And They Shall Be My People: An American Rabbi and His Congregation

A profile of Rabbi Jay Rosenbaum and his leadership of a Massachusetts synagogue argues that economic success and the waning of anti-Semitism has led most American Jews to become secular-minded and weakened religious observance.

Wilkes spent a year with Rabbi Jay Rosenbaum, leader of Congregation Beth Israel, a Conservative Jewish synagogue in Worcester, Mass. This report is a searching meditation based on the assumption that American Jewry is fragmented, diluted and facing a precarious future. Rabbi Rosenbaum, who zealously attempts to reach alienated Jews and to nudge the marginally observant toward greater commitment, emerges as confident yet deeply frustrated as he copes with intermarriages, declining membership, a stagnant budget and the resentment of congregants uncomfortable with his demands for stricter observance. A congregational trip to Israel unleashes pent-up emotions in the rabbi and his wife, Janine, who contemplate relocating there. (For most of the book, Janine seems bitterly disillusioned and peeved at her frequently absent husband.) Wilkes (In Mysterious Ways: The Death and Life of a Parish Priest), who is Catholic, brings a sympathetic perspective to this probe.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Sometimes perceptive scenes from the life of a rabbi, as observed through the eyes of a Catholic journalist. Both uneasy hybrids, rabbi and book seek the spiritual but often bog down in the mundane. Wilkes, whose In Mysterious Ways (1990) profiled a parish priest who was stricken with cancer, here attaches himself to Jay Rosenbaum, the 42-year-old rabbi of a midsize Conservative synagogue in Worcester, Mass., who is himself the son of a pulpit rabbi. How does a rabbi stem the Jewish tide of assimilation and indifference in a society where his people have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams? Wilkes has remarkable access to Rosenbaum's long days--not all parts of which are so interesting for a man who is both the synagogue's spiritual leader and chief bottle washer- -and we are privy to the rabbi as he counsels noncongregants who want to raise their baby as a Jew even though the expectant mother has no desire to convert to Judaism; leads an acculturation class for Russian immigrants, where sometimes only one or two pupils show up; officiates at a ritual circumcision of the son of marginally observant Jews; visits a congregant who is dying of Alzheimer's; hustles to get congregants to join a trip to Israel that he's leading; tells a tale about a Hebrew-speaking parakeet to the Jewish day school's nursery school class; and haggles with the synagogue's board of directors over a new contract. Several congregants confide to Wilkes that the rabbi is unknowable; to the reader he appears under-appreciated, very caring and very frustrated, but also naive and presumptuous in his desire to make his congregants observant Jews. His wife, overweight and depressed, briefly confides her unhappiness with never seeing her husband; more from this insightful rebbitzen would have been welcome. Wilkes follows the rabbi on the congregational tour of Israel, but it's a choppy, pretty banal travelogue. Also annoying is his sometimes wide-eyed appreciation of his subject as evinced by his references to Rosenbaum as a Moses and as the person charged with the care of his congregants' souls. More respectful reportage than rigorous analysis, Wilkes's latest effort begs the question: If, as statistics proffered here suggest, two-thirds of American Jews today are not affiliated with a synagogue, who's going to buy a book on the nuts and bolts of a rabbi's world? -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

Wilkes, an award-winning writer and a Catholic, spent one year with Jay Rosenbaum, the 42-year-old rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel, a Conservative synagogue in an upper-middle-class community in Worcester, Massachusetts. Wilkes followed Rabbi Rosenbaum on his daily rounds--leading the services, performing weddings and conducting funerals, teaching children, and counseling couples. Wilkes interviewed the rabbi, the rabbi's wife, and some of the synagogue members. The rabbi had been at Beth Israel for six years, had started many new programs, and had begun to reverse the demographic trend, attracting younger families into what had been an aging synagogue. But he wanted his people to live more intensely Jewish lives. Consequently, the book explores the complex question, What is the place of the Jewish religion in today's lifestyle? In seeking the answer, Wilkes has written an important book, focusing on a religion at a perilous juncture in time. George Cohen

Wilkes (In Mysterious Ways, Random, 1990) here follows Rabbi Jay Rosenbaum of conservative Congregation Beth Israel in Worcester, Massachusetts, on his daily rounds over the course of a year. Rosenbaum is a young, committed rabbi, passionate about raising the level of observance of his rather lax and well-to-do congregants. His efforts typify the underappreciated efforts of many of the rabbinate to make inroads into secular American culture. Rosenbaum's efforts meet with great resistance. The reader sees how the work of a rabbi can be an all-consuming one, leaving little time for privacy and undistracted time with family. While this easy-to-read study does not break any new ground, it does underscore the many issues in contemporary Jewish life. Recommended for libraries that serve a Jewish clientele.
Paul Kaplan, Lake Villa Dist. Lib, Ill.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc.