To Build a Brave Space: The Making of a Spiritual First Responder

A memoir of becoming, To Build a Brave Space takes the reader on one rabbi’s journey of self-discovery and intellectual evolution—from a free-spirited liberal teenager to the leader of a large suburban congregation, through several national and global crises and countless personal experiences.

When I was a boy, I told my mother I wanted to become a rabbi on a motorcycle. This was a joke in our family for many years. As a young man, despite my love of Israel and a strong spiritual and cultural connection to Judaism, I would not have believed that my own childhood prediction would become a reality. And yet, for over twenty-five years, I have served large synagogue congregations and shepherded hundreds of families through unspeakable tragedy, unfettered joy, and complicated times in our country’s history.

This book is a reflection on where I came from and how I got to my current place as the Senior Rabbi of a Temple, B’nai Jeshurun of Short Hills, NJ. Not only have I grown and changed professionally from my early days of rabbinical school, but my philosophy on how to lead a community and how to bring people together during trying times has evolved over many years of trial and error. My hope is to inspire other clergy and people in general to find a way to help their communities thrive, even during our current climate of fractured politics and overt hostility among one another.

Matthew D. Gewirtz has served as the Senior Rabbi of Congregation B’nai Jeshurun in Short Hills, the largest synagogue in New Jersey, for sixteen years. He serves as the President of the Coalition of Religious Leaders for the State of New Jersey.

A regular contributor to a number of publications, he is also the author of The Gift of Grief: Finding Peace, Transformation, and Renewed Life after Great Sorrow.

He appears as a religious commentator on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and CNN’s State of the Union. For several years, he served as a tri-anchor of PBS’s A Matter of Faith with a Bishop, an Imam and a Rabbi.

He is married to Lauren Rutkin, the director of a philanthropic family foundation. They are the proud parents of Jake, Talia, and Sadie. They reside in Maplewood, New Jersey.