What do you say when two outstanding Jewish educators, intellectuals and trailblazers pick up and move their family to Israel? You wish them hatzlacha and klita kallah, good luck and an easy absorption. But what you really want to say is that their leaving will be creating a vacuum in the highest echelons of Modern Orthodox educators in America. What should comfort you is knowing that their aliyah is the natural next step in their work on behalf of our youth, just in another venue, Israel. Rabbi Uri and Dr. Julie Goldstein see their aliyah as the continuation of their lifelong mission to educate Jewish young men and women in an “academic atmosphere with a frum soul.”
Rabbi Uri Goldstein has been the spiritual leader of Congregation Ahavat Achim in Fair Lawn, New Jersey, for the past 10 years. After a recent sabbatical year in Israel, he was contacted by Yeshivat Hesder AMIT Orot Shaul in Ra’anana, under the leadership of Rav Yuval Cherlow and Rav Dr. Tamir Granot, to head up an overseas program. For Rabbi Uri this is a unique opportunity to integrate overseas students into the serious study of Gemara, Halacha, the Jewish state, medical ethics and technology and Jewish philosophy, while pursuing a traditional gap year of study. He will be working with a faculty of creative rabbanim who welcome inquiry and serious intellect, within a spiritually uplifting environment.
For Rabbi Uri, this position is the result and reflection of his own educational background. Beginning at Yeshivat Mizrachi L’Banim, where his grandparents and parents were amongst the original founders, through MTA, Yeshivat Kerem B’Yavneh and Yeshiva University where he was ordained, Goldstein was the beneficiary of a Jewish education where substance and intellectual integrity were primary. As the young JLIC Rabbi at UCLA, he and his rebbetzin saw their mission as more than kiruv. It was to educate the unaffiliated as well as the Orthodox students in Jewish texts. He and Dr. Julie could often be found throughout campus, in pizza places and coffee shops learning with their students b’chavruta.
This mission of educating continued through his position as assistant rabbi at Park East Synagogue and, for the past 10 years, serving as rabbi of Congregation Ahavat Achim in Fair Lawn. Rabbi Goldstein has established a reputation for the depth and breadth of his shiurim, which have ranged from traditional classes in Chumash, Talmud and Halacha, to topics in Jewish history and philosophy as well as contemporary issues. In addition to programming within the shul, Rabbi Goldstein worked to broaden the horizons of the community, by coordinating joint activities with other Fair Lawn shuls, and instilling a sense of activism and giving back to the Jewish people and the community. “What has been most meaningful, though,” says Goldstein, “are the relationships that have been created, the happy and sad times that have been spent together, and the conversations, laughter and tears that will undoubtedly continue despite the geographical distance.”
In addition to his shiurim for his congregants, Rabbi Uri has served on the faculties of Frisch, Ma’ayanot and Heichal Hatorah where he has taught Talmud as well as Jewish history and philosophy, European history and Zionism. Rabbi Uri has also contributed to the Steinsaltz Koren Talmud, translating and editing portions of Bava Kama, Bava Batra and Zevachim.
Rabbi Goldstein is looking forward to this special and unique opportunity at the AMIT Hesder Yeshiva to fuse traditional learning with intellectual inquiry, to expose his students to many versions of Orthodox thought, and to provide them with meaningful experiences to broaden their culture and connection to Judaism, the Jewish people and the Jewish homeland.
For Julie Yanofsky Goldstein, a Staten Island native, the road to aliyah began at the Jewish Foundation School followed by high school at Bruriah, where she was able to develop her singing and drawing skills along with her love of Limudei Kodesh. “Chaya Newman a”h believed in me. I always had that Zionistic streak in me and, as it happens, my class was the first to march in the Israel Day Parade.”
After Shana Bet at Midreshet Moriah, she returned to Stern College where her dorm room hosted a mini Israel lending library. During her first semester at Bernard Revel Graduate School, she was recommended to Esther Krauss as a teaching candidate for the relatively new girls’ yeshiva high school in Teaneck, Ma’ayanot. Krauss was seeking newcomers in Jewish education who were intelligent, dynamic, engaging and willing to become aligned with the vision of the new school which was and still remains the preparation of the next generation of female Jewish community leaders. Goldstein attributes much of her pedagogical success to date to the mentorship she was afforded by Krauss and Fayge Safran Novogroder.
The following three years as a young rebbetzin at UCLA raised her awareness of the insecurity of Jewish students on secular college campuses about their Israel connection. As Torah educators, she and her husband were able to imbue their students with pride in their heritage through the learning of texts. “We did not wait for the students to come to us. We strapped our babies to our backs and went out to seek them.”
Goldstein returned to Ma’ayanot in 2004 where she taught Jewish history, directed the school play, oversaw the creation of the school Salute to Israel banner and was involved in myriad other school activities. When Rabbi Goldstein accepted his position in Fair Lawn in 2006, Julie felt that, as a result of her teaching experience at Ma’ayanot, she wanted to hone her critical thinking skills and bring them back into the classroom. She was accepted to the Ph.D. program at NYU where she pursued a dual major in Jewish studies and medieval history. With her doctorate completed, she returned to Ma’ayanot to continue her teaching career. However, when two fellowships in Israel were offered to her, she could not refuse. And so, in 2013, the Goldsteins were off to Beit Shemesh for the year. Julie was a Golda Meir Fellow at Hebrew University, where she worked with professor Yisrael Yuval, while simultaneously conducting research at Tel Aviv University, as part of the Global Research Initiative.
The family year in Israel must have “clinched” the road to aliyah for the Goldsteins, for here they are in May of 2016 looking forward to their July Nefesh B’Nefesh flight. But as Dr. Goldstein maintains, “This is not goodbye but a continuation. Ma’ayanot helped shape who I am and I would hope that I have had a hand in shaping who my students are and who they will become. I take great pride in counting several of our current faculty as my former students.”
According to Pam Ennis, Director of Community Relations at Ma’ayanot, “Incredible as it may seem, fully 20 percent of our graduates have made aliyah. This should make the Goldsteins feel right at home.”
From Israel, Dr. Goldstein will be tele-teaching a course in Holocaust studies three times per week to the 11th graders at Ma’ayanot. She is also in the preliminary stages of opening up Amudim, a new girls’ post-high school program in Modi’in, which will incorporate the high level of intellectual curiosity and academic seriousness she has generated during her years at Ma’ayanot.
At the recent Ma’ayanot dinner honoring Dr. Julie Goldstein for her years of commitment to the school, Principal Rivka Kahan said the following in praise of this exemplary member of the faculty. “Dr. Goldstein’s teaching is dynamic, compelling and fascinating. But what is truly exceptional about Dr. Goldstein is that her dynamism and compassion are combined with the highest level of substance, intellectual rigor and depth. She equips her students with the skills and knowledge to soar intellectually, and she always encourages them to push harder and stretch themselves further. In and out of the classroom, Dr. Goldstein creates relationships that are nurturing, warm and encouraging, but always with the intent of encouraging students’ full self-expression, exploration, and intellectual and religious growth.”
As for the five little and not-so-little Goldsteins, Beit Shemesh is the “place to be.” Shimshon, 14, Moriah, 11, Aviad, 9, Lielle, 6, and sabra Ayala Nitzan, 2, will be re-joining the friends they have made and look forward to their new family adventure.
So, what can we say but hatzlacha and klita kalla!
By Pearl Markovitz
