a career choice after college. He had been active in Jewish youth groups and Hillel, but never planned on becoming a rabbi. He applied to law school, and the seminary. It was at an interview for the seminary where Brusso said he was asked "some phenomenal questions I had always been interested in, but never thought I could have a career working on. I loved it."

That kind of enthusiasm is translating into some "out of the box" programming at synagogues across the country. Savenor, for example, is one of several rabbis to put on a program called Biblically Incorrect, a play on the popular late night show "Politically Incorrect." Moses is especially proud of leading a Shabbat morning spirituality group. Landsberg said she has connected with people about 10 years her senior who weren't finding what they had been looking for in the synagogue, in terms of spirituality and educational programs. And Brusso, the newest to the pulpit, already has an ambitious project list.

"I'd like to start study groups with the younger set--maybe even hold the meetings downtown, for professionals," he said. "My goal is to establish personal relationships with people and from there, help them find aspects of the synagogue that appeal to them."

Send comments to Allison at AllisonSKaplan@aol.com

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