NOVEMBER 4 • 2021 | 7
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wisdom into contemporary
insight and realistic policy.
To my mind, only Rabbi
Sacks has earned the title of
gadol in recent times.
ENGAGING THE WORLD
Rabbis today, like the clergy
of other religions, have been
compartmentalized as the
leaders of the faithful only,
with little to say in the public
square. The sad result is that
many rabbis now perceive
themselves in this limited
way too. But Rabbi Sacks
always championed “a Judaism
engaged with the world.”
He was able to speak to
all people, using a language
anyone could understand
and that could move them to
action. He was at home in the
beit midrash, the Jewish house
of study, and in the academy,
but he learned to be most
at home in the community.
Toward the end of Morality,
his final book, he writes:
“I had the privilege of
studying with some of the
greatest philosophers of our
time, yet I learned more about
morality in my years as a
congregational rabbi than I
did at Oxford and Cambridge,
and I did so by conducting
funerals.
“
As a young rabbi in an
aging congregation, I often
did not know the deceased
personally, so I had to ask
relatives and friends what they
were like and what they would
be remembered for.
“No one ever spoke about
the clothes they wore or the
cars they drove, the homes
they lived in or the holidays
they took. They spoke about
their role in their family, their
place in the congregation and
its activities, the good deeds
they did, the causes they
supported, the voluntary work
they undertook and the people
they helped.
“It is not what we do for
ourselves but what we give
others that is our epitaph and
that ultimately floods life with
meaning.”
The loss of Rabbi Sacks is
felt most acutely by British
Jews proud that such a great
thinker and rabbi emerged
from their ranks. Yet his
influence spread across the
oceans to the entire Jewish
world, and well beyond
the Jewish community. He
began as a rabbi in a small
synagogue, then he became
the chief rabbi of Anglo-Jewry
and, in his later years, a rabbi
to global Jewry as well as to
some of the most influential
people, both Jewish and non-
Jewish, on the planet.
INSPIRING OTHERS
I am not fond of hyperbole,
but I honestly wonder if we
will ever see his kind again. He
was a genuine gadol, a Jewish
voice heard by all, a rabbi in
the widest sense of the term.
But he is not the last
true rabbi, because of the
other great focus of his life:
leadership and empowerment.
I am just one of thousands of
men and women for whom he
is a crucial inspiration, who
have built their leadership
upon his principles. His many
books line our shelves, and his
deep belief in us compels us to
continue his legacy.
No one can fill his shoes,
but I am sure he would prefer
that we fill our own. He would
always say, “Education is not
what we do, it is who we are.”
Rabbi Sacks was not the last
true rabbi, precisely because he
was a true rabbi to the last.
Rabbi Raphael Zarum is dean of the
London School of Jewish Studies,
where he trains teachers and lectures
in modern Jewish thought. This article
is adapted from “The Last Rabbi,” an
essay in The Jewish Quarterly, Issue
246, November 2021, and is used with
permission.
Bring
Danny Home!
The Detroit Jewish News
urges the community to
continue raising awareness
for Huntington Woods native
Danny Fenster — a journalist
who has been unjustly held
without cause and without
specified charges for
165 days
by a military regime in
a gruesome prison in
Myanmar (Burma).
The family is looking for people
to create portraits of Danny that
can be shared on social media at
https://bringdannyhome.com/pages/gallery.
You can also support Danny at:
BringDannyHome.com
fenster-verse.tumblr.com
facebook.com/groups/1164768597279223.
Journalist Danny Fenster, before his captivity, wearing a
Detroit Pistons cap