14 | JANUARY 27 • 2022 

OUR COMMUNITY

A

s far back as 
Abraham and Sarah, 
Jews have been 
taught to be a welcoming 
people. Congregations and 
those who lead them have 
long championed the message, 
opening their doors, literally 
and figuratively, to their 
members and the broader 
community.
“These are open spaces; 
there’s a strong, deeply rooted 
notion in Judaism about 
kindness to strangers and 
welcoming strangers,” says 
Howard Lupovitch, associate 
professor of 
history and 
director of the 
Cohn-Haddow 
Center for Judaic 
Studies at Wayne 
State University in 
Detroit. 
“So, a synagogue and rabbi, 
as part of their training, they’ve 
been taught to imbue and to 

teach and to live this value.” 
The Jan. 15 hostage situation 
at Congregation Beth Israel 
in Colleyville, Texas, comes 
as a reminder that abiding by 
this value is not without risks. 
Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker 
had graciously invited a man 
in from the cold and offered 
him a cup of tea, unaware the 
visitor would soon take him 
and three congregants hostage 
at gunpoint. 
In 1966, Rabbi Morris 
Adler was fatally shot by a 
23-year-old congregant while 
Adler was conducting Shabbat 
services and a bar mitzvah at 
Congregation Shaarey Zedek 
(CSZ) in Southfield. 
“Because of that tragedy that 
took place on the 
Shaarey Zedek 
bimah, there’s not 
a Shabbat that goes 
by that I’m not 
mindful of the fact 
that we are at risk,” 

says CSZ’s Rabbi Aaron Starr. 
Security, he says, has been on 
members’ minds for more than 
50 years now. 
Starr is a longtime friend of 
Cytron-Walker, who grew up 
in Lansing. They lived in the 
same dorm at University of 
Michigan in Ann Arbor and 
both participated in NFTY 
Michigan, a Reform Jewish 
youth group. 
Starr also is a friend of 
Rabbi Angela Buchdahl, a New 
York-based rabbi who ended 
up becoming part of the story. 
The hostage-taker demanded 
Cytron-Walker contact her 
that Saturday to try and secure 
the release of Aafia Siddiqui, 
a Pakistani neuroscientist 
serving 86 years in jail for 
attacking American troops in 
Afghanistan. 
“I happen to know both of 
these [rabbis], but it’s not about 
me, it’s about them and their 
true heroism and commitment 

to saving Jewish lives,” Starr 
says. “
And I think all of us are 
trying to do that, whether it’s 
compassion for our friends 
and family, or standing up for 
what’s right, or literally saving 
someone’s life, if that’s what 
we’re called upon to do.”
He pointed to the courage 
of rabbis all over the world 
in speaking truth to power, 
bringing to light issues of 
ethics and morality, and trying 
to address questions of justice 
in a world rife with injustice. 
“
A rabbi, by his or her 
nature, has to be courageous 
in ways large and small,” Starr 
says. “Please God, we won’t 
have to be put in the situation 
of defending our community 
physically the way Rabbi 
Cytron-Walker did, but it takes 
a lot of courage to be a rabbi.”
Devorah 
Titunik, a 
longtime member 
of Congregation 
Beth Israel who 
grew up in Ann 
Arbor, was 
watching the 
livestreamed Jan. 15 Shabbat 

Examining the courage required to be a rabbi, 
community support, antisemitism and security.
Hostage Aftermath

KAREN SCHWARTZ CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Howard 
Lupovitch

HOWARD LUPOVITCH

Devorah 
Titunik

DEVORAH TITUNIK

Rabbi 
Aaron Starr

CONGREGATION SHAAREY ZEDEK

Congregation Beth 
Israel Synagogue in 
Colleyville, Texas, 
 
Jan. 15, 2022 

Rabbi Charlie 
Cytron-Walker with 
congregants at 
Congregation Beth 
Israel in Colleyville, 
Texas. 

ANDY JACOBSOHN/AFP VIA GETTY IMAGES VIA JTA

