Back in 2006, when Chavie and I announced that we were heading to Montana to open the state’s first Chabad Center, I was standing on Kingston Avenue and Union Street, in the heart of Crown Heights, chatting with Shlomo, my close friend and lifelong classmate. He asked, “Chaim Shaul, what’s it like out there? Do you think things will grow? Will you be able to have a minyan?”
I responded, “I don’t know about a minyan, but there’s a lifetime of work inspiring Yidden with the Rebbe’s ten mitzvah campaigns.”
You see, over the years, primarily in the 1960s and 70s, the Rebbe, of blessed memory, launched ten mitzvah campaigns that enabled Jewry to reconnect with their faith, their observance, and their healthy Jewish identity. The ten campaigns are: (1) Torah: Encouraging every individual to set fixed times for Torah study every day. (2) Tefillin: Encouraging men (ages 13 and up) to wear tefillin every morning. (3) Holy Books: Furnishing Jewish homes with as many Torah books as possible. (4) Kashrut: Inspiring fellow Jews to observe the laws of kosher both at home and away from home. (5) Shabbat Candles: Teaching Jewish women and girls (ages 3 and up) to light their own Shabbat candle. (6) Mezuzah: Ensuring that every Jewish home has a mezuzah on its doorposts. (7) Tzedakah: Giving charity daily. (8) Education: Seeking to involve every Jewish child in Torah educational programming that will teach him or her what it means to live as a Jew. (9) Love your Fellow Jew: Reaching out to our brothers and sisters with patience, love, concern, and unity. (10) Family Purity: enhancing and enriching Jewish marriages through incorporating the sacredness of mikveh into their union.
What’s beautiful about these ten particular mitzvos is that each individual can incorporate them in his or her daily life, even when the opportunity for communal Jewish experiences isn’t possible. Undoubtedly, living in a flourishing Jewish community, with all its amenities, is valuable and a cherished way of living, but for so many Jews that just isn’t reality, and the Rebbe wanted to ensure, as do each of his shluchim/shluchos, that no Jew ever feels like his or her geographical choices are an impediment to his or her connection to Hashem.
When my buddy Shlomo asked me that question almost 15 years ago, it was eye-opening for me, because it forced me to ponder the question and recognize that it isn’t about minyanim and having two others with me when I say Kiddush Levanah so they can answer my “Shalom Aleichem.” It’s about souls on fire.
Talking about souls on fire, I want to share with you two recent experiences that are impacting the future of our people, but also impacting me along the way.
Back during the COVID summer, an Israeli couple living in Bozeman asked me about teaching their kids Hebrew school lessons. We went back and forth about the details, and, finally, right after Chanukah, we had our first lesson. Since then, almost every Sunday I spend 45 minutes on Zoom learning parashah, mitzvos, Jewish history, and Alef-Beis with their older son Eli and it’s truly a nachas to watch his interest in his Yiddishkeit grow. His Savta emailed me from Israel and told me that “just in case it doesn’t come through, you should know that he talks about his Hebrew lessons all week and refers to it all the time.”
Here is a young boy in Big Sky Country, with two Jewish parents, Israelis, lovers of Judaism and Israel, but without a local Jewish day school and the ability to give their child a conventional Jewish education; yet, this child will be raised, G-d willing, with a strong Jewish identity and loads of Jewish knowledge because it’s not about the minyan, it’s about the soul. (Though I think he will eventually be very helpful with our Shabbos minyan when he turns 13 in about six years.)
More recently, a family from Orlando, who lives part time in Bozeman, asked me to arrange their son’s bar mitzvah. The boy doesn’t want a conventional shul celebration with an aliyah and minyan; he wants it outdoors with just his immediate family in attendance. I explained to him that the most important aspect of becoming a bar mitzvah is accepting the mitzvos, donning tefillin, and recognizing this milestone in the journey of the Jew. I’ve been learning with the boy every week on FaceTime and it’s amazing to watch this kid learn the morning berachot—from Modeh Ani to Adon Olam—and take in all the incredible blessings—from Asher Yatzar, about the wonders of the human body, to “Malbish arumim,” appreciating the blessing of being clothed and having our basic needs. It’s so simplistic, so basic, something we can say while half asleep, yet it’s so profound and, for this boy, life-altering. He is starting to see the beauty of Yiddishkeit.
In this week’s parashah, Beha’alotcha, we read about the kindling of the Menorah in the Mishkan and of course later in the Beis HaMikdash. The soul of a Jew is compared to a flame, and the idea is that just as in the Holy Temple the Menorah serves to brighten the world, so, too, each neshamah has the innate ability to brighten itself and everything around it. Sometime a soul needs a bit of help to uncover that which is aflame in the inner recesses of its being, but once it’s revealed, there isn’t anything that can stop that light from glowing.
That is what we are trying to achieve, day in and day out. It’s not commercialized Judaism, it’s not about mass attendance, and it’s not even about the 80 people who joined our community during this amazing Shavuot holiday. It’s about the individual, each of whom the Tanya teaches is “truly a part of G-d above” and has the ability to shine brightly with holiness.
In the words of Abie Rotenberg’s song: “There’s a small piece of heaven in everyone’s heart, a glorious gift from Above; it will sparkle and shine if we each do our part, to reach out and touch it with love.”
Rabbi Chaim Bruk is co-CEO of Chabad Lubavitch of Montana and spiritual leader of The Shul of Bozeman. For comments or to partner in our holy work, e-mail rabbi@jewishmontana.com or visit JewishMontana.com/Donate.
