Portrait of a typical Israeli baal tshuva -- An
interview with R' Eliyahu Kaufman, another Wandering Jew,
always questing...
Today, a rabbi serving the "Ohel Sarah Kehilla" which he
founded in Rumania.
Part III
We have seen Eliyahu as a young man, anti-Zionism, anti-
Establishment -- not quite committed but interested in
practicing Judaism. Eliyohu is working for Maariv as a
reporter, with all that this represents, but not violating
the Shabbos. He encounters a fiery kollelnik as he shops one
afternoon in a chareidi enclave, who lashes into him.
"Another face for Shabbos," he taunts him.
On that same Friday, Eliyahu decided not to be the servant of
two masters. This decision led him first and foremost to
reexamine the media's attitude towards chareidim. He arrived
at the conclusion that the secularist attacks were baseless,
perhaps founded on the lurking fear that their empty lives
might be exposed for their ugliness...
Eliyahu had to go to Thailand on business. Here, he felt, he
would be far from Jewish antisemitism.
Eliyahu landed in Bangkok before Shavuos in 1989 and
immediately searched for a synagogue. He came to one called
"Evven Chen." The next few days were full of intensive
activity: Business on the one hand and reconnoitering with
the Creator on the other. In the hot days of July, he
returned to Israel and decided to go to Jerusalem in order to
investigate deeply what Judaism demanded of him. He had just
one thing of a formal nature to arrange: He wanted to pick up
his M.A. diploma from Haifa University, and was reminded of
it right after he boarded the 405 bus from Tel Aviv to
Jerusalem.
He told the driver he had to get off and was refunded his
fare. Eliyahu doubled back and got on a bus to Haifa. Not an
hour went by before the nation received the terrible news of
the devastating suicide bombing that had destroyed the bus on
the outskirts of Jerusalem. Eliyahu was in shock. What would
have happened had he not gotten off on time! The next day, he
set out without delay for Meah Shearim.
How interesting, he thought. A person comes to
different crossroads in his life and his ambitions change
accordingly. As an officer of 19, serving on the West
Bank, he thought his dreams had come true. Then when he had
commanded a unit that patrolled the Old City walls of
Jerusalem, again, he was certain he had reached the pinnacle
of the Zionist dream. But now he knew that when the spiritual
level of a person rises, he aspires to things at the top of
the world.
Not quite comfortable yet in Meah Shearim, he decided to try
out the only baal tshuva yeshiva in the Stamford Hill
neighborhood of London, Od Yossef Chai, run by a
Sefardi, and having no paternal tradition, decided to adopt
that stream of practice. He found to his surprise that the
chassidic communities were not far different and was greatly
impressed by the generous hospitality extended there, the
likes of which he had never imagined existed in the world. He
chalked up another black mark against the Israeli
Establishment which had brainwashed him into believing that
chareidim weren't nice, were insular, xenophobic to everyone
outside their closed circles. In Stamford Hill, he exposed
many other lies which he had been fed about chareidim and
chassidim.
Eliyahu combined Sefardic practice with the hashkofo
of chassidim, who painfully reminded him of his roots which
lay in Charlau, Rumania, where his great-grandfather had been
a Ruzhiner chossid.
Regardless of the fact that he still dressed as a secular
person, he was warmly welcomed into chassidic circles and
invited to their simchas. He was completely won over
through the experience of dancing at weddings. The enthusiasm
was contagious and he began to feel part of them, as if he
had always been there. Having studied Jewish history, he was
able to compare himself to a cantonist, a soldier who had
arrived in England after being forcibly detached from the
body of Jewry where, surprisingly, or perhaps not, he
discovered his Chassidic roots.
When he felt well immunized against the scorn and ridicule
that Israelis bear towards chareidim, in 1991, he returned to
Israel, where he began working as a chareidi journalist and
parliamentary correspondent for the chareidi camp.
When violent demonstrations erupted over Rechov Bar Ilan,
Eliyahu was among the main activists. He painfully recounts
what he witnessed, and found it hard to believe that it could
happen among Jews, including a pogrom of police rioting in a
private home there. He had a tape documenting it but the
police made a cover-up. Eliyahu was present when the police
injured MK Rabbi Ravitz, who fainted and required extensive
medical treatment since he had a heart condition. Eliyahu
witnessed how the regional commander ordered innocent passers-
by beaten till they bled. According to him, the stories about
dirty diapers thrown at the police were a total lie, designed
to besmirch the Torah observant public.
*
As an anti-establishment type, Eliyahu has never been afraid
to expose incidents that other reporters hushed up. He helped
expose the incident in which Meretz MK Deddi Tzucker was
involved that led to his incrimination in the Knesset Ethics
Committee, involving the smuggling in of treife meat.
He was also involved in exposing fake conversions in
Germany.
Eliyahu eventually received his smicha, after studying
from dawn to night in a Jerusalem kollel, and chose to
go to Rumania, out of a sense of personal obligation, to
complete any circles that still remained open. But before
being accepted in that community, he had to convince its
heads that Communism was dead and would not return, and that
it was time for change.
It isn't easy for Rabbi Kaufman in Rumania. For the past five
years, he has been active there among Israelis and natives
alike. He has seen to what depths Israelis can fall; they
assimilate among the gentiles and intermarry, even turn
against their own people. Nevertheless, he has succeeded
considerably in bringing the Orthodox path to Rumania.
Witness the Israeli businessman from Kfar Sava who settled in
Bucharest -- dubbed the "New Sodom" by the Malbim -- and
tasted, for the first time in his forty years, the sweet
taste of Torah study. On one of his sallies to Israel, he
called up the YATED columnist who authored this article and
said enthusiastically, "Your readers should know about such
an active and interesting personality as Rabbi Eliyahu." And
he was duly tracked down to tell his story.
Rabbi Eliyahu Kaufman claims that the things he prevented in
Rumania are more significant than those he organized. He
encountered many roadblocks but never gave up. He organized
the supply of Mehadrin meat, prevented non-halachic
conversions and established regular Torah study classes which
grow by leaps and bounds.
The kehilla which he founded is named Ohel Sarah,
after his mother. He tells us one of the open miracles which
he experienced in his activities in the major cities of
Bucharest and Yassi: He encountered much behind-the-scenes
sabotage in receiving funding for his organization. One
night, his mother appeared in a dream and told him to visit a
certain wealthy person. That man did, in fact, give him a
generous donation.
Rabbi Eliyahu established a synagogue on the local university
premises. The only trouble he met up with was from local Jews
who had a gentile professor remove the mezuza since
"it might lead to antisemitism..." Through his involvement in
the university on behalf of the Jewish students, he succeeded
in releasing students from important exams taking place on
Shabbos and Yomtov. When a decisive medical exam was
scheduled on Yom Kippur, which could only be made up a year
later, he took action and had a makeup scheduled for Jewish
students on the following day; this was hailed as a major
accomplishment.
One gentile professor was so impressed that he inquired about
the conversion process. Couples already keeping Shabbos were
urged to open their homes to anyone interested in a taste of
Shabbos and couples who were already very strong in their
committment and observance were urged to move on to
strengthen other communities in Rumania. The regular
shiurim attracted many secular Jews, who came out of
curiosity and a general love for knowledge.
Eliyahu concludes the interview with a message to his wayward
brothers, "We, the victims of Zionism, must carry the flag
against the Zionist ideology. Because where all paths end and
you reach the dead end, you discover that your life has been
a terrible mistake and you've been driving in the wrong
lane...
"And so you search for another journey."
