by Johanna Ginsberg
NJJN Staff Writer

June 18, 2009

Members of a 29-year-old Orthodox congregation in Morristown voted June 14 to dissolve the synagogue and donate its assets to the Jewish Community Foundation of MetroWest to establish a permanent fund for Jewish day school education.

The 27-11 vote came as Congregation Ahavath Yisrael struggled with debt, a building in need of repairs, and an aging membership.

“It’s sad that it came to this state of affairs. Unfortunately, the shul is in serious financial trouble and in debt,” said president Jerry Nedelman, who called the decision “wrenching for people on both sides.”

Remaining assets after the sale of the synagogue, also known as the Cutler Street Shul — it’s located at 9 Cutler St. — will be donated to the foundation; how it will specifically be used is to be determined. Administrators estimate the gift at approximately $500,000.

“This is a tremendous gift to the community; it’s a substantial contribution to benefit Jewish day school students,” said foundation executive director Josh Rednik.

The synagogue community had its beginnings in an Orthodox minyan held at Morristown Jewish Center. In 1980, the minyan began meeting in the home of Edith and Nathan Wenarsky, and the group moved into its current location later that year.

Founders included Lillie and Ron Brandt, Simma Buchalter, Sylvia and Nathan Ehrlich, Andrea and Kalman Gidding, Irving Hertzberg, Irene and Mark Jacobs, Alice and Lewis Krauss, Ruth and Abe Lavein, Baila and Norman Mandel, Betty and Sam Reich, Florence and Abe Shoner, Charlotte and Alvin Turner, Edith and Nathan Wenarsky, and Beatsy and Morton Wertheimer.

At its peak, the congregation had just “30 or 40 families,” according to Baila Mandel, whose son Zelig has served as rabbi for the last 16 years. At the time of its decision to dissolve, the congregation had 41 members from 20 families.

The synagogue is carrying not only a mortgage on the building but also debts that include a fund borrowed from members for emergency repairs to the building as well as payments owed to a cantor for leading High Holy Day services, according to Nedelman. “Once I saw the numbers, I realized there was no way of paying off the debts or ever accumulating enough money to manage the upkeep of the shul,” he said.

Board members have not yet decided when the last services will be held in the building, but some members are getting ready to move. With no other synagogues in walking distance, staying isn’t an option for the Mandels, who are strictly Sabbath observant.

“I’m not sure any of us have made firm decisions,” she said, but she acknowledged she will probably move closer to her children. It’s painful, she said, because the synagogue “has been like a second family to me.”

Naomi Bacharach’s parents, the Wertheimers, were among the founders. Although she grew up at the synagogue, she has also joined Morristown Jewish Center Beit Yisrael, mainly because of her children, who had no peers at Ahavath Yisrael.

“The shul has been kept alive by Baila Mandel and her husband, Norman,” Bacharach said. “They have dedicated their lives to the shul, without a doubt.

“But there are no young families to take over; it’s been many years of difficult struggle for the shul. No young families have stepped up to the plate.”

She said she cried at the meeting on Sunday. “It was very emotional, but it was the right thing to do. It was a difficult, devastating decision.”

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Minority plans a challenge

NOT EVERYONE involved in the decision to dissolve Congregation Ahavath Yisrael is satisfied with the results.

Congregants representing the minority faction told NJ Jewish News they will be contesting in court the vote to dissolve the synagogue. Yaakov Zirkind, a rabbi by training, said he would like to continue the minyan at 9 Cutler St.

According to Zirkind, the vote to dissolve the congregation was held in violation of a ruling last November by a beit din, or rabbinical court, in Monsey, NY. Zirkind said both the majority and minority groups submitted a disagreement over how the synagogue was being run to the beit din last August.

The disagreement reflects a division between two groups at the shul: a contingent associated with the Chabad-Lubavitch hasidic movement that voted against dissolving the shul, and a contingent of synagogue founders and their followers, who are Orthodox but neither Lubavitch nor hasidic, who voted to dissolve.

According to Moshe Isenberg, a member of Chabad Lubavitch who lives down the block from Ahavath Yisrael and davens there often but said he was denied membership, the beit din ruled, in essence, that the group should find a solution short of closing. “You don’t close a shul down so long as there are Jews in town who want to pray there,” he said.

“This is very simple,” said Isenberg. “They have a property with no members and no money. We have access to members and money. It’s really about the family member you hate. It’s ‘anything but the Lubavitchers.’”

Synagogue president Jerry Nedelman said the vote was legitimate. “We believe there’s a different interpretation to the beit din ruling,” he said.

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