Chabad shluchim draw strength at the Rebbe’s Ohel in Queens

Coming to the annual Kinus gathering of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries, who travel to New York from more than 100 countries, is “when the lone trees come back to the forest,” according to Rabbi Zvi Drizin, director of Chabad at Southern Methodist University in Dallas.

Rabbi Drizin talked to JNS at the Ohel, the burial place of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson. He was one of 6,500 emissaries, or shluchim, who came that day to the site in the Old Montefiore Cemetery in Cambria Heights, Queens, where people greeted each other with “Mazal tov,” embraced and wished each other a forthcoming “Shabbat shalom.”

“The shluchim are carrying the weight of the Jewish people. From facing terrorism, war-torn countries and natural disasters to everyday human struggles, they absorb it all,” said Rabbi Mendy Kotlarsky, director of the International Conference of Chabad-Lubavitch Emissaries.

“But here, at the Rebbe’s resting place, they draw the strength they need to keep going, to return home and be the ones who uplift, who rebuild and give hope to millions of Jews across the globe,” he said.

For Rabbi Drizin, Kinus is a chance for emissaries, who spend much of the year working independently, to remember that they are part of something much larger — a homecoming that gives them the support and “nourishment” they need to continue their work.

The visit to the Ohel is central to that process.

Rabbi Mendel Shmotkin, executive vice president and CEO of Lubavitch of Wisconsin, said that “for so many of us, it’s coming back home.”

Rabbi Mendy Dubrowski, a Chabad emissary in Tampa, Florida, whose father the Rebbe dispatched to the city in 1983, said that the Ohel visit is both personal and collective.

After years away studying and receiving rabbinic ordination, Rabbi Dubrowski returned to Tampa to expand his father’s work. The family now operates multiple centers across the city.

At the Ohel, he said, emissaries bring their individual challenges together and seek strength to continue. He compared the gathering to soldiers of different ranks standing together before their commander.

“The atmosphere for those that are lucky enough to be here is one of hope,” Rabbi Dubrowski said. “When we are strengthening and reinforcing each other, there’s nothing we can’t accomplish and overcome.”

Rabbi Shmotkin said that Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, the late former chief rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth, described the Rebbe as sending emissaries to search for every Jew with love, in response to the many who had hunted Jews with hatred.

That approach resonates particularly today, as Jews navigate rising antisemitism, according to Rabbi Shmotkin. Rather than letting hatred define Jewish life, Chabad stresses strengthening Jews’ understanding of and connection to their own heritage, he said.

“When I am comfortable with my Judaism, when I know exactly what it is and somebody out there doesn’t like it, well, what a shame, how ignorant somebody out there is,” he said.

In Wisconsin, he has seen more parents seek Jewish education for their children, increased synagogue attendance and more people taking on Jewish ritual commandments since Oct. 7, 2023, he said.

Rabbi Chaim Greisman, a Chabad emissary in Stockholm, said that he has seen a similar reconnection among Jews in his community since Oct. 7.

Many had assumed that they could live like anyone else and be accepted, but the Oct. 7 attacks and their aftermath prompted some to reconsider where they belonged and to reconnect with Jewish life, the Swedish rabbi said.

Rabbi Greisman said that Chabad focuses on Jewish identity rather than making opposition to antisemitism the center of communal life.

“We’re not supposed to be anti-antisemites,” he said. “We’re supposed to be Jews and live as proud Jews.”

That approach is reflected in the everyday work of his community, including helping people take on Jewish practices they may never have considered. A 90-year-old Hungarian Holocaust survivor recently put on tefillin for the first time, on his birthday, Rabbi Greisman said.

Rabbi Drizin, the Dallas rabbi, said that “we, as Jews, don’t have an antisemitism problem. People who are antisemites have that problem.”

He compared Jew-hatred to racism: Responsibility lies with those who harbor prejudice, not with the people targeted by it, he said. Chabad empowers Jews to be courageous and confident in their Judaism, regardless of how much antisemitism they encounter, he added.

“Our world, as Jews, has to be to make sure there are Jews that are embodying what it means to be Jewish,” Rabbi Drizin said.

At SMU, a private school with United Methodist heritage that is nonsectarian in its teaching, the Jewish student population is growing. The rabbi estimates that about 2 percent of the senior class is Jewish, compared with at least 8 percent of the freshman class. —JNS