In response to a question, Mr. Kantor said
that most of the individuals who attend his programs are people whom he
has met through his work at the Israel Cultural Center and at Beit Grand. Many Jews, he continued, are searching for a spiritual
framework, but find Chabad and other Orthodox practice unappealing. Answering another query, Mr. Kantor stated
that the cost of renting suitable premises for a more comprehensive Masorti
program probably would be about $500 monthly.
16.
The Progressive/Reform movement has had a presence in Odesa since
2000, expanding significantly in recent years due to the acquisition of larger
program space, frequent visits of a student rabbi, and a more active lay
leadership. The rabbinical student, a
native of Odesa, is expected to become the fulltime rabbi of the congregation,
Temple Emanu-El, when she completes her studies at the Reform seminary in
London.
The writer spoke with Viktor Zonis,
current lay head of the community. Mr.
Zonis had emigrated to Germany and spent 15 years in Dortmund. He was a member of the local Orthodox
congregation while there, but decided to return to the post-Soviet states and
to embrace Progressive Judaism. Progressive
Judaism, he said, is a much more logical expression of Judaism for a population
in which the majority of Jews are intermarried and few Jewish young people are
halachically Jewish.
The Odesa congregation, continued Mr. Zonis,
now has about 300 members, many of whom are employed in local cultural
or intellectual institutions. Members
include Jews originally from Ukraine (including other cities), Russia, Belarus,
Israel, and the United States. In
response to a question, Mr. Zonis said that about 35 people usually attend
Friday evening Shabbat services.
The congregational Sunday school enrolls 17
youngsters and a Netzer youth group draws 20 to 25 adolescents. An art studio for children and adolescents
also is popular. Emanu-El hosts adult
classes in Hebrew, Judaism, and Jewish history, as well as literary and chess
clubs for adults. The congregation
publishes a periodic newspaper, of which Mr. Zonis, a professional journalist,
is the editor. In addition to reaching
Emanu-El members, the newspaper is distributed at kiosks in Sochnut, the Israel
Culture Center, and several other venues
frequented by Jews.
Mr. Zonis described the congregation as
strongly Zionist in orientation.
Many students from Emanu-El participate in Taglit/birthright tours, and
the congregation enjoys excellent relations with the Jewish Agency, said Mr.
Zonis.
In response to a question about relations
with the two Orthodox chief rabbis, Mr. Zonis said that such relations are
cool and correct, nothing more and nothing less. When they see each other, they nod in
recognition and usually say a few words in a perfunctory greeting.


The
rented premises of Temple Emanu-El include two large halls. At left is a reception hall that features
work by local artists on its walls. Through
the arch on the right of the reception area is a room that doubles as sanctuary
and classroom, as seen in the photo at right.
The premises also include offices, a small kitchen, and other
workspaces.
Photo: the writer.
To outsiders, it may seem quixotic, but Mr.
Zonis is attempting to recover the Brodsky synagogue, a substantial
structure dating from the nineteenth century that is now used as a Lutheran
church with, said Mr. Zonis, support from the German government. The synagogue is not related to the Brodsky
synagogue in Kyiv; the name of the Odesa building derives from the hometown of many
of its founders, Brody, a city in western Ukraine near Lviv.
International Organizations
17.
The Jewish Agency for Israel (JAFI, Sochnut) maintains an office in
Odesa that is managed by a non-residential director, Shlomo Azarov, who
lives in Israel and commutes monthly for a 10-day visit to the city and the
surrounding area, which includes Moldova.
The non-residential tenure permits JAFI to reduce expenses regarding
housing and support for Mr. Azarov's family.
Five local individuals staff the office on a fulltime basis, each with
responsibility for a particular JAFI program area. Due to
scheduling issues, the writer met separately with Mr. Azarov and with the
five-person staff.
The Jewish Agency staff estimated the Odesa
Jewish population at 21,000 in a municipality of 1,029,000. In the 19th century, they said, 60 percent of
the entire Odesa population was Jewish, and 30 to 40 percent of the population
was Jewish prior to World War II. The
next largest Jewish population centers in southern Ukraine are Mykolaiv (5,600
Jews)
and Kherson (3,500). The Jewish
population will be considerably smaller in ten years due to emigration of
younger age cohorts and assimilation of those who remain, predicted the staff.
In 2012, reported the staff members
responsible for aliyah, 205 Odesans emigrated to Israel, not including
those who changed their status to new immigrant while visiting relatives in
Israel, participating in MASA, or in Israel for another reason. The number of Odesans currently enrolled in
aliyah-related activity is 726.
Additionally, 60 Odesa young people currently are in Israel on MASA programs,
and 63 have been in Israel or will visit Israel on Jewish Agency Taglit/birthright
Israel tours in the near future. The
number of young people enrolled in JAFI Taglit tours actually has decreased in
recent years due to competition from other Taglit providers.
In the area of formal education, JAFI currently
operates eight Hebrew-language ulpan groups in the Odesa region. It also assists four Jewish day schools (three
in Odesa and one in Mykolaiv) with Hebrew-language instruction through the
Heftzibah program, which pays the salaries of eight teachers from Israel in
Heftzibah schools; in total, about 1,300 youngsters are enrolled in these four
schools. Additionally, JAFI operates
small Sunday schools in both Odesa and Mykolaiv, reaching a total
of 50 youngsters.
The Odesa regional JAFI office will sponsor a
two-session summer camp in the summer of 2013, enrolling 115 youngsters
between the ages of seven and 12 in one session and a similar number between
the ages of 12 and 15 in the second. In
response to a question about winter camps and other summer camp follow-up
activity, JAFI staff stated that it lacked funds to operate a winter camp or
even a Shabbaton during the winter. The
JAFI office is too small to host activities for children or teens even for a
period of several hours; its multi-purpose room actually is an expanded
corridor that controls access to staff offices.
A JAFI student group holds about four
meetings during the year, the frequency partially dependent upon finding
low-cost or free meeting space. Actually
a project of the JAFI Hamama incubator project, the student club
attracts veterans of Taglit and MASA.
Its mailing list includes 50 to 60 people, of whom about 30 are active;
a large proportion of its members also are associated with Hillel and/or Moishe
House, said a staff member. Individuals
on the mailing list are notified of upcoming activities through these and other
organizations and on Facebook.
The JAFI Hamama incubator project,
which provides seed money for innovative projects in formal and informal Jewish
education, involves about 120 young adults, said JAFI staff. However, it is difficult to operate this
program in Odesa because participants find it arduous to come to the
inconveniently-located JAFI office for meetings and the office space is not
conducive to deliberative activity anyway.
Whenever possible, said JAFI staff, JAFI
conducts activities jointly with other organizations in order to advance
Jewish communal collaboration and reduce expenses. It co-sponsors Chanukah celebrations with the
Migdal JCC and the ORT school; Jerusalem Week with Beit Grand, Migdal, JDC, and
the ORT school; Israel Independence Day with MASA and Hillel; and Holocaust
commemorations with the new Holocaust Museum.
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