One Mitzvah At A Time

The Re bb e ' s

Lubavitch emissaries raise the level of Jewish involvement

SHELLI LIEBMAN DORFMAN
StaffWriter

hen Doba Rivka Weber
left her parents'
Farmington Hills home
last March, and traveled
with her husband, Rabbi Levy Yitshak
Weber, and their 1-year-old son,
Menachem Mendel, to their new home
in Thailand, she was beginning a life
she'd anticipated since childhood.
The Webers are among the more
than 100 young families expected to
move this year to cities, often far from
home, as Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries.
"We left with an open return tick-
et, knowing we would come home —
to visit," Weber says, stressing the
word. Bangkok probably will always
remain their home. "This is a deci-
sion we made and we are very happy
about it," she says.
Nearly 50 years have passed since
the first Chabad emissary left New York
for Morocco at the request of the late
Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson,
the seventh Lubavitcher Rebbe. This
year marks the 50th year since Rabbi
Schneerson assumed leadership of the
Lubavitch movement. The beloved
leader died in 1994, with no successor
chosen to take his place. "The Rebbe's

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legacy is his ability to inspire people to
go all over the world and serve Jews,"
says Rabbi Elimelich Silberberg of the
Sara Tugman Bais Chabad Torah
Center in West Bloomfield.
Currently, 3,700 emissary families
like the Webers are working through-
out the world. Many are second-
generation, having grown up in
the homes of their emissary par-
ents. They travel to begin or join
established Chabad Houses (called
Bais Chabad), multifaceted spiri-
tual and material Jewish commu-
nity centers offering Torah and
prayer study.

Starting Young

School and the Rabbinical College of
Lubavitch, both in Oak Park. They
visit stores and offices in areas where
there are Jewish-owned businesses.
The boys are the Detroit-sector of a
worldwide battalion of high school-
aged youth who distribute literature

on Friday afternoons to visit with
business owners, like Rob and Linda
Goudsmit, owners of Cinderella's
Castle in West Bloomfield. Visiting
with the boys is a regular part of the
couple's Friday routine.
"I'm on my third or fourth genera-
tion of these guys," Rob
Goudsmit says. "Two of
them are already rabbis.
"I'm a real paradox to
them," says Goudsmit, who
identifies as a Secular
Humanist. "But we have a
real nice relationship. They
are not giving propaganda —
no persuasion, just giving
their point of view. These
kids are very open. They
come in and talk philosophy
with us, sometimes for a few
minutes, sometimes for 15."

It's hard not to notice the young
men wearing kippot (skullcaps),
white shirts and black pants mak-
ing their way on Friday afternoons,
rain or shine, to wish "Good
Reaching Out
Shabbos" to West Bloomfield shop Rabbi Menachen Mendel Schneerson o ciates at the
Many students. also spend
owners in the vicinity of Maple
1950 wedding of the first Detroit Chabad emissary,
their school vacations doing
and Orchard Lake roads.
Rabbi Beret Shemtov and his wife Batsheva.
international outreach work.
"They are training on the job,"
They
lead Passover seders,
says Rabbi Silberberg, whose
and seek out traveling college students
about Shabbat, the week's Torah por-
Chabad House is just one block east
to bring to the full-time emissaries for
tion, the Chabad L'Chaim magazine
of the intersection.
Shabbat meals.
and Shabbat candles.
The young men are high school
Detroiters traveling in Europe often
Nationwide, Chabad boys pair up
students from the Mesifta High

