World

The Good Fight

A visiting rabbi works to combat
missionaries who target Jews.

Elizabeth Applebaum
Special to the Jewish News

T

Eastern Michigan University
Jewish Studies

Presents

An Evening With

Aaron Lansky

Founder and President of The National Yiddish Book Center

"GEVALT!: The Last Minute Rescue
of Modern Jewish Culture"

In 1980, at the age of 24, Aaron Lansky began rescuing unwanted and abandoned
Yiddish hooks. The National Yiddish Book Center has since recovered more than
one million volumes, in what has been described as "the greatest cultural rescue

effort in Jewish history."

Tuesday, December 7, 2010, at 7:30 p.m.

Auditorium, Student Center, Eastern Michigan University
FREE

Lecture Sponsors

• Division ofAcademic Affairs
• College ofArts and Sciences

• Detroit Jewish News
• Hillel at EMU

This lecture is part on an ongoing Jewish lecture series along with a new Jewish Education
First History Gallery in the EMU Student Center. Visit einich.edu for updates on future
lectures.

For more information, please contact martin.shichtman(iiiemich.edu

A book signing will follow the presentation.

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Educaticon

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emich.edu

26

December 2 • 2010

EASTERN

MICHIGAN UNIVERSITY

Education First

ake the entire Jewish
population of Detroit,
double it and still it would
come nowhere near to the num-
ber of Jewish men and women
who, in recent years, have opted
to join "Jews for Jesus" and other
"Messianic Jewish" groups.
"They are the unpaid bills of the
Jewish people," the result of a com-
munity that neglects to provide its
children with an education about
its history, practices and beliefs,
says Rabbi Tovia Singer, founder of
Outreach Judaism, an international
organization dedicated to counter-
ing the efforts of Christian evangeli-
cal groups that specifically target
Jews for conversion.
Rabbi Singer was in town last
week, the guest of the Jewish
Community Center of Metropolitan
Detroit's Seminars for Adult Jewish
Enrichment (SAJE), the Michigan
Jewish Institute and The Shul in
West Bloomfield.
In an interview, Rabbi Singer said
he became interested in the subject
when, as a teen growing up in an
observant family in New York, he
first encountered missionaries. "It
shocked me to my core:' he said. "I
found myself unable to respond to
them effectively"
And he was a young man with
a strong Jewish upbringing. How
much more true this would be, then,
for those with no Jewish education.
So he did his research.
The first step: know the opponent.
The typical missionary to the Jews
is an Evangelical Christian, an ordi-
nary man on the street who reaches
out to Jews who are uneducated and
always have "a horror story" about
a time their family was rejected
(turned away from a synagogue
on the High Holidays because they
had no tickets, for example), Rabbi
Singer says.
These Jews feel alienated, but
they also are looking for spirituality
and for answers — "and missionar-
ies are perfectly willing to provide
simple answers to their complex
questions."

Rabbi Tovia Singer

The missionaries' success among
Jews is "outstanding," Rabbi Singer
says, having converted more than
250,000 Jews to date. They do so by
saying it's possible to accept Jesus as
the son of God and yet still remain
Jewish — an idea that anyone with
a modicum of Jewish knowledge
would find ridiculous, yet the naive
may readily embrace.
The first defense against mis-
sionaries, Rabbi Singer says, is edu-
cation. Also, youth groups provide
an excellent opportunity for Jewish
boys and girls to have a sense of
community.
Getting people out of groups
like "Jews for Jesus" is challeng-
ing, though there are tools, such as
Rabbi Singer's website, where any-
one can access a free audio series
on the subject. (The site has about
2,000 downloads a day.)
But quick intervention is a must,
Rabbi Singer says. "If you catch it
early and you're able to address it,
chances are great" that the person
can be helped.
"If you don't, it's a disaster. People
wind up in church and get married
and have children, and then they
can never get out." 7

Elizabeth Applebaum is a marketing

specialist with the Jewish Community

Center of Metropolitan Detroit.

For more information, visit
www.outreachjudaism.org .

