Am Yisrael Chai: Rabbi Riskin  addresses OTS’ Polish guests

Dedicated young OTS rabbis trained at the Joseph and Gwendolyn Straus Rabbinical Seminary and its Straus-Amiel Practical Rabbinics Program are reinvigorating Jewish life in Poland, where Judaism was nearly wiped out by the Holocaust and years of communism.

Eighteen Polish Jews and candidates for conversion to Judaism had a hands-on introduction to Eretz Yisrael and Torat Yisrael – the Land of Israel and its Torah – in the summer of 2007. Initiated by two Straus-Amiel graduates in the field – Rabbi Boaz Pash, community rabbi in Krakow, and Rabbi Yitzchak Rapoport, rabbi of Breslau – and sponsored by Shavei Israel, an organization dedicated to helping ‘lost Jews’ renew their links with the Jewish people, the 40-day program combined sessions on Torah topics relating to the Land of Israel with field trips across the country. The group was hosted by OTS’ Neveh Efrat Retreat Center, as guests of its Susan and David Wilstein Conversion Institute.

“The participants ranged in age from 18 to 68,” says Rabbi Zelig Avrasin, who coordinated the program. Avrasin, a Straus-ordained rabbi and Straus-Amiel graduate who served as the community rabbi of Warsaw from 2004 to 2006, explains that while some of the students were born Jewish, others decided to convert after discovering that they had Jewish ancestors who hid their Judaism in the wake of the Holocaust.

The seminar opened up a new world to the participants,” reports Avrasin. “In fact, some of them say they’re already planning aliyah!”

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