Michael Brooks, the Legendary University of Michigan Hillel Director

Everyone remembers their first boss. Michael Brooks was mine.

Michael was an iconoclast in the American Jewish community. To me, he was a mentor and a motivator. Sometimes he inspired me by saying the most outrageous thing. Other times, he left me scratching my head because he had said the most outrageous thing.

I was very active at Michigan State Hillel during my undergraduate years, so I had heard about the legendary Michael Brooks, who grew the University of Michigan Hillel into the powerhouse that it was.  But I met Michael only once before he called me to interview for a job in Ann Arbor. After a terrible fire destroyed the MSU Hillel building and forced the institution to rebuild, Michael came to East Lansing to meet with our Hillel board. We had no full-time director at the time and were distraught. He sat at the table with us, the smell of smoke still lingering, and said, “This is a wonderful thing!” It was only many years later that I fully understood what he meant. Sometimes we need to build anew for the sake of future generations.

Looking back, working with Michael at Michigan Hillel in my first job after rabbinical school was a gift. Whenever I was feeling bored, Michael would challenge me to take on a new project. When we had lunch together, he would begin the conversation by saying, “I want to know what’s on your mind.” It is not hyperbole to say that Michael Brooks understood community better than almost anyone I have known in the Jewish professional world.

Michael was odd, witty, and famously an outside-the-box thinker. He taught me how to sit back and give others the opportunity to put their visions into practice. He taught me to allow people to fail before stepping in. He understood that leadership was not always about being the person with the answer. Sometimes it meant creating the space for someone else to discover it.

But for all his wisdom and mentorship, one of my favorite memories of Michael will always be on the racquetball court. Michael beat almost everyone he played, but before our first match, I conveniently forgot to mention that I had been playing racquetball regularly since middle school. Being thirty years his junior certainly gave me an edge, but I proudly became one of the few people who actually beat Michael Brooks on the racquetball court!

I am grateful to Michael for giving me my first job more than 22 years ago, and I feel tremendously fortunate to have had the blessing of being inspired, challenged, and mentored by the legendary Michael Brooks.

May his memory be for a righteous blessing. Yehi zichro baruch.

How the Internet Redefined Jewish Community

A little more than thirty years ago, as a senior at James Madison College at Michigan State University, I wrote my undergraduate thesis on how the internet would change Jewish life. I argued that this new technology would redefine the very meaning of “community” in Judaism because the virtual borders were being erased by globalization. At the time, it felt like a bold prediction. Today, looking back on the past two decades, I see how completely that vision has come true. The internet has expanded Jewish life far beyond the walls of synagogues, JCCs, and college campuses, connecting Jews across the globe in ways that my grandparents could never have imagined.

AOL, Listservs, and the First Digital Jewish Neighborhoods

In the mid-1990s, Jewish life online was in its infancy. I remember logging into America Online (AOL), after waiting minutes for the dial-up modem to connect and seeing many vibrant Jewish chat rooms with names like “Torah Talk” or “Jewish Singles.” For many Jews, it was the first time they could instantly connect with others who shared their identity, no matter where they lived. The virtual Jewish community was open to all, had no membership dues, and was quickly redefining synagogues, JCCs, and Jewish federations.

Listservs soon became popular. I was on a couple of Jewish educator listservs in the late 1990s, and I remember how surprising it felt to send a question into the digital void and then receive thoughtful responses from people in Israel, New York, and Los Angeles within minutes. That was the beginning of something. Jewish conversation had gone global.

MySpace, for a moment, gave Jewish teens and college students a platform to showcase their Jewish identity, often with links to Jewish bands or photos from summer camp. And then came YouTube. I recall when rabbis first started posting sermons in short video format. Suddenly, a rabbi in Chicago could share words of Torah that reached Jews in Australia and South Africa. Suddenly, Jewish people were asking why their own rabbi wasn’t talking about the same hot topics other rabbis were and why their congregation’s cantor wasn’t inspiring them with such spirited melodies to the prayers. Jewish musicians, comedians, and educators found an international stage, and the Jewish world felt smaller in the best possible way.

The Iran Nuclear Deal Divided Our Jewish Community: A Tochecha for our Discourse

The following is the sermon I delivered on the first day of Rosh Hashanah 2015/5776 at Congregation B'nai Israel in Toledo, Ohio.

A new rabbi comes to a well-established congregation. Each week on Shabbat, a fight erupts during the service. When it comes time to recite the Shema, half the congregation stands and the other half sits. The half that stands say, "Of course we stand for the Shema. It’s the credo of Judaism.

Throughout history, thousands of Jews have died with the words of the Shema on their lips." The half that remains seated say, "No. According to the Shulchan Aruch, the code of Jewish law, if you are seated when you get to the Shema you remain seated."

The people who are standing yell at the people who are sitting, "Stand up!" while the people who are sitting yell at the people who are standing, "Sit down!" It’s destroying the whole decorum of the service and it’s driving the new rabbi crazy. Finally, it’s brought to the rabbi’s attention that at a nearby home for the aged is a 98-year-old man who was a founding member of the congregation. So, in accordance with Talmudic tradition, the rabbi appoints a delegation of three, one who stands for the Shema, one who sits, and the rabbi himself, to go interview the man. They enter his room, and the man who stands for the Shema rushes over to the old man and says, "Wasn’t it the tradition in our synagogue to stand for the Shema?"

"No," the old man answers in a weak voice. "That wasn’t the tradition."

The other man jumps in excitedly. "Wasn’t it the tradition in our synagogue to sit for the Shema?"
"No," the old man says. "That wasn’t the tradition."

At this point, the rabbi cannot control himself. He cuts in angrily. "I don’t care what the tradition was! Just tell them one or the other. Do you know what goes on in services every week — the people who are standing yell at the people who are sitting, the people who are sitting yell at the people who are standing."

"That was the tradition," the old man says.

This is a joke, of course, but, these days, I can commiserate with the rabbi. In 2015, it's sadly become the tradition that half of the Jewish community is arguing with the other half; they’re talking past each other, and this heated debate has got me as frustrated as the rabbi in the story.

This past summer, the discourse in the American Jewish community over the Iran Nuclear deal has been horribly gut-wrenching. I have found myself cringing at the battles that have been waged -- Jew vs. Jew. The rhetoric has been cruel, venomous and downright dangerous to the future vitality of our Jewish community.

The NY Times reported that the attacks on Representative Jerrold Nadler, a Democrat of New York, since he announced his support for the nuclear accord with Iran have been so vicious that the National Jewish Democratic Council and the Anti-Defamation League both felt compelled this week to publicly condemn Jewish voices of hate.

On the other side, three Jewish Democrats in the House who oppose the deal released a joint statement denouncing “ad hominem attacks and threats” against not only supporters like Mr. Nadler but also Jewish opponents, who have been accused of “dual loyalties” and treason.

Greg Rosenbaum, the chairman of the National Jewish Democratic Council, said, “We are on the verge of fratricide in the Jewish community, and it has to stop. He noted that there are Jews avoiding organizational meetings, and even religious services, simply to avoid discussing Iran.